Clem is stirring the Suggestion Pot with this query: “It occurs to me that nobody has said much about ethical screening and training of mages.  Consider: If you are going to enable someone to throw fireballs and petrify people and screw around with the weather, wouldn’t you want to be pretty sure they won’t run amok with the ability?” Spell slingers Judging from how some players have their wizards ...

Here's a question from frequent commenter BryanB, subjected to the ramblings of many a gnome. I was interested when I saw how similar the gnome responses are; clearly a reaction to our huddling in dark caves waiting for adventurers to walk by, lamenting our former PC status. Please share the opinions of the sunlit word in comments! Take it away, Brian: Have we had an article ...

Von Bek has an excellent question about making character failure interesting. Hi all, One thing I sometimes struggle with is player failure, I’ve come up with a few simple failures, like taking more time, or breaking something, but wondered if there were others I might have missed out on. I know of GUMSHOE, I believe a system that treats failure differently? But are there other systems out, or things that work ...

Swordgleam is looking at the 4E rules, and wonders about this: “If something in a core rulebook looks like it won’t work for your group, should you still give it a fair shot? For example, action points in 4E look stupid. My group, in other games, already uses a version of action points that are a lot more powerful and allow for more cinematic action, and it would ...

Aegon is playing D&D 4E and he stirred the Suggestion Pot with this question: “There is something about investigation, I am having difficulty putting my finger on it., part of it is that investigation seems to break up the group, one person wants to run up, pull the funny bookm off the shelf while another wants the rogue to take a look at it for traps. This ends ...

We got an email from Gnome Stew reader Cody Jones of gameonpodcast.com with this stumper of a question -- one we hadn't heard before. Several of us responded, so we decided to start a new series called "The Rambling Gnomes" for Q&A posts where a bunch of us gnomes nibbled on the same question. Here's Cody's email: I have a question for you fine gnomes. I currently am blessed to play ...

Clem had a question in the Suggestion Pot: Supers gaming: In a world with ubiquitous security cameras, DNA analysis that can identify someone from a skin cell scraped from their knuckle by an evildoer's five o'clock shadow, image and profile matching software, huge fingerprint and medical ID databases, easy wiretapping and bugging etc.; how does an enterprising vigilante protect his/her/their/its secret identity? I just finished an interesting book, Superpowers ...

Clem asked about less special PCs in the suggestion pot: Almost all settings and campaigns seem to assume that pcs are a breed apart. They may start weak but, if they survive, they can eventually become extremely powerful and/or capable. Ok, suppose there are such special people in the world and that they are born with something extra that gives them this superhuman potential. Now suppose that the ...

Sektor asked this question in the Suggestion Pot: I was wondering what alternatives exist for the battlemat, preferably without the miniatures and other small things that my players love to fiddle around with (all the while not paying attention to the game), but at the same time as clear and unambiguous during a complex combat situation. Right now, I use the excellent MapTool from RPTools (rptools.net) in ...

In our Suggestion Pot, Sektor asked: Perhaps a list of interesting combat tactics to use during an encounter? It could really beef up sessions, trying to get beyond the ‘You swing, you hit’ situations. I see two questions there: what are some interesting things I can have happen in a fight, and how do I get beyond boring hit/miss attacks? (Yes, I'm interpreting a bit.) I'll start with the second ...

This is the first post that's been pulled from our Suggestion Pot. Connoisseur of stewed gnome flesh Sean A. Brady asked us to write about GMing a new RPG, and a mere six years later, here we are! (Our progress is lazy but inexorable, kind of like green slime.) Got something you want us to post about? Throw it in the pot. With one exception, I've never given much ...