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  • VideoPrepping a Dungeon

    Get $96 of Sly Flourish books for $20 at the Sly flourish Bundle of Holding!

    Dungeons are probably my favorite structure for fantasy RPG adventures. There's a fixed location, interesting options, clear goals, and a nice flow for the game.

    In the context of focusing on the minimum prep we need for a night of adventure, we're going to look at a simple way to prepare specifically for dungeon adventures.

    Here's a quick summary for preparing a dungeon adventure:

    • Define a clear goal and session start. An NPC asks the characters to do something at a location. Alternatively, skip right to the dungeon explaining the job they've already accepted.
    • Pick a location. Choose a map from Dyson Logos to fit the type of location you need. Pick the first map that fits the overall purpose of the dungeon you want to run.
    • Write down brief chamber descriptions with one or two words. You can print your Dyson map and write the descriptions on the printout yourself with a pen or sharpie.
    • Write down inhabitants. These inhabitants can be a mix of monsters and NPCs. Who might the characters run into? Make sure to include some non-hostile or friendly NPCs.
    • Write down ten secrets and clues the characters might discover in the dungeon.
    • Roll for random treasure the characters might acquire such as a pile of gold and gems, a couple of consumable items, and one or maybe two nice permanent magic items.

    Keeping Things Simple

    It's easy to get overwhelmed when thinking about your next game. This game is so vast, how can we not get lost in the deepest reaches of our imaginations? But what if we focus down on simply running a fun dungeon delve? How can we refine the eight steps from Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master around this focus?

    Here's an example of that refined list. For our dungeon delve, we need

    • a goal.
    • a location.
    • inhabitants.
    • secrets and clues.
    • treasure.

    An NPC Offers a Job

    An NPC offering a job to the characters is an easy strong start. There's lots of different potential jobs. Page 12 of the sample chapters of the Lazy DM's Companion has a list of potential goals from NPCs. When considering your dungeon delve, pages 12 and 13 of the sample (pages 6 and 7 of the Lazy DM's Companion itself) have lots of tables to inspire you.

    But the easiest way to get started is for an NPC to give the characters a job to do at a location. Fill in those blanks and you're ready to go.

    Alternatively, you can skip this part and jump straight outside of the dungeon and describe the job the characters already accepted. This pre-assigned mission works great for single-session and short-session games. Skip the process of receiving and accepting the job and jump right to the dungeon with quest in hand. Just tell them what their quest is and you're off to the races.

    Prep the Dungeon Map

    Now we need a location. Personally, I grab the first Dyson Logos map that fits the concept of the location. Dyson has over a thousand maps with just about every type of dungeon location you can imagine. Scroll through until you find the first map that suits your needs both from the style of location (worked stone versus natural caverns) and the general number of rooms you need. Don't be picky. Grab the first one that works.

    Now fill in room descriptions with one or two words. One easy way is to print the map on a piece of paper, grab a pen or sharpie, and write in one or two words to describe each chamber. Don't use long descriptions. A couple of evocative words does the trick. If you need a digital version, take a picture of your hand-annotated map and put it back in your digital notes.

    Handwritten labels on a Dyson map

    Alternatively, write down location descriptions in a list with a vague idea about where they might go on the map. Creating this list is easier than trying to digitally edit the map to add your own annotations.

    Choose Inhabitants

    Now create a list of potential inhabitants. These inhabitants might be monsters. These monsters might be intelligent bad guys, mindless minions, or hungry beasts. They might be good guys or potential NPCs to talk to. If you're using a monster book of some sort, write down the page number of the stat block for the monster on your list.

    If you want to go really light, write down their CRs and use the Forge of Foes monster stats by CR and monster powers to build monsters as you need them.

    You don't have to decide where these monsters reside in the location. You can decide encounter locations during play. Some monsters may make sense for specific locations while others might wander about.

    Include friendly NPCs as well as monsters. Offer opportunities for roleplaying. Remember your story beats.

    Write Down Ten Secrets and Clues

    This tip is a direct lift from the eight steps of Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master. The characters need to learn things as they explore the dungeon. Maybe it's knowledge about the location's history. Maybe it's the villain's secret plans. Maybe it's the history of the gods. The characters should gain knowledge as they explore the dungeon and interact with its inhabitants. Secrets and clues are the treasure of exploration.

    Write Down some Treasure

    While secrets and clues may be the treasure of exploration, it won't buy you a hot bowl of stew and a tasty beverage at the local pub. Players love loot, so give it to them. Roll up random loot from your favorite GM's guide or use one of the many online treasure generators (Sly Flourish Patrons have access to the Lazy GM's Generator with some awesome random loot options).

    Include coins, interesting jewels and art objects, consumable magic items, single-use magical relics, and one or two permanent magic items suited to the characters. Like inhabitants, you can decide later where to drop this loot – often after fighting a big boss or discovering a hidden treasure vault.

    What We Skip

    This outline skips a few of the eight steps including:

    • Review the Characters. You still want to do this review if you can, but it's not any different for a dungeon delve than any other game. Reviewing the characters (and the players) is a great way to focus on what you can include that may resonate with them and what styles of play you want to reinforce during the rest of your prep.
    • Outline Scenes. Dungeon delves give characters the option to explore any direction they wish. Thus, we don't have a linear set of scenes. We can often omit this step for dungeon delves.
    • Develop NPCs. I wrapped this step up into inhabitants because you'll likely have more monsters than NPCs in a dungeon delve.

    Sometimes you can skip the steps above. Other times they make sense even for a dungeon delve.

    A Simple Checklist for Limitless Options

    Dungeon delves give us a solid adventure structure with lots of variability. Who gave the party the job? What does the job entail? What larger purpose does the job serve? What makes the location and its inhabitants unique? Like the Seven Samurai adventure model, the dungeon delve is a fantastic framework around which to build a fun and unique session.

    Hopefully, with the steps above, we can get past the nervousness we all feel and prep an awesome night of high adventure.

    More Sly Flourish Stuff

    This week I posted a couple of YouTube videos titled Does D&D Need High Production Value? and A Forest Dragon Wants Beer – Shadowdark Gloaming Session 12 Lazy GM Prep.

    Last Week's Lazy RPG Talk Show Topics

    Each week I record an episode of the Lazy RPG Talk Show (also available as a podcast) in which I talk about all things in tabletop RPGs. Here are last week's topics with time stamped links to the YouTube video:

    Patreon Questions and Answers

    Also on the Talk Show, I answer questions from Sly Flourish Patrons. Here are last week's questions and answers:

    RPG Tips

    Each week I think about what I learned in my last RPG session and write them up as D&D tips. Here are this week's tips:

    • Give new characters the "Heroic Spark" and avoid the tiresome "who the hell is this guy" moment of their introduction.
    • Understand and reinforce what motivates the characters to risk their lives in such dangerous places.
    • Print maps and annotate with a pen.
    • Your prep notes are just for you. They don't have to be fancy or complete.
    • Write notes to spark your memory and imagination not to publish.
    • Choose monsters that make sense for the situation. Then check to see if that might inadvertently wipe the characters.
    • Know the play structure of various situations like dungeon delving or overland exploration. How do these situations play at the table?

    Related Articles

    Get More from Sly Flourish

    Buy Sly Flourish's Books

    Have a question or want to contact me? Check out Sly Flourish's Frequently Asked Questions.

    Read more »
    Source: Sly Flourish | Published: November 27, 2023 - 6:00 am
  • VideoDo We Need a New D&D Player's Handbook?

    Get $96 of Sly Flourish books for $20 at the Sly flourish Bundle of Holding!

    One Word Summary

    No.

    Two Sentence Summary

    There's no need to discard the millions of existing copies of the 2014 Player's Handbook. A frank conversation with our players can move us past the game's rough spots and keep us playing this fantastic version of the game for the rest of our lives.

    Longer Article

    If you're wrapped up in the D&D zeitgeist, you know that Wizards of the Coast plans to publish new D&D core books in 2024. It's not 6th edition, they remind us, or even 5.5. The best name we have for these new books is the "2024 Revised D&D Core Books." I can live with that name.

    But then I think about how many copies of the 2014 D&D Player's Handbook are out in the world. Over the past ten years, more people played D&D than at any other time in the history of the game. More people started playing D&D in the past five years than all previous players since 1974. There are likely millions of copies of the Player's Handbook out there and the game plays just fine.

    Do we really need new ones?

    It seems like a tremendous waste to discard millions of fantastic books and replace them with new ones.

    But if we stay with the 2014 books, don't we need to fix them?

    Not really.

    From Nerfs to Open Conversations

    I discussed this question at length with fellow lazy DMs over on the Sly Flourish Discord server, available to Patrons of Sly Flourish and shot a YouTube video called [House Rules for the 2014 D&D Player's Handbook]. What do we need to do to "fix" the 2014 D&D Player's Handbook to keep it vibrant and useful for the next ten years (or twenty or fifty or two hundred)?

    I came up with a big list of changes for spells I didn't like banishment, heroes' feast, force cage, counterspell, shield, and the various conjure spells. But this list was just a bunch of nerfs. Sure, some of these spells are either overtuned, clunky, or make life for a DM harder, but do they really need to be fixed?

    What if, instead, we just talk to our players about why these spells are burdensome and how they disrupt the game. Maybe we can come to an agreement about them.

    For example, a common issue with a lot of spells is how effective they are against boss monsters. Banishing one of four giants is one thing. Banishing the big bad evil guy is a whole different story. Legendary resistance helps but only if they have it and typically we don't see monsters with legendary resistance before CR 11 or so.

    What if we gave more bosses legendary resistance and also the ability to use legendary resistances to break out of other effects like the chain-stunning of a monk, a force cage, or other effects that are simply too effective on bosses?

    And we can just explain this to our players. "Look, a lot of the things you might use to lock down monsters won't work on boss monsters." Every major video game figured this out. You don't pin down bosses in World of Warcraft or Diablo with a single ability. Game designers nerf the minute they prove to be overpowered.

    Conjure animals gives a single player up to nine turns in a round if they summon eight wolves each with pack tactics and a knockdown ability. That's 27 possible d20 rolls on a single player's turn. How about we ask our players, for the sake of the enjoyment of the game, to not summon more than one or two creatures.

    Those people I discussed this with resonated much better with this approach than just a bunch of direct nerfs. It's addressing the actual problem instead of just the mechanics of a single spell.

    The drive to optimize around the mechanics exists in any player who's interested in those mechanics. But maybe if we explain how the combination of those mechanics ends up disrupting the game for the other players and the DM (whose fun is as valid as anyone else's), maybe we can skip the mechanical nerfs and just ask our players not to do it.

    Discuss During a Session Zero

    If you're going to have this conversation, have it during your session zero, before players start making characters. This way they know what's acceptable and what isn't. A player considering an enchanter might think differently if they know they can't pin down every boss in the game with a well-placed hypnotic pattern. Most importantly, your requests won't come as a surprise in the heat of things. Have a rational conversation before the game begins so no one is surprised.

    So Does the 2014 PHB Need to be Fixed?

    Maybe we don't need to fix anything in the 2014 D&D Player's Handbook. Every time I suggested fixes to the 2014 Player's Handbook, people told me it works just fine for them. Many groups still run and enjoy even older versions of D&D. Given the sheer number of 2014 Player's Handbooks out there, I expect many groups will continue to play 2014 D&D for a long time.

    Above all we shouldn't forget that the important part of this game is getting together with our friends to enjoy some laughs while sharing tales of high adventure. As long as we agree on it, we can have fun with any RPG.

    More Sly Flourish Stuff

    This week I posted a couple of YouTube videos on Movable Torchlight in Owlbear Rodeo and Mugdulblub – Shadowdark Gloaming Session 11 Lazy GM Prep.

    Last Week's Lazy RPG Talk Show Topics

    Each week I record an episode of the Lazy RPG Talk Show (also available as a podcast) in which I talk about all things in tabletop RPGs. Here are last week's topics with time stamped links to the YouTube video:

    Patreon Questions and Answers

    Also on the Talk Show, I answer questions from Sly Flourish Patrons. Here are last week's questions and answers:

    RPG Tips

    Each week I think about what I learned in my last RPG session and write them up as D&D tips. Here are this week's tips:

    • Only have a few minutes to prep? Plan a strong start and write ten secrets the characters might discover in the game. Add in anything else you really need such as locations, monsters, treasure.
    • Need a map in a hurry? Grab one from Dyson Logos!
    • Rely on random treasure generators to inspire your rewards.
    • Add a daily-use spell to typical magic items for a unique treasure your players will love.
    • Narrow your campaign down to the big final scene as you get close to the end.
    • Build monuments in battle like monsters. Choose their CR, AC / DC, hit points, and damage if needed. Successful skill checks apply damage equal to a portion of their HP such as 1/2 or 1/3.
    • Choose the components you want to build the D&D you want at the table. Only you and your players get to choose what you want to run.

    Related Articles

    Get More from Sly Flourish

    Buy Sly Flourish's Books

    Have a question or want to contact me? Check out Sly Flourish's Frequently Asked Questions.

    Read more »
    Source: Sly Flourish | Published: November 20, 2023 - 6:00 am
  • VideoRunning Towns in Fantasy RPGs

    Get $96 of Sly Flourish books for $20 at the Sly flourish Bundle of Holding!

    When the characters reach a town or other large settlement, the pacing of our D&D game changes — and not always in a good direction. Towns are tricky environments to run. They have a wide range of locations, oodles of NPCs, and often too many options for things to do.

    "You enter the village of Redtower. What do you want to do?" can be a game-killing introduction.

    So how do we ensure when the characters reach a town, it's as interesting as the rest of our game? Let's take a look.

    Identify a Fantastic Feature

    What makes this town unique or interesting? What noteworthy feature grabs the characters' attention when they enter the town? What famous or infamous landmark lies near the town? Add at least one of these fantastic features and probably no more than three – enough to define the town in the eyes of the characters and your players.

    Here are ten examples of notable features:

    1. The town surrounds a huge sinkhole with a river flowing down into its depths.
    2. The town surrounds the skull of a huge twisted beast half-buried in the ground.
    3. The town floats on an earthmote one hundred feet above the edge of a vast canyon. Rope bridges connect smaller floating earthmotes providing a path to the town.
    4. The town surrounds a single obsidian spire piercing out of the ground.
    5. The petrified form of an ancient dragon snarls in the town square.
    6. The town always appears to be in the darkness of night with an alien moon above.
    7. An ancient portal to an alien world lies dormant, only opening every five hundred years.
    8. The horns of a sleeping tarrasque pierce out of the ground beneath the town but no one can be bothered to move it.
    9. The marble statue of a priestess shining a wand into the heavens stands in the center of town, the light of the wand seems to reach a golden star above.

    You can find more fantastic features, and generate your own, using the "Random Monuments" table on page 12 of the Lazy DM's Workbook or the "Core Adventure Generators" tables on page 6 of the Lazy DM's Companion.

    Set Up a Situations

    When the characters enter the town, it works best if they get involved in something right away. Try launching into a situation just as they walk into town. Such situations help define the town and offer interesting choices. Here are ten examples of situations the characters may encounter in town:

    1. A trained owlbear gets loose.
    2. A pair of ogres wander into town, demanding their yearly promised wheel of cheese. The vendor who promised them the cheese has long since moved away.
    3. A mob accuses an old man of witchcraft.
    4. Villagers scream as three giant vultures fly off with two haunches of meat and a bemused child.
    5. An escaped prisoner runs down the street throwing spells with the local battle-mages's wand of wonder.
    6. A sinkhole into an unknown tomb collapses and begins belching out ancient skeletons.
    7. A recently unearthed vampire walks into the local bar offering 200 gold pieces for a suitable drink.
    8. A ghost asks the characters to avenge her death. The locals say she's been asking for revenge for a century but she was run over by her own ox cart.
    9. A giant crocodile crawls out of the well and attacks but the local priests beg the characters not to hurt the holy creature.
    10. Local toughs start trouble with the characters and challenge them to a dance-off.

    Come up with your own list of potential encounters as the characters first travel into the town. You don't need one every time they return but something to set the stage always helps. The "Framing Events" table in chapter 3 of the Dungeon Master's Guide is a great go-to, as are the "Random Town Events" table on page 15 of the Lazy DM's Workbook and the "Settlement Events" on page 37 of the Lazy DM's Companion.

    Clarify Options Customized to the Characters

    When the characters come to town, they might have twelve to twenty options or more. Do they go to the inn? Visit the blacksmith? Talk to the local mining guild? The decisions can be paralyzing. Instead of building a huge town and offering the whole thing to the characters we can start with the characters and build the town around them. What sorts of locations would they be interested in? Here are ten examples:

    • The fighter might be interested in the local mercenary company headquarters.
    • The paladin might be interested in the local temple or the citadel of guardians.
    • The cleric might be interested in the local temple or the observatory of the gods on the mountaintop above.
    • The rogue might be interested in the seedy bar or the thieves' den they hear about.
    • The bard might be interested in the local theater or music hall.
    • The sorcerer might be interested in the strange floating obelisk of power hanging over the pond.
    • The warlock might be interested in the house of the coven who follows their patron.
    • The wizard might be interested in the local sage's tower.
    • The barbarian might be interested in the local fighting pits.
    • The druid might be interested in the wild grove just outside of town.

    These locations of interest are based on classes but you can do the same thing with races or backgrounds. Perhaps the mushroomfolk character finds a local compost heap where others of their kind hang out, enjoy the meal, and share rumors. Perhaps the clockwork character is interested in the local Temple of Rava — deity of the clockwork folk.

    When you're preparing to introduce your town, write down locations you think may directly interest the characters based on their class, race, background or interests.

    Towns – Locations of Adventure

    It's hard to think of a town as another location of adventure but that's what we're trying to do. Instead of running a town with an open end of possible directions and decisions, focus your town to make it an interesting place to run a session.

    • Give it an interesting feature.
    • Include situations in which the characters can get involved.
    • Highlight locations that suit the characters.

    By giving the characters interesting things to see, interesting places to go, and interesting things to do, a town can be as exciting as any other location they visit in their games.

    More Sly Flourish Stuff

    This week I posted a couple of YouTube videos on RPG Adventure Pitfalls – What are GMs Doing Wrong? and Gelatinous Cubes! – Shadowdark Gloaming Session 10 Lazy GM Prep.

    Last Week's Lazy RPG Talk Show Topics

    Each week I record an episode of the Lazy RPG Talk Show (also available as a podcast) in which I talk about all things in tabletop RPGs. Here are last week's topics with time stamped links to the YouTube video:

    Patreon Questions and Answers

    Also on the Talk Show, I answer questions from Sly Flourish Patrons. Here are last week's questions and answers:

    RPG Tips

    Each week I think about what I learned in my last RPG session and write them up as D&D tips. Here are this week's tips:

    • Give bosses strong protections and include easily disrupted lackeys.
    • Tie the history of magic items to the story, the wielder, and the character who may acquire it.
    • Build interesting environmental effects into boss fights.
    • Have a good handle on the mechanics of unique combat monuments like godly statues protecting boss monsters.
    • Damage is the strongest dial in combat.
    • Note the many types of combat: big boss battles, set-piece battles, small skirmishes, conversations-gone-wrong, etc. Know how best to run them and what tools you need to do so.
    • Give characters a single-use nuclear bomb. See what they do with it.

    Related Articles

    Get More from Sly Flourish

    Buy Sly Flourish's Books

    Have a question or want to contact me? Check out Sly Flourish's Frequently Asked Questions.

    Read more »
    Source: Sly Flourish | Published: November 13, 2023 - 6:00 am
  • VideoHow to Choose DCs for Your 5e Game

    Get $96 of Sly Flourish books for $20 at the Sly flourish Bundle of Holding!

    Here's a quick way to determine the difficulty class (DC) when characters attempt to accomplish a risky endeavor in your 5e RPG.

    Think about the situation in the game's world. Then ask yourself, on a scale of 10 to 20, how hard would this action be to pull off? Pick a number and go with it.

    Between 10 and 20

    DCs can go as low or as high as you want, but there are practical limits. Below 10 and it's not worth rolling – just let the characters accomplish their goal. Above 20 might make sense when an objective is really hard but still possible. Trained characters with high ability scores can still hit DCs above 20, but not often. Sometimes it's better to just say something's impossible if it's really not possible.

    Otherwise, picking a number between 10 and 20 works just fine.

    Advice from the Dungeon Master's Guide

    Buried way in the back on page 238 of the 2014 Dungeon Master's Guide, we find useful advice on choosing DCs:

    If you’ve decided that an ability check is called for, then most likely the task at hand isn’t a very easy one. Most people can accomplish a DC 5 task with little chance of failure. Unless circumstances are unusual, let characters succeed at such a task without making a check.

    Then ask yourself, “Is this task’s difficulty easy, moderate, or hard?” If the only DCs you ever use are 10, 15, and 20, your game will run just fine. Keep in mind that a character with a 10 in the associated ability and no proficiency will succeed at an easy task around 50 percent of the time. A moderate task requires a higher score or proficiency for success, whereas a hard task typically requires both. A big dose of luck with the d20 also doesn’t hurt.

    If you find yourself thinking, “This task is especially hard,” you can use a higher DC, but do so with caution and consider the level of the characters. A DC 25 task is very hard for low-level characters to accomplish, but it becomes more reasonable after 10th level or so. A DC 30 check is nearly impossible for most low-level characters. A 20th-level character with proficiency and a relevant ability score of 20 still needs a 19 or 20 on the die roll to succeed at a task of this difficulty.

    Don't Overthink It

    Don't get your head too wrapped up around DCs. Go with your gut. Think about the difficulty of the situation in the world and choose a number.

    Don't Set DCs Based on the Characters

    Don't set your DCs based on the characters, their proficiencies, or other abilities they have. If they're good at something, let them be good at it. Choose DCs regardless of who's attempting it. An approach might change a DC. If you're trying to intimidate the lich (DC 32), that may not work out very well, but flattery might (DC 14)! Just because the bard has a +12 in Persuasion doesn't mean the lich becomes harder to flatter.

    Keep Your Head in the World

    This advice feeds into a bigger tip – keep your head in the game's world. Think about things from inside the world. What is it really like there? How hard are the situations the characters attempt? What are the NPCs really like?

    5e games are about building a world and wrapping it in DCs against which the characters attempt actions using their ability bonuses, skill proficiencies, and a d20 roll. Every rock, every crevasse, every locked door, every scowling bar bouncer – they all have little DCs floating over them. All you have to do is look at them in the context of the world and read what they say.

    Imagine the situation in the world and choose a number between 10 and 20.

    Helping Jennell Jaquays

    Esteemed D&D designer Jennell Jaquays, the inspiration for many fantastic dungeon design principles, is battling some difficult medical conditions and could use your help. Please help her out on the GoFundMe set up by her wife.

    More Sly Flourish Stuff

    This week I posted a couple of YouTube videos on Running I6 Ravenloft with the Shadowdark RPG and Prepping Mysteries with the 8 Steps.

    Last Week's Lazy RPG Talk Show Topics

    Each week I record an episode of the Lazy RPG Talk Show (also available as a podcast) in which I talk about all things in tabletop RPGs. Here are last week's topics with time stamped links to the YouTube video:

    Patreon Questions and Answers

    Also on the Talk Show, I answer questions from Sly Flourish Patrons. Here are last week's questions and answers:

    RPG Tips

    Each week I think about what I learned in my last RPG session and write them up as D&D tips. Here are this week's tips:

    • Use the 13th Age “escape” rule. The group can run from combat, avoiding further attacks and collecting downed allies but at the cost of a significant shift in the story.
    • Let enemies retreat when you think it makes sense to them to do so.
    • Use the simplest tools you need to help you run your game.
    • Take a deep breath. Your friends love you and want to have a great time. You’re all on the same side sharing an awesome story together.
    • Worry less about the TTRPG industry news and the larger zeitgeist and focus on running an awesome game for your friends.
    • Spill too many secrets.
    • Clarify out of game what the characters learned in-game.

    Related Articles

    Get More from Sly Flourish

    Buy Sly Flourish's Books

    Have a question or want to contact me? Check out Sly Flourish's Frequently Asked Questions.

    Read more »
    Source: Sly Flourish | Published: November 6, 2023 - 6:00 am
  • VideoFocus Extra Prep Time on the Characters

    Get $96 of Sly Flourish books for $20 at the Sly flourish Bundle of Holding!

    Whenever we're looking at our game prep, it's useful to consider what's valuable and what isn't valuable for the fun of the game. What matters? There's not a perfect answer — each of us chooses what matters the most for us and our group — but there are common areas we can focus on.

    Almost everything we do to tie the characters to the world, the story, and the game provides tremendous value in our prep. As much as we might enjoy pondering the 7,000 year history of our city or hunting for the perfect battle map, it's important to find new ways to tie the characters to the story and draw our players deeper into the game we love.

    Maybe you're done with your prep (as much as we're ever done.) Maybe you still feel some anxiety about it and have some time. Where do you spend that time?

    On the characters.

    Here are ten things you can do during or after your prep to better tie the characters into the game.

    • Add one secret or clue tied to each character for your next session.
    • Look over the characters' current magic items and think about what they might want to find next.
    • Think about each character's specialty in combat and think about a way to let them shine in one of your upcoming conflicts.
    • Think about the NPCs players really liked and how you can bring them back into the story.
    • Think about a home base the characters might acquire or ways to modify their existing home base.
    • Write some flash fiction about one of the characters and email it to the group.
    • Develop a handout describing one or more of the characters and the impact they had on the world.
    • Tie one of your upcoming locations to the backgrounds of the characters.
    • Plan a prophetic scene for one of the characters with an arcane or religious bent.
    • Think about the motivations and actions of an intelligent item currently carried by the characters.

    Whether you're having trouble digging into your prep for your next session or you're done with your prep but want to dive in a little more, think about what character-focused ideas you can drop into your next game.

    Every moment spent thinking about the characters and their connections to the world, the story, and the next session provides great dividends for you and your players.

    More Sly Flourish Stuff

    Last week I posted a couple of YouTube videos on Get Characters to Move in D&D Combat and Mutant Catfish! – Shadowdark Gloaming Session 9 Lazy GM Prep.

    Last Week's Lazy RPG Talk Show Topics

    Each week I record an episode of the Lazy RPG Talk Show (also available as a podcast) in which I talk about all things in tabletop RPGs. Here are last week's topics with time stamped links to the YouTube video:

    Patreon Questions and Answers

    Also on the Talk Show, I answer questions from Sly Flourish Patrons. Here are last week's questions and answers:

    RPG Tips

    Each week I think about what I learned in my last RPG session and write them up as D&D tips. Here are this week's tips:

    • Change up the themes and feeling of your adventure arc by focusing exclusively on a new monster book.
    • Prep in the space where you’re going to run your game. Visualize what it’ll be like to play. Fill in the gaps.
    • Build three musical playlists to run during your game: Relaxing, sinister, and battle music.
    • Worry less about the larger D&D and RPG zeitgeist. What do you want and need to have a great time playing games with your friends?
    • Run small experiments.
    • Ask players what mechanics they’re eager to see play out in the game. Build encounters to show them off.
    • Great table aids: blue sticky tack, index cards, adhesive re-usable bookmarks, generic tokens, Pathfinder flip mat, dry-erase markers, big flat acrylic sheet.

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    Source: Sly Flourish | Published: October 30, 2023 - 6:00 am
  • VideoThe Eight Steps of the Lazy DM – 2023 Review

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    Since 2018, Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master has helped thousands of GMs improve their tabletop roleplaying games and focus on what matters most for their games. The core of Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master is the eight steps for game prep offering a flexible and modular outline to help GMs

    • focus on what matters most for the game,
    • prepare what they need to improvise at the table,
    • and keep the pacing of the game flexible and fun.

    Today we're going to review the eight steps from Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master for those who haven't yet seen them and offer a refresher for those who have used them over the past five years.

    The free Lazy GM's Resource Document includes descriptions of the eight steps and many examples along with other material from Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master, the Lazy DM's Workbook, and the Lazy DM's Companion. It's available to read, copy, or use, even commercially, under a Creative Commons Attribution license. Give it a look if you want to dig further or include these ideas in your own work.

    And now the steps.

    Step 1: Review the Characters

    In the first step, we focus our attention on the players' characters. The characters are the single interface between players and the world we're sharing together. We spend this part of our prep remembering who they are, what they want, and what connections they have to the world. It's the first of the eight steps so we can keep them firmly in mind while running through the other seven steps.

    One fantastic way to work the characters into your prep is to ask yourself

    "What hook can I include in the next session to draw this character into the game?"

    and do this for each character in the game.

    Step 2: Create a Strong Start

    The strong start draws players out of the real world and into the game. The key driver for the strong start is "something happens." Maybe the characters get attacked (a typical but potentially overused favorite). Maybe they meet a long-lost NPC. Maybe there's a festival in town. Maybe a sinkhole opens up in the road leading to the depths below. Something happens, and it draws players into the world. The strong start often leads to the hook to draw the characters into the adventure if there isn't one already.

    Step 3: Outline Potential Scenes

    This step is entirely designed to help GMs feel good about their prep. It sets the potential boundaries for the session. The key question is "what scenes might occur in this session?" These scenes might be in a linear sequence or potential branches based on the choices or actions of the characters. They might be small and focused scenes or big plans like "explore level 3 of the Scarlet Citadel." Your outline of scenes should be small and brief – just a few short sentences in a list. Don't overdo it. Keep it brief and flexible and be ready to throw these scenes away if they don't actually come up in the game.

    Step 4: Define Secrets and Clues

    This is the heart of the eight steps from Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master. Whatever steps you decide on for your prep, "secrets and clues" may be the main one you want to include.

    These secrets and clues have a few criteria that make them powerful:

    • They're short. Usually just a sentence or two.
    • They're relevant. They focus on things the characters may want to know like the history of the location or the plans of a villain.
    • They're abstracted from the location of their discovery. We don't determine how the characters find a secret. We focus only on the secret itself and then improvise how characters find them as we run the game.

    This last point is tricky to understand and critical to their value in our prep. You decide which secrets the characters uncover during the game itself. Maybe they learn it from an NPC. Maybe they learn it by examining a fresco on the wall. Maybe a secret comes to them in a divine vision. The Lazy GM's Resource Document includes ten different ways secrets might be discovered in four different categories.

    Originally I recommended starting with a fresh slate of ten secrets every time you prep. Recently, many GMs, including myself, find it easier to review your last session's secrets and bring forward any secrets that have yet to be uncovered and are still relevant to the game.

    Step 5: Develop Fantastic Locations

    Fantastic locations serve as the backdrop to the scenes we run. What locations might come up during the game? Locations might be small, like the master bedroom in a manor or a prison cell in a dungeon. They might be large backdrops for a scene like the dank alleyways of a city or an ancient fountain in the plaza at midnight. We decide how much detail we need for a location based on how important it might be in the game. For some locations, all we need is a name like "bloody torture chamber" or "master bedroom of shattered mirrors."

    We usually want enough of a description to help us improvise locations during the game but we often don't need more than a sentence. If we think a location is going to be the backdrop to a big set-piece battle, we might add one to three fantastic features to a location so it looks like this:

    • Hall of storms. Large pit dropping into the sky below, huge crumbling pillars, lightning-charged throne.

    Those "aspects" of a location gives the characters something to mess with during a scene.

    If you're running a large dungeon, you might not need anything more than the titles of the rooms in a list. If you're running a published adventure, you might not need anything at all.

    Step 6: Outline Important NPCs

    In this step, we write down the names and any important notes for NPCs that might come up in our next session. These NPCs could be people the characters might meet, villains they might face, or even intelligent magic items the characters carry.

    Often the hardest part of preparing NPCs is remembering their names. Writing down their names might be all we need. We might want to build NPCs from characters in popular fiction so we have an instant set of mannerisms, dialects, and appearances. More detailed NPCs might have goals and quests they follow to accomplish those goals. To keep your NPCs fresh, switch their genders and appearances. If you can, grab artwork to show your players what the NPCs look like.

    Step 7: Choose Relevant Monsters

    What monsters might the characters face in the next session? Typically, GMs prep whole scenes with locations and monsters together. In these eight steps, we separate out our list of monsters so we can drop them in anywhere. We may still build big set-piece boss battles by combining monsters with locations (and secrets, NPCs, and treasure) but most of the time we just list potential monsters. This gives us the freedom to improvise combat encounters based on the situation in the game's world and the pacing of the game itself.

    When we're looking at the locations the characters might explore, what monsters make sense for those locations? During the game we use upward and downward beats and the dials of monster difficulty to help us build fun and engaging combat encounters.

    When thinking about what monsters might make sense for the next session, it helps to write down the lazy encounter benchmark so we know where the line is between a potentially challenging encounter and a potentially deadly one.

    For boss battles or big set-piece battles, we might go with the more traditional way of setting up a detailed location with a specific set of monsters. This method works well when a big battle might be our strong start.

    Step 8: Select Treasure and Magic Item Rewards

    Players love getting loot. Thus, it's worth our time to consider what loot they might discover. We can use two different methods to select loot:

    • Choose magic items that fit the characters.
    • Choose treasure and magic items randomly.

    We can mix these two methods. Sometimes we select specific magic items useful for particular characters. Other times we roll randomly to see what they get. There are many different ways to roll for random loot including tables in the Lazy DM's Companion, the Dungeon Master's Guide, or using a variety of online tools like Donjon's treasure generator.

    Choose Your Own Style

    The eight steps from Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master are intended to be modular. You can choose different steps depending on whether you're running homebrew or published material or whether you're running a single-session game or a long campaign. You may have other steps you find vital to your prep not included here or find that some of these steps don't serve you and are easily skipped. That's perfect. That's how the Lazy DM style is supposed to work.

    Focus on what matters and omit what doesn't.

    More Sly Flourish Stuff

    Last week I posted a couple of YouTube videos on Minimum Viable Prep and Bittermold Keep – Shadowdark Gloaming Session 8 Lazy GM Prep.

    Last Week's Lazy RPG Talk Show Topics

    Each week I record an episode of the Lazy RPG Talk Show (also available as a podcast) in which I talk about all things in tabletop RPGs. Here are last week's topics with time stamped links to the YouTube video:

    Patreon Questions and Answers

    Also on the Talk Show, I answer questions from Sly Flourish Patrons. Here are last week's questions and answers:

    RPG Tips

    Each week I think about what I learned in my last RPG session and write them up as D&D tips. Here are this week's tips:

    • Mix easy battles, hard battles, interesting conversations, and exploration throughout your adventures.
    • Let mid-bosses be destroyed by good player tactics, surprises, and good luck. You can always whip up another boss.
    • Use non-core and lesser known spells as powers for single-use or once-per-day magic items.
    • Shake up battles. Include big single or duo monsters sometimes, huge hordes another time, one-on-one wolfpacks another time. Run easy fights, hard fights, and multiple waves of combatants.
    • Pathfinder flip mats offer great table-usable and re-usable locations you can use for years.
    • Cull your tools. Keep those that help you run awesome games and get rid of the rest.
    • Reveal secrets anywhere — carved into old dead trees, whispered among tavern patrons, or shouted out from villains as you engage them in combat.

    Related Articles

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    Source: Sly Flourish | Published: October 23, 2023 - 6:00 am
  • VideoDungeon Crawls Versus Situations

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    Sometimes the line between running a dungeon crawl and running a larger situation – like a heist – isn't so clear. They both have locations. They both have goals. They both have inhabitants. But both styles of games run differently. Each type has a structure we follow when we're preparing them and running them.

    It behooves us GMs to compare these two structures. What defines the difference between a dungeon crawl and a larger situation-based adventure?

    The answer is: goals and circumstances.

    Different Types of Dungeon Goals

    Characters should always have a goal when delving into a dungeon – be it a series of caverns, an old temple, a ruined castle, an ancient crypt, or a mysterious manor. Maybe it's to find treasure. Maybe it's to find information. Maybe it's to kill a nasty boss. There are always reasons to go into a dangerous dungeon — otherwise, why go into such a horrible place?

    Sometimes these goals require crawling from room to room, avoiding wandering monsters, checking for traps, worrying about lighting and visibility, and so on. Other times these goals mean finding the main room, getting in, doing your job, and leaving before something terrible happens.

    A scenario in which the characters must light the four braziers of Set to open the obsidian door to the shadowed vault likely requires crawling through a dungeon to find said braziers and locate the door.

    A scenario to rescue the king's nephew from the cultists of Set before they sacrifice him to their serpent god might not require so thorough a dungeon crawl. Find the chamber, free the prince, and escape.

    Example Goals

    Here are five examples of more dungeon-crawly goals. These goals lend themselves towards adventures in which the characters travel through a larger part of a dungeon seeking one or more things without a big time constraint.

    • Light four magical candles to illuminate a hidden fresco.
    • Find three of five keys to open a gateway to another world.
    • Destroy four anchors of a hellish portal.
    • Find a powerful foe-slaying weapon.
    • Lay a tormented soul to rest.

    And here are five examples of more situation / heist-style goals. These goals focus more on a single specific quest taking place in a larger location. These goals are more focused on getting in, accomplishing the goal, and getting out.

    • Dismiss a powerful fiend.
    • Steal invasion plans of the nearby city.
    • Rescue a reluctant hostage.
    • Recover a dangerous artifact.
    • Steal the key to an aerial warship.

    Different Types of Circumstances

    Circumstances also dictate whether the characters approach a dungeon as a crawl or as a situation. Are there lots of wandering patrols? Is something important to the story happening soon? Would crawling through every room take the characters away from their goal? Are events changing while the characters might be exploring? Any of these circumstances might shift the characters away from crawling room to room and drive them towards the main goal instead.

    Do the characters know the layout of the dungeon? If they know the layout, they know where to go to accomplish their goal. If they don't have a map, they'll have to crawl the dungeon and learn where to go. Sometimes the characters have a partial map devoid of secret hallways, hidden chambers, or underground tunnels. They know most of the location, but not all of it.

    Know Your Adventure Structure

    When building an adventure or running a published adventure, you may not know right away whether you're running a dungeon crawl or a more dynamic situation. In Wild Beyond the Witchlight, the Palace of Heart's Desire looks like a big place to explore with 51 areas to investigate. In reality, the characters may only visit a handful of rooms depending on how you run it and the choices the characters make.

    When preparing a location for your game, ask yourself if the characters are going to treat it like a dungeon crawl or treat the whole thing as a situation. Then choose the approach that fits the structure.

    More Sly Flourish Stuff

    Last week I posted a couple of YouTube videos on Moving Things Forward and Journey to Bittermold Keep – Shadowdark Gloaming Session 7 Lazy GM Prep.

    Last Week's Lazy RPG Talk Show Topics

    Each week I record an episode of the Lazy RPG Talk Show (also available as a podcast) in which I talk about all things in tabletop RPGs. Here are last week's topics with time stamped links to the YouTube video:

    Patreon Questions and Answers

    Also on the Talk Show, I answer questions from Sly Flourish Patrons. Here are last week's questions and answers:

    RPG Tips

    Each week I note some RPG tips I learned from my last game. Here are this week's tips!

    • Let monsters get crowd controlled. Have enough that it doesn't completely remove the threat.
    • Tell players when they may accidentally trigger multiple groups of monsters.
    • Set up a whole location with small groups of monsters who move around and may or may not become aware of the characters.
    • The dungeon crawl and the heist are two common adventure models. Know how they work and build around their strengths.
    • Embrace shenanigans!
    • Throw mixtures of low and high CR monsters at your characters.
    • Use more monsters and let them get thrown off pits and ledges or banished to the forbidden zone.
    • Use random generators to spark your creativity.

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    Source: Sly Flourish | Published: October 16, 2023 - 6:00 am
  • VideoUse Dyson's Maps

    Get $96 of Sly Flourish books for $20 at the Sly flourish Bundle of Holding!

    DMs often overprepare. Drawing our own maps is typically one such activity. You may be tempted to draw out your dungeon maps and, if you enjoy it and have the time, go with the gods. But if time is tight or you feel like your time may be best spent elsewhere, use existing maps instead.

    Dyson Logos Maps

    Dyson Logos, the cartographer responsible for numerous maps in published Wizards of the Coast adventures, has more than a thousand maps available on Dysonlogos.blog. Instead of drawing a map, grab one from there. I've used Dyson maps for all sorts of locations in all sorts of worlds whether it was Forgotten Realms, Eberron, Shadowdark, or Numenera.

    If you have an idea for a location, keep the general location in mind and scroll through Dyson's maps. When you find one that fits your needs, stop, download it, and stick it in your notes.

    Dyson's maps are easy to use in a VTT, easy to replicate on a hand-drawn battle map, and cheap to print large-scale as blueprint maps at your local printer. They follow the best practices of Jaquays-style maps including multiple entrances, multiple paths, loop-backs, asymmetric designs, elevation changes, and secret passages.

    Tips for Using Dyson Maps

    Here's a handful of other tips for making the most of Dyson maps:

    • Dyson's maps often have gridded and gridless versions. Try the gridless version in your VTT of choice, adding the VTT's grid on top of it if needed.
    • Resize Dyson's maps to suit the size you want for rooms and hallways. Make sure there's plenty of room for those fire giants.
    • Aim for maps that fit the size you need. Dyson maps can go from five rooms to dozens (even hundreds) of rooms. Choose the size that best fits the length of the delve you have in mind.
    • Collapse halls to shrink down larger dungeons if needed.
    • Write down evocative names for major chambers. Keep descriptions short – just a word or two – enough to give you what you need to improvise it during the game.
    • Write room descriptions in a list moving clockwise around the map if you don't want to annotate individual rooms.
    • If needed, print and draw in room numbers. Take a picture and put it in your digital notes. It's often faster than annotating it with an image editor.
    • Keep a handful of your favorite Dyson maps downloaded locally in your notes so you have general-purpose maps handy when you need them.

    An Invaluable Tool for Lazy DMs

    The next time you're tempted to draw out a map, grab a Dyson map and put your prep time into other high-impact areas like building encounters around the characters, making interesting or unique treasure, or thinking through the eyes of your villains.

    Dyson's work is funded through Patreon. Dyson's maps are an incredible resource for the TTRPG hobby. Please give Dyson your support.

    More Sly Flourish Stuff

    This week I posted a couple of YouTube videos on my Uncharted Journeys Spotlight and Drusilla's Hut – Shadowdark Gloaming Session 6 Lazy GM Prep.

    Last Week's Lazy RPG Talk Show Topics

    Each week I record an episode of the Lazy RPG Talk Show (also available as a podcast) in which I talk about all things in tabletop RPGs. Here are last week's topics with time stamped links to the YouTube video:

    Patreon Questions and Answers

    Also on the Talk Show, I answer questions from Sly Flourish Patrons. Here are last week's questions and answers:

    RPG Tips

    Each week I think about what I learned in my last RPG session and write them up as D&D tips. Here are this week's tips:

    • Keep the characters at the center of your prep.
    • What hooks do you have for each character in your next session?
    • Cut the boring middle.
    • Use spells as interesting rewards on single or daily use magic items.
    • Draw out and show players the layout of the location for a heist-style adventure.
    • Design magic items around the characters.
    • Let monsters get crowd controlled. Have enough that it doesn't completely remove the threat.

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    Have a question or want to contact me? Check out Sly Flourish's Frequently Asked Questions.

    Read more »
    Source: Sly Flourish | Published: October 9, 2023 - 6:00 am
  • VideoHow Many Rounds of Combat Are Ideal?

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    The answer? Don't worry about it.

    Ok, you probably want more advice than that.

    Recently Hayley M., a Patreon of Sly Flourish asked:

    Combat encounter length: It depends, of course, but do you or your players have a base expectation of how many rounds feels too few or too many for a main story-related fight? You often talk about buffing hit points on monsters and villains, is that because you expect them to last a minimum number of rounds?

    I don't know if there's a base expectation. I think many DMs and players expect the answer of roughly "three" – maybe more for big story-moving fights like boss battles.

    Like many aspects of the game, I tend not to think about how many rounds a battle should go. Like Gandalf, I think a battle should end precisely when it means to.

    As Hayley says, it depends. You don't want a battle with two bandits outside of a hideout to take three rounds. That encounter can be over in the same amount of time it'd take you to roll initiative. You also don't want your massive three-phase pinnacle boss battle to be over in three rounds. Climactic multi-phase battles might go six or nine rounds.

    I don't think it's useful to worry about how many rounds combat takes. Instead, I think it's better to focus on the feeling, the pacing, and the beats of your game. Keep your hands on the dials. Know when monsters have overstayed their welcome and turn that hit point dial to 1. Don't just "call it right here."

    GMs tend to worry too much about aspects of the game that really don't matter to the fun and story of the game. The number of combat encounters per long rest, the exact details of encounter balance or combat difficulty, or how the characters might bypass an encounter we intend for combat – these details aren't the critical criteria for a great session. They build a desired but often stale structure around an otherwise free-flowing game.

    Ignore things like the ideal number of rounds and focus on building interesting situations for the characters to explore however they choose. Maybe a battle takes half a round. Maybe it takes nine rounds over an entire session of the game.

    The real question is:

    Are you and your players having fun?

    More Sly Flourish Stuff

    This week I posted a couple of YouTube videos on Running Cities in D&D and The Wardenwood Caverns – Shadowdark Gloaming Session 5 Lazy GM Prep.

    Last Week's Lazy RPG Talk Show Topics

    Each week I record an episode of the Lazy RPG Talk Show (also available as a podcast) in which I talk about all things in tabletop RPGs. Here are last week's topics with time stamped links to the YouTube video:

    Patreon Questions and Answers

    Also on the Talk Show, I answer questions from Sly Flourish Patrons. Here are last week's questions and answers:

    RPG Tips

    Each week I think about what I learned in my last RPG session and write them up as D&D tips. Here are this week's tips:

    • Note the characters' resistances. Attack them with those resistances.
    • The higher level the characters go, the more monsters you'll want to throw their way.
    • Single monsters typically can't stand up to a group of characters above 6th level.
    • Give characters several meaningful paths through a location.
    • Highlight the story and game effects of notable features in big combat arenas.
    • Build vertical combat arenas.
    • Give each magic item a story and unique property or effect.

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    Source: Sly Flourish | Published: October 2, 2023 - 6:00 am
  • VideoShare PDFs With Your Players

    Get $96 of Sly Flourish books for $20 at the Sly flourish Bundle of Holding!

    There are times when we're running our RPGs where we want to be able to share PDFs of game materials with our players. Maybe we're including 5e published material not available on D&D Beyond. Maybe we're running an entirely different roleplaying game. In either scenario, it can be either expensive for players to buy the material themselves or we'd be breaking the law (and generally behaving badly) by sharing copies of our RPG PDFs directly with players.

    It isn't reasonable to expect each of our players to drop $20 to $60 on PDFs for one campaign or one run of a new RPG and not every game offers cheap or free alternatives. I expect a lot of GMs send players copies of these PDFs but doing so is illegal and risky. Many of these PDFs are watermarked to the person purchasing the PDF. Should the watermarked PDF be widely distributed, the original purchaser could be under considerable risk. It's also morally questionable. Don't bootleg PDFs.

    So here's a better way – a free and safer way to share PDFs with your players. This content-sharing method follows the same content-sharing model used by D&D Beyond and Roll20. Just about all popular VTTs with roleplaying content allows this sharing model. This method, however, doesn't require a VTT – just Google Drive.

    If you'd rather watch a step by step video on this tip, please check out the Share PDFs With Your Players YouTube Video.

    This trick uses Google Drive so you and your players each need to have a Google account to use it.

    These steps are for the person sharing the PDF to others.

    1. Create a "shared PDF" folder in your Google Drive folder.
    2. Open that folder and upload the PDF or PDFs you want to share with your players.
    3. Select the files you want to share. Right click and press "Share".
    4. Add the Google email addresses for each of the players with whom you want to share the PDF. Make sure they're selected as "Viewer".
    5. In the upper right corner of the share window is a little gear "settings" icon. Click that icon.
    6. Ensure that "Viewers and commenters can see the option to download, print, and copy" is not selected. This ensures that the viewer can't download or print the file.
    7. Save your settings and notify your players that you shared your file.

    For the reader, they can go to their Google Drive and see that these PDFs are now shared with them. As long as the person sharing the file continues to do so, they'll be able to read the file through their browser on Google Drive but can't download it or print it.

    Sharing PDFs using Google Drive is an extremely useful trick to keep on hand anytime you want to give the players new character options, player guides, or entire rules to a game without worrying that they'll get out there to the open internet and without requiring each player to drop a lot of cash to get the materials you want to share. When you're done with the campaign, remove their access.

    Pass this tip, the article, and the video to anyone you think will find it useful!

    More Sly Flourish Stuff

    This week I posted a YouTube video on the Return to Wardenwood – Shadowdark Gloaming Session 4 Lazy GM Prep.

    Last Week's Lazy RPG Talk Show Topics

    Each week I record an episode of the Lazy RPG Talk Show (also available as a podcast) in which I talk about all things in tabletop RPGs. Here are last week's topics with time stamped links to the YouTube video:

    Patreon Questions and Answers

    Also on the Talk Show, I answer questions from Sly Flourish Patreons. Here are last week's questions and answers:

    RPG Tips

    Each week I think about what I learned in my last RPG session and write them up as D&D tips. Here are this week's tips:

    • Ensure there's a choice and multiple outcomes in every scene.
    • Strong starts need not be combat but they should draw the characters (and the players) into the game.
    • What's your minimum viable set of tools and prep to run a great game?
    • Discard NPCs that don't resonate with the players.
    • Let the characters' exploits follow ahead of them as they meet new NPCs.
    • Give gods "masks" – alternative personas they wear while engaging in the world of mortals.
    • Give each monster you run an interesting flavorful move or power that defines them in the world.

    Related Articles

    Get More from Sly Flourish

    Buy Sly Flourish's Books

    Have a question or want to contact me? Check out Sly Flourish's Frequently Asked Questions.

    Read more »
    Source: Sly Flourish | Published: September 25, 2023 - 6:00 am
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