GM Tips, Tricks, & General Advice

[cailano]

World Building: Something Different

Published settings tend towards the generic, tolkien-esque worlds we are all familiar with in fantasy. There is nothing wrong with this per se, but if you are going to go through the trouble of making your own world, why not go for something completely different?

What about a world wracked by magical storms that alter the land itself? What if at the center of it all was a 3000 year old empire with a capital that had been shattered by a thousand storms and was now spread across half a kingdom? What if even the castle itself is split apart and the sections connected by permanent dimension doors?

What about a world caught in the grip of an eternal winter, ruled by an executioner who has taken death herself as a lover? What happens when a boy enters this world who himself embodies summer... but he's only nine years old and now the executioner knows he exists?

What about a world underground, where sky is only legend and no one dares to venture beyond the catacombs near the cities because of the terrifying monsters that dwell in the dark?

What about a world where the gods have all died in a great war and when their blood rained down onto the earth their power infused it... and now some people are starting to manifest that power, threatening to become gods themselves?

Just a few examples and I bet you can do better... as a challenge, who can give me three totally unique settings, each described in three sentences or less?

[Hibernate_Paths]

Oooo, I like the post about making the world "different." The world I'm building is quite generic (though there's nothing wrong with a standard fantasy setting if you've got interesting characters and a good story for it), but I think it would be great to add something that makes it stand out.

As a brainstorming exercise, I'm going to take you up on your challenge!
1. A continent that was only recently colonized, so the only human settlements are just outposts or homestead type arrangements, with the surrounding lands quite wild and dangerous. Supplies (especially metal)are hard to come by, Magic items even less. That is, unless more established races (if any) can be contacted and traded with.
2. A land infested with gargantuan birds of prey that cause virtually all land-dwelling inhabitants to scatter for cover like rodents whenever a shadow crosses the sky.
3. A world where hill giants outnumber all the other races and subjugate them in a kind of lord-serf arrangement. The dull minded yet powerful overlords let the villages of "little people" largely govern themselves, but occasionally show up in force to demand tribute, food, labor or make other unreasonable requests of them.

[cailano]

Oooo, I like the post about making the world "different." The world I'm building is quite generic (though there's nothing wrong with a standard fantasy setting if you've got interesting characters and a good story for it), but I think it would be great to add something that makes it stand out.

As a brainstorming exercise, I'm going to take you up on your challenge!
1. A continent that was only recently colonized, so the only human settlements are just outposts or homestead type arrangements, with the surrounding lands quite wild and dangerous. Supplies (especially metal)are hard to come by, Magic items even less. That is, unless more established races (if any) can be contacted and traded with.
2. A land infested with gargantuan birds of prey that cause virtually all land-dwelling inhabitants to scatter for cover like rodents whenever a shadow crosses the sky.
3. A world where hill giants outnumber all the other races and subjugate them in a kind of lord-serf arrangement. The dull minded yet powerful overlords let the villages of "little people" largely govern themselves, but occasionally show up in force to demand tribute, food, labor or make other unreasonable requests of them.

Nice! I like the giant one especially.

[RaistlinMC]

I'll use the example from my own game:

The game world began as a fairly generic one, with one key difference: Stones, or orbs of power, were waking up after a 1,500 year slumber. No one save for the oldest elves and dragons remembered what happened the last time the orbs "woke up". The world has a gigantic swamp, an endlessly-shifting forest that only certain races can enter, an uncharted ocean, and many, many tunnels leading into a vast, seemingly endless underground.

The twist? The game-world that my PCs were born into and raised in is a show. A sandbox for the amusement of the masses of the "real" world, a la The Truman Show. Only three of the six PCs currently know the truth of their world. In fact, the groups are split right now, three and three; three are in Hrunun, the original game world, and the other three are just now discovering the so-called "real" world.

Oh, and we have airships. Like Final Fantasy.

Because seriously, life's not worth living without an airship

[cailano]

I'll use the example from my own game:

The game world began as a fairly generic one, with one key difference: Stones, or orbs of power, were waking up after a 1,500 year slumber. No one save for the oldest elves and dragons remembered what happened the last time the orbs "woke up". The world has a gigantic swamp, an endlessly-shifting forest that only certain races can enter, an uncharted ocean, and many, many tunnels leading into a vast, seemingly endless underground.

The twist? The game-world that my PCs were born into and raised in is a show. A sandbox for the amusement of the masses of the "real" world, a la The Truman Show. Only three of the six PCs currently know the truth of their world. In fact, the groups are split right now, three and three; three are in Hrunun, the original game world, and the other three are just now discovering the so-called "real" world.

Oh, and we have airships. Like Final Fantasy.

Because seriously, life's not worth living without an airship

Definitely an original setting!

[cailano]

Encounter Design Tip: Boss Fights

Boss fights are important encounters to spend time on because they are the payoff for the whole adventure, maybe even your whole campaign. In a PbP environment, your players may have been battling away for months or years to get to this point.

I have a few tips to make it memorable:

1) Don't leave your boss alone!

Having all your PCs surround and wail on your boss is a quick way to have that boss be overwhelmed faster than you'd believe. Even if your boss is a traditionally solo creature such as a dragon, you can easily work in some allies to distract the PCs. Maybe the dragon has young that are big enough to be a minor threat, or maybe the princess they thought they were coming to rescue has decided she loves the dragon and is going to lend her considerable magical abilities to his. Maybe - if you really hate your players - its mating season and there isn't one dragon, but two.

With non-dragon bosses, allies are even easier. Vampires have their spawn, Liches have constructs, sorcerers have apprentices and henchmen. You know what a really great boss fight henchman is? A rogue. Its very hard to concentrate on hammering the boss when someone is running around flanking and sneak attacking you. Barbarians and rogues have some defense against this, but everyone else is going to find that rogue a real pain.

Clerics are also great henchmen. Just like clerics in your party make almost all encounters easier, clerics on the bad side make everything harder.

Add Complications - This could be a trap in the room, or an environmental difficulty. Maybe its even something that could make the fight easier, but one of the players is going to have to activate it first. Stories are ful of things like this. Think Juggernaut's helmet in the X-Men, or a crew having to sneak into a castle to open the gates from the inside. Maybe a construct henchmen can be deactivated by a certain device if the rogue in the party can only get to it. These things add stress and difficulty to the scenario, and keep players occupied.

Add some rules - Your boss isn't just a lich...he's a lich created using the ashes of an ancient demon, giving him an aura of pure evil that damages good characters every round and will allow him to rise from his own ashes after being destroyed the first time. Cheating? No, not at all this is your BOSS! Throwing new rules like this at the PCs - as long as they've been properly foreshadowed - keeps them on their toes and makes the encounter more memorable.

Next section: pimping out your boss - how to equip them for the fight.

[cailano]

Encounters - Equipping your Boss

When it comes to pimping out your end boss, you have to strike a balance between items that would be useful to the boss and items that you don't want to fall into PC hands. Sure, you can give your big bad a rod of dragon control... but when the PCs kill him guess who is going to own all the dragons in your campaign?

Powerful items might also raise the CR of the encounter, so watch out for that.

In general, a melee type boss should have some good weapons or armor, and a wizard some good items for that class. If there is going to be a featured magic item in the boss' treasure, the boss should probably have it in hand and ready to use when the PCs come in. Not only does it make the encounter more challenging but the PCs will appreciate the power of the item more once it is used against them.

[RaistlinMC]

Now that's very good advice! Couldn't agree more.

[Hibernate_Paths]

Got another question, about difficulty of campaigns/adventures in general.
I want my game to be hard. I want the danger of death to be real, and force the players to struggle to win at times, and sometimes retreat out of necessity. Sometimes, they may die. In the end, I want them to succeed, because there's no game unless there are players. But to me a fun game is one that has real risk of defeat fairly often.

My questions for you Cai (or anyone else):
Do other players like playing this type of difficulty?
Any tips on walking that fine line between a challenging game and one that's too hard to be fun?
Any advice on how often or how to drop hints for a puzzle or encounter that's turning out harder than you thought? Anything else you can think of?

[Blue Tempest]

Yeah I agree with HP here. Where's the line exactly between being challenging and just being unfairly impossible?

[RaistlinMC]

My six players like the difficulty and danger of my game, I think. When folks die, no one complains; they just add a new character to our growing, living world. Be honest with players, don't fudge rolls, use CR levels to design encounters, and make death a part of your game without going out of your way to punish people.

That's my advice.

[cailano]

Difficulty

I think you need a balance of encounters. Some can be easy, others very tough, some in the middle.

In general I'd throw two or three not so tough or level appropriate encounters at them for every big one. The big ones will actually start to wear down the players, not just the characters. In a PbP setting a high CR battle can take days. They need a little down time after that.

In general, any thing CR+3 (that's three CR levels over the average party level) is going to be very hard for your players and characters to deal with. My group is in a CR 8 encounter right now when they are level 5, and it has been pretty demanding on them. They've had three other CR+3 encounters so far in the campaign, and in two of them they nearly lost a character.

A good tool is hero points, which you can find rules for in the PRD. The hero point rules allows you as a game master to throw tougher encounters at the PCs, and give them a little bit of a buffer between them and a gruesome death.

Because you're right, you don't want to kill your PCs, you want to challenge them. Death should be a possibility in every fight, but not the goal of a fight from a design perspective.

Also, if you want them to take the risks seriously, you might try eliminating raise dead and the like from the game, or make it hard to get.

One last tip, hit them with a variety of threats. Not every opponent just has to use attack rolls vs. AC. Use spellcasters, and creatures with special abilities to really keep them on their toes. Even things like movement powers (like vampires being able to turn into flying mist) can really change the dynamics of a battle.

[Garrett Bishop]

What are you doing giving this away for free? Put it in a book format and make a mint! LOL Just give me a cut as your "Manager" :cool:

[Hibernate_Paths]

Great insights guys, thanks!

[cailano]

What are you doing giving this away for free? Put it in a book format and make a mint! LOL Just give me a cut as your "Manager" :cool:

I'd would seriously be happy if even one player were to read this and then post a campaign that got to at least 1000 posts. So far I don't think any one has been inspired enough by this forum to even start a game. Still... build it and they will come, right?