Campaign Mastery

So, here it is: a day late, thanks to the Easter long weekend, but better late than never! Normal Service will be restored next week… in the meantime, enjoy. We’re still working our way through what was originally intended to be Part 4 of this series, believe it or not! Part 1 concerned itself with […]

Two weeks ago I reported on my combat timing and discovered I was taking the longest turns at the table. I vowed the fix this, and Friday’s session bore great results. Here’s the lowdown on how we did so well. Fight To The Death To Lift A Paladin’s Curse The PCs had just finished exploring […]

I was curious to see how long combat encounters last in my Riddleport campaign, and how long my group takes on each turn to do our actions. I surfed around for a long time, looking for the right timer software, and then I finally found it, for the iPad. This is a review of how […]

In part one, you saw how spell details can inspire encounters. In part two today, we continue to walk through the plight of poor Halcos and who the PCs’ enemies plot to prevent them from casting Speak With dead. We also offer tips on how spells can help you design game worlds and regions. We […]

If two people are casting Speak With Dead on the same body, does one get a busy signal? In my Riddleport Pathfinder campaign, an NPC named Halcos was assassinated as the PCs were dragging him away to be interrogated. In reaction, the party plans to bring the body to an allied temple for a Speak […]

This month’s RPG blog carnival theme covers life and death in RPGs. When thinking about what I’d write for the carnival my attention wandered to my Riddleport campaign. There, I spotted how death was a theme in at least two plots. Then another plot. And then another. Soon, I was seeing death everywhere. It makes […]

Drow are soon to make their appearance in my Riddleport campaign. They are part of The Great Game being played out in the background as the characters struggle for fame and power in the pirate city. To help me GM the dark elves I created the following tables and references. Maybe they would be useful […]

I’m using Google Calendar as the in-game calendar for my Riddleport Pathfinder campaign. It started as an experiment, but it’s worked so well I’m making it a permanent addition to how I run the campaign. Perhaps you can do this too. Riddleport is set in Paizo’s world of Golarion, and the calendar in that world […]

Architecture is often an afterthought in campaigns, so it under performs as a GM tool. I’ve set about to fix that for my Riddleport campaign. Here are a few of the ways I’m using building architecture to enhance the campaign, and I describe my thought processes so you can do the same for yours. The […]

In the first post about gods and the Cypher Gate in my upcoming Riddleport campaign several readers supplied great ideas. Thanks to that feedback, I have a better picture of how things are in the pirate city. The secrets of the Cypher Gate as it is in my game, with reader feedback interwoven, are now […]

Characters in my Riddleport campaign will be constructed just from the Pathfinder Core Rules and two regional supplements the group bought for Paizo’s world of Golarion. This is a nice break from the splat book inflation previous D&D 3.5 campaigns of mine have suffered. Further, I’m ruling that exotic arms, armour and equipment will be […]

While I’m using Golarion as the world for my upcoming Pathfinder campaign, I’m making changes to the powers-that-be in a move that is the ultimate change in top-down planning. Spoiler warning: players in my campaign please read no further. A big dynamic in my upcoming Riddleport campaign will be the Ascended – a group of […]