Campaign Mastery

Popularity Being popular earns a government a lot of power, though it is always a fragile thing. Think of popularity as a form of temporary affiliation. Popularity is often restricted to a subset of urban society – you can’t please everyone. Strengths With a large amount of consent, a government can rule with fewer objections […]

The city power base series picks up again this week with thoughts about something you will not find in real life, but which affects fantasy cities in a huge way: levels. Think about it – most fantasy RPG systems offer class levels that create huge disparities between those who have them and those who do […]

In the introduction last week I covered the goal of this series, which is to use the idea of power bases – where do fantasy governments, government officials and factions get power and influence? – to make your cities interesting places to adventure. Each part in this series will cover two or three power bases […]

The topic of city government causes GMs big yawns. Other than picking a government type, you find it a difficult city element to make interesting for game sessions, adventures and city design. However, it is an important part of urban environments that should not be ignored. And it does not have to be a difficult […]

I’m interrupting my series on Psionics to bring you this timely post on sports and nation-building… As I write this, the local TV host is replaying highlights from the opening ceremony of the 2010 Commonwealth Games. Since Johnn is Canadian and I am Australian, both Commonwealth countries, we find our respective nationalities on opposing sides. […]

It’s time for another of my occasional Lessons From The West Wing. This draws heavily on concepts put forward in a single episode, Episode 16 of Season 2, “Somebody’s Going To Emergency, Somebody’s Going To Jail”. Some people have decried the episode as one of the weakest in the West Wing’s repetoir, others found it […]

This article deals in subjects that are sensitive issues to a lot of people. Everything contained within is written from a roleplaying context and no judgements are intended regarding the validity of any individual perspective on theology or on any social issues that may be referred to; no offence is intended. It’s just a game, […]

Okay, so for the first time since we started this online magazine/blog, one of us has missed getting a post up. Johnn struck problems with his planned post at the last possible moment, and then tried to rewrite it but missed the deadline; thought that he would be able to get it up a day […]

In the first part of this article, which is only the first installement of a series, I discussed the delivery of uniqueness in an RPG campaign, and derived a definition of doing so to perfection that was achievable in more than a hypothetical sense, that was actually a practical goal: “Perfection in an RPG is […]

In the first part of this article, which is itself just the first installement of a series of articles, I discussed the execution and delivery of uniqueness in an RPG campaign, and derived a definition of doing so “to perfection” that was achievable in more than a hypothetical sense – that was actually a practical […]

In the first part of this article, which itself is the first installement of a series of articles, I discussed the execution and delivery of uniqueness in an RPG campaign, and derived a definition of doing so to perfection that was achievable in more than a hypothetical sense, that was actually a practical goal: “Perfection […]

With a big holiday imminent, today’s post is themed on how to create adventure-filled holidays for your campaigns. It’s one thing to have a date picked in your game world calendar, and another to have a holiday become a living, interactive game element that helps you do some of the legwork for session planning and […]