Campaign Mastery

In part 1, I identified AERO, four roles that the majority of significant NPCs occupy in most adventures or encounters: Ally Enemy Resource, and Opportunist …and then considered the combinations, demonstrating how rich the in-game plot functions of characters became when one of these roles adopted one of the other roles as a secondary function. […]

Most NPCs occupy one of four niches in terms of their impact within an adventure or an encounter: Ally, Enemy, Resource, and Opportunist. I use AERO as a mnemonic to remind me of them. The four roles These four roles define, in broad parameters, how an NPC will interact with the PCs and how that […]

The examination of the consequences to a community being located close to the center of administrative, political, and economic power that is a national capital continues. To recap: So far, I have looked at: Proximity To Power Proximity To Authority Proximity To News Access To Communications Proximity To Trade Proximity To Opportunity Proximity To Fashion […]

When I started writing this article, it was expected to be another short one. I had only 3 or 4 impacts in mind… deeper analysis when I started detailed planning soon dispelled that expectation. Of necessity, I’ve had to break it into smaller pieces… Being close to the population / administration / social center of […]

How do you take three plot ideas and interlink them to make one grand adventure? I’ve often skimmed over this point because it’s usually arisen in the context of campaign planning, so I thought it was high time that I went into it in greater detail. Another reason why I’ve been dodging this discussion for […]

I’ve been holding off on this article for almost 9 months because I wanted to make sure I had an RPG connection. Last week, I finally found it. 2016: The Myth 2016 is perceived to have been a horror year for the loss of celebrities. One famous face or voice left us after another. It […]

You can never tell where inspiration is going to come from. The best you can do is remain alert to the world around you and leap in with both feet whenever you find it. That’s what I was thinking while enjoying a chocolate treat – A mint Aero bar – the other day. For some […]

While this article starts off with political analysis, it leads into the discovery of what appears to be a universal social truth that can be integrated into multiple situations in any RPG. I’ve done my best to avoid coloring the analysis with my own opinions, and have neither intent nor desire to belittle in any […]

Having been delayed 8 hours by a massive spam attack last night (650+ spam in 6 hours – but the effectiveness of my response is clear, only 17 spam made it through my protections while writing this article), it’s back to business. The fact that this is appearing rather less than 8 hours after it […]

We’re part-way through a comprehensive answer to the question, both direct and implied, by Jesse Joseph. Last time out, I repeated the basic advice I would offer to anyone in his situation, and looked at ways to make low-level undead more respectable opponents so that GMs weren’t forced to use Undead Royalty just to have […]

This is not the article that most people will have expected to see in this space. It’s supposed to be the fifteenth shelf of the Essential Reference Library, but that’s taking a lot longer to complete than expected – up to 3 hours per item just to gather and describe all the links, with 66 […]

There were only two DVDs by Derren Brown that were appropriate to the Pulp Reference Library, Items 1175 and 1176, which can be found reviewed towards the bottom of the Twelfth Shelf. These barely scratch the surface of the relevance of this man’s work in a broader RPG context, however, and so I determined to […]