Campaign Mastery

Weather At Sea can be considered to comprise several of the unluckiest things that can and will happen to a ship, so it’s somewhat appropriate that this is the dominant subject of the thirteenth part of this series! Believe it or not, the entire weather system presented in the post was designed on a single […]

Finally! After the diversions caused by Rafts and boats, today the series focuses on Ships at sea, with a bonus sci-fi section or two on the side. The original plan was to also include Weather at Sea and Exotic Transportation Modes but the former has quickly grown to the point where the post would not […]

Running a campaign is a lot easier if there’s a clear process that maximizes opportunities for success and avoids the worst traps and pitfalls. Campaign Mastery has again been recognized as one of the top 20 blogs devoted to the subject of RPGs. Given the caliber of the opposition, I consider this to be a […]

Today’s post focuses on Rafts and small boats like Kayaks and Canoes. The defining trait of such vessels is that while they can have sails, their primary motive power derives from the use of oars or paddles. It’s taken quite a bit longer than I intended, due to a fundamental truism of publishing, at least […]

Rivers provide a natural alternative to roads and overland travel, if the river happens to go where you want it to. That’s more likely than it might initially seem, because rivers provide natural resources and defenses that make them natural locations for settlements, with transportation of cargo a bonus on top of those advantages. Table […]

I was recently offered the opportunity to review a copy of Mythwoven, a new RPG supplement by Sphynx Tale Games, by the Author Brett Moore. His description sounded intriguing: a collaborative worldbuilding game designed to enhance session 0 and immerse players in the game world’s lore. From the additional details that his email disclosed, I […]

The last installment of the third Chapter of the series looks as worker productivity and how race and other factors influence it. It’s been an interesting 2025 so far, characterized by things going wrong in unexpected and unusual ways and recovering from those problems. It actually started on New Year’s Eve, when I rebooted my […]

The 3rd of 4 posts looking at everyday personnel in Trade focuses on the Labor Unit and how to use it to make GMing a business easier. Today’s post starts with a couple of short sections that were inadvertently left out of last week’s examination of carts. They had been written, but not where they […]

It’s my contention that with every encounter, the canny GM will expand on the lore surrounding the creatures encountered. I’ve been plugging away steadily at the next part of the Trade In Fantasy series, in which a lot of the elements discussed start to come together into a coherent picture of the processes, but it’s […]

The 2nd of likely four posts looking at everyday personnel in Trade. In this part, Beasts of Burden, Provisions, Carts, and Wagons. For anyone wondering at the cause of the delay, just look at the number of tables that I’ve ended up using in this post – then remember that each of them has to […]

The first of at least three posts looking at everyday personnel in Trade. This covers everything from wagon drivers to guards to dock-hands and farmhands. Anybody who can be considered a faceless cog in the trade machine, in fact! Credit where it’s due: The series title graphic combines three images: The Clipper Ship Image is […]

There are six types of skill roll modifier that I take into account when assessing any attempt by a character – PC or NPC – to carry out some task. Past articles have focused on just a few of them; this post is intended to provide an overview of the whole. I worked on the […]