Campaign Mastery

Campaign Mastery is hosting the Sept 2026 Blog Carnival, and the chosen subject is “The Face Of Money”. Next month sees Campaign Mastery host the Blog Carnival once again. The topic I’ve chosen is “The Face Of Money”. The faces on coins and banknotes are a great way to sneak snippets of game lore and […]

A new (?) concept in math / probability that should be part of the risk management planning in any Sci-Fi society – maybe in real life, too. Yes, this is the fourth in a row under the “MozAIc Exchanges” banner. That’s because they’ve had a very long time to build up while I worked on […]

The US Midterms are <100 days away, so these two real-world original political tools might be useful – and in RPGs, too. My goodness but a lot of elements went into creating this logo! Tile effect by Melanie Simon. Background by StockSnap. Atom by Gerd Altmann, Earth by Alexander Antropov, Jupiter by Adis Resic, Rubick’s […]

GMs can take a lot of the strain off by worldbuilding within their encounters. It’s easier than it sounds! Any genre. I’ve been increasingly frustrated lately by dramatic headlines that offer two choices, neither realistic, only for the whole of the content that follows to knock down one of the two and assert that this […]

This post offers a way to create unique original names on the fly, selecting for cultural relevance as you go. It’s another shortish one to help me stay on-schedule while devoting time to the bigger articles to come! I was half-watching a FIFA world cup preview on YouTube when the hosts flashed up a list […]

This quick post offers an adventure idea that works with almost ANY campaign, almost ANY genre. 2 1/2 weeks ago, I started a quick little article, 5-10 paragraphs long. For the last 10 days, every day, I’ve thought “It’s almost finished, any day now it will be done”. The last time I checked, it had […]

There are parallels between Perspective, as used by artists, and how players and PCs will perceive plotlines in an RPG Campaign. Wow, but this turned out to be bigger than I expected. I expected to be able to post it Monday, instead it’s going up today – early Sunday morning in my neck of the […]

How to create and implement new tech into an RPG campaign. This half focuses on sci-fi and the more realistic types of innovation. Fantasy to follow! Strange Tech: Sci-Fi / Superhero I’ve divided this question into two halves, one for Sci-Fi and related genres and one for Fantasy. I’m going to try and put them […]

World-building through an exotic cuisine technique, it’s easier than you might think – AND more effective. This post is one of those ideas that comes to you out of nowhere but, as you’ll see, as a technique, it’s worth sharing. One of the hardest things to do is to convey a sense of the action […]

A question so obvious I don’t think I’ve ever answered it before: Why does a game physics matter? I give 7 reasons. I was working on a future post detailing a speculative (real-world) physics – it’s good stuff, coming soon – when it struck me that I don’t think I’ve ever addressed this fairly fundamental […]

A process for designing & constructing big or complex things, from spells to magic items, castles to space stations, industrial processes to political campaigns, new chemistries to better TVs and AC systems, using something every RPG already has. The real world caught up with me somewhat in the course of writing this article – I […]

A simplified mechanism for the simulation of trade in an RPG where it is not to be the focal point. Background A confluence of thoughts from different sources came together the other day relating to how we assess profit from selling something. I’m not sure it was strong enough to count as a revelation, but […]