W. F. Smith 2/13/24 W. F. Smith 2/13/24

Potion Clues

Advice for identifying the potions you find in dungeons, ideally before quaffing them.

W. F. Smith 8/14/23 W. F. Smith 8/14/23

Social Monsters

Monsters should be more than just a threat in the dungeon to your player characters’ physical health and wellbeing. Here is how to make a monster a threat to their reputation in town.

W. F. Smith 12/28/22 W. F. Smith 12/28/22

Here Be No Product Identity Monsters

File off the serial numbers, take what you want. Also, I talk about and rate some classic (some less so) monsters.

W. F. Smith 12/15/22 W. F. Smith 12/15/22

Hexcrawl Checklist: Part Two

The second part in a comprehensive guide for designing and running your own hexcrawl campaign, which focuses on random encounters, calendars, factions, history and rumors.

W. F. Smith 10/17/22 W. F. Smith 10/17/22

Hexcrawl Checklist: Part One

The first part in a comprehensive guide for designing and running your own hexcrawl campaign.

W. F. Smith 9/19/22 W. F. Smith 9/19/22

Doppelgänger Dos & Don’ts

Advice for bringing the fun of hidden role games to your doppelgänger encounters.

W. F. Smith 7/12/22 W. F. Smith 7/12/22

Encounter Checklist

A checklist you can use to improve your TTRPG encounters.

W. F. Smith 12/21/21 W. F. Smith 12/21/21

Dicember Blogstew

For Dyson Logos’ Dicember Challenge, I address the first 21 prompts in a single blogpost.

W. F. Smith 9/20/21 W. F. Smith 9/20/21

The Keep on the Borderlands is Full of Lies

The Keep on the Borderlands is not what it seems. This reinterpretation of a classic module presents a more vibrant world, ripe for player choice.

W. F. Smith 7/8/21 W. F. Smith 7/8/21

How to NOT Run You Got a Job on the Garbage Barge

No adventure survives contact with the players. And that’s a good thing! I discuss You Got a Job on the Garbage Barge and Canal of Horrors.

W. F. Smith 6/24/21 W. F. Smith 6/24/21

A Better Approach to Deadly Games

Don’t let character death slow down your games. If you want to run a deadly game, you do not need to make it easier to die. To run a deadly game, make it easier to live.

W. F. Smith 3/13/21 W. F. Smith 3/13/21

Maybe Split the Party

A definitive guide to splitting the party or running PvP while keeping all the players at the table engaged with the action.

W. F. Smith 1/18/21 W. F. Smith 1/18/21

How to Run a Mystery in TTRPGs

Advise on running mysteries and reflections on capital-T Truth in TTRPGs. By speaking a fact at the table, you reify that as a Truth. All clues unuttered are merely potential truths, waiting their turn.

W. F. Smith 12/30/20 W. F. Smith 12/30/20

Schrödinger’s Chat: Improving Language Rules in RPGs

The way Dungeons & Dragons handles language is lacking in either realism or fun. In this post, I offer a system that is at least fun, if not particularly realistic.