this post was submitted on 20 Feb 2025
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Many of us, have read GM-sections in RPG, RPG blogs, forum discussions, and sometimes books about the storytelling art.

All of these contains tons of interesting tips/techniques (and some will contradict each other, you don't GM a gritty mega-dungeon and high-school drama game the same way), so I am curious which ones are your favourite and how do you use them in your game

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[–] Susaga@sh.itjust.works 7 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

A few favourites from the Alexandrian:

  • Don't prep plots. Prep scenarios. If you give the players a goal and a world, they will make the plot themselves, and it'll be more interesting. And it's not like you wouldn't need those things for a railroad plot anyway.
  • Don't plan contingencies. Instead of explaining everything the party could do to get past the guard, just describe the guard. It's a lot more flexible, and it takes less time to prepare.
  • With the 3 clues rule, make sure to have different clue types. If all your clues are pieces of evidence, then a party who prefers to talk to people is clueless.
  • If you feel the need to ask "are you sure you want to do that", there might be a miscommunication to figure out. Maybe you didn't explain the situation clearly, or a player misheard you, or the player has an item to help things work out.
  • When creating a system within your setting (eg, nobility), add two exceptions to the neat and tidy rules. "Each region is ruled by a count, except for those over there which are ruled by comtes." This adds history to your world while making it less daunting to add more exceptions if you need them later.