A table top role playing game is a bit different from an MMORPG or some other activity.  Not all of the parts and pieces may be readily available.  Things like character sheets, minis, dice and so forth are the responsibility of everyone involved.

In addition there are often some responsibilities that need to be dished out as well.  Mapping, treasure division, leadership roles, tracking initiative and any number of other administrative tasks need to be handled.  Often the DM will handle some of these for the players, often she will not.

There are a couple of ways of making these assignments.  Where possible I recommend asking for volunteers.  Someone who wants to do a job is more likely to do a good job at it than someone who doesn’t really want the responsibility.  It is important to remember that these assignments don’t necessarily have to be role played.  The player drawing the map may not be the character drawing the map.  This makes it so that the fighter in the party doesn’t have to be walking around with a piece of paper in his hand rather than a shield.

Helping out with these tasks can take a lot of the burden off of the DM.  This in turn will make the game run more quickly and smoothly.  If the DM is not having to worry about whose turn it is she may be able to put more effort into the witty remarks of the NPC noble.

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A small town differs from a village not only in size, but also in feel and scope.  Whereas a village will have but a few houses and perhaps an inn or one shop or irregular market, a small town will have greater organization.

Some of the houses will at least look permanent.  There will probably be at least three or four places of business.  Some degree of trade will have been established with both larger and smaller towns, cities and villages in the area.

For the designer this means a couple of things.  First it means that there will be more NPC’s.  This also means that the players will have more options.  There will also be more buildings.  This could mean that you have to go through a ton more work than you would in order to design a village, but in truth you don’t have to do that much more work.

In order to avoid going through a lot of work that is never used, plan the approach and exit of the PC’s.  Are they going to be doing a lot of clue hunting or adventuring in the town?  If not, why not?  What is going to motivate them to move on?  If they are going to stay, why?  Where will the action take place?

If there are three inns or taverns in the town, most likely they will choose only one to deal with.  They may make superficial inquiries to all three, but will probably settle on one as the primary base of operations in that town.  I suggest making one grid of the inn.  Make it complete, but don’t put any names on it.  Whatever inn they happen to choose gets to be that inn.

The same principle would hold true for any guilds, major houses or other places of interest.  There may be multiple, but the adventure will only happen in one of them.

This simplicity can be assured by providing little of interest in the other options.  If there are no NPC’s, no treasures, no clues and so forth the players will tire and move on to the interesting bits.  Make sure that the interesting stuff really is interesting and as fully developed as you can make it so that the players enjoy it.

Another part of capturing the essence of a town is giving it a purpose and a feel to it that fit well with your campaign.  The predominant race will give clues about what is readily available and what is scarce or entirely unavailable.  The age of the town will help determine the types of buildings, the level of influence that different people have in the community, and the sources of income.  Capturing this flavor can go a long way towards convincing the players that it is worth their while to stop and explore.

Like any other aspect of campaign building, making a town should be fun!

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There are lots of ways to enjoy playing any class, but the rogue (and perhaps the warlock) offers more opportunities to play with the information available to the other characters.

Dungeons and Dragons is a game of many dimensions.  The opportunity to hack through monsters and snag the nifty lootz is always a lot of fun.  Exploring strange new worlds and discovering new creatures is part of what draws us to fantasy.  Interacting with others, however, is what draws us to tabletop gaming.

Choosing a sneaky character (not necessarily a stealthy character) opens up many options for interacting with the other players in interesting ways.  If they do not know for sure what class you are playing they will act differently in different situations.  If they are not sure that they can trust you they will act differently.  If they are not sure what abilities you possess or what the true limits of your powers are they will treat you differently than scout/disarm.

Yes, playing up the personality of your rogue will add time to the game and slow down the pace a bit.  This isn’t for everyone.  However it has a lot of rewards beyond just gold and magic items.  Many DM’s will not reward this style of play with experience points and some may be unfamiliar with it altogether, but the intangible rewards are real and exciting.

Be cautious when interacting with other players.  Understand that creating barriers between characters can undermine the effectiveness of the party in dangerous situations.  Don’t hold back in a crisis just to prove a point.  Letting other characters die or suffer serious setbacks can create very real metagame effects such as getting a drink dumped in your face.

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Sometimes a player finds himself in a party of players that for whatever reason they feel that they are simply carrying the party and that everyone else is just there to leech off of his or her well optimized character and strategy.  Sometimes these same players are leading the party and making decisions and at the end of the night they feel exhausted rather than excited by what happened during the session.

What to do?

First, realize that the game really is about having fun and if you aren’t having fun then you need to change something.  Often this step, as simple as it may sound isn’t usually very easy to take.  The player described here often feels a great deal of pride in their ability to min/max any situation so they are reluctant to be humble enough to admit that perhaps the problem lies not with the other players but with their own play style.

Learning that supporting the party does not mean running the party can be a hard lesson to learn – one usually learned only after being asked politely (or not so politely) to find another group.

Supporting the party is a combination of finding opportunities to step up and take over a situation and sitting back and letting the others work it out.  Most of the time the other players will be able to come up with a solution to nearly any problem.  Letting them work through it will help them learn the game and help them enjoy it more.  If they turn to you for help then so much the better.  If they don’t, no worries.  Focus on the aspects of the game that you enjoy the most and give yourself a break at other times.

One trick that often helps is to focus very carefully on the role-playing aspects of the character.  Focus on the character’s personality.  Would that mage really use the same solution to get through this trap that the fighter you played three characters ago used?  Is this rogue really so altruistic as to care if the cleric gets hurt in a fight she started?

Whatever solution you find, make sure it is one that makes the game fun to play!

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Making a battle grid is essentially as simply as making a large piece of graph paper with 1” by 1” squares.  One question that comes up from time to time is choosing the size of battle grid to use.

There are two ways to approach this question, but they all tend to come down to the size of the encounter that will be used.  If you are going to use a magnetic battle grid, then the size will be determined by the size of magnetic surface that you purchase.  I recommend getting the largest that can be most easily moved, usually 18” x 36”.

If you are doing something more fancy, like dwarven forge or some other 3D dungeon then be sure that all of your rooms are large enough for a battle to easily take place.  In general anything smaller than 3”x3” is going to be too small for maneuverability and players with fat fingers will have difficulty.

No this is not realistic.  There are no buildings that I know of where the smallest rooms are 15’ x 15’.  Most bedrooms are 10’ x 10’ and there is plenty of room for more than 4 people in most of them, but this is one aspect of the game where realism really does get in the way of the fun.

If possible, I would really recommend that you keep your rooms in general to at least 4 squares wide or deep, and all passageways should be at least 2 squares wide.  This will make for more tactical choices as well as allow for more terrain options and features.  Also players will appreciate the added room for their hands.

Be sure to have fun with it!

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The 4th edition Players Handbook outlines various party roles, defender, controller, striker, and leader but this article has nothing to do with those roles.  What I want to address today is the oft controversial role of party leader – the guy who does most of the talking to NPC’s and who makes most of the major decisions, i.e. which way to go next.

I need to make it absolutely clear to anyone new to the game that any character of any race or class can be party leader, and in fact the responsibility can (and probably will) shift from player to player throughout the campaign.

There are two common misconceptions about being party leader.  First that it is fun.  Second that it is not fun.

Some people feel completely left out.  They feel like the person in the leadership position is stealing their thunder or pushing them to the side.  While this can happen, usually it is not the case.  Usually they aren’t even trying to be leaders.  They just like playing and don’t take time to notice that the other players have something to add.

This brings us to the first responsibility of leadership within the D&D game.  If you are party leader, then your primary job is to make sure that everyone is included and that all party resources are being utilized.  All too often someone who assumes (or is given) the job of party leader feels like they need to solve problems by themselves.  Most times problems can be more easily solved by pooling resources than by tackling them solo.

This can make being party leader sound very unfun.  After all if the other players blame you for leaving them out and making their game unfun that can be a big negative.  So what do you do?  Have fun first.  Learn to balance your needs with the needs of the other players.

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Characters die in Dungeons and Dragons.  It is basically a given.  It will happen.  There is no point crying about it, whining about it, or pretending that it won’t happen or that it didn’t happen.  It has happened, will happen, and it will happen to you or to someone you know.

Unfortunately there are some times when character death actually is a very bad thing.  Some of this has to do with the game and some of it is part of the metagame.

-    When it cripples the party.  If a character’s death cripples the party to point that they can no longer function this can be a bad thing – usually because it leads to Party Wipe.  There is a fine line between making things more challenging and crippling them to the point it is no longer fun.
-    When it causes Party Wipe.  If one character’s death leads to the loss of the party then it is a bad thing.
-    When it is unfun for everyone.  Most times players handle character death without too much trouble – especially if they play in my group for very long.  We all like a challenge and accept that sometimes (no matter who is DM’ing) that the dice will roll poorly and things won’t go well and somebody will do something stupid and somebody is going to die.  But if the character death is unfun then it should be avoided.
-    When it has metagame ramifications.  If somebody’s character dies simply because they pissed off the DM’s girlfriend’s dog then more than likely there will be more unfun group dynamics to follow.  This is a situation to avoid.

Character death should be a normal part of a well balanced but challenging adventure with natural consequences for poor choices.  Otherwise it probably is just mean and not very fun.

And what is the game without fun?

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Traps can be one of the most exciting parts of any adventure.  They can also be one of the most disappointing.  Depending on the edition of the game that you are playing traps can be more or less balanced, but more importantly depending on how they are presented they can either wipe out a party or provide no challenge or interest whatsoever.

Probably the single biggest mistake made when creating and presenting traps is that the GM doesn’t think through what will actually happen in the game with the trap.  Either they  figure the party will never see the blatantly obvious pit hidden in the squares that the monsters are curiously avoiding or he figures that it won’t be as bad as it really is when it goes off.

To avoid this problem I recommend playing through the scenario in your own mind.  What is the difficulty of spotting the trap?  Where would the party need to stand in order to see it?  Are there party members who will get passive checks?  How likely is it that they will be in the right place at the right time?  Do the people you play with regularly check for traps?  Yes, I know I am advocating some metagaming here, but if you don’t do it you can really end up with a flop for a trap.

Once you have gauged the party’s likelihood of finding a trap you can then figure out their ability to disarm it.  You know your players.  Are they creative enough to disarm it without getting hurt?  What methods are they likely to use?  Does anyone have a skill high enough to just disarm it?  What requirements are necessary in order to disarm it?

For examply – let’s say that I’m a really mean DM and I know that my party will search every inch of the dungeon and that they have not just one, but two characters who get passive checks and have the ability to disarm nearly any trap.  But I really want to soften them up or create a dangerous area?  What do I do?  I put the trap in an obvious but inaccessible place.  Fireballs that rain down from a shaft that they can’t get into for example.  The passageway is important, they have to cross it, but they know that they will get blasted.  Not nice, and not recommended for every party.  A lot of parties would take serious damage from such an encounter – perhaps even die.  So be careful.

If the party isn’t likely to see a trap or search for it, then a covered pit of moderate difficulty could be in order.  A pit filled with a pool of acid would outright kill at least one character in the same party, and could very well wipe out the party.  More creative players would probably find a way to deal with the pit of acid.

Even more than monsters, traps need to be thought out and tailored specifically to the party.  A party can always run away from the monsters.  They often won’t get past the first round with a trap.

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So you may find yourself in the unfortunate situation of not owning your own printer, and yet you really want to have all the latest and greatest stuff for your D&D game.  What can you do?

Here are some options that I have tried in the past.

-    Use the printer at school or work.  Be a bit careful about this one.  Check with your company’s policy or school rules first, but most places are pretty lenient when it comes to printing up a few things especially if you are willing to do it on your own time and not company time.
-    Borrow your friend’s printer.  Again, be responsible here.  Buy your own paper and throw in an ink cartridge if you print a lot of stuff – especially color.  Those cartridges are expensive.
-    Just make copies.  Copy machines are plentiful.
-    Print at the library.  Most public libraries these days will allow you to print just about anything and the cost is reasonable (unless you are trying to print off entire books).
-    Print online using any number of online print services like fed-ex kinkos.  Though this can quickly get very expensive so I don’t really recommend it.
-    Draw the stuff you want to use on regular paper.  This can be a lot of fun, and often generates some of the most adored character sheets, maps, and just plain fun stuff for the game. The drawback here is that it takes a lot of time and more than likely you will make many mistakes and have to start over again and again and again.
-    Finally you could just go out and buy a printer.

Whatever your choice, have fun with it.

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There are a lot of different board games available, from Monopoly to Risk, and most of us have played many of them.

These games can be a valuable resource when creating props for your table top role playing sessions.  Everything from tokens to money to dice can be found in different board games.

Game boards themselves can be used as backing for maps and battle grids.  The usefulness of board games as sources of props is limited only by your imagination.

I know at my house that we have several games that are no longer played.  A few moments of time has turned up a variety of objects that have proved useful.  If you don’t have any lying around then check your local second hand store.  Many times these games can be picked up for about a dollar – often because they are missing some element such as the rules or one or two game tokens.  These can quickly and inexpensively be turned into props for your game.

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If you have a magnetic game field then you have a couple of options for doing walls for your dungeons.

The easiest is simply to use a dry-erase marker and draw in the features that you need for each area of the dungeon.  This is fairly efficient and not a bad way to go at all.  But if you are in the mood for something that adds a bit of dimension to the game without getting too complicated, then you can try walls.

The easiest way to do it is to get some 1” by ¼” wooden strips.  You can find wood used for trim at any hardware store.  They come in nice thin strips of long lengths that can be easily cut down to any size you need.

Next, glue some thin magnetic tape to one edge of the wood.  That’s it.  Really simple, and really effective.  You can build rooms as quickly or even more quickly than you can draw them.

As always, have fun!

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Metagaming – everything that happens outside of the game – is going to happen.  There is nothing you can do as a player or DM to stop it.  Whether it is simply the players discussing what roles they want their characters to play in the upcoming campaign (in order to build a well-rounded party), or running out and buying every pre-made module in order to know the DM’s next move – metagaming will happen.

So what do you do about it?

There are a lot of options, and a lot of opinions.  Some say embrace it.  Most say fight it and put a stop to it.

My recommendation is to direct it, as comfortably as possible in a direction that fits your interests and tastes.  What I am talking about here is being as open and honest with your gaming group about what you feel is an appropriate level and type of metagaming.

If, at the table you prefer that everything be said in character, then let people know.  Perhaps propose that a session or a portion of a session is run according to your style.  By opening the discussion you are enabling the other players to bring out their opinion and increasing the likelihood that they will support your opinion.

If you fight it – especially in a confrontational manner I can pretty much guarantee that you will get nowhere.  Most likely you will frustrate and alienate other players.  At best you will get them to abide by your rules just long enough for them to find another game.

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This is a problem for a number of players.  They believe that their DM is simply out to get them.

Real or imagined, this can be a huge problem for enjoying the game.  So what do you do?

Realistically, no matter the actual cause of the problem there is only one answer.  Talk about it.  Don’t be confrontational or a jerk.  Just bring up the problem and ask what is going on.

It is entirely probable that whatever the true source of the problem is has nothing to do with anything that you have considered to this point.  It is also highly probably that the problem can be easily resolved.

A lot of people make the mistake of whining about the problem instead of dealing with it and drag the baggage around for months or even years before quitting and finding a different game.  This is unnecessary.  Either the problem is easily resolved or it isn’t, but it will never be resolved until it is confronted.

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