So, a month, eh? (original) (raw)

Peering into the present Like a leopard into a fat land

	ivan23		So, a month, eh? All right, let's try to put some longer stuff out there. I miss you guys and the job isn't going to get any easier anytime soon, so I better get my g__d___ priorities straight.Again, if you want really up to the minute nonsense, you can find me on Twitter of Facebook as IvanEwert. I'm thinking of going ahead and renaming this one to match, as my old paranoia has largely faded away thanks to a combination of therapy and advancing years.The biggest news isn't my own, but we finally launched the Triskele Moon Studios Web site at http://www.triskelemoon.com/ for Leanne's jewelry. Two pieces have sold so far, which is not a bad rate in my opinion, given the lack of advertising and the higher-end nature of the pieces. She's planning to work this week on getting some new stuff up as well, but if you'd like to stop by and pass along your opinion, that'd be awesome.Second biggest news is only partly my own: Grants Pass won the Australian Shadows award for the Edited Publications category! So huzzah to jennifer_brozek and amandapillar for that one, but also, hurray for me - my contribution was called out as a standout story, which gave me a nice kick inside.The news that HASN'T been reprinted anywhere so far is gaming news. I was thinking of trying to write it up for claw/claw/peck, but basically, I've learned two big things about the way I run D&D 4E and how best to make it work for my group.First off: Start the evening with the great big conflict, don't end with it. By ten o'clock two of the dudes are practically asleep, and I'm anxious to get on the interstate home. That makes me rush things, which is no damn good at all. On the other hand, when I kick off with the great big conflict, people stay alert and excited until at least the aftermath ... when the roleplay starts, and our resident "buddy" and "combat monkey" players can afford to drift off.Secondly: Let them pick a great big obvious path with a flashing yellow question mark above an NPC's head. Give them big, broad choices; and make the smaller ones on their behalf. Sandbox play is sadly not their style, and frankly, that makes my life simpler.Thirdly: Spent the g__d___ money on minis, set up interesting combat maps, etc. If they're drooling over Penny Arcade's DM style every month, then it's clear they want the geegaws. _Listen to that and use it._I can't recommend MasterPlan enough to anyone running 4E. As doogs19 puts it, you're basically cheating at being a DM now, because it's so much easier.Next post will be less game-oriented. Honest.

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One caveat: D&D Insider subscription, at least a one-time, is necessary. That imports all the monsters, traps, hazards, magic items, etc into MasterPlan's libraries; and that's the real timesaver.1) I used to have to create encounters by manually flipping through books or pdfs and assigning XP. With MP, I can filter by category and level, and just double-click to add them. The program tracks the XP amount of the encounter and ranks it easy, moderate or hard.2) Treasure parcels can be randomly generated, then modified. So I set up the encounters first, then the parcels, and link them up where they make the most sense.3) Plot Points. A visual map of how encounters tie together. A bit railroady at times but (as mentioned above) that's how my players roll. Also, it lets me create multiple tracks for "this way / that way" and as long as I keep encounter levels more or less equal, it goes fine.4) Running combats. Auto-damage for lasting effects, auto-reminder for saving throws. The only thing this DOESN'T do well is allow you to heal characters with surges, instead, you kind of implement negative damage.

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