Day 24 Main Prompt: Acclaimed Advice

“Be a fan of your players”

This is one of Karl Rodriguez’ mantras. You can find Karl on The GMologist YouTube channel or on his podcast, The GMologist Presents.

I love this mantra and try to incorporate it in my games. If the players want to try something, let them. If it is likely to get them killed make sure they understand that too. If something happens and there is a chance they could survive help them look up the rule, or take a minute to look up the rule yourself, to give them every opportunity to survive. An example of this was during an AD&D 1E session run by the M.W. Lewis from The Worlds of MW Lewis podcast and author of the module The Mystifying Marvel of Nicomeiden’s Tower which you can buy here on Amazon. During the session a drunk cleric in plate mail fall out of a boat. M.W. gave us a chance to grab him, gave him saving throws, and looked up the rules for drowning in the various AD&D books to make sure every possibility was exhausted.

This does not mean you should fudge dice! If the player character dies, they die. The cleric in the example I just mentioned ended up drowning but it was no fault of the GMs and death is part of these games.

It does mean that you should not gloat when a PC dies and you should cheer when things go well for them. Do not bemoan the fact they one shotted your big bad, be happy for them!

The attitude of the GM goes a long way towards the overall feeling of the session. I do not believe it is the GM’s job to entertain their players, a role playing game is a group effort, but a negative GM can really put a damper on a session.

Day 24 Alternate Prompt: Antique and my d10 roll is a 3, Write a Bulletin Board Quest

Wanted: Internet Researcher and Antiquarian.

Assistance needed in finding unique antiques that were inadvertently sold. Discretion mandatory. Pay good. Some field work required. Current life insurance policy and living will highly recommend. Inquire at Vendredi’s Antiques, ask for Micki.

That’s all for today, until tomorrow be excellent to each other!

August is #RPGaDay2024 and I am going to posting daily responses to the prompts. You can find more information about #RPGaDAY2024 here: https://www.autocratik.com/2024/07/announcing-rpgaday2024-for-august.html

There are two sets of prompts this year and since I have room to do so on the blog I will answer both. In episode S2E6 of my podcast titled RPGaDAY2024 Panel Discussion I assemble an esteemed panel and we go through the main prompts for the entire month’s so I will try to give different answers here on the blog but may end up repeating myself occasionally.  

On their podcast Mirke the Meek suggested using the alternate prompts to create a setting and that is a great idea so I’m going to steal that. The setting I am going to craft for this month will be a modern, conspiracy style setting. Nominally I think we’ll set it in the 1970’s to avoid the problems cell phones and the internet can cause if player characters have access to them.

Here are the main prompts:

And here are a set of alternative prompts suggested by Skala Wyzwania, look at the day on the left, pick the theme, then roll d10.