A brief introduction to this hodgepodge online dump of RPG ideas and notes.
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RPG Industry News
A collection of links and latest headlines about RPG-related websites.
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RPG Podcasts
The Adventure Zone, One-Shot, Film Reroll, Happy Jacks, Imaginary Worlds, Hello From The Magic Tavern and more.
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STA2e Complication Ideas
Idea for creating negative traits from botched task dice rolls.
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Encounter: The Memory Eaters
An idea meant to evoke emotional impact from psychic damage.
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Fantasy Story Gods: What? Why? How?
Stealing from ideas from The Silt Verses TTRPG.
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D&D Stats: Ridder Joost Vanderbruuk (Lvl 9)
Level up to 9, adds proficiency increase, 3rd level Paladin spells, Abjure Foes
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D&D Stats: Ridder Joost Vanderbruuk (Lvl 8)
Level up to 8, adds Heavy Armor Mastery.
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Realis RPG 101
A diceless narrative space fantasy game by Austin Walker.
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D&D Stats: Tainzer Spoor (Lvl 7)
Backup character for Jason’s D&D campaign, starting at to level 7.
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D&D Stats: Ridder Joost Vanderbruuk (Lvl 7)
Character for Jason’s D&D campaign, leveled up to 7.
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Some D&D Combat Tactics
Ideas to parley, use diversions, make better attacks, and flee when necessary.
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Curse of Strahd Magical Loot
Game stats for acquired magical items.
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D&D Stats: Ridder Joost Vanderbruuk (Lvl 6)
Character created for Jason’s D&D campaign.
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Curse of Strahd Campaign Notes
This time I get to be a player character for once!
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The Shortest TTRPG Rules Ever
Roll 2d6, get 9 or more or spend a story token to succeed.
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My Ridley Scott-iverse Headcanon
The Alien/Prometheus, Blade Runner, Predator, and Raised By Wolves shows all happen in a shared universe.
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STA2e Rules Notes, Glossary, Momentum and More
Some clarifications on terms used in Star Trek Adventures Second Edition.
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How Much Did It Cost In The Past?
A rule-of-thumb guide for estimating U.S. dollar values between time periods.
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Homebrew Rule: No Dice Failures
Instead of success or failure, attempt always work but player must choose at what cost.
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Chaosium’s Basic Roleplaying Rules
Notes on mashing up BRP with some patchwork houserules.
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Another Homebrew RPG Idea
Another homebrew idea, Frankenstein of ideas from D&D5e and BRP (Chaosium’s Basic Role Playing/Call of Cthulhu system), with a few bits borrowed from Marvel Multiverse RPG and GURPS.
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Range and Scale Benchmarks
Some generic range bands for any rpg-like comparisons (may vary per game system).
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Sci-Fi Equipment Lists
Sample personal “starting gear” lists from science-fiction role-playing games.
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Terraforming Steps
Some steps along the way to making an exoplanet livable for humans.
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Otherwhere (Summer 2024)
A brief recap of the D&D5e game played on Roll20 during summer 2024.
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Setting Up “Hard Sci-Fi” Settings
What would a “hard sci-fi” setting look like without any “magic sci-fi tech” cheats?
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The Inevitable Machine Uprisings
Some thoughts on why and how the machines will kill us all.
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100 NPC Types
Seeds to prompt personalities for minor non-player characters.
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Tricks, Minor Curses and Magical Complications
Colin McLaughlin’s ideas for minor complications from using magical portals.
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Fast Starship Combat Rules
Some ideas for a quick-and-dirty starship RPG rules set.
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Notebook of Star Trek-isms
Random notes about details from the Star Trek universe.
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Star Trek Prime Timelines Headcanon
Why there must be two “Prime Timelines” in Star Trek.
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Fast RPG v0.8
Yet another homebrew set of tabletop role-playing rules to playtest.
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D&D 5e House Rules, Take Two
A list of common Dungeons & Dragons 5e house rules, and some new ideas to consider.
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Fast Traveller 0.8
Version 0.8 of my re-edit of classic Traveller rules.
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On DMing Faeries and Fey Pledges
Some ideas on fey encounters and making pledges with such creatures.
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Stanton’s DM Screen
A peak at my cribnotes for running 5e-based games, including credit on some great reference sources.
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My MCU+ Timeline (+ X + FF)
List of news headlines includes only events as the general public would understand…
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Marvel Multiverse RPG Cheatsheet
Some quick reference notes on Matt Forbeck’s rules.
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Hey ChatGPT, Make Me Some Wargame Rules
An experiment in AI game design using some prompts into ChatGPT-3.5, circa October 2023.
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Trait System RPG Idea
Updating my 30-year-old RPG design project notes, started way back in the early 1990s. Uses d20s only, no ability scores, and players roll for all task outcomes.
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Another RPG Ruleset In Progress
Brainstorming a sort of D&D-Cypher hybrid rules idea…
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LARP Character Magical Powers
I found the following character abilities in some mid-1990s LARP rules I made for con events in Wisconsin.
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Animal Spirit Powers
A sampling a possible abilities gained by channeling animal spirits.
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AD&D1e to 5e Conversions
When running old AD&D1e modules for D&D 5e adventures, follow these guidelines
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Sci-Fi Space Travel Speeds
Some notes cribbed from various sources on sunlight and faster-than-light starship speeds in popular science-fiction worlds.
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Questions to Make Character Bonds
This exercise is designed to help players create character bonds through debts, rivalries, and shared past experiences. Position players in a circle (around a table
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Coup: Rules & Notes
Notes on how to play the card game “Coup.”
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Exandria Condensed Timeline
A condensed timeline of Matt Mercer’s Exandria campaign setting
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Magic Item Shopping In Ank’Harel
Quick rules on shopping for specific magical items sought on the streets of Ank’Harel.
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Sci-Fi Environmental Standards
Taking a guess at what the “air” inside most spaceports and starships must be like in the Traveller Universe.
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Marvel Superheroes FASERIP Redux
The Marvel Superheroes Role-Playing Game rates abilities by descriptive ranks, each used to roll percentile dice (d100) to measure results on the Universal Results Table.
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Describing Fiends
Ways to describe encounters with demons, devils, and other unholy creatures spawned from the Lower Planes.
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Imperial / Metric Conversions For D&D
Loose estimates rounded for narrative/gaming purposes.
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D&D 5e House Rules
A list of house rules I tend to use in Dungeons & Dragons 5th edition games.
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Call Of The Netherdeep: Game Notes
A crash course in Matt Mercer’s campaign setting ahead of playing the module released in March 2022.
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Otherwhere: Game Session Notes
SESSION 0: A SUMMONS TO OLYA’S (9/8/2021) The mage-merchant Olya summons a group of adventurers in service to him to gather at his shop within
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Otherwhere: Cast Of Characters
A brief summary of player character bios.
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Otherwhere: Peoples And Places (2021)
A “mythological theme park” of ancient cultures and classic fantasy tropes: the fall of Atlantis, pantheons of mischievous gods, nations of human and non-human peoples, the struggle between order and chaos, and lands conjured out of dreams.
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5e Custom Character Traits
Some ideas on character customization.
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D&D5e Action Economy
A breakdown look at RAW, plus a couple of house rules.
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Magical Healing 101
A comparison of what magic fixes what injuries.
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Rime Of The Frostmaiden Log
Campaign session notes for playing Icewide Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden, with two major changes: The setting has been moved to Blackmoor in the World
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Campaign Timeline: The World Of Greyhawk
A revised historical timeline with significant player character events noted.
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Micro Fast Traveller 2.1
Even shorter version of ttprg rules for Traveller.
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Roll20 User Notes
Some reference notes on using the VTT Roll20 platform.
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Sci-Fi Technobabble
Nonsense words to use at the table to sound like a starship engineer or doctor.
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D&D5e: Expanded Conditions & Abilities Glossary
Notes on conditions, common abilities, and a few house rules.
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Sci-Fi 5e Medicines And Equipment
Some homebrew items for a science-fiction flavor to D&D5e.
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Rime Of The Frostmaiden: Blackmoor On Oerth
Details about the archbarony in the Greyhawk setting.
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D&D5e: Prices For Spellcasting Services
A houserule on the price and availability of hiring spellcasters.
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D&D5e: Magic Item Prices
A shopping list for magical items and spellcasting services.
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White Plume Mountain Log
Notes on an adventure to recover three missing magical weapons guarded within a taunting wizard’s dungeon built into an active volcano.
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Subtle Spellcasting House Rule
A clarification on spellcasting.
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Faster Combat Tips
Cribbed from several YouTube videos and blog sites…
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Renewing My Old City Of Greyhawk Campaign
Background notes on revising my college-days D&D campaign.
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Gamma World for D&D 5e
Notes for playing Gamma World using the D&D 5e ruleset.
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Dirty Tricks Of The Evil Spellcaster
Uses D&D5e PHB spells for espionage – surveillance, sabotage, psyops and assassination.
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Valerie Valusek’s City Of Greyhawk Map Annotated
Links to view a version of the City Of Greyhawk map with key locations labeled.
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The Xro Dinn Chronicles RPG
A quick outline about a sci-fi role-playing game from 2001.
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My Campaigns’ Metaplot
What I’ve noticed as a consistent theme in campaigns I’ve run, and how they can be made to fit together into an ongoing cosmic mystery.
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Why Does The King Send You On Adventures?
Besides the chance for fame, treasure and glory, what’s your personal link to the ruling king?
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Shorthand Stats For D&D Monsters
Text crib notes for D&D monster stats.
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Sample Riddles
Riddles stolen from a bunch of different sources.
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Fiend Rationales
Even the most primally evil beings in the multiverse consider themselves “good” from their own points of view…
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Sample Fantasy Character Equipment Lists
DUNGEONEER’S GEAR (AD&D) Adapted from Advanced Dungeons & Dragons. A melee weapon (longsword or battleaxe common). Leather armor (or better, unless forbidden). A waterskin (2
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Role-Playing Mini Codes Of Honor
I once wrote up playing card-sized OD&D character sheets that included three guidelines to remember when role-playing characters. Some were distilled down from the “code
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The Outlands (Revised)
What if Planescape was run without Sigil?
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House Rules For Modern 5e
Some rough ideas on using the Dungeons & Dragons 5th edition ruleset for other genre games.
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The Entity MacGuffin
Idea for a shared horror meta-plot across multiple games in which Nyarlathotep, Tharizdun, the Elder Elemental Eye and The Wyrm are all the same malevolent cosmic being.
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Top Secret: New World Order Notes
Some initial notes on the 2018 reboot version of Merle M. Rasmussen’s original espionage role-playing game.
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Fantasy Timelines
Example timelines of some Dungeons & Dragons campaign backstories.
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Speed Benchmarks
A range of movement rate examples per 6-second round.
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Heat And Power Benchmarks
Random notes on temperatures.
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Star Trek Fast Traveller
Notes for running a Traveller game in the Star Trek universe.
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T.I.M.E Stories Rules
A summary of basic rules to Space Cowboys’ “decksploration” board game.
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Adventures In Middle-Earth 5e
Some early notes on the D&D sourcebook / conversion of THE ONE RING role-playing game.
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D&D5e: Inspiration Hack
An alternative method for determining when and how a character gains Inspiration during play.
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D&D5e: Downtime Activities
Notes about what characters may do between adventures. More roll-play than role-play but nice to have some guidelines for DMs and players to set expectations.
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D&D5e: Magic
Notes about spellcasting, magic items and guidelines for effects and limitations in play.
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D&D5e: Skill & Tool Use
Notes about ability checks and various proficiencies, plus clarification on the “Hide” action.
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