Reading the book and checking out everything here in the Lab makes me very excited to run a proactive campaign (if only a little anxious to change up my routine, but that’s healthy I guess). Since I haven’t done it yet, I’d like to hear your thoughts on immersion, and particularly the feeling that the world is bigger than the players. When every encounter is tied to the PC’s goals, I imagine that it might break some of that immersion. The players being the center of the universe (”the world’s bellybutton“ like we say in Norway). But what does your players say? I guess one could see the encounters as the scenes relevant to the story, and that all the random encounters and digressions are left on the cutting room floor.

For example: We play Daggerheart, and during a failure with Fear I used the opportunity to show an NPC (Celeste) that the PC thought was dead, retrieving a package on behalf of a faction. This happened at the lobby of high security condo, and she went back to the faction's penthouse via a direct elevator disk entrance. The PC witnessed this from the corner. The Player's goal: - Talk to Celeste My response: - Needs more specificity for me to prep, and I can't prep it unless you tell me how you want to approach talking to her So how much specificity do y'all need before it starts to feel like traditional DnD where players lean on the GM instead of being proactive?

Long time listener, first time caller...I'm Snyder from SW Ohio and I like long walks on the beach...no wait, wrong group...Been DMing for about 5 years now and looking forward to learn more and make my games better. 5E As a fun introduction...I give my players stupid little puzzles that have no bearing on the game. If they solve, it comes with prizes or bonus levels. In my last session, my players found a coin on one of the ̶m̶u̶r̶d̶e̶r̶h̶o̶b̶o̶e̶d̶ bodies from an encounter. On one side was the sigil of Baal/Bhaal and the other a figure with a peg leg. They stewed on it and someone said Diablo 2. I then held up a print out of the difficulty selection screen of Diablo 2 an put the secret cow level on the table. The bonus was refilling 2 spell slots, charges, abilities, or features, their choice.

This Issue: Social Encounters! The second issue our monthly zine, the Game Master's Field Notes, is out now! Written in the style of the Game Master's Handbook series (the Proactive Roleplay and Collaborative Campaign books), these 36+ page issues are packed with advice, articles, mechanics, and encounters suitable for any game. - Articles cover how to make social encounters interesting, easy to run, and avoid over-mechanization - Encounter creation guidelines provide a variety of ways to run social encounters and other challenges in any system - Encounters, built to drop into any game with little to no prep, cover common social encounters your group might undertake at the drop of a hat This issue is currently available to all Gold members, but it'll be up later this week to buy individual on DriveThruRPG and RPGTrader (I'll leave a comment). Gold members also have access to our monthly (returning this month) workshops, every packet we've ever made, and a slew of other game materials/recordings, plus the playtest draft of our upcoming RPG, The Ordained! You can find a writeup about the series as a whole, as well as a preview of the first issue, here: https://www.skool.com/game-masters-laboratory/now-out-the-game-masters-field-notes?p=095e95ad

UPDATE: This issue is now available for purchase at RPG Trader! You can buy it here: https://rpgtrader.com/products/10182/the-game-master-s-field-notes-issue-1 It will be available on DriveThruRPG at a later date as well! The first issue of our new monthly zine, the Game Master's Field Notes, is out now! Written in the style of the Game Master's Handbook series (the Proactive Roleplay and Collaborative Campaign books), these 36+ page issues are packed with advice, articles, mechanics, and encounters suitable for any game. This month's theme: Travel. This issue is currently available to all Gold members, but I'm working on getting it up at DriveThruRPG with our other packets for those who want to purchase individual issues. Gold members also have access to our monthly (returning this month) workshops, every packet we've ever made, and a slew of other game materials/recordings, plus the playtest draft of our upcoming RPG, The Ordained! In the meantime, I've attached a free, shortened preview to take a look through, which you can download right from this post. Each issue contains: - Articles written in the style of the Game Master's Handbook series. These are a essentially condensed book chapters, covering all-new topics. - System-agnostic mechanics suitable for any game, made to be easy-to-use and understand. Each is table-tested and made to encourage proactive and/or emergent roleplaying. - Encounters, ready to drop into any game! These are modular and made specifically for proactive roleplaying games. We're excited to keep the momentum! I'll comment under here once this issue is available on DriveThruRPG (I was hoping to have it up by now, but there's a brief review process and I didn't wanna wait!). For now, Gold members can access it in the Classroom tab alongside all other materials.