Articles from August 2009
Posted by Ravyn on August 31, 2009
Magical rituals have been around as long as magic has been a plot device, for a wide variety of reasons. Sometimes they’re plot-vital, keeping magic from taking a form that would be inconvenient for plot, world, or creator’s sanity; sometimes they’re more indirect-expository, created more to say something about the people who perform them than [...]
Categories: For Roleplayers, For Writers, GM Advice, Magic systems, Player Advice, World-building |
Tags: original posts | 
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Posted by Ravyn on August 30, 2009
Times have changed.
Back in the day, villainy was an easy business to make a big splash in. They didn’t mind the insanity defense, mustache-twirling was considered a useful job skill, and most heroes had a prohibition against killing; you could settle in, fight the same couple of people over and over, slowly advance your plans, [...]
Categories: Generic Villain |
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Posted by Ravyn on August 29, 2009
The mystery I’ve spent the last few weeks writing about wasn’t my first attempt at a mystery; instead, my first had been a while before, as an attempt to see if my group was the type before I hit them with a big one. It crashed and burned. So when I started the second one, [...]
Categories: Impractical Applications, Mystery Month |
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Posted by Ravyn on August 28, 2009
An embedded mystery, or a mystery inserted into a larger plot, poses a unique challenge to its creator, particularly when the narrative is clearly moving in a certain direction and the mystery slows it down. How do I make this sufficiently complex and interesting without it seeming like a way to stall? Do I use [...]
Categories: For Roleplayers, For Writers, GM Advice, Mystery Month, Plot, Technique |
Tags: original posts | 1 Comment »
Posted by Ravyn on August 27, 2009
Who’s on the suspect list? Who have we eliminated? What clues haven’t we come up with explanations for? Who was there on that New Year’s Eve when Minna “Munchkin” Maxwell was found with a bag full of dice shoved down her throat? Did we ever establish a motive for the Looney? Does anyone remember? Why [...]
Categories: Exposition, For Roleplayers, GM Advice, Mystery Month, Player Advice, Plot, Technique |
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Posted by Ravyn on August 26, 2009
One of the biggest challenges in GMing a mystery is making sure that the clues actually point to what you want them to mean. You’d think that wouldn’t be hard, wouldn’t you? That as long as you know what you’re trying to say, that the players should be able to pick it up and follow [...]
Categories: Exposition, For Roleplayers, GM Advice, Mystery Month, Player Advice, Plot, Technique |
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Posted by Ravyn on August 25, 2009
For Mystery Month. Can you guess why?
Nighttime in the big city. The D-4 Detective Agency is on the case, and we’re pretty sure it’s close to the end. There’s The Dame, on the other side of the table with her piles of folders and that screen she always carries. And Clubs, plastic rattling between [...]
Categories: For Roleplayers, Mystery Month, Player Advice, stories |
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Posted by Ravyn on August 24, 2009
Many people run mysteries in their games, but not all of them are successful—and in many cases, the failure can be pinned on the GM. This week, I’m going to discuss ways the GM can inadvertently sabotage her own mystery.
One of the biggest ways to scuttle a mystery is an undefined suspect list. And I [...]
Categories: For Roleplayers, GM Advice, Mystery Month, Plot, Technique |
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Posted by Ravyn on August 23, 2009
Despite the inherently risky nature of our jobs, we Hands of Darkness tend to crave stability. Calm. The ability to carry out our evil plans in peace without some idiot with a Grand Destiny or a four-loaf cleaver getting between us and our goals. And perhaps we’re even good at finding the kinds of people [...]
Categories: Generic Villain |
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Posted by Ravyn on August 22, 2009
When my group went through the mystery I ran for them, it was pretty straightforward, and it might almost have seemed as if I’d only planned for what ended up happening. That wasn’t quite true, though; I’d had several contingencies in play based on a number of factors, and there were a few completely unexpected [...]
Categories: Impractical Applications |
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