Tag Archives: #badgmtips

#BadGMtips

Posted by grimachu on

From yesterday’s Twitter madness:

From @Grimachu

  • Having trouble getting players to listen to your descriptions? Pay R. Lee Ermey to shout them instead.
  • To increase randomisation ‘train’ your cat to chase dice.
  • Don’t play Conspiracy X, it’s ALL TRUE!
  • Create the RIFTS atmosphere by injecting your players with testosterone and LSD, then bashing their skull with hammer
  • Help counter power-creep in your games by replacing experience points with head.
  • Make your rolls better by clubbing a leprechaun to death with your dice bag
  • If they give you lip, threaten to outsource your players to India.
  • Tattoo important rules onto your body so you always have them to hand.
  • Play Exalted with more than four players.
  • Use your moobs to conceal dice rolls from your players.
  • Save on game prep time by not learning the rules.
  • Recreate a NASA feel for your SF game by filling your play room with 70s computers and giving everyone’s money to a soldier.
  • Form an all-star player group to show your group how it’s done, GMS, Justin Achilli, Me, Ron Edwards and RPGPundit would be a good start.
  • Increase game immersion by running LOTR entirely in Sindarin.
  • Defeat Rules Lawyers by claiming The Terrorists Win if you uphold their complaint.
  • Justify out of character shitty behaviour by NPCs with the phrase ‘bitches be crazy, yo’.
  • Get tips on suspension of disbelief from Col. Gadaffi.
  • Don’t feel like GMing? Summon the unquiet spirit of Gary Gygax, ask him about 4e and then have him run Tomb of Horrors.
  • Get the best out of your game by threats to start a new one with blackjack and hookers.
  • Show your players how it’s done by introducing a GM PC to pick up the slack when they fail.
  • Medical waste is a great source of game props.
  • Increase player attendance by having their partner and children killed by the Serbian Mafia.
  • Get your players emotionally invested in the game by sleeping with them.
  • Want to get more girls to play in your games? Rohypnol.
  • Create a peasant look by eating 1lb of sugar pulling out three teeth and smoking this will also give you a medieval lifespan.
  • Your descriptions aren’t good enough to scare players in horror games? Keep Goatse flashcards to hand.
  • Having attendance trouble at your sessions? Addict your players to crack. They’ll come back!
  • Create that all important Steampunk atmosphere by playing up a chimney and smacking any female player who opens their mouth.
  • Beholder encounter? Shine a high-powered laser pointer at your player’s eyes.
  • Worried about cheating? Make everyone play naked and roll their dice for them.
  • Give that session of  Gamma Worldan authentic edge by feeding your players polonium in their pizza.
  • Make that inn-based downtime a session to remember by dressing up a homeless man as a wizard and hiring prostitutes to be wenches.
  • Add verisimilitude when the adventure in the sewers by shitting your pants during the game.
  • Condition your munchkins to avoid combat by slapping them in the face every time they take damage

From @Cavalorn

  • Amuse and amaze players by explaining that the gruelling six-hour dungeon they have just laboured through was ‘all an illusion’.
  • Add that indefinable ‘Ridley Scott’ atmosphere to your games by setting fire to some rags in a plastic bucket.
  • If the text says ‘read this aloud to your players’, then you’d better fucking do it. If you mess up, just start all over again.
  • Don’t neglect player handouts! They’ll never forget the trouble you went to when you use proper offal.
  • Don’t waste cash on expensive miniatures. Langoustines make ideal Mi-Go and one block of lard can yield over 50 Gelatinous Cubes.
  • Pyramidal dice make ideal caltrops when players try to flee.
  • Avoid the age-old problem of stained, unwashed gamer clothing by simply GMing naked.
  • Remind your dice who is in charge by ‘executing’ the ones who ‘fail you’ with a hammer.
  • Save valuable playing time and avoid arguments by simply telling players what they decide to do next.
  • Authentically recreate Olde English speech by simply adding ‘-eth’ to the end of every word.
  • Plastic ‘pizza savers’ make ideal towers for unambitious wizards.
  • Bring ‘power gamers’ down to size by insisting they suck helium from a balloon before being allowed to speak.
  • Cultivate players’ attachment to their characters by enacting a simple ‘one nose hair pulled per hit point lost’ rule.
  • Keep an air horn ready under the gaming table to liven up dull ‘what shall we do next’ moments.
  • Simulate the tension of a collapsing dungeon ceiling by dunking a hob-nob in hot coffee and holding it above your player’s head.

From @Fnordland
The Rules are there for everyone’s benefit. If they won’t play by them, sue your players.

From @Pookie_uk
Increase game immersion by making Hobbits in a LOTR kneel barefoot throughout and Elves stand on chairs