![RJ Currer](/img/default-banner.jpg)
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RJ Currer
United States
เข้าร่วมเมื่อ 18 เม.ย. 2016
I'm a professional ghostwriter and a DM. I've been playing #dnd since the 90s and DMing #dnd5e since 2015. Let's talk about D&D and storytelling!
How to make NPCs that grow with your campaign | Open Table Campaigns
NPCs are everywhere in TTRPGs, and while not all need more than a sentence or two of descriptions, many recurring NPCs benefit from a little fleshing out. Here's how to make NPCs that will grow with your campaign.
Come play D&D with me! Check out my open tables at startplaying.games/gm/rjcurrer
Find all my D&D and TTRPG content at rjcurrer.com
#dndexperiences #roleplayinggame #ttrpgcampaign #tabletoprpg #dungeonsanddragons #dnd #ttrpg #dnd5e #worldbuilding #storytelling
Come play D&D with me! Check out my open tables at startplaying.games/gm/rjcurrer
Find all my D&D and TTRPG content at rjcurrer.com
#dndexperiences #roleplayinggame #ttrpgcampaign #tabletoprpg #dungeonsanddragons #dnd #ttrpg #dnd5e #worldbuilding #storytelling
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Making and managing TTRPG factions is easier than you think | Open Table Campaign Series
มุมมอง 10221 วันที่ผ่านมา
Active factions are one of the fastest ways to add vibrancy and depth to your TTRPG worldbuilding. And they are a lot easier to create and manage than you might think! I'll show you my method in this continuation of the Open Table Campaign series. Come play D&D with me! Check out my open tables at startplaying.games/gm/rjcurrer Find all my D&D and TTRPG content at rjcurrer.com #dndexperiences #...
Home Base: Make Towns and Cities the Easy Way | Open Table Campaigns #dnd #ttrpg
มุมมอง 23128 วันที่ผ่านมา
Home Base: Make Towns and Cities the Easy Way | Open Table Campaigns #dnd #ttrpg
You're running out of time! How to write a full adventure in an hour. #dnd #ttrpg
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You're running out of time! How to write a full adventure in an hour. #dnd #ttrpg
TTRPG mysteries are easy to write! Here's how. #dnd #ttrpg
มุมมอง 348หลายเดือนก่อน
TTRPG mysteries are easy to write! Here's how. #dnd #ttrpg
Should potions be a bonus action? The answer is less obvious than you might think!
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Should potions be a bonus action? The answer is less obvious than you might think!
Make TTRPG maps in Krita! It's easier than you think...
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Make TTRPG maps in Krita! It's easier than you think...
Create Roleplay-Ready D&D Characters in Minutes
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Create Roleplay-Ready D&D Characters in Minutes
Write exciting TTRPG adventures every time: Understanding adventure structure
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Write exciting TTRPG adventures every time: Understanding adventure structure
RJ Currer: DMs workbench Welcome Video
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RJ Currer: DMs workbench Welcome Video
Hag Heist: Let's Write a 5-Room Dungeon!
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Hag Heist: Let's Write a 5-Room Dungeon!
Let's Make a 5 Room Dungeon! The Sanguine Chapel
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Let's Make a 5 Room Dungeon! The Sanguine Chapel
3 tips for writing your very first campaign. #dnd #ttrpg #dnd5e #dungeonsanddragons #writing
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3 tips for writing your very first campaign. #dnd #ttrpg #dnd5e #dungeonsanddragons #writing
Instant Book Talk: The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson - Part 2
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Instant Book Talk: The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson - Part 2
Instant Book Talk: The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson - Part 1
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Instant Book Talk: The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson - Part 1
Instant Book Club: The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson -- Part 1
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Instant Book Club: The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson Part 1
Instant Book Club Story Talk: The Festival by HP Lovecraft
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Instant Book Club Story Talk: The Festival by HP Lovecraft
Instant Book Club Read: The Festival by HP Lovecraft
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Instant Book Club Read: The Festival by HP Lovecraft
Instant Book Club Discussion: The Masque of the Read Death #fiction #horrorstory
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Instant Book Club Discussion: The Masque of the Read Death #fiction #horrorstory
The Masque of the Red Death Read Through #fiction #horrorstories #shortstories
มุมมอง 168 หลายเดือนก่อน
The Masque of the Red Death Read Through #fiction #horrorstories #shortstories
Could I make a magic user who has a really weak body, but what is great at magic? If so, how would I handle the stats with that? Would I keep the constitution low or high?
This is a fantastic step-by-step. Love it.
Thank you! 😊
Great idea!
Thank you!
This was awesome! Any other cool ideas coming up?
Thanks! Working on another as we speak. 😊
Dudes dope
This dude is an awesome DM that host D&D games on StartPlaying. It’s an awesome way to play d&d if it’s hard finding a group around your area.
Thank you so much!
yay ❤ subscribed
Thank you!!!
Hi RJ! I just stumbled upon your channel and this series and I am enchanted by the insights I receive from you working through your own process. I hope your channel will grow quickly to match the quality of your content. One question though: You kind of pointed towards the fact, that the Hags would stop the players if they simply walk away. Wouldn't that be exactly railroading them into one specific outcome? And maybe one feedback: the recording volume of your voice is quite low in this series. Maybe turn it up a notch in the future :)
Thank you so much! Glad you're finding it helpful. To answer your question, it depends on the situation. You never want to force one outcome, but I can imagine a scenario where the Hags view the party as a threat, if not an immediate one. If that were to happen, then yes I would have a member of the Bloodgood Sisters attack the party at a time of their choosing. But if the party makes it clear that they aren't a threat to the hags, the sisters would just let them walk away. It all comes down to how the characters handle the situation after they return from the Berg. As for the feedback: thank you for letting me know. I was still learning my audio set up when I recorded this, but I've corrected the low volume in later installments. Thanks again for reaching out!
@@rjcurrer thanks for clarifying!
@@Yarradras Any time!
Awesome! I love this!
Thank you! Glad you like it!
Wow this is perfect. I just found you and I wanted to check more of your content. I've recently thought about using krita for map making but I'm still very new to everything, this is very helpful. Thank you!
Thank you so much! I'm glad you found this helpful. 😊
Just wondering, is there a reason you didn't use the original planescape factions for Sigil? en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faction_(Planescape)
It was just a personal choice. I don't find the original lore for Sigil very inspiring (I talk about that in a previous video). So I took the parts I liked and invented the rest. Plus, since this video is about creating factions, I thought it would be more helpful to see a faction created from scratch without any existing lore to lean on.
Also, the pawnshop have your characters ask if they have the items
I love using pawnshops and flea markets in game. They're great opportunities for collaborative worldbuilding.
How long are your sessions? This is an incredible process that I'd absolutely steal for a full campaign based in one city (e.g. Ravnica, Cyberpunk, any WoD campaign ever) but for an open table with a loop around leaving and coming back to the city, I'd worry about my players getting bogged down in the home base and running out of actual adventure time. We tend to go for 4 to 4.5 hours biweekly.
Great question! My sessions are only 2 - 3 hours every other week for that group. And they had a history of getting bogged down. I fixed that by having them post anything they wanted to do between adventures in our Discord chat. That way I can manage all the stuff that isn't directly related to the upcoming session during the week and we can focus on the adventure when we all group up to play.
Just found this series and a BIIIG piece of advice: get the playlist for this series in order. Part 1 should be on top, not on the bottom. Make everything in order. Once your playlist for this series is fixed I'll try and give it a watch :)
Thanks for the feedback!
Thanks for the feedback!
Environment is also huge. It's going to determine or at least inform everything about the town/city. If its a town on a river, for instance, everything is going to be different compared to a mountain town. For me I always make it step 1 especially since in the context of improv, environment is likely already decided. If something is on a river its probably going to be larger and have great farming, trade, and transportation options whereas if its in the middle of mountains its probably poorer/smaller and relies heavily on logging and mining with another larger neighboring city they rely on for materials and trade.
Environment does play a big role, but to your point, it's usually already determined when you sit down to make a settlement. Also, in the context of a fantasy setting, it doesn't necessarily have to put the same limitations on a community that it might IRL. For example, a mountainous region might isolate communities in the real world, but fantasy mechanics like airships could make mountains more accessible than other locations. Still, people are heavily influenced by the environment. So it's a great thing to consider when adding flavor to these 5 basics.
@rjcurrer Yeah, that was one of my points above. I suppose I should have commented more succinctly. My main takeaway was to say that by determining/looking at the environment can determine or at least inform your other decisions including the Big 5 in the short. A rich mountain village should/could be rich for a reason worth making a POI or even an entire side quest. I wasn't intending to say environment should limit what you do. Just that -- on the fly -- it can help you more easily make decisions.
@@AnarexicSumo Ah! Sorry for the confusion. I get what you were saying now and I absolutely agree!
My trap is simple.... The player falls into a pit of darkness.... There will be an IMMEDIATE OBVIOUS SMELL all around them... If they use any sort of spark or fire or flame of any kind... The gas will have a chance to be lit.... The pit will also be filled with slimes resistant to physical and magical attacks but weak to fire........ So they have to find a happy medium of fire attacks and not blowing up.... They can risk it all or try to brute force the slimes with physical attacks that do next to nothing.... Also they will be fighting in complete darkness unless they use a light source..... Like a torch......
Savage! I love it! But more importantly, it leverages a really effective storytelling tool: forcing your characters to make difficult choices. This kind of thing gets remembered long after the campaign is concluded.
Haven't DM'd yet, but thinking that if I can't figure out a way to dissarm a trap, I present it in a one-shot, and wait until one of the players comes up with a solution I like!
Letting your players figure it out and then prending that was the solution all along is always a viable option!
in a DnD game i was the DM for, i had a minefield with elemental magic mines, the intention was for the group to use dispel magic but the barbarian of the group just decided to sprint through the minefield
😂 Players are like that. They'll surprise you every time!
Watching this knowing damn well I’m too lazy to make a game
First 😅 always wanted to do that... Now that I've indulged my inner child YAY next installment.
could you assist me on which video you discuss the cornell-style note taking?
Absolutely! Here you go: th-cam.com/users/shortsNL-ZE2civ_0?feature=share
@@rjcurrer thanks so much!
@@kadmii My pleasure! Thanks for watching!
This reminds me of w baytle i partaked in at lvl one where ee just murdered some alley robbers (i was a warlock)😂
I need more for a Playlist please. Thank you
More about antagonist archetypes? No problem. I'll be making more of these videos in the coming weeks.
Great info! Thank you for sharing.
Glad you found it helpful! Thanks for watching.
I have written mysteries. I am helping AxalKay write a mystery for The Thirty Moons System. In that system rolling is not super important. All mysteries can be solved by asking the right questions. You can roll to get help. The rule we have is you must be able to solve the mystery wothout rolling. It must be written in a way that encourages rolling.
That's a great attitude toward mysteries and one that a lot of mystery-specific TTRPGs use. It keeps the game moving no matter what the dice do but keeps the players from assuming the solution is a foregone conclusion.
Eh, if you really do not have backstory prepared? Your character is now amnesiac. They know their name (subject to change, since it's a name they chose for now, not their real one), they have their things... but they do not know anything else. After that, you can either prepare the backstory for next session and slip it to DM, or get with GM after first session to brainstorm it together and weave it into what DM wants to do with the campaign. Then, it gets revealed bit by bit as your character's quest for their lost identity progresses.
That's a good solution too
BATMAN!!
I really love the passionate narration of forgetting to write a backstory.
Thanks! 😊
I did something like this with my latest character. Ven was orphaned at birth, being raised by many different families, until a dwarf adopted him. This dwarf, while being his main guardian, never felt like a dad to Ven, more like an uncle that you grow to treat more like a friend. No one knew what really happened to Ven's parents after they abandoned him, but hes determined to find out where his parents are, or at least how they died. So he leaves the comfort of the capital with a group of people he met at an escort job, and hes on the hunt for any clues on what may have happened to them
Excellent! Ven sounds like a really compelling character.
I'm pretty sure my newest character is an orphan. but we haven't focused much on backstory so they're currently just really fast and comically stealthy. and a kleptomaniac. i robbed a 20th level wizard because I thought it would be funny
Sometimes that's all you need to know for a character who's a ton of fun! You can always come up with the backstory later.
That link is startplaying.games/gm/rjcurrer Right now, I only have one-shots scheduled, but I'll be adding campaigns in the near future. I'm leaning towards playing Ghosts of Saltmarsh with Tales from the Yawning Portal blended in, but I'm open to suggestions. What campaign would you want to play?
i would have loved to watch this but its too quiet for me to understand what your saying
Thanks for the feedback!
Raw treasure matters to the character if the players make it matter. Being rich due to massive loot from extremely dangerous dungeons should show in your character's growth. The issue here is with D&D. Other systems have hard coded rules that allow your character to grow mechanically as they grow personally including due to how they carry/present themselves once they're loaded from that dragon's hoard. Only really D&D has such a strict and limited progression system. Any D&D player, however, can play their character as rich if they're rich. That matters if they let it.
Sounds like what you're saying is that treasure has the value that the players give it and I completely agree with that.
❤very true❤
My first Dm was really good at this. He was playing with all new players and he was teally good at giving everyone chances to give ideas and also giving every character some moments to shine. For example, i was playing a monk and he let me kill the dragon we were fighting by elbow dropping it
Sounds like he was a great DM! That kind of thing is a skill that takes practice to master, but when you do, it makes a huge difference at the table.
There’s actually three, with the third being episodic. Shadowrun, deathwatch, and Vaesen fall well into this category.
Episodic refers to the adventure length or the length of its segments. Episodic adventures are still either plot-driven or character-driven because either the characters choose their own goals or the plot thrusts goals upon them.
See I don’t really know how to make a good campaign, but I can improv well enough to make my bard fight a moose.
Nothing wrong with that at all! If the bard-moose fight gets the bard closer to their goals, then it's a good story. But, so long as the bard's player has fun fighting the moose, it's a good campaign. Ultimately, fun is the only metric that matters.
I am currently running a wizardy school campaign and it's crazy how character driven the story of, but the players just don't realize
I get that! That's one of the things I love about being a DM. You sit behind your screen tweaking the valves and dials on this contraption of a story you created, knowing where all the pipes connect. But your players play so close to the moment that they are amazed at the sudden appearance of what you knew was inevitable.
CORRECT! I like to call these Innate goal story’s And bespoke goal story’s. Innate goal story’s should take the hero’s internal pre existing goals, give them a somewhat clear path to achieve them, and put some sort of clear risk of failure on it Bespoke goals should radically change the hero’s life with risk of drastic consequences if they don’t take action At least that’s my approach
That's a great approach! And I love the term "bespoke goals." It really gets to the heart of what plot driven adventures should be about.
How do you ensure the players have the opportunity to figure out the "fatal flaw" without handing it to them?
That's frequently a matter of laying clues that point to the beast's weakness. These could be anything from in-game folklore to interviews with survivors to plain old trial and error. The trick is to put plenty of these clues throughout the adventure so that the characters can miss one or two and still be able to figure it out.
My ruling always has been Bonus action: drink the potion roll the dice Action: Drink the potion for the max amount/Feeding potion to another player rolling thr dice I think this personally gives the most risk/reward with potions because while yes they do delay the inevitable sometimes you just need that delay yo win a combat meanwhile the action let's actual healing be done with a potion and getting people up with one makes things more tense.
That's a great way to handle it! Giving players a choice with clear pros and cons on either side adds excitement to high-stakes moments like combat.
"GM" [Wizards disliked that]
I honestly think I needed to see this, thanks a bunch dude. I hope you stay safe out there! 👍
Glad it helped! And thanks for commenting. Comments like this remind me why I do this.
The rule we use currently at the table is the best variation we have found so far for our group. Healing potions exclusively can be used as a bonus action however if you use a full action you don't have to role. You take the max that the potion could heal. In our campaign gold is not something that is given out hand over fist so that makes the use of a potion a far more tactical decision. We are lvl 9 in a long campaign and my pc has made maybe 3000 total gold up to this point. That 300gp potion looks very different when gold is not something easy to come by.
I like that! Based on your play style, it sounds like it strikes a great balance between making them a coveted resource and a life-saver. That's a very cool way to handle healing potions.
We rule it as a move action. If you want to move and drink you can sacrifice your standard action
That's a good middle ground!
...it's called acting. He's telling you to use an old Stanislavski method of acting.
That's exactly what I'm talking about. Method acting is a powerful but underused technique for anyone interested in taking their roleplay beyond simple character choices. But it's not for everyone or every table.
As a forever GM this is something I tell my players every session 0 (even vets) especially people new to TTRPGs. As a player the natural tendency is to look at your skills and think "which of these can solve my issue" when you should instead be thinking "how would my character *attempt* to solve the issue?". Put it on the GM to call out what rolls to make. Sub'd
I'm very much the same way. Tell me what your character does and let me worry about what the mechanics are.
It makes prep harder but instead of looking at the campaign like a video game with red or blue Kool-aid I've always had success drafting a storyboard of sorts with main essential plot points and then letting the player decisions fill in basically everything else. It requires you to woldbuild a lot more because you have to give yourself pieces to throw into the campaign later but it leads to very organic storytelling
That's a great way to make choices meaningful for your characters!
Free agency and “real” choice is what makes the game a fantasy reality brought to life ❤
Couldn't have said it better myself!