Fan Club Video #3: Campaign Reports Vol. 1!

So gooooooooooooooooooood ! I love this review so inspiring, thank you so much !

Orus L'oublié

I love these campaign reports! They are worth far more than the price of admission! Thabk you so much quinns for all the help on my journey to being a better gm 😁

Christian Mull

Goddamn this was some good advice. I think the best way to achieve a sense of scale is to have the mechs interact directly with everyday objects. Narrate an enemy mech throwing a car or an oil tanker truck at the party. Maybe rip a fire hydrant out of the ground and use the spray to put out a fire on your suit. If a player gets thrown into a building, really sell how easily they pass through concrete.

Ryan

Oh!! Where do you find Battletech maps?

Patty

I used hex maps from Battletech! And then for my world maps I just printed random, unrecognisable regions from Google Earth 😁

Quinns

On the topic of making one of the players more powerful than the others - One thing I enjoyed about the Destruction supplement for Age of Sigmar: Soulbound is that one of the players is Da Boss. Aside from changing the role-playing dynamics, it also gives them an extra ability they can use to help the team, and the book specifically also says that who's Da Boss should be switched up throughout the campaign

Khris

I loved this perspective and hope you can return to this format later with a Part 2. Hope the leg is getting better.

Peter Haderlein

Would love to see a video that goes into detail on how you format prep for yourself and how you take notes during a session. Not the most exciting subject but I run a lot of investigative horror and OSR stuff and have become obsessed with how good information design is in OSR scenarios and how bad it is in Call of Cthulhu and friends. This will likely be more relevant once you get to your Delta Green review.

Ian Wyant

"Make the robots feel huge" reminds me of a stock shot in mecha anime, where the robot takes its first step and we see something at its feet react to the impact - such as in Evangelion, when Eva 01 first steps from its stand and a telephone booth in the foreground is fractured by the shockwave.

Dr Razno

Definitely want more recaps like this! SUPER fun! On players making art. There's a wonderful game called Primal Quest (sword and sorcery with cavemen!) that has a really cool extra mechanic (The Cave of Our People). At the end of a session, the players record their adventure by making a drawing together like a cave painting. Great insight into what they find important and memorable and also creates a REALLY cool keepsake.

JP Coovert

Loved this video! I wanted to ask where you got your maps for Lancer? I'm finding that's the biggest issue in my prep for Lancer at the moment.

Dylan Parry

Loved this! I think it would be cool to see tips on improv, especially as the inverse relationship between "length of prepared notes" and "number of sessions" exaggerates. I lean on heavily on improv, (in the 5e campaign I just wrapped up I did next to no prep for the last few sessions), but ultimately those sessions end up better than one where I tried to prepare more (based on player feedback). Would love to hear yours and others' perspectives!

Henry Farr

Hot damn that Lancer campaign sounds epic. Loved this thanks!

Lojaan

This was wonderful. I want this recap for every campaign please.

Shon Richards

This type of content is so incredibly rare, but so tremendously useful! I understand the necessity of patreon-only content, but I'm also sad more people don't get to see it.

twerp

this is great please please please keep doing these

deacon lasagna

Hi Quinns and the community! This was an _excellent_ resource for me, a new(ish) GM who is trying to get to grips with Wildsea after starting a campaign off the back of the QQ review. There's so many tips and nuggets of advice to bring the games to life, and I'd love to see more of this kind of thing - help and advice on how to be a better GM from someone who seems to have a lot of experience!

Jon Naylor

Always nice to hear about other... shall we say 'veterans'?... returning to the fold. Need to show these young whippersnappers how it's done!

Brett Rolfe

Really great video - currently running wildsea and have had heart on the docket for awhile so listening to your approach was definitely very helpful. For sure like the idea of doing these campaign recap / method behind the screen every few reviews!

Chris Stagno

Biggest thing I've learned is don't think about the "why" when presenting a scene. Just present your scenes and adventure locations honestly, and your players will likely just run with it. Mausritter is helping me with that quite a bit, and has already influenced how I run my Call of Cthulhu campaign.

Alex von Vom

Quinns

I've started to run Mausritter. Any tips?

Gage Peterson

I really loved getting to see this. So many little tips and tricks that I can use in my GMing. Also, as an aside Quinns, if you've not heard of Salvage Union, you basically took the cool mechs of Lancer and ported them into a Salvage Union game. SU is post-apocalyptic, where a group of people have banded together in a sand crawler. Players use mechs to salvage stuff from ruins/enemies to upgrade their own mechs and their community's sand crawler. You move around the campaign map in a point crawl style.

Alejandro Chavez

This was so good! Quinns, you're the best. Absolutely love what you do and have been a big fan for some years now. I've finally started running my first campaigns (Call of Cthulhu and Mausritter), and you've already got me salivating and ready to run games of Heart and Wildsea. A true inspiration and a legend you are.

Alex von Vom

This was great, definitely down for more. Also, don't worry about running too long on these, there were definitely things during the video I would have been happy to hear more/more details about. One thing this made me curious about is if there are games you do excessive prep for. Since seemingly, all of these games lent themselves to being fairly low prep, for you.

Malek

Loved this! More of this type of content is great. I'd also love to hear more about your experience pushing yourself with NPCs and trying to channel all the Brennan-Lee-Mulligan-style voice and characterization work that you mentioned in the Wildsea section. I'm always trying to have more interesting and characterful NPCs and it's always a little intimidating to really go for it, but also usually a lot of fun when I do!

Brendan Albano

Great video! I'm about to run my first multi-session adventure in ... er ... forty?!!! years, so very happy to hoover up all those tips.

George Poles

This is great stuff Quinns. Got me thinking about all sorts of story elements in other RPGs I've run or been a part of, and even my own fiction writing. It's so valuable hearing an open informative and passionate perspective like this. I hope you do decide to make more of these videos going forward

Stephen Schulze

What a great video, thanks for it! I'll be running a mini campaign in Wildsea and a perhaps longer one as well so getting a lookg into your prep was really nice. I started into the first session with nothing aside from a quick "You're here and there's a thing happening" encounter and will lean into what players gave me for a campaign. Hope it works out :D (They decided that they got their ship from some shady organization that wanted them to hunt for artifacts, the Ironbound found something that called to it .. I love the minimal prep I have to do :D)

Raptorendame

Thanks so much Quinn’s, really helpful stuff. I am a counsellor running therapeutic TTRPGs at a university so I love all these tips! I ran a game of Tales of the Loop and my next group will be The Wildsea and can already see some of this being included.

Stephen Maslin

I tend to be the same way - but Dagger in the Heart might be enough to get me running Heart again...

Patrick O'Duffy

Quintin Smith

You are a breath of fresh air, Brother Quinn. I found out that humans Quinn and Hankerin Ferinale exist within the same week and I feel very thankful/spoiled. Cheers!

Adam

I had these questions before about Heart and I'd love to get it right before I run my first campaign: +Imagine you're in the last session. How would players execute their Zenith goals? Should it happen all at once? or can it happen within an hour for instance? I just didn't picture that yet in my head and wanted to hear your ideas +What happens if a character dies prematurely? Lets say, what happens if a friend's character dies before the last session? Are they supposed to assist to the last session or what? Do they keep playing? Are you supposed to avoid that as a DM? I'm just a total newbie on DM's and RPG's So id' appreciate some insight and advice

Guille García

Agree entirely - be delighted to see more like this.

John Hunt

Just echoing the sentiments of others here, this video was great and I’d love to see more like it further down the line. The tips, the anecdotes from your campaigns, seeing the notes, all brilliant. Much more immediately relatable than the typical GM advice video.

edmo

Please continue with this. It is great.

Ainar Miyata

And GOD I wish last year's Heart campaign hadn't collapsed due to scheduling problems. There was a plotline about the amnesiac Incarnadine realising they inherited the debts of versions of themself from alternate timelines. We had a Vermissian Knight who was the agent of a fanatical order of gnoll public transport advocates. Our Hound was a Minister from Spire who accidentally killed a cop, stole their badge and realised they stole responsibility along with it. It would have been AMAZING. If it had finished. Kids, finish your games.

Patrick O'Duffy

As is the idea of having video feeds of major battles so that the population of those stations start having opinions about these mechs and pilots...

Patrick O'Duffy

Hmmm... I'm running a Lancer campaign right now (set in a group of space stations), and 'make the mechs feel big' is triggering some thoughts...

Patrick O'Duffy

Quinns

Quinns

I think Quinns perhaps emphasises the inevitability of that element a liiiiiiittle more than strictly necessary. It's up to the players if they push their characters all the way to the brink and over the edge in pursuit of their goals. it's just as possible for some of them to go, 'actually, I'm good' and return to the surface reality once they're achieved some of their goals. ...but also going over the edge and screaming all the way down is more fun.

Patrick O'Duffy

For instance - that 7-3-1 technique/process? That's really interesting! I could do a lot with that in my current Lancer game! I didn't know about it until RIGHT NOW!

Patrick O'Duffy

The book says that campaigns should take ~8 sessions, not much more, so a DM can mentally prepare everyone for the fact that it's gonna end at some point. So at some point, if you're seven sessions deep and the story starts to build towards a climax, everybody knows what's up. On top of that, if people have their Zenith abilities ready, those could always force a climax to the story. So rather than forcing an ending for review purposes, I think the game itself really supports that moment where you can announce an end to the campaign.

Fabian

It's always welcome to hear from GMs about the nuts and bolts of their sessions. I'm envious of all the paper shown. I was so enthralled with The Wildsea video, it gave me the impetus to get out and rustle up players to return to RPGs after decades away from the hobby. I started out with the idea that I'd ,"do it Old School," and work everything on paper and in journals, but the convenience of Google drive killed that pretty quick. We have session 2 in a few weeks, and I am still casting about for ideas on how to run such an open game. This was helpful!

Nathaniel Friese

A delight to watch as always! I would love to see this develop as a recurring series. While I absolutely love being exposed to all these new RPGs. I do wonder what compels you to keep exploring new systems and settings. Not that that's a bad thing, I find it to be extremely creatively stimulating and engaging as a Gm. Is it common for to run one RPG once and then move to another right after? Or do you find yourself sticking with a system for more than one campaign? Perhaps running the same RPG multiple times for either the same or new groups?

NinjaGuy00

Oh this was awesome, and exactly what I wanted! I hope this becomes a regular series!

Robert Haynes

Curious about Heart and its campaign ending. I understand the campaigns are kept short, but does it typically end with a "Next session you're gonna die, get ready" mentality? I get the need for an expedited wrap up to a campaign for review purposes but the "forced termination" aspect feels a mite arbitrary to me if that is what regular, general play would promote.

Alex Kay

This was amazing getting to peek into your mind as a GM, highly invested in making this a kind of roundup every few episodes. I'm gearing up for my first ever session zero for wild sea and felt like will get a ton of milage from your tips and experiences (heart too, when I get around to running it!). Lastly, as a fan of words, thank you for introducing me to 'Vertiginous', chefs kiss!

Eric K

I have a feeling the paralysis comes from the Mercer/Brennan effect. I ran 5e quite happily before I saw them!

Johannes B

Quinns

Quinns

Quinns

Quinns

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Quinns

This was a real treat. As someone who's always one step away from running something, then thinks about prep and then chickens out, I needed this. Working at a game company I feel like everyone should running games at all times so this video brings me closer to that inconvenient utopia!

Johannes B

It's great to see folks talking about the small tips and techniques they use when GMing, and making it clear that running isn't some kind of impossible skill. I've been running RPGs since *checks watch* 1983, and there are still new ideas and tricks I learn from listening to other GMs share their stuff.

Patrick O'Duffy

wow, genius way to do a mecha game....

gm_naahz

I agree that combining 3 campaigns/systems was part of the secret sauce of this great video.

Clark Olson-Smith

Love this!

Clark Olson-Smith

Like you, I keep lots of lists. Specifically, any and every decision the players make I figure out the knock in effect and add it to a list of consequences they may run into again. And every NPC the players leave behind, I add to a roster of potentially recurring characters that may return one day. Then any time I’m stumped, I just roll on that list to see who or what is just on the horizon beckoning (or chasing) them. Not revolutionary. But highly effective because the game quickly becomes alllll about the consequences of their actions and intimately *their* story.

P0rthos

This was super super interesting and inspiring as a new DM! Gave me a lot of cool ideas and inspirations for my own campaigns. Thank you so much.

David Mason

"Wildsea's Reaches - think of them like zones in Sonic the Hedgehog." You know, that's actually a pretty good description of Reaches. :P

Felix Isaacs

Would absolutely love to see this as a regular feature. Really nicely threads the needle between the fun-but-probably-too-long Actual Play and the exciting-but-a-bit-flyover nature of a review. Thanks for sharing!

BassPope

You know how you made that analogy of Playing TTRPGS / Watching Actual Plays and S*x / Corn ? (I am censoring this just in case some algorithm doesn't understand that in this context these words are fine) This is that, but for GM tips. This is "down to earth honest talk" and not the typical cosmo article style of "top 10 tips for you players out there". I love that you are willing to show all the good and bad, we all learn from that, even if it hurts to admit "hey, I made a mistake here, and it was all on me, I had this idea and all these reasons but I was wrong" it is where we can all really learn. Suggestion for the next sinister hang theme, could be that everyone brings their biggest flops, what went wrong and what we recommend for others, to avoid the same mistake... you share a lot here, and I think you also deserve to hear some of those stories from others.

Philip Kristoffersen

Making it a recurring thing is indeed a very good idea. No need for it to be long if not much as to be said but it'll be a great complement to the reviews and the community of qquest.

pablo codeina

On the question of balancing encounters, I get the problem of "sudden reinforcements", though I think it's better to err on the side of too easy and do that than to err on too hard and have a deux ex machina. Personally, if I think a combat is getting too easy, I like invoking a bit of conservation-of-ninjutsu, where one or two of the faceless enemies realise they're about to die or they're about to lose what they value, and so they start fighting much harder. They do a little speech to the heroes, just enough to give a sense of character and flag their determination, and then their stats go up a tick. Sifu is a video game that does this really well, where there's a chance that a random enemy in a fight will go super saiyan if you attempt a standard takedown on them. Suddenly they become a huge problem and the whole dynamic of the fight revolves around them.

Eóin Dooley

Other than your use of AI art, this was my favorite video yet (Fan Club or otherwise)! You really brought the personal anecdotes to life and learning about the times you lacked as a GM makes me approaching these games feel all the more possible.

NonBinaryBomb

I love the tiny nuggets of your campaigns and favourite moments! Please go into more detail about some npc’s

Tom Lavery

Aha! There's so many great little resources for being a better GM. I really love the Stars and Wishes portion of this video, and I loved how so much of this video ended up being a list of things that worked, things that almost worked, and things you wish you'd tried in these various TTRPGs. This also felt liked a condensed version of Matt Colville's old campaign diaries, which were great for little nuggets of wisdom for D&D back when I ran that. I'd love to see this as a recurring series and about every 3 games feels really good. As is this is wonderfully information dense and I feel like I could watch it three times and come back with a new tip or thing I want to focus on in my games each time. Top notch.

Jack Graham

Quinns

Incredibly excited to give this a watch!

Aslan Silva

I've been looking at a lot of youtube videos and such about GMing tips lately. I started my career GMing with Blades in the Dark, which allows the GM to be very improv-heavy (read: lazy) when it comes to planning sessions and campaigns, so now that I'm planning on running other systems I've been worrying about how to prep. Quinns, in making a video just chatting about the real, anecdotal experiences you've had, you've made a better "How to GM" video than anything that intentionally set out to do such thing. I think having this as a recurring feature is a great idea!

Michael

Thank you, Quinn, for this amazing video ! Because of you, I really want to GM an Ultraviolet grassland campaign using Wildsea and some of Fragged Empire races :) A post post apocalyptical ecological ultraviolet grassland campaign definitely sounds cool. I could totally use some of Cloud Empress content I think I might be addicted... Anyway, thank you again

Malice, The Salty Brain Maniac