Life events, a bout of COVID, and a week-long trip slowed me down a bit, but I'm excited to share that I'm officially done writing the rough draft of the content for Arc P: Ravenloft Heist! Specifically, since my last update, I've made the following additions to the arc:
Added new loot to the Element Room, including brooms of flying
Ad...
2024-06-20 18:37:36 +0000 UTC View PostArc P: Ravenloft Heist is probably one of the strangest arcs I’ve had to write so far in Reloaded, structurally speaking.
At its core, Castle Ravenloft is a romp through a giant dungeon sandbox. It’s a labyrinthine, mazelike apparatus where often the only way to go to another room on the same floor is to go one floor up or down first. Numerous junctions and dead ends dot the keep’s interior, and countless secret doors make it easy to criss-cross diff...
2024-05-24 00:51:14 +0000 UTC View PostAlthough an ill-timed cold laid me out for a solid week, I'm still making steady progress on Arc P: Ravenloft Heist. I'm a little more than two-thirds done with the arc's narrative content so far; once that's done, I still need to tinker with some statblocks, finish area maps, make any necessary edits to older arcs, and so on. Due to the cold, I'm not so sure whether I'll be able to hit an end-of-May release date, but I'll see what I can do.
If you'd like to re...
2024-05-20 22:02:06 +0000 UTC View PostI've published Chapter 5 of the Dungeon Master's Guide: Reloaded on the Bronze Masterpost! This chapter discusses using tension curves to build tension and create emotional catharsis, distinguishing and using the different types of narrative segments, and identifying which level of narrative agency is right for your game.
I hope you enjoy, and feel free to leave any thoughts, questions, or feedb...
2024-05-13 01:38:27 +0000 UTC View PostI've posted links to the VODs of the last four workshops—resonance, tension, agency, and voice-acting—on the Bronze Masterpost. (You can also find them linked in the #workshops-archive channel in the Patreon Discord.) My apologies for the delay in getting these posted!
2024-05-11 00:34:02 +0000 UTC View PostFollowing the results of last month's survey regarding the future of the Patreon workshops, I've decided to move ahead with replacing the monthly Discord voice-chat workshops with monthly preview chapters of the Dungeon Master's Guide: Reloaded, my forthcoming DMing textbook on narrative design, game design, table management, and performance. (For more information on why I'm implementing th...
2024-05-11 00:01:12 +0000 UTC View PostI've officially begun work on Arc P: Ravenloft Heist, and this arc is definitely looking to be a doozy! Still, thanks to a more regular and efficient writing schedule (plus a lot of pre-planning), the actual writing process seems to be chugging along smoothly.
I'm about 40% done with writing the guide content; once that's done, I've just got to make the new statblocks for the three Brides (plus tinker with Rahadin's for balance purposes), make some area maps t...
I got hugely positive feedback from the last changelog design notes devblog, so I've decided to keep the train going for v2.0.7! Hope you enjoy.
Gave Doru vampire lore to share
The players can find a torn excerpt of Doru’s copy of Van Richten’s Guide to Vampires (which Van Richten ...
2024-05-02 12:00:08 +0000 UTC View PostAs you probably already know, I recently released v2.0.7 of Curse of Strahd: Reloaded, featuring Arc O: Dinner with the Devil. As per usual, this release also featured a number of edits to prior arcs, some of them minor, and others fairly far-reaching.
After the release, someone asked if I had any intention of writing a devblog to explain why I made these particular changes - why they were necessary, and why I implemented them the way that I did. “Huh,” I thought. “That sounds li...
Since I first started this Patreon, I've also offered (near) monthly patron-exclusive Discord workshops focused on an assorted grab-bag of topics related to DMing theory, game/narrative design, and table management. These workshops began as lectures-plus-Q&A, but starting in January, I began experimenting with a "hands-on" approach, in which I sent out a handout covering an aspect of DMing theory and used the workshop itself for case studies and group exercises.
The good news: This ...
2024-04-16 01:37:59 +0000 UTC View PostI'm excited to share the seventh public installment of my revised Curse of Strahd guide, Curse of Strahd: Reloaded. This new release contains Arc O: Dinner with the Devil, which includes:
Road to Ravenloft. New encounters with Arrigal, Doru and Father Donavi...
2024-04-12 11:54:29 +0000 UTC View PostYou do not need to have attended prior workshops to attend this one. VODs of previous workshops are linked in the Bronze Masterpost.
I'm excited to announce the fourth workshop in my educational DMing skills series, modeled after the chapters of my forthcoming textbook, The Dungeon Master's Handbook. This meeting will focus live "classroom" time on hands-on activities, workshops, a...
Arc P, Dinner with the Devil, is complete, as are most of my edits for v2.0.7. My current target for release is late next week.
Unrelated - I'm interested in eventually releasing an update focused on the needs of new DMs. What, if anything, could be added to or changed to Reloaded to make it better suit your needs? What have been the biggest roadblocks and challenges you've faced in trying to run it? Let me know in the comments, and don't be afraid to be ambitious!
(My current ...
I don't have much news on Reloaded at the moment, so please enjoy this brief blog about my homebrew campaign - or rather, what became of my homebrew campaign - and how it influenced my thoughts on DMing as a craft and hobby.
Last week, I canceled my homebrew campaign.
We're still going to play together; don't worry. And I'll still be DMing. We've all agreed on what we're going to play next, and we're all excited for what that looks like.
But we also all agreed...
Hey all, and apologies for the long period of radio silence.
First - Arc P: Dinner with the Devil is nearly finished. I just need to wrap up writing the final combat (yes, there will be some (optional) combat) and write up the arc outtro, and it'll be finished.
Unfortunately, version 2.0.7 won't quite be ready for publication once Dinner is done. I also need to make a number of revisions to Arc L: The Fallen Abbey 2024-03-10 16:30:00 +0000 UTC View Post
My last homebrew session left me in a bit of a funk.
In fact, my last several sessions have.
As I’ve previously mentioned, I run a biweekly homebrew campaign for nine (relatively new) players. We started playing in-person last winter, and have continued with the same campaign via Discord since late summer.
If you’ve never seen a group of offline players make the abrupt jump to online play, the difference is stark. There’s no more crosstalk; no more side-chats. Distr...
It’s genuinely difficult to balance encounters for parties of different levels. It’s even harder to balance encounters for parties of different tiers - or different sizes.
In Re-Reloaded, Argynvostholt is a location that the players might conceivably visit at levels four (during Vallaki downtime in Act II), five (on a free day after killing Izek and before the Wizard of Wines), or six (after the Wizard of Wines).
To make matters worse, completing the Wizard of Wines al...
I'm excited to share the sixth public installment of my revised Curse of Strahd guide, Curse of Strahd: Reloaded. This new release contains the first half of Arc M: The Den of Wolves and the first half of 2024-01-31 15:14:31 +0000 UTC View Post
You do not need to have attended prior workshops to attend this one. VODs of previous workshops are linked in the Bronze Masterpost.
I'm excited to announce the second workshop in my educational DMing skills series, modeled after the chapters of my forthcoming textbook, The Dungeon Master's Handbook. This meeting will focus live "classroom" time on hands-on activities, work...
2024-01-28 15:10:36 +0000 UTC View PostArgynvostholt, in RAW, is impressively empty.
It has fifty-three rooms. Of these, five have combat encounters (giant spiders, chapel revenants, trapped hallway, beacon phantoms, and maybe Vladimir). An additional four have noncombat encounters (living fire, Savid, smoky dragonet, and Sir Godfrey). Another seven have minor “haunts” that don’t serve any purpose other than delivering exposition or making the players go “huh, that’s weird” (dragon statue cone of cold, s...
2024-01-22 22:25:30 +0000 UTC View PostThis is the ninth in a series of regular posts providing updates on my progress in drafting and editing the new Reloaded guide. You can find all previous posts here.
A brief update before we dive into the bigger stuff—Hotfix 2.0.5.5 is live on the Reloaded website. You can read about its details 2024-01-21 22:38:18 +0000 UTC View Post
This is the eighth in a series of regular posts providing updates on my progress in drafting and editing the new Reloaded guide. You can find all previous posts here.
The holidays have come and gone, and so has the end of Arc M: The Den of Wolves. I've also passed the halfway point of Arc N: Argynvost's Beacon, and anticipate hav...
2024-01-12 13:00:09 +0000 UTC View PostI'm excited to announce a new series of monthly Patreon DMing skills workshops, beginning this Saturday.
Where the old series of workshops discussed ad-hoc topics submitted and voted on by patrons, this new format (as voted on by the members of the Patreon Discord) will take a more formal approach, moving sequentially through chapters of my forthcoming DMing textbook, The Dungeon Master's Handbook, while focusing live "classroom" time on hands-on activities, workshops, an...
2024-01-04 13:00:07 +0000 UTC View PostAs a DM, I like it when my players surprise me.
Not “surprise” as in “going entirely off the rails,” mind you (though that can be fun in the right circumstances). No, I mean when players control the pace of the game - when they can poke and prod in different directions, and I just get to sit back and respond to what they’re doing. When I can react, instead of act.
Unfortunately, as my (homebrew campaign) players made their way down the road toward their latest d...
2024-01-03 13:51:09 +0000 UTC View PostThis is the seventh in a series of regular posts providing updates on my progress in drafting and editing the new Reloaded guide. You can find all previous posts here.
Version 2.0.5 of Reloaded went live last week, including Arc K: The Stolen Gem and Arc L: The Fallen Abbey. I've since begun work on Arc M: The Den of ...
2023-12-21 13:00:07 +0000 UTC View PostToday, after an unexpected four-month delay, I’m excited to share the fifth public installment of my revised Curse of Strahd guide, Curse of Strahd: Reloaded. This new release contains Arc K: The Stolen Gem, the first half of 2023-12-13 13:16:03 +0000 UTC View Post
The three vampiric brides of Strahd von Zarovich - Ludmilla, Volenta, and Anastrasya - have a far more pronounced role in Curse of Strahd: Reloaded. Where, in RAW, the three brides are ordinary vampire spawn serving as mere guardians of Strahd’s coffin, in Reloaded, they serve roles somewhat closer to Strahd’s lieutenants, acting as mini-bosses who instigate trouble throughout Barovia in order to impress him and earn his favor.
The original Curse of Strahd has two m...
2023-12-10 16:04:00 +0000 UTC View PostThis is the sixth in a series of regular posts providing updates on my progress in drafting and editing the new Reloaded guide. You can find all previous posts here.
Apologies for going dark for so long! The holidays caught me by surprise, and it's been a bit of struggle to get through all of the edits I needed to make to the already-published arcs.
I do have some upda...
2023-12-09 16:33:51 +0000 UTC View PostHappy November! Got some quick updates - both about the workshops and about a new in-progress release.
First: after talking through the topic on the Patreon Discord, I've decided to shift the focus of the monthly workshops from "ad-hoc nominated topics" to "structured formal theoretical game/narrative design curriculum." It'll take me some time to get this curriculum together, as well as my lesson plans and drafted materials, so we'll be taking a month off from the Disc...
2023-11-22 00:42:49 +0000 UTC View PostIn Curse of Strahd: Reloaded, unlike RAW, the players have an opportunity to heal the Abbot of the Abbey of Saint Markovia of the corruption that has tainted his soul (courtesy of the Dark Powers and Amber Temple) since he first entered Barovia. The way this arc unfolds is simple: