How to Create an Interesting Villain

Most every story has some kind of villain, even if it's something abstract, but it's especially true that tabletop games have villains. Part of the nature of the gameplay dictates that a story is more accessible and rewarding if there's a villain to confront and triumph over. Creating an interesting villain can take work, but the rewards are many: your players will be interested in the character, ready to interact with them, and engaged with the story around the villain, to name just a few benefits. For some people, all they need is inspiration--check out this list of villain ideas for that--but some folks have the idea and need help putting it into practice. Read on for a full guide to creating an interesting villain from the ground up.

The first step is in choosing an idea. I've taken one from the list linked to above--the urban terrorist. But if we don't have an idea already, here are a few things to keep in mind about your villain: 

• Why do they do what makes them the villain? Do they stand to gain something from it, exact revenge on someone, fulfill some personal goal, etc.? One thing that applies here and elsewhere is the idea of having a reasonable villain. This is not a requirement; you can certainly have a totally deranged villain if you want to. But in my experience, players are far more intrigued by an enemy who makes some kind of sense to them. In the urban terrorist example, the villain looks at society and sees something wrong--that's their main motivation. But most all of us see something wrong with society, so we identify with the villain's perception, but not their methods. This creates a complex situation as the players must carefully define moral and existential issues to communicate with the villain (as opposed to "stop sacrificing babies," which is not complex). 
• How far do you want the villain to be able to take their plans? This will define almost every action you take when the villain is present in the game. If you would let your players overwhelm the villain in session two is that's how it worked out, then know that going in. Then you can plan for a villain whose time in the spotlight is limited and should be maximized. Inversely, you might be planning for the villain to constantly elude the party until a truly dramatic final battle can take place. In that case, you need to design a villain who is reasonably capable of constantly outfoxing the players, which creates its own problems (how do you keep players feeling empowered as they constantly fail to the villain no matter what? do you make the villain insanely powerful to explain their escapes? if so, how do will the players ever be able to overcome them?). By anticipating these problems, we can build solutions right in to our villain. Since most people will fall somewhere between these two extremes--no scripting and total scripting--use a combination of both approaches that feels right. 
• How can you escalate the villain's plans? As a story progresses, you want the stakes to become more dramatic. Again, the length of your campaign matters because it determines the pacing of your villain's actions. But generally, you want a regular reminder that the villain is at work even when the players are up to other things. In Listen Check, a D&D podcast, I had the villain of the campaign begin to create terrible nightmares in the minds of the players when they didn't pursue his morally objectionable quest--the nightmares came whenever the players slept, so it happened with notable regularity. You can do something like this: the urban terrorist always strikes at midnight for secret villain reasons, which then creates drama around the time; players and NPCs alike will be wary around that time. Or you could reserve actions from the villain for when you need to add drama to the players' lives. Answering these questions tells us about our villain, and we should be sure that the idea we had to start can work with our needs for the campaign. 

Beyond these considerations, you're essentially building a character like normal. I've written about this from the player perspective before, and I think that process can be helpful for making a villain. After all, the main NPC that the GM usually builds a campaign around is the villain, so it's worth taking time to really invest in the villain as a character. Knowing how the villain would act not just as a part of the plot but also as a person is huge. A villain with complexity is practically the holy grail of tabletops, and it's fairly attainable if you really think about them as a person outside of the story. 

One thing I personally enjoy in writing villains is to give them contradictory ideals. By this I mean that my villains are often very idealistic people who have been led astray by something in their lives. The players will be able to see over time that your villain's talk about morals and ideals is genuine, and part of the identity of the villain becomes complicated by this puzzle--why is the villain like this? This wrinkle can be a fun detail or a defining feature, depending on how you play it. I've run games with an angry god with a tragic past (a detail) and an anarchist princess who toppled her own kingdom (a defining feature). It's up to you how much this idea is a part of your villain. 

When you introduce this villain to the story for the first time, you are establishing the tone of the campaign. Is your villain menacing and mysterious? Condescending and chaotic? Silent and surly? You're also establishing how your players are going to feel next time they see the villain, so be careful to handle things right. I personally never prepare any language in advance with the occasional exception of riddles, and I recommend improvising most of your game if you're comfortable with. But if anything in a game is ripe for writing ahead of time, it's a villain's part. You want the villain to come off exactly as you intend, so at least for the first introduction, give yourself room to prepare. 

You also need to go into the campaign knowing that the villain, despite all your work on them, is not the star of the show. We want them detailed so that when it's their turn, we're ready. But if a villain is constantly around and the players can't do anything to them, it's just disempowering for the players. Be ready to introduce your villain and get them out of the scene as soon as their purpose is served. Be comfortable with playing the villain in brief scenes and then allowing the players to do the heavy lifting of creating a story in reaction to the villain. 

And I recommend that when you introduce your villain, you hold back on showing how powerful the villain is at first. Let's return to the urban terrorist example. The first time I have my players meet this villain, the urban terrorist is going to seem like a completely ordinary person. They'll be able to escape the scene capably, but they won't be superpowered. Then, I would gradually reveal more and more abilities in the villain until finally, they are revealed to have placed bombs all over the city, due to detonate at midnight. This massive race against the clock would be the climax of the campaign. Seeing a villain become more and more powerful is more dramatic than having a villain who can cast "Wish" from the first moment. 

How to Develop Places of Interest in a Setting

Good tabletop game writing answers all of the interrogatives: who, what, when, where, why, and the elusive how. Games are almost always clear about who (the players and the featured NPCS), the what (the quest), and the why (the reason behind the quest). Players themselves provide the how--it's the method they choose for progressing. The when is rarely a real question--it's answered by the context of the campaign and usually not given much thought. But the where! The where is a question that usually gets relegated to a secondary concern. It doesn't have to be, though. With a little bit of work, you can turn the places in a campaign into integral and interesting elements of the game. I call these developed locations "places of interest," parts of the game that double as settings and characters in their own right (a character in the sense that New York is kind of a character in movies about New York). Read on for a guide on how to develop a place of interest (or several) for your campaign. 

A word about the inspiration for this guide: recently, I created a tabletop game involving time travel and historical settings. When designing the game, I began with the where. I chose places (and times, but the time was informed by the place), and my first step in filling out the game was to create places. People came afterward, as did motivations and timelines. The individual locations in each place came to be not just significant locations in and of themselves, but also anchors that kept the places alive. So I want to apply that design to other tabletop games, and the guide below will show you how to do so. 

The first step in designing a place of interest can vary. Personally, I recommend beginning with a purpose. You may derive this purpose from a narrative concern--you need a place for the BBEG to hide out, or a place for the player characters to make a discovery, or a place that is chaotic and filled with people for a dramatic reveal. Or you might pick a place that serves a function in the community it's a part of--it serves a common utilitarian purpose, or it expresses something unique about the place it's in, or it is a regular hangout place for a particular faction of people. Any of these options are good starting points, and other ideas not listed here will, work too. What matters is that you have a grain of meaning to begin with that you can spin into a pearl. 

Once you have your purpose in mind, it's time to select a place that suits it. For the purposes of this guide, I'll complete each step with an example. Per this example, our developed place of interest will both express something unique about the place it's in and be a faction hangout. The unique aspect of the community it represents is that the town is built across a river, and rather than build a bridge, the city has planted a massive tree in the center of the river and strategically cut it as it grew--now there is a bridge across the river formed by the trunk of this tree, which has been cut into in its branches to create homes and businesses. So this tree is the center of the city and one of the more prestigious places to live and work. It also serves as a faction hangout. The most elite merchants who have businesses in this tree have formed something of an alliance to keep competing businesses out of the tree. They also want to grow the city around it at large, so they fund business ventures in the surrounding city. Although there is official governmental authority in the city, the real seat of power is these businesspeople. 

We can add a name to the place at any point in the process, so I'll pick one now. I want it to reflect the natural profile of the tree but also the power that it holds. For bonus points, something that reflects its purpose as a bridge would be good too. I'm going to go with "Great Oakbridge," which is good enough for my purposes in illustrating the process. 

The next step is in filling out the other functions of the place. Great Oakbridge acts as bridge, apartment, business complex, and base of operations for the elite merchants. But how does everyday life progress there? We know that because the location acts as a bridge, there are a good number of people who pass through every day. This could create safety concerns for residents, so I will add that there are only businesses on the bridge-level of the tree; in order to access the houses built into it, people must climb a staircase which spirals around the tree as it ascends. This trend should bear out as the tree's heights are reached; almost all the businesses are lower on the tree to make them easier to get to. Thus, the tree is divided more or less in half--businesses below and homes above. The most wealthy and elite of the merchants on the tree also have homes higher up, and the higher the home, the more prestigious. 

We also know that the elite merchants use the tree as a base of operations. But real estate on the tree is precious, and a dedicated space for meetings would be impractical. (Other residents of the city might also complain that livable space is dedicated to being empty most of the time.) So we can determine that the meetings take place in the personal spaces of the elite merchants. Let's say that these merchants take turns hosting the others in their respective businesses for the meetings. Obviously, this would not happen during business hours, so these meetings must happen either very early in the morning or later at night. I want these merchants to be industrious, and an early morning meeting feels more in line with that vibe, so we'll say that the first few floors of Great Oakbridge are alight with activity early in the morning before the first shoppers are out and about. 

Now that we know about the place a bit, it's time to attribute some characters to it. You might take an NPC or two who would fit the place and add them, and you can also create characters to fill the place out. I recommend a mixture of both. For the purposes of this example, let's create a few characters: 

• Violet Higgins - One of the elite merchants vying for control of the merchant group, she owns a business that sells common goods in a kind of expanded general store. Because she has irons in so many different fires, she is one of the more active members of the group, pushing for general business rights. She is aggressive in terms of business strategy and is in a bit of a rivalry with Gregory Illinel, a producer of finished goods. 
• Gregory Illinel - A new addition to the elite merchant group, he oversees several small companies which create specialized goods and resells them to merchants. Illinel is regarded by the other elite merchants as something of an outsider--he is the only one in the group to be primarily involved in resale rather than engaging in vertical integration like the others. He is somewhere cautious, and he regards the rest of the elite merchant group as potential assets he needs to convince of his value. 
• Janice Hornblower - The only artisan to be a part of the elite merchant group, she creates the city's finest metal goods. As the expert smith in the city, she has gained a following from adventurers for her high quality work. She has recently organized a form of apprenticing, charging for her tutelage--many of the regions best smiths trained under her. She represents the interests of labor, and is often outvoted by the other merchants. 

Already from these three characters, we get plenty of story opportunities. Violet Higgins can be used as something of a nemesis as she makes business interests more powerful than individual people; she might also be a strong ally if the party is looking to establish their own business. Gregory Illinel might provide quests to work with individual craftspeople; he might also be empowered to help growing businesses in the city over established businesses. The rivalry between the two could be ripe for a story about a power struggle amongst the city's most powerful people. Janice Hornblower could be the heart of a story about empowering laborers and craftspeople; she might be the center of a quest to change the business strategies in the city at large. These are just possibilities, and there will be more if we look closer. The important thing to recognize, though, is that these personalities came out of the place we built. 

We might then expand. We can do so in a number of ways. We could expand from the place: if the city in question has this combination bridge/apartment/shopping center, what other places would be necessary to serve the city. We still have lots of roles to fill: religious centers, governmental centers, cultural sites, and many more. We might make an individualized version of each of there: a temple that caters to all the good-aligned deities with considerable freedom of worship, a modest mayor's office that is overwhelmed by public demands for action, a formidable library of literature and philosophy from every culture. These places add complexity to the city and make it seem like a living place. 

We could also expand from the people: where else might Violet Higgins spend her time? Certainly she would check in on her various business concerns--we can develop those. She regularly visits creators of rope, textiles, and clothing at one location (a textile factory run by local laborers); she works with a shipping company (perhaps her own) to ensure timely deliveries (Higgins Deliveries is dedicated to transporting only her wares); she checks in at the city temple in order to reach out to the city's underprivileged with offers of work (she considers it good business practice to hire people who are formally aligned with good behavior). We might do the same for the other two people, following these steps for each place. 

And then we might expand from considering the opposite of what we've crafted so far. If the city has a good-aligned temple, a modest mayor's office, and a formidable library, what else might they have? Perhaps the less-than-good residents of the city have their own temple for evil-aligned deities, and it is carefully hidden away from the public. Maybe the mayor is not really the most powerful person in town, and the former mayor (now retired but not uninvolved in the city's progress) has been pulling the strings unseen. Mayhaps the library is so high-minded that common people have little use for it, instead preferring a local book collector's array of practical texts. Now we can develop these places further, and the result will be a complex mixture of places that represent all walks of life. 

The opposite approach also works for people. Let's consider Janice Hornblower. Her opposite is someone who works hard but hasn't broken through to success, someone who is more focused on their community than on themselves. They are not an expert like her, but they do have considerable skills in organizing people. Perhaps as Janice Hornblower uses her business expertise to advocate somewhat for laborers, our foil to her is a labor organizer who doesn't feel she works hard enough for common people. Now, Janice Hornblower is caught in a bind between the labor organizer and the other elite merchants, forcing her to pick a side. 

The best thing about the opposite approach is automatic conflict. In the examples from expanding based on place, we see that immediately, the good-aligned temple is in conflict with the evil-aligned temple. Similarly, the mayor and former mayor are locked in a struggle, as are the libraries of high knowledge and practical knowledge. One thing I have learned concretely about running games is that players pick up on conflict and almost always insert themselves into it. But creating places and people that oppose each other, we not only represent more than one side of a story, but we also give the players opportunities to assert themselves in the gameworld. 

In the end, your developed place should include what happens there (both in terms of its intended purpose and what people actually use it for), who frequents the location, and a counterpart to it (usually an opposite like we built, and sometimes a shade of grey when the story calls for it). What matters is that you have a complete sense of the place. And you want to communicate as much of this to your players as is reasonable. You don't want to drown the players in information, but you definitely want them to have more than a name to go off of. 

As your players explore your world, they'll begin to notice that places in your campaign are more than just a scene for the drama to unfold. This in turn leads them to investigate locations more completely, and you as a GM will be in a position to depict the other locations in your game more fully. And of course, remember to include the details you brainstorm. I for one am guilty of occasionally coming up with all manner of interesting detail and then neglecting to share all of that information with the players. It's in my head, so they must get it too, right? I wish that were the case. You can get away with more description of places than other elements of the game, so really show your players what a place is like. 

The amount of work you need to put into the overall process depends on your goals. For a small settlement that won't be a major part of the campaign, I recommend developing at least 3 places of interest. For a mid-size city that will be visited a few times, at least 5 places of interest should do it. But if you're going to base a whole campaign in one city (as I have before, and as I do in the game that inspired this guide), you want to get very granular. In my custom TTRPG, I developed 12 places of interest for each setting. That's quite a lot, and I don't think you need to go into that level of detail for any campaign. But I will say this: the more you know about a place, and the more complex and varied that place is, the richer it is as a setting for both you and your players. Think about it like sightseeing: would you rather go to a city which boasts 3 interesting places, or one that claims over 10? Give your players cause to get excited about exploring!

That's all for now. Coming soon: a one-shot based on the movie Snakes on a Plane, the value of reviewing last session's events, and a profile on music in my homebrew setting. Until next time, happy gaming!

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How to Use Historical Research for Inspiration

I recently finished developing a tabletop game that takes place in important periods in history. One of the things I learned from the process is that all of the greatest drama that I can create from nothing pales in comparison to the texture and drama of real history. By simply selecting a historical event, you can have all manner of dramatic context and realistic story to build a campaign from. In this guide, I will use a historical event as a basis for a campaign and show you how to do the same from your own research. 

The first step is in coming up with the kind of story you want to tell. As you can tell if you've read my other campaign materials, one of my favorite kinds of stories involve social upheaval. For the example case of historical research, I'll be using one of this variety. But your own method can be very different. Where my social upheaval story involves all members of society, history also has a variety of rich stories involving warfare, diplomacy, invention, and cultural revolution. Once you know the genre of your historical tale, it's time to pick a specific example. 

To start, we can just do a cursory Google search for the general topic. Then we follow up by selecting a few links that can give us a specific look at the issue. This site offers a look into U.S. diplomacy at certain periods of U.S. history. I chose to look more closely at U.S. diplomacy during the American Revolution. There are a number of links on this page that explore the issues in more detail--this one on a secret committee seems interesting and dramatic. Then we can Google for more information about this specific secret committee, which can lead us to Wikipedia's broader treatment of the issue. You can take it further than this and look at more scholarly sources on this committee like this one. All of that clicking around and cursory research took only a few minutes, and now we have the basis for a campaign. We have a colonial civilization throwing off the control over this mother civilization; the diplomatic efforts on either side become key to the progression of the story; the secret committee becomes crucial to the revolutionary effort. This slight framework for a campaign holds more than enough potential for drama and excitement to make it a successful game, and it only took looking back at our past. 

But for the bulk of this guide, I will be turning a different historical event into a more complete campaign. For the event itself, I will be using perhaps my favorite chapter of world history: the Prague Spring. As I mentioned above, this episode of history is one of social upheaval. In 1968, Czechoslovakia (a part of the Soviet Union) elected a man named Alexander Dubček was elected President of the country. This was notable for a number of reasons. First, Czechoslovakia's politics had long been dominated by the people of what would later become the Czech Republic; the Slovaks had little representation. This led to the friction that would make part of the Prague Spring's efforts involve the separation of the two entities. But Dubček was a Slovak. His election was a huge reversal. It signaled that reform was more important to the country at this time than its history of partisan politics. Second, part of Dubček's proposed reforms involved creating some autonomy from the Soviet Union--this was unthinkable at the time, but it caught on quickly. Soon, student-run organizations, newspapers, and radio programs were sharing radical ideas about revolution. Over the course of nine months, stretching into the spring of 1969, Czechoslovakia was an engine of change. In the end, the government held a public referendum: the people of the country voted on a measure to transition from communism under the Soviet Union to socialist democracy as two independent nations. The measure passed handily. Very quickly, the Soviet Union's attempts to negotiate Czechoslovakia back into the Soviet Union were abandoned, and Soviet tanks rolled into the country to enforce the reversal of the Czechoslovak vote. In the end, many of the changes made during this explosion of democratic and community-based growth were hampered. Czechoslovakia would not be able to return to changes like these until the fall of the Soviet Union 20 years later. 

Already, we have options when it comes to exploring this story. We could have our players experience this story themselves: the bulk of the story would be about making societal and governmental changes that reflect the peoples' desires. We could use this story as a prologue: the players would play in the in-game equivalent of 1989, when the imperialist forces are weakened, and the players would be responsible for driving the changes pioneered by the earlier civilization. Or we could flip the script entirely: the players instead play for the in-game equivalent of the Soviet Union, assigned to controlling and sabotaging the revolutionary efforts of the Czechoslovakians. With this option, your players may end up being faithful workers under the Soviet banner, and they may end up sabotaging the Soviets to help the Czechoslovaks. But as you can see, even this short period of history (not even a full year!) bears lots of possibilities for stories and twists on narrative convention. 

It's time to make the campaign outline from the Prague Spring. I'm going to opt for the most direct interpretation of the historical event to help keep this process clear: the players will act as the revolutionaries in the potentially doomed effort to throw off the control of the imperialist forces. I'll provide a campaign overview, a profile on the major NPCs involved, and an outline for each of the campaign's sessions. Like with my mystery campaign, I'll include a total of ten chapters, which would generally translate to about 20 sessions, give or take a few depending on how focused the party is. 

Campaign Summary: 

The party is approached by a social activist, who explains that a revolution is brewing and that they need help. The social activist wants the party to execute a number of goals that will strengthen the movement for revolution. The party is promised several favors from the new government officials if the revolution is successful. 

Major NPCs: 

• Anders Dover - This stand-in for Alexander Dubček is the leader of the reform movement. He promises better representation for common people, greater connection with civic responsibilities, and freedom from the demands of the imperialist power that controls the city. He oversees the overall strategy of the campaign, but most tasks are handled by his second-in-command, Nina Hornback. 
• Nina Hornback - Anders Dover's second-in-command, she tends to the day-to-day issues of the campaign. She gives the party missions to fulfill in order to advance Dover's plans. Hornback is more pragmatic than Dover, and she understands that many of the campaign's goals must be handled carefully and under cover, lest the imperialist forces catch wind of the campaign. 
• Andrew Norris - This stand-in for Antonín Novotný is the leader of the forces that Dover bested to be elected. He is sympathetic to the imperialist regime and will try to observe the actions of the party and report them to the imperialists. Norris acts as a foil to Dover; where Dover is idealistic, Norris is a practical man who doesn't believe change can be achieved. Norris can be treated as the key enemy in this campaign, and his reach can become more intimidating if he has a network of people working beneath him. 
• Englebert Gordon - This stand-in for Eduard Goldstücker is a writer and labor organizer. He is a powerful voice of common people, an outspoken critic of Andrew Norris, and a supporter of Dover's agenda of empowering labor and the voice of the people. He can be a key resource for the party, as ideas that he publicly espouses become more popular amongst the people; the party can work with Gordon to spread word of their goals and receive public support. 
• Lana Vessel - This stand-in for Ludvík Vaculík is a writer and broadcaster who supports Dover's plans for social reform and greater control of the economy, but she also believes that Dover's efforts don't go far enough. Vessel believes that all ties with the imperialist forces should be severed, that the media's role is to criticize power, and that the economy should be more free than planned. In order to completely gain the support of the people, the party will have to work with Vessel to unite the entire city behind Dover. 

Story Chapters: 

1. The party is contacted by Nina Hornback, who explains that a revolution is brewing in the city against the imperialist forces that control it. She offers political favors and a moderate payment in return for the party's support of Anders Dover, the newly-elected leader of the city. The first task is meeting with Dover, learning about his goals, and discussing strategy. The party should also witness Andrew Norris publicly speaking to a crowd about how the imperialists are the city's lifeblood; the speech is met with resistance by some. 
2. Hornback gives the party their first assignment: speaking with Englebert Gordon about Dover's policies. Gordon is grateful for the opportunity to learn more about the new leader, and he is generally excited about Dover's plans. Before he will publicly endorse Dover, though, he requires a favor from the party: they must prove their commitment by criticizing Andrew Norris. Specifically, he wants the party to vandalize Norris' home, leaving behind a message that calls him a traitor. If the party does agree to vandalize Norris' home, they are met with resistance from city guards. 
3. Englebert Gordon is convinced to help the party. He organizes an event where he is to speak about the city's needs, but he fears that he may become a target from the imperialists if he does. He agrees to speak at the event and endorse Dover if the party agrees to guard him during his speech. During the speech, three assassins arrive and strike at Gordon; the players must protect him. The attack raises questions in the public about the morality of the imperialists, who people assume ordered the attack. A new wave of support for Dover results from the outcry against the attack. 
4. Hornback is pleased that the party has gained Gordon's support, and she turns her efforts to building the movement. She explains to the party that some revolutionary writers have messages to publish, but there are not enough printing presses in the city to support everyone's voice. Hornback says that three presses were intercepted en route to the city; she assigns the party to go recover and deliver the presses to the city. The party discovers that a band of highwaymen have taken the presses; close investigation reveals that the imperialist forces paid the highwaymen to intercept the printing presses. 
5. Hornback is pleased that the party has recovered the printing presses. She tasks the party with reaching out to various revolutionary writers and decide on the writers who will have first access to the presses. She suggests beginning the search with Lana Vessel, the most outspoken of the city's advocates for home rule. Vessel is at first cautious but soon grows excited at the chance to spread her message. She also suggests that the party reach out to a few of her colleagues. They are: 
1. Douglas Moore - A Dover supporter who believes that negotiation with the imperialists is the best way forward.
2. Penelope Sign - A former Norris supporter who cautiously supports the home rule movement. 
3. Yancy Willniel - An outspoken critic of the imperialists, he ardently supports the right of the city to publish critical materials. 
4. Cassandra Rogers - Mainly an economist, she believes that an economy planned by the city will always be stronger than an economy planned by the imperialists.
5. Rutger Friedman - An advocate for furthering the strength of democratic processes in the city, he is cautious of sharing his ideas under his own name for fear of the imperialists. 
6. With the presses printing the works of the party's chosen authors, Hornback directs the party to oversee the distribution of the newly printed materials. Hornback recommends working together with local businesses to hand out the materials. The party must then convince various business owners that spreading the materials is worth the chance of being targeted by the imperialists. Business owners should be especially sensitive to arguments about the freedom of economy they would have under Dover's plans. The party should ensure the cooperation of at least three major businesses before completing this chapter. 
7. Hornback believes that the party's efforts are paying off and the people of the city are beginning to rally around Dover's agenda. She proposes a large event in the center of the city, with speeches from Dover and his supporters. The first step is in planning the event. The party must obtain the rights to hold the event in the center of town, find at least two other speakers in support of Dover (these can be drawn from the writers in chapter 5 or from other corners of the city), and spread word of the event. The party should face resistance from public servants who are still sympathetic to Norris and the imperialists.
8. Hornback is concerned that the imperialists may be mounting a counter-offensive. She asks the party to act as defense against any imperialist actions taken during the speeches. The party must deal with these three issues during the speeches: one of their chosen speakers is anxious and reconsidering speaking (the party must calm them and convince them to go on), a fight breaks out in the crowd between Dover and Norris supporters (the fight must be quelled, or it will turn the whole event into a fracas), and three more imperialist assassins arrive and try to kill Dover (the party should be able to save him here; the greater impact is the sense of a loss of public safety following the event). 
9. The event a success in raising public support, Hornback says that it is time to put the public to a test. She asks the party to work with a few public officials to create a referendum on which everyone in the city can make their voices heard. The party must deal with the bureaucracy of the city's government (having players go back and forth between people who push responsibility off onto others will do well), convince a Norris sympathizer to cooperate (Charisma-based skills, bribery, or strong-arming them could all work), and getting Dover's approval (he nitpicks several wordings but ultimately agrees to move forward based on Hornback's confidence. 
10. The referendum takes place, and Dover's measures are uniformly approved. The city enters a short period of celebration, which is cut short when an army and siege machines arrive at the city gates. The party may try to fight, but they should quickly be surrounded. Dover is taken captive back to the imperialist capital, and Hornback watches in horror as most of the writers are rounded up as well. In the real history, Czechoslovakia had to wait two decades before they could truly recover from the Soviet invasion. But for a more satisfying end to the campaign, we can handle this a few different ways:
1. The party leads a mission to rescue Dover and return him to power. 
2. The party takes city leadership themselves and continue's Dover's agenda or their own. 
3. The party raises troops and attacks the imperialist forces in an effort to gain independence. 
4. The party creates an underground resistance to the imperialists. 

So there you have it: a complete campaign created from inspiration from a historical event. Not only is this story driven by a real tale of human resistance, which means that as GM, I get to tell my players about the surprising real history along the way, but the reality of the story makes it more believable and accessible to my players. And the act of writing all this was very simple; I really just had to take the big ideas of the Prague Spring and recalibrate them for tabletop game playing. You can easily do the same. 

That's all for now. Coming soon: how to use Hope and Despair for storytelling, a one-shot based on the movie Napoleon Dynamite, and a profile on mythology in my homebrew setting. Until next time, happy gaming!

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How to Develop a Historical Event in Your Gameworld

Your gameworld has a distinct history and vibrant cultures. The forces of history combine to create a variety of effects that govern the way life in your world functions. And a well-developed history can inspire your players and show them that the gameworld is more real than they realize. But developing a sense of your world's history can be a challenge--which details are useful? This guide will show you how to turn an idea for a historical event into a full expression of your world. Read on for the details you'll need to create a meaningful historical event. 

In my gameworld, I have developed a few historical events into world-changing things that every person in the world knows about. Most of these events are designed to show how the origin of my society reached the point where standard D&D ideas can be represented. To that end, I developed historical events like the dissolution of kingdoms and the forging of a shared currency, which give my world a form that lends itself to D&D details. But I have also developed unique world events that make my world distinct from other homebrew settings. This guide will revolve around one such event--the Magic War--and show you how to design an event like it. 

Let's start with the write-up and move into why these choices serve you in your worldbuilding. You can find the document I've prepared here; I'll be using it as a framework for what we're doing here. The first thing that I think we should address is the brainstorming aspect. When worldbuilding and creating historical events, we want to imagine things that have meaningful effects on everyday life. I am in some ways hesitant to use a war as the example here, because often the result of wars is simply that a border changes or a certain group's access to governmental representation changes. These can be interesting ideas, but what's much more interesting is a world event that affects the culture of the world. I developed the Magic War not so much as a large armed conflict but more of an ideological struggle. That's why the conflict of the Magic War is about what people think magic should be treated as; there are forces which say to keep magic free, forces which say to regulate magic, and forces which want to outlaw magic altogether. I like this conflict because it's really about people's beliefs about fairness and power. I would recommend that you too develop events that are more culturally-oriented, if only because it will have much more interesting effects on your world than a series of battles. 

So now we have our main idea--a conflict between people from all walks of life along ideological lines. Then it's time to make a web of the information that will define how the conflict plays out. I started with the names of organizations and individuals who were prominent in the conflict. This gives me the ability to come back to these names when I need someone to do something important; it also lets me start before the conflict with just the ideas of the people who would get involved. Here's my array of important people--note that many are tied to the important organizations, which gives a sense that many broad interests are being served under a single banner: 

Combatants:	Pro-Magic	Pro-Regulation	Pro-Abolishment
Major Forces:	United Academies of Evanoch	High Council of Commerce	Citizens Against Magic
	The Magic User Alliance	Religious Protection League	Nature Preservation Society
	Governments of Mishara, Talon Gorge, Vestry	Governments of Finiel, New Dalton, Ringsdale, Torga, Underhar	Unified Artisan Coalition
Major Players:	Plia Yallo, Magic User Alliance Chief	Murphy Cavedweller, politician	Craig Nerrin, Regent of Such
	Forrester Ridge, grand sorcerer	Preston Rafter, high priest	Vaughn Plouder, CAM Head
	Randall Mintner, UAE Dean	Harley Constance, author	Terry Humbert, UAC Representative
	Torrine Aureli, high cleric	Pauline Foster, HCC Chair	Evelyn Knot, NPS Leader
	Calies Tasselman, scholar	Lenk Prodd, philosopher	Daniel Thorpe, Chief Editor of New Dalton Herald
Major Combatants:	Friella Volinea, grand mage	Julian Harp, famed mercenary	General Grant Taggert
	Laurie Denning, high cleric	Colonel Stephen Holton	Ophelia Dinnir, tracker
	Felix Pilliu, grand mage	Jackie Dustrider, mercenary	Captain Tossul Vark
	Lop Friggle Rind Seppa, grand sorcerer	Roger Gillina, high cleric	Sergeant Knox Bulwark
	Insellor Diesef, mercenary	Private Jop Derritt	Gerald Blademaker, militia leader
Casualties:	9,642	28,382	51,951
Total:		79,975

In addition to the organizations and names (which distinguish between combatants and more diplomatic or ideological players), I included a breakdown of the casualties on each side of the conflict. I figured that magic users have access to more power than the average person who wants magic abolished, and there are generally fewer magic users than otherwise, and ultimately the magic users do win, so I gave them the lowest casualty count. They're followed by Regulation forces, which might have a few magic users but who are more neutral in the conflict and thereby less inclined to be targeted by enemy forces than a diametrically opposed side. Finally, the Abolition forces take the highest casualties, as they are the least able to defend themselves and are the likeliest to be targeted by magic users. Initially, these numbers were just semi-random digits, but having a general idea to start with means that I have a reference point to work with. 

The next step is to create an overview of the information included in your event. In my overview, I talk about the formation of the sides of the conflict; one specific politician's suggestion of regulating magic to resolve sore feelings about magic users caused people everywhere to take sides depending on what they believe is right. I also describe the beginning of hostilities and the close of those hostilities with just enough detail that I have a sense of the framework of the event. You'll notice if you're looking at the description of the Magic War that the opening and closing of the war are really just suggestions of a larger idea. I like that because I'm a GM who loves to improvise and leave areas open in my gameworld in order to let players decide the world's fate. If you're a little more inclined to have everything totally spelled out, then develop these ideas in greater detail. But I think that unless you're having your player characters learn intense historical education, you can use the detail level I'm representing--it's what an average living person who didn't serve in the war would know, and that's enough. 

Next, I include a short section on the war itself. I indicate that magic users had a specific position in the war; many of their governments advocated for Regulation, and many of their neighbors were advocating for the Abolition of magic. This means that magic users were suddenly turned against their communities; it was fight your neighbors or lose your livelihood, and that gave the magic users a certain edge in the fight; they had more to lose than anyone else, and that edge ultimately turned the tide for the magic users. 

The next section in the document is a breakdown of major battles in the war. If you're opting for a more cultural impact than a war, I recommend substituting this section with a list of cultural events and diplomatic actions, or something that similarly serves your event. Such a list might include successful and failed diplomatic missions, public statements, newspaper articles, works of art, governmental measures, or inventions. In the case of the Magic War, though, these events are represented by battles. For each battle, I indicate a date that the battle took place, a location that the battle took place, which forces fought there, and what the casualties looked like. I also include a description of the battle: how it started, who fired the first shot, what actions turned the tide of the battle, and how it ended, as well as impacts of the battle (like changes to the momentum of the involved forces and later battles). 

I include in my list a total of five battles. I think that five is a good number to stick with; less than that, and the event seems abbreviated and unrealistic, but more than that, and the event seems unwieldy and includes too many details for the players to really process and appreciate. In the case of the Magic War, the five battles show the general trend of the war over time; the magic users initially pull ahead, the Regulation and Abolition forces deal heavy blows to one another, and the magic users experience a setback. This general trend sets up the magic users as favorites, but the late Indigar Raid hands the magic users a mixture of a draw and defeat. You can imagine how the culture of the world is affected by all of this. Abolition forces see magic users as uncontrollable liabilities who can overpower anyone they choose, and the early battles of the war bear this out. It was only the increasing ruthlessness of the war that led to the Indigar Raid, as people feared a world in which magic users could go unchecked in their powers. Thousands of Regulation and Abolition forces were dying compared to only hundreds of Pro-Magic forces. It was a troubling time for many. And it all sets the stage for the end of the war. 

I've also included a section called "Important Events." This, like the overview, is not as detailed as it could be; the idea here is to create a sense of what is going on during the war that isn't a direct battle. This is another place you could lean on the many cultural things that we can consider (successful and failed diplomatic missions, public statements, newspaper articles, works of art, governmental measures, or inventions). In the case of the Magic War, I opted for a few assassination attempts and a public massacre. Initially, there are some botched assassination attempts: the magic users fail at the assassination of two Regulation leaders, and the Regulation forces respond by assassinating a prominent magic user leader. This is early in the war, so it adds to the sense that magic users were fighting everyone around them; the early failure to assassinate rival leaders makes the magic user cause more desperate to get the upper hand. The public massacre is a way to show that the war turned the public consciousness violent enough to attack civilians, and it also shows that the war was loudly opposed by even some who had a stake in the war. Finally, I close this section with the Abolition assassination of an vital Regulation leader; this both removes Regulation momentum and shows that Abolition forces grew more violent and desperate as the war escalated and turned away from their favor. 

The final section in this document is about the resolution of the war. I describe the final battle of the war, which the magic users decisively win with the deployment of a powerful spell ("Stop Time" freezes the battlefield, allowing magic user forces to strike at their foes invulnerably). As a result, Regulation and Abolition forces capitulate at a tavern in the nearby city of Talon Gorge, and free use of magic reigns supreme over the land. The treaty signed by Regulation and Abolition forces recognized free magic as the law of the land and dissolved the military forces of all sides involved. So ends the Magic War after nearly a year of slaughter across the countryside, and today, people in my world are still bitterly committed to their cause, but do not speak of it for fear of riling up someone with a different cause. 

So I've developed this whole historical event. No what? Well, there are lots of things you can do with an event like this. One fairly obvious implementation would be a campaign that is set during the Magic War. I've developed it as history, but wouldn't all the fighting and diplomacy and other machinations of the war be a fun storyline? I could just put my players in my world 30 years before the present day and let them serve in the army of their choosing. Or I could have a storyline that echoes that event--perhaps there's a faction of Abolition forces who have been quiet for years but are lurking in the darkness, preparing to launch the first attack of a new war. Or it could be more cultural in scope: perhaps the players are involved at a university where debates over the war are still raging. Or we might get even more cultural and start dropping references to the war in common speech--perhaps a wizened old spellcaster has stories about their old days serving for the right to use magic. Or maybe the appeal of Regulation never went away, and some cities and towns are starting again to push for Regulation--what would a spellcasting player character do? These are all just some ideas about how to include the historical event in the gameworld so that it's more than an idea, but an actual reality for the players. You can do all this and more with a well-developed historical event. 

So get to it: brainstorm your idea, get the big picture written down, and start to think about how the details can reflect the big picture. You'll find that even the most unassuming idea can become spectacular with the right details in place. And remember that these events should honor your players as much as your own interests--try developing historical events that reflect what your players are interested in by personalizing your game's content. And most of all, have fun with it. Creating a history for your world should create interest in the gameworld for you, so if you're not having fun, bring it closer to what you really enjoy. Before long, you'll have a sparkling, rich gameworld your players will love. 

That's all for now. Coming soon: a list of ideas for your next BBEG, a one-shot inspired by Alice in Wonderland, and naming conventions in my homebrew world. Until next time, happy gaming!

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How to Write Riddles for Your Players

Riddles are a classic part of TRPGs; they guide the players from point A to point B with some critical thinking on the players' part. But riddles are also a difficulty in gaming, as they create a circumstance in which the players must think through a problem with only one correct answer. Further, many players have encountered a variety of riddles in their lifetimes, and your presentation of a tried-and-true riddle may mean that the players are supposed to work through a riddle that they've already heard plenty of times. Read on for how to create your own original riddles and how to keep players on the right track. 

When I ran the National Treasure campaign, I had to include riddles. My players were tracking down powerful magical artifacts in hopes of attaining great power, and the format of the movies the campaign was based on called for riddles leading from clue to clue. I had to create a system of interconnected riddles that would guide the players across the continent. I originally wanted to place a riddle clue in each of the major cities on the island, but my players were more the type to get into shenanigans than follow a story, so I shortened the riddle count to five. The riddles the players answered described locations to find the next clue. This makes the riddle different in nature from traditional puzzles, as they are more of a scavenger hunt than a single riddle challenge. As I continue, I will break down the difference between location-based riddles and answer-based riddles. But first: what makes a good riddle? 

A strong riddle is specific enough in its clues that only one answer should be right. A strong riddle should be long enough to include specific information, but not so long that the information in the riddle gets overwhelmed. And finally, a good riddle should have a certain sound to it: it should be mystical and broad in scope, and it gets bonus points if it rhymes. Writing a riddle isn't as difficult as it may seem at first. If you work backwards, you can usually come up with something that will work well. Imagine something that exists in your fantasy world; it could be common, like grass or a spoon, or uncommon, like a wand or a beholder. Then try to come up with three descriptions of the thing that are vague enough to not give away the riddle. I'll do one common and one uncommon version by way of example. A spoon is shiny, curved, and carries things. (Not a lot of work here, just defining a spoon in a way that it would be hard to define something else.) On the other hand, a wand is long and thin, made of natural materials, and can be used to invoke energy. (These are a bit more specific, but only because a wand is something that doesn't exist in our world, so we want to make it a little clearer for players who might not be thinking in the gameworld.) Now that we have the details, we can write the actual clues. "What curves like a river and shines like a star? You use it to carry, but not very far." So in three short steps, we've gone from our answer to clues to the final form of the riddle. The wand example now: "Built of the wilds, long and thin like a road; using this right or wrong may cause stuff to explode." [If the rhyming element of the writing process is giving you a hard time, might I offer to pieces of advice: (1) play around with word choice until you have a common word ending, and (2) use RhymeZone to find good matches for what you need.]

With riddles like these, there is always the possibility that your players will name something that does fit the description but wasn't your intended answer. For instance, I tried the spoon riddle on a friend, and they came up with "shovel." A shovel is curved, and it shines as much as a spoon does; it also doesn't usually carry things very far. If I posed this riddle and my players answered "shovel," I would have the riddle-giver grant them correct and disclose the intended answer as well. There's no point in holding players to an exact answer if they're successfully being clever and playing the game by the rules. 

These are examples of answer riddles, riddles in which solving the riddle is the endgame of the riddle process. By this I mean, you are likely to have instituted answer riddles as part of a challenge with a powerful enemy or in a dungeon. We're thinking of the classic Lord of the Rings "speak friend and enter" kind of riddles, where solving the riddle allows a story mechanism to advance the players because of their completing the riddle. But you can also write interconnected riddles which lead to one another as part of a larger "scavenger hunt" style series of riddles. This means that instead of crafting a riddle that has an answer like we did above, we need to indicate another location. This can be slightly more challenging because the riddle must indicate an exact place on the planet rather than simply having a broad answer. But it's still very doable. Let's say we have players who need to solve two riddles to go from where they've begun (a noble's estate) to another riddle location (a mausoleum in the countryside) to the final location (an abandoned temple in the forest). To do so, we'll need two riddles to get them there. 

Our first riddle appears at the estate and directs the party toward the mausoleum. So we treat this specific mausoleum as the answer to our riddle. We need three details about the mausoleum: it belongs to the Orrin family, it has a large griffin carved into the roof, and it lies 50 paces from the meeting of several roads. It's worth noting that unless the party has been to this mausoleum before, this clue still won't mean anything to them, really. They'll have to ask around for a place matching this description, or do some research at a library, or simply start checking out mausoleums across the countryside. But the important thing is that when the players do encounter this specific mausoleum, they'll have everything they need to identify it as the correct one. But let's go ahead and convert these details into a riddle: "Of Orrin clan and griffin-defended, this is where the journey ended; step away from the meeting of paths, and go 50 paces toward the aftermath." This riddle is a little longer than the ones above because we need more details to make the place specific enough. 

Then we'll follow up with the second riddle for this example: going from the mausoleum to the abandoned temple in the forest. Let's decide that the temple is a shrine of Ehlonna, fallen into disrepair and overgrown by plant life. It lies at the heart of the forest, where no light can filter through the treetops. And it is marked by a carving of a unicorn into the elaborate floor of the temple. Again, this temple would only be an obvious answer if the party is returning to it, so you may need to have them investigate to find it. Our riddle will again be longer than our first examples. "The woods' defender overgrown, and draped in vines, to light unknown; a unicorn carved on the floor, and nothing like what came before." This riddle is specific enough to indicate this temple in particular, and as they players enter the temple, they will be excitedly pointing out the details that match the riddle. It will be a confirmation they'll solved the riddle correctly, which will be exciting for your players. 

In general, you want to err on the side of being more simple and direct with your riddles. Think about it this way: if your players solve a too-easy riddle, then the game continues a little quicker than anticipated. But if the players can't solve a too-difficult riddle, then the whole game grinds to a halt while the players, more frustrated and delicate now that they can't progress, reach evermore desperately at possible answers. Don't let this happen. You can prevent it from ever being an issue if you just tune your difficulty down a bit. 

Even with your best efforts, though, your players may run into difficulties. Even a well-designed riddle can stump players who are simply thinking in different ways than your riddle requires. It's useful in that case to have a backup plan. If you have an NPC hanging out with the player characters, have them offer a "hint," by which I mean have the NPC take a guess that's along the right lines but still wrong. It may jumpstart the players to consider similar options and get them closer. If you can't do that, you can always opt for out-of-game hints, which I dispense based on the result of Intelligence checks: get a 15 or higher (depending on the riddle, this DC goes up or down) and receive an out-of-game hint. Let's provide an example from the spoon riddle. The players just aren't getting it; the curved shiny idea has them thinking about weapons like scimitars rather than spoons. So you allow an Intelligence roll, and one of your characters meets the DC, so now you offer a hint: "It is much smaller than a sword, but it is gripped the same way." Or "It is not meant to carry very much, but its entire purpose is to carry things." These bonus clues are very minor; they more add one extra detail to the big picture, and that's what you want. Try to add one more detail every time you use this strategy, giving the players a chance to solve the riddle without your completely giving it away. 

There are lots of ways to use riddles in your game. As mentioned previously, you can have riddles be a part of dealing with certain NPCs for moving through a dungeon; you can have a series of interconnected riddles which move the players through a story; you can have your players solve riddles as part of a narrative that focuses on player ingenuity. But a well-placed riddle can be a great challenge to your players in other circumstances as well. When your players meet a wise but slippery NPC who they need help from, that NPC can refuse to help the players until they solve a riddle. When dealing with the gods, the players may be forced to solve a riddle before speaking with the powerful entities. You can even use riddles as a traveling game, having NPCs the players are traveling with spout riddles for the players to solve as they go. Whatever way you want to insert riddles in your game, the actual writing of them can be simple and add a good deal of excitement to your game. 

Maybe the riddle-writing concept is still intimidating, or maybe you want more examples of riddles to work off of. Here are ten more riddles with their answers:

1. Round as the sun which marks the day, it keeps what eludes all else as it inches away. (Clock)
2. What speaks any language but cannot make a sound? What can fold up and be carried around? (Book)
3. What feeds villages that doesn't grow from the earth? It is a thing created from birth. (Milk)
4. These small things can simulate fate; with a flick of the wrist, the stakes they dictate. (Dice)
5. What blocks out the sun and locks out the cold? What has a way to block the threshold? (House)
6. From stock of soaring wings, you wouldn't think | that its greatest journey would be ink. (Quill)
7. What language can excite you without your comprehension? Its voice is made by changing patterns of tension. (Music)
8. Silent and stealthy, it hides from all; it comes naturally since it is so small. (Mouse)
9. Metal and curved is this tool for the poacher; it's often employed with an attached floater. (Fish Hook)
10. What is sized for people, but always larger than they? It is where people go for hours to stay. (Bed)

That's all for now. Coming soon: a list of custom magic items, how to balance your game's economy, and how to manage a boss fight. Until next time, happy gaming!

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