Jim Dan Hill Library: Tabletop Role-playing Games Guide: Advice For The Game Master

Advice For The Game Master

While players can find detailed instructions in each game's manual, here are broader ideas like creating worlds, stories, and campaigns, along with ways to become a better Game Master.

Books

Collaborative Worldbuilding for Writers and Gamers

Call Number: Garden Level: PN145 .H425 2019

This book helps readers create vast fictional worlds with rich histories, interesting characters, and diverse places and items. It uses examples from popular stories like Game of Thrones and Star Wars, and provides a clear step-by-step approach to bringing these worlds to life.

Title text over a background that fades from blue to golden orange. A small figure in a space suit faces away from the viewer.

Complete Kobold Guide to Game Design by Wolfgang Baur

Call Number: Games: GV1469.6 .C667 2012

Game designers share advice on how to come up with exciting new adventures, creatures, and magic for a game.

A yellow cover with three images in vertical rectangles. The left image has a figure holding daggers, crouched on a cliff. The middle image is multiple figures fighting in a tight canyon. The right image has a shadowy figure perched high, watching others wade through high water.

How to Write Adventure Modules That Don't Suck

Call Number: Games: GV1469.6 .B58 2017

This book presents advice on how to write great adventures that will captivate players.

A black and white cover with doodle-like drawings of monster fighting various fantasy characters.

Kobold Guide to Plots and Campaigns

Call Number: Games: GV1469.6.K63 P56 2016

This book includes essays by experienced game masters on how to build a campaign from scratch and keep players interested all the way to the end.

Two figures stand on a cliff overlooking a medieval city. One is a large red dragon, crouching and looking downward. The second figure is a red draconic person with a staff.

Kobold Guide to Worldbuilding

Call Number: Games: GV1469.6.K63 W67 2012

Eleven leading designers in adventure gaming unite to share their thoughts on creating unforgettable worlds for players.

A stone tower is bathed in golden sunlight. The structure has much scaffolding around its base that people walk upon.

Kobold Guide to Worldbuilding, Volume 2

Call Number: Games: GV1469.6.K63 W67 2012

Eleven leading designers in adventure gaming unite to share their thoughts on creating unforgettable worlds for players.

A robed figure stands in front of a round window. The figure holds a feather quill and a book and gazes upon the nearby drawing board.

One-Shot Wonders : Over 100 Adventures For Fantasy RPGs

Call Number: Games: GV1469.6 .B36 2023

Though originally designed for use with Dungeons & Dragons, the ideas can be adapted for any system. It includes maps and key details to help create a quick adventure, as well as advice for creating worlds, stories, and characters.

Bartlett, Sam. Cover image. One-Shot Wonders : Over 100 Adventures For Fantasy RPGs, Roll & Play Press, 2023.

On the Way to Fun

Call Number: Garden Level: QA76.76.C672 D54 2010

This book explores the rich and engaging worlds found in video games and why they have become such a fun and memorable part of people’s lives. They trace the history of gaming and beyond to understand how and why these games gained significance. Aspiring game designers can use these insights to help them create their own unique worlds and stories for players to enjoy.

A photo of a smiling figure is facing the viewer. They are holding a controller for a video game.

So You Want to Be a Game Master

Call Number: Games: GV1469.6 .A54 2023

This book, written by an award-winning game designer, is filled with helpful advice and maps, making it ideal for anyone looking to be a Game Master. It's loaded with tips for crafting exciting dungeons, battles, role-playing experiences, and much more.

An illustration of a figure in a hooded robe. They hold a large book and sit behind a game master's screen. In front of them are artistic versions of a world map and various dice.

The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human

Call Number: Garden Level: GR72.3 .G67 2012

This book explores storytelling and why it has become so significant to people from all walks of life. The author examines the science of storytelling to help us appreciate its value in the world.

Gottschall, Jonathan. Cover image. The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, 2012.

A tan cover with various small images of people and things, spaced out between a variety of words.

Videos

3 Rules to make your RPG scary
A video from the designer of Call of Cthulhu. He gives advice to run games, including how to make them scary.
Length: 10 minutes.
10 Things All Dungeon Maps Must Have in D&D
A video to help players design maps for games.
Length: 14 minutes.
Adventuring Academy
A video series where an interviewer talks with a key person in the tabletop role-playing game (TTRPG) community. Each episode features a new guest from the TTRPG world. They discussing different topics, primarily about how to run games, but also how to be a better player.
Length: Varies by episode.
Creating Homebrew Content in RPGs! (GM Tips w/ Matt Mercer)
A video of tips to make up items, enemies, and even an entire world, within the rules of a TTRPG.
Length: 6 minutes.
Deborah Ann Woll on DMing & Why It’s Better When Things Go Wrong
A video of advice for running a game.
Length: 15 minutes.
Game Master Tips
A playlist of videos from Geek & Sundry to help run a game.
Length: Varies by episode.
How to Create Amazing Villains for Pathfinder and D&D
A video from Pathfinder 2e designer Jason Bulhmahn. He gives tips on running games.
Length: 1 hour and 2 minutes.
My First Character - Bringing Young Players Into D&D | D&D Celebration 2021
A video of advice from a panel of people in the TTRPG community on how to run games for children and teenagers.
Length: 58 minutes.
Problem Players | Running the Game
A video from a TTRPG writer. He gives advice on how to deal with one or more players in the group causing trouble for the other players and the game.
Length: 19 minutes.
Balancing the Dice - Game Masters Hall
A video from Geek & Sundry on how to handle the randomness of dice rolls in a game, ensuring that everyone has a good time, even when the dice don’t go in their favor.
Length: 14 minutes.
The Sociology of D&D | Running the Game
A video from a TTRPG writer that looks at the sociology of tabletop role-playing games and how to make a story and world that all the players have fun with.
Length: 11 minutes.
Worldbuilding: Making Unforgettable Characters (ft. Bob World Builder)
A video from Ed Greenwood, a creator of a Dungeons & Dragons world and many stories, talks about world-building.
Length: 8 minutes.
Writing & Sharing Your First Adventures w/ LaTia Jacquise
A video about making an adventure for the first time.
Length: 22 minutes.

Additional Resources

Finding the self in role-playing games: Weaving myth, narrative, and identity.
This article looks at Joseph Cambell's heroe's journey in storytelling and its uses in tabletop role-playing games.
First Time Game Master Guide
A 3rd party website full of information to help players learn to run a game.
Towards Immersive Computational Storytelling: Card-Framework for Enhanced Persona-Driven Dialogues
This article discusses role-playing games (RPGs) and how to create interesting and character-driven conversations. The authors suggest that this can be challenging for players. To help with this, they introduce a new card-based system that uses a 7B language model to generate tailored dialogue. By including details about the scene and the characters, the 7B model can effectively produce fitting conversations for characters and situations that players may not have encountered before.