#gmadvice

20 Things to Find on a River Pirate's Ship

Mark S. Cookman

Mar 15, 2016
4 min

20 Things to Find on a River Pirate's Ship

Today's subject matter is river pirates. River pirates are usually much different than their seaborne bretheren. The main reason for this is the difference in terrain. Seaborne pirates primarily live on their ship, but river pirate ships are rarely big enough for the crew to live on. Usually these vessels are little more than a barge or a large, flat-bottom canoe. River pirates routinely live more like bandits, hiding away in secret camps or inside concealed caves near the ri

283 views0 comments

Mark S. Cookman

Mar 14, 2016
6 min

10 Diabolically Cursed Magic Items

Welcome back to One-Armed Sal's Nautical Trade Emporium and Pawn Shop. Today's magical items do not identify as cursed because they do provide a positive magical effect, yet the cost to access the magic is far higher than most care to pay. Sal openly admits that these are some pretty shady pawned items that are now available for sale because their loans are in default. His prices are low, but he ain't a charity. Sal doesn't do buy-backs or returns so if you don't like what yo

1,177 views0 comments

Mark S. Cookman

Mar 9, 2016
2 min

20 Curses from a Roma Matriarch

Yesterday, I inadvertantly offended some people and I want to apologize. It was never my intention to offend; I was unaware that "gypsy" was a derogative slang for the proud Romani people. I believed the term "gypsy" to be a generic description, not unlike "mercenary" or "pirate". My intention was to illicit colorful images of a specific sort of nomadic people that might be found in any number of gaming multiverses under any number of names. I share these small tables to hel

221 views0 comments

Mark S. Cookman

Mar 8, 2016
1 min

20 Things to Find Inside a Gypsy Wagon

Keeping with yesterday's fortune teller theme, today's list is an odd collection of items that your PC's might find in a gypsy wagon. The items detailed below come from traditional human gypsy wagons, but there's no reason that other races couldn't have gypsies as well. I'm not really sure what would be on orcish gypsy wagons, but I will leave that for you to consider. For now, here are 20 Things to Find Inside a Gypsy Wagons. Happy Gaming! A hand-crafted violin 2 sets of b

339 views0 comments

Fortune Teller Double Feature - 20 Ways to Tell a Fortune and 20 Future Mysteries Revealed

Mark S. Cookman

Mar 7, 2016
6 min

Fortune Teller Double Feature - 20 Ways to Tell a Fortune and 20 Future Mysteries Revealed

Some feel it's best to have nothing to do with fortune tellers and their ilk, believing that nothing good ever comes from it. Others feel the need for weekly, or even daily, readings to provide advice to their daily routine. Whatever your personal feelings are on fortune tellers and the fortunes they give, they are a fundamental trope of story telling. Today's tables are to help provide you with some fortune teller fodder so that you might be better prepared the next time you

577 views0 comments

Mark S. Cookman

Mar 3, 2016
6 min

20 Strange Discoveries in Remote Places

Today's post is about unexpected finds. Perhaps your group is scouting a new area of the world or finds themselves waking up in an unknown location not sure where they are or how they got there. Maybe they are remote border guards or are travelling through a foreign desert. Whatever the case, these are not the kinds of things people see every day, in fact quite the opposite is true. These are things that few people will ever see. Feel free to use them however you like. Happy

125 views0 comments

20 Reasons for PC's to Adventure Together

Mark S. Cookman

Feb 29, 2016
4 min

20 Reasons for PC's to Adventure Together

On Leap Year Day, I wanted to create something a little different for you. Something that you may not need often, but hopefully something you'll find useful never the less. This is a table for starting a new campaign, shaking up an old one to introduce new characters, or giving you a premise for your group in a one-shot game. Additionally, sometimes the players create such a diverse group of characters that the GM has difficulties trying to make them all fit into a group. For

123 views0 comments

10 NPC Distractions to Allow Villains to Escape in a City

Mark S. Cookman

Feb 26, 2016
3 min

10 NPC Distractions to Allow Villains to Escape in a City

Today's post contains a table I created to help resolve a problem that I have had come up more than a few times while game mastering over 30+ years. The problem is the PC's have decided to chase someone and the GM doesn't want them to catch that someone. As DM, you can simply state that the target gets away, but I prefer to have a story element to blame so that the PC's don't feel railroaded. I also use these same sorts of entries for "missed" perception rolls, so that the pl

57 views0 comments

Mark S. Cookman

Feb 25, 2016
4 min

10 Minor Magic Items That Rock

Honestly, this post should be entitled "10 Minor Magic Items That Are Rocks", but I shortened it for at least 2/3 of a pun on today's content. Not all magical items are flashy and powerful, some are just simple items that help out in minor ways. Today, One-Armed Sal is having a sale on some cold, hard magic items that you or your PC's might like. Take a look and let Sal know if anything strikes your fancy. Soup Rock -- A roundish common looking stone approximately 2" in diame

985 views0 comments

Mark S. Cookman

Feb 24, 2016
3 min

20 Weaknesses for Villains and Henchmen

We all have our strengths and our weaknesses. When building a villain or major henchman, it is important to remember that they will have some weakness, too. Adding personality to your villains and henchmen makes the game more fun and the story more memorable. Below are twenty suggestions for bad guy weaknesses that can help you to develop some of your own. I have kept them generic using only male and female pronouns, but switch them up and change them to whatever you enjoy th

2,190 views0 comments

Mark S. Cookman

Feb 23, 2016
3 min

20 Pieces of Idle Gossip

Sometimes your PC's are trying to gather information. They are trying to find out about what is going on in the town and you suddenly realize that your adventure has TONS of gossip about what you really want them to follow up on, but NOTHING about anything else. This is for those times. This is a collection of hot air. Words spoken in front of, but not necessarily to, the PC's. It's probably all just bunk and nonsense, but something in it might be true. I leave it to you to d

248 views0 comments

Bard College of the Shanty Master for 5e

Mark S. Cookman

Feb 19, 2016
2 min

Bard College of the Shanty Master for 5e

Today, I decided to post a link back to a piece that I did for Tribality a while back. There are two reasons for this. First, I think that you should be aware of ALL of the great gaming resources on Tribality and second, because I am working on something special. So, if you have a 5e Bard character and you are looking for a different college, then you might like the link below. However, I encourage you to check out Tribality, even if you don't give one song about sea-faring B

379 views0 comments

Mark S. Cookman

Feb 17, 2016
2 min

20 Treasures Better Than Gold

On Wednesday, I am often thinking about the rewards of the coming weekend and those thoughts led me to treasure. Treasure is often the motivation for RPG adventures and I have talked about treasure twice before, once in Treasures That Aren't and again in Troublesome Treasures. Neither of those pieces contains a list of 20 items however, so I wrote this one to add to the set. I hope that you enjoy it. At low levels, most old school PC's crave gold, gems, and magic for treasure

117 views0 comments

One-Armed Sal's Nautical Trade Emporium and Pawn Shop

Mark S. Cookman

Feb 16, 2016
3 min

One-Armed Sal's Nautical Trade Emporium and Pawn Shop

Do your PC's need a (reasonably) trustworthy place to buy spell components, potions, and minor magic items? Do they need a fence to sell arcane items to? Perhaps they just need a person to cast spells (like identify) for them. Maybe they need a contact into the seedy underworld of the docks or maybe they need a low-level quest giver or a place to learn of rumors or arcane lore. Perhaps they could use a 30 day loan on some magic item that they possess. You could also use Sal a

73 views0 comments

20 Lines of Bad Guy Trash-Talk for RPG Fights

Mark S. Cookman

Feb 15, 2016
4 min

20 Lines of Bad Guy Trash-Talk for RPG Fights

There are numerous elements that go into creating a memorable RPG fight. One of the best ways to get players more engaged in a fight is to use trash-talk. Trash-talk has been used by fighters and athletes for generations, both to build themselves up and to tear their enemies down. Sure, it's always fun to kill the bad guys and take their treasure, but it's even better to beat down a trash-talking bully and take their stuff. The victory is more personal and sweeter somehow whe

915 views0 comments

20 Groups of Guards Searching for Something

Mark S. Cookman

Feb 11, 2016
4 min

20 Groups of Guards Searching for Something

Are your PC's suspicious? Are they wanted for some crime they committed -or- didn't commit? Maybe it's just a case of mistaken identity, but either way these guards are looking for something and they're determined to find it. Today's table is to help GM's out when someone has dispatched guards or henchman to ferret out information or find the PC's. I have tried to use generic titles like "guards" and "guard captain", but there is no reason you couldn't use this table for ANY

218 views0 comments

The Island of Lost 5e Monsters: The Baluchitherium and The Dragonne

Mark S. Cookman

Feb 10, 2016
2 min

The Island of Lost 5e Monsters: The Baluchitherium and The Dragonne

Today, we are returning to the Island of Lost 5e Monsters to see what other beasts from the days of 1e yore we can find. Here are where the other 5e monsters that we've already found are kept. This time I thought that we would go after some "big boys", so to speak. Without further delay, here are the Baluchitherium and the Dragonne for your pleasure and your PC's torture. Baluchitherium Rare Number Appearing: 1-3 AC: 15 HP: 218 (14d20+78) 1 Attack Trample +9 to hit 20 Dmg (3

497 views0 comments

Mark S. Cookman

Feb 9, 2016
1 min

20 Guilds Your PC's Might Encounter

The picture above is of the House of the Blackheads in Riga, Latvia. The Brotherhood of Blackheads was a trade guild founded in the 1300's. If you are intersted in the history of guilds, you should read about them in the link. Today's post is a follow up to yesterday's post that offered 20 different groups that your PC's might encounter. The hope is that this post will help to fix the imbalance of the previous post. This table is for guilds and other more organized groups tha

407 views0 comments

20 Groups for your PC's to Avoid or Join

Mark S. Cookman

Feb 8, 2016
1 min

20 Groups for your PC's to Avoid or Join

First, let me brag on the artist of today's pic. This is "The Distinguished Mercenary" by Toni Justamante Jacobs. You can see a lot more cool character portraits and other stuff at the ARTOFJUSTAMAN, so check it out. Second, today's post is a collection of group and organization names that might be used as either friends or foes to your PC's. Perhaps they just have information or they might be hiring. Feel free to use them however you wish. Sometimes a GM just needs a halfway

58 views0 comments

20 Critical Hits or Fumbles for Characters Fighting in a Ship to Ship Battle

Mark S. Cookman

Feb 5, 2016
6 min

20 Critical Hits or Fumbles for Characters Fighting in a Ship to Ship Battle

Creating realistic shipboard combat can be a challenge for any GM. Every D&D combat has its own unique features, whether it be terrain, monsters, or magical elements, but getting players to feel like they are fighting and moving on a ship when they are rolling dice and crunching chips around the table in your gaming room is a real challenge. I use a combination of elements to some effect, but be warned. There's no magic charm here; these are all cheap tricks. You must have yo

253 views0 comments

BLACK SHARK ENTERPRISES