Best of the Web: Teaching Game Mastery, Factions, & Video Bits

Teaching Game Mastery
Many have tried. Gary Gygax barely tried, mostly limiting himself to don't Monty Haul and don't buy non-TSR products during the big D&D boom. Then when he was kicked out of TSR and they were fighting legal battles to keep him producing other games he came up with a game mastery book or two, but nobody really talks about those books.

Every Game Master is different, every group of players is different. There are literally tons of variables that can screw up any lessons.

There are books and blogposts dedicated to explaining how to game master. I read and mostly enjoy them all. People learn in different ways (and as noisms mentions different topics demand different learning tactics). I don't think all those things I've read have really helped my GM skills at the table. I absorb the good ideas about designing adventures and campaigns and all that stuff that happens before everyone settles down to play, but once the dice are rolling I sort of run on intuition.

Of course some lessons sink in and become part of the nebulous intuition so bless the folks for trying.

Factions in the dungeon
Ran across a bit on the Sorcery & Super Science! blog called Everyone's Got an Angle in Arden Vul. Basically it has a chart showing the relationships between various dungeon groups. Factions and exploiting their conflicts have been a thing since B2. The concept is vital to any larger dungeon to move beyond simply hack and slash so this really isn't anything new but the table might be nice in a module overview of the dwellers.

Video Bits
There are a handful of Youtube channels I watch regularly (depends on the topic). They tend to be less about gaming and more about the medieval weapons and armor. A few are a bit goofy but interesting and knowledgable enough they are worth giving a chance.

• Scholagladiatoria 
• Knyght Errant
• Lindy Beige 
• Skallagrim
• Shadiversity
• Metatron

Blog Roll

• Akratic Wizardry - One of the few blogs that discusses OpenQuest, Mythras and RuneQuest.
• Bat in the attic - Home of the series How to create a fantasy sandbox which is must read material.
• Monsters and Manuals - The creator of Yoon-Suin, a setting I'm not sure I'll ever use but that is overflowing with creativity (and thus spurs idea after idea when I read it). I also must mention the graphic design is slick. Too many games are ugly because they overdo, or simply ignore, the graphic design aspect of their product.