“Because DMing is a Perform check.”
The Blog
DMing With Charisma is a blog dedicated to helping DMs of tabletop games improve their skills and hopefully the enjoyment and engagement of their players, and vice versa. Created in mid-2011, it focuses mostly on d20 systems.
The Author
I got into gaming via a circuitous route. I’d played video games as long as I could remember, and I picked up the D&D 3.0 Monster Manual in a video game store because it contained a lot of the monsters I didn’t recognize from a rogue-like game I had been playing. From the monster information I reverse-engineered the basic rules of the system, which gave me enough of a foundation to join a gaming club in college without embarrassing myself. I joined a D&D campaign in my second semester and ran my first campaign a year later.
Since then I’ve run a few hundred sessions over a dozen campaigns, not counting playtests, emergency one-shots, guest DMing sessions, and D&D game nights both sanctioned by Wizards of the Coast and otherwise. Though I’ve played in a few big-name systems and I want to play in a half-dozen more, I run in d20 because that’s where I’m most comfortable and where I have the most experience. My current focus is on a multi-campaign setting in Pathfinder.
For additional minutia, check out my answers to the #RPGaDAY event questions:
- Do you prefer to use real dice, a dice application or program, or use a diceless system?
- What is the best game session you have had since August 2015?
- What is something you have done with your game character that you are the proudest of?
- What is the most impressive thing that you can remember another player’s character doing in a session?
- What story does your group of players tell about your character?
- What is the most amazing thing that you know a game group has done for their community?
- What aspect of Roleplaying Games has had the biggest effect on you?
- Do you prefer hardcover, softcover, or electronic books? What are the benefits of your preference?
- What things are a part of your ideal session, other than the actual game?
- What was the largest in-game surprise you have experienced?
- Which gamer that you have played with has most affected the way that you play?
- What game is your group most likely to play next? Why?
- What makes a successful campaign?
- Who would be on your dream team of people you used to game with?
- What types or source of inspiration do you turn to most often for RPGs?
- What historical character would you like in your group? For what game?
- What fictional character would best fit in your group? Why?
- What innovation could RPG groups gain the most benefit from?
- What is the best way to learn a new game?
- What is the most challenging but rewarding system have you learned?
- What was the funniest misinterpretation of a game rule in your group?
- What are some random events in your games that keep happening?
- Share one of your best ‘Worst Luck’ stories.
- What is the game you are most likely to give to others as a gift?
- What makes for a good character?
- What hobbies go well with RPGs?
- Describe the most unusual circumstance or location in which you have gamed.
- What film or novel would you be most surprised that a friend had not seen or read?
- If you could host a game anywhere on Earth, where would that be?
- Describe the ideal game room if your budget were unlimited.
- What is the best piece of advice you were ever given for your game of choice?