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That is a pretty neat summary of the distinction, I like it. And it works, story-wise. You can shrug off getting thrown into a wall hard enough to crack it because you're a hero, you're special. This poor sucker didn't have a chance. (I've found it also makes the players a bit more aware of the...

Wow, I didn't know the AngryDM posted here. ;) There is something to that, though. Being planned out a whole session ahead of time is as far as I ever plan, and that's only because we've had to skip the last couple of sessions. Since we're playing over Maptools, I've got a stack of...

I only ever run games (Or play them, for that matter), with people I know and can get along with. I've had too many disasters with random people, hardened by random people on the internet trending towards :):):):):):):). With that in mind, I tend towards the service side of DM. A lot of that...

I like Eberron, as much maligned as it tends to be, just for the film noir vibe that you can get from it, and how much fun it is to completely flip expectations on someone. It does bring up one of the greater strengths of the D&D brand, I think, though. It has multiple, widely different...

I'm a fairly young gamer and DM (AD&D 2e came out the year I was born, just to make you all feel old.), so most of my experience is with 3e-4e. I also may be the odd one out being a very aggressive DM who has no issue with handwaving a rule that gets in the way of the table having fun, who still...

This may be cheating a bit, and it's likely been said upthread, but: Learn to wing it. The second best skill a DM can have is a mastery of the Indy ploy. You only have to make it look like you're one step ahead of the players. If you can convince them you're prepared and keep rolling when...

That's genius. The Silence like that, as agents of the Lords of Dust in an Eberron game would be awesomely paranoia inducing. That really makes me want to write an Eberron adventure using that hook. Depending on the players, you could also get a lot of mileage out of running a scene where after...

Used a couple of fun mechanics in our latest game. One artillery with an immediate interrupt to get +3 to all defenses and DR 3/all until the start of next turn (I like the DR mechanic, so I brought it back.). Not grindy, but lets it last a little longer on a low health artillery critter. And...

Yeah, I'd make sure it's known that the leader needs to disengage, and letting the healer disengage. If it continues to be a problem, I'd (as a last resort), maybe come up with an (expensive) item that would bring someone up to fixed HP from dying, no surge. Hopefully, they'd get the hint.

Unless they were less than an actual surge, I'd lean heavily against it. The healing surges work pretty well, and unless they're running hard for long periods of time, they'll want to stop to use more dailies long before they're out of surges. Now, if you have a low-surge striker that is...

I like it. Next session is them finding a dungeon loaded with undead. The specters will definitely have something like that.

I rather like going off-book. It lets me mess with my DM-players (Which I always have at least one, it seems), and tweak things I don't like about whichever system I'm using. I also ascribe to saying yes to my players as much as possible, and try to kill them in combat. I'm also blessed with...

Silt runner ragers are notoriously evil. The Jhakar Trackers are just as bad with CA. I'm likely going to use them soon, but I plan on nerfing the crap out of them before I do.

They were a little... tactically unsound at first, though they have been improving. The biggest problem so far has been someone dropping while everyone was out of healing due to a baddie getting a nasty roll or lucky crit. (Oddly enough, this group prefers to use second wind before leader...

Skirmishers are fun. Especially if half the party has high AC. Those you don't have to feel so bad about trying to nerf the defender using, since that's what skirmishers are meant to do. Controllers that aren't shy about knocking the party around or into nasty traps do a lot to threaten the...

There are 5 PCs, a warlord, an elemental paladin, a warlord, a ranger, a rogue, and a (defiling) wizard. Not a lot of healing, there. Especially with the defiling wizard breaking out Arcane Defiling for major powers. And like I said, new players, not inclined to powergame or overly optimize...

I used the far plane analog as a great big eldritch abomination that spanned universes and really liked eating multiverses with a high level of magical (or life) energy. Abberations were either the mad fever dreams of the universe eating monstrosity or things it deliberately created to...

I've run into a slight problem in a Dark Sun 4e game I'm running. My players are running out of healing entirely too fast. I don't mean surges, I mean the leader's ability to heal, and second winds. The problem is, I run lethal, opportunistic monsters. So they go for CA, hit bloodied PCs to...

More of a question than a comment, but it's something I've not really been able to get a decent handle on. Wondering about how to design in an exploitable mechanic for a solo monster. To clarify, I'm working on a sunwarped goliath solo (with minion backup) for a new Dark Sun 4e game. To put...

I stole Rel's general idea for the game I'm running. I did tone down the damage (just added another 1/2 level) since all of my players are a bit new. Overall, I have the cut down monster HP, a 1 minute egg timer, and generally, a round limit for minor fights. If someone runs down the egg timer...