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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Manbearcat" data-source="post: 6265413" data-attributes="member: 6696971">[MENTION=7006]DEFCON 1[/MENTION], @<a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/member.php?u=20323" target="_blank">Quickleaf</a> and @<a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/member.php?u=42582" target="_blank">pemerton</a> give great advice. I'll be short.1) Get the DMG2 and heed all of the great advice therein. 2) Take a look at <a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?342174-Skill-Challenge-Depot&p=6193291&viewfull=1#post6193291" target="_blank">this post</a> with Dungeon World's advice on techniques and GMing principles for dynamic conflict resolution.3) Heed Vincent Baker's advice in Dogs in the Vineyard for techniques and GMing principlces in conflict resolution:a) Always drive play towards conflict.b) Escalate, escalate, escalate.c) Roll the dice or say yes.d) Establish the stakes. Make them transparent to the players. e) Play whatever it is that is interposing itself between the PCs and the successful realization of their goal. This might be a Duke, it might be a conspiracy, it might be treacherous badlands, it may be a full whiteout, it may be entropy itself. Play all of these things and play them to the hilt.4) Personally, I like to do a few things for metagame props. - Place a countdown dice on the table for Success, for Failures, and for Advantages. Whenever these tick down, tick the dice down with them. This will help pacing. As a GM, you're trying to move things roughly through the dramatic rising and falling of Freytag's Dramatic Structure. You need a conflict to be introduced. You need the conflict to rise, to fall and to end in a denouement that thematically captures the ultimate resolution of the stakes established at the outset of the conflict.- I use flash cards and I write a few pithy phrases for PCs and myself to riff off of. As play evolves, I may add and remove them. Phrases could be "Blinding Whiteout", "Dizzying Switchbacks", "Pompous Bureaucrat", "Children At Play", "Gathering Storm", "Bustling Marketplace", "Demoralized City", etc.5) Take advantage of techniques (such as "Fail Forward") that creates dramatic complications which fill the PCs lives with adventure and adversity. A failure doesn't need to be a linear, binary interpretation of task resolution. It needs to pay heed to the player's intent. They should be telegraphing precisely what they are trying to do with respect to the zoomed-out view of the conflict at large. They aren't "chatting up the cute barmaid" for the sake of chatting her up. They're trying to get her to focus her attention on them so the PCs can successfully infiltrate the cellar. The successful infiltration of the cellar is what is of import. So a failure can mean that she is charmed by the overtures of the PC, so long as the successful infiltration of the cellar is complicated. Perhaps a drunken patron, annoyed at her lack of attention of getting her another brew, makes a scene near the cellar as they attempt to get the drink themselves!6) Practice, practice, practice! The point is creating dynamic scenes where something is at stake. You aren't just exploring a scene. You're driving play, every moment, towards exciting, relevant conflict for the PCs to resolve, up or down. It takes practiced, refined technique and is different than standard exploratory play inherent .If you'd like, I can run you through an example of a Social Skill Challenge and an Exploration Skill Challenge. If you want to build a PC of whatever level you guys are playing, we can settle on 2 conflicts and run them with you as the PC and me as the GM playing the opposition. That might help you get a better feel.</blockquote>

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