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Message: <blockquote data-quote="werecorpse" data-source="post: 8198623" data-attributes="member: 55491">sorry not skilled with forum techniques so Ive just listed the OP’s 6 points.1. Let the dice fall where they fall and character death is a real threat.I agree but if you expect to play a longish campaign give players plenty of resources to avoid death. Narrowly avoiding death (through character resources not DM fiat) when it is a real chance is the rush2. Avoid letting bad things happen to characters lessens the ultimate fun in the long run by reducing suspense.This is often correct but depends on the players. I play with a player who seems to have high stress in the other parts of his life (work/relationships etc). He plays to escape the stress and for pure wish fulfilment, if too much bad stuff happens to his character he‘d rather not play. He wants to kick down doors, dominate the enemy, get cool loot and level up. Not my style but when I DM him I've finally learned to let the bad things and suspense happen to other characters- he doesn’t want that spotlight & they do.3. Player agency is really important. So sandboxes and choices. No railroads.  Agency & choices is what makes an RPG imo, though I’m happy enough with a bunch of predetermined encounters as long as I have choices within those encounters. 4. Preparation. The new wave seems to be improvisation and player's building the world as they go. I guess Macris' approach is more "old school" but it's the one I've always used and at least for me it's made my players happy. So concentric circles starting with the a well detailed starting area and then less detail as the circles go out from there but not no detail. At the world/continent level you know the nations. Kind of similar to a gazatteer though of course personal notes don't require super great writing.5. A DM who is neutral and plays the bad guys as sentient enemies with goals and fears of their own. I often do this by writing down in advance what the bad guy will do in various circumstances so that I'm not tempted to change a plan to meet something unexpected.6. Use randomization to spur ideas and creativity.agree with all this, use anything to spur ideas and creativity.</blockquote>

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