8 Bloggers Talk Fantasy Locations

It’s February already, which means the RPG Blog Carnival on the topic of “Fantasy Locations”, has wrapped up.

A total of 8 bloggers contributed a variety of design tips, think-pieces and original new locations that gamers can drop into their own RPG sessions.

Below you can find links to all that location-based goodness, posted on their own blogs. Hopefully you’ll also find a new voice you enjoy along the way!

Think Pieces on Locations

1. Vulcan Steve’s Database discussed What Makes An Extraordinary Location through the prism of three settings, coming up with three key ingredients.

2. Advantage on Arcana wrote a piece entitled My Plan For Better TTRPG Locations, postulating how to make better locations for their games, by reflecting on some lessons learned and writing a concrete list of action points.

New RPG Locations

3. Dungeons & Possums contributed Swordwatch Tower, a watchtower built around the towering remnants of a titan’s sword… their location comes complete with artwork and NPCs!

4. Apertus Gaming submitted a concept for an extraordinary Wizard’s Tower. One that acts as a physical representation of its creator’s psyche, and “functions on the logic of a decaying mind.”

5. Seed of Worlds rendered us Gaus Tschaltis, a port on the deep astral. This leviathan-hunting port, on the far fringes of the Githyanki empire, is built from the drifting bones of colossal astral whale.

Location Design Tips

6. DnD Lounge posted an epic 12-point guide on designing Dynamic Combat Locations! In other words, he encourages GMs to replace “White Rooms” with multi-faceted, story-driven, tactical terrain.

7. Roleplaying Tips published a thought-provoking post on Why Dungeon Maps Feel Fake, before going on to share their 3 Age Timeline… a creative exercise designed to help you create credible dungeons. (I used a similar technique when designed several of the locations in my book!).

8. Hipsters & Dragons (aka me!) kicked off the Carnival with My 12 Tips for Designing Extraordinary Locations. These tips are a reworking of the ideas that appear in the first chapter of my book The Creative Game Master’s Guide to Extraordinary Locations & How To Design Them. The book itself contains a bunch of handy random tables, in addition to the tips, but this post contains much of the wisdom contained in the book for free.

Thanks so much to all the bloggers that contributed to the Carnival… that was a lot of fun (…and a nice way to feel connected in the oft lonely world of content creation)!

And many thanks to Scot Newbury, the blogger behind Of Dice & Dragons for letting me take charge of this fiesta of freaky thinkery.

You can find an amazing archive of previous RPG Blog Carnivals on Of Dice & Dragons, each with its own topic, full of rich and insightful entries.

Podcast Tour (Some Great Chats!)

Aside from hosting the RPG Blog Carnival, I’ve been on a bit of a podcast tour in support of my book. Each chat has been quite different and revealing, and it’s been great connecting with other passionate gamers. I will write up a full list of some of my favourite podcasts later in the year, but here some of the fun places I’ve appeared so far, in case you want some background listening material as you go about your day:

Setting the Stage – I talk to Isaac about my life as a travel writer, writing DRAGONBOWL during Covid, and then we go onto discuss the book.

Tabletop Tune Up – I talk to Mark and Ben about the power of maps, what makes a good map, and other fun D&D stuff!

Effekt Publishing – I talk to Dave and Matthew about why I presented the locations in the book the way I did. I then have a golden chance to ask them about the ALIEN RPG, as (amongst other things) they wrote the game’s starter adventure that I’m prepping for my home game!

Win With Dice – During my first podcast interview I talk to Calvin & Ramon about a bunch of stuff, including random locations, travel in RPGs, design tips, and converting stat blocks for other systems. This chat went on so long it’s available as parts 1 and 2.

The DM Lair – I was also lucky enough to be invited onto the DM Lair livestream to discuss “The Secret to Great D&D Adventures” with Luke. We chat for 2 hrs, so obviously we cover a bunch of other stuff too… a good one to stick in the background!

RPG Products Spotlight

A few people have got in touch with me recently about their projects, so let me share what they are up to:

Unmodified is a documentary about the use of tabletop and miniature gaming as a vehicle for people to explore their own creativity. You can check it out here.

5e Spellbook.app is a web app to build spellbooks, compare 2024 and 2014 rules, and play with digital cards at the table or print them to go offline. No signing up for an account, no logging in, you just get making your spellbooks and they are saved to your device instantly and you can share them via URL.

Groupfinder is a platform for TTRPG players who are looking to join a group, or for groups looking for more players for their games. The platform is global, users from Europe, US, Oceania and many other regions. Best of all, the the platform is completely free to use.

Coming Soon on the Blog…

Ok, think that’s it from me. I just ordered a fun game called Orbital Blues after playing a one-shot at the weekend, so hoping to run and review that soon… while I will be running ALIEN RPG for the first time this month, so expect a full report soon!

And, of course, I haven’t given up playing D&D… if I have any game-changing thoughts, you’ll be the first to know!