Avoid The Algorithm, And Follow Me Directly! (Troubleshooting Current Social Media Setbacks)

Folks who have been watching my saga recently (detailed in my post Another Social Media Struggle (Reddit Has Decided To Kick Me In The Teeth, And I Could Use Some Help)) have likely noticed that one of the major challenges that every creator in the world is dealing with is that we simply cannot reach our potential audience. And the reason we can't seem to reach people is because the social media sites and groups that used to help us connect are now throttling our signals, restricting our ability to post, and trusting to bots to determine what kind of posts are allowed, and when an account needs to be shut off... even when it's wrong.

And while I'm taking several steps at present (seeking out new Discords that might appreciate my work, coming up with a fresh Reddit strategy, trying to figure out why the hell Facebook stops me from making posts anywhere but my own personal pages, etc.), there is one thing that I would like all of you reading this to do for me. I would like you to please go to my Patreon and my Ko-Fi pages, and subscribe/follow me there.

 

If you want to tip me or support me for what I'm doing, I appreciate that. But mostly I'm going to be using those accounts a LOT more, because they seem to be some of the only places that I can actually let people who enjoy my work see what the hell it is I'm making.

Because a lot of what I'm putting out is getting lost in the screaming void, and I'd like you to see it.

But before I get into the meat of today's post, remember, don't forget to sign up for my newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Also, if you've got a bit of spare cash that you'd like to use to help keep the wheels turning, consider becoming a Patreon patron! Also, be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree.

Lastly, for hundreds of extra articles on gaming, weird history, and for more free fiction, check out my Vocal archive, too!

You Get A Direct Feed (And It's Technically Free)!

The entire point of social media, from a creator's perspective, is to connect you with your audience, and your potential audience. As someone whose hair is more gray than not these days, I remember when it basically did this, too. I've quoted the numbers before, but a decade or so ago I could get hundreds of impressions from Facebook, thousands from Reddit, and tens of thousands on a good day from Digg or Stumbleupon (both of which have gone down into the dark depths of websites murdered by AI slop). These days, though, it feels like the same 17 people see all my posts on whatever social media I'm part of, and when I do manage to fly through the storm of algorithm interference it's like trying to get an emergency message to someone through a time machine.

Dearest Allies, I request your aid in this time of dire need...

Which is why I wanted to take this week's post to ask everyone who made it this far to follow me on Patreon and Ko-Fi. Because while both of those are crowdfunding websites, you can follow me for free on both of them, and get notified when I share things on them (it's usually once or twice a day in the evenings, so not a huge inbox stuffer). And I'm asking this because, just like my newsletter that I mentioned above, it's one of the only ways for you to actually see and hear what I'm doing without the algorithm getting in the way, waiting for moderators to approve a post (which can take hours, days, or weeks), or depending on your For You Page to decide that you get to see stuff that I've made, as opposed to your 19th advertisement of the day.

 

My hope is that if I can get enough folks onboard with this request that I can get direct feedback from people who want to be in my audience the way that I used to on the sites that have slammed all their doors, and which are burying creators under restrictions and inertia. Because I post dozens of things (sometimes as much as a hundred posts or more) every day... and there are a lot of people who have tried to follow me who just don't hear about it because the algorithm won't slide it into their feeds.

 

So get a direct line, and let me know what you think of my work today!

 

Lastly, speaking of Reddit, there are two subreddits that I moderate that I would like to invite folks to. I am the moderator of Tabletop Homebrew! So if you have things you'd like to share, or if you want to see the sort of things creators are making and sharing, stop in, get comfortable, and take a look around. We'd be happy to have you.

Like, Follow, and Stay in Touch!

That's all for this week's Moon Pope Monday. To stay on top of all my content and releases, make sure you subscribe to my newsletter at the bottom of the page!

Again, for more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, and stop by the Azukail Games YouTube channel, or my additional audio dramas over on The A.L.I.C.E. Files! Or if you'd prefer to read some of my books, like my dystopian sci-fi thriller Old Soldiers, my hardboiled gangland noir series starring a bruiser of a Maine Coon with Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife or my latest short story collection The Rejects, then head over to My Amazon Author Page!

To stay on top of all my latest releases, follow me on Blue Sky, Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now Pinterest as well! To support my work, consider Buying Me a Ko-Fi, or heading to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to become a regular, monthly patron. That one helps ensure you get more Improved Initiative, and it means you'll get my regular, monthly giveaways as a bonus!

Dungeon Design Tips: Limited Resources Can Lead To Creative Strategies

When you pop the hood on what makes an RPG challenging, there are a lot of different systems at play. However, if you dig down to the very foundations of what makes the game work, a lot of it comes down to a smart use of the available resources to complete a task, or achieve a goal. Whether it's spell slots, rage rounds, alchemical items, carrying capacity, or even time, limiting the resources your players have available is one of the main ways a Game Master establishes challenge... and it can often lead to creative strategies on your players' part.

We've got three of them left... how many villains are there?

As always, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Also, if you've got a bit of spare cash that you'd like to use to help keep the wheels turning, consider becoming a Patreon patron! Also, be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree.

Lastly, for hundreds of extra articles on gaming, weird history, and for more free fiction, check out my Vocal archive, too!

Putting Pressure On Your Players

Challenge is, on the surface, a very simple thing to create. There is an obstacle, and the players need to find a way over it, around it, under it, or through it... and whichever strategy they use is going to come with risk, and it will use some of their resources.

 

What you have to determine, as the Game Master, is how you're going to apply pressure to ensure that your players have to get creative with both their risks and their resources.

 

Think this will be enough ammo for the quest?

 

What resources you have on-hand typically determines what strategies players will want to try... however, the most important consideration for you, as the Game Master, is that every strategy to solve a meaningful problem should come with some kind of potential risk as well as a potential reward.

As an example, take one of the most basic situations found in fantasy RPGs; your party is going to a crumbling ruin that is infested with monsters (and potentially traps) in order to take the treasure inside for themselves. A simple dungeon crawl... however, there are some ways that this scenario might lack challenge. And while most Game Masters just add extra monsters, slap more hit points onto existing creatures, or increase the difficulty and damage on the traps, those things can feel arbitrary.

So instead, let's ask what other things might add pressure to this treasure hunt. Potential challenges include:

- Time Constraints: If the dungeon is only accessible during a specific time frame, say for three days, the party doesn't have a lot of spare 8-hour recharge times to use. The same is true if they manage to get to the dungeon first, but there are other so-called adventurers hot on their tails that they don't want to fight for the loot.

 

- Food: While most campaigns don't pay any real attention to how much your players eat, take a moment and ask how many provisions they brought with them out into the depths of this old-growth forest. Do they have the necessary skills to forage? Do they end up eating something poisonous or rotten, and getting sick? Even if they technically have all the time in the world, they can't keep fighting on an empty stomach.

- Tools: Typically RPGs don't worry about weapon and armor durability, but there are some tools that can break if checks go badly enough. If the rogue only has two sets of lockpicks, and one set gets broken on a door because they rolled poorly enough, will they press forward? Will they allow companions to kick in doors instead, risking drawing the attention of monsters? Or will they use another strategy entirely to open locked portals?

- Material Components: We typically don't worry much about these things, but they are a major necessity for spellcasting. So while relatively simple components might get a hand wave and a pass, ask which spells require notable costs, and expensive or rare components. Because if the party can only bring a handful of those, their absence is going to be felt sooner rather than later.

- Resetting Dungeon: If the players don't complete the dungeon crawl, it should reset or change in a meaningful way when they either abandon it, or hunker down to rest. Perhaps the creatures are reinforced with fresh recruits, or the dead get back up, reanimated by the nature of the place. Maybe creatures that were held in check by creatures the party slew can now expand their territory and wander freely. Maybe the locks reset themselves. Perhaps the traps come back online, or they're reset by monsters who regularly patrol the dungeon. If retreating is a strategic choice, then the dungeon shouldn't just remain in status in their absence.

 

All of these, and many others, are ways you can use limited resources to put a squeeze on your players... and every way they find around one of these constraints is a victory for them. For example, if a ranger can reliably forage well enough to feed themselves and their companions, that removes food as a constraint that can weigh on players. If players have access to fast travel through spells or unique mounts, that also buys them more time, and lets them bypass the dangers of the wilderness.

 

The key here is to get your players thinking in terms of what will use the fewest resources, or what will be most effective, and seeing if it will get them venturing off the beaten path as they search for solutions.

 

Because if you have a thousand arrows, a trunk of material components, and all the healing items in the world, then it's likely your players might try to brute force their way through overwhelming odds by fighting a grueling war of attrition against every monster, bandit, and assassin that comes for them. However, if they just don't have the resources to make that a winning strategy, it can be interesting to see what they do instead. Do the players instead embrace stealth, either ambushing enemies to get the upper hand, or skipping combat altogether to reach the treasure chamber? Do they employ guile, using lies and disguises to hide in plain sight? Do they set traps, or use the ones already in the dungeon to damage or destroy monsters they themselves couldn't fight on their own?

 

When you have access to all the resources in the world, you can get lazy and just do whatever. But when the pressure is on, and you have limited options, that's when people start getting creative with the choices they make... and it can overall lead to a much more satisfying experience!

Like, Follow, and Stay in Touch!

That's all for this week's Crunch post! To stay on top of all my content and releases, make sure you subscribe to my newsletter at the bottom of the page!

Again, for more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, and stop by the Azukail Games YouTube channel, or the dark sci fi channel I contribute stories to, The A.L.I.C.E. Files! Or if you'd prefer to read some of my books, like my dystopian sci-fi thriller Old Soldiers, my hardboiled gangland noir series starring a bruiser of a Maine Coon with Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife or my latest short story collection The Rejects, then head over to My Amazon Author Page!

To stay on top of all my latest releases, follow me on Blue Sky, Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now Pinterest as well! To support my work, consider Buying Me a Ko-Fi, or heading to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to become a regular, monthly patron. That one helps ensure you get more Improved Initiative, and it means you'll get my regular, monthly giveaways as a bonus!

Dungeon Design Tips: Provide Targets For Your Players' Big Guns

The Internet is full of Game Masters asking for advice on how to best counter the abilities and powers the player characters acquire in their games. And while I've given my share of advice on the subject (many of which are previous entries in this very series like getting rid of doors, actually triggering multiple encounters when warranted, terrain and cover, etc.), this week I'd like to remind Game Masters that if your players go through all the effort and struggle to acquire a big gun... well, you should at least let them knock down a couple of targets with it from time to time.

They're clustered in a 20-foot radius circle, you say...

As always, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Also, if you've got a bit of spare cash that you'd like to use to help keep the wheels turning, consider becoming a Patreon patron! Also, be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree.

Lastly, for hundreds of extra articles on gaming, weird history, and for more free fiction, check out my Vocal archive, too!

Set Encounters Up (So Your Players Can Knock Them Down)

Picture this scenario. You're running a campaign, and the evoker has finally survived to 5th level. They've just picked up fireball, and their trigger finger is itching to give it a go. As a Game Master do you, A) ensure there are never groups of enemies in close proximity to one another, thus making sure this spell meant for horde elimination is never used for what it was designed for, or B) do you conjure a scenario or two where your wizard gets to sling their new spell, and feel that it made a significant difference in the encounter?

A lot of Game Masters go for the first option because they don't want their players to feel too powerful, or like they're somehow winning in the arms race versus their enemies. But you should really opt for the latter for at least a few reasons.

And morale is just one of them.

First and foremost, letting players flex their new abilities and tools is good for the game. It keeps players invested and paying attention, and it lets them come to grips with how a spell or power is supposed to work. Additionally, by creating scenarios where players get to use their abilities, it keeps them participating in scenarios... and it often uses up their resources, which is the actual point of most encounters, and what creates challenge. Encounters are supposed to be gone through in a sequence, with each one being progressively harder as players use more and more of their daily allotment of abilities to survive.

Let us say, for example, that you are running a scenario where the party has to defend a tumbledown fortress from a massive hoard of the undead. There are waves of shambling zombies and skeletons, and then after their initial assault there are disease-spreading ghouls, and then at the end the commanding death knight takes the field. You can key different aspects of this encounter specifically to the abilities of your party so that everyone feels useful, and like they're getting moments to shine.

We lead with the evoker and their fireball, because it allows them to act as an artillery piece, firing from extremely long range and punching holes in the enemy's forward line. It's possible that, if the rolls are good enough, the wizard might destroy the walkers altogether. Then the ghouls start rushing in, and as they close it's the ranger's turn to use their new feat, rapid-firing their bow to try to bring the monsters down before they can reach the walls. And if the ghouls do manage to close, the monk has placed himself in the gap, preventing the ghouls from entering, the monk's recently acquired passive immunity to disease taking away the ghouls' most dangerous weapon. Then when the death knight takes the field, the paladin steps out to smite them, backed up by the rest of the party.

Now, this encounter could be shifted and changed to make every aspect of it even more frustrating for the players. A Game Master could choose to have the undead approach under cover of darkness or mist, making them difficult to target until they're at the gates. The field could be filled with trees or ruins, giving the approaching enemies ample cover, frustrating the party's ability to actually do anything to halt their progress. There could even be a secret way into the fortress, leading to undead coming out of tunnels inside the walls, leaving the party scrambling about whether to fight the monsters within, or the monsters without, first.

The damn things are everywhere!

It's easier to add difficulty to a scenario than it is to take it away, and it's important that your players feel challenged, without feeling overwhelmed. Most importantly, though, you don't want to punish them for trying to play the game. So when you're concocting an encounter (and the dungeons/adventures they make up), make sure that you're offering square pegs for square holes so that your players can accomplish the task in order to overcome the challenge, and move on to the next step. At the end of the day, you want them to be able to finish this. You want them to succeed, because if they fail then the campaign ends.

So whether the barbarian picked up the ability to attack in a whirlwind and hit every target around them, or the bard just grabbed the power to fascinate a crowd of people, or the rogue finally got the ability to add poisons to their attacks, facilitate them actually getting some mileage out of these abilities. They just got a new hammer, and you should let them drive some nails with it. It will, overall, make your game a great deal more fun for everyone involved.

Like, Follow, and Stay in Touch!

That's all for this week's Crunch post! To stay on top of all my content and releases, make sure you subscribe to my newsletter at the bottom of the page!

Again, for more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, and stop by the Azukail Games YouTube channel, or the dark sci fi channel I contribute stories to, The A.L.I.C.E. Files! Or if you'd prefer to read some of my books, like my dystopian sci-fi thriller Old Soldiers, my hardboiled gangland noir series starring a bruiser of a Maine Coon with Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife or my latest short story collection The Rejects, then head over to My Amazon Author Page!

To stay on top of all my latest releases, follow me on Blue Sky, Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now Pinterest as well! To support my work, consider Buying Me a Ko-Fi, or heading to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to become a regular, monthly patron. That one helps ensure you get more Improved Initiative, and it means you'll get my regular, monthly giveaways as a bonus!

Using Jungian Archetypes As A Way To Build Your Character

The early contributors to the modern art of psychology were really more philosophers than they were doctors in many respects. Because of this, most of the things they laid out as explanations for human behavior seem wildly off-base at best, and outright harmful at worst, mostly because of how far we've come since these initial explanations that are nearly a century old in some cases. While not really useful for modern therapists, however, the models and ideas they proposed can often be extremely useful to storytellers and players alike who might be having trouble getting a strong grip on their characters, and what their story is.

And if you're looking for a fun place to start, I recommend the 12 Jungian Archetypes.

As we enter the dark contemplation of the soul...

As always, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Also, if you've got a bit of spare cash that you'd like to use to help keep the wheels turning, consider becoming a Patreon patron! Also, be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree.

Lastly, for hundreds of extra articles on gaming, weird history, and for more free fiction, check out my Vocal archive, too!

The 12 Archetypes (And Their Uses)

The idea behind the 12 Archetypes is that these are concepts that exist within the great collective unconscious of humanity. They are broad titles and ideas which, according to their inventor, provide insight into understanding the human psyche, and the challenges we face both inside and out. While this idea has long fallen by the wayside for medicinal purposes (right alongside cocaine being used to treat the ghosts in your blood), this idea can have several applications for your characters, and even your settings!

The 12 Archetypes of Jung are:

- The Innocent

- The Orphan

- The Hero

- The Caregiver

- The Explorer

- The Rebel

- The Lover

- The Creator

- The Jester

- The Sage

- The Magician

- The Ruler

This might put one in mind of ANOTHER tool that deals in archetypes and symbolism...

While a deeper description of the archetypes is listed in the link at the beginning of this post, the best way to think of them is kind of like a zodiac sign for a character. They represent a generalization, along with conflicts and struggles someone who fits this kind of concept might deal with, and the strengths and drives they might have. What can be even more fun, though, is that because there's 12 of them, you can roll 1d12 as a way to randomize part of what you want to do with your character's story, as well as their personality!

If you want to play a fighter, but you end up with the Creator, do they struggle with their skill in conflict? Do they hope to lay aside their sword one day, and to take up a life of carpentry, or another craft? Do they instead attempt to treat their weapon as an artist would a brush, developing a unique martial art, or perhaps weaving their own legend? Or do they seek mastery of strategy, creating entirely new ways of thinking about warfare? Does a wizard who winds up as the Ruler seek to solidify their grasp on power and authority through the arcane arts? Do they struggle with trust, or delegation to others, growing paranoid as they come ever closer to a seat of command? Or does the rule over mortals pale when compared to a rule over gods? Does the noble with a cold fortune and elite training fulfill the role of the Orphan, seeking to find (or perhaps to be) the family that was denied to them? Or do the challenges they face leave them as an outsider, despite their best attempts?

And if you're a Game Master who happens to be in the process of creating your world, consider using these 12 Archetypes as the basis for your cosmic pantheon. They make for great gods, and they can really get your brain churning regarding the types of divinities your players might serve... or even oppose! Making these Archetypes the names of constellations and actually turning them into the zodiac signs of your world is also a fun idea (especially if you're keeping a 12-month calendar), and this goes double if being born under certain signs does actually come with particular powers and blessings, as well as drawbacks.

Lastly, though, I have one for my World of Darkness players...

You summoned us?

If you're having trouble with a character's Nature and Demeanor, roll 2d12. The Archetypes work a treat for that system, and they're a great way to really stretch your creativity by seeing how these two randomly-selected broad generalizations come together, and coalesce into a single person. Especially when they seem contradictory, but truly aren't when you dig just a little bit beneath the skin.

Some More Recommended Reading Before You Go...

If this article caught your attention, I wanted to recommend a few supplements I've put out over the past few years that also might be of use to you! So if you've made it this far, consider picking up"

- 100 Questions To Ask About Your Characters

- 100 Character Goals and Motivations

- 100 Tips and Tricks For Being A Better Game Master

Like, Follow, and Stay in Touch!

That's all for this week's Fluff post. To stay on top of all my content and releases, make sure you subscribe to my newsletter at the bottom of the page!

Again, for more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, and stop by the Azukail Games YouTube channel, or my Rumble channel The Literary Mercenary! Or if you'd prefer to read some of my books, like my dystopian sci-fi thriller Old Soldiers, my hardboiled gangland noir series starring a bruiser of a Maine Coon with Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife or my latest short story collection The Rejects, then head over to My Amazon Author Page!

To stay on top of all my latest releases, follow me on Blue Sky, Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now Pinterest as well! To support my work, consider Buying Me a Ko-Fi, or heading to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to become a regular, monthly patron. That one helps ensure you get more Improved Initiative, and it means you'll get my regular, monthly giveaways as a bonus!

Not All Tactics Are Endgame Viable (Pathfinder)

There are few things more frustrating that when your character is in a situation where your character's main skill set isn't applicable or effective. Whether it's the greatsword-wielding barbarian who can't fight the flying dragon, or the wizard's spells slide right off the golems, or the rogue who just can't use their sneak attack on creatures who don't have a discernible anatomy, it can be incredibly frustrating.

But it's even worse when this becomes your character's permanent state of being. There are a lot of situations where this can happen, which is why it's important to take a step back, and really evaluate your strategy's viability.

Because it can be frustrating to get sidelined right as the campaign is coming to the climax... or even when you hit the midpoint.

Because no one wants to be Bruce Banner when they built the Hulk.

As always, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Also, if you've got a bit of spare cash that you'd like to use to help keep the wheels turning, consider becoming a Patreon patron! Also, be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree.

Lastly, for hundreds of extra articles on gaming, weird history, and for more free fiction, check out my Vocal archive, too!

What Are The Weaknesses in Your Strategy?

No matter what kind of character you're building, they're going to have some kind of weakness... something that is necessary for them to operate at full-strength, or which they are not going to be truly effective against. After all, if you're a fighter in heavy armor with a tower shield, then you probably aren't going to be great at a lot of saving throws. If you're a melee specialist then you have to be able to close with the enemy in order to hit them. If you're a ranged combatant you need to have line of effect to your target... and so on, and so forth.

And generally speaking, when you realize these flaws, you should take measures to deal with them. For example, if you know you need to be able to reach your foes in melee, you need to ensure you have some method of increasing your speed, or flying, etc. in those instances where an enemy would be otherwise out of reach. Alternatively, you need to be sure you have some kind of ranged weapon option that, while it might not be ideal, will still allow you to participate in a battle instead of just slogging forward and hoping for the best. If you know there will be situations where your spells can't hurt the enemy, then you keep a few party-buffers, defensive spells, or area manipulation spells up your sleeve so you can still do something.

But in Pathfinder the issue arises that some strategies simply are not long-term viable simply because of the nature of how so many adventures function.

We are legion, and we are many.

As an example, consider poison use. It takes a specific class feature in order to use poison safely as a PC, and the saves for most poisons are fairly minor. Poison itself is expensive to acquire, and time consuming to make... but all of these challenges can be overcome if a player really wants to make poison use a central feature of their character build. However, the issue is that many enemies that tend to make up the end-game threats of a campaign (powerful outsiders, deadly constructs, undead creatures, etc.) are outright immune to poison. So what might have once been a trump card becomes an absolute dead-end, and all the time, energy, and resources dedicated to honing poison into a genuine strategy becomes useless.

You see the same with a variety of other tactics. Mind control spells and certain types of illusions are all well and good when dealing with creatures that have minds to control, or who are subject to illusions. But if your enemies have immunity to mind-affecting effects, or if they tend to have true seeing or similar abilities, then these spells are going to fall flat. Even combat maneuvers like disarm, while they're useful at lower levels, tend to fall flat when your enemies are all monsters with natural weapons, or spellcasters who have no weapons that can be disarmed. Hell, even characters who focus on fire as their main damage element often run into issues because so many creatures have large resistances (or outright immunity) to fire when you hit higher challenge ratings.

None of this is meant to discourage players who want to pursue these options, and in many cases you can still use them effectively for a great deal of the campaign. However, it's important that you have secondary strategies you can rely on in the event your main strength doesn't work against a particular foe, and in a particular way.

Lastly, talk to your Game Master about what you're planning, and ask if this strategy is going to work when you reach the endgame. Don't ask specifically what's coming, but make sure that if you have a strategy in mind that you are going to lean into that your Game Master is aware of it so they can tell you yay or nay.

Because just like telling the ranger who just leveled up not to take Favored Enemy: Goblin, because you're never going to fight another goblin in the entire campaign, they should also tell you if your strategy of using the knockout venom from your pseudodragon companion is going to simply stop working after level 7 because every enemy after that point will simply be immune to it, and you'll need to do something else for the next 10 levels until you reach the conclusion.

Like, Follow, and Stay in Touch!

That's all for this week's Crunch post! To stay on top of all my content and releases, make sure you subscribe to my newsletter at the bottom of the page!

Again, for more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, and stop by the Azukail Games YouTube channel, or my Rumble channel The Literary Mercenary! Or if you'd prefer to read some of my books, like my dystopian sci-fi thriller Old Soldiers, my hardboiled gangland noir series starring a bruiser of a Maine Coon with Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife or my latest short story collection The Rejects, then head over to My Amazon Author Page!

To stay on top of all my latest releases, follow me on Blue Sky, Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now Pinterest as well! To support my work, consider Buying Me a Ko-Fi, or heading to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to become a regular, monthly patron. That one helps ensure you get more Improved Initiative, and it means you'll get my regular, monthly giveaways as a bonus!

Dungeon Design Tips: Pay Attention To The Environment

Our adventures are supposed to take place in dangerous, terrifying places. From lost ruins, to dense forests, to haunted castles, our parties go to places where most normal people would never go. However, as Game Masters, we always seem to forget that the environment they're in isn't just limited to the box text we read at the beginning of the scene... it should show up on the mat as well!

Because environmental factors can be a huge component of any encounter.

Previous entries in this series (for those who haven't seen them) include:

- Consider Removing Doors From Your Dungeon

- Combine Combat With Traps

- Cover, Firing Lines, and Dynamic Arenas

- Antagonist Action Economy (Never Fight Just One BBEG)

Initiative? Ah hell... I can't see a damn thing!

As always, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Also, if you've got a bit of spare cash that you'd like to use to help keep the wheels turning, consider becoming a Patreon patron! Also, be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree.

Lastly, for hundreds of extra articles on gaming, weird history, and for more free fiction, check out my Vocal archive, too!

It's About More Than Light And Darkness

When it comes to environmental factors, the most common aspect Game Masters remember to use is light levels. If the party is sleeping around a campfire, and they're ambushed by orcs in the dead of night, then the firelight only goes so far, and beyond that there's darkness. This situation obviously benefits creatures with darkvision (such as the attacking orcs), and penalizes those who don't have the ability to see in the dark.

And while that is an important consideration for your combats, it is far from the only environmental condition one might have to overcome.

All right... let's get this fire going.

For example, consider some of the following environmental effects your party might have to deal with, and how they could drastically tilt the challenge level of a quest, and the encounters in it.

- Temperature: If the temperature is too cold, or too hot, it can require very specific gear, spells, and potions to combat it. This can also greatly reduce viable armor choices, or favor the natural abilities of certain species over others.

- Visibility: Whether it's from mist and fog, dense trees, or even rain, visibility is a huge deal when it comes to encounters. This is particularly true when it comes to enemy movements, and the difficulty this can inflict on those who focus on ranged weapons and spells during combat.

- Wind and Storms: There are half a dozen spells for dealing with wind, and we rarely end up using any of them. Whether it's affecting those trying to track by scent, interfering with arrows and bolts, or it's significant enough that it poses a real hazard to Small-sized creatures, this doesn't factor into nearly as many campaigns as you'd think it would. And when you add in lightning strikes, deafening thunder, and other aspects, it can be a real issue to overcome!

- Miasma: Whether it's the rotting stench of a swamp, or the bad air deep in a dungeon, breathing in the wrong thing can be unpleasant at best, or dangerous at worst. Add in the fact that it can hide the stench of dangerous enemies, or render the ability to track by scent impossible, and you have a serious obstacle.

- Water: The existence of water and water hazards changes things up entirely. Whether it's ankle-deep water that hinders movement, waist-deep water that can be a serious hazard for Small-sized characters, or deeper bodies that are a risk for anyone who can't breathe under the waves, water comes in many shapes, sizes, and choices.

These are just a few of the options when it comes to the enviornment that we often overlook as a Game Master. Because as I've mentioned in previous installments of this little series, putting your party in a plain, white room or an open field with perfect lighting, clear sight lines, and no cover on concealment means that you've handed your players a straight-up fight.

Why would your monsters ever do that?

While you don't have to stack the deck against your players like a death run by Tucker's Kobolds, consider the environmental effects that should be an issue for them, and possibly for their enemies. If the dungeon is underground, or it's night time, what source of light is the party making use of? Do their enemies also need a light source, or can they see using other means? Is the air laced with spores of poisonous mold that don't bother the necromancer's undead minions, but which can be a serious problem for the party? Is the exposed side of the Dragon Mountain a place of cutting winds and potential avalanches, both of which might be used by yeti and ice dragons to wear down and kill their enemies?

So before you decide to just add more hit points to your enemies, or to slap another dozen monsters onto an encounter, ask yourself whether you've considered possible environmental effects. Because they might not be a make-or-break part of an encounter, but they can be that little extra bit of challenge that can put an edge on your game.

Lastly, if you're looking for some extra things to throw into your games regarding weather and strange conditions, consider these classic encounter lists:

- 100 Random Encounters For On The Road Or In The Wilderness

- 100 Encounters In A Fey Forest

- 100 Pieces of Floatsam and Jetsom to Find on a Beach

Like, Follow, and Stay in Touch!

That's all for this week's Crunch post! To stay on top of all my content and releases, make sure you subscribe to my newsletter at the bottom of the page!

Again, for more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, and stop by the Azukail Games YouTube channel, or my Rumble channel The Literary Mercenary! Or if you'd prefer to read some of my books, like my dystopian sci-fi thriller Old Soldiers, my hardboiled gangland noir series starring a bruiser of a Maine Coon with Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife or my latest short story collection The Rejects, then head over to My Amazon Author Page!

To stay on top of all my latest releases, follow me on Blue Sky, Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now Pinterest as well! To support my work, consider Buying Me a Ko-Fi, or heading to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to become a regular, monthly patron. That one helps ensure you get more Improved Initiative, and it means you'll get my regular, monthly giveaways as a bonus!

Furyborn... An Overlooked Pathfinder Enchantment

Magic weapons are one of those things characters tend to acquire as they advance in level in Pathfinder classic. However, it's particularly easy to get caught up in all the choices for weapon enchantments as we try to figure out which options are going to be most effective against the particular enemies we're fighting, which ones work best with our character's class features, and which ones provide the most bang for our buck.

There is an enchantment that often falls through the cracks, though, and it's easy to overlook it if you aren't the sort of player who goes through rulebooks from cover to cover. And if you didn't dig into Ultimate Equipment (which I would recommend getting a copy of if you haven't), you may have missed the Furyborn enchantment.

Do not test me, for my fury has no limits.

As always, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Also, if you've got a bit of spare cash that you'd like to use to help keep the wheels turning, consider becoming a Patreon patron! Also, be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree.

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A Deadly Enchantment For All Occasions

The Furyborn enchantment is born of the frustration from a warrior whose enemy refuses to lay down and die. It is a +2 enchantment that can be placed on any melee weapon, and every time the weapon hits a single target, the enhancement bonus increases by +1 to a total of +5. So even if you have your weapon as a +1 furyborn weapon, a single hit raises it to +2, a second raises it to +3, and so on, and so forth, until you have a +5 furyborn weapon.

The bonus resets if you attack a different target than the original, the original target dies, or 1 hour passes.

Just die... it's the only way to end this!

Now, on the one hand, that likely sounds pretty good. After all, if you have a character with a full base attack bonus who can take iterative attacks, every hit you land makes you more likely to hit again, and adds a little bit of bonus damage. Because a +5 enhacement to hit (and the +5 enhancement to damage that comes with it), ain't nothing to sneeze at.

But there's another benefit that comes with a weapon's enhancement bonus that a lot of us simply don't think about. If you look in the back of the Pathfinder Core Rulebook on page 562, it lists the kinds of damage reduction that's overcome when a weapon has a high enough enhancement bonus. If a creature has DR that's overcome by silver or cold iron, then a weapon with an enhancement bonus of +3 ignores that ability. DR that normally requires an adamantine weapon to bypass can be ignored by a weapon that has an enhancement bonus of +4. And if a creature has alignment-based DR, that can be overcome by a weapon with an enhancement bonus of +5.

So if you're fighting a werewolf with your furyborn weapon, the first two hits will apply its DR, but after that your furry friend will take the full brunt of your blows. If it's later in the game and you're opposing devils, demons, or even angels (it's hard to say where your campaign will go), connecting with 4 hits means that your weapon is now going to pierce their protections and cut into them... and if you're a full-BAB martial character, that can mean you're only sacrificing a round or two to overcome your enemy's biggest defense.

And, of course, an extra handful of damage can really make a difference in conjunction with your general combat strategy... especially if you're confirming critical hits and multiplying that damage by 2, 3, or more!

So, if you're not sure what kind of weapon enchantment will work for your next game, consider grabbing this one for your melee weapon. Especially if you are the sort of player who likes to focus on a single enemy until they are down for the count, and out of the fight.

Further Reading Recommendations

If you enjoyed this week's advice, consider checking out the following Pathfinder RPG supplements as well!

- Sellswords of Sundara: A collection of 10 mercenary companies, each one comes with its own, unique class archetype!

- Feats of Legend: 20 Story Feats: One of the capstone pieces from the Feats of Legend series, this one covers one of the most under-utilized feat choices that can be extremely rewarding in a Pathfinder campaign.

- Pathfinder Player Companion: Bastards of Golarion: My first official contribution to the Golarion setting, this one covers a variety of tricks that can be a serious boon to adventurers who want to come out ahead.

Like, Follow, and Stay in Touch!

That's all for this week's Crunch post! To stay on top of all my content and releases, make sure you subscribe to my newsletter at the bottom of the page!

Again, for more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, and stop by the Azukail Games YouTube channel, or my Rumble channel The Literary Mercenary! Or if you'd prefer to read some of my books, like my dystopian sci-fi thriller Old Soldiers, my hardboiled gangland noir series starring a bruiser of a Maine Coon with Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife or my latest short story collection The Rejects, then head over to My Amazon Author Page!

To stay on top of all my latest releases, follow me on Blue Sky, Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now Pinterest as well! To support my work, consider Buying Me a Ko-Fi, or heading to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to become a regular, monthly patron. That one helps ensure you get more Improved Initiative, and it means you'll get my regular, monthly giveaways as a bonus!

Dungeon Design Tips: Antagonist Action Economy (Never Fight Just One BBEG)

Every Game Master has been in this situation. The party has been working their way closer and closer to a final confrontation with a powerful enemy. They've bested their traps, they've slain their minions, and now it is time for an epic clash! But when the dice hit the table, the antagonist you spent so much time building up and preparing is roundly stomped into the pavement, left beaten, broken, and defeated in a matter of a few rounds (or sometimes less).

While there are a lot of factors that can go into this kind of defeat, one of the common threads between most of the stories you hear GMs tell is that they were running a 4-on-1 combat... and that's a losing scenario for most monsters!

No matter how powerful you think they are.

As always, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Also, if you've got a bit of spare cash that you'd like to use to help keep the wheels turning, consider becoming a Patreon patron! Also, be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree.

Lastly, for hundreds of extra articles on gaming, weird history, and for more free fiction, check out my Vocal archive, too!

The Problem

The idea of the party facing down a single creature in battle, their combined strengths necessary to overpower it, is an iconic image. Whether it's a lich lord, a full-sized red dragon, or some other adversary, so many of us have been raised on this setup (both in games as well as in films, comic books, etc.) that we just assume that's the way things are supposed to be.

The problem is the numbers of your action economy just don't add up.

Now, for folks who aren't familiar with the term action economy, it's just a fancy way of saying the amount of stuff you can do on a single turn. For example, let's say you're facing down a necromancer lich. They are a potent foe with a nasty template, a slew of immunities, and a bunch of dire powers to draw on... but generally speaking, they can only use one of those abilities on their turn. So if the lich wants to cast a spell, they'd better make sure it counts... because the party wizard and cleric also get to cast a spell, and that's on top of having to deal with the angry barbarian charging straight at the lich, and the paladin who isn't far behind him!

Oh balls...

Typically the big bosses of the dungeon have fat sacks of hit points, a bunch of pre-cast buffs, monstrous templates, and enough magic items to help them become a threat to an entire party worth of adventurers... the problem is that they need to dodge every bullet the party fires, metaphorically speaking. If the party manages to land a status effect, to slow the enemy, to instantly counter their spells or abilities, etc., then no matter how powerful they're supposed to be it's going to be Good Night Gracie in a big damn hurry.

And while this can make the party feel like big time badasses, it can also make what should be a climactic battle feel... well, anticlimactic. And while I've talked about cover and firing lines, combining traps with combat, and even getting rid of doors in this series, I'd say this week's solution is one that will solve more than half of all the problems that Game Masters deal with.

In short, stop giving your players a single target to gang up on.

The Solution

Give your antagonists backup. That's it... that's the solution.

Whether your lich lord has a cadre of bodyguards to defend their person, or your fallen paladin is backed up by a conjurer and a sniper, the idea is that you are breaking up the laser focus of your party, and giving everyone a dance partner.

If the lich has an undead champion to guard their person, now the party members have to weigh the pros and cons of dividing their attention. Does the barbarian engage the undead black knight, hoping to keep him busy while the paladin closes with the necromancer? Or do the melee bruisers both double team the bodyguard, hoping to take him out quickly while the spellcasters attempt to contain the lich?

Forcing your players to make these decisions means they have a wider array of options, and they have to sometimes get creative with their strategies and tactics. For example, with multiple targets on different ends of the battlefield, would the wizard get more use out of spells that put a wall of iron between the party and the black knight instead of directly attacking the lich? With multiple enemies, does the cleric choose to buff the brawler going toe-to-toe with the bodyguard, keeping him in the fight longer so the paladin doesn't end up having to fight a two-front battle?

And the more antagonists you put on the board, the more choices your players are going to have to make. Not only that, but you are going to have more strategic options, and you won't have to focus so much on making any single antagonist powerful enough to face down the entire party on their own.

This is actually where we get into The Anti-Party, which can best be summarized as the Legion of Doom to your party's Justice League. If you have an evenly-matched party of antagonists with similar abilities, now your players have to get really creative in order to make sure they are able to best their foes.

The important thing to remember here is that when you add multiple enemies, you should be diluting the power of the Big Bad and spreading it around. It also allows you to have boss antagonists who aren't either extremely powerful monsters (dragons, demiliches, etc.), powerful spell casters, or some combination of the two. For example, if you want to challenge your party with a bandit lord, you could have them as a decently high-level ranger, in an area that's full of traps they've set to give themselves an advantage. However, you could also give them half a dozen henchmen, or some kind of tamed monster threat to sic on the players. So rather than the entire party versus a single ranger, they have to deal with his arrows, his traps, but also the two dozen ghouls he's released from their cages, and his two bodyguards who are also taking pot shots at the party.

The more targets there are on the field, the wider the array of tactics the party will have to make use of in order to be successful. For example, does the evoker create a wall of fire to hold back the ghouls, buying their companions a precious round or two before the undead monsters close? Or do they sling spells back at the archers, trusting the front line fighters to hold the line? Does the barbarian's great spear come in handy due to its reach, and does the fighter stick close with them, using their shield to grant their companion additional protection from the rain of arrows above?

With so many additional moving parts, a battle becomes an actual battle, instead of a grudge match against one enemy. Not only that, but you have more things you can do as the Game Master than options that feel like dirty tricks, or which could permanently cripple player characters (rendering them permanently blind, giving them debilitating curses or diseases, destroying their enchanted gear, etc.). While you shouldn't make every fight with a boss (or mini boss) into the Battle of Helm's Deep, ask yourself why the head of an entire assassins guild, a feared bandit lord, or the head of a dark cult is standing alone against an entire hit squad coming for them... then ask who they would keep around just to make sure it's a fair fight.

Also, if you haven't watched any of my series Discussions of Darkness, check out episode 25 below, Don't Overuse The Game's Big Bads. Because if you're no longer trying to have just 1 antagonist taking on the whole party, it throws the party's plans into chaos because they now have to deal with a wider array of challenges coming at their faces.

Like, Follow, and Stay in Touch!

That's all for this week's Crunch post! To stay on top of all my content and releases, make sure you subscribe to my newsletter at the bottom of the page!

Again, for more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, and stop by the Azukail Games YouTube channel, or my Rumble channel The Literary Mercenary! Or if you'd prefer to read some of my books, like my dystopian sci-fi thriller Old Soldiers, my hardboiled gangland noir series starring a bruiser of a Maine Coon with Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife or my latest short story collection The Rejects, then head over to My Amazon Author Page!

To stay on top of all my latest releases, follow me on Blue Sky, Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now Pinterest as well! To support my work, consider Buying Me a Ko-Fi, or heading to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to become a regular, monthly patron. That one helps ensure you get more Improved Initiative, and it means you'll get my regular, monthly giveaways as a bonus!

Dungeon Design Tips: Combine Combat With Traps

A while back I put together an article titled Consider Removing Doors From Your Dungeons, and it was popular enough that I thought I'd come back to the topic of dungeon design this week. And before I get into this next topic, I wanted to ask my readers out there... is this something you'd like to see me turn into an ongoing series? And if so, would you like to see it remain part of my Crunch updates, or would you like to see it become its very own section? And, for that matter, do you want it to remain hosted on this blog, or should I put it over in My Vocal Archive?

All input is welcome, as it's the voices of my audience I use to try to guide my decisions going forward. With that said, onto this week's topic!

After all, not all traps are this obvious!

As always, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Also, if you've got a bit of spare cash that you'd like to use to help keep the wheels turning, consider becoming a Patreon patron! Also, be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree.

Lastly, for hundreds of extra articles on gaming, weird history, and for more free fiction, check out my Vocal archive, too!

Combat And Traps: A Match Made In Hell

As I mentioned in the previous installment, a lot of us tend to think of our dungeons in segmented parts and pieces, which we don't allow to interact with one another. If there's a room with an encounter in it, then no matter how long or loud the combat gets, other denizens of the dungeon won't come to see what's happening, even though that's the logical thing to do... it's as if the doors are all soundproof, and none of the other monsters want to overstep the limits of the arena they're placed in. To help break us out of that mindset, my suggestion was to eliminate doors, or to at least leave them open so it's clear they aren't a barrier between what happens in this part of the map, and what happens further away.

However, just as we often section off our rooms and arenas, keeping them separate and apart from one another, we often refuse to let two other parts of our dinner touch; namely traps and combat encounters.

Guys, got a monster! Stop checking for traps and help me!

Consider this. A majority of the time we put traps in long hallways, cramped corridors, and otherwise empty rooms because (whether we're thinking about it or not) we consider the trap to be the encounter in that area. While some doors might have traps on them (thus allowing the trap to act as the opening salvo of an encounter), that is a one-two punch rather than a genuine combination of a trap and encounter. Like having a burger and fries in the same take out container, but they're still not touching each other.

No, this week's advice is to purposefully and deliberately combine traps with combat encounters as a way to create a more dynamic arena, and to increase the difficulty/challenge rating for your players.

There are a few different ways I would suggest thinking about this. Some of those methods, with examples, include:

- Added Threat: Consider a room with hidden crossbows or arrow traps, but which all fire at a height that will hit a Medium creature and not a Small one, and which go off when triggered by a higher weight than a Small creature possesses. This ensures the goblins in the room can run amok, goading the party to close the distance via certain routes, thus setting off additional, hidden attacks. Bonus points if the bolts/arrows are drugged or poisoned, thus creating an additional danger.

- Ticking Clock: We've all been in a room with a flooding trap before, putting a ticking clock on how long players have before they're drowned... but what if there are hungry crocodiles released into the rising waters? Or skeletal warriors who aren't bothered by things like a need to breathe? The water doesn't hurt the characters in and of itself, but it does add one hell of a challenge.

- Battlefield Control: The party steps into a room with a handful of orc archers firing their longbows. Clearly the solution is for the barbarian to charge them so they can no longer take pot shots at the party. But that's when the roaring brute finds, to their chagrin, that parts of the floor are loose, leading to drops into spiked pits. The enemy knows where the camouflaged pits are, and while the party now has to move carefully, the enemy can fire at will, or engage however they wish to.

These are just a few ways that traps can add additional threats to a situation, and create an additional threat for your party to deal with!

With that said, consider some of the following caveats...

Before going ham and adding traps to every encounter, take a deep breath, and let it out slowly. Because when choosing the proper traps to mix into your combat, it's important to consider the following questions:

- Is This An Equal Opportunity Trap? Most traps will likely be avoided by the monsters in the room, but there are some traps which will only be an issue for the party, even if they go off. A poison gas trap, for example, won't affect the zombies in a room, even if it creates a deadly poison cloud that can be a serious danger for the party.

- Is This A Crippling Trap? Most traps are dangerous in-the-moment, but if someone survives the trap, will it create a condition that character now has to deal with for the rest of the dungeon? Something that deals hit points, or which creates a short-term negative is very different than something that gives the victim a permanent negative, or which takes away one of their options to participate in the game going forward. Just like how a monster sundering a fighter's sword is a serious issue that shouldn't be considered lightly, so too is a trap that leaves an effect on a character after the room it's encountered in (other than hit point loss, as that's often reparable).

- Does This Trap Make Sense In This Location? If the party is invading the secret underground lair of a mad alchemist, then it makes total sense for rooms to be rigged with poison gas, explosive traps, and other challenges... but would those same devices be found in the lair of a dragon? Or a defunct crypt that no living person has entered in a century? Just because a trap might make good tactical sense, that doesn't mean it makes sense with the world's internal consistency.

- Is This Avoidable? There shouldn't be a guarantee that a trap goes off. There should be a chance that players avoid it, whether it's moving in a certain way to avoid triggering it, making a Perception check to notice the trap, or having some ability to negate or stop it from going off. Traps that you basically have to set off, or disable while you're under attack, can quickly suck the fun out of an encounter, and they're something you should avoid doing often (or at all, depending on the opinion of your table).

One last thing I would add as a piece of advice here is to choose your traps carefully. Just like how players will get tired of fighting the exact same monster over and over again, or how they'll come up with strategies to deal with specific tactics, a particular trap layout is only going to work so many times before it goes from a new and dangerous threat to an annoyance or frustration.

More importantly, though, is that the real advantage of traps is the uncertainty they create. For example, if your party snuck into a forbidden crypt, and they had to do battle with undead squires to enter the tomb proper, then the lack of a trap might make them confident. But then they have to cross a bridge that is trapped while undead archers fire arrows at them, that might leave their confidence shaken. When they enter the depths of the tomb, and find a skeletal champion and its retainers waiting for them, is the party going to assume this is another straight-up fight? Or will they be moving with caution, wondering where the booby traps are?

A trap only has to happen every now and again for the party to become wary of them. However, traps can grant a serious home field advantage, often allowing a small number of adversaries (or even just one) to take on an entire party of well-armed, well-prepared player characters!

Speaking of Traps...

Part of the reason I was thinking on this topic was that I've been re-reading my recent supplement Ungentlemanly Warfare: A Baker's Dozen of Booby Traps that I put out a little while back for my RPG Army Men: A Game of Tactical Plastic. I'm slowly gearing up to write a few more missions set in this world to follow up the first release A Night At Breckon's Beacon, and at least one of these missions is going to have a lot of traps as part of the challenge a squad is going to have to face.

Seriously, grab a copy if you haven't yet!

If you're looking for a game that definitely encourages the use of traps as part of the challenge (for both allies and enemies), then grab yourself a copy of Army Men for the holidays! And if you just want some improvised mayhem in your game, well, Army Men is based off of a 5E engine, so if your game also runs on something 5th Edition, or a 5th Edition port, these booby traps should be equally useful for you as well! And while some are meant for dealing with infantry, there are several that are meant for taking out vehicles, as well as their entire crew... so tread carefully!

Like, Follow, and Stay in Touch!

That's all for this week's Crunch post! To stay on top of all my content and releases, make sure you subscribe to my newsletter at the bottom of the page!

Again, for more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, and stop by the Azukail Games YouTube channel, or my Rumble channel The Literary Mercenary! Or if you'd prefer to read some of my books, like my dystopian sci-fi thriller Old Soldiers, my hardboiled gangland noir series starring a bruiser of a Maine Coon with Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife or my latest short story collection The Rejects, then head over to My Amazon Author Page!

To stay on top of all my latest releases, follow me on Blue Sky, Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now Pinterest as well! To support my work, consider Buying Me a Ko-Fi, or heading to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to become a regular, monthly patron. That one helps ensure you get more Improved Initiative, and it means you'll get my regular, monthly giveaways as a bonus!