A very interesting book. The articles are short and concise. The artwork varies in style and content. Warning: some of the artwork is for a mature audience! Overall, the author gives very good advice fo Game Masters, novice and experienced. Some are little things that have been overlooked in games I have run and played. Also some overall things. My only complaint is the size. Feel that it should have been in digest size to save space.

How to Game Master Like a Fucking Boss – A Review by Kurt R

Overall this is a great book for either the new GM or one with some years of experience.

There are some gripes that others have had about this, and that is the language and nudity. Well, if you couldn't tell that this was going to be one of those then you should re-read the title, it's at least R rated. There are nudes of both human sexes and some beasties too. As far as the language goes just about everyone watches HBO and the language in here is no different, but I saw it as being down to earth and lent to it's conversational feel.

There is another gripe about the lack of bookmarks and/or the Table of Contents not being linkified, I have been told that the author's previous layout guy either was too lazy or didn't know how to add them. I hope that Venger sees that there's a demand for these additions and has his new layout guy add them, because that would be VERY useful.

Now on to the meat of the book, I found it to have a great number of useful tips and tricks to improve my Game Mastering. A little background on me now, I use to Game Master years ago for AD&D, V&V, GURPS and Battletech, but after many years of not reffing I have picked up Pathfinder and started running some games of that. What use to fly for a good game years ago has changed somewhat, so I found myself more than once, while reading this, thinking, “Oh Yeah, This is great, I can use that!”

There is some disorganization to this book and should be alleviated somewhat when links are added, but the change in thought streams is severe at times. One example that stands out is in the, The Checklist, things that you should include in your own games. About halfway through this section is a listing about things to do when, you, as a former Game Master, start playing again, I thought this was the end of this section. Then I read the next part and it was back to the list of things to include in your games, I found this very confusing and think that section should have been saved until the end, of The Checklist.

However, once I got the hang of this format I started thinking of it like panning for Gold. There are many very useful tidbits in there and you must read through them all, and even re-read sections to get to the juicery parts.

Then I came to the Tables section, this is like hitting the precious Gem vain. There are tables for all kinds of really cool stuff and a lot of them are d100, so lots of options for one item.

There is also a section on a magical language that Venger created as well as 3 small dungeons in case you run out of ideas or don't have any others with you.

My Rating is 4 stars out of 5

With the inclusion of Bookmarks and Table of Contents links this would be a five.

If you like some wacko metal pulp action in your OSR VS makes products for you. There is lots of good stuff in HtGMlaFB to help one build a better game, if the delivery style and game type fit your world and play style.

VS, like a lot of the OSR vanguard, happily shares his experiences and personal insights to kick in the readers own creativity.

A lot of folks are accustomed to "prescriptive" gaming references rather than "descriptive guidance" refs that require a little more thinking and integration into each individual game.

My game is crazy gonzo metal and VS is helping me make it better.

Vengers style and approach is for sure unique but what can a GM want more than to get challenged and to discover new approaches? Despite being in the RPG scene for nearly 30 years now and for having read 1000 and 1000 of pages in Englisch, German and French about how to be a good GM (and a good player too) I don't regret to have supported the Kickstarter of this product. The tables are very inspiring though, as usual, I will adapt them to my very personal style and create generators out of them. When one was looking for a product to have all served on a silver tablet - well then this is not for him. But for the old ones out there who love to create their own stuff from scratch, and for the youngster who want to follow this most honorable path, I can only recommend "How to Game Master like a Fucking Boss". The least it will do is to joggle your mind and make your creative juices flow... flow in abundance. On my word and honor.

Yes, you read that right. This is really the title of the book. And it should already tell you something: the author doesn’t take any prisoners. In fact, Venger Satanis is one of those guys in the scene who polarizes a lot. His previous works are reminiscent of 80s trash and nostalgia but also some fine ideas. Yet his work is not for the faint-hearted. He clearly caters to the majority of male role playing gamers. As a woman I had to cringe sometimes when reading his weird fantasy campaign setting The Island of Purple Haunted Putrescence (aff) (the cover features the naked behind of a sparsely clothed leather-clad female). Still, I’m always on the lookout for good advice on game mastering. Some people argue that those tips don’t help because you have to learn by doing it. I beg to differ. Of course, no instruction book can instantly make you a great GM but it certainly helps to learn this skill (and it is a skill!) when you prepare by learning from other people.

What do you need to know?

How to Game Master Like a Fucking Boss is a book full of short articles by a guy named Venger As’Nas Satanis, at least that’s the name he goes by on the cover. Furthermore, the book contains a whole lot of random tables. The advice is mostly geared towards fantasy old school gaming, but some tips should be universally applicable.

What’s inside?

Again, some of Venger’s ideas clearly go against the mainstream. That already begins with the opening salvo: we don’t play RPGs to have fun, to tell stories, to socialize or to see what happens. Nope. We do it to immerse ourselves in an imagined self and/or reality. I don’t agree completely. I’m pretty sure that there are people who are not that interested in the immersion and more in the storytelling aspect. But, well, nothing to get hung up upon. Generally, the advice he gives are a mix between mundane tips (i.e. choose clothing that makes you feel good and pretend you’re on a job interview or take some breaks in your campaign to keep things fresh) and technical stuff (how to build encounters, how to deal with character deaths). The author’s writing style is engaging, colloquial and easy to understand. He knows how to draw you in with headers like “When Metallica forgot to be Metallica”. There’s stuff like the waiter analogy (cater to the audience, anticipate their needs) but also the warning not to be a pushover. I like how he stresses that you should make the game your own and give it your unique voice. Even if you use published adventures, take care to prepare them, adjust them and sprinkle some of your ideas into them. Additionally, there’s some idea about a d6-based skill system which should be easy to implement if you’re missing some in your game (i.e. some old school D&D games). Venger gives you advice on the ideal gaming length (3-5 hours), on how much time to allocate for prep (1/2 of gaming time). Break things down into encounters, come up with the basics first and build from that. Some tips may sound a bit cute, but they might still be useful. For instance, he tells you to hand out pleasantries and to praise your players. Probably not the worst advice. It’s also nice to see that he writes about making mistakes and admitting them. I’m pretty sure that there are some shitty Game Masters who never admit that they’re wrong (though I’ve personally never encountered people like that). Moreover, there is guidance on how many encounters you could stack into your gaming session, to leave your preconceived story behind you, group size etc. One of my favorite ideas is the notion of the 33%. If you’re unsure about an outcome, give the unlikely outcome a chance of 33%. This will make things interesting and will also surprise you as a GM. Furthermore, there is the idea to highlight missed opportunities to become better at your craft. A neat concept because it can show you where you can improve the next time. So, instead of just asking yourself what went well and what went badly, also reflect on those things which you could tweak to make them better. There are some gems in the short blogpost-like articles: how to handle backseat GMs, how to make your NPCs unique, how to use improvisation techniques using covert solicitation (a really nice trick), and a little checklist for your campaign (include something grizzly, something disgusting, something the players have never seen before, something whimsical etc.). You won’t agree with all of what the author suggests. Some articles are just assortments of general ideas you could throw into your campaign. The last part of the books contains tons of tables, i.e. your past, character questions, reasons the characters are together, motivations, cults, monsters, mutant magic items, complications, NPC reactions and more. Also included is a fictional magic language the author invented. All things considered, this book contains an eclectic mix of articles on how Venger Satanis runs his games. There’ll be some stuff you could use but also things you might not like.

Look and Feel

The PDF is 124 pages total, no electronic bookmarks (grrr). The content is not really organized which makes it hard to look up specific themes. There’s an index at the beginning of the book, but some titles are a bit obscure (Seinfeld?). Layout, font choice etc. are adequately done. The background has a watermark tribal which I could have done without. The artwork is sparse but mostly good. However, be warned that there are some naked folks (both genders).

Summary

What do I like? There’s some stuff I could use, some ideas that I like, for instance, the 33% rule. I like the writing style, it’s fun to read.

What would I’ve liked to see? I’m more of a fan of organized content and the articles feel like they were more or less randomly put together. The PDFs should have bookmarks, it’s 2015! I personally find the watermark on each peach annoying, it distracts a bit from the text.

Some bullet points:

articles about how to Game Master a fantasy campaign (mostly geared towards old school, so it’s not a universal toolkit) engaging but polarizing style badly organized (on purpose, the author states that repetition helps you with learning or something like that) contains some gems and is an entertaining read visual presentation of the digital version doesn’t rock my socks I personally find the price point of USD $14.00 too high, I paid USD $10.00 with the kickstarter and I feel that’s the sweet spot nice to have but not a must-buy

Content-wise I'm giving this 4/5. Considering the book's (missing) organization and the value for your money, I'm knocking off 1 star, so it's 3/5.

Book review: How to game master like a fucking boss When I first saw How to Game Master like a Fucking Boss by Venger Satanis I was interested in the book but somewhat put off by the title. What kind of cocky bastard gives a book a name like that? The really enthusiastic kind as it turns out. The authors enthusiasm for Game Mastery is contagious, I got about ten pages in and decided that I would run my game on a week that I was planning to skip.

The intent of the author with this book is to present the 'Draconic Method', a system agnostic style of game mastering that has been developed over a period of three decades. This book runs to 122 pages and consists of what I perceive as three main sections, game mastery tips, the checklist and assorted appendices.

Game mastery tips occupy roughly the first fifty pages of the book and are presented as bite sized chunks of advice, most of which are about half a page in length. The first ten or so tips generally deal with what role playing and game mastering are, why we do them and ways to psyche oneself up to the task of running your game. As I mentioned above these serve to infuse the reader with a portion of Venger's enthusiasm for game mastery and these alone would make the book worth purchasing.

The remainder of the tips are practical in nature and pretty easy to implement in order to incrementally improve your game. Every aspect of role playing seems to receive attention, highlights for me which I'll expand on, included the authors advice on building encounters, positive affirmations and meditation.

I always go into an encounter with a pretty good mental model of what is going on. Deliberately giving each encounter three elements and each element three aspects plus, optionally, three characteristics to each aspect is an excellent way to bring your mental model of the encounter out into the real world where your players can share it. I'm honestly surprised that I've never come across anything like this before. Revolutionary.

In my work I'm always using positive affirmations to encourage and reassure those I'm working with, and in hindsight it's surprising I never though to bring these to the gaming table. You're sure to come across a number of tips in this book that are blindingly obvious in hindsight.

Rather than actual meditation, the author recommends spending some quiet time thinking. This really resonated with me as I'm sure it will with many of you. I've had insights into lots of things, not just game mastering while gardening or walking to the train station.

I did find some tips to be, perhaps, slightly odd. Despite having a matching dice set myself, I found the recommendation to have matching dice curiously judgmental. Also, what to do about unwanted flirting seemed a bit irrelevant, but perhaps for those better looking than I it could be useful.

The tips don't seem to be presented in any particular order, for example 'unwanted flirting' is sandwiched between 'focus on one thing at a time' and 'have a backup adventure ready to go'; this has positive and negative aspects but on the whole I liked the approach as there is almost certainly something interesting on any random page even if it does make it slightly difficult to find any particular tip.

The Checklist is a list of ideas for things to include in your campaign. It occupies roughly twenty pages, and at four or five items per page is a goldmine of game master inspiration. Not everything will be suitable for your game but most of it will be. As I was idly grazing through the checklist I pieced together an approximate solution to a campaign planning problem I've been grappling with for some time.

The appendices as I'm calling them consist of a selection of tables, a glossary for Viridian and some dungeon maps.

The tables could equally serve as inspiration while preparing your game or to fill in a blank that has arisen during play. Those that stand out the most to me are one hundred questions to ask characters to find out a little more about them, a series of tables for creating a cult and a table of twenty unique NPCs.

The Viridian glossary allows a game master to deliver text or speech in a sinister sounding language the author has devised. I haven't completely read this section but after a quick skim there appears to be a good selection of words that should allow wide range of phrases to be constructed.

Finally, at the very back of the book are three very different, unlabeled dungeon maps for those times when you need a bit of help coming up with the layout of that temple or thieves den or whatever. An excellent addition that the author could probably have gotten away without had he been less rigorous.

I have a digital copy of this book and it is professionally laid out in an easy to read two column format, although it could have done with more thorough proofreading. If my previous experience with DrivethruRPG is anything to go on, a physical copy should have good print and construction quality.

The cover image is gorgeous and evocative and there is plenty of art scattered through the book that will appeal to the thirteen year old boy in all of us.

The contents page actually stretches to a page and a half and unless you can remember the exact name of the section you're looking for you may have to search for a while to find just what you want.

How to game master like a fucking boss is a solid title with much to recommend it. If you run a game, you will almost certainly find a lot in this book to help you improve your game and to make you more enthusiastic about running it. I'm going to be implementing the Draconic Method in my game.

Venger Satanis takes game mastery seriously, maybe you should too.

This is my review of Venger Satanis' book on Game Mastering tips, tricks and guidelines. The original version of this review included some play reports but things got very long. I'll post those seperately.

How to Game Master like a F***ing Boss was an entertaining and easy read. It is well written; using a light, conversational tone that is heavy with self-aware humor and light in pretentiousness.

While there are plenty of sources of Game Mastering tips out there, in published works and blogs, I found several fresh, unique ideas. Here are three that stood out to me:

-Deeds of Might: giving each player a finite source of bonus dice each session that can be spent to perform potentially extraordinary feats. These dice may be spent sparsely or a bunch at a time. While this concept is nothing new, I rather liked the implementation.

-Handing out a brain teaser to occupy the players while taking a break. I can't believe that I never thought of this before (or simply taking a break after leaving a cliffhanger at the table).

-Improvisation via Covert Solicitation: using player ideas and expectations to create encounters and events (covertly "passing the joint" around the table and gathering ideas for your use). I was a fan of this concept when I played Dungeon World, but this method is more casual and less formal.

I appreciate Venger's goal to bridge "old-school" with the new. He uses the term "O5R" in reference to the OSR movement (Old School Revival) and the latest (fifth) edition of Dungeons and Dragons. This strikes a chord with me because I'm doing exactly that: using OSR and DIY (Do-it-Yourself) material in my modern edition campaign.

The quality of the artwork is really decent (Venger never disappoints in this dept.). There are lots of evocative, full page illustrations. Some are rather campy and kind of sleazy (in the tongue-in-cheek manner of Heavy Metal magazine). Luckily, they're always interesting. Three of my favorites:

-An homage to the first monolith scene in 2001: a Space Odyssey, but with dinosaurs instead of apes.

-A page and a half spread of a classic dungeon party with traits that made me think of Elfquest, Erol Otus and Ralph Bakshi.

-A mage and a dwarf warrior battling it out on top of a freakin' speeding monorail! Also, winged horrors approaching to eventually join the fray.

While I really liked the art (I feel that this book has the most impressive collection of any of Venger's books to date), I wasn't a fan of the iconic watermark on each and every page. I felt that it was distracting and would have preferred a lighter version or if it had been placed off in the side margin (as is seen in Venger's other recent publication, Crimson Dragon Slayer). I also felt a bit jarred while reading half of a sentence at the bottom of one page and being interrupted by a full page illustration while flipping to read the rest of it later on (to be fair, this isn't likely to be an issue in the printed version).

The font and the 2-column text layout are fine and easy on the eye (except for the before mentioned watermark). My only criticism relates to the center margin: at times it felt a bit narrow, especially when two headings ended up side-by-side in each column. I usually read these as a single heading. I also would have liked a bit more space above the footer: the text at the bottom of each column came a bit close at times. Take these criticisms with a grain of salt: I'm no desktop publisher or typographer. This is all personal taste.

The headings were nice and clear, and often sardonic or clever. Whenever they were a bit vague, they were thought-provoking or attention grabbing. Some of my favorites:

-When Metallica forgot how to be Metallica

-The Waiter Analogy

-Flatlining the Burning Chrome of Chiba City

The Game Mastering advice includes all manner of topics that you'd expect: handling different kinds of players, campaign management, finding inspiration, pre-game prep, improvisation, balancing encounters and pace. What made this book feel a bit more unique were the tips on lifestyle and handling stress. Sure, some books out there offer advice on managing a campaign, few offered advice like Venger's that bordered on self-help or mental health (in a good way). I appreciated these sections a great deal because of my own life experiences and current family life.

There's lots of great stuff in here: I guarantee that every Game Master will find something inspiring and useful.

A few sections, however, will probably draw ire from some critics. While I "get" Venger's attitude, I still cringed slightly at a few things that I know could draw negative attention. While I refuse to be a moral judge about authors and artists, others out there might not. All that I'll say is that this work, like all of Venger's products, isn't for absolutely everyone.

Here are a few tips that I liked:

-A pre-game mantra-like poem: it clears your mind and, if you speak it out loud in a few different voices, gives you a bit of practice playing out different NPC personalities.

-Tips on improving your presentation and style (comfy and nice attire, boosting self-confidence, getting into a good state of mind, being a good "waiter" and ensuring that you use a complete set of same-colored dice: all of which may seem trivial or shallow, but I find that there's value in this advice).

-Building encounters with Three Aspects. Just like with the Fate fractal, give each encounter three aspects for added detail, interest and context for the players. You can drill down and give three aspects to NPCs, objects and even the environment. A nice, concise idea. As you might have noticed, I'm quite a fan of the Rule of Three.

I won't go into too much detail because I don't want to spoil anything: part of the enjoyment of this book (and conversely, a bit of an annoyance, see below) is discovering something new as you flow from section to section.

While the journey is entertaining, I still would have liked a bit more structure. These tips could have easily been grouped into sections or chapters (Game Master Lifestyle, Your Players, Campaign Management etc...). While these topics do flow somewhat naturally, I had trouble going back to reference some things later on (I couldn't remember under which heading some things appeared). Because of this lack of structure, the Index is just a huge list of titles sorted by order of appearance. A Table of Contents would have been a nice addition, but there is none.

I'd also add that while it was a nice surprise to discover a whole section of tables, languages and even maps (which are all really, really well done), there was no indication of this in the Index. I know that some people decide on whether or not to buy a book based on the index; it is unfortunate that many may not realize how much they're missing. A few uses of index headings like "Tables", 'Tools", "Languages" and "Maps" would be a great and useful addition. To be fair, these are mentioned on the cover, though.

Loosely, I'd break this product down into these sections (in pages):

-4-70: Game Master Advice

-70-97: Tables

-98-116: Language reference (Viridian to English and then English to Viridian

-119-121: Dungeon Maps

The Tables are a great addition, useful in any Game Master's kit. They're system-agnostic; more like idea generators. Some are great for character creation (backgrounds and the like), NPC motivations/goals, cult generators and a vaguely Lovecraftian monster builder. In particular, I liked these ones:

-Magic Item Mutations: mutation tables are a dime a dozen... for player characters. How about for equipment and magic items? Gnarly...

-Stupid Gnome Hat: I'll let you discover this yourself.

-Reaction Table: some nice ways to alter typical encounters. Sure there are others, but I liked this one and the way that it works.

The Viridian section, by the way, is a made-up language that sounds suitably sinister and otherworldly for a variety of campaign styles: evil cults, demons, aliens or Mythos Monsters. It's split into two parts: Viridian-English and then vice-versa. A nice reference if you quickly need eerie-sounding words.

Yes, they're duelling on a monorail and yes, it's awesome.

I'd say that How to Game Master like a Fucking Boss is a worthy book for any Game Master out there. It is chock-full of great advice and tools. Despite a few issues with layout and structure, it is a very good read. As usual the cheesecake nudity and occasionally the subject matter will not be appreciated by all. After having read a few of Venger's works, I know what to expect but it might not appeal to everyone. Be warned, but give this book a chance: it's worth your time.

I've been making my way through How to Game Master Like A F$%#ing Boss for the better part of a week. The book is part DM's Guide, part rpg self help course, part re-division OSR campaign kit, and all about notching up your game. Venger was very excited to get this slime covered child of old school/new school weirdness into my hands via email. And I have to say that its very well done. The sucker clocks in at over 124 pages filled with practical advice, lots of practical hands on material and a bunch of very non politically correct adult only artwork. This book isn't filled back to back with the gore of some of his earlier efforts but there is a lot of not safe for work material. And that's fine with me. The book is a step by step course from everything of working through accepting your role as DM, to preparing the adventure, design, anthology of examples of methods of campaign implantation to execution. Not surprisingly this is a pretty solid hands on step by step process broken down by Mr.Satanis in his rolling enthusiastic style. Yes there is an actual appreciation for old school gaming here and that energy translates into some hand holding but in actual fact a ton of practical advice. But is it good advice? Yes I actually do think that there's some real world advice here that goes about trying to speak to both the new DM and the beginner from the ground up. And that exactly what this book does takes the DM from start to finish to improve their skills. But is it good advice? Yeah, I actually think that it is and this book provides the DM with all of the essential's over viewed including all of the usual tropes and traditions associated with science fiction, swords and sorcery, science fantasy, and fantasy for no particular edition. Venger gives these tropes a structure and how they fit into adventures including how to use them during adventure design. This is a slice across the jugular of the DM's throat for adventure design & placement of adventure elements. Again this is done in such a way to actually be useful to a DM. The advice is done in down to earth and no nonsense kinda way which characterizes the entire book. There isn't so much a lot of hand holding as 'here's what needs to be done' to improve your games and here's what worked for me. The next chapter is a random cinematic DM's kit. Here we get page after page of random tables that give's a meat and potatoes cinematic approach to random adventure generation for adventure elements, NPC's and their motivations, plus minions, and more. And then we get random tables and I do mean useful random tables for adventure design everything from NPC motivations to character questions and much more. Secondary NPC motives on the fly and weirdness tables to add into your campaigns. And this book isn't simply a DM self help book its more like game neutral system push for your campaigns as well. There are cult generation tables, NPC cult leader generation tables, whose going to be sacrificed, why are they going to be sacrificed. There's a whole 80's horror, VHS special aesthetics that runs through here. And it extends into a mother of a monster generator set of tables including appearance and weirdness. And a magic item mutation table as well. Cosmic horror generation tables and much more. Then the ubiquitous stupid gnome hat table and yes its pretty damn sweet as a table. Its the little things that I love. Unique NPC random encounter and generation tables as well. Faction and reaction tables and more. Ten ways to alter your purple consciousness table and more! And lots more. There's enough random table's material to generate at least twenty or more campaigns on the fly. Next we get a magical language that you can drop right into your campaigns for added effects and high strangeness. Viridian or the green tongue is a completely imaginary language that can be dropped right into your campaigns when you need a weird language with strange bits lurking in the background. And then we get a bit more material and an afterward. But is this book an essential book that I would reach for when designing an adventure or campaign? Yes I believe it is. There's a foundation and course work that has gone into the first half of the rpg advice section of the book and then a ton of useful campaign and adventure bits that have gone into the second half of the book. This makes the whole product a win/win in my book. Simply grab the book and add it right next to your DM's Guide to help get your campaign back into gear! Four out of five for this book.

Note that this is an adult title with a bit of adult and mature content between the covers and this is something that readers should realize before getting into the book.