GREATGM: Mystery Setting for your Role Playing Session

[@youshimimi]

"The players are already suffering from brain problems" I spit out my drink when I heard that :D

[@reginaldgickington4793]

"Mysteries should be kept to about 2 sessions in length" My GM: *runs a mystery for 2 years*

[@JacobGrim]

How did you go about doing that?

[@reginaldgickington4793]

@@JacobGrim With great difficulty. Basically every mystery lead to another mystery. "What's in the tunnels under the city?" a swarm of insect monsters and some weird creepy dudes with plans for the monsters -> "Where did they come from?" "Who were the creepy dudes?" "What was their plan?" "Who are the creepy dudes?" agents working for an even more powerful unnamed entity with a tie to a named location -> "who's their boss?" "what's at the location?" "What's at the location?" their safehouse and also an abandoned city underneath the city, and the creepy dudes also are there and are willing to talk -> "what's their plan?" "why were they aggro'd on us at the beginning but now are peaceful?" "why did they do the weird shit they've been doing?" "what's up with the abandoned sub-city?" "why doesn't anybody know about it?" Etc etc. Basically, the story was that an ancient evil slumbered beneath a city. Thousands of years later, a corporation tested a bioweapon that turned the people in the sub-cities into insects, and then the government just covered it up. Then the ancient evil was awoken and began mind controlling a member of a local crime syndicate so that it could gain sufficient resources and influence to take over the city, through which it would take over the world. Meanwhile, a different guy with aspirations of world domination sent out his agents to set up some groundwork so he could play god, all while another guy in the background is planning on becoming god and trying to eliminate potential vectors for everyone else to achieve that end (he ends up being not particularly relevant since he's a character from the canon of the setting who wouldn't achieve his goals for another 100 years, but it did weigh in that he was foiling the plans of other key agents). However, we were not privy to most of that info until the late game. For us, we were trying to solve a bunch of low-level mysteries with some connective tissue, then fill in the gaps along the way, occasionally finding powerful NPC's to offer slight explanation, I.E. finding the Mafia boss's diary that explains they've been mind controlled, but not telling us for what reason or to what end. It was fun, albeit frustrating at times, since it felt like we never got any closer to solving the overarching mystery. Still, I had a good time in the end.

[@RubberDuckKid]

​@@reginaldgickington4793that's honestly really helpful to think about. I'm planning to run a longer Call of Cthulhu mystery campaign, and thinking of it as a lot of little mysteries definitely helps

[@sirhamalot8651]

I like to add an NPC "Watson" character in the mystery. He goes with the party on their investigation and let's the PC's take the lead and draw conclusions, but when the GM sees the players not understanding the obvious clues, the "Watson" NPC speaks up. This NPC is great at speaking out loud a re-cap of the clues and knowledge the party has so far and can ask the important questions to help the party to move on the right track. The "Watson" NPC: "So what do we know? A dead Mr. Pimbrook, A window smashed outwards, and footprints in the thick carpet. But how did the murderer get out of the room, do you suppose?"

[@unforgeti]

Finding this channel is the best thing thats happened in my DnD career, the way you unfold the clues and the story is remarkable! I wish one day to be as good as you, the next session I'll try something like this to see how the players feel about the change of pace.

[@HowtobeaGreatGM]

+unforgeti Thank you, and I hope that this will help improve your game and make your players have more fun! Let us know how it goes!

[@joshuaperrine2019]

Check out Seth Skorkowski's channel and DawnForgeGames

[@curvy4655]

at this point i think im watching these more for the awesome stories you use to explain, that the actual explaination XD

[@Harrow_the_Ninth]

Great advice throughout! A related topic I'd love to hear your thoughts about is puzzles. How do you incorporate them into an adventure without the risk of roadblocking the players? How can you make puzzle-solving a team effort, e.g. how do I engage an 8 Intelligence barbarian in the process?

[@HowtobeaGreatGM]

+egoistic lily It's a good question - I'll add it to the list!

[@Harrow_the_Ninth]

+How to be a Great Game Master Huzzah!

[@Grimlore82]

Yes please!

[@RandyKalff]

Although it's a late response and although I have never played a tabletop RPG, I have a suggestion. Make at least a part of it one in which you need two different players. One with brains who sits back and does the thinking while the other needs muscle to do the hard work. For example: have a puzzle in an ever changing part of a dungeon where the thinker needs to guide the fighter. As the fighter moves through the hallways, it's the thinker's job to keep him as safe as possible while getting him to the exit. This will end up giving the fighter various monsters to battle and traps to deal with. In order to add more on the fighter's side, I suggest you add an element that only he can detect. If the thinker can only see a map of the dungeon, the fighter can be given clues on the walls, floor, ceiling or just about in any way that isn't displayed on a map. However, assuming the thinker is good at his job, most of these should lead the fighter down the wrong path. If the fighter decides to go down the suggested path, it will change the plan for the thinker. But because some help, they won't entirely ignore it either. Another thing you can add are tasks. Have several kinds of tasks, each involving another physical ability. The thinker now has to find a path that won't lead to a task that's unsuited for the fighter's stats. To add predictability, thus making it a test of skill more than a test of luck, include some basic patterns. If a certain hallway closes, two particular ones open up. If a certain task is failed at, a certain hallway closes. Then you can give the thinker some control over which hallway becomes available, making it a better puzzle. Very useful to do there is to use basic numbers. If a hallway closes by chance, one option is that the hallway to the north and west of it open up. Like that you can expand upon it. Of course you still need to add communication options (for realism) and various limitations such as the two not being able to know what the other sees but that's up to you to make up as you go along in the planning.

[@superlolgal555]

I'm making a multi-layered mystery right now, where there's one mystery, and some of the loose ends will lead to another

[@steviegilliam5685]

Really how do you do that

[@bovrar2nd861]

My deepest thanks, just what I was needing to know.

[@sixsmithgames475]

Thanks Guy! I wrote a mystery one-shot and played it with my regular group. It was a blast!

[@michellethomas6494]

Hey there, i really like your advice. However i found this video a little hard to follow. I think you've improved a lot over the years at getting your point across and would really love a revised how to run mysteries video. Please and thank you.

[@Bigslam1993]

you remembered me that (in my next Shadowrun-Campaign) not every Hacking-Task must involve a hour-long single adventure for the hacker to do 1337ness and his H4xXx0r-skillz to be helpful. It can be simple stuff like hacking someones mobilephone... Also, related to that, you gave me the ultimate formula for every shadowrun-adventure ever - which I practically knew, but you called it to the forefront of my mind. [The Employer] wants to have [something], but cant have it because [reason]. He hires a team of Shadowrunners to [do something] which is not exactly legal. Even though the runners do all they can, [something] does not go as planed, because [reason]. This can be [Old Granny next door], [her sisters cookie recipe], [her sister died last week and never wrote it down], [summon a spirit into her body and let it tell her the recipe], [the whole fragging summoning-thing], [the sister was bitten and killed by a vampire and has not feed on anything since she was killed (violent reaction)]. or [A Corporate Manager], [the position of SuperExecutive_of_MegaMarketing], [the guy that has the position is an elf and wont die that fast, naturaly], [kill that bastard in a not too conspicuous fashion], [the payment at the end], [Mr Johnson is stupid enough not pay a bunch of hardened criminals, he just send on a job to kill someone]. its a simple Who, What, Why, How, What goes Wrong, Why go things wrong? Of course there are other little nuances but this REALLY streamlines my thinking, which was way more messy. I am still Newbie-GM, even after doing this for a few month now. PS: Just in case this does not shine through the lines of my non-native-english writing: Thank you! Keep on the good work!

[@HowtobeaGreatGM]

+Bigslam1993 Your English is great! I totally get what you're saying, and you totally get what I was trying to say. Once you have the basic formula it becomes easy to come up with a good story that works well. Good luck with your game and let us know how it goes!

[@Lionrhod212]

Regarding timeline: How would you go about establishing this in a medieval fantasy setting? No clocks or watches to determine time of death. No stopwatch to figure out how many minutes it takes to get from one room to another. Perhaps the amount of time for candles or torches burning down may help, but by the time the party arrives at the scene, there's no way to go back to, "the candle burned this much" unless said torches/ candles/torches were extinguished at time of death. Even so when timing methods are more like, "around sunset," "during the third course," etc, how do I help the party figure timeline?

[@sirhamalot8651]

Astrolabe

[@starbugmechanic5236]

I think a good mystery campaign might be where you find a murder victim and you have to reconstruct his mystery board.

[@irateaaron3837]

I'm actually using a mystery plot as a means to introduce the party to one another at the beginning of the session. The idea is that a arch duke has invited the PCs to a party in order to honer them for their individual accomplishments before the beginning of the story, when suddenly a horrible scream is heard from the next room over. When the characters go to see what the noise was, the find that a beautiful woman has been killed by an unknown a salient. The Duke promptly collapses at the sight of the woman and crystal out her name out of a deep grief. This establishes that the Duke has some sort of relationship with the woman. From there the PCs have several routs they could go with their investigation. I can have hinted that the Duke and his younger brother, who was also at the party, might have had some reason for having his brother cut ties with the woman. Perhaps there is a corrupt cleric that may have served as the younger brothers adviser. Perhaps the PCs overhear a heated conversation between the brother and the cleric before the party and the subsequent murder.

[@HowtobeaGreatGM]

Sounds really cool. Let us know how it goes!

[@whiterabbitstories1454]

What if your players only laugh about your "mystery" ? Or is that just because my writing sucks ? :P

[@classofrass5752]

Run with it. Comedy/Mystery is always a great time!

[@steviegilliam5685]

Players make will make fun of anything so roll with it

[@BobVosh]

I'm planning on doing a closed room mystery, so glad I found this.

[@HowtobeaGreatGM]

That's super cool! Please let me know how it goes?!

[@BobVosh]

+How to be a Great Game Master I will. out of curiosity should I ensure that there isn't any attempt to frame someone? I'm weird if I do the players would just immediately hop on it and never finish investigating.

[@HowtobeaGreatGM]

Yeah framing someone works but only if the players get to know the person to understand that when they say I am innocent, the players believe them!

[@BobVosh]

The most likely character I have is an assassin....not sure how that would go over.

[@CrazyCajun777]

My two biggest complaints about this video are that the sound isn't as good as usual (but i know others have already commented on this) and that you get a little tangential from time to time. It feels like you are flying off the cuff than having written out all the points you'd like to make and examples you'd like to use. With that said I very much like this video. I find it very helpful and when I follow you your tips and examples are very useful. As someone who recently bumbled a mystery quest, I find your tips very helpful. I think an actually pretty good demonstration of many of your points was in the Acquisitions Incorporated game DMed by Mike Krahulik. It was short and very beer and pretzels of a 1hr adventure, but it had many of the points you covered that made it very functional. I particularly enjoy your points about having "good, time based obvious clues." I think the rule of 3 is a good one and I think that adding a red herring is does help. I also agree that too many red herrings can muck up a session. Basically, I really liked this video and found it very helpful and watched it 3 or 4 times. Without getting over long, I applaud you and think your setting videos are your best yet.But I haven't forgotten about "web site stuff is coming" I'll keep my eye out and look forward to hearing more from you fellows. I think you are a very good resource and think that you guys will surpass many currently popular GM tip channels in views and subscribers if you keep up this body of work!

[@HowtobeaGreatGM]

+CrazyCajun777 Many thanks. Yes the audio was a stuff up. Oddly enough I had worked out the points I wanted to make not the actual mystery. I was making that up on the fly but wanted you guys to see how my mind drifted from one question to another adding in details as needed. I'm glad it was useful to you in the end! Thank you for your comment - it's good to know we can stuff up on a recording and still get some value out of it!

[@tauofwar]

wonderful. I love this videos. I'm about to run a mystery campaign. Warhammer Dark Heresy. I might just do the dagger thing but fit it in the warhammer universe.

[@HowtobeaGreatGM]

Thanks for the comment and let us know how a Warhammeresque dagger goes :)

[@tauofwar]

+How to be a Great Game Master heh, I've turned it into a cannister that contains a shard of a meteor that can be used to amplify psychic abilities when fitted to a special contraption (which is affixed to a psyker). The villain wants it so that he can summon vile daemons from the warp to serve as his army in his quest to reclaim lands taken from him during a civil war.

[@natalieeggold3292]

Got a question for you, I've been a GM for awhile now, and my groups have been from about 2-4 players. Its been nice and I am really comfortable with Gming, I'm getting ready to embark on a new campaign with some new people, some I've played with before, some I've only met once. The big thing though is now my group is looking to be anywhere from 5-7 people. so my question for you is, do you have any tip and tricks on how to deal with a larger group, how to keep things going at a good pace and how to keep people from talking over each other and such?

[@HowtobeaGreatGM]

+SyFy girl So I hate big groups... 6 is my limit usually cause that's our Convention limit size. 7 players should be a group of four and group of three in my opinion. I do however have some rules when running big groups because it does happen. The 5 second rule. Once initiative is rolled I turn to the first player and say: What are you doing - then start counting to five. If I reach five, I say - you're considering your options, and move on to the next person. I do this for combat and for high intensity non-combat situations. It helps keep the ball moving and keeps everyone focused on the game otherwise they don't know what to do. Then in non-combat situations I split the party through various GM's tricks. That way - whilst one group is solving a problem the other group is shopping, or making coffee for the table. Hope this helps?

[@LunaProtege]

I tend to like the idea of figuring out most of the mystery just by talking to the people involved. With Martha, the players could make an off hand comment that people who get killed like this often have multiple enemies, and that not all of them would be happy with him just being dead. Martha's reaction to this might say a lot about what she would have planned to do if he wasn't killed, and if what she'd do doesn't line up with what the killer was attempting to do before he was killed, then you can generally pass her over as a suspect. Side note: Another thing a player may investigate is why that other woman might be so quick to mention Martha, while it may be as simple as gossip or a dislike of Martha, its good to consider the possibility she's trying to discourage suspicion on herself. Also, the mystery itself my not even be as interesting as the OTHER mysteries it connects to. If the Players have discovered the dagger, expect that whether or not they find out the identity of the killer, they'd probably want to track down what its deal is... Perhaps expecting that they'll find the killer by tracking down THAT mystery.

[@jvy012896]

Any tips on a mystery to prevent a crime. Such as stopping a prince from being assassinated at his party and the party has to figure out the potential culprit and where and when.

[@timothyheimbach3260]

JarvisYang it's really the same sort of thing. Start with why he's going to be killed and provide clues from there. In the example from the video the man could be worried because he got this threatening letter and the players have to investigate to find out why the dagger is special and who this "b" is.

[@MrGeneralPB]

i know this is probably 5 months too late but you can always go with the means, motive and opportunity when it comes down to any crime, who would stand to benefit from the princes death? probably a very long list so the players need to have it be cut down to a manageable size for them to chew through so you can narrow it down to who would stand to gain something if the prince died tomorrow? who would take power, who would benefit from the chaos enough for the murder to outweigh the potential costs and risks. now means and opportunity, again a very long list of people could kill him in any number of ways but since the prince is likely not on the stupid list he has likely surrounded himself with bodyguards to discourage a straight forward assassination in something like an ambush, that should cut the list down as well, then comes the next question, if someone cannot get to do it straight forward brute force, then we are looking at subterfuge of some kind, an assassin in the night ninja style, poison in a drink... one requires a lot of money, the other opportunity, each scenario starts cutting down the number of suspects. now at a party, there will be a lot of guests, one or more who intends on killing him, any straight forward challenge or duel is very probably a no go but a good red herring if needed, now, for opportunities during a party; a poisoned glass of wine/beverage is a classic, poisoned dart or ring depending on how brave the would be assassin is and how much they would love to see the prince die in front of them and have a really good plan on getting out of there which is a very vital plan of any assassin unless they do not mind dying for revenge. most of the limiting factors can be given to the players outright by whatever you set up, fx why do the players think the prince is getting assassinated? did they find some clues as to someones intentions or where they hired by the prince as he knew they would be outsiders and so likely neutral, which would imply that he has some intelligence about who, why and when this would happen and that would make the first good clue for the players, the next might be the party itself, is the party some kind of annual event which could make it the best time for the assassins to strike because they might not have the opportunity to do so or the risk of being found out too great should they attempt this at another time, this could lead to fx the prince's younger brother who would really like to sit on the throne himself and needs the investigators to have to go through a lot of potential suspects before he would be investigated, if the assassin is someone without access to the prince on a regular basis this might be his or her only time to strike and you would have someone more desperate to look for... anyways, i am not an expert on mysteries and when i have been a player in them i have usually wound up not being able to see the most obvious clues without being told about them XD (so i kinda avoid bringing in any when i am GM)

[@classofrass5752]

An assassination in the form of a group. One of which is catching up with the group which the PC's will encounter, on him is the contract outlining the details of the upcoming assassination and pre-payment for the attempt. Then the PC's have to go and find the rest of the assassins and protect the NPC.

[@michaelthomas2804]

There's something salacious about the he says, "tweaks", and I just can't put my finger on it.

[@dynamicworlds1]

Any advice for atypical mysteries where there isn't a criminal? (Such as making sense of the aftermath of something supernatural)

[@HowtobeaGreatGM]

Instead of Criminal replace Murderer with Supernatural event. It won't have a motive so the clues should point to randomness, disorientation, and searching for safety/escape. Instead of a murder weapon - make it more like carnage, random and unintended. But you have to give them some kind of clue that it was not of this world :)

[@Otaconsps]

Great videos!

[@Proximax9]

I tried this once. My players didn't want to see the body, didn't want to see the place they were murdered. They interrogated the main suspect (who was innocent) and then decided they didnt know who to believe so they just left him be. I had to expose the murderer by other means lol 😂

[@Fjuron]

Some good tips and examples like giving multiple clues for any given question. But to me it felt like a lot of the video as spent on improvising story examples. Maybe they could have been prepared a bit more beforehand to make the video a little shorter and more concise? Thanks :)

[@Seth9809]

10:00, save for later.

[@Forge_n_Brush]

Great ideas. Keep up the good work.~K

[@HowtobeaGreatGM]

+Kurtus Brown Why thank you!

[@MajorSebbaa]

The sound is terrible on this vid.

[@HowtobeaGreatGM]

+MajorSebbaa Sigh... we were trying a new sound set-up cause people didn't like the other sound... back to the drawing board. Thanks for the feedback!

[@fearenhyde8943]

Im loven that intro

[@Seth9809]

What was so bad about the old sound? That was fine, this is uhhh... weird.

[@varvec1824]

There is something funky going on with the audio. Kinda sounds like you're under water or something like that.

[@HowtobeaGreatGM]

Yeah I was running a compression on a compression which I didn't know about until after publishing. Long story, I don't have the originals. I might re-record this one if the audio is that bad?

[@varvec1824]

Honestly, it bothers me. I got used to it halfway through, but that is only because you have good Insight here, and its worth listening to, even if I'm grinding my teeth through it a little. I'd also like to say that I really admire you work, and that is probably another reason this bothers me so much.

[@HowtobeaGreatGM]

Thank you for your honesty. I can't promise but maybe this festive season I can revisit the Mystery video :)

[@brandonnicholas3666]

+How to be a Great Game Master Hi , I am from South Africa in the Pretoria area, and I would like to get into role playing ,where do you think I could get a D20 or other essentials in the Johannesburg area?

[@HowtobeaGreatGM]

+Brandon Nicholas Hello. Head on over to www.outerlimits.co.za they have a store in Pretoria and should be able to hook you up with other groups! Good luck! Also head on over to Gallagher estate in June for the ICON convention. It should be a blast!

[@joshuaperrine2019]

That's WAY too many red herrings, Guy.

[@user-nx5vl9wy4s]

Don’t be so heteronormative, THAT is a tip to make your game better.

[@رجلاً-مجهول]

????

[@alexanderhood8993]

Let just hope your player isn't going to be a bunch of murder hobo in a murder mystery and just murder everyone.

[@BobVosh]

Sooooo.....they skipped half of the investigation, ignored more of the clues, and didn't even investigate all the rooms where the attack happened. They did grab every letter and are planning on talking with the corpse with a spell. I think I can put enough links to get them on the right track with that. Oh, and they only talked to one person in the house, not even the one who witness the assassin fleeing.

[@HowtobeaGreatGM]

Did they want to play an investigative game? Or is this just once off within a bigger campaign? If they did want to do investigative stuff have a mentor or 'second group' arrive and give them the points you just outline here :) If it's just once off... then maybe have a 'post investigation' out of game chat. Nothing serious just a light chat about how you thought it went, and how they thought it went.

[@BobVosh]

+How to be a Great Game Master Once off in a bigger campaign. I think the biggest problem is mostly this is literally their first game. Not the first session, it has been several months, but definitely the first game. I think a mentor will be cleric whom takes an interest in the case after talking with the corpse. I am trying to throw literally everything iconic I can think of at them, just to see what works. I am pretty sure we won't revist this, but I shall see how the conclusion goes.

[@HowtobeaGreatGM]

Well good luck and let us know how it goes!

[@Tarrasuge]

How wood you do a medieval fantasy mystery and magic?

[@alexandredesouza3692]

Same applies, just try to adapt to the world. Assuming it's a murder: Why did X die? - Who would have that reason and enough motivation to go through with it? How, when and where did he die? Scatter Clues vaguely pointing to the Killer's direction while being coherent with the imagined murder scene.

[@IronDruids]

The audio sucks for headphone users.

[@stiegmusic]

I don’t see why it’s so important that the assassin isn’t a woman, seems like a weird thing to focus on

[@Tunakens]

Cant give u a like with that sound, sory Guy

[@t.a.hargrove1212]

So much of this advice seems like it is focused on teaching children how to DM. Where is the quality shit? Unfortunate.