How do you build engaging and fun encounters for your players? This week, Doc & Liv invite Chris Sniezak and Teos Abadia onto the show to tackle one of the cornerstones of GM-ing and session prep – building encounters. From combat to roleplaying to puzzles, understanding your table, their play style, and your game is crucial to creating memorable encounters for everyone involved. Not only does this episode tackle the designing encounters, but how to pivot mid-game when players break your plans!
Episode Topics
- Building encounters with purpose
- Balancing challenge and player agency
- Designing beyond traditional combat
- Adapting encounters during play
- Creating memorable player moments
Game Spotlight
This week, we discussed Lancer with our guests – a brilliant game for those who grew up loving Mobile Suit Gundam and giant mecha fights!
Peer Review
This week, we explore how to find inspiration for encounter inside and outside of your game table.
- When Does a Paper Clip Become a Sundial? Exploring the Progression of Originality in the Alternative Uses Test (Abstract) by B. Kudrowitz and C. Dippo (2013) examines the how we derive new and innovate ideas from everyday items, such as a paper clip via the Alternative Uses Test and the concept of divergent thinking.
Find Us and Our Guests
Chris Sniezak is a podcaster, game designer and audio editor for many TTRPG podcasts, including ours!
Teos Abadia is a game designer with dozens of credits and the host of Mastering Dungeons! You can find his work here.
Follow the Forever GMs on social media on BlueSky (@theforevergms.bsky.social), Instagram (@theforevergms), and TikTok (@theforevergms) for updates on the show and let us know what topics we should cover in the future
Want to hear more from this episode? Join our Patreon at $3 per month for our after show, Table That!
Podcast: Play in new window | Download