Some More Everywhen Awesome

So, with about 35 years as a gamer under my belt, I certainly don't have to read to GM tips in an RPG book before reading it? After all, what could they tell me that I don't already know?

Well, there actually is one thing or another, so I need to amend my review of Everywhen: The chapter on game mastering is awesome. It's only 10 pages, but they are packed. There's some system-specific stuff about setting difficulties first, but that already features some good general advice for most RPG genres: Look where the players have put their build points and consider that that's where they want to shine - so make sure that they get the opportunity to do so in your adventure. It also re-iterates an important idea that has been stated before in Everywhen: A failure doesn't necessarily mean that a hero has failed due to ineptitude; always err towards assuming that circumstances beyond their control thwarted them.

Then we get some great advice on investigative adventures and information management that articulates something that I feel I already knew, but couldn't put my finger on: It's about the players often getting stuck in the information-gathering stage, spinning out ever more theories, without starting to narrow down possibilities. Everywhen makes a very neat and helpful distinction between open ("Why would anyone want to murder a blind old lizard-man?" and closed questions ("Did the priestess do it?") that helps a lot to figure out when and why the players might get stuck and how to get things rolling again. I've read an GMed a lot of Gumshoe games and know the problem, so I really appreciate Garnett Elliott spelling it out for me in a way I couldn't have!

Following that, there's stuff about planning and pacing adventures and campaigns, listening to your players, enlisting them for your world-building, encounter-balancing and setting creation. None of it is revolutionary, but it's solid, concise, and there's nothing in there that screams "Bad advice!" to me (which means a lot, because usually, when I'm reading through GM advice chapters, there are a quite few fingernails-on-chalkboard moments ...).

Also, I have to retract my allegation that Everywhen doesn't feature any career examples: There are a few (albeit short) career examples in the two mini-settings at the end (one Buffy-ish Urban Fantasy, the other Tolkienish Fantasy). I haven't bothered to read these two in depth, because I already know that I won't be using them, but obviously, some of the "worked example" stuff that I was missing is in here.

So, more good reasons to go get Everywhen - you don't only get a really good rules engine, but also remarkably good advice on how to use it!