Giving Out Clues This is an excerpt from the most recent version of GUMSHOE – The Esoterrorists 2nd Edition. It is GM-facing advice on the most central element of the game – how the characters interact with the scene in the game’s fiction, and how the players and GM use GUMSHOE to handle the delivery […]
Category Archives: Gumshoe
GUMSHOE general category
We are controlling this transmission. If we wish to make it louder, we will bring up the volume. If we wish to make it softer, we will tune it to a whisper. We will control the horizontal. We will control the vertical. We can roll the image, make it flutter. We can change the focus […]
In the shadowy world of The Fall of Delta Green, you never know who’s got clearance, not to mention who’s got your back … and who’s got your back in his sights. The Company man – the man from the CIA – might fit any of those descriptions, or any other. That’s kind of the point, […]
Sign up here to become a Pelgrane Press convention GM Like a burnt but still alarmingly competent spy with the whiff of vampire in her nostrils, convention season has crept up on us once more. Last year was our most successful yet, with Pelgrane games on the rise at a number of conventions around the world. More than […]
I’m glad tabletop culture still seems to respect elder wisdom. Otherwise I’d be reluctant to tell you how long I’ve been doing GM Masterclass panels. Over time a few questions change, but some stay the same. One question you don’t get much anymore: the once-standard, “How do we get new blood into the hobby?” This […]
by Yohann Delalande [Editor’s Note: Yohann ran the the One Sheet GUMSHOE competition on RPG Geek, which had an extraordinary 18 entries. Congratulations to all the entrants .You can download all the entries here.] One of the recurring obstacles every GM has met at least once concerns time vs preparation work. After all, it is […]
See Page XX A Column about Roleplaying by Robin D. Laws When we of the Pelgrane-Industrial Complex write and test GUMSHOE scenarios, we take care to avoid short circuits—moments that, early in play, could conceivably allow the investigators to abruptly move to the end of the story. The dissatisfactions of short-circuiting are various. The players […]
Karloff reviewed the backer-PDF copy of the Dracula Dossier. You can find the full review here. Thanks, Karloff! Karloff says, “This improvisational Night’s Black Agents campaign setting, complete with the unredacted print copy of Stoker’s first edition Dracula and a massive Director’s Handbook, is beyond huge. It’s one thing to write up Stoker’s Dracula with little […]
This article offers a way you can use the 13th Age Escalation Die in your GUMSHOE games. GUMSHOE games and 13th Age manage the narrative flow of combat – the emotional upbeats and downbeats – very differently. In all GUMSHOE games, players usually start a battle with more combat resources than when the battle is […]
The most vivid GUMSHOE investigative abilities in play are the Interpersonal ones. They allow your characters to get information through extended dialogue with Game Master characters, requiring a touch more player skill than the Technical or Academic categories. They also show, in the game’s imagined on-screen space, who your character is and what attitudes she […]