Help making my game more cinematic

> none of my sets or descriptions are very nice, the NPC's are normal as can be, and the enemies are standard, nothing special about them. plus the quest essential things to do are never fun or cool, nothing like place the orb on the pedestal and watch the tower of thorns erupt from the lava in the shape of a dragon.

It seems like you're aware of what you'd like to upgrade in regards to your GMing, all you really need to do is execute your vision bro.

Outside of just giving you things to use, all I would say is just read more books and watch more movies. See a side character or set piece you like? Ape it, shamelessly. The way in which your players interact with it will likely twist it beyond what you took the seed from.

As far as making your games more "cinematic," that could mean a couple things. If it is you trying to bolster your descriptive prose, again, read and read. Try finding a few actual screenplays for your favorite movies and read those, they're generally written in ways to convey a pretty strict sense of image and layout in a more concise way than novels. If you mean more pacing, remember that there is usually some internal drive or external pressure that keeps the heroes of a good story moving.

>>53689352
this is actually pretty great advice, thank you. ill look into what i can find.

File: dungeon_entrance_by_sucdeportocale-d8d6krk.jpg (163KB, 1191x670px) Image search: [Google]

163KB, 1191x670px

just some high cinematic art to work from

>>53687447
Just try and relax. You can't force inspiration, the harder you try to "think of something cool" the harder it will get. As >>53689352 this anon said, just start reading random things. Look at some cool art, read a book, listen to some music.

If you really feel you have to actively do some work on your campaign, my best advice is to mentally run through how you think your game will go. Make a basic, generic outline of your session with the important plot points, then sort of play out the session in your mind. When I say play it out, I really mean play it out, like imagine your players physically sitting there, and sitting through your session, rolling their dice, reacting to whatever you bring up.

Then, find the places where you feel the pacing will drag. The unnecessary skill checks. The generic NPC. The expected outcome. The not-so-flashy setpiece. Take these boring bits and either cut them, replace them, or just make them really wild. Then go back to the rest of your plans and adjust them accordingly. Then repeat the process. If you really focus and get into the rhythm, you'll eventually find you can't stop, as your mind starts coming up with more "wait, what if we did this instead," and you make your session more exciting.

Basically, what I'm saying is, it is really hard to be spontaneously imaginative. Real artists don't get their ideas in flashbulb moments. Most of it is actually just sitting down and putting in a lot of effort, and trying to get some momentum going.

>>53690224
Skill checks. Riiiight I really need to work those into the game as well, I don't have enough challenges that can't be solved by having a talk. Having a fight, or Having the key item

>>53690224
>Then, find the places where you feel the pacing will drag.

Remember that no session is going to be high-octane action all the time, and that stuff that's not thrilling or exciting can have it's place if it serves to make the thrilling, exciting bit more thrilling and exciting.

When it comes to pacing, I'll aim for something that grabs the players attention at the very beginning of a session, then a slow build up towards another sort of exciting or climactic thing occurring towards the end of the session.

Bum p