“If you get stuck, cheat” and “If it’s boring, skip it” THANK YOU. I know some commenters disagree with the choice of language, but cheating is how a lot of people view these executive decisions. Giving permission in no uncertain terms, without euphemism, is so valuable to enjoying solo games. I can’t believe I only just found this video now!

There are so many new RPG books and genres, and I've never understood how to play solo! I can't believe I gave away all of my Star Wars RPG books because I couldn't find anyone to play with me--I could have learned to solo. Thank you for expanding our minds!

You answered your bonus question with your second recommendation. If you want to be excited for your next session end your first session right before something exciting happens. Same trick for waking up early. Don’t stay up late doing all the fun things, save some fun things for the next morning.

Dead end - cave collapse - tunnel exposed behind the wall - continue forward in new direction.

Skipping "downtime" / transition time is so key. I have a still ongoing Ronin game and it has really helped me to hop from moment to moment. It's like a film fading from scene to scene. Anytime you play out downtime, should only be for the sake of tension, drama, foreshadowing, or other "active" moments, like checking how much ammo you have to heighten the importance of not missing shots later, for example.

"I always start too big in terms of scope and Materials used." Every. Single. Time. 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 Seriously though, me too. Love the solo rpg Friday concept! Great inaugural show, looking forward to more!

Another creator playing solo RPGs! Insta sub 🤘 These are great tips

These are great tips. I've watched a lot of videos of solo roleplay sessions and thought "that looks easy" and then sat down to play and been totally stuck. Or I'll collect a bunch of solo tools and then not enjoyed how they worked in my game. So lately I've been making my own tools by either adjusting the tools I'm using or combining the aspects I like from each of them.

For rule #3 I like to say "Don't be afraid to make the GM call." I don't call it cheating when the GM makes a call. The word cheat comes with so much baggage that does not apply to the situation. Other than that, nice list. 🙂

Thank you! These principles are a huge help to me. I noticed immediate improvement in session quality: 1. Light rules ( Dragonbane), 2. started off waking up in the middle of orc surprise attack 3. a bit of "rule bending" here and there,, 4. trying to remember that I am a GM as well as a player, so some work needs to be put in there. 5. and 6. Keeping in mind, this is my downtime, and therefore I shouldnt be overthinking the session beforehand, instead I have small episodic adventures, that are a part of a main quest: As a dwarf artisan my main goal is to craft a monster slaying weapon, and for that goal Intraverse the beautiful map finding components and materials for the weapons. So you need some NPCs like merchants, explorers, mages, as well as thiefs, hunters etc...

Hey Daniel, Great video with useful info for beginners. I’m excited to come on the channel & talk more about my book & all the ways into soloing.

Cool opening theme! Totally got me amped for the video. I like that you’ve got another tune for this series.

These are great! I originally got into the idea because of Me Myself and Die. It never occurred to me that you could play these things solo. What I like to do for my solo games is to consider them all legends and to have them either played in the same geographic regions as my table game, or if it doesn't line up there, I just play it as is, but I use it to generate fully fleshed out NPCs that can show up in game, or come up in lore. The way I deal with the time and location disconnects is that I will write the introduction to the whole thing from the perspective of an investigator or an historian, and then once I've set the stage, I just start throwing dice and using charts, etc. Super fun and an amazing creative exercise!

Excellent advice and reminders!

I have been looking forward to the beginning of this series all week - woke up early to watch before work and it did not disappoint.

Great tips - I really like starting small - something that has worked really well for myself, you then get to build which makes it very satisfying. Also your original Solo RPG for Beginners video is up to 24k - in my humble opinion those are big numbers and such a great video on getting folks started. Thanks for all you do!

looking forward to this new series

These are great. I've been playing my solo D&D campaign over the past week or so. I've been using your suggestion to build the world as you go, and it has made a big difference unlocking new areas on the map as a wider story progresses. One other suggestion I am using (saw this on another YT channel) is to use literal, real world time in the game. So today in my world it is Nov, 21, 422. My party is leaving for a long journey tomorrow morning, around 200 miles in total. During the next few days I will be rolling a couple times a day (and at night) for random encounters. I will sit down and run the encounter if anything happens. This change has made my game much, much more immersive. Planning long trips and dungeon expeditions feels more realistic. It also gives me more urgency to sit and play, knowing that my party is using resources and/or gold staying at inns.

#5 is so good. I start because of something I love, but get sidetracked by other things resulting in me not enjoying things

Some great points here! starting small is definitely the way to go. simple resolution mechanic (pick your preference) otherwise, getting comfortable with "letting go" can be tough. roll with the dice! allow the story to unfold. And I gained a lot of power at my solo table, when I realized "its my game to play", make choices!

So helpful. I’ve been on & off with solo roleplaying for a few years now. I just can’t get it to click for me so all tips get me closer to my future epiphany!

Good idea for a series, thanks.

I'm getting started on the Solo RPG concept. I'll be watching your series with great interest. 😊

These are great! I'm currently trying to get a solo session of Hunter: The Reckoning together and the first two tips have me thinking I'm going about some of it wrong. Looking forward to the interviews too, what a cool idea.

Oh awesome! Love tips videos!

Great tips and very timely as I'm looking to start a solo Warhammer Quest campaign, but with maybe less sudden random death!

Nice advices to keep in mind ! Really fun video and glad to found out that The Peril of Cymbaline Isle will be back ! I think you need at least one random generator book also to stimulate your imagination and give you a narrative hook! Thanks again for the video!

This really gave me some good ideas for how to start my solo Frontier Scum campaign. Definitely starting in the middle. As in the middle of a conflict in the middle of the town!

6:47 - Please, please continue on this topic! It has been my main motivation in moving away from board games, as I feel they are limiting my options. Again and again I observed myself getting board (err bored) way too quickly once I grasped the mechanics and saw those being repeated over and over again. It was the hopes of getting to experience something new, fresh and exciting and relive those experiences and connected emotions you had as a kid. Remember when you first got into contact with RPGs and that spark which ignited your passion for the hobby? I was constantly searching for a boardgame, that could make me reconnect to this excitement. Time and again I felt let down by board games not delivering on that initial promise. One of the reasons being, that I felt railroaded and discovered board games mainly being focused on rules - the same mechanics over and over again with maybe a slightly adjusted theme tagged onto it. Those mechanics didn't offer anything new and exciting to me. I was looking for a story to reignite that great passion I once had. It sadly never happened and I got more and more exhausted on chasing the latest hype in the board gaming industry in search of that epiphany. It slowly dawned upon me, that I was looking for a great captivating story. Rules and mechanics had become secondary to me. And a little further down that quest for the perfect board game I knew, that mechanics weren't the solution, but part of the problem. They hindered me in using my own imagination to its fullest potential and getting totally emotionally involved in the unfolding story. Because that's what it all boils down to for me personally: the emotional connection and investment - whether it is my connection to my character I play, the laughs in surprising ridiculous situations, goosebumps of fear and the sighs of relief when that tension finally resides. These moments within story arcs when coming up with a totally awesome description of a scene, that involves mutiple senses and pulls me in even further... Sorry to disappoint anyone still on that quest, but my personal experience is, that I finally accepted the fact, I am no longer waiting and holding my breath for a potential board game fulfilling that urge and hope. Instead, I'd rather get started TODAY with a creation of my own where I have the full freedom to direct my game into the direction I enjoy the most. I make my own game. And although it may initially fall short on my hopes and the initially mentioned promise, I believe it is in my own hands to carve out that great gem of a game which can become a masterpiece taylored to my personal tastes. With each session of solo role playing I play, I can tell, that the overall trajectory is taking me ever closer to that dream.

3 could be a big hurdle since we were told to not make flubs and if we cannot adapt to everything thrown at us we should just write a novel instead to make things easier. I find both silly in solo rpgs or solo play in general. Sadly i got a collection of stuff instead of starting small just in case i wanted to use it. Though i plan to start small at first and add on later if i wanted to.

Solo RPG Friday FTW, let’s go! 👍👏🥳

This is a really good video and the tips are all very spot on. Your discussion about how to maintain the momentum after the first session is something that I was thinking about earlier this year. It made me change the format of my solo games. I used to record the sessions on the iPad using Pages but once saved I would have to dig out the file to continue. I ended swapping to notepads and physically writing out the sessions. Now I had a couple of pads with adventures to hand and I find it a lot easier to pick one of them up, leaf through it and crack on with the next adventure. I don’t know if this will work for anyone else but it has helped me from running a session zero and going no further. I look forward to future videos in this series.

This was excellent! I'm ashamed to say, this is only the second video I have watched from this fine Channel. Needless to say, I'm subscribed now and I look forward to seeing more quality videos, excellent information and tips! Thanks for have clear, concise and helpful videos.

This is golden. Thank you, dungeon dive.

Fantastic advice. This is a promising start for the new series, exciting!

Thanks Daniel for the great tips! Solo rpg-ing is new to me. 12 years is my current favorite with Iron Helm a close second. Having a solo rpg video every week! Great! Can't ask for more!

Brilliant. It will be so interesting to hear you and Geekgamers together and the plans for this series are very exciting . I might have to increase my Patreon amount at this rate!

Looking forward to more content like this. Thank you

Top tier advice, good Sir.

Thanks , loved the reverse Monty Python Rpg clap back 6 things actually 5 things🤣. Tip 2 - Always start a presentation or speech with something that gets attention, follow with something known so they have time for everything to sink in and prepare for more to come, the. start ramping up to end on te big thing.

As always, great info, great vid, great everything, Keep up the good work Daniel.

Great idea for a series. I'd also like to see some stuff about DM-less co-op RPGs

"Start small" - that's so true. When I've learned you can play RPGs solo, I was right away shopping for all sorts of tables, oracles, suppliments, checking out new systems. Let's just say, it didn't go well. Now all I have in front of me is an "Ironsworn" book, and it's so much more focused and fun.

Great start to the series!

This is great advice. One of the best things that I've ever done for myself and solo roleplay is remember it is my game and no matter what the rules tell me it's my fun and if I don't like something I can change it and make it fun for myself. One thing I would like to see and I have not seen very many people discuss however is why you want to solo roleplay. Not a list of reasons people do it but more of a philosophical discussion on maybe why as a person you want to do it and tools to think about why you want to do it so you can find your own fun in that. It might also solve the how do I continue the sessions. Also there's nothing wrong with only playing one session or playing nothing but endless zero sessions if that's what you want.

This was awesome. I'm so glad this is going to be a weekly series! Thank you.

Today i played my first ttrpg solo session (and my first ttrpg session at all). I used pathfinder for it, since i was already familiar with the system (in theory). 1. Started with my character already settled in a new city, preparing to break into a home and kill a necromancer, he was hired to assassinate. Basically, right before the action. 2. Started small. The session I prepared featured two necromancers, couple of enemy types and one human ally. 3. Cheated a bit, ignoring the rule about mindless companions in pathfinder (they're speechless and can follow only short, direct orders). Sent a zombie to the front door with algorithm 1. Knock the door 2. Wait for it to open 3. Ask for food 4. Repeat step 3. I also used this same quest as a plot hook for the campaign (my character is a runaway from a necromantic cult, so I made those two part of his former "church" members.) Had A LOT of fun with it and then found this video, telling me, I did it right :D

Great ideas. I have been in and out of Solo for a year or so now myself and these tips are really good. I often myself falling out a series for various reasons. Thank you for the video

I'm 2 weeks late but I'll leave a tip. If you want to do a training arc or something slow like he was saying, just trying to get money. Just add conflict, increase the tension. Even a boring session of your character training to beat the BBEG can get more interesting if you show the consequences of 1: Characters that are not trained enough that get killled by the BBEG or yourself being defeated and forced to retreat after trying ot fight the BBEG and 2: While you're training show how the BBEG is harming the world and other characters and how your character has to struggle mentally to focus on the training and not just run and try to stop it. Your session could be about how to find a way to convince your character to stay and train instead of going out and trying to save the world....and getting killed because your PC isn't trained enough. Basically just focus on things that are fun and if you really want to do less exciting stuff like the example I gave "the training arc" then try to make it more fun by adding conflict and increasing the tension. Maybe your trainer doesn't really want to train you or one of your training mates hate you or an accident happens during training or there is a limit of a week to get you trainned before the BBEG attacks or you don't have the materials that you need to train. Idk try to spice things up.

Awesome - looking forward to future episodes - sounds like you've got some interesting stuff coming up!

Great video and awesome tips for new and old players. Keep up all the great work

Good advice, Daniel. Thanks. Just yesterday I discovered Gray Army Gaming's video, Solo RPG with Magic the Gathering. It's a fascinating and brilliantly creative use of incorporating surplus MTG cards to solo RPG narratives, challenges, etc. Worth checking out if one has MTG cards.

Great advice! Thanks for the video!

Useful and interesting info. I would love to see some info for people using solo to get started in roleplaying. A lot of the videos and tools I've found seem better suited for experienced role players who want to go solo, whereas I have no real roleplaying experience and am finding it all a bit daunting.

Having recently got into Call of Cathulu it seems an ideal system and theme for a solo mission. A crime has been committed its up to you to find the culprits. I think also a more focused route is better than say a sandbox.

"Don't worry about downtime" Pathfinder Ultimate Campaign guide has ways to handle down time quickly Warhammer Fantasy (not sure which version I have but think it's a slightly older one not the newest) has a great way to handle it, but this system assumes you're a normal person like a cook or such that just happens to adventure from time to time Conan Exiles from Modiphius I think it was has a way to handle down time where basically ALL your money just goes poof from celebrating and such and you start the next adventure with same gear and just a little extra money to buy resources needed Ultimately I think 1 thing to help with "down time" is assume your character probably celebrated away much of their money and start with not much for the next adventure. Helps keep your character from becoming unreasonably rich even though there was weeks, months or maybe even years between quests.

Keep it up, brother; good work

I got enticed to play Solo RPGs because of Me, Myself, and Die. Recently I rolled to kickstart my imagination for a campaign and got Oppose Relationship. I interpreted this to mean my character ran away from his wedding. That was enough to kick off a whole campaign for me.

Me encantan tus videos, son una fuente de inspiración para mi, me ayudan a planear mis aventuras de mejor manera, sigue así, saludos desde México

So excited for this series! Awesome tips!

Great video. Thank you for these tips!

An auspicious start to the series. Great energy in the video and in the comments -- looking forward to seeing Solo RPG Fridays develop! (Also need to develop the theming for some kind of a t-shirt here...)

Thank you for the awesome video! Very, very helpful! 🎉

Great 1st episode. Good guidelines too. The interviews also sound interesting. Also I cheated a lot when reading fighting fantasy books. :-D Never cheated in a face to face DnD game as a player though. That's just wrong. Look forward to the next one.

great info - thank you!

Very good tips Thank you

Such a good channel.

I'm very thankful for an awesome game system I love in D100 Dungeon. But I even got a little blocked up after adding too much material with my characters as well. Now I have quite a few D100 Dungeon charecters I've played.

Excellent video!

Thank you , Congats !

I make a entire universe, with tons of planets. I ended rolling only in 3 hexes of one little moon. xD. Start smal !!

Idk if you’ve ever looked into dungeon crawl classics but I think you would be into the aesthetic and art, also it’s only one book that you can get for like 20 bucks, running it solo would take some work though

the eagles 🤣

Good vid

Would you consider Folklore the affliction a solo RPG,? Or more a board game?

Plz i need like the most imersive and most deep of all solo rpgs i can play i need smth good and deep . Wich one should i take?

I’m looking to start playing solo rpg’s I’ve never done any rpgs so any recommendations what books to start with or where to even get some? thanks

This was a great video! Will Solo RPG Fridays be continuing in 2024?

With downtime, what about upkeep costs? If you're living on the lamb, do you reduce your rations per day and/or consider the ammo that may be expended to hunt?

Basic question: I dont think I understand the difference between a RPG and regular Dungeon Crawler... I obviously understand the difference between D&D style games (with a DM and etc) and a board game... but many dungeon crawler mini's games get called RPG and not others... Why?

What I learned from Daniel: CHEAT! With that in mind, I'm now off to do my taxes. LOL

When is the Geek Gamer interview? Or did I miss it?

Is the thumb nail made by an AI artist?

One thing I dont get about solo Rpg and not knowing kind of puts me off. Do you talk to yourself while you play or are you just silent and it all happens in your head? All the KZfaq videos of solo Rpg dont explain this and the playthroughs dont seem pertinent as the player is constantly talking the viewer through their process, giving voice to NPCs, describing locations etc. surely you dont do that when youre on your own.