The Lazy GM's Toolbox in Rise of the Lazy Gamemaster

by Mike on 27 July 2026

The Rise of the Lazy Gamemaster Kickstarter marches on thanks to all of you who supported the project, shared it with your favorite GMs, and posted it on your favorite online haunts!

If you haven't, please visit the project, check out the free preview, and pass along the following link:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/slyflourish/rise-of-the-lazy-game-master?ref=bm1dia

In previous articles we've talked about the following big focuses of the book:

In a future article I'll cover Adventure Scenarios and other stuff.

Today we're going to talk about the Lazy GM's Toolkit.

Your Personal Toolbox of Proven GM Tips

The Lazy GM's Toolkit is a huge chapter in Rise of the Lazy Gamemaster with over sixty tips, tricks, and tools I've gathered over the past eighteen years writing for Sly Flourish and my previous books. Some GM tools are little tricks you can keep in your mind. Others are actual physical tools to help you run games.

Each tool is described in a succinct paragraph that goes right into how the tool works and what value it brings to your game.

The 36 page preview includes a full list of all 60 (there's actually 61 now — I added one after the preview went live) so you can see what they all are. I thought I'd talk about a few examples and why they work well in the book.

Example Lazy GM Tools

Alarms and Timers. Not to be confused with "clocks" — alarms and timers are actually physical alarms and timers to help you keep track of the timing and pacing of your game. It's easy to lose track of time when you're in the flow of the game. Setting physical timers helps you ensure you're getting done what you want to get done and keeps you on track to run your game in the time you have.

Book Tabs. I think many GMs fail to see the value in using physical books. Small adhesive tabs are a great tool to help us get more value out of our physical books. Even if you play online, having a reference book on hand with good tabs to your most-used sections can be faster than trying to dork around with a half-ass online search tool.

Describing Killing Blows. A fantastic way to add some excitement to our games, "describe your killing blow" gets your players into the fiction of the game — breaking out of the mechanics of our games and into the world we all share.

Dice Averages. Who really wants to roll 24d6 for a dragon breath? Who has that kind of time? Likewise, what if you find yourself with a static damage number but want to convert it to its dice equivalent? This table in Rise of the Lazy Gamemaster helps you convert any static number to any dice equivalent and vice versa.

Domain List. When running in a homebrew campaign setting or in a published campaign setting that doesn't quite fill out the details of the world's pantheon as much as you like, we have a generic set of twenty theological domains — both good and evil — to help you fill in the world. A solid list of domains helps you flavor NPCs, quests, locations, monuments, and items.

Escalation Die. The escalation die is a tool from 13th Age that works just as well in most d20 games. On the second round of combat, you put out a D6 on the 1 and add +1 to attacks (or damage or both). At the beginning of the next round, you move the D6 to the next highest number. This incremental bonus speeds up play and adds interesting tension. You can give the bonus to just characters or both characters and monsters. You can also let the die trigger other interesting effects in the battle similar to a clock (another tool in the toolbox).

Flashbacks. From Blades in the Dark, flashbacks give players the opportunity, sometimes at a cost, to "flash back" to an earlier scene that might not have happened yet during the game. Perhaps they had bribed the guards or left a useful tool in just the right place. You might call for a check to see if they succeed or might use up some other form of in-game currency to determine if the flashback succeeds.

Handouts. Handouts are a high-value activity that helps draw your players into the game, helps GMs focus on what's important, and brings a fun tactile feature to a game that otherwise occurs in dialog. The tool description discusses some fast and effective ways to make great handouts.

Initiative Systems. Lots of different systems exist for managing initiative. Some methods are particular to one type of game but others can be used in several different RPG systems. This tool description talks about some of the fastest and easiest ways to manage turns in and out of combat.

Mashing Up Random Encounters. One of my favorite tricks for getting more out of random encounter tables is to mix them up — either with different tables or by rolling twice and mashing up the results. This tool description digs into this concept.

Player Roles. Some new and old games alike include roles not just for the characters in our games but for our players as well. This section describes roles like the cartographer, scribe, and the caller who helps coordinate the rest of the players around the decisions they want to make.

Build Your Own Personal Toolbox

The above tools are just a sample of the tools you'll find in the lazy GM's toolbox in Rise of the Lazy Gamemaster. With them, you can pick and choose the tools that fit best into your own personal toolbox, adding them alongside some of your own favorite tricks for running your own games.

Michelle and I really hope you'll check out Rise of the Lazy Gamemaster. We're really excited to bring it into your hands and help GMs all over the world run great games for their friends. Check out the Kickstarter here and please share it with your friends!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/slyflourish/rise-of-the-lazy-game-master?ref=bm1dia

More Sly Flourish Stuff

Each week I record an episode of the Lazy RPG Talk Show (also available as a podcast) in which I talk about all things in tabletop RPGs.

Last Week's Lazy RPG Talk Show Topics

Here are last week's topics with time stamped links to the YouTube video.

Patreon Questions and Answers

Also on the Talk Show, I answer questions from Sly Flourish Patrons. Here are last week's questions and answers.

Components of a Campaign Frame

Talk Show Links

Here are links to the sites I referenced during the talk show.

Last week I also posted a couple of YouTube videos on Hunting Lashmaraq – Dragon Empire Prep Session 73 and On Puzzles.

RPG Tips

Each week I think about what I learned in my last RPG session and write them up as RPG tips. Here are this week's tips:

Mix simple and straightforward combat encounters with complex encounters with alternate goals.
Use round-based countdown timers to ratchet up the tension in big encounters.
Use several terrain features to add depth to big combat encounters.
Run some battles in big areas where it takes effort to get from one side to another.
Protect your bosses.
Give each monster an interesting mechanical effect beyond just damage.
Seek the tools and info you need to improvise monsters and encounters to go where the story takes you.

Share this article using this link: https://slyflourish.com/lazy_gm_toolbox_in_rise.html

Subscribe to Sly Flourish

Subscribe to the weekly Sly Flourish newsletter and receive a free adventure generator PDF!

Get More from Sly Flourish

Sly Flourish's Books

Have a question or want to contact me? Check out Sly Flourish's Frequently Asked Questions.

This work is released under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International license. It allows reusers to distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon the material in any medium or format, for noncommercial purposes only by including the following statement in the new work:

This work includes material taken from SlyFlourish.com by Michael E. Shea available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International license.

This site may use affiliate links to Amazon and DriveThruRPG. Thanks for your support!