The pages below cover the craft of running campaigns: how to plan, prep, run sessions, and build the people and places that fill them. They are written system-agnostic. The content on this hub page — negotiation, pairings, the fun rule — is Soltherra-specific.
The
You govern the framework, not the outcome. The dice handle outcomes. Your role is to decide which pairings are valid, keep the narrative coherent, and make sure everyone at the table is having a good time.
Here is how it works at the table:
This should take a few seconds. Not a debate. Not a parliamentary procedure. Most of the time the right pairing is obvious and nobody needs to discuss it. The interesting cases are the unusual ones.
Say yes when the player’s description justifies the pairing, even when it’s unusual. The question is not “is this the most logical pairing?” but “does the fiction support this?” And as the fiction continues, will the pairing continue to work?
Situation: A swordsman faces an opponent in single combat.
Description: “I flourish my blade with deliberate grace — each movement designed to intimidate and distract. My untrained opponent hesitates, not because the sword is fast, but because I am beautiful and terrifying at the same time.”
Why it works: The player described how
Situation: A diplomat has been at the negotiating table with hostile opposition. Six hours and counting.
Description: “I don’t argue back. I hold my position — calmly, patiently — until the other side runs out of energy.”
Why it works: Not the usual Presence + Persuasion, but the approach is clearly about endurance and willpower, not personality. The description makes
Situation: A character fights a creature they have studied extensively.
Description: “I know where the joints don’t articulate and where the skin is thin. My punch isn’t powerful — it’s precise.”
Why it works: The player turned a fistfight into an anatomy lesson.
Situation: A mage needs to move through a guarded corridor undetected.
Description: “I dampen the sound around my feet with a whisper of magic, moving through a silent bubble of my own creation.”
Why it works: Creative, narratively justified, and uses an unconventional Gift in a way that makes the character feel unique.
Situation: A group needs to scale a cliff face. The leader is not the best climber.
Description: “I shout encouragement, direct handholds, keep morale up. I’m getting the group to the top by deluding myself that we can do it!;
Why it works: The context changes what the roll is about. Even though its not a climbing roll, the character somehow manages to even motivate himself.
Say no when the pairing has no narrative justification — when the player is picking their highest Gift to maximize dice without describing how it applies. The description matters, not the combination.
The pitch: “I want to use Appeal to lift this boulder.”
Why it fails: Appeal is about being compelling to perceive. A boulder does not care how you look. No fiction connects Appeal to the physical act of lifting. This is number-chasing.
The pitch: “I use
Why it fails: The character is just climbing with their hands. Channeling is not involved in any described way. The Gift must shape the approach. (Note: describing the use of magic to lighten their body or grip the stone with force energy would make this a yes. The description matters.)
The pitch: “I’m lifting it smart, not hard.”
Why it fails: Too vague. “Lifting smart” is not a description — it’s a justification wrapped around a high stat. Describing the use of leverage, finding the right grip point, or improvising a fulcrum might work. But the player has to actually describe it.
Sometimes a pairing does not make rigorous sense but would create an extraordinary, absurd, or memorable moment. That is reason enough to allow it.
A scrawny bard wants to use Presence + Brawl to fight with such theatrical flair that his enemy cannot predict his attack. Mechanically questionable. Potential hilarious. Let it happen. The table will remember that fight.
The purpose of Soltherra is to create stories worth retelling. Creative pairings that make the whole table laugh or gasp mean the system has done its job. Rigid logic serves the game most of the time. Fun trumps rigid logic some of the time. Your judgment is knowing which is which.
As the story progress, there might be situations that allows you to decide what the players roll. If the situation calls for it, you name both the Gift and the Skill.
A locked door stands between the party and their objective. You know something they don't, and you want to give them a hint that something may be hiding on the other side. You call for a Wits + Alertness to see if they sense the ambush.
You control which Gift + Skill pairings are valid at any given moment. A pairing that works in one context does not automatically work in another. The fiction moves, and the valid pairings move with it.
This is not about restricting players. It is about the world making sense. A charm offensive works against someone who can be charmed. Once the situation changes, the pairing changes with it.
Round one: Fiera faces a distracted NPC in single combat. She lets the tip of her iron rod drop — a deliberate tell, cold and unhurried, that reads as fatigue or poor form. The NPC reads it as an opening. You allow Appeal + Melee. The feint works because the NPC is watching her posture, not her eyes.
Round two: The NPC recovers. He squares his stance, stops reading her body, and starts reading her weapon. Fiera wants to use the same tell again. You tell her the window has closed — he adjusted. The fight is now about steel and positioning. Body + Melee or find a new angle.
The GM decides when the narrative shifts. This is not a punishment for using a creative pairing — it is the world responding. The NPC adapted. The environment changed. The window closed. Creative players will find a new window. That is the game working as intended.
Think of it as “yes, when it makes sense” rather than “no.” The pairing was valid. Then the scene moved. Now a different pairing is valid. Keep listening to the fiction.
Fame is one of the few mechanics that the GM controls directly during play. Players spend XP on it at character creation, but after that, fame changes when you say it does — and it costs the player nothing.
When a player spends points on Fame, ask them what the fame is for. “You have Fame 3 — what are you known for?” The answer shapes how NPCs react and what kind of attention the character attracts. Fame without a reason is just a number. Fame with a story behind it is a tool you can use in every session.
Award fame points when a character does something that the world would notice. This is free — no XP cost, no negotiation. The character did something visible, and the world responded by paying attention.
Gerald pulls the magistrate’s daughter from a burning building in full view of a market crowd. Next session, strangers recognize him. You award a fame point. Gerald did not ask for it. The crowd made the decision for him.
Tilly’s wanted posters appear across two districts after a botched heist. You award a fame point. It is not the kind of fame Tilly wanted, but fame does not care about preference. The posters are up. People are looking.
Fame changes are narrative beats, not transactions. Announce them at the moment they make sense — when the crowd cheers, when the posters go up, when the bard starts singing about what happened last Tuesday. The player should feel the world shifting around their character, not receive a line item on a ledger.
You control the world. You do not control the characters in it. That line is absolute.
You create settings, introduce NPCs, present situations, and describe consequences. The players decide how their characters respond. Always. Even when the response is strategically terrible, emotionally irrational, or certain to make things worse.
You can say: “The corridor is on fire. The heat is unbearable. The exit is behind you.”
You cannot say: “Your character turns and runs.”
The player might say: “I walk through the fire.”
That is their call. You describe what happens to someone who walks through fire. They chose it.
Present consequences. Present temptations. Present pressure. A powerful NPC offers a deal that is clearly a trap but solves the immediate crisis. A beloved ally asks the character to do something that conflicts with their values. The building is collapsing and there is only time to save one person.
These are all your tools. The one tool you do not have is the player’s choice. A character can stand and fight when running is smarter. A character can refuse a deal when accepting is safer. A character can walk into the fire. Your job is to make the choice meaningful, not to make it for them.
Every decision the players make lands somewhere. Your job is to figure out where and let them see it later.
Consequences are not punishments. They are the world continuing to exist after the players acted on it. A punishment is the GM retaliating. A consequence is the GM remembering.
Session three: Tilly steals a purse of coins from a food cart vendor in the Trades Ward. Quick hands, clean getaway. The table moves on.
Session five: The party passes the Southgate Orphanage. A familiar face sits outside — the food cart vendor, thinner than before, asking strangers for coin. The cart is gone.
You did not punish Tilly. You did not lecture. You showed the party a world that kept turning after they left the scene. What happens next is their choice.
Track what the players do. Write it down — a line or two per session is enough. Not every action needs a ripple, but the ones that matter should echo. The merchant they helped remembers. The guard they humiliated remembers. The district they saved throws a festival. The district they ignored does not.
The best campaigns feel like the world has a memory. Not because you scripted every outcome, but because you asked a simple question after each session: “What would logically happen next because of what the players did?”
The Player Guide tells players that their descriptions drive the game. This is the other half of that promise. Their descriptions matter because you make the world respond to them.
© Soltherra RPG System