Alyss Hayes banner

Alyss Hayes

she/they

5.0

(3)

Timezone

America/new York

Language

English

Identity

LGBTQ+
Neurodivergent
Women/Femme Identifying
Game Designer

About Alyss Hayes

Hi everyone, My name is Alyss I am 29 years old. I am a Dungeon Master who has played and ran tabletops for about 20 years. My first system was Advanced Dungeon and Dragons 2e when I was 6 years old, after which I became enamored by the ideas of tabletops. Since then I have ran over 8 different systems, and have cultivated a environment that welcomes those of all skill levels and safety. I tend to favor player freedom and sandbox like games, where the players get to write their story, and affect the world around them.

At a glance

2 years on StartPlaying

Highly rated for: Storytelling, Creativity, Knows the Rules

Featured Prompts

My favorite system of all Time is

Call of Cthulu

The three words my players would use to describe me are...

Fair, welcoming, patient

When I'm not running games I'm...

Writing another world, cooking, and hanging out with friends

How Alyss Hayes runs games

I enjoy running a lot of roleplay, and a lot of combat. I tend to favor player freedom and sandbox campaigns within the confines of the rules set forth by the editions. Most combats may seem brutal at first glance are often puzzle combats. Everything has a solution but it is up to the players to find it.

Featured Prompts

I deal with rules issues by...

I deal with rules issues by comprising at the table so it doesn't slow down the game, and then researching it after session.

My games focus on...

Role-playing with player driven choices. Often times I will set the scene and let my players decide what happens, each choice impacting the current narrative.

Rules are...

I am of the belief that Rules are suggestions. Often times I am willing to bend a rule if it seems cool or will impact the scene more.

Alyss Hayes's ideal table

My table style is relaxed. We all play tabletop games for different reasons, but most come to escape our current world. So in spirit of that, I tend to have a more relaxing table. If there is any issues I tend to deal with them quickly. Players who fit at my table is really anyone.

Featured Prompts

If you're into ___, you're going to love my table

Dimensions 20, Harry potter, Brandon Sanderson novels.

I think metagaming...

Can ruin a table, in my eyes there are two versions of meta gaming: implied and intentional. Implied is character knowledge that would be common knowledge in the world (e.g. werewolves are weak to silver) and intentional is where you actively seek information to tell the table ("stat block says...")

I think min/maxing...

Is okay in the right context. Unfortunately D&D 5e doesn't allow for build experimenting really well. While D&D 3.5 was known for it. However, ultimately it is the Players character it is up to them how they build them, just as long as they don't hurt the table.

Alyss Hayes's Preferences

Game Mechanics

Game style

Roleplay Heavy

Dungeon Crawl

Rule of Cool (RoC)

Combat Lite

Hexcrawl / Exploration