Does anyone have any opinions on web based organizational tools? I have subscriptions to World Anvil and WorldSmith.ai. I purchased Amsel Suite, Quest portal, Dungeon Alchemist, and Arkenforge. Any tips on how you've used these.

Is anyone a professional/paid DM? I'm hoping to write off all my D&D/TTRPG expenses and to do so I have to run enough paid games so that I can tell the IRS I'm serious about making money off this endeavor. I'd love to pick your brains about how you do it.

Proactive roleplaying (PR) advocates that PC goals should drive the story. Collaborative Campaign Design (CCD) posits that story is driven mostly by PC internal struggles being overcome by confronting player obstacles and that encounters should be designed with this in mind. (That is my very high level summation of that part of the book - let me know if I got that wrong). With that in mind, is there every a tension between the two objectives? It seems like a player could set goals that don't really do anything to overcome their PC struggles. Is the job of the game master then to design encounters that will both help the players meet their goals while at the same time helping them resolve their struggles? Or am I just completely over thinking this?

Have any of you tried to use these principles in a West Marches campaign? Would it change how you apply these principles? I'm not sure if it would but I'd be interested to hear if anyone has tried.

I am taking Tristan's advice and writing an introductory post. My name is Mark and last year I got back into D&D after a 35 year hiatus. I began playing at about 8 years old with the BECMI Red Box that is familiar to everyone who was playing at that time. I began playing 2E before life started getting in the way. Last year I was at a cross roads (literally and metaphorically) and happened to be walking past a gaming story and just for nostalgia's sake I popped in. I saw all the D&D books and remembered the great times I had as a kid. I bought the 2014 core books and I was hooked! I played several one shots, found my group and have been playing regularly ever since. My group and I are about to finish our first long term campaign, based on Descent into Avernus, after a little over a year and 35 sessions. I've been having a blast playing a Dragonborn Oath of Vengeance Paladin of Tyr who had the stereotypical tragic backstory of betrayal, corruption and a dead father figure. I also developed an absolute obsession with game books and materials..... I mean seriously its probably something I need professional help for. With my game ending, I really want to take on the DM role and tell me own story. After reading the two handbooks I've changed how I want to do this. I'm creating a world for my players to play in and I really want them to push that world to its limits. I know the things that are going to happen on a mega scale, and my players are free to choose what they do on a micro level. In fact some of them are already telling me what their characters goals are, and I couldn't be more excited about it. In fact the more they have told me about what they want, the more I have been able to adjust my game world to incorporate their goals in ways that take my original ideas and expand them in new and exciting ways. For example one of my players wants to play a warlock whose patron is a talking rock. The character is a lonely child who started talking to a rock until eventually the rock started talking back and gave her magical powers. The rock, who she calls Lionel, told her to walk. That is all the information she gave me. What she didn't know is that in this world the weave has fractured into two oppose beings. With her idea, I decided that the split wasn't clean and fragments of the weave permeated the world. And when the PC talked to the rock, a fragment of the weave found a place it could inhabit and could use the PC to accomplish its own ends. The weave fragment wants only to be reunited with the weave. It told her to walk so it could find its way back to the weave. I love this idea. And the great thing is all of my players have given me ideas just by telling me what they want for their characters. I'm looking forward to seeing where our story will take us.