Smiley Emoticon by Pixabay.com/3dman_eu, color-shift & background by Mike

I know a number of former GMs who gave up the job. Some of them reverted to being players, some of them occasionally still dabble in the big chair, and some were so traumatized by the experience that they gave up RPGs entirely.

There are always three parts to the equation that dictates a GM’s longevity.

The first is the amount of work required and the GM’s capacity for completing that work in a timely fashion while maintaining some sort of personal life beyond RPGs. No GM should ever be put in a position where they have to choose between family and an activity with friends, and if one is, most of the time you can expect the activity with friends to be the loser. And, even if things never get that far, stress resulting from overwork can force the GM to abandon his role, anyway.

The second is the degree of skill with which the GM executes the various tasks, both in-game and prep, that comprise that game function, and his ability to recognize and acknowledge that skill. A GM who feels, rightly or wrongly, inadequate to the demands placed upon him by the big chair, will often take any excuse to abdicate his role, if necessary by shutting down the campaign and beginning a new one with a different concept, game system, and possibly even genre. This outcome is still more likely if the GM is, in fact, inadequate in the estimation of the players concerned; their lack of support can discourage the GM before experience gives him the chance to rise to the standard demanded. Of course, the standards applied by the players may be unrealistic, or the GM might even be genuinely swamped by the demands being placed on him. It can be hard to judge. And, of course, the still more-likely prospect may be that they are somewhere in between these extremes.

My co-GM’s experience in the early days of the Pulp Campaign is relevant. Although extremely knowledgeable in a number of fields – in fact, of us all, probably the most knowledgeable in those fields, including genre knowledge – his ability to execute a campaign was not up to the same standard.

This had previously killed off a Traveler campaign when the players wanted more information about the different factions in a civil war before committing themselves instead of diving in up to their necks, and were insistent on peaceful trading in the meantime. He could not find a way to engage us in adventures; his entire campaign plan was predicated upon us choosing a side in the war and actively engaging in the military campaign.

After a couple of okay-but-not-brilliant adventures, frustrations were beginning to mount in the Pulp Campaign. In particular, his plan to backstop the players and fill any gaps in their capabilities with ultra-capable NPCs, a lack of expertise in the game system that showed no signs of improving and which led him to continually over- or under-estimate how effective his NPCs would be, and the sheer number of players (9 or 10) – which resulted in none of them receiving an adequate share of the spotlight – had the campaign on the rocks.

All the players acknowledge that they were at the point of pulling the plug. Some were intending to give it one last chance to improve, others were already prepared to pull the pin.

That was when I stepped into a co-GMing role. I had virtually zero genre knowledge, but knew how to string plotlines together into bigger pictures, knew the game system, and how to solve most GMing problems. I was able to put together a coherent concept for the campaign that emphasized the collective power of the PCs and minimized the individual capabilities of the NPCs, was able to put some depth into the plotlines and incorporate them into a more sweeping plotline, and able to provide the expertise needed to challenge the PCs without overwhelming them. What’s more, I was able to expand the adventures to encompass the palette of capabilities of all the characters. As some players left the campaign because they weren’t in love with the genre, we were better able to focus these efforts on those who remained, and so ended up with a stable line-up.

We’re currently running through the 31st adventure since we teamed up, and working diligently on the 32nd, which we expect to begin early next year. We’re also into our 12th year of co-GMing the campaign, so it’s gone from a near-death experience to extreme longevity!

The third critical factor is the amount of fun that the GM extracts from the process. What floats their boat, ticks their boxes, and keeps them happy to invest the kind of effort that’s required to create a campaign to modern standards?

That’s the subject for today’s article.

Itches to scratch – Prep

There are two parts to GMing – prep and play – and they are about as different as chalk and vulcanized rubber. Prep is the 90% that players rarely see; but for some GMs it is the reason they get up in the morning and think gaming.

RPG Prep is creating plots and situations; creating characters; creating locations; contingency planning; and may also involve creating maps, props, flavor text, research, psychology, strategy, and big-picture conceptualizing.

Inevitably, there will be parts of this cocktail that appeal more than others, and parts that any given GM does better than others, and parts that they perform more efficiently than others, and the likelihood that any of these attributes coincide is vanishingly small, but happens more often than some might think.

That’s because the things that we’re good at tend to be performed better and/or more efficiently, both because we’re more inclined to devote our full attention to them, and because our skill in performing those tasks is part of the reason why we enjoy them. It can convey a sense of being in control of an otherwise uncontrolled melee of competing demands for our attention.

When Practical Solutions fall short

Equally, there will be some approaches to the craft of GMing that work for a particular GM, and some that fail miserably, no matter how objectively practical the approach might be. A good example is Johnn Four’s “5 room” systems – while I can appreciate the practicality, having tried the approach a couple of times, I found that for me, they sucked all the fun and coherence from my prep, turning it into something that had to be done rather than something that could be enjoyed for its own sake. It felt like the process was in control, not me.

Waning enthusiasm for game prep is a sure sign that your prep system isn’t scratching your personal prep “Itch”.

Johnn has also tried my techniques, and found that while he started strongly while utilizing them, he was unable to sustain coherence and output in the medium-to-long term; his campaigns escaped his control, and his enthusiasm for them waned in proportion. He needed a more loosely-structured approach that nevertheless suborned everything into a consistent pattern – the “5 room” system that he now espouses.

Once again, waning enthusiasm is the key indicator.

Every GM is different, and every GM needs to find their own solutions. That creates good blog content, because the only certainty is that your solutions might fit others. I can share my techniques and Johnn can share his, and we’re both right – and might both be wrong when it comes to the needs of “GM Johnny”.

Moreover, exposure to multiple techniques means that you can cherry pick what you need to get you past a particular creative “hump” or problem. You learn something even if the overall experience is negative and your response is, “I’m never doing it that way again!”

The conflict between Need and Desire

My process, in a nutshell, is to create a to-do list and then prioritize the items on it. Some may generate new entries or alter existing ones, so the list is always growing and evolving.

I divide the list into “must’s” and “desirables”, estimate how long the must’s will require (minimum) to complete to a minimum acceptable standard, and make sure that I allocate at least that much time to them. That automatically adds “Polish [X]” to the list of “desirables”.

Of course, I’ve added refinements and complications that suit me to that process, but that’s what the essentials boil down to – making sure to do the essentials to the minimum acceptable standard and then spreading what free time remains on the remainder, selected by value to the adventure and how much that process scratches my personal itches.

That means that some parts of the GM’s task are forever being neglected by my prep, but I know I can live with that because if I couldn’t, it would be on the “must do” list. For example, having some idea of what a villain can do with his powers is a “must” for my superhero campaign, actually translating that into game mechanics is close to the bottom priority of the “desirables” list, more often not done than complete. I trust myself to be able to improv a translation of concept into game mechanics during play, and find I get more “value” (both in polish and in fun) from polishing the abstract concepts.

I’ve described my planning process and some other techniques in previous articles, most notably

There are a couple of problems with this technique.

  1. All your “itches” might end up in the “desirables” column.
  2. Itches that make the “musts” tend to be front-loaded into the start of game prep.
  3. You can easily overindulge because you enjoy what you’re doing.
    1. It all feels like work

    If all the parts of game prep that you enjoy end up on the desirables list, your game prep is a list of chores that have to be finished before you can go and play – if you get any “play” time at all.

    Every now and then, you can cope with this, but it’s not sustainable, even if it is the “responsible” approach.

    Now, I’m not smart enough to solve the problem of work-life balance to universal satisfaction, and this is just another reflection of that social issue. But I have a solution to this particular problem – distributing the “musts” throughout the available prep time, and – in the process – leaving a little room for indulgence in the daily or weekly schedule.

    For example, if you have a total of 10 hours a week to devote to game prep, and the “must do” list for the current adventure you are working on requires 6 of those hours, that leaves 4 hours for fun. You can either spend all six of those hours up-front, making sure that the “musts” get done, or you can decide that for every two hours spent on “musts”, you will spend one hour of the available prep time on a “desirable” that scratches your personal itch. That uses up half the time allocated to ‘desirables’ before the ‘musts’ are complete, technically violating the principles of the prep structuring process, but it’s a lot more sustainable over the long term.

    The real problem, which I can only partially solve through efficiencies like “Partial NPCs”, still arises when there isn’t even enough time to complete the “musts”. But that’s beyond the scope of this article.

    2. That’s the fun part over with

    A similar problem arises because of the natural human tendency to prioritize the tasks that we enjoy most, when all other factors are identical. If you apply that tendency to the list of “musts”, it’s easy to see that you will do as many of the fun parts first as you can – and then find the rest of your game prep to be a chore.

    The solution, once again, is to deliberately distribute the fun and the work – and, in fact, to prioritize the “work” over the “fun”, as that provides an incentive to get the “work” done.

    That’s not always possible, because of the principle of “dependence,” which I haven’t mentioned so far. Simply put, it means that some tasks depend on the output of other tasks, and so can’t be carried out until the dependent tasks are complete. The prioritization process is vastly complicated than the elegant model described by the earlier synopsis because of this factor.

    There are only two ways of approaching this problem – either you do all the dependents first, regardless of the prioritization sequence with “fun” as an incorporated factor (the top-down approach) or you create some jigsaw pieces without knowing whether or not they will fit (a bottom-up approach).

    The choice for me is a simple one – if I have ample time in hand (“Musts” consuming 50% of the available prep time, or less), I’ll go with the bottom-down approach because there’s time to completely redo a jigsaw piece that can’t be hammered and filed to fit. If time is tight, the more serious strict dependence must be followed.

    But here’s a fun fact that shows the underlying complexity of the whole situation: with a little discipline, the more you indulge the “fun when it’s scheduled” bottom-up approach, the easier it becomes to do so. The solution is to save and index discarded jigsaw pieces.

    Let’s say you have an idea for an interesting location. Normally, you shouldn’t spend time on it until you finish outlining the plot and know whether or not it’s going to be needed, but if you have the scope for some self-indulgence, if it turns out not to fit the plotline, you can save it for an occasion when it does match your needs.

    The more you indulge in the bottom-up approach, the more leftover puzzle pieces you stockpile against future needs, so the smaller the risk entailed in future indulgence. Of course, the more such puzzle pieces that you stockpile, the more dependent you are on your indexing process to quickly find what you are looking for.

    3. The Danger Of Overindulgence

    Self-indulgence at any time leads to the potential for overindulgence. In this case, that usually takes the form of spending more time on a list item than the minimum needed to produce something of playable standard – simply because you are enjoying working on what you creating at the time.

    This is actually both a manifestation of, and a cause of, “Can’t see the forest for the trees” syndrome, where you loose perspective on the bigger picture and begin to obsess about the details of one part of that bigger picture.

    You can actually reach the point of counter-productivity – the more details you load into a list item beyond the necessary, the greater the danger of incongruity and incompatibility between the details and that bigger picture.

    The self-discipline required to avoid overindulgence is the price you pay for permitting distributed ‘fun’ prep. Everyone will have their own line that they should not cross, and it won’t be a fixed thing for any given individual over time, either. To guard against over-indulgence, the best solution is to end each prep session with a review of how what you have done fits into the whole. You will soon recognize when you have over-indulged – and when such indulgence begins to threaten your capacity to complete the other items on your “must” list.

    Personally, I punish myself for any over-indulgence by insisting that the extra time spent eats into the time reserved for other social activities. I might have to forego watching a TV series that I enjoy, or stay home and work instead of going out, or getting up early, or whatever. It’s important that it be an activity that I would enjoy so that it’s an actual punishment.

Itches to scratch – Play

For some people, prep contains the only parts of GMing that they actually enjoy; running an actual game is the price they pay for the stimulation needed to trigger prep. Some of these people spend all their time designing adventures and campaigns and never actually playing them!

Other people go so strongly in the other direction that they would (and do) eschew prep almost completely, relying on their capacity to improv. (While I can do that, I find it too stressful; but it’s better than not GMing at all).

Most people fall somewhere in between these two extremes. And that means that there are some parts of sitting behind the GM screen that they enjoy and some that they don’t, or don’t enjoy as much. Interpreting rules and dynamic rule creation, depicting multiple characters in a session, communicating persona or plot, being the center of attention or the ringmaster – these are all aspects of being a GM that may constitute an “itch” that the process of GMing scratches.

Don’t ever let anyone tell you that the amount that you relish what you may be doing has no impact on your performance. There are NPCs that I’ve played that were strictly mechanical, by-the-numbers, resulting in an at-best adequate performance, and others that were so joyous to depict that I threw myself into the part, chewing the scenery most entertainingly. Players notice the difference. It can even change from week to week – this week, a smarmy official might be the big winner, next week a crazed scientist or mage.

Isolating and analyzing different activities comes far more naturally when prepping for a game session than it does when actually running a game session. That’s because such analysis and it’s documentation represents additional tasks at exactly the time when we’re already maxed out.

The only acceptable methodology is to review your memories of the events of the game session, perhaps aided with a prompt or reminder of some kind, such as a recording of play or log of events, both in- and out-of-game. Although not as visceral and in-the-moment accurate, this can at least provide the basis for some generalized appraisal – and more detailed analysis can be misleading, anyway – see, for example my comments on relishing playing particular NPCs a few paragraphs ago. If one of those showed up on a given day, “roleplaying NPCs” might get quite a high score, whereas on a day when none of them front up, “roleplaying NPCs” might get quite a low score. Only when that pattern is correctly identified can you think about functional strategies for increasing your enjoyment of your time behind the GM screen.

With a reasonable understanding, however, you can start adapting your GMing style to scratch your in-game “itches” more frequently and mitigate or change the elements you don’t enjoy as much.

Vicarious Engagement

One source of pleasure behind the GM screen that is often overlooked, and which deserves special mention, is Vicarious Engagement. This occurs when the players are engaging in the material you have prepped for them and clearly having fun, and you can vicariously enjoy the entertainment you are providing.

This is far more powerful than most people realize, because it feeds back into virtually every other aspect of GMing. If the players are having fun, they will be more tolerant of rules interpretations, they will react more strongly to the NPCs who are supposed to elicit reactions, they will immerse themselves more fully in the plot and in their character’s reactions to the circumstances in which they find themselves, they will be more forgiving and tolerant of the GM in general.

If, on the other hand, they are not having barrels of fun, that also feeds back into everything the GM does. They will be less tolerant of the need for rules interpretations, they will be more blase even toward provocative NPCs and frankly dismissive of those not designed to elicit a strong reaction, will not display heart-felt reactions in any event, will go through the motions rather than engaging with the plot, and will be less forgiving of anything and everything.

There are two sides to every coin, and it’s easy to see the negatives without appreciating this feedback/amplification effect. Having fun is infectious, and misery loves company; use these truisms of human psychology to your advantage. And contemplate this scenario: if you are able to fake your own level of enthusiasm enough to push your players onto the “enjoyment” side of the above equation, the principle of vicarious engagement can feed back to you to make the pleasure that you were feigning genuine, even if only to a lesser degree.

This same process has often been recommended for those feeling down – forcing yourself to smile has the same chemical effects within the brain as actually enjoying yourself, and those in turn make you feel better. It’s ten-cent pop psychology, but it works to at least some extent, and any improvement is a good thing!

A Log Of Labors

The best approach is to maintain a log of your activities over a couple of game sessions, both prep and in (reconstructed) play. That will give you some indication of which situations come up most frequently, and permit you to assess which ones you derive the most satisfaction and pleasure from – and that’s the basis of reasonable steps to improve your satisfaction with all aspects of your GMing.

Nor should you fall into the trap of thinking that the two are disconnected. They aren’t – inadequate prep of NPCs, for example, leads to greater improv, which may lead to either greater or lesser enjoyment from those NPCs behind the GM screen. The optimum strategy in your particular case might be to prepare less, not more.

What makes you Itch

Another way to look at it is to assess, as dispassionately as possible, your GMing strengths and weaknesses, then modify your prep and GMing style to maximize the value of the first and mitigate the second.

Find your itch, and scratch it. You will be a better GM for doing so, and it only takes flipping a few elements from negatives to positives to radically alter the overall balance within a campaign.

Not that you should perform this kind of postmortem all the time. It’s too distracting and self-obsessive for that to be good for you. An annual check-up is usually enough, plus (perhaps) a review a month or so after implementing any changes to see if they’ve had the desired impact.

If you have more fun at the game table, there’s a preponderance of probabilities that your players will, too. If your players have more fun at your game table, not only will your game be strengthened, but you are more likely to enjoy it too. Scratching your itch is a win-win. You won’t find a better bargain than that!

Print Friendly, PDF & Email