Quote from: GameDaddy;301463Finally, there's nothing wrong, or insocial, in cutting loose a predatory leech.

Never cut loose a leech.   Burn them and they fall off.

Quote from: jeff37923;301664What should the goal of a good GM be?

To run adventures that are fun for himself and his players!

Quote from: Benoist;301701And over time, you become "Monte Cook, Gary Gygax, Rob Kuntz" awesome.

If this was true, there would be many more good GMs.   The only people who improve are those who focus on their improvement.  The rest just bumble along making the same mistakes repeatedly.

Some of those people *may* read a book on GM Mastery, but most of those who would pick up a GM Mastery book would be Good GMs who want to become Great.

And that's fine too.

The "Monte Cook, EGG, Rob Kuntz" awesome precludes years of practice combined with empathy, in particular what the players think, how and when they think what they do, and so on. Don't quote what I said partially. Thank you.

I was thinking of a way of making this work is  being able to see three our four top GM's running a game at Gencon or some other major Con. Even better would be to actually videotape or stream it across the net. I'd love to see footage of  St. Cook or Kuntz in action.

The problem with providing good, solid GM advice is that is that you end up looking an entirely different set of tips for different types of games and groups.

What works for a good sandbox campaign isn't going to work for focused mystery game. Advice for GM trying to contain powergamers seeking to exploit the system is just going to stifle the more creative, story-orientated players.

Take for instance the issue of using 'out of character' information in play. In "old school" play, character's were sort of expected to use ooc information. If your previous character was killed by a specific trap, your next character was expected to "learn from that" and avoid that specific trap second time round.

In the "mainstream" play using ooc information is considered bad form and tends to be considered cheating. Some GM might pass secret notes or talk to a player in private in order to keep the ooc/ic divide but mostly players are expected to act responsibly.

In some of the "indie" games, ooc information is meant to be used on the basis that anything that makes game more interesting is a good thing.  

The fact all three approaches are correct and all three are wrwong, it all depends on the specific game and group of people playing.

One of the best things of Robin Law'sbook on gamemastering is that make the point very clearly that there are a lot of different kind of games and gamers out there and that what works for one doesn't work for the other. What is missing however is a set of follow up books focusing depth on each individual game style.

However, just recognising that there is a wide a range of viable but very different game styles out is a start.


PS: The problem of course is that the recognition that there are different approaches to the hobby quickly descends into an "us and them" culture as one group praises the merits of their own approach, knowingly or unknowingly dissing the other approaches and then it all ends in tears. It's kind of hopeless, really.

Well, this could be the non-official  follow up to Law's book.  In the past, you really had to learn as you go along, now you can learn with a better understanding and see how other people play. No one can teach you to GM like St.Cook or Gygax, but it sure helps to see people of that caliber playing.

Has anyone ever read "Master of the Game" and "Role Playing Mastery" by Gygax?

I have both and have attempted to start them.  My fellow 1e gamers tell me that they are very good reads and do hone one's DM skills but damn they're hard to get started on.

The best guide to good GMing skills right now are found in the two Amber RPG books by Erick Wujcik. Much moreso than Gygax or Laws.

Someday the Pundit will have his attempt, if I can ever get sufficiently un-swamped by work to finish the damn book.  I've only got maybe 15 pages to go.

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