As I run the game of Ptolus here on the RPG Site, I can't help but think about all the things I love about GMing. Like the prep, the drawing of the maps, the moments where you wonder if this or that idea is going to be too tough on the players, or not enough. Wondering how that is all going to come together in the game.
I love all this stuff. I just love it. I understand people get busy in their lives and don't have as much time to devote to their prep as they did when they were university students, but at the same time, whenever I see people talking about their prep time as some kind of homework they'd rather not do at all, I can't help but think that something might be wrong there. Maybe enjoying the game itself isn't enough. Maybe enjoying the prep is a good thing too.
Also, just watching the players deal with the setting, the information, the clues is just AWESOME. I of course know what's going on, and seeing players come up with all sorts of ideas, some of them surprising, unexpected, or downright outlandish, makes it all worthwhile for me. They're getting intrigued, excited, want to step up to the challenge, and that makes the game so much better for me.
I love this stuff.
The hours I spend making big-ass maps or papercraft props are all worth for that ten seconds of "oh wow" I get during game sessions. :)
Plus it's lots of fun in its own right.
Other simple joys of GMing, even the prep-work, that I can think of...
Glancing at the results of your random result generator and then becoming simply inspired as you work to shoehorn in the random bits. I can't even remember how many times a random monster encounter led to either a major adventure tangent or somehow created depth quite by accident. Placing random treasure creates similar opportunities for me.
GMing creates in me a drive to discover. I'm not about to launch into a "RPGs make you smart" sort of thing. However, GMing has trained me to learn more about the real world in an effort to make better settings.
I have to say that having once despised random tables I am now a total convert. For my ICONS supers game I created a set of crime tables to be used at specific intervals during play as a way to vary the pace of the game and make it less predictable. In one instance I rolled:
When: In progress
What: Kidnapping - Celebrity
Who: Man-beast
Why: Misunderstanding
And it suddenly clicked; this is basically the plot of King Kong. So I had Man-Beast swing in and kidnap a movie starlet at a world premiere of “King Kong 2” which resulted in heroes chasing Man-Beast and his victim across the moonlit city rooftops. As filler scenes go, it felt pretty spectacular.
Unfortunately in the last few session I keep rolling "Nothing now" on these tables.
One of my favorite things when GMing: when the players basically hand you next week's scenario.
Player 1: "Oh my God, what if the Minister actually is Gablifax the Insane? We would be so screwed!"
Player 2: "But that would mean his entire army is actually mind-controlled... and they'd all come after us!"
Gamemaster: "Yes, that would be terrible..." *scribble scribble*
Quote from: Insufficient Metal;419421One of my favorite things when GMing: when the players basically hand you next week's scenario.
Player 1: "Oh my God, what if the Minister actually is Gablifax the Insane? We would be so screwed!"
Player 2: "But that would mean his entire army is actually mind-controlled... and they'd all come after us!"
Gamemaster: "Yes, that would be terrible..." *scribble scribble*
LOL Oh yeah. That's awesome. It's like the random stuff you roll and try to fit in the game, as WB just said.
It's all very stimulating. Plus, it gives you a direct feedback from the players of what they expect. Sometimes you can play with the expectations, or against them, as warranted.
Quote from: winkingbishop;419415GMing creates in me a drive to discover. I'm not about to launch into a "RPGs make you smart" sort of thing. However, GMing has trained me to learn more about the real world in an effort to make better settings.
I completely agree, by the way. Same thing with games where players do not roll for everything. If you want to figure out some stuff for yourself, you might get curious and go look for more information in some encyclopedia or whatnot. It makes you, not smarter, but potentially
curious about stuff. And that's very cool.
I love making settings, including stuff like recent history and the religions. I know I'll never use most of it, but it's just as big a part of the hobby as actually playing is for me.
Whenever I start working on a new campaign I buy a new journal to keep all of the notes in.
I try to find a journal that has cover art in keeping with the setting (sometimes I create a slip cover myself), open it up to page one and start writting down my first thoughts. Looking at that first blank page is one of my favorite experiences as a GM. All the ideas that have been rattling around in my head for the previous few weeks start to line up and march from my brain, down my arm, through the pen and onto the page.
After that moment comes lots of planning and plotting, mapping and research. But that first moment is really the best.
I guess I'm totally different. I avoid prep, don't stat anything out, maybe draw a map if needed, and foist whatever I can onto the players. I love GMing because with my group it's like juggling chainsaws riding a unicycle on a tightrope over a volcano. The rush is incredible! I GM for the moment.
-clash
I used to not bother with prep work. I mean, I'd have world maps drawn out and world information and shit, but session to session I'd never bother working on the game. I let the thing grow organically during the session. And I had a LOT of fun doing it that way.
But then I started GMing Dark Heresy for a bit, which we all can pretty much accept is Call of Cthulhu in space. Which, like CoC, means that the game will be a LOT of clue-gathering. I started writing out data-slates (i.e. notepads, sorta) they'd find. I worked on making physical clues and shit. And the pay off was incredible.
YMMV, but I've found that a prepped campaign is more detailed and sets up clues for things several adventures down the road. While this was possible to an extent with free-form GMing, I do not believe that it comes close to prepped campaigns.
Fortunately, some games don't require so much prep work. Right now I am running Realms of Cthulhu and free-form GMing would NOT be as successful here. Not when the adventure involves layers and layers of clues and mysteries (as well as red herrings). I made the newspaper clippings they may (or may not) find, the sketches of locales they may (or may not) explore, complete with locations of Mythos-related clues. I need to create the NPCs with rather detailed motives.
Were I running AD&D and focusing on dungeon-looting, wilderness exploring, and hardcore-wenching I think that pre-session prep work, while awesome to work on, is not as necessary. In this regard, it is a matter of taste and style.
But any games involving layers upon layers of mystery? Mandatory prep work there. At least if you want to run a convincing, deep storyline...
-=Grim=-
And yes, Benoist, I also happen to agree - prep work is as much fun as running the game. Sometimes I find it even more fun. Right now I'm addicted to making newspaper clippings for PCs to stumble across. ADDICTED. This newspaper program thing I a fellow CoC Keeper directed me to makes the thing easy as hell, which means MO' CLIPPINGS PER HOUR!
;)
-=Grim=-
Quote from: flyingmice;419448I guess I'm totally different. I avoid prep, don't stat anything out, maybe draw a map if needed, and foist whatever I can onto the players. I love GMing because with my group it's like juggling chainsaws riding a unicycle on a tightrope over a volcano. The rush is incredible! I GM for the moment.
-clash
Hey, it's cool with me, Clash. :)
And I do love the chainsaw-juggling part too! :D
Quote from: GrimJesta;419454And yes, Benoist, I also happen to agree - prep work is as much fun as running the game. Sometimes I find it even more fun. Right now I'm addicted to making newspaper clippings for PCs to stumble across. ADDICTED. This newspaper program thing I a fellow CoC Keeper directed me to makes the thing easy as hell, which means MO' CLIPPINGS PER HOUR!
;)
-=Grim=-
Oooh. That news clipping program thingy sounds very cool!
Do you have a link? :D
Quote from: Benoist;419457Oooh. That news clipping program thingy sounds very cool!
Do you have a link? :D
I sure as heck do, amigo:
This is one for the Arkham Advertiser (http://rpgplotter.wordpress.com/2010/10/04/arkham-advertiser-editable-pdf/); Cthulhu specific, but could also be used for Gotham or something.
This one (http://www.fodey.com/generators/newspaper/snippet.asp) is for clippings. You can make any newspaper and story and all that jazz.
In case you want one, here's one for telegrams (http://www.bookranger.co.uk/Cthulhu/Telegram.html), too.
-=G=-
Quote from: Benoist;419410As I run the game of Ptolus here on the RPG Site, I can't help but think about all the things I love about GMing. Like the prep, the drawing of the maps, the moments where you wonder if this or that idea is going to be too tough on the players, or not enough. Wondering how that is all going to come together in the game.
I love all this stuff. I just love it. I understand people get busy in their lives and don't have as much time to devote to their prep as they did when they were university students, but at the same time, whenever I see people talking about their prep time as some kind of homework they'd rather not do at all, I can't help but think that something might be wrong there. Maybe enjoying the game itself isn't enough. Maybe enjoying the prep is a good thing too.
Also, just watching the players deal with the setting, the information, the clues is just AWESOME. I of course know what's going on, and seeing players come up with all sorts of ideas, some of them surprising, unexpected, or downright outlandish, makes it all worthwhile for me. They're getting intrigued, excited, want to step up to the challenge, and that makes the game so much better for me.
I love this stuff.
Interesting. I dislike prep. And I dislike the sort of gaming that comes with prep. For me, the fun is in the interaction between me and my players, when our creativity "mingles" to create something nobody of us would have been able to come up with alone.
But then, I also dislike maps and what people usually call sandboxes, because in my eyes, having a map and knowing what's there is the beginning of a railroad.
Quote from: DominikSchwager;419468Interesting. I dislike prep. And I dislike the sort of gaming that comes with prep. For me, the fun is in the interaction between me and my players, when our creativity "mingles" to create something nobody of us would have been able to come up with alone.
But then, I also dislike maps and what people usually call sandboxes, because in my eyes, having a map and knowing what's there is the beginning of a railroad.
What games do you play?
Grimjesta is right that Call of Cthulhu requires detailed prep to be fully satisfying.
I run a lot of mystery/investigation games - a lot. And most of them are as heavily prepared as a typical CoC game. However, it is easier to prep what you might call more obviously pulpy detective games, with a lighter hand. In these sorts of games, which tend to feature more action than in a typical CoC game, you can make the clues more straightforward and then it's not so much the case of who did it but, "How do we get the bastartds?"
Lately I've become a bit burned out on deep mysteries. As I don't run fantasy games anymore, Atomic Highway has been a godsend. Put together a simple sandbox with minimal detail and make it up as you go along, riffing off the players.
I've enjoyed it so much that I've actually started running a modern day cop show game using Atomic Highway's V6 mechanics (with just a few changes). So yes, I'm running a mystery game again!
I still think that prep is fun - up to a point (I dislike statting up the opposition) - but lately I've really enjoyed the light prep approach.
Quote from: CRKrueger;419482What games do you play?
At the moment I run a Burning Wheel campaign and 2 Dresden Files RPG campaigns. But I have run everything from AD&D to Mage the Awakening this way.
I love doing prep, but my current lifestyle isn't compatible with long, laborious, loving prep like I used to do back in the day. More and more I turn to published adventures, and to games which allow for minimal preparation (like Savage Worlds, and TSR-era D&D).
I've always been good at improvisation, and this is a talent I've been sorely putting to the test for the last 8 years.
I still hold out for the hope that one day things will slow down, and I will once again find the time to buy myself a huge sheet of graph paper, and draw a huge effin' dungeon with ruler and compass, and seed it with monsters, and traps, and treasure rolled item by item under the D&D RC tables.
(whine, whine, whine) :D
Intertsting the way threads go. Or, at least, where we decide to take them.
Answering the original OP, One of my greatest pleasures is when the PCs 'get it'. Which leads into my feeling onto prep, and one canot imagine a better dovetail as to where this thread has gone.
I tend towards long games with many levels of interconnected plots and events that the players can involve themselves in. And one of my greeatest rewards is when they untangle one of these things, especially when it is all based on setting -specific logic.
And I echo those who mention that certain types of games really need prep to make them succesful.
Obviously, this also defines my prep game preferences. I did a lot of improv GMing back in college, but i learned that the better the framework, the more consistent and coherent the improved GMing.
I have come to love the feeling of the players moving into a main adventure area where every little item and motivation is well know to me, because I took the time to work it out. I enjoy creating a feeling of layered history, and siometimes this takes some serious record keeping.
Oh, yeah, current and similar thread here (http://www.thecbg.org/e107_plugins/forum/forum_viewtopic.php?122428.last).
Quote from: Gruntfuttock;419488(I dislike statting up the opposition)
That's why I'm a statblock junky - I look for and save every statblock I can find for 3e and 4e, so that if I need a particular NPC or monster, I can simply look through the vault and see if there is already something close to what I want to do. Sometimes they take a little tweaking, sometimes they're good as-is.
That's one of the reasons I like prep-work so much. A little work now can mean no work later.
Quote from: ColonelHardisson;419537That's why I'm a statblock junky - I look for and save every statblock I can find for 3e and 4e
That is tremendously useful in a game like 3e, to me. I used to save all the statblocks I could find. There was never enough statblocks, to me, because once I got them, I didn't have to bother with statting NPCs from scratch and could just look into this or that book, select a guy, change a couple of feats or equipment items or what-have-you, and be done with it.
It's all about when the players have those 'Hell yeah' moments. When they are asking and surmising and thinking about events that have happened or may happen.
The secondary joy is that being the GM gives me more to do. I find that being a player most of the time I get bored or am constantly thinking how I could have done something better.
Quote from: ColonelHardisson;419537That's why I'm a statblock junky
...
That's one of the reasons I like prep-work so much. A little work now can mean no work later.
Word. Not just stat blocks for me. I generate hordes sometimes and stash them away. Actually, it's something I decided to start doing to fill in those last 10 minutes waiting for my girlfriends to finish "getting ready" before you can leave for [social function]. I collect small dungeons or chop up larger ones to use as lairs; I'm not really into "reskinning" them, so I might dump the keys if they'll never fit, but even having the maps and layouts are big time savers. This level of of prep is actually just enjoyable, like keeping a scrapbook of sorts. Like Hardisson said and I agree, it does pay off. I don't actually have to spend much time "designing adventures" if I know my major villains' motivations or landmarks or McGuffins for the day.
Speaking of villains: Before going back to TSR D&D I sometimes employed this trick to save time on prep for middling NPCs in 3.x games (If I posted this before, I apologize): I recruited my more crunch-minded players to twink out my NPCs. I would give them the shell of the idea, changing one or two vital details like the gender, race, alignment, signature weapons or spells such that, come game time, they never recognized them until it was too late.
For all the shortcuts I do enjoy, I also like to bask in surprises at the table. So I guess its worth mentioning that I like a good amount of random at the table too: the wandering monster rolls, weather (if I use it), some of the hoards, some reaction rolls.
Quote from: GrimJesta;419462I sure as heck do, amigo:
This is one for the Arkham Advertiser (http://rpgplotter.wordpress.com/2010/10/04/arkham-advertiser-editable-pdf/); Cthulhu specific, but could also be used for Gotham or something.
This one (http://www.fodey.com/generators/newspaper/snippet.asp) is for clippings. You can make any newspaper and story and all that jazz.
In case you want one, here's one for telegrams (http://www.bookranger.co.uk/Cthulhu/Telegram.html), too.
-=G=-
Great resources! Thanks, G. :D:cool:
Quote from: The Butcher;419504I love doing prep, but my current lifestyle isn't compatible with long, laborious, loving prep like I used to do back in the day.
I'm the same. When I used to run a regular D&D game, I loved making maps and NPCs and monsters, and I loved when that prep paid off in a game.
Unfortunately, I rarely have time to do that kind of thing anymore. (Which is why I mostly prefer low-prep games.)
Quote from: DominikSchwager;419497At the moment I run a Burning Wheel campaign and 2 Dresden Files RPG campaigns. But I have run everything from AD&D to Mage the Awakening this way.
Please move this thread to Other Games.
I used to do a lot of prep. Nowadays I don't. I'm the opposite of grimjesta in this regards: find my best games are off the cuff, rolling with the surprises the players throw my way. The biggest successes I've had GMing are just winging it over trying to plan things out. The more planning I do, the worse the game gets.
I think about the game between sessions, of course, and I may think up an idea for a scene or a battle or what the Big Bad is Really up to... But I never really write it down or anything. I just come with my vague ideas and my creative juices flowing and then throW stuff at the players and watch them react.
One of the joys of GMing for me is when I sit down at the table I have no idea what events will transpire in the game today. I don't know what the PCs will do. But I do know they will surprise me and surprising me will keep me on my toes.
I really like the part of preparation that's the invention of locations, characters, things to be found there. I don't at all like doing a lot of MECHANICAL preparation, so I prefer GMing games where the preparation of stats is very lightweight, or may be reasonably filled in as necessary.
Quote from: DominikSchwager;419468Interesting. I dislike prep. And I dislike the sort of gaming that comes with prep. For me, the fun is in the interaction between me and my players, when our creativity "mingles" to create something nobody of us would have been able to come up with alone.
I think much of the fun is there too, but I think having some material ready can help this creative mix form. Things that exist already can imply things the GM another player hadn't anticipated. A GM places a stone statue - to him it signifies that the place is a temple to the god depicted by the statue. But to another player it's a place to hide behind, or the statue's head might be broken off to act as a counterweight, or any of a million things. While in another kind of game, theoretically the player might 'invent' the statue to hide behind, maybe he wouldn't have without the inspiration - the creative event, hiding behind the statue, came from the mixture of the gm's and player's contributions.
QuoteBut then, I also dislike maps and what people usually call sandboxes, because in my eyes, having a map and knowing what's there is the beginning of a railroad.
Is anything set on modern day earth the beginning of a railroad? :)
I think I do see what you mean, and I think it's valid to say having certain things (such as even the map) fixed as causing you in particular as a player or GM to start trending toward a preconceived idea of the action. But I hope you would accept someone saying that the effect isn't universal.
For example having some degree of who the PCs are when the game starts might set certain theoretical constraints on the action - at the same time it can help instigate creativity. At the most basic, if your character is some kind of warrior, in a sense you might say the action may be biased toward fighting as a solution to things, but you might say "well, he could try to fight ANYTHING!" or try other things.
To me, a map says "you can go ANYWHERE on the map - and you can go off it!"
Quote from: Doctor Jest;419677One of the joys of GMing for me is when I sit down at the table I have no idea what events will transpire in the game today. I don't know what the PCs will do. But I do know they will surprise me and surprising me will keep me on my toes.
In other words, juggling chainsaws... :D
-clash
Quote from: Doctor Jest;419677I used to do a lot of prep. Nowadays I don't. I'm the opposite of grimjesta in this regards: find my best games are off the cuff, rolling with the surprises the players throw my way.
Same here. I like games where everyone is surprised by the outcome, including me as the GM.
I'm not able to run high-prep games (like D&D or GURPS) off-the-cuff like that, however. If I'm gonna run a D&D game, I want to be well-prepared.
Some people can do it, I know, but I am not one of them.
Quote from: Cole;419681To me, a map says "you can go ANYWHERE on the map - and you can go off it!"
Of course I am not saying maps are always the beginning of railroad tracks, after all tons of people sandbox with maps just fine. When I see a map, my mind creates a mental checklist of things that need to be worked through, encounters on a string if you want, instead of organic gameplay where my stories happen naturally.
Quote from: DominikSchwager;419959Of course I am not saying maps are always the beginning of railroad tracks, after all tons of people sandbox with maps just fine. When I see a map, my mind creates a mental checklist of things that need to be worked through, encounters on a string if you want, instead of organic gameplay where my stories happen naturally.
That's a weird brain you've got there...
RPGPundit
Quote from: DominikSchwager;419959Of course I am not saying maps are always the beginning of railroad tracks, after all tons of people sandbox with maps just fine. When I see a map, my mind creates a mental checklist of things that need to be worked through, encounters on a string if you want, instead of organic gameplay where my stories happen naturally.
I don't at all doubt you, it's just that I have almost the opposite experience.
Quote from: Cole;420400I don't at all doubt you, it's just that I have almost the opposite experience.
Yes, exactly, a map fills my brain with ideas about wide-open possibilities.
RPGPundit
Quote from: RPGPundit;420554Yes, exactly, a map fills my brain with ideas about wide-open possibilities.
RPGPundit
Have you seen this site?
Strange Maps (http://bigthink.com/blogs/strange-maps)
Quote from: Cole;420576Have you seen this site?
Strange Maps (http://bigthink.com/blogs/strange-maps)
Very interesting stuff!
The "oh God you didn't" moments. Moments of plot or player manipulation of plot that make things awesome.
My experiences regarding maps and their use in RPGs are similar to Cole's and the Pundit's. I think that, for choices to exist in a role playing game, some of them should be at first presented to the players, in the sense that, if you have a completely open environment, then it actually plays AGAINST its sandbox nature in that many players will not know what to do or that choices even exist, to begin with.
The map is the most direct visual answer to this concern. It provides a support, in the form of locations, areas, cardinal points, towns and geographic features, which the players might refer to and say "alright. Now we decide which way we want to go". If the map was a blank space to begin with, there would be no available choice to the players: no matter what direction they choose to take, it would just take them to yet some more blank space.
I've mainly used maps for city type environments in sandbox type games. Less so for wilderness, underground, etc ... areas.
I was never really into the megadungeon in the middle of nowhere thing.
Quote from: RPGPundit;420554Yes, exactly, a map fills my brain with ideas about wide-open possibilities.
RPGPundit
Same here. One of the things that attracted me to the Hellfrost setting is the large and extremely detailed map of the world. The map alone gave me endless ideas.
Quote from: Gruntfuttock;419488Grimjesta is right that Call of Cthulhu requires detailed prep to be fully satisfying.
I run a lot of mystery/investigation games - a lot. And most of them are as heavily prepared as a typical CoC game. However, it is easier to prep what you might call more obviously pulpy detective games, with a lighter hand. In these sorts of games, which tend to feature more action than in a typical CoC game, you can make the clues more straightforward and then it's not so much the case of who did it but, "How do we get the bastartds?"
Lately I've become a bit burned out on deep mysteries. As I don't run fantasy games anymore, Atomic Highway has been a godsend. Put together a simple sandbox with minimal detail and make it up as you go along, riffing off the players.
I've enjoyed it so much that I've actually started running a modern day cop show game using Atomic Highway's V6 mechanics (with just a few changes). So yes, I'm running a mystery game again!
I still think that prep is fun - up to a point (I dislike statting up the opposition) - but lately I've really enjoyed the light prep approach.
You know, having been running CoC for about a quarter of a century now, I really don't need much prep any more.
The main simple pleasure of GMing is spending hours prepping maps and so on, fooling yourself about the ways that the party would "probably" make their way through the dungeon/wilderness/hideous gauntlet of traps and then they do something totally wayward that means you have to throw 50% of your idea out of the window. It's the contrast between obsessiveness and control when prepping and then having a vastly reduced amount of "control" of structure (if any) in play.
Quote from: AndrewSFTSN;421875The main simple pleasure of GMing is pending hours prepping maps and so on, fooling yourself about the ways that the party would "probably" make their way through the dungeon/wilderness/hideous gauntlet of traps and then do something totally wayward that means you have to throw 50% of your idea out of the window. It's the contrast between obsessiveness and control when prepping and then having a vastly reduced amount of "control" of structure (if any) in play.
That's a canny observation. When I am GMing one of the biggest rewards is getting to be surprised - it's really exciting when you have created an element and the players do something very different with it than you might have imagined.
Quote from: Cole;421886That's a canny observation. When I am GMing one of the biggest rewards is getting to be surprised - it's really exciting when you have created an element and the players do something very different with it than you might have imagined.
It took me a while to realise this, and I'd probably have listed it among the things I dislike most about gaming when I first started out.