Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;1023359Except running a game isn't like being an architect, it's more like making a decent meatloaf or a fairly good fried egg sandwich.  Yeah, there are people who never will learn to do it, but they are DAMN few.

It is NOT that tough.

If I can do it, then anyone can do it.

Quote from: chirine ba kal;1023372If I can do it, then anyone can do it.

In my experience, that is not true.

Quote from: trechriron;1023294Sorry Catelf, but this weeks asshole % is too low, so this has to be done.

None of us are confused. Maybe if you're an AP English teacher whos butthole is so tight as to create its own gravitational pull, perhaps you might be confused that real people use colloquial terms, but outside that rare state, no confusion here.

Can Be and Become are synonymous in most circles. ANYONE can pick up an RPG, form a group and GM for them. Anyone. Because this is a site discussing RPGs, and new people wander here for advice, it would behoove those of us who recruit and train new GMs to make some assertions and clarifications.

Fucking Nerd.

( PS, I still love you - I'm mostly being as pedantic as you just were - nanny nanny boo boo)

Ok, you did ask for it.
No, i'm not an english teacher, i'm very much closer to the opposite, in the way that i have english as my second language, and because of this has indeed run into the double meaning of "can be", whereas one means "is competent" and another means "may become competent", and those two are far from synonymous.
And even more, both meanings seem to come up far more in online discussions than your troll-brain seem to be able to fathom.

Also, my butthole is only that tight so i can squeeze the resistance out of dicks like you.
And of course you love me, i was built to be lovable.
<3

Now i hope we together has filled up this week's asshole-quota, so we can talk serious again?
:cool:

It's easy to be a shitty GM.

It takes either natural talents or concentrated effort or a mix of those to become a good GM.

Quote from: Catelf;1023382Ok, you did ask for it.
No, i'm not an english teacher, i'm very much closer to the opposite, in the way that i have english as my second language, and because of this has indeed run into the double meaning of "can be", whereas one means "is competent" and another means "may become competent", and those two are far from synonymous.
And even more, both meanings seem to come up far more in online discussions than your troll-brain seem to be able to fathom.

Also, my butthole is only that tight so i can squeeze the resistance out of dicks like you.
And of course you love me, i was built to be lovable.
<3

Now i hope we together has filled up this week's asshole-quota, so we can talk serious again?
:cool:

Okay, if English is not your first language I'll give you a break.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;1023373In my experience, that is not true.

Then you must know some real dunderheads.  Fifteen year old kids can run an adequate game.

Anyone can be a good GM.

But it requires some qualities people don't have: maturity and impartiality.

Without those, sooner or later there will be a trainwreck.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;1023390Then you must know some real dunderheads.  Fifteen year old kids can run an adequate game.

Can't deny that.  Although, Mac, below makes the point for me.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;1023392Anyone can be a good GM.

But it requires some qualities people don't have: maturity and impartiality.

You do realize you just negated your own statement, yes?  Some people just don't have the aptitude.

OK, maybe calling myself stupid wasn't exactly accurate, I've worked with computers for over 30? (First PC was a Vic20) years, as well as having been a computer hardware tech for over a decade so it takes some knowledge and ability to problem solve, not to mention organizational, but I'll be the first to admit, I am not a genius by any stretch of the imagination.  But being intelligent by itself doesn't mean you'll be good at things, even things that aren't that hard like running an enjoyable RPG.

(I'm good enough to be a computer tech, is what I'm saying, but that's not enough to be an even moderately decent GM, it takes more.  Flexibility, which I like to stroke my own ego into thinking I have, and impartiality.)

So again, no, not everyone can do everything.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;1023392Anyone can be a good GM.

But it requires some qualities people don't have: maturity and impartiality.

But immaturity and partiality are much more fun.

QuoteWithout those, sooner or later there will be a trainwreck.

And we all slow down our cars to watch a train wreck.

Well, there are genuine humans with power and capacity limits. (Currently known as the developmentally-challenged, or was it on-the-severe-side-of-the-spectrum? differently-abled?... the mentally handi-capable? I am gauche with the terms these days.)

But barring that, yes, I do believe you have a point. Children play Let's Pretend all the time. And apparently it left a litany of scarred adult wrecks who are still ruing the day.

Whether people do it well with an eye towards juggling the social needs of people, the demands of judgment and creativity, and the constancy of organization and preparation... That's another matter. But it's not like any of these are impossible to develop as skills. Practice! It's OK if there's naught but tears and cheeto dust in the end as long as you get back up and try again, with an eye towards remembering we're all just people.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;1023373In my experience, that is not true.

My personal experience dovetails with yours, actually; some people have that certain spark and some people don't, which is not surprising. I've listened in to some games where I thought that the GM was the most boring person I'd ever heard in my life, but the players all seemed to like the style. YMMV may vary, and all that.

What I've been getting from gamers here locally for decades - especially from The Serious Gamers! - is on the order of "If that doofus Chirine can do it, then any moron can do it!" So, my data may be, as me dad the rocket scientist might say, 'ratty'.

Quote from: jeff37923;1023019Had a conversation a short while ago about people being Gamemasters. The guy I was talking to declared that not just anyone can be a GM. That it takes a special mix of intelligence, imagination, and organizational skills to even begin to learn the art of GMing.

My own thoughts are that his opinion is self-aggrandizing bullshit.

Anyone can be a GM, anyone can learn how if they apply themselves. In the beginning, you will suck at it - just like all of us did at the start. Given time and effort, anybody can become a good GM.

What are your thoughts? Am I wrong?

I agree, anyone can be a GM, all you need is a fair understanding of the game rules, willingless to learn and adapt and have a skin as thick as a rhino's.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;1023370Because if you don't know how to think your way out of difficult situations - or evade them completely - then you try to stat your way out of it. It doesn't matter if you figure out how to avoid or disarm the trap if you've managed to get +30 to save and have 152 hit points.

Superior players rely on their wits, not on the numbers on the page. But it takes time to do this.

Point-buy and encounterisation also helps the inferior DM. "Well, if the book says they can handle this encounter, I guess they can." So I guess it could be useful as training wheels... but at some point you get rid of them and just ride.

That's a crock 'o shit. Players who proselytize about random rolling, in my experience, are shit at the actual game aspect of the game. Give me a powergamer anyday, you've got something to work with there at least.

In fact, even when it comes to roleplay, they're still shit because they tend to have little to no ambition or aren't goal-orientated which means I can't trust them to do shit in-game like follow-up leads, build businesses, establish relationships in the power structure, plan, scope etc...

GMs who "rely on their wits" can't structure their gameworlds for shit and end up bullshi... fiat'ing the players when it comes to consistent gameplay and in-world reactions. Can't even design a fucking AOA.

Quote from: jeff37923;1023019Had a conversation a short while ago about people being Gamemasters. The guy I was talking to declared that not just anyone can be a GM. That it takes a special mix of intelligence, imagination, and organizational skills to even begin to learn the art of GMing.

My own thoughts are that his opinion is self-aggrandizing bullshit.

Anyone can be a GM, anyone can learn how if they apply themselves. In the beginning, you will suck at it - just like all of us did at the start. Given time and effort, anybody can become a good GM.

What are your thoughts? Am I wrong?

It's probably self-aggrandizing bullshit. But it's not wrong.

There's levels to this shit. Like coding, there's I-know-variables and then there's Knuth or Torvalds or Sweeney and several different tiers in-between.

I write maze solvers and fuck around with APIs for fun. Hell, I built my own character validator/generator for my club games myself ages ago. A lot of coders I've met, however, just don't have that love for it, that affinity for it.

It's that affinity that makes GM'ing logarithmic in terms of ability scale, like any other skill or discipline.

Number crunching, personal charisma, encounter design are just some of aspects you need to be good at or possess. The more you do, the higher up the scale you can potentially reach. And practice does make perfect, of course, though it's only one part of music-making process (so to speak) and you need something to work with to even begin on the path to getting really good.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;1023057If anything it's harder to be a "good player." It sure as hell is for me, so I stick with what I enjoy, GMing.

And that tells me the two roles come at the game from fundamentally different angles. Anyone can be a GM but it means playing a different game essentially than being a player.

This is the same as saying someone watching John Wick will have an appreciation for firearms in the same way someone who's gone to spend their Saturday at the range and that these are transferable.

One is a passive participant, the other is active.

No dude, if anything, you should GM first before being a Player. Gives you perspective and respect for the role. Too many players bitch about gms. Like biking, you'd get much better drivers if everyone had to ride a motorcycle for their commute and FAR less people trying to kill bikers as a result.

Quote from: ArrozConLeche;1023058I think some people are more able to hit the ground running than others, from experience. With enough practice, I can imagine someone might get good eventually, but the trouble will be finding others who are willing to spend their time in a bad game.

In my limited experience, that hasn't been the case. For example, in college, one guy volunteered to GM for a group. He pretty much sucked, and people lost interest. Some of the "diaspora" ended up in a vampire game with a guy who was pretty good.

I really wanted to give the other dude a chance, but no one else did.

Do you go for the veteran lawyer with fifteen years of experience and a string of highly public case wins or do you go with the fresh-out-of-school grad with a barely a year as a junior associate?

When it comes down it, most people will go with the former.

And that's why that grad has to have that special something to stand out from the rest and make it. First impressions are last impressions, yo.

Quote from: Ulairi;1023060This anecdote furthers my belief that one of the biggest impediments to getting new players is the RPG "community". Before I deleted my Twitter account and Facebook accounts I cannot count high enough the times I read a post from somebody that was terrified to GM a session based on stories like yours or what they see on Twitch.

And again, I think when I got started GMing, the game was very focused on the "dungeon" and buying a module that was focused on the dungeon or building a dungeon was a way for new players to all learn the game together. Now that we are focused on "story telling" and too many of the gaming intelligentsia believe that the dungeon is "outdated" it makes it a lot harder for new players both behind and in front of the GM shield.

I think the easiest way to learn and teach the game is with a dungeon crawl.

I'd say for teaching mechanics, yeah sure. The actual other half of the RPG, as in the roleplay aspect, nah you're gonna need to learn to improv and take on a different personality fairly quickly.

Quote from: Skarg;1023063Anyone can, but (after having played with, talked with, and heard about many problematic GMs who don't improve their wacky behavior very quickly at all) I don't really want to play with just any GM, and not even with many experienced ones. There are many GM behaviors that I don't want to play under, and in recent decades some of them have become typical and supported.

Care to share some wacky behaviors? It's always interesting to hear about the shit that happens at gaming tables around the world.

Quote from: Psikerlord;1023149Anyone can be a pretty good GM. I think being a player first helps, but of course not required.

See above replies.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;1023356What a load of post modernist BS.

No, not everyone can be a GM.

Just like not everyone can be an architect.  I wanted to be to one, to design buildings, learn civil engineering, but I just don't have the aptitude for it.  I just ain't smart enough.  Not everyone can be an Engineer.  Not everyone can be a world class Athlete.  But that's OK, I have other abilities.  Everyone does.  It's what makes the world so interesting.

BUT!  And this is a KEY POINT

Like most things in life, it can be learned, and luckily the bar to entry is very, very, very low.  As long as you're willing to mentally flexible, problem solve relatively quickly (as in minutes, not days) and willing to use your imagination (Even if you think you have none), maybe you'll pick it up.  If you don't or can't, then there's something else for you.

But is it something everyone can do?  Nope.  Life don't work that way, Sugar Pop.

Post-modernism has nothing to do with this. That's saying the GM is a fish when really they're a complex, self-sustaining organic automata that represents the RPG hobbyist's journey from angst-ridden mechanics-polemicist to becoming the embodiment of the path of least resistance of those who just want everyone to enjoy themselves at the gaming table.

Or it could just be that they need to go take a shower real bad.

Anyway, your post is also a crock 'o shit like Aaron's above but from a different angle, one of defeatism and one that tries to have it both ways. Keep it simple: you either can or you can't and there are levels to the can, it's as black 'n' white as that.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;1023392Anyone can be a good GM.

The OP is about being a GM, not being a good GM.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;1023392But it requires some qualities people don't have: maturity and impartiality.

Without those, sooner or later there will be a trainwreck.

Yes, and that is how people learn to be better. If you haven't had a train wreck you don't know what to avoid in the future.

Bad GMs are the ones who have the same train wrecks again and again, or those who relish having train wrecks.

Even bad GMs are GMs.

Quote from: PrometheanVigil;1023471Give me a powergamer anyday, you've got something to work with there at least.

You can keep all the powergamers. Those clowns are a waste of space.

I'd happily mail you any I encounter...preferably in sandwich bags.

Quote from: soltakss;1023472Bad GMs are the ones who have the same train wrecks again and again, or those who relish having train wrecks.

Agreed.

A good GM isn't someone who never makes mistakes. Good GMs learn from their mistakes and aim to improve.

Quote from: chirine ba kal;1023465What I've been getting from gamers here locally for decades - especially from The Serious Gamers! - is on the order of "If that doofus Chirine can do it, then any moron can do it!"

All your "Serious Gamer" stories sound like escapees from a mental hospital or champions of the asshole brigade.

Quote from: Opaopajr;1023415It's OK if there's naught but tears and cheeto dust in the end as long as you get back up and try again, with an eye towards remembering we're all just people.

Just people??? WTF. Players are pawns for our ego gratification! What hobby are you in?