Have you thanked your GM lately?
>>46201499
i thank him by not being a retard during games
>>46201525
Your GM appreciates this more than anything except maybe the last slice of pizza.
>>46201499
Everyday I don't snap and shout at my players is like a pat on my back from myself.
>>46201499
I try to make a habit of it, but saying "thanks for running" every day seems liable to lose its luster.
I offer to buy him a pint every game, and always at least say cheers for running.
>>46201499
Our game is in so high spirits that our GM is constantly in an asspat machine. We thank him, over and over again, compliment him and bribe him with food.
We love him, we really do, so I hope that he can become a bit better to accept out praise.He's probably going to kill us all, but in a way that we can't truly be mad at him.Wish us luck this Friday!
I never did understand the sycophantic relationship so many groups have with their GM. Maybe it's because as a GM I want to tell stories as bad / worse as most people want to play in them? Most other GMs I know are just players who reluctantly step up to the plate because SOMEONE has to be the GM, and so they need constant thanks and validation and final pizza slices to be appeased.
>>46201962
Even if the GM's do enjoy it, which as a GM I do, you still put in way more effort than the players. Ofcourse I do this for fun, but at the end of the day it's polite to say thank you to the person doing the actual work while the rest coast off his efforts.
>>46202003
I guess I don't see it as work. In my opinion, most really good GMs are failed novelists. The sort of people with millions of stories rattling around in their head, and binders and notebooks filled to the brim with maps, notes, character notes, plots, et cetera.
Hell, if I didn't have a group I'd still be writing adventures because I find it so much fun. The players are just my outlet to actually get to use some of it.
>>46202124
I see where you come from, but I've known a couple good GM's who consistently use their stories as a stimuli just to provoke their players into action. If you use a plot as a way to showcase your writing skills, then the players will end up with a half completed world rather than what you imagined unless you railroad them horribly, which is just as bad, if not worse.
>>46202232
That's an excuse that lazy GMs use. People who prefer open free form playing are people that don't know the alternatives. It's why settings with mounds of information available like the Forgotten Realms are so popular. There's substance to it, it feels like a breathing and dynamic world that exists and moves with or without you.
Players don't have to be railroaded into a plot for you to be able to GM, but by the same token, just giving your players the teeniest morsels of plot and hoping they write the story for you is just as awful. If they want to be arbiters of their own fate and avoid every hook you through, so be it, but it shouldn't be for lack of them having enough hooks to choose from.
If I drop the players in a city, you better believe I've got dozens of NPCs fleshed out there already. I've got tons of quests, hooks, and plots for them to unearth, stumble into or just be presented with at arrival. There are notes for what happens if some threats or opportunities aren't followed through on and how it will affect the overall climate of the region. When they get there, they don't feel like the town was just waiting with bated breath. When they make decisions on what to do, they understand that not pursuing something can have as much an effect as pursuing it.
A good GM creates that dynamic world. He immerses his players.
>>46202356
through=throw*
Embarrassing slip.
>>46202356
I didn't mean that you shouldn't come up with elaborate plots and such, but you shouldn't be in a position where you require them to follow the yellow brick road. A dynamic world is something we both agree is key, but a good story and a good plot for a TTRPG aren't necessarily the same thing.
>>46202729
And yet I think both a good story and a good plot are key. What's that copypasta that floats around sometime where the players ignore the lich threat to institute gay marriage?
But anyhow, it's all secondary to the original point being made. In my experience there are three kinds of GMs.
1. Player GMs. These are the ones that would much rather be playing and are only taking the mantle because someone has to and they either drew short straw or reluctantly volunteered. These are ones that need thanks and ego-stroking, and often verbal commitments that 'next story, someone else has to run so I can play!'. I guess nothing specifically precludes them from being good GMs, but I've never seen one that tipped the scales further than the worse end of average.
2. Low-energy GMs. These are the majority of your GMs. They put very little effort into being a GM and laugh off anyone who criticizes it (which almost no one ever will, for fear of losing a GM and someone having to be #1) by saying "I do this to relax, it's not a job." Stories and quests are winged most of the time with little foreplanning. The GM scribbles out a map of the dungeon literally as you explore it. He proudly tells everyone else that he doesn't railroad his players, he lets them choose their fate. He's just there as a facilitator. Players who don't know better think he's just fantastic. This kind of GM basks in praise, thanks and bribes. It's part of the "culture" after all. Someone brings him a mountain dew, so he "fudges" the Bugbear's crit roll ;DDDD, etc.
3. GMs who love to GM. These are the ones with mountains of books and binders ensconcing them like a castle during play. Other GMs might game on Friday nights or something, but this is what this guy does for free time every night and is just unleashed when you show up Friday. His week was spent crafting dungeons and questlines, and working out personal tailor-made challenges from your character's backstory.
>>46202895
Granted, nothing makes #3 any better than #2 or #1. Slavish devotion to the game and enthusiasm is no substitute for raw talent or capacity for compelling storytelling. But on average, when you're playing in a game where this is what the GM LOVES and this is what they want to be doing, it's better. The disparity in effort is noticeable. So, again, #3's aren't always better than 1's and 2's, but the absolute best GMs are always #3's.
>>46202930
Oh, and generally #3's don't want or are bewildered by thanks.
Thank him? He should be thanking them! The players aren't HALF as excited as he is to tell this story. Here, why don't you all get the last slice of pizza for showing up!
>>46202895
I would say that those categories don't necessarily equate to GM quality.
GM's who love to GM can very easily get caught up in their own imagination to the point where others aren't following, or even worse, they magical realm it.
Also, the classifications aren't nearly that clear-cut.
I would personally rate myself as a mix of 2 and 3. I GM for the sole purpose that my players enjoy themselves. I put hours into planning throughout the week for the game day. I don't require thanks or gifts or anything of the like, but I do get a morale boost when the players say they enjoyed the session.
Devotion to the GM doesn't necessarily make a GM a good GM. Being a good GM makes a good GM, and for the majority of cases the more effort they put in the better, with plenty of exceptions however.
>>46202930
>>46202895
As a GM, I'm somewhere between all of these. I enjoy GMing but part of me is a bit sad to be the Forever GM. I used to do a metric ton of prepwork for every session but now I do way more fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants gaming for small scale stuff, in part because I found my best laid plans would often end up never coming into effect forcing me to wing it anyway. I've got an image of the big picture and maps of any dungeons, but beyond that? I'm making this up as I go along.
>>46201499
We do everytime we leave his house. Both for hosting us and runing the session.
I try to think of doing it, but not always with the DM we have on roll20. But i did it 2 sessions ago, so it's kinda okay.
>>46201962
And there is the simple case where people both enjoy being DM and player.Was so happy when a player told me that she liked my custom setting
>>46203019
As I said, one isn't inherently better at GMing than the other. Raw talent and intelligence accounts for the largest chunk. But there's no discounting experience, effort and passion, and that scales up as you climb those numbers.
The difference between a GM who does it because he has to and one who does it because it's his passion is always going to be there, even if the former is smarter and more talented.
Now, the fact that you spend the week planning out your game, don't require your players to thank or bribe you makes you solidly a type 3 GM in my eyes. The forethought, the planning, the taking that extra time to elevate what would've good to make it great? That's the major distinction between 2 and 3.
Like the difference between a gamer and someone who games.
>>46203051
I've never found a group that was so consistently off the rails that planning was pointless. Could you share your experience? What was your plot, and how did they completely fly off? And when you plotted their new course, how did that fall apart?
>>46203094
>where people both enjoy being DM and player
I never had much patience for the latter. I think it's the downtime between sessions. As a GM, I can spend that writing more ideas and plots. Draw out a few more dungeon maps "just in case." Detail hamlets and townships they might never visit, but if they do! BAM! Fleshed out world.
As a player, you're just waiting to play. It's exciting and fun when you are, sure, but... as a GM you get to play whenever you want. And the more you play, the better the game is on game night. Y'know?
>Was so happy when a player told me that she liked my custom setting
I love hearing about custom settings! Any bit you want to share?
>>46203412
>I've never found a group that was so consistently off the rails that planning was pointless. Could you share your experience? What was your plot, and how did they completely fly off? And when you plotted their new course, how did that fall apart?
The large scale plot isn't the issue. THAT I can keep largely in control. Heck, I don;t usually need to try. But the small scale? I introduce a hostile ghost or ghost-like entity expecting the group to go ghost busters on it and they try to talk to it to resolve unfinished business. I show off a notably dangerous combat encounter with everything short of a direct DM-to-player warning to NOT take it head on and rather than going for what's controlling the big monster they take it head on.And win thanks to the cleric casting revivify something like three times and me being generous about the enemy stomping unconscious PCs due to not wanting a TPK. If I make a castle and plan for the group trying to enter through the front gate or by sneaking through the walls, they'll want to try the sewers. And I've learned to roll with it and let them find out the layout for a sewer slog rather than mumbling something about the sanitation system being portal-based so would you please find another way in (Unless I'd already established that fact in public)
>>46203529
Well, none of that sounds so bad, or at least so awful to turn into a "fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants" GM.
The ghost thing is one of my favorite parts about being a GM. That moment when they quit treating it like a video game RPG and look for motive and purpose behind encounters. That's delicious immersion, baby. That's not a CR 5 Undead worth ___ XP, that's a thinking creature with plot.
And then you, you lucky bum, you get until the next session to start coming up with more information. Graveyards, crypts, the tragic backstory that you winged now gets fleshed out. NPC backstories are introduced. Tying the whole thing back to your original plot is the final step. This side quest just made elevated your whole thing. Delicious.
As far as the dangerous encounter, I feel you there. One of the hardest lines to walk as a GM is lethality. No one wants to be the ineffectual GM that mollycoddles their group. They know there's no danger, so why not charge every dragon they see? It'll work out! But no one wants to be the jerk that wiped the entire group and necessitated the rolling of new characters. Still though, if they're consistently blitzkrieging into danger, it might be because you've given them the impression of the former and the only cure is a healthy dose of the latter. Nothing solves players think a GM won't kill them quite like a character's death.
With the sewer thing, I think it's admirable you winged a sewer system in. With me, if I didn't account for a sewer system (I don't even know how that would work in a castle), there just isn't one. Chamber maids and the like empty refuse buckets. Just because they're looking for the sewer entrance doesn't mean there has to be one. Or even if there is, that it's a 10x10 torch illuminated low-water one for them to trapse about in.
>>46203745
>Well, none of that sounds so bad, or at least so awful to turn into a "fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants" GM.
Oh, don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining! I actually rather enjoy seeing the out of the box solutions.
>>46202356
>>46202895
You seem awfully critical of GMs who just wing it.
There's a whole school of performance dedicated to improvizing comedy or narratives. Why should GMing be any different? There are GMs who can come up with an amazing story and world on the fly, much in the same way there are the novelist-type GMs who write it all down beforehand.
You can even improv within an established setting like the Forgotten Realms if you know it well enough, or a GM with good historical/world-building knowledge could create a world that opens up around the players as they're playing.
In fact, if you learn improv, one of the mantras they'll teach you is to "think inside the box". If you're doing a scene set in a modern office, you don't have a dragon fly in out of nowhere. In GMing, this translates to a structured and consistent world.
>>46204464
>Why should GMing be any different?
Because it is different. I'm honestly shocked that you can't see that the two don't parallel here. Shortform improv is all well and good and a fine talent to cultivate, but this isn't a five minute skit at a random locale. This is a breathing and evolving world.
You winging it might go well. It might even go better than well, but it won't be as good as it would've if you'd cared to put the legwork in to plan and make it great. You miss out on the little details that could've drawn your players in and made them feel like they're really a part of something bigger. Sure, what you gave them was acceptable. But never forget: "Acceptable" is the enemy of greatness.
That inspired moment when you realized that it was actually an Ogre tearing across the farmer's land and not a haunting? It would've been better had you planned it before. Your party's Ranger could've had a Survival check to note the Ogre scat or tracks. Gather Information checks could've had your bard hear about a hostile tribe of Hill Giants driving the Ogres and Trolls out of the local mountain regions into other lands. The longer you had time to think about it, the more you planned that it wasn't just the CR 3 loot pinata to finish the farmer's quest... but this ogre is separate from the others fleeing the mountain for a reason.
Sure, this inspiration could come to you in the moment, but you can't retroactively add the details. Maybe the ogre is old and blind. But you can't go back an hour and describe the devastation in such a way that it looks like something stumbled into the animal pen and started flailing about, killing things that got too close. Or maybe it was a mother ogre that was slowed down by caring for her newborn, and she actually was trying to steal a few goats to survive the upcoming cold winter in the countryside alone. But then you already said the animals were all slaughtered.
See what I mean?
>>46201499
That fucker doesn't deserve it. Last campaign was literally the shittiest one I ever played. I wonder why I didn't drop it earlier.
>>46202895
This seems like a fair and unbiased depiction of GM types.
At a guess, I'd say you're number three. Am I right?
>>46201499
No, but my GM hasn't run anything lately, so we're square.
>>46202895
Lemme guess. You're a #3.
If so, why aren't you "ensconced" by your books and binders writing up the backstory of every NPC's freckle, pimple and unfortunate birthmark, instead of frivolously dividing your attention by being on /tg/, making totally fair and balanced posts?
Us real gms huh amiright ;DDDDDDD etc.
>>46201499
Nope, and I wouldn't want to be thanked when I run either.
'thanks for the session' just comes off like you're trying to be polite. Telling your GM what you liked about the session is a hell of a lot better encouragement. It shows that you were paying attention and that you liked part of the game enough to speak up and say it. It's also useful to them in running future games.
My GM is inexperienced and is taking flak, so in lieu of thanks I'm trying to deliver some validation instead.
>>46205827
You do realize you didn't describe anything that couldn't have been improvised, right?
