Where To Find Advice

Hello Stuffer Shack, it’s been a while hasn’t it? No, I don’t have any excuses. Life got hectic, and I just kind of curled up in a ball and cried. Oh sure… you called, you wrote, you even invited me out to dinner last Tuesday night. But I didn’t show, did I? So now I’m back, and looking for your forgiveness. You’ll take me back, right?

Alright, with that out of the way, let’s get down to business. I’m Anthony, and it’s been a while since my last post here. Nothing personal, but life is life. Anyhow, I wanted to get back into the swing of things here, and I figured what better way to do that than to talk about where you can find advice. Crazy, I know, right? See, lots of places give advice (hint, the Shack gives awesome advice) but do you know where to find more? Very few places really do that, and there are mediums out there that many of us have yet to actually try. So, let’s talk about that today, shall we?

The Shack, and Sites Like It
First off, you’ve already found a great resource. The Stuffer Shack is an awesome example of a site with a lot of different blog authors coming at you with different bits of advice. There are other sites like this too, but the key point here is the variety of authors. Why? Because everyone games differently, and everyone has a different view point on gaming itself. Something that I might think is impossible is very likely something that Tourq does every other game with the greatest of ease. How? I dunno, you’d have to ask him. However, the inverse is also true, which means that I have some words of wisdom to help do things I can pull off that some others can’t. You don’t get that at a blog with only one author, because they can’t teach you how to do what they don’t know.

So, first and foremost, find some sites you like that are like the Shack here. They have lots of good stuff for you.

Other Blogs
After the sites with lots of authors, you have the dedicated author. Some blogs, like Reality Refracted (disclosure: this is my gaming blog) are more focused on the theory behind how you do things, and looking a bit deeper into mechanics. Others, like “Life and Times of a Philippine Gamer” will delve a bit more into system specifics, examples of play, and other topics. Yes, everyone will cover more than one type of thing over time, but having a variety in primary topics will help to keep you well-grounded. It can also be fun to find the blogs of a few of your favorite designers. Often they’ll give you tips and insight into how things should work (vs how they do work) that can blow your mind.

Podcasts
Podcasts are a growing medium, and one that has gotten big enough that you’ll likely be seeing several podcast sites in the Shack’s Site Of The Year contest (SOTY!). These are kind of like blogs, only you listen to them and they often are a bit more focused in each episode. Bonus points here because you can hear a conversation, sometimes they have guest speakers, and you’ll get multiple sides of an argument in a quick and easily understood chunk. Podcasts are one of the areas I’m hoping to find more on, and start listening to. The ones I have heard have been amazing, and are often very insightful into the topics at hand.

Gaming Books
That’s right, the books you use for playing your game can teach you a whole lot about how to run a game. Look at the system and ask yourself why things are presented the way they are. The game wants to be played a certain way, and the mechanics are set up to encourage that method of play. Find that, and you can find out a lot about how the designer and project leads feel about gaming and what works or doesn’t work. D&D can teach you a lot about going with a tactical RPG, while a game like Burning Wheel can teach a lot about making a spanning epic master piece. The advice is there in the books, you just have to find it.

The Point?
The point of all this is to keep you interested in learning. Odds are if you’re reading this website, you are interested in improving as a GM and/or a player. Never stop doing that. There is always something more you can learn, more you can do, and you won’t find out how – or what – if you don’t go looking for it. Keep those eyes open, and find advice where you can take it. It just might be easier to start in the places I’ve listed here.