Gamecraft: The Stress-Free GM – part 1

Over the years my approach to running games has changed and evolved.  I used to spend the game session scribbling notes, rolling dice, consulting charts, and frantically trying to anticipate my players’ actions, and keep them on track.  Oftentimes, the players would throw me off by wanting to go somewhere that I hadn’t planned on, or by interacting with an NPC that I hadn’t fleshed-out, or by taking a totally unexpected course of action.  These are those moments of pure GM frustration, when the players go “off the map.”  Sometimes I would just wing it and hope for the best; other times I would stop the game for a while to readjust and compensate for the new direction things were going.  Both of these techniques worked to varying degrees, but not without adding stress to my life and completely disrupting the game.

These days when I run a game, I do it with the confidence that nothing is going to throw me off or derail the game.  I’m ready for whatever the players want to do and wherever they want to go.  I’m ready to tackle whatever the players throw at me.  So what’s the secret to running the stress-free game? How do you approach your game with this level of confidence and self assuredness?  Well, the answer is simple, really.  Do what I did – run games for thirty years and eventually it will get easier!  However, for those of you who’d prefer some advice that can help you tonight, I’ll let you in on the secret: relax, be flexible, and don’t stress… But since that’s easier said than done, I’m here to offer the following tips and techniques for making your life easier and for making the game as fun for you to run as it is for your players to play.

Tip 1: Change Your Focus

In the past, when I would begin laying out a campaign I found that I was very player character-focused.  My mindset had me thinking about how the PCs would do something, or when an event would happen to the PCs, or what the PCs would do.  Although it is critical to remember that the players and their characters are the focus of the story while actually playing the campaign, they are not necessarily the focus while designing the campaign.

These days when I begin designing a campaign, I start by focusing on the setting and the NPCs.  I develop a feel for the people, places and events that are going to be important during the campaign.  Even before I have a theme, a primary antagonist, or plot line in mind, it’s critical for me to know the setting, to have an understanding of how its components work together without interference.  I get a feel for the setting and then begin thinking about the people within it, more specifically, who they are, why they are there, and what they want.  Once I have some idea about the people in the setting I move on to thinking about my antagonist(s).  I don’t need to think about goals or motivations yet, just what type of antagonists the campaign will feature.  There could be power-mad despots, a criminal organization, psychotic serial killers, or even the environment itself working against the heroes.

Having an idea about the campaign’s antagonist, I beginning thinking about what they want and how they are going to get it.  In my mind I begin telling the story from the villain’s point of view.  I think about where the villain will go, who he will ally with, what he’s going to do, and what he’s already done.  I have found it is much easier to envision the antagonist’s plans at this point without thinking about how it will interact with the PCs.  In a nutshell, I imagine how the campaign will evolve for the antagonist without any influence or interference from outside sources or random factors. Enter the PCs, or as I like to call them, the random factors.

Changing your design focus makes it much less work to remain flexible and adapt to the infinite variety of unforeseeable things that your players and their characters do.  Reacting to the characters’ actions is much easier than anticipating them.  Once you begin thinking from the antagonist’s and the world’s points of view, it usually becomes self-evident what will happen in response to any course of action the PCs choose to take.  A clear understanding of what the bad guys are trying to achieve makes it easier to figure out how their plans will change when they’re interfered with.   When you eliminate the need to anticipate the actions of the player characters your life as a GM becomes much less complicated.  Remember, focus your energy on the characters you control, not the ones you don’t.

Tip 2: You Run the World, not the Other Way Around

As GMs, we continually design and create worlds – even when we use published settings we still take great liberties with the design for our individual campaigns.  However, in an effort to design a realistic and exciting setting, many GMs frequently back themselves into a corner. We do this without even realizing what we are doing every time we place a dungeon on a map, when we pick a specific location for some climactic battle, or even when we decided when an event will occur.  Once we commit to some specific time, place, or event within the campaign, we often become completely inflexible about it.

I use to do this all of the time.  I would design a great location for some fantastic encounter, make it the scene for the final confrontation with some arch-villain, and then I would place it somewhere on my map.  The only problem was the minute I placed it somewhere, whether on a physical map or in my mind’s eye, I felt committed to its location and its circumstances.  I would place myself in a position where I was forced to find a way to get my players to that location or to make those circumstances occur.  By doing this, I allowed the world to control my game and dictate the things I needed to do to make my story work.  The secret to overcoming this is for the GM to not fear having a lack of commitment. I know this goes against everything your parents, boss, and significant other has been saying to you, but it is one of the secret keys to stress-free gamemastering.  I like to think of it as the Schrodinger’s Cat Theory of campaign management.

For those of you unfamiliar with Schrodinger’s Cat (and if you call yourself a geek you should be familiar with it), it is a thought experiment in which a cat is placed into a box wherein there is a 50/50 chance of the cat being killed.  How the cat might die is irrelevant here (maybe it’s a one hit point minion) but Schrodinger suggested that until we actually look into the box we don’t know the cat’s fate, and furthermore the cat’s fate may, in fact, be undetermined until we look into the box.  So what does Schrodinger, his cat, and your lack of commitment, have to do with being a better GM?  Simple, be flexible.  Remember, only the part of your world that the characters are actually interacting with, needs to be in solid, sharp focus with a sense of permanence.   Many of the aspects of your world can be safely tucked away in the box with Schrodinger’s Cat.  They can exist in a state of flux, ready to be used when and where you need them until the characters open the box and “reality” is forced to take shape.

When I gamemaster, there are many “static” features in my campaign – most of the villages, cites, and geographic features of the world are fixed and in permanent locations.  However, there are still many aspects of the campaign area I leave “in the box.”  Say for example, I design a haunted tower. I won’t commit to it’s location until I’m forced to.  Then when I need to use it I can place it in the characters’ path.  Of course, it won’t appear in a place in which the characters have actually been and they know there has never been a tower there (unless it is some sort of “ghost-tower” or something), but it will appear when I need it and once the characters “look in the box.”  This reduces GM stress in a couple of ways – first, I don’t have to worry about how to get the characters to the tower.  I don’t have to drop a bunch of “subtle” hints or worry about “railroading” the characters.  And secondly, it helps maintain the illusion of free-will for the characters.  This approach works for events, locations, NPC’s, almost anything.  Many of the elements of your campaign are things that can remain in the box until you decide that it has been opened.  Remember: flexibility is the hallmark of the stress-free GM.

You can read part 2 here.