PSA: Just Play
For a very long time I didn’t think I could be a gamemaster. I wondered, “What kind of genius must you be to create and hold a world in your head?” Not only did this keep me from trying to run games, but it also kept me from playing at all.
After I graduated college, I went into a pretty demanding career that both consumed a lot of time (like all careers do) but also required me to move every two to three years. This was 2005 and online gaming wasn’t really a thing, so this made finding a group pretty tough. In retrospect though there was ample opportunity to create a group. The friends I made along the way were often the right kinds of nerds to love TTRPGs. However, this was also prior to 2014 and the rise of D&D 5e, Critical Role, and the other influences that launched TTRPGs into the general consciousness. If these friends were to learn about and experience these games, they were going to need to do it through me. I sucked at that.
At one point I had a friend in my little apartment admire my D&D and Star Wars RPG books. He said, “Oh cool, I’d love to try that sometime!”
Want to know what I said? How I responded? I said, “That’s great, if I can ever find a gamemaster, I’ll let you know.”
“…if I can ever find a gamemaster, I’ll let you know…”
I hate that I said that. That was maybe the biggest missed opportunity in my gaming life. If I had stepped up and run a game, I know at least three other friends who would have showed to try it. I missed an opportunity to bring people I liked into the hobby I loved. I also missed an opportunity to to start running games and build confidence to keep playing. That would have meant a break in playing of less than two years after I said goodbye to my college group. Instead that break in play would stretch into 17 years. If I could go back in time, I’d slap 24-year-old me across the face and shout “You need to be that gamemaster!”
Old books, once seen long, long ago in studio apartment far, far away…
Ok, I probably wouldn’t slap younger, naive, me, but I’d give him a good talking to. I think I’d tell him something like this:
You don’t need to be a genius to run a fun game. You don’t need to hold a world in your head. Start small: a town, a dungeon, and a forest or small region is enough for fantasy game. Sci-fi games can be limited to a colony or space station. Players don’t need magic carpets or starships in the first session. You don’t need to define the world because you are the world, it is your character. Just be consistent, once you say something it becomes real. Make a note, it doesn’t have to be super detailed, just enough to capture a new bit of the world so your players can visit it again. Or start with a published adventure but be willing to let it blossom into something larger. Also be willing to change what’s on the page – yeah you can do that, you’re the gamemaster. The key thing is…you can’t prep everything, and you don’t need to. You only need to prep what you need to get a session started. It will often shift and change, but you can adapt. It’s also ok to take a break and refill beverages or snack bowls. This is often plenty of time to find your footing for the next bit of the gaming situation. Your players need to pee too, its fine.
I think you’ll find what I found. That running a game is just a conversation with your players. The experience will arise at the speed of speech. Give your players the agency to choose where they go, but you control the pace at which they get there. If they ask to visit a neighboring village/colony/region/planet you can say yes. If its late in a session it’s cool to say, “that’s a good stopping point, what is y’all’s intent in the new place.” It is ok to take their input and take the time to prep.
Trust me, if there is a GM in the group, they will really get it. The forever players won’t think much of it, because like an earlier version of you and me, they will think it’s all magic…
Please, for you and for them, and for 24-year-old me…Just play…