Thoughts on being a TTRPG Gamemaster

Having been a GM (gamemaster) for a full 10ish session Daggerheart campaign, I have naturally started to develop opinions. Role playing games are really just collaborative story telling prompts masquerading as games. There are a lot of stories out there and even more ways to tell them.

Exploring and answering these questions has been incredibly rewarding. It scratches a creative itch I have always had. Like any other creative person, there is a deep want to create something truly "unique". But when running a TTRPG there is also this beautiful freedom to blend and steal any and all inspiration with reckless abandon!

I want to develop a writing style that does a lot with a short word count. Something that gives the sense of a person, place or thing quickly and richly. I love descriptions that engage the senses and are "vibes" heavy. Finding the correct music to go with these spoken words is important, as it helps the imagination fill in the gaps.

I love worlds and stories that make you ask questions. You should not know how or why things work, at least not at the beginning. Stuff like murder mystery "whodunits" and voyages into lands unknown. Grounded emotional stories can thrive in these backdrops.

I like magic that is rooted in the organic. Druids with dirty hands mixing bitter herbs and sweet smelling flowers. Blades forged from an odd alloy which blazes hot in the sun. the heroes, being ordinary people, must call upon the powers of their extraordinary natural world.

Yes, I did write those last 3 paragraphs in my "style". Hopefully it didn't make you cringe.

My greatest weakness as a GM, right now at least, is not giving players enough agency. Because of my desire to tell a specific story, I will naturally railroad players. My DM style will always include big epic set pieces, but in between those I really want to create playgrounds for players to freely explore.

The challenge then is how do you structure a campaign? How do I design a set piece or story moment that can be slotted in after any player decisions?

I don't know

This blog post by the Angry GM about the "shape of adventures" has been inspiring. There is also the hard truth that I just need to give up some control, let players and dice rolls direct the story. I'll need to work on my improvisation skills..

In my daggerheart campaign I experimented a lot with how I ran things. I tried printing battle maps, building them out of foamboard (utter failure), and using erasable mats. I tried running with my laptop, with a tablet (utter failure.. how the heck does multitasking work on IOS?!), and with just paper. For my next campaign I am going to try and optimize one set up.

  1. I will use emacs org mode for all my notes. I have been experiment with scripts to play music, setup monster stats, and link to other relevant notes. Hopefully that will result in a neat blog post. Org mode is super powerful!
  2. I will be using the erasable mat for all locations. After some soul searching about "grid based battle maps" vs "Theater of the mind", I realized that it's just fun as a player to move your mini around. Daggerheart uses flexible distance ranges instead of a specific grid, and that feels like a good fit for the group I play with.
  3. I will continue to ask players to use only paper playersheets. The temptation to browse reddit while its not your turn is massive.

This hobby has taken up more and more of my free time (and book shelf), so expect more writing on the topic! I still want to somehow share the worlds and stories of the campaigns I run here. However I haven’t decided on the right way to do that.