Making a Ruling

 One of the most common things a GM has to do when running a game is make rulings. The ability to make rulings is - in my opinion - one of the key things that makes a Table Top RPG infinitely more flexible than any computer game can be. See, every option before you in a computer game has to be specifically programmed for by the designers. If a player wants to do something that the designers didn't account for, well then they're just shit out of luck. But in a table top game, the GM can figure out a way to make it work.

So what should you consider when making a ruling? Let's go over the basic steps.

What Does The Player Want to Do?
The first thing you need to consider is what is it the player is trying to do? When asking yourself - or the player - this question don't just focus on the means by which they hope to bring about the end, but the end as well. There is a big difference between a PC trying to befriend the druid's wolf companions so he's on their good side, and a PC trying to do that in order to convince the local villagers that the wolves aren't something to be afraid of. And if you don't know what the player is going for, you may make the wrong ruling, or one that needlessly complicates things.

Does The System Do Anything Close To That?
The second thing is to check if your system does anything that is close to what the PC is trying to do. If nothing else you should have the system's 'core resolution mechanic' - the basis around how skill checks, combat checks, and all that are determined. But sometimes there is a more specific system or rules around things the player wants to do. If nothing else, a GM handbook may have some quick guidance if not full mechanics of something adjacent to the task.

This is a good idea to check just because why do work that is already done? And you may get ideas from for how you want to handle it for your game.

Can You Steal A Method From Another System?
If you have access to multiple systems, do any of them do the thing the player is looking to do? If so, can those rules be stolen if only for ideas? Taking from other systems is in general just a good idea as a GM. The 5e Legendary Actions mechanic can work in any system to make a boss feel more boss like. Aspects from FATE are easily stolen to give and track penalties and bonuses in a situation or to even tag or invoke on players and scenes as needed.

Is This Ruling Liable To Become A Rule?
The difference between a ruling and a rule, is that a ruling is meant to resolve something in the moment so that normal play can resume and the game can continue. A rule on the other hand is part of the game. It will be referenced again. It will come up again. A player wanting to make a magic sword as a one time thing is a ruling. A player wanting to make magic swords as a thing their character does on the semi-regular? That's a rule (or rule set.)

The more likely something is to be a rule, the more complex you can be with it as needed - provided it works, is fast enough for your needs, and is fun. The less likely it is to come up again? The more I suggest you stray to a simple method that gets the job done and move on.

Make Your Ruling
At this point, in most circumstances, you should be able to make your ruling. This may seem like a lot, but in the moment at the table it goes by very quickly. And when given time to make a decision you can more slowly indulge in looking for rules.

Don't get hung up on looking up rules at the table. When in doubt, make a ruling and move on. You can always look it up later and adjust as needed from there. But do consider what you know of the system, and how it works.

GMs Should NOT Be Aiming To Kill PCs

 I feel like I keep stumbling across stories about this over the past week. RPG Horror stories that frequent the theme of the GM or DM planning on, and in some cases outright saying, that they were going to kill at least one PC in a given scenario or boss fight. If I'm being charitable I can kind of get the idea. They want a boss to be scary. They want it to stand out. They want it to be a fight that the PCs remember or that meets their definition of 'adequate' amounts of cool for the boss. And that means not being a chump who gets wrecked without even taking someone with them.

The problem is that if you have in your notes, or your head, that you're killing a PC you're already doing it wrong. And if you tell the players you are doing this, you've already ruined the encounter - and likely their trust in you as a GM.

Be Ready For Open Ended Choices

 Open Ended choices are a necessity to come up in RPGs at times. There is simply no avoiding situations where the PCs have a blank slate in front of them - or just a problem - and all the options in the world open to them for how to overcome this obstacle. It is a chance for the Players to show their full creativity. However, it is also prone to bringing the game to a screeching stop if not worse if you, the GM giving the choice, are not ready for what it means when you give an Open Ended Choice to your players.

How We Think It Will Work
The idea is simple. It is the core essence of how RPGs should work. You provide a situation to your PCs, and they tell you what they do and the game goes forward from there. If the obstacle is in the way, the PCs tell you how they try to overcome it. If the choice is more about where they're going, they tell you which way. Easy, right?

Well, kind of...

How It Goes Over
Frequently what happens when an open ended choice is given out - especially in what could be a tense situation - is the game freezes. The Players presented with a simple "what do you do?" either freeze and look around like they were caught not having done their homework, or they start asking all sorts of questions that have at best limited relation to the situation you have in your mind. So what is going on?

In Your Head vs. In Their Head
The first problem, and the reason for all the questions and some of the freezing, is how the picture looks. You likely have the whole scenario in mind and know what everything looks like and what the relevant information is. This is easy for you, because you built the scenario. In the players head it may look completely different. And odds are it is not a complete picture.

Option Paralysis
The second problem is option paralysis. With every option open to the players (perhaps hyperbolically but you get the idea) choosing one option can be near impossible. This is especially true when there is a feeling of a choice being potentially wrong. If your players are creeping around and come upon a strange box in the middle of the road there are potential wrong answers. Which means the obvious choices - go and check it out - could lead to potentially bad results. Very often the players are frozen because they fear a wrong choice could cost them their character - or someone else's character. Other players are afraid of being ridiculed or mocked by their fellow players for doing the "stupid thing" that triggered an obvious trap.

Players Are Not As 'In Game' As They Should Be
Sessions tend to be 4 hours long. That is a long time to be in game, and frequently players will fall in and out of game as a session goes on. If one person is talking for a long time - especially if there is no change in the tone of voice - some people will check out. Even if they're completely interested in the game, the constant stimulus in unchanging tone/pitch from one person just turns into noise and their brain goes to check other things. It is essentially the 'falling asleep in class' problem, just for fantasy pretend games.

How is this a problem? Because the player knows they're supposed to do something, but they don't know what, and they don't fully understand the situation. Only they don't want to ask questions or clarify because they're worried they'll come across as uninterested in the game or otherwise not engaged because their brain slipped out.

How To Be Ready?
So three problems, how can we be ready for this? First, be ready to answer questions, and when answering your questions keep in mind that your players don't have the benefit of picturing the scene in their head with the same clarity you do. Be kind to questions and give full answers. Point out what the important information is. And when players ask about doing potential actions, ask them what their hoped for results will be and work with them on achieving those.

Whenever possible be able and ready to summarize the situation in short, distinct points as a sort of summary. "In summary, there is a gift wrapped box in the middle of the road sitting there. You don't think this is a good place for an ambush. It is definitely strange. There is no way to continue forward without going past the box, or backtracking a third of a day to go the long way adding 2 more days to your trip." This loses a lot of the drama of the narration you did, but it sums up the situation into digestable bites your players can work with. It also helps bring anyone who may have missed something up to speed when their brain goes "shit, he asked a question. Pay attention!"

Better: Provide Options
An even better idea though is to never just drop an open ended question on your players. Instead, give them options with one of those options being room to go their own way. For example, with our gift box scenario you could present it as "Would you like to go forward as a group to investigate, have just the rogue go forward to check for traps, try to scan it from a distance, or do something else?"

This doesn't cure the above problems, but by giving options and ideas you give people something to latch onto and work with. You show routes forward that they can take and ways they can deal with the problem.

Don't Open Session With An Open Choice
Finally, as a word of advice, try not to open session with an open choice. Your players aren't fully in their characters yet. The game isn't fully in mind. The session has no momentum. An Open choice starting things off can be a painful, grating experience and in some cases can kill a session dead because everyone will want to do something else, or won't know what to do, and then that is your session.

A closed choice however works well here. A few limited options to get things moving. Build up some momentum. And once the game is going and people are fully in character, you can open up the choices more and more.

PC Pets

 In a couple of the games I run I have had PCs look to have pets for their characters. Pets are a weird things when it comes to RPGs - especially combat heavy ones like D&D. Why are they weird? Because animals tend to be fairly squishy and easily killed, especially as PCs get stronger. This isn't normally a problem, except that the idea of a pet also implies an emotional attachment.

The "Problem" With Charisma

 The youtube algorithm brought this video across my feed the other day. Being as Charisma in games is something I am always interested in seeing I clicked it. I am not going to say this person is right or wrong, their advice - like all advice - should be listened to, considered, measured for usefulness in the unique situation for you, and then used or discarded. I will say however that I feel this is an incomplete argument for both how to handle Charisma, and how you can handle shy players with High Charisma characters - and high charisma players with low charisma characters.

It's Ok To Be A Little Silly

 Even if you're running a serious game. Even if you're in a serious part of the game. Don't forget that it is ok to be a little silly, and that silliness might even be something that just happens. Some players - like myself - will occasionally make jokes to lighten the mood when things seem to be getting too tense or dour. It doesn't mean they're not enjoying things - if anything it means you're having the desired effect.

Handling A Rules Dispute At The Table

 I've seen some conversations online with people wondering where the line is between bringing up a rules question and with being a rules lawyer. If you're new to the hobby this can definitely be confusing. Very few things in gaming are as loathed and despised as the dreaded 'rules lawyer' player. it is probably the most despised player type that is at least somewhat acceptable to have at the table. At the same time, gaming is also rife with stories of GMs causing players harm and decreasing the fun at the table through bad rulings that seem aimed to make the players lose even when the rules indicate otherwise.

Let Them Play, Correct After Game

One of my tendencies as a GM, and even as a player, is to correct things when I think they're being stated wrong. This isn't malicious on my part. I just don't want people acting under the incorrect information, and it is very easy to get something wrong in an RPG. The problem with this though is that sometimes people are deliberately giving wrong information, and by chiming in you're disrupting the scene, the conversation, and making things more awkward.

There are a lot of reasons for someone to give the wrong info deliberately. Sometimes it is how their character saw it. Sometimes they feel their character just wouldn't get it or care enough to get it right. Sometimes they are actually trying to deceive and lie in character.

The reason doesn't matter. What matters is that when you chime in and bring things out of character to correct it, you can lose a lot of energy in the scene. In ensuring that the player knows what is up, and is saying it deliberately, you break them out of the moment. This can de-escalate desired in character tension.

Let Them Play
Because of this, of late I've started giving myself the following advice mid-session: let them play. Keep quiet, let them play the scene out IC, and don't interrupt either with clarifications or stuff going on in the world. Let the scene play out and see what happens.

Now if things slow down, or the world is primed to interrupt that is one thing, but 90% of the time when the PCs are having a conversation there is nothing immediately going on that could interrupt that. When the GM moves things along, they're literally moving things along either in time or location. So just let the players play out the scene.

Pay Attention
That said, you still want to pay attention. If 2 of 6 players are doing a private scene, you can do stuff with the other 4 players. There is no reason that they can't also do something while those PCs are having their private scene. Even then, try to pay some attention to the conversation. Did something important get said wrong? if so, make a note for yourself. Were there questions they need answers for? Make a note.

Are things getting heated in character? Keep an eye on it. If it seems to be going out of character you can chime in with a "is everything cool, out of character I mean?"

Time For Correction
After the game make yourself available to the players on an out of character level for questions and clarifications. This is the time to ask about those things you made notes of. You can do it privately with the player, or openly at the table depending on how your group works. Mostly I don't keep secrets from the other players and trust them to keep their IC knowledge and OOC knowledge divided, so I can just ask. Other groups may do things differently, and that's just fine.

After the game is also a good time to make sure players are having fun out of character even if their characters are at each other's throat in character. Drama is fine. Tension is good. As long as both are kept in character. Out of character? It's a game. It's supposed to be fun.

Don't Be Afraid to Speak Up

Over the past weekend one of my friends was coming off a bit of a rough week and was more tired than normal for the Friday D&D game I run, and the Sunday Star Wars game we're both in. The result was he ended up being more quippy than normal. He was in that state of tired where his filter was off, and so he responded - in character - to more things than he normally did.

Which was completely awesome.

I like playing with this guy, but at times his characters can feel weird or flat partly because he can be so reluctant to speak up. But with the zingers and responses, not only did we get to see more of the character and get insight, but it prompted other people to speak up more as well. The game became more enjoyable, a couple laughs broke out out of character from snarky comments, and in general it made for a pleasant experience.

Now, I'll never tell you to do something you're completely uncomfortable with, but the thing I took from this - and I hope the friend did too - is that you shouldn't be afraid to speak up and give voice to your character. RPGs are as external for others as they can be internal for you, and if you don't interact at the table, let your character speak, or go and perform actions there is nothing there for the other people at the table to see or latch onto for your character.

This doesn't mean there is anything wrong with staying quiet if you prefer that. However, in general I would recommend making the effort to speak up and put your character into the game. Have fun. Triumph. Fail. Learn. Make things interesting. You can't do any of that unless you first speak up and have your character do something.

And for the rest, I know this seems super basic, but even DMing for 20+ years and playing for longer I am often the person at the table being quiet and letting everyone else play while I don't voice my character. The basic things need to be said sometimes. If only to remind us of how they work.

It's a game. Have fun. Play. Leave it all on the table so you can come back and pick up the pieces next time.

Table Craft: The Importance of Session 0

Session 0 is a common term used in communities discussing table top RPGs. For those unfamiliar, Session 0 is the first session of the game that takes place before the game starts. At Session 0 you make characters with the other players (sometimes anyhow), and in general talk about the game before the game gets going.

It is a good chance to talk to the GM and the other players about your character. It lets you set up pre-existing connections with other PCs. It lets you say where you want the game to go. Most importantly, it enables everyone to get on the same page regarding expectations for the game.

Table Craft: What Your Location Ideally Should Have

When it comes down to it, the beauty of 'table top rpgs' is that with theater of the mind you can run the game about anywhere. With how good digital products are of late, provided you have your character sheet and dice - both of which can be on your phone - you could legitimately run a game of D&D in a car driving across the country. Now, I'm not sure if I would recommend that - especially if the driver is the GM - but you could.

That said, in my experience there are some things that qualify a space as a better gaming space than others. Obviously your mileage may vary when it comes to what works for you and your group, but these are some things you want to consider.

Table Craft: The Location Where You Run Your Game

At the end of last week Rob Donoghue tweeted that one of the places where there isn't a lot of GM advice is about all the things outside the game that have influence on how the game runs and works. I wanted to jump in because my Table Craft tag was designed for exactly that, but ultimately I've done very little with it. However, I agree that it is a topic that can be just as important as anything else for in person games.

The thing is, there is a lot to talk about outside the game. This is just one aspect of it. But let's talk about your gaming space.

Adding Players To Your Game

Adding players to a game can be a fun and great experience for the game. It can add a new dynamic to the game in general, and can bring new energy to the players. The introduction of a new PC can test, push, and develop relationships. Not to mention the added skillsets to the group, and new avenues for challenges. That being said, there are some steps I've found it is best to take in order to keep your game safe and fun. After all, while a new player can bring a lot of good things...bad chemistry can also make it a bad fit which can damage the game.

As Long As It Is Fun For You & Your Group

Any time someone posts a story about their game, there is invariably one response in the mix. That response is different in wording, but carries the same message about a rule done wrong or a correction for the game. In some threads this can go on and in a depth to a troubling degree. Why troubling? Because the implication is that you're running your game wrong.

Now there are other responses, and I doubt everyone posting with a rules clarification is trying to say you're game is wrong, but it is easy to come to that conclusion. And when you see it so often, and everyone has opinions on how games should go, it can be very pervasive. Then there are sites and blogs like mine that give advice on how to run the game, and you may continue to think that way.

So let's lay it out straight: If you and your players are having fun, you are playing your game right and fine.

I don't care if you ignore or break every rule. I don't care if you don't use dice. I don't care if you 'railroad' every encounter. If everyone at the table is having fun, you're doing your game right.

Remember that whenever you doubt, whenever you're not sure, and whenever you're stuck. As long as the game is fun, it is a good game.

And some sessions will be less fun than others. And some moments may be a bother. But just aim to have the game be fun as possible, and you'll be alright.

Danger Level, Expectations, and Trust

Over the past couple weeks I've seen a lot of discussions online about danger level in RPGs and how it works. For example, a conversation about the Princes of the Apocalypse campaign posited that the campaign was set up so if players discovered they were in an area too difficult for them at the time, they could go somewhere else first. However, despite this option, most groups chose not to do this which led to disastrous results for the game.

The person making that observation was curious as to why it happened. To which Matt Coleville simply responded "because the players are there to play D&D." This sparked a huge discussion about danger level, the openness of game worlds, and whether or not it is ok to have a world where players can run into encounters and areas too dangerous for them.

The interesting thing to me though is that this conversation has very little to do with danger level or whether PCs should retreat and return to encounters/areas later when they're stronger. Despite what many people thought. No, this conversation is about two things: Expectations and Trust.

"Waiting is the bane of Exploration"

I was watching an old egoraptor video for some reason about The Legend of Zelda, and he dropped this line in the middle of a rant about Ocarina of Time's failings in design: "Waiting is the bane of exploration." The line made me sit up in my chair, because it kicked my brain over. There are parts of table top RPGs I don't like, and it is always hard to put my finger on them. I know I - in general - don't particularly enjoy dungeon crawls, and while I like the idea of exploration a session just about exploration tends to turn me off.

Setting the Social Contract

Over the weekend I ended up in a prolonged exchange with a fellow random internet citizen about their game. The person was disappointed because after putting a lot of effort into their game, having enthusiastic players, and working hard to build those players not only a spot in the game, but a place in the story...only a couple of them were really invested in the game.

I can tell you from first hand experience this can be a crushing feeling. You have all your hopes and effort into the idea of the game. Part of the idea is the return of your effort from the other people. Only...they don't seem that into it.

We Built A Table Topper - Part II (Now With Pictures)

Over the weekend my buddy and I took a shot at revising the table topper we made in November to get it into a better spot. It still needs work, but after what we did (mostly shortening the legs and changing the hinges) I'm a lot happier with it's appearance, how it feels at the table, and everything else about it. In the process I learned a valuable lesson about doing a little bit more research before jumping into projects, and how sometimes the 'cheap' way and the 'smart' way have literally the exact same cost.

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We Built A Table Topper

I was hoping to have this post for Friday, but Thanksgiving went better than expected - and thus longer - and Friday was consumed with the actual building. I was also hoping to have some pictures, and I'll hopefully get to add some soon but I haven't had a chance yet as of the time of this writing.

On Friday we built a table top that can sit atop our normal table. The table we use for game is great, but when everyone has their character sheet, dice, notebooks, drink, and potentially food it fills up fast and that leaves little room for battlemats, miniatures, and other things needed to be on display for game. The solution? build a second table to sit atop it.

What we have now is just a rough proof of concept. We already had the tools (consisting of two drills) but everything else (including screws) came to less than $70 at Home Depot, which isn't bad for building a tabletop. With the table top deployed there is currently 15 inches (this is too much. We're going to cut it down to about 9-10 inches!) of clearance for people to use the table. LED remote lights are on the bottom of the table to provide light for character sheets.

Essentially this doubles our table space. The actual table can now be used for sheets, dice, food, notes, and everything else. Then the action can be on clear display on the second tabletop. You have to stand to comfortably move your mini for combat, but I also noticed that everyone got a lot more into combat once they were standing which was awesome. Combats also got to be a lot bigger because we got to use the large battle mat I have instead of making do with the half sized one.

All in all, I recommend it if you can. Maybe you don't have a table space problem - or a very large table - which is awesome. But this was a relatively cheap solution that made the game better in a lot of ways in my opinion.

I'll update or follow up with pictures when I have them.

I did find this thread of people doing similar things (if you want to see about how it looks) which has also given me ideas for how to make my own work even better!

Starting A New Game

With two long running games having come to a conclusion for me recently, it should come as no surprise that starting a new game is on my mind. I figure this may be a good chance to go step by step through the process - as I see it - of starting a new game. Today I want to talk about the first steps.