Rules for the Roleplaying Table

 I thought I'd take a short off the path delve into roleplaying.  Not much to do with my story, but I thought I would share some ideas.

1) Everyone pitches in for dinner, (or lunch, or what ever).  Maybe this is in the form of a side dish or snacks or drinks.  We found that you, as a group, don't feel so upset at someone for eating all the food if they did contribute.  Roleplaying with a group of young men made me realize they eat a lot, so making sure it wasn't just one person bringing the food was a good idea.

2) No politics.  Or what ever you know is going to set someone off.  Our college group of roleplayers had some very different politics and though, unlike today, we could have a civilized conversation and agree to disagree on stuff the roleplaying table is not the place to bring this stuff up.  Stick to the game.  Yes, you can tangent to horrible professors, homework due, work assignment deadlines, or even the commute if you  have one, but stay off the sticky topics if you want to have a fun night.

3) Make sure as the GM you have everything ready to go and extra stuff for your players.  Our newer group of roleplayers didn't have dice and the like, but we knew that going in, so we made sure they had some dice to role and we had crisp new character sheets printed so they could make up their first ever characters.  It makes it so much smoother to have everything prepped, sorta like real life :)

4) Establish rules on rolling, take backs, and what a character knows.  This is much better to figure out before you sit down.  They don't have to be perfectly specific, but some guide lines are good.  Like everyone, except the GM, rolls out in the open and don't help a player if your character isn't in the room.  (This is tempting as a player all the time.)

Happy Gaming!

I Want a Campaign They Love

 Many of you may just write stories and have no idea about being a Game Master for a roleplaying game.  In this day and age of roleplaying online games, why do you need to do paper and pencils.  Personally, yes, it takes a long time to go through one battle with paper and pencil and dice, but it's the time with friends that really makes it worth the time and effort.  But unlike video games you want a good plot when you do the paper and pencil version.  Here are some ideas I hope help you find that good story:

1) So is this a one off or a campaign?  It does make a difference.  Long term you want to work in the plot line early along with any bad guys or friends.  One time game, just find a goal for the night, (rescue the prince, storm the castle, clean out the dungeon, etc.).

2) For a long term campaign, just like a story plot outline what you want to do with the characters or would like them to do, (players don't always go along with what you want them to do, trust me).  For me, originally my High King's Sword was a roleplaying game and I had a vague idea of what I wanted to do, so I had a sorta outline of what I'd like them to do.  Problem was, the players went and took my flavor text and ran with that instead of my plots sometimes.  So don't be married to your outline. Be flexible, but do try to keep the players on the main path.  How they get there isn't as important as the goal as long as they are having fun. 

3) Have a notebook with you at each game.  Sometimes they ask the name of a barkeep or innkeeper.  Keep that for later.  You might be able to use it later.  Maybe you add in something you hadn't planned, but will now be important.  It also helps to have some names, descriptions and random encounters already rolled up.  You never know when your players are going to go off the path, trust me.

4) For the one offs, don't get too specific, unless you know every direction your players are going to go, but have a general idea and pre-rolled bad guys.  Just because they don't go to the bandit camp, doesn't mean you can't have an ambush of bandits on the road to where ever they are going.

5)Ask your players what they are looking for.  Do they want dungeon crawls or an in-depth murder mystery?  It will make a difference.

Happy Roleplaying!