
Pink shirts are all well and good, but when it comes right down to it I can think of at least two GMing challenges that have intimidated me for years:
- Running a convention game. Reading Carolina‘s excellent TT post I Was a Virgin Convention GM was a good step, but this one still intimidates me — and it has for a long time. It’s easily the single most intimidating GMing-related thing I can think of.
- Oddly enough, running a Star Trek game. I set out to do this back in college, and after buying and reading a metric shit-ton of books — on top of all the Trek I’ve watched over the years — I just didn’t think I could live up to it. I love Trek, and I know it’s silly, but after nearly a decade of not feeling like I could do it justice, that’s a tough hill to climb.
So how about it — when it comes to GMing, what intimates you? And what used to intimidate you until you just bucked up and gave it a shot, and what did you learn in the process?
Sitting down to a game and the players look at me with blank stares. The energy flow is one direction – into the mindless void of apathetic players. They expect the experience to born on my shoulders alone.
GMing for other GMs is always intimidating to me no matter how many times I do it.
Convention games used to intimidate me, but the truth is that convention games are easier in my opinion. You can pull out all of the stops and after four hours it is over with. Just treat the players like rock stars, throw in big epic challenges, and you are usually good to go.
Running serious or emotional scenes. I can do laughs and I can do action.
Anything else is uncharted territory, even after 24+ years.
Romance. Like gospog, I’m not totally comfortable with more emotional scenes, but it’s romantic relationships that are most difficult to run.
I agree that GMing for other GMs is pretty intimidating – in my core group,at least two of the other players are accomplished GMs.
What has always been the worst for me, though, is GMing in front of a new group. Not knowing what to expect from the players, and at the same time, them not knowing what to expect from me, is always a bit sticky right up front.
Really only two things intimidate me:
1. Running a game for a bunch of new people I don’t know.
2. Running a game for a bunch of people that haven’t played before.
It’s rough, but I’ve had to do #1 several times. #2 not so much.
As much as I prefer historical games, running a Samurai game has long intimidated me–despite my desire to run such a game. I finally overcame that obstacle with a limited run game and have been enjoying it tremendously.
Historical games are always a problem for me. I tend towards fetishism in historical verisimilitude and it just overwhelms me. The great group I have now is helping me just dive in.
As for GMing for other GMs, I was intimidated by the “quality/experience” of my current group, until I started and found that they wanted me to succeed. They jumped right into the tropes and themes and ran with them. Then I (doh!)realized, they wanted the game to be great too and they best way to do that is cooperate with the GM.
Generally, GMing convention games is more exciting than intimidating. That is probably because every convention game I’ve had is for promoting a system that I know they haven’t played before. It is still a bit intimidating, but I’ve usually got my game face on to make sure that the best of the system comes across.
The biggest thing that intimidates me when I’m running a game is when I know the players tend to be chaotic in their game style. If I know that their playing style is generally going to clash with any kind of game I run, I’m just reluctant to run it if I know the players motivation is to enjoy spreading chaos. This is probably just because of one or two problem players that I’ve had, but it is something that I always look out for in gaming groups.
James Jeffers and VV_GM hit the nail on the head for me. DMing for other accomplished DMs has always made me a bit tentative … and the no-energy table is the other.
I think that’s why I like novice games. Even though they have no idea what’s coming, newbies bring their own unique energy to the table.
A batch of jaded players who are waiting to be impresses, well, that’s a tough mountain to climb.
Disappointing players, whether or not I know them.
I’ve still got some residual “I want everyone to like me” sensitivity left over from high school, and I find it really tough to disappoint someone, even if all I’m doing is enforcing the rules we all agreed on. (“Sorry, but you failed the save.”) It’s irrational, but there you go.
It’s even tougher when the conflict is above-game. Every time I’ve “had a talk” with a player, it’s gone well and I’m glad I did it, but it’s still something I have to almost force myself to do.
My two fears are running horror and supers (not necessarily at the same time).
Horror is the most difficult balancing act I’ve seen in a game. You need to have a mystery; a difficult GMing challenge in and of itself. you need to get strong suspension of disbelief, then maintain the mood for a long time. I’ve run a dozen or so and played a dozen or two more. Only on a handful of occasions has the game worked.
As for supers, I’m still struggling capturing the excitement of comic super heroes without making the game a silly stream of fights. For rock-em-sock-em supers, the fights probably should be the core, but like D&D, you do need some satisfying glue between them.
Unfortunately I love both genres and I don’t know anyone else willing to run them, so if I want them, I have to run it myself. So I’m doing what I can to prepare for them both. In both cases it involves lots of reading modules and GM advice to see what I can learn, as well as playing as many games as I can (usually at conventions).
My strongest dreads in GMing stem from uncomfortable situations: role-playing a romantic or (eek!) sexual relationship — especially with another male player.
Oddly enough, I have something cooked up for my current campaign that could go right down this path. A player wrote some love-triangle stuff into his PC’s background, and in an attempt to “close that door” (as the TT post refers to it), I’m going to have his (former) lover make an appearance. I’m sure that the player was totally expecting me to pursue the other corner of the triangle (the jilted rival), and we’ll get to him eventually, but first I want to make the player squirm a bit. {evil DM laugh}
Getting back to the point, my dread is that the player is more comfortable with the situation than I am and he’ll start role-playing detail of their relationship. I own no source books such as The Guide to Erotic Role-playing and have no interest in pursuing such angles of the game. I’m a pretty vanilla guy; stick with the action and intrigue, please. π
P.S.: Martin’s “All Holes Filled With Harn” post made me wince most uncontrollably.
(MountZionRyan) Historical games are always a problem for me. I tend towards fetishism in historical verisimilitude and it just overwhelms me. The great group I have now is helping me just dive in.
This is exactly why the Trek game thing is so intimidating for me (minus the “historical” part, of course π ). Intellectually I know the solution would be to stop worrying about it and dive in — and if a GM asked me for ideas about getting over this problem themselves, that would be my advice.
It’s much easier to give that advice than it is to actually take it, though. π
I’d just like to mention that playing via online chat helps with the romantic relationship problem. I can’t RP that in person, either, no matter how hard I try my face always turns red and people start asking me if I’m okay.
Damn you, traitor face!
There are a couple of other options: If the player REALLY feels the need to describe their character’s interaction in detail, ask them to write it up and give them some XP for the work. No one says you have to read it, although you may have to discourage your other players from calling him “hot lips” for the rest of the game . . .
When I’m improvising and I run out of material mid-session. That blank eyed stares and the constant threat of what a bored Vanir will come up with often wake me in cold sweats.
This same situation tends to take place when my campaign gets taken FAR off base by my players. It doesn’t happen that often anymore since we’ve started planning for that contingency, but it is still good for that fear adrenaline hit. π
1. Running a game for people who have not played before and are relatives. I it didn’t work once with my sister and that left marks.
2. Running a game in a setting I have not created. The pressure to “get it right”, though irrational, is too great.
3. Romantic stuff.
Running games that either limit my resources as part of the system mechanic (In Spaaaace) and/or place a significant burden upon the shoulders of the players whether they realise it or not (Amber Diceless, Feng Shui).
Running a humor game. I’ll laugh at almost anything, so it’s hard for me to figure out where other people stop finding things funny and start finding things to be distasteful. And my preferred humor tends towards the adult side of things (in both the sex and violence senses) and puns, both of which are usually detested by a large number of people.
I get freaked out with people I have never gamed with before. Thats about it.