the_gneech (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
the_gneech) wrote2016-09-04 12:28 pm
the_gneech) wrote2016-09-04 12:28 pm
Entry tags:
My Dark DMing Secret
Okay, it's not that dark. And it's also not that secret. But here it is anyway:
I don't want to be the DM.
I mean, I do sometimes, sure. I've been a DM fairly regularly since 1981 or so, so I must get something out of it. I even have a Gamemastering Credo. But the thing is, the reason I'm usually the DM is not because that's what I want out of the game.
The reason is that if I don't DM, there is no game.
Like, almost ever. I have played in a few games, including a few run by![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
jamesbarrett that actually spanned more than three levels. But not often, and rarely with sustain.
The reason I bring this up is because I spent the past week working on my Keep On the Borderlands conversion, and I put some thought yesterday toward how it could be built on if the group gels and people really get into it, etc.
Then I remembered my binder full of stuff for Secrets of Thunderdelve and how much of that never saw the light of day, and all the plot threads I put in to hint at adventures the characters would someday get to as they levelled up and so forth... and then Jamie's work schedule went south and we moved to Maryland and everything just fell apart. Again.
Blugh. I don't want to go through all that again. Especially not for what was supposed to be a throwaway game to teach Seifer how to play. Maybe I can pull stuff out of it to use again? I probably should have just figured out some interesting stuff for 1st level characters to do on the Silver Coast instead of Keep On the Borderlands anyway.
Meanwhile, I've got folders full of PCs I've never played, or only played in very small chunks; and for that matter I've got a certain drow bard I'm very very fond of and want to play more, but despair that I ever will.
I wonder if I should just suck it up, go find the nearest Adventurer's League location, and take what I can get. It's not the same experience as gaming with your friends, but it is at least gaming... and (theoretically at least) it would be with someone else behind the screen.
-The Gneech
I don't want to be the DM.
I mean, I do sometimes, sure. I've been a DM fairly regularly since 1981 or so, so I must get something out of it. I even have a Gamemastering Credo. But the thing is, the reason I'm usually the DM is not because that's what I want out of the game.
The reason is that if I don't DM, there is no game.
Like, almost ever. I have played in a few games, including a few run by
jamesbarrett that actually spanned more than three levels. But not often, and rarely with sustain.The reason I bring this up is because I spent the past week working on my Keep On the Borderlands conversion, and I put some thought yesterday toward how it could be built on if the group gels and people really get into it, etc.
Then I remembered my binder full of stuff for Secrets of Thunderdelve and how much of that never saw the light of day, and all the plot threads I put in to hint at adventures the characters would someday get to as they levelled up and so forth... and then Jamie's work schedule went south and we moved to Maryland and everything just fell apart. Again.
Blugh. I don't want to go through all that again. Especially not for what was supposed to be a throwaway game to teach Seifer how to play. Maybe I can pull stuff out of it to use again? I probably should have just figured out some interesting stuff for 1st level characters to do on the Silver Coast instead of Keep On the Borderlands anyway.
Meanwhile, I've got folders full of PCs I've never played, or only played in very small chunks; and for that matter I've got a certain drow bard I'm very very fond of and want to play more, but despair that I ever will.
I wonder if I should just suck it up, go find the nearest Adventurer's League location, and take what I can get. It's not the same experience as gaming with your friends, but it is at least gaming... and (theoretically at least) it would be with someone else behind the screen.
-The Gneech
no subject
And over time, one of the Sunday gamers decided he wanted to ref. [Yay!] So he became my apprentice [say that like Emperor Palpatine] - and began reffing his 2nd ed AD&D game once every 4 gaming sessions. It was great! So I got to play in his game.
Then Pathfinder came around and a Saturday gamer decided that he would run some of the Pathfinder modules. Hurray again. So Friday nights, we get together for Pathfinder.
So ... 46 years of gaming - and I get to play now, almost as much as I ref. [All it took was mentoring a new ref - and learning a new game system. ^_^]