twofalls
DM Beadle
I've been wondering... how many other folks find that they are doing less and less prep work for game sessions these days? I've been running D&D games for three decades now, and I've noticed a trend in myself to do less work preparing for a night of gaming as those years grow longer. Now, I find that I read a book, look over an adventure, scan a map and that is my prep work for the evening of gaming.
Another trend I've discovered in myself is a tendency to completely ignore the rules but leave my players feeling like I am following them very closely. I know the rules (we still play 3.0) very well, and most of the time (nearly all the time) I can't be bothered with them. The monsters I use are either old favorites I know well, or more often concoctions off the top of my head to fit the moment. I write down the damage my players do in combat like I am keeping careful track to see how close they are getting to the monster's death threshold, but in reality I am just narrating the story and will kill it off when it is the most exciting to do so. I use the rules when the players need to interact with them, like grappling... how many magic missiles a caster can toss, etc. So I petty much don't ever prep monsters either.
I run a group of 9 players, some who have been gaming with me for 30 years, some who have been with me for about 3 years (the avg is about 8 years of playing with me) and know they are having fun. I asked one of my players after last session if it was obvious that I "often" (read: always) toss out the rulebook when its convenient and he was genuinely surprised to find out that I do that. I invent spells on the fly, I make rules calls (educated calls of course) as needed, and pretty much just invent the game as I go mostly with themes and ideas I dreamed up either in reaction to the players or sometimes ideas I thought about the week before the game.
So... is this more or less common out in gamedom? I essentially don't ever "play" in the players seat as my experience with other GM's has been... disappointing. It's one of the reasons I love going to local Con's because I find excellent GM's there and get to play with a lot of folks who are much more talented at rpg games than I am. But I wonder, here on Enworld, how well does the way I run D&D games mesh with the way you all do it?
Another trend I've discovered in myself is a tendency to completely ignore the rules but leave my players feeling like I am following them very closely. I know the rules (we still play 3.0) very well, and most of the time (nearly all the time) I can't be bothered with them. The monsters I use are either old favorites I know well, or more often concoctions off the top of my head to fit the moment. I write down the damage my players do in combat like I am keeping careful track to see how close they are getting to the monster's death threshold, but in reality I am just narrating the story and will kill it off when it is the most exciting to do so. I use the rules when the players need to interact with them, like grappling... how many magic missiles a caster can toss, etc. So I petty much don't ever prep monsters either.
I run a group of 9 players, some who have been gaming with me for 30 years, some who have been with me for about 3 years (the avg is about 8 years of playing with me) and know they are having fun. I asked one of my players after last session if it was obvious that I "often" (read: always) toss out the rulebook when its convenient and he was genuinely surprised to find out that I do that. I invent spells on the fly, I make rules calls (educated calls of course) as needed, and pretty much just invent the game as I go mostly with themes and ideas I dreamed up either in reaction to the players or sometimes ideas I thought about the week before the game.
So... is this more or less common out in gamedom? I essentially don't ever "play" in the players seat as my experience with other GM's has been... disappointing. It's one of the reasons I love going to local Con's because I find excellent GM's there and get to play with a lot of folks who are much more talented at rpg games than I am. But I wonder, here on Enworld, how well does the way I run D&D games mesh with the way you all do it?
