DMs, what´s your preparation-to-enjoyment ratio?

[BryonD]

I find that my players enjoy it a little more when I have done a good bit of prep. But the difference does not justify the time put in.

However, I only do prep that I enjoy. So I usually still do a pretty good bit of prep.

 

[IronWolf]

Seriously, unless you are just an absolute freakin' Game Master Master with 20 years of experience, you just aren't going to get away with 90 minutes of prep each week. And even then, you are going to essentially be relying on rehash. It's not even a reasonable goal. As a DM you should be aiming at least a 1:1 ratio of prep time to game time or you are cheating your players (and probably yourself). If you can't hack that, you can't DM, and I'm still awaiting the exception that disproves that after nearly 30 years of gaming.

While I do prep for more than 90 minutes a week, I think there are DMs out there that can get by with less preparation than the 1:1 ration you are suggesting. That ratio may work well for you, but some people out there are good at either improv'ing or simply able to prepare pretty completely in less time than others.

I willl add that by far the most often complaint I hear from players from other tables was, "Most DMs don't want to put the work in." I've heard stories about DM pet NPC's, being forced to ride the rails, DM's trying to run the PC's for the players, and DM's with bizarre in game fetishes, and a whole host of other DM flaws. I've never once heard a player complain, "My previous DMs prepared too much (or too well)."

While that may be the most frequent complaint you hear, I don't see the follow-up examples of pet NPCs, railroading, running PCs or DM's game fetishes as supporting that complaint. A DM could spend the magic 1:1 ratio of time preparing for a game and *still* have a pet NPC, force people to ride the railroad, try to run PCs for players and have bizarre game fetishes - all of which would quite likely turn players off from the game - at least with that DM.

 

[Hussar]

I like to prep my games fairly thouroughly. But, a lot of my prep time comes from the medium I'm using. I'm playing over Maptools, so, I'd say about half my prep time stems from art selection - prepping minis for use with macros, having pretty maps sized just so, that sort of thing.

I find that it makes sessions run SO much better when I have all that sort of stuff done beforehand. Even if I have left over minis that I never use, and maps that get left by the wayside, I can always slip them in later. Change the image and a skeleton becomes an orc. Which means my prep time tends to go down the longer the campaign goes.

As far as the other stuff - NPC motivations, conversations, descriptions of the scenes and whatnot, I tend to have a few "Boxed Text" things ready, since cut and paste into the chat window is SO much faster than my typing. But, after that, I'll just have rough notes.

As a recent example, the party was camped in a swamp and I planned an encounter with a party of undead lead by this ghost thing that I found in a free download here at En World. When the ghost is defeated, it's curse lifts and it gives a beneficial aura to the group. I changed things in mid stride and had the ghost stick around for a bit afterwards and become an NPC to interact with. Wasn't really planned and led to some frantic note taking on my part to keep things straight, but, it seems to have worked well.

I think my motto is, be prepared, but also be prepared to chuck stuff out the window as well.

 

[Ant]

The single biggest reason our hobby is dying (if it is dying, and I'm not convinced) is not enough DMs willing to put in the work. There are tons of players out there who would love to play, but can't find anyone willing to run the game, tell the story, build the world, create the adventures, etc.

Given the nature of this thread it seems there's an implication here that DMs who don't prep as much as others aren't working hard (and seem to also be destroying the RPG hobby and possibly causing global warming ).

If this is the case then I respectfully disagree. I simply prefer to put the effort (and a considerable effort it is) where I believe it counts more -- during the game session itself.

Heck, it's not unusual for me to be exhausted after a really great session ... The highs! The lows! New plot hooks! Random acts of setting-things-on-fire!

Well, you get the drift ...

What I'm trying to say is that all those things you mentioned in your other post, Celebrim -- player freedom, having somewhere for the PCs to go etc -- those things aren't reliant on hours on prep.

And I do admit that felt a little sad when you compared running a session to the sterile rigidity of a database or piece of code.

Now if you're a DM who loves doing hours of prep for each sesssion then rock on, my brother! However I tried that road for a while and it wasn't for me. I love my precious spare time a little too much.

For those of you who sink a lot of time and energy into your prep ... how much of that prep actually ends up being validated during the game session? How much of it are the players aware of or even see?

(And if your players see the results of your prep because you're spending days creating status markers or battlemaps or whatever then that's a whole other issue )

I think my motto is, be prepared, but also be prepared to chuck stuff out the window as well.

I like that, Hussar. I think mine is "Expect nothing. Be ready for anything. Minimum one PC death per adventure."

 

[EP]

I've found the exact same thing. When I'm playtesting a published product, I find I'm more caught up in the mechanics, thinking about numbers than I am about running a good game. So when we had a gaming weekend up at the lake, I intentionally decided to improv our 30th level god-fest and we had a blast with it.

The main thing I find with winging it at the table is that you're also inclined to try out a new idea/concept that's not necessarily part of the rules. For example, I ran a fight inside a house where the players suddenly started picking up furniture and using it as weapons. We trashed the entire house, even had a balcony collapse onto the main floor. It...was...sweet.

 

[Starfox]

My best sessions have been improvisation sessions. My worst sessions have been improvisation sessions. Prepared sessions tend to fall in the middle of the scale. Preparation hedges your bets, gives you safety margins, and makes sure the story has some direction to it. This lets me avoid the worst and most common mistakes. But an improvisation session where everything comes together, when the player and the GM successfully play ball with each other - nothing can beat that.

On average, I think my prep time is about half my play time. This does not include campaign and rules preparation, just preparing adventures for specific sessions. I generally find this kind of "tactical" preparation to be a bore, while I love the "strategic" campaign preparation and rules work.

 

[Kobold Boots]

As a DM with the 20 years of experience that another mentioned.. I can openly state that I too have prep issues and have always had them regardless of whether I've spent 20 hours in prep or none. There's always some level of anxiety akin to butterflies just before a session (especially since our average game session is 9 hours in length.)

However, here are the tricks to short prep, enjoyable sessions in my opinion. They've worked for me as I've done all of them. Most of these have to do with doing prep in other ways such that you can improvise off the cuff with things that are just innate to you as a person.

1. Read voraciously. Know the classics. Most stories build off of only a few basic hooks and themes. Most players don't read the literature, they've seen it on TV. In my case I'm doubly prepared as I took the long road in college and could have gone Lit or History, but you don't need to go to school to pick up books and in most cases you don't expose an entire plot line all at once. If you need an hour or two of filler, grab a subplot from literature and wing it. You'll only need to change a few names and will have time to figure out what you did after the fact if done properly.

2. To understand your X - do what X does in the real world and retcon it back to your milieu. If you have a bard in your group, pick up an instrument and get a street performer's license for a few bucks. If you have a monk in your group, take a martial art.. If you have a cleric, spend a few hours in church, any church. Need ideas for a tavern, go to a bar..

As presented, this sounds like prep, but it's life experience. It's something I like to call (amongst gamers only) gaming while not gaming or prep without walls. Doesn't hurt that you can do all of these things while on a date or while meeting other people and you end up a better rounded person. In a game application, it allows you to have a certain amount of crushing logic about things that can help in making decisions.

3. Have players openly discuss the games or do a post event letter via email that gets them some experience in exchange for giving an in game view of the characters thoughts or the players values in gaming. Whole plot arcs can come off of those things; reducing prep time (and anyone that's done a larp probably understands PELs).

4. Practice storytelling via any medium you can. Keep a journal of ..once upon a time.., read to your kids before putting them down for the night.. slowly ween off the books and just come up with stuff randomly.. volunteer to give presentations at work.. these things all translate into good gamemastery directly and they all win brownie points with some group of people in your life.. which brings me to my last point.

5. Live well, sleep well, eat well, exercise. If you want your energy to be dedicated to performance you can't expect to do well if you're worried about your relationships, health or are exhausted.

Probably missed a bunch of stuff, but those are the most important in my view.

KB

 

[I'm A Banana]

I do more prep now under 4e than I used to do in 3e, because there's more decision points to fiddle with, but I'm still a dude who wants to wing it at heart.

At my prime, I wasn't even preparing sessions. I'd show up with a vague idea of a threat, and a vague idea of where the PC's were, and I'd let them entertain me for a few hours.

That's not so much the case now, but I long for the day that it will again become reality.

 

[scourger]

I love the prep work, to a degree. Probably my favorite time is thinking of cool games to run. But, over the years I've learned that my players don't think all the cool games I want to run are all that cool and that there is not enough time for all of it. Actually, there isn't really enough time for a small fraction of it. So, I have to be really discerning about where I put my preparation effort. Especially with a family, a job, and everything else IRL. The return has to justify the investment.

Currently, I'm enjoying somewhere between a 1:5 and 1:10 ratio of prep time to game time. Although I ponderend the current game for a long time, I really did about 1 evening of hard prep work. There has been a little time here & there over the past 8 or so play sessions, but it pretty much is ready to go from the initial work up. I find that is working well for me right now.

I think the fact that my current game is a D&D minis (skirmish) campaign helps control the prep time. There is a story and a goal, but it is not scripted. I hope to translate some of these elemesnt into future games, but DDM is probably too light to be an RPG-type game--even though I've incorporated role-playing elements. I feel like the character development is a little light. My players love it though. And I've long thought that a "box-a-week" camapign would be great fun (although I can't really get new boosters of old D&D minis as easily right now). I may just go with a merger of 3.0/3.5 for the players with DDM for me as the DM next time. We'll see.

Savage Worlds was lighter prep for me, but it could do with a line of pre-painted minis with stat cards. Perhaps the new Gamma World will lend itself to this kind of "plug & play" DMing. I hope so.

 

[Beginning of the End]

Enjoyment increases with the amount of prep I do. But it's because I spend my time prepping a toolkit instead of a straitjacket. I think a lot of GMs have a tendency to prep the wrong things -- things that are not only wasting their prep time, but which actually make them less prepared for the game because they're limiting their options instead of giving them more options.

Seriously, unless you are just an absolute freakin' Game Master Master with 20 years of experience, you just aren't going to get away with 90 minutes of prep each week.

I dunno.

Consider the One Page Dungeon. I'm skeptical of its general utility as an ideal, but as an exercise to remind yourself that prep can be kept to a minimum as long as you're prepping the right stuff it can be very valuable. And I really don't think you need that much experience in order to get a really solid night of entertainment out of a dungeon with 16 or so keyed locations described in a single page.

And if you can't write a page of text and whip up a functional map in 90 minutes, you're doing it wrong.

I dunno. Maybe I'm over-estimating people. Maybe I'm secretly a genius. But I've been able to say, "Wanna play?" and whip up a fun, functional dungeon in 10 minutes while the players are rolling up their characters. And I've been doing that since I first started playing.

I guess my point is this: In your prep you can write a single bullet point "when Nerissa learns that the PCs are investigating the murder, she'll send a squad of 12 orcs to attack them". That took... what? 12 seconds to prep? But it'll probably chew up at least 15-30 minutes of game time.

The one place I will invest "extraneous" prep time is in the gilded edges: Handouts. Digging through supplements to assemble tomes of unique lore which can be found in the campaign world. Customizing a miniature for a particularly notable bad guy. These chew up a lot of time, but they're nice extras if you can find the time. But I don't think they're essential for a successful session.

The single biggest reason our hobby is dying (if it is dying, and I'm not convinced) is not enough DMs willing to put in the work.

See, I'd argue the opposite: The single biggest reason our hobby is dying is the belief that being a GM requires a huge time investment and a devilishly complicated set of skills. And I think that's a belief primarily driven by GMs doing bad prep instead of effective prep.