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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Manbearcat" data-source="post: 8975370" data-attributes="member: 6696971">The GMs in these games don't consider themself poor-off.They GM's don't indulge player's power fantasies.  There is no "serve the game up for the players."  Quite the opposite in fact.  GMing these games is about putting rules/structure-constrained pressure on what the players (through their PCs) care about.  You aren't a passenger on some kind of "player-side railroad."GMing these games is mental bandwidth-intensive.  Its cognitive load-intensive.  Its creativity reservoir-challenging.  At every moment of play, you're integrating several different axes of thought:* What do the rules demand of me here and how am I constrained by them?* How does the fiction to this point inform and constrain the obstacle/situation I'm framing or the consequence I'm meting out as a result of some kind of failure or complication of action resolution?* What is the intersection of drives and relationships and entanglements that make this PC's life interesting and how can I use that right now (if I can)?* How can I build out as interesting a decision-space (thematically, tactically, strategically) for the player(s) right now (either via framing or via consequences/complications)?* What might be going on offscreen that can be in play here (or might be in play within the potential constellation of consequences should things go haywire)?[HR][/HR]I've said it before and I'll say it again.  These games are Not Writer's Rooms.  These games are not Player-Side Railroads.  I feel more than a little confident that the players I GM these games for don't feel like I'm their "friend" or "conspirator."  But, likewise, they certainly don't feel like I'm their antagonist.  I just give expression to their opposition and it doesn't matter that my "opposition-throttle" is to the floor because they know there is no shenanigans going on (because the games are table-facing).So no "poor GM."  The say that I have over the creative trajectory of play is not small and the stimulation involved in my role in running the game is considerable.  There are tons and tons of play excerpts of these games that I (and others in this thread) have posted.  <a href="https://www.enworld.org/threads/stonetop-rpg-session-post-mortems.686741/" target="_blank">Here is a Stonetop game you can take a look at</a> if you're interested with [USER=6785785]@hawkeyefan[/USER] (he plays The Judge in that game so he carries out The Chronicling).  Post 20 is his Chronicling of Session 1.  Post 22 is my breaking down of the machinery of the session (including my GMing).  There are other such entries in that thread.  Its just north of a year of that game and we stopped adding to it awhile ago, but there should be plenty in there to wrap your brain around the concepts and execution.There should be lots of post-mortems of the Blades game that hawkeyefan mentions above.  There are post-mortems of the current Blades game I run around here (just keyword search if you're interested).  There are post-mortems of Torchbearer of Dogs in the Vineyard of Dungeon World of Lazers & Feelings of D&D 4e and other games.  [USER=42582]@pemerton[/USER] has vast swathes of post-mortems of Burning Wheel, Torchbearer, Aegon, In A Wicked Age, Prince Valiant, etc.  All of these games are different in their particulars but the general GMing load is roughly the same (as I've bulleted above).  And there is no "poor GM" factor going on there.  They're quite challenging and quite rewarding to run.  The challenge and reward is just different than that of a prep-heavy traditional game.</blockquote>

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