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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Rune" data-source="post: 6854570" data-attributes="member: 67">Lesson 27: Set nothing in stone.The next few lessons are going to focus a bit on running the game and, particularly, on honing your improvisation skills to do so. Improvisation can be intimidating, particularly if you don't have an anchor to center your efforts on and ground them. The anchor is important. You definitely should have one. But that anchor should be the PCs. They are the only constant that matters. To that end you should never consider any element you introduce or resolve as written in stone. Allow yourself room to change everything in response to the changing needs of the game. Especially, be prepared to respond to the PCs' actions, even if that means ditching, modifying, or replacing something you were looking forward to. Of course, this all seems well and good, but why should you do these things, and how?"Why" is simple. You want to give as much narrative control over to the players as you can get away with, not only to increase their investment, but also to decrease your workload. Every time you predetermine that something definitely is one specific way, you have answered a potential future question with a "No." And that can stop the flow of collaborative improvisation (in other words, "role playing") cold. So, how do you leave room for change? Just don't create anything? Not at all! Go ahead and create to your heart's content! Just keep in mind that <a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?316091-Full-time-DM-Part-time-Prep/page4&p=6210849&viewfull=1#post6210849" target="_blank">details don't matter until they matter</a>. Don't just be prepared to change things on the fly - go ahead and look for opportunities to do it, especially when the players' ideas are better than your own. Now, this doesn't mean you should throw setting consistency out the window; you're going to need that to keep your players' disbelief suspended. What it does mean, however, is that the world should react to the PCs' actions - sometimes visibly. Of course, all of this is easier if you <a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?316091-Full-time-DM-Part-time-Prep/page4&p=6092408&viewfull=1#post6092408" target="_blank">be mysterious</a> in your descriptions. The more uncertain they are about the reality of their assumptions, the more room you have to surprise your players - or roll with whatever unexpected course they choose.</blockquote>

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