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What's the best GMing advice you've ever received? (lemmy.ml)

submitted 1 day ago by mr_noxx@lemmy.ml to c/rpg@ttrpg.network

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For me, it was: "If it's going to help your players have more fun, cheat. Fudge a die roll. Make shit up. The dice don't tell you what needs to happen, your players' reactions do."

Obviously, many people will disagree with this, but I've always appreciated this advice, and I believe it has made me a better GM.

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[–] southsamurai@sh.itjust.works 3 points 1 day ago

I was thinking and trying to come to with something and I realized that I never got advice.

My path as a DM was essentially all "jump in and learn to swim".

First from the old red box an uncle left behind when he moved, trying to figure it out (and bashing my face into thac0 until giving up for years).

Then, when I got fed up with the first DM I played under, I said "fuck it", then finally figured thac0 out enough to run some d&d for friends, and decided I liked the mishmash my first DM used that was a gurps/d&d/marvel heroes/call of Cthulu abomination. I took the things I liked that he did, rejected what sucked for me, then gradually grafted on my own home brew stuff.

My group vastly preferred the near future, science fantasy setting I cooked up to standard d&d, so that was what mostly got played over the years until I essentially retired from running games (tried to run some here and there, with varying degrees of flake leading to aborted games).

So I never got advice. What I got was players, friends, giving me shit when things sucked and helping me cook shit up to fix what was broken. I call it "my" system, but the mechanics that weren't lifted from established systems then adapted are only maybe 90% mine. Even the ones I wholly cooked up got adjusted over time by my friends input.

My best friend completely designed two magic "schools", and had a major hand in coming up with racial abilities for our weird-ass wants.

And I think that's the advice I got indirectly. Make the game, whatever system it is, a thing of creativity and fun. The system doesn't fucking matter. The setting isn't important. The people are. Time and time again, my best shit as a DM wouldn't have happened without everyone being fully engaged, fully free to pull shit out of their ear and see what happened.

It's the advice I tend to give when asked. And it isn't just rule of cool writ long winded, because you don't actually have to do that for an engaging table. You can RAWdog the fuck out of dice and rules as long as players and DM are invested in mutual enjoyment.