Drac's thoughts on GM'ing: Selecting a Genre

[Dracos]

Okay, so you have decided you want  to GM a game.  Well before you get  around to actually building said game you have to ask yourself what kind of game do you want to GM.  This is a decision that is best made by the GM BEFORE you start collecting players, as some players enjoy certain genres more than others.  Additionally, certain genres are better with certain player group sizes.

Today, I'll go over a few classic genres, what they entail and the general group sizes that I feel are the best for playing them..

Kick-in-the-door: This style is fast action and best run with a single GM/arbitrator.  Four players is usually the preferred size for this though good adventures can be done with anywhere from 2-6.  When the groups get too large this method tends to implode and stall, ruining the fun for everyone so it's generally good to keep your group small.  In this style you encourage fighters and fighting, as that's what the game revolves around.  The players don't stop and try to unlock the door to catch the enemies by stealth.  Intead they kick in the door and charge in spells and swords.  There's no deliberating over the 'good/evil' of an enemy.  It's just hacky-slash.   It can be fun for some people and generally doesn't require too much prior planning  to keep a good Kick in the Door campaign going.

Intrigue-centric:  This is the antithesis of the Kick-in-the-door style of gaming.  If a battle happens once ever fifty sessions it's a lot.  Instead here you will have gamers that write elaborate and complex backgrounds and spend hours in conversational intrigue.   Political intrigue is the most common type of adventure in this style of GM'ing.  This style of campaigning quickly implodes if you have too many players.  The max I would suggest is 3, though with more gm's it can work with more.  This requires a lot of planning on the gm's side along with a very quick mind to keep it running well.  I'd go as far to say this isn't for beginning GM's.

Adventure: The young lad sets off into the world, the great unknown for places beyond his imagination.  This is also a relatively small group size type of campaign, averaging about four players as it's optimal size.  Sometimes this can grow into an epic style campaign but it does not have to.  The focus in this is on the journey.  To give it another name it would probably be referred to as a buildingsroman(sp) in literature, focusing on the growth of characters as they travel the world.  The major difference from epic style (which I'll go over later) is that GM generally can concentrate on single adventures alone without worrying about a grander scheme of things.   This is a simpler style of gameplay and good particularly for beginner GM's to flesh out their own style in.

Gothic Horror: The towering castle of Count Strahd beckons  in the distance...  the horseless carriage of the Lord vampire calls for you...   Many will recognize my employment here of the classic Gothic Horror setting of Ravenloft.  A gothic horror game is indeed just that, a game that focuses on telling of a horrifying tale and mystical setting in which the protagonist  (the players) find themselves in.   The optimal size for this campaign  is 2-3 players.   The player group is supposed to be horrified, so the storytelling ability is of key importance in this style.  It is also not reccommended for beginning GM's as you generally need a dramatic and skillful storytelling ability to really seize your players in this style of gaming.

Mystery:   Spooky sometimes...whodunnit othertimes... the land of the great mystery is vast and wide....and contains many quirks.   The optimal gaming environment is usually about four to five players with very separate roles.  Scooby doo oddly enough is a good  example of a basic campaign setting for a mystery campaign.  As a GM you have to plan in advance, set clues, build up npcs; this type of campaign is a lot of work in advance to do well, at least until you get skilled at it.  Suggestion, read a few good mystery novels before tryinng your hand at this.  Sherlock holmes is always in.

Comedy centric: This is the most common chat rpg.   Pies are often the weapon of choice though in my time I've seen it range from tentacles to large two story upside down mansions.   This is a campaign where the GM largely does not GM except to handle disputes.  The GM sets up a scenario and setting...and then people run with it.  It's an easy style to do as long as you are funny.  I generally suggest a group of  four to ten here.  Any larger and some people might get left out.

Epic Style: The End of the World is Nigh...Demons walk the earth...Angels fly in the heavens...  and it's all up to the players to save all of existence.  This requires a relatively large playing  group and a gm who isn't afraid  to kill things.  By the millions if necessary.  COR  falls into this category.  One of the big facets of epic style is that it has dozens of interleaving plots and stories all fleshing into one grand tapestry.  This is hard to do well, and usually if you do it you can just about bind your story and publish it.  It will be that large.  Player characters are deep in this game style, often requiring 5-20 pages of backstory.  My average npc gets anywhere from a half page of written backstory to two pages and these are generally just outlines of what I've fleshed in my head.  While COR only has a few players, they run roughly fifteen or so Player Characters, which will generally be the case in any epic rpg (Either a lot of player or a lot of player characters).  Not Recommended for beginners.  Notes HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

Dracos the Dark heretic
"He who walks with light in his hand...is an easy target for the archer in the trees."