5 GM Tricks of the Trade

From an email sent out by Troll Lord Games this week, 5 useful tips for GMs from Head Troll Stephen Chenault:

Being a GM, DM, or CK is a tricky business. You must be able to think on the fly, keep people engaged and lead them down the path to adventure. Bogged down in the minutiae? Stuck in a dungeon? It's important to lead the players to the best game they can have. That's why our CEO and founder, Stephen Chenault -- a gamer for over 40 years and CK that can keep a game of 20 plus moving smoothly -- has put together these top 5 gems guaranteed to give you your best game.

#1: Always keep the pace moving. As soon as the game slows, people start looking at distractions and it’s difficult to get them back on track.   #2: Try not to single people out. When it comes to their turn to react, look to make sure they are comfortable. If they are not, and are being shy, give them more context, draw the attention away from their character and themselves and put it back on you. It is easiest to do this with more descriptive text. Describe the encounter, with smells and sounds as it is happened. This may allow them time to formulate a response and will definitely take the attention away from them.   #3: Don’t play their character. Allow them to choose their own actions and describe them. If they don’t, it is better to coach them. “When you swing, do you stab with the sword and use a cutting motion?” The more you coach a player, the sooner they get into the groove of things.   #4: Playing mood music is good, but make sure it doesn’t drown out what you are doing. Worse than that is choosing music that may aggravate someone. Choose music that has the right mood, but is not destructive. #5: Don’t be afraid to damage equipment. Do it in every battle. This will pay in the end. If players are used to their character’s equipment being damaged then it opens up future opportunities to you, the GM. If in combat session a character is getting close to death with low hit points, you can allow continue suffering by damaging equipment without killing the character. It all seems quite natural to the player as it is a common enough theme in your game. Plus it gives them something to spend their money on.