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bonny_kateI've been reading a few different writer's blogs lately, and I find it interesting to read different perspectives on GM-ing RPGs. Some authors seem to be saying that RPGs helped them learn how to develop certain things, like characters or backstory or dialogue or world building. Others seem to be saying that RPGs take away valuable time that they could be spending writing. Interestingly, neither perspective covers my experience.
For me, co-GM-inig an RPG takes up story space in my head, but in a different way than writing a story does. I discovered that I can't work on writing on the same day that I'm going to be GM-ing, or my GM-ing seriously suffers. It's a very different way of looking at a story. In order to GM well, I have to have a developed set of characters, an idea of setting, and occasionally some type of set event (such as the Fey attacking the village). But I can't have a set plot. I can have a general idea of where the story is going, but I have to be willing to change it on the whim of the players. They may spend an entire session interacting with the carefully created village obsessed with llamas, and then turn around and blithely kill off archaeologists by sending them into danger. They may entirely ignore carefully crafted characters, or throw a wrench into things by doing something entirely unexpected (like replacing the artifact they are after with a perfectly constructed fake). In order to be a good GM, I have to be flexible with what the players want. I have to scrap my lovely plan because they have come up with something else (which I may not like quite as much). I have to interact with their characters in whatever direction they decide to take things. As someone who plots things out ahead of time*, this is a very different way of thinking about a story. I come up with a situation and let the players react, rather than coming up with a story. I can't expect the players to have a predictable reaction to the situation.
In the story that I'm currently co-GM-ing, I'm working with certain constraints. I didn't write any of the setup. I'm trying to resolve a story that someone else started. If I were starting from scratch, I expect I should set it up a bit differently. I would have a villain (or set of villains) with an agenda and a plan, and the main characters would encounter the beginning of the plan (with many hints as to the ultimate plan) and then I would let them react to the plan (it would be a somewhat morally ambiguous choice). I can't do this to near the same degree because of earlier constraints of the story, but I'm still trying for this as much as I can.
Writing is a different use of story space for me. I have to know where a story is going before I write it. I have to have it plotted out. I don't always have to write the plot down, as in the case of a very short story, but I have to know before I start writing, or the story will stall. I rarely make changes once it is plotted out (I made some changes to my novel when I was doing NaNoWriMo, but considering the scope of it, they mostly weren't large changes). This is similar to how I think about plotting out something to GM; I want to know where things are going and how they are getting there. But, when I write, I know exactly what will happen. There can be a specific set of events that has to happen. More than that, I know what the main characters will do. I know how they will react. I never ditch my beautifully constructed set of challenges because there is something I don't like quite as much. I always know what will happen with those challenges, and I never have to stack the dice to have it happen.
For me, GM-ing is certainly related to writing. I use similar skills, and both, after all, are about story. But they are about story in different ways, and some good GM skills would make for bad writing (for instance, having to remind characters multiple times in multiple ways of important things, because they've forgotten or not noticed or been distracted by the llamas in the story or the brownies on the table). Some aspects of the way I write would be bad if applied to GM-ing (such as the way I poke at an idea until I have it just right and it clicks, and then I don't want to use any other idea).
As an aside, I can make up a story without having it plotted out. I can take a first scene and go somewhere with it. It is almost certainly invention and not inspiration, though. There isn't the sense that everything clicks and has to be a certain way. The sort of stories that I invent aren't alive in the same way an inspired story is.
*Joel, on the other hand, is the sort of GM who has a vague notion of what is going on, and wants to make things up on the spot. I'm not really sure how we GM together, because I want to know what's going on ahead of time.
For me, co-GM-inig an RPG takes up story space in my head, but in a different way than writing a story does. I discovered that I can't work on writing on the same day that I'm going to be GM-ing, or my GM-ing seriously suffers. It's a very different way of looking at a story. In order to GM well, I have to have a developed set of characters, an idea of setting, and occasionally some type of set event (such as the Fey attacking the village). But I can't have a set plot. I can have a general idea of where the story is going, but I have to be willing to change it on the whim of the players. They may spend an entire session interacting with the carefully created village obsessed with llamas, and then turn around and blithely kill off archaeologists by sending them into danger. They may entirely ignore carefully crafted characters, or throw a wrench into things by doing something entirely unexpected (like replacing the artifact they are after with a perfectly constructed fake). In order to be a good GM, I have to be flexible with what the players want. I have to scrap my lovely plan because they have come up with something else (which I may not like quite as much). I have to interact with their characters in whatever direction they decide to take things. As someone who plots things out ahead of time*, this is a very different way of thinking about a story. I come up with a situation and let the players react, rather than coming up with a story. I can't expect the players to have a predictable reaction to the situation.
In the story that I'm currently co-GM-ing, I'm working with certain constraints. I didn't write any of the setup. I'm trying to resolve a story that someone else started. If I were starting from scratch, I expect I should set it up a bit differently. I would have a villain (or set of villains) with an agenda and a plan, and the main characters would encounter the beginning of the plan (with many hints as to the ultimate plan) and then I would let them react to the plan (it would be a somewhat morally ambiguous choice). I can't do this to near the same degree because of earlier constraints of the story, but I'm still trying for this as much as I can.
Writing is a different use of story space for me. I have to know where a story is going before I write it. I have to have it plotted out. I don't always have to write the plot down, as in the case of a very short story, but I have to know before I start writing, or the story will stall. I rarely make changes once it is plotted out (I made some changes to my novel when I was doing NaNoWriMo, but considering the scope of it, they mostly weren't large changes). This is similar to how I think about plotting out something to GM; I want to know where things are going and how they are getting there. But, when I write, I know exactly what will happen. There can be a specific set of events that has to happen. More than that, I know what the main characters will do. I know how they will react. I never ditch my beautifully constructed set of challenges because there is something I don't like quite as much. I always know what will happen with those challenges, and I never have to stack the dice to have it happen.
For me, GM-ing is certainly related to writing. I use similar skills, and both, after all, are about story. But they are about story in different ways, and some good GM skills would make for bad writing (for instance, having to remind characters multiple times in multiple ways of important things, because they've forgotten or not noticed or been distracted by the llamas in the story or the brownies on the table). Some aspects of the way I write would be bad if applied to GM-ing (such as the way I poke at an idea until I have it just right and it clicks, and then I don't want to use any other idea).
As an aside, I can make up a story without having it plotted out. I can take a first scene and go somewhere with it. It is almost certainly invention and not inspiration, though. There isn't the sense that everything clicks and has to be a certain way. The sort of stories that I invent aren't alive in the same way an inspired story is.
*Joel, on the other hand, is the sort of GM who has a vague notion of what is going on, and wants to make things up on the spot. I'm not really sure how we GM together, because I want to know what's going on ahead of time.