How to Make Your Adventures, NPC's and Campaigns Feel Real

what's that little spark that that's something that truly great gms have that perhaps you don't have well this is what i think hello and welcome to this week's episode of how to be a great gm as you can see we're trying something a little bit different so let me know what you think in the comments down below as to whether you like this new format or not now today we're talking about something that is very personal it's very difficult to do if this is you and it's also something that i think separates truly great gms from gm's who are just good and what i'm talking about is i'm talking about honesty and truth now you kind of go well where does honesty and truth come from i mean what does that have to do with anything why why do we why do we care about honesty or truth what is that what does that mean from a role-playing perspective quite simply truth is when i am wanting to be a certain type of character when i want to put on an accent i am being true to myself as a role player when i am loud and drastic and things explode and there's fire everywhere a non-show pass all that wonderful stuff when i am doing that i am being true to who i am and to what i am as a person now i know this comes as a surprise to some of you but there are a lot of people out there who can't embody that truth who don't want to embody that truth or who are too afraid to embody that truth at the table i see this all the time people say oh i'd love to try and do accents but i'm not very good so i don't want to do it when i was in japan this for me is the entire reason why the japanese role-playing space is so interesting everyone's afraid of living their truth so if you are someone who doesn't care what other people think that i think is a bit of a misnomer by the way i don't think that's entirely true i think there's a difference between caring what other caring about what other people think which makes you a compassionate empathic human being and realizing that when you are true to who you are as a person people will go i like that person i think that person is great i think that person is a great storyteller because they get so involved in their story they really believe it they really feel that it's true because if you do feel that it's true if you live your truth that becomes the case now yes you are going to get some friends to go what the hell are you doing have you been watching that channel again where they talk about you know giving up everything and and just going mad at the table your answer should be an emphatic ah that be true matey and what you're gonna do about it i'm not saying go completely nuts and just be a complete hooligan at the table i'm saying do what you enjoy doing it's your hobby don't hold back don't restrict yourself and don't be afraid to do it because i guarantee you i have had people say to me oh i hate your games that you're so dramatic and flamboyant and everything is always so epic and it's always big scale stuff that's fine i have cues of people waiting to play in my games and it's for the simple reason that i am honest to myself as to what i want from my game as the gm we are so often relegated the task of creating the adventures creating this creating that doing this adjudicating that making the right call making the wrong call being accused of making the wrong calls having players being snarky towards you because the plot was a little bit thin we've got all of that pressure on us so why then do we not actually do what we enjoy doing which is being truthful to ourselves now that's one aspect of it that's that's the that's the bigger concept the scarier concept because there is a scarier concept is you need to be you in every npc that you do um how what does that mean what i mean by that is you as a person you have accumulated experiences you have wants you have needs you have desires you have all those words that we talk about when we talk about creating livable realistic breathing npcs you have all of those in spades in yourself because you're a real being a bigger pardon so so what does that mean for us when you create an npc i've got a video on a checklist and there's tables you can download from my website www.greatgamemaster.com that'll make the marketing goblin happy those templates are methodical mechanical things that are designed to assist and help you but you can fill in that template and if you're not being truthfully you as that npc you won't have a great npc so what do i mean by being truthfully you as the npc well people say how do you embody an npc how do you make them real and the flippant answer the usual answer is be the mpc embody the mpc what the hell does that mean it doesn't make sense it's be the npc great okay what i'm going to say to you is there is no such thing as an npc there is just you as the gm you as the person as the human being and all that you are doing is you are responding as you what you are changing is you are changing your current desire need or want and that's all and then you're using your intellect because we all have them you're using that to then alter what you truthfully want okay based on the parameters of those templates that you have downloaded from the website on how to create a grading pc an example you are a blacksmith we love blacksmiths blacksmiths are the go-to okay you are the blacksmith when you are creating this blacksmith in your head you have the option of doing the standard stuff oh he's got these stats he's got these abilities he's got these powers you take it to the next level um he really wants to finish work early today because he wants to go home and he wants to do this and he wants to do that then he's got this quirk on top of that which is that he's running out of iron because that's the platform those are all great then you personify him then you are him you are the blacksmith you have sore arms because you've been hammering iron all day what do you do when you get sore what truthful response do you do i get grumpy i'm like what i don't want to move just leave me alone life sucks okay but you have to deal with customers how do you deal with customers oh all right hi so nice to see you coming to the store oh my god everything still hurts but coming to the store it's nearly closing time which means you're probably going to be brother you have to respond as you would respond and sometimes that's scary and it's particularly nerve-wracking when you are trying to seduce or charm someone an npc is being charmed by the player but now i never advocate that you are going to then describe how you have sex that is not what seducing or charming another character means in a role-playing game so don't even start typing that comment what i'm talking about is the bard looks at the princess how is the princess going to respond to the bard be truthful how do you respond to someone engaging you with possibly a hint of they want to get to know you better are you kind of are you i mean is this a thing are we is that i mean statistically on paper you have great charisma and you're saying all the right things and you're giving me all the cues so maybe i'm a little bit flattered actually i'm kind of nervous a little bit excited channel that find that space what do you do find your honesty find your truth how do you respond to those situations but don't get to the point where you're sitting there going how do i respond to this when i'm remember how you responded to that situation unless you are a four-year-old you have had at least a decade if i don't think anyone under the age of 16 should be watching these videos or maybe they should be i don't know whatever different debate think about it how do you respond to that kind of stuff that's that's the importance so we want to know we want you to be you and that will make everything feel real because it is the lie is the fact that it's not you it's a goblin or it's a blacksmith or it's a bar keeper at the end of the space lane whatever it doesn't matter it's still core fundamentally you so you're responding to those situations and what you're going to find is that your players are going to start doing the same thing they're going to start saying well these these these are real people i'm not having a conversation with a figure an imaginary character i'm having a conversation with a real person who who is real and is responding in a real way because it is a real person it's you the gm you're being honest and truthful that's it i'm not gonna say any more on this subject it's a very complicated subject it's a deep subject and it's a subject that once you grasp you'll realize that a lot of the gems that we love watching that we love emulating that we're trying to be like that's what they do is they truthful to themselves they put themselves out there and say this is me folks this is what i would be like if i was a blacksmith this is what i'd be like if i was a goblin this is what i'd be like if i was a master starship captain imprint some stuff on top of that but ultimately if you answer truthfully as you would answer in real life then that's the way that is absolutely the way and maybe sprinkle a little bit of heroics there too to make them a little bit stronger so your task this week that's right we're going to be giving out tasks you don't have to do them it's entirely up to you but if you want to be a great limit a little bit if you want to be a better gm you might want to try and practice one of these your task for this week is to design an adventure that is a retelling of your most embarrassing moment personally your own personal real embarrassing moment that time your mother walked in when you were examining human anatomy because that was of interest to you at that particular age let's be honest it remains an interest right but anything along those lines what is your most embarrassing moment don't put it in the comments down below i don't need to know that but you're going to design an adventure using that find the truth in yourself and put it into your npcs i guarantee you your players are going to be going whoa this was intense this was insane if you think this video has at least inspired you or motivated you or maybe you've just gone what a waste of time i do this already i don't know leave your comments down below is it too raw perhaps i'm advocating something that's too close to home and that's role-playing shouldn't be all about the emotions and the passion perhaps it should be something that is distant and is a metric that we run through with matrices on values and numbers and the emotional things shouldn't even come into it i don't know what do you do how do you live your truth or do you avoid it completely are you someone who doesn't go anywhere near there in the comments down below it's fascinating to see and to talk and to discuss of course you could hit that like button if you really wanted to show your appreciation for this video and of course the subscribe button will let you know when stuff is is going on and it will show support for the channel and that's always useful in terms of keeping the channel going and showing me that i'm not just wasting my time uh so that means let's see who sponsored today's show today's video was brought to you by tabletop wizard now tabletopwizards.com link here is a free to use tabletop linkage site you want to find players to join your game tabletop wizard you want to create a game and get players to come and join your game table top wizard it's got everything that you could hope for in terms of finding people bringing people together and then you go and play your game wherever it is that you so choose as i mentioned before it is free to use sign up and go for it find someone to play with we've got over 39 000 users already and they are running games they are running regular role-playing games they're running board games they're running war games they're running events it's all there go and 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Channel: How to be a Great GM

Views: 20,797

Keywords: creating the campaign, campaign creator, how to be a great game master, how to gm, great gm, campaign creation, dnd campaign, dnd campaign design, dnd campaign ideas, rpg campaign design, rpg campaign ideas, rpg campaign, role playing campaign, campaign design, fantasy campaign, game master guide, dungeon master guide, gm tips, dm tips, epic guide to creating campaigns, how to, how to make npcs, how to play dnd, dungeons and dragons, how to be a great dungeon master

Id: Nl0ZmksZnPc

Length: 14min 23sec (863 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 29 2021