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Post by Kainguru on Feb 10, 2015 3:39:58 GMT -8
Sounds like 'a party promise', ie: we all set about saving the world with our small band of true believers at parties, then everyone wakes up the next day and forgets everything in favour of preferred hangover remedy. It may just be that the volunteering of your GM services by friend-HG was a but too hasty/premature; possibly because friend-HG is aware he is going to be absent for some time and hopes that you might fill the void on his behalf. What you can never be is a 'stand in' for friend-HG's social network. That is, you cannot replace him or keep his position warm for him until he returns. You need to find your place, if any, with this social group. You need to socialise with them first and become friends that game rather than the other way around. Basically isn't not really a game issue at all, it's a social dynamic issue that could be problematic regardless of the question of RPG's (in any form). Maybe just get to know them with a few beer and pretzel board/card game nights . . . like a good crack dealer tempting a mark with the harmless stuff first in order to get them on to the real deal. Aaron
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Post by CreativeCowboy on Feb 10, 2015 5:49:03 GMT -8
Hmmm. so much for the gestalt of role-playing.... (abandon ship!) So I paraphrase: play a few games of chess with them, get to know them, before making the leap to get to know them through RPGs more heavy-ruled chess with them." Sort of like masturbating to Penhouse to get to know women, IMHO. I do agree about the no stand-in rule (cough***CENSORED***cough). But the game itself can bond people, like team games can. Besides, I cannot imagine you (cough^**CENSORED***cough) a stand-in. Only "standardized players" would expect such a RAW cookie cutter. The Science of Roleplaying #2: Relationships between Players and Characters
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Post by archmagezemoc on Feb 10, 2015 7:25:48 GMT -8
Sounds like 'a party promise', ie: we all set about saving the world with our small band if true believers at parties, the everyone wakes up the next day and forgets everything in favour of preferred hangover remedy. It may just be that the volunteering of your GM services by friend-HG was a but too hasty/premature; possibly because friend-HG is aware he is going to be absent for some time and hopes that you might fill the void on his behalf. What you can never be is a 'stand in' for friend-HG's social network. That is, you cannot replace him or keep his position warm for him until he returns. You need to find you place, if any, with this social group. You need to socialise with them first and become friends that game rather than the other way around. Basically isn't not really a game issue at all, it's a social dynamic issue that could be problematic regardless of the question of RPG's (in any form). Maybe just get to know them with a few beer and pretzel board/card game nights . . . like a good crack dealer tempting a mark with the harmless stuff first in order to get them on to the real deal. Aaron I think this is more my problem, and I'm definitely not filling HG's spot in their social dynamic ( from my point of view anyway ) as he only ever GMed for our core group twice, and he never played with them separately, one of them joined our group before (two separate occasions actually) and both times he played for about 1 month where he would just get drunk and forget how to play. My friend HG is the out-going drinking\party guy, I am very much the kid listening to Snoop Dogg in that hazy room off "away" from the party with the small group of folks. The only time my social anxiety ( nerd with SA how surprising!) doesn't tear me down most of the time is when I'm GMing but it takes alot of self-inertia to get in the mindset so when the group isn't into it or we have too much lag-time at the beginning I lose inertia and by the time i've corralled all the cats I'm too annoyed to GM without being a nightmare-gm. I think I'll just "shelve" the game for awhile till I can get them to respond to msgs at least lol. I have some board games and shit I could throw at em to wind em up, I don't think any of them play Chess to any degree, it would be a slaughter. Edit: Thanks for helpin me work this one through guys, that was causin me a mental knot for awhile now. I appreciate it.
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Post by CreativeCowboy on Feb 10, 2015 7:51:32 GMT -8
I don't think any of them play Chess to any degree, it would be a slaughter. Would this be the problem you are identifying yourself with? (echoing the advice to go rules light) Are you a rules-heavy system GM? (I think you admitted as much in another post.)
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Post by archmagezemoc on Feb 10, 2015 8:10:42 GMT -8
I am a rules heavy GM, from what Stu has said (sorry if I misquote) "I like to GM from the bottom of a pile of crunch". Whether or not I actually use\implement the rules depends on the game\system\group\whatever but I really like to know how it works first so I know how it "should" work and I can build off that, or chisel down.
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Post by Malex on Mar 5, 2015 9:21:37 GMT -8
2nd Session I show up and it didn't seem like anyone even knew we were supposed to be playing, so I left my PHB there and asked them to make characters. They proclaimed to know how so I left it at that and whent home. I sort of feel that you having left them the book and you leaving was the big mistake. You might have gotten further with the players by sticking around and spit-balling ideas for their characters and then helping them create their PCs. Throwing the book into someone's lap is going to end with exactly what happened. I just finished reading Odyssey: The Complete Guide to Campaign Management and I found it rather helpful for issues like this. I recommend taking a look.
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Post by jazzisblues on Mar 15, 2015 9:50:11 GMT -8
2nd Session I show up and it didn't seem like anyone even knew we were supposed to be playing, so I left my PHB there and asked them to make characters. They proclaimed to know how so I left it at that and whent home. I sort of feel that you having left them the book and you leaving was the big mistake. You might have gotten further with the players by sticking around and spit-balling ideas for their characters and then helping them create their PCs. Throwing the book into someone's lap is going to end with exactly what happened. I just finished reading Odyssey: The Complete Guide to Campaign Management and I found it rather helpful for issues like this. I recommend taking a look. Odyssey is a very handy book with some very good ideas in it. I very much recommend it. I take the view that character creation should be done as a group and should never be done without input from all quarters. Just my 2 krupplenicks on the subject, your mileage may of course vary. JiB
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