The Diceology Podcast
Welcome to Diceology, where we dive deep into the stories that make tabletop role-playing games more than just dice and character sheets. As a GM-at-Large, I explore the lives of gamers, facilitators, con organizers, and the creators who bring these worlds to life.
Think StoryCorps for gamers: We talk about where games fit into people’s lives, what early gaming was like, and even what life looks like after the dice are put away. I also share my own GM-at-Large adventures—what I’m playing, running, or prepping at the table or online.
Whether you’re curious about the latest trends in TTRPGs, or just want to hear the stories of those who play and create them, Diceology is here to bring you the rest of the gamer’s story. Roll initiative, and let’s get started!
The Diceology Podcast
From Hobby to Profession: The Life of Paid Game Masters
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Have you ever wondered what it's like to turn your tabletop gaming passion into a profession? Judd Karlman and I chat about our extraordinary path from hobbyists to professional game masters (GMs), revealing the quirky, exciting, and sometimes absurd adventures that come with the territory. From hilarious bachelor party RPG requests to the broader implications of monetizing our love for gaming, we peel back the curtain on a niche that's rapidly gaining traction. Join us as we reminisce about our initial foray into paid GMing and how it has evolved into a noteworthy part of our creative and community endeavors.
As seasoned GMs, we also tackle the practical side of running various campaign styles, including the nuances of open table versus West Marches formats. I open up about the routines I've adopted to stay sane and healthy during long sessions at the screen, and we both reflect on the rewarding experience of watching players shape their own narratives. Setting boundaries and creating inclusive spaces for our players is paramount, and we share how we navigate these responsibilities to ensure that everyone at the table feels comfortable and safe.
The episode concludes with a critical discussion on maintaining a safe and respectful gaming community, addressing the challenge of confronting 'broken stairs'—problematic individuals who threaten the group's play. We highlight the cultural impact of phenomena like Critical Role and the excitement around the Dungeons & Dragons movie, emphasizing how they shape our approach to community building. Our conversation is an invitation to listeners to engage with us and contribute to a dialogue that prioritizes safety, inclusion, and the pure joy of collaborative storytelling in gaming.
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Happy holidays and Merry Christmas to you. Today I've got Judd Carlman of Daydreaming About Dragons on the show and we talk about getting paid to GM Games. Judd shares his experiences prior to and including his run on StartPlaying Games, the platform where you can pay to play RPGs online. This is part one of a huge conversation of our thoughts and experiences in this area. Enjoy. This is Dysology, the podcast about tabletop games and the talk to the people that play them. The Dysology show is sponsored by listeners like you. Subscribe to the show on Patreon. Let's make this our regular thing.
Speaker 2I realized that before StartPlaying I had done a stint of pro-Gaming in the sense of CryoStays with Jeff. It was right before Storm joined us. We could figure out the date if we really wanted to, because it was right when preview stuff for fourth edition was coming out. I remember one of the people in the group we were running a game for for money was looking at it and he was like, yeah, I'm not going to allow Dragonborn in my game. We had always had a Dragonborn-like thing when I was growing up. We just made our own. Why not, he said, because player characters don't have breath weapons. That's just not a thing that happens. I was like, okay, that's your mind. God bless, the conversation is so vivid. Player characters don't have breath weapons. Gm monsters have breath weapons.
Speaker 2We got hired to run a bunch of games for the weekend at a dude's bachelor party. One of his friends found out that he loved Sons of Cryos. He emailed us and he was like hey, I'm a well-to-do professional in Staten Island. Would you guys come for a couple grand and run games all weekend and we'll feed you? Jeff and I were like, yeah, we'll do that.
Speaker 1Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2That sounds like it's just like. I think we did it almost out of curiosity. Also, we did it because we'd be doing it together. We weren't going to end up in a dumpster in Staten Island, right, at least one of us will get away.
Speaker 2One of us is definitely going to get away my money was on Jeff at that point I think, yeah, jeff would have gotten away, he would have been fine. I'm pretty sure I would have been like I'm going to try to hit somebody a little too much and then I would have gotten without being the end of me or I would have started grappling like a total jackass. So before start playing and before all that, we did that. That was fun. We could have made that part of our podcast spiel back. We could have been like hey, if you want to get game with us?
Speaker 2send us a thing send us an idea and we'll send you a quote. We could have started. But I think we were both like, yeah, that was fun, but no, I just want to be there. We don't want to be our lives. We don't want that to be our lives. But what I think is kind of my reaction to all of it is like, yeah, this is interesting, there's a way to make a good amount of money at this, where I think it would actually be worthwhile. I just don't know if this is what I want to do with my life, and it would take a lot of time and energy to get this to do this right the way I want to do it.
Speaker 2I think I've run two or three start playing games. I just got dinged up for two more and I've got to go back to them and say, hey, I just started a new job. I can't do this and I owe those people an email and I'm way overdue. I'm about two weeks overdue on those emails. So I've got to go back and be like no, I'm sorry, but I think there is a market for people like us who run games that aren't fifth edition. I think that that's a totally possible thing, that I think it's there. There are people who want to.
Speaker 2I got hired once for start play because a GM grabbed a couple of players from his game and was like, hey, we'd like to see how Trophy Gold works. Oh wow, nice, yeah, so could you just run it? And I was like, yeah, absolutely. I was like I'm going to get a gold and I thought it was a pretty successful session. They did not leave a review, so I don't know what that means. Yeah, I don't know. And yeah, it was what it was. And then I ran up the other game that you were in, and I think there was one other one and it's fun. It's not enough money for it to be worth my time as it is, but I think I don't know. It's just like a little extra money. I think it's, that's cool, do it. And I think if, if there are people who have that money and want to play a specific way at a specific time, then that's great. Like if there are people you know, if someone wants the money and someone has the money, then great, those two people should get together, right.
Speaker 1Yes.
Speaker 2I think you know, like any deal, but, yeah, I wouldn't want, I wouldn't want a world where that was the only way to play, right, yes, but I don't think that's the world you're creating by, by taking part in it. I don't think you're suddenly, I don't think you're going to wake up and be like, oh man, you've got to pay someone 30 bucks an hour if they're going to run a game for you and and. But yeah, I don't know, but I am definitely running games for my friends because there's stuff in those games I want to create from the fifth edition games or you know, whether it's a blog post or a podcast, or maybe not even a podcast about the game, but, like, gaming helps me create the podcast. So, right, right, I'm definitely not doing it for nothing. Right, I'm right. So, even the games where I'm not charging my friends money, it I feel like there is something I'm getting out of it. There is no kind of exchange going on, you know, right.
Speaker 2No I agree, I agree, yeah, so oh, and there was one other exchange of money. When I first got back to it, like a friend of mine was like hey, you know, I'd love to pay you to run a game for me, for me and the guys. And there was this really interesting moment where he and I were kind of alone and I was like, hey, how are you doing? And he was like he basically like was like told me how work was going Right, and it was his way of like being like this money doesn't, like I can afford this, like work is going really well.
Speaker 2Like I can afford to pay you a couple hundred bucks to run this game. So it's cool. I know you're unemployed right now. I don't think this is going to change your life. I don't think you owe me anything. I can really afford it and it makes me happy to do it and like it was a really nice way to for him to kind of like wink and just be like it's cool, just run a game, like just have fun. I can afford it and it makes me happy to do this. So, yeah, those are the times that I've I've run games. I've definitely understand that.
Speaker 2There's a worry in my head that I'm going to start doing this for money and it's going to mess it up, like. I absolutely have that. I have that fear in my head, right, and I think, in order for it to be a full time job for me, I would need to grind really hard for about six months to a year and then after that, I believe I would get to that point where I'd find the, the niche that I want to find. Ok, but does that niche exist? Right, right, right. I don't know. Like is there a super rich person who is just going to pay me three hundred?
Speaker 2dollars a session to run a one on one game for them. Like I know I can do that, like I know that, like I can run a single GM and single player game and make it awesome, right, and not have you know and and pick the right system that works for that kind of thing and and run the shit out of it. Right, but does anyone? I don't know, I don't know.
Speaker 1So and how do you find? How do I find that person or those people or however many of those folks that I need? I'm with you. I started with the math, the math in general and then the math for me, and I think that math is always going to be personal to the person who's who's running, what their time constraints are, and then how much money they need and how much expenses they've got there in that, wrapped up in that. Yeah, so I'm with you there.
Speaker 2Yeah, and that's another. I think if I was going to go back and do this again and do it right, I think there'd be a half hour to an hour before the game and a half hour to an hour after the game, right, where I would engage and play your self care and then my self care, like it's right in a world where I'm a professional GM. In that world, an hour before the game I'd meditate for 20 minutes and then, a half hour before the game, I'd go online and let everybody know I'm going to be here, right? If you want to check in with me before the game, I'm here, you know, and just let them know that, like before the game, you can come in. Like, if you just want to shoot the shit and find out who I am, that's great.
Running Open Table and West Marches
Speaker 2If you want to say, hey, last game something happened that really bothered me, that's great. If you want to let me know that, like, hey, you know I just got stabbed. I really don't want a game where, like, a knife is being drawn on me, then like, that's also great. Like, so it would be like a safety thing, a social thing, a bunch of you know all that kind of stuff. No, I agree. And then, and then, for a half hour, I would make myself available afterwards, and then, for a half hour afterwards, I would, you know, stretch, do some yoga, do something to like, take care of my body, because sitting in front of these damn machines is tough.
Speaker 1It is tough. It is tough Doing some quick math. If I, because I can't be online more than three hours. So if I say three plus your 90 minutes, right, we're already looking at four and a half to five hours.
Speaker 2Yeah, process.
Speaker 1Yeah, right. So, yeah, that's your day. Yeah, yeah, that's your day, yes, and for me it's not. So I would lose track of the time because I love doing this, right, right and I would. If your time is valuable, I would be value because I would give that time and not keep track of it. Does that make sense?
Speaker 2Yep, yep, yep, yep, yeah, yeah, it's hard, it's really hard. So in your article you were talking about running like I don't want to say West Marches, but like West Marches style.
Speaker 1Yeah, I would say probably more open table, yeah, than West Marches, yeah, but having run two online campaigns of West Marches, I noticed some things. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I noticed some things that I want to keep in my open table games for me and to keep the open table games, I don't know, compelling Maybe that's the word, right, ok, yeah, so open table, so it's so. I think, and this is, maybe this is the weird space between the hobby, right, and being a professional, right, yeah, because there's some marketing and some sales there, and I hate both those words and I hate that that just came out of my mouth and all that stuff, right. But if you're going to be a professional GM, right, I am self employed and one of the things I hate the most is running in running a software company is I just want to make software for people and I want to help you do your job faster, better, quicker, right, the way you need to work, right, and I like to be transparent about all those things and I've gotten to a place where I feel good, mostly about that. But I will over talk a thing, because I don't want to be selling snake oil. I want you to understand what you're paying for what you're getting into. Yeah, right, yes, yep, so it's the same here for me. So when I'm talking I notice that man, this comes out like I'm a sales guy, but I think it's still also true.
Speaker 1So in that article, when I wrote that, my thought is out of the gate. The easiest thing for me to do is run, pick a game. I'd probably pick something popular Fifth edition is the 800 pound gorilla. So if we go with that, right, I would run an open table and that makes it easy for players to get into that game. Fifth edition is a great big touchstone, right? Most folks can make their own characters and hop in. If I'm available 30 minutes before we can talk about that, I will have free gins, right. Or we can help you get through the character making process and now we're playing, right, yeah, then my thought is, if it's open table, we could do the player introduction, so we all know each other and that kind of thing and we just play, right.
Speaker 1But if it's like Wes Marches style, there's a let's call it a meta lore happening. All the sessions combined make a story. You don't have to be in all of them, right, but at least I, as the GM, I'm aware all those things happen. Some of that will spill over into other games. If you want and I make it available online you can have a place to go look at how some of the other sessions played out or where the other adventurers are. It's a shared world that we're playing in, right? But you don't have to have all that other information and you don't have to be in all those other games.
Speaker 1But what I found with let's just go with Wes Marches styled games like that is folks want to know that lore and they're trying to reach out to some of the other characters or other players and form new parties and stuff like that. And when they're at the same table, like if at least two or three games have happened and there's some overlap of players, but some new players the new players are bringing are getting brought up to speed by the other two players from their previous sessions, and you've kind of got that shop talk among adventurers happening. When we'll go hey, have you guys been out to that old Dwarven temple? And somebody will go no, I heard about that but I hadn't gone there, right? I heard XYZ.
Speaker 1And then the new guys go what? This is my first adventure, right? So what are we doing? And then one person will go well, I thought we're going to go here, but maybe we should go to that temple, right? And then right, and I don't, I haven't done anything yet. Right, they're sharing information, especially if they played before. Right, and they keep doing that. And right, I see that happening, yep, and that's where the gold is right.
Speaker 1Yes, that's where the gold is.
Speaker 2I don't have to do very much. The players are just kind of doing their thing on themselves and yeah, yeah, what I've done is I've created this space where they feel safe to do that that's the work, in that they have to feel safe there.
Speaker 1But we've done enough con games that we have a toolbox for at least building some safe spaces.
Speaker 2Yeah, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And honestly, like in the world, in the GMing thing, the least difficult and worrisome thing for me is the GMing right, right, I know someone might come in and be like that's not the style of game I like, which is awesome. Like I'll be like, okay, well, let me, let's find you the person you do like Right, can I help, right. But yeah, I think the hard part is it's all the stuff you just said the marketing, the community building, the all of it.
Speaker 2The accounting, for God's sake, the accounting, yes, yeah, you know, because one player is going to bust out and be like I'll be the chronicler. It's like does he or she get a little bit off on their thing Because they're doing a lot of work? Like they're doing labor, now they're doing labor, right Now they're doing labor. And then you know, if you get three people who are all doing labor in one session, like was that day worth anything, money wise to you, all of a sudden, right, and I know that those people are bringing in other like it can become really weird. Yeah, yeah, really really weird.
Speaker 2And someone, some ones, are going to get together with like three good GMs and be like, hey, we're running a thing Right, and I think there's room to make that really awesome. And I think it's there, especially because you can yeah, I mean, you can record everything right, so you can, like, watch the important moments you can, you know, let the next GM know, like, hey, you should watch. You know our 245, you know 245 mark on the video and just look at that before the next game. Right, you know, and read my synopsis. But it's a lot of work, I think it would be a lot of work.
Speaker 1No, it is some work. Yeah, it is some work.
Speaker 2And the other thing that vexes me about it is I like jumping around, I like playing into the odd for a couple months and writing a bunch about it. And then I like picking up traveler and running that a bunch and then going back and being like, oh shit, that thing that we did with into the odd was fun. I should write that up. And like, I like being able to jump around. And there you know, once you start doing this for money, then you've got to follow the market forces a little bit Right and yeah.
Speaker 2I don't know I don't know where exactly that's going to be.
Speaker 1And I don't know either. My thought was at the beginning and this is all theory. This is what I'm going to step out into, start playing and find out. My thought is open tables. We do that at con games. I've got those skills. Let me run with open tables with a popular game and build some traction out there and learn some things right. Ideally that is an easy win not effort but an easy win and from there my hope is to build into a work, into one-off campaign games where I'm running maybe four or five sessions of a thing burning wheel or I don't know, legacy or whatever right, something that takes some more work, a little bit harder than the easier games I can run 5e, bx, there's certain games we can run in our sleep and it's nothing. But I think, like you said, I think there's a market or there's a place for non-mainstream indie games that are a little heavier, that folks want to play.
Speaker 2Yeah and yeah. Just people who are like hey, I'm curious, I want to, I'm going to run this for my friends, I'd like to see how it works and what you do, and I think that's like a whole other aspect of this is like hey, would you like to buy my GM coach package where I run three sessions for you and then help you set up your game for your friends? That's like that's a thing, and then, like you can send me a video of you and your friends and I'll help coach you based on that. I don't know. Yeah, I think there's like so many weird little niches to be found.
Speaker 1I think it's there, I agree.
Speaker 2It's absolutely all there. But someone's gonna oh, they're gonna have to work so hard and someone's gonna work real hard at this and they're gonna hit it big and absolutely God's bless them. It's just not me. I would rather be playing on the side and working a little bit hard, a little bit hard on like putting a couple of blog posts together, doing some podcasting, and the real career is in the library and that's that. But I don't know, if I didn't get this current job that I had now I might be like in the midst of the grind because I might be like you know what? I gotta give it a shot, right, right. So, yeah, I think I just like got lucky and decided that wasn't the thing I wanted to do, but I could definitely see it was gonna be a brutal amount of work and there are people doing it.
Speaker 2Yeah, you know people who have sub stacks who are like, hey, this is how I'm making professional jamming work and they're killing it. That's pretty cool. Yeah, it's a whole thing. I don't know. Yeah, yeah, and I don't think it's destroying. Yeah, we talked about this a little bit before, but I don't think it's destroying the hobby. I don't think, as soon as you agree that this is a skill-based hobby, then expertise should be paid for sometimes and it's not all the time, but it's sometimes. I don't know, yeah.
Paid GMs
Speaker 1So for me, because I've seen the hot conversations and I think it's easy for me to say I think it always is about where you started in life and where you're at right now oh, interesting, Right for me, I know, when I first got out of the military, I'm a shoot things and blow stuff up guy and you're not going to get a whole lot of civilian jobs doing that. One of the first jobs I got was as an armored courier. I got five bucks an hour sitting in the back of a truck with a gun that's loaded a truck full of money. But on the side I would DJ, because I would DJ before I went into the military and I DJed while I was in the military and so I would do private parties and things like that on the side. Dj, right. But then sometimes I would have friends that would have events like weddings or whatever, and they're like, hey, would you come out and DJ and I would just do it? Right, Just feed me and I will DJ for you for free, right, Because I know you're spending money on your wedding, that kind of thing, right?
Speaker 1And my thought is all kinds of folks have different. I play guitar. I would sometimes side gig and play guitar for folks, and sometimes I would just play for fun for folks, I would help fill in. They're like, hey, Jerry's out, Can you come do some rhythm guitar for us? They're speaking. I'm like man, I'd love to do that and I'd like to go out and do that. So I think folks have different sets of skills that they might use to gig on the side or whatever, right, For whatever reasons. And I feel like running games is the same thing. It's the same spot, same place, right, I'm never gonna show up Wednesday night to my regular group and say, hey, I need five bucks from everybody. Right, Give me $5, right. And I think most folks' games at home and that kind of stuff are safe, right.
Speaker 1I remember early on in this conversation I was setting up my. It was when I did the Kickstarter for the Into the Madlands and there were some women that reached out and they asked about some safety things and we had that conversation and I came up short and I asked, hey, would you help me bridge that gap Because I don't know? Right, and they did. And what I learned was, even before I came along and before all this other stuff came along, there were plenty of folks who were already paying GMs to run games for them because they couldn't find other folks to run games for them. They didn't feel safe in other spaces and this was a way where they could set up where the game was gonna happen at. They bought in some trust or got into some trust with this GM that they're paying and it's entertainment and they're getting what they needed out of it, the way they needed to have it, and they were willing to pay the money for it.
Speaker 2Yep.
Speaker 2And so it's funny you're saying that, because you're making me rethink about when I've done paid jamming. So I don't know if this is paid jamming, but this is when money gets involved, right. Right, when I was like in the midst of like in the heyday of dictionary of Mu, which is my, my, my sorcerer supplement, and I still sell a couple every couple of months the way at the end of the long tail. But every once in a while somebody on RPGnet is like hey, what's a good sort, you know sort and sorcery setting. And someone jumps in and is like dictionary of Mu and like I get some guy in Ohio who needs to have it and I send it to him or her usually him. So when I was making some money on that and the long tail wasn't quite so long, when my friends and I would go to cons before I would just be like no, no, no, no, no, I'm, I got my own, I have my own hotel room. I'm too old for this, I'm too old Before I would do that.
Speaker 2We would all get a room together and I would say, listen, I'll pay for half the room. The rest of y'all pay the rest. Right, and that's because everybody who is sleeping here, whether it's on a bed or on the floor or wherever you all end up sleeping. You all like play tested, you all did a beta read, like everybody here contributed somehow and so I will pay for half and the rest of. And if you haven't contributed to that, you're contributing to the next thing, so I will pay for half the hotel room for the weekend and the rest of you all split the rest.
Speaker 2And like that was my way of like taking care of the people who were taking care of me at the table, and if things had gone even better, I'd be like the hotel room is free, but I was like this is what I can afford right now. And yeah, that's definitely. But like people who are like oh well, pay jamming is bad. It's very interesting because how many of them are doing independent publishing and how many of them are play testing with their friends, because that's a professional service, like your friends are giving you something at that point, they are helping you publish. And yeah, I don't know, it's a thing I would say most of the time it's there already in some way.
Speaker 1I become a dickhead of two folks who become bullish or bulldogish about this topic and I'll say have you ever been to GenCon? Have you ever gone to Origins or any? And most of them will say yeah. And then they will immediately say but the ticket doesn't count. And I'm like I know I'm not talking about the badge, right? Have you bought tickets to an event, right, right?
Speaker 1And they're like yeah, I'm like, yeah, so let me tell you about the other side. Right, if you go to GenCon and I don't know what the prices are today, but you paid $4 for that ticket and you sat down and you turned your ticket over, right? Then you paid GenCon for the room and that GM is running for free, but if you paid anything over four bucks, you're paying that GM. Anything over that. $4 went to the GM, whether you know it or not, right, and that kind of shuts down the conversation. But what I'm saying there is you already pay for GM. So don't say I would never pay for, right, it's not right, we were already doing it in some form or fashion. But what I was going is I didn't realize that there were other needs, right, like I said, the women that I spoke with oh like safety yeah, yeah, they had a safety need.
Speaker 1There was a guy from Wyoming that he's like I'm in Wyoming and I'm so far out I just I don't have anybody else to play with right, yeah yeah, so yeah, and I'm like oh, I didn't think about that either, right, Yep, yep. So there are a bunch of different reasons for all why folks would probably pay a GM to run games for them, right, yeah? Instructional, like you said, right, yep, yep, yep.
Speaker 2The type of game I really wanted to take off and nobody bit on it, and I really, really wanted it to happen was I wanted to run a two hour morning wander home game. Just be like I'm gonna be here every morning between six and eight o'clock in the morning.
Speaker 2Come on in, log in, you don't have to. Like you go get your coffee. Like you don't have to sit here and be here, totally present. You'll be walking around doing stuff. Come on back and we'll be running like a real kind of cozy, chill game.
Speaker 2Still with that kind of morose-ness that's at the background of wander home, it's not totally a cool game. There's trauma that happened in the past, right, and we're kind of trying to get past it together. But I really wanted like a cozy, communal, fun wander home game when, like we just we just game, like like real chill gaming in the morning. You know, we might sit around a fire and talk about where we're going, we might actually go somewhere and travel, we might, you know, pack, help each other, pack our bags. But right, just something real chill.
Speaker 2And it just never quite came together. But I was like, oh, that's the man, somebody better than me is going to make that work. You know it's going to be fucking awesome. I just think I. What I think is interesting about the the page jamming thing is I think there are so many different niches to. Yes, I agree, yeah, I think the if someone like, especially like people who play all kinds of different games and know about all kinds of different games. Right, I just wouldn't want to throw myself into that. Five E like shark pool, like there's just so much of it.
Speaker 1And it's all over the place. You just don't start playing. Yeah, it's all over the place.
Speaker 2It's not in my head.
Speaker 1I wild, crazy success is there's some open table game that I use as I don't have this other stuff on the schedule. Let's say I'm trying to fill in 20 hours a week, right, right, right. And the first thing I'm going to try to do is run some campaign games, and maybe it's a game that I'm strong in, maybe it's a liminal right. I'm running my regular liminal thing Get in where you can get in at right. And then maybe I'm like, hey, you know, homeworld is out, right, so I'm going to run Homeworld this month because it's new and is hot and is is fancy, let's give that for us and run. And if those don't fill in the 20 hours, then whatever's left I will do the open table stuff. Yeah, and I have a make sense, that's that's my, but I don't know if that works. Right, right, that's my ideal, right.
Speaker 2But yeah, 20 hours is a lot of hours, Like right and that's that's like, because, again, this is just math for me.
Speaker 1I was working from the math side back the other way, right, instead of I've played with it a bunch of different ways there's I want to make. I'm just throwing numbers out there yeah, 300 bucks a table, what does that look like? And I'm like, wow, that's too many people I'd have to pack that table with and I don't want to run that. Yeah, right, how else can I get there? Right, and when I do 40 hours, I'm like man, there's no way, that's a lot of work to make all those tables go, right, yeah. So the sweet spot for me is 20 hours. I'm running three hours, yes, three hour sessions, right, and that's not counting. We talked about the half hour aftercare and half hour, right, but before bookmark, yeah, that doesn't. So now I'm still at four hours, right, yeah. And the five of the week.
Speaker 1Yeah, so yeah, that's still a lot. But then I'm like no, that's fine, Right, because when I do convention stuff, right, I run a game Friday. Usually, I run two games on Saturday and a game on Sunday, right, and so that's four games already, right?
Speaker 2Yeah, but you come home and then you get sick.
Speaker 1That's right.
Speaker 2You come home and you get the flu. That's right. You're like that was great. I'll do it again next year.
Speaker 1Yeah, next year I'll do it again next year. Yes, so, yeah, so it's some work. No, you're right, and that's just 20 hours, right, right. So then, if you keep messing with the math and again, this is all personal depends on who you are and what kind of income you need, right, yeah, yeah, you're having to and you don't have a lot of variables. Right, I got to change the price of the ticket. Right, I got to reduce or change the number of hours per session. Right, I've got to change how many people can sit down and play. Right, to make all that stuff work. And you got to jiggle those things, right?
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, I like if someone's listening to this and they're like I'm thinking about being a pro GM, like my advice is like find your angle, like you have there's something unique about you and your gaming experience Right and market that Right. You know, and I don't. I don't know what it is Like. Maybe you run like all the D&D, watsy hard cover modules reverse, so everybody plays monsters, you know, and you're doing like reverse modules for everything. Or maybe you're, you know, doing everything but with you know, into the odd old school style or black sword hack or whatever it is.
Speaker 1I think of Rich Rogers. He runs everything through Star Wars.
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, totally yeah, find, find your way. And geez, rich, I I Would love like we should talk to Rich, because it's like, how does he game so much Like?
Speaker 1I don't Right.
Money Games, Set Expectations, Running
Speaker 2He has an incredible amount of gaming hours in oh my goodness, I hear about like his stats sometimes when he talks about like end of the year. This is how many games I played, new games I played. This is how many different sessions I played. And I'm just like I know you're a good dad and husband too.
Speaker 1Yes, yes, get that in.
Speaker 2Like.
Speaker 1I know a regular job, I know a podcast.
Speaker 2I know you're an editing other podcasts and like when do you walk your dog? Like I don't understand how he does Make zero sense to me. God bless you, rich. Yes, that is crazy, right, I'm inspired by you, you, you, you do things with time that make no sense to me.
Speaker 2So, yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean I just think that there are so many different ways to do this hobby and and there are so many niches that people need, and I think there are niches that people don't even realize they need yet, and that's going to be interesting. It's going to be interesting to see people find those and and and rock out. It's yeah. I mean. The other, like my closest thing to the model you're talking about is I've got a little Facebook group of like all of my gaming friends and then people who I know are like nerd adjacent or like nerd friendly I've invited into this Facebook group too, and it's about like 144 people at this point, right, and so I said, you know, hey, I'd like to run, you know two games a month, would you all be into that?
Speaker 2And so there's like 20 something of them were like, yeah, that would be awesome. So I was running twice a month, I was running into the odd. You know, clearly 144 people didn't show up. You know, scheduling Nix is a lot of people and so you end up with like a little group, but it's it's all of these people from all over my life. So it was interesting. So it was like people who I know from online, people who I game with locally, people who I I a couple of people who I just like practiced jujitsu with, and we're like, yeah, I'm interested in gaming, I'd love to try it. And some of those folks were like, yeah, I watched Critical Role to prepare for the game tonight and I was like, oh shit, ok. So I think the other interesting thing about the the paid for GM is you don't know who's going to walk through the door and throw money, right, and you don't know what their experience is. You really like the setting of expectations. It's just got to be like the.
Speaker 2The language we have for gaming is not perfect Like the. The way we talk about the game is not perfect Like the, the the way we talk about it is weird. I remember living with a friend of mine who actually I just spent the evening at his house putting together a, a, a squat rack in his house, but we were roommates ages, like you know, 20 years ago we were roommates and we knew that the other one game and we couldn't talk about it because we didn't want to be in a bad game. And then, like, yeah, I don't like the way you game. So we just didn't talk about, we talked about anything else but gaming and eventually we games together.
Speaker 2But it took a long time. It took a long time because we were just nervous and and and now I know, like if I was interviewing someone and I want to know, like hey, you know, I would say, hey, like, tell me about, like a fun thing that happened in your last game. And so, like that way you find out, oh, this is what I thought was fun and it might be like, oh, there was a goblin with a funny voice, or it might be like oh, you know the build of my character was perfect and I, I, I killed everything, or you know it might be.
Speaker 2Oh well, I, my character, had to make this terrible decision. And is he even a hero anymore? I don't even know. And yeah, there are so many different answers to that question, and and so, yeah, the setting of expectations is very difficult, I see it.
Speaker 1And.
Speaker 2I think we we see that with cons right.
Speaker 1We see that was down, absolutely yeah.
Speaker 2Friends of cons, where you know, not everybody, not you know I. Often, when I go to cons, I often say like, hey, I don't know how this is going to end. I'm as curious as you are. Let's, let's see. And, and you know, once I said that and one guy was like yeah, of course, yeah, of course, that's the only way to play. I was like, well, OK, no, I will.
Speaker 1Usually especially cons, usually the games I pick. I have this prep but I don't know where it's going, right? Yeah, I'm going to follow the characters wherever you guys go Is where I'm going, and I will usually sit down and I'll say, hey look, this could go great, this could go down in the ball of fire. I don't even know, right.
Speaker 2Yeah, I'll have a plot.
Speaker 1I'll have a plot. There's no railroad. We're going to see what we get. We'll see what we see, right?
Speaker 1I don't know Right, yeah, and, and it's true. So with that I have another question. Yeah, so when we talk about Running games for money, another question or another Concept that comes up is wow, if you're running games for money and you're taking people's money and you run in this session, do you kill the characters? Does it change the way? Does the money change the way you run the game? Yeah, are you running it differently than you normally?
Speaker 2would. Right, you have to let, I think. I think you have to be transparent as hell and be like this is the type of game we're running here, folks, right, if your character dies, this is what we're going to do to get you back into it, and and just set the expectation. So it's very clear. And yeah, like you know, I would want people to know. Like, hey, you know you're not going to know, but I'm going to massage things so that people don't die, you know. And yeah, everybody who actually does that is like no, jed, you don't tell them, but I am really too old to be doing presto, you know, imaginative presto, digitization at the game.
Speaker 1Right, yes, no, I'm with you, yeah.
Speaker 2Like there's like a school of GMing, where it's like you are actually manipulating people and I'm like no, you're not, I just or. Or yes, you are, but but no, I'm not.
Speaker 2Right, I'm not interested in that game? I'm not interested in manipulating people, I think. I think, yeah, that's a very good question. I think you let people know what happens, right, and you just demystify the whole thing and be like, hey, you will not sit out for more than a few minutes, we will get a new character and get you back into the game quickly. If we don't like the kind of character you build, we can build another one in between games, and and we'll go from there. But you know, and and yeah, you just demystify the whole thing and and and.
Speaker 2With fantasy, there's so many cool ways to do that. Right, there is, there is, you can, you can have, you can be like, hey, if you die, your character hangs around as a ghost, right, like, was it Ron Edwards Circle of Hands, where it's like you, you, you can give advantage dice to people and and and like, say goodbye to your friends one last time, right, as you, you know, and and that way you don't have to sit around at all, you don't have to wait for the next character. You're just kind of like this ghost thing kind of floating around, right, yeah, I would think you just set the expectation and yeah, I'm sure that'll go wrong for somebody right. Somebody's gonna stomp off so I have.
Speaker 1I Ran the into the Madlands West Marches. I use forbidden lands and I use BX D&D and there were 40 players that signed up for all of that. And you're right, I thought the BX games would be deadlier. I Didn't want to remove too much of that. Yeah, so I did. I did set the expectations and I always said if your third level or below and you die, right, there's probably combat happening. You're just out for that combat, right, right, as long as somebody is alive at the end of that combat, right, then You're out and they bring everybody back around and we'll work that out. So nobody's dead, I said. But if everybody's dead, then it's a TPK, right, okay.
Speaker 2Okay, that's a level and above.
Speaker 1Dead is dead is what I said. Oh, interesting, okay, so that was funny, I would. I might change that going forward if I had to do it again, but I'm not sure I would do something similar. Yeah, what was what I didn't account for was People deciding who's going to be in the expedition party and who isn't. Based on those levels, right?
Speaker 2Right so that's God.
Speaker 1That was interesting. That wasn't bad.
Speaker 2I didn't expect that but that was interesting and funny. But you could also make that an in-game thing where it's like hey, when you're, when you get that powerful, death actually watches you more carefully, right, right. And so like they're like hey, death is, death's eye is on me, like I, I'm not opening that door, you open it, grunts.
Speaker 1Dream about.
Speaker 2I had a dream where death was just sitting on my bed watching me I know death is watching me. Like I feel like when people talk about this stuff they don't talk about like just fantastic, like just have that, like death is just like a person who shows up, right.
Speaker 1Right, I can see him. Right, you can see him, he's there, he's right there and and. So I'm gonna stay out here and watch the whole. You guys got that room right.
Speaker 2Because I am too old for that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think that's legit, I think that like, especially if you make it an in-game thing, I think that that's, that's that might make it more interesting and and and Make it less of a of a kind of an emerging killer, um, to say a dirty word, immersion. But, yeah, um, interesting, yeah, I like that policy. That that's interesting. It's a. I like the, the pressure of not having the TPK right. It's right. Right, that is very cool. Did you out? Did you have any?
Speaker 1Oh, man, I had. So what's funny is I thought that BX, d&d, it was just old-school essentials. I figured that was a nice easy touchstone. I figured that would be the fun laid-back casual game because everyone could easily make characters hop in and do that. And I figured forbidden lands would be the serious game, right, and it didn't turn out that way. It was completely opposite. Forbidden lands Interesting was the more casual games that folks got in and it wasn't silly, but it was casual, right, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, right, bx was serious. Those folks came to play for real, right, right, and I love that was here for it. Um, I had one TPK, one TPK and forbidden lands. Monsters and forbidden lands. If you run up on one, you can't be casual about that. The monsters and forbidden lands I love it. They have a kind of a behavior AI table, right. So every round the GM rolls what it's going to do. So I don't choose, I roll, and whatever it comes up, that's what it does that round.
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah. I can't help that it danced on your corpse.
Speaker 1It's not me and me I would. I'm sometimes, I'm like, how about you make that roll and we find out what this? Oh nice Put it right with this snakes into her creature thing is going to do oh it, oh, and it's you, because you rolled the dice right.
Speaker 2So yeah, I would do that right. So I want to circle back around to the safety thing. I feel like you talked about Um, ladies in the game coming to you and talking about safety stuff. Yes, Was that like a hey, you're not doing this and you might need it. You might want to think about that For future endeavors. Or was it like hey, you know, these are some questions I have that I need answered Before I jump into any of this or put money down or whatever right.
Speaker 1So at first there were two things. One was a question about the safety tools like the X card, yeah, lines and veils, and I said I'm super familiar with those. At the beginning of all the sessions we would talk about those things. I'd know every session, right, every single session. But I'll fail, I would do that.
Speaker 1Code of conduct came up and I was in the middle of drafting it and I said here's what I got, right, if you don't mind, you know, taking a second set of eyes and telling me what I'm missing, right? Hmm, because what what's going to happen is I'm a dude. I play with a lot of dudes, I know a lot of dudes are dickheads, right, but I don't know what it is. I can never need, right, can never read this as a woman, right, and I don't know what. You need to see what? Yeah, right, to feel safe, to know that we're on the same page, smart, and she was happy to help me fix that there and we had a conversation about that because it's here, here's what I would like to see.
Speaker 1But I also need to know that you're going to do those things right, right, and I'm like, yeah, no, I'm here for that, right? Yeah, I just don't know how to Communicate that, right, yeah, and so we did that. And then I asked what, what's gaming like where you're at right? What are you? What are you playing now currently? Right, because we're starting to turn into a regular conversation and she said you know, she has a small group of folks that she plays with and they routinely hire one of two different GM's to run games for them and I'm like yeah, I'm like, why wouldn't you?
Speaker 1just, she said we got games we like, but the things that we're interested in or the things that we want to know, sometimes we just want to play together. Right, I don't want to just go to the local game store and hop into any of those games or pull the one of those cars off the wall and Short for that. Yeah, yeah, and they had some bad experiences with that. Yeah, and she said we, we found a couple of GM's that we like and we offered to pay the money for them to come Run games. You know where. We want to play games that and it's worked out for us, right. Yeah, and I was like, wow, that's, and they do it for for safety reasons, they feel comfortable and they get to play stuff that they want to play. They get to play together and they don't have to deal with. I remember At a con, one of the things and it makes me embarrassed sometimes I'm like man, I need a Another gender.
Speaker 1I can join, right, so I'm not with, I'm not associated with some of these dudes, right, I got up in the middle of the car, in the workshop panel thing, and he said, hey, can you tell me how I can get more girls To come play games with us. Right, I run these games and I can't get any women to play these games. And I'm like, aside from none of the other panels folks wanted to touch that question right? I said I'm gonna do it. Right, I'm gonna do it. I said, but I got some questions first too. Right, and this is gonna be important.
Speaker 1He was a white guy that that said this, right, and I asked so when you say you want to run some games and let's say women, not girls, right, and you want Women to be part of your gaming group and play where these games being ran at, right? And he said at my house. I'm like okay, all right, at your house. Who else is at your house? And he named like three or four guys. I'm like great, great, this wouldn't be in the basement, right? And I was joking. He's like yeah, my basement is. It's pretty fixed up, it's the gaming room, it's nice. I'm like I'm sure it is, I'm sure it's nice, I'm sure it's fantastic.
Speaker 1I said, but I'm a black dude, I Was in the military, I'm a vet, I'm pretty sure I can take you right, I'm not coming to your house to play any kind of game, right, I'm not doing right, right, and I'm a dude, right, I'm not doing that. How about you put up a list, a listing, in your friendly local gaming shop and say, hey, right, or just start running some games there, right, yeah, and play there, right, where it's a known quantity, yeah, it's like. Well, no, I got this whole setup in my basement and I'm like, and it will always be you and Frank and Tony and right, and that's it. Right, nobody in the right mind. You guys are strangers. Right, and I'm telling you, I'm not coming to your house To play games with you guys. I'm sure you're all nice guys, right? Um, I, some folks just don't write that. I don't know, right, how to drag them across the line and understand that other folks don't see it that way. Right, you have to earn that trust.
Speaker 2I can't stop thinking about Brad Pitt and the glorious bastards talking about the basement. Like you can fight in a fucking basement. You didn't tell me this was in a basement, Right.
Speaker 1Right, oh boy, yeah, wow, uh, so so, yeah, uh, both those, both those stories. Her story that we paid GM's so we can have a safe gaming experience breaks my heart, right, yeah. And that one guy how do I get more girls in my basement? Right.
Speaker 2That also breaks my heart, right Yep.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 2Yeah, that's bad. I did with with one of the pro games. I one of the paid games I ran. Uh, I don't like pro because it's like oh yeah, the other guys are amateur.
Speaker 1I don't like that either. No.
Speaker 2No, uh, in one of the paid games I ran there was, there was a lady who said like I don't want any romantic plots of any kind. Right, I was like rock on, I can do that, I can do that, I can do that, yeah.
Speaker 1Yes, I think it's stuff. Yeah, I think it's stuff like that. Uh, I'm amenable to right, but I would be. I would listen to that at a free con table, right, and someone's like I'm not into this, right, I categorize that under lines and veils, right, yep.
Speaker 2Yep, so I've got my pregame talk. This is actually, uh, expanded from my pregame paid game talk. This is what I would say for the into the odd game that I ran with the with the Facebook group. Um, you want me to run through that? Is that a?
Speaker 1useful thing. Yeah, no, that'd be fantastic. Yeah, I think it's a springboard for folks to jump off. Yeah.
Speaker 2Yeah, some of it is one of the things that I really liked, and if I had to like, cut this down too long, didn't read. This is what I would say. Um, there's something that Jason Morningstar said in uh, at the indie game reading club when we were there at the slack and and uh, he was like are we all agreed that the game is less important than the people? Like, these people are friends and we're looking out for them, and there is nothing about this game that is more important than the people in it. Are we all agree on that? And everyone would say yep. And then we say, okay, let's play like that and I would love to start doing that in just my day to day games and I always forget, and I would love to start doing it, cause I think it's just a great thing to say right, but so some of this, you you'll see that come in Uh, and it's totally inspired by Jason Morningstar. So it says uh, and the other thing I have at the top of here is is the following is not set in stone and will change as I learn more about gaming and collaboration and friendship Uh, hello and welcome. Thank you for joining me to play into the odd I'm Judd, affirmed by he, him pronouns.
Speaker 2We can pause the game, stop the game, rewind the game. Feel free to put an X in the chat or make an X with your arms, like so, if something comes up that is triggering or traumatic. This is a fantasy horror game. That does not mean that you have to be uncomfortable in a bad way. You can walk away at any time for any reason and don't owe anyone here an explanation Ever. And the other thing I would say is like, if I see you at a con, I'll say how are you doing? I won't say why'd you leave my game? I'm not going to ask you. So just if you need to bail, bail go. I will never ask you why. I don't care. Um, I care that, um, you know if you're upset, but I've not ever going to your new. You don't owe me an explanation if you walk right. Um, before we start, we will need to agree that this is a game. The mechanics, the characters, the story that we will create through our play is not as important as the people at the table. I'd rather the game crashed and burned and cause anyone to relive past traumas. We are playing to find out. I have ideas, daydreams and even some maps and notes, but I'm I'm playing with you all to find out what will happen. I will take joy in how you all will no doubt surprise me. I have no idea how this will end, and that makes this fun for me.
Speaker 2Ask questions, both in character and out of character. Explore and be creative. I'm asking you all to play your characters, while also supporting and cheering each other on and being your wonderful selves, offering your unique perspectives and ways that will bring out the this fantastic world of life. Being a good player is synonymous with being a good friend. Let's look out for each other, enjoy each other's imagination and contribute to the next few hours being wondrous. If you find that playing your character might interfere with being a good friend, stop and check in with your friends at the table. Sometimes characters die in into the odd. If this should happen, we will get the player back into the game with a new character as quickly as possible. Character's perishing is not a mess, it's just part of the game. Can we agree on the above? Everyone says yes, great, and I say please do the following Ask questions, cheer when someone does or says something cool.
X Card Concerns, Prioritize People
Speaker 2Please don't have situations where players can't control their characters. Sexual violence of any kind. Don't keep secrets from players. Is there anything that you would like to add or change? Before we make introductions and begin, do you have any questions about the game or about how me or about how I will play it? At the end of the session, I'd like to record a short post game talk in the format called Stars and Wishes. I've been sharing these videos on YouTube. If you do not want to be recorded, please let me know. That is my spiel. It's a Google Doc. It's going to keep changing. My idea of how this stuff works will keep changing, right. My worry about the X card is that people think it's like a holy symbol that will stop bad actors, right, and it's like no, no, the only thing you can do is remove that person from your space. Like a broken stair is not going to. An X card is not going to stop a broken stair, it just doesn't. So, yeah, yeah, that was my spiel.
Speaker 1No, that's good, that's solid, that's solid, yeah.
Speaker 2It is too long, it is too fucking long, but there's so much to say.
Speaker 1But as I said, if I?
Speaker 2could cut it down to just one bit. It would be like, do we agree that the people around us are more important to us than this game? And like, if you cut out everything else, that's the sentence I want to say Right, that's the core. Right, because people have weird ass ideas about games and they do, they do. I just kept the game going because I didn't want to mess up everybody's good time. It's like oh shit, yeah, yeah, it's your good time too, yeah.
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, it's your time. Like it's yeah, yeah, it's really weird. Like the things I've seen other people face and deal with and things I've dealt like, I think about things I've dealt with in gaming, you know, knowing about this, being someone who podcasts about it, talks about it, thinks about it, writes about it all the time. And then I look back and I'm like, oh shit, I did that. Like you know, I, I, yeah, it's bad, it can be bad. Like you, it's such a shock when something really bad happens at the table, like really abusive it's not. People's reaction isn't sometimes? It's just shock, right, it's just like what just happened, right, you know, and then everybody kind of looks to the person it happened to and it's like what do we do?
Speaker 2Right, right, right. And yeah, I had something real bad happen to me once and I was like, no, keep playing, keep playing, and I played out the fucking session and I'm like, I'm like, oh, that was straight up abuse, like I straight up got abused at the table and it was bad. It was real, real bad, yeah. So, yeah, do not put up with that shit. And right now you're right. Yeah, yeah, the brakes, for F sake. But yeah, it's all stuff and that's all. The reason why I bring that up is because if, as these games like, the reason why we're even having this discussion is because we're living in this post actual play critical role world, where so many people know what gaming is and right, the D&D movie is out and yeah, and there are more people gaming than ever before, ever, and so there's a market. There's just a market.
Speaker 1I was. I was just today brand new. Send your comments, questions about this episode to me. I'm on Patreon at Magi Zero all letters. Or send it to Twitter at Google Dysology and you know, subscribe, rate and like. Let's make this our regular thing.