The competence level of of the average GM is ...average.  What are the key characteristics of a competent/incompetent GM?  Some people have offered good examples, but it's worth discussing further.  If everyone' having fun (i.e. a sign of a competent GM), what is the GM specifically doing right?  If the players are irritated and bored, what is the GM doing wrong, and -more importantly- what can the GM do to fix it?  I want to be a competent GM, and I'm working really hard to try to make that happen, but GMing is an art.  You can't get better until you practice, but unlike playing an instrument, you can't practice on your own. 

Quote from: yosemitemike on December 27, 2024, 08:02:40 AMMy experiences have been similar.  A lot of GMs are obviously unprepared and apathetic if they even bother to show up at all.  Unprepared GMs floundering around leads to bored, irritated players.  People constantly bog down the game with stuff that is marginally relevant at best.  Sometimes, players will act out in game just to try to make something happen because they are bored and disconnected.  They are bored and disconnected because the GM doesn't know what they are doing, both figuratively and literally, and the game is going nowhere.  This mostly isn't beginner GMs either.  It's people who say they have significant experience and, sometimes, even more experience than me.  It's amazing how long some GMs can string things out without anything actually happening in the game.  In one game, we went 2 1/2 hours out of the first 4 1/2 hours doing solo scenes with one of the players in which nothing happened while the rest of us sat around doing nothing.  GMs who run boring, meandering sessions where nothing much happens seem to be overrepresented among people who run Call of Cthulhu on Roll20.  People have praised by Call of Cthulhu games because, essentially, things happen in them and their characters get to do Call of Cthulhu investigator things like have a bout of madness.  It's a pretty low bar but apparently it's noteworthy.               

           

A few years ago there were two of us paid by a local bar to run games on game night. $20/hour and free drinks. The other guy ran 3.5 exclusively, which is fine, he just went off on very bizarre and weird (sometimes current political) tangents, refused to prep, showed up stoned or drunk, drank more and was loud, abrasive and kind of stuck on being in a local rendition of 'CATS' from years prior.

Compared to that I could have run most anything and looked like DM of the Year. It did not take much, although I always prep and try to run the best game I can. In time people left his game and I was running 12+ players and the other guy threw a tantrum and dropped out. I ran a lot of DCC and MCC, S&W, Labyrinth Lord and even some 5e in there over the years. The reality is that 12+ players is not a hobby after a while, it is a job and sometimes you get people that are intentionally abrasive and difficult to work with, or players that show up when they want to and drag others away or bring more people in without warning, so there is no continuity. Now I run a game at home and one in public (NOT for pay). I try to throw in riddles, traps, puzzles and other things besides one combat after another and players thank me after the games and that is all of the payment I need.

Quote from: ReginaHart on December 29, 2024, 03:19:06 PMIf everyone' having fun (i.e. a sign of a competent GM), what is the GM specifically doing right?  If the players are irritated and bored, what is the GM doing wrong, and -more importantly- what can the GM do to fix it?

This could be a very involved thread. Hell, many people have written books on it. Not remotely a comprehensive answer, but FWIW the single thing I attribute the success of my games to, relative to other people I've played with, is respecting players' time. I never show up unprepared, to the point that if I don't think I'm ready to run a good game I cancel the session. If something does happen I'm unprepared for, I improvise and keep moving along. I don't give my players homework. I keep book-keeping and downtime to a minimum. I try to avoid stopping the game for more than about a minute to look anything up in the book. Basically, everything about my games is designed around cutting out anything that gets in the way of the moment-to-moment roleplaying experience. Won't work for everyone, but it's been a successful approach for me.

Quote from: ReginaHart on December 29, 2024, 03:19:06 PMI want to be a competent GM, and I'm working really hard to try to make that happen, but GMing is an art.  You can't get better until you practice, but unlike playing an instrument, you can't practice on your own.

I'd say it's more like learning martial arts. Yeah, if you never put the gloves on and throw hands, there's a ceiling on how much you can improve. At the same time, there's a lot you can do on your own time to improve technique.

Scenario writing can do a lot to improve your at-the-table technique, especially if you game out the possible directions your scenario might go in your head while writing. The same is true of working up monster stats or NPCs. The trick is to not just come out with ideas in the abstract, but to actively consider how they're going to play out when they make contact with your players.
 
Reading and listening to audiobooks can help improve your narration, particularly if you read short, plot-driven fiction. An underappreciated but critical GM-ing skill is packing information and flavor into as few words as possible. Reading the right authors can help you build up a mental library of pithy, expressive phrases to use when describing situations in your game. Another thing that can help practice conciseness is writing post-game summaries. I do a roughly 150-word recap after each session that I keep as an ongoing log for my players. Not only is it good brevity practice, it's probably good memory training for keeping track of what happened in the last session. Especially if like me, you don't take any notes mid-session.

Quote from: bat on December 29, 2024, 03:52:16 PMThe other guy ran 3.5 exclusively, which is fine, he just ... refused to prep

How the fuck can someone expect to run D&D 3.5 without doing the prep work.

Quote from: HappyDaze on December 29, 2024, 05:31:42 PM

Quote from: bat on December 29, 2024, 03:52:16 PMThe other guy ran 3.5 exclusively, which is fine, he just ... refused to prep

How the fuck can someone expect to run D&D 3.5 without doing the prep work.

He had a table with books open on it and referred to them constantly. I had sat in one a couple of his games and (I am not the best DM, I am not claiming that at all) it was a really disorganized and jarring compared to what I have known for decades. He burned out fast.

Quote from: bat on December 29, 2024, 09:25:34 PM

Quote from: HappyDaze on December 29, 2024, 05:31:42 PM

Quote from: bat on December 29, 2024, 03:52:16 PMThe other guy ran 3.5 exclusively, which is fine, he just ... refused to prep

How the fuck can someone expect to run D&D 3.5 without doing the prep work.

He had a table with books open on it and referred to them constantly. I had sat in one a couple of his games and (I am not the best DM, I am not claiming that at all) it was a really disorganized and jarring compared to what I have known for decades. He burned out fast.

Trying to run any game, but especially something as rules dense as D&D 3.5e, in that manner is almost a sure path to burnout.

There are games where you can get away with minimal prep but D&D 3.5 isn't one of them.  If he wanted to run low prep D&D, there are a lot of OSR games that would work a lot better and give him a lot less heartburn.  The Black Hack and derivatives come to mind.

Quote from: bat on December 29, 2024, 03:52:16 PMA few years ago there were two of us paid by a local bar to run games on game night. $20/hour and free drinks. The other guy ran 3.5 exclusively, which is fine, he just went off on very bizarre and weird (sometimes current political) tangents, refused to prep, showed up stoned or drunk, drank more and was loud, abrasive and kind of stuck on being in a local rendition of 'CATS' from years prior.

There are things that I would consider to be a bare minimum.  Be prepared enough to run the game at least somewhat smoothly.  Take a shower.  Be sober.  Don't act like an asshole.  I don't have high standards for GMs.  It's depressing how many people can't or won't live up to even the lowest standards.   

Quote from: bat on December 29, 2024, 03:52:16 PMor players that show up when they want to and drag others away or bring more people in without warning, so there is no continuity.

That's why I only run one-shot games or organized play stuff like Adventurers League or Pathfinder Society in venues like that.   

I will address both replies to my post here.
YES, it was awkward and I am honestly not sure of the particular vibe this guy was trying to give off. Beer and pretzels and a simpler game is one thing; hard alcohol shots when already stoned and a gibberish, unprepped game is totally different. His games were basically just like a video game run through of one combat after another, none of them made sense or were connected; he just picked monsters at random on the fly and adjusted them. This guy's behavior started to cause others to shun the place and eventually his books were confiscated in a coup by his other players and a new DM was established in his place and I moved on to quieter grounds. In defeat he switched to trivia night and then eventually drifted to wherever people like that flounder off to.

I haven't had one as a GM, but I've been the GM for a group with a couple of stoner D&D players. The first "smoke break" they took wasn't the end of the world, but the game went downhill in the long run. I think in their minds its just what they do to unwind, and why not play D&D while unwound? But like drunks with alcohol, they don't fully know how they look to people who are sober.

There are always the common issues like DMPCs, railroading, lack of preparation, etc. but what I have personally observed with people who are genuinely trying tends to be two things:

1. Running a module or attempting to design a module without the knowledge to discern what is good material and what isn't. Sometimes they do know which parts are boring but for some reason they won't cut them out, maybe because they don't feel confident tinkering with it. I had a newer GM run Storm King's Thunder and straight up tell us "these sidequests are boring but we'll knock them out so we can get to the good part." It can be a tricky skill to learn for GMs, and some never get it because they don't even grasp that it's an issue.

2. Letting the wacky, overexcited players monopolize all the time and attention, usually with trying to roleplay out minutiae like eating breakfast, sleeping at an inn, walking, buying stuff, etc. If the GM is too indulgent then the game is effectively halted for improv comedy hour. Critical Role and that whole cultural phenomena feeds into this because it perpetuates the idea that the game is about doing exaggerated voices and trying to impress an audience.

Quote from: ForgottenF on December 29, 2024, 04:32:07 PMScenario writing can do a lot to improve your at-the-table technique, especially if you game out the possible directions your scenario might go in your head while writing. The same is true of working up monster stats or NPCs. The trick is to not just come out with ideas in the abstract, but to actively consider how they're going to play out when they make contact with your players.

This is actually really helpful to hear.  All the advice out there talks about preparing scenarios - people, places, and things.  No one really gets into the part about thinking through how all of those things are going to interact and what might happen when the PCs enter the mix. 

Honestly, I find that aspect of planning very difficult, and I would welcome some guidelines, suggestions, and examples.  It sounds like a simple and obvious thing to do until I sit down and find myself staring at a list of story elements but not knowing how to think through what is going to happen with them.  The closest I've found is the Angry GM's recommendation to "script"  (not to write a railroad plot but to consider the most likely scenario progression.

Quote from: ForgottenF on December 29, 2024, 04:32:07 PMAn underappreciated but critical GM-ing skill is packing information and flavor into as few words as possible. ... Another thing that can help practice conciseness is writing post-game summaries. I do a roughly 150-word recap after each session that I keep as an ongoing log for my players.

This is another skill that is very challenging but very important.  I like the suggestion of writing concise recaps for practice.  I write recaps, but hoo boy do I struggle to make them concise.

Thanks for taking the time to write your post.  It speaks to a lot of the issues I struggle with in trying to become a better GM.

Quote from: yosemitemike on December 30, 2024, 03:19:24 AMBe prepared enough to run the game at least somewhat smoothly.

I swear I'm not being a jerk, but what are the key components of doing so?  Obviously, you should know the rules and you should have some scenarios prepared.  But it's still really easy to fall flat.  What do you do to make sure a game runs smoothly?

Quote from: Spobo on December 31, 2024, 06:50:34 AM1. Running a module or attempting to design a module without the knowledge to discern what is good material and what isn't. Sometimes they do know which parts are boring but for some reason they won't cut them out, maybe because they don't feel confident tinkering with it. I had a newer GM run Storm King's Thunder and straight up tell us "these sidequests are boring but we'll knock them out so we can get to the good part." It can be a tricky skill to learn for GMs, and some never get it because they don't even grasp that it's an issue.

This is very good food for thought.  My current campaign is a mash-up of two modules that are pretty light on details, so I'm creating a lot and filling in the blanks as needed.  I have trimmed some dead weight, but it's good to keep in mind that a strong 'editing hand' might improve the game.  I think it's easy to think that a module is written by a 'professional' (or at least a published person), and we forget that we can improve it. 

Quote from: Spobo on December 31, 2024, 06:50:34 AM2. Letting the wacky, overexcited players monopolize all the time and attention ... Critical Role and that whole cultural phenomena feeds into this because it perpetuates the idea that the game is about doing exaggerated voices and trying to impress an audience.

Keeping the players' on track in this regard is challenging. Some people are more outgoing and others less so.  I've also noticed the tendency for some players to interrupt others or to interrupt/derail a scenario with questions and actions that aren't relevant to the scene at hand.  It's like being a traffic copy.  This article offers some advice that I found helpful for that issue.

Quote from: ReginaHart on January 02, 2025, 05:38:41 PMI swear I'm not being a jerk, but what are the key components of doing so?  Obviously, you should know the rules and you should have some scenarios prepared.  But it's still really easy to fall flat.  What do you do to make sure a game runs smoothly?

Knowing how the system works on a basic level helps.  Having some idea of what you are going to do and putting some thought into the most likely course of action for the PCs helps.  I don't have high standards here.  Go over the material a bit.  If you are using tables, have them ready.  A lot of people don't seem to have done even the most basic stuff.

Quote from: yosemitemike on January 02, 2025, 06:37:45 PM

Quote from: ReginaHart on January 02, 2025, 05:38:41 PMI swear I'm not being a jerk, but what are the key components of doing so?  Obviously, you should know the rules and you should have some scenarios prepared.  But it's still really easy to fall flat.  What do you do to make sure a game runs smoothly?

Knowing how the system works on a basic level helps.  Having some idea of what you are going to do and putting some thought into the most likely course of action for the PCs helps.  I don't have high standards here.  Go over the material a bit.  If you are using tables, have them ready.  A lot of people don't seem to have done even the most basic stuff.

Yes.  Put in the effort. Then iterate through improvements. That is, pick 1 or 2 things you want to get better on next time, think about what concrete things you can try that might help, then do that. Evaluate afterwards.  If it works, great.  If not, try something else, or cycle into another thing to improve.

After the big one, lack of effort, the reason most people spin their wheels trying to improve on any set of skills is that they distract themselves with things that aren't that important (relatively, right now) or go chasing their tails trying to do too much at once. 

You can make a list of all the things you want to improve, but focus each session.  If you want to rotate through the list every session, sure.