Quote from: VengerSatanis on February 28, 2024, 09:44:58 AMWhere there is passion for a particular hobby, there will eventually be monetization.  That's just the way of things.  Rather than waste time and energy railing against it, let's take a look at what the future might hold, shall we? 

I'm of the opinion that one possible evolutionary avenue for the professional GM and content creator facing the destruction of D&D as we know it, thanks to WotC, is the year-long campaign contract.  Take any other hobby that wealthy individuals might care to pursue... $50K annually is not a ton of money for such men (and a few women, I suppose, but let's acknowledge that is a smaller market).

Without further ado, I'm going to link my blog post where I wrote out the entire idea.  Didn't put this in news and advertisements because unless someone lives within a 45 minute drive of me, none of you are potential customers or clients.  Also, I truly want to know what my fellow gamers think of this paradigm shift.  It changes the game, changes the economics.  For me, it makes what I do a more viable option than GMing my home-game for free and self-publishing on the side for roughly $10K a year.

https://vengersatanis.blogspot.com/2024/02/game-master-to-rich-famous.html

I welcome your feedback!  If this is a future business model for GMs and content creators who wish to make RPGs their profession, I believe it's more sustainable than traditional GM for hire gigs and DM's Guild once WotC has their virtual 6e "walled garden with micro-transactions" in place later this year.

Thanks,

VS

How's this coming along, Ace?

YouTube minor celebrities can certainly make good money on paid GM gigs. Not sure if Venger's audience is likely to cough up the Ginny Di level dough though. I do think there would likely be a VTT audience ready to pay a premium for a Venger run Alpha Blue game though.

This has always been a crazy and provocative post.  It seems unlikely that there would be a group of wealthy players willing to go that high for a celebrity GM, but it is certainly conceivable that there would be- it's well within the real of possible, but not particularly probable.

A related topic is how paid DMing is becoming more and more of a thing.  There's startplaying.games, which from my understanding will charge players 20/seat and give DMs 15/seat, along with making a set of VTTs available and providing said matchmaking.  There's a subreddit, /r/lfgpremium, with per-seat pricing ranging from 5 to 25 dollars.  There's the occasional testimonial about how players hardly ever miss a session and how a good DM really works well for them or whatever. 

But, if you don't mind me noticing:
1- Many advertisements mention "[LGBTQ+]" or similar.  Would it be reasonable to assume that the ones without this tag wouldn't accept a gay guy?  Probably not- I bet you'd get kicked right off that website for telling a player that you didn't want his dollars because he's gay.  Meaning that these tags remain some curious signal, some odd thing.
2- Many of the advertisements mention safety tools.  As always, safety tools aren't needed at a real table, and in the event of a player who can't process some dark narrative in a fantasy story, what is that person doing at a table?  Well, in the case of a paid table we kinda have an answer- this is a paying customer who is willing to pony up cash to make sure that the story doesn't do whatever it is that they don't want.  This also strikes me as weird, and it makes me wonder how often this ever comes up, or if it's yet another thing you can put in your advert to show off how much of a $CURRENT_YEAR rules-follower you are, how you are just such a good boy
3- There's incredible demand for DMs for systems that offer huge amounts of player power options.  If it's a 5e campaign, you'd better believe that the advertisement implies you'll be able to make whatever powergamer monstrosity you want.  These types of characters relatively quickly blow up the fragile assumptions of 5e D&D and can also create huge power differences at the table, and the easiest way to handle that is to simply limit options out of the gate to some set that represents an honest attempt to give the players plenty of options, without blowing up the power level.  Is all the demand for DMs for ones that allow these kind of powergamer munchkin things?  Or at least, is there so much demand for that, that almost all DMs advertise with the implication that such things are allowed?

I know that OSR doesn't care much about point 3, but a huge chunk of these are not particularly OSR-y obviously.

The nature of paid DMing is interesting to me.  Has DMing become such ass in the modern audience group that normal RPG people interacting with it are interested in DMing at historically low rates?  Or is it just that VTTs have enabled the dream of getting a good group without having to kick your current group of friends into one?  I can't shake that idea that it's more the first than the second- that these systems are so frustrating to DM for, along with the expectations that would NEVER have crossed the lips of anyone twenty years ago, that the average table of friends wanting to play 5e doesn't really even HAVE a qualified DM, given the artificial qualifications.

Anyway, I don't think it's likely that Venger can find enough multiclassed simp/millionaire/TTRPG players to fill a table, but hey, it would be fucking awesome if it happened.

Quote from: Venka on April 17, 2025, 02:30:18 PM1- Many advertisements mention "[LGBTQ+]" or similar.  Would it be reasonable to assume that the ones without this tag wouldn't accept a gay guy?  Probably not- I bet you'd get kicked right off that website for telling a player that you didn't want his dollars because he's gay.  Meaning that these tags remain some curious signal, some odd thing.

It indicates that the game welcomes LGBTQ+ themes - sex, romance, relationships. You can have a Trans character romancing a Cis NPC and be sure the GM will be accommodating.

Wait, really?  It's about PC on NPC romance, etc.?

Ok, well that addresses that point entirely, I had no idea.

In my experience, PC on NPC romance is pretty handwaved and any roleplaying of that is relatively light.  I certainly didn't think it would be common enough that there would need to be a tag for the gay etc. versions thereof.

Quote from: Venka on April 19, 2025, 03:18:55 AMWait, really?  It's about PC on NPC romance, etc.?

Ok, well that addresses that point entirely, I had no idea.

In my experience, PC on NPC romance is pretty handwaved and any roleplaying of that is relatively light.  I certainly didn't think it would be common enough that there would need to be a tag for the gay etc. versions thereof.

I don't think they were being literal.