Chen Zhen's page

If you are one of my players, turn around and walk away!

To everyone else...

I'm a newer GM. I have played some, but only martial characters, which leads to my current struggle.

For the current campaign I am running, I want to have a BBEG that is a sorcerer... Having never played a sorcerer, or even a spell caster, I was looking for advice to cook up a worthy foe for my players. I'm looking for tips on building the perfect villain, as well as using the baddie effectively against the party!

I'm thankful for anyone who has ideas, thoughts, or critiques.

First off, I am a very new GM. I had done some role playing back in high school, but had not played in over 13 years. I was over at my friend's house and saw some 3.5 books on his shelf. He had picked them up a while ago, but had never played. We started talking about RPG's, and I said that we should get our friends together to do this!

I took the books home and started doing some research. Pathfinder kept coming up in the blogs and reviews I was reading. I looked into it, loved the art, loved the PRD, and the option to buy PDF's. As I was reading, I started to get a rough idea for a story. I approached four of my friends and pitched the idea of starting a RPG group. They were all up for playing, and so I started to map out a campaign.

Some of it has gone well, some of it has not, but overall it has been a lot of fun! I learned much of this from reading what had worked and not worked for other groups on various forums, so I thought that it might be helpful to share my experience with others.

Start with a small group. I limited the group to 4 players. I had heard many stories about the challenges that a large group can place on any GM. I knew that it would be challenging for me to keep up with 4 players, and I did not want to make this new adventure any more difficult on myself!

Ask the players what they want. Many stories of problems in groups seemed to be a difference between the expectations of the type of game the GM wanted, and the players wanted. I put together a survey I sent out to the 4 players. I asked the following questions.

After I got the surveys back, I saw several trends. First, most preferred a balance between combat and other styles of conflict. I made sure to include this in the way I approached adventures. Second, role playing was rated between a 5 and a 9 for the group. They wanted the chance to role play, but not to be forced into talking in character all evening. Finally, backstory was very important to some, and not that important to others. In talking with the group, several mentioned that they wanted to envision their character, but that they generally “find” their character through playing them.

Be willing to take a risk if you think it might work. I decided to try a mini session with each of the players before the first big session. This would give them the chance to “try on” their character before the whole group was together. Two of the players were really into it, and really enjoyed it. One player did it, but felt a bit silly just doing a one on one session. One player did not really want to do the mini session. He just wanted me to tell him how his character fit into the story. I had a lot of fun with the mini sessions, but I am not sure I would do it again. It was quite a bit of extra work (scheduling, thinking about the individual character backstory, having one player switch character ideas 3 times before finally settling on one) but I do think it added to the group’s level of attachment to their characters. I also had the players pick out one trait for their character. The second trait I awarded after the mini session. This was something that seemed to fit how the player was playing the character. The players seemed to like this.

Establish your comfort zone. As a new GM, I was struggling to learn all the rules. I decided to limit the group to the Core Rulebook. This cut down the amount of complexity for me, and let me focus on learning a smaller chunk of rules/feats/spells. It is always easier to add in more material later, than it is to cut it out after it is in. I felt confident with the combat rules, but I did not (and still don’t) feel confident with the magic rules. The classes the group chose were Fighter, Paladin, Bard, and Druid. With no full casters in the group, I felt that limited magic would be ok. This also fit into the story that I had been thinking of. I started very melee combat heavy, and have been slowly adding in magic. I had decided to do this for story reasons, but it also let me focus on getting comfortable with the other parts of the game before worrying about the magic rules.

Work with the players. Before we started playing the first few sessions I gave a bit of a speech on how we were getting together for collaborative story telling. The goal is to tell a compelling story together. Two of the players had done some role playing before, but the other two were basically new to the hobby. After a few sessions, it felt like things were really rolling. I also asked for some leeway from the group regarding rules. The group tends to be more story-focused than rules-focused, so this helps. If we run into an issue where no one knows the relevant rules, we wing it. I make a note of it, and we can look it up later. I know not every group works like this, but it seems to be a happy compromise for us.

Don’t be afraid of acting stupid. Roleplaying is a ton of fun, but can be rather silly, too. In an early session the group was being lippy and silly to a rather serious NPC. I was amused by their craziness, but figured that the NPC was not. I slammed my hand on the table and told the party “if you are going to act like ill-mannered dogs, you can go out into the street and join the rest of the rabble!” There was stunned silence from the players, until one realized that my outburst had been in character. We laughed about it, but it helped the group jump back into the session with some really good roleplaying. Quite a bit of what I try can fall flat, but I have had some good moments as a GM, and I have had several GREAT ones. Keep trying until you get comfortable.

Don’t be afraid to steal good ideas. My first two sessions had significant sections lifted from PFS scenarios that I re-skinned to fit into my world. I had thought of the overall story, but it was helpful to have combat blocks written up, strategies laid out, and NPC descriptions. I am now using more of my own ideas, but it was a great confidence booster to have those adventures as cheat sheets early on. Running the Adventure Paths or other pre-generated materials also seems to be a great help to lots of new GM's.

Ask for feedback. I think this may be the most important. Ask the players individually how they feel about the group, and how they feel about the game. What do they like the most (so you can keep doing it) and what would they like to change? This can help uncover interpersonal conflicts (which can spell death for a group if left unchecked). It also can help you tailor the adventure to the group. If everyone says that they want more combat, you can respond. If they really liked the roleplaying section of the session, you can make sure to include those more often. One of the players called me after the 2nd session to let me know that he would rather not be the leader of the party. His Paladin character description and backstory had seemed to lend themselves to a leader, and the group had seemed to follow his lead in social situations, but the player said that he really just wanted to be the guy to follow orders and hit things with his weapons. I thanked him for letting me know, and arranged for a new character to be identified in-game as the party leader. I followed up with the player after that session, and he said he was enjoying the game much more now.

Help your characters meet their expectations. With my group, they really wanted to have a mix of combat and non-combat in the game. They also had character concepts that were certainly non optimal. I did a variation of a normal point buy. All stats start at 10. You get 20 points to raise the stats. Raising or lowering a stat costs one point. I was prepared to adjust the point buy if it got too crazy, but the group was between 26 and 32 on the regular point buy scale. For the low magic world I was playing it, this would work out fine. It also helped certain player concepts become a reality. The fighter who (for story reasons) wanted to be extremely charismatic (CHA 16), the paladin who wanted to dual wield a longsword and a light mace, or the Halfling druid who wanted to do well in combat and go the wild shape route. I believe that character optimization and great roleplaying can go hand in hand, but none of the players really had an interest in optimization. They found concepts that they liked, and I found a way to make up for some of their very sub optimal choices. Your mileage may vary, but it has worked for our group.

Other than that, best advice I have seen is just jump in and try it. You will never be perfectly ready. Don't let that stop you from trying. I have had a blast running a game and playing with my friends. Hope this turns out to be the same for you!