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I'm moving to Denver April 1st. It's been over a year since I played Pathfinder, but I do have experience as a GM and player. I'm more interested in non-PFS play, but I am open to it. I'll be going to LGSs to find players, too, but figured I'd reach out here as well.
Let me start by saying that being a GM is my favorite experience in tabletop gaming. I've been gaming for about a year and I've noticed something in most gaming groups in which I've participated. Nobody is a slave to the rules. This is a good thing, and I'm not putting that up for debate, because the Core Rulebook itself says that we can do whatever works best. As a GM, I try to stick to the rules as much as possible, but I'll admit that I use far less crunch than the books advise. What I mean is this: My worlds or locations typically don't have stat blocks. I rarely use tables for item / character / encounter generation. My NPC or monster stat blocks are typically abbreviated and incomplete (if I missed something I come up with it on the fly). I eyeball CR for encounters. I don't pay much attention to how much treasure is too much or too little. I try to build characters and locations naturally and creatively rather than sticking to preset tables and equations. Don't get me wrong--combat, leveling, and basic gameplay mechanics are all in line with the rules. But when I build scenarios--and when other GMs build them, even for games like D&D 4e--I don't stick to the full crunch and I don't see others sticking to the full set of crunch. That is, I typically don't build everything (monsters, NPCs, items, locations, encounters, etc) from scratch, but I build, rearrange, borrow, recycle, make up, and steal what I need and what suits me and my players. Now this has never led to any real problems that couldn't be solved with a "+2/-2" solution or some creativity on my part, but when I crack the less-read sections of my Core Rulebook or GMG, I can't help but wonder if I'm missing something critical to the gaming experience by not crunching through everything. I've made an effort to spend more prep time building adventures "by the book", but I'm not sure how much attention to fully fleshing out everything numerically and formally is necessary for a quality experience. I have a feeling that I'm not qualified to be a convention or Pathfinder Society or official GM because of my philosophy. The other GMs I've played with seem to do things this way too, rarely acting like programs that churn out adventures, and more picking and choosing scenario building methods as they suit them. If you have any thoughts on this I'd like to hear them. I'm interested in hearing about what chapters or rules are most useful (or not) to you as GMs.
If anyone is still looking for a weekend game of Pathfinder in the WNY / Rochester area, contact me at jpraab@gmail.com. |
