GM 101 is a course that is divided into four lessons, each lasting approximately one hour. These include "Roleplaying: Bringing Scenarios to Life," Rules: Enabling Awesomeness, Restricting Abuse," "Running the Game: The Science Behind the Art," and "Advanced Topics: When the Unexpected Strikes." These four basic topics will allow a player, new to GMing, to ease into the role, and also feel more comfortable overseeing the enjoyment of a table for a group of four to six players.
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My former lodge in Bloomington has frequently used this program to encourage new GMs, which has helped us immensely in avoiding the situation where only 3 people GM every week.
As I begin my own lodge, I intend to use this for the same purpose. It's a great tool, and one I'm glad Paizo produced for its base.
I think this is a very good training tool for new GMs. It has gotten some of the GMs in my area more excited to running games. This is only going to get better as we go.
Do you need to report with a specific character number? There is no Chronicle Sheet, so I'm wondering about the purpose behind reporting it. Does it count towards your GM stars?
Dinketry, there's two types of credit we're talking about:
"I've GMed 'Citadel of Fire 15 times, and I have a single Chronicle sheet for it, the first time I ran the scenario! Next up, I'll run 'Murder's Mark', for which I'll get a Chronicle sheet with 4 XP."
"I've GMed 'Citadel of Fire 15 times, and I have 15 tables of credit towards my GM stars. (That would be a first star and change.) Next up, I'll run 'Murder's Mark', for which I'll earn another 2 tables."
The information in the GM 101 PDF is so useful that every GM (maybe everyone) should read it even if you couldn't report it; with that added bonus you'd be extremely silly not to.
So, if I understand correctly, someone who runs a GM 101 session for other budding PFS GMs gets to report it for credit. If you as a new GM download the PDF and read it, that's great, but you can't report it for credit for yourself. Is this accurate?
It doesn't appear that "players" receive credit. I tried recording a sample event with my husband as GM and myself as a player and it gave him an extra table of credit, but it didn't affect my tables. (I then deleted the table after testing) I do think it would be appropriate to give players credit since it is just as helpful as running a single table for GM experience.
I think GM 101 is an excellent resource and I would like my group to all go through the material. Unfortunately, I don't think my players will give up a night of playing for a night of talking about GM'ing unless I can find another way to bribe them. While we don't have a shortage of GMs, I think we could all use a few tips, such as adding more immersion and dealing with the occasional socially awkward moment.
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