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Ladies and gentlemen, ‘tis my pleasure to announce to you all the naming of a second 5-Star GM in the North Star State, Andrew Christian! Andy has been a Venture-Lieutenant since the days of Ryan Bolduan, going above and beyond to run awesome games for players across the Twin Cities metro area and as far north as Anoka where he founded our game day at Village Games. He's a blast to play under, dedicated to running a fair and fun game for everyone at the table, and in his spare time does an exceptional job as a store coordinator and convention organizer.
As Andy's fame spreads far and wide, or at least from Indianapolis to Seattle, I encourage you all to share awesome stories about his awesomeness. Congratulations, Andy; I look forward to the games to come!
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Congrats, Andy!
Andy was my second GM ever for PFS, and if I wasn't hooked on the first game I played, I was by the second. I have thoroughly enjoyed playing games that Andy has GMed over the last year. He's always managed to keep things "interesting", though I haven't been "lucky" enough to reach the level of "interesting" that Jon Dehning has with Andy.
I've learned a lot from Andy over the year, both as a GM and as a player. He's always willing to help a GM figure out difficult scenarios (and perhaps players, too!)
Now, don't take this wrong, Andy, but the biggest thing that I have learned from you as a GM is to be humble (those of you that only know Andy from his presence on these forums may be surprised by this, but he does have a completely different personality IRL than on the boards)! Admitting that as a GM you make mistakes, and allowing yourself to learn from them is a talent that few people actually have.
One of the best conversations we've had was when I was in the process of prepping Rivalry's End (after you had run it for my table). There were a few things I asked you about, and you were very straight foward with what happened, which honestly allowed me to run my table far better than I would have been able to do had I not talked through it with you (I still made the same mistake as you did in regards to Halberds not being a reach weapon, but oh well).
Talking with Andy more recently allowed me to reverse a fatal mistake that I made in the running of a recent scenario (as a slot-0 for Con of the North). I was able to reverse a death that should not have happened, because of my error.
So, all in all, congratulations, Andy! Thank you for allowing me to be a part of it!
RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16
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I'll tell you what I learned from a couple of conversations with Andy: how to balance keeping an eye on rules enforement and still emphasize this fun around the table. GMing next to him at several conventions, I can see that all of his players are enjoying themselves, and he still keeps a tight ship.
What advice do you give, to newer GMs? What advice do you give, to people with D&D or Pathfinder experience, building their first characters in PFS?
Congratulations Andrew. But why do you yet have only 4 stars? ;l)
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I'll tell you what I learned from a couple of conversations with Andy: how to balance keeping an eye on rules enforement and still emphasize this fun around the table. GMing next to him at several conventions, I can see that all of his players are enjoying themselves, and he still keeps a tight ship.
What advice do you give, to newer GMs? What advice do you give, to people with D&D or Pathfinder experience, building their first characters in PFS?
New GMs: Mainly I try to tell them not to worry so much about whether they are rules masters or not. To just ensure that the table is having fun. System mastery will come with time and experience. Don't be afraid to make a mistake.
Anecdote: My wife ran her first scenario ever (Pallid Plague) and made a mistake with how bane works. She is still reading game rules like you would read English. So she thought when it said a 50' radius and a duration of 1 round / level, that everytime someone stepped within 50' of the badguy, that they had to make a roll against bane or take the penalties. She took charge of the table and said, "well this is how we've been doing it for 3 rounds, so lets just keep going this way, and you can explain it to me later." That -1 wasn't so debilitating, and the scenario is relatively easy, so nobody cared. Afterwords we explained that it was a burst spell, and the duration was only for how long the penalty lasted for each person affected. She felt horrible on the ride home. I explained to her all the mistakes I made in the scenario I ran later that same day. I've been GM'ing for almost 30 years, and PFS for 2 years at that time (was already a 4-star). And that made her feel better. That you are allowed to make mistakes, its how you handle them that matters, not that you made one.
Additionally, I usually advise new GM's what the most important things to pay attention to are, during prep time. Pay attention to flow and transition. To me those are the most important things to pay attention to while prepping a scenario. All the other details are important, but you can have the scenario down pat--the stat blocks down pat--but if you don't do the flow and transition well, you'll run out of time and lose the interest of your players as the flow bogs down during the story. Remember, you are telling a story, and the players are the primary protagonists. They should feel like they are partaking in the story, not like you are just reading off some stats to them. Once you have flow and transition down, everything else falls into place (and you'll have time while the players are figuring out what to do, to make sure you have how the hazard in the next room works).
As for those with previous roleplaying experience in building a new character for PFS for the first time?
I would have to say that I assume they know the roles and rules well enough, that they can create a healing cleric, battle wizard, skill monkey, or tanking melee guy with some proficiency regardless the rules system. So what I focus on is the campaign itself. I tell them what being a pathfinder is all about, and a bit about the world (like where Absalom is, and what its all about) and about the factions and stuff. So they can be better prepared to use their already learned system mastery to build a character that better fits the campaign we are playing, rather than a character that fits some other campaign. Indeed, if they have some idea that doesn't quite fit, I will help them figure out how to have the best of both worlds: the character they are set on playing, that also fits into the Pathfinder Society campaign roleplay wise.
