No prep GMing comes down to the mindset of how you approach the game.
If you approach the role-playing games as the game master who has to know everything and control everything, you just put a ton of pressure on yourself.
However, if you can get into the mindset that you are here to have fun and that your job is to offer options and arbitrate rules.
Then you can see how not preparing will actually help you during the session.
In Some Sense, I’m Always Preparing to GM
In some sense, I’m always preparing for an RPG session or campaign of some kind.
I’m constantly thinking of ideas. When I’m in the shower. When I’m driving to work. When I’m eating my sandwich during lunch hour.
I’m constantly thinking of cool scenarios that I could run and awesome settings that I want my players to encounter.
If your mind works like that, you should never have a problem being able to sit down and start an RPG session.
If your mind doesn’t work like that, it can be trained to. I’ll go into more detail on how to train yourself to be an idea machine in later posts.
Of course, Those Ideas can Be a Trap
Having a premise of an adventure or campaign before you talk to your players or before you start to run a session can be helpful.
However, it can also create a trap.
There should never be any thought that the story has to progress in a certain way or the game’s a failure.
If you are thinking of things like a spooky cottage in the woods, a castle that appears to be abandoned but actually shelters a coven of evil clerics, or a bounty on the head of a bandit leader, then you’re safe.
If you have a bit of material to work with, you can then allow the story to unfold based on the player’s actions and choices.
Great set pieces or locations are helpful as well.
A sheer glacier cliff where there can be a fight, or a space station casino, or a crime lord’s river barge help you give interesting tidbits to your players so the story and adventures can spring from those things organically.
If you are thinking of plot points or certain things that must happen during a session to trigger something else, you’re walking on dangerous ground.
The Nasty Rumor that Dungeon & Dragons requires tons of GM prep
There is an idea that has spread like
It is that D&D requires more prep than any other RPG. Therefore if you want to cut down your GM prep you need a different game system.
This is a vicious rumor that is ridiculous and completely untrue.
D&D only requires a lot of game master preparation when the game master decides to prepare a lot.
There is no reason for tons of prep. In future posts, I will break down the steps you can use to run D&D with little or no preparation.
Coming Up
Tips and tricks to cut down your GM prep in the upcoming posts. Don’t miss a post and get free dungeon maps.