We talked last post about why we should encourage more people to GM, but how can we do that?
Enthusiasm does a lot. It’s simple, but you’d be surprised how much this changes things.
You don’t have to feign being overly excited, you just need to be ready to engage with the world or mechanics–even if the game isn’t exactly your thing.
Sometimes it’s hard to get the table on board with something new. It’s hard to know what a new game or GM “wants” you to do at first. And that can lead to stagnation.
But even one person who’s ready to make decisions, engage with the story and the world, and shape the gameplay experience can be the difference between a campaign taking off and fizzling.
If the entire table is wishy-washy or silent when they need to make a decision, a GM that’s struggling with confidence might internalize that as their own failure. The players’ (real or perceived) lack of engagement might be read as something they failed to provide as GM.
Have a character concept
When starting a new campaign of a game most of the other players are familiar with, I will sometimes wait to create my character concept. I want to see what the other players are doing, and fill in the gaps they leave. (This tends to work well given I play a lot of healers and support.)
This is good for enthusiastic new players–for example, people who’ve watched actual plays and come to the table with a ton of existing knowledge and ideas. You want to leave room for them to explore the space of the game, because (very likely) you’ve already done that exploration yourself.
It’s also good for games everyone is familiar with, because they already know what’s “expected.”
But sometimes letting other players choose first is counterproductive–especially when approaching a new TTRPG that doesn’t fit into a mold anyone at the table is familiar with, or whose first impression has left mixed feelings. Sometimes, you stare at the list of classes and you feel like everything is a little same-y (from your perspective, whether it is or not).
In those cases, you need to step up and fill the void. If you have a clear idea of what you want to play, you can help set the tone until other players get comfortable with the game.
It doesn’t have to be complicated–just a simple species and/or class choice is enough. Anything to create some momentum past that initial moment of analysis paralysis.