GM Diary #2

It has been a bit of a disappointing week from the perspective of my hobby. Although, being the first week back at work, things have been generally positive, the problem has been that I have been both too tired after work to enjoy hobby time and unable to grab hobby time before or during working hours.

School Delays

The school club has, rather disappointingly, had to be postponed for two weeks: this week just gone, I had to attend a meeting at another school on the Tuesday straight after teaching, and this coming week I am on detention duty (again) which falls on Tuesdays. Still, it’s the best night for the club’s attendees at this time. We return to the table on the 22nd January.

Friday Night Flop

It’s a mixed bag on the Friday Night Roleplay front. The bad news is that I’ve made very little progress, and nothing tangible, in the last week.

We’ve set a date – the 8th February – for a first session. This is to allow both the regular players an opportunity to show up, largely due to January being a nightmare for both. That date also gives me a month to prepare and deliver on my secret plan.

On the upside, we’ve both agreed to play Savage Worlds in the Hell on Earth Reloaded setting and to focus on an exploration game. Additionally, I may have recruited an additional player from my MeWe contacts who is tempted by the Open Table approach because it fits in with his erratic work-life balance.

Online In Stonehell

Last weekend saw the return (after the Christmas hiatus) of the SXG group with whom I play Castles & Crusades online. We are playing the “Stonehell” megadungeon by Michael Curtis.

The dungeon is fun to run and apparently good to play. I was gratified to have three players on Saturday night and to finally enter the dungeon proper. The best moment was, near the end, hearing a player state that he had not played a dungeon-crawl like this since he was in college – a considerable time in the past.

The players delved the first level’s first section and discovered lightly populated halls. They did, however, open a previously unpenetrated tomb and begin to loot it… although the giant rats and zombies within proved too dangerous for our Level 1 heroes to stay too long.

I have instituted a house rule I picked up from Tim Shorts, of Gothridge Manor fame, to award XP to players who show up. It fits well with my Open Table approach to encourage… well, turning up. I gave 100XP to players for attending and a 50XP bonus for being on time. I aim to add this approach to the school club and Friday Night tables too.

Solving The Time Problem

Looking at the advice of Daniel Pink, from his excellent book, “WHEN: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing” has been an encouragement:

The recipe for greater productivity and well-being is to do analytic work during your peak, administrative work during your trough, and insight work during your recovery. 

The reminder, delivered via Dan’s excellent newsletter, was a timely one. I am a Lark, an early-riser (of the extreme type) and so my peak is first thing in the morning, my trough seems to come around midday until 3pm, and my recovery period is most noticeable between around about 6pm and 8pm. I’ve been switching my working behaviours to take advantage of this, but the best option hobby-wise for me would be:

1. Writing and design work weekend mornings.
2. Printing, paperwork update, and other hobby admin after work but before dinner/social time with my wife.
3. Creative thinking / imagining work in the evenings before bed.

Thus, I have decided to try this for a few weeks and see how it impacts my hobby output.

Tempted By Norðlond

In a definite case of the Butterfly Head, I have been growing increasingly tempted to play Douglas Cole’s “Hall of Judgment” adventure using the Powered by GURPS “Dungeon Fantasy Roleplaying Game“. (I’ve also been torn by the desire to try his excellent 5th Edition-powered “Dragon Heresy” roleplaying game, given that the same adventure is currently on pre-order via Backerkit for the 5e-powered version too.)

Norðlond is a barbarian realm, off up north (surprisingly enough), designed to evoke the feeling of a Nordic/Viking culture without specifically invoking Norse myth and legend. Doug’s work is exemplary and brings this setting to life with an awesome combo of artwork, background, and evocative adventure writing.

I have long been a fan of GURPS and the Dungeon Fantasy RPG has been an excellent route into that rules system, being a specifically tweaked version of GURPS designed to evoke classic dungeoneering. Although it’s a pretty high-powered ruleset, encouraging and celebrating a certain “munchkinism”, it is nonetheless very playable and relatively easy to learn.

Bringing a setting like Norðlond to the DFRPG has been really inspirational. If I had a group who both wanted to play fantasy and were willing to try GURPS, then I’d not hesitate. Neither of those is currently my situation, however. That said, I have been considering taking a solo approach and playing in Norðlond as a loner. My main hesitation arises from feeling pretty sure that this will be a game too far and likely to negatively impact my current gaming prep time.

Still, this is a diary and I am determined to be honest. I really do want to play the game and try the setting. There, I’ve said it.

Game on!