Archive:My GM Style

On cool ideas

I try to be as open as possible to cool ideas, provided that they fit within the underlying mechanics of the game

I am equally on board with forlorn heroes on pensive brooding quests to correct ancient wrongs as I am with a team of meme heroes.

• You want to make your own copyright-infringed carbon-copy of Aragorn? Chef's kiss, classic choice. Let's try bake his ascension to king into the story somehow.
• You also want to make a man with a banana-wagon who slides around calling himself the Peel Mobile? Splendid, what if his catchphrase was "Well ex-BRUISE-me Princess!"

I want to learn the art of saying "yes, and.." instead of "yes, but.." to fun ideas

On how I roleplay

I like the breakdown of roleplay into two types:

Descriptive Roleplay

This is the more accessible of the two, you simply describe what, how, and why your character is taking an action. You still need to have a firm grasp on who this character is and their goals/skills in moving about the world. But the advancement of the plot is not gate-kept behind your ability to stay in character and be an improv actor.

Performative Roleplay

This one is the whole thing about "being in character" speaking as if you are the character. Accents, mannerisms, attitude, and all. It's a load of fun but you have to be pretty good at improv.

Blending the two

I personally feel most comfortable in the Descriptive camp, but its always a good idea to throw in bold splashes of flavor into your descriptions and manifesting the character. There are times I will oscillate between the two mid-roleplay scene. Sometimes I will be firmly in the descriptive mode. Some players hang out in the performative mode more often. It's really a matter of choice and all are valid at the same table at the same time. The most important thing isn't HOW you manifest the character, as long as you are having fun bringing the character alive.

Resolving Dice Rolls vs Roleplay

Aside from adjudicating rolls based on the game mechanics, there is a whole other discourse in balancing what you can accomplish by pure conversational roleplay versus rolling a skill check to achieve something. This is particularly salient in scenes of political intrigue, information gathering, or other times where you need to resolve something difficult to pin down with NPCs in an unstructured environment.

How far do you take the roleplay? How soon do you jump in with a dice roll? What external factors are at play that are currently, or might potentially, affect the success of the outcome?

Generally, my strategy is to roleplay until you get a sense of what your aims are and the pieces of information you are dealing with, then we roll to advance the scene. I'll try to employ "Roll first, then role play" as my general approach. What this means is you, as a player, know will know which way the interaction will likely go before you act your character through it. You can be confident and bold following a successful roll, or navigate the failure while still in command of your character's conduct. We'll work together to advance the scene consistent with both the dice result and your character's characterisms.

One important note with my GM style: a failed dice roll simply means the narrative has become more complicated or otherwise changed. There will be times where you'll hit a dead end on a course of action as a result of the failed roll, sure. But I try to take a page from the Fate system and will assure you the plot and your character's story will still advance, it just means it advances differently. Different can be big or small, it depends on what was going on in the scene.

Characters are Expendible

I don't mean it as harshly as the section header indicates lol

In my eyes, characters are meant to be made, enjoyed, and retired when it's the right time to get to know a new character. Really cool character concepts can definitely be re-explored in another character or character concepts recycled for different campaigns. If a character is struck down, there could be plot-related reasons to revive a fallen character, with both in-universe and system-mechanical means to bring them back.

And as always, if you are feeling kinda bored with that character and would like to start another one, by all means do so! The modular nature of the PFS scenarios seems to support this well. We can simply write them out and write in the other character you'd like to play.

In combat

I will always try to make balanced and appropriate encounters where possible (I'm very new to doing so, but PF2e's structure supports balance). Once the group is familiar with the system and ttrpgs, I will definitely try to be a challenging opponent with the adversaries I have available to me.

Despite the balancing act, combat may still be lethal to these characters; dice rolls and critical hits can be untimely for some characters. I will never be unfair or deliberately min/max an encounter so I can "win", that would defeat the purpose of the group game! I will do my best to play out your adversaries as they would act within the world they live in.

Out of combat

I will never put your characters in a "this one single roll determines life or death" situations. Similar to combat, there may be treacherous situations your characters find themselves in. But, any significant or long-lasting effects to your characters should be behind several rolls with opportunities to get creative in between. And even then, I will still try to have results be complications to the narrative rather than outright character death.