Nerd-Up

Forcing friends and evilly coercing others…

In our first installment of HTBGG we looked at deciding what type of game you want to play.  Sadly, that was the easy part!  So now that you have decided on a game you want to play and there is no one to GM it.  You know the core material well enough or have read it enough times to understand it and you figure “I can GM, why not?”  Before you jump in, you should know that there are a lot of situations that can arise before or during GM’ing that can be bothersome.  This is where I come in.

In all honesty, getting a group together can be a big pain in the arse, but it is your first step to being a good GM.  Here are some helpful tips to finding the right players:

a)      Selling yourself:
You have to drum up interest and hype yourself quite a bit, but do not oversell yourself either.  You do not want players walking away thinking you really did not live up to our own hype.  Any GM should have enough confidence to make themselves sound somewhat awesome.

b)      Advertise:
Go to your gaming stores and put up flyers or talk to the owners and mention that you want to run a game.  See if they have a forum you can post on. Try local meetup sites as well.

c)      Interviews:
When you start to get responses make sure to talk to your potential fodder (gamers) either face-to-face or via email.  Make sure they are not complete loonies and also make sure they are open to many concepts and ideas. Make sure no one is easily offended, since gamers are nerds and geeks — offbeat and/or adult topics could easily come up.  Also make sure they are decent people and decent conversationalists.  All of this helps in the long run, especially if this is going to be a long-term campaign.

d)      Be awesome:
Early on, establish your expectations for your players and yourself. Ensure that everyone knows what they are getting into.  And always ask questions that might help you.

Here is my list of questions I ask potential gamers:

1)      What types of games have you played in the past?

2)      What type of character do you normally play or want to play?

3)      Not that it will definitely happen, but are you okay if your character dies?

4)      Can you work as a team, even if it means having to compromise from time to time?

5)      Is there anything that offends you?

That’s it, 5 simple questions. When you talk to the rest of the players that want to join, you can figure out how they will all mesh together.

This is the end of Part 2, look out for Part 3 in the next few weeks.

Live long and prosper,
The Dave

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