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Personal Rules for Narrating
Today, I thought I’d share a few of my own personal rules for running a game.
The Story Isn’t Mine. It can be tempting to try to control or direct the course of a story, I make up only a small portion of those who participate in it. The story belongs to the players, too.
The Story Isn’t the Player’s. The story belongs to the characters who make it up, and the story should evolve from their actions and behaviors, not those of the party. This can be hard to balance, especially with the previous rule, but adhering to it helps keep the story from getting stale, predictable, or becoming a one-way railroad track.
When in Doubt, Ignore the Rules. I’m not sure where I first heard the term “rules gap” used to describe a hole in the rules, or a situation not covered, or even a situation which causes the rules to fall apart, but every system has them. Some systems, most often those which are setting specific, rarely see these situations come up. When this happens, don’t be afraid to throw the rules out the window for a house rule, or a temporary ruling. Make sure that the group is okay with this, as changing rules can be problematic.
Force Breaks During The Game. For my group, I’ve noticed that after three hours of solid gaming, a break is needed. Often they don’t realize this, or are excited and want to plow ahead. When this happens, I inform them I need a few minutes to check some rules, take some notes, or roll up an NPC. Taking a five minute break keeps everyone’s mind fresh, and allows another three hours of continuous gaming to take place.
It’s Over When The Player’s Say It’s Over. I will never force my character’s to retire their characters, nor simply kill them off so that they are forced to create a new character. Players put a lot of time, effort, and love into their characters, and I won’t take them away.
This isn’t to say I won’t temporarily remove a character from play if the story takes that character in a direction the rest of the party can’t or won’t follow.
Start and End With Crossroads. By ending every session in a position where players have several choices about what to do at the start of the next session, they are allowed to pursue their passions or moods of the moment. For bigger decisions, allowing players a week to think over their choices gives them time to make sure they aren’t deciding out of impulse.
What are your rules for running a game?
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4 Responses to “Personal Rules for Narrating”
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We will frequently make a temporary ruling when we can’t get a firm answer in the middle of combat. It really helps keep things moving forward and allows time for investigation to either 1) find more information or 2) make a house rule.
In your second rule, you seem to be drawing a distinction between the players, the individual characters, and the party. I’m not sure what you’re getting at, there. Could you clarify?
Uncle Dark,
Thanks for pointing out my unstated assumption! I’ll explore what I meant in some detail in an article on Monday.
[…] morally irresponsible about winging it. As Ominus says at Game On :: Aleph Gaming blog in a post on Personal Rules for Narrating, the story isn’t the GM’s, nor is it the players’. A GM who lacks the agility to […]