Play like a GM

Most of the advice I give out here is for the GMs of the world.

But what about the players? Surely, there’s an artform to running a character in a game as well, right?

This is going to sound pretty whacky. I know this.

But if you want to play a character and heighten the experience for everyone else at the table? Play like a GM/DM.

No, really.

Every so often, I have the pleasure of running a game full of other GMs. They play differently.

Why? When you GM enough, you’re never just thinking about one character. You’re thinking of the game as a whole.

You won’t run into too many GMs pulling the whole “but it’s what my character would do” after performing an action that pisses off everyone else at the table.

They’re enjoyment isn’t just from what they do, it’s from what they facilitate at the table.

They’ll also write a character’s backstory like I write an adventure.

When I write an adventure, I try to cram it with hooks – points of curiosity and places for the players to engage with the adventure. A light shining out in the darkness, a sound coming from beneath the floorboards, a crazy man running through the streets, shouting “THEY’RE COMING!”… Each of these things makes the players want to know what’s happening. They raise questions. They’re sticky. They’re hooks.

A GM often writes their PCs backstory in the same way. “When I was young, I’d dream of a faceless man.

“He was always in the background of my dreams, rummaging around, until he would ultimately find a rusty brass key and walk out of my field of vision.”

Now imagine your a DM and you get that backstory. That’s a fricken playground. You get to now craft the tale of who this weird ass dream creature is.

So yeah… if you wanna be a better player, GM more, I guess.