In reply to tulgurth (msg # 6):

You could give them XP, but my advice is to not take any from the players for the NPC. I just have them level when the PC's do without giving them XP, but always keep them a little behind the PC's in level. That way the PC's are still expected to do the heavy lifting, and the NPC is still just a supporting role.

As to loot, that would depend on the agreement for the NPC. A fighter that's hired for part of the treasure would get loot. If he's hired on a rate, (daily, weekly, monthly, etc...) Then he wouldn't be expected to get loot. Good PC's would still outfit the NPC with good equipment that their not using, as that improves the NPC's ability to assist.

Then there is the option of having the NPC along for a specific item. "You can keep anything you want, but I must have the Eye of Baergon!"

In reply to A Voice in the Dark (msg # 9):

No, I would not take any from the players.  The XP would be divided equally among the players and then the NPC would receive an amount, although lower, commensurate with the PCs.  For instance, if I awarded the PC group 42,000 xp and there were 6 PC's, each PC would receive 7,000 XP.  I would redo the math including the NPC as part of the group and the NPC would receive 6,000 XP.

That's actually a good Idea. More work for the GM, but I like it.

In reply to A Voice in the Dark (msg # 11):

Yeah it works out and the work is not that much really.  Just have the do the calculation a second time, including the NPCs in the second calculation.  I dont mind the second calculation as my chosen system is math heavy anyways.

another thing I remember from my days as a young GM.  I believe every GM goes through this phase, and yes I call it a phase, where they give out way to much loot.  PCs adventure for a few main reasons, the first is for Fame and Glory, the second is Gold.  Even though GMs use many different cover up the two reasons, working for a local lord, rescuing a damsel in distress, slaying the evil dragon, etc. it all boils down to fame and glory and the gold.

Gms have to balance the amount of treasure they give out to their players.  Give to much and the players become lazy and don't want to adventure.  Give out to little treasure, and whats the point?  The treasure and danger don't equal out.

Treasure can be many things, gold and other various coinages, spell scrolls, magic items, titles from high ranking nobles, treasure can be just about anything that has value to a player character.  The players normally will never tell the GM they are giving out to much treasure.  This means you have to develop the ability to decide what is too much and what is too little.

In reply to tulgurth (msg # 13):

   That's one thing that's always bothered me - giving out the right amount of 'loot'. I'm learning the AD&D system to try and DM at some point and I've always had trouble in trying to hand out 'just the right amount'. I understand that there are other methods of 'treasure' to give out, but is there some sort of formula to follow?

I'm not sure if this is quite the advise you're looking for, but I'd suggest starting with a later edition.  Then you will have charts that clearly state expected levels of loot at each level, which will help quite a lot.  Then again, I've never tried to run ADnD, I barely played it.  I didn't get into rping till 3rd ed launched.

It's an old (and wise) truth that the best way to kill any campaign is to let it grow too quickly.

Once your PCs are rich and famous, there's nothing realistically left for them to do, and they don't want to risk what they've already gained.

But likewise, if you persistently beat up your PCs and they don't feel rewarded for their efforts, you're going to lose players.

Each game has its own 'sweet spot', and finding it is one of the GM's goals. D&D is not the only system out there, and each one must be worked carefully by the GM to provide that elusive 'Goldilocks reward'.

You won't get it right first time, and even if you did, you'd get it wrong second time. It will take a number of attempts to get it right, but going through the maths a few times, doing a few 'what if' calculations in advance will help you to pitch your first shot in the right ball park.

It has been 20+ years since I have seriously played AD&D, so I am not that familiar at all with the later editions and the charts used for treasure.  However with 1st and 2nd Ed. I can say for sure there are tables for treasure.  Each creature has a Treasure Type that applies to a chart.  If you follow this chart and the treasure types you will get sufficient treasure for the encounter.  Pay attention though as some of the creatures have a type for individual creatures and the tribe's treasure.  Goblins and other humanoid creatures are good for this.

When it comes to the magical items, be creative.  Even though the treasure generation charts for AD&D will include them, magical items don't always come in the form of weapons, potions, scrolls, etc.  They could be a magical deck of cards that allow the owner to see the specific cards on each side, highly prized by gamblers.  Or a magical item could be a variant of the Bag of Holding in the shape of a saddle bag.

Also remember, bonuses on weapons do not have to be magical, they could have bonuses based just because of the material the weapon or item is made from.  For instance, the Rolemaster system gives mithril weapons a bonus of +25, just because of the material.  Although not magical, still highly prized because of the material bonus.

I do think DnD is a good starting system to run, since you can rely on the rules more.  I feel like the more I can point to what the rules say, the better I can judge impartially.  If tulgurth is saying that ADnD has treasure charts, I'd still say go by that for impartial fairness.  I also agree with what Ike said about making the reward seem worth it.  Killing a dragon will bring tons of loot, but killing a dragon is quite difficult, hey?

Remember that there are ways of correcting those overindulgence when giving out treasure. PC's getting too fat from laziness? They make rich targets for thieves. Or worse the local lord wants his taxes. Two things are certain remember. One they are good at avoiding, but taxes? Titles getting to easy for them? Suddenly they're being drawn into the noble political game, and have to watch their backs. Fame is it's own problem. They'll soon not be able to rest for a night without being asked for help form one person or twenty.

So don't fret if you over indulge, but keep some ideas on how to correct it if you have to.

Keep the players spending gold.

That works as long as you don't give them too much in the way of power.

I find it best to let them come up with new equipment, magical items, etc... The R&D costs eat up a lot of funds, and then working the bugs out. but when they finally succeed they are really happy due to getting what they were after. They usually don't realize that it cost more than a stock item, sometimes almost double. But if they do figure it out they don't usually care. It's what they wanted, and they earned it.

Remember that rewards don't always have to be items or money or titles, Sometimes the reward is them getting what they've been seeking for a long time. Finally finding and killing the six fingered man. Getting to the Dark Tower. Finding your way out of Wonderland. Etc...

Voice that makes a great segue into the next item, 'What do the players want for their characters?'.  The easiest way to get this information is to ask them, of course.  What are the Character's long term and short term goals?  Long term goals are of course those goals to be accomplished years down the road.  These goals could change, but rarely do.  A simple short term goal could be to travel from their home village to big city and finally join up with the same guild their father was a part of in his youth.  A fine example of this would be the 'Three Musketeers' movie from 1993 when D'Artagnan arrived in Paris to join the Musketeers.

Long term goals of course would take more time accomplish, but if the GM knows what these goals are for each player, the GM can tailor their campaign around these goals.  Each player gets the opportunity to accomplish their personal goals, but at the same time each player gets to have their character in the spotlight of the story.

   One thing I have found useful, and that most players hate, is the taxman or other fee collectors. If the PC's are getting too much money, and the local lord sees this, he might want a 'piece' of the action. (No matter your inclination, the fact that some people have more than others will incite envy, and a few deadlier sins along with it)

   I've even seen in some fantasy states that are pro-active about this, and have made laws that call for an 'adventurer's license' and that dungeoneering done without a said license will cause the group to forfeit a significant portion of their treasure to the state (or worse). To cut the PC's complaints short, it has been mentioned that the state has the best of everything - roads, drainage, mildly subsidized magical research - and not a few statues in the honour of past Adventurers - as a result of such licenses being bought. (That, and the 5% treasure tax afforded by the license, rather than the 10% normally)

I don't recall which book it is, but I believe it was a GURPS book, that discusses this very thing. Essentially there are all sorts of ways players can be drained of cash. A few examples:

• Taxes (or "taxes"), licenses, etc.
• Increased cost of purchases (if you're dumping money into the economy you're going to cause inflation - that raises prices... the more money you shove into the economy, the more expensive services and items will get[does anyone else remember when petrol cost less than a buck a gallon?]).
• There's always new, bigger stuff to build or buy - fortifications, soldiers, horses, whatever all get very expensive very quickly... there's a reason medieval kings were constantly in debt (http://medieval.ucdavis.edu/120D/Money.html).
• A massive pet project - maybe the character wants to build a monument to herself or her god (medieval churches bankrupted more than one powerful family because they believed it was for the good of the soul). There's also research to do ("This magic staff - how can I recreate it?"), economic investments to make ("I think a three field system will work better than a two field system - let's look into that"), what-have-you.
• Business. If your world is anything like the real world, the people that make money want to make more of it. You think the Zuck's okay sitting on his billions? Not bloody likely. I guaran-damn-tee once your characters get a taste of wealth they're going to want to figure out how to make more.
• Good old disaster. Can your "heroes" really stand on all that wealth while the people they care for suffer through a disaster, man-made or otherwise?
• War. I mean, I hate to say it but, at least in roughly historically-accurate stories, the wealthy try to gain more wealth by going to war with their neighbors. It may be a currency sink, but historical rulers care for real estate more than a few coins.

There are a load of other things, but I cant remember them all. I want to say it's in the GURPS dungeon books, but I could be wrong.

One of the big problems with all these solutions if one of player agency, however. Let's face it - if the character's all about the power and the shinies, there's not a lot you, as GM, can do to force them to get rid of it - it's then a matter of not giving them the shinies in the first place.

I have to disagree Story, a GM can do alot to get the shinies from the PCs.  You covered a lot of good ways to do so and KHB mentioned a very good way as well.  But instituting Training costs is a good drain.  I find a lot of GMs miss this very good gold sink into the players.

For systems that are not skilled based, but instead are gain XP and automatically level, this may be a bit difficult, but the skill based systems are really good for it.  Rolemaster, HARP and Hackmaster are 3 systems that come to mind and I am sure there are several more out there like the Whitewolf system.  There will come a time when the players will no longer require trainers, or at least have to pay for them as their skills will be advanced enough they can not find the trainers and have to rely on their own RESEARCH to advance their skills.

So new GMs, don't forget, training cost money and time.

There are a few ways to deal with player shinies/gold/equipment without being malicious or mean about it.

You can take the hardest way out, own up to the players and explain that you've been too generous and that you are concerned about keeping them challenged and not wanting to go through tedious means to remove some of their stuff.  You'll have to hope they see and understand, and allow themselves to be depowered/deprived a little.

However, another way you can go about it is to ratchet up the difficulty a little.  If they have money, they will probably not have problems dealing with extra healing, or buying scrolls for extra firepower, and so on.  Or perhaps they can outfit an army to help deal with issues bigger than themselves.

What falls right into this is having them acknowledged as lords and ladies of the realm.  Now they have to use their wealth for things that are bigger than they are.  They need to fund an army, see to the safety and welfare of their citizens, and so on and so forth.  Of course, you want to have a balance between their stewardship of the lands, and them going out to do things on their own, and so on.

In some games, I have used people's equipment (cars, guns, homes, etc) as a means to absorb damage.  So the player doesn't get shot, but their car's engine gets taken out.  You can't just arbitrarily do that, but I've found that after an epic car chase with all kinds of things happening, players are generally happy to have survived AND dealt with a bad guy who was after their hide, even if they lost a car.  Or gun, etc.

John Wick's a good example, the bad guys put a lot of effort into destroying his car, killing his puppy and setting fire to his house.  And we know how that ended.

This brings up another point. When a GM is starting out they need to be upfront with their players as to their level of competence. Just like when you first start riding a bicycle you need training wheels, they need to be aware of your limitations.

So don't be afraid to ask for help from other GM's in your game or out. Also don't be afraid to admit when you are wrong. Pride leads to more trouble than anything else. Let your group know if you screwed up, they will forgive you, and help you make adjustments to compensate.

One of the examples of this is when you accidentally send the group against a foe too powerful for their capabilities. Not where they have gone somewhere they shouldn't but the planned boss fight is just too powerful. When you realize this apologize for the mistake, and allow them to escape. It happens, we've all done it, and you just learn from it.

Eventually you have to take the training wheels off, but expect to fall a few times. Just like riding a bike, you'll get it.

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Another thing. Your job as GM is to make a fun interesting and challenging story. Your job is not to kill characters. (Unless you are playing a horror game like Call of Cthulhu, then have at it. Or Paranoia. The computer is our friend...) I've seen too many GM's out there who think that their job is to kill characters. That will lose you players. I'm not saying never kill a character, If the story goes that way fine, or if the character does something really stupid, (jumping off a 1000 ft cliff and turning in to a goldfish halfway down,) sure kill them. But avoid the rooms of instant and assured death, and the 400 hp dragon at 3rd level.

Challenge yes, but don't be a killer GM. Allow your players the option to run if necessary, or to win if they come up with a clever way around an encounter that you had expected them to lose.

Just because it deserves to be repeated.

   Wish I'd known that many years ago, but the problem was that the games I was trying out in the 1980's were fairly brand new and we were all making mistakes (as players as well as GM/DMs. Thankfully, we just read the rules as we were going and learned 'on the fly' as best we could.

   But you are right, listing your skill with a particular ruleset is a good idea - at least the players will know what to expect and those that have played the game in the past can give you a hand with things until you're comfortable with the rules and the setting. (I'm doing that right now, re-learning the 2e Ad&D rules for the second time, and the "Birthright" Campaign setting for the first. I know, not the easiest setting to use, but I'm looking at it as a challenge.)

   But with learning the 'ropes' and such when you are a novice GM/DM, one thing to be cautious of are those players who know much more about the system than you do and possibly 'railroading' you into their perception of the game. Everyone plays (and GMs) differently, and although they might be helping you, you need to understand that your interpretation might be different than someone else's. Don't be afraid to step up and let someone know that 'this is how I'm working things.'

   On the flip side, don't 'railroad' your PCs with an adventure. Most people don't like to be told where to go and what they need to do, and setting them down a track with no way to go but forward is just sticking too much to the script and not giving the players any 'wriggle room' - and if you aren't, they will make it themselves. Be prepared to move the Wizard's Tower somewhere else, or even make it into something else, like a small town where the Wizard holds court and lords it over the townsfolk. Be flexible, if at all possible.

   Something I've come along and noticed on Youtube is a plethora of videos on both playing and running games. One that I subscribed to early on was the "How to be a Great Game Master" series that covers a lot of topics and gives some rather helpful advice on everything from World Building to running an "Evil" campaign.  I'll include one of his videos here - it's on how to create your own world and campaign - for everyone to look over. From that point, you can look through and find other videos that might interest you as well.

https://youtu.be/Dbbm5dLXGyI - Building your own world and Campaign

Happy gaming.

I have used that myself, and I've been GMing for over twenty years.

That's another thing, though not something that is exclusive to new GMs. Like anyone in the medical profession, you should never stop learning and growing as a GM. Twenty years or twenty minutes, you never know it all, and you should keep learning tips, and refining your technique.

It's actually a good idea for life. Never stop learning.

If you've stopped learning, you've stopped living.

One thing I might suggest is not to force your desired behavior onto player characters. If a PC is a ruff and gruff soldier, don’t force him to be a gentle boy scout. Don’t force a peaceful cleric to become a ruthless killer. Edit: By force I mean somehow punishing them for not complying.
Main reason is it doesn’t allow the player to play the character they signed on to play.

Of course, there are limits.
Actions might still have practical consequences. Bad behavior could get the law after them, being too merciful might allow foes to keep causing trouble.
You might also let the players know at the beginning what kind of characters you’re looking for. If you’re looking to run a kid friendly hero game, they may need to take their psycho murderer character elsewhere.


This has probably already been said or implied, but I’d say to be very flexible in your planning, and don't plan too far ahead.
If you railroad the players, they might feel like they don’t actually matter.
Players can easily mess up your plans with unexpected actions.
Outside factors can mess things up too (people leaving and joining).
This message was last edited by the player at 20:43, Sat 09 Dec 2017.

Here is another thing a new GM should avoid. Until you have both considerable experience, and a good group of experienced players who know how to not take IC personally, don't run an evil based campaign.

Running an evil based campaign is like being a ship captain piloting your ship through a series of icebergs. Just like an iceberg there are hidden dangers to this kind of campaign. Actions that a character takes will have consequences they might not foresee, and group infighting is almost universal. Better to avoid that until you know what you are doing, and whom you are playing with. The evil acts that your characters will do, really do need an experienced hand at the wheel.