As a GM, what do you need from a system's book?

[Ashkhar Ben]

Hey everyone!

So, I'm hoping to get a bit of discussion going over here as well (cross posted on rpg.net) regarding what type of guidance GMs like/want/need from a new system's core book.

Here's the scenario: you are the group's GM for a brand new system. Other than learning the core rules, what kind of GM specific guidance, subsystems, or rules do you look for? Story creation, pacing, creative elements? Tactical rules, encounter building, party balance, mechanical things? Some of both? A lot of both?

Personally I have always been a system tinkerer, so I like games that clearly show how all of the math is derived, allowing me to create my own stuff on the fly. What about you?

Full disclosure: I am a publisher and plan to release my next RPG in mid 2014. While I do personally enjoy this conversation, I am certainly interested in it from the standpoint of a system designer/publisher as well.

[Remmirath]

My primary wish in this case is to learn the rules well and swiftly, so that I will be able to create whatever NPCs and enemies I will need for my campaign.

The story side of things I don't look to the system books for. Subsystems and tactical rules I am always interested in. I first look to understand the basic system, and then go further to make sure I understand as much of any subsystems as I can. Classes and species and similar things tend to be what I look at first, and then I dive into combat and anything associated with the previous things (feats and skills, for instance). I make sure that I know enough I can easily answer any questions that the players might throw at me, and that I know what if any house rules I feel are going to be necessary, and then I start the work of planning. During that time I'll often refer back to the books to plan things, of course, and may look at some advice on encounter building and such if the system is very unfamiliar to me.

What I want out of any system is the tools for running a campaign and the knowledge of how to use them. I always have a strong idea on what I want to be doing in my campaigns, so I don't have much use for advice on where to put monsters or how to write a campaign or that sort of thing (although examples of play for combat breakdowns can be helpful to illustrate what's going on). Any rules for creating magical items I'll certainly look at, or if there aren't any I'll just look at the sorts of things the stock ones do and work from there. The better I can understand the system the happier I am, but I don't care if that understanding comes through the form of breaking down the math or the form of there being a lot of tables for everything.

If the system has a setting strongly associated with it, and if I am running a campaign in that setting, I will want to know as much as I can about that. I typically use my own settings, and everything I wrote above assumes that, but if I'm not then I will want a lot more on the creative side of things out of the books. Mostly I'll want to know what creatures and peoples are native to what lands and environments, enough about culture and such to lend the right tone to the campaign, and maps and floorplans of major settlements.

[MukkTB]

When I learn a new system I want it somewhere to spell out the underlying assumptions of the system clearly and unambiguously. "We expect free form role play out of combat," is a clear example. If it doesn't provide clear indications of the intents and purposes of the rules at least to some degree I get annoyed.

I don't want to read a bunch of combat rules and then wonder where the noncombat material is hiding.

[JusticeZero]

Equipment lists with stats and costs, generic monsters, stat blocks, specific spells when appropriate. Those things are a royal PITA to come up with, and lots of systems go "We've done the easy bit of telling you an abstract way to roll dice - the actual hard balance work and drudgery of making 90% of everyone's effective character abilities we'll leave to your poor GM."
One thing I always want to see somewhere and rarely do is a couple of mid-high op sample characters, fully kitted out with careful annotations of strategy, sneaky little holdouts and contingencies (including stuff like "I bought a Pearl of Power and gave it to the party wizard so he could cast Buff X on me every morning, and he also put contingencies Y and Z on me..") and design philosophy used. I don't want my city guards to be level 6 generics, I want them to be level one Tuckers trained by an in-game General Tippy, and I want to know what their op manual looks like.
I also find that every game book I have ever seen is poorly ordered. Give an intro to terms and a couple of basic stat blocks first. Then go through some basic rule interactions with those basic stat blocks. A sample combat, some skill use, mixed with a bit of flavor. Then and only then am I ready to start getting the material to build a character.
Instead, I get "Here's how to make a character: Roll some dice! Now pick a class from a list we haven't really given much definition to yet! Here's how to put some numbers in! Okay, now that you've spent twenty minutes on that, we'll put a few class features down that let you start to get ideas for the character you're halfway done with! now equipment - bah! your GM can figure that out, we're too lazy to! okay, now that you've spent an hour poking at putting your character together, we're going to start explaining to you what any of these numbers you just wrote down mean!"

[BWR]

Are we talking pure system or attached to a setting? Because this is very important.

In descending order of importance.

1. Something readable.
Nothing is a bigger turn-off than picking up a new book and finding a confusing mess of format, poorly edited, haphzardly organized drivel.
Make sure the language is clear and easy to understand. Make sure the book is well organized, with a natural progression of subject matter. E.g. if you are use a certain dice mechanic in System X, explain the mechanic before you tell people about what sort of skills they can choose. Make sure you have a solid table of contents and a good index. The two are not the same thing. They have different functions, and both are vital to making the book usuable. When in doubt, make the index more detailed.

2. Clarity of purpose
If you are making a system, make sure you have a clear and well thought-out vision of what the system is meant to do and what it is not meant to do. If you intend to make a system that supports giant mechs duking it out with enormous lizards, make sure your mechanics clearly support this. If you are not trying to make a universal system that handles everything equally well, do not waste too much space on peripheral mechanics that are not intended to be important. That's what splatbooks are for. Avoid useless mechanics.
Optional mechanics are fine as far as they go, but if the other option is 'no mechanic', you should really think things through. If it's important enough to add an optional mechanic, it's probably important enough to make into a core mechanic. It's really only a good optional if there is already a core mechanic that handles the subject and you are providing an alternative.



3. I want to run a game without turning to the internet or designer clarification.
This one is probably the worst of the lot because no matter what, you will come up with some problem that the designer didn't think of or that seem obvious to everyone but you. Nothing is perfect but very little ruins a game, either in prep stage or in play, than getting bogged down with "how is this supposed to work?" problems. A certain amount of GM on-the-spot decisions is necessary for any game, but if I'm running a system I want the system to support my games. The more effort I have to put into deciding on how mechanics interact with my game, the less interest I have in the system.
E.g. L5R. Though I like the roll and keep system, its skill system is lacking in. Numerous skills are listed but without any indication what a skill roll of x actually achieves. You'll have something along the lines of "Athletics includes running, jumping, swimming, tumbling, balancing" but no information about how difficult it is to do any of that.
If a mechanic is important enough to be included in the game, it is important enough to be given some guidelines about how it is intended to work.
Sure, as a GM I can assign a difficulty on the fly or in prep, but the more work I have to do on stuff other than story, the less interested I am in running that system over another system that takes these things into account.

A. Setting.
Assuming this book in the works is tied to a specific setting, setting trumps all. The biggest draw to any work will be setting. Even if you have crappy mechanics, people will still buy your books if you have a good setting and just use a different system.
Most of the points mentioned already will hold true when applied to fluff as well as crunch.
Make sure the setting is presented in an easily comprehensible fashion.
Make sure you know what the setting is supposed to be and how it differs from other settings. There's nothing new under the sun and you have to come up with something very well done to pique the interest of the community. If your product comes off as just another Greyhawk clone, you need to put some more work into it.

[Frozen_Feet]

Random encounter tables, maps, adventure locations and game scenarios. You know, actual game content, something to play. Lamentations of the Flame Princess (Deluxe edition) was great in this regard, because it gave you a playable tutorial, a playable module with notes of HOW and WHY it was made as it was, and a whole hex-crawl campaign setting with more fully-fleshed-out locations, a wilderness map and random tables for weather and encounters.

I mean, I bought the game just for the cover artwork, but those things are what actually made me PLAY it.

Most RPGs, especially those that drum themselves to be "systems", are woefully lacking in this regard. They give you a bunch of rules, with loose guidelines on how to use them, and almost no fully fleshed game scenarios. They expect the GM to conjure most of that stuff from thin air, or to buy it with (more) hard money.

[Lorsa]

Full disclosure: I am a publisher and plan to release my next RPG in mid 2014. While I do personally enjoy this conversation, I am certainly interested in it from the standpoint of a system designer/publisher as well.

Good luck with your project! Would you care to tell us what it is about more in specific? A teaser if you will?


So, I'm hoping to get a bit of discussion going over here as well (cross posted on rpg.net) regarding what type of guidance GMs like/want/need from a new system's core book.

Discussion or views/opinions. Those are two different things.


Here's the scenario: you are the group's GM for a brand new system. Other than learning the core rules, what kind of GM specific guidance, subsystems, or rules do you look for? Story creation, pacing, creative elements? Tactical rules, encounter building, party balance, mechanical things? Some of both? A lot of both?

A very complex question. From a pure system's book I won't look for any GM specific guidance. If the book is a generic "all-you-need-to-play-the-game" thing then yes, I would look for it

It's good if the game explains the vision, what it is trying to accomplish and what sort of games they were written for. Usually you can figure it out from the rules but sometimes there are discrepancies. It's good to know.

Setting description, if such exist, is also very good to have.

I'm not sure what GM specific subsystems is. I tend to think all subsystems would be important for everyone at the table, not just the GM in specific. Do you have any examples of when that is not the case?

Story creation is good help for beginner GMs, and can often give you some ideas you didn't think of yourself. Pacing on the other hand is very group specific, so unless your system requires a certain pacing to work there's no need to mention it I would think. Again I am not sure what you mean by creative elements, but I do look for games that when reading through the rules I get plenty of adventure ideas as opposed to some where I get very few. It has more to do with the setting, style and general rules though.

If tactical rules are important, they should be equally important to players to hardly a GM specific thing. Help with encounter building is something that many new GMs would need. Party balance, in the way of "you need to have one of each thingy" is not something I look for. If the game needs that it means it needs a certain amount of players and is thus very restrictive. Party balance in the way of "all characters are somewhat equally good" is something I DO look for, but that has more to do with character creation and advancement. Which isn't really GM specific.

There is one thing I really dislike as a GM (and player) which is often too common and that is the "useable once per session" or "reward per session" kind of thing. A session can be arbitrarily long, from 2-16 hours, and they can span minutes in-game or years. I think every power and reward should be based on in-game time spent. If time has to be a factor at all. It's not just that such as system is easily abusable ("oh look at the time! best go home, let's finish this next time... when my powers are back 'cause it's a new session"), it's that it doesn't make any sense.


Personally I have always been a system tinkerer, so I like games that clearly show how all of the math is derived, allowing me to create my own stuff on the fly. What about you?

Yes. Openness with how the rules are derived and what they were meant to do is good. Guidelines for how to create your own templates (if such exist) or just help with how to modify the rules to work best for you is certainly welcome.

[huttj509]

E.g. L5R. Though I like the roll and keep system, its skill system is lacking in. Numerous skills are listed but without any indication what a skill roll of x actually achieves. You'll have something along the lines of "Athletics includes running, jumping, swimming, tumbling, balancing" but no information about how difficult it is to do any of that.
If a mechanic is important enough to be included in the game, it is important enough to be given some guidelines about how it is intended to work.
Sure, as a GM I can assign a difficulty on the fly or in prep, but the more work I have to do on stuff other than story, the less interested I am in running that system over another system that takes these things into account.


In the L5R 4th ed book there's a chart on page 76 right where the mechanics get introduced, listing TNs for difficulties ranging from Mundane to Impossible, with physical and mental examples for each. Now, it doesn't say "I rolled X, how far did I jump," but instead approaches it from the direction of "did I get across this gap, yes/no?" It also uses jumping a ten foot ditch as an example of a moderate difficulty physical task, TN 20.

[BWR]

I play 3ER, for reasons I won't derail this thread with. I argued for more detailed TN tables for just about everything when they were working on 4e, because I seriously disliked the idea of their one-size-fits-all TN table. The actual TN table only confirmed my fears.

Edit: Since the subject came up, L5R 3e/r vs. 4e is actually an excellent example of important parts of creating a good rpg product.

Many of the complaints against the third edition (and it's revised printing) was that, apart from mechanical considerations, the main rule book was rather confusingly organized and the ToC and index weren't nearly as good as they should be. Also, poor editing left tons of copy/paste errors, grammatical errors, typos , unfinished bits and weird formating in every product. This was consistently a major complaint through all of the third edition run of books.

With 4e they really put an amazing amount of effort into each book. Fewer releases, but every product is a work of art. High-quality hardcovers, incredible interior art, everything is sensibly, almost intuitively organized, the ToCs and indices tell you everything you need to know with a minimum of effort. Quite simply, just looking through any book in 4e is a pleasure, not a chore, even if you are just looking for something. The general quality of of 3e/r L5R art was fine - a lot better than many contemporary rpgs because they had awesome ccg art they could recycle (even if the 1-2e black/white pencil art of Cris Dornaus is perhaps my favorite for the rpg) - but trying to browse the written parts of the books was often annoying.

[Brookshw]

If you asked me at another time I'd have a different answer for you, but currently I'm running an epic high op campaign and the one thing that drives me nuts is the prep time. Anything that can help mitigate that is greatly desired.

Good luck on your launch and please share details =D

[Black Jester]

There are only twp things I find hard to tolerate from a game system: One is an overtly patronizing or pompous tone (like Savage World's reminder on every other page that this game is something! something! something!) because that doesn't make me want to play the game, it makes me want to hit the authors.

The other, and vastly more important one is that the book (or books if the basic system is clearly distinguishable part of a fixed set, like D&D 4th edition slipcase, or the basic books for Gurps which even have continuous page numbers) is complete, as in I am not expected or required any more books to play the game. I have no problems with game expansions in any kind or form; but they should always be optional, not obligatory.

Everything else, I can deal with.

Now, for a really good book, I also expect proof reading. It really sucks when you have a professionally published book, there are just a few mistakes in spelling and layout which really shouldn't happen (the last L5R sourcebook I read was truly horrible in that regard by the way).
I mean I can argue day and night about concrete contents or mechanics and things i would have done differently, and that is usually a matter of taste and preferences, and things I have no use for (I almost never read fiction chapters or paragraphs in RPG books, and skip over most rule examples as well) can be helpful or worthwhile for others.
But bad production values are just unnecessary (and usually the result of laziness) and always, always look as if the editors and authors didn't care.

[The Rose Dragon]

As a GM, specifically? Nothing different from what I would want as a player. Even if the system isn't entirely symmetrical, all the information should be written with the expectation that the players will read it.

One thing that the GM will likely make use of more often than the players, however, is the probabilities involved, if the system isn't diceless, and how various modifiers affect them. This is usually far more helpful than giving descriptors to possible outcomes or stats.

[Grod_The_Giant]

One thing that never seems to be covered enough is encounter design. We give 3.5's CR system a lot of crap, but you have to credit Wizards for at least making the attempt. I see something like Savage Worlds and I'm like "Great! This looks like fun! Now how many bandits can I throw at my party without killing them?" And I get... well, in Savage Worlds I get some complicated formula which is, practically speaking, worthless, but in a lot of other systems I get nothing. Give me an experience budget or something.

Basically, the GM's section of the guide should be "you know how to play the game, here's the additional crunch you need to run it."

[Emmerask]

As a gm I often miss something that lets me easily create encounters on the fly, especially if its a new system its really hard to accurately judge stats and even more so in point buy systems where creating a simple character can still take 10 minutes.

They dont even have to be perfectly rules legal, just something like a table that lets me pick:
-level on y axis
-class on x axis

then shows me some specifics: attack value, defense value, hitpoints and maybe some important skills or somesuch depending on rules. Maybe even be a bit more specific and allows me to pick some packages to further customize.
All this should not take longer then maybe a minute / creature designed.

/edit or basically what half the posts here seem to be about :smallbiggrin:

[Ashkhar Ben]

Good luck with your project! Would you care to tell us what it is about more in specific? A teaser if you will?

Thanks for the feedback! If you're interested in possibly playtesting Ashkhar, I just put out a call for PbP or online playters (feel free to shoot me a PM.)

Here's the pitch: Ashkhar RPG is a flexible, elegant system tied with an original fantasy setting. It is classless and has a bell curved dice method (3d6 + mod). Players can tune their characters precisely how they want them right from creation. Magic is uniquely handled and more freeform than most systems. Combat can be anything from cinematic to highly tactical, leaning toward earth-realism (albeit beyond the limits of human capability.) The setting combines a handful of familiar elements with some new ideas, including a bevy of independent cultures and six different sentient species.

If you're interested in checking out the system in detail, you can do so here (http://ashkhar.wordpress.com).

Thanks for your feedback everyone, really enjoying the discussion.

[Icewraith]

Give a brief description of available classes/roles/whatever it is you use to build your character and what they do before introducing them one by one. Many people will automatically read the whole section and then decide what they want to play, what this leads to is player intimidation and choice paralysis. These people are often hoping to find something that jumps out at them because they don't know what they want to play, so give the new players something they can quickly read and digest, ideally accompanied by some really good art showing sample characters in action. (And not just a sample character by each class/role/whatever entry, show how you expect the characters to be interacting with each other etc, especially if the game is combat focused)

The more examples you give of in-game play, encounter design, and how the math is supposed to work the better. Make it easy for people to apply the math and make sure the math actually does what you want it to do.

[Emperor Tippy]

Let's see.

1) Computer support.
Your book should have a DVD in the back of it (or a code to download from your website) the entire book as a text searchable, cross referenced, and indexed format. It should include a utility to create basic maps, a dice roller, a character sheet creator with most (if not all) of the number crunching handled on the back-end (even if the GM/players can select the option to see it).

2) Fluff kept out of crunch. When I get to the mechanics of how the system works I don't want to see anything about specific NPC's (outside of short examples), setting specific words like "chummer", or any other setting details. I want the mechanical rules laid out in a clear, concise, clean manner and in something approaching a sane order.

3) Example character sheets, lots of them. Clearly marked what difficulty level of play said NPC is intended for (think video game difficulty levels), the kind of guard that is a challenge for total newbs to the system will be slaughtered by the experienced veterans because you can't really build (mechanically) one character that can be both. These should be fully furnished sheets (including items and suggested backstories/plot hooks/plot links).

Now from either the Setting section of the book or from a separate Setting's book I want a full world complete with maps, NPC's, backstories, plot possibilities, and pretty much everything else. What I don't want is new and specialty rules or mechanics. You have already given me the rules, this is the world that those rules have been applied in.

[Lorsa]

Let's see.

1) Computer support.
Your book should have a DVD in the back of it (or a code to download from your website) the entire book as a text searchable, cross referenced, and indexed format. It should include a utility to create basic maps, a dice roller, a character sheet creator with most (if not all) of the number crunching handled on the back-end (even if the GM/players can select the option to see it).

If the book comes with a DVD (the most stupid name ever by the way) I think the price would be steeper than most people want to pay. I agree that it's nice to have a searchable, cross-referenced .pdf but I don't think I've ever seen a system that comes with everything you listed there and unless the creator is a computer programmer it might get too expensive for an independent publisher.

[Emperor Tippy]

If the book comes with a DVD (the most stupid name ever by the way) I think the price would be steeper than most people want to pay.
It adds maybe a dollar in total production costs to the product. And giving a code for online download works just fine, better in preventing piracy actually.


I agree that it's nice to have a searchable, cross-referenced .pdf but I don't think I've ever seen a system that comes with everything you listed there
As an indy publisher you need to stand out, your product has to be better than the major systems. The best way to deliver that is full computer support and integration.


and unless the creator is a computer programmer it might get too expensive for an independent publisher.
It's not that expensive, and there are a number of ways to make it generate a continuing revenue stream without alienating your customer base with monthly fees or the like.

[Toofey]

1) a clear guide to character creation. If my players can't pick up your book and make a character I can look at and understand, your game has problems.

2) an example of a complex fight, so that the DM can see the intended flow of combat, and how things get resolved.

3) a system for resolving question marks. A lot of systems have no way to address something that isn't an attack, or a skill usage.What they're often missing are answer to things like "will that branch break if you swing on a rope connected to it" etc...

4)AN INDEX. seriously if you write an RPG and there's no index (I know I'm arcane still using paper, but still) then the word filter will stop me from saying what I'd like to you.

5)No references to other books for rules. If it's the core book, you should have the rules you need there, I'm not saying don't put rules for things in other books, just don't answer any rules question that will come up from the core book in another book. There's nothing worse than needing to know how to do something then looking it up to find it's explained in book X or Y.

[Axinian]

Monsters/Enemies, and a significant number of them. They don't need to be in the core Core book, but there better be a Monster Manual or something as well.

Seriously, its kind of unreasonable to expect GMs to be able to properly balance foes just from reading the core rules. There need to be examples and things we can pick up and play.

At least for me, the lack of monster books has been a 100% deal-breaker for me regarding many systems.

[beachhead1973]

I need weapon and damage rules which make sense, even if fighting is not core to the game. If you make weapons meaningless, if one is as good another with no difference, it really makes combat boring.

[valadil]

I'm going to keep this abstract. I want the book to tell me what the system covers and what I'll have to make up.

I want the things to book covers to be indexed for quick access. There's nothing worse than knowing a rule you need exists, but not being able to find it mid session.

I want the things that I have to make up to have some examples or basis in game rule. As a trivial example if I know that climbing a ladder is difficulty 5, a rope is difficulty 10, and a wall is difficulty 20, I can improvise an oak tree no problem.

[skyth]

A couple things spring to mind as good things to include. The first is lots of examples of how things work. The second is encounter design (IE what can I throw at the players to make something a challenge). This is something that I really like about 3.x.

[GungHo]

4)AN INDEX. seriously if you write an RPG and there's no index (I know I'm arcane still using paper, but still) then the word filter will stop me from saying what I'd like to you.
Indexes are needed in e-books, too. I may misremember what clever terms you've invented for product differentation, but a quick glance at an index may help me remember that you call your dice rolls "success/failure determination tosses"

[Kaun]

People have said Index but i'm going to say it again. A good index is golden.

Pre-made characters are nice - i often make use of them to help teach myself the system.

Give examples of how to handle the non combat aspects of a game. Social interactions - crafting skills - etc

Stat out a bunch of basic NPC/Monsters. for example its nice to know what a run of the mill bandit looks like so we i have a bench mark to build from.

Give costs of living examples for your game: How much it costs to live, day to day costs for basic things, like public transport (if appropriate), (taxes) and so on. You don't need to go into to much detail but it helps to have a defined bench mark.

Outline the key aspects for your game early and clearly - If your game has a some key things that are meant to make it what it is, or shape the style of play, explain them early and in detail. It is always good to know what the game designer views as important so i can keep it in mind while learning a new system.

Go into detail about how to award experience - To many games are vague about how to award experience, how much you should try to award per session and so on. Go into detail about experience because it does end up being a very important element of the game.