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► 5 GAME MASTER LESSONS I WISH I’D LEARNED EARLIER:
https://youtu.be/iWHJ-DxUvwk
Has your tabletop game ever ended thanks to game master burnout? Whether you’re playing D&D, Pathfinder, or another game, the GM can have a lot on their plate… and sometimes, that can spell the end of your campaign. Here’s how to avoid it.
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"I hope his cat barfs into his shoe" is my favorite new insult.
I ran a Curse of Strahd campaign and was super burned out, I was tired of having to constantly maintain "spoooky gothic atmosphere", I was tired that I was running a setting over which I had no creative control, and I was tired of the setting as a whole after months in it. So I came to my players and said that we won't be finishing this campaign because we either start a new one or we aren't playing at all – I was that close to dropping everything altogether.
Now, in the new one, I was inspired by spelljammer and decided to create my own setting with astral ships and stuff, but it was completely my own, and the trick is – this is my sandbox as well as theirs. Because they are basically swimming in the astral sea between worlds I can choose whichever setting I fancy – gothic horror, viking epic, mummy pyramid mystery – setting of my choosing with just a turn of a wheel. Throw in a unifying element – in my case it's a certain west-astral company serving her majesty the queen (wink-wink), and this company is waging war over this sector of astral space, and on these worlds they have certain interests of their own – and now I can swap settings without it feeling jarring for my players. Honestly, the most fun I ever had, I have full freedom to create whatever I want, and it tremendously helps to keep burnout at bay.
IIRC, you mentioned you have ADHD at sone point. I can definitely relate to building up a busy life and then never being able to manage the “homework” of being a GM!!
10:35
That was indeed the worst possible way, to make a pretty good point.
(I hope the last time I made it, it was worded better. As it was in private at least the 'consider your audience'-part was handled better).
That and the "If you don't schedule time for maintenance, your equipment will schedule it for you."-line will be my 2 take-aways from this one.
I just took a long break from my long running group cause of burn out, I couldn't find inspiration to build the world I was thinking of and then it kept getting worse trying to build the lore. It has been nice not running games for the last 3 months, but I miss meeting with the people.
This video is spot on for how you feel about letting down your players when you realize that you need a break and no one else was willing to take the GM role.
We are lucky to have 3 DMs in our usual games. All big stakes, with varying degrees of highly intense roleplay or character arcs.
One thing I notice happening quite often during stress-filled periods and we all agree on is…spinoffs. We do short arcs (max 5 sessions) with brand new characters and the DM can let someone else take the wheel for a small part of the story that is usually unrelated to the main events. We get to try a class, DM relaxes a bit and we use a different tone.
Both my last two campaigns crashed and burned due to gmburnout. I'm going to start dming PF2e tomorrow and have put a hard limit on myself; I will only DM pre-written adventures, and preferably adventures I can buy 'prepared' (FoundryVTT premium modules). I think this will be the lynchpin to my GMing problems.
Damn Ginny, that was a solid 101 on how to deal with emotional problems, lack of motivation and feeling overwhelmed in general.
Seriously, I've been watching a Youtube channel for a while now called HealthyGamerGG. It's by a psychologist and therapist who talks about many common problems like the ones mentioned above. I find his explanations very relatable not just from the issues he talks about but also the solutions he mentions and how they mirror what I found out by myself over the years. Also he is kinda relatable for the gamer archetype 😉
One of the core aspects he often brings up is the processing of emotions. We often escape unpleasant feelings by numbing them through gaming. His advice is to to ponder them instead, by doing some low effort manual task without any distractions like podcasts in the background. And that is how you start your video here. A funny sketch about cleaning the dishes, but it really really helps. Setting aside some time for the mind to wander and think about the issues you face is often the first step to dealing with them and improving the situation.
Then you mention using supplementary material to lessen the workload and focus on what you enjoy, like building characters. Similarly a common issue he talks about is the feeling of being overwhelmed, "I can't build an entire campaign", and it's true, that's an impossibly large task to do. In one sitting. So focusing on one small step that can be done in one sitting is far healthier, preferably something that you'd enjoy spending the time on. Everything else can be outsourced as much as possible.
Spending time on the 'homework' for the next session takes energy away from us. Thinking about ALL the energy that we need to spend to reach the end paralyzes us. Energy is only recuperated each time we see progress and get a nice result. Focusing on the end result means we only get our energy back at the very very end, far away from now. No one enjoys spending energy without payback. Especially since the payback happens during a play session where everything clicks and fits together. But that's when we are distracted and preoccupied with other things, running the game and stuff. And directly afterwards we get new homework to spend energy on in the future. The payback is so quiet it might just as well be skipped. Of course that leads to burn out.
If instead we focus on the small steps we can do today and ideally enjoy doing then we get a nice result nearly immediately. We spend some energy, but we recover it right away, it might even be a net gain which we can spend tomorrow on something we enjoy less. Thats a way to sustainibly get through large and 'impossible' projects.
You bring up talking to the players in the group and openly share the troubles, maybe even switch roles. That's an important point. In order to talk to friends you need to articulate your feelings, and having them articulated is very useful in figuring out which of your needs are not met. At the same time, having other folks share the same experience and then ideally have them share their toughts as well allows you to reflect on your own life. If your friends occasionally GM and then start feeling overwhelmed and share their thoughts on this issue you get an entire second persons impressions and thoughts on the issue. Thoughts you might not have had but that you find are true for you as well. Listening in a group setting about personal issues of others is beneficial for figuring out your own problems.
So yeah, great video, important topic, because it touches on very common and general issues.
Improvising is really a good skill ti have as a dm:)
The only campain we have stopped was the “phandelvers-lost-mine”, wich was just goblins all the way! Thankyou for the video by the way:)
I used to do the whole "I must design everything from scratch!" angle in my world, and it was exhausting. When I finally realized that I had a setting with deep lore and its own 'vibe' however, I realized I could start reskinning content from elsewhere and then get it to match this 'vibe'. Even things that are far out there can work if you know the vibe of your setting well. (I reflavored a number of medieval fantasy encounters into lovecraftian cyberpunk, so it can be done!). Entire missions got lifted whole from other games, and you know what? Everyone had a blast. Can't recommend stealing and reflavoring enough.
I've let some of the pressure off with improv sessions. Every now and then I'll tell the group I haven't prepped, we can play board games or something if they don't want a session with me flying by the seat of my pants.
I've found it helps for a couple of reasons 1) I don't feel that weight of needing to have prepped and 2) it made me realise I don't always have to have every line of dialogue written out (in fact some said they preferred it).
One page/no prep RPGs can be great for letting people take a break. Everyone just rocks up to the session all relaxed and it only lasts one session. Some recommendations – Ah, Dang! Mothman Won't Move Out (He Said It Was Just For The Weekend), Oh, Dang! Bigfoot Stole My Car With My Friend's Birthday Present Inside and Adventure Skeletons
I honestly do next to no prep. I get a general idea for a story with a handful of generally defined locations (rarely a hard drawn map), and just have an idea of the enemies I want to have in place. The entire rest of the adventure is purely pulled from what the players do. It works. Its more stressful in the moment because I am not really great at improv but the players dont seem to know that, or care
I'm a nurse. I'm at work rn, a patient is screaming every 15 minutes but is refusing all sorts of pain meds. When it's been 3 12 hour nights in a row and now 9 hours (3 more to go) since start of shift tonight and all you hear is screaming. Ya burn out. So glad you mentioned it! Take it easy and keep doing what makes you happy. I love your content!
Game Master Job "Moderating Interpersonal Conflict." I understand that it is kind of expected for Game Masters to do this.. but why? Outside of the game everybody at the table is equal and is equally responsible to solve problems. The Game Master has enough responsibility, putting this on the plate as well is wrong. Players should work to solve every problem they can without expecting the GM to take action! There is no good reason for a GM to take up this responsibility other than the feeling of being the group leader – but you aren't and shouldn't be, there is no leader, there is just a group of player with equal responsibility to make the game fun and succesful and one of them took up the role of GM, thats all. GMs are not the group nannies.
I’ve experienced burnout, but it was quite a long time ago. Like the early ‘90s. I’m currently running a game that started in 2017, and we expect to wind it up in the mid 2030s. I’ve designed every NPC, every adventure, every location, and I work on it about 25 days per month.
But, you have to ask questions of your players, keep track of the things that work for you and your group, and figure out ways to change up the mood of the adventures from time to time.
I have a document full of ideas for adventures. It’s currently 78 pages long, and I access it every week to begin planning new adventures. That’s the main tool I use to keep my interest up and keep burnout at bay.
Ugh. I never get to be a player. Such a royal pain in me German-Irish ass.
As a long term dm I sympathize with your situation. I've also seen what other DM's with greater insecurity may lash out with, but the games they create are their punishment enough (here's looking at you poll retweet guy). Here's a little piece of advice that's helped me battle burnout, and it's probably advice that will help a lot of DM's. Make fighting burnout PART of the campaign, part of how you play. I use a trick where at the end of every session, we quickly go around the table, and each player gives a "star" they saw during gameplay. This could have been anything. Maybe another player said something funny, or used a spell or item in a cool way, or maybe for an npc they really liked, or even just for the map itself. After, they get to make a wish (as you do when you see a shooting star) which can also be anything. One of my party members wished to defeat capitalism in game because they can't do much about it irl. Another player wished we streamlined combat. I do my best to make good on those wishes. This helps me focus on my limited energy on making sure my players are getting what they want, and I swear it works. Somehow my half baked campaign is thoroughly enjoyed because the players feel seen and heard, and when they see me take care of their wish they always feel good. It also gives me some free dopamine when I get a shout out, but it also makes the players feel excited too when they get a star. I know some of my players have struggles irl, and I've been told in private the star very much made a difference in their own self confidence in learning the game, and how they feel about themselves outside of the game. You lose a tiny bit of playtime (schedule 15 minutes, 30 for groups over 5 players) but the quality of the session is improved
for the statetment of that very empathetic dude: How dare you care for your friends feelings and wanting to create an entire world that all of them will enjoy. OFC its a game but its also scary to feel like you have the responsibility of others enjoyment on your shoulders.
Wise words, I`m currently taking a break from DM`ing my campaign, one of the players took over for a stand alone adventure, and I can recharge while still playing.
Its great , we have been doing it for awhile now, since i used to suffer from burnouts often.
The simplest and easiest way to stave this off is to be lucky enough to have a fellow GM in your group. In mine we alternate chapters of our campaigns for 8-12 weeks. Thus by the time we've been a player and come back we're ready to DM again. 100% saved me from flaming out.
Great video Ginny, loving the comfy sweater aesthetic too.
I've only had burnout once that I can remember but yeah, it sucks. I just had to talk to the players and gracefully now out, but luckily another friend of mine stepped in to DM for them so I didn't feel so guilty afterwards.
glad you're back queen
more funny than the Freud reference in Freudenbergers name is, that Freude is the german word für Joy/Pleasure and he had worked on depression/burnout.