RfP #007 – GM on Empty: Understanding and Avoiding Burnout

Terry: 00:00:00

You're listening to roll for Perceptocast episode 7 GM on empty understanding and avoiding burnout. It's time once again to Roll for Perceptacast. I'm Terry, your forever GM and lover of all things roleplay.

Evelyn: 00:00:30

And I'm Evelyn, role player GM and unrepentant dice goblin.

Terry: 00:00:35

Join us as we roll our dice.

Evelyn: 00:00:36

And talk in strange voices and bring.

Terry: 00:00:39

To you our excitement and joy for all things tabletop role playing.

Evelyn: 00:00:43

For more on Roll for Perceptacast, head over to www.rollforperception.com.

Terry: 00:00:49

And we are back. Yes, it has been almost eight months since the last time you heard from us and we are excited to be here.

Evelyn: 00:00:57

Yes, we are.

Terry: 00:00:58

It is Evelyn and I just real life happened. I ended up getting a full time tenure track position at the university that I teach at.

And that unfortunately came with more responsibility and new faculty orientation and a lot of things in my first year that I won't have moving forward.

And in fact my chair was even getting on me and saying you need to be doing less stuff so that you can work on your creative stuff because I do lighting and projections and LED walls. And I was like, yep, you're right, you're right.

And of course I'm thinking also my other creative stuff, which is outside of work, more specifically this. But the hope is now to continue this podcast for as long as we can.

Evelyn: 00:01:44

Yeah, because you know, we got lots of good stuff that we have planned out at least seven more episodes already, which is awesome. And we have a bunch of new TTRPGs that we're checking out to see, you know, if there's something that we're interest in delving a bit more into.

So that'll be exciting too.

Terry: 00:02:02

So let's get into today's topic, which is very specifically GM dm Call it what you will Burnout title said it all GM on empty understanding and avoiding burnout. Many of us have been there in one way or another. And I'm going to use a quick story to kind of illustrate my burnout.

I've been burnt out and I it was while I prior to my Current position over 20 years at small liberal arts colleges and at those schools in the theater department you usually have two faculty members. You have your acting directing professor and then you have your technical professor. Your professor who covers all the technical areas.

Well, technical areas are a lot of work. You're constantly going, I got burnout in the last couple years at my previous institution. I was ready to quit theater.

I was ready to quit academia and find something simpler in my life so I could spend more time with my family and my friends and enjoy my life. And luckily, I got the job that I'm in now. I have a lot more time I get to spend with my family. We. Which is amazing. Got new friends up here. Not.

I mean, I miss my old friends.

Evelyn: 00:03:24

Yes, absolutely.

Terry: 00:03:26

But it is. I'm super excited that we now have this opportunity. But burnout is real.

And whether we're talking about game masters or dungeon guides or lorekeepers or whatever.

Evelyn: 00:03:39

You want to call the storytelling position, the person who sits behind the screen and, you know, who comes up with the basic, you know, elements of the story that you play in.

Terry: 00:03:54

Yeah. And it. We. We need to avoid it, right?

Evelyn: 00:03:58

Yeah, absolutely.

Terry: 00:03:59

And so we're going to talk a little bit about that today. Being. Being should be fun. Our players get that fun, right?

Evelyn: 00:04:09

Yeah.

Terry: 00:04:09

And so we need to be able to have that enjoyment as well.

And so we're going to look at ways to hopefully, you know, kind of jump over the hump of burnout or fight against it or stop it before it even becomes a thing.

Evelyn: 00:04:27

Yes. Because sometimes prevention is the better option. If you can do that.

Terry: 00:04:34

If you can do that. Always a better option. All right, so the first one we're going to talk about is. We're going to talk about over preparation, stress.

And I'm going to say I'm guilty about it. And I know you are guilty about it.

Evelyn: 00:04:51

I mean, I don't know what you're talking about.

Terry: 00:04:54

I have seen you stress out so severely when it comes to prepping for a game.

Evelyn: 00:05:01

Yeah. Yeah. Because I just want to make sure that it's fun, you know, understanding what's to come.

Terry: 00:05:08

And I know that you want the game to be fun, but it is a stressor. I know that it. It has happened to me. Like, I know I'm. I'm picking on you here right now, and I apologize for that, but that's because I see it.

Evelyn: 00:05:22

Right, right.

Terry: 00:05:23

And you're doing. You're actually doing a bit more GMing than me right now.

Evelyn: 00:05:27

I am. I am currently running two games a week. I'm looking to start a third as well. You know, wanting to be prepared for those when you go in.

Especially because I'm getting paid to run these games, making sure that they are, you know, at least prepared enough that we can get. Fill that four hours for one game and three hours for the other one.

Terry: 00:05:54

But what that does, like, it. It leads to things like anxiety. It leads to feeling overwhelmed even before the Session starts. And I think for me, that's my biggest thing.

Like, especially if I don't feel like I've gotten enough time to do it, I will fall into this where I'm just writing things down, I'm coming up with ideas, I'm making sure that everything is ready to go and is perfect. And let's be honest, our players don't.

Evelyn: 00:06:32

Always do what we expect them to do. That's exactly by any means. Yeah.

Terry: 00:06:37

And so we've done all this preparation, all of this work, and then, boom, it's gone in the first 10, 15 minutes. We don't have it there anymore.

So what we've done then to ourselves is we have spent hours upon hours prepping, stressed about it, and then, boom, we're now more stressed because our players have gone in a completely different direction.

Evelyn: 00:07:06

Encounter that you had so meticulously built for them is suddenly just discarded.

Terry: 00:07:12

And so one of the solutions to this is to embrace more flexible preparation methods. And so, for example, I have begun moving into a direction where I may come up with some ideas and encounters and I'll put them in my notes somewhere.

But I'm not expecting it to happen that night, or whatever night is my next session. I have a list of things that can happen at any time.

And I've been doing that more and more as I've gone along because I found that if I just have these things, then I can toss them in whenever. Now this is. I'm moving towards a different system. And we'll talk about systems in a few, in just a little bit.

But one of the things is it's kind of dependent on the system. Right. D and D.

Pathfinder 2e, a little harder to not prepare for unless you know the tools that are available, like Mimic Fight Club, which is super handy. Right. And we'll put a link to that in the show notes. It's a. An encounter builder for Pathfinder 2e.

Evelyn: 00:08:29

And then you can balance it for however big your player group is, which is really nice.

Terry: 00:08:33

Oh, super. Oh, my gosh. Yeah. And so gotta find out what your flexible preparation method is. I know.

I've Talked to some GMs who, they just have a couple of NPC names, a couple of general ideas, and then they go into their session.

Evelyn: 00:08:51

Right.

Terry: 00:08:52

I want to get there. I'm hopefully moving in that direction. But that's one of those things there. You know, you can only prepare for so much. Right, right.

Evelyn: 00:09:04

I know in the last, like, couple of RP things that I've built, I've been Noting down specifically the points that I want to hit and like, specific things that, like, if there's something exact that I want a character to say, I'll write that down. But the rest is improvis, improvisation within the. The idea that I'm trying to get across like.

And I find that's helped a lot of the roleplay stuff with. I'm not trying to completely, like, diagram out the entire conversation because there's a million ways that my players can go.

And I think that's actually one of the disadvantages to using pre Built adventures.

Terry: 00:09:44

Right?

Evelyn: 00:09:45

Because half the time the responses that the NPCs are supposed to give based on questions that the players are supposed to ask never happen. Because the players never ask those questions ever.

Terry: 00:09:58

No.

Evelyn: 00:09:58

And so you're like, okay, so how do I give them this information without like 8 sounding completely out of the blue statement, Because I like, how do I refrain? Doesn't just sound like I'm answering a question that they didn't ask.

Terry: 00:10:11

They prefer to ask questions like, what color are the boots on the third person to the left? And I'm going to throw this in here. And this is, you know, take this as you will.

We should probably do an episode at some point talking about what I'm about to say. But I have found that for things like names or rituals or spells, using an AI is helpful. Look, I have my issues with AI. We will.

Let us know if you want to hear an episode talking about AI, the ethics, the how it can or cannot or should or should not be used. Let us know. Leave us a message on the website.

But I'm not gonna lie, I've used it to figure out names for things because it's nice for me to just say, look, I need a name in this style. Give me like 10 of them and then I can just pick from it. Yes, there are fantasy name generators out there. I use those too.

I'm a person who uses as many tools as I can when I'm.

Evelyn: 00:11:20

I have my little roll tables. My book that I have on my desk has a bunch of names in it and I can just like glance down at it and find a name really quick. That's helpful.

Terry: 00:11:30

Find those things that are going to make your life easy so that you don't have to prepare so much.

Evelyn: 00:11:35

Yeah.

Terry: 00:11:36

All right, so that's over preparations. The next one we want to look at is Player Dynamics. Dun, dun, dun.

Evelyn: 00:11:47

Now, we're not necessarily a bad thing.

Terry: 00:11:48

No. We're in a day and age now, though, where groups of players can come together in a much different way than what they did in the past.

And what I mean by that is you can find players online so easy now.

Evelyn: 00:12:02

You don't have to go necessarily go to your local game shop anymore to find people.

You don't have to go to your friend's mom's basement because that was the game room and kept you out of her nice living room area while you play D and D. That's exactly it. But that's oddly specific.

Terry: 00:12:21

But you know, that was very oddly specific. But that means that sometimes there is going to be tension, drama, misalignment between players.

These things can drain a GM's enthusiasm very quickly. I'm going to use an example now. This was from paid games. So again, a slightly different situation.

When I was running paid games, I had a couple of groups where there were people on different sides of the table that did not necessarily get along with each other. And that of course saps my energy. Had that been a non paid game, I would have probably ended that game fairly quickly.

Because there's something to be said about not forcing yourself to deal with that stuff as a gm. Because we get caught in the middle and it is emotionally exhausting.

Evelyn: 00:13:25

Yeah, I mean, one of, you know, the things we do as GMs is we mediate things at times.

And sometimes you don't want to have to mediate stuff that is seeping in from the outside that doesn't have to necessarily do with conflict, inter character conflict, but inter player conflict.

Terry: 00:13:47

Right.

Evelyn: 00:13:48

And so that's a kind of a big thing that I think session zeros tend to be very useful for is how do you deal with the interplayer conflict when they happen?

Because some, I mean, you can be with a group of friends that you've been playing together forever and the conflicts can happen just because you've known each other forever. And sometimes it's, you know, things come to the table that you don't want to be at the table.

But you know, knowing how to deal with that and not letting it overwhelm your enthusiasm for the game and take away from the, the experience for you as the GM or from your, the other players who are at the table, because that affects them as well. Just like finding that balance.

Terry: 00:14:36

That's exactly. And it, it is, it's about finding that balance. And not everybody who runs a game is going to be good at dealing with these types of things.

And it can be hard. And so what. So in that essence, it kind of in that thought is you want to set clear Table expectations from the beginning.

Obviously, you know, I'm a huge session zero.

Evelyn: 00:15:07

Oh yeah. I like at. I don't think we've done a thing on session zeros, but we should if we haven't.

Terry: 00:15:15

Yes.

Evelyn: 00:15:17

It's been a while, guys.

But with, I mean, every table, even if you've been with this group forever, you should have a new session zero for every single campaign that you do because it helps reestablish the, you know, expectations for the table.

Terry: 00:15:43

Right.

Evelyn: 00:15:43

You know, how things will be handled.

It also helps bring up things that might have been issues in the last game if you're playing with the same group or things that are sensitive topics potentially.

Especially because as you go through life, things change and there might be things that have become an issue for you topic wise to deal with that would not have affected you the same way previously.

And so revisiting that, regardless of or the same group you've been playing with for 15 years, it's important to do that I think at every beginning of a campaign.

Terry: 00:16:23

That's exactly it. And like an example of, you know, player dynamics is at a table.

I know I've run into the instance a couple of times where a couple players are very metagame type decision makers.

Evelyn: 00:16:39

Yes.

Terry: 00:16:39

And the rest of the table is not. And that, you know, that becomes a problem.

Evelyn: 00:16:47

Which is why I don't allow metagaming at my table, period.

Terry: 00:16:50

Yeah, well, you know me, I am very anti meta game, generally speaking as well. And so it is. So player dynamics make sure that going into the game you have some clear, concise ideas and rules on how you want the game to run.

Evelyn: 00:17:09

Yep.

Terry: 00:17:12

So to kind of bounce off of that idea a little bit as a gm, there is also the emotional labor and group management that ends up happening. So obviously we're talking player dynamics before.

Now we're going beyond storytelling and we're talking about managing those emotions and what can very quickly turn into true conflicts within the group.

Evelyn: 00:17:41

Right.

Terry: 00:17:41

Now I've never person where I had people come close to fisticuffs, but I have read enough Reddit, the horror stories, the TTRPG horror. Yeah. I know that it is happening before.

Evelyn: 00:17:55

Oh yeah.

Terry: 00:17:56

And there, you know, I can't even imagine like the real like the in person tables that I've been a part of. Everybody has been. Although now that I look back of it, we had some, a table that Evelyn and I were at that I ran.

We had some, some stuff going on between a couple of players there.

Evelyn: 00:18:20

Right. Yeah.

Terry: 00:18:21

Which as the gm I kind of was in the middle of.

Evelyn: 00:18:26

Right. Oh, yeah.

Terry: 00:18:28

Because they were both close friends of mine. Still are. Still talk to them. I've moved away, so obviously the game doesn't occur anymore, but I had to deal with that.

Where two players ended up who were very close friends, ended up kind of not becoming enemies, but not. They were no longer friends.

Evelyn: 00:18:52

Yeah.

Terry: 00:18:53

And I just remember as a. As a gm, how I looked forward to the nights of those games.

But then I also knew that there was going to be something that I was going to have to deal with afterwards, depending on who left last.

Evelyn: 00:19:08

Yeah.

Terry: 00:19:09

Because that's how it always was. Somebody left first, and then I ended up talking to.

Evelyn: 00:19:15

Was still there. Yeah.

Terry: 00:19:18

And it took a toll. I mean, it took a toll. That game ended when we moved.

Evelyn: 00:19:24

Right.

Terry: 00:19:25

So it was less of an issue. But, boy, was that.

I mean, it's exhausting as a gm to be thinking about the game, but then also have to deal with kind of mediating issues between players, and then you've got things like disputes about loot.

Evelyn: 00:19:43

Oh, gosh. Yeah.

Terry: 00:19:45

Now, I. Again, I've been lucky. Part of that is much of my time has been Pathfinder 2e. So loot is less of an issue in. In that. In how it's divided up.

But again, I've read stories about people who have had to deal with someone.

Evelyn: 00:20:00

Who takes all the. All the loot. Everything drops.

Terry: 00:20:05

Actually, we did have that. There was a problem in that in.

Evelyn: 00:20:07

A game, and I've had a player like that before who kind of tries to take everything, and I'm like, well, guys, like, spread it out. Spread the wealth. It's meant for everybody.

Terry: 00:20:22

Let everybody play the game. I know that's crazy talk.

Evelyn: 00:20:25

You're not a caster. You don't need five magic wands. Please let the casters have one or two of them.

Terry: 00:20:32

But I want to sell them, and then I can buy the super big beefy sword. Oh, man. Yeah. So, you know, how do you do this as a gm? You do your best.

Evelyn: 00:20:44

Right.

Terry: 00:20:47

And we, as a gm, tend to end up. It weighs on us. It just weighs on us. And you can usually tell. You can look at your GM and go, ooh, something is going on there.

Evelyn: 00:21:00

Well, and this also falls into the players. Sorry. This also falls into the players that do the whole. It's what my character would do.

Terry: 00:21:12

Oh, my gosh.

Evelyn: 00:21:13

And luckily, most of the time, we have not had to deal with that.

Terry: 00:21:19

No, we haven't.

Evelyn: 00:21:20

But I have had people kind of dance the line of that a couple of times where I've had to be like, okay, so what you're doing. And this is a conversation that I've had with them behind the scenes. Because you never, ever, ever do it at the T in front of everybody else.

Because that's just. But unless it's a situation that has to immediately be stopped and the person removed from the. But I. Luckily I have not had that situation so far.

But I have had people who have been kind of toeing the line of this is what my character would do. And I'm like, but it's not in my game.

Terry: 00:21:59

Right.

Evelyn: 00:21:59

Because it is all. You're almost hitting the point of inappropriate. And we need to back that up a little bit before we get to the point of it being an issue.

Terry: 00:22:10

Yeah. Because let's be honest, these games are. They're meant to be aberrations.

Evelyn: 00:22:17

Yeah. It's a cooperative environment.

Terry: 00:22:20

And so if. If you've got a player who's not cooperating, that's a. That's a major issue.

Evelyn: 00:22:26

Yeah.

Terry: 00:22:27

Major, major red flag. We need the red flag guy from Tick Tock. You should do one just on TTRPG players. That'd be awesome.

Evelyn: 00:22:36

That's all red flags. But yeah, I mean like in. Yeah. Also springing character conflicts on a GM unexpectedly is. It's really bad idea.

Terry: 00:22:49

Yes.

Evelyn: 00:22:51

So that. That would fall into, I think the. Just the kind of character behavior conversations that need to happen before it happens at the table.

Because you know how. If that's something you spring on the gm, how do they deal with that?

You know, because if you aren't expecting it, then suddenly it's a question of are the players having a conflict or is this a character thing? Especially if it's like a new character coming into an established group. Because that's always has a. Always has sort of weird dynamics at times.

So, you know, that can sort of. It's just.

Terry: 00:23:32

Yeah.

Evelyn: 00:23:32

Everybody needs to talk to everybody.

Terry: 00:23:34

Oh yeah.

Evelyn: 00:23:34

Like, I feel like one of the big things with GMs and players is you should treat it like any relationship. Communication is key.

Terry: 00:23:44

Communication. I know, right. Oh man. We're going to stick on players for one more. And that's.

And this one is probably the one when it comes to players because we've got some others coming up that actually affect me a lot more. That probably is one of my biggest. And it's lack of player investment.

Evelyn: 00:24:04

Yeah.

Terry: 00:24:05

And this is when your players seem distracted, unprepared, disinterested. It can feel like everything you've done has been completely pointless. And I will tell you as a gm, this affects.

When it comes to players, this affects me more than anything else. Yeah, I have. I've done a lot of DMing now for a short amount of time. I didn't, I didn't get into the TTRPG space too late.

But since I've been in it, I've been mostly a gm. I was a player early on, switched over to gm, Ben, GM forever, and currently I'm a player in a single game and then setting up some other GM stuff.

But when a player doesn't seem interested or doesn't want to take the time to pay attention to what's going on, we've run into this before where somebody will ask a question that's been answered already, like five minutes ago, and that's because they were. They just didn't. Didn't pay attention. Now I find this is more prevalent in online game.

Evelyn: 00:25:25

Well, yeah, because there is. There's a lot of distractions when you're playing online. I mean, it can happen in person too.

Like people whispering at the table and stuff where they're having a side conversation and they completely miss something that was just said to them because they're too busy talking to each other. Right. Because it can happen. People get distracted. And when you're hanging out with your friends, you know, conversations happen.

But one of the big things is you'd like, just put the phone down, maybe close a couple tabs and just listen. Yeah.

You know, and, and I know some people need things to help keep them focused that, like, because, you know, everybody has different abilities to like, have an attention span. And for me, like, I have to take notes and doodle as I do it, because it helps me focus on what's being said when I.

In moments where I'm not part of the role play, obviously, but like, when information is being given, I will complete. And it's nobody's fault. I'm doing my best to pay attention, but sometimes my brain kind of wanders places that it need to refocus.

So actively taking notes actually helps me focus better as a player, as a gm, I have so many plates spinning that I have to pay attention to what I'm doing. No, like, and there's times where it's just crickets.

Terry: 00:26:55

Yeah.

Evelyn: 00:26:55

In. In past games that I've run where it's like it. Did I completely miss the mark. Like, am. Did I. Did I do something that. Am I here by myself?

You know, and.

Terry: 00:27:14

And I. Obviously a lot of that has to do with.

There are more players than GMs and so many Players don't know what it's like to be on the other side of the screen.

Evelyn: 00:27:26

Right.

Terry: 00:27:27

And they don't understand that, you know, the GM is putting as much out there as they can for the players. And so you want the player to be invested in the story, in what is going on and what is happening.

And it doesn't like makes the GM feel invisible, sometimes underappreciated or as you were just talking about, performing for an empty room. Yeah, yeah. The, the, the glued to the phones.

I like, I look back now and I wish I could go back in time and play the game before phones were a thing because I bet it was really cool.

Evelyn: 00:28:06

Yeah, that's, I mean that's how I started. We had paper sheets and that's what we had.

Terry: 00:28:11

And don't get me wrong, I love technology. I think it does wonders for us. But it is. Yeah.

Evelyn: 00:28:16

I mean I have to say having the digital character sheets makes things look to erase and rewrite stuff in all the time. Which is, which is lovely.

Terry: 00:28:25

But so some solutions to kind of avoid the, the LA player investment obviously to talk about it in expectations. This goes back to session zero. Make sure you let people know that you expect them to be engaged with what's going on.

Design more player driven plots and use the characters backstories in what you're doing. And so that I think we're going to be talking about characters backstories in a future podcast. It's on our list of, of podcasts.

But how do you incorporate what the player has brought to the table into what you're doing? Because that's going to help. That's going to motivate them to be a part of what is happening.

Evelyn: 00:29:08

Yeah. Because it, you know, if they're not paying attention and they miss major stuff related to their story arc, they're going to be real sad.

Terry: 00:29:15

They're going to be real sad. All right, so we're going to move away from players and we're going to talk about. This is probably my best biggest one overall.

And it is system fatigue.

Evelyn: 00:29:28

Yeah.

Terry: 00:29:30

And that's running the same RPG system for years. And especially if it's it, it's complex or you know, grindy or any of those things. And it has hit me. Yep, it has hit me.

And I've been GMing one game, Pathfinder 2e now for. Well, Don said what he'd been playing with us for three years now.

Evelyn: 00:29:59

Right. But Extinction Curse was even further back.

Terry: 00:30:04

I know that's what I was using. So at least four years.

Evelyn: 00:30:07

Yeah.

Terry: 00:30:07

Because Extinction Curse happened.

Evelyn: 00:30:10

That was your very first.

Terry: 00:30:12

That was my very first stream that we did with my first GM that. I mean that for.

Evelyn: 00:30:17

Because we were all brand new to Pathfinder 2e at that point.

Terry: 00:30:21

Yeah. I picked up a humble bundle.

Evelyn: 00:30:23

Yeah. Because that was. That was even before we were using Path Builder. Because it was that we started with.

Terry: 00:30:27

That other fantasy grounds.

Evelyn: 00:30:29

Yeah. But no Path Builder.

Terry: 00:30:31

Oh. Wander.

Evelyn: 00:30:33

It was like Wanderers got like something.

Terry: 00:30:36

Yeah. Wanderer's Guide or something. Something similar to that.

Evelyn: 00:30:39

And then we found Path Builder and switched to that for our character sheets. But like, it was. Yeah. So Extinction Curse was like my introduction to. To Pathfinder 2e. I think it was. I mean, that was yours as well. Right. So.

Terry: 00:30:55

ickly, like some of the early: 2020

Evelyn: 00:31:05

Yeah.

Terry: 00:31:07

Holy cow. So I've been DMing or GMing a game of Pathfinder 2e almost consecutively for five years.

Evelyn: 00:31:17

Right.

Terry: 00:31:19

And at one point I was doing 10 games 2e in a single week. So every week I was doing 10 games.

Evelyn: 00:31:28

It was a lot.

Terry: 00:31:29

And so system fatigue has hit me. And part of that is Pathfinder 2e is a bit crunchy for you in general.

Evelyn: 00:31:41

I mean, it's a crunchier game.

Terry: 00:31:42

Yeah.

Evelyn: 00:31:43

But it's. I'm saying it's crunchier than what you're looking for.

Terry: 00:31:46

Yeah, yeah. And that's exactly. It is. I'm looking for something that is more narrative based.

Evelyn: 00:31:52

Yeah.

Terry: 00:31:53

Well, the reason I bring that up is that that's. That's what system fatigue can. Can do to you. And it can, like the rules start to become a dragon instead of a support structure.

Evelyn: 00:32:07

Right.

Terry: 00:32:08

Like, part of the reason I went into Pathfinder 2e is because of the structure of it. But I think part of that when I first started was I was brand new to GMing, so having that structure for me at the time was perfect.

Evelyn: 00:32:22

Right. Yeah.

Terry: 00:32:23

I've now moved beyond that and that structure becomes a hindrance in what I'm trying to do.

Evelyn: 00:32:32

And you get bogged down in some of the mechanics of it and you lose the storytelling aspect.

Terry: 00:32:41

That's exactly it. And so how do you get past that? Well, for me, it's about explore alternative systems.

For me, it's systems that allow my players to do some more interesting things. My big ones right now are Legend in the Mist, of course. Huge fan of that. It's in. They're still finishing up. I've been reading.

I think we get another copy on the first is that two days. So in two days I get my next update on that. And Cypher system is starting to really appease me. Now we have some others that I really want to play.

Wander Homes one the. Which one?

Evelyn: 00:33:24

The Brindlewood Bay.

Terry: 00:33:24

Oh, Brindlewood Bay. Any of the PBTA tend to be a little more rules light.

Evelyn: 00:33:29

Yeah.

Terry: 00:33:30

Like Root RPG is. Is fantastic. And so I am now I'm moving towards those games. I'm not.

I'm not gonna GM Pathfinder 2E games right now because I don't want those rules anymore. I needed those rules at one time and, and I love Galarian.

So at some point what I'm probably gonna do is end up doing another system in Galarian just not using PF2E. So, you know, I haven't fallen out of love with Pathfinder, I've fallen out of love with the rules.

Evelyn: 00:34:08

Right. Yeah.

Terry: 00:34:10

It's the same way, you know, because before that I was in D and D. Right, right. Well.

Evelyn: 00:34:15

And you play Pathfinder 1. Of course.

Terry: 00:34:18

Right.

Evelyn: 00:34:18

Which was the rule set we were doing.

Terry: 00:34:22

Which is pretty crunchy.

Evelyn: 00:34:23

Yeah. I mean 2E for sure. Oh yeah. I think 2E remedied a lot of the analysis paralysis that 1E faced. And I could go into a whole thing about that, but.

Terry: 00:34:40

Although we can agree that there's a lot of analysis paralysis, but the fact.

Evelyn: 00:34:45

That it improved it significantly by simplifying like the. The three action economy actually significantly simplified combat, I think because it's not well. And it, it also made it.

And, and I know it can get very monotonous at times, but it also made it less. I move, I hit, I move, I hit, I move, I hit. Like. Because that's, that's what 1E was. Right?

Terry: 00:35:09

Yes. Yes, it is.

Evelyn: 00:35:11

So 2E has improved a lot on the. Its predecessor.

Terry: 00:35:18

Right?

Evelyn: 00:35:18

For sure.

Terry: 00:35:19

Oh yeah.

Evelyn: 00:35:20

But the, the big thing with it that can get very, very challenging is just how long combat can take.

Terry: 00:35:37

Right.

Evelyn: 00:35:37

Even with you even if you have amazing players who like, are super prepared for combat, which like Mo. In most cases with my players that's been the case. They come in prepared, they're ready to go, they know what they want to do.

Terry: 00:35:54

They investment.

Evelyn: 00:35:57

Exactly.

Terry: 00:35:57

That's a callback. We just did a callback.

Evelyn: 00:36:00

But you know, a. They're not going to have that every single time. They're not going to be on top of it every single time because conditions change. Right.

But regardless of that, D20 systems like Dungeons and Dragons, like Pathfinder 2e, like anything that is Kind of within that same family have this issue where you could literally spend three hours out of a four hour session just in combat.

Terry: 00:36:31

Yeah.

Evelyn: 00:36:32

And it, you know, because conditions might change and, or you know, someone goes down or suddenly there's in. And that can definitely bog down a session.

And when you have that happen, you know, over a campaign, and especially if you're running multiple campaigns, that can start to feel like a slog and it can start to kind of, it kind of drains you. Especially because you'd rather get to the juicy bits. I mean the combat is fun. Right. Because.

And it gives your, you know, players a chance to feel like the heroes they are.

Terry: 00:37:16

Correct.

Evelyn: 00:37:17

But you know, there. That's only a small part of the story.

Terry: 00:37:23

Yes.

Evelyn: 00:37:23

And you forget most of the time in reality that was, you know, at most maybe five minutes of their lifetime. In this entire like something that takes three hours is actually just five minutes.

Terry: 00:37:40

Yeah.

Evelyn: 00:37:41

Of their story. And then. Yeah, I just, I don't know. I could go on about that.

Terry: 00:37:48

No, you're. And that's it. But, and that. And, and so for again that comes back to me.

That is what, what has killed me on the system right now and why I'm stepping away from it.

Evelyn: 00:37:59

Right.

Terry: 00:38:00

So, so yeah, so that's an E. Luckily that's an easy solution. Right.

Evelyn: 00:38:05

Right. I'm not to that point yet.

Terry: 00:38:07

No, I know you're not.

Evelyn: 00:38:08

But I'm also looking at other, you know, systems too.

Just because I'm interested in seeing what else is, you know, out there to perhaps, you know, utilize or even just branch out a bit and run some other things while I run my PF2E games.

Terry: 00:38:27

You know, although of course we, we have to be careful because we were just looking at Invisible sun out of Monte Cook games.

Evelyn: 00:38:35

So cool.

Terry: 00:38:35

It looks so awesome.

Evelyn: 00:38:38

I just, I love a good like. Okay, this is totally a sidetrack.

But like I, I just love something where it's like such a cool like setting and the lore is like really fleshed out and it, that sort of stuff just gets me really excited because it's something I just want to dive into because there's, it's like a brand new.

Terry: 00:38:58

I know I'm with. I am totally with you. All right. We're moving on to perfectionism and self pressure.

Oh, and this, I mean this could kind of feed off of what we talked about earlier with the over preparation stress.

Evelyn: 00:39:12

Yeah.

Terry: 00:39:13

But this goes I think a little deeper. We put too much pressure on ourselves. Oh absolutely we do.

Because there have been many a times and Evelyn has heard me say, like, I can't tell if they like it, but they said they liked it at the end.

Evelyn: 00:39:30

Yeah.

Terry: 00:39:31

Like, I've run full sessions where at the end I go, God, they just hate that. And then they are raving about the session. And that's because we, for ourselves, expect to present the perfect game. But it's impossible.

It's not going to happen. Yeah, it is not going to happen. And again, this brings in that anxiety and fear of running sessions. Like, it's one of those weird things.

And I've come to find, and I'm in a game right now where there's one player who doesn't necessarily talk much of the session, but by the end of the session he's talking about how he had a ton of fun. And I'm so confused. I'm like, wait, what? But one of that. One of those things that we have to realize, right. As GMs, we tend to be a bit more.

So we tend to show ourselves to the group. So we are always hoping to see others show that excitement. But not everybody shows that excitement in the same way.

Evelyn: 00:40:40

Oh, yeah, absolutely. And some people are a little more passive.

Terry: 00:40:45

Correct.

Evelyn: 00:40:45

But they, I mean, they still get in there when, you know, it feels appropriate for them. And, like, that's one of those things where just you have to give your players the opportunity to shine and, like, pull them out a little bit.

Because sometimes those are the people that you gotta kind of coax out of their shell a little bit. You know, you never want to put too much pressure on them to perform by any means.

But, you know, getting them coaxed out a little bit is not a bad thing. But yeah, perfectionism is.

Terry: 00:41:15

And we have to. We have to understand that. We have to. Sometimes good enough games are good enough. Right. And we've got to celebrate those small victories.

And in the grand scheme of things, our players do appreciate the consistency of games that are happening week in and week out. I mean, I know. I enjoy that.

Evelyn: 00:41:41

Well, and you're never really going to have the perfect game.

Terry: 00:41:44

No.

Evelyn: 00:41:44

Because something's gonna. Something's gonna throw a wrench in it no matter what. You know, the dice are not gonna roll how you want it to.

And especially, especially when you're hoping your. Your players roll really well. For example, yeah. You have set up the, like, most significant combat for players. Specific backstory.

Terry: 00:42:12

Yep.

Evelyn: 00:42:13

You have put them up against someone who is like the, the person who has caused all the. The woe in their characters. Like, like development.

And you're like, okay, I just need, you know, you're fighting them, and I want that person to get the final blow. And then the dice just wasn't. Won't let them hit the thing at all the entire combat.

And you're like, please, please, narratively, please just let them hit this person at least once because it's just not fair. Because you want it to be awesome for that person because you built it for that character, you know?

Terry: 00:42:54

Yeah. Yeah.

Evelyn: 00:42:56

And then the dice are like, nah, I think. I think not.

Terry: 00:43:00

Just kidding. It's. It's not your time.

Evelyn: 00:43:03

Yes, but I mean, the. The whole idea of, like, just no game is going to be perfect. Right.

Terry: 00:43:12

And that's. That's the short and the long. So understand that you don't need to put that pressure on yourself.

Look, I'm going to tell you, this is Terry from Roll for Perception, and he's looking at you right in the eye, Jonathan. And you. Your games are. They're good enough. And Jonathan could be any name. That's just my. The name I'm currently using for everything.

Evelyn: 00:43:38

Yeah, it's true. Yes.

Terry: 00:43:39

Yeah, it's. I mean, every NPC. Every NPC's name right now is Jonathan. So it happens. All right.

The next one, we all hit, and we hit it in lots of different ways, and that's creative blocks. This hits me a lot. And the ideas stop flowing.

And I will tell you, one of my good ways right now is either reading another TTRPG book or there are certain shows that tend to help me. And just so you know, we're going to be watching the Wheel of Time. Okay. It's in the third season.

I've already watched the first two, but since it's summertime, I won't be able to watch it during lunches.

Evelyn: 00:44:21

That's right.

Terry: 00:44:21

But the Wheel of Time TV show, Brandon Sanderson.

Evelyn: 00:44:25

Right. That's the author.

Terry: 00:44:27

I have no idea who the author is.

Evelyn: 00:44:29

They're like this thick.

Terry: 00:44:31

So the. The show's been really good, and it has actually inspired some of the things that. I think it would be really cool that magic was like in TTRPGs.

Evelyn: 00:44:42

Gotcha.

Terry: 00:44:42

And so I've actually. That is a story, or at least the television show. I need to read the books.

I know somebody's gonna send me a message and say, you really should read the books. But that is a show that has kind of inspired me and where I want my moving into when we play our game. But you've got to find those creative outlets.

The other thing I've started doing is writing.

Evelyn: 00:45:08

Yeah.

Terry: 00:45:09

And Again, don't, don't, don't, don't destroy me yet. But I've been using CHAT GPT to give me prompts to write about. And all I need is some prompts, gives it to me, and then I start writing.

And that has begun to help me as well. I'm actively seeking out things. And that's what you have to do as a gm. You have to actively seek things out.

Evelyn: 00:45:34

Yeah.

Terry: 00:45:35

Because if you don't, nobody else is going to do it for you.

Evelyn: 00:45:37

Oh, absolutely.

And so just, I mean, I was talking to Terry about this earlier, but I was talking about how I've been experiencing quite a bit of like, creative burnout just in general. And now the homebrew game that I'm running has helped a little bit with that, but it's, it's still something that I'm trying to work my way around.

And I've actually started reading again, which has been a big thing because, like, I haven't had the, like, really the time and the mental capacity to just sit down, like, for the time that it takes to read a book. But I'm actually, I've read four books so far this year, which is like a lot for me. It's been a while since I've been able to do that.

So it's helping kind of get through that wall a little bit. So, you know, you have to do what it takes. You know, sometimes it, it can take a bit to, to work, but it's so true.

But like, once you, once you get there, it, you know, some you have to, you have to be kind to yourself. And that's one of the hardest things for people to do a lot of times. Remember, like, you're not bad because you have burnout. You just have burnout.

And then you have to.

To work through that and be kind to yourself along the way and do the things to take care of yourself to make sure that, like, you don't make it worse. Because you don't want to make it worse, obviously. So, you know, find those things that, that can, can help you kind of work through that.

Terry: 00:47:15

It's exactly it. Yeah. And I work in a creative field. I'm. Like I said, I'm a theater professor. I am a lighting and projection designer. I design, you know, LED walls.

So my life is creativity. But even in that, I hit roadblocks and I have to find ways to get by them. And, you know, something as simple as designing a dungeon.

And I like creating maps. I'll sometimes be in the middle of creating map and be like, I've hit a wall.

I'm going to step away and find something else that's going to energize me. Podcast is a good one for me. Right now I'm listening to two different podcasts, A Delta Green podcast and a Numenera podcast, of course.

But books, television shows, things like that can all kind of help you break out of that rut.

Evelyn: 00:48:12

Oh, absolutely.

Terry: 00:48:14

So. And I have an additional advantage being where I live right now in the uppers of Michigan is I have a lot of nature around me.

And so just having that, that helps me.

Evelyn: 00:48:24

Just the entire forest strolling through our.

Terry: 00:48:26

Backyard, the turkeys, the deer, coyote. From now. From time to time. So. All right, we're going to talk about our final one, which is scheduling pressure.

Evelyn: 00:48:39

Yes. And Ultimate NAT1.

Terry: 00:48:41

Yeah. Well. And it always comes down to the GM to organize sessions.

Evelyn: 00:48:45

Oh, yeah.

Terry: 00:48:46

And why. Why does the GM have to do. That's a great question.

Evelyn: 00:48:51

Well, I mean, if you're, you know, if you're running it out of your space and you're providing, you know, you have to be available.

Terry: 00:48:58

Okay. I'll give you that.

Evelyn: 00:49:00

People can't just show up with pizza and be like, dig dee dick. Hey, roll some dice.

Terry: 00:49:05

I mean, if they show up at my house of pizza, I'm gonna be like, oh, yeah, let's go. So, but you're. You're right in that. But, yeah, it oftentimes comes down, and because we're adults, we have lots of things going on.

I'm gonna use an example with us right now.

Evelyn: 00:49:19

Oh, my gosh. Yeah.

Terry: 00:49:21

So one of my colleagues, a good friend of mine and his wife, we hang out fairly regularly, and we want to start up a TTRPG game. And we have in our last three, two.

Evelyn: 00:49:38

It was twice that we've tried to do.

Terry: 00:49:40

I think it was three. I think it was three times.

Evelyn: 00:49:42

Well, one of the times we went over there, we didn't take the books with us.

Terry: 00:49:45

No. But we talked.

Evelyn: 00:49:47

We definitely talked about it.

Terry: 00:49:48

So we're going to say three times we've tried starting up a game, but trying to get it scheduled has been the biggest difficulty because we're both very busy families in one way or another.

Evelyn: 00:50:01

And especially because we were all working on the same show at the same time there for a minute. Yeah.

Terry: 00:50:06

That did not make it any easier.

Evelyn: 00:50:08

No, there was, like, no time for anything during that.

Terry: 00:50:11

And so trying to kind of herd the schedules together and figure out who can play, when they can play. I mean, I've run into that in all, all sorts of games.

Evelyn: 00:50:20

Oh yeah. And well, and then like you have emergencies that come up or suddenly you get scheduled for work when you don't expect to and so you can't be.

Terry: 00:50:29

You know, so, so what that I'm saying is everyone should quit their jobs and just play. Just become children again and play. Teach. No, that's not what I'm saying.

Evelyn: 00:50:38

No responsibilities.

Terry: 00:50:40

But if, if you're a player, think about ways you might be able to help your GM do that. Scheduling. Maybe you can take the onus and figure out when everybody can meet after you've talked to the gm. You know, players can assist in that.

There's also. There's a couple of games like the Invis. Was it the Invisible sun one where like if the GM's not available.

Evelyn: 00:51:04

Invisible sun was. Or we were looking at that a bit.

But like it actually is designed so that like if a GM isn't available or if you want to do side play at all, it's designed so that you basically like keep track of what happened.

Terry: 00:51:23

Yeah.

Evelyn: 00:51:23

Give that to the gm. GM tells you kind of like how that functions essentially and you get your XP for it.

Terry: 00:51:30

So the game, the game can continue. Which I think is really cool. I'm a big fan. Big fan.

Evelyn: 00:51:36

That's. That's a really cool idea. And any of those like games that kind of allow for you to do some, you know, side.

Terry: 00:51:46

Yep.

Evelyn: 00:51:47

Stuff.

Even outside role play as a way to, you know, even text wise, that's always fun and it can be good for continuing the story when you can't get together. Yeah.

Terry: 00:52:01

I've got a game coming up where I'm going to be actively giving XP to my players if they write journals outside of the sessions. So I'm kind of, I'm kind of excited to see how that will end up.

Especially since part of what we'll be doing is we'll hopefully be running two to three sessions and then taking a break of two to three weeks.

Evelyn: 00:52:22

Right.

Terry: 00:52:23

I'll be really excited to see how the journal writing goes on in between there. I think that's going to be a really cool kind of effect. Oh yeah, that's just me though.

Evelyn: 00:52:34

I'm excited.

Terry: 00:52:35

I know.

Evelyn: 00:52:37

New creative exercise.

Terry: 00:52:39

So bringing everything kind of full circle. One of the big things to recognize if, if you're a GM is you got to recognize the burnout and try and recognize it early.

Evelyn: 00:52:48

Yeah.

Terry: 00:52:48

Like if you start to feel it, figure out what is causing it and find a way to battle it in some way. Because if you can, if you can feel, if you can see the early warning signs and you can figure out a solution early, it won't interrupt your play.

Evelyn: 00:53:07

Right.

Terry: 00:53:07

But if you let it build and build, what's going to happen is you're going to get to a point where there's nothing you can do and you're going to have to break off and take a break or have somebody else GM or something. And you don't want, like, obviously that's difficult. You end up having to do that. You got to figure out ways to.

I've written in here, practice self care. Right. As a gm, be kind to yourself. Yeah, exactly. Communicate with your players. Step back when you're, when needed.

Don't be afraid to say, look, I need a couple weeks off. Can somebody run a one shot, two shot mini campaign, right. So that I can take a break? Because I'm not feeling it right now.

Evelyn: 00:53:56

Well, I notice when the things start, like, getting to you, when it's when I keep track of those like little frustrations because if you kind of note like what's causing that, that can help you figure out the source of the early stages of burnout. And you can kind of make course corrections as needed too, even if that means, you know, stepping away for a week or whatever, taking a break.

And that also can mean reconfiguring some things in the way you do stuff because it, you know, that can help as well. It's like, this is not working. Oh, well, if I just did this, that would fix, you know, that sort of realization.

Terry: 00:54:43

So, so yeah, you know, if you're a gm, help yourself, Help yourself, do what you need to do to make sure that you continue to enjoy being a gm.

Evelyn: 00:54:52

Yeah.

Terry: 00:54:53

Because there are a dearth of it, of us as it is, and we don't want, we don't need to lose more. So this is what I'm going to want you to do. I'm going to want you to homework. Homework.

I want you to share your stories of DM burnouts or how you overcame a GM burnout. And you can do this a couple different ways. On our website, www.rollforperception.com. in the bottom right hand corner is a little microphone.

You can click that microphone and you can leave us a voice message or you can email us at contactollforperception.com and we can read it out and share it with everybody on our next week. Next week's. But we want to hear from you as a listener and even if you're listening to this way past when we release this.

Feel free to send us stuff because we always like to call back to these things.

Evelyn: 00:55:51

Absolutely.

Terry: 00:55:51

What do you do to get past your burnouts? Maybe you've thought of something that we didn't think of.

Additionally, in this spot each week we're going to talk about Kickstarters that are ending in the week. We don't have any this week, and when I say Kickstarter, there's lots of Kickstarters ending. But Kickstarters that we've looked at, we've gone.

Either we click the button to back.

Evelyn: 00:56:12

Or at least save for later so we can come back to it. Yeah, because we do that a lot.

Terry: 00:56:16

So we don't have any this week to talk about. But just know that there will be more in the future.

Evelyn: 00:56:23

Yes.

Terry: 00:56:24

Again, I want to. I want to thank everybody for everything. This has been fantastic and I'm looking forward to our next podcast.

As always, I want to thank you for joining us for this week's podcast. We hope we inspired you to continue your TTRPG journey. However that may look make sure to.

Evelyn: 00:56:45

Stop by at www.rollforperception.com and leave a comment on our podcast page. We're always looking to answer questions and discuss new TTRPGs, so make sure to.

Terry: 00:56:55

Have your D20 ready and

Evelyn: 00:56:57

your Goblin voice rested as

Terry: 00:56:59

you head out into the world of TTRPGs with Role for Percepticast