There is only so much of the game that can happen on the player level. Characters can be created, but what can be done with them? What determines their fate, or their immediate goal, for that matter? Vehicles can be created, but who operates them? What is their purpose? Mighty starships can be put together taking hours upon hours of painstaking work, but without some motivational force for creating it, it is nothing more than words and numbers on a piece of paper. Something else is required for the game to function. That something is the formalized rules of play, the mechanisms that give the players the object of the game. There are several players in a group, and each one has to agree to follow the rules. However, no player can be trusted to follow the rules all the time, particularly when doing so would be disastrous for their character. So something has been done about it. That something is formally known as
gamemastering.
This chapter begins the section of the rules on gamemastering, meant for those few players who have the time, energy and skill needed to put together and conduct a group of players through the course of an adventure or full-fledged campaign. This Chapter is meant mainly as a primer for new or relatively inexperienced GMs, and will include rules on how to conduct a gaming session and what the functions of the gamemaster are, including a practical example of how to play the game. For more experienced GMs, this Chapter includes instructions on how to create materials needed to conduct specific adventures (including rules on how to build an adventure from scratch). This chapter will not discuss specific components or types of adventures; those topics will be covered in the next chapter.
NEXT: 10.1 Specific Functions of a GamemasterPREVIOUS: 9.5 Mixed-Scale CombatTOP