Open the gate to agency!
You know in some way you’re a lot like me
You’re just a prisoner and you’re tryin’ to break free
— John Parr, “St. Elmo’s Fire (Man in Motion)”
One of the most powerful, if not the most powerful, elements of roleplaying games is “agency.” When RPGs claim that “you are limited only by your imagination” or similar, “agency” is what they mean. The idea that a group of people can get together and decide how a fictional group of characters is going to react to situations without artificial limitations is a very strong draw.
When we speak about agency in RPGs, however, we tend to focus on the players. Do the players have agency when it comes to creating their own characters? Are they free to make their own choices? Are safety tools in place? Are they stuck on the dreaded “railroad?” I think most Game Masters would agree that giving players as much agency as possible is a good thing.
But what about agency for GMs?
I know, I can already hear some of you snickering. Why does a GM need agency? Don’t they have total control over their gaming table? Aren’t catchy terms like “Rule 0” and “rulings not rules” just fancy ways of saying that the GM has final say over both rules and play? Why the heck do they need to worry about their own agency?
I used to think that way as well. But after a year of running a sandbox-style old school campaign, I found myself musing that I’ve had a lot more agency lately. Hopefully today’s article will inspire you too!
Sandbox Sensibility
Normally, starting a new campaign is a pretty massive undertaking up front. I need to design an adventure path and a setting to go with it. While some campaign prep is easier than others, each still tends to involve a lot of reading and writing to wrap my mind around it and get something in the players’ hands to help them create characters.
For my old school campaign, world prep was a lot easier. As I mentioned in my previous article, all I really needed to prep was a map, a home base, and a dungeon or three to sprinkle around the base. And that was pretty much it!
It is truly amazing how much this has freed up my prep time. Occasionally I need to add another dungeon or conflict for the players but, for the most part, the campaign is self-sustaining. I don’t feel the need to keep rereading notes or worrying about whether I’ve fleshed out enough to get through the next session.
It’s worth noting here that what makes my prep even easier is the sheer wealth of material that’s already out there. In addition to the many official TSR modules put out (all of which are largely compatible no matter which TSR edition or retroclone you are using), there is a wealth of material available on DriveThruRPG and other sources.
Players Handle Characters
While I always try to give my players as much choice as possible when it comes to creating their own characters, I usually spend a good chunk of time writing up a primer that explains the game world and the cultures that I expect the PCs to come from (not to mention the invariable retconning when a player really, really, really wants to play a Drow in my Drow-less setting).
In addition, I often find myself sticking my hand into PC generation to ensure that the group is a good fit for the missions, or “adventure path” in modern D&D parlance, that they are expected to face. And then, once it’s perfect, it only lasts until the first character dies or a player gets bored and wants a change, which then involves a lot of finagling to integrate the new character into an ongoing plot.
Running an old school campaign frees me up from most of that. The group begins each session anew in a tavern or other safe location, and it doesn’t matter whether they are continuing their old characters or bringing in new ones. Even the class mix isn’t an issue. The group knows what they have, hires a few retainers to shore up weak areas, and decides for themselves where they want to explore.
That’s not to say that I don’t set limits. I do have a list of classes (yes, I use species-as-class) that they can select from, but it’s a pretty large list. And if someone really, really, really wants to play something else, then it’s a quick discussion – I don’t have to worry about how they fit, only that they might encounter some resistance (“You really want to play a dragonborn in this Tolkien-esque setting? Fine, the keep guardians have heard rumors of dragonborn but have never actually seen one, so be prepared for suspicious stares and awkward conversation”).
There are No Rails
Another key point of GM agency is that, in my old school campaign, I don’t have to worry about keeping the players on track to complete the mission. In fact, there are no “missions” per se, just a list of rumors (compiled from the dungeons I pick) that the group gets to point them in various directions. It is entirely up to the players where they go and how long they stay there. If they dip into the Crypt of Terrors and find that too deadly, deciding to leave and spend some more time exploring Monster Island, that’s totally cool.
Even better, I let my players know at the start of the campaign that a lot of stuff would be made up as we go along, becoming a part of the campaign only after being introduced. Thus, my players understand that if they decide to explore a region that I haven’t prepared, that they can wait a few minutes while I randomly generate encounters or lairs (as I write this, the group spent the better part of our last session hunting a monster that was randomly generated because the Dwarf recalled lore about the value of its eggs, which led to a lair stake-out and ambush that I came up with on the fly).
Letting Fate Happen
One of the most difficult things that can happen to a GM during an adventure path is for a PC to die at a critical moment, prodding you to use GM fiat to save them lest the entire mission falls apart. And it is very difficult to maintain the veneer of deadliness, telling players that “smart play matters” when you constantly pull them out of the fires they blunder into or create.
While running an old school campaign doesn’t necessarily eliminate the “GM’s saving hand” when a GM doesn’t want a treasured PC to die, it does free GMs from the repercussions of losing a PC in the group. A PC’s death in an old school campaign won’t disrupt the flow of a mission or force you to rewrite your plot elements because you expected that PC to handle them.
Room for Whimsy
While much of the above can be attributed to GM privilege as much as agency, this section is where the agency really kicks in. When you have built a sandbox in which the group can freely explore without worrying about overarching metaplots and such, it frees you to toss anything, and I do mean “anything,” into that sandbox that you wish.
Feel like tossing a crashed spaceship into the mountains just beyond the home base? Why not? Feel like introducing traveling NPCs that look like they stepped out of a Saturday Morning cartoon? Sure! Feel like tossing in a new Big Bad and stronghold that had never been mentioned before but are now just across the Great Lake? Go for it!
The beauty of this agency is that you don’t have to have fully formed ideas or spend a lot of time trying to fit your idea into the campaign. It’s okay to have Dr. Strange or the Flash accidentally breach dimensions for a session, exhausted and leaving the PCs to deal with someone from their rogues’ gallery. It’s fine to have a saucer descend and unleash a squad of daleks to storm the castle where your group is resting.
Wrapping Up
In short, I’ve found that running an old school campaign has freed me from a lot of my usual worries and let me kick back and have some fun! Hopefully those of you indulging in classic play are enjoying the same agency!
