Lessons From a First-Time GM: Burning Wheel, Session One


by Steven "THE KRAKEN" Richards

Lessons From a First-Time GM: Burning Wheel, Session One

Introduction
In this every-once-in-a-while series, I'll relate painful lessons and general tidbits from my first-ever attempt at running an RPG campaign. My group is playing The Burning Wheel for the first time, and they have a newbie GM to contend with. Here be monsters.

Session One: That Wasn't Supposed to Happen
Even a player who has never run a game can appreciate the challenges a GM faces: creating a campaign (and possibly a setting), organizing players, desperately trying to keep the group focused as the plotline spirals out of control like a narcoleptic seagull...

...it is not easy. Fortunately for those with an interest in game-masterin', it doesn't look easy either.

So it was with appropriate humility and trepidation that I decided to run a campaign using The Burning Wheel. By any objective measure, TBW is a complex system. For players accustomed to Dungeons & Dragons, Paranoia, and Call of Cthulhu, it is nothing short of mind-boggling. So to choose this as my first system was perhaps overambitious. Conversely, however, it allowed for a unique opportunity, in that none of the players knew the rules either.

Lesson 1: As GM, you only need to know a little more than your players do about the rules.
When I play an RPG, I am typically that one guy who is constantly checking rules, correcting the GM, and generally being a nuisance. Accordingly, developing this modicum of knowledge was not a great challenge. I encouraged the players to peruse the rules…but only to the extent I had myself partaken. For the most part, this worked well, and allowed us to complete our preliminary warm-up session with a minimum of a) hand-holding, and b) rules lawyering.


I am a methodical person, and so I spent about a week before our first session planning and plotting and scheming. I drew a map of the game world I had created (a non-traditional choice for a system like Burning Wheel, in that it was not a fantasy setting). I outlined the plot and broke it into three idealized sessions. I began a glossary of terms.

In truth, this preparatory work did little to smooth the rocky introduction to Burning Wheel. It is, ultimately, a system that can only be learned by playing.

Lesson 2: Your plan will not survive the first five seconds of battle.
At the last minute, due to an unexpected combination of player substitutions and my own lack of familiarity with the system, we decided to run a non-canon session to get a feel for the game mechanics. Instantly, my carefully-crafted storyline and characted development scenarios were tossed out the window. This is not an unusual occurrence with our gaming group. I knew before I began that I would need to be able to improvise, and thus ensued a cobbled-together session fraught with peril and entirely lacking in continuity.


I would like to say for the record that The Burning Wheel has one of the most confusing and unintuitive combat systems I have ever seen. Nonetheless, as my first act as GM, I threw the players into a battle with multiple opponents and no preparation. They handled it well, but lack of familiarity with the rules meant that what should have been a five-minute conflict ate up the better part of an hour and a half. Near the end, not content with the way things were turning out, I resorted to dice-fudging to produce a suitably epic conclusion.

It was obvious to me, in retrospect, that a much better way to begin would have been with some basic roleplaying. TBW, after all, is a heavily character and story-based system, with as many (if not more) rules for handling social interactions, travel, and conversation as for combat.

After a brief break, we resumed play and I let the group do what it does best: whatever it wants.

Lesson 3: Your players will have fun, if you let them.
Free from anything but the most basic guidance ("where are we going?"), the players quickly slipped into their defined roles and began to interact accordingly. Fights, drinking, fires, murder, and demon-summoning ensued. Everyone was clearly having much more fun than during the initial combat, and I was left with the much simpler task of clarifying rules, setting obstacles, and acting for NPCs.


The second part of the session went much more smoothly. Everyone had fun, events proceeded in a timely manner, and rule lookups were at a bare minimum. I call that a success.

Closing Thoughts
At the end of the session, the players had managed to:

  1. Get drunk

  2. Summon a demon to murder a local noble family

  3. Commit patricide

  4. Negotiate with a guard

  5. Commit matricide

  6. Bribe a S.W.A.T. team

  7. Commit butlercide

  8. Give an old man a heart attack


Needless to say, I was quite pleased. Not only was the session a valuable learning experience for everyone involved, but it also allowed the players to refine their character concepts and have a bit of fun.

Hopefully, future sessions will go more smoothly. A little bit of experience, however, has taught me that 'fun' is better than 'smooth.' Also, that players ruin everything.

Continue in Session 2
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Steven Richards is a computer programmer, writer, gamer, TTS co-founder, and all-around good guy. In his spare time he codes, writes books, plays video games, and co-founds cool websites like this one. Steven has a home, shoes, and the ability to speak, which also makes him a person by the standard TTS definition of personhood.