039: Should You Pay for a Pro GM? - With David Northeast - Claim to Game

Episode Transcript
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>> Clint Scheirer (00:00):
Does a real tabletop gamer, someone
who truly loves this hobby, pay to play?
Many wonder if hiring a professional game master for your next one
shot or campaign is just selling out or simply
wasting money. And ill ll be honest with you all. This was something
I was adamantly against when I first started
playing tabletop role playing games. I would have never paid

(00:21):
a professional GM to do something that I felt I could do
pretty darn good on my own. But in this
episode we are welcoming back David North, East, a
professional GM himself to explore these questions
and shed light on the growing trend of
paid game mastering. And if after the episode you're
still unsure whether to hire a professional GM
or to do it yourself, go ahead and click on the link

(00:43):
in the show notes.
We have a free quiz called Should I
pay for a pro gm? Just answer a few easy
questions and you'll have clear direction on which way you
should go. Welcome to Claim to Game. We help
tabletop gamers have a great time with friends to
experience amazing stories. It can be overwhelming to start
and run great games. Let'make it easy

(01:04):
for you to play any game that you want to have fun with
your friends. I'm Clint Scheirer. I've helped thousands
of students in my career find their way to better
themselves and better their game. With more than 10
years experience in leadership, coaching, live
performance and public speaking, I I know I can help
you create immersive, low stress games
youll never forget.

(01:25):
Its time to make your claim to game.

(01:55):
What's something you've been dying to tell
people? You know, what is something you've been dying to tell people that you think is
so important and for those listeners who want to
enjoy fantastic authentic
worlds with deep characters and they may not feel
confident being vgm or dm that they're playing D20 &
D, you know, what would you say to them about
the value of hiring a professional game master?

(02:18):
How does a professional world building u
connoisseur I would say like you were you
savor what you're creating here. How does somebody hiring
someone like you contribute to just a
fantastic experience?

>> David North (02:31):
I will preface again by saying that
if you are not ready to gm, that's
absolutely fine. If you have a group of friends
and you want to go GM'do it.
Try it. Play hot seatgm. You know,
have a seat swapper and people taking over
that seat all the time.
I advocate for free games

(02:53):
as much as I do for paid games. And that sounds weird
because I'm a professional gm. What do I mean by, that, well,
if you are an individual in
a group of friends and you want to play D20 &
D, go and play D20 & D with your friends
and try your hand at gme. Just do
it. Don't think too much about it. Don't worry

(03:14):
about, you know, oh, I can't do the silly voices or
what. What if I don't have enough prep time? If you don't have
enough prep time, grab the book and throw it over your shoulder and go. We're
gonna improvise this entire thing. What do
you think about that, boys? you know,
but obviously, I get there's a level of apprehension
there. If you are a group of players,

(03:34):
and this is one that really grinds my Go. If you are a
group of five or six players,
and you come online and you
go, we want this very
specific campaign run for us in
this very specific way.
Will you DM for us for free?

(03:55):
Well, the answer that you will find
from most DMs is no.
Even the people willing to run games for free online
is going to be no. And I'll tell you why.
There are already six of you. You already
have a really good idea as to what you
want to run. And the question is, why? aren't one of

(04:15):
you giving it a go? Now, not
everyone is adept at being a gm.
Not everyone suits being a gm, just like not
everyone suits being a player.
You know, I know GMs that refuse to
play because they just cannot get in that player
mindset. If you
want to go and hire a professional gm,

(04:37):
ask them questions.
You are hiring them for a service. Don't
just jump into the first game you see and you think,
I like the sound of that. Really go into
depth. Ask for their
experience. Ask for proof of
their experience. Ask for video recordings,

(04:58):
ask for audio recordings.
Ask for, you know,
anything that they can give you to prove to you they are
worth their buck. Because I know there are
also people out there that are
professional GMs that are
advertising their services for hire, but they are just

(05:18):
reading from a book. And
this is the problem that I'm facing as
a professional gm who actually cares about what I'm
doing, who cares about the effort that I put
in. And, you know, I'm in the
process of writing my own materials.
You really, really do need to vet

(05:38):
GMs as much as DMs need to
vet you. You can offer to run a game
for free online. It's really not
that expensive. There are services and products out there
that will allow you to do it. And, the worst case scenario is
you do it. Theatre of the mind and make
it up as you go. There are free dice rolling

(05:59):
apps and all that kind of stuff on discord.
Just do it is my advice.
You know, if you want to hire a gm,
fantastic, but vet them first.
Make sure you know you're getting
the bang for your buck.

Something that I have never had the
opportunity to do is to play with a professional
gm. And just talking to you
right now in this episode and also
the previous one, it is very
clear why have you
would call it a craft like this is not just

(06:35):
somebody telling, a funny story or doing
funny voices. It's somebody who is really giving thought
to breathing life into the world. and if you haven't
gone back, go ahead and listen to when David and I talked
about world building back in the previous
episode. it, it's, it's crucial,
it's crucial to have somebody who knows what they're doing.

(06:55):
I think I said before we started I would not try to
do my own plumbing in my house and
expect it to one function correctly
and not have a leak. I would ask a professional
to come in and do it. So if that's the kind of experience you
want, you need to pay professional experience if you want the
potentially leakally leaky problem

(07:16):
that you might get. or you're just okay with, you know,
not that top grade tier. Totally,
fine.

I think I prefer the analogy
of the restaurant and the home chef.

O give it to me.

So if,
if you want to run your own game, it
is like you inviting your friends over for a
dinner party. You don't have any
professional experience in the kitchen, but you know how
to follow a recipe. You can get the
ingredients in, you can chop them up, you can throw them in a
frying pan. You know, you can throw it all

(07:52):
together and bring out a
reasonable dish. I've done some fantastic home cooks in
my time. One of them is laying upstairs, but don't tell her I said
that. but I have, I've known some
fantastic home cooks in my time
and, you know, a dinner party and those sorts of
things is nice,

(08:12):
but you still have to put in that effort to go and
cook the meal, prep the meal, make sure you've got all the
ingredients, make sure that you've got everything that you
need to present the meal for a dinner party
versus the restaurant where you phone up,
you book a table for six, you all go
along. None of you are worrying

(08:33):
about the dishes. None of you are worrying about the cooking.
You're just ordering a nice meal and a
drink. But that nice meal and a
drink is coming at an extra cost because there is
extra hands at, play in order to get
all those extra jobs done that need to be
done. And I think that is the key
difference between a, you know, a group of

(08:56):
friends playing D20 & D and hiring a
professional GM to run a D20 & D Game for
you.

Yeah, I mean, you really answered the question.
This was one of the first questions I was gonna ask to try to
dig into this stigma, right? There's a stigma
that sometimes is around paying somebody to
be your professional gm. And the question was,
why would I pay somebody to do it when I could do it myself for free or
have a friend who is willing to do it? And you're

(09:23):
saying it is the difference between a home cooked meal,
which can be good and enjoyable,
and a professionally made meal, which is just
a wonderful experience that you may not do every
single time.

Yeah, exactly.

Now I have another question. A gamer. This is
a, this comes up quite, quite a bit. A gamer should
GM for the love of the game, not for
monetary gain. If they want
money, they're selling out. Well, okay, what
is your, what is your rebuttal?
I'm going to ask you to give a rebuttal to some of these questions. What would
you say to somebody that said you're selling out?

So, okay, I just turn around to them and say to them,
do they pay an Xbox Live subscription? Do they
play, pay a PlayStation Network subscription?
Do they pay, a Netflix
subscription? Do they play, pay a Disney
subscription? Because you can watch the free
channels on the tv. The
free channels are there, you know, why

(10:20):
pay?
but the other point about that
is if I love what I do
and I can't
commit that time freely,
why am I going to do that whilst
holding down, say a quote, unquote, proper

(10:42):
job? Why am I going to do that,
hold have another job and
try and run a really high
quality game just because I love doing
it? I'm a F, so I'm a family man, I've
got children, I've got a partner,
I've got a life outside of D20 &
D and outside of what I do. If I was to

(11:04):
work and to
have games to the same level of
quality that I do now, I'd be running one game a
week because of the hours
that I put into my games now,
I only consider my hourly rate as,
as the actual game that I run

(11:25):
and I work it out to be about 20 pound per
hour of the game that is actually run.
But if I break it down, it actually comes
down to about 6 or 7
GBP per hour, which is well
under minimum wage. But
that's because I enjoy the worldild building aspect and a lot of
the world building stuff can be reused. A lot

(11:47):
of the storytelling tools can be reused and
recycled later on for other campaigns.
on top of that, there is no such
thing as a free D20 & D Game. There is no such
thing as a free TTPG game.
Yes, the rules for the game are
free online. The rules you

(12:09):
can play with just dice and a piece of paper.
That is totally true. You can play for
free. What do I mean by there's no such
thing as a 3D and D game? Well,
somebody has to host likely
people are going to, want snacks. So someone's going to bring
snacks or you're all going to contribute snacks. So you're

(12:29):
all paying something there. If you're playing in
a shop. Normally shops have a fee
for a table, so you will have to pay a
fee for the table. If you want to
use the official materials or unofficial
materials even quite often you have to
purchase those in order to use them.

(12:51):
Then we get into the
extras that I, As a professional GM,
use Sirenscape. That is
about 20 bucks a month.
I have bought over
2,000 pounds worth which works
out to be good luck. About

(13:12):
2, 6, about
$2,600 worth of
modules and extra stuff for
my VTT, which is fantasy
grounds. I
invest in other
projects that I'm working on as well. So I'm working
on releasing a.

(13:34):
I mentioned it in the last episode. I'm working on releasing
my own supplements for D
and d and for 5e. and I'm paying
an artist for that. And you know,
all this it helping fund that.
But the majority of my money goes
back into my business, back into

(13:55):
running games for people. Yes, you can run
D20 & D for free, but the quality is going to
be far less than if you've
got the really cool soundbo board, if you've got really
cool visuals, if you know, if you're playing
online, if you've got good quality equipment such
as microphone and camera,

(14:15):
it's really, really going to
make a difference.

So it's not just for
money. It is because you want the
quality to be the level that you want it to
be. You have to be able to be paid for the time that you're
putting into that. Especially when you have other responsibilities
that you have to. You have in life.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I mean,
don't get me wrong, I've seen some
fantastic GMs run games for free
online, but I have horror stories. But
that's something for another day, I feel.

Well, dude, you know, props to you. Like, this
is, it's really giving me a different view
of this profession and the
respect and it's really awesome. I know that I am
definitely of the free sword. I'm making home cooked meals kind of
games for people and
I feel like I'm missing out. I gotta get that cuisine, that
fine, fine dining experience of GMing.

(15:14):
Or maybe not me GMing, but me being a player in a GM
game. There's, there's one final question
and I'm sure it'll lead to some other questions, but professional
gmg, this is the statement.
Professional GMG is financially
gatekeeping the game from those who cant afford
it. What do you have to say to that? Hey, quick pause
in the episode. Have you ever wanted to chat about tabletop

(15:36):
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or just geek out about tabletop games with someone who
gets it? Now is your chance. I'm opening up
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love to feature you. Are you working on some
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(15:56):
have an amazing time at the table? Let's make it
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passion for great games, claim your spot on
a future interview by clicking on the link in the show notes
to book your interview. Now let's talk about Tabletop
rpgs and make something awesome together. Can't wait to
hear from you.
All right, back to the episode.

So this is where, the conversation
for me gets difficult because can
relate, I can massively relate to
this issue.
however, it's not financially
gatekeeping the game. As I said, the game is
playable for free. You can go and do it for
free. Unfortunately, it just means

(16:39):
there is going to be a lower level of
quality to the game. And I don't mean that in a
condescending or patronizing way. What I mean is you're
not going to have all the bells and whistles to the game. You're not going to have
the soundboards, you're notnna have,
you know, very, very specific audios. You can go, you
know, if you're running a game for free at home, you can go up,

(17:00):
load up YouTube on a laptop and play
music, but you're gonna have adverts every 30 minutes, you
know, and that there's always going to
be bits and bobs and
eventually you'll find that you start wanting to
invest.
in terms of Saying that professional
GMing is gatekeeping,

(17:22):
I feel that it's an unfair,
it's very, very much an unfair review of
what professional GMing actually is or what
it should be. I should say,
because professional
GMing is

(17:43):
trying to take yourself to that next
level, to that extra fine
dining. Again, going back to the restaurants,
it's like saying that because
people can't eat at a 5M Michelin star, ah,
restaurant, it's gatekeeping food.

You know, I'm laughing because it is kind of
a silly argument.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's the same
kind of concept. You know, I
understand that it's becoming increasingly more
difficult to find a good DM
for free online, but that's
because those three DMs are fed up
and bored of having to wade

(18:25):
through piles and piles of
toxic and bad players in
order to find the quality of game they want to
run. And I have to say
that I had the same issue.
I used to be of the mind that why would I pay
for a game? Why, why should I pay for a

(18:45):
game? And after being
nearly driven out this hobby, I think on three
separate occasions due to
two due to online gms
and one due to tut to
online players. And you know,
I was running a game, I was trying to stream it

(19:06):
and you know, try and really build something from
it. And I said, you know, guys, if this makes money, if we,
you know, if we get known, I will
compensate you. So I made that very clear to, them. But
unfortunately I had
a, I had three rotating seats at that,
ah, table for the best part of six
months. And I think most people

(19:29):
can relate to that experience, especially running
games online for free. And again,
running games for free for your friends by all means,
but running games online for
strangers, you have to be more
careful when you're doing that as a gm,
because you will find yourself in
all kinds of

(19:51):
unsavory situations, as I have
on many occasion.

What other objections have you heard? I'm
sure you've heard it all. Like, I'm sure all of it
has come to your table at least one time or another, at least
in social.

Yeah, I mean, I've had some weird ones. I
had one guy turn around and say, I'm not going to pay you because you're
British.

That would be a great reason for me to want to pay you. Your accent
is awesome, man.

don't. Don't I sound like I'm from Eon, but
really from the back quarters.

That's awesome.

Good. What other objections have I
has? I mean, there's a whole host of reasons. Obviously,
one of them is, I'm sorry, I just can't afford it.
Which is a fair enough objection. There's not much
you can do or say. I would say
if you're a professional gm, and you
have a conversation with somebody, and it's a really,

(20:45):
really good conversation, you're really, really confident about this
individual, use them as a seat
filler. Use them as somebody to join your
game, to show that people are interested in your games.
Because the hardest point as a professional
GM is getting first 2P players. The first two
players are always the most difficult. If you can offer one of these

(21:06):
players a seat filler position, a seat filler doesn't even have to
be permanent. And you can explain that to them. you can say
them, come along and play just, just for a little
while, you know, until
I fill up the rest of the table. And if I fill up the rest of
the table, you know, you understand it. You know, we'll put
your character to the side for a moment just to see if I can
get another paid seat field.

(21:28):
you know, and a lot of people are willing to do that
and, you know, be that seat filler.

I think what's cool is, you know, offering somebody
a seat to fill the position. it's providing
social proof of your expertise, and
that's kind of worth its weight and money for
people to be able to. To vouch
for your expertise. So I think that's really.
It's a type of reciprocity, I think is the

(21:54):
word. Right. You're giving something because
it's not just to get something back, but it's knowing that. That
goodwill will come back.

Can go way.

Yeah, kind of a karma.

I mean, I've had players that have left
because they've fallen on hard times. and
they've, you know, I've said to them, you know,
rather than leave, let's just
00 your session costs
just for a few weeks. We'll see how things
change in the next couple of months. If things pick up, let me

(22:25):
know and we'll keep you on. And, you know, giving them that couple
of months breathing space. Sometimes it's just enough to
keep those players on that, have fallen on hard times or
you know, perhaps they've lost their job and they've
been a really consistent, really good player and you
want to keep them on. So why wouldn't you keep them
on? Especially if they're vibing with the rest of the group.

(22:46):
I've known players to turn around if
someone has been open and honest enough and
said, you know, I'm really sorry, I'm going to have to drop. I
just can't afford this campaign anymore in front of the group.
Which has happened a few times. Not to me personally, but I know it's
happened. The rest of the group sometimes
will turn around and go, we want to cover their costs.

O, that's awesome.

I will tell you quick story.
I was just scrolling around
online and looking at the
players, looking for DMs posts and things,
and I came across one and it was
somebody looking for a DM for their group of
six. At the time, it was six players. And

(23:28):
they had explained that
they had not had a good time
with two other DMs. Two previous
DMs had really made it hard for
them. They had, you know, allowed
metagaming at the table, had allowed
conversations that should never have occurred

(23:48):
and these kinds of things. And
I reached out to them again, you know,
hey, can I know exactly what you guys are
looking for? What sort of game are you looking for? What kind of D em are
you looking for? And she, they explained to me about their
problem. You know, I went through my usual garb
of who I am, what I do, and what I bring to the
table. And in the end,

(24:11):
this person felt, because two of the
other players were brand new to the game, absolutely brand
new to D20 & D, this individual decided she'snna pay
for the whole table. I was just like, you know what?
That is such a kind thing to do. That is
such a, you know, I want to give my friends
a really good experience of D20 & D. Let's go with

(24:32):
this. Because she'd watched all my YouTube videos, all my
Twitch videos, my TikTok streams, for like two
weeks. She'd been watching them and doing her
research. And when it came down to
when she said that, I was like, okay, fantastic. And
she'd already expressed interest in another one of my
games, and she said she couldn't do it if
she took up the,

(24:55):
like, full table of people, as it were. And
I turned around to her and said, what you talking about? I said, I'm not going to charge
you for that, for that seat at that table. You know,
you're doing a good deed. So I'm going
to do something for you. I'm going to give you a seat, at
another table completely for free. That's a
weekly campaign rather than a monthly one

(25:15):
alongside what you're paying for.

The word that encapsulates
everything that we've been talking about is integrity,
right? Like, you are a
GM who has
integrity, and you are fostering
integrity at your table. that's beautiful.
And I think that encapsulates this
hobbyes. There are so many wonderful people

(25:40):
in this community who just pour
out their support, their
encouragement. you can do this, like, play the
game, go get the book, play free, you know,
see how it is. Play with the professional gm. You'll love
it. And that is awesome. So
I. Dude, that's u. that's something I hope you continue
to foster because we need more good

(26:02):
people, showing how great this hobby is
and how people can really love it. Worlds were meant
to be explored, meant to be created, meant,
meant to come into, come into their own. And
people like you are helping us do it. So I guess
my, my gratitude is thank you for doing
that. That's just so cool.
For those of you guys who did not listen to last week's

(26:24):
episode, you know, David was talking about world
building and how players are so important. And
first he's, you know, David, you started Talking about
how NPCs are a vital part of the world
building and so are players.
And what you suggested about
letting somebody stay on a
couple more sessions, maybe, you know, not charging

(26:47):
just to see where they're at, you are
technically keeping the world intact
because to lose even that player's
imaginary character would be losing a part of the
world that was created. That world is
beingah. It's a little less colorful than
it was before. If that person's not at the table.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I mean, especially when it's
somebody that you've had at the table for a while.
You know, if it's somebody that's jumped in for a couple of
sessions and then sort of said, you know,
I've fallen, on hard times, you can make
a judgment call. You know, sometimes you get a feeling that
perhaps that isn't really the issue and

(27:26):
there's something they just don't want to talk about, and you sort of
just let them go and you write
their character out and whatever else
you have to do. the other
alternative is, you know, if
you get a really good feeling about somebody, if they've been with you for
a long time then giving them that bit of

(27:46):
leeway sometimes because especially if they've paid
regularly, they haven't missed payments, they're not late or anything like
that, giving them leeway is
sometimes just the right thing to
do because they've more than earn, that
level of reasonable,
accommodation that you should give

(28:07):
them. And also you don't want to lose
those players. The ones that have been with you for
you know, even six months,
you know, even two or three months. If they are
really consistent and really
engaging, you don't want to lose those players.
And even if it'a professional gm, sometimes you have to cut your
losses and go, you know what, let's keep this player.

(28:30):
Because if I lose this player, I'm likely to lose
this player and it's going to chain onto this player. And sometimes
you have to keep it, you know, try and keep the party
together where you possibly can. Obviously
there are times you can't avoid it. People's lives change,
their work schedule changes and all this sort of stuff and you just
have to chug along. but

(28:50):
yeah, you know, from a GM
perspective, you have to look after your
players. You know, I think it
was o. What's his name, the guy
who owns Virgin, the Virgin
companies.

Sir Richard Branson.

Sir Richard Branson said it best when it came to
his workers. Teach them well enough
that they can leave if they want to, treat them well
enough so they don't want to.

You know the term don't split the party, I think
has multiple meetings here. Yeah,
right. For those who play D20 & D, not splitting the party
usually prevents life. Right. The
characters survive to live another day. And what
you're talking about is preventing a group's
life from diminishing.

Yeah, Keeping them, keeping them together as
much as humanly possible is always going to be in
the best interest of any professional gm.

Well, David, just like last time, I'm going toa have you
create that ten word phrase,
to help people get the core of the
message that you live and breathe when it comes to
professional GMing. What do you want them to leave with? What
do you want our listener to leave with?

A home cooked meal is fine
to dine, fine costs.

Oh, that is poetry. And that goes right back to your
analogy that you talked about. The difference between running a
game for free and asking a professional GM to do
it.

Yes, I think that that, that really
highlights that.

Yeah, that was. So don't delete that. You need to
put that on A shirt that should be your. Your
calling card.

u. But, honestly, like that, is the English
literature student coming out in me?
Unintentionally.

But dude, this is. This is so great. Yeah, I hope, I hope
that people give it a try. my cousin
Andy, and nobody knew that he was my cousin when he did the
episode with me. I can't remember the episode number,
but he and his, master
class that he was taking, he was getting his masters.
They paid for a professional gm.

Yip.

And it's what got him into the hobby. Right now, without
that experience, I don't know if he would be as
interested about D20 & D or any of it.
So you guys definitely do good work in the world.
Here's my, final question. It's the quintessential
podcast question. Whenever you finish.
Where can people find you, David? Where can

(31:17):
they get connected? Where do you want them to connect with you?

So there are loads. so get pens and
papers ready. If you want to find me on TikTok, it
is at the Captain 91. if you want
to find me on Twitch, it is
SS Adventurer. Twitch TV
SSAD Advventurer. If
you want to find me on YouTube, it's

(31:40):
YouTube.comssvententurerprod
Productions. they are my three Wayne
ones Blue Sky Socials. I am the
Captain 91 and I think
on X, I, am SS Adventurer. But don't worry, I'm
not on X all that much.

Well, dude, I will make sure that you re. You
are, available, because I'm sure some people are going
to love what you have, love what you're doing. Thank you
for connecting to me, connecting with me.
Thanks again.

Thank you very, very much for having me on board and
also if you are looking for any professional games,
you, can find me on Start Playing
Games GM
SS Adventurer. However, you
don't just have to come and find me. There are many,
many, many other great professional GMs on

(32:31):
start playing, servers. Feel
free to browse and I hope to see at
least someone come and join us.

Thanks again, David. And join us next time as we find the best
ways to have great times with friends and experience amazing
stories for tabletop role playing. And dont forget to access your
free Should I pay for a pro GM quiz?
Answer a few easy questions and have a clear direction on
GMG yourself or hiring a gm. I mean,
even if youre re like I was and you were dead set on never

(33:00):
paying to play take the quiz, you
may find out. Paying a pro is the way to go.
And may you keep having fun as we continue to make our
claim to game.

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039: Should You Pay for a Pro GM? - With David Northeast

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}039: Should You Pay for a Pro GM? - With David Northeast