Many times I have thought that running a campaign is somewhat similar to running actual business. Today I will focus on issue which I call Campaign Quality Control. Now I will be starting a series of posts titled Game Management which will address several issues about gamemastering and its depths.
Campaign Quality control (CQC) is set of procedures intended to ensure that you, as a manufacturer of the performed service, adheres to a defined set of quality criteria or meets the requirements of the players. It involves examination of the campaign thoroughly to meet the specific standards set by the gamemaster himself and players. If a problem is identified, there is need to find a suitable solution and clarify the course of actions.
Usually it is the job of the quality control team within business, but here the quality control team is you and your players. The team members however are always not the same. It is You when (1) the issue is about what is happening inside the campaign and here the NPCs are your salespersons. (2) It is you when the issue is about deepening the world around (or with) the players. It is you And your players when there is need to find to common tune i.e. the campaign theme.
We will take notice that players are your employees as they are your customers. They are the most important parts of any company. If a company has employees that don’t have adequate skills or training (rules or being reckless for example), have trouble understanding directions (GM doesn’t provide enough information to get the clear picture what to do), or are misinformed, quality may be severely diminished. When quality control is considered in terms of human beings, it concerns correctable issues. This means you as an gamemaster have to take care of your players, help them to understand the flow of information around the gametable, inside the campaign and everything related so every “stakeholder” can be satisfied.
Finally, the CQC process must be ongoing to ensure that remedial efforts, if required, have produced satisfactory results and to immediately detect recurrences or new instances of trouble.
What is different to the real world and organizations is that You, as a Gamemaster, hold just as much resources you want to use to run the whole thing. Players are your Customers, NPC’s and Players are your Personnel, You are the Management and Customer Care. The line always can’t be drawn clearly since you and your players are usually playing several parts. Running a successful business requires quality control to make the product successful; my opinion is that so does campaign and gaming in general.
Campaign Quality mainly comprises of three major elements: Gamemastering; ethics and independence around the table; acceptance and continuance of player character relationships and specific engagements; and of course campaign monitoring. These components are necessary to meet the demands and expectations of everyone around the table
How could I improve our game to the goal we call FUN! FUN! is the most important thing that the game masters and players need running a successful and good session. That’s right. It is the most essential thing that goes ABOVE everything else. Next I will present you the CQC Tools. I’ll try to clarify the whole CQC process with a picture and then explain the required processes one by one.
Everything begins with a good amount of planning ahead. What is going to happen and what is the main theme. Here, I have found most useful to take effort to meet with the players, discuss about wants and needs, theme and mood of the game etc. When it comes to planning, it should be done, but there is danger overdoing it. Every good gamemaster must be able to improvise, because the sessions won’t go as you have planned. It’s almost a guarantee.
Strongly linked to the Campaign Planning and Improvisation part, here Player Knowledge means literally knowing your players, their characters, motivations, player types (power-gamer, tactician…) emotional kicks. Seeing how do they react around the table. Are they bored and so on. My opinion is that in campaign creation, knowing your players comes always first, since it will work as basis for good campaign. Enough said, it will help you in your campaign planning, keeping the excitement in the air around the gametable. There is no point planning a dungeon delving campaign to players who enjoy political intrigue. Planning may also prevent us from falling back on old frames and first impulses. It is essential to take into account the tastes of your play group. As a further reading I suggest Robin’s Laws of Good Game Mastering or Chatty’s Robin’s Laws Revisited: The Complete Series. Read it, if you haven’t already.
Campaign Inspection & Consistency control deals with several important issues. The adventure structure for example. Over planned adventures can quickly fail because the complexity of it. We as human beings are incomplete and information flow is a major obstacle also in many companies. It is not a surprise that the clear awesome superb vision that gamemasters have in their heads always doesn’t transmit to the players and if it does, it is distorted. Good adventures are actually quite simple and information thus should always be as much available as possible in order to prevent misunderstandings. Illustrations during sessions etc always provide a much clearer image than just explained one. As Robin D Law says “You don’t need to make an adventure complicated. The players will do that for you”. Checking from time to time, that the adventure has clear ending and players are enough informed and STILL interested in that adventure is vital.
Session Control is also important. It helps you to keep things interested during the actual sessions. Here, I cannot dictate what is the best way to do this, it requires a whole post, so I just suggest that you take a look to Chatty’s Robin Laws’ Revisited: Part 7, Running your Game.
And of course there is one final source of information which is very helpful. Feedback from your players. By Reading your players, asking their opinions you can get valuable information about likes and dislikes. Are you doing everything right etc. Be careful, not everyone cares to say for example that his friend is taking too much attention in front of him. Ask feedback in general after the session or when you see your friends in environments that others can’t hear you. Be creative, since it is more useful than you think. They usually see the things you don’t.
And when you have gathered all the information, you know what to do and make the Imrovements and adjustments. Results may include: Homebrew Rules, Contracts, Incentives, Storyline alteration, bringing new elements, Deeper player knowledge. etc.
As a summary, when you have everything in control it will provide you a More organized, consistent, interesting experience which makes the game more fun. A quality campaign!
So there you have it. This seems reasonable enough since it encourages you to stay on your character, but does not punish the ones who really want to create a new character. This house rule or clarification just forces you to create a deeper character, avoids sudden mood changes etc. Opinions are welcome. Prove me wrong, challenge me and perhaps we alter it a bit in order to make it more fluent..
