New Beginnings - kinda sorta

It has happened. It took over a year of advertisements, but I've managed to sell my Royal Enfield Classic 500.  

It's a little depressing. I paid so much for the motorcycle and, five years later, only managed to sell it for a fraction of the initial price. But I did end up selling it to a lady who is passionate about the motorcycle and is already working feverishly on it. So at least it's going to a good home.

I'm doing something epic with the funds received. After 6 years, I'm getting myself a new gaming PC.

I'm both excited and terrified at this venture. The last time I bought myself a gaming PC was just after those mofos cleaned out my house. Getting a computer was a matter of necessity to me and I had some funds available along with the insurance, but I was still rather limited. This time I wasn't as limited. The specs are insane, but again, it has to last another six or seven years before I'd even consider an upgrade let alone a new build altogether.

So what am I going to play on the new PC? I have a few ideas... I might babble about them as I play. Should give me something to write about.

DM Babble: Talk to your players... how that went.

 After ten sessions of my homebrew world with the South Africans, I decided to follow advice frequently dolled out and very rarely done.

"Talk to your players," the advice goes. "Find out what they like and don't like about the campaign you're running. Touch base with them and find out what expectations or desires they might have."

Now this sounds like sound advice, but these internet wise ones neglect with one crucial bit of reality.

Asking for critique is fucking terrifying! Especially when it's about things you've spent hours working on and have poured a lot of yourself into.

So with both these thoughts in mind, I went ahead and warned my players that I was going to ask them feedback at the end of the session. Fortunately with this group, it's a bunch of thoughtful, emotionally intelligent people which means I got a lot of constructive feedback and uplifting comments. Each had a different focus and there are some challenges that I need to overcome, but what I essentially got from the whole conversation was that they were enjoying themselves, that there are a few things that can make it better, but overall there was a general sense of being satisfied.

Yay.

Now comes the question: Would I recommend everyone doing this with their players?

Nope!

You know what players you have. Some of them are critical without really being considerate. Or they're selfish, pushing their desires at the cost of everyone else's. I'm fortunate that I have a group of older, more mature players. Not everyone has that. If you do have that, then go right ahead! Bask in the terror and be prepared to grow. But if you're dealing with miscreants, then don't expect to get much out of the exchange.

Not being terribly helpful, am I. Well, I guess it comes down to how well you know your crowd.

As part of my 'take it easy' drive, I only have one more session with these peeps this year (that I'm running). I'm optimistic that it'll go well. My anxiety isn't quite as high and even if I mess up, I know I have so many potentially cool things that could happen in future. So I'm optimistic.

DM Babble: Feel the burn

Just an update with no real message.

It's nearing December... and I'm pooped. This year has been insane, with lots of people drama (weren't I avoiding them?), work drama (ugh, work), law drama (I'm still waiting for the bill, eek), and just general mayhem.

To date, I've run 54 RPG sessions in 2021 (of which the majority was DnD). A little under half of those were sessions having to with my homebrew. 

Okay, so what's the point? The point is that I might have burnt myself out. The past couple of weeks have been rough creatively as well. Usually I'd be doing nanowrimo (see my previous posts about the joyous insanity) but I just couldn't get myself to do much of anything this year.

So instead of continuing this uphill run while on fire, I'm doing what I can to become unpooped. 

I've stopped running the homebrew with the Brits. I just realised it was a square peg in a round hole scenario (I might post about it later). I've been running Starforged with them, but that's not really working as spectacularly as I would have hoped. I might run something else with them in January. I've begun reading (and yes, prepping) The Wild beyond the Witchlight and it might be a much better fit. 

I'm halting the homebrew with the South Africans in December for the month just to take a break. It's been going really, really well, but I'm running on empty. And I found that it begins bleeding into the game. 

That leaves me with two groups of Dragon Heist. One might not play in December because they have social lives (weirdos), which leaves me with one group. And I love Dragon Heist, I've done it so many times that prep is a breeze, so I think that's going to be okay. 

I wouldn't have thought that 2021 was going to be 'worse' than 2020, but in some ways it has been and I find that I'm basically in disaster recovery mode. I've never had burnout. Been close, but I'm also aware that my depression mimics a lot of the symptoms. Now I know it is burnout. Even writing this post was somewhat exhausting. 

Hopefully I'll be able to report better things in January.