This week in my gaming group, the reign of command changed from our current game master to me. I will be taking over running our once a week game now for the next several months. The regular switch we do gives us time to both sit on the player and game master side of the screen, enjoying the successes and failures that each position has to offer.

This week, our group spent three or four hours making character in preparation for next week’s starting adventure to the campaign. This character creation session with my players actually helped me iron out how we were all interpreting some of the rules in the game. So, a potential stumbling block was avoided during the character creation session, well before we started. This led me to thinking, what other things can I do before the adventure next week to avoid problems and keep it a resounding success?

Here is a list of the possible stumbling blocks that you can run into when starting a new campaign.

(1) Not discussing the game with your players well in advance of the first session. With my group, we talked for several weeks about what game everyone wanted to play. We just finished a D&D campaign, so none of us wanted to jump right back into another one. We nixed some other systems that were suggested for various reasons. Then Spycraft, Alpha Omega, and an undetermined Savage Worlds setting were also considered. In the end, we all chose Spycraft as a group. Now we’ve avoided the potential conflict of the game master running a game the players don’t want to play, or the game master running a game he doesn’t want to run.

(2) Take an entire session for the group to create characters together. I have read about this on other roleplaying blogs and I highly agree. Creating characters together provides a lot of synergy. Players can decide if they want to create complimenting characters or a balanced group. Also, if there is a question that needs to be asked about character creation, you can answer it once and for all for everyone! You won’t have to explain it later. Plus, it gives the game master an opportunity to help think of story line ideas on how to bring each character into the game WHILE they make their character.

(3) Not being familiar with the rules before the first session of play. This is one I’m actually pretty intimidated by with Spycraft v2.0. That book is about 500 pages packed full of rules. And every one of them is a pretty good rule and has the potential to come into play. So I need to do a lot of reading, and rereading, to make sure I’ve got a good grasp on the system. There is no way to know absolutely everything before play. But be at least familiar with the basics and have an idea where certain things are located in the book in case you need to look them up.

(4) Have all the supplies you might need ready. Do you have multiple copies of the player’s handbook, so both your and some of your players have access to the book? Do you have some good miniatures that fit the setting you will be running? Do you have all the other basic essentials, dice, pencils, character sheets, maps?

(5) Confer with your players about the game before the first session. If they had access to the books, such as when they created their characters, ask them if there were any possible issues they saw with the game. Maybe there was a rule they disliked. Maybe they realized it requires a certain dice they don’t have, and they’ll need to remedy that.

(6) If you’ve never played this game before and the system or setting is completely new to you, maybe you should talk to someone who is familiar with the game? If you know a game master who has run the game before, ask them what they liked about the game and what they had problems with. Also, check the game’s forums if they have any. Forum monkeys (as I like to call them) can be a great resource for when you’re starting a new campaign. They can often point out problematic points in the game, such as broken rules or overpower items/classes.

(7) And finally, do you have something planned for your campaign? Not just your first adventure… for your entire campaign? Have you taken the time to develop some reoccurring NPCs? How are these NPCs going to fit in with the player characters? Create the foundation for your campaign now when you still have unlimited flexibility. And if you develop a good start, it will make the middle and end of your campaign so much easier and satisfying.

Do you have any suggestions on avoiding stumbling blocks when you start a new campaign with a completely new game?