9 Things I've Learned Running 9 Different RPGs

I've run nine different RPG systems in the year and change (and read twice that many games). A couple of these were one-shots, but most were adventures or campaigns. The games I ran were:

• D&D 5e (2014) - ended a multi-year Planescape campaign
• Mechwarrior: Destiny - 5 session mini-campaign
• Warhammer 40,000: Wrath & Glory - 7 session mini-campaign
• Shadowdark - one-shot
• Call of Cthulhu - one-shot
• Mothership - 5 session mini-campaign
• Old School Essentials - 8 session campaign, converted to...
• Worlds Without Number - 4 sessions in, still ongoing
• Delta Green - 9 sessions comprising Act 1 of Impossible Landscapes, with Act 2 forthcoming next year

Here are nine takeaways I've learned about myself from trying out many different games:

The narrative promise is what hooks me. The reality is always different.

Every game promises "this is what kind of game this is - this is the fantasy you get to have in this game." Imagining that experience is what gets me excited about each new game, as well as the scenarios or situations I come up with to run for my players. But it turns out this imagined scenario plays out very differently at the table. Players come with their own goals and playstyles and interests, and things always work out differently than I imagined they would. I'd say it's best to go in with zero expectations, but it's the expectation that gets me excited to play in the first place, that brings me to new games.

Player preferences and GM preferences are often different.

This sounds obvious, but it wasn't obvious to me. Maybe this is a corollary of the point above, but I found several cases where what I imagined the players would like or enjoy about a game was not what I would have imagined. For example, in our Old-School Essentials game, where I thought my players would enjoy the streamlined, clearly defined character classes, my players didn't like how little progress they felt upon gaining a level. While they enjoyed the level of danger and the procedures of OSE play, they wanted options and a sense of progression when leveling. We switched to Worlds Without Number, which offers tons more options while still retaining a lot of the old-school elements of OSE. 

Metacurrencies are a pain in the ass.

I played in a few games that use metacurrencies. Simple ones like Inspiration or Luck are fun, but games where metacurriences power a lot of player and GM mechanics were problematic. I found them difficult to remember and my players forgot about them entirely. Warhammer 40k: Wrath & Glory was the worst offender for this, with multiple metacurrencies and multiple ways to spend each metacurrency. It was just too much to keep track of.

We'll see if my attitude about this changes in 2026, since I've got several games on deck that leverage  metacurrencies.

Simpler is better when playing online.

I tried using Foundry VTT for the Warhammer 40k: Wrath & Glory game, and I didn't like it for three reasons. First, the tool itself is fiddly and time-consuming. Just learning to use it was a headache, and forgetting how to do something as simple as roll initiative ground at least one session to a temporary halt. Second, it's really difficult to improvise. VTTs rely on extensive prep and improving stuff on the fly - something I do regularly - becomes really difficult. Finally, since VTTs like Foundry do so much of the back-end mechanics, it's harder to learn the game. That meant when rules questions came up, I was left fumbling between the VTT and the rulebook.

I'll be sticking with Owlbear Rodeo for all future online games.

Old-School doesn't mean play is not character-focused.

I've heard some discussion to the effect that trad games (like D&D) are character-focused and OSR games are adventure-focused, and I don't think this holds true. I think that any game can be character-focused if it is a game where the narrative emerges from the decisions of the characters and how they interact with the world. To me, that's the essence of character-focused play and it's central to what I try to incorporate into all games that I run, old-school, trad, or whatever.

I prefer when the story is what happens at the table.

This is a central tenet of OSR play culture and one of the things that brought me to the OSR in the first place. After running a multi-year D&D campaign that had an overarching plot of my own devising, I began to grow bored because I knew the overall outcome and where things were going. It was hard to stay motivated to run games every week (5e is also a slog at higher levels). Coming to run OSR-style games, I began to see the magic in what happens when there's no scripted plot, but just characters in scenarios with factions and an assortment of problems. That led to running a sandbox campaign that's been a great success and turned in totally unexpected ways. Even in my most trad game of the year - Delta Green's Impossible Landscapes campaign - the unexpected directions the players took things with their characters was the highlight of the campaign for me so far.

Backstory is best when it establishes who the character is, not who they need to become.

When I ran Dragon of Icespire Peak a few years ago, I asked all the players to write backstories, and then I used those backstories to flesh out the campaign, building adventures tailored to tie into their backstories. And that can be an awesome experience, if that's what the players and the GM want to do. But it doesn't need to be the default mode of play. What's more practical is using backstory or background to help define who the character is now. What are they like and how do they behave? Those are questions that can be answered by backstory. Matt Colville did a great video about this subject.

The best part about starting with a limited backstory or background is that it allows the players to really discover who the character is at the table rather than being scripted into certain role play based on the elaborate background. As an added bonus, it takes less time.

Understanding the "basic procedure" and the flow of information at the table.

The Basic Procedure, as defined by Prismatic Wasteland, is the basic process of information gathering and sharing that happens between players and GM in a TTRPG. He defines it in the context of the OSR, but I think it can apply to any GM-run game. The Warden's Guide for Mothership does an excellent job of describing the procedure, too. It's so basic, that we mostly don't even think about it. But becoming aware of it can help to reduce confusion at the table and even grants the players more autonomy through more informed decision-making and a clearer shared understanding of the fictional scenario.

Combat as story versus combat as sport.

The OSR disdains the idea of combat as sport. Combat is often said to be a fail-state. I think there are very good games that are "about combat," and combat can be very fun in some games. But if the experience you want to create is one where the world feels dangerous and the stakes are about personal survival, then combat as the default option for dealing with obstacles isn't going to create the experience you want.

After running a mini-campaign of Mothership, I did a piece on how Mothership handles combat situations by turning it into an opportunity for storytelling. I've been trying to leverage this approach to violence in more games and it really works to transform a combat encounter into a compelling narrative.

As a bonus tenth thing I learned... I still love learning and running lots of different games! I can't wait to try out even more new ones in 2026: Draw Steel, Mythic Bastionland, and Daggerheart, and I'm sure there will be others!

What games have you run and what have you learned? Share your thoughts in the comments below.