I was looking at the other prompts for RPGaDay, and realized that some of the ideas I had for this post would be covered in others…so what to do? Runeslinger had an alternate series of suggestions for the prompts, including “what was the heaviest set of RPG things you’ve had to carry?” for strain. That one’s pretty easy — way back in high school, I’d walk the half mile or so to my friend’s place to GM most evenings. After a few years of collection minis, maps, dice, folders of characters, books, etc., a trek to his place had a 20 pound case of minis in hand, a backpack full of the other crap (probably another 10-15, easy).

The other strain, over almost a half century of gaming, has always been finding players and keeping a game going. Back in the bad ol’ days of the “Satanic Panic”, you didn’t just go advertising for players; you had to suss out the geeks. It was like a senator tapping your foot under the bathroom stall for an illicit hookup — except you’d roll a d20 under the stall wall and hope to hit “critical hit!” Everytime a game group blew apart — either because I moved away, or a bunch of folks all moved out within six months of each other — you were back to square one. By the ‘90s, gaming was getting pretty accepted, and finding players was probably the easiest it had been. A lot of the groups from that point usually had at least one player from the last, and often they brought someone into the group with them. Even in the military, changing posts, I usually had someone I knew about. The last real blow for finding players was in 2010, when a divorce lost me half the group, then others having divorces or moving away left us with one to two players, and a bunch that cycled in and out irregularly until the current group.

Once you have players, keeping them is the hard part. It’s easy when you’re kids. You have time, often disposable cash, and your schedules usually allow a normal meet-up. College, it’s often similar. It’s the working world and real responsibility that gets in the way. I’ve noted that to keep a gaming group intact you need actual commitment. Sometimes, it’s a pain (or strain) to keep that weekly nerd night; I’d suggest it’s worth it. The hard part is simply consistency. Even with a very regular group in play, right now, I’ve got one player who got bumped to management at a national lab; he has to travel a lot to beg for money. I’ve got another guy that goes on vacation seemingly every few months, though with the new live GF, I suspect that’ll get curtailed. Another travels for business quite a bit.

The trick is that Nerd Night happens every week. Period. If you’re not there, we play something else that doesn’t need you. Or there’s a movie night, or board games night; but if you lose the momentum, it’s done within a few weeks. Everyone has something else vying for the time. If it’s not regular, it’s not happening. Having Nerd Night be other things is also important. Movie night, board games, something — because if you’re not friends outside the group, there’s less connection to keep it going.

I’d point out that it’s often worth it. Mental health, alone — the ability to have friends outside the marital group, the ability to walk away from the real world for a few hours, the camaraderie in an era where people complain that “loneliness” is on the rise is a good reason to put in the time. 

So make the strain; show up.