Tight focus versus a sprawling playground

[Phaelen Bleux]

For my group (me included as primary GM), we tend to be the world-building type. While the GM may roughly direct the scenario from session to session, many times the end of a session becomes "what do you plan to do next (as a group) so I (the GM) can be ready for it."

We have a long-standing world (Arnur Soghal), in which we have had numerous campaigns with various foci. . .some of them GM designed and some of them player inspired. It is not unknown for a player and the GM to kabitz out-of-game to direct the focus of the next session(s). Player-generated goals are often more important than GM (or pre-generated module) "railroading;" hence, we like a large world to rattle around in.