Discussions from the Convention: Prepare Problems, Not Solutions

While talking about Game Mastering at our first convention, one of the recurring concerns was preparation.

How much do you need to plan?

How do you account for everything the players might try?

What happens when they come up with a solution you never considered?

The answer is that you do not need to predict every solution.

Prepare the problem.

Let the players figure out what to do about it.

Understand the Situation

Suppose the party needs to enter a guarded building.

You should know why the building is guarded, who is inside, what the guards have been told, and what happens if they notice something suspicious.

You do not need to decide that the players must sneak through a back window.

They might disguise themselves.

They might bribe a guard.

They might create a distraction.

They might climb onto the roof, enter through the sewers, convince someone to invite them inside, or simply break down the front door.

Your job is to understand the situation well enough to respond.

Their job is to choose an approach.

This does not mean you prepare less carefully.

In some ways, it means you need to understand the situation better.

If you know the guards, the building, what everyone wants, and what happens when something goes wrong, you can respond when the players choose an approach you never considered.

You are not preparing less.

You are preparing something different.

Do Not Hide the Only Answer

Problems become frustrating when the Game Master prepares one correct solution and expects the players to discover it.

The party finds a locked door.

The intended answer is hidden in a clue from three rooms earlier.

The players missed that clue, so now the game stops.

They search the door.

They try to pick the lock.

They attempt to break it.

They look for another entrance.

But none of those ideas work because the Game Master is waiting for them to find the one prepared answer.

At that point, the players are no longer solving a problem.

They are trying to guess what the Game Master wrote down.

A locked door should be an obstacle, not a test of whether everyone can read your mind.

Let Reasonable Ideas Work

Not every idea should automatically succeed.

Some plans are difficult.

Some are dangerous.

Some are simply impossible within the world of the game.

But when players suggest something reasonable, give it a fair chance.

Decide what the attempt requires.

Set an appropriate difficulty.

Explain any obvious risks.

Then let the players act and allow the dice to help determine what happens.

A failed attempt can create a new problem without ending the game.

The lockpick breaks.

A guard hears the noise.

The door opens, but the party loses valuable time.

The players succeed, but someone now knows they were there.

Failure can move the story forward just as easily as success.

The important part is that the players are still interacting with the situation rather than searching for the answer you already decided upon.

Players Will Think of Things You Never Will

A Game Master has one perspective.

The players bring several more.

They will combine abilities in ways you did not expect.

They will notice details you included only for atmosphere.

They will build entire plans around one sentence you barely thought about when you said it.

Some of those plans will be brilliant.

Some will be ridiculous.

Some will somehow be both.

That is part of the fun.

You do not need to protect the encounter from their creativity.

When a clever plan avoids a fight, bypasses a trap, or changes the direction of the adventure, the preparation was not wasted.

The obstacle gave the players something meaningful to overcome.

They simply overcame it differently than you imagined.

If the encounter only works when the players behave exactly the way you expected, then you did not really prepare a problem.

You prepared a sequence.

And players are very good at refusing to follow sequences.

Do Not Confuse Structure With Predetermined Solutions

Preparing problems does not mean every campaign needs to become a completely open sandbox.

You can still have a strong story.

You can still know where the party needs to go.

You can still prepare encounters, villains, locations, clues, and major events.

The difference is that you are preparing what is happening in the world instead of deciding exactly how the players must respond to it.

A guarded bridge can still matter because the party needs to cross it.

The ritual can still happen at midnight.

The creature can still be too dangerous to fight directly.

Those things create structure.

The players still decide what they are going to do about them.

That distinction gives you room to prepare without needing to predict every possible choice the table might make.

Prepare the Question

Instead of asking:

“How will the players solve this?”

Ask:

“What is happening, and how will the world respond?”

The bridge is guarded.

The witness refuses to speak.

The creature cannot be defeated in a direct fight.

The station is losing power.

The ritual will be completed at midnight.

Those are problems.

They create pressure, choices, and consequences.

You do not need to write the players' answer.

Give them the situation.

Understand what is at stake.

Know what happens if nobody intervenes.

Know enough about the world to respond when they do something you never expected.

Then place the problem in front of the table and ask:

“What do you do?”