The Danger and Reward of Losing Control.

Control. Every GM has a different relationship with it. Some simply remember it fondly as they allow their players to run roughshod over them and their world, while some cling to it so obsessively that railroading the players is the only way they know how to play the game. I attempt to give it a long leash, so that it doesn't break it chains, and flee me forever.

By that I mean that while I am in final control of what goes on in my game and the world of Meaghana, I try to give my players as much running room with it as I can. In general, I would rather reflavor than ban. A good example of this is the new race in PHB 3, the shardmind. Meaghana has no real room for people make of hunks of psionic rocks, however I respect the idea of people wanting to play with the new mechanics that they provide so I reskinned them as half-dragons of the Gem type. This allows me to meet the players halfway, while still maintaining control of the feel of the game, and the mechanics allowed.

Much trickier, is the level of control maintained over the story elements of the world. Usually, I try to maintain a protective hand over my world, while allowing the players to tell the stories that they want to. Recently, I am finding that there is some excitement in the occasional removal of that protective hand. For example, the Epic level campaign I am currently finishing up has the player characters entering the ninth level of Hell to destroy the Archdevil, Asmodeus. The reason for this has to do with portals that have opened all over the game world that are combining the world of Meaghana with the plane of Hell. The players recognize that they are the only ones capable of dealing with his problem, and that if they fail that the world, as they know it, will be badly damaged if not completely destroyed. That level of responsibility adds a whole new rush to the game. For the players, it shows them that they truly matter in the grand scheme of things, and for all of us it creates the tension of a truly epic climax, one where no one is sure what will happen.

As a GM, this is both an amazing and a completely nerve wracking time. The story that I have constructed has lead the players here, but I am taking my hands off the wheel, and letting them lead my world into the future, whatever that future might be. That is the danger and the reward of giving up that control for a brief time. No campaign world can last if the players are in total control, with the GM unable to maintain a solid and believable world, but sometimes the world is in need of the kind of chaos that only a group of player characters can provide. The real skill of a good GM is the ability to integrate these moments of chaos into the overarching campaign world, and use it as a point of evolution, both for the world and their story telling ability.