Rules for Paid Games and hiring a Games Master

[Frunobulax]

I made a sub-form for Paid Games and moved the threads I saw that were obviously paid over to there. That should make it easier to keep the two camps separate. I will add to the first post that if you really don't like paid games, then please stay out of that forum.

Thanks!

[Frodie]

We never thought of doing a paid game, but it might not be a bad idea. Is there a rough going rate and is there a GM rating system? Just looking at it right now to see if we might want to give it a try, maybe a one shot or something.

[Marquis_de_Taigeis]

I like the posted rules for advertising paid games

For me a paid game should not be for trying to make a profit but for covering the cost of purchasing source material / maps / map creation software / time for prep
for example DND 5E essential bundle is ~$200
the ultimate license is ~$149
total ~$350/£250
if you charged say 25pence/50cents per player per session a 4 player game would would pay for both the license and bundle in ~175-250 sessions so roughly the length of a single 4 hour per session level 1-20 campaign

When i see paid games of roughly £15/$20+ per session im going yes thats a good minimum hourly wage for a person if they have a table of 4 for a 4 hour game and it also speaks towards the amount of prep time you would expect to be getting put in, but if im paying these rates for a game then maybe having a refund policy stated, and probably a couple free taster sessions to see if the groups personalitys work together.

When playing pick up games (adventurers league) in cafe/pub in the before times normally players would cover the GMs drinks as a courtesy.

For a regular group of friends If we ever get back to being able to play at a physical table then i might put a jar at the side into which 20p could be tossed per session and then this cash would go towards buying / painting minis first of the players characters then of npcs / monsters

[CraigTD]

Question for the team: I'm a registered GM on the Start Playing Games website (not linking it until my question is answered). They function as a discovery engine for paid games as well as payments and scheduling.

Does the scheduling conflict with the Calendar rule here? While I'm coming up on my one year anniversary of purchasing FGU for my games I have to admit that I'm not active in the forum and can't find the calendar that's referred to. I want to be sure I'm respecting all rules before I make a post. Thanks!

[Mgrancey]

Working under you being on a desktop or similar, if you look at top of page you will see a bar with a number of options: Home, New Posts, Forum, Blogs, Store, etc. If you hover over "Find Games", you will get a dropdown with "Recruiting Calendar", "Manage Campaign", and Looking for Group with more stuff.

Recruiting Calendar takes you to the calendar, while Manage Campaign takes you to where you can create, and deal with campaigns you are in or running.

[HywelPhillips]

I had exactly the same question as Craig on posting announcements here for paid games run via StartPlaying. Thus far I've only posted here for free games on there but I am about to start running paid-for games using them as payment provider.

Is posting notifications here about paid games on their system against the fourm rules here, because they have an integrated calendar and scheduling system as well? The games will be run on Fantasy Grounds, and it is nice to be able to announce them on the LFG's here, but with the rules-as-written it is not allowed to post here because we would technically be asking players to sign up to some alternative scheduling system. But we need to do that in order to be able to use it as the payment processor.

Cheers, Hywel

[CraigTD]

Thank you for the walk through to finding the calendar and campaign managers!

[ddavison]

Question for the team: I'm a registered GM on the Start Playing Games website (not linking it until my question is answered). They function as a discovery engine for paid games as well as payments and scheduling.

Does the scheduling conflict with the Calendar rule here? While I'm coming up on my one year anniversary of purchasing FGU for my games I have to admit that I'm not active in the forum and can't find the calendar that's referred to. I want to be sure I'm respecting all rules before I make a post. Thanks!

In general, we don't want posts here that lead users off the site into another site where they have to register. I'm okay with doing a test run to allow linking to Start.playing games as long as they are posted in the Paid forum and it is clearly listed that you also need to sign up at start.playing. If people don't seem to complain about it, then we will continue to allow it. This doesn't mean carte-blanche approval for any and all sites -- just the Start.playing site for now.

[CraigTD]

In general, we don't want posts here that lead users off the site into another site where they have to register. I'm okay with doing a test run to allow linking to Start.playing games as long as they are posted in the Paid forum and it is clearly listed that you also need to sign up at start.playing. If people don't seem to complain about it, then we will continue to allow it. This doesn't mean carte-blanche approval for any and all sites -- just the Start.playing site for now.

Thank you. I have no problem with this setup. I'm a fan of being transparent about the games I intend to run.

[Montis]

In general, we don't want posts here that lead users off the site into another site where they have to register. I'm okay with doing a test run to allow linking to Start.playing games as long as they are posted in the Paid forum and it is clearly listed that you also need to sign up at start.playing. If people don't seem to complain about it, then we will continue to allow it. This doesn't mean carte-blanche approval for any and all sites -- just the Start.playing site for now.

Is there any news on this? I started a paid PF2E FG campaign on StartPlaying and am curious if I'm allowed to advertise that on here. I already advertised the campaign in the FG discord which seems to have no rule against that and StartPlaying seems to be the go-to site for paid games in general, so I feel it should be allowed in this forum as well, as long as everything is made clear.

Edit: I've also seen that many games advertised here actually do link to StartPlaying, so I guess it's just that the rules haven't been updated yet?