The staff has come together. Your vision is set and the members know what pieces they'll be responsible for creating. Responsibilities are assigned and power flows are understood. What could stop you now?

Money.

We spend our lives working for it. We use it to obtain things we want. Its flow towards us is a profound motivator and its flow away from us is something to be avoided. The bigger your game gets, the more it will be hemmed in by the power of the almighty dollar.

The best job you'll ever go hungry for
"It's too bad that we don't have any friends that could put together an awesome website for us for free."

Think about the last time you ran a single-GM campaign for a small handful of friends. How much time did you spend developing the world, writing the NPCs, and planning the plots? As discussed in the last column, your J types are more likely to answer, "a lot," but even your P types have to spend a little bit of brainwork to be ready for feats of improvisation. And, even though it's something you enjoy, there's probably a part of you that wishes there was a tangible benefit for being the primary source of entertainment for regular multi-hour stretches. You spent way more time working on this than the players, in most cases, and there's the temptation to believe that the compensation is insufficient.

And that's just a small tabletop game with a single GM. The single GM can work in his or her own head and personal computer. The single GM can think about the game in off moments, or when inspiration hits. The single GM doesn't have to answer to anyone else but player expectations when creating a world.

When you have to travel somewhere on a regular basis, at a specific time, and with external input in order to do something it's usually called a job. But a team of GMs has similar constraints. You need regular contact. This will generally have to be at a specific gathering place to which at least one person probably has to drive. You have to schedule a time where everyone can meet, and sticking to it helps create inertia. And you have a team that you have to run your ideas by.

But do you get paid?

The answer is probably no. Some gestalts are able to generate enough profit once they start running games that the staff can receive a nominal return. It's probably not even minimum wage for the time you spend working on the game, but it assuages the need for pay. Some very lucky teams run games that are successful enough to pay the core staff a salary. These are few and far between; there are probably less than half a dozen near my city, and the numbers likely fall the further you get from a metropolitan area. And even then, the money made is probably not anywhere near what the team members could make at a normal job.

Chances are very good that you're never going to see a cent of cash return on your decision to staff a game, but you're quite possible going to wind up doing enough work to qualify for certain day jobs. What do you do when it winds up feeling like just an obligation for which you're not getting paid?

First off, think about why you're doing it. In theory, you signed on because it sounded like a fun and exciting idea and you enjoy developing and running games. Why don't you feel like that anymore? Do you feel like your work is not appreciated or you don't have enough creative control? Talk to your team leader about re-apportioning the roles in the team so that you have something more interesting and satisfying to do. Is the amount of work leading you to burn out? See the next column for some ideas for how to mitigate this problem.

It may be insurmountable, though. You may be making regular trips to a scheduled location for hours at a time without having enough fun to make up for the investment. The fire may be gone, the creativity may be burned out, and you may just feel like the game has gone beyond the concept that drew you in to a reality that feels like work.

Quit.

By all means, be nice about it. You may want to, initially, just take a leave of absence to see if you feel differently in a few weeks. Be sure to give your fellow staff members the opportunity to make changes to suit you (which means giving them the actual reasons you feel like quitting, so they can make the right changes). But, in the end, if it feels like a job instead of fun, and you aren't getting paid, walk.

It's a simple issue of input. If you're not enjoying yourself and the only thing left to motivate you is the missing paycheck, you're not going to be putting a lot of effort in. This will manifest itself in subtle ways, but it will be felt and will begin to affect the rest of the team. You don't want to be there, so they start to wonder if they want to be there. Staying in a position where you don't feel compensated is a sure way to harm friendships and bring down the game.

The best thing you can do to ensure the continued functioning of the gestalt is, sometimes, to leave it.

When did patronage go out of fashion?
"We can pay you in free game attendance."

As a member of staff, you are unlikely to get paid for running your game. This doesn't mean that others will be content to give you freebies. There's a lot that you can do on a shoestring budget, and a good prop wrangler helps make a little cash go a long way. But there's always more to buy.

If you're running a multi-GM tabletop game, you can probably squeak by. But there's still an opportunity cost involved in gathering a lot of people in one place. Is everyone contributing to snacks, or are the GMs providing more than an equal share? Do you make the players keep track of their own characters, or do you print out new sheets on a regular basis? Have you spent money on new sourcebooks specifically to support the game? These may not be a huge drain on your resources, but they're still an indication that the game is a financial drain in addition to being a drain on your free time and creativity.

This is also to assume that you're not running a miniatures-heavy game. Those tiny pieces of pewter (or pre-painted plastic) can be a substantial investment for a tabletop group.

If you're running a LARP, food, sheets, and sourcebooks are often the least of your worries. Lucky folks have access to big backyards or have gaming-club-related free college venues. Others are looking at up to $100 to rent a venue for a few hours, and even more to get one for a whole weekend. Then there are props; the cooler they are, the more they cost, and the perfect period costume isn't usually for sale at a thrift store.

And muses help you if you decide to go all out on production for your player handouts. Good art usually starts at $50 per piece and just goes up.

So where does the money come from? As the title of the section suggests, your best bet is to find an eccentric rich dude and get him to give you a lot of money. That's not terribly likely, though. If you can figure out how to reliably obtain a sugar daddy for your game, I'd love to hear about it.

More likely, you're looking at cost-saving measures. Although it's tough to find one perfect costume at a thrift store, you can usually find a ton of really neat stuff. You may have to re-conceive a NPC or alter the prop description, but it's easy to compromise when you're only out five bucks instead of fifty. Similarly, there are often good deals on eBay if you're willing to put your faith in your fellow man. Junkyards and flea markets may also help. This is your prop wrangler's opportunity to shine.

I mentioned it earlier, but it bears repeating: poor college kids are often your best resource. It's amazing what they'll do for free admission to your game, something to add to their portfolio, or just a snack. If they're in a gaming club they may be able to get you the student center for free. If they draw, they may be able to illustrate your book. And who knows what kind of knick knacks and costuming they may have accumulated that they'll let you borrow? Just make sure you don't ask them for anything around finals week; they suddenly get really protective of their time.

In the end, though, you have every likelihood of needing to spend more cash than you happen to have in your pockets at the moment. I don't advise serious cash outlays unless you actually plan to charge admission to your game. This tends to go without saying for venue rentals, but props, costuming, and miscellaneous costs can still add up and need a source of payback.

And these non-rental costs are going to come up well before you run your game. What do you do if there are only a couple members of your team that can afford to spend money at the moment? At that point, it's up to the staff members with disposable income to bite the bullet and decide if they want to contribute an unequal amount to the project. If you spend $300 on art, $100 on beta testing, and $200 on props you should be prepared to never see that money again.

But once the game is running, it should be understood that all attempts will be made to reimburse this money from any game profits. As such, don't plunk down your money if you're not sure the rest of the staff is okay with compensation. If you barely charge more than enough to cover site rentals, paying back previous expenditures will leave you with much less money to spend on new props and such for your game.

The disposable income conundrum
"I don't know… $30 is a lot."
"It barely covers the site rental, sadly. Other games around here charge $50."

Look at the other members of your team. Chances are, you're staring at some of the few gamers you know willing to invest heavily in the hobby. Think about it; much of the industry is based on the idea that the GM will buy all the books and all the players need is the main rules and maybe a splatbook or two. When players are reticent to shell out $30 for a rulebook to play in your game, how good will the reaction be when you ask them for cash every time you run?

But should you charge for your game? If it's more than just a few friends sitting around your house, then you definitely should. As discussed in the last section, any size game has a financial drain involved, whether it's noticed or not. By charging for attendance, you allow the players to help you afford the opportunity costs of running the game.

Won't charging for a game, even if it doesn't cost you much, lose you players? Of course, it will. Even a token fee is enough to drive off a number of gamers. But looked at from another angle, what does it say about these players that they're willing to pay to see movies, buy books, or attend concerts but not to play in your game? It says that they don't really think of your game as a genuine form of entertainment, and may lead to a fundamental lack of respect. If they'll only attend your game if it's free, they may be more willing to disrupt the game or wander off precisely when you have something planned for their characters. After all, they have nothing invested in playing.

Of course, there are gamers that genuinely can't afford a token fee or to whom it may be an affordable burden. See the poor college kids described above. These folks don't pay to see movies, or to buy books, or to see concerts unless they've saved up for a long time. They may be good players; they're just broke. By all means, work out a way to include these people. A good option is to offer a game or two free; give them the chance to see that they enjoy your game before making the decision to save up to attend. You can also let them barter; they may be willing to help you with some of the props and such in exchange for free games. Hell, you can even get them to help with logistics and game advertisement. The players that you want to have attend your game are generally willing to support the game the best way they are able, even if that isn't with money.

So how much should you charge for a token fee? A good number is five dollars for several hours of play. One or two dollars isn't usually terribly helpful financially unless you have a lot of players. Five dollars isn't that significant of an increase over two for many people, but will add up in your game budget fairly quickly. If you go too much more than five dollars, you start losing the players with ready disposable income as they begin to wonder whether it would be more cost effective to see a movie instead.

That's for a token fee. If your game actually requires a serious outlay of funds, you should charge enough to cover it. Unfortunately, this is often tricky. Site rentals are generally a flat fee, but the player base shifts from game to game. If your site costs $100, and you get 40 players, you'll only need about $2.50 a person. But if you only get 15 players this game, suddenly you're looking at a significant deficit. And that's all before you decide whether to try to sell snacks at long games.

In general, you should figure out how much you'll spend on each session and then divide that by the minimum number of players you expect. Round the number you get up to the nearest five to figure out what to charge. That way, you're covered if you have a sparse turnout but anyone extra increases your budget for subsequent games. If it turns out that you get way more players than expected on a regular basis, you can either lower the price or maintain their interest with the lavish props you're able to buy with the windfall.

Pre-registration doesn't hurt either. If you know you already have 90% of the players who're needed to pay for the game, you can feel safer about a few more cash outlays to make the session spectacular. In general, it's worthwhile to knock about five bucks off the price for people who pay you more than a week or two in advance. Being able to count on a certain number of players well before the game is worth risking not meeting your break-even point. The cash break is also a really good incentive to get people to pay you in advance. In-game rewards (extra exp for pre-registering) can also work, but risks annoying those that feel that only in-game concerns should affect their in-game advancement. It's up to you whether you care whether those folks are annoyed.

To sum up: don't feel guilty for charging for your game. If it's costing you money to run, it's more than fair to pass that cost on to the players. If you wind up making even more money than your costs, then good for you (but don't count on that happening often).

Next month, I'll go into more detail on the issue that I touched on in the first section: staff burnout and how to prevent it.