The Art of Being a Game Master
Being a Game Master (GM) in Doctor Who RPG is like being the showrunner of your own Doctor Who series. You're not the dictator of the story - you're the facilitator who helps everyone create something amazing together. Think of yourself as a jazz conductor: you set the tempo and provide the structure, but the players are the musicians who create the magic through improvisation.
Unlike many RPGs where the GM is an adversary to overcome, in Doctor Who you're more like a creative partner. Your job isn't to "win" against the players - it's to create situations where they can be brilliant, compassionate, and heroic. You're the universe responding to their actions, the challenges that bring out their best, and the supporting cast that makes their characters shine.
The Doctor Who GM Mindset
The best Doctor Who stories aren't about defeating enemies through superior firepower - they're about understanding, communication, and finding the clever solution that saves everyone. As a GM, your role is to create opportunities for these moments, not to prevent them. You want your players to feel like they're in a Doctor Who episode, complete with impossible situations, moral dilemmas, and triumphant solutions.
The Three Pillars of Great GMing
Adventure - The Engine of Story
Adventure means giving players interesting problems to solve and meaningful choices to make. It's not about combat - it's about situations that require creativity, courage, and compassion.
Creating Adventure
- The Ticking Clock: Time pressure that forces action
- The Moral Dilemma: No perfect solution exists
- The Impossible Task: Success requires thinking outside the box
- The Personal Connection: Someone the characters care about is at stake
Real-World Parallel: The Emergency Room
An ER doctor faces constantly changing situations requiring quick thinking, ethical decisions, and creative problem-solving. No two cases are exactly alike, and the stakes are always high. That's the kind of dynamic environment you want to create.
Character - The Heart of Story
Character-focused GMing means creating situations that reveal who the player characters really are, challenge their beliefs, and give them opportunities to grow.
Character-Driven Techniques
- Personal Hooks: Tie adventures to character backgrounds
- Value Challenges: Test what characters believe in
- Relationship Dynamics: Create bonds between characters
- Growth Opportunities: Let characters overcome their limitations
Example: Sarah's Archaeological Background
Sarah is an archaeologist, so you create a story involving ancient alien artifacts. But the twist: the "artifacts" are actually living beings in stasis. Now Sarah must choose between scientific discovery and ethical responsibility - perfect character development opportunity.
Wonder - The Soul of Doctor Who
Wonder is what makes Doctor Who special - the sense that the universe is vast, strange, and full of impossible things. Your job is to make players feel like anything could happen.
Building Wonder
- Scale Variance: From quantum mechanics to galactic empires
- Scientific Magic: Technology indistinguishable from magic
- Temporal Mysteries: Effects that precede causes
- Alien Perspectives: Truly different ways of thinking
Running the Second Edition Rules
Doctor Who: The Roleplaying Game, Second Edition gives you a small set of tools: Difficulties, six levels of success, Story Points, Conditions and an order of action. Used well, they do most of the storytelling work for you. This part covers how to use each one at the table. The rules themselves are explained in Playing the Game.
Setting Difficulties
Every roll is Attribute + Skill + 2d6 against a Difficulty, and the player needs to equal or beat it. Difficulties run from 3 (trivial) to 30 (near-impossible), and 12 is the typical Difficulty for an ordinary challenge. The book calls 12 Okay, 15 Tricky and 18 Hard, and those three cover almost everything you will set.
- Start at 12. If you can't decide, it's Okay. Move up only when the fiction gives a reason: a ticking clock, alien technology, a hostile crowd.
- Don't roll for the boring stuff. If failure wouldn't change the story, the character just does it.
- Raise the stakes, not just the number. A Hard roll should feel hard in the description too.
- Reach above 18 rarely. Those Difficulties are for feats the heroes will need Story Points, help or Advantage to pull off.
| Attribute + Skill | vs 12 (Okay) | vs 15 (Tricky) | vs 18 (Hard) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 4 (out of their depth) | 41.7% | 8.3% | 2.8% (double 6s only) |
| 6 (an average human: 3 + 3) | 72.2% | 27.8% | 2.8% (double 6s only) |
| 8 (a real expert) | 91.7% | 58.3% | 16.7% |
These are the chances of passing on a plain 2d6 roll, counting double 6s as a success. Story Points, Advantage, Focus, Experiences and help from other characters all push them higher, which is why a Hard roll is still worth attempting.
Narrating the Six Results
The dice tell you more than pass or fail. A 6 on either die upgrades the result and a 1 downgrades it (a 6 and a 1 on the same roll cancel out). That gives you six results to narrate:
Passing
- Brilliant (pass with a 6, or double 6s): they succeed and get something extra. A clue, a head start, a scared guard who decides to help.
- Success (pass, no 6 or 1): they get what they wanted, nothing more.
- Barely (pass with a 1): it works, but at a cost. The door opens and the alarm goes off.
Failing
- Almost (fail with a 6): it doesn't work, but something good comes out of it. They don't crack the code, but they learn who wrote it.
- Failure (fail, no 6 or 1): it doesn't work. Move the story on anyway.
- Disastrous (fail with a 1, or double 1s): it fails and things get worse. The Cyberman turns round.
Twists come up often. For an average human (Attribute + Skill 6) against Difficulty 12, half of all rolls are Brilliant, Barely or Disastrous, so have a few small extras and small costs in mind before the session starts. A failure should still change the situation: Doctor Who stories rarely stall because a lock didn't open.
Running the Story Point Economy
Story Points are the heart of the system, and the GM decides how freely they flow. A human character starts with 12; characters with Distinctions or Gadgets (a Sontaran, an experienced Time Lord) start with fewer. Players spend them to:
- Raise a result one level per point. A roll that passed can be raised all the way to Brilliant, but a failed roll can be raised no higher than Barely. You can always buy your way through, but never cleanly.
- Gain Advantage (roll 3d6 and keep the best two), get a hint from you, activate a Distinction, heal, use a skill they don't have, or do something amazing.
- Edit the story. Small edits ("there's a fire extinguisher on the wall") are cheap; big ones ("UNIT arrives right now") cost much more, up to 11 points.
Keep the points flowing back, or players will hoard them. Players regain Story Points by acting heroically, from each other, and by getting captured. Two tools are worth offering out loud:
- Take a worse result. A player can drop their own result one level to gain a Story Point. When a Success would be dull, ask: "Want to make that a Barely for a point?" Most players will say yes, and you get a complication for free.
- Play the Focus flaw. Every Focus has a downside. When a player lets theirs cause trouble (the curious one opens the box, the protective one won't leave someone behind), give them a Story Point straight away.
Story Points can also be lost for terrible acts such as killing. Say so at the start of the campaign so it feels fair, not like a punishment out of nowhere.
Talkers First: Pacing a Conflict
There is no initiative roll. Everyone states what they intend to do, then actions resolve in order: Talkers, then Movers, then Doers, then Fighters. This is the most Doctor Who rule in the book. Someone who talks always gets to act before anyone who shoots, so a good speech can end a fight before it starts. Reacting out of turn costs Disadvantage (roll 3d6 and keep the worst two).
- Ask for everyone's intent before resolving anything, and resolve the Talkers first, out loud, so the table sees talking work.
- Let the Talkers' results change what the Fighters can do. If the Sontaran commander agrees to listen, the soldier with the blaster may have nothing to shoot at.
- Use chases for running away. They are their own subsystem, and "Run!" is a perfectly heroic plan.
Conditions and Defeat
Damage can be physical, mental or social, and it lowers the matching Attribute. When an Attribute hits 0, the character gains a Condition and has Disadvantage on related rolls. With two Conditions, opponents get Advantage against them; with three, they are Defeated.
Defeated doesn't have to mean dead. In a family-friendly game it usually means captured, knocked out, lost in the crowd or sent back to the TARDIS, and getting captured can even earn Story Points back. Describe Conditions in the fiction ("shaken", "humiliated", "limping") so players know what their Disadvantage applies to.
Use Lethal Sparingly
Some attacks, such as many advanced weapons, are Lethal and kill outright. Think of a Dalek exterminating someone on screen. That is a powerful tool, so use it with care:
- Telegraph it. Make it clear that this threat kills, before anyone steps in front of it.
- Give a way out. Hiding, talking, running and clever tricks should always be on the table.
- Use it on scenery more than heroes. Showing what a Lethal weapon does to a wall (or a statue) is usually scarier than doing it to a player character.
Safety and Tone
Doctor Who is "behind the sofa" scary: tense and creepy, but rarely gory and never hopeless. Agree the tone before you start, especially with younger players or a mixed-age table.
- Talk first. Before the first session, ask what everyone is excited about and what they'd rather keep out of the game (spiders, body horror, losing a family member).
- Use a simple stop signal. A card, a word or a gesture that means "let's skip this" with no explanation needed. Then move on without fuss.
- Fade to black. Cut away from anything grim, the way the show does.
- Check in. At breaks, ask whether the scary bits are fun-scary or too much, and adjust.
Building Doctor Who Adventures
A Doctor Who adventure follows a different rhythm than traditional RPG scenarios. Instead of "explore dungeon, fight monsters, get treasure," it's more like "arrive somewhere, investigate mystery, discover deeper truth, save everyone through cleverness."
The Classic Doctor Who Adventure Structure
Act I: Arrival and Hook (25% of session)
The characters arrive somewhere - by TARDIS, accident, or investigation. Something is clearly wrong, but the true scope isn't apparent yet.
- The Hook: Something that grabs attention immediately
- Initial Mystery: Questions that need answering
- Key NPCs: Introduce important supporting characters
- Local Color: Establish the setting's unique feel
Example Opening: The Silent Village
The TARDIS materializes in a picturesque English village. But something's wrong - there are no sounds. No birds, no wind, no human voices. Even the characters' own voices seem muffled. In the village square, people stand frozen mid-conversation, not statues, but somehow... paused.
Act II: Investigation and Complications (50% of session)
The characters explore, gather clues, and gradually uncover the true nature of the problem. Just when they think they understand, complications arise.
Investigation Techniques
- Three-Clue Rule: Always have at least three ways to discover each crucial fact
- Active Clues: Information that comes to the characters, not just waiting to be found
- Snowball Revelations: Each discovery leads to bigger questions
- Personal Stakes: Make it matter to the characters individually
Classic Complications
- The Authority Figure: Someone in charge who doesn't believe or actively opposes
- The Innocent in Danger: Someone who needs protection
- The Ticking Clock: Time running out
- The False Solution: What seems to work actually makes things worse
- The Personal Cost: Saving others requires sacrifice
Act III: Crisis and Resolution (25% of session)
The true scope of the problem becomes clear, everything seems hopeless, and then the characters find the clever solution that saves everyone.
Building the Crisis
- All Seems Lost: The obvious solutions have been tried and failed
- Personal Stakes Maximum: People the characters care about are in immediate danger
- Multiple Problems: Several things go wrong simultaneously
- Resource Scarcity: Time, tools, or allies are running out
The Clever Solution
The best Doctor Who resolutions come from the characters, not the GM. Your job is to listen to their ideas and find ways to make them work. The solution should be:
- Unexpected but logical in hindsight
- Based on information discovered during investigation
- Require cooperation between characters
- Solve the problem without excessive violence
- Leave room for character growth and relationships
Creating Memorable NPCs
In Doctor Who, the supporting characters are often just as important as the main characters. They're not just quest-givers or obstacles - they're people with their own motivations, fears, and dreams. The key is to make each NPC feel like the protagonist of their own story.
The Three-Layer NPC Method
Layer 1: Surface (What Everyone Sees)
This is the NPC's public face - their job, their apparent personality, their obvious motivations.
Example: Dr. Margaret Sinclair
Surface: Stern head of the archaeological dig, focused on proper procedures, skeptical of anything that can't be scientifically verified.
Layer 2: Personal (What Close Friends Know)
The NPC's private motivations, personal relationships, and individual quirks that make them human.
Example: Dr. Margaret Sinclair
Personal: Lost her mentor in a previous dig accident, now terrified of taking risks. Has a pet theory about ancient astronauts that she's afraid to voice. Secretly writes science fiction novels under a pen name.
Layer 3: Secret (What They Hide Even from Themselves)
The deep truth about the character - their core fear, their greatest desire, or the lie they tell themselves.
Example: Dr. Margaret Sinclair
Secret: Became an archaeologist not for science, but because she's desperately searching for proof that humans have a greater destiny among the stars. Her skepticism is actually fear that her deepest hope might be false.
Doctor Who NPC Archetypes
The Authority Figure
Someone in charge who creates obstacles, usually through bureaucracy or disbelief.
- Give them good reasons for their positions
- They're protecting something important to them
- Can become allies if convinced properly
- Often have more information than they initially share
The Local Expert
Someone who knows the area, the people, or the situation better than anyone else.
- They have crucial information but may not realize its importance
- Often older, with long memories
- May speak in local dialect or cultural references
- Usually eager to help once they trust the characters
The Innocent in Danger
Someone who needs protection and represents what's at stake in the adventure.
- Not helpless - they contribute in their own way
- Often see things adults miss
- May have a special connection to the mystery
- Represent hope and the future
The Unlikely Ally
Someone who seems like an enemy or obstacle but becomes a crucial ally.
- Initially oppose the characters for logical reasons
- Change when they understand the real situation
- Often have skills the characters need
- May sacrifice themselves for the greater good
Creating Compelling Villains
The best Doctor Who villains aren't evil for evil's sake - they're the heroes of their own stories. They believe they're doing the right thing, even when their methods are horrific. The most memorable villains make you understand their point of view, even as you oppose their actions.
The Villain's Journey
Every great villain started as someone with good intentions who made increasingly questionable choices. They're what the heroes could become if they abandoned their principles.
Classic Doctor Who Villain Archetypes
The Fundamentalist
Someone who believes their cause is so righteous that any means are justified.
Example: The Cyber-Controller
Believes that emotion and individuality cause suffering. Converting everyone to Cybermen eliminates war, jealousy, and pain. From their perspective, they're saving the universe from itself.
The Wounded Idealist
Someone who once fought for good but was betrayed or failed catastrophically.
Example: General Kellaway
Once believed in peaceful exploration. After losing his family to alien raiders, he now advocates for preemptive strikes against all alien threats. Every compromise feels like betraying his family's memory.
The Desperate Survivor
Someone facing extinction who will do anything to preserve their people or way of life.
Example: The Ice Warrior Commander
Mars is dying, and Earth looks like salvation. Humans seem primitive and wasteful. Taking Earth isn't conquest - it's conservation. Better that Mars-kind use the planet properly than let humans destroy it.
The Misguided Protector
Someone trying to protect others by controlling or limiting them.
Example: The AI Guardian
Created to protect humanity, it concludes that humans' greatest threat is their own freedom. By controlling every aspect of life, it eliminates war, crime, and suffering. It genuinely loves humanity - it just doesn't trust them.
Controlling the Rhythm of Adventure
Great Doctor Who adventures have a specific rhythm - like a symphony with movements of different tempos. You need quiet character moments, building tension, explosive action, and satisfying resolution. Learning to control this rhythm is one of the most important GM skills.
Tools for Controlling Pace
The Scene Cut
Like a TV director, you can cut away from one scene to another to maintain momentum.
Example
"As Sarah works on the computer, we cut to the Doctor and James approaching the reactor room. You hear alarms starting to sound in the distance..."
The Cliffhanger Moment
End a scene at the moment of highest tension, then cut away.
Example
"The Dalek's eyestalk swivels toward your hiding place. Its voice grates: 'LIFE FORM DETECTED. EXTERMINATE!' We'll come back to this - James, what are you doing in the control room?"
The Pressure Valve
After high tension, give characters (and players) a moment to breathe and process.
Example
"In the quiet aftermath, as you catch your breath in the TARDIS, there's time to talk. What does your character do with this moment of safety?"
The Revelation Cascade
Layer revelations so each answer leads to a bigger question.
Example
"You discover the aliens aren't invading - they're refugees. But then you realize: what are they running from? And why is it heading toward Earth?"
Session Pacing Template
Common GM Challenges and Solutions
Every GM faces certain challenges, especially when running Doctor Who adventures. Here are some of the most common problems, and fixes that work.
Problem: Players Want to Fight Everything
Some players default to combat solutions, but Doctor Who is about finding peaceful resolutions.
Solutions:
- Make Violence Costly: Fighting creates more problems than it solves
- Reward Cleverness: Award a Story Point for heroic, non-violent solutions, and remind the table that killing can cost Story Points
- Use the Order of Action: Talkers act before Fighters, so a good speech can end the fight before the first shot
- Show Consequences: Violence affects innocent bystanders
- Provide Better Options: Always make talking/thinking more effective than fighting
Example in Play
Player: "I shoot the alien!" GM: "That's a Fighter action, so it comes last this round. You can try, but your weapon just makes it angry and now it's calling for backup. However, Sarah notices it's wearing what looks like a medical bracelet - maybe it's injured and scared?"
Problem: Characters Are Too Competent
Player characters, especially Time Lords, can have high Attributes and Skills that make Okay (12) rolls trivial. Remember that their Distinctions already cost them Story Points, so they have less to fall back on when things go wrong.
Solutions:
- Social Challenges: High Technology doesn't help with scared children
- Raise the Difficulty: Use Tricky (15) or Hard (18) when the fiction justifies it, not across the board
- Time Pressure: Even genius solutions take time
- Multiple Problems: Can't solve everything at once
- Ethical Dilemmas: Some problems can't be solved, only chosen between
Problem: Players Overthinking Simple Puzzles
Players sometimes make simple solutions seem impossible by overcomplicating them.
Solutions:
- The Three-Clue Rule: Always provide multiple paths to the solution
- NPC Hints: Have characters suggest simpler approaches
- Environmental Clues: Make the solution visible in the setting
- Time Pressure: Force quick decisions instead of endless analysis
Problem: One Player Dominates
Some players naturally take charge, leaving others feeling sidelined.
Solutions:
- Spotlight Management: Deliberately ask quiet players for input
- Specialized Challenges: Create problems only certain characters can solve
- Split the Party: Temporarily separate characters to give everyone screen time
- Character Connections: Give each player personal stakes in different parts of the story
The Art of Improvisation
No matter how well you prepare, players will always do something unexpected. The key to great GMing is learning to improvise confidently and make it seem like everything was planned all along.
Core Improvisation Techniques
"Yes, And..." Thinking
The foundation of all improvisation. When players suggest something unexpected, your default response should be to accept it and build on it.
Bad Response: "That doesn't work."
Good Response: "Interesting! The computer responds in perfect French - apparently it was programmed by someone from Earth. It says 'Bonjour, mon ami. I have been so lonely.'"
The "Bag of Tricks" Method
Keep a mental list of flexible story elements you can drop into any adventure.
- The Helpful Stranger: An NPC who knows exactly what the characters need to know
- The Hidden Room: A secret area that contains crucial information
- The Old Friend: Someone from a character's past who appears at the perfect moment
- The Wounded Enemy: An antagonist who needs help, creating a moral dilemma
- The Innocent Witness: Someone who saw everything but doesn't understand its importance
The "Steal and File Off Serial Numbers" Method
When stuck, "borrow" from your favorite Doctor Who episodes, but change the details to fit your story.
Example
Players want to investigate the town's power plant, but you haven't prepared anything. Remember "The Green Death" - an industrial facility with environmental problems. But instead of giant maggots, maybe it's a sentient pollution that's trying to communicate through the electrical grid.
Try It at the Table
Activity One: NPC Speed Creation
Practice the three-layer NPC method. For each prompt, create a complete NPC in 2 minutes:
- The head librarian at an ancient university
- A gruff mechanic at a spaceport
- A child who claims to have seen aliens
- A military officer investigating strange events
- An elderly shopkeeper in a small village
Activity Two: Complication Generation
For each simple scenario, add three different complications that would make it more interesting:
- The characters need to get inside a locked building
- They must convince a scientist to help them
- An alien device needs to be repaired
- The team has to evacuate a town
Activity Three: Villain Motivation Workshop
Take these generic villain concepts and give each one sympathetic motivations:
- Alien invasion fleet
- Mad scientist
- Corporate executive covering up alien contact
- Time traveler changing history
- AI that has taken control of a city
Activity Four: Improvisation Practice
Practice "Yes, And..." responses to unexpected player actions:
- "I want to try befriending the Dalek."
- "Can I use my sonic screwdriver to make the alien music?"
- "I challenge the Ice Warrior to single combat."
- "Let's split up - I'll go into the obviously dangerous area alone."
- "I want to travel back in time to prevent this problem."
Practical Session Management
Running a great session isn't just about storytelling - it's also about managing the practical aspects of play to keep everyone engaged and having fun.
Before the Session
- Prepare Flexibly: Plan situations and NPCs, not rigid plots
- Review Character Sheets: Know what makes each character special
- Set Up Materials: Have dice, character sheets, and notes ready
- Think About Pacing: Plan for 3-4 major scenes
During the Session
- Share Spotlight: Make sure every player gets moments to shine
- Keep Energy Up: Take breaks when needed, vary the pace
- Listen Actively: The best plot twists often come from player ideas
- Be Flexible: Abandon your plans if something better emerges
After the Session
- Get Feedback: Ask what worked and what didn't
- Take Notes: Record important events and player character development
- Plan Connections: Think about how this session affects future adventures
- Celebrate Success: Acknowledge great moments and player creativity
Your Journey as a Game Master
Being a great GM is like being a great conductor - you're not making the music yourself, but you're helping everyone else create something beautiful together. It takes practice, patience, and a willingness to learn from both successes and mistakes.
Remember that your players want you to succeed. They're not adversaries trying to break your story - they're collaborators who want to help create amazing adventures. Trust them, trust yourself, and trust in the collaborative magic that happens when people come together to tell stories.
The universe of Doctor Who is vast, strange, and full of infinite possibilities. As a GM, you get to be the guide who helps your players explore that universe, discover its wonders, and become heroes in their own right. There's no greater privilege in gaming than helping others become the heroes of their own stories.
The Most Important Rule
Rule Number One: Everyone should have fun, including you. If you're having fun, your enthusiasm will be contagious. If you're stressed or not enjoying yourself, it shows. Sometimes the best GMing advice is simply: relax, enjoy the story you're creating together, and remember that every mistake is just another opportunity for adventure.