Onerous Guac
he/him
5.0
(6)
Timezone
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Identity
About Onerous Guac
Hi! I'm Guac. I'm a high school teacher, recovering theatre kid, and game addict with more than a decade of experience playing and running tables for D&D and a number of other Tabletop Roleplaying Games (4e, 5e, Monster of the Week, the FFG Star Wars RPG, Honey Heist and a few even more obscure ones). Most of my experience has been in teaching the game to new players - playing with my students so I could have a professional excuse to do what I already love doing. Whether you're a newcomer to the tabletop hobby or a veteran looking for a controlled and deliberate experience - I'm your guy! I believe that the object of the game in D&D is having fun, telling an open-ended and authentic story together that's bigger than what any one of us could dream up alone. My games tend to be narrative and role play-forward (since that's my favourite part of the game) but I know we all come to the table for a lot of different kinds of fun, and I firmly believe different players can all have fun at the same table every session.
At a glance
3 years on StartPlaying
Highly rated for: Inclusive, Creativity, Rule of Cool
Featured Prompts
I got started GMing...
the way many of us do - I had a burning desire to try RPGs and no friends who wanted the homework of running the game themselves. All that time ago the urgency hasn't faded - I'm so eager to play new games, new systems and with new people that I thought that here on SP was a great place to find you!
When I'm not running games I'm...
a teacher, a Dad and a gamer. I'm always playing lots of other kinds of games! Board games, video games. Designing games as learning activities for my students. All games all the time.
How Onerous Guac runs games
I tend to emphasize D&D as a tool for storytelling. So my 'comfort zone' is in roleplaying, character voices and rich stories centred on your player character - the hero! That being said, D&D and games like it really 'sing' when we let the systems drive the story in directions we don't expect. I tend to avoid the published modules. Running them well is often more work than writing and designing something new myself. I like tailoring an experience for an audience. So if you're into gritty realism, or a really strong sense of genre (from horror to swashbuckling to noir), I want to work with you to craft a bespoke game experience.
Featured Prompts
I prep by
...talking to my players about what your happy place is and then designing something that sets you up to have it. I beg, borrow and steal from all over to craft an experience that delivers the intended fun, be it shocking horror, gritty drama or zany hijinks.
Rules are...
... purpose-built Lego bricks designed to spur creative play, not stymie it. Rules provide structure when open imagination would struggle to get off the blocks. And they don't have to be defended from creative players, so long as that irreverence is fun for everyone. We play games for FUN!
When it comes to voices
...more is always better! Whether you do a character voice is about your comfort, but I hope you don't begrudge me my bad celebrity impressions, poorly-executed accents and everything in between. One of my favourite things about GMing is getting to play so many diverse and weird people!
Onerous Guac's ideal table
I love curating experiences for people to have fun together. Whether that's a teaching game tutorializing the systems or a group of old vets looking for some new kind of vibe or genre sandbox to play in. Players who enjoy role play, social interaction scenes and dialogue sequences will find my table really easy to play at. Players who enjoy combats that you just barely survive on a knife's edge will enjoy my table. Players who want to flip every lever and steal from every shopkeeper, treating the world like a video game open world, might chafe a bit when they find out that I believe in realistic and reasonable consequences of actions. Skyrim lets your bounties expire, but I don't have to. Make choices, good or bad. And then let's have fun navigating the consequences of those choices together. That's where all the story is!
Featured Prompts
I think it's a red flag when players...
...bring a character to the table who wants nothing, needs nothing, is afraid of nothing, etc. A heroic adventurer needs a reason to be a hero. I could work with you to develop one. But if you're a disconnected loner being swept up in the adventure, you're going to have less fun being that person
My perfect party mix is
a small group of friends or soon-to-be friends that is enjoying each other's company even before the intro music plays and the recap is read. If everyone in that table wants to be a bard, then so what? Then it's "Oops all bards!" Then it's a "Battle of the Bards"!
My table is not the place for...
Negativity or bullying. It's not a place for bigotry, aggression or judgementalism. It takes all kinds to make a world and there's no ideological barrier on my games. But... We play games to have fun. Being treated unkindly is not fun. If your fun requires hurting others, find a different game.
Onerous Guac's Preferences
Game Mechanics