What kind of GM are you? - Factor analysis results
Greetings, programs!
2 weeks ago, I asked what kind of GM you are with a 43 question survey. 101 of you answered! Then I analysed the data to find 9 underlying factors to GM style and named them. Then I got bored and didn’t publish the results outside of Discord.
Well, now it’s time to publish the results! I’ve named all 9 underlying dimensions of GM style, and created an acronym!
S.T.O.P.J.A.D.E.N.
I also wrote some detailed descriptions of some of the components. Here they are:
Preparism
If you’re high on Preparism, you spend a lot of time planning your sessions ahead of time and building great encounters. You have lots of maps, and use them even outside of encounters. You’d rather follow the game you laid out for your players than be surprised, and when there’s a question of what’s happening outside of the players’ view, you’ve probably already been tracking it.
If you’re low on Preparism, you’d rather improvise than plan. No matter what crazy idea your players come up with, you can figure out how to roll with it. You don’t have many maps, and the ones you do prepare are more likely to be used in combat than in roleplaying. You can get ready for a session very quickly, as long as you understand the world’s lore.
Directorism
If you’re high on Directorism, you’re interested in making your players shine. Your players work with you to build the world and set the scene at the table. You give plenty of information about your setting to the players, and they feel like the center of the game world.
If you’re low on Directorism, you’re in charge of this story. This is your world, and you’re the one who immerses everyone in it. There’s plenty going on in your world that the players have no idea about. And you’d rather your players avoid making joke characters.
Egalitarianism
If you’re high on Egalitarianism, everyone at your table is an equal. You take turns GMing, and tell lots of different stories together. You like challenging the characters rather than the players, and are happy to kill off a character if the table thinks it makes a great moment. You trust your players to look after their own dice and character sheets.
If you’re low on Egalitarianism, your players aren’t ready to do what you do just yet. You’re probably the only one who GMs, and you’re more likely to roll the dice and manage the character sheets. You only run the one adventure in your world, and you’d rather avoid killing off a character and making things harder for everyone.
I wish My ADHD had given Me enough attention span to do detailed descriptions of the other 6, but alas. The good news is: You can look at the data and decide for yourself what you think they mean.
Closing thoughts: In My search for an easy to remember acronym, I realised that the dimensions seem to mostly be clustered into pairs.
Strategism and Tacticism are about how challenge is presented to the party
Orderism and Preparism are about approaches to planning and the unexpected
Jesterism and Authentism are about sources of fun
Directorism and Egalitarianism are about attitudes to player-GM collaboration
And Narrativism is on its own
So you could visualise all of this data as four cartesian grids: Challenge, Planning, Fun, and Collaboration, and a slider for Narrativism. If I’m right about the pairs.
The following users expressed interest in being notified when results are released: @[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected]
Interesting Links–Week of 4/22/26
At All Dead Generations, there was a look at what a Beholder might look like as a biblical angel. Wejia Cheng, an editor with Standard Ebooks, wrote about how eschewing automated shortcuts and doing the work can sometimes further our goals better than having the work done for us. At Sly Flourish, there's a discussion of mixing and matching preferred rules from different 5e versions. Standard Ebooks Releases The Pearl Lady Rose's Daughter by Mary Augusta Ward Olney Hymns by John […]https://alexanderkeane.com/2026/04/22/interesting-links-week-of-4-22-26/
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Alex Keane
