If you are the one who runs the games at your table and you dread the hours of prep, Mike Shea has written a book aimed squarely at you. Rise of the Lazy Gamemaster, the newest entry in his long-running Lazy GM series under the Sly Flourish banner, has come to Kickstarter this month, and its whole pitch is helping you run great tabletop RPGs while preparing a lot less.
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See how it worksShea is the author behind Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master, the GM-prep book that turned "prepare less, improvise more" into a mantra for a generation of game masters, along with follow-ups like The Lazy DM's Workbook and Forge of Foes. Rise of the Lazy Gamemaster is roughly 160 pages and lands in hardcover, PDF, EPUB and even Markdown. Shea is clear that it is not a rewrite of Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master. Instead it expands his eight steps of Lazy GM Prep with concrete examples, ready-to-run scenario outlines and beefed-up random tables, all shaped by years of feedback since the original.
The other big change is reach. Where the earlier books leaned on Dungeons & Dragons, this one is built to be system-agnostic, with advice pitched at GMs running D&D (both the 2014 and 2024 rules), Shadowdark, Daggerheart, Dragonbane, Dolmenwood, Nimble and plenty more. If you have been curious but unsure it applies to your table, the campaign includes a free 36-page fully laid-out preview you can download and read before pledging.
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Find events near youFewer hours of prep is the single biggest thing standing between most groups and a regular session. If it has been nagging you to finally start running games for your friends, this is a gentle push. Round up some players and find or start a group on Backseat Gamer, then let the book do the heavy lifting on prep.
Sources: Sly Flourish | Kickstarter | TTRPG Fans
