Things you can learn by being an Old School DM

You can get learn a lot from being an Old School GM and as odd as it seems the social skills I learned at the table have come in handy many times at work and in real life.

And in case anyone asks, you absolutely can learn these with any game and edition but I think that the looser nature of the rules and the social expectations of the games and maybe the era, pushed me farther in that direction than say had something like 4e existed than.

Bluntly,sometimes like life my calls weren't fair, I couldn't just download the latest greatest (so I had to improvise) and I had to deal with the fallout from those choices. In short I had to lead.

Over the years I learned to give orders, make my decisions stick, have confidence, social acumen, good organization , people management , how to keep a group happy and on track and how to think on my feet.

Sure there were other places I could have learned those things but nowhere that would have been as much fun.

Right now if you can convince you players to go along (especially the younger ones who are more conflict adverse) and to be a player or a Judge (or a DM or a Ref) and
to game game it old style, all of you may just learn something about yourselves.