How to Run Paid TTRPG Sessions in Singapore

Should you charge for TTRPG sessions?

The short answer is: if you're putting in the prep time, yes.

The longer answer involves understanding what "paid" means in the Singapore context. It doesn't mean expensive. Paid sessions on TTRPGoblin typically run $15–$30 per player for a 3–4 hour session — comparable to a meal out, less than a cinema booking if you're a group of four. Players in Singapore are increasingly accustomed to paying for quality GMing. Studios charge $35–$45 per session with their in-house GMs. Independent GMs running original content or niche systems are charging similar rates and filling tables.

The question isn't whether Singapore players will pay. They will. The question is what you get paid for — and the answer is your prep, your craft, and your consistency.

Charging also changes the dynamic of a table in useful ways. Players who've paid for a session show up. They don't cancel the morning of. They've made a small but real commitment, and that commitment carries through to how seriously they engage with what you've put together.

The practical side of running paid sessions

What payment actually looks like right now

TTRPGoblin does not currently process payments between GMs and players. Players pay you directly — PayNow, PayLah, bank transfer, cash, whatever you and your players prefer. The platform handles everything else: signups, approvals, reminders, and payment tracking. You log who's paid and who hasn't from your GM dashboard. No spreadsheet, no chasing PayNow screenshots in group chat.

Stripe-based payment processing for sessions is on the platform roadmap. When it arrives, it'll be opt-in and still zero-commission.

Setting your price

System and prep overhead. A rules-light narrative game might take two hours of prep. A fully mapped dungeon crawl in D&D 5e might take eight. Price accordingly.

Your experience and ratings. Starting at $15–$20 is reasonable if you're building your first player base. As your platform rating builds and your waitlists grow, there's no reason not to move toward $25. Players make decisions based on ratings, not just price.

Offer Game Credit. You can use TTRPGoblin's built-in systems to offer players a certain percentage of what they pay for a session as credit for future sessions — this reduces the cost of games overall, and helps you attract and retain players. Good when you're testing adventures, or want to fill a particular date.

What you keep

Everything. TTRPGoblin charges GMs a subscription fee for platform access. It does not take a percentage of what players pay you. A $25-per-player session with five players is $125 in your pocket, not $125 minus a 15% commission. This is a deliberate design choice — we want you to have the fruits of your success, and are here to be your tool, not your boss.

Finding players without cold-posting

The hardest part of running independent sessions isn't the GMing. It's the marketing. Cold-posting in Discord servers and Telegram group chats is how most independent GMs try to find players. It's exhausting, inconsistent, and produces a lot of last-minute table collapses.

TTRPGoblin's approach to this is the module waitlist system. A module is a reusable adventure template — you create it once, describe the adventure you want to run, and players join the waitlist to say they're interested. When you're ready to schedule, the platform automatically notifies every waitlisted player with the session details and a direct signup link.

This means you're not announcing sessions to a cold audience. You're announcing to people who specifically said they wanted to play your game. The conversion rate is significantly higher, and you spend zero time chasing signups.

Waitlists grow over time. A module you created six months ago might have thirty interested players on it by the time you schedule another run. That's thirty warm leads who get a Telegram notification the day after you publish.

You can also choose to build your own Telegram channel for your players, and the platform can post there for you too.

Social recommendations

For GMs on paid tiers, the platform also surfaces your sessions to players who've played with your past players — friends-of-friends, essentially. This works because TTRPG tables are social. Players who've enjoyed a session with someone you've GMed for are meaningfully more likely to enjoy your table than a random player from a cold post.

The operational side: what TTRPGoblin handles for you

Signups and approvals. Players tap a button. A request appears in your GM queue. You approve or decline. Approved players are added to the session and get a confirmation.

Reminders. Automatic Telegram messages go out to all confirmed players before the session. You don't have to send a "see you tomorrow" message to five people individually.

Cancellations. If a player cancels before you approve them, you're notified. Otherwise, you'll have control. If they cancel late — within seven days of the session — that's flagged on their platform record. GMs can see a player's late cancellation history before approving them. This discourages the casual cancel-and-forget behaviour that plagues games. You can also choose to collect payment before games if preferred.

Payment tracking. From your dashboard, you can mark each player as paid, pending, or waived. If a player's session fee is being comped (common for hosts providing their home as a venue), the platform handles that automatically.

Post-session feedback. After the session closes, the platform sends feedback requests to your players. Ratings appear on your public GM profile, which is one of the main things prospective players look at before signing up.

What a realistic first few months looks like

You create an account. You build one or two modules — one-shot adventures you've run before or want to run. You publish them and let the waitlists start building. You get your past players to give your first ratings on the platform. Your profile gets real data on it: sessions run, average rating, systems offered.

Then you schedule a paid session. Your waitlisted players get notified. Some of them sign up. You fill the table. You run it, you collect payment via PayNow, you close the session. Players leave ratings. Your profile improves.

Month two, you have a stronger profile, more waitlisted players, and a clearer sense of what's worth charging for. GMs on paid tiers report earning an average of five times their subscription cost back in session revenue per month. That's not a promise — it depends on how much you run — but it gives a sense of the economics.

The subscription tiers, briefly

Explorer ($0/month): Up to four free sessions per month, up to three modules. Sessions published to your dedicated game group only. Good for getting started.

One Shot Runner ($30/month): Unlimited free sessions, two paid sessions per month included. Full publishing to the @ttrpgoblin platform channel. Waitlist notifications activated. This is the tier where independent GMing starts to look like a real thing rather than a side experiment.

Session Master ($50/month): Four paid sessions per month. Everything in One Shot Runner plus profile-based recommendations — your sessions appear in front of players based on their stated preferences and player archetype.

World Builder ($100/month): Unlimited everything. All features. For GMs running multiple sessions a week and treating this seriously.

New GMs get a 30-day trial with full Session Master access. No credit card required. Start earning immediately.

One thing worth saying plainly

Running paid TTRPG sessions in Singapore is viable. Not "viable if you hustle nonstop" — viable in a "run two sessions a month, cover your subscription and all the things you spend on for TTRPGs, feel good about what you're doing" sense. The supply-demand gap in the Singapore scene is real. Players are looking for tables. Independent GMs with good ratings and a growing waitlist are not struggling to fill seats.

The infrastructure to run this as an independent operation now exists. Whether you use it is up to you.