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Lysander
2009-09-16, 11:51 AM
Here's an idea. What if you had multiple DMs controlling a single game? Do any of you ever do this? The DMs would agree on scenarios in advance, then control different NPCs. If anything had to be made up on the fly the DMs could confer privately with each other.

Another idea building on that. What if you had two DMs, one "good" and one "evil", perhaps representing competing gods or fates. The evil DM's goal is to kill the party and protect the BBEG. The good DMs goal is to see them succeed. Of course each is limited in their power by the scenario they agreed on with the other DM. They'd haggle with each other before the game, trading pros and cons.

Bad DM: I'll let you include a Ring of Wizardry in the loot if I can add four more ghouls.
Good DM: It's a deal. And you can give the enemy mage Finger of Death if you get rid of that poison trap in the tomb entrance.

Thoughts?

Kylarra
2009-09-16, 11:58 AM
I've never had experience with more than one DM and a co-DM, so my stuff is gonna be mostly theory craft.

Re: Many DMs each playing NPCs, It's not going to work unless you have a clearly defined head DM and the rest as secondaries. Even if they all agree on scenario, you'll still need someone to be the main to give descriptions and do all the other DM stuff. Playing NPC parts is a big role, but not all of it.

Re: Good DM/Bad DM - It sounds semi-plausible as a thought exercise, but I can't see it working out too well in practice... for the players. The DMs might enjoy it, but unless the good-bad stuff is restricted to the planning stage, the two might as well be playing Black and White, at least computer minions don't mind not being a part of the story.

valadil
2009-09-16, 12:04 PM
A couple years ago we did a rotating DM campaign. It was one of my best experiences with 3.5.

There were 5 players. Each of us would take turns GMing an adventure, usually 2 or 3 sessions long. Between GMs, we levelled up. The world was vague and generic, but we filled in details as we went.

All our progress was kept in a wiki that everyone had access to. I think this was the most important thing in running the game. All our characters were kept up here. We posted NPCs too, although some GMs made notes that NPCs were reserved for their own use at a later date. We also divided loot on the wiki, which I liked a lot because it cut that out of the game sessions. We tried to keep the loot to WBL. It actually ended up being stingier than that, because nobody wanted to be the jerk who gave out the vorpal weapon. Anything non core had to be voted on. I'm still not sure why they let me play an Incanatrix (although it was the slightly gimpier 3.0 version).

The first cycle through GMs was kind of bland, to be truthful. Everyone wrote adventures that wrapped up nicely by the end. The only changes were that players had acquired loot and levels. By the second cycle we were deliberately leaving plot threads unfinished so that other GMs could run with them. Once this started up was when the campaign really got fun.

Crow
2009-09-16, 12:04 PM
All I can see this doing is slowing things down and ruining immersion. I would recommend against it.

Godskook
2009-09-16, 12:05 PM
Bad idea. It'll either (A) boil down to a competition between the two DMs, leaving the players as bystanders, or (B) boil down to bad-DM versus the PCs, and in which case, it isn't in anyway fair.

Lysander
2009-09-16, 12:12 PM
Bad idea. It'll either (A) boil down to a competition between the two DMs, leaving the players as bystanders, or (B) boil down to bad-DM versus the PCs, and in which case, it isn't in anyway fair.

While the DMs are competing, ideally whatever situation they think up will give the PCs a fair challenge. The bad DM makes a puzzle, the good DM writes a clue. The PCs will still need to figure it out.

SydneyLosstarot
2009-09-16, 12:42 PM
doing a d20M campaign with a friend of mine, and it's pure awesome!

we contain each other's mad ravings during preparation, we support each other when one of us runs out of air during dialogue acting and descriptions, and we remind each other of forgotten bits of texture

can't imagine how this campaign would have gotten as great as it is now if i ran it alone.

Kris Strife
2009-09-16, 12:47 PM
I was in a large group with three DMs while in Med Hold actually. We had about ten players, so dumping all that math on one person and having them make a plot, NPCs and so on would have been overwhelming. One DM handled the main story line and the major NPCs with the two sub DMs keeping track of the paperwork and handling the specific details for the two parties really helped out.

Tyndmyr
2009-09-16, 03:21 PM
Im currently participating in a rotating DM game, and it's a blast. Ground rules for setting, NPC, and basic rules have to be set initially of course, and its best if everyone is decently familiar with the ruleset being used.

If it helps, our current rules are book wealth, somewhat below book xp(probably -33%), and everything is legal. Nobody is really going to do anything terribly cheesy, and any attempt at infinite combos or such certainly wouldnt be allowed, but there's a great deal of freedom. Also, there are global NPCs that are shared by all players, and personal NPCs that are only typically used by one DM(unless permission is obtained beforehand). That way, people can build their crazy interweaving plotlines without accidentally destroying that of others.

warrl
2009-09-17, 01:48 AM
Reading this topic, I've seen a number of things second-DMs are supposed to be doing during the session, and what they have in common is that if the primary DM really can hand them off to someone else at all, he can hand them off to someone who isn't part of strategy sessions and doesn't have any clue what's coming next.

In fact I've seen NPCs handed off to people who had never even seen the campaign before - and seen it work well. (They were experienced at running D&D characters of similar classes.)

And in our group the DM still tracks the stats of the NPCs he's running, but we've taken the initiative list away from him.