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Smilgram
2012-12-11, 04:49 PM
I don't run games very often, but I'm running a Shadowrun game right now for my group because the DM for our D&D game is busy at work. At the last game, the group was trying to escape after completing a mission in a city suffering from an outbreak of a VITAS plague while being assaulted by feral and intelligent ghouls. When they finally made it to a boat and they were attacked by an enemy rigger's drone (with machine guns and missiles), at which point one of my players commented to me:

"If I had to describe your DM style, I'd call it closest to Jigsaw (from the movie Saw). Whenever we get past one threat there's always one more complicated and deadly for us to face around the next corner."

After thinking about it, I'll take that as a compliment. I always thought Jigsaw showed a lot of intelligence and ingenuity in his challenges, yet always left a way out (even if it sometimes left you crippled for life). That's a good role model for designing fun games in my book.

How about you, how do describe your DM's style? What do you DMs use as a role model for how to design fun games for your players?

CarpeGuitarrem
2012-12-11, 05:05 PM
I strive to GM like a martini shaker: I take all the ingredients (which includes player actions), shake it all up, and then pour it out and see what happened. Set up dominoes for the players to knock down, make actions have consequences, put powder kegs on the table and let the players throw their sparks around.

Yukitsu
2012-12-11, 05:18 PM
Make the players think whatever is happening was their idea.

Amidus Drexel
2012-12-11, 05:23 PM
1. Plan what the NPCs are doing, and lots of statblocks.
2. Throw PCs into the mix.
3. Improvise, and then claim it was all in the original plan.

I think some of the best scenes I had in my last campaign I had to come up with almost on the spot.

I'm also not above having my PCs die; sometimes they even kill each other. :smallbiggrin: My last campaign had a pretty high lethality rate.

Toy Killer
2012-12-11, 05:31 PM
I'd probably say something akin to Joker. I'm a troper at heart, and I love throwing in little puns into my encounters and story lines that take a little bit for the players to realize. It flags the NPCs and such as being important to remember for later on (after all, I won't put the effort into a throw away concept).

For example:

The PCs hear of help needed by a Queen. She tells the PCs that she has had a problem at Blackburn, the dwarven settlement hasn't made shipments in months and she sent a ranger to go and find out what has happened and he never returned.

Along the way to Blackburn, they find the quarry the dwarves used to make their product abandoned and eventually find the ranger. He tells them that a local artificer has been turning the dwarves into half-golems and are falling irrevocably evil. He had friends in Blackburn, and the twisted crimes against nature can't be stood any longer, offering a great reward if they can A)kill the three clay half-golems, two stone half-golems, one flesh half-golem and one Iron half-golem, B) bring him the tome that the artificer is using to make these half-golems and C) kill the artificer, and put bring her artificial heart to the Ranger in a wooden box.

They go into the town, every thing is wrecked and ruined. the PCs save some survivors, hunt down the golems and find the Albino artificer, return for the reward.

About a week later, someone will roll their eyes when they realized what transpired, and usually the baddie of the adventure has a new nick name (Snow White, in this case, if you didn't get the joke) for the Players to remember her by.

^I plan on using that one soon, actually...

Whatever I decide to name her and when I decide to bring her back, I don't have to remind the players what they did or how they know her because they remember the joke. Plus, even if I don't use her again, it's still funny out of character.

I have a tendency to make real world references in game from time to time, shout outs to video games and such (Like an evil bard that used 'Would you kindly' before making suggestions, or having homunculus that teeter about saying "Are you still there?" And going "OWWwww" like the turrets in Portal). When I make encounters/adventures, I tend to name them after movies and movie quotes.

Morithias
2012-12-11, 05:35 PM
Find videogame I like.

Steal plot from videogame I like and make alterations to make it original setting.

Find eroges no one has ever played.

Steal characters from games no one has ever played. Only make minor alterations to fit the new setting, since no one plays them and I'm the only one who would know them (plus the games I tend to steal from you don't want to admit you play anyways).

Find players and ask them to make characters.

Alter setting and plot according to characters made.

Introduce them to the setting and basic plot.

Wing it!

Lord Il Palazzo
2012-12-11, 05:59 PM
I'm a strange cross between an over-prepared DM and a seat-of-the-pants DM. I tend to latch on to some detail of the campaign or setting and lay out a lot of plans about what that character or group is doing or how that dungeon is layed out or what that culture is like and then be super prepared on that subject and ready to wing it if the game heads in a different direction. If I expect combat, I'll have stats ready for everyone I think the PCs will fight and even if I don't I'll have a vague idea of the stats of anyone the PCs might fight. Maps are generally drawn on the fly based on the type of room that would make sense in the current location, though if there's a dungeon rather than just a castle or natural cave I'll usually plan it out in detail.

As for story style and setting, I'll start a game with a basic idea (knowing the main setting, who the villain is and what he's planning, sometimes with a few juicy set pieces I want to work in) but I'll leave lots or room for this to be adjusted and added to based on the PCs and their backgrounds and actions. If one PC is from a tiny village near the capital, then there's a tiny village near the cpital. If one PC had his family murdered and is looking for the one responsible, chances are it'll turn out it was part of the villain's plan that wasn't originally obvious. If one of the PCs has close ties to a certain powerful NPC, the plan could will expand to involve that NPC in some way. This way, there's a reason that this particular band of adventurers is facing down this particular threat which doubles as a reason the adventurers are together in the first place. If the villain is the guy who killed the cleric's parents, is an old rival of the wizard's mentor, who's in charge of the mercinaries the fighter is on the run from and whose evil plan happens to require the artifact the rogue stole, it makes perfect sense that these are the four people concerned with fighting him and it's more engaging and believable than four random guys meeting in a bar and end up overthrowing an evil duke.

I do borrow a fair amount from other sources. When I needed a background story for a queen and the founding of her nation from a period of relative chaos, I pulled the story from an obscure RPG that a grand total of 3 people I've ever met have played. The queen herself is a mix of the character from that game and a couple other characters from TV shows I like or was watching as I wrote the background. A powerful outsider who figures strongly into the campaign background has more than a little of The Doctor in him (mostly 2nd and 3rd with a bit of 10th) but with a strong dash of Obi Wan and a few personal interests and habits mandated by a PC's backstory. In my opinion, as long as I'm not distractingly blatant (I stick mostly to things that only one or two players would get if I referenced directly) and use them in ineresting ways, any of the various bits of culture bouncing around my brain is fair game.

Tengu_temp
2012-12-11, 06:00 PM
Put story and characters above dungeoncrawling and gathering treasure.

Run a game with a specific premise, with PCs created specifically with that premise in mind.

Write a cool story for the game, but expect and encourage the players to get off the rails.

Create colorful and unique NPCs, but let the PCs be the stars and main characters.

Run difficult battles where it's easy to get knocked out, but hard to actually die. Reserve PC death for special, dramatic occasions.

Admit when you made a mistake and don't be afraid to retcon it. You're not some kind of untouchable authority figure looming over the table, you're another guy who wants the game to be fun, just like everyone else.

If a silly situation in the game made the players laugh, if something that happened to an NPC made them feel sad, if they got angry at a villain and if they felt awesome when the accomplished something - you know that the game was a success.

genderlich
2012-12-11, 11:01 PM
I'm almost done DMing my first game. I'm obviously not a master, but I've had a great time, and this is what I've learned about myself.

Improvise a ton. Even when everything goes according to your plans, you will still need to make things up on the fly.

I'm probably more linear and obvious in my plots than I should be. I should work on that. I wanted them to go off the rails, but they never did except when they killed themselves.

My players keep saying "When DoctorStandard DMs, it's D&D Hard Mode!" I always bring them very close to defeat, making it all the more satisfying when they survive. But the only PCs that die are due to their own stupid decisions.

I kill off their allies... a lot. They only have one left alive, and she was thought to be a villain until the very end of last session.

I've tried to weave the characters' backstories into the plot, but only one really gave me anything to work with. Still, it turned out well.

There's a perfect balance zone between infodump and just not telling them anything about the plot, where they discover by themselves just enough information to keep them interested. I have yet to find it.

I'm never letting that one player be a 12 year old girl with the powers of a 11th level Oracle again.

Lord Il Palazzo
2012-12-12, 12:52 AM
I've tried to weave the characters' backstories into the plot, but only one really gave me anything to work with. Still, it turned out well.This is my experience as well and I feel like it's a pretty good way to guage player expectations. A player whose entire backstory is "I used to be a soldier in an army but I got tired of following orders so now I'm a soldier of fortune" is probably looking to get something different out of a game than someone who sends you three pages about his character's mysterious lineage and possible ties to a powerful and ancient dragon. Being able to figure which one your group as a whole is closer two and balance the game so those on both ends of the spectrum get a game they can enjoy without alienating the people on the other end is one of the biggest challenges I face as a DM (with varying degrees of success.)

Anderlith
2012-12-12, 01:00 AM
My style is that the PC's are professionals at what they can do but they aren't special snowflakes, if they are smart enough, strong enough, & fast enough, they will become legends. If you are cunning & wily you'll make in far in my games, I reward those that think on their feet. I like to craft my own worlds & always progress from level 1 to level 20 in the storyline.

When I run a monster encounter the creature is going to act like it should, retreat is an option & they will use tactics if they are intelligent enough (I have ran several nasty encounters such as crippling several party members from a single undead minotaur, to 6 tiny vipers poisoning half the party into unconsciousness). The players should treat the world as real, that way they are more enthralled by the story.

Karoht
2012-12-12, 01:06 AM
*sitting in lawn chair at the beach*
What's my DM style?
...DM style...
...DM style...


To be honest, if it doesn't feel like an awesome music video, I'm probably not giving it 100% that day.

Totally Guy
2012-12-12, 01:57 AM
I just do what the game tells me to do.

BootStrapTommy
2012-12-12, 02:11 AM
Sandbox. I sandbox. I put the players in a box full of sand and left them rip.

However, I have a cat and he tends to use the sandbox as a litter box, so occasionally the players dig up cat ****. And it usually explodes in their face.

I also absolutely love players who think on their feet and out of the box. Thus I often change plans based on any brilliance the party may muster. However, I strictly enforce consequences for their mistakes.

Zelphas
2012-12-12, 02:15 AM
I'm fairly new at DMing, but what I've found is that I tend to have a basic idea of what certain places look like and what people live there (I made my own demiplane for my first campaign), and then I fill in details as the players ask about things. My players, oddly enough, seem mostly happy to chug along the rails I've tentatively placed for them at the moment, so I haven't had to create anything entirely new yet, but I make up a lot as I go.

hymer
2012-12-12, 05:58 AM
I'm a builder at heart. I sometimes use published material for NPC stats and other ideas, but I like to build - NPCs, nations, plots, histories, languages, subcontinents, bloodlines, cosmologies, gods, technologies... So when I came across the notion of the sandbox campaign, I felt right at home. If only it weren't so time consuming, I'd probably DM like that nearly all the time.
But another part of what I do, which I emphasize, is I ask the players to trust me. And of course do my darndest to live up to that trust, and apologize when I fail.

Yora
2012-12-12, 07:31 AM
1. Plan what the NPCs are doing, and lots of statblocks.
2. Throw PCs into the mix.
3. Improvise, and then claim it was all in the original plan.
I think the result is even better if the players think they are putting you and the NPCs on the defensive, trying your best to salvage the original plan despite the heavy opposition of the PCs.

DigoDragon
2012-12-12, 09:00 AM
My style? Hmm, I'm not sure if i'm describing it correctly but I like to set up my campains to put the players the "Big Damn Heroes" moment. The campaign starts with some minor issue, then quickly escalates to problem on a national scale and the PCs then gotta show up at ground zero and put the problem down (Usually with violence).

Rules-wise I play semi-loosely. Like for Shadowrun 4e, I usually don't roll against fake SIN/license rating to see if the Runner's card get's found out. Instead I just play it as the fake card's rating is the number of times that the Runner can use it before it needs to be ditched.
Worked out for my players this way.

Dienekes
2012-12-12, 09:02 AM
I'm the over-prepared GM. I stat almost everything, create plans, back-up plans, contingency back-up plans, and more. It works mostly because I only GM for my close friends and I've gotten fairly good at predicting what decisions they'll make. And in the off chance they do mess up a big plan I tend to have enough prepared scenarios that I can put one of them in without worry.

OverdrivePrime
2012-12-12, 09:31 AM
I'm a world-creator, sandbox GM. I've got my various metaplots going on in the background, always moving forward, ready to interact with the PCs should they become interested or stumble into them.

I create the continents, the towns, the cultures, and throw in various ruins, dungeons, NPCs and motivations. Because life is busy with a toddler around these days, I've also got a few purchased adventure paths that I've retooled to fit into my world.

The PCs get to run free and bump into stuff... and I get to see what happens. We all have a lot of fun. :smallbiggrin:

Karoht
2012-12-12, 10:18 AM
I usually have an origin and 6 potential endings, and not a care in the world how I get there.
My Starcraft campaign (D20 modern, heavy duty homebrew) is the first game I've run where I have an on rails plot for each session, mostly because the players seem a bit tired of the sandbox lately.

I also heavily adhere to Rule of Fun. I don't challenge my players with high level save or dies or absurd amounts of damage, I challenge them with enemies who use simple and basic tactics, with important encounters involving more advanced tactics. Think Tucker's Kobolds, but the DM isn't being a jerk.

supermonkeyjoe
2012-12-12, 10:26 AM
I tend to be fairly well prepared but in very short amounts, I never plan ahead further than the next session, I will have a variety of NPCs and encounters ready to drop into the mix at a moments notice, Various events will occur unless the PCs intervene, as the PCs interfere in one scheme or another they will grow and develop until finally climaxing at the end of the campaign at which point I will look back on it all and inform my players that it all went exactly as I planned

valadil
2012-12-12, 10:41 AM
I run simple plots, but I run 12 of them at the same time. When the players find a dead body, they don't know which plot(s) its attached to. Sorting out which information goes where becomes nontrivial.

I like to keep my games urban. Hard to have simultaneous plots in a dungeon.

I like humor that comes from the characters. I don't like characters that are reduced to jokes. I also like absurd situations. The sort of thing where a casual observer would wonder WTF we're playing, but there was a logical series of events that led to the situation the players are in.

I feed off the players' hate. I personally offend them with my NPCs. Then I let them kill those NPCs. It's a stupid formula but it works really well. The way I see it is if you have an irrational hatred towards an NPC it becomes a whole lot easier to portray a character who shares that same hatred.

willpell
2012-12-12, 10:47 AM
I'm probably best described as something of a benevolent megalomaniac. I tend to be somewhat controlling and to have a narrowish plot - not quite railroady, but often without a lot of mapping other than in the places I'm most certain the players will go, and thus a tendency to nudge them away from going elsewhere. But on the plus side I do really try to ensure that the players are enjoying themselves, to the point of bending the world around them to as great of an extent as they're comfortable with, while still making an effort to provide surprises. My campaign worlds are virtualy always vast in scope, but sketchily enough described that I can zoom in on whatever the players are drawn to; I aim to provide versimilitude by having the world seem to operate itself, but virtually never to the point of forcing the players to participate in important events that they don't care about, or to die just because a high-level NPC felt like going on a killing spree across their path.

LordHavelock
2012-12-12, 01:47 PM
1. Plan what the NPCs are doing, and lots of statblocks.
2. Throw PCs into the mix.
3. Improvise, and then claim it was all in the original plan.

I think some of the best scenes I had in my last campaign I had to come up with almost on the spot.

I'm also not above having my PCs die; sometimes they even kill each other. :smallbiggrin: My last campaign had a pretty high lethality rate.

This, and always be ready to let the players fill any details you didn't already have in mind or are not story dependent.

I remember I had planned the campaign to go a certain way, but one of the players had written up such a cool backstory for their character involving their lost father (one of the other characters was his half-brother) that they decided that instead of pursing the adventure I had planned, they wanted to go the elven capital and see what they could find. I rolled with it, turned in to one of the most fun adventures we've ever played.

CarpeGuitarrem
2012-12-12, 01:57 PM
*sitting in lawn chair at the beach*
What's my DM style?
...DM style...
...DM style...


To be honest, if it doesn't feel like an awesome music video, I'm probably not giving it 100% that day.
I...I feel the compulsion to write this entire song now.

Karoht
2012-12-12, 03:04 PM
I...I feel the compulsion to write this entire song now.
Yeah, I have that effect some times.
I was going to push further with lyrics but I figured that might sour the humor just a little.


And yeah, I do try to line up story and action set pieces that would indeed make some pretty cool music videos.
PS-Lindsey Sterling. If you don't know who she is, look her up. I love setting up sessions with at least one of her songs as partial inspiration to a scene or two.

Sylvos330
2012-12-12, 04:09 PM
I'm a Sandbox DM but to add onto it I tend to make my players characters really powerful and let them run around with their power.

My last game was VTM, it was a Sabbat game and I was using the Elder rules. Their pack ran all over the world and wrecked everything they came accross. I set up an encounter with werewolves and Pentex, each wanted the other wiped out so the players took out both camps. The werewolf combat did scare them a bit but in the end they came out alive with some fun Famori powers and Werewolf magic items.

I think I may be sick in the head... :elan:

yosimoshe
2012-12-15, 06:07 AM
Start with what the players ask me to do, continue with altering it halfway in, adding their guesses about it, claiming it was my idea.

Siegel
2012-12-15, 09:30 AM
I just do what the game tells me to do.


Yeah me too. I tend to only play games that have good GM advice and !procedure!.
But i also like to put difficult choices in front of the PCs that will close up certain paths for them.

TheThan
2012-12-15, 03:26 PM
My (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_Ycw0d_Uow) style (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LSIr1LO6sVk)?
I call it the art of DMing without DMing.
As a DM, I’ve evolved quite a bit since I’ve started. I used to write out long campaigns with predetermined outcomes, throw the players on rails and expect certain outcomes from players.
It didn’t work out so well, people fell off the rails all the time. I found they were not interested in my completely original and awesome plot. Needless to say, it didn’t work too good.
So what I started doing, is listen to my players. They began telling me what they didn’t like in my games, and I started to change to make them happier. After all, if the players aren’t having fun, I’m failing as a DM.
Now I’ve become more of a sandbox Dm. I provide the players with interesting NPCs, scenarios, situations, environments etc and let the players decide what they want to do about it. I know it sounds lazy but I do spend a lot of time working on the various NPCs and scenarios.

Phaedrus2129
2012-12-15, 04:19 PM
I'm a sandbox mini-arcer. I sketch out a world and let the players do whatever they like in it; but then I throw a curve-ball at them and suck them into a mini-plot, 3-6 game sessions worth.

One plot I've got planned for a post-apoc RPG I'm running is that the players will wander into this small farming town that survived the war. They'll be encouraged to stay the night; but in the morning they'll be rustled out of bed and accused of murdering the mayor! They have to exonerate themselves... Or if they're not in the mood, they could just do a jailbreak, skip town and head back into the sandbox, with one less town they can visit safely.

scarmiglionne4
2012-12-17, 09:42 PM
I try to change my style with each campaign. I have not really been DMing very long so am not sure if I have found a style that is my own other than I like to have a lot of planned material.

So far I have run two campaigns. The first one was pretty linear. I had a few forks in the road, but it more or less went in a straight line. Characters were not lead around by the nose, but taking divergent paths was made intentionally boring. I had many fights, and a few puzzles. I gave out to much treasure too fast.

My second campaign I tried to make a sizable enchanted landscape to be explored. It was supposed to be pretty open. Lots of side quests, and a main quest. The players wanted to be lead around by the nose, so I had to do that again. Most side quests were left to be handled by NPCs. Lots of puzzles, few fights but VERY challenging. Very story oriented, none of which came from the players. They refused to role-play.

My next campaign I am going for 90% open world. Most of the campaign will be "short stories" with 2-3 main quests that may not be hooked right away. I am trying to build a Low Fantasy Fallout inspired by Golden Axe, Sieken Densetsu and Final Fantasy I and II.

Doxkid
2012-12-18, 10:41 AM
Step 1-Create a tasteful plot/story line that allows great flexibility

Step 2-Ravage my players in battle using good tactics and a bit of psychology.

Step 3-Reward with puzzles, chances to toy around, etc

Step 4-Have my game die.

Reathin
2012-12-18, 04:50 PM
Architect. I can design dungeons pretty well, along with traps and ambushes and such. I like to think they're interesting places, description is okay, and, in particular, I make them as three dimensional as possible and use that to help in the design (this helps with some of the more insane strategies they come up with).

Sadly, I'm not very good at improv or voices, so my dming in person could use a bit of work.

thamolas
2012-12-18, 05:08 PM
I don't run D&D anymore, having created my own system, based on a novel I wrote. When I run a game, my focus in on challenging the characters (and players) to develop as people. I cobble together a handful of scenarios that might play out, define a handful of likely NPCs, and then open up the sandbox; allowing the players to go where they want. I like to start the players off with familiar tropes and then let the game get weird if the players push themselves.

My players know that if they do stupid things, they will likely face consequences for their actions; likewise with smart things. They understand that there are other forces at work in the game world, both higher and lower than themselves and I don't pull punches - characters die when they should.

I do like to make sure that, at character creation, there's an overall theme with the group so that there's a reason for them to travel together and do whatever they're going to do. If the characters are deep and interesting, the best stories will take care of themselves.

RufusCorvus
2012-12-19, 02:34 AM
I like putting a world out there, putting some PCs in it, and seeing them interact with it. I don't care about story at all, as a player or as a DM. If I want to experience a narrative, I'll read a book or watch a movie. If I have a story I want to tell, I'll write it with characters that will participate in it the way I've envisaged, not try and force a group of people to stay on the plot rails. So, I sandbox. It's a hell of a lot of work for the DM to be pulled off well, requiring either encyclopedic knowledge of the game world or else a great capacity for improvisation. But it's also work for the player, requiring initiative and proactivity to seek out adventures instead of waiting for some hook.

But I also don't like DM fiat. I balk at the idea of being Rule Zeroed and at the idea of doing the same to anyone else. If something is allowable within the rules and the social contract of the campaign didn't specify that something or other was not allowed in that campaign, then nothing saps my sense of fun more than the action being vetoed on the spot except for doing it myself. If I didn't have enough foresight to see the ramifications of some judgment I made during the pre-game, then more the fool I am. (Note: If it's a case of something being actively disruptive to play, then I'll see about dealing with the problem and coming to some kind of solution.)

olejars
2012-12-19, 05:16 PM
I use the sandbox approach. I'll have the plot I'd love to tell but if the pc's don't go for it that arc still goes on just without them. I also fly by the seat of my pants alot.

For instance, I DM'd for the group I play with one evening after telling them make level fives with no restrictions. The first session began with them helping get rid of some kobolds that threatened a small town. The second session had a new PC join that was a samurai that hunted Oni. That gave me immediate direction that sucked them all into a demon/devil hunt for eight more sessions that ended with them trying to save a city from a Kython infestation caused by the half son of Mephistopheles.

Toofey
2012-12-21, 02:38 PM
I like sandbox style play but I'm also a prepper, which makes my sandboxing equal parts prepped stuff from notes that comes up as the characters figure out what's going on, and stuff I pull from my rear to accommodate where the players are going with the plot.

Most of my adventures I figure out what is going on: who is the BBEG and what are they doing that is why they are the BBEG. If I do it right players will sandbox into it because the BBEG will be impacting their game world. That's my idea.

Kobold Esq
2012-12-22, 08:04 PM
I find that I only need just enough prep to get from one session to the next. Every once in a while I'll throw in some "random" encounter that is unrelated to anything I ever had planned.

Then I let players talk amongst themselves while I set up the battle, or double check some stats, and pay attention to what they say.

Inevitably, someone comes up with some sort of conspiracy theory that everyone else thinks is stupid. I then steal this, make some minor changes on the fly, then decide that is roughly what is actually going on.

-------------

Imagine if the writers of LOST based their later seasons on internet speculation, not on anything they had actually originally planned.

It is surprisingly effective.

Need_A_Life
2012-12-22, 10:47 PM
I steal plots, NPCs and other ideas from any source I can.

Then I try to set up a plot where, even if I was to hand the players my notes (and a "decoder" to deal with my handwriting and made-up abbreviations), that wouldn't help them one bit.

Then, as the characters stumble around and make stuff happen, the world reacts and the original plot idea I stole becomes the backdrop for whatever stuff is happening because of the PCs.
Sure, the city being under martial law and flesh-eating mutants trying to destroy world as we know it might be the original plot idea, but if the players decide that getting one character's little sister a date with that guy she likes instead, then that's where the story is headed. If they decide to try to seize control of the military instead, then that's what we'll do.
Ah, who am I kidding; they'll try to do both and the result will be hilarious.

willpell
2012-12-25, 04:32 AM
The things I tend to like or dislike as DM are much like the way I feel as a player. For instance, I wouldn't build a character whose concept is "paladin" and then build him as a Factotum with a bunch of Devotion feats and Martial Study crusader maneuvers and such, just because this is more efficient in the system. If I want to play a "monk" conceptually, then I want it to say "monk" on my character sheet, and if a player in a campaign I'm running wants to be a monk, I expect him to take the Monk class. If he routinely fails to contribute in-game, I'll try to start floating him bennies of various sorts until he seems to be on a par with the other players, but I don't like the attitude that optimizers seem to tend to have, where they want an ironclad guarantee of what they'll be capable of in game, before the game ever starts. Sorry, folks, but I'm just not that organized; things come to my attention when they happen, and sometimes they screw up my plans and I need time to figure out what to do about it. Plus D&D is just a time-consuming game in general. I don't respond well to someone crying foul in response to a judgment call made in the heat of the moment; nobody signed a contract at the start of the game saying that you were always going to be able to accomplish everything you set out to do within the bounds of your character concept.

The best player I've had to date has responded very well to my attitude, because they were more into seeing how the character thought about a situation than about actually dominating the situation, though she does always try to turn it to her advantage as best she can (she is a Drow, after all). When my plot called for her bodyguard to rescue her from a bunch of monstrous spiders, I just ruled that they got her, and the player wrote up her feeling scared and helpless as she was dragged away, and then her vitriol toward the rest of the party for not helping her in time, and so forth. It's been a very good relationship, but it seems to be an attitude that's rare among D&D players (this particular player, like myself, is more familiar with White Wolf games, where the emphasis is very much on storytelling over accomplishment).

Amphetryon
2012-12-25, 11:04 AM
I tend to try to build "story webs." Players have free reign to go anywhere they like along the web, but all the points on it are connected in one way or another, and getting to some points means going through other plot points along the web.

Of course, then I have Players that jump off the web entirely. . . .