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View Full Version : DM Help I feel like I suck as a gm....



MonkeySage
2017-09-14, 02:45 PM
In a recent session, I was all caught up in trying to deal with all of my players buying things at once and competing for my attention... And when I failed to give equal attention to each player, one of them stormed off in anger. I have another player telling me all the time that the only reason he keeps playing in my campaign is because he's my friend and he feels an obligation to stay for the others.

And all this has served to destroy my confidence as a gm, questioning whether or not I should even try to continue the campaign...

ZamielVanWeber
2017-09-14, 03:01 PM
Without more information I honestly cannot judge. However just because someone does not like your game does not men you are a bad GM; there is a lot more to it. Would you mind providing more details (system and such maybe?) and more details would make it easier to help you.

MonkeySage
2017-09-14, 03:10 PM
This last session, I had set up an elaborate side adventure and anticipated them going after it. When they spent 2 hours shopping instead, it was kinda something I hadn't prepared for. I had a guideline for things the players might be able to find in town set aside for this. I had an effect over the town which allows the crafting of magic items on the cheap, which means magic items could also be purchased for a fraction of their usual market price. One of my players decided to sell a magic item they bought before the campaign started and ended up doing so at market price. So, when the other player, the one who stormed off, wanted to buy back that item, I had the thought in my head that the person who just bought it would want to sell it at a mark up, so he'd make a profit. This didn't sit well with the player, because everything else was being sold at below usual market price. His tipping point was when he started to feel like he was being ignored... in truth, his messages were being buried in the chat.

The game is Pathfinder, we use Roll20 and Skype.

Koo Rehtorb
2017-09-14, 03:14 PM
Tell them to give you constructive criticism instead of being an *******.

Tinkerer
2017-09-14, 03:36 PM
Ooh, yeah having a magic item sale will side track almost ANY party. And I wrote a big 5 paragraph response before I saw that you are using Roll20 and Skype which... 90% of my advice from that wouldn't have applied to. Honestly it sounds like a brat player to me. Just explain what happened, I mean he can see the chat so there's really no reason for him to have been surprised by that. Me, I would have explained that the item was sold to a different merchant which explains why the merchant paid full value and why it wasn't available at the moment. Or that the merchant had sold that particular item already.

If the other things which you said apply this could be a symptom rather than the problem though. If chat is coming in so fast that you can't read it then you need to take control and tell people to slow down. Maybe tell them that they have to talk one at a time. If it's competitive purchasing then do an auction style format. Did you let things get out of hand? Yes. But the real question is did you learn a lesson from it.

FreddyNoNose
2017-09-14, 03:40 PM
In a recent session, I was all caught up in trying to deal with all of my players buying things at once and competing for my attention... And when I failed to give equal attention to each player, one of them stormed off in anger. I have another player telling me all the time that the only reason he keeps playing in my campaign is because he's my friend and he feels an obligation to stay for the others.

And all this has served to destroy my confidence as a gm, questioning whether or not I should even try to continue the campaign...

Someone has to be the suck dm. Why not you? What you do is try to be the best suck dm or would that be the worst suck dm?

exelsisxax
2017-09-14, 03:41 PM
This last session, I had set up an elaborate side adventure and anticipated them going after it. When they spent 2 hours shopping instead, it was kinda something I hadn't prepared for. I had a guideline for things the players might be able to find in town set aside for this. I had an effect over the town which allows the crafting of magic items on the cheap, which means magic items could also be purchased for a fraction of their usual market price. One of my players decided to sell a magic item they bought before the campaign started and ended up doing so at market price. So, when the other player, the one who stormed off, wanted to buy back that item, I had the thought in my head that the person who just bought it would want to sell it at a mark up, so he'd make a profit. This didn't sit well with the player, because everything else was being sold at below usual market price. His tipping point was when he started to feel like he was being ignored... in truth, his messages were being buried in the chat.

The game is Pathfinder, we use Roll20 and Skype.

Shopping is annoying and time-consuming, don't do it during a session. There is absolutely no upside, and lots of downside. Do it between sessions so your players don't have to play mother-may-I one at a time for a few hours.

Kallimakus
2017-09-14, 03:44 PM
Shopping is annoying and time-consuming, don't do it during a session. There is absolutely no upside, and lots of downside. Do it between sessions so your players don't have to play mother-may-I one at a time for a few hours.

I agree. In the Skype/roll20 game I run, I typically try to end one session in a few in a town so that we wouldn't have to waste session time shopping. It doesn't work, but it does cut down the shopping time some.

Anonymouswizard
2017-09-14, 04:01 PM
This last session, I had set up an elaborate side adventure and anticipated them going after it. When they spent 2 hours shopping instead, it was kinda something I hadn't prepared for. I had a guideline for things the players might be able to find in town set aside for this. I had an effect over the town which allows the crafting of magic items on the cheap, which means magic items could also be purchased for a fraction of their usual market price. One of my players decided to sell a magic item they bought before the campaign started and ended up doing so at market price. So, when the other player, the one who stormed off, wanted to buy back that item, I had the thought in my head that the person who just bought it would want to sell it at a mark up, so he'd make a profit. This didn't sit well with the player, because everything else was being sold at below usual market price. His tipping point was when he started to feel like he was being ignored... in truth, his messages were being buried in the chat.

The game is Pathfinder, we use Roll20 and Skype.

Well you did the right thing, because a basic rule should be that, no matter how well you roll, you can't get infinite money loops from merchanting. As this rule is to make players keep moving and doing stuff, there should be little stopping players from loading up on cheap magic items here, moving to a place where there's nothing making them cheaper to craft, and selling at a tidy profit, because that's doing something that plot can be spun out of.

Now, a good diplomacy roll should allow the player to buy back the item at the price it was sold, with a circumstance bonus for buying something else from this merchant. It makes sense that the merchant would want to sell at a mark up, but he should be able to be bargained down to not a loss (not easily, but it should be a possibility).


Shopping is annoying and time-consuming, don't do it during a session. There is absolutely no upside, and lots of downside. Do it between sessions so your players don't have to play mother-may-I one at a time for a few hours.

Eh, it depends. I've had some great sessions which were just shopping, I've had some horrible ones. Normally the GM doesn't want to roleplay it and we agree that after buying everything I want my bartering has allowed me to buy everything at around list price, it's quick and simple and only takes the time to total costs and write down. Maybe I have to make a check to find something strange like a technosorcerous flight pack, illegal like a laser rifle, or rare like deep one jewellery, but that's as far as most GMs will go for shopping. If they really don't want to do it we'll get to search for one nonstandard item apiece.

Although I generally don't play D&D, which changes things a bit (no massive list of magic items to look through, most characters can probably pick up basic tools or the like from their house).

Esprit15
2017-09-14, 10:51 PM
On shopping ingame, my rule as a GM is to know what you want, and know what you want if you can't get that. Talk after the game or before the game if you need to ask further questions on items that you want.

As for being a bad GM, sounds like someone was trying to make a scene because they didn't get their way. Ignore that. If they still do want to play, talk to them after the session, making it clear that another scene like that will not be tolerated.

chainer1216
2017-09-14, 11:24 PM
Tell them to give you constructive criticism...

Dunno about OPs group but mine just clams up and doesn't give me any. Its really frustrating.

ZamielVanWeber
2017-09-14, 11:41 PM
As for being a bad GM, sounds like someone was trying to make a scene because they didn't get their way. Ignore that. If they still do want to play, talk to them after the session, making it clear that another scene like that will not be tolerated.

OP said they were accidentally getting ignored. I can see why that would get frustrating, although I am not sure why they did not just open a separate char to talk to the DM directly.

Esprit15
2017-09-14, 11:52 PM
OP said they were accidentally getting ignored. I can see why that would get frustrating, although I am not sure why they did not just open a separate char to talk to the DM directly.

Sure, their frustration was justified. That doesn't make a tantrum the proper response. I've been frustrated with a DM before. I waited, then spoke to them out of the game, rather than make a big show of things and hope that acting like a small child helped me get my way.

AMFV
2017-09-15, 12:49 AM
Well given the information you've given us, I would say that you probably don't suck. I would suggest doing shopping in-between sessions as others have. Because it's a huge time sink, which is usually fine in person when the other people can BS, but in a roll20 environment it doesn't work as well.

Darth Ultron
2017-09-15, 08:45 AM
Well, ''suck'' is a bit far...but, sure, maybe you just need time to grow. Everyone, with everything really and not just being a DM, needs to get real life experience at it to become better, and eventually good.

As both an online DM and a DM DM I can spot a lot of ''things''.

1.In a chat window game, you really, really, really, really need to clamp down on the spam posters. A lot of people will shoot of a post every couple of seconds, some times it is relevant to the game, some times it is spam and sometimes it is a silly happy face. And sometimes it is just too much as they type a line every 20 seconds and hit 'send'. Otherwise things can scroll by in the chat window at the speed of light; you will only start to read a line and it will be bumped off the screen. And worse, some people wait like ten seconds after a post and then will start posting like crazy ''yo DM did you see my question? Hello DM? Hello DM?''.

So in a chat type game you, as DM, really need to control the chat window. You can ''ask'' people to do the right thing (I don't recommend this one) or you can just out right demand they do the right thing (this is what I do). So first is no spam, OOC, funny pictures or sounds and happy faces. Second is no ''yo DM'' spam. Both are very basic, and any average good person should agree to them. Third you want to make sure everyone understands that the game does not revolve around them and they should not expect a detailed, personal response every 1.2 seconds. Again, very basic. Next you want to limit the 'post every ten seconds' and make sure people understand that they should only post at a set time limit (like say a minute) or use my Rule: Once you post anything in the main chat room to the DM you must wait until the DM posts an response/acknowledgment before you continue to post.

2.It does not seem like your using PM/DM's but they do take away a lot of clutter in the Main Chat Screen.

3.You all ways want to avoid ''crazy free for all's'', really in any game or in real life too. If you toss $10,000 dollars into a crowd you can expect people to ''go wild'' and try and grab all the money. When a super star celebrity walks out into a crowd, you can expect a mob to descend on them. And when you open a ''super cheap super magic store Blue Light Special'' event in a game...well, you can expect the players to go crazy (like Supermarket Sweep Price is Right crazy!).

So to be blunt: this is why you simply don't do that. Ever.

4.You can do ''for all's'' but only in a very, very, very limited and controlled manner. If you want to give away $10,000 dollars to a crowd you show up with 25 security guards armed with P-90's and slowly have each person step forward one at a time to get their envelope of money. If super star celebrity wants to walk out into a crowd, 25 security guards in muscle tee shirts clear the way and control the crowd. And you do the same thing for the Blue Light Special magic item event.

For example limiting the magic items for sale is a great idea, you all ways want to avoid the ''ok, player waste as much game time as you want trying to remember ''that'' magic item you want and goggle it and look through all the books.'' The clerk says we have x and Y or can order Z, or such. It's even better if you just toss in custom items you know the players will like. You also want a shopping time limit: just say ''each player gets five minutes to shop'' or something like that.

My way of ''everything is an adventure'' would be more like Ghost Casher ages the poor player character customer ten years a round: if they can finish shopping before their character dies of old age they can keep what they bought and be de-aged (a bit, maybe); if they ''die of old age while they are shopping'' then their character is dead and Ghost Mart animates the skeleton to be a new door greater. Or Storm Giant Casher picks up each poor player character customer and crushes them in her hand each round for 1d12 damage; if they can get done shopping before their character dies they get a 'free bonus' potion of healing; if not their crushed body goes into the giant's stew pot. I've done my games like this for years and years......you would be amazed how quickly a player can ''shop'' when they don't want their character to die ''in a stupid store''.

5.The ''other player by back of Item Number Nine'' is really an obvious thing to happen. When any ''cool'' magic item is ''free'' you can expect at least one player to try and grab it. And really the best thing to do is just avoid this whole thing and have the magic item ''gone''.

Like again, my game: Storm Giant Casher Lady picks up the Bastard Sword +5 Vopral that Kosh sold to her and she snaps it in half like a twig, obliterating it, and absorbs the magic. Then she reached down, grabs Shezdon, crushes him and says ''what do you want to buy?".

6.Pick your battles. If your doing a Blue Light Special magic sale, it kind of does not make sense to ''suddenly'' have an item coast more....even if it sort of makes sense to you. But really you want ''shopping'' to take like ten minutes, so this is where you just ignore it and give it a cheep price and move on with the game. Having Shop Keeper McScrooge demand six times the market price is just stalling the game play...and this is after all just shopping.

And note, I'm not even close to saying ''give in to the players'' even some of the time (you ever read any of my posts....). I only ''seem'' to ''give in'' (to the players) for the good of the game. And, really, if I ''did'' want to make a character broke there are only 1,894 ways I could do that in the next couple rounds......

Happy Gaming!

Anonymouswizard
2017-09-15, 09:07 AM
My way of ''everything is an adventure'' would be more like Ghost Casher ages the poor player character customer ten years a round: if they can finish shopping before their character dies of old age they can keep what they bought and be de-aged (a bit, maybe); if they ''die of old age while they are shopping'' then their character is dead and Ghost Mart animates the skeleton to be a new door greater. Or Storm Giant Casher picks up each poor player character customer and crushes them in her hand each round for 1d12 damage; if they can get done shopping before their character dies they get a 'free bonus' potion of healing; if not their crushed body goes into the giant's stew pot. I've done my games like this for years and years......you would be amazed how quickly a player can ''shop'' when they don't want their character to die ''in a stupid store''.

OP remember, that no matter how bad of a GM this is, you'll never be as bad a GM as Darth Ultron is.

What does a round mean when shopping? Why is the elf allowed to spend more time shopping than the half orc (more than 10 times in most cases). Then why is the barbarian allowed to spend more time shopping than the wizard? Plus a lot of players do find the occasionally shopping session fun, but because it's not What Darth Ultron likes it is automatically bad and worth derailing another thread over.

Seriously, this is rather abusive and the definition of using in-game effects to solve an out-of-game problem. 'No, your fun is stupid, therefore your character dies by basilisk shop keeper.'

Faily
2017-09-15, 10:00 AM
:smalleek: And here I thought shopping in the US during Black Friday was lethal...


@MonkeySage: Live and learn. GMing online is pretty difficult too. I find it hard to keep track of all the chatter in a big group at tabletop sessions, I'd hate to try and do it through Skype or Roll20. I agree with the above on enforcing the "no spam the game-chat" rule, so that it will be easier to see the important messages. When playing Scion over MSN (oh man, I feel old now), we'd have separate windows for GM-player conversation and one group-chat for everything that was In Character. Sure, us players had separate windows with OOC-commentary between us, but that way we kept the spam out of the game-window.

Is it mostly text-based or voice-based for you guys? Just checking since you're using Skype.

I'd at least recommend talking to the offended player, to at least clarify that you weren't ignoring them on purpose (and explain your situation that it is difficult to keep track of everything). Also, it is totally OK to speak the group as a whole and say "hey, if you feel like you've been ignored or that your questions are not being noticed, I apologize and I will try to do better, but I think we should all work together to make it easier for all of us to communicate better".

Tinkerer
2017-09-15, 10:04 AM
It does make a certain amount of sense for the item to not be at a discount though. You said it yourself

I had an effect over the town which allows the crafting of magic items on the cheap, which means magic items could also be purchased for a fraction of their usual market price.
That means that only items which were made in the town would be selling at a discount. Any outside magical items not being made locally would be buying and selling at regular values.

Erys
2017-09-15, 10:26 AM
It does make a certain amount of sense for the item to not be at a discount though. You said it yourself

That means that only items which were made in the town would be selling at a discount. Any outside magical items not being made locally would be buying and selling at regular values.

Eh, to be fair- that same enchantment means they should have bought the item for less in the first place too.

If I have a rare ruby worth 10k and go to a town full of them where they are only worth 100gp... no merchant would buy my 'out of town' ruby for more than what they sell theirs for.

Tinkerer
2017-09-15, 10:34 AM
Eh, to be fair- that same enchantment means they should have bought the item for less in the first place too.

If I have a rare ruby worth 10k and go to a town full of them where they are only worth 100gp... no merchant would buy my 'out of town' ruby for more than what they sell theirs for.

Nah, I meant only types of items being made in town sell at a discount. If they have a potion maker and a armourer and a miscellaneous item maker but no ring maker or no one who can cast the spells used to make that particular item then it makes sense that it wouldn't be available at a discount.

Also that town is about to get slammed by every wizard who makes items in the world flocking there at one time.

EDIT: But yeah this is a side effect of not thinking through the side effects of your plot. I've seen groups where in that situation they would be instantly setting themselves up as merchants and buying as much gear as possible to sell halfway across the world. So count yourself lucky that they only wanted to shop.

Erys
2017-09-15, 10:44 AM
Yeppers.

So much abuse possible with that situation.

MonkeySage
2017-09-15, 12:18 PM
We mostly use voice to shoot the breeze and to help with coordination, while roleplaying is primarily done in text.

As for the town itself, I should have been more careful with them trying to sell their items. On the one hand, this is a coastal trading hub run by powerful mages who even infuse magic into their bank notes.

On the other, it's a fiercely xenophobic nation where non magic users are considered lower class and foreigners, especially non human foreigners, are treated with intense distrust.

Its caste system normally only allows magic using patricians to sell magic items, while non magic using foreigners are normally only allowed to buy them.

That's what I should have done.

Thrudd
2017-09-15, 01:47 PM
You live and learn. Figuring out how to deal with problems just makes you a better GM. Now you know that open-ended magic item sales are a bad idea, and you probably won't do it again. The problem of everyone talking over each other is an ageless one. You can solve this by going around the group, one at a time, in a more organized fashion. Don't wait for their messages to come to you, ask each player whether you saw a message from them or not. Be aware how much time you're spending on each player.

-Here's what I do. When the characters enter town, ask them each to prepare a list of the equipment they want to buy (maybe after giving them an idea the sort of stuff they are likely to be able to find there). Give them a few minutes to do that, and then pick a player who is ready with their list and address the stuff they want - try to keep it to a couple minutes per player, max. Then ask the next player in line for their list of stuff. Go around the table, one person at a time, Nice and orderly and fair for all. Don't have full role playing scenes with every shopkeeper and merchant where you haggle in-character for everything - just tell the players the results of their shopping: this is what you were able to find, this is how much it costs, do you want it? get answer, cash total is adjusted, move on to next player.

This same technique works for all situations where you need input from all the players or the party is split up for some reason. Just go around the table, one person at a time, and if something looks like it is going to get complicated or take a long time, put it on hold and make sure everyone else has had their say before you start in with rolling dice and acting out scenes.

Also, not all players can be satisfied all the time. However, if you find players are not satisfied, try to pay attention to what they like to do and what they don't, when they are engaged and when they aren't. Over the internet, it is tougher, because you aren't seeing everyone's faces and body language all the time or hearing the tone of voice. Maybe turn on the cams so you can see everyone's faces sometimes, if you don't do that already.

Sometimes when something feels like a struggle, the best thing to do is step back and consider what part of it is not fun for you. What part of this is causing you stress? Find a way to change that, adjust how you approach it. Don't keep pushing through with things that aren't working. You are allowed to change the entire direction of the game if you want to. If there's an element that's difficult, try to think of solutions to make it easier.

This whole thing should be fun, you should love it. If you aren't loving something about it, figure out how to do it in a way that's more fun for you.

TheManicMonocle
2017-09-15, 01:51 PM
In a recent session, I was all caught up in trying to deal with all of my players buying things at once and competing for my attention... And when I failed to give equal attention to each player, one of them stormed off in anger. I have another player telling me all the time that the only reason he keeps playing in my campaign is because he's my friend and he feels an obligation to stay for the others.

And all this has served to destroy my confidence as a gm, questioning whether or not I should even try to continue the campaign...

This kind of thing happend to me as well. We solved it by having a non-combat timer. So basically, I had each player take turns, rolling a d20 to determine order. First player goes shopping and has 3 minutes to do so. After 3 minutes, we move on to the second player. If the first player isn't done he can complete his errand on his second turn.

Anonymouswizard
2017-09-15, 02:11 PM
This kind of thing happend to me as well. We solved it by having a non-combat timer. So basically, I had each player take turns, rolling a d20 to determine order. First player goes shopping and has 3 minutes to do so. After 3 minutes, we move on to the second player. If the first player isn't done he can complete his errand on his second turn.

That's a neat idea. I might do it next time the party splits for any reason, you have 5-10 minutes for your bit, then when the timer beeps we finish the action (to the level of 'if we were going to roll you can still roll') and move to the next player/subgroup. It's the good version of Darth Ultron's 'ghost shopkeeper' solution, and it's solving an out of game problem with out of game means.

At first I thought it was stupid, but looking at it, I really like it.

Tinkerer
2017-09-15, 05:49 PM
It is always important to recite the DM's oath.

"I am going to screw up.
I’m probably going to screw up badly.
But it’s ok and I’m not going to worry about it."

I completely forgot about the DM thread that came from under the notable threads header at the top until I was showing someone the site and it popped up. I would add the rider that "I'm not going to worry about it" is not the same as ignoring the problem. Get excited when you find a problem! That's your chance to improve.

Darth Ultron
2017-09-15, 06:49 PM
OP remember, that no matter how bad of a GM this is, you'll never be as bad a GM as Darth Ultron is.


Shopping at Ghost Mart is fun, ''Shop till you Drop!''


:smalleek: And here I thought shopping in the US during Black Friday was lethal...


The real Hardcore Shoppers are out on Gray Thursday....

JAL_1138
2017-09-18, 12:58 PM
Shopping can be a fun session in certain games where gear is a big deal. It's about half the point of Shadowrun (not necessarily during the session, but gear in general is about half the point). Get better gear to do tougher jobs to get better gear to do tougher jobs to get better gear to do tougher jobs and eventually piss off a megacorp and/or dragon and/or crazy cult and wind up with a campaign plot in the process. Doing the shopping in-game leads to making connections with suppliers and fences, which can make for plot if anything goes wrong in the supply chain (e.g., Renraku comes down hard on your usual arms dealer and half their contact network for stealing product; suddenly you don't even have a ready source of bullets, much less new guns, drone parts, grenades, body armor, and the like).

Incorrect
2017-09-19, 04:33 AM
In all my campaigns, magic item shops are kind of a meta-zone. They have all items in existence, up to a gp amount that the GM decides.
There is no haggling or diplomancing, all item prices are controlled by "some wizards that live by the coast". Buy for full price, sell for half, everything by the books. Usually the session will end after players enter the shop and get the description, and they will use the time between sessions to go through books and pick what they want. The next session starts with me quickly going through what they have bought and sold.
Basically, I make the players do all the work.

I have zero interest in spending 4 hours playing shop, when we could be adventuring.

You don't have to do it like I do, but this is an alternative to trying to cope with the madness of shopping characters.

Florian
2017-09-19, 04:56 AM
And all this has served to destroy my confidence as a gm, questioning whether or not I should even try to continue the campaign...

Learn from the experience.

You´re one person and you have limited time, no difference between online or offline gaming. Ironically, in a party-based game, it´s downtime activities like shopping when players want to be the sole center of attention and do "their thing". That´s the point when you should take a break and announce a series of solo sessions, or you´re frank enough to proclaim that you this will drag out the time you have and all involved should just reduce it to the necessary meta level and the party as a whole should continue on with the action.

Mordaedil
2017-09-19, 06:43 AM
You are only human and you can only divide your attention so much. Apologize for not being able to give them all attention and say that you have to tone things back a bit and take people in turns.

As others have said, do shopping out of sessions unless they just need one or two items. Agree on costs at least outside of session when everyone can do math right without getting information clutter. Use private IM windows in Skype to better organize matters. Make sure you have txt files on each character that you move details into.