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View Full Version : The dm player relationship and some horrible things I've seen on the internet



Dankus Memakus
2018-05-03, 10:33 AM
Okay so I'd like to start this off to say I both play and DM so I have had both ends here.

So anyway, I have played d&d with around 7 different groups and always it has been the DM as a referee and he/she makes sure the players have fun without breaking the game and keeps them on the rules (unless something is awesome) and in these groups, including the ones I run, great sacrifices will be made for fun. For instance we had 2 players who were generally a problem and made the game less enjoyable. So my solution was first to talk to them, then when they ignored our talk to kick them out. They caused 5 people to not have fun because they wanted to be munchkins and not participate in role play (and do ALOT of other things that were not accepted in the group) So I guess I see the relationship as the DM, the referee and guardian of fun, and the players who follow the refs rules and have the fun. The relationship is toxic if the players don't have fun and if the DM neither fairly referees or protects the fun. Sadly however I saw a thread on Reddit where a new DM was being bashed for not allowing optional rules, hombrew and multiclassing because a player was abusing these rules and frustrating both the DM and his other party mates. People came in droves to the players defence saying that these things were in the game and shouldn't be restricted. So really I just want to know what you guys believe a good relationship between player and DM is and do you think it's okay to restrict rules to protect the majority of your players fun at the expense of another who is ruining the game for others?

Scripten
2018-05-03, 10:45 AM
Sadly however I saw a thread on Reddit where a new DM was being bashed for not allowing optional rules, hombrew and multiclassing because a player was abusing these rules and frustrating both the DM and his other party mates. People came in droves to the players defence saying that these things were in the game and shouldn't be restricted.

Without seeing the original thread, there's not a lot that can really be said. A new DM disallowing homebrew and multiclassing in a system is perfectly understandable. I'm not a new DM and I do it myself more often than not, depending on the desired challenge and balance levels in the campaign. It also depends on what you mean by "bashed". If they're getting abuse for running their games with default rules, then they're likely in the right. If people are just arguing that homebrew and multiclassing can work under the right circumstances, then it's not really a big deal.

In short, there's just not enough information here to make a good assessment of the situation.


So really I just want to know what you guys believe a good relationship between player and DM is and do you think it's okay to restrict rules to protect the majority of your players fun at the expense of another who is ruining the game for others?

In a vacuum, I absolutely believe that restricting rules (especially if they are homebrew) is acceptable. However, "That Guy" sorts are usually OOC problems and should thus be solved OOC, rather than in-game.

Dankus Memakus
2018-05-03, 10:51 AM
Without seeing the original thread, there's not a lot that can really be said. A new DM disallowing homebrew and multiclassing in a system is perfectly understandable. I'm not a new DM and I do it myself more often than not, depending on the desired challenge and balance levels in the campaign. It also depends on what you mean by "bashed". If they're getting abuse for running their games with default rules, then they're likely in the right. If people are just arguing that homebrew and multiclassing can work under the right circumstances, then it's not really a big deal.

In short, there's just not enough information here to make a good assessment of the situation.



In a vacuum, I absolutely believe that restricting rules (especially if they are homebrew) is acceptable. However, "That Guy" sorts are usually OOC problems and should thus be solved OOC, rather than in-game.

In the original thread the dm said he restricted the rules and people claimed he was being a jerk and ruining the game claimed he was an idiot, so on so forth. Although it is Reddit...which is a bit more hostile than here.

Pelle
2018-05-03, 11:01 AM
Okay so I'd like to start this off to say I both play and DM so I have had both ends here.

So anyway, I have played d&d with around 7 different groups and always it has been the DM as a referee and he/she makes sure the players have fun without breaking the game and keeps them on the rules (unless something is awesome) and in these groups, including the ones I run, great sacrifices will be made for fun. For instance we had 2 players who were generally a problem and made the game less enjoyable. So my solution was first to talk to them, then when they ignored our talk to kick them out. They caused 5 people to not have fun because they wanted to be munchkins and not participate in role play (and do ALOT of other things that were not accepted in the group) So I guess I see the relationship as the DM, the referee and guardian of fun, and the players who follow the refs rules and have the fun. The relationship is toxic if the players don't have fun and if the DM neither fairly referees or protects the fun. Sadly however I saw a thread on Reddit where a new DM was being bashed for not allowing optional rules, hombrew and multiclassing because a player was abusing these rules and frustrating both the DM and his other party mates. People came in droves to the players defence saying that these things were in the game and shouldn't be restricted. So really I just want to know what you guys believe a good relationship between player and DM is and do you think it's okay to restrict rules to protect the majority of your players fun at the expense of another who is ruining the game for others?

The DM isn't any more responsible for the fun than other players. If you as a player or DM is not enjoying yourself because of someone elses behaviour, only you are responsible for letting others know so they can adapt.

People on Reddit can't decide what the group enjoys, only the group itself.

1337 b4k4
2018-05-03, 11:44 AM
With respect to the rules that are allowed / disallowed, my philosophy has always been “its the GMs game, they get to pick” Now there are a number of caveats (should be discussed up front etc) that come along with that but ultimately the GM is the one that has to manage things, so it’s their prerogative what they want to manage. If a player doesn’t like the game a GM is offering, they’re free to fund a new game, GM themselves or negotiate.

Human decency says everyone will and should communicate, but there’s no reason beyond that a GM must provide the game that the players demand any more than a player must play in the game a GM wants to play

Aotrs Commander
2018-05-03, 12:29 PM
When I DM, I make it very simple. The price of me DMing for you (which, in my case, will require an EXTENSIVE amount of time investment on my part) is that you, the player, have to pick your character stuff from what I deem is available for any given party/campaign.

There will be lists. BIG, extensive lists, compiled at great length, since I will use a large chunk of stuff from, say, 3.x/PF or Rolemaster; but if it is not on my list, pre-emptively, no, you can't have it. There will be enough toys for you (and by extension me, because I like the toys probably as much or more than you, being the resident rules mechanics expert of my group (and also the primary DM)) to play with. If you were not prepared to acede to that simple expectation, then you would have to find yourself a different DM. (And hey, I might get to be a player, for once...!)

Koo Rehtorb
2018-05-03, 01:21 PM
Making sure everyone has fun is not part of the GM's job. It isn't called the Fun Master.

The Glyphstone
2018-05-03, 01:24 PM
Making sure everyone has fun is not part of the GM's job. It isn't called the Fun Master.

Do you get paid to play games? Cause I play games to have fun - therefore by transition, the Game Master very much is the Fun Master.

Quertus
2018-05-03, 01:37 PM
So, there are two questions here. One is regarding the relationship of the GM to the players; the other regards limiting content.

I believe that "fun" is the ultimate measuring stick of the relationship, but I think Pelle had the right of it:


The DM isn't any more responsible for the fun than other players.

Fun is everyone's responsibility. The GM is not special in this regard.

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Now, as to limiting content. There are many reasons to limit content. Almost all of them are wrong.

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The GM can limit content in an attempt to create game balance. Although I do not personally value game balance in an RPG like I do in a war game, I nonetheless consider it a worthy goal if that's what your group enjoys. So why would I claim that only a Fool of a Took would attempt game balance through limited content? Well, there's lots of reasons.

The first is that not all characters are created equal. By RAW, I can create an Int 3 Wizard in 3e. By all means, tell me how, with limited, "balanced" content, I can ever make that character balanced with the party?

The second is that not all characters are created equal. Maybe DMM Persist is broken on a CoDzilla, but it allows the party buff bot to actually have fun and play the game, rather than spending his turns just buffing everyone else.

The third is that not all players are created equal. Player > character. With balanced playing pieces, it is guaranteed that players of disparate skill will not have balanced performance.

The only ways I have ever seen players of disparate skill level, playing characters with diverse chassis and functions, actually have balanced performance is through GM fiat (which leaves quite the bad taste in my mouth), or by mindful application of a full spectrum of options. In other words, if the group cares about balance, the GM should leave open all options, to allow the players the greatest capability to balance their characters.

In short, it's throwing the baby out with the bath water to disallow a balanced character just because some of its components exist on an unbalanced character.

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The GM can limit content in an attempt to create a thematic world. Exploration is my favorite "aesthetic", it's where I derive my greatest fun from a game. I appreciate internal consistency, and games that are worth my time to think about. So why would I possibly fault a GM for limiting content thusly?

This one is harder to express. Call it a matter of mindset. IME, GMs who think of content in terms of limitations rarely produce interesting worlds to explore. They're too focused on the limitations of things to be open to options. They tend towards a railroading mindset. They tend to produce worlds of black and white, rather than colorful, vibrant, rich worlds that are fun to explore. They tend to produce content where, if you happen to want to explore the one thing they've got for you to explore, great; otherwise, forget about it.

GMs who create a consistent world through an additive process tend, IME, to produce worlds that are much more conducive to Exploration, themes that are much more interesting to explore.

There are exceptions, of course. GMs who "add limitations" to their worlds (such as "no gods", or "all dwarves got wiped out 100 years ago by a magic plague in the great elf / dwarf wars"), and still produce interesting worlds. But this is, IME, the exception to the rule.

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The GM can attempt to limit content to things that they understand. This is either a noob mistake, of the GM not realizing that he can deal with the party as black boxes (and that his time and attention are best spent elsewhere), or an indication that the GM is playing a linear story / CaS / "the heroes always win" / otherwise running in a style that I won't enjoy.

But so what if I won't enjoy it - why would I consider it wrong-minded in general, even for groups where I am not present? Well, the answer is, it's generally indicative of a GM attempting to pull off an illusion while lacking the skill to do so. It's a recipe for disaster.

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Homebrew deserves special mention here, because it interacts differently with the game. The short answer here is, I don't generally fault GMs for disallowing homebrew, but give them credit for creating their own. I may go into my reasoning if people are interested.

JoeJ
2018-05-03, 01:57 PM
The GM can limit content in an attempt to create a thematic world. Exploration is my favorite "aesthetic", it's where I derive my greatest fun from a game. I appreciate internal consistency, and games that are worth my time to think about. So why would I possibly fault a GM for limiting content thusly?

This one is harder to express. Call it a matter of mindset. IME, GMs who think of content in terms of limitations rarely produce interesting worlds to explore. They're too focused on the limitations of things to be open to options. They tend towards a railroading mindset. They tend to produce worlds of black and white, rather than colorful, vibrant, rich worlds that are fun to explore. They tend to produce content where, if you happen to want to explore the one thing they've got for you to explore, great; otherwise, forget about it.

GMs who create a consistent world through an additive process tend, IME, to produce worlds that are much more conducive to Exploration, themes that are much more interesting to explore.

Refusing to exclude content makes some themes impossible. If you want to create a knights of the round table feel, or Robin Hood, or Lord of the Rings, or Conan, a great deal of content that is perfectly fine in itself must be eliminated because it can't be made to fit aesthetically. Guns and non-human races don't work in a quasi-historical Charlemagne's paladins campaign. Only certain non-human races fit in Middle Earth, and a different set work in Thundarr the Barbarian (which, btw, would be a very fun concept for a D&D game). Pretty much anything can fit in Spelljammer.

Pelle
2018-05-03, 02:04 PM
Do you get paid to play games? Cause I play games to have fun - therefore by transition, the Game Master very much is the Fun Master.

If you just expect the DM to entertain you, and are not prepared to contribute actively to everyones' fun, I hope you pay the DM/group...

Quertus
2018-05-03, 02:39 PM
Refusing to exclude content makes some themes impossible. If you want to create a knights of the round table feel, or Robin Hood, or Lord of the Rings, or Conan, a great deal of content that is perfectly fine in itself must be eliminated because it can't be made to fit aesthetically. Guns and non-human races don't work in a quasi-historical Charlemagne's paladins campaign. Only certain non-human races fit in Middle Earth, and a different set work in Thundarr the Barbarian (which, btw, would be a very fun concept for a D&D game). Pretty much anything can fit in Spelljammer.

I've played Robin Hood with magic, or Star Trek Robin Hood, or any number of such things. There's just an issue of distilling base elements, and poetically recreating them in a new aesthetic.

Trying to force a system into an incompatible aesthetic - and doing it well - is a task requiring considerable effort, and beyond the scope of most GMs' changes.

But, yes, if the GM insists on creating an aesthetic using a system that was not designed with that aesthetic in mind, then something must be done. Banning everything that doesn't match the GM's vision is one solution. Sharing their vision, and asking the players to create something that matches that vision, however, is, IMO, the optimal route. It has the added bonus of providing an opportunity to discuss differences in the players' understandings of the aesthetic.

Koo Rehtorb
2018-05-03, 02:50 PM
Do you get paid to play games? Cause I play games to have fun - therefore by transition, the Game Master very much is the Fun Master.

Do you pay your GM to GM games?

JoeJ
2018-05-03, 03:00 PM
I've played Robin Hood with magic, or Star Trek Robin Hood, or any number of such things. There's just an issue of distilling base elements, and poetically recreating them in a new aesthetic.

Trying to force a system into an incompatible aesthetic - and doing it well - is a task requiring considerable effort, and beyond the scope of most GMs' changes.

But, yes, if the GM insists on creating an aesthetic using a system that was not designed with that aesthetic in mind, then something must be done. Banning everything that doesn't match the GM's vision is one solution. Sharing their vision, and asking the players to create something that matches that vision, however, is, IMO, the optimal route. It has the added bonus of providing an opportunity to discuss differences in the players' understandings of the aesthetic.

Star Trek Robin Hood, while a cool idea, does not have the same aesthetic as, say, Howard Pyle's Robin Hood.

And it is often the case that a rules system is not as incompatible with a particular aesthetic as it may at first appear. In most of the examples I've seen, the content that is excluded is sufficiently modular that it's removal has no impact on the way the game plays. It only affects the aesthetic of the world. In any version of D&D*, for example, eliminating any race or class or combination of races and classes produces exactly the same mechanical result as allowing those races/classes but having no player choose to play them. You do have to have at least one class and at least one race, but there is no specific class or race that must be there.

*(edit: with the possible exception of 4e, simply because I don't know it well enough to say)

RazorChain
2018-05-03, 03:01 PM
With respect to the rules that are allowed / disallowed, my philosophy has always been “its the GMs game, they get to pick” Now there are a number of caveats (should be discussed up front etc) that come along with that but ultimately the GM is the one that has to manage things, so it’s their prerogative what they want to manage. If a player doesn’t like the game a GM is offering, they’re free to fund a new game, GM themselves or negotiate.

Human decency says everyone will and should communicate, but there’s no reason beyond that a GM must provide the game that the players demand any more than a player must play in the game a GM wants to play

I agree with this. The GM does the majority of the work so I'd rather he ran something he wants and then my choice is to participate or not.

It's often that the GM becomes the Primus Motor that also keeps the game going and often is the one that has to herd cats.

This is also the reason I only run things I want to run. My enthusiasm makes for a better game and reduces the chance of GM burnout.

Aotrs Commander
2018-05-03, 05:10 PM
Star Trek Robin Hood, while a cool idea, does not have the same aesthetic same as, say, Howard Pyle's Robin Hood.

And it is often the case that a rules system is not as incompatible with a particular aesthetic as it may at first appear. In most of the examples I've seen, the content that is excluded is sufficiently modular that it's removal has no impact of the way the game plays. It only affects the aesthetic of the world. In any version of D&D, for example, eliminating any race or class or combination of races and classes produces exactly the same mechanical result as allowing those races/classes but having no player choose to play them. You do have to have at least one class and at least one race, but there is no specific class or race that must be there.

I would also note that there is no mandate that a DM should be required to use any bit of rules because they have been printed, whether for mechanical or setting requirements. This is as true for race/class/feat choices as it is for obviating XP multiclass penalties or treating the 50-hit sudden death with the derision it deserves in 3.5, not allowing the player to play a replicant Pilot in a Rolemaster game set in Middle-Earth, playing Jedi in a Babylon 5 game or denying a player who wants a Mad Cat in a game of BattleTech set in 3025.

Or, for example, if I say "we're doing a party of lawful evil Liches" one player are not going be allowed to play a chaotic neutral vampire. (Actually, in the latter case - and this is an actual campaign of mine, in Rolemaster - there were quite a few other restrictions, including one that unusually pertained to character personality itself in that "you must be of a suitable personality type that you would have been recruited into an LE meritocracy, so no 'mavericks that don't play by the rules' allowed etc...")

Rolemaster, actually, was rather a good learning device for this, since you literally CANNOT use whole splat books wholesale like 3.x is oft assumed to be considered, since they had a lot of entirely alternate and mutualy incompatible systems.

TheStranger
2018-05-03, 05:31 PM
IMO, in 99% of the "DM-player problems" that I read about on the internet, the fact that one person is the DM and one person is a player is kind of a red herring - these two individuals would probably have the same problems in any other context, because sometimes people are jerks and sometimes misunderstandings happen. The basic principles of human interaction don't change because you're playing a game, and the DMG doesn't have a table on how not to be a jerk to your friends (nor does the PHB, for that matter). Whether you're playing D&D, or poker, or candyland, at the end of the day you're just a bunch of people hanging out around a table. Yes, you're also playing a game, but that's just a context for the issues that come up, and in most cases the game and the rules thereof hold neither the causes nor the solutions for the problems that I read about.

Just wanted to get that off my chest. Carry on.

Aotrs Commander
2018-05-03, 05:45 PM
IMO, in 99% of the "DM-player problems" that I read about on the internet, the fact that one person is the DM and one person is a player is kind of a red herring - these two individuals would probably have the same problems in any other context, because sometimes people are jerks and sometimes misunderstandings happen. The basic principles of human interaction don't change because you're playing a game, and the DMG doesn't have a table on how not to be a jerk to your friends (nor does the PHB, for that matter). Whether you're playing D&D, or poker, or candyland, at the end of the day you're just a bunch of people hanging out around a table. Yes, you're also playing a game, but that's just a context for the issues that come up, and in most cases the game and the rules thereof hold neither the causes nor the solutions for the problems that I read about.

Just wanted to get that off my chest. Carry on.

Indeed.

I am myself fortunate that I am in a position where I've been playing with mostly the same people since I started in the early ninties, and the few interpersonal conflicts that I (even if not as DM, as "person who makes the gaming session happen") have had to deal/resolve with in the group, I can count on the fingers of half a hand.

Mr Beer
2018-05-03, 05:57 PM
This kind of stuff is so situational that it's very difficult to say who the jerkface is. Often when groups implode, there are in fact multiple jerkfaces involved.

In a vacuum, should a DM be obliged to let players shoehorn in a bunch of homebrew content? Hell to the no. That said Session Zero is very important, if the DM sold the game as Wacky DM Funmaster And His Freewheeling Circus Of Player Craziness then that's on him.

Experienced DMs who advertise for games tend to state their ruleset and expectations right from the start.

EDIT

Oh yeah and the DM does the lion's share of the work so he gets to define the rules, setting, expectations etc. Players can sign up or not.

A sensible DM will offer a certain amount of compromise for player enjoyment (especially group enjoyment) but if the game offered is a low fantasy gritty setting and a player turns up with his Drizzt knock-off, expecting to be able to acrobatically murderhobo his way through the adventure, that player should be invited to re-evaluate his expectations or leave.

JoeJ
2018-05-03, 06:04 PM
If I'm going to run a game, it's going to be set in a world I created, because I enjoy worldbuilding. If there need to be additions to, subtractions from, or modifications in the rules to make them do what I want to do in this game, then I'll make those changes because, as far as I'm concerned, the rules exist to support the world and not the other way around. And then I'll tell prospective players what the premises for this game are, because I want players who understand what I'm planning to do and are excited by it.

And if somebody doesn't want to play in my game, that's absolutely fine. We can still be friends, and it won't have any impact on my willingness to be a player in their game because I totally get that people like what they like, and that no game is going to appeal to everybody.

But any selfish complaints (because that's what they are) that I ought to run a game that somebody else likes rather than one I like, will be ignored. As a GM, my responsibilities are simply to run a game that's fun for me, and to give other players enough information up front that they can decide whether it will be fun for them as well.

Pex
2018-05-03, 07:28 PM
A DM is entitled to place any restrictions on the game he wants to run as he sees fit. A Player is entitled to not like those restrictions and choose not to play.

If the DM is finding other Players, all is well with him. If he is not finding Players, maybe he should relent on some of his restrictions.

If the Player is finding another DM and playing the game, all is well with him. If he is not finding games to play, maybe he should relent on some of his requirements.

If the DM wants the Player and the Player wants the DM, they could try to negotiate respectably. If there's hostility end the conversation and both look elsewhere. If they can't find common ground, how unfortunate but both look elsewhere. If they can find common ground, all the better and enjoy the game.

Honest Tiefling
2018-05-03, 07:45 PM
Settings come with restrictions. In Eberron you can't summon a god for tea and crumpets, in Forgotten Realms you can't just ignore the gods and do your own thing and in Ravenloft, well, having a nice day is pretty much out of the question. But even with these restrictions, these settings are beloved and enjoyed. Yes, even Forgotten Realms.

Which is why if a DM had restrictions in terms of game rules, I'd try it. A DM that is telling a story they have crafted and worked on and put a lot of effort into is going to do a much better job of making a story. A DM that is allowed creative freedom is also going to have an easier time of weaving an interesting story and portraying memorable characters. They are also less likely to experience DM burnout, which is the bane of many a group.

So yeah, I'm okay with a DM restricting content. Just try to sell me on how awesome your setting is first. That'll distract most people.

D+1
2018-05-03, 08:06 PM
Sadly however I saw a thread on Reddit where a new DM was being bashed for not allowing optional rules, hombrew and multiclassing because a player was abusing these rules and frustrating both the DM and his other party mates. People came in droves to the players defence saying that these things were in the game and shouldn't be restricted. So really I just want to know what you guys believe a good relationship between player and DM is and do you think it's okay to restrict rules to protect the majority of your players fun at the expense of another who is ruining the game for others?
It would be one thing to offer the suggestion that restrictions of certain rules might have unforseen consequences or simply to extol the virtues of this rule and that rule. However, the faceless "they" would seem to believe that the DM is only there to enforce somebody ELSE'S collective vision of what the game is. That once an edition is published and you choose to use it as the basis of your game you are FORBIDDEN to add, alter, or delete anything, and when supplementary rules are published to expand it that you are FORBIDDEN to deny those expansions to players. It is then an enforced, directionless, kitchen sink of game rules continually bloating by independent contributions from appointed expansion committee members who have no idea what any particular campaign actually needs. The DM is perfectly capable of deciding what their campaign needs, or doesn't need, without game rule authors and internet kibitzers coming on like they have editorial control over everyone's game. In particular, the idea that all game rules are equally valid for all games in all circumstances is just so ludicrous it's boggling.

A DM is not just permitted but in many ways obligated to add, alter, and delete whatever parts of the game they feel is necessary or desirable. Rules don't run the game. WotC doesn't run the game. Random people on the internet don't run the game. Dice don't run the game. The DM runs the game - THEIR game. If players have objections to how the DM runs the game they are certainly entitled to voice their opinions and desires in appropriate contexts, but the DM still gets to make those decisions. If that's just too much for the players they can choose NOT to play.

A good relationship between players and DM is one where they will talk to each other, explaining what they want, don't want, and why. Then the DM makes the decisions about what the game will actually include, or not include. Players can then choose to participate knowing what the other players and the DM have in mind. This line of communication between players and DM is maintained with each permitted to continue to express their views - but the DM still in the position of having the last word.

And as for players having fun at the expense of others, whether DM or player, by whatever means, is not acceptable. If it's the DM who is the one having fun at the expense of their players and refusing to be accommodating, well, then the players can vote with their feet. If it's players ruining the game for other players, the DM has not just the right but the responsibility to put a stop to that. DM's have no obligation to run a game for players who do not appreciate their efforts. Players who continue to play under BAD DM's who can't or won't improve their games, not only do themselves no favors but ensure that the DM never has motivation to do better.

In over 40 years of playing D&D and other RPG's I have never heard once - not even once - of a DM who deliberately set out to upset their own players. They may have had very narrow, short-sighted ideas of what would be fun (including not even taking into account the possibility that what may be fun for the DM might not be ANY kind of fun for players), but never have I seen a DM come in with the attitude that they themselves will have fun, but the players WILL NOT. Seen a few PLAYERS with that kind of attitude but they've been thankfully very, very rare, and they never last long (unless the DM and other players are TOO NICE in reaction to being rudely abused).

DM and player relationship is, very simply, a matter of honest, open communication. 99.9% of all problems arising in relation to D&D can be prevented by people who take the simple bother to actually TALK to each other.

Pex
2018-05-03, 08:41 PM
In over 40 years of playing D&D and other RPG's I have never heard once - not even once - of a DM who deliberately set out to upset their own players. They may have had very narrow, short-sighted ideas of what would be fun (including not even taking into account the possibility that what may be fun for the DM might not be ANY kind of fun for players), but never have I seen a DM come in with the attitude that they themselves will have fun, but the players WILL NOT. Seen a few PLAYERS with that kind of attitude but they've been thankfully very, very rare, and they never last long (unless the DM and other players are TOO NICE in reaction to being rudely abused).

DM and player relationship is, very simply, a matter of honest, open communication. 99.9% of all problems arising in relation to D&D can be prevented by people who take the simple bother to actually TALK to each other.

I can envy you. I have. The most recent, a number of years ago, I can still quote from memory. "I'm a DM who believes a player should never get what they want."

oxybe
2018-05-03, 09:47 PM
I've had one of those before Pex. Openly admitting to not feeling like it was a successful session unless one PC died was one of many reasons I left and never returned.

Kane0
2018-05-03, 11:44 PM
At that point the DM may as well come out and say "I am the adversary"

I've had a self-proclaimed bastard DM but even he just had a morbid sense of humor rather than true killer attitude.

Darth Ultron
2018-05-03, 11:54 PM
So I guess I see the relationship as the DM, the referee and guardian of fun, and the players who follow the refs rules and have the fun.

This is fairly accurate. The DM is responsible for the fun in the game, and just about everything else. It is how the game works. It is why the game even has a DM.

Beyond that though, really any social gathering of people, where the people will do some sort of activity together, needs a leader. This is just how reality and humans work. A group without a leader is just a random mess.

The DM has to, for example, be the social guardian. Sure you can say it is ''everyone's job''...but most often no one else will ''do the job''. For example take a group of one DM and four players(3 guys, and one gal). Players 1 and 2 intermediately do all the stupid things like talk down to her and make fun of her and insult her and so forth. Guy player 3 is shy and just sits there(though remember it is ''his job to do something, right?"). So who is left? The DM.

The DM also is running the game: their game. So they have all the power of weather or not someone plays in their game. And this is a huge player/DM difference: a player can't kick another player out of the game. The DM can: it is their game. The DM can say ''stop that behavior or leave''.

It would be great if you could just vote for everything, and if all votes would come out the right way...but that is not how voting works.

Lets take smoking. You have five people in a room at a table doing something. One person wants to smoke, one person does not want to sit in a smoke filled room. So all five people vote, and you get one yes, one no, and three don't cares. So the person smokes away: and the other person leaves. Or maybe a person or two voted 'yes' with the wacky wrong idea that ''everyone can do whatever they want all the time". This is why voting does not always work.

The Right thing to do: have no smoking in the room at all. No vote, whoever is ''in charge'' or ''social leader'' says the Right thing to do: and people do it.

As for the rules, it is again the DM's game. The DM can change or alter or do whatever they want in their game. The players don't really get any say: but sure they can ask or make recommendations.

The player does not have to play in the DMs game, but as long as they do, they must follow that DMs rules.

Knaight
2018-05-04, 12:44 AM
First, on restrictions - I'm all for only using part of a system*, and lots of systems are deliberately made to be used that way. Nobody is using every GURPS book for one campaign, optional rules are optional for a reason, so on and so forth. That Reddit thread sounds like a collection of people I wouldn't want to play RPGs with, let alone GM for.

With that said, these restrictions are often flexible. There are aspects of a GM's setting that are very important, thematically critical, so on and so forth, where a change would be a problem. There are other aspects that are far more incidental, where changes can be made for the players with an "eh, whatever".

*Pulling from other threads, my style leans ridiculously heavily towards rules as toolkit, with rules as map a secondary point of consideration and rules as contract a perspective I'm downright antagonistic to unless deliberately GMing something well outside of the norm.


This one is harder to express. Call it a matter of mindset. IME, GMs who think of content in terms of limitations rarely produce interesting worlds to explore. They're too focused on the limitations of things to be open to options. They tend towards a railroading mindset. They tend to produce worlds of black and white, rather than colorful, vibrant, rich worlds that are fun to explore. They tend to produce content where, if you happen to want to explore the one thing they've got for you to explore, great; otherwise, forget about it.

GMs who create a consistent world through an additive process tend, IME, to produce worlds that are much more conducive to Exploration, themes that are much more interesting to explore.

There are exceptions, of course. GMs who "add limitations" to their worlds (such as "no gods", or "all dwarves got wiped out 100 years ago by a magic plague in the great elf / dwarf wars"), and still produce interesting worlds. But this is, IME, the exception to the rule.
This is all a matter of perspective though - you can end up with the same settings by building them up to include what you want and by starting with a giant pile of content and trimming it. Similarly, if you build up a setting in a system that has a massive pile of content, expressing it often takes the form of limitations.

Say, for some reason, I'm GMing a D&D game. I make a setting from scratch, then look at the system. That setting probably won't have gods (though usually in a cagey way where there's no direct evidence of them, religions are still present, and definite information one way or the other isn't happening), probably won't have dwarves (though not in the sense of them being wiped out), and likely wouldn't be set up to fit certain classes. That doesn't mean that this setting was ever designed through limitations, just that it's faster to express restrictions than anything else.

Plus, as far as settings go the worst settings I have ever seen built for an existing system have universally been those built to include the obligate pile of stuff the system comes with.


I can envy you. I have. The most recent, a number of years ago, I can still quote from memory. "I'm a DM who believes a player should never get what they want."


I've had one of those before Pex. Openly admitting to not feeling like it was a successful session unless one PC died was one of many reasons I left and never returned.

There's a whole genre of .gifs involving fleeing animals and similar while the word "Nope" appears repeatedly. These are basically all applicable for these situations.

Tanarii
2018-05-04, 09:32 AM
Except for the internet, which is a horrible source to rely on, no one every said playing games in general or RPGs is about "fun". First of all, that's a piss-poor vague word to apply as a reason for anything. Second, there are lots of emotional and intellectual reasons people play RPGs. Fun is just one kind of player engagement.

DMs get to set the rules for their table, and attempts to engage the players. Players get to decide if they are going to play at the table. The check on the DM sets unreasonable rules, or fails to engage the players in the way they are looking to be engaged, she won't have any players. So it generally behooves a DM to work with the Players, not against them.

Also, it's reddit. What do you expect? If you play in a cesspool, you're going to come out of it disgusting.

2D8HP
2018-05-04, 10:13 AM
.... I just want to know what you guys believe a good relationship between player and DM is and do you think it's okay to restrict rules to protect the majority of your players fun at the expense of another who is ruining the game for others?


:sigh:


Just choosing which game to play is "restricting the content".

STORYTIME!

In ancient times,
Hundreds of years before the dawn of history the 1980's
Lived a strange race of people, the Druids
No one knows who they were or what they were doing
But their legacy remains
Hewn into the living rock, of Stonehenge me and my gaming circle friends had played D&D, and then other games for years, and they wanted to badically play PC's with guns and pretend to be James Bond-ish characters which I wasn't interested in, as I wanted to go back to playing D&D, or to play Pendragon or Stormbringer, which they weren't interested in.

So we compromised and I GM'd (was "The Keeper" of) Call of C'thullu instead (though I re-used a D&D campaign scenario that I put a 1920's veneer on. MWAHAHAHAHA!).


Credit where credit is due, here's a good lesson that fits these types of situations:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lEi9DAn9rE

Definitely recommend you watch this video. He succinctly describes what you should know in this situation.

kyoryu
2018-05-04, 10:55 AM
Most of these problems are really best framed as "this player (including the GM) wants this thing. This other player wants this other thing. What do we do?" 99% of the time, it's not a matter of "right" and "wrong".

All hail the flowchart!

https://i.imgur.com/IVljfT9.jpg

2D8HP
2018-05-04, 11:13 AM
Most of these problems are really best framed as "this player (including the GM) wants this thing. This other player wants this other thing. What do we do?" 99% of the time, it's not a matter of "right" and "wrong".

All hail the flowchart!

https://i.imgur.com/IVljfT9.jpg


So going to steal make appropriate use of that!

kyoryu
2018-05-04, 11:24 AM
So going to steal make appropriate use of that!

Please do. I can't claim it as mine, anyway!

Like, it should be a sticky on EVERY RPG FORUM EVER.

Tanarii
2018-05-04, 12:02 PM
All hail the flowchart!
I love the "how salty are you" part :smallbiggrin:

2D8HP
2018-05-04, 12:07 PM
I love the "how salty are you" part :smallbiggrin:


"A WINNAR IS YOU."


:amused:

GentlemanVoodoo
2018-05-04, 12:29 PM
The DM and player relationship is one of mutual trust and respect. In many ways it is a social contract where the individual whom is the dm or whatever named position takes on the role of rule master to ensure the game is balanced and fair for all. At the same time they are also partially responsible for some of the fun factor. Like wise the players whom join the gaming are under the presumed understanding that they agree to the calls and limitations imposed by the DM but are also responsible as well for the fun factor. I have been in games where I had a tyrannical DM and players that highjacked the game from the DM so there is ugliness on both sides of the fence.

But many issues could be prevented if people just had a session zero to talk and discuss expectations or what limits are to be set.

Pex
2018-05-04, 12:34 PM
*Pulling from other threads, my style leans ridiculously heavily towards rules as toolkit, with rules as map a secondary point of consideration and rules as contract a perspective I'm downright antagonistic to unless deliberately GMing something well outside of the norm.



That explains our relationship on these forums. :smallamused:



There's a whole genre of .gifs involving fleeing animals and similar while the word "Nope" appears repeatedly. These are basically all applicable for these situations.

I did quit that game. For other reasons too, but the DM was a major one.

Quertus
2018-05-04, 01:12 PM
In any version of D&D*, for example, eliminating any race or class or combination of races and classes produces exactly the same mechanical result as allowing those races/classes but having no player choose to play them.

And this is exactly the kind of thing I'm talking about.

Remove spells, and it impacts items and creatures that require those spells.

Remove feats (in 3e), and it impacts prestige classes that require those feats.

Removing entire classes or races... actually isn't too horrible in 3e. In earlier editions, there weren't really a lot of redundant crafting classes, for example.

But, sure. You could make an all Gnomish Expert world of mundane invention and politics using the d20 engine. But it would be difficult to run such a world as D&D adventures - WBL, for example, would be rather skewed, and we all know how much that impacts the game.

So, changing details of the world often should have a much larger impact on world building than most GMs, IME, bother with.

I've got no problem with actually thought-through changes. It's just my experience that that rarely actually happens.


Lets take smoking.

Yes, let's.

Whoever's house / business this is - who may not even be involved in the game - has final authority on the answer to this question.

Now, the group may decide that their inability to smoke in school makes this a no-sell, and vote with their feet. But the status of "GM" gives one absolutely zero authority in this decision.


First, on restrictions - I'm all for only using part of a system*, and lots of systems are deliberately made to be used that way. Nobody is using every GURPS book for one campaign, optional rules are optional for a reason, so on and so forth. That Reddit thread sounds like a collection of people I wouldn't want to play RPGs with, let alone GM for.

With that said, these restrictions are often flexible. There are aspects of a GM's setting that are very important, thematically critical, so on and so forth, where a change would be a problem. There are other aspects that are far more incidental, where changes can be made for the players with an "eh, whatever".

*Pulling from other threads, my style leans ridiculously heavily towards rules as toolkit, with rules as map a secondary point of consideration and rules as contract a perspective I'm downright antagonistic to unless deliberately GMing something well outside of the norm.


This is all a matter of perspective though - you can end up with the same settings by building them up to include what you want and by starting with a giant pile of content and trimming it. Similarly, if you build up a setting in a system that has a massive pile of content, expressing it often takes the form of limitations.

Say, for some reason, I'm GMing a D&D game. I make a setting from scratch, then look at the system. That setting probably won't have gods (though usually in a cagey way where there's no direct evidence of them, religions are still present, and definite information one way or the other isn't happening), probably won't have dwarves (though not in the sense of them being wiped out), and likely wouldn't be set up to fit certain classes. That doesn't mean that this setting was ever designed through limitations, just that it's faster to express restrictions than anything else.

Plus, as far as settings go the worst settings I have ever seen built for an existing system have universally been those built to include the obligate pile of stuff the system comes with.

Hmmm... IME, GMs will usually do one of two things: they will exclusively remove content, and produce a setting which is neither coherent nor interesting; or they will carefully add, change, and remove things, producing 50 pages of house rules in the process, and the players will be unable to comprehend the setting, having lost the forest for the trees - even if they want a Master's in This World to go with their PhD in the system.

Imagine trying to create a Tolkien setting for someone who only knows 3e. The sheer amount of stuff you'd need to add / remove / change would be mind boggling. Further, your idea of what makes a Tolkien setting is doubtless different from my vision, or from what anyone reading your rules would likely take away.

IMO, "setting through restrictions" is (in most systems) wrong-minded because the changes and additions are the fun part, and just as if not more important. And (still IMO), setting through changes is wrong-minded because it is highly taxing and inefficient, for both GM and players.

I'm too senile to be sure, but I think that the only successful implementations of cool, unique settings I've seen have involved the GM working with the players to share his vision.

EDIT: oh, sorry, I forgot to say thank you - your post made me realize that "one of these things was not like the others" - that the much harder for me to wrap my head around "restrictions for setting" is far more into "IMO/IME" territory than my other points. It's something I believe, but not a hill I'd die on - I admit I could be proven wrong on this. So, again, thank you for helping me see this.

Aotrs Commander
2018-05-04, 01:57 PM
I'm too senile to be sure, but I think that the only successful implementations of cool, unique settings I've seen have involved the GM working with the players to share his vision.

Successful by what - or whose - metric?

I DO do the aforementioned 50 pages (and that's being understated) rules changes (in addition to the NORMAL changes of rules, lists of available stuff and whatnot we have as our default set of D&D rules)1 and about the same in Rolemaster; hell, I shudder to think about the amount of information available total over the entire pan-game universe we play in, of which any and all D&D worlds are but a tiny, not-quite-but-nearly self-contained part.

And yet my players turn up every week, and every day game, and have done for the past not-quite-yet thirty years.

(It should also be noted that, really, the only time I "failed" with a game was the one time I tried setting up a ground-up sandbox-y world where the players were supposed to be charting the course of the game, rather than me doing The Plot and them following along. That lasted about four sessions before my nominal stuff ran out...)

Would you consider that "successful?"



1Nevermind anything else (like the flavour), my Dreemaenhyll mechanically tosses out the entire bestiary to be rebuilt from mythological scratch, dumps Vancian for mana points, obviates "items give you bonuses" in favour of a fixed progression approximating it ("it's you, not your gear") - I've never payed attention to WBL at the very best of times, save for starting gear for above 1st level character sometimes - and goes from air/earth/water/fire/acid/cold/lightning/sonic to air/water/earth/heat/cold/fire/ice/lightning/sonic/aid/corrosion/ooze/mist/dust/magma/steam/darkning/light/shadow (and I've probably missed a few).

Koo Rehtorb
2018-05-04, 02:07 PM
The occasional houserule is fine to tweak the system to match the setting better.

If you're routinely doing it, though, then you're probably just playing the wrong game.

Aotrs Commander
2018-05-04, 02:17 PM
The occasional houserule is fine to tweak the system to match the setting better.

If you're routinely doing it, though, then you're probably just playing the wrong game.

Again, I must ask "wrong" by what or whose metric?

People on the internet that will very likely, unless through some unusual geographical changes, never be it a position to play in the metaphorical "your" game...?



For that matter, how is, say, what I do to 3.x/PF different to modding a computer game, up to and including a total conversion mods?

JoeJ
2018-05-04, 02:27 PM
The occasional houserule is fine to tweak the system to match the setting better.

If you're routinely doing it, though, then you're probably just playing the wrong game.

Alternatively, you're approaching the rules as a set of tools, using the ones that you need for the job at hand, and ignoring the ones you don't need. And sometimes altering a tool to make it work better.

For a quick example, suppose I want magic to have more of a medieval feel, with wizards messing around with books and incantations instead of shooting fire from their hands like comic book superheroes. I can easily do that in 5e D&D just by increasing casting times and durations of spells. One action or bonus action becomes one minute, one minute becomes ten minutes, etc. (Reaction casting times and instantaneous durations are left alone.)* That alone changes significantly the way characters use magic, including which spells they choose to cast, so everything falls nicely into place. Now, I could also search for a different rules set, learn it, and try to get a group together to play it (GURPS, possibly, with the Path/Book magic from Thaumatology), but if 5e D&D changed this way does what I need it to do, why not use it and take advantage of the ready availability of D&D players?


* For the record, this is modeled after rules from the AD&D 2e historical reference books.

kyoryu
2018-05-04, 02:39 PM
Hmmm... IME, GMs will usually do one of two things: they will exclusively remove content, and produce a setting which is neither coherent nor interesting; or they will carefully add, change, and remove things, producing 50 pages of house rules in the process, and the players will be unable to comprehend the setting, having lost the forest for the trees - even if they want a Master's in This World to go with their PhD in the system.

Until you get to something like GURPS, where "use anything from any book" is pretty much explicitly a *bad idea*.

If you're disallowing something from a tight game, like Apocalypse World, or Basic D&D? Yeah, you should consider that.

The trick is that things like D&D 3.x fit into the middle area. You *could* argue that they're all part of the same thing and should all be allowed, and you can just as easily argue that it's a base rule system with a bunch of specific stuff layered on top of it.

And that's before we get into talk of different play styles, and the idea of some people really enjoying the character-building minigame and optimization (and therefore wanting as many widgets available as possible), while some people actively dislike it and want to minimize it.

Cealocanth
2018-05-04, 02:56 PM
Others have pretty much covered this, but I figured I'd weigh in on one little thing.

When you make a game, (using the collective 'you', as in "addressing both the GM and the players"), it's part of the group's responsibility to establish the social contract behind the game's formation. This needs to be a real discussion between you and your players, so that everyone is on board before any characters are made, worldbuilding is done, and plot is written about what exactly you do and do not want to see in this game. What system are you running, what changes, if any, are being used, what type of adventure or world is the GM making, and what type of characters are we making for that world? Some GMs like to say "this is the game I'm running, and if you don't like it, you don't have to play". This is fine. That GM has made it clear that to play in this game you need to be okay with his rules. It's on him to make those rules clear. Some GMs like to give the players agency. This is also fine, as long as they make it clear what they want to do.

To do this, my group uses a comination of 'Session Zero' and a modified version of the Microscope worldbuilding system. The day of the game, two weeks before the game is scheduled to actually start, we all meet up (or in our case, join the group call) to discuss the specifics of how we want the game to run. This is the system we use to make sure that everyone has a say in the game world. We go around one person at a time and establish the following:


No-goes: What are you absolutely not willing to see at this table? (This is usually stuff like "no torture RP" and similar)
Game system and genre we're playing in.
Each person (player and GM) gets to name one major positive and one major negative aspect of the world. These are grand overarching things, like continents, gods, rule changes, etc. This is mostly to get people brainstorming about what they think would be interesting.
Each person (player and GM) gets to name one minor positive and one minor negative. Same here. People ususally use this slot to establish cities, places, NPCs, organizations, and similar small things so they have a place their character fits into the world.
Once everyone has had a weigh in, we open up the table to more discussions, in case people have more than one idea they want to see. This is the opportunity for players and the GM to 'veto' other people's suggestions. They state that they disagree, don't understand, or otherwise would rather not see one of the previously stated things, and the rest of the group can weigh in on whether or not they agree with this sentiment. In the end, though, the player who originally placed the positive/negative aspect gets to decide if they want to reconsider or not. (This is the best opportunity you will have to see how the players attempt power dynamics over each other, who is a spotlight hog and who is a wall flower, and who thinks that everything in the game needs to go their way.)
Only when everyone is satisfied does the GM get started building the world and the players, their characters. Until the first session, changes can be made to the game structure by talking with the GM or other players, but once the first session arrives, you are expected to be satisfied in the rules you helped create.


The main problem with this is when we have a player who joins this game in the middle of it. This is when the 'if you want to join, please be clear that these are the boundaries the other players set for this world and it's way too late to change them' discussion comes in.

Aotrs Commander
2018-05-04, 03:16 PM
Alternatively, you're approaching the rules as a set of tools, using the ones that you need for the job at hand, and ignoring the ones you don't need. And sometimes altering a tool to make it work better.

Exactly. I find no rules sacroscant, and nothing is above modification if necessary. The rules - and this goes for the dice as well, for that matter - are not the game, they merely facilitate it.




Until you get to something like GURPS, where "use anything from any book" is pretty much explicitly a *bad idea*.

If you're disallowing something from a tight game, like Apocalypse World, or Basic D&D? Yeah, you should consider that.

The trick is that things like D&D 3.x fit into the middle area. You *could* argue that they're all part of the same thing and should all be allowed, and you can just as easily argue that it's a base rule system with a bunch of specific stuff layered on top of it.

My own approach hasn't changed from Rolemaster - the bits of the rules in use will be clearly marked, but if it isn't, it isn't in use.

(Note that this, in the case of 3.Aotrs, means that there are tens of pages of feats and the same of spells (some tweaked, clarified and sometimes improved, e.g. cure/inflict, and some new) and the only class out of the splats in use not on the approved list is Complete Warrior Samurai (on the basis that it was strictly inferior to Fighter. let alone 3.Aotrs Fighter) and a handful of not-allowed spells (notably Shivering Touch), PrC on a case-by-case basis provided they don't have incompatible flavour (for the maybe three players that care about PrC, all three being among the group's better mechanically adept); whereas the not-allowed stuff tends to be rather a handful of magic items out of MiC, a lot out of previous sourcebooks. The availability of choice is arguably already a bit overwhelming for the less mechanically adept, who often ask me for advise on what to pick anyway.)




Others have pretty much covered this, but I figured I'd weigh in on one little thing.

When you make a game, (using the collective 'you', as in "addressing both the GM and the players"), it's part of the group's responsibility to establish the social contract behind the game's formation. This needs to be a real discussion between you and your players, so that everyone is on board before any characters are made, worldbuilding is done, and plot is written about what exactly you do and do not want to see in this game. What system are you running, what changes, if any, are being used, what type of adventure or world is the GM making, and what type of characters are we making for that world? Some GMs like to say "this is the game I'm running, and if you don't like it, you don't have to play". This is fine. That GM has made it clear that to play in this game you need to be okay with his rules. It's on him to make those rules clear.

That is definitely me. And we have EXTENSIVE documentation, especially after this time last year when I completed a shift more towards PF (but still not PF)...! And when we occasionally get new players, I make very sure to let them now what we do and how we run.

(I also do most of the organisation, as and when required, since I'm the primary DM (since I am the one most keen to devote the time to it) and I do a sort of not quite an unofficial chairlich-ish sort of thing. And I'm extremely lucky compared to some that my players will pretty much cheerfully go along with more or less anything.)

Quertus
2018-05-04, 05:19 PM
Successful by what - or whose - metric?

What you described was clearly successful, but not included in my experiences, because I clearly wasn't at your table for all them years. :smallwink:

Now, out of curiosity, did you actually have players who read and understood your 50 pages of changes before play began?


The trick is that things like D&D 3.x fit into the middle area. You *could* argue that they're all part of the same thing and should all be allowed, and you can just as easily argue that it's a base rule system with a bunch of specific stuff layered on top of it.

And that's before we get into talk of different play styles, and the idea of some people really enjoying the character-building minigame and optimization (and therefore wanting as many widgets available as possible), while some people actively dislike it and want to minimize it.

I've dealt with small, surgical changes. My issue is just with GMs generally lacking the ability to make larger changes, or to understand the ramifications of the changes that they do make, and with players not really understanding or being onboard with larger changes, particularly when approached rules-first.

Now, that last paragraph of yours is particularly interesting to me. See, I generally hate when the character creation minigame is required to be complex. Yet I don't condone arbitrary removal of content - "forced simplification", as it were.

I want a game that caters to both crowds - where one can build simple, competitive characters, or perform complex dumpster diving, as they see fit.


(This is the best opportunity you will have to see how the players attempt power dynamics over each other, who is a spotlight hog and who is a wall flower, and who thinks that everything in the game needs to go their way.)

I don't usually address this layer, but that's brilliant.

So, what do you do with this data once you have it?

Pex
2018-05-04, 06:18 PM
Again, I must ask "wrong" by what or whose metric?

People on the internet that will very likely, unless through some unusual geographical changes, never be it a position to play in the metaphorical "your" game...?



For that matter, how is, say, what I do to 3.x/PF different to modding a computer game, up to and including a total conversion mods?

If you have to write your own Player's Handbook to account for house rules, you're really not liking the game system. If you have to keep fiddling the rules even as the game is played continuously introducing new ideas for the next session, you're really not liking the game system.

Aotrs Commander
2018-05-04, 07:21 PM
What you described was clearly successful, but not included in my experiences, because I clearly wasn't at your table for all them years. :smallwink:

Now, out of curiosity, did you actually have players who read and understood your 50 pages of changes before play began?

Not as such, since many of the basic changes (like ditching multiclass XP penalties as we did almost instantly, 3.x's multiclassing system being probably the single best idea in the entire system) were largely unwritten rules that me and the other players had decided on (i.e. someone would say "that's stupid, bollocks to that" and the rest would agree). Or it's stuff that's been phased in over the time or when I do a big update or a major change, like the buffing of Cure/Inflict spells to something more plausible.

But they don't need to. The majority of them group have never read the core rulebooks front-to-back anyway, and just learned the system by playing and taking advice from those of us who have (maybe three of us). Most of 'em aren't all that bothered about the rules, so they just trust me (as the one with time and inclination) to get on with at and they all tend to go with whatever I've one. Hell, by their own admission, the the other DMs will lean on my experience with rulesmithing if they run D20 something (Judge Dredd, Sidewinder) and occasionally ask me for advice. (Since, y'know, they can trust me to be impartial, even if it screws us up! And vise versa.)

For Rolemaster, I am basically the unparalleled authority1. They don't NEED to know the system in RM, since it's all skill checks, basically. (Nor would any of them have the need or inclination to read a bookshelf of rulebooks to do that, for that matter; certainly, none of them have ever asked but they'd be quite welcome to if they did!) There's not really any sort of optimisation you can do with RM (at least, not which is trivialised by the sort of parties we play), so all they need to know is how to spend their development points and how to add said numbers to percentiles. (And for the, like, one or two spellcasters, what their much more limited spells do, though for the given value of "have the print outs".) Even for the action sequences (which are a bit more complex than D&D's), I'll ask what the player wants to do and then suggest the best division of percentage activity (and leave the ones who CAN be arsed to work it out themselves). But combat isn't typically a major portion of our RM games, and, for that matter, the action sequence is just a modifed, complied one of the MANY, MANY such rules across five editions of Rolemaster and Spacemaster and the RM companions...




If you have to write your own Player's Handbook to account for house rules, you're really not liking the game system. If you have to keep fiddling the rules even as the game is played continuously introducing new ideas for the next session, you're really not liking the game system.

On the contrary, if it's not worth fiddling with, it's not worth playing in the first place, period.

No system is ever perfect (rules or otherwise), no system is immune to being tweaked and improved over time and no system doesn't have room for improvement.

I have writing and modifiy rules almost the second I started gaming... No, tell a big fat lie, now I think about it, I was writing rules BEFORE I was technically a "gamer," as a child (and somewhere, I might even have the cardboard starship counters and such to prove it). So I've been writing rules for as long as I've been aware that game rules Were Even A Thing.

Thus, it isn't - and would not be - any different with ANY system you can name. Like I say, we as a group have not ever played any set of rules in coming up to thirty years without tinkering it it, be it Rolemaster, HeroQuest, Warhammer (WFRP, WFB or WH40k), BattleTech, Stargrunt II, Full Thrust, Silent Death, Fox 2, DBM, D&D 3.x, D&D 4E, AD&D, Dungeoneer, Star Wars D6, Maneouvre Group or Accelerate and Attack (and I WROTE that last one MYSELF)... I could go on.

The more a system is played, the more it will be inevitably be house-ruled modifed, changed and improved as time goes on. And we've been playing 3.x since release regularly (with only a slight break for 4E because someone else runs it and maybe a breif break for Rolemaster or Warhammer), basically every week for what, seventeen years? Thus it is only natural that 3.x has got the most modifications, with only Rolemaster (which is the second system of choice) bringing up the rear and I've been playing that since I started roleplaying properly (literally), period.



There is no such thing as "good enough" for me, it has to be Right, or as close to Right as it can be. Whether this means tweaking the rules mechanics, or spending an afternoon working out the correct gradient and therefore size of the ramp to push a trolley up in Defunct Female Quad-Spider-Robot Space IKEA (yes, that was A Thing), or working out how many hours of daylight at the latitude the party belonging to the ten-to-thirteen year old players have to work with or spending thirteen years writing me own starship rules, it's all the same.



1Only one of them (the guy that was running it when I joined!) has probably even read the main rules. He might even be the only other guy who even HAS a copy of some of the rulebooks, but he's not part of the subset of the group that does the day session Rolemaster anyway. (My day quest sessions have a larger pool of players than our weekly games, so not everyone comes to every day quest game.)

D+1
2018-05-04, 08:31 PM
I can envy you. I have. The most recent, a number of years ago, I can still quote from memory. "I'm a DM who believes a player should never get what they want."
I myself, repeatedly quote Spock:
"After a time, you may find that having is not so pleasing a thing after all as wanting. It is not logical, but it is often true."

I would further emphasize here that the word used in that quote is "often" and not "always". I don't want players to NOT HAVE FUN, but that doesn't mean they get whatever they THINK they're entitled to. When players are given everything they want, as [cough] the 21st century editions are wont to do, I think we tend to see more results such as the OP describes - players who think that being denied ANYTHING by a DM is unreasonable.

But again I go back to the question - was this attitude one that the players were made aware of up front? Did they find out only later, and if so what did they do? Did that DM rightfully lose all his players, or is he still running a game somewhere with that player-repellent philosophy? A DM can invent any twisted, abusive, tedious version of D&D that they like, but the key to making it work is COMMUNICATION. Players who know they're in for a struggle generally expect NOT to find a game full of win. Players who expected at least the occasional W on the W/L record and never get it will complain. If a DM then tells them they will never get what they want, those players will quit - or %@*& well should.

One of the guys I used to game with a good 30 years ago joined a campaign run by a DM whose game could be described as a bit twisted, certainly pointlessly harsh, and possibly even cruel. But the players ENJOYED it. If they didn't know what they were in for when they signed on it certainly didn't take long to find out. They chose to stay and wallow in the struggle and misery, though to me (even moreso nowadays) it sucked like a black hole to not so much LOSE as simply never really WIN, never progress, never achieve anything openly fun or heroic, but merely trudge wearily onward and survive. It is certainly important that there be STRUGGLE, that victories and rewards and goals require effort, sometimes a great deal of effort, as well as occasional real sacrifice in order for those rewards to be valued, but that comes somewhere between Care Bear cakewalks and "The players should NEVER get what they want". If players make it clear to their DM what they want, and DM's are truthful and forthright about what they are actually going to give, the game will work.

Pex
2018-05-04, 09:03 PM
I myself, repeatedly quote Spock:
"After a time, you may find that having is not so pleasing a thing after all as wanting. It is not logical, but it is often true."

I would further emphasize here that the word used in that quote is "often" and not "always". I don't want players to NOT HAVE FUN, but that doesn't mean they get whatever they THINK they're entitled to. When players are given everything they want, as [cough] the 21st century editions are wont to do, I think we tend to see more results such as the OP describes - players who think that being denied ANYTHING by a DM is unreasonable.

But again I go back to the question - was this attitude one that the players were made aware of up front? Did they find out only later, and if so what did they do? Did that DM rightfully lose all his players, or is he still running a game somewhere with that player-repellent philosophy? A DM can invent any twisted, abusive, tedious version of D&D that they like, but the key to making it work is COMMUNICATION. Players who know they're in for a struggle generally expect NOT to find a game full of win. Players who expected at least the occasional W on the W/L record and never get it will complain. If a DM then tells them they will never get what they want, those players will quit - or %@*& well should.

One of the guys I used to game with a good 30 years ago joined a campaign run by a DM whose game could be described as a bit twisted, certainly pointlessly harsh, and possibly even cruel. But the players ENJOYED it. If they didn't know what they were in for when they signed on it certainly didn't take long to find out. They chose to stay and wallow in the struggle and misery, though to me (even moreso nowadays) it sucked like a black hole to not so much LOSE as simply never really WIN, never progress, never achieve anything openly fun or heroic, but merely trudge wearily onward and survive. It is certainly important that there be STRUGGLE, that victories and rewards and goals require effort, sometimes a great deal of effort, as well as occasional real sacrifice in order for those rewards to be valued, but that comes somewhere between Care Bear cakewalks and "The players should NEVER get what they want". If players make it clear to their DM what they want, and DM's are truthful and forthright about what they are actually going to give, the game will work.

We were on a ship. The mast was broken. We wanted to rig a temporary replacement to set the sails just long enough to get to shore which was close. On land we could chop wood and make a proper permanent mast. I was not involved in the conversation. Two who were told the DM what they were doing, how they were doing it, and why they were doing it. Some spells were to be cast, especially Enhance Ability to give advantage on Strength checks since heavy lifting was involved. The DM was arguing with the players every step of the way on why it couldn't work but the players explained how it would. If you're thinking metagaming was going on, especially since the barbarian player came up with the plan, I wouldn't disagree but no one, not even the DM, was concerned about that. The barbarian player admitted she knew about this in real life. She literally had done the exact thing we were wanting to do, but the DM would not let it work. No skill checks. Just flat out No. Finally he relented. Next gaming session it was obvious it stuck in his craw as he complained about it before game start. He vowed that would never happen again and said the quote.

In any case, the DM said he believes players should never get what they want. Disagreeing with that does not mean players must always get what they want. It's not an either/or. Players are allowed to get some things they want, and even that doesn't mean poof they get it.

RazorChain
2018-05-04, 09:35 PM
One of the guys I used to game with a good 30 years ago joined a campaign run by a DM whose game could be described as a bit twisted, certainly pointlessly harsh, and possibly even cruel. But the players ENJOYED it. If they didn't know what they were in for when they signed on it certainly didn't take long to find out. They chose to stay and wallow in the struggle and misery, though to me (even moreso nowadays) it sucked like a black hole to not so much LOSE as simply never really WIN, never progress, never achieve anything openly fun or heroic, but merely trudge wearily onward and survive. It is certainly important that there be STRUGGLE, that victories and rewards and goals require effort, sometimes a great deal of effort, as well as occasional real sacrifice in order for those rewards to be valued, but that comes somewhere between Care Bear cakewalks and "The players should NEVER get what they want". If players make it clear to their DM what they want, and DM's are truthful and forthright about what they are actually going to give, the game will work.

Sounds like one of my grimdark campaigns where I pile it on the PC's and every small victory is savored. The true measure of a hero isn't all the victories he/she accomplishes, it's the struggle. It's when all hope is lost and all seems doomed but still you go on because you cannot, will not give up. Some people like this kind of campaigns where nothing is given and everything is taken, where you know that everything you achieved was based on your plans, your tactics, your cleverness, your luck even when the GM was stacking things against you.

Darth Ultron
2018-05-04, 11:32 PM
Whoever's house / business this is - who may not even be involved in the game - has final authority on the answer to this question.

Now, the group may decide that their inability to smoke in school makes this a no-sell, and vote with their feet. But the status of "GM" gives one absolutely zero authority in this decision.

The host has final authority over the game? Seems a bit odd. And you can't trust some random host to do the right thing. But a DM is committed to doing the right thing for the good of all can. A jerk host can smoke or drink or whatever and ruin the game for all, stomping their feet and saying ''it's my castle''. Or a reasonable, clear headed DM can say ''oh, sure it is your place...but how about for just the couple hours of gameplay while we are at the table: no smoking."




Hmmm... IME, GMs will usually do one of two things: they will exclusively remove content, and produce a setting which is neither coherent nor interesting; or they will carefully add, change, and remove things, producing 50 pages of house rules in the process, and the players will be unable to comprehend the setting, having lost the forest for the trees - even if they want a Master's in This World to go with their PhD in the system.

Just note, in general, I'd put this type of person as a Bad DM.



Again, I must ask "wrong" by what or whose metric?


I'd ask too.



Now, out of curiosity, did you actually have players who read and understood your 50 pages of changes before play began?

It is very rare any players do. Much like the 'core' rules, most players only skim the things they want to know or will use. And few players have the knowledge or system mastery to understand much of anything. So when they are told X will be Y, they just nod yes and shrug.


The majority of them group have never read the core rulebooks front-to-back anyway, and just learned the system by playing and taking advice from those of us who have (maybe three of us). Most of 'em aren't all that bothered about the rules, so they just trust me (as the one with time and inclination) to get on with at and they all tend to go with whatever I've one.

Yes, this right here. The vast majority of players are more then happy with ''my rules'' and can care less what the ''rule book'' says.

oxybe
2018-05-05, 12:19 AM
The host has final authority over the game? Seems a bit odd. And you can't trust some random host to do the right thing. But a DM is committed to doing the right thing for the good of all can. A jerk host can smoke or drink or whatever and ruin the game for all, stomping their feet and saying ''it's my castle''. Or a reasonable, clear headed DM can say ''oh, sure it is your place...but how about for just the couple hours of gameplay while we are at the table: no smoking."

Uh, no.

To flip your argument around: it's my apartment, so no smoking. I don't care if you're a friend, my mom or the pope: You light up and your kiester is going out on the streets. If some rando GM I picked out of the FLGS wants to take a puff because he can "better concentrate on the game", he can go out in the cold as far as i'm concerned. I'm the one paying rent and I don't want my apartment smelling of smoke. If he's going to make a huff about the whole thing, he can take his game and leave.

In short: the GM is human and can be just as much of a richard as a host, but in the end if what you're doing makes you an unwanted guest, the host can uninvite you and ask you to leave.

Darth Ultron
2018-05-05, 12:31 AM
In short: the GM is human and can be just as much of a richard as a host, but in the end if what you're doing makes you an unwanted guest, the host can uninvite you and ask you to leave.

It does work much better if one person is both Host and DM.

Really it is not a big deal to ask a host to do the right thing. Asking them to not do something for a couple of hours is not the end of the world.

Mr Beer
2018-05-05, 06:09 AM
The host has final authority over the game? Seems a bit odd. And you can't trust some random host to do the right thing. But a DM is committed to doing the right thing for the good of all can. A jerk host can smoke or drink or whatever and ruin the game for all, stomping their feet and saying ''it's my castle''. Or a reasonable, clear headed DM can say ''oh, sure it is your place...but how about for just the couple hours of gameplay while we are at the table: no smoking."

LOL

Pretty presumptuous to walk into another man's house and then tell him not to smoke.

Satinavian
2018-05-05, 07:17 AM
So really I just want to know what you guys believe a good relationship between player and DM is and do you think it's okay to restrict rules to protect the majority of your players fun at the expense of another who is ruining the game for others?

Simple :

Rules are decided democratically by the group.

It is not a sine non qua, but it is a realy strong preferrence.

Darth Ultron
2018-05-05, 09:56 AM
LOL

Pretty presumptuous to walk into another man's house and then tell him not to smoke.

Not if that person is a good man. Asking someone to not do something, even when that someone is in their own home, is not a problem for a good person in general.

And if that person stamps their little feet and says ''it's my home and I will do what I want" then they are a childish jerk.

Though too it is always best to not have Bob the epic stinking chimney smoker as host..

Quertus
2018-05-05, 11:47 AM
Not if that person is a good man. Asking someone to not do something, even when that someone is in their own home, is not a problem for a good person in general.

And if that person stamps their little feet and says ''it's my home and I will do what I want" then they are a childish jerk.

Though too it is always best to not have Bob the epic stinking chimney smoker as host..

DU, please consider your position very carefully here.

Playgrounders have asked you to stop a great many things, and you have rarely acquiesced.

If you really believe what you said above, consider what this says about you.

Please carefully consider which piece of this you would like to change - yourself, or your stance on what makes a good man - unless you want to self-label as a "childish jerk".

Tanarii
2018-05-05, 12:17 PM
And if that person stamps their little feet and says ''it's my home and I will do what I want" then they are a childish jerk. True.

But this also applies to DMs who stamp their little feet and says "it's my game and I will do what I want".

And that's my position even though I think it's the DMs game and they set the rules. There's a difference between that and a stubborn insistence on doing things the hard way and throwing a tantrum about it.

I have many rules in my game that are a condition of coming to play at my table, mostly character creation rules, but also things like No Evil Characters and Don't be a Richard. Because they are a baseline standard for all of my players and the type of game I am willing to run.

I have other things where I certainly listen to the players, and make a ruling one way or another, and possibly revisit the ruling after the game.

Then there's things like phones at the table. I hate them. I could stamp might little feet about them. But I don't, because the majority of my players really want to use phone apps for character related stuff.

A host insisting on smoking inside or getting drunk at a game session because it's their house dagnabbit, is the same as a DM insisting on something fairly ridiculous at their table. You don't return.

bc56
2018-05-05, 01:58 PM
Settings come with restrictions. In Eberron you can't summon a god for tea and crumpets, in Forgotten Realms you can't just ignore the gods and do your own thing and in Ravenloft, well, having a nice day is pretty much out of the question. But even with these restrictions, these settings are beloved and enjoyed. Yes, even Forgotten Realms.

Which is why if a DM had restrictions in terms of game rules, I'd try it. A DM that is telling a story they have crafted and worked on and put a lot of effort into is going to do a much better job of making a story. A DM that is allowed creative freedom is also going to have an easier time of weaving an interesting story and portraying memorable characters. They are also less likely to experience DM burnout, which is the bane of many a group.

So yeah, I'm okay with a DM restricting content. Just try to sell me on how awesome your setting is first. That'll distract most people.

Thank you Tiefling, you pretty much summed up what I was going to say.

But I'll elaborate anyway.
I restrict a lot of stuff, because the themes of the game don't work well with some of the options. I run a serious game. NPCs are gruesomely murdered, villages are burned down, etc. I ban gnomes because the wacky exploding gadgets are too light-hearted for my setting. I base my setting on midevil Europe, so no monks, because they aren't culturally appropriate. I ban everything remotely resembling a gunslinger, because the only guns in the world are matchlock arquebuses which cannot by any means be "slung."

This doesn't mean I don't allow stuff. I initially banned Tieflings, because I thought fiends shouldn't be running around procreating with humans. My players weren't interested in playing Tieflings, so it was fine, but about four sessions in, my players asked me why I didn't want Tieflings in the game. I explained, and the next words out of the player's mouth were "But what if..." We ended up sitting down and deciding together how Tieflings could exist in the setting.



IMO, "setting through restrictions" is (in most systems) wrong-minded because the changes and additions are the fun part, and just as if not more important. And (still IMO), setting through changes is wrong-minded because it is highly taxing and inefficient, for both GM and players.


But allowing everything is also incredibly taxing on the DM, because you need to possess every rulebook the players might use, and that's not even including homebrew. Restricting options also allows a more cohesive setting, where you don't need to explain how vancian magic and psionics and ki all fit together and all work in one setting, especially since they each represent different themes. Vancian magic is power through practice, knowledge and risk. Psionics is about the mind and science having ultimate control of reality. Ki is about power through self-actualization. Divine magic is about power from a greater source and faith in a higher power. Druidic magic is about drawing power from the natural world. It's hard to explain how these different methods can exist together (especially psionics and clerical/druidic power). As such, I find it wise to limit the number of classes available, especially in terms of power sources.

Put another way, few popular fantasy books have more than two or three ways to access magic. In Harry Potter, magic is learned through the memorization of magical formulae and incantations, but an untrained wizard can still cast unpredictable effects. There's no divine power, no psionics, etc, yet no one would say that they're missing. Rather, the world seems more cohesive and makes more sense.

That's my three cents (Because why give 2 when you could give three?)

2D8HP
2018-05-05, 02:50 PM
...allowing everything is also incredibly taxing on the DM, because you need to possess every rulebook the players might use, and that's not even including homebrew. Restricting options also allows a more cohesive setting...


Which is a reason that I'll probably never DM modern D&D.

There's just so much!

I could use the core of 5e D&D, stripped of a a lot of options, and make a good (to me) game out of it, but what I see is players clambering for even more options, and to play increasingly special snowflake PC's, so more "crunch" for DM's to handle.

The social politics of GM'ing a game without all that content and then allowing some extras is easier for me than how many "No's" I'd have to do.

Quertus
2018-05-05, 03:10 PM
But allowing everything is also incredibly taxing on the DM, because you need to possess every rulebook the players might use, and that's not even including homebrew. Restricting options also allows a more cohesive setting, where you don't need to explain how vancian magic and psionics and ki all fit together and all work in one setting, especially since they each represent different themes. Vancian magic is power through practice, knowledge and risk. Psionics is about the mind and science having ultimate control of reality. Ki is about power through self-actualization. Divine magic is about power from a greater source and faith in a higher power. Druidic magic is about drawing power from the natural world. It's hard to explain how these different methods can exist together (especially psionics and clerical/druidic power). As such, I find it wise to limit the number of classes available, especially in terms of power sources.

That wasn't my point. It's not a dichotomy of "allow everything" vs "ban stuff". If you want to create a cohesive setting, you start with... a cohesive setting. Then, you take the rules, and you add, remove, or modify as necessary to create that setting.

Far too many GMs seem stuck in "sculpter's logic", and only think in terms of removing things.

----

And, no, a GM doesn't need to possess any rules books (although having the core rules for most any game certainly helps), let alone all the ones that the players are using. A GM need never look at the players sheets, or have any notion of what they are running. In fact, IME, games run best if the GM generally treats the PCs as black boxes, completely unaware of and uncaring towards their internals.

Knaight
2018-05-05, 05:11 PM
LOL

Pretty presumptuous to walk into another man's house and then tell him not to smoke.

Seeing as secondhand smoke is a thing it's hardly unreasonable to ask other people not to smoke around you. Now, declaring someone's house a smoking area, that's presumptuous.

Darth Ultron
2018-05-05, 09:37 PM
Playgrounders have asked you to stop a great many things, and you have rarely acquiesced.


You are talking it way out of context.


But this also applies to DMs who stamp their little feet and says "it's my game and I will do what I want".

And that's my position even though I think it's the DMs game and they set the rules. There's a difference between that and a stubborn insistence on doing things the hard way and throwing a tantrum about it.

This does yet again mix the apples and oranges.

The DM does get to set the house rules for their personal game. The players can ask the DM for things, but the DM makes the final call.

And phones? I ban them from my games......but if you are a ''cell phone person'', you likely won't be in my game anyway.

Corneel
2018-05-05, 10:04 PM
You are talking it way out of context.



This does yet again mix the apples and oranges.

The DM does get to set the house rules for their personal game. The players can ask the DM for things, but the DM makes the final call.

And phones? I ban them from my games......but if you are a ''cell phone person'', you likely won't be in my game anyway.
Without a phone, how is the DM going to make that final call?

Mr Beer
2018-05-05, 10:40 PM
Not if that person is a good man. Asking someone to not do something, even when that someone is in their own home, is not a problem for a good person in general.

And if that person stamps their little feet and says ''it's my home and I will do what I want" then they are a childish jerk.

Though too it is always best to not have Bob the epic stinking chimney smoker as host..

It's perfectly reasonable for a good person to smoke in their own home without the consent of the guest DM. Of course if the DM is a childish jerk and insists on their almighty word being obeyed at all times, they will probably stamp their little feet. But that would be their problem.

Mr Beer
2018-05-05, 10:43 PM
Seeing as secondhand smoke is a thing it's hardly unreasonable to ask other people not to smoke around you. Now, declaring someone's house a smoking area, that's presumptuous.

Put it this way, if you know the person smokes in their home and you go round there to game, that's your problem. You don't get to declare the place to be a non-smoking zone.

Of course, smoking in the home belongs to the 1970s and mainland China, so probably better to avoid those homes in the first place.

Knaight
2018-05-05, 10:48 PM
Put it this way, if you know the person smokes in their home and you go round there to game, that's your problem. You don't get to declare the place to be a non-smoking zone.

Of course, smoking in the home belongs to the 1970s and mainland China, so probably better to avoid those homes in the first place.

Declare? No. As a request though it's entirely reasonable, and smoking anyways when that request has been made is incredibly bad hosting. What event is being hosted is almost completely irrelevant here - it could be an RPG, it could be getting friends together for a movie, whatever. If it isn't a cigar sampling party there's a clear hosting etiquette.

Pex
2018-05-06, 12:06 AM
Some people like to be dressed only in their underwear or nude when at home. Should they still be such when hosting a game?

Tanarii
2018-05-06, 12:35 AM
Some people like to be dressed only in their underwear or nude when at home. Should they still be such when hosting a game?
Depends how cute they are?

Mr Beer
2018-05-06, 01:57 AM
Declare? No. As a request though it's entirely reasonable, and smoking anyways when that request has been made is incredibly bad hosting. What event is being hosted is almost completely irrelevant here - it could be an RPG, it could be getting friends together for a movie, whatever. If it isn't a cigar sampling party there's a clear hosting etiquette.

We've both said what we're going to say I think, so I respectfully disagree and will leave it there.

Mr Beer
2018-05-06, 01:58 AM
Some people like to be dressed only in their underwear or nude when at home. Should they still be such when hosting a game?

Of course, who doesn't like a friendly underwear get together?

I play a lot of online poker and I hide the pee bottles when I host. That's only fair.

Satinavian
2018-05-06, 04:57 AM
Some people like to be dressed only in their underwear or nude when at home. Should they still be such when hosting a game?
Personally i would have far less problems with that than with smoking during game.

Quertus
2018-05-06, 07:58 AM
Some people like to be dressed only in their underwear or nude when at home. Should they still be such when hosting a game?


Depends how cute they are?


Personally i would have far less problems with that than with smoking during game.

But that's the question. Is "take your shoes off at the door, no profanity in my house, no feet on the table" the host being a bad person? Is, "it's my house, I'm gonna smoke in the nude with the windows sky light open" the host being a bad person? Is "posted: all visitors will be sacrificed to Cthulhu" the host being a bad person?

Does the fact that schools demand no smoking, no firearms, no using the alternate genders restroom make them bad hosts? Or how about them not stopping their obnoxiously loud band practice / football game when asked? Or their unwillingness to change their bus schedule to accommodate curb-side drop-off of your crippled friend?

I stand by "host's house, host's rules", for all things within the bounds of the law, at least. If you're deathly allergic to the host's pets, you don't get to sacrifice them to Cthulhu and burn the couch - you find somewhere else to game.

Tanarii
2018-05-06, 10:12 AM
I stand by "host's house, host's rules", for all things within the bounds of the law, at least. If you're deathly allergic to the host's pets, you don't get to sacrifice them to Cthulhu and burn the couch - you find somewhere else to game.
You can't force someone else to be a good host. You can definitely find somewhere else to game. If truly bad, like someone insisting on smoking inside at the table because it's their home, you cancel the session.

I smoked cigarettes for 10 years, including in my dorm rooms at college. I still sometimes smoke cigars, including in various friends smoking rooms (usually converted garages) and of course in cigar shops. I find it hard to believe anyone is seriously defending the idea of a host saying they'll smoke at a game session because it's their own home dagnabbit! I'm assuming people arguing that point are just making their argument based on principle. Not on actual experience with indoor smoking.

Darth Ultron
2018-05-06, 11:39 AM
I stand by "host's house, host's rules", for all things within the bounds of the law, at least. If you're deathly allergic to the host's pets, you don't get to sacrifice them to Cthulhu and burn the couch - you find somewhere else to game.

I don't see how asking someone to do/not do something for a couple hours, even in their own house, is a big deal. And, unless the host is a jerk, there is no reason they can't do/not do something for just a couple hours.

Maybe just make it part of the vaunted Gentleman's Agreement? If everyone in the game can to agree to do things like ''Neither players nor DM are to use inherent flaws in the rules to break the game", maybe they can also agree to ''not smoke during the gameplay".

Quertus
2018-05-06, 02:26 PM
I find it hard to believe anyone is seriously defending the idea of a host saying they'll smoke at a game session because it's their own home dagnabbit! I'm assuming people arguing that point are just making their argument based on principle. Not on actual experience with indoor smoking.

The smoke was so thick from double-digit chain smokers in a confined space, I couldn't read the clock from my seat.


I don't see how asking someone to do/not do something for a couple hours, even in their own house, is a big deal. And, unless the host is a jerk, there is no reason they can't do/not do something for just a couple hours.

Maybe just make it part of the vaunted Gentleman's Agreement? If everyone in the game can to agree to do things like ''Neither players nor DM are to use inherent flaws in the rules to break the game", maybe they can also agree to ''not smoke during the gameplay".

Asking isn't. Expecting is. Do you really consider the school board bad people because they won't postpone their football game for a few hours, because the crowd is to loud for you to hear each other roleplay?

The host is the final authority on the matter.

Knaight
2018-05-06, 02:30 PM
You can't force someone else to be a good host. You can definitely find somewhere else to game. If truly bad, like someone insisting on smoking inside at the table because it's their home, you cancel the session.

I smoked cigarettes for 10 years, including in my dorm rooms at college. I still sometimes smoke cigars, including in various friends smoking rooms (usually converted garages) and of course in cigar shops. I find it hard to believe anyone is seriously defending the idea of a host saying they'll smoke at a game session because it's their own home dagnabbit! I'm assuming people arguing that point are just making their argument based on principle. Not on actual experience with indoor smoking.

I hope so - I have some limited actual experience with indoor smoking (compliments of some relatives who did it), and from that perspective it's very high on the list of things not to do when hosting. Heck, I'd generally prefer not to use a location people smoke in at all, even if they don't smoke when people are there, a perspective widely shared enough that everyone I know who both smokes and likes hosting events smokes outside to insure that the stench doesn't drive all their guests away.

Solaris
2018-05-06, 10:09 PM
If I can put pants on when I host the nerdlings coming over for the game, a smoker can hold off on lowering his property values for the duration of the game.
My wife has some pretty nasty breathing problems that pop up around smoke. The average game has three to four people in it. How well do you think that game's going to go when two of the players drop out because the GM/host just had to have his way? In this hypothetical, she might well be willing to stay - but I don't play with *******s.

I do believe I saw mention made upthread of negotiating the terms of the game between GM and players. This kind of thing is no different. It holds true for just about every interaction you have with another person.

Mordaedil
2018-05-07, 02:35 AM
I don't really smoke, but I know plenty of people who do smoke, and nearly everybody that do understands that smoking around me as a non-smoker is a rude gest and they will go to admirable lengths to not bother me with the smoking (as far as I consider reasonable plausible at any rate), such as smoking on the porch or wait until I leave before resuming their habbits. The only exception to this are my parents and it's either because I overstay my welcome or because they just have an older upbringing and to them getting away from their parents to own their own place meant they could do as they wanted.

My generation seem to be far better at respecting others (health) than that one.

That said, I have never played D&D with someone who smokes in person.

Beleriphon
2018-05-08, 03:54 PM
The only exception to this are my parents and it's either because I overstay my welcome or because they just have an older upbringing and to them getting away from their parents to own their own place meant they could do as they wanted.

It isn't either actually. Its because they re your parents and don't actually view you as a guest in their home, you're actually at home when you're there even if you don't live with them. There are lots of things my parents, and I expect the vast majority of people's parents, do around them that they would never do with others around.

Tanarii
2018-05-08, 08:07 PM
It isn't either actually. Its because they re your parents and don't actually view you as a guest in their home, you're actually at home when you're there even if you don't live with them. There are lots of things my parents, and I expect the vast majority of people's parents, do around them that they would never do with others around.
That ... may just be the most insightful in an applicable to real life way comment I've ever read on these forums. I'm going to see my parents different next time I'm "at home" with them. Well done.