Quote Originally Posted by Kurt Kurageous View Post
I just wanted to say that I, too, am a recovering Army vet. 31 years an officer, retired in previous decade.

The AAR you described is a hot wash. At the battalion+ level these get turned in to the Center for Army Lessons Learned or CALL in a particular format. That format is "Issue, Discussion, and Recommendation."

I say this all to say how right you are about how the military makes mistakes. To murder a previous recruiting slogan, "There's dumb, and there's Army dumb." Where we go really wrong and stay wrong is not enough decision makers actually read the formal AARs written by dwids like me and you.

And this is why this forum is so freakin' valuable to running better games.
Well, d@mn! Congrats on making it 31 years, sir! I'm glad people are finding value in this thread; I honestly wasn't sure if I should even post it.

Quote Originally Posted by Pex View Post
The DM isn't to blame for a player choosing to be a donkey cavity, but it is his responsibility to keep it out of the game.
Your point about not blaming but taking responsibility is, I think, the major thrust of DMing. Yeah, you're not to blame, but you sure didn't do your job, y'know?

Quote Originally Posted by Samayu View Post
Part of this remind me of parts of a recent campaign I played. Too many hooks.

We were based in a town, and there were defined bad guys, but there were too many things we could choose to do at any given moment. It's not that we couldn't choose something, it was more that there were so many things we could do that we felt that whatever we chose would have so little effect overall.

What's worse is that with so many hooks presented, we felt like we could handle a new one every session or two, but when all was said and done, it became clear that the only way to succeed on many of the paths was to stay on them. Which meant abandoning all the other story elements (people and causes), which made me feel like a failure.
This is excellent feedback! Thank you for sharing, because this is exactly what I want prospective DMs to see before they try this kind of game.