Talking to my players

[Excession]

@Quertus: Ok, so I think we are both just failing to communicate the idea that it takes two to argue and that the enjoyment of the group as a whole is important. The tone that I am getting from you that I am picking up as toxic is sort of an attitude of "I am always right, so therefore I am always justified in arguing, therefore the other guy is bullying me for arguing back," which may or may not be how you intended to come across.

I think ideally you should assume a player has a point when they argue about something. They are raising it as an issue because they feel aggrieved. That feeling is valid. If you feel they are wrong, your feeling is also valid. The point of the argument is to fix any communication issues that led to the problem and to find a solution that helps both parties feel better about the situation. The argument doesn't need to be a bad thing, call it a discussion if you prefer, but it doesn't need to be a shouting match.

The alternatives seem to be to:

• Assume the other party as arguing in bad faith. They are bringing something up to be disruptive, because they just like arguing, or to attack you.
• Dismiss the other party as invalid or unimportant, which can only hurt them. If you want to hurt them then please stop.
• Promise to come back to the problem later, then actually do that.

Admittedly this stuff is hard to actually pull off in the moment.

The idea of someone other than the GM being the referee is an interesting take.

The way I read that idea is not that another player is a referee, it's that the rules are. A good rules lawyer should be able to tell you neutrally what the rules say, and what they don't say, and let the other players and GM do what they want with that information.

As I understand it, you're playing a system you wrote yourself, right? That is also a conflict of interest and power imbalance. You get two votes in everything because "what the rules mean" and "what the GM says" are now both up to you. That isn't necessarily a problem but it is something to be aware of.

This makes me want to design one of those high-concept games that probably no one would ever play, where the single 'special' table role is that one person controls the solitary hero, and all the various elements that are normally DM jobs are purchased by the other players for some kind of build point resource or even some kind of rank auction system. So e.g. at the start of the game the non-hero players each take on some aspect of the world ('the ocean', 'society', etc) just to have something to point to, and can bid on roles like:

I would totally read the rules to this game then not play it . Out of interest, I have at times delegated some of these roles to the players. For less important encounters I used to just drop a bunch of dry erase markers on the table and say "draw a ruined tavern, you are approaching from the road" while I found the right monster stats for the fight. It gave them something to do while I was busy and gave them more agency over the world. Complaints of the terrain always favouring the enemy should disappear when the players draw the terrain

I have also done things like pointing to a blank spot on the world map and asking "What is here?". It was a dragon, and the players got to fight it.

[Cluedrew]

This makes me want to design one of those high-concept games that probably no one would ever play, where the single 'special' table role is that one person controls the solitary hero, and all the various elements that are normally DM jobs are purchased by the other players for some kind of build point resource or even some kind of rank auction system. [...] I have no idea what the 'point' of play would be other than as a sort of story-telling game.

The same point as other role-playing games I guess. But really it sounds like a lot of fun, or I see a bunch of fun ways to approach this to open up new campaign ideas. For instance, anything with a single-protagonist would suddenly become viable, maybe you could set it up as a world-building game, about the story of some mythic figure in the past of a setting that you could play in normally afterwards. Maybe only run it as a one-shot to reverse roles for a day and see the other side.

[Pex]

I am a player in one of Phoenix's games:. . .

I can imagine the conversations had over pizza break on what Pex posted about today.

That's the wrong question, or more to the point, the framing is wrong. I'll quote Dave Arneson, yet again, partially: the rules lawyers are the enemy. (That observation becomes even more cogent when one appreciates how many years he spent as a referee for miniatures games before he became a referee for a fantasy campaign ...) I'll now badly quote (and possibly misquote) the D&D 5e DMG and observe that the rules serve the game and the players. (That's their purpose, anyway).

Yes, and some DMs need those rules written to help them. I stand by my point. The issue is different people having different opinions on where the proverbial line should be drawn. The game designers make the decision where it is, but that doesn't mean everyone who plays their game has to like that decision nor even agree with their personal opinion of the matter.

This makes me want to design one of those high-concept games that probably no one would ever play, where the single 'special' table role is that one person controls the solitary hero, and all the various elements that are normally DM jobs are purchased by the other players for some kind of build point resource or even some kind of rank auction system. So e.g. at the start of the game the non-hero players each take on some aspect of the world ('the ocean', 'society', etc) just to have something to point to, and can bid on roles like:

- Referee: the authority to determine how actions are resolved and what happens immediately after
- Land: the authority to determine ambient environmental factors of the world, the shape of terrain, the paths between places
- Relics: the authority to determine what items exist and what they do
- Strife: the authority to determine the characteristics and behaviors of those entities hostile to the hero
- Comrades: the authority to determine the characteristics and behaviors of the hero's friends, family, sidekicks, and supporters
- Society: the authority to determine the characteristics and behaviors of groups of people in the world, and how they relate to the hero
- Metaphysics: the authority to determine the hidden truths underlying the world.

Non-hero players each have some budget of points at character gen, and can spend them bidding on each of those aspects, on a 'favors' pool which they can spend from per-game to temporarily boost their rank in a conflict, or on 'domains' which give them a bonus to their rank on all issues involving that domain. Whenever a matter involving one of these attributes must be decided, the player with the highest rank gets to determine that detail, or they can cede it to a player of a lower rank. However, all decisions must be prompted by the hero and what they are doing - a player can't decide to just start detailing things in a far away area until that area becomes relevant. And every subsequent decision that a player makes lowers their effective rank by 1 in that attribute until someone else has had a chance to make a decision. Once something has been decided to be a certain way, it remains as such and not even the player who decided it can change it. Furthermore, the hero can never permanently be defeated (various ways this could be done, not sure what's best - maybe something like 'if the hero dies, the world ends - the fates may no longer decide anything, and all becomes stagnant; the job of the fates is to get the hero to accept the state of the world without choosing to leave it').

I have no idea what the 'point' of play would be other than as a sort of story-telling game. How should the player playing the hero 'run the game' the way that a DM is responsible for? Would the player running the hero be trying to ask questions of the world, the way one way of looking at the DM role is as someone who sets challenges for players?

This sounds fun to me. I wouldn't want it as a regular RPG campaign, but to me it makes for a fun party game. Devil in the details to help not have players make the gameworld too hard or too easy. It could be a cooperative game where the goal is for the Hero to succeed in some task by a certain amount of real world time, say an hour.

[NichG]

This sounds fun to me. I wouldn't want it as a regular RPG campaign, but to me it makes for a fun party game. Devil in the details to help not have players make the gameworld too hard or too easy. It could be a cooperative game where the goal is for the Hero to succeed in some task by a certain amount of real world time, say an hour.

I almost think the way to do it is for each of the non-hero players to pick or randomly draw or somehow collectively put together some particular thing that they each have to get to happen over the course of the game without explicitly telling the hero player - basically stuff that is really secondary to whatever the main thing the hero player is trying to express with their adventure, but which might require complications to achieve. So e.g. a player might have 'get the hero to face their own mortality' or 'even when the world is at risk, there's always time for romance' or 'the fate of the world turned on the third and final time that the hero would meet the disfigured traveller'.

Maybe those things could even be table-public, but pulled from a list of ambiguous prophecy phrases.

[Kardwill]

rules[/I] are. A good rules lawyer should be able to tell you neutrally what the rules say, and what they don't say, and let the other players and GM do what they want with that information.

Some games like Fate core use the table consensus as the ultimate referee. The GM does most instant decisions, but if a disagreement arise (about the rules, the gameworld, the way the game is going), then the entire table gets to decide how it will work (and that decision can be "let's follow the GM's ruling" or "let's follow the challenge rule on p.134". It just doesn't have to be.) I like it, since it simply "makes official" what is already an unwritten rule at many tables, and encourages cooperation between the GM and the other players.

Another example is Wushu, where whatever the players or GM says does happen, unless it ends a conflict before the rule said it could be ended, or the idea is vetoed (because it's not the kind of story that was decided at the beginnign of the game, it misused another PC, goes against something already established, etc...). Every player has that right to veto any other player.

And there are many "GMless" storygames where the GM role is in fact distributed amongst the players, or changes player according to the scene. Although those games heavily rely on a strict adherence to the rules and the game structure.

Of course, those systems need a collaborative group willing to go along with their fellow players, and will fall apart quickly when confronted to belligerent knuckleheads. But on the other hand, I've yet to see any game that survives contact with said belligerent knucklehead.

[Satinavian]

The idea of someone other than the GM being the referee is an interesting take. I personally would never want to be in a group where one of the players picked up that role, its just too big a conflict of interests, but, were it possible to find a third party with the rules knowledge and interest to referee impartially, that might be pretty cool. Of course, it may well cause a lot more problems than it would solve. Interesting topic for a discussion though if anyone wants to continue it.

I experienced it often with a player doing it and it always worked extremely well.

But you do need the right players for that and you do need an existing trusting relationship between player and GM. I would not set up a new group like this and i would not make it standard modus operandi when writing a rule system.

Considering your special circumstances, i would not recommend it either.

[Talakeal]

The way I read that idea is not that another player is a referee, it's that the rules are. A good rules lawyer should be able to tell you neutrally what the rules say, and what they don't say, and let the other players and GM do what they want with that information.

But why are they bringing this up?

Why do we need a specific person to do this?

There is a world of difference in these scenarios:

"Does anyone remember if a bodak is undead or an outsider?"

"Wait a minute, did you just move and cast a full round casting time spell in the same turn? That's illegal, you can't do that!"

"This wording is ambiguous and could be read in two different ways. Bob is the designated referee, he get's to make the call."

"Let's stop the game to have a three hour argument over whether the darkness spell is opaque."

[*]Assume the other party as arguing in bad faith. They are bringing something up to be disruptive, because they just like arguing, or to attack you.[*]Dismiss the other party as invalid or unimportant, which can only hurt them. If you want to hurt them then please stop.[*]Promise to come back to the problem later, then actually do that.

This just baffles me.

People make bad faith or unimportant arguments all the time. It is human nature regardless of the person or the context.

One thing my players make me do all the time is stop the game to break down an NPC build. This takes a long time, and almost always serves no purpose, as even if they do find an error, it is invariably a small one that either doesn't make a difference or could have been achieved some other way. Are you really saying that it is somehow sadistic for me to ask them not to do that during the game?

As I understand it, you're playing a system you wrote yourself, right? That is also a conflict of interest and power imbalance. You get two votes in everything because "what the rules mean" and "what the GM says" are now both up to you. That isn't necessarily a problem but it is something to be aware of.

I am really curious about where you see a conflict of interest here. Could you please elaborate?

As for a power imbalance, yeah, it is. Although in many ways it is less of an imbalance than in traditional RPGs as I actually feel bound to respect rules that I have written. D&D, for example, is full of stupid rules and gives the GM authority to do whatever they want, so I am a hell of a lot more likely to change or fudge the rules on the spot in D&D than I am in a system I wrote.

[Quertus]

I think that communication is tantamount to an enjoyable gaming experience.

There's definitely a strong correlation, and games without communication are rarely enjoyable.

@Quertus: Ok, so I think we are both just failing to communicate the idea that it takes two to argue and that the enjoyment of the group as a whole is important.

Glad we're on the same page so far.

The tone that I am getting from you that I am picking up as toxic is sort of an attitude of "I am always right, so therefore I am always justified in arguing, therefore the other guy is bullying me for arguing back," which may or may not be how you intended to come across.

Well, if you were trying to describe the attitude of the *GM*, or of bad GMing advice, then we'd have communicated almost successfully. Because, I agree, that attitude is toxic. Yet many GMs have that attitude, and there's plenty of bad GM advice out there that encourages that toxicity.

The GM is wrong for *claiming* or *believing* that the player is "arguing" - for belittling the player's contribution to improving the fun of the game for its existence rather than its merits - not for "arguing back", exactly.

I'm trying to promote a culture of communication and "fun optimization". A GM just assuming that anything the player says is wrong, or "arguing", who cannot conceptualize the possibility that one of the players sees that Bob is deathly afraid of spiders, or any other scenario where they see better than the GM how to safeguard / improve the fun of the game? A GM who cannot have a reasonable conversation, cannot actually listen to their players, and must resort to attacks and bullying? That's what I'm arguing against.

Or, as Excession said,

I think ideally you should assume a player has a point when they argue about something. They are raising it as an issue because they feel aggrieved. That feeling is valid. If you feel they are wrong, your feeling is also valid. The point of the argument is to fix any communication issues that led to the problem and to find a solution that helps both parties feel better about the situation. The argument doesn't need to be a bad thing, call it a discussion if you prefer, but it doesn't need to be a shouting match.

The alternatives seem to be to:

• Assume the other party as arguing in bad faith. They are bringing something up to be disruptive, because they just like arguing, or to attack you.
• Dismiss the other party as invalid or unimportant, which can only hurt them. If you want to hurt them then please stop.
• Promise to come back to the problem later, then actually do that.

Admittedly this stuff is hard to actually pull off in the moment.

Excession, you missed the ever popular, "Promise to come back to the problem later, then don't do that". And "deal with it later"? If, for example, Bob is deathly afraid of spiders, or somebody needs to "fade to black", "later" is too late - the damage is already done. And, really, the damage is already done for most any incoherence that isn't addressed immediately, IME.

But your sentiment of "assume they have a point" is spot on, and acknowledging them feeling aggrieved is brilliant.

What I am trying to say is that even if you are in the right, you need to pick you battles. To continue the earlier analogy, "bad food" is subjective, so it may well be your fault if the food isn't to your liking, but even if the chef is objectively making bland food, you can still be in the wrong by making a scene about it.

The chef cannot make food that is to your liking if they do not know what "to your liking" means. Once again, communication is key - the players need to speak up, and the GM needs to listen; otherwise, the chef will never know how to make food that the players will enjoy.

OK, I've mixed my metaphors - what's the next step in this recipe?

How, or how often, such communication should occur? Such details are outside the scope of my commentary.

But… yes, a player who didn't bother communicating how bland the chef's meal is can *also* share some blame. But remember context: it's a chef throwing meat cleavers and screaming at customers who attempt to provide that feedback.

The idea of someone other than the GM being the referee is an interesting take. I personally would never want to be in a group where one of the players picked up that role, its just too big a conflict of interests, but, were it possible to find a third party with the rules knowledge and interest to referee impartially, that might be pretty cool. Of course, it may well cause a lot more problems than it would solve. Interesting topic for a discussion though if anyone wants to continue it.

Once again on point, Excession:

The way I read that idea is not that another player is a referee, it's that the rules are. A good rules lawyer should be able to tell you neutrally what the rules say, and what they don't say, and let the other players and GM do what they want with that information.

That is, indeed, more of what I meant.

Anything outside the scope of the rules, that the GM has to "rule 0"? Even there, the GM as the only source, while often fine, still gave us the SUE Files. And every GM can have a bad day. So it's best to listen to your players there, too. I suspect one of my former GMs will go to his grave still being teased about his buoyancy rules.

And, third time, for the win:

As I understand it, you're playing a system you wrote yourself, right? That is also a conflict of interest and power imbalance. You get two votes in everything because "what the rules mean" and "what the GM says" are now both up to you. That isn't necessarily a problem but it is something to be aware of.

I definitely agree that this is a conflict of interests - probably moreso than simply being a player.

Hmmm… from a certain point of view, one could argue that "railroading" is when just "GM" and "rules adjudication" proves a conflict of interests, no additional "game designer" role necessary for problems to occur.

So, yeah, despite the fact that it hasn't really been a problem with any… *otherwise good* GMs whose homebrew I've played, it's still worth paying attention to.

[Talakeal]

I definitely agree that this is a conflict of interests - probably moreso than simply being a player.

Hmmm… from a certain point of view, one could argue that "railroading" is when just "GM" and "rules adjudication" proves a conflict of interests, no additional "game designer" role necessary for problems to occur.

So, yeah, despite the fact that it hasn't really been a problem with any… *otherwise good* GMs whose homebrew I've played, it's still worth paying attention to.

Again, I would really love an explanation of this.

I am having a hard time even seeing where the conflict of interest lies, and the only scenarios I am coming up with that come even close require both an extreme amount of effort and an extreme lack of scruples like re-writing the entire game just to screw over one player for some OOC vendetta.

[Pex]

I almost think the way to do it is for each of the non-hero players to pick or randomly draw or somehow collectively put together some particular thing that they each have to get to happen over the course of the game without explicitly telling the hero player - basically stuff that is really secondary to whatever the main thing the hero player is trying to express with their adventure, but which might require complications to achieve. So e.g. a player might have 'get the hero to face their own mortality' or 'even when the world is at risk, there's always time for romance' or 'the fate of the world turned on the third and final time that the hero would meet the disfigured traveller'.

Maybe those things could even be table-public, but pulled from a list of ambiguous prophecy phrases.

It's been a very long time since I played it, but this reminds me of a Rocky & Bullwinkle RPG I played. It's semi-cooperative, and there is a winner. Depending on the scenario, you win individually if you can get the story to conclude your personal goal. Everyone has cards to manipulate events. You also have a character trait to influence events as well. There's a wheel to spin that allows you to win if at the current happenings of the story you can monologue your win condition. If you don't spin that space that monologue doesn't happen and game continues. The other scenario is team play of "Good Guys" and "Bad Guys" trying to manipulate events to their side's goal.

But why are they bringing this up?

Why do we need a specific person to do this?

There is a world of difference in these scenarios:

"Does anyone remember if a bodak is undead or an outsider?"

"Wait a minute, did you just move and cast a full round casting time spell in the same turn? That's illegal, you can't do that!"

"This wording is ambiguous and could be read in two different ways. Bob is the designated referee, he get's to make the call."

"Let's stop the game to have a three hour argument over whether the darkness spell is opaque."

There shouldn't be a long debate about a rule, but "good rules lawyering" is allowed because everyone at the table, including the DM, wants to follow the rules. Following the rules matters. Absolutely the DM can know the rule and ignore it anyway. The good rules lawyer also picks his battles. Sometimes a player is so caught up in the moment he has this brilliant idea of awesomeness and does it. The DM is also excited for the player, and the Thing happens. Problem is technically a rule was broken. The good rules lawyer keeps quiet. It's not breaking the game. No one is cheating. Let it go. The good rules lawyer is not immune to this. He too can get excited about something and forget the rules don't allow it. After the Thing happens and the adrenaline rush goes away the good rules lawyer will realize what happened. He must always admit his error, and that Thing won't happen again. He has to admit it to retain respect.

Well, if you were trying to describe the attitude of the *GM*, or of bad GMing advice, then we'd have communicated almost successfully. Because, I agree, that attitude is toxic. Yet many GMs have that attitude, and there's plenty of bad GM advice out there that encourages that toxicity.

The GM is wrong for *claiming* or *believing* that the player is "arguing" - for belittling the player's contribution to improving the fun of the game for its existence rather than its merits - not for "arguing back", exactly.

I'm trying to promote a culture of communication and "fun optimization". A GM just assuming that anything the player says is wrong, or "arguing", who cannot conceptualize the possibility that one of the players sees that Bob is deathly afraid of spiders, or any other scenario where they see better than the GM how to safeguard / improve the fun of the game? A GM who cannot have a reasonable conversation, cannot actually listen to their players, and must resort to attacks and bullying? That's what I'm arguing against.

I once quit a 2E game for exactly this. I was telling the DM I was not enjoying the game for reasons, but he kept dismissing me as whining and another player would tease me about it. The proverbial camel straw happened, and I left.

[Yuki Akuma]

{Scrubbed}

[FrogInATopHat]

Again, I would really love an explanation of this.

I am having a hard time even seeing where the conflict of interest lies, and the only scenarios I am coming up with that come even close require both an extreme amount of effort and an extreme lack of scruples like re-writing the entire game just to screw over one player for some OOC vendetta.

I can answer this for you, I hope to your satisfaction. But to provide the best answer I can, I need to ask you one more question first.

In the system you have designed that you are playtesting with this group, how often have you changed or implemented a rule because a player has suggested so and how significant were the changes to the system that you made on the basis of these player suggestions? Can you give us some examples of times this happened?

[Kardwill]

Again, I would really love an explanation of this.

I am having a hard time even seeing where the conflict of interest lies, and the only scenarios I am coming up with that come even close require both an extreme amount of effort and an extreme lack of scruples like re-writing the entire game just to screw over one player for some OOC vendetta.

Allow me to revert the question : You are not a fan of the idea of a player being rule-referee because it creates a conflict of interest. Why? Where is the conflict of interest? And why does it matter?

If the fact that a player may be tempted to rule to achieve a personal agenda (like favoring his character) is a conflict of interest, then the fact that the GM may be tempted to achieve a personal agenda (like favoring their story, or teaching a player a lesson) is just as much of a conflict of interest. We GMs are not pure intellects. We have no more reason to be right about our rulings than the average player. Most games rely on the GM for the referee role because it's convenient, but it doesn't mean we are better at it than the players would be.

Usually, if the players and the GM disagree, they can use the rule as some sort of neutral ground to find a solution or a working solution. But in your case, the guy who GMs the game and the guy who wrote the rules are the same. The "Neutral ground" is yours and yours only, and you can always argue that you understand the rules better since you wrote them.

Another potential conflict of interest : you are probably more invested into your ruleset than the average GM will be. So you may be less likely to listen with an open mind to a player's complaint about a rule they find stupid, and to compromize that rule to maximize the fun of everybody at the table.

And note that I usually play games with a GM-referee, and that I've built and GM'd several custom games, so I don't say those things are BAD. But the players have no reason to trust the GM any more than the GM trusts them. It's very easy to misuse the GM's responsibility.

[Talakeal]

I feel like telling a very old gaming horror story as a sort of response to some of the more critical posters.

Many years ago there was a guy named Lance who was part of my middle school gaming club. He was very dishonest. He would lie, cheat, and steal in pretty much all aspects of life, to the point where most of our parents didn't want us hanging around with him, and last I heard he was having trouble holding down a job because he kept getting caught stealing from his employers.

Playing D&D, he would always cheat subtly; mostly by not writing down damage he took, writing down extra XP and treasure, or picking up the dice really quick and announcing a false result, and he would brag about doing so when the DM wasn't around. This was with an adult teacher as the DM. When we tried running our own games, he wouldn't be subtle about it, he would simply refuse to acknowledge the GM's rulings, to the point of writing down magic items on his sheet that he felt he deserved without his character actually acquiring them.

When we graduated middle school he went to a different high school than us, and I started running my own D&D game on the weekends, which went, well, as well as it could be expected for a teenage first time DM. Lance found out about the game through a mutual friend, and asked if he could play, and me, always loving gaming and eager for more players, said sure. So he made a character and I ran him through a simple solo dungeon to catch him up to the rest of the party.

When the rest of the group found out that I had allowed him to play, there was a mutiny. Basically the entire group came to me and told me that they would not play with Lance, and if I wanted the game to continue I needed to uninvite them.

Now, despite the impression I sometimes give on forums, I don't like face to face conflict, so I tried to get it over with as fast and as cleanly as possible. So I basically just called Lance up and told him flat out that he couldn't play in my game because nobody wanted him there and then hung up. And, toxic player and all around jerk that he was, he didn't deserve that. I remember he called my back a few hours later crying and begging me for an explanation, but I wouldn't give him one and just told him the decision was final and hung up on him again. To this day I feel really, really bad about how I handled it.

Allow me to revert the question : You are not a fan of the idea of a player being rule-referee because it creates a conflict of interest. Why? Where is the conflict of interest? And why does it matter?

If the fact that a player may be tempted to rule to achieve a personal agenda (like favoring his character) is a conflict of interest, then the fact that the GM may be tempted to achieve a personal agenda (like favoring their story, or teaching a player a lesson) is just as much of a conflict of interest. We GMs are not pure intellects. We have no more reason to be right about our rulings than the average player. Most games rely on the GM for the referee role because it's convenient, but it doesn't mean we are better at it than the players would be.

Usually, if the players and the GM disagree, they can use the rule as some sort of neutral ground to find a solution or a working solution. But in your case, the guy who GMs the game and the guy who wrote the rules are the same. The "Neutral ground" is yours and yours only, and you can always argue that you understand the rules better since you wrote them.

Another potential conflict of interest : you are probably more invested into your ruleset than the average GM will be. So you may be less likely to listen with an open mind to a player's complaint about a rule they find stupid, and to compromize that rule to maximize the fun of everybody at the table.

And note that I usually play games with a GM-referee, and that I've built and GM'd several custom games, so I don't say those things are BAD. But the players have no reason to trust the GM any more than the GM trusts them. It's very easy to misuse the GM's responsibility.

Again, I see how this is an imbalance of power, but not so much a conflict of interests.

The investment in the rule-set part is close, and I can see where you are coming from there, but most people in this thread, yourself included afaict, consider adherance to the rules to be a good thing.

I can answer this for you, I hope to your satisfaction. But to provide the best answer I can, I need to ask you one more question first.

In the system you have designed that you are playtesting with this group, how often have you changed or implemented a rule because a player has suggested so and how significant were the changes to the system that you made on the basis of these player suggestions? Can you give us some examples of times this happened?

Not nearly as often as I would like.

I try to take what suggestions I can, but my players just don't offer up that many, they just aren't really creative in that way.

Now, I have made some pretty drastic changes to the system based on feedback over the years, for example switching from a d100 to a d20 rather early on, and changing a penalty for being untrained into a bonus for being trained. I have also abandoned several systems because players didn't like them.

As far as new content, a few spells, items, and monsters are player created. I remember the Kiai Shout manuever was a player suggestion, and the nation of Zaikhan in my campaign world was created as part of a player backstory.

But no, mostly player feedback comes in the form of fixing an exploit / dysfunctional rule that a player finds or adjusting dominant / suboptimal strategies that come up in play.

[NichG]

I feel like telling a very old gaming horror story as a sort of response to some of the more critical posters.

Many years ago there was a guy named Lance who was part of my middle school gaming club. He was very dishonest. He would lie, cheat, and steal in pretty much all aspects of life, to the point where most of our parents didn't want us hanging around with him, and last I heard he was having trouble holding down a job because he kept getting caught stealing from his employers.

Playing D&D, he would always cheat subtly; mostly by not writing down damage he took, writing down extra XP and treasure, or picking up the dice really quick and announcing a false result, and he would brag about doing so when the DM wasn't around. This was with an adult teacher as the DM. When we tried running our own games, he wouldn't be subtle about it, he would simply refuse to acknowledge the GM's rulings, to the point of writing down magic items on his sheet that he felt he deserved without his character actually acquiring them.

When we graduated middle school he went to a different high school than us, and I started running my own D&D game on the weekends, which went, well, as well as it could be expected for a teenage first time DM. Lance found out about the game through a mutual friend, and asked if I could play, and me, always loving gaming and eager for more players, said sure. So he made a character and I ran him through a simple solo dungeon to catch him up to the rest of the party.

When the rest of the group found out that I had invited him to play, there was a mutiny. Basically the entire group came to me and told me that they would not play with Lance, and if I wanted the game to continue I needed to uninvite them.

Now, despite the impression I sometimes give on forums, I don't like face to face conflict, so I tried to get it over with as fast and as cleanly as possible. So I basically just called Lance up and told him flat out that he couldn't play in my game because nobody wanted him there and then hung up. And, toxic player and all around jerk that he was, he didn't deserve that. I remember he called my back a few hours later crying and begging me for an explanation, but I wouldn't give him one and just told him the decision was final and hung up on him again. To this day I feel really, really bad about how I handled it.

You ultimately did the right thing in this situation, not because Lance was a cheat, but because the other players should have a say about who is at the table with them, your initial invitation denied them that. Doing the difficult thing and telling Lance that he wasn't welcome was unpleasant, but important and necessary.

[KorvinStarmast]

When the rest of the group found out that I had invited him to play, there was a mutiny.

Which was the correct response. You invited a known toxic player into an otherwise harmonious group. That's bad form.

Doing the difficult thing and telling Lance that he wasn't welcome was unpleasant, but important and necessary.

Making the best of a bad situation is sometimes all that one can do. This was the correct course of action, once the initial faux pas had occurred.

[Talakeal]

Which was the correct response. You invited a known toxic player into an otherwise harmonious group. That's bad form. Making the best of a bad situation is sometimes all that one can do. This was the correct course of action, once the initial faux pas had occurred.

Just as a minor clarification, I didn't invite him per se, he found out about the game and asked me if he could play, and I said OK. (I honestly don't remember if I said OK right away because I never turn down a player or if he had to badger me a bit, both are possible).

Honestly, a lot of my gaming horror stories boil down to me trying to please multiple groups of players who are unwilling to talk to one another and instead use me as the middle man because they know I am not good at just saying no.

But yeah, the point of the story was more about how maybe I just have a higher tolerance for toxic players (and am bad at saying no to people) rather than somehow turning good players toxic.

[KorvinStarmast]

But yeah, the point of the story was more about how maybe I just have a higher tolerance for toxic players (and am bad at saying no to people)

I don't think that you are alone in this regard. Plenty of folks encounter that with the usual unfortunate results.

[Quertus]

Again, I would really love an explanation of this.

I am having a hard time even seeing where the conflict of interest lies, and the only scenarios I am coming up with that come even close require both an extreme amount of effort and an extreme lack of scruples like re-writing the entire game just to screw over one player for some OOC vendetta.

For reference:

Allow me to revert the question : You are not a fan of the idea of a player being rule-referee because it creates a conflict of interest. Why? Where is the conflict of interest? And why does it matter?

If the fact that a player may be tempted to rule to achieve a personal agenda (like favoring his character) is a conflict of interest, then the fact that the GM may be tempted to achieve a personal agenda (like favoring their story, or teaching a player a lesson) is just as much of a conflict of interest. We GMs are not pure intellects. We have no more reason to be right about our rulings than the average player. Most games rely on the GM for the referee role because it's convenient, but it doesn't mean we are better at it than the players would be.

Usually, if the players and the GM disagree, they can use the rule as some sort of neutral ground to find a solution or a working solution. But in your case, the guy who GMs the game and the guy who wrote the rules are the same. The "Neutral ground" is yours and yours only, and you can always argue that you understand the rules better since you wrote them.

Another potential conflict of interest : you are probably more invested into your ruleset than the average GM will be. So you may be less likely to listen with an open mind to a player's complaint about a rule they find stupid, and to compromize that rule to maximize the fun of everybody at the table.

And note that I usually play games with a GM-referee, and that I've built and GM'd several custom games, so I don't say those things are BAD. But the players have no reason to trust the GM any more than the GM trusts them. It's very easy to misuse the GM's responsibility.

"Conflict of interests". To me, the phrase gets translated to "wanting something" (see also my claims around the problem is the GM wanting something).

So, the simple question is, why did you write your own system? What do you want?

If any of those answers do not overlap 100% with definitions of "what makes for a fair arbiter", or "what makes for a good GM", then you - by definition, at least as I understand it - have a conflict of interests: you have interests / goals that may come into conflict with one another, or with running a good game.

So, take for example the player who wanted to run a "storm Cleric" - which, to them, meant lightning and healing. And something muggle. You said that your system wasn't designed for such characters (it could handle "casters" or "single-sphere gishes",, but not "multi-sphere gishes"?); and, indeed, you went on to talk about how they foundered: anemic damage, insufficient mana to power both offense and healing, etc.

(How's my senility doing? Sound about right?)

As a system designer, you had a vested interest in your system.

As a GM, I would have probably a) made sure that they understood and agreed to the outcome of their choices (a2-with possibility of rebuild later), or b) said, "huh. That seems like a valid concept, but you'd fail to be balanced to the table. Perhaps we can optimize him harder" (not really a possibility in your system though, right?), or c) said, "huh. That seems like a valid concept, but you'd fail to be balanced to the table. Perhaps we should house rule the rules to make this more balanced" (or, more likely, d) like "C", but get everyone onboard, and have the other players decide how we'll write the house rules after a few sessions of evaluating his anemic nature)

Also… was this the same player who now totally maxes out one stat, despite exponential costs? If so, then I think I can see some cause and effect here.

For a fun experiment, look at every decision you've made / make about a game, and ask yourself, "why?" Of course, the trick is also including the decisions you didn't make, like why you didn't change the rules to make this concept balanced.

The good rules lawyer is not immune to this. He too can get excited about something and forget the rules don't allow it. After the Thing happens and the adrenaline rush goes away the good rules lawyer will realize what happened. He must always admit his error, and that Thing won't happen again. He has to admit it to retain respect.

Yeah. Not that I'm exactly your definition of a "good" rules lawyer (I try(ish), but… I don't have enough ranks in my "choose my battles" skills), but in 3.5 I messed up the whole "immediate action loses your *next* ____ action" thing. Amazingly, the "good rules lawyer" GM hadn't just ignored it - he had missed it, too.

I once quit a 2E game for exactly this. I was telling the DM I was not enjoying the game for reasons, but he kept dismissing me as whining and another player would tease me about it. The proverbial camel straw happened, and I left.

Sadness. This kind of thing is why building a table culture is so important.

But yeah, the point of the story was more about how maybe I just have a higher tolerance for toxic players (and am bad at saying no to people) rather than somehow turning good players toxic.

*That* was your intended point?

Even with your high tolerances… no, strike that - Because of your high tolerances, you are more likely to turn good players toxic, and should continue to investigate that angle.

When you train an animal, you don't punish the behavior you don't want to see - you punish the behavior that comes *before* the behavior you don't want to see (chronologically, or escalation). That way, even when the animal is being "bad", it still won't be doing the things you don't want to see.

People are surprisingly similar.

Sure, it can be more complicated than that, but patents who don't say "no" generally have the worst-behaved children. And "high tolerance GM with Bizarro World level player behavioral issues"? Check.

Your only hope may be to be adopted by a good group, that someone else continues to be in charge of the culture / membership of.

[Talakeal]

For reference:
"Conflict of interests". To me, the phrase gets translated to "wanting something" (see also my claims around the problem is the GM wanting something).

So, the simple question is, why did you write your own system? What do you want?

If any of those answers do not overlap 100% with definitions of "what makes for a fair arbiter", or "what makes for a good GM", then you - by definition, at least as I understand it - have a conflict of interests: you have interests / goals that may come into conflict with one another, or with running a good game.

That definition is so broad that makes it more or less impossible to referee anything without it becoming a conflict of interests.

So, take for example the player who wanted to run a "storm Cleric" - which, to them, meant lightning and healing. And something muggle. You said that your system wasn't designed for such characters (it could handle "casters" or "single-sphere gishes",, but not "multi-sphere gishes"?); and, indeed, you went on to talk about how they foundered: anemic damage, insufficient mana to power both offense and healing, etc.

(How's my senility doing? Sound about right?)

As a system designer, you had a vested interest in your system.

As a GM, I would have probably a) made sure that they understood and agreed to the outcome of their choices (a2-with possibility of rebuild later), or b) said, "huh. That seems like a valid concept, but you'd fail to be balanced to the table. Perhaps we can optimize him harder" (not really a possibility in your system though, right?), or c) said, "huh. That seems like a valid concept, but you'd fail to be balanced to the table. Perhaps we should house rule the rules to make this more balanced" (or, more likely, d) like "C", but get everyone onboard, and have the other players decide how we'll write the house rules after a few sessions of evaluating his anemic nature)

Also… was this the same player who now totally maxes out one stat, despite exponential costs? If so, then I think I can see some cause and effect here.

No, not the same player. But they are both opposite ends of the same problem.

Its not about the characters being bad in a vacuum, its that they have a level of focus that was out of sync with the rest of the party, and this is a logical consequence of any task based RPG system. The guy who can do a little everything is pretty bad in a normal sized party, but be great in a solo adventure, and in a very large party might make a good fifth wheel who can fill in when needed.

But again, I don't really see what rewriting the games rules to make one character work has to do with whether you are running a game you invented or a game someone else invented.

*That* was your intended point?

Even with your high tolerances… no, strike that - Because of your high tolerances, you are more likely to turn good players toxic, and should continue to investigate that angle.

When you train an animal, you don't punish the behavior you don't want to see - you punish the behavior that comes *before* the behavior you don't want to see (chronologically, or escalation). That way, even when the animal is being "bad", it still won't be doing the things you don't want to see.

People are surprisingly similar.

Sure, it can be more complicated than that, but patents who don't say "no" generally have the worst-behaved children. And "high tolerance GM with Bizarro World level player behavioral issues"? Check.

Your only hope may be to be adopted by a good group, that someone else continues to be in charge of the culture / membership of.

Geeze this is tough. The last guy told me that the reason I turn players toxic is that I am too condescending, and that me trying to give advice to new players is a sure sign of this.

You are saying that I create toxic players by being too permissive and not teaching them good habits, and comparing them to trained animals and small children.

Damned if I do, damned if I don't apparently.

[Satinavian]

Geeze this is tough. The last guy told me that the reason I turn players toxic is that I am too condescending, and that me trying to give advice to new players is a sure sign of this.

You are saying that I create toxic players by being too permissive and not teaching them good habits, and comparing them to trained animals and small children.

Damned if I do, damned if I don't apparently.

I would offer a third one :

If you have toxic players in a group, they will dominate table culture. Other players will either be turned away if they can't stand the toxic behavior or adapt to what your toxic players regularly demonstrate to be acceptable and might even occasionally get results.

[KorvinStarmast]

If you have toxic players in a group, they will dominate table culture. Other players will either be turned away if they can't stand the toxic behavior or adapt to what your toxic players regularly demonstrate to be acceptable and might even occasionally gets results.

which spreads the cancer.

[Talakeal]

I would offer a third one :

If you have toxic players in a group, they will dominate table culture. Other players will either be turned away if they can't stand the toxic behavior or adapt to what your toxic players regularly demonstrate to be acceptable and might even occasionally get results.

This is very much what I am afraid of.

On the other hand, severing ties is just so hard. During the last session I kept being reminded of how having 20+ years of shared gaming history enriches the fabric of the game and how cool it was.

[PhoenixPhyre]

which spreads the cancer.

One bad apple spoils the bunch, as they say.

Especially with new players (new to a particular game and to a particular group)--they try to fit in. So they're easily led to believe that the toxic behavior is appropriate for this new culture. Which means that they go and spread that toxicity (likely not even recognizing it as toxic) to other groups.

I've been in the weird position of generally not having long-running groups -- my longest was about 18 months before real life intervened. And most of mine were in the 20-session range, due to being an after-school club 1x/week at most during the active school year. I've found that I enjoy playing with new players--both those new to the game and new to me. In part because I can lead them into the One True Way (ie my particular style ) instead of having to struggle against a bunch of habits learned at other tables. I just hope that I'm not creating any toxicity myself--it's something I actually worry about, because my personal style isn't exactly...normal...from what I can tell.

[Kardwill]

That definition is so broad that makes it more or less impossible to referee anything without it becoming a conflict of interests.

You were the one who brought up the conflict of interest when we talked about player-referees. If that conflict of interest is a problem with a player, then it will be with the GM. I think there's no reason to believe one side of the GM-screen is more prone to "pure" rulings than the other. So either you trust both parties, or you end up running into this distrust problem that disrupted your games.

(that's also the reason I don't like the culture of tolerating a cheating GM but tar-and-feathering a cheating player, but that's another debate)

[KorvinStarmast]

I can imagine the conversations had over pizza break on what Pex posted about today.

We spend way too much time distributing horrible puns to spare any time for such conversations. The groans from the others at the {virtual} table can be heard across state lines .

I just hope that I'm not creating any toxicity myself--it's something I actually worry about, because my personal style isn't exactly...normal...from what I can tell.

The open-ness to suggestions is appreciated.

[Talakeal]

You were the one who brought up the conflict of interest when we talked about player-referees. If that conflict of interest is a problem with a player, then it will be with the GM. I think there's no reason to believe one side of the GM-screen is more prone to "pure" rulings than the other. So either you trust both parties, or you end up running into this distrust problem that disrupted your games.

I did bring it up. Believing conflict of interests can exist without applying to every situation isn't a contradiction.

The GM is supposed to be an impartial referee, indeed that was their original title. They should not favor one character over another (GM's girlfriends, DMPCs, and pet NPCs are also conflicts on interest

Players, on the other hand, should absolutely identify with their character first and foremost and want them to survive and succeed with their goals.

(that's also the reason I don't like the culture of tolerating a cheating GM but tar-and-feathering a cheating player, but that's another debate)

Agreed there. Although I can at least see where they are coming from, even if I don't agree with it.

[Kardwill]

The GM is supposed to be an impartial referee, indeed that was their original title.

That's the platonic ideal. But really, we're not. We're players too, we're invested in the game, we want stuff out of the game, we usually have an idea of the way we want the game to turn out. Sometimes, we are attached to some storyline, to some NPC, or even to one of the PCs.
We're not impartial in this, because we're here to have fun, and we will defend our idea of the fun, sometimes instinctively.

For example, in the last few threads, you made clear that you had a strong idea of what a proper adventure should be like, of what a proper hero would do, and you asked about ways to encourage your players to do that kind of things, rather than what they think would be fun.

I'm not saying that all of this is bad. I'm a GM myself, and I feel everything I just wrote when I GM a game. And I won't stop feeling engaged in my game, because that would be a very quick way to get bored and stop GMing. But I have to remind myself that I'm neither impartial, nor perfectly rational in my rulings. I'm not better than my players, nor do I "know better" than them. I just have more power.

If a GM can be trusted with the rules, then a player should be trusted with them too, even if she's enguaged in her character.

[Talakeal]

That's the platonic ideal. But really, we're not. We're players too, we're invested in the game, we want stuff out of the game, we usually have an idea of the way we want the game to turn out. Sometimes, we are attached to some storyline, to some NPC, or even to one of the PCs.
We're not impartial in this, because we're here to have fun, and we will defend our idea of the fun, sometimes instinctively.

For example, in the last few threads, you made clear that you had a strong idea of what a proper adventure should be like, of what a proper hero would do, and you asked about ways to encourage your players to do that kind of things, rather than what they think would be fun.

I'm not saying that all of this is bad. I'm a GM myself, and I feel everything I just wrote when I GM a game. And I won't stop feeling engaged in my game, because that would be a very quick way to get bored and stop GMing. But I have to remind myself that I'm neither impartial, nor perfectly rational in my rulings. I'm not better than my players, nor do I "know better" than them. I just have more power.

If a GM can be trusted with the rules, then a player should be trusted with them too, even if she's enguaged in her character.

This is about contradicting expectations.

Trying to be fair and impartial does not conflict with interpreting the rules. Trying to win the scenario and favoring your character does conflict with interpreting the rules.

Everyone falls short of the ideal, that doesn't mean you shouldn't try.

Likewise, its not about "what a proper adventure should be like, of what a proper hero would do"; its about my players telling me that they want an action adventure game with lots of balanced combats, and then showing up with overly cautious PCs who would never willingly go on an adventure or get into a fight, especially one that was "balanced" rather than being rigged in their favor.

Its a contradiction of desires that, even if done perfectly, will result in an unsatisfying conclusion.


Generally the purpose of my advice threads is trying to get players to realize the contradictions in their desires; like the guy who refuses to buy armor and then throws a fit when his character gets hurt; those desires are working against one another.

Likewise, I try and design my scenarios so the fun thing and the effective thing are the same thing. To use an old example, in Ultima Online crossbows were grossly overpowered, and while I was playing a swordsman rather than an archer, I would still put away my sword and pull out a bow whenever a fight got tough not because I found it fun, but because I didn't want my character to die; in a balanced game I shouldn't have to make that choice.

Just like if I am the DM and a player, the optimal move to help my PC succeed is to always fudge the rules in my favor even if that goes directly against my desire to be fair and impartial.

[quinron]

@Talakeal, re:GM-designers and conflict of interest:

Have you considered or tried having one of your other group members GM a game using your system? Whether or not you agree with the conflict of interest notions being put forward, that should eliminate even the possibility of one.