dm's, be honest: how often do you make mistakes?

[messy]

as an inexperienced dm, i'm a little surprised at how difficult it is to keep track of all the information involved in an encounter with more than a few participants. i'm finding that i make in-game mistakes pretty often. i forget someone's favored enemy, i forget a buff spell that's active, i forget a creature's special attack, etc.

so, to all the dm's out there, how often do you make mistakes?

messy

 

[Crothian]

All the time, but they never matter. The Pcs are rarely aware of them, so it's never any big deal.

 

[Emirikol]

There's really no need to be concerned. Forgetting one thing or another just means you've got to learn one thing: roll with it. Sometimes players whine. Roll with it

Learning to relax when you DM is more important than being an uptight rules freak. Trust me, there are plenty of players who feel it's their god given autistic-right to tell you how wrong, wrong-o, wrongness you are. Most of the time those people are jerks that you quickly kick the heck out of your game anyways. Your best DM's and players are the ones who make the game fun, not worry about every fricking rule judgement

GM Rule #0: If all else fails, call insurance company rules: www.youtube.com/watch?v=bVpX5fUvPlg]YouTube - Insurance Company Rules

Jay H

 

[Mallus]

I make mistakes all the time.

 

[Festivus]

Happens almost every time I run a game. It's what makes each game unique, and since the players don't know it's no biggie.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

My games aren't a comedy of errors, but I'll often forget temporary bonuses. Sometimes I'll forget an NPC's turn, sometimes I'll make little errors like giving a Ninja Sudden Strike damage from flanking, or if it's an online game w/ no minis, an NPC will make a charge the I later realize was obstructed. Maybe once per game session I'll forget or incorrectly remember a rule like how turning works or what kind of action the PC's ToB maneuver is.

By far the most annoying mistake I make is in the heat of the moment, and wanting to keep things moving, I'll often neglect to use the NPC's best tactics/spells, even if I had planned out a pattern of attack beforehand.

 

[Vanuslux]

It depends on how much time I've managed to take to prepare...which often is next to none since I've got a ton of non-game stuff that I have to squeeze my gaming love in between. If I have time to prepare, I only make a few mistakes each session. If not, I make a ton of mistakes but I roll with it. I'm usually playing with people who don't know the rules very well anyway, so most of the time they don't even notice...though if I make a mistake that screws the PCs in a significant way I'll cop to it and fix it somehow....otherwise I just keep pretending that I know what I'm doing.

 

[jdsivyer]

With a doubt, every session. It could be anything from forgetting a spell that's current to realising the PCs should know something but I didn't tell them.

In the end, it doesn't matter though. I compensate for the mistakes, or just let them ride; as long as they're not game-breakers it's all cool.

 

[megamania]

A comedy of errors.

Generally 1 per hour

Players generally catch it and its okay. Most of my mistakes favor them. Unless its a near death event we agree to continue on, no rewinds.

Most common errors.... miscount of distance on the map. Forget a feat I gave a foe that would've have stopped / hampered PCs and other little stuff not worth argueing over.

 

[Delta]

Every session. To me, it's an opportunity for improvement; I think about it right afterwards (couldn't stop myself if I tried). Write down notes for how to fix it next time (new thing on screen, or better process, whatever.) I find that flushes it out of my system afterwards.

I do find that teaching college (my money job) is a lot like DM'ing in some respects; part performance, part technical, prep time, etc. I've been doing this almost daily for about 5 years now, and do the same thing -- screw up, make notes, do it better next time.

Oddly enough I have just gotten to the point (like within the month) where once in a while I have a day where I can't think of anything I screwed up. In some ways that actually worse! I head home my brain gets caught in a loop: What'd I screw up? First class, second class, third class? Nope, nope, nope. So what'd I screw up? And I wind up not getting to anything else and sleeping weel that night. Who knows, maybe I'll start getting used to it.