DM Style vs. Player Style

Have you ever DMed a game where the majority of the players have a gaming style that is different than your own?

Do you go along with what the players want or do you try and work with the players to play a game more in line with your particular style?

With my current group, I'm still in the "feeling out" stages, although we have played over 10 sessions by my estimate. I don't think their particular style is exactly like my own, which would be an unrealstic expectation, but close enough that no great problems have arrived.

Talking with my players has helped me discover more of what they want in a game. However, it has mainly been me asking them what they want. I have not realy voiced my own desires or wants for the campaign.

For now I am going along with the flow, but my own "twisted desires" are about to be realized soon, if you read my "Help me destroy the Forgotten Realms" thread, hehe.

What do you do?

dreaded_beast said:

Have you ever DMed a game where the majority of the players have a gaming style that is different than your own?

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I have one player in my group who is a powergamer. The rest of us like a more reasonable game, so its kinda the opposite for my group.

Do you go along with what the players want or do you try and work with the players to play a game more in line with your particular style?

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I'm in the minority I think, where the DM has to enjoy the game being run rather than catering to the wishies of the players. Thankfully I have a group that enjoys how I want to run things. They still dictate actions for the characters, but I don't include the players in discussion of what get used or direction of a campaign.
That sounds bad, but its not as bad as it sounds.

I really don't know. I mean, I've run games for players w/very different playing styles from my own, but they also had very different styles from each other. I've had campaigns where some players wanted lots and lots (and lots) of combat, and others wanted lots of role-playing, and some were just along for the ride. I've run some players who are very immersed in their roles and others who rarely speak in character. But I don't think I've really had an all-the-players-vs-the-DM split.

Generally, I see DMing as a responsibilty to make sure 4 or 5 other people have a good time, so I tend to cater to the players. I find I've been MUCH more successful writing adventures based on the PC-backstories than those based on my own stuff that the players might or might not be interested in.

But as for my "style?" I don't think I could DM any other way- there's always a certain Grackiness to it. If they really didn't like it, I'd just let someone else take over.

Cautionary Tale

(Posted previously on several occasions)

Three years ago, I had been playing with a group of friends for more than 10 years. We'd played three previous games and this was the fourth. Second I had run, other two run by another guy. The games had been more of a social event and less about the actual game. Beer and Pretzels game, in other words. We hung out, we talked, we drank, we had fun. The game was more or less just there.

We started the game under 2e, switching to 3.0 as it came out. Gave the players some killer stats! But unlike previous games where, despite the social nature of the game people still had vague goals for their characters; this game was nothing but D&Diablo. Kill something, take it's stuff. No goals but kill more things and take their stuff. Plots be damned, the players would deliberately turn their backs on anything even remotely smelling of a plot.

Well, having tasted better games and tiring of this, I told the group that I didn't want to run that kind of game anymore, that it was too much work and not at all fun for me as GM. I gave them two options;
A> I host a once-a-month social gathering for the group. We can play assorted games, drink, smoke and have fun. But no D&D.
B> We keep playing D&D, but we cut down on the socializing (especially the interjections about random crap right in the middle of descriptions and combats).

One player chose option A. The other five chose option B. The player who chose option A decided to leave the group - and I respected him for that.

One player, the least experienced, made a good stab at getting her character involved in things and made me very happy.

The other four? Well, they said they wanted to actually play the game, but not a one of them made any effort to actually do so. They continued to drink and socialize, to blatantly ignore plots, to refuse to do anything beyond kill things and take their things. And as I got pissed at them for refusing to keep their promise, they became angry with me for wrecking their fun.

The entire group broke up amidst serious mutual recriminations and I haven't spoken to any of them since.

But...

The only regret I have is that I allowed the situation to fester for nearly six months until it came to a head and destroyed relationships, rather than simply refusing to GM anymore once they demonstrated that they were NOT really interested in playing the game.

The game has to be fun for the GM too. If the players don't want to play the same game that the GM wants to run, there is no point in continuing. Not anyone's fault, just a matter of preferences and enjoyment.

Under the best of circumstances, there's some give and take all around.

However, I would not recommend DMing for a group where they are radically opposed to your preferred style. It's best when everyone's having fun because it's the group's story, even if the DM is the lead storyteller.

I can't recommend enough Robin's Laws of Good Game Mastering, by Robin Laws. Published by Steve Jackson Games. Used to cost $7.95. Great wisdom in those 32 pages. I've read it more than many books that I paid twice that amount for and thought it better to be. Get it, read it and then look at your group and decide.

I'm afraid I might be encountering a situation similar to this very soon. My current group is going through some changes: the DM is moving out the country, another guy is expecting a child, etc. We are currently finishing up a high-level, high-power, high-magic, combat-heavy campaign. It can't end soon enough IMO. I really want a change.

So...I recently picked Grim Tales and the gears started churning. I've never done a low-magic campaign before. I'm going through D&D burnout right now and I want to do some really different.

So I casually started mentioning some ideas I had for the campaign: no caster classes, no alignment, generic classes, no multiclass penalties, etc. These are all fairly unique concepts for this group. One guy asked what happens if you want to use magic. I didn't really know how to respond without "scaring" him away (in other words, it's basically up to me if magic is available).

I really want to try this type of campaign out but most of the players are weekend warrior types who like to get together, roll some dice, kill some stuff, and eat junk food. Nothing wrong with that and we have a blast but I just don't know if I can take another "generic" D&D campaign.

At GenCon one year, I really needed to be released from running a RPGA slot; I had a headache, I hadn't eaten all day, and the game was a mediocre dungeon crawl. Unfortunately, a table of guys showed up late and I had to run the game. I was really worried at first because their attitude was very different than mine at the time: totally gung-ho, kick in the door, backstab one another for treasure, conquer the dungeon, sa ha!

We had a blast.

The change was just what I needed. I rejiggered the module to concentrate on the butt-kicking elements instead of the story elements, and I think everyone had a lot of fun. Four of them were killed in the final encounter, and they didn't care. That taught me an important lesson about player styles vs DM style.

I don't think I'd want that sort of game all the time, though, but it was a nice change.

Players, like DMs, get into grooves when it comes to how they play D&D. I've found that it's very difficult to alter how people play a game they've been taking part in for years. I guess I come from the school of thought that it's easier for the group to have fun when the least amount of people have to change their playing styles and usually this means the DM having to conform to what the players like.

I've been DMing for the last 3 years and I've found that knowing what my players like is the most difficult thing a DM can master. These are my best friends but I still can't say I completely understand what type of game they like to play.

Just this past week I told my group that I couldn't keep DMing because the game had become a social event and was largely unrewarding for me. I was getting flustered at every turn and DMing was just one big headache.

To my surprise they said they were just as upset with the way thing were going and preferred the old way. It was decided that one of the players would take over as DM (to give me a break) and that we would start being serious about our game.

After some thinking, I think that my players are the following types:

Player 1: likes a mix of role-playing and hack-and-slash, is willing to interact with NPCs and be "serious" about the game

Player 2: says he likes a mix of role-playing and hack-and-slash, but IMO, is more of a hack-and-slash type, seems to enjoy more tactical combats

Player 3: the former DM and new to 3.0/3.5 DND, the least "serious" about the game, a bit of a joker but seems to have more fun during combat or attacking hated NPCs