Future of the current Adventure League

Warmaster Horus said:

With statements like ... "Regardless, the point is that, if the only reason you consider DMing is to rack up DM Quests, maybe you shouldn't be DMing." ... you seem to have an opinion about why DMs should participate in AL and it doesn't seem very favorable to DM Quests.

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OK, let's unpack that:

1. I made that comment in response to another poster claiming that, because CCC adventures don't qualify for DM Quests, therefore DMs have no incentive to run them.

2. If you really don't care about providing your players with a good time, or prepping the adventure properly, or anything except collecting those sweet, sweet DM Quest rewards, then yes, I think you should reconsider your decision to be a DM. I also don't see why that's a controversial opinion.

We have begun doing player audits before play at some events. Just a look through logs and seeing if anything pops out, like a 20 stat at 5th level or a magic item that seems out of place. As a DM I've asked a few questions, clarified what needs to be logged and asked some players who were bringing in non-AL characters to start a new one or grab a pre-gen. Nearly all players seem to be in accord with only new and young players being the ones who need clarification.

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I'll actually agree with you on that -- most players are able to follow the basic character creation rules in the PH and the ALPG, and the few times I've seen errors, those players are generally easy to convince to fix those errors. Part of the reason why, though, is that the character creation rules are fairly easy to explain and largely unambiguous.

There are parts of the DM Quest process that are similarly well-explained and unambiguous -- the 'bonus for downloading the DM Quest pack' award is just fine, as an example. There are other parts that aren't as well-explained and are subject to significant interpretation -- I may think someone is cheating, but the player doesn't, and the DM at the table takes his interpretation over mine. DM awards that stack other awards, awards that are ambiguous about when they are awarded, awards that allow an open-ended selection based on criteria that can't be easily verified ("Of course I ran that mod! It was in a home game with my cousin and his friends."). Eliminating those types of awards, or at least modifying them so that they are less ambiguous and less open-ended ("You may select any uncommon item from Magic Item Table C in the Dungeon Master's Guide.") would go a long way toward making these awards less abusable and more easily verifiable for those DMs who prefer to do so.

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Pauper

I'm not sure how you balance out DM rewards and am open to suggestions for what the numbers should look like. I've seen plenty of "The rewards are so low, I don't both DMing or I am not motivated to DM any extra," to "The rewards are WAY to big, DMs can basically do anything they want with a PC." Given how widely varied the amount people DM, I'm not sure how you balance without discouraging additional DMing (which would be the opposite of what the goal is).

(As an aside, I helped a local very active DM put his rewards together when he wanted help tracking it. It was a little over 300,000 xp and more than a dozen magic items. I myself who rarely gets to play, but does DM several times a week and obviously goes to two-three cons a month and pretty much always run premiers, stopped tracking when I crested half a million banked xp and about 20 magic items).

Honestly, I get that the idea of someone being able to cheat and it being impossible to tell for sure is disconcerting to people, but I really think if you pay attention to the actual people who are doing such things you'll find that there are other issues that also make them a pain in the neck to play with. If you can't easily act on the "you cheated and claimed DM rewards you didn't deserve" thing you can probably act based on the "you're actually cheating at the table" or "you're an irritating person to play with and nobody enjoys when you're at the table" parts of things. If there are no "you're cheating at the table" or "you're an irritating person to play with..." issues then why worry about theoretical cheating on DM rewards? If it doesn't actually impact play at the table how is it practically different from the "some random guy showed up with his character he played to high level at another store" case?

skerritthegreen said:

I'm not sure how you balance out DM rewards and am open to suggestions for what the numbers should look like.

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Well, you could start here with my math-based suggestion to reduce DM award gold in modules to somewhere between 20-30% of DM XP rather than the current 50%.

My next suggestion (which I suspect you're already doing) is to identify the most-frequently asked-about DM Quests on the various social media groups ("For this DM Quest, how does this work? Or can I do this?") and either eliminate them or reduce their scope to make them more specific and unambiguous.

Lastly, re-think the seemingly common-sense idea that, if a given season can advance a single PC from 1st level to Tier 3, then a DM who runs all those adventures should also be able to advance a single character that same amount. If you decide this is really the target, then balance the in-module DM awards with the DM Quest awards so that a DM claiming all such awards for running a full season can accomplish this -- which I'm certain would involve reducing individual awards to a lower and more easily justifiable number. Otherwise, decide what the target should be and adjust the awards accordingly to hit that target.

As an example: Running all 20 DDAL SKT modules grants the DM 45,000 XP, a potion, up to three additional scrolls or potions, and a magical weapon or suit of armor or other wondrous item that appeared in a Season 5 module. Add the XP, gold, and downtime from those actual modules likely pushes the total award well into Tier 3 range (>85k XP total -- I don't have all the Season 5 modules to review their DM awards, but if they follow the DM Rewards guidance in the SKT DMs Guide, they'll easily let a DM get to that point). And that doesn't count any of the quests that allow you to double your rewards for running in a store, running when you weren't expecting to, etc., though given those are situational, maybe you want to keep those as 'extra bonus' XP and don't factor them into the regular sum.

I've seen plenty of "The rewards are so low, I don't both DMing or I am not motivated to DM any extra," to "The rewards are WAY to big, DMs can basically do anything they want with a PC." Given how widely varied the amount people DM, I'm not sure how you balance without discouraging additional DMing (which would be the opposite of what the goal is).

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My guess is that people who complain that the awards are too low aren't really complaining about the awards, but are instead justifying to themselves why they don't DM (or DM more). Sure, the goal is to encourage additional DMing, but DMing solely for the sake of earning rewards isn't really meeting the goal, either, if the goal is to have additional DMing that helps grow the game and cultivates new players (and ultimately more new DMs). It would be great to come up with a system whereby DMs are rewarded based on the quality of their DMing -- special certs at conventions, for example, since that's the place that's easiest to quantify how well a DM is doing her job, or the apparently short-lived "DM of the Year" award which was handed out one time at GenCon and apparently never again.

I'm glad to provide suggestions and point out places where the system doesn't quite work as well as it might. I suppose the criticisms from people who don't like to be told they could be doing things better is just part of the price of doing that business.

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Pauper

Pauper said:

As an example: Running all 20 DDAL SKT modules grants the DM 45,000 XP, a potion, up to three additional scrolls or potions, and a magical weapon or suit of armor or other wondrous item that appeared in a Season 5 module. Add the XP, gold, and downtime from those actual modules likely pushes the total award well into Tier 3 range (>85k XP total -- I don't have all the Season 5 modules to review their DM awards, but if they follow the DM Rewards guidance in the SKT DMs Guide, they'll easily let a DM get to that point). And that doesn't count any of the quests that allow you to double your rewards for running in a store, running when you weren't expecting to, etc., though given those are situational, maybe you want to keep those as 'extra bonus' XP and don't factor them into the regular sum.

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Just FYI, getting all those awards requires DMing both Tier 3 and Tier 4 adventures, which means you must already be DMing for players with characters who are far beyond the level you'd like the DM to be able to get their character to. It also requires checking off all the boxes, something that is easy to fail to do for one reason or another. Just increasing the base rewards so that DMs don't fall so far behind would be dramatically simpler.

Pauper said:

OK, let's unpack that:

1. I made that comment in response to another poster claiming that, because CCC adventures don't qualify for DM Quests, therefore DMs have no incentive to run them.

2. If you really don't care about providing your players with a good time, or prepping the adventure properly, or anything except collecting those sweet, sweet DM Quest rewards, then yes, I think you should reconsider your decision to be a DM. I also don't see why that's a controversial opinion.



I'll actually agree with you on that -- most players are able to follow the basic character creation rules in the PH and the ALPG, and the few times I've seen errors, those players are generally easy to convince to fix those errors. Part of the reason why, though, is that the character creation rules are fairly easy to explain and largely unambiguous.

There are parts of the DM Quest process that are similarly well-explained and unambiguous -- the 'bonus for downloading the DM Quest pack' award is just fine, as an example. There are other parts that aren't as well-explained and are subject to significant interpretation -- I may think someone is cheating, but the player doesn't, and the DM at the table takes his interpretation over mine. DM awards that stack other awards, awards that are ambiguous about when they are awarded, awards that allow an open-ended selection based on criteria that can't be easily verified ("Of course I ran that mod! It was in a home game with my cousin and his friends."). Eliminating those types of awards, or at least modifying them so that they are less ambiguous and less open-ended ("You may select any uncommon item from Magic Item Table C in the Dungeon Master's Guide.") would go a long way toward making these awards less abusable and more easily verifiable for those DMs who prefer to do so.

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Pauper

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Woo... I made that comment about DMs and motivation. While I did make those from the perspective of an event coordinator, I also DM and select, volunteer and avoid mods based on my personal preferences. One of those factors is whether it's a CCC or DDAL. Why would I run a CCC over a A DDAL when given a choice?

Plus, it's a huge and erroneous leap in logic to attack DMs that look for the best bargain, from their perspective, as people that don't care, don't prep or run fun games. Hell, I know a DM that goes for cheapest. He'll volunteer for a 2.99 module before a 3.99 module. Does that mean he doesn't prep or tries to be fun DM?

While cheating happens, I do, as an event coordinator and DM, have the right to refuse an item without proper documentation. I have a list three pages long with over 30 entries on each page, front and back, listing the dates, modules and items along with the other necessary data. If the player can't provide adequate documentation, that is unfortunate for them. Having said that, I've never denied an item based on the DM reward program. It's never been an issue for me, the few cheaters I have caught were relatively easy to catch. The two that come to mind: multiple runs of the same module for a specific item and claiming that a Sword of Sharpness exists on random item table C.

Pauper said:

Yep. Just like there have been people criticizing President Trump, and other people complaining that the criticisms are unwarranted, so on the whole he must be doing a great job!



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Pauper

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No real-life politics in EN World, please.

I stumbled upon this and just want to put in my two cents. It's so easy for players to exploit the system now, even without cheating. Online play, SKT, trading without certs all make it very easy to exploit the rules without breaking them.

For example, I have a character I use for events and epics. I supplement with online play to boost levels. He recently played a session of SKT that was purely to get loot. I didn't know what I was joining when my friends asked me to play, but I didn't object when I found out. Run into giant layer, get conch, go to Maelstrom, kill Imryth with Storm Giant help, get loot, kill Imryth's spawn, get loot. Now, it was fun, but clearly not how SKT was meant to be played. But perfectly legal. Log sheet shows that now my level 10 fighter has Ring of Protection, Dwarven Plate, Staff of Thunder and Lighting (he had previously had this, traded an Anstruth harp online over facebook, the harp he had picked up in a previous SKT chapter I played out of context when a friend's table game at a store was short one week) and Ingot of the Skold Rune (which he will likely put on a shield), and a potion of Giant Size. Again, all legally, if somewhat exploitively, gained. Now I'll take him to an epic in a few weeks and he'll be pretty powerful in T2 with a +2 weapon, and 24 AC. Not to mention the super OP potion of Giant size and an insane amount of GP.

Are DM reward really that much of an issue when stuff like this can happen legally when playing online with players who metagame like crazy? All logged with DCI numbers and everything.

monkeydave said:

Are DM reward really that much of an issue when stuff like this can happen legally when playing online with players who metagame like crazy? All logged with DCI numbers and everything.

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Indeed. Stuff like this makes me feel absolutely zero shame for picking and choosing the adventures I'll DM based on the Dedicated DM items I can get from them ;-)

monkeydave said:

He recently played a session of SKT that was purely to get loot. I didn't know what I was joining when my friends asked me to play, but I didn't object when I found out. Run into giant layer, get conch, go to Maelstrom, kill Imryth with Storm Giant help, get loot, kill Imryth's spawn, get loot. Now, it was fun, but clearly not how SKT was meant to be played. But perfectly legal.

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Sure, it's legal, but it's also perfectly obvious when you sit down at a table with that sort of character. Case in point -- the last session I ran at the FLGS, a player came in at the last minute and asked to sit in on our Tier 2 game. He only had a level 4 character, but that was OK, because he had enough downtime to use the 'catching up' option before the game. Then, while reviewing his sheet, I noticed a few oddities, like an over 20 Strength and a scimitar of sharpness. When asked, the player claimed to have played through the entire Storm King's Thunder module, completing the final chapter while still level 4, and despite not having any log to support his assertions.

As it turned out, we were playing DDEX 2-9, and were in the midst of the heavy RP/investigative portion of the adventure, so his hope to join the table and dominate our combats was sadly for naught. We'll see if he comes back next week, but if he does, we'll have a character audit before the game begins.

Are DM reward really that much of an issue when stuff like this can happen legally when playing online with players who metagame like crazy? All logged with DCI numbers and everything.

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Sure it does -- some things that some tables do 'legally' aren't really in the spirit of the rules and are therefore not really legal. That's why the DM has the authority she has in the AL to review character sheets and logs and disallow items and abilities that don't seem to have been gained through normal play. Not doing this is almost guaranteed to ruin your session when players (even DM/players) with no interest other than to wreck your game with cheesily-constructed characters show up at your table.

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Pauper