I think, and I'm just speaking for myself here, that the problem I have with the basic premise of a neutral DM is that it ignores the fact that D&D (and RPG's in general) are made up of a number of different games at different times. When the DM is creating an adventure, it's almost impossible to be actually neutral. Unless that adventure is 100% randomly generated, the DM will ALWAYS have a thumb on the scale. Has to. And, is advised to PUT a thumb on the scale during scenario creation - sure, randomly roll your treasure, but, if it is too much or too little, roll again goes the advice in the 1e DMG.
I just have serious doubts that the sort of play where the GM doesn't need to make decisions based on their whims is actually possible in practice. Who made the charts in the first place and how it is decided when the chart is used and which chart is used? How it is decided what sort of tactics the enemies use once the combat begins?
I don't know, it just feels to me like some sort of self deception to think such neutrality is truly possible, and thus disowning the actual responsibility of what's happening in the game. In D&D ultimately the GM is in charge, and I feel it is the best to recognise what it means.
There's a reason
@Snarf Zagyg tried to head these kinds of arguments off at the pass. They're
not interesting. We're all of us here, I think, familiar enough with postpositivist incredulity to be aware that certainty is a
technical impossibility. But it's trivial — it doesn't lead to any useful insights here.
Yes, impartial refereeing is an ideal that DMs (of this particular inclination) strive for while running the game — while wearing the Referee's Hat.
It's also an ideal that DMs may take into account while wearing the Worldbuilder's Hat, fully aware that the Worldbuilder's Hat and the Game Designer's Hat often need to compromise (such as, for example, when deeper dungeon levels have scarier monsters guarding better treasures — this makes a certain sort of sense from a perspective of verisimilitude, but ultimately it's a concession to good game design, and any in-universe justifications for it, like the "mythic underworld" principle or simply an appeal to deeper dungeon levels being naturally more difficult to plunder, are pure
post hoc reasoning).
But ultimately, neutrality (in the sense that we mean here — impartiality with respect to PC and NPC, player and game-world; running the world as a kind of best-judgement-driven simulation) is something that happens at the game table. It's a principle that lives mostly in the Referee's Hat, and I don't think that we need overly concern ourselves with it to the same extent when worldbuilding or designing adventures.
I think establishing such things like blorb principles (where does this term come from?) can certainly be enormously beneficial for running the game in disciplined manner, but at the same time I feel it is important to recognise the limitations even the most strident prep and principles, and that the GM cannot, nor should not, disown their responsibility about decision making.
Ninja'd by
@Charlaquin already, heh. Here's
another blog post by a different author that gives a different perspective and summary of the notion. As one might expect, "blorb" comes out of (one small, idiosyncratic corner of) the theoretical/exegetical tradition of OSR blogging.