DM tips - what makes a good DM?

[aboyd]

The reason to not attack a random NPC shouldn't be because the PC's are weaklings. It should be because the PC's are heroes -- or failing that, because they aren't pyschopaths and treat NPC's as if they were people, or failing that, because they know the campaign is dynamic and killing the manor lord will bring down outlawry (inability to get any help from NPC's) and the full force of the law and bounty hunters down on them. That is -- have a campaign world and use it as a real world. It's more fun and emersive for the players than "everybody is too tough to fight". Keep the PC's special, but not too special -- they still have to live with the consequences of their actions.

Unlike the other points, this makes assumptions about the "right" way to play. My players are playing D&D to play villains not heroes, so they would chafe under the "act like a hero" and "don't be a psychopath" solutions. In addition, some of your substitutions for high level NPCs appear to be... more high level NPCs. For example, to avoid giving the NPC lots of levels, you suggest giving the NPC high level bounty hunters as backup, instead. That's "six of one, a half dozen of the other."

 

[aboyd]

Lastly, don't forget the rule of multiple hints. It's actually not called the rule of multiple hints. It's from an article that talks about how DMs should build in multiple people/items that can lead players to a quest or to the resolution of a quest.

I found the article. It's called the three clue rule.

 

[segrada]

aboyd, if your players are as wantonly destructive as you say, how do you motivate them? If their only driving forces are murdering innocents and plundering loot, then I would claim that nothing can be done to protect "questgiver NPCs," other than to make them powerful enough to not be murdered and plundered.

It seems like the gist of many of these suggestions are "make it too costly to kill this important guy," but using social/moral consequences instead of the more obvious physical ones. If your players throw social/moral concerns out the window, then the only consequences that remain are those of violence.


To the OP --
Spellcasters aren't the end-all devastation machines they once were, so a way to design interesting encounters around them is to give them support. Use highly advantageous terrain or traps that the caster has prepared beforehand (since he's likely a pretty smart and diabolical dude). Have the PCs burst in on him when he's just finished summoning some brute-type demons to help with the fight. This is true of any controller-type monster that you want to keep alive for more than 3 rounds, really - you'll find that controller NPCs are incredibly squishy, and not very scary by themselves.

 

[aboyd]

aboyd, if your players are as wantonly destructive as you say, how do you motivate them? If their only driving forces are murdering innocents and plundering loot, then I would claim that nothing can be done to protect "questgiver NPCs," other than to make them powerful enough to not be murdered and plundered.

Right. Exactly. That's why I'm defending making at least some NPCs ridiculously powerful. And I'm not making them immortal. I don't like playing @ epic levels, so most important NPCs are level 10-20. They will eventually be killed off by the players. Near the end of the campaign, I suspect the climax will be the utter extermination of anyone that ever stood in their way, and then brutal acquisition of power -- enslaving entire towns, etc. I'll let 'em do it, and even make it "canon" for my campaign. I'll let those players go with thanks (in a couple of years) get new players, and have them be heroes in this horribly oppressed world. Their campaign will take 2 or 3 years, and will culminate with the overthrow of the vile original PCs. Or... maybe those new players will like what the PCs did, side with them, and consolidate power. It'd be pretty rare to side with your oppressors, but I'd allow it.

And I won't be "toning down" the original PCs when my new campaign starts in 2010 or 2011. I'll let them remain at epic levels, and if the new players attempt to overthrow them too early, TPK, start over.

To me, this is fun. To my players, it seems to be a hoot. Is this not fun where everyone else is from?

 

[Myth and Legend]

It takes you guys *years* to get from 1 to 20+ while playing in real life... Wow i am new aren't I.

 

[aboyd]

It's about 14 combat encounters to level up (in D&D 3.5), right? And we do about 3 on average per game session, so after 5 games they level up. That's 10 weeks IRL, since we only play every other Saturday. So 3 years after starting, they'll be around level 15-18.

If you're playing weekly or daily or having 24 hour marathon weekends, you should certainly expect to level up waaaaaaay faster. One marathon weekend would accomplish what normally takes us 10 weeks.

 

[Rel]

One reason for my earlier flippant reply was because I wanted to offer advice as somebody who has been GMing for almost 28 years but I find that much of it is not applicable to a PbP game. Things like pacing or ignoring rules for a quick resolution in the middle of a session are meaningless in that context. So there are people much better qualified to offer advice for that medium.

However, from observation, running good combats is not the principal skill required for a good PbP game. It seems to me that they are much more reliant and focused (in general) on a strong setting that hooks in good players and an intricate plot, laden with hooks, to keep the players coming back for more.

Honestly I don't much care for PbP games for myself. I feel the need for some level of real-time interactivity with the participants in the game, even if we're not face to face with each other. But I've played one before and read along with a couple more as they progressed. The ones that seem to work best start with and maintain a fast pace of posting over an extended period of time.

That is difficult to do with a combat focused game because inevitably you have somebody who can't post as frequently as the others do at a given time. And the creates a problem because, unless you plan to "skip" them when it is their turn in the battle, you can only move as fast as your slowest person.

Non-combat situations seem far more forgiving in that respect. The PC's can roleplay off of each other and make a few skill checks without everybody needing to participate at the same level. To facilitate this you need either a really good plot with lots of interesting aspects to it or really good players who will take any shred of plot and run with it. You aren't guaranteed the latter so its better to make sure you have as much of the former as possible.

 

[Janx]

As a new GM, (and relatively new player), start at level 1, Learn the game from the ground up.

Leveling in real RPGs is real time slower than CPRGs. I suspect that its could be a similar amount of hours spent, but you log 12 hours in WOW more easily than you can in D&D. This supports my basic XP rule: hand out less XP for more frequent gaming sessions, more XP for less frequent sessions. People like to see change, and if a session is 4 hours, playing every week, you might not mind leveling up every 4 sessions. Playing once a month, that would mean only gaining 3 levels in a year. That means you don't feel like you accomplished much. So you pad the XP to make the players feel like they're gaining something. It's a psychological thing.

D&D is not a CRPG. There's not a literal entity that exists as a "quest giver". There's no such thing as a quest. These are all constructs we fabricate. The sandbox guys would probably more strongly agree with that thought. In my "I write up an adventure ahead of time" model, I make up a problem. Usually a bad guy with a plan, a location, minions, and put them in action. I then work out how many different ways I can make the bad guy's stuff intersect with the players in a fashion that will INTEREST them.

That means I don't use a blunt instrument of the "high level NPC who asks the party to stop the bad guy." Instead, the party runs into a caravan of refugees who are fleeing their diseased village. NPCs known to the PCs might talk about rumors of the place. NPC patrons of the PCs might ask them to look into the matter, or reveal information that the bad guys actions impact the PCs. For instance, if the players own stock in a tea trading company, it turns out, a profitable flavor of tea comes from that village. He's losing money every day that village is empty.

The point is, there's not quest givers, there are plot hooks. You want your plot hooks to be something the PLAYERS and PCs would be interested in pursuing, not being coerced into.

What I find works, is that the first session I bring the PCs together (in bar for example), and then bring on an event that affects the whole party and gets them into the action. Sweep them up in a problem that directly affects them (the village that the bar is in is under attack by orcs). No quest giver, it's an event that crosses their path. This gets them MOVING, and they will then drive the action, by reacting to what I set in motion. From there, the first adventure is stopping the attack (which might actually just be a raid), and then they will probably track down the raiders, which can lead to a small dungeon crawl. They find the head orc, fight him, game over, hand out XP.

Then you ask the players what they think they will do next. You write the next session based on their declarations of intent, mix in some complications and some bad guy shenanigans that have nothing to do with the PCs but crosses their path anyway, interfering with their original plan. From that, you have a formula for making adventures based on what the players want to do and mixing in your ideas for stories as well.

PbP is slower than molasses. Combat shouldn't be. Watch how others do combat in PbP and pick the methods that work the smoothest and fastest. Also, avoid doing as much combat. You can't literally stop the PCs from attacking anything, but you can avoid time wasting combats. Skip the mook fights and random encounters. PbP shouldd have more role-playing, with sword play being the climax with the villain.

Stopping the random violence by PCs. Step one, filter out the PCs during char-gen. Tell them you are running a heroic campaign, no evil PCs. Evil PCs are less predictable, whereas a good PC will almost always rescue the princess when presented with on that needs it. Step 2, have consequences for random killing. Namely, the law. The difference between having every NPC be high level to protect themselves from PCs, and sending higher level guards after PCs when they kill low level PCs is carrot and stick. With every NPC being tough, it is an arms race that you have to take ridiculous precautions for, even for a carrot farmer NPC. Using the guards as stick method, you get to make your NPCs realistically. Yep you can easily kill that farmer. But if you do, the cops will hunt you down. Just like real life.

That's just a few things...

 

[S'mon]

That's odd. I so easily hand-waved this. I think I just said, "They're busy. They delegate." And it never came up again.

As a player I'm not too keen on running minor errands for the uber-NPC who could do it himself far more easily, but can't be bothered because he's 'too busy'.

My last campaign, I took the opposite approach. King Thongar the quest-giver was old and feeble, the PCs were the kingdom's Big Damn Heroes. If they refused the missions, the bad guys would triumph and the kingdom go down the toilet. And the kingdom was a point of light in a world of ruins and howling wilderness. So the players never had any trouble with their motivation.

 

[haakon1]

In addition, some of your substitutions for high level NPCs appear to be... more high level NPCs. For example, to avoid giving the NPC lots of levels, you suggest giving the NPC high level bounty hunters as backup, instead. That's "six of one, a half dozen of the other."

You're missing the point. The OP's assumption was that the only way to keep her PC's from killing the NPC who gives them a quest -- a goal she announced as wanting to do -- was to make the NPC uberpowerful compared to the PC's. I was pointing out there are other ways to prevent the PC's from going on a psychopathic rampage -- again, a goal she seemed to already have -- than having every NPC be more powerful.

What I was trying to explain is how to use the campaign setting, the milleau, to make a world where the PC's aren't constantly overshadowed, but also are discouraged from psychopathic destruction of everything in sight. Discouraged, but not prohibited, much like in the real world -- if you want to kill the first person you meet, you can, it's just there are a consequences, so most likely you won't chose to do that, even if you could "take him in a fight". That makes more sense than pretending everyone else in the world is an unkillable superhero.