DM Entitlement...

[Steely Dan]

Okay, if I'm running a campaign with only humans as a playable race, and there are no dragons in the world, should I succumb to this dragonborn request?

 

[Hussar]

/snip
The DM shouldn't be a jerk, but should a DM ever ban a race you like, you'll purposefully destroy the group?

This is exactly what I'm talking about. The DM isn't feeling entitled, YOU are. You feel that you, as a player, should be the one making all the decisions in the group or campaign, otherwise you'll DESTROY it. And you say the DM is the one with a god complex?

Try rereading what I said.

What I said was that if a DM had his sphincter in such a pucker that a player trying to pick a race that didn't fit with that DM's "artistic tastes" get ejected for trying to force the issue, I'd most certainly lead the player revolt.

Perhaps gank is the wrong term, but, you get the point.

Sorry, "My artistic vision is better than yours" is not good enough. It most certainly isn't a good enough reason to eject someone from the game.

Hussar is the one who said he would "gank" the players - and that's not a positive term. It's typically considered underhanded. So I think you and Cadfan should cool your jets about grickherder's indignation. If Hussar really did mean "gank" and not something more innocuous like "woo away", the indignation is correctly placed.

Well, no, there'd be nothing underhanded about it. So, perhaps gank is the wrong term. I'd be pretty upfront about it.

Me: Hey guys, this DM has his sphincter in such a knot about his "vision of the world" that he won't even try to meet me half way despite the fact that I've come up with a plausible explanation about my character. If he's that tight assed about this, imagine what his adventures are going to be like. **Choo Choo!** Let's let him/her go write that fanfic that he's really trying to rope you into and I'll run a game where you get to play the characters you more or less want to play, within reasonable limits set by the parameters of the game and not my personal "artistic vision".

If I'm alone in the room after this, then I'm wrong. Something tells me, having had the misfortune of playing with DM's like I'm seeing in this thread, I'd have players. Done it before, will hopefully never have to do it again.

And then there's my game, where aquatic elves, locathah, and merfolk are the "core" races. PCs must have a natural swim speed and be able to breathe underwater without the use of magic.

I would allow a player to choose a core race from the PH, though. Their character can be played... for as long as they can hold their breath. Then they can play their character as an undead.

See, now this I would have zero issue with. Aeolius isn't forcing his (or her, appologies) artistic viewpoint on me. There's a very clear, logical reason why I cannot play certain races in the game. The game's underwater. Ok, fair enough. I'd be a crappy player for trying to weasel my way around that. It's not that dragonborn (to use the current example) are distateful to Aeolius, it's that they physically cannot work in the setting.

Great. Perfectly logical reason that doesn't boil down to, "Well, my imagination is just better than yours".

It all depends on the circumstances. For instance, if you are in a group and a player (or players) are not enjoying their DM's game, it is one thing to offer to run. It's also ok to run a game to give the DM a break and have people to decide they like your game better.

However, to complain that you don't like the restrictions, call the DM a jerkwad, and try to steal players is not going to go over well if the other players are enjoying the game. Such behavior is probably going to get you labeled a problem player. And, if the members of the group, are pretty well connected with the local gaming community via cons, the largest larp groups (comprised of many table top players from various local cities and suburbs), and players that play in multiple rpg groups, word can spread quickly among a decent segment of the local gaming community.

Wow, DM mafia now. Bow down to the all powerful DM or get reamed, not just at the game, but by the entire community. How's that for a power trip?

Look, please, read what I'm saying.

It is not a problem to enforce limitations on your game. That's perfectly fine IMO.

My problem is when the DM says, "My imagination is just better than yours, so, tough noogies" and has his mind so set on only one perfect vision of his campaigns setting that he or she cannot possibly envision bending an iota to allow a player to play the character they want to play.

Any DM that inflexible, that far up his own petoot, is a bad DM. Full stop. And deserves to have his group taken away.

 

[EATherrian]

Shemale, better. *in the voice of Dr Evil*

…Though that does sound remarkably like a Planescape party I once DMed.

I was getting more of a Dr. Girlfriend vibe there myself. Also the faint scent of Rifts *shudder*.

 

[Fenes]

Except that this whole scenario is crazy. Why is it exclusively DMs to have this problem? Shouldn't players logically have it too, at the same rate? And of course we'd see even more of it, since there are more players, right? But we don't. We just see DMs proclaiming that this or that would wreck their ability to enjoy the game so much that they wouldn't even be able to be interested in running the game well.

I'd posit that this is because DMs have the power to ban things, and players don't. So players roll their eyes and get over their dislike of dragonborn when their fellow player wants to play one, and just go enjoy the game. DMs don't have to do that, so they don't.

Do you keep missing that in a good group, everyone has the right to veto stuff that makes the game unfun for him? Of course, if what annoys him is essential to someone else there will be problems, but in a good group who has been playing together for some time it's unlikely that two players' taste differs that much.

If one of my players hated elves and no one would like them I'd surely either ban them, or make them a non-factor in my campaign. It's simply smart and logical not to use something (aka ban it) if no one really wants it and someone hates it.

 

[Fenes]

Try rereading what I said.

What I said was that if a DM had his sphincter in such a pucker that a player trying to pick a race that didn't fit with that DM's "artistic tastes" get ejected for trying to force the issue, I'd most certainly lead the player revolt.

Perhaps gank is the wrong term, but, you get the point.

Sorry, "My artistic vision is better than yours" is not good enough. It most certainly isn't a good enough reason to eject someone from the game.

A player that is as much of an egoist that he has to play his chosen race (like kender, vampire, demongod, dragonborn) no matter if it annoys other players or the DM just because "my fun is more important than yours" doesn't really deserve a DM or a gaming group.

I'd most certainly kick the guy, or leave myself, because odds are such an egoist will try to control the whole game for his own ego, and try to render everyone else including the DM into his "helpers" so he can play his true fanfic.

 

[Hussar]

Do you keep missing that in a good group, everyone has the right to veto stuff that makes the game unfun for him? Of course, if what annoys him is essential to someone else there will be problems, but in a good group who has been playing together for some time it's unlikely that two players' taste differs that much.

If one of my players hated elves and no one would like them I'd surely either ban them, or make them a non-factor in my campaign. It's simply smart and logical not to use something (aka ban it) if no one really wants it and someone hates it.

Really? In a "good group" everyone has the right to veto. So, when the DM says, "You enter the castle of Baron Von Evilton", the players can veto the vampire because they hate the "angsty, Buffy crap" they'd been subjected to for years?

 

[Greg K]

Except that this whole scenario is crazy. Why is it exclusively DMs to have this problem? Shouldn't players logically have it too, at the same rate? And of course we'd see even more of it, since there are more players, right? But we don't. We just see DMs proclaiming that this or that would wreck their ability to enjoy the game so much that they wouldn't even be able to be interested in running the game well.

I'd posit that this is because DMs have the power to ban things, and players don't. So players roll their eyes and get over their dislike of dragonborn when their fellow player wants to play one, and just go enjoy the game. DMs don't have to do that, so they don't...

No, the player shouldn't have the right to ban things. The DM has the right to include what they want and exclude what they don't what. The player has the right to walk away from the game. And, as a player, I have walked away from games for a variety reasons.

I have walked away, because the GM had no strong coherent setting in mind. It was simply build whatever you want and I'll build the setting around the party (if even that) or he'd retcon the setting to fit whatever you built.

I have walked away from a 2e campaign run by a boss, because everyone was playing superhero inspired characters (e.g, magic wolverine claws and regeneration, iron man battlesuit, and green lantern ring) in a high level universe

I have refused to join an ongoing high level game run by one of my M&M players. He had been introduced to rpgs let alone DND when he inherited his group after the DM left. Not knowing the rules, his campaign became quickly broken with outrageous builds, rules misinterpretations, etc. He admits hit. His players admit it (and, one players built broken combos just to test the DM and see what he could get away with).

In each the above instances, the players were having fun. The games were not to my taste. I didn't belittle the DMs. I didn't try to disrupt their play sessions or steal the players (although half of the last group is currently in my M&M group and understand the need for the GM to limit concepts to maintain the setting and campaign themes).

And, if I were looking for a new gaming group, I'd walk away from a game that included most WOTC supplemental classes, races, books or combinations thereof.

 

[buzz]

Hardly. I invite the players, I host the game at my house, and sometimes, I provide them with books. Players are a guest at my house and as long as I'm running the game, I'm the one laying the ground rules. If they can't abide by the ground rules, it's their loss, not mine. That isn't being a control freak, refusing to be coorperative, or asserting control over things outside of the game, it's just performing the function of a DM.

The fact that you may be hosting the game at your house, providing books, or whatever is a separate issue. You could be doing that regardless of whether you're DM'ing that night. Heck, you could be playing Scrabble. The idea that the players you're inviting to your home acting like considerate human beings needs to somehow be tied to some special social status supposedly conveyed to you by the DMG is, to me, really disturbing.

I once proposed a D&D campaign to my group that was based on the "medieval paradigm" concept in Ars Magica. I.e., it would be a mostly-humans game in 13th century Europe that featured the medieval conceptions of Christianity, Islam, and Judaism as the setting religions. I thought this was a really cool idea, but two guys in my group had a real problem with using real-world religions. Using them was a deal-breaker for them, and not using them was a deal-breaker for me.

Did I for one second think that my role as DM in this proposed campaign entitled me to a "my way or the highway" attitude? Of course not! Did one of the objectors think for one second that their role as likely host entitled them to a similar attitude? Of course not!

Being rational human beings who care about each other's fun, we talked about it for a while. In the end, I decided to shelve the idea and proposed something else. A fun campaign ensued.

To say that there is something wrong with running the game instead of simply acting as a referee is to have an inherently flawed understanding of the way D&D has worked for the past 34 years. Squishy DMs tend to get trampled. I'm not one of those.

Well, I don't really know what your definition of a "squishy DM" is. And I have no quarrel with the DM taking on whatever responsibilities are outlined for their role in the rulebooks. I do not, however, know of any passage in the DMGs I've read that include privileged social status among those responsibilities.

I also don't know of any passage that states the social glue that holds the group together has anything to do with the game itself. The glue needs to pre-exist in order to have a viable gaming group in the first place. Issues of hospitality, consideration, and collaboration are completely separate from the DM and player roles in a game of D&D. There's nothing in the DM role that is going to magically fix them, just like there's nothing in the banker role in Monopoly that will, either. Thinking that problems in these areas can be solved via in-game status is misguided.

This is the primary flaw in these discussions. People say they want to talk about the DM/player roles, but then they give examples of people simply being jerkwads. Said jerkward behavior would be jerkwad behavior whether you were playing D&D, basketball, or having a birthday party. No text printed in the DMG is going to fix that.

 

[Mallus]

It is one thing entirely to invoke that stupidity when talking about a game system, though it is annoying enough there.

"Don't think too much about fantasy" are some of the most sage words ever posted to this board, and for the record, I've though a lot about fantasy over the years.

Considering the ramifications of in-game choices and events is not some kind of disease that needs to be purged.

Luckily I never said they were. I was talking about over-thinking setting details/background/minutiae outside of the context of providing an interesting play environment.

Thinking too much about the impact of hyperspace on Faerie (or any related elf-spaces) seems like wasted effort. It misses the point, which should be 'how do I create an interesting environment for my players to adventure in?'. Or, rather, it fails to ask the more important question: "does preserving setting integrity in this case make the campaign better?".

Generally speaking, a setting needs to serve the people playing in it. It's a tool. When you start considering it for it's own sake, you're usually going off the rails. Setting cohesiveness or thematic unity are means to an end, and maintaining those things shouldn't be a reflexive act. You should carefully examine the situation at hand, your players, and how much you trust them -- I can't stress that enough.

Some of us actually like consistency and sensibility in our settings; I'm sorry if you don't...

But I do. I just have a different perspective, which I'm trying to share by posting in this thread, natch.

...that are clearly going to be declared worthless by the likes of us, since the saying is clearly anathema to the very way we play the game.

How did I know beforehand that the 'likes of you' would get all rant-y and defensive?

And note in my response to the example about the Christian priest in the Realms, I tried to give honest-to-God helpful advice that illustrates my perspective. Which is more than you did, BTW... I'd hoped that could launch a more substantive discussion.

I don't care if you don't like consistency...

You've said it again... nope... still still not true.

...but don't act like your way is the "most awesomest"...

I'm sharing my experiences and perspective. I'm not sure how I can do that without stating them. If you choose to find that offensive or somehow invalidating, knock yourself out.

And another thing (hmmm, this works better if I could actually point at you), please stop trying to portray yourself as the defender of sensible, consistent, and well thought-out setting and me as a proponent of random stuff and nonsense. That's not what I'm advocating at all. Though I do have a fondness for stuff and nonsense, in moderation, of course...

I like a good setting. I have two of mine --well, they're both collaborations, but they're mine enough-- on display here on ENWorld. Click either link in my .sig. There's a method to my madness.

...or that it is somehow superior to actually caring about consistency and the idea that your actions have reasonable repercussions.

There are a number of ways to care about consistency. Not all of them are equal.

Really, all I'm saying is that a DM should think hard before saying 'no', and ask himself if it really benefits the campaign. Well, that an advocating being open to player input, even when it runs contrary to your taste and/or 'vision'. I've had great results doing so.

 

[buzz]

The boss-employee relationship does not fall under "any other social context"?

No, it doesn't.

You're not talking about a social context, save in the most broadest, scientific definition of the world "social." You're talking about a contractual business relationship in which I am being paid to perform a specific function within a corporate hierarchy. This isn't analogous to a game of D&D in any way, shape, or form, so I don't think the metaphor is even worth examining.