Is the DM the most important person at the table

[atanakar]

Well, technically yes it does work. All that last sentence means is that the rest of the group voted with their feet and now you have to go out and get more "dime a dozen" players.

Personally, I like playing with people I also like outside of the game, so having to go get some strangers to play the game with in order to run the game like a Commandant isn't my thing and won't work for me.

Agreed. The worst thing that can happen to a DM is to loose his group of players. It happened to me three times since 1981 because people moved to other cities, got divorced, had kids and other real life events. Each time it was hell to rebuild the group. It takes time for a group of strangers to become comfortable and be on the same page. You have to weed out those who don't fit. Telling a player not to come anymore is the worst part of the DMs responsibilities. «dime a dozen» does not work for me either.

 

[prabe]

I think then the question becomes... How typical is your particular situation?

I'm DMing two groups. One group has six players; of them I know for certain that four have DMed, the other two are new (this is effectively their first campaign) though one has expressed interest in DMing. The second group has five players, three of which are also in the first group and among the players I know to have DMed; of the other two, I'm pretty sure one has DMed and that the other has not (though I don't think the one that hasn't is new to the game, particularly).

I don't think I have typical groups, especially considering that they're both in game stores.

 

[Michael Silverbane]

I think then the question becomes... How typical is your particular situation?

I think this is the sort of question that we can get a lot of anecdotes about, but for which there is little data (though it is possible that Wizards collected this data at one time...?)

 

[Imaro]

I think this is the sort of question that we can get a lot of anecdotes about, but for which there is little data (though it is possible that Wizards collected this data at one time...?)

Oh I agree... which is why I didn't state what I think the typical group has.

 

[Sadras]

Agreed. The worst thing that can happen to a DM is to loose his group of players. It happened to me three times since 1981 because people moved to other cities, got divorced, had kids and other real life events. Each time it was hell to rebuild the group. It takes time for a group of strangers to become comfortable and be on the same page. You have to weed out those who don't fit. Telling a player not to come anymore is the worst part of the DMs responsibilities. «dime a dozen» does not work for me either.

Did you move? Because you say you lost an entire group of players multiple times? I have lost a handful of players along the way but never an entire group. In any event that is no fun to lose an entire group. Losing 1 committed player is bad enough. Just over a year ago we lost an amazing player due to health issues. We ended running several games in the hospital towards the end realising 7 games in one month (our table's record). He loved to roleplay.

I'm not sure how it is in the USA with the large cities, maybe some areas are fortunate to have a greater concentration of players, but it definitely isn't easy to find players in Cape Town. So I echo your statement - there is no 'dime a dozen' to find players that suit you, especially the older you get.

Sadly I haven't invested enough time with roll20, discord...etc, I absolutely hate running D&D combat over the net. So my anachronism has gotten the better of me in that department.

 

[prabe]

I can't speak for @atanakar but I live in between two large-ish cities in the US, in a sprawling web of suburbs dense enough that there are three well-supported gaming stores in easy driving distance (and a gaming space unrelated to any of those, also an easy drive away). I'm something of an introvert, but I started running in gaming spaces because I wanted to game with/meet new people. I've had gaming buddies move away or otherwise leave, but it's been a few years since I hosted TRPGs in my own home.

I'm happy not to need to find games online, to meed my gaming needs.

 

[hawkeyefan]

I think people's perceptions of the importance of the DM is strongly colored by whether or not their groups feature multiple DM's. See, "vote with their feet" to me means that someone else is running the game because, well, we have, currently, three active DM's in our group and it used to be four. Trying to play the "players are a dime a dozen" card doesn't really work when all or at least most of your group is perfectly willing to take your place.

I think that's certainly a part of it. In my group, everyone who participates has also GMed in the past. Some more than others, but all have experience.

I also think it depends on other factors for their group. Are they playing at a store or at someone's home? Are the participants all friends outside the game, or is the game the only thing that has brought them together?

My group is made up of friends. So the idea that I'd tell them to beat it if they didn't like something about the game is just bonkers to me. This is something we all do together.

I get that it may be so for others....maybe there's a queue of people waiting to join a public game at a store, and so asking a problem player to not return and give that spot to someone who wants to play makes total sense.

But it's all situational.

 

[atanakar]

Did you move? Because you say you lost an entire group of players multiple times? I have lost a handful of players along the way but never an entire group. In any event that is no fun to lose an entire group. Losing 1 committed player is bad enough. Just over a year ago we lost an amazing player due to health issues. We ended running several games in the hospital towards the end realising 7 games in one month (our table's record). He loved to roleplay.

I'm not sure how it is in the USA with the large cities, maybe some areas are fortunate to have a greater concentration of players, but it definitely isn't easy to find players in Cape Town. So I echo your statement - there is no 'dime a dozen' to find players that suit you, especially the older you get.

Sadly I haven't invested enough time with roll20, discord...etc, I absolutely hate running D&D combat over the net. So my anachronism has gotten the better of me in that department.

Once I moved to the big city to study. The second time was a bad divorce between my two best players. People took sides. It was ugly. The third time the group was never stable. The two permanent and best players got feed up and left. I didn't feel like continuing the search for replacements. I had a DM burn out. Played only wargames for a while. My current group is 3 years old and everything is going very well. My best group ever. Crossing my fingers.

 

[Hussar]

I think then the question becomes... How typical is your particular situation?

Oh I agree... which is why I didn't state what I think the typical group has.

Then, why did you ask the question? If you agree that we have no idea what a "typical" group is, then why would you ask if my situation is typical? Seems a bit ... bad faith to me.

 

[Imaro]

Then, why did you ask the question? If you agree that we have no idea what a "typical" group is, then why would you ask if my situation is typical? Seems a bit ... bad faith to me.

Because I think you're smart enough to arrive at the same conclusion I did. So since you posted it like it was proof of something...I figured I'd use a question to highlight that fact (as opposed to spelling it out since I felt that was unnecessary and might offend you). That said...you posted it like it was some kind of proof and if you knew that it wasn't why did you post it?