I mean, the DM is ultimately the narrator. And yeah, DM's aren't obligated to listen to players as much as players aren't obligated to listen to DMs.
You're either deliberately misrepresenting my argument or being obtuse. I made the simple argument that the DM must act as the referee, the ultimate authority, by virtue of their position as narrator. What I did not argue was that you should "just leave" if you don't like a DM's decision, nor did I present leaving the game as the only solution.
Because, yes, ultimately, I believe that the DM has to act as referee and narrator, and you can argue with the DM all you like, and maybe come to a compromise, but the very function of the game relies on the DM as narrator, not on the players as narrators of the story at large.
In a real, functional world, the DM and players try their best to facilitate each other's fun. Furthermore, referencing your first point, yes, that's absolutely valid. If you want to play something the DM doesn't want to run, you can't force the DM to run it, you can leave.
The ultimate authority.
Why?
I haven't done it much, but I do remember that multiple editions of the game (I think every edition since 3rd) has had rules for randomly creating a dungeon and "DM-less" play. And, while the game is less narratively interesting, for a hack and slash game, that would seem to work just fine.
And Hack and Slash, kick down the dungeon door, style games are fully functioning DnD games, right? Same with megadungeons. So, assuming that you have a random dungeon generator, complete with monsters and loot, and a group of veterans who know the rules and that have no issue separating player knowledge from character knowledge... Could you not have a fully functional game of DnD without a DM?
I think the answer is yes, you can. It wouldn't be my prefered style, but it is certainly a functional DnD game.
And, a lot of the responses I've gotten over these last few threads have shown a... disdain for the players hope of the DM facilitating their fun. I actually got accused more than a few times of wanting to treat the hypothetical DM as my slave for wanting them to compromise on an aspect of their world-building.
I find it troubling. Because, I think you are right. In the real world, when things are functioning properly, the DM and Player both try and make the game as fun as possible for everyone. But, for whatever reason, the idea has snuck in that the best way for that to happen is for the DM to ban, restrict, and monitor their players. Because bad players will try and ruin the game, and DMs need to be ready with the hammer of justice to beat them down. Which then seems to slowly morph into, "if you don't like what I'm offering, then leave. If you stay, you submit to my rules."
Which doesn't sound like trying to facilitate fun.
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All well and good. And at that point, I would say, “It’s an important part of my setting that Genasi aren’t native to the material plane, so if we go this route, we’ll have to do some thinking about why your characters are exceptional, and you’ll need to be prepared for the other inhabits of the world to find you all very alien. I’m willing to do that work if you folks are, but if that doesn’t sound like fun to you, maybe we should consider a different party; or maybe a different setting if you’re all really jazzed on the idea of playing a Genasi party. I’m sure I could translate the themes I pitched to you into like Forgotten Realms or something.
Not really? None of that seems unreasonable to me, beyond maybe your choice of words with “using that fact as a bludgeon to demand that they concede further.” It’s a negotiation. Here’s what I was thinking of running. Sound fun? Cool. Oh, you wanted to play characters that don’t really fit into the setting? Ok, let’s talk about that and figure out how they fit. If you’re not willing to do that, maybe we consider re-drafting the pitch around the characters you are interested in playing. If you’re not willing to do that either, then we seem to be at an impasse. Maybe what we want out of the game is just not compatible. That’s fine, we don’t need to play this game together if it isn’t going to be mutually enjoyable.
I said I would offer an alternative, and leave if no mutually agreeable alternative can be found. In any negotiation, there are things people are willing to compromise on and things people are not willing to compromise on. Using my homebrew world as the setting for a campaign is something I’m willing to compromise on. Changing the lore of my homebrew setting is not. I fail to see how that makes me some kind of tyrannical dictator.
This is a gross mischaracterization of the position I’ve been arguing. I’m not claiming I’ll walk if the players don’t obey my every decree. I’m saying I reserve the right to make the final call on rules disputes (a right I have seldom had the need to exercise) and to decide the setting details, as is the DM’s role. If the players want to provide their input, I am more than happy to take it into consideration, but I will make the final decision. If the players all collectively agree that they don’t like the setting details I’ve decided on, I’m willing to negotiate, but one point I am not willing to concede is the lore of my own homebrew setting. It’s baffling to me that anyone would find this an unreasonable position, let alone authoritarian.
I'm not saying it is unreasonable, but I am trying to make a point.
You started out your last post by listing all the things the players had asked for.
They asked you to be DM
They asked to play in your setting
They asked to be in the Material World
They asked to play Genasi
They asked to play Genasi from the Material World.
But, that wasn't the real situation. It almost never is.
You asked to the DM. You presented your setting.
Now, if the players aren't interested in your campaign, you are willing to try and find a different campaign, but you aren't willing to budge on certain points.
Potentially, I'm carrying a little too much over from the last thread, but so many of the same actors are on the stage, it is hard not to, but there was a lot of discussion on that thread about how players were being unreasonable by not being willing to bend on their desires. A lot of times they were called entitled, or a whole bunch of other things.
But, DMs don't need to bend either. And, maybe you won't bend on your homebrew setting, but some DMs also don't bend on the lore of established settings either. And a lot of the time, if there is something a player wants badly enough, the only recourse is to become a DM.
So, here we have the situation, maybe not specifically from you but in general.
A single player, they should bend to the DM.
The DM... really never has to compromise. The closest we get is that the DM is free to take the players opinions into consideration, but that is always presented as the DM being gracious, not as something they have to do.
And even if the entire group wants something, the DM might negotiate with them. Or they could end up deciding the group won't work and they will leave.
I have yet to come up with a single scenario where people have agreed that DM should bend or back down. Ever. No matter what scenario I present. The DM might kindly agree to negotiate, or they might decide the game isn't going to work. But never has someone said "As a DM, I'd change my mind."
But, players should back down. In fact, in the previous thread, it was questioned why a player would even attempt to push the envelope and not ask for something that the DM didn't approve.
Sure, that’s pretty consistent with my experience as well. And since I am generally the one taking the initiative to invite people to my game, I’m generally going to invite people I know have similar taste in fantasy to me. So this hypothetical scenario where the whole group is overruling me on the subject of whether or not Genasi should be native to the material plane is kind of absurd; it just isn’t likely to happen, because the people I would ask to play are people I think are likely to be on the same page with me as to baseline setting assumptions.
But that is what it takes to even get people to consider that the DM should change their mind.
And despite you inviting the players, you presented it as the players asking you to DM. Kind of strange, isn't it? You ask them to play, but you present it as though they asked you.
This has never really happened to me. This is all an extremely dubious hypothetical.
Sure, but if we are talking about the limits of DM authority, this seems to be what we have to talk about. A DM against a single player, the player seems to always be in the wrong. Always be overruled. Maybe not specifically for you, but that is how it seems from this perspective.
Even the entire table overruling the DM seems to be a grey area. Maybe it would matter. After all, it never even happens, so most DMs don't know how to react to that.
I just think some of y’all are interpreting phrases like “ultimate authority” in as uncharitable a way as possible. Especially when the folks your arguing with have consistently stated that they do take their players’ desires into account and negotiate with them.
Then why do you keep saying it is ultimate authority?
Um, what? I’ve never heard of anyone deciding what races and classes their players are. Many DMs provide a limited set of options for players to choose from, but that’s not even in the same ballpark as choosing the players’ races and classes for them. And providing a limited set of playable options within a particular setting is bog-standard setting design. Dark Sun lacks divine magic and most of the standard fantasy races. Lots of settings exclude “monstrous” races as PC options. Vedalken are a race from Magic: the Gathering, for which playable racial stats exist to allow for the possibility of playing in that setting, but don’t generally exist in most D&D worlds. Hell, the DMG advises the DM to make a document of up to two pages laying out the scope of playable options for their setting. This is not outlandish stuff.
Again, discussions from the other thread.
There seemed to be no limits. A DM could hand out Pre-generated characters, and that was perfectly fine. So, yes, that seems to be something that people think a DM is perfectly fine to do.
As well it should be. That’s what makes D&D work as a roleplaying game.
But, if we are as uncharitable with DMs as we are with players, we have to recognize that it is entirely possible that that agreement that the DM can use that understanding to act improperly.
I don’t know what Lanefan does, and in general they seem to be an outlier in the way they run their game, which as I understand it is some manner of kitbashed monstrosity built on the back of AD&D. Myself, I have a table rule that rules discussions not interrupt play (as the DMG recommends.) If a rules question does come up, I make a ruling in the moment and take note to return to the issue later, when it won’t interrupt the flow of play (again, as the DMG recommends.) At that time, I will listen to the players’ input on the matter and will make a more permanent decision. Certainly if the majority of players agreed on an interpretation of a rule that I disagreed with, I would agree to their interpretation unless I had a very good reason not to, and I can’t really imagine what such a reason might be.
Exactly, that seems to be a reasonable position. And yet, I was told that it would matter about the context. That if the players were only all agreeing on that interpretation because it was in their favor, he might overrule them anyways.
That would be excersising Ultimate Authority, wouldn't it? But you seem to be of the opinion that doing so would be improper. So, perhaps, you are not advocating for Ultimate Authority?
Generally symmetrical games have very strictly defined rules, and introducing house rules to them is a group decision. That is also the case in some asymmetrical games. In D&D, the nature of the game is so asymmetrical that it often doesn’t make sense for the players to have equal input on all things. The DM is in control of the environment and everything in it save the players’ characters. It makes sense that the DM be the authority on the rules governing the environment and its responses to the players’ characters’ actions. The DM is in fact part of the game’s core action resolution system, so that authority is important for them to have to be able to fulfill that role.
But none of that is what people are saying they need the authority for. No one is claiming they need Ultimate Authority to run the environment or the NPCs.
I think that’s a rather silly assumption myself. The players trust the DM not to cheat, the DM should likewise trust the players not to cheat; and frankly, the DM having authority over the rules or not really has very little bearing on the likelihood of cheating.
And yet, that is the majority of what people are talking about. Almost exclusively.
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Anyone who doesn't think the DM isn't the authority doesn't seem to realize the DM is the author of the story they are all sharing. The players, at best, are co-writers.
Except, they aren't co-writers. A Co-Writer gets to make decisions about what characters are in the story, they get to decide what cities are like, the locations.
At best they are actors.
And, as to the rest of it, again, why are we always assuming the players are acting in bad faith. Why is the example "I want to leap over the moon!" ? Every player example is them cheating, breaking the game, or something similar.
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Honestly, no, it doesn’t have to be. It just tends to be that way because the DM’s schedule is the only single one that must be accommodated since only one player is in that role. And people tend to passively let other issues fall on the DM’s shoulders.
But, hell, if other players would take up the initiative to deal with problem players and other conflicts that would be great! I’m sure lots of DMs would love players to step up that way, or be the ones pushing people to settle on the next date, or coordinate their PC creation, etc.
Which is something we are trying to advocate for. Increasing Player involvement across the board.
But, it must fall to the DM is what I'm being told. They must be the one to handle issues. Ect.
