D&D General My Requirements to Run a 1-20 Adventure.

[Kromanjon]

Well duh if you have a great group of people to play with for free then that's infinitely better. To be Captain Obvious for a second here, not everyone has a group to play with for free.

You can do all the apples to oranges comparisons you want, $20 is just not particularly expensive to do something that you consider really fun. Personally I wouldn't do online DnD even for free but I've paid more than $20 per session for in-person DnD with a great DM, and it was some of the most worthwhile money I've spent

I don't know anything about apples or oranges but I do know that $20 is a huge amount of money for me so please don't presume that your economic situation translates to everyone else. I also don't like the thought of normalizing having to pay to play ttrpgs. It makes the hobby less welcoming. If someone wants to play they should be able to find someone to play with without having to pay them, that's what I think. Not everyone has a group to play with for free? That's only because some people refuse to play with them without getting compensated.

 

[GrimCo]

If someone wants to play they should be able to find someone to play with without having to pay them, that's what I think

Should, would, could. That's nice thought. But in reality, if you can't find group to play for free and don't have money to pay, you find another hobby you can afford. Sure, i would like to go skiing in Zermatt every year, but if i can't afford it, i'll go to Madonna di Campiglio or just stay at home and watch nice snow covered slopes on TV. That's life.

 

[Kromanjon]

Should, would, could. That's nice thought. But in reality, if you can't find group to play for free and don't have money to pay, you find another hobby you can afford. Sure, i would like to go skiing in Zermatt every year, but if i can't afford it, i'll go to Madonna di Campiglio or just stay at home and watch nice snow covered slopes on TV. That's life.

Well I was advocating for ttrpgs being a hobby people would be able to afford but I guess "reality" and "life" is working against me so discussion over I guess.

 

[thullgrim]

I’m the former GM of my Groupon my opportunities to actually be a player are strictly limited. For a long time o thought I would never pay to be a player but I’ve changed my mind on that.

I would pay to be a player in a WHFRP game. I would pay to be a player in a full run of a Pathfinder AP. I would pay to be a player in a Blades in the Dark game. There might be others but that’s what comes to mind.

I would pay to be a player in those games because there a good chance I will never have the opportunity to play them in any other circumstance.

 

[Remathilis]

Should, would, could. That's nice thought. But in reality, if you can't find group to play for free and don't have money to pay, you find another hobby you can afford. Sure, i would like to go skiing in Zermatt every year, but if i can't afford it, i'll go to Madonna di Campiglio or just stay at home and watch nice snow covered slopes on TV. That's life.

What hobby is that? Name a hobby that doesn't either require a tremendous amount of money either in materials or facilities. Sports? That's a huge investment to play at even a city league level. Video games? Hardware games and subscriptions/dlc. Art and music? Tools and workspace.

RPGs routinely get touted as a low cost hobby. You can buy or borrow the books, dice are cheap, and everything else is social interaction. Unfortunately, it's becoming husslfied like every other activity. Yeah, you can go whaling with B&G deluxe boxes, painted minis, etc. None of that was needed. But now we're talking $20 per person per session. On a "once a month" schedule that's still rough, but anything more than that is insane. Especially if I'm expected to buy my own books and bring my own food.

Eh, no thanks. I personally don't like this trend towards DMs charging because if it catches on it will be another hobby enshitified on the altar of capitalism as a thing for only well off people to engage in. Life's too full of those already. Let's not encourage TT gaming to join them.

 

[GrimCo]

Some sports are on par money wise with ttrpgs, but they have same problems that ttrpgs have. You need group of people that are also interested and a ball (basketball or football). Only it's tad bit easier to find another 5-9 people to play sports. 3v3 basketball or 5v5 small football. Don't know how it is where you are, but here, outdoor elementary and high school courts are publicly accessible and free for everyone and decent amount of parks have ping pong tables with integrated metal "net" ( 2 cheap rackets and pack of balls is 20e all combined).

True, ttrpgs are, money wise, among cheapest hobbies around if you can find few like minded people to play with. Same category as some card games ( you just need a deck of cards- 3e for a deck), some classic board games ( chess, checkers, nine man's morris, battleship, yahtzee, dominos - all either almost free or dirt cheap, like under 5e cheap), video games ( yes, you can play them on the rather cheap side if you aren't into newest AAA games, in the end, there are f2p mobile games) etc.

Point of that post was, that it sucks if you can't find group to play for free and can't pay to play, but that's life. If you can't, you can't, no point complaining, you find something else you can enjoy.

Me personally, i wouldn't pay for playing d&d, specially not in online only game. But if someone finds good value proposition in paying 20$ per session, great for them.

 

[Zardnaar]

What hobby is that? Name a hobby that doesn't either require a tremendous amount of money either in materials or facilities. Sports? That's a huge investment to play at even a city league level. Video games? Hardware games and subscriptions/dlc. Art and music? Tools and workspace.

RPGs routinely get touted as a low cost hobby. You can buy or borrow the books, dice are cheap, and everything else is social interaction. Unfortunately, it's becoming husslfied like every other activity. Yeah, you can go whaling with B&G deluxe boxes, painted minis, etc. None of that was needed. But now we're talking $20 per person per session. On a "once a month" schedule that's still rough, but anything more than that is insane. Especially if I'm expected to buy my own books and bring my own food.

Eh, no thanks. I personally don't like this trend towards DMs charging because if it catches on it will be another hobby enshitified on the altar of capitalism as a thing for only well off people to engage in. Life's too full of those already. Let's not encourage TT gaming to join them.

I'm not really trying that hard to convince people yo pay up. I don't really want to run high level.

But if the group was paying I could be convinced to do high level, adventure of their choice or edition of their choice. First sessions free to see if they like what's on offer.

Free group you get a say but getting out voted and it's really 2E FR /OSR or 5E FR as your options bi weekly to level 10 or 12 or until DM gets bored.

Additional cost would be specific product I don't own or printing costs/POD of a pdf something like that.

 

[Iry]

Well I was advocating for ttrpgs being a hobby people would be able to afford but I guess "reality" and "life" is working against me so discussion over I guess.

There's room for both. If you've got a passionate GM who is running an amazing game for free, go for it! If another GM is doing a great job and you feel like chipping in some way (a $20, pizza, a book, etc) that's great too! I don't think any option should be demonized. I wouldn't hold it against a single artist if they want to set up a Patreon account so people can help them do what they love to do, just like I'm always happy when an artist posts things for free as well!

 

[Distracted DM]

I doubt OP wanted to turn this thread into a "should paid games exist?" discussion, but it's always been a hot topic so it's understandable. I grew up with there being a heavy stigma attached to the idea of paying to play DnD- it was something you did with your friends.. or a way that you made friends! ...Or not, since some folk can be very unpleasant whether or not they're at a gaming table

Anyway, it took my wife pushing me when I left my law job to get over that stigma and try GMing professionally. I've been lucky; over 2-3 years I've gotten a decently-sized pool of players that really enjoy the world and games that I run, enough that they pay $35-40/seat (I bounced between $25 and $35/seat for a while when trying to find players). I know it sounds crazy and/or evil to folk that're playing free games; I think one fear people have is that because some paid games exist, ALL games will eventually become paid games. That it'll destroy the hobby, or something like that... it's understandable to fear that, but I don't think it's realistic.

Trying your hand at paid GMing is really a crapshoot- even if you're "really good," you need to luck into the players that'll vibe with your style.. AND if you want to do it full-time, those players need to be able to afford your prices! Or you need to be able to run multiple times per day without burning out.

Burnout's real... I ran 2-3 West Marches sessions for friends pre-COVID in-person, and that was a blast for a couple years... but man, running 4-6 4hr sessions per week can be pretty draining! Physically and creatively

edit: I was extra lucky because a few of my friends were more than happy to join my paid games! I still play with the rest in a game another friend occasionally runs.

I can't really explain it from a players perspective ofc, but I think Iry's comparison to Patreon is a good one- I back A LOT of folk on Patreon for maps and assets for my games... It can kind of be similar.

 

[DinoInDisguise]

Eh, no thanks. I personally don't like this trend towards DMs charging because if it catches on it will be another hobby enshitified on the altar of capitalism as a thing for only well off people to engage in. Life's too full of those already. Let's not encourage TT gaming to join them.

The difference between supply and demand that we see in 5e with players and DMs is the cause. Anytime you have that, I think it is inevitable that money enters the picture.

The breadth of this gap is probably understated. Last time I offered to run a game for strangers, using reddit's /r/lfg, I got over 100 responses in the google form within a 24 hour period. That was with minor race and class restrictions. And the gap is probably bigger than that for decent to good DMs, because as we see in some discussions on social media, some people seem to be "sticking it out" with bad DMs.

So the question really should be, is it better for people to have the option to pay a DM and play, or should that option just not exist. And if that option shouldnt exist, are we okay with that meaning more people will lack the opportunity to play?

It's unclear to me that the alternative, of not charging for games, leads to a better end state. That said, unless times get really difficult, I hope to keep DMing for random strangers for the foreseeable future for free. Because I love the feeling I get when players enjoy themselves.