A DM's main priority is...

[Doug McCrae]

My #1 priority at the moment is that the characters and situations I create please me. I try hard to stay true to my initial setting concept, which was to combine Marvel's Silver Age with the modern era, much as the Spider-Man movies have done. Occasionally I have another initial priority. Recently I fel;t things had gotten a little too 'samey' so my priority has been to vary things up a little.

I then try to ensure that what I've created will be a challenging adventure, which allows for player choice to affect outcomes and maybe a bit of background world detail too.

Seems to be working quite well so far.

 

[Treebore]

As a result of my ultimate goal as a DM, having fun, I find I do everything you mention in your poll at one time or another. Often with a lot of overlap.

 

[Doug McCrae]

Guys, priority does not mean 'to the exclusion of all else'.

From Merriam-Webster:

3 : something given or meriting attention before competing alternatives

 

[Tigerbunny]

Eh. I gave the 'emotional involvement' answer, but only because it was closest to the real one.

'Cool Stuff'

The players come up with 'cool stuff', it's my job to facilitate it, give them chances to do things they think are cool. I also try to put in my own 'cool stuff' and present it as well as I can, so that players can say later on 'wasn't it COOL when the X did the Y at the Z?'

Whether the cool stuff is nifty character abilities, fiendish plots, memorable relationships with NPCs, gosh-wow bits of setting, or even just the natural 20 at just the right moment or the hi-larious quotable moment, that's what I'm after, and that's what I try to get in there. Everything else is secondary, a means to that end.

Best,

Mark

 

[green slime]

I cannot believe that the poll excluded "have fun" as an option.....

no 1. priority, all categories. If it ain't fun, it doesn't matter, and I'm not interested.

 

[argo]

I vote for keeping the campaign enjoyable at the level of each adventure. Not all adventures need to have the same content (dungeon crawl vs city mystery), meanwhile focusing on making each and every encounter super-cool can bog the DM down while paying too much attention to the long-term story arc can be booring. So I just focus on making sure that each evening spent gamming is more fun than an evening spent at the movies or playing Halo and call it good.

That is the high-order philosophy. As for what makes an individual session good, well as I said it doesn't have to be the same thing every time but my game style focuses on: challenging the player's minds (note that this doesn't have to be a puzzle/riddle, simply forcing them into a situation over their heads and watching them fight their way out works too), suprising the players (hard to do but big payoffs if I can manage it), over-the-top villians/NPC's, kicking in doors and showing off their uber-buff character by knocking down the bad guys. I tell my players that verisimilitude and drama are important but really that is just a lie. If I can make them think that then they tend to create their own verisimilitude and drama which takes a load off my shoulders but the second either one gets in the way of a cheap laugh it gets kicked to the curb

The rest of that stuff; emotional involvement, non-linear gameplay and moral dilemma, can go hang. I'm interested in running a game, not an amateur theater.

Later.

 

[shilsen]

Other. Making sure the players and I all enjoy ourselves thoroughly. Many of the choices on the poll are means to that end, but they are never the main priority.

 

[painandgreed]

Other - Another vote for making it fun for the players and DM

 

[MonsterMash]

well I voted for the story arc being most enjoyable, but really could have voted for several and left out the option I thought of for voyting Other - Setting up the TPK

 

[Pinotage]

Voted for other since there wasn't a 'Many of the above' option. I think it's a fine balance between a lot of those options, and having to concentrate on one all the time would take the fun out of it in the long run. There has to be a bit of mixing things up or variety to make the game fun. Some scenarios will be roleplay heavy, while others will be dungeon crawls. Both are equally important.

Pinotage