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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AaronOfBarbaria" data-source="post: 6749471" data-attributes="member: 6701872">Sure, not every player will enjoy being a DM - I never said they would. But those folks you say aren't interested are still capable, and that's all I said they were.Campaign depth is not exclusively achieved through prep - I run campaigns that are at least as deep as any I have ever participated in with no more effort put into the game than my players, including that we start campaigns opportunistically (there are a few of us here, we have a few hours... let's make some characters and start playing) and have them last 6-9 months of weekly sessions, being allowed to wrap-up and end for no other reason than that we have some other game we'd like to play and don't have time for another session in our schedule.If you don't ask your players to commit to actually attending, I can see how you would think that the DM has to commit more... but I find "I'll run it as long as you guys want to play it" and "we'll show up to play as long as you want to run it" to be equal.I am saddened that you consider it "dream-like" to have a group of players that aren't trying to get one over on the DM. Do you not play with friends? Anyone trying to get some kind of advantage by abusing a new DM's lack of confidence rather than help them bolster that confidence (to the benefit of the whole group) is the kind of player I'd show the door and ask not to return.Yes, as I said, the rules don't really matter that much so you just need to either be confident in making a ruling and moving on, or having your group work together (rather than against you) to keep the game going.I picked up a book in a bookstore when I was 12 because it looked cool, I read it and found out it was a game that I needed a couple more parts of, so I returned to the bookstore the next day, bought those other parts needed (a couple more books and some dice), gave them a quick read, made up my first adventure and recruited my cousins and a couple friends to play it through.All the rest of my DM "schooling" is from getting people together and just playing games - and I'm not some kind of prodigy, it is just that easy to learn to be a DM (and practice makes you a better DM), but some folks think otherwise because they came into gaming a different way and have likely had experience with DMs that play up how much "work" they do to run the game as a means to keep their players drinking the "his game, his way, I don't deserve a say in it" koolaid.I used to design a fresh world for every new campaign I put together - whether I planned in advance, or just did it improv style as it came up during a session.Of course I house-rule when I see the need... but I involve my players in the process since the outcome affects them as much (usually more) than it does me.I've been playing D&D for half my life and have only ever run 4 campaigns from published materials - but that doesn't mean I have to prepare in advance of the session, or that me thinking up what obstacle stands in the way of a stated goal of the players takes any more effort than the players thinking up what they want their characters to be doing in the first place.Here's a point where I bet there is a lot of disconnect: I actually have my players split the "work" with me, rather than doing everything on my own like some DMs feel they must. One player keeps track of the party's inventory, another tracks their wealth, another draws maps as they explore, and another keeps track of the went here, did that, met them, and what day it is type of stuff.Yes they take time and effort, and yes there is skill involved - but the DM taking all that time before a session instead of everyone taking a share during, and the DM making all that effort rather than the group all sharing it, and even that skill being skill at preparing in advance rather than skill running a fully improvised and reactive campaign are not the only possibilities.I can leave it to the player, and I do - it's his character, and I don't like Gnomes, both of which are good reasons for it to be done by him rather than me - but I can also acknowledge that where the gnome came from and whether there are other gnomes out there doesn't necessarily have any bearing on the campaign at all, and never bother filling in any more details than actually do have bearing on the campaign.Maybe it is just me, but I don't think that being able to have fun without taking a particular option you find fun has anything to do with whether or not removing that option affects your fun.I mean, I've got a player that I know really enjoyed the human fighter he played - it's one of his favorites, and so much fun in fact that he's asked to reprise the role of that character in an upcoming campaign (which I have obliged, of course - pretty much the whole group wants to play that set of characters again with 5th edition). But if I told him that he couldn't play dwarves anymore because I've got this plotline that requires them being absent or some setting that never had such a thing as a dwarf and had no dwarven visitors from other worlds, he'd skip out on playing without even hesitating, no matter how much he could still find that he would enjoy playing (he plays non-D&D games that don't have dwarves and enjoys them just fine) because I'm looking at the possibilities and am saying that X is more important to me than him getting to play what he wants to - which means I'm putting his enjoyment of the game at a lower priority by definition.</blockquote>

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