As a DM which do you like best?

[Stormborn]

As a DM which do you like best:

creating settings: homebrew from the ground up or tweaking an existing setting to the point of only barely recognizable you prefer the process of world creation, may or may not include homebrew/house rules (for example: Middle Earth)

creating campaigns: somewhat like the above, but more focused on creating the larger overarching events of a campaign, you like developing the big picture of events (for example: The Quest to destroy the One Ring)

creating adventures: more than the big plots you like planning the environs and enemies of a session or small series of sessions (for example: The Battle at Amon Hen)

creating NPCs: you like developing the behavior and characteristics of a single NPC, be they reoccuring or not (for example: Gollum).

I am interested in what you like best. I acknowledge that they are all, to lesser and greater degrees, related and in someways mutually dependent. However, for me their is a distinct difference.

Personally I get excited about world building, with campaigns a close second, and then less interested in planning the week to week sessions. This is probablly why I have trouble, as a DM, staying interested in running long term campaigns even though I put a lot of work into them on the front end.

 

[Rafael Ceurdepyr]

While I like world building, I mainly like it in connection with storytelling, so I chose the second option. In fact, I tend to get very wrapped up in the story arc.

 

[Woas]

A mix of B and C.
I like making campaign overarching story-events and then working on the individual adventures.
I'm not really sure what to call it. I enjoy "seeing" history and change. And knowing why its like that. It's kind of hard to explain and its a very personal interest/enjoyment. An example would be looking at political maps from different decades and seeing how the borders changed and where and who changed them (events, people, etc,). Another example now that I am thinking about it is why I love games like SimCity so much. On the surface SimCity seems like a fairly boring game... almost like D&D. You really can never "win" and it just goes on forever. But playing the game, then coming back to it and seeing how a once empty map has filled up... where the streets are and why. Where the airport is.. where the industrial areas grow.
This is the same feeling I get when I sit down and think of an overarching campaign theme and then from smaller adventure to small adventure, see all the elements coming together (friendly NPCs helping, enemy NPCs harming, the growth of the characters and knowledge they've learned coming to use) and altering the end result.

 

[Masquerade]

creating NPCs: you like developing the behavior and characteristics of a single NPC, be they reoccuring or not (for example: Golem).

(Did you mean Gollum?)

Of the choices, I definitely had to vote NPCs. Whether foes or allies, having a cast of well-imagined NPCs is a great way of encouraging well-imagined PCs. I know that when I was starting out, I didn't quite get the whole "roleplaying" thing until I played under a DM who was brilliant at creating, describing, and acting his NPCs. Then it all clicked. I try to offer the same experience to my players.

 

[T. Foster]

I don't really like any of that stuff. What I like best as a DM is sitting at one end of the table administering the setting/campaign/adventures/NPCs for a group of players and seeing them come to life through the interactive process of actual play -- whether those elements were created by me or someone else is largely immaterial; I'd just as soon use pregenerated stuff and only bother to create my own (which I consider to be a hassle and not much fun) when I can't find something pre-existing that suits my needs or desires.

 

[GlassJaw]

When I have the time, I like all of those, although I probably enjoy setting-building the least because it's potentially the most time-consuming and the one thing that usually adds the least amount of "fun" to the actual gameplay.

Unfortunately, I currently have little-to-no time for any of those things.

 

[Crothian]

Developing the story and plot.

 

[bento]

Its B and C for me as well. I don't want to work on a setting, that's too much work and there's plenty of settings already out there and well supported. Settings that are really large and can handle lots of different types of campaigns. It has to be something I can ignore the things I don't like and build around those that I do like.

For instance, last night a new player to the group is developing a background e-mails me with a request, "I need to be from a town that has merchant houses as that's my character's background." I read through the DCC #35 Aerth Gazeteer and within ten minutes I'm e-mailing him back with a description of the perfect town. That's what a setting is to me, a common set of information to pull from and stick into the adventure I'm running. It can provide flavor, but is secondary to the adventure at hand.

 

[Ry]

Again, I create 4 elements per my sig (Threats, Rewards, Assets, Problems). That's not the same as Adventure, Campaign, Setting, or NPC, but sometimes they involve those.

 

[Oryan77]

I like the storytelling angle and seeing what PCs will do within that story.

I'm not always thrilled with what ends up happening....but I guess that's why I DM and they don't

I think if a lot of campaigns were written in book form, there would be a lot of pretty lame heroes as main characters