DM Entitlement...

[Halivar]

You seem to want to tell other people where to drive and what to eat. If someone invites you to a dinner party do you suggest they call everyone being invited and make sure everyone has a say in what the host prepares?

I host dinner parties about twice a week (I love to cook). I always clear the dinner menu with the invitees first. Nothing is more disheartening to me than preparing a lavish meal only to have people turn up their noses at it, simply because it isn't in their taste. The dinner party is not a success unless someone other than myself enjoys the meal.

Now, as a player, I will always defer to the DM. Always. If a DM abuses that trust with fickle and senseless house rules, the DM is replaced. It's democracy in action.

 

[Doug McCrae]

Maybe it's because most of the games I run tend to be with friends I've known since junior high or longer?

Probably. Viking Hat DMing seems to be more necessary among strangers or groups where the focus is more on the game than the socialising.

 

[Lanefan]

It's in most ways the DM's game.

In our crew, the first question a DM (and there's now 4 of us) gets asked now is "what edition are you running?". If the answer is 3e, then more detailed questions come next, as 3e can represent a great many things - compare 3e Eberron to 3e FR, for example. If the answer is "Victoria Rules 1e" there's not much more to ask unless you've never heard of the system...which means you don't already know us so why are you trying to get in the game anyway?

The DM decides the edition. And the setting. And the rules. And while players of course have every right to make suggestions, the DM has just a little bit more right to ignore 'em...

For Decast (my new game), in order to set a tone early I forced everyone to start with Human characters only, as they were setting off from deep in a classical-Greek-based Human land; non-Humans could drift in later (and have done so, now) once the party was far enough afield to logically meet such. The players didn't know this until roll-up night, and there wasn't a hint of objection; I think they just took it as part of the "surprise" and went with it.

Oh, and party infighting is allowed. (I just had a player manage to pull off what I long thought was impossible: he ran a Paladin and an Assassin side by side as his two characters in the same party! Neither realized what the other was (the Paladin wasn't the showy type) and both died against the enemy before the inevitable showdown could take place; but I'd have loved to have watched this player have to throw down against himself...)

Lanefan

 

[Mark]

I host dinner parties about twice a week (I love to cook). I always clear the dinner menu with the invitees first.

You deciding to clear your cooking plans with your guests is not the same thing as your guest telling you what you are going to cook.

 

[Gundark]

It's the DM's job to put together fun adventures, an interesting campaign world (or at least to portray an interseting campaign world), and possibly to develop an intricate plot.

It's not only the DM's right, but his responsibility, to ban material that's going to make it harder for him to do the above. And yes, that includes sometimes banning races, classes, alignments, or what have you. I rarely allow evil characters, for instance, and I feel not one shred of guilt for doing so. If I'm running a Conan-like game, I'm going to ban most of the non-human races for PCs, for the sake of the aesthetic.

Well I'd say the DM needs the support of his players first and foremost. If a DM wants to run a Conan style game and his players don't want to play that , it'll kill a game pretty damn fast too ( at least my group). It's also the DMs job to create a world that everybody enjoys and wants to play in.

What I think th OP means are the DMs who say hate Dragonborn and don't allow them merely on that basis. In that case I think it should be a group decision. As mentioned above the DMs job is to make the game enjoyable and if playing X race would make that so for the group then why not?

However I agree that if X race doesn't fit the setting then the DM is within his right to say no...or say no for some other reason which I'm not thinkng about right now.

 

[Hussar]

In non-food metaphors, the DM is doing the players a favor by running the game instead of playing (as most people prefer playing). Like a good cook, he's best served to find out what his potential customers like to eat, rather than just plop a steaming plate of beef tongue and boiled cabbage in front of them, but it's his kitchen, and ultimately, nobody has to eat what he's cooking, when they could all get out of the player chairs and go cook up something more to their taste and let *him* sit down and sample their fare instead.

Now this I 100% disagree with. As a DM, I am not doing anyone any favors. (heh, rereading that, that can go a lot of ways. ) I DM because I want to. If someone DM'd because of some sort of sense of obligation, that they HAD to DM, I'd never want to play with them. DM because you want to, and for no other reason.

Funnily enough, this exact thing just came up in my game. I'm starting a Savage Tide (3.5) game next week and everyone is making their characters. Now, I had a rather lengthy list of races and classes that I wanted to see in the game. I gave all sorts of bonuses for choosing from that list (I prefer a carrot approach).

One of the players wants a tiefling. Not on the list. On the list is Diaboli (from Dragon Magazine and Mystara fame) and I pointed him in that direction. He turned up his nose and said that he really, really wanted to try tiefling. I pointed out the great goodies he was giving up by taking tiefling instead of diaboli. He stuck to his guns.

Then I stepped back a second. He REALLY wants to play a tiefling. He's made this abundantly clear. Plus, he's a good player who will really bring the character to life. Tiefling and Diaboli aren't all that different at the end of the day. So, I caved, let him have the tiefling with the extra goodies as well.

He's happy, he gets to play the character he has in his head. I'm fairly content because there isn't a massive shift in the game between my idea and what's being played.

To me that's a win all the way around.

 

[Cadfan]

I have mixed feelings about this.

On one hand, I believe that cutting material is one of the fastest and most efficient ways to make a coherent setting. If you want to go into details about the relationship between, say, humans and elves, it helps to not have 15 other sentient humanoids mucking things up. Simplify! Eliminate the rest of them unless you have an actual reason to include them.

But on the other hand, I've certainly read posts from DMs who seem to have... the wrong motives, lets say, in banning material. I've read LOTS of those posts. And they annoy the crap out of me.

I generally keep quiet though. Because the same DMs that seem to display ridiculous senses of entitlement also tend to post hysterical accusations of player entitlement. And since its hard to really prove that sort of thing, and since those threads always devolve into comments like "You don't know me! You can't say that! But I'll say it about you without noticing the irony! Just watch!" I just stay out of it.

There are certainly some DMs around here who absolutely suck. They may not realize they suck. But they suck. And happily, I don't have to play with them. So it really doesn't matter.

 

[Mister Doug]

As a player, the one thing you must always keep in mind is that the DM is god. The DM creates the world, the adventures, the DM sometimes cheats to make the encounters more interesting or enjoyable. Without the DM there is no game. So if the DM says that X race or class does not appear in this campaign world, that's just the way it is. Players who push issues like that with me get ejected from the game, which is also my right.

DMs are entitled to make decisions like this because it is their game. If the players don't like it, they're always welcome to take their self entitlement and find a different group.

See, I was raised on old school and I just don't get this. No DM = no game. No players = no game. DMs are not god. At best they are elected officials, and as such they have responsibilities, and their powers arise from those responsibilities. They have a responsibility to make worlds, make decisions, and create opportunities for fun and entertainment. In pursuit of this, the players trust and grant them power to run the game and to make things happen.

This is a partnership. The DM has a right to make these decisions, but not because of his exalted place above "self-entitled" players. They have the right to do this because the trust and consent of players entitles them to these rights.

 

[Darrin Drader]

See, I was raised on old school and I just don't get this. No DM = no game. No players = no game. DMs are not god. At best they are elected officials, and as such they have responsibilities, and their powers arise from those responsibilities. They have a responsibility to make worlds, make decisions, and create opportunities for fun and entertainment. In pursuit of this, the players trust and grant them power to run the game and to make things happen.

This is a partnership. The DM has a right to make these decisions, but not because of his exalted place above "self-entitled" players. They have the right to do this because the trust and consent of players entitles them to these rights.

As I said, the player always has the option of not playing if they don't like the specific terms I put in front of them. As a DM, I tend to weigh arguments made by players fairly and take their point of view into consideration. I am a kind and benevolent god at my table, and that is the way the players like it. At the end of the day though, the tough decisions are mine to make. If I'm not sure about a rule (and yes, it does happen occasionally), I am willing to defer to the interpretation of one of my most experienced players, provided that he is being reasonable and not trying to break the game.

The point behind taking this attitude is so that the boundaries separating player from DM are clearly defined and there is no confusion. Some players always want to have their way about rules interpretations and character builds. By laying it down from day 1 that I am the final arbiter of such things, there is no gray area and any rules discussions are quickly and permanently resolved.

 

[Mister Doug]

Or, more accurately, *I'm* going to Taco Bell. If anybody wants to come with me in my car and have some of the Taco Bell food that I'll be buying, they're welcome to do so, but I'm just going to Taco Bell. If somebody wants Pizza Hut, they are more than welcome to take their own car and maybe I'll go with them and have pizza instead!

In non-food metaphors, the DM is doing the players a favor by running the game instead of playing (as most people prefer playing). Like a good cook, he's best served to find out what his potential customers like to eat, rather than just plop a steaming plate of beef tongue and boiled cabbage in front of them, but it's his kitchen, and ultimately, nobody has to eat what he's cooking, when they could all get out of the player chairs and go cook up something more to their taste and let *him* sit down and sample their fare instead.

See, that's where I don't quite see this the same way. I don't see DMing as doing anybody a favor. I enjoy running games, and that's why I run them. I change things as I play to keep the game dynamic strong and everyone (including me) happy. But when I cook, if someone isn't eating, I think that I need to think whether I'm cooking well or to the taste of my guests, too.