DM Schticks That Grind Your Gears

[Agent Oracle]

If you don't like the way the DM drives, then you take the wheel if so many things DM's do annoy ya. :\

Honestly, I don't think anyone has the right to criticize a DM for just trying to entertain people. Player's who do that are the same players that DM's will criticize as being annoying players.

Sorry Oryan77, but players have as much right to gripe as anybody.

If it helps, you could go start up the traditional "Stupid player schticks" thread that allways appears shortly after this one does. I highly reccomend you come up with a list of 3-5 "DM grievances" and kvetch about the folks who play under you for a while. Heck, i'll be the first one to reply if you go do it now.

 

[Sejs]

It's the end of the world as we know it, and it's not fine

Somewhat related:

The Ol' Bait-and-Switch.
AKA the misrepresented campaign theme. You're told to make characters for an RP-heavy, politically focused, intrigue-laden kingmaker type game, and so you do. Backstory interwoven with various in-game fixtures, personalities left and right, motivations, loyalties, the whole works. You've got contacts in every major port for two days sail in any direction, and your class and skill selections are very socially oriented; sure you're not brilliant at disarming spiked pit traps, but you know when someone is lying to you and how to hold your own at parties. You're quite proud of your character. Once the game starts up, however, you quickly discover that by 'politically focused', the DM actually meant that the hordes of badguys you'll fight are humanoid, by 'intrigue-laden' the DM actually meant that all the dungeons you delve will have been built under towns somehow, and that the DM wouldn't know 'RP-heavy' if it jumped up and bit them on the ass.


And the other one...

Just Handing Him Ammo.
Your backstory serves one, and only one, purpose: to give the badguys more way to get you. Come from a town? It'll be razed. Have a sibling? They'll be attacked, kidnapped, turned into undead, or similar. Mentor? Killed before your very eyes, or turned evil. So on and so forth. Anyone you care about will be used against you in some way. If you have noone, you're fine, but you have people in your life they are tragedy waiting to happen.

 

[Sejs]

Short but sweet:

In your FACE, Joe Holy!

If you are playing a paladin, the DM sees it as their divine calling to somehow, no matter what, no matter how contrived and lame, somehow make you fall from grace. Like it's a requirement of the class. If there is a paladin, then they must fall. No other class gets this treatment. Druids are never pushed to violate their spiritual oaths, clerics are never forced to lose their abilities, etc. Oh, and if you complain, then you're the jerk.

 

[Oryan77]

Sorry Oryan77, but players have as much right to gripe as anybody.

And you'll never be happy with a group with that opinion. In fact, didn't you just start a thread recently about leaving a group and I think you posted about being kicked out of a group? Huh....good luck finding that perfect DM

If it helps, you could go start up the traditional "Stupid player schticks" thread that allways appears shortly after this one does. I highly reccomend you come up with a list of 3-5 "DM grievances" and kvetch about the folks who play under you for a while. Heck, i'll be the first one to reply if you go do it now.

Why would I start up a Stupid Player thread when we have 2 going each week? I think that alone shows how much more annoying player schticks there are compared to DM schticks.

I just think it's wrong to pick on a guy who is just trying to entertain some friends and there is very little required by the friends. Player's will have the attitude like their 4 hours that day is completely wasted if a DM blew it when he was trying to do a good job. Big whoop; so the player could have been playing WoW instead....well, the DM wasted those 4 hours plus the other 10 hours the previous week preparing a game for some ungrateful player.

 

[RisnDevil]

**STUFF**

**STUFF**

:oints to thread topic:: Let's give thos people who want a place to rant or blow off steam a place to do just that. Maybe it means the difference between them not blowing up at or berrating said DMs.

Secondly, I do DM. That does not change the fact that I agree with almost everything that has been posted, and find them valid complaints. I am in the Army (ACTIVE-duty), married, have a one year old daughter, have D&D just as a hobby (not lifestyle) and am currently attending school full-time. That doesn't mean that I have to or do resort to any of those things. They are just annoying to players.

 

[Kafkonia]

I've been lucky, I've not really had any bad DM experiences. I guess the worst one wasn't actually a DM problem -- it was someone who usually DMs and was unconsciously trying to run the game while he was a player. That didn't last past the first session, though.

 

[Agent Oracle]

And you'll never be happy with a group with that opinion. In fact, didn't you just start a thread recently about leaving a group and I think you posted about being kicked out of a group? Huh....good luck finding that perfect DM

Why would I start up a Stupid Player thread when we have 2 going each week?

firstly: Yep, just exercizing my right to gripe, and for the record, I was kicked out of that game over two years ago, and the GM and I are still great friends and were playing alongside each other oin ANOTHER gaming group the day after I was asked to leave her group. I still talk to her about once a week, mostly so each of us can dish about how well plots are going, and gripe about silly things like bad players and odd DM quirks.

Secondly Yep! I left the bad group, and found a better group in the same week, two as a matter of fact, I got stuck DMing one of them, but If they have any problems with my campaign, i told them to come to me, and we'll talk about it. The other one has a problem player, but i think i'm going to have fun straightening him out.

And third: The Stupid player threads are your friend. Go over to one of the two (? I didn't see one, but i'll take your word for it) on the boards now and gripe aobut your players there.

See, Being the GM is an ego-filling position. While you have a lot of power, and authority, you don't necessarily have the respect or admiration of your players. Even if you were to declare that You didn't wish to entertain your players that week, it's not like they are incapable of entertaining each other. Someone else would take your place behind the GM screen, and then you could complain about what they do.

 

[Oryan77]

:oints to thread topic:: Let's give thos people who want a place to rant or blow off steam a place to do just that. Maybe it means the difference between them not blowing up at or berrating said DMs.

You're right. I'll shutup.

I would just hope that any players that gripe about these DM faults are constructively pointing them out to their DM rather than just bash him and make him feel crummy.

I've had my share of bad players complain about my DM'ing in the past. No matter how I tried to cater to their complaints, they had more complaints. And as I hear others say all the time, "I felt like giving up DM'ing". In the end, they left the group, and it turns out the remaining players are relieved because they were annoying players and I'm not a bad DM as they tried making it seem.

Just don't give your DM a hard time like so many players do. They can't get better at DM'ing if they feel worthless for trying.

 

[Montague68]

And you'll never be happy with a group with that opinion. In fact, didn't you just start a thread recently about leaving a group and I think you posted about being kicked out of a group? Huh....good luck finding that perfect DM


Why would I start up a Stupid Player thread when we have 2 going each week? I think that alone shows how much more annoying player schticks there are compared to DM schticks.

I just think it's wrong to pick on a guy who is just trying to entertain some friends and there is very little required by the friends. Player's will have the attitude like their 4 hours that day is completely wasted if a DM blew it when he was trying to do a good job. Big whoop; so the player could have been playing WoW instead....well, the DM wasted those 4 hours plus the other 10 hours the previous week preparing a game for some ungrateful player.

Easy, sailor.

I am the OP and I DM too (or at least I did back home, still searching for a regular group in godforsaken Alaska). This wasn't meant as a malicious post. Unless you've spent very little time as a player you had to have run into a plot device, schtick, DM fiat or what have you that made you groan at least a little bit on the inside.

Some may agree with some of the scenarios given, some may disagree. But if you see somebody posting something similar to a pet tactic of yours, perhaps you should rethink it. I've already seen myself in at least one post (the buttonlipped NPC's heh), and maybe changing that trait makes me a better DM.

 

[Oryan77]

See, Being the GM is an ego-filling position.

I know there's plenty of DM's that think like that. Luckily I have never had to play under one. I have played under bad DM's, but it wasn't because they were bad guys like the ego-DM, they just weren't on top of their game. I can think of one bad DM I had that did at least 3-4 of the "schticks" mentioned in this thread. And honestly, I never thought much about them being annoying habits. I felt privilaged that the guy wanted to take the time to prepare adventures for me and do all of the work. If it was a long term game I would help him avoid those schticks rather than let it get to the point where it aggrivates me enough that I'll post about it.

Someone else would take your place behind the GM screen, and then you could complain about what they do.

But I try my best to be a great DM and player. As a player, I never complain about the DM.....I'm not an annoying player
I have played with DM's that ran boring games. I just gave them constructive criticism which they really appreciated. And the following game was always a huge improvement. If whined to him the way bad players whined to me; that DM would never DM again because he'd think he sucks. When really, it would've been me that sucked as a player