DM seeking advice

[Gus L]

It's not malicious.... but the player is making decisions that are a bit reckless. Not recognizing when it's time to bail and let the tanks do tanky things. Not understanding the powers and limits of stealth. Also not recognizing subtle role-playing stuff, like an NPC asking for discretion - and then the rogue asking the NPC for papers or documents to connect the party to the NPC.

I always figure that one of the important aspects of older editions is the relative ease of rolling up new characters. Consequences are part of the game. Sometimes being recklessness gets you the gem eyes of the statute - sometimes it animates and pulps the party... Both results are the game working as intended.

That said...

One doesn't want to be the "killer DM". I find a lot of the time when players say they're about to do something obviously very dangerous that checking in with them and reiterating the obvious danger is a good referee tactic. A lot of the time the player may have missed some bit of description or context that should be obvious.

For physical dangers I even go so far as telling the players the mechanics I will likely use. e.g. "You want to jump onto the bar of the mummified chariot king's chariot as it charges you? Okay that is very hard, and you aren't an acrobat - If you make a 6d6 roll under Dex you'll succeed, if not you'll fall under the hooves and wheels and be stunned for 2 rounds while taking 5D6 damage with a Save vs. Paralysis for 1/2 damage." Generally I find players are okay with terrible consequences if they're making the decision to take the risk. I figure most characters can judge risks like that. Likewise NPC stuff. Like the player might not know that "The Knights of Not Putting Up With Your naughty word" train their entire lives to murder people who give them guff, but the character likely will and even if not that knight's expression and hand hovering over the hilt of their sword "PC Killer" should.

 

[Theory of Games]

One doesn't want to be the "killer DM".

IME there are no "killer DMs" - just "meat-grinder" adventures/campaigns.

 

[Moving Pictures]

You might want to try a more fair and balanced game.

It would seem you have issues with comprehension.
Don't bother replying to my posts in the future.

 

[Zardnaar]

Consequences character dies he dies.

If it's disruptive to the other players fun player might need to be booted.

Your game/decision.

 

[R_J_K75]

I have a player - mature (middle-aged) who says he's played before 20-odd years ago. He's playing a rogue, impulsively. The problem is that the impulsiveness is .... causing issues.

I had a player a few years ago who was very disruptive. He just made the game unpleasant for everyone else, and they all told me so. I'd known this person long enough to know that trying to have a discussion about this wasn't going to do any good. It was either just ask him not to play anymore or slowly watch the other players quit. As much as I didn't want to have to do it, there really was no other choice. Sometimes you just have to make hard decisions to preserve the rest of the group.

 

[Mannahnin]

First, congrats on the return, and on providing a game for others!

I have a player - mature (middle-aged) who says he's played before 20-odd years ago. He's playing a rogue, impulsively. The problem is that the impulsiveness is .... causing issues.
It's not malicious.... but the player is making decisions that are a bit reckless. Not recognizing when it's time to bail and let the tanks do tanky things. Not understanding the powers and limits of stealth. Also not recognizing subtle role-playing stuff, like an NPC asking for discretion - and then the rogue asking the NPC for papers or documents to connect the party to the NPC.

I agree overall that what's really needed is a bit more out of game conversation to get on the same page. We each carry invisible rulebooks in our heads, and I've found over the decades that GM/player conflict is often a result of having different assumptions underlying our expectations and decisions, and one or both parties not realizing that their assumptions aren't the only logical or possible ones.

And if he's just not getting it after that, the other approach is just to run the game so as to let the chips fall where they may with consequences or aggressive and foolhardy play.

 

[Gus L]

IME there are no "killer DMs" - just "meat-grinder" adventures/campaigns.
[...]

While I agree that adventure content has a good deal to do with how deadly a given campaign is ... there are absolutely bad refereeing methods that make for "killer DMing". many of us may remember some of these from playing D&D when we were pre teens and teenagers in the 1980's...

1) Having exactly one right solution to a deadly problem. This is more then just deciding on a possible solution to a trap or similar encounter, it's the habit of then rejecting any other ideas out of hand and killing the PC who attempts them for doing it wrong. Players think of things the referee and designer doesn't all the time and often these also work to solve puzzles or neutralize dangers.

2) Playing "Gotcha" and "Mother May I". This problem has been reconceptualized a bit lately in the contemporary traditional space to encompass almost any sort of danger that isn't entirely obvious. What it means here is hiding obvious dangers through omission. E.g. "HA HA! You fall into the lava, roll 12d12 for damage ... you didn't ask me what the floor looked like." This is why referee clarification is important, because otherwise the players have to clarify EVERYTHING and that takes forever. Referee description is the players only way of knowing about the world and one should be generous rather then hiding things with omission.

3) A compete lack of telegraphing or clues. This isn't to say you can't have traps in hallways - put generally traps or monster ambushes that have no possible means of discovery (or require some sort of excessive caution - see 2 above) shouldn't be immediately deadly - at least they shouldn't be common. This doesn't apply to obviously dangerous situations such as treasure chests and the like (a poison needle is a chest is a classic), but even "hallway traps" that aren't a save vs. death, such as a pit or spear trap should have some kind of warning, even just the knowledge that the dungeon is trapped ... or that the corridor is entirely unused (dungeon denizens don't like skipping over their own tripwires). The same goes for monsters with dangerous special abilities. Poison drips from the jaws of a "poison wolf" (not necessarily from a spider though ... because spider) etc.

4) DMPCs ... not just the ones that help the party - those are annoying as hell on so many levels ... but I means enemies and such that the referee has a special fondness for. In the old G+ days one party playing Ravenloft famously got very lucky somehow blasting Strahd when he first appeared to mock them. This is not how the adventure is meant to go (and it's hard to do), but the referee should let this kinda thing happen when the dice say it happens. NPCs and foes - even the ones with fun plans have to be mortal and have to play by something akin to the same rules as the players (not exactly the same - they need not have the same abilities). They might take precautions (shield spells, magic items, demon pacts that make them immune to normal weapons etc) but if the players get lucky or figure out a monster or NPCs tricks and kill them, the referee should let it stand. A killer referee won't just let their pet NPC escape though, they will use the pet NPC to punish characters who try to beat them and especially when they do something clever. This is bad refereeing.

5) Antagonistic Refereeing more generally. D&D/RPGs aren't a wargame in the sense that they are meant to be more or less equal contests between player antagonists governed by rules of a game. The DM is not a player (one reason I like "referee" not any kind of "Master"), despite what Dragonlance's DL1 Dragon's of Flame says in the intro...(read it you will not thank me, but you may chuckle). The referee has the power to manipulate the setting and rules of the game almost any way they want, especially in older systems. This has can't be brought to bear against the players in an antagonistic way - the referee can't win. They can't lose either. Thinking of the game as a contest between players and referee is the best way to ruin things. It's tricky of course, as a referee one wants intelligent enemies to do intelligent things, to use their advantages - and that's fine - but as a referee one has to temper this with accepting that dumb enemies do dumb things and that even smart ones might make mistakes or otherwise fail to plan for every eventuality.

Anyway that's enough maundering from me. But yeah - killer DMing is a thing, and the more dangerous an adventure is the more it's something to avoid. I think it's especially an issue these days with people new to "old school" style stuff buying a bit to hard into the idea that the game is meant to be super lethal to PCs or especially unforgiving. To some extent this is even a hold over from newer editions where organized play tends to be designed with more wargame like scenarios and the balanced tactical combat focus with high character power level/survivability encourage referees towards a more antagonistic style out of a need to make things challenging. Older editions have no problem creating super challenging situations.

 

[Theory of Games]

While I agree that adventure content has a good deal to do with how deadly a given campaign is ... there are absolutely bad refereeing methods that make for "killer DMing". many of us may remember some of these from playing D&D when we were pre teens and teenagers in the 1980's...

1) Having exactly one right solution to a deadly problem. This is more then just deciding on a possible solution to a trap or similar encounter, it's the habit of then rejecting any other ideas out of hand and killing the PC who attempts them for doing it wrong. Players think of things the referee and designer doesn't all the time and often these also work to solve puzzles or neutralize dangers.

2) Playing "Gotcha" and "Mother May I". This problem has been reconceptualized a bit lately in the contemporary traditional space to encompass almost any sort of danger that isn't entirely obvious. What it means here is hiding obvious dangers through omission. E.g. "HA HA! You fall into the lava, roll 12d12 for damage ... you didn't ask me what the floor looked like." This is why referee clarification is important, because otherwise the players have to clarify EVERYTHING and that takes forever. Referee description is the players only way of knowing about the world and one should be generous rather then hiding things with omission.

3) A compete lack of telegraphing or clues. This isn't to say you can't have traps in hallways - put generally traps or monster ambushes that have no possible means of discovery (or require some sort of excessive caution - see 2 above) shouldn't be immediately deadly - at least they shouldn't be common. This doesn't apply to obviously dangerous situations such as treasure chests and the like (a poison needle is a chest is a classic), but even "hallway traps" that aren't a save vs. death, such as a pit or spear trap should have some kind of warning, even just the knowledge that the dungeon is trapped ... or that the corridor is entirely unused (dungeon denizens don't like skipping over their own tripwires). The same goes for monsters with dangerous special abilities. Poison drips from the jaws of a "poison wolf" (not necessarily from a spider though ... because spider) etc.

4) DMPCs ... not just the ones that help the party - those are annoying as hell on so many levels ... but I means enemies and such that the referee has a special fondness for. In the old G+ days one party playing Ravenloft famously got very lucky somehow blasting Strahd when he first appeared to mock them. This is not how the adventure is meant to go (and it's hard to do), but the referee should let this kinda thing happen when the dice say it happens. NPCs and foes - even the ones with fun plans have to be mortal and have to play by something akin to the same rules as the players (not exactly the same - they need not have the same abilities). They might take precautions (shield spells, magic items, demon pacts that make them immune to normal weapons etc) but if the players get lucky or figure out a monster or NPCs tricks and kill them, the referee should let it stand. A killer referee won't just let their pet NPC escape though, they will use the pet NPC to punish characters who try to beat them and especially when they do something clever. This is bad refereeing.

5) Antagonistic Refereeing more generally. D&D/RPGs aren't a wargame in the sense that they are meant to be more or less equal contests between player antagonists governed by rules of a game. The DM is not a player (one reason I like "referee" not any kind of "Master"), despite what Dragonlance's DL1 Dragon's of Flame says in the intro...(read it you will not thank me, but you may chuckle). The referee has the power to manipulate the setting and rules of the game almost any way they want, especially in older systems. This has can't be brought to bear against the players in an antagonistic way - the referee can't win. They can't lose either. Thinking of the game as a contest between players and referee is the best way to ruin things. It's tricky of course, as a referee one wants intelligent enemies to do intelligent things, to use their advantages - and that's fine - but as a referee one has to temper this with accepting that dumb enemies do dumb things and that even smart ones might make mistakes or otherwise fail to plan for every eventuality.

Anyway that's enough maundering from me. But yeah - killer DMing is a thing, and the more dangerous an adventure is the more it's something to avoid. I think it's especially an issue these days with people new to "old school" style stuff buying a bit to hard into the idea that the game is meant to be super lethal to PCs or especially unforgiving. To some extent this is even a hold over from newer editions where organized play tends to be designed with more wargame like scenarios and the balanced tactical combat focus with high character power level/survivability encourage referees towards a more antagonistic style out of a need to make things challenging. Older editions have no problem creating super challenging situations.

When we were kids playing D&D, we were just doing what the modules told us to do Also there's a lot of Presentism clouding how we view older games. Look at the popular games - 5e and Shadowdark. They're both super-protective of the PCs. "Death saves"? Really? It's completely unfair to judge old-school DMs by the modern standard because games weren't as soft then as they are now.

I'm also defending the DM using DMPCs because usually it was someone who wanted to play but couldn't because no one else would DM. The DM chair's a lonely place when you really didn't want to be there in the first place. IMO if a player takes one for the team and becomes DM, we shouldn't begrudge them their overpowered and obnoxious pet PCs.

Finally, how hard is it for a GM to kill off a party anyway? Super-duper easy. They could do it before combat even starts. GMs don't kill PCs. PCs get perished because (1) the player made bad decisions, and (2) the dice rolled against them. And it's funny because when GMs interfere with player agency, it's an unforgivable offense, but when PCs die from players making bad decisions, it's STILL the GM's fault.

 

[bloodtide]

If a new player doesn't know what the power level of a 1st level character is... then just sit down with them 30 minutes before the session and explain the difficulties of the various options a character might try to accomplish. Especially if there are dice checks that go into exactly what the odds are for most actions.

This is important. I would add that you should make it clear. If you expect a 1st level character to be unable to do anything in the game, you should make this clear. Tell the player you expect them to sit quietly often.

Though you should apply this to all players equally, and not favor some players or classes or anything else.

 

[ericmpaq]

When we were kids playing D&D, we were just doing what the modules told us to do Also there's a lot of Presentism clouding how we view older games. Look at the popular games - 5e and Shadowdark. They're both super-protective of the PCs. "Death saves"? Really? It's completely unfair to judge old-school DMs by the modern standard because games weren't as soft then as they are now.

D&D, AD&D 1st, and AD&D 2nd edition also had saves vs. death and saves vs. other effects which would eliminate a PC.