D&D General DM with too High Expectations - Advice?

[prabe]

Seems pretty straightforward to me:

DM: I want us to play this style and form of D&D game.
Player(s): We don't really want to play that and prefer the earlier style we played.
DM: Either we play the game I wanted or we play board games on game night.
Player(s): Well, Toni says she is willing to give DMing a try so we're gonna go play X thing.
DM: I don't want to play that. I only want to play what I described.
Player(s): That's cool, but I guess you're gonna have to find someone else to play that way with, in the meantime you are welcome to join game X. If not, maybe the next game will be more to your liking. Hopefully, we can still get a board game night in every once in a while too - so you should definitely come to that!

The DM can then whine and insist that no one else should run a game if it doesn't match his preferences without compromise, but not sure why that would be persuasive and not just reason to be like "What the heck is wrong with that guy? He's being a baby!"

I feel like I know this because in the past I was that baby and got over myself.

Pretty much this. I don't and wouldn't deny that I run campaigns that are very much to my own tastes as a player (and I play in ways that I'd very much like to GM for) but that doesn't mean I don't or won't listen to players when they ask for something (especially when they do so in their subtext) or that I'd take my toys and go home if they didn't like want I was running.

 

[Eltab]

But let's call a spade a spade.

Remind us again: who decided they would rather play Clue than discuss what the rest of the group thought of their sessions being streamed?

 

[Charlaquin]

What group decision? That he run something he doesn't want to run? LOL

Or that they kick him to the curb by insisting to play something he refuses to play? That's not him leaving the group voluntarily. That's being booted. They can boot him if they want. But let's call a spade a spade.

Dude, they came to him saying they collectively didn’t want to play such an intense game. Rather than listening to their perspectives, expressing his own, and trying to come to a mutually agreeable solution (which may indeed have ended up being that what he wanted from the game wasn’t compatible with what they wanted from it and agreeing to part ways on amicable terms!) he just shut the discussion down by saying “well, I’m only going to run a game that’s this intense.” Again, he has the right not to run a game he doesn’t want to run. He doesn’t have the right to prevent others in the group from running a game he doesn’t want to run.

 

[Mecheon]

What group decision? That he run something he doesn't want to run? LOL

Well, I think its moreso "He runs the type of game he used to run until he got this idea and doesn't throw a bunch of people who do not want to stream online and ruin 5 years of DMing for these people with an ill thought-out attempt to get into the D&D stream market"

If I was DMing for you for that long and then changed things up in such a way they didn't work for you, I'd expect, y'know, 5 years of talking would mean you could come and talk to me about it. But, their DM apparently considers those big big Twitch or Youtube bucks (boy do I have a tale about how I'm technically authorised to earn money from Youtube but chose to do literately nothing about this for the last 10 years) to be more important than his friends and their mutual enjoyment, and he'd rather blame the people who don't like idea than blame himself and a poorly thought idea to begin with.

 

[Guest 6801328]

Ask the DM how much he’s paying the players to help him start his new career as a celebrity DM. Or is he proposing a revenue share?

 

[Dausuul]

I've offered to run a game for them, most recently when the DM took a month off because of burnout, but no one jumped on it - possibly out of a fear of offending the regular DM. Two other players in their group have also spoken about wanting to try DMing, but the regular DM kinda squashes their offers.

Sounds like this is a golden opportunity, then.

It would be one thing if the old DM was the only one in the group with any interest in the role; it still wouldn't justify his behavior, but it would give him a bit of a leg (half a leg, maybe a third of one) to stand on in asking for more participation from the players. But if these other folks have been wanting to try it, why don't they give it a go now? Or take you up on your offer?

 

[FrogReaver]

Seems pretty straightforward to me:

DM: I want us to play this style and form of D&D game.
Player(s): We don't really want to play that and prefer the earlier style we played.
DM: Either we play the game I wanted or we play board games on game night.
Player(s): Well, Toni says she is willing to give DMing a try so we're gonna go play X thing.
DM: I don't want to play that. I only want to play what I described.
Player(s): That's cool, but I guess you're gonna have to find someone else to play that way with, in the meantime you are welcome to join game X. If not, maybe the next game will be more to your liking. Hopefully, we can still get a board game night in every once in a while too - so you should definitely come to that!

The DM can then whine and insist that no one else should run a game if it doesn't match his preferences without compromise, but not sure why that would be persuasive and not just reason to be like "What the heck is wrong with that guy? He's being a baby!"

I feel like I know this because in the past I was that baby and got over myself.

Yep. My only issue with was framing that as the DM voluntarily leaving the group. You kicked him to the curb by insisting on playing a game you know he is going to refuse to play. That's fine. Sometimes it needs done. I also find it ironic that this is what is being advocated for right after his players (some of them at least - wasn't particularly clear how many) view him as a jerk because they feel like he insisted they play in a game they didn't want to and now we are telling the players to do the same thing to him...

 

[FrogReaver]

Well, I think its moreso "He runs the type of game he used to run until he got this idea and doesn't throw a bunch of people who do not want to stream online and ruin 5 years of DMing for these people with an ill thought-out attempt to get into the D&D stream market"

I think he's entitled to change his mind about the kind of game he wants to run/play in (regardless of his motivations for doing so).

I do agree it does suck for the group to have something upended like that especially when some of it appears based on his ill thought out attempt to get into D&D streaming.

If I was DMing for you for that long and then changed things up in such a way they didn't work for you, I'd expect, y'know, 5 years of talking would mean you could come and talk to me about it.

They did talk about it. That it didn't work out as hoped doesn't mean they didn't talk. And I'm still not sure why everyone insists he should have left the door open to someone else DMing for the group when it's pretty obvious he wasn't interested in playing a less intense campaign either. I wouldn't bring up options I wasn't good with or that would disinculde me either. I don't think anyone would.

The rest of the group is definitely free to establish their own game and then play it instead if they want to. They can kick him to the curb so to speak.

But, their DM apparently considers those big big Twitch or Youtube bucks (boy do I have a tale about how I'm technically authorised to earn money from Youtube but chose to do literately nothing about this for the last 10 years) to be more important than his friends and their mutual enjoyment, and he'd rather blame the people who don't like idea than blame himself and a poorly thought idea to begin with.

I think you read to much into the situation. I agree it was a poorly thought out idea and that I would have chose to keep the game running as always for that group - but I'm not going to fault someone that makes a different choice.

 

[Starfox]

The strategy this GM is setting out to use seems dangerous for a GM who feels he's risking burnout. This will involve a lot more work than simply GMing, and work of entirely new kinds - video editing being the first and most important new task. If the GM was already feeling overburdened, adding a lot of new tasks doesn't strike me as the right way to do things.

I could be wrong, some people do find new energy in adding more of a work burden.

 

[MNblockhead]

The strategy this GM is setting out to use seems dangerous for a GM who feels he's risking burnout. This will involve a lot more work than simply GMing, and work of entirely new kinds - video editing being the first and most important new task. If the GM was already feeling overburdened, adding a lot of new tasks doesn't strike me as the right way to do things.

I could be wrong, some people do find new energy in adding more of a work burden.

Yeah, but as someone who works himself into burnout both at work and as a DM, I kinda get it. Different people respond to stress differently. I crave a certain level of stress and can handle a lot of it...until I can't. Sometimes, burnout is boredom, the work you make for yourself is no longer interesting, so you try to up your game to get the same thrill, not thinking about how it will impact other aspects of your life.

DMs who operate this way need to realize that most people are not interested in this level of effort and intensity in their gaming, or work hard to find a group of players who are.