DM'ing is a skill, not an art.

[FireLance]

Storytelling has always been considered an art.

Serving as a referee is generally considered a skill.

And here is what I believe to be the crux of the disagreement, although I would use the word "entertaining" rather than "storytelling" as the latter term has a few other connotations in gaming circles.

If you think a DM should be an entertainer, then he should try his best to ensure that the players are having a good time.

If you think that a DM should only be a referee, then it is not his responsibility to do so.

 

[Dausuul]

The way I see it, a DM is not obligated to make every choice the players make fruitful. However, the DM also should not be wasting the players' time.

If my players announce their intention to explore a dead end, I don't have them roll a bunch of skill checks and spend a lot of time climbing and exploring only to say, "Nope. Nothin' there." Instead, it goes something like this:

Players: "Okay, we're going to go explore the sewer and see if we can find a way into the fortress. We go in the mouth of the sewer. What do we see?"

Me: "Nothing of interest. You explore for a while, but as far as you can tell, there's no way in. All the pipes leading up into the fortress are too small to fit through. By the way, y'all smell really, really bad now."

No decision the players make while in the sewer is going to matter, so I'm not going to waste their time or mine asking them to make such decisions. Instead, I "fast-forward" through it and move on to the interesting bits.

Now, if your players actually enjoy exploring dead ends, more power to you. Mine, as far as I can tell, don't. Keeping them entertained is quite enough work as it is.

 

[Cadfan]

This is a playstyle difference, but it seems like some people are trying to make it a badwrongfun issue here. If my group likes spending half a game session wandering back and forth trying to decide which way to go at a crossroads, what's wrong with that? If your group doesn't, then don't do it, and if splitting up is the issue and it spoils your fun, don't split up.

Nice try with the attempt at shutting down the debate at invoking badwrongfun. But I don't actually believe your group enjoys that.

They might enjoy something else that happens simultaneously with wandering around at a crossroads. But the actual useless wandering, they don't like that part for itself.

 

[Mallus]

If you think that a DM should only be a referee, then it is not his responsibility to do so.

I've always wondered how a DM can be only a referee when it's also his job to play the other team, often manufacturing them whole cloth, not to mention the people manning the concession stands, all the fans in the bleachers, and the stadium itself.

 

[Reynard]

I've always wondered how a DM can be only a referee when it's also his job to play the other team, often manufacturing them whole cloth, not to mention the people manning the concession stands, all the fans in the bleachers, and the stadium itself.

It is an interesting question, the answer to which would likely be the ultimate marriage of the OP's "skill vs art" dichotomy. I do think it is the ultimate goal, however -- though I'd take out the word "only" because clearly the DM is not "only" a referee and hasn't been since the G first acquired the RP prefix. Interestingly, I think, is that in order to be a "referee" one's skill and artistry as a DM needs to be at a level of mastery: you cannot be fair and unbiased so long as the game that you present to your players is in some way flawed (as I think all games we do present to our players are). But if you could achieve a flawless presentation, what you would ultimately be is a fair and unbiased referee adjudicating the actions of the players.

 

[DrunkonDuty]

Most important topic first: Tim Tams. Yuck. Hate the over-sugared bloody things. Gimme a Scotch Finger to dunk in my tea any day. Contraversal aint I?

DMing: Art or Skill? Call me Grandpa Simpson: a little from column A, a little from column B. Having the technical know-how is important. Having the 'art' or possibly 'meta-skill' required to use the technical know-how is important.

To put it another way: Possibly the 'skill' being referred to is the knowledge base that needs to be built up: Knowledge Skills. The art is using the Knowledge Skills, or Process Skills.

Regarding the example given I side with Varis' interpretation. The pipe was there as defence, most folk seem to have ignored the fact that it was there for a reason, just not the reason of giving the PCs an easy back door. Detail is nice, it's the crinkly bits that make the game interesting. Not every detail is a plot point. And as several people pointed out: ya never know how something is going to come into play at a later stage. I like the quick exit idea.

ya know, I hope that tim tam comment of mine doesn't spark a flame war.
cheers all.

 

[Vegepygmy]

But if you could achieve a flawless presentation, what you would ultimately be is a fair and unbiased referee adjudicating the actions of the players.

I agree 100%.

Look.

The DM believes that he adequately communicated to the players that climbing up the pipe was a waste of time.

But they didn't get the message, or else they wouldn't have climbed up the pipe and wasted time.

Either this is the fault of the players for not listening or reasoning well, or, this is the fault of the DM for not communicating as well as he intended.

I think you're overlooking another possibility: players who are used to playing with a DM who makes sure they don't "waste time" often won't realize (when playing with a non-interfering DM) that "climbing up the pipe" is a waste of time, no matter how clearly the DM describes the "pipe," because what they are used to is a DM just coming right out and telling them that what they want to do is a waste of time.

In this case, the only way to avoid the "miscommunication" is for the DM to come right out and tell them it's a waste of time (in which case, he wouldn't be a non-interfering DM anymore), or for the players to realize that some DMs won't prevent them from wasting their time (and that it is their responsibility when playing with such a DM to make sure they don't wind up wasting their time).

In short, I see the "problem" as simply a clash of play-styles. Some people think that just because they like to play the game a certain way, that's how everyone likes to play it (or would if only they could be shown the One True Way). But it just ain't so, as this thread clearly demonstrates.

 

[aboyd]

I would advocate for summing up the situation with a few sentences like 'after several hours of climing you realise this is a hopeless dead end. Frustrated and weary you climb back through the water pipe cursing your bad luck.'

Wow, that's so railroady. Here, someone else had a much better approach:

If my players announce their intention to explore a dead end, I don't have them roll a bunch of skill checks and spend a lot of time climbing and exploring only to say, "Nope. Nothin' there." Instead, it goes something like this:

Players: "Okay, we're going to go explore the sewer and see if we can find a way into the fortress. We go in the mouth of the sewer. What do we see?"

Me: "Nothing of interest. You explore for a while, but as far as you can tell, there's no way in. All the pipes leading up into the fortress are too small to fit through. By the way, y'all smell really, really bad now."

And now for something completely different:

The DM believes that he adequately communicated to the players that climbing up the pipe was a waste of time.

But they didn't get the message, or else they wouldn't have climbed up the pipe and wasted time.

Either this is the fault of the players for not listening or reasoning well, or, this is the fault of the DM for not communicating as well as he intended.

I happen to think that the latter is more likely.

I happen to think that the former is more likely, for one obvious reason: at least some of the players got the hint. Don't forget, this is the moment that the party split. The DM describes it, half the group says, "Sounds like it's not worth exploring," and the other half says, "Are you kidding? Let's explore!" The half of the group that is sure it's a waste of time is so confident, they refuse to go up -- they let the group split.

To me, that means some players not only failed to pick up the clues from the DM, but they were oblivious to the other players too. Final verdict? The DM could have found a way to shorten their exploration time, but other than that he correctly DM'd a sandbox game. I'd like to join his game, if he's in the San Jose area.

 

[Gimpoloshe]

To me, that means some players not only failed to pick up the clues from the DM, but they were oblivious to the other players too. Final verdict? The DM could have found a way to shorten their exploration time, but other than that he correctly DM'd a sandbox game. I'd like to join his game, if he's in the San Jose area.

In my understanding, the exploration time was roughly 15 minutes, which is not too much, but could've been shortened, that's true.
The problem lies in the in-game time of the pipe-exploration, which took a couple hours, AND the other players deciding to move on and explore their route alone, instead of waiting for the party to proceed together.
Even if the DM says "dead end, no way to get through", the party seperated anyways and this leads to boredem of 2 players. But they (the group of players) forced this situation completely upon theirselfs.

 

[CharlesRyan]

Anyone ever heard of Chekhov's Gun? It's a literary/dramatic rule, which can be paraphrased as "If you show the audience a gun, it needs to go off an act or two later."

In other words, it's a basic law of storytelling that when an element is introduced into the story that seems like it might be important, it probably should be. Maybe not right away, but at some point.

Given that this rule is embedded in virtually every movie or book (and probably most RPG adventures) the players have ever experienced, how can anyone be surprised that some of the players persisted in the suspicion that the pipe was important, even if the GM attempted to dissuade them? At best, the players were getting mixed messages: "Here's something that might be important. But you shouldn't check it out."

If the pipe was there for a real, story-related purpose (not entering the keep, but something else--an escape route, a trap that comes into play later, or whatever), the GM needs to convince the players to move on through gameplay. Maybe the pipe entrance is barred or too high in the cliff-face to reach. Maybe the rogue or a dwarf could identify its role as the business end of a trap. Maybe there was a rumour about this defense in the town the PCs passed through.

Or maybe they do explore it, but it's handled with a gloss: "OK, you spend a couple hours climbing the slimy, wet tube. It ends in a sealed door. Clearly this is a regularly used outlet for water, but there doesn't seem to be a way in. Two hours later, you rejoin your friends." Or whatever.

If the pipe does not serve the story, why is it there? If it's just an exercise in the GM's dungeon engineering skills, well, the players can be forgiven for finding that less than compelling. If it's purely a fulfillment of the simulationist creed that "some roads are just dead ends," then why are we even having this conversation--except that clearly this simulationist creed didn't result in a very satisfactory session for the players or the GM.

Either way, I point you back to Chekhov's Gun. If you put something in your adventure that seems important, your players are going to assume that it is.

And, to answer the OP, using Chekhov's Gun effectively is both a skill and an art.