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Message: <blockquote data-quote="EzekielRaiden" data-source="post: 8330817" data-attributes="member: 6790260">A good question, hence my above response. If we make the line of "too far" something that's really, really stringent, then almost no one will clear it...but that's because we made it that way. If we make it really loose, then plenty of people will clear it for the same reason. Where do we draw the line between "ordinary DM who has human foibles while trying to present a dangerous challenge for characters to overcome" and "bad DM who abuses their power and inflicts needless/senseless punishments on characters"?Yeah, this thought definitely crossed my mind too. The "DM Empowerment" crowd has plenty of totally fine people in it, but there's definitely some...questionable undertones in a lot of their concepts that are very...welcoming, shall we say, to the "Killer DM" type as described in the OP.My experience has absolutely not been this--and I'm one of those very people who thinks death should be a "sometimes food."Wouldn't phrase it that way myself, but definitely this idea. If death is final, it gives at least a little closure, since there's nothing the dead can do about the future. And if it isn't final, then it was basically just a mandatory all-expenses paid vacation (of your mortal coil), making it fit squarely into the "twist them up" region if that mandatory vacation happened while they wanted (or would have wanted) to do something. It's far more effective to turn the player's own efforts and values...not "against them" per se, but to force difficult moral choices and situations where there is no going back.Frex: party Bard is a tiefling, mysterious devil ancestor on dad's side, succubus great-grandmother on mom's side. He hates the BS of both devils and demons, but has willingly taken on power-ups from both sides, not for himself, but to help others. (One, saving a group of "made" tieflings from their devilish bond; the other, enabling succubus great-grandma to become properly mortal, and thus eventually die and, according to their religion, reunite with her dead husband in the afterlife.) Player AGONIZED over these decisions, and while the perks have been real, both player and character still wonder sometimes if they made the right decisions. That's the good stuff--the twisting that lingers ages and ages after the deed was done.Jeez, yeah, I can definitely understand that. Feel bad for the folks who had no alternative!Often one of these reasons:<ol> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">"Only game in town" effect. Be it truly the only game, or the only game that fits your schedule, or the only game of the system you want, etc.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">The person running it is a friend, who outside of being a jerk DM, is a perfectly fine person, so refusing their game has social costs.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">Someone else playing in the game doesn't hate it, and this is one of the few ways you get to spend time with them.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">Genuinely not realizing how bad it is, or rationalizing having an overall bad time because of the few good moments along the way.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">Not knowing what the real problem is. (I long thought if I could tweak 3.X enough, it'd make me happy. It took 4e for me to see the real problems.)</li> </ol>There are probably other reasons, but I think those four capture the majority of it. 3 and 4 are subtly different, but still different. With 3, the person either just doesn't know there's a problem at all, or pretends the problem doesn't matterr. Meanwhile with 4 one recognizes there's something going on, but due to ignorance or inexperience, repeatedly fails to identify the real problem, thus attempting "fixes" that aren't actually what's needed.Not to make an overwrought analogy, but...why do people keep coming back to abusive partners? You're gonna see a lot of similarities.</blockquote>

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