Excerpt: You and Your Magic Items

[Kaffis]

There are too many players who feel like the DM is there lapdog, only there to run the game they want to play regardless of what the DM wants.

And I (and others, I think) are just pointing out that the vibe you're giving out in this thread is that you're just the opposite:

A DM that feels like the players are his minions, only there to perform to with whatever rules the DM wants regardless of how the players have fun playing.

I mean, seriously. You present this as a "it sounds better if I get to relax the rules to get my game of perfection, rather than restrict them" and all I hear is "I don't care how much the players balk at the rules themselves, I just want the rulebook to make it taste better going down, no matter how much heartburn it'll give them."

You're looking to sugarcoat house rules. I'm saying that if they were good house rules that everybody thought was fun, you wouldn't have to sugarcoat them. You'd present them as "I have a setting that I want to encourage this feel with, and here's how I'm going to do it" and they'd go "Yeah, that sounds like a fun vibe, I'm down with that."

 

[Rechan]

I have nothing against posing tough choices to players. But I think those choices should stem from story elements, not from simply wondering if they can afford to find out what their hard-earned stuff does.

"Do we take time to rescue the prisoners the orcs took on their last raid? If we do, there's a chance the Cult of Orcus may raise enough undead to raze the entire village, but if we don't, those captives will surely die." That's a tough decision.

"Is it worth spending half of our pooled party funds to find out exactly what this magical-but-likely-mostly-useless-ring does?" That's not a tough decision. It's a quagmire that slows down fun at the table.

Reminds me of a story I read in a Dragon Mag issue. The DM required training before you levelled up, and you did not get any benefits from your levelling up (like HP, BAB, etc) until you trained. You couldn't even gain xp.

Party hit the next level. However, there was a time crunch: the Big Bad was going to Destroy this Thingy Over Here. To beat the BBEG, the PCs had to Go Over Here to get this Thing from a dungeon.

The PCs decided to screw dungeoncrawling when they couldn't gain XP. So they trained.

One fo the players chose to run the dungeoncrawl solo because he cared about completing the mission. He completed it, but got no xp for it (and got drained a level due to a trap).

This is why I dislike training rules.

 

[Yaezakura]

Reminds me of a story I heard. The DM required training before you levelled up, and you did not get any benefits from your levelling up (like HP, BAB, etc) until you trained.

Party hit the next level. However, there was a time crunch: the Big Bad was going to Destroy this Thingy Over Here. To beat the BBEG, the PCs had to Go Over Here to get this Thing from a dungeon.

The PCs decided to screw dungeoncrawling when they didn't have their level. So they trained.

One fo the players chose to run the dungeoncrawl solo because he cared about completing the mission. He completed it, but got no xp for it (and got drained a level due to a trap).

This is why I dislike training rules.

Wow... that is... horrible. If anything, I'd have given that player enough exp to compensate his level loss and then some for his dedication, nevermind the fact he ran the thing solo when it wasn't designed to be.

I also think that's a gross representation of training rules. It's one thing to have a character do training for a new feat or to pick up a skill he doesn't already have ranks in, or picking up a level in a new class... but gaining a level is supposed to represent the fact that all those battles you just took part in made you better at what you're doing.

But yeah... I suppose this is a topic for a different thread.

 

[Ingolf]

There are too many players who feel like the DM is there lapdog, only there to run the game they want to play regardless of what the DM wants.

DM's who run the game they want to run regardless of what the players want to play typically find themselves without a game to run in short order.

Games that die because the DM isn't willing to accommodate his players can't be saved by any wording of the rules. They weren't killed by the rules, they were killed by the DM. A successful campaign requires some give and take by both players and DM, simply saying "My world, love it or leave it" doesn't work.

 

[Rechan]

Wow... that is... horrible. If anything, I'd have given that player enough exp to compensate his level loss and then some for his dedication, nevermind the fact he ran the thing solo when it wasn't designed to be.

I also think that's a gross representation of training rules. It's one thing to have a character do training for a new feat or to pick up a skill he doesn't already have ranks in, or picking up a level in a new class... but gaining a level is supposed to represent the fact that all those battles you just took part in made you better at what you're doing.

But yeah... I suppose this is a topic for a different thread.

I intended to illustrate how 1) story choices vs. mechanical choices, and 2) Downtime Is Important. And I think downtime is also related to the identify issue; the players are tracking around a bag of items until they get some time to go to town and get it identified. Instead, players get their magical items the same time they get their encounter powers: one brief rest.

 

[Henry]

Games that die because the DM isn't willing to accommodate his players can't be saved by any wording of the rules. They weren't killed by the rules, they were killed by the DM. A successful campaign requires some give and take by both players and DM, simply saying "My world, love it or leave it" doesn't work.

I will say that (given Aria's comment on DM Reputation being affected by how the rules are written) that the most reputable DM that I know (and I'm thinking of a specific person here) was also the one who taught me a few years ago more about saying "yes" to my players to enhance the game.

I've always been a champion of "DM as final arbiter" in the game, but in my opinion, how the rules are written really shouldn't make a difference with the DM's reputation for running a fantastic game. I've seen the same DM run Call of Cthulhu, D&D, Feng Shui (the most "player permissive" game I know), Spycraft, and even Paranoia (the most "player non-permissive" game I know) all to great success.

 

[Ingolf]

I've always been a champion of "DM as final arbiter" in the game, but in my opinion, how the rules are written really shouldn't make a difference with the DM's reputation for running a fantastic game. I've seen the same DM run Call of Cthulhu, D&D, Feng Shui (the most "player permissive" game I know), Spycraft, and even Paranoia (the most "player non-permissive" game I know) all to great success.

I'm with you. I've been playing & DMing for 29 years, and good DMs are system neutral in my experience, and edition neutral as well. If you have a rep as a hard-ass, or a killer DM, or a Monty-Haul style pushover, no wording of the rules can save you. You have to fix the underlying problems yourself, or get used to having no players.

Years ago - almost 30 years in fact - a member of my "summer holiday" play group developed a rep for ruthlessly killing players. He'd throw a Spectre at a 1st level party, and cut off all means of escape, for example, or pit beginning RuneQuest characters against hordes of Trolls. We contemplated just not letting the guy run games for us, but we were kids, and geeks to a man, and the guy was our friend, so we felt obligated to stand by him. But finally, he wiped out the entire group in a game of Boot Hill when he was essentially serving as a "guest GM" - running our long-standing PCs from another GM through his well-crafted slaughterhouse of an encounter. I just sort of snapped, told him I'd rather be gut-shot than let him GM anymore and suggested that he do something probably physically impossible with his game. The poor guy - it was like the light went on over his head. "Wait - you guys don't like being slaughtered like cattle in every game I run? Hmmmmmm."

 

[AZRogue]

I will say that (given Aria's comment on DM Reputation being affected by how the rules are written) that the most reputable DM that I know (and I'm thinking of a specific person here) was also the one who taught me a few years ago more about saying "yes" to my players to enhance the game.

I've always been a champion of "DM as final arbiter" in the game, but in my opinion, how the rules are written really shouldn't make a difference with the DM's reputation for running a fantastic game. I've seen the same DM run Call of Cthulhu, D&D, Feng Shui (the most "player permissive" game I know), Spycraft, and even Paranoia (the most "player non-permissive" game I know) all to great success.

I agree. I'd also add two things:

1. Players are entitled. To have fun.

2. And the really successful DMs I know are those that take as much, or greater, enjoyment from the players having fun as from the crafting of a shared story. It's not difficult. Just takes a subtle shift in goals and attitude.

 

[Wormwood]

There are too many players who feel like the DM is there lapdog, only there to run the game they want to play regardless of what the DM wants.

And there are too many DMs who believe their precious snowflake setting is more important than the group's game experience.

Just sayin'.

 

[Fayd12]

I've been lurking here for many years and this is one of the most bizarre threads I've ever seen.

Oh, and I really like the magic items rules...