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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 5165445" data-attributes="member: 4937">On one level yes, the story teller is delaying the gratification of seeing the villain defeated so that the villains ultimate defeat will have a greater payoff.  But on another perhaps more important level, that's a very bad analogy.  It's analogies like this that often lead to disfunctional role-playing game designs.There is a very critical difference between watching a movie and participating in a role playing session.  Watching a movie, you are an observer.  Participating in role playing session, you are the protagonist.  When you are watching a thriller, you can vicariously thrill with all of the protagonists struggles.  Heck, you can even get a vicarious thrill from the successes of the villain.  But if you are the protagonist within the story, the section of the plot where nothing is going right and the odds are getting stacked higher and higher against you isn't necessarily exciting - it's often frustrating.  The experience of the protagonist during this period is one seemingly unending period of defeat and setback in a situation beyond their control.  You have to be very careful about emulating that directly.  This can be one of the differences between the experience of the game as a DM and as player.  For the DM, you are always in something of an observer role and can get vicarious excitement from both defeats and triumphs because you aren't personally vested in the outcome.   For the player though, events are happening to you.  This gets worse when the player percieves the DM as 'the villain', or if the DM starts to identify with the villains and puts an emotional stake in the villains success (in which case, validating the players impession of the DM as villain).</blockquote>

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