GM Confessional

[thullgrim]

I am not good with NPCs and I let my players off the hook when dealing them frequently.

I have gamer ADD which means I’m always thinking about the next game rather than the current game.

I start many things and never finish them.

 

[Andvari]

I often forget to ask the players where they want to go next session, leaving me having to prepare multiple areas.

 

[Jack Daniel]

My sin is repetition. Falling back on the same few unconscious canned phrases to describe something that happens frequently (e.g. a monster attacks a PC with a claw/claw/bite routine, "The beast turns its attention to you and just lays into you with everything it has." — imagine realizing that you've used that same phrasing probably four or five times in every game session). Or thoughtlessly slipping into the same generic Cockney accent for any random NPC — that one is a very difficult habit to break.

I have gamer ADD which means I’m always thinking about the next game rather than the current game.

I start many things and never finish them.

Oof. Yeah, these too. But I suspect that they're conditions rather than sins.

 

[Manbearcat]

This is an easy one. Over-affinity for American Western/Kurosawa/McCarthy themes, tropes, and tragic figures/situations related to the prior.

 

[kenada]

I’m lazy in odd ways. I don’t want to have to prep a hexcrawl, so I am designing a homebrew system to obviate the need to prep a hexcrawl. I can sometimes be too silly, which can come back to bite me when I try to be serious about something. Relatedly, I am bad with NPC names and like goofy ones like Erg Bergle Blerg and Blarpy Darp.

 

[Doc_Klueless]

I am sentimental. Which means I find it hard to inflict hard consequences on PCs, even when the system calls for them.

^this.

I have a VERY hard time killing PCs. Usually, it's the player who goes: "I should be dead." or some such that triggers the PC's death.

I don't care about rules when I'm running the game. I get close most of the time. But I refuse to interrupt the game to look something up. Which might seem like a possible strength, but... Have you ever run untested House Rules? LOL.

 

[DetachedObserver]

I'm a killer DM. I can't help but to optimize monsters and NPC foes.

"Oh, you're going to play a Complete Warrior Samurai? Good luck with that..." (sorry for the 3.5e aside...)

 

[Xamnam]

Falling back on the same few unconscious canned phrases to describe something that happens frequently (e.g. a monster attacks a PC with a claw/claw/bite routine, "The beast turns its attention to you and just lays into you with everything it has."

That's one I'm not sure any GM is entirely immune from.

 

[Warpiglet-7]

Over many years I have played with pals. 30-almost 40 years. We are lifelong friends from grade school some since college. We take turns DMing campaigns. It’s not formal, we just say hey let’s play, I have a campaign.

My biggest flaw is wanting to master the rules and not wanting to “do it wrong.” At times, this means I look things up or abound things as a result.

In truth, close enough for things rarely encountered is fine.

I also am anal about “earning it” as both a player and DM. So starting at 1st for the 50yh time is not what the whole group prefers…

But I have gotten my kids to play (well 2 of them!) and spreading the game should get me some credit and forgiveness, right?

 

[hawkeyefan]

I have one that came up in my game Saturday night.

We’re playing The 13th Fleet, which is based on the Forged in the Dark system, and is a kind of Star Trek spoof. It’s meant to be a silly and funny game. Each player is a Captain in the 13th Fleet, which is where the empire sends all its problem officers. After a battle with the Coalition of Worlds decimated the rest of the empire’s armada, only the 13th Fleet remains. They must return across hostile space to their homeworld. But they’re also competing to be named Admiral upon their return.

One of my players took an ability for his captain that allows him to share Resources (an in game.. uh, resource) and to clear one Stress whenever he does. Management of Resources is a key part of the game, and they get divvied up by whoever is the current Fleet Commander. The ability essentially allows them to funnel all the Resources through that Captain which he then distributes accordingly and clears stress.

The game has a competitive element to it, as well as cooperative, so this ability seems very prone to teamwork. So I keep finding myself trying to limit it in some way. I don’t even mean to do it, it just happens. It’s not game breaking by any means (and the tone of the game is so over the top silly that it shouldn’t matter even if it was), but there’s something about it that doesn’t seem right to me, and so I’m constantly trying to undermine it, which isn’t fair at all to that player.

It’s just the latest example of an urge I have to put what is essentially a preference of mine ahead of others’. If I decide that something is off in some way… not far enough to actually be damaging to the game’s balance, but just the level of “cheesy” or otherwise flawed… I try to limit its use or utility even if it’s something the player enjoys.