GMing: What If We Say "Yes" To Everything?

[FrogReaver]

This seems like an overly negative framing.

"Door Puzzle: the door can be opened by positioning the dragon claw in the socket and putting the rings in the following order: bear, eagle, whale."

I'm not sure what the GM would say "no" to.

I’d say accurate. I’m not sure why you refuse to call that ‘the dm saying no’.

But doesn’t look like there’s going to be any progress on that, which for me puts the rest of the thread premise in limbo, so probably best I just be done here.

 

[not-so-newguy]

Assuming that the players are behaving in good faith...

I think that discrepancies will still arise between the players, which would require rules and a DM to make a ruling. Players in our group call each other out when they think that what the other player is trying to do is absurd.

Player 1: My halfling tries jump the gap.
Player 2: Dude, your like 3 feet tall and it's a 30 foot gap.

 

[FrogReaver]

Assuming that the players are behaving in good faith...

I think that discrepancies will still arise between the players, which would require rules and a DM to make a ruling. Players in our group call each other out when they think that what the other player is trying to do is absurd.

Player 1: My halfling tries jump the gap.
Player 2: Dude, your like 3 feet tall and it's a 30 foot gap.

Indeed. These discussions are often presented as 1 DM and 1 Player. But DM always saying yes to character premise, may actually make for a game another player enjoys less and players aren’t typically given the power to veto each others characters.

 

[Reynard]

Assuming that the players are behaving in good faith...

I think that discrepancies will still arise between the players, which would require rules and a DM to make a ruling. Players in our group call each other out when they think that what the other player is trying to do is absurd.

Player 1: My halfling tries jump the gap.
Player 2: Dude, your like 3 feet tall and it's a 30 foot gap.

Like I said, that is a genre thing that everyone still needs to be on board for.

 

[BookTenTiger]

I don't think this tracks. The GM can still certainly a complex, challenging scenario and say yes to all the actions the PC wants to take. But "Can I beat this puzzle" is not a valid question.

But that's breaking your rule! What will the always yes DM say to "Can I beat this puzzle?"

 

[Theory of Games]

More often than not, GMs ARE saying "yes" to player questions. It's the game rules that interfere, normally. Which is why many GM house-rules are designed to improve player experiences, rather than degrade them.

The advice years ago for GMs to "be a fan of the players" has had an impact on how many of us run our games. The hallowed edicts of Lord Gygax imploring DMs to leash the Beast that is your players is old hat. A funny old hat that we can dust off every now and then, just for fun. But, usually, a half-way decent GM will side with the players in most situations.

I can't even really imagine a session where the GM is mostly saying "no" as being fun. It was why I will always value my time running Shadowrun:

Players: So, yeah, after a week of discussion, we've decided to (do this completely suicidal thing that will end this campaign in an eye-blink). What do you think?

Me:

 

[bloodtide]

Well, it would be a pointless non game. Much like some five year olds playing pretend: each just says whatever and it happens. Kid one says "I have a sword plus ten!", so the next kid says "my sword is plus a thousand!" and so on.

The DM would just sit there...or really leave as it does not matter.

 

[not-so-newguy]

Like I said, that is a genre thing that everyone still needs to be on board for.

Fair enough, but the game requires an arbiter because a line needs to be drawn somewhere. I'm assuming that we're talking about a game of DnD or something similar. GM-less RPG's are outside of my experience.

Saying "yes" to anything possible might work for some tables, but others would miss a sense of challenge if anything possible was an automatic success. In fact, I think most tables would miss that sense of challenge.

OTOH, having crazy player options might work, but that would require agreement of everyone at the table. "My character invented the Magic Missile spell, so only I know it" probably wouldn't work well with a group of players.

 

[Umbran]

I think @Umbran and others are correct in suggesting it depends a lot on whether the players are asking those questions in good faith, but I would like to start with the assumption that they are.

Hold your roll there. You misunderstood me. I said those games would look different, not that either one was a problem.

There's nothing "bad faith" about a game of Toon. There's nothing "bad faith" about having fun in being ridiculous.

"Bad faith" is a boogieman. We throw it around willy-nilly to dismiss things we personally don't like, without first exploring the possibility that the thing is actually valid, at least for those engaging in it.

 

[Emberashh]

This is exactly the sort of thing I was talking about in the "RPGs are Improv Games" topic, Game Tone and all.