How do you determine a "Real Bad Dungeon Master"

[Sigg]

The only way I can answer this from my perspective is by giving an example. I joined a game awhile back where the Dm was:

A: starting a new campaign
B: just finished reading and very much liking David Eddings

These in and of themselves are no problem, but unfortunately he was also of fan of evil campaigns so what he started was a campaign where all of us players ran evil monster characters, and he tossed the magic system in favor of a homebrew "will and the way" magic system where we all had so many points of "will", but could do anything we wanted to with them as long as we could live with the "consequences". I chose a rather initially unassuming CE minotaur as my character (what the hey). During the course of our very first adventure I learned that one of the players in the group was apparently used to being the "leader" of every party no matter the campaign....the other players seemed to be "ok" with this.....and I was not. Turns out the object of our unlikely and disfunctional group's quest was a crown which granted it's wearer unlimited will points. I can't really remember the races of the other players, or the specific situations other than somehow my (CE mind you) minotaur managed to be the first to get ahold of this wonderous crown. As the party "leader" called for me to throw him the crown, the thought came to my admittedly mostly brawn yet still incredibly ambitious, ruthless, and selfserving mino to don the crown himself...at which point I "willed" that the crown could never be removed even by the "will" of others and then I "took over" leadership. For this the DM and PLAYERS got very angry and banned me (thankfully) from the games forever. This, to me, is an example of a bad DM.

 

[Hussar]

Similar to what has been mentioned above: A DM who feels that HIS/HER story is far more important than the characters. Nothing the characters can do can alter the story and attempts to do so result in blatant railroading/deus ex machina.

The worst example of this I saw was in a 2e campaign years ago. The DM was using the old Keep on the Borderland as a base for adventuring. The party thief, being the sneaky guy that he is, planned for several game weeks and quite a few weeks outside of the game, to commit a jewel heist of the jewel merchant. Had all the bases covered, managed to convince a couple of mooks to help him, convince me to play lookout etc. Really an excellent piece of rp. However, the afternoon before the heist, the jewel merchant, whom we had been dealing with for quite some time, decided to close up shop and leave town. No warning, no reason. Just left.

Only time I've ever walked out on a campaign. Looking back on it now, I still think that was the best thing I could have done.

 

[Berandor]

Could we please differentiate between a Rat Bastard DM (RBDM), which I aspire to become in the next ten years, and a really sucky DM (rsDM), which I aspire not to be anymore in ten years?

It had to be said.

To me, the worst DM is one that mantains control over every situation, extending to the player characters.

 

[Keeper of Secrets]

Any DM who forces characters into roleplaying specifc encounters or forces them to fight specific encounters.

Any DM who uses a their own past PC in a game (and the character quickly becomes the star of the show).

Any DM who takes a confrontational attitude when you defeat their traps with skill or finesse.

Any DM who has clear favorites on a long term basis.

Any DM who can't roleplay.

 

[Hand of Evil]

trust me, you will know. the first time you have a good one.

Some bad DM
The me vs you DM, the one that sees the game to be won either by the players or him.
Corrections, corrections, corrections DM; always changing in the middle of action
The sex DM: thinks that sex happens all the time and wants to detail every encounter.
The roll roll DM: will roll dice for every action and event

 

[rushlight]

The party thief, being the sneaky guy that he is, planned for several game weeks and quite a few weeks outside of the game, to commit a jewel heist of the jewel merchant. Had all the bases covered, managed to convince a couple of mooks to help him, convince me to play lookout etc. Really an excellent piece of rp. However, the afternoon before the heist, the jewel merchant, whom we had been dealing with for quite some time, decided to close up shop and leave town. No warning, no reason. Just left.

To me, if the player's actions were left unchecked, the DM would have perhaps lost control of the game - resulting in still being called a sucky DM. While I disagree with the DM's method of handling things, you can't just let the PCs run rampant. Left with (what I assume) was such a large amount of cash, the game would likely have derailed anyway. Unless stealing from jewel merchants was the whole point of that campaign.

So what you've got here is a player making bad decisions, compounded by a DM making bad decisions to try and keep the player in line. The DM knew there was a problem, but didn't apparently have the tools to deal with it properly. This game was going down one way or the other it seems...

 

[JediSoth]

Worst DM I've encountered:

I was playing a ranger (this was 2nd Ed.), don't recall what my favored enemy was. We came across some goblins and he refused to let me attack them because they were "natural creatures." I could defend myself if they attacked me, but I couldn't be the aggressor.

JediSoth

 

[Shemeska]

The DM who runs a module without actually having read -any- of the module ahead of time. So we tell the guy that we open the doors and walk into the next room. There's then the immediate shuffling and turning of pages as the DM finds the room in the module and hastily reads it. All we then hear is, "Ooooooooohhhhhhhhhhhhhh! This'll be goood!" as the DM only then finds out what is actually there.

Same DM who in the same module let us eat stat boosting apples from an evil god and not telling us the additional flavor text involved that might have dissuaded us from doing so. Ten minutes later he tells us, "Oh, and Tharizdun owns your souls now." Way to go.

And yes, my campaign was what killed that abomination and drove a stake into its heart after everyone involved decided they didn't want to restart the campaign of the cookie cutter DM.

 

[Umbran]

When you regularly don't have fun at their games, they're bad.

I personally prefer to allow that there may be things of fine craftsmanship which I don't enjoy personally. There are books and movies out there that I don't enjoy, but lots of others do. I'd be hard put to call them objectively bad.

So, when nobody has fun at their games, they're bad.

 

[johnsemlak]

I don't think it should be a question of 'what is a bad DM like?' The better question is, 'What are bad ways to DM?' A good DM can run a bad session.

I think the primary issue is whether the campaign is enjoyable for the players.