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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Caeleddin" data-source="post: 2239247" data-attributes="member: 31912">About the topic of the threadThis is generally how I DM. I create a list of House Rules. The most obvious recurring ones are: If you want to be a Monk, speak with me FIRST. I have found problems with Monks in the past and am reluctant to allow them unless you give me a history, character plan and things like that. Sorcerors get to change ONE of their spells EVERY level, up to their max level known. This allows people to swap out Monster Summonings, Dispels, etc., when they get access to better ones. TWF has been majorly changed. Please talk to me if you want to use it. Sorcerors have NO PENALTIES when applying metamagic feats. Don't expect a combat if you are outnumbered 5 or more to one by things that look roughly as tough as you. If you try to fight 2k peasants, I don't care if you are a level 3859436758356375638 wizard/archmage/whatever, you are dead. Apart from those rules, I abide by the rules laid out in the Core books. Any form of altering the rules is considered cheating on my part. I even dispense with the DM screen in most cases and roll openly in front of the players. The point is to have fun, both for me AND the players. If I cannot achieve that, something will have to change. I consider those DMs that piss and moan about how much they sacrificed for the game and all that as being full of it. I don't like rules lawyers. I don't like munchkins. I don't like being wrong. No one does. But I don't think I am freaking GOD either. I DM because I enjoy it. It is not a sacrifice. It is a pleasure. I play because I enjoy it. That is not a sacrifice. I have played with munchkins (read my thread on the Fighter/Psion and you'll see). I don't care. Let him take all the loot. Let him twink his character to within an inch of its life. I have fun being the mage with the boosty spells. So I play. I have DM'd munchkins. I have a Paladin that charges a bunch of Orcs because believes that his tricked out character will survive. He was down to -2 hp by round 2 (level 9 barbarian with rage and 20 base Str will do that). Too bad, so sad, nevermind. Bottomline is this: The objective of the game is for everyone to have fun. DMs that think they are God or they are infallible are guilty of arrogance. There is a reason why people despise arrogance. It is wasteful in terms of time and resources due to pig-headedness. It creates ill-will. It promotes feelings of superiority. A DM is as human as the players. He is not superior to anything, no more so than the players. It is easy to say "If you don't like it, don't play!" when you have a captive audience. Most, like me, would leave you in a flash if there were other games brewing. It is lack of options that would keep me with you, nothing else. There is a social contract between DM and players, whether you wish to acknowledge it or not. You have a world. So what? What good is your world if there is no one to play in it and bring it to life? You would rather sit in your dank basement coming up with world after meticulously researched world that never sees the light of day? Or would you rather bring it out into the open and set it to life? The world being created is a cooperative process between player and DM. It is NOT a one-sided affair. Thus, the players SHOULD have a say in how things are runned. Perhaps not to the point of being disruptive and destroying the world, but they should have a say. It is THEIR world as much as it is the DMs. Encourage outspokeness. If a rules debate comes up, ask each player what his views are. Train them to give their view on things. Add yours. Mix and let the majority win. So, when a rules problem comes up, they will pipe in and either support the DM or the player in question. If they think the player is correct, then maybe it is you as the DM *shock horror* is in the wrong. Accept that. Humans make mistakes and you are human, however much you would like to think you are God. Deal with it. Move on. Cry on your own time. As an aside: One of my players came up with the brilliant idea of using stretchers to run around in, so that the party can take turns sleeping while moving 24/7. Unfortunately for him, everyone else immediately piped up (without me ever saying a word) and asked him to justify being able to sleep while being jostled around like that. THAT is how a well-runned group should be like. DM and player bearing EQUAL responsibility in keeping the game world within bounds of reason (as much as a world with magic and dragons can be). It was too bad the group had to disband due to personal commitments. All you "I sacrificed so much for the game, I should be God!" DMs out there..... Well, you give the entire genre of RPGs a bad name. Because of you, RPGs get a bad rap for being the game of nerds and power-tripping social rejects. Sorry, I have no sympathy for you.</blockquote>

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