In Your Experience: How Good are GM's?

[The Shaman]

This poll is seriously skewed.

First, I checked "very few," because very few of the referees with whom I've played over the years were "bad" (more on that choice of words in a moment). That doesn't mean that most of the referees were "great," however. Most contributed to a fun game, in conjunction with the players (more on that in a moment, too), but only a few stand out as truly exceptional.

Second, "good" and "bad" are so relative as to be meaningless. What we're really talking about is 'referees with whom I enjoyed gaming' and 'referees with whom I didn't.' And even that misses the myriad reasons why one might choose between the two. Did you dislike playing with a particular referee because he had hygiene issues, because he kept hitting on your girlfriend, because he railroaded the hell out of the players and their characters, because he was clueless about the rules, because his setting was boring?

Third, everyone at the table contributes to the gaming experience, so my opinion of a particular game and group is shaped not just by the person behind the screen, but by the other players as well. I've played with some referees who were competent enough with the rules and ran plain-vanilla settings, but their games were a total blast because the other players were thirty-one flavors of cool.

Fourth and last, in my humble opinion, if most of your experiences with something are bad, then the problem is often found not in the something but rather in the mirror.

 

[Lanefan]

Bad for me is:

Changing your character into something the GM wants it to be.

Impossible scenarios that take a GMs personal pet character to solve and rescue the PCs.

Favoring girlfriend over all other players.

Too many suicide runs that even if successful don't have any real impact on the game world.

Pulling rules changes at the drop of a hat in order to confound the players in order to "foster role playing".

Illusion of player control over their characters.

Being entirely disruptive of a game when s/he's the player and these things are being done to him because s/he can't stand not having control of their own character.

Making everything exceptionally hard. Such as every time one goes to the bank you're always robbed because the GM hates wealthy characters.

Pretty much agreed up to here, but:

Never allowing characters to have any resources and reducing them to being squatters on muddy filthy infested land .

A DM who can do this and still keep players coming back to his game is in fact a true master of his craft!

Lan-"jack of all trades"-efan

 

[Odhanan]

I've played with many great GMs. No question about it.

Most GMs I have played with were at least decent, and I had a good time with the great majority of them. It's not some audition or something: we're here to have fun together, so if the GM makes a mistake here and there, I'm not holding it against him/her.

Very few GMs are irremediably bad. It's the GMs who think they're really good but are instead stubborn asses that are a pain, but these are relatively rare, in my experience.

And then there are those who just don't know any better. As others have said upthread, these ones will usually learn rather fast. If they're attentive to feedback, of course.

 

[Lidgar]

I have gamed with the same group of players for around 20 years.

And before that, most us had gamed with other groups for another 10+.

So in short, mostly good to very good GM experiences.

However, as several have noted, if one is tolerant of different GM styles, one can find a lot of "good" GM experiences.

I would only consider a GM potentially "bad" if they were consistently inconsistent in rulings at the table, and even then, I would probably spin it as the chaotic whim of the gods.

 

[MortalPlague]

I usually DM for my group.

We have one, possibly two other DMs in my group who are both quite good, but prefer the player side of the table. So my group has two, maybe three good DMs.

I also game with another group, which involves a good DM, and an average DM. So far, everything is pretty good.

Every other game I've ever played has been with a DM who, at best, was average. Most of these were convention or game day or events of that style. But I've had it all; DMs who giggle constantly and stutter, DMs who don't know the rules (One DM claimed that if a dryad was in a forest square we had no line of sight to them because they were assumed to always be in a tree... while the dryad was attacking the party. In melee.), DMs who weren't interested in the game...

Some of the DMs were new or inexperienced. Not all of them. And many times, the players really didn't help matters much. But I haven't had a good DM at a D&D event.

 

[Kerranin]

Personally, I would probably limit 'bad DM' experiences to situations where the DM is having fun at the expense of the player's.

Any DM who is making an effort to make it fun for everyone, is not a bad DM. (doesn't make them a great DM though. )

 

[S'mon]

Fourth and last, in my humble opinion, if most of your experiences with something are bad, then the problem is often found not in the something but rather in the mirror.

Agree strongly with that. I know I struggle to be a good player myself and not be abrasive or over-critical. Some players can make almost any game good, some players can make almost any game bad. If your play experiences are consistently bad, you should examine your own attitudes and play style.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Fourth and last, in my humble opinion, if most of your experiences with something are bad, then the problem is often found not in the something but rather in the mirror.

You must spread XP around, yadda yadda.

Seriously, can someone XP The Shaman for me? That was a seriously good post, and a great summation.


RC

 

[Hussar]

"Must spread some XP around"

Yup, this is exactly right.

Re player revolts - what is a player revolt? When players drop a game they don't enjoy? I've left a game where the GM was objectively highly competent, because of interpersonal issues.

I once ran what I still feel was my best D&D session ever - The Wicked Ruins of Cursed Castle Kaladrac. 3/4 players loved it and were eager for more. One player hated it and didn't come back.

A player revolt is when the entire group, en masse, turns to the DM and refuses to play with him or her again. Essentially, they fire the DM.

THAT'S how bad the DM's I played with were. FOUR TIMES. Entire groups walking out on a DM.

Originally Posted by The Shaman View Post
Fourth and last, in my humble opinion, if most of your experiences with something are bad, then the problem is often found not in the something but rather in the mirror.

Nice. I wondered how long it would take before someone simply pointed the finger at me.

Couldn't possibly be that you could take something at face value.

I've had players quit my groups. Sure. But I can honestly say I've never been fired as a DM.

Try not to read too much into things. It's a pretty simple question. "Of the GM's you've had, what percentage do you consider bad?" Whatever your criteria was, I don't care. Not important. Judging from the results, I'd say a lot of people have had better runs of luck than I've had.

S'mon, yeah, I'd totally agree with you that my experiences color my responses. When people talk about dumping off more responsibility and power over the game onto the DM, my initial reaction is always, "GOD NO". Because, in my experience, that's not going to end well.

But, I can see that if someone's very rarely had to deal with crap GM's, then this would seem like a good idea.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Nice. I wondered how long it would take before someone simply pointed the finger at me.

I read that "you" as a general "you", not as "you, Hussar" specifically.

Moreover "often the case" =/= "always the case".

There is no reason to assume The Shaman is talking about you, specifically.


RC