Is DMing its own reward?

[Traveon Wyvernspur]

Yeah this was the first time I had actually plotted out a whole campaign arc. I had a very rough draft of notes of what I wanted the characters to see/accomplish and went with the tiers to unleash certain things on the players. I know not to get too complicated and in-depth with the arcs because you never know what will happen in the course of the game and the players will toss you a few curve balls when you least expect it.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

I'm not exactly the opposite of an Adventure Path GM, but I'm pretty much on the opposite end. I enjoy spikes of difficulty and interesting set pieces, so Final Confrontations are great; all the rest of the stuff, though, that's best resolved in the context of "okay, what did the PCs do last session?"

That is very much how I prefer to do it. Besides the sheer fun of running it, though, the main rewards are appreciative players and satisfaction of doing something well. About the only time I don't feel rewarded is when I know I did a poor job and/or the players didn't enjoy it.

 

[Madeiner]

Well i've been DMing a campaign for close to 6 years non-stop now.
Ingame, 20 years have passed since the first characters have been made.
I have a paladin PC that started at age 25, now he's 42 and getting old.

I built the world myself, with all the politics and stuff.
The players have changed the world a lot, too. A few of them have strongholds, alliances, important roles in the society.

The world itself has evolved a lot. It started a post-apocalyptic demon-devil invasion. Human society was rebuilt from scratch, with help from the PC's.
New religions have been founded, magic has been restored, new cities have been found and united under a single banner.
Devils have invaded the society and kept control for years. Characters have helped liberate the capital city with a long and hard effort.

Not all the original players are present. Some have left, and have been replaced.

The nice quirk is that this campaign world has been ENTIRELY sparked by the same players, about 8 years ago, playing another campaign.

They were carrying powerful artifacts while exploring the tomb of horrors, trying to seal a portal. Of course they all died, and the artifacts had been lost. A demon found them, and used them to open the portal permanently.

Demons and devil invaded the world and decimated humanity. 10.000 years after, this new campaign started


I don't think i'd like to play any other world at the moment, as this is the world i've put years into. The players like it.
Sometimes we do sub-campaigns.
For example, they have played for 8 sessions as an evil party in the same world-year. Last session, they got killed by the very same "main" PCs, thereby resuming the original campaign.

We will probably play a few sessions in another age soon; the players have asked to see the opening of the first portal themselves, probably as demons.

Soon, they'll be able to use a flying ship planar engine to reach Sigil, and another sub-campaign will start in Planescape.

I didn't plot any of this from the beginning, except very general things like "main city will get invaded" or "demons will attack this place someday" or "this new technology will be discovered soon". My players shape the story, sessions by sessions. Like the first characters created the campaign, they are modifiying it each day. I think they will soon start a revolution, and i will not stop them from changing the world's order.

Yes, to me DMing is my own reward. But only if i am a narrator telling a long, convoluted story.

Oh and, if anyone is intested, you can google translate the world's story at http://dnd.grieco.org.
It is in italian, unfortunately.

 

[Barastrondo]

That is very much how I prefer to do it. Besides the sheer fun of running it, though, the main rewards are appreciative players and satisfaction of doing something well. About the only time I don't feel rewarded is when I know I did a poor job and/or the players didn't enjoy it.

Much agreed. One of the most "eureka!" discoveries I've made was actually writing down a long list of campaigns I figured out I could run and passing it around. The players marked the ones they found most interesting. Then I compiled the short list, and put it to a vote. The winning campaign got run.

I've done this three times and the results have been fantastic. Because the players chose the things they were most interested in, they have buy-in from the moment of character creation. Because the things they chose were from a list of stuff I was interested in running anyway, my own inspiration is covered. I highly recommend this technique to GMs starting a new campaign; although I'm sure it's not foolproof, it's created such dynamic feedback loops of inspiration that I can't help but encourage giving it a try.

Plus, it actually makes a long list of "campaigns I'd like to run but won't have time for" a good thing, instead of an agonizing one. If you're the type of GM who understands what I'm talking about... yeah.

 

[Kzach]

Not having a long-term gaming group for a long time now, I've been leaning more and more towards being a player simply because DM'ing is so unsatisfying in short-term groups.

I don't need a long story-arc to be satisfied as a DM, but I do need a level of quid pro quo in terms of player involvement and positive feedback. When putting together random groups of people, you invariably find that a large percentage of them don't gel with you or your play-style. Because of this, the feedback and involvement you get from players tends to be negative and low, respectively. That sort of environment wears at a person.

In fact, I'm even finding these types of games to be unsatisfying as a player. Roleplaying in an LFR group, for instance, is generally unheard of and there is no continuity as far as party make-up is concerned. As a player I can't go for too long at a table that is only a glorified skirmish game. If that's what I wanted, I'd go play Warhammer.

Point being is that I think it depends highly on the group. In a good group with people who are interested and involved in the story and campaign and who you share a play-style with, then I get far more out of the game as either a player or DM than I do in random, hodge-podge groups.

The Mithril Jacket Is Made From Kevlar and Meant to Last a Lifetime

I'd just like to point out that this is an item from Cyberpunk. The future is NOW people!

 

[S'mon]

I should actually clarify: I don't like plotting out long campaign arcs, myself. It's more sort of a bit where I consider what a good, way, 5th-level enemy would be, place some sort of hint to said enemy's existence in the first adventure, figure out a few of his schemes and where the PCs might (or might not) cross paths with them, and then fill in all the rest of the gameplay with organic stuff.

I'm not exactly the opposite of an Adventure Path GM, but I'm pretty much on the opposite end. I enjoy spikes of difficulty and interesting set pieces, so Final Confrontations are great; all the rest of the stuff, though, that's best resolved in the context of "okay, what did the PCs do last session?"

That seems like a good approach, very close to what I do.

 

[ExploderWizard]

It kind of has to be, just like playing is. Unless there is some compensation out there that I've been missing out on.

If everyone involved is happy with the game, long or short term then that happiness is not only a reward but the reason we sat down to play in the first place.

 

[Swedish Chef]

I used to love DMing. My group has always been of the "go out and kill bad monsters and take their treasure" type, so long, convoluted plots never happen. The best I can usually get is to have a villain appear early on and then show up on occasion to harass the party until they finally kill him.

Lately, though, I've not enjoyed it. I even took a break for about 2 years and let other members of the group try their hands at DMing. The main reason was I wanted them to see what it was like to DM and have the players argue and bitch about various rules. It only worked for a short while. The constant arguing over rules gives me no end of grief.

Most of our campaigns end between 10th and 15th level. With 6 players, I find the power creep to be too much at that point.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

I love long convoluted plots - and have them even if the PCs don't interact with them.

I just finished a Gargoyles Steampunk campaign using the Spycraft 2.0 engine. It was not until the fifth adventure that they realized what was going on, that the cathedral that they had wakened on was built over a Hellmouth getting ready to reopen. (No, Hellmouths were not invented for Buffy... they are a trope from Mediaeval drama.) In this case a literal Hellmouth, one of the three mouths of Dante's Satan. (So there I was, face to face with Satan... not all of Satan, mind, just his face.)

Last time it opened was the Wasteland of Arthurian myth. Not hordes of demons rampaging around the city of Blythe, but a generalized malaise of despair, and a slow failing of magic. Had they failed to close the Mouth of Satan then all saves for every non fiendish character, PC and NPC alike would have been at -1, all fumble chances increased by 1, etc. in the next Steampunk campaign. Worse, in the grand scheme of things, many souls would have ended up in Hell rather than Purgatory.

One thing that I have noticed is that since 3e I have been more likely to actually have campaigns last long enough for the long plots to matter.

The Auld Grump

 

[howandwhy99]

Refereeing requires a good memory, keen observation, and a belief in fair judgement. Practice improves all of these and running a D&D game with creative players means the ref can be put to the test as much as the players are. I think excellence is its own reward and it doesn't matter so much what avenue one goes down to reach it.