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Message: <blockquote data-quote="delericho" data-source="post: 3029594" data-attributes="member: 22424">You know what I've come to realise, both from these threads and also from my gaming experience?There is a segment of DMs, the vast majority of whom have been running games for years and have been doing so since 1st Edition days*, who consider the deathtrap dungeons of yore, exemplified by "Tomb of Horrors" as the exemplars of adventure design. And so they model their adventures on the works of the master, putting all sorts of obscure and deadly traps into place without sufficient thought or reason, and without considering the notion that their players might not think exactly as they do in order to solve the problems. They think they are designing in the vein of the legendary Gygax, without realising that virtually none of them have the wit and wisdom of the master.Looking at "Tomb of Horrors", one finds lots of deadly traps, it's true, but these have clues to their existence that go beyond "you find a lever in a room." Besides, "Tomb of Horrors" isn't a master-class in design. It's a tournament adventure designed to 'catch out' arrogant players who think they're untouchable.These DMs tend to have no problems filling their tables. They generally have a strong group they have played with for years, and who turn up week after week. Lulled by the strength of their group, therefore, they consider themselves the absolute masters of the craft...Except that as time goes by, players have to drop out of the game, for one reason or another. They try to attract new players, who come for a session or two, get frustrated, and quit. Either they give up gaming entirely, or they seek out DMs who understand that the appropriate level of difficulty is somewhere between "challenging" and "abandon all hope, ye who enter here".Anyway, it's their prerogative to run their games as they wish. I'm sure they'll have a great time, with their one remaining player.One more thing: you cannot convince me that an undetectable extreme-save DC insta-kill trap is an example of good design. You can't convince me that springing an ambush by hill giants on a 1st level group is good design. You can't convince me that a map saying "great treasure" that leads the a group to a TPK that they could not have predicted coming is good design. These are all examples of really sloppy DMing. Any fool can kill off PCs. The challenge comes in putting together an adventure that requires them to use every skill, every spell, all their brainpower, and a lot of luck to come out alive, but which guarantees success if all these elements are in play.* Which is not to say that all DMs who've been running since 1st Edition, or even all those who are still running under 1st Edition, are like this. But a minority are.</blockquote>

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