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<blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 8858396" data-attributes="member: 4937"><p>This is the "The DM is Satan" trope, and it's one of my least favorite in all of tabletop role-playing gaming. Of all the abused player syndromes that I encounter when bring experienced players in, this is the most common one. When you have "The DM is Satan", the world is subtly or overtly skewed to evil such that all acts of goodness, mercy, kindness, trust, compassion, and so forth harvest only sorrows. Those NPC's that aren't entirely wicked are stupid and incompetent to the point of there being no real difference. The world the PC's operate in is perverse and twisted, so that not only are NPCs merely strangely hostile, but they will even ignore their own best interests in an effort to backstab the PCs and enact the pettiest sorts of revenge on them. This will continue no matter how many times the PC's save the day and prove themselves heroes. PC's never accrue any benefits from a positive reputation. </p><p></p><p>The result of this sort of experience is the players are taught that the only way to succeed is to be utterly ruthless and evil themselves - never truth anyone, never leave an enemy alive, never be honest, never be charitable. Murder hoboing becomes the functional strategy for dealing with the game universe because only evil is rewarded by the GM as clever, whereas every act of goodness is actively punished.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Celebrim, post: 8858396, member: 4937"] This is the "The DM is Satan" trope, and it's one of my least favorite in all of tabletop role-playing gaming. Of all the abused player syndromes that I encounter when bring experienced players in, this is the most common one. When you have "The DM is Satan", the world is subtly or overtly skewed to evil such that all acts of goodness, mercy, kindness, trust, compassion, and so forth harvest only sorrows. Those NPC's that aren't entirely wicked are stupid and incompetent to the point of there being no real difference. The world the PC's operate in is perverse and twisted, so that not only are NPCs merely strangely hostile, but they will even ignore their own best interests in an effort to backstab the PCs and enact the pettiest sorts of revenge on them. This will continue no matter how many times the PC's save the day and prove themselves heroes. PC's never accrue any benefits from a positive reputation. The result of this sort of experience is the players are taught that the only way to succeed is to be utterly ruthless and evil themselves - never truth anyone, never leave an enemy alive, never be honest, never be charitable. Murder hoboing becomes the functional strategy for dealing with the game universe because only evil is rewarded by the GM as clever, whereas every act of goodness is actively punished. [/QUOTE]
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