I was just typing up a reply to another thread when I had an epiphany about myself. Given that I'm an utterly fascinating individual, I felt the need to share this marvellous revelation with you all.
Firstly, some background.
For various and sundry reasons I've DM'd a lot. Not just a lot, but for a lot of people as well. A transient DM that can never pin down a group and not for lack of trying. I seem to put together a new group every six months or so and they last anywhere from one session to a dozen or so before something happens and the group disperses into the wilderness.
Because of this, I have constantly sought to improve myself as a DM. I've taken all sorts of advice onboard and tried all sorts of ideas for running games, building adventures, how to deal with disparate personalities, etc. Practically every single game I've run in the last fifteen years I've tried something different in order to satisfy the whims of my players. All to no avail.
It was in my last group that I realised something utterly horrible; I was an awful DM. No amount of changing and fixing and adapting would help me. For years I had operated under the assumption that I was an awesome DM. Now, it must be said, that this assumption was based on feedback from people who I DM'd for during the first half-dozen or so years of my RPG interest. I quite literally inspired people who in a million years you wouldn't expect to be into roleplaying, into buying books and becoming RPG enthusiasts. The games I ran were legendary. People always had a blast and whenever I've ran across these people from my past again, they always bring up how good those games were.
Point being, somewhere along the way, I lost my ability to DM.
This is where the realisation comes in. You see, more and more, I've been reverting back to running games how I used to, before I started trying to become some uber DM god. As I was writing out this other post, it occurred to me that all the efforts I've made to change myself as a DM, have actually made me WORSE at it, and not better. Not only have I become a worse DM, but my enjoyment of DM'ing has dwindled to the point where I've almost given up on it.
I'm not sure exactly what point I'm trying to make here, only that sometimes it can take a long time for us to realise that we've lost our way. My strength as a DM is spontaneity. Coming up with plots, characters, scenarios, magical items and story in the moment, with no preparation whatsoever. The more I prepare, the less my games seem to flow, and the less people seem to enjoy them. People get a buzz when I give them some awesome description of a magical item that does some funky thing in some really cool way. They feel special and they envisage their character as gaining something really valuable. Writing that down on a piece of card with some stats on it, simply isn't the same. Who cares if the item is balanced or not for their level? If it shoots exploding puppies and everyone gets a thrill out of it and walks away from the game with a smile on their face, then that's all that matters.
