*shrug*
I can't deal with problems people have had with other DM's in the past. My own experience with DM's has been for the most part good, and when it wasn't I simply just didn't come back. For the part people have (apparantly) been very pleased by my refereeing, as they keep coming back often in preference to other DM's (for which I'm flattered).
So to a certain extent I find comments like this amusing:
I'm not perfect like you. I make mistakes occasionally and am man enough to admit those mistakes and fix them.
My own sense of honor and decency are much more important to me than any game. If I had to completely erase a days, or even a months, worth of play to restore a player to life because of a mistake that I made, I would do it without regret. I respect the people that I game with and they respect me for that.
You talk about your 40 hours of effort. I think about the years of effort that my players have put into their characters.
The only authority you have is the authority that the players give you. You 'rule' only with their blessing. If you think otherwise, you are deluding yourself.
Because it is clear they aren't arguing with me, and aren't even reading what I said. Posts like this are continuations of arguements someone has had with someone else. I wouldn't bother replying except that once a thread gets long there is always the possibility that people won't read the thread and will just rely on the 'conclusions' at the end of it.
For one thing, no where did I claim perfection, nor did I suggest that I don't fix mistakes I make. I just suggested that never ever did I fix mistakes by rewinding the clock and giving players a do over. That 'fix' causes more problems than it cures, IMO. I suggested some other ways of handling the problem from simply informing a player that some resource unfairly taken away has been restored, to giving (secretly or explicitly) 'gifts' to a player you had cheated - up to an including the 'gift of life' in the unhappy event I screwed up big time and killed someone through my misunderstanding.
And as for 40 hours of effort, that is sometimes the DM's time cost IN ONE SESSION. Over the course of a multi-year campaign, DM's can spend thousands of hours. And yes, I rule by consent of the ruled. When they sit down, they consent to be ruled. If they don't like my rulings, they are free to succeed and form their own group and leave me by myself. That has never happened, but they have that right. What they don't have a right to do is tell me how to run my campaign (though again, complaints at the end of the night are greeted sympatheticly.)
As for this:
Yes, the players are there for your amusement. They're like little bugs. You can block them, force them to go around, constantly keep them from where they want to go. No, it's not fair, but you're boss. And it's all in good fun. Your fun. Not theirs. What have THEY contributed to the game, huh? Their time? Bah, you contribute as much time yourself! Their personal investment in their characters? Bah, you do the same with your NPCs! Their belief in and devotion to your story? Bah, you made it, so you can do what you want to them, even if it's not fair!
I smell the odor of someone else who has been burned and is continuing an earlier arguement. I don't know what which DM did to you, but could you consider not taking it out on me? Players _ARE_ their for my amusement, just as I am there for THIER amusement. But that is not the same as them being little bugs, nor do I have the right to run thier PC's any more than they have a right to run my NPC's. If I'm not making them happy, I'm not doing my job well, and if going somewhere they want to go makes them happy, then well they get to go there. (Perferably, if they are planning a trip somewhere exotic I get just a little notice, but even that isn't a complete necessity.) I occassionally 'rail road' a player but only in the sense that often times IRL larger events sweep around individuals beyond thier control. To the extent that they can control things, they are allowed to control them, even if they are unexpected and 'mess up the plot'. I do somewhat expect characters to be 'adventurous' and bite onto adventure hooks if it is at all in character to do so, and I do expect that the player at the time of character creation give thier character some hooks I can use to get them adventuring. Afterall, if you don't, you shouldn't expect adventures to happen to you. We can just RP 'wood chopping' and 'sitting around the fire at night' and 'looking for a wife in the next village' if you like and you can entertain me doing it.
Yes, it hurts a DM to lose a good NPC, but sometimes you go with the flow and see what happens. Am I always fair? No, but generally when I am not I'm cheating on behalf of the players and not 'my story' or 'my NPC's'. Sometimes, NOT getting what you deserve is better than getting what you deserve. I don't save the lives of NPC's. If an NPC can't take care of itself with the powers I gave it at the beginning of the session, I'm not inclined to give the NPC any new powers. Every once in a while when I overestimated the NPC, and it is the climax of an adventure, I might give the NPC a few extra hit points so long as it doesn't change what is clearly going to be the outcome of the adventure (ei the PC's win without losses). I don't tell the PC's I've done this, and I've never been caught, but it tends to make the ultimate victory more satisfying for them if it wasn't a complete pushover and they got worried for a second.
All of this is probably related to how quickly a fellow DM who started this thread was condemned for having an intelligent NPC do what the DM felt was intelligent at the time. Maybe the DM was wrong and thier were better things for the NPC to do that would have screwed the PC's even worse, but the DM didn't think of those in time and thats ok IMO. NPC's shouldn't be perfect, and if DM falliability enforces that, then so much the better.
But it is not somehow cruel and malicious to have NPC's attempt to destroy or steal some toy the PC has which is particularly dangerous. For one thing, some NPC's may well relish the idea of revenge, and if they can hurt a PC's pride by destroying something they cherish it is ok for them to move to do so. The fault lies with the PC for failing to consider the full consequences of thier actions and assuming that the only things that could happen were the things that they considered. If something happens that the player didn't consider, some players tend to get upset, but that's not necessarily the DM's fault.
*sigh*
All of this seems obvious to me, and I could keep writing forever trying to explain how to DM, but if people insist on misunderstanding I can't stop them. Suffice to say that it is the job of the DM to make the campaign fun - and that a good DM knows how to do this even if his players don't necessarily (which is usually made clear one way or the other when they try to run a campaign of thier own), and that each good DM has his own style of doing this, and that sometimes you have to adapt your style to your group.
. Of course she'd have to watch her back for the rest of her life considering how vengeful fantasy heroes tend to be about that kind of thing. Then again, as a Big Bad Evil Girl she's probably used to watching her back in case her Trusted Lieutenant turns out not to be so trustworthy. What's a few more enemies on her list of people who want to kill her?
