Playing as both DM and a player

[MojoGM]

Back in the says of 2E, I ran a Spelljammer game with only two players and used a DMPC to turn the duo into a trio. It worked fine and the two players treated him as a seperate entity (and not a DM tool). They also learned that just because it came out of his mouth didn't mean it was necessarily a good idea...

As someone has said, done right it can be great, done poorly it can be a disaster.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

Well played NPCs are one thing. IME, though, I've never seen a DMPC that didn't end up spoiling a significant portion of the game for the players -- either through being the "DM's pet" or distracting the DM from holding up his end of the game.

If you can pull off both successfully, my hat's off to you.

Personally, I prefer to run very short term NPCs. I'd rather have a cohort, hireling, or two-PC player than a DMPC. I've been running an NPC with the party for about four sessions now, and he's already grating on my nerves.

You might consider a fourth PC that rotates between the players.

 

[Ed Cha]

As long as your players are having fun, I don't see a problem. It is a difficult balancing act though. You need to think objectively and separate what you know as a DM and what the character would know.

 

[ThirdWizard]

I have never run a DMPC even when DMing for a single player. I think that doing so would undermine my impartiality, or at least perception of impartiality.

I have, however, run NPCs who tagged along with the PCs for varous reasons many many times. The PCs have no healer in my current campaign, so they hired a cleric early on, didn't like her very much, and hired a druid who they had met while fighting some lizard-men. The druid parted ways with them recently, and now they've found a friend of the first cleric who is happy to adventure with them. They've also had the unfortunate displeasure of adventuring with a cowardly orc barbarian and recently a sister of one of the PCs who came looking for him. The difference between these and DMPCs is basically that they come and go while the PCs are the heros who stick around (that and lack of DM attachment to them - they can come and go and die etc for story purposes like other NPCs).

 

[takyris]

(snip)
if, however, you are describing in your eyes this guy not being an NPC but being "your player character", that would be a viewpoint i would be very leery of as a player.

See, as a GM, an NPC is not something i am attached to, have an emotional investment in, and can let rise or fall as the scenario and story and game needs dictate.

However, as a player who has a character, that character is more important, his success more crucial, and basically he is my eyes into thw world.

Please understand that I mean no offense by this, but that's not how everyone plays their characters. If that was how you felt about every character you played, then heck yeah, you shouldn't play a DMPC. But if your primary interest in playing was to help out other people and provide a valuable support role, possibly adding in some intraparty play or comic relief... well, you might do just fine with a DMPC.

I've played a few DMPCs. The first was a paladin -- she added combat and light healing ability to a cleric-light party that needed another tank. The second was a rogue/shadowdancer who was versatile and powerful, but who was philosophically lazy and pretty much did whatever the bard PC wanted her to do -- so she was helpful, but didn't overpower anybody (until she got a certain magical item, which I then had her lose when her power with it became obvious). The third, in a d20 Modern campaign, was a Strong Hero with a medical focus through occupations and such -- he was, unfortunately, far too flashy and cool, so I got rid of him after two sessions and replaced him with a Dedicated Hero with an absurdly high Intelligence, a lot of skills at a few ranks apiece, and the intention of eventually maxing out the "Improved Aid Another" talent tree, getting him to the place where he could give the PCs a +6 on just about any roll they could get help on.

Since then, I've had too many players to justify a DMPC. There are times when I miss it, since, well, I don't have anyone to throw in funny lines during the party rest breaks. But unless your gaming style is "fulfill dreams of achievement and success you've been denied in real life", having a DMPC isn't automatically going to be a problem.

(And you'll note that in two of those cases, there were isolated problems, which I corrected by making sure the character didn't outclass a PC -- or by removing the character.)

Honestly, if he said something like that before the game started, i would likely drop out then and there and not get into that quagmire in the first place.

And that would be your loss, if you did that before you checked to see if this was actually a problem.

My general rules, things I try to keep in mind for myself, are:

1) If possible, don't be the best in the party at anything
2) If you have to be the best in the party at something, be the best at something that a) nobody wants, but most people agree is good to have, and b) can be handled off-stage as often as possible (ie, "Bill the rogue heads off at your request and comes back a few minutes later. 'No traps that I could see,' he reports.")
3) Specifically regarding the end of 2, only play a DMPC with social skills if they can be easily handled offstage, and if a compelling reason for your DMPC to not become the party's face-person can be brainstormed. Under no circumstances should the DMPC become the face-person, unless you're doing the equivalent of a cut-scene.
4) Ideally, the DMPC should be good at making other people look good -- buffs, an ability to give a sneak-attacker a chance to sneak-attack, or a well-muscled DMPC barbarian who hangs back to protect the PC wizard, who then gets to look cool by casting neat spells.
5) The DMPC should either have a roleplayed reason for not needing the best loot (ie, has taken a vow of poverty, prefers his family sword, etc), a character build that avoids a lot of loot requirements (ie, monk, rogue), or nice general loot requirements that allow the DMPC to get decent stuff without it being overly showy ("I'll take any heavy armor and any melee weapon -- whatever you guys don't want is good for me...")

 

[caudor]

You might consider a fourth PC that rotates between the players.

Hum, thanks for the suggestion. I'll run this by my players and see what they think about the idea for an upcoming session.

In fact, I received is a lot of helpful advice (and cautions) in this thread. Thanks folks.

I imagine allowing the players to handle the additional PC is probably less risky than my current approach and will probably will be just as enjoyable. All I want is for everyone to have a great time playing.

Of course, my best option might be to find another player to join us. Maybe we could teach my nephew to play...

 

[Emperor Valerian]

I'm running a game right now with only two players, and so I've had a few "semi-permanent" NPCs attached to the group (the players are a rogue and a sorcerer, so there's an NPC cleric and NPC warrior/fighter of some type). I try to make the NPCs quirky, and keep them in the background during fights.

Another thing I've found that helps (and its something the players like) is to let the players each run one of the NPCs during combat. The player who is the rogue usually picks the cleric, the sorcerer picks the fighter. That makes sure the NPCs don't get out of hand, and saves me time because usually I'm throwing a small horde of baddies at them in the first place!

 

[A'koss]

Hmm.... Through most of my (24+ year) DMing career I've run a PC alongside the rest of the gang. I wish I could offer some poignant advice as to why this has worked out so well for our group over the years, but it just... has. If there were any problems with this, I must have solved them early on.

I will say though I don't usually play the powerhouse of the group - I definitely lean more towards the sneaky rotten bastard end of the adventuring spectrum. Other than that I find it pretty easy to be impartial and that's just the way it works...

Cheers!

 

[Mark]

If not, do you feel this approach is a poor remedy to balance things for an adventure?

I'd suggest that you leave the fourth character to be either played alternately by one of the three players, or collectively by all three. It will never be a fully realized member of the four-character party in your own hands as you can never have a leading role in decision making or truly be at risk since you have inside knowledge. Players also, whether it is obvious or not, pick up on cues (sometimes subconsciously) and play their characters differently than they would if all of the character were run by players.

 

[Mark]

One DM I know likes to run an NPC with the group, however this character is more powerful than the rest of us.

AKA Gandolfian DMing