Rant -- GM Control, Taking it Too Far?

[jdrakeh]

Okay, so I was using the term rather loosely. What I meant was that problem players and problem DMs have more in common with each other than with other players and other DMs respectively.

Well, I don't think they necessarily share the same problem behaviors (IME, they often don't) but I do agree that both 'problem players' and 'problem GMs' are often to blame in some way for what is ultimately a match made in Hell.

Sometimes, though, the problem is entirely one-sided (f'rinstance, the guy that I mention a few posts up). Someday I may post those stories but they're so unbelievably crazy that only those posters here who know they guy wouldn't balk.

 

[architectofsleep]

I'll ask around for you, Jennifer, and pass on your info when appropriate.

I've had the most luck with a local Bay Area forum called "Critical Hit," but it seems to have gone away. (It was at "www.cilibrin.net/rolldice.) I'm very surprised it's gone, as I used it when I found my first 3E game in 2000, and I got a couple of players from it as recently as six to eight months ago. Shame.

There's a "Gamers Seeking Gamers" forum here on EN World (I just found a good online game using it), so you could give that a shot. Also, there's a great game store in Santa Clara called Game Kastle that I know hosts several weekly D&D games. (I can't vouch for the quality of those games, but I can vouch for the approachability of the gamers I met through Game Kastle when I lived in Los Gatos.) They'll certainly have a "Gamers Seeking Gamers" physical bulletin board.

You have a huge advantage going for you, being a woman. While it's true that there are a fair number of gamer guys just looking for gamer girls to hit on, it's also true that most mature DMs would love to increase the female-to-male ratio in their games, because women bring different -- usually positive -- things to the table than male gamers do. Because of this, you even have a good chance of wedging yourself into a "full" game.

What I'm getting at is that if you make the effort to find games, I wouldn't be surprised if, within a month, you have literally eight or ten you can choose from.

I used CritHit a lot when it was around. I found one good game that I stayed with years. But I left for grad school for a couple of years, and when I came back, the good gamers had jumped ship. One of them brought me into the current game I'm kvetching about, in fact. I, too, lament the loss of CritHit.

I didn't know about that game shop; I'll check it out. I'm also heading to Dundracon this year in hopes of finding more options. I'm new to EN World, so thanks for the tip on that. I worry, though, because this is a global site and not a local one.

Being a gamer girl has its downsides, too. I'm married, so that wipes out the creeps pretty quickly. I find that I tend to be overly sensitive at times, which is why I like to vent my concerns in a neutral forum before bringing them to the GM. I'm not a girly-girl, so expectations of me being all that different from male players tend to gp unfulfilled.

Thanks for the tips and the help!

 

[delericho]

I have a GM who is, apparently, a control freak. For example, I come up with a really great concept for a character background that I'm really looking forward to playing, and he comes back with a watered down, much more boring version of the same, telling me I can't play it the way I want to.

Yeah, that seems unreasonable. Working with the player to tailor the character background to the campaign better is fine, but changing the background for them is not on, IMO. In an RPG, the DM has control of the rules, the monsters, the NPCs and the world. The only thing the player has control of is his character, and he should therefore be permitted that control.

Currently I'm playing a druid, and I've been coming up with slightly silly names for my animal companions, just for a little fun. Think "Fido" for a wolf, or "Rex" for a dinosaur, or "Tweety" for an eagle. Kind of undercutting their ferociousness or their skill, for irony's sake. Nothing game-stopping, and just mildly amusing the first time you hear it.

However, here I have some sympathy with your DM, having seen one of our campaigns destroyed by this very thing - the DM said that he wanted to run a "semi-serious" Ravenloft campaign, a goal which lasted right up until one player gave her character a joke name. In that instant, the entire campaign was ruined.

Basically, your DM should have communicated to you the sort of campaign he wants to run (including setting, suitable character types, tone...). It is then up to you to create characters that fit that desired style (or persuade him to run something else, or get someone else to run a game). If the DM wants a semi-serious game, a Druid with a pet dinosaur named Rex just won't fit.

Besides, after the first twice, you would find that the joke name isn't even close to as funny as you first thought.

 

[Holy Bovine]

Of course, I like the names Fido and Tweety because their easy to remember and pronounce. To many serious names suck because they are hard to pronounce and remember. (How come no one discusses that aspect of fantasy names?)

I wish I had search function for this site and I might be able to dig up the old Forrester posts about this very subject - they were brilliantly funny.

 

[Holy Bovine]

I had a player recently who subsequent to the death of his PC, informed me that his PC was unkillable, because his background "which I had approved" said he was cursed to be killed by a red dragon, ergo he could not be killed by anything except a red dragon. I kicked him out right away.

Oh, I wouldn't have kicked him out. I would have had him run over and killed by a cart carrying manure. Painted red. Killed by a red wagon.

 

[vagabundo]

Oh, I wouldn't have kicked him out. I would have had him run over and killed by a cart carrying manure. Painted red. Killed by a red wagon.

Or on a more serious note: have a themed Death knight who welds a red intelligent sword called Dragon.

 

[Calico_Jack73]

From his perspective he may think that you aren't taking his game seriously by giving your beasties funny names. Considering the amount of effort that some DMs put into their settings and games I can see how it could be upsetting to him. If he is trying to create a serious mood a silly name could ruin it. If I were running a game in the Midnight setting I'd have to disallow silly names too... you are trying to inject comedy in what is supposed to be an intense and somewhat depressing setting.

 

[Mallus]

From his perspective he may think that you aren't taking his game seriously by giving your beasties funny names. Considering the amount of effort that some DMs put into their settings and games I can see how it could be upsetting to him.

Speaking as someone who spends a borderline ridiculous amount of time developing his homebrew setting(s), I can understand this. But at the end of the day a D&D setting isn't just my own work of fiction, or at least, it stops being that as soon as the campaign begins. After that, for better or worse, it belongs to the group as a whole.

Besides, freely allowing player input in --even something as trivial as a mood-changing pet name-- can enlarge the setting, make it bigger, richer, and more varied in tone than a single person's imagination could. I like to say that my group's aggregate imagination is greater than my own (and I'm pretty imaginative).

If he is trying to create a serious mood a silly name could ruin it.

The name 'Fistandantilus' is so bad it's impossible to parody, and yet Dragonlance survived it.

If I were running a game in the Midnight setting I'd have to disallow silly names too... you are trying to inject comedy in what is supposed to be an intense and somewhat depressing setting.

On the other hand, you can't ban your way to an intense gaming experience. If the DM provides intense situations, the players will react accordingly. Even the ones who named their dire lion companions 'Mittens'.

 

[JRRNeiklot]

It's not the sillyness that bothers me as much as the intrusion of 20th century names in a medieval world. Rex wouldn't bother me, Tweety would.

 

[Mallus]

Tweety would.

Because no one called a bird Tweety --or something similar that remarked on the sound the animal makes-- until Warner Brother came around?