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The DM is Not a Player; and Hot Topic is Not Punk Rock
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<blockquote data-quote="Jack Daniel" data-source="post: 8153757" data-attributes="member: 694"><p>Just for the sake of clarity, I'm going to define "player" as "someone participating in a game of D&D" and "Player" as "someone running one or more Player Characters, i.e. not the Dungeon Master."</p><p></p><p>The question hinges on the following: at what point have we begun to conflate the concepts of "player" and "Player"?</p><p></p><p>Of course the Dungeon Master is a player and a peer of the other players; and of course the Dungeon Master is not a Player. The gray areas lie somewhere in between these two obvious and hopefully uncontroversial statements.</p><p></p><p><em>Should</em> the DM be made to herd cats, schedule games, be the group organizer as well as a player? Ideally not, but that's usually how it goes, especially if the DM is more invested and eager to run the campaign than any of the Players. If the DM is the one who cares the most, of course the DM is going to naturally fall into that organizer role—just like a DM who has a big table, battle-mats and minis, and a shelf full of rulebooks is probably naturally going to fall into the role of game host, because that's far easier than transporting piles of <em>stuff.</em></p><p><em></em></p><p><em>Should </em>the DM be the "group mom" who settles interpersonal disputes and talks to problem players and kicks That Guy? Ideally not, but there isn't always a perfectly clear line between adjudicating an in-game dispute (clearly the purview of the DM) and an out-of-game one. Sometimes the interpersonal stuff is totally and unavoidably enmeshed with the in-game stuff, and the business of calling out problematic in-game behavior is the overlapping responsibility of both the DM <em>and </em>all of the players.</p><p></p><p>Can the DM curate the setting or change the rules on a whim? Now we're definitely well into that gray area, where it depends on context and group dynamic. Obviously, for there to be a game at all, all of the players have to agree on what game they're playing. But for some groups, rules details and setting details are definitely under the sole purview of the DM and not the Players, most especially in RPGs that don't have a ton of player-facing rules or a char-op/build mini game*. Under these circumstances, a DM who changes the rules "on a whim" isn't necessarily doing something bad or beyond the scope of their role.</p><p></p><p>Sometimes the DM <em>does</em> have special insight, because as [USER=7016699]@prabe[/USER] has pointed out, it's often the DM and only the DM who treats the game as a serious hobby, reads theory, posts on forums, etc. (Certainly when I play, some 90% of players are totally casual and never crack open a rulebook except to read a spell description.) Sometimes the DM is literally <em>the game designer </em>and is very often <em>the world-builder</em>. A DM cannot help but have special insight in those circumstances.</p><p></p><p><span style="font-size: 9px">(* i.e. RPGs worth playing.)</span></p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Jack Daniel, post: 8153757, member: 694"] Just for the sake of clarity, I'm going to define "player" as "someone participating in a game of D&D" and "Player" as "someone running one or more Player Characters, i.e. not the Dungeon Master." The question hinges on the following: at what point have we begun to conflate the concepts of "player" and "Player"? Of course the Dungeon Master is a player and a peer of the other players; and of course the Dungeon Master is not a Player. The gray areas lie somewhere in between these two obvious and hopefully uncontroversial statements. [I]Should[/I] the DM be made to herd cats, schedule games, be the group organizer as well as a player? Ideally not, but that's usually how it goes, especially if the DM is more invested and eager to run the campaign than any of the Players. If the DM is the one who cares the most, of course the DM is going to naturally fall into that organizer role—just like a DM who has a big table, battle-mats and minis, and a shelf full of rulebooks is probably naturally going to fall into the role of game host, because that's far easier than transporting piles of [I]stuff. Should [/I]the DM be the "group mom" who settles interpersonal disputes and talks to problem players and kicks That Guy? Ideally not, but there isn't always a perfectly clear line between adjudicating an in-game dispute (clearly the purview of the DM) and an out-of-game one. Sometimes the interpersonal stuff is totally and unavoidably enmeshed with the in-game stuff, and the business of calling out problematic in-game behavior is the overlapping responsibility of both the DM [I]and [/I]all of the players. Can the DM curate the setting or change the rules on a whim? Now we're definitely well into that gray area, where it depends on context and group dynamic. Obviously, for there to be a game at all, all of the players have to agree on what game they're playing. But for some groups, rules details and setting details are definitely under the sole purview of the DM and not the Players, most especially in RPGs that don't have a ton of player-facing rules or a char-op/build mini game*. Under these circumstances, a DM who changes the rules "on a whim" isn't necessarily doing something bad or beyond the scope of their role. Sometimes the DM [I]does[/I] have special insight, because as [USER=7016699]@prabe[/USER] has pointed out, it's often the DM and only the DM who treats the game as a serious hobby, reads theory, posts on forums, etc. (Certainly when I play, some 90% of players are totally casual and never crack open a rulebook except to read a spell description.) Sometimes the DM is literally [I]the game designer [/I]and is very often [I]the world-builder[/I]. A DM cannot help but have special insight in those circumstances. [SIZE=1](* i.e. RPGs worth playing.)[/SIZE] [/QUOTE]
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