D&D General The DM Shortage

[nevin]

no risks and responsibilities is a GM issue not a dnd issue. But the other thing is every group plays it thier way. If godlike PC's are what they want then why should anyone else care. That's one of the games defining features every group can do it thier own way.

 

[Desdichado]

This is a serious issue and it doesn't have to be this way. I'm currently running a 3rd party adventure path (Dungeons of Drakkenheim) and it's SO MUCH better (from an organizational, ease of use point of view) than any 5e adventure I've read so far. It's also good as an adventure incidentally, but that's besides the point. The authors clearly spent a lot of time thinking about how a DM will use the material.

A premade adventure should have 2 things: one is quality material that is interesting, and 2 it should make the DM's life easier. Some of the WotC adventures are so badly thought out that I think they take more work than homebrewing!

I think that for a long time now there have been a lot of products that were written to sell, not necessarily written to be played. If it so happens that they're being marketed to armchair gamers who just want to read gaming books and imagine what they could do with them, rather than... y'know, ACTUALLY use them, well... that's OK, I guess. There's a market for that. The problem comes when either the publisher or the consumer thinks that a product is meant to be one thing, but is actually meant to be something else.

 

[nevin]

I think that for a long time now there have been a lot of products that were written to sell, not necessarily written to be played. If it so happens that they're being marketed to armchair gamers who just want to read gaming books and imagine what they could do with them, rather than... y'know, ACTUALLY use them, well... that's OK, I guess. There's a market for that. The problem comes when either the publisher or the consumer thinks that a product is meant to be one thing, but is actually meant to be something else.

I think you are overestimating the publishers. The artists that come up with the modules make modules they'd play or run. If the DM isn't experienced enough to know it's a bad fit or isn't able to adjust the module then it become unfun. But I don't think they are trying to sell something that was meant to be something else. It's just the way they play the game. I just said that's the best part of DND. It's also it's worst part sometimes.

 

[robus]

…And 24 pages on cosmology. Clearly, something went wrong somewhere.

I’ll admit to a ”wtf?!” when I opened my fresh copy of the DMG and that was the first thing I encountered.

 

[payn]

That seems related to my earlier comments about generational pop cultural zeitgeists. Maybe it shouldn't be surprising that PCs are like this in the same age that we have superhero movies dominating the box office. 5e is like the fantasy Avengers.

I prefer games that are something more like the fantasy Daredevil Netflix show or the fantasy X-files. But I'm not sure that that's entirely generational. I've always struggled with getting D&D to do what I wanted it to, even way back in the mid-80s.

I think this is why some folks often call it quits before high level. Why 3E had a popular variant called E6. I for sure prefer what you suggest, though I am far from a pre-Hickman OSR type GM/player. Which is why I think power level is not the right item to put into the old school vs nu skool or generational bucket. It's also a long running D&D problem in that it needs to provide all these experiences, but often has trouble doing them and communicating that.

 

[Ancalagon]

That seems related to my earlier comments about generational pop cultural zeitgeists. Maybe it shouldn't be surprising that PCs are like this in the same age that we have superhero movies dominating the box office. 5e is like the fantasy Avengers.

I prefer games that are something more like the fantasy Daredevil Netflix show or the fantasy X-files. But I'm not sure that that's entirely generational. I've always struggled with getting D&D to do what I wanted it to, even way back in the mid-80s.

A while ago I wrote a blog about that - I think it's also because of advantage.

The problem with 5e? ... it's best feature.

So people have been grumbling about 5e. (tl,dr: advantage is great! but it has consequences - the players engage less. A proposal to fix ...

slugsandsilver.blogspot.com

 

[Micah Sweet]

no risks and responsibilities is a GM issue not a dnd issue. But the other thing is every group plays it thier way. If godlike PC's are what they want then why should anyone else care. That's one of the games defining features every group can do it thier own way.

The problem is when the players want god-like PCs and the DM doesn't.

 

[nevin]

That problem can't be fixed without new players. No amount of game design, uber DM skills is ever going to fix that. You might as well argue the sun coming up ruins your day.

 

[Ancalagon]

I call rose-tinted nostalgia specs on this one.


But the issue isn't skill. The issue is TIME. I pretty much gave it up from leaving school to becoming semi-retied. You can't be a DM and work full time. Not enough hours in a day.

Secondary (but still significant) issues:

Cost. The DM is generally expected to be the person who buys all the books.

Feeling underappreciated.

... I have a full time job and I have run 6 sessions a month...

 

[robus]

My hot take is that the WotC adventures are more work than they’re worth, leaving DMs to either throw up their hands in frustration or start rolling their own (which, while very rewarding, does take some serious attention).

And not only are the adventures hard work, they’re quite dull. Rarely do we get to visit somewhere fantastic. Mostly retread fan service IMHO.