D&D 5E The Pendulum: Player Entitlement & DM Empowerment

[Greg K]

Kill with fire the DM mindset of "it's my game, I do what I want".

I think the phrases are backasswards. It's DM Entitlement and Player Empowerment. The more rigid rules empowered the players to generally have an idea of what to expect as a baseline from play. By removing those codified rules, you're basically removing the tightrope walker's net, or lowering it so close to the ground to not matter. DMs that came up before 3/4E are generally more entitled and antagonistic towards their players, with a much higher chance to have the attitude of "it's my game, if you don't like it, leave". Note the self-serving and self-centered attitude that conveys. "My game, my table, my rules". This is not the attitude of a DM who's interested in being part of a group experience. These types also have a habit of being frustrated novelists rather than collaborative storytellers.

Reread the 3.0 PHB and DMG. The PHB has rule 0. It also has a sidebar that the DM can prevent a player from placing ranks in a scale if it is inappropriate given where the character grew up in the setting. As for the DMG, it tells the DM that he or she is in charge of the game and how it is played at the table. He or she is in charge of which rules to allow or ignore, making changes to classes and races or disallowing them, introducing new rules (and even giving many optional/variant rules). Then you have Unearthed Arcana which is a whole book of DM options and variants for altering the rules to fit their campaign.

As for "my table my rules", the DM should not have to run a campaign or setting that does not interest him or her. Everyone comes to the table with different fantasy influences and play style preferences. Sometimes those differences are so divergent that people are not going to be happy. With so many potential differences, the DM needs to ensure everyone is on the same page whether running core only, anything goes, or a specific setting with limitations and/or house rules in mind.
When dealing with a specific setting whether due to influences, high preference/dislikes of certain elements, or a specific campaign vision the DM needs to be clear. They can listen to players' input, but ultimately the decision rests on the DM to decide what they can change or not change and still enjoy running the setting/campaign. This has nothing to do with being a frustrated novelist. Players can still direct the entire campaign in play despite setting/campaign restrictions. they may just need to keep within certain set guidelines (e.g., no evil characters, no gunpowder, or whatever).

Just as a DM should not run a game/campaign/setting they do not like, a player should not stick around and play in a campaign that they do not like. If the player doesn't like the limitations, they are free to walk and find another table, go start another group and find players, or find another activity. When the player insists they be catered to and the DM has to run it how the player prefers, that is when it becomes player entitlement, because the player is not running the game and is free to leave if they do not like what is being offered. A player is not entitled to a seat at the table just because another person is running a game and the player happens to like the game system or even the people at the table.

 

[Sacrosanct]

I think a big reason why you hear "DM Empowerment" more often than "Player Empowerment" is because by the very nature of the game, the DM puts in a LOT more work into the game than the players do, and the DM is responsible for keeping the game world working right.

 

[the Jester]

This attitude stems from two related things. First, as you mention, the disparity in time commitment involved. Second, the wrongheaded belief that the admonition "They can't play without me" only cuts one way, namely, from DM to players. Shocking surprise, the DM can't game without the players either.

This is true, but in my experience, it's far easier to find a new player- or even, for that matter, an entirely new group of players- than for a group of players to find a new DM if none of them wants to step up.

In point of fact, for about two decades, I have ALWAYS had a list of people waiting and chomping at the bit to get into my game.

The DM chooses to put in the work, they want to -- for whatever reason -- run a game session for other people. An area may not have a DM so that person decides to run something so the group can have fun. Note that's not so the DM can have fun, rather so the group can have fun. To then turn around and say, "The players can sit out if they don't like what I'm doing," is to betray the entire purpose of the game in the first place, namely, telling a good story that's entertaining for everyone involved, not just one person at the table.

I disagree. If the DM is not having fun running the game, there is absolutely no reason for him or her to run it.

I play a game not because it's fun for other people. I play the game because it's fun for me, and so does each other player at the table. Yes, the group dynamic is the source of a lot of fun, but we can get that without playing a game that I'm not enjoying. We can go out to a movie, sit around drinking beer, hang out doing art together, hell, we even painted the house of a couple of our players recently and it was fun, not because of the painting, but because I was hanging out with my friends. No need to conflate the two things. I know people that I hang out with who won't play certain games- my buddies Dave and Aaron both dislike board games, for example. But the rest of us play them! We don't force Dave and Aaron to join us. They can hang out and chill with us while we play, or they can do something else. We don't have to change the game to suit the guys who aren't interested. If the rest of us want to play some Catan, we don't switch to Uno just because Dave and Aaron might come over for the game then. We play Catan with the people who are interested.

The gaming session isn't only about the DM having fun, likewise, it isn't only about the players having fun.

Of course the game isn't about just the DM having fun. The key is to play games that sound fun to you.

But, due to the power discrepancy between DMs and players, DMs have no shame when they proclaim their power over players, whereas if a player made the same proclamation, most would simply shake their heads and laugh. Why? Because it's accepted in gamer culture for the DM to simple brush off the players as secondary to their game, rather than the entire point the game is happening.

No, the reason a player proclaiming his power over the DM is laughed off is the exact same reason that the cover artist for a novel gets laughed off if he declares that it's his novel instead of the writer's (to use your authorship metaphor). It's because the cover artist is essentially replaceable without destroying the integrity of the novel. Likewise, only the DM is indispensable to the DM's campaign.

Unless of course the players are irrelevant to the game, in which case it's fairly clear the DM just wants to tell their story and players, and player decisions, be damned.

Your perspective seems locked into an either-or, here. It's a false dichotomy. You keep reasserting that "My Game" style DMs don't care about player decisions, and it's repeatedly insulting. So I'd appreciate it if you'd stop, because that is objectively false. As a "My Game" style DM, I can assure you that the decisions that players make have a huge impact on my campaign. Just as a few examples, pc actions have led to:

• The replacement of Asmodeus as ruler of Hell;
• The destruction of a major, world-spanning empire;
• The death of gods;
• The exposure and death of long-hidden monsters hiding in plain sight in the campaign world for thousands of years;
• The establishment of states large and small;
• Even the destruction of the entire campaign world, when the pcs failed to stop a world-threatening menace!

So to put the lie to this assertion of yours once and for all, would you let your campaign end if the pcs made crucial mistakes in fighting a world-threatening monsters? Would you let those dice fall where they may, or would you come up with some Deus ex machina to save them? I suggest that, unless your answer is an unequivocal "I'd let the world end", I have demonstrated a stronger commitment to letting the players' actions reverberate through the campaign than you would.

So, frustrated novelist? Maybe sometimes, when I'm writing a novel and I hit a wall, but not during my D&D game.

Dunning-Kruger effect. "In order to know how good you are at something requires exactly the same skills as it does to be good at that thing in the first place... if you are absolutely no good at something, at all, then you lack exactly the skills that you need to know that you're absolutely no good at it."

And this is relevant how, exactly? A crappy DM can be a player-accommodating coddler or a harsh iron-hearted DM; a good DM can also be either one (or anywhere in between). The best way to find out whether you're a crappy DM is to listen to feedback from your players, same as with almost anything you do that is based on interacting with other people.

I think the real solution is to not keep up the antagonistic stance of DMs and for everyone to accept that it's a symbiotic relationship between the DMs and players that lets the game happen.

That's fine for you. It's not true for everyone, though. Part of the issue with this conversation is that you don't seem to see that not everyone likes the same things in a game that you like, and you are casting judgment on those other styles as inferior to yours. They aren't. They're just different and not for you. And that's fine! There is nothing inherently wrong with your playstyle any more than there is anything inherently wrong with mine. I just happen to prefer one very different from yours.

The players are not just there to entertain the DM any more than the DM is just there to entertain the players. It's mutually assured destruction... erm, entertainment. So anyone digging in their heels and saying, "My way or the highway," is, by definition, not only antagonistic but also anathema to the entire purpose of tabletop gaming.

Of course the players aren't there to entertain the DM (at least, not solely). They are there to have fun, just as the DM is. But just as they shouldn't come over to play Axis & Allies if they hate the game, they shouldn't come over to play in Bob Bitchin's D&D game if they don't like his DMing style.

And I think that your grasp on the "entire purpose of tabletop gaming" is not as firm as you seem to think. But it's a perfect fit for the "entire purpose of tabletop gaming for overgeeked". There is no one purpose for TT gaming. There just isn't.

 

[Umbran]

In fairness though "I don't give a crap what you say or think, this is what is happening, and if that screws you over, I don't care." seems to be a typical method of unfairly framing "DM empowerment".

Yes it is. But the fastest way out of the ugly circle was not to challenge the framing, which wouldn't prove that Jameson was reasonable, but to show quite clearly that Jameson didn't fit within that framing, and show that he was reasonable.

The complainer should either get over it or go find a group that suits their personal needs.

Yes, but this approach to the conversation does not promote understanding nor help construct solutions or show where compromises could be had. Your response of, "Get over it or get out!" *fits* the ugly framing. You are, in effect, confirming his assertions, rather than demonstrating them as unfair or inaccurate. So, I'm not sure this approach serves your purposes.

 

[chriton227]

I'm going to point this out again- the DM is the one who spends probably 90% or more of the time, effort and money that a group spends on the game.

I've seen this claim before, and I think it is grossly exaggerating to justify the sense of importance of the GM. Take a weekly 4 hour game with 4 players. The players combined are investing 16 hours of their time just by attending and participating in the game, and to be generous we'll assume that the players spend absolutely no time outside the sessions working on their characters, talking to the other players, reading up on the rules, or anything else related to the game. In order for the GM's share to be 90% that would have to be 160 hours total per week, and discounting the 20 hours of the session itself (5 people * 4 hours) the GM would be averaging 20 hours a day preparing for the game. Likewise, if only 2 players bothered to buy a PHB and a set of dice (say $35 total each), that would imply a total group investment of $700 in the game, with the GM share at $640. I'd buy it if someone were to say that the GM invests 3-4 times more time and money relative to any single player, but even then that would put the GM's share of the investment down around 50% of the total for the group, and probably significantly less than that for larger groups. If measuring importance by investment, the GM is no more important than the rest of the players combined.

Essentially, the DM does all the work.

I would have issues with a GM who has so little respect for me and my contributions as a player as to imply that I do nothing while they do everything. If the GM is doing everything and the players are doing nothing, why do they even need to bother with having players. Do they view themselves as some benevolent charity, gracing the undeserving players with the privilege of experiencing the fruits of their labor?

 

[BryonD]

Yes it is. But the fastest way out of the ugly circle was not to challenge the framing, which wouldn't prove that Jameson was reasonable, but to show quite clearly that Jameson didn't fit within that framing, and show that he was reasonable.

True, but I wasn't responding to the framer. I was responding to your comment in response that position.

Yes, but this approach to the conversation does not promote understanding nor help construct solutions or show where compromises could be had. Your response of, "Get over it or get out!" *fits* the ugly framing. You are, in effect, confirming his assertions, rather than demonstrating them as unfair or inaccurate. So, I'm not sure this approach serves your purposes.

Ok. I'd say that is a pretty radical interpretation. But knock yourself out.

 

[Jesauce]

Just going to drop my 2 cents into the jar here. The best way I can sum up my views is by using one of the terms that I believe is in the new PHB when talking about the DM, which is 'referee.' The ref knows the rules, in theory better than anyone on the field. He has some leeway in his calls, and sometimes has to make a hard decision. Sometimes they'll earn him a cheer, sometimes he'll be criticized. In the end though, he's just as invested in the game as the players. Trying to say that one is more important, or invests more into the game than the other is ridiculous. They all have their reason the be there.

Learning and adapting your game to the players as a GM is a must, IMO. If you're so iron-clad in everything that happens in the game that the players have no room to interact outside of what you're doing then you might as well simply read them the campaign as a story. The GM inherently has control over the game, it's his job, and the players should abide by his decisions. The GM, also, should be open to critique. There have been plenty of times when I've made a ruling off the cuff when a situation presented itself and afterwards had players come up to me and tell me they thought I made the wrong call. Simply telling them off and letting it drop would only earn me the animosity of my players, and a smaller group. It's worth taking the time to listen to your players concerns, sometime they will surprise you, you know. At the very least, be willing to explain yourself candidly to your players even if you stick to your call, rule or tweak. Being open with your players is important. My personal rules have gone through so many revisions based on how games have turned out that I couldn't possibly keep count. Likewise, I've had entire campaigns turned upside down by a single decision. I have a personal rule that I never say 'no' to my players when it comes to roleplaying. If they want to try something, I let them try. Even if they have no chance of success I don't tell them so. I let them roll and see what happens. Most of the time I simply let them know that it didn't work out. However, every once in a while they try things so stupid, ridiculous or simply amazing that I will alter the course of a campaign for it. It has led to some incredibly memorable games.

In the end I think terms like 'Player Entitlement' and 'GM Empowerment' are useless. Sure, the rules in 5e lean more in favor of letting the GM make the calls. But that doesn't mean that the GM is suddenly somehow more important than in previous editions. It just means that he has to make a few more calls when situations arise. Everyone should be at the table to have fun, if fun is being had, who cares?