D&D General The Tyranny of Rarity

[Imaro]

I think there is certainly a common perception that DMing is hard. And while I don’t want to dismiss the effort it takes, I don’t think it’s something that most players can’t do.

I agree... though just because one can do something doesn't mean you can do it well.

They may be scared of doing it, or they may believe it’s more than they can handle, or they may not have the time it may take to do it. And of course, for some people, it may just not be something they’re suited to.

So it may be...
scarier than being a player
more (something) to handle than being a player
more time than being a player
more/different skills than being a player

But I think the difficulty of the role often gets overstated. More people can and should GM.

I disagree here... if more people want to GM they should... but honestly that doesn't seem to be the case. There has to be a reason for that.

I also think that there are many people who actively enjoy the role and don’t do it out of necessity, but rather by choice.

I agree here as well... I enjoy it but I have been on both sides of the screen and my experience is that being a DM is all the things you said above... It's scarier (especially the first time) than being a player because unlike a player I don't have a group of other DM's at the table I can draw from, acquiesce to if I need a moment or follow the lead of if I don't want to be front and center. There's more of everything to handle than being a player, from descriptions of people, places and things to roleplaying NPC's to keeping the lionshare of the mechanics straight in order to make rulings to improv'ing... there is more. It takes more time than being a player, because as a player I can, if I choose,literally not think about the game until the second we begin play and I'll do fine, maybe there are DM's out there like that but I've needed to do at least some minimal prep work before a game session to feel comfortable enough to run. Finally the skills are different... screen time management, pacing, acting, the ability to clearly describe various and numerous things, and so on. These are skills a player doesn't necessarily have to bring to the table but are near necessities for running a good game.

EDIT: Also many DM's tend to be the host, set the schedule, get the group together and so on. I guess what I'm saying is maybe it isn't hard to be an above average DM but maybe, just maybe it's more effort than most people are willing to put into a leisure activity when they can just play.

 

[hawkeyefan]

Is the fact that this is still true after all these years the game's (DMG's?) biggest failing?

It may be, I think, yeah.

Look at the DMG for 5e. There is so little practical advice on how to actually run the game in that book that it's kind of amazing. I think that this is largely due to the approach that they took with 5e....they didn't want to commit to specific direction. Everything is worded in a pretty open way, so that groups can interpret it however suits them. Which is great for folks who're already familiar with RPGs, but less so for anyone new.

I can't imagine how difficult it would be for a newcomer to try and learn the game and how to run it from the 5e PHB and DMG. There are so many gaps in direction.

But I imagine that most of the time, newcomers are learning by watching others first and then figuring it out from there. Streaming and instructional videos likely do the heavy lifting here.

 

[Stormonu]

It may be, I think, yeah.

Look at the DMG for 5e. There is so little practical advice on how to actually run the game in that book that it's kind of amazing. I think that this is largely due to the approach that they took with 5e....they didn't want to commit to specific direction. Everything is worded in a pretty open way, so that groups can interpret it however suits them. Which is great for folks who're already familiar with RPGs, but less so for anyone new.

I can't imagine how difficult it would be for a newcomer to try and learn the game and how to run it from the 5e PHB and DMG. There are so many gaps in direction.

But I imagine that most of the time, newcomers are learning by watching others first and then figuring it out from there. Streaming and instructional videos likely do the heavy lifting here.

Well, I think in part that’s what the Starter set is for. Jumping in head-first with PHB-DMG-MM would NOT be my suggestion for first-time DMs. <edit>. That’s like teaching your child to drive by putting him in the Indy 500.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I... I'm not going to get this out exactly the way I want it, so apologies in advance.

Noted.

I mean, there's no intrinsic requirement for D&D to be level based, or hit point based, or use classes, or use alignment, or anything else that (iirc) every other edition of D&D has always had as rules either, but they're usually taken as the default when discussing the game. (Are there any editions of D&D that haven't had the DM make the final call?)

Even so, as many others have posted in various threads. there are games that have different arrangements between players and DM, and there's nothing wrong with modding the D&D rules, and a lot of us would still claim to be playing D&D.

Well, just to be clear, while this thread is about D&D, there's nothing about it that makes the issues involved specific to D&D. And the fact something has been done for decades is not, in the end, a sign it should be taken as a necessity. All kinds of things were taken as a given at one time (level caps for nonhumans, random rolls for available starting spells) that have been extinct for a long time now. There's nothing intrinsic in the D&D rules that requires heavy top-down authority. Some people may feel that it will change the experience in undesirable ways, but that's at least a separate argument.

If we want to decenter the DM, I guess: "The participants (that is, both those playing characters and the DM) decide how these rules will be used in the game. The participants should talk about problem areas with each other and consider each other's requests. The participants should determine how they will handle disagreements that occur in play and what to do if a full resolution seems likely to hold things up. If any participant disagrees enough, they may quit the game (and if it is the DM then the other participants will need to designate a new one). It is up to all of the participants to create an adventure they all enjoy."

That all seems entirely fair.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I had no idea.

It got started as a travel guide to the French car owners (the couple thousand of them that existed at the time) and among other things reviewed restaurants.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Why don't the other players just pick a new DM if the current one is too domineering for their tastes?
(I assume DMing isn't particularly hard or demanding to do. Because if it was then the position of DM would be more important. And that would explain why their fun might be seen as more important than the others in some senses). <- That came out snarkier than I wanted. I think it's lunch time.

Well, the easy answer is because nobody else wants to DM. There's no question that, while not universal, there's a reasonably pronounced line of demarcation between people-who-like-to-GM and people-who-like-to-play in many cases.

But "nobody else wants to GM so we're forced to allow the jerk to do it" isn't exactly a lovely choice over not playing for many people, and it gets more complicated the more mild the jerkiness gets.

 

[Thomas Shey]

No one's arguing it's the best approach. But your approach is not inherently superior to it.

Don't think I said it is, but the fact some people treat it as the self-evident way it should go is still a problem in discussion and sometimes in play.

(And it should be noted my GMing style is probably more top-down than not; I'm just aware that there's nothing "holy" or "expected" about it.)

 

[Oofta]

I had no idea.

Yeah, back in the day they wanted to sell more tires, which meant more driving. How to convince people to drive? Tell them about this awesome restaurant down the road.

 

[Helldritch]

Yes and no. Change for the sake of change is not worth the effort and will often make things worse. That doesn't mean that fiddling with things like the setting I brought up isn't worth pursuing. Dwarves, elves, halflings and a surface that grows good aren't broken, but the quick setting blurb I came up with seems pretty interesting. If this were 20 or 30 years ago, I'd be building this setting in detail. Now I just don't have the time.

It still amount to "not to repair".
My car did not come with a remote starter. I can always improve it by adding one. I can get better tires than the stock ones. Better wiper and so on. Adding to a game is not the same as deeply changing it. And a few minor change here and there do not amount to a full rebuild. Some rebuilds are goods. Others... not so much.

 

[Maxperson]

It still amount to "not to repair".
My car did not come with a remote starter. I can always improve it by adding one. I can get better tires than the stock ones. Better wiper and so on. Adding to a game is not the same as deeply changing it. And a few minor change here and there do not amount to a full rebuild. Some rebuilds are goods. Others... not so much.

How much of a car can you change before it becomes a different car? Everything but the body? Less? Does it take a body change?

Engines can be replaced with different ones. Different tires added. You can add in hydraulics if you want to be ghetto. Lots and lots can be changed without replacing the body of the car.

I agree with you, though, that not all rebuilds are good. D&D, though, is a game built on the idea that the DM/group will like some things and dislike others, changing what they want into what they need(or think they need). Things are "broken" if the DM/group thinks it is and "repair" is something they should jump right into when they come across those.