Things you don’t like about DMing

[Zaukrie]

About they w sessions into a campaign, when I get bored. Learning the rules. Ugh. I hate nitpicky rules so much . Players that don't know their characters at all.

 

[Zaukrie]

Spending money on rules,tools, adventures.

 

[ART!]

I hate how many things I think I need in front of me to run a game, and I can't seem to talk myself out of it. I wind up switching between too many things, which makes me anxious.

Also, when I don't immediately know the answer to something or know what to do next, I default to panicking.

If I could get those two things out of the way (I'm open to suggestions!), I would run games a lot more.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Not getting to run the kinds of games I most enjoy. I want to run old school-styled, high sim games with a lot of detail and preferably a sandbox base. Most of my players want a loose adventure path.

 

[GuyBoy]

I love DM-ing overall. I also have been blessed by having so many great players, who buy into the implied social contract of the game, specifically in regards of fun for all, including the DM.
One minor, and very occasional dislike, is if a player blames the ruleset or game system for something that happens to their character. I don’t mind if they blame me, especially if I make a mistake, but blaming the rules, while in session, does destroy the magic a little.

 

[Kannik]

The blank page. That's the part that's the biggest 'struggle' for me. For whatever reason, when I need to come up with a scenario/module carte blanche, the ideas don't flow or I get concerned "will that be good/original/interesting/complex/etc enough?" And I can spin my wheels for quite some time.

But once over that hurdle, even with only a small seed or suggestion, I can go from there and elaborate it out. Ditto if cribbing from a prewritten adventure and re-working over half of it. No problems. It's just that initial bit that vexes me.


On the premise of the thread's inquiry, while I do enjoy GMing, on the whole I much prefer to play than GM. Yet I very much agree with bsss above, it's a weird premise to me that if there's even one aspect of GMing that you don't find enjoyable or find hard or a chore then you shouldn't GM at all. If you're suffering over it, then yes, stop until you can clear the suffering (note, that doesn't mean clearing the chore or hard work or etc, it's clearing the suffering about/around it). If you dislike the majority of GMing, then sure, switch to being a player only or do it in smaller doses until you gain enjoyment. But a binary "you must like everything or else you are doomed to failure and suffering" is unnecessarily reductive (and not a good recommendation to approach our lives).