D&D General What is adversarial DMing?

[Desdichado]

Nah. You are seeing thing backwards imo.
The DM proposes a campaign tone and theme and then the players should adjust and build characters that would fit into that campaign.

Also, I strongly believe that every DM should make a list of which classes, races and sourcebooks are allowed at any given campaign.

Guess our views on that matter are diametrically opposite.

I'm not talking about tone and theme. And I'm not talking about classes, races and sourcebooks. I agree with you 100% on that.

I'm talking very specifically on the idea that if the players don't build a "balanced party" then their chances of failure increase, because the game the GM has in mind was not built with the actual PCs in mind. Ultimately, that's the deeper root cause of my extreme position on this one very specific issue. Good GMing is GMing with the PCs in mind, not "generic campaign that any group of players could play". Otherwise, the game is unlikely to rise above mediocre to OK.

 

[Maxperson]

My experience with adversarial DMs is the DM who will agree to anything, any character, any race, any class, any homebrew, any magic items...just to get you at the table, then once play starts, punish you for those choices he allowed. Some examples, a player wanted to have a drow character and the DM allowed it, but promptly had the town guards murder the character at the first town...this was five minutes into the game, if I recall. Someone else was playing a drunken master monk and wanted an everfull mug (we started at 5th level for that game)...the DM allowed it, but in the first combat...again, less than five minutes into the game...the DM forced the character to drop the mug (I think it was a disarm) and described the mug shattering when it fell. I'd played with that DM long enough to know better than to get "creative" with characters. To me that's a clear example of adversarial DMing. If you're not going to actually allow someone to do something, play some character, or have some item, just say no. Don't say yes then snatch it away.

Put like that, it's adversarial, but in fiction conflict doesn't have to be. For instance, drow in my game are known to be evil as a general rule. There are some very few good one, but those are unknown to the common folk and even most informed folk. If someone wants to play a drow, I will let him know up front that the world isn't going to see him as a happy person and not all of them will stop to talk to him. If he chooses to play a drow with that knowledge, what happens after is fair game. The world is not required to conform itself into a happy, friendly place for every PC.

A simple definition of adversarial DMing is when the DM plays the game in an DM vs. Players manner. Not World vs. PCs, which is often part of the game, but DM vs. Players.

 

[Nefermandias]

I'm not talking about tone and theme. And I'm not talking about classes, races and sourcebooks. I agree with you 100% on that.

I'm talking very specifically on the idea that if the players don't build a "balanced party" then their chances of failure increase, because the game the GM has in mind was not built with the actual PCs in mind. Ultimately, that's the deeper root cause of my extreme position on this one very specific issue. Good GMing is GMing with the PCs in mind, not "generic campaign that any group of players could play". Otherwise, the game is unlikely to rise above mediocre to OK.

Well, good thing D&D 5e doesn't really need a "balanced party" by design. But yeah, I believe it's best to build character agnostic campaigns and let the players figure out how they want to approach the challenges.

 

[overgeeked]

First hat, worn when planning the game session/adventure: Playing the part of whatever Big Bad is involved, he/she has to plan for the defense of whatever it is the PCs are going after. This should be done within the limited resources said Big Bad has. No new or additional resources should be invented for this part, but it should be done with full malice. The PCs are the enemy.

Second hat, worn during play: The DM should be the impartial arbiter of the game, implementing the Big Bad's plan as written, but without favoritism. The DM isn't god, because in these games the gods play favorites. He/she has to be better than that.

Yeah. I can definitely see that split. I think that's how I try to run my games. The world is what it is. The smart bad guys will be smart bad guys. The dumb ones, dumb. Set everything up and let the dice fall where they may. I can plan for reinforcements to show up at a given fight beforehand, but I would consider it bad form to decide during the fight that reinforcements show up just because the fight's too easy. I like emergent storytelling with games. I want to be surprised.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Personally, it's my job as a GM to be adversarial -- I am expected to introduce adversity into the lives of the characters so that the game is about something. The point, though, is for the adversity to be honest adversity and, in the case of D&D, fair. The term adversarial GM, to me, implies that the adversity being brought is not honest or fair.

 

[bloodtide]

Adversarial DMing? When the DM sees his role as being the direct personal adversary of the players for a reason such as to stroke the DMs ego at the expense of others or fuel the DMs hate. You can't just say "an adversary" as a DM vs the players and characters by design.

In the game, the DM is set up to be an impartial neutral role in the game. The whole game world is against the characters...that is the whole point of the game.

 

[Shiroiken]

Adversarial has taken a negative connotation over the years, and I feel it's undeserved. It's a style of game that some people enjoy, including players. An adversarial DM is one who takes greater focus on the "game" part of RPG. The DM designs devious challenges, always with a chance of success, which the players must overcome (often by outwitting the DM). The movie "Escape Room" is a perfect example of an adventure designed by an adversarial DM.

This isn't easy, because the term is often thrown around by people who use it to simply refer to, "DMing styles I don't like." Which is a definition, just not a very helpful one!
<snip>
It's a constellation of behaviors that usually go to the same problem; the DM views themselves as a participant in a zero-sum game, and that their role is to win.

Not all adversarial DMs are bad, but it's very, very easy to become one. A good adversarial DM not only ensures the possibility of success, but acts impartial during the actual running of the game. A great example of this is the Tomb of Horrors, which was originally designed specifically to kill Lord Robilar, who managed to succeed instead. A lot of the earliest adventures were designed this way, with a general setup that isn't balanced specifically to the party, but rather to force them to outwit (outplay) the enemy instead.

I consider myself an adversarial DM. I setup the challenges, not necessarily "balanced" by game assumptions, then force the players to try and solve the problem. During design I might be vicious and evil, but during play I let the dice fall as they may. I used to fudge dice and use dues ex machina to force things to a specific outcome, but this isn't being fair IMO (making me a bad DM). I often joke about delighting in the player's failure, and they consider me a "killer DM." Not because I go out of my way to kill them, but because I will do so with impunity. When the players succeed, they know it's untainted by DM fiat. Sometimes it's because of their characters, sometimes luck of the dice, and sometime simply because they outwit me (I postulate that if I come up with 100 different possible outcomes, any particular group will find the 101st outcome).

 

[tetrasodium]

IMO adversarial GM as a term almost borders into the realm of jargon for ttrpgs like d&d. An adversarial GM goes from being a fair & impartial puppetmaster for the world the player characters interact with to something where players go in ill equipped with things like flashing neon sign type warning light knowledge their characters should know/consider. They might stack the deck by nerfing disabling or finding blatantly not impartial loopholes against player abilities. They might require players to do things like hit on the exact question/solution in a module & have NPCs completely ignore when players are fishing close then later blaming for not asking to speak to the mayor's assistant who never came up rather than wasting time with the seemingly fruitful & helpful mayor or whatever.

There's been a lot of other examples through the thread already, much like pornography however there is no simple answer that doesn't include "We know it when we see it" types of specificity. For that reason it's easy to look like an adversarial GM without actually being one if the slightest whiff of it is suspected.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

I feel that this short video from Colville is a good explanation (to players) about the good side of adversarial DMing. (i.e. that the DM is on their side and wants the players to win.)

I felt that it was relevant to the thread.

 

[Lanefan]

I recognize that my EXTREMELY strong feelings on this regard are unusual, so I don't try to harp on it too much. I'm a very strong believer in the ideas of GM sovereignty and player sovereignty. Building the characters that you want to is one of the hard and fast rules of player sovereignty that I have, and if I GM is going to "punish" them by not bringing a game that works for the players that he has, as opposed to some platonic ideal of a party, then to me that's adversarial and passive-aggressive.

Of course, I also have EXTREMELY strong feelings with regards to pre-prepared games. In reality, if a party creates a party of all wizards or something, then they OBVIOUSLY shouldn't be doing standard dungeon-crawling, and that shouldn't be assumed to be what the game is about. It's the GM's job to recognize that and adjust his game accordingly. Otherwise, he's messing up one of the cardinal rules of good GMing, which is that he needs to read the group and present a game that's fun for them, not some game that has nothing to do with the group.

But I don't want to derail your thread to talk too much about what is clearly little more than a personal affectation of mine, since I recognize that I've never really seen anyone else talk about this, or even very many people agree with it when I state it.

I disagree here in that I see is as the DM's job to present the setting as it is, neutrally and without regard for what particular PCs the players decide to run in it. Thus, if the players have an all-wizard party and then bite on an adventure hook that takes them into a full-on dungeon crawl then so be it: I just run it neutrally just like I'd run it with any other group of PCs.

As for adversarial DMing in general: most would probably consider me as adversarial in that I see it as my job to, fairly and without malice, try to kill the PCs dead and-or otherwise make their lives miserable and I see it as the players' job to ensure their PCs survive...or at least some of them...and prosper. I also see myself as enforcer of the rules (my job) that players try to break or twist (their job).

This does not mean it's my job to throw ancient dragons at 1st-level parties; but it does mean it's my job to play the foes they do face to the best of their abilities given who and what they are (e.g. mindless skeletons won't know a thing about tactics or focus-fire etc.) and not to pull my punches unless the situation clearly calls for it. It means that yes there's going to be gotchas; it's on you-the-PCs to take precautions to ensure there's fewer of them, but they'll still happen now and then regardless. It means that combat is nearly always going to be war.