Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
Why does the stigma of the "jerk GM" still persist in our hobby?
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Tony Vargas" data-source="post: 7571001" data-attributes="member: 996"><p>Also in the 1e DMG, IIRC, EGG goes on about the need for the DM to maintain superior knowledge of the rules relative to his players, which'd also contribute. </p><p></p><p>For the first 25 years of it's history, D&D was a very DM-driven game, great DMs ran great games and jerk DMs tortured their players - both extremes did so because they could. </p><p></p><p>It really seems an ingrained stereotype at this point, with it's roots in reality, of course. You'd expect it to continue even if it were solved by a subsequent edition.</p><p></p><p>And it has, the same abuses of system mastery that let 3.5/PF players be total jerks, also worked for DMs. They were just a step down from the good ol' bad ol' days. But nothing to counter the existing stereotype</p><p></p><p>OTOH, there didn't seem to be a lot of jerk DM complaints about 4e. Mind you, h4ters had a full court press going against 4e, pushing every real, imagined, and out right fabricated criticism they thought could get the least traction...</p><p>... and jerk DMs weren't exactly a prominent talking point for them. </p><p></p><p>4e did arguably cramp the style of jerk DMs a bit on two levels: 1) The system was clear, consistent, and played best 'above board,' so a lot of jerk DM tricks, while you could still do them, were more obvious, even to relatively innocent players. 2) 4e, especially in the newbie friendly Encounters program, was embarrassingly easy to run, so players burned by a jerk DM could jump tables or take up DMing, themselves, offering an immediate alternative.</p><p></p><p> There's both a skill and a will to running a non-sucky game. You can use DMing chops for good or ill, just like players can use or abuse system mastery. Perhaps part of the problem is not just a game is flawed or merely imperfect, so if you're not careful, you can make it suck, but also that there can be 'flaws' in the game that can be leveraged (and/or used to obfuscate) when not participating in good faith, whether as GM or player. </p><p></p><p>Another possible genesis of the jerk (hey, that'd make a bad movie title) stereotype could be the way we can view games. I'm sure we've all heard '0 sum' vs 'positive sum' followed by "game." You usually hear it as an analogy for something more serious than a game, but it can apply to games, too. And, games can be negative sum, as well. Jerks approach an RPG (or almost anything else) as a negative sum game: in their view, to maximize their own experience of the game, they must not only divert a finite supply of fun from other players to themselves, but actively ruin the fun of other players to enable their own. </p><p></p><p>Contrast that with a paradigm in which each player takes turns of equal length and enjoys their own turn as much as they can, while patiently enduring those of everyone else without complaint (0 sum, but equitable), or (if you can imagine, it's maybe a little Pollyanna) one in which every player stays engaged with and enjoys each other player's time in the spotlight, enhancing everyone's fun (positive sum).</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Tony Vargas, post: 7571001, member: 996"] Also in the 1e DMG, IIRC, EGG goes on about the need for the DM to maintain superior knowledge of the rules relative to his players, which'd also contribute. For the first 25 years of it's history, D&D was a very DM-driven game, great DMs ran great games and jerk DMs tortured their players - both extremes did so because they could. It really seems an ingrained stereotype at this point, with it's roots in reality, of course. You'd expect it to continue even if it were solved by a subsequent edition. And it has, the same abuses of system mastery that let 3.5/PF players be total jerks, also worked for DMs. They were just a step down from the good ol' bad ol' days. But nothing to counter the existing stereotype OTOH, there didn't seem to be a lot of jerk DM complaints about 4e. Mind you, h4ters had a full court press going against 4e, pushing every real, imagined, and out right fabricated criticism they thought could get the least traction... ... and jerk DMs weren't exactly a prominent talking point for them. 4e did arguably cramp the style of jerk DMs a bit on two levels: 1) The system was clear, consistent, and played best 'above board,' so a lot of jerk DM tricks, while you could still do them, were more obvious, even to relatively innocent players. 2) 4e, especially in the newbie friendly Encounters program, was embarrassingly easy to run, so players burned by a jerk DM could jump tables or take up DMing, themselves, offering an immediate alternative. There's both a skill and a will to running a non-sucky game. You can use DMing chops for good or ill, just like players can use or abuse system mastery. Perhaps part of the problem is not just a game is flawed or merely imperfect, so if you're not careful, you can make it suck, but also that there can be 'flaws' in the game that can be leveraged (and/or used to obfuscate) when not participating in good faith, whether as GM or player. Another possible genesis of the jerk (hey, that'd make a bad movie title) stereotype could be the way we can view games. I'm sure we've all heard '0 sum' vs 'positive sum' followed by "game." You usually hear it as an analogy for something more serious than a game, but it can apply to games, too. And, games can be negative sum, as well. Jerks approach an RPG (or almost anything else) as a negative sum game: in their view, to maximize their own experience of the game, they must not only divert a finite supply of fun from other players to themselves, but actively ruin the fun of other players to enable their own. Contrast that with a paradigm in which each player takes turns of equal length and enjoys their own turn as much as they can, while patiently enduring those of everyone else without complaint (0 sum, but equitable), or (if you can imagine, it's maybe a little Pollyanna) one in which every player stays engaged with and enjoys each other player's time in the spotlight, enhancing everyone's fun (positive sum). [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
Why does the stigma of the "jerk GM" still persist in our hobby?
Top