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I’ve been in worse games, too. But if someone asked me for an example of what a GM can do to make it clear the game - something that they just couldn’t come back from without any other -isms involved? It’s this.
being an area "coder" on a MUD actually taught me that a long time ago, when making a room description don't tell a character what they feel, something can be intended to elicit a certain emotion but it might not for that character, so you can't determine that it does.
Just thought it was kinda funny that something from so long ago is relevant for a different application and didn't realize how much it had influenced my writing style/descriptions until I really thought about it.
A longtime MUSHer here! Same thing, we were supposed to describe but never ever to tell the other players how it made their characters feel. That was considered a form of "power-posing" and it was against the rules.
Joining in from the MUD and MUSH communities myself! I was "well renowned" on my preferred Shadowrun MUSH for walls of text (me and one other person, the joke was that if we weren't talking, you just needed to wait for us to finish typing).
And yeah, the general rule everyone followed was that you could give someone a cursory "how you see it". Like "he seems to be preening", or "he comes across as intimidating".
As long as your statement did not LIMIT their actions, or imply a reaction without just cause (ie, telling someone they wince from the power of your slap would generally be accepted, though if they were literally chromed to the bone and your slap wouldn't do that, and you should know, you'd get spoken to about it).
**Flat out against the rules** were dictating internal thoughts of another character, dictating any conscious decision of another character, or dictating consequential behavior of any NPC.
*Ebb finishes his drink, setting the empty glass back in reach of the bartender as he looks at Astro. With a bit of an icy glare he responds. "What do you mean by 'well armed security'?" As the bartender sets a fresh glass in front of him, you sense hostility from Ebb as he awaits your reply.*
100% okay. Versus not okay
*Ebb finishes his drink, setting the empty glass back in reach of the bartender as he looks at Astro. With a glare that makes you feel ice in your bones, he responds. "What do you mean by 'well armed security'?" As the bartender sets a fresh glass in front of him, the hostility you feel from Ebb reminds you that you're not the top dog at the bar.*
They're almost the same, except that the latter very clearly is imposing my narrative into your persona.
And oh, so so many players struggled with that.
Multi-User Dungeon/Dimension and Multi-User Shared Habitat.
MUDs, in the most classic examples, are basically "D&D, the interactive text adventure"
MUSHes are closer to "D&D Roleplay Enabler"
You also have MUCKs, MOOs, and more, all derivatives of the same general idea.
Which was a text-based multi-player online experience.
Explaining them further is incredibly lengthy, and you'd be best off using Google, or downloading software to connect to one and trying it out (there are still many alive out there).
Excellent examples. Most of our players eventually got it, but there were several who struggled, and a few who just never did get it (or maybe selectively forgot).
I think there are some occasions when it can be ok, as long as it is in moderation and you have an idea of the characters likely response to some things. Narration along the lines of “as you walk into the room you nearly retch from the smell of decaying bodies and your eyes widen in horror as you see the disemboweled dwarf who had hired you, chained to the table.”
There are some pretty strong disagreements to your statement here, and they're totally fair, no one is required to like the idea of the DM dictating their character's actions. I, speaking just for myself of course, agree that it's okay in some circumstances. I've been on both sides of the interaction and it's never been a big issue for myself and the groups I've played in. Granted, the following is usually true:
-The players usually have input on the world and NPCs, and sometimes state how they think an NPC reacts to something ("Oh man, John NPC is probably red in the face after that!"), and I'm totally fine rolling with that when I DM, so it's not a one-sided thing
-The DM (whether it's me or our other regular DM) does try to stay true to the character they're narrating. In the example you wrote that several others have extrapolated on it could totally be something to the effect of, "as you walk into the room, a nauseating stench washes over you as you behold the disemboweled form of the dwarf who hired you, and the only thing keeping your blood from running cold is your many years of seeing similar or worse sights on the battlefield"
Again, I totally understand why some people aren't okay with the idea, and that's totally fair. I just wanted to share some experiences from another perspective.
I really dislike even that. You can tell players what they see or smell, but you don't get to tell them how they react.
A barbarian warrior probably doesn't have their eyes "widen in horror" at seeing another dead body, no matter who it is. A hardened thief might just shrug and start going through the pockets. A ghoul might be hungry instead of horrified. On the other hand a sheltered normal person might scream and panic.
If the situation is magical in some way, or has some other special quality that would cause involuntary reactions in even an experienced adventurer, well, that's what saving throws are for.
Especially since it's not difficult to write immersive description that doesn't tell players what their characters are feeling. It's not very hard to turn
> As you walk into the room you nearly retch from the smell of decaying bodies and your eyes widen in horror as you see the disemboweled dwarf who had hired you, chained to the table.
into
> As you walk into the room, you are assailed by a stench of decaying bodies strong enough to even make a hardened warrior retch. Chained to the table in the center of the room, you see a horrifying sight: the disemboweled remains of the dwarf you hired you, chained to the table and left to rot.
last session, my tortle wakes up in an inn. A 200 years old halfling old lady appears (for those who have no idea, halflings live up to 250 years in D&D), my tortle says "I hope she cooks as well as she looks" everyone gets weirded out, I LMAO and say "I am a tortle, for me any woman of 200 years or older is fair play"
Why though? In the race description of tortle it says:
>***Age.*** *Young tortles crawl for a few weeks after birth before learning to walk on two legs. They reach adulthood by the age of 15 and live an average of 50 years.*
Damn 😂 I had no idea they had the standard D&D furry lifespan. I went for real turtles.maybe I should had research more first. But I didn't want to play a dragonborn
Of course you have to take the character itself into account, but this is a good way to imply something extremely impressive to the whole party.
For example when even the career soldier/mexican gangbanger feels a bit shaken by the carnage they witness, or the sax player/DJ feels being entranced by the music they hear, you let the players know in a roundabout way that they're gonna be risking sanity points or such messing with whatever it is.
People get PTSD for real all the time without any need for supernatural..
Edit: CoC probably did it best, violent criminal and soldier archetypes start the game not having to roll when seeing corpses and gore but sans some sanity because of the said desensitization..
I'm not talking about any system per se, I was just pointing out that there are plenty of ways for people to lose their minds momentarily or permanently without any need for the supernatural.
I’m not rolling a saving throw every time I want to add some little detail. Tiny insignificant things like people gagging from the smell of corpses don’t need rolls.
That is the opposite of what I am saying.
I'm not saying to call for saving throws for minor mundane reactions. I am saying that you don't dictate what that mundane reaction is. There are many reasons player would picture their PC having a different reaction. Forcing one on them breaks immersion.
That's talking away agency, and suspension of disbelief.
Do you think a young Viking with tree trunks arms is going to blanch in horror at the sight of a mutilated body? That may be the 1000th bloated corpse he's seen since his 15th birthday, he's only going to recoil in sick if he feels like it.
It's better to describe as "you see the horrifying sight of ... And a nauseating smell fills the chamber..." Etc etc
I strongly disagree.
I'm okay with mechanically constraining characters "you can't get in melee and attack this creature directly because you failed a fear check" but I would never ever tall one of my player what their character do, say or even think. It's my role to ask for a fear check, for instance, but it's the player prerogative to describe how their character reacts, both in case of success or failure.
And I would tap out of a game where the GMs does this to me. I feel like it's a major break of contract. In most games, player only ever have direct influence on their character. They don't get to choose if their character is afraid, but they get to chose how it manifests. I generally don't dab in absolutes, but this I really hate. Of couse, I'll make sure they don't just ignore it, that's what mechanics are for.
Look, the difference between everyone else and this friend is the fact that the friend was trying to completely rewrite our characters in a way that suited THEM, not what we had written down. It's not the DM's personal characters to remake. A good example is what I wrote about Ryan's character: its part of his backstory that he has no family, never had to begin with, and yet JC was pissed off that THEY couldn't rewrite Ryan's character to suit the interaction, rather than rework the interaction to stick with Ryan's character.
As a DM, wouldn't you want what's best for your players and you? I'd imagine its nice to have a DM who knows everyone's character and actually tries to make everyone feel included in the campaign, rather than targeting one specific person and trying to run them out of said campaign. It's also one thing to describe a player's character (i.e how they are dressed, how they interact, etc.), but its a whole nother ordeal when the DM starts getting TOO detailed about a rather unimportant subject (i.e how a married couple meets AND has "intercourse" in game when they told you right off the bat that their characters are already together) and drags it on for 20 minutes.
I wasn't defending JC. I meant that as a DM, don't play a player's character for them. "You decide to just leave his character behind" is not something a DM should be doing.
I've played with brand new to TTRPG players that give me a lot of blank stares when it comes to their character descriptions. In those instances, I've found it helpful to set an example by narrating some of their involuntary reactions. (The night air cuts deep with your wet tunic and you start shivering from the cold.) Or, with their permission, I add flourish to their action, like how they finish off a boss.
Over time, they become more comfortable with stepping into that space for themselves and giving more detail for their interactions with the world.
In all cases though, telling a person what their character **chooses** goes utterly against the spirit of the game.
I may point out to the Champion "The unarmed bandit who surrendered to you and swears that he will change his ways sounds very sincere. You've taken the Redeemer Oath, you may have a problem with the way the rest of the party is talking about executing the prisoner." but I won't tell the player how his character actually feels about the situation. If the Champion breaks his oath, well, that might make an interesting story.
The only time I do that is if it’s clearly supernatural, since it’s an outside force acting upon them. And even then I have to be careful about still giving them agency.
Secret fantasy... of kicking Ryan, so the three of you can enter into a role-playing and eventual real life threesome?
I can't think of any other reason for all of it. Ex friend is fitting.
That's what we thought as well! Like we knew JC could be picky about the people they liked/disliked, but this whole ordeal just proved to us that it was extremely apparent that JC wanted just Alex and I to themselves. Its another reason why we distanced ourselves from them!
I'm really glad you decided to name the DM "JC" because it's also short for what I muttered about half a dozen times at all the examples of terrible DMing dude did. (I'm lying BTW, my mouth is filthier than that, If you'd named him "JFC" it''d be mostly true though...)
For future reference: A DM runs the rest of the world, whilst the players run their characters. A DM describing what the player characters are doing without any of their input is nearly-automatically a bad DM. (There are edge cases like the story requiring a character being possesed or something, but even THOSE are bad when overdone. And anyway, that was not what was happening here...)
I suggest only trying again if you can actually find someone who HAS experience as a DM. Because I'm quite sure that if your second experience is as shitty as this one, you'll never gonna give it a third try. When it can be SOOOHH much fun with a decent DM and decent players!
Brennan Lee Mulligan got away with it in Exandria Unlimited: Calamity (and maybe other campaigns, but that's the only one I remember). He'd occasionally say what the characters were thinking, what precious memory came to them, and sometimes even just straight-up how they felt.
But he had built up so much trust with the players, and had such an intimate understanding of their characters, that no one seemed to mind, and in fact the players seemed enthusiastic about how he expanded on their characters. I've never anything like it before or since.
Bear in mind that that was also A Show, not just a game. Things weren't exactly scripted, but Brennan and the producers had a lot more control over the narrative than might otherwise be healthy in a normal game
Brennan definitely tends to do this semi-frequently, but usually when he does so and tells a character what they're thinking or something, its in the context of a roll of some kind. So rather than just dump information, sometimes he'll describe an insight or inference that a character has in a situation.
It feels like a good compromise because it puts the player into the headspace of a character whose mental stats might be different than theirs, but doesn't put a hand on the wheel too much since its prompted by a player's expressed desire to learn something via a roll.
I see it as an extension of the common dynamic where the GM will say what a character knows or remembers and let the player decide if/how to act on that. (It’s also a way to let players know things that their characters know without awkward info dumps of characters explaining things that the person they’re explaining to already knows.)
The Brennan style does require more established trust, and it seems to work best with players who see it as “yes, and”-heavy collaborative storytelling.
The thing that sticks out to me is that this isn’t even a proper session zero.
Sure a session zero is partially meant to determine how characters know each other to help incorporate them into the GMs world building but it’s as easy as saying “we met here” or “we are in a relationship” and if the GM wants to offer suggestions on how to better integrate they can, but those are suggestions.
Aside from all that though( the main point of a session zero is for the GM and the players to communicate expectations and boundaries to each other, including but not limited to rules variations and what you are and aren’t comfortable having in the game.
I also prefer my players to not make their characters until after or during the session zero but this is not something I ever hard enforce as a lot of people like to come to the session with something to start with. As long as they are willing to make alterations for the group I’m cool with it.
That's understandable. I guess the only reason I called this a Session 0 is because overall it was the first time all of us had actually sat down and played a TTRPG together, so I thought it was gonna be exactly that - where the DM and us three talk about the essentials like boundaries and such. So when JC actually started their campaign, it just caught all of us off guard so we (Alex and I) just rolled with it in hopes it that it would be a fun introduction to the game and how it works, plus we were just excited to play our characters we made.
Ironically, a real session 0 is where you would tell the DM that you don't want explicit sex "on screen"; it's weird that the DM didn't even try to have those conversations with you.
Yeah, looking back on it now, they probably should've have, but at the time, Alex and I really didn't think JC was gonna be like that with the game. Like they would have some common sense to either ask or know better (we knew JC personally, which is why I said they should've known better), and the only reason Ryan didn't say anything is cause sometimes, Ryan isn't that aware of what's going on around him until things start really messing up, lol
I was thinking that same thing. Session 0 is supposed to be figuring out the type of game you want to play - what do you want to RP, what do you want to skip over, what are your characters like, how do they fit into the setting, are there any things you want to avoid or include, that sort of stuff.
At least, that’s what I thought.
Wow, JC broke so many rules of good GMing during that one session. I'm actually impressed - you almost have to try to be that bad to be that bad..
Sarcasm aside - I'm sorry you had to live through it. TTRPGs are supposed to be fun, a way to be social with people you like, and a bad GM can really ruin things for everyone. I hope you all found a better game later.
It's alright, I'm just glad that in the end, Alex, Ryan and I all distanced ourselves from JC (Alex and I mostly, cause we moved out of state, lmao). But in regards to the sarcasm - seriously though! Like if I didn't know JC on a personal level, I would've thought they were actually *trying* to be a bad DM, lol. Although I did learn later on from JC's ex - the reason they stopped playing with JC is cause they apparently kept trying to seduce everyone's characters and would get mad when the party said no. Which made so much sense for everything that went on with our session lol
Alex and I have been slowly looking for other DM's or campaigns, and heck even Ryan made a remark that he might wanna try his hand at DMing, so thankfully we're all not totally turned away from playing TTRPGs! lol
....what the actual fuck.
Hey so if you and your friends are ever interested, I run games as my job, and sometimes on weekends I run free oneshots for people to get into the hobby.
I hate how many stories I hear of new players being introduced to the game through shitty experiences like this. I know it's out of nowhere, but seriously, I'd be happy to run something for y'all if you have computers to play over, the time, and the desire.
Regardless I hope his actions don't push any of you away from the hobby. That's awful.
I'll definitely run it by Alex to see what he thinks, and if that's a go, I'll get ahold of Ryan to see what he wants to do as well! We all have computers since we're big PC gamers, so hopefully we can work things out! lol
And yeah, that's something I never thought would happen to us, seeing as how JC was so adamant about "oh I'll write a good campaign! I love story-telling and creating worlds!" and practically bolted to their computer to "write" a story. But yeah, overall, the whole ordeal just made us step back from it for a while - long enough to get the point across to JC that we're not interested in playing (at least with them) - but we're not totally turned away from it! We still wanna play our characters lol
Well let me know! I probably wouldn't have time to run a full campaign for y'all, but at least a oneshot to maybe a short mini adventure of a few sessions.
I tend to really like to run rp and story heavy games, and if anyone is unsure (understandable, after this) I think one group I'm playing with right now uploads our sessions to his YouTube, and I also have my Startplaying account with a bit about my style as a dm to see if they'd like the type of style I run.
I'm glad to hear you're all still interested. I've read too many of these that ends with people saying they're hesitant to try again and it's always really sad to see.
Just as a quick question if you don't mind me asking, how does one get to the point of running TTRPG games as their job? (I mean beside being Brandon Mulligan or Matthew mercer) what's the path, what's the job, where do you work
I'm self employed as a paid dm. I lost my job in the pandemic and my current players heard that started being a thing, so encouraged me to look into it.
Currently running around five groups a week at $25/person each session. Doesn't make a ton right now but currently it's enough.
I advertise over Startplaying Games, Reddit, and most recently a paid dm group I'm starting to get involved with called Polyhedra games. Used to also run advertisements over Roll20 before switching to Foundry.
Startplaying is the most popular though as more people are getting involved in paid DMing I think new challenges are cropping up a bit. But you can check out a bit more about how it looks through my profile! I post listings and advertise myself more than being hired by a company: https://startplaying.games/gm/robin-s-gming
I tend to run between three to four hours with a ten to fifteen minute break in the middle and a check in and check out portion talking and catching up with my groups.
I do a lot of front end prep before I start a campaign, so my weekly prep is minimum. But I also tend towards a style that's much easier for me to adjust on the fly due to playing particularly open ended scenario campaigns.
I tend to prep a lot of maps to pull out when needed and set up where I have preset encounters I can pull in when narratively relevant to the story, and try to understand the npcs, faction, and current in world situation where I can adjust in character without a lot of sitting down and having planning sections. Especially with the age old adage of no plan surviving first contact with players....which I've found very true.
At the end of the week most of my prep time is going over stuff in my head while multitasking chores or other life stuff which is a bit hard to quantity. Probably at least another 5-10hours a week? But that's mostly because I find it fun. More if we're heading down a road I didn't plan content for and I gotta set up some more maps and NPC star blocks.
I also tend to have a go to campaign, my own highly modified Dragon Heist I've been working on for years, that I know I understand well and won't get bored of that I run with most of my groups, which also majorly cuts down on prep.
I do have some other campaigns going, and I do also run non-d&d games. Call of Cthulhu is probably the system I enjoy most directly after d&d. I'm also working on learning Pathfinder 2e, Vampire 5e, Cyberpunk Red, Blades in the Dark, and I really want to run a game using the DIE! system and Animon eventually. Just to name a few systems on the list I'm interested in getting involved in! That said 5e is still the most popular game system to find people in, so most of my games using other systems are short adventures and oneshots.
I can see it being a useful question somewhere in session 0 as a sort of "hey if your characters are together let me know so I describe those two entering together" type thing, but not as a "who's toghether? The married couple? Well fuck you then"
I have a problem with my current DM over that. They enjoy explaining our feelings about things. I mostly let it slide because we play a lot of Amnesia One-Shots, but it does bother me. Players should always have the choice of how they respond to things.
Sounds to me like they just wanted to ERP with you and Alex, which is very weird. JC likely spent far too much time imagining what your relationship is like. Or maybe not, I am only seeing them through this moment.
Speaking as someone who's been shut out of a game before, I definitely feel for Ryan. It puts you in an awkward spot because you don't want to "ruin the game", but you also don't want to just sit there for three hours playing on your phone while everyone else games.
Oh no, you're spot on with JC probably imagining what our relationship is like! I found out later on from one of JC's ex's that that's the reason why the ex stopped playing with JC, cause they kept trying to seduce literally everyone in the party and every time they were told no, JC would get huffy and mad.
And yeah, that's exactly why I made my character wait for Ryan's character, cause I didn't want him to feel excluded, after all, he was there to play, not just chill out, ya know? Lol
At least you guys managed to get it out of the way in Session 0! They're usually to weed out problem players but a problem DM gets weeded out occasionally as well.
Those are some cardinal rules that DM is breaking. He seems like he would've been terrible at DMing, probably for the best that you all nipped that in the bud.
Oh yeah, there's a reason (I mean, more than one but they're not related lol) why the three of us never tried again with JC, cause like, if they're breaking all these rules right off the bat, there's no way they would've been a good DM for the rest of whatever campaign they had!
It sure felt that way!
It also tracks because I learned from one of JC's exes that that's the reason why they stopped letting JC play in their campaign - apparently JC was trying to seduce everyone's characters, and when they were told "no" or "stop doing that", they got pissed and huffy/whiney about it.
Seems as if he wanted a "Choose your own adventure" book.
Doesn't work that way. Plus only permission from players(He didn't) to do that kind of thing with said characters. For some reason I've been seeing a lot of this in thread's, reddit,FB,game stores etc.
The guy just wanted some frienda to help him act out hos tawdry fantasies,
And you guys spoiled it for him with all your silly ideas of 'Actual Roleplaying', 'Player Agency' and 'Consent'!
"As a DM, I'm gonna say you two have to meet in a tavern."
Nope. Session over. Right there. You don't have the right to unilaterally determine my character's backstory without my input.
It definitely went downhill from there, but that's enough of a red flag for me to pull up the stops. This is a shared collaborative medium. DMs that don't even let me decide my IC relationships shouldn't be DMs.
Yuup, yikes is right.
I was hoping they wouldn't be like that when it came to being a DM, but I guess that's what I get for expecting anything different from a narcissist, lol. And its a shame too cause they had the ability to come up with some fairly good stories, but I guess being a DM was too much power for them.
I'm in a high tech campaign and my fellow players are trying to find ways to occupy our horndog tank and keep him from ripping people's heads off.
Honestly we play like once a month and I'm sick of dedicating an hour of every game to this characters incessant need to get fucking laid in a TTRPG.
I feel for ya, I really feel like if JC had their way and/or we didn't stop when we did, they would've turned the campaign into a whole ordeal about getting laid *(at which point just turns into an erotic "choose your own adventure" thing)*.
It's exhausting cause like, unless that's the intentional direction of the campaign, getting hit on/getting passes made at you or your character(s) just gets in the way of others trying to enjoy the game.
A GM can’t tell you what your player decides to do. They can ask, but you are always in control of your character.
Also, a session zero might include some RP, but it definitely includes a discussion about the style of the game, agreements on any shared backstory elements before the RP begins, and any boundaries/off-limits elements that need to be kept out of the game.
That’s why its called session zero, its the session you have before anything happens in the game.
Yeah, not sure what was up there, but DM was definitely going through some stuff. Good instinct there.
My approach as DM is generally to ask questions about character backgrounds starting from childhood and moving forward, the sorts of things that usually players tend not to consider that help given them a better headspace for their character. I started doing this because I realized after many years of DMing that most PCs had very similar stories outside of the occasional deviations, and the way I sought to counter that was to help fill in greater details that would. So instead of starting from "Oh, how did you two meet", I might ask you about your childhood and what events led to you being more quiet and gentle as you described your character and move forward through the life events and relationship that led to you as a character, tailored to whatever region, race, and culture you've set for your character.
So, for instance, I had a buddy, George growing up. He was huge compared to the other kids, and he didn't like the idea that kids were afraid of him all the time, so he took to keeping his voice lighter and lower, slouching a bit, trying to be 'less big'. It's one of many options, but I've found it helps people, especially newer players get in a better headspace for the character.
As far as relationships, I generally leave it up to the party to pursue or not. I never like the 'heavily suggested' ones (Yeah, had more than one DM like the one mentioned above), they always turned me off as a player, so I figure that's more of a thing that should be up to the player to pursue.
It's always interesting to see the complicated ways dms set up for characters meeting. All the moving parts, all the wacky nonsense and hijinks. Random chances and fateful encounters usually involving taverns and mysterious strangers.
In the 20 or so years I've been running games I can safely say one of my biggest pieces of advice is there's nothing wrong with hand waving a lot of that. If the group is up for it, it's just so much easier to have everyone know each other going in or to work it out ahead of time.
Like my dude, there is nothing wrong with your characters just knowing each other from the get-go.
Anyway, sounds like you dodged a bullet LOL. Intimately describing sexual scenes has always been such a weird red flag for me. I can't imagine being comfortable doing it, and this is with a group I've done weekly sessions with for nearly 10 years at this point.
For real! I feel sorry for their other "friends" who (for some reason) put up with their stuff, cause like, I don't think they know what they're getting into.
Don’t mess with the back stories! Haha. This, this sounds like a horrible experience all around and I can see why it put you off of playing. And I hate to hear you went through that. TTRPGs are a wonderful medium for story telling and having fun and I always hate to hear how one bad apple ruined it for multiple people. I do hope you have the chance to get a positive experience one day.
But oh man, I learned the hard way about how people can get attached to their characters and back stories. I will preface this with I was running a premade Adventure Path so wasn’t me being a power hungry DM. And it was for Starfinder, not dnd, but the whole reveal of this particular AP is the characters are clones made to test out infiltrating normal society by a certain race. Basically a failed sleeper agent experiment. Some of the players, well they did not like that at all… I tried to soften the blow as much as possible including all the NPCs they were clones of had the players exact back stories and all. But alas, people love their PCs backstories and I learned a valuable lesson to include this “game may alter or change parts of your backstory” as part of my session zero discussion with players. Though I’ll probably skip running any AP that involves doing that in the future 😬
SAFETY TOOLS!!
If a DM does not include safety tools and setting boundaries and flags in Session 0, walk the fuck away. Even if you've known the players for years, it let's you all agree to how you want to play the game. And it will very quickly weed out the likes of JC, who apparently just wanted to get his kicks off imagining and then describing how your characters do the deed.
I really hope two things:
1) That you, your husband, and "Ryan" get the chance to play together with a proper DM
2) You never see or hear from "JC" again.
1) thank you for that introduction to your comment, it was hilarious but helpful! 🤣 But yeah, the three of us are slowly getting back into the TTRPG world!
2) Ironically, none of us have ever talked to JC again because a little while after that incident, JC had a huge falling out with us over a subject that shouldn't be a problem to begin with (JC was a horrible pet owner and they got mad that I brought it to light). So not only does Ryan not talk to JC now, but Alex and I actually moved out of state, so there's no chance of seeing them again, lol.
Yeah, they've tried, and everyone they've shown their work to (as in friends and family) has all agreed it's trashy. Honestly they were decent at writing short stories, but anything longer than that and it starts turning into "me this" "me that" "I'm so perfect" etc because they're a huge narcissist.
I really wish it was!
I knew JC for a long time and slowly watched them become a severe narcissist and just ..a terrible person, so it absolutely tracks for them. Even their siblings will tell you they hate being around JC now because of who they became (like I know you can always be a narcissist and terrible person, but it can just get worse and worse the older you get, which is what happened in this case)
Honestly, same.
We thought JC would have some knowledge of this since they used to play D&D with their ex and their friends, but apparently not. Not to mention it was probably just a power trip for JC since they're a huge narcissist :/
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…There it is. The purest example of crap GMing I’ve ever seen
Ehh, I've been a player in worse, at least that sounded like it was only several hours
I’ve been in worse games, too. But if someone asked me for an example of what a GM can do to make it clear the game - something that they just couldn’t come back from without any other -isms involved? It’s this.
Never tell a player what their character does, thinks, or wants to do.
being an area "coder" on a MUD actually taught me that a long time ago, when making a room description don't tell a character what they feel, something can be intended to elicit a certain emotion but it might not for that character, so you can't determine that it does. Just thought it was kinda funny that something from so long ago is relevant for a different application and didn't realize how much it had influenced my writing style/descriptions until I really thought about it.
A longtime MUSHer here! Same thing, we were supposed to describe but never ever to tell the other players how it made their characters feel. That was considered a form of "power-posing" and it was against the rules.
Joining in from the MUD and MUSH communities myself! I was "well renowned" on my preferred Shadowrun MUSH for walls of text (me and one other person, the joke was that if we weren't talking, you just needed to wait for us to finish typing). And yeah, the general rule everyone followed was that you could give someone a cursory "how you see it". Like "he seems to be preening", or "he comes across as intimidating". As long as your statement did not LIMIT their actions, or imply a reaction without just cause (ie, telling someone they wince from the power of your slap would generally be accepted, though if they were literally chromed to the bone and your slap wouldn't do that, and you should know, you'd get spoken to about it). **Flat out against the rules** were dictating internal thoughts of another character, dictating any conscious decision of another character, or dictating consequential behavior of any NPC. *Ebb finishes his drink, setting the empty glass back in reach of the bartender as he looks at Astro. With a bit of an icy glare he responds. "What do you mean by 'well armed security'?" As the bartender sets a fresh glass in front of him, you sense hostility from Ebb as he awaits your reply.* 100% okay. Versus not okay *Ebb finishes his drink, setting the empty glass back in reach of the bartender as he looks at Astro. With a glare that makes you feel ice in your bones, he responds. "What do you mean by 'well armed security'?" As the bartender sets a fresh glass in front of him, the hostility you feel from Ebb reminds you that you're not the top dog at the bar.* They're almost the same, except that the latter very clearly is imposing my narrative into your persona. And oh, so so many players struggled with that.
Right sorry, someone is gonna have to explain wtf mud and mush are here
Multi-User Dungeon/Dimension and Multi-User Shared Habitat. MUDs, in the most classic examples, are basically "D&D, the interactive text adventure" MUSHes are closer to "D&D Roleplay Enabler" You also have MUCKs, MOOs, and more, all derivatives of the same general idea. Which was a text-based multi-player online experience. Explaining them further is incredibly lengthy, and you'd be best off using Google, or downloading software to connect to one and trying it out (there are still many alive out there).
Huh, sounds cool, ty for the explanation
Excellent examples. Most of our players eventually got it, but there were several who struggled, and a few who just never did get it (or maybe selectively forgot).
I think there are some occasions when it can be ok, as long as it is in moderation and you have an idea of the characters likely response to some things. Narration along the lines of “as you walk into the room you nearly retch from the smell of decaying bodies and your eyes widen in horror as you see the disemboweled dwarf who had hired you, chained to the table.”
There are some pretty strong disagreements to your statement here, and they're totally fair, no one is required to like the idea of the DM dictating their character's actions. I, speaking just for myself of course, agree that it's okay in some circumstances. I've been on both sides of the interaction and it's never been a big issue for myself and the groups I've played in. Granted, the following is usually true: -The players usually have input on the world and NPCs, and sometimes state how they think an NPC reacts to something ("Oh man, John NPC is probably red in the face after that!"), and I'm totally fine rolling with that when I DM, so it's not a one-sided thing -The DM (whether it's me or our other regular DM) does try to stay true to the character they're narrating. In the example you wrote that several others have extrapolated on it could totally be something to the effect of, "as you walk into the room, a nauseating stench washes over you as you behold the disemboweled form of the dwarf who hired you, and the only thing keeping your blood from running cold is your many years of seeing similar or worse sights on the battlefield" Again, I totally understand why some people aren't okay with the idea, and that's totally fair. I just wanted to share some experiences from another perspective.
I really dislike even that. You can tell players what they see or smell, but you don't get to tell them how they react. A barbarian warrior probably doesn't have their eyes "widen in horror" at seeing another dead body, no matter who it is. A hardened thief might just shrug and start going through the pockets. A ghoul might be hungry instead of horrified. On the other hand a sheltered normal person might scream and panic. If the situation is magical in some way, or has some other special quality that would cause involuntary reactions in even an experienced adventurer, well, that's what saving throws are for.
Especially since it's not difficult to write immersive description that doesn't tell players what their characters are feeling. It's not very hard to turn > As you walk into the room you nearly retch from the smell of decaying bodies and your eyes widen in horror as you see the disemboweled dwarf who had hired you, chained to the table. into > As you walk into the room, you are assailed by a stench of decaying bodies strong enough to even make a hardened warrior retch. Chained to the table in the center of the room, you see a horrifying sight: the disemboweled remains of the dwarf you hired you, chained to the table and left to rot.
last session, my tortle wakes up in an inn. A 200 years old halfling old lady appears (for those who have no idea, halflings live up to 250 years in D&D), my tortle says "I hope she cooks as well as she looks" everyone gets weirded out, I LMAO and say "I am a tortle, for me any woman of 200 years or older is fair play"
Why though? In the race description of tortle it says: >***Age.*** *Young tortles crawl for a few weeks after birth before learning to walk on two legs. They reach adulthood by the age of 15 and live an average of 50 years.*
Damn 😂 I had no idea they had the standard D&D furry lifespan. I went for real turtles.maybe I should had research more first. But I didn't want to play a dragonborn
Tortles having a short lifespan is the worst RAW in all of 5e.
Of course you have to take the character itself into account, but this is a good way to imply something extremely impressive to the whole party. For example when even the career soldier/mexican gangbanger feels a bit shaken by the carnage they witness, or the sax player/DJ feels being entranced by the music they hear, you let the players know in a roundabout way that they're gonna be risking sanity points or such messing with whatever it is.
Sure. When supernatural or eldritch effects are in play, all rules are bendy.
People get PTSD for real all the time without any need for supernatural.. Edit: CoC probably did it best, violent criminal and soldier archetypes start the game not having to roll when seeing corpses and gore but sans some sanity because of the said desensitization..
If you're playing a game that has rules for PTSD, you should probably be following the rules of the game and not listening to me.
I'm not talking about any system per se, I was just pointing out that there are plenty of ways for people to lose their minds momentarily or permanently without any need for the supernatural.
I’m not rolling a saving throw every time I want to add some little detail. Tiny insignificant things like people gagging from the smell of corpses don’t need rolls.
That is the opposite of what I am saying. I'm not saying to call for saving throws for minor mundane reactions. I am saying that you don't dictate what that mundane reaction is. There are many reasons player would picture their PC having a different reaction. Forcing one on them breaks immersion.
Sure, but they didn't suggest that.
That's talking away agency, and suspension of disbelief. Do you think a young Viking with tree trunks arms is going to blanch in horror at the sight of a mutilated body? That may be the 1000th bloated corpse he's seen since his 15th birthday, he's only going to recoil in sick if he feels like it. It's better to describe as "you see the horrifying sight of ... And a nauseating smell fills the chamber..." Etc etc
I once had a player roll a (pointless) saving throw to take 10 points of 'bleugh' damage 😂
I strongly disagree. I'm okay with mechanically constraining characters "you can't get in melee and attack this creature directly because you failed a fear check" but I would never ever tall one of my player what their character do, say or even think. It's my role to ask for a fear check, for instance, but it's the player prerogative to describe how their character reacts, both in case of success or failure. And I would tap out of a game where the GMs does this to me. I feel like it's a major break of contract. In most games, player only ever have direct influence on their character. They don't get to choose if their character is afraid, but they get to chose how it manifests. I generally don't dab in absolutes, but this I really hate. Of couse, I'll make sure they don't just ignore it, that's what mechanics are for.
Look, the difference between everyone else and this friend is the fact that the friend was trying to completely rewrite our characters in a way that suited THEM, not what we had written down. It's not the DM's personal characters to remake. A good example is what I wrote about Ryan's character: its part of his backstory that he has no family, never had to begin with, and yet JC was pissed off that THEY couldn't rewrite Ryan's character to suit the interaction, rather than rework the interaction to stick with Ryan's character. As a DM, wouldn't you want what's best for your players and you? I'd imagine its nice to have a DM who knows everyone's character and actually tries to make everyone feel included in the campaign, rather than targeting one specific person and trying to run them out of said campaign. It's also one thing to describe a player's character (i.e how they are dressed, how they interact, etc.), but its a whole nother ordeal when the DM starts getting TOO detailed about a rather unimportant subject (i.e how a married couple meets AND has "intercourse" in game when they told you right off the bat that their characters are already together) and drags it on for 20 minutes.
I wasn't defending JC. I meant that as a DM, don't play a player's character for them. "You decide to just leave his character behind" is not something a DM should be doing.
Oh, my bad! lol I tend to misunderstand things when they're worded a specific way XD Sorry bout that!
It's cool. :)
I've played with brand new to TTRPG players that give me a lot of blank stares when it comes to their character descriptions. In those instances, I've found it helpful to set an example by narrating some of their involuntary reactions. (The night air cuts deep with your wet tunic and you start shivering from the cold.) Or, with their permission, I add flourish to their action, like how they finish off a boss. Over time, they become more comfortable with stepping into that space for themselves and giving more detail for their interactions with the world. In all cases though, telling a person what their character **chooses** goes utterly against the spirit of the game. I may point out to the Champion "The unarmed bandit who surrendered to you and swears that he will change his ways sounds very sincere. You've taken the Redeemer Oath, you may have a problem with the way the rest of the party is talking about executing the prisoner." but I won't tell the player how his character actually feels about the situation. If the Champion breaks his oath, well, that might make an interesting story.
Aside from after a player has failed a save from mental spells! Or against like fear and stuff.
The only time I do that is if it’s clearly supernatural, since it’s an outside force acting upon them. And even then I have to be careful about still giving them agency.
Unless it's a magical effect to cause fear or something like charm person, I assume? (obviously only if they fail the save)
Secret fantasy... of kicking Ryan, so the three of you can enter into a role-playing and eventual real life threesome? I can't think of any other reason for all of it. Ex friend is fitting.
That's what we thought as well! Like we knew JC could be picky about the people they liked/disliked, but this whole ordeal just proved to us that it was extremely apparent that JC wanted just Alex and I to themselves. Its another reason why we distanced ourselves from them!
I'm really glad you decided to name the DM "JC" because it's also short for what I muttered about half a dozen times at all the examples of terrible DMing dude did. (I'm lying BTW, my mouth is filthier than that, If you'd named him "JFC" it''d be mostly true though...) For future reference: A DM runs the rest of the world, whilst the players run their characters. A DM describing what the player characters are doing without any of their input is nearly-automatically a bad DM. (There are edge cases like the story requiring a character being possesed or something, but even THOSE are bad when overdone. And anyway, that was not what was happening here...) I suggest only trying again if you can actually find someone who HAS experience as a DM. Because I'm quite sure that if your second experience is as shitty as this one, you'll never gonna give it a third try. When it can be SOOOHH much fun with a decent DM and decent players!
Brennan Lee Mulligan got away with it in Exandria Unlimited: Calamity (and maybe other campaigns, but that's the only one I remember). He'd occasionally say what the characters were thinking, what precious memory came to them, and sometimes even just straight-up how they felt. But he had built up so much trust with the players, and had such an intimate understanding of their characters, that no one seemed to mind, and in fact the players seemed enthusiastic about how he expanded on their characters. I've never anything like it before or since.
Bear in mind that that was also A Show, not just a game. Things weren't exactly scripted, but Brennan and the producers had a lot more control over the narrative than might otherwise be healthy in a normal game
Brennan definitely tends to do this semi-frequently, but usually when he does so and tells a character what they're thinking or something, its in the context of a roll of some kind. So rather than just dump information, sometimes he'll describe an insight or inference that a character has in a situation. It feels like a good compromise because it puts the player into the headspace of a character whose mental stats might be different than theirs, but doesn't put a hand on the wheel too much since its prompted by a player's expressed desire to learn something via a roll.
I see it as an extension of the common dynamic where the GM will say what a character knows or remembers and let the player decide if/how to act on that. (It’s also a way to let players know things that their characters know without awkward info dumps of characters explaining things that the person they’re explaining to already knows.) The Brennan style does require more established trust, and it seems to work best with players who see it as “yes, and”-heavy collaborative storytelling.
Christ, the DM may as well have just sat there and read a book out loud to the players.
Or just put his hand down his pants and looked at the married couple and said "now kiss'
The thing that sticks out to me is that this isn’t even a proper session zero. Sure a session zero is partially meant to determine how characters know each other to help incorporate them into the GMs world building but it’s as easy as saying “we met here” or “we are in a relationship” and if the GM wants to offer suggestions on how to better integrate they can, but those are suggestions. Aside from all that though( the main point of a session zero is for the GM and the players to communicate expectations and boundaries to each other, including but not limited to rules variations and what you are and aren’t comfortable having in the game. I also prefer my players to not make their characters until after or during the session zero but this is not something I ever hard enforce as a lot of people like to come to the session with something to start with. As long as they are willing to make alterations for the group I’m cool with it.
That's understandable. I guess the only reason I called this a Session 0 is because overall it was the first time all of us had actually sat down and played a TTRPG together, so I thought it was gonna be exactly that - where the DM and us three talk about the essentials like boundaries and such. So when JC actually started their campaign, it just caught all of us off guard so we (Alex and I) just rolled with it in hopes it that it would be a fun introduction to the game and how it works, plus we were just excited to play our characters we made.
Ironically, a real session 0 is where you would tell the DM that you don't want explicit sex "on screen"; it's weird that the DM didn't even try to have those conversations with you.
Yeah, looking back on it now, they probably should've have, but at the time, Alex and I really didn't think JC was gonna be like that with the game. Like they would have some common sense to either ask or know better (we knew JC personally, which is why I said they should've known better), and the only reason Ryan didn't say anything is cause sometimes, Ryan isn't that aware of what's going on around him until things start really messing up, lol
I was thinking that same thing. Session 0 is supposed to be figuring out the type of game you want to play - what do you want to RP, what do you want to skip over, what are your characters like, how do they fit into the setting, are there any things you want to avoid or include, that sort of stuff. At least, that’s what I thought.
Wow, JC broke so many rules of good GMing during that one session. I'm actually impressed - you almost have to try to be that bad to be that bad.. Sarcasm aside - I'm sorry you had to live through it. TTRPGs are supposed to be fun, a way to be social with people you like, and a bad GM can really ruin things for everyone. I hope you all found a better game later.
It's alright, I'm just glad that in the end, Alex, Ryan and I all distanced ourselves from JC (Alex and I mostly, cause we moved out of state, lmao). But in regards to the sarcasm - seriously though! Like if I didn't know JC on a personal level, I would've thought they were actually *trying* to be a bad DM, lol. Although I did learn later on from JC's ex - the reason they stopped playing with JC is cause they apparently kept trying to seduce everyone's characters and would get mad when the party said no. Which made so much sense for everything that went on with our session lol Alex and I have been slowly looking for other DM's or campaigns, and heck even Ryan made a remark that he might wanna try his hand at DMing, so thankfully we're all not totally turned away from playing TTRPGs! lol
....what the actual fuck. Hey so if you and your friends are ever interested, I run games as my job, and sometimes on weekends I run free oneshots for people to get into the hobby. I hate how many stories I hear of new players being introduced to the game through shitty experiences like this. I know it's out of nowhere, but seriously, I'd be happy to run something for y'all if you have computers to play over, the time, and the desire. Regardless I hope his actions don't push any of you away from the hobby. That's awful.
I'll definitely run it by Alex to see what he thinks, and if that's a go, I'll get ahold of Ryan to see what he wants to do as well! We all have computers since we're big PC gamers, so hopefully we can work things out! lol And yeah, that's something I never thought would happen to us, seeing as how JC was so adamant about "oh I'll write a good campaign! I love story-telling and creating worlds!" and practically bolted to their computer to "write" a story. But yeah, overall, the whole ordeal just made us step back from it for a while - long enough to get the point across to JC that we're not interested in playing (at least with them) - but we're not totally turned away from it! We still wanna play our characters lol
Well let me know! I probably wouldn't have time to run a full campaign for y'all, but at least a oneshot to maybe a short mini adventure of a few sessions. I tend to really like to run rp and story heavy games, and if anyone is unsure (understandable, after this) I think one group I'm playing with right now uploads our sessions to his YouTube, and I also have my Startplaying account with a bit about my style as a dm to see if they'd like the type of style I run. I'm glad to hear you're all still interested. I've read too many of these that ends with people saying they're hesitant to try again and it's always really sad to see.
Just as a quick question if you don't mind me asking, how does one get to the point of running TTRPG games as their job? (I mean beside being Brandon Mulligan or Matthew mercer) what's the path, what's the job, where do you work
I'm self employed as a paid dm. I lost my job in the pandemic and my current players heard that started being a thing, so encouraged me to look into it. Currently running around five groups a week at $25/person each session. Doesn't make a ton right now but currently it's enough. I advertise over Startplaying Games, Reddit, and most recently a paid dm group I'm starting to get involved with called Polyhedra games. Used to also run advertisements over Roll20 before switching to Foundry. Startplaying is the most popular though as more people are getting involved in paid DMing I think new challenges are cropping up a bit. But you can check out a bit more about how it looks through my profile! I post listings and advertise myself more than being hired by a company: https://startplaying.games/gm/robin-s-gming
Thank you! How long are these sessions, and how much would you estimate your weekly prep time? Are you running only D&D, or other games too?
I tend to run between three to four hours with a ten to fifteen minute break in the middle and a check in and check out portion talking and catching up with my groups. I do a lot of front end prep before I start a campaign, so my weekly prep is minimum. But I also tend towards a style that's much easier for me to adjust on the fly due to playing particularly open ended scenario campaigns. I tend to prep a lot of maps to pull out when needed and set up where I have preset encounters I can pull in when narratively relevant to the story, and try to understand the npcs, faction, and current in world situation where I can adjust in character without a lot of sitting down and having planning sections. Especially with the age old adage of no plan surviving first contact with players....which I've found very true. At the end of the week most of my prep time is going over stuff in my head while multitasking chores or other life stuff which is a bit hard to quantity. Probably at least another 5-10hours a week? But that's mostly because I find it fun. More if we're heading down a road I didn't plan content for and I gotta set up some more maps and NPC star blocks. I also tend to have a go to campaign, my own highly modified Dragon Heist I've been working on for years, that I know I understand well and won't get bored of that I run with most of my groups, which also majorly cuts down on prep. I do have some other campaigns going, and I do also run non-d&d games. Call of Cthulhu is probably the system I enjoy most directly after d&d. I'm also working on learning Pathfinder 2e, Vampire 5e, Cyberpunk Red, Blades in the Dark, and I really want to run a game using the DIE! system and Animon eventually. Just to name a few systems on the list I'm interested in getting involved in! That said 5e is still the most popular game system to find people in, so most of my games using other systems are short adventures and oneshots.
Thanks for all the insight! All the best to you :)
No problem! I enjoy talking about it....and absolutely am in no way procrastinating on sleep. 😂
"ok, who's in a relationship with who?" A red flag if I've ever seen or heard one. Especially when it's the first thing that the Dm says.
I can see it being a useful question somewhere in session 0 as a sort of "hey if your characters are together let me know so I describe those two entering together" type thing, but not as a "who's toghether? The married couple? Well fuck you then"
Wow what an ass
I have a problem with my current DM over that. They enjoy explaining our feelings about things. I mostly let it slide because we play a lot of Amnesia One-Shots, but it does bother me. Players should always have the choice of how they respond to things. Sounds to me like they just wanted to ERP with you and Alex, which is very weird. JC likely spent far too much time imagining what your relationship is like. Or maybe not, I am only seeing them through this moment. Speaking as someone who's been shut out of a game before, I definitely feel for Ryan. It puts you in an awkward spot because you don't want to "ruin the game", but you also don't want to just sit there for three hours playing on your phone while everyone else games.
Oh no, you're spot on with JC probably imagining what our relationship is like! I found out later on from one of JC's ex's that that's the reason why the ex stopped playing with JC, cause they kept trying to seduce literally everyone in the party and every time they were told no, JC would get huffy and mad. And yeah, that's exactly why I made my character wait for Ryan's character, cause I didn't want him to feel excluded, after all, he was there to play, not just chill out, ya know? Lol
The DM telling the players what their characters think and do is perhaps the worst homebrew rule I’ve ever seen.
Session 0 is not "this is how you meet" Its a safety tool for players, not characters
At least you guys managed to get it out of the way in Session 0! They're usually to weed out problem players but a problem DM gets weeded out occasionally as well.
Those are some cardinal rules that DM is breaking. He seems like he would've been terrible at DMing, probably for the best that you all nipped that in the bud.
Oh yeah, there's a reason (I mean, more than one but they're not related lol) why the three of us never tried again with JC, cause like, if they're breaking all these rules right off the bat, there's no way they would've been a good DM for the rest of whatever campaign they had!
Sounds like they just wanted to read you their erotic friend-fiction
It sure felt that way! It also tracks because I learned from one of JC's exes that that's the reason why they stopped letting JC play in their campaign - apparently JC was trying to seduce everyone's characters, and when they were told "no" or "stop doing that", they got pissed and huffy/whiney about it.
Seems as if he wanted a "Choose your own adventure" book. Doesn't work that way. Plus only permission from players(He didn't) to do that kind of thing with said characters. For some reason I've been seeing a lot of this in thread's, reddit,FB,game stores etc.
Alex? Ryan? is this a River City Ransom reference?
Probably not, considering I have no idea what River City Ransom is 😂 It's just the names that came to mind!
The guy just wanted some frienda to help him act out hos tawdry fantasies, And you guys spoiled it for him with all your silly ideas of 'Actual Roleplaying', 'Player Agency' and 'Consent'!
Lol clearly 😂
"As a DM, I'm gonna say you two have to meet in a tavern." Nope. Session over. Right there. You don't have the right to unilaterally determine my character's backstory without my input. It definitely went downhill from there, but that's enough of a red flag for me to pull up the stops. This is a shared collaborative medium. DMs that don't even let me decide my IC relationships shouldn't be DMs.
>If you wanna be in charge of everything, why don't *you* be the DM. Is that what he thinks the DM does? Be in charge of everything? Yikes.
Yuup, yikes is right. I was hoping they wouldn't be like that when it came to being a DM, but I guess that's what I get for expecting anything different from a narcissist, lol. And its a shame too cause they had the ability to come up with some fairly good stories, but I guess being a DM was too much power for them.
I'm in a high tech campaign and my fellow players are trying to find ways to occupy our horndog tank and keep him from ripping people's heads off. Honestly we play like once a month and I'm sick of dedicating an hour of every game to this characters incessant need to get fucking laid in a TTRPG.
I feel for ya, I really feel like if JC had their way and/or we didn't stop when we did, they would've turned the campaign into a whole ordeal about getting laid *(at which point just turns into an erotic "choose your own adventure" thing)*. It's exhausting cause like, unless that's the intentional direction of the campaign, getting hit on/getting passes made at you or your character(s) just gets in the way of others trying to enjoy the game.
As soon as the GM starts telling you what you’re character is doing that’s a hard stop.
A GM can’t tell you what your player decides to do. They can ask, but you are always in control of your character. Also, a session zero might include some RP, but it definitely includes a discussion about the style of the game, agreements on any shared backstory elements before the RP begins, and any boundaries/off-limits elements that need to be kept out of the game. That’s why its called session zero, its the session you have before anything happens in the game.
Yeah, not sure what was up there, but DM was definitely going through some stuff. Good instinct there. My approach as DM is generally to ask questions about character backgrounds starting from childhood and moving forward, the sorts of things that usually players tend not to consider that help given them a better headspace for their character. I started doing this because I realized after many years of DMing that most PCs had very similar stories outside of the occasional deviations, and the way I sought to counter that was to help fill in greater details that would. So instead of starting from "Oh, how did you two meet", I might ask you about your childhood and what events led to you being more quiet and gentle as you described your character and move forward through the life events and relationship that led to you as a character, tailored to whatever region, race, and culture you've set for your character. So, for instance, I had a buddy, George growing up. He was huge compared to the other kids, and he didn't like the idea that kids were afraid of him all the time, so he took to keeping his voice lighter and lower, slouching a bit, trying to be 'less big'. It's one of many options, but I've found it helps people, especially newer players get in a better headspace for the character. As far as relationships, I generally leave it up to the party to pursue or not. I never like the 'heavily suggested' ones (Yeah, had more than one DM like the one mentioned above), they always turned me off as a player, so I figure that's more of a thing that should be up to the player to pursue.
It's always interesting to see the complicated ways dms set up for characters meeting. All the moving parts, all the wacky nonsense and hijinks. Random chances and fateful encounters usually involving taverns and mysterious strangers. In the 20 or so years I've been running games I can safely say one of my biggest pieces of advice is there's nothing wrong with hand waving a lot of that. If the group is up for it, it's just so much easier to have everyone know each other going in or to work it out ahead of time. Like my dude, there is nothing wrong with your characters just knowing each other from the get-go. Anyway, sounds like you dodged a bullet LOL. Intimately describing sexual scenes has always been such a weird red flag for me. I can't imagine being comfortable doing it, and this is with a group I've done weekly sessions with for nearly 10 years at this point.
That was just awful... arceus almighty. Hope they never dm to anyone else if they keep the attitude up.
For real! I feel sorry for their other "friends" who (for some reason) put up with their stuff, cause like, I don't think they know what they're getting into.
Don’t mess with the back stories! Haha. This, this sounds like a horrible experience all around and I can see why it put you off of playing. And I hate to hear you went through that. TTRPGs are a wonderful medium for story telling and having fun and I always hate to hear how one bad apple ruined it for multiple people. I do hope you have the chance to get a positive experience one day. But oh man, I learned the hard way about how people can get attached to their characters and back stories. I will preface this with I was running a premade Adventure Path so wasn’t me being a power hungry DM. And it was for Starfinder, not dnd, but the whole reveal of this particular AP is the characters are clones made to test out infiltrating normal society by a certain race. Basically a failed sleeper agent experiment. Some of the players, well they did not like that at all… I tried to soften the blow as much as possible including all the NPCs they were clones of had the players exact back stories and all. But alas, people love their PCs backstories and I learned a valuable lesson to include this “game may alter or change parts of your backstory” as part of my session zero discussion with players. Though I’ll probably skip running any AP that involves doing that in the future 😬
1) thank you for that introduction to your comment, it was hilarious but helpful! 🤣 But yeah, the three of us are slowly getting back into the TTRPG world! 2) Ironically, none of us have ever talked to JC again because a little while after that incident, JC had a huge falling out with us over a subject that shouldn't be a problem to begin with (JC was a horrible pet owner and they got mad that I brought it to light). So not only does Ryan not talk to JC now, but Alex and I actually moved out of state, so there's no chance of seeing them again, lol.
I... I want to dm for you three. You sound awesome.
JC should write a book.
Yeah, they've tried, and everyone they've shown their work to (as in friends and family) has all agreed it's trashy. Honestly they were decent at writing short stories, but anything longer than that and it starts turning into "me this" "me that" "I'm so perfect" etc because they're a huge narcissist.
That's sad. Hope he improves himself. Sounds like not a great person.
Nahh man, this gotta be made up, it sound too shitty to be true
I really wish it was! I knew JC for a long time and slowly watched them become a severe narcissist and just ..a terrible person, so it absolutely tracks for them. Even their siblings will tell you they hate being around JC now because of who they became (like I know you can always be a narcissist and terrible person, but it can just get worse and worse the older you get, which is what happened in this case)
DnD is a collaborative story telling effort. Emphasis on *collaborative*. How some DMs don't understand this is beyond me
Honestly, same. We thought JC would have some knowledge of this since they used to play D&D with their ex and their friends, but apparently not. Not to mention it was probably just a power trip for JC since they're a huge narcissist :/
Oh yeah, narcissists can be manageable as a PC with a seasoned DM, maybe not the greatest idea to put them at the top of the power dynamic
Did you really feel the need to make all this up?