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Oct 7, 2012 -- 9:15PM, Haldrik wrote:

Tyranny is an issue. I have played with players that might have been prone to tyranny, save for the fact the culture ensured it never got out of hand. Rotating DMs curbs it. There is no chance of you assuming “you know best”. 

You'll never know then.  However, if they turned out to try to be tyrants, then you would have stopped playing under them and they never would have DMd again.  Therefore, no actually tyranny was possible. 

When you are the adventurer at the mercy of a DM, it inherently reminds you, the adventurers are at your mercy when you DM.

So what.  DMs are fair.  Save for the exceptionally rare bad DM who you stop playing with.  It's utterly irrelevant that you are "at the mercy" of DMs who do not abuse their authority.

Nice effect too is, players pay close attention to the game, especially the story and setting, because soon they are going to have to take the wheel to run it, and need it to go smoothly.

I'm not about to run someone elses game.  If that works for you, great.  Yours is not the one true way, though.  DM authority =/= tyranny.

Oct 7, 2012 -- 10:04PM, Maxperson wrote:

If they can complain about it, then they can take over as DM and run a game where they don't engage in "tyranny."

Here, we can totally agree.



I want to clarify, when I use the word “tyranny”, Im referring to a specific *gaming* dynamic. I dont mean like reallife government tyrants.

It has been my experience, the D&D game seems to attract unusually intelligent and sensitive people, who I am proud to have as friends.

I'd be willing to bet that if everyone taking part in this conversation were to come across each other and for some reason start a D&D game, someone would be designated the DM and that person would have a certain amount of latitude with regard to how they played their game.

I bet anything at all that the moment a dispute came up about how this worked against that or can this skill be applied to that sort of scenario, the DM would make a ruling one way or the other and everyone would go with it. I strongly believe that most people, in the interest of getting on with the next bit, would not go flipping through books to contest what the DM was saying, and if they did I'd be willing to bet that the DM would ask that they take it up with them after the session was over. I bet you they would drop it at that point and do so, as well.

Maybe after the session the DM would say "you know, you're right." That happens, but it doesn't change the fact that the DM had to make a call in the moment based on what was in front of them to keep the game moving. That's their job.

So if people are willing to allow their judgement to stand in game, then it's not much of a leap to allow the DM to develop the setting to a place where certain things are common and others aren't. Once you do that, it's not much of a leap to accept that some things simply aren't available in that setting.

Basically, the authority, tyrrany, right, gift or however else you want to characterise it - the control shifts to the DM. It does this not because the DM is a power hungry butt-face, it does this because it's easier to let the DM run the game. "I don't want to think about it, let's let him do it" is pretty much the sentiment we're seeing here.

There will never be a rule system for any game like this that does not inherently land the game master with the right of arbitration. How far it goes is entirely dictated by the specific relationship of the people involved, even in an organized situation where nobody knows anyone you've got certain assumptions about where the power is and who can override whom. It's a necessary part of organizing ourselves to achieve a goal and it happens everywhere.

Trying to promise that there will be no DM power in D&D is like a political candidate coming forward and promising everyone direct democracy via telepathic unicorns. It ain't gonna happen.

Oct 7, 2012 -- 11:02PM, kadim wrote:

I'd be willing to bet that if everyone taking part in this conversation were to come across each other and for some reason start a D&D game, someone would be designated the DM and that person would have a certain amount of latitude with regard to how they played their game.

I bet anything at all that the moment a dispute came up about how this worked against that or can this skill be applied to that sort of scenario, the DM would make a ruling one way or the other and everyone would go with it. I strongly believe that most people, in the interest of getting on with the next bit, would not go flipping through books to contest what the DM was saying, and if they did I'd be willing to bet that the DM would ask that they take it up with them after the session was over. I bet you they would drop it at that point and do so, as well.

Maybe after the session the DM would say "you know, you're right." That happens, but it doesn't change the fact that the DM had to make a call in the moment based on what was in front of them to keep the game moving. That's their job.

So if people are willing to allow their judgement to stand in game, then it's not much of a leap to allow the DM to develop the setting to a place where certain things are common and others aren't. Once you do that, it's not much of a leap to accept that some things simply aren't available in that setting.

Basically, the authority, tyrrany, right, gift or however else you want to characterise it - the control shifts to the DM. It does this not because the DM is a power hungry butt-face, it does this because it's easier to let the DM run the game. "I don't want to think about it, let's let him do it" is pretty much the sentiment we're seeing here.

There will never be a rule system for any game like this that does not inherently land the game master with the right of arbitration. How far it goes is entirely dictated by the specific relationship of the people involved, even in an organized situation where nobody knows anyone you've got certain assumptions about where the power is and who can override whom. It's a necessary part of organizing ourselves to achieve a goal and it happens everywhere.

Trying to promise that there will be no DM power in D&D is like a political candidate coming forward and promising everyone direct democracy via telepathic unicorns. It ain't gonna happen.

Very good post Kadim.

Oct 8, 2012 -- 8:46AM, Nelyo wrote:

I think this is the main place where I disagree with you; I think it is a significant leap, because in the one case, you're talking about a judgment call made in the middle of a session for the sake of keeping things moving and preserve the flow. People have a limited time to game during the session, and spending a lot of time on a rules dispute because people disagree about how a rule should be applied (or what should be done in a case where there is no rule) wastes that time and disrupts flow. This necessitates giving the DM a certain degree of power to make and enforce rules decisions.

In the other case, though, you're talking about creating the setting before the game even starts. The game hasn't started, so there's no flow to disrupt. Time constraints are more flexible because people can communicate about ideas electronically instead of needing to do so in real time and in person. In short, the factors that justify giving the DM carte blanche to make rules judgments in game are not factors in developing the setting, so it is a major leap to say that because we accept the DM-as-sole-referee, we should just as easily accept the DM-as-sole-world-builder. Just because I accept the DM being able to make the call on whether ray of frost is capable of freezing a ship's sails, doesn't mean I have to accept the DM being able to unilaterally say that spell point based casters don't exist.

That said, I agree with your general point that people are much more reasonable in person than they appear on forums, and that most DMs do not egregiously abuse the powers they are awarded.

Well it's not much of a leap in that once you're used to listening to people over small things it becomes easier to listen to them over larger things. I'll grant you it takes time and not everyone is won over at the same speed, but once everyone's become friends and there's some mutual respect going on it's not very difficult to envision somebody thinking up an abnormal scenario and asking if everyone would be willing to try it out.

The "before the game starts" thing is a very specific scenario where a person is starting things up from scratch or someone new is coming to an established game.

In the former case, it's wiser to just let the game ride on the core books and ask that the players not hit you with any surprises 'cause you don't know anyone. In the latter, the newcomer really needs to respect the established group's dynamic and if they're really not happy about the dynamic then there's not a whole lot they can do. The DM's role in the latter scenario is not really any greater than anyone else at the table, apart from being the one who's forced to play the heavy and preserve the vibe they've got going.