GM Complaints Thread

>Schedules
Fucking this. Playing with a couple people in school and one overseas made me want to shoot myself thanks to trying to herd them all together.

The fact that all my players browse Veeky Forums so I can't talk shit about them behind their backs here because they'll recognize my posts right away.

kek

>And using their strategy against them is just asking for them to complain about how you picked on one character the whole fight.
Then fuck 'em. If your players get mad that the enemies are smart enough to use the same tactics they do, then you have shit players.

More a gripe at me, I wish I wasn't such a flake. I can run a campaign for a few months but then I lose interest in that specific campaign and limp along before canceling.

People never seem to want to play. Everyone is interested when the idea is first pitched but getting them all together or interested after the first session is next to impossible.

Going to run a 5e soon on roll20 and reading these posts is scaring me. I haven't run a game for over 3 years.

My biggest complaint is something of a meta one. A lot of the people I talk to and game with seem to confuse random chance elements and rolling of dice for actual game play decisions. To me anyway, it just seems so wrongheaded and stupid, and I don't like how it seeps into games; it's all well and good to subject players to an arbitrary and stupid set of unavoidable hazards, as long as if they roll well they can get out of them, maybe even richer in character. But heaven forbid you get a good or bad result from just declaring the right (or wrong) set of actions, without chucking some painted bits of plastic at the table. That's just not done. And there seem to be an awful lot of people who complain at the notion that there are right and wrong choices to make at all.

That I can't figure out what to give my players as gifts.

Was thinking dice boxes or dice sets.

I will tell you right now you have a different ideal of what you want from games then your players and unless you learn to cope or change them, you are going to find gaming shit in short order.

> Being this wholesome
Bless you

That my current game isn't going well, but I'm also too lazy to change it, and I can't really set up a good end to the current section.

Eh, it doesn't help the tactic is extremely immersion breaking. I get that people refer to dnd and anything even remotely similar to wargames, but its one aspect i can't get over.

Speaking of my own experiences, I've seen dice sets in every hobby store (low quality, admittedly, but frequently obtainable) and have never found a cool dice box. I'd love that as a gift from my DM or players!

For that, you would need to introduce a mechanic or ability for enemies that makes it so that their death gives a buff to the enemies that are still alive. That would lead to instances where the correct answer is instead to whittle the enemies down to lower health and then wipe them all out at once.

Aw. Thanks user.

But for real though, I've been with most of them since I was 13, so just over a decade ago, one of them four years ago, and two of them over a year ago now.

Side topic I guess but anyone have suggestions for them? Been trying to find dice that have a bird or some avian symbol on it for one player, but so far only found a set of d6s that have a feather.

...

It's really hard to get players who aren't in character to be in character. If you can get them in character, it should become less of a problem. Also, the action economy in most games is fucked anyway.

Then just houserule it away. Have everyone declare their actions by writing them down in-secret and passing them to you. Then deal with the inevitable clusterfuck. You'll kill yourself after the third round, but at least you'll be immersed!

I agree. I mean, I also appreciate that people have full time jobs, or are in university and are busy, but I also work a full time job with other hobbies. I can still scrounge up enough time to not only prepare the session, but also show up on time.

Man, a lot of those fancy dice sets are complete trash. Way too much noise on them to read them quickly. One of my players bought a set because he loves irish culture, but he used them in one session and never touched them again because he has to get real close to the die and squint to make out what number it landed on.

But yeah, you raise a good point. If I can't find something reasonable, I may wind up making dice boxes for some of them.

I hear what you're saying. Truth be told, I have the same problem, but most of the time it can't be helped. This is a hobby, after all, and real life commitments take priority, as you said. In the instances where we do have to wait for some players, we do what solo stuff we can for the players who arrived early, or just shoot the shit about the week. Talk about news from the past week, funny stuff we scavenged from the internet, conventions, or games.

I mean, we're all doing these hobbies not just because we enjoy the game, but we enjoy the company of our companions, right?

Oh I know this all so well. Mine would be people never use their character names. My biggest hate though is having to spoonfeed directions and clues to them. Never once do they go on their own initiative. Likewise, they get sidetracked from everything to out-compete themselves on who gets the most kills.

>who arrived early
>early
Strange way to say "on-time".

>we're all doing these hobbies not just because we enjoy the game, but we enjoy the company of our companions, right?
Little of column A, little of column B.

Just needs mechanics which don't allow you to ignore a combatant without suffering for it.

>early
Slip of the fingers. My bad, user.

>My biggest hate though is having to spoonfeed directions and clues to them. Never once do they go on their own initiative. Likewise, they get sidetracked from everything to out-compete themselves on who gets the most kills.
I can't tell you how much I hate this.

Sorta depends. In the system we use, the players arent any more special than anyone else aside from the camera follows them, so none of the problem dnd has where mooks never land hits. By the same vein though, its not hard to hit your target aside from a few certain enemy types.

I've certainly toyed with the idea of a fight with enemies who if their focus isnt broken (attack attempted on them), they get a buff at end of round or something.

I'm a bit confused. Could you elaborate?
Are you saying you want people to stop using dice when instead they could be making meaningful choices just by stating them?

When you've had the same players for many months, and they still do this shit:
>When players don't roleplay.
>When players don't strategize.
>When you ask what they want to play as or role they want to have in this game and they respond "I don't know..."
>When players ask "what skills are actually useful?"
>When I ask what their characters name is and they reply "Uhhhhh..."

I currently run D&D at my college, and for new players this doesn't bother me at all. But I'm still baffled when players who've been in my campaigns for months still don't learn. I've found out that some people just never lose the video game mindset.

I'm sure you've heard this before, but it really is a good idea to have a "session zero" where everyone makes their characters together and figures out how they're connected to each other and the world.

Stop reminding me that I need to write out my backstory. It's all there, I just can't seem to overcome this fucking writer's block for whatever reason.

I'll usually run a session zero with new groups, I've been with this one a while, and gave them three weeks notice of when the game was starting. They've had access to both myself and the other players via Discord for the entire duration of the three weeks for planning and discussion, and I've actively encouraged it, and answered any questions that they may have. I have facilitated everything within my power short of having a session zero, but here we are.

play online, you can join games and ghost after a single session, or even mid session. i do this all the time.

In my last campaign, I had seven players flake out without saying anything. Seven players! I had to recruit new ones constantly, and it still died out from too few players in less than a year.

If you don't like my campaign, that's fine. Different people like different things. I'd appreciate it if you told me why you don't like it, so if I am doing something wrong I can improve it. Or at least tell me you're dropping out, so I can plan accordingly. Instead we had seven fucking people just stop showing up, displaying a complete disrespect for me and their fellow players.

I did run a session zero and they still didn't do it

>When GMing: encourage my players to make backstories and tell them that I'll work them into the game, but they never do
>When playing: no GM has ever even looked at my backstories

The fact that I quite literally start some sessions with "OK we did X last time what are we going to now guys?" and it takes one guy 30 seconds to come up with a plan and the rest a solid hour of shitposting and gaming while playing to actually DO ANYTHING

I know exactly what you mean. Having played diceless games, the biggest issue that I ran in to what that people took all success or failure as direct GM fiat even if it was well within the rules as intended. It seems like dice (or other randomizers) creates a buffer zone between the intentions of the players and the GM that makes them more okay with bad things happening. If something goes wrong because of a deterministic outcome, the players blame the GM. If something goes wrong because someone failed a dice roll (even if the chance of success was extremely low), they blame the dice instead of the GM. Randomization is basically a blame-sponge.

And that bothers me, because clever ideas, character motivations, and strategic thinking are far more satisfying paths to success than blind luck. But randomization seems to perform a (nearly, depending on the quality of the group) essential social role of diverting hard feelings away from the GM.

>Player 1: I do the combat.
>GM: You do the combat.
>Player 2: I do the combat.
>Player 1: I'm bored. When do I do the combat?

Combat ends.

>GM: Alright, what do you guys want to do next? Player 1, you've got a tinkerer/inventor theme, there's a workshop over-
>Player 1: No thanks. We should rest so that we can go do the combat.
>Player 2: When do I do the combat?
>GM: Does anyone else want to do non-combat things? Go fishing, craft some neat item, talk to merchants, train a skill, find new items?
>Player 3: Sorry, I was on my phone. I can't make it next session. When do I do the combat?

Ad infinitum.

They keep being "busy" and can't make time and hardly ever talk about the game

How much gold did I get?

I loot the bodies, what gibs?

In his defense, I read your post twice and I have no idea what your point is.
Give me a tl;dr

pain.jpg

Stay strong

>One player is consistently late but says he can make it on time this time
>Get text at starting time
>'Hey man I'm gonna about an hour late got something planned'
>Texts me this AT THE STARTING TIME AND NOT EARLIER IN THE DAY
>Other players are consistently on time so decide to run anyway
>Gets mad when he finally rocks up and finds we've all started without him

I've seen this go bad in the reverse as well. Players were breaking into a bandit fortress, they killed the gate guards and immediately dumped the bodies in the moat - the bodies that had keys to the gate on them.

>Players greeted by veteran, noble, king, sorcerer, spy or other notable figure
>Order them around as though they have authority over them
>Genuinely confused when these people tell the players to fuck off and that they're in charge or that they don't obey them

>playing with a group for 2 and a half months
>players reach level 5
>fighter makes an attack
>hit
>rolls damage twice
>b-b-but i have two attacks now!!

YOU SHOULD KNOW HOW TO FUCKING ATTACK AS A FIGHTER GODDAMN

One good way to get people more invested is to actually ask for feedback. My players know I do this and are fine with it, so I just say every so often "Hey, summarize the plot for me," and get a good sense not only of how much attention they're paying and how clear I'm being, but also of how exactly the player is engaging with the game. This is not only useful for me to consider when writing future sessions, it also helps shock players into trying to remember past events and anticipate future events. Moreover, once they become aware that there will be a pop quiz, they start paying more attention.

90% of the time, people "don't care" about something because they assume you don't care about it. Think about every rogue who put all their skill points in tumble and disable device and never had a thought in the world for Forgery or Decipher Script or one of the knowledge skills. It's not just because the player is disinterested in those gameplay features, it's also because they don't think the game will ever feature that content, or that the DM doesn't care. Same with people who don't buy the basic traveling and survival gear, if the DM doesn't care, why should the player? This attitude also applies to much deeper things, like character backstory, setting lore, themes, even things like "realism" and "intrigue", here used to describe aesthetics rather than qualities. A player may assume that the princess needs rescuing and that's just the cutscene they have to deal with at the start and end of the actual game, the dungeon crawl. They assume this because they think the DM doesn't have any interest in roleplaying the princess or exploring a deeper plot involving *why* she needs rescuing.

>I loot the bodies
I actually had a player in my game complain about not having enough money (they do, but he's used to being showered in so much gold he can afford whatever he wants at level one) but at the same time refusing to actually loot the bodies of slain enemies.

This is even after he said they should have money and stuff from fallen enemies. That they're refusing to search for whatever reason.

technically not much difference right? if he misses he misses both. if he hits he hits both.

>One good way to get people more invested is to actually ask for feedback.
All you're going to get is "It's fine".

You have to make two attack rolls

You swing your sword, it cuts into him. You take a second swing, but your enemy manages to parry this swing, and your second attack misses

This isn't hard. Compared to what he s doing which is just rolling like he crit something every time

some player do that voluntarily so that you dont have the time to check the sheets in detail and find the cheat they put in it.

some players play for the mecanics with a video game mindset.

is say the worst of this situation is when there a couple last minute cancels and you have to kill the session entirely at the last minute. nothing kills the day like that.

i have TWO gm like that........fuck you! id say kill yourself but gms are a rare breed so......try to get better.its painfull to never be able to invest yourself in a character because the games keep dying.

you give GIFTS to your players? most players i know should only get fists to the face as gift.

a clever but dangerous idea, i like. could work for an encounter with undead, the essence spread back to the other still active undead.

video game mindset, a lot of people dont get that they can do anything, talk to anyone in a tabletop. so they wait for the npc to fill the quest log.

i personaly dont like session zeros, my character is made like...2 days after the game is announced with a short background that is lore friendly with the setting of the gm and most of the time related to what other players will do. zeroes feel like travel to not play to me. just an opinion of course.

stop giving yourself excuses. just to a list and the gm can use that. a literal bullet point of things, doesnt need to be complicated and the gm can use this to make a compelling story for your character.

i hate murder hobos...

I can understand somewhat him not being used to the difference in the amount of loot getting handed out more directly, but how can you complain about not getting stuff from enemies when you just walk past them?

I tend to avoid putting much of value on foes for that reason, since I find it's just a lot cleaner when the goal is to get past them to get to a bigger chest or stash or complete a mission that would net them a greater reward. I had my players squable over a rather trivial amount of gold once because one of them knocked out a bandit in a cave while away from the others and wanted to keep it for himself.

The most effective solution I've found for this is the one I gave above, ask players to explain why they're there, what they're doing. As I said, I can just ask my players to summarize the game and they will, but if you need to coax your players a bit, just try baby steps. It can be as simple as "Remind me what happened last session," (good for players who don't seem to care about other PCs, or don't seem to care about NPC names, they'll start paying more attention after this) to asking them to summarize how their character sees the story (great way to get players who don't think about backstory to actually consider it).

fucking THIS. i ask players all the time for feedback negative or positive and ive never gotten anything except: its fine, it was ok or it was fun.

i want to get better dammit!

A new person joined the group, and I had his character meet the group at a caravan loading station. He asks to tag along they say sure.

Its been 5 sessions and the other 3 have yet to introduce themselves to the new character. None of them have any idea who he his, where he is from...hes just a guy tagging along for the ride

>Never once do they go on their own initiative.
You know some people are passive or reactive players, right?

I have no idea. It's getting to the point where I stop giving a crap about what's on the enemies because, before, I was thinking that anything even remotely useful would be immediately pilfered like everyone and their mother usually does in these games

For me I suppose it's that my players consistently assume that the enemies they're facing are retarded

>Players tasked with infiltrating bandit fortress and killing leader
>Decide to task friendly spy with starting a fire as a distraction about a hundred ft from the fort
>They think this would cause most if not all of the bandits to run out of the fortress and put it out
>Furthermore they seem to think this wouldn't put the bandits on alert for intruders since the fire was clearly artificially lit
>I explain the problems in their reasoning but they insist it would work or at least empty the fortress a little
>I acquiesce and the players give the spy instructions to start the fires in a few minutes
>They sneak through fortress and get to bandit leader where they fight him
>Fire start midway through fight and I decide that the bandit leader, in his paranoia, thinks they're under attack both within and without
>He roars this to the rest of the now waking bandits and several rush out to put out these flames while others are frozen in terror at the supposed army surrounding them
>Players kill bandit leader and throw his head among bandits in courtyard
>Bandits seeing their leader dead and thinking they're under attack break and flee
>Players cheer and congratulate themselves as if using the fire to break their morale was their plan all along instead of somehow emptying the fortress of bandits
It was just so fucking frustrating. I couldn't for the life of me understand their thought process and tried to explain that it would likely alert the whole fortress but they kept insisting it would work. Eventually I just decided to cheese it and have the fire be of use but not in the way they thought. I'm still mad about it.

yes and they shouldnt stay like that at all time. a gm's job is not herding sheep. its creating an interactive world with players!

some rpgs are good at avoiding this. legend of the five rings kinda discourage players to fuck with monetary business and are not expected to gain strength by looting or equipment upgrade. a great change of pace comparing to dnd.

I had something similar happen, and I was ultimately left with two players, one who was RP focused, and one that purposely was trying to crash and burn the campaign. It ground to a halt eventually. Were you able to keep your plots going in a meaningful way that you enjoyed, or were you just trying to push the proverbial boulder up hill?

>they shouldnt stay like that at all time.
>why do peoples' personalities affect their roleplaying?
>people should only have the personalities I want them to

Not that user, but could you elaborate how they do that? You got me curious.

>It's your responsibility to lead people around by the nose

I frequently get the reverse, the ones that treat any display of authority as somehow hostile. Yes, guards are going to stop you from trying to dick-slap the king Jon, they probably should be stabbing you but they're trying to be an "are you sure?" buffer. No reason to hunt them down and poison them later.

I have players kinda like that, in that anyone of authority is met with immediate disrespect.
In a game where they start off as the lowest rank in an organization and are assigned a boss from the word go.
They all agreed to this.
They are staying lowest rank possible for quite a while at this rate

>stop giving yourself excuses. just to a list and the gm can use that. a literal bullet point of things, doesnt need to be complicated and the gm can use this to make a compelling story for your character.
Holy shit, user! I never ever thought of doing that! Oh, wait, I did. That and a shitload of other reasons why getting this shit done SHOULD be a cinch. I know it's irrational, you uppity cunt. That's why it's fucking writer's block.

If you have reactive players, yes, it is your responsibility to prompt them to action. Don't like it? Get some active players instead of reactive ones.

The nat20 meme
>Player tries to ask noble to give him his title
>I ask why
>'I don't know it'd just be cool lol'
>I decide to humor him and make him do a persuasion check
>rolls 20
>OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH OOOOOOOOOOOOOOH NAT TWENNY OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH
>Player literally gets up from chair and is parading around room before sitting back down smugly
>Noble rubs his beard and tells him that he appreciates his services and that if he keeps them up he might consider adopting the player's character into his house
>Players face drops for a moment before he freaks out
>REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE BUT I ROLLED A NAT20 REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
>Pouts for the rest of the session and even writes 'sir' next to his name and introduces himself as one in protest

My GM does this, too, and I do the same. He's a good guy, and there definitely is a bunch of shit about the way he GMs that bugs me, such as his lack of description or the way he just seems to want the players to paint the scene for him, but I sometimes feel that if I do give him my honest opinion, there's gonna go the GM.

I hate that shit. NAT 20 mind control is the worst

Then just throw something together. It doesn't have to be good but at this point you're being an indecisive cunt and fucking up your DM by not giving him anything.
>Dude I really need your character sheet
>B-But my writer's block! Waaah waaaaah my character has to be a masterpiece! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH

To all my GM brothers, you don't have to take this sort of bullshit. I've been GMing for 16 years and at some point I stopped taking any BS.

I don't sit and pray my players make character who aren't CN dickbags or split up constantly, I tell them flat out during character creation. Anyone who doesn't agree with me banning obnoxious character ideas like lone wolves can take a long walk on a short pier.

Shit, this extends to anything. If players act disruptive and are ruining the fun I give them one warning so they know they need to shape up. When they don't, I give them the fucking boot. You'd be amazed how many nerds think RPGs are their consequence-free fun land (and not just in game).

My players always trying to describe what happens instead of just what they're trying to do.

Rolling the dice before I ask them to or even saying what they're doing.

Not knowing any of the rules.

a gm is not a tv screen, vomiting entertainment for your pleasure. if you are not going to give anything, at least state that you are using this as free cable tv.

Does gold have weight in 5E? That was always a big deal for my players in olden days out of sheer virtue it was a limitation so they had to be conscious of it. Suddenly extracting thousands of currency from a dungeon becomes a problem, let alone storing and moving it.

>some players play for the mecanics with a video game mindset.
Oh I know for a fact one of my players is playing the game like that. He's upset that enemies flee from a fight they're losing, or that enemies use tactics beyond stand there mashing the attack button

THIS SHIT RIGHT HERE

FUCKING

I must have described and named the location that the party is in about a dozen times by now. Desolate icy wasteland. First thing a player does when the session starts is describe his character wiping the sweat from his brow as the intense sun beats down on him while travelling through the desert.

Might seem like a minor gripe but this shit happens constantly. Every session they ask me where they are and what they were doing, and either myself or the one player who obsessively takes notes on everything I say has to remind them. Every single session.

>your character sheet
He has my character sheet. I make sure to give him a new version every time something important on it changes, too. It's just the fucking backstory.

50 coins (of any type) weigh a pound.

What's your character anyway?

Next boss battle they get into, have three enemies which cause BAD SHIT to happen if they don't all die within a turn of each other.

I find that the key to making fun combat in turn based systems, is, ironically, to emulate the shit out of MMO bosses.

My players lack common sense, to put it bluntly. The psyker in the party tries to contact Tzeentch in the warp to play a card game a la TTS and is surprised when he experiences a daemonic incursion... from his ass. When the Daemons manifested in reality, someone got the bright idea to play poker with them, promptly betting most of the party's souls and losing them in one hand. So essentially, the Inquisitorial Acolytes decided to chance fate by betting against a being that could change fate itself. I'm probably going to give them a chance to get their souls back by the end of the campaign... probably.

if its bad enough to stop you from doing a bullet list well....id suggest reading books? like get some inspiration and not stress too much about this. anything can help a gm spark a personal adventure. family pet, parents job, etc

Fuck off Jay

I don't know who started the nat 20 skill check shit because I know it was not a rule in damn near anywhere. Nat twenties and ones are only for combat and have only ever been for combat.

amen brother
i like to set what is gonna be allowed before the game. dont like? dont play.