One of my players was my previous GM and he has a difficult gaming mentality to deal with

One of my players was my previous GM and he has a difficult gaming mentality to deal with.

During the last half of the session, the players skewed off from the main quest and looked for ways to make money during downtime.

Here's the thing that boggles me: As a player, he says he liked it because it allowed him to improve his character. He likes to improve his character and make it a bad ass and make it overall the best it could be. But if he were DM, he would judge it as we were wasting time and didn't get anything done.

I mainly want to know what do you think about this?
Not as important to me but what would you do/Is there anything to do?
This is pathfinder if it makes a difference

Use the good old strategy of letting them do whatever they want, but not without any consequences.
They wanted to sell hotpockets to gain some gold instead of investigating whatever shenanigans you said were happening in a neighbouring town ? The town has been destroyed in the meantime. Too bad.
They keep on sidequesting each time, and simply dont want to take the hint ? The Big Bad succeeded in his evil plans, while they were wasting their time getting rich just for the sake of it.

Why not just point it out to him like a friend? maybe he'll change his GM style

I'm a pretty lenient right now and allowed them try getting a drug trade started. I was referring to what I should do about his gaminh mentality.

I have and I plan on bringing it up again to discuss it. I was looking for help brainstorming things to say or something. I feel this is really messed up.

Op again. That also sounds like a petty toxic way to handle it.

Having a BBEG is a good sign you are a shitty DM.

You went to a lot of unnecessary effort just to type "ugh".

talk to your players and see where you all want to take the game.

Really now? Next you're going to try and convince me having combat in my games is bad, all conflict is wrong to roleplay and all hooks should be straightforward.

Listen, user, those tropes exist for a reason. Having a BBEG the characters can point at when shit starts going wrong is good for investment and for stakes.

>BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH BBEG UGH

making a bit of scratch on the side is a nice way to make it feel like you're not being punished for taking skills that fit your character but aren't particularly useful for dungeon crawling.

preventing it from eating significant amount of game time would depend on the skill of the dm to gloss over the details and quickly determine an appropriate result. break it down to a single skill roll or something.

if the dm doesn't feel comfortable with doing a bit of handwaving to make it flow smoothly he should just say so and the players should respect it.

>Every action has an equal and opposite reaction.

>To harsh for your group.

Well it doesn't sound like they're much for narrative. Why not have the BBEG interfere with their plans by using a proxy gang that belongs to him which cuts into their drug trade business? Perhaps the BBEG has an evil lord who has a monopoly on such dealings.

Here's hoping the BBEG at least cares about gold enough in some way for this to make sense.

I mean do you really think someone wouldn't try to take over the world if they feel they could get away with it?

Of course they would. Every asshole on this board would if they could get away with it.

It's great to have someone act as a power vacuum the players will eventually absolutely have to deal with.

If you begin a story with no ending in mind, you are a bad storyteller.

>double spacing
>use of the word toxic
I think there's another site that might be a bit more your speed buddy

People are dicks. You see, I've come through years of realizations and long time roleplaying extensive analysis thaat it all boils down to players, yes, players, either GM's or not to have a basic speck of human decenty, not even having to be fucking saints of our times or something, just be somewhat decent, and by being decent, not even good but minimally proper, then people ensure their RPing experience is nigh impeccable.

So actually wanting to create stories, plots and interesting moments with your players is bad?

Have some of the sidequesting tie in with the main plot in a small, more or less inconsequential way (but you could make it more important - totally up to you).

For example, that woman whose husband you're trying to find - perhaps he was taken in an area with lots of BBEG activity - not taken by him but his minions could be a red herring.

Or that stuff you sold to a travelling merchant, maybe a couple of days later his wagon was attacked by a group who subcontracted by the BBEG a few years ago.

You can see it as a vehicle to shove in some extra lore about the world, or the antagonist, etc. Let the players do their thing, but sneak in some stuff about the plot, that might remind them that they have a bigger mission to do.

>create stories, plots, interesting moments, with more interesting moments, upon more interesting moments, with fun moments that are a little less interesting because we have seen an aspect of this before/the players aren't leaving their formula they've made for problem solving, advancing towards even less interesting moments because one person had to leave the group for reasons, to a fraying of the story and immersion as no end is in sight so people just start to devolve into making stupid/uncharacteristic decisions, to eventually just dropping it entirely as there was apparently never an end goal in sight so players/DM got bored and anytime you talk about it usually starts off nostalgic until you get to the later sessions and get an empty feeling inside

But hey, least you dodged the BBEG meme amirite?

>As a player
>But if he were DM

"Good thing you're a player then, right faggot?" - You (in a universe where you possess a set of testicles)

Enlighten me

I was more looking for a suggestion to fix or understand his mentality better. Just because I don't feel like insulting someone for being a douche doesn't mean my generals will change.

What the fuck does BBEG even stand for? Like they are called villains guys why are saying retarded shit like BBEG.

lurk more

You aren't hear to teach your players a lesson or punish them for having fun the wrong way. This is a game. If the players aren't following your adventure hooks, maybe those just aren't the sort of experience the players are looking for. This is why session zero is so important; make sure you're on the same page as far as the core focus of the campaign. If the players want a game where they're entrepreneurs trying to get rich quick in a fantasy world, then make a story for that.

here*, whoops. This is what I get for posting so late.

That sounds a bit passive-aggressive. I do believe that you should consider the ramifications of people's actions, but a campaign is not a reality simulator, at least not in the sense that they are, first and foremost, trying to be as realistic as possible. You're there to create a story together, and in the course of that, realism takes a back seat to drama, even in simulationist games. You're setting up challenges for the party to face with an eye towards what would be fun for your group, and what's appropriate for their characters. And the ultimate purpose of all of this is to have fun.

Now, sometimes a little bit of tough love is necessary and can actually result in people having more fun in the long run. People are shortsighted and often want you to let the run wild without repercussion, but this can ultimately hurt their sense of immersion and take away the challenge of the game. They're like little kids who would keep eating chocolate cake until they got sick if you kept letting them have it. So I'm not proposing you roll over and let them get away with anything they want. At the same time, your goal as the GM is to provide them with an enjoyable experience, and if they're not interested in the type of adventure you're pushing, you should probably reassess things and try to accommodate their tastes. That means that if they're really interested in getting money through some sort of commercial venture (like selling hot pockets), you probably shouldn't smack them down to hard for it. Granted, you may have a pre-established reality in which such a thing would logically be detrimental, and you may not want to turn on a dime and throw all that out, but you do want to be flexible and responsive to your players' interests. And that means trying to rationalize and facilitate a change of events that they will enjoy.

continued
After all, designing an adventure specifically with the PCs in mind, and with a bad guy only they can defeat is every bit as artificial as later de-emphasizing that bad guy, or altering the way he fits into the setting so that the players can focus on some other mission or activity that interests them more.

>As a player, he says he liked it because it allowed him to improve his character. He likes to improve his character and make it a bad ass and make it overall the best it could be. But if he were DM, he would judge it as we were wasting time and didn't get anything done.
I'm guessing the issue, in his mind, is sort of like a cool scene that gets cut from a movie because it fucks with the overall pacing.

Big Bad Evil Guy you dumb double nigger

>Players keep skyrimjobbing off instead of moving the story forward.
>World moves on without them
>"Oh em gee. That so toxic!"

No. That's realistic. If they keep pissing off on their journey then they need to have a sense of urgency pushed upon them.
"Maybe we should stop being money grubbing shits and get a move on, or there won't be an (x) to save!"

What's really depressing is when you have to he the groups only sense of story urgency as a fucking PC cause the gm won't nut up.

>muh plot
>it's realistic!
Punishing players by destroying villages and making the world collapse around them because they spend some time fucking around in town is petty bullshit.
You didn't put a time table with "well, in X days this village is going to be attacked" you didn't planned it before hand, you just do it because you're annoyed that the players won't follow your shit doomsday plot.

>inb4 you're a player
I'm a GM who doesn't do shitty doomsday plot.

See

Oh come on, unless the campaign was specially advertised as playing destined heroes who are the only ones who can stop the darkness, burning a village because they wanted to earn a little extra cash is not only petty but absolutely unrealistic. Where were the guardsmen, or army, or other adventurers when the town burned? Why only these four individuals in the entire world were able to prevent if from happening? See, you need to keep the setting realistic.