Recently I've been reading "Reality is Broken" and it's pointed out a few things that interest me.

The author defines a game as something with 4 characteristics:

1- A goal
2- Rules as an artificial obstacle between you and the goal
3- Feedback
4- Voluntary participation.

Later in the same book the author discusses intrinsic versus extrinsic rewards- her thesis is that intrinsic rewards are basic to human happiness and that games dish out huge servings of intrinsic rewards.

The intrinsic rewards that she identifies as most important are these:

-Satisfying work- clearly defined, demanding activities that allow us to see the direct impact of our efforts.
-The experience, or at least the hope, of success.
-Social connection.
-Meaning and significance- we want to be part of something bigger than ourselves.

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(I'm only very experienced with of Rifts, Exalted, and D&D- otherwise I'd talk more generally)

Recently, dungeon mastering has slightly burned me out. I've considered giving it up for a while, or trying to blackmail another player into running th game. I'd still like to play, I'm just tired of DMing. I've wondered what a DM is supposed to get out of his game and then I read the chapters I just described.

One of the DM's jobs is to design and plan adventures and campaigns- I love it. It addicts me like heroin.

However, his other job is to "run the game" for his players. From what I can tell-

About the Qualities of a Game:

-The DM has no real goal moment to moment except to make the players enjoy themselves. During an encounter his role is to just run the monsters. While the party's in town, his role's mostly to provide hooks for adventure and facilitate/rule their decisions. By contrast, the players are seeking to survive, to win, to accumulate gold, progress through the story, and to level up. For example, last session I decided it was logical for the orcs to chase the PCs, but during the fight- what exactly is my goal? To remain faithful to what orcs are/do? To kill the PCs? To challenge them without killing them? To create fun for people?
-The DM has no artificial obstacles which prevent him from achieving his goal- if he had one. Take most rule books- most that are related to d&D style games advise the DM to change things in whatever way works best in his campaign.
-The DM gets feedback in real time and DMing is voluntary, so that's fine.

About the Intrinsic Rewards

-The DM's work isn't clearly defined and isn't necessarily demanding by nature unless the DM challenges himself. He's mostly just got to learn the rules. I built an interesting campaign world and various fun adventures- the players love them and they love the campaign. Is that my goal though? Have I "won" the game? What now- or am I not done?
-He gets the rest- especially if he's ambitious and wants to make an important game for multiple groups :)

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As for DM goals, the only one's I've been able to chase are design goals. Those are fun and rewarding, but they're very short lived. You succeed or you don't- you need a new goal almost every session, or every few sessions. There isn't generally a design goal that you can pursue for an entire campaign (unless I'm missing it).

A simple goal is to make the players enjoy your game. Yesterday one player took the day off work to play our game- it's an alright goal for starters, but it's not the same kind of goal as "Kill Gannondorf" is.

When the DM pursues game-outcomes you get a railroad.

As for DM obstacles and rules, by definition the DM may alter anything he sees fit, so the only rules he has to follow are his own.

In my case I've added a lot of rules for myself. For one, I railroad and interfere with character decisions as little as possible. For another, I attempt to improv as little as possible, so as to "keep the quality up" when I start to run dry. Another is to allow the players to roll for pretty much anything and if a dice is rolled, and I allowed it, it means the outcome is in question. It creates a lot of chaos and player-power in games.

However, these are self-imposed rules.

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Forgive the long thread, but the short of my post is this: I think d&d style games are games for the players, and aren't games at all for the DM during play and that the DM suffers for it. These games lack the structure to make the game a game for the DM.

I'm sure this extends to many RPGs and games besides those like D&D, but I can't speak generally without more experience.

So: am I right, am I wrong, and if I'm right what can I do about it?

Cool post!

1- A goal
2- Rules as an artificial obstacle between you and the goal
3- Feedback
4- Voluntary participation.

The intrinsic rewards that she identifies as most important are these:

-Satisfying work- clearly defined, demanding activities that allow us to see the direct impact of our efforts.
-The experience, or at least the hope, of success.
-Social connection.
-Meaning and significance- we want to be part of something bigger than ourselves.

About the Qualities of a Game:
-The DM has no real goal moment to moment except to make the players enjoy themselves. During an encounter his role is to just run the monsters. While the party's in town, his role's mostly to provide hooks for adventure and facilitate/rule their decisions. By contrast, the players are seeking to survive, to win, to accumulate gold, progress through the story, and to level up. For example, last session I decided it was logical for the orcs to chase the PCs, but during the fight- what exactly is my goal? To remain faithful to what orcs are/do? To kill the PCs? To challenge them without killing them? To create fun for people?

Forgive the long thread, but the short of my post is this: I think d&d style games are games for the players, and aren't games at all for the DM during play and that the DM suffers for it. These games lack the structure to make the game a game for the DM.

I'm sure this extends to many RPGs and games besides those like D&D, but I can't speak generally without more experience.

So: am I right, am I wrong, and if I'm right what can I do about it?

I'm concerned the DM's role is more one of responsibility than fun, and is primarily one of "entertainer." I think it'd be more interesting if he had well defined goals also. However, any DM vs player action requires the DM to restrict himself, since he can kill at will; and any DM and player collaboration risks railroading or the DM taking over.

Hi Nate,

One of the DM's jobs is to design and plan adventures and campaigns- I love it. It addicts me like heroin.

These games lack the structure to make the game a game for the DM.

I think if you want to remain fully in control of all aspects, then you can't have a game. A game necessarily takes away control over certain aspects, like when it's done, what your goal is, how much currency you get, etc. You can either have full control or a game. Not both.

I think it is possible to make a game where you design a dungeon or something much like you'd design a character, and so you have a capacity to design an adventure, yet it's still a game.

However, maybe that'd water down the heroin aspect? Maybe nothing short of full control will forfill that fix? What say you for yourself?

Hi Nate,

I generally enjoy both playing and running D&D, but it is a lot of work - which is why I don't run more than a few sessions at a time.

For games that have crunchy combat rules, and rely on challenge, it's a lot of work to:
a) come up with a good challenge
b) that isn't the same as previous ones and repetitive
c) and to do one for each "encounter" in a given session.

(Mind you, a similar problem holds true for non-combat games where the GM is primary producer of interesting events in the story- one person is producing a lot of the major content.)

The things that make it fun, are like being a puzzle creator or a level designer for a videogame- the fun is in making a clever dungeon/encounter/whatever and that it entertains others.

That said, because it is so much work, I very often like to play other games that do not have as much overhead- where either the players generate a lot of the events and content and I don't actually have to do more than 10 minutes of planning, if that, OR where the game system itself sets that up for me.

This is probably the third thread you've started about your dissatisfaction with D&D - why not try a different game?  You don't owe it to anyone to keep doing this if you're not having fun.

Chris

What Chris said, and I think I can distill my previous long and convulted post down to this:

Being creative is intrinsically  fun and a goal in itself.

When you pre-plan a plot, you are being creative away form the table.

When you improvise, you are being creative at the table, just like the other players.

This is probably the third thread you've started about your dissatisfaction with D&D - why not try a different game?  You don't owe it to anyone to keep doing this if you're not having fun.

Nate, are you trying to make something new, or trying to figure out how D&D is fun? It's kind of like your ricocheting between the two?

Particularly with the latter, you might simply be working under a false hypothesis - ie, the idea that there is a fun way to GM D&D, you just gotta find out how. This hypothesis might be entirely false. I've described it as stone soup before - people, under the thought that there is some fun way to GM/play D&D, invent the very ingrediants that make what is consumed have any taste. But eventually this false conclusion turned self forfilling prophesy catches up with them and...you get what is usually called GM burn out. It's the time you realise all your really getting is plain old water, which you can get without prep just from hanging out or a party, already.

You might be thinking 'But I've run so many games before and the players loved it, so it must work and there must be a way'. But as I said with your system diagram of D&D, there is no link between character creation and monsters. Any such line is your own invention. But you keep inventing, along with thousands of others, and attributing your invention to being inherent in the text.

You have never played D&D. Nor have I. Nor have hundreds of thousands who insist they have. You've only ever played your own invention, drawing on lots of components from the text and drawing your own system lines between them. I know, it sounds too absurd to possibly be true. D&D is the greatest game no one has ever played.

But as long as it sounds absurd, the stone soup will keep you in it's grip. The mercenary side of me really admires the design of that over arcing grip.

Think of it this way, could you (given some money and idle time) write a game which is not playable, which misses crucial links between it's main components, but appears playable. I bet you could. Now the only leap to make is that somebody already did.

Hi Nate,

Just making fun for others isn't enough. I'm not complaining, I just think we can make the role better. We have so many tools for creating engaging PC experiences but I can't think of many that engage the DM- perhaps why everybody else refuses to do it.

If we switch systems I'd have do GM that too :) It's not a solution, and I do enjoy the design aspects of it, just not the actual play parts.

Alright.

You all might be right about what I should do.

However: I still think I've raised an interesting point and you're all neglecting it.

You may be absolutely right about ME. The idea is still worth considering though, the idea's what I made the thread for.

The idea is this: in a gamist game, during play the DM's role is more or less that of referee. In most cases the DM is excluded from the gamist aspect of the play that he runs. He doesn't really get to take part in the gamist aspect of a gamist game. What little aspect of "game" that there is for the DM to play out is poorly defined and lacks a lot.

In a sim game I think the GM's role is better related to the sim play- he explores the situation and setting and color right alongside with the players. In a Narr game, I think the GM has a related role where he can actually explore a theme with the players and facilitate it. The role seems coherent.

But in gamist terms, the GM only really gets to be a referee and facilitator- not a gamer himself. He's partially excluded from the creative agenda. His gamist challenge is merely to challenge the players and keep them on their toes- mostly a design aspect, not a gameplay aspect.

I think your point is interesting but I think talking Creative Agenda clouds it somewhat.

When you get down to the personal goals that drive an individual you've moved past talking about Creative Agenda.  We cant really tell what motivates people towards any specific agenda but we can see in action a shared understanding of how the game will operate and what are our goals for the game and the fiction we are creating as a group.  So whether a gm is an impartial referee or an active combatant in the game doesnt really matter, it comes down to him understanding and working towards a game where success for the characters is determined by the strength of the players actions and/or whether they get lucky with dice rolls when they gamble at risks.

As for what a gm gets out of running a game like this, in my experience the people who really enjoyed running games in this style and had a real knack for it tended to either be interested in it dramatically or as design testing.  They would either love to perform and reveal their work through play, much like a actor/writer or else they wanted to see what would happen with their creation like a scientist running rats through a maze.  I ran into more of the former than the latter but that may just have been the crowd I ran with.

Hi Nate,

Natespank wrote: In most cases the DM is excluded from the gamist aspect of the play that he runs. He doesn't really get to take part in the gamist aspect of a gamist game.

Yeah, I see, you can play the monsters by the rules but there isnt anything that tells you what level of opposition to make, its arbitrary.  and your own goals are vague.  You could front up with 1 orc or 1000.

Ill try to come up with a suggestion on your terms:

1) The level of opposition should be pitched so that if the players play well, they win, and if they dont they lose.  Thats still a judgement call, but at least you have a clear guideline.  It means the players fate is in their own hands.
2) Change it up -- look for and challenge the parties weakspots.  Avoid their strengths and hit them where they are vulnerable. 
3) Use their greed to split them up
4) Force them to cooperate or lose individually.
5) Have something cool on the line as stakes for the contest.  If they lose the battle, they dont die, but they dont get the stakes.  the really phat loot!  too bad, so sad.
6) Once you have determined the right amount of opposition, your devious strategies and tactics -- have fun!  play hard but scrupulously fair - try to win.  Narrate the monsters having a victory celebration if they do win!  Let the monsters steal some of THEIR stuff if they do win.
7) Be fair, fair and overly fair to the players.  Youre playing hardball with your goal of winning and your tactics, but if there is a grey situation with the rules, or tactic that the player think should work or give them some advantage, etc... judge in favour of the players, even if you think its a bit dubious.  Show them how fair and generous you are being, to underline the point that if they lose, its not because of some stupid rule or arbitrary judgement on your part, its because they should have chosen better strategy.

Thanks for addressing the idea :)

I'm not understanding you here.  If you're playing gamist play, as a GM, you should be taking whatever encounter you've made, and going all out in terms of playing them tactically.  That's pretty much textbook gamism.

#1 is folks who are there to play a gamist game

Again, if everyone's on the same page about what they want, this shouldn't be an issue.

And again, can you talk about a time when things worked just right- in D&D or any other rpg so we have some benchmarks about what you're aiming for in play?  This is what the Actual Play forum revolves on.

As for what a gm gets out of running a game like this, in my experience the people who really enjoyed running games in this style and had a real knack for it tended to either be interested in it dramatically or as design testing.  They would either love to perform and reveal their work through play, much like a actor/writer or else they wanted to see what would happen with their creation like a scientist running rats through a maze.  I ran into more of the former than the latter but that may just have been the crowd I ran with.

3) Use their greed to split them up
4) Force them to cooperate or lose individually.

2) Change it up -- look for and challenge the parties weakspots.  Avoid their strengths and hit them where they are vulnerable.

1) The level of opposition should be pitched so that if the players play well, they win, and if they dont they lose.  Thats still a judgement call, but at least you have a clear guideline.  It means the players fate is in their own hands.

Not exactly 'challenge the players', which is a side effect, but the point to it is  make their decisions matter.  Thats all any players really want.  If the fight is mismatched on one side or the other then it doesnt matter what the players decide -- the outcome is going to be the same.  And it also makes the GMs tactics matter too, which hopefully will give you the fun youre after.

On targeting the characters weakspots.  different weakspots at different times -- not all weakspots all the time.  change it up so that they have to alter their tactics continually.  and when you target a weakspot, lower the other parameters of the opposition accordingly.  The point to it is to make the players make decisions and those decisions have to matter.  The players have designed these characters and some of the designs will be min-maxed, which is a perfectly valid design decision.  But it has consequences.  Hit them in their 'mins' occasionally, forcing them to adapt.  this also highlights the players who have designed with a 'strength through diversity'  pattern -- it allows them to shine when the narrow-focus characters are floundering.

basically the game is squad-based tactical combat right?  keep that in mind at all times.  Dont have bits in your campaign where the game stalls because someone failed an 'observe' or 'persuade' roll and so the game doesnt move on to the next high-stakes fight. 

But in gamist terms, the GM only really gets to be a referee and facilitator- not a gamer himself. He's partially excluded from the creative agenda. His gamist challenge is merely to challenge the players and keep them on their toes- mostly a design aspect, not a gameplay aspect.

Natespank wrote:

"6) Once you have determined the right amount of opposition, your devious strategies and tactics -- have fun!  play hard but scrupulously fair - try to win.  Narrate the monsters having a victory celebration if they do win!  Let the monsters steal some of THEIR stuff if they do win."

PC failure needs to be spectacular. Last time the dragon ate a PC the dragon took him alive, ate his arms, and then over a week nibbled off the rest of his bits. The players prefer for their deaths to be excellent and spectacular.

no, thats not what I mean.  I dont see the point in PC death, unless the player was bored/disatisfied with that design.  losing the contest has to be consequential, not necessarily spectacular.  There has to be something substantial on the line other than PC death.  Generally it will be opportunity lost - some phat loot they dont get, or even worse, some of their own loot lost.  And make it permanent, for whatever fictional reason, there are no second tries.  the stakes are on the line one time only, now fight and win to get them!  

Play that is oriented exclusively on the dungeon fighting type thing struggle with any kind of consequence, IMO.  Even fairly rigid mission style play can do this better.  In that structure there is a mission to fulfill, and the means are not necessarily strictly defined.  The GM may introduce surprises, previously unknown dangers, twists etc, all of which can present a risk of failure in terms other than winning or losing fights.  It seems to me that successive versions of D&D have moved away from that style of play, and put almost all their effort into the dungeon crawl style.

Yeah I think I agree with Contra, mission based play may work better for what you want than dungeon crawls do.

Take a look at this link.

http://www.indie-rpgs.com/archive/index.php?topic=21227.0

It's a very gamist game, mission based, the GM is getting a bit of drama and a lot of design and critiquing of the players abilities.

Well, I can speak for myself.  I've been DMing a D&D game for, oh, six months now or so, roughly once every two weeks (down at the Sentry Box -- woo!); the PCs just hit level 4.

I've flirted with burnout now and again.  The thing that really strikes me about your description is:

During an encounter his (the DM's) role is to just run the monsters.

On one level, yeah, that's obviously what the DM does.  It's obvious too that the players' role is to just run their characters.  That's objectively what an encounter consists of.

What's missing there, of course, is the Agenda of the people involved.  That, I suspect, is where this sort of burnout comes from -- being substantially frustrated in one's attempts to pursue a meaningful Agenda.

Unfortunately lots of games give a lot of really worthless advice about how a DM is supposed to pursue his own Agenda.  (For a rare example of one that gets it right, consider Apocalypse World.)

Speaking for myself, outside of combat I find I tend to pursue a certain amount of Right To Dream and a certain amount of Story's Around Here Somewhere, at various points.  Within combat, however, I'm probably as much a hardcore Step On Up kinda guy as any of my players. 

I'm saying that purely descriptively, though -- don't take it as a prescription.  My prescriptive advice is this:  think about what sort of Agendas you want to pursue, and when.  This positions you to be better-informed about what to actually do in order to meaningfully pursue those Agendas.

Cheers,
Roger

Hi Nate,

2- Actual Play Step - Put on your Angry DM hat, dedicate yourself to the PC's failure and try to destroy them every chance you get throughout the game. The DM "wins" from a play perspective if the PC's fail the quest.

Nope!  Who said anything about angry?  Playing hard isn't playing angry.

Hi Nate,

It was a lot of fun seeing the players step on up for the challenges- however, the stat blocks matter so much that it's more a matter of encounter design than how you run it.

As for DM Goals- I wonder if some arbitrary point system could be conceived of. +1 point if a PC spends a healing surge, +5 if a PC is incapacitated, +20 if a PC dies, -50 if 2+ PCs die, etc.

In terms of specifics... I'm dry.

I'm really liking that stunting article.

I'm too busy with school this week to DM, a friend will take over this weekend. I'll try it when I get back to DMing.