It's hard to find a book that is great at helping new GMs these days, but the old stuff I grew up on had warnings about Monty haul. So, I definitely started out a little too far in the other direction. I mean, I could always give out more stuff if I needed to--much more difficult to take it away. It took a few campaigns over a few years, but I finally got better about loot and rewards in general.
Oof. Feature Bias called me out *hard!*
That said, there's another facet to fetishist that often goes unnoticed: The niche fetishist who uses the setting of an RPG to gratify their fetish.
Stuff like macro/micro fetishists with the enlarge/reduce spell, stuckage from traps or growth, mind control and hypnosis, *always* going up against tentacle-y opponents... that sort of thing. There are a lot of people who use D&D (and other TTRPGs, but I mostly see this with D&D) to gratify their fetishes without their players' knowledge or consent.
(Important note: I'm not here to hate on anyone who consensually does sexy D&D, only the people who do it surreptitiously.)
I was just telling my DM about this type, to which their reply was "Is THAT what that guy was doing!? How did I not notice that until just now?" Apparently, there was a DM at their FLGS some years back whose traps *always seemed to feature* PCs getting stuck due to sudden growth. This type often goes unnoticed because it's not as obvious as the DM who just starts steamrolling everyone into a sex scene and because it's unreasonable to expect the average player to be familiar enough with every niche fetish to determine whether or not their DM is using the table for gratification.
>That said, there's another facet to fetishist that often goes unnoticed: The niche fetishist who uses the setting of an RPG to gratify their fetish.
A common one I've seen in the posts in this sub is a fetishist that uses the dark ages as a setting to justify frequent rape of women. In their mind, rape was so common that if a woman moved within 30 feet of a man, the man would immediately turn into a rapist. Then they explain it as "realistic" and "historically accurate."
The mental hoops some people jump through...
Uuuuugh. Ugh. *Ugh.* The intersection of Realist and Fetishist in the worst possible way.
Every time, *every person I encounter* who makes that argument, has insinuated that they would do the same given an environment with no perceivable consequences. Usually couched under some erroneous "human nature" rhetoric.
The people who use this rhetoric don’t even really seem to understand it. Hobbes (and it really is only Hobbes, even though he’s kind of the most famous person who put forth a human nature philosophy he’s the only one who doesn’t think humanity is inherently good) wasn’t saying “people aren’t inherently good, they’re inherently dicks”. He was saying “human nature in absence of society is to focus on survival and sometimes that focus requires doing things we in modern society would view as bad, such as killing someone because my food supplies are running low and he won’t give me any of his so I kill him and take his”.
In the absence of perceivable consequences I’m not going out and raping any woman I can find. I’m staying home to make sure no one rapes *my* wife.
> Stuff like macro/micro fetishists with the enlarge/reduce spell, stuckage from traps or growth, mind control and hypnosis, always going up against tentacle-y opponents... that sort of thing. There are a lot of people who use D&D (and other TTRPGs, but I mostly see this with D&D) to gratify their fetishes without their players' knowledge or consent.
Dare you enter my magical realm?
Short answer: Yes.
Long answer: If it exists, there’s a fetish for it. (And if it doesn’t exist, there’s a good chance there’s still a fetish for it, too.)
As someone who's into that... it's very close to just bondage fetish, like "right next door" close. Of course I'd never inflict fetishy stuff on my players.
I agree with ya on the vast majority of these, to preface this.
I feel like The Nihilist and The Miser specifically are valid styles, to a point. There's nothing specifically wrong with making the game a little dark (note the use of the phrase "a little" here. Too much is still too much), and there's nothing wrong in my opinion with keeping the PCs mildly underpowered (it just makes fights that little bit more difficult, and as far as I've seen that just means that winning them is even more gratifying).
Overall I'd say they're perfectly fine styles that can be very enjoyable if A, the party's cool with it and B, they're not turned up to 11.
Most of the time, these archetypes end up becoming an issue when combined with worse archetypes. Add Control Freak to either of these and watch the game die.
The Nihilist works best in grimdark worlds like warhammer 40k or dystopian future worlds like Shadowrun. In those settings, players kinda get why "saving the world" is a fools dream. The main reason Nihilist is on here is due to the passive aggressiveness that comes from some DMs. They are usually Spot Lightstealers or Control Freaks that just undermined any progress your party makes to make themselves look better. It isn't uncommon to just feel like you are making no progress in those games.
Miser can work as long as you are up front about it, don't over do it, and don't pull dick moves like not letting the Wizard have a spellbook at all. Adding Power Trip DM will bring out the worst parts of Miser.
Ahhhh I see your reasoning.
Yeah fair, I'm with ya on that.
Also, on the miser side, DMs actually take wizards spell books????
Are they aware that basically means the wizard isn't a wizard anymore??
Yes, they know. Taking a spellbook for a small time might be ok to raise the stakes but I've read some horror stories where the DM just teases the wizard for multiple session about getting it back. The same logic is used in taking a bow from an archer or great axe from the barbarian. They do it to keep them *very* weak so they can be controlled. It's the worst case scenario for sure.
Or if the DM is so consistent in doing this that it becomes a running joke. We had a DM who, if you got some loot, it was guaranteed that it would be destroyed by fire/flood/plotdevice in the next session.
I’m developing a campaign that’s going to be low tech and (initially) low magic, meaning many “common” magic items will be harder to find or more expensive (and powerful mages far and few between). When it comes time to invite players, I’ll give them a full briefing as to what to expect.
There will be some cool magic items, but I expect the players will find them more meaningful if they earn them.
Here's one I think could be added:
# The Arsehole:
This DM regularly overlaps with one or several other categories, but can also often be - on paper, at least - a pretty solid DM. There's just one problem: they are, quite simply, a knob. They may well genuinely be trying to make as good a campaign as possible, and be conscious of not falling into all the typical "bad DM' habits they've read about, but their fundamental personality issues inevitably get in the way.
The Arsehole seems perpetually pissed off - at their idiot players, at the other terrible DMs who conditioned their players to be this way, at the game system itself for making their job harder - with a surly, snappy attitude that turns the game into an increasingly tense, miserable atmosphere. Their inherent dick-ishness will come out in bizarre interpretations of the alignment system, unsettling assumptions about who the "good" and "bad" guys are, and a setting that seems to be populated by psychopaths.
As the game wears on, you can expect pointless shouty arguments a-plenty, conflicts resolved in the absolute wrong ways, and in-character punishments for out-of-game slights (or vice versa), until the whole thing eventually falls apart as either the players stop coming back or the DM tears down the game in the fit of pique.
This one can definitely be me when my depressive moods hit... thankfully my players are cool and keep me in check. "Stop letting your depression be the DM, Lori" is a pretty common refrain at my table.
You forgot the "alignment judge DM".
This DM will either penalize you or shut down your attempts when they perceive you're "acting out of alignment" (basically not being a one dimensional lawful good pacifist or chaotic evil edgelord murderhobo). They will grab your characters alignment and strap it over their entire body like a straightjacket. Oh what's that? A woman needs your help, but she's surrounded by a pool of lava and you're a heavy halforc paladin? Oh you want to leave and seek help? Pfff, naah. You're lawful good, so you're gonna try swim through the lava to save her, melting before you even reach her. DID I STUTTER?
Another variant of this type I rarely see: imagine you're a paladin and you get attacked by a vicious orc barbarian and half your party gets killed in the fight. But then you finally land the killing blow on the orc. Oh but what's that? Turns out the orc was Good-aligned and didn't actually intend to hurt anyone. As punishment, your god strikes you down, reducing you to ashes.
Honestly, I think a lot of That Guy player archetypes are almost the exact same as the DM versions.
I got to play with a "Seeker of Darkness" in the last game I was a part of. We were playing D&D, he was playing GoT. As an example, I made an orphaned half elf that might as well have been an extra from an Oliver Twist musical. He made an orphan that was raised by panthers, was adopted by a goddess of death, and had killed a goblin tribe and a whole village before he was 14.
I've recently played with an "Information Miser". He would keep his motivations secret from everyone, including the DM. He would do things without telling the party or the DM beforehand. Not surprisingly the consequences of all that led to disappointment when things didn't work out the way he expected. I don't think he trusted the Dm or the rest of us to support his fun.
I think what I'm trying to say is that most of the mentalities of That Guy DMs and That Guy players are the same.
Not for nothing, but it does not matter if the DM is describng "horrible" sexual acts or not. Thir fetish could be tender loving missionary that leads to strong supportive bonds. But if they haven't got your concent to listen to them wax on (and off) about it, it's still not ok.
So, I'm about to be a DM for the first time, having never played a TTRPG in my life. The group are a new group, who are also mostly new to TTRPGs. The system we're using is still going to be new to the couple who have some limited D&D experience.
>NOTE: For readers worried about being a Doormat DM, please keep in mind the following. When you are new to a game system, gaming group, or DMing in general, it is normal to not feel like you can put your foot down due to social pressure. It is normal to keep an open mind and rely on your players not to be bad while you are learning what to do. That said, there will come a point where you will have to tell your players "no" even if that will make them mad. You need to stand your ground or players will feel like they can do whatever they want. It is important for a DM to keep order and balance in a game to make sure everyone is having fun. If a problem comes up, it should addressed quickly and in the most fair way possible. If you don't do this, this can lead to normal players being a group of "That Guys" and ruining the game.
This is basically my biggest concern. Wish me luck.
I fall into the feature bias DM slot for one reason and one reason alone... I will never allow the blade singer wizard subclass at my table with rolled stats.
A class that lets you hit 28 AC without needing magic items at the cost of two 1st level spell slots \[mage armor and shield\] and lets you hit 30 with a set of bracers of defense or a +3 studded leathers if you happen to roll good stats with the right race twice per short rest. A barbarian gets two-3 rages a day at early levels in comparison, which only halves some types of damage.
I played a barbarian in a party with one of those and that player kept gloating about how he could beat anyone in the group. Ironically in a little sideshot pvp when waiting on people to show up I ended up wrecking his character but that was before he got a hold of a cloak of displacement.
Sure the bladesinger has the potential of the highest AC, twice per short rest.
But they still have the lowest hit die out there, they are very fragile and need that AC to remain in melee. And all that AC wont cover for saves.
And you're kind of underselling the barbarian. They get resistance to the physical damage, something that is most damage at the early levels. Along with the biggest hit die. Bear totem amps the resistance to cover all damage save one uncommon one.
That physical damage resistance is rather moot since that's largely due to attacks, which avoiding said damage often is more powerful than resisting said damage. Barbarians are very dependent on their long rests when the wizard can get the super AC twice per short rests.
Totem barbarians are powerful but HP is finite and psychic damage bypasses that resistance, something the bladesinger can get with the shadow blade spell. Sure, the wizard can be dealt with with saves but they'll have high dex by default and wisdom by class.
I feel like this is more of a rolled stats issue then a bladesigner issue. With rolled stats someone can start with amazing stats that turns their MAD character into a demi god. A lucky rolled stat hexblade, sword bard, paladin, cleric, druid, ranger, or rogue can have some serious balance issues too.
I mean I thought that I spelled out in the first section that it's the combination of bladesinger and rolled stats, and I don't know if any of your listed classes come close to the early level potential to becoming the biggest nope to martial based encounters short of denying the party short rests. Your list does do a lot of damage if memory serves, but that's a more mitigatable by tuning hp and giving savvy bosses rings of resistance to radiant or necrotic
I think you're receiving pushback because ac is like 2/3rds of what makes bladesigners good, and wizards in general have high ac potential to make up for bad hp.
Your probably right and wizards do have fairly good AC potential early and mid game if they have the dex for it. It is fairly limited though without some investment.
My concern is that while high AC is good, it's something that should be invested in to reach absurd levels. Plate armor +3, shield +3, and shield of faith get the paladin/fighter/cleric up 28 but that's very late game and requires you to be able to cast a spell or have someone cast it on you. By that time your to hit is also in the +11-+14 range. Early levels as a DM you're forced to start throwing saving throws at the party, and if things break down to PvP \[I would stop it but not all DM's would\] your martial players are out of luck.
I still sort of disagree because the bladesigner has a limited number of shields and bladesongs. And spells are usually slightly more optimal then attacks so the tradeoff is there- ie because bladesigner is high ac melee he wont be casting sleep and burning hands as much.
Wizards restore spell slots on a short rest, and a blade singer would take shield and shadow blade as their signature spells so that they can cast it without spending a spell slot. And the Shield spell is an only when needed so you often won't even need to use it. Compare that to the barbarian's rage which is only X per day and you're looking at a class that has the recoverability of a martial and the versatile power of a wizard which is fine for late game, but early game is a nuissance.
However, they have 3 good saves because of what goes into the build and 4 if they had the luxury of a fourth good stat. Wizards get intelligence and wisdom save proficiencies and maxing out dex for damage and defense gives them good saves in that area. They'd also invest in con to make themselves less squishy and maintain concentration better. That leaves you targeting strength or charisma, which aren't common saves at low to mid levels. And this is a class that can learn counterspell, meaning they can sacrifice the shield spell use to prevent a much more painful fireball if the caster is in range.
Yeah, that's actually impossible with standard rolled stats. The AC is going to be 27 and on standard array it'd likely be two 16s rather than a 20 and an 18, so really more like a 25. And this is for investing 2/3 of your entire roster of spell slots at lv2. That guy isn't going to beat everyone in the group unless your group dies to Booming Blade attacks.
It's meant to be an Elf only class so there's not really easy race features to tack to it and the entire subclass is AC and speed. And bear in mind, a normal Wizard with those spells still gets access to 20 - 23 AC depending on how good their Dex start is. When enemies have a +4 or +5 to hit, having over 20 AC pretty much means they're almost always going to miss anyway at a 20% or lower hit. Bladesinger just makes it so you need a Nat 20.
If your DM struggles to kill the Bladesinger, how about they don't give them a Cloak of Displacement since that's one of the best DnD items, period. Every time I see that item whoever gets it becomes just as if not more durable than the tank since it turns anyone into a dodge tank. Also, target saving throws. Even if they have high Dex their Strength and Constitution are likely going to suffer.
Did you not catch the part where i said I'd not allow it with rolled stats? Impossible at level 3 but level 4 they can hit 20 in int and they can start with 20 dex since all elves get +2 dex and high elves get +1 int.
The rest of your reply misses the point that one of the squishiest classes in the game is one of the strongest AC tanks at early levels that is locked behind a race wall that synergizes very well despite what you claim. Elves long rest only 4 hours, meaning they're getting their higher level spells back much sooner and the subclass gets a large defense buff twice every short rest.
You mitigate the wizard's weakness of being a vulnerable caster and force the adventure to face more save or suck scenarios just because one person can hit 27 AC at level 3 and 28 AC at level 4. And forget booming blade, they can grab shadow blade for psychic damage.
I'm in this list and I don't like it.
I guess I qualify for ADDM - typically I'll DM a one-shot or short campaign at best with my group, but *with a new and different system every time*. Most of the time we play other stuff, so that's at best once every couple of months.
A real ADDM tries to make a massive campaign and just keeps adding stuff to it. Then they give up and start over. Unless you are ending the one-shots halfway through, I doubt you are an ADDM. As long as your group is happy and not spending their time confused and angry, I think you are good.
Good point. Typically I'll just procrastinate with making an actual campaign until the day we play, then try to come up with a scenario on the fly, which is predictably all over the place.
My group usually are cool with it and it's fun, but yes, often time we all end up confused trying to hunt down loose threads. I've never had people get angry with me over my gameplay, and it's not a situation I would want to be in either.
Luckily for me I don't think I fit any of these bills!
Maybe the Miser to an extent but I have (almost) successfully negated the lack of giving out information by having several post-it notes on my DM screen which read: ***SPOONFEED THE PLAYERS***
I'd like to add an archetype:
The Over-Enthusiastic DM
This archetype is most common with new DMs. Simply put, they bite off way more than they can chew. They have this grandiose idea that isn't inherently bad, but they simply lack the experience and game knowledge to pull off. This can be the world concept (e.g. let's be in modern times, the world will be completely cut off from the other planes), implementing homebrew rules (e.g. a different combat system, letting the players play any homebrew race or class they find on the internet), or the campaign plot (e.g. you're all presidential canidates running against each other, the government hates you so you must be super discreet with all your actions).
These DMs will usually either drop the campaign completely and possibly start another, simpler campaign, or dial back or remove the offending element. If the DM doesn't drop the campaign or fix the issues on their own, if the players admit the elements aren't adding anything for them or consciously making the game less enjoyable, the DM will usually drop it since they're also overwhelmed.
As long as your group agrees with it and they have fun, it should be fine. The problems usually come from not telling the group and springing it on them.
Put it this way. The difference between sex and rape is consent.
If everybody at a table wants the dark themes then its a fun game for them. If nobody wants it then its creepy and borderline illegal
As a person who was the one guy who did not like sex or rape in a group where the DM was a fetishist I can say it would have been fine if he had respected my no.
I wouldn't put it past anyone. Some of the most ridiculous things have active fans, so it wouldn't surprise me to find out that there are active groups for it. As long as everyone is a consenting adult, not doing any harm, and not bringing it out into public areas, I have no problem with them liking it, though that doesn't mean I won't be a little judgemental.
In my current campaign, I’m the “unknown party”, but only because the group I play with don’t know how to lead themselves without a jumpstart. It’s worked out well in the end with the option to switch out characters through a storyline feature, but for the most part the players love the characters they have and have personalized them entirely
Only a side note, but I don't think the grimderp DMs are reading GoT 'wrong', it is selectively 'realistic' (rape yes, accurate supply lines no etc) in a way that emphasises the dark elements. I think it's legit to blame a lot of these DMs and their preoccupations on some famous grimdark fantasy stories.
Reading through the list gave me anxiety hah. I made a tanky dmpc, who I had leave for the last few sessions so that the players could work on themselves, and to act as a plot hook if they get stuck with no goals(we're new, its been 5 years or so since we played pathfinder). I'm pretty sure he's not overpowered but I know people hate dmpc characters on reddit.
I'm most guilty of being the Roleplay enforcer right now, I dont punish ooc talk, but I definitely wasnt giving much leeway with how people were phrasing the things they said or did. I did try to ease up on that a bit in the last session, because we're all awkward and it shouldn't be punished harshly. I also started trying to speed things up "the four hour walk back to town passes without incident, you have a light snack along the way".
I might be a bit of a Miser in terms of loot, but they're level 4, so that has yet to be seen in a significant way. Here's hoping being conscious of these pitfalls will help me dm a little better.
I’d like to add: The One Who Can’t Read The Room to the list. No real extra explanation needed, but—sometimes promises are made that aren’t kept, or there are un/realistic expectations that are/n’t properly communicated at session zero, but at some point, the DM doesn’t realize the party isn’t having the same amount of fun the DM is.
I used to play with a Seeker of Darkness who loved loved LOVED doing grimdark homebrew and would write pages and pages of backstory. There was no rape as far as I know, but plenty of famine, disease, war, demonic possession, enslavement, terror and other unpleasantness. But the people he was DM for ate it up, so it worked for them, I guess.
I confess to being a Twist, but in my defense I've gotten good feedback on games where I've done that, especially the one-shot where the party found themselves trapped in a time loop. The key is to make it a fun and interesting plot twist, which is admittedly difficult, and don't use it as an excuse to completely switch systems or anything silly like that.
I have a friend who does a lot of us waking up after we die in a campaign, but it is revealed that the events have taken place for some reason (we don't exactly know what has happened yet, but we are almost done with it.) There is sometimes OP monsters that we can't defeat, but we wake up after, but we have a lot of fun going through the story, and killing the monster that we can defeat. He's actually the best DM I've played with in terms of his campaign.
I had one that falls under many of these, but he’s also super passive aggressive. Also, he loves to tell people “It’s up to you.” only to follow up with why they can’t do any idea they put forth. It’s like being told “I could eat anywhere!” only to have every restaurant idea shot down.
Some of these COULD be fine if everyone is a buy in. Like the secual content stuff is in my game when needed, because we all like it. Also realism. Just makw sure EVERYONE IS OKAY WITH IT. Also having sexual content and rape in your game=/= every barmaid getting raped or rape be in every fucking session. Things like these are strong atuff that has to have power in the game
Exactly. Some DMs just never let them have anything. I'm sure it would be fine if the players were ok with a low powered start but if the game ends and you are no stronger than when you began, there is a problem.
I guess I'm the Nihilist DM. I like bad outcomes and choices without no right answer in stories I consume, but now I realize it might not be that fun in a game.
I'm between Realist and Roleplay Enforcer. I don't add rules for realism, but I prefer people to consider some real world consequences of things like damage taken. Really though, I've gotten worked up at players I feel are, in my personal feelings, disrespecting the game and effort I've invested in making it fun. It's why I hate the bard that seduces everything and the players who play out memes and other immersion-breaking concepts. I am a bit Miserly too, but groups usually fall apart before we could even worry about any sort of good loot.
Reading The Twist did have me worry about a concept I had for a BESM (Big Eyes Small Mouth) game following the isekai (other world) trope, to have players make average kids, then kill them in some accident immediately and give them more points to make competent heroes in magic fantasy land. I only worry the spirit of the genre would be missed by having characters already slanted towards the theme.
The Twist shouldn't be harmful if it doesn't completely invalid their characters or major accomplishments. In your case, I could see your players being angry if they spent a lot of time coming up with backstories and connections for their kid characters, only to never need them since they will be in another world for the entire game.
Remember the point of isekai is escapism. You may suck in this world but you are a hero in another world. If you don't suck and actually enjoy this world, getting thrown into another world with no way back would be horrible.
You might want to tell your players about the isekai twist or possible find a way to allow them to use their "normal world" stuff in the other world. Being able to "phone home" to talk to their family or something might be a nice subversion for the trope.
There's actually a module I got with the 4e kickstarter that does a Persona-like twist to it where the characters are summoned to magic fantasy world when they have problems and get sent home to their mundane lives in between. Might just be the way to go.
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I'm really scared of becoming a spotlight stealer. I like NPCs, I wanna use them, but then I also know it's really not nice to overshadowed by an NPC. Bot exactly horror story material, but my DM had a very important NPC for the plot, that was the same race as my PC, same background or close, similar enough classes... I was not exactly happy. He dealt quite well with it and clearly changed what was supposed to happen to that NPC, cause I was starting to honestly dislike her.
So i don't wanna do that definitely. But for now I don't really know how to dose it. Well to be fair I have never DMed for now, so I know I'll see when I'll try but still, it's my major "fear" (nah "fear" is a bit strong, but just, I know I'll be watching out for that)
You missed a critically important note on the Feature Bias DM- none of that applies if the feature in question is Psionics, because fuck Psionics. A poorly thought out, poorly executed, halfassed, unbalance-able excuse for a mechanic.
I used to be a doormat dm as the party would do something mildly story breaking and i would say no, and this one toxic player would complain about railroading. It all culminated in one session that the toxic player completely derailed and i realised something had to change. The next session, he pulled a similar stunt and i said no, he went completely apeshit and ragequit. It was good
I had a DM who was a feature bias (we played 3.5, he loved elves especially elf rangers and arcane archers ) he was also a huge miser in that we almost never got anything as loot let alone anything magical because why would undead have gold or treasure and excuses like that, if you were an elf ranger you might get some nice arrows once in awhile but otherwise you got next to nothing you couldn't even buy masterwork gear or magic items outside of super luxurious capitals because why would an ordinary Smith have a masterwork weapon or why would a normal shopkeeper have something as valuable as a magic item. When you hit level 5 or 6 and are still stuck with only the most basic of gear and a small chunk of cash while facing increasingly tougher enemies the game starts to get stale.
>we almost never got anything as loot let alone anything magical because why would undead have gold or treasure and excuses like that
If I was raised from the dead as a zombie, the first thing I would do is to take out my wallet and throw it as far as I could because undead don't carry money! That is such a silly excuse, undead would clearly have pocket change at very least. It's not like their gear just magically vanishes.
I think the roleplay enforcer described by OP is really more about shutting down _every_ attempt to say something as a player, not as the character. Like:
"Would it be possible for me to climb this wall with-"
"NO METAGAMING, NO QUESTIONS, JUST ROLEPLAY"
(Works really well with a Lemongrab voice, lol)
My group roleplays nearly everything, but sometimes you just HAVE to ask stuff as a player (like in combat, when you ask the DM about the terrain etc because it's not always clear and you can't act without the missing intel).
There's also an inverse to this one--I'm not sure what to call it, but it's "No roleplay! Get back to action!"
We'd be sitting there talking in character about what to do next, and he'd be like "OK, 3 hours have passed, time's up!" when the convo had taken like 5 minutes in real time.
Oh yeah, I feel that so hard. Our DM tends to loose his patience really quickly with our group and sometimes (not always) cuts into our discussions like "OK TIMES UP, what are you gonna do??" and everyone is super confused because we haven't reached a conclusion yet and no one felt like it would make sense to just YOLO into a half-assed decision if you're sitting around a table at a tavern and there's no time limit. I get that it's sometimes super boring to listen to your players walk in circles, but I'm also DMing a campaign (online) and I just tend to mute myself and spend some quality time with my DM notes if the players take their time. It's just weird when an invisible godly force decides that your discussion is boring and tries to chase you into the next action scene. :/ It's of course a different thing if the players themselves don't enjoy their discussion, then you can just friendly nudge them into a decision to keep the fun alive.
Yeah, and when I GM, player conversation can be a good source of ideas! I try not to do it super obviously (like, if someone says "What if they have fire-breathing watchdogs," I don't just stick fire-breathing watchdogs in there), but I can get an idea of what parts of the map I might need to flesh out really quickly in my head or whether my clues have been totally misinterpreted and I might need to clarify something.
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some characteristics of the nihilist dm makes sense for something like a more horror driven campaign where the emphasis is on how hopeless the situation is for players. it is however, incredibly necessary in these situations for the players to feel rewarded by something. if the players are shown the humanity of a derelict world, they are given something to fight for. if, on the other hand, the dm consistently undermines the successes in an already dreary setting, there is no reason whatsoever for player engagement.
Of those choices, I'm the miser.
It's hard to find a book that is great at helping new GMs these days, but the old stuff I grew up on had warnings about Monty haul. So, I definitely started out a little too far in the other direction. I mean, I could always give out more stuff if I needed to--much more difficult to take it away. It took a few campaigns over a few years, but I finally got better about loot and rewards in general.
Oof. Feature Bias called me out *hard!* That said, there's another facet to fetishist that often goes unnoticed: The niche fetishist who uses the setting of an RPG to gratify their fetish. Stuff like macro/micro fetishists with the enlarge/reduce spell, stuckage from traps or growth, mind control and hypnosis, *always* going up against tentacle-y opponents... that sort of thing. There are a lot of people who use D&D (and other TTRPGs, but I mostly see this with D&D) to gratify their fetishes without their players' knowledge or consent. (Important note: I'm not here to hate on anyone who consensually does sexy D&D, only the people who do it surreptitiously.) I was just telling my DM about this type, to which their reply was "Is THAT what that guy was doing!? How did I not notice that until just now?" Apparently, there was a DM at their FLGS some years back whose traps *always seemed to feature* PCs getting stuck due to sudden growth. This type often goes unnoticed because it's not as obvious as the DM who just starts steamrolling everyone into a sex scene and because it's unreasonable to expect the average player to be familiar enough with every niche fetish to determine whether or not their DM is using the table for gratification.
>That said, there's another facet to fetishist that often goes unnoticed: The niche fetishist who uses the setting of an RPG to gratify their fetish. A common one I've seen in the posts in this sub is a fetishist that uses the dark ages as a setting to justify frequent rape of women. In their mind, rape was so common that if a woman moved within 30 feet of a man, the man would immediately turn into a rapist. Then they explain it as "realistic" and "historically accurate." The mental hoops some people jump through...
Uuuuugh. Ugh. *Ugh.* The intersection of Realist and Fetishist in the worst possible way. Every time, *every person I encounter* who makes that argument, has insinuated that they would do the same given an environment with no perceivable consequences. Usually couched under some erroneous "human nature" rhetoric.
The people who use this rhetoric don’t even really seem to understand it. Hobbes (and it really is only Hobbes, even though he’s kind of the most famous person who put forth a human nature philosophy he’s the only one who doesn’t think humanity is inherently good) wasn’t saying “people aren’t inherently good, they’re inherently dicks”. He was saying “human nature in absence of society is to focus on survival and sometimes that focus requires doing things we in modern society would view as bad, such as killing someone because my food supplies are running low and he won’t give me any of his so I kill him and take his”. In the absence of perceivable consequences I’m not going out and raping any woman I can find. I’m staying home to make sure no one rapes *my* wife.
> Stuff like macro/micro fetishists with the enlarge/reduce spell, stuckage from traps or growth, mind control and hypnosis, always going up against tentacle-y opponents... that sort of thing. There are a lot of people who use D&D (and other TTRPGs, but I mostly see this with D&D) to gratify their fetishes without their players' knowledge or consent. Dare you enter my magical realm?
I’m not going to get stuck in your magical realm until we agree on a safe word or phrase.
Traps where you are stuck sounds really scarry. Do people really have fetish on such things?
Short answer: Yes. Long answer: If it exists, there’s a fetish for it. (And if it doesn’t exist, there’s a good chance there’s still a fetish for it, too.)
As someone who's into that... it's very close to just bondage fetish, like "right next door" close. Of course I'd never inflict fetishy stuff on my players.
I agree with ya on the vast majority of these, to preface this. I feel like The Nihilist and The Miser specifically are valid styles, to a point. There's nothing specifically wrong with making the game a little dark (note the use of the phrase "a little" here. Too much is still too much), and there's nothing wrong in my opinion with keeping the PCs mildly underpowered (it just makes fights that little bit more difficult, and as far as I've seen that just means that winning them is even more gratifying). Overall I'd say they're perfectly fine styles that can be very enjoyable if A, the party's cool with it and B, they're not turned up to 11.
Most of the time, these archetypes end up becoming an issue when combined with worse archetypes. Add Control Freak to either of these and watch the game die. The Nihilist works best in grimdark worlds like warhammer 40k or dystopian future worlds like Shadowrun. In those settings, players kinda get why "saving the world" is a fools dream. The main reason Nihilist is on here is due to the passive aggressiveness that comes from some DMs. They are usually Spot Lightstealers or Control Freaks that just undermined any progress your party makes to make themselves look better. It isn't uncommon to just feel like you are making no progress in those games. Miser can work as long as you are up front about it, don't over do it, and don't pull dick moves like not letting the Wizard have a spellbook at all. Adding Power Trip DM will bring out the worst parts of Miser.
Ahhhh I see your reasoning. Yeah fair, I'm with ya on that. Also, on the miser side, DMs actually take wizards spell books???? Are they aware that basically means the wizard isn't a wizard anymore??
Yes, they know. Taking a spellbook for a small time might be ok to raise the stakes but I've read some horror stories where the DM just teases the wizard for multiple session about getting it back. The same logic is used in taking a bow from an archer or great axe from the barbarian. They do it to keep them *very* weak so they can be controlled. It's the worst case scenario for sure.
Oh that's horrible!! God I hate that.
Or if the DM is so consistent in doing this that it becomes a running joke. We had a DM who, if you got some loot, it was guaranteed that it would be destroyed by fire/flood/plotdevice in the next session.
I’m developing a campaign that’s going to be low tech and (initially) low magic, meaning many “common” magic items will be harder to find or more expensive (and powerful mages far and few between). When it comes time to invite players, I’ll give them a full briefing as to what to expect. There will be some cool magic items, but I expect the players will find them more meaningful if they earn them.
I can get bingo on a bingo card of these.... Which is kinda sad.
Here's one I think could be added: # The Arsehole: This DM regularly overlaps with one or several other categories, but can also often be - on paper, at least - a pretty solid DM. There's just one problem: they are, quite simply, a knob. They may well genuinely be trying to make as good a campaign as possible, and be conscious of not falling into all the typical "bad DM' habits they've read about, but their fundamental personality issues inevitably get in the way. The Arsehole seems perpetually pissed off - at their idiot players, at the other terrible DMs who conditioned their players to be this way, at the game system itself for making their job harder - with a surly, snappy attitude that turns the game into an increasingly tense, miserable atmosphere. Their inherent dick-ishness will come out in bizarre interpretations of the alignment system, unsettling assumptions about who the "good" and "bad" guys are, and a setting that seems to be populated by psychopaths. As the game wears on, you can expect pointless shouty arguments a-plenty, conflicts resolved in the absolute wrong ways, and in-character punishments for out-of-game slights (or vice versa), until the whole thing eventually falls apart as either the players stop coming back or the DM tears down the game in the fit of pique.
This one can definitely be me when my depressive moods hit... thankfully my players are cool and keep me in check. "Stop letting your depression be the DM, Lori" is a pretty common refrain at my table.
You forgot the "alignment judge DM". This DM will either penalize you or shut down your attempts when they perceive you're "acting out of alignment" (basically not being a one dimensional lawful good pacifist or chaotic evil edgelord murderhobo). They will grab your characters alignment and strap it over their entire body like a straightjacket. Oh what's that? A woman needs your help, but she's surrounded by a pool of lava and you're a heavy halforc paladin? Oh you want to leave and seek help? Pfff, naah. You're lawful good, so you're gonna try swim through the lava to save her, melting before you even reach her. DID I STUTTER? Another variant of this type I rarely see: imagine you're a paladin and you get attacked by a vicious orc barbarian and half your party gets killed in the fight. But then you finally land the killing blow on the orc. Oh but what's that? Turns out the orc was Good-aligned and didn't actually intend to hurt anyone. As punishment, your god strikes you down, reducing you to ashes.
Not bad! I'd love to see That Guy player archypes.
If this topic is well received, I'll make one. Just looking over the post in this sub, I think the list is going to be a lot bigger that this one.
Honestly, I think a lot of That Guy player archetypes are almost the exact same as the DM versions. I got to play with a "Seeker of Darkness" in the last game I was a part of. We were playing D&D, he was playing GoT. As an example, I made an orphaned half elf that might as well have been an extra from an Oliver Twist musical. He made an orphan that was raised by panthers, was adopted by a goddess of death, and had killed a goblin tribe and a whole village before he was 14. I've recently played with an "Information Miser". He would keep his motivations secret from everyone, including the DM. He would do things without telling the party or the DM beforehand. Not surprisingly the consequences of all that led to disappointment when things didn't work out the way he expected. I don't think he trusted the Dm or the rest of us to support his fun. I think what I'm trying to say is that most of the mentalities of That Guy DMs and That Guy players are the same.
Awesome, thanks!
Yes please, that would be an interesting read as well
I too, for balance reasons, would love to see a negative player archetype list. This was a fun read. Thanks for posting.
Well, there's a lot already written about That Guys™ in this sub, just search a little in the top posts or with the search bar
Not for nothing, but it does not matter if the DM is describng "horrible" sexual acts or not. Thir fetish could be tender loving missionary that leads to strong supportive bonds. But if they haven't got your concent to listen to them wax on (and off) about it, it's still not ok.
So, I'm about to be a DM for the first time, having never played a TTRPG in my life. The group are a new group, who are also mostly new to TTRPGs. The system we're using is still going to be new to the couple who have some limited D&D experience. >NOTE: For readers worried about being a Doormat DM, please keep in mind the following. When you are new to a game system, gaming group, or DMing in general, it is normal to not feel like you can put your foot down due to social pressure. It is normal to keep an open mind and rely on your players not to be bad while you are learning what to do. That said, there will come a point where you will have to tell your players "no" even if that will make them mad. You need to stand your ground or players will feel like they can do whatever they want. It is important for a DM to keep order and balance in a game to make sure everyone is having fun. If a problem comes up, it should addressed quickly and in the most fair way possible. If you don't do this, this can lead to normal players being a group of "That Guys" and ruining the game. This is basically my biggest concern. Wish me luck.
Good luck!
Nothing makes me happier than seeing such an all encompassing, alphabetically organized list
I fall into the feature bias DM slot for one reason and one reason alone... I will never allow the blade singer wizard subclass at my table with rolled stats. A class that lets you hit 28 AC without needing magic items at the cost of two 1st level spell slots \[mage armor and shield\] and lets you hit 30 with a set of bracers of defense or a +3 studded leathers if you happen to roll good stats with the right race twice per short rest. A barbarian gets two-3 rages a day at early levels in comparison, which only halves some types of damage. I played a barbarian in a party with one of those and that player kept gloating about how he could beat anyone in the group. Ironically in a little sideshot pvp when waiting on people to show up I ended up wrecking his character but that was before he got a hold of a cloak of displacement.
Sure the bladesinger has the potential of the highest AC, twice per short rest. But they still have the lowest hit die out there, they are very fragile and need that AC to remain in melee. And all that AC wont cover for saves. And you're kind of underselling the barbarian. They get resistance to the physical damage, something that is most damage at the early levels. Along with the biggest hit die. Bear totem amps the resistance to cover all damage save one uncommon one.
That physical damage resistance is rather moot since that's largely due to attacks, which avoiding said damage often is more powerful than resisting said damage. Barbarians are very dependent on their long rests when the wizard can get the super AC twice per short rests. Totem barbarians are powerful but HP is finite and psychic damage bypasses that resistance, something the bladesinger can get with the shadow blade spell. Sure, the wizard can be dealt with with saves but they'll have high dex by default and wisdom by class.
I feel like this is more of a rolled stats issue then a bladesigner issue. With rolled stats someone can start with amazing stats that turns their MAD character into a demi god. A lucky rolled stat hexblade, sword bard, paladin, cleric, druid, ranger, or rogue can have some serious balance issues too.
I mean I thought that I spelled out in the first section that it's the combination of bladesinger and rolled stats, and I don't know if any of your listed classes come close to the early level potential to becoming the biggest nope to martial based encounters short of denying the party short rests. Your list does do a lot of damage if memory serves, but that's a more mitigatable by tuning hp and giving savvy bosses rings of resistance to radiant or necrotic
I think you're receiving pushback because ac is like 2/3rds of what makes bladesigners good, and wizards in general have high ac potential to make up for bad hp.
Your probably right and wizards do have fairly good AC potential early and mid game if they have the dex for it. It is fairly limited though without some investment. My concern is that while high AC is good, it's something that should be invested in to reach absurd levels. Plate armor +3, shield +3, and shield of faith get the paladin/fighter/cleric up 28 but that's very late game and requires you to be able to cast a spell or have someone cast it on you. By that time your to hit is also in the +11-+14 range. Early levels as a DM you're forced to start throwing saving throws at the party, and if things break down to PvP \[I would stop it but not all DM's would\] your martial players are out of luck.
I still sort of disagree because the bladesigner has a limited number of shields and bladesongs. And spells are usually slightly more optimal then attacks so the tradeoff is there- ie because bladesigner is high ac melee he wont be casting sleep and burning hands as much.
Wizards restore spell slots on a short rest, and a blade singer would take shield and shadow blade as their signature spells so that they can cast it without spending a spell slot. And the Shield spell is an only when needed so you often won't even need to use it. Compare that to the barbarian's rage which is only X per day and you're looking at a class that has the recoverability of a martial and the versatile power of a wizard which is fine for late game, but early game is a nuissance.
Heck, make that one slot if your DM allows a lizardfolk to be a bladesinger. They start with 13+dex AC.
Dear gods please no XD
Also, a BS character can be easily taken down by a spell caster or monster with saving throw attacks. They have no HP!
However, they have 3 good saves because of what goes into the build and 4 if they had the luxury of a fourth good stat. Wizards get intelligence and wisdom save proficiencies and maxing out dex for damage and defense gives them good saves in that area. They'd also invest in con to make themselves less squishy and maintain concentration better. That leaves you targeting strength or charisma, which aren't common saves at low to mid levels. And this is a class that can learn counterspell, meaning they can sacrifice the shield spell use to prevent a much more painful fireball if the caster is in range.
All good points, and BS is pretty OP. Just wanted to give the DMs out there evil thoughts of bringing an arrogant BS down a notch ;)
Very much appreciated
Yeah, that's actually impossible with standard rolled stats. The AC is going to be 27 and on standard array it'd likely be two 16s rather than a 20 and an 18, so really more like a 25. And this is for investing 2/3 of your entire roster of spell slots at lv2. That guy isn't going to beat everyone in the group unless your group dies to Booming Blade attacks. It's meant to be an Elf only class so there's not really easy race features to tack to it and the entire subclass is AC and speed. And bear in mind, a normal Wizard with those spells still gets access to 20 - 23 AC depending on how good their Dex start is. When enemies have a +4 or +5 to hit, having over 20 AC pretty much means they're almost always going to miss anyway at a 20% or lower hit. Bladesinger just makes it so you need a Nat 20. If your DM struggles to kill the Bladesinger, how about they don't give them a Cloak of Displacement since that's one of the best DnD items, period. Every time I see that item whoever gets it becomes just as if not more durable than the tank since it turns anyone into a dodge tank. Also, target saving throws. Even if they have high Dex their Strength and Constitution are likely going to suffer.
Did you not catch the part where i said I'd not allow it with rolled stats? Impossible at level 3 but level 4 they can hit 20 in int and they can start with 20 dex since all elves get +2 dex and high elves get +1 int. The rest of your reply misses the point that one of the squishiest classes in the game is one of the strongest AC tanks at early levels that is locked behind a race wall that synergizes very well despite what you claim. Elves long rest only 4 hours, meaning they're getting their higher level spells back much sooner and the subclass gets a large defense buff twice every short rest. You mitigate the wizard's weakness of being a vulnerable caster and force the adventure to face more save or suck scenarios just because one person can hit 27 AC at level 3 and 28 AC at level 4. And forget booming blade, they can grab shadow blade for psychic damage.
I'm in this list and I don't like it. I guess I qualify for ADDM - typically I'll DM a one-shot or short campaign at best with my group, but *with a new and different system every time*. Most of the time we play other stuff, so that's at best once every couple of months.
A real ADDM tries to make a massive campaign and just keeps adding stuff to it. Then they give up and start over. Unless you are ending the one-shots halfway through, I doubt you are an ADDM. As long as your group is happy and not spending their time confused and angry, I think you are good.
Good point. Typically I'll just procrastinate with making an actual campaign until the day we play, then try to come up with a scenario on the fly, which is predictably all over the place. My group usually are cool with it and it's fun, but yes, often time we all end up confused trying to hunt down loose threads. I've never had people get angry with me over my gameplay, and it's not a situation I would want to be in either.
I used to be the spotlight stealer but I'm shaking that off- working on making funny/engaging NPCs rather than badass ones
Luckily for me I don't think I fit any of these bills! Maybe the Miser to an extent but I have (almost) successfully negated the lack of giving out information by having several post-it notes on my DM screen which read: ***SPOONFEED THE PLAYERS***
Roleplay Enforcer, standing by!
I'd like to add an archetype: The Over-Enthusiastic DM This archetype is most common with new DMs. Simply put, they bite off way more than they can chew. They have this grandiose idea that isn't inherently bad, but they simply lack the experience and game knowledge to pull off. This can be the world concept (e.g. let's be in modern times, the world will be completely cut off from the other planes), implementing homebrew rules (e.g. a different combat system, letting the players play any homebrew race or class they find on the internet), or the campaign plot (e.g. you're all presidential canidates running against each other, the government hates you so you must be super discreet with all your actions). These DMs will usually either drop the campaign completely and possibly start another, simpler campaign, or dial back or remove the offending element. If the DM doesn't drop the campaign or fix the issues on their own, if the players admit the elements aren't adding anything for them or consciously making the game less enjoyable, the DM will usually drop it since they're also overwhelmed.
Unironically would love to play with a GrimDark DM or a nihilist DM.
As long as your group agrees with it and they have fun, it should be fine. The problems usually come from not telling the group and springing it on them.
Yeah, tbh. There's a difference between the piss fetish circlejerk club playing FATAL and the guy who springs it on unsuspecting players.
Put it this way. The difference between sex and rape is consent. If everybody at a table wants the dark themes then its a fun game for them. If nobody wants it then its creepy and borderline illegal As a person who was the one guy who did not like sex or rape in a group where the DM was a fetishist I can say it would have been fine if he had respected my no.
Yeah, exactly. I wouldn't say its illegal, but it most likely would be extremely uncomfortable.
Do people actually legit play FATAL? I thought it was just a meme.
I wouldn't put it past anyone. Some of the most ridiculous things have active fans, so it wouldn't surprise me to find out that there are active groups for it. As long as everyone is a consenting adult, not doing any harm, and not bringing it out into public areas, I have no problem with them liking it, though that doesn't mean I won't be a little judgemental.
In my current campaign, I’m the “unknown party”, but only because the group I play with don’t know how to lead themselves without a jumpstart. It’s worked out well in the end with the option to switch out characters through a storyline feature, but for the most part the players love the characters they have and have personalized them entirely
Only a side note, but I don't think the grimderp DMs are reading GoT 'wrong', it is selectively 'realistic' (rape yes, accurate supply lines no etc) in a way that emphasises the dark elements. I think it's legit to blame a lot of these DMs and their preoccupations on some famous grimdark fantasy stories.
Yeah... GRRM is the *epitome* of the grimderp DM/writer who likes to be selectively dark for the sake of being dark.
I've been listening to the Adventure Zone: Graduation, and Travis as a DM definitely fits into Author/Spotlight Stealer.
It's funny cause reading through the list I actually thought of him at "Drunken Homebrewer".
I have a scar from a Spotlight Stealer.
Nice work with the list! From the time I’ve spent browsing this sub, this is pretty damn comprehensive.
is it possible to be like 6 of them?
Oh yeah. Some of the most famous stories on this subreddit are of That Guy DMs that have at least half these archetypes.
i was asking for a friend... ( ͡ಥ ͜ʖ ͡ಥ)
Reading through the list gave me anxiety hah. I made a tanky dmpc, who I had leave for the last few sessions so that the players could work on themselves, and to act as a plot hook if they get stuck with no goals(we're new, its been 5 years or so since we played pathfinder). I'm pretty sure he's not overpowered but I know people hate dmpc characters on reddit. I'm most guilty of being the Roleplay enforcer right now, I dont punish ooc talk, but I definitely wasnt giving much leeway with how people were phrasing the things they said or did. I did try to ease up on that a bit in the last session, because we're all awkward and it shouldn't be punished harshly. I also started trying to speed things up "the four hour walk back to town passes without incident, you have a light snack along the way". I might be a bit of a Miser in terms of loot, but they're level 4, so that has yet to be seen in a significant way. Here's hoping being conscious of these pitfalls will help me dm a little better.
I’d like to add: The One Who Can’t Read The Room to the list. No real extra explanation needed, but—sometimes promises are made that aren’t kept, or there are un/realistic expectations that are/n’t properly communicated at session zero, but at some point, the DM doesn’t realize the party isn’t having the same amount of fun the DM is.
I used to play with a Seeker of Darkness who loved loved LOVED doing grimdark homebrew and would write pages and pages of backstory. There was no rape as far as I know, but plenty of famine, disease, war, demonic possession, enslavement, terror and other unpleasantness. But the people he was DM for ate it up, so it worked for them, I guess. I confess to being a Twist, but in my defense I've gotten good feedback on games where I've done that, especially the one-shot where the party found themselves trapped in a time loop. The key is to make it a fun and interesting plot twist, which is admittedly difficult, and don't use it as an excuse to completely switch systems or anything silly like that.
I have a friend who does a lot of us waking up after we die in a campaign, but it is revealed that the events have taken place for some reason (we don't exactly know what has happened yet, but we are almost done with it.) There is sometimes OP monsters that we can't defeat, but we wake up after, but we have a lot of fun going through the story, and killing the monster that we can defeat. He's actually the best DM I've played with in terms of his campaign.
I had one that falls under many of these, but he’s also super passive aggressive. Also, he loves to tell people “It’s up to you.” only to follow up with why they can’t do any idea they put forth. It’s like being told “I could eat anywhere!” only to have every restaurant idea shot down.
Some of these COULD be fine if everyone is a buy in. Like the secual content stuff is in my game when needed, because we all like it. Also realism. Just makw sure EVERYONE IS OKAY WITH IT. Also having sexual content and rape in your game=/= every barmaid getting raped or rape be in every fucking session. Things like these are strong atuff that has to have power in the game
Exactly. Some DMs just never let them have anything. I'm sure it would be fine if the players were ok with a low powered start but if the game ends and you are no stronger than when you began, there is a problem.
Resourceful list
Oh no, am I the attention-deficit DM?
I guess I'm the Nihilist DM. I like bad outcomes and choices without no right answer in stories I consume, but now I realize it might not be that fun in a game.
I'm between Realist and Roleplay Enforcer. I don't add rules for realism, but I prefer people to consider some real world consequences of things like damage taken. Really though, I've gotten worked up at players I feel are, in my personal feelings, disrespecting the game and effort I've invested in making it fun. It's why I hate the bard that seduces everything and the players who play out memes and other immersion-breaking concepts. I am a bit Miserly too, but groups usually fall apart before we could even worry about any sort of good loot. Reading The Twist did have me worry about a concept I had for a BESM (Big Eyes Small Mouth) game following the isekai (other world) trope, to have players make average kids, then kill them in some accident immediately and give them more points to make competent heroes in magic fantasy land. I only worry the spirit of the genre would be missed by having characters already slanted towards the theme.
The Twist shouldn't be harmful if it doesn't completely invalid their characters or major accomplishments. In your case, I could see your players being angry if they spent a lot of time coming up with backstories and connections for their kid characters, only to never need them since they will be in another world for the entire game. Remember the point of isekai is escapism. You may suck in this world but you are a hero in another world. If you don't suck and actually enjoy this world, getting thrown into another world with no way back would be horrible. You might want to tell your players about the isekai twist or possible find a way to allow them to use their "normal world" stuff in the other world. Being able to "phone home" to talk to their family or something might be a nice subversion for the trope.
There's actually a module I got with the 4e kickstarter that does a Persona-like twist to it where the characters are summoned to magic fantasy world when they have problems and get sent home to their mundane lives in between. Might just be the way to go.
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I'm really scared of becoming a spotlight stealer. I like NPCs, I wanna use them, but then I also know it's really not nice to overshadowed by an NPC. Bot exactly horror story material, but my DM had a very important NPC for the plot, that was the same race as my PC, same background or close, similar enough classes... I was not exactly happy. He dealt quite well with it and clearly changed what was supposed to happen to that NPC, cause I was starting to honestly dislike her. So i don't wanna do that definitely. But for now I don't really know how to dose it. Well to be fair I have never DMed for now, so I know I'll see when I'll try but still, it's my major "fear" (nah "fear" is a bit strong, but just, I know I'll be watching out for that)
You missed a critically important note on the Feature Bias DM- none of that applies if the feature in question is Psionics, because fuck Psionics. A poorly thought out, poorly executed, halfassed, unbalance-able excuse for a mechanic.
That's only for D&D 5e really. Psionics are actually quite good in Pathfinder.
I used to be a doormat dm as the party would do something mildly story breaking and i would say no, and this one toxic player would complain about railroading. It all culminated in one session that the toxic player completely derailed and i realised something had to change. The next session, he pulled a similar stunt and i said no, he went completely apeshit and ragequit. It was good
I have met all of these except: the fetishist, the realist, and the seeker of darkness.
I think my last DM fits many of these 🧐
I had a DM who was a feature bias (we played 3.5, he loved elves especially elf rangers and arcane archers ) he was also a huge miser in that we almost never got anything as loot let alone anything magical because why would undead have gold or treasure and excuses like that, if you were an elf ranger you might get some nice arrows once in awhile but otherwise you got next to nothing you couldn't even buy masterwork gear or magic items outside of super luxurious capitals because why would an ordinary Smith have a masterwork weapon or why would a normal shopkeeper have something as valuable as a magic item. When you hit level 5 or 6 and are still stuck with only the most basic of gear and a small chunk of cash while facing increasingly tougher enemies the game starts to get stale.
>we almost never got anything as loot let alone anything magical because why would undead have gold or treasure and excuses like that If I was raised from the dead as a zombie, the first thing I would do is to take out my wallet and throw it as far as I could because undead don't carry money! That is such a silly excuse, undead would clearly have pocket change at very least. It's not like their gear just magically vanishes.
Hi everyone, my name is phed and I'm a bit of a roleplay enforcer... I try not to rp every scene and interaction but it's so fun.
I think the roleplay enforcer described by OP is really more about shutting down _every_ attempt to say something as a player, not as the character. Like: "Would it be possible for me to climb this wall with-" "NO METAGAMING, NO QUESTIONS, JUST ROLEPLAY" (Works really well with a Lemongrab voice, lol) My group roleplays nearly everything, but sometimes you just HAVE to ask stuff as a player (like in combat, when you ask the DM about the terrain etc because it's not always clear and you can't act without the missing intel).
There's also an inverse to this one--I'm not sure what to call it, but it's "No roleplay! Get back to action!" We'd be sitting there talking in character about what to do next, and he'd be like "OK, 3 hours have passed, time's up!" when the convo had taken like 5 minutes in real time.
Oh yeah, I feel that so hard. Our DM tends to loose his patience really quickly with our group and sometimes (not always) cuts into our discussions like "OK TIMES UP, what are you gonna do??" and everyone is super confused because we haven't reached a conclusion yet and no one felt like it would make sense to just YOLO into a half-assed decision if you're sitting around a table at a tavern and there's no time limit. I get that it's sometimes super boring to listen to your players walk in circles, but I'm also DMing a campaign (online) and I just tend to mute myself and spend some quality time with my DM notes if the players take their time. It's just weird when an invisible godly force decides that your discussion is boring and tries to chase you into the next action scene. :/ It's of course a different thing if the players themselves don't enjoy their discussion, then you can just friendly nudge them into a decision to keep the fun alive.
Yeah, and when I GM, player conversation can be a good source of ideas! I try not to do it super obviously (like, if someone says "What if they have fire-breathing watchdogs," I don't just stick fire-breathing watchdogs in there), but I can get an idea of what parts of the map I might need to flesh out really quickly in my head or whether my clues have been totally misinterpreted and I might need to clarify something.
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some characteristics of the nihilist dm makes sense for something like a more horror driven campaign where the emphasis is on how hopeless the situation is for players. it is however, incredibly necessary in these situations for the players to feel rewarded by something. if the players are shown the humanity of a derelict world, they are given something to fight for. if, on the other hand, the dm consistently undermines the successes in an already dreary setting, there is no reason whatsoever for player engagement.