bald man blogging

Here’s a great article that captures the essence of D&D for me.

I’m a players’ DM, for crying out loud. I’m on your side, guys. I want to tell a deep and thrilling story together, and instead, we’re wasting time with stupid arguments about auto-failures in skill checks.

And thus came my epiphany, when the clouds broke and the sun shone down. As a DM, it is my responsibility to exterminate all traces of competition. It is on me to ensure it doesn’t creep into the game.

via Critical Hits » Winners and Losers in D&D.

Amen and Amen! D&D is a game of cooperation not competition. After all, the dice are stacked in the DM’s favor. If the DM wants a TPK, he can make it so: He creates the encounters, designs the environment, stocks the monsters, rolls behind the screen (if he chooses) and finally adjudicates all disputes. He’s the Legislative, Executive and Judicial branches all rolled into one. I think that’s called a Tyranny, and rarely does anyone but the Tyrant come out on top… unless the Tyrant wants another outcome to occur.

If the DM wants to “win,” there is nothing the players can do to stop him… short of not playing. And if that happens, where does that leave us? Rather, a good DM ought to have another goal in mind. D&D is about a shared experience, so the good DM ought to define “winning” this way: Did everyone enjoy him or herself? Did my players share in the emotional highs and lows that are inherent to a good story? Did they experience the tension that comes with the threat of failure and the elation that comes from successfully overcoming failure. These are the things that make for a good night of D&D, and these are the things that good DMs deliver.

For this reason, I’m a very relaxed DM. The guys I normally play with are tacticians and puzzlers. They generally like to utilize their min-max combos, and strategize their way through encounters. Because of that, I normally level up enounters, not so that I can “win” in the traditional sense, but rather so that my players get to experience the challenge of a well-executed strategy.

My preferred method of dealing with rules disputes or improvised actions is to turn the question back to the players: “How do you think it should work?” If players take advantage of me, I don’t care. I have no vested interest in “winning,” because that’s not what it’s about.