Being a player after being a DM
Dithmer:
Hi Kyle
I am the only one in my group who regularly GM,(Mostly, whenever people decide "hey i want go GM" they usually try a single session, "realize" that they "fucked up" and decide never to GM again (which I think is a bloody pity, since they usually do pretty damn good)) and the only one who enjoys GMing, and I've been faced with this exact same problem.
There is a guy in my group who, and I quote, "want to be an awesome GM" and I've played in one of his sessions. The peculiar thing about this game was that it was inherently (albeit very disfuctional, as i learned later) very straightforward: EVERYONE at the table figured "hey, this guy is new, we better not challenge his prepared material too much" even if it wasn't said explicitly. The end result was that everyone except the new GM thought it was a good session, because the GM expected that we, as players, fucked over everything. I learned this when I talked about his first session later, and he was disappointed, even though none of the players were.
And this really got me to thinking, especially about my own GMing style (since I am the only GM my current group has ever had), where I directly expect that my players will solve my problems. This sounds a lot like Dogs in the Vineyard (which directly says that you shouldn't figure out how a problem COULD be solved) but I actually figured out on my own that the players were usually resourceful enough that they could figure out things without my help. But I found out, when my player tried GMing, that player-activism/input is very important, no matter who GMs. And I found out when I tried to play in his session that my very own attempt at accommodating his wishes was actually detrimental to the story. He told me how he constantly expected derails, weird plans and unexpected detours, and how he didn't understand how we didn't do any of these things.
I think you may have had the same problem; You say that you have a problem getting into ONE character, after playing all the NPCs as a GM, and describe yourself as a "Chameleon" while GMing. What the problem seems to be is that, as a GM you pretty much have to be reactive to whatever the player does, in most circumstances. On the other hand, if you're a player, you have to give the GM something to work with, you have to be in an active role, or the GM feels that he needs to force things onto the PCS.
Now, as noted earlier, i've fund that if you think of the general GM role as player, it inevitably becomes detrimental to the session/story/situation: A GM, pretty much no matter what he's running, will have multiple character under his command, so you can get both an outlet, and a base, for any emotion or characteristic you deem neccessary, whereas if you play a single character, you have to make do with a "limited" set of characteristics and emotions. And I think THIS is the great difference between playing and gamemastering, and the reason I prefer to do the latter; As a player I only get to play ONE character, and this single character has to do things that are interesting and make things interesting, whereas if i play ALL the other characters, If 1 out of 10 is a character which build upon the story, I can retroactively decide which character is effective and good to bring along; ergo, I don't have to make a single character which HAS to be good. Does this make sense to you?
Kyle Van Pelt:
Quote from: Frank Tarcikowski on November 05, 2011, 12:57:22 PM
Hey Kyle, it occurred to me that the Pathfinder game is probably pretty straightforward but the more interesting question is what's up with all that "accommodating" DM style and those "sacrificed" NPCs. What do you think?
Quote from: Dithmer on November 05, 2011, 07:10:10 PM
I think you may have had the same problem; You say that you have a problem getting into ONE character, after playing all the NPCs as a GM, and describe yourself as a "Chameleon" while GMing. What the problem seems to be is that, as a GM you pretty much have to be reactive to whatever the player does, in most circumstances. On the other hand, if you're a player, you have to give the GM something to work with, you have to be in an active role, or the GM feels that he needs to force things onto the PCS.
Gentlemen,
Both of these quotes go hand-in-hand. I think what I meant by "sacrificing" my NPCs is that there have been multiple occasions where the role of the NPC changed a great deal to make the game more fun or interesting for the players, when I had intended something entirely else for them. This is the product of two things:
1. My play style reflects how I build adventures, yet my players do not play like I do, and do not see the same fun as I do. This leads to situations where something I thought would be fun in the session is actually boring for the players, so I must change things accordingly.
2. My DM style was one where I thought I had to build up to a predetermined end, and naturally things never really went that direction. However, now that I've come to understand things like Social Contracts, I see that I've never fully established what exactly I was aiming for in my sessions and instead just expected players to know that they should play a certain way.
I think that by combining a proper social contract and a campaign with a clear goal but NOT a predetermined ending would solve many of my insecurities with DMing.
Lurking on the Forge has been one of the most enlightening things I've done. I think a great deal of my problems with playing in this Pathfinder campaign stem from a failing on both DM and myself to establish what exactly it is that we expect from each other, although I admit that my own inexperience with playing has complicated things.
I think the proper thing to do now is to talk with the DM not only about how I can further involve myself in the campaign world, but also see what his desires are for the party and act accordingly to aid him in the matter. Like I said earlier, it's not that I'm not having fun, because I am enjoying myself. But if I can contribute something meaningful to the campaign, then not only does it intrinsically increase my character's importance to the story, but it also increases my own attachment to the character, and by proxy, the party and setting.
Thanks again for all the comments, guys. I appreciate the feedback. I may start a new thread in a little while to give a play-by-play of how these new developments evolve, if that sounds interesting to you.
Until then, I'm still open for comments and questions, but I think you've all helped me answer my questions in the thread.
Thanks again,
-Kyle
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