Back to the main page

Mailing List Logs for ShadowRN

Message no. 1
From: Wagemage wagemage@**.rr.com
Subject: GM Calls
Date: Sat, 23 Sep 2000 14:41:23 -0400
> Unfortunately, there's really no easy fix that dosn;t change the
>inaitive system and / or creat new problems and imbalances. The best way
>around it is for the GM to know the situations where it might cause
trouble,
>and just use GM perogative to change the result in that situation to what
it
>"should" be.

Dammit! When will they just make the rules work so we don't have to deal
with these damn GMs and their "rules calls".

For those that don't know or didn't get it, I AM a gm and that WAS
satire. However it made me think of a point.
90%+ of the questions on here boild down to "It's up to the GM.". Why do
people have such a problem with this? I play pretty loose with the rules I
suppose but my primary concern is making the world make sense.
A good example is point blank range. You get a no bonus for point blank
range (AFAIK). So a completely unskilled person would be at a base TN of 4.
They are at a +4 since they are defaulting to Quickness, TN 8. They are
firing a heavy pistol (9M). Let's say they are slow and only have a 1
quickness. By the rules they can put that pistol to your head and you have
no fear since it only does M damage and they can't possibly stage it up with
one die and even with more dice a TN 8 is pretty sttep anyway (TN12 if you
make them use called shot to point it at the head). Right. Anyone here
willing to let my 8 year old nephew put a loaded .45 against thier forehead
and squeeze the trigger?
...Anyone?
I thought not.

If you are going to be a GM get used to the fact that you will have to
make calls to keep the game moving. Don't worry about it. Damn.
Message no. 2
From: Augustus shadowrun@********.net
Subject: GM Calls
Date: Sat, 23 Sep 2000 13:03:30 -0700
----- Original Message -----
From: Wagemage <wagemage@**.rr.com>

> 90%+ of the questions on here boild down to "It's up to the GM.". Why
do
> people have such a problem with this? I play pretty loose with the rules I
> suppose but my primary concern is making the world make sense.

Its because some people must have rules to cover everything... But, it also
depends on the players... some players play this as a game of PCs vs GMs...
and the only true weapon they have against the GM is the rulebook... because
he controls everything else, the NPCs, their actions, the world around them,
etc...

And for some, I think its just something that has come natural after years
of doing it... I think back to 1981 when I started playing D&D basic... we
had all those boxed sets back then... and when things came up and rules were
needed... we would stop the game and look them up... sometimes this went
quickly, sometimes it went slow. Over the years we added more and more to
the game, our own rules here and there, bought some supplements... and we
still kept doing the same thing... the DM would never make a call on the
fly... if he tried to the others would just keep on looking and if the DM
was right we went on playing, if the DM was wrong they corrected him.

For myself... I tell my PCs off the bat that common sense will prevail (in
your example of shooting yourself in the forehead with a .45 and taking only
a moderate wound... for that I would kill the person with no chance of
survival (if it was self inflicted I would say they are dead... if it was
done by an NPC to a PC I might opt for the Hand of God rule to save his
life)

But... sure shooting a PC in the head and saying its an automatic death
isn't a "cool" thing to do. But its not something that is going to happen
often, if ever... If its something you do to your PCs every week or two,
you are just going to end up driving the players away from the game.

Personally though, I've found the Shadowrun crowd to be generally more into
letting the GM resolve things with his experiences and common sense... most
of the time when the phrase "its up to the GM" comes up in here its usually
some munchkin thing where they want to get somthing into their game that
might not be allowed, or they want to munchkinize the rules and get some
kinda advantage that any Gm with some common sense and a modest knowledge of
the rules would see right away.

But D&D tho... there is a crowd that needs the rules pretty much spelled out
for them...

Augustus
Message no. 3
From: Mark C Farrington alareth@*********.net
Subject: GM Calls
Date: Sat, 23 Sep 2000 21:31:37 -0400
> But D&D tho... there is a crowd that needs the rules pretty much
> spelled out for them...
>
> Augustus

Excuse me? Are we engaging in rpg elitism? Are you a better more
experienced gamer because you don't play D&D?

Personally I've played various bersoins of D&D for the last 18 years and I
don't need anything spelled out to me and never did.

As for GM calls we have a simple rule, what the GM says goes and AFTER the
gaming session we check the rules and apply our findings from that point on.

Alareth
Message no. 4
From: NeoJudas neojudas@******************.com
Subject: GM Calls
Date: Sat, 23 Sep 2000 20:44:27 -0500
From: "Mark C Farrington" <alareth@*********.net>
Subject: RE: GM Calls


> > But D&D tho... there is a crowd that needs the rules pretty much
> > spelled out for them...
> > Augustus
>
> Excuse me? Are we engaging in rpg elitism? Are you a better more
> experienced gamer because you don't play D&D?

No, that isn't what he's saying at all. At least, not by the way I read it.
My personal view(s) on (A)D&D (any version) has for a long time now been
that the game is probably what most gamers enter into the "gaming" class
learning. As time goes on, and depending upon circumstances, a lot of D&D
game players learn more and more about the other RPG's that exist (and I
believe we all know there are a ton of them).

I also think that on a growing scale, more and more game players in general
are having to have an ever-increasing amount of information/rules "spelled
out for them". And that isn't just D&D. Its happened in the SR games
around here (both HHH games, and other games that I kept appraised of), and
I've seen evidence of "gamer elitism" in various genre's and categories
spreading throughout the Internet as well.

> Personally I've played various bersoins of D&D for the last 18 years and I
> don't need anything spelled out to me and never did.

And for some reason, I believe you are probably making as a broad a
statement as Augustus is. Usage of too many general statement terms there.
We all do it now-and-again, so it really isn't a big deal and most of us do
usually just shrug it off after a while.

> As for GM calls we have a simple rule, what the GM says goes and AFTER the
> gaming session we check the rules and apply our findings from that point
on.

Which is *always* a super-good rule to have, one that I personally have been
reaquainting myself with a lot more lately, if for no other reason than to
have the group here get out of the habit of asking *me* questions even
though I wasn't the GM for that session.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
J. Keith Henry (Webmaster)
Hoosier Hacker House (www.hoosierhackerhouse.com)
Message no. 5
From: Augustus shadowrun@********.net
Subject: GM Calls
Date: Sat, 23 Sep 2000 19:18:11 -0700
----- Original Message -----
From: Mark C Farrington <alareth@*********.net>
> > But D&D tho... there is a crowd that needs the rules pretty much
> > spelled out for them...
> >
> > Augustus
>
> Excuse me? Are we engaging in rpg elitism? Are you a better more
> experienced gamer because you don't play D&D?

Hmm... I don't remember saying I don't play D&D... from my whole post what I
meant by my last statement was... D&D is a game where there are rules for
everything... and before 3rd edition the rules in alot of places were
ambiguous and contradictory (hence why the Dragon Magazine column "Sage
Advice" has been fielding 10-15 questions a month for the past decade)

In Shadowrun you can really boil alot of things down to "Its up to the GM"
and a good Gm with some common sense can interpret the rules to his liking
and usually it's in a way that would satisfy all... whereas in D&D
(especially in 2nd edition, its alot better in 3rd edition) alot of the
rules were open to multiple interpretations and would really boil down to
who was the better at presenting his/her case to the DM.

So... maybe I shouldn't have included that last statement if it was taken
the wrong way by some... more I meant to say... because D&D (2nd or 3rd
edition) is such a rules heavy system, there is alot of room open for
interpretation of the rules, one way or the other. I will always feel
though, that D&D players are less mature than players of say "Shadowrun"
(and alot of other games) but not because they play D&D and not because
"they don't know any better... obviously cuz they play D&D"... but mostly
because they are some of the youngest and least experienced gamers... partly
because D&D is the "main game" as far as the RPG market goes... it has the
most new players (by "new players" I mean people who have never played a pen
and paper RPG before) in the RPG gaming community... and obviously new
players will always be the least experienced.

When I started playing 2nd edition AD&D back in 1989... we came in right fro
m basic D&D (played that for 9 years... never played 1st edition AD&D)...
and "Its up to the DM" never really came up... instead when the rules
arguments started, the DM would usually just sit back and listed to the
players who had points to put forth and decide there on his interpretation
based on what the players argued (and in some cases, on what they bought him
for lunch cuz the guy was a grade A mooch)

> Personally I've played various bersoins of D&D for the last 18 years and I
> don't need anything spelled out to me and never did.

And thats good for ya... I also played D&D or 2nd edition for 18 years...
and alot of times what seemed like common sense interpretations of the rules
were argued about in our group (partly because my main DM in the 90's was
the same guy and he liked to use Charm spells on the players to get us to
battle eachother and as 1 player would defeat another, we would have to open
the rulebooks to interpret the rules... because it wasn't just a point of
contention... it was your characters life to deal with too)

For my Shadowrun games, whenever I start up a new group... I always tell
them off the start that I may or may not know the rules 100% (I'd like to
think that other than the decking rules I know them 100% but there is always
room for error). And that during the game, I prefer that the players don't
break up the flow of the game, even if they think I wronged them... because
I am a fair GM and I won't go out of my way to screw a player around
knowingly... and that if they really feel I wronged them someway, they can
bring it up during a break in the game session and cover the topic there if
its a relevant point.

Augustus`
Message no. 6
From: Phil Smith phil_urbanhell@*******.com
Subject: GM Calls
Date: Sun, 24 Sep 2000 09:04:42 GMT
>From: "Augustus" <shadowrun@********.net>
>Personally though, I've found the Shadowrun crowd to be generally more into
>letting the GM resolve things with his experiences and common sense... most
>of the time when the phrase "its up to the GM" comes up in here its usually
>some munchkin thing where they want to get somthing into their game that
>might not be allowed, or they want to munchkinize the rules and get some
>kinda advantage that any Gm with some common sense and a modest knowledge
>of
>the rules would see right away.

The way we play it is that the rules are to be kept to but the GM can
over-ride them at any time for the sake of keeping the game moving,
maintaning game balance yada yada yada. FASA have put a long time into
their rules, making sure that they all work together and there is nothing
that will screw up game balances, but they can not plan for every situation
in every run. Thus the GM has, on more than one ocasion, said to us "fine,
I totally accept that by the rules that can't happen; it just did, deal with
it!" The GM is the best person to decide what will and won't fly in their
games.

Phil

Let us assume we have a can opener.
_________________________________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com.

Share information about yourself, create your own public profile at
http://profiles.msn.com.
Message no. 7
From: Gurth gurth@******.nl
Subject: GM Calls
Date: Sun, 24 Sep 2000 11:25:10 +0200
According to Augustus, at 19:18 on 23 Sep 00, the word on the street
was...

> In Shadowrun you can really boil alot of things down to "Its up to the GM"
> and a good Gm with some common sense can interpret the rules to his liking
> and usually it's in a way that would satisfy all... whereas in D&D
> (especially in 2nd edition, its alot better in 3rd edition) alot of the
> rules were open to multiple interpretations and would really boil down to
> who was the better at presenting his/her case to the DM.

Your two examples are the exact same thing: the GM decides. You're saying
that in SR the GM has to decide based on rules for situations, while in
(A)D&D the GM -- excuse me, DM(tm) -- has to decide based on rules that
are open to interpretation. Same thing, if you ask me.

As for who's better at presenting their case to the GM, that happens in
both as well. If there are no rules then players will try to get the GM to
rule based on their POV on the situation, while if there are rules the
players will present their POV on the rules for the GM to worry about.
Again, it's the same thing, and it will happen in any game regardless of
how clearly the rules spell things out.

> I will always feel though, that D&D players are less mature than players
> of say "Shadowrun" (and alot of other games) but not because they play
> D&D and not because "they don't know any better... obviously cuz they
> play D&D"... but mostly because they are some of the youngest and least
> experienced gamers...

Being inexperienced is very often the same as not knowing any better...

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
It was a warning shot that missed.
-> NAGEE Editor * ShadowRN GridSec * Triangle Virtuoso <-
-> The Plastic Warriors Page: http://plastic.dumpshock.com <-

GC3.1: GAT/! d-(dpu) s:- !a>? C+@ UL P L+ E? W(++) N o? K- w+ O V? PS+
PE Y PGP- t(+) 5++ X+ R+++>$ tv+(++) b++@ DI? D+ G(++) e h! !r(---) y?
Incubated into the First Church of the Sqooshy Ball, 21-05-1998
Message no. 8
From: Sinabian@***.com Sinabian@***.com
Subject: GM Calls
Date: Sun, 24 Sep 2000 10:45:56 EDT
<snippit a whole buncha stuff>

Just a personal addition to this forum here. First thing I'll say is that I'm
relatively new to GMing, and gaming in general for that matter. I've been
playing Shadowrun for maybe 3 years now and that was my introduction to the
gaming world (aside from a session a long time ago of a game called Chill,
but that was a long time ago and only one session). I'm just now beginning to
get the hang of running in D&D, mainly because as with any game no two GMs
run it the same way. Some will do pure RP, some will run you through the
dungeons (mapping and all) and do RP, and others (like the group I'm in now)
will just run you through the dungeons where you hack and slash... <snippit a
LOT of digression on my part> Anyway, and yes this does actually have to do
with the conversation at hand...as a GM on Shadowrun, I've found that there's
NOTHING more annoying than those players who want to argue the rules or
whatnot with you in the middle of a game. I had one group where this chick
who was playing with us would argue every little thing I said, and it broke
things down to the point where EVERYBODY just about would argue all the time
and it just wasn't any damn fun at all. As a result I've kind of become
something of an @$$hole as far as GMing, though I'm a fair @$$hole. It should
definitely indeed be, the GM's call, AND...the GM's word should be final. You
may not always like it, and yes your character may even die. But if you spend
all your time arguing about the game and the rules it's just no fun, and a
simple session can drag on for hours. If there's anything I'm not sure of as
a GM, to be fair to the player if I'm clueless enough I will look it up in
the rules quickly. But in the end, whether a GM calls it from the books, his
head, or cruel fanciful whim, that needs to be the final say...at least until
the next break in gameplay. And even then, but preferably only if you had to,
go ahead and talk to the GM about what you think they did wrong (or hey, how
about right? with all the bitching and moaning they get it's nice to
occasionally hear they did a good job...you just might surprise them into
sneaking you some extra karma points or something...). And if you do that,
it's best to take them aside and talk to them about it. ::steps down off his
soapbox and tucks it away neatly until next time::

Just my .02¥
Message no. 9
From: Aristotle antithesis@**********.com
Subject: GM Calls
Date: Sun, 24 Sep 2000 18:44:01 -0400
>>>Augustus said:
"But D&D tho... there is a crowd that needs the rules pretty much spelled
out for them..."


>>>Alareth replied:
"...As for GM calls we have a simple rule, what the GM says goes and AFTER
the gaming session we check the rules and apply our findings from that
point on."


>>>My response:
I have to say that after several major arguments at the gaming table we
adopted this same rule. If a player doesn't agree, I make a compromise
"call" at the table and promise to look into it fully before the next
game. This list has become a big part of that proccess for me, because it
allows me to come to other experienced players and GMs and get your
opinions.


I also want to go on the record as saying that I do not need things
spelled out for me, nor do I require a rule for every little detail.
However a game is run, at least for the most part, by rules and I like to
have a firm grasp of those rules. Furthermore my players just recently
came off of a 4 year Whitewolf game in which I TOTALLY rewrote the books.
Some of them expressed a desire to run a game by the book, so that they
could learn the game to instead of having to rely on my interpretation. I
respect that and am trying my best to comply...


Thank you,
-- Travis "Aristotle" Heldibridle

Further Reading

If you enjoyed reading about GM Calls, you may also be interested in:

Disclaimer

These messages were posted a long time ago on a mailing list far, far away. The copyright to their contents probably lies with the original authors of the individual messages, but since they were published in an electronic forum that anyone could subscribe to, and the logs were available to subscribers and most likely non-subscribers as well, it's felt that re-publishing them here is a kind of public service.

Thwap!