If you don't like how a GM runs a game, why not man up and run the game yourself?

I have two bad gm stories. That's not bad for my gazillion years of heavy gaming.

1) Played with a gm that had a pet npc named 'Old Macdonald' who traveled with the pc's. Old Macdonald was very irritating, invulnerable to everything, and ate any and all gems the characters found.

This was also the guy that would have a dozen ogres in a 10x20 room, and had a medusa petrify someone at 100 yards even after he accidentally read from the monster manual out loud that it had a very short range for its gaze.


2) At a convention an RPGA dm did some crazy stuff. It was presumably a low level module of some sort, and my pregen character was a cavalier, with heavy plate armor, a shield, and 'A special parry ability'

So my cavalier is body guarding a frail npc, and a villain throws a daggaer at me. I asked the dm if I could get in the way, and use my special parry ability to protect the frail npc.

DM said "The dagger hits your jugular vein, you die"

Later in the adventure, although I was dead and just observing, he sicked a ninja like fire giant on the low level pc's and pounded them into paste.

"Look, stop fighting back: you're supposed to get captured in this session!"

Same GM a few sessions later after explaining to him how we hated railroading:

"Look, go into the haunted house or else there's no game. No you can't take any of your weapons: this is supposed to be horror."

Same GM again, after another few lectures:

"Look, those are all clever plans but there's only ONE way to kill the vampire and that's in his lair in the sewer. So stop wasting your time so we can get to the climax."

Needless to say, I don't play with that dick head anymore. On top of that he's the type who gets a hard-on about arguing about gun-related minutiae and his beloved GMPCs who were always 16-year old nymphomaniacs. Yes, you read that right.

Quote from: Simlasa;756622...
THAT was when the GM pulled out an actual revolver (he was a security guard) and pointed it at me... telling me that 'THAT is how it feels to have a gun pointed at you and isn't it obvious your PC would NOT refuse to get in the boat!'
So yeah, very unimaginative up until that final bit of creativity. And then I left.

I've had gaming groups where almost all the participants were carrying and I can almost guarantee that had any of the participants behaved that way (they wouldn't), police would have been involved.  I will note that nothing like this has ever occurred at any game I've played or run where people happened to be armed.

The most violence I've ever seen at a game has been a few small scuffles and thrown dice in my teens and some pushing and shoving when tempers flared during fights on hot ass days during fight LARPs.  Actual fist-fighting would be a one way trip to "don't come back" and/or police being called.

Quote from: Necrozius;756785...

Needless to say, I don't play with that dick head anymore. On top of that he's the type who gets a hard-on about arguing about gun-related minutiae and his beloved GMPCs who were always 16-year old nymphomaniacs. Yes, you read that right.

While I've met both of those types, I've never seen anything that suggests the two types necessarily go together to form one type, though they can cross over.  And really the problem from a bad GM perspective is "beloved GMPCs."  I don't care what kinks a GM fantasizes about in their private time, but seeing "beloved GMPCs" is a sign I probably don't want to play in that game.  As well when I was in my teens, "16 year old nymphomaniac" actually described a couple players we had.

What I have noticed is that those railroad GMs are often frustrated authors or easily bored when people engage the environment peacefully. I wonder how many examples here fall under either group.

Quote from: Opaopajr;756817What I have noticed is that those railroad GMs are often frustrated authors or easily bored when people engage the environment peacefully. I wonder how many examples here fall under either group.

I dislike the gm style of "You must fight everything" and the often included styles of "Every enemy suicides on the PC's" and "Even the zombies and oozes use intelligent tactics"

Quote from: Opaopajr;756817What I have noticed is that those railroad GMs are often frustrated authors or easily bored when people engage the environment peacefully. I wonder how many examples here fall under either group.

To be honest here, one of the reasons why the OP example bugged me so much is that I will go the opposite route. If the Players are going their own way that doesn't match what I prepared, then I must follow their lead to where they are going. Maybe I can gently steer them back and maybe the direction of the Players is much more fun, whatever happens it is my job as GM to try and be like the Wizard of Oz and not let them see the fakery behind the curtain which would break immersion.

Yeah, I feel there's a "I prepped too hard to throw all of this away!" and "talk? move stuff? but why?" (which might actually be 'how?') connection. I wonder if there's material out there to advise how to unclench and roll with the punches.

The DM that I had that drove me away from rpgs for years would throw fits if we didn't adhere to his grand epic story he had prepared for us. He practically reveled in the game being a railroad and the players having no real agency. In fact I'm convinced the guy actually had some kind of antisocial behavior going on and this was just one way he got his kicks in screwing with people. He would arbitrarily end games and kill off players if things weren't going the exact way he wanted it to go. (an example, our party was tasked with escorting a rescued hostage to safety. Party wanted to go explore some cave, my paladin told them to shove off and stick with the plan. DM Decides my paladin's god is upset with my actions and strips his paladinhood.)

Not only was he unimaginative, he thought he was god's gift to gaming.

Quote from: jeff37923;756606One of the most boring and unimaginative GMs I ever had to deal with could not allow an adventure to exist that wasn't a railroad. If your PC went somewhere that he shouldn't have and you asked what was there, the GM would say that all the PC saw was "a grey fog" or "raw holodeck panels". Talk to a NPC that wasn't part of the plot and they would answer with, "Why are you talking to me? I'm just an extra." Killed immersion dead. Didn't feel like a living world at all.

At least he was honest about the railroading, instead of wasting your time following stuff that he'd make turn into dead ends anyway.

Wow, nothing I've encountered was as bad as these examples. Two stories come to mind though, both from conventions:

1. At one con I played in a game (forget which system) based on the Alien movies. The last person alive would win a prize. There were supposed to be 8 or more players, instead there were 4 of us. For the next three hours we chug through a ruined spaceship shooting up Aliens. One by one we die as ammo runs out. I was the last one, thus the winner who escapes to star in a sequel. All pretty meaningless. The prize I got: a copy of the Aliens rules (obviously used) which is a crappy rulebook filled with B&W grainy pictures from the films. Yeah, thanks. Fun concept, could have been good if the GM was decent but he was bland.

2. I've mentioned this before, at conventions in Florida there's a group of overweight bearded guys who run a game called "Second American Revolution", a right-wing fantasy where the American government goes Communist and gun toting patriots fight for freedom "Red Dawn" style. Okay, fine, I can swallow that turd. So out of a 4 hour session one hour is spent explaining the concept and rules, a second hour or more on blah character generation and equipping (backpack, boots, rifle, knife, grenades, that's all you need) and one hour of play. My guy was a sniper type who fired two shots then got in close and threw one grenade which blew up a barracks killing 30 sleeping soldiers at once. Yeah, sure, thanks for wasting my valuable convention time. This was back in the 90's and these guys really thought their concept was soon to happen. Sigh.

Quote from: Doughdee222;7568641. At one con I played in a game (forget which system) based on the Alien movies. The last person alive would win a prize. There were supposed to be 8 or more players, instead there were 4 of us. For the next three hours we chug through a ruined spaceship shooting up Aliens. One by one we die as ammo runs out. I was the last one, thus the winner who escapes to star in a sequel. All pretty meaningless. The prize I got: a copy of the Aliens rules (obviously used) which is a crappy rulebook filled with B&W grainy pictures from the films. Yeah, thanks. Fun concept, could have been good if the GM was decent but he was bland.

That's funny, one of my one shot games I run to introduce people to GURPS is an Event Horizon style survival horror on a spaceship thing. It's extremely railroady (mostly because it's new players and I'm trying to teach the mechanics quickly.) But has always been popular when I've run it. I think Railroading at a convention or in a game with a tight schedule can be good, but there's no hope if you have a crap dm (or a crap system, as that sounds like it was.)

I've been the suck GM on many occasions.  Railroads, GM PC Theater, arbitrary calls against players.  I've done all the mainstream sins.

Most of the time, I was just trying to present something fun to my players.  I wasn't trying to be a suck GM.  I was trying to do something entertaining and doing it badly.

However, a few times I've just flat out been an ass.  They're not particularly interesting stories.

One time there was a player named Roger in our group who most of us had issues with.  So one game session he was making a routine pilot check and failed it by one.  I was in a bad mood that day, so I declared that his failed pilot check caused hs variable fighter to fall apart in the sky.  I told him he successfully ejected, but was going to have to sit out the adventure and wait for rescue, and that if he left before his character was rescued, then his character would die.   I then made him sit there for six hours doing nothing. It was purely a dick move.  No one else thought it was anything less than what he deserved, but it was still a dick move.

Another time I was running a game and doing a plotline where a PC had been possessed, but the player was still playing the character.  I told the player the little voice inside his head was instructing him to capture my GM PC and kill him.  So, the player did, quite eagerly I might add.  He never tried to struggle against this instruction even once.  I wonder why?  Anyway, it became clear the player was going to be successful in killing my GM-PC, so I paniced and arbitrarily pulled some crap out so I could kill his character before he killed mine.  Yeah, dick move, because I intentionally set him up to just declare his character dead.  Everyone was rightfully pissed with me for that one.

However, the funniest one is another Roger story.

Some backstory, I had this strange double pronged knife.  It was something I had found.  It was probably from the forties or something.  It was pretty wicked looking, and it had some rust on it to make it look especially nasty, because the rust was on it in just such a way that made it look like it was still stained with blood from a recent murder.

Anyway, we were having game night as usual.  As usual, Roger was being himself.  I forget what was happening in the game.  I think Roger said something about demonic sacrifice.  Whatever he said, it was the trigger for what we did next.

I told everyone else in the group "it is time."  We hadn't planned any of this beforehand.  It was purely spontaneous.  It's kind of scary how coordinated we were.  They grabbed Roger and hurled him down to the floor, holding him down while he screamed in confusion.  I turned and brought the evil looking knife out of it's hidey hole.

As I turned around I held my arms out and chanted stuff like "almighty satan, we do give this virgin sacrifice unto you..." blah, blah, blah.  This scared Roger even more, and he was screaming bloody murder and struggling for his life.  But everyone else managed to keep him held down while I kept chanting.  Then, I said something like "Amen Satan" and looked down at him as crazily as I could.  He was yelling, "Oh god, oh god, please don't kill me." or some shit like that.  I acted like I was going to stab him, and he let out a blood curdling girly scream worthy of a slasher movie.

That was finally what did it for me.  I started laughing and couldn't stop.  Neither could anyone else as they let go of Roger.  Roger was paralyzed for a moment, still recovering from fear.  He said something like "You guys are assholes" and fled.  We probably kept laughing about it for at least an hour.

I guess it wasn't quite bad enough a gaming experience, because Roger was back to play next week.

Quote from: Opaopajr;756817What I have noticed is that those railroad GMs are often frustrated authors or easily bored when people engage the environment peacefully. I wonder how many examples here fall under either group.

I haven't GMed in awhile (no one who'd play the games I'd run), but I try not to be that. E.G. having a go-gang in Shadowrun challenge the group to a race instead of to the fight the adventure originally called for.