Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Great Cthulhu 08-17-05, 11:23 PM	This is a thread to list the mistakes that you'v made as a DM. The goal is to get as high as 1001. Let's face it: we're not perfect. I'm sure even Gygax himself did some stupid things too. This is basically a list of such mistakes. Note: You can also add your solution to the mistake too. 1. I once let a PC (CN ranger) overthrow a kingdom. My solution was to switch his alignmetn to CE afterwards. That made stuff worse. 2. The previous PC (now evil) decided to use his alignment shift to his advantage by demanding insane taxes, making strict laws, and slaughtering all of those that he found stupid. My solution was rather the other PCs' solution: to have a neighboring tyrant of epic proportions challenge the ranger's might. Next session, the good king was back, and the party had a new sorceror. (If you catch my drift.) Let's make it to at least 101! :D
lonesoldier 08-17-05, 11:30 PM	3. Leting my players vouch for other players. Now I only play with personal friends. If you are not my friend, I don't DM for you (Note: This doesn't apply online). I had these three players, did not understand a thing, which isn't bad, we can teach them, but they refused to learn. Golem monks...shudder.
jera 08-17-05, 11:39 PM	elemental campaign 4. i allowed to get a bard to use any song he had the real life version of on a cd as long as he had thelyrics and could make an efect to go along with it that sounded fair what happend that disco song can't touch this giving all players a +5 to dodge ACs 5. cloak of invisibility 6. ring of wall walk (took me a week to figure out how to get rid of that) 7. ogers fighting with giant bolas (the 2 balls attached together) 8. one word GUNS 9. keith bryant
Token 08-17-05, 11:53 PM	What's so bad about cloak of invisibilty? (Assuming it is either a cloak version of ring of invis, or even an improved invis item). There's plenty of stuff that thwarts invisibility. All dragons, to name a few. What's so bad about ogres fighting with giant bolas? Unless you have screwy rules for bolas, it's just a weapon used for tripping.
jera 08-18-05, 12:04 AM	the cloak of invisibility paird with a ring of wall walk meant that they could go anywhere and do almost anything they wanted and it added to many variables to my game besides they would never use it for game purposes that i gve it to them for. the cloak was for carlos to use it to spy on the mage counsel but, ric and pasha used it to spy on naked chiks at local bathing houses and stuff like that and the ogres with bolas my group is 14 to 17 think about it ogres with giant balls they wouldnt stop making nut jokes it was "so did i get touched by his balls or not?" and other stupid jokes like that for the next 3 sessions
CryoSilver 08-18-05, 10:14 AM	10. Telling my players: "I trust you; you can use any official material you want to create your character..."
NinjaE 08-18-05, 11:30 AM	elemental campaign that disco song can't touch this giving all players a +5 to dodge ACs Oh. Hell. Yes. Am I the only one thinking that? 11. In a trial adventure I'm running(BESM D20), the ninja PC is kinda... Freaky. Blindsight, a +12 modifier to initiative, moving about sixty feet a round and the ability to do 1d10+4d6 on a sneak attack makes him rather nasty at level three. Problem is, I actually helped him make the character.
BloodGod 08-18-05, 11:46 AM	Trying to run on the fly, in my first campaign. There was no remedy, other than not bothering with a second session. -BG
VinylVillichi 08-18-05, 11:52 AM	13. GMPC. I subjected a few friends to a game that could have been titled "And you shall be my Minions!" Eventually got the idea that this wasn't the way to go. Even I wasn't having fun.
LCD2YOU 08-18-05, 11:55 AM	14: Not just allowing a TPK when the PCs and players are not being unlucky, just stupid because they think, "Ah, the DM has a campaign for us and he doesn't want to kill us off". Which leads to #15, 15: Killing the players because you had great dice rolls and your players rolls wouldn't add to 15 combined each round and you have 5 players. That's when you take all their stuff but leave them alive.
mhr74 08-18-05, 12:05 PM	16. Dropping the lower level party with the 10th level retired whatever class bartender in a fit of DM v. PC. Sorry guys! :weep:
LCD2YOU 08-18-05, 12:44 PM	16. Dropping the lower level party with the 10th level retired whatever class bartender in a fit of DM v. PC. Sorry guys! :weep:I actually have a few of those guys around. Not so much in a big city though. In a small village, chances are up you'll run into some ex-adventurer who fell in love with the quaint surroundings/the mayor's daughter (or son)/the idea of being a bar keep, sole survivor of 5 adventurers who perished because of something stupid or felt they got "too old" to go out and about hunting orcs and dodging dragons. Note this is not all the time, but it does add a bit of mystery and makes the PCs think about their actions first.
Nomad4life 08-18-05, 01:25 PM	17. Telling my players upfront that I would not kill their characters in an upcoming adventure. (Why, oh why didn’t I just add “…Unless you do something STUPID!!!”) 18. Trying to seek justice for that adventure by killing them all in the next one. 19. Being more interested in my own story than what the players wanted to do (railroading.) 20. Not railroading enough. (Running a game that was too open-ended.) 21. Taking criticism of my DMing too personally. 22. The week we tried to play RIFTS- One of the all-time worst disasters ever. Everyone *hated* the game mechanics, even me! But I kept urging them to try it out just a bit longer... Wish we hadn't wasted all that time, or kept the story and used a real system. 23. All the times I KNEW I should have kicked a problem player out first thing... But kept giving them “second chances.” Not anymore. I consider myself a pretty good GM. This is largely due to the vast number of mistakes I have learned from over the years!
VinylVillichi 08-18-05, 01:26 PM	Isn't there a list of roleplaying rules that inlcudes "Never attack the bartender" , right below "Never split up the party" ?
LCD2YOU 08-18-05, 01:44 PM	Words to live (well) by. Even if the bartender is a 1st level commoner, he can always add "something special" to the drinks when the characters start getting drunk.
Furious D 18 08-18-05, 02:34 PM	24. Telling the players too much about the next session. They started thinking about what I was planning and not about what was happening in game. Metagaming to the max!
VirgilCaine 08-18-05, 03:33 PM	4. i allowed to get a bard to use any song he had the real life version of on a cd as long as he had thelyrics and could make an efect to go along with it that sounded fair what happend that disco song can't touch this giving all players a +5 to dodge ACs That was rap, not disco.
Zyklon 08-19-05, 03:24 AM	25. Trusting for one gamer who usually power games, that this prestige class he wanted to play was just for RP not for Power gaming. He actually was suprised how űber it was. Next time im sure i read all the prestige classes he wants to take.
DraconsNighthawk 08-19-05, 02:33 PM	Letting all my pcs to have these uber weapons that gained enhancment bonus equal to their level... with interchangable powers. Meaning they can make it a +1 holy volper weapon, to a +15 holy flaming burst when they were 19... Hoo boy did I ever learn my lesson on that one. I hate PCS... especally ones that attack evil guys with +6 Icyburst, flaming burst, acidic burst, shockburst, sonicburst, chaotic holy greatswords... Comic Book Guy: Worst Mistake EVEER!
hollow_ghost 08-24-05, 05:49 PM	27. Pales compared to previous mistake but anyways... I made my PC face themselves in a mage tower where they had just recently got a neat treasure from a dragon. They asked me after killing themselves: ''Do we get to double our inventory???'' DM: ''ummm... yes.'' (+3 Defending Composite Longbow of Spell Storing, doubled like that) 28. A DM of mine once gave his dragons last will. If they were killed to easily, the blue one explodes in a lightning nova requiring a fortitude SV that kill the unharmed character who fails his save (me) and the red spits a fireball at everyone before collapsing in 2.0 killing a character who was unfortunatly hit previously by all the attacks (me).
Chobemaster 08-24-05, 06:45 PM	29. Didn't learn the difference between HP and HD before my first game. of course, I was 8 and my one player 5. 30. On the old treasure tables, instead of reading it as 10% chance OF 4d6 x100 gp (for example) I read it as 10%X3d4x100 gp. Same in the long-run, of course.
RogerWilco 08-24-05, 07:19 PM	One my DM once made: Forget to have stairs in the floorplan of a multistory building. (we still ask him "it does have stairs doesn't it?")
Crystal Monk 08-24-05, 09:30 PM	32: my first time DMing. trust me, that was a mistake. 33: letting two guys who were good friends both play characters with high INT and low WIS (rogue and wizard). that was just a recipe for disaster, though it was fun. I think that grapple is still stuck in that spiderweb. 34: Boots of Springing and Striding (3.0 version, doubled your speed) for a DEX-based fighter. moving 60 feet per round and using Spring Attack = what monster?
Discordia 08-24-05, 09:54 PM	35. Allowing a dissatisfied player to repeatedly change his PC. It seemed like a fine idea for a casual game. Over a period of three sessions, he somehow went from a gnome illusionist to a minotaur barbarian with a custom pet. 36. Not stopping my players when they started plotting each other's deaths. 37. Not stopping my players when they actually started attacking each other (a different campaign from 36, oddly enough).
tharivol266 08-24-05, 10:29 PM	38) +5 holy keen vorpral....they bribed me...i got three books outta the deal(no not really three but enough for one)
Ty-No-Mite 08-25-05, 01:59 AM	39. Allow both PCs in a two-man party to play CN gnome illusionists with a wisdom of 3. They fed the captain of the guard uncooked cheescake made from milk and dirt...then they began a running "projectile vomiting" fight. I ended the session then and there and still have nightmares to this day. :weep:
DraconsNighthawk 08-25-05, 03:39 AM	38) +5 holy keen vorpral....they bribed me...i got three books outta the deal(no not really three but enough for one) Three books for saying a PC can have a +5 holy keen worpral? seems fair to me. I can give it to them, get my books, then send a powerful mob to steal it. Problem solved and three books to boot.
High King Tigernmas 08-25-05, 05:54 AM	39) Allowing players at all. 40) *Tired DM* 'Ok, change your damn characters then.' *Players change alignment, class, creature* 13. GMPC. I subjected a few friends to a game that could have been titled "And you shall be my Minions!" Eventually got the idea that this wasn't the way to go. Even I wasn't having fun. ^Currently being subjected to this as a PC, it's really ****, especially as the whole campaign seems to be headed this way...
Lily_Knight 08-25-05, 07:01 AM	41) Assuming my lower-level players where clever enough not to engage the vampiric BBEG in combat, whilst he stood in the middle of a high societal function within a heavy guarded Embassy.
Crowyn 08-25-05, 07:08 AM	42) Allowed PC who had gotten knocked unconcious to participate n the planning by giving them 1/2 hp. The slaves the were in the process of rescuing armed themselves with the weapons of the out-of-order characters. Chaos ensued. The most notably sentence was uttered by our CN mercenary fighter :"Gimme back my sword you :censored: :censored: slave". The young nobleman who had been abducted was not so happy being called names. Therefore I have never again let an unconcious character take part in anything (by the way, this was 2e, were you had to rest for a day before healing was possible).
LCD2YOU 08-25-05, 07:44 AM	#43: After reading many posts from many threads, allowing boderline evil people play CN is right up there. #44: Not sitting down with a player of a LG Paladin (or Cleric) and letting them know what LG is and what their codes in in detail.
Kaligrad 08-25-05, 11:37 AM	#46: (check back, there's 2 39's) A DM I was under (shortly, thank heaven) used the random treasure charts. In front of us. So there were no takebacks. So it was that a group of level 5 adventurers got hold of a Mask of the Skull, a Deck of Illusions, and Marvelous Pigments.
Needle 08-26-05, 05:07 PM	#47: Going by the books too much, and not using common sense and established lore to override some very silly rules. I learned my lesson.
DraconsNighthawk 08-26-05, 05:23 PM	(not a number, but example Needle??)
Stealthd 08-26-05, 10:34 PM	48. Not using encumbrance rules. I'm so bad for this because I'm lazy and hate detail, but... ... "You have NINETY TWO swords? Okay...." :rolleyes:
hollow_ghost 08-29-05, 12:12 AM	49. Allowing players to use books you never hear of or have.
BoxcarWilly 08-29-05, 01:31 AM	50. Not explaining to my players that thier 1st lv characters dont have to fight every enemy I throw at them, and that they are given a speed and the option to run for a reason.
Zilred 08-29-05, 02:22 AM	51. Using far too many thin walls in a recapturing mission. A Stone Shape plus building blueprints led to a brutal surprise round on the BBEG. 52. Not using adequate defenses against a Flying Sorcerer with Improved Invisibility. Led to a hallway full of lower-level wizards surrendering to an unknown source of sniped fireballs from outside the building. 53. Democratic D&D, where everyone takes turn as a DM and everyone has a say in devising plot. It just doesn't work with too many missed plothooks, uncoordinated plots, and the occasional Monty Haul adventure cropping up in a relatively normal campaign. 54. Allowing evil PC's in a Save the World campaign. (not my mistake)
Amene 08-29-05, 02:34 AM	55.- thinking it was cool to give one of the pcs a deck of vorpal cards to throw (Wtf i was thinking??... i was playing Final Fantasy 6 at the time and i loved the Setzer character)
insomnambulist 08-29-05, 05:18 AM	56. Agreeing to let a player who was always a good roleplayer with a creative flair bring his often-talked-about-with-misty-eyes-and-a-wistful-smile favorite character from another game into mine without looking at the character sheet first. It was, of course, a blend of stats that can only be rolled by the hand of god or a cheater, multiple PrCs that I couldn't even find mention of online, overpowered (but manditory for his character concept) equipment for the level, and an inaccurate ECL that should have made him two levels higher than the rest of the group. 57. Allowing the rest of the group to beef up their characters to be on the same playing field, instead of making the original guy rework his "baby." (Thankfully, while someone was guest-DMing a few sessions later there was a slight case of TPK, and no more Munchkin characters for them.)
lockdar 08-29-05, 07:03 AM	58. Trying to do a decent conversion on the Labyrinth of Madness ending in a freaky session of half converted traps/rooms and monsters. Never doing that again.... 59. Letting someone play that is a known powerplayer in that half-converted Labyrinth. Result was a Sorcerer who was disintegrating and using meteor shower on every door/wall/monster in there. And after his spells were all used up he demanded 16hours of rest so he could replenish. He was the first player who ever walked out on a session because of massive level drains :cool: :D
HMSHIELD 08-29-05, 07:54 AM	60. 1 DM vs 11 players(yes 11 and we were all different alignments LG, CG, LE, LN etc and the lawful evil one was a minotaur in dragonlance with 20 str) it was 2nd edition
hollow_ghost 09-10-05, 01:02 AM	This is from another thread. Hi guys and gals, I need your help and two cents! Little background: the party was escorting a merchant from Waterdeep (FR). They arrived at Nashkel, where both he and the NPC druid were arrested by the Flaming Fist because of a murder from several years ago where a new witness just appeared. Here's my problem with the Paladin player: 1) She insists on helping them by finding the "real culprits". That clearly shows that she doesn't trust the established law. This is chaotic behavior. 2) She disagreed with the idea of the bard and the soulknife: starting a frontal assault on the garrison (where the captives are held) with the help of both a PC and an NPC wizard. That is clearly chaotic behavior, as she is standing agains the lawful organisation (the PC's group). 3) She got a bad warning when she killed off some Gibberlings that were attacking them. Since some were pregnant, she killed off innocent children, too! (She didn't take this one very good, either. I guess I should have been forewarned that she isn't one to play paladins seriously.) 4) The money that she was given by the NPC wizard (who bought what the merchant was originally carrying to Nashkel) is currently residing in her own pocket. She claims it's "safekeeping, until we found the real murderers". I say it is a bad excuse for selfish (aka evil) behavior. 5) The NPC wizard was evil (what a Detect Evil showed), yet she still took the money and is thinking of getting his help if it can help the merchant and druid. This is clearly associating with evil characters, and therefore inherently evil. So, when I told her that her paladin was now chaotic evil and she should start rolling up a new character, as the current (now NPCed) one was busy trying to further an evil plot, she started foaming out of her mouth and accusing me of hating paladins, which is of course, utter nonesense. Since then, I have started getting dead rats in my mailbox and all... still, I want to know if I was justified or not. Since I already know that I was (as usual) fully justified, I will discard all attempts to convince me of the opposite, but please, post anyway. And someone dared saying in that thread: This is the best paladin thread evar. Ignore those naysayers Siguard, a true DM never changes their decision (especially when the decision is so awesome, and absolutely correct). The paladin player should thank you for pointing out just how wretched of a player she is. For more replies, go to http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=499200&page=1&pp=30
Surprise 09-10-05, 03:45 AM	#61-Not having a spine. A group of PC's (ave character lvl 12) decide to go into a forrest that was described as "extremely dangerous" by epic-level mages. They go in anyway. Instead of TPKing them like I should have for doing something so stupid I allow them to win the encounter, the result being their getting ridiculous EXP and knowing too much for their own good. One of these days...
Malice Duskblade 09-10-05, 10:22 AM	#62. Considering the team had a hard enough time taking out one Fomorian, they level and I give them two fomorians. (hey, it fit the EL...) #63. Allowing pre-generated characters at the table. Every pre-generated character comes with "I had the best rolls! Here's the paper to prove them!". For this, my next campaign will be point-buy only. #64. Not confronting people about cheating. #65 (blends with 64) allowing players to roll those dice that you can't read unless you're a foot from them. #66. Seeing the 'cheater dice' in the store, and realizing they look exactly like those of one of your players, and not doing anything about it, even though he rolls great. #67. Spending 6 hours a week working on a campaign that a certain person is going to cheat at (I'm attacking with my scyth, smiting, oh wow, natural twenty - look at that, another twenty, (nobody can see his dice from here, these happen a lot) wow, I just did 140 damage to your BBEG). #68. Letting the cheater get under my skin while everybody else wants to roleplay. #69. Not getting rid of the cheater sooner.
ermedic 09-10-05, 10:40 AM	70. Allowing 3 of my 7 players to take the leadership feat. I learned that lesson. If you want to take leadership...fine, but your cohort and followers stay at home while you go adventuring. I'm never again going to run a combat against 10 characters. :rant:
A Bigmouth Bard 09-10-05, 10:52 AM	Sorry what I'm about to post is a little late... 4. i allowed to get a bard to use any song he had the real life version of on a cd as long as he had thelyrics and could make an efect to go along with it that sounded fair what happend that disco song can't touch this giving all players a +5 to dodge ACs The song "It's Raining Men" would have an interesting effect... :rofl: 71. (this almost happened) Giveing my brother a 10th level starting character with a luck blade (gives 1d3 wishes)!
DarkWolfe7 09-12-05, 12:58 PM	Without actually adding the total amount myself: 72. I once had a player, who we all recognized as the weakest role-player, state that he does the exact same thing a fellow player does except: "I do it quicker, and faster ... oh, and better." All in character. And to make matters worse, I told him he'd have to role opposing checks to see how well he preformed. Again, in character: "In that case, I rage." I simply replied: "And?" "And what?" At this point he actually got up from the table and started doing push-ups, right there on the floor. The mistake being: not clubbing him to death on the spot with the Player's Handbook. Oh, how I wish I made this up! DarkWolfe
King Goblin 09-12-05, 01:19 PM	73. Make a special prestige style class where by the player has an agreement with a demon to use gems to trap the souls of poor innocents he tricks into trusting him and then find the player plots to trap the soul of a king's daughter and hold her for ransom (that was actually another DMs game I was playing in that some player threw on him unexpectantly) 74. Use time travel in your stories...arghh!!!
The Forgotten Traveler 09-13-05, 07:01 AM	75: Allow everyone to play fighters or barbarians. NEVER AGAIN! :rant: :hoppingma :banghead:
Rhomphaia 09-13-05, 08:04 AM	76) Good concept...Bad delivery. I devised a rather sneaky and devious trap...well, trap room. I called it 'The Gauntlet'. The basic story behind this room was that it was used as a training hall for rogues to sharpen their skills. The catch was is that it was very old and things did not work well. For example, someone would step on something, then nothing would happen until the party had passed the 'danger zone' then a bladed pendulum would swing out harmlessly. There were over a hundred traps in this room. The whole thing was set up in a huge room with wooden or thin stone walls imitating cooridors and stuff like that and was up on raised platforms. The catch was to be when the players began to get overconfident and just start strolling along, the traps actually began to work well (a better maintained area). My mistake here was two-fold. First was forgetting to make the traps work again. The second was when I remembered, it was on the deadliest trap in there and then springing it on the players (when they were expecting none of the traps to work). I had to do some major flubbing and DEM to have the players survive from my doubled mistake.
Sand_Man 09-13-05, 08:41 AM	eating and drinking while playing, then spill my drink on my map and my PCs character sheets :eek:
Gurthoron 09-13-05, 10:08 AM	78.) (I think) Allowing a character to be an awakened ferret rogue. And giving him full sneak attack dice. With my preference for outdoor campaigns, this guy almost missed his sneak attacks (Ferret jumps out of high grass, attacks, disappears. Damn ferret.) 79.) Not fudging dice rolls. What was supposed to be a battle around their CR ended up easy when the leader rolled 1s every round for three rounds. At the end, he just said f*** it, sat down, and let the PCs pass because he was tired of it. Similarly, having an Ogre Mage be fascinated by dancing lights for 3 rounds because of a natural 1. 80.) Allowing the party redeemer to do their job way too easily. She ended up converting a Draegloth (special half-fiend drow) and this weird scorpion abberation thing bred by Kaorti. The combo of her spells, high diplomacy, and me rolling terribly for will saves made converting a breeze.
green_yawgmoth 09-13-05, 10:40 AM	Sorry what I'm about to post is a little late... The song "It's Raining Men" would have an interesting effect... :rofl:There's a whole list of songs that came to mind for me: Iron Man Stayin' Alive Weapon of Choice Bulls on Parade :D http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v91/yawgmoth/kittyjig.gif
lordgeek22 09-13-05, 06:56 PM	81) I played a session the day I graduated from college. In my celebration I toldthe DM that I would do a shot every time I rolled 1-5 and he allowed it. The next morning I flushed that D20 down the crapper with what I ate for dinner. If I ever find that Murphy guy, I will stomp him into ooze for creating that stupid law.
Nevynxxx 09-14-05, 08:05 AM	There's a whole list of songs that came to mind for me: Iron Man Stayin' Alive Weapon of Choice Bulls on Parade :D http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v91/yawgmoth/kittyjig.gif Hmmm Nine Inch Nails - closer.....that could have some strange effects. Walk like an egyptian anyone?
hollow_ghost 11-08-05, 06:23 PM	82) divine ranks, for someone un-epic...
Calico Jack Drake 11-09-05, 04:15 PM	83) Second Edition Unearthed Arcana - Probablility Control?!? Who thought up a spell that would allow you to adjust your die rolls by 20%!?! 84) Second Edition Character Option books - Hey, let's take a relatively uncomplicated system and change everything about it that makes it playable... huh? what do you all think? 85) An overabundance of splat books 86) Thinking I know better than the game desginers (and play testers and editors and...) and changing or eliminating a rule before understanding it fully and considering what it does and why it's there. *sigh* --CJ
MindWandererB 11-09-05, 04:43 PM	#46: A DM I was under (shortly, thank heaven) used the random treasure charts. In front of us. So there were no takebacks. So it was that a group of level 5 adventurers got hold of a Mask of the Skull, a Deck of Illusions, and Marvelous Pigments. I can do you one better. Same story. Deck of Many Things. The party literally more than doubled in power before the game even began. Speaking of which.... 84) Giving players a Deck of Many Things. I can't count the times this has happened, and it always either results in most of the party being utterly destroyed or the party's power being magnified immensely. Usually the latter. 85) Using lots of house rules. I played in a game that was so complicated, we had to constantly ask the DM, "can I do this?" 86) Magnifying #85: Not making all those house rules available to players so they could read them and be familiar with them. 87) Changing those damn house rules virtually every session. We never had any idea what the rules were at any given time. Sometimes this was good, though- I remember a house rule he used that cause random stuff to happen every time two characters or monsters tied for initiative. This was in 2e, where initiative was a d10- rerolled every round- and he rolled it individually for each monster. Even small battles took all day, as everyone was randomly dropping weapons, falling over, and getting stuck under chairs. Bad, bad. 88) Mixed-level parties. Same game. Level 6 humans adventuring with level 15 PC minotaurs. Just... ugly. Fatalities occurred all the time. 89) Favoritism. Played in a game with the DM's girlfriend and best friend. My character was so utterly useless in comparison it was only worth playing because he did a good job with the RPing elements. 90) XP rewards for out-of-character stuff. Now, I can see some small rewards for roleplaying. But passing trivia challenges about the homebrewed campaign world, helping the DM organize materials, etc. just contributes to party imbalance. Of course, this was in the same game as #88 above, so who really cared anyway?
boatmanj 11-09-05, 05:03 PM	91) Allowing players to play drunk/stoned/or otherwise intoxicated 92) Making the campaign just about numbers (okay, you've done 1500 dmg, who's turn is it?)
Sangredwarf89 11-09-05, 05:07 PM	43) Letting stupid players lead a party just because his character has a high diplomacy/intelligence etc. This particular campaign drove me nuts!!! AAAAHHHHH!!!!! I HATE STUPID PEOPLE!!! [This Message was proofread by Sangredwarf89's friend. It's a living! At least I get paid.]
Blesus 11-09-05, 07:35 PM	93) Expecting too much from the players. Without fail, my players always manage to act stupider than I account for. I always find myself making a scenario and thinking "there is no way in hell they could screw this up." Lo and behold, my simple task of getting past a trapped door is thwarted as the party warmage attempts to disable the trap. By casting fireball on it. From 5ft away. While everybody was in range. You think I'm joking. Sadly, this actually happened. Which leads me to my next mistake as a DM... 94) DMing for my friends in the first place. Seriously, I would be better off today if I had just played all my campaigns by myself. I guess maybe this mistake should be called "not having retarded friends."
DragonMage(xxx)>>>>> 11-09-05, 08:16 PM	95) Letting a druid have a megaraptor and riding it one level earlie "its not that great" he said "all it can do is swallow things whole". 96) Not paying attention to the munchkin players. I ender up having to deal with an incarnate with some wierd manticore tail....4d8 damage?... 97)Letting the players relax and take their time with making their charecters...it took them 3 hours to do it.... 98)Letting the players find a dragon egg and raise it...enlarge,enlarge,enlarge...so what not youre riding a colossal dragon thats 3 months old? :dragon: 99)Letting the players find a village of badly defended villagers....they literally became vikings and anialated it.
Malruhn 11-09-05, 08:39 PM	Before I get the honor of posting the 100th and 101st worst DM mistake, may I say two things? First off, you guys are pathetic, and you must me the world's WORST DMs!! :P Secondly, where can I prove that I am NOT a victim of multiple-personality disorder, because I swear I have made ALL of those mistakes before!! :D :rolleyes: :weep: _____________________________ 100: First edition (yeah, I'm that old!), had a house rule that said if you didn't have a patron deity, if you asked for divine intervention, odds were, SOMEONE would hear you... and usually not someone you wanted to. Watched a player ask to be rescued from his predicament and become a 20th level ninja on the spot. A demon lord heard and granted it - in exchange for his soul. Two words: Bad. idea. 101: Depending on/designing too many dungeons that revolved around trapping the characters in them - and they playing "The Great Escape" or "The War of Attrition." Two more words: Worse. idea.
Dragonspirit 11-09-05, 10:34 PM	102) Too many sidequests. 103) Agreeing to a PrC before reading the details. 104) Entertaining notions of 'democracy' at the gaming table.
kajinoryu 11-10-05, 03:33 AM	105) Mistaking LA for ECL (on a monster race with 14 racial hit dice and LA +5)
Evercursed 11-10-05, 04:21 AM	106) Saying "I trust you guys to roll your own die" while DMing an online campaign. Worst mistake ever. In a 3 round battle with a Stone Giant, the Giant suffered 8 Critical hits from various players. 107) Trying to speed through a campaign by skipping encounters, under the assumption that "Since you're going to beat that thing anyway..."
Quirriff 11-10-05, 05:05 AM	100: First edition (yeah, I'm that old!), had a house rule that said if you didn't have a patron deity, if you asked for divine intervention, odds were, SOMEONE would hear you... and usually not someone you wanted to. Watched a player ask to be rescued from his predicament and become a 20th level ninja on the spot. A demon lord heard and granted it - in exchange for his soul. Two words: Bad. idea. 1e Oriental Adventures Ninja? Effectlivly becoming a high level multiclassed assassin with theif acrobat abilities? How can that not be a mistake! Well I'v only DMed twice. And I started with a minimodule, and then I tried to create the world on the spot, I didn't like the results of either.
Flushpuppie 11-10-05, 05:16 AM	Well I'm guilty of multiple crimes... 108: I handed my party the deck of many things....stupid stupid stupid. they ended up with a wish, a small keep and an imprisoned cohort. 109: In my starting days, I dind't understand the magic item rules so my lvl 8 party didn't even had a +1 weapon. I also didn't understand the way spells worked. so.. no wizards in my campaign :embarrass Nowadays I've got the game under control and I don't make that many real bad mistakes anymore.
AlanBruce 11-10-05, 05:51 AM	110. Stupidly allowing a player friend of mine to roll not once or twice but THREE times in a row for a character. His first two tries produced characters with 12 and 9's as his best and worst numbers (and everything in between). The bastard rolls three 18's in a row, a 16, 15, and a 9. "I'll be a half-orc fighter!" Never let your players get the upperhand by whining over bad dice rolls... 111. A campaign I played years ago in 2ed. The DM gives the party (level 1) a stone with 3 wishes. Our worst player, the most powerhungry of them all gets the stone and wishe sto eb a black dragon. We had a black dragon with our party from level 1 to level 5, at which point he devoured us.
Araes 11-10-05, 09:11 AM	Ok, that was literally a laugh out loud on 111. Have this great image like a doctor seuss book where there's the three normal guys and then this massive dragon walking along with the dragon eying them all like snacks. Then flip the page, and just the dragon smiling. (mainly that last line "at which point he devoured us") *edit* Wow, didn't realize I had so many mistakes *sheepish* 112: Wishes are great fun. Had a game where the DM allowed somebody to make a retarded wish for lvl 20, a kingdom, and a dragon follower. "Ok, roll three 20's in a row for me and I'll give it to you" Either luck hates us or he had cheater dice, either way, no more game. Should be noted, 2nd Ed. 113: Letting a friend do a couple guest DM sessions while I was away, so that the group would have something to do and retain interest, but not filling him in completely on the plot. Back to the word processor. 114: Allowing friend's spouses, children, ect.. to play who either weren't all that interested in the game (but the friend really wanted them for family time), or they just weren't capable of handling it. So much, "what should I do honey?" 115: Allowing rules that I haven't read has led to several mistakes, but probably the most fun has been with psionics. Didn't have the book, barely had time to read it beforehand, spent all game adjucating actions I had little idea of the meaning of. Highly frustrating. Not a new one: But reiteration of allowing cheating or at least not directly confronting it when everyone knew that it was going on. Led to a lot of unhappiness all around. 117: Leads to my next one though, rolling everything openly. Not treasure as those were done before, but combat, saves, ect... Man, no takebacks, no fudging to help folks, that got ugly. Particularly cause my players are all cursed in a very bad way. Couldn't roll a 2 to save the lot of em. 118: Playing with flakes. Man, nothing more annoying than playing with people who can't stick to a game, a concept, a character, anything for more than two sessions. Sadly, think the longest game that group may have played was with an entirely different ruleset altogether (Shadowrun, which is known for causing party breakdown) 119: Playing the escalating conflict game with munchkinery. Poor players who weren't munchkins never had a chance against the tweak villains used to oppose the munchkiners. 120: Trying to play RP games with people who are not verbal, or have rarely played a game that doesn't involve hitting things. So much, "I stab the duke and take his stuff" 121: Playing d20 Star Wars at all. Ack. Space combat. It hurts, so, much. Kind of a reiterate: Not having the "paladin talk". ["This is what I expect from you", "this is how I view paladinhood", "this is what will happen if you break your vows", "this is what it takes to break your vows", "these are the warning signs I will give you and my second chance policy"] To be fair, I have to be nice to them, or I would be horribly hypocritical. I once searched a corpse for loot as a paladin when I was first getting started. Not his clothes. The actual corpse. I took it apart - there might have been candy inside. *edit*Ah remembered more 122: Letting people make characters that they knew weren't going to be all that effective but were going to be funny. IE, gimmick characters. Never got anything done in those games. Particularly the ones where they ended up not being funny, just annoying, and everybody hated them. 123: Leads to allowing people to play obvious spoiler characters. Have had a number of players over time who showed a tendancy to always play somebody that wasn't going to go along with the group. Not necessarily evil/alignment, but they would be opposed on moral, legal, statistical, ect... Would also make characters who they knew would grate with the flow of the party, could see it in their eyes when everyone else was chatting out character concepts. Got so old. 124: Not sure if this was a true "mistake" or just really weird. Let two guys who were very, very repressed play a small session of the WoT game when it first came out to see how it was. Unfortunately, decided to let one of them be a female channeler and the other a guy. Well, little way in the female starts trying to seduce the other guy. For a while he's all "wtf mate", and then all the sudden he starts warming up to it. Oy. Pretty soon I was being subjected to very long, very descriptive explanations of how they were...exploring each other. My brain needs fire. *edit 2* Man, even more. 125: Trying to play a character in a game that I'm running myself in the hopes that we can play the "rotate GM's" game. Way too hard to avoid the response that you're favoring yourself and quite honestly, kind of hard not to be a jerk and favor yourself. Either way, bad, bad news. 126: Trying to run multi-thread adventures. This is actually a couple parter, but the first part of it is trying to run two or more groups of PCs going through a similar place at the same time from different angles. Can't do fights or long puzzles to avoid boredom/glazeover, and maps had to be fairly benign so you wouldn't spend forever describing things. Overall, not recommended unless ultra short. 127: The second part would be trying to run a game with two DMs. This occured because we had a massive group. I would have sworn that I would have never disliked having too many people to play D&D, but somehow word got around that our games were interesting, or maybe they were just the only option in town, but suddenly we had friends'/friends'/friends joining us who they met at the BK or college. We had a group of like 15-20 who wanted to play, and really liked each other (was amazed). So we figured we'd try doing something where we'd have multiple groups and they'd crossover, maybe share/switch characters every once in a while, accomplish different things for the game, cause you just couldn't handle that as a DM in one session. Wow, big mistake. We had similar views, thankfully, on where we wanted to go, but due to time, player interest, ect... became a pain to keep it all organized, keep progression similar. Ugg, the bookeeping alone. And, due to the way it was set up, we had to split some people, there was just no way around it, so it was already starting with hurt egos. That whole thing was just unpleasantness.