Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Aterum 08-06-06, 07:54 AM	My DM is ready to finish up his campaign. He's going to take a break and run a one-night Star Wars game before he does. I was surprised when he told he was going to let me write the story and CO-DM it with me. Of course, he laid out some ground rules. All of which I agreed with except for one... He told me I couldn't have cameos from "Harry Potter/Batman type characters... heh." -- Those were his exact words. Thing is, I never said I wanted to do any crazy cameos. I guess he just assumes I'm wild enough to do something like that. The rule really puts a damper on my creativity, however and I don't think it's fair. In his game, he's had one of the PCs turn into a character from a previous game the PC played. Next week we get a cameo from one of his own characters he played in a previous game and he's mentioned other characters from different games that exist in his world. He said that SW has enough of it's own characters, no need to bring in more. My only problem is he's restricting what I am able to do when this is supposed to be my story and he's just helping me run it. I was going to email him with an ultimatum: either you let me write what I want to write or you run it by yourself. Is this unreasonable?
Archmage Atrus 08-06-06, 08:13 AM	Er... what? Why would you want to bring in Harry Potter or Batman like characters into a Star Wars game? By the way, you're Co-DMing. Co being key. Stop acting like a 9 year old and compromise.
rogue_lettuce 08-06-06, 08:16 AM	You're certainly over-reacting. Are you going to have harry potter in your game? No. Well then run it, and have fun.
Aterum 08-06-06, 08:20 AM	Er... what? Why would you want to bring in Harry Potter or Batman like characters into a Star Wars game? By the way, you're Co-DMing. Co being key. Stop acting like a 9 year old and compromise. Honestly, is the attitude really necessary? How come every time I ask a question, someone comes in and acts rude for no reason. Maybe if you read the the post you would have saw where I said the story is mine and the problem I have is that he's trying to say what I can and can't do with my story. He's saying 'no cameos' when he's doing just that - right now - in his own campaign. If you're not going to be helpful, go away.
Archmage Atrus 08-06-06, 08:36 AM	No, you didn't ask me to be helpful. You asked for an opinion. My opinion is you're acting like a 9 year old. You fail to accept it, that only proves my point.
Pegasos989 08-06-06, 08:55 AM	My helpful opinion: You should disguss this problem with your CO. DM.
The_Apathetic_Despot 08-06-06, 09:18 AM	perhaps, Atrus, in future you should keep your more abusive oppinions to yourself. I tend to side with you on this one Aterum, if you are in charge of the story you shouldn't be restricted from a device as general as cameos (im assuming here that the prohibition is on cameos in general and not Harry Potter and Batman in particular as those are odd choices to single out). As Pegasos989 said you need to work this out with your co. dm, explain how you feel like the constraints are unfair and he should back down
KJW 08-06-06, 09:22 AM	I think you should not do it and let him write and run the adventure. I say this because I don't think you are acting mature enough to work effectively with your DM. For whatever reason, his extremely reasonable and appropriate request has bothered you to the point that you are being unreasonable. My guess is that your DM wanted to share the stage with you and help teach you how to DM, but you really don't want to work with him. So don't it will make everyone happy, working with another DM is great, but it requires give and take.
revnk 08-06-06, 09:29 AM	Talk to your co-DM. Your attitude isn't necessarily unreasonable. The question, I suppose, is whether compromise is possible and/or worth it. Y'all do need to agree on ground rules to co-DM, and his suggestion isn't unreasonable. (Although his rationale that "there are enough characters" is, frankly, bull; perhaps he'd be happier if every adventure you wrote featured a cameo from Jar-Jar Binks or one of his ancestors/descendants? Or a semi-regular troop of ewok NPCs?) You should feel free to suggest your own ground rules, as well. One final thought, regarding compromise and collaboration. There's a phenomena in music where there are several artists (Sting and Roger Waters come readily to mind) whose solo projects have never come within spitting distance of their work with bands (The Police and Pink Floyd, in the case of the examples I mentioned); a likely reason is that even when the artist in question was writing most of the group's output, the bandmates could say things like, "I'm not playing that" or "Wouldn't it be better if it went like..." or the drummer could simply punch the bassist in the nose while the guitar player backed into a corner of the control room with a shocked look on his face. Point being that the artists in question benefitted from having someone to veto their work. That's not to say that you're wrong or should compromise (I have no problem with "borrowing" characters, personally): it's merely to suggest that letting your friend limit you might bring out better work--perhaps if Roger Waters still had David Gilmour to shout at him, his solo work wouldn't be so unpleasant and if Sting still had Stewart Copeland to hit him occasionally his recent records wouldn't be so bland and forgettable. At any rate, talk to your friend and see if you can find some common ground. Good luck!
Aterum 08-06-06, 02:28 PM	Revnk and Despot: Thanks for your replies, I appreciate the help. I know I should speak to my DM about this but I wanted to get some outside opinions first. Some times you just can't see that you're being irrational -- you have to step back and look things over. I will ask him to relent on the 'no cameos' rule a bit and I'll promise to him that the game won't turn into a Star Wars version of Kingdom Hearts.
revnk 08-06-06, 10:09 PM	Even if your friend doesn't relent, you still might want to work within the limitations: keep in mind the second half of my post--sometimes having someone limiting you makes your work better. Sting wrote 90% of the songs The Police performed, and they tended to be good songs; since leaving the band in the mid-80's, he's done maybe a dozen good songs over the course of twenty years. Why? It's highly improbable that one morning he started spontaneously sucking. It's far more likely that having other people "hold him back" meant that only his best ideas became public, while his bad ideas went in the trash. Now he's the boss and there's no one else to tell him whether an idea is bad or not. Indeed, in the other example I mentioned, consider Roger Waters. In 1979 he brought two ideas into a band meeting discussing what Pink Floyd's next project would be. His bandmates rejected the first idea, which was eventually turned into his first solo album, The Pros And Cons Of Hitch-hiking a record that few people bought and was mostly disliked by all but a few fanatical Waters fans. The other idea became The Wall. Talk to your friend. If you can't reach a compromise, consider doing it anyway--unless you just don't want to at that point, which is also okay. Either way, good luck!
rogue_lettuce 08-07-06, 05:02 AM	I have to ask myself why you feel you can't be creative without using cameos of already-established characters. I can't think of many good films/books/etc that have cameos. The only good cameo characters IMHO are Mr T and Jay and Silent Bob. :)