Quote:
Originally Posted by Dark Lord Galen
Wow? What does one say to this? I'm personally stunned and not sure (mark it down it down doesn't happen often).
I guess I'm fortunate? in nearly 30yrs of DMing (yea don't like the phrase GM<old school grunard here>) I have never had a shortage of players. At times I have had a shortage of chairs. 
Years ago, I floated games in three rooms with 20+ people (not ideal but we were young and had fun then) but through the years, I have maintained an average of about 10.
I'm not sure (lying here. cause I guess, I think, I do know) how my own players would respond if they read a post such as this if I were to post it. 
To me (IMO FWIW) 99% of all players have something meaningful to contribute. The more difficult challenge is finding a cohesive mix of personalities (both at the table & in game) that work well together. Surely at the mecca of RPG (indi is still the locale for Gen-con after all) there must be a surplus of players and resources?
Not to be caustic or judgmental (cause I certainly don't know the details) but Pollution, take your own advice, cherish your players. Having a game with no players is as much fun as having players that have no game to play in. Both, in the end don't work.
Just remember, the hardest "role" to Play.. is the DM. It takes a mixture of accountant, bookkeeper, analyst, improv actor, script writer, counselor referee, and multitudes of others blended together and combined with the ability to multitask, compartmentalize and cram all of that into a fun incursion for friends. Often having to do so with less time than you would normally like to have. Not exactly an "easy" job, that is why most don't want, and fewer love it. (I fall into the love it category probably not a surprise to most)
Your other postings within threads are good and insightful my friend, I hope this was just a bad day... 
@LWD Liz> My apologies Liz for usurping thread AGAIN, but sometimes it is just not in my nature (my wife would say most times here) to leave some things unresponded. |
I've been running games for around 20 years or so (just over). I took a break of about 5 years from all gaming completely. I got back into it for a few years, break, back in, break, etc...
ALL my old gaming buddies are either:
A) gone, moved, or vanished
B) Only playing LARPS
C) Completely uninterested in gaming anymore.
My current players are great guys, really, even the potato (the 17 year old). We have a nice dinner, they bring stuff, we play, laugh, it's a good time. But 2 of them are just lame. One is COMPLETELY new to gaming, and the other is one of those reactionary players (never plans ahead, never has a goal, etc...)
The new player was making his hunter character for my Vigil game, and when going through the merit changes in the God Machine Chronicles update he saw Pyrokenisis. He's all like, "I WANT THAT!!!!!" I told him, "No. We're playing hunter, human characters only, the story won't work if anyone's psychic, I didn't let anyone else do it. The point of this game is to be NORMAL and fight monsters. Maybe next time." He got all pissed off. I think the quote was, "Dude, unfair! The rule is in it and you're just going to cherry pick what you can do and what you can't?" I was floored. Seriously, this guy's the same one who says he's never read any of the books I gave him access to, and who said he'd NEVER use RW:PE. I'm a bit at a loss with this guy. Very tempted to not invite ever again.
He's not a dick, just.....new....he doesn't get it. He claims to really want to play, but his attitude lately is for shit.
Again, I LOVE this product. I can see this software going CRAZY popular to the point of being required in just a few short years, kinda like HL has almost become. But my players, they don't care. It's lame. I'm sad.
I think what's got me the most annoyed at all this reaction from my group is that nobody will see the full extent of what I've done. Seriously, I just put in EVERY Attribute, Skill, Merit, and common roll from the nWoD core book (about 8 hours work) into RW when i was told that they'd never use it. I think that's what made me the most pessimistic lately.