Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site watmath.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!csc
From: csc@watmath.UUCP (Computer Sci Club)
Newsgroups: net.games.frp
Subject: Multi-DM campaigns
Message-ID: <14621@watmath.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 23-May-85 15:25:54 EDT
Article-I.D.: watmath.14621
Posted: Thu May 23 15:25:54 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 24-May-85 04:41:58 EDT
References: <2847@drutx.UUCP>
Reply-To: csc@watmath.UUCP (Computer Sci Club)
Organization: U of Waterloo, Ontario
Lines: 75
Summary: 

In article <2847@drutx.UUCP> slb@drutx.UUCP (Sue Brezden) writes:
>We are in someone else's world now, having come to a pause in mine.  (I 
>needed a rest--that is hard work!)  They ended up with, among other things, 
>a ring of regeneration, a nice staff, and a mithril circlet which gives the 
>wearer psionics.  The last is tempered by the fact that psionics are hated 
>and killed when found.  The PC with that one is going to have to watch it.
>
>However, I do intend to slow them down a bit when I DM again.
>
>                                     Sue Brezden
>                                     

This brings up an interesting point.  Rotating DMs within a single
campaign.  Who else has done this?

In my first year here ('81), I had already spent 3-4 years running a D&D,
then AD&D campaign.  I joined the science-fiction club here (WATSFIC),
and met other people who had also been D&Ding for some time also.

The person whose campaign it was (Al Brooks) had been using this system
(ie taking turns at DMing) to a) give himself more time to write his own
scenarios and b) to get in some playing himself.  The benefits are/were
obvious.

There are, however, some not-so-obvious not-so-good things about it.
Firstly, the plot line can suffer terribly.  One DM has some ideas about
how he would like the politics (or anything else) of the world to
operate, and another feels differently, and the world changes as you
move from DM to DM.  There are two ways to handle this.  The first
(which we did not use) is to have different worlds with different characters,
different rules, different everything, one for each DM.  If DM A is
running, you use character A, rule set A, etc.  Since we didn't use this,
I can't offer any comment, except to wonder whether the campaign would
hold together for lack to cohesion between the parts.  The option we DID
use was that Al was to become the head DM, and as such, would control
the world's politics, rules, etc.  Other DMs would simply construct
scenarios which "fit" more-or-less well into Al's scheme of things.
This, in turn, brought to light, another problem.  We ignored it.

The problem was that the subsidiary DMs had to know some inner workings
of the universe that were not (yet) known to the players.  It should be
pointed out here, though, that "playing to win" took a back seat to 
role-playing.  People became their characters, and, in our case, the
information the player had but the character didn't was very rarely
(I can only think of once or twice over a 2.5 year period) used.

Another problem we encountered was not as inherent in the system as the
problem just described.  It essentially was that, inevitably, when a
S-DM was running (particularly those with less DMing experience) the
temptation was great to include in a "last-room" type of treasure one
or two very "neat" magic items.  Standing alone, this was not much of
a problem.  The problem occurred as a result of the fact that these
adventures were worked to last 2-3 weeks (w/ 8hr sessions).  Sooner
or later there was bound to be a problem.  And there was.  The average
level was 6-7 (we had started as 1st a year before) and we were dungeon
stompers.  The solution to this problem was fairly straightforward.

We started fighting tougher monsters.  I recall taking on an 18th level
fire mage (we won); a magic-proficient (could use ANY magic spell, not
only MU spells) lich (he won); and large amounts of VIII/IX level
monsters.  If we had to think, plan, and execute carefully, we were
not having play-balance troubles.  The moment we could mindlessly
eliminate what we were fighting was the moment to step up the opponent.
It didn't hurt the play-balance (re amt of magic owned) that one of
our number was a pack-rat extra-ordinaire.  Giving an item to him was
like feeding it to a black hole.  *sigh*

My.  Excuse the length.  We now return you to your regular programming.

Gilles Dignard (aka Thunderbuns, the baby storm-giant magic user/druid)
University of Waterloo
Waterloo, Ontario

Facts all come with points of view.
	- David Byrne