The Lazy DM on Ultimate Power!
by Neal Mattingly
Over the years, many have said I’m crazy as a DM for allowing the players too much power. I let them be Gestalt, I let them pick classes and prestige classes with impunity, and I don’t care what horrific combination of feats they come up with. It all works to my advantage as a DM.
How is that an advantage you wonder? Simple if they have broken powers that let them bypass or destroy the Big Bad at the end of the story in 1 round… I don’t have to spend 10 hours writing that bad guy. I can assign a couple of powers which will scare the group enough to use “the power” and then the enemy is dead. It’s how it works in a books and movies most of the time and it works well in game.
Once in a while you need to have a protracted dramatic fight but those times should fit the story and be fun for all. Big fights can become grueling for all involved and if an adventure has too many of them in it the adventure becomes an unpleasant memory for both sides of the screen.
In order to expedite and test this theory I gave the party an over powered spell that allows them to cast up to 5 spells at once at the cost of enough Con damage to kill them with a chance of part of the damage being permanent.
So now I just need to scare them enough for them to risk using the doomsday spell to solve a problem… bottom line I don’t have to write up anything I don’t want to now. Nothing can stand before their ultimate power and that’s fine by me.
In order to get someone back from the dead they have to go role play a hell of a lot and kiss NPC butt and neither of those need to be written up past a name on a sheet of paper… one must always be mindful of the need to look consistent. You get all the names right all the time and they think you wrote stuff up and it’s not the work you do but the perception of the work you do that matters.
This process will work in any system in which writing up foes is a pain in the butt… such as 3.x, GURPS, Hero and maybe even Chart Master but someone else will have to test it in that system.
So there you have it my first tip to my fellow DMs. May it serve you as well as it has served me. Now I’m off to look for good voice recognition software cause all this typing is killing me and wouldn’t it be easier if all I had to do was talk?
The Lazy DM
I can’t tell if this is satire or not, because this is pretty much what I’ve started doing recently and the amount of rp has skyrocketed.
I see it. I dig it.
I have been getting all stumped over such detail stuff. It is good to read a reminder that the players don’t see past the screen if I don’t let on.
For once an idea I like. Rarely does any of the DM-advice catch my interest, but this one is interesting. Perhaps because it isn’t so different form my own GM style. Being lazy seems to be the solution. Keep up the good lazyness.
I thought I was lazy – I’m just nonchalant. :(
Using the rules to mediate a challenging and believable story is a hang up I stll struggle with. Even turning to lighter rules like those in Wushu, FATE and 4e – not very lazy I admit.
I’ve written on power scaling, but it never occured to me to just spread the plot cheeks and let the party rape the campaign. NOW THAT’S LAZY! :D
I just figure if the players can justify it to me then its acceptable. I’ve had some pretty interesting methods of defeating my boss monster because of this. My favorite was using multiple Stone Shape spells to create and igloo in which to hide with a hole large enough to see through and cast spells through, but not allow my monster of legend to get in. Once the monster was dead they just rested and Stone Shaped themselves out.
my internet lock up or start slow
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