Cowardly and Lazy - thats the way she goes!

By MorbidDon, in Dark Heresy Gamemasters

OK here's a topic not tied to any rules or game system rather I'd lie to share with you all my lastest challenge / experience as a GM of over 20 years...

My latest group of players are all veterans having played RPGs back to dare I say first Edition D&D (I started in 2nd) - to add to that all of them are seasoned DM/GMs alike!

Now this would normally make play much easier when going over concepts and rules and situations at hand in the stories we play - fine!

Here's the rub

They in their older age have become either lazy in their pursuits or just plain cowardly in that they dont want to be the one to stick their neck out amongst the group (sort of like its a private joke as to who will suffer the next ill around the game table lol).

Lazy; overlooking tried and true practices or making plans with no backup or fail safe - best of all if nothing seemingly works then as of late the option is go all in for a suicidal attack and if that doesn't work - it must be the fault of the evil GM LMFAO

For those who'd like some perspective we play like this

Sandbox; roam around do what you will influence the world around your characters and extract from it what you will...

Linear; adventure / i.e. you are on a structure adventure - nuff said

So in sandbox mode say they the players see something that was meant as "window dressing" say like a heavily fortified and guarded locale - now say the players want something from there - they see it as their entitlement rather than an option or challenge to be studied and tackled later when they are more powerful (i.e. classic rpg formula)

Or or - they the players start some sort of conflict (ie Beef) then are surprised by how far things can get out of hand for them.

Then there's "why are they attacking thats dumb" - in terms of dealing with the inhabitants of the 40k universe who by the way did away with the logic that came with out age of enlightenment (ie Enlightenment included a range of ideas centered on reason as the primary source of authority and legitimacy) - if reason were in full effect we wouldnt have Voidship Captains in audiotales considering going for their guns when the Admech scumbag is like look I brought us to a Spacehulk AKA Captain Corolev LMFAO!

And finally onto cowardice - anytime conflict arises the table goes slient as each player awaits to see who'll be victim rather than working together as a team - they are a group of individuals and as much as one GM can support team play it is a lost concept to them sort of like "Aspergers" where the person cant tell other peoples emotions...

That's our group dynamic ATM in a nutshell - it may sound aweful to some but in all actually its very fun and plus theese players when pressed keep me on my feet!

Stay GAMING

Morbid

Have you come across Torchbearer? Its a retro-clone RPG which takes you right back to the early stages of RPG industry but makes you actually think about the consequences of your actions.

Our group tried it for a couple of weeks and it really seems to freshen up the mind. Must say the following weeks DH2 session was fantastic to run!

**** I like to pride myself in that I've touched alot of games over the years since the late 80s - never head of Torchbearer - I will look for it and see wussup!

Thanks for the suggestion XorA

I can post more juice tid bits if people want - let me know?

Stay GAMING

Morbid