It can all be avoided if I can find a way to not give out the plot and not break out of DMing

It was my post that got away.

Mike: I don’t think we’re on the same wavelength. Yes, I’m a writer-GM. I realize this. But I’ve never been that big a railroader. (I mean, I’m the one whose second session of her first real game featured the group recruiting a quintet of individuals who were supposed to be running antagonists.) For me, story in a game is the collaborative fiction element–everyone contributes, everyone spotlights, and the end result is better than anything just one person can come up with. It’s not necessarily the same as plot; sure, we work in eventual plans like one player’s idea for a character arc or another wanting to play with demon possession or me attempting to run a session which can be summarized as “Fourteen demigods playing Calvinball”, but at this point, they’re pushing the plot as much as I am. And when someone’s getting their feet wet trying to get into that part of what running a game is, I’m not going to run roughshod over them. Particularly not the kinds of rule-messery that I’ve come to associate with exploiting rule knowledge over a DM. Yes, I’ll tell them when they’re forgetting something important, but I’m as likely to toss my DM a rules suggestion that’s going to make my life difficult as take advantage of something that’ll get us out of here. So for me, yes, it’s about the story. Everyone’s story.

(Speaking of story vs. game: http://exchangeofrealities.today.com/2008/06/19/letting-go/ might interest you. Or at least tell you what kind of DMs I wrote my original riff assuming the existence of. How’m I supposed to get them to improve their game this way if they get broadsided by powergaming at the starting gate?)

Kudos.

Pity I got to it so late.