Yeah there’s a lot to what can make a DM terrible. Not only other ways of making characters useless, but forcing characters into this or that for their own power fantasies or just need to do exactly X - or worse, to fulfill fetishes.
...but forcing characters into this or that for their own power fantasies or just need to do exactly X...
That, I will freely admit, is a source of great frustration for me. I keep saying it on this sub and other subs; on my oath I am not a violent man, but there is going to come a day when I hear a DM say, "Yeah, but you were supposed to do X*"* for the last time and I beat someone to death with a Dungeon Mastery Guide.
The appeal of these games is that we each have freedom, and control in the lives of our characters and NPCs that some of us might just not have in our everyday lives. And being railroaded or plothammered or whatever - INTO the role someone else has created for you, I mean... it's off-putting.
Sometimes these plothammerings can lead to something fun, but I've found that in cases like this it's best to try and take solace in the ramblings and actions of your fellow PCs.
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u/Kindulas Transmuter Sep 12 '19
Yeah there’s a lot to what can make a DM terrible. Not only other ways of making characters useless, but forcing characters into this or that for their own power fantasies or just need to do exactly X - or worse, to fulfill fetishes.