Dungeon Masters and Moderators - Timelines Etc

My consideration and execution of giving some people the role of dungeon master (and some the extra capabilities of moderators) had not been a planned arrangement. This task had been completed in a haphazard fashion without setting up rules and regulations for both the DM and the players.

In my time as an owner of forums I had never had to create any such rules as the forums never had many people or characters so everyone took turns being the DM for their own threads and understood what others were like in the group so whoever was doing the dm'ing at that time knew what to expect.

There have been some difficulties and I had not taken heed of them before they came to ahead. Now rules are being made for everyone regarding DungeonMasters (DM) vs PlayerCharacters (PC). Please read everything before you make any judgements as I have taken into account the concerns of those who have spoken to me and am doing my best to make this acceptable to all.

I wish to have a discussion on these rules and regulations. If you do not wish to do it publicly then send me a PM or chat with me over MSN. I want to cover everything and know if there is anything left out or that should be discussed.

These are not completed and there may be changes or additions as I see fit.

As of far we have four dungeon masters and myself. I would like to keep everyone if they all comply to the regulations which will be set out here. I also have three moderators and I will be setting up their rules in here as well.

DM vs PC Rules and Regulations

Basic Rules

1. The DM characters cannot be so tough that no character is able to affect him/her.
2. Any characters a DM wishes to use which is much stronger than the PCs must be discussed with myself.
3. The DM account is used in order to inform the players of what is happening around them and what NPCs have been affected and how.
4. If a DM is running a thread it will be their ruling on what happens to a non player character, not the PCs.
5. If an automatic hit attack (as per below) is not used then the PC has the right to say if the attack hit or not.
6. NO KILLING OFF PLAYER CHARACTERS unless the player wishes to this done.
7. Neither DM or player will create comments within OOC to discuss disagreements. Disagreements will be brought up with myself and can be discussed over MSN or through PMs.

DM Character Stats Pages

1. The extent of DM character skill sets, abilities and strengths must be discussed with myself and entered on a separate DM Character Stats Page which will be located in the Notes and All section which is only accessible to DMs and Moderators.
2. The DM has the ability to make attacks that hit a PC and these attacks will be declared in the DM Character Stats Page.
3. Automatic hit abilities will not be able to be used all the time. A ruling of when these may be used will be placed in the DM Character Stats Page as well.
4. When the automatic hits are declared it must be explained to the player in the DM post on what kind of damage it will do and what range of damage there will be to the PC. The PC will choose how badly their character will be hurt taking in account how close they are to the attack (melee, 10 paces away, etc).

What is Expected of Moderators

1. Mods can move threads and indicate within threads an URL to other threads which connects to the current one.
2. Mods will not delete other people's posts or remove previous posts done by themselves in an already moving thread. For instance, Mods cannot delete their fourth post in a 25 post thread.
3. Mods can watch over a thread if a DM is not ruling it. Understanding 'watch' as checking it and acting only when it's necessary (ex: a PC killing another, endless fights involving other characters that doesn't want to or need to continue, etc). If there is an issue the Mod will lock the thread until it can be resolved and indicate why the thread is locked.

I suppose if I want people to read and discuss this I have to put it in a section which is not mods only even if it is global. Ha.

I have absolutely no problem with the above stated rules, they encompass all sides of the issue. Uncle Vanya approves.

Seal of approval:

Sadly, I do have an issue.

Is it necessary for a GM to have a character? In my experience, GMs tend to treat GMPCs favorably and/or get attached to their GMPC "because it's part of the story!" Bah. If you need a plot-essential NPC, then make a plot-essential NPC, not a GMPC. The narrator of the story does not necessarily have to be part of the story themselves.

Most of the other things that I want to say regard the philosophy behind a GM (as a storyteller of a cooperative, collective narrative vs. as a referee of a game) that these rules don't really touch on (and that I made a huge long post about, that got corrupted because fuck you, Adobe Flash).

-- Griffinhart

I've had a couple discussions about that one and it is reasonable so I removed the DM requiring separate accounts for each character they wish to use as DM. They can use them in DM posts instead.