I would have dropped already. You say you haven’t played a single session yet as they have all been cancelled at last minute. They clearly don’t appreciate you or value your time. You don’t owe them anything so cut your losses with your head held high.
This might also be a stage of life disparity, too. Blowing off plans is much easier when you are younger and/or have fewer commitments. If you work a demanding job, have a family, and must specifically carve out time to play, "sorry, no session today" hits you differently
This is something I've encountered more times than I can count.
Maybe someone can help me?
Where I struggle is why a person who is struggling for time due to such demands would sign up for a weekly session for 3-4 hours a week?
Lots of options out there, maybe a west marchers server, perhaps a odd one shot every few months. Or maybe just read the books, enjoy a nice walk.
Ultimately what I don't understand is why people say they can commit to something they can't commit to?
In my experience, it's the people who don't have a lot on their schedules who tend to flake on D&D the most. Free time isn't as precious to them, since they can reschedule more easily. The ones who are limited in time tend to be more committed to the sessions, I find, because it takes so much more effort to be available and they make it a priority. But again, that's just been my experience.
I would have dropped already. You say you haven’t played a single session yet as they have all been cancelled at last minute. They clearly don’t appreciate you or value your time. You don’t owe them anything so cut your losses with your head held high.
This is true, if you're not invested.
Because, in the end - you are potentially declining other plans for this session (as a player) and for the DM, they're constructing adventures.
And with the excuses cited, these are people who are inconsiderate and probably "playing D&D" because it's popular and not truly invested.
I would have dropped already. You say you haven’t played a single session yet as they have all been cancelled at last minute. They clearly don’t appreciate you or value your time. You don’t owe them anything so cut your losses with your head held high.
This is true, if you're not invested.
Because, in the end - you are potentially declining other plans for this session (as a player) and for the DM, they're constructing adventures.
And with the excuses cited, these are people who are inconsiderate and probably "playing D&D" because it's popular and not truly invested.
It has nothing to do with whether I am invested or not. I’m simply not going to waste what little free time I have on people who either can’t manage their own time or don’t have enough manners and respect for me to show up or give a decent heads up. I appreciate things come up at short notice, grannies can’t die every week though.
I would have dropped already. You say you haven’t played a single session yet as they have all been cancelled at last minute. They clearly don’t appreciate you or value your time. You don’t owe them anything so cut your losses with your head held high.
This is true, if you're not invested.
Because, in the end - you are potentially declining other plans for this session (as a player) and for the DM, they're constructing adventures.
And with the excuses cited, these are people who are inconsiderate and probably "playing D&D" because it's popular and not truly invested.
It has nothing to do with whether I am invested or not. I’m simply not going to waste what little free time I have on people who either can’t manage their own time or don’t have enough manners and respect for me to show up or give a decent heads up. I appreciate things come up at short notice, grannies can’t die every week though.
I think you misread what I was implying - those others, providing their excuses of going to the gym and such are the problem.
"This group isn't for me. Thank you, I hope you have a wonderful campaign."
If people are unable to commit, it does technically mean they aren't prioritizing it in the same way as other people.
In the same way that they person who is late and angry at all the slow drivers is prioritizing themselves and their needs over everyone else.
However...
Unless this is a group of people you know really well and all that, it might not be worth hanging out. I have had to cancel as many as six game in a row for some groups. I use that time to tweak, personally, but the thing is I know my players pretty well (and most are family of others or all but).
If this was a game I ran, I would be "cool, cool, carry on, and keep going. I have had a dungeon start with 8 people and then suddenly it is just one and the reason was because that one person was really into it -- and kinda pushed the others out. ANother time it might be because life gets weird, and sometimes it is easier to say "tired from the gym" rather than "my great aunt twice removed was robbed and I have like a dozen people giving me grief because the robber might have been a friend of mine".
Or, in my case, it might be "I am just too tired tonight" when in reality I have three projects I am behind on because I spent time on some damn D&D forum, lol.
But that's me -- and not everyone else, and in my experience, the best solution is what I said at the top of this post.
If it was me, and I really wanted to play, I would move on, or add a second group and see what sounds good.
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Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
"This group isn't for me. Thank you, I hope you have a wonderful campaign."
If people are unable to commit, it does technically mean they aren't prioritizing it in the same way as other people.
In the same way that they person who is late and angry at all the slow drivers is prioritizing themselves and their needs over everyone else.
Eh..."prioritising over what?" is a key question missing from your rant. If someone's mother is dying, then I'll cancel the night for them and wait until they feel better (if we're solely discussing actions relevant to D&D). They decided that they'd rather watch paint dry? Yeah, I'm not inviting them to the table again.
It's not even what they're prioritising (until you get to the extremes). It's really just the likelihood of them turning up in future compared to how disruptive their absence is, versus how much the table needs them. If they spontaneously decided they'd rather go to the gym than the prearranged D&D...it's not about the gym, it's about the fact that it likely won't be the last time and will be a possibility every single session. They get a last minute once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to go hang out and discuss D&D with Jeremy Crawford? Dude, just go. Have an awesome time, Crawford won't be an issue next week. I'd be mad if you didn't go, and can you ask these questions for me?
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If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
"This group isn't for me. Thank you, I hope you have a wonderful campaign."
If people are unable to commit, it does technically mean they aren't prioritizing it in the same way as other people.
In the same way that they person who is late and angry at all the slow drivers is prioritizing themselves and their needs over everyone else.
Eh..."prioritising over what?" is a key question missing from your rant. If someone's mother is dying, then I'll cancel the night for them and wait until they feel better (if we're solely discussing actions relevant to D&D). They decided that they'd rather watch paint dry? Yeah, I'm not inviting them to the table again.
It's not even what they're prioritising (until you get to the extremes). It's really just the likelihood of them turning up in future compared to how disruptive their absence is, versus how much the table needs them. If they spontaneously decided they'd rather go to the gym than the prearranged D&D...it's not about the gym, it's about the fact that it likely won't be the last time and will be a possibility every single session. They get a last minute once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to go hang out and discuss D&D with Jeremy Crawford? Dude, just go. Have an awesome time, Crawford won't be an issue next week. I'd be mad if you didn't go, and can you ask these questions for me?
I will add again here, why cancel the game, if your a party of 4 or more characters then 1 player being away for a session is not a reason to stop playing. In 2 years, playing once a week every week only 15 sessions have needed to be cancelled, all of them because me, the DM couldn’t make it. And only 2 of them on the day because I was fighting illness. In that time I think we have had a full party about 60%-70% of the time overall. The players are not upset that we didn’t stop the game for them. Most recently a player has had work commitments come up last minute 2 weeks in a row and so at short notice had to pull out, he is gutted because it has been the culmination of 2 months of build, but he also wished the party well and gave instructions as to what he would do with his healing potions (share half of them in combat if needed, save the rest for him and his sister) and left the party to it. If his character dies while he is away from the session then that is just what happened. But I set that expectation in session 0.
I had a discussion about the number of "no show players" with another DM and I think he was spot on.
There are a lot of players, a lot of which are great people, that would like to play dnd but simply don't have the ability to commit to any scheduled activity and are either unable or unwilling to accept that.
You can be as accommodating as you like but if this is the type of person you're dealing with it's unlikely to change. It's either something you accept or don't.
This happens a lot more frequently than say a sports team as these types of people are able to see they can't commit to that as it's more obvious and there's likley to be on going competition for selection so any that can't are filtered out.
So an update from my own game, a player has approached to say they won't be around for 6 months because they are starting an evening course to change career. After a very short conversation as a group to see if we could switch evenings he will be leaving the game end of March, which gives me plenty of time to write him out, and for those 6 months I am going to run a 1 player campaign for him with his character, in 6 months then he will rejoin, having had his own series of solo adventures pushing forward his own characters story arc.
Sometimes as a player you have to accept your schedule means you will have to stop playing in your fav campaign, I think it is more important to just be upfront and talk to the DM about that and see if there is a way around things. Applying this to the OP, if you have not already talk to the DM, if you and they are available to play every week then ask them to run a 1 or 2 player campaign you could even have a character set up just for those campaigns and then another you use when other players can show up. As a DM I would much rather run a campaign for someone rather then cancel all together because the whole party wasn't there. It might also give the other players a drive to start showing up if they know they will actually be missing out on stuff.
i would also ask the other players, are the new or experienced? Is this their first campaign, sometimes at campaign start it is just about getting session 1 happening and ending on that moment to start driving people to make it a can't miss moment each week.
Good comment Scarloc. We had a full group for Dragon Heist. When scheduling issues hit a player(s) unexpectedly another in the group took the role of DM for smaller adventures that we had secondary characters created for and ready to go. We played every Thursday. Most sessions were for Dragon Heist and some for the secondary campaign, but we always had an adventure on game night. Granted, it was our good fortune to have multiple DM level players in the group to cover the back up campaign.
As a DM my main request is for players to let me know in advance if they can or cannot make the session. As long as I know how many will show in advance of game night then adjustments will be prepared and those of us at the table will play.
So the 4 session in a row looks like it's about the be cancelled. DM needs to work.
I'm sticking around out of curiosity if nothing else. We've passed the 2 month without a game or the campaign being called. I want to see how long this will go on for before the group realises that the game probably shouldn't run on the time/day/set of player it does/has.
So the 4 session in a row looks like it's about the be cancelled. DM needs to work.
I'm sticking around out of curiosity if nothing else. We've passed the 2 month without a game or the campaign being called. I want to see how long this will go on for before the group realises that the game probably shouldn't run on the time/day/set of player it does/has.
Honestly, just bail. It's beyond whether there's commitment or not or valid excuses or not - they've demonstrated that the game isn't going to work anymore. Just tell the DM that the constant cancellations means that you can no longer commit. They may make adjustments, but at this point, it's likely it's just dead. It takes doing something repetitively three times to establish a habit and they've chosen four times to not have the game, so that's their new habit.
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If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
My group will play if there are 4 players (currently there are 6 players in the group) and the DM available to play. We play online via FG for about 3 hours every Tuesday night. We try to gauge the next couple of months of so and make sure any given night will be available. We ended up going without for about a month due to the holidays this past year, but it was known ahead of time.
As for priorities, you first need to decide what your own priorities are. Each member of the grou should as well and everyone clearly communicate that to the others. I have a personal priority list. I don't expect everyone to have the same priorities, but its best to decide for yourself what are your priorities and let the others know if it might affect the game. For me my list includes:
Health
Family obligations
Work obligations
Church obligations
Game night
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- The WyvernSpirit Started Playing: 1988 Editions Played: AD&D, AD&D 2e, 3e/3.5e, 5e
Given that you said they are not friends outside the game, and the game has yet to happen, here are my thoughts:
This isn't about what is best for them, or whether they have personal reasons that cause them to cancel. This is about you and your time. If you are planning on this game, that means you are reserving this time on your schedule, and when it is cancelled it is an inconvenience to you. They may all be good natured and nice people, but that is irrelevant. You don't know any of them well, and you don't owe any of them anything aside from showing up for the game, which you have and they have not 4 times now.
Further, some of the excuses you have been given are not good. There are people in life that will make good on their commitments, and there are people that will do it if/when it suits them.
Lastly, the DM has cancelled twice now. This is a bad sign. I would say that you should talk to your DM, and let them know that you have been excited for the game, but respectfully, you are not happy with the cancelations. See how the DM feels about things, and ask them if they have any plans/intentions to do anything about it. If the DM is not also concerned, or does not intend to do anything about this, then you can expect this trend to continue. The past is the best predictor of the future as they say, so at that point I would look for another group.
Life is too short, you need to be respectful of your own time.
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I would have dropped already. You say you haven’t played a single session yet as they have all been cancelled at last minute. They clearly don’t appreciate you or value your time. You don’t owe them anything so cut your losses with your head held high.
In my experience, it's the people who don't have a lot on their schedules who tend to flake on D&D the most. Free time isn't as precious to them, since they can reschedule more easily. The ones who are limited in time tend to be more committed to the sessions, I find, because it takes so much more effort to be available and they make it a priority. But again, that's just been my experience.
This is true, if you're not invested.
Because, in the end - you are potentially declining other plans for this session (as a player) and for the DM, they're constructing adventures.
And with the excuses cited, these are people who are inconsiderate and probably "playing D&D" because it's popular and not truly invested.
Check out my publication on DMs Guild: https://www.dmsguild.com/browse.php?author=Tawmis%20Logue
Check out my comedy web series - Neverending Nights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Wr4-u9-zw0&list=PLbRG7dzFI-u3EJd0usasgDrrFO3mZ1lOZ
Need a character story/background written up? I do it for free (but also take donations!) - https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?591882-Need-a-character-background-written-up
It has nothing to do with whether I am invested or not. I’m simply not going to waste what little free time I have on people who either can’t manage their own time or don’t have enough manners and respect for me to show up or give a decent heads up. I appreciate things come up at short notice, grannies can’t die every week though.
I think you misread what I was implying - those others, providing their excuses of going to the gym and such are the problem.
Check out my publication on DMs Guild: https://www.dmsguild.com/browse.php?author=Tawmis%20Logue
Check out my comedy web series - Neverending Nights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Wr4-u9-zw0&list=PLbRG7dzFI-u3EJd0usasgDrrFO3mZ1lOZ
Need a character story/background written up? I do it for free (but also take donations!) - https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?591882-Need-a-character-background-written-up
"This group isn't for me. Thank you, I hope you have a wonderful campaign."
If people are unable to commit, it does technically mean they aren't prioritizing it in the same way as other people.
In the same way that they person who is late and angry at all the slow drivers is prioritizing themselves and their needs over everyone else.
However...
Unless this is a group of people you know really well and all that, it might not be worth hanging out. I have had to cancel as many as six game in a row for some groups. I use that time to tweak, personally, but the thing is I know my players pretty well (and most are family of others or all but).
If this was a game I ran, I would be "cool, cool, carry on, and keep going. I have had a dungeon start with 8 people and then suddenly it is just one and the reason was because that one person was really into it -- and kinda pushed the others out. ANother time it might be because life gets weird, and sometimes it is easier to say "tired from the gym" rather than "my great aunt twice removed was robbed and I have like a dozen people giving me grief because the robber might have been a friend of mine".
Or, in my case, it might be "I am just too tired tonight" when in reality I have three projects I am behind on because I spent time on some damn D&D forum, lol.
But that's me -- and not everyone else, and in my experience, the best solution is what I said at the top of this post.
If it was me, and I really wanted to play, I would move on, or add a second group and see what sounds good.
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities
.-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-.
An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more.
Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
Eh..."prioritising over what?" is a key question missing from your rant. If someone's mother is dying, then I'll cancel the night for them and wait until they feel better (if we're solely discussing actions relevant to D&D). They decided that they'd rather watch paint dry? Yeah, I'm not inviting them to the table again.
It's not even what they're prioritising (until you get to the extremes). It's really just the likelihood of them turning up in future compared to how disruptive their absence is, versus how much the table needs them. If they spontaneously decided they'd rather go to the gym than the prearranged D&D...it's not about the gym, it's about the fact that it likely won't be the last time and will be a possibility every single session. They get a last minute once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to go hang out and discuss D&D with Jeremy Crawford? Dude, just go. Have an awesome time, Crawford won't be an issue next week. I'd be mad if you didn't go, and can you ask these questions for me?
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
I will add again here, why cancel the game, if your a party of 4 or more characters then 1 player being away for a session is not a reason to stop playing. In 2 years, playing once a week every week only 15 sessions have needed to be cancelled, all of them because me, the DM couldn’t make it. And only 2 of them on the day because I was fighting illness. In that time I think we have had a full party about 60%-70% of the time overall. The players are not upset that we didn’t stop the game for them. Most recently a player has had work commitments come up last minute 2 weeks in a row and so at short notice had to pull out, he is gutted because it has been the culmination of 2 months of build, but he also wished the party well and gave instructions as to what he would do with his healing potions (share half of them in combat if needed, save the rest for him and his sister) and left the party to it. If his character dies while he is away from the session then that is just what happened. But I set that expectation in session 0.
I had a discussion about the number of "no show players" with another DM and I think he was spot on.
There are a lot of players, a lot of which are great people, that would like to play dnd but simply don't have the ability to commit to any scheduled activity and are either unable or unwilling to accept that.
You can be as accommodating as you like but if this is the type of person you're dealing with it's unlikely to change. It's either something you accept or don't.
This happens a lot more frequently than say a sports team as these types of people are able to see they can't commit to that as it's more obvious and there's likley to be on going competition for selection so any that can't are filtered out.
So an update from my own game, a player has approached to say they won't be around for 6 months because they are starting an evening course to change career. After a very short conversation as a group to see if we could switch evenings he will be leaving the game end of March, which gives me plenty of time to write him out, and for those 6 months I am going to run a 1 player campaign for him with his character, in 6 months then he will rejoin, having had his own series of solo adventures pushing forward his own characters story arc.
Sometimes as a player you have to accept your schedule means you will have to stop playing in your fav campaign, I think it is more important to just be upfront and talk to the DM about that and see if there is a way around things. Applying this to the OP, if you have not already talk to the DM, if you and they are available to play every week then ask them to run a 1 or 2 player campaign you could even have a character set up just for those campaigns and then another you use when other players can show up. As a DM I would much rather run a campaign for someone rather then cancel all together because the whole party wasn't there. It might also give the other players a drive to start showing up if they know they will actually be missing out on stuff.
i would also ask the other players, are the new or experienced? Is this their first campaign, sometimes at campaign start it is just about getting session 1 happening and ending on that moment to start driving people to make it a can't miss moment each week.
Good comment Scarloc. We had a full group for Dragon Heist. When scheduling issues hit a player(s) unexpectedly another in the group took the role of DM for smaller adventures that we had secondary characters created for and ready to go. We played every Thursday. Most sessions were for Dragon Heist and some for the secondary campaign, but we always had an adventure on game night. Granted, it was our good fortune to have multiple DM level players in the group to cover the back up campaign.
As a DM my main request is for players to let me know in advance if they can or cannot make the session. As long as I know how many will show in advance of game night then adjustments will be prepared and those of us at the table will play.
So the 4 session in a row looks like it's about the be cancelled. DM needs to work.
I'm sticking around out of curiosity if nothing else. We've passed the 2 month without a game or the campaign being called. I want to see how long this will go on for before the group realises that the game probably shouldn't run on the time/day/set of player it does/has.
Honestly, just bail. It's beyond whether there's commitment or not or valid excuses or not - they've demonstrated that the game isn't going to work anymore. Just tell the DM that the constant cancellations means that you can no longer commit. They may make adjustments, but at this point, it's likely it's just dead. It takes doing something repetitively three times to establish a habit and they've chosen four times to not have the game, so that's their new habit.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
It sounds like the other players don’t take the game that seriously if they keep making all these excuses.
I really like D&D, especially Ravenloft, Exandria and the Upside Down from Stranger Things. My pronouns are she/they (genderfae).
My group will play if there are 4 players (currently there are 6 players in the group) and the DM available to play. We play online via FG for about 3 hours every Tuesday night. We try to gauge the next couple of months of so and make sure any given night will be available. We ended up going without for about a month due to the holidays this past year, but it was known ahead of time.
As for priorities, you first need to decide what your own priorities are. Each member of the grou should as well and everyone clearly communicate that to the others. I have a personal priority list. I don't expect everyone to have the same priorities, but its best to decide for yourself what are your priorities and let the others know if it might affect the game. For me my list includes:
Given that you said they are not friends outside the game, and the game has yet to happen, here are my thoughts:
This isn't about what is best for them, or whether they have personal reasons that cause them to cancel. This is about you and your time. If you are planning on this game, that means you are reserving this time on your schedule, and when it is cancelled it is an inconvenience to you. They may all be good natured and nice people, but that is irrelevant. You don't know any of them well, and you don't owe any of them anything aside from showing up for the game, which you have and they have not 4 times now.
Further, some of the excuses you have been given are not good. There are people in life that will make good on their commitments, and there are people that will do it if/when it suits them.
Lastly, the DM has cancelled twice now. This is a bad sign. I would say that you should talk to your DM, and let them know that you have been excited for the game, but respectfully, you are not happy with the cancelations. See how the DM feels about things, and ask them if they have any plans/intentions to do anything about it. If the DM is not also concerned, or does not intend to do anything about this, then you can expect this trend to continue. The past is the best predictor of the future as they say, so at that point I would look for another group.
Life is too short, you need to be respectful of your own time.