Despite saying you're not asserting anything, you then follow that up by asserting that it's like a scam.
That's what I strongly disagree with. I don't think it is any more of a scam than, say, an escape room or a haunted house or a movie theater or any other place a group of people can go for a fun experience.
Its different because an escape room, hunted house or movie theater are impersonal things. If you go to a bar and order a beer and some food, your paying for a service that isn't meant to be personal, its just a service.
Shared food is one of the most personal experiences there can be - think of a family dinner, with traditional food prepared by grandma... ...and that doesn't take anything away from professional chefs and restaurants, who make delicious food for people.
Same with DMing.
Paying for a DM is like paying an escort so you have a date, or paying someone so you can borrow their dog so that your not lonely, or renting someones kids so you can feel like you have a family. Paying someone to DM for you is like paying someone to be a friend for a day.
No, not really. No reason a DM has to be your friend, no more so than an actor on stage performing for you has to be.
You don't question the motives of the person doing the paying, but the person getting paid... it just feel suspect and I think that's the community in its round about way is trying to point out. A DM is not some random service or some sort of entertainer.
It isn't "a random service or some entertainer" if you get a group of friends together and one of them is the DM.
It is if you have a professional DM.
It's a member of your crew, someone who effectively does something for you through the means on personal knowledge about you, your preferences. Its a kind of personal matter of sorts, its really not something you can buy and not feel weird about it and I get that.
That (the bolded part) I disagree with. It IS something I could buy and not feel weird about it.
Like I said, I don't think there is anything wrong with people offering it, I don't think there is anything wrong with people taking it, but I do get why the community at large opposes the concept as it just feel kind of wrong somehow. It feels like your taking something that is supposed to be intimate and personal and turning it into a business.
I've bolded the part I disagree with. I don't think DMing is "supposed" to be intimate, no more than food is. When done with a group of friends or a family, it IS intimate. When done with strangers, it's not. Both are fine!
I'm imagining it to be very much like an escape room in terms of the kind of activity it feels like.
You get together with a group of friends. It's a few-hour experience, so like 2-3x longer than an escape room, so probably more expensive. You probably do the "session zero" stuff online/on a website before showing up - maybe you get to pick one of a few adventures, with some description to make sure the party matches the adventure. Possibly have an option to pick from a list pregen characters to make a balanced party for new players.
Then you go and have a DM run a session for you. All nice and slick, with musical/sound/light cues, cool maps and awesome minis, and a DM who knows the setting well so you can think you're going off the rails and still be in territory they've prepared. A mix of puzzles, combat, exploration, social (possibly depending on the adventure).
Then you go out and have dinner with your friends, while the DM stays at work and runs the next party through. :)
Idunno, to me that sounds like an awesome day out with my friends.
What do y'all think of like tiered prices based on setting and player count? I feel like running a published adventure takes a little bit less prep work than an original adventure in a pre-built setting, and even that is less work than homebrewing a completely new setting. Then, there's palyer count. 3-4 players is manageable, 5-6 can tend to get a touch more chaotic, and 7+ is just chaos. Would y'all agree that you'd ask for more based on how much more work you have to put into it?
I'll be honest with you, the real problem is that, like with a lot of small solo businesses, there's no way to tell the good ones from the bad. If paid DMing became a thing, a lot of nerdy recluses and wannabe authors would ruin the business both for the customers and the DMs who are actually worth it (if anyone is). I sure wouldn't pay someone without knowing how good they are, and there's not a lot of ways to monitor small businesses like that.
If you look at the thing from a different perspective... what is the DM actually providing on the most basic level? An experience, perhaps... and hopefully, an entertaining experience. Entertainers are among the highest paid members of our society because we consumers do in fact value an entertaining experience greatly. Some may balk... but I perceive even football players and other sports celebs to be essentially entertainers and they get paid in the millions. Obviously a great deal of training and commitment goes into becoming a star quarterback or a tennis pro, or mma boxer. That should be rewarded. When a DM puts in that kind of work they should expect a decent financial return on investment. Not many DMs invest at that level of course, largely because there is no well established system for reward... well... not yet....
Paying for a DM is more like paying for a tour guide than an escort. The tour guide takes responsibility for the course of the tour. Guides you to sights interesting to see, avoids dangerous areas, is aware of all the relevant laws/rules than might affect your tour. A tour guide typically has expertise and knowledge about the particular subject and area you are interested in. A tour guide doesn't just passively follow the group around. They lead and guide them so that they get the most from the experience. (At least the best tour guides do).
A tour guide makes the experience entertaining and fun.
Some folks will pay for tour guides, some won't. Some tour guides are good and some aren't. Do folks feel insulted by tour guides asking to be paid for their time leading a group around? Not usually. So why should folks complain about DMs who might choose to offer their services to others leading them through an adventure in D&D?
If you look at the thing from a different perspective... what is the DM actually providing on the most basic level? An experience, perhaps... and hopefully, an entertaining experience. Entertainers are among the highest paid members of our society because we consumers do in fact value an entertaining experience greatly. Some may balk... but I perceive even football players and other sports celebs to be essentially entertainers and they get paid in the millions. Obviously a great deal of training and commitment goes into becoming a star quarterback or a tennis pro, or mma boxer. That should be rewarded. When a DM puts in that kind of work they should expect a decent financial return on investment. Not many DMs invest at that level of course, largely because there is no well established system for reward... well... not yet....
There is no system for reward because being a DM is not a job, it's a hobby and social occasion-event. Again, I get what everyone is saying but the role of the DM isn't just some arbitrary task like hiring a car mechanic, this is a member of your gaming group, a friend, someone you spend time with not because they are the DM but because they are your buddy. Bringing a stranger you have never met and paying them to run a game for you and your friends is on its best day going to be an awkward experience lacking the personal touch that such an occasion/event needs in order for the experience to be good.
I don't care if your the best damn DM that has ever lived and you do it for free, I still don't know you, your a stranger in my house. That is not an experience I'm interested in nor do I believe there is any hope of it being any good. Its nothing personal but I believe the shittiest game run by one of my friends for free is still going to be better than the best DM on earthing doing it for money. Just the exchange of cash alone will ruin the experience.
A lot of assumptions in here. As well as opinions.
1. DM’ing “can” be a job.
just because it’s a hobby for some doesn’t make it a hobby for others. I see people that are in their 40s play in softball leagues and etc. but there are also people that make a living playing baseball.
the difference between hobby and job is “so you get paid for it”
2. Why does the game have to be in your house?
why can’t it be at a 3rd party site? Why can’t it be someone else in the groups house? Why can’t it be in the DMs house and he converted his basement into the equivalent of an indoor pool, with a life size set of the fight scene you’ll encounter specifically designed and set up?
or maybe he has a lot of custom made tables and maps with little fog machines and weather effects.
or maybe. He just has a piece of graph paper and a black sharpie.
As to your opinion that paying money for it will ruin it for you. 🤷🏼♂️ That’s the one opinion of yours you have that there’s no argument to. You’ll know you best. I would like to disagree, but there’s nothing to really disagree with from an empirical objective standpoint. That’s a completely subjective thing.
but yeah.
the fun stuff you can do with inflatable obstacles/furniture. Basic woodcarving and carpentry skills, 10 acres of land, solid grasp of basic physics and engineering. And simple botany.
then it’s just a matter of knowing a good taxidermist.
I voted yes and I'm playing with the idea to do it myself as a secondary service of my own company.
My pricing would be based upon wanting to cover my time spend preparing and leave some money to invest back into developping the service itself. Miniatures, scenery, maps etc.
I am thinking about doing 3 different services: Introduction into D&D, Learning to DM and Hosting a campaign as a DM.
For the first 2 I would charge a little bit more, say 100 EURO for the evening. It's not only about pricing, it's also that I want to go to people, who REALLY want it! Besides that, I think, preparing a first timer session will take more then an hour or 2 to prep and it would be cool to leave them with some stuff: their character sheet, some dice maybe?
The ongoing campaign I would do for 50 EURO per evening as it's an ongoing thing and it should be affordable for people. I would however come-up with a minimum of numer of sessions to prevent myself from developping campaigns for people who bail out after 1 or 2 sessions because of other reasons than me.
people are willing to pay so we would be dumb to turn it down. I personally don’t get paid to dm. Would love too. In the end why would someone pay me personally?
think about it! Every DM would love to get paid. If you look into it there are actually very credible DMs offering to run games for money. There’s a large section on roll20 for it. If I was to try and run a game for money why would someone go with me over one of the credible guys doing it?
What I’m getting at is I think there’s more to it than “hey ima get paid!” On top of wearing the DMs hat your gonna have to put on the hat of a business man and also realize your no longer doing this for fun. This is a legit service and which beckons the question of “is the customer always right?”
a big reason I have been hesitant to put on the business man hat is I think it could create some weird player-DM expectations? What happens when the players are not satisfied?
• Paid GMing is already a thing. It’s already here. I seen some comments like “if paid GMing became a thing....” -well it’s already a thing and “the market is the market!”
• paid GMing is an online thing. I would never pay someone to come to my house and if someone offered to pay me to come to their house to GM, I would be super creeped out. I’d probably do it though rofl
• my local game store charges 5 dollars a person when they have game nights. I don’t see how that is any different.
The question about customer expectations is also probably my biggest concern with paid DMing.
The best D&D campaigns contain uncertainty and risk. Situations can be close. Characters may have negative effects acting on them or they could die, sometimes permanently. In most games it is a rare occurrence but the chance of it happening adds to the immersion and often restrains the characters from taking unreasonable or risky actions.
However, now translate this to a paid DMing situation where the players are paying to have fun. Is it fun to have a character die? I would argue no. The risk can be fun, the actual event? Not. How does a paid DM balance this inherent conflict? Do they have a session zero making it clear that adventuring is risky business and the characters may die? What happens if the customer states that they do not want the character to die under any circumstances? Anyway, to me this is probably the biggest concern I would have with paid DMing ... managing and dealing with player expectations.
The question about customer expectations is also probably my biggest concern with paid DMing.
The best D&D campaigns contain uncertainty and risk. Situations can be close. Characters may have negative effects acting on them or they could die, sometimes permanently. In most games it is a rare occurrence but the chance of it happening adds to the immersion and often restrains the characters from taking unreasonable or risky actions.
However, now translate this to a paid DMing situation where the players are paying to have fun. Is it fun to have a character die? I would argue no. The risk can be fun, the actual event? Not. How does a paid DM balance this inherent conflict? Do they have a session zero making it clear that adventuring is risky business and the characters may die? What happens if the customer states that they do not want the character to die under any circumstances? Anyway, to me this is probably the biggest concern I would have with paid DMing ... managing and dealing with player expectations.
Things could get sticky pretty quick. I have probably a dozen players that I have ran for over the years and for the most part they trust me blindly however there are multiple player deaths I have had over the years were these players who trust me blindly disagree with me on how particular deaths played out. I believe they were in the wrong. They believe I was in the wrong. If money was involved these situations would probably be very ugly.
The question about customer expectations is also probably my biggest concern with paid DMing.
The best D&D campaigns contain uncertainty and risk. Situations can be close. Characters may have negative effects acting on them or they could die, sometimes permanently. In most games it is a rare occurrence but the chance of it happening adds to the immersion and often restrains the characters from taking unreasonable or risky actions.
However, now translate this to a paid DMing situation where the players are paying to have fun. Is it fun to have a character die? I would argue no. The risk can be fun, the actual event? Not. How does a paid DM balance this inherent conflict? Do they have a session zero making it clear that adventuring is risky business and the characters may die? What happens if the customer states that they do not want the character to die under any circumstances? Anyway, to me this is probably the biggest concern I would have with paid DMing ... managing and dealing with player expectations.
Things could get sticky pretty quick. I have probably a dozen players that I have ran for over the years and for the most part they trust me blindly however there are multiple player deaths I have had over the years were these players who trust me blindly disagree with me on how particular deaths played out. I believe they were in the wrong. They believe I was in the wrong. If money was involved these situations would probably be very ugly.
This is something to think about. I could see players who payed to have a good time in an adventure get rather pissed if characters die. I can hear it now. The whole "I did not pay you to kill my character. If im paying then my character cannot die." Basically anyway. I could see all sorts of players having certain expectations that favor their character simply because they payed. Im sure that there would also be a lot of expectations placed on the DM that would most likely make DMing feel more like a job sooner or later. Not something that I want. The DM is just as much a player as the rest of the group. I know there are those with the mind set of "why not get payed to do something I love." In the end its not the same. I do think that the issues will come from the players having that mindset of I payed therefore I should get what I want. Not what the DM wants.
The majority of the responsibility for the gaming experience for others falls on the DM. They have to take the time to read the adventure/module, discuss player demands, purchase the majority of the stuff that is needed. Some players won't bother to even buy dice and expect those things to be provided. I see no reason why a DM should not be compensated in some way or another.
I am in a group where the DM has graciously shared his D and D Beyond campaign with players. Of the 6 players only 3 have a Player's Handbook. Only one player makes sure to bring something for the DM every session, whether that is food or treats and even bothers to say thank you. The majority of the financial investment is on him and others share in that. Being nice only goes so far especially if no appreciation is demonstrated.
I DM a game specifically so that he has the opportunity to play. However, I am a little bit more of a stickler, if you want to play you need to buy the basic book. There needs to be a little bit of an investment from the players themselves.
No. No paid D.M.ing. It turns a game for fun into a job.
Sure. However, I figure that decision is entirely up to the DM who wants to charge and the players who are willing to pay for it. I may think it ludicrous if a DM charges $10/hour/player but some seem to manage it. If they are having fun and their players are having fun, it isn't up to me.
The question about customer expectations is also probably my biggest concern with paid DMing.
The best D&D campaigns contain uncertainty and risk. Situations can be close. Characters may have negative effects acting on them or they could die, sometimes permanently. In most games it is a rare occurrence but the chance of it happening adds to the immersion and often restrains the characters from taking unreasonable or risky actions.
However, now translate this to a paid DMing situation where the players are paying to have fun. Is it fun to have a character die? I would argue no. The risk can be fun, the actual event? Not. How does a paid DM balance this inherent conflict? Do they have a session zero making it clear that adventuring is risky business and the characters may die? What happens if the customer states that they do not want the character to die under any circumstances? Anyway, to me this is probably the biggest concern I would have with paid DMing ... managing and dealing with player expectations.
This isn't really different from unpaid DMing. In unpaid DMing, if your players don't find your game fun, they leave and do something else, and possibly complain about your DMing style to other people. In paid DMing, they do they same, only they also stop giving you money and they're more likely to bother with complaining.
I doubt that paid DMing is actually a viable business model for most people, though, except maybe to offset the cost of supplies.
I'm bringing back an old thread here, but I really think this is worth pointing out: D&D has two distinct and important layers that both really matter.
There's a strategy game defined in the rulebooks, and part of the DM's role is to craft and run interesting encounters in that strategy game. That's something that benefits from some expertise in the materials, but I don't think it's actually the main value that a good DM adds. You can buy adventures that contain interesting encounters, and although the rules are complex they're actually much simpler in 5th edition than in some prior editions, so it doesn't take that long to learn how to run a battle.
But D&D is also an improvised drama, and that's where I think a DM has a much more complex role, and where I think there is a lot of value in having a really exceptional DM. Participatory drama is cool, and we should be as happy to pay for a good D&D experience as we are to pay for tickets to a good show.
Yes, but I'd argue that a DM is first and foremost a friend, that the game is about hanging out and telling a story together. I'm a longtime DM and longtime improv student, but in the end I think I'm only 10% of the game: the other 90% is my friends and the memories we make together. Not to say I don't enjoy a good Adventurer's League game once in a while, but in the end, it's a game, and even at AL the goal is just fun playing. For me, no matter how good I think I am, I won't be hiring myself out anytime soon. (Tbh, even as a theater person, I don't think I'm worth paying for!) The DM is a player too, and it would feel wrong to turn something I do for fun into a business.
In the end, of course, it's irrelevant, because, like with any niche small business, there's no quality control, and there's a lot of basement-dwellers who think they're Matt Mercer and aren't. A few rotten apples would spoil the whole paid DM-ing barrel pretty quickly, even if it did happen.
Prodding the beehive, but... being paid to DM feels to me exploitative - and it goes against some of the true, genuine value of TTRPG, I think. (Creativity, joy, inclusivity.)
By charging players, there is really only one guaranteed consequence: You're excluding players who can't afford to pay 20$ a session. For a weekly game that's about 80$ a month, which is a lot of money to many people. When you set this kind of barrier, I think you're hurting your own game and the community. Dungeons & Dragons is already a very expensive game if you're more than a casual player. The sourcebooks cost money. Subscriptions and online content costs money. If you're playing live, you have grid-maps, dice, minis etc. that costs money. Some people can afford to purchase more tools, some can only afford the basics. Neither is a guarantee for skill (either DM or player.)
- You haven't excluded uncreative people. You've excluded people who don't have money. - You haven't excluded flighty players. You've excluded people who don't have money. - You haven't excluded non-serious players. You've excluded people who don't have money. - You haven't excluded ******* players. You've excluded people who don't have money.
With regards to the argument of quality, a "Professional DM" is not a protected title. There are no requirements for advertising DM-services online, no control-system or guarantee that the DM is a good match, a good storyteller, a good organizer, a creative improviser or a pleasant person. In fact, I have found that a lot of the time, the self-'professionalization' of their role has tended to interest the unfortunate sort of DMs*. Besides - the game is more than the DM. When you set money as the requirement to join the campaign rather than the aforementioned qualities, you may be a Mercer-level DM and still fail miserably because your players aren't playing along.
(By 'unfortunate' sort of DM I mean the sort that vastly overestimates their skill and use their 'status' as so-called 'professional' to justify all their shit.)
I can understand exactly two paid DM services. Example 1: DMs who are hired by local game stores to set up Adventurer's League drop-in sessions. This brings activity to local game stores, and the store is able to monetize off that. Hiring DMs is fair in this scenario, as they're organizing an event. Example 2: The likes of Brennan Lee Muligan and Matt Mercer, who are professional actors paid by a company to provide an entertainment service online. People are generally paid to run podcasts.
What I think is, a lot of people look to the success of Dimension 20 or Critical Role and see a market. They see that D&D has become more popular, that more people are interested in playing and think how can I profit off of that? But the idea that a person takes money to run a game on Discord - or worse yet, a module on Roll20 (Can you even comprehend the audacity of taking money to DM a game that someone else wrote?) - or in someone's living room is to me exploitative, uninclusive and elitist.
And with regards to the time-argument: Yes, it takes time to prepare a game of Dungeons & Dragons. Especially if you're the same type of DM as me, who likes to use character backstories actively in the plot and who prefer a very roleplay-heavy approach with much improvisation and social interactions. However it also takes time to be a good player in these serious, high-roleplay sort of games. The backstory has to be rich enough to build into the plot, some players commission art or draw themselves, some write notes and share them with the group, some have long conversations with the DM and players about their thoughts and ideas --- this is their time as well.
Money is the death of creativity. And you don't ask your friends to pay you to hang out and have fun - you ask for help in specific purchases if they're needed. If you are concerned about the cost of a module on Roll20, for example, how about using the "I want to run this game - anyone wanna pitch in for the one-time cost of buying it?" approach?
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
JADE OF HIGHGARDEN Waterdeep: Dragon Heist
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Despite saying you're not asserting anything, you then follow that up by asserting that it's like a scam.
That's what I strongly disagree with. I don't think it is any more of a scam than, say, an escape room or a haunted house or a movie theater or any other place a group of people can go for a fun experience.
Shared food is one of the most personal experiences there can be - think of a family dinner, with traditional food prepared by grandma... ...and that doesn't take anything away from professional chefs and restaurants, who make delicious food for people.
Same with DMing.
No, not really. No reason a DM has to be your friend, no more so than an actor on stage performing for you has to be.
It isn't "a random service or some entertainer" if you get a group of friends together and one of them is the DM.
It is if you have a professional DM.
That (the bolded part) I disagree with. It IS something I could buy and not feel weird about it.
I've bolded the part I disagree with. I don't think DMing is "supposed" to be intimate, no more than food is. When done with a group of friends or a family, it IS intimate. When done with strangers, it's not. Both are fine!
I'm imagining it to be very much like an escape room in terms of the kind of activity it feels like.
You get together with a group of friends. It's a few-hour experience, so like 2-3x longer than an escape room, so probably more expensive. You probably do the "session zero" stuff online/on a website before showing up - maybe you get to pick one of a few adventures, with some description to make sure the party matches the adventure. Possibly have an option to pick from a list pregen characters to make a balanced party for new players.
Then you go and have a DM run a session for you. All nice and slick, with musical/sound/light cues, cool maps and awesome minis, and a DM who knows the setting well so you can think you're going off the rails and still be in territory they've prepared. A mix of puzzles, combat, exploration, social (possibly depending on the adventure).
Then you go out and have dinner with your friends, while the DM stays at work and runs the next party through. :)
Idunno, to me that sounds like an awesome day out with my friends.
What do y'all think of like tiered prices based on setting and player count? I feel like running a published adventure takes a little bit less prep work than an original adventure in a pre-built setting, and even that is less work than homebrewing a completely new setting. Then, there's palyer count. 3-4 players is manageable, 5-6 can tend to get a touch more chaotic, and 7+ is just chaos. Would y'all agree that you'd ask for more based on how much more work you have to put into it?
I'll be honest with you, the real problem is that, like with a lot of small solo businesses, there's no way to tell the good ones from the bad. If paid DMing became a thing, a lot of nerdy recluses and wannabe authors would ruin the business both for the customers and the DMs who are actually worth it (if anyone is). I sure wouldn't pay someone without knowing how good they are, and there's not a lot of ways to monitor small businesses like that.
Wizard (Gandalf) of the Tolkien Club
If you look at the thing from a different perspective... what is the DM actually providing on the most basic level? An experience, perhaps... and hopefully, an entertaining experience. Entertainers are among the highest paid members of our society because we consumers do in fact value an entertaining experience greatly. Some may balk... but I perceive even football players and other sports celebs to be essentially entertainers and they get paid in the millions. Obviously a great deal of training and commitment goes into becoming a star quarterback or a tennis pro, or mma boxer. That should be rewarded. When a DM puts in that kind of work they should expect a decent financial return on investment. Not many DMs invest at that level of course, largely because there is no well established system for reward... well... not yet....
Paying for a DM is more like paying for a tour guide than an escort. The tour guide takes responsibility for the course of the tour. Guides you to sights interesting to see, avoids dangerous areas, is aware of all the relevant laws/rules than might affect your tour. A tour guide typically has expertise and knowledge about the particular subject and area you are interested in. A tour guide doesn't just passively follow the group around. They lead and guide them so that they get the most from the experience. (At least the best tour guides do).
A tour guide makes the experience entertaining and fun.
Some folks will pay for tour guides, some won't. Some tour guides are good and some aren't. Do folks feel insulted by tour guides asking to be paid for their time leading a group around? Not usually. So why should folks complain about DMs who might choose to offer their services to others leading them through an adventure in D&D?
A lot of assumptions in here. As well as opinions.
1. DM’ing “can” be a job.
just because it’s a hobby for some doesn’t make it a hobby for others. I see people that are in their 40s play in softball leagues and etc. but there are also people that make a living playing baseball.
the difference between hobby and job is “so you get paid for it”
2. Why does the game have to be in your house?
why can’t it be at a 3rd party site? Why can’t it be someone else in the groups house? Why can’t it be in the DMs house and he converted his basement into the equivalent of an indoor pool, with a life size set of the fight scene you’ll encounter specifically designed and set up?
or maybe he has a lot of custom made tables and maps with little fog machines and weather effects.
or maybe. He just has a piece of graph paper and a black sharpie.
As to your opinion that paying money for it will ruin it for you. 🤷🏼♂️ That’s the one opinion of yours you have that there’s no argument to. You’ll know you best. I would like to disagree, but there’s nothing to really disagree with from an empirical objective standpoint. That’s a completely subjective thing.
but yeah.
the fun stuff you can do with inflatable obstacles/furniture. Basic woodcarving and carpentry skills, 10 acres of land, solid grasp of basic physics and engineering. And simple botany.
then it’s just a matter of knowing a good taxidermist.
Blank
I voted yes and I'm playing with the idea to do it myself as a secondary service of my own company.
My pricing would be based upon wanting to cover my time spend preparing and leave some money to invest back into developping the service itself. Miniatures, scenery, maps etc.
I am thinking about doing 3 different services: Introduction into D&D, Learning to DM and Hosting a campaign as a DM.
For the first 2 I would charge a little bit more, say 100 EURO for the evening. It's not only about pricing, it's also that I want to go to people, who REALLY want it! Besides that, I think, preparing a first timer session will take more then an hour or 2 to prep and it would be cool to leave them with some stuff: their character sheet, some dice maybe?
The ongoing campaign I would do for 50 EURO per evening as it's an ongoing thing and it should be affordable for people. I would however come-up with a minimum of numer of sessions to prevent myself from developping campaigns for people who bail out after 1 or 2 sessions because of other reasons than me.
The market is the market.
people are willing to pay so we would be dumb to turn it down. I personally don’t get paid to dm. Would love too. In the end why would someone pay me personally?
think about it! Every DM would love to get paid. If you look into it there are actually very credible DMs offering to run games for money. There’s a large section on roll20 for it. If I was to try and run a game for money why would someone go with me over one of the credible guys doing it?
What I’m getting at is I think there’s more to it than “hey ima get paid!” On top of wearing the DMs hat your gonna have to put on the hat of a business man and also realize your no longer doing this for fun. This is a legit service and which beckons the question of “is the customer always right?”
a big reason I have been hesitant to put on the business man hat is I think it could create some weird player-DM expectations? What happens when the players are not satisfied?
Reading over a bunch of comments.
• Paid GMing is already a thing. It’s already here. I seen some comments like “if paid GMing became a thing....” -well it’s already a thing and “the market is the market!”
• paid GMing is an online thing. I would never pay someone to come to my house and if someone offered to pay me to come to their house to GM, I would be super creeped out. I’d probably do it though rofl
• my local game store charges 5 dollars a person when they have game nights. I don’t see how that is any different.
The question about customer expectations is also probably my biggest concern with paid DMing.
The best D&D campaigns contain uncertainty and risk. Situations can be close. Characters may have negative effects acting on them or they could die, sometimes permanently. In most games it is a rare occurrence but the chance of it happening adds to the immersion and often restrains the characters from taking unreasonable or risky actions.
However, now translate this to a paid DMing situation where the players are paying to have fun. Is it fun to have a character die? I would argue no. The risk can be fun, the actual event? Not. How does a paid DM balance this inherent conflict? Do they have a session zero making it clear that adventuring is risky business and the characters may die? What happens if the customer states that they do not want the character to die under any circumstances? Anyway, to me this is probably the biggest concern I would have with paid DMing ... managing and dealing with player expectations.
Things could get sticky pretty quick. I have probably a dozen players that I have ran for over the years and for the most part they trust me blindly however there are multiple player deaths I have had over the years were these players who trust me blindly disagree with me on how particular deaths played out. I believe they were in the wrong. They believe I was in the wrong. If money was involved these situations would probably be very ugly.
This is something to think about. I could see players who payed to have a good time in an adventure get rather pissed if characters die. I can hear it now. The whole "I did not pay you to kill my character. If im paying then my character cannot die." Basically anyway. I could see all sorts of players having certain expectations that favor their character simply because they payed. Im sure that there would also be a lot of expectations placed on the DM that would most likely make DMing feel more like a job sooner or later. Not something that I want. The DM is just as much a player as the rest of the group. I know there are those with the mind set of "why not get payed to do something I love." In the end its not the same. I do think that the issues will come from the players having that mindset of I payed therefore I should get what I want. Not what the DM wants.
The majority of the responsibility for the gaming experience for others falls on the DM. They have to take the time to read the adventure/module, discuss player demands, purchase the majority of the stuff that is needed. Some players won't bother to even buy dice and expect those things to be provided. I see no reason why a DM should not be compensated in some way or another.
I am in a group where the DM has graciously shared his D and D Beyond campaign with players. Of the 6 players only 3 have a Player's Handbook. Only one player makes sure to bring something for the DM every session, whether that is food or treats and even bothers to say thank you. The majority of the financial investment is on him and others share in that. Being nice only goes so far especially if no appreciation is demonstrated.
I DM a game specifically so that he has the opportunity to play. However, I am a little bit more of a stickler, if you want to play you need to buy the basic book. There needs to be a little bit of an investment from the players themselves.
Sure. However, I figure that decision is entirely up to the DM who wants to charge and the players who are willing to pay for it. I may think it ludicrous if a DM charges $10/hour/player but some seem to manage it. If they are having fun and their players are having fun, it isn't up to me.
This isn't really different from unpaid DMing. In unpaid DMing, if your players don't find your game fun, they leave and do something else, and possibly complain about your DMing style to other people. In paid DMing, they do they same, only they also stop giving you money and they're more likely to bother with complaining.
I doubt that paid DMing is actually a viable business model for most people, though, except maybe to offset the cost of supplies.
I'm bringing back an old thread here, but I really think this is worth pointing out: D&D has two distinct and important layers that both really matter.
There's a strategy game defined in the rulebooks, and part of the DM's role is to craft and run interesting encounters in that strategy game. That's something that benefits from some expertise in the materials, but I don't think it's actually the main value that a good DM adds. You can buy adventures that contain interesting encounters, and although the rules are complex they're actually much simpler in 5th edition than in some prior editions, so it doesn't take that long to learn how to run a battle.
But D&D is also an improvised drama, and that's where I think a DM has a much more complex role, and where I think there is a lot of value in having a really exceptional DM. Participatory drama is cool, and we should be as happy to pay for a good D&D experience as we are to pay for tickets to a good show.
Yes, but I'd argue that a DM is first and foremost a friend, that the game is about hanging out and telling a story together. I'm a longtime DM and longtime improv student, but in the end I think I'm only 10% of the game: the other 90% is my friends and the memories we make together. Not to say I don't enjoy a good Adventurer's League game once in a while, but in the end, it's a game, and even at AL the goal is just fun playing. For me, no matter how good I think I am, I won't be hiring myself out anytime soon. (Tbh, even as a theater person, I don't think I'm worth paying for!) The DM is a player too, and it would feel wrong to turn something I do for fun into a business.
In the end, of course, it's irrelevant, because, like with any niche small business, there's no quality control, and there's a lot of basement-dwellers who think they're Matt Mercer and aren't. A few rotten apples would spoil the whole paid DM-ing barrel pretty quickly, even if it did happen.
Wizard (Gandalf) of the Tolkien Club
Prodding the beehive, but... being paid to DM feels to me exploitative - and it goes against some of the true, genuine value of TTRPG, I think. (Creativity, joy, inclusivity.)
By charging players, there is really only one guaranteed consequence: You're excluding players who can't afford to pay 20$ a session. For a weekly game that's about 80$ a month, which is a lot of money to many people. When you set this kind of barrier, I think you're hurting your own game and the community. Dungeons & Dragons is already a very expensive game if you're more than a casual player. The sourcebooks cost money. Subscriptions and online content costs money. If you're playing live, you have grid-maps, dice, minis etc. that costs money. Some people can afford to purchase more tools, some can only afford the basics. Neither is a guarantee for skill (either DM or player.)
- You haven't excluded uncreative people. You've excluded people who don't have money.
- You haven't excluded flighty players. You've excluded people who don't have money.
- You haven't excluded non-serious players. You've excluded people who don't have money.
- You haven't excluded ******* players. You've excluded people who don't have money.
With regards to the argument of quality, a "Professional DM" is not a protected title. There are no requirements for advertising DM-services online, no control-system or guarantee that the DM is a good match, a good storyteller, a good organizer, a creative improviser or a pleasant person. In fact, I have found that a lot of the time, the self-'professionalization' of their role has tended to interest the unfortunate sort of DMs*. Besides - the game is more than the DM. When you set money as the requirement to join the campaign rather than the aforementioned qualities, you may be a Mercer-level DM and still fail miserably because your players aren't playing along.
(By 'unfortunate' sort of DM I mean the sort that vastly overestimates their skill and use their 'status' as so-called 'professional' to justify all their shit.)
I can understand exactly two paid DM services. Example 1: DMs who are hired by local game stores to set up Adventurer's League drop-in sessions. This brings activity to local game stores, and the store is able to monetize off that. Hiring DMs is fair in this scenario, as they're organizing an event. Example 2: The likes of Brennan Lee Muligan and Matt Mercer, who are professional actors paid by a company to provide an entertainment service online. People are generally paid to run podcasts.
What I think is, a lot of people look to the success of Dimension 20 or Critical Role and see a market. They see that D&D has become more popular, that more people are interested in playing and think how can I profit off of that? But the idea that a person takes money to run a game on Discord - or worse yet, a module on Roll20 (Can you even comprehend the audacity of taking money to DM a game that someone else wrote?) - or in someone's living room is to me exploitative, uninclusive and elitist.
And with regards to the time-argument: Yes, it takes time to prepare a game of Dungeons & Dragons. Especially if you're the same type of DM as me, who likes to use character backstories actively in the plot and who prefer a very roleplay-heavy approach with much improvisation and social interactions. However it also takes time to be a good player in these serious, high-roleplay sort of games. The backstory has to be rich enough to build into the plot, some players commission art or draw themselves, some write notes and share them with the group, some have long conversations with the DM and players about their thoughts and ideas --- this is their time as well.
Money is the death of creativity. And you don't ask your friends to pay you to hang out and have fun - you ask for help in specific purchases if they're needed. If you are concerned about the cost of a module on Roll20, for example, how about using the "I want to run this game - anyone wanna pitch in for the one-time cost of buying it?" approach?
JADE OF HIGHGARDEN
Waterdeep: Dragon Heist