I've noticed a trend in a particular type of DM/Poster, not only here, but in most places D&D is being discussed - and to be fair this is not a  phenomenon limited to D&D, it seems to be a general human failing.

"I've been playing D&D for ____ years, and I think .... ", "I've been playing D&D since 1942!" ( yeah - I know - it's called hyperbole ). Often this is presented in a context which implies " ... so I know better than you, and I'm right". I've seen some posters who somehow manage to sneak their age statement into almost every single post they make. 

To me, this is complete s%@t. It an appeal to authority logical fallacy, and worse - the speaker is usually trying to cast themselves in the role of the authority ( ego much? ). And I say this as someone who picked up the game for the first time in 1978, so if this was valid argument, I could use my "advanced years" to my benefit in discussions.

I'm seen DM's who have been playing for 2 years or less who are on top of their game ( pun intended ): sharp, observant, know what kind of game they want, know what kind of game their Players want, know how to blend those expectations, know their Players, know how to read the table and adapt, understand ( even if only on a semi-conscious level ) how to handle dynamic plot & pacing, who critically evaluate their games & the games of other DMs, incorporating techniques they think are valuable regardless of the source, and strive to create the best possible game they can. This isn't an approach attached to any one style of play, or type of plot - and could be attached to any these. This is just the attitude of the DM.

I've also seen many DMs with decades of experience who do that as well - perhaps even most. The point is not that "new DMs are better", it's that "some DMs are damn good, even with a relatively short gaming career".

I've also seen DMs with self-proclaimed decades of experience, who have petrified their approach - usually several editions ago. They decided what the one true way of running the game was years ago, and they don't need to think, or listen. They are right, and they don't need to think about how they run their game ( since they have it all figured out ), or pay attention to the Players. If someone disagrees with their approach, well that person is wrong. Why? Because that person has less experience, Q.E.D. If the Player wants to do something different, or has a different approach, or has "unrealistic" wants based on those "horrible live streams which are ruining the gaming community" - well - they're wrong, and they just don't understand what role-playing actually is. The DM will either "educate" them ( that is, beat the inconvenient creativity out of them by punishing the Character unjustly for things the DM doesn't like about the Player ), or simply kick them out of the game. They often bemoan some of the horrible design decisions of 5E, since WoTC hasn't codified their personal preferences ( which are, after all, objectively the best approach, so the current designers are just ruining D&D by emphasizing <this-thing-I-don't-like> ) into the current edition. And they are right to do because they've put in their time; they are experienced; they've been playing for ___ decades, and therefore, they're right.

Again, I've also seen many new DMs who fall into a variation of this camp that as well. They've hit upon a style, to go beyond that is to get into areas that make them uncomfortable, so they'll refuse to even entertain the idea of adapting their game and their expectations, and they'll punish Players who want to push them out of their comfort zone. The point is not that "older DMs are bad", it's that "some DMs are toxically inflexible". The added wrinkle with some of the more experienced DM's is that they'll attempt to defend their toxicity as virtue, based on their experience.

However, there is nothing wrong with a DM who is solid, confident, and has a well polished and effective approach to the game, built from experience. That's being an experienced, seasoned, good DM. The only time this goes off the rails is when the idea that "I'm experienced = I'm automatically right" creeps in. It's only a problem if that DM stops observing, evaluating, and seeing if they can improve because they've hit upon The One True Way.

I've been involved with RPGs in general, and D&D in particular, a long time. I don't think that matters. I'll listen to anyone who does something I think is valuable for my game, and see if I can pick up techniques from them. I don't care if they're of my "vintage", or a 12 year old. If someone is running a different kind of game from me, I'm curious about it - even if I decide that type of game isn't for me and I don't want to emulate any of it, it's still good to understand the different types of games out there. I also have no respect for DMs possessing "toxic ego" based on "time served", and I have little respect for DMs who say they want to accomplish X but implement techniques that lead to something totally different, and then defend their bad results as correct.

Ultimately - for me - it's about the game your run, how well you run it, and the experience you provide. If you run a bad table ( however you want to define that ), I don't care if you've been practicing those same mistakes for 20+ years; it doesn't make it better.

But that's just me. What do you think? Poll is above.

I think most people try and find a way to make themselves better by trying to boast about what ever the situation is 

The truth is there are many ways to play the game. There is no one way to play the game. Just because I like or don't like something, doesn't mean anything to what other's preferer. It a very hard concept for many people to accept. I think that is where a lot of players / dm  get caught 

If anything, I would argue in the reverse that sometimes DMing for many years (and not getting many chances to just be a player) can cause burnout to the extreme. There are people who are happy to be DMs and not really play, but I've seen a fair share of people who clearly need a break.

It has been my experience that people that have been DMing longer tend to be better DMs, BUT time in the seat only really counts within the current edition.  Those that were the DM in 2e or 3.5 but have not run 5e games are no better than a brand new DM when running 5e. Some skills carry over and the learning curve can be a little easier, but I would say the difference is negligible.  

Diversity of gaming experience is good, although I wouldn't necessarily privilege older editions of the same game over different games altogether. Someone who has experience with many different systems is more likely to have an understanding of and appreciation for how, and more importantly why, the rules of any given system work the way they do. I think having played four editions of D&D and countless other games besides gives me a certain perspective that someone who's only ever played 5e won't have. To be very clear, that doesn't mean I'm a better GM than they are, just that I have a broader view, something that doesn't have to be relevant to a single campaign, but that can be if the GM wants it to.

On the other hand, there are people on this forum who unironically declare that no one has played "real" D&D since 1e, so clearly senility can arise from getting too attached to how things "used to be" or whatever.

So, mostly I think it depends on the GM. There are new GMs who can run a better and more enjoyable game than someone who's been playing for 30 years if they have the right mindset and perspective. But for GMs who do have the right mindset and perspective, I think more exposure and experience can only be a good thing.

I started playing back with 1st edition as a player and a DM, I went to being just a DM with 2nd edition. But I actually prefer 5th edition rules over the older systems, I especially like the Advantage/Disadvantage mechanic. While I do believe that playing longer can make the best DM's it is up to the DM's who like me to embrace this edition and take in its simplicity of rules compared to earlier editions. 

There is a general, rough correlation between someone spending a long time doing something, and being good at it. After all, how do you get to Carnegie hall? Practice

If you stipulate "rough", I can agree. 

A counterexample - my wife crochets. She's met grandmothers who have been crocheting for 50 years, who have never gotten past knowing how to make a granny square ( one of the least challenging building blocks of larger projects ), and weren't able to grasp the technique my wife was teaching in her class ( while other less experienced students had no issues ).

You might say that some minimum level of experience is required to be good at what you do - I haven't seen any awesome DMs with only a week's experience - but time served is no guarantee of being good at what you do, if you don't/won't/can't learn from your experience. Being able to learn implies a certain openness to new experience, and an assumption that you don't know it all, and no one has anything to teach you. The type of ossified DM I was talking about in the OP isn't.

Generally speaking a DM with more experience is going to be better than one with less experience.  A better gauge would actually be the number of years of running for the same group of players.  If you had the same group playing your games for several years chances are your games are better than someone who has more total years of running for short lived play groups. 

There's a certain intro time period, a time for a DM to get their feet under them. It's usually more about game rules than about the 'soft skills', the social and narrative ones. I find everyone has to take a little time with that, but after that, exactly how much a DM improves over time, will vary incredibly. There's definitely some toxicity that you encounter, and people reach for time to support their opinions. It's not just D&D though. You see it in the 40K community too. Probably there's a version of it in a lot of hobbies.

I've worked with teens most of my adult life (teaching, youth ministry, Boys&Girls Club), and a lot of that time has centered around the use of games, in particular rpgs. It causes me to reflect on the changes in US youth culture, and that effects D&D culture likewise. I see a lot that's encouraging. The toxicity is in decline, both in our gaming and in general. These kids talk about their emotions more. The group that games is more diverse. They have fewer issues and they resolve them quicker. There's a lot less 'sorting' behavior, less focus on in & out. It gives me a lot of hope.

 In any aspect of life, experience at a thing tends to make you better than you were -- but it doesn't necessarily make you better than other people are at it.

For example, I have been a college professor for 13 years now. I'm a little better in the classroom now than I used to be, but not all that much. However, what I have really improved on is my "reaction time" in response to what a new teacher would consider "unexpected" student behavior. In other words, at this point, I have seen it all. There is (almost) nothing my students will do that can throw me. And I can grade the same student project now in half the time as I would have taken to grade it 13 years ago -- just because I have seen so many hundreds of student projects of this type now, that I can tell at a glance if it is good, meh, or bad. Experience has made me more efficient at things, more "nimble" on my feet as it were, in reaction to things. In total, I am a better professor now than I was when I started. But that doesn't mean I'm better than the other people who have taught less time than I have.  And there are profs who have been at my institution for 25 years and have been awful for 25 years. Students don't learn from them, hate their classes, and so on -- experience may have made them better than they were, but it didn't make them good.

GMing is the same. You will get better over the years as you see more player actions and have more experience with dealing with them. The first time you have to figure out if someone gets a flanking bonus you will be in the rulebook. Maybe the 3rd time... the 5th. By the 500th time, you will know it off the top of your head. Battles will go faster because you're not looking things up as much. And you will develop an intuitive feel for things like, how to stock your dungeons with monsters... how much your party can get done in a play session... how far ahead you have to prep to stay ahead of the party... and so on. Each person gets better at these things as he goes.

But that doesn't mean that someone can't be an awesome DM on their first night out... or that someone necessarily will be an awesome DM on their 1300th night out. There are many variables. Experience is just one. But it definitely is a variable and can affect how good a DM is at the task.

Hiya Vex.  Nice thread ya have, be a shame if someone were to post an opposition viewpoint in it. :D  

I voted that more experience is mostly linked to being a better DM, but that I agree that some DMs are unskilled or untalented no matter how many years they have been doing it.  SagaTympana has it right though, being a game master for a game, and more importantly playing in all sorts of games (on either side of the screen) gives a DM a better handle on how to be a good DM because they can see the flaws in the systems they run.  They can also have the game design chops to realize why the developers wrote a particular rule in a certain way.  

From my own personal experience, I can say that I am a full spectrum DM.  I can be full on Tyrant in the Seat or I can be gentle and allow that little girl the corgi pet she wants for her Aasimar Sorceror.  I can sink every ship out of Waterdeep harbor to keep the group "on book", and I can freestyle with the players when they fall through a portal into..say...Weird Wars Rome-esque world.   I can give a player a flat "No." and dismiss his idea, and I can nod and say "You can of course try, but the outcome, that is on you." while secretly being jazzed about the player's idea and just wanting to poker face them so they have total ownership of the idea.  I can run a game of Theater of the Mind and spin out a world of words and I can haul out and place my maps and terrain for the player that just needs that lil bit of tangibility to enjoy the game.  

On the other hand, I know you have mentioned DMs with little or no seat time that are running good games, all I can say to that is iron sharpens iron so they will get better as their time running games increases.  Moreover, unlike we Gaming Methuselahs new DMs have a vertitable cornucopia of resources to use to become better or simply learn basic skills that we never had.  Matt Mercer, Matt Colville, Satine Phoenix, Zipperon Disney, Web DM, Nerdarchy, and more are just a few clicks away.  Entire forums and chats exist to provide ideas and support like this one.

Additionally, some DMs have not learned their role yet and fail to understand that being the player's biggest fan does not mean you want them to win all the time.  Where is the drama in that?  Failure states and how players and their character's overcome them is far more interesting than always winning.  Not to drag the rather dead equine of "Improv" back into the argument, but saying "no" to a player and telling them to try something else is more interesting than letting players steamroll over potential storylines because the DM was afraid to simply stop an approach.  More seat time would likely teach them how to exert more control.   To quote Amy Vorpal, "No, you may not roll for sex!"

But, hey what do I know. I have only been playing TTRPGs the majority of my life.  

It would  be a shame if you put all that work into an opposing position only to find I didn't disagree :)

My vote - if I cast one - would float between "show me the results, don't care your experience level", and "experience is mostly linked to being a better DM" - since I don't think ( upon retrospect ) that they're exclusive; both are probably true.

I've never said that experience can't equate with a better skill level - or that it doesn't do so most of the time. I even specially called that out.

That's generally the case in all skills - practice usually makes it better. 

I'm not sure I said DM's with little to know seat time produce superior results, and I did say that in a follow up post that there probably is a minimum amount of experience required to get ones feet under you as a DM. Perhaps I should have been more specific about "2 year or less". I don't know how much less than 2 years I'd go - maybe down to one. Of course, the number of games and the frequency of them skews this wildly. It would probably be better to talk about "hours experience" - although I wouldn't take a stab at figures of merit without some actual study on that ( anyone float me a research grant? ).

I agree that the general trend is that more experience leads to a better skill level. 

What I object to - and am complaining about - are those individuals who cannot walk the walk, yet demand to be heard because they've been practicing the same idiotic mistakes and attitudes for the last 70 years.

Spin it a different way - if you are a competent and capable DM, I can respect that. If you're a competent and capable DM because you've got 35 years experience and have learned from that, that's fine ( it's even expected ). If you're a competent and capable DM because you're a prodigy who just seems to "get it" out of the gate, I can respect that. So ... whether or not I respect your abilities, doesn't connect to your "time served" at all. Time served may have some predictive value, at a probability level ( drop a random DM in front of me, tell me how many years/hours/campaigns she's played, and then ask me to guess how good they are ). There might even be strong correlation, but there's no guarantee of causality.

But I'm not looking at predictive models here, I'm looking at the inverse relationship: the individuals who demand that they be considered good DMs, or even authorities in the community, because of a number. Not that causal flow of experience usually begetting good DMs ( it usually does ), but those DMs that expect to be automatically considered good because of that number, without any demonstration of that ability ( and in fact sometimes counter demonstrations ).

I respect ability. Period. I disrespect incompetence. Period. I can agree that experience gives you a higher probability of having ability - I'm just not sure that really matters. EIther you've got it, or you don't. I don't really care why - and if you don't, don't try and BS or browbeat me because you've been making the same mistakes for decades. 

Edit: I would like to retract or refine the "I disrespect incompetence. Period." statement. It's still generally true, but I think it needs to be coupled with willfully continuing that incompetence. DMs that aren't up to a competent level, but who are honestly making an effort to learn and improve - they are still individuals who I respect, and eventually they will get up to a level of competence. 

I have no respect for those who are incompetent, and have no interest in improving their abilities, or worse - defend that incompetence as virtue based on their role as DM or time served.

Vex, that is why I like you.  

I mean, isn't it similar to any other skill? Practice helps you get better. Practice alone doesn't guarantee anything, because you might be practicing the wrong thing, or just repeating bad habits. Some people are just naturally better, even without practice.

Same with DMing. Typically, getting a bunch of experience will help someone get better. The improvement with experience will be much greater if they're actively trying to improve, finding their flaws and fixing them, rather than just doing the same thing over and over. And of course, some people will come in at a higher level than others to start, for other reasons.

I voted for the middle option, but actually fall between that and the higher option of more experience can equal better DM.

I haven't seen anyone really respond to the top of your original post, but I just woke up...

I believe some people post (or say in real life) their years of experience to make them seem better. However, it seems to me that most people do it to let others know that they have a certain baseline of knowledge and to strengthen their arguements. I've done this many times at my job to save time as it's generally assumed you know certain things after "x" amount of years at my workplace. I've also swung it like a hammer on the inexperienced to shut down any BS if they try wriggle out of something or throw someone under the bus. Heck, I've done that to some in higher positions when they argue for some new process that I know we've tried in the past that has only lead to increased costs. In this case, it helps that we have a high turnover rate and I've worked nearly every position attached to my current one.

DM'ing is just like anything in life. More experience let's you have more options on how to deal with situations or inject more flavor into a campaign. But like anything else, a person can do something for ages and still be bad at it. A DM may also be unable to adapt 5E or modify a campaign that may really need it.

My current DM is from the Old Days. Played off and on since 2E (or there abouts) and is a wargamer. With that background in mind, he sometimes has a hard time keeping rules straight,  complains about D&D 5e being too easy, and occasionally thinks of D&D as a wargame. The players are OP and must be weakened somehow, and he prefers people play to stereotypes. No one would be willing to play a Pally in his game. His style is very by the book with a few added things that add humour. We've had a few heated "discussions" but generally we do pretty good because I balance him out and have pretty good knowledge about the rules for 5E. He's also asked for opinions when it comes to rulings due to that. I also remind him that you can always modify the rules a bit to inject things from older editions and that 5E is simplified to make it easier for newer people to get into the game. Most of our current players were completely new to the game. It's helped that most of us share a workplace. Part of the reason we use DndBeyond is for ease of use and information sharing.

D&D was forbidden when I was growing up. My only experience with D&D 3.5 and earlier is from video games and what little I could read from either novels or instruction manuals with games like Baldur's Gate. I didn't get to play until 4E came out, and even then could only play a few games with my cousins. Penny Arcade and Critical Role helped reignite my desire to play the game.

I started 5E the same time everyone else did in my group (including the DM.) The difference is that I voraciously buy and read all the new setting books that come out for 5E (and own some for 4E) while also getting some from Kobold Press. I purposely avoid most of the adventure parts. I've DM'd Lost Mines of Phandelver for our group and chucked out or modified most of it. My own style is very loose with a lot of improv to make my life easier since I have a poor short term memory. The old DM helped me with rules or explaining things to the other players, much like I did with him in our first campaign and the current one. Playing with our group is like herding cats...

Currently making a homebrew world for our next campaign. We've been discussing doing the occasional one shot for anyone interested in DM'ing. One of our players has introduced D&D to his family and is now DM'ing their own campaign. We have another who is talking about DM'ing for their group of friends and as been asking for advice. Lot of talk about character concepts, as well as DM and player styles at work, lol.

Edited many times for clarity and brain not go...

Quote from HunterStryker83 >>

 

I believe some people post (or say in real life) their years of experience to make them seem better. However, it seems to me that most people do it to let others know that they have a certain baseline of knowledge and to strengthen their arguments. I've done this many times at my job to save time as it's generally assumed you know certain things after "x" amount of years at my workplace. I've also swung it like a hammer on the inexperienced to shut down any BS if they try wriggle out of something or throw someone under the bus. Heck, I've done that to some in higher positions when they argue for some new process that I know we've tried in the past that has only lead to increased costs. In this case, it helps that we have a high turnover rate and I've worked nearly every position attached to my current one.

 

I'm fully aware of this. This, right here, is the problem.

You can walk the walk, or you can puff and posture. Show me, don't tell me (and most likely lie to me, or exaggerate to try and wield unwarranted authority )

If you can only do the latter, why the hell would I listen to you? Answer is simple; I don't.

You can demonstrate ability? Fine - I respect that ( and if you demonstrate that, I don't care how long you've been at it ). But I've seen enough people try and rely on the fact that it is "generally assumed you know certain things after 'x' amount of years", or "swing it like a hammer on the inexperienced to shut down any BS" - be mistaken, then fall prey to their own propaganda. They're wrong, or their approach is sub-optimal ( or worse counter-productive ), for what they're trying to achieve, but they assume they know better, they never critically evaluate their goals or methods, and they sure as hell don't listen to anyone else. Why should they? They know best. They get lazy, they get sloppy, and they never even realize it, because they never need to explain themselves, or evaluate their position. There's a quote from one of the characters in Tad Williams Otherland series that I think is appropriate ( if, hopefully, more extreme than is warranted :p ): "Confident, Cocky, Lazy, Dead".

In some extreme cases - they vanish down the rabbit hole of their own ego, assuming that their worst  narrow perspective, Id-driven whims about how they wish something was is authoritatively how it should be, and they rail against the fact that other people are idiots for not complying. In some extreme cases, they internalize their wish fulfillment fantasy so hard, that they genuinely cannot conceive that their wants and goals might not be universally valued.

I stand in much the same professional position you describe. I've been in that situation where someone junior, or new management, wants to do X, where my long time experience tells me it is impractical, impossible, or expensive. I always explain why I don't think it's a practical alternative. I've had enough practice explaining, I can do it clearly and concisely ( although you might not agree based on my forum posts :p ). As an experienced member of the team, or as an SME that's part of your job. If you can't, or won't, you're incompetent, being lazy, or you're just acting like an *******. By explaining my position, and why I have it, they learn and become better at their role, and better able to help me with mine. And sometimes - not often, but sometimes - they introduce a new element into the problem I've never considered before, and I learn something new.

There are absolutely situations where you ( or management, or your commanding officer) can't explain in the heat of the moment; no one discusses battlefield or emergency situation orders ( or they get shot :p ), but I've never worked with competent management who wasn't willing to go back later and discuss the whys of the decision.

Pulling it back to D&D, there are times when the DM says "OK, I'm going to rule it this way for now, since we're in the middle of combat, but we can circle back on this discussion later after the game". Sometimes, based on points raised by Players in that after game discussion, they manage to convince me. We change how that is handled, moving forward.

In forum discussions, I've become very cautious about people who lead with "well, I've been playing the game for ___ years, and this is how it is ... ". I find that it is often - not always, but often - an indication that the person is trying to "swing it like a hammer on the  [perceived] inexperienced", and we're expected to accept their pronouncements as if they're ex cathedra statements. It's my experience that often people who need to fall back to that kind of argument, can't make any other kind of rational argument for their position. They may have had one, once, but it's atrophied and become muddled as they've just wield their hammer instead, for so long.

I've clashed with people on forums, and I try to always explain my position ( don't know if I've done that 100% of the time, but I try ). You know what? I've learned things from their counter-arguments. I've adapted my positions, and my approach to how I run the table, based on some of those arguments ( shout out to Hawksmoor :p ), because what they're proposing works better for what I'm trying to accomplish. Still my game, still my goals, still pursuing the type of game I value - just better tools. 

Where would I be if I had adopted the "I first started playing in 1978, so you should just shut up and accept my position as right" approach? I'd be running a poorer quality game.

Don't tell me, show me - because my experience is that if you need to fall back on the former, and expect me to take it on faith, then you're really doing neither - you're trying to bullshit me.

Bad thing about typing anything, it's difficult to get across the exactly what you're trying to say.

I don't disagree with what you're saying. The key words I used were some and many. Not all or every... time... You get what I'm trying to say, hopefully.

I try to explain and evaluate in those situations, but there are times when you have to correct someone now. Especially when you're dealing with time sensitive things that can injure or kill someone. I was using personal experience from work, where I'm actually with the person, as an example for why some might post something like that with their DM experience. At work, I have demonstrated my ability, but there's no way to confirm that on here, nor do I desire too. Once again, it was an example comparing how some on a forum post about D&D might blare out their experience. Poor example, I guess. The use of the word many might have been too strong for what I was trying to get across, but that just means I need to expand my vocabulary.

As for the D&D posting, as I said before, I'm sure there are some posting it to puff themselves up, but I would hope a lot of the others are just using it as short-hand. I don't know about every one else, but I typically don't desire to post a resume every time I make a comment. I'm just trying to answer a post the best I can. Part of the reason why I had edited that one so many times...

I guess what I'm trying to say is, no post, no matter how well or poorly written, should be taken as truth. I would hope it's obvious. If someone posts that they have "x" years of experience, I read that as I can assume they have a certain baseline of knowledge that I can reply to with out having to explain myself.

My group has a lot of new players right now. There's only two (maybe three if the new guy sticks around) of us with much experience with D&D. The current DM has been playing off and on since 2E or so. I've played since 4E, and only rarely, until 5E. We bounce rules and concepts off each other. The new players, two of which would like to DM for their friends or family, have been asking us for advice because both of us have had experience with it. We don't discount their lack of experience. Heck, it's great to have people I can bounce ideas of.

Anyways, something, something... (Never been good at ending posts...)

I've been playing D&D since 1981, and I still learn new things every time I play. 

I have a bit of experience as a DM, but most of my experience is as a player. 

D&D has taught me how to listen to the people around me and to trust in the group's decision - even if it doesn't work out. D&D has taught me to roll with the punches and to laugh at our own failures as much as I revel in our successes. D&D has taught me that anything is possible if you are well prepared, make a good plan, and have a bit of luck on your side. D&D has taught me that plans usually fall apart as soon as they're implemented, and that luck doesn't give a rat's a$s about you. D&D has taught me that the most important parts of any adventure are the people you share the adventure with. D&D has taught me not to judge a book by its cover, and never to turn my back on a halfling. D&D has taught me that if something sounds too good to be true, it's probably a mimic. D&D has taught me that death is not something to be feared, and neither is life. 

It's a game. As long as everyone is having fun, that's all that matters.