Joel is the perfect example of an awful Reddit DND 5e Game Master

[CountCapacollo]

All the hallmarks are there.

1) Rail roads you into his version of the story, despite whatever efforts you take
2) retaliates against you for struggling against it in the first place
3) thinks the game is Game Master vs Players

Joel needs to read some AngryGM on what it means to be a good Game Master.

[Tigerhawk71]

You fell for the Joel meme.

There's trackers that clearly show when anything is modified and it's not as often as redditors claim

[CountCapacollo]

Originally posted by Tigerhawk71:

You fell for the Joel meme.

There's trackers that clearly show when anything is modified and it's not as often as redditors claim

I stand unapologetic and unbowed in my original assessment.

[Rhudda]

This isn't a TTRPG.

[Key]

I don't entirely get the "reddit" part of the insult, are reddit GMs particularly bad, or?

[Tigerhawk71]

Originally posted by Oops All Eagles:

Originally posted by Tigerhawk71:

You fell for the Joel meme.

There's trackers that clearly show when anything is modified and it's not as often as redditors claim

I stand unapologetic and unbowed in my original assessment.

That's fine. Nobody said you can't be wrong on the internet and I applaud your bravery in the face of websites that track this data.

[CountCapacollo]

Originally posted by Key:

I don't entirely get the "reddit" part of the insult, are reddit GMs particularly bad, or?

Reddit is a special kind of sub human, yes.

[CountCapacollo]

Originally posted by Tigerhawk71:

Originally posted by Oops All Eagles:

I stand unapologetic and unbowed in my original assessment.

That's fine. Nobody said you can't be wrong on the internet and I applaud your bravery in the face of websites that track this data.

Except I'm correct.

[Wiawyr]

Originally posted by Oops All Eagles:

Originally posted by Tigerhawk71:

You fell for the Joel meme.

There's trackers that clearly show when anything is modified and it's not as often as redditors claim

I stand unapologetic and unbowed in my original assessment.

I just want to have nice planets to fight on again. Scratch that, not even "nice", just not absolute ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ terrible planets with vision impairment and soupy fog that limits visibility to 35m. Whoever came up with (and gave the go-ahead on) these planet effects has never played this game or any other, they add nothing and only make the experience worse. It absolutely reeks of a petty GM going, "Oh yeah? Well if it's too easy to avoid things you can see, I'll make it so you can't see! Rocks fall, roll for fort save at -6 you plebs!"

Give us back Omicron!

[Key]

Originally posted by Wiawyr:

Originally posted by Oops All Eagles:

I stand unapologetic and unbowed in my original assessment.

I just want to have nice planets to fight on again. Scratch that, not even "nice", just not absolute ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ terrible planets with vision impairment and soupy fog that limits visibility to 35m. Whoever came up with (and gave the go-ahead on) these planet effects has never played this game or any other, they add nothing and only make the experience worse. It absolutely reeks of a petty GM going, "Oh yeah? Well if it's too easy to avoid things you can see, I'll make it so you can't see! Rocks fall, roll for fort save at -6 you plebs!"

Give us back Omicron!

I'm kinda tired of the main effect on half the planets being:

"Hey on this planet you can't see sh*t, but in a different colour this time!"

[Grommy]

Originally posted by Wiawyr:

Originally posted by Oops All Eagles:

I stand unapologetic and unbowed in my original assessment.

I just want to have nice planets to fight on again. Scratch that, not even "nice", just not absolute ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ terrible planets with vision impairment and soupy fog that limits visibility to 35m. Whoever came up with (and gave the go-ahead on) these planet effects has never played this game or any other, they add nothing and only make the experience worse. It absolutely reeks of a petty GM going, "Oh yeah? Well if it's too easy to avoid things you can see, I'll make it so you can't see! Rocks fall, roll for fort save at -6 you plebs!"

Give us back Omicron!

I do agree that vision impairment effects are a bit much. They're nice and immersive at first, but then it's just annoying.

[Queltis]

Originally posted by Oops All Eagles:

All the hallmarks are there.

1) Rail roads you into his version of the story, despite whatever efforts you take
2) retaliates against you for struggling against it in the first place
3) thinks the game is Game Master vs Players

Joel needs to read some AngryGM on what it means to be a good Game Master.

Every GM will try to get you back on track to the story they were attempting to tell. The good ones are just capable of being subtle about it.

[Slithy]

Originally posted by Rhudda:

This isn't a TTRPG.

You're kind of missing the point and you don't need to be a TTRPG to have a bad game/dungeon master. If it's the title that bothers you: curator, director, administrator or manager. The point is that Joel does it fairly badly and broadly.

Now is Joel being malicious about this? Hard to tell. Staff at Arrowhead have, in the past, been rather antagonistic to the community before; but I suspect this isn't it. I think what is happening is they have a vision of where the story is supposed to go and it needs to go to that place so they can introduce new elements of the game for us.

However, in the manner they are going about it, there is a feeling of "us vs them" instead of a "us vs the game" with a administrator making sure we always have enemies to fight because, let's be honest, if we defeated the bugs and bots we'd all be complaining that we have a game we paid for with nothing but hugs for each other whilst bored on a Super Destroyer.

There are more organic ways to do this that feel good and forced ways that feel bad. The most recent was the Automatons returning. Don't get me wrong, it had to happen, but the "Valdis sector fell in hours and the other two sectors are being threatened" feels SUPER forced. If it was a massive barrage of invasion missions (that we inevitably would lose because we lose most invasions anyway) it would have given the players some agency to at least try but, by design, fail; especially if they had thrown in the already hinted at toxin boosting the bugs causing invasions in unexpected regions. This would split the community further, allowing us to fail and point the finger at each other instead of Joel.

[Wiawyr]

Originally posted by Queltis:

Originally posted by Oops All Eagles:

All the hallmarks are there.

1) Rail roads you into his version of the story, despite whatever efforts you take
2) retaliates against you for struggling against it in the first place
3) thinks the game is Game Master vs Players

Joel needs to read some AngryGM on what it means to be a good Game Master.

Every GM will try to get you back on track to the story they were attempting to tell.

That's not what a GM does. The players create the story as they go, the GM creates the setting and framework for the players to do so.

[CountCapacollo]

Originally posted by Queltis:

Originally posted by Oops All Eagles:

All the hallmarks are there.

1) Rail roads you into his version of the story, despite whatever efforts you take
2) retaliates against you for struggling against it in the first place
3) thinks the game is Game Master vs Players

Joel needs to read some AngryGM on what it means to be a good Game Master.

Every GM will try to get you back on track to the story they were attempting to tell. The good ones are just capable of being subtle about it.

No, back on track is not the same as "I designed the story like this and your decisions don't matter".

That's awful GMing and you're perpetuating it.

[Ishan451]

Originally posted by Oops All Eagles:

Joel is the perfect example of an awful Reddit DND 5e Game Master

Tell us you don't know the game mechanics without telling us you don't know the game mechanics.