Thought I'd just write a quick article about my experience attempting to be a good samaritan DM on the D&D Facebook group.
There's a lot of folks out there who profess to be players in need of a game to attend. A lot. I used to see their posts in the group when I was on Facebook (I've since deactivated my account as I was spending too much time on Facebook).
A month ago, I posted to the Facebook Dungeons & Dragons group and stated that I am a Dungeonmaster who would be willing to DM an online game for anyone who wished it. No commitments, no wierd requirements.
Just a webcam and a microphone so you can be part of my stream.
A lot of excited people responded and I asked their availability and made a spreadsheet of all the respondents and said I will try to organize some games.
Quite a few people! Oh how will I dungeon master for them all?
I decided to run a Thursday game and a Saturday game despite the fact I was (at the time) operating three other games. I let folks know what was going on and made an event and told folks to sign up.
Of the respondants, when it came to committing I had very little response. One fellow marked himself uhh.. 'Interested' for both games and attended neither. One fellow claimed he was available all the time and yet didn't have a webcam (didn't stop him from trying to attend the hangouts).
Two people ultimately attended the Thursday game which turned out to be a great session with a cool story. I was surprised and pleased with the end result. Another great example of what Dungeons & Dragons can be!
When Thursday concluded, I informed the players that I would not conduct any more organization and that if they wanted to continue playing they would have to organize the playership and let me know, and I would continue to operate campaign. The players followed up to tell me they had two other people ready to go!
For the following Saturday game, I had two no shows, and one disappointed player.
The following Thursday, nobody showed up, nobody messaged me, and nobody played.
The Saturday after that, I didn't receive any messages, and subsequently went about my day unabated.
I dun care.
I'm not butthurt about any of this and I'm not trying to be smug in writing this. I do want to document the effort and the result though.
There's a lot of people who profess that they would love to play, but the bottom line is the reason they're not playing is because they're either not making the time, they're being flaky, and ultimately, they don't appreciate the opportunity provided. Yet folks wonder why 'Professional DM' is a thing?
To those who would say, "But Dooley, life gets in the way sometimes!" You're right, and that's fine. If folks are busy, I get that. When folks don't remember the game, don't message me before or after, and leave me wondering, that's not "life getting in the way," that's just folks being flaky.
Would I still be willing to operate a game for any of these folks? Not for free.
Moving forward I'll be taking payments to pay for my time involved. A monetary commitment of $10USD per player should ensure that when folks say they'll attend, they attend. As a working father of two, I have better things to do then be flaked upon.
More to the point, I offered to do it for free and was met with the outcome I saw; so far as I'm concerned, those folks have forgone their opportunity to play in my games for free.
Think I'm being unfair? Sound off in the comments.