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What kind of GM are you?
(forms.gle)
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this post was submitted on 06 Apr 2026
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A fair criticism, as these questions were submitted by the MCDM community, and most of us play Draw Steel, so the questions are probably biased towards games like Draw Steel.
However, if a GM mostly runs Blades in the Dark as a player-directed experience, and spends way more time collecting music and paintings to set the scene and mood, rather than preparing heist obstacles for their Crew, I'd say that GM runs an art-prep-heavy sandbox game. Such a GM might also prefer to hide enemy factions' plans from the players and blindside them with twists, or roll on the complication table in front of the players and let them see how the mechanics are creating the story. So while I agree with your point, I don't actually find your examples convincing. Perhaps you have experience with games even less like D&D than BitD, and I'm simply too narrow minded to understand your critiques.
Nah, you're probably right that I was not very good at explaining myself.
I think this one link can hopefully make my point clearer: 1d6chan.miraheze.org/wiki/Everyone_Is_John
Using that game would then make less sense to ask about encounters or challenging players/characters, or railroaing, or sandboxing.
Same for example if a game has a specifically defined setting not made by gm or players, does not have encounters and is not involve the idea of challenging anyone. Technically, I can go around the world classifying people as "proactive" or "reactive" in the way they see life, but it would not necessarily mean much to many of them.
But it is fine, I'm far from being representative. Many questions work on a broader scale, but some did not. Especially if my perspective on ttrpgs does not align with the way things are often presented in groups where DnD is a synonym for ttrpgs.
Kudos for mentioning Everyone is John.
And since I’m already typing a reply, I might as well link to another obscure RPG (that I haven’t played):
https://rpggeek.com/rpg/104103/boss-dragons-and-scrambled-eggs
Wowee, that game looks like fun! I'll go play it with My friends now!