“Where are you coming back from?”

“The gaming store. I just ran a D&D game for some people.”

“Oh yeah? Did you win?”

This is the sort of question you’d expect from those people who somehow survive without D&D in their lives. They can’t imagine a game that isn’t competitive in nature, that doesn’t have winners and losers. These poor lost souls, frequently answering to “Mom” or “Honey” but rarely both, don’t see any value in a cooperative effort where success isn’t measured by the highest score, the most hotels, the fewest contusions, but instead by elements more intangible: “How cool was the battle?” “How memorable was the scene?” “How amazing was that moment?”

All of this happens under the impartial hand of the dispassionate Dungeon Master, who fully understands the differences between competition and cooperation, who bears no ill will towards these players, who isn’t interested in dominating the players, battering them down, embarrassing them, showing them who’s in charge.

I follow these tenants because I consider myself to be a players’ DM. Partly this is a result of massive self-delusion, but mostly it’s because I can remember every time I’ve seen twinkly delight in the eyes of a DM as he crowed, “Critical hit on your character! HAHAHAHAHA!” That always infuriated me. Why does he seem so delighted by my character’s misfortune? “You rolled a 1? HAHAHAHAHA!” What does he have to gain by my failures? “You didn’t find the trap… and it explodes! HAHAHAHAHA!”

I want my players to succeed. I really do. I want them to have that spectacular moment. I want them to stare down the ferocious, slathering monster, and say, “Wrong, hellish beast. This is where your reign ends. Prepare to die.” And I want them to win that fight.

Only… only…

Recently, I started running a new game assembled from total strangers found on the internet, and it’s been a fascinating experiment simply because nobody knows each other. There are no preconceptions, and even more importantly, there is no established trust. In a game of close friends, you can expect a degree of trust, of patience, of forgiveness. There was none of that here. And it was justified.

They didn’t know me. If I threw down a ruling that didn’t make sense or just seemed small and petulant, they would challenge me on it, and rarely with anything resembling grace. Naturally, that would put me on the defensive, leading me to say things like, “Hey, find it in the books,” and though I didn’t come right out and say it, it was clear in my tone: “Or shut up.”

Suddenly, despite my best intentions, my game was transforming into a competition. DM vs. players, and I was sprinting toward the jagged cliff of “Hey, look, I don’t think I’ll be able to make the next game.”

How did this happen? I’m a players’ DM, for crying out loud. I’m on your side, guys. I want to tell a deep and thrilling story together, and instead, we’re wasting time with stupid arguments about auto-failures in skill checks.

And thus came my epiphany, when the clouds broke and the sun shone down. As a DM, it is my responsibility to exterminate all traces of competition. It is on me to ensure it doesn’t creep into the game.

If the players out-think me, I must acknowledge it, and with a smile: “Yeah, I did say the villain was scared of water. Okay, you escape in the rowboat, jeering at him as he stands helplessly on the dock.”

If a player proposes an idea, I must not carefully parse every word to figure out how to warp the intent: “Sorry, you said you were going to blast the closest enemy. That’s this guy, who’s surrounded by your allies. Roll attacks on each of them.”

If a player misspeaks, or worse still, makes a “hilarious” comment at the table that was not intended for gameplay, I must not exploit it. “Hey, you were the one who said, ‘I’d like to see what the overlord’s guards could do to us.’ He cries out for his elite dragonborn guard, and they attack.”

The best treatment for the “must not” situations is a simple clarifying question from me: “The roof looks very fragile. Are you sure you want to run across it?” or “The giant ant nest looks very active. Are you sure you want to approach it?” Of course, any clarifying question will set off alarm bells in my players’ heads, but that’s only a problem if I’d miss out on a good GOTCHA, if I run the risk of “losing the game.”

Finally, there is the reality that the competition comes from both directions. Even if the DM is committed to being impartial, the players might still be into it for the competition, to put one over on the all-powerful rube-behind-the-screen. Players can forget about penalties, ignore conditions, add or subtract gear as required, or (always a favorite) fudge die rolls. How do I deal with this? Easy. I don’t. I have enough to worry about on this side. I don’t want to have to run your characters as well. If you decide to beat me, there’s not much I can diplomatically do about that.

To paraphrase the lawyers, “Better that a hundred lying, cheating players get away with it than one good player gets screwed.”