West Marches & crappy attitude, loud players
TL;DR: "Beware players who keep complaining about a fundamental aspect or preference for/of your game"). If anyone has thoughts or similar experiences, by all means do drop me a mail if you like.
I have always been extremely clear about me wanting to do West Marches, forever. Well, within reason of course, if I ever am retired or have a lot more free time and most of my players too, I would of course consider playing with the same small group of players.
I have always explained at once, to any new prospective player, exactly why West Marches is the only viable way for me personally because trying "always same 4 to 6 guys" for 25 years previously, without fail led to way more stress, logistics, cancellation and other huge downsides (literally in terms of stress & mental health as well) for me as host + DM and even issues for everyone else in group too.
Since for instance not every one can always commit to coming every 2 weeks, always, and that is fine! That does not make them lesser roleplayers. Also, I prefer it if newbies or less experienced or pretty busy or women or less dominant people are able to play too. Anyone nice/cool, should be able to play, with some frequency.
As ever, on the site where I recruited all my players, on a Cryptpad that everyone read and agreed to before joining plus in the permanently pinned on Telegram post, I was crystal clear, from day 1, that we would always play West Marches and also why.
Yet I noticed this correlation! ->
Older, experienced TTRPGers (decent players! usually quite generous with snacks etc too), taller, always guys, louder voice, more dominant, bit more likely to talk over others/try too much for loot or min-max their way a bit through Dungeon or rules players,.. had an issue with West Marches, maybe from day one. In their own words: "Because I want to have a guarantee I play every session!"
But weirdly, they kept playing in group for like 1 to 2 years, many sessions, they loved the games and the group, kept saying so. Except every few months talk they'd shit about West Marches style, in both our public group with all our players & in private to me, despite me repeating it was not going to change and highly necessary for my mental health and stress level. All of which was a bit annoying and disconcerting. They recently found/focused on other Non-West Marches groups that consist of always the same 5 guys or so (0 women, 0 newbies/little experience people,. none of that is a coincidence!) and they both quit our group in same week.
Which I had 0 problem with because fair play, do what makes you happy! Plus I already had nicer, easier going players (including hyper experienced dude/DM who lives 1 min walk, nicest guy ever) lined up or actually playing, this, thanks to the West Marches/recruiting thing, proving my point again in a way! Those other guys leaving, honestly is better for everyone -and a relief for me- so it is not sour grapes on my part.
About those other groups they joined, my gf joined each group for a single session. Basically loud guy 1., was the worst TTRPG experience she and loud guy 2 ever had. Loud guy 2. left me long voice msg about how much he hated the session. The problem was that loud guy 1. was a horrible DM, borderline adversarial "No, no no, u cant do any of that or this! Not that either, nope, bad idea! Follow the module RAW/all my hints and plans!", so he had insane railroading and other DM issues.
The Other group/game my gf tried the once, devolved into complete chaos of DCC rules nerding + way more tactical, combat as sport and complex play featuring extremely LOUD "DUUUUUUDE!!-Lulz! playing" and DM "losing complete control" (his own words!) over this collection of Loud, Tall more powerplay-ey TTRPGERs. The DM that ran that session is an extremely nice and experienced soft-spoken guy, still plays in my group, has 0 problems with West Marches but is perhaps just way more permissive than I. Yet even he said that, that specific session was his worst in a year or more.
I've since amended my Cryptpad to reflect that if people do not love West Marches they should just gracefully bow out after max. 3 sessions.
The Cryptpad always already stated that:
"Some people have softer voices, some are a bit more introvert, or less experienced, absolutely make sure they are involved, ask them their opinion. They are certainly should not be less invested, engaged and involved in the session! Most definitely modulate your volume and how much you speak to the persons with softest voices at the table!"
I did write those guys after they quit, to genuinely thank them for nice sessions, but to also express:
"My POV is that when someone hosts and entertains you, and puts in way more work for the game, you adapt or if you can not,.. you gracefully bow out, quickly. But you do not repeatedly complain. It would be different if you hosted/DMed your own frequent game and offered the exact thing you prefer, then that seems fair, to expect that which you also offer."
One never DMs or hosts at all, the other = that awful rail-roadey DM who runs Mothership 1x or max. 2x a year and literally disgusted 2 players (at least) with his DMing so much they swore to never again join any game he DMed.
Don't get me wrong, my group here is AWESOME, especially now, now that I have like 9 super nice, kind, appreciative, non-complainy people that are very keen to play and have 0 issues with West Marches. ❤️ 😃
But what the above tells me is that in TTRPG too: "When people/players show you who they are and what they prefer, believe them, the first time or quickly."
Other example: two years ago I also had two players who kept questioning me "Why do you prefer Shadowdark, why not 5E / Cthulhu ?". First one quit after nr of sessions, to find a 5E group, but messaged me months later asking if he could come back, since had troubling finding -any- group where he lived in a village.
Sorry, no.
Second guy, proved to be an alcoholic abuser who sometimes plays with the loud guys above and he is obsessed with Cthulhu it seems. All he wants to talk about in terms of RPGs and all he wants to run himself. 🤷🏻