The Evil DM speaks

[Rakoa]

I don't get your logic here. When it comes to the paladin falling from their own actions, the god would contact the paladin directly, not their superiors. Why do you assume it would be the other?

No, the god would not contact the Paladin directly, because that isn't how divine beings work. A god does not give you a phone call to schedule performance meetings to assess your work progress. A god has priorities on a cosmic level that go beyond the sidequest of a second level Paladin.

And regarding warnings...let me tell you a story. Once upon a time, there was a Paladin of Pelor. He lived in a large city. That city began to flood, and quickly, so everyone panicked. The city guard came to the Paladin's residence and told him they were evacuating. The Paladin said he would stay, because Pelor would keep him safe.

Later, once the flooding is up to the Paladin's second story, a man knocks on his window from the deck of a large boat. He asks the Paladin to join them, but again the Paladin refuses, for he trusts in Pelor.

Later, the Paladin's entire house has flooded, and he stands on his roof with an ocean rising around him. A Cleric with the Travel Domain, flying over head, spots him and flies downwards, offering to Teleport him to safety. The Paladin refuses, for he trusts in Pelor. The Wizard leaves, and the Paladin drowns within the hour. From whatever celestial plane Pelor resides on, the Paladin's spirit emerges, and his anger is without he end. He demands that Pelor personally explain the reason for allowing him to die. Pelor responds by saying he did no such thing, and in fact sent some guards, a guy on a boat, and a Cleric to help him.

The moral of this story is gods work in mysterious ways. A supernatural warning doesn't have to be obviously supernatural to qualify, and given the STATUS of those warning the Paladin away from the Necromancer, should be obviously heeded. Supernatural or not.

[Milionac]

Furthermore, to expect supernatural signs of your own wrongdoing as a Paladin is ridiculous. If your grip on morality is so tenuous that you need your god to hold your hand every step of the way, you don't deserve to be a Paladin. And then you're going to whine, "no fair, you didn't tell me this was bad, so I want a do-over"?

[Ralanr]

Furthermore, to expect supernatural signs of your own wrongdoing as a Paladin is ridiculous. If your grip on morality is so tenuous that you need your god to hold your hand every step of the way, you don't deserve to be a Paladin. And then you're going to whine, "no fair, you didn't tell me this was bad, so I want a do-over"?

You'd think they'd weed those people out in basic training.

[Boci]

No, the god would not contact the Paladin directly, because that isn't how divine beings work. A god does not give you a phone call to schedule performance meetings to assess your work progress. A god has priorities on a cosmic level that go beyond the sidequest of a second level Paladin.

But the god will personally yank the powers of the paladin, so they are already involving themselves. Why not do so in a manner that can keep a servant, especially since the paladin would have needed to be a good servant for years in order to have just one level in the class, so its not like they shouldn't have any good will?

Furthermore, to expect supernatural signs of your own wrongdoing as a Paladin is ridiculous. If your grip on morality is so tenuous that you need your god to hold your hand every step of the way, you don't deserve to be a Paladin. And then you're going to whine, "no fair, you didn't tell me this was bad, so I want a do-over"?

The problem is they would have never gotten that first level in the paladin class if their grip on morality is so tenuous, so it is not at all believable.

[Rakoa]

The problem is they would have never gotten that first level in the paladin class if their grip on morality is so tenuous, so it is not at all believable.

If you want to institute a multiple choice morality questionnaire assessment on your players before they can play the Paladin class, go right ahead.

[Boci]

If you want to institute a multiple choice morality questionnaire assessment on your players before they can play the Paladin class, go right ahead.

Right. Alternatively I could give a supernatural warning as a way of compensating for the character/player knowledge discrepancy. But no, your way of punishing the player for not understanding your take on morality, something that is hardly a fact based science, works too. It al depends on how you define the word "works".

[Ralanr]

Don't alignment restrictions just suck?

[The Evil DM]

Thank you for the replies. I am enjoying the discussion. Proper behavior of a paladin or lawful good cleric can be an interesting point of argument with regard to moral philosophy. But I digress. The following quote peaked my interest a little bit.

As mentioned, the lack of any saves mentioned in the story is the most troubling aspect, moving this from 'DM using heavy-handed methods to demonstrate that the PCs aren't the most powerful beings in all the land' to 'DM having a power-trip to prove to his Players that he can win D&D by manipulating the flow of information.'

Also, I have issues with 'failing a Will save causes two PCs to fall on Alignment grounds.'

First off there was no mention of saving throws, attack rolls or any other die rolls in the story because I was not trying to pass on a blow by blow of who did what and who rolled what. Suffice it to say, there were dice involved where appropriate.

As far as it was having a power trip due to manipulating information, you are partly correct. No power trip was involved, I am quite emotionless as a DM - I got over that as a Teenager and now that I am pushing my late 40's this behavior is well behind me. But manipulation of information is the key to being an Evil DM. However, if you cannot manage it with subtlety it quickly becomes heavy handed.

Let me explain with this hypothetical example.

"The party is walking down a wooded path. Both sides of the path are lined with oak, maple and a variety of ground scrub and bushes. Ahead on the trail you see a man, who smiles when he sees you. He is leading a cart pulled by a single horse. What do you do?"

Now what happens if I take that description and tweak it ever so slightly..

"The party is walking down a wooded path. Both sides of the path are lined with oak, maple and a variety of ground scrub and bushes. Ahead on the trail you see a man, who smiles unconvincingly when he sees you. He is leading a cart pulled by a single horse. What do you do?"

I added one word... Unconvincingly.

Language is powerful. Careful choices with descriptive words can lead players to all sorts of false assumptions. And once the art of doing so with subtlety is mastered the DM can wreak all sorts of havoc on the group.

What if I choose other words to insert in that description?

You see a man who smiles:

Sinisterly
Happily
Warmly
Evilly

It is easy to see that one word can trigger player assumptions and biases.

So lets take that to the next level.

One rule in the house of the Evil DM is that notes received may not be physically passed to other players but the player may role play against the information and even describe what is on the note. Also I keep a folder for each player which I can use between sessions to insert notes, background information and other character relevant info between games.

So sometimes, when I want to trigger mass confusion I take a statement such as above. And I write it on notes. But each player will have a different descriptive word insert in one spot. Often how I do this is preparing information in advance and slipping the notes into folders I keep for players. One player will see the man smiling sinisterly, another warmly. I sometimes even based these adjectives on the relative alignments of the target and the players.

Done well the natural biases of the players will take over and the DM can sit back and watch as the players implode. Its rather entertaining. They all have very nearly the exact same information. There is a man walking down the trail with a cart and a horse and he is smiling. But they disagree on the meaning behind the smile.

Some players have tried to argue that if they play with me long enough, they will be able to outwit the methods I use, but alas the opposite is true. The more I get to know a player, what their individual biases are and their triggers the easier it is for me to manipulate the information and trigger game play behaviors.

In the end it is a sales process. For each player I am selling a version of a story and the your version is just as believable as the version given to the player next to you but just ever so slightly different.

Now - I must also add that every game session is not about giving the players a hard time. In the story of Bob's demise 8 weeks of game play led up to the final moment. And in the end, they resurrected Bob, and the Paladin and Clerics were given opportunities to atone and regain their powers but a terrific story emerged and its one all the players in that group still remember and still talk about 20 years later - (The game was in 1995)

Bob is sitting in the tavern with his companions.... "Hey do you guys remember that time you murdered me? - You bastards!"

Most of the time the players are living their life and trying to make their way in a campaign world and the weekly events are very different. But with the necromancer, that party bit off a little more than they could chew.

[Boci]

So did the necromancer use any homebrewed spells, or were they clever applications of already printed stuff?

[The Evil DM]

Except for the paralysis it was all an illusion. Everything was standard published stuff for 1995.

[Boci]

And this was all possible in AD&D? Cool.


That said, I really do want to like this, but I can't. It all seems too convenient, either through dice rolls (the whole party failing their saves against paralysis), or just the way the system was set up (needing to actively disbelieve illusions, like the illusionary air from Yet Another Gaming Comic). They say your stories at the table usually aren't nearly as impressive to others, but then plenty of people seem to be with it, so don't let my skepticism bother you.

Also the writing descriptions differently for the PCs. Why? Why does one PCs see an unconvincing smile whilst another doesn't? This isn't inherently bad, but its aiming for a particular type of game atmosphere that I would be pretty annoyed at if I wasn't told was part of the game.

[The Evil DM]

Regarding actively disbelieving illusions that is a point of contention for many gamers and it comes down to philosophy.

As it stands the question comes down to willingness to resist. If I am an evil enchanter and I say "Hey Fighter, I am going to cast a spell on you that will enhance your strength is that cool?"

Now if the fighter replies, "Sure buddy cast your spell" and now is willingly accepting the magic but the Enchanter has lied to the fighter and casts Dominate instead should the fighter get a saving throw?

Some argue yes because it is hostile magic, others say no because the fighter has lowered his guard. The argument ultimately is determined by whether or not the structure of the system says you always get defense or you must actively be willing to defend.

This extends to illusion. 2nd ed always required an active defense as a general standard. It is something I hold to still. But illusions are a special case. Smart illusion should get no save if there is no reason for the characters to disbelieve unless the player takes the special time and effort to try.

For instance you are in a swamp. The spell caster is low on wall of fog spells so he uses an illusion to create the illusion of fog. I have never had a player attempt to "Disbelieve" fog in a swamp. Use the same fog trick in other environments and sometimes players do. Thus context is important. What happens that cause the behavior to cross the lines into railroading is when poor DMs utilize obvious illusions and when players don't disbelieve they get screwed.

In my tale, why would anyone disbelieve that a Necromancer could cut open someone's chest. The players ate it up hook line and sinker.

They did get saves against paralysis, some of the players put up a fight and the necromancer had to use a variety of spells to subdue them. They also got saves versus curses.

[Strigon]

While I admire your creative methods - the necromancer one was simply inspired - I must say I don't appreciate the example you gave with the smiling man. While it is possible for a word's difference to drastically change the interpretation of a phrase, I don't think you would be justified in using all those adjectives to different players. They all see the same thing, and you are more or less telling them how they feel about it.
I know that, while amongst my friends, I've never seen someone smile and had this happen:
"Man, what a creepy smile... it looks like he's plotting a murder!"
"What? No; that's a smile of just pure joy, like you'd see on a child at Christmas!"
"I dunno what you guys are talking about... that's the smile of a man who's just lost everything and is putting on a brave face!"
And so on, and so forth.
Instead, I would give them all exactly the same information, but know how each one will react. For example, if one party member sees threats everywhere, maybe the man looks directly at him, and then smiles. Suddenly, self-preservation kicks in, while the others could think any number of things; friendly merchant, old neighbour, or even a serial killer looking for his next target.

[The Evil DM]

Also the writing descriptions differently for the PCs. Why? Why does one PCs see an unconvincing smile whilst another doesn't? This isn't inherently bad, but its aiming for a particular type of game atmosphere that I would be pretty annoyed at if I wasn't told was part of the game.

It is about perceptions and world view. I actually answered this above. Sometimes I base the variances on the declared alignments of the players other times I might base it on sense motive ranks or other reasons. For what ever reason a character perceives something differently than the others.

Someone demonstrates that their player is racist versus half-orcs I might skew their information to reflect that .... "The half-orc smiles unconvincingly."

Remember the key is subtlety. Took me many years to master it and understand how player perceptions and assumptions affect role playing.

It can even be used to affect simple choices.

The party comes to a T junction in a dungeon crawl. I want to bend their decision towards taking a right turn rather than a left.

I say... Both the right and left corridors appear to have the same construction. Dwarven stone expertly fitted rising 10 feet to an arched ceiling. You look down the right corridor and see darkness beyond the light of your torches. You look down the left corridor and see the same.

But then I might pass a note to the Halfling in the party... You smell something really bad down the left corridor. The odor reminds you of decaying animals.

Now I don't force the players to go right or left but this additional bit of information usually results in a protracted decision process where the players argue which way to go and their biases about bad smells emerge. Over the course of my gaming career the rate at which players approach the bad smells is about 30%. Thus I can skew the odds of going right without forcing the players to go right.

[Boci]

Regarding actively disbelieving illusions that is a point of contention for many gamers and it comes down to philosophy.

As it stands the question comes down to willingness to resist. If I am an evil enchanter and I say "Hey Fighter, I am going to cast a spell on you that will enhance your strength is that cool?"

Now if the fighter replies, "Sure buddy cast your spell" and now is willingly accepting the magic but the Enchanter has lied to the fighter and casts Dominate instead should the fighter get a saving throw?

Different issue for me. The fighter doesn't get a save there, unless they had a reason to suspect the wizard was lying.

In my tale, why would anyone disbelieve that a Necromancer could cut open someone's chest. The players ate it up hook line and sinker.

The first time sure, but after that they know have a reason to disbelieve everything, which will stall the game and is hence why people prefer a passive defense against illusions, or one that requires interaction with them (as long as it is clear what interaction is).

They did get saves against paralysis, some of the players put up a fight and the necromancer had to use a variety of spells to subdue them. They also got saves versus curses.

I'm not doubting you did, just that there had to be an element of luck that they all failed their saves, since even a single one passive could have been problematic. There are 8 PCs, so that's 17 failed saves (8 paralysis, 8 curses, and Bob should have got a save vs. the illusion).

It is about perceptions and world view. I actually answered this above. Sometimes I base the variances on the declared alignments of the players other times I might base it on sense motive ranks or other reasons. For what ever reason a character perceives something differently than the others.

Someone demonstrates that their player is racist versus half-orcs I might skew their information to reflect that .... "The half-orc smiles unconvincingly."

Remember the key is subtlety. Took me many years to master it and understand how player perceptions and assumptions affect role playing.

But to me, that is not subtle. Handing out notes to every party member instead of describing something in plain view to the group isn't subtle, and decided for a player how their character's racism manifests is a big no-no. Just describe the half-orc and let the player make the conclusions. It sounds like you wouldn't trust the players to RP the rascist aspect of their character.

[Pex]

You won D&D. Congratulations! Must have been real hard to do considering you were only the DM.

[Rakoa]

You won D&D. Congratulations! Must have been real hard to do considering you were only the DM.

If that wasn't the most needlessly passive aggressive statement there is, I don't want to know what is.

[The Evil DM]

I can agree that my example with the man smiling is not the greatest but it is something short. Also through the medium of a forum it is impossible to demonstrate. These things I am talking about develop over game sessions many weeks - not simply a single encounter.

In my games note passing doesn't happen frequently or regularly. Most of the time the notes are left in a players folder and they find the information. But perception is everything. Even if I change my body language as I describe things players respond differently.

If I lean back in my chair and describe something - to the whole group - I will get different responses than if I lean forward and fondle my dice and drop one for no reason while describing something.

Its not about trusting the players to role play - in fact I happen to have great players who are great role players and the poor role players are the ones that don't last in my games. As an alternative - a game system once proposed long ago - introduced a mechanic that gave modifiers to social interaction based on alignment differences. For instance if a LG individual wanted to Sense Motive on an LE individual there would be modifiers.

The modifiers though get in the way of the story. Rather than use modifiers I use the descriptions of people and perceived intent to reflect perception. This way I am not revealing metagame information through numbers. At the same time it can be used dangerously and destroy games - Did that about 25 years ago.

[Kalmageddon]

If that wasn't the most needlessly passive aggressive statement there is, I don't want to know what is.

He's right though.
I can't say I speak for everyone, but I wouldn't have fun playing in a session like the one described above, unless the game was specifically horror-themed and CoC-style. It was in bad taste, smelled of DM vs players and breaks several unspoken rules that I find are necessary for everyone to have fun.

Everyone acting like the whole scheme blew their mind is also hard for me to understand. The necromancer went meta. That's about it. Because putting up the whole scheme just so that the patron gods would abandon their champions reeks of meta, if any actual roleplaying was applied to the situation, the gods would have known that their champions were tricked and they wouldn't have taken their powers, at most they would have required the necromancer's ass on a silver platter as atonement for the mistake made. If anything, the necromancer's situation would have been worst.

And, newsflash, a clever DM can always manipulate his players into doing really stupid things. Doesn't even need to try that hard and he can ass-pull whatever justification afterwards to make it sound like it was all brilliant planning.

[Ralanr]

He's right though.
I can't say I speak for everyone, but I wouldn't have fun playing in a session like the one described above, unless the game was specifically horror-themed and CoC-style. It was in bad taste, smelled of DM vs players and breaks several unspoken rules that I find are necessary for everyone to have fun.

Everyone acting like the whole scheme blew their mind is also hard for me to understand. The necromancer went meta. That's about it. Because putting up the whole scheme just so that the patron gods would abandon their champions reeks of meta, if any actual roleplaying was applied to the situation, the gods would have known that their champions were tricked and they wouldn't have taken their powers, at most they would have required the necromancer's ass on a silver platter as atonement for the mistake made. If anything, the necromancer's situation would have been worst.

And, newsflash, a clever DM can always manipulate his players into doing really stupid things. Doesn't even need to try that hard and he can ass-pull whatever justification afterwards to make it sound like it was all brilliant planning.

I haven't really played enough rpgs. I only looked at it from a story perspective as I assumed a lot of others did. It makes a good horror story and that's usually all that matters to me when it comes to tales of games.

I wouldn't want to play in it. I get when a fellow player whispers to the DM for something that ends up being nothing that anyone needed to be sneaky about (If anyone wanted to know, he was asking the DM if he could have his character steal the scroll out of my character's hands. The fact that he tried to be sneaky with the DM about it was annoying. Don't know if he was in the right, but it was annoying to me.) so an entire table where things are just passed around secretly like that (To the DM, but still)? I'd either be furious or bored. If I'm either and the atmosphere doesn't make me feel the opposite of that more times than not, then I might actually leave the game.

[Calen]

While I admire your creative methods - the necromancer one was simply inspired - I must say I don't appreciate the example you gave with the smiling man. While it is possible for a word's difference to drastically change the interpretation of a phrase, I don't think you would be justified in using all those adjectives to different players. They all see the same thing, and you are more or less telling them how they feel about it.
I know that, while amongst my friends, I've never seen someone smile and had this happen:
"Man, what a creepy smile... it looks like he's plotting a murder!"
"What? No; that's a smile of just pure joy, like you'd see on a child at Christmas!"
"I dunno what you guys are talking about... that's the smile of a man who's just lost everything and is putting on a brave face!"
And so on, and so forth.
Instead, I would give them all exactly the same information, but know how each one will react. For example, if one party member sees threats everywhere, maybe the man looks directly at him, and then smiles. Suddenly, self-preservation kicks in, while the others could think any number of things; friendly merchant, old neighbour, or even a serial killer looking for his next target.

If the adjectives in the description were the result of…say an insight check would you have the same reaction to the concept? Communicating information about what a player perceives on a gut level either through a skill check or the simple telling of a story is a very fine line to cross. I don't think that the smiling example is to extreme.

[Kane0]

Bravo, Evil DM. I'd hapily have you at my table!

Edit: not sure why people are siding with the players here. They picked a fight with someone very powerful but not actually that threatening, and were advised not to before they went around advertising it all. The target took the initiative, and chose to teach them a lesson rather than just waste them. And it was all fair, the PCs knew what they were up against and severely underestimated their opponent, as well as forgetting his specialties.

[The Evil DM]

Quoting myself here to clarify a previous statement...

poor role players are the ones that don't last in my games

I actually did not intend to imply that people who don't play with me are all poor role players. There is definitely a subset of people with different interests and play styles who simply don't play. But in general strong role players do very well in my campaigns because they are very very open ended and sandbox format.

The story is taken out of context a single event played over many weeks of play. As discussion gets bogged down into minute details of who/when did people get saves, or this is breaking a rule of gaming etc the purpose is lost.

Perception is everything. 10 people witness a crime and they all see different things. Your reality varies from my reality through the veil of our own personal biases and assumptions. Using this a DM can do very bad things to a game. Even as I noted destroy the group and break real life friendships.

Its definitely not the norm. Most of the time the players are moving their individual stories forward. But occasionally they bite off a little more than they can chew.

[Maglubiyet]

While I admire your creative methods - the necromancer one was simply inspired - I must say I don't appreciate the example you gave with the smiling man. While it is possible for a word's difference to drastically change the interpretation of a phrase, I don't think you would be justified in using all those adjectives to different players. They all see the same thing, and you are more or less telling them how they feel about it.
I know that, while amongst my friends, I've never seen someone smile and had this happen:
"Man, what a creepy smile... it looks like he's plotting a murder!"
"What? No; that's a smile of just pure joy, like you'd see on a child at Christmas!"
"I dunno what you guys are talking about... that's the smile of a man who's just lost everything and is putting on a brave face!"
And so on, and so forth.
Instead, I would give them all exactly the same information, but know how each one will react. For example, if one party member sees threats everywhere, maybe the man looks directly at him, and then smiles. Suddenly, self-preservation kicks in, while the others could think any number of things; friendly merchant, old neighbour, or even a serial killer looking for his next target.

You've never sat on a jury, have you? Amazing how the exact same testimonies can produce 12 different reactions.

[Boci]

Edit: not sure why people are siding with the players here. They picked a fight with someone very powerful but not actually that threatening, and were advised not to before they went around advertising it all. The target took the initiative, and chose to teach them a lesson rather than just waste them. And it was all fair, the PCs knew what they were up against and severely underestimated their opponent, as well as forgetting his specialties.

Its not so much that I'm siding with the players so much as I'm finding it hard to like this story as much as a probably would had a different person told it. When someone opens up a post with "you're all doing evil DMing wrong. Here, let me show you"...pretty much anything that follows can be nothing short of a disappointment after that opening. I'm also trying to understand how the scenario unfolded mechanically (hampered by my limited understanding of AD&D), and it seems like bad dice rolls were required, given the number of failed saves, on which a single pass would have spiked the trick.

You've never sat on a jury, have you? Amazing how the exact same testimonies can produce 12 different reactions.

That's what they said: you don't need to change the information to get players to react differently to an event.

[Rakoa]

He's right though.
I can't say I speak for everyone, but I wouldn't have fun playing in a session like the one described above, unless the game was specifically horror-themed and CoC-style. It was in bad taste, smelled of DM vs players and breaks several unspoken rules that I find are necessary for everyone to have fun.

Everyone acting like the whole scheme blew their mind is also hard for me to understand. The necromancer went meta. That's about it. Because putting up the whole scheme just so that the patron gods would abandon their champions reeks of meta, if any actual roleplaying was applied to the situation, the gods would have known that their champions were tricked and they wouldn't have taken their powers, at most they would have required the necromancer's ass on a silver platter as atonement for the mistake made. If anything, the necromancer's situation would have been worst.

And, newsflash, a clever DM can always manipulate his players into doing really stupid things. Doesn't even need to try that hard and he can ass-pull whatever justification afterwards to make it sound like it was all brilliant planning.

I'm not seeing it. Bad taste is a matter of opinion. They rolled their dice, and they lost. That isn't DM vs. Player. I don't know your unspoken rules, and I probably wouldn't like them.

As far as meta goes, unless Clerics and Paladins being endorsed by codes with rules is some hidden and mystical knowledge, still not seeing it. If I was a player at your game, I would be amazed that the gods are even aware of what just transpired. Deities are not exactly omniscient, and they aren't omnipotent, so they can't take action in response to every single thing they know. A common thought seems to be that gods personally power these people, and personally stop powering these people. I find that a hard pill to swallow. It seems more likely that a Paladin is given some power, and that power is linked to the Paladin's aura. If a Paladin's aura ever wavers and produces an Evil bit of energy, it turns off until atonement.

If you ask me, though, that's tertiary. Even assuming that the necromancer actually did put a demon-looking thing into Bob's chest cavity, so what? Bob is still alive, and doing fine, other than some weird movements in his chest. There was zero evidence to support that anything would have come of it. Trickery or no trickery, there is no way that the party should have killed Bob. It is Evil, plain and simple. That group would have fallen so fast I wouldn't even be able to hear their outcries on the way down.

As for your last point...it doesn't even seem like much of a point. You're insinuating that the OP manipulated his players, and that DMs can manipulate players? Good to know he managed to do something that is within the realm of possibility. I was worried there for a second. And then you go on to insinuate that he lied about planning it. Cool!

[The Evil DM]

Boci I understand now

What I said was not

"you're all doing evil DMing wrong. Here, let me show you".

as it was, things attributed to being "Evil DMing" should be attributed to "Bad DMing"

I am looking to make the distinction.

[Boci]

Boci I understand now

What I said was not



as it was, thing attributed to being "Evil DMing" should be attributed to "Bad DMing"

I am looking to make the distinction.

That's the same thing though. "You attribute things to Evil DM that should be attributed to Bad DM" is pretty much the same as "You are doing evil Dm wrong."

[The Evil DM]

I disagree,

Some of the things I have seen attributed to "Evil DM Behaviors" are things that reflect inexperience and lower levels of skill. I was there once too. The first games I ran using the original red box back in 1979 were quite poor. I can give stories of my own DM behavior at its worst.

Where I am looking to make the distinction is the DM using tools that are actually manipulative and evil - without breaking the system - or is the DM displaying inexperience.

such as

Player favoritism is called evil dming - but it is really bad DMing

and so on

[Boci]

I disagree,

Some of the things attributed to "Evil DM Behaviors" I have seen are things that reflect inexperience and lower levels of skill. I was there once too. The first games I ran using the original red box back in 1979 were quite poor. I can give stories of my own DM behavior at its worst.

Where I am looking to make the distinction is the DM using tools that are actually manipulative and evil - without breaking the system - or is the DM displaying inexperience.

So you're saying the forum as a whole understands evil dming, but thinks bad dming is evil dming and needs to hear an example of evil dming?

Plus, its kinda funny that your example of evil dming was perceived as bad dming by several posters on this thread.

Player favoritism is called evil dming - but it is really bad DMing

Really? I've only ever seen it called bad dming.