Is an Ordinary Average RPG Session Really So Bad?

Travis Miller at Grumpy Wizard asks that question over at his blog. He doesn't have comments on the post so I'll spew my opinion here, looking back on a year and half long campaign... 

Is an Ordinary Average RPG Session Really So Bad? Its an interesting question. My opinion of average and my players opinion are not always aligned.

I was running Storm King's Thunder and thought things were going well when they all decided why were the Giants there problem? They were bored killing giants and wanted some urban faction adventures. 

I had one session where they were in a villa in Waterdeep and had a series of visitors. Spies, informants. messengers from noble houses. All role play, no combat to be seen. I thought it was gonna be a dull info dump but it turned out to be one of their favorites. It made them feel like big-wigs, important movers and shakers and had their heads spinning on what they could do with the info. What do I know about a dull info dump?

After urban adventuring for a year I granted them some fiefs. Fiefs torn from their enemies control and granted to the the players for a job well done. Did you know Waterdeep had fiefs outside the walls?(1) Well my version of Waterdeep does, I change what I want because Forgotten Realms is a silly place. I had a session a couple of weeks ago that was just a tour of those three fiefs (one player had Noble Background so he didn't get anything) and I let them each pick which one went to which player. Kind of boring stuff but they loved it (possibly because they are power mad). 

My most recent session I felt was uninspired. Just combat because the enemy noble house had not vacated their fief at Daggerford and had to be removed (took that more or less from Dune and Shogun as I don't think western feudalism ever worked that way) and the players loved it(2). 

This is the only group I've GM'd for i know them pretty well, maybe I just know them and can provide what they want(3). Or, maybe they are easy to please and happy to get together for a few hours each week. That's good with me although I'll keep trying my best anyway.

So an Ordinary Average RPG Session is not so bad, and it may not be so bad viewed from the eyes of the players. 

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(1) Some Noble Houses are unhappy about Waterdeep moving beyond just a city-state, but that hasn't been explored yet.

(2) The enemies conquered Daggerford on behalf of Waterdeep. The townsfolk want independence, so that's gonna be a problem for the new Baron most certainly.

(3) I guess I thought they just wanted combat, because they clearly enjoy that, but it seems even more they like plotting and the lamentations of their enemies.