General RPG DiscussionDiscussion of all RPGs and non-system-specific topics. DM/GM/player issues, settings, etc. Rules discussion belongs in one the forums below.
As an educator myself, I don't think apportioning blame is helpful. However, it is my job to motivate that student, and I am paid to do so. RPGs by contrast are an unpaid leisure activity, no one is paying me to motivate the difficult player.
As an educator, sometimes you have to recognize that it's not all about you. Students have lives outside of class. They have self-destructive habits. They have different priorities. They have crises. They make bad choices. They have a bad day, week, or month. You have to let go. Let there be consequences for their actions. Sometimes, that's what you're there to teach them. I think that applies to DMs with players too.
However, I do agree with S'mon in that teachers are paid to motivate students and that an unmotivated student is an opportunity to grow as a teacher. That student may be a sign that you're getting stale with this material. It may motivate you to try new techniques. Or maybe it's something about you, and not the techniques or material, that needs changing. And that applies to DMs too.
__________________ All role playing advice is given without knowledge of you and your group. Only you and your group knows what is fun for you. What you are doing is not badwrongfun. My advice is offered based on what I think might be fun for you to try.
"Art is the demonstration that the ordinary is extraordinary." - Amedee Ozenfant, Foundations of Modern Art
"I already have a place where I can get little recognition for my accomplishments, advance at a very slow pace, and have to work hard to eke out minimum rewards for my efforts. It's called work." - toberane.
I do love for Players to seriously role play their characters, but there is a limit. There is a line between playing a role to the benefit of the game and playing the role to the detriment of the game.
The common term for the kinds of players you are describing is "dickweed."
It's also sometimes called "my guy" play. I.e., "My guy wouldn't do that!" being said in response to any attempts to, you know, actually get the game moving forward n an enjoyable fashion.
Easy fix: Don't play with these people.
__________________ If knowledge of a game's plot would spoil its experience, it isn't a game.
... A player cannot learn of a game's ending without experiencing it, because a game is not a linear object.
—Mike Mearls
It's a two-way street. Everyone at the table is responsible for making the experience enjoyable. Anyone who throws up roadblocks is being counter-productive.
That said, the "my family would never have flown me out there" player is pulling a classic dickweed move. No different from he player who, when the GM opens up an adventure with the PCs meeting in a tavern to talk to an mysterious old man, says something like, "My character would never set foot in a tavern!" He's being obstructionist.
Granted, the ideal situation involves good communication amongst the group. The players are clear about what kinds of situations in which they are interested, and the GM is crafting adventures that push those buttons. Or, at least, everyone has agreed that, hey, we're gonna play published module X, so there's no excuse for anyone to be getting in the way of our playing published module X.
__________________ If knowledge of a game's plot would spoil its experience, it isn't a game.
... A player cannot learn of a game's ending without experiencing it, because a game is not a linear object.
—Mike Mearls
But these issues are minor. They shouldn't bring the game screeching to a halt. The DM can prevent this. If the DM chooses not to, I can't understand why. Nobody ties the DM's hand.
Except that, with D&D specifically, DM'ing tends to involve a not-insignificant amount of prep work. If a player is putting up enough roadblocks that they invalidate that prep, the whole session is going to suffer, and everyone's enjoyment is affected.
Again, the ideal situation has these sorts of issues being hashed out pre-game. If the player isn't interested in the adventures the DM is prepping, the place to address that is person-to-person, out of game. Using a "my guy" defense to handle the issue in-character is immature, unhealthy, and waste of everyone's time.
__________________ If knowledge of a game's plot would spoil its experience, it isn't a game.
... A player cannot learn of a game's ending without experiencing it, because a game is not a linear object.
—Mike Mearls
The common term for the kinds of players you are describing is "dickweed."
I prefer the term "prick".
And on a more thoughtful note, it occurs to me this kind of behavior might sometimes have to do with the player's perception that they don't have access to any --or enough-- ability to affect the game world. That the main power they have in the game world is to say 'no' to whatever the DM is doing. D&D by way of Bartleby the Scrivener. The only response of the powerless to the powerful is to say 'I prefer not to'.
This is elegantly solved by the DM 'loosening the reins' and sharing a little narrative authority with the players, which is what I was getting at earlier in the thread. If a player declares their character is too poor to afford a flight on Value Jet, allow them to also declare they rode a freight train cross country in the company of folk-signing hobos.
__________________ "We're pimps and killers, but in a philanthropic way." -- Boyd, Dollhouse.
And on a more thoughtful note, it occurs to me this kind of behavior might sometimes have to do with the player's perception that they don't have access to any --or enough-- ability to affect the game world.
This is certainly true.
Again, what we're talking about is a symptom of a problem that really occurred prior to the point in the game we're focusing upon. Once recognized, it's time to step out of character and start talking about it.
__________________ If knowledge of a game's plot would spoil its experience, it isn't a game.
... A player cannot learn of a game's ending without experiencing it, because a game is not a linear object.
—Mike Mearls
Again, what we're talking about is a symptom of a problem that really occurred prior to the point in the game we're focusing upon. Once recognized, it's time to step out of character and start talking about it.
I agree with Buzz 100% (which is nothing unusual).
In situations like this you have two choices: deal with it as an out of character player to player (or player to GM) problem, or deal with it in character.
In just about every game I've played a character who disagrees with something that an NPC or other PC does, and usually I just let it go. When it comes down to someone saying "I'm just playing my character!" to excuse something truly horrible that they want to do, I'll usually say, "okay, then I'll just play mine too, and we'll see where this goes." Usually no one likes the results of that, so why not just discuss it out of character and come to a solution that everyone can live with?
That and have no one be a jerk in the game...
--Steve
__________________ Be a rebel...order your coffee in one of these three radical sizes: small, medium or large.
"Sure as I know anything, I know this. I aim to misbehave."
--Capt. Malcolm Reynolds, Serenity
I play 4E, and it's every bit as much Dungeons and Dragons as any other edition, including the one(s) you play. No more, and no less.
Remind such players that the point of gathering to play an RPG is to enjoy a game and have fun. The roleplaying is a part of that, but is not the entire point of it! If they don't get that, kick them out of the group, as they are problem players and don't care about you or your other players and that you are all having fun. Nobody needs people like that around... they clearly have messed-up priorities.
Location: “Over the Hills and Far Away” - (TDY in Florida - "Home" is Michigan)
Posts: 1,547
Quote:
Originally Posted by doppelganger
I am confused by this story and your statements. You claim metagaming is so horrible that you will not do it, but you expect the DM to wave his hands and get you back into the game after you make a bad decision. It seems like you are complaining about not being able to have your cake and eat it too. What am I not getting here?
Then I'll attempt to clear up the confusion. Bad decision or not, it's the GM's responsibility to keep the game moving, and keep players involved. There's no way, in any of the myriad aproaches to GM'ing, where leaving a player sitting with nothing to do for over three hours is a good thing to do.
The decision to stay and guard the spacecraft was not taken as a completely arbitrary decision. I and the group (but mostly me) asked the GM questions after we arrived at our landing sight. Questions such as; "Is there any way to secure our spacecraft?" - answer "No", "Would guarding the spacecraft be a good idea?" - answer "Do whatever you feel you need to do." So, it was decided that the spacecraft needed to be guarded. There was the worry that we may not necessarily be on a "friendly" planet, or that the Empire may have followed us.
None of us in the group realized that the GM had an extensive tomb/dungeon encounter planned. When it became obvious that this wasn't going to be a quick encounter (after twiddling my thumbs for the first hour). I tried to get the GM to help me out with a reason why my character would leave off from his "duty" of guarding the ship, and even gave him ideas or "outs", but he refused all of them.
At any time the GM could have said that there was no reason to guard the spacecraft, or could have said my character was getting a feeling of unease through the force that my friends needed help, none of which is "hand waving", but is actually good GM'ing. Having a player sitting with nothing to do for three hours, and not doing anything to get the player involved, and actually actively shooting down ideas from that player that could get the player involved, is nothing short of horrible GM'ing.
After being left out of the game for over three hours, and then having my character killed with no saving throw, defence roll, or anything, I'd had enough.
I don't feel asking the GM for help was outside of the concept of the game. While GM's should try and avoid GM fiat as much as possible, there are times where it becomes necessary to keep the game going and the players involved. Conversely there is no such thing as Player fiat, it's the GM's world and rules, not the other way around. The only option other than GM help, was for me to say "I'm tired of guarding this ship (something a Jedi wouldn't do) and since I'm bored and want something to do, I'm going to go down in this tomb (of which my character had no knowledge that there was anything untoward, or that there even was a tomb) and go have some fun." all of which was outside of character knowledge. All I did was give the GM ideas for getting my character involved, ideas that he should have already had, and he shot every one of them down. To this day I still don't know if it was incompetence, ignorance, or just spite, but it was the end of my gaming with this group.
__________________ Mark "El Mahdi" Armstrong - Semper Operor Verus
". . . after all, that is why we're here. Kill the last bad guy and then there's cake." - Major General Jack O'Neal
"Don't Just Do It, Just Do It Right!"
"Right, without Reason, is unmitigated Foolishness."
"If you make a mistake, Acknowledge It, then make it Right."
I love to roleplay my characters. One of the things I really enjoy about D&D is the ability to put on somebody else's skin and explore the way someone else might think and act. I loved "playing pretend" as a little girl, and D&D is my grown-up version of that. Doing things that are true to my character's personality is very important to me.
At the same time, I believe in the idea that the players have to meet the DM half way. The DM takes the time to prepare an adventure, and it's my responsibility to motivate my character to get involved. If being true to my character and playing the adventure are mutually exclusive then it's time to rethink my character. After all, this is a game, and I belive that you have to play along at some point to get the most out of it. Being able to completely derail an adventure and go way off track is one of the glories of D&D, but I believe that a player should at least try to become motivated to go through the material that the DM has prepared as a courtesy to the DM.
I recall that there was one time in the last campaign that I felt like my character would not want to go on the adventure that was being presented to us. The exact details are foggy as it was a little while ago now, but I believe we were being asked/threatened to go to a far off continent and gather artifacts for a person we had just met and whose motivations were unclear to us. I as the player wanted to go, but I felt like my character would want nothing to do with it. Out of character I asked the other PCs to convince me, and we did a little roleplaying to finally convince my PC that this was the best course of action.
That, to me, was fun. I wasn't just saying, "my character wouldn't do that!" I was saying, "my character wouldn't do that without a good reason... help me think up one!" I got to be true to my character and go on the fun adventure. You're usually able to do both at the same time if you're determined enough to make it work. I feel like people who just say, "my character wouldn't do that" and leave it there probably have other motivations in mind, like acting out about the above-mentioned feeling that they cannot affect anything in the game world, or they have picked the wrong character for the game they're playing.
__________________ Adventure is not outside; it is within. --Found in a fortune cookie on game night
Strangely I think I'd be okay with having a PC die by a bear exploding out of his head. --Awayfarer, after having his PC put a furry ball from a Bag of Tricks into his mouth.
I've seen situations just like this. I was Vampire: The Masquerade and one of the other players created a slightly insane vampire doctor. Problem was he refused to come out of his mansion claiming that he's quite comfortable and doesn't need to go out on hunting missions with total strangers. The GM had to constantly all but force the player to have his character be involved. Needless the rest of us were pretty frustrated.
The problem is while this might make perfect sense from a character stand point it makes no sense from a game stand point. In other words when he set out to make the character instead of realizing that the character he's going to play has to go on adventures with the rest of us he purposefully created a character that just wants to stay at home. He didn't create a real PC. Instead he made an NPC and trust me the DM did not need the help.
That's what it ultimately comes down to. When you're deciding what kind of character you're going to create and how that character will behave you have to be mindful of the fact that this is a game and that your PC will have to go on adventures. If you create a stay at home character who is too scared to get involved or you create a nasty mean person who doesn't get along with anyone or any other non game conducive character concept you're not being a good roleplayer. You're being a jerk.
This is always good advice. Unfortunately, it doesn't guarantee that the DM will correctly work out how those motivations he's discussed relate to the adventure at hand. He could be wrong.
The great thing about making the player primarily responsible for providing their character's motivations is that they can't be wrong about them. For that reason alone I find it to be the most practical approach.
Motivations for adventuring yes. However, imo, its the DM's responsability to use those motivations to get the charcters into the adventure (or at least to the location). Afterall, the GM knows the campaign world, the characters, and the adventure. He can tailor the adventure (even if a module) to accomodate the characters such changing how an NPC approaches the characters (or even the NPC itself), throwing in bits of existing plotlines (e.g., a hint to a to motivate the characters (e.g. the NPCs has information to something they seek), etc.,
__________________ "The designers of the newest edition built so much reliance on rules right into the game, to make it easier to play. As one of those designers, I occasionally think to myself, 'What have we wrought?' " -Monte Cook
" If the DM has to make a lot of judgment calls, the game is more difficult to learn. However, it's my belief that it's also more satisfying." -Monte Cook
"Don't let rules replace good DMing skills"- Monte Cook
Motivations for adventuring yes. However, imo, its the DM's responsability to use those motivations to get the charcters into the adventure (or at least to the location). Afterall, the GM knows the campaign world, the characters, and the adventure. He can tailor the adventure (even if a module) to accomodate the characters such changing how an NPC approaches the characters (or even the NPC itself), throwing in bits of existing plotlines (e.g., a hint to a to motivate the characters (e.g. the NPCs has information to something they seek), etc.,
If the GM has time to prepare, maybe he can do this. But it's completely unfair to expect the GM to come up with this off the cuff, when there are 4 or 6 or 8 PCs to attend to.
Location: “Over the Hills and Far Away” - (TDY in Florida - "Home" is Michigan)
Posts: 1,547
Quote:
Originally Posted by S'mon
If the GM has time to prepare, maybe he can do this. But it's completely unfair to expect the GM to come up with this off the cuff, when there are 4 or 6 or 8 PCs to attend to.
IMO, not only do I feel that it's not unfair, but I think it's the very definition of what a GM should be doing. Different GM's do this to varying degrees of success based on experience, but I think it should be the level to which all GM's should endeavor to achieve. No-one will ever reach a point where they are "perfect" as a GM (unless they are completely self-delusional), but we should definitely try to achieve this.
__________________ Mark "El Mahdi" Armstrong - Semper Operor Verus
". . . after all, that is why we're here. Kill the last bad guy and then there's cake." - Major General Jack O'Neal
"Don't Just Do It, Just Do It Right!"
"Right, without Reason, is unmitigated Foolishness."
"If you make a mistake, Acknowledge It, then make it Right."
It's not an issue of whether it's the GM's job or the player's job. It's the group's job.
To assume otherwise is to claim that a good game can happen without prior communication and consensus, and that's simply not true.
__________________ If knowledge of a game's plot would spoil its experience, it isn't a game.
... A player cannot learn of a game's ending without experiencing it, because a game is not a linear object.
—Mike Mearls
None of the GM-improvisations cited in this thread have been particularly demanding though. And I'm not someone who just goes off the cuff all the time – I do worry about things like presentation & coherency. Nor do I think the GM has to bend over for the players at all possible junctures. It's just, this stuff here, not really that hard to finesse.
I don't think any of the OPs concerns are serious problems. It isn't up to the DM to force the PCs to work together or even stick together. Any PC who wants to leave can leave. My PCs have taken hiatuses for several sessions from what the party decided to do and I rolled up TempPCs to still get to go and play with the group. No problem.
__________________ Apparently Reagan never played RPGs ...but he liked to watch.
Spoiler:
Participants in the Pentagon simulations were sometimes of very high rank, including members of Congress and White House insiders as well as senior military officers. The identity of many of the participants remains secret even today. It is a tradition in US simulations (and those run by many other nations) that participants are guaranteed anonymity. The main reason for this is that occasionally they may take on a role or express an opinion that is at odds with their professional or public stance (for example portraying a fundamentalist terrorist or advocating hawkish military action), and thus could harm their reputation or career if their in-game persona became widely known.
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...former US president Ronald Reagan was a keen visitor to simulations conducted in the 1980s, but as an observer only. An official explained: "No president should ever disclose his hand, not even in a war game". Para,6
Roleplaying is more of a problem for me when another player's character starts chatting in-depth with the imaginary innkeeper about his imaginary family and the imaginary weather while the rest want to kill some imaginary things and take their imaginary stuff!!
Location: “Over the Hills and Far Away” - (TDY in Florida - "Home" is Michigan)
Posts: 1,547
Quote:
Originally Posted by Blair Goatsblood
Roleplaying is more of a problem for me when another player's character starts chatting in-depth with the imaginary innkeeper about his imaginary family and the imaginary weather while the rest want to kill some imaginary things and take their imaginary stuff!!
Huh?
__________________ Mark "El Mahdi" Armstrong - Semper Operor Verus
". . . after all, that is why we're here. Kill the last bad guy and then there's cake." - Major General Jack O'Neal
"Don't Just Do It, Just Do It Right!"
"Right, without Reason, is unmitigated Foolishness."
"If you make a mistake, Acknowledge It, then make it Right."
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