DM Advice - character with partial amnesia (and he doesn't know it)

[S'mon]

If your players are disrespectful jerks who won't at least try to work within the bounds of your story, you need to tell them to shape up or ship out.

I do (politely-ish). I GM for dozens of different people, normally strangers to start with, so inevitably I see the occasional jerkish behaviour. Much less in 4e than 3e though.

 

[S'mon]

5. If the player has a problem with you 'using' the characters background, ignore the character background. There are other players at the table who might have less problems.

Heh, this reminds me of the Bad Player who informed me that as I had approved his background where his PC was cursed to die by a red dragon, he COULD NOT BE KILLED by anything else.

I booted that player.

 

[pemerton]

Heh, this reminds me of the Bad Player who informed me that as I had approved his background where his PC was cursed to die by a red dragon, he COULD NOT BE KILLED by anything else.

That's kind of witty, but pretty hard to implement in standard D&D!

 

[S'mon]

That's kind of witty, but pretty hard to implement in standard D&D!

It would have been witty if he had said it before his PC died, rather than in an email demanding I resurrect his dead PC.

 

[Sunseeker]

Heh, this reminds me of the Bad Player who informed me that as I had approved his background where his PC was cursed to die by a red dragon, he COULD NOT BE KILLED by anything else.

I booted that player.

"As the blood slowly drains from your body and your vision blurs, you see the tattoo of a red dragon on the leg of of your killer."

That sort of thing could work well in a fantasy novel, that a child is cursed to die by one thing only so somehow through the hands of fate he always narrowly avoids death. Or perhaps is more like a Kenny where he does indeed die but then is reincarnated a few moments later and noone has any knowledge of his death. But it doesn't work out so well in an RPG.

 

[pemerton]

But it doesn't work out so well in an RPG.

I think it could be done fairly easily in some systems - even 4e, given its flexibility over what "0 hp" means - but you'd need to have player and GM both on board (at least - maybe the rest of the table too) and obviously it would preclude wildly open-ended play - you'd expect the curse to be a pretty central focus of play.

 

[Sunseeker]

I think it could be done fairly easily in some systems - even 4e, given its flexibility over what "0 hp" means - but you'd need to have player and GM both on board (at least - maybe the rest of the table too) and obviously it would preclude wildly open-ended play - you'd expect the curse to be a pretty central focus of play.

Sure, I'd favor a smaller group of more closely-knit friends as players so that if we play out "Bob's Curse - The Adventure", noone feels like Bob is getting all the attention. I mean a lot of RPGs end with a red dragon as the "big bad" anyway...though this'd all be easier to do if Bob was cursed to say, "die horribly" but didn't know when, where, or how.

 

[OnCider]

Thanks for all the considered comments.

I asked for the back stories and specifically asked the players to add in some plot hooks for the campaign. I'm planning on using the slow experience track and adding alot of additional content.

This particular player is a good friend of mine (but actually very new to roleplaying) and the rest of the group has been together for about 20 years. I know this guy quite well and he is really into BSG (in fact we play the board game and he almost always wants to be Baltar) and therefore I think he'd quite enjoy this plot. I've spoken to him about general arguments from this thread and I think he'll be OK with it. I liked the idea of the wizard in the family's history who is trying to return to life by possessing members of his family (which sounds like a plot from the Call of Cthulhu campaign Coming Full Circle - which I have). Perhaps the father took him away because he learned that his mother was possessed and she has since died and it has moved onto him. That takes away the parenticide part of the history!

 

[Elf Witch]

IME few players are as prickly as this, but you do need to be careful, and know your player. If you think they would react like Shidaku then don't do it.

Edit: Also, IME a 4,000 word backstory is a big WARNING sign that this guy may well be very sensitive to you messing with his 'canon'. These tend to be the 'special snowflake' players who only care about playing a pre-conceived PC (usually recycled from other games) exactly the way they want, and have no real interest in your campaign per se.
Personally I strongly discourage anything over half a page, and the guy with the 5-page backstory is usually not a guy I want in my game, PC or player.

I really think you need to stop painting all players who enjoy writing big back stories with the same brush. I often write long back stories and I am not a special snowflake who only cares about playing a preconceived character. As far as I am concerned the back story is just that it is what has happened up to the character to the point they step in the game.

I view gaming a lot like life you never know what is going to happen to change what you wanted and you as a person. Who you are at first level often is very different than who you are at tenth after you have faced adversity, bloodshed and maybe death yours or members of your party.

As a DM I enjoy reading detailed backgrounds and often mine them for plot hooks.

 

[Sunseeker]

Thanks for all the considered comments.

I asked for the back stories and specifically asked the players to add in some plot hooks for the campaign. I'm planning on using the slow experience track and adding alot of additional content.

This particular player is a good friend of mine (but actually very new to roleplaying) and the rest of the group has been together for about 20 years. I know this guy quite well and he is really into BSG (in fact we play the board game and he almost always wants to be Baltar) and therefore I think he'd quite enjoy this plot. I've spoken to him about general arguments from this thread and I think he'll be OK with it. I liked the idea of the wizard in the family's history who is trying to return to life by possessing members of his family (which sounds like a plot from the Call of Cthulhu campaign Coming Full Circle - which I have). Perhaps the father took him away because he learned that his mother was possessed and she has since died and it has moved onto him. That takes away the parenticide part of the history!

Sure, the important part is just that you talk to him about it.