Help! Trouble at the gaming table

[Balrog]

Some players are not happy unless they are "hogging" the attention/glory, and thats not an indictment on the thieving rogues alone; there are Paladins for example (with all their special abilities) who can hog the spotlight in some games. With their high charismas, some tend to relish their role as party spokesperson and dominate the conversation with every NPC they run across. Or they take every opportunity to detect evil and go smite it....and there is nothing wrong with all that. Nor is there anything wrong with a Player with a Roguish character occasionally passing a note to a DM, or occasionally pilfering an item. but there is a sensible limit to this kind of shenanigans. Ideally, every DM is giving each character a chance to use his/her abilities and shine in the game. But sometimes it doesnt work out that way to the satisfaction of every player. Just as in real-life, a player may feel they deserve more attention than they are getting, and feel slighted.

Of course, if caught red-handed, the best way for most parties to handle the Treasure Leech is In-Game, confronting the character and reinforcing the ideals of teamwork. But of course not everyone follows those ideals......there are selfish players out there everywhere,and they have a tendency to follow the same cycle of ME-ME-ME play, no matter what happened to a previous character. but I think the VAST majority are the players who enjoy cooperative roleplaying and teamwork with other players.

I am having a similar problem with a long-time player, but the problem with his antisocial characters is balanced by his nearly complete apathy lately. IMC, the party is predominately good-aligned, and most of the PCs have common goals and have forged bonds with each other. But this player has seemingly gone out of his way to create "problem" characters and try to get them into the party. I am running the Silver Summoning by FDP, and 2 of the PCs are dwarves, and 2 more have a very strong hatred of Orcs in their backgrounds. So the problem player's first character?: A Drow. Of course the Dwarves have an age-old hatred of the Dark Elves, so that started off well. Well, he ended up getting blindsided by a troll, so for his next character he made up an Orc fighter.....................right on the eve of the characters leaving for Smaragholt in this adventure.



SPOILERS AHEAD.....

For those who dont know, the Silver Summoning features a dwarven fortress (Smaragholt) being besieged by an Orc army, all while an underground sneak attack is being planned by a sorceress who wants into the fortress. i had a heck of a time trying to roleplay getting an orc into a party about to go help a Dwarven fortress besieged by an orc army, but it wasnt impossible. Some of the other players didnt like it though, and some were glad our last session when the Orc player didnt show up, and I took the character out.

Anyway, didnt mean to ramble on so much and hijack this thread, but my point is that there are players out there (thankfully not the majority I think) that seem to want more attention than others at the table. That is human nature. And if they arent getting that extra attention, they might be miffed, and become even bigger problems. I believe the best way to handle this would be 1st try in game to resolve the thefts. If that didnt work, or if the situation escalated, then some OOG discussions with or without the DM present are needed to get this player to realize that there are 7 (or however many) other players there who want to have fun too, and if every one of them was demanding the same or more time that this Rogue character was demanding, nothing would get done. IMHO of course.

 

[jgbrowning]

well

have the other PCs kill her. take the alignment hits if your DM rules it as such. have the entire party kill her. maybe she'll get the message. "not fun for us... ? not fun for you!"

i dont put up with that crap.

It is the player. its not that the player's "just playing the PC the way he/she imagines the PC would be". its all up to the player about how its done.

Kill her character. Mayber her feelings will get hurt enough that she'll 1. stop playing 2. play nicer. either way im a jerk about this stuff.

its better that she does not play, than when she does play the makes it not fun for others.

but, this is just my opinion.


joe b.


edit... on the advice of my wife, here's a little bit more of my reasoning.

in the real game world... if the PCs were actually there and it was real.. none of the other PCs would put up with her crap... if they wont kill her they would sure leave her behind or kick her out. the only reason why they havent is because, you as a PLAYER, dont want to hurt her feelings and you want to include her PC for meta-game reasons. One of the guys i've recently DM cast a magic missle at one of the other players because the other guy was a dwarf and he was an elf and the dwarf insulted him. The party killed him. on the spot and with no regrets. the guy who was playing the elf came back into the group and there were no problems from then on.

 

[madriel]

A friend of mine had this exact same problem back in University. The party's thief would make off with everything. The thief would scout ahead and pocket any treasure or wait for his turn on watch to pilfer from his party mates. He always denied it.

Finally my friend (whose character was militantly lawful neutral) took the thief out back off the inn and dealt with it IC. The thief was strip searched and beaten unconscious. The troublemaker didn't enjoy getting "hey, it's what my character would do" told right back to him. He was told IC that he'd lose a hand if he pulled any more crap with the party.

Eventually, the thief's player left the group.

 

[SHARK]

Greetings!

JBrowning, and Madriel, I agree with you guys, too! Funny stuff you related, as well!

In several campaigns I have run, I, as a Game Master, take a dim view of players behaving in such a obnoxious, disruptive manner. My players though, truth be told, take at least as dim a view of such behavior that I do. I have had one player act similarly, and the character was overwhelmed by the King's soldiers, and imprisoned. Within the week, the player characters were tried by a Royal Magistrate, and condemned for Assault, Murder, Theft, and Rebellion. By high noon the guilty player characters were escorted to the scaffold after being flogged with the scourge, and hanged.

The other players that witnessed such but were not guilty of any crimes were shocked but stern in condemning the other players for their greed, arrogance, and stupidity. The guilty players had learned a bitter lesson in my world, and it wasn't a problem again with those players.

In another campaign, a particular player was very much a selfish kind of character, as well as inept and argumentative with other players. Not in a really mean way, but in an obnoxious kind of irritating way. Eventually, he became so irritating to the rest of the group that they ganged up and killed the irritating character. I was shocked to see the group do such a thing, but the other player just wouldn't get it. This same player rolled up another character, and behaved in an obnoxious manner with an NPC Dragon character that was in human form. He just spent about three hours rolling up and making his character. He proceeded to provoke the dragon-character (shape changed into the form of a female elf)--and a brief fight broke out where the Dragon character slaughtered the player's character. His character that he had spent three hours working up had just died in less than an hour's playing time!

We all laughed hugely at his denseness!

He created another character, who also ended up dying relatively swiftly, in about three or four sessions.

Finally, on this person's fourth character, he seemed to settle down and get the point not to be so irritating. He was never insulting or really being a jerk--he's a nice guy, and funny, too--but he just has this wierd rebellion/sarcastic/contrarian streak that wasn't well-recieved by the rest of the group. He went on to be a very good player by the way. He just took a while to learn what the rest of the group would tolerate and what it wouldn't.

Same thing with this Thief character. Such an obnoxious, lying character should be ganged up on and killed by the party. Have the whole party kill every character she plays like this until she gets the hint. She no doubt will get tired of making up characters only to watch the party soon grow tired of her stupid antics, and finally kill her character. Be ruthless, and don't tolerate such nonsense! As I mentioned, in some of my campaigns, I have had no problem having the Law come down on such lawless characters and execute them ruthlessly. The players as well don't appreciate such thieving, lying, uncooperative players either. This player in your group needs to learn this lesson, and the sooner the better.

Ultimately, of course, if the player becomes obnoxious as opposed to the character, then you may have to ask the player to leave the group. Some people just can't--or don't want--to get along with other people. As another member mentioned, some people just demand that they be the absolute center of attention, and if they aren't, they start acting out in petty, juvenile ways. Such attitudes and behaviors should not be tolerated!

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

 

[Fenes 2]

I am firmly in the "personal problems" should be dealt outside the game camp. If you have no fun roleplaying because of another players action, talk to that player. A reasonably social person will care about the other player's fun enough to adjust. IMHO and experience, in-game action only promotes in-game retalation. I think that adults can and should work out their differences face to face, not through their characters. Don't kill her character - just tell her to play her PC with the group, not against the group, switch characters, or get lost. "I am just roleplaying my character" stops where others' fun is concerned.

 

[DaemonBolo]

To Queenie

Queenie,

Unfortunately, your party seems to be meta-gaming to keep her character in the group. If these things had happened in real life, people would no longer care to be around her. I am not sure what the rest of the party's alignment may be, but she is obviously being disruptive to the game.

Her actions are not chaotic neutral. They are EVIL. A CN character would not consistently steal from a group that should be her friends. CN only means that the PC is not beholden to any laws and will tend to do things for themselves. Note: That a CN character would not be selfish. Just because the PC looks out for number one, does not mean that they are free to do whatever. Stealing from friends and wanting to kill the party is an evil act. Her alignment actually appears to be CE or NE from her actions.

In any event, if she chooses to go off on her own, the GM cannot focus solely on her PC. It does as if she wants attention and is doing anything to get it. My recommendation to the GM is to intentionally place the party in a tough fight where a number of PCs almost die and her PC does die.

Then she can make a new one and maybe be a better fit for the party. The other option is to have the GM talk to her in private about the game. Let her know that she is being disruptive and explain everything to her. If neither option works, then you'll have to ask her to leave the game.