Player schticks that grind your gears

[wingsandsword]

"Mr. Impractical Character Concept"

I know one player who is very bad for this. He comes up with a character concept which he thinks is really cool, he'll talk about it, maybe sketch it or write a short bit of fiction about it, come up with an elaborate background story. He's very enthusiastic about playing this character. He is typically inspired by the newest anime or manga he's bought for these characters.

There are three problems with this.

One is that the concept may only vaguely or loosely fit into the current campaign. In D&D it may be a member of a race the DM wasn't planning on allowing (wereraven and wemic have been two I recall) or use a class or other mechanics the GM wasn't familiar with or even he didn't fully understand (in 2nd Edition using Skills & Powers/Spells & Magic coming up with incredibly convoluted custom classes, when the GM would allow them for minor changes to classes but didn't like for them to be too heavily modified).

The second problem is that these characters are usually painfully useless once in play. A hindrance he thought would be just nifty for roleplaying becomes a horrible crippling condition fairly quickly (a drunkard character in a system where alcoholism is a fairly serious hindrance, or a dependence on a special drug that he has only a limited supply to start out with, and he didn't bother to read the rules for it). The limited scenarios he had in mind when he came up with the character are exceeded after, or during, the first adventure. He'll lack critical skills, or have a spell list so specialized and esoteric that it's nigh useless, or otherwise be really nifty if you're imagining adventures around what he can do, but not as an RPG character in a party.

The third problem is that he cycles through these ideas pretty regularly. Every month or two he'll have a new idea. If he's playing a character from his old kick, he'l grumble and whine about it being useless and there is a new, nifty concept he wants to try. Since his characters tend to die fairly quickly, it means another short-lived, impractical character is on the way. The few times he's had characters last in the long term are ones he whines about as not being as powerful as the rest of the party, or are so far from his original concept that he doesn't find them fun anymore (since he's now thinking of a new concept).

 

[Agent Oracle]

Mr/s. Gender-neutral
GM: "Coming out through the tree line, you see... hmm, Could you describe your character?"
Player1: "Sure! It's a elf with a slim build, long flowing black hair and brilliant golden eyes. They look are very, Very pretty."
Player2: "Um... okay, in character i say 'Hail, and well met good lady!'"
Player 1: "'Sir!'"

This player takes delight in causing gender confusion. All males are bishonen, all females are butch.

 

[jmucchiello]

See, that, in my view, is poor DMing on your part. In fact, I've seen this attitude singlehandedly destroy a group.

Thanks for saving me a lot of typing, Jeffh. Your post covered just about everything I'd have said. (Although my example would have been that the event took place a month ago out of game and a day ago in game. )

 

[Hitokiri]

See, that, in my view, is poor DMing on your part. In fact, I've seen this attitude singlehandedly destroy a group.

For the players, this stuff happened a week ago or more, was at best quicly described to them, and is part of something they are doing as a hobby. They have jobs, relationships, other friends, and other hobbies. For the characters, on the other hand, those events may have happened a few hours ago as part of something they actually experienced, and this is information their lives may depend on.

How is it even possible for you to think they should be treated the same way? I seriously don't see how anyone who gave the matter a moment's thought could ever, in a million years, reach that conclusion. It's like saying two and two make five.

Forcing the players to take all the responsibility for this
1. Is utterly preposterous from the point of view of having a reasonable, internally consistent world
2. Is completely unsatisfying from the point of view of telling a good story
3. Is egregiously unfair from the point of view of running a reasonable game
4. Most importantly, is just not fun for anyone but the power-tripping GM (and, more often than not, is frustrating even for him)

In short, it's one of the few GM behaviours I am willing to say is, always and everywhere, completely unacceptable. It has, as far as I am honestly able to see, no upside whatsoever, no matter what kind of group you have - and gamers' tastes are diverse enough that it's very rare to be able to say that.

You seem to be under the mistaken impression that I am sitting behind my GM screen just waiting for the players to forget some minute detail so that I can screw them over.

Unfortunately, it has been my sad experience that without imparting some of the responsibility on to the players, that the players need to be reminded of every single aspect of a campaign every single session. Of course, maybe you LIKE having players break out of character every couple of sentences when talking to someone because they can't remember the name of the character their talking to, or the fact they refer to the artifact the game revolves around as "that doohickey thingamajob".

And you make a valid point that it is unreasonable for players (as opposed to PCs) to remember everything from week to week. That's why I tell them to write it down. Amazing things, pencil and paper, you can quickly jot down a note and it'll still be there next week when you need it. If you can remember major NPCs and plot points without taking a few notes, great. Unfortunately, most people can't (or at least will forget parts).

Ultimately, I've found as a player that actually being able to remember things because I took some notes allows me to interact more fully and realisticly with the world. I get a richer roleplaying experience out of the game, bacause I can draw on the totality of the campaign world, not just a few major highlights and what's happened in the last five minutes of play. It also means that the group spends a lot less time asking the DM for answers to questions he's already given, much less given repeatedly. Considering that many of the people who have played with me now also take notes outside of my games, I'd say someone found something right with the way I was doing things.

But then, what do I know, I'm obviously a poor excuse for a power hungry DM whose only concern is how can I best screw the players.

 

[Crust]

I have a player that argues about game physics. I tune him out.

I have one player who will go right into the books as soon as his character is bested in any way in a vain attempt to prove that I've done something wrong. It's very disrespectful.

I have a player who will open rulebooks and read while we're role-playing.

Another player actually leaves the table and lies down on the floor when there's a gap in the action. Another player did that once and fell asleep! His character had died, so he took a nap. We left him there.

 

[Elf Witch]

See, that, in my view, is poor DMing on your part. In fact, I've seen this attitude singlehandedly destroy a group.

For the players, this stuff happened a week ago or more, was at best quicly described to them, and is part of something they are doing as a hobby. They have jobs, relationships, other friends, and other hobbies. For the characters, on the other hand, those events may have happened a few hours ago as part of something they actually experienced, and this is information their lives may depend on.

How is it even possible for you to think they should be treated the same way? I seriously don't see how anyone who gave the matter a moment's thought could ever, in a million years, reach that conclusion. It's like saying two and two make five.

Forcing the players to take all the responsibility for this
1. Is utterly preposterous from the point of view of having a reasonable, internally consistent world
2. Is completely unsatisfying from the point of view of telling a good story
3. Is egregiously unfair from the point of view of running a reasonable game
4. Most importantly, is just not fun for anyone but the power-tripping GM (and, more often than not, is frustrating even for him)

In short, it's one of the few GM behaviours I am willing to say is, always and everywhere, completely unacceptable. It has, as far as I am honestly able to see, no upside whatsoever, no matter what kind of group you have - and gamers' tastes are diverse enough that it's very rare to be able to say that.

QFT

This drives me crazy when DMs do this. We play DnD every other week and we play Shadowrun the other week with the same DM now sometimes we forget things. I do take notes but there are times I forget to write something down or I just didn't catch the importence of something.

The DM has these rules if you forgot so did your character it drives me crazy if he was not such a good DM in other areas I would quit the games.

For example we had a parachment to deliver to a town official we had two sessions of traveling to the town and then we had a four week break of real time due to the DM's job. No one remembered who to deliver the parahment to. Thr Dm was like well I guess you guys are in trouble then. I argued that the person's name was on the envelope and in the end he relented and reminded us who we were supposed to deliver it to.

In another game a DM gave me certain information at the start of the game about my background it did not come into play for close to seven months and I had forgotten it. The DM didn't remind me about it either saying I should have remembered. My character would have remembered even if I didn't.

 

[Mark Chance]

Related to number 1 in the OP:

The So-Called Invincible Character (S-CIC): This character has been heavily optimized to be a raging, damage-dealing machine. He regularly turns foes into clouds of gooey mist. Eventually, after several game sessions, when finally facing down two of the BBest BBEGs in the campaign, the S-CIC gets wasted. Immediately the game drags to halt with several long minutes of whining about how the BBEGs would have needed such-and-such roll, such-and-such BAB, et cetera, in order to defeat the S-CIC.

 

[Psion]

Mr. Dodge Responsibility

This player usually plays CN characters with a "resent the law" attitude. The character actively avoids any obligations and lacks any real motivation to get involved with an adventure the GM might offer.

 

[Lhorgrim]

But then, what do I know, I'm obviously a poor excuse for a power hungry DM whose only concern is how can I best screw the players.

Don't sell youself short. You're an excellent example of a power hungry DM whose only concern is how he can best screw the players.

Just kidding of course. I saw a similar exchange in a movie somewhere and it gave me a good laugh.

I can see the middle ground on documenting things during game. As a player, I do want to remember town names and important NPC names and such. I don't have a problem jotting those things down.

I don't like scribing a copy of some speech that an NPC gives because there may be an important nugget of info that I'll need four sessions from now. I can't write shorthand, and my experience has been that my abbreviated notes often don't make enough sense to me four weeks later. In my defense, I don't like to ask the DM to pause or repeat his description because I am still writing.

As a DM, I try to make NPCs have a memorable hook (sometimes a literal hook) so that if players can't remember the name, they can usually remember the hook as a way to describe the NPC they are referring to. If I have some very important info buried in an NPC speech, I usually print the speech to give a copy to the players.
I do expect my players to write down or remember the names of the town they are in, and the name of the inn where they are staying.

 

[Hitokiri]

QFT

This drives me crazy when DMs do this. We play DnD every other week and we play Shadowrun the other week with the same DM now sometimes we forget things. I do take notes but there are times I forget to write something down or I just didn't catch the importence of something.

The DM has these rules if you forgot so did your character it drives me crazy if he was not such a good DM in other areas I would quit the games.

For example we had a parachment to deliver to a town official we had two sessions of traveling to the town and then we had a four week break of real time due to the DM's job. No one remembered who to deliver the parahment to. Thr Dm was like well I guess you guys are in trouble then. I argued that the person's name was on the envelope and in the end he relented and reminded us who we were supposed to deliver it to.

In another game a DM gave me certain information at the start of the game about my background it did not come into play for close to seven months and I had forgotten it. The DM didn't remind me about it either saying I should have remembered. My character would have remembered even if I didn't.

See, now this I don't have a problem with. You're taking notes and forget things "sometimes". Great, I can work with that. It's not players like yourself that bother me, it's the guy who managed to forget in the space of one week that they were even delivering a letter (much less to whom ).

Of course, if a player didn't catch the importance of something, then I see no reason not to assume the PC did, so I have no qualms with giving them a bit of a rough time because of it.