D&D 5E How to deal with Metagaming as a player?

[Corwin]

Yeah, or he could have had it be an ogre that was attacking the camp... me attacking an ogre with a log from the campfire my character is tending isn't metagaming.

Bingo. Upthread, I described a recent session where I decided to grapple a drider with my goliath EK, with the intention of pulling most of its legs off. My roleplaying intent was to make him a biped again in response to him prancing around like an arrogant twit because he was a big, part-spider dude. Anyway, the DM never took issue with my tactic. But, what *IF*, in secret, the adventure had a special rule in it for this particular drider having a powerful feature/ability based directly on the number of his spider legs he had intact. Whether I knew that or not, how many DMs here would immediately question me on why I wanted to tear his legs off, instead of just kill him outright? I can easily imagine at least a few posters in this thread would instinctively take me to task as a dirty metagamer and/or even outright call me a cheater.

 

[Bawylie]

Bingo. Upthread, I described a recent session where I decided to grapple a drider with my goliath EK, with the intention of pulling most of its legs off. My roleplaying intent was to make him a biped again in response to him prancing around like an arrogant twit because he was a big, part-spider dude. Anyway, the DM never took issue with my tactic. But, what *IF*, in secret, the adventure had a special rule in it for this particular drider having a powerful feature/ability based directly on the number of his spider legs he had intact. Whether I knew that or not, how many DMs here would immediately question me on why I wanted to tear his legs off, instead of just kill him outright? I can easily imagine at least a few posters in this thread would instinctively take me to task as a dirty metagamer and/or even outright call me a cheater.

Try Not imagining that, though.


-Brad

 

[Corwin]

Try Not imagining that, though.

Are you telling me what I should think? Now I'm also a metaforumite...

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[Shasarak]

So now I have a choice "Do I want to play with MegaGame Knowledge Imculata?" Years ago I would grit my teeth and say play on. Now days. "No I will not play with green eggs and MegaGame Knowledge Imculata". If you are just a game friend. Bye. If you a friend, see at Taco Tuesday, Football Fridays but I will not be gaming with you.

I would agree with this except I am also busy on Taco Tuesday and Football Friday.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[jasper]

The loss of 90% of the lion population to poaching and habitat loss probably contributed to that as well.

So all we have to do is convince aristocrats in Kara-Tur that troll blood is an aphrodisiac, and all our problems will be solved.

We see my assistant Elfcrusher try to extract troll blood from the troll Shasarak which we tagged last season. Crikey it looks the troll has Elfcrusher in a duplex choke hold....
Tune in tomorrow at Marlin Perkins Wild Kingdom.

 

[Corwin]

Same here. The only person who usually truly knows if you are metagaming is, in fact, you.

And yet, that hasn't stopped countless DMs and players from leveling accusations over the decades, has it?

So the issue is the social constraint. If you are at a table where people don't care, then people don't care. Metagame away! But if the other people at the table don't enjoy metagaming, then the first time (or two, or three) that you magically know the exact solution, people will give you the benefit of the doubt. And at some point, either the players will talk to you, the DM will talk to you, or you will wonder why you're not invited to the next D&D session. *shrug*

This doesn't seem to coincide with @AaronOfBarbaria's campfire example. Nor my hypothetical alternate reality of my drider encounter. Are you claiming people didn't/haven't actually told Aaron he was cheating after only that single instance? Or that none of the posters here would raise an eyebrow at my grapple decision were there a secret-leg-power feature on that particular drider? In spite of my not knowing it? How does the Boy Who Cried Wolf correlate at all? I'm not seeing it.

 

[Shasarak]

If you're missing out on Taco Tuesday, something has gone horribly wrong.

No one should be deprived of Taco Tuesday. And, if you get the special (Troll Tacos), they regenerate in your mouth. Now that's a filling meal!

Why would I go for Taco Tuesday when jasper is running Troll Tuesday every day now?

 

[Shasarak]

The loss of 90% of the lion population to poaching and habitat loss probably contributed to that as well.

Except that would equally apply to the tribes people as well.

So all we have to do is convince aristocrats in Kara-Tur that troll blood is an aphrodisiac, and all our problems will be solved.

Why would they use Troll blood when mercury is so much more effective?