Armour Dilemma: Am I Wrong Here?

[Wormwood]

fusangite: Make that 28 in support of you.

The armor donning rules are there for a simple reason: the party will not be fully prepared for some encounters.

I can only imagine the sheer horror of this jerk if he was playing a wizard and the invasion occured while he was *resting*.

 

[Videssian]

I agree with you as well fusangite.. it seems to me the key point here isn't the armor (or lack of it), but the maturity of the player. My feeling is that if he's going to act like an immature 13-year-old, then treat him like one (despite whatever his actual age might be). I would suggest taking him aside privately to discuss the issue and giving him one last chance to act at the gaming table like an adult then see what happens. If he insists on acting immaturely, then drop him from the group.. And perhaps he'll learn from that and behave better in the next group he plays in.

And as far as the scenario goes, if I were playing, I would relish such a challenge. Part of what makes D&D interesting to me (as compared to just playing Diablo or something) are interesting dilemmas and tactical situations like that. I do tend to play combat-oriented characters, so I'd probably have rushed into combat without my heavy armor.. and if I fell, well, it would have been in a good cause and all that..

 

[Tom Cashel]

D00d, I'm not the one who had the hissy fit and proclaimed he was going back to Mage. That was pretty funny, though!

Touche.

I am touched and honored to have made your sig line. And you know I only say these things because I know you can take it, right?

 

[fusangite]

Thanks Videssian. This makes you the 42nd person to express an opinion in the debate, with the opinions breaking down roughly 30/6/6.

Well, we'll see what happens tonight (the player didn't show at the previous episode). I'm off to run the game in 90 minutes. Wish me luck!

 

[Darkness]

Make that 31 in favor, fusangite. 'cause I think you should get rid of this player - especially after Teflon Billy's tale of that guy's previous behavior.

That said...

I had grown increasingly tired of people coming up with absurdly flimsy excuses offered by my players as to why they would be wearing heavy armour at midnight or wearing it during meetings with city officials. I realized that I wasn't enforcing the rules in a balanced way by consistently looking the other way on a very clear game mechanic for armour.

But did you tell your players that you intended to enforce the armor rules, whereas you previously hadn't?
'cause if you didn't point it out, your player might have a point after all. (Not to excuse his outburst, of course.)
If you told them, though, this guy's just unreasonable.

But from my player's behaviour and from some of the comments made on this forum, it seems like gaming has different social rules: social rules which entitle guests to berate their hosts for not giving them an enjoyable enough evening. Do people believe this is the case?

Hm. For one, the emotional investment in an RPG is higher than it would be for a dinner.
Playing an RPG demands also more work from the 'guests'; it's certainly not as passive as sitting around, chatting, and waiting for you to serve dinner.
Further, an RPG is still a game and some people aren't very gracious 'losers.'

Originally posted by danzig138
3. Never split the players.

I couldn't disagree more. But then, my preferred mode for RPGs is horror. So it figures, I guess.

 

[Videssian]

Luck!

Just noticed you're in Vancouver.. ah, I remember my gaming days in North Vancouver fondly.. where I first learnt about our great game many years ago!

So, how'd it go?

 

[Saeviomagy]

First up - I think the guy seems like he's more trouble than he's worth. However it's not my opinion that matters, it's your own.

Second up - you say that you've been lax about the armour restrictions in the past? This, to me, is a significant problem. It's the equivalent of suddenly changing the rules (even if you DID tell them at the start of the night).

Why? Because I know for one that if the rules about donning and wearing armour were loose in a campaign, I'd probably not bother with contingencies. I'd make the assumption that, whenever it was needed, I'd be suited up, and I would base my strategies for the character around that fact.

If you say at the beginning of the night "I'm enforcing the armour restrictions tonight", I simply won't have the opportunity to put those contingencies in place. I'll be guaranteed to be caught unarmoured. I'll expect to perform far below par. I'll be very unwilling to break routine and go unarmoured.

So - try not to change the rules (even if you're just tightening up on enforcement) without some significant lead-up time (at least a level's worth).

Finally - although I disagree with your DMing style on this point, I wouldn't have addressed it in the way that he did. I would have had a polite chat, not the hissy fit you described. I'd do the same if I was at a dinner party and the food was terrible (if it was inedible swill, I'd probably bring it up during the meal).

 

[fusangite]

Allow me to clarify what precisely I mean about laxly enforcing armour restrictions in the past. Every single time anyone has had to put their armour on, the rules have been observed to the letter -- 40/20 rounds and all.

What I meant by laxness is my willingness to accept people's lame excuses about why, at a particular moment, they already have their armour on and therefore don't need to don it. For this reason, I picked a time in the dead of night when there was no possible reason anyone could reasonably have their armour on unless they were sacrificing their capacity to regain spells by not sleeping.

 

[Scion of Vyshaan]

I would like to throw in my point that verbal abuse is never justified when in regards to D&D.

Now, if Fusangite had made disparaging remarks about a player, or in some way acted outside of normal social mores, I would say that such behavior may be understandable (not justified, but understandable). Otherwise, D&D is a game, and there is no reason to yell at your game master, just as one does not overturn a table after losing a game of checkers.

I myself am guilty of getting angry at a gaming table, however, one of my only goals in regards to gaming is overcoming this. It is not appropriate to get emotional over what goes on a gaming table (at least, no moreso than it is at a dinner table). Someone mentioned that RPGs require a more of an emotional investment than sitting down to eat a meal. I will not argue this point. However, I cannot condone yelling at another human being because of something that happened to a fictional character.

If you sit down at a gaming table, and the game-master changes a rule in the middle of the game (not that I'm saying thats what Fusangite did), the game master has done nothing worse than making a bad call. If a game-master kills your 21st level bladesinger, of which you have drawn your own 12 page comic book and included in a novel proposal, the game master is guilty only of insensitivity. However, if you then yell at the game-master and storm angrily out of the room, you are being immature. There is nothing in any WotC product that tells you how you should treat your friends.

Now, if you're part of a big boisterous group of friends who will scream at each other for a couple of hours and then go have a beer like nothing happened, then of course, I guess it makes sense to scream over D&D. But my point is that its a game, at the end of the day, RPGs are not matters of cosmic importance, and there is no excuse for mistreating another person because you don't like how they run their game.

 

[mmu1]

I have to say I have one problem with this scenario... On one hand, you're basically only being reasonable and realistic by demanding they spend the time putting on armor, and take as much time as necessary.

On the other hand, if you're being reasonable here, then it's a very strange situation in which the characters aren't actually allowed to take 2-4 minutes to put on armor. This isn't a midnight ambush, after all, where the characters wake in the middle of a battle.

Sure, in combat conditions, characters might be able to get to the center of the action in 4-6 rounds, but assuming that, when woken up in the middle of the night they can't take several minutes to get their bearings, grab their gear, put on armor, figure out where the attack is happening, and get there with some sort of coherent plan of action, then we're really departing from what's reasonable and what makes sense...

I mean, really - players have to arrive at the site of combat in 36 seconds, or 100 guards die? If that's the case, then I think you made the vampires' plan a little too brilliant and efficient, and shouldn't be upset that your players weren't able to deal with it. (although someone yelling at you and being abusive is obviosuly another matter)