D&D General Bad gaming experiences and how they made you a better player/GM...

[iserith]

If you remember the article a few months ago about "cultures of gaming" - in the neo-traditional group there's a desire to express the character by having them interact with things. In some ways, that's the point of the game: to let you play out the cool character you made.

The thing is: this doesn't need to be combat. The neo-trad player spent a lot of time and energy build a personality for the character, and they want to show that off, which is a lot easier to do when talking to npc's like shopkeepers. You can't really banter with wolves or even ogres, and pc-to-pc conversations might end up being about the other pc, while an npc is just there to give you something to work off of.

So within that subset of gamers, talking to a shopkeeper is just as much fun as fighting a goblin, because the situations let you use different parts of the characters.

(Of course, there's a limit to how many shopkeepers you can talk to without repeating yourself, and skilled players can do this during pc-to-pc conversations.)

This isn't a question of combat though, more one of stakes. I'm interested in playing out scenes where there is something to win or lose. That could be a quirky, cagey merchant social interaction challenge, but that's not what a lot of these groups are doing. So to me we're just wasting valuable session time. And again, I'm speaking for myself here. People can find fun what they like. Barring receiving some kind of reasonably succinct exposition download so we have context to act, however, chit-chatting with merchants when there's nothing meaningful at stake isn't for me. It makes for a bad game experience.

 

[TheSword]

So many:

GM gives professional actor in group majority of spotlight since he's so entertaining. Everyone else expected to watch, play scraps.

Make magic user. GM doesn't like how broken power-gamed wizard is in RPG system that they wrote. Spontaneous magic nerfs and all enemies heavy anti-magic (in magic rare setting) during play.

Running a gritty game of noble politics with young group wanting consequence-free action.

Playtesting crunchy homebrew system with brand new players.

Follow the badass GMPC.

Simulationist, player-choice-focused game for narrative, follow-the-GM-plot expecting players. "What are we supposed to do next? Why don't NPCs come in and rescue us or lead us?"

Story-focused 4e.

Enable the toxic player because he's a friend.

GURPS. Half-joking.

You missed the second bit

 

[jmartkdr2]

This isn't a question of combat though, more one of stakes. I'm interested in playing out scenes where there is something to win or lose. That could be a quirky, cagey merchant social interaction challenge, but that's not what a lot of these groups are doing. So to me we're just wasting valuable session time. And again, I'm speaking for myself here. People can find fun what they like. Barring receiving some kind of reasonably succinct exposition download so we have context to act, however, chit-chatting with merchants when there's nothing meaningful at stake isn't for me. It makes for a bad game experience.

Right, so: you want stakes... they don't. Winning or losing is irrelevant, which means focusing on it would, to them, create wasted table time as you try to rush past the fun part to get to the boring bit. That's the divide.

I'm not sure that's a solvable thing, other than letting people at the table know you don't find it fun.

 

[iserith]

Right, so: you want stakes... they don't. Winning or losing is irrelevant, which means focusing on it would, to them, create wasted table time as you try to rush past the fun part to get to the boring bit. That's the divide.

I'm not sure that's a solvable thing, other than letting people at the table know you don't find it fun.

I'm not trying to solve it though. It is what it is and I use it as fuel to build what I consider more engaging games.

 

[niklinna]

Right, so: you want stakes... they don't. Winning or losing is irrelevant, which means focusing on it would, to them, create wasted table time as you try to rush past the fun part to get to the boring bit. That's the divide.

I'm not sure that's a solvable thing, other than letting people at the table know you don't find it fun.

I love stakes! I just hate hit points.

Chit-chat is fine too, though. But not smalltalk.

 

[Bolares]

I love stakes too! They are really effective against vampires...

 

[niklinna]

I love stakes too! They are really effective against vampires...

When I ran Curse of Strahd in high school, the party killed him by smoking him in a hookah. (They had reduced him to 1 hit point by more conventional means, he turned to mist, and then snort! If I recall correctly—and I almost certainly do not so many years later—it was the character who'd been reincarnated as an ogre mage. Different times.)

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

Many of my bad experiences with gaming in the past could've been avoided with a bit more assertiveness and outright saying what I was feeling. When we were all younger, maybe it would've fallen on deaf ears now and then, but maybe not.

Today, I'm a pretty assertive person. But I learned to be over the years.

Without a doubt, we learn more from our mistakes than our successes. That was an accidental process for me when I was younger, but these days when something doesn't work, I analyze the heck out of it to make sure it doesn't happen a second time.

So many lessons learned over the years, so many of them blunders of my own design.

 

[Swarmkeeper]

I love stakes! I just hate hit points.

Chit-chat is fine too, though. But not smalltalk.

Is this one of those Tilly Williams riddles? Give some more examples!

 

[Swarmkeeper]

a little vague on details but here are a few I’ve encountered:

• The DM and/or other player(s) who constantly advise other players on the “best” course of action. A helpful suggestion now and then is fine but trying to essentially run another player’s character or even the whole party(!)? Not so much
• Not addressing disruptive behavior at the table before it becomes a real problem.
• A DM having a pre-planned solution to a particular challenge that must be overcome and not offering clues as to how to overcome it