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<blockquote data-quote="Lanefan" data-source="post: 6622163" data-attributes="member: 29398">Agreed, and my comments are in assumption of gaming with known friends rather than strangers.So far, so good...&nbsp; ...and yet some of the most entertaining and memorable characters I've ever seen were, at their core, psychopaths.The trick is to not confuse &quot;ruin a game&quot; with &quot;take a game in directions you had no idea were coming&quot;.&nbsp; The former, of course, is bad.&nbsp; The latter is often excellent.Not &quot;at this table&quot;, as the characters aren't at a table.&nbsp; But &quot;in this party&quot;, maybe - depending on how open-minded the rest of the party is. (and, out of character, how accepting the players and DM are to characters who don't fit some predefined mold).&nbsp; Closed-minded parties that take the attitude &quot;we'll only run with those who are just like us&quot; are awful unless &quot;just like us&quot; is what you want to play all the time.Sounds like you forgot to loot them the first time. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile&nbsp; &nbsp; :)"&nbsp; data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />The key thing here is the psychotic characters were given a chance to go wrong, took it, and met the consequences; all in character.&nbsp; This is just fine - excellent, in fact.&nbsp; Where I get very annoyed is when such characters aren't allowed in the game at all (usually by DM decree), or where they are pre-emptively killed by the party after a simple &quot;Detect Evil&quot; pulls them, before even having a chance to co-operate...or not.&nbsp; I was on the wrong end of this a few years ago - brought in a Necromancer-Assassin with intent to play her as a cross between evil Maxwell Smart and Jack Sparrow: an inept spy.&nbsp; Party found her in mid-adventure, took her in, she ran as a useful (if unpredictable) party member for the rest of the adventure.&nbsp; On getting back to town a party goody-good decided her E alignment was reason enough to kill her in cold blood, and did so.&nbsp; Problem was, he picked a town run by Assassins as where to do this; he was caught, put on trial (!), found guilty and forced to pay whatever was needed to revive her.&nbsp; This was done (with much grumbling) and my character went on to win our annual &quot;Most Entertaining Character&quot; award once and be in close running a couple of other times.True, but there's a big difference between &quot;stab everyone in sight&quot; and &quot;not get along with the party&quot;.I just had a character - probably the nastiest one I've ever played (and that's saying something!) - voluntarily leave her party because she figures she can be far more useful (and have far more fun!) operating behind enemy lines as a one-woman terrorist cell.&nbsp; And, she doesn't have to worry about these annoying things called morals - the more disruption and destruction she can generate the better.Lan-&quot;Elena - Elvish Lawful Evil Necromancer Assassin - kinda failed on the Lawful part&quot;-efan</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Lanefan, post: 6622163, member: 29398"] Agreed, and my comments are in assumption of gaming with known friends rather than strangers. So far, so good... ...and yet some of the most entertaining and memorable characters I've ever seen were, at their core, psychopaths. The trick is to not confuse "ruin a game" with "take a game in directions you had no idea were coming". The former, of course, is bad. The latter is often excellent. Not "at this table", as the characters aren't at a table. But "in this party", maybe - depending on how open-minded the rest of the party is. (and, out of character, how accepting the players and DM are to characters who don't fit some predefined mold). Closed-minded parties that take the attitude "we'll only run with those who are just like us" are awful unless "just like us" is what you want to play all the time. Sounds like you forgot to loot them the first time. :) The key thing here is the psychotic characters were given a chance to go wrong, took it, and met the consequences; all in character. This is just fine - excellent, in fact. Where I get very annoyed is when such characters aren't allowed in the game at all (usually by DM decree), or where they are pre-emptively killed by the party after a simple "Detect Evil" pulls them, before even having a chance to co-operate...or not. I was on the wrong end of this a few years ago - brought in a Necromancer-Assassin with intent to play her as a cross between evil Maxwell Smart and Jack Sparrow: an inept spy. Party found her in mid-adventure, took her in, she ran as a useful (if unpredictable) party member for the rest of the adventure. On getting back to town a party goody-good decided her E alignment was reason enough to kill her in cold blood, and did so. Problem was, he picked a town run by Assassins as where to do this; he was caught, put on trial (!), found guilty and forced to pay whatever was needed to revive her. This was done (with much grumbling) and my character went on to win our annual "Most Entertaining Character" award once and be in close running a couple of other times. True, but there's a big difference between "stab everyone in sight" and "not get along with the party". I just had a character - probably the nastiest one I've ever played (and that's saying something!) - voluntarily leave her party because she figures she can be far more useful (and have far more fun!) operating behind enemy lines as a one-woman terrorist cell. And, she doesn't have to worry about these annoying things called morals - the more disruption and destruction she can generate the better. Lan-"Elena - Elvish Lawful Evil Necromancer Assassin - kinda failed on the Lawful part"-efan [/QUOTE]

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