Clueless DM

[kigmatzomat]

I think the short answer to the group is "medicine tastes bad, now suck it up and drink it."

I am a let the chips fall where they lie GM, but I apply that to the players as well as characters. When a character dies, it is up to the other players to get them rezzed. If the party does not raise a dead PC, the players have the option not to accept replacment PCs from that player. The same goes for players that cycle PCs. I, as the DM, can boot a player but I won't override a party booting another player.

I allow evils and chaotics but once the majority of PCs decide that any character is an enemy then that character become an NPC. This happened once in an odd way with a group of Lawful Evils and one Chaotic Good. The CG was very confused even though I told him it was a drow game.

My games tend to have 6-10 players so it's rare to be booted but it has happened. These rules have evolved from being in bad games or having my own games derail.

My advice to this group would be:

The DM is going to have to grow a pair and take control of the game. Several 1-on-1 conversations will need to be had as well as the declaration of table rules. It's a risky thing since if a DM's group is nothing but sucky people, the game will collapse. If the people have a brain, they will get over it. But there is no real chance that things will get better unless the DM gets on the stick and takes charge.

The thieves are going to have to grow up. My first character was a thief in red book D&D. Thieves should learn to enjoy the gloating of that comes from saying "hey, look what I found!" rather than the gloating of having more loot.

The DM needs to sit down with Sticky McFingers and tell them "The other characters will find out about your thieving and when they do they will kill your character. If they merely drive him off he becomes an NPC villain under my control. I will then ask them if they want to deal with another one of your characters in this campaign."

The lone wolf will have to work with the group. I'm a lone wolf by nature but it makes for crappy gaming. I actively have to avoid making characters too autonomous to justify, in my head, being a member in a group. I avoid playing rangers and druids b/c they are the ones who need others the least. The DM needs to sit down with this one that "if they don't become part of the game, their character will become an NPC that appears and disappears randomly. This is not a 1-on-1 campaign so either make with the teamwork or your character won't come back from his next jaunt. And then I'll ask the other players if they are willing to deal withanother one of your characters in this campaign."

The cleric is going to have to get over it. The DM will need to tell her that he is working on improving the game and be able to honestly say "I've talked with the others." He should also, at the next game, reiterate the table rules, particularly those that involve the party booting characters. But she will have to get over it; there will be no vendettas and no crusades. Failure to acknowledge that mistakes happen and people can grow earns the Boot feuding.

This group is not a catastrophe, it sounds young. Fine, it's time to learn how to play the game in a socially acceptable fashion. This isn't much different from teaching 8yros to play wiffleball. At least one would rather than run around whapping people in the head with the wiffleball bat. They need to learn that it's fun to be the one with the bat until the others gang up on you. Now play the game like a real person or go sit in the car.

 

[HeapThaumaturgist]

It's a game. It should be fun. For everybody.

People whose fun revolves around limiting the fun of other people by causing conflict, seeking conflict, are people I don't want to play with.

Inter-party conflict can be fun. We've had a few moments of it. But I prefer to have it very limited. I don't enjoy arguing with people. I do enough of that at home. I play D&D to have fun. We had our moments of argument and then we got over it, we moved on.

I, personally, would find my fun severely disadvantaged by something like this. I would have things changed, or I'd leave the game. That's me.

No Gaming Is Better Than Bad Gaming.

--fje

 

[Imagicka]

The only time I give out extra XP is for things like journals, finding a good picture, things like that and it is not a lot it is about 50 to 100. Its a little reward for the extra effort but not enough to penalize people who don't have the time or inclination to do extra.

I too give out extra XP. I was a big fan of Palladium Fantasy, and thought that there XP system was pretty good... so I reward players extra experience points for:

• Roleplaying in character
• Adding humour to the game
• Coming up with good/great plans and ideas
• Generally impressing me with something I wasn't expecting, or I think made the game better and more fun for everyone.

If someone goes out of their way to write journals or draw pictures for the game... not that anyone has done that, I'd reward that too.

 

[Elf Witch]

Initiative roll inequities will largely cancel out in the long run. For the rest, if you got knocked out that tells me you were in what I call the risk zone, so you get ExP. If you get held, it somewhat depends. I don't give ExP if you never knew what hit you, but if you'd charged in, swung, missed, then got held you'd definitely get full ExP.
I have, and I know that if people knew they'd get full ExP regardless there'd be certain characters who would not take any risks unless they absolutely had to (e.g. everyone else was dead). Fun for these players is watching other players' PC's take the risks and die, and being glad it wasn't their own. I'll discourage this by any means possible...variable ExP seems the most obvious, and easiest.
Fair enough; if it works for you, fine, but were I a player in such a game I think I'd soon end up resenting it...and resisting it.

Lanefan

It has never become an issue in our games. The ones who don't write journals enjoy reading the journals and don't mind the extra 50 XP the others get.


I also give out extra XP for clever plans and really heroic deads.

I am just having a problem wrapping my mind around players just watching other players characters die and doing nothing to help. The people I play with are usually foaming at the mouth ready to roll those dice. If I had that issue in a game I would be tempted to give out variable XP too.

My issue with what the DM was doing was different you did not get XP unless you actually hit and delivered the death blow. So say you wore the orc down with your sword and the mage cast magic missle and down goes the orc then the mage gets credit for the kill.

Or in one case we had encounter and the paladin of the party use diplomacy and avioded a fight he got a lot of XP for the encounter and the rest of us got nada. After that as soon as the pally opened his mouth someone would charge in.

I really think we are talking two difernt things about variable XP.

 

[Lanefan]

I also give out extra XP for clever plans and really heroic deads.

That's a great typo! And yes, I sometimes do likewise; also for puzzle solving.

I am just having a problem wrapping my mind around players just watching other players characters die and doing nothing to help. The people I play with are usually foaming at the mouth ready to roll those dice. If I had that issue in a game I would be tempted to give out variable XP too.

Sad to say, I've seen it almost since I've been playing, to some extent.

My issue with what the DM was doing was different you did not get XP unless you actually hit and delivered the death blow. So say you wore the orc down with your sword and the mage cast magic missle and down goes the orc then the mage gets credit for the kill.

I've heard of others doing this as well, and I don't like it any more than you do. Risk and reward should go together.

Or in one case we had encounter and the paladin of the party use diplomacy and avioded a fight he got a lot of XP for the encounter and the rest of us got nada. After that as soon as the pally opened his mouth someone would charge in.

In my game, on the rare occasions the paladin puts in an appearance, as soon as he opens his mouth someone will often charge *him*, to shut him up!

Lanefan

 

[Li Shenron]

I don't think the game is rigged. The DM told me that when he plans encounters he has a list of treasure a head of time and they only get it if they defeat the encounter and they have to roll searches to find the items.

Now who usually has the best search the rogue does. The player who plays the rogue writes notes to the DM to let him know that he is stealing the items. So the other players have no reason to ask for spot checks. I asked my roommate about it and she said that she tried asking for spot checks anytime she saw a note going to the DM and he got mad.

I can understand that but when I DM if I have a player pulling this kind of stuff I roll spot checks for the other players to see if they notice something going on. It evens the playing field.

I think that the game and some of the behavior has gotten away from this DM not that he is trying to favor certain players.

If such a situation happened in my games, I would simply ask the players in question to stop stealing. Your situations very clearly demonstrates how the game can easily suffer when someone "roleplays" against the other players. It just doesn't work, unless your group is way experienced and skilled.

Your Cleric player is NOT having fun, and this just because someone else pretends to have his own fun in a particular way. I believe this is just wrong... it's not acceptable to spoil one's fun because of someone else's fun. In my opinion your DM is acting very badly, and he's been basically supporting this situation all the time.

How can he put the game back on track? Honestly I think it's going to be hard. It's already moved into metagaming and player conflict, and sooner or later it will be a matter of which player is better at argumenting his point (which has nothing to do with being better at playing the game) and IMO the Rogue player will win, the Cleric player will be pissed off and leave the game.

Even solving this in-character is difficult at this point, because I'm sure that the Rogue is already manipulating the DM, and if the DM tries for example to enforce some realism such as giving a chance to the other characters to discover the thefts (unbelievable if the DM has never even *allowed* the other characters to notice, that is truly bad DMing) and then force the Rogue player to deal with it in-character, I am quite skeptic that the player would accept it, he'll try to accuse the DM of punishing his roleplaying concept...

But truth is that if the Rogue player is really interested in roleplaying someone who steals from his friends, he should be very happy to have the chance to roleplay the realistic and near-inevitable consequences: that when they find out, the thief is going to pay for it (such as now everybody else takes his gear) or if he refuses and resist, he's on his own and out of the party, and the player makes a new character.