D&D General Dealing with Inter-Party Conflict

[Ovinomancer]

Since some of you are suggesting story ideas to get us back on track, I will give a couple more specifics, but these are spoilers for Curse of Strahd....

Spoiler: Curse of Strahd Spoilers

The party went to the Amber Temple. Instead of playing it as a murder dungeon, I presented it as a way to get information about Strahd's backstory and potentially find a way to destroy him once and for all. Kasimir, the dusk elf, was foretold by the Tarokka Deck as their ally against Strahd, and he also wanted to go because he thought there would be a way to restore his sister to life. The party's rogue, who had developed romantic feelings for Ireena (who had died earlier in the campaign), thought this would be a way to restore her as well. It was also theorized that if the party eventually defeated Strahd and used this power on him, it would restore him to a mortal man and break his curse - or make it so he could be permanently banished. When reaching the amber sarcophagus that grants the ability to resurrect the dead, both Kasimir and the party's rogue took the offer. The druid, thinking this was against "the natural order" tried to subdue the two; while the fighter decided it was an evil action and should lead to the deaths of the two; the ranger walked off and did nothing. The druid and fighter are worried that since Strahd became a dark lord by accepting the dark gift that the same fate is in store for Kasimir and the rogue. They would rather fight Strahd on their own merits without accepting evil help.

Oh, yeah, Amber Temple is terrible for that stuff. Really bad setup there. I'd recommend modifying the module, here. You won't break the module by offering a different alternative.

 

[bloodtide]

Just let them fight it out.

Really, this comes under "player responsibilities". You would hope the players would just want to have a good corperative fun game together.........BUT, that is not always the case. All to often that is not every players defination of fun.

So everything they are doing is because they WANT to do it. Maybe they were bad, hostile players all along....maybe they "just suddenly decided to change into a bad person to be cool": It does not matter. They want to do it.

See, no matter WHAT happens in a game: the players always get to choose what their character does. ALWAYS. If they can "go all crazy murderhobo on a fellow PC" THEN they can ALSO "forgive the fellow PC and move forward".

 

[Minigiant]

Have the players stand up and break out the judo mats.

Might makes right.

My DM screen unfolds into a octogon for MMA matches

 

[Ancalagon]

Before we started the session, sensing there could be a division in the group, I recommended they discuss an overall plan and goal before we started rolling dice. They elected not to do so.

Quick but important question - was this days before the start, or as people were arriving (ie 5 minutes prior). I've noticed that because of the stress of the pandemic, my players are a lot less willing to do "work" between sessions, and especially something touchy like this... I had to drop a campaign and start something lighter/sillier, the current one demanded too much engagement from the players at this time.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Since some of you are suggesting story ideas to get us back on track, I will give a couple more specifics, but these are spoilers for Curse of Strahd....

Spoiler: Curse of Strahd Spoilers

The party went to the Amber Temple. Instead of playing it as a murder dungeon, I presented it as a way to get information about Strahd's backstory and potentially find a way to destroy him once and for all. Kasimir, the dusk elf, was foretold by the Tarokka Deck as their ally against Strahd, and he also wanted to go because he thought there would be a way to restore his sister to life. The party's rogue, who had developed romantic feelings for Ireena (who had died earlier in the campaign), thought this would be a way to restore her as well. It was also theorized that if the party eventually defeated Strahd and used this power on him, it would restore him to a mortal man and break his curse - or make it so he could be permanently banished. When reaching the amber sarcophagus that grants the ability to resurrect the dead, both Kasimir and the party's rogue took the offer. The druid, thinking this was against "the natural order" tried to subdue the two; while the fighter decided it was an evil action and should lead to the deaths of the two; the ranger walked off and did nothing. The druid and fighter are worried that since Strahd became a dark lord by accepting the dark gift that the same fate is in store for Kasimir and the rogue. They would rather fight Strahd on their own merits without accepting evil help.

If this is the case, I place the blame firmly on the shoulders of the Fighter player.

You have a friend of yours make what you think is a bad decision. And the first thing you think of is "Well, I guess I have to kill him!" Really? You couldn't just give the Rogue an ultimatum? Reason with the guy? "You are making a horrible mistake and risking our lives because of this deal. You go through with it, I will not continue down this path with you." And then like the Ranger did, you just walk away. But no, instead it's "Time to die, muthafraka!!!"

It's this kind of D&D-specific self-righteousness that players get... usually when they are playing paladins more often than not... that makes them stupidly believe that any whiff of badness means they have no choice but to slaughter the heretic. Even supposed friends. It's a ridiculous trait. I mean, if I had a friend of mine make an exceedingly bad decision, I'd be more inclined to... I dunno... actually try and help the person. Going straight to chopping their head off would be an option a bit further down the line.

So in this particular case... the fighter, ranger and druid really should just go off on their own, and leave the rogue and Kasimir to continue their quest to save their loved ones. For you, that means either splitting the group in half and running the two groups separately (either on the same night or on separate nights)... or the fighter, ranger, and druid need to come up with a reason to keep the rogue and dusk elf around-- like they need the elf's for the finale, and they want to keep an eye on the rogue to make sure he doesn't do something really stupid with this new power he has. It's safer for them to keep the rogue close to keep their eyes on him, than it is for the rogue to just wander off by himself. At least maybe then this game can be salvaged.

 

[Retreater]

Quick but important question - was this days before the start, or as people were arriving (ie 5 minutes prior). I've noticed that because of the stress of the pandemic, my players are a lot less willing to do "work" between sessions, and especially something touchy like this... I had to drop a campaign and start something lighter/sillier, the current one demanded too much engagement from the players at this time.

Two opportunities, actually. The first was in a follow-up email after the previous session. Then we took a week off. So when we got together for the game night two weeks later, I started the session (after some time to get past technical issues and some friendly chat) with asking them if they wanted to come up with a plan. I told them that it would be helpful to review the information they had and to proceed with a goal in mind. They commented that it was "the heat of the moment" and they wouldn't have time to discuss in the game. I reiterated that I thought it would be helpful, but they could proceed if they had nothing to say.
The NPC was the first to take the gift. After seeing the effect, the rogue was ready to do it. He wanted to roll Deception against the other players' characters. At that point I saw it was turning into a PvP situation. I told them that wasn't what I liked in games but I didn't want to take away their agency. I asked again if they knew the stakes. Throughout the combat I would say things like "so you're attacking your party member?" and would remind them about doing non-lethal damage (which the fighter said he didn't want to do.)

 

[Gamerbug94]

I had this exact issue, in the exact same spot in my game of CoS. The party wizard was all about gaining power and knowledge, and thus took (multiple) dark deals, and became pretty corrupted. The party ranger (planar warrior) was pretty zealous about ridding the world of darkness and corruption, so they came to blows. The Barbarian and Artificier stayed out of it, as did Kasimir who was with them and was just thankful to not be targeted.

In the end, i knew my players well enough to know they could handle it maturally, so I allowed them to hash it out however they saw fit. They fought, the ranger killed the wizard then struck out on his own because he couldnt trust the others anymore for not backing him up. Both players made new characters and rejoined the Barb and Arti, I continued to play the Ranger in the background a bit and he showed up once or twice (once in the werewolf den and once in the castle where he battled Rahadin so the party could move past him), and I even had Strahd (who was already attempting to sway the wizard prior) bring back the wizard as an ally of his, and now corrupt-wizard-vampire fought the party in the castle chapel. (I of course got the players go ahead to do these things)

Overall, it all comes down to how the PLAYERS are willing to handle these kind of situations, the onus is not on you as the DM to always make everyone happy, its the entire groups responsibility to ensure the others are both having fun, and ok with whatever outcomes and consequences come from the decisions they make.

 

[Shiroiken]

So what do you do in these situations? Any words of wisdom, any encouragement to this DM who is feeling down?

I've got no solution for your current situation, but after having one player make a deadly decision that affected the whole party, we came up with a table rule you might want to consider. At any time, a player can call a time-out before a single player takes a unilateral action that would affect the party. There is discussion and then a vote on if the action is taken (ties go towards the action). This prevents a single player from screwing over the entire party on a whim, but it shouldn't come up that often. We've only used it once since it came up, and that was last year (I honestly wonder if the party even remembers that table rule anymore).

 

[GMMichael]

If inter-party conflict gets too heavy, I check to make sure the players are comfortable with it, and if not, I use fewer orcs.

One of the characters took the dark deal. The rest of the party was divided. One chose not to be involved and left the area. One party member tried to subdue the guy who took the deal. The other party member decided to fight to kill. I told the players that I don't like PvP situations, but I wouldn't take away their agency if that's what they wanted.

In the end we have a campaign on pause: characters who refuse to adventure with each other, completely divided on how to proceed. In real life, I have friends who are frustrated with the decisions of each other. I have told them that we can reset the whole evening's game, make all new characters and continue with the adventure, alter the module to give them all a satisfactory solution, or play something else.

This sounds awesome, actually. @DEFCON nailed it (quoted below for reference). What's more dramatic than the heroes starting to fight each other? To the death? Unless the bard took the deal. That would be anti-climactic.

Okay, yeah, PvP fights can get edgy. You have to put on your therapist hat and make sure no players get hurt. If one player can't handle it, make sure the more mature player is the one who loses. But it makes for a great, and memorable, scene. If the less mature player is the one leaving the party, he'll need a debrief. . .

You could start two different groups. Group 1 took the dark deal. Group 2 didn't. Have them adventure in the same world, competing for fame and fortune.

Ideally, this would work great. Practically, you need to set up another gaming group for this, because I doubt anyone wants to sit through a session watching another group play, or knowing that you'll spend the entire session sharing time with another group. Edit: also practically, setting up a second game session requires times and players that might not be available.

This sounds like the culmination of that particular game. The Big Bad had its plan... the PCs got involved... and the party became irrevocably split. At this point I would just narrate for all of them the denouement of that fight... what happened to each of the characters after one of them took the deal and what happened to everyone because of that decision.

The other option of course is that if it was only a single PC who took the deal and the others all rejected it (and tried to abandon, fight or kill the PC that did)... then the single PC becomes an NPC (and potential new Big Bad) and the other characters try to fix what broke between them all. And it's only the player of the PC that took the deal that rolls up a new character to join the group.

 

[WayOfTheFourElements]

Ideally, this would work great. Practically, you need to set up another gaming group for this, because I doubt anyone wants to sit through a session watching another group play, or knowing that you'll spend the entire session sharing time with another group.

Well, yes. That was the implication. Two groups, two nights, one world, lots of conflict.