@Oofta is right. You keep ignoring the whole discussion and you focus/nitpick on what you believe will prove your point by taking it out of its context. You're not a bad person, but your approach to most discussion is usually a twisted view of what was or what was not said. You cite the tiny bit that goes along what you want to prove and ignore the rest.
Again, you're a good open minded person. You have a lot to offer this forum for your analytical mind is also a kind one. But what you do is perceived as nitpicking (and I am sure it is not your intention) can get a lot of bad reactions. Try to see both sides of a post and temper yourself (something I must do myself, I am not perfect either). Nothing is ever fully black or white. There are a lot of shades of grey... (no I don't refer to that damn book...)
He accused me of lying about what he said.
I quoted back to him, from that same post I had originally posted, exactly what he said I was lying about.
Even if I fixate on portions of points instead of the wider swath of an argument, I don't see how that applies to false accusations.
And for our subject...
Yes we are talking about rare exceptions where a toxic or very obnoxious player will want to pervert a campaign or drive the DM to "his" side. But if such players were so rare, why does everyone here have a story about some? When tournaments were done in the 80's, I have had my share, and more than one of this type of players. In fact, as I was often the Prime DM for the tournaments, I often had to come into a table and settle an arguement. Often giving a player a warning for not abiding by the rule of the DM. Only once in a dozen or so tournament have I to rule against a DM. Tournament rules and expectations were quite clear. Yet quite a few players were trying to pull off stuff that were not in the rules or simply bad interpretation.
One example: A player was insisting on casting Feign Death on unwilling subject as to put them on catalepsis and simply killing them. It was not how the spell was working and it degenerated into a shouting match between the DM and the player. I had to put that player out and it almost cost his team a place in the next phase of the tournament. Fortunately, once out of the game, I got to talk to the player and he finally understood that his behavior was not welcomed. He came to the next phase and behaved as was expected of him.
We all agree that, as the relationship between players and DM evolves, trust comes and frictions and arguements go down to become a rarity. And whenever we get a new player, most experienced DM will make sure that this new player will understand the written and the unwritten rules of the table. It's only when the DM does not inform the new player (be it online or live) that potential situations for arguments can arise. So I strongly believe that most situations can be resolved quickly without hurting the feelings of anyone.
So, we want to talk about rare exceptions with toxic or obnoxious people?
Okay, I heard a story once, a DM wanted to introduce two new people who had never payed DnD to his "perfect" version of 4th editions. He invited them over to his house along with two other people, and began the long, by hand process of creating their characters. Except, he had told the players that each person had to play a single role in the party. Then as he presented each of the classes in the role, he told them which class was the best for that role, and that the others weren't worth taking. Then he told them about every race they could potentially choose, before telling them that with the classes they had, these were the best races and they should just take those. And then he presented every single power that the class had access to... before telling them that in actuality, there was only one choice and they should just take that.
He subjected them to nearly four hours of this. Exhaustively telling them every single option, before informing them that there was only one "real" choice and that they should just write that down on their sheet.
When they finally left, according to the player reporting the story, not only did they never come back to play DnD, but they also had a statement, "DnD seems like it has a lot of options, but really if there is only one choice I don't get the point."
By overbearing them and trying to craft his "perfect" adventurers for his "perfect game" he drove them off.
Or, since we need to focus on the rare exceptions of toxic people, I have heard another story.
A guy who told his players to make high-level powerful characters with legendary magic items. He railroaded them from being arrested twice to meeting his DMPC, the King and Demigod of a Secret Magical Kingdom with Five Ancient Chromatic Dragons as pets. Eventually they end up fighting a Lich Lord they weren't supposed to beat. In fact, after beating him the DM pulled a "Fools! My real body is over here" but had forgotten that among those legendary magical items, there was a Ring of Time Stop, which the party used to kill the Lich a second time. The DM then ruled that their manipulation of time created a Paradox and exploded the universe. Game over.
So, if the rare exceptions of toxic and/or obnoxious players requires the DM role to exist, and have some form of Final or Ultimate Authority and ownership of the game to prevent those players from ruining everything, what role do we create for the rare exceptions or toxic and/or obnoxious DMs, who use this Ultimate Authority and Ownership of the game for ill purposes?
I mean, the purpose of the DM is tied so intrinsically to these rare Toxic players, that we literally can't have a discussion about how authority is handled within the game without bringing them up over and over and over again. The entire game was designed with the role of DM in mind, creating this power dynamic for, seemingly, this sole purposes. So, with the equally common, equally toxic DMs, clearly we need a new role in the community, right? Because the only solution we have for the player problem is to create DMs.
Or, maybe, that argument doesn't seem to hold a lot of water. Which, makes me wonder why the player argument is, well, quite literally the only one people seem to make.
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Many consider purposeful omission to be lying. You were omitting a ton of obvious facts about what he was saying in order to paint a picture that he meant something he didn't mean.
I made the post showing that he said exactly what I said he said. I omitted nothing in that post that applied to his misrepresentations of the positions being put forth.
Sure, he said "there is a wide spectrum on both sides" but that doesn't excuse him accusing us of arguments we never made. You know, the thing he is accusing me of doing? And that you are accusing me of doing. And Helldritch is accusing me of doing.
If you want to claim that my single post did not encapsulate the entirety of every single argument he has made over the last 50 pages? Guilty as charged. I was responding to 1 post, not every single argument Oofta has ever made.
And if you need to double check, it is trivially easy to follow those posts back and read exactly what both of us said.
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I'm not offended, but I am annoyed that he put me in the awkward position of having to say no to him, after he put such lot of work into it.
I'm sorry you are annoyed, but it seems rather clear to me that there was no malicious intent. At worst, he wanted to build a part of a world he has been enjoying, potentially after seeing that you weren't going to, and thinking it was only because you were too busy.
It may be awkward, but I'd take "awkwardly being a fan" over a lot of other attitudes I've seen.
They like my world and my characters, and they absolutely feel a bond with them. These are characters they have known for several years now. They don't like someone else (even if it is a fellow player) inserting their own characters into something they like. It is an unwelcome addition. Further more, if someone were to name these nameless npc's, they'd prefer it to be me.
It's kind of like reading a book from your favorite author, and another reader coming in and making their own additions. The additions aren't necessarily bad, but no one asked for it.
As a group we have an agreement that the DM writes and runs the world, and the players write and run their own character. The only collaboration occurs when we want to weave their backstories into the world I created.
Yeah, look, I get that they like your stuff, but this is sounding more and more like a mountain out of a molehill. Maybe it is just because I've gotten into the fanfiction community a little, but the idea that the guy was somehow in the wrong for adding to a world he likes makes no sense. And being offended that a guest author came in to create something is just.... out of this world to me.
Frankly, when you first started this example, I thought the characters themselves were offensive, or horrifically written, or some other aspect of the characters themselves were the offensive part of this. But, it really sounds like you guys are just not happy that he played in your sandbox. And I can't find it in me to picture someone earnestly interested in fleshing out these crews that you had zero intention of fleshing out, as somehow having done something wrong.
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Has it occurred to people that it's a pain in the neck to have to be asked to give your opinion if a real interpretation is reasonable or not. I suspect would most people would prefer there's a person to decide so that they can move on with the game.
Hell, I use to become really annoyed when there was a rule issue and the GM would root around in the books looking for an answer. "Just make a decision" I would think so we could get on with playing the game we were all there to play.
The GM controls the pace of the game so therefore the GM is naturally the one too lead. Hell even if you're making a ruling by consensus it's most likely the GM who's leading the discussion that leads to consensus.
Or the player with the most rules experience. They can also make calls on the rules.
This is the point I keep trying to make, the DM can do these things, but it is not a requirement.
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No compromise is possible, because compromise involves.............compromise. When you have zero middle ground, no compromise is possible. Giving in to the other side is not compromising, no matter what you might think. It's ceding your position. I mean, if giving in to one person completely is compromise, then even the most authoritarian DM is compromising with all the players that do as he says.
I knew it was a waste of digital ink to try and give examples of how you can compromise in that situation. Obviously it was going to be ignored in favor of a black and white view of the world.
