kigmatzomat said:
I'm feelin' really fortunate right now. My one Rollplayer just goes to sleep during the "talky" sections he isn't interested in. Since he's a monk we call it "meditation."
I'd go with Parlan's suggestion to sit down with the other players and ask them for advice and/or peer pressure on Bob. You won't get anything significant but it'll make it a consensus so they can't turn on you. This is important since Bob will try to make it "ForceUser vs. Me" but is probably smart enough not to rail directly against "ForceUser+Hjolnir+others vs. Me."
I've been the RBDM before and it may have fallout. Expect a temporary shutdown of the game while everyone avoids the issue of "the game" and lets Bob calm down so they can still be his friend.
To the people who say "I game with friends so we should all have fun" I respond that everyone at the table is friends with someone else at the table but they may not all be friends with each other. I've GMd and played in many groups where I didn't see or talk to half the bunch away from the game table. I've gamed for long periods of time with people I personally disliked just like I work with people I dislike. As long as my dislike for them does not taint my enjoyment of the game I put up with it.
Bob, it seems, has tainted the enjoyment of most of the group.
I think that you offer some valuable advice for a difficult situation.
To my mind, a cleric that stands for a deity should act in ways to represent that deities beliefa and interests. In game terms, a cleric of Tyr who has little regard for law or fails to act bravely would at least know the displeasure of his peers and suffer a loss of power. Equally important is the concept that a deity or a deities agents will interact with clerics. It seems that rather than treating the cleric's god as an NPC whose beliefs and feelings matter deeply to his cleric, Bob is merely viewing his cleric's deity as a "power source". Very few people like being treated as things rather than persons. I am sure that this would be more true for deities than human beings. So, in game terms, I expect Bob's characters would be in constant trouble in your campaign.
However, fusangite's point that Bob's behavior has tainted the fun of the group is a {b]critical [/b] point. I left a gaming group that I was associated with for many years, because it was no longer fun and a world that I helped create had become -- to my mind -- a farce. So, there are some questions that Hjormir and Force User must ask themselves, and their players. Is compromise possible, or even desirable? It seems that there has been some accomodation on the part of the DMs and the other players. Has Bob even attempted to compromise or understand the issues? If Bob has done neither of these, then I am doubtful that there will be much change in his behavior. One of the reasons I left my old group, as did several other players, is that the DM no longer cared about our concerns and took all criticisms personally. Indeed, he even tried to manipulate events and, according to someone I trust, probably manipulated someone whom I considered a friend as well. I left a campaign and group that I was in for over 20 years, as some faltering friendships finally came to an end. I came fairly close to giving up gaming, as I was disappointed in what happened to a group that I once considered myself part of and then left as an outsider.
Force User said:
I appreciate your perspective, friend, but unfortunately, such things have been tried with Bob and they always lead to arguments. When we say that he doesn't "get" story concerns, we mean it. In your first example, turning his paladin into a death knight is the same as killing his character in our games. We don't allow evil PCs. Thus, Bob would take it as an offense that we would handle his PC in such a way. He has a hard time separating "in-character" events from "out-of-character" events, and this leads to much frustration for everyone involved. He often assumes rulings unfavorable to his character are an act of vindictiveness on the part of the DM, when in fact it is simply the DM having his NPCs react appropriately to the situation.
I don't know how you run your games, and I'm not judging you, but in our games, a paladin is a holy exemplar of the faith, and would not whore out his celestial axiomatic dire lion mount just to make a few gold pieces. But when the DM in that game, Hjorimir, pointed out how un-paladinlike such an action would be, Bob became defensive and angry, and a game-stopping argument ensued. I remember that day clearly. I shudder. There are many more examples of such arguments from over the years.
One of the problems with my old DM, at the end of the campaign was that he was allowing anything and everything in terms of bending the rules and third-party supplements. Characters of similar level could be vastly different in terms of power, in terms of the rule books that some players were using. Tne DM took my criticisms personally, and failed to separate criticisms about his DMing style as criticisms of him as a person. It was this that brought an old friendship to an end.
I hope that there is a way to reach a compromise with Bob. I suggest that talking to the group about Bob, and having the group talking to Bob might work. At the very least, people will know where they stand with each other. I would hope that Bob can see that criticism or concern about his playing style is not an attack on him as a person. A gaming group and a campaign is about much more than rules and character classes, but how everyone relates to each other to have fun. It would seem that Bob is having some fun in the game, as are the other players. I think that Bob and the other players can reach a compromise, only if they understand and respect the views of each others. I have found that you cannot reach a solution is someone either fails to understand or care about a problem.
ForceUser, I suspect feels so strongly about the problems with Bob as he feels deeply about the other parties involved and may on some level like Bob as a person. I think the fact that both DMs care about the campaign and all the players shows some promise for a possible solution.
Not everyone is suited to every group or campaign. Perhaps Bob can learn that some things that he considers irrelevant -- such as the tenants of a faith -- do matter in a campaign world, as well as to the players and the DMs. However, I think that it is important to be honest with yourselves, Bob, as well as your other players. What does Bob bring to the gamign table, and is it more than what he takes away from the rest of the group. ? I think that it is important for DMs and players to have fun. So, I think that is the crucial issue in the group. So far, it seems that Bob is largely indifferent to the concerns of others. I find this to be one of the most troubling parts of the situation. If Bob seems to be unwilling to address the concerns of the majority of the group, then I have doubts that a compromise can be reached to keep him in the campaign.
