DMs: What are your character pet peeves?

[Tyler Do'Urden]

I guess I am a bit old-skool in some regards... but I think one of the problems is players feeling that they can "insist" upon such things in the first place.

Just because a race appears with a level-adjustment (or a silly monster-class progression) in some book somewhere does not mean that a DM is required to let you play it.

Asking is fine of course. But the player needs to have a VERY solid back-story and character concept to make it worthwhile. And even then I would veto the idea if it was completely out-of-place in the campaign I was running.

Yes, this. Back when I ran 2nd edition AD&D in high school, I had a player who would show up at the game with some piece of complete cheese (like the Complete Humanoid's Handbook, or Faiths and Avatars, or both) and insist that he had to play a Minotaur Specialty Priest of Mystra or some such nonsense. Then, when I'd say no, he'd pout and say that I had no right to do that, it was part of D&D and therefore he could use it, he'd take his dice and go home, etc. It was really, really annoying.

What made it all the more annoying was that, using the Player's Option series and Michael Morris's "Dusk" materials (which were then hosted on TSR's website), I'd built a very elaborate (and often unbalanced) system of character customization which should have been sufficient to keep any creative player busy for years.

You just can't please some people.

Now, 3e's racial classes and ELs were an innovation I really, really liked. But I always placed restrictions on using them to prevent cantina-scene scenarios. Nobody complained- I think it was a matter of increased maturity...

 

[Kzach]

Players that make ineffective characters. I get that you're a special snowflake who wants to have some random assortment of roleplaying menagerie stuck together by sheer force of will, but the simple fact of the matter is that such a character is a detriment to the rest of the group. Work WITHIN the system, not AGAINST it.

 

[Tyler Do'Urden]

Players that make ineffective characters. I get that you're a special snowflake who wants to have some random assortment of roleplaying menagerie stuck together by sheer force of will, but the simple fact of the matter is that such a character is a detriment to the rest of the group. Work WITHIN the system, not AGAINST it.

Oftentimes, however, what constitutes an effective character can vary heavily with the setting and DM. The "random assortment of roleplaying menagerie" type character would probably be pretty effective in a campaign that I run, given my DMing style, whereas I tend to go out of my way to penalize one-trick pony combat monsters and the like. Often figuring out what constitutes an effective character requires seeing what the DM pays attention to and what they don't, and that can take a few sessions to "feel out".

For instance, some DMs blow past wilderness survival matters and go straight to the dungeon. In such a game, a ranger or scout-type character with abilities optimized for wilderness survival, travel and combat would feel a little weak. If the DM doesn't bother rolling social skills, your social skill-heavy rogue or bard with the high charisma becomes more of a liability than an advantage (given the half-orc with the 8 in Charisma is being judged solely on his player's merits- not the character's).

I tend to run games which favor "utility belt" characters with a variety of different abilities and competencies, whereas most DMs (with one exception) that I've ever played with tend to play campaigns heavily biased towards combat maximization, because other parts are simply "narrated". 3e/3.5/Pathfinder tends towards the first DMing style, whereas 4e was largely designed to favor the second approach (given WotC realized that most DMs were playing that style, and decided to run with it- which was an appropriate move on their part, even if it wasn't the one which I'd favor; I'm in the minority).

Though if you meant a completely incompetent character, well, that's something different from the "utility belt" character (or, it's a utility character that doesn't work)...

 

[haakon1]

I tend to run games which favor "utility belt" characters with a variety of different abilities and competencies, whereas most DMs (with one exception) that I've ever played with tend to play campaigns heavily biased towards combat maximization, because other parts are simply "narrated". 3e/3.5/Pathfinder tends towards the first DMing style, whereas 4e was largely designed to favor the second approach (given WotC realized that most DMs were playing that style, and decided to run with it- which was an appropriate move on their part, even if it wasn't the one which I'd favor; I'm in the minority).

I, for one, favor the well-rounded character too. For example, I want to know how the character made a living before being an adventurer, and have the character sheet back that up (so a few skill points in Profession (Boatman) or whatever). And everyone needs to do at least some Diplomacy or other social interaction -- both by telling me what they are trying to say and rolling the dice + skill.

In my email campaign, we spend FAR more time out combat than in it. They solved the most recent adventure mostly with social interaction, by building relationships with NPCs and then using Diplomacy on the "Big Bad" and talking him down. (He wasn't actually evil, and in the critical juncture, do or die Diplomacy roll, the party spokesman got a natch 20 and talked him into stopping what he'd been doing -- Paizo Module "The Last Baron".) In the latest level up, most people put at least some points into the social skills.

For my "live" campaign, we just don't have time for much else, so we tend to get to the combat much quicker.

But as a DM, it's definitely not min-maxing toy combat that gives me my jollies. It's building the setting, creating the NPC's, setting up the scenarios, and seeing the players do the stuff nobody ever thought they would.

I've actually only known one DM who was fixated on all combat, all the time, with almost no interest in setting and NPC's. He's also the only person I know who likes 4e better than 3.5e. But he's actually stepped up his game a lot and added a lot of Netir Value background stuff. To me, that means he's becoming a "better" DM, but I guess that view might not be popular.

The other DM's I've known were mostly storytellers, or a mix of storyteller/role player/ and get on with the combat.

 

[Kzach]

Though if you meant a completely incompetent character, well, that's something different from the "utility belt" character (or, it's a utility character that doesn't work)...

I'm pretty sure I said that...

Players that make ineffective characters.

...yeup, I did.

 

[Pilgrim]

Characters with in-depth character backgrounds prior to start or background/history that describes the character as being someone of "importance" at 1st level.

Players who play characters as if they had knowledge of modern era concepts.

Characters (or players) who want to initiate deep romance or estranged sexual orientation into their character.

Critically optimized characters.

 

[Rhenny]

My pet peeve is when a player can't decide on a name for his character so he calls himself "The Coweled One." (A terrific friend of mine did this in one of our games over 30 years ago...I still hate it.)

 

[Wiseblood]

My pet peeves outnumber 4e's powers so I'll randomly determine which one to metion here.

Dang my wife hid my dice.

Well bandwagon it is....

If you aren't a Dwarf, Elf, Gnome, Halfling or Human I'm offended that you are here pretending to breathe my imaginary air.

 

[Tyler Do'Urden]

I'm pretty sure I said that...



...yeup, I did.

Yes, and I was saying that "ineffective" can vary tremendously with DMing style.

 

[Elf Witch]

My biggest peeve is the rogue who steals from the party. I hate it so much that I will find away to get the sucker caught by the rest of the party. It makes no sense to me that you would steal from the people who are helping keep you alive.

I had a player do that he was stealing items the other characters needed and selling them in town even the healing wands I put in the game. I finally had the cleric healing spell not go off one day. I told the cleric you feel that something is blocking your divine power. The rogue had stolen an important relic of the cleric god so the god was really angry.

The healing would not work again until the rogue fessed up about what he was doing and made amends.


My second is two fold power gamers and lame ducks. Both cause issues. The power gamer character is so awesome that he overshadows every other character and makes it hard for me to come up with a challenge that will challenge him and not kill the rest of the party.

Lame ducks on the other hand bring the over all party power down and make the rest of the party carry them because they don't contribute anything at all to the game.

And my last is lone wolves they just don't work with a game that is meant to be a cooperative one.