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Message: <blockquote data-quote="mhacdebhandia" data-source="post: 1863391" data-attributes="member: 18832">I wasn't the DM, and in fact the player wasn't asked to leave, but I've been in a situation where the presence of a certain player drastically impaired the experience of a game for the rest of a group.She was in two games; in both she created characters with their own specific goals which were not generally compatible with those of the rest of the group, and complained often and loudly that what the group was doing was "boring" and that she wanted us to do something her character cared about.In one, sadly, run by her then-boyfriend, she got what she wanted more often than not, even after they broke up. In another, a d20 Wheel of Time game, he helped talk that game's DM into giving her character a more powerful and "interesting" character class from d20 Legend of the Five Rings after a few sessions playing with the Wheel of Time version didn't satisfy her.She talked people into giving her more powerful options or gear than the rest of the party, but still complained bitterly whenever she felt useless - and often objected to the party even engaging in activities that she couldn't directly contribute to. Playing a social character in Wheel of Time she complained about having nothing to do in combat, but preferred to rely on her (overpowered) social skill bonuses and dice rolls when interacting with NPCs, often flat-out refusing to even come up with an out-of-character explanation for exactly how she was planning to convince or intimidate or manipulate other people, much less attempt the barest amount of in-character dialogue.In the game her boyfriend ran, she came into a game which had been established for around nine months and refused to alter her character concept even though it was immediately clear that she'd have no reason to adventure with the party any more than we had a reason to help her attain her goals - which, incidentally, kept ramping up in difficulty as it became clearer to her that they weren't that impressive compared to the long-established campaign-driving goals of the original players.She was also that fun kind of gamer who takes the reactions of other people's characters to her character as the other players' criticism of her ability to roleplay, to come up with character concepts, or of herself as a person. Yet at the same time, she'd openly criticise other players and their characters for various reasons and be hurt when people reacted negatively.You get the idea.I bring this up for two reasons: one, because it's a good example of how one player can really ruin the fun of a campaign for the rest, and how important it is for DMs or the other players to have the guts to ask them to leave; two, because it was part of the reason I left the campaign run by her boyfriend.Still, I think asking a player to leave is harder than leaving yourself, for the same reasons most other people have put forward. If I leave a game, my friendships with the other players only suffer if the reason they're breaking down is the same reason I'm leaving the game. If I kick someone out of a game and they don't agree it's reasonable, the friendship inevitably suffers.The aforementioned player solved the problem herself, in a way; while she played until the end of her by-then-ex-boyfriend's campaign (the one I left), she decided a few months later to quit the Wheel of Time campaign, which was a relief to the rest of us even though she essentially gave her reasons as "I'm a crap roleplayer, my characters suck, and you all suck for hating me for it".Had she been asked to leave her boyfriend's game (nigh-on impossible, though it might have been nice if she'd done so after they broke up), I may not have quit it myself; while she wasn't the only reason I did so, part of the rest of it was that I was irritated that the DM was willing to cater to her demands for storyline and goals to pursue, while at the same time he was reversing the campaign's earlier course of being driven by the original group's goals and desires and railroading us to what he thought was a fitting conclusion to the game without concern for our opinions.</blockquote>

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