Jeff Wilder
First Post
The question is mostly self-explanatory, but I will clarify that I mostly have in mind "a largely unobjectionable player," with the implication that your behavior was ... not ideal.
This will come as a universal shock to the reader (you may want to be seated), but I can be an abrasive guy. Often intentionally, sometimes not, and even sometimes when my intent is just the opposite. So I'm sure that there are situations besides the three below in which players have left games because of me. These are just those I know for sure, and the ones where it wasn't my intention to drive the player away.
The first 3E campaign I was in, there was this tall Asian dude playing a halfling. I kinda liked the guy ... he was laid back, low-key, and somewhat shy, but he also actively participated in the game. But, using my 12 ranks in Social Backfiring, I alienated him by remarking -- as a true observation, meant in fun and meant to help him feel included -- on the length of his fingers. (And man, I am serious. The dude's fingers were freakishly long. Like 25 percent longer than mine, and I have large hands.)
Now, there are a lot of people who respond well to this behavior of mine -- inclusive teasing -- whatever merits it has or lacks, objectively, as a behavior. But this guy wasn't one of them; he didn't show for the next session, and the DM (who is now a very good friend) let me know two years later than I was the reason he disappeared.
Same campaign, maybe six months later, we had this guy playing a bard. Gay dude, kinda flamboyant, with a serious streak of cheesy dramatist in him. His go-to schtick for being intimidating was casting pyrotechnics and fingering his rapier while staring at the victim menacingly. At probably around the fifth occurrrence of this exact same script, I started making meta-gamey half-IC/half-OOC comments. They started gently, but escalated with each occurrence. Eventually he got seriously pissed and quit the game. (I honestly wasn't trying to drive him away. He's a nice enough guy. He's just ... cheesy, and I was -- admittedly passive-aggressively -- trying to get him to stop. But he went from seeming oblivious to my attempts to being absolutely furious in the sppace of about 0.7 seconds.)
Years later, I'm DMing a brutal published module detailing an orc stronghold. Newish player, who I largely liked because of his engagement with the game, went prone during a combat while surrounded by orcs. On his turn, he stated he was standing up. I pointed out that he had few HP left, and that the orcs would all get AoOs at +4 to hit, so standing up might not be a good idea. I even suggested, "You could, for example, try to fake unconsciousness." The other players chimed in, more or less echoing my warning.
But he stood up, and was hacked to pieces. He got really pissed. But he seemed to calm down, and started on a new character. Between sessions, we corresponded via email, and he repeatedly tried to talk me into allowing him to take Craft Magic Arms and Armor at 3rd level, though the requirement was 5th level. I repeatedly turned him down, telling him that I wasn't comfortable with him being able to start his new character with self-crafted magic items at 5th level (the level of the party), when if he were working up from 1st level he wouldn't be able to do it until he was 6th level. The exchanges were civil, if tedious, and his character was otherwise a good one. (He really was into the game, engaged as a player and prone to submersion.)
But the next thing I knew, he was sending me email that he and his SO were withdrawing from the game. I asked why, and told him (sincerely) that I'd miss him as a player, but he didn't respond to me, instead responding to ... all the other players about how unfair it was that his PC had died, and how unfair it was that I wouldn't bend the Craft Arms and Armor rules for him. He ran me down impressively, in about a six-page email.
My other players (almost all of whom are good friends now) had a good laugh over it ... mostly at him, but they understandably like to see me discomfited now and then.
This will come as a universal shock to the reader (you may want to be seated), but I can be an abrasive guy. Often intentionally, sometimes not, and even sometimes when my intent is just the opposite. So I'm sure that there are situations besides the three below in which players have left games because of me. These are just those I know for sure, and the ones where it wasn't my intention to drive the player away.
The first 3E campaign I was in, there was this tall Asian dude playing a halfling. I kinda liked the guy ... he was laid back, low-key, and somewhat shy, but he also actively participated in the game. But, using my 12 ranks in Social Backfiring, I alienated him by remarking -- as a true observation, meant in fun and meant to help him feel included -- on the length of his fingers. (And man, I am serious. The dude's fingers were freakishly long. Like 25 percent longer than mine, and I have large hands.)
Now, there are a lot of people who respond well to this behavior of mine -- inclusive teasing -- whatever merits it has or lacks, objectively, as a behavior. But this guy wasn't one of them; he didn't show for the next session, and the DM (who is now a very good friend) let me know two years later than I was the reason he disappeared.
Same campaign, maybe six months later, we had this guy playing a bard. Gay dude, kinda flamboyant, with a serious streak of cheesy dramatist in him. His go-to schtick for being intimidating was casting pyrotechnics and fingering his rapier while staring at the victim menacingly. At probably around the fifth occurrrence of this exact same script, I started making meta-gamey half-IC/half-OOC comments. They started gently, but escalated with each occurrence. Eventually he got seriously pissed and quit the game. (I honestly wasn't trying to drive him away. He's a nice enough guy. He's just ... cheesy, and I was -- admittedly passive-aggressively -- trying to get him to stop. But he went from seeming oblivious to my attempts to being absolutely furious in the sppace of about 0.7 seconds.)
Years later, I'm DMing a brutal published module detailing an orc stronghold. Newish player, who I largely liked because of his engagement with the game, went prone during a combat while surrounded by orcs. On his turn, he stated he was standing up. I pointed out that he had few HP left, and that the orcs would all get AoOs at +4 to hit, so standing up might not be a good idea. I even suggested, "You could, for example, try to fake unconsciousness." The other players chimed in, more or less echoing my warning.
But he stood up, and was hacked to pieces. He got really pissed. But he seemed to calm down, and started on a new character. Between sessions, we corresponded via email, and he repeatedly tried to talk me into allowing him to take Craft Magic Arms and Armor at 3rd level, though the requirement was 5th level. I repeatedly turned him down, telling him that I wasn't comfortable with him being able to start his new character with self-crafted magic items at 5th level (the level of the party), when if he were working up from 1st level he wouldn't be able to do it until he was 6th level. The exchanges were civil, if tedious, and his character was otherwise a good one. (He really was into the game, engaged as a player and prone to submersion.)
But the next thing I knew, he was sending me email that he and his SO were withdrawing from the game. I asked why, and told him (sincerely) that I'd miss him as a player, but he didn't respond to me, instead responding to ... all the other players about how unfair it was that his PC had died, and how unfair it was that I wouldn't bend the Craft Arms and Armor rules for him. He ran me down impressively, in about a six-page email.
My other players (almost all of whom are good friends now) had a good laugh over it ... mostly at him, but they understandably like to see me discomfited now and then.
