How badly have past DMs screwed up your current Players?

[Stormonu]

The only one I can remember running across occurred at a Con I went to a couple of years back. A lady, probably in her 50's, who was completely paranoid about anything and everything in the game, to the point of threatening violence against other characters if they touched anything or tried to go anywhere without her permission.

I quickly realized why after I later that afternoon listened into her 1E/2E game that she was running. Killer DMs would have bowed before her in reverence. She opened the game by TPK'ing the party's handmade characters and then handing them (badly generated) premade characters to start the real adventure.

 

[Dausuul]

I believe i have a player with that problem right now. Any sugestions? I tried to talk already. And I don´t wanna lose him because, most of the time, he´s a good player. It´s just some nights that he goes 'lets f*** things up'.

Well, if you've talked to him about it and the talk went nowhere, you might try a little observation to see if you can figure out what "triggers" him. Are there particular scenarios where he starts balking? Or is it just a matter of how he's feeling that day? It's possible you can come up with a way to avoid whatever sets him off.

Failing that, you can always enlist the other players and fall back on the old standard, which is, "Okay, the other PCs go on the adventure. You stay in town. Nothing happens. It's very boring." If he demands you pay attention to him and the wacky things he's doing in town, simply explain that you're running an adventure for the other PCs, and resolve whatever he does with a handwave.

In the end, you may have to simply decide whether the occasional hassle is worth whatever good things he brings to the gaming table. If so, live with it. If not, give him the boot.

[Edited to add: What do the other players do when this guy refuses to bite on your hooks? Do they try to talk him into getting with the program, or do they follow his lead? If the latter, you may want to consider that the problem lies with your hooks and not with the player.]

 

[fba827]

the only "bad player habit" that i can attribute directly to their other past DMs is excessive PC paranoia - where anything and everything is out to get them, never trust anyone, an every adventure is expected to be so difficult they may as well crawl in a hole and consider themselves dead from the get-go.

anything else i've seen players do that is annoying is more often the result of individual player personality, not something i can specifically say is trained into them by past DMs.

 

[Starfox]

I've had players starved for a particular type of action or role. This is an ill derived from too large game groups with other, more dominant players setting the agenda. It is very hard to overcome - such players become overly possessive of their newfound role and won't quit.

I've had players off on power trips, and that is something I know most DMs have more issues with than I do, so I guess that's not a "bad earlier DM" thing - except perhaps that they take the chance to do what they were earlier denied. Ties in with the thing above, I guess.

I've had players with an "lets kill everything" mentality that i don't like. It is hard to say if this is a "bad earlier DM" thing or not.

And having players surrender is indeed a very hard thing to do - which we have actually become much better at. Sometimes it can work out wonderfully. It depends very much on how the scenario is written and on how important magic items and other signature gear is. Surrendiering and having your stuff taken away is much worse in DnD than in most modern-day games.

I've had players give either excessive or no backstory at all, and some of them resent any actual USE of their backstory in the game - this being to sacred to actually use in play. Some of those players I've "trained" myself by overusing their background, I guess.

I've had players that are totally uninterested in team play, there to play out their character's interaction with the world but who avoids interacting with other players. Some of that might be because they were "burnt" in earlier groups, but mostly I think its is the way they want to play - a way I find completely uninteresting.

At cons, I often overawe groups with my exuberant DMing style. At a con, you can use up characters and situations in ways you can never do in a campaign - the game is a one-off after all. In one such game, I killed six out of five characters in a horror game - one of them died so early I gave the player an NPC to play. The adventure was completely surviveable, but the players insisted on biting on all my horror hooks, making themselves victims more than investigators. They were kind of stunned, but that's not a "bad earlier DM" thing either - possibly I was the bad DM here.

Overall, it is VERY hard to make a player give up bad habits, but that might also have to do with the advancing age of my gaming groups, most of us are in our 40s now.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

The other consequence has been players who refuse to provide any kind of story for their PC so the DM has nothing to "use against them." This one bothers me the most because I prefer to get the players to feel like their PCs are really part of the world.

Sometimes that's not a defensive reaction. I generally do that because I don't like writing backstories... and I've had DMs who wanted English-class essay-style backstories.

 

[Lord Xtheth]

Back when I used to play more, I went through a few DMs that thought it was cool to insert several "No way out" death-traps into their games. For the longest time I was so very paranoid of traps I wouldn't even enter the dungeon until I knew that at least 3 other people looked for traps... then I'd send in our captured kobold first, just to make sure.

DM: You step through a strange portal you weren't able to see, you find yourself in an eerie black void, you can't breathe, and the only point of light seems to be miles away...
Me: I try to go to the light
DM: There's no traction under your feet
Me: I ... check around me for somthing to cling to, walk on, or open
DM: (not allowing a roll) There's nothing there
Me: I ... Swim? Trying to breast-stroke toward the light here...
DM: you suffocate and die. Roll up a new character
Me: That's the 3rd tonight... I think I'm done.

A player of mine has the same general attitude toward Drow. It seems that any time a drow PC or NPC has ever been in a party with him, they have all tried to stab him in the back and take his stuff. He swears for the life of him that every single drow in existence is just trying to kill him.
"But this is a Lawful Good Paladin Drow, with a holy avenger, a bonded mount, who more than once saved your life..."
"it's a cover, (s)he's going to kill me in my sleep, I swear it"

 

[kimble]

Are there particular scenarios where he starts balking? Or is it just a matter of how he's feeling that day? It's possible you can come up with a way to avoid whatever sets him off.

He needs to do things on his own. Not all the time, but at least once or twice per session. Even when there´s no reason for that. Its like he needs his 'i´m the only protagonist'-time every session. Sometimes that´s not a problem, I can work with that. But sometimes he does something crazy for no reason. Like attacking another PC or NPC just because they disagree about something stupid, and he forgets he´s not playing with the only character that matters.

Failing that, you can always enlist the other players and fall back on the old standard, which is, "Okay, the other PCs go on the adventure. You stay in town. Nothing happens. It's very boring." If he demands you pay attention to him and the wacky things he's doing in town, simply explain that you're running an adventure for the other PCs, and resolve whatever he does with a handwave.

Yeah, did that already. Other GMs too. He goes with the story like there´s no problem with it.

[Edited to add: What do the other players do when this guy refuses to bite on your hooks? Do they try to talk him into getting with the program, or do they follow his lead? If the latter, you may want to consider that the problem lies with your hooks and not with the player.]

Roll eyes, make some jokes and they talk with him too ('come on, it´ll be fun'). I believe the problem is not with my hooks, because I´m not the only GM and we saw that attitude with other GMs. Like another campaign where he had a PC with a bunch of minions, so he could play without the group.

Ask him politely not to just decide some nights to be a jerk. If that doesn't work, boot him. If following alignment strictly is insufficient reason for being a jerk then certainly failing to follow alignment is even less of a reason for being a jerk. IOW, being a jerk is never valid.

Yeah, the problem is that he´s important for the group (we play a lot at his house, most players are more his friends than mine, etc.). And it´s not like he does that all the time, its just sometimes. But those sessions always make me think 'should i keep this campaign?'.

I´m starting to consider a new group.

 

[WayneLigon]

It creeped her out enough to make her break up with the guy and leave the group. She didn't play again for years.

I strongly suspect that for every D&D player we have now, there's at least one previous D&D player out there who had the game forever ruined for him or her by bad GMing.

 

[Wepwawet]

I had a DM that was over protective, we never felt challenged. Because of that I started opening doors without Search checks or whatever, because I knew that nothing bad would happen. And if there was a trap it would be too weak. Also, any time someone had a scratch on him, there'd appear some cleric and heal him.
He plays a lot of videogames, probably that's what he was used to (like filled with loads of healing potions everytime).

Then when I started DMing the same group they'd get upset because I'd hurt them bad. Never to the point of a TPK, but enough to let them know that swords and sorcery can hurt them.

Actually, that DM still influences me, because I tend to do the same careless door-opening. I mean, it's way faster. Really, what are the chances of something hap...*BOOM*

 

[TerraDave]

I have some players I have DMed with a really long time. And they have always had certain distinct "issues". They still have them. But I don't think its me, I think its them.

They pretty much play the way they want to play.

After a long time, I have played and DMed with a range of new people. I don't see much baggage, but I do see individuals with those nagging individual issues.