How to deal with a "true roleplayer".

[James Gasik]

.It sounds below like it was not a TPK, just his character getting squished.

So the party was on board with his plan.

This is all his choice here. He chose to take this into combat here.

So the party did not back him up at this point.

That is an issue.

I can see feeling angry after getting killed and feeling left out to dry and not backed up by the party when things turned south, but scorn can be an issue.

Going from stereotypical racial hate to attack is an affirmative choice.

I agree it was an encounter, but encounters do not have to go to combat. It could have easily been an insult trading back and forth.

Sounds like he wants to play a combatant who can get in over his head against a more powerful enemy, use poor tactics, and not get squished. Seems like a possible mismatch of expectations.

Not cool. That is an issue.

So the biggest issue to me as described seems to be the one true wayism on unoptimized builds and tactics and insults on those who don't character build according to his preferences.

Secondarily there is the unoptimized (rogue played as a fighter) hitting the mechanics (slow non-stealthy dwarf soloing an unengaged giant after the party ambush plan fails) and being upset by the result.

So I realized when you posted this that I failed to explain what actually happened. It was a TPK, but the DM, not wanting his game to implode because of it, allowed us to go back and redo the encounter. My friend insisted that if we did everything again, we could win with better die rolls, and said he would do the same thing he did the first time, because, again, it was what his character would do.

After some discussion, the rest of us decided that even if we won, we would probably lose more characters, and decided to evade the giant.

 

[James Gasik]

I am curious how this player behaves outside of the game. What is he like at work? Do you play board games, sports, or engage in any other non-gaming activities with him? I know a lot of friends and colleagues who I can enjoy hanging out with but wouldn't want to have in my D&D campaign. Also, which game you are playing can make a big difference. I think that this player could be great in a Paranoia campaign, but his belly aching and comments on the DM and other players are big red flags to me.

Believe it or not, I've known him for, oh jeez, a long freaking time. He's the uncle of a friend I had back in grade school, and he was the main DM when we played AD&D. We had to drag him into playing "that horrible WotC edition" (his words) kicking and screaming, because that's what people play now and our attempt to teach people how to play AD&D did not go well (we used 2e because there's a girl in the group who likes to play warrior types, and I figured the Strength limits would not go over well).

As a DM, he's great, his games are more about roleplaying and story than combat, and even if you make bad decisions, they rarely end in death. When I was younger and more foolish, we were camping in the forest and a bear came up to the campsite, and my gladiator decided to fight the bear. I got mauled, but survived and learned a valuable lesson- no I'm lying, because I later tried to fight a shark and lost an arm for my trouble.

But when he plays, it's like he's not making a player character, as much as a memorable NPC. He gives them a backstory, oddball build choices that "make sense" (I know he gets annoyed at the few skills choices in 5e, because he'll be like "my character is a sailor, of course he should have Perform so he could entertain people on long sea journeys"), and then keep playing to script, never learning or deviating from this character. I guess it's like there's no end game here, he expects them to remain static from the moment of inception to the end of the campaign.

And it just doesn't jive with the rest of the group. Like the Web incident, it wasn't that he burned the webs away that was the problem, so much as when he did it; we were always going to fight the webbed enemies, but we wanted to deal with them in an orderly fashion. Doing so all at once after dealing a few points of measly fire damage was, in the Wizard's opinion, a total waste of his spell.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

Hmmm. Out of curiosity, when he was DMing AD&D, was he a forever DM? Because I've seen sometimes where people that have only ever DM'ed just don't have as much experience as players. A lot of the social contract skills players develop over the years are absent (though certainly, some players don't have them either).

Another possibility I've seen is that when some players don't fully grok the system, they engage in more disruptive behavior as a way to engage with the game. Or they just stick to simple things, like setting things on fire instead of having to keep their sneak attack rules straight.

Believe it or not, I've known him for, oh jeez, a long freaking time. He's the uncle of a friend I had back in grade school, and he was the main DM when we played AD&D. We had to drag him into playing "that horrible WotC edition" (his words) kicking and screaming, because that's what people play now and our attempt to teach people how to play AD&D did not go well (we used 2e because there's a girl in the group who likes to play warrior types, and I figured the Strength limits would not go over well).

As a DM, he's great, his games are more about roleplaying and story than combat, and even if you make bad decisions, they rarely end in death. When I was younger and more foolish, we were camping in the forest and a bear came up to the campsite, and my gladiator decided to fight the bear. I got mauled, but survived and learned a valuable lesson- no I'm lying, because I later tried to fight a shark and lost an arm for my trouble.

But when he plays, it's like he's not making a player character, as much as a memorable NPC. He gives them a backstory, oddball build choices that "make sense" (I know he gets annoyed at the few skills choices in 5e, because he'll be like "my character is a sailor, of course he should have Perform so he could entertain people on long sea journeys"), and then keep playing to script, never learning or deviating from this character. I guess it's like there's no end game here, he expects them to remain static from the moment of inception to the end of the campaign.

And it just doesn't jive with the rest of the group. Like the Web incident, it wasn't that he burned the webs away that was the problem, so much as when he did it; we were always going to fight the webbed enemies, but we wanted to deal with them in an orderly fashion. Doing so all at once after dealing a few points of measly fire damage was, in the Wizard's opinion, a total waste of his spell.

 

[pointofyou]

If there is this sort of failure to align at the table there needs to be some adjustment both in the sense that he needs to adjust to the rest of the table and in the sense that the rest of the table needs to adjust to him. If that proves not to be possible then he probably simply will not work at that table.

 

[James Gasik]

Hmmm. Out of curiosity, when he was DMing AD&D, was he a forever DM? Because I've seen sometimes where people that have only ever DM'ed just don't have as much experience as players. A lot of the social contract skills players develop over the years are absent (though certainly, some players don't have them either).

Another possibility I've seen is that when some players don't fully grok the system, they engage in more disruptive behavior as a way to engage with the game. Or they just stick to simple things, like setting things on fire instead of having to keep their sneak attack rules straight.

If I had to count his actual PC's over the years, I probably wouldn't run out of fingers, no. And he's always going on about how awesome some of them were, even a guy he played for ONE session, a Fighter with 7 Intelligence and 9 Wisdom, but 17 Charisma, who was convinced he was a genius.

 

[Haplo781]

If I had to count his actual PC's over the years, I probably wouldn't run out of fingers, no. And he's always going on about how awesome some of them were, even a guy he played for ONE session, a Fighter with 7 Intelligence and 9 Wisdom, but 17 Charisma, who was convinced he was a genius.

See that one isn't a problem, presuming he could actually hit things.

 

[James Gasik]

See that one isn't a problem, presuming he could actually hit things.

I mean it was AD&D, so most people don't have high bonuses to hit. I do remember him wanting to buy high quality studded leather armor with "diamond studs, because he thinks it will look cool".

 

[Lanefan]

I feel like the core distinction here in play preferences is that the metagame aspect of looking for synergies, making sure the party has bases covered, and no one concept is overshadowing another can also be considered fun, in and of itself. I like thinking up concepts that play well with what someone else might be playing.

I fully agree with making sure the party has the bases covered but don't agree that doing so should soft-force players into playing characters or classes or roles they don't necessarily want to play. This goes back to the old 1e saw "Last one to arrive has to play the Cleric". No. play what you want, then recruit NPCs - there's a whole world full of 'em out there - to fill holes if necessary.

As for overshadowing, IME it happens all the time and there's rarely any resentment because most (as in, nearly all) of the time it's an established character overshadowing a new one. @Blue posted an unusual example where a new character came in and overshadowed an established one: I can only assume the new character came in at the same level as those existing, bringing new ones in a level or two lower solves this issue before it arises.

Also, my usual situation is a big sprwaling type of campaign where parties form or coalesce, run for a while, then interweave with other parties, change membership, and so forth; meaning you never know who you'll be running with down the road.

 

[MNblockhead]

That fact that he has so much experience DMing and still got on the DM's case in your current game just lowers my estimation of him. Geez man, have a little empathy and gratitude. I would think that he is trying to tank the game so that he can offer to DM, but you did mention that he plays a lot. Bottom line, whatever his good characteristics may be, he clearly doesn't seem to be a good fit for this group.

 

[Lanefan]

I'm not so sure you're dealing with a "true roleplayer" here. This sounds more like an Instigator to me.

I love instigators! Players who just have their characters get on with it and make things happen - way more fun and entertaining than players who have their characters hang back, be cautious, and in the end don't get much done.

However, what happens in character stays in character. The OP's tale of the player complaining at the table and making a meal of things isn't the sort of thing that flies well.

Reading later that the DM allowed a do-over after the initial TPK also doesn't sit well with me: do-overs are never a good idea. In my view in this instance it's just asking for trouble: the Dwarf's not going to change his actions, meaning either the Dwarf will get hung out to dry (as happened) or - assuming the Giant is in fact unbeatable by the party - the party will just TPK again.

There's a whole lot of doing stuff just to see what happens, regardless of what the other players want or are doing, because it means the whole course of the game has altered to revolve around them and their actions.

As to how to deal with them when you're not the DM, that's a tough call. When I'm the DM, when I've got an instigator, I always try to make sure that the consequences affect only the Instigator, and that it's over and done with as quickly as possible.

My response as a DM is quite often an internal "Thank gods, something's finally going to happen!", particularly if the instigator is interrupting a drawn-out round of planning and-or caution by doing something gonzo.

The consequences - if any - fall where they fall.

As a fellow player, I dunno.

My response to that as fellow player is (if it makes sense for the character I'm playing) to instigate right back and encourage others to do likewise - be a leader, not a follower. Try stuff, even if it seems (or is!) gonzo. Be entertaining in character. Make us laugh.

And if he's telling other players how superior his characters are to this,

Yeah, that's a bad sign if the player is serious about it; though it's not an issue if the player's just joking around.