Meta-gaming Player

[Primitive Screwhead]

This is why pre-game assumptions need to be set.

I handle most of the mundane shopping off-camera. Email traffic or sitting around before/after the session is good.
I set a gp-limit based on where the PC is, and they pay list price for anything under that.
Anything over that must be requested and may cost more or be unavailble..or have a plot hook attached.
Selling is also affected by the gp-limit. Anything list priced under the limit can be sold for 50% of list. Anything over must be requested and the price may vary or the item not even get bought.
- This is the default. If the player wants to use thier skillz and roleplay the interaction, they will probably get a better bargain.

Most interactions within the game are plot related..unless the party has wandered off on a tangent. In which case I will go along with it until they give up or it turns into a plot

Most PC backgrounds are an integral part of the story line. I would bring the captured wife as teh main focus for 3 or 4 sessions. At the end of the arc he would be able to potentially rescue his wife, and learn about the mastermind/evil genius/bad next thing to keep the adventure going...
- Or focus on another characters background plothook and drag him in with a 'they helped you, time to help them'


Mainly my advise to you is a bit late... before the game make sure the baseline assumptions of how things are going to go are set. Include:
- Standards for purchase/selling
- Standards for use of such rules as encumbrance, appraise, Kn Local
- Define 'normal' for cities, towns, villages, wildlands
- Set a reward system that encourages the type of play you find fun. In this case adhoc Action Points may be the best method as your 'problem' player will see the rules-value in them. Note here, ensure your system is obviously fair and equitably handed out.

Some advise that might be on time.. tell the player that this time you will let him trade in the gems as he did, but in the future he needs to abide by the standards for purchases. Tell him that *this* time there will be a plot hook attached to those gems.
{depending on where the campaign sits, and how the rest of the party goes.. I would have one of them previously belong to his wife, allowing a lead towards finding the slavers....then start the next session with "Joe needs to talk to y'all" and he can pitch the adventure to the rest of the group IC, possibly gaining rpXP for doing this piece well.}

 

[VirgilCaine]

Oh, you mean people like:
Conan
Heracles
Lancelot
Reynard
Were not Heroes? Read some of the things they got up to. They were indeed heroes, as well as violent lunatics....

Or do you think that PCs do not get up to shenanigans? Or that all regimes welcome people who, ahem, upset the apple cart?

I beg to differ.

The Auld Grump, sometimes the townsfolk like the evil despot that the heroes have come to kill...

Who's Reynard? I get why you mention the other three.
Sure, violent lunatic AND heroic deeds, yes. Heroes, no.

I KNOW PCs get up to shenanigans.

 

[DM-Rocco]

I have a problem with a player who continually meta-games. At the moment it is not too extreme and I have previously dealt with a player who was much worse. He rarely does anything in character and is always thinking about loot and XP. This is not necessarily a bad thing in the right sort of group but everyone else is not like that. He is a stark contrast to the rest of the group and it kind of stands out.

The rest of the group, a couple of players in particular, get right into their characters. They make sub-optimal combat choices or say things that they know out-of-character are dumb but are still things that their character would do. The meta-gamer seems to treat the game as some sort of tactical wargame. I understand that this is a valid way to play and is originally where D&D came from in the first place. That doesn't really help my situation though!

It there any hope of turning him around to a similar playstyle as everyone else or do you think that this is just a situation where he just wants to play a different sort of game to the rest of us and it is best if we just part ways?

The meta-gamer has come up with a background which is a step in the right direction and better than what some players do. However the background is that his wife was taken by slavers. He knows that he doesn't have enough money or power to rescue her so he took up adventuring to try and fix that problem. This conveniently matches in with his meta-gaming wishes for more loot and XP. Personally, I think if someone took my wife I would be trying to get her back at all costs. If I died trying then at least I know I tried. I wouldn't go work out in the gym, take martial arts, boxing and firearms training for a year or so and then give it a go!

The last session that we played he got a little upset a couple of times. The first time was because I wouldn't let him carry into town the 9 light crossbows and 9 longspears that he had taken from some fiendish locathah that the party had killed. My arguement was how he was going to carry them (never mind that they were coated in sewerage and slime). The rest of the players hadn't even though about taking them but he just saw them as XXgp resale value.

The other incident involved him wanting to scribe a spell on a scroll. The party is in the city of Freeport, a reasonably big place. He just wanted to cross off XXgp from his character sheet and then scribe the scroll. I asked where and how he planned to get the paper and materials from. He said that they were common items and he should be able to find them easily.

This is a fair enough arguement but I think that it is besides the point. What is the point of playing an RPG if you are just going to fast foward past all of the interactions with people that are not explicitly related to the main plot. We only play once a fortnight and he said afterwards that he didn't want the game to be taken up with stuff like that. The rest of the group didn't have a problem with it but he just seemed to be in a hurry to keep everything moving forward at a rapid rate.

After only 2 sessions of about 4-4.5 hours each he asked when we were going to level up because it seemed to be taking ages. (As a side note the party levelled, going from 3rd to 4th, halfway through the next session)

Is there any way that I can get him out of the meta-gaming mentality or is it better if we just go our seperate ways? I can tell that our playstyles are very different, but do you think there are ways that I can keep him happy, without destroying everyone else's fun?

Olaf the Stout

P.S. Apologies if it sounds a little bitchy and one-sided.

Hmm, this thread interests me. I apologize for not reading everyone elses comments, I will later tonight. I am at work and can't take the time to do so now, lol, but I have time to reply

I think there is a fine line here between Meta-Gaming and good role-playing. I think he has probably crossed the line once or twice, but I am not sure that his actions are always meta-gaming.

First, it is important to note, this is a game, and while it doesn't have a set of parameters to win, it does have goals, most commonly XP and Loot. Yes, there is a role-playing element to it and that is fun too, but there is only a small section of a sample game session in the DMG and thousands of rules to reward the character with things like feats, skills, PrC's, spells, magic items and such. We, as either players or DMs know far more about the rewards of playing than the elements of playing itself.

I try to have them role-play when I DM and sometimes I just let them play bashers and hack and slash. I find it wirks well to let them use a little of both styles from time to time.

It sounds like this PC is more of the Kick in the Door style of play than the role-playing style of play. Neither is wrong and you both have to admit that or you will always have conflict. If you have not done so, I would suggest reading the article in the last Dungeon Magazine, it's the DM's fault; cause it could be.

Here is what I mean, and the article will tell you the same thing. When you first started the game, did you lay out expectations for the players on what you expected from them and how role-playing should be handled. If not, it is your own fault cause as a DM, you are the law in the game and must, I repeat MUST set the stage and tone of the game. I won't go on about that any more though cause I don't want you to think I am taking a shot at you and I don't really now your true style or every detail about your game. I would recommend reading that article though.

Next, assuming he has a clear expectation of his role in the game, try talking to him about his style of play and make gentle suggestions. I would also get a quick background from him. Here is why, I have played Magic the Gathering competatively, nationally I was ranked. I have made money playing a game that others played for fun. Magic is not D&D, but the feeling doesn't go away over night. When money is at stake, you have to scan your enemies, which is everyone else, find out what they are playing and either play that too or find something that you can play that will beat the most popular decks. This is meta-gaming and it is a must in such a sport. However, as a result, I don't get much fun out of playing Magic for fun with friend cause my mind knows the thousands of pages of errata by heart and they don't. You don't feel like you can tell them that they are wrong cause some idiot at WTOTC didn't word the card right before printing. I also build much better deck than they do. Decks that focus on the =objective of the game, bringing your opponent to less than zero life or running them out of cards as quickly as possible. They build decks with themes, like dragons that can't be put into play until turn ten, when they have died 10 times over. Find out his games of interest, see if he has any competative background in games like Magic. It might help explain a lot of things.

About his wanting to carry back spears and such to sell them for loot, that is part of the game. I had my players fight a ton of orcs, each had a orc shot put of returning with some other magic on it, but it had a new feature called orc blood, so only orcs and half-orcs could use it. I put that on it so they wouldn't use them but also so I had more competative orcs that could challenge them. To my surprise, they saved every shot put, hauled them to town and sold them. I was a bit disapointed that they didn't role-play that out a bit and try to destroy them instead, but that is how they wanted to handle it. Now, I did make them hard to sell in town, they only got 25% normal price for them.

As far as scribing a scroll, again even though I said I wasn't going to take a shot at you, but that is your fault as a DM. A player is only as good as his DM. If you were to set the standard that the PC must buy materials to make scrolls, then I think you would find that he would. He would most likely make a gather information check to find a shop that sells such stuff and then role-play it all out.

Of course, he may not, he may just be there just for a good fight. I play in a game where we have a lot of role-playing, and there is one player who loves to start fights, even when we know we are out classed, just to get XP or cause he doesn't like role-playing and is bored. Those characters are truely dangerous to have around, but, from what I gather, this PC you are talking about is not like him.

Anyway, that is some free advice for now, I have to get back to work. I'll read the whole thread later tonight.

 

[mmadsen]

Yeah, they are probably much more fungible than most coins.

Gems are not easily interchangeable, especially when you're not a skilled jeweller able to appraise them accurately and able to draw on a huge inventory of roughly similar stones.

In the pre-modern era, coins were notoriously lousy as a means of transaction.

Compared to what? To modern coins, sure, but not to gemstones.

They were usually shaved, cut, dusted, and clipped. In many cases, they were made of diluted alloys. Just about every shopkeeper kept scales on hand to weigh the coins people brought in, which were valuable for their metal content, and not for the minted symbols in them. The "coin of the realm" was basically just a away to move silver around.

Agreed.

 

[Storm Raven]

Gems are not easily interchangeable, especially when you're not a skilled jeweller able to appraise them accurately and able to draw on a huge inventory of roughly similar stones.

For any merchant skilled enough to evaluate the value of various metals (and identify adulterated alloys and the like), evaluating the basic gemstones is not that difficult. In any event, you are likely to have several people in most reasonably sized towns who can do this for you (and in a middle ages type setting, you will be legally required to have members of the jeweler's guild evaluate the gems).

Compared to what? To modern coins, sure, but not to gemstones.

Compared to gemstones, yes. Metal coins may be easier to identify, but they are much easier to tinker with and adulterate. Evaluating a gemstone takes a little more effort up front, but it is more reliably worth what you think it is to begin with.

 

[Olaf the Stout]

He wants to play Halo, or Jade Empire, or various similar games where you kick ass and take names but with a definite underlying storyline guiding events.

Yeah. That may be what he wants. Unfortunately (since it doesn’t quite gel with the type of game that the rest of the group is after) I think he is treating it a little bit too much like a video game. I think he wants combat after combat with a little tiny bit of story linking them in. He doesn’t really seem to care what the plot is, just as long it means he gets to kill more things and get more loot and XP (at least that's how it seems to me).

Olaf the Stout

 

[Olaf the Stout]

First off, I'll sorta leave aside the issue (brought up by someone else) of whether your player is "roleplaying" or not, as I don't want to threadcrap. Just let me state: I think he is.


If this player likes to minmax (as in, maxmizing reward and minimizing risk, not as in "munchkin"), he'll likely find a way to minmax his rp'ing rewards. He may very well just find out what he has to do in-game to earn the rewards; it's unlikely that he'll fundamentally change his playstyle.

And that, IMO, is an important point. I don't think the answer is to try and change the player via mechanics that affect the character. You're just asking for trouble. If his style's conflict with the rest of the group's is genuinely affecting the game, you simply need to talk to him.

The important thing to remember is: he isn't doing anything "wrong," per se. D&D specifically rewards his playstyle. It presents an array of choices, some good, some bad; he's choosing the good ones. The issue is simply that he's the only one in your group doing this.

Ergo, I'd lay out what kind of game it is that you're running, and make it clear that it's not going to change anytime soon. See how he feels.

The other thing I'm curious about is: is this player unhappy with the game? Or are you (and the other players) simply unhappy with him?

Buzz,

I understand that he isn’t doing things “wrong”. He style just has doesn’t seem to match in with what the rest of the group wants.

The game has only been going on for 3 sessions so it is relatively early stages. He is one of 3 players (out of 5) that I have not roleplayed with before. He has said that he has enjoyed the game so far but it has been heavy on the dungeon-crawl/combat elements to date so that may explain why. Having said that he has had issues with several different things.

Firstly he felt that the party should have more of a chance to take monsters by surprise. He said that this would (in his words, including the bit in parentheses) “allow the party to fight tougher CR bad guys (and get more XP !!) as they can't bring all their abilities to bear on us right away.”

At the time he sent me the above comment in an e-mail the party was exploring underground caverns. They were carrying torches/light sources around to see (3 out of 5 PC’s are human and therefore can’t see in the dark). Personally I think that carrying light sources around in an otherwise lightless environment may give away your position and make it very difficult for you to surprise others.

Secondly, he was surprised that we hadn’t levelled after 2 sessions (each about 4-5 hours long). A third issue, which he has brought up twice already, was that the citizens of Freeport seem very distrusting and suspicious of the party.

I made comments that when the party walked through the city (all fully armed and 1 character in full plate) that they were given a wide berth by people passing them in the street. No-one shouted things at them or tried anything on them, they just kept their distance. I don’t know about you but if a group of people armed to the teeth were walking past me in the street I would give them plenty of space too. He seems to think that a fully armed and armoured party would be a normal thing that people wouldn’t bat an eyelid about. I disagree (even in a medieval fantasy world) but I am interested in hearing what other people think.

So far 2 of the 4 other players have expressed their unhappiness with the way that he plays. His interests seem to lie in getting more power and cool gear, not in developing his character or achieving any character goals. While this is not a bad or wrong way of playing, it doesn’t really fit in with the type of game I want to run or the type of game that the other 4 players seem to play.

I plan to talk to him (and everyone in the group) before we start the next session to go through and discuss all these issues.

Olaf the Stout

 

[Olaf the Stout]

All the great warriors and generals in history were metagamers. None of them would have ever been caught making "sub-optimal" combat choices. For example, when Ghengis Khan decided he was going to invade China was he doing it for some other reason than XP and GP? Was he doing it because he took the "Khan" prestige class and thought it would be in character?

And when he got there and found the cities surrounded by walls did he way "well, my character's a Mongol so I guess I'll just do the dumb thing and ride around the walls shouting while I get shot at all day" No! He looked through his Chinese copy of the Player's Handbook until he found the chapter on "Siege Engines" and then he built one or a hundred. Then he killed everyone who didn't surrender because he needed the XP to level up.

Ok, granted, that's the real world, not some fluffy Dragonlance. It's possible that your player is perfectly roleplaying a warrior.



Well, yea, I guess Ghengis Khan doesn't belong in every party. I suppose in a party of Kender that want to roleplay their tea ceremony, he can be pretty annoying.

I don’t know much about Ghengis Kahn apart from the fact that he was a Mongolian warlord that took control of much of his surrounding area. However, I imagine that he had very good in-game reasons for doing what he did. I’m sure he didn’t think “Gee, I bet if I attack that country over there it will make me a better fighter and I might get some phat loot as well”.

At the same time I wasn’t there when it happened so it is possible that this was the real reason.

And yes, you are right, even if he did have good roleplaying reasons, it still doesn’t mean that he would fit in with every adventuring party.

Olaf the Stout

 

[Olaf the Stout]

Ah man!!! That one made soda come out my nose!!!! Awesome

Seriously though, during combat is one time that that no character should be making any sub-optimal choices unless that character is not interested in survival. This might happen if the character is being controlled by an enemy trying to conceal the fact or perhaps the character is depressed for some reason and wants to die gloriously in combat. I am not talking about actual metagaming or anything like that. One thing to consider about combat options is the experience of the character vs. the player. For example I have been playing for about 26 years or so. When I create a new 1st level character, he won't have any " real" tactical knowledge except what was learned in training. If I join a game and create and play a 10th level fighter then I will play combats with more " knowledge" .

The problem comes with distinguishing this stuff in actual play. One idea I had was to vary the time given to act in combat based on character level. Very low level adventurers would have to react much quicker than experienced ones to simulate much less tactical understanding. The downside of this is that low level characters forced to make snap decisions wouldn't live long enough to become high level . I suppose if high level adventuers are supposed to be "special" then it might be workable.

Kormydigar, by your reasoning that no character should be making sub-optimal combat choices in combat, should a Wisdom 3, Intelligence 3 Fighter always choice the optimal way to approach any combat situation? Should he avoid all attacks of opportunity and weave a path through the front-line fighters so that he can attack the mage at the back? Or would he just charge the first thing that he saw coming towards him? If he chose the first option all the time, every combat I would be a little disappointed that the person wasn’t playing in character.

As for not being able to survive unless you make optimal choices in combat, one of the PC’s in the party has a split personality character. One half is a cowardly sorcerer, who looks to avoid combat at all times and when the party inevitably gets involved in one he stands at the back, marginally assisting other party members, but generally remains ineffective. The other half of his personality is a barbarian who is basically the exact opposite of the sorcerer. He is always the first into a fight and will often rush over to help out other PC’s in combat, even if he is seriously wounded and stepping back to get some healing may be the best option.

The player definitely doesn’t make optimal choices when he is the sorcerer and it can be debated as to whether he is when he is the barbarian. Is it in character? Hell yeah. Is it entertaining for the player, GM and other players? Yep. Has the PC or other PC’s died as a result of him sub-optimal choices in combat? Not so far. The closest has been when the barbarian charged into a combat against 2 Ooze Paraelementals and was taken into negative HP’s due to a couple of lucky dice rolls on my part. No other party member have been taken into the negatives so far.

Sure, I understand that sometimes this sort of action may result in PC deaths but at the same time that happens to parties that have powergaming PC’s making optimal combat choices 100% of the time. Sometimes players roll badly or the GM rolls really well.

Olaf the Stout

 

[Olaf the Stout]

Actually Robin D. Laws makes a good point in his Gming booklet ... that all types can fit into a group without a problem as long as the DM is ready for them.

From posts thus far he doesn't seem to be a meta-gamer, more like a user of the rules. The d20 system allows all sorts of players, including those people that play it like a tactical problem. In fact if he is a tactician in combat then what is wrong with that ... there are players out there that enjoy the tactical aspect of a game.

True if he takes too long to deliberate you have the right to remind them of the 6 second issue, but you cannot honestly tell anyone that you can RP a full fledged combat that is supposedly being participated in by expert adventurers in the appropriate time limit. A fully trained Fighter could handle the speed of interchange, but not your average roleplayer.

It is completely unfair (and I'm surprised at the responses thus far) and selfish to force a player to change his play style because you want him to. As a DM you are the facilitator for the game, the creator for the game world. And kicking him out is the antithesis to the social aspect of roleplaying.

By forcing him to change his play style you are in fact behaving like a munchkin player. The munchkin wants to be the best and will use whatever he can get to achieve that. You want your game to be hardcore roleplaying and you're willing to force someone to change or kick him out of your group because of it.

Can you honestly say that no one in your world isn't a tactician? What about the great generals? What about the bodyguards?

If you have a RPing group and a Tactical Player then you need to cater for that player. Either by making his meta-game tactical choices worth something sometimes ... for example the fact that he took Weapon Specialisation might aid them, or the fact that he is carrying the right gear.

When you do combat, give them a tactical set up where this player's meta-gaming might be useful sometimes.

Of course don't do it all the time, but embrace him.

For example in my main group I have:

P1: Tactical Wargamer Type
P2: Hardcore Munchkin
P3: Tactical Roleplayer (roleplays fantastically but doesn't make useless choices in feats etc)
P4: Character Changer (likes to play his latest idea but won't change until he dies or something happens to trigger the character leaving)
P5: Balanced (my wife actually - hates knowing the mechanics but enjoys all aspects mayber RPG a little more than other things.)
P6: 100% Roleplayer (he dislikes combat in general but revels in the RPG)

Now from your point of view P6 would probably not suit this group since most of them have tactical parts to their make-up while P6 doesn't want to get involved. Is that wrong? No ... I create situations where the roleplaying will save them. And the party has learnt that lesson by messing up an RP situation and ending up in a combat they almost got killed in.

The whole point here is that unless the guy is really obnoxious, or has social issues, then you should embrace him. He's like the proverbial fresh breeze to your stagnant roleplayers only game.

Improve your DMing style (I am not saying you are not good, but everyone can learn more) and learn to cater for various types. You will create a richer tapestry for your world and games because suddenly everyone can input into that game. Instead of chomping at the bit with this guy, use it.

Now to the speicifc issue of his money conversion ... have you ever put into play some kind of economic system? If not you cannot curse his conversion of cash to jewels. However my suggestion would be to instigate something, citing that since it has just come up you thought you would expand your world information. And keep in mind that he can't spend his money using gems in general.

Going into a business with your gems will not work. Even an armourer or weaponsmith would reject it. Why?
* no time to go convert the item
* knows they will lose money on coversion (just look at modern conversions)
* trusting someone to convert for them is a risk
* and they don't want to risk become unwitting fences

Just my two cents

Personally dvvega I couldn’t disagree with you more. The GM and 4 other players should change the way that they enjoy playing so that it is more to 1 player’s liking? Sorry that doesn’t sit well with me. Just because someone else prefers a different style of game doesn’t mean that everyone else has to change to accommodate that.

Yes, differences can be a good thing and be a “fresh breeze” but it doesn’t guarantee that it always is. Sometimes they can be detrimental and ruin the enjoyment of the game for everyone else. Is this the case here? Probably not at this point in time, but it has the potential to. I have played, quite enjoyably, before with people who had very different aspects of the game that they enjoyed compared to myself. However, I have also been in the same situation with games that were just a trainwreck waiting to happen due to differences in preferred playstyles.

And you have slightly misunderstood my complaints in regards to his tactical style of gaming. I have no issue with him playing tactically. However I don’t think that he should be telling other players what to do in the middle of combat or taking up an inordinate amout of time to come up with the most optimal action. If you want to plan out a combat, fine by me. Just do it before the combat has begun, just like a football team would design their plays before the game.

You don’t see the coach come onto the field and explain to every single player what he wants him to do in the next play. He just tells the quarterback the name of the play he wants them to run and then they know what to do because they have planned and practiced it beforehand.

Olaf the Stout