Party Infighting?

[RandomPrecision]

Just out of curiosity...

Do you find that it happens often?

As a DM, do you try to stop it? Encourage it? Penalize it? Reward it?

As a player, what's more important, role-playing, or maintaining the party? In your experience, do RP conflicts cause OOC conflicts? Do OOC conflcts cause RP conflicts?

And of course, I'd welcome any interesting or amusing stories, if they're out there (and I bet they are...)

 

[Numenorean]

Just out of curiosity...

Do you find that it happens often?

As a DM, do you try to stop it? Encourage it? Penalize it? Reward it?

As a player, what's more important, role-playing, or maintaining the party? In your experience, do RP conflicts cause OOC conflicts? Do OOC conflcts cause RP conflicts?

And of course, I'd welcome any interesting or amusing stories, if they're out there (and I bet they are...)

Hmmmm .......

I've always believed that OOC trumps IG (in-game). Because ultimately we are all real people and we come around the table to game to have fun. For example I wouldn't allow someone to play an evil assassin type or another character that is inherently going to cause problems in the group (read: whack the other PCs) because too many times that spills out and ruins people's enjoyment of the game.

Our games tend to be centered around characters that are largely cooperative with one another.

I've also seen OOC conflicts cause RP conflicts. Two guys I used to game with were friends, sort of, but they were also always at each other. And no matter what characters they played in the game they ALWAYS managed to become bitter rivals IG. It was funny at first, then after a year or so it got old and began to detract from the game. Thats when it was stopped.

As far as the DM response ... it really depends on the situation. I would say as long as its not ruining people's enjoyment of the game then so be it. But once it starts affecting the players enjoyment of the game then it ends pronto.

 

[Crothian]

There are two typoes of infighting that I've seen. THere is the non hurtful kind where two party memebers just diagree and it is a good role playing situation. THen there is the bad kind where the players hate each other or some other meta game or out of game reason is the cause for the fighting.

The first one is okay, and doesn't happen a lot but can be a good and fun encounter for the DM to just watch unfold.

THe second I try hard to make sure it never happens and when I see it, I try to work it out out of game.

 

[Steel_Wind]

I don't put up with it, even in the least. They start it - I stop running.

Nevermins the roleplaying angst - I don't put up with it and it doesn't happen.

 

[Odysseus]

In my experience , the chance of party infighting is inversly proportial to the players age.

 

[Jupp]

In one group I play a dwarven priest of Moradin and the other guy plays a fighter of Kelanen. He's the arrogant snot that thinks Kelanen is the center of the world. In the dwarves eyes he's just a little twit with a 2-handed stick in his hands. Out of this situation there have been some funny "incidents" where the one tries to outplay and outwit or just generally lead the other one by the nose. It's great fun for the two of us and our DM doesnt think its disrupting the game. Then there is the conflict between the elven ranger with the priest and the fighter. See, there is a constant bickering and poking in our group, occasionally there are even some small brawls that tend to be sorted out in the middle of a tavern. Most of the time it ends with us being thrown into a dark, wet cell to rethink our actions

I think it always depends on how things are played and if it comes out of fun or not. It's a thin line but if you play it well it can be entertaining. We play together since 12 years and we poke each other since day one. It's one of the reasons we still play as one group.

 

[FreeTheSlaves]

There are 2 types of infighting as I see it:

1)
Goods friends OoC, IC their PCs clash over objective and/or means. PCs resolve differences in an acceptable manner and adventure continues.

2)
Not good friends OoC, usually aquaintances irl, didn't metagame their PCs to be compatible, cannot logicaly coexist in same party. PCs cannot resolve difference without violence & even then, the loser will harbour a gripe whether with current character or new.

These are the two ends of the spectrum. The real difficulty is where the situation is somewhere in the middle, the obvious kick-em-out is not such a good option because there is still some fun to be had.

My current disposition is to fix anything to make the situation as #1 above, but if after effort I can not accept the game falling short of this - something/one will have to give.

 

[ThirdWizard]

They can do whatever, they want, and I'll just play off of it like any other character actions. We don't do the whole meta-game in-fighting, though, and if that was a problem, I might be more controlling. But, as it is, I never tell a player that his or her PC can't do that. The whole "we're just a big happy family" thing doesn't fit in with most of my games, anyway.

Infighting rarely means actual fighting, though. It can be arguing about a course of action, hiding information/items from other PCs, turning in information about another PC to someone else, or whatever. Rarely is it very extreme, I think the last case of party in-fighting would be the PCs fighting over who got the intelligent infinite beer stein. It's always funny when the halfing orders the humans to give it up, or else. The even funnier part is that they comply!

 

[Jupp]

One should always haggle over a beer stein, they are essential items for every adventurer.


This was is what happend about two sessions ago :

We were invited to the court of Prince Olinstad in Gryrax in Uleg and after the day before. After a long and intense banquet we fell into our beds.....
The dwarf (me) was sleeping like a baby when the sun went up and the fighter started hammering at the door yelling "The sun is up! Breakfast time! Get up you useless little dwarf!". The prompt reaction was that the dwarf was throwing his hammer at the door, mainly to scare the fighter away. Problem was that I rolled a natural 20 and then 75% with D100. That meant that the hammer crashed the door out of the frame and flew right into the face of the fighter, doing 9 HP door-to-face damage. We laughed at least 5 mintues like maniacs while the fighter was just speechless I fear the moment the fighter will have his revenge on that one

 

[RithTheAwakener]

1)
Goods friends OoC, IC their PCs clash over objective and/or means. PCs resolve differences in an acceptable manner and adventure continues.

This is what my group does. We consist of: a power hungry wizard, a fighter, and power hungry cleric, and another fighter. We are all good friends, but the wiz n cleric constantly flare up at eachother for doing different activities. I am constantly prevently my group from killing eachother. Its actually really fun and quite humerous, but its really hard to play Lawful Evil when i constantly look like a good character. /endtangent

Id say that IF players cannot not take things personally (like maybe a characters death at the hands of a friend), maybe you should try your damnedest (is that even a word?) to prevent it. If theyre ok with it, let them roll up a new charcter and see if they conflict still. Its ALL ABOUT HAVING FUN. If your players stop enjoying themselves cause theyre beating the crap out of eachother, its time to put an end to it.