PC threatening PC. What to do?

[anest1s]

Hmm...you are the DM.

A cleric turned evil.
The other cleric follows the evil cleric.

The paladin lets be honest, should kill them both.

Now, you can tell them to stop it, or split them, or let them kill each other. You can also stop playing with them. But why?

If they want the in-game drama, why would you stop them? Let them turn evil. You are the DM, you can have a God bind their souls together and curse them to live forever together/killing each other every day if they want, only to rise from the dead at sunset.

However, if they want the drama, why shouldn't you support it? A Cleric turned evil. Even if his God is ok with this, there can always be a Devil around. He sees that the Cleric wants power, he can see that he wants to rule. The Devil will try to earn the Clerics soul. The Devil will try to make the paladin fall. He will ask him where his God is when the Cleric backstabbed him. He will offer power. He may not ask anything in return. Nothing, until power will lead the Paladin to fall.

Have a demon in a non demonic form, to ask the Paladin to give up his detect good ability for a strong power. Then give the Cleric an equal power, and promise him authority. You want to turn the Cleric Lawful and the Paladin Evil. Give the Cleric an admirer. Give the Paladin clues that the admirer is the one who made the Cleric evil. See the Paladin fall, as he kills an innocent without proof.

I mean common, I though this in like 5 mins, you can make up something better.

If you want them to keep together, still, its ok for them to be enemies. You just have to force them together. And I am not telling you to tell them off game or in game through NPCs ''You two stay together or else''.

They are in a ship, if I got that right. They can't leave, so this buys you some time. You can use that time to threaten the PCs. For example, have a terrible monster sneak in the dark room of the Cleric while he sleeps. The Cleric wakes up, feeling a chill all over his body, and listening to something moving in his room. If he tries to speak, he realizes he is paralyzed. No one else hears the creatures silent moves, or the Clerics silent prayers. The Paladin sees a vision in his sleep. It may be symbolic, it may be the reality, the point is, he wakes up. He sees a terrifying creature over the Cleric. He can either attack the creature, entering an unlikely battle to save the Cleric. Or he can leave the Cleric die. He somehow knows that everyone else in the ship is in deep sleep, and only he was able for some reason to be up.

The Creature will just want to take part of the Clerics soul, but he won't harm him to death. Should the Paladin not react, he will lose his Paladin status, and the Cleric will lose half his soul. The quest to get back the soul and the Paladinhood, will be the same. Should the Paladin save the Cleric, the Cleric will see the Paladin more friendly. Win-win.

 

[TarionzCousin]

The cleric believed herself to be the strongest member of the party and concluded that because of that the others all had to obey her... In a literal sense of "obey". In other words "you do exactly what I tell you to do when I tell you to do it" more so than "I'm party leader so everyone runs major decisions through me")

You said later that she normally doesn't pay this style but instead hangs back. Is it normal for someone in the group to be this type of "leader"? Does she think that it is her turn?

In other words, why is she acting this way now? It really sounds counter-productive to everyone's fun.

 

[LordPsychodin]

Now I am going to say two things that a lot of people here are going to disagree with me on -

One - the point to decide if this was okay or not should have happened when the campaign first began, not now. You're the DM, you can unwind cancel nix negate ANYTHING you want that's stupid, and this is very stupid.

Two - as a DM, I *don't* care what the characters might have for reasons to fight because it's still the PLAYERS behind it doing it, and they are being top class Douchebags right now. *ANYONE* who uses "because my character would" as an excuse to take actions that disrupt the group can get the hell out of this entire genre of gaming, that's not an excuse, and it never was in any tabletop RPG EVER. Normally I never recommend doing this, but the players that spewed this garbage and attacked first - unwind time in campaign, tell them their characters drop dead or they stop being douchenozzle fairy RPers from the island of terrible players. (note you don't have to actually say this I'm exaggerating but the point is still there.

 

[SnowleopardVK]

You said later that she normally doesn't pay this style but instead hangs back. Is it normal for someone in the group to be this type of "leader"? Does she think that it is her turn?

In other words, why is she acting this way now? It really sounds counter-productive to everyone's fun.

No, it's not normal for there to be that type of leader. Normally we go with the type of leadership the paladin suggested; namely that everyone makes their own decisions but the group as a whole has the same overall goal and so the players work together to reach it.

[MENTION=84896]LordPsychodin[/MENTION]: I could unwind time I know. I considered it before I even made this thread. I just don't think it would be productive however. The cleric has already said she was attacking the paladin, so even if I rewind time and forbid such an action, the other players all know what she wants to do. Making the game continue with a character who wants to kill her teammate but can't for no other reason than that the GM said she can't seemed like a bad idea. I can control time, but I can't force them to get along, not really, unless they make an effort to do so themselves.

 

[Aar Khalim]

from my point of view these players are not mature enough if they fight over leadership in a group of clerics paladin and sorcerer. what kind of cleric would attack from behind a paladin, if the cleric is not evil enough. and how an evil cleric could coexist with a paladin?
maybe you should consider experience penalties.
if your first discussion with the protagonists didn't consent, then expect more of it in the future

 

[LordPsychodin]

Are you kidding me? the characters sacrifice themselves for the story practically all the time. They can do that here too and stop being such a jerk. (not the character, THEM) "what their character would do" has meant crap for the entirety of roleplaying games, and here is a good chance to point that out.

 

[SnowleopardVK]

Meh, it's over now. The paladin killed the cleric and the campaign ended.

And now I, the paladin, the sorcerer, and the second cleric (the one that wasn't causing a problem) have started a new game, swapping out the other cleric for a new player.

So... I guess it worked out well enough. The players still get along, which is more important in the long run than the survival of the game. Plus I'm a player in the new game, which is fun because I've been doing nothing but GMing lately.

 

[Lanefan]

Now I am going to say two things that a lot of people here are going to disagree with me on

I'll start, shall I?

Two - as a DM, I *don't* care what the characters might have for reasons to fight because it's still the PLAYERS behind it doing it, and they are being top class Douchebags right now. *ANYONE* who uses "because my character would" as an excuse to take actions that disrupt the group can get the hell out of this entire genre of gaming, that's not an excuse, and it never was in any tabletop RPG EVER.

You're making some huge assumptions, many of which are questionable:
- that intra-party fighting disrupts the group. Sometimes this happens, but by no means always. What it's more likely to disrupt is the DM's storyline, and speaking as a DM I really don't care if it does. A DM who is so tied to her story that some party conflict becomes a problem for her is probably about to put on an engineer's hat and fire up the locomotive anyway...
- that intra-party fighting automatically shouts "bad players". Not at all true. Often-times it says "excellent players", capable of separating their characters' feelings from their own (players who can't do this are a much bigger problem) and capable of acting out a conflict with each other while still having fun in the process.
- an unsaid assumption but I'll go out on a limb and (yes) assume it to be present: that the slowdown in game advancement caused by party infighting is a problem. It isn't, again unless the DM has preconceived ideas about such things and is not willing to be flexible.

Normally I never recommend doing this, but the players that spewed this garbage and attacked first - unwind time in campaign, tell them their characters drop dead or they stop being douchenozzle fairy RPers from the island of terrible players. (note you don't have to actually say this I'm exaggerating but the point is still there.

Why change anything? It's happened. Move on.

Lan-"member of the loyal opposition"-efan

 

[CuRoi]

But honestly another big issue is that it messes up plans for the DM.

Players can't mess up the plans. They ARE the plans. The story is about THEM.

I think that's truly the crux of the matter, whether you want to give the players control over the campaign/plot/scenario. It does take a different DM style, but some people prefer it.

Here's a thought, perhaps your players planned this to happen? Perhaps they felt they were not having enough say in the story and mutually decided to usurp control just to test you and see if you would let them have it? Especially since the players seem totally fine with this out of character....

At any rate, I agree with the calls to let them have it out. The actions of the cleric, IMO, sound completely in line with a CN god of War/Strength etc (if I read your responses right.) The cleric found the paladin's leadership lacking because he was "weak" and beat him down to prove a point (without murdering him - allwoing him to surrender).

Ahh, but the foul scoundrel hit the paladin from behind? Answer from the CN War Cleric: "So what. What sort of rules are there on a battlefield? I'll name one - never turn your back on your enemy. The only other would be, you survive or you die." Completely appropriate in my opinion.

The paladin, as a "leader" needs to then know that to win over this group member he has to prove he is stronger. Once he has done that, he has to maintain tight control over this group member. An extremely powerful "loose cannon" sorts. He has to exert dominance - if he can't he's got no business leading this cleric or the group.

Sounds like great RP fun to me.

If you have to, adjust this quest they are on just a little bit to give them in character incentive to work together. Maybe some prophecy describes their gods working together to complete the quest...I know sort of cliche but that's just off the top of my head.

 

[CuRoi]

Not at all. Her normal play style with pretty much all characters is to sit at the back and never say anything during any and all social situations and step forwards only when fights arise to use her always extremely combat-optimized (far more than anyone else she tends to play with) builds to kill monsters and enemies.

Given that, I'm going to continue to harp on letting this RP out. I love it when a player who doesn't RP starts doing so! It's complete gold for me as a DM and it means I made them care about something in game in a way they haven't before!

The only issue you have is the player will also out of character assume they are on paper more powerful. In the case of a cleric versus a paladin, they may very well be. However, you need to make sure that the ways the come into to conflict aren't just slugfests. There needs to be a RP social element for them as well.

For example - as mentioned by a previous poster the captain of the ship gets ticked that people are shedding blood on his boat. He's truly the one in a power position here. His boat he is judge and jury on the high seas and someone just assaulted another passenger with nearly deadly consequences (I'm guessing this was a weapon atack and not a punch in the face.)

The captain threatens to throw the cleric (or both) overboard, the paladin then has a chance at diplomacy to settle the situation. Now we sort of even the score cleric:1 paladin:1 and the jockeying for leadership position continues.

Just don't forget the other two players in this little side adventure...