Player challenging DM authority and competative

[Arbanax]

HI all

I've had a great group of guys play 4e since around Aug and we've been getting one well. But for one player who over time has increasingly shown (through his character) some difficult tendencies but its spilled out into the game personally the last two sessions.

Basically he seems to like optimising characters, so he wanted to swap out his Warlock, I said see if you can keep him but change his powers/pact etc. This seemed to delay things, but increasingly he'd been acting at odds with the party, provoking the defenders etc until he got this warlock killed by attacking another PC so he could now play this new character (risking another PC to do it).

So I retconned this as I wouldn't have allowed this to happen if I knew what he was up to (long story). So I said no to his new character an Assassin Rogue Hybrid, partly because the party had a Rogue and needed a controller and because I think he is doing it to outshine the Rogue and play competitively again.

Anyway having said no, he still showed up with the character and began to play it until I realised he wasn't playing his previous character (again long story here). I told him he had to play his old character or role up someone, anyone else as long as it wasn't a Rogue. But he refused and told me he was going to play his new character and that was that! So I said enough, you can sit this out and we'd sort it out after the game. I talked to him after the game briefly and took his character to see what he'd done. But in truth I don't feel he should play this character for the trouble it will cause and the way he tried to engineer it to.

The thing is as I've got to know him I've found out he is desperate to DM, but the rest don't appear to want to be his players. Secondly he is very competitive and can be childish when he doesn't get his way.

I'm looking over his character trying to decide if its a good idea to let this character roll, or stand my ground and potentially loose him from the group. I think the thing is I could be misjudging him, but the rest of the group was embarrassed by his behaviour. Who needs that in a game which supposed to be fun?

For the more experienced DM's out there what would you do, would you ask him to leave if he doesn't do what you said? Would you let him play his character and give him a bit more room to see what happens?

Thanks

Ab

 

[Prestidigitalis]

I can't offer a solution, but here is my perspective:

You are in a no-win situation. This person has issues that go far beyond the game, and how it turns out basically hinges on whether he can recognize the issues and address them. Do not, under any circumstances, feel guilty about what you have to do to keep your group functional, even if it means booting him out. And if you feel that the best thing is to accede to his wishes and let him play what he wants, be prepared for more manipulation down the road.

I don't mean to sound unsympathetic to the player. We all have demons and inner conflicts that play out in our interactions with others. It's just that you have no way to help him -- you can't let it be your problem.

 

[Mummolus]

Try offering to let him play a new character, but not one that overlaps so heavily with another player's? That way you might be able to avoid some of the competitiveness while he can switch away from a character he apparently didn't like?

 

[Raven Crowking]

As Dan Savage would say, DTMFA.


RC

 

[fba827]

Based soley on what you wrote here ...
1) He doesn't want to play his exsiting warlock
2) He wants to play a min-maxed rogue/assassin but it would overlap AND outshine an exsisting and established PC
3) He doesn't want to come up with another concept.
4) he would like to DM but other players probably wouldn't like that

So...
you're (bleeped)

Personally speaking, if I was playing an established PC and someone else wanted to knowingly make a new PC that would completely negate my own (rather than complement it - and there are ways to accomplish that with the right player types), then I'd be annoyed and want to change mine.


I would not force him to continue playing the warlock (even though I think that he should because it doesn't sound like he'll just keep getting bored and cycle through characters which is disruptive) but if you did force him to keep playing it, well, it would just drag everything down and he'll mope.... loudly.

So you could

1) ask the rogue player if he/she wants to change and, if so, let the Player in questioin play his assassin-rogue
(as a warning from personal experience, the personality type you describe combined with wanting to play a rogue-assassin would set off a red flag in my head. that type of combination in the past has usually led to a PC that is as disruptive as the player: the pc will want to run off and do things solo, all the time leading to everyone else sitting around half the session; or he'll try and murder people for no real reason, etc etc. that's not to say this player will do the same.just saying that's been my experience with the combination of player and character archetype that you're describing).

2) find a way to make his proposed rogue compliment the existing rogue, rather than negate it (i.e. maybe make sure they don't overlap entirely in skill sets; maybe one is more ranged while the other is more melee; and maybe they have a shared background like being form the same guild). note any changes made here should be on the new PCs sheet, not the existing one's. As an aside, if I were DMing this situation, I would be a bit of a subtle "balancer" and look for deficiencies in the new PC and present those situations on occasion such that the existing rogue has moments to shine beyond the min-maxed rogue, despite not being min-maxed.

3) stick to your gun and tell the player he can't play that type -because- it would overlap an existing PC archetype but pick something else that wouldn't be so similar to another PC (and if he balks at that, go with option 4)

4) ask the player to sit out this campaign since that archetype is already filled and he's not willing to change it. (or, as Dan Savage said via Raven Crowking, DTMFA )

having said all that- there are surely circumstances that aren't apperent by the summary here. i'm just sharing thoughts based on what i can see from your one-sided perspective summary.

 

[gourdcaptain]

I'm sorry I have to ask - but how exactly did he min-max a rogue assassin hybrid? I really don't see much synergy there.

 

[Aegeri]

A hybrid Rogue|Assassin seems like a great idea in theory, but is so unbelievably terrible in practice.

 

[Felon]

I'm looking over his character trying to decide if its a good idea to let this character roll, or stand my ground and potentially loose him from the group. I think the thing is I could be misjudging him, but the rest of the group was embarrassed by his behaviour. Who needs that in a game which supposed to be fun?

For the more experienced DM's out there what would you do, would you ask him to leave if he doesn't do what you said? Would you let him play his character and give him a bit more room to see what happens?

Let's start with the part where I think you're wrong: don't try to enforce party diversity. Encourage? Yes. Enforce? No.

The fact that there's already a rogue in the party shouldn't mean that other players are forbidden to play a rogue while the existing one draws breath. And this guy wasn't even making a rogue, but a rogue/assassin hybrid, so they wouldn't play identically.

It's not as if the warlock brought anything to the table that a party really needs that they couldn't get from a rogue. Warlocks have a lot of problems that keep them from being satisfying to those who, without resorting to pejoratives, are mindful of their character's effectiveness relative to the rest of the party. The fluff is delicious, the mechanics are poor. I started play 4e with a warlock and jumped to sorcerer a year later as soon as the PHB2 came out. WotC's general neglect of the class and the recent advent of hexblades leads me to beliee that they are hoping the 1.0 version is quiety shuffled off to the attic by virtue of player abandonment.

That's what I have to say about the basic premise of the character swap. Now, the player himself throwing tantrums and whatnot is a separate issue. Find a way to take him aside. First, let him vent his complaints and see if actually hearing him out settles him down. If that doesn't do the trick, simply tell him he needs to chill out or stop showing up. Make it his choice.

 

[Prestidigitalis]

Personally speaking, if I was playing an established PC and someone else wanted to knowingly make a new PC that would completely negate my own (rather than complement it - and there are ways to accomplish that with the right player types), then I'd be annoyed and want to change mine.

Cool. I'll bring a charging Predator Druid (named Z'fba827) next week.

 

[Felon]

I'm sorry I have to ask - but how exactly did he min-max a rogue assassin hybrid? I really don't see much synergy there.

A hybrid Rogue|Assassin seems like a great idea in theory, but is so unbelievably terrible in practice.

Yeah, that's another fishy thing about this situation. The guy starts out with a warlock--notorious for being the worst-performing striker at damage output--and then he wants to do this bad hybrid? And this guy is supposed to be a power gamer of some kind? Something ain't adding up.