Player Meltdown; Input Requested

[Keeper of Secrets]

One of the most unusual player meltdowns I have ever experienced happened at last night's session. Some background is required but bear with me . . .

I run Mutants & Masterminds every Friday night and have been running the same supers campaign for years. Last night a player of mine (who has always been kind of a manic/depressive fellow, prone to bouts of quirky behavior) finally fell apart.

His character is the resident occultist and wizard. Morose and eerie is his personality and he has a variety of magical gadgets which help during investigations. Now, his character was center stage. He was a approached by a woman for a new story arc. She expressed romantic interest in him and they began a few days of seeing each other (Now, the woman is actually dead and he is talking to her ghost as the ghost is subtly trying to warn him of the big bad who killed her and she wants him to solver her murder, etc.)

Meanwhile I go back and forth to the other players in between mysterious and romantic dates and so on with the meltdown player. They go about their lives and follow up on some leads for their own personal investigations.

The set up for the meltdown player's mystery is that he is finally invited back to the dead woman's 'home' (which actually will end up being a creepy condemned apartment where she was killed about a week ago in a ritualistic murder in the basement.

As I am ready to go back to the meltdown player to explain how he drives up to the apartment, he says he has to talk to me right now - in private. I don't think much of it as he is the kind of player who constantly asks to see me in private because he is often too shy to have his character be romantic or submit an interesting idea for fear of the others making fun of him.

As we are going into the next room the other players are mumbling something about a trap ready to be sprung on him by the mysterious (ghost) woman.

In the next room meltdown player proceeds to tell me how he 'can't do this.' I am wondering if he means the romance angle (since I know the romance angle is done at this point and all he has to do is stumble across the body). I assure him we'll get through this, he should trust me, etc. Then he proceeds to clarify. He can't do this character. He can't be an occult expert. He doesn't know what he is doing. The other players will laugh at him and give him a hard time. He is sick to his stomach over the grief.

My jaw drops. I am stunned. I have no idea what to say next.

To make matters worse, the clues that are supposed to be found with the dead woman are to lead into the next chapter of the campaign. Cultists. Coming of a Lovecraft style god, etc. I can't have him back out. I can't start over again. I beg him to just make it through the next 15 minutes.

So like some director, trying to film the last 20 minutes of a movie with a slung out, coked up starlet, I push him through the next scene as he enters the creepy apartment, finds the body and then the player freezes.

He freezes. About a minute of silence as he has his head down in his hands, looking at the floor. (Try this experiment. Get your gaming group to sit in utter silence, waiting for something to happen. 1 minute feels like 20 and is very awkward.)

Eventually I put my years of GM experience to use and have meltdown's character's phone dial another PC and have ghost voices threaten the other PC which prompts a callback to meltdown. Meltdown manages to pull it together a little bit but as soon as he eeks out his weak description of what his character saw, I end the game early.

I sent an email to meltdown player this morning and am waiting for a response. I politely asked him, 'WTF!?!?!?!?!'

Any thoughts, ideas, advice or observations would be appreciated. I have been running games over 20 years and never had anything this strange happen.

 

[crazy_monkey1956]

"Meltdown player" needs to seek professional treatment, I think. You are a GM, not a therapist. You, and he, may seriously want to consider that gaming may not be good for him.

 

[Peni Griffin]

Put the game on indefinite hold until this is resolved. Assure him, as often as necessary (and you will get sick of saying it, but do it anyway), that no one is mad at him, these things happen, it's just a game and it doesn't matter, everybody's concerned and wants him to do what's best for him, etc.

You say he's exhibited manic/depressive behavior before. Is he on medication? Does he see a professional or have a support group? Who's his next of kin? If you don't know these things, find out. You can't make an intelligent decision without such knowledge.

The next move depends on a lot of things - how willing you are to devote time and energy to this person, who else in his life is available to be responsible for him, how self-aware he is, what his resources are, etc. It may be that all you can do is make his next-of-kin aware that he needs help and make sure that person gets the straight dope on what happened. If your friend is trying to cover up, for any reason, he may minimize events like this to the people who care most until an unnecessary state of crisis is reached. If he lives alone, you may be the first person in a position to notice that anything is wrong, and you might have to take the responsibility of forcing him to face up to the fact that something is out of whack simply because there's no one else available to do the job. If, however, he's an experienced mental patient, he may already have started the necessary sequence to deal with a familiar probem, and all you may have to do is express the level of support you're willing and able to supply. If there's a large depressive component, one of the most important things you can do is check in on him periodically, just to let him know somebody gives a care and to assure yourself that he hasn't accidentally-on-purpose taken all his meds at once, forgotten to eat, or otherwise put himself in danger of dying.

I've dealt with and gamed with a surprisingly large number of people with diagnosable mental/emotional problems, and they're just like any other health problem except that the standard of care is lower because they aren't as well-understood. Do not reject him outright or get all creeped out at the idea that he's "crazy." Lots of "crazy" people have busy, productive, interesting lives in between bouts of craziness, and the number who are a danger to others is statistically smaller than the number of "normal" people who are a danger to others.

 

[dagger]

Kick him to the curb and keep gaming. Life is too short....


My group is a bunch of grounded professionals and we can be cruel.

 

[Kesh]

It sounds like he has a serious anxiety problem. Maybe a fear of failure, or just a fear of embarrassment. Talk about it with him, but crazypixie is right. He either needs professional help, or he needs time to work it out on his own.

If he still feels he can play, just with a new character, let him reroll and move on with it. Write the old character out somehow (preferably not a mental break down).

 

[takyris]

As a friend, you should encourage him to get some treatment. That sounds like social anxiety disorder.

As a GM, you should probably gently let him out of the gaming group, with a free invite back once he's had some treatment and is feeling better about dealing with the team. Or, failing that, ask him if he'd like to stay in the group with a different character, one with whom the player feels more comfortable.

The initial tone of your post suggests that you want us to make fun of this guy -- you're calling him "meltdown player", after all. Frankly, while I'm sorry that your game got disrupted, I'm also sorry that this guy went through such a humiliating and frustrating experience... with a group that appeared more concerned with continuing a story arc than whether one of the players was having a good time.

Next time a situation like that rolls around, see if there are ways to deal with it without having to shove the player through a situation he's not comfortable with. You could have just cut away from the player, giving him a break, and had other players get a magical warning that let them know that the occultist character was in trouble. A quick visit to his home shows that he's scheduled the date on his calendar, complete with the address of his romantic interest, and the heroes go there and get exactly the same information from the ghost-woman -- who is standing over the unconscious form of the occultist (who was overwhelmed by the ghost's pyschic energy and will remain unconscious for some undetermined time). You get to continue your plot, and you didn't have to force a player who was having an emotional crisis through something he didn't want to do.

 

[Keeper of Secrets]

There are a few more details I feel comfortable in sharing now (as the original post was too long for me to info-dump on everyone).

I have known the guy since 1992 and gamed with him off and on (mostly on) for about that amount of time.

He is (was) seeing a doctor.

He is (was) on pills.

He has been a very good friend and helps me out with everything from moving furniture to computer problems I am having. He was even in my wedding.

He used to live alone but about 5 months ago moved in with a girl I introduced him to (and work with). So asking her will be pretty easy.

I will be seeing him Sunday for a different game and will see what his attitude is there.

 

[jjsheets]

Kick him to the curb and keep gaming. Life is too short....


My group is a bunch of grounded professionals and we can be cruel.

Of course, if you care about this player, this is definitely not something you should do. At least not cruelly. If this happens, it should be HIS idea, not yours. This guy isn't being intentionally or maliciously disruptive to your game. You need to find out what is really the problem before you tune or change your campaign to him. Until then, suggest he see a doctor about the freeze. Also, don't gossip or reveal anything personal about him yo might learn to your other players.

 

[Emirikol]

"Meltdown player" needs to seek professional treatment, I think. You are a GM, not a therapist. You, and he, may seriously want to consider that gaming may not be good for him.

YUP. Some people are not cut out for it.

jh

 

[Phlebas]

........... You could have just cut away from the player, giving him a break, and had other players get a magical warning that let them know that the occultist character was in trouble. A quick visit to his home shows that he's scheduled the date on his calendar, complete with the address of his romantic interest, and the heroes go there and get exactly the same information from the ghost-woman -- who is standing over the unconscious form of the occultist (who was overwhelmed by the ghost's pyschic energy and will remain unconscious for some undetermined time). .........

That's a clever way out for a DM - I hope if I ever get to a similar situation I get that level of inspiration, though if I'm honest I would probably have reacted like the original OP in just being completely blindsided by the sitation.

RP'ing can be incredibly intense emotionally, sounds like your player needs some time / help before playing again.