D&D General Player Responsibilities

[Ralif Redhammer]

I've long been quite open with getting buy-in on my campaigns in advance. While pulling a bait-and-switch campaign doesn't generally work out either, some players just like to throw a monkeywrench in the gears to see what happens.

I get the appeal of a surprise reveal theme. It's a cinematic and literary technique we see all the time. But D&D is a shared storytelling game, and pulling the rug entirely out from underneath your fellow storytellers has to be done very cautiously, if at all.

everytime I've seen the won't bite the plot hook DM wanted to keep the new concept "secret" till the game started. I had a character start in forgotten realms as a wild who hated humans got thrown into another world where humans hated elves and was promptly imprisoned for no reason and DM spent three game sessions trying to convince the character to hero up and save the world full of humans who hated him. if a player concept is a bad idea at least tell the player that the entire game will be against them with that concept.

 

[nevin]

My question is always "why does your characters want to participate in this group?"

If your character does NOT want to participate, that's cool. Make a new character that does and describe why.

There's no room for lone wolf types at my table.

I've found if you tie those players goals into your campaignig t works pretty well the few who didn't suffered the consequences till they left the game. I've only had that happen three times since first edition

 

[Ath-kethin]

I've found if you tie those players goals into your campaignig t works pretty well the few who didn't suffered the consequences till they left the game. I've only had that happen three times since first edition

As part of my session 0 I always have the players work out why they are a team. I find the group always comes up with better ideas than I can on my own, and it makes for super invested players and really tight groups.

 

[Lanefan]

As part of my session 0 I always have the players work out why they are a team. I find the group always comes up with better ideas than I can on my own, and it makes for super invested players and really tight groups.

I'd rather find a way for them to either meet in-character or be thrown together in the fiction as part of session 1; and have the characters rolled up either mostly or completely independent of what anyone else is doing. And yes this can mean we start with a party of 6 Fighters and a Thief - so be it.

For example: the last three times I've started a brand new 1st level party went thusly:

--- a famous adventuring company advertised for new recruits. Many dozens showed up, and were arbitrarily divided into party-size groups and given "practice missions"* as tests of their abilities; all the PCs went into one party, of course. Off they went.
--- two PCs (who were intentionally rolled up by their players as a team) travelled through the land recruiting adventurers at every village they stopped at; the other PCs signed up one at a time, and off they went.
--- a temple in a peaceful town asks for help with an odd situation. Each PC responded to the request independently, the temple then got them all together, and off they went.

* - for plot reasons "practice missions" is in quotes: each mission was in fact a suicide run, with the idea that if the PCs are resourceful they'll find a way to survive anyway; and most of them did.

 

[Ath-kethin]

I'd rather find a way for them to either meet in-character or be thrown together in the fiction as part of session 1; and have the characters rolled up either mostly or completely independent of what anyone else is doing. And yes this can mean we start with a party of 6 Fighters and a Thief - so be it.

For example: . . . [Snip]

There's no wrong way to play!

I frankly lack the time (by which I mean interest) these days to have everyone build characters independently and then hope they work together. I find it easier to establish why they are together right off and build the campaign from there.

 

[Weiley31]

Be ACTUALLY willing to play a module, especially if you agreed to join in/play it. Yeah yeah yeah we all love our homebrew or like to DND Flex by coming up with the next Lord of The Rings, but if your playing a module and agreed to play the module, don't throw it out the window. Otherwise it leads to examples such as:

Tyranny of Dragons 2019

DM: So the Dragon comes swooping down and star-
PCs: Nope not heading to that town. Leaves the beginning of the Module to go screw around like blockheads.

Mad World starts playing as the camera pans up close to the Disgruntled DM's face as he's wondering why people agreed to play the module but NOPED outta it

Out of The Abyss
DM: So the Demon Lor-
PCs: Hard Pass: screw the Underdark. NOPES outta it again.

DM: I mean.....do you guys wanna play or not?

PCs: HAHAHA, dice gets rolled.

DM: Uh.... yeah I know we covered thi-

PCS: We're KINGS OF THE WORLD!!!! SUCK IT ELMINSTER!!

DM: Rolls for Self Mental Breakdown check.

Descent to Avernus
DM: So these guys come into the Tavern. It seems like they may know something to leverage against you, possibly even death. There seems to be no w-

PCS: So wait, your forcing our hands or using a cutscene on us?

DM: What? No...we discussed this during Session 0 and spent most of that time coming up with a Group Secret that ties the party together. Knowledge that shouldn't normally be known and could give a disadvantage against the party should it be leaked....Don't you guys remember this?

PCS: HEY LOOK AT THE NERVE OF THIS DM HERE, TRYING TO FORCE THIS STORY ON US!

 

[jmartkdr2]

When I'm dming, it's my responsibility to do what I can to make sure everyone has fun.

When I'm a player, it's my responsibility to do what I can to make sure everyone has fun.

I usually call that 'playing in good faith,' a useful concept for all kinds of games. It's supposed to be fun for everyone, and this tend to happen when everyone sees that as a goal. I

If everyone is playing in good faith, there are no problems: only speedbumps and opportunities.

But more specifically (and/or when meeting people for a one-shot): 1. you must be an adventurer (someone who will go on an adventure - reluctant is fine, but I ain't fighting you on this.) 2. You must be a team player (I don't dictate alignment because the definitions aren't agreed upon, but don't be a wangrod) 3. try to learn the rules for your character (as long as I can see progress I'll forgive being a new guy. But make an effort.) Nothing radical, really.

 

[MGibster]

My #1 is that players need to create a character that both WANTS to go on the adventure(s) at hand (roleplaying reluctance is fine as long as it doesn't lead to actual avoidance) and a character thatworks within the context of the PC party. That last bit is both a roleplaying consideration and a mechanical consideration.

This is high on the list for me as well. If we all agree that we're going to be a band of lovable thieves, don't bring a law & order type. Make sure you create a character appropriate to the game we all agreed to play.

1. Show up to game night on time and on a regular basis. Let us know when you can't make it.
2. At least have a basic understanding of the rules well enough to run your character. (Exceptions made for new games/players of course.)
3. Let everyone participate in the fun.

 

[bloodtide]

*Knowing the rules, and very much knowing the rules for your character.

*IF they have any questions ASK them before the game (Do NOT wait for the first round of combat and then stop and derail the game by asking " how does my character attack with a whip?!?!")

*You must not endlessly whine and complain about the Metagame. Everyone knows we are playing a GAME. So it's full of plot hooks, game hooks, traps, tricks and all sorts of metagame things. Yes the broken door knob is a plot contrivance, but you do not whine and complain about it. It's part of the game and must be there.

*And even if you know something is a metagame construct, you still must play the game. You might figure out something is an obvious game trap....that your character could never figure out in a million years.....you can't just cross your arms and refuse to play the game.

*Bad things will happen to your character....just about all the time. It's part of the game. You must accept this and keep playing.

* If you "want" something out of the game YOU must put in the effort to get that: it will not be handed to you.

*You have agreed to play in a group with a group....so you must do that. You can't Lone Wolf.

 

[Li Shenron]

My #1 is that players need to create a character that both WANTS to go on the adventure(s) at hand (roleplaying reluctance is fine as long as it doesn't lead to actual avoidance) and a character thatworks within the context of the PC party. That last bit is both a roleplaying consideration and a mechanical consideration.

This is a good one. Here's another...

Every RPG rules system can be abused. I think an important player's responsibility is to play along with the spirit of the game and therefore not to try to abuse the system. Strive to connect with the RAI more than serving the RAW. If you find a loophole that can be exploited, seriously consider whether exploiting it would serve your game and make it better, or destroy your fun, and in case of the latter, just don't exploit it. Complaining about loopholes, blaming designers... we have forums for that! Just don't destroy your own game only to "prove" you are smarter than the authors because you figured out they made a mistake.

---

Concrete example (pet peeve of mine): skill checks retries.

The rules don't say you can't just keep trying a skill check you have failed. There are plenty of example where it seems "it makes sense": searching for something, force open a stuck door, recall a piece of knowledge... If you roll a low number, you may be convinced you could have in fact found something, and want to try again. The rules usually make it so that these tasks take only a little time, so if you can afford to take more time, why not retrying when your previous dice roll(s) clearly showed you were way below your possibility of success?

What many players do not realize, is that this is not within the spirit of the original skill check. If the DM decides or knows that you should succeed at a task, they won't call for a skill check in the first place, they'll just say "you find this" or "you force the door open", period. The DM calls for a dice roll when they doesn't want to decide. The rules help the DM set the probabilities at least roughly (that's why we have sample DCs for tasks, and the whole framework of ability modifiers and proficiency bonuses).

If you simply allow retries, you break all the probabilities. Even ONE retry makes success significantly more probably. Unlimited retries makes success certain, unless the task is impossible in which case it was DM's mistake to grant a check in the first place (although an exception might be if the DM doesn't want to let the players know that the task was impossible, and called for a check to hide such fact).

If a player insists that "it makes sense" to retry, or that the RAW doesn't say they can't, they are failing their responsibility to play along with the original spirit of skill checks, which is simply to "toss a coin" to determine if the game goes right or left at a plot point. What is the consequence? The DM is usually compelled to come up with house rules that either frustrate the players even more (player will think the DM is making it more difficult than RAW because DM doesn't want us to win, or because the DM doesn't like that I am so smart I figured out how to win the game) or simply complicate the game more than necessary. Yes, I am sure in YOUR game they all love your house rule about progressively increasing how long it takes at every retry or suffering drawbacks and so on, but not everyone really likes to make the game more complex, and the point is that it would not need to be made more complex if everyone just played along since the start.

See for example how the Critical Role players are in fact playing along with this sort of spirit. I haven't watched that much of it, but it seemed to me that they just move forward with the game and don't question how they can use the RAW or the RANW ("rules as non-written") to make sure everything in the game goes the way they want it to.

This really boils down to the core idea that D&D is a game based on frequent randomness, it has always been, from nearly everything in combat rules to random encounters to treasure... A stuck door or a hidden trap is either supposed to be random or non-random: the DM decides whether there is a roll or not. The spirit of the game is that to increase your chances on a random point you can either use resources (possibly limited ones i.e. pay a price) or use your brains to find another solution (stuck door? find another way! non-disarmable trap? throw the halfling!). If you just don't like randomness, ask your DM to play the game without ever asking for checks.