Player Revolt

[boerngrim]

Hi
Many years ago before I had started DMing I was involved in a minor revolt during a Spelljammer campaign. Our DM was running a campaign based loosely on the Spelljammer novels, the Cloakmaster Cycle. I didn't know that untill I read the books years later. One of the PC's (mine) came to posess a cloak which was an Ultimate helm. Ultimate helms were the big Spelljammer mcguffin, they supposedly would allow the owner to take command of THE Spelljammer, the giant manta ray looking ship with the castle on its back which was the symbol of the setting. Incidentally, once you put on an ultimate helm you can't remove it unless you die.

We had a lot of fun in the campaign, running around doing different things and all the while various power groups were trying to get my cloak and kill us all in the process. We got into the low teen levels and were at a crossroads. The campaign had lasted about a year. We had confronted/been confronted by the majority of our long running foes ( and some former allies)and came out on top. We had to decide if we were going to enter the final phase of the story and go find The Spelljammer or not. The DM gave the impression that we had a choice at this point. We were given time for an out of game confab. All the players discussed it, and we decided we didn't want to find The Spelljammer. We wanted to just keep adventuring. The DM seemed fine with that.

When we returned to the game, we were immediately surrounded by the full might of the Elven Imperial Space Fleet. The DM states that they want me and the cloak, or just the cloak if I resist. They are taking us prisoner and any PC who resists will be killed on the spot, no dice rolls allowed. I got up from the table and went home. A couple of other players did the same.

A few days later we talked it out and we returned to the game, but we started over with a new campaign. Now, loking back as a DM I understand his frustration that we were about to derail his campaign, but we really thought he was giving us the option of what direction we went. I still feel he should have told us he didn't want to go that route instead of nuking the game.
Thanks.

 

[barsoomcore]

My Barsoom players attempted a revolt early on in the campaign's life.

What Triggered The Revolt?
They had just endured the admittedly unpleasant adventure detailed in the beginning of my Season One Story Hour, wherein under their care, a huge number of innocent civilians were slaughtered by an enemy FAR too powerful for the party to deal with.

What Form Did The Revolt Take?
They told me they hadn't enjoyed it, that it was all too dark and depressing for them, and requested I lighten things up.

What Was The Fallout?
I pretty much refused to change pointblank. I assured them that I had a plan, and that if they stuck it out they would find it worth their while. They decided to trust me on that



and the campaign resumed. Things stayed dark and depressing, really.

It was primarily a question of mismatched expectations, and once those were re-aligned there wasn't really any trouble. They embraced the style of the campaign and Barsoom lurched along in its dark and depressing way.

 

[Corbert]

Back in my 1e days, I decided to run an adventure based on a movie I saw the week before. It starred Burt Reynolds, Jon Voigt, Ned Beatty, and Ronny Cox. (And no, I'm not the inspiration for Nitro Fergusson, at least I don't think I am). The revolt hit the moment the players saw the canoes. I was voted out as DM two weeks later.

Hark, is that the sylvan sounds of a ... banjo?

 

[CanadienneBacon]

I almost had a revolt in my Night Below game.

The players were investigating the appearance of this new marsh near some town to the south. Detailed descriptions of trudging around in swamp-water, with NOTHING happening was just a bit too much for them.

We kept playing though.

I'm playing a PC in the Night Below and we are pretty much exactly at the time/place you describe. It's INCREDIBLY freaking boring. I'm tempted to ditch that game but have been hanging on because I know it's a boxed set and we're only 2nd level. If I didn't know that we are doing a boxed set adventure, I probably would've quit two sessions ago just out of the sheer vapidness of this particular segment.

Regarding the OP's questions:
With my spouse DMing, I ended up being the lone player not to quit a 2E game. Everyone else at the table had cut their teeth on 3.0 and when the DM announced he was going to run 2E for a while--after we'd been using the 3.5 system--three-quarters of the party up and quit a short time into things. No one wanted to play 2E. In the short-term, this meant that we were never able to finish the DM's 2E campaign. In the long-term, there were no ill effects. We're all friends.

 

[Lanefan]

The second incident was in a Midgard game (though that didn't have much impact on the problem) where one of the players decided that the stats he had rolled for his character were just too bad to allow him to survive his first batte but the DM didn't want to allow him to reroll. Said player then tried to let his character commit suicide which the DM wasn't inclined to allow. So things got worse and the attempts at suicide became increasingly elaborate with the DMs attempts to thwart them becoming ever more implausible.
Eventually, the other players joined in the fun and tried to kill off their characters, as well. Naturally, the DM gave up on the session after a while and after another session gone bad on the campaign, as well.

This is priceless!

Too bad the DM gave up on it...

Lanefan