Players forgetting their PC's shtick.

[Doc_Klueless]

Anyone else have problems with some of the players never remembering how their characters stuff works?

For instance (and I hope I'm not upsetting any players in the game I'm in), say the character uses the Trip maneuver a lot, but has to have it explained everytime.

Or, say, he's playing a cleric, but has to read over the rules for Turning Undead everytime.

It's not that the player is stupid or deliberately lazy, the rules just don't stick in the guy's mind.

Anyone else have players in their game like that.

What I'm doing is making multiple copies of angrimanu's (spelling... way bad) cheat sheets to hand out.

Would you be insulted if you were the forgetful player and another player gave you such a cheat-sheet?

Guess I'm just mini-ranting... Feel free to ignore.

 

[Brimshack]

I once had a couple that had sort of arranged an intellectual division of labor which made him responsible for remembering all the rules. I liked her a lot, and enjoyed having her in my game. She was great at role-playing, but about a dozen games into it, she still needed her husband to tell her which dice to roll as an attack dice. The fact that she was more than intelligent enough to remember this made it all the more frustrating. She had simply filed this under "his responsibility," but of course this whole division of labor meant that she was very fuzzy in her thinking about what her character could and could not do. She had one of the more powerful characters in the campaign, and she consistently underplayed him, often costing the whole party dearly. I eventually engineered a game where they couldn't sit together. When it wasn't as easy for him to select her dice and tell her what to do, she began to think it through on her own.

...so I guess I can empathize.

I wonder if there is a way you can present the information to him in a novel form. If your frustrating player has to think the process through from an unusual angle that will create a new opportunity to learn it. One way would be to ask him to guest DM a small segment of a game and let him deal with the responsibility of figuring out the process. Sometimes just having the increased responsibility makes the difference.

 

[shaylon]

Eh it happens to me sometimes but most of the guys in my group are either in the same boat or pretty sympathetic.

I plan on making a "cheat sheet" but I haven't got around to it.

-Shay

 

[KB9JMQ]

I have one player who is playing a barbarian warforged.
Doe's he ever remember to rage ? No.
He has a Doh ! moment when I mention he forgot to rage again

 

[Oryan77]

I'm the DM in our game and after two years of playing 3.5 I still can't remember all the rules when grappling. I have a reference sheet I made (you can get it in the link from my sig). I use it every game. Maybe people are a little more lenient on the DM needing to refer to his reference sheet? I don't mind if players still don't remember how to Turn Undead or Trip, I can usually tell them how and if I can't, it only takes a second to check my reference sheet.

With work, school, families, and real life in general, I don't expect people to remember detailed rules in a roleplaying game. As long as they remember they can use abilities, it's fine with me if they need to check the rules on how to do it.

 

[MacMathan]

The cheat sheets are a good idea.

I have had a lot of success with the rules cards in Fiery Dragons Battlebox speeding up combats.

As a group we put a fair amount of the honus on players to know the rules relevent to their characters before they sit down at the table.

 

[sniffles]

Just because a character has the ability to do something like rage or turn undead doesn't mean they have to do it every time the opportunity presents itself. Unless the person in question has defined his character as someone who always uses trip or always turns undead, you shouldn't be bothered if he doesn't remember how to do it every time.

If, on the other hand, he does use those abilities all the time (and by all the time I mean at least once a game session), but can't remember the rules with all that practice, then perhaps he needs a cheat sheet. Or perhaps you should just give him a break and help him out. Not everyone is equally skilled at remembering and interpreting rules.

 

[EdL]

I could be that cleric. I'm always forgetting the rules. Turn Undead, spells, you name it. And I've been playing for over a quarter of a century! But then, my memory has always been spotty. *Sigh* And I certainly wouldn't be insulted if someone handed me a cheat sheet. It would make things easier! (Everyone I play with is well aware of my poor memory, even people I play with online. That's the first thing I tell people who don't know me that I'll be playing with.)

 

[Voadam]

I played shadowrun for years, playing a smart bodyguard. I grokked the character creation and stats, the bioware and techno equipment, the mythology and magical metaphysics, the cultural mixes and the lingo.

I had to have the damage codes for my guns explained to me every single time I shot them. Every game in the first fight I had to have someone explain it to me quickly then I was good for the day. The letters I could remember how they connected to the health levels but the numbers always went screwy. Some mechanics just don't click with some people. And that is one reason I never GMd SR. I played a ton, loved it and had an incredibly badass combat machine character who shot a lot of people, but the mechanics of damage codes just didn't click in for me.

 

[diaglo]

i have 15 pages of cheat sheets and i still forget to use all of my options....