D&D 5E Players Killing Players for stupid reason

[R_J_K75]

PvP is always on the target’s terms. If you want to attack another player’s character, that player decides if the action succeeds, fails, or requires a roll, and if so, what needs to be rolled.

I agree and that's pretty much how I handle it. If players come to blows in game/in character and roleplay the circumstances as a DM I'm OK with it, and I will referee the situation as I would any other combat. At that point as we are all grown adults they should know what the outcome could be. We are all friends so this rarely, if ever happens and if it does there are no hard feelings. If a player just wantonly and maliciously goes after another player for no good reason then I'll step in and put an end to it. If a player isn't there we just remove their PC from play for the session so that solves that.

I've seen some PvP crime that was downright hilarious and although it was when we were younger I kind of miss those games. From a game consistency perspective I don't like having players need to make new characters over something like PvP crime but otoh it does ruin the immersion and suspension of disbelief if every argument between characters is resolved nice and neat like a "Family Ties" episode. IRL I've seen friends/acquaintances fight and things get out of hand and its usually pretty quick. To think that a PC wouldn't or shouldn't end up dead at the hands of another PC is somewhat unrealistic to me. "Let's Get Ready to Rumble...Fighting"!!

 

[TheSword]

As a DM, I have had probably 20 PCs die in my campaigns from other PCs killing them. Thankfully, not in the last few years. These days I simply ask people not to make characters with a code of chivalry, or extreme religious dogma. That little change alone has seen a 100% drop in PC v PC fatalities. Codes of chivalry, or worse yet, bushido, are just terrible for making players feel like they either act out in a disruptive way or stain their honour, I really hate the (often false) dichotomies it forces.

Honour systems work when everyone follows them, and people are unfailingly polite up to the point of conflict. Two things that PCs are notoriously bad at.

 

[turnip_farmer]

With a new group we tend to talk about this Session 0 or when someone new comes in. My preference is inter-character tension and drama is fine, inter-player is not. Be respectful of the other players (for instance I checked with the player of the Tiefling before deciding my half-elf paladin was racist against "fiend-bloods"). And no PvP - which includes stealing and other hostile acts.

The first campaign I ever ran (the players were all strangers) the group included characters that would be expected to dislike and distrust one another (character A's religion dictated that character B was a dangerous heretic). I thought this could be fun, with a classic 'unlikely allies forced together by circumstance' slowly coming to trust each other.

My discovery was that, when playing with strangers, you should not assume that they listen to anything you said at session zero, nor that chronological age implies an adult worldview.

 

[Blue]

The first campaign I ever ran (the players were all strangers) the group included characters that would be expected to dislike and distrust one another (character A's religion dictated that character B was a dangerous heretic). I thought this could be fun, with a classic 'unlikely allies forced together by circumstance' slowly coming to trust each other.

My discovery was that, when playing with strangers, you should not assume that they listen to anything you said at session zero, nor that chronological age implies an adult worldview.

Same as with any outside-of-the-game-world problem. You talk to them. If that doesn't work you decide if the table can live with the problem or you eject them. Bad players are bad players.

On a separate note, I applaud you for being able to run your first camapign with strangers. It's a leap to DM, one that's easier with friendly faces. You put yourself through a gauntlet of fire and from the "first campaign" comment, it sounds successfully. Kudos.

 

[turnip_farmer]

Same as with any outside-of-the-game-world problem. You talk to them. If that doesn't work you decide if the table can live with the problem or you eject them. Bad players are bad players.

On a separate note, I applaud you for being able to run your first camapign with strangers. It's a leap to DM, one that's easier with friendly faces. You put yourself through a gauntlet of fire and from the "first campaign" comment, it sounds successfully. Kudos.

Not exactly. That one wasn't successful. The inter-character conflict became inter-player conflict, toys were thrown out of prams, people stormed off, the group fell apart.

I got back on the horse having learnt something about communication and agreeing on shared expectations, and subsequent campaigns went better!

 

[R_J_K75]

On a separate note, I applaud you for being able to run your first camapign with strangers. It's a leap to DM, one that's easier with friendly faces. You put yourself through a gauntlet of fire and from the "first campaign" comment, it sounds successfully. Kudos.

I agree. From past experiences I've taken a strict no strangers policy. Its just not worth the self inflicted pain.

 

[embee]

Should i allow my PC's to kill another PC just because "he wasn't here"?

I say no. Are your players annoyed? If yes, that's understandable.

But you need to talk to the AWOL player and give them notice. "Hey, you've been missing some sessions and it's starting to get disruptive. I can let it slide this time and one more time, but, after that, it wouldn't be fair to the other players."

After that, if s/he still goes AWOL, don't kill the character. That would be a waste of a perfectly good NPC or villain.

 

[TheSword]

Out of game problems (attendance) don’t have in-game solutions (murder). This law is universal and incontrovertible. The same applies to all the other out of game issues. Trying to deal with these things in game often strays dangerously close to bullying.

 

[embee]

Man, you guys are boring!

Party arguments, internal rivalries, infighting and plots are an accepted part of the game 'round here; as is friendly-fire injury or death whether intentionally done or not. Oddly enough, such instances are often the stories that survive long after every other aspect of whatever adventure it was is forgotten.

Myself, I sometimes play goodly and-or co-operative characters and sometimes I don't; it all depends on what I've got in mind for its personality - and sometimes on how the rest of the party treats it.

An example of what can happen: one of my characters, a front-line Fighter, has been hit a few too many times by friendly-fire area-effect damage spells. So, he went out and got himself a Wizardslayer longsword; and now the party casters are on notice: hit me with your damage spells and this sword's getting used - you might get one more spell away while I'm charging you, so you'd better make it good.

That said, knocking off a character just because the player isn't there (as opposed to any in-character reason) is not cool.

Lan-"if your players are in fact killing other players that's a bigger issue: call the cops"-efan

Here's my way of thinking:

You CAN have in-party tension and have it be good RP. I'm on an Expanse re-watch and would cite to Amos coming to blows with Miller. But that's some high-level RP right there. Is the bruiser PC crazy? Do I need to keep an eye on that PC? That adds a lot of dramatic tension. If they then come to respect each other later, you've got a real good arc.

But the thing is that that works great in storytelling, where there is one voice and one plot and one direction. That's not a RPG. And because of the randomness and not knowing of an RPG with multiple voices and multiple directions and no real plot, PvP, even non-lethal, is best avoided.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Or you could....start a new thread, maybe?

This one is working just fine; its aged and wise.

Yeah, I always wish when we see a new thread involving a topic that has been debated to death for literally years (Stealth anyone?) that the person who started the thread had gone to look for any of the old ones and seen what had already been written and debated and argued in the past for thousands of pages of text before adding their opinion. Because that way they'd get a much better understanding about both sides of the argument already and could then add to it and speak from a place of personal choice rather than definitive "This is how I read the rules and am 100% correct!" (like many new threads on much-debated topics start with.)

Because that "definitiveness" just leads to bickering and people getting defensive about what's "right" rather than just how they feel about it. We don't tend to argue about people's tastes, but rather their beliefs about what something IS or when something HAS to be done or made.