Rat Bastardry: Is there an equivalent for players?

[MarauderX]

RB players tend to always be the ones that do exactly what you don't want them to. Ever had one of these scenarios?

DM: "there is a rumored to be an undead army to the North marching this way, and the residents of this town are fleeing to the caves in the south, but the caves aren't completely safe either, unless a certain band of adventurers {ahem} clears the way for the weakened people..."

RB Player (RBP): "I'm going to ride to the north to see if I can somehow find a way to stop the army."

Other players (OP?): "but, um, that's too dangerous, we could die, I mean we barely escaped the first run in with them before..."

RBP: "Nevermind that, we need to defeat them soundly this time. And I'm going no matter if you go with me or not!"

OP: "Um, ok, i suppose we could start taking out scouting groups and harassing them from afar, perhaps disrupt their supply lines..."

RBP: "They don't have supply lines! (Paraphrase: That makes me right, you wrong, so we should do what I say!)"

DM: "you know, you could wait until you survive to 4th level..."

RBP: "Off we go! To defeat the undead menace!"


I hate when that happens.

 

[takyris]

Well, as one of the RBDMs, I can at least say what we like on the board.

1) Hookability. A good player creates a character who has hooks, trusting that the DM isn't going to hold EVERY sibling, girlfriend, or buddy hostage. It's great to be able to design a story that's tailored to a specific person, and that's only possible when the player puts some character into his character.

2) Competence. A good player knows the rules well enough to do everything his character can reasonably be expected to do, generally has his action ready to go when his turn comes up, and feels comfortable coming up with inventive actions that don't require hugely elaborate house rules to map.

3) Trust. A good player trusts that the DM is acting in good faith, and, while he may verify that the DM understands the normal rules when the DM does something different, goes along with it nevertheless. The player is also comfortable working with the DM even against the rest of the party as necessary (roleplaying that his character has been kidnapped and replaced with a doppleganger, for example).

4) Roleplaying. A good player is willing to faithfully roleplay an action that the player strongly suspects is going to be bad, believing that a large part of the fun of the game comes from roleplaying a character rather than "winning" a game. While the player isn't trying to commit suicide or deliberately fail, he is quite comfortable limiting his personal social or intellectual abilities in order to faithfully play someone of lesser ability.

5) Originality. A good player uses the rules as a tool, not a crutch, and is always open to trying new ideas, provided that they are something that might work in real life. Sometimes this means that the player undoes massive amounts of DM planning, while other times this means that the player creates an entire side adventure by seeing an opportunity, or even a necessity, that the player's character would see or conceive of, even though it was not deliberately hinted at.

This is all informal, but in general, those are the big five that I recall us appreciating a bunch when we gush about our kickass players.

And please note that a lot of those traits only really work if you've got a GOOD DM, too. A player can't trust a DM who makes arbitrary and illogical rulings, who kills off every sibling or girlfriend that the character has, and who gets frustrated when the players "ruin" his adventure by solving it too early. So a lot of these abilities are really partnership abilities.

 

[el-remmen]

Well, as one of the RBDMs, I can at least say what we like on the board.

1) Hookability. A good player creates a character who has hooks, trusting that the DM isn't going to hold EVERY sibling, girlfriend, or buddy hostage. It's great to be able to design a story that's tailored to a specific person, and that's only possible when the player puts some character into his character.

2) Competence. A good player knows the rules well enough to do everything his character can reasonably be expected to do, generally has his action ready to go when his turn comes up, and feels comfortable coming up with inventive actions that don't require hugely elaborate house rules to map.

3) Trust. A good player trusts that the DM is acting in good faith, and, while he may verify that the DM understands the normal rules when the DM does something different, goes along with it nevertheless. The player is also comfortable working with the DM even against the rest of the party as necessary (roleplaying that his character has been kidnapped and replaced with a doppleganger, for example).

4) Roleplaying. A good player is willing to faithfully roleplay an action that the player strongly suspects is going to be bad, believing that a large part of the fun of the game comes from roleplaying a character rather than "winning" a game. While the player isn't trying to commit suicide or deliberately fail, he is quite comfortable limiting his personal social or intellectual abilities in order to faithfully play someone of lesser ability.

5) Originality. A good player uses the rules as a tool, not a crutch, and is always open to trying new ideas, provided that they are something that might work in real life. Sometimes this means that the player undoes massive amounts of DM planning, while other times this means that the player creates an entire side adventure by seeing an opportunity, or even a necessity, that the player's character would see or conceive of, even though it was not deliberately hinted at.

This is all informal, but in general, those are the big five that I recall us appreciating a bunch when we gush about our kickass players.

And please note that a lot of those traits only really work if you've got a GOOD DM, too. A player can't trust a DM who makes arbitrary and illogical rulings, who kills off every sibling or girlfriend that the character has, and who gets frustrated when the players "ruin" his adventure by solving it too early. So a lot of these abilities are really partnership abilities.

 

[Pielorinho]

I guess I think one of the central points of being a rat-bastard DM involves getting your players to look at you admiringly and say, "You sonofabitch!" at some unexpected twist in the plot.

A rat-bastard player should make their DM do the same thing. Do something unpredictable, in-character, and cool, something that challenges the DM, and you've achieved it. It doesn't need to be violent or game-winning.

I'm trying to think of some examples from the games I've run. Let's see:

* Recently, my players entered a city that was surrounded by an impoverished refugee camp. I had this whole political intrigue plot going in the city -- but the players' first act was to go right back outside the city gates and tend to the refugees. It was a definite challenge to me, and led me to create one of the better monsters I've ever come up with (IMO) in an effort to give meaning and story-goodness to their choices.

* Part of the city intrigue, when they finally got to it, was an eight-year-old princeling being kept away from members of the court. The players saw him playing in a park, and managed to coordinate plans with (and interview and gain information from) the princeling by having a pseudodragon familiar telepathically pretend to be a friendly bunnyrabbit in the park and talk with the child from a distance. While the princeling's guardians were suspicious, they didn't see the pseudodragon, and figured the PCs were too far away to gather information. The PCs ended up finding out a lot more than I'd planned, via use of a clever ruse.

* One example of my own rat-bastardly playing . We knew that a certain hag was guarding a bunch of prisoners held in an extradimensional prison, and that a pedestal in her lair, combined with a nearby dial/lever, constituted a portal to the various cells in the prison. My ninth-level bard singlehandedly defeated this rather tough creature: he disguised himself as her boss, went into her lair and told her he needed an inventory of prisoners (so he could find out which cells were empty and which were occupied). He then began using his fascinate ability to tell her the story of Little Scarlet-Cloak, a druidic girl with a who was going to visit her wolf companion in the woods, and how a clever hag ate the wolf companion and took its place in order to ambush the druid girl. As I went on telling the story about the clever hag, I got the real hag to stand in various places to act out her counterpart in the story (using suggestion); when she finally stood on the pedestal, I flipped the lever, imprisoning her in one of her own cells. (We later transferred the worst of her prisoners, a starving bloodthirsty troll, into the same cell with her. After a long, long fight that she couldn't hope to win, she got et.)

Throw your DM for a loop, but make it a fun loop, and you're a rat-bastard player.

Incidentally, we've been talking about getting some new folks in the Rat Bastard DM forum; would folks be interested in seeing a recruitment drive?

Daniel

 

[Steverooo]

So, what would we call such a player? The term Rat Bastard should be reserved for the DM. What would be a good formal definition for this type of player (like the one above for Rat Bastardry). Anyone want to share their own personal moments of such play, or those you've witnessed?

My second GM once told me: "You're an excellent player, and you give the GM fits!". He was a Killer GM (I recall 15 PCs biting the dust in one game session; some players losing theirs two or three times that night).

So, maybe "Fit-giver"?

 

[Steverooo]

Fit-Giver PC Story

After some time being the GM, the rat mentioned above got a bit tired, so someone else ran a game, and he entered as a PC...

A Chaotic Evil Mage, with a Staff of Wizardry, IIRC...

Naturally, this didn't fit into the party well, at all, and the RB-former-DM immediately began to cause trouble. My seventh level (1e) Druid tried to talk him into being good. He refused.

Finally, the Druid pondered aloud: "Hmmm! I wonder what effect a Warp Wood spell would have on that Staff?" Immediately, one of the other players (who sometimes GMed and was known for his knowledge of the rules) jumped in.

"Oh, I think it would destroy all of its power. It'd just be a bent stick!"

The RB-former-GM said "Don't warp my staff!" After that, "warp wood" was all we had to say, to keep him in line...

(How does a seventh level PC get a Staff of Wizardry, anyway?)

 

[el-remmen]

He was a Killer GM (I recall 15 PCs biting the dust in one game session; some players losing theirs two or three times that night).

This does not fit my definition of a Rat Bastard DM - anyone can kill off tons of characters.

While an RB DM will not hesitate to kill off PCs who make poor choices or do dumb things - He will also gleefully let someone live and provide terrible choices and follow up on the logical reprecussions of PC action or inaction.

 

[Piratecat]

I LOVE rat bastard players. That's my favorite moment as a DM, when a player pulls something out of my butt and just makes me stand there and blink.

At GenCon, Zarathustran was playing the charming disguise expert in my Spycraft game. They were being chased along narrow mountain roads by lackeys for the bad guys. After the team computer expert patched into the On*Star system in the lackeys' cars, he got on the On*Star radio system and imitated the chief villains' voice.

"You idiots! I'm up here!" Rolls his bluff, gets something amazing.

"Um.. sorry, boss!"

"I swear, I can't trust you idiots to tie your own shoes. Let's go over it one more time. What was the plan again?"

"But, boss..."

"SILENCE! You will demonstrate to me that you're not totally incompetent, or...."

*gulp* "Yes, boss. We agreed to meet..."

It was really just beautiful.

 

[takyris]

Ditto nemm. There's nothing Rat Bastardly about a trap that the PCs can't avoid or a monster that is too powerful for them to defeat.

(Just like there's nothing RB-Player-ish about a raging barbarian with a greatsword and Power Attack. While the barbarian guy is romping around, the actual RB-Player is proving to the world that a half-elven ranger/bard who specializes in throwing axes is a viable concept.)

An RBDM never designs a trap that can't be bypassed. It might be tough. It might be unpleasant. The players might not figure that trap out. But if they get frustrated, it's with themselves and not with the DM, because they KNOW that the RBDM doesn't get any particular enjoyment out of killing them -- they're frustrated because they KNOW that there was some way to disarm the trap, bypass the trap, or never need to go into the hallway with the trap in the first place.

The RB-Player is the one who doesn't think of the campaign like a computer game. Just because someone is giving you a quest doesn't mean you have to take it -- and it doesn't mean that you have to fulfill the quest in the manner that they intend. The RB-Player acts as though the campaign is the real world. He takes off his armor when he's in the city and leaves most of his weapons in his room (or he comes up with a good illusion to cover the fact that he's tromping around fully armed). He doesn't necessarily think "like a hero" at every moment. And so on. Roleplaying, realism, a respect for the separate consciousness that is the PC that he has created. That's an RB-Player.

 

[Steverooo]

Back on track

RBDM and Killer GM are not mutually exclusive, but that's beside the point...

Back on track, what do you call the player of such a character?

Fit-giver?
Lassoist?
Loop-thrower?
Plot-breaker?
Something else?