Should I let my players kill each other?

[Morrus]

As people have said above, you play a game for one reason: for fun. The basic idea is that a group of friends get together and do something fun together; the result being that they all have a good time.

If they're all having fun killing each others' characters, that's fine. Goal achieved.

If doing so is ruining anybody's enjoyment of the game, then - well, why would someone want to ruin somebody else's enjoyment of a mutual social activity?

The golden rule is: everybody should be enjoying themselves. Anything else falls a long way below that in order of importance.

 

[Montague68]

As people have said above, you play a game for one reason: for fun. The basic idea is that a group of friends get together and do something fun together; the result being that they all have a good time.

If they're all having fun killing each others' characters, that's fine. Goal achieved.

If doing so is ruining anybody's enjoyment of the game, then - well, why would someone want to ruin somebody else's enjoyment of a mutual social activity?

The golden rule is: everybody should be enjoying themselves. Anything else falls a long way below that in order of importance.

Agree completely.

Having had plenty of experience of meeting new players and DMing for players I don't know, I have a strict no-conflict rule unless the players involved give their consent, and I tell them this up front. If players disregard it (which has happened a few times), they get one warning. If it continues their character suffers a massive myocardial infarction and the player gets shown the door. I have neither the time nor the inclination to deal with sociopathic players who think they are entitled to roleplay petulant rogues who constantly pickpocket the party, steal treasure and then backstab a party member in their sleep for some perceived slight.

In the case of the OP who's dealing with more experienced players who have known each other a long time, at the point the sorcerer cast the charm person I would have stopped the game and asked the two players to reconcile their OOC differences before we continued, ending the game that evening if necessary. In my experience nipping that kind of behavior in the bud by shining the spotlight on it by pausing or ending the game tends to work best instead of ignoring it until it boils over.

 

[Noumenon]

The problem I have with "fun" is I'm a pretty ideological person and sometimes I just can't accept that someone could have fun the way they do, even when they've been happy for years doing stuff like role-playing every copper piece they spend on lunch or losing characters to random pit traps. "That's not fun!" I cry. "You just don't understand what fun is!"

So maybe PVP is fun for them, but they're not going to get a chance to find out in my game because it makes me quite distressed.

 

[Greja]

Sounds like some of my old campaigns. My brother and I have each had a few sessions where players were killing each other due to 'unresolveable differences'. Thing is it usually isnt the characters differences, its the campaign itself.

Don't get upset with them behaving how you wouldn't, just find some of the things they find entertaining so they are provided with better options. If the party has more fun proceeding with the quests, earning titles, or getting loot then killing each other may not seem as attractive. Do a needs analysis on the characters and players (they are two seperate entities). A character will seek a reward that satisfies a player's desires in a manner they can achieve while maintaining their character's personality.

You can remove instigators of fights - something my brother has to pick up on still. If the players fight when they get dirty, then it's just asking for it when you make a mudpit they have to move through. Having organizations give players conflicting objectives with quests is another instigator. Tie their quests together so they can both accomplish their goals at the same time. There is no reason you can't use instigators (gremlins stealing items from one player and stashing it in the others backpack is classic) - but these instigators should be used sparingly and only for story related instances. I find it helps to use instigators during a combat, for example: finding potions are missing when they go to reach for them, they argue for a bit, another combat starts due to their yelling (possibly with more weird things going on that clues the players in). The combats give the players a chance to cool down and end the arguing, moving onto something more productive.

In a very sucessful campaign I just ran there was a new rule I experimented with: No one can reroll their character. If you die and the party refuses/can't find some way to bring you back, you'll have to wait for the next campaign. Given a sense of mortality, the players started to care if they pissed off each other. The campaign world was dangerous enough that they accepted they needed each other, even if they didnt like each other. There were a few instances of players wanting to kill each other because of some drastically conflicting personalities, but it never went past some in character threats: "Man I hate how cowardly you fight... You'd be so dead if we had some way to deal with the invis mages"... "Yea, but you don't so suck it up". End of the night everyone had a ton of fun every time!

 

[Kurashu]

I once decided, foolishly, to run my players to run evil characters. Of course they decide to run the insane evil characters, one even turned in a character sheet that had Evil^2 written on it which did make me laugh it also made me go *facepalm* But there were two big problems. The player with the Evil^2 decided to unleash an invisible dire bear on the rest of the party. The other problem was the player with a warlock. I'd help him design the character, but I told him "You need to read and understand all the rules involved with this class." And he said yes. In the middle of the fight with the dire bear he says "I fire my eldritch blast at him and swing my sword." To which I calmly reply: They are both standard actions, one or the other. He blew up. I called a massive time out and went to get a soda from the vending machine in the church kitchen. We stopped playing for about a half hour while my Evil^2 player and I talked about Starcraft and the minister in our group calmed down the warlock and explained to him what happened.

That campaign lasted a whole two sessions. The minister started a campaign the week after that went better except for the warlock playing a cleric that acted more like a barbarian -- i.e. APAAT and no spells.

 

[Noumenon]

Apaat?

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

All Power Attack All (the) Time?