Dragonbait
Explorer
While this is not directly related to the Whiney Player thread, it does deal with a whiney player that is in both my gaming groups. The guy flips between a polite and soft-spoken person to a whiney game disruptor, but there is a catch.
I went into rant mode on this one, and I apologize ahead of time:
He gets bored very easily. If combat lasts for more than 3 rounds he gets bored AND if there is role-playing for more than 5 minutes he gets bored. I've told him on a number of occasions that perhaps he just does not like role-playing games, but we both know he does. He is a damage-dealer player. He only sees a character's value in how many dice they roll for damage. All other things are tertiary and unimportant. And yet, he insists on taking other classes like the bard or cleric, then gets bored with them or frustrated with them after three or four sessions. When he is reminded how disgruntled he was all the other times playing class X, he insists that the next time will be different. When he IS a damage dealer, he gets upset if someone can do more damage than he, even if he's the fighter and he's trying to compare his damage to a wizard's spell damage. In fights, when he feels that someone else's character is too powerful (read: more powerful than his character) he starts calling that the enemy is dead before the damage is even rolled. When someone is saying "he's dead" after each hit for two or three rounds, it gets very anticlimactic when the creature actually dies. He can be very passive-aggressive, doing the opposite of what someone recommends if he feels that he is being told what to do. Reverse psychology only works about 50% of the time. He dislikes role-playing with more than 4 other people, and will shut down when the group's number reaches 5. He will eagerly remind people about all the penalties that they suffer from various actions, never remind them about their bonuses, and gets vocally frustrated when he suffers a penalty (like the -4 when shooting into melee). All of this has created a very negative reaction in most players, and people will often nitpick him.
Worst yet, he used to throw temper tantrums. Not the kicking and crying, but the yelling and complaining. Sometimes this would be a result of something in the game, many times he would just show up in a bad mood and apparently look for an argument. Months ago after one of his tantrums the GM and I had a sit-down with him. See the paragraph below for the reason why we did this and did not just boot him from the group. We told him that he would be booted from the group if he did it again because it ruins everyone else's fun. We told him to let us know if he felt like he was being picked on, or to let us know if he came to the game in an argumentative mood. We did this in a very calm manner and he seemed to eagerly accept the terms. He even recently apologized for yelling at me in a game (he didn't yell, and the apology caught be by surprise).
The Catch: All people who know him are certain that he has a learning disability of some sort, if not something far more extreme. He's great with charts and tables, but can not seem to connect action->consequence or think in the abstract. When we use mini's he will not recognize his own in the group unless he's paying close attention. Most recently, everyone else's minis were painted and his was the only non-painted mini. He had used the mini for the past four weeks. He continuously would start to move other people's minis on his turn, having to be reminded that the unpainted mini was his. He could go for rounds not knowing that he started moving the red-cloaked kobold mini instead of the pewter elf wielding twin scimitars. He has a lot of trouble remembering non-numeric or fact-based concepts, like what an NPC says. Writing for him is time-consuming because he will write something, erase it, then rewrite. This will often happen two or three times every time he writes. People that briefly meet him will typically wonder if he is slow. Worst of all, he *knows* that he might be off in some way and has an inferiority complex.
With all that in mind, my groups have a conundrum: There are far too many signs that something is 'off' with him for us to just say that he is 'quirky' like some other players. Do we hold him completely accountable for his actions like we would for anyone else, or do we give him more leeway? We are having a tough time telling where his own personality ends and his inability to mentally cope with things begin (IF he does have some sort of issue) and have flip-flopped between the two for years.
I went into rant mode on this one, and I apologize ahead of time:
He gets bored very easily. If combat lasts for more than 3 rounds he gets bored AND if there is role-playing for more than 5 minutes he gets bored. I've told him on a number of occasions that perhaps he just does not like role-playing games, but we both know he does. He is a damage-dealer player. He only sees a character's value in how many dice they roll for damage. All other things are tertiary and unimportant. And yet, he insists on taking other classes like the bard or cleric, then gets bored with them or frustrated with them after three or four sessions. When he is reminded how disgruntled he was all the other times playing class X, he insists that the next time will be different. When he IS a damage dealer, he gets upset if someone can do more damage than he, even if he's the fighter and he's trying to compare his damage to a wizard's spell damage. In fights, when he feels that someone else's character is too powerful (read: more powerful than his character) he starts calling that the enemy is dead before the damage is even rolled. When someone is saying "he's dead" after each hit for two or three rounds, it gets very anticlimactic when the creature actually dies. He can be very passive-aggressive, doing the opposite of what someone recommends if he feels that he is being told what to do. Reverse psychology only works about 50% of the time. He dislikes role-playing with more than 4 other people, and will shut down when the group's number reaches 5. He will eagerly remind people about all the penalties that they suffer from various actions, never remind them about their bonuses, and gets vocally frustrated when he suffers a penalty (like the -4 when shooting into melee). All of this has created a very negative reaction in most players, and people will often nitpick him.
Worst yet, he used to throw temper tantrums. Not the kicking and crying, but the yelling and complaining. Sometimes this would be a result of something in the game, many times he would just show up in a bad mood and apparently look for an argument. Months ago after one of his tantrums the GM and I had a sit-down with him. See the paragraph below for the reason why we did this and did not just boot him from the group. We told him that he would be booted from the group if he did it again because it ruins everyone else's fun. We told him to let us know if he felt like he was being picked on, or to let us know if he came to the game in an argumentative mood. We did this in a very calm manner and he seemed to eagerly accept the terms. He even recently apologized for yelling at me in a game (he didn't yell, and the apology caught be by surprise).
The Catch: All people who know him are certain that he has a learning disability of some sort, if not something far more extreme. He's great with charts and tables, but can not seem to connect action->consequence or think in the abstract. When we use mini's he will not recognize his own in the group unless he's paying close attention. Most recently, everyone else's minis were painted and his was the only non-painted mini. He had used the mini for the past four weeks. He continuously would start to move other people's minis on his turn, having to be reminded that the unpainted mini was his. He could go for rounds not knowing that he started moving the red-cloaked kobold mini instead of the pewter elf wielding twin scimitars. He has a lot of trouble remembering non-numeric or fact-based concepts, like what an NPC says. Writing for him is time-consuming because he will write something, erase it, then rewrite. This will often happen two or three times every time he writes. People that briefly meet him will typically wonder if he is slow. Worst of all, he *knows* that he might be off in some way and has an inferiority complex.
With all that in mind, my groups have a conundrum: There are far too many signs that something is 'off' with him for us to just say that he is 'quirky' like some other players. Do we hold him completely accountable for his actions like we would for anyone else, or do we give him more leeway? We are having a tough time telling where his own personality ends and his inability to mentally cope with things begin (IF he does have some sort of issue) and have flip-flopped between the two for years.
