Mercule said:
Anytime a (non-deity) NPC does something that the PCs could not ever do, regardless of what level, spells, or abilities we learn.
Check. A DM wanted to annoy us with a thief, who then got away. He "just let himself fall back into the open window". No initiative rolled, nothing. Even though my (Dex 19) Ranger had his bow aimed at him and would only have to let go.
The DM didn't even bother to make a token die roll and fix the result...
Other players who are incapable of separating in-character from out-of-character reasoning.
It's worse if you make out-of-character jokes and he considers them to be in-character, and starts attacking. Or you have some argument with him and he takes it into the game.
Example: The player I talk about was a sorcerer, and we also had a wizard in the party. DM describes a bunch of enemies coming over a hill, and the two spell-slingers decide to toast them with a fireball each. They toss, the other burn, DM gives out XP - for the two of them only.
I pointed out that we travel as party, and should get xp as party. We might not have made a single point of damage, but if one of them survived, we others would have to soak the blows so the arcanists can keep on firing away. The DM agreed, the wizard agreed, everyone else agreed. Except the player with the sorcerer. And directly after that, his sorcerer started to make comments to another character about my ninja: "he has to hide and attack cowardly". I make a listen check and say "I think I heard that". And he practically flips out: "You can't make rolls unless the DM says so."
Normally, I'm flat against in-fighting in the party, but another word or action from that idiot and I would have blurred the line of in-and-out too - by shoving two ninja-tos (coated with wyvern poison for this occasion) up his spine. (It wasn't the first time he did something like that.
Handwaving the introduction/acceptance of a new PC because it's a PC (see previous point).
It isn't not that bad. Just not very realistic and inventive. There are always ways for the DM to help this along.
Galeros said:
One thing that annoys me is when the DM does not even know the rules.
It's worse when the players will get the disadvantage for that.
kamosa said:
GM's taking away powers and abilities from characters in mid game simply because they interfere with their carefully crafted plot. Ex: no flying, no sneaking, no turning.
It's even worse if he doesn't even explain it.
Players that are constantly losing the character sheet and are chronically late or no shows to games.
We have plenty of them. I hate it. There are some people who only show up if the weather is not good enough for a day at the lake.
Other things I don't like:
Screwing the Campaign Setting we play in up big time. Okay, I'm a little overzealous sometimes, but a plot where teh Red Wizards and the City of Shade (and, as a sidenote, the Cult of the Dragon) ally to back up Cormyr in a war against Sembia (which is backed by the Zhent) is way out there.
Ignoring every skill that is keyed to Cha (and using Charisma only to determine how big the breasts or tonkers of people are). So the fighter has Cha 7 and not a rank in Diplomacy, but he can talk the king into letting him marry his daughter and give his throne as dowry.
Rollplaying all the way. Thinks like "I got a 52 on my Diplomacy check, this should turn the unfriendly king into helpful, and now he has to give me the hand of his daughter and the throne as dowry. The idiot". This is linked to the one above - I hate either extreme: either they are min/maxing or don't bother about actually talkin in character
People who think that in an evil party, you have to scheme and steal and backstab all the time, even against the other players.
Players who choose some aspects of their character only because of the power gain, but don't roleplay them. That's the wizard who takes one level in cleric (Selune, goddess of moon and enemy of Shar, the goddess of Night and Shadows) to be able to use heal scrolls, but uses shadowwalk as his favouritve mode of transport. Or lets his dwarven cleric be Lawful so he can play that overpowered warpriest of some lawful god, but then behaves worse than a cn kender rogue.
Prejudices like "halfling = rogue", and, especialla "rogue = thief" - "he has a level of rogue, I don't trust him, he will steal my stuff." I really liked how they renamed the thief class.
People who refuse to play 3e because "you can play non-human paladines". As if they are forced to play a half-orc paladin with Cha 6 now.
DM's who introduce rules that are only usable by non-PC's.
DM's who give out next to no treasure, and if they do, it's something noone in the party has any use for.
DM's who take away the most powerful abilities of the players, without any chance for them to regain it. It is one thing to let the main villain (a cleric) cast spell immunity against destruction, disintegrate and chain lightning, if these are the favourite spells of the PC's (and the villain had been informed and warned), but giving her an item that makes her immune to that is pretty rude. (You can dispell the protection - if you have no dispel magic or greater dispel magic, it's your problem - but you can't dispel an item - when you don't even know which one it is)
