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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Meech17" data-source="post: 9342805" data-attributes="member: 7044459">This weekend I jumped at the chance to play some D&D. I'm part of a LFG type Facebook group and someone posted that they had some players drop out, and were looking to fill spots. I said YOLO and shot him a DM. We got to talking and decided we'd be a good fit and he told me to make a level 7 character and show up at game time, so I did. We read a lot of horror stories online about players not paying attention, and playing on their phones or goofing off at the table. The trope of players not knowing their class/characters and expecting the DM to know how their stuff works is so pervasive that it's a meme at this point. ("Players don't read the PHB") This game was full of all of that. I was one of five players at the table, and there were three players filling in over Discord voice chat. I was honestly a little surprised how stacked it was, considering the DM was out shopping for more players. It started to make sense however as we played. Myself and one other player were really the only ones driving the session. It seems like everyone else was just there to roll dice and loot treasure. I think that mindset is fine, I'm happy to do some dungeon crawling.. But if that is your only goal, shouldn't you at least know how your character works? I corrected the level 8 bard twice, letting him know that his Vicious Mockery was 2d4 instead of 1d4, and that his Bardic Inspiration had gone up from 1d6 to 1d8. We had a several minute long discussion with the level 8 Rogue about how sneak attack works, and why the +2 great ax was a cool weapon, but probably didn't make sense for him. Near the end of the session there was a point where the DM was suggesting one of the players could go talk to a particular NPC to further his personal quest, and he refused to do it. Not like outright saying "No, I don't want to do that" but each time it was brought up he just ignored it or moved on to something else like upgrading his gear. Then of course there was the off table issues. Playing on phones instead of paying attention, building dice towers, fiddling with minis, and two of the guys playing remotely went off on a ten minute tangent about movies in the middle of the someone else's turn. I'm not trying to disparage these guys. I actually had fun, and they invited me back, so I'll probably go. But I've just never understood what motivates people who are so seemingly disinterested in the game to keep showing up? Just a commitment they feel obligated to uphold? The second the session wrapped the players who were struggling to pay attention were all pretty quick to skedaddle.  It reminded me of being in high-school where everyone seems like a zombie who instantly jumps back to life as soon as the bell rings. Has anyone ever been one of these players? Or do you perhaps have some insight into this mindset? I'd love to hear your thoughts.</blockquote>

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