What to do when the PC Rogue picks the pockets of the other PCs

[Stalker0]

As the DM, I let the player know discretly...that I have no problems with what your doing...but whatever the party decides to do about...you cannot complain.

This has especially come up on the occasion when a player wants to play the evil guy in the good party.

Its fine by me, but the party is well within its rights to leave you behind or just flat out kill you.

 

[Mercule]

As a DM, I let the players take care of it. If that's the sort of game everyone wants, I can do that for a while. If the players have an issue with it, they'll let me know and things will get resolved -- usually in character. Odds are good the rogue ends up dead or "excommunicated".

As a player, my character will usually vote to boot any character that does this. Unless I'm playing a less-nice character, in which case the SOB dies. If the player gets whiny or plays lots of thieves, then it becomes an out of game issue.

 

[reanjr]

I sit and watch the other characters eventually kill the rogue. Then I turn to him and say "Told you so"

Yup.

 

[SpringPlum]

Point out that, besides being annoying, it is simply trite and overdone. And no one wants to be that guy.

 

[d20Dwarf]

Yeah, murder or crippling is always the best response to having your pocket picked.

I like this idea. Have his hands cut off, then force him to continue playing the character. If I was the DM, the character would become legendary for both his manual ineptitude as well as his amazing ability to escape death by the narrowest of margins.

 

[painandgreed]

Yes, yes it pretty much is. Though I prefer the old rope-and-rafter approach if there is time and someone remembered to buy rope.

Ya, but you're probably used to running an evil party that is used to killing party members over a few gold. Never mind any of his other actions and that time he jumped into the middle of battle along side you the last few combats. To an evil person, I can see how that doesn't amount to anything compared to a handful of coins.

For good characters, which many of the people on EnWorld seem to want to play, that might prove a little more difficult. Theft might not equal killing in their eyes and life might not have such a low price. Such theft might make for a trust issue however and a good party will be left with either putting up with it or kicking him out of the party (making the character start a new character).

 

[Fingol]

When I started DMing that behavior was fresh new and exciting. A lot of "character play" has become cliché but stealing or even skimming from the group has become old hat quickly and now irritates me more than most stupid character play. Where previously I might have given the character "breaks" I don't anymore in fact I go out of my way to make sure other players pick up on it. Breaks as in if the PC was relatively clever with his description of his actions I'd cut him slack. How many DMs give other PCs rolls to wake up/ notice something is wrong/ realize that the rogue is bluffing if he says he wants to perform religious rites, alone, behind closed doors, unobserved, over the fallen body of a naga that might have a belly full of magical gear? And it was 2nd ed….

So spot/ bluff/ listen checks (as appropriate) all round for every occasion, and in the case of pick pocketing not just for the character getting pick pocketed.

Want to do your stuff while others are sleeping? Listen rolls, or even wisdom or intelligence rolls to have a notion that leaving the rogue on watch alone might not be such a good idea. It's one of the things your daddy or the adventuring school warned you about. The beauty is they all get to roll and at least one of them will make it. (While it hecks me off when they all get spot checks to spot my ninjas creeping up on them, and at least always one making it, I mind it a whole lot less during inter party checks.)

If through stealing/ skimming there is an item that is reasonably noticeable; i.e. a new magical sword or armor or similar, spot checks all round again. Even powerful amulets or rings get spot checks, or sense motive checks if the character is trying to hide them.

Karma starts coming into play; no more random dice rolls to see who gets attacked if there are two or more "equal" opportunities.

Of course I'd have a word with the player, quiet like, amend your ways, atone, confess to the group and return the gear/ money and I'll stop/ not start riding you. If he didn't listen either the group would sooner or later 'catch' him or he'd meet a sticky end because sooner or later he is in the wrong spot at the wrong time. I normally hate killing characters as a DM, but as the game demands a certain kill ratio to keep it interesting I hunt these wayward ones actively and they go nicely towards the quota of PCs I have to kill in a 3 month period to avoid the troops getting overconfident or lazy.

 

[RithTheAwakener]

Actually, ive got a shifter rogue in an Ebberon campaign, and my Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma are all 6's. So, my character is ...mentally handicapped... and whenever i fail a pickpocket on the party (i dont steal from the cleric or mage cuz of magic use) but i do steal from the barbarian and other rogue, when i do fail a check (or they make a spot check), everyone takes pitty on me and say "oh its just a poor mentally deficiant kid" and i get off scot-free

 

[Bigwilly]

From my own experiences

Rgoues holding out on the party, not stealing from them, has happened a couple of times in games I have been in.

First time it was a dwarf rogue IMC. Party held him upside down and shook him down. Next night he left with all the party's horses and valuables.

Second time it was a kender in a game where I was a PC. Kender's player had been part of the dwarf shakedown party. New party found out, held him upside down and shook him out. Next night...(you get the picture). Fortunately I didn't take part in the shakedown and didn't leave any valuable items on the horses, so got off lightly. I might not have mentioned the previous encounter to some of the other party members, who were a little tiffed.

Third time was an elf rogue played by yours truly. Like the other two rogues above, he didn't actually steal stuff from players, just palmed the odd valuable or held onto the odd unwanted but valuable item. Campaign didn't last long enough for him to get caught doing this.

Bigwilly

 

[robberbaron]

I think Crothian summed it up perfectly.