Silver Moon
Adventurer
For the worst game-dynamics situation I would say it was during a city adventure that I was DMing that got totally out of control by a player's over-the-top interpretation of what having a "Chaotic Neutral" alignment meant.
The party are doing some shopping when one decides to go buy some chainmail. He and his two buddies head over to an armor shop and enter where they see suits of ringmail and splitmail on display. The charcter asks about chainmail. The shopkeeper apologizes that he doesn't make chainmail but gives them directions to another armorer and even adds "Mention my name and he'll give you a discount." The character thanks the armorer and hands him a gold piece.
The character then pulls out his sword and stabs the shopkeeper to death, taking back the gold piece. The character's buddy asks "What did you do that for?" The first character replies "He had my gold piece." Meanwhile the third character slips out and alerts the City Guard to the murder. So the next fifteen minutes of game time consist of the pair of charcters attempting to hide from and escape the guards, with the third character doing everything he can to help the guards find them.
Eventually they are cornered with a row of archer guards on both sides of the street blocking their escape. The non-murderer character then starts to pummel the other one. So the guards just stand there watching the fight. The murderer eventually is knocked unconscious and the other then starts to bash his head on the cobblestones. The Captain of the guard tells him to stop and he charges the guards. So they open fire, eight arrows hitting and killing him.
The player then throws a tantrum, saying that as the DM I acted totally unrealistically, killing off his character for no reason! I tried to point out that it was his allies who one had killed an unarmed shopkeeper and the other had turned them in, plus the fact that he had ignored the warning from the captain and chose to attack them. The players unite though and complain that I had overreacted to the situation!
As for the worst player-dynamic situation (posted recently elsewhere but worth repeating).....
My weekly gaming group began in 1982 back when I was in college and my best buddy enthusiastically wanted to play. But the girl he was dating at the time would not allow him to do anything without her so he rolled her up a character so that she could play too. For the next six months she was the bump on the log, who had no interest in the game. She was also angry that one of his ex-girlfriends also played in the group, which was not helped by the fact that this same player helped with her character development too, making both of their playing characters sisters.
I iniitally thought that maybe she just didn't like the character he created for her and suggested to both us them that she roll one up a new one she might enjoy more. She did, a sneaky thief, and did enjoy playing more, using it to get revenge against a male player who she now hated worse than the ex-girlfriend. First she set up his playing character to get blamed for a theft that she did. Then two games later she killed his playing character in-game.
It turns out that the murder was her 'swan song' as she then convinced my buddy to do other things on game nights the next two weeks, during which the other characters moved on without them. But he still wanted to play and asked me if I could set up a pick-up game to bring their characters back into the game. None of my regular players were interested so my Buddy convinced two of his other semi-gaming friends to join them.
So myself and two other guys block out a night for the pick-up game. The couple are 45-minutes late in arriving and we promptly begin. She sits and says not one word while the four of us game for an hour or so. She then declares that the two them have to leave. This annoys not only myself and the other two friends as we have all been enjoying the game plus storywise they still aren't even close to catching up with the other game.
This conversation gets exacerbated when we discover the reason they have to go - she wants to watch a program on television (this was in pre-VCR days). I offer to let her watch it on a tv in our home but that is unacceptable to her. The other three of us turn to my buddy, as we had all changed our plans to play this game at his request. He says nothing, stands up, and leaves with her. Needless to say, the two of them don't return the following Sunday.
He and I stay buddies but the only games he comes to again for the next eighteen months are ones that take place when she is out of town. He starts his own gaming group which includes both guys who were at the pick-up game but she eventually sabatages that too and it folds. When he eventually breaks up with her he rejoins our game on a weekly basis, which lasts for two years until he starts dating (and later marries) a Fundamentalist who convinces him that D&D is evil.
The party are doing some shopping when one decides to go buy some chainmail. He and his two buddies head over to an armor shop and enter where they see suits of ringmail and splitmail on display. The charcter asks about chainmail. The shopkeeper apologizes that he doesn't make chainmail but gives them directions to another armorer and even adds "Mention my name and he'll give you a discount." The character thanks the armorer and hands him a gold piece.
The character then pulls out his sword and stabs the shopkeeper to death, taking back the gold piece. The character's buddy asks "What did you do that for?" The first character replies "He had my gold piece." Meanwhile the third character slips out and alerts the City Guard to the murder. So the next fifteen minutes of game time consist of the pair of charcters attempting to hide from and escape the guards, with the third character doing everything he can to help the guards find them.
Eventually they are cornered with a row of archer guards on both sides of the street blocking their escape. The non-murderer character then starts to pummel the other one. So the guards just stand there watching the fight. The murderer eventually is knocked unconscious and the other then starts to bash his head on the cobblestones. The Captain of the guard tells him to stop and he charges the guards. So they open fire, eight arrows hitting and killing him.
The player then throws a tantrum, saying that as the DM I acted totally unrealistically, killing off his character for no reason! I tried to point out that it was his allies who one had killed an unarmed shopkeeper and the other had turned them in, plus the fact that he had ignored the warning from the captain and chose to attack them. The players unite though and complain that I had overreacted to the situation!
As for the worst player-dynamic situation (posted recently elsewhere but worth repeating).....
My weekly gaming group began in 1982 back when I was in college and my best buddy enthusiastically wanted to play. But the girl he was dating at the time would not allow him to do anything without her so he rolled her up a character so that she could play too. For the next six months she was the bump on the log, who had no interest in the game. She was also angry that one of his ex-girlfriends also played in the group, which was not helped by the fact that this same player helped with her character development too, making both of their playing characters sisters.
I iniitally thought that maybe she just didn't like the character he created for her and suggested to both us them that she roll one up a new one she might enjoy more. She did, a sneaky thief, and did enjoy playing more, using it to get revenge against a male player who she now hated worse than the ex-girlfriend. First she set up his playing character to get blamed for a theft that she did. Then two games later she killed his playing character in-game.
It turns out that the murder was her 'swan song' as she then convinced my buddy to do other things on game nights the next two weeks, during which the other characters moved on without them. But he still wanted to play and asked me if I could set up a pick-up game to bring their characters back into the game. None of my regular players were interested so my Buddy convinced two of his other semi-gaming friends to join them.
So myself and two other guys block out a night for the pick-up game. The couple are 45-minutes late in arriving and we promptly begin. She sits and says not one word while the four of us game for an hour or so. She then declares that the two them have to leave. This annoys not only myself and the other two friends as we have all been enjoying the game plus storywise they still aren't even close to catching up with the other game.
This conversation gets exacerbated when we discover the reason they have to go - she wants to watch a program on television (this was in pre-VCR days). I offer to let her watch it on a tv in our home but that is unacceptable to her. The other three of us turn to my buddy, as we had all changed our plans to play this game at his request. He says nothing, stands up, and leaves with her. Needless to say, the two of them don't return the following Sunday.
He and I stay buddies but the only games he comes to again for the next eighteen months are ones that take place when she is out of town. He starts his own gaming group which includes both guys who were at the pick-up game but she eventually sabatages that too and it folds. When he eventually breaks up with her he rejoins our game on a weekly basis, which lasts for two years until he starts dating (and later marries) a Fundamentalist who convinces him that D&D is evil.
Eating fast food makes you a bad gamer and/or an abnormal person?
