GM gripes about players..

I saw the earlier post about players griping about G Ms, but for us beleagured G Ms, we can have plenty of gripes about players. How about some constructive discussion about what we can do from both sides?

So here's one: I was running a single-player Vampire game with a friend of mine. His character is a Nosferatu Mad Scientist/Occultist and is very good at stealth. He's a veteran character but, for various reasons, had to leave his old city and is therefore a newcomer in this city.

He makes contact with some local Invictus power players and, at a gathering, impresses an elder in a game of Go. On seeing this, I have an Ancilla ask him for a favor: quietly deliver a message to an independent Gangrel named Omar and bring me his response. In return, she will do him a favor. (The content of the message is unimportant right now.)

So his character goes to where this Gangrel and his pack like to hang out: the city art museum. He turns himself invisible and watches them for a while, then follows as they proceed inside. Shortly thereafter he manifests himself, but keeps his vampiric nature concealed with Obfuscate. Pretending to be a homeless guy, he allows one of the pack to lure him in, and all five Gangrel begin to feed on him. Partway through, they realize they're feeding on a Vampire and stop, giving him a chance to disappear and escape. Now short on blood, he hunts down another homeless vagrant and drains him dry.

The next night, he returns to the museum where this gang is hosting an open Elysium. After the previous incident, they've beefed up security and have several vampires with Auspex watching for a spy. One of them spots him and orders that he make himself known and that he's in violation of the rules. He finds Omar and gives him the message. Omar tells him that he should have delivered it earlier, because now "the situation is out of my hands." So his character leaves and is attacked outside by someone working for the Ancilla he made the deal with. (Because she assumed that he had deliberately betrayed her.) He manages to escape the attack slightly drained, so he finds another place to feed and does so.

The next night, he returns yet again to the museum to find it locked and nobody in sight. So he breaks in and returns to the location of last night's gathering. On entering, he is surrounded by several Vampires, who give him one last chance to explain who he is, why he's spying on them, and why he violated the sanctity of Elysium. He's not able to, so they rush him, stake him, stick him in a box and drop him in the river.

A few nights later he wakes up after an ally of his recovers the box and unstakes him. The ally says that he'd get in trouble if anybody found out that he rescued the PC, so he points him in the direction of a biker bar and says that he can reach the next town by sunrise if he moves fast. So the PC goes to the bar, stealthily feeds off some drunken bikers and wanders out to the back roads, ignoring the dozen or so motorcycles outside. A few hours later a lone car comes down the road, so the PC jumps in front of it, causing the driver to veer into a ditch. He knocks out the driver but, since he's recently fed off of booze-laced blood is unable to keep control for long and crashes the car into a tree.

At this point he's dithered around long enough that he's now minutes from sunrise in the middle of nowhere without shelter. "Luckily" he spots a farmhouse and runs toward it, blacking out just as the first rays of sunlight come over the horizon. The next night he wakes up in the basement of the house with burns on his body and blood everywhere. That was where I decided to call it a night.

My player got very upset at me for the situation, and I've been thinking about it ever since. What did I do wrong, and what could I have done better? The job seemed easy: deliver a message and be discreet about it. He didn't. He could have fixed things the next night, but didn't.

I've had players jump the rails before, but how do you deal with a player who keeps making what seem to be virtually suicidal choices? He said I made it too difficult, whereas I thought I kept pulling his bacon out of the fire with deux ex machinas. Thoughts?

I'm glad this thread is here now, because I've had one problem player and still have one now.

On your situation, I can't make any real judgments on that.

As for my D&D 4E group, one player ended up leaving after four levels because he was bored, but I would have been justified in kicking him out four levels before that, and threatened (ineffectively) many times. I've made it clear that, despite him being one of my best friends, his deliberate belligerence will no longer be tolerated.

Before anyone jumps down my throat for allowing him to stay that long (yes, he was that bad), I should inform you that the four of us together have been best friends since middle school, and I doubt he would have acted like this with a group of relative strangers.

What he's done? Let's see . . .

• Killed someone else's PC with a scorching burst (I should never have allowed him to play a wizard), knowing that he could have placed the center of the burst somewhere else. What's worst is that the character had already been knocked out.
• Repeatedly mocked the names of our P Cs, making puns off of their names (this falls in with his tendency to repeat his jokes ad nauseum).
• Erased the lines of the whiteboard tiles that I was using for the map.
• When I tried to install a punishment system (horrible, horrible idea, in hindsight), he skirted the edges of its limits, seeing how much he could get away with (I admit that this is probably mostly my fault for encouraging a troll).
• And I pretty much made his character for him. He put no effort into making him.
• I could have sworn there was more.

One of the ones I currently have is arguably even worse, because, aside from the PC-killing, which he hasn't done (at least by choice}, his characters repeatedly grate on the nerves of the two of us that remain.

This list will probably be even longer than the list for the other kid if I put more thought into it than my lazy ass would normally be comfortable with, but for starters, in the 3.5 game that I'm now D Ming with the same people, his Lawful Neutral samurai apparently finds it okay to beat a homeless peasant child to death for stealing bread to survive, simply because he was breaking the law, despite not having any other options (eventually he conceded, if you could call it that, that the kid would be better off in jail). Eventually it came down to him settling, if such a situation arose (which it never will), for slapping the kid, giving him some money, and telling him that death would await if it ever happened again. I find it funny as hell because of how stubborn he tends to be, and how stupid the whole thing is. Naturally, the rogue who grew up under similar circumstances to the kid will probably hate the samurai's guts.

Back in 4E, he has also tried to push us onto another battle (the final battle in the dungeon, and thus exceptionally difficult) even though we hadn't taken a short rest yet and were moderately exhausted (heck, his own characters were the worst off, since his Paladin nearly died on an electrical panel).

Another character of his, who I have decided is Evil, found it okay, in a skirmish involving a town full of super-adventurers we were working for and some minotaurs, to directly disobey orders not to kill any non-demons after the fight because his deranged master told him to kill any enemies that he bested in battle, no matter what. He thought it was honorable and totally not evil at all to find minotaurs who had been left alive by the others and kill them while they laid helpless. The rest of the characters took major offense to that, and his character left (by that I mean I kicked his character out due to in-game conflict, since I take alignment and character philosophy seriously).

All of this, combined with his tendency to try to push an issue even when we're clearly outmatched, makes him very harmful to the party sometimes.

edited 29th Nov '10 3:00:49 PM by Everest

Whoa. That's contrived stupidity on both sides. First, the Gangrels feed on a random guy without checking him out - real fucking nice, the player has five very friendly Gangrels to help him sometimes. Then, he's forced to fuck up for the same reason. Oh yeah. As for using obfuscate to suddenly appear in secured locations, last time my character did it, the guy inside was so freaked out he blasted me with a shotgun THROUGH A DOOR. Yeah.

I ran a campaign in which I allowed my two regulars to have two characters each. Which has been sort of like standard practice for us since nobody else will play with them anymore and I don't have the free time to find another group, so it's either that or parties of two.

Both of them made a male character and a female character. And at every opportunity, both of them declared that their own characters were having sex with each other. At one point one player's female character died... and he brought in her sister as a Backup Twin and she started banging his other character.

I wish very much that I had simply killed them when I had the chance. I no longer run games because of scheduling issues, but I still go to the Sunday game. And I have resolved that the first opportunity I get, I'm going to run two characters who are brother and sister and have them do it constantly as revenge.

edited 29th Nov '10 4:41:47 PM by Ezekiel

What's worse is when a player tries to ship one of their characters with one of yours.

I wouldn't mind that so much, at least that would give some level of dignity to the NPCs by recognizing them as something other than resources or obstacles.

edited 29th Nov '10 4:41:18 PM by Ezekiel

I have told the story of the Kobold-Eating Cannibal Dragonborn often enough.

(If I haven't, well, read what I just called it.)

^^ Well, I meant other P Cs. I phrased it that way because it's happened to one of my characters (half-jokingly, but still).

edited 29th Nov '10 4:47:06 PM by Everest

larpers. just...larpers. I don't have time (and this forum doesn't have the space) to describe how much of a pain in the ass storytelling for them is.

Someone tried to get me to run another one last week; I told him no, sorry, I don't hate myself nearly enough for that.

@Everest: Wow man, I feel for you. I think the worst I've had were players who get caught up pursuing some inconsequential detail or take precisely the opposite course of action I intended. I haven't yet had players who turn their characters into colossal jerks like that samurai.

I would like to pose a theory: Most RPG encounters boil down to three basic decisions: talk, fight or evade. A good game session should present players with situations that can be favorably resolved by two of those methods. The proper choice should be apparent to the players, and the wrong choice should have some clear negative consequence attached.

Example 1: The characters need to sneak into a facility to steal the MacGuffin. On the way they spot a team of low-level guards. Good choices: attack and kill the guards (fight) or try to sneak past them (evade). Trying to talk to the guards will get them to sound the alarm.

Example 2: The characters need a MacGuffin they know is owned by a powerful NPC. Good choices: Try to bargain with the NPC to get it (talk) or sneak into his base to steal it (evade). If you try to kill him and take it, you'll end up with a powerful enemy.

I'm running a game where I have both the same problem and a completely different one. At some times, they act completely idiotic, not even understanding basic RPG survival tactics. I'm playing with my brothers, who are 11 and 8 respectively, but I don't think that it excuses the incredibly poor decisions they have previously made. The only reason they've survived as long as they have is because one of them reads Darths and Droids. Here's an example:

The game I'm playing is my own, and i guess you could call what I'm doing play testing. The 11 year old is playing a human archer that happens to be a member of the city guard, the 8 year old as a utahraptor assassin. The human one is supposed to be arresting the utahraptor, when all of a sudden they are attacked be a flock of humanoid pterosaurs called pterosapiens. I throw a few of the things at them to show how tough they are, and then send a huge flock at them, and make sure to leave a door to a conveniently open to an easily protected building. They take the bait, and run to the top floor. They do some fighting, but for some reason think that unless they keep moving then they'll die. So the human one gets the idea to jump OUT THE WINDOW AND USE ONE OF THE CREATURES AS A PARACHUTE. Ignoring the ridiculous idea of jumping out of a four story building and using a struggling creature as a parachute from the perspective of physics, this would put them out in the open, a much less easily defended place. Then the one playing the utahraptor decides to try the same thing. This is even more ridiculous, because utahraptor weighed about HALF A TON. The only reason that they survived is because;

A- Part of the plot involved the flock flying off.

B- If they died ten minutes into the campaign they would never play again. This was the first time I made them come up with a backstory, and to them it was a damn near insurmountable mental challenge.

Part of what made that whole thing so frustrating for me is that usually they're incredibly unimaginative. I have to spell out in golden letters on a mile wide billboard what the best course of action would be. I think I need to find some older play testers.

I think I need to find some older play testers.

Uh-huh.

edited 30th Nov '10 6:52:08 PM by Everest

^^ That's probably a good idea. My players... dear christ. They're the worst Blood Knights I've ever seen. But even worse than that is their habit of coming up with RIDICULOUS backstories. In my most recent campaign, I only had two players, which I'm okay with- I like small parties because they give more of a chance to show your characters off.

So, Jural decides to play a Dragonborn Paladin. I tell him that this would be o.k. except that the Dragonborn nation, Kress, is very determined to wipe out every living thing inside Medine (the Human, Elf, and most other races' nation), and there aren't any gods in my setting. So... he uses this excuse to have a Chaotic Evil Paladin exiled from Kress for no apparent reason, who went to Medine's outskirts and killed a bunch of people for shits and giggles.

Kiana's was equally insane; she wanted to be an Elf Sorcerer, the child of two noble Elves. Who betrayed her mother, tried to kill her to take her estate, and was then nearly killed and deposed from the county. Because of course she had to be just as jacked-up as her brother.

Is it THAT impossible to find players who aren't intent on playing Complete Monsters in a Heroic Fantasy?

Nope. For evidence, consult my earlier comment on cannibal dragonborn. (Important note: the player in question was in his twenties.)

It is quite difficult to find such players. Even worse are the ones used to playing Complete Monsters in such games and who make that sort of character in games where such characters are explicitly discouraged, such as a Spirit Of The Century game with the canonical setting and premise. (Yes, I've had players like that. Fortunately, they seem to be getting better.)

You know what? I'd actually like some halfway organized complete monsters for once. My old group was very fond of the Nolanverse Joker/Tyler Durden school of thinking, and interpreted this, and the alignment "Chaotic Neutral" as "Nothing I do have to make sense, ever." Highlights include the "I Shoot The Barkeeper"-incident.

Then again, that particular brand of insanity could open up some interesting storytelling opportunities, if it hadn't been for the fact that the entire group was like that, all the time. It was a bit like herding Honey Badgers, honestly.

I have had the good fortune to play a few Wo D games with players who have a good sense of drama, though. Players who create a good conflict, or bring the story in a better direction are rare and precious gems that should be treasured.

One Vampire game I was doing was set in 19th century London. One PC was given permission to Embrace a member of his mortal family and, as part of the ritual, he had another player procure a young, pretty girl as the fledgling's first feed. The Embrace went as planned, and the new Vampire drained the girl dry. As she was about to die, the character who procured her felt such sympathy that he Embraced her on the spot. This gave me, the Storyteller, a new character to play with. In a game we played that took place a century later, she grew to be one of the most powerful and deadly Vampires in the city. That was a good game.

Some people should never play RP Gs, even if they're your best friends. If they seem interested, try them out, but be prepared to walk away from the game.

Case 1: a guy who was my best friend at the time. He asked to join a Traveller game because he liked SF. Most of the interaction with him went like this: "You want me to do what? Why? ... That's not good enough. I won't do it, and you can't make me." He never asked again.

Case 2: a teenager from a broken home (in a small town you take what you can get). In an Arthurian campaign, he got in a fight with the other character over a crystal ball and died. The other character, a druid, obligingly reincarnated him. He created a new character: a Shao Lin monk. In 6th-century England.

The worst player I've ever had, by far, was one I ran a couple of sessions for a few months ago. I'm very glad I didn't have to deal with the guy for more than a couple of weeks.

The first weird thing about his character was that his greatest aspiration was to be a pastry chef and he had a tendency to derail things based on that alone. Still, I rolled with it because it was unique, and not always a bad thing. Somewhere along the line though, he decided he should be a total perv, too... he hinted that he "put himself into his work" by way of his "special cream filling", and his patron deity was a Pedobear expy.

I'll admit that some people would be justified in finding that funny in the right setting, but we were playing at my apartment, and I told my players ahead of time that I have a three year old. My kid wasn't present at the time, thankfully, but when I told the player he wouldn't be able to use that character when the kid was around, he didn't seem to understand why. I wanted to tell him that the answer involved my wife brandishing a rusty screwdriver, but I figured that would be too subtle.

CURSE YOU PLAYERS, CURSE YOU!

to the OP:

don't know the circumstances, just my thoughts:

First, I think you'd need to use capital punishment more sparingly. It's not like you automatically shoot a person that has wronged you, and it's not like vampires feel that it's needed to send a newbie into eternal sleep because he once crossed the line. (If they didn't know that this sort of thing happens all the time, they weren't vampires.) When you examine closely, vampires are really vulnerable. He only needs to do so much as to misspeak before an NPC or run into some enemies and he's staked or chased out of town. In both cases that particular adventure is over. Being immortal only means that he can keep the character or come back for another session, but the result is the same as if you've just gotten him killed. You also sacrifice the setting and conflicts that you have prepared as the GM.

I feel that newbie vampires crossing the line while they're fresh to the city is hardly a rare thing, and most elders would probably see it as an opportunity to get them involved in their political games, while individual vampires would treat it as an annoyance and would be satisifed with just showing them who's boss.

Second, I can see that you always gave a logical way out, but as a player I'd still feel that my actual range of choices was narrow. Each player has their own style of doing things, and if they don't play by the rules or don't find the solution that you've prepared for them, they shouldn't be punished for it. Especially those players who are not yet too familiar with the game.

Credit for following up with the consequences, but I still think that it ended up as punishing the player. The task of delivering was seemingly simple, but what I see that at the same time the player was surrounded by enemies prepared to murder him and an employer who provided him with little help but would drop him at any sign of disobediance. Those are not neccessary bad things if you want to portray a paranoid town or give the player a challenge, but they do push the difficulty level higher.

I find NP Cs are a great way to take care of the stuff that is neccessary for the campaign, but would be boring or too difficult for the players, or just stuff they didn't think of.

Also, a new vampire is supposed to be a big deal. There aren't too many vampires in the nWoD to begin with, so the elders (be they ally or enemy you just wronged) are more likely to view them as valuable information sources or chess pieces in their games than expendable resource. Maybe even give them allies (if only to make sure that they can be trusted, and that there's someone to get the job done if the player does not.)

Sympathetic and cool NP Cs is also a good way to make players more interested in playing the role they do, and stealth-educating them on how they could go about doing things.

edited 4th Dec '10 4:15:07 AM by Vree

In reply to Vree:

If he had been a brand-new vampire then yes, I certainly would have been far more forgiving. But this player has had this PC for several years now, on and off, and he is fairly well experienced. And while he was a newcomer in that particular city, he had already made several useful contacts and got a feel for the local power struture which, in my mind, meant that he had the resources to deal with what problems I could give him. It's possible that I didn't make those options clear with him.

For some more context, the character is a member of the Ordo Dracul and the city he just arrived in has OD members, but they're undisciplined and too interested in politics. For some reason the older OD Academy was dissolved, and their collection of artifacts had been dispersed or lost. The player told me that he wanted to find out what happened to the old academy and recover their lost items.

The thing is, the whole "deliver this message" mission was intended solely to introduce the PC to that group. Had he done so, they could have pointed him in the direction of one of the items he was looking for.

Thanks for the insight.

I had a player, when I was stationed on the Kitty Hawk and running a Fallout campaign. It's the post-apocalypse, of course, and this genius decides that he's going to cannibalize the corpse of one of the bandits the party just wiped out. Naturally, he's caught at it. The party leader tells him, "If we catch you at this again, we're going to kill you."

Said player turns to me, and says, "You won't let them kill my character."

I say, "Yes, I will. If you're eating people, that's grounds to kill you *on sight*. Their characters are actually being pretty lenient with you."

Needless to say, next game session, he tried it again. And got caught again. And was promptly killed, and had his head put on a stake as a warning. The player then stormed away from the gaming table, and refused to talk to me for the rest of the deployment.

Another player from the same group was totally awesome, right up until his very last game session before he transferred. Then, he tried to blow up the party, purposefully destroyed some of their stuff, and was a complete Jerkass because he wouldn't be there for the rest of the campaign. Soon as he was gone, I Ret-Gone'd all those actions.

So one of my friends is interested in playing D&D.

She thinks she doesn't need the Player's Handbook.

Well, that's just stupid. I sure hope you educated her.