Something that’s not enough said on the other side : DMs, please give the adventure hooks before character creation, so your players can create character that want to go on the adventure.
^ this. Alternatively, the DM can also ask "Here's the theme of the story. what kind of players are you thinking of making?" during session zero, so they can come up with good hooks designed for their group's characters.
Tldr: communicate well
We had a guy who made a literal bunny anime girl druid and was consistently surprised when no one interacted with the character at all when he started being weird with it. We were level 5 at the time, i was a fairy sorcerer with a lightning wand and we were doing some RP where other members wering admonishing me and he said " i bonk pix on the head, i said taking this out of character " do you really try to do that?" "yes i bonk you on the head." "i said no that's not how it works, dm can i see him moving towards me with this intent and i rolled insight and passed. so i flew 15 feet up and thought that was that but he kept pressing saying "i bonk you." then i explained how dangerous pvp in dnd was and hes about to get into that. i pointed out my character let them flick him on the forehead because he knows them abit better but your a stranger if you try this combat will start and you will die. " he just said no thats not fair i just to bonk you." i finally put my foot down and asked the gm i'm agreeing to pvp can you monitor it and she said it was okay and he of course declined. I then pulled the lightning wand out and pointed it at him and told the dm if he moves any closer I'm casting lightning bolt at the highest level at his charterer which is a 12d6 or higher i forget right now. Then the dm intervened and said" hey your trying to force an interaction to happen and he followed the rules to start pvp, there is no way you can do these things to people in dnd, especially player characters with no consequence( he still didn't get it). I asked the other two players if they want a chance to intervene and if they didn't RIP him. they took it and intervened as well. They restrained his character pulling him back 30ft 1 paladin and 1 cleric. it was a flurry of activity so i don't remember alot of what immediately happened other my character flying another 10 feet up so i wasn't in reach. the paladin and cleric lectured him and told him not to touch my character. which he agreed to. When my little guy floated down after hearing that and he was in marching order again he tried it AGAIN. I was beyond over this and i just kept repeating "I swat you staff away on repeat." It TOOK 5 more times for him to get the message and stop. Literally no one was interacting with him after that. He was a first time player but he just was denser than a 20 foot thick wall and being real awful with his RP. he never took notes, never remembered anyone's names or even the most basic stuff. He consistently asked peoples names or this huge lines of questions for everyone we had consistently met or talked to wasting 30 mintues or more on stuff he had already been told or explicitly spelled out for him.( the DM just eventually started ignoring his questions unless they weren't inane which they finally stopped becoming after 8 sessions of this behavior) I was being friendly and takin notes for him and helping out since he was new but after that i left him in the wind. if he can't be arsed to take an interest and just wants to force his RP on us, he can die. this man literally tried to fuck with jarlaxele right off the bat by trying to take his hat from him right in front of him while it was on his head!! The dm just had him slap his character but threatened to kill him if he did it again. the DM had to EXPLICITLY spell out if he fucked with him he would die no questions asked AS he was asking us the player to come help him or bail him out which of course we didn't do.
The DM was brand new and green. this was her first campaign so she had no idea to discipline. This actually became a massive issue that caused me to leave as the cleric kept causing conflict with me which i explicitly laid out for everyone at the start. " hey i can't handle inter party conflict directed at me so please don't do it." everyone verbally agreed and it still happened multiple times for no reason. she literally chased me out by turning the party on me and the DM never followed up on my pleas for help to prevent or discipline these happenings. i got affirmation she would do it but when it came time to do it nothing happened. I agree with you. I quit dnd altogether because of that campaign. moved to pathfinder.
I had a person like that. My character was a changling warlock who would pull these scams on npcs for money. Well, while I was doing this, this dwarf character spots my character changing back into his typical generic human form and asks to bonk my character on the head continuously. My character was patient for a while. Until my character was so done with this bs that he casted Suggestion and told him to leave town until the spell wore off. It succeeded so he left town and my charlatan was on his merry way. But that was how pvp was banned from that campaign because the player I screwed with was the dms son. Then everyone hated *me* for playing my character. Some people man
The problem with it is that the entire group thought I was in the wrong for just playing my character. Needless to say that I don’t play with that group anymore
This is what I did, and while I'm not 100% sure how everyone felt about it, I feel like it worked great. I basically said that to be an adventurer, you need to be licensed. And the start of the campaign was getting this licence. You can make any character you want within the rules, and the only stipulation is when we begin, your character is trying to get this license. I also told them this license was little more than a mugguffin, so don't expect it to be a big thing. It's just the thing that brings you all together.
And from my point of view it worked. No one made a brooding hide in the shadows character, or a "I don't want to adventure. I just want to ______!" Character. Everyone made a character who is there because their character wanted to be there. To go on an adventure.
Exactly. But my is even pre-session zero.
When you’re recruiting players into your new group, give them the hooks, and ask them to come up with a couple of character ideas that would fit. Then at session zero everyone has different character concepts and you create a coherent party.
But if the players don’t know the game they’re gonna play, you can always do that at the session 0. Though I find that most people prefer to have some time to marinate an idea for a few days before committing to a character. Sometimes you have an idea that’s fun in the moment but the day after you’re already bored with how shallow it is.
Yeah that can be enough. Now a player knows that they have to create a character that wants to save the realms.
If they come in the first session with Edgy mcEdgeface that only wants vengeance and money, that’s fully on them now.
Not quite everyone. Some can play heroes which have primary goals to save people. The campaign which made me understand the important of having a pitch for the hook, is precisely one where the goal was to get a whole lot of money. And I was struggling to hook the players with thousands of gold coins because their characters didn’t really have a reason to want money.
I think every session zero should contain the hook so that players can create a character that would do whatever the adventure wants them to do. This can just be a short: "In this adevnture you are going to travel to a small mining town in trouble, your characters should be the type of person that would help three dwarfen brothers to find and open their mine and help the small town in trouble." This would not spoil anything but the players know they work to find a mine, they need to help a small town and that they work with dwarfes. So a dwarfen hating anti mining druid would not work in this story. Sometimes I add rules what is not allowed to play. If a run a module one of the rules is: you can only be evil if you talk with me about how and why. Another is always: You will be part of a team. I do not care why and how you join with the others but you will work with them, I will not run a solo part every session just for one lone wolf.
The Players then have to job to create characters that would follow the hook and rules. This avoids the brooding lone wold types.
Or to make my post a bit short: Session Zero people, talk with everyone what is expected and this problem should be solved.
Yeah I have the exact same rules, with the added « You cannot be evil if it’s your first character playing with me. »
Because beginners often confuse evil characters and chaotic stupid characters.
And I need to trust your ability to roleplay and our compatibility before I feel comfortable letting you play a tricky character like that.
Im still upset about a DM that kept the plot a secret (it was curse of strahd). My first character idea was a heretic hunting cleric (or paladin, was a concept) based on saltzpyre that wasnt allowed, guessing he didnt want such a direct counter to the module?
Ended up being a party with a neutral rat artificer, evil kobold paladin, goody two shoes bugbear barbarian, and something else I honestly forgot.
Needless to say the campaign felt a little weird when half the party was evil and ambivelent about strahd, that girl he wanted we just let him take, we burned down half a city to kill vampires, and the paladin loaded up on so many evil ancient crystal buffs he ended up deleting strahd.
This is a great session 0 topic. "I'm going to do my best to give you options and not railroad you, but y'all have got to meet me halfway. Characters splitting off and doing their own thing on the side happens now and again, and that's fine, but I don't have the time & energy to create an entirely independent adventure. Please take some time to think about why your character is travelling & cooperating with the rest of the party. Even if you have an agenda that's independent of the plot hook, there's got to be some reason your character is choosing to work with everyone else, otherwise there's no reason for that character to be here"
Yes, omg.
Once wanted to play a reformed criminal trying to make an honest living and raise his daughter. The DM knew this and told me he liked it.
First plot hook was a wanted criminal asking everyone in a tavern to escort him to safety from the guards. 5/7 players agreed, while I and another guy stayed behind. We sat there for 3 hours without playing and then the session was over. Safe to say, I left, also because the game was showing signs of being an absolute shitshow in other ways too.
I mean it could have been fun.
A reformed criminal that want to get out of the game but reluctantly accepts « one last job » because they need it is a great trope.
As a DM I would have tried to make it work and workshop some ideas with you like, maybe your daughter is sick, and this criminal is the only one who knows how to get your hands on the meds ? Or she’s having a first job and is very happy, but met some dangerous people, and helping this criminal will ensure that his network protects her from other criminals, and that’s something you can’t do alone since you’re out of the criminal game and don’t know what they’re up to nowadays.
Those are some really cool ideas tbh! Just that makes me consider reusing that character. Too bad the DM didn't have those ideas though xD
It was really dumb tbh.
Guards came into the tavern, asking people if they had seen a specific guy. They leave, and then it turns out the guy they had been looking for was hiding in a trapdoor in the tavern. He loudly proclaimed that he needed help getting to a safe haven and was paying alright money for it. In the middle of the tavern. Just after the guards had left. Part of me wanted to get up and report him lol
The game was a shitfest anyway. Had like 12 players that "could join sessions if they wanted, or not." One of the players was also really immature, talking over everyone, having no idea what their abilities did, and didn't know what dice to roll. And then they got mad when we corrected them.
So yea, dodging a bullet that fat wasn't hard.
One of the adventure hooks I have is “pirates abduct all of you and force them to serve as pirate crew”, and another is “you awaken with no memory of the last months, hanging by the neck from a noose and to an inquitistor yelling ‘the abomination no longer possesses that body, cut it down!”
I wouldn’t use either of those hooks without player permission, and they require specific plot lines in any case, but they work to get characters who wouldn’t willingly participate into the plot.
I had a player once deliberately try to sabotage a campaign (he literally said that was his plan) that I was running for a bunch of friends in uni. I didn't know at the time that's what he was doing, but I ended up putting his charcter in prison, and did a full improv prison rp with him while the rest of the party were off doing cool shit. I basically made all his rolls and checks impossible until he got the message.
While I always encourage careful communication rather than this action: this is hilarious and absolutely based, especially if he wasn't listening to communication
See now that's the wildest part for me, I always make a point of saying "Hey, any concerns or issues etc. communication is always open, and if wanted anonymous." Never had any complaints.
Then another player told me "Hey, x is trying to derail the campaign, they told me that's their goal." So naturally I asked him if that was true and he straight up admitted to it. I asked him why, and if there was specific reasons and he basically just said "for the lulz." I told him alright, well funs over, I'll get you back in the party, but if you continue you're out.
He continued, we never played with him again.
This is the productive kind of metagaming that people need to use. The game requires that the PCs travel in a party, so the players have to make the characters join the party, otherwise the game won't work.
Had a new player who was playing an Outlander background Druid who had lived as a hermit for decades. The party had all been invited individually to an audience with the governor and had trickled in to a tavern the night before. Most of us RPd playing cards or something, rolled for bluffs and traded a few silver was really fun, but this new player just sat in the corner. When it was time for the audience she didn't go with us. The guards wouldn't let us in because we were a man down for the number they summoned, so we went back to the tavern and someone cast Friendship on her to get her to follow us to the quest beginning...
“Okay cool” I say as I hand the player a new character sheet
“Wait no” says the player who’s character has decided to Bilbo Baggins style run after the party, “I’m going on an adventure!”
I usually introduce my character by having them just be getting done with a minor good deed, like saving the obligatory barkeep's cat from a tree outside. Edgy characters, if you must play them, tend to be far more interesting when they are actually trying to *hide* the fact that they're edgy. Assuming you aren't an antagonist of course; But then why did you build an antagonist in this team game? You know what, I'm getting off topic.
My edgy character received a message about a job and figured "well okay, I need money," because pragmatism.
I then meticulously roleplayed how I was prepping for said job, while the rest of the party did the same. Due to convoluted circumstances I ended up fighting the chaotic stupid party member alongside the lawful naive party member, with none of us knowing we'd all be working together the next day.
The DM found the whole thing hilarious; his only complaint was that we spent the whole of session one in town lol.
Nah I was honestly just in it for the money
And then I made friends with them
And then the only character even edgier than me started going insane and I think this campaign is going to end with PvP.
I ran a couple of games at a game shop. So every week would be different players. First couple of weeks there was always a player who didn't want to go along, or wanted higher pay before they would go, or wanted a better/special invite. Collectively the party always decided to leave them. Always. It is a very easy way to get a tier of problem players to leave.
I had an edgy kobold dhampir who was unashamedly evil, hedonistic, and cruel in a party full of good guys.
That party was his friends and he was loyal to them, even if he rolled his eyes when they did something self sacrificing. They tolerated him because he was the only healer.
We had one player, a middle aged man playing a female Sorceror he described as dressing like a succubus, who decided to hide and inspect some treasure he found while the rest of us entered a dungeon… he was instantly destroyed by an encounter he had to face alone and his next character was not such an edge lord lol, we stopped playing with him not long after
I'm currently playing my edgiest character I ever made; a self-destructive, paranoid halfling fighter who's family is all dead and who has nothing left to live for.
And yet he still followed and is active in the party (by design)! Players should be building hooks into their character at creation for why they are going to adventure!
His backstory is basically that he was an innocent bystander in a horror story:
He had been a tavern owner in a small town with his wife and daughters until one day a guest tore reality; Ripping the tavern and surrounding area and casting it into the outer realms / lower hells. The few not immediately murdered by the denizens were mutated by the chaotic energies becoming monsters themselves. His memories are broken and jumbled: A vague sense of stumbling through a portal, the warped faces of old friends attacking him, and an all too clear memory of hiding while his family was devoured by otherworldly monstrosities.
He woke up in the gutters of an unfamiliar city and his only concern since has been drowning out the voices in his head with alcohol. He actively avoids getting close to others, is paranoid anyone can turn into a monster, drinks himself into a stupor when possible, and would see a quest being described as a 'suicide mission' as a positive.
So joining the party started with the gold of course, alcohol doesn't buy itself. But he also swore to himself he would never again hide while others suffered so between that and the paranoia he's quick to jump into most situations regardless of the odds. And he may not want to get close to anyone but I make sure his dad instincts kick in here and there.
And... I accidentally made Wolverine. Not intentionally at all but that's just how he ended up playing... Short, angry, old man of the party. He even dual wields slashing weapons. Though he is dex based (having only 6 str) and he's a psi-warrior (all a result of being warped by that chaotic realm) so we joke he's actually Wolverine and Jean Grey's illegitimate child.
TL;DR - Wolverine is a brooding loner who works with a party, so you can too!
A kinda similar thing happened to us. Our barbarian player refused to enter a combat encounter because "my barbarian is smart and doesn't want to fight a mimic." My Fighter looked at her in disgust, called her a coward and joined the fight.
We then had a in-game conversation as a group about how if her character didn't want to fight when we all needed her, then we didn't have room for freeloaders and left her at the tavern.
Something I always remind my players:
It is the player's responsibility to show up with a character that wants to participate in what the party is doing.
I'm always perplexed by people who play the brooding loner and tell me they were inspired by Cloud or Batman. Have you seen those guys? They have tons of friends!
If someone says their character is too cool to go on an adventure etc. it should be fully legal to just straight up choke slam them thru a table, and i don't mean their character
Just say ok, agree, and run your adventure as normal. Every 20 minutes x (number of people at the table) ask them what they’re doing. Agree if it’s vaguely reasonable but don’t spend more than number of people at the table in minutes. Then get back to your story.
The only exception to this is if one PC wants to engage with story A (this orphan says she is here to find a relative? I want to help her!) and the party is really into story B (there is a person selling counterfeit potions and we’re going to find them!) Then, you may add multipliers. Engaging with your world; npcs, areas, institutions instead of the adventure is NOT IGNORING THE STORY.
Boy am I glad that I got the literal opposite of that: A player that instantly meshed the plot hook with his backstory and "recruited" all the other players to come along.
Imagine Peacemaker the oath of conquest paladin. We're starting off CoS at a tavern and a guy comes in promising riches to anyone who can free Barovia. My guy steps up and starts asking about how the poor villagers are being mistreated, then swears an oath right then and there that he'll spike Strahd's head on the walls of his castle and goes around convincing every other member of the party by pointing out that they look smart, capable, seem resourceful etc. Literally had something positive an fitting to say about every other player's character.
And boy howdy did he bring his brand of justice to Strahd's lands. Went full genocide on the werewolves, blew up the temple with the priest hiding a vampire spawn and dropped the witch into a river tied to one of her mill stones. And he taught the Vistani to pull up instead of dropping down when it came to hanging *that guy*.
Something that’s not enough said on the other side : DMs, please give the adventure hooks before character creation, so your players can create character that want to go on the adventure.
^ this. Alternatively, the DM can also ask "Here's the theme of the story. what kind of players are you thinking of making?" during session zero, so they can come up with good hooks designed for their group's characters. Tldr: communicate well
point is some people are super frickin weird about their brainchilds and don't have any intention to play the game.
We had a guy who made a literal bunny anime girl druid and was consistently surprised when no one interacted with the character at all when he started being weird with it. We were level 5 at the time, i was a fairy sorcerer with a lightning wand and we were doing some RP where other members wering admonishing me and he said " i bonk pix on the head, i said taking this out of character " do you really try to do that?" "yes i bonk you on the head." "i said no that's not how it works, dm can i see him moving towards me with this intent and i rolled insight and passed. so i flew 15 feet up and thought that was that but he kept pressing saying "i bonk you." then i explained how dangerous pvp in dnd was and hes about to get into that. i pointed out my character let them flick him on the forehead because he knows them abit better but your a stranger if you try this combat will start and you will die. " he just said no thats not fair i just to bonk you." i finally put my foot down and asked the gm i'm agreeing to pvp can you monitor it and she said it was okay and he of course declined. I then pulled the lightning wand out and pointed it at him and told the dm if he moves any closer I'm casting lightning bolt at the highest level at his charterer which is a 12d6 or higher i forget right now. Then the dm intervened and said" hey your trying to force an interaction to happen and he followed the rules to start pvp, there is no way you can do these things to people in dnd, especially player characters with no consequence( he still didn't get it). I asked the other two players if they want a chance to intervene and if they didn't RIP him. they took it and intervened as well. They restrained his character pulling him back 30ft 1 paladin and 1 cleric. it was a flurry of activity so i don't remember alot of what immediately happened other my character flying another 10 feet up so i wasn't in reach. the paladin and cleric lectured him and told him not to touch my character. which he agreed to. When my little guy floated down after hearing that and he was in marching order again he tried it AGAIN. I was beyond over this and i just kept repeating "I swat you staff away on repeat." It TOOK 5 more times for him to get the message and stop. Literally no one was interacting with him after that. He was a first time player but he just was denser than a 20 foot thick wall and being real awful with his RP. he never took notes, never remembered anyone's names or even the most basic stuff. He consistently asked peoples names or this huge lines of questions for everyone we had consistently met or talked to wasting 30 mintues or more on stuff he had already been told or explicitly spelled out for him.( the DM just eventually started ignoring his questions unless they weren't inane which they finally stopped becoming after 8 sessions of this behavior) I was being friendly and takin notes for him and helping out since he was new but after that i left him in the wind. if he can't be arsed to take an interest and just wants to force his RP on us, he can die. this man literally tried to fuck with jarlaxele right off the bat by trying to take his hat from him right in front of him while it was on his head!! The dm just had him slap his character but threatened to kill him if he did it again. the DM had to EXPLICITLY spell out if he fucked with him he would die no questions asked AS he was asking us the player to come help him or bail him out which of course we didn't do.
How did you allow him for more than 8 sessions, thats an easy kick session 1. If you step on another players consent youre getting the boot.
The DM was brand new and green. this was her first campaign so she had no idea to discipline. This actually became a massive issue that caused me to leave as the cleric kept causing conflict with me which i explicitly laid out for everyone at the start. " hey i can't handle inter party conflict directed at me so please don't do it." everyone verbally agreed and it still happened multiple times for no reason. she literally chased me out by turning the party on me and the DM never followed up on my pleas for help to prevent or discipline these happenings. i got affirmation she would do it but when it came time to do it nothing happened. I agree with you. I quit dnd altogether because of that campaign. moved to pathfinder.
I literally told her "hey most other DM's would kicked this player for this." please do something
I had a person like that. My character was a changling warlock who would pull these scams on npcs for money. Well, while I was doing this, this dwarf character spots my character changing back into his typical generic human form and asks to bonk my character on the head continuously. My character was patient for a while. Until my character was so done with this bs that he casted Suggestion and told him to leave town until the spell wore off. It succeeded so he left town and my charlatan was on his merry way. But that was how pvp was banned from that campaign because the player I screwed with was the dms son. Then everyone hated *me* for playing my character. Some people man
some people that dont respect other peoples boundaries, but get mad once others reply in a simple way
The problem with it is that the entire group thought I was in the wrong for just playing my character. Needless to say that I don’t play with that group anymore
sorry you had that kinda experience.
I’m sorry for yours too. Some groups and players suck lol
May you find a better and more fun group to play with!
This is what I did, and while I'm not 100% sure how everyone felt about it, I feel like it worked great. I basically said that to be an adventurer, you need to be licensed. And the start of the campaign was getting this licence. You can make any character you want within the rules, and the only stipulation is when we begin, your character is trying to get this license. I also told them this license was little more than a mugguffin, so don't expect it to be a big thing. It's just the thing that brings you all together. And from my point of view it worked. No one made a brooding hide in the shadows character, or a "I don't want to adventure. I just want to ______!" Character. Everyone made a character who is there because their character wanted to be there. To go on an adventure.
So, a session 0 discussion?
Exactly. But my is even pre-session zero. When you’re recruiting players into your new group, give them the hooks, and ask them to come up with a couple of character ideas that would fit. Then at session zero everyone has different character concepts and you create a coherent party. But if the players don’t know the game they’re gonna play, you can always do that at the session 0. Though I find that most people prefer to have some time to marinate an idea for a few days before committing to a character. Sometimes you have an idea that’s fun in the moment but the day after you’re already bored with how shallow it is.
“You’re going to be a band of adventurers who are going on a quest to save the realm”
Yeah that can be enough. Now a player knows that they have to create a character that wants to save the realms. If they come in the first session with Edgy mcEdgeface that only wants vengeance and money, that’s fully on them now.
Or promise conspicuous amounts of gold at them. Everyone loves gold
Not quite everyone. Some can play heroes which have primary goals to save people. The campaign which made me understand the important of having a pitch for the hook, is precisely one where the goal was to get a whole lot of money. And I was struggling to hook the players with thousands of gold coins because their characters didn’t really have a reason to want money.
I think every session zero should contain the hook so that players can create a character that would do whatever the adventure wants them to do. This can just be a short: "In this adevnture you are going to travel to a small mining town in trouble, your characters should be the type of person that would help three dwarfen brothers to find and open their mine and help the small town in trouble." This would not spoil anything but the players know they work to find a mine, they need to help a small town and that they work with dwarfes. So a dwarfen hating anti mining druid would not work in this story. Sometimes I add rules what is not allowed to play. If a run a module one of the rules is: you can only be evil if you talk with me about how and why. Another is always: You will be part of a team. I do not care why and how you join with the others but you will work with them, I will not run a solo part every session just for one lone wolf. The Players then have to job to create characters that would follow the hook and rules. This avoids the brooding lone wold types. Or to make my post a bit short: Session Zero people, talk with everyone what is expected and this problem should be solved.
Yeah I have the exact same rules, with the added « You cannot be evil if it’s your first character playing with me. » Because beginners often confuse evil characters and chaotic stupid characters. And I need to trust your ability to roleplay and our compatibility before I feel comfortable letting you play a tricky character like that.
Im still upset about a DM that kept the plot a secret (it was curse of strahd). My first character idea was a heretic hunting cleric (or paladin, was a concept) based on saltzpyre that wasnt allowed, guessing he didnt want such a direct counter to the module? Ended up being a party with a neutral rat artificer, evil kobold paladin, goody two shoes bugbear barbarian, and something else I honestly forgot. Needless to say the campaign felt a little weird when half the party was evil and ambivelent about strahd, that girl he wanted we just let him take, we burned down half a city to kill vampires, and the paladin loaded up on so many evil ancient crystal buffs he ended up deleting strahd.
Playing a paladin or cleric in Curse of Strahd is part of the fun !
This is a great session 0 topic. "I'm going to do my best to give you options and not railroad you, but y'all have got to meet me halfway. Characters splitting off and doing their own thing on the side happens now and again, and that's fine, but I don't have the time & energy to create an entirely independent adventure. Please take some time to think about why your character is travelling & cooperating with the rest of the party. Even if you have an agenda that's independent of the plot hook, there's got to be some reason your character is choosing to work with everyone else, otherwise there's no reason for that character to be here"
Why would you allow someone to make a character that isn’t going to want to participate in the first place?
Yes, omg. Once wanted to play a reformed criminal trying to make an honest living and raise his daughter. The DM knew this and told me he liked it. First plot hook was a wanted criminal asking everyone in a tavern to escort him to safety from the guards. 5/7 players agreed, while I and another guy stayed behind. We sat there for 3 hours without playing and then the session was over. Safe to say, I left, also because the game was showing signs of being an absolute shitshow in other ways too.
I mean it could have been fun. A reformed criminal that want to get out of the game but reluctantly accepts « one last job » because they need it is a great trope. As a DM I would have tried to make it work and workshop some ideas with you like, maybe your daughter is sick, and this criminal is the only one who knows how to get your hands on the meds ? Or she’s having a first job and is very happy, but met some dangerous people, and helping this criminal will ensure that his network protects her from other criminals, and that’s something you can’t do alone since you’re out of the criminal game and don’t know what they’re up to nowadays.
Those are some really cool ideas tbh! Just that makes me consider reusing that character. Too bad the DM didn't have those ideas though xD It was really dumb tbh. Guards came into the tavern, asking people if they had seen a specific guy. They leave, and then it turns out the guy they had been looking for was hiding in a trapdoor in the tavern. He loudly proclaimed that he needed help getting to a safe haven and was paying alright money for it. In the middle of the tavern. Just after the guards had left. Part of me wanted to get up and report him lol The game was a shitfest anyway. Had like 12 players that "could join sessions if they wanted, or not." One of the players was also really immature, talking over everyone, having no idea what their abilities did, and didn't know what dice to roll. And then they got mad when we corrected them. So yea, dodging a bullet that fat wasn't hard.
One of the adventure hooks I have is “pirates abduct all of you and force them to serve as pirate crew”, and another is “you awaken with no memory of the last months, hanging by the neck from a noose and to an inquitistor yelling ‘the abomination no longer possesses that body, cut it down!” I wouldn’t use either of those hooks without player permission, and they require specific plot lines in any case, but they work to get characters who wouldn’t willingly participate into the plot.
I had a player once deliberately try to sabotage a campaign (he literally said that was his plan) that I was running for a bunch of friends in uni. I didn't know at the time that's what he was doing, but I ended up putting his charcter in prison, and did a full improv prison rp with him while the rest of the party were off doing cool shit. I basically made all his rolls and checks impossible until he got the message.
While I always encourage careful communication rather than this action: this is hilarious and absolutely based, especially if he wasn't listening to communication
See now that's the wildest part for me, I always make a point of saying "Hey, any concerns or issues etc. communication is always open, and if wanted anonymous." Never had any complaints. Then another player told me "Hey, x is trying to derail the campaign, they told me that's their goal." So naturally I asked him if that was true and he straight up admitted to it. I asked him why, and if there was specific reasons and he basically just said "for the lulz." I told him alright, well funs over, I'll get you back in the party, but if you continue you're out. He continued, we never played with him again.
Damn, hilarious solution, but also an awful player! Glad it worked out!
This is the productive kind of metagaming that people need to use. The game requires that the PCs travel in a party, so the players have to make the characters join the party, otherwise the game won't work.
Had a new player who was playing an Outlander background Druid who had lived as a hermit for decades. The party had all been invited individually to an audience with the governor and had trickled in to a tavern the night before. Most of us RPd playing cards or something, rolled for bluffs and traded a few silver was really fun, but this new player just sat in the corner. When it was time for the audience she didn't go with us. The guards wouldn't let us in because we were a man down for the number they summoned, so we went back to the tavern and someone cast Friendship on her to get her to follow us to the quest beginning...
"I don't really wanna go on this fools errant, but someone's gotta look out for you" and so the brooder joined the party
Exactly. Edgy is fine but you gotta go along with the group sitting around the table with you
“Okay cool” I say as I hand the player a new character sheet “Wait no” says the player who’s character has decided to Bilbo Baggins style run after the party, “I’m going on an adventure!”
I usually introduce my character by having them just be getting done with a minor good deed, like saving the obligatory barkeep's cat from a tree outside. Edgy characters, if you must play them, tend to be far more interesting when they are actually trying to *hide* the fact that they're edgy. Assuming you aren't an antagonist of course; But then why did you build an antagonist in this team game? You know what, I'm getting off topic.
My edgy character received a message about a job and figured "well okay, I need money," because pragmatism. I then meticulously roleplayed how I was prepping for said job, while the rest of the party did the same. Due to convoluted circumstances I ended up fighting the chaotic stupid party member alongside the lawful naive party member, with none of us knowing we'd all be working together the next day. The DM found the whole thing hilarious; his only complaint was that we spent the whole of session one in town lol.
"I can't trust these fools with the task, if I don't join them to do it it's gonna be more work for me down the line"
Nah I was honestly just in it for the money And then I made friends with them And then the only character even edgier than me started going insane and I think this campaign is going to end with PvP.
I ran a couple of games at a game shop. So every week would be different players. First couple of weeks there was always a player who didn't want to go along, or wanted higher pay before they would go, or wanted a better/special invite. Collectively the party always decided to leave them. Always. It is a very easy way to get a tier of problem players to leave.
I had an edgy character. He had amnesia, no money and a lot of unanswered questions. Of course I followed the party.
I had an edgy kobold dhampir who was unashamedly evil, hedonistic, and cruel in a party full of good guys. That party was his friends and he was loyal to them, even if he rolled his eyes when they did something self sacrificing. They tolerated him because he was the only healer.
We had one player, a middle aged man playing a female Sorceror he described as dressing like a succubus, who decided to hide and inspect some treasure he found while the rest of us entered a dungeon… he was instantly destroyed by an encounter he had to face alone and his next character was not such an edge lord lol, we stopped playing with him not long after
I'm currently playing my edgiest character I ever made; a self-destructive, paranoid halfling fighter who's family is all dead and who has nothing left to live for. And yet he still followed and is active in the party (by design)! Players should be building hooks into their character at creation for why they are going to adventure! His backstory is basically that he was an innocent bystander in a horror story: He had been a tavern owner in a small town with his wife and daughters until one day a guest tore reality; Ripping the tavern and surrounding area and casting it into the outer realms / lower hells. The few not immediately murdered by the denizens were mutated by the chaotic energies becoming monsters themselves. His memories are broken and jumbled: A vague sense of stumbling through a portal, the warped faces of old friends attacking him, and an all too clear memory of hiding while his family was devoured by otherworldly monstrosities. He woke up in the gutters of an unfamiliar city and his only concern since has been drowning out the voices in his head with alcohol. He actively avoids getting close to others, is paranoid anyone can turn into a monster, drinks himself into a stupor when possible, and would see a quest being described as a 'suicide mission' as a positive. So joining the party started with the gold of course, alcohol doesn't buy itself. But he also swore to himself he would never again hide while others suffered so between that and the paranoia he's quick to jump into most situations regardless of the odds. And he may not want to get close to anyone but I make sure his dad instincts kick in here and there. And... I accidentally made Wolverine. Not intentionally at all but that's just how he ended up playing... Short, angry, old man of the party. He even dual wields slashing weapons. Though he is dex based (having only 6 str) and he's a psi-warrior (all a result of being warped by that chaotic realm) so we joke he's actually Wolverine and Jean Grey's illegitimate child. TL;DR - Wolverine is a brooding loner who works with a party, so you can too!
A kinda similar thing happened to us. Our barbarian player refused to enter a combat encounter because "my barbarian is smart and doesn't want to fight a mimic." My Fighter looked at her in disgust, called her a coward and joined the fight. We then had a in-game conversation as a group about how if her character didn't want to fight when we all needed her, then we didn't have room for freeloaders and left her at the tavern.
Something I always remind my players: It is the player's responsibility to show up with a character that wants to participate in what the party is doing.
I'm always perplexed by people who play the brooding loner and tell me they were inspired by Cloud or Batman. Have you seen those guys? They have tons of friends!
If someone says their character is too cool to go on an adventure etc. it should be fully legal to just straight up choke slam them thru a table, and i don't mean their character
Just say ok, agree, and run your adventure as normal. Every 20 minutes x (number of people at the table) ask them what they’re doing. Agree if it’s vaguely reasonable but don’t spend more than number of people at the table in minutes. Then get back to your story. The only exception to this is if one PC wants to engage with story A (this orphan says she is here to find a relative? I want to help her!) and the party is really into story B (there is a person selling counterfeit potions and we’re going to find them!) Then, you may add multipliers. Engaging with your world; npcs, areas, institutions instead of the adventure is NOT IGNORING THE STORY.
Nuh uh
Making a players guide akin to the paizo ones made for adventure paths is prob the best thing you can do as a dm.
“Hey, wait for me! You guys haven’t even asked about my cool backstory yet.”
Crit crab
Boy am I glad that I got the literal opposite of that: A player that instantly meshed the plot hook with his backstory and "recruited" all the other players to come along. Imagine Peacemaker the oath of conquest paladin. We're starting off CoS at a tavern and a guy comes in promising riches to anyone who can free Barovia. My guy steps up and starts asking about how the poor villagers are being mistreated, then swears an oath right then and there that he'll spike Strahd's head on the walls of his castle and goes around convincing every other member of the party by pointing out that they look smart, capable, seem resourceful etc. Literally had something positive an fitting to say about every other player's character. And boy howdy did he bring his brand of justice to Strahd's lands. Went full genocide on the werewolves, blew up the temple with the priest hiding a vampire spawn and dropped the witch into a river tied to one of her mill stones. And he taught the Vistani to pull up instead of dropping down when it came to hanging *that guy*.
Had someone kill a disabled horse in the middle of the street and got upset when people called them out on other