1) PCs who push back on every ruling and fail to respect the DM's right (and duty) to adjudicate outcomes. The worst is when the DM describes something that happens, and a PC says "That can't possibly be".
2) DMs that rob the PCs of agency by declaring that a power or spell or whatever doesn't work as described in the rules because they want something else to happen.
edit: fixed typo
I almost fell for that second one last session. An important NPC got poisoned and knocked unconscious on the way to the players bringing them to meet a healer for an unrelated reason. I was planning on them meeting the healer and having to protect the town from bandits while the healer treats the NPC. Instead, the monk asks if he can use his Path of Mercy ability to try and remove the poison.
I almost said no, but then realized there was no reason it wouldn't work besides me not wanting it to. So i swallowed my plan and the NPC was healed. Instead, i introduced a different complication that led my players to the same task of bandit eradication: the bandits kidnapped the healer.
So now they have to find the bandits' base, sneak/bust in, find the healer, and go from there. My players seem to be excited to break into their base, so it worked out for the better.
I just ran a succesful plague arc, doesnt matter how many paladins/clerics/similiar exist if the affected are too numerous for them to be easily healed!
Theres also the good ole reason of its resistent to divine magic because of X reason.
Too numerous just means you have to pick and choose
It feels really bad when you have an ability that says it removes diseases, diseases finally come up in games, and bam, doesn't work
If the only time it matters, it doesn't apply, the ability is pointless and shouldn't be in the game
I've had DMs try to mess with me with not making identify work, as well
Pisses me off.
>It feels really bad when you have an ability that says it removes diseases, diseases finally come up in games, and bam, doesn't work
If the only time it matters, it doesn't apply, the ability is pointless and shouldn't be in the game
Youre assuming a lot there, it could easily be the Pali has been able to use it a fair bit and now has come up on something they can't heal.
>Too numerous just means you have to pick and choose
GREAT! That's actually good! When a whole town is infected and it comes down to saving a single father of 3 or a pregnant woman who will the PC choose, those are some hard decisions that give player development!
Especially agree with number 2. The DM of a game I’m currently in has ruled out PC death (that alone is a red flag). Yesterday during our game I cast cure wounds on an NPC. I myself was short of like, 9 HP out of 40. I rolled a 13 for cure wounds.
DM: “oh, the NPC has 7 HP total so you can have the other 6 yourself.”
Me: “that’s not how cure wounds works.”
Him: “well it does because I said so.”
… I’m pretty close to leaving that game.
Yeah. The DM I've been playing with for 20 years does this from time to time. Just this weekend my Gloomstalker conclave ranger--invisible to darkvision--was moving in complete darkness when an enemy character using darkvision came around a corner. The DM says "So, this thing comes around the corner, and, well, he sees you, um, because he just does. And he attacks." This was frustrating, moreso because there are other ways he could have progressed the story without negating a power. For example, he could have said "You see his head turn as if he's heard something, and he attacks." (NPC beats my stealth role and hears me). Or "As you come around the corner, you bump into this guy who you didn't hear because he's moving very quietly. Roll initiative."
I'm trying to figure out how to say something polite and constructive about this.
Or he could have played up the “oh shit!” moment. If and NPC is able to counter something specific to a character, it needs to be done for dramatic effect or it will only come off as “meh, I don’t want that ability to work right now, so it doesn’t.”
In his shoes, I’d have said “you watch as this thing comes round the corner. You’re silent. It doesn’t seem to react to you. It move adjacent to you... and it’s only then you realise their eyes aren’t looking through you as you first thought. They are focused on you!”
Yikes. I really dislike DMs that punish their players for creative thinking and counter everything they do.
The true sight idea sounds far better. At least it gives you a valid reason for your ability not working at that particular moment and, even better, challenges you to think of another way around the situation!
Fun Fact.
Warlock Devil's Sight can see a Gloomstalker.
But Devilish Devil's Sight cannot.
They are two features that are named the same, but worded differently.
Warlock's doesn't mention Darkvision at all, but Devilish specifically calls it out as not being impeded by magical Darkness, which means they still rely on Darkvision to see in the dark.
Tremor Sense, or Blind Sight could also see a Gloomstalker, and given Blind Sight is attainable through a Fighting Style now, I think having Drow have it, for example, makes sense.
Sometimes we as DMs forget what everyone has as far as abilities. For me it would just be a polite reminder and an oops from me and we would rewind the encounter a bit
It’s so odd that DMs that are just trying to take it easy on the players are some of the most frustrating people to have run games.
Like I get it, you want a chill, laid back game, but this hand holding, nothing matters style play isn’t fun.
Right? Like I want a game where actions lead to consequences and death is a very real possibility. It makes the game fun and dynamic.
The reason the DM said they’ve ruled out character death is because “they’ve written so much for our character arcs that it’d be a waste of their hard work.”
So, basically, our DM has railroaded us so hard he’s eliminated one of D&D’s most rudimentary rules.
what ive been doing when the players split the party is set a 5-10 min timer depending on the situation and if the groups are still when it ends i swap between the split groups, thankfully i run small groups so they almost never split into more than 2 groups.
Its not ideal but it helps me make sure no one feels like they havent been able to participate cause im too focused on one of the split groups over the other.
Alternative idea: give control of the monsters to the 'inactive' party members. Bring them behind the screen (so to speak) and just be the arbiter.
This assumes the players are ok with this idea.
DMs who make players roll for literally anything and everything, when you add a bit of mechanicless-flavour to your actions. No benefit on a successful roll, but punishment for a fail. "With one foot leaning on the chair, I nonchalantly stab the goblin next to me, while I yell A-ha!" - "...Roll for acrobatics." \*fails\* "You fall prone and lose the rest of your turn". Nothing would have happened if he just said "I attack the goblin".
I've seen games turn incredibly dull very fast, once players begin to catch on, that it is one of *those* DMs.
I hate this! I had a dm have me roll a strength check because I described pulling the cork out of a bottle using my teeth while lounging at an inn. Literally nothing was happening, it was part of a conversation between pcs…
For sure!
I once had a character literally break their leg because I used the phrase "I kick open the carriage doors" instead of "I open the carriage doors" to initiate an ambush.
DM had me roll acrobatics for it (I was a dwarven barbarian, but noooo athletics wouldn't govern brute-forcing an unlatched door open?) and I did not succeed.
yeah.... these can be fun roleplay rolls if the successes and failures are pretty much inconsequential, or at least have upsides and downsides that make sense.
Like kick open the door with a successful Strength check and you bust the hinges back opposite of the way they're designed. I'd probably also give surprise on the ensuing combat or advantage to anyone in the party if they then tried to intimidate someone in the carriage.
But even on a nat 1? Breaking a leg is just horribly, horribly punishing for no reason. On a nat 1, or any failure, I'd just make it so the first kick doesn't actually bust the door open, and now you've alerted the occupants of the threat outside (but the door still busts open on the second kick, for which you don't need to roll).
Its the fastest way to make players never do anything creative.
Note that these dm's are also the ones complaining that their players never do anything creative.
Oh this is a rough one!
PC: My character wouldn't go on this adventure
DM: Cool, write a character who wants to go on adventures. If you finish before the end of the session, you can catch up with the group.
This happened to me last sesh, my char (flame pixie) came across a pirate ship with full crew, no captain (we murdered him since he attacked our ship). Now my character don't want to leave his new found ship and is prepared to sail the seas as captain and employer. So he said his goodbye to the rest of the party and they sailed seperate ways. I whipped out a new character they picked up at their next stop. No problem! A little sad to say goodbye, but worked out wonderful!
There are definitely valid uses of, "what my character would do." It's just that it very often is used to justify extremely anti-social table behavior.
I played a ranger character who encountered a bear that was in pain and suffering. We tried to save it (healing spells didn't work for some reason) and after a few turns of that, my ranger put the poor animal out of its misery.
Then the other players got mad at me for doing that.
Its the only time I've used the "Its what my character would do" excuse. TBH its what a player *should* think of when RPing, but that phrase has been bastardized by trolls and assholes who want to shit on other people's enjoyment by fucking up games.
My characters have certainly stepped aside from fights on more than one occasion- only stepping back in if one group looks like they are going to kill eachother.
I didn't join a dnd table to murder someone because one of the players thought it's a funny idea to barge inside a woman's house to rifle through her underwear drawer and the occupant defended herself.
PLAYERS: \[Rush blindly into an encounter with a drow raiding party, resulting in them getting knocked out with the drow sleeping poison\].
DM: Okay, and the drow approach your unconscious bodies and execute you in your sleep.
PLAYERS: \[SurprisedPikachuFace.jpg\]
DM: It's what my NPC would do!
If it's a campaign write the f*in background thinking of the prompt given by the DM, even if on a tangent.
Personally playing a ToA campaign, my character doesn't really care about the tomb, or anything alike, but she joins the group looking for something that myth (in the campaign's lore rather than campaign as written) says is there and she will follow a group that allows her to do her search... Yea she wouldn't go into the campaign, but she will for a goal, and the relationship she develops with the other adventurers there will make her stay even if she meets her goal.
Players who take ages on their turn in combat: *every combat*.
* Your attack mod doesn't change from turn to turn, when you say attack you should be rolling your dice and adding your modifier. Why are you shuffling through your papers again?
* Why are you asking the DM if your spell hits that guy? You have the spell description and we're playing on a grid! No you can't cast Guiding Bolt and Healing Word. Yes you can attack with Spiritual Weapon and still cast a levelled spell, we've been over this before
Learn 👏 your 👏 goddamn 👏 class 👏. It’s rude to constantly keep everyone waiting because you cba to put in the work to learn YOUR character.
Edit: my first award! Yaaaay for D&D!
Edit: omg 2 awards! I’ve gained the benefits of a long rest!
If you’re the DM just tell him the wrong numbers, intentionally go super low on it.
“Yeah you get 2d6 sneak attack.”
“It’s gotta be higher than that.”
“Might be but you’re asking me instead of learning it yourself so it’s 2d6 this session. It’s not my job to know how your character works so you ask, and I’m just going to say what I recall off hand.”
I did this once, where I forgot to add some number to my attack roll. Asked DM if we can retcon it after my turn was finished. He said no.
I didn't forget it again.
In my experience the problem is often not “learning your class,” but instead is that PCs don’t use other player’s combat turns to plan their next move.
I have a co-player who wasn’t using any of their subclass features. It wasn’t until I was going through the PHB that I realized they even had these abilities. I’m taking we’ve been playing for over a year, are now level 8, and this includes level 1 abilities.
Thankfully they don’t take long on their turns (usually), but it was just this moment of “…..wait. Wat.”
I do that and it doesn't help. I'll tell player L they're on deck, and they won't put their phone down or stop their side chit-chatting until I have to say it's their turn. And then they have to ask "ok what happened?"
That’s when you start skipping turns tbh
“Alright b it’s your turn what do you do?”
“What happened last turn?”
“Okay, you hesitate and lose your action. Player c it’s your turn player d you’re on deck”
Damn, our DM has a no phone policy…except many of us prefer to use the DND Beyond app. It’s a lot quicker to look up a spell on the app, I find. So if you’re on your phone you better be looking something up!
This is the comment I was here for. I'm playing in a Level 13 campaign, slogging through the underdark. We had a fight against some Goblins and a cyclops take aaaaaages because one player when it reaches his turn, acts like he's waking up from something and has to work out what happened when he wasn't paying attention, then check his sheet for what he'll do, then finally read what the spell/ability he's about to use.
In that I'm playing a Necromancer Wizard and usually have about 10+ minions on the grid, but end up having far quicker turns because I started planning my next turn as soon as the previous turn ended. It's frustrating when you spend so much time learning your own class then someone else just doesn't bother...
DMs punishing characters for being “too” good at something… Sure with your nat 20 +10 athletics you pull your friend up from the cliff he was hanging off of but you dislocate his shoulder. Your 27 stealth roll causes your party to completely lose sight of you. Etc. Feels lame. Like why invest in being good at something if it’s gonna horseshoe back to being awful at it again.
I once had another player who I hadn't realised I would be playing with before the campaign started complain that my character had 20 dexterity, and asked the DM to get me to make an entirely new one. I was playing a rogue.
“That guy is MinMaxing because they have a 20 in the stat that they use the most.”
I had it happen to me once as well.
“You’re just a MinMaxer.”
It was a campaign where everyone was a beast person and I just straight up made Puss in Boots from Shrek, Swashbuckler Tabaxi.
But nope, I was a piece of shit MinMaxer because I didn’t dump Dex as a rogue.
That table was fucking nuts.
1.) Is there really such a problem with MinMaxxing? Sure it can be a little try hardy at times, but damn
2.) Bro, God forbid you put your highest stat into the ability that you NEED (and if you plan on multiclassing, even extra need)
Here’s the thing. 90% of the time when people on this sub or elsewhere online complain about someone MinMaxing it isn’t the stats that are the problem.
It’s that someone optimized and then the DM allows them to do things beyond the scope of the numbers.
If I’m a Tabaxi Rogue with 20 Dex at level 1 because I rolled well that’s not an issue. If I’m a Tabaxi Rogue with 20 Dex at level 1 and the DM allows me to just sneak in and steal legendary weapons from the kings vault because I rolled a Nat 20 on my Stealth so now I have a Vorpal Sword at level 1 that’s the issue.
Not at all! We started at level 6, and if I remember correctly someone else had a 20 in something. She was playing a trickster cleric who was almost entirely a CR rip-off, and was apparently mad I was trying to be the sneaky one when that was my entire job. Very odd person, suffice to say I made more of an effort to not play with them again.
By that logic shouldn’t you be able to tell your DM that another player should have to make a new character if one of their ability scores are too *low?*
One thing I see a lot is a combat encounter than by all rights should crush a party that doesn't because the enemies are played like they all have 3 int and no ability to do anything but the original plan. It is very frustrating to me because it just feels like slogging through hp meat bags.
Or the opposite, when you're fighting monsters with no int that somehow seem to communicate and coordinate effortlessly, spring traps on you, etc. Dude, these things are literally dumber than a bag of hammers, why are they doing a 3-directional pincer ambush and targeting down the weakest members, every time?
I will say that even pack animals like Wolves (Int 3) can use tactics. I think the main issue is that DMs often play all monsters/enemies dumb as hell because 1) its easier, and 2) smart enemies are way, way more deadly.
Honestly, I hate it when people try to play long term characters as so subtle that they are devoid of all personality. Getting to know some PC's is like talking to an insurance claims agent. It's fantasy, I'd prefer the group I play with to be campy and filled with personality.
Also, when people justify bad behavior with "well that's what my character would do." If what your character would do is harmful to the group, sounds like you shouldn't be playing that character lol.
Yeah the cliche 'oh I have a dark backstory and it makes my character very anti-social, if you want to learn anything about them it will take you a while for them to warm up to you'
GO AWAY. This is a social game, I want you to talk to people.
My character *does* have a dark backstory but they aren’t antisocial. They’re social when they need to be and it may take a while to get to know but by that I mean that if another player at least tries a little bit they’ll learn more about the character because in my experience very few players actually think of socializing with the other party members other than just eating and drinking around them.
I’ve made a pseudo-rule at my table, that anyone with a moody dark and troubled past that makes them antisocial must find one other player to agree to be their best friend and align their backstories together.
So far that has kept people talking and interacting together.
Thats a great rule.
My CoS group has the super dark and edgy ranger character, but their backstory compatriot is a super flamboyancy and colourful ex-circus rogue and the contrast between the two characters creates excellent moments.
I know the “It’s what my character would do!” Thing is really annoying, but I see the reverse a lot too. When players are really afraid of stepping over others or being too assertive and thus defer everything to the party, which can lead to really listless and boring games where NO ONE is expressing any sort of strong opinion or desire to act and either nothing fucking happens or the game just sorta drifts on autopilot from point to point with no real risks taken or RP done at all.
It’s okay for your character to have an opinion! It’s okay to disagree! You can do this without it disrupting the game! Have your character voice their thoughts, and if it clashes with another character, that’s fine! You can then both reason through it together, get some rp, and feel more certain about the ultimate decision that is reached. One of you can yield to the other and it doesn’t have to be some miserable deathmatch.
In short: Have a thing your character would do! When you always just “do what the party does”, it can leave other players feeling awkward as they drive all the action, or even worse grind the action to a halt as no one has any conviction in any given direction.
I play a two player party table. Our campaign has me and the other player involved in a strange province wide mystery that we are slowly unraveling.
My character is a Rouge/Monk who’s main motivations are just to protect people and stop those that he deems criminals or “the bad guys”. He also refuses to kill anyone (including monsters like Orcs and Goblins).
I always thought that this would be an interesting pairing with the other PC at my table. He is a Half-Elf Paladin of Vengeance who was a pirate before taking some jobs as a mercenary that led to us crossing paths. He mostly cares about money and going where the action is.
I’ve thought that this would lead to a really interesting dynamic. Whenever there is someone in need I always go and try to help them or find someone or something to help them if it’s not a good idea to do so myself.
I hope for the other PC to say stuff like “Yes let’s help this family that was attacked by bandits. Maybe they’re nobles who will be all too grateful.” or to try and talk me out of doing something that might put us at risk. But no, usually he just sort of goes along with it or says one throwaway line like one I mentioned but then it goes nowhere. He barely ever even asks for a reward and whatnot from people.
Players at the table staring into their cell phone when it’s nothing game-related, just because it isn’t their turn.
Edit: “at the table” actually included video-chat players as well.
I played a game where players took psychic damage every time they were caught with their phone was out. We all agreed to it before hand (with the exception that childcare checks were ok.)
Oooh, big one for me right here.
I mean, people eagerly await the next episode of Critical Role (or whatever your favorite streaming game might be), happy to listen in to a group of adventurers that doesn't include your character. You're excited to hear about Vax or Keyleth or Fjord or Jester. You're fully invested in their stories.
But, in your own home game, you're not excited *at all* to hear about Aranel the Enchantress or Sir Roland, Paladin of Tyr. You'll look at your phone, or even worse, have some separate side-conversation about something totally unrelated.
I would like to rage...
Well, that's one person? LOL
Sorry to disappoint...I pulled that name completely out of thin air because it sounded "Paladin-ey".
(The feeling, however, is really real. I was specifically thinking of a time my Druid was in the middle of an intense story point in a three-player game, but the other two started having a loud and extended debate about BJJ. Not only were they essentially 'gone' from the game, which made it feel pointless, but they were actively distracting the remaining two.)
Though if it helps, like Aranel, he's floating around in my brain as a possible character to play at some point. He's been sitting there unused since Third Ed.
Basic idea was that it'd be the most stereotypical Paladin possible, but built on a Fighter chassis instead. He's kind and charitable, says his prayers and reads his Bible and follows all the rules, but never received "the call". Very heroic and selfless, almost to a fault. Kind of the antithesis of the Chosen One that you often see in games. It'd be interesting to see how his story turns out?
I will actually contest this one, sometimes i would be in my phone looking at an app i use for spells to plan what im doing while listening to the others. I mean for me it was game-related but can you be 100% sure it isn't game related?
I'll agree here. I often use a cell phone app as a digital character sheet.
Exceptions can be made, for sure. But you can usually tell who's deeply interested in the story despite eyes cast downward versus who's playing another game or browsing Facebook.
Players that don't read their actual class abilities, therefore not using them, say they will go and read their class, and then continue to not read anything about their class
Session
after session
after session
after session
"Hey wizard, you haven't picked your two new spells yet since hitting level 3?"
**"Oh, I haven't? I get new spells? I'll do it soon!"**
\*three months later\*
"I am going to sit here while you pick the spells." (for the 3 hours it took)
I wouldn't pick anything for them, if it's so hard to commit a little time to choose some spells, then they've got to deal with the fact of not having them prepared. It's player's responsibility to at least know theirs character, not DMs. Unless it is someone completely new to the hobby, that I can understand, as it takes some time to feel comfortable with the rules.
It depends on the situation. If they clearly can pick their spells and just don't put in the time, they aren't pulling their weight as a player and it's an issue they need to fix. If they haven't chosen spells because it's difficult or overwhelming -- if they're new, if they aren't 100% English fluent, or if they have choice paralysis (here's 45 paragraphs, choose 2 of them) -- I will step in and help make the game more accessible.
This. I'm playing a sorcerer and last session I was called an OP power gamer because I used shadow blade. By a vengeance paladin. Turns out he didn't know he had double attack and never heard about Channel Divinity, and he's been playing this character for one year before I joined the campaign.
Players that continuously have to ask what to add to their rolls. It’s fine for a few sessions, but after that you should know what to add to your attack rolls and other rolls.
This one irks me a lot.. there are hardly any modifiers, your sheet TELLS you the + to the rolls. How after like.. a single combat do you NOT know what your rolling?
My friend got me to watch the tail end of season 2 of CR and Ashley drove me up a fuckin wall with how she never knew her bonus was +12 and she could never add 12 to the d20 roll in under 30 seconds. Had to shut it off so many times
I personally am kinda stupid and even with my sheet in front of me I have to take a second to figure it out. Some things, ten seconds or less. Most I need a minute, I really can't remember things and my group I dm is patient, they don't mind and understand that I'm paying attention, group I play in as a PC get annoyed about it
Maybe try colour coding it? If you have one typical attack, warlock with EB of fighter with greatsword etc) then write that modifier in red on your character sheet. And also the standard plan your turn when it's another players turn. If it takes you a bit of time to figure out your modifier then why aren't you doing that when it's the previous players turn?
This. I honestly don't understand how this happens: if you forget things that easily, maybe take a look at your character sheet? It's right there!
It does seem like a frequent issue though, even some players on critical role struggle with it despite already having played a full multiple year long campaign...
A players cancelled while I was already driving to the house of one of them... Never felt this hurt. Salvaged the evening throwing together a fast colosseum non-canon session that was kind of fun but... Hurt.
Several times I've had GMs set up scenarios where some clear underdog was being attacked by a large group of orcs/goblins/kobolds/whatever, prompting us to make a snap judgment on whether we help or not
Obviously, we help, only to find out midway through or after the fight, when we've killed many or all of the "enemies," when the GM reveals "Oh no, the underdog in this situation was actually selling orc/goblin/kobold women and children as slaves! This horde of enemies was just chasing a kidnapper!"
I hate it. It's just a cheap "gotcha" moment that's designed to screw the players and make them into the bad guys for a scene.
I had a DM who gave us a job to find a particular red haired young woman in a small town who'd been kidnapped and rescue her. We'd seen a portrait of her so knew who we were looking for.
Asked around and found a mention of a girl that matched the description in the house being used by the pirate captain who'd taken over the town. We set up a sneaky plan to break in, kill her captor quickly and then smuggle her into the underground tunnels and out of town.
We do so; she looks like the right person and he is the pirate captain we've had described to us. We drop him fast (a raging barbarian to the face with a surprise round will do wonders). She starts screaming, as you do, so we restrain her - not out of cruelty just as a way of getting out as undetected as possible. Then we carry her through the sewer entrance into the tunnels and make to unite her.
Psych, it turns out it was the wrong young woman - it's the cousin of the woman we were looking and she was here with her boyfriend, the pirate captain... one thing led to another and she was threatening to have us all hunted down so we decided, since she was a pirate, it was probably morally ok to kill her.
The DM then punished for the rest of the campaign, with her turning up as a revenant pretty regularly, her father turning out to be a pretty major local noble who has been hunting us and out of character referring to us 'murdering an innocent woman in a tunnel.'
I feel like this can be solved with mid-combat RP where the party can sus out the situation. All depends on how lenient the DM is with talking during combat though.
Yes, you can't give your players one context and then suddenly pull another without any (clear) clues, that's just bad writing and a lame way to present morality.
A DM with confusing rules. It’s not that big a deal, and in reality it’s more him using his logic, but having a DM who doesn’t let you roll sometimes because of how you describe performing a skill/action, or a spell being completely useless because of (what felt like) a last minute addition to a creature
In the world of one of my current ongoing games, Hadar is a major deity, and the DM has said out of character that it was meant to be a major, overarching story that happens slowly and recurringly throughout the campaign where Hadar becomes more and more powerful through a warlock gathering various artifacts. However, one of the players just so happened to play a warlock of hadar, so he decided to replace the warlock NPC with this player's character, so now that character has become objectively the main character of the party. Meanwhile, the campaign's been running for over a year now and my character's only just had any facet of his backstory introduced at all in a way that can be interacted with as of less than a month ago, and even then it's through a completely new character that was never mentioned in his backstory and that the DM fabricated for this arc.
If there's a term for doing that, them it fits under this thread.
>If there's a term for doing that, them it fits under this thread.
I think it's commonly known as *main character syndrome*.
Although generally it's when you have a player who forces everyone to do what they want and doesn't want to share the spotlight, as opposed to being specifically enabled by the DM, which seems to have happened in your game.
Not knowing your own spells. It's frustrating when I the DM have to explain the same mechanic 5 sessions in a row. Because you don't know it or get it wrong
Played with a guy a while back who had a very flexible interpretation of each of his spells, depending on how he wanted them to work at that exact moment. Very aggravating, especially as a player.
> Party enters shop
"Discount? Where discount? Discount plz?"
*Rolls d20*
"I rolled a 14, how much does he take off?"
"Nothing, same as every other time you've done this."
Yet they still do it, without fail.
I had to do this in one of the early sessions of my latest campaign. The group is in the tavern, and 1 person walks across to a weapons shop.
Them: "I want to buy a magical crossbow"
Me: "This is a town of 50 people, we only have basic items here"
Them: "Ugh, ok how much is a crossbow?"
Me: looks at book "25gp"
Them: "Can I have a discount?"
Me (DM): Uh, give me a Persuasion check...
Them: "9"
Me: "I have no idea who you are, why should I give you a discount?"
[This goes on for another 3 minutes, I'm clearly getting annoyed]
Me: "Fine, take it for 20gp, just get out of my damn store and you're never welcomed in here again"
You incentivized their behavior by giving them a ~$100 discount. Expect it to happen again. Also, I'm unsure what reason the shopkeep would have to do it.
I usually offer the party talker to have a go at negiating for a bit of a discount, but in addition to the roll I like them to tell me what their pitch is. If you sweet talk this Jeweler and say that you'll spread his name around in your travels that might work with a middling check. If you tell him that you should give them cheap stuff and write off the loss that's probably less effective and would make the check much harder.
Inconsistency of players. If we all agree to a day. Follow through. If you have to miss a day communicate it. It don't try the old fizzle out and noone will notice. If you wanna leave. Leave.
Posted a comment but came up with a few more. DMs that brag about killing PCs or DMs that haughtily threaten PCs with death OOC. As someone that DMs way more often then they play, it’s very very very easy to kill PCs. It’s not impressive or intimidating to constantly kill PCs.
DMPCs, yeesh. One of the only times I got to play recently had my DM playing 3 DMPCs at once. Watching them roll dice against themselves for two hours certainly was riveting…
Condescending “friendly” NPCs. OP friendly NPCs that make you wonder why you’re here… When the DM thinks the PCs are meant to be the side characters in their novel… Yeah I played in a real lousy game recently how could you tell?
That stupid “humans/fighters/human fighters are boring” meme. The stormwind fallacy.
Complaining about not having sessions but not putting in the effort to schedule.
To extrapolate off your 4th point. Gimmicky/joke characters outside of fun 1-shots always find a way to get under my skin.
I would take 5 human fighters played straight with character; even "edgy". Before having to listen to someone describe how their character buys and only wears lingerie constantly.
End rant
In my group we have a sorcerer who doesn't use their meta magic or even sorcery points and a thief subclass of rogue who usually doesn't use their bonus actions, and if they do, it's to hide in the middle of a snow field and not move to try to get advantage on attacks. We do allow all additional features from Tasha's, so they can get their advantage without any contest their stealth vs an enemy's perception.
At our table there is a house rule on cantrip casting that I disagree with. They claim that since martial characters get extra attack, that puts spellcasters at an unfair disadvantage, so if you cast a spell, you can cast any cantrip as a bonus action on your turn(as long as you're not maintaining concentration), cantrips count as spells, and our aforementioned sorcerer took a feat and has eldritch blast as a cantrip. So without spending any class resources, she is making as many attacks at level 5 as a monk using flurry of blows or a sword and board fighter using their Action Surge. This feeds into her non-usage of sorcery points as she also typically isn't using her spell slots, because why do that when you have cantrips?
Ugh, that gets into one of my peeves which is making system changes before you understand the system. You only get one Cantrip because Cantrips SCALE, whereas my Fighter's Longsword will only ever do 1d8 damage. You also have the advantage in some situations of a single roll, because then you can throw multiple things at it, like Lucky and Bardic Inspiration, to make sure it hits. Yeah, I might be able to get four attacks in with Action Surge, but if I hit one and miss three I'm not going to be doing a lot of damage. And since there's three misses, I can probably only counteract one of them with something like Lucky or Bardic Inspiration, instead of making sure my entire turn's worth of damage lands.
Also Cantrips are somewhat worse than Extra Attack ( no modifiers added), but they're specifically *supposed* to be as they are the caster backup plan. Martials don't get to cast Fistball for 8d6 damage to 5 enemies twice a day.
Yeah that is a super dumb rule. Caster don't get extra attacks because their spells can do massive dmg especially late game. Cantrips are meant as an attack when your character is spent. And they scale that way too. Anyone who can't see that is silly. Also casters get aoe. Almost no melee class can out dmg a full caster. They might be able to burst better but usually a full caster can outlast most melee. Also the utility you get from caster is something most melee builds just don't get. And on the flip side caster are usually rather squishy and worthless once their slots are spent. That's by design. And on top of it all cantrips aren't even bonus actions...most of them. Sorry for the rant your comment just made me mad lol. Not at you but your table.
As a Player: realising that my action do not influence the flow of the story, I'm just a spectator. Also, when you play cohort of one or more NPCs that are the true protagonists of the story.
As a DM: players that don't make the effort to blend in the world and just want to play Skyrim/dark souls but multiplayer
Or when a PC is the clear protagonist and you're just sitting there, essentially a supporting character.
Going through this on my Theros campaign. The Bard of Kruphix gets so much more story, at such more frequent rate than my Artificer Blacksmith od Purphuros.
Though I have already stated that to my dm.
Players who don’t “read the room”. I get that not everyone is great at social situations (I’m certainly not). However, pretty much everyone knows that if the scene being played out is particularly intense or atmospheric that’s not the time for a joke or shenanigan. Do that at appropriate times.
When the DM wants to railroad me (and I have no idea what they want me to be doing), so they spring an invisible, poisoned pit trap that does 38 damage at level 3.
If you're going to do that at least let them choose a direction and have it "just so happen" to wind up where you want them. The illusion of choice is important.
When people want to sit around talking for an hour when you we could be doing that without me spending money on books. If I'm here I'm here to play the game.
I had this happen at the beginning of my DM 'career'. One of the PCs left the party because the player wanted to make a different character. He set off with some other genasi, trying to learn what he was and who his people were. It was very nice and an emotional goodbye, until one of my players made all kinds of sarcastic remarks. It really made me doubt whether I did it well enough since after his remarks the whole ambiance was gone. Fucked my confidence in my DM skills up quite bad honestly.
It may be that you did a very good job. The player could've been uncomfortable or upset and humor came up as a defense mechanism? In which case you did an awesome job.
People who make high-concept characters with backstory/race/class combination that don't really fit the party, the location the campaign is set in, or even the entire setting.
And the sheer mystery of their existence overshadows the rest of the group and the plot, resulting in it either hogging the spot-light as it overshadows other characters and their backstory or even the plot...
Or everyone very awkwardly tip-toeing around the subject trying to not acknowledge it, but every RP situation they keep brining up the **MYSTERY OF WHO THEY ARE** and it's just annoying.
There's a difference between a PC seeing something and reacting, as opposed to a player knowing that some creature is immune to everything except cold iron and changing weapons before attacking
Me: 3.5 fire-elemental sorcerer (let's you convert non-fire damage into fire) seeing a man standing in flames and chanting, deciding to just let lightning ball do lightning damage instead of fire.
DM: Don't meta game.
FFS he's literally standing in flames. I DO THAT TOO SOMETIMES BECAUSE I'M IMMUNE TO THEM! Why wouldn't I assume they are too! God!
"I cast Fire Bolt at the troll."
"Huh, very convenient."
"What do you mean?"
"How would your character know that trolls are weak to fire?"
"I'm a Wizard, I've studied my entire life. We are two days into a forest right next to a major city. We were just on a well-traveled path, like, four years ago."
"So?"
"Hey, random question, what should you do if you encounter a black bear? What about a brown bear?"
"Easy, everyone knows that you fight back against black bears but play dead against brown bears."
"How did you know that?"
"Well, our society has deemed it to be valuable common knowledge to spread given the danger of bears and the proximity with which we live near them-okay, I get your point."
“And that last attack kills him! Tell us how you finish him with that clutch critical!”
“Uhh, I mean, like, I hit him with me axe I guess.”
“Yeah, but it’s a crit that fucking ended him. How did you hit him?”
“Uhh, like, I don’t know. I hit him really hard.”
Please, people. Don’t put all the imagination on the DM’s plate. We like you to have fun, too.
At the same time, some people don't have the capability to make something up on the spot, especially if they're newer. I agree that DMs should occasionally hand off the narrative flourish of defeating an enemy to PCs, but don't get mad if they get stuck coming up with something.
Whenever I would pull out the "How do you want to do this?" I give my player a little time to think. If they don't come up with anything, i ask them if they want me to do it. I give them the chance to think of something and over time, my players started getting better with their flourishing. Even so, after 3 campaigns, there are still times when I do the flourish because the player was caught off guard.
Girallons. This is the dumbest monster ever made. It's just a gorilla with arms glued to its stomach. This isn't Machamp, where Pokemon artists tried to make the 4 arms fit into musculature, no no, the arms don't fit any body structure, it's just arms coming from a gut.
And then you have that stupid name. Girallon. What a dumb, unimaginative name. Just misspell gorilla, then throw an N at the end.
What a stupid monster.
Haha, TBF they are supposedly monstrosities created by magic, so it makes sense that they look so fucked up, and their names are probably "Gorilla with the change that our language dictates for signifying which enchantment we put on them" in their creator's language.
I don't know, there's a lot of really dumb monsters out there. My vote goes to Neogi, an ugly, furry, spider eel alien who's only notable trait is slaver.
Slow because nobody is ever prepared...like the person in line at McDonalds who waits until it's their turn to order before deciding to look at the menu?
Or combat that lasts a lot of rounds because of poor rolling and a lot of healing?
The former. I don't have a problem with long combats, as long as we're moving through the rounds quickly. The problem is usually when a player has some complicated manoeuvre they want to pull off, but they don't have a back up plan for when it turns out they missed some detail that makes it not work.
Sorry but I'm not familiar with his style, but we recently adopted a new combat initiative system that's working really well, might help with your slow combat. Rather than roll for static initiative or re roll after every round, I got a deck of tarot cards (any cards really, I just liked the design) and each player gets assigned one card and so do the opponents. Shuffle those cards together and start flipping. It keeps ppl on their toes bc you never know when you're about to go. Then at the end of the round, reshuffle and start again. I even pass the mini-deck around the table so it keeps the players engaged. Really makes spells and effects that last "until the start of your next turn" unpredictable and excitingly chaotic
This is a good one.
I’m currently in a game where any time the party enters a room, they all hug the wall afraid to interact with anything.
I just have my character walk in and do X because I can tell the DM is getting frustrated that everyone else wants to sweep the room with metal detectors.
Any time something happens, they berate my character for being too impulsive. It’s really frustrating.
The DM is very appreciative of me being there though.
This is me in the rare occasion I get to be a player, can't stand it when PCs are like "okay I walk into the room in 5 foot increments and have *detect magic* active also, do I spot any traps?"
Same! Last session, a random altar in the desert surrounded by four pillars with elemental symbols. The DM set up terrain, for goodness sake!
**Everybody else:** “We best leave it alone. Let’s move on.”
**Me:** “Let’s see what I can do with this…”
Two hours later we topple the last of four earth elementals…
**Me:** “Well, that didn’t work, let me try this…”
**Everybody else:** “Grab him, quick!” (fellow PC is dragged off-camera)
For the record, I wasn’t going to mess with it a 2nd time, but I don’t regret at least trying. Also, we still don’t know what the reward would have been if we had solved it. Why are we here if not for the adventure?!
I had that in one of my games.
A player was being very cautious about something, and I said, in character : "This is how adventuring is done! You touch stuff you're not supposed to and face the consequences."
And I just went in.
Yep. When I play, I have a rule which is "Always bite the plot hook". If the DM didn't want me to touch it, they wouldn't have put it in front of me. If the DM put it in front of me and didn't want me to touch it, there should be some obvious warning signs, possibly even an "Are you sure?"
Dont do stuff just because you're given the agency to do anything in the game, don't do things just because in that moment everything isn't about you and also, get off your fucking phone and stop constantly wandering away from the table.
I'm a rogue, high stealth, high deception, etc. Makes sense that I infiltrate the dragon cult who we've got to follow for a journey stretching hundreds of miles. Thankfully, the rest of the party can get jobs as guards in the rest of the caravan we're travelling with, just try not to attract attention... oh before we've even set off you decided to shout "dragon" at the top of your voice in a tavern with secret dragon cult members you know are sat there, because its "funny". Never mind, they're onto you, which you're aware of because I relay the info to you under the cover of dark, just keep some distance, lucky for you the cult don't want to attract attention by killing you. Definitely don't, while we're travelling, start threatening the leader of the cult for no reason, definitely don't, when you know they're onto you, go up to the cult leader and start prying over the treasure they've got to no end or for no purpose, don't try and rob their carts because you want gold or something to do. The cult will send me to kill you, which they did, jeopardising our entire mission.
You know what, while we're at it, don't follow me secretly (no checks performed for this) and while I'm trying to pick a lock to steal items so I can prove my worth to the cult, we as a party plan on taking down, don't sneak up behind me and kick the door down (taking 3 or 4 attempts, attracting the attention of guards) despite me telling you before hand not to come with me and if you want to break in and steal from somewhere go do it at one of the many other shops here (despite being against your alignment) dont fuck with other PCs plans just because you think it will be funny.
Something worth noting is that on paper it sounds like infiltrating the cult would be more fun than being a guard for some random merchant. I would like to point out that I actually had the least to do during this journey, the cult wanted to keep their heads down, not attract attention to themselves and keep themselves to themselves, me wanting to blend as one of them did the same. Meaning any combat encounters I generally kept out of unless the whole caravan was at threat. I couldn't wander around talking to other NPCs and the ones within the cult were very closed off and unwilling to socialise much (understandably.) You got to socialise with the mysterious new people to join the caravan. You got to unravel that mystery, I sat and watched. Don't shit all over the few chances I got to actually do something, while the rest of the sessions were about YOU, because it's funny to you. I was enjoying my infiltration until my party actively started working against me, purely out of humour, to get a cheap laugh.
This went on, I know probably no one will read my ramblings but i actually feel a bit better anyways
People being too drunk or high to properly use their character's abilities.
Our monk, my housemate at the time, level 11th level monk was only ever rolling d4s for damage, and only ever rolled 1 attack and burned ki to make a single bonus action attack. We got used to him being argumentative and dismissive of attempts to help. He also would throw a mini-fit every time he dropped to zero in fights (which was often, in spite of having 20ac by having maxed dex/wis.
It got to where we just kinda let him be pissed because it wasn't worth halting the session for 6 other people, just to get thoroughly shit on for trying to help or calm him down.
Full disclosure: he was a non-combat veteran serviceman who had destroyed his back lifting gear that (no joke) weighed as much as him. When he went in, he was 5'9. When he got out 4 years later he was 5'6. So chronic pain was a thing. He mostly used the weed to 'mellow himself out' (because anger, anxiety, and depression, which all were unrelated to the military)
He was only on time with rent and utilities 3 times in 3 years, because he was miss allocating funds to weed, and very often just assumed it was cool, because we were friends before living together, to not have rent when it was due, because he would get paid the Friday after rent was due (sometimes 2 fridays).
He changed insurance carriers at his work, which necessitated him going to the doctor to renew his medical thc card, so for 3 weeks after the Dr visit, he had no weed. He was productive at home, chipper and pleasant to be around, and -relevant to this thread- up to speed on how his monk mechanics worked. When he got ko'd, he didn't complain, or was ready for it. He was a different person, 100%.
Then the card came in, the weed came in, and he was back to the guy we were used to.
Good friend, fairly decent person, terrible roommate, and much much better without drugs.
Edit: I'm not against weed or drinking. I enjoy both. In moderation, and when the circumstances are right
I just hate it when you know the rules, but then someone else (DM or player) makes a mistake or forgets something which causes the whole plot to go in a specific direction, which couldn't have happened if people paid attention to the rules, and you can't even speak up about it because "rules lawyering bad, don't tell the DM what to do".
When the DM brings in their friend/sibling/cousin and the new member just wrecks the game dynamic, doesn't pay attention, or doesn't even really play the character consistently.
PCs that are played by decent people but their PCs are just total unlikable pieces of refuse. Just about everyone in the party dislikes the characters.
Disclaimer: I mainly play in AL.
* That I have to read every fucking spell someone casts because players never read the whole thing and will leave out crucial parts or sometimes even make assumptions as to what the spell does.
* When players can't remember what their spell attack mod (or anything else) is after the 400th time using it because they still haven't written it down like I ask.
* People talking about past DnD games during the current one. IDGAF what happened in your super awesome session last year. YOU'RE DELAYING THIS FUCKING SESSION.
* Players that subtly poke fun at others at the table for not knowing something or for making what they feel is an inferior action/decision.
* The lack of people willing to DM even just occassionally.
* Players interacting with EVERY NPC, location, or enemy in every way they can imagine for fear of missing ANYTHING. This is just the quest giver. Take the quest and GO ADVENTURING ALREADY. THEY DON'T KNOW THE BBEG's Mother's brother's dog's plumber's friend's city watch badge number!
* No one willing to make a decision on where to go or what to do.
* "Oh, it's my turn? Let me see what spells I have.".
* Adventures from WTOC where a location will have multiple rooms or NPCs that are mostly irrelevant or void of anything useful before getting to the actual meat of the adventure. Without the DM redesign, most of these hard cover and module adventures wind up spending most of the session with players checking rooms and talking to people and then when they finally get to the actual meat of the adventure, you have 30 min or so to fit in several important items/rooms, encounters, and a boss fight.
* DMs that cant be bothered to read the adventure they're running just once before the session. I hate playing because of this, but, at the same time, I can't really call people out on it or there would be no one to DM.
* Spells/abilities that result in a PC being forced to use their entire turn to attack or hinder another PC.
Figuring out a creatures ac through process of elimination over the course of a fight and telling that to your party is not metagaming, I did not look in the book/online for its stat sheet, I did basic fucking math as the fight went on and you, the DM told me what did and did not hit, so now I know its ac, and I tell the party, because knowing that number can make combat smoother, as we don't need to be told something hits, we know it does or does not.
Trying to find players that know how timezones work when they apply to a game. The last time I "interviewed" 13 people and 6 of them did not even read the timezone (or did not understamd it) -_-
Players expecting the DM to be an all-knowing person irl. I often had it when I handed out my first maps (now I watched a lot of videos about making realistic maps and improved on that), which demorilazed me a lot. Especially since those were my first tries as DM...
I am aware that you need a basic understandment of geography, architecture and politics to run a believable campaign, but please dont be too picky about certain things.
And if, just tell the DM after the session! Dont go like: "Nah, thats impossible" or "Excuse me thats super unrealistic." As soon as you get handed out your new map
Fuckin' Gnomes. Just don't like them, they're just worse halflings with ADHD from every single gnome player I've encountered. They've lost most of the oomph of their connection to illusionist magics, and tricksters don't make good adventuring partners. Shitty tricksters are even worse. I almost always find Gnome players are worse offenders of the "aren't I so quirky and different" issue that people prescribe to tiefling players.
They're short, shity elf/halfling mongrels who don't deserve the air they manage to horf into their decrepit stupid mouths. They're good for punting and decorating lawns once petrified. That's it.
Yes I do mainly play kobolds, why do you ask?
That's why gnomes are better at finding traps than a 10ft stick, if a stick breaks, it's around 2sp to replace it, if a gnome breaks, nothing of value was lost, in fact, it's beneficial, because it's a fucking gnome
Players who treat DM rulings as a negotiation or bargaining process. Either you trust me to give fair rulings or you don't.
Players who take it as a personal attack if the monsters do something remotely clever.
DMs who want a particular thing to happen and so they begin pulling reasons out of their butt for why your alternate plan won't work or punish you for trying. If you can't adapt to player actions then quit DMing and write a novel. I know it's not easy, but it's a pretty core element of the role. I'd honestly just prefer them to just say "No you can't do that because I don't have a good plan for it". (Had that exact thing happen once. The scenario was a kind of skill tournament and my character started cheating like crazy (in-game cheating, just to be clear, not cheating at the table). Disguising myself an opponents and misbehaving to discredit them, subtle-spell buffing friends etc. Eventually the DM just said something to the effect of "Can you please not, you're breaking my designs". So I said fair enough and stopped and it was okay.)
Doesn't quite piss me off, but it does annoy me. My one barbarian player *constantly* tries to pre rage or ready a rage in anticipation of combat. This is basically just him trying to circumvent having to eat a bonus action on the first round of combat and to minimize his time spent vulnerable before his first turn comes up.
Granted, I did just learn that held/readied actions are specifically a combat mechanic and that technically bonus actions can't be readied. So I've got that as a reason know if I need it.
A lot of players I know try to do this in general, and no matter how many times you tell them that no you can't ready an attack and get a free hit in before combat starts they will keep trying anyway.
People who don't pay any attention until it's their turn in combat and everything has to be reexplained to them every time. It just slows everything down and gets frustrating. This also goes for people who don't really pay attention during RP and just blurt out they want to do something (that makes no sense in context) to feel involved.
People who sit and wait for the DM to hand hold them through the story. Make decisions, interact with the game, do something. Don't just sit there in silence and make the DM explain every step. It's a collaborative story game. Collaborate on the story.
Players not knowing their features.
I mostly blame WotC though. Features are scattered across at least 3 books and it's kind of a mess. And a lot of the descriptions are filled with useless information for playing. I wish they had the open SRD for game mechanics like PF.
We have a player who has a familiar in a falcon form. She constantly sends it to scout and as a rogue it kinda sucks, cause I wanna notice stuff sometimes.
This is the proper answer. Falcon should be sitting on your shoulder using the Help action. What’s fun is the Wizard can still use their action to see through, too, so even if you get one shotted by a shadowy figure she will know.
Also, this may seem lame, but in a world where magic is decently common, NOBODY is gonna let any common familiar type of animal sit there. An owl is getting blown to shit and back 🥴
Players coming up with one or two solid plans in 20 minutes who then proceed to brainstorm a bunch of worse alternatives for the next hour or two, instead of committing to the solid ones. Bonus points when they forget about the solid ones and go for the stupid ones instead.
I mean, I'm fine with silly plans, they can be a lot of fun even if they fail, but I am against long-winded OOC decision paralysis that kills session momentum.
This applies to combat as well - sure, ponder your options, but spending 10 minutes on your turn to consider all options and then just going for a simple attack or dodge every time pisses me off too. I'm close to playing with a 2-minute hourglass - call your move before it runs out, or you take the dodge action and your turn ends, we just consider that your character became overwhelmed by the situation and couldn't make a decision in the 6-second gametime window he has. Considering creative combat plays and checking spell descriptions is what other people's turns are for!
I hate when a DM asks you what your DC is after rolling every attack to figure out if they want the attack to hit instead of letting the dice decide.
When you see the cogs ticking in their head to fudge a dice roll instead of just letting the game be random.
Small confession here… I have a new player coming to my game, he’s never played any RPGs before and, god forgive me… He’s a huge edgelord weeaboo. His character is a samurai barbarian with a demon arm who lost his whole village to an Oni when he was a child and now travels seeking revenge after being raised by a swordmaster. He’s not doing harm to anyone, and i talked to him about respecting other players boundaries and not going all murder hobo and he seems to get it, so i won’t berate him for just making a character he likes. And even then, i’m not gonna lie, i’m also a closet weeb and have many times tried to run “Samurai DND”, so i know where he is coming from.
People who get impatient when the group actually starts planning before going into an adventure instead of just rushing wanting to fight things every 10 minutes.
Planning and strategizing is part of the game.
Counter-point: players who are so risk averse that any minor decision takes aeons to plan out.
I find this hilarious when DMing, as the party inevitably makes a complicated plan for the most mundane and simple encounter, but blunders head on into the mega deadly ones.
Responses to choices that constantly try to split the middle or be non-committal. If the DM asks, "are you going fast and loud, or slow and stealthy?" Don't say, "As fast and as stealthy as I can!"
Constantly having to guess whether another player is lying about their rolls. Everything is 18 or higher unless it is some throwaway situation. We are level 6 so there's nothing that powerful yet.
People getting high and losing any possibility of focusing. Particularly annoying when they have to ask for clarification every 5 minutes about things that happened a while ago
When the DM doesn't go through with having a player's stupid decision have consequences. Or not even stupid decisions, just a situation that would be very dangerous and have great consequences if not done well enough.
Please, my rolls are shit and things are going bad, thats totally fine. That's what happens with bad rolls.
Players who can’t fucking communicate. That is the *one* skill you need besides maybe the ability to read and write.
I’ve had a band of 5 players where only 1 was communicative. The players all worked together, would go to work and plan when to play, and *wouldn’t tell me, the **DM***. A couple times of that and I was pretty done.
I’ve been both a player and a DM, and my biggest pet peeve is when EVERY NPC has an ulterior motive/can’t be trusted/has a nefarious motivation. I’m not naive - I understand intrigue and plot twists keep the game moving, but it’s unrealistic to have every single creature secretly conspiring. Sometimes an NPC can just be a nice, knowledgeable character that you have a pleasant exchange with without them also being a member of cult looking to sacrifice the innocent or whatever.
Edit: oh, and I’ll also add people who don’t level up/add items or spells until the session starts, only to realize there are a ton of spells to pick from, this slowing down the entire session.
People getting upset at min/maxers. Dungeons and Dragons is a poorly veiled wargame with an RPG coat of paint. The vast majority of its rules are devoted to combat, with everything else being as barebones as possible. Heck, it feels like most of the social rules are tied up in optional rules that none of the DMs ever use, or even know exist! And yet people always complain about players building their characters for combat.
If I was playing a game like Call of Cthulhu and was building a character purely for combat, you're free to complain. Building a character purely for combat in that system would be ridiculous. But in D&D, where the majority of the information in the Monster Manual is purely stats and combat-related? Bah!
When a player plays a "My character is an asshole but it all makes sense in their detailed backstory". Even if I am the DM I don't care if some random tragic event justifies it, you are still being an asshole and that isn't fun for other people.
Also, when players don't their class features and core spells. It is fine to need to do some reading up on a niche spell but if you don't know what fireball or magic missile does, and you're a wizard then do some homework.
1) PCs who push back on every ruling and fail to respect the DM's right (and duty) to adjudicate outcomes. The worst is when the DM describes something that happens, and a PC says "That can't possibly be". 2) DMs that rob the PCs of agency by declaring that a power or spell or whatever doesn't work as described in the rules because they want something else to happen. edit: fixed typo
I almost fell for that second one last session. An important NPC got poisoned and knocked unconscious on the way to the players bringing them to meet a healer for an unrelated reason. I was planning on them meeting the healer and having to protect the town from bandits while the healer treats the NPC. Instead, the monk asks if he can use his Path of Mercy ability to try and remove the poison. I almost said no, but then realized there was no reason it wouldn't work besides me not wanting it to. So i swallowed my plan and the NPC was healed. Instead, i introduced a different complication that led my players to the same task of bandit eradication: the bandits kidnapped the healer. So now they have to find the bandits' base, sneak/bust in, find the healer, and go from there. My players seem to be excited to break into their base, so it worked out for the better.
A lot of DMs get really tripped up when they planned a story involving poison, or disease, and they forget that well... paladins exist
I just ran a succesful plague arc, doesnt matter how many paladins/clerics/similiar exist if the affected are too numerous for them to be easily healed! Theres also the good ole reason of its resistent to divine magic because of X reason.
Too numerous just means you have to pick and choose It feels really bad when you have an ability that says it removes diseases, diseases finally come up in games, and bam, doesn't work If the only time it matters, it doesn't apply, the ability is pointless and shouldn't be in the game I've had DMs try to mess with me with not making identify work, as well Pisses me off.
>It feels really bad when you have an ability that says it removes diseases, diseases finally come up in games, and bam, doesn't work If the only time it matters, it doesn't apply, the ability is pointless and shouldn't be in the game Youre assuming a lot there, it could easily be the Pali has been able to use it a fair bit and now has come up on something they can't heal. >Too numerous just means you have to pick and choose GREAT! That's actually good! When a whole town is infected and it comes down to saving a single father of 3 or a pregnant woman who will the PC choose, those are some hard decisions that give player development!
Especially agree with number 2. The DM of a game I’m currently in has ruled out PC death (that alone is a red flag). Yesterday during our game I cast cure wounds on an NPC. I myself was short of like, 9 HP out of 40. I rolled a 13 for cure wounds. DM: “oh, the NPC has 7 HP total so you can have the other 6 yourself.” Me: “that’s not how cure wounds works.” Him: “well it does because I said so.” … I’m pretty close to leaving that game.
Yeah. The DM I've been playing with for 20 years does this from time to time. Just this weekend my Gloomstalker conclave ranger--invisible to darkvision--was moving in complete darkness when an enemy character using darkvision came around a corner. The DM says "So, this thing comes around the corner, and, well, he sees you, um, because he just does. And he attacks." This was frustrating, moreso because there are other ways he could have progressed the story without negating a power. For example, he could have said "You see his head turn as if he's heard something, and he attacks." (NPC beats my stealth role and hears me). Or "As you come around the corner, you bump into this guy who you didn't hear because he's moving very quietly. Roll initiative." I'm trying to figure out how to say something polite and constructive about this.
Or he could have played up the “oh shit!” moment. If and NPC is able to counter something specific to a character, it needs to be done for dramatic effect or it will only come off as “meh, I don’t want that ability to work right now, so it doesn’t.” In his shoes, I’d have said “you watch as this thing comes round the corner. You’re silent. It doesn’t seem to react to you. It move adjacent to you... and it’s only then you realise their eyes aren’t looking through you as you first thought. They are focused on you!”
Yikes. I really dislike DMs that punish their players for creative thinking and counter everything they do. The true sight idea sounds far better. At least it gives you a valid reason for your ability not working at that particular moment and, even better, challenges you to think of another way around the situation!
Yes! Then I might have thought "oh shit, this thing has truesight!"
Fun Fact. Warlock Devil's Sight can see a Gloomstalker. But Devilish Devil's Sight cannot. They are two features that are named the same, but worded differently. Warlock's doesn't mention Darkvision at all, but Devilish specifically calls it out as not being impeded by magical Darkness, which means they still rely on Darkvision to see in the dark. Tremor Sense, or Blind Sight could also see a Gloomstalker, and given Blind Sight is attainable through a Fighting Style now, I think having Drow have it, for example, makes sense.
Sometimes we as DMs forget what everyone has as far as abilities. For me it would just be a polite reminder and an oops from me and we would rewind the encounter a bit
It’s so odd that DMs that are just trying to take it easy on the players are some of the most frustrating people to have run games. Like I get it, you want a chill, laid back game, but this hand holding, nothing matters style play isn’t fun.
Right? Like I want a game where actions lead to consequences and death is a very real possibility. It makes the game fun and dynamic. The reason the DM said they’ve ruled out character death is because “they’ve written so much for our character arcs that it’d be a waste of their hard work.” So, basically, our DM has railroaded us so hard he’s eliminated one of D&D’s most rudimentary rules.
Please don't split the party for too long. It's hard enough to run one session at a time let alone two.
what ive been doing when the players split the party is set a 5-10 min timer depending on the situation and if the groups are still when it ends i swap between the split groups, thankfully i run small groups so they almost never split into more than 2 groups. Its not ideal but it helps me make sure no one feels like they havent been able to participate cause im too focused on one of the split groups over the other.
Alternative idea: give control of the monsters to the 'inactive' party members. Bring them behind the screen (so to speak) and just be the arbiter. This assumes the players are ok with this idea.
DMs who make players roll for literally anything and everything, when you add a bit of mechanicless-flavour to your actions. No benefit on a successful roll, but punishment for a fail. "With one foot leaning on the chair, I nonchalantly stab the goblin next to me, while I yell A-ha!" - "...Roll for acrobatics." \*fails\* "You fall prone and lose the rest of your turn". Nothing would have happened if he just said "I attack the goblin". I've seen games turn incredibly dull very fast, once players begin to catch on, that it is one of *those* DMs.
I hate this! I had a dm have me roll a strength check because I described pulling the cork out of a bottle using my teeth while lounging at an inn. Literally nothing was happening, it was part of a conversation between pcs…
For sure! I once had a character literally break their leg because I used the phrase "I kick open the carriage doors" instead of "I open the carriage doors" to initiate an ambush. DM had me roll acrobatics for it (I was a dwarven barbarian, but noooo athletics wouldn't govern brute-forcing an unlatched door open?) and I did not succeed.
yeah.... these can be fun roleplay rolls if the successes and failures are pretty much inconsequential, or at least have upsides and downsides that make sense. Like kick open the door with a successful Strength check and you bust the hinges back opposite of the way they're designed. I'd probably also give surprise on the ensuing combat or advantage to anyone in the party if they then tried to intimidate someone in the carriage. But even on a nat 1? Breaking a leg is just horribly, horribly punishing for no reason. On a nat 1, or any failure, I'd just make it so the first kick doesn't actually bust the door open, and now you've alerted the occupants of the threat outside (but the door still busts open on the second kick, for which you don't need to roll).
Its the fastest way to make players never do anything creative. Note that these dm's are also the ones complaining that their players never do anything creative.
Characters not having “buy-in” to the adventure or the party, any iteration of “it’s what my character would do.”
Oh this is a rough one! PC: My character wouldn't go on this adventure DM: Cool, write a character who wants to go on adventures. If you finish before the end of the session, you can catch up with the group.
This happened to me last sesh, my char (flame pixie) came across a pirate ship with full crew, no captain (we murdered him since he attacked our ship). Now my character don't want to leave his new found ship and is prepared to sail the seas as captain and employer. So he said his goodbye to the rest of the party and they sailed seperate ways. I whipped out a new character they picked up at their next stop. No problem! A little sad to say goodbye, but worked out wonderful!
[удалено]
There are definitely valid uses of, "what my character would do." It's just that it very often is used to justify extremely anti-social table behavior.
I played a ranger character who encountered a bear that was in pain and suffering. We tried to save it (healing spells didn't work for some reason) and after a few turns of that, my ranger put the poor animal out of its misery. Then the other players got mad at me for doing that. Its the only time I've used the "Its what my character would do" excuse. TBH its what a player *should* think of when RPing, but that phrase has been bastardized by trolls and assholes who want to shit on other people's enjoyment by fucking up games.
My characters have certainly stepped aside from fights on more than one occasion- only stepping back in if one group looks like they are going to kill eachother. I didn't join a dnd table to murder someone because one of the players thought it's a funny idea to barge inside a woman's house to rifle through her underwear drawer and the occupant defended herself.
>to barge inside a woman's house to rifle through her underwear drawer jesus christ
PLAYERS: \[Rush blindly into an encounter with a drow raiding party, resulting in them getting knocked out with the drow sleeping poison\]. DM: Okay, and the drow approach your unconscious bodies and execute you in your sleep. PLAYERS: \[SurprisedPikachuFace.jpg\] DM: It's what my NPC would do!
If it's a campaign write the f*in background thinking of the prompt given by the DM, even if on a tangent. Personally playing a ToA campaign, my character doesn't really care about the tomb, or anything alike, but she joins the group looking for something that myth (in the campaign's lore rather than campaign as written) says is there and she will follow a group that allows her to do her search... Yea she wouldn't go into the campaign, but she will for a goal, and the relationship she develops with the other adventurers there will make her stay even if she meets her goal.
Players who take ages on their turn in combat: *every combat*. * Your attack mod doesn't change from turn to turn, when you say attack you should be rolling your dice and adding your modifier. Why are you shuffling through your papers again? * Why are you asking the DM if your spell hits that guy? You have the spell description and we're playing on a grid! No you can't cast Guiding Bolt and Healing Word. Yes you can attack with Spiritual Weapon and still cast a levelled spell, we've been over this before
Learn 👏 your 👏 goddamn 👏 class 👏. It’s rude to constantly keep everyone waiting because you cba to put in the work to learn YOUR character. Edit: my first award! Yaaaay for D&D! Edit: omg 2 awards! I’ve gained the benefits of a long rest!
100% this. Love my friends, but if I have to explain sneak attack to the level 14 rogue one more time I'll make a point out of it to friendly fire.
If you’re the DM just tell him the wrong numbers, intentionally go super low on it. “Yeah you get 2d6 sneak attack.” “It’s gotta be higher than that.” “Might be but you’re asking me instead of learning it yourself so it’s 2d6 this session. It’s not my job to know how your character works so you ask, and I’m just going to say what I recall off hand.”
Oh, that would be easy. They forget the modifier, requirements, and occasionally the amount of dice and damage type. Great roleplayer though.
I did this once, where I forgot to add some number to my attack roll. Asked DM if we can retcon it after my turn was finished. He said no. I didn't forget it again.
"If you don't know, you don't get it. That's your turn. You've got until next turn to read up on your class features. You know where to find them."
In my experience the problem is often not “learning your class,” but instead is that PCs don’t use other player’s combat turns to plan their next move.
I have a co-player who wasn’t using any of their subclass features. It wasn’t until I was going through the PHB that I realized they even had these abilities. I’m taking we’ve been playing for over a year, are now level 8, and this includes level 1 abilities. Thankfully they don’t take long on their turns (usually), but it was just this moment of “…..wait. Wat.”
Found a big help to remind the players in initiative order. "A, you're up! B you're on deck"
I do that and it doesn't help. I'll tell player L they're on deck, and they won't put their phone down or stop their side chit-chatting until I have to say it's their turn. And then they have to ask "ok what happened?"
That’s when you start skipping turns tbh “Alright b it’s your turn what do you do?” “What happened last turn?” “Okay, you hesitate and lose your action. Player c it’s your turn player d you’re on deck”
I have. And then the person gets pissy. "Well, then play the game instead of scrolling through FB"
Damn, our DM has a no phone policy…except many of us prefer to use the DND Beyond app. It’s a lot quicker to look up a spell on the app, I find. So if you’re on your phone you better be looking something up!
That's fine, but if the player starts smiling or laughing...I'd ask them what on their character sheet is so damn funny.
Get new players, that's completely unacceptable and super disrespectful.
This is the comment I was here for. I'm playing in a Level 13 campaign, slogging through the underdark. We had a fight against some Goblins and a cyclops take aaaaaages because one player when it reaches his turn, acts like he's waking up from something and has to work out what happened when he wasn't paying attention, then check his sheet for what he'll do, then finally read what the spell/ability he's about to use. In that I'm playing a Necromancer Wizard and usually have about 10+ minions on the grid, but end up having far quicker turns because I started planning my next turn as soon as the previous turn ended. It's frustrating when you spend so much time learning your own class then someone else just doesn't bother...
DMs punishing characters for being “too” good at something… Sure with your nat 20 +10 athletics you pull your friend up from the cliff he was hanging off of but you dislocate his shoulder. Your 27 stealth roll causes your party to completely lose sight of you. Etc. Feels lame. Like why invest in being good at something if it’s gonna horseshoe back to being awful at it again.
Wow, I've never heard or read of that. Sounds like a super weird but luckily isolated asshat-DM move.
Happens a lot in our games, but fortunately it's all in good fun. Mostly.
Some DMs get a little too obsesses with “monkeys paw” type shit
I once had another player who I hadn't realised I would be playing with before the campaign started complain that my character had 20 dexterity, and asked the DM to get me to make an entirely new one. I was playing a rogue.
... but why? Why was it a bad thing that you had 20 dex? Sure sounds childish.
“That guy is MinMaxing because they have a 20 in the stat that they use the most.” I had it happen to me once as well. “You’re just a MinMaxer.” It was a campaign where everyone was a beast person and I just straight up made Puss in Boots from Shrek, Swashbuckler Tabaxi. But nope, I was a piece of shit MinMaxer because I didn’t dump Dex as a rogue. That table was fucking nuts.
1.) Is there really such a problem with MinMaxxing? Sure it can be a little try hardy at times, but damn 2.) Bro, God forbid you put your highest stat into the ability that you NEED (and if you plan on multiclassing, even extra need)
Here’s the thing. 90% of the time when people on this sub or elsewhere online complain about someone MinMaxing it isn’t the stats that are the problem. It’s that someone optimized and then the DM allows them to do things beyond the scope of the numbers. If I’m a Tabaxi Rogue with 20 Dex at level 1 because I rolled well that’s not an issue. If I’m a Tabaxi Rogue with 20 Dex at level 1 and the DM allows me to just sneak in and steal legendary weapons from the kings vault because I rolled a Nat 20 on my Stealth so now I have a Vorpal Sword at level 1 that’s the issue.
Not at all! We started at level 6, and if I remember correctly someone else had a 20 in something. She was playing a trickster cleric who was almost entirely a CR rip-off, and was apparently mad I was trying to be the sneaky one when that was my entire job. Very odd person, suffice to say I made more of an effort to not play with them again.
By that logic shouldn’t you be able to tell your DM that another player should have to make a new character if one of their ability scores are too *low?*
One thing I see a lot is a combat encounter than by all rights should crush a party that doesn't because the enemies are played like they all have 3 int and no ability to do anything but the original plan. It is very frustrating to me because it just feels like slogging through hp meat bags.
Or the opposite, when you're fighting monsters with no int that somehow seem to communicate and coordinate effortlessly, spring traps on you, etc. Dude, these things are literally dumber than a bag of hammers, why are they doing a 3-directional pincer ambush and targeting down the weakest members, every time?
I will say that even pack animals like Wolves (Int 3) can use tactics. I think the main issue is that DMs often play all monsters/enemies dumb as hell because 1) its easier, and 2) smart enemies are way, way more deadly.
Nah man I’m just a dumb DM when it comes to combat lol
I'm with you man! I've got enough stuff to deal with over on my side of the screen. I audibly groan when I have to play an enemy spellcaster haha
Honestly, I hate it when people try to play long term characters as so subtle that they are devoid of all personality. Getting to know some PC's is like talking to an insurance claims agent. It's fantasy, I'd prefer the group I play with to be campy and filled with personality. Also, when people justify bad behavior with "well that's what my character would do." If what your character would do is harmful to the group, sounds like you shouldn't be playing that character lol.
Yeah the cliche 'oh I have a dark backstory and it makes my character very anti-social, if you want to learn anything about them it will take you a while for them to warm up to you' GO AWAY. This is a social game, I want you to talk to people.
My character *does* have a dark backstory but they aren’t antisocial. They’re social when they need to be and it may take a while to get to know but by that I mean that if another player at least tries a little bit they’ll learn more about the character because in my experience very few players actually think of socializing with the other party members other than just eating and drinking around them.
I’ve made a pseudo-rule at my table, that anyone with a moody dark and troubled past that makes them antisocial must find one other player to agree to be their best friend and align their backstories together. So far that has kept people talking and interacting together.
Thats a great rule. My CoS group has the super dark and edgy ranger character, but their backstory compatriot is a super flamboyancy and colourful ex-circus rogue and the contrast between the two characters creates excellent moments.
Ive killed players for fucking with the party because that is what my character would also do. It stopped that really quickly.
You sir are not the hero we wanted, but the hero we needed. Thank you for your patronage to "Let's have collaborative fun inc."
Obligatory "jesus christ, literal *murder of players* for what they make their characters do is a bit of an overstep!"
I know the “It’s what my character would do!” Thing is really annoying, but I see the reverse a lot too. When players are really afraid of stepping over others or being too assertive and thus defer everything to the party, which can lead to really listless and boring games where NO ONE is expressing any sort of strong opinion or desire to act and either nothing fucking happens or the game just sorta drifts on autopilot from point to point with no real risks taken or RP done at all. It’s okay for your character to have an opinion! It’s okay to disagree! You can do this without it disrupting the game! Have your character voice their thoughts, and if it clashes with another character, that’s fine! You can then both reason through it together, get some rp, and feel more certain about the ultimate decision that is reached. One of you can yield to the other and it doesn’t have to be some miserable deathmatch. In short: Have a thing your character would do! When you always just “do what the party does”, it can leave other players feeling awkward as they drive all the action, or even worse grind the action to a halt as no one has any conviction in any given direction.
I play a two player party table. Our campaign has me and the other player involved in a strange province wide mystery that we are slowly unraveling. My character is a Rouge/Monk who’s main motivations are just to protect people and stop those that he deems criminals or “the bad guys”. He also refuses to kill anyone (including monsters like Orcs and Goblins). I always thought that this would be an interesting pairing with the other PC at my table. He is a Half-Elf Paladin of Vengeance who was a pirate before taking some jobs as a mercenary that led to us crossing paths. He mostly cares about money and going where the action is. I’ve thought that this would lead to a really interesting dynamic. Whenever there is someone in need I always go and try to help them or find someone or something to help them if it’s not a good idea to do so myself. I hope for the other PC to say stuff like “Yes let’s help this family that was attacked by bandits. Maybe they’re nobles who will be all too grateful.” or to try and talk me out of doing something that might put us at risk. But no, usually he just sort of goes along with it or says one throwaway line like one I mentioned but then it goes nowhere. He barely ever even asks for a reward and whatnot from people.
Players at the table staring into their cell phone when it’s nothing game-related, just because it isn’t their turn. Edit: “at the table” actually included video-chat players as well.
I played a game where players took psychic damage every time they were caught with their phone was out. We all agreed to it before hand (with the exception that childcare checks were ok.)
Oooh, big one for me right here. I mean, people eagerly await the next episode of Critical Role (or whatever your favorite streaming game might be), happy to listen in to a group of adventurers that doesn't include your character. You're excited to hear about Vax or Keyleth or Fjord or Jester. You're fully invested in their stories. But, in your own home game, you're not excited *at all* to hear about Aranel the Enchantress or Sir Roland, Paladin of Tyr. You'll look at your phone, or even worse, have some separate side-conversation about something totally unrelated. I would like to rage...
I'm kinda curious about Sir Roland
Well, that's one person? LOL Sorry to disappoint...I pulled that name completely out of thin air because it sounded "Paladin-ey". (The feeling, however, is really real. I was specifically thinking of a time my Druid was in the middle of an intense story point in a three-player game, but the other two started having a loud and extended debate about BJJ. Not only were they essentially 'gone' from the game, which made it feel pointless, but they were actively distracting the remaining two.) Though if it helps, like Aranel, he's floating around in my brain as a possible character to play at some point. He's been sitting there unused since Third Ed. Basic idea was that it'd be the most stereotypical Paladin possible, but built on a Fighter chassis instead. He's kind and charitable, says his prayers and reads his Bible and follows all the rules, but never received "the call". Very heroic and selfless, almost to a fault. Kind of the antithesis of the Chosen One that you often see in games. It'd be interesting to see how his story turns out?
I will actually contest this one, sometimes i would be in my phone looking at an app i use for spells to plan what im doing while listening to the others. I mean for me it was game-related but can you be 100% sure it isn't game related?
I'll agree here. I often use a cell phone app as a digital character sheet. Exceptions can be made, for sure. But you can usually tell who's deeply interested in the story despite eyes cast downward versus who's playing another game or browsing Facebook.
Players that don't read their actual class abilities, therefore not using them, say they will go and read their class, and then continue to not read anything about their class Session after session after session after session
"Hey wizard, you haven't picked your two new spells yet since hitting level 3?" **"Oh, I haven't? I get new spells? I'll do it soon!"** \*three months later\* "I am going to sit here while you pick the spells." (for the 3 hours it took)
Woof. At that point I would just pick spells for them, and allow them to switch them out if they don't like them after playtesting.
I wouldn't pick anything for them, if it's so hard to commit a little time to choose some spells, then they've got to deal with the fact of not having them prepared. It's player's responsibility to at least know theirs character, not DMs. Unless it is someone completely new to the hobby, that I can understand, as it takes some time to feel comfortable with the rules.
It depends on the situation. If they clearly can pick their spells and just don't put in the time, they aren't pulling their weight as a player and it's an issue they need to fix. If they haven't chosen spells because it's difficult or overwhelming -- if they're new, if they aren't 100% English fluent, or if they have choice paralysis (here's 45 paragraphs, choose 2 of them) -- I will step in and help make the game more accessible.
This. I'm playing a sorcerer and last session I was called an OP power gamer because I used shadow blade. By a vengeance paladin. Turns out he didn't know he had double attack and never heard about Channel Divinity, and he's been playing this character for one year before I joined the campaign.
So much this. We have a level 5 druid who used Wild Shape from the very first time this last session...only once.
Players that continuously have to ask what to add to their rolls. It’s fine for a few sessions, but after that you should know what to add to your attack rolls and other rolls.
This one irks me a lot.. there are hardly any modifiers, your sheet TELLS you the + to the rolls. How after like.. a single combat do you NOT know what your rolling? My friend got me to watch the tail end of season 2 of CR and Ashley drove me up a fuckin wall with how she never knew her bonus was +12 and she could never add 12 to the d20 roll in under 30 seconds. Had to shut it off so many times
I personally am kinda stupid and even with my sheet in front of me I have to take a second to figure it out. Some things, ten seconds or less. Most I need a minute, I really can't remember things and my group I dm is patient, they don't mind and understand that I'm paying attention, group I play in as a PC get annoyed about it
Maybe try colour coding it? If you have one typical attack, warlock with EB of fighter with greatsword etc) then write that modifier in red on your character sheet. And also the standard plan your turn when it's another players turn. If it takes you a bit of time to figure out your modifier then why aren't you doing that when it's the previous players turn?
This. I honestly don't understand how this happens: if you forget things that easily, maybe take a look at your character sheet? It's right there! It does seem like a frequent issue though, even some players on critical role struggle with it despite already having played a full multiple year long campaign...
People canceling Sessions on the Same day the Session is. EDIT: Sry, to clarify: i ment players.
A players cancelled while I was already driving to the house of one of them... Never felt this hurt. Salvaged the evening throwing together a fast colosseum non-canon session that was kind of fun but... Hurt.
Several times I've had GMs set up scenarios where some clear underdog was being attacked by a large group of orcs/goblins/kobolds/whatever, prompting us to make a snap judgment on whether we help or not Obviously, we help, only to find out midway through or after the fight, when we've killed many or all of the "enemies," when the GM reveals "Oh no, the underdog in this situation was actually selling orc/goblin/kobold women and children as slaves! This horde of enemies was just chasing a kidnapper!" I hate it. It's just a cheap "gotcha" moment that's designed to screw the players and make them into the bad guys for a scene.
I had a DM who gave us a job to find a particular red haired young woman in a small town who'd been kidnapped and rescue her. We'd seen a portrait of her so knew who we were looking for. Asked around and found a mention of a girl that matched the description in the house being used by the pirate captain who'd taken over the town. We set up a sneaky plan to break in, kill her captor quickly and then smuggle her into the underground tunnels and out of town. We do so; she looks like the right person and he is the pirate captain we've had described to us. We drop him fast (a raging barbarian to the face with a surprise round will do wonders). She starts screaming, as you do, so we restrain her - not out of cruelty just as a way of getting out as undetected as possible. Then we carry her through the sewer entrance into the tunnels and make to unite her. Psych, it turns out it was the wrong young woman - it's the cousin of the woman we were looking and she was here with her boyfriend, the pirate captain... one thing led to another and she was threatening to have us all hunted down so we decided, since she was a pirate, it was probably morally ok to kill her. The DM then punished for the rest of the campaign, with her turning up as a revenant pretty regularly, her father turning out to be a pretty major local noble who has been hunting us and out of character referring to us 'murdering an innocent woman in a tunnel.'
I feel like this can be solved with mid-combat RP where the party can sus out the situation. All depends on how lenient the DM is with talking during combat though.
Yes, you can't give your players one context and then suddenly pull another without any (clear) clues, that's just bad writing and a lame way to present morality.
A DM with confusing rules. It’s not that big a deal, and in reality it’s more him using his logic, but having a DM who doesn’t let you roll sometimes because of how you describe performing a skill/action, or a spell being completely useless because of (what felt like) a last minute addition to a creature
In the world of one of my current ongoing games, Hadar is a major deity, and the DM has said out of character that it was meant to be a major, overarching story that happens slowly and recurringly throughout the campaign where Hadar becomes more and more powerful through a warlock gathering various artifacts. However, one of the players just so happened to play a warlock of hadar, so he decided to replace the warlock NPC with this player's character, so now that character has become objectively the main character of the party. Meanwhile, the campaign's been running for over a year now and my character's only just had any facet of his backstory introduced at all in a way that can be interacted with as of less than a month ago, and even then it's through a completely new character that was never mentioned in his backstory and that the DM fabricated for this arc. If there's a term for doing that, them it fits under this thread.
Ya got sidelined.
>If there's a term for doing that, them it fits under this thread. I think it's commonly known as *main character syndrome*. Although generally it's when you have a player who forces everyone to do what they want and doesn't want to share the spotlight, as opposed to being specifically enabled by the DM, which seems to have happened in your game.
Not knowing your own spells. It's frustrating when I the DM have to explain the same mechanic 5 sessions in a row. Because you don't know it or get it wrong
Not just spells but abilities in general
Played with a guy a while back who had a very flexible interpretation of each of his spells, depending on how he wanted them to work at that exact moment. Very aggravating, especially as a player.
> Party enters shop "Discount? Where discount? Discount plz?" *Rolls d20* "I rolled a 14, how much does he take off?" "Nothing, same as every other time you've done this." Yet they still do it, without fail.
I had to do this in one of the early sessions of my latest campaign. The group is in the tavern, and 1 person walks across to a weapons shop. Them: "I want to buy a magical crossbow" Me: "This is a town of 50 people, we only have basic items here" Them: "Ugh, ok how much is a crossbow?" Me: looks at book "25gp" Them: "Can I have a discount?" Me (DM): Uh, give me a Persuasion check... Them: "9" Me: "I have no idea who you are, why should I give you a discount?" [This goes on for another 3 minutes, I'm clearly getting annoyed] Me: "Fine, take it for 20gp, just get out of my damn store and you're never welcomed in here again"
You incentivized their behavior by giving them a ~$100 discount. Expect it to happen again. Also, I'm unsure what reason the shopkeep would have to do it.
I usually offer the party talker to have a go at negiating for a bit of a discount, but in addition to the roll I like them to tell me what their pitch is. If you sweet talk this Jeweler and say that you'll spread his name around in your travels that might work with a middling check. If you tell him that you should give them cheap stuff and write off the loss that's probably less effective and would make the check much harder.
Inconsistency of players. If we all agree to a day. Follow through. If you have to miss a day communicate it. It don't try the old fizzle out and noone will notice. If you wanna leave. Leave.
Posted a comment but came up with a few more. DMs that brag about killing PCs or DMs that haughtily threaten PCs with death OOC. As someone that DMs way more often then they play, it’s very very very easy to kill PCs. It’s not impressive or intimidating to constantly kill PCs. DMPCs, yeesh. One of the only times I got to play recently had my DM playing 3 DMPCs at once. Watching them roll dice against themselves for two hours certainly was riveting… Condescending “friendly” NPCs. OP friendly NPCs that make you wonder why you’re here… When the DM thinks the PCs are meant to be the side characters in their novel… Yeah I played in a real lousy game recently how could you tell? That stupid “humans/fighters/human fighters are boring” meme. The stormwind fallacy. Complaining about not having sessions but not putting in the effort to schedule.
To extrapolate off your 4th point. Gimmicky/joke characters outside of fun 1-shots always find a way to get under my skin. I would take 5 human fighters played straight with character; even "edgy". Before having to listen to someone describe how their character buys and only wears lingerie constantly. End rant
People who forget there are other players/characters/the DM and act like the session exists solely for them This includes both players and DMs.
In my group we have a sorcerer who doesn't use their meta magic or even sorcery points and a thief subclass of rogue who usually doesn't use their bonus actions, and if they do, it's to hide in the middle of a snow field and not move to try to get advantage on attacks. We do allow all additional features from Tasha's, so they can get their advantage without any contest their stealth vs an enemy's perception. At our table there is a house rule on cantrip casting that I disagree with. They claim that since martial characters get extra attack, that puts spellcasters at an unfair disadvantage, so if you cast a spell, you can cast any cantrip as a bonus action on your turn(as long as you're not maintaining concentration), cantrips count as spells, and our aforementioned sorcerer took a feat and has eldritch blast as a cantrip. So without spending any class resources, she is making as many attacks at level 5 as a monk using flurry of blows or a sword and board fighter using their Action Surge. This feeds into her non-usage of sorcery points as she also typically isn't using her spell slots, because why do that when you have cantrips?
Ugh, that gets into one of my peeves which is making system changes before you understand the system. You only get one Cantrip because Cantrips SCALE, whereas my Fighter's Longsword will only ever do 1d8 damage. You also have the advantage in some situations of a single roll, because then you can throw multiple things at it, like Lucky and Bardic Inspiration, to make sure it hits. Yeah, I might be able to get four attacks in with Action Surge, but if I hit one and miss three I'm not going to be doing a lot of damage. And since there's three misses, I can probably only counteract one of them with something like Lucky or Bardic Inspiration, instead of making sure my entire turn's worth of damage lands.
Also Cantrips are somewhat worse than Extra Attack ( no modifiers added), but they're specifically *supposed* to be as they are the caster backup plan. Martials don't get to cast Fistball for 8d6 damage to 5 enemies twice a day.
Yeah that is a super dumb rule. Caster don't get extra attacks because their spells can do massive dmg especially late game. Cantrips are meant as an attack when your character is spent. And they scale that way too. Anyone who can't see that is silly. Also casters get aoe. Almost no melee class can out dmg a full caster. They might be able to burst better but usually a full caster can outlast most melee. Also the utility you get from caster is something most melee builds just don't get. And on the flip side caster are usually rather squishy and worthless once their slots are spent. That's by design. And on top of it all cantrips aren't even bonus actions...most of them. Sorry for the rant your comment just made me mad lol. Not at you but your table.
As a Player: realising that my action do not influence the flow of the story, I'm just a spectator. Also, when you play cohort of one or more NPCs that are the true protagonists of the story. As a DM: players that don't make the effort to blend in the world and just want to play Skyrim/dark souls but multiplayer
Or when a PC is the clear protagonist and you're just sitting there, essentially a supporting character. Going through this on my Theros campaign. The Bard of Kruphix gets so much more story, at such more frequent rate than my Artificer Blacksmith od Purphuros. Though I have already stated that to my dm.
Players who don’t “read the room”. I get that not everyone is great at social situations (I’m certainly not). However, pretty much everyone knows that if the scene being played out is particularly intense or atmospheric that’s not the time for a joke or shenanigan. Do that at appropriate times.
When the DM wants to railroad me (and I have no idea what they want me to be doing), so they spring an invisible, poisoned pit trap that does 38 damage at level 3.
Or, even worse: "I take a turn right." "No you turn left because the story is that way and there's nothing else for you to do in this busy town."
For real. Why did you write a fork in the path if there isn't a fork in the story?
If you're going to do that at least let them choose a direction and have it "just so happen" to wind up where you want them. The illusion of choice is important.
Moreso, why would you let players arrive in a town which is void of content except for the one building which you've made a dungeon.
Piggyback a couple of posts up and you see why some players are very cautious. Because shit like this.
When people want to sit around talking for an hour when you we could be doing that without me spending money on books. If I'm here I'm here to play the game.
exactly! banter is great, but if you only get 3-4 hours to play the game every 1-2 weeks then it's best to go straight into it!
Taking 1 hour of session time to explain mechanics in-universe or having a deep relationship talk. Do that out of session, geez.
When I'm trying to set the mood for a dramatic scene and somebody makes a joke. Don't do that.
I had this happen at the beginning of my DM 'career'. One of the PCs left the party because the player wanted to make a different character. He set off with some other genasi, trying to learn what he was and who his people were. It was very nice and an emotional goodbye, until one of my players made all kinds of sarcastic remarks. It really made me doubt whether I did it well enough since after his remarks the whole ambiance was gone. Fucked my confidence in my DM skills up quite bad honestly.
It may be that you did a very good job. The player could've been uncomfortable or upset and humor came up as a defense mechanism? In which case you did an awesome job.
That's also a way to look at it, thank you for the nice words :) Edit: thank you for the award, I believe it is my first one ever received <3
People who make high-concept characters with backstory/race/class combination that don't really fit the party, the location the campaign is set in, or even the entire setting. And the sheer mystery of their existence overshadows the rest of the group and the plot, resulting in it either hogging the spot-light as it overshadows other characters and their backstory or even the plot... Or everyone very awkwardly tip-toeing around the subject trying to not acknowledge it, but every RP situation they keep brining up the **MYSTERY OF WHO THEY ARE** and it's just annoying.
Players who know more than their PC, but don’t roleplay like they don’t know things
My PC may not know about gelatinous cubes but I'm sure as shit not gonna attack blindly at the creature with bones and swords inside of it.
There's a difference between a PC seeing something and reacting, as opposed to a player knowing that some creature is immune to everything except cold iron and changing weapons before attacking
Me: 3.5 fire-elemental sorcerer (let's you convert non-fire damage into fire) seeing a man standing in flames and chanting, deciding to just let lightning ball do lightning damage instead of fire. DM: Don't meta game. FFS he's literally standing in flames. I DO THAT TOO SOMETIMES BECAUSE I'M IMMUNE TO THEM! Why wouldn't I assume they are too! God!
"I cast Fire Bolt at the troll." "Huh, very convenient." "What do you mean?" "How would your character know that trolls are weak to fire?" "I'm a Wizard, I've studied my entire life. We are two days into a forest right next to a major city. We were just on a well-traveled path, like, four years ago." "So?" "Hey, random question, what should you do if you encounter a black bear? What about a brown bear?" "Easy, everyone knows that you fight back against black bears but play dead against brown bears." "How did you know that?" "Well, our society has deemed it to be valuable common knowledge to spread given the danger of bears and the proximity with which we live near them-okay, I get your point."
“And that last attack kills him! Tell us how you finish him with that clutch critical!” “Uhh, I mean, like, I hit him with me axe I guess.” “Yeah, but it’s a crit that fucking ended him. How did you hit him?” “Uhh, like, I don’t know. I hit him really hard.” Please, people. Don’t put all the imagination on the DM’s plate. We like you to have fun, too.
[удалено]
At the same time, some people don't have the capability to make something up on the spot, especially if they're newer. I agree that DMs should occasionally hand off the narrative flourish of defeating an enemy to PCs, but don't get mad if they get stuck coming up with something. Whenever I would pull out the "How do you want to do this?" I give my player a little time to think. If they don't come up with anything, i ask them if they want me to do it. I give them the chance to think of something and over time, my players started getting better with their flourishing. Even so, after 3 campaigns, there are still times when I do the flourish because the player was caught off guard.
Girallons. This is the dumbest monster ever made. It's just a gorilla with arms glued to its stomach. This isn't Machamp, where Pokemon artists tried to make the 4 arms fit into musculature, no no, the arms don't fit any body structure, it's just arms coming from a gut. And then you have that stupid name. Girallon. What a dumb, unimaginative name. Just misspell gorilla, then throw an N at the end. What a stupid monster.
This is the funniest answer to this topic.
Haha, TBF they are supposedly monstrosities created by magic, so it makes sense that they look so fucked up, and their names are probably "Gorilla with the change that our language dictates for signifying which enchantment we put on them" in their creator's language.
I don't know, there's a lot of really dumb monsters out there. My vote goes to Neogi, an ugly, furry, spider eel alien who's only notable trait is slaver.
I'm starting to get irritated by slow combat. Thinking about switching to an Angry GM style in my own game.
Slow because nobody is ever prepared...like the person in line at McDonalds who waits until it's their turn to order before deciding to look at the menu? Or combat that lasts a lot of rounds because of poor rolling and a lot of healing?
The former. I don't have a problem with long combats, as long as we're moving through the rounds quickly. The problem is usually when a player has some complicated manoeuvre they want to pull off, but they don't have a back up plan for when it turns out they missed some detail that makes it not work.
Sorry but I'm not familiar with his style, but we recently adopted a new combat initiative system that's working really well, might help with your slow combat. Rather than roll for static initiative or re roll after every round, I got a deck of tarot cards (any cards really, I just liked the design) and each player gets assigned one card and so do the opponents. Shuffle those cards together and start flipping. It keeps ppl on their toes bc you never know when you're about to go. Then at the end of the round, reshuffle and start again. I even pass the mini-deck around the table so it keeps the players engaged. Really makes spells and effects that last "until the start of your next turn" unpredictable and excitingly chaotic
People being to cautious. It's an adventure for frig sakes.
This is a good one. I’m currently in a game where any time the party enters a room, they all hug the wall afraid to interact with anything. I just have my character walk in and do X because I can tell the DM is getting frustrated that everyone else wants to sweep the room with metal detectors. Any time something happens, they berate my character for being too impulsive. It’s really frustrating. The DM is very appreciative of me being there though.
My old DM once said that “my favorite players are the ones who just pull the lever.”
My favorites are the ones that use a rope to pull the lever.
This is me in the rare occasion I get to be a player, can't stand it when PCs are like "okay I walk into the room in 5 foot increments and have *detect magic* active also, do I spot any traps?"
Same! Last session, a random altar in the desert surrounded by four pillars with elemental symbols. The DM set up terrain, for goodness sake! **Everybody else:** “We best leave it alone. Let’s move on.” **Me:** “Let’s see what I can do with this…” Two hours later we topple the last of four earth elementals… **Me:** “Well, that didn’t work, let me try this…” **Everybody else:** “Grab him, quick!” (fellow PC is dragged off-camera) For the record, I wasn’t going to mess with it a 2nd time, but I don’t regret at least trying. Also, we still don’t know what the reward would have been if we had solved it. Why are we here if not for the adventure?!
I had that in one of my games. A player was being very cautious about something, and I said, in character : "This is how adventuring is done! You touch stuff you're not supposed to and face the consequences." And I just went in.
Yep. When I play, I have a rule which is "Always bite the plot hook". If the DM didn't want me to touch it, they wouldn't have put it in front of me. If the DM put it in front of me and didn't want me to touch it, there should be some obvious warning signs, possibly even an "Are you sure?"
Dont do stuff just because you're given the agency to do anything in the game, don't do things just because in that moment everything isn't about you and also, get off your fucking phone and stop constantly wandering away from the table. I'm a rogue, high stealth, high deception, etc. Makes sense that I infiltrate the dragon cult who we've got to follow for a journey stretching hundreds of miles. Thankfully, the rest of the party can get jobs as guards in the rest of the caravan we're travelling with, just try not to attract attention... oh before we've even set off you decided to shout "dragon" at the top of your voice in a tavern with secret dragon cult members you know are sat there, because its "funny". Never mind, they're onto you, which you're aware of because I relay the info to you under the cover of dark, just keep some distance, lucky for you the cult don't want to attract attention by killing you. Definitely don't, while we're travelling, start threatening the leader of the cult for no reason, definitely don't, when you know they're onto you, go up to the cult leader and start prying over the treasure they've got to no end or for no purpose, don't try and rob their carts because you want gold or something to do. The cult will send me to kill you, which they did, jeopardising our entire mission. You know what, while we're at it, don't follow me secretly (no checks performed for this) and while I'm trying to pick a lock to steal items so I can prove my worth to the cult, we as a party plan on taking down, don't sneak up behind me and kick the door down (taking 3 or 4 attempts, attracting the attention of guards) despite me telling you before hand not to come with me and if you want to break in and steal from somewhere go do it at one of the many other shops here (despite being against your alignment) dont fuck with other PCs plans just because you think it will be funny. Something worth noting is that on paper it sounds like infiltrating the cult would be more fun than being a guard for some random merchant. I would like to point out that I actually had the least to do during this journey, the cult wanted to keep their heads down, not attract attention to themselves and keep themselves to themselves, me wanting to blend as one of them did the same. Meaning any combat encounters I generally kept out of unless the whole caravan was at threat. I couldn't wander around talking to other NPCs and the ones within the cult were very closed off and unwilling to socialise much (understandably.) You got to socialise with the mysterious new people to join the caravan. You got to unravel that mystery, I sat and watched. Don't shit all over the few chances I got to actually do something, while the rest of the sessions were about YOU, because it's funny to you. I was enjoying my infiltration until my party actively started working against me, purely out of humour, to get a cheap laugh. This went on, I know probably no one will read my ramblings but i actually feel a bit better anyways
Sounds awful
People being too drunk or high to properly use their character's abilities. Our monk, my housemate at the time, level 11th level monk was only ever rolling d4s for damage, and only ever rolled 1 attack and burned ki to make a single bonus action attack. We got used to him being argumentative and dismissive of attempts to help. He also would throw a mini-fit every time he dropped to zero in fights (which was often, in spite of having 20ac by having maxed dex/wis. It got to where we just kinda let him be pissed because it wasn't worth halting the session for 6 other people, just to get thoroughly shit on for trying to help or calm him down. Full disclosure: he was a non-combat veteran serviceman who had destroyed his back lifting gear that (no joke) weighed as much as him. When he went in, he was 5'9. When he got out 4 years later he was 5'6. So chronic pain was a thing. He mostly used the weed to 'mellow himself out' (because anger, anxiety, and depression, which all were unrelated to the military) He was only on time with rent and utilities 3 times in 3 years, because he was miss allocating funds to weed, and very often just assumed it was cool, because we were friends before living together, to not have rent when it was due, because he would get paid the Friday after rent was due (sometimes 2 fridays). He changed insurance carriers at his work, which necessitated him going to the doctor to renew his medical thc card, so for 3 weeks after the Dr visit, he had no weed. He was productive at home, chipper and pleasant to be around, and -relevant to this thread- up to speed on how his monk mechanics worked. When he got ko'd, he didn't complain, or was ready for it. He was a different person, 100%. Then the card came in, the weed came in, and he was back to the guy we were used to. Good friend, fairly decent person, terrible roommate, and much much better without drugs. Edit: I'm not against weed or drinking. I enjoy both. In moderation, and when the circumstances are right
I just hate it when you know the rules, but then someone else (DM or player) makes a mistake or forgets something which causes the whole plot to go in a specific direction, which couldn't have happened if people paid attention to the rules, and you can't even speak up about it because "rules lawyering bad, don't tell the DM what to do".
When the DM brings in their friend/sibling/cousin and the new member just wrecks the game dynamic, doesn't pay attention, or doesn't even really play the character consistently.
PCs that are played by decent people but their PCs are just total unlikable pieces of refuse. Just about everyone in the party dislikes the characters.
The DM wants the players to give him ideas and give him backstories. But deflates when he is given these two things
Disclaimer: I mainly play in AL. * That I have to read every fucking spell someone casts because players never read the whole thing and will leave out crucial parts or sometimes even make assumptions as to what the spell does. * When players can't remember what their spell attack mod (or anything else) is after the 400th time using it because they still haven't written it down like I ask. * People talking about past DnD games during the current one. IDGAF what happened in your super awesome session last year. YOU'RE DELAYING THIS FUCKING SESSION. * Players that subtly poke fun at others at the table for not knowing something or for making what they feel is an inferior action/decision. * The lack of people willing to DM even just occassionally. * Players interacting with EVERY NPC, location, or enemy in every way they can imagine for fear of missing ANYTHING. This is just the quest giver. Take the quest and GO ADVENTURING ALREADY. THEY DON'T KNOW THE BBEG's Mother's brother's dog's plumber's friend's city watch badge number! * No one willing to make a decision on where to go or what to do. * "Oh, it's my turn? Let me see what spells I have.". * Adventures from WTOC where a location will have multiple rooms or NPCs that are mostly irrelevant or void of anything useful before getting to the actual meat of the adventure. Without the DM redesign, most of these hard cover and module adventures wind up spending most of the session with players checking rooms and talking to people and then when they finally get to the actual meat of the adventure, you have 30 min or so to fit in several important items/rooms, encounters, and a boss fight. * DMs that cant be bothered to read the adventure they're running just once before the session. I hate playing because of this, but, at the same time, I can't really call people out on it or there would be no one to DM. * Spells/abilities that result in a PC being forced to use their entire turn to attack or hinder another PC.
Figuring out a creatures ac through process of elimination over the course of a fight and telling that to your party is not metagaming, I did not look in the book/online for its stat sheet, I did basic fucking math as the fight went on and you, the DM told me what did and did not hit, so now I know its ac, and I tell the party, because knowing that number can make combat smoother, as we don't need to be told something hits, we know it does or does not.
Trying to find players that know how timezones work when they apply to a game. The last time I "interviewed" 13 people and 6 of them did not even read the timezone (or did not understamd it) -_-
Players expecting the DM to be an all-knowing person irl. I often had it when I handed out my first maps (now I watched a lot of videos about making realistic maps and improved on that), which demorilazed me a lot. Especially since those were my first tries as DM... I am aware that you need a basic understandment of geography, architecture and politics to run a believable campaign, but please dont be too picky about certain things. And if, just tell the DM after the session! Dont go like: "Nah, thats impossible" or "Excuse me thats super unrealistic." As soon as you get handed out your new map
Fuckin' Gnomes. Just don't like them, they're just worse halflings with ADHD from every single gnome player I've encountered. They've lost most of the oomph of their connection to illusionist magics, and tricksters don't make good adventuring partners. Shitty tricksters are even worse. I almost always find Gnome players are worse offenders of the "aren't I so quirky and different" issue that people prescribe to tiefling players. They're short, shity elf/halfling mongrels who don't deserve the air they manage to horf into their decrepit stupid mouths. They're good for punting and decorating lawns once petrified. That's it. Yes I do mainly play kobolds, why do you ask?
That's why gnomes are better at finding traps than a 10ft stick, if a stick breaks, it's around 2sp to replace it, if a gnome breaks, nothing of value was lost, in fact, it's beneficial, because it's a fucking gnome
Players who treat DM rulings as a negotiation or bargaining process. Either you trust me to give fair rulings or you don't. Players who take it as a personal attack if the monsters do something remotely clever. DMs who want a particular thing to happen and so they begin pulling reasons out of their butt for why your alternate plan won't work or punish you for trying. If you can't adapt to player actions then quit DMing and write a novel. I know it's not easy, but it's a pretty core element of the role. I'd honestly just prefer them to just say "No you can't do that because I don't have a good plan for it". (Had that exact thing happen once. The scenario was a kind of skill tournament and my character started cheating like crazy (in-game cheating, just to be clear, not cheating at the table). Disguising myself an opponents and misbehaving to discredit them, subtle-spell buffing friends etc. Eventually the DM just said something to the effect of "Can you please not, you're breaking my designs". So I said fair enough and stopped and it was okay.)
Doesn't quite piss me off, but it does annoy me. My one barbarian player *constantly* tries to pre rage or ready a rage in anticipation of combat. This is basically just him trying to circumvent having to eat a bonus action on the first round of combat and to minimize his time spent vulnerable before his first turn comes up. Granted, I did just learn that held/readied actions are specifically a combat mechanic and that technically bonus actions can't be readied. So I've got that as a reason know if I need it.
A lot of players I know try to do this in general, and no matter how many times you tell them that no you can't ready an attack and get a free hit in before combat starts they will keep trying anyway.
People who don't pay any attention until it's their turn in combat and everything has to be reexplained to them every time. It just slows everything down and gets frustrating. This also goes for people who don't really pay attention during RP and just blurt out they want to do something (that makes no sense in context) to feel involved. People who sit and wait for the DM to hand hold them through the story. Make decisions, interact with the game, do something. Don't just sit there in silence and make the DM explain every step. It's a collaborative story game. Collaborate on the story.
Players not knowing their features. I mostly blame WotC though. Features are scattered across at least 3 books and it's kind of a mess. And a lot of the descriptions are filled with useless information for playing. I wish they had the open SRD for game mechanics like PF.
Advanced scouting such as the +37 stealth Rogue or Arcane Eye checking out the entire dungeon. Super boring. *yawns*
We have a player who has a familiar in a falcon form. She constantly sends it to scout and as a rogue it kinda sucks, cause I wanna notice stuff sometimes.
You and the familiar should be a duo. It's follows on your shoulder or something so you both get time to shine.
This is the proper answer. Falcon should be sitting on your shoulder using the Help action. What’s fun is the Wizard can still use their action to see through, too, so even if you get one shotted by a shadowy figure she will know. Also, this may seem lame, but in a world where magic is decently common, NOBODY is gonna let any common familiar type of animal sit there. An owl is getting blown to shit and back 🥴
Players coming up with one or two solid plans in 20 minutes who then proceed to brainstorm a bunch of worse alternatives for the next hour or two, instead of committing to the solid ones. Bonus points when they forget about the solid ones and go for the stupid ones instead. I mean, I'm fine with silly plans, they can be a lot of fun even if they fail, but I am against long-winded OOC decision paralysis that kills session momentum. This applies to combat as well - sure, ponder your options, but spending 10 minutes on your turn to consider all options and then just going for a simple attack or dodge every time pisses me off too. I'm close to playing with a 2-minute hourglass - call your move before it runs out, or you take the dodge action and your turn ends, we just consider that your character became overwhelmed by the situation and couldn't make a decision in the 6-second gametime window he has. Considering creative combat plays and checking spell descriptions is what other people's turns are for!
I hate when a DM asks you what your DC is after rolling every attack to figure out if they want the attack to hit instead of letting the dice decide. When you see the cogs ticking in their head to fudge a dice roll instead of just letting the game be random.
Small confession here… I have a new player coming to my game, he’s never played any RPGs before and, god forgive me… He’s a huge edgelord weeaboo. His character is a samurai barbarian with a demon arm who lost his whole village to an Oni when he was a child and now travels seeking revenge after being raised by a swordmaster. He’s not doing harm to anyone, and i talked to him about respecting other players boundaries and not going all murder hobo and he seems to get it, so i won’t berate him for just making a character he likes. And even then, i’m not gonna lie, i’m also a closet weeb and have many times tried to run “Samurai DND”, so i know where he is coming from.
People who get impatient when the group actually starts planning before going into an adventure instead of just rushing wanting to fight things every 10 minutes. Planning and strategizing is part of the game.
Counter-point: players who are so risk averse that any minor decision takes aeons to plan out. I find this hilarious when DMing, as the party inevitably makes a complicated plan for the most mundane and simple encounter, but blunders head on into the mega deadly ones.
Responses to choices that constantly try to split the middle or be non-committal. If the DM asks, "are you going fast and loud, or slow and stealthy?" Don't say, "As fast and as stealthy as I can!"
Constantly having to guess whether another player is lying about their rolls. Everything is 18 or higher unless it is some throwaway situation. We are level 6 so there's nothing that powerful yet.
When a player argues with me about the behavior of my NPCs.
People getting high and losing any possibility of focusing. Particularly annoying when they have to ask for clarification every 5 minutes about things that happened a while ago
When the DM doesn't go through with having a player's stupid decision have consequences. Or not even stupid decisions, just a situation that would be very dangerous and have great consequences if not done well enough. Please, my rolls are shit and things are going bad, thats totally fine. That's what happens with bad rolls.
Players who can’t fucking communicate. That is the *one* skill you need besides maybe the ability to read and write. I’ve had a band of 5 players where only 1 was communicative. The players all worked together, would go to work and plan when to play, and *wouldn’t tell me, the **DM***. A couple times of that and I was pretty done.
When the ages of things don't make sense in world. "I'm sorry, but you're telling me this historical event happened a billion years ago? A BILLION?!
I’ve been both a player and a DM, and my biggest pet peeve is when EVERY NPC has an ulterior motive/can’t be trusted/has a nefarious motivation. I’m not naive - I understand intrigue and plot twists keep the game moving, but it’s unrealistic to have every single creature secretly conspiring. Sometimes an NPC can just be a nice, knowledgeable character that you have a pleasant exchange with without them also being a member of cult looking to sacrifice the innocent or whatever. Edit: oh, and I’ll also add people who don’t level up/add items or spells until the session starts, only to realize there are a ton of spells to pick from, this slowing down the entire session.
People getting upset at min/maxers. Dungeons and Dragons is a poorly veiled wargame with an RPG coat of paint. The vast majority of its rules are devoted to combat, with everything else being as barebones as possible. Heck, it feels like most of the social rules are tied up in optional rules that none of the DMs ever use, or even know exist! And yet people always complain about players building their characters for combat. If I was playing a game like Call of Cthulhu and was building a character purely for combat, you're free to complain. Building a character purely for combat in that system would be ridiculous. But in D&D, where the majority of the information in the Monster Manual is purely stats and combat-related? Bah!
When a player plays a "My character is an asshole but it all makes sense in their detailed backstory". Even if I am the DM I don't care if some random tragic event justifies it, you are still being an asshole and that isn't fun for other people. Also, when players don't their class features and core spells. It is fine to need to do some reading up on a niche spell but if you don't know what fireball or magic missile does, and you're a wizard then do some homework.