PDA

View Full Version : Question for y'all



Superglucose
2009-07-19, 01:56 AM
I have a player who 1) demands more social encounters, and 2) does his best to destroy any social encounter he comes across. I think he takes pleasure in ruining the GM's story, which bothers every other GM in the game. It's my term as GA, and my turn as the recipient. Now, his character... it's way, WAY subop, and he likes to character fap a lot about how "great" it is (his primary attacking method is to use a rod that, 3 times/day, casts CL 3 Melf's).

Anyways, they went through what was supposed to be an investigation, he jumped to a conclusion, murdered an NPC. The NPCs buddies are now, unbeknownst to him, stalking him, and are going to use the Silence spell to sneak up on him when he sleeps and murder him, then leave.

Too harsh?

thegurullamen
2009-07-19, 02:10 AM
Too harsh?

For a subop (AKA gritty) game? Not at all. Hell, if anything, i would have recommended something along this course eventually. Wrecking social encounters is good for a man who never sleeps within miles of his victims, but if you're going to insult a king to his face, enforce Pally Detect-Evil-SMITE! justice in a community setting or generally treat murdering like baseball practice, then you're Too Dumb To Live.

In all fairness, though, I say stack the deck against him as best you can and then give him a glimmer of false hope.

DM: You awake in the middle of the night to see a trio of men standing beside you. They look pissed.
Him: I pick up my rod and--
NPC: Looking for this? (Alakazam!)
Him: Oh God, my eyes! The goggles do nothing!

(the next morning)

Party Member A: (Looking down at melted head. The rod rests in the dead PC's hand) Oh my Gods. He always talked about it, but I never thought he'd do it!
PMB: What are you talking about? He never--
PMA: (elbows PMB) I know it's tragic, but life goes on and so should we.
PMB: Shouldn't we bury him?
PMA: No. It's part of the healing process. Now come on, let's go. (Sleight of Hand on the rod.)
Him: I hate you guys so much.

WeeFreeMen
2009-07-19, 02:16 AM
For a subop (AKA gritty) game? Not at all. Hell, if anything, i would have recommended something along this course eventually. Wrecking social encounters is good for a man who never sleeps within miles of his victims, but if you're going to insult a king to his face, enforce Pally Detect-Evil-SMITE! justice in a community setting or generally treat murdering like baseball practice, then you're Too Dumb To Live.

In all fairness, though, I say stack the deck against him as best you can and then give him a glimmer of false hope.

DM: You awake in the middle of the night to see a trio of men standing beside you. They look pissed.
Him: I pick up my rod and--
NPC: Looking for this? (Alakazam!)
Him: Oh God, my eyes! The goggles do nothing!

(the next morning)

Party Member A: (Looking down at melted head. The rod rests in the dead PC's hand) Oh my Gods. He always talked about it, but I never thought he'd do it!
PMB: What are you talking about? He never--
PMA: (elbows PMB) I know it's tragic, but life goes on and so should we.
PMB: Shouldn't we bury him?
PMA: No. It's part of the healing process. Now come on, let's go. (Sleight of Hand on the rod.)
Him: I hate you guys so much.

HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHA
*Gasp for Air*
HAHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA

Phew, I needed that.
Anyway, Second on the Killing, players are hard enough to get into a story let alone they Derail it often enough by themselves. They don't need to make a point of it by doing it just to be an @ss.

Alternatively, let him make a fool of himself, and let the PC's sort it out amongst themselves. Nothing says Divine Justice like a good old disembowelment from the party barbarian :p

TSED
2009-07-19, 02:27 AM
Way, way subop?

Well, the obvious answer is to be all "way, way charop" on him. Not to kill him, but to seriously rub his nose in the dirt. And tie him there. Naked. With chickens on his back. And an announcement that there's free gold available from him at his tied-location broadcasted throughout the city/hamlet/whatever.

CharOpd then walks up, flourishes for the crowd, and is all "Wow, yep, he is definitely great alright."

Then inform him that this character was completely legal, used almost no magical items (maybe a +2 to something here or there, I don't know), and was 2 levels lower than him. I'd go for a caster-level-boosting beguiler (for magic, Gather Information, and forgery) with that touch that deals non-lethal damage until you make a save, and nasty save-reducers. Or something. Be creative!

CharOpd is, of course, some NPC that he slighted with his wreck-all-social-encounters attitude.

(Bonus points if you can pull it off with elite array or something).

AslanCross
2009-07-19, 02:56 AM
How does he destroy social encounters, apart from aforementioned murder?

I'm normally of the "ask why he enjoys doing it and ask nicely to stop" crowd but if he does it no matter who the DM is, and he thinks he can get away with murder, he must be shown the error of his ways. And I agree with the "hoist with his own petard" method of murder, for extra irony.

Superglucose
2009-07-19, 03:31 AM
Way, way subop?

Well, the obvious answer is to be all "way, way charop" on him. Not to kill him, but to seriously rub his nose in the dirt. And tie him there. Naked. With chickens on his back. And an announcement that there's free gold available from him at his tied-location broadcasted throughout the city/hamlet/whatever.

CharOpd then walks up, flourishes for the crowd, and is all "Wow, yep, he is definitely great alright."

Then inform him that this character was completely legal, used almost no magical items (maybe a +2 to something here or there, I don't know), and was 2 levels lower than him. I'd go for a caster-level-boosting beguiler (for magic, Gather Information, and forgery) with that touch that deals non-lethal damage until you make a save, and nasty save-reducers. Or something. Be creative!

CharOpd is, of course, some NPC that he slighted with his wreck-all-social-encounters attitude.

(Bonus points if you can pull it off with elite array or something).
The way I was planning on shoving his brains out his skull was via a Cleric, level 5. he's 7th level (and his primary combat is the CL 3 rod of Acid Arrow... yes, I'm going to let that sink in. I don't think it's done any damage in the past five encounters). Buffs up, Silence, Smash.

No notecard saying "Stop killing my buddies" unfortunately.

He's already made a backup character since it turns out that when my monsters roll critical hits on characters, they actually roll critical hits on characters. None of this "neg nine" crap... you tried rolling past the flesh golemn as a rogue 2/sorceror 4 to set up flank, you get to see how ****ty d4 HD is for close-range combat.

So far the party has survived because in the first meet, I forgot spell resistance of the enemies they were facing. Second big battle they got really lucky (it took ten rounds of combat before I managed to roll anything above a 10 for the baddies). Then they started facing what I call "meh" op characters. Power attack barbarian almost soloes the +2 full plate wearing "tank" they have. Level 5 party. +1 greataxe. Wizard with Lesser Globe and Flesh Golem almost TPKs party, except I ruled that the wizard didn't realize where the "meat" was and accidentally walked into him instead of camping the staircase he was on while his (now berserk) golem finished off the party.

However, challenging me on every point of this campaign, saying "this doesn't exist" or "that doesn't make sense" just because you think you're God himself, and wrecking every encounter we have? This is why I was willing to GM. 5th level Cleric for the pwn.

Core only.

Vaynor
2009-07-19, 03:34 AM
I wouldn't say kill him, but if you can combine showing him that his social interactions have consequences and that he's underpowered, that would be great. Make sure he is caught in a situation without the rest of the party (thus having to defend himself with his crappy rod) as a result of his actions, or something similar.

hewhosaysfish
2009-07-19, 09:36 AM
I see two distinct "problems" here:

1) The player seems to delight in destroying social encounters and ruining the GM's story.

Without more detailed context to help us understand the "destroying", the "ruining" and indeed the "story" then it's hard to diagnose the root cause of this one.
Is the player refusing to bite on any plot hooks? Is he acting like a tool towards important NPCs (or just lots of NPCs) for no apparent reason?
Is he just trying to think of an "outside the box" solution to the problems he sees? Is he rebelling against a percieved railroad?

Now, if the character does something in-game that upsets people in-game then I fully agree that there should be realistic (or at least coherent) consequences for that in-game.
However, if the character does something in-game that upsets people out-of-game then that's a bit more complex and I for one would need to know more about what is upsetting people,why, and why is it being done before I can offer any useful advice.

Except this: You're first reaction should probably not be to drop the GM-Smite-Hammer.


2) The player thinks his character is very powerful when in fact he is underpowered. And you feel the need to demonstrate this fact to him.

Here, I would like to vote against any plans to create a cazy-powerful DMPC, spank his character into a stupor, tea-bag him like you're both playing Halo, crow "L3RN TO DND N00B!", frog-march him through town in women's underwear, etc, etc.

What is this going to achieve? What, other than making yourself feel good and making him feel humiliated and resentful?

If his character is as woefully inept as you make out then he will notice this fact himself over time (e.g. after going 5 more encounters without doing any damage). If you want to spare him frustration and disappointment (e.g. not doing any damage at all in the next 5 encounters) then point out some of the flaws you see in his build (assuming you haven't done this already). If he doesn't believe you then point his past performance as a evidence. If he still doesn't buy it then let it go.

Let it go.

Repeated failure will teach him that you were right. Then offer to help him rebuild his character.
But there's no need to "punish" him for his under-performance; it is its own punishment. There's certainly no reason to be personally offended by it.
And no way you should use it as an excuse to pleasure yourself at his expense. No, not even if your CharOp is much bigger than his.

RandomNPC
2009-07-19, 10:11 AM
you could always make his faveorate attack form become famous and when someone sees the party show up start spamming elemental protection spells on the important hench people. those hench people run out, soak the daily uses, and retreat with bows. or ya know, other elemental spells. something.

Lord Loss
2009-07-19, 10:17 AM
Okay (assuming he's not your best friend or the like), give him a hellish session. If he tries to screw something up, have it all topple back on his head. If, the next session, he's not reformed, KILL HEEEM! in the most stupid, humiliating embarassing way possible. However, take him aside and tell him his behavior is wrecking the game and is not acceptable. Maybe he doesn't know. maybe he thinks that screwing around with NPCs makes roleplay more lively and interesting. Possibly he likes being usesless in combat, trying cool ways to fight, at the sacrifice of power? Talk to the guy. Tou never know.

Ninetail
2009-07-20, 12:09 AM
I have a player who 1) demands more social encounters, and 2) does his best to destroy any social encounter he comes across. I think he takes pleasure in ruining the GM's story, which bothers every other GM in the game. It's my term as GA, and my turn as the recipient. Now, his character... it's way, WAY subop, and he likes to character fap a lot about how "great" it is (his primary attacking method is to use a rod that, 3 times/day, casts CL 3 Melf's).

Anyways, they went through what was supposed to be an investigation, he jumped to a conclusion, murdered an NPC. The NPCs buddies are now, unbeknownst to him, stalking him, and are going to use the Silence spell to sneak up on him when he sleeps and murder him, then leave.

Too harsh?

More information required.

1. Why do you think he takes pleasure in ruining the GM's story? What sorts of "stories" is he ruining, and how?

2. Why do you care whether his character is suboptimal, if the player doesn't?

3. There are at least two and perhaps three seemingly-disparate issues here: a. His desire for more social scenes, b. His ruining of the story, and c. His suboptimal build. You seem to think these issues are interrelated. How? Or what makes you believe so?

4. What did the investigation involve? Who was the NPC they (he?) killed? Who are these buddies, and were they on the scene already or did you create them after the NPC's murder? Is the setting such, and is the NPCs' character such, that these people stalking and killing the PC makes more sense than calling in the authorities? (Or is it that the players are the authorities, since they were investigating? If so, don't they have superiors?)

5. Are you planning on arranging the killing a. because it's the logical reaction to the PCs' acts, or b. in order to punish the player for "ruining" your story? If it's b, or "both," then don't. Seriously, you don't want to get caught in an escalating feedback loop of game-ruining. Of course the GM will always win in the end "in-game", but it's a Pyrrhic victory if the game ends because none of the players were having fun because of the ongoing fight.

6. Have you, or has any other GM, talked to the player about his behavior? If not, is there some reason why not?