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View Full Version : My players are crazy, I'm wondering if I should do anything about them



Sharkman1231
2009-08-31, 10:55 AM
Okay, I'm running a fun (currently) low level evil campaign (3.5)(lvl2). They completed their first adventure, helping a constable by "taking care" of an evil hobgoblin group-thing. They found out that the hobgoblins weren't evil and the constable was, they helped the hobgoblin leader kill the constable. Then later killed the hobgoblin and took all their stuff. I was fine with that. Yeah, evil, betrayals, whatever, then they felt like killing a commoner. Still fine with that. So they help the commoner harvest wheat on his farm in exchange for a place to spend the night, I ruled that that would be fine with him. So around midnight the wizard casts color spray on all four commoners (him&his family) knocking them unconscious for about 6 rounds.

Now here is where things get really creepy.

They kill the farmer,tie up the wife and two daughters. Then one character rapes the wife, kills her and the older daughter. Then they force-feed the older sister's toes,fingers,one eye, to the younger daughter. Then one of them takes out the farmer's brain and later eats it. They take out both of the farmer's eyes and tongue, and puts his tongue in his eye socket. They use their grappling hook and rope to attach the farmer's and older daughter's dead bodies to the ceiling. They nail the wife's feet to the floor. Splatter blood everywhere, splash oil everywhere, steal the little money they had, wash all the blood off themselves, and set the place on fire and leave. (I can't remember what they did with the other daughter(I think they let her go))

I was retching and gagging through parts of this "event". My old DM would have said there was a retired 20th lvl barbarian somehow living in the house and would have killed them, but I allowed them to get away, because it would be kinda realistic. Now should I allow them to do this again? Or should I somehow stop them? Or should I never had allowed them to do this in the first place?:smalleek:

Sallera
2009-08-31, 10:58 AM
This sort of thing really just ends up depending on the overall comfort level of everyone at the table. If everyone's fine with it, then it doesn't really matter. If someone isn't, and it sounds like you weren't, then no, you should simply let them know that that sort of thing bothers you and ask them not to repeat the incident.

Oh, and also? Unless they do a really good job of hiding the evidence, that's the sort of thing that's going to get good-aligned adventuring parties after them really fast.

potatocubed
2009-08-31, 10:58 AM
...that's messed up. Honestly, I would have just had rocks fall and kill everyone, then start again. Sure, it's not realistic, but it's an effective metagame way of communicating that I don't want to deal with that kind of material.

EDIT: Also, by killing all the characters you remove a certain amount of temptation to keep doing it because "It's what my character would do."

mikej
2009-08-31, 10:59 AM
...

just, wow

maybe (A) don't run a evil campaign or (B) get new players.

Doc Roc
2009-08-31, 10:59 AM
So yeah. Change your locks.

And send them to Ravenloft. They've earned such an accolade.

Woodsman
2009-08-31, 11:02 AM
That is seriously creepy.

Tell them to tone it down a bit, especially if it's a fun campaign. If you aren't fine with it, you have every right to say "Stop before I pull out the TPK."

I'd be seriously bothered with it, though. While Evil campaigns allow you to vent, in this degree, it suggests something might be wrong.

SurlySeraph
2009-08-31, 11:03 AM
...that's messed up. Honestly, I would have just had rocks fall and kill everyone, then start again. Sure, it's not realistic, but it's an effective metagame way of communicating that I don't want to deal with that kind of material.

EDIT: Also, by killing all the characters you remove a certain amount of temptation to keep doing it because "It's what my character would do."

Yeah, this. As fun as it is to say, "Roll a spot check. You see a group of paladins. A GROUP OF ALL THE PALADINS IN THE WORLD COMING TO KILL YOU. ROLL INITIATIVE NOW," rebooting the campaign or just telling them to tone it down gets the message across better.

Johnny Blade
2009-08-31, 11:04 AM
A group of six Level 5 Rangers that found the place and tracked them down should do nicely.
If they try to get away with it: Bluff/Sense Motive check. Don't let the party decide who does the talking. Also give them appropriate modifiers, since the Rangers are pretty sure they did it and the PCs also smell like smoke.

Seriously, let them die for it.

And give them an appropriate epilogue: all their characters go to the Abyss and are transformed into some ugly, wretched low-level demon.


Afterwards, tell them that this will happen again if they continue doing things like this.


(Also, I'm kinda disappointed here. When I read the thread title, I thought this could be about the funny kind of crazyness. Well, it's not.)

Grumman
2009-08-31, 11:05 AM
Forget any kind of metagame justification. Just tell them outright, out of character, that you are not DMing that kind of game. You should have done so as soon as you realised they wanted to RP chaotic stupid sickos.

Sharkman1231
2009-08-31, 11:05 AM
I really like my players, they're great guys, and really fun be be around. What I think happened is that they pretty much always restricted to good and neutral alignments, I think they did need to be finally able to do this after about playing for about 5 years. So all I can hope is they don't pull that again, or the consequences will be swift and harsh. Yeah I'll talk to them.

Oh yeah, they have already played through Ravenloft, I was thinking later Tomb of Horrors...

lsfreak
2009-08-31, 11:06 AM
Start over. Give them limits. Tell them they are evil, that doesn't mean idiotic-serial-killer-I'll-do-it-cuz-I-can. They are the BBEG's to some upstart heroes, but they're acting like nothing more than run-of-the-mill, dime-a-dozen psychopaths. They need something that makes their characters stand out, motivations or goals that are unique.

The Vorpal Tribble
2009-08-31, 11:07 AM
I'd avoid the group period. The fact that they fantasize about that sort of thing is very dangerous.

If it was just the forcefeeding bits that's just immature guys trying to be gross and shocking. Throw in the rape and it goes another level.

I... oh... oh ho ho ho ho... it's undead time. Pick up Libris Mortis and give it right back to them. The family is NOT HAPPY.

In fact, I'll write you up an entire encounter based on this if you like, and don't expect me to give quarter.

Doc Roc
2009-08-31, 11:08 AM
Okay, no, seriously. There's a mechanic for this in D&D. It's called Ravenloft. It's like hell but even more morose. It's where you send people who have sinned greatly and with grave pathos, and they never ever get out. Suddenly they're trapped in a world with dire consequences and really scary things.

Lysander
2009-08-31, 11:10 AM
Geez. I mean, was this what you were going for when you decided to run an evil campaign? Because evil plots are one thing, but just describing what you're doing to an npc for ten minutes is not only gross and perverse but kind of boring.


Now I take that peasant and tie him to a cactus! Yeah! And the cactus is filled with bees! And the bees are cannibal bees that eat human eyes! And then I drink his blood! And then I drink the bees blood!

Congrats Shakespeare on your new Titus sequel.

toddex
2009-08-31, 11:20 AM
I actually have no problem with this.... You people act as if they REALLY committed these acts. Do you pretend your last game of slaying some dragon really happened? Take it as if you were watching a horror movie... And like someone said YOU WERE RUNNING AN EVIL GAME

valadil
2009-08-31, 11:22 AM
Ah, that kind of evil. It sounds like your players are going through the phase where they don't really care about roleplaying a self motivated person and are having some sort of verbal grossout contest to see who can be the most vulgar. A lot of groups go through that phase. If you let them run with it they'll get tired of it sooner or later. If you don't want to deal with it, don't DM for them until they grow up a little. Banning certain actions seems heavy handed and it'll just make them want to be disgusting all the more.

What you could do if you wanted to make it interesting, is run a second group for PCs investigating all these disgusting murders. I'd even consider letting the first group of players investigate themselves.

Krrth
2009-08-31, 11:33 AM
I'd avoid the group period. The fact that they fantasize about that sort of thing is very dangerous.

If it was just the forcefeeding bits that's just immature guys trying to be gross and shocking. Throw in the rape and it goes another level.

I... oh... oh ho ho ho ho... it's undead time. Pick up Libris Mortis and give it right back to them. The family is NOT HAPPY.

In fact, I'll write you up an entire encounter based on this if you like, and don't expect me to give quarter.

This. I vote for this.

woodenbandman
2009-08-31, 11:33 AM
The correct response when they say that they do that is "No, you don't."

That is the one instance where that is an appropriate response.

Seriously, what the hell?

Kill their characters, and stop DMing for them until they change their ways. Jesus.

Radar
2009-08-31, 11:39 AM
Seriously talk to them and say you aren't comfortable with that level of brutality and find some compromise. For example: if they want to go on a killing spree, it's fine on condition that they won't go into that much detail.


I actually have no problem with this.... You people act as if they REALLY committed these acts. Do you pretend your last game of slaying some dragon really happened? Take it as if you were watching a horror movie... And like someone said YOU WERE RUNNING AN EVIL GAME
Yet, it's sort of creepy, if someone goes strongly into detail of how will he mutilate a commoner. Flipping someones organs inside-out (in-game) is one thing, describing the scene up to obscene and gross details is something way different. It's like poop jokes during a meal only worse.

Sipex
2009-08-31, 11:42 AM
Views on all ends.

I say, figure out if everyone is comfortable with it, if you're comfortable with that (it sounds like you aren't) and maybe tell them to tone it down a bit (or maybe just gloss over the disturbing parts).

On that tangent, if they let the little girl go you have a way to get punishment to them.

Foryn Gilnith
2009-08-31, 11:43 AM
Are you as disgusted as you seem? If so, OOC resolution would seem to be the preferred route. If you're fine with this because it's just a game (although this is a bit abhorrent. I can't really tell, since /b/ has lowered my standards), then having an undead family stalking them and out for revenge seems reasonable.

PaladinBoy
2009-08-31, 11:55 AM
:eek:

Okay, I know some people enjoy being weird like this, but there's something seriously off about this. I'd go for the OOC resolution of "I really don't care to hear such graphic detail again, if you all don't mind."

Thajocoth
2009-08-31, 11:59 AM
Well, they ARE evil. I honestly would have no problem with evil characters doing that sort of thing. However, I would not make such actions free from consequence. They let one daughter get away? Well, maybe she told the town guard, who've put up wanted posters of the characters. Maybe she even becomes a Paladin just to get revenge on them later. And even if they had killed everyone, there are ways of getting clues from the rubble... They could even have a rich cousin that's a noble in a distant land who can afford to raise them if need be...

You could also easily give them diseases from the event... ESPECIALLY whoever ate brain. Brains are very toxic. (If you're ever stuck on a deserted island and need to resort to the horrible act of cannibalism, don't eat the brain.) The most common diseases from eating brain involve going insane before death. And, of course, whoever commits rape risks some irritating side effects...

Remember, the less the players adhere to any guidelines at all, the more people are shocked, appalled and confused by their actions, the more their heads are worth. People can tolerate a thief, embezzler or a hitman a lot better than a rapist, torturer or cannibal.

-----

Of course, there's also always the option of saying "Look, I know you're supposed to be evil, but this just makes me squick. I'm not gonna play like this.", since that seems to be true for you.

Foryn Gilnith
2009-08-31, 12:07 PM
You could also easily give them diseases from the event... ESPECIALLY whoever ate brain. Brains are very toxic. (If you're ever stuck on a deserted island and need to resort to the horrible act of cannibalism, don't eat the brain.) The most common diseases from eating brain involve going insane before death.

Oh, a player ate a brain? I didn't see that part, I thought that they force-fed it to a farmer. In that case, horrible, crippling disease is practically the only realistic option for that player. Hope they can find a sympathetic cleric.

Shpadoinkle
2009-08-31, 12:10 PM
Tell them you're willing to DM a SANE evil campaign, not a "Jack the Ripper meets Ted Bundy meets Richard Ramierez meets a Stephen King novel" evil.

If I were DMing and it happened again after that, I'd say "Rocks fall, everyone dies, GTFO" (or "I'm leaving" if you're not playing at your place). That's not the kind of thing I'd put up with.

Myou
2009-08-31, 12:13 PM
Okay, no, seriously. There's a mechanic for this in D&D. It's called Ravenloft. It's like hell but even more morose. It's where you send people who have sinned greatly and with grave pathos, and they never ever get out. Suddenly they're trapped in a world with dire consequences and really scary things.

Pfffft, my players are having fun there right now. There's nothing that bad in it.

Mando Knight
2009-08-31, 12:15 PM
They could even have a rich cousin that's a noble in a distant land who can afford to raise them if need be...

They don't need one. Your PCs just killed a peasant's family. That essentially means they just robbed the peasant's liege lord: the family can't take care of their farm land any more, so the lord loses out on both the family's taxes and the commerce from the produce.

Lords don't like to lose money. Lords also tend to have connections to Lawful churches, which tend to field Paladins and Clerics, and also to Wizards. They will be hunted down and arrested for their crimes, if not destroyed outright for their depraved behavior.

Nero24200
2009-08-31, 12:18 PM
I'll be honest, it doesn't sound like your players are really interested in the idea of heroic fantasy or adventuring, which is really the point of D'n'D. It sounds more like they have a stronger interest in very graphic stuff that I wouldn't touch with a ten-foot pole. Theres a few things I'd do

No.1: Find another group. I understand that might not always be a good option, but it's the first I would look at if theres alternatives.

No.2: If you're nto fine with number 1, explain to the players why you disliked the scene. If possible, ask them to play good or neutral characters until you all find a level you're comfortable RPing with.

And for the record, evil or no, nothing should for a PC to commit vile act's randomly. That's not evil, that's chaotic stupid. Only people with increadibly severe mental and emotional problems would randomly commit such acts, even then, it wouldn't really be random, since generally if something like that were to happen RL, there would be a trigger or some such (for instance, killing the farmer because he said somthing in such a way that reminded one character he suffered at the hands of a person resembeling the farmer). "I'm evil" is just a poor excuse to act immature. Really, "It's IC" is as well, since it doesn't matter what your character is like, their actions are determined first and foremost by you, the player.

People don't simply meet others randomly in the bar and then go "Well you seem nice, feel like walking down into these dark dungeons? Don't worry about monsters, you have me, the person you just met, to rely on". There's always an element of metagame activity in any game, though it's usally to such a minor extent that no-one really cares. But if players are caring, then somthing needs to be done.

So if you feel a little grossed out and don't want the PC's to continue on such a triad, simply say, and tell them to pipe down if they pull out the "It's IC" crap.

Besides, allowing it because it's realistic can be a slippy slope. Again, if people perform act's like that RL, they never stop with one person. If the PC's continue they should have folk after them (if they don't already). And what's more, the number and strength of these angry people should escalate. What's more, they'll likely grow more ruthless as well, maybe even to the point that they'd perform the same dispicable acts on the PC's.

If you insist on keeping it realistic, I'd add such an element, and maybe even enforce that last part should they manage to get a hold of one of the PC's. If you don't want to go for option one, I'd probably use this one, since it'll also show the player's just how agitating and disgusting their act's might be to those spectating (or show just how immature they are if they refuse to RP out the scenes then).

Myshlaevsky
2009-08-31, 12:19 PM
Oh, a player ate a brain? I didn't see that part, I thought that they force-fed it to a farmer. In that case, horrible, crippling disease is practically the only realistic option for that player. Hope they can find a sympathetic cleric.

They won't. At least not one who's not taking something a lot more costly in return.

Honestly, after something like this in my game I would ask the players never to do it again - in fact I would have asked that during or before in all probability.

However, if you want to use this as an opportunity to punish the players in-game or are hesitant about taking it OOC, they are an enormous number of ways to deal with these players. The ideas in the thread are only the start. As many people have pointed out, this is the kind of thing gods punish. Feel free to drop curses, divine sanction or vengeful clerics and paladins on the players.

They haven't covered their tracks nearly enough to stop being found out.

Superglucose
2009-08-31, 12:23 PM
Quit GMing for them and remember their names, just in case people go missing. Recommend psychologists and ffs stay as far away from them as you can.

only1doug
2009-08-31, 12:24 PM
If you are comfortable with them playing evil PCs but not with the level of description then I suggest a pre-game chat at the start of the next session:

"OK guys, you want to play the evil dudes and I'm fine with that, your characters can do all the evil they like but I don't want to hear any detailed descriptions of it. if you have helpless prisoners you can just tell me what state they are left in... By which I mean living, dead or undead; mutilated, abused, defiled or unmolested."

"Giving me a level of detail that makes me feel ill will result in you getting hunted down and killed by forces of good far beyond your ability to cope with, so stong in fact that they can kill you just by hurling rocks from heaven at you (no save, just die)."

Comet
2009-08-31, 12:26 PM
Talk to them about it, as has already been said. This sounds like a simple case of miscommunication.
You tell the players "let's play EVIL" and they will do their best to oblige. They just got a little too carried away, it happens.

Now, what you absolutely must not do, is resolve this in some in-game fashion.
If you send someone after them or have the gameworld take some other kind of revenge, you're basically saying "okay, I'll play along since you guys seem to want a story that resolves around these themes".

If, however, you tell them outside the game that you don't feel comfortable playing a game with such themes, the message is bound to be received better.
Just a simple "hey guys, let's skip the whole torture and rape thing with as little description as possible, since I think it's kind of boring. How about we find something else that's cool and evil to tell a story about?" should do the trick if the players aren't complete retards.

Communication is ace. The human element is the first and only benefit of roleplaying and that can be enjoyed only by interacting with the players outside of the fiction.

Starshade
2009-08-31, 12:33 PM
id judge that kind of deeds so bad, its plausible its a certain chance an Inevitable would be constructed to do the same deed against them as they did. Simply let it be a 10% chance on every superevil deed, a clockwork nightmare from Mechanus comes after them to try do to them, as they did to whatever. :smallamused: :smallbiggrin:

Edit: leave one of the stupid single minded thingies walking around aimless, talking to pesants, perhaps make it having heard of the murder, but not picked up the mission due to missing any knowledge yet, just being a bit inquisitive. a Aimless, Inevitable roaming for bad guys to beat up. :smallamused:

Grumman
2009-08-31, 12:34 PM
I actually have no problem with this.... You people act as if they REALLY committed these acts. Do you pretend your last game of slaying some dragon really happened? Take it as if you were watching a horror movie... And like someone said YOU WERE RUNNING AN EVIL GAME
You can be evil without being a complete monster. The difference between good and evil is not the goals, it's how much collateral damage you're willing to cause along the way. For the complete monster, the collateral damage is the goal.

That is why it is creepy. Good PCs and evil PCs both want the same things (XP, power, gold, etc), and the difference is simply that the player of the evil PC disregards the imaginary suffering of the NPCs. The OP's players aren't ignoring it, they're glorifying it, treating it like a goal in itself.

Delwugor
2009-08-31, 12:37 PM
This is a fairly common problem that occurs when players have their first evil characters. Most example people see of evil (tv, books, games even D&D bad guys) is this kind of graphic murder and mayhem. This does not have to mean that your players are sick or perverted or whatever, unless it is repeated just put a stop to it and let it slide as a bad session.

Sounds like you are having problems with the graphic details more than the fact that it happened. This is perfectly understandable and all you have to do is tell them that this bothers you and that you don't want it as a GM or even a player.

What else you can do? Try the same thing done with Anakin in Jedi Temple, just cut the scene and go on to the next. The act still happened, it was still evil but there was no gory details to repulse people. And remember as others have said every act has a consequence.

Comet
2009-08-31, 12:43 PM
You can be evil without being a complete monster. The difference between good and evil is not the goals, it's how much collateral damage you're willing to cause along the way. For the complete monster, the collateral damage is the goal.

That is why it is creepy. Good PCs and evil PCs both want the same things (XP, power, gold, etc), and the difference is simply that the player of the evil PC disregards the imaginary suffering of the NPCs. The OP's players aren't ignoring it, they're glorifying it, treating it like a goal in itself.
True, what they are playing can be described as being a monster. But that, in a way, is only taking evil to it's logical extreme. You can be either reasonably evil, which is what most PCs settle for, or completely, absolutely, horrifyingly evil, which is what's happening here.
I feel like the players are trying their best to create the most evil story possible, since that is what they agreed to play to begin with. That doesn't mean that they're sociopathic nutcases. People have been telling stories about horrifying, inhuman deeds for ages. That doesn't make every horror writer out there a sicko.

Once again, talk to them. If that doesn't help, then you can be sure there's something wrong with their attitudes.

Sharkman1231
2009-08-31, 12:45 PM
id judge that kind of deeds so bad, its plausible its a certain chance an Inevitable would be constructed to do the same deed against them as they did. Simply let it be a 10% chance on every superevil deed, a clockwork nightmare from Mechanus comes after them to try do to them, as they did to whatever. :smallamused: :smallbiggrin:

I like that idea, and the one similar to Anakin, the details are skipped.
I'm definitely going to run with the little girl who they let go, becoming a pally.

Roukon
2009-08-31, 12:48 PM
Honestly, I agree with toddex and Thajocoth. For the most part. If you are offended or feel that is not the type of campaign you want to run, then tell them that. However, if you don't mind, and they want to, by all means let them. It is sometimes healthy to play out fantasies such as these, as long as your players know that this is fantasy and not reality. If you feel that line is being blurred, then that is another reason to end the campaign.

And, while I usually don't like to play this card, this is coming from a psychology graduate. (Not grad student yet, in a few years.)

In the end, it is what matters to you, if you feel like this is something you have no trouble with running, then let them. If you feel you this is not something you want to run, stop now. Side note, what they did was horrific, no doubt about that, but I once made something as a DM that was a bit more psychologically damaging than what they did. And, it was fun to make.

Drider
2009-08-31, 12:59 PM
Okay, I'm running a fun (currently) low level evil campaign (3.5)(lvl2).
They kill the farmer,tie up the wife and two daughters. Then one character rapes the wife, kills her and the older daughter. Then they force-feed the older sister's toes,fingers,one eye, to the younger daughter. Then one of them takes out the farmer's brain and later eats it. They take out both of the farmer's eyes and tongue, and puts his tongue in his eye socket. They use their grappling hook and rope to attach the farmer's and older daughter's dead bodies to the ceiling. They nail the wife's feet to the floor. Splatter blood everywhere, splash oil everywhere, steal the little money they had, wash all the blood off themselves, and set the place on fire and leave. (I can't remember what they did with the other daughter(I think they let her go))

I was retching and gagging through parts of this "event". My old DM would have said there was a retired 20th lvl barbarian somehow living in the house and would have killed them, but I allowed them to get away, because it would be kinda realistic. Now should I allow them to do this again? Or should I somehow stop them? Or should I never had allowed them to do this in the first place?:smalleek:

If this was me, I'd make them roll against poison/diseases the farmer and family had. Nothing says "I meant evil campaign as in, "the DM...being evil...to you" like breaking out swine flu/mad cow disease.combined with explosions of many varieties, of course.


Of course, if you want to be nice, you can try talking to them first, and explaining at what point you think they went too far. Be sure to mention that the world has consequences, and someone will try to look for them if they leave evidance, or piss off the wrong person(killing a farming family? a village could pay for some divination magic to stop mass killers who may come after them, then seeing everything they did, try to warn ANY paladin. Or druids/rangers could chase down people lighting fires randomly and tracking)
Make sure they realise that you still like them, but hate what they did in the game, if they keep doing things that make you uncomfortable, stop DMing, say you want to be a player and don't want an evil campaign.

Keshay
2009-08-31, 01:06 PM
You're right, your players are crazy, they went through with all of that then let the little girl go? I mean keep her as a pleasure slave or sell her or something...

In all honsety though, this sounds like a good start to an evil campaign. It woudl have been better if they had done this forst, then set the Hobgoblins (was it) up for the crime. Just make sure there are reprocussions for the acts and guide the players to be smarter about thier atrocities in the future.

If the extended descriptions were the problem, ask them to tone it down in the future. Let the scene fade to black, and have them standing smiling evily to themselves in teh front of the burnt-out husk of the cottage the next morning, no need to spell out every crime in detail.

Also, this:

You could also easily give them diseases from the event... ESPECIALLY whoever ate brain. Brains are very toxic. (If you're ever stuck on a deserted island and need to resort to the horrible act of cannibalism, don't eat the brain.) The most common diseases from eating brain involve going insane before death.

Is inacurate. There are comparably very few diseases that pass into the brain. Your chances of getting a disease from eating the liver, kidnies or even muscle tissue are far greater than from eating a brain. Then again, the diseases that are present in a brain are far worse than whatever else you kight get, but fortunately even rudimentary cooking will kill any transmission through the GI tract. Also, brains have really poor nutritional value, so eating one woudl be a last recourse anyhow.

Grumman
2009-08-31, 01:09 PM
True, what they are playing can be described as being a monster. But that, in a way, is only taking evil to it's logical extreme.
No, it's taking evil to its illogical extreme. A regular evil person and a good person still value the same things, it's just that the evil person doesn't value the wellbeing of others as highly as the good person. A monster is completely different, assigning the wellbeing of others a negative value in their mental calculus, something to be destroyed for its own sake.

Lycan 01
2009-08-31, 01:11 PM
Wow. Just... wow. :smalleek:

I would have stopped the moment rape entered the picture. I don't care if one of my players does something stupidly evil - one of my evil PCs in a good party keeps it relatively tame. The worst thing he's done was wear a Kobold's bloody skull as a hat, IIRC... But the moment they start to do something that is just wrong, like raping, or torturing children, that is where the fun stops. I don't care if I have to TPK them right then and there - there's no way I'm DMing anything that goes beyond my comfort zone.


I say justice should be served. Be it a deadly disease incurred from eating the brains, an angry fuedal lord sending out his best knights to take back what is owed in blood, a band of travelling Lawful Good rangers that somebody described earlier, or a pack of angry Paladins who've come to Smite Evil. Heck, any combination of those would be nice, too! Just be sure to explain to them that for every action, good or evil, there is a consequence.

And yeah, talk to them OOC about it first. But then smite them anyway! :smallbiggrin:

Myshlaevsky
2009-08-31, 01:12 PM
Is inacurate. There are comparably very few diseases that pass into the brain. Your chances of getting a disease from eating the liver, kidnies or even muscle tissue are far greater than from eating a brain. Then again, the diseases that are present in a brain are far worse than whatever else you kight get, but fortunately even rudimentary cooking will kill any transmission through the GI tract. Also, brains have really poor nutritional value, so eating one woudl be a last recourse anyhow.

Sometimes it's more the time of transmission. More animals (inluding humans) than you think can transmit prion diseases (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prion#Prion_disease) but the timeframe of such a disease can be massive - some species of deer can give you a prion disease that will affect you in about 400 years time, so it's redundant.

Thajocoth
2009-08-31, 01:13 PM
Is inacurate. There are comparably very few diseases that pass into the brain. Your chances of getting a disease from eating the liver, kidnies or even muscle tissue are far greater than from eating a brain. Then again, the diseases that are present in a brain are far worse than whatever else you kight get, but fortunately even rudimentary cooking will kill any transmission through the GI tract. Also, brains have really poor nutritional value, so eating one woudl be a last recourse anyhow.

I've heard it both ways... What I stated seems to be the more common view, and without really knowing for sure, it's better to be cautious.

Regardless though, it doesn't sound like the character cooked it anyway, so they'd be susceptible in either case.

Tyrmatt
2009-08-31, 01:20 PM
I like the idea of having an order of paladins roused by the second daughter to hunt the PCs into the ground but this will only teach them the valuable lesson of "Leave No Survivors".

I'd be inclined to say the players got together and deliberately decided to freak you out here. Not to offend but it sounds like you're a little squeamish and that's fine. There's no reason to feel nauseated when you sit down to DM. I'd call the players out on it and put in place the "dinner conversation" rule. You don't say anything that you yourself would want to hear while enjoying a nice dinner. Put it in the context of "Ha Ha, you got me. Don't do it again."

Of course, as a more jaded soul whose read every hideous description of PoW mistreatment, sickening science experiments and serial killer bios, I'd be inclined to retaliate.

My personal idea here would be to have the living daughter come back, having made an infernal pact of some kind and a literal taste for flesh. Have her hunt the PCs with demonic powers, pin them down and begin to strip the succulent flesh from their bones. Turn her into their worst nightmares, stalking them even while they sleep. Now they have to live with the monster that they created. I'm sure there's a dark god of cannibalism somewhere in the splat books that would be glad to empower her against these nutters.

Have them enter a town and be begged by a terrified populace to help them against something that's killing the people, eating their flesh and stealing all their valuables (the key lure for the evil). They think "Hurr hurr we'll help them then run with the gold." The daughter has no interest in the gold. It's merely a lure to get the PCs into her domain. For even more fun, have the PCs be indebted to an order of clerics/paladins/good guys who drive her off just as she's moving in for the kill. That should really stick in the craw of evil players.

Blackknight1239
2009-08-31, 01:22 PM
There should be some rather dire consequences. I mean, if they did let the little girl go, there will surely be some authorities/low level adventuring party after them from now on. I mean, sure some people may think is funny to mercilessly slaughter peasants, but if nothing is going to happen about it, there's no reason for them to stop.

valadil
2009-08-31, 01:35 PM
True, what they are playing can be described as being a monster. But that, in a way, is only taking evil to it's logical extreme.

Umm, no. Evil characters are purely self motivated. There is nothing to gain from defling a family. This is just going to attract the attention of the nearest paladin. Logical evil would want to remain innocent looking. These PCs have lost all logic and become monsters.

Yukitsu
2009-08-31, 01:36 PM
If you want to continue, as opposed to destroying the campaign, which you should, you could use one of my current PCs for this. Creepy little girl archetype, inspired by Alma Wade from the F.E.A.R. game.

Elan wizard 5, dread witch 4 nightmare spinner 1. Learned it all fairly quickly due to burning motivation for revenge against people. (within 6 months)

Last person on her hit list was a slave owner of a pirate city. Hit him with a dex damage spell, brought him down to 0, and put his face in a bowl of water, while singing a cheerful, yet emotionally dead tune.

Custom research spell is a phantasmal killer with a 5 round duration. As in, an individual hit with it takes 5 rounds to die, rather than immediately.

Spiryt
2009-08-31, 01:38 PM
As few people suggested - this:


A group of six Level 5 Rangers that found the place and tracked them down should do nicely.
If they try to get away with it: Bluff/Sense Motive check. Don't let the party decide who does the talking. Also give them appropriate modifiers, since the Rangers are pretty sure they did it and the PCs also smell like smoke.
Seriously, let them die for it.
And give them an appropriate epilogue: all their characters go to the Abyss and are transformed into some ugly, wretched low-level demon.
Afterwards, tell them that this will happen again if they continue doing things like this.
(Also, I'm kinda disappointed here. When I read the thread title, I thought this could be about the funny kind of crazyness. Well, it's not.)

After all that crazzyness with organs and fire, they can bathe in acid and will still stink from the mile.

And rangers will have dogs. Or wolves.

Seriously, they're just 2nd level stinky guys, there's NO WAY they can get away with that, there's no need for any DM fiat, rule 0 or something - especially if they let the girl live. They will be found, and they will die, probably horribly on a scaffold, if setting resembles medieval in any way.

I probably wouldn't want to play with them, but since you're sure they're fine guys - your will.

Just tell them that you don't want that stuff. If they necessarilly want to play complete psychopats, they can find different DM.

ken-do-nim
2009-08-31, 01:38 PM
There should be some rather dire consequences. I mean, if they did let the little girl go, there will surely be some authorities/low level adventuring party after them from now on. I mean, sure some people may think is funny to mercilessly slaughter peasants, but if nothing is going to happen about it, there's no reason for them to stop.

I'm thinking dire consequences more along the line of all the murdered people coming back as revenants, spectres, vampires, you name it, and seeking vengeance. Then as the DM you do to the characters exactly what they did to the NPCs, tear out their guts and force feed it and what not. I bet you'll have a bunch of shocked players at the table.

Sipex
2009-08-31, 01:39 PM
One thing you should all consider is that these players have played good characters until now so they probably don't know how to play evil properly. When that happens you tend to go extreme in order to make sure that...in this case, they are staying evil and don't float towards good tendencies.

It could simply be that sort of situation.

As for the detail, if they've been on 4chan or seen enough horror movies they could easily be desensitized by that sort of thing.

Spiryt
2009-08-31, 01:42 PM
In that case, horrible, crippling disease is practically the only realistic option for that player.

It is? I thought that some cannibalistic tribes were actually eating brains alongside with heart and other things - according to those beliefs that eating the heart of your enemy will give him his courage, eating brain will give a bit of everything generally ec. :smallconfused:

Is brain really so toxic?

Elfin
2009-08-31, 01:47 PM
That is very messed up.
Make it clear to your players that you're not comfortable with things like that, and you don't want it to happen again. If they're your friends, they should understand.

Foryn Gilnith
2009-08-31, 01:49 PM
Is brain really so toxic?

No, not really. It was an exaggeration because this situation is so exaggerated.

Hijax
2009-08-31, 01:51 PM
the problem arises when a lot of people are being eaten cannibalistically. One brain probably wont hurt much.

Narmoth
2009-08-31, 01:58 PM
What you could do if you wanted to make it interesting, is run a second group for PCs investigating all these disgusting murders. I'd even consider letting the first group of players investigate themselves.

Make it pbp.
Have some of the gitp-ers join up. Sue as heck I'd want to-
Heck, if it went far enough, I'd dig up my lvl 18 blackguard to hunt them.
(Yeah, he's a blackguard. But he was more the fallen paladin type of evil, not the insane childmolester type of evil. He'd hunt them and torture them to death, after resurrecting the farmers girls. Yeah, he and his 25 in charisma would get paid....)

or you know, you could simply talk to them

Still, a play by post-game, where one fraction plays good and the other evil sounds fun

Lycan 01
2009-08-31, 02:00 PM
^2nd'ed! :smallbiggrin:

You could also time skip it a decade or so ahead, and let them gain a bunch of levels. Then have the girl show up, having trained as a Paladin since the day her family was murdered. Not only has she dedicated her life to smiting the forces of evil from existance... but she brought friends. :smallamused:

Woodsman
2009-08-31, 02:01 PM
^2nd'ed! :smallbiggrin:

You could also time skip it a decade or so ahead, and let them gain a bunch of levels. Then have the girl show up, having trained as a Paladin since the day her family was murdered. Not only has she dedicated her life to smiting the forces of evil from existance... but she brought friends. :smallamused:

Make her a paladin 5/Crusader X.

Much more deadly.

Unwitting Pawn
2009-08-31, 02:05 PM
They don't need one. Your PCs just killed a peasant's family. That essentially means they just robbed the peasant's liege lord: the family can't take care of their farm land any more, so the lord loses out on both the family's taxes and the commerce from the produce.

Lords don't like to lose money. Lords also tend to have connections to Lawful churches, which tend to field Paladins and Clerics, and also to Wizards. They will be hunted down and arrested for their crimes, if not destroyed outright for their depraved behavior.

QFT. Do this. It would be accurate in a purely historical campaign (w/o magic). In D&D with spellcasting Clerics running around, it'll be even easier.

You won't even have to cheat and they won't be able to complain, either. It would be unrealistic if this DIDN'T happen.

Umael
2009-08-31, 02:05 PM
Okay, I'm running a fun (currently) low level evil campaign (3.5)(lvl2).

Just because it was fun doesn't mean that it will keep on being fun.


I was retching and gagging through parts of this "event".

This.

Just stop everything and read that again.

That was you.

You were so emotionally upset by what your players did that it violently disturbed you.

Yeah, they're supposed to be great guys. Yeah, they're just trying their hand at being evil, unwinding. Yeah, it's not like they did it in real life.

I get it. I get what you are saying.

But you, the DM, were disturbed - really disturbed - by what they did. I would venture a guess that it wasn't necessarily so much them being evil that got you, but the graphic level to which they took it.

I am not going to advocate calling off your friendship, putting up pictures of them all around town, or contacting the police to report their behavior. You know them, you know the circumstances, you are a better judge if they are whacked or not.

But the big thing is that you were disturbed by what happened.

So now you come, asking for advice.

1) Tell them OOC that you were uncomfortable with that level of graphic detail. Accept if they apologize, hopefully they will, but do not expect them to do so. Inform them that you will never allow that kind of violent smut in your games again. Also, OOC, this should be considered your first, last, and only warning on the subject - if they pull this again, end the campaign. Immediately. Make sure they know.

(It is possible to play evil and do horrible things in a D&D game, but if you do, you need to learn tact!* Playing "Let's-Gross-Out-the-DM" is not cool. Playing "Fantasy Psychopath" is not cool. Letting the scene fade to black leaves what happens to the imagination, which is far more effective and less likely to induce sleep-depriving nightmares.)

2) Assuming that your players are not fledgling serial killers in the making and that they did not intend to take things that far, ask them if they want to take back what happened IC last night. This will be your first, last, and only chance in-game for them to correct their mistake.

If they decline, then... well, there have been plenty of good suggestions already made. Barring the fantasy element, killing a peasant family is bad enough, but that kind of sadism? The local lord is going to be very, very concerned, and word of this is going to spread. Oh, and look at that! They let the youngest daughter go! That's what's known as an eye-witness, possibly even someone who alerts the authorities!

In our world, that usually means flashing red-and-blue lights and the sight of a dozen or so gun barrels. If it looks particularly dangerous, the police call in the SWAT.

But this isn't our world. It's D&D. Which means that things can get a lot nastier...

Do they think they can get away? Speak with Dead might say otherwise. Rangers with tracking hounds will get the scent. If not local forces, a bounty could be arranged or even a party of "concerned citizens" could make an appearance (I would love to play a party vs. party game, where a higher-level and/or higher number of members group tracks down an evil party like this and brings justice upon them).

What if they get away? Unlikely, but as people have already pointed out, the younger girl got away. Reoccuring antagonist, to be sure, if the campaign lasts long enough. The dead family? Natural way for undead to come about - it would be poetic justice for your PCs to be tracked down and killed by the very monsters they helped create.

It is possible that some of the local big-shots in the evil community will have heard of them - and want them eliminated because they were just so sloppy. Personally, I would use that as my setup as follows:

The party is approached by a low-ranking demon, orc, something nasty and evil, but powerful enough that they don't want to just fight it out of hand. Maybe it is flanked by several of its lackeys. Maybe the party is worn out because a pack of ghouls, alerted to that special scent of the dead, has been tracking them for several nights.

Whatever is the case, the evil being tells the PCs that its master heard about what they did back that, congratulates them on just a splendid bit of evil, and then mockingly informs them that it is too bad they were so sloppy. Apparently, the Hounds, an elite cadre of paladins in service to the king, were in the area, alerted by divination to be on the lookout for trouble within the lands. That trouble, naturally, is the evil being's master and its plans, but the PCs make for such wonderful pawns and scapegoats. Not that the master would have wanted them in any case, but the point stands. The good guys are tracking them down and the evil guys are showing up just long enough to tell the PCs, "you're screwed!"

Cackling, the evil beings disappear. Soon afterwards, the forces of good attack. I would favor harassing attacks at first, such as multiple long-range archery shots, the sound of dogs baying not far behind, and a long and brutal chase. Once cornered, the Hounds, the paladins appear and demand the group surrender or face immediate execution by the law of the king, power bestowed upon the Hounds to maintain order.

If any surrender, allow the PCs to in-fight and kill one another ("No one surrenders! We all die together!"). Once the surrenders are handled, go for the TPK. After the mop-up, any who weren't actually killed (i.e., in the negatives and stabilized, but captured, or those who surrendered) get a swift trial upon waking up, one that will result in their execution.

In short, there is no mercy. Justice must be served.


* - Forgot to explain this part.

As DM, I had one of the NPCs rape one of the PCs. It was done with tact - in fact, I was more disturbed about it than she was.

Me: "Look, I didn't intend for this to happen, but it looks like the only logical way for this to proceed is for your character to get raped. Now, if you want-"
Her: "Oh, I'm fine with it!"
Me: :smalleek::smallsigh: Okay... well, then, I'm NOT going to go into the details, but this is what is happens...

Spiryt
2009-08-31, 02:08 PM
the problem arises when a lot of people are being eaten cannibalistically. One brain probably wont hurt much.

But what problem? And is this something with human brain? AFAIK many cultures found rams brain tasty food.


And to stay on topic, did the place and corpses burned well? You can always rule that they didn't - rain, players failure to set fire well. And this opens another trail options, from mundane trails to Speak with dead (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/speakWithDead.htm).

Kylarra
2009-08-31, 02:09 PM
It's been covered multiple times but I'll repeat, if you, as the DM, are uncomfortable with the direction the game is going, that is a sign that you need to make a full stop and talk to the players out of game about the issue.

Narmoth
2009-08-31, 02:18 PM
But what problem? And is this something with human brain? AFAIK many cultures found rams brain tasty food.


And to stay on topic, did the place and corpses burned well? You can always rule that they didn't - rain, players failure to set fire well. And this opens another trail options, from mundane trails to Speak with dead (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/speakWithDead.htm).

There is a prion disease, similar to cow madness, that is transmitted by eating brains of your fellow humans. Especially if you eat brains of people that ate brains of people that ate brains in a very long line of people eating brains.

Glass Mouse
2009-08-31, 02:19 PM
Remember - the whole episode feels worse to you because you were in the DM's shoes. You empathize with your NPCs, as you are the one roleplaying them and understanding them. And as such, you have to feel a bit of the terror when the PCs do stuff like that.
The players are more distant. You know how NPCs are somehow 'invisible'? Yeah.

I remember one time when one of my own groups shifted to "dark and gritty". We'd just caught up with an NPC rapist, and our characters were furious. The guy was tortured, intimidated, crippled and finally killed. Yes, in detail. It was one of the most awesome sessions ever, and I swear - ooc, I'm the kind of person who feels bad whenever I kill a mosquito.

Just... Y'know, don't think that the players need psychological help. It's a game, after all, and while the actions sound disgusting (creeped me out, anyway), I think some reactions in this thread are a bit over the top.


Comfortability, on the other hand? Yeah, you sound like you should talk to them, ooc. I'm pretty sure at least one of them feels a little bit guilty about getting carried away, anyway, and they might actually be relieved if someone steps up and suggests "hey guys, great to see you being so enthusiastic about it, but let's keep it a bit more family friendly from here on, okay?"

Lycan 01
2009-08-31, 02:31 PM
Actually, I have 2 stories of my own to tell, revolving around Call of Cthulhu.

Call of Cthulhu, as some of you may know, is filled with dark and evil things. Blood and gore is common. The worst scenario was when one player got mind controlled and ended up pulling his own femur from his leg. Since I know some people would get sick at the details, I'll be nice enough to leave them out. To my players, however, I left no detail undescribed. The player who died was actually out of the room, but the two players in the room didn't enjoy the description. One began to massage his leg, looking horrified. The other... he actually covered his ears and began to sing frantically to himself so he wouldn't have to hear the rest of it. Maybe I over did it... :smalleek: But the players still enjoy refering to that as the worst CoC death ever. Oh yes, he died, of course. Massive blood loss, if you can believe it... :smalltongue:


The other story occured with a new group of players. Trapped in a church during an exorcism, one of them was unsure of what to do. So he began to flirt with a nun. He then asked me if he could convince her to have sex with him. :smallconfused: I decided to play along, so I told him it would take a LOT of convincing. He spent the next few rounds rolling Fast Talk and Persuade rolls. He did good on a few of 'em... and then he got a Critical on a Persuasion roll. Not just any crit... but a "1", which is the best you can roll.

:smalleek:

I politely explained that while what followed was allowed, I would not be describing it. I told him that he and the nun headed off the confession box, but I would go no further than that. The rest would be left up to his imagination.

Leave it to one of the other players to remember that he knew where the door to the priest's side of the box was... Upon his statement that he wanted to go watch while drinking his moonshine, I told him the same thing - you do so, but I won't be telling you what you see. Use your imagination...


The only real reason I let them do all that, though, is because there would be a zombie attack in a few turns. And if they happened to be busy at the time... well... that was their own fault. :smallbiggrin: Luckily, the 3rd player kept his wits about him, and the sounds of shotgun fire a few rounds later diverted everyone's attention back to the issue at hand...



So yeah... The moral of my stories is: Make sure your players are okay with what you're describing, and make sure you are okay with describing what they do.

ScIaDrd
2009-08-31, 02:32 PM
Ugh that just sick and wrong and and generraly gross. But is also it isnīt how it isnīt how i imagine evil. A evil person, in my mide is the one that is so devoted to their cause, that he wwell not stop at anything (within boundaries of good taste of course, which Iīm afraid have been greatly overstepped in this caase) to achieve their goals, stop ingore laws and mores, lie cheat, intimidate, extort and chielfy, exploit his enemiesī(and occasionaly his aliesī) flaws to their extreme, and most inportantly will besthealty ,subtle and snug about all this, covering his tracks at all time, while having the confidence and audacity, to foil his oponentsī countermoves effectively. (maybe also further ensnaring them in his nefarious plans.)
I suggest that you an you players readthis page on TVTropes (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/XanatosPlannedThisIndex), as well asthis (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheChessmaster) and this one (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MagnificentBastard)
Other that that I would have stooped them befefore they did it or sic a troop of paladins that, just happed to be passing trough the area" as a TPK or a vigilliante angel of vegence or the mist of Ravenlost and an instat darklordship (with seperate domains for each player, just for kicks:smallcool:)
I wouldenīt have let them get away with something like this. either "No you donīt do this , its disgusting" or rocks fall everyone dies. Period.

Narmoth
2009-08-31, 02:35 PM
In the previous campaign I dm-ed, I let down my restriction on playing good or neutral characters. One of the players made then an evil thief.
The campaign was inspired, amongst others, by the computer game Thief, so they were supposed to break into places and steal things if they so wanted.

Now, they break in into one of the 2 goldsmith shops on a bridge. Finding not enough gold (after all, I won't give that much cash away at low lvl), they broke into the neighboring house, where the goldsmith and his family lived.
They enter straight into the goldsmiths sleeping room, where they kill the goldsmith.
They also kill his wife and some children as they run down the stairs.
Now, I wanted this to be a mostly good campaign about living under, and maybe opposing an evil regime, so I wasn't very happy about it.
What I did, was to have the masked thieves breaking into the other goldsmith shop at the same time (the players saw it before entering this goldsmith shop) to enter and investigate the noise.

They come to late to save all of the family, but they have spellcasters, and raise the killed part of the family. Being not only thieves, but also part of the resistance, they were later supposed to hunt the players for their misdeeds.

Keshay
2009-08-31, 03:42 PM
I once actually PK'd a fellow party memeber when he announced his intent to violate the daughter of a noble we had recently deposed. We were playing a evil-tending pirate/privateer campaign, and the player in question was undoubtedly the most evil of the bunch.

While in the process of the deed, I asked the gm if said character and victim were to be considered defenseless. Upon a yes answer I announced a cdg. The other player tried to roleplay his anger that I'd killed her before he was done. I then cast Trap the Soul and politely explained it was him I'd killed. When angrily asked why I'd done this I told him I may be playing an evil character, but I wasn't playing a sick F*@%.

The rest of the party was a bit perturbed, but as you can deduce I was the Wizard, so no one really wanted to test my resolve not to release the soul from the gem... this led to them announcing thier intent to do the actual evil things away from my character. Of course I learned about it all through divination.

Turned out I was the BBGG fight for them when the campaign ended. I lost, but it was still quite fulfilling. Since them I'v not really had the taste for evil campaigns.

Lycan 01
2009-08-31, 03:48 PM
-awesomeness-

That was awesome. :smallbiggrin: I gotta ask, did you take any of 'em with you at the end?

Name_Here
2009-08-31, 04:15 PM
If something the characters are doing makes you uncomfortable you say no and you say no hard. You give your players power over your NPCs they will take it too far it doesn't mean they are bad people they just get carried away.

The second you get uncomfortable you need to just say something along the lines of "No you don't do that *Stuff* at my table." Also keep a weather eye out if anybody else is uncomfortable at what is going on.

erikun
2009-08-31, 04:25 PM
I think there's a misprint in the first post. You put "crazy". I think you meant "sadistic".

Honestly, it sounds like the party was testing the limits of what you'd allow them to do in-game. It sounds like they didn't find any, which doesn't bode well for future encounters. If the future, you might want the neighbor to stop by, the wandering adventurer to come up from the basement, etc. to put a stop to such nonsense.

Unless you're running an evil campaign, of course. If that's the case, then my question is "What did you really expect?!?"

Or send them to Ravenloft. I like that one. :smallbiggrin:

Wings of Peace
2009-08-31, 04:42 PM
I'm on the side of it's all a matter of what you're comfortable with. If you as the DM aren't comfortable with how evil the players are being talk to them about it and tell them to tone it down a little. Or just start a new adventure. It's a game. If it's not fun what's the point of playing?

Jayngfet
2009-08-31, 06:52 PM
This means for what serious reprecussions. The woman's prolly going to have to join up with a holy order since she has no where to go, which will teach her to wield powers for justice, as already said, leading her to the PC's with several allies.

As well said before the lord and his men are going to be pissed since now you killed their serfs, and I doubt the PC's can consistently hit knights and fighters in full plate.

Another point is they stink of corpses and fire, no one's going to talk to them for DAYS, and people nearby who'll have found out will immediately know who did it, and at second level they don't have much defense.

And then there's whatever fey are nearby, who'll regret the fact that the people planting the plants every spring are gone now.

And in general a whole list of things that can go on.

LordZarth
2009-08-31, 07:03 PM
What they did has absolutely nothing to do with evil.

Evil people are usually normal people. Your party is flat out insane.

I would have just said: no, you don't. Your characters aren't insane.

Or, have the normal consequences occur. A good adventuring party comes. And why can't they be 5 levels higher?

Yukitsu
2009-08-31, 07:10 PM
What they did has absolutely nothing to do with evil.

Evil people are usually normal people. Your party is flat out insane.

I would have just said: no, you don't. Your characters aren't insane.

Or, have the normal consequences occur. A good adventuring party comes. And why can't they be 5 levels higher?

5 levels is nothing. My psychotic evil character had to deal with people twice her level (9//7 vs. 18) using cooperative casting to get off huge binding spells, not to mention the holy words. And the fact that it was an army of 600, and not a party. I lived, and questioned the fact that I did. DMs response was "I used holy word on you, what do you think I intended."

My vote? An aspect of a diety. :smalltongue: Prove that god does care.

Ripped Shirt Kirk
2009-08-31, 07:25 PM
Holy ****.


My solution for this is:

A. Kick them out of your house, tell the police (they are their for a reason), change your locks, and stay away from them.

B. If you are OK (Which I am certianly not) with this kind of behaviour, and keep letting them play with you, have the NPC's get ressurected, and turn into level 80 Barbarians, and have them commit the acts the PC's commited to them, on them. Irony, how I love thee.

Also, Tomb of Horrors, Every monster is level 80, the characters are level 1, and they automaticly role ones on everything they do.

Temet Nosce
2009-08-31, 07:58 PM
I simply want to note my whole hearted approval of your wonderful, wonderful players and to request that you post their future adventures. Although I'm disappointed they didn't somehow make use of all this carnage... With a little effort they could've driven part of the family insane and convinced them it was all their fault.

SilverClawShift
2009-08-31, 07:59 PM
This is...rough.

But it's no worse than anything the Marquis de Sade wrote.

If your players want to be vicious, hedonistically sadisitc little bastards, remind them that it's easier to get away with stuff when you're ROYALTY. A small group of penniless wanderers? The hammer will drop.
But that's what happens in an evil campaign. The good guys come looking for you (and the other bad guys that don't like you consider you an easy target).

Thrawn183
2009-08-31, 08:15 PM
I had a CE rogue who secrectly worshipped the dark goddess of murder. I always made sure to try and not take things too far though. He also started an orphanage. :smallbiggrin:

Mongoose87
2009-08-31, 08:24 PM
I had a CE rogue who secrectly worshipped the dark goddess of murder. I always made sure to try and not take things too far though. He also started an orphanage. :smallbiggrin:

Were most of the orphans his doing?

ColonelFuster
2009-08-31, 10:58 PM
A glimpse into the mind of The Colonel

Okay, I'm running a fun (currently) low level evil campaign (3.5)(lvl2).

Low-level evil. Oh, how I remember how annoying those floating balls of light used to be.

They completed their first adventure, helping a constable by "taking care" of an evil hobgoblin group-thing. They found out that the hobgoblins weren't evil and the constable was, they helped the hobgoblin leader kill the constable.

Good times. Evil helping evil is the core of an evil PC party.

Then later killed the hobgoblin and took all their stuff. I was fine with that. Yeah, evil, betrayals, whatever,

go on.

then they felt like killing a commoner. Still fine with that.

I would have asked for an IC reason to kill the commoner... but go on...

So they help the commoner harvest wheat on his farm in exchange for a place to spend the night, I ruled that that would be fine with him. So around midnight

Awesome.

the wizard casts color spray on all four commoners (him&his family) knocking them unconscious for about 6 rounds. Now here is where things get really creepy.

They weren't creepy before, what with the four evil people?

They kill the farmer,tie up the wife and two daughters.

Fade to black.

Then one character rapes the wife, kills her and the older daughter. Then they force-feed the older sister's toes,fingers,one eye, to the younger daughter. Then one of them takes out the farmer's brain and later eats it. They take out both of the farmer's eyes and tongue, and puts his tongue in his eye socket. They use their grappling hook and rope to attach the farmer's and older daughter's dead bodies to the ceiling. They nail the wife's feet to the floor. Splatter blood everywhere, splash oil everywhere, steal the little money they had, wash all the blood off themselves, and set the place on fire and leave.

OH GOD WHY DIDN'T YOU FADE TO BLACK

(I can't remember what they did with the other daughter(I think they let her go))

This seems like an important detail.

I was retching and gagging through parts of this "event".

You have the power to say, "Two minutes later, you're leaving the house, washing blood off of yourself."

My old DM would have said there was a retired 20th lvl barbarian somehow living in the house and would have killed them, but I allowed them to get away, because it would be kinda realistic.

In D&D, Yondalla seeing these events two weeks in advance and sending a mid-level halfling cleric to stop them is just as realistic as them getting away scot free. Always remember that in this world, miracles actually happen for the faithful.

Now should I allow them to do this again?

Obviously not, if it makes you uncomfortable. You're a person at the table, too.

Or should I somehow stop them?

Yes. Do this.

Or should I never had allowed them to do this in the first place?

As soon as something makes me uncomfortable as the DM, I make something else happen. In your example, a hobgoblin ranger would have burst in the door as soon as the flashy little color spray went off, having tracked the EPCs down. Or, a good-aligned (class X) from one of the PCs background shows up, "finally" finding them (Please god tell me they have backgrounds to justify how messed up they were).
The power is yours! In short, don't play with /b/tards and you should be fine. If they (like so many other gamers) still live with their parents, FOR GODS SAKE TELL THEM.

FoE
2009-08-31, 11:16 PM
It's your own fault, really. If you play an evil campaign and don't lay down any ground rules beforehand (no rape, etc.), then you can't blame the players for acting out their sadistic fantasies.

In my experience, even the most virtuous player turns into Gregor Clegane (http://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/Gregor_Clegane[) when told to act Evil without being put on a leash. I attribute it the lack of inhibitions from playing Evil, the loss of repurcussions that would come with RL crimes, and the complete absence of guilt that comes from the knowledge this is actually real.

If you're really disturbed by their behaviour, drop an angel on them with the words "YOU HAST OFFENDED THE D&D GODS" and start over.

Dienekes
2009-08-31, 11:49 PM
Heh, I generally leave evidence of this sort of stuff to motivate and disgust my players. RPing through it though, heh.

While I will admit I'm a bit disturbed. If they want to play no holds bar evil let them. But BE SURE that they understand that there are limits of what you'll RP through.

Ex. Player 1: "Ok I tie up the wife."
You: "Ok now, we all know what you guys are gonna do. Let's just say you have your fun and keep going beyond that part."
Player 2: "Aww, come on. I had something truly terrifying planned."
You: "More to the reason to skip then. Now, on to after the events..."

Tokiko Mima
2009-08-31, 11:54 PM
If this makes you uncomfortable, stop the evil campaign. If someone in the room is not enjoying themselves, it's a problem, especially if that's the DM.

If you decide you want to continue, consider repercussions. The daughter that escaped will find someone to recount the tale of what the EPC's did to her family. Wanted posters will be posted and spread, no one will sell or even open their doors to them. Additionally the full force of the city guard will arrive ASAP at any town they try to enter in order to arrest, try, convict, and sentence them to death. Remember this is D&D, and speak with dead is not a very difficult spell to acquire.

The cost of being evil is that no one likes or trusts you anymore. The EPC's have enough helpless and innocent blood on their hands that even the dullest mind should sense they are to be avoided. Don't let them dodge the consequences of their repugnant actions, even though they might think they 'got away with it scott-free.'

Wizzardman
2009-09-01, 12:06 AM
My personal idea here would be to have the living daughter come back, having made an infernal pact of some kind and a literal taste for flesh. Have her hunt the PCs with demonic powers, pin them down and begin to strip the succulent flesh from their bones. Turn her into their worst nightmares, stalking them even while they sleep. Now they have to live with the monster that they created. I'm sure there's a dark god of cannibalism somewhere in the splat books that would be glad to empower her against these nutters.

Have them enter a town and be begged by a terrified populace to help them against something that's killing the people, eating their flesh and stealing all their valuables (the key lure for the evil). They think "Hurr hurr we'll help them then run with the gold." The daughter has no interest in the gold. It's merely a lure to get the PCs into her domain. For even more fun, have the PCs be indebted to an order of clerics/paladins/good guys who drive her off just as she's moving in for the kill. That should really stick in the craw of evil players.

This. If you send good guys against your players, they'll hardly care. That's what villains expect to happen, after all. And, in return, when they inevitably win (being PCs and all) they'll do far, far worse things to the good guys.

Your best bet: throw something worse than they are at them, and make it their fault. Hell, just throwing evil at them is fun.

In the last evil game I ran, my PCs were searching for a number of major evil artifacts, so they could influence the inherent nature of the world in a more... interesting direction.

One of the people supposedly guarding an artifact was, in fact, an Illithid. Now, this Illithid, being a sensible Illithid with knowledge of the power of his artifact, decided to play that sort of **** up, and pretend that he had the power to control some of the fundamental laws of the universe. He filled his lair with specially animated runes, and set it up so that whenever someone disturbed the runes, lights started flashing, the runes started changing, and the lair would shake with a brief earthquake-like effect.

When the PCs showed up, he played this up as hard as possible, just to convince the PCs not to mess with him. And, since his ruse was working, he decided to play with them a bit.

You see, this Illithid was a bit of a traditionalist. He liked his slaves--the more mindless, the better. And he preferred Githyanki and Githzerai slaves over any other type; after all, they're all descendants of a species the Illithids had bred for slavery, and said Mind Flayer did love his irony.

And, as his divinations had shown him, one of the PCs was a Githzerai. So, said Illithid picks out his youngest, most attractive female Githzerai slave, and proceeded to taunt him--mentioning what good slaves they make, thinking about eating her, offering to pimp her out to the Githzerai party member, that sort of thing.

By the end of that session, the other parties members were forced to literally (in-game) hold said PC back. They were too scared of the Illithid to challenge him, and too desperate for the item to dare risk offending him, but the Githzerai character could barely speak from all the anger he felt.

These were characters who had, in previous games, killed random commoners for making jokes. Who enjoyed randomly setting towns on fire. Who practically lived for the chance to kill things. They later went on to kill angels, sell captured Solars for body parts, and transform low-level paladins into blind, deaf squirrels for the sheer fun of it.

And the one thing I sent against them that scared them the most? The one thing that truly got their attention? Hell, the one thing that got a party member to even consider a fairly good-aligned action? A single, moderately-powerful, evil Illithid, and an enslaved, mindwiped girl. In other words, a single NPC a little too much like them, and with just enough nastiness directed towards them to make the PCs hate that Illithid's guts.

That was a damn good game.


Edit: Another good recommendation? Encourage them to be intelligent evil. Intelligent evil is much more fun than random-serial-killer evil, and quite frequently involves less... mess and more getting things done. Why bother with all this random raping and murdering? It only attracts attention.

Better to avoid the mess, and use your potential wisely. Ignore the commoners, or treat them well, as that can buy you their allegiance. Avoid messier crimes; they make ruling an empire so much more difficult. And save the murder and mayhem for more important people; you'll go much farther that way.

PLUN
2009-09-01, 12:15 AM
Well, beating a dead horse here, but when something stops being fun for someone, they need to be in an environment where they can express this outside the game. Methods within the game enviroment might not express approval, but suggest the game is acceptable in it's current format. It may not be. Sending in game enforcement or even hand of god actions against the perp creates a world against that action, or consequences they can deal with. Even a rocks falls everyone dies scenario cements it as 'happened' or 'canon'.

Don't indulge that. Allow it to be taken into the real world, in civil conversation with the player characters. My current group, for example, is tromping around through cults, xenos and grimdark. They didn't want to agree a list of taboos they may never encounter, so they play in an enviroment that they can say 'no' to content without argument and judgement. I'm with a bunch of mature, level headed people so it goes without saying. It was said anyway, and I intend to enforce that caveat hard if it ever comes up.

There may be nothing wrong. This may be the game everyone wants to play. Just remember all that stuff you hear about 'the greater good'? Generally does not apply with human feelings. One person being grossed out and miserable when they should be enjoying a game with their friends is no less a flaw in the game if three other people or playing along or fourty people are having the time of their lives. Have fun however you want, but with lines and crossing them minority rules.

If you're cool with it, well, a vengeful family member or friend finding the crime can be a very motivated investigator, ESPECIALLY when his sniffing around finds him a spellcaster who is at least sympathetic or hired. They're not the only ones adventuring while gaining contacts and gear...

Yahzi
2009-09-01, 12:33 AM
In other words, a single NPC a little too much like them

One time I had a party traveling around the world in their flying boat and causing mayhem. They enjoyed making up grosser and grosser actions.

Eventually I sent them to an underground Orc kingdom that was so hideous, so cruel, so overwhemingly evil that they couldn't stand it. I grossed them out.

They were good guys for like, 2. 3 sessions after that.

:smallbiggrin:

Decoy Lockbox
2009-09-01, 02:48 AM
Sounds like garden-variety serial killer shenanigans to me. You guys need to stop being so sensitive. Although I suppose if I hadn't seen so many serial killers shows or read as many news articles like this (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/1703595.stm), I'd be shocked too.

But yeah, sounds like a bunch of rookie evil-ers didn't' know how to act and so decided to break out some psychotic stuff. Everyone knows evil is all about nefarious schemes and power grabs, not raping random commoners. God knows there's enough of that going on in real life, no need to bring it into a fantasy game.

Also, to the OP, never ever read Cannibal Corpse (http://metal-archives.com/band.php?id=186) or Devourment (http://metal-archives.com/band.php?id=818) lyrics. You have been warned!

Philaenas
2009-09-01, 03:32 AM
Right, it just seems to me the players wanted to do something different that time, as the OP said they had played good or neutral parties for 5 years already. And of course, once you go evil for the first time, this approach described is the most obvious and probably the most venting. I assume they will have had their fill of it after maybe two more tries and move on to other stuff. Seriously, this is not that bad, sometimes people like this stuff, horror movies you know?

Oh yes, and death metal of course (See previous post) :smalltongue:

Caewil
2009-09-01, 07:33 AM
Bah. Those players are sissies. To do things properly, you have to cook their flesh while they're still alive (with a torch or something) and then rip it off with your teeth. Skinning one of them alive and peeling off their fingernails also works. Remember to have the others watch. Forcing them to drink scalding hot water and then punching them in the stomach... Then gouge their eyes out. Finally, cast a cure spell to restore them to full HP (and regeneration if high level) plus a modify memory spell. Then leave. You've gotten your sick pleasure with no lasting physical or psychological harm done.

Foryn Gilnith
2009-09-01, 07:41 AM
1) Not to be twisted or evil, but many of you are, in fact, reacting too violently to this. The people involved are actual people, more than likely sane and/or good in real life. Assume good faith. React based on what would reasonably solve the problem with the least harm done overall, and not based on overly emotional disgust.

2) The point remains, though, that the GM was violently sickened. This is a serious problem that needs addressing. Talk to them out of game about it, and frame your argument in hard yet not overly harsh terms. If that doesn't have the desired effect, have the girl and/or the slaughtered family come back as horrific undead to torment them. There are /b/tards, practically evil people, or just plain insensitive people here that would be glad to help you solve your problems. The solution of out-creeping them may not work if you are uncomfortable with gorn (which you may very well be, after this incident).

Melamoto
2009-09-01, 08:12 AM
Retroactively introduce the Sanity (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/campaigns/sanity.htm) variant, and have them lose a LOT of sanity points for that. Try something like 2d10+5. After that, if they go too hard, then they will end up insane and unplayable. That should keep them on a leash, and make sure that they know what will happen if they don't show restraint.

Katana_Geldar
2009-09-01, 08:37 AM
What is the most important thing to happen in a D&D Game? To have fun, and that especially involves you.

I don't think there's anything wrong with a DM's Saving throw, and maybe a pre-game growl that actions will have consequences.

onthetown
2009-09-01, 08:50 AM
Keep it a lawful campaign. They can still be evil, and they might even have more fun trying to shape the laws to their advantages rather than just barging in and being completely chaotic. I always have at least one lawful evil character and she always makes everything a little bit more interesting :)

readsaboutd&d
2009-09-01, 09:00 AM
Make them assume every single consequence possible. First they suffer an insanity effect (must be completely negative). Then, some get a disease for doing some of that stuff with dirty commoners. Then, they are captured by a band of rangers who are 1 member bigger than their group and 1 level higher on average. They are captured and get a beating that makes them lose some hp/bab/spell slots/... permanently until they get cast on them a spell wich is currently much to high for their level. When they escape, they find all equipment they buy 1.5 times more expensive than usual and people have very little cooperation. A lot of accidents will tend to happen (bunch of flying bricks, equipment stolen, roof gave way on them,...). Groups will be after them, frequently using hit and run tactics and led by an overleved crusading paladin. In the underworld, they find a gang led by the youger daughter gone psycho, having acquired rogue levels and a demonic template, attacking them mixed with undead including the commoners as high level undead. Then set objectives to cancel the problem in a suitably evil manner (kill paladin, overthrow the lord of the land, destroy the rebellion, get evil clerics to cure the effects of the beating,...) and make that your campaign.

Keshay
2009-09-01, 09:19 AM
That was awesome. :smallbiggrin: I gotta ask, did you take any of 'em with you at the end?

Oh yes, I would have easily slaughtered them all, but I was supposed to lose per the game narrative so I was given some pretty severe limitations. I actually ended the fight with a retributive strike with my staff. Unfortunately, I didn't travel to another plane. I took all but one guy (the cleric) with me though. Good times.

Delwugor
2009-09-01, 09:47 AM
Keep it a lawful campaign. They can still be evil, and they might even have more fun trying to shape the laws to their advantages rather than just barging in and being completely chaotic. I always have at least one lawful evil character and she always makes everything a little bit more interesting :)

I did a campaign with a player who ran a LE Paladin of Hextor and modeled him after his view of a corporate executive. He was a very productive member of society as an unofficial trouble shooter (fixer) for the city of Greyhawk and helped had Hardby stop an uprising (ruthlessly). He was absolutely ruthless in achieving his goals and he punished those who he thought deserved it without mercy.
One of the best characters I had ever seen played.

Umael
2009-09-01, 11:24 AM
Sounds like garden-variety serial killer shenanigans to me. You guys need to stop being so sensitive. Although I suppose if I hadn't seen so many serial killers shows or read as many news articles like this (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/1703595.stm), I'd be shocked too.

Just because you are not as squeamish as the OP and several of the posters does not mean that they "need to stop being so sensitive." I could just as easily accuse you of never being sensitive enough, but that wouldn't accomplish anything either, would it?




Oh yes, I would have easily slaughtered them all, but I was supposed to lose per the game narrative so I was given some pretty severe limitations. I actually ended the fight with a retributive strike with my staff. Unfortunately, I didn't travel to another plane. I took all but one guy (the cleric) with me though. Good times.

...wait?

Your PC was railroad'd to lose?

Irreverent Fool
2009-09-01, 11:37 AM
I haven't read the whole thread, but what I have seen is a lot of the following:

1) Don't play with them any more

2) Punish them with sanity loss/diseases

3) Kill the characters outright

While I think there should definitely be potential in-game consequences, I don't think any of these are the proper course of action. I'm sure I'm not the only one who has suggested:

Speak with the players calmly and rationally and tell them that this sort of role-playing makes you uncomfortable and you would prefer that their 'evil' stay more along the lines of run-of-the mill fantasy violence and evil supervillain-esque plots.

I find the type of roleplaying mentioned in the original post distasteful but it is your responsibility to speak up when this sort of thing happens, OP. Walk away if you need to make a point. Those saying that these people are dangerous are wrong. There is nothing wrong with roleplaying these actions within the context of a game as long as you are within a mature group that understands what's going on (and also preferably not in a public place like a gaming shop).

You can possibly reach a compromise with the players who want to play murderous psychopaths if you don't mind them doing so.

Ultimately OP, I understand that your players are a little bonkers but the problem here is with your inability to remove yourself from the uncomfortable situation with the various means at your disposal.

obnoxious
sig

Keshay
2009-09-01, 12:16 PM
...wait?

Your PC was railroad'd to lose?

Well, yeah. Otherwise it would have been the equivalent of ending the campaign on a "Rocks fall, everyone dies, except Arik's the one who killed you all".

It wouldn't have been terribly fun for the other 4 players if they'd just been beaten.

This was a game in college, I was the only one who didn't and play, I was the only optimized character (quite by accident). We had to end the campaign because the semester was over and ony two of us were sticking around for summer sessions. I didn't mind playing to lose because it was still fun.

In the end, I did "win", the people of the city I was defending from the rest of the party had me raised. No one else was rezzed in the epilogue. I figure I hunted the surviving evil character down and prevented him from raising the rest of the party.

Ormur
2009-09-01, 01:44 PM
Wow, that's awesomely horrible. Yeah if you can't stomach deprived stuff like that (either as a player or a DM) you should ask the players to stop it and have some serious consequences if they don't. I wouldn't be comfortable with that kind of stuff in my group either, especially not the rape.

But this is all fictional of course. D&D is escapism and if everyone is OK with venting steam by playing deprived serial killers it doesn't mean there's anything (seriously) wrong with them. Horror movie and novel writers must think about stuff like this to write it and we read it.

On the other hand if I the DM is equally deprived he can take revenge on his players by having NPC's do the same to them. :smallamused:

monkey3
2009-09-01, 03:23 PM
I know I am late to the party, but I will throw in my 2 cents.

For me there is a very real line that separates reality and fantasy. My personal opinion is that if you don't see this line, or don't have such a line, you should not play RPGs. I for one would certainly not feel safe playing with you. I feel that those who take about calling the police, TPKing the party by rocks from the sky and (apologies in advance) the OP have missed this line.

The OP says the players are fine people who would not do this stuff in RL. Why get squeamish about a story? Do you get squeamish about the color purple in a painting, or a particular note in a song? A descriptive paragraph in a book is simply a "color" the author chose to convey a mood. This stuff didn't really happen!

So what would I do if my players did this in a campaign? First I'd congratulate them in my head for playing something they have not played before. Then I'd bring the hammer down, the way it would be brought down in game:

The mayor calls a town meeting. The local priest's 100gp reward for the capture of the perpetrators of this heinous act has spread the story. The local baron has added 1000gp to the total. Low level parties are pouring into town, smelling an adventure. During the mayor's speech, they see a dot in the sky. It looks like a flying lizard with wings, bearing a rider. It approaches fast and lands in the town square. It is a raptor with wings, carrying an 8' tall man in black robes. He speaks in a low menacing whisper, followed by a loud demonic echo. "I am here about the job. I AM HERE ABOUT THE JOB. I will find those responsible. I WILL FIND THOSE RESPONSIBLE. I will take one of the corpses left behind. I WILL TAKE ONE OF THE CORPSES LEFT BEHIND."

With that one of the coffins on display floats towards him and is grabbed by his hand. He then looks at what is obviously a Paladin in an adventuring group, and says: "ahh, a paladin. AHH A PALADIN. Too bad, no time to chat. TOO BAD, NO TIME TO CHAT." The raptor and rider swiftly take off into the sky.

Later at home, he looks over the corpse and muses. "How amusing. No tongue for "Speak With Dead." Oh well. "Animate Dead" and "Awaken Undead." The skeleton rises. "Now, give me a description of who did this to you. NOW GIVE ME A DESCRIPTION OF WHO DID THIS TO YOU"

... To cut descriptions short ...
A "scry" later, he is sitting in a chair, the animated skeleton next to him, he faces the party. He likes their style. From now they work for him. But no more messy stuff. It's bad for business, and attracts attention. He kills the first party member to object, and turns the corpse over to the town.

Take it from there.

Erts
2009-09-01, 03:46 PM
The thing is, what kind of evil?

In real life, evil people don't go around doing that. Sure, they might backstab a lot (as result of a harsher world they live in then ours,) but they don't go around eating brains. Thats just http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main.LawfulStupidChaoticStupid (Evil Stupid.)

2 punishments:

Realistic: The word gets sent to the law enforcement, and they are hunted down merclessly. They will be on the run for pretty much the rest of the campaign from the law, (if there is one,) until they find some way to destroy the law itself, (usurp the king?) or run to a different country. If your players go "but we cleaned up after ourselves! We were low level then!" you should explain that extremely brutal crimes like that almost always leave traces, and thats how extremely violent psychopaths usually go.

Unrealistic: The daughter that they left develops MASSIVE sorcerous powers, (either immediately or later) and devotes herself solely to finding, torturing, and killing the party. Would likely be a major villian.

I prefer both.

The reason I like these is because you can continue the game, but they still have to suffer the consequences.

I think from now on you should say before they do stuff like this "Why?" Not "No," but in a sense, why would your charecter do this for besides the fact that it is http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ForTheEvulz (so EEVIL!!)

Weasel of Doom
2009-09-01, 03:48 PM
I honestly don't think its a big problem and I really think that the people saying kill tham all are overreacting. I would just tell them you're not comfortable with that level of detail and then I'd sick some level-appropriate (or slightly above) power characters after them.

Sharkman1231
2009-09-01, 04:57 PM
Well, our group got together again yesterday. I didn't talk about it with them much, but they didn't pull anything like that again. I think they just needed to vent and were able to for the first time. So everything went well, and I will have the little girl they let go come back for revenge.:smallamused:

Stormageddon
2009-09-01, 07:18 PM
When I was younger I used to be more sick twisted stuff like this (although I don't think I ever went as far as your players did) as I grew up I became more interested in character development and other aspects of the game. Remember it's just a game and only in your mind. Looks like your players might be taking it to far. But what really concerns me is the roleplaying. Did you sign off on there being a rapist and a cannibal in your group? Being evil even CE mean your character has the stomach (pun intended) to eat someones brain. Having no problem with putting a end to someones life is a little bit different than being a rapist or cannibal.

Talk to them about the issue and if you cann't resolve the problem. Stop the campaign if it makes you uncomfortable or you could get Heros of horror and hit them with depravity points and corruption points that's always fun.

Foryn Gilnith
2009-09-01, 07:22 PM
When you have three other people joining in and egging on the depraved, violent fun; I don't consider it any stretch of the imagination that an already hardened, merciless killer wouldn't easily stoop to rape or cannibalism. Hell, eating part of a brain is a material component for one Corrupt spell. Cannibalism especially the right type of person could easily do - if I were given the proper incentive (big bucks, or perhaps saving some lives) and assured that nobody had been killed to provide the brain, I'd consider quaffing a bit of gray matter. And once you've started murder just for the fun of it, rape is a natural outgrowth of that same twisted sadism.

Katana_Geldar
2009-09-01, 11:22 PM
This gives you a very well-thought out solution (http://www.roleplayingpro.com/2009/09/01/the-dm%e2%80%99s-call-consequences/)

Woodsman
2009-09-01, 11:27 PM
Well, our group got together again yesterday. I didn't talk about it with them much, but they didn't pull anything like that again. I think they just needed to vent and were able to for the first time. So everything went well, and I will have the little girl they let go come back for revenge.:smallamused:

That's probably good. Of course, you may not have given them an opportunity to act like that again.

Or maybe they realized they went too far (perhaps even reading this thread :smalltongue:).

lothos
2009-09-02, 02:35 AM
Hi,
Wow, I've just read most of this thread. Some good advice from many people so my thoughts are probably redundant at this point, but here is my advice, for what it's worth -

I used to run a 1st Edition AD&D game back when I was at school. Around 14 years of age, A new player joined the (all male) gaming group and he had a rather immature (even for a 14 year old boy) attitude towards sex and women. Lots of smirking. The first female character he played was a rather shallow emulation of of what he thought a woman should be, basically a nymphomaniac omni-sexual dominatrix. He built a (non optimized) Magic User with a fairly high charisma and wanted to use charm person to have sex with virtually everyone he could, gender and species didn't matter much.

The entire party was Neutral Evil or Chaotic Evil, I should add.

Well, most of the rest of us just ignored it whenever he explained "my character does <<INSERT MINDLESS SEX ACT WITH NPC HERE>>". We just said "OK, moving on". I thought about giving him loads of STDs, but he wouldn't care unless they actually had a measurable impact on his character and even then would probably just use remove disease and keep going.

Eventually I got rather annoyed with him doing this. It was kind of distracting to say nothing of the fact that if our parents heard this kind of thing it wouldn't come across well and would reflect badly on the rest of us. I mean, we weren't above a bit of smirking, we were 14 year old boys, but it was too much. Even though he didn't go as far as this group of players mentioned in the first post of this thread, it wasn't great.

I wanted something that would address the solution ideally removing this character and having him create a less distracting replacement, but not be a DM just saying "hey, your character dies". I wanted ideally for it to be something he would bring on himself and be able to easily avoid if he acted vaguely sensibly as a player.

Now we had a rather crowded poly-theism in our 1st Edition campaigns. We used the ENTIRE population of the 1st edition source book "Legends and Lore" (prior to that named "Deities and Demigods"). Unlike the 3.5 edition source book, it had about 15 or so panthons - Greek, Babylonian, Norse, Japanese, American Indian, Asian India, Sumerian... lots of others. Each pantheon had control of a different part of the world (rather like OOTSverse in fact).

The point is, there was a god for pretty much everything, including a goddess who had purity and chastity in her sphere of influence. Now I forget who it was and what pantheon it was for, but I set a trap for this player that I knew he couldn't resist.

A priestess of this religion encountered the party and begged them for help, offering some serious reward for their help and also some healing they needed quite badly.

But I didn't make it clear what deity (or even the sort of deity) she was a priestess of. She had a very high charisma and "comeliness" (a rather ill thought out optional statistic from the 1st Edition "Unearthed Arcana" source book that measured physical beauty). Beings with very high comeliness caused specific favourable reactions. I made sure that this effect was noticeable to the PCs in that another NPC reacted to her beauty.

So predictably he pretty soon tried to charm her in to having same-sex intercourse with him. The priestess failed her save and submitted. When the spell wore off she realised what she had done and begged her deity to intercede. At this point the player realised which goddess she worshipped and really went for the nuclear option. He didn't like the idea of a goddess of purity and chastity and decided he would humiliate the priestess and her deity.

I'll spare you the details, but he said that his character grabbed her holy symbol, desecrated it in a sexual manner and then used it in a way to further violate the priestess. Pretty distasteful really. I didn't think he would go that far.

However this gave me all the ammunition I needed to have the goddess notice the incident, despite the priestess being quite low level.

The goddess sent an avatar to the prime plane and utterly destroyed the character. The other PCs stood back and let it happen, their characters were evil anyway and they didn't mind they player getting what he deserved. The avatar removed the body to "purify" it with holy fire, preventing resurrection too.

I internally debated if I should have the avatar also punished the rest of the party for letting it happen as accessories, but I didn't.

This worked to a large extent because the other players were unhappy (in varying degrees) with this players behaviour and didn't have any reason to support him. If all of your players are working together to steer your game in this direction, this approach might not work.

So to summarise I'd like to suggest you find some reasonable in-game way to deal with this if possible, with holy forces taking some kind of revenge upon those who perpetrate depravity on the innocent. If you go with this, I think it needs to be made clear that it's the extent of the depravity that caused the intervention. They can be evil and do evil things without an epic level paladin with a holy avenger jumping out from behind every rock, just not that depraved sort of evil.

Another in game solution might be for them to attract the attention of fiendish powers, say a powerful demon. Then the demon approaches them with a tempting offer to "enhance" their ability to perpetrate evil, but of course it has such a high price to pay that it effectively removes these characters from the game or causes them to need help from holy powers, requiring them to mend their ways...... handle this with care though.

If you fear that killing off the whole party will just lead them to create a whole new set of similar characters doing exactly the same thing, then you have to decide if this group is right for you. But there might be a way to steer things without leaving the group.

Perhaps have 2 or more campaigns running in parallel ? My gaming group back then usually had 2 or 3 separate campaigns running in separate multi verses that never interacted with each other. Usually one had a heroic party and often one evil. The evil one was a change of scene whenever the group as a whole wanted to let off some steam and kill things mindlessly. The tone of the campaigns was different too with the evil one being more "kick in the door" than the good one........ usually :-) The good campaigns usually got more focus.

I hope this helps. It's hard to manage players sometimes. If it's too hard, don't try. Play with someone else, or play some other game.

Cheers !

Irreverent Fool
2009-09-02, 04:34 AM
... To cut descriptions short ...
A "scry" later, he is sitting in a chair, the animated skeleton next to him, he faces the party. He likes their style. From now they work for him. But no more messy stuff. It's bad for business, and attracts attention. He kills the first party member to object, and turns the corpse over to the town.

Take it from there.

This is great. It deals at once with the OP's (understandable) distaste of monstrous behaviour and gives a nice railroad station for everyone to get on.

obnoxious
sig

kamikasei
2009-09-02, 06:15 AM
A. Kick them out of your house, tell the police (they are their for a reason), change your locks, and stay away from them.

This is absurd overreaction.

The players went overboard in pushing the boundaries with their Eeeeeeeeeeeevil characters. Tell them you're not comfortable DMing what amounts to a splatter flick fantasy, and will be skipping over anything that sickens you in future. Tell them also that (I'm assuming) you're not interested in running a pointless escalation of atrocity and outrage, so they should be trying to have actual motivations for their characters to work from and towards and avoid the Stupid Evil shenanigans.