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C.Penguin
2011-01-22, 04:13 PM
Hey Playground,

So in the campaign I've been playing for some time, there exists an NPC who is supposed to be one of those loveable rogueish types who seems to know everything with his underground connections. Originally before I joined the group the party hired him to be their "permanent consultant" which meant that in exchange for 5% of party loot, we could call on him whenever we wanted to get information, which certainly seemed like a good idea.

However the issue I have with this character is that not only does he have an irritating personality, he clearly knows EVERYTHING the DM knows. For example, my character recently acquired a large amount of cash that the party does not know about, and the DM told me that, so long as I gave this NPC his 5% of the treasure, no one would know. I asked the DM how exactly he would know, because he wasn't with us when I got the cash and would really have no way of knowing besides because the DM does. It's fairly obvious, at least to me, that the DM has this NPC here in order to play his own character (the dreaded DMPC). In addition, the party has apparently attempted to kill this NPC several times and he has been magicked away when there was seriously no actual way to do it. I even went so far as to ask the DM if this NPC is killable and he said "it's not likely."

So Playground, how would you handle this situation, and what do you think I should do about this rather bothersome NPC. As a final note, my character is totally evil with few moral things to worry about, so any solution is a viable solution.

Kelvara
2011-01-22, 04:17 PM
Get an antimagic field, grapple him, and beat or poison him until he's dead. Though it sounds like the issue is with the DM and not the NPC.

Asema
2011-01-22, 04:21 PM
I hate to say it, but if the DM is breaking all law and logic in running this character, you have little hope of killing him within your means. In the immortal words of the Spy (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FzYjNXpo8Fs), maybe you should just give up, partner. At least, of settling this in-game.

Instead, talk to your DM about your problems with this NPC and how you'd like to resolve them. You could simply ask that the DM make him killable, if a challenge. Maybe even get the DM to base an adventure around this sort of thing! You could ask the DM to make him tolerable, or what have you. You could even simply tell him that you'd like to just forget about this NPC forever and your character would break off all contact with him, if you had any chance of successfully doing so.

But whatever you do, I'd say that it's best to avoid trying to settle this in-game. It just won't work if the DM is attached to this character.

C.Penguin
2011-01-22, 04:21 PM
Ha yeah I was thinking that while walking today. And yeah the DM is a pretty odd dude; the game is fun but the DM is pretty controlling; his thing is "making sure his players don't have a sense of entitlement," which...well who knows.

Private-Prinny
2011-01-22, 04:22 PM
If your DM is dead set on keeping this guy alive, nothing you can do will be able to take him out. I'd talk to the DM about this if you reaaally can't stand this guy. In-character, your only options are to pay him the money, or let the party find out.

Asema
2011-01-22, 04:24 PM
Ha yeah I was thinking that while walking today. And yeah the DM is a pretty odd dude; the game is fun but the DM is pretty controlling; his thing is "making sure his players don't have a sense of entitlement," which...well who knows.

That sounds bad on the surface, but it might just be that he's trying to reflect that you're a small fish in a really, really big pond -- which is a realistic thing to do for characters that go about murdering and commiting theft and all sorts of crimes. But he shouldn't make the situation utterly hopeless, because that's generally not fun unless you're a masochist, and in my opinion he definitely shouldn't try using a GMPC to enforce that sort of feeling.

Arutema
2011-01-22, 04:27 PM
Hey Playground,

So in the campaign I've been playing for some time, there exists an NPC who is supposed to be one of those loveable rogueish types who seems to know everything with his underground connections. Originally before I joined the group the party hired him to be their "permanent consultant" which meant that in exchange for 5% of party loot, we could call on him whenever we wanted to get information, which certainly seemed like a good idea.

Fire him. In-character. Make it clear that the party no longer requires his services and no longer wishes to travel with him. See what kind of deus ex machina the DM is forced to cook up to keep him with you. It should at least be trickier than magically having him survive an assassination attempt.

jguy
2011-01-22, 04:28 PM
Even if you kill him, as unlikely as that is, this well connected rogue probably has some clerics on retainer to raise dead him in case he dies.

Waker
2011-01-22, 04:38 PM
Curses, Arutema beat me to it. I would just fire the guy. You could also point out that as you were not involved in the original contract, you are in no way bound to honor the agreement and are therefore not required to pay him (after all, if he is providing the others information, they can share it with you.)
Aside from the potential of bad DMing, it is possible that this npc is a wolf in sheep's clothing. They might actually be an agent for the BBEG or even the BBEG himself and that is why you have such difficult in killing him.

true_shinken
2011-01-22, 04:40 PM
Have you considered that the character really does have a way to know exactly what you're doing?
What if he is scrying on you? What if he has someone scrying you 24/7?

Callista
2011-01-22, 04:47 PM
You should be guarding against scrying... but yes, that's a possibility. For low level parties and parties without arcane magic-users, scrying can be a real problem. Remember that you can often detect scrying even if you're not a magic-user, though.

Third the "fire him" suggestion. And if that doesn't work, talk to the DM about this.

Pink
2011-01-22, 05:10 PM
Have you considered that the character really does have a way to know exactly what you're doing?
What if he is scrying on you? What if he has someone scrying you 24/7?

See, this was my initial thought too when reading things over. The party has hired this rogue to be an information broker for the party, and he's apparently very good at his job. If he can gather information so easily, why wouldn't he also be using his sources to check that the party is really giving him his fair share?

Though I will cede the "surviving death attempts' does smack highly of an ill-used DMPC. If this does indeed annoy you and the rest, I would agree that the best bet is to fire him. If a DM doesn't want you to win a fight, you won't win it, but in this case you should be able to walk away from it and not have to worry about it.

Volos
2011-01-22, 05:42 PM
Bring it up to the other players, OOCly. If they can keep their out of game knowledge sperate from their in game knowledge, they should sympathise with you. Then, as a group, bring it up to the DM that this NPC is unrealistic and is not making the game fun for you anymore. If the DM doesn't listen or just doesn't care, then either quit the game and find a new DM or do something drastic. My suggestion would be to pretend as if the NPC doesn't exsist. When he tries to collect payment, ignore him. When he talks to you, walk past him and go back to what you were doing. If he attacks you, become paranoid about 'invisible' attackers. If this really is a DMPC, this sort of behavior will not only get the point across to the DM, but it should infuriate him.

As a DM who has run DMPCs before, I have succumed to the wishes of my players when it comes to their elimination. My favorite DMPC had enough wealth and influence to stay well protected at all times, untill the PCs exploited his weakness... his pride. In a party vs DMPC's group fight, they focused on the DMPC and ended up beheading him with a triple nat 20. He couldn't be raised by the agreement signed before the fight, so he was gone forever. I dealt with it, you DM should be able to do the same.

Pink
2011-01-22, 05:48 PM
My suggestion would be to pretend as if the NPC doesn't exsist. When he tries to collect payment, ignore him. When he talks to you, walk past him and go back to what you were doing. If he attacks you, become paranoid about 'invisible' attackers. If this really is a DMPC, this sort of behavior will not only get the point across to the DM, but it should infuriate him.

Don't do this. Upsetting someone as a way of revenge is not a good idea. People look like petty and vengeful doing things like this and can lose friends. If it gets to the point that this sounds like a good idea, quit the game.

Waker
2011-01-22, 05:57 PM
I agree with Pink. Don't try any stunts like that just to start a conflict with the DM. Either fire the NPC (if you have that power) or say "I never agreed to give you my money, just because I travel with these guys, doesn't mean my share goes to you."

Sillycomic
2011-01-22, 06:07 PM
My question is... after the first time your group tried to kill this DMPC, why did he ever come back?

You try to kill him, and then he shows up and asks for his 5% again the next day? What?

And this happened several times? I don't get it.

Have you ever tried telling him his services are no longer required? I guess he would still show up. If attempting murder won't stop him, I doubt a pink slip will.

If he runs off every time you try to kill him, then keep trying to kill him every time you see him. I would say this is the equivalent of swatting an annoying fly every time it gets too close.

And the best news is, perhaps this rogue will get the hint if you attempt to murder him enough times. The DMPC seems resourceful, but not very smart. So it might take a few times.

Waker
2011-01-22, 06:10 PM
I can't believe I brainfarted and didn't notice that. Yeah, if the attempts have been made to kill this npc, I'd think the contract is no longer in effect.

Sillycomic
2011-01-22, 06:22 PM
You get to keep your money.

You said the contract states that, "he gets 5 percent of the party loot." You getting money by yourself (for whatever reason) is not party loot. So, there's nothing to give him... you can always hire a lawyer to explain this to the DMPC.

And... why don't you hire a wizard or higher level rogue to take this guy out? You just said you came into a lot of money. Use some of that money to pay for an amazing assassin. Get the whole team in on this. Let them all pay a share to hire an assasin.

This rogue is obviously not taking a hint and is now blackmailing you. So, I would say that is more than enough for your character to react appropriately. Role playing wise it makes sense, and if the group hates him enough to plot his murder more than once, they would be willing to shell out a few copper in order to make this problem go away.

TheCountAlucard
2011-01-22, 06:33 PM
And... why don't you hire a wizard or higher level rogue to take this guy out? You just said you came into a lot of money. Use some of that money to pay for an amazing assassin. Get the whole team in on this. Let them all pay a share to hire an assasin.Ah, but remember, this guy knows everything the DM knows. And thus any assassination attempts should logically fail. Just saying. :smalleek:

And that's assuming the assassin doesn't just take your money and betray you. :smallyuk:

Waker
2011-01-22, 06:34 PM
Yeah, you shouldn't rely on an NPC to deal with another NPC, especially when its kinda obvious the DM favors him.

Sillycomic
2011-01-22, 06:42 PM
How would hiring an assassin not work? Of course the rogue will see it coming, but then you're looking at a rogue versus a higher level rogue or a wizard. He can see it coming a mile away, not much he can do about it.

If you don't want to talk to the GM about it outside of the game, this is a perfectly logical way to solve your problem in game. You tried to kill someone, it didn't work... he's being a jerk to your character who has a lot of money, so hire someone better than you to take this guy out.

In fact, if you wanna be super awesome about it... go to the rogue you want killed and ask him to find you a very reliable assassin with lots of kills under his belt. Don't tell him why you're doing it (or the DM either)

That way, you know the person you get won't betray you or just try to steal your money. And plus you can enjoy your little irony cloud as the rogue is assasinated by the assassin that you found because of the rogue.

TheCountAlucard
2011-01-22, 06:49 PM
How would hiring an assassin not work? Of course the rogue will see it coming, but then you're looking at a rogue versus a higher level rogue or a wizard. He can see it coming a mile away, not much he can do about it.If you can't think of a way to foil something that you have foreknowledge of, that's just plain incompetence, levels be damned.

For that matter, we don't know this guy's level - he may well be the highest-level character in the game.


That way, you know the person you get won't betray you or just try to steal your money. And plus you can enjoy your little irony cloud as the rogue is assasinated by the assassin that you found because of the rogue.Just saying, I can only see this ending in tears.

Waker
2011-01-22, 06:52 PM
The point that the Count and I are trying to make is that a DM could just handwave the problem away. "Oh that assassin you hired was actually an old associate so he dropped the job." or "The rogue bribed him" or something else that would work on an NPC outside of your control. There are any number of things the DM could do to preserve his rogue.

Sillycomic
2011-01-22, 06:59 PM
The only foreknowledge you have is... a wizard is coming to kill you.

If that's all you need in order to foil someone's plans, then every single BBEG in every game is doing it wrong.


Besides, you're really trying to get the rogue off your back. I would say trying to kill him, firing him, not giving him any money and now... hiring an assassin SHOULD get your point across that you want nothing to do with this guy.

The fact that the GM can hand wave it away is irrelevant. It's not about metagaming what the GM would do, it's about what your character would realistically do if he were in this situation.

TheCountAlucard
2011-01-22, 07:03 PM
The only foreknowledge you have is... a wizard is coming to kill you.No, he knows which wizard is coming to kill him, how he's going to do it, when he's going to do it, how much the PCs are paying him, and even what footsteps the wizard is going to take. We've seen no indication that this DM has a sense of fair play, and has apparently imbued his NPC with the power of omniscience.

Sillycomic
2011-01-22, 07:06 PM
And your character knows this how?

I think it's a little messed up not to have your character think of a valid option because you, as a player, knows that the GM ultimately won't let it fly.

Barbarian: We should hire an assassin.

Druid: Nope, we can't do that. The person controlling this world will know we're doing it and won't let the assassin kill that rogue.

Barbarian: Umm... what? How does that work? How do you know that?

Druid: Trust me, I read it on a GITP board. It won't work.

Rest of the party: ....

TheCountAlucard
2011-01-22, 07:10 PM
And your character knows this how?I suppose I wouldn't, but it comes awfully close to that...
1) This guy's been proven to have knowledge about things he should have no way of knowing, and
2) Has easily foiled previous assassination attempts by the party.

So they could assume in-character that he's spying/scrying on them, and thus assassination plots would be problematic. So I suppose they can just go dip themselves in lead... :smallsigh:

Besides, were I in this game, I would fire the DM. :smallyuk:

Ashram
2011-01-22, 07:11 PM
Personally, I'm going with the "Fire him" thing, or the "I don't remember hiring you, I'm just traveling with these guys" bit. Technically, your party hired him before you got there, and if even then the rogue demands a payment, that's more or less extortion in your case. It really sounds like the DM wants 5% of your money to "keep your money in check", which I think is where the "sense of entitlement" thing comes in.

Jornophelanthas
2011-01-22, 07:13 PM
Is it time to quote Oracle_Hunter yet?



DON'T TRY TO SOLVE OUT-OF-GAME PROBLEMS WITH IN-GAME SOLUTIONS!

This means (now bear with me):
Hiring an NPC to deal with an NPC is not going to work.
Attacking the NPC with the PC party is not going to work.
The PC party firing the NPC is not going to work.
Any PC doing anything is not going to work.

And why not? Because the DM does not want it to work.

Talking to the DM is the only thing that has a chance of solving the problem.
(For one thing, it makes the DM aware that there is a problem.)

Comet
2011-01-22, 07:15 PM
Thing is, sometimes you need to take a step back from the simulation and interact with the world on the meta level.
If nobody is having fun, then the simulation should stop and the real people should discuss how they want the game to continue. Judging from the info at hand, this problem is about the GM and players having different expectations for the game and this particular NPC. Out of game problems should not be solved in game and all that.

Then again, the situation might not be bad enough to warrant that. If the players are having fun with trying to kill off this powerful character, then more power to them. It could be a fun plot.

For now, I'd say that the OP and the other players should just try to distance themselves from the NPC in-game (firing him, mistrusting him) and then mention the GM that they'd want that particular character to fade a bit more into the background. Nothing dramatic, no fighting, just a small nudge towards the right direction.

edit: I was too slow, again. Oh well, I suppose this stuff is worth repeating a few times over.

Thufir
2011-01-22, 07:30 PM
Ha yeah I was thinking that while walking today. And yeah the DM is a pretty odd dude; the game is fun but the DM is pretty controlling; his thing is "making sure his players don't have a sense of entitlement," which...well who knows.


That sounds bad on the surface,

I disagree. To me, that sounds like a good idea - there is no reason the PCs should be any more entitled than the NPCs. But what he's doing here is not a sensible instance of that principle.


Fire him. In-character. Make it clear that the party no longer requires his services and no longer wishes to travel with him.

This is my suggestion as well.

Sillycomic
2011-01-22, 07:32 PM
I never said it was going to work. I just said it's a viable option for a character to consider.

I do understand the best thing to do... out of character is to talk to the Gm and figure out why the DMPC is so important and why he's bothering your characters so much? If he's so annoying but you can't kill him, then what's the point?

However, the OP clearly asked for ideas in character (even claiming his character is evil so pretty much anything goes) so I was just giving him a few random normal ideas for him to try out.


Also, the Op clearly said that he was having fun in the game. So, considering that... all we really have is an NPC who knows stuff he shouldn't, and has access to random teleporting magicks. (plus an irritating personality)

And people have already stated that with a little magic and a wizard on retainer the NPC could know all of the stuff that he does.

And if the GM is making this NPC a villain or thorn in the character's side, it would make sense for him to be annoying and have an irritating personality.

Asema
2011-01-22, 08:42 PM
I disagree. To me, that sounds like a good idea - there is no reason the PCs should be any more entitled than the NPCs. But what he's doing here is not a sensible instance of that principle.

That's exactly what I said. :smallwink:

Aidan305
2011-01-23, 12:52 AM
DMPC's are the trickiest of creatures to dispatch. Evidently, your DM is rather fond of this little addition to the game, and probably won't take efforts to remove him lightly. Even if you simply fire him, he'll turn up later, likely as an assistant to the BBEG, and perhaps becoming a recurring villain in his own right.

Your DM hasn't taken the hint IC via the assassination attempts, and probably never will. You see, the thing that really makes a DMPC what it is, is that the DM doesn't realise what he's doing. He honestly thinks this character is making the game more interesting for you the players, and this is what you need to confront.

A few years ago I was playing a BESM pirate game with a group of my friends. One of the NPCs was a small girl who snuck on to our ship. She grew persistently annoying, and we would resort to increasingly drastic measures to try and keep her out of the spotlight, all "out of concern for her safety". This ranged from the mundane (chaining her to a tree) to the extreme (dangling her off the edge of the ship, just above the surface of the water within reach of the numerous sharks that were around while we were battling a huge sea monster.) Eventually, when we couldn't stand it any longer, we tied her up, shoved her in a barrel, sealed the barrel, shoved that barrel in another one full of gunpowder, sealed that one, and dumped it overboard.

We spoke to the GM afterwards about it and he had never realised that we were unhappy with what he was doing.

No matter what you do to the NPC, if your DM doesn't realise that the DMPC is making you unhappy, then all is for naught. The only way to deal with it is to talk with your GM out of the game and express your feelings about the character.

C.Penguin
2011-01-23, 02:18 AM
Oh man so many responses, thanks all.

Well another night of gaming and we addressed the issue of this character. We went with the try to fire him thing but that didnt work because apparently the appointed party leader decided he was too valuable to have around even though i wasnt really able to get a satisfying answer out of him as to why. So I decided I'd go with the ignoring him plan, where I dont pay him and simply pretend, in character, that he doesn't exist; not giving him my portion of the treasure and only acknowledging him when absolutely necessary. Oh and I solved the money problem by committing the funds into my character's shop which not only means he cannot access it (at least not easily) but that it effectively vanished.

On a related note, does anyone else have any DMPC horror stories they would like to share?

Ashram
2011-01-23, 02:59 AM
Oh man so many responses, thanks all.

Well another night of gaming and we addressed the issue of this character. We went with the try to fire him thing but that didnt work because apparently the appointed party leader decided he was too valuable to have around even though i wasnt really able to get a satisfying answer out of him as to why. So I decided I'd go with the ignoring him plan, where I dont pay him and simply pretend, in character, that he doesn't exist; not giving him my portion of the treasure and only acknowledging him when absolutely necessary. Oh and I solved the money problem by committing the funds into my character's shop which not only means he cannot access it (at least not easily) but that it effectively vanished.

On a related note, does anyone else have any DMPC horror stories they would like to share?

You do remember he's a rogue AND the DM, right? Just remember what most rogues do for a living. :smallsigh:

C.Penguin
2011-01-23, 03:03 AM
You do remember he's a rogue AND the DM, right? Just remember what most rogues do for a living. :smallsigh:

Oh no im aware but if he does go so far as to track down the store of a different person whom he has never met (my character assumed an alias while forming the shop in order to protect himself, and his will save is very high so im not worried about scrying), it will totally justify what my issue with this character is and then i will have solid ground to bring up a legit complaint against the dm.

Kris Strife
2011-01-23, 03:22 AM
"I'm not having fun." should be the only complaint you need.

Kaun
2011-01-23, 04:37 AM
i have had a party ignore and unkillable DMPC out of a game. Whe just didnt aknowledge anything that NPC did. When it spoke we pretended we couldn't hear it in and out of character.

When it got pissed and attacked up we ignored the damage.

We then DM accused us of cheating because we wern't marking of the damage we kept saying "What damage?!?" "from what NPC?!?!?"

The DM got the msg after abour three hours of this.

MickJay
2011-01-23, 01:46 PM
If that's the only problem with the game, I'd just roll with it. For all you know, the loot you're getting after giving him that 5% might be exactly the same amount you'd be getting even if he wasn't around, and that way you at least get the info (even if the NPC is a bit annoying). :smallwink:

Callista
2011-01-23, 07:31 PM
Well, if I were doing that kind of thing, I'd recalculate the loot to add that 5%, yeah, but I don't think that it's the loot he's taking that's the big issue here, at least not from what it feels like to me--it feels more like this particular NPC is being used to lead the PCs around and try to force them to do particular things rather than letting them make their own decisions.

Is this an inexperienced DM? Because he may not really know how to deal with the fact that PCs will inevitably do something you have not planned for...

Grollub
2011-01-23, 09:23 PM
shoulda paid him, after coating the money with contact poison. :smallsmile:

Sipex
2011-01-24, 10:36 AM
My guess is this isn't as DMPCish as you may think but instead he's the intended BBEG of the campaign, you just don't know it yet. The DM doesn't want you guys killing him off so early so he gets plot armor (by the way, does your party have any IC reason for wanting to kill him?).

I'd suggest firing him, I'm going to guess that's what the DM has been hoping you'd do the entire time, this is why the guy knows about your money and keeps taking a cut of your treasure, because the DM wants you to eventually refuse so he can pull this plot open.

true_shinken
2011-01-24, 10:45 AM
My guess is this isn't as DMPCish as you may think but instead he's the intended BBEG of the campaign, you just don't know it yet. The DM doesn't want you guys killing him off so early so he gets plot armor (by the way, does your party have any IC reason for wanting to kill him?).
I've had a something similar in my game. A corrupt mayor who was a pain in the ass, always bugging the players, getting money from them (usually just charging for equipment they needed) and being loved by everyone else while being a complete *******.
Then he shows up, sent by the assassin's guild to try and cut the character's a deal. They refuse. So instead of trying to escape the assassin's guild while getting the information they need, the party needs to break into their stronghold (trap-filled, with assassins and monsters as guards and with the Tarrasque's lair somewhere in the middle). Halfway from the difficult, deadly and almost terrifying dungeon, the players realize they really shouldn't have killed the mayor.

Tyndmyr
2011-01-24, 04:17 PM
Fire him. In-character. Make it clear that the party no longer requires his services and no longer wishes to travel with him. See what kind of deus ex machina the DM is forced to cook up to keep him with you. It should at least be trickier than magically having him survive an assassination attempt.

This. You can't outright kill someone the DM refuses to let you kill.

However, you CAN see what hilarious lengths he'll go through to get his way. GM vs Players can be hysterical when you're not playing to win.

Remember, if a problem can't be solved with violence, you can solve it with love. Yes, roleplay your character falling in love with the DMPC. Find out where your GMs level of acceptable squick is. Dance merrily over the line.

CapnCJ
2011-01-24, 04:50 PM
Your best bet is to talk to the DM outside of game about him. You've already said the DM refuses to let him die, so doing anything ingame is pointless.

A game I was in year year, we had a terrible appearance from a DMPC. We were on trial for murder (framed), and we were putting up a fairly good defence. Any logical judge would have cleared us, but the DM kept making this guy shoot down all our evidence with none of his own. Just when the judge is about to sentence us all to death, the DM's old character from another campaign kicks the door in, kills the judge and 2 armed guards, and leads us out through a hidden passage.

I swear to god this is true.

Toliudar
2011-01-24, 05:00 PM
Remember, if a problem can't be solved with violence, you can solve it with love. Yes, roleplay your character falling in love with the DMPC. Find out where your GMs level of acceptable squick is. Dance merrily over the line.

Assuming that the mature OOC solutions have been tried and have failed, this is the most fun solution I've heard so far, in a thread with some really fun solutions. Kudos!

Tyndmyr
2011-01-24, 05:04 PM
Your best bet is to talk to the DM outside of game about him. You've already said the DM refuses to let him die, so doing anything ingame is pointless.

A game I was in year year, we had a terrible appearance from a DMPC. We were on trial for murder (framed), and we were putting up a fairly good defence. Any logical judge would have cleared us, but the DM kept making this guy shoot down all our evidence with none of his own. Just when the judge is about to sentence us all to death, the DM's old character from another campaign kicks the door in, kills the judge and 2 armed guards, and leads us out through a hidden passage.

I swear to god this is true.

Wow. That's ugly.

Of course, there's always the "honorable" option of refusing to escape with him, announcing that you trust that the rule of law will clear your name. Encourage him to stop his rampage of violence now, and promise to speak up as a character witness so they'll go easy on him.

Oh, how I love playing "good".

CapnCJ
2011-01-24, 05:34 PM
I get the impression that if we'd refused to go with him, we'd have been accused of the murder of the guards & judge. I'm very happy that the guy doesn't DM anymore :smallbiggrin:

I'd post more about his antics, but it'd derail the thread.

C.Penguin
2011-01-25, 04:53 PM
Is this an inexperienced DM? Because he may not really know how to deal with the fact that PCs will inevitably do something you have not planned for...

See, it's odd because this guys been DMing for something like 4 years, and I haven't been gaming with him that long but he seems like a pretty big control freak to me. I'm for sure not alone with this thought path though, the other players agreed with me when I brought it up last session.

Hazzardevil
2011-01-26, 05:21 PM
About the whole teh DMPC bursts in, kills teh judge and 2 guards.
What's so wrong with that?
I'm pretty new on teh whole scene of Rping and it sounds like a great idea for me to use in my campaign.

Toliudar
2011-01-26, 05:28 PM
About the whole teh DMPC bursts in, kills teh judge and 2 guards.
What's so wrong with that?
I'm pretty new on teh whole scene of Rping and it sounds like a great idea for me to use in my campaign.

Well, ideally, the players' choices affect the world around them. They are the stars of their own story. It seems in that scenario, they were attempting to be the stars by reasoning their way out of a silly situation, but instead of rolling with that, the DM inserted his own star character and erased their efforts, recasting them as helpless "damsels in distress". Not a particularly fun thing to play.

Sillycomic
2011-01-26, 05:32 PM
Yes, think of it from a player perspective...

You are falsely accused of murder. You are brought to court to defend yourself. You can role play for a good long time about how the evidence doesn't stack up...

And in the end the judge sentences you.

Then you get to watch as someone else comes in and takes care of the guards as well as the judge and then invites you out to leave.

As a player, other than wasting your time talking with the judge what exactly are you supposed to do? You're sitting and listening to the GM describe what an awesome person his little NPC is.

A better thing to do is make the players go to jail. Put them on a time limit, they are to be hung in 3 days time. They now have 3 days to get out of prison.

The NPC will be waiting for them and help them escape as soon as they get out.

See, now you are asking the players to be resourceful and do something. They're not listening to how awesome the NPC's are.

Czin
2011-01-26, 05:33 PM
Well, ideally, the players' choices affect the world around them. They are the stars of their own story. It seems in that scenario, they were attempting to be the stars by reasoning their way out of a silly situation, but instead of rolling with that, the DM inserted his own star character and erased their efforts, recasting them as helpless "damsels in distress". Not a particularly fun thing to play.

This.

The entire scenario just reeks of the DM setting up a scene just so his blatant Marty Stu Indulgent self insertion Author avatar of perfection GMPC could jump in and rescue the PCs as if they were a helpless princess locked in a castle.

faceroll
2011-01-26, 07:33 PM
Sabotage the campaign.

Fortuna
2011-01-26, 07:51 PM
Sabotage the campaign.

No, no, no, a thousand times no. If you have the other players' support, then you have enough leverage OOC that, all else failing, you can just change DMs. But blatantly sabotaging it, IC or OOC, is wrong and stupid.

VeisuItaTyhjyys
2011-01-26, 07:53 PM
I think it kinda depends on the situation whether being "damsels in distress" or whatever is altogether that bad. I mean, if it's just to show off how cool a DMPC is, that's one thing; if it's to show how incompetent/corrupt the justice system in place is, that's another. In the last campaign in which I played, we were on trial for starting a massive fire and, despite our intelligent and well-reasoned defense, were ignored entirely; then, an NPC who is friends with the mayor made the same arguments and they were listened to. It gave the party an idea of who the real movers and shakers were, for one thing, and established the town's justice system as deeply flawed.

Boci
2011-01-26, 08:07 PM
I think it kinda depends on the situation whether being "damsels in distress" or whatever is altogether that bad. I mean, if it's just to show off how cool a DMPC is, that's one thing; if it's to show how incompetent/corrupt the justice system in place is, that's another. In the last campaign in which I played, we were on trial for starting a massive fire and, despite our intelligent and well-reasoned defense, were ignored entirely; then, an NPC who is friends with the mayor made the same arguments and they were listened to. It gave the party an idea of who the real movers and shakers were, for one thing, and established the town's justice system as deeply flawed.

As a PC, I'd prefer the DM demonstrates the corrupt/flawed justice system by the lack of a trial ("A trusted member of this community has sworn your guilt, that is enough for me"), rather than let me roleplay my defense only to laugh and handwave it aside.

Sillycomic
2011-01-26, 08:16 PM
I think it kinda depends on the situation whether being "damsels in distress" or whatever is altogether that bad. I mean, if it's just to show off how cool a DMPC is, that's one thing; if it's to show how incompetent/corrupt the justice system in place is, that's another. In the last campaign in which I played, we were on trial for starting a massive fire and, despite our intelligent and well-reasoned defense, were ignored entirely; then, an NPC who is friends with the mayor made the same arguments and they were listened to. It gave the party an idea of who the real movers and shakers were, for one thing, and established the town's justice system as deeply flawed.

Your solution to show the justice system as biased and corrupt was to have the players sit down for awhile as you play out a bunch of NPC's talking and solving the problem....

And my idea of just letting them get falsely accused and now having to find a way out of prison shows the exact same thing... except it also gives the players something to do aside from see how well the GM can act with himself.

This happened in our last campaign. We were all accused of some random murder. By the time we went to see the magistrate (a total of 45 minutes from murder scene to the courthouse) he had all of our information (including some backstory that we hadn't shared with each other) and knew of family members and important documents about our characters. We realized right then it was not only a set up, but the system was corrupt and we weren't going to get a fair trial.

Then we spent the next session and a half escaping from prison, which was a lot of fun.

BobSutan
2011-01-26, 11:01 PM
Fire him. In-character. Make it clear that the party no longer requires his services and no longer wishes to travel with him. See what kind of deus ex machina the DM is forced to cook up to keep him with you. It should at least be trickier than magically having him survive an assassination attempt.

Ooooh I like that! I'll have to remember that if I run into a similar issue.

Hazzardevil
2011-01-31, 12:08 PM
How about if the PC's make a pathetic attempt at showing evidence of innocence, if they did I think it is fine to have teh DMPC just smash his way in and get them out.

Boci
2011-02-02, 06:20 AM
How about if the PC's make a pathetic attempt at showing evidence of innocence, if they did I think it is fine to have teh DMPC just smash his way in and get them out.

That's different. Having a contingency plan to get the PCs out of jail if they fail to defend themselves is fine. Allowing the PCs to defend themselves and then ignoring it is not.

quiet1mi
2011-02-02, 10:14 AM
I would suggest you get the party to ignore the DMPC and all his actions if it is a problem, then talk with your GM.

BadJuJu
2011-02-02, 01:26 PM
I had a DM that had a DMPC and his g/f was a player. That was one of the worst games I have EVER been in. His NPC was a TWF crossbow gun slinger type. He was very annoying. Our DM would spend huge amounts of time on his turn. He would fudge his damage so that he was the all star. His GF was in the game so it was even worse. He would refuse to let us buy anything helpful. It was 3.0 so they had the dr 10/+2 or whatever and he never let us get good equipment yet she had 500k worth of magic items. At 17 level I had a master work set of full plate and a +1 morning star. That was basically it. I had 300k gold but could never buy anything or take the down time to craft any. She would drop fire balls on us and shrug cause she was immune to fire. this bugged the two clerics of Bane(my friend and I) yet our god specifically stated in a vision that we weren't allowed to kill her. She was a Red Wizard who wasn't even a follower of his.

Bruendor_Cavescout
2011-02-02, 02:33 PM
I really do like the idea of falling in love with the DMPC - that's a great way to totally derail the omnipresent character.

Another thing I'd do is the next time the DMPC requests 5% of the money that was made on some side venture, before the game, and preferably out of sight of the DM, hand a PC a sealed letter (an actual envelope with paper inside, outside of the game), telling them not to open it. Then, in game, roleplay out going and finding some virulent contact poison. Back at your hideout (or someplace else very secure), describe how you carefully paint the poison onto each gold piece you plan on delivering to this guy, and place them into a sack. Then, when you deliver the money, if the guy tries to threaten you about trying to kill him, brazenly reach into the bag and grab the gold coins with a bare hand, and toss them to him. Hell, pop one in your mouth for that matter! Then, as the DM asks you to make a save against whatever poison you asked for, have the PC open the letter you passed out earlier in the night. It simply reads, "I switched out the poison for a simple clear syrup using sleight of hand."

This will help to give you some idea of how the DMPC is learning all his information. Is it some sort of 24/7 scrying? Then the DM might have you make a retroactive Sleight of Hand versus a Notice check. Is it him simply using out-of-game knowledge? Well, then it'll be interesting to watch him squirm to come up with some way that the guy knew what you were doing even when he didn't. Worst case scenario? He refuses to allow this admitted bit of chicanery in his game, and rules that since you said you were putting contact poison on the money, that's what's on there, and you die, freeing you of the obligation to continue playing the game. Seriously, if you're not enjoying it that much, find something else to do.

JamesonCourage
2011-02-02, 02:45 PM
I really do like the idea of falling in love with the DMPC - that's a great way to totally derail the omnipresent character.

Another thing I'd do is the next time the DMPC requests 5% of the money that was made on some side venture, before the game, and preferably out of sight of the DM, hand a PC a sealed letter (an actual envelope with paper inside, outside of the game), telling them not to open it. Then, in game, roleplay out going and finding some virulent contact poison. Back at your hideout (or someplace else very secure), describe how you carefully paint the poison onto each gold piece you plan on delivering to this guy, and place them into a sack. Then, when you deliver the money, if the guy tries to threaten you about trying to kill him, brazenly reach into the bag and grab the gold coins with a bare hand, and toss them to him. Hell, pop one in your mouth for that matter! Then, as the DM asks you to make a save against whatever poison you asked for, have the PC open the letter you passed out earlier in the night. It simply reads, "I switched out the poison for a simple clear syrup using sleight of hand."

This will help to give you some idea of how the DMPC is learning all his information. Is it some sort of 24/7 scrying? Then the DM might have you make a retroactive Sleight of Hand versus a Notice check. Is it him simply using out-of-game knowledge? Well, then it'll be interesting to watch him squirm to come up with some way that the guy knew what you were doing even when he didn't. Worst case scenario? He refuses to allow this admitted bit of chicanery in his game, and rules that since you said you were putting contact poison on the money, that's what's on there, and you die, freeing you of the obligation to continue playing the game. Seriously, if you're not enjoying it that much, find something else to do.

While I wouldn't be using the PC in question, if I were GMing, I'd say "no, you didn't switch anything out. If you want to do anything in game, it goes through me." This, of course, often leads to abuses by irresponsible GMs (such as the DMPC in question). This is unfortunate. I just don't think the idea of saying "I did something in game without my GMs permission" really ever flies. Often, I don't stop my players from talking in game, picking up weapons, etc. This is routine stuff. However, important actions like switching out poison do need to go through the GM.

I think talking with the GM in question is the best decision. Out of game. Metagaming, like many people in this thread have suggested, is probably one of the poorer choices. Of course, like everything, YMMV, and feel free to disregard my my opinion, for it is simply that.

Bruendor_Cavescout
2011-02-02, 04:03 PM
I had a long response, but the board ate it. In general, I agree with you, Jameson. The only reason I suggest this drastic course of action is that the DM seems to have broken one of the "social contracts" of gaming: your role as adjudicator and your role as story-teller should be kept seperate - your NPCs should have as much intelligence as their role in the story dictates they should have. If this was some god of spies, or some other deific being, I'd have no problem with this NPC knowing everything the PCs do. This is, at the end of the day, some guy who knows a lot of other guys. He shouldn't know everything the PCs do, which is why I advocated the "imperfect information" scenario I described.

You are right though. If the OP has any intention to continue playing, they shouldn't follow my advice. This is a good way to kill the campaign, and possibly hurt feelings.