Inter-group conflict (and hoping to prevent OOG conflict)

[Pinkcrusade]

Greetings!


So, one of my current groups is composed of races that range from Neutral Good to Neutral Evil; we are all friends from out-of-game, which is nice, anyways: we have a character who plays a gnome, doesn't RP that often, etc (you know that type of person), and we also have a bugbear, who dedicates time to role playing, character-building, lore-friendly, all of that (the group -does- work out... sort of). So, occasionally, there is in-game conflict, such as money, actions, and the gnome (the bugbear could -destroy- this gnome mage) makes comments that usually would cause the bugbear to attack this gnome (lore reasons, obviously), I (the DM) am pretty 'lax with this, and wouldn't just forbid the bugbear from attacking. So, the gnome makes annoying comments that he wouldn't in-game (due to ramifications from some members) and the bugbear contemplates attacking (he told me). If he wants to attack, fine, it makes sense -- though I don't really want some conflict out-of-game.

Any suggestions (the bugbear player feels as though his experience is being dampened, as he is restricting himself from playing how he would in-game) on how to resolve this problem? Would it be better for the bugbear to just attack the gnome?


Any help is appreciated, thanks.

[AzureKnight]

Maybe you could take the player of the gnome aside and give him warning that his actions may at some point have severe circumstances reguarding this matter. Have a simular talk with the player playing the bugbear and tell him that if the gnome character persists than have it issue a final ingame warning before slaughtering the little meatball.