Most annoying RP-ruining events (vent)

[Shnigda]

Hey guys,

Something happened during a recent session that I wanted to relate to you guys and to get your opinions on it.

I also want to know whether anything similar has happened where your RP was ruined by another PC's actions.

If you are in the campaign with me, please understand that this is me venting, so either stop reading or see it as such, thanks!

So in the campaign I am playing in, we have been sent on a side quest to gain some experience, loot etc in order to be powerful enough to stand face a strong Bone Devil (we are at levels 3, 3, 4, 5 and 5 due to various PC deaths). Last time we faced the Bone Devil, one of our party ended up dying, so we are trying to find a way to overcome the DR through this quest.
Anyway, we were moving along the road and a thunder storm kicked up. My character doesn't particularly enjoy being out with lightning striking due to one of the PCs having been struck a few weeks previously, so tried to push ahead to the town with the aforementioned PC. The other 3 PCs decided that they would just travel at normal speed and meet us in town the next morning.
About an hour after separating from the other PCs we came upon a goblin roadblock where we were threatened with death unless we paid 500gp each (I also spotted a nearby cage with some evil looking cockerels inside and a rope leading away towards one of the goblins, so I did't particularly fancy a fight). Now, that is a huge amount to pay at our level, so we decided that we would try to role-play our way out of the situation.
We did some serious RP and after almost an hour of real time RP, we had managed to convince the goblins that we had a map leading to some treasure and we had offered to hand it over in place of the 500gp (we also offered to hand over a bag of rocks which we claimed were uncut geodes). As we were approaching the goblins to hand over the map and bag of rocks, one of the other PCs who we had left behind said, "Okay, at this point we arrive and I turn into a goblin." (He's a doppelgänger psion)
This character then went through a poorly thought through plan where he rolled a potato towards the goblins, mindlinked one of them and then claimed to be 'Lord Spudd'. The goblins all saw the Psion roll the potato towards them and decided to attack everyone, thereby ruining an hour of fun RP. (I know you may say that it wasn't fun for the 3 who were lagging behind, but they seemed to be enjoying the story and had had some time dedicated to just their actions prior to switching to the two of us in front).
This player's 2 previous characters have both been troll characters and have been so over powered for our level that all combat was ruined, as was most non-combat interactions due to having very good stats and skills. He is also very disruptive and it now seems that all he wants to do is just 'troll' everyone and do whatever he wants without actually letting other players do their own RP...
So, thoughts? And have you ever experienced anything like this?

EDIT: Incidentally, during that combat, one of the characters was bitten by the evil cockerels (cockatrice) 4 times and was eventually petrified. So basically one Player's inconsideration got someone else's PC killed (at our level, I don't think we can afford any ways of removing the petrification...)
Also, at the end of the session, the DM said to me that if the other player hadn't randomly interrupted at that point, the two of us would have completed the encounter and the goblins would have left to search for the treasure by the time the other 3 got there.

[atemu1234]

One of my players decided to run outside in the middle of a game. Another decided to play video games. Most have used their phones at one point or another.

[Shining Wrath]

Yeah, someone ruining your hour of negotiations with a potato joke is not good clean fun.

Talk to the DM about the problem child, since he's also been OP and otherwise troublesome.

[weckar]

None of you is higher than lv 5 and yet there is a doppelganger with full access to their abilities AND class levels?

Does - not - compute

[Dezea]

Hey,

I would say that things started to go downhill when you took one hour for an even with only two player. That being said, if you are sure it was cool for everyone else at the gaming table - It would definitely not at mine - why not !

Anyway it's indeed frustrating that someone else step into a fine plan, and I understand your frustration. Have you explained to the other player that you disliked his intervention ?

[Red Fel]

Hey guys,

Something happened during a recent session that I wanted to relate to you guys and to get your opinions on it.

Alright, well, let's take it step by step.

First off, you split the party. That's a cardinal sin, and not just because it imperils everybody. You and this one other PC engaged in "almost an hour of real time RP". What were the other players doing during that time? I want you to realize that, as frustrated as you might have been with how this other player "ruin[ed] an hour of fun RP", imagine how he - and the other players - felt, doing nothing for that hour.

So before you get mad that someone ruined your fun, realize that you may have ruined theirs.

Now, onto his sin. He came up with a stupid plan, which resulted in combat and one PC death. Let's ignore for a moment the fact that PCs die in combat. That's a thing. Let's instead focus on the fact that, after you spent an hour haggling these guys down to not killing you - which, if your friends hadn't shown up when they did, would mean that they would also have to spend an hour haggling, or fight without you - this guy showed up, ticked them off, and fought.

So, his crime is turning an RP scene into a combat scene. And honestly, it's not that big a crime. Yes, it was a bit of a jerk move, especially after you invested all that time - time which, again, was devoted to only two out of five PCs - but it wasn't exactly a capital offense. Social encounters devolve into combat all the time; say the wrong word, tick off the wrong NPC, or just plain get bored or frustrated, and BAM, roll initiative.

No, what's bothering you is the fact that, after an hour of RP, he came along and ruined it with combat. It doesn't bother you that another PC died - that was an aside of your venting, not the focus. It bothers you that he got combat in your RP. You also describe how he "wants to ... 'troll' everyone and do whatever he wants without actually letting other players do their own RP". Frankly, if "do their own RP" means "spend an hour focused on only one or two PCs," I'm not surprised that he gets a bit disruptive. It's juvenile, and rude, but a little understandable.

Here's what you need to do. You need to sit down and talk to this guy. Tell him you feel like he dominates at combat, and tends to turn everything into a combat situation. Tell him you'd like to be able to spend more time on RP scenes. And then ask him how he feels, and listen to his response.

It sounds like he's playing a combat game. That's fine, D&D is very good for that. But it sounds like that's not your expectation of the game. And the players need to be onboard with respect to common expectations of the game they're playing. So step one is to sit down and discuss what you expect from the game, and how to make it happen.

And step two is to stop splitting the party. Seriously.

[Crake]

Oh maaann, the case of "that one guy who does stupid stuff in the game because he thinks it'll be funny". That guy is the worst. I've had a slightly more benign case of "that one guy who doesn't think things through properly and is way too focused on gear and stats in a roleplay oriented game". Less intentionally annoying, but still just as annoying.

This player had been a handful to try and steer straight from the get go. To clarify, I was the DM, and the player was getting envious of the other player's deep and meaningful character, with all his in character connections, associates and friends. Both players had the same opportunities, but one player took advantage of them and did extensive roleplay, while the other wanted the same end result without any of the effort of roleplaying out various events and scenarios.

Eventually the player found himself a walking statblock of gear and class levels, and so when I threw a living disjunction at the players (ok, not my best move, but i had an idea in mind and i wanted to see how it would work) the player finds himself with about 100,000gp worth less gear. Despite the fact that the loot from the living disjunction (I ruled that the leftover ooze of it could be stored in vials to act as a rod of cancellation item, either splashing it or throwing it as a touch attack) was enormous, and the other players offering the player compensation to cover the lost gear before splitting the worth of the loot, the player almost rage quit at that very moment, claiming that his character was ruined. Now this player is easily upset, and typically calms down over time, and the player requested some time away from the game, so I gave him 2 weeks to cool off, at which point he came back and decided to pick up things that couldn't be disjoined (because he was convinced that I would disjoin all his items again) and ended up settling on fiendish grafts. I of course made sure he was aware that with fiendish grafts he would eventually descend into evil, and that it would consume most of his cash. He was fine with that. Then I brought up that finding a fiend to apply the fiendish grafts would require him finding a fiend of corruption, and likely involve some kind of pact signing. Long story short, the player goes through and makes a faustian pact, requiring that he perform an enormous amount of evil (which he later admitted was completely out of character and he only did so because he, and I quote "didn't care about the character anymore"), damning him to hell at this point. Shortly after, ther was a big battle, in which the player's enjoyment spiked, because it seems he loves having all these grafts and extra bits and pieces from the faustian pact (ability bonuses, feats etc). Of course then shortly after THAT all the NPCs find out what he did to gain all this fiendish power, and he basically becomes completely ostracised from the main faction.

So basically, a player did something so completely stupid and out of character because he lost a bunch of loot that would have been immediately replacable (they were high enough level and had access to what essentially was the sigil of my game world, so they would have been easily able to buy whatever they wanted) and that one action completely ruined the whole roleplay focused campaign I was running. All this despite him insisting that he wanted his character to be more roleplay oriented, and that his character was more than just his class and gear.


None of you is higher than lv 5 and yet there is a doppelganger with full access to their abilities AND class levels?

Does - not - compute

I'm guessing he's actually a changeling, not a doppelganger.

[Shnigda]

None of you is higher than lv 5 and yet there is a doppelganger with full access to their abilities AND class levels?

Does - not - compute

Yeah, he decided that he wouldnt take all of the doppelganger abilities, only the mind reading stuff, shape shift stuff and the two +2 boosts to stats " 'Cause that totally balances everything out and means I shouldn't have any LA" (We make our characters ourselves and then anything our relatively inexperienced DM doesn't like gets changed, but this change was instigated by the player and then he didnt tell the DM all the stuff he can do...)
As I said, this Player likes to break the campaign/RP

[Shnigda]

Hey,

I would say that things started to go downhill when you took one hour for an even with only two player. That being said, if you are sure it was cool for everyone else at the gaming table - It would definitely not at mine - why not !

As I said, the three who were behind were fine with it as they had had a lot of time to RP their actions before we switched over to the two of us at the front. But yeah, very frustrating.
Also, this was the first time we had ever split the group, so initially we were RPing to delay the goblins so the others could catch up and we could do the combat, but then we realised that we could probably complete the encounter just by RP, which everyone else was interested in as failure would have meant the likely death of our two characters, something which always interests the people in our group.:smallsmile:


Anyway it's indeed frustrating that someone else step into a fine plan, and I understand your frustration. Have you explained to the other player that you disliked his intervention ?

We have had talks with him in the past due to arguing and told him to let others do their thing and not to argue so much, but it doesn't seem to have had much effect... :smallannoyed: