Empathy for a new DM

[undervillain]

Hi Everyone,

I've been playing for a few years, and as my current group's campaign is winding down we are discussing what we're doing next. For a time we were discussing doing Out of the Abyss, but our current DM has been in the seat for a while and is getting a little weary. He's clearly wanting to take a break before jumping into something new.

So while he and another from our group were hanging out one evening, I mentioned that I'd like to run a game, and within hours our plans had changed. Mike offered up an adventure (Legacy of the Crystal Shard: "I bought this like two years ago but we haven't had a chance to play it, why don't you run it?"), and the two of them just sort of decided that this was happening. Mike had written the group and suggested that everyone play a class that they have avoided or have never played before - it's a shorter adventure, and that way everyone can try something new. This seems to have been pretty well received.

It's been a ton of fun already, and we haven't even started playing! I've been reading the module materials and taking notes. I sent the players background information about Icewind Dale that I want them to have as character knowledge, and they've started sending their backstories. I've been reading as much as I can about how to make the game run smoothly and be fun for everyone involved - I'd hoped that I would know that on some level from the experience of being a player, but it's still good to see others put to paper the lessons that they've had to learn through experience.

Anyway, I'm writing here tonight to tell you all about "that guy" - it seems like every group has one. In response to Mike's email, Josh responded: "In respect of the request of playing a character I've never played before....I will be...LAWFUL GOOD".

I read this on my phone, and my first thought was, "I really wish he had considered playing sane, but I guess LG is a good start....". I hadn't even finished the thought before I got a text message: "Will we be fighting many humans in the campaign? I have a character idea but he may be unable to harm a human."

....... :smallconfused:

We exchanged a few texts clarifying what he meant, and it finally came out that he wanted to play a character that would adhere to the three laws (I'd include a link but as a brand-new poster that's forbidden)..... he felt that might be the only way he could successfully play lawful good (Having known Josh for over a decade, I can say: I have no idea if he was joking or not. It's got just enough truth in it to make it impossible to tell). He had no problem bringing people to justice - since he couldn't injure them (and presumably since they wouldn't just surrender whenever the party showed up) he would just grapple them into submission. He would actively interfere with any combat to prevent any humans from being harmed, whether in the party or not. :smalleek: And he wanted me to keep that as DM knowledge, everyone else wouldn't know why he was acting that way and they would just have to figure out his motivations based on his actions. The cherry on top of all of this is that if he fails, he would risk losing his mind and going insane (he left it up to me to determine what check we would do for that, and what those consequences would be.......) :smallannoyed: I did go back through the books and see how much of a problem this would all be, and then I told him no, that it was a matter of when, and not if, he would break the party.

I'm sure everyone has ridiculous players like this, but I felt compelled to share. My hope is that this isn't a story about my being a lousy DM for saying no, or for being a lousy DM because my players are trying to sabotage the game. For what it's worth, another player wants to have a split personality disorder and I'm going to let that go forward, but that's because he presented a compelling plan for how it will work without destroying party cohesion, and I also trust that player more to understand that the game has to be fun for everyone and not just for him.

If you've got thoughts on this or tips for a new DM, I'd love to hear them! Or if you just want to provide some empathy that's appreciated too. The first session should be in about a week and a half. :smallbiggrin:

[BurgerBeast]

Angry DM has some great articles that touch on some of this. I'm sure he has one that discusses how to handle these things out-of-character, but I'm not sure it's one of the two I've linked. Anyway, here are two articles: one on tone policing (http://theangrygm.com/tone-policing-sir-bearington/), and one on intra-party conflict (http://theangrygm.com/ask-angry-i-stop-him-from-doing-that/).


(snip)

Yeah, so his basic idea just reeks of problems.


He would actively interfere with any combat to prevent any humans from being harmed, whether in the party or not. :smalleek: And he wanted me to keep that as DM knowledge, everyone else wouldn't know why he was acting that way and they would just have to figure out his motivations based on his actions. The cherry on top of all of this is that if he fails, he would risk losing his mind and going insane (he left it up to me to determine what check we would do for that, and what those consequences would be.......) :smallannoyed:

Yeah, there are two huge red flags here: (1) absolute behaviours that will certainly cause intra-party conflicts. (2) player-DM secrets.

Obviously the insanity thing is also a red flag. It's disrespectful toward everyone involved, because he's totally willing to "lose" his character at any random time. How much can he actually care?


I did go back through the books and see how much of a problem this would all be, and then I told him no, that it was a matter of when, and not if, he would break the party.

100% within your rights, even if you are wrong. But you are right. If ever a DM has been right, you are right.


If you've got thoughts on this or tips for a new DM, I'd love to hear them! Or if you just want to provide some empathy that's appreciated too. The first session should be in about a week and a half. :smallbiggrin:

You have my empathy. I hope the articles help a little, too.

[Gastronomie]

The first step in being a good DM is knowing when to issue a clear NO. Because here, you're the correct one.

Some people don't understand unless told. In which case this helps everybody get happy.

Some people don't understand even if told. In which case he has to leave the game, which makes him unhappy, but everybody else gets happy instead, so it's still a good thing.

Feel free to make him stop. While most of the DM's job is to take care of players' problems, another important part of the DM's job is to take care of problematic players - at times, by cutting him off the player list.

[Ninja_Prawn]

The first step in being a good DM is knowing when to issue a clear NO.

Yeah, when people say "never say no," they don't mean it in this context (they mean it when saying 'no' would shut down the story, such as when the players want to deviate from your plot, or when they come up with an idea that trivialises your carefully-planned encounter. In those cases, you should try roll with it and say 'yes, but' or 'yes and').

Other advice: read Angry's articles, they're good. And quite witty. Familiarise yourself well with pages 82 and 274 of the DMG, you will need them more than any other. Make sure you know what your players want from the game - and be aware that they often won't know that themselves.

[Giant2005]

The best advice to give when dealing with a Lawful Good character as rigid as that, is to play Mass Effect 2 and 3.
To save you the extreme amount of time it would take to play those games (and explain the advice a little more usefully), there is a character in those games named Samara that is the absolute pinnacle of rigidity when it comes to being Lawful.
She is a Justicar (http://masseffect.wikia.com/wiki/Justicar) basically she lives by an inflexible code that would ordinarily be disastrous for anyone to be around. Even law-abiding citizens fear the Justicars because there are many situations where a Justicar would be forced to kill them regardless of anyone's morality or even feelings on the matter. One example within the game is that a cop was ordered by their superiors to detain her in order to prevent her from causing trouble. Her code allowed her to be detained for 24 hours, so she willingly complied in order to keep the peace, but if she was still held 24 hours later, that code would force her to escape and kill everyone that continued to try and keep her captive.
Ordinarily, there is no way in hell she could join your character in saving the galaxy, because her code would have forced her to try to kill him at least a dozen times over. Yet the code had one allowance that made it possible. Because your character was on a mission of importance, the code allowed her to temporarily swear fealty to him until the mission was complete. Doing so meant that his orders superceded the code - the code allowed her to break the code, or even ignore the code, as long as it was his request.
So talk to your player, and have him turn his 3 rules into 4 rules with the fourth being that same fealty clause. That way he could still honor his code without obstructing the party, unless they wanted him to for whatever reason.

[smcmike]

If you are looking for moral support in shutting Josh's idea down, you've got it.

He is basically warning you that he will do self-destructive things, including fighting the party, inserting the party into every conflict between humans that he sees, and going insane. Unless everyone is knowingly signing on for this sort of behavior (most importantly, you), it really has no place in a campaign.

So, yeah, tell him no.

Or, if you feel like being a jerk, tell him "that sounds like a good way to get your character killed," then follow through on this threat in the first session.

[Kurt Kurageous]

Tell him his zealot rules are an ideal, just an ideal. No one, not even his god(s) expects him to follow them all the time every time, just when it is practical or possible. His code has an atonement process. Look at vengeance oath paladin. To be a zealot is to be unhappy...a lot. because you so rarely get what you want.

Otherwise, introduce him to a gelatinous cube holding a human commoner. Then reroll.

[Grod_The_Giant]

He would actively interfere with any combat to prevent any humans from being harmed, whether in the party or not
Nooooope nope nope nope nope. You are absolutely right to say no. Ultimately all restrictions on player characters boil down to "will it annoy the other people at the table?" and this sounds like a doozy. Suggest a more moderate version of the code: he will not kill a human, nor will he be happy if others do. A little violence is fine, though-- even Superman will punch out a dude. 5e's nonlethal rules are generous enough that the first won't be a problem, and a few moral arguments with the rest of the party can be good for roleplaying. (And again, because 5e nonlethal rules, compromise isn't mechanically onerous). Although you might point out that racism isn't lawful good-- dwarves and elves and the like are almost as intelligent as humans*, so why is it okay if they're harmed?




*Humans have +1 to every stat, meaning that on average they're better than other races at almost everything.

[Laserlight]

Tell him "Sounds like an interesting character for a novel, but it won't work for an RPG. You need a character who will be a team player."

[N810]

Swap all races in the game from human to non-human.
(except him) problem solved. :smallwink:

[mgshamster]

Tell him "Sounds like an interesting character for a novel, but it won't work for an RPG. You need a character who will be a team player."

I agree with everyone else here, and this post in particular. Whenever I run a game, I request the characters always want to be with this adventuring group and want to be on the adventure/campaign that we as players decided on before we made the characters.

On a completey separate note, I had an opposite experience as a player once. I joined a new group for a 3rd edition game (or maybe 3.5), and I wanted to play a basic fighter. Decided to go with the classic longsword and shield. The group highly disapproved of that; the DM said it was too cliché and I should be using something unique like a spiked chain. I didn't want a spiked chain, I wanted a simple sword and shield. Also decided that my character was from Cormyr with aspirations of one day being a Purple Dragon Knight; made him LN with a desire to follow the letter of the law. I chose that country because that's where the DM set the game.

At that time in Cormyr history, the Goblin Wars were fresh on the minds of every Cormyrian citizen; just a year before, the goblin armies killed the Cormyr King. The country was facing threats from multiple sides. It's a perfect setting for an adventure. So we set off on our adventure to hunt and kill goblins. When we got to the first group of enemies, the DM declared that my character couldn't be involved in the battle because he was LN and its against the law to murder someone - even though that "someone" was a goblin who was an active enemy of the country and we were on a specific mission to hunt and kill goblins.

That same battle, the player with a sorcerer demanded a duel against one of the goblins. I objected, but was told that because I was LN, my character had to accept it, since duels are a part of Cormyr society. I ended up intervening and killed the goblin just before he killed the sorc. The DM ruled that I had to change my alignment.

So here's an instance where I wanted to play a helpful character with a bit of a quirk, and ended up being useless and detrimental to the party because of how the DM ruled alignment for my character. I didn't come back to that group again.

[undervillain]

The good news is, Josh has agreed to put this idea on the shelf and come up with something else. He does seem to always need the weirdest or quirkiest character at the table, so we'll have to see what the next idea is, but hopefully it will be something that will not be so disruptive to the workings of the party. Mike told me today that he actually had a very similar conversation with Josh that I did, which essentially was along the lines of "If you want to play a character you haven't played before, you should be looking to play someone who is normal and sane."


Obviously the insanity thing is also a red flag. It's disrespectful toward everyone involved, because he's totally willing to "lose" his character at any random time. How much can he actually care?

That's a really good way of thinking of the situation, so I'm glad that you phrased it that way. Luckily he's agreed that this idea isn't going to work, so he is brainstorming what I'm sure will be a new type of troublesome character. If he tries to take it too far I'll see if I can get him to think of how it affects the other players and see if that changes his behavior a bit.


The best advice to give when dealing with a Lawful Good character as rigid as that, is to play Mass Effect 2 and 3.

I had completely forgotten about that character! I'm familiar with the series, and yes, that is exactly the kind of problem we would have been facing.


Tell him "Sounds like an interesting character for a novel, but it won't work for an RPG. You need a character who will be a team player."

I'll admit my first thought was that it is an interesting concept, and could be fun and entertaining with some modifications..... as others have stated the adherence to the laws would need to be modified to be less rigid or to give the party some other kind of "out". It would be less of a problem in an environment with a more diverse set of enemies.....there are some dwarves in the area but the population (and thus the villains) are primarily human.


Swap all races in the game from human to non-human.
(except him) problem solved. :smallwink:

I thought about that, but had already sent background information to the players describing the region, geography, population, economy, etc. I warned them that the author of the background information was an unreliable narrator so it might not be 100% accurate (and in fact it has some things that I have left vague or purposefully made incorrect, in order to represent what a person moving into the region for the first time would understand from their general knowledge). Depending on a player's background I've been sending supplements or corrections to reflect what they would actually know at the start of the adventure.

Anyway, dropping in a different race to replace the humans seems like a lot of work, especially since it would ultimately just piss off Josh when I use DM powers to foil his intention for the character.


Or, if you feel like being a jerk, tell him "that sounds like a good way to get your character killed," then follow through on this threat in the first session.

Yeah, I thought about that too........ I didn't want to play the metagame... in this case, instead of "how many times do I have to attack this enemy with the wrong weapon before my character figures out it is resistant", the game is "how much of this do I need to put myself and the party through before I can kill his character, without completely pissing him off". It's better for everyone if we just don't go looking to answer that question. Removing him from the group isn't really an option either.


Anyway, thank you all for the links and suggestions! I have been surprised by how much work I am doing to prepare for this.... I knew that there was some extra time involved but it is way more than I had expected. It's been a lot of fun so far though and I'm certain that the prep work will pay off in the first session when the party has more of a bond than 'You were in a cart.' and already they have set themselves up for some hilarious coincidences.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

Tell him "Sounds like an interesting character for a novel, but it won't work for an RPG. You need a character who will be a team player."

Over my years of playing D&D I've played plenty of CE and LE characters, however the one thing I've never played was an Antagonist to the party.

Being a party antagonist is one of the few things that will get your character slaughtered real real real real fast.

[Sigreid]

I recommend simply telling the group "Since this is my first time DMing, and I'm just going to be starting to learn how to do it, I want you guys to go for easier concepts for me to work with."

Or some such.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

I recommend simply telling the group "Since this is my first time DMing, and I'm just going to be starting to learn how to do it, I want you guys to go for easier concepts for me to work with."

Or some such.

That just pushes the issue to the side instead of dealing with it.

Later, if this person DMs again, the player may try the same character. The DM should nip this in the bud and just be firm, yet nice, and say "no, that's not good for group dynamics, I won't ever allow that".

[smcmike]

Sounds like it will work out. Glad everyone is being reasonable. Have fun.

[Sigreid]

That just pushes the issue to the side instead of dealing with it.

Later, if this person DMs again, the player may try the same character. The DM should nip this in the bud and just be firm, yet nice, and say "no, that's not good for group dynamics, I won't ever allow that".

DM can always say that character is a no go. For a new DM I would leave the door open to the possibility that at some time down the road he may find that the character would be entertaining in a campaign.

[Laserlight]

One problem that crops up for both players and DMs is "This would be good in a book / movie!" and thinking that it would therefore be good in an RPG. That is often correct--but not always. Sometimes stuff that would be great in a movie doesn't work on a tabletop. The Moody Broody Loner PC, the Double Agent PC, the guy who pretends to be NG but is actually CE, or the guy who pretends to be CE but is actually a murderous psychopath. Or the railroad problem which the players cannot circumvent and must solve in one particular way and no other.

[Herobizkit]

Is he, by chance, playing a LG Warforged GOO Warlock who uses Disguise Self to appear human?

Because the IDEA is rad. Having an insanity affixed to the character? Not too bad. Using it as an excuse to mess with the party? Wrongbadfun. :3