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Haldir
2016-09-18, 10:48 PM
The game is a 5e adaptation of Phandelver. Not a huge deal, but it is pertinent to note that The Black Spider, through a zany improv on the DM's part, had his blood spilled on the Spell Forge which turned him into a giant, swirling magical energy monster.

Pretty cool right? Well...

The problem essentially comes down to OOC player favoritism. We were able to gain an item that could trap the Swirling Energy Monster inside or could said item could to drain some of this monster's power from a friendly NPC that was basically put into a coma. The player/character, let's call him SW, is the one that created the SEM, and decided he was going to try and summon the SEM/Black Spider without letting any of the other characters know. Well, SW ended up getting possessed. My wizard, a tinkerer/magic item expert, used the magical funnel to save this other character from the SEM, but a latent psychic link remains. No problems here.

The real problem came about when I told the DM and the other characters, completely OOC, that my wizard was going to turn the SEM into a magical battery. The DM immediately says "If you try that, there's a 90% chance you will become the new Black Spider" Hardly, considering that Magic Circle is a fairly cheap spell. IC, the wizard says he wants to study this thing while it's contained. This is where the real favoritism comes in.

First the DM and SW have a private conference in a separate voice channel. Then we are told that the magical funnel is secure enough, then we are told it is not secure enough, then I ask specifically and get it confirmed that it was secure enough, but there are "tons of ways it can get stolen and manipulated and blah blah blah." SW goes to the rest of the party and convinces us there is a plan to transfer the Black Spider back into a human body, and we should steal the funnel from the wizard and enact yet another hairbrained scheme (this guy always has a hairbrained scheme that he entirely f***s up, yet het DM gives him more play time than anyone else). The entire time SW is trying to convince the party, he and DM are taking breaks to loudly to type to one another, every time SW comes back and has some new information and argument in favor of denying the Wizard access to the item. The party doesn't want to let a powerful enemy wizard free. Well, I guess there's a precedent for putting demons into pigs, and all of a sudden a pig body counts as sentient. This goes on for many minutes.

It's very clear that the DM didn't want my wizard to have access to this monster he created, and in the end, SW ends up attacking my wizard, which causes him to flee. I am not allowed to play my wizard anymore because no inter-party fighting is allowed. I can, however, direct my wizards actions through the DM, making my character a faux villain.

I've already spoken to the DM about how I feel that SW gets the most play time and they get wrapped up in the stupid s*** that he does. The rest of the party, more patient and seasoned D&D players, are willing to let it slide in favor of having a decently running game, but the idiocy is becoming a little much.

I am also playing the Cleric of this party, who thinks SW is an idiot and argued against the Pig scheme, mostly based on SW being a catastrophic failure at literally everything else he does (even the DM agreed this was a fair point). But it was clear from the DM and SW's OOC actions that they were dead set on denying the wizard his opportunity to research.

Thoughts? Suggested course of action?

Anti-Eagle
2016-09-18, 11:36 PM
So let me get this straight. There's a rule against PVP, he initiates PVP, and you're the one ejected from the party instead of him?

You should be mad.

Segev
2016-09-19, 10:41 AM
So let me get this straight. There's a rule against PVP, he initiates PVP, and you're the one ejected from the party instead of him?

You should be mad.

Yeah, this is my first reaction, too.

I can see reasons why it might be "your wizard" that caused the problem by being the one in opposition to the party, but the way it shakes out (by your version of the story, anyway, which is all we have to go on) is awfully shady.

So the question is: are you having fun? If not, can you talk to the other players - particularly SW's and the DM - and find a way to make it fun for you? Failing that...well, leave the game.

You can either convince the others to stop the OOC stuff that makes it not fun, decide that it's fun enough to keep playing anyway, or leave.

But no, from what you've said, being mad isn't unreasonable. "There's no PvP allowed, so when the other guy attacked me I had to drop my PC from the party" is the kind of insane troll logic that allows a noble in a fantasy dystopia to charge a poor merchant's family for the damage done to his clothes when he stained them with the blood of the merchant's son after decapitating him for not getting out of the way fast enough while the noble was walking down the street.

Jay R
2016-09-19, 11:33 AM
It's crucial to realize that you have incomplete information, and that we have incomplete information filtered through one of the people involved in the disagreement.

A. We have only heard one side. No fair person can conclude that your side is correct without hearing the other side as well.

B. The DM knows things you don't know. You cannot fairly and completely represent either the DM's side or SW's side. I'm not speaking against your honesty or competence - just pointing out that you don't have all the information.

C. From the point of view of the DM, the initiation of PvP occurred when you announced OOC that you would try to take over his character's beastie. The DM did everything you could to turn you away from that course of action. It is generally a good idea to play the game that the DM thinks will play best.

D. If SW is possessed, or has a psychic link, then yes, he should be getting private discussion with the DM. That's the nature of the situation.

E. Sometimes something shouldn't be allowed to happen for reasons that the player can't know. So if the DM really wants you to stop trying something, it's usually best to stop trying it.

F. What happened could have happened from DM favoritism. Or it could have happened for perfectly good reasons you just don't know about, and it's impossible for you to know which it is.

My recommendation is that you decide, ignoring this episode, whether or not you trust the DM. This is not primarily a question of honesty. Do you believe in his competence and ability to put together a good game?

If you do, then trust him even when it matters, and stop trying to take the game somewhere that he, with far more knowledge, thinks it shouldn't go.

If you don't trust him, leave the game. And when you tell him why, leave out this episode. You don't have the information to judge it fairly.

Quertus
2016-09-19, 11:39 AM
So let me get this straight. There's a rule against PVP, he initiates PVP, and you're the one ejected from the party instead of him?

You should be mad.

This.

Clearly, the correct response is to bring in a new character who attacks SW, turning him into an NPC.

Also, this DM is obviously not to be trusted, based on use of OOC information.