How to deal with difficult team members and save an npc

[adsbell25]

Ok so my dnd group is myself, 2 other teammates and the DM
We were asked by a village to save them from a giant who was throwing boulders down a cliff at them. We went and confronted it and I made 'friends' with it.
It's name was squish and it likes squishing things. I was able to get him to apologise and I was teaching him not to squish people.

My team mates then got bored and decided to kill squish, I'm a conjunction wizard with a lightning staff and I have low hp. My 2 other teammates are sole dps character so I can't really stop it... I really don't want squish to die as my character has become attached to him.

The DM has refused to do anything even though my teammates broke character as they wouldn't normally attack the giant

Any ideas how to stop this?? And save squish

[NecessaryWeevil]

Any ideas how to stop this?? And save squish

Are you prepared to kill your teammates (seems like a misnomer)? Are you prepared to anger your fellow players?

[Kane0]

Cast sleep, hold person, web or any other CC spell you have available to you on your teammates and tell squish to run?

[Spore]

I feel like this behavior could stem from an OOC problem. Are the other players bored? Did they expect a simpler hack & slash game? Why do they break character this way? The last time one of my fellow players did this was because the main plot moved too slow, and they took "freedom of choice" literally. So instead of investigating the tower of a wizard with untold magical secrets (which should interest a wizard and your run-of-the-mill greedy rogue) they broke into some commoner's home and made coffee. After some hubub we managed to get into the actual story.

Maybe they think they only get XP from kills, a common mistake made because of computer RPGs. Maybe they want more action and less RPing with NPCs. Ask them beforehand. If they don't respond then CC their characters, tell Squish to run. Afterwards confront the characters and ask about their ingame goals. If your goals don't match, your wizard just leaves them where they are. Maybe communicate with the DM first.

[Kane0]

I feel like this behavior could stem from an OOC problem. Are the other players bored? Did they expect a simpler hack & slash game? Why do they break character this way? The last time one of my fellow players did this was because the main plot moved too slow, and they took "freedom of choice" literally. So instead of investigating the tower of a wizard with untold magical secrets (which should interest a wizard and your run-of-the-mill greedy rogue) they broke into some commoner's home and made coffee. After some hubub we managed to get into the actual story.

Maybe they think they only get XP from kills, a common mistake made because of computer RPGs. Maybe they want more action and less RPing with NPCs. Ask them beforehand. If they don't respond then CC their characters, tell Squish to run. Afterwards confront the characters and ask about their ingame goals. If your goals don't match, your wizard just leaves them where they are. Maybe communicate with the DM first.

Spot on advice.

[Douche]

I feel like this behavior could stem from an OOC problem. Are the other players bored? Did they expect a simpler hack & slash game? Why do they break character this way? The last time one of my fellow players did this was because the main plot moved too slow, and they took "freedom of choice" literally. So instead of investigating the tower of a wizard with untold magical secrets (which should interest a wizard and your run-of-the-mill greedy rogue) they broke into some commoner's home and made coffee. After some hubub we managed to get into the actual story.

Maybe they think they only get XP from kills, a common mistake made because of computer RPGs. Maybe they want more action and less RPing with NPCs. Ask them beforehand. If they don't respond then CC their characters, tell Squish to run. Afterwards confront the characters and ask about their ingame goals. If your goals don't match, your wizard just leaves them where they are. Maybe communicate with the DM first.

Yeah, I agree with this. If your teammates are that bored, they're probably trolling the DM.

That's the problem with "sandbox" games is that they often don't have enough direction or the DM can't lay enough breadcrumbs, or gets distracted & leaves too many plots unresolved. Since there's no satisfying plot, the players will start doing inane things, being that it doesn't matter what they do anyway.

For instance, my party spent 3 sessions (4 hours each - 12 hours total!!) making our party Paladin into the Greco-Roman wrestling champion of the city, totally ignoring the main plot, in protest because literally every plot thread leading up to that point was left totally unresolved. On the bright side, it got him all the finest wenches throughout the city & we made a good bit of gold by betting on him. We even spent like an hour detailing a halfling orgy he took part in, making the DM totally uncomfortable.

[JellyPooga]

Any ideas how to stop this?? And save squish

Put the dilemma in the other Players' ball-park. They say they want to kill Squish? Say that you don't want them to and that you're ready to defend your new "friend" if need be. If they go through with it, you might end up with some PvP on your hands, but with any luck just your assertion in Squish's defence might put them off the idea.

If that fails, you're the Wizard, you're the smart guy; Point out that Squish is no longer a threat to the village and that, given some training, could even be of immense use to the village or the Players themselves. Friendly NPC's, especially ones that are both strong and easily manipulated, are an invaluable resource that they're just throwing away by killing him.

[Spore]

in protest because literally every plot thread leading up to that point was left totally unresolved.

Oh I totally get this. We had a game where the DM laid several big significant breadcrumbs, a huge variety of encounters. But it felt like for any one danger we got under control, either three new problems popped up or our actions resulted in a situation far worse than before. The DM also told us that the feeling of helplessness is intended and honestly, any other group would have quit by then. But having a good aligned cleric and a Paladin on board had enough say in the group to drag the others along the not-so-glorious main quest. I've had campaigns where the DM tried to build on minor details he said or played with (RL) years ago. We went sightseeing in that campaign, for 8 sessions, spread over a year.

You may want to critisize the DM by putting your critique into context. A standard technique of giving critique is sandwiching the bad things between two good things.

1) "I love how carefully you describe your NPCs to the point where I cannot think my wizard would continue without Squish"
2) "but maybe you should start to give us a direction or we start doing random things that do not lead anywhere."
3) "I trust you can guide our group with subtle hints towards the right track. You are a good DM."

[Maxilian]

As a Wizard, your strenght is not in RAW power, make them play with the same card, don't they have someone they love? kidnapp that NPC and use it to negotiate, use CC spells that don't require the others to fail their CC to be effective (Any of the Wall spells), do they have range capabilities? no? (Fly on the giant and you), still nothing? Abuse the different summoning spells to slow down your teanmates (Pixes can easily Polymorph and sleep whoever they polymorph -giving you time to react-), or use their own ideals against them (make the Paladin feel like what he's doing is against his God will)

[Coffee_Dragon]

You make nighty-night on mean peoples! Squish help squish when mean peoples go zzz. Squish and pointy hat make new team! Squish many things.

[adsbell25]

Squish survived and turned out to be very op. He is now guarding the village he used to throw boulders on. I wish I could stay with him but my team mate roled a natural 20 on persuading me to come with them.. oh well ..

[Addaran]

Squish survived and turned out to be very op. He is now guarding the village he used to throw boulders on. I wish I could stay with him but my team mate roled a natural 20 on persuading me to come with them.. oh well ..

Glad Squish survived! =)

Staying with him would probably have meant that your character retire, i doubt the DM is planing to do the whole campaign around that little village. And if he had come with you, it would have made the job of balancing encounters a lot harder for the DM.

Usually, you can't use social skills on other PCs. It's your character and just because someone rolled well or invested in charisma, he doesn't get to choose for you.

[JellyPooga]

Squish survived and turned out to be very op. He is now guarding the village he used to throw boulders on. I wish I could stay with him but my team mate roled a natural 20 on persuading me to come with them.. oh well ..

Hooray! Squish lived!

I'd have been tempted to retire the character and set up shop in the village. Just think of how quickly you could have built your Wizard Tower with Squish helping with the manual labour...

[Herobizkit]

For instance, my party spent 3 sessions (4 hours each - 12 hours total!!) making our party Paladin into the Greco-Roman wrestling champion of the city, totally ignoring the main plot, in protest because literally every plot thread leading up to that point was left totally unresolved. On the bright side, it got him all the finest wenches throughout the city & we made a good bit of gold by betting on him. We even spent like an hour detailing a halfling orgy he took part in, making the DM totally uncomfortable.This is great. This is what all "sandbox" games should come to. Plots are only interesting if the players find them interesting. You don't have to 100% your DM's work if he says "do whatever". Make Your Own Fun, is what the DM is saying, and you did. ^_^

[MaxDPSsays]

Yea, as said earlier, characters can't use social skills against other characters. Especially persuasion. He rolled a 20? Good for him, you can still make your own choices. Think of it like this, all the charisma based classes would be using these skills as "charm" spells (unlimited) if they were able to do what your team member did, and basically control your character.
No Bob, you really do want to go punch the king in the face *rolls 20 and snickers*.

[Coffee_Dragon]

We even spent like an hour detailing a halfling orgy he took part in, making the DM totally uncomfortable.


This is what all "sandbox" games should come to.

*takes notes*

[Douche]

This is great. This is what all "sandbox" games should come to. Plots are only interesting if the players find them interesting. You don't have to 100% your DM's work if he says "do whatever". Make Your Own Fun, is what the DM is saying, and you did. ^_^

Oh, no, we always followed the plot. It's just that the DM was constantly stringing us into another mostly unrelated plot without any resolution to the first one.

It started off that we were trying to destroy a drug smuggling ring, which led us to have to go kill the king of a neighboring kingdom, who turned out to be a good guy & we learn we were deceived, then we had to flee the country & spent a few weeks killing pirates, now we're trying to prevent a war. A few weeks ago, I thought to myself, "What have we actually accomplished? What reason or qualifications do we even have for anyone to put their faith in us as adventurers?" and came up with nothing.