Player vs. Player: How common is it?

[Talakeal]

Ok, so I have been in numerous groups over the years where players betrayed, stole from, attacked, and sometimes even killed one another. I thought this was normal. Generally I didn't get involved, I normally play NG characters and never initiate PvP, and normally try and mediate or break it up when it occurs.

One time, about 15 years ago, a player who had a long history of stealing from or betraying the party behind their back and I were in a new group. I was a rogue, he was a fighter, and he was constantly bullying me like he was Biff Tanen and I was McFly. Eventually we came to a place where I refused to swim (my character was afraid of water) and he through me in, where I was attacked by sea monsters and nearly killed. I decided I had enough, and as I was a rogue and couldn't stand up to him in a straight fight I murdered him in his sleep. The rest of the group was absolutely shocked, kicked me from the group, and miraculously resurrected the fighter. To this day they will not let me game with them and whenever I complain to them (some of whom are RL friends) about my current (insane) gaming group, they tell me that as a vicious player killer I don't deserve to play with decent players.

For almost ten years I have played with one group exclusively. They are crazy and have serious behavior problems both in and out of game, but I will say that on my watch none of them have ever resorted to PvP behavior, despite the fact that several of the players in the group have engaged in it in the past.

Recently I have tried to break out of my shell and find a new, more sane group, and to my shock PvP combat is again relatively common in the groups I am looking at.

When I asked my friend about this, he came up with a theory that there are basically two circles of gamers. More or less people with social skills and those without. When someone with social skills tries to play with the latter group they simply leave the hobby. When someone without social skills plays with a "normal" group they are quickly kicked out and will gravitate towards like minded players, essentially forming an under class of "psychotic rejects", a realm to which I have banished myself by retaliating in PvP.

Is there any truth to this? Are there really two "classes" of gaming groups? How common is PvP? How appropriate is it? How does one retaliate if they are the victim of it?

[Segev]

I don't know. I have never played with a group that has a major problem with PvP. I don't mean "we do it and don't mind," I mean that there haven't been problems where it's arisen overmuch.

I'm not sure what to tell you about your friends who keep insulting you as "a vicious player-killer." It sounds like they're not being very good friends if they take one incident and assume you never changed and refuse to listen to your side of the story, but as it is, I only have your side of the story to go by, so I can't really fairly judge. Nor, really, is it my place.

I would advise talking to them and trying to get into gaming with them again, and take the tac that you do not want to engage in PvP, and that you won't if it isn't instigated by another player again. And that, even if it is, you will point out that it is happening and point out that, if they do it, you will respond in kind, and make sure everybody knows it's not you starting it. Try to resolve such things OOC, since they don't want PvP in games.

But I have no idea if that would work; I don't know your friends.

[BWR]

Talakeal: All I can say is that you've had almost unbelievably bad luck with your groups. However I would say in your first example you crossed the line. Not by much, and their reaction was ridiculous, but you did go a bit far.

Personally, PVP doesn't happen. We're more likely to have players screw their characters over to avoid being dickish to other players. We've had a couple of campaigns where political backstabbing and similar unpleasantness was expected and agreed upon beforehand but in general PCs actually attacking other PCs only happens because of external forces like Confusion or Dominate. We generally try to get along and not be unpleasant enough that PCs want to do that to other PCs.

[Rainman3769]

I don't think any serious PVP has ever happened in my gaming group, serious as in one PC killing another. There have been very rare occasions where a PC is in such conflict with the group that they pack their stuff and leave, but PVP has never been the answer. I cannot speak for other groups, but from my reading here at the Playground it seems more often than not that when bad/negative stories pop up, PvP seems to involved more often than not. Personally I would be very pissed off if a PC of mine got whacked by another unless I started it, which I would never do.

As an aside, your team killing wasn't entirely justified IMO, but then again that Fighter HAD to know your PC was going to snap eventually. Its VERY ANNOYING in and out of game when another player decides his character is going to be a raging **** to yours, assuming their actions will be consequence-free because you are all "just playing a game."

[Thrudd]

My groups have generally avoided PvP unless it was set up intentionally as part of a story game. The exception to this was when I was 11-12 years old, and my friends and I were teaching ourselves AD&D. We were kids and our games were crazy and everyone was trying to get that gold, which sometimes resulted in killing another player for a nice piece of loot, or just because they were annoying. Characters came and went like the wind in those days.

[ComaVision]

I am commonly the initiator of PvP in the games I play. I had never seen or been told that PvP was bad prior to reading on GitP. As it was never criticised when I was learning to play, I have no problem with it in the games I now DM. The best roleplaying drama you can get is between PCs. That being said, I wouldn't be angry if my character attacked someone in game and was consequently killed for his aggressive actions. It's a game.

As far as the comment about PvPers being those without social skills... I'm easily one of the most socially aware people in my player group. Maybe it'd be fairer to say that PvPers are the more competitive people.

[BWR]

I am commonly the initiator of PvP in the games I play. I had never seen or been told that PvP was bad prior to reading on GitP. As it was never criticised when I was learning to play, I have no problem with it in the games I now DM. The best roleplaying drama you can get is between PCs. That being said, I wouldn't be angry if my character attacked someone in game and was consequently killed for his aggressive actions. It's a game.

As far as the comment about PvPers being those without social skills... I'm easily one of the most socially aware people in my player group. Maybe it'd be fairer to say that PvPers are the more competitive people.

It's a game, as you rightly say. That doesn't mean PVP is automatically ok. The game is supposed to be fun and for lots of us, in lots of games, PVP and general unpleasantness between PCs is considered dickish behavior. Having your PC continually steal from other PCs, screw them over in game, kill them etc. is fine if the target players are ok with it. If they aren't ok with it, it's a problem and should stop. Saying "it's just a game" doesn't excuse anything.

[ComaVision]

It's a game, as you rightly say. That doesn't mean PVP is automatically ok. The game is supposed to be fun and for lots of us, in lots of games, PVP and general unpleasantness between PCs is considered dickish behavior. Having your PC continually steal from other PCs, screw them over in game, kill them etc. is fine if the target players are ok with it. If they aren't ok with it, it's a problem and should stop. Saying "it's just a game" doesn't excuse anything.

What I don't understand on this forum is how everyone has these stories about how someone initiated PvP and they're jerks. It seems to me if the group doesn't like/allow PvP they should mention that at the beginning.

[BWR]

What I don't understand on this forum is how everyone has these stories about how someone initiated PvP and they're jerks. It seems to me if the group doesn't like/allow PvP they should mention that at the beginning.

You may feel that way. Most people feel that they shouldn't need to point that out. Kind of like you don't generally feel the need to point out that you don't start randomly punching members of the same team in various sports.

[mikeejimbo]

I think that saying those without social skills are the PVPers is an oversimplification, and possibly just false. Doing PVP "well" probably requires good social skills, and so it can come up in mature groups. That said, I feel that it's best when rare (lest it come to be expected, which keeps the edge off), and either indirect (not typically killing) or at least equal opportunity. (Like the one time I killed the rest of my party. Good times. Good times. Granted my character was killed the next week when I couldn't make it, but that was honestly not in retaliation - the rest of the re-rolled PCs were TPK'd. Also my GM put me up to all of it.)

[BeerMug Paladin]

I've gamed for well over a decade now, and I can only think of three instances of PVP. I'll describe them.

This was an evil game. The goal was to overthrow the local kingdom and rule over it. For some reason, instead of ruling our own empire, about half of the player party wanted to run off and become some kind of hit-squad for a competing evil empire (the DM likes to insert a WW2 Germany analog into every game).

As the self-appointed party leader, I concocted a double-cross consisting of the members of the party which I more or less figured wouldn't want to go along with that plan. One of the players used to be a priest in the aforementioned evil empire, but was kicked out for being "too extreme" so he of course wasn't interested in rejoining them. We waited until our main story objective was complete, using a codeword I spoke to begin the betrayal.

It was essentially just the capstone to the campaign. But the person who got the blame IRL for the betrayal was the person who played the priest, who got a bad reputation among certain people as a backstabber and a PVP enthusiast.

In the second game, the party got ahold of a dangerous artifact. I was a chaotic neutral priestess of Bacchus. Another player was a chaotic evil wizard. The wizard was trusted with the big dangerous artifact, and at one point opened a doomy portal of doom and tossed a good aligned NPC in there my priestess liked.

At the time we were alone, one player was somewhere else and another player had died that session, so me and the wizard fought each other one on one. I happened to win and rescued the NPC.

The player with the evil wizard was fine with that killing, because he said he expected it to turn out that way eventually. (He was evil in a mostly good party.)

The third, I was playing a warlock and we had a priest of Pelor in the party. I cast an animate dead spell I had gotten in order to help in a tough combat and was immediately turned on and attacked by the player. It was funny, actually. The party ended up winning, but was nearly wiped out by that.

So I have been on all sides of PVP. And only really had them happen a few times in a long gaming history. The only people I know who took PVP badly were the people who like to consider themselves 'serious' roleplayers. (That same person who played the priest was told by people he supposedly 'breaks character' when he gets bored.)

I don't generally get the impression that PVP is more common amongst the socially inept. Just that whether or not a group engages in it frequently is going to mostly matter on the group dynamics and how they approach the game. I've never been in a gaming group where PVP is common, though. So I can't comment on what that's like.

[BWR]

Actually, I just recalled one time we had proper, unplanned pvp: Ravenloft. The party's wizard had become an evil undead and was stealing some evil artifact. The party's paladin tried to stop him with his lance. One dead paladin land a fireballed, nearly dead group later, the wizard flew off. It was agreed that despite being entirely in character for an evil, power hungry vampire-lich and making for a better story, pvp was not something we wanted to make a habit of.

[Tengu_temp]

What I don't understand on this forum is how everyone has these stories about how someone initiated PvP and they're jerks. It seems to me if the group doesn't like/allow PvP they should mention that at the beginning.

I think it's the opposite, actually. If pvp is expected to happen, it should be mentioned at the start. The default assumption is "no pvp, we stick together and work together".

In general, unplanned pvp is usually the sign that something went wrong.

[ComaVision]

Saying "it's just a game" doesn't excuse anything.

I was using that to explain why I'm not upset if something happens to my character, not as an excuse for anything.

You may feel that way. Most people feel that they shouldn't need to point that out. Kind of like you don't generally feel the need to point out that you don't start randomly punching members of the same team in various sports.

Those aren't remotely the same thing. I suppose I'm a jerk for winning at video games too because it's akin to punching a team mate. However, it is the same as me assuming I can play a Wizard unless I'm explicitly told otherwise. There is no rule that I am aware of that says you can't be involved in PvP.

I think it's the opposite, actually. If pvp is expected to happen, it should be mentioned at the start. The default assumption is "no pvp, we stick together and work together".

In general, unplanned pvp is usually the sign that something went wrong.

I wouldn't say that PvP is particularly expected to happen in the games I run or play in, it just isn't discouraged. If one player attacked another for no coneivable in-game reason then it would be frowned on. I would be fine if the understanding was "no pvp, we stick together and work together" but that's never been established.

[Tengu_temp]

I wouldn't say that PvP is particularly expected to happen in the games I run or play in, it just isn't discouraged. If one player attacked another for no coneivable in-game reason then it would be frowned on. I would be fine if the understanding was "no pvp, we stick together and work together" but that's never been established.

"No conceivable in-game reason" is just one of the many ways pvp can be a sign of things going wrong. Others might be the group not bothering to make sure the characters mesh and resulting in a party with heroic boy scouts and dog-kicking cartoon villains together, or the rogue thinking that playing a thief gives him an excuse for stealing from the party, or one of the players being a **** in general and just looking for IC reasons to screw over the other characters, and many other such reasons. These are vastly more common than unplanned pvp that fits within the game.

[Amidus Drexel]

I've had all kinds of PvP in my games, and generally it's worked out fine (my players are all fine with PvP - I'd say most of them like to play in campaigns where that sort of party in-fighting is expected), with a few exceptions. Here's the scenarios that I've run into.

1). PC attacks PC. I've run a lot of evil campaigns, and backstabbing is common and expected. Ditto for when PCs are mind-controlled and directed to attack other PCs (although that's a much rarer occurance). I'm fine with this if all players involved are fine with this (and they usually are).

2). PC steals items/gold/etc from PC. I generally ban this, just because of how much trouble it causes. I'm sure it could work alright in some situations, but unless both players are fine with it (this has never happened to me), I won't allow it.

3). PC mind-controls/lies to another PC. This I'm kind of iffy on - as with 1), I'm fine with it if both players are fine with it, but it has a habit of going too far pretty quickly, so I've found that I often need to put my foot down if it's causing a problem. Now, if the two PCs are dueling to the death or something, then this is fair game - if you attack the party's enchanter without good defenses against suggestion and dominate, then it's your own fault.

[Fire Lord Pi]

I certainly don't encourage PvP as it dislikes the narrative if it is the focus, but if it happens naturally is makes for an excellent story.

In my first big campaign, everything came to a close when a ghost convinced a character to chop of the other members of the party's finger and issue an ultimatum. After someone was killed it was clear that the campaign had reached an ending, but I have no regrets. I didn't plan this PvP, it just happened for in-game reasons.

In my current campaign PvP is also prevalent. In a world where arcane magic users are executed on sight, some people still chose to play wizards and such, and payed the price. I had one player get stabbed by a party member after accidental friendly fire. He was already a suspected a Mage, so they made short work of him.

On another occasion, a Mage hunter PC attempted to kill the very popular party bard involving a massive interparty skirmish, with various people picking sides. This player was eventually killed for this, but not before taking the bard out of the picture.


Keep in mind, I do run a very high fatality campaign, but PvP can be an excellent plot device (not always, but sometimes) and as long as everyone is acting IC, I find no reason to discourage it.

[WarKitty]

I think it's the opposite, actually. If pvp is expected to happen, it should be mentioned at the start. The default assumption is "no pvp, we stick together and work together".

In general, unplanned pvp is usually the sign that something went wrong.

Depends on the game. In a D&D game no PvP is probably pretty common, though not universal. Paranoia? If there's no PvP you're doing it wrong.

[Benthesquid]

It's common in my experience for PCs to bicker, and occasionally steal from or deceive each other, but I haven't seen it go further than that except in cases where it's been planned by mutual agreement (one campaign where I changed from being a player to GM involved my character robbing the rest of the party on the way out to become the BBEG). Personally, when I'm playing in a campaign where it seems like PvP might come up (such as an Evil Campaign, or something where there's a clear prize that only one person can get, such as becoming king), I check with the GM for their expectations on the matter.

[WarKitty]

Most of the PvP "problems" honestly seem like they were problems before the PvP ever got started.

[jedipotter]

Is there any truth to this? Are there really two "classes" of gaming groups? How common is PvP? How appropriate is it? How does one retaliate if they are the victim of it?

It is no where near that simple. It is not just the ''bad social skilled people'' that do PvP.

The top three I'd think would be

1.Mean People If a person is mean all the time...well then they are mean all the time. If the guy just insulted five people, stole a parking spot and kicked a dog before the game....then when he does some PvP in the game, is really not too much of a shock.

2.Selfish People If as person is selfish all the time...they will stay selfish during the game. And PvP is a great way to get a person out of the way...

3.Bullys This is the most common. If someone is a Bully, then PvP is just another way to ''beat up someone''.

[Cazero]

And of course, there is the good roleplayer who already tried numerous alternatives.

A paladin might start by lecturing the rogue for stealing from the party. He's supposed to immediatly turn the rogue to a legitimate authority, but he's metagaming and uses the credible roleplaying alternative of doing concessions for the sake of the party. The second time comes with a warning rather than a lecture, the third with measures to actively prevent or punish stealing. If the rogue still doesn't get the message, subduing him by force is the only alternative remaining for the paladin. He simply has to stop the rogue from crossing the line more, and that is good roleplaying, as opposed to the immediate brute force option, wich would be a **** move.

The OP situation seems rather similar. The fighter had it coming, he stretched it too far by attempting murder (even if he wasn't seeing it that way) and the rogue answered in a logical, pragmatic way that perfectly fits his abilities and worldview : killing before being killed, while he sleeps because he can't beat him otherwise. Of course, if the rogue never complained IC before it seems excessive.

Remember that PvP doesn't boil down to blowing hits and killing. It's just a line that you should avoid to cross, but sometimes it makes no sense not to do so.

[Earthwalker]

What I don't understand on this forum is how everyone has these stories about how someone initiated PvP and they're jerks. It seems to me if the group doesn't like/allow PvP they should mention that at the beginning.

In one way I think you are right. If you are a group that does not like PVP and doesnt want to PVP you should say up front. Of course equally when you are joining a group its not that much effort to ask, what does the group feel about PVP.

As for being a Jerk for PVPing. Say 5 people get together to play DnD. One of them makes a character that has issues one way or another with one of the other players characters. At some stage PVP starts and a character is killed. One player is then out of the game till he gets rezzed (if possible) or makes a new character. Its like the person initiating PVP is saying. My need to play my character how I want is more important than your need. You sit out of the game for two hours so I can play who I want to. I can see how that can be seen as jerkish.

Of course thats DnD, if we are playing Paranoia then also shiny. After all i its just another Clone down and we carry on with the game, no one sits out.

For me PvP was common when I started. We did some Runequest and one GM ran adventures where we would all be the same family of cults and work together on the adventure, no PVP. The Next GM I think was just Lazy. It was far easier to just have the players work against each other and kill each other than work out an adventure. It was always terrible PVP with people just murdered in thier sleep with no rolls.

These days PvP is not that common at all. I generally play with no PvP groups and its made clear before hand the group is suppose to be working together.

[Jay R]

When I asked my friend about this, he came up with a theory that there are basically two circles of gamers. More or less people with social skills and those without. When someone with social skills tries to play with the latter group they simply leave the hobby. When someone without social skills plays with a "normal" group they are quickly kicked out and will gravitate towards like minded players, essentially forming an under class of "psychotic rejects", a realm to which I have banished myself by retaliating in PvP.

Is there any truth to this? Are there really two "classes" of gaming groups? How common is PvP? How appropriate is it? How does one retaliate if they are the victim of it?

This is a fascinating blend of important truth (grossly over-simplified) and self-serving prejudice. It's certainly true that people get kicked out of groups, or leave groups, over this kind of issue. And if people find a compatible group, they try to stay there.

But the rest is both overly simplistic and prejudiced. First of all, there are more than two types of gamers. There's a continuum:

• gamers who will assume that the party is the playing unit, and equate PvP with hitting yourself in the face in football,
• those who consider the party to be a group of mostly friends with individual goals as well,
• those who will hide a small piece of any treasure they find when alone,
• those who will commit overt obnoxious acts against party members but not murder,
• those who will murder a party member in his sleep if provoked,
• those who are playing against the other PCs.

This is by no means a complete list. There are many other gradations.

Very few people see it as a continuum, and almost everybody considers the people just one step past them on the continuum to be jerks. It's always tempting to put a wall between you and everybody who goes further than you do, and call it the definition of fair play. People who treat the party like absolute allies get annoyed when somebody pockets 50 cp he found when alone. People who would try to cheat another PC are outraged when the second one fights back physically.

This is normal behavior - very tempting and very common. After all, the reason you will do X but not Y is that you believe X is all right and that Y is not. It's hard to remember that the people who do W but not X feel the same way about you, and for the same reason.

Your misfortune was that you escalated from overt action to killing, in a group that accepted the first but not the second. Another group might have kicked the other guy out as soon as he threw you in the water. (I'd have talked to him OOC after the game.)

I don't believe that having social skills is correlated with this continuum, but reducing it to that insult is a quick and easy way to dismiss players who disagree with you. Most games are directly competitive. It's not true that people who play any non-role-playing game like football or poker have no social skills.

In your place, I might have considered leaving the group when he threw you in the water. If you had done that, you could have claimed the same pretended moral high ground that they are now claiming. Unfortunately, you lost your right to complain about it when you escalated in-game. By that action, you accepted his act as part of gameplay

In any event, to let you back in, they would have to admit that their "moral outrage" was out of place, and possibly admit that the other guy's action was also unreasonable. These are hard moral hills to climb. It's so much easier and more comfortable to condemn somebody else.

And to be fair, I have to admit that to some extent, that's what I'm doing, by speaking against them here. As I said, it is very tempting, and very common.

"The brotherhood of man is no mere poet's fancy. It is a most real and depressing reality."
-- Oscar Wilde

[BeerMug Paladin]

Actually, now that I've had some time to think about it, I realize I've been involved in more PVP than I remembered at first. Twice, I was involved in killing a character before they were even properly introduced to the party. (Not as bad as it sounds, honest!)

And there's at least one other time I can think of where I was a bystander to a PVP fight.

So it's more common than I was initially thinking. But I still don't think all that common. Many more campaigns come and go (in my circles at least) without PVP of any kind than with it.

[Segev]

Yeah, to me, "physically forcing another PC to do what you want" (in this case, pushing them in the water to force them to swim) is as much PvP as "threatening to/following through on kill(ing) a PC for not doing what you want" (in this case, treating you with respect and not risking your life needlessly). Given the lethal nature of your jobs, callous disregard for a party-mate's safety is close enough to deliberate threats on their life that preventative (IC) murder is not beyond the pale in terms of OOC choices.

Now, perhaps it warranted some OOC discussion, first. "Hey, I don't appreciate you using your characer's mechanics to force mine into these situations. I will put up with it if you will tolerate mine reacting as mine would, IC, to somebody who physically abuses and nearly kills him. If, however, you'd prefer I curb my character's responses, I would ask that you curb your character's abuse."

But I've noticed that there is a tendency amongst some players to draw a line which they call "unacceptable PvP," then engage in bullying that allows them to basically coerce other PCs into doing their will out of fear or through overt control, because those PCs' only retaliatory options are across that line.

If somebody is playing a monstrously powerful death-dealer but can't fight without killing, and another character physically wrestles with, abuses, and throws around said death-dealer in non-lethal ways, it is no less PvP than that death-dealer turning around and killing the aggressor. But for some reason, there are groups that will accept the non-lethal bullying as "okay" but turn on the player who dares retaliate with lethal action. Even though his choices are "do nothing" and "respond lethally." Even if the death-dealer has nearly died thanks to the bullying.


Again, I'd try to talk to your friends again. Lay out the situation as you saw it. Explain that you're happy to come to an agreement on what level of PvP is acceptable, but would like to know in advance. You're not out to PK just to PK; to you, it was a PvP response to PvP action. Express a willingness to avoid PvP if they will enforce it equally, and to come to OOC agreements about IC behaviors to make for a smoothly running game.

That they hold this grudge for so long sounds like they have a very different perspective on what happened...or that they might not really want to be your friends. Which would be very sad.

[ElenionAncalima]

In the games I have played...not very common.

I think we have had two party betrayals and one incident which resulted in PvP combat. None of those situations went particularly well. The combat one was a good roleplaying moment, but also resulted in two players having to build new characters and a third player sitting out for two sessions while we rescued her character...and the campaign never really recovered.

That being said, all the groups I am in tend to favor long campaigns with few character deaths. Its not surprising that killing a character someone has been playing for 6 months doesn't go over well. Tables who mostly play one shots or play in meat grinders might have a different attitude about PvP. I don't really see that as lacking social skills, so much as being less invested in their character's fate...and that ok. The ability to step back and say, "Its just a game" certainly isn't a sign of social impairment.

I think PvP becomes a problem when it is unwelcome at the table. In the OP's case that was true...although it sounds like that wasn't made clear. Obviously we are only hearing one side of the story, but it even sounds like the group was misleading in this regard. The bullying of the fighter didn't imply a "make a character that gets along with the group" table...and picking someone up and throwing them in a body of water with sea monsters is borderline PvP in its own right. Based on your friend's comments and the whole table's attitude, I wouldn't spend a lot of time lamenting being kicked from their group.

[Mastikator]

Why didn't you say "that's PVP what the hell are you doing man?" when the fighter threw you into the water?

It's very easy to be blind to when bullying occurs and you need to point it out and freak out about it or it is only going to get worse.

[Sith_Happens]

My current group can't go two sessions without at least two PCs getting into a fistfight (or sometimes just a fight fight), but it's never while something important is going on and no one's ever gone lethal.

[Dycize]

Why didn't you say "that's PVP what the hell are you doing man?" when the fighter threw you into the water?

From what I understood Talakeal wasn't even aware that PVP would be an issue with the group. It was just natural and the guy he killed was a guy who pretty much engaged in theft pvp all the time before. So they were both used to PVP. The new group... Was not, and sadly Talakeal was the one who took the one totally wrong and unforgivable action (seriously they still don't allow you *years* after 1 mishap?).

My old group was always... Casual PVPers? PVP naturally came if characters did unsavory stuff to each others. There was also that time my character actively pursued another player's character with the intent of killing him before he was properly introduced (don't introduce people with assassinations it ends badly if it was a friend of a perceptive warblade). The DM eventually deus ex'd the other player out of certain doom... But no one was feeling especially horrified at the turn of events (in fact, the assassin only got angry at the DM 'cause he was the one who put him in the assassination position in the 1st place). Characters didn't often try to kill off each others, but if it happened, there generally was a good reason (and things that weren't killing happened waaaay more often, practical jokes!). It was just a result of roleplay and character interactions.

Now there was that one time where my old DM and I joined a skype game because my old DM had found it where it had an instance of PVP that absolutely baffled me. Party had a druid, a swordmage thing-amajig (my old DM), a ninja and my psion. It was all going well until after one night we found the druid's animal companion dead and a nowhere to be seen ninja. Turns out he had turned evil (yes, he was CG and literally turned CE at the drop of a hat and the DM saw nothing wrong with that) because the party "lacked a proper leader" (who would have thought that everyone chiming in to make party decisions would turn out so badly!...). After that other issues popped up and I quickly left the game once the session was over. It was weird and came out of nowhere with the strangest reason backing it.

In short I personally see nothing wrong with PVP if it makes sense or is not completely over the top (like those stories of thief players who steal everything that isn't bolted down). I can understand Talakeal's position but yeah, the IC bullying should've been brought up before you went straight for the kill. Maybe they thought it was funny and didn't realise it was really bothering you? However, their reaction once it was done... Yeah now that's something that doesn't really have much to do with PVP imo.

Also I don't believe in there being 2 classes of gaming groups. You can have some of the most pvp-less, unfriendly people ever and some really friendly people who see absolutely nothing wrong with PVP. Also if you're a victim of PVP, ie you don't like it when your supposed allies stab you, you talk about it to the group. Maybe they'll stop and it'll be all good, maybe they won't and then you have to decide if you'd rather play a pin cushion or go do something else.