Common Aggravating Table Behaviors

[Darth Ultron]

"Mk. So that's what you see when you walk out the door. MEANWHILE, with the rest of the group, you all just saw the rogue leave. What is the plan?"

Just swap focus between the two groups. It's not even hard. It's as easy as saying "We'll come back to you in a moment, I want to see what's happening with X." No one can force the GM to follow their individual adventure. And the GM can always say "you do indeed wander off your own. Nothing interesting happens. We'll catch up with you momentarily."

And these are equally lazy as "You die for no reason" and are less likely to cause someone to pitch a fit.

Sure you could cut back and forth from the group of good players and the jerk solo player....but why reward the jerk?

And it's just as ''lazy'' and a waste of time to say ''sigh, like a jerk you wander away from the group and you see nothing of interest, ok.''

Another good thing to do to the solo jerk player is have the group have a combat encounter with good loot after they wander away.

This right here is what I was looking for. Heck, a simple "you go off and have a fun afternoon hanging out with the Jawas. Meanwhile, back to the rest of the group..." would have been perfectly acceptable.

That your just the type of player that likes to waste game time with fluff does not change anything. Sure you say it would have been fine if the Dm just ''said something'' and you'd stop disrupting the game. And, ok, fine...that is you. So how about all the other 99% of players that won't do that? They are going to be disruptive and whine and be like ''what did I do with the Jawas'' and ask all sorts of questions and even spiral into a solo game.

Instead, I more or less got "you've broken direct line of sight with your party members. Now you're at -8 and bleeding, and let that be a lesson to you." That's way over the top.

For me it's all about saving game time and encouraging good player behavior.

[Cluedrew]

Sure you could cut back and forth from the group of good players and the jerk solo player....but why reward the jerk?

Well remember Darth Ultron, you are that solo player. You are the odd one out who we spend time and energy connecting with the "good players", which is the other posters who have more standard play-styles. Yes the analogy is not perfect, but both are cases where (if handled properly) including someone who is a little off-beat of the others can benefit the situation.

You can spend 30 seconds establishing the connection to the local Jawa's which can become a plot point or "resource" for later in the campaign. Maybe they can get something fixed, or get something smuggled in that they need.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Sure you could cut back and forth from the group of good players and the jerk solo player....but why reward the jerk?

I think a few minutes of spotlight is a fine reward for paying attention and actively trying to engage with the game world. Not every second of table time has to apply to every player, and I I want them to react to things in-character. As long as you're not consistently favoring one player with solo time, or running them for a prolonged time without jumping back to the main group, it's better to allow PCs to not be chained together.

That your just the type of player that likes to waste game time with fluff does not change anything. Sure you say it would have been fine if the Dm just ''said something'' and you'd stop disrupting the game. And, ok, fine...that is you. So how about all the other 99% of players that won't do that? They are going to be disruptive and whine and be like ''what did I do with the Jawas'' and ask all sorts of questions and even spiral into a solo game.

I think 99% of players will modify their behaviors if the DM asks them politely, rather than the reverse. And again, it takes so, so little time to just say "you meet with the Jawas; it turns out that one of them is your sixth-cousin, so you all go out to drink and scavenge for a while."

[Stealth Marmot]

Should we just make another thread JUST about switching focus between different characters? I figure since it seems to be dominating this thread.

[Blue Duke]

the Fluff lets your mind drag you off into the fun rather then just throwing dice and cheering or cursing when you get numbers with no real context other then 'low is bad, high is good' or vis versa. The fluff is how you aren't sitting around a table tossing dice but instead your group/team/party/crew are sitting around a table in an inn/cantina/seedy space port bar/stuffer shack waiting for the mission/quest/cargo/what have you.

the fluff is literally 50% of the damn game rather then '1% that no one cares about'


Sorry i'll move on now.

[The Fury]

In-character references to real world pop culture.

I'm guilty of an odd variation of that-- having conversations at the table, (in character or out,) that sound like they could be pop culture references but aren't.

Belligerent PC: Completely breaks the immersion of the game by doing things like shouting insults at the BBEG who is here to destroy the world. I spend 2 hours leading up the to Boss Battle, setting the tone and getting everyone in the "mood", and he screams "YOUR MOM WEARS COMBAT BOOTS, etc." at the BBEG and ruins the atmosphere I have been setting up all night.....

I'm not even a weird variation of that. This is me. Full stop. Campaign villains have a habit of appearing on the scene, and dropping some kind of spell that makes it impossible for the currently under-leveled player party to cause them any harm. Usually this involves the bad guy delivering some kind of bombshell about what they're up to and how hopelessly outclassed we are. Yet I gotta get my hits in where I can, and if I can't hurt them physically, I can at least try to hurt their feelings. I do this in fights when I'm losing as well. "My sister hits harder than you! She's eight!" was one of my favorite zingers.

please don't be that guy.

Yeah, sorry about that. At least I'm not in your group, right?

[Vrock_Summoner]

If it makes you feel any better, The Fury, you'd fit right in in my group. Well, except that I don't have "untouchable boss appearance" scenes. But the insults and peppy humor-laden dialogue would fit right in. This despite being an overall serious game, because I like mood-whiplashing my players. (Is that an aggravating/bad behavior on my part? Man...)

[Quertus]

I'm not even a weird variation of that. This is me. Full stop. Campaign villains have a habit of appearing on the scene, and dropping some kind of spell that makes it impossible for the currently under-leveled player party to cause them any harm. Usually this involves the bad guy delivering some kind of bombshell about what they're up to and how hopelessly outclassed we are. Yet I gotta get my hits in where I can, and if I can't hurt them physically, I can at least try to hurt their feelings. I do this in fights when I'm losing as well. "My sister hits harder than you! She's eight!" was one of my favorite zingers.

Fighting a foe whose power was "total lockdown, no actions, no roll", my response as I was being run through was, "c'mon, I've had piercings that hurt worse than this".

[The Fury]

If it makes you feel any better, The Fury, you'd fit right in in my group. Well, except that I don't have "untouchable boss appearance" scenes. But the insults and peppy humor-laden dialogue would fit right in. This despite being an overall serious game, because I like mood-whiplashing my players. (Is that an aggravating/bad behavior on my part? Man...)

Ha! What I've been learning is that there are groups out there that would boot me during the first session, and that's OK. After all, my style of playing isn't for everyone. At least there are groups that have kept me around.

Fighting a foe whose power was "total lockdown, no actions, no roll", my response as I was being run through was, "c'mon, I've had piercings that hurt worse than this".

That's pretty good. Maybe we can compare notes on insults delivered to NPCs that had it coming?

[Darth Ultron]

I think 99% of players will modify their behaviors if the DM asks them politely, rather than the reverse. And again, it takes so, so little time to just say "you meet with the Jawas; it turns out that one of them is your sixth-cousin, so you all go out to drink and scavenge for a while."

A agree the small, rare 1% of players are great. They can take the 30 seconds and the game goes on. The problem is the other 99% of players...the jerks that just don't know when to stop. The DM makes the slight remark of ''you drink and scavenge for a while'', and wants to get back to the game. The player, however, goes into full jerk mode and they want to know ''what did I drink?'' and ''what did I scavenge?" and want to spiral off into a solo adventure.

[Vrock_Summoner]

A agree the small, rare 1% of players are great. They can take the 30 seconds and the game goes on. The problem is the other 99% of players...the jerks that just don't know when to stop. The DM makes the slight remark of ''you drink and scavenge for a while'', and wants to get back to the game. The player, however, goes into full jerk mode and they want to know ''what did I drink?'' and ''what did I scavenge?" and want to spiral off into a solo adventure.

I'm pretty sure the disagreement here is that you each have a different idea which kind of player is in the 1% and which is in the 99%. Which, more likely than not, means the real numbers fall somewhere in between.

I'm just thankful to have a group who doesn't mind solo or split segments and who all have equal opportunities to engage in such. I sometimes forget that a lot of the groups I hear about online are people who only hang out to game rather than being friends in general, so there isn't the air of mutual respect and generosity I'm used to at my tables.

[Blue Duke]

Do people often have kleptomaniacs in their groups ? ones who go around stealing stuff from NPC's and party members and do so ALL THE FREAKING TIME, do so gleefully and often get away with it (ocassionally with out a roll because the DM thinks its funny)?

[Erit]

Do people often have kleptomaniacs in their groups ? ones who go around stealing stuff from NPC's and party members and do so ALL THE FREAKING TIME, do so gleefully and often get away with it (ocassionally with out a roll because the DM thinks its funny)?

You mean Kender? Speaking for my groups, anyone who did that would find themselves lynched in-game quite rapidly. Speaking for others... probably the same considering "Promoting Table Discord" is one of the Deadly Sins of TTG.

[Blue Duke]

No i mean some one who does that no matter what character/race/game they are playing......and deliberately does s%$& to get us in trouble with the police/guard/security. and before you ask: they cant be kicked they are dateing/engaged to one of the DM's in the group.

[Cluedrew]

I'm just thankful to have a group who doesn't mind solo or split segments and who all have equal opportunities to engage in such. I sometimes forget that a lot of the groups I hear about online are people who only hang out to game rather than being friends in general, so there isn't the air of mutual respect and generosity I'm used to at my tables.

On Split Parties: One of my favourite campaigns had this weird feature where there was only one scene in the entire campaign that had the entire party in it. Every other scene was just one or two members. You can make it work, just make ample use of scene transitions and don't ask too much of people who aren't in scene.

On Gaming With Friends: Sit down with strangers and leave with friends. Or at least on friendly terms. I think generally if there are a enough people there setting the right mood others will... open up? That's not quite right, sort of like take the hint, but in a "we want you here" way instead of the usual "we don't want you here" way. The best game I have had have always been completely cooperative out of character, even if we are trying to kill each other in character.

Tips for running a good game or encouraging good table behaviours could be its own thread.

[Darth Ultron]

Do people often have kleptomaniacs in their groups ? ones who go around stealing stuff from NPC's and party members and do so ALL THE FREAKING TIME, do so gleefully and often get away with it (ocassionally with out a roll because the DM thinks its funny)?

Yes, I'd add this to the list. The worst is when they steal from NPC allies, and do over the top things like ''when sitting at the dinner table with the king they take a gold cup.''

And this runs into Players that think they can act without consequences. Such as when the thief gets caught or even just not be trusted by an npc they stole from.

[cobaltstarfire]

No i mean some one who does that no matter what character/race/game they are playing......and deliberately does s%$& to get us in trouble with the police/guard/security. and before you ask: they cant be kicked they are dateing/engaged to one of the DM's in the group.

That sounds awfully specific to be common.

Though I have met a player that was always trying to break into houses and steal things. He never tried to pick pocket anyone. I guess he thought that as long as he was stealing from the homes of the people we were trying to protect it was ok, because they had fled for the time being.

The DM wasn't having any of it though: The first house had nothing of worth in it (because peasants), the second house featured a door that was opened very suddenly and knocked him out cold. The rest of us survived the fight without him at least.

[NickChaisson]

I have a few behaviors that I find to be aggravating, but the most offensive one if not bothering to read the rule books for whatever system we are playing.

I find it to be rude/offensive because I am usually the DM and I have spent my own time reading the rulebooks and so have my other players. But I have one player who usually refuses to read the books and the rest of the party needs to help him make his character and learn the basic rules of the system instead of doing this himself (unless its D&D 3.5).

[WarKitty]

On Gaming With Friends: Sit down with strangers and leave with friends. Or at least on friendly terms. I think generally if there are a enough people there setting the right mood others will... open up? That's not quite right, sort of like take the hint, but in a "we want you here" way instead of the usual "we don't want you here" way. The best game I have had have always been completely cooperative out of character, even if we are trying to kill each other in character.

Tips for running a good game or encouraging good table behaviours could be its own thread.

And of course how cooperative you're expected to be varies by system. In the various iterations of D&D, party cohesion is generally seen as a good and expected thing. That's not true for all systems - in some systems screwing over your fellow party member is expected.

[quinron]

I have a few behaviors that I find to be aggravating, but the most offensive one if not bothering to read the rule books for whatever system we are playing.

I find it to be rude/offensive because I am usually the DM and I have spent my own time reading the rulebooks and so have my other players. But I have one player who usually refuses to read the books and the rest of the party needs to help him make his character and learn the basic rules of the system instead of doing this himself (unless its D&D 3.5).

Honestly, this is what drove my decision to switch away from 3.5/Pathfinder - I get upset when my players don't read the rules (especially on the several occasions that I've told them, for example, "read the Combat chapter for next session), but if I can't even persuade myself to read through the whole rulebook over a few weeks, I can't really feel justified in getting upset with my players for not reading it. Fortunately, since I cut my teeth on 3.5, I'm now able to tell more or less at a glance which parts of the book are going to be important and which parts I can put off reading until something comes up in the game.

[Delicious Taffy]

Similar to the phone thing described earlier. As one who's only every played on online sites like roll20, I hate when players are off playing other games while the session is running.

"Oh, it's not my turn? Cool, I'm gonna go play Fallout and not pay attention to what's going on." And then you have to waste several minutes bringing them back up to speed once they decide to grace the game with their attention once more.

I don't know if you brought up the Fallout thing just as an example, but one of my players did exactly that during our last session.

[Cluedrew]

And this runs into Players that think they can act without consequences.

I have had one particularly bad experience with this, I still call this issue: The Problem with Vincent. Actually that was really the only time, so not common for me.

[Zalabim]

First, a confession: I have, in the past, completed some WoW raids while simultaneously in a particularly slow patch of an online D&D game.

snotty Magic-Users in cohoots with the DM

Do people often have kleptomaniacs in their groups ? ones who go around stealing stuff from NPC's and party members and do so ALL THE FREAKING TIME, do so gleefully and often get away with it (ocassionally with out a roll because the DM thinks its funny)?

I'll try to tell this story quickly to get to the peeves part. A long time ago, when Neverwinter Nights was new, my cousin invited me to his RP multiplayer server. So I made a sorcerer and logged on, but he wasn't online. So I played a quest with the people I did meet there, then hung out by the campfire afterwards. This is where the disaster starts.

A halfling strolls up to me out of stealth. We have a short conversation, and I notice my brand new magic staff is missing from my inventory. So I request that the thief return it, and he starts running away. I tell him to stop or I'll kill him. He goes through a zone transition just ahead of me and vanishes. Apparently he loaded the next map faster, because he really did vanish. I was just beat by a halfling in a footrace.

A short while later, I see the halfling again back at the campfire and follow through on my threat. A magic missile and an acid arrow later and the thief is down. While looting the body, the thief messages me and calls me a metagamer, the GM for the server intervenes and resurrects him. Thief claims there's no way I recognized him because it was dark and he was wearing a hood. I counter with it was not dark as my belt has a light enchantment, and you stopped and had a chat with me. The GM says there's one way I could recognize the halfling, but I have to guess it or let him be. Since I was unable to read the GMs mind through the internet after several guesses, I left and never went back.

So, metagamers who use the "but I'm a PC, you can't do that to me" attitude while doing just that to the other players, DMs who enable this kind of ****ty player, and DM scenarios where you're supposed to be a mind reader in order to solve it.

TL;DR: Playing NWN multiplayer and I killed a bandit and he went "Nuh, uh, I'm like Zorro", and the GM agreed, "Yeah, he's like Zorro." If I had been at a table, someone would have been punched.

[Segev]

If you're concerned about being fair to all players when the party is split, give each group N minutes per player represented in that group. So the solo guy gets 1/4 the time that the other three players, grouped together, get.

[Roughishguy86]

That's pretty good. Maybe we can compare notes on insults delivered to NPCs that had it coming?[/QUOTE]



Just last night my character told an evil warlord that his castle was tacky and that he should fire his interior decorator. In this same campaign I informed another NPC that he was just a walking cliché and that he didn't interest me enough to kill.

This is basically just my default setting when dealing with NPC's that can kill me.

[The Fury]

Do people often have kleptomaniacs in their groups ? ones who go around stealing stuff from NPC's and party members and do so ALL THE FREAKING TIME, do so gleefully and often get away with it (ocassionally with out a roll because the DM thinks its funny)?

Sort of like when I'm going on about formulating a plan to deal with our current predicament, meanwhile there's a player that rolled dice randomly and started snickering and passed a note to the GM, who then also started snickering. Then the GM says to the rest of the party, "You all notice that The Fury isn't wearing any pants. The Fury, you're yammering on about your plan and suddenly you feel a draft!"

Then I'm shown the note that the GM got, it says: "I rolled a 45 on a natural 20 for my Slight of Hand, I steal The Fury's pants."

Yeah, I think I might know that player. It was once explained to me that the reason why I'm usually the target of stuff like this is because I never really get mad over it.

Just last night my character told an evil warlord that his castle was tacky and that he should fire his interior decorator.

So tacky, right? Honestly, it's skulls of his enemies as light fixtures, wall embellishments, banister finials everything! I'll bet that if I went into the bathroom he'd have skulls of his enemies in there too, and I cringe to think what his kitchen looks like. Would it honestly kill him to change up the decor even slightly? Then again, I imagine he would have plenty of skulls of his enemies to go around-- I guess there is an advantage to nobody liking you.

In this same campaign I informed another NPC that he was just a walking cliché and that he didn't interest me enough to kill.

Heh. Yeah, look it this guy-- dressed all in black, bunch of knives, billowing cloak, tastfully "battle scarred..." I get it. "Oooh look at me! I'm so dangerous!"

This is basically just my default setting when dealing with NPC's that can kill me.

Yeah, I'm a little like this too, I like to think I'm decent at picking my targets-- punching up, not punching down if you get me.

[Vrock_Summoner]

TL;DR: Playing NWN multiplayer and I killed a bandit and he went "Nuh, uh, I'm like Zorro", and the GM agreed, "Yeah, he's like Zorro." If I had been at a table, someone would have been punched.

To be fair, if you had been at a table, that probably would've been resolved by a skill check to make out his facial features or something, rather than just coming down to a slightly more advanced version of the usual dispute between children over who, in fact, shot the other first.

[Max_Killjoy]

Sort of like when I'm going on about formulating a plan to deal with our current predicament, meanwhile there's a player that rolled dice randomly and started snickering and passed a note to the GM, who then also started snickering. Then the GM says to the rest of the party, "You all notice that The Fury isn't wearing any pants. The Fury, you're yammering on about your plan and suddenly you feel a draft!"

Then I'm shown the note that the GM got, it says: "I rolled a 45 on a natural 20 for my Slight of Hand, I steal The Fury's pants."

Yeah, I think I might know that player. It was once explained to me that the reason why I'm usually the target of stuff like this is because I never really get mad over it.

1. If I were the GM, I'd make sure the player was looking, set the note down in something fireproof, and light it on fire.

2. If I were the player targeted, I'd get up and leave.


I have no patience for clowns, and even less for pathetic little turds who try to make other people the butt of a stupid stunt.

[Blue Duke]

Sort of like when I'm going on about formulating a plan to deal with our current predicament, meanwhile there's a player that rolled dice randomly and started snickering and passed a note to the GM, who then also started snickering. Then the GM says to the rest of the party, "You all notice that The Fury isn't wearing any pants. The Fury, you're yammering on about your plan and suddenly you feel a draft!"

Then I'm shown the note that the GM got, it says: "I rolled a 45 on a natural 20 for my Slight of Hand, I steal The Fury's pants."

Yeah, I think I might know that player. It was once explained to me that the reason why I'm usually the target of stuff like this is because I never really get mad over it.

I'm the opposite, it annoys the crap out of me and i have a horrible poker face and show it, so i continue to get targeted. I think the one that does it is insulated because shes engaged to one of the DM's but just once i'd really like to go and shoot one of their characters when they do it one time too many. i am just not a fan of player induced shenanigans especially when i'm expected to help keep the other character out of trouble and there is no way mine would do that.......but to preserve the party i have to toss out character behavior and help them dodge the guard.

[Vrock_Summoner]

1. If I were the GM, I'd make sure the player was looking, set the note down in something fireproof, and light it on fire.

2. If I were the player targeted, I'd get up and leave.


I have no patience for clowns, and even less for pathetic little turds who try to make other people the butt of a stupid stunt.

I see how you earned your name.

On my end... I wouldn't be bothered unless those pants had one of my buffs... Though whether I would react in-character or not depends on the intended tone of the game. And not always in the way you might expect - in a more comedic game, I might well just go into my next combat pantsless and not even notice. (Which, really, if the GM is tolerating the player doing that, it better not be a game I'm supposed to take at all seriously.)