So Edgelord definitely had a lot of issues going on that lead me to believe he likely just wasn't in a good headspace to be playing D&D like so many other people have mentioned here. But why the hell is everyone ignoring the role the dm played in this whole tale? OP even outright stated that the dm had been a right asshole for MONTHS to the Edgelord during the previous campaign. He'd been more or less bullying this guy while he was already in a poor place mentally and then everyone is confused when he doesn't seem to want to cooperate with the dm? Who can fucking blame the poor guy after getting tormented by this dm for so long? He shouldn't have joined the new game, that's for sure, but damn I don't entirely blame him for acting out when he had no reason to trust the dm.
I came here to type this same thing. OP literally said his asshole friend was being a rules lawyer the entire time our antagonist was trying to DM. Imagine how he feels now that the guy who rode his ass for an entire campaign is running the show. It's a wonder he lasted as long as he did. Ya know some of these stories describe genuinely weird behavior but some of them teeter on the edge of OP diluting a questionable situation just to get their reddit post onto UA-cam.
Yeah, it seems like the DM was purposely putting him in situations where he would have to give up his hammer/security blanket because of the beef from the previous game.
@@susannahammond2033 I wouldn’t go that far - First time the WHOLE party had to give up their weapons because they where being arrested and it’s silly to expect somebody to throw a fit over that. Second time he was literally just trying to give him a chance to fight without killing somebody - since he had made it clear that’s what he wanted to do even though it was inappropriate and would have hurt the party in-game. Definitely didn’t help with his own behaviour but these scenarios don’t sound anything like an intentional set-up without any more context. You can only come too that conclusion if you go into any scenario expecting the worst and trying to find any reason to believe it’s happening without thinking about any, more reasonable, alternatives - the fault of nearly every conspiracy theorist out there.
@@matthewbibby8921 In character the Hammer was important to him and was the "only thing he had left" of course in character you wouldn't give it to a random NPC so him getting upset isn't too uncalled for
My therapists office advertises their dnd group. It can be a healthy way of letting out your problems. It can equally make them worse. Kinda like how people behave differently when under the influence.
Sounds like he was getting back at dm for messing with him during his campaign and wasnt close enough to the rest of the group so it didn't go over well
So OP invites our antagonist to DND. Antagonist DM's. OP has a friend who is literally called "asshole friend" who is a rules lawyer to our antagonist the entire time he's DMing. Now the guy who's been riding our antagonist for a whole campaign is running the show. From the perspective of our antagonist he got invited to a game, basically bullied into running a campaign by the book when even the book says the DM makes the rules, I can imagine OP didn't stand up to his asshole friend, and now he's got no choice but to relieve himself from being a DM or face further grief from OP's friend. Every decision he makes is met with strife even if it fits with his character. I wonder why he would ever feel conspired against. 🙄
I believe he isn't a creep, just had the worst case of "extremely bad timing". He was far from a great mental state, and shouldn't had been invited to play D&D, given time and space to mourn his loss. It also resulted in him revealing far more than he should've, resulting in him coming off as a creepy dude. As I said, all he needed was time to mourn and he would've been fine.
Agreed. It doesn't tickle as the typical creep who actually acts like a creep all time. This seems like your good coworker friend who has that weird side, but otherwise is a great person....but the timing is just the worst. Loosing a loved one and being isolated, it's likely he was self inserting so much as a cry for help. But he needed professional help, instead he likely only caused the destruction of one of his friendships. the fact that OP saw him alive and still working afterwards means that the dude likely got back in shape, and knew that what he did was wrong. Let's hope both OP and The Dude are doing well. The loss of lives during the pandemic left scars in the hearts of many
I have to say thought, that orc he came up with was just too real. And the fact that not only the DM, but the rest of the players grouped up to make that person hand over the only thing that the character still valued, tells me that the group was a part of the problem. Maybe OP wasn't as nice to them as they say. Or maybe I'm wrong. But trying to separate him from the hammer seems harsh. How come the PCs didn't try to help him keep his hammer when the cops came?
@@psychowordsmith I agree people always make themselves sound better in stories whether intentional or not. I also feel like he wasn't a good fit sounds like he was look more for an action campaign with shit posting jokes in between fights but all of them want a serious story bases game with not much focus combat
@@psychowordsmith this 1000%. The group forced him to DM by the book, criticized his every character move, refused to help with his hammer, then had the nerve to call him a conspiracy theorist when he felt he'd been ganged up on. Sounds like a terrible group who felt like they could bully an outsider.
The thing about not putting your trauma into a character when you're still processing is SO important. It's in general why negative jokes about your mental health is, overall, unhelpful because you're constantly bringing up a traumatic experience and minimizing it. Humor can be an amazing coping mechanism, but it can also be incredibly unhelpful
Idk... I think attempting to work through trauma with a character can be helpful to your real life issue. I often address some trauma with my characters. My current character is a person who was forced out of his home. This is a bit of trauma I've been dealing with. I will however say that time place and people are 3 things you gotta consider when you do it. Firstly, are you in a time in which you can deal with the trauma, are you in a place where dealimg with that trauma would be acceptable within the game, and finally are the people around you people you are comfortable sharing your trauma with and also people comfortable enough with you that they find ot acceptable.
@@Still_who_IamThank you for your reply, your points at the end were very solid and thought-provoking. I think that any form of artistic displays of your trauma can be incredibly healing (I say artistic displays because roleplaying requires creative effort/writing), but I also think, like you said, it is heavily dependent person-to-person. Generally, though, from personal experience, I will say that putting your trauma into a character and actively roleplaying their feelings upon the trauma it can be really triggering and also just negative. Which is why I think a healthy dose of processing is needed before roleplaying.
Funnily enough I really gravitate towards and love characters who have gone through similar experiences as me. It's like "yes, someone understands" and hopefully I can use said character to express my trauma and hopefully get people to understand me better
@@cryguy0000 That makes a lot of sense and I relate on several levels. There's times where I want to feel understood, and othertimes where I just want to be distracted. Imo, so long as you're able to manage your emotions/mental health responsibly, it's a great tool. Just thought this advice was important for people who need it, which won't be everyone. (Also, sorry, replied to you earlier but UA-cam flagged my comment, lol? Weird. Anyway, thank you for your reply!)
Nobody should be doing this with any of their characters lmfao. This all is super cringe and only mentally ill leftists act like this Make sure your group are conservatives. It'll save many MANY headaches
Yeah, as I was listening, a lot of self-destructive tendencies I've seen in friends with depression were making themselves evident here. The guy likely wanted to prove that people don't like him so that his brain chemicals telling him he was worthless could be vindicated. This was more sad than anything else.
This is NOT how you RP psychopathic characters. Some tips for this: -Make the character engaging. -Give the character a reason as to why they do wha they do. -Don't put your pee fetish in it 💀
@@geraldgerald4548 she’s a drow. So, everything. First, being an elf that isnt a drow. Then, being a man on top of it. Absolutely disgusting. Drow aren’t known for being good XD
Dang... if I had a nickel for everytime I heard a dnd horror story involving people pissing on others this week, I'd have 2 nickels. Which isn't a lot... but it's weird it happened twice.
So this guy was going through an awful time, was bullied by the DM while he dm'd his own game, but the DM isn't at fault? Maybe if he hadn't made a guy who was really strugglings life miserable they would have had a good and trusting relationship
Yes, I would want to do a Batista bomb against his own minis on DM each time he forced the barbarian to drop his hammer. In a game of zombiecide I had played an old man with a chicken, and that hen was everything for old man. I sent a player as a bait so we could all escape just because he suggested me to ditch the poor bird so we could all be saved. We won (well most of us, zombiecide is a game when sacrifices should be made). Playing traumatized characters is stressful, and DMS bullying the fuck out of trauma end bad for both the traumatized character and the player who controls it. As my mom said "that game sounds like theatre"
I mean the pee thing is weird but op is shitting on him for everything he does. Like he doesn't go into the same building and interacts with npcs instead? What's wrong with that.
I mean...this Barbarian guy was pretty consistent honestly. The party continuing to be surprised about the things with the Hammer is whats strange here.
@PalnPWN First of all, he was just acting in character and for the description, his character was just going oposite when it had something to do with socialization. I didn't hears any complains about team work in battles or exploration. From his poimt of view he was just roll playing. You know why I can tell that so confidently, ¡cause nobody in that group of 40 year old grownups dared to talk to him in real life about their character! No one said directly to him they had a problem on how he played his character and they act surprised when his character (whose backstory literally states the thing he cares the most for is his hammer) acts the way it does when they try to take it. I love how the OP say "the DM give him all the oportunities in the world to hand them the hammer"... did he even remember the backstory he himself told us? And I find the phrase: "I don't remember how that ended" after the piss incident quite suspicious. I cannot trust this OP as a reliable narrator.
This character is disturbed, but doesn't seem to be a psychopath, unless the idea is that their unnatural obsession with their hammer is proof that they have no sympathy for human life, which is still arguable at best
Yeah, Crit, I agree with your conclusion. After all, nobody TALKED to him, this whole time, asking him WHY he was being this way, or WHAT HE NEEDED. He got NO help. He was grieving for a lost loved one, and there were a LOT of conspiracies flying. There still are. If he's thinking that someone basically MURDERED his family member, and then the DM is someone he doesn't trust, because of the rules lawyering, then I can see it spiraling from there. And NOBODY called him on it, and asked for COMMUNICATION. They just kept playing. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: ANYONE should be allowed to call a break, so that people can COOL THE HECK OFF when the crap hits the fan, and they can ret-con, if necessary. Do what you need to do to make the game a SAFE PLACE for everyone involved. Yes, it can be therapeutic, and a good way to explore issues in your life, through the role-play and taking on different characters and situations, and maybe seeing things through a different lens. But if you're feeling TRULY afraid, not just for your character, but personally, then STOP AND BREATHE and COMMUNICATE, for real. Barbarian was definitely NOT the sort that we usually read about, for sure. I think that, if he got the help he needs, he'd be a fine player. Part of that help is EVERYONE in the group taking some responsibility to speak up, for themselves, and for each other.
Hey critcrabby! I really enjoyed when you started using that skittering sound just before interrupting the narration to give your opinion. Most of the time i am just listening and not actually watching the video, so the sound helped a lot to understand what is happening.
I'm a bit late to this party but when the op said "Me and my friends were all in theatre back in the day and enjoy intelligent improv" is such a fucking uppity "I'm so much more sophisticated than you" attitude that I can't get over.
Yea, def a case where OP's definitely leaving out/diluting their own shit bc he just. Calls Barbarian a conspiracy theorist with no examples and even admitted to "saying cruel things" intentionally being vague.
15:40 “when he pissed on her it was like he pissed on the DM’s world” 😂 this is the third story I’ve listened to from you that had characters pissing and pooping and annoying everyone.
I dunno. Obviously Edgelord Barbarian made some questionable decisions, but the idea of a barb that rolls around in trash and is in love with his hammer to the point of doing constant perception checks to make sure nobody steals it on the rare occasion he puts it down sounds kind of hilarious. I think if that was the concept for the character then there's nothing wrong with him being glued to the hammer. If anything the DM is the asshole for seeing a character like this and constantly trying to orchestrate situations that rob the barb of his hammer. Too often the DM gets off without any deserved blame in situations like this. It's easy to say that the player is a problem player for playing a character who's difficult in certain situations but if the DM knows that this is the kind of character they've got to work with, they should use their power as the DM to create scenarios that suit the characters in the party, not just do whatever they want and get mad when all the players don't play along.
Yeah it seems weird that this super important moment was pushed onto the shoulders of the one mentally unstable guy, and could ONLY be resolved by having him let go of the most important aspect of his character. It's also a little weird that OP said "cruel things" to him during this, but never specified what they were.
There's moments when players say "I do X" and it's perfectly appropriate for the GM to say "no, you don't. endof." and "i pee on her" is one of these moments.
I think he probably always had some problems but they were likely always fairly well controlled aside from stuff here and there. Major stress and trauma can knock a LOT loose. Mental health issues that were so small many isn't even notice it was there can suddenly grow to be monstrous and start to rampage pit of control. Example: Someone I used to know was always a neat and organized person (exact opposite of me,) when stressed or angry they'd clean. Back then it was healthy. But then they buried their child. After that their neat and specific tendencies became full blown OCD. They HAD to keep everything clean. They had to control their home environment because of how lost they felt from their child suddenly dying from something they had no control over. (By the time symptoms were shown enough to be noticed it was too late.) They became so obsessed that they started to develop habits and rituals that actually were counterproductive to keeping things neat and organized, nice and clean. But to them it at firts made sense because of their state of mind and when they eventually came down enough (which is very common for many types of OCD,) theyrealized it made zero sense but by then the ritual a hold on them and they felt they'd loose their entire family if they didnt do it. (The child didn't even die due to anything related to stuff being dirty. It was just a mix of genes and bad luck.) So a tendency that was there and before even very healthy became extremely detrimental. It took them yrs to get to a point where they realized how bad it was. A few more to be ready to accept help and a lifetime of mental health management (like another mental health condition. It doesn't go away, it just gets to a point to where it's manageable.)
Whether he was always a psycho or he slowly became one doesn't matter in this story. What's important is that he was causing so much trouble and he refused to see that his actions were a problem. If you try to help him so much and he only gets worse, you gotta cut the dead weight loose for your own sake and in most cases for the offender themself
Exactly no matter how they're acting if they make someone even the slightest bit uncomfortable especially if you notice they aren't stopping cut that shit short.
That is the type of person that feels so~ rewarding to betray. Just imagining him losing his sh°t, maybe trash his reallife surroundings too - I chuckle just imagining it.
@Point Blank As someone who still plays Elsword, I am interested in knowing when you last played the game, because the game has seen a lot of changes during the last two or so years.
It's seen as a consequence free environment because it's not real, so it attracts a lot of people who want to abuse that kind of environment. It's like playing GTA with all the cheats enabled; surely there's no actual penalty for beating up the hookers, right? Problems are, firstly when you stop to think about that for a second it's not hard to realize how terrible a thing it is, and secondly people aren't just limited to whatever the video game allows them to do, so they think they can attempt to get away with far more than they actually can. Add all that to a lack of self reflection, and you get the run the gamut of people who think murdering someone for their silver spoon is appropriate to "I freeze them and use my whip to smack of their testicles".
I think it has a lot to do with the ability to bring fantasies to life and include your friends "without making it weird" (as in my experience, many would frown upon playing an adult themed game, even a TTRPG, as they feel ashamed to do so in a group, but they feel that 'disguising' it in a more typical TTRPG is somehow less embarrassing and personal, no matter how kinky or weird they get). As for me, I'm the type of DM/GM to suggest personally running the adult themed TTRPG when I see such themes arise in my group, so make of that what you will.
I thought it was kinda funny. One time in D&D I had this friend who was playing. He was playing some kind of mad wizard and I remember finding his wife and peeing on her. He got super pissed and used some kind of magic item to piss on the moon. He then went on some weird rant about Obama.
So i was scrolling through my homepage here on UA-cam. Just my normal stuff, some news, documentaries, icebergs, and then out of left field; this thumbnail. It just took me so off gaurd couldn't help but laugh. Thanks, crab. I needed that.
I do this every time so here we ago again. This starts with a guy who is really vulnerable and naturally distrusting THIS IS 60% of the time for a reason, past experience, trouble with authority or relationship problems family or otherwise normally as a child so it never properly gets resolved. Nothing at the start is any kind of issue at all, its just "you aren't having fun right" from others there's 2 ways out of this, be more inclusive you not allowed to be mad at them for excluding there fun or for them to find another game where there play style is more accepted, unfortunately numbers players or min maxers are very heavily excluded from most DnD games and being one myself and not being able to turn it off I understand why and its the reason I don't get to play DnD anymore just run it though I would love to. The darkening camera was very cool for a sunless Cit game, I don't know why they take this as a Red flag and not a clever idea, his humor is different than yours, your not more intelligent for a weaker sense of humor. I assume they never brought the no role play up to the DM, don't know for sure but I am almost sure they would never have said anything just hope the problem resolved itself but I have been in games where a player didn't feel like they had there character highlighted enough in the game so they festered and often narrated themselves and people around them so I assumed they where doing it for themselves but they later ranted on discord for me not including them EXACTLY like this guy does if she had said something I would have been more inclusive. So when hes running a campaign and there is this one player who constantly fucks with him, calls him on rules, argues with him and makes running a game a chore, this can completely ruin any game you play with this person, regardless of how you try to get over it, there always gonna be that sabotaging dick head to you at least in the back of your head now there your DM have fun. He was obviously able to tell no one was having fun, so he called it off but still wanted to play with most of them. He for very very relevant reasons for not trusting your friend and your friend might entirely have been I have never ever met someone who calls the DM on rules and argues with them often tend to be able to turn that off. He wasn't even a problem at the start but then the DM took his characters one main trait (his attachment to his hammer) and decided this would be a good thing to make a plot point to have it taken away and everyone is surprised he didn't want it taken after this he plays the game very dejected, now sure the DM was trying to piss him off again possibly even was trying to. Him pissing on the PC could be just a stupid joke without reading the room. A "its what my character would do" since that really seems like it was his character, a gross weirdo and I find that interesting but rather than reading it that way they immediately took it as the player pissing on the character. YOU KNOW HE HAS ONE CHARACTER TRAIT, HAMMER, WHY WOULD YOU THING SUDDENLY NOW ITS CHANGED. Then he decided to play give them the try puts down his character and plays his character like the weirdo and watches his hammer the whole time, then he does the obvious and takes the hammer (Who woulda seen it coming) and someone fucking takes it, HIS WHOLE CHARACTERS THING and someone took it right in front of him. I know this is probably not the case at all but you are getting one players side, a player on the side of what in the other guys view is the antagonist. Don't read these story's and say what a freak, read the story and go I wonder what caused this?
This is hard to read. Is English your first language? Did you proofread this? I get the gist of your comment, but there's a lot of issues with punctuation and separating your commentary from observations from the post in order to show a concise thought.
13:24 Gotta admit, that actually sounds like a great gag to pull as a chaotic character. But not something to be done at every chance. Maybe once or twice in a campaign, to dispel a hyper tense moment.
The way I see it (in my thoroughly unprofessional, armchair-psychologist way) is that dude had no idea how to handle his stress or healthily express his emotions. He's got kids and a job, so he can't act out in real life. There's too much at stake. But the rage (because he strikes me as a guy who transmutes all of his uncomfortable feelings into rage because rage feels stronger than grief, fear, or confusion) had to go somewhere. So it went into D&D where he could use the thin veil of "roleplay" to make it socially acceptable (or, well, socially justifiable to himself, let's say). I dunno, though. Even on a guy's more grief-stricken, misplaced rage days, I still think it's pretty damn creepy to think "What's my character going to do in this situation? Hmmm....flirt with this woman then pee on her without her consent." But that's just me.
Yeah no, I feel the DM is more to blame than anyone. He could have easily solved most of these issues beforehand. Also having been an asshole to him when he was a DM, he should have been ready for the player to not trust him one bit.
We can all agree the poor guy went crazy during the pandemic and made some very bad choices, but like is no one else noticing the red flags the OP seem to have? Claimed the problem player was a conspiracy theorist with no examples as proof, and if the guy loved his hammer so much why did they keep putting him in situations where he couldn't use it/force it away from him? let the man have his hammer. I agreed with stopping him from killing the mafia dude, but why disarm him to begin with? someone else could have 1v1 the mafia if it was that important. The problem child and the Asshole dm already had a bad relationship, so of course he would be distrustful of him what does that have to do with conspiracy theories? I think the problem player needs therapy for sure but the underline story I was seeing was that the dm and other players (mainly the op) were possibly pushing him towards insanity as well.
I mean, aside from the peeing part, the guy was clearly playing his character in a very consistent way and the DM absolutely did keep putting him in situations that would get a negative reaction from him as the "out" he would be given would always be against a strongly established character trait.
16:25 - "Man doesn't play the game the way I want to, so I insult him repeatedly by calling him an edgelord while the group forgets we're supposed to be roleplaying."
There is another point both OP and you CC forgot: D&D is a collaborative game. Adversial DMing can be a thing in some campaigns, but that should absolutely be stated in Session 0 and at least for games since 3.x it is not the norm. If there was no statement of adversiality and you still can't bring yourself to thrust the DM, that's no foundation for a collaborative game and the best you could do then is to excuse yourself from the game.
Wow, sounds like the party tried every possible in-game solution to an out-of-game problem; trying to take away important items, letting everything "edgelord barbarian" does play out, PvP. Well, to be fair, the author did try some out-of-game solutions; looking at his phone until "edgelord barbarian" gets the hint and calling him a "terrifying creep" behind his back.
Some people in mental distress are coming to D&D with it - which I FULLY AGREE is problematic - because they don't have other options, they don't have somewhere else to go. Therapy is not nearly as easy to access as many commenters on these sorts of videos seem to believe. Waiting lists can be YEARS - not an exaggeration - and getting seen quicker is only possible if you have money. Not to mention that this happened during a time when COVID was causing a lot of services to be even less accessible than they already were. If we want people to stop bringing fresh trauma to D&D and causing further harm to themselves and often others as well, we need to make better options actually available, not just theoretically. Working through trauma with the aid of roleplaying can actually work extremely well, just- not like this and not without having the go-ahead from and assistance of the other members of the group.
The thought about putting too much of yourself into a character is 100% true. My father died at the beginning of the year, and I started a new DnD campaign with a new group a few months after. As I was writing my character’s backstory, I realized a parent being dead for them might be too real for me, and would affect my own mental state with the character. So I told the DM, and requested that my character’s parents not die. Or, if one did, for it not to be her father. My DM is amazing and agreed immediately. I’ve also had to have talks with players as a DM, because I thought one player was being a That Guy, because he’d get seriously bent out of shape whenever the players had a hard challenge and lost. At one point in another game one of my characters died and he straight up left the call. Turns out, it wasn’t that he was a That Guy. He had PTSD and one of his triggers was overt helplessness, and because he put so much of himself into his characters, he couldn’t separate his feelings from theirs. Not saying not to put yourself into your characters, but sometimes you do gotta be mindful of your feelings and take a step back when you need to.
The two times listed were fairly reasonable. One they were arrested, and the other was a fist fight. That's not unreasonable at all, perfectly normal. Critical Role campaign 2 Notte was scared of water, but situations came up with water. 2 situations isn't a lot.
Never thought I'd say this on one of these videos but this isn't as bad as what I expected from the title and intro, maybe because I steeled myself for an absolute crap show (pun absolutely intended). Tho I agree with the Crab King™, it seems more like his mental health deteriorated and he needs some psychological intervention. I hope he's doing better now and got the help he needed.
I don’t really see an issue with his love of his hammer. It’s his BOND & FLAW. He’s playing his character, but it ends there. Splitting from the party to do other things isn’t conducive to team work & the pissing thing is a HARD NO. The DM can avoid the hammer or make it interesting character stories But the player must of had some trauma he wasn’t to deal with it. The pandemic has effected everyone in so many different ways. I wish everyone the best
This one kinda seems like a 'every one is at fault' story. Like barbarian had some weird tendencies, but this is no way near a pyschopath. Plus, he's just lost someone close to him during a pandemic (the world is literally falling apart), and in the character was filled his own trauma and he was not in a good mental state at the time. also, OP already stated that the rules lawyer was a bit of an asshole, and to have someone correct you constantly, demand that they are right is draining and can easily kill the fun. so yeah, I can see why he doesn't trust the DM when he becomes a player. add all that to the DM deciding that his mission now is to separate Barbarian from a thing that is very important to him more than a few times. something that he's made a point to be an essential key part of his character. I am by no means excusing the problem player's behavior, but there are certain things that I think might have exacerbated the situation.
Also the fact that OP admits they said "some cruel things" and intentionally leaves it vague makes me think that they might've also antagonized Barbarian, ntm the fact that they feel comfortable not only spilling everything abt his traumas (loosing a loved one)
so after checking comments for a very short amount of time I see nobody else noticed what I did.... I honestly believe this guy could be an interesting player who brought about cool plotlines and so on, just he's being painted as some sort of maniac. Remember we're seeing OPs retelling, not actual events. He met tons of resistance while DMing (a rules lawyer who kept annoying him), then was replaced as DM by that same rules lawyer. The group seem to have considered him a weak roleplayer, but when he tried it does not seem like he was encouraged to continue through good responses. Simply put this story is FULL of bias that paints that guy in a bad light, while I think there might have been a bigger gray area in reality. Sure the pissing thing was stupid, but with another group it could have went off really well and gotten tons of laughs. I'm just thinking that is something Scanlan Shorthalt would do, and Vox Machina would laugh and so would most of the internet.
World Anvil is a fantastic service with genuinely helpful and enthusiastic people running it. I use it myself for the new TTRPG world I'm building. I cannot recommend it enough. On a completely different side note, the way you said, 'definitely has a scat fetish' had strong 'Whang!' vibes. (That's neither a positive nor a negative-just a fun observation.)
I mostly just feel bad for the guy. Sure he wasn't the best player here, but a lot of these behaviours sound like a cry for help. Hopefully he's getting the help he needs and is doing better.
My 2 cents, this hammer was a replacement for the person he lost due to COVID and this was a classic case of the denial and bargaining stage of grief rolled into one. I hope he got the help he needed to come to terms with the loss It takes a great deal of strength to get professional help. If it took this game for him to realise then all the best to him, not the ideal situation, but life isnt ever ideal
"He got hit by covid hard" - "this is way back in the past and years have passed" ... what strange world does OP live in? that is not much time since it is only 2 years since the break out... o.O
Imma be real, when my mom died, I also roleplayed a parent who was going to die, just to help process my thoughts and feelings on the matter. Did this while she was dieing(during my rare down time between helping her), and right after she died. But I guess Ive always been use to self coping lol. So, I wasnt questioned on it at all.
Picturing this Barbarian attacking, then peeking back to check on his hammer, then attacking again, I’m reminded of that episode of The Simpsons where Homer boxes a homeless guy who keeps stopping his punch combos to check on his bindle.
>Don't put down hammer under arrest. >Chat up potential love interest NPC. >Sexually assault said NPC for no reason. >Attempt to beat NPC to death with a hammer in unarmed duel. >Party combat begins >Leave for months with no explanation. >Refuse to elaborate.
17:14 i dont see him watching for the hammer and for breaking rules as bad, its in character and makes his transition to leaving the hammer more natural
The fm brought the romance thing down on himself. They had been playing for months and seemingly knew how the player reacted yet tried to set up a romance sene/subplot for the barbarian going so far as to make a female barbarian who would stand outside with the players barbarian. That I’ll fully put on the DM for knowing how his player played the character and expecting a spontaneous 180. Like you don’t start petting a dog who is known to be aggressive and expect not to get bitten. And the last bit yea they should have seen it coming like a mile away you know he’s an aggressive charater who loves the hammer more than anything yet you created a senerio with the intended purpose to make the player go against that. That feels like writing things so that a player that wants to play a exclusively healing classic has to play as a murder hobo. I’m not saying the dm is nessesaraly wrong on being annoyed but they and the party were just as stubborn as the wired guy in wanting him to play a character differently. I’d try to work around him if we need to do somthing that involve tact write a detour for the charaters or have somone else distract him and you can bring him in when that segment is over. Like on the last encounter you could have literally had the guy play poker with some hobos while the rest of the group delt with the extortion. Because if at that point they believed anything else was going to happen after months of play than that’s beyond being blind that’s actively sabotaging yourself as much as the barbarian player was himself.
There was definitely no excuse for the behaviour of the last "that guy," but there was some stuff the DM could gave done a lot a better. Like not making situation involving weapons when he knew the character would cause a problem about it, and being more assertive about what behaviour is not acceptable at his table.
I got the impression there was a tug-of-war going on between this guy and the DM. No doubt the player was losing it but the DM did some pushing of his own (why keep messing with his hammer?) Everybody else was just caught in the middle.
There's such a GIANT avenue for a beautiful redemption arc for the trash hammer man, one I would love to explore and it would probably be my favorite. It's so sad to see it get pissed on.
I agree with what you said about therapy and this just seems like a very sad case of slipping into a trap and having your mental state erode. I've seen it happen to friends before and it always sucks. He might have been fine if he took time to mourn but essentially repeating the grief in dnd wasn't the way to go. At the 14 minute mark it seemed like he was TRYING to get booted from the party as a way to "shield" them from his mental health. It's just sad to watch this happen to someone you know. The hammer probably representing something he got attached to as a way of coping with whatever affected him irl
in some chases I image that being difficult, taking a break here sounds like waiting 3-4 years before playing again, depending on what "the problems being worse enough" would mean.
There are two problem individuals here. Dm had some major red flags when op describes them as a player. I think with both people essentially making it toxic for the other ruined it all. I don’t care if op thinks the sun shone out of the dms ass, he had so many issues op just hand waved away when they were a player.
When you're trying to enjoy a shared game like D&D with a bag full of stress and anxiety, you become fantastic at overexamining behavior, yours and theirs. I played a small thing of D&D over Discord to try and share SOMETHING among mutual friends and I played Whickett, I made him up to be a hobo type as well; he was found mentally shattered. He could break stones in his hands and could hardly string a full sentence... and I couldn't roleplay as him, with Whickett's madness being how I wanted to play the game and fully knowing what it might look like to the jury of the table. This man had 10,000 more things going wrong than I did and his soul was, for that week or whatever, a total skeleton... And seemingly shared a level of vulnerability the rest of the table couldn't handle. I really wish other narratives were available, but there's only ever one steno recording the problematic player. (But I'm blaming nobody!! D&D is not therapy!!)
Bro its an NPC, its not surprising D&D players feel more sympathy for an NPC than their real friends. No wonder they encourage the control freak dungeon master's actions.
"have you ever met a person that seemed cool, but later on was revealed to be horrible" ... yeah, everyone who has at least one ex has had that happen to them.
Crab, I respect you and love your channel. But I'm kinda conflicted: He was roleplaying a psychopath, yes... but from what I can gather from this story (as you said at the end around 20:20 ) is not about a dude being creepy: he appears to be more of a mentally unstable person than anything else. Please don't take this as me being angry, annoyed at you or even siding with the person from this story. It's just that it bothers me that the content, your opinion, the title and the thumbnail are kinda conflicting with each other.
I mean, if you're laid back enough, you can use your own psychology to make a character; even the bad parts can be used to great success. A few years ago, I put my one particular issue into my character and everyone loved it, as I tried to give it more of a comedic twist and understood that first of all I'm a player. With that, it was less of a reflection of me, but a simplified caricature. But I would never do that with fresh trauma I haven't processed yet.
I have unfortunately dealt with a similar though thankfully nowhere near as extreme case of problem player myself. I have a friend who started playing about the same time that I did, and had a fun enough character concept where she was meant to go to wizard college but woke up one day as the servant of an unknown god as their cleric, she also had a "necronomicon" that she found before the adventure started and had a spirit she would talk to that resided in the book. The problem came about a couple months into the campaign where when she had a complete and total tonal shift where her entire character motivation became about getting her family out of the desert and making sure they were all taken care of, and any mention of the possibility of her family dying or not hearing from her family or how long it would actually take campaign wise to get to her family generally upset or annoyed her. She threw out everything else about her character would have almost no interaction with her god once she found out who it was, just didnt even bother with the book after a few sessions. Taking care of her family was the sole focus of her character. Which in one campaign isn't that big a deal but when she does the same thing or other variations of family in trouble must rescue them while her actual character is completely devoid of any detail at all it just made things worse and worse, because she was trying to use d&d to make a perfect little family that she never had in real life and was afraid to confront the actual problems she was dealing with in the hopes that she could escape to her perfect family.
not to play keyboard psychiatrist but i can't help but feel like going "lol conspiracy theorist" as a factor for his behavior is downright disrespectful and downplays whatever grief this guy was going through. unless he was randomly going off about nonsense like reptilians & flat earth in casual conversation the way his's character's backstory parallels what happened to him makes it sound like the loved one he lost was his wife and was struggling with raising kids without her.
This seems a lot like an Anakin/Jedi Council situation to me. Yes, Edgelord Barbarian had issues, and it was not appropriate or even a good idea for him to try and use the game as therapy when he was so far down the rabbit hole.( Considering that it was in the midst of Covid, though, I wonder if he thought that it might be his only venue, with all the shutdowns and remote-everything going on.) On the other hand, the DM was not doing the game any favors, either. His handling of EB was just making things worse, and even seemed to be targeting him. Considering EB's mental state, is it any wonder that he cracked more? If you realize that the character is too connected to the issues a player is going through, you don't need to accept it and be the therapist, but you don't need to use it against them, either, and push their buttons. Instead of just largely ignoring EB's character quirks and letting the player internally RP what he was going through, the DM made a bad situation worse. The fact that it was with a player going through a lot of personal difficulties and trauma, and not just a difficult or antagonistic personality, just makes it even more egregious.
I found the story interesting to listen to, but the op's credibility takes a huge dive when calling the Player a conspiracy theorist. The group getting frustrated about the Barbarian using his hammer when they already knew that he would use it is interesting. They present him with new challenges , but expect him to do something different for some reason. The word insane could be easily used here, as they keep presenting the Barbarian with new challenges and expect different results to happen. Also, some random npc comes unarmed to a group of adventures and demand that they pay up some money. I could see why players would try to intimidate the npc or kill them to teach them a lesson in humility. (of course, I guess it would depend on how powerful the players are and how powerful the mafia group actually is/what the reputation is.) Thanks for the upload and another good time.
I rather miss the little crab scurrying sounds that indicated when you would interject. Made things easier when i was audio only
Damn... Didn't notice that but yeah, now it's not so easy to audio only. Why the need?
Crab, we wait for an epic return of the little crab scurrying sounds!!
We want the Little Crab!
Agree!
Thanks! They'll be back next video!
"DnD can be theraputic, but it's not therapy"
It's in words!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
"You should never bring your own trauma into a game unless you are mentally stable enough to deal with it." *Louder for the people in the back!*
wow, 666 likes
i won't ruin it...
In Call of Cthulhu and Kult we spell this out a lot to people asking if they can use these games as therapy.
This character is the LITERAL version of the phrase: “To a man with a hammer, every problem looks like a nail.”
"Think of it as... Protection money."
"Them's awfully brave words for someone in hammer range..."
If you can't fix something with hammer, you aren't using big enough hammer.
This channel shows me that DMs absolutely have the right to say "No."
You mean "grab a bolt pistol and shoot problem player."
*aims gun behind your head* Always did.
I mean, they’re the Dm, they control what happens in the games.
@@nalrashido lmao 🤣
I think you mean obligation
So Edgelord definitely had a lot of issues going on that lead me to believe he likely just wasn't in a good headspace to be playing D&D like so many other people have mentioned here.
But why the hell is everyone ignoring the role the dm played in this whole tale? OP even outright stated that the dm had been a right asshole for MONTHS to the Edgelord during the previous campaign. He'd been more or less bullying this guy while he was already in a poor place mentally and then everyone is confused when he doesn't seem to want to cooperate with the dm? Who can fucking blame the poor guy after getting tormented by this dm for so long?
He shouldn't have joined the new game, that's for sure, but damn I don't entirely blame him for acting out when he had no reason to trust the dm.
I came here to type this same thing. OP literally said his asshole friend was being a rules lawyer the entire time our antagonist was trying to DM. Imagine how he feels now that the guy who rode his ass for an entire campaign is running the show. It's a wonder he lasted as long as he did. Ya know some of these stories describe genuinely weird behavior but some of them teeter on the edge of OP diluting a questionable situation just to get their reddit post onto UA-cam.
Yeah, it seems like the DM was purposely putting him in situations where he would have to give up his hammer/security blanket because of the beef from the previous game.
It just takes a bunch of bullies to start a single school shooting
@@susannahammond2033 I wouldn’t go that far - First time the WHOLE party had to give up their weapons because they where being arrested and it’s silly to expect somebody to throw a fit over that.
Second time he was literally just trying to give him a chance to fight without killing somebody - since he had made it clear that’s what he wanted to do even though it was inappropriate and would have hurt the party in-game.
Definitely didn’t help with his own behaviour but these scenarios don’t sound anything like an intentional set-up without any more context. You can only come too that conclusion if you go into any scenario expecting the worst and trying to find any reason to believe it’s happening without thinking about any, more reasonable, alternatives - the fault of nearly every conspiracy theorist out there.
@@matthewbibby8921 In character the Hammer was important to him and was the "only thing he had left" of course in character you wouldn't give it to a random NPC so him getting upset isn't too uncalled for
Therapists use DND for thearpy. THERAPISTS THOUGH. TRAINED PROFESSIONALS not just your random DND group.
I'm glad someone said this! There's a therapist in my area who runs campaigns as a form of group therapy. It's very cool when done correctly!
bro i watch Doctor K, i think i know my shit
@@lucaluca111 “trust me bro, i watch that one medical show i know how to do surgery”
@@quinnw919 lol agree
My therapists office advertises their dnd group. It can be a healthy way of letting out your problems. It can equally make them worse. Kinda like how people behave differently when under the influence.
Sounds like he was getting back at dm for messing with him during his campaign and wasnt close enough to the rest of the group so it didn't go over well
Reading between the lines, I'd put a fair amount of blame on the DM as well.
So OP invites our antagonist to DND. Antagonist DM's. OP has a friend who is literally called "asshole friend" who is a rules lawyer to our antagonist the entire time he's DMing. Now the guy who's been riding our antagonist for a whole campaign is running the show.
From the perspective of our antagonist he got invited to a game, basically bullied into running a campaign by the book when even the book says the DM makes the rules, I can imagine OP didn't stand up to his asshole friend, and now he's got no choice but to relieve himself from being a DM or face further grief from OP's friend. Every decision he makes is met with strife even if it fits with his character.
I wonder why he would ever feel conspired against. 🙄
I believe he isn't a creep, just had the worst case of "extremely bad timing". He was far from a great mental state, and shouldn't had been invited to play D&D, given time and space to mourn his loss. It also resulted in him revealing far more than he should've, resulting in him coming off as a creepy dude. As I said, all he needed was time to mourn and he would've been fine.
Agreed. It doesn't tickle as the typical creep who actually acts like a creep all time. This seems like your good coworker friend who has that weird side, but otherwise is a great person....but the timing is just the worst.
Loosing a loved one and being isolated, it's likely he was self inserting so much as a cry for help.
But he needed professional help, instead he likely only caused the destruction of one of his friendships.
the fact that OP saw him alive and still working afterwards means that the dude likely got back in shape, and knew that what he did was wrong.
Let's hope both OP and The Dude are doing well. The loss of lives during the pandemic left scars in the hearts of many
@@zahylon5993 Agreed.
I have to say thought, that orc he came up with was just too real. And the fact that not only the DM, but the rest of the players grouped up to make that person hand over the only thing that the character still valued, tells me that the group was a part of the problem.
Maybe OP wasn't as nice to them as they say. Or maybe I'm wrong. But trying to separate him from the hammer seems harsh.
How come the PCs didn't try to help him keep his hammer when the cops came?
@@psychowordsmith I agree people always make themselves sound better in stories whether intentional or not.
I also feel like he wasn't a good fit sounds like he was look more for an action campaign with shit posting jokes in between fights but all of them want a serious story bases game with not much focus combat
@@psychowordsmith this 1000%. The group forced him to DM by the book, criticized his every character move, refused to help with his hammer, then had the nerve to call him a conspiracy theorist when he felt he'd been ganged up on. Sounds like a terrible group who felt like they could bully an outsider.
The thing about not putting your trauma into a character when you're still processing is SO important. It's in general why negative jokes about your mental health is, overall, unhelpful because you're constantly bringing up a traumatic experience and minimizing it. Humor can be an amazing coping mechanism, but it can also be incredibly unhelpful
Idk... I think attempting to work through trauma with a character can be helpful to your real life issue. I often address some trauma with my characters. My current character is a person who was forced out of his home. This is a bit of trauma I've been dealing with. I will however say that time place and people are 3 things you gotta consider when you do it. Firstly, are you in a time in which you can deal with the trauma, are you in a place where dealimg with that trauma would be acceptable within the game, and finally are the people around you people you are comfortable sharing your trauma with and also people comfortable enough with you that they find ot acceptable.
@@Still_who_IamThank you for your reply, your points at the end were very solid and thought-provoking.
I think that any form of artistic displays of your trauma can be incredibly healing (I say artistic displays because roleplaying requires creative effort/writing), but I also think, like you said, it is heavily dependent person-to-person.
Generally, though, from personal experience, I will say that putting your trauma into a character and actively roleplaying their feelings upon the trauma it can be really triggering and also just negative. Which is why I think a healthy dose of processing is needed before roleplaying.
Funnily enough I really gravitate towards and love characters who have gone through similar experiences as me. It's like "yes, someone understands" and hopefully I can use said character to express my trauma and hopefully get people to understand me better
@@cryguy0000 That makes a lot of sense and I relate on several levels. There's times where I want to feel understood, and othertimes where I just want to be distracted. Imo, so long as you're able to manage your emotions/mental health responsibly, it's a great tool. Just thought this advice was important for people who need it, which won't be everyone.
(Also, sorry, replied to you earlier but UA-cam flagged my comment, lol? Weird. Anyway, thank you for your reply!)
Nobody should be doing this with any of their characters lmfao. This all is super cringe and only mentally ill leftists act like this
Make sure your group are conservatives. It'll save many MANY headaches
Yeah, as I was listening, a lot of self-destructive tendencies I've seen in friends with depression were making themselves evident here. The guy likely wanted to prove that people don't like him so that his brain chemicals telling him he was worthless could be vindicated. This was more sad than anything else.
This is NOT how you RP psychopathic characters. Some tips for this:
-Make the character engaging.
-Give the character a reason as to why they do wha they do.
-Don't put your pee fetish in it 💀
Closest i get to psychopath, is my drow pirate. God help the enemy if they’re male elves
@@realrealwarpet What's wrong with male elves?
The gut punch that was reading "Don't put your pee fetish in it" before watching the video almost killed me
@@geraldgerald4548 she’s a drow. So, everything. First, being an elf that isnt a drow. Then, being a man on top of it. Absolutely disgusting.
Drow aren’t known for being good XD
@Warren Ward Drizzt is the only exception to this rule.
Ok but like. The romantic build up into the pissing on her kinda had me laughing
Dang... if I had a nickel for everytime I heard a dnd horror story involving people pissing on others this week, I'd have 2 nickels.
Which isn't a lot... but it's weird it happened twice.
what was the other?
Almost as if this stories take inspiration one from the other...
So this guy was going through an awful time, was bullied by the DM while he dm'd his own game, but the DM isn't at fault? Maybe if he hadn't made a guy who was really strugglings life miserable they would have had a good and trusting relationship
Yes, I would want to do a Batista bomb against his own minis on DM each time he forced the barbarian to drop his hammer.
In a game of zombiecide I had played an old man with a chicken, and that hen was everything for old man. I sent a player as a bait so we could all escape just because he suggested me to ditch the poor bird so we could all be saved.
We won (well most of us, zombiecide is a game when sacrifices should be made).
Playing traumatized characters is stressful, and DMS bullying the fuck out of trauma end bad for both the traumatized character and the player who controls it. As my mom said "that game sounds like theatre"
I mean the pee thing is weird but op is shitting on him for everything he does. Like he doesn't go into the same building and interacts with npcs instead? What's wrong with that.
Seems like a bunch of manchildren acting like the losers they really are, nothing too surprising...
I mean...this Barbarian guy was pretty consistent honestly. The party continuing to be surprised about the things with the Hammer is whats strange here.
It’s not just the hammer . It’s clear that he was trying to make life hard for the other players.
@@artypicklespvp7174 he wasn't a stranger???
can you read
or hear
actually, do you have *any* senses of any kind?
Agreed.
@PalnPWN First of all, he was just acting in character and for the description, his character was just going oposite when it had something to do with socialization. I didn't hears any complains about team work in battles or exploration.
From his poimt of view he was just roll playing. You know why I can tell that so confidently, ¡cause nobody in that group of 40 year old grownups dared to talk to him in real life about their character! No one said directly to him they had a problem on how he played his character and they act surprised when his character (whose backstory literally states the thing he cares the most for is his hammer) acts the way it does when they try to take it.
I love how the OP say "the DM give him all the oportunities in the world to hand them the hammer"... did he even remember the backstory he himself told us?
And I find the phrase: "I don't remember how that ended" after the piss incident quite suspicious. I cannot trust this OP as a reliable narrator.
"dont piss on anyone without their consent"
well said mr.critcrab, well said
Unless you're a puppy.
What an alarming thumbnail, I feel like it is the three little red laser dots of the predator about to kill me
This character is disturbed, but doesn't seem to be a psychopath, unless the idea is that their unnatural obsession with their hammer is proof that they have no sympathy for human life, which is still arguable at best
Yeah, Crit, I agree with your conclusion. After all, nobody TALKED to him, this whole time, asking him WHY he was being this way, or WHAT HE NEEDED. He got NO help. He was grieving for a lost loved one, and there were a LOT of conspiracies flying. There still are. If he's thinking that someone basically MURDERED his family member, and then the DM is someone he doesn't trust, because of the rules lawyering, then I can see it spiraling from there. And NOBODY called him on it, and asked for COMMUNICATION. They just kept playing.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again: ANYONE should be allowed to call a break, so that people can COOL THE HECK OFF when the crap hits the fan, and they can ret-con, if necessary.
Do what you need to do to make the game a SAFE PLACE for everyone involved.
Yes, it can be therapeutic, and a good way to explore issues in your life, through the role-play and taking on different characters and situations, and maybe seeing things through a different lens. But if you're feeling TRULY afraid, not just for your character, but personally, then STOP AND BREATHE and COMMUNICATE, for real.
Barbarian was definitely NOT the sort that we usually read about, for sure. I think that, if he got the help he needs, he'd be a fine player. Part of that help is EVERYONE in the group taking some responsibility to speak up, for themselves, and for each other.
Hey critcrabby! I really enjoyed when you started using that skittering sound just before interrupting the narration to give your opinion. Most of the time i am just listening and not actually watching the video, so the sound helped a lot to understand what is happening.
I'm a bit late to this party but when the op said "Me and my friends were all in theatre back in the day and enjoy intelligent improv" is such a fucking uppity "I'm so much more sophisticated than you" attitude that I can't get over.
Yea, def a case where OP's definitely leaving out/diluting their own shit bc he just. Calls Barbarian a conspiracy theorist with no examples and even admitted to "saying cruel things" intentionally being vague.
15:40 “when he pissed on her it was like he pissed on the DM’s world” 😂 this is the third story I’ve listened to from you that had characters pissing and pooping and annoying everyone.
I dunno. Obviously Edgelord Barbarian made some questionable decisions, but the idea of a barb that rolls around in trash and is in love with his hammer to the point of doing constant perception checks to make sure nobody steals it on the rare occasion he puts it down sounds kind of hilarious. I think if that was the concept for the character then there's nothing wrong with him being glued to the hammer. If anything the DM is the asshole for seeing a character like this and constantly trying to orchestrate situations that rob the barb of his hammer.
Too often the DM gets off without any deserved blame in situations like this. It's easy to say that the player is a problem player for playing a character who's difficult in certain situations but if the DM knows that this is the kind of character they've got to work with, they should use their power as the DM to create scenarios that suit the characters in the party, not just do whatever they want and get mad when all the players don't play along.
Yeah it seems weird that this super important moment was pushed onto the shoulders of the one mentally unstable guy, and could ONLY be resolved by having him let go of the most important aspect of his character. It's also a little weird that OP said "cruel things" to him during this, but never specified what they were.
oh man so wonderfully said never thought of this. It looked like he was indeed trying to pick on his insecurities the more this went on.
You know how this people think when they make an equivalence between role-playing a quirk and real life sociopathic behavior.
There's moments when players say "I do X" and it's perfectly appropriate for the GM to say "no, you don't. endof." and "i pee on her" is one of these moments.
I think he probably always had some problems but they were likely always fairly well controlled aside from stuff here and there. Major stress and trauma can knock a LOT loose. Mental health issues that were so small many isn't even notice it was there can suddenly grow to be monstrous and start to rampage pit of control. Example: Someone I used to know was always a neat and organized person (exact opposite of me,) when stressed or angry they'd clean. Back then it was healthy. But then they buried their child. After that their neat and specific tendencies became full blown OCD. They HAD to keep everything clean. They had to control their home environment because of how lost they felt from their child suddenly dying from something they had no control over. (By the time symptoms were shown enough to be noticed it was too late.) They became so obsessed that they started to develop habits and rituals that actually were counterproductive to keeping things neat and organized, nice and clean. But to them it at firts made sense because of their state of mind and when they eventually came down enough (which is very common for many types of OCD,) theyrealized it made zero sense but by then the ritual a hold on them and they felt they'd loose their entire family if they didnt do it. (The child didn't even die due to anything related to stuff being dirty. It was just a mix of genes and bad luck.) So a tendency that was there and before even very healthy became extremely detrimental. It took them yrs to get to a point where they realized how bad it was. A few more to be ready to accept help and a lifetime of mental health management (like another mental health condition. It doesn't go away, it just gets to a point to where it's manageable.)
Whether he was always a psycho or he slowly became one doesn't matter in this story. What's important is that he was causing so much trouble and he refused to see that his actions were a problem. If you try to help him so much and he only gets worse, you gotta cut the dead weight loose for your own sake and in most cases for the offender themself
@Point Blank I tried to play it and never got very far, but I liked the profile pic
Exactly no matter how they're acting if they make someone even the slightest bit uncomfortable especially if you notice they aren't stopping cut that shit short.
That is the type of person that feels so~ rewarding to betray.
Just imagining him losing his sh°t, maybe trash his reallife surroundings too - I chuckle just imagining it.
@Point Blank As someone who still plays Elsword, I am interested in knowing when you last played the game, because the game has seen a lot of changes during the last two or so years.
The author literally writes that he did not talk with him about it. They just kept making the game more hostile, hoping he would get the hint.
Pee on her? What in the holy hell is wrong with people and why do so many of them play tabletop?
you really need to ask this question?
It's seen as a consequence free environment because it's not real, so it attracts a lot of people who want to abuse that kind of environment. It's like playing GTA with all the cheats enabled; surely there's no actual penalty for beating up the hookers, right?
Problems are, firstly when you stop to think about that for a second it's not hard to realize how terrible a thing it is, and secondly people aren't just limited to whatever the video game allows them to do, so they think they can attempt to get away with far more than they actually can.
Add all that to a lack of self reflection, and you get the run the gamut of people who think murdering someone for their silver spoon is appropriate to "I freeze them and use my whip to smack of their testicles".
I think it has a lot to do with the ability to bring fantasies to life and include your friends "without making it weird" (as in my experience, many would frown upon playing an adult themed game, even a TTRPG, as they feel ashamed to do so in a group, but they feel that 'disguising' it in a more typical TTRPG is somehow less embarrassing and personal, no matter how kinky or weird they get).
As for me, I'm the type of DM/GM to suggest personally running the adult themed TTRPG when I see such themes arise in my group, so make of that what you will.
I thought it was kinda funny. One time in D&D I had this friend who was playing. He was playing some kind of mad wizard and I remember finding his wife and peeing on her. He got super pissed and used some kind of magic item to piss on the moon. He then went on some weird rant about Obama.
So i was scrolling through my homepage here on UA-cam. Just my normal stuff, some news, documentaries, icebergs, and then out of left field; this thumbnail. It just took me so off gaurd couldn't help but laugh. Thanks, crab. I needed that.
I do this every time so here we ago again.
This starts with a guy who is really vulnerable and naturally distrusting THIS IS 60% of the time for a reason, past experience, trouble with authority or relationship problems family or otherwise normally as a child so it never properly gets resolved.
Nothing at the start is any kind of issue at all, its just "you aren't having fun right" from others there's 2 ways out of this, be more inclusive you not allowed to be mad at them for excluding there fun or for them to find another game where there play style is more accepted, unfortunately numbers players or min maxers are very heavily excluded from most DnD games and being one myself and not being able to turn it off I understand why and its the reason I don't get to play DnD anymore just run it though I would love to.
The darkening camera was very cool for a sunless Cit game, I don't know why they take this as a Red flag and not a clever idea, his humor is different than yours, your not more intelligent for a weaker sense of humor. I assume they never brought the no role play up to the DM, don't know for sure but I am almost sure they would never have said anything just hope the problem resolved itself but I have been in games where a player didn't feel like they had there character highlighted enough in the game so they festered and often narrated themselves and people around them so I assumed they where doing it for themselves but they later ranted on discord for me not including them EXACTLY like this guy does if she had said something I would have been more inclusive.
So when hes running a campaign and there is this one player who constantly fucks with him, calls him on rules, argues with him and makes running a game a chore, this can completely ruin any game you play with this person, regardless of how you try to get over it, there always gonna be that sabotaging dick head to you at least in the back of your head now there your DM have fun.
He was obviously able to tell no one was having fun, so he called it off but still wanted to play with most of them.
He for very very relevant reasons for not trusting your friend and your friend might entirely have been I have never ever met someone who calls the DM on rules and argues with them often tend to be able to turn that off.
He wasn't even a problem at the start but then the DM took his characters one main trait (his attachment to his hammer) and decided this would be a good thing to make a plot point to have it taken away and everyone is surprised he didn't want it taken after this he plays the game very dejected, now sure the DM was trying to piss him off again possibly even was trying to.
Him pissing on the PC could be just a stupid joke without reading the room. A "its what my character would do" since that really seems like it was his character, a gross weirdo and I find that interesting but rather than reading it that way they immediately took it as the player pissing on the character.
YOU KNOW HE HAS ONE CHARACTER TRAIT, HAMMER, WHY WOULD YOU THING SUDDENLY NOW ITS CHANGED. Then he decided to play give them the try puts down his character and plays his character like the weirdo and watches his hammer the whole time, then he does the obvious and takes the hammer (Who woulda seen it coming) and someone fucking takes it, HIS WHOLE CHARACTERS THING and someone took it right in front of him.
I know this is probably not the case at all but you are getting one players side, a player on the side of what in the other guys view is the antagonist. Don't read these story's and say what a freak, read the story and go I wonder what caused this?
Weirdly defensive...
This is hard to read. Is English your first language? Did you proofread this? I get the gist of your comment, but there's a lot of issues with punctuation and separating your commentary from observations from the post in order to show a concise thought.
13:24
Gotta admit, that actually sounds like a great gag to pull as a chaotic character.
But not something to be done at every chance.
Maybe once or twice in a campaign, to dispel a hyper tense moment.
The way I see it (in my thoroughly unprofessional, armchair-psychologist way) is that dude had no idea how to handle his stress or healthily express his emotions. He's got kids and a job, so he can't act out in real life. There's too much at stake. But the rage (because he strikes me as a guy who transmutes all of his uncomfortable feelings into rage because rage feels stronger than grief, fear, or confusion) had to go somewhere. So it went into D&D where he could use the thin veil of "roleplay" to make it socially acceptable (or, well, socially justifiable to himself, let's say).
I dunno, though. Even on a guy's more grief-stricken, misplaced rage days, I still think it's pretty damn creepy to think "What's my character going to do in this situation? Hmmm....flirt with this woman then pee on her without her consent." But that's just me.
Yeah no, I feel the DM is more to blame than anyone.
He could have easily solved most of these issues beforehand.
Also having been an asshole to him when he was a DM, he should have been ready for the player to not trust him one bit.
We can all agree the poor guy went crazy during the pandemic and made some very bad choices, but like is no one else noticing the red flags the OP seem to have? Claimed the problem player was a conspiracy theorist with no examples as proof, and if the guy loved his hammer so much why did they keep putting him in situations where he couldn't use it/force it away from him? let the man have his hammer. I agreed with stopping him from killing the mafia dude, but why disarm him to begin with? someone else could have 1v1 the mafia if it was that important. The problem child and the Asshole dm already had a bad relationship, so of course he would be distrustful of him what does that have to do with conspiracy theories? I think the problem player needs therapy for sure but the underline story I was seeing was that the dm and other players (mainly the op) were possibly pushing him towards insanity as well.
Was CritCrab okay this week? He sounds sick.
I am :/
I hope you feel better soon, Crab!
@@CritCrab Get well soon. Your health is way more important than a piss video
@@CritCrab You mean you are ok or you are sick? lol jk xo xo
I mean, aside from the peeing part, the guy was clearly playing his character in a very consistent way and the DM absolutely did keep putting him in situations that would get a negative reaction from him as the "out" he would be given would always be against a strongly established character trait.
16:25 - "Man doesn't play the game the way I want to, so I insult him repeatedly by calling him an edgelord while the group forgets we're supposed to be roleplaying."
There is another point both OP and you CC forgot:
D&D is a collaborative game. Adversial DMing can be a thing in some campaigns, but that should absolutely be stated in Session 0 and at least for games since 3.x it is not the norm.
If there was no statement of adversiality and you still can't bring yourself to thrust the DM, that's no foundation for a collaborative game and the best you could do then is to excuse yourself from the game.
Wow, sounds like the party tried every possible in-game solution to an out-of-game problem; trying to take away important items, letting everything "edgelord barbarian" does play out, PvP.
Well, to be fair, the author did try some out-of-game solutions; looking at his phone until "edgelord barbarian" gets the hint and calling him a "terrifying creep" behind his back.
Some people in mental distress are coming to D&D with it - which I FULLY AGREE is problematic - because they don't have other options, they don't have somewhere else to go. Therapy is not nearly as easy to access as many commenters on these sorts of videos seem to believe. Waiting lists can be YEARS - not an exaggeration - and getting seen quicker is only possible if you have money. Not to mention that this happened during a time when COVID was causing a lot of services to be even less accessible than they already were. If we want people to stop bringing fresh trauma to D&D and causing further harm to themselves and often others as well, we need to make better options actually available, not just theoretically.
Working through trauma with the aid of roleplaying can actually work extremely well, just- not like this and not without having the go-ahead from and assistance of the other members of the group.
Oh lord. I’ve been putting off watching this video for how cursed the thumbnail is, but I can’t put it off forever.
The thought about putting too much of yourself into a character is 100% true. My father died at the beginning of the year, and I started a new DnD campaign with a new group a few months after. As I was writing my character’s backstory, I realized a parent being dead for them might be too real for me, and would affect my own mental state with the character. So I told the DM, and requested that my character’s parents not die. Or, if one did, for it not to be her father. My DM is amazing and agreed immediately. I’ve also had to have talks with players as a DM, because I thought one player was being a That Guy, because he’d get seriously bent out of shape whenever the players had a hard challenge and lost. At one point in another game one of my characters died and he straight up left the call. Turns out, it wasn’t that he was a That Guy. He had PTSD and one of his triggers was overt helplessness, and because he put so much of himself into his characters, he couldn’t separate his feelings from theirs. Not saying not to put yourself into your characters, but sometimes you do gotta be mindful of your feelings and take a step back when you need to.
Why would DM create such situations that so-called-edgelord will lose his hammer?
To further fuck with him after ruining his campaign, it's clear those two didn't like each other and the DM was closer to the group than the barbarian
The two times listed were fairly reasonable. One they were arrested, and the other was a fist fight. That's not unreasonable at all, perfectly normal. Critical Role campaign 2 Notte was scared of water, but situations came up with water. 2 situations isn't a lot.
"Are you seriously going PVP on me right now?"
"Yes, this is the perfect opportunity!"
Huh this story...a song comes to mind..."clang, clang Maxwell's silver hammer came down, on her head..."
Never thought I'd say this on one of these videos but this isn't as bad as what I expected from the title and intro, maybe because I steeled myself for an absolute crap show (pun absolutely intended). Tho I agree with the Crab King™, it seems more like his mental health deteriorated and he needs some psychological intervention. I hope he's doing better now and got the help he needed.
I don’t really see an issue with his love of his hammer. It’s his BOND & FLAW. He’s playing his character, but it ends there.
Splitting from the party to do other things isn’t conducive to team work & the pissing thing is a HARD NO. The DM can avoid the hammer or make it interesting character stories
But the player must of had some trauma he wasn’t to deal with it. The pandemic has effected everyone in so many different ways. I wish everyone the best
Once met a man who was chill
But his fetish was a really tough pill
Took all his will
to not drink some swill
and next thing we knew he was making us ill
This one kinda seems like a 'every one is at fault' story. Like barbarian had some weird tendencies, but this is no way near a pyschopath. Plus, he's just lost someone close to him during a pandemic (the world is literally falling apart), and in the character was filled his own trauma and he was not in a good mental state at the time.
also, OP already stated that the rules lawyer was a bit of an asshole, and to have someone correct you constantly, demand that they are right is draining and can easily kill the fun. so yeah, I can see why he doesn't trust the DM when he becomes a player. add all that to the DM deciding that his mission now is to separate Barbarian from a thing that is very important to him more than a few times. something that he's made a point to be an essential key part of his character.
I am by no means excusing the problem player's behavior, but there are certain things that I think might have exacerbated the situation.
Sounds like they just didn't match up, and nobody cared about him and they just wanted him gone.
Also the fact that OP admits they said "some cruel things" and intentionally leaves it vague makes me think that they might've also antagonized Barbarian, ntm the fact that they feel comfortable not only spilling everything abt his traumas (loosing a loved one)
so after checking comments for a very short amount of time I see nobody else noticed what I did.... I honestly believe this guy could be an interesting player who brought about cool plotlines and so on, just he's being painted as some sort of maniac. Remember we're seeing OPs retelling, not actual events. He met tons of resistance while DMing (a rules lawyer who kept annoying him), then was replaced as DM by that same rules lawyer. The group seem to have considered him a weak roleplayer, but when he tried it does not seem like he was encouraged to continue through good responses.
Simply put this story is FULL of bias that paints that guy in a bad light, while I think there might have been a bigger gray area in reality. Sure the pissing thing was stupid, but with another group it could have went off really well and gotten tons of laughs. I'm just thinking that is something Scanlan Shorthalt would do, and Vox Machina would laugh and so would most of the internet.
Yeah OP lost me at we're theater kids (three 40 year olds) and our sense of humor is less scategorical (not a word)
@@BanillaVean yeah when op started making shit up I knew something was, well, up
@@doubleaabattery7562 Imaginary stuff like not being with the party, botching nonaggressive npc interactions, muderhoboing....
World Anvil is a fantastic service with genuinely helpful and enthusiastic people running it. I use it myself for the new TTRPG world I'm building. I cannot recommend it enough.
On a completely different side note, the way you said, 'definitely has a scat fetish' had strong 'Whang!' vibes. (That's neither a positive nor a negative-just a fun observation.)
You lost me at " theater back in the day, amd enjoyed intelligent improve"
Hell, I've done theater and improve, and I don't even talk like that
True. Came off as snarky
Finally! Glad someone else caught it.
Remember these are 40 year olds talking about high school. It's goes beyond snarky into just sad territory.
@@BanillaVean yeah good point, they're talking about stuff 20+ years in the past as justification for their more "sophisticated" sense of humor...
Yo those “realistic” angry bird images with weird quotes? That’s what I image every time I see the thumbnail 🤣
I mostly just feel bad for the guy. Sure he wasn't the best player here, but a lot of these behaviours sound like a cry for help. Hopefully he's getting the help he needs and is doing better.
Well they tried reaching out to him. Can’t help people that don’t want to be helped.
My 2 cents, this hammer was a replacement for the person he lost due to COVID and this was a classic case of the denial and bargaining stage of grief rolled into one. I hope he got the help he needed to come to terms with the loss
It takes a great deal of strength to get professional help. If it took this game for him to realise then all the best to him, not the ideal situation, but life isnt ever ideal
"He got hit by covid hard" - "this is way back in the past and years have passed" ... what strange world does OP live in? that is not much time since it is only 2 years since the break out... o.O
Interesting
nah bro it was like 20 years ago or something i dunno lmao... OP just changed their timescale i guess
@@AlFredo-sx2yy can't be 20 years since OP said it was during covid...
@@gecko2.617 Jesus bro, you're terrible at detecting sarcasm omg...
We're all focusing on the poopy but the hammer was the real fetish all along
"A friend and I bullied a depressed man and it's his fault'
When you said “went to play poker with some homeless men under a bridge” - for a moment I thought OP meant IRL 🤣🤣🤣
I think your takeaway from the whole thing (expressed at the end) is really human and incredible. I thought that was really cool, dude.
Imma be real, when my mom died, I also roleplayed a parent who was going to die, just to help process my thoughts and feelings on the matter. Did this while she was dieing(during my rare down time between helping her), and right after she died.
But I guess Ive always been use to self coping lol. So, I wasnt questioned on it at all.
No joke, I legitimately love the homeless barbarian, who smells like trash and is obsessed with his hammer. I hope he is doing better.
man you scared the hell out of me with that thumbnail
I really thought edgelord was going to hit the bodyguard with the hammer lmao 😂
How to know if somebody was/is theater-kid? they will tell you.
Seriously. The whole "we were in theater, so we prefer INTELLIGENT improv..." superiority complex
OP huffs their own farts.
i did not read a single thing
where can i find that art (its awesome if you drew it)
@@someguy1894 Do you mean my avatar?
@@WladcaPodziemia yes
@@someguy1894 It is from comis JTHM by Johnen Vasquez (from its last few chapters)
Picturing this Barbarian attacking, then peeking back to check on his hammer, then attacking again, I’m reminded of that episode of The Simpsons where Homer boxes a homeless guy who keeps stopping his punch combos to check on his bindle.
At about 11 minutes, i have to say, if his character would never give up the hammer, there is nothing you can say to make him give up the hammer
>Don't put down hammer under arrest.
>Chat up potential love interest NPC.
>Sexually assault said NPC for no reason.
>Attempt to beat NPC to death with a hammer in unarmed duel.
>Party combat begins
>Leave for months with no explanation.
>Refuse to elaborate.
17:14 i dont see him watching for the hammer and for breaking rules as bad, its in character and makes his transition to leaving the hammer more natural
"we were in theater and enjoyed inteligent improv" . Shut up, poop is funny.
The reddest of flags
The fm brought the romance thing down on himself. They had been playing for months and seemingly knew how the player reacted yet tried to set up a romance sene/subplot for the barbarian going so far as to make a female barbarian who would stand outside with the players barbarian. That I’ll fully put on the DM for knowing how his player played the character and expecting a spontaneous 180. Like you don’t start petting a dog who is known to be aggressive and expect not to get bitten. And the last bit yea they should have seen it coming like a mile away you know he’s an aggressive charater who loves the hammer more than anything yet you created a senerio with the intended purpose to make the player go against that. That feels like writing things so that a player that wants to play a exclusively healing classic has to play as a murder hobo. I’m not saying the dm is nessesaraly wrong on being annoyed but they and the party were just as stubborn as the wired guy in wanting him to play a character differently. I’d try to work around him if we need to do somthing that involve tact write a detour for the charaters or have somone else distract him and you can bring him in when that segment is over. Like on the last encounter you could have literally had the guy play poker with some hobos while the rest of the group delt with the extortion. Because if at that point they believed anything else was going to happen after months of play than that’s beyond being blind that’s actively sabotaging yourself as much as the barbarian player was himself.
There was definitely no excuse for the behaviour of the last "that guy," but there was some stuff the DM could gave done a lot a better. Like not making situation involving weapons when he knew the character would cause a problem about it, and being more assertive about what behaviour is not acceptable at his table.
I got the impression there was a tug-of-war going on between this guy and the DM. No doubt the player was losing it but the DM did some pushing of his own (why keep messing with his hammer?) Everybody else was just caught in the middle.
There's such a GIANT avenue for a beautiful redemption arc for the trash hammer man, one I would love to explore and it would probably be my favorite. It's so sad to see it get pissed on.
I agree with what you said about therapy and this just seems like a very sad case of slipping into a trap and having your mental state erode. I've seen it happen to friends before and it always sucks. He might have been fine if he took time to mourn but essentially repeating the grief in dnd wasn't the way to go. At the 14 minute mark it seemed like he was TRYING to get booted from the party as a way to "shield" them from his mental health. It's just sad to watch this happen to someone you know. The hammer probably representing something he got attached to as a way of coping with whatever affected him irl
Ok, that made me laugh hard. Telling her to close her eyes first made it so much funnier.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem seems like a nail.
There is some logic in what Crit Crab said. It does sound like this guy may have cracked under the pressure.
Although this other guy is a weirdo, “intelligent improv” sounds crazy arrogant
It’s 00:24, seeing that thumbnail wasn’t helpful for my sleep
You too, huh? Love getting a heart attack before cosying down to kip. I was having such a nice lucid dream too
Sweet dreams!
in some chases I image that being difficult, taking a break here sounds like waiting 3-4 years before playing again, depending on what "the problems being worse enough" would mean.
There are two problem individuals here. Dm had some major red flags when op describes them as a player. I think with both people essentially making it toxic for the other ruined it all. I don’t care if op thinks the sun shone out of the dms ass, he had so many issues op just hand waved away when they were a player.
When you're trying to enjoy a shared game like D&D with a bag full of stress and anxiety, you become fantastic at overexamining behavior, yours and theirs.
I played a small thing of D&D over Discord to try and share SOMETHING among mutual friends and I played Whickett, I made him up to be a hobo type as well; he was found mentally shattered. He could break stones in his hands and could hardly string a full sentence... and I couldn't roleplay as him, with Whickett's madness being how I wanted to play the game and fully knowing what it might look like to the jury of the table.
This man had 10,000 more things going wrong than I did and his soul was, for that week or whatever, a total skeleton... And seemingly shared a level of vulnerability the rest of the table couldn't handle. I really wish other narratives were available, but there's only ever one steno recording the problematic player.
(But I'm blaming nobody!! D&D is not therapy!!)
Bro its an NPC, its not surprising D&D players feel more sympathy for an NPC than their real friends. No wonder they encourage the control freak dungeon master's actions.
You're so insightful and an absolute joy to listen to.
"have you ever met a person that seemed cool, but later on was revealed to be horrible"
...
yeah, everyone who has at least one ex has had that happen to them.
halfway through this i really forgot this was about +30 years old people
Crab, I respect you and love your channel. But I'm kinda conflicted: He was roleplaying a psychopath, yes... but from what I can gather from this story (as you said at the end around 20:20 ) is not about a dude being creepy: he appears to be more of a mentally unstable person than anything else.
Please don't take this as me being angry, annoyed at you or even siding with the person from this story. It's just that it bothers me that the content, your opinion, the title and the thumbnail are kinda conflicting with each other.
Lol i would have laughed if i was in the party, that shit was hillarious
I mean, if you're laid back enough, you can use your own psychology to make a character; even the bad parts can be used to great success.
A few years ago, I put my one particular issue into my character and everyone loved it, as I tried to give it more of a comedic twist and understood that first of all I'm a player. With that, it was less of a reflection of me, but a simplified caricature.
But I would never do that with fresh trauma I haven't processed yet.
I have unfortunately dealt with a similar though thankfully nowhere near as extreme case of problem player myself. I have a friend who started playing about the same time that I did, and had a fun enough character concept where she was meant to go to wizard college but woke up one day as the servant of an unknown god as their cleric, she also had a "necronomicon" that she found before the adventure started and had a spirit she would talk to that resided in the book. The problem came about a couple months into the campaign where when she had a complete and total tonal shift where her entire character motivation became about getting her family out of the desert and making sure they were all taken care of, and any mention of the possibility of her family dying or not hearing from her family or how long it would actually take campaign wise to get to her family generally upset or annoyed her.
She threw out everything else about her character would have almost no interaction with her god once she found out who it was, just didnt even bother with the book after a few sessions. Taking care of her family was the sole focus of her character. Which in one campaign isn't that big a deal but when she does the same thing or other variations of family in trouble must rescue them while her actual character is completely devoid of any detail at all it just made things worse and worse, because she was trying to use d&d to make a perfect little family that she never had in real life and was afraid to confront the actual problems she was dealing with in the hopes that she could escape to her perfect family.
not to play keyboard psychiatrist but i can't help but feel like going "lol conspiracy theorist" as a factor for his behavior is downright disrespectful and downplays whatever grief this guy was going through.
unless he was randomly going off about nonsense like reptilians & flat earth in casual conversation the way his's character's backstory parallels what happened to him makes it sound like the loved one he lost was his wife and was struggling with raising kids without her.
This seems a lot like an Anakin/Jedi Council situation to me. Yes, Edgelord Barbarian had issues, and it was not appropriate or even a good idea for him to try and use the game as therapy when he was so far down the rabbit hole.( Considering that it was in the midst of Covid, though, I wonder if he thought that it might be his only venue, with all the shutdowns and remote-everything going on.)
On the other hand, the DM was not doing the game any favors, either. His handling of EB was just making things worse, and even seemed to be targeting him. Considering EB's mental state, is it any wonder that he cracked more? If you realize that the character is too connected to the issues a player is going through, you don't need to accept it and be the therapist, but you don't need to use it against them, either, and push their buttons. Instead of just largely ignoring EB's character quirks and letting the player internally RP what he was going through, the DM made a bad situation worse. The fact that it was with a player going through a lot of personal difficulties and trauma, and not just a difficult or antagonistic personality, just makes it even more egregious.
I found the story interesting to listen to, but the op's credibility takes a huge dive when calling the Player a conspiracy theorist.
The group getting frustrated about the Barbarian using his hammer when they already knew that he would use it is interesting. They present him with new challenges , but expect him to do something different for some reason. The word insane could be easily used here, as they keep presenting the Barbarian with new challenges and expect different results to happen.
Also, some random npc comes unarmed to a group of adventures and demand that they pay up some money. I could see why players would try to intimidate the npc or kill them to teach them a lesson in humility. (of course, I guess it would depend on how powerful the players are and how powerful the mafia group actually is/what the reputation is.)
Thanks for the upload and another good time.
The thumbnail is going to give me nightmare, thanks
This guys character reminds me of the bad guy of surfs up. His obsession with his hammer reminds me of the guys obsession with his trophies.
i thought i’ve seen peak dnd story thumbnails. but this takes the yellow cake
thanks for the jumpscare thumbnail critcrab 😅
hell yeah it's a critting crab
Man lost his mind damn.