Instigator: *attacks guard* Guard: "You are under arrest for assault of the royal guard." *turns to the party* "Noble adventurers, I request your aid in detaining this criminal"
I used this once but the best time was when I didn't need to use it. First campaign: group of adventurers hired. They don't know each other prior to this. One of them is a Cleric/Paladin devout to a god of justice and war. Two are edgy rogues. They were gonna stay the night before going in the dungeon at a local castle that the residing nobleman kindly offered them as a safe place to stay. Edgy Rogues try to picklock the doors to rob the man blind while the party is asleep. They crit failed and "there is no crit fail in ability check" but I was new to 5e and I like it so crit fail it is. "The castle door was old and brittle. You didn't have any trouble opening it, but it hinged and actually cracked as you forced you lock pick, and you know the whole castle heard you." *cleric girl* "including me?" "Yep" The two rogues thought she was gonna protect them. So they didn't hide or anything. "Smite." And two new character sheets were rolled that day. I hate pvp but it wasn't a pvp it was a slaughter.
I did something similar once that wasn't to deal with a problem player, it was to make the point that the place they're at is very different to what they're used to. They're in a Dwarven city, trying to find their way around. They're asking locals for directions but, being a very tight-knit group that aren't fond of outsiders, the dwarves aren't especially helpful. One dwarf didn't want to help them (I was rolling each time they approached someone to decide whether they would be willing to help out), so they offered him some coin but - unaware of how drastically different the dwarven economy is - didn't realise they'd insulted him by offering so little and he just stormed off. One of the party realised they offended him and decided to try and make amends but, being so far away because the dwarf stormed off so fast, decided to do it by casting message on him to avoid being misheard. The dwarf shouts something in Dwarvish, the only member of the party who speaks the language understands the word as "sorcery!", all the nearby dwarves converge on the cramped tunnel intersection, blocking their escape but not attacking, a couple dwarves run off somewhere, no one is willing to explain. After a few minutes the dwarves who ran off return with a retinue of city guards. The crowd parts, the dwarves identify the two half-elves as the culprits because elves = magic, the guards arrest them, the Half-Elf who didn't cast any magic pleads his innocence as they explain that magic is illegal this close to the mines while the one who did tries to accuse the other one to save his own skin. To my pleasant surprise, the party didn't resist. One of them, being an ex-lawman, even offered assistance with his own handcuffs, they followed them to the jail at a respectable distance and politely inquired at the front desk as to what could be done. They... have been a lot more careful about observing and respecting local culture since then.
If someone’s bossy in combat, make an NPC they’re fighting point out, “He’s the boss, get em!” And have everyone prioritize him till he’s down or low on health
I honestly appreciate the distinction, though. I'm an optimizer--I actually enjoy the challenge of trying to get the most out of a set of class/army/whatever restrictions. We're not all trying to be "that guy".
We once had a cleric who would only heal us if we paid him Finally we got fed up and next combat We all pointed at him and said "That's our healer, get him"
I currently have this Cleric. Yet. It is more to the fact that not a single party member has made any actual attempt to befriend the Cleric. So she currently is a Hireling.
As a former cheater, I would say the best way to deal with one is to just pull them aside and tell them they’re caught. Be nice about it and ask them why. I did it because I was generally insecure about myself and it carried over to D&D. I just wanted to look cool. A great thing to do is show how bad rolls can be fun! Also point out that the game is way better when you’re not cheating. I of course can speak from experience.
I found that a big reason can also be.. not wanting your charachter to die. If I just miscalculated and make that save my charachter isn't uncounscious I'm not dying. I don't think it's weird that people don't want to lose the character they are do attached to. A solution might be to make the campaign less deadly. Not attacking the downed charachters, or having option for ressurection be available :)
One dude cheats all the time at adventures league, also refuses to roll out in the open. The DM is pretty non confrontational but you can tell he was getting annoyed as well as the rest of the table is finding it frustrating as every roll of theirs is a hit, every save is a success, and they metagame the fuck out of the module. One week, the DM asks for a marching order, then rolls some dice. asks the cheater to roll a dex save. Chester says he got a 27 “oof, a lit opens up beneath you and you’ll begin falling a great distance. Does anyone want to use their reaction to try and grab him before her falls?” no one offers to help. Chester says “I use my reaction to grab the ledge” DM “roll an athletics check” Cheater rolls “28” DM “you reach out but it’s too late and you start falling. I need to borrow some D6s” Almost everyone hands over 2-4 D6 at the table and the DM rolls them quite a few times. “That’s 287 falling damage, tough break, hey on the bright side you can make a new level one character”
I got accused of cheating at one game where I was rolling hot. I suggested that we all role in the open with no picking up of dice and easily readable dice which upset a player whose dice were kinda hard to read, but they were his lucky dice despite the number of nat 1s he rolled on them. They decided they believed me after all because one good session doesn't outweigh multiple other sessions where I had bad, average, and good rolls.
Most of these seem like they can be solved by simply asking the other players what they do. I ran a one off campaign with a party of one murderhobo and 3 normal players. When the murderhobo swung at a guard in the middle of conversation, I asked the other three people what they did. Had they said "I guess we jump in..." I would have had everyone roll for initiative, but unanimously all 3 of them said "We step back in confusion and put our hands up." "OK...[murderhobo character] go ahead and give me an initiative roll." "What about everyone else." "No need." "What so I'm gonna fight 5 guards?" "Well no...more accurate you're gonna get bear tackled and arrested." "Why only me?" "Who else assaulted a royal officer." Ironically, it was a rather weird conversation that followed as the murdrhobo player argued that the guards should go after the rest of the party to as I explained that out of everyone, only one person actually committed a crime.
Had the same thing happen with the murderhobo in my party. He got thrown into prison for a full session where the the DM introduced him to two new players as his cellmates. In the session after that all three worked as a team and pulled of an epic prison break (for which all of them got massive xp).
Had to improv a whole court case because one of my players decided to track down a merchant he had interacted with, and then killed in broad daylight in front of several guards. I asked all the other players what they would do, and all of them agreed it would be fair for just that one to get punished for putting them all in an unwanted situation (I played this that the guards set everyone except the murderhobo free since they clearly saw it was only him)
When one of my fellow party members attacked a shopkeeper (in a weapons shop, of all places), my character ended up holding them back with Hold Person to leave no doubt that I was not associated with the attack. They still got thrown in prison, though, which lead to a prison break. Why we decided to break them out of prison, I don't know -- we could have just had them roll a new character since it was the second session or something like that (we started at a later level, which is why I had Hold Person). It completely changed the track of the story onto a more interesting direction because of events going on outside the city that were previously unknown to us, so that ended up positively, though I expect that the DM had to improvise quite a bit.
"The salt lord" the one who every bad roll they immediately complain, and every time they get hit they are upset they have to use their action to withdraw or perhaps die.
Yeah they're annoying but I think anyone can get like that when they're trying to have fun and they're having the world's worst luck. Me personally I'm pretty gracious about bad rolls, I just RP them out cos I have shit luck more often than not but some people create an image of their character in their head and anything that falls flat of it just feels disappointing. You can help em if you're dm by giving them inspiration if they're rolling really bad and if you're a player then use the assist action or something to help them so they feel their character is useful and gets a bit of the spotlight
Doesn't matter how gracious of a bad dice roller you are 10 rolls in and you still haven't succeeded at the intended objective it gets annoying. I almost have the dice rolling skills of wil wheaton. It just gets to you sometimes
Ok reverse of that, Dishonest DM. There have been a number of times dice wise I could have PPK'd kids. I chose not to because my love of my players love of the story outweighed the authority of the dice. Does that make me a bad person? Oh yeah I'll hurt them really bad, but I go to -3 HP so judge me wider universe am I a bad DM? (no seriously I want to know.)
@@clymdodds1020 depends if it’s going to insta kill them. If you deal their max health in one attack, it’s an insta kill. If it won’t, and someone can heal, I would just let the fate of the dice show the way. But if an attack insta kills them, I’d say it’s okay to fudge because the encounter is probably a little unbalanced.
I realized awhile back I can be an Attention Hog. I have ADHD and when I get really excited and involved in the game I JUST WANT TO DO THINGS! Once I realized it I apologized to the party and told them if I started doing it again to please remind me. I guess what I'm trying to say is some people don't realize what they're doing is a problem
@@RaizanMedia I disagree. There is a decent chance the hog is unaware of their behavior and calling them out 4v1 and basically mob shaming them is a thing that might scare off the one person that was probably the most excited about the game.
Yeah I’m fairly new to the game but I am very aware that I could quickly fall into this when I get more comfortable with it (for now my anxiety is stopping me) because I am really interested and excited about it. I would much rather be pulled up on it though (nicely not a blunt confrontation that would not work well with anxiety and adhd things [like rejection sensitive dysphoria]) if you just point it out to me when I’m doing it I’d apologise and rein myself in for as long as possible
My DM sends me PMs to help me know when to dial it down. I have the same problem as OP, and it's hard to know when to stop. My issue is autism and I can't perceive the others' frustration. This works for us and might be something to try.
For problem players: the edgelord, who insists their character has Suffered the Most and that Nobody Else Could Understand and generally don't make any attempt to get along with the other players in the name of roleplay
This can work if they make their character actually work with the group, even if it's RPed as a begrudging alliance (or they're a secret softie). This becomes a real problem when they refuse to work with, or sometimes even join, the party. I've had one player who, when given the plot hook & multiple reasons to join the party, refused to join at all & insisted that they'd just sit in the tavern & brood. Then they got upset when they weren't part of the combats, despite sitting in the tavern alone was *their idea.*
Yeah i had one of these fucks in a game. He brooded in the corner of the bar a lone watching the rain. He did nothing to talk or interact with the rest of the troupe other than brood. He then asked if they were ever going to fight something and i said sure when you decide to play with the rest of the players and not brood in a corner. He quit 4 minutes later. After the others picked a quest off a job board to do.
I like to give my characters like that some sort of connection to one other party member, or a reason to care about what the party is doing. Playing a lone wolf type character is totally doable while still keeping with the party, you just have to do it right. The begrudging allies thing works really well, and is the sort of thing that can lead to great character growth, as they bond with the rest of the party and come to actually care about the others.
i honestly just quit playing, because people are idiots, you can barely have a game anymore without some moron ruining everything or being so irritating you dont even want to finish the game
I’ve got a rules lawyer, and I love him. Been playing off and on since the late ‘70’s. New to 5e, don’t have it all down, yet. He is a walking encyclopedia. And, if I say it doesn’t apply for this game for x reason, he gets excited about the home brew change.
I don't think that ur friend could be a problem at all. For me, it only gets annoying when they're super defensive with the rules thing, like: "Hey, i saw this really cool homebrew..." and they go "but by the rules in the book...". It's more when it affects the little twists in you're trying to do with your storytelling.
Attention Hogs are easy to deal with. "You start searching the room; it's going to take you 10 minutes to make your roll. While you're doing so, The bar owner looks at you nervously. 'Ya don't think this place I bought got anythin' bad in it do ya?'" In short, actions take time. Enforce that.
DnD i've learned is VERY much about time scale. Like working with time is REALLY freaking important. People generally know a round in combat is 6 seconds, if you're in a city you could be going by minutes if you're walking through a festival or something, or hours if you're going around doing shopping and just general busy work. Then if you're traveling to another town you take it in days or potentially weeks if it's a LONG journey without too much in the middle. However things also happen, simultaneously. If you've got a character doing a ritual to identify something you've found, don't just go. Ok 10 minutes pass and this is what it does. One character is taking ten minutes, what's everyone else doing? Is everyone just kinda catching their breath after a tough fight, just wanna figure out what this loot does and divvy it up? Ok, fine, they all relax for 10 minutes while the wizard casts his spell. If they have something else they want to do, maybe a conversation some characters want to have, this is a good time to go "Ok, so the wizard is going to take 10 minutes to cast his spell. Do you guys have anything you want to talk about or do in this time?" And then the bard can go "yeah, i'm going to pull the Ranger a bit to the side" and they have their talk, the fighter and monk want to see if they can find some fish in a river that's close by. Everyone's got SOMETHING to do, players that wanna character build can do that, players that want to just do something to pass the time can do that, players that want to discover cool magic can do that. Everyone gets what they want, and if someone starts bitching about it, you've got a bit more work to do to either smooth them over or if needed, kick them out.
I am an attention hog. I don't mean to be, I just get excited ans start talking. My group knows this about me and they remind me that it another person's turn to talk. I don't get mad because I know about this flaw of mine and just have a hard time controlling it when I get excited. They don't get mad either by the way. It is actually a running joke in my group that I can't keep my mouth shut. And a chorus of shut up Tony is not unheard of. 😁
I've always liked asking the "spotlight hog" players for their help and ask them to help me highlight one of the quieter players who might not be saying as much. It helps the shy player find more confidence and leverages the spotlight hog's enthusiasm in a positive way.
yep, and as a typically shy player i love to attach my backstory to a spotlight hog. then i always have someone to play off of and i can keep them busy in side rp to help the GM.
These types of people are in general a DM's best friend as long as they don't overdo it. I used to have this problem a bit but I reformed and now I mostly play the sidekick and I frequently discuss with the DM in private and we find ways to make the game a little more hype and entertaining, to have people shine and the storytelling be a bit more intriguing, scenes more flamboyant etc It really helps create a more entertaining story in the end if you work hand in hand with these players because chances are, if someone knows how to make something exciting, it's them. If you discuss with them, they'll get their col scenes but they'll also give you ideas to make it cool for other players as well and you'll also see that they don't take the spotlight so much now that they have some guaranteed coolness and they'll more readily let others bask as well
That is an excellent way to divert spotlight players into enjoying the game for everyone! I know that there are times when I become a spotlight hog so I always check in with the DM about who’s been quiet etc.
An even better use of sandwich technique is “hey I really love how enthusiastic you are while playing, it always gets me excited to run a game. It does slightly overwhelm some of the quieter players, and if you could help me give them a little more air time to bring them up to our level it would help everyone have more fun!” So it should go “1/positive remark about situation 2/CONSTRUCTIVE criticism 3/ways to use this criticism positively “
I have a group of mostly new player that all ended up being power gamers. It pissed me off for ages, to the point that I didn't wanna run the campaign any more cause I let them all run too strong of characters for the campaign I wanted to run. I finally realized I was being a dumb baby making it about myself and turned the campaign into demigod campaign filled with set peice battles and homebrew monsters to try and make the power gamers still feel strong but challenged. As a DM its hard sometimes to remember that you are God and can control what the players face. If they all wanna be legends that walk through ages, set them up with equally strong demigod antagonists.
If your adventure module is too low-level, homebrew it to be a little deadlier and add some extra flair to it. Mention that nobody has gone in that place and left alive in 10 years, that even skilled adventurers don't return. They powergame because being optimal and powerful is fun for them, so make the challenges tougher both in stats and lore so that they feel more powerful for having overcome it.
Same situation here so when the players started to make some big brain plays with their powered up characters they ended up sparking a war with gods getting involved as the Mindflayers and Aboleths allied. Now the gods are starting to get killed off and the players are freaking out having really tough fights on their hands as they are facing Mindflayer demi-gods and are caught in a three way war between the Gith, the mindflayer alliance and the gods. Now they can't wait for each session, and yes it is pretty much all homebrew now. As a result DMing for them has become a blast. ^_^
@@Hurdleizer the campaign is part of a bigger homebrewed multiverse that contains multiple campaigns, including one another player is running. so I'm just making them part of the "old lore".
@@dragonbane97x Sounds awesome keep up the great work! sounds like your players are having a blast too! As DMs that is the best reward for our craft. ^_^
This problem as been adressed since times immemorial. At least in French, I don't know for English folks. We have the mythical sentence : "Ta gueule, c'est magique !", or "Shut up, it's magic!". ^^
I think these types of players are just curious about the world that was built and have an inquisitive nature. I ask a lot of questions to make sure I know what's going on or incase I'm missing something... And sometimes it's to just gather as much knowledge I can about the GM's game world, but hey. I can see how that might get annoying after awhile but from seeing other players that do the same thing, they stop after awhile for the most part.
The middle of the game session is probably the wrong time to bring it up, but if they want to introduce a house rule that was in an early edition, that could be good. The beauty of tabletop games lies in their flexibility.
I'm a spotlight hog accidentally, I just realized from watching this. I just get excited to play the game. It's like when I'm writing my own stories, I get the scene in my head and love to keep it going faster and get hyped.
MY dm has started making us roll initiative when we get to talking over each other. I have that problem too, at times but getting better. I'm trying to let the best player for the job do the action. Roll play IG and tell party , who's the best at the skill being tried. Try RPGing "hey you know I have knowledge and studied that".. Sneaky guy sneaks, talky guy talks et cetra yada yada. Think in team mode.
Something that a lot of people seem to Omit is there's more to the game than just rolling Dice and knowing the rules it's how you interact with each other too
@@zuleanservant I agree and I know role play is important to the game, but it is just not my favorite part of the game. I do enjoy persuasion and deception and stuff but having to literally act like someone that I'm not isn't as fun for me as the battles and ability checks. I am trying to work on it though, I know its an important part of the game and I'm hoping I will get better at it and enjoy the role play more.
We had a few Flakes in my group but we simply stopped inviting them, every single one of them. If the player doesn't have the time and/or disposition to play they shouldn't be scheduling games at all. They're just making things more complicated for everyone, especially the DM who has to balance encounters for a party that may or may not have an extra character in it. Finally, constant rescheduling is disrespectful and makes them look like they don't give a shit about the game, so why would we keep inviting them?
Yeah, that's the flippant player. Either move on without them, or if you're willing to do a more work and have flakes that are interested but busy, set up a West Marches or solo campaign. Something where they're not putting the game on hold for a whole group if they can only show up once every 6 sessions.
My dnd group has 12 players (I don’t know what are dm was thinking) and some players in particular can’t make it often at all. My dm cancels if more than 2 players are absent, so we hardly ever get to play. It’s even worse because not only is this my first campaign, but we’re only scheduled meet once a week, for 2 hours. I’m a month and a half in, and I’ve been to 2 sessions.
As someone who has (at various times in my life) been accused of being both a Rules Lawyer AND a Power Gamer, getting them on YOUR side as a GM is the best thing that could ever happen. Need to know what the obscure rule for X is? Ask the Rules Lawyer (if they don't know, they'll be happy to find it for you while you do other things). Have a new player who is very enthusiastic, but know nothing about how to build a character? Ask the Power Gamer to help! Turn the natural inclinations of these types of player to the advantage of the group (including you), and you campaigns will profit.
As someone who naturally optimizes my characters, I absolutely love helping the other players do the same with their characters. I like it when my character is really effective, but I love it when everyone else's characters are just as effective. I don't want anyone to feel ineffective or overshadowed. This also extends to giving advice during play. I don't cross over into being the Boss/Critic (I think), but I like to give tips when someone is unsure what to do, Jut a simple "Hey, you should totally cast grease on the floor by the door so that the orcs will get stuck" can show other people effective (or cool/funny) ways to use their spells. I never get mad or upset when my advice isn't followed or anything like that, and I love hearing suggestions from other people for cool ideas for my character to do.
I love this tip so much. In my game, I’ve played with one of of the players before. When we played together, we kind of power gamed together, but also cared about the roleplay. So now, I usually put them up to helping another character with creation. I was also the closest we’d get to a lawyer, (I was never insistent that the rules be followed, but I understood the value that good mechanics can have over good stats. If you know what I mean) so now that I’m DMing it’s pretty coherent.
Someone who is both consistently plays at my table all the time, they are the greatest asset I've ever had in keeping the game flowing smoothly. It sucks if they decide to play a Cleric though.
Utilize a problem and turn it into something helpful is a great approach. But, I see one issue here... In my experience some (or more like many) Power Gamers think that there is a *right* way to create a character, and there is a *wrong* way (every other approach than their powerful perfectionist). When such a Power Gamer tells someone else how to build their character, they give them the feeling that if they don't follow their perfect approach, then they're building the character the wrong way. But, if your new and unexperienced player just wants to *roleplay* (and that's something great, even better than having the perfect stats IMO) and is trying to create a *"personality"* rather than a *"weapon wielded by optimized stats",* your problem player just became an even bigger issue. So, if the Power Gamer is like Steve Mahar, who said "I never get mad when my advice isn't followed", then it's a great approach. With most Power Gamers I've encountered, this is a bad idea. They will just annoy the hell out of the new player before the game has even started.
Instead, I'd be down with giving time-wasters "negative inspiration" - i.e. disadvantage - on their next roll where their problem conduct would have worked against them. Too much time wasting? The problem players get disadvantage on the next initiative roll to reflect the time enemies had to observe and plot against them. Spotlight hogging? Player gets disadvantage on the next skill that would traditionally be done by another PC's class to reflect the party tension caused by pre-empting their comrades. And so on.
@@spaceranger7683 I would ask the other players if they mind the spotlight hogging. If the players are fine with it, I wouldn't punish the hogger for creating fun in the game
I DM for a group of players. If I run into metagaming in the midst of an encounter etc. and the players are making plans mid-battle, I just continue the initiative count by skipping to the next enemy's turn. If it is mid roleplay, I have the NPCs make comments like, "I am right here and can hear you planning to con me into x" or whatever is relevant. The battle stuff has been taken well by my group as they can't help wanting to chat out their actions to get the best possible outcome, and they understand that mid-battle is not the time to stop and make plans. Note on this, I give the players ample opportunity to plan ahead when it fits the situation and if they approach it say with stealth and scouting, then mid-fight I allow some chat, but when it gets ridiculous I step in and move the enemies, make an attack or whatever seems appropriate.
Exactly the right number of types to make an alignment chart! Lawful Genuine: Rules Lawyer Neutral Genuine: Spotlight Hog Chaotic Genuine: The Jokester Lawful Selfish: Powergaming Neutral Selfish: Metagaming Chaotic Selfish: Cheating/Dice Fudging Lawful Malignant: The Boss/Critic Neutral Malignant: Flippant Player Chaotic Malignant: Instigator (ofc none of these are Always The Case, i just wanted to make a chart)
Genuine, Selfish and Malignant...really...lets try to pick the most asinine words we can to put in an alignment chart...not aimed at the poster but the rules themselves. Good, Neutral and Evil leaves everyone knowing exactly what they mean.
@@Ghorda9 Its D&D, it is what you make it. Good is good, evil is bad, neutral is switzerland...whats to confuse? Interpret evil how you want. Your DM will let you know if your going off-course. Good people can be selflish too. Your average Lawful Good Paladin will pursue law and good whatever the price...sod the wife at home and 3 kids. So whats that? Lawful Selfish? Even saying it just sounds bizarre. Lawful good. You do good and stick to a code of honour and ethics. Lawful Genuine, means...who the hell knows... :D Sorry but We'll stick with Good, Switzerland and Evil thanks.
In one campaign I was a player in, "the instigator" let me go first into a room he knew had a giant spider in, then when I got attacked he spent nearly a dozen turns standing in the doorway, and every time it came to him in the initiative, his response to the DM was "I do nothing", to the point that another player had to threaten to throw his character at the spider to save me.
That is absolutely horrible and should not have even been allowed, in my opinion. I hope either you don't have to deal with that player anymore, or they grew and changed their game play.
@@breebree2842 Honestly, it was a very fun group and I am still friends with him to this day, however, I haven't played with him since, partially because I haven't had a chance to play since then.
The interrupter : The player who will talk over another player when the other player is talking to the DM or talking over and interrupting the DM. Especially when their character is not involved in what is happening.
I ended up quitting a game because one of these players not too long ago. I made it known that the person interrupting me consistently was bothering me and nothing changed. So after awhile I ended up just leaving cause it wasn't worth getting irritated over.
@@Sirschlonky I do my best to let players know to wait their turn when they start interrupting, and if they continue I tune them out. Then when I'm done talking to the original person I turn back to them an ask them, what they had to say. Eventually they got the hint and things are better. Sorry that your experience was not as good.
I've played in some adventures where I rolled up a social or piloting class, being assured on session zero that there will be challenges for my class. Only to play through the adventure and find out this wasn't true. Constant physical checks and intense combat, constantly being targeted even though i had the combat effectiveness of a wet noodle, was assured this would not be an issue at the start of the game because my guy was supposed to be in a vehicle. Was never once given the opportunity to man a vehicle even when they were on the battle map. If you play an adventure for half a year, and only get to roll for your relevant skills 3 or 4 times, you have to start being the interruptor unless you want to silently stare at your sheet each session.
Re- Attacking guards: Ask their party if they are with this fool, and kill/arrest that player's character and ask them to make a new one, they'll get the hint eventually. If the rest of the party wants to attack the guards too, cowabunga it is.
I'm the DM that will ask with a straight face: "Are you sure you want to do this?" And if the answer in the scenario is yes, I will roll an initiative of 20d20 and have at least two "Hero Guards" that are basically high level PCs that will spank the offending party members. It's not railroading if the players play on the train tracks.
relying on players "getting the hint" sounds like avoiding uncomfortable direct communication. communicating directly, if post-game/privately, in my experience works better than the subtle approach.
@@vernonhampton5863 Having high level NPCs to discourage this kind of behaviour is a tradition that dates back to some of the earliest settings of the game.
Had an edgelord in my party attack a merchant right in front of some guards. DM called for initiative and I rolled high. On my turn I announced that I turn my back on the guards and use my action to withdraw my rope facing the edgelord character. DM had the guards read my body language & Ally with me
For the Jokesters my DM set up a group chat where we all had on silent. We could put in our funny jabs in text form while not interrupting the DM and currently role playing character(s). I liked this solution.
yeah, when I get the urge to make puns on NPC names and stuff, I do it in the game chat (since D&D is an online game these days) so I’m not talking over exposition or RP dialogue. It’s a system that works pretty well. And it’s still rewarding when I hear the DM lose his train of thought 30 seconds later when he reads back and tries not to laugh.
@@KCBCollier This! As a DM my players do this in either Roll20 or Discord, especially if I'm having a serious moment with a certain player and just roleplaying with them. 5-10 minutes later I'll go back to read what they RP'ed and my brain just stops completely, while I'm shaking my head at their antics.
One time, we left an innocent npc somewhere (it was safe) and the dm said "as you walk away, he sits down and stares at the grass" (he was some kind of golem, i think) and I went to are group message and put "Starin at that grAss😂" I was cackling, and the dm laughed, but then rolled a d4 and dealt me psychic damage😅
You missed the “edgelord”, the “unnecessary murder hobo” (as in they kill anyone and everyone, even non-enemies, towns folk and the DM’s NPC’s) and the “creep”. The one who tries to RP getting freaky and makes other players feel uncomfortable. The sort who clearly has no luck irl.
Its funny that you mention these. I commented before and the cheater is a murder hobo as well. I have no luck either. Its insane the number of 1's I roll.
edgelords are just a fact of life, though some advice to deal with them would be welcome. the unnecessary murder hobos are usually instigators or people who are disengaged. I think murder hobo pcs who aren't otherwise unpleasant are more solved by clever worldbuilding and general dm skills than labeling them problem players and trying to deal with them
I hope by edgelords you mean players who roleplay their characters as mysterious, angsty, pessimistic weebs. Because I would accidentally make a character like that. My advice would be to treat them in game the same way you would treat someone like that out of game. Try to be upbeat and optimistic towards them, the worst that could happen is it turns into a comedy of pessimism and optimism. Most likely the edgelord will grow as a character and stop being an edgelord. :)
@@gabrielarchangel2658 I'm fine with mysterious and pessimistic. Roleplayed right they can be cool. By "edgelord" I mean the sort of player who made a Mary Sue character that sits in the corner brooding, has no personality outside of unexplained nihilism and being a loner, gives either NO info about their "dark and tragic past" whilst constantly mentioning it or CONSTANTLY talk about it, attacks NPCs and is self serving in game. Like intentionally going against the group (such as killing someone the rest of the group went out of their way to NOT kill). Its when the PLAYER is the edgelord that its a problem. Edgelord characters "can" be awesome. Hell every time I play a rogue I'm pretty much a walking shrine to edgelordness. I've even played a evil necromancer before who was edgier than the edgiest edge of something edgy. But I played him like a 80s/90s cartoon super villain and had a blast whilst making the other players laugh.
@@Scotch20 It depends what type of "Edgelord" you're dealing with? If the player is an edgelord themselves, there is no fix until they grow out of it. Better to kick them. (this only applies to edgelords in personality. Not alternatives who look "edgy", like goths and metalheads. We can be pretty chill and friendly. My GF is goth and covered in tattoos and piercing and she's one of the bubbliest people you'd ever meet. I have hair down to my knees and am the guy who makes everyone laugh) If they are new to roleplay or a shy person, they're likely just trying to play it safe. It gives them an excuse to be quiet. Just let them be and in time they will likely become more open. Edgy characters can be fun when done right though. Just look at Batman, Red Hood, Spawn, Venom, The Punisher, Wolverine, The Crow, Prince Zuko, OG Dante from DMC, Raven from Teen Titans, Guts, Sooooo many Anime charaters and EVERY Warhammer character lol. So don't dismiss a good player who can play an edgelord the "right way". I.E. doesn't ruin it for other players.
The metagaming DM, in a recent boss battle the Boss kept throwing fire attacks against my barbarian while using physical attacks at the squishier targets. I would argue the boss should not know I am resistant to physical damage without having attacked me at least once. The DM should not play the monsters in the most optimal way, he should play them as they ought to act from a roleplaying perspective.
You left out a kind of specific one that's part boss, part spotlight hog: the steamroller. Steamroller: We wanna kill this guy, right? Player 2: My paladin would not want to kill randos. Player 3: Yeah my cleric definitely opposes that. Player 4: My monk would want to avoid unnecessary violence. Let's settle this peacfu- Steamroller: Ok, so we're killing this guy, right? Dominant, uncooperative, can often only hear their own plans/intentions. It's not super common, but I think it's common enough to be worth mentioning.
I have a player like that, but I’ve talked to him about it, and he understands how he was upsetting other players and was kinda mad at himself for It, he’s a gotten better, he’s a new player and was just excited to be playing and having fun with friends.
The Paladin in my party is this exact way. He’s so tunnel visioned for his own goals that during my arc, where a very important and powerful artifact was stolen from my character’s people/family, he instead wanted to go and visit some holy place or whatever. I was so pissed off that I nearly just had my character split off and go by himself
I played a character similar to this but I always kept it within reason. I only killed/attacked things that had more then enough reason to be suspicious of or problems that keep occurring throughout the campaign. I did however give fair warning out of game to what was about to happen and usually said something in game to make sure characters could react before I attacked
I played with my family who have never played before. I was scared my mum would be a rules lawyer. So I took her through the book and then showed her the page that says: it all comes down to the dungeon masters. She was perfectly happy helping enforcing the home brew rules a little to much.
Homebrew rules are cop outs. There are books full of actual, balanced rules for a reason. No one will never make an aspect of the game better by giving out gross advantages through bogus rules. I have a member in my group that always wants to be a fucking animal and it's annoying as shit. Be a goddamn normal race, an ogre would smash you to death, you're a fucking cat. Go read Garfield if you love stupid ass cats so much. Also, I hope every tryhard loser from critical role gets colon cancer. Hexbloods are so painfully stupid and their PC SJW shit is physically painful.
Had a player actively say he was going to cut the rope the rest of the party was climbing down. No player characters were there, all were on the rope. But they all heard him. It was a near 200 foot drop, and would have killed several or all the characters. So I just said no. He said he wanted to cut the rope again, and I raised my voice a little and said no. At this point the party was chastising him, and he backed off, claiming he was 'just joking.' He then complained that I was actively taking player agency away, to which I responded that ruining everyone else's night was not something I would tolerate. If you want to play a jerk character, fine, but the moment you openly declare you are wiping the party and walking away is when you are welcome to leave the group.
similarly, I had a player who wasn't paying attention think that they party was on the cliff's rope cut it while he was still on the top... When he already said "yeah" to being on it and forgot to climb off. Really, he just cut the rope he was on and killed himself even though I gave him two warnings.
I had an incident where i knew exactly what monster my dm threw against my party so what did i do i announced that the monster sounded familiar and had my character look up the monster in a book effectively taking me out of combat for a few turn until the party realized the flail snail has spell reflection
Okay, didn't see this type here, but I'm looking for advice: "The Over Invested." That player who has the opposite problem to the flippant or the metagamer, where their character is their baby and they get unreasonably upset when bad things happen to their character. Sometimes even going so far as to blame the DM and say they're being targeted unfairly, or to view characters having disagreements (in roleplay) with their character as a personal attack on them? I have both DM'd with, and played with, this person and it has become increasingly uncomfortable in every campaign we're in. They're a good friend, but they get too emotional over the game and it's hurting the experience for every other player as well as the DM. Any advice?
I've dealt with this player before on varying levels. Sometimes you can reason with them, sometimes not. But the biggest thing is to question whether they are having fun or not. Because as it's said in this video, the object of Dnd is not only for everyone to have fun, but to tell a story that creates tension with a reasonable amount of risk. If this person isn't comfortable exposing this character to such risk, maybe they should be writing a book about the character rather than playing a game where it is possible to lose, and roll a new character that they can professionally distance themself from.
I used to be like this, not because of any emotional investment in the character, but because I rolled really well on their stats. Almost died during a fight and was panicky for the rest of the session, and even after the session. All I had to do to ease that tension was to make a backup character that I liked an equal amount. Simply knowing that I have a safety net character that I will still enjoy playing as is enough to soothe the panic of losing a character every session.
This can be a lot harder to deal with than some realize because of the relationship between the people involved. I speak from experience because I basically lost a friend over this one. Short version: they were in denial about having a textbook extreme edgelord (not mentioned in your video Cody, missed that one) with lots of super big deal secrets they couldn't allow anyone to find out. Their character was not very endearing to anyone to say the least, my character decided they wanted to figure out what their deal is (why they're so shady and a brat), dice rolls went my way, some character secrets were revealed... and they quit the game after that session. I've known them for many years so I know they placed too much value on the character they made, but despite my efforts to try and reason with them that it's a game and it's a *character* quarrel not a *personal* one, but they didn't want to listen. Good luck to anyone who has to deal with the problem player I would call the "insecure edgelord" because it's the natural 1 of player drama and it still kind of hurts my heart that having a fictional character "embarrassed" was enough reason for them to cut ties with someone they've been friends with for over a decade.
@@bjiggles8145 I always find this behaviour really kind of weird. It's okay to play things close to your chest now and then… but ultimately, secrets you're including in your character's backstory should be secrets that will come up in play. What's the point in having them if they exist only to never be found out by anyone at all ever? That's not meaningful _anything._ Secrets in a tabletop setting exist to be aired eventually, and used for character development.
The interrupter. There are 2 people in the game I am dming that will always, and I mean ALWAYS inturrupt my description of an area the second something catches their eye. "You walk into the grand hall, with ceilings 40 ft high and long tapestries draping fro-" "can i steal the tapestries?" Like dude.... let me just get this out and then decide what to do. Your focused on the tapestries but are missjng the dinnner table full of vampires
That happened in one of my campaigns. The party encountered two nagas, and the idea was that the nagas were supposed to tell them where the tower was that they were supposed to go to. But one of the players attacked the nagas before they could say anything. I tried to ask if they were sure about their decision, but they'd already dropped the dice, so it was too late. So yeah, they failed the adventure because of that, and the game ended up taking a completely different direction with the person who gave out the quest effectively becoming the antagonist. Never interrupt the DM.
Or in your case, I would have just said, 'You got it.', but have them be trapped. As they grab the tapestries and they're distracted with that, have a bunch of poison darts or have a spike trap deploy on them. You don't have to explain it. If they'd have let you finish, maybe they would have known about it.
@@SBaby This, this right here. I get so annoyed. Middle of describing the room, and talking about a lever that is attached to this huge heavy door that literally takes up the wall. About to explain what they can see through the top windows of the door and the important plaque when the rogue says "I PULL THE LEVER". I'm sitting there going... wait are you sure cause i wasn't finished "Okay well I still pull the lever." I'm like okay fine. What they didn't seem to remember is the Queen of this land keeps a TARASQUE as a pet. The beast is normally harmless... as long as the queen is there. They end up trying to survive this beast while I"m rolling in the back ground praying the queen gets there before the team wipe. No one died but most of them were extremely injured and the guard that was with them was traumatized by the experience.
@@nicolewolfcry7408 They're lucky it wasn't me running it. A Tarrasque would've been a TPK in my game. But that's my point. When players interrupt the DM, it often opens doors they might not want open.
One you missed: the discouraged player, who will stop having fun after a series of bad rolls and sours the mood for everyone with unwillingness to engage. My solution has been to have lots of "roll-free" RP encounters and backup plans for converting an encounter from lots of checks to very few checks if it starts to go downhill, but that can sometimes reduce the fun for players who just love rolling dice.
technically that one can be split into 2 sub categories, The player who is discouraged easily due to the rolls and the player who is discouraged by the dm, one is a problem, the other is the result of a problem but that's probably for a different video
@Papa Pjort I can say I'm that kind of player; I try to not get discouraged from a small streak of bad luck, but after a while you start naturally wondering if there's anything else you could do that doesn't require rolling. Unfortunately, and especially in combat, there is not much use a PC can be to the group directly without rolling a die, so you just start to figure there's no point in engaging because your failures will usually actively harm the (luckier) group's efforts.
The Spotlight Hog can also be redirected to become a role playing playmaker. "Hey your enthusiasm is infectious. Could your character play a scene with XYZ?"
I have someone who’s a spotlight hog in our group I’m kinda shy and don’t like talking over people both of our characters are very similar as in technology based backgrounds but he ends up taking up the spotlight and doing everything that we could be doing as team or that I could be doing since my technology base stat is high then his since I’m a technomancer but I don’t really care or get too upset with him about it. I don’t like to interrupt and I have a fun time either way because we’re all friends, plus I’m just not that good at role playing I like the idea of it but I’m not good at acting my character out.
@@Name.......... I don't have a lot of experience, but judging from what I was just told in this video, you could (between sessions, or discreetly during a session) ask them to maybe let up a little - perhaps what you need to become good at acting your character out is a little bit of practice and experience. Of course, you also need to let them understand that you don't exactly mind - you would just like to participate a little more. Also, you could make a suggestion/request like, hey man, could I get you to do a little scene the next time we are making X contraption, I feel like I want to participate more when making stuff, and perhaps we could work together on some of the things we make. Of course, this is only with an outsiders perspective, and I have close to no experience playing D&D :)
I feel like a category you missed is the shy character. They are afraid to stand out or roleplay and are worried that they will "mess up". I find that the best methods for this are to ask the players that excel at RP to try and include them or to design a small arc in which their character is the expert.
These players aren't problems though. Some people like just chilling in the crowd and then getting to roll dice in combat. The occasional passive player is fine. Having a party full of them is difficult.
One example of this from my own experiences are the characters that constantly ask if they "can" do something. "Can I walk over here? Can I maybe talk to this guy?" I often respond with, "I don't know, *can* you?" and it usually gets the point across that *they* are the dictators of what their character says and does, not the DM. Usually happens with newer players. It's also good to, of course, point this fact out directly. "You don't need my permission to speak with the NPC/make a dumb decision/buy that cool item." A co-DM I was with used this to good effect when a player repeatedly kept asking for permission to attempt to scale a totally flat, vertical wall. Eventually he was like "Look, you can do that if you want to, it's your character". Of course, because it was a flat, vertical wall, and exceptionally difficult to climb... Well, he failed miserably, but he was at least empowered from that point on to make his own decisions without asking for our input all the time.
Had an instigator attack a guard in my last campaign, he got parried and dogpiled by other guards ending up spending the rest of the session in jail. The rest of the party let him stew for a bit before going to talk to the sheriff to negotiate his release. On power gamers, I also tend to find they like helping other players so after a little while I end up with a group of power players and I can amp up combat encounters for all.
Well not erveryone wants help from a power player, sometimes these kind of people try to change or ridicule charakter ideas of other people because they are not "stong" enough.
@@keithconrad9033 It's good to give people help and advice, so they can manage expectations. If they're trying to do something that's inefficient or falls off, isn't it better for them to know that than to hit that point and start being disappointed by their lack in performance?
The chaotic un-invested player: Person who does not give a F in game about their character living or dying, as they have another character concept they want to play. They sulk when the group want's to do things like roll play, or invest in a long term world and story building as non of their characters live long enough to be a real part of that. So it's boring to them and then they do more chaotic things to alleviate their boredom. OHHH and the player who can not separate between what another persons character does, with the person who is playing them-- have seen this be a big issue a few times and it often is not pretty.
I mean, personally I find character death to bring out some of the best roleplay moments and hilarity at the table. Often times I look for opportunities for my character to go out in a blaze of glory defending their friends
so i have a scenario that cropped up where some people might look at it and go "why would you do that", but it was a very in-character thing. i sprinted through 3 platoons of enemies, dying to attacks of opportunity at the end of the process. but it was one of the most glorious moments i have ever seen in D&D. my character was a partially insane goblin raid captain. Storm Herald Barbarian and Phoenix Sorcerer (this was an MTG setting, so i was permitted to cast in rage so long as my spells made sense for the character. because everyone needed a spellcasting section to their character to be a planeswalker). the BBEG was channeling something on an obelisk on the other side of those armies. one of the NPCs with us gave me a one round haste spell (i was informed one round prior to accepting it). i had already been in rage (arcing lightning). i then activated mantle of flame, then cast Haste on myself, before taking off at 70 feet/second sprinting through the 70-ish enemies in front of us (420 feet of movement in a turn). the DM told me i could also cast Wall of Flame, with it being in my wake, if i so chose. i did. so you have a half-insane goblin on fire, arcing lightning, yelling "BONSAI!" at the top of his lungs sprinting through a small army at 40 mph. the group loved it, and actually put their own little segment into it. one of them asked if, upon seeing that, they could make a group intimidation check. nobody rolled less than 18 on their dice. the armies actually gave ground, running back into my wall of fire (which stuck around for 1 full round). i also managed to knocked the BBEG prone before getting launched several hundred feet backwards, though nobody knew where i ended up other than me.
@@edschramm6757 I was reading this intently until... "bonsai"? That's the miniature tree, I think you mean "banzai". But a gruul orc screaming "bonsai" does seem rather fitting
I have a Rules Lawyer who is also an instigator. Suprise!, He is the rogue. At the last Monday's game, he tried to pickpocket the obviously-above-their-level wizard the party was talking with. Just for the flair, I have used an extended version of Matt Mercer's new "Wristpocket" spell for the wizard when he showed his coins to the party. It was only put there for the players to "oooh" and "aaaah" about the powerful wizard who plucks the coins out of thin air and put them back. So when the rogue tried to pickpocket him and rolled a natural twenty, I could still deny his disruption saying, "your invisible magehand catches nothing but empty air". He replied with what is in line of "I am Hidden from him and I had a crit". To which I gleefully replied, "With the crit, you gather the information that the coins are not in this plane of existence". And that is how the party avoided being TPKed and being raised as zombies last week.
Natural 20s don't do anything special on skill checks. Crits are only a thing in combat. I find the whole "The laws of reality should bend to my whims 5% of the time" mentality pretty annoying. Especially for players who just go ahead and roll without being asked to roll.
@@mgb360 He used to do that as well. Rolls investigation or stealth before being told. I stopped (or reduced) it by point-blank asking him to roll again.
For a rules lawyer he seemed to forget that a Natural 20 is only an automatic success when rolling to hit. His pick pocket check isnt an auto success. Should we remind him for you?
@@joshshin6819 This is his first time playing 5E. He said he has played older versions and a number of other RPGs. But yes, I too had to remind this rule to him the very first day he played and critted on a lock-picking check. There he even proceeded to describe how the door clicked open. I had to stop him and point out that, no, the door doesn't open. Then I assume he googled the rule and this kind of behaviour on crits did not come up for a while until the incident I mentioned above.
one missing so far as i can tell: The Space Cadet. the player who's never paying attention unless the story is about them and then never knows what's going on, creating drag time catching them up...
God I hate these players so fucking much. This is my version of Cody's cheater, where I probably should be dealing with them better, but they just make me irrationally angry. If you aren't gonna pay attention to the story as a whole, and only care about yourself, stop playing D&D and go write a book about your oh-so-special original-OC-don't-steal.
Here's a funny thing: I have become this type of player as an attempt to not be an attention hog/jokester. I've realized that I have a hard time not being those two things, and also that they can drag the game down. So by distracting myself when my character's not doing anything, I can create a period of time where I'm being neither a jokester or a hog, time which the other players can use to do what they need to do. It does create it's own drawback though, which you described: sometimes I have to be caught up and/or am now constantly asking about things I missed or just wanting to confirm something I didnt fully understand. Honestly, I still prefer it. It doesn't get to the point where I'm a flippant player, since by nature I'm always excited as shit to play, and it does mitigate the other two problems I could be creating. It's also not something I do all the time.
1:50 The rules lawyer really only have one problem, they bring it up during the session. If they save it for after the session they're just a really interested player.
It is actually 2, but the second is mostly present on the "terminal cases". First is disrupting the game, and the second is not accepting a ruling and making a fuss about it.
I feel like it depends on the situation. If I suspect the DM may just have forgotten about a specific rule or feature, and that it can be solved quickly with next to no impact on the flow of the game, I just tell them as a friendly reminder; whether or not they decide to correct themselves, I'll respect the decision and keep my mouth shut. Most of the time, it's solved by a "oh, you're right, thank you" or a "Yes, but in these circumstances, I decided to rule it that way". Now, if after that I feel the ruling didn't make sense, or was unfair to a specific player, I'll wait until between sessions before mentioning it, because I don't want to ruin a scene by starting a 15 minutes argument in the middle of the game.
@@bouboulroz This is the kind of rules lawyer my fellow DM that's a player in my campaigns is like and its greatly appreciated. The other player that WAS in my campaigns was the disruptive type of rules lawyer I had to boot from the group as talking to him outside of game wasn't helping and he would constantly interrupt gameplay to argue rulings with me. If it had just been affecting me I would have dealt with it, but it was becoming toxic to the other players to the point they would join in to defend my rulings and he would argue with basically everyone at the table till either we conceded or X amount of time had been wasted. The rest of my group is a mixed menagerie of types (most are seasoned players), I have 2 power gamers, the helpful rules lawyer, 1 overly engaged player (not bad), 2 people living on their phones but still want to play, and a newbie. If I had to peg myself as a type, I would be a lesser version of the boss/critic. I get super excited about builds that I tend to OVER-help my colleagues build their chars and get visually saddened/frustrated when they ignore my ideas. I've been working on lessening this and I must be doing ok as none of my players have gotten upset at me over it.
@@cloudstrife8 I'm also a personnal mix of the boss/critic, though I made huge progress on it, and the helpful rule lawyer. I'm a bit of a powergamer too, but I mostly keep that in check. Now I merely discuss with other players what they could do with their characters between sessions and upon level up ("yeah, sure, that feat is good, but a +2 Dex is VERY strong for your character"). In the end, I just stop at talking about the pros and cons, and let them do the choice themselves. I feel like that's the best balance the boss type (and, honestly, most types from that list) can achieve : make that quirk helpful, and understand that everyone at table has their own. By keeping the behaviour between the boundaries of what's healthy for the group and keeping the fun at the table is how you can truly be respected as a player. In fact, most issues players have can work if you keep in mind that the game isn't just about you. I mean, I ran multiple occurrences of DMPCs, a vastly frowned upon concept, and made my table enjoy them everytime.
@@bouboulroz I don't think it is rules lawyering if the player does not continues to argue beyond the DMs first response. I mean i pointed out a rule mistake my DM did last session, we were fighting a boss and I did reckless attack, and the next turn the DM forgot the boss had advantage when attacking me so I told him "You forgot to role for advantage", the boss proceeded to crit me instead of missing and I took half my max HP from a single attack. It wasn't entirely selfless though I want the boss to attack me because I am essentially a tank.
Being a fellow (hopefully former) Spotlight Hog. I really appreciate the way you explained how to deal with them. A lot of Spolight Hogs don't realize they are doing what they are doing and are just really excited to play. I've dmed for a while now and have realized that I used to do it. So yeah.
I feel like it makes more sense to have the individual player trying to hide something a slight of hand roll or something against passive perception of other players. Feels a lot less targeted that way.
I think a good way of dealing with the spotlight hog is to compliment them by asking for their help in getting other players to participate more. I walk a line between being a spotlight hog and passively letting nothing happen because no one speaks up. If I want to do something but feel like I've been too dominant in a session I ask one of the quieter players for their advice on what to do or if they want to join me in checking this thing out, in character of course. Or give them something that gives them more to do, like I found a panther kitten and really wanted to keep it and raise it as a pet but I gave it to a new player that was shy so she could have something to interact with more that's all her own. She's training it to basically be a bloodhound! :D
I’m dealing with a very difficult flippant player: the stoner. Shows up an hour and a half late, stoned af and disrupts the game while not really caring about the game, cause they see it as a group hangout for smoking and talking rather than playing
My group has 4 people who smoke (myself included) and one who doesn't. I've definitely noticed a lull in interest or attention with us smokers once we get too stoned. Fun to smoke and play but once you cross over into antisocial, attention-deficit territory there's a problem.
@@balloonfiesta15 exactly, he’s not the only one who smokes in that group, but he’s the only one who cares about it more than actually playing. But that problem has been solved on itself a month ago after he just decided to leave without us even saying anything cause he just really wasn’t interested in the game. And no, it’s not cause my game was boring, he is generally bored from d&d as a whole while the other players only want more
@@balloonfiesta15 tldr weed might work for people who also like the game and don’t see the meet ups only as opportunities to smoke , so just pick actual players
Zack Nowlin, unless that bard is RP’ing a very selfish and mean character, they probably don’t realize what it means to give bardic inspiration. Either talk to them or ask the DM to talk to them and make sure they understand their class abilities better.
@@zacknowlin3214 Ever since I went lore bard I save all my inspiration for cutting words, unless it's a really cool roleplaying scenario where I want to 'instruct' a player to do something.
I have had a jokester plaguing my games for a while, however i recently started testing a way to mitigate the joking. See this character constantly makes jokes, but because they don’t use a voice for when they are in character it can be hard to tell when they are joking in character or out of character. So now whenever they make a joke that has no connection to what is currently happening I immediately play it as if their character said this in game.
I love jokes the only issue is they have nothing to do with the game. Even a joke that boiled down to “this thing in game funny” is great. What they do is constantly interrupt my descriptions, and break everyone elses immersion
The issue with jokes (to the commenters) is it breaks tension. This can be fine if its that kind of game. But if you want high tension OOC jokes kill it. Forcing thin character is the best way to do without killing player agency.
3:48 For anyone confused, or disagreeing there's a difference between the problem player instigator here and the instigator player type used in other places/videos The instigator player type is a player that does something unexpected but also still logical, or at least in-character without being terrible for everyone else. A good instigator can push the plot forward when it's slowing down, not like when a party is just chilling around a campfire, that's a necessary slowdown and good RP time, I mean when a party is indecisive about choosing which direction to go to, instead of taking like 30 minutes of arguing and decision making to end up going left, the instigator went left after like 5 minutes of discussion. It's a balance like most things, if the party is constantly wasting healing on you because you keep going down from reckless decisions, that's hampering their fun. Smart but decisive, and has the party's best interest in mind. I think that's what makes a good instigator I like playing with good instigators
Are you trying to correct him about a term that he invented for this video to describe a common and problematic behavior? He is not talking about what you think an instigator is.
@@jaimemnds I'm trying to correct other people that might not be as knowledgeable on terms and are confused when they see the term "instigator" in other videos, and the term means something different in that video
Absolutely. Players that show initiative when needed do a great job of greasing the wheels of a good session. Some players will spend far too long on things that don't matter in the slightest.
@@jaimemnds Yes Cody ABSOLUTELY INVENTED the word instigator! Cyanic is just as right as Cody is in the video. I have seen, played in, and run games where people didn't want to do anything so someone had to be the "Let's get this story moving." person, I appreciated that person very much. I also have had the "I'm wanna attack the guard!" player, and they piss me off! I have honestly had more than one of these issues in a single player over the many years I have been playing, I also remember when negative AC was good and how hindsight has made me REALLY dislike THAC0!
A dm in an online group has set up a memes channel and a quotes channel, and it makes a really nice side place to keep the running humor recorded and available without it interrupting play for anyone who's super in deep. Idk if that would have worked out as smoothly in the before times but we're here now...
"DM would my character know ______" "hmm make an intelligence check for me really quick" players love rolling dice and at this point you leave it entirely up to them. plus you can set multiple DC checks for it too. below 10 is an absolute no. 10-15 is a yes but. and 15-20 is a yes. and 20+ usually gives a little bonus to give an example my players ran into a tunnel dug by umber hulks. the player with high intelligence who went to school asked if he would know. intelligence check of like 18 or so. with that number he got to learn that yes it was umber hulks that dug the cave and that they're very tough and sturdy bastards. if he had rolled 20+ then i would have also told him about their gaze ability
I like the way we handle it at my table. If it's from around the area a character is from, they have a better chance to know. Also if their background would make it reasonable. For example, my Cleric has the Acolyte background, worked with angels, and lived in a large city surrounded by wilderness. He has decent knowledge of angels, demons, devils, and the surrounding area. But when it comes to strange creatures in areas he's never visited, he has to experiment with combat, making him more cautious, even if I, the player, know.
Funny story about rules lawyers. I have a player who's _actually_ a lawyer. Last year when I was running the group through Curse of Strahd, just as the group is plotting their confrontation with the Mad Mage (the Tarroka deck had given him as a potential ally), she marches into the session and shoves a couple of densely handwritten pages of text into my hands and orders me to read it. There was seriously a part of me that thought that she had finally had enough of ... well, _something_ that I'd done and this was some kind of cease and desist letter. But no. This was a detailed explanation of a series of experiments her Knowledge Cleric PC was conducting using a number of smooth river rocks, the spell Glyph of Warding and the party's Portable Hole. Basically, the purpose was to find out whether I would rule that a Glyphed object placed in the Hole's extradimensional space was regarded as being stationary or not. I ended up ruling that - provided the hole was otherwise empty; no other objects to interfere - her Glyphed stones were technically stationary even if the Hole itself were moved, thus retaining their enchantment. Basically, she'd found a way around the restriction on Concentration spells. Provided, of course, she spent like a full day setting this stuff up and dumped all the stuff they were normally carrying around in the Hole (they _looted_ the Amber Temple; there was a lot of stuff). People could just jump into the Hole and trigger one of the stones, gaining a powerful buff that required no Concentration to maintain. The party walked into the confrontation with the Mad Mage virtually invulnerable. I actually felt bad for them when a couple good rolls meant their precautions were unnecessary: the Druid successfully dispelled the Mad Mage's Mind Blank protection on the first try and my lawyer's Heal spell restored his mind. But if the fight had gone badly (and it could have), the extra resilience would have been great.
I should probably say that this is not an example of a "problem player". Actually, I was flattered as hell that this player had put the amount of thought she did into her plan.
In my experience (well, mostly me and my DM, over a variety of games) actual lawyers aren't usually as problematic as the untrained "dungeonhouse rules lawyers". Maybe part of it is, whether you're a trial lawyer or not, you know arguing with the judge is usually pointless. Raise your issue when it comes up, then if the judge rules against you, politely preserve the issue for appeal. But throwing a tantrum in the middle of court never helps....
That's actually so cool! Personally, I love when people find loopholes in the roles and do awesome things, it really brings an extra element to the game I feel.
Honestly yeah, having the party roll perception would be my preferred way, might even give advantage if they're close since they would know what their party members are doing. Particularly if its not the first time.
I don't think loot hiding is that bad honestly, so long as you remember there's hidden loot and use it as rp opportunities and disadvantages for the character. Treat it like a flaw, and it can turn into something interesting instead of a big deal
@@dweebicusmaximus I mean no ones saying the people who perceive it being stolen have to say or do anything about it. Maybe they let him get away with it only to bring it up later. Thats how much failed deception checks between players go, at least as far as I've seen, since ya know, calling a person a liar to their face is kinda odd. It can be good role-playing fodder regardless of how the DM plays it but I feel like at least asking for a perception check gives the rest of the party the idea that this isn't going to be an unchecked power in the game
When it comes to spotlight hogs, I've found that something like "I appreciate your eager go-getter attitude, butet's give the other players a chance to join in and try to save some of that can-do energy for later events" usually slows them down a bit without provoking any major issues.
yup, as an excited attention hog myself, I just have to be reminded that others want to do things as well and then I will settle back down and wait my turn.
This is def real. I def have struggled with my “attachment to a character” Vs the “wild nature of the game”. After time and effort, “the unexpected” is an amazing part of the narrative and the game, and it’s good to embrace it.
I personally find it ok if you get emotional about a character death. But the player cant let it ruin the game for them or others. Also, even worse, they should not become angry at the dm, and blame the dm for their problems.
Jack Bellinger 100% that’s fine, I get emotional when anyone’s character dies. I had a player though, who whenever he would roll bad (which was half the time usually because, you know, it’s dice), he would swear and pout. At one point, he even threw his dice across the room. It was very awkward and very much killed the vibe
Marcus, those kinds of players really confuse me. It's like your playing a game with a ton of luck involved. How can you be surprised if one day your luck is good, and the next it's awful. Hopefully the player got better overtime, or you just kicked them out.
I used to be a spotlight hog; I had my first DM send me “Travis willingham: how to be a good player” and since then, I’ve done my best to let everyone talk and see if other people get the initiate to do something first. I’m a little self conscious about it now so I wait a while before doing anything
@@DaDunge Sorry that not everyone is as quirky and chaotic as you Fredrik. I guess not everyone wants to play a lizardfolk wizard with a 8 in intelligence Fredrik. Is it so inconceivable to you that people actually just like playing this game with their friends and having a good time Fredrik. People can play whatever they want, its D&D that's the whole point.
@@DaDunge In my opinion being generic has nothing to do with giving others the spotlight/work towards making other players feel amazing. Every player can do that no matter the character. I think you should separate player from character here. On a side note: it can be a fun challenge to make a generic/stereotype player be interesting, compelling or entertaining. Insert "human fighters can be creative"-argument here. :)
I can relate to that. I sometimes feel like a spotlight hog and was also inspired by Travis willingham among others. In my experience it feels much better and earned when I take the spotlight, because anytime else I give others time to shine.
The advice for the spotlighter and powergamer instantly fixed nearly all the issues I had with one player in my group. Now he's a major contributor that flows with the group so well and it's all just so much better! Thanks, man!
I had a great friend who set up a d&d group with me and some other people but he insisted I DM, even though he had more experience with the game as a whole and was much smarter, even for being a few years younger than me. What was memorable though was how he had chosen a power character. He would deliberately manipulate the campaign story with his plethora of abilities. But he never once took away from the fun, the difficulty, and the story. He held his character back when he needed to and under his creative assisstance the story I had written blossomed into something so much better and different. A great player.
Spotlight hog: the most annoying trait to me. I have a fellow player in my group that will always interject himself into any situation even if he’s in another part of the city/dungeon/town whatever. Once my character (a sorcerer) used her strength to open a door that was stuck and he got upset and slammed the door back shut to he could open it himself and then said “that’s what my character would do”. So I offered to feed him to a demon dog...because that’s what my character would do.
sounds like something that can be quite comedic? maybe with a neurotic twist, competitive nature, maybe an insecure gentleman who wants to impress a lady or something... depends on the tone of the adventure and how frequent it happens of course. but maybe people like him need a bit more inspiration to flesh out ideas?
I imagine a big dumb barbarian going "No. I got it." and proceeding to re open the door. But obviously in this case it's different and I would probably just let them die at the next available opportunity if it was a on going thing.
Every dnd problem is always the same. "I have a problem I'm doing nothing about it and it doesn't solve itself". Every solution is always the same. Communicate in private your problem with respect, explain the expected attitude, offer solutions, congratulate players for efforts to better themselves.
You'd think that people would be better about talking to others in a hobby that relies so much on your ability to talk and explain things to other people. Unfortunately, that isn't the case so people usually skip the first step of "talk to the person causing the issue". You will either fix the situation by explaining why what the player is negatively affecting the game or you will expedite that player leaving the game. Either way your game will be better for it.
I have read quite a few posts on the various DnD subreddits from DMs asking how to handle Player D that is doing Behavior R. It's almost always the same answer: communicate with them. Be direct but respectful. Unfortunately, not everyone is up to the task of handling confrontation. Case in point: I was playing in a Star Trek play-by-post (PbP) game, hosted by someone who was a friend. He had a core group of us for the first ship, and had essentially promised the captain's chair to two of us, myself and another friend. Neither of us knew the other had been promised it, and neither of us chased it. The game master gave the position to me, but told the other player I was given it because I threatened to quit.
A while back I was a big spotlight hog then my dm took me aside and we sorted it I didn’t improve right away but I improved slowly. I’m better now for it.
I actually realized that I was a spotlight hog when I had 2 OP characters in a row, so OP they had to be pulled and swapped out. In the same campaign. So now I'm playing a support wizard to learn some humility and help the newer players at the table have fun and get their spotlight time.
As a "teachers pet" and someone really into the fantasy genre playing with groups who are almost entirely new to rpgs I have to try very hard not to be the spotlight hog. So often if feels like "Am i the only one who cares to rp at all!?" But taking a few seconds to let others pipe up sometimes encourages people to do so. It also can make for long silences that make everyone uncomfortable... Ive acctually debated crippling my ability to do this by creating a character who is mute or a big part of his character is how little he speaks. But then I fear I will end up speaking all the more to describe what they do. Lol
Got a cheater for years in our group... We tried subtility, passive-aggressive things like : wow u always dealing Massive damage man or like The man that never fails a saving Throw. We did put rules that if a dice is rolled and u touch it it's a automatic 1 since the first version was a reroll and he were constantly picking up bad rolls to have a free new one. What have been the most successful is me just pulling out everything he did all in one session and saying : I'm not comfortable DMing you since you're constantly cheating so this is your last chance. If u cheat again and I spot it, you're out. Cheated on his last boss fight. PWKed him and tell him to leave. Never been to a game since. We've been too tolerant with him, but it's a close friend and we knew that it was the kinda thing that could affect our friendship so we (2 rotating DMs) tried to be subtle... Would've been better to be strong from the beginning and just call him out every single time
Did you try having a tablet or similar to roll the dice in? Should also make so that any dice he rolls doesn't count unless it's right in front of the DM.
Yeah thats pretty bad. I'll admit there have been a few occasions where I've fudged a roll, maybe added like a 2 or 3 to it (when its like a number more towards the middle like a 12 or something), but ive only done that when I'm concerned it will lead to someone dying if I fuck up the roll. And once or twice in a really difficult fight (like a DM having us fight an owlbear at level 1), I've rolled two 20's at the same time and take the highest whatever it is. I try not to do this, and when I get a really shit roll like a 2 I'm honest. I don't cheat to "Win" I cheat because I'm too attached to my characters 😭 and I don't want them to die.
For the Spotlight hog I use a different method. I use the "spotlight" method. I try to make sure that each character gets a specific scene where they are the primary. Something specific for them. Making one player character the focus for a scene, gives them ability to control that part of the narrative for a few minutes, with me. They get the rolls, unless the ask someone in the scene to roll for them. I have group scenes where I say what happens but, I want to make sure each player has roughly the same amount of spotlight time. If you have someone who is super dominate in the general scenes, maybe they don't get one or they get one last that's shorter. This method has helped ME be a better player too. I've started to develop a feel for it and I will turn and directly ask others what we should do to engage them, when I'm the leader. When I'm playing a supporting character, I do the same thing to the characters that are not as engaged or intimidated. Heck, if we are just doing a dungeon crawl, I will try to RP with a character that's not getting to do as many actions. Ask them about their past or bring up something that happened before. It's not that the Spotlight hog is being a jerk, it's just they need to learn to be more aware. Unless they are being a jerk and that's another problem.
Something My Group Is Doing For Our Upcoming Game Is That Everyone Get's Their Own,Little Arcs To Grow Their Character And Just Kinda Get Their Chance In The Sun (Example: My Human Cleric Is Very Pure And Innocent With NO Life Experience But Will Slowly Start To Grow As She Battles And Uses Rest Time To Learn About The World She's Been Forced Into To The Point That It Will Be Reviled That She's Half Dragon And Will Then Slowly Start To Awaken Her Dragon Powers And Be Forced To Choose Between Her Religion And Her Heritage. Another Example Is That Another Player Is A Tiefling Artificer That Dreams Of One Day Creating A Legendary Weapon And Part Of That Will Be Us Meeting A Dwarven Gunsmith (The World Is Slightly Steampunk) That She Will Take Some Time Out To Learn Under That Will Help In Her Personal Quest). That Way,Everyone Get's Their Shot At Being In The Spotlight And Everyone Is Happy.
This makes me want to play a light annoyance character called "The Insta-gator" that starts crap at every tavern. Then when a fight breaks out, turns into a toothless pygmy albino alligator and scurries under the floor boards.
This is super helpful as a player! I don't always realize that I'm being a problem player, but I sometimes fall under like 4 of these categories... So I really appreciate this
He forgot the sadist. I knew a guy who consistently would torture every single npc we came accross by cutting all of their tendons even if they were always willing to coorporate.
I had a player like that, I think it's because they're bored with DND, and a closet psychopath. At some point they were asking my pc how to cook a dead person into a pie.
A friend of mine would play the same character every time we played. Some sort of mid-teenage girl who was an overly sexualized sadist and an complete instigator. Some of our best moments in D20 were when we knocked him out, tied him up and tossed him in a dumpster before going into a dialog heavy part of the game. We also knocked him out and stuck him in a wheelchair and bluffed our way into a museum's archive to find a lost artefact, by pretending he was Steven Hawking and needed to do some primary research on it. We choose not to play with him anymore.
@@ValuesNotFound So, the key to your fantasy experience is to turn other sentient beings into garbage to reinforce your own self worth, doing in the fantasy world what you do not dare to do in real space, and skew the narrative to make everyone else have to deal with your mood-killing contempt for all things?
A problem I run into is the character that forgets everyone has autonomy. Too often I hear people say "Anita and I are going to go flank," and I have to tell them " only if Anita wants to, you can't take her autonomy"
His solutions are all about keeping people in game (in the classroom and engaged), and trying to minimize players (students) self-marginalizing themselves. Exactly what you want in classroom management.
I was the power gamer in a Power Rangers game. Became the single strongest player ranger in our world. Being that strong was fun, but the best part was the characters history and development. He went from a sadistic and violent villain, to a hero slowly discovering his humanity and learning to deal with the trauma of his past. Definitely a character and story I'll always remember.
How to beat a meta gamer: Threaten them with homebrew. Never say what monsters are homebrewed and which arnt. All there knowledge goes out the window and it can become great roleplay. "*Rolls well* Stereotypicaly they have high physical and low mental stats, so that may be good to try, but keep you eyes out, I could be wrong."
A comment that should give them pause - "That's what the book says, yes." If after that subtle warning (delivered as unsubtly as you like) they continue to assume the book is gospel, they will probably have a nasty shock when the monster they are fighting turns out to differ substantially from the as-written archetype.
One thing I used to do was penalize xp for them for ruining an encounter with bad role playing. I always reminded players before the campaign that they were playing a new character and their characters have no initial experience or very little experience with most of the monsters in the realm. If they didnt act like it and began spewing stats out of character from the monster manual during an encounter I would dock everyone's experience for the encounter. At the end of the night I let everyone know how much exp. they lost because of that one players antics. Usually much glaring and mumbling under the breath ensued at the guilty party and that person got the message. If they got pissy and decided to do it anyways just to ruin the fun then I would stop penalizing everyone and just their character. If it persisted then their character would meet with an unfortunate situation that caused them to get their tongue cut out and I would tell them they weren't allowed to speak until someone cast regeneration on them. (Which would be when they exited the dungeon and went back to town as they were low level players without regeneration spells) If they tried to continue to speak anyways without mumbling incoherently and roleplaying what happened to their character then I would politely kick them from the game session and told them they could come back whenever they felt like playing right.
@@badbishop1049 You sound like an asshole, if your playing with players with experience come up with unique monsters or something different rather than forcing your players to intentionally play the game poorly, their comes a time for roleplay but expecting players to do stuff that they know is wrong and avoid stuff they know is right because its meta knowledge is just bad form. If players are opening the monsters manual mid encounter or trying to learn new Out of game knowledge during the game you should have a go at them obviously but you cant expect a player to not play as if a troll is weak to fire, or a barbarian is weak to psychic abilities or magical attacks or a coloured dragon has resistance to that type of damage.
@@majorscrub2856 Maybe I was. I'm willing to consider that possibility. But it got results and I only had one player ever quit on me because they didn't like the way I ran the game. Maybe you're just a little to sensitive if you think my way was to harsh.. Ever consider that possibility? Also this was 3rd edition.. I havent played in well over a decade so I wouldn't worry myself about it to much if I were you. The D&D days are dead, done and over with for me and my friends.✌ Edit: Also the player I was referencing that was calling out monster stats and abilities was ruining the game for the ones that didn't have his knowledge and I didnt feel like making up monsters or artificial stats because he couldn't just keep his mouth shut. Example: Linda- "I'm going to cast fireball! Yay! I just got this spell and haven't had a chance to fry something with it. Player who knows stats- "Why would you do that when he only has 10 hp left? I've been counting damage. You're just gonna waste your spell. Dont be stupid and waste a fireball." Que Linda's disappointed look that she isn't going to get to cast her new spell that she wanted to cast for the first time without being considered stupid for doing so. That's why I didn't like it and I gave him plenty of opportunities to correct his behavior to make the game fun for everyone and he refused so it escalated from there until he finally got the picture and stopped.
One kind of player that I’ve been dealing with is a Critical Role enthusiast. I know plenty of people have done videos about the Matt Mercer Effect, but man, once I had a player with that expectation, I was shocked to see just how much they think every session should be like theirs.
Xavier Wiegand “Hey, in an episode of Critical Role, when this same situation happened, they did this! So let’s try that!” *Goes poorly* “What!? That’s not how it happened on Critical Role! Somethings obviously wrong here.”
The last two groups I played in specifically had to have conversations when we started about the Mercer Effect, and to temper expectations as the DM is just doing their best with the far more limited resources compared to what Mercer has.
Critical Role is to D&D what Disney moves are to relationships. Edit: just in case it looks like I'm trashing CC, I love both the show and Matthew Mercer, in fact I think we should clone him so that future generations can experience him as well, but like others have said CC sometimes create insane expectations on what a normal game should look like. Players need to keep in mind that not only the people from CC are veterans with plenty of time and resources to pull those amazing gaming sessions, they're also creating content for an audience.
Yeah, it can sometimes be a real big problem. This is why I NEVER suggest Critical Role to brand new players who have never played in a "normal" home game.
Something interesting is that in my tables, the rules lawyer and the power player kind of overlap. The one guy who knows the rules and want them followed is the one most capable of abusing it.
Honestly I have a power player who doesn’t know how the game works, once he tried to buy scale mail because he thought it was dragon scale mail, to make it worse he’s a sorcerer he can’t use heavy armor like that
When I play I am both power gamer and rules lawyer because as you stated the (RL) knows the rules and the (PG) knows how to abuse them; however, because I make a min maxed character based on whatever concept I wanted to run I work with the DM to make a backstory that gives me my own goals that can easily be accomplished whilst travelling with the party and intentionally take a back seat in most moments, stepping in if the party looks to be lost. I also mostly play supporting roles like: healer, knowledge dump, buff caster, party smith, or face if no one else wants to so that others can be the big dam heroes dealing all the damage and slaying the monsters and that’s how I have fun as a power gamer/rules lawyer.
@@BESTdonglewenis7254 so whats the problem? Let him buy the armor and fail. Enough mistakes, he might start learning tge rules, if not maybe die and roll a new character. Your problems I understand a little annoying, but seems easily remedied. I might be missing something.
Sinister Thoughts well it wasn’t as straight forward as I said, There is one magic shop in my world and he tried to commission something that could tell him where dragons are in a 1 mile radius, when I gave him a rough estimate for a price he said “scale mail doesn’t cost that much”, and I was like “did you think normal scale mail could track dragons” and he came up with some excuse, overall that’s not the problem with him though
I think the biggest issue I had was players who connect to their character so much that they have trouble separating their character from themselves. This led to them taking things that happen to their character personally and even exploding at the DM over character deaths despite it being addressed as a possibility in session 0. I had to talk with players and they told me their character was a coping mechanism for some issues they were dealing with irl. This was addressed by reassuring the player I wanted to support them emotionally but also setting clear boundaries. To help we presented character creation as a new exciting opportunity to explore and honoring their character's death in a respectful way. Helping the player generalize D&D as an escape instead of a particular character while alsl setting boundaries so everyone can have fun ended up helping a lot.
You really have to play it one time. If it doesn't suit you who cares. A year ago I didn't think good of this game and now I have characters with more than 10 pages of backstory and so on. This game had such a great impact on my life till now and I don't think that I will stop playing it. It's one of the little things that make life much sweeter
Our group cheater was bought a dice tray by his gf and now every pc rolls into the same central dice tray so he can't really pull anything anymore. The rest of the table basically handled it for me.
I was the attention hog at one point, until one of the other players looked me in the eye and said "The game isn't just about you, you know". Which burned, but also got me to rethink my attitude.
I start every session zero with my 3 game rules, which usually go a long way to curtailing most negative behavior. They are easy to remember and players often use them to keep each other in check. They are 1. Be Heroic 2. Be Respectful and 3. Be Responsible.I then give examples of what I mean by each of these, but it's funny how a problem player gets corrected by a peer without any DM involvement at all. Just two weeks ago, a player was getting a little frustrated that his character was being chastised in-game by another character for in-game behavior that inadvertently harmed the other character. The player didn't like his character being confronted and said, "I punch him in the face." Before I even had to say a word, two other players jumped in and reminded him that PVP breaks rule 1 since heroes in a group would talk it through and accept criticism without resorting to violence and also rule 2 since he wasn't being respectful to the other player by allowing him to role-play the event naturally. This was an online game, so I muted myself and turned away from the camera so I could laugh without the player thinking I was making fun of him. I wasn't. I found it not only funny that they immediately enforced the rules on themselves collectively, but also extremely heartwarming that they cared enough about the game and each other's fun, that they wanted to use their agreed upon rules of conduct to ensure this. The result was great. The player said, "Yeah, OK. I didn't think about that." He then jumped back into the role and, in character, said, "Yeah, well it wasn't my fault. The spell was cool, and you didn't get out of the way." It was perfect. That's what his character would say and do. His character wouldn't punch the others. He'd blame them for his recklessness. They all know he's a loose cannon, so he's not exactly wrong.
I'm not sure I'd 100% agree with your "be heroic" rule, unless your party is literally filled with nothing but Lawful Good paladins and their ilk. The best stories and characters in all of fantasy tend to be characters with flaws, not characters who are always heroic all the time. Frodo was scared and lacked the inner courage to take the ring all the way to Mordor, and this let Sam become a much stronger supporting character. But in your world: "No, Frodo has to be heroic, he isn't allowed to get scared." Or take someone like Tony Stark, an arrogant narcissist that is an extremely memorable character. But in your world: "No, Tony Stark isn't allowed to get mad at Captain America. THEY MUST BE HEROIC AT ALL TIMES"
@@trapical I agree. Being getting isn't flawless. Like I stated, I give examples of each of the rules. I just like to make them short for reference. It's a trick used in education for easy recall. Being heroic in our games is standard since I only allow evil characters for one shots. I just don't enjoy evil campaigns, so we run them from the heroes side.
1:20 Rules lawyer 3:47 The Instigator 6:57 The Spotlight Hog 8:45 The Cheater 10:05 The Power Gamer 14:50 The Jokester 16:08 The Metagamer 18:10 The Boss/The Critic 19:40 The Flippant Player
One time a group I was in had an "instigator" Barbarian who literally attacked city guard for stopping him on the street. This was early on (level 2) so with a little buff from our Cleric my Paladin managed to grapple him down and help the guards tie him up. The session ended on a bit of a cliff-hangar not only for the characters, but also for the players because Barb wasn't very happy that we ganged up on him, even though he was "role playing" his super prideful Conan facsimile (fair enough, but he didn't have to take it to such an extreme), and we weren't very happy with him for trying to start a war with the only city in the area. Our DM however, was a goddamn genius. In our next session he went through what the rest of the party was doing after Barb was hauled off the jail, then turned to the Barb and started a separate 1-on-1 scene with him in the jail. He used the Barbarian being in prison as a plot point to meet a very important NPC in the cell next to him; the overthrown Lord of the city. This led to a great plot of intrigue and secret cults all from the Barb wanting to start a riot over nothing because he was bored. Suffice to say, we the players turned the instigator into a real team player by showing him that: his actions have consequences (we won't tolerate any BS) and the DM still encouraged him to roll with the punches by making said consequences into a plot point.
I find that setting clear expectations early on is massively important - I run my Session 0 almost like a formal meeting, but I'd rather have a serious platform where I can discuss the social contract with my players. It goes both ways of course; as much as I talk about my expectations, they can also let me know of their expectations. On rules lawyers: my rules lawyer is a beloved member at my table. I'm a relatively new GM and I told him to help me with rules. This takes a huge load off of me, gives him validation, and since we have already established expectations, he knows to interrupt by way of "gentle reminders", and respects my final ruling. It's such a mutually beneficial relationship and I wouldn't trade that quality of his for anything else.
I also think DMs need the strength to admit when they don't know something. It is only human to forget things. Simply by saying "I actualy have no idea, does someone?" the rules lawyer can come in handy. As a rules lawyer myself I also think we are really fair players because rules set equality for everybody and we kinda "demand" it to be as equal as it gets for us and all the other players. In good or bad situations, rules are rules and lawyering a rule can have good or bad consequences, which is the fun about sticking by rules.
An example of dealing with a jokester is like when sam on critical role has that sound board and Matt sed “if you do that during the game you take 1d10 force” and like 10 min in to the game sam did it and he quietly sed you take 4 points and then he did not do it again.
With the metagaming part, I've noticed with my groups several players try real hard to avoid metagaming by asking the dm if they can make an appropriate roll to see if their character would know things related to the knowledge they have as a player. The dm will often times let them roll and dispense what knowledge the character has and the player will have to go with that and play off what information their character knows. It makes things easier for everyone by establishing the distinction between character and player knowledge right off the bat.
I'd say I'm the "newbie" -not really sure what most things do -gets worried when it's my turn, because I don't want to slow down the game I chose sorcerer, and I was very bamboozled, I didn't even know what scorcery points did until like the 5th session I'm just going to pick fighter next time ;~;
Don't feel bad, I'm playing druid, were level like 6 now and I just found out that cantrips aren't something I can swap out like my prepared spells. I had it in my brain that cantrip just meant "free spell" and so of course I can swap it daily after my morning meditation bc why wouldn't I? Then I found the lvl perk for druids that I could swap 1 cantrip out at x lvl and had my "wait a second.." moment Our DM is new and the party is pretty big so I can't fault them for not catching it sooner but yeah xD there's plenty of stuff to catch newbies up lol
I totally understand it, I wanted to play a caster but there is too much information for new players, plus you need some experience to know when is the perfect time to use your spell slots etc. I advice every new player to go for martial types especially fighters or any archery class can be as simple as you want in combat and rp .
I fully support any decision you make for future characters, but I have a suggestion for you. If you're still having trouble figuring out the nuances of how to play a sorcerer, then you can reach out to one of your group members who maybe has more experience with it, or your DM, or even a friend outside the group who may have experience with it, and ask them for help with learning how to play your class as effectively as possible. If there's one thing I've learned about D&D players, it's that they're one of the most welcoming and helpful communities out there. You can have them help you learn how to use the mechanics to greatest effect, go over sample combat sequences with them, or look up videos here on youtube that go over the best ways to play a sorcerer. If you have a question, there's almost definitely at least one really good answer out there. Also, that hesitancy can be a really interesting facet to your roleplaying; you can have your character be gunshy, or pacifist, or just not confident in themselves. This sort of thing leads to GREAT character building as the campaign continues on. Even if you're no master, there will inevitably be times when things click into place and you know EXACTLY how to deal with a situation you're facing, or you save the party, or you are the secret weapon who proves to be the difference against a tough boss. And because of that contrast against your struggles at the beginning, these moments will make you look even more like a badass, and it'll also be that much more fulfilling for you personally. Besides, that's the natural process of character development in D&D in the first place: at the beginning, your character is... well, a beginner, and they have to gain a lot of their strength and power the hard way over the course of a rugged campaign where you're ultimately doing things that normal people couldn't do, and so you have to grow gradually into the role of being an extraordinary person to meet this seemingly impossible challenge. Because even though it seems impossible at level 2... it won't be impossible once you're at max level and wasting fools.
New players are not "problem players", they're a glorious gift to the entire hobby community. Every single one of us, from the grognard neckbeard chowing down on meatbread while telling tales of elder days when "Dwarf" was a Class, to the complete rookie who's wondering what all these weirdly shaped dice are for share one thing: We were all new once. May your ale always be cold, your loot always plentiful, your party never split, and your Natural 1's always be dramatic. Welcome to the hobby, friend.
The most important thing about all of this is communication. I see so many posts online from people asking for help on how to combat a problematic situation at the table, without having talked about it with the person who‘s causing it. Most of the problems I have been part of or witnessed while playing dungeons and dragons were solved by just talking it out. People often don’t know that their behavior is upsetting somebody and making them aware of that is often the easiest way to success. That is if they‘re a decent human being and capable of taking critique gracefully and bettering themselves. This should probably be the takeaway. If you‘re having a problem at your table, talk about it and if the other person is a decent human being, they‘ll make an effort to change their behavior. If they don’t and continue to ruin the precious time you guys have together, give `em the boot.
Bingo! Most of these issues can be resolved through managing expectations and communicating effectively. These same basic rules apply to any set of interpereonal relationships. It's almost as if players are...people!
As someone relatively new to D&D, playing in a large party for the first time. I really appreciated having a rules lawyer in our group. I could check things with them without having to interrupt our DM or slow down combat. Within three short sessions I was competent enough that they weren’t really shooting corrections at me anymore.
We had to introduce the "Three Second Rule" for one player many years ago. He was nimble, (the player... not his characters so much...) he could roll a d20 with real precision. It rarely rolled more than 5 or 6 inches out of his reach, and he was able to scoop it up with his other hand the instant it stopped rolling. Long enough for him to see the result, but no one else. He got a LOT of good of rolls. He was a bit of an ass out of character, and none of us wanted to deal with his inevitable bullshit if anyone called him out on this behaviour. So Chris... (one of my longest running players, and my absolute hero in this instance) decided, "OK... I will start doing it... I'll make a really obvious cheat, Eden can catch me out and we can introduce a house rule that all dice have to sit for three seconds before they can be picked up!" He took one for the team and all three of us had to control ourselves to not laugh like hyenas when Paul, (the real cheater...) was the one most annoyed at Chris for his "Cheating!" We all knew that he was really annoyed that his favourite cheat was over... He hit for crits a lot less often afterwards. Funny, that...
For spotlight hogs: I have one in an upcoming campaign, and I have preemptively asked for his "help to get the other players involved in play" so it shifts the attention from him over playing to players that could be doing more (given a chance) and he was super receptive
Many of the players in my group are power gamers, and I've never found it to be a problem. Giving decent magic items that are based on characters can be a great way to artificially balance the group as well (sometimes). While yes, it does take more time to make encounters interesting and challenging, you can have a lot more fun experimenting with abilities. Facing an ancient white dragon in its lair? Take out the dark souls playbook and give it a lair action that spawns hundreds of sharp icicles on the ceiling that fire upon characters on the battlefield; which then summon ice elementals to attack the party. Give it spells it can cast as a legendary action if needed, and a rampage ability that lets it stomp around the battlefield while incased in a magical ice layer that gives it temporary nullification to certain conditions. Just enjoy creating ridiculous encounters that your party will need to work together to come out on top. That being said, if you are running a published adventure, (not AL) dig into the lore of the foes you face and buff them how they are portrayed to be. I've never had players complain that monsters were "too unfair" as long as everything is thematically appropriate.
It just gets rough when you have a basic party except krogg the destroyer with a 32 str, and 187 HP at level 6. Anything the rest of tge party are capable of fighting he one hits before thet even get a chance to play. So nobody else gets to participate. And when you send something thay challenges him, the rest of the party gets one shotted. It can be managed but it is a pain.
@@sinisterthoughts2896 If you do have a player that is so unbelievably overpowered that they completely overshadow other players, (within the rules of course) then you can then go Cody's route of having a conversation with said player. Every group is different and my solution definitely isn't a one size fits all option (I imagine most groups aren't like mine). It was simply a call for the DM to play to their creative abilities when confronted with a party that punches above their weight.
@@thesargeras1532 Definitely a strong solution. I've run games in other systems where it is intended that the players work towards demi-godhood, and outrageous encounters are the standard. If the group (as a whole, mind) enjoys the high powered lifestyle, then as a GM there is no need to hold back. Throwing some ridiculous overpowered behemoth at the group and seeing how they can juggled their obscene powersets to stop it can actually be entertaining in its own way. But I think thats something to address near the outset - if half the group are playing Krogg the Destroyer and his Dreadnaughts (I may steal that name @Sinister Thoughts) and the rest have put together a gumshoe detective team, something needs to be adjusted right at the start.
@@stealthington Again, this was simply the solution for my table. If you and your players have a different way of playing, then they'll obviously need a different solution.
I love your psychology on the importance of language for getting people on your side. I've literally given talks at conferences to medical professionals on the importance of doing things like saying "help me out" and "I know you'll understand because you seem very smart" etc. It starts you and the 'problem person' on the same 'side' so their energy goes towards progressing the common goal instead of progressing the oppositional goal.
Instigator: *attacks guard*
Guard: "You are under arrest for assault of the royal guard." *turns to the party* "Noble adventurers, I request your aid in detaining this criminal"
I absolutely love this method, might end up using it myself
I used this once but the best time was when I didn't need to use it. First campaign: group of adventurers hired. They don't know each other prior to this. One of them is a Cleric/Paladin devout to a god of justice and war. Two are edgy rogues.
They were gonna stay the night before going in the dungeon at a local castle that the residing nobleman kindly offered them as a safe place to stay. Edgy Rogues try to picklock the doors to rob the man blind while the party is asleep. They crit failed and "there is no crit fail in ability check" but I was new to 5e and I like it so crit fail it is. "The castle door was old and brittle. You didn't have any trouble opening it, but it hinged and actually cracked as you forced you lock pick, and you know the whole castle heard you."
*cleric girl* "including me?"
"Yep"
The two rogues thought she was gonna protect them. So they didn't hide or anything.
"Smite."
And two new character sheets were rolled that day. I hate pvp but it wasn't a pvp it was a slaughter.
Or the group turns on the instigator and hands them over for justice or out of vindictiveness.
I did something similar once that wasn't to deal with a problem player, it was to make the point that the place they're at is very different to what they're used to.
They're in a Dwarven city, trying to find their way around. They're asking locals for directions but, being a very tight-knit group that aren't fond of outsiders, the dwarves aren't especially helpful. One dwarf didn't want to help them (I was rolling each time they approached someone to decide whether they would be willing to help out), so they offered him some coin but - unaware of how drastically different the dwarven economy is - didn't realise they'd insulted him by offering so little and he just stormed off.
One of the party realised they offended him and decided to try and make amends but, being so far away because the dwarf stormed off so fast, decided to do it by casting message on him to avoid being misheard.
The dwarf shouts something in Dwarvish, the only member of the party who speaks the language understands the word as "sorcery!", all the nearby dwarves converge on the cramped tunnel intersection, blocking their escape but not attacking, a couple dwarves run off somewhere, no one is willing to explain. After a few minutes the dwarves who ran off return with a retinue of city guards. The crowd parts, the dwarves identify the two half-elves as the culprits because elves = magic, the guards arrest them, the Half-Elf who didn't cast any magic pleads his innocence as they explain that magic is illegal this close to the mines while the one who did tries to accuse the other one to save his own skin.
To my pleasant surprise, the party didn't resist. One of them, being an ex-lawman, even offered assistance with his own handcuffs, they followed them to the jail at a respectable distance and politely inquired at the front desk as to what could be done.
They... have been a lot more careful about observing and respecting local culture since then.
I will admit i am a bit of an instigator but I always try to make sure no other player is hurt by my antics.
If someone’s bossy in combat, make an NPC they’re fighting point out, “He’s the boss, get em!” And have everyone prioritize him till he’s down or low on health
that's dirty and amazing!!
There are many "player" problems that we DMs can resolve ingame, and I love this approach.
Just make sure to also talk to the player about it, problems rarely go away if we don't adress them
If that guy is playing a tank, you're doing him a favor.
I love you.
I love the quote "they understand the rules well enough to abuse them."
The problem with being a DM and wanting to play instead of direct. No one wants you to 😂
@@ToozDaeYO I know this feeling. 10 years playing as DM, I have got to actually play twice, both times were one shots.
I have a Powerplayer so good at breaking the game I run all my home-brewing by them before applying in order to prevent powerplaying
I honestly appreciate the distinction, though. I'm an optimizer--I actually enjoy the challenge of trying to get the most out of a set of class/army/whatever restrictions. We're not all trying to be "that guy".
@@ToozDaeYO wrong i made the world and we play it fast and loose and we have fun if you abuse it I use it against you
We once had a cleric who would only heal us if we paid him
Finally we got fed up and next combat
We all pointed at him and said
"That's our healer, get him"
Just tell him his price are too much and you’ll find another cleric or healing potion recipe
I currently have this Cleric. Yet. It is more to the fact that not a single party member has made any actual attempt to befriend the Cleric. So she currently is a Hireling.
LOL!
First character I played in an RPG was a rogue, so the first time he got badly hurt I shouted to the cleric "Hey, priest, want 5 bucks?!"
American health care lol
Lawful Evil Cleric based off the American Healthcare System
You missed the Alcoholic player who gets drunk during every game and becomes all of the problem players at once
Oh yea, had one of those, kicked him out after awile
First time playing and my brother-in-law is one of these. It’s so oppressive.
thats no way of talking about your uncle, riley!
@@derdox6720 *cousin lol
THATS ME
As a former cheater, I would say the best way to deal with one is to just pull them aside and tell them they’re caught. Be nice about it and ask them why. I did it because I was generally insecure about myself and it carried over to D&D. I just wanted to look cool. A great thing to do is show how bad rolls can be fun! Also point out that the game is way better when you’re not cheating. I of course can speak from experience.
props for living and learning
I found that a big reason can also be.. not wanting your charachter to die. If I just miscalculated and make that save my charachter isn't uncounscious I'm not dying. I don't think it's weird that people don't want to lose the character they are do attached to.
A solution might be to make the campaign less deadly. Not attacking the downed charachters, or having option for ressurection be available :)
One dude cheats all the time at adventures league, also refuses to roll out in the open. The DM is pretty non confrontational but you can tell he was getting annoyed as well as the rest of the table is finding it frustrating as every roll of theirs is a hit, every save is a success, and they metagame the fuck out of the module. One week, the DM asks for a marching order, then rolls some dice. asks the cheater to roll a dex save. Chester says he got a 27 “oof, a lit opens up beneath you and you’ll begin falling a great distance. Does anyone want to use their reaction to try and grab him before her falls?” no one offers to help. Chester says “I use my reaction to grab the ledge” DM “roll an athletics check” Cheater rolls “28” DM “you reach out but it’s too late and you start falling. I need to borrow some D6s” Almost everyone hands over 2-4 D6 at the table and the DM rolls them quite a few times. “That’s 287 falling damage, tough break, hey on the bright side you can make a new level one character”
I got accused of cheating at one game where I was rolling hot. I suggested that we all role in the open with no picking up of dice and easily readable dice which upset a player whose dice were kinda hard to read, but they were his lucky dice despite the number of nat 1s he rolled on them. They decided they believed me after all because one good session doesn't outweigh multiple other sessions where I had bad, average, and good rolls.
respect
Most of these seem like they can be solved by simply asking the other players what they do.
I ran a one off campaign with a party of one murderhobo and 3 normal players. When the murderhobo swung at a guard in the middle of conversation, I asked the other three people what they did. Had they said "I guess we jump in..." I would have had everyone roll for initiative, but unanimously all 3 of them said "We step back in confusion and put our hands up."
"OK...[murderhobo character] go ahead and give me an initiative roll."
"What about everyone else."
"No need."
"What so I'm gonna fight 5 guards?"
"Well no...more accurate you're gonna get bear tackled and arrested."
"Why only me?"
"Who else assaulted a royal officer."
Ironically, it was a rather weird conversation that followed as the murdrhobo player argued that the guards should go after the rest of the party to as I explained that out of everyone, only one person actually committed a crime.
Had the same thing happen with the murderhobo in my party. He got thrown into prison for a full session where the the DM introduced him to two new players as his cellmates. In the session after that all three worked as a team and pulled of an epic prison break (for which all of them got massive xp).
Had to improv a whole court case because one of my players decided to track down a merchant he had interacted with, and then killed in broad daylight in front of several guards. I asked all the other players what they would do, and all of them agreed it would be fair for just that one to get punished for putting them all in an unwanted situation (I played this that the guards set everyone except the murderhobo free since they clearly saw it was only him)
When one of my fellow party members attacked a shopkeeper (in a weapons shop, of all places), my character ended up holding them back with Hold Person to leave no doubt that I was not associated with the attack. They still got thrown in prison, though, which lead to a prison break. Why we decided to break them out of prison, I don't know -- we could have just had them roll a new character since it was the second session or something like that (we started at a later level, which is why I had Hold Person). It completely changed the track of the story onto a more interesting direction because of events going on outside the city that were previously unknown to us, so that ended up positively, though I expect that the DM had to improvise quite a bit.
Thats a good way to do it
I'm new, what's a murder hobo
"The salt lord" the one who every bad roll they immediately complain, and every time they get hit they are upset they have to use their action to withdraw or perhaps die.
Yeah they're annoying but I think anyone can get like that when they're trying to have fun and they're having the world's worst luck. Me personally I'm pretty gracious about bad rolls, I just RP them out cos I have shit luck more often than not but some people create an image of their character in their head and anything that falls flat of it just feels disappointing. You can help em if you're dm by giving them inspiration if they're rolling really bad and if you're a player then use the assist action or something to help them so they feel their character is useful and gets a bit of the spotlight
yessss... i have one. like, buddy, it's a luck and we're playing a gaaaame...
Doesn't matter how gracious of a bad dice roller you are 10 rolls in and you still haven't succeeded at the intended objective it gets annoying. I almost have the dice rolling skills of wil wheaton. It just gets to you sometimes
Ok reverse of that, Dishonest DM. There have been a number of times dice wise I could have PPK'd kids. I chose not to because my love of my players love of the story outweighed the authority of the dice. Does that make me a bad person? Oh yeah I'll hurt them really bad, but I go to -3 HP so judge me wider universe am I a bad DM? (no seriously I want to know.)
@@clymdodds1020 depends if it’s going to insta kill them. If you deal their max health in one attack, it’s an insta kill. If it won’t, and someone can heal, I would just let the fate of the dice show the way. But if an attack insta kills them, I’d say it’s okay to fudge because the encounter is probably a little unbalanced.
I realized awhile back I can be an Attention Hog. I have ADHD and when I get really excited and involved in the game I JUST WANT TO DO THINGS! Once I realized it I apologized to the party and told them if I started doing it again to please remind me. I guess what I'm trying to say is some people don't realize what they're doing is a problem
It's worse when you are playing with blunt people and they just stop the whole table and confront you right there about "why are you like this?"
@@RaizanMedia I disagree. There is a decent chance the hog is unaware of their behavior and calling them out 4v1 and basically mob shaming them is a thing that might scare off the one person that was probably the most excited about the game.
Yeah I’m fairly new to the game but I am very aware that I could quickly fall into this when I get more comfortable with it (for now my anxiety is stopping me) because I am really interested and excited about it. I would much rather be pulled up on it though (nicely not a blunt confrontation that would not work well with anxiety and adhd things [like rejection sensitive dysphoria]) if you just point it out to me when I’m doing it I’d apologise and rein myself in for as long as possible
My DM sends me PMs to help me know when to dial it down. I have the same problem as OP, and it's hard to know when to stop. My issue is autism and I can't perceive the others' frustration.
This works for us and might be something to try.
Me, very much me
For problem players: the edgelord, who insists their character has Suffered the Most and that Nobody Else Could Understand and generally don't make any attempt to get along with the other players in the name of roleplay
This can work if they make their character actually work with the group, even if it's RPed as a begrudging alliance (or they're a secret softie). This becomes a real problem when they refuse to work with, or sometimes even join, the party.
I've had one player who, when given the plot hook & multiple reasons to join the party, refused to join at all & insisted that they'd just sit in the tavern & brood. Then they got upset when they weren't part of the combats, despite sitting in the tavern alone was *their idea.*
Yeah i had one of these fucks in a game. He brooded in the corner of the bar a lone watching the rain. He did nothing to talk or interact with the rest of the troupe other than brood.
He then asked if they were ever going to fight something and i said sure when you decide to play with the rest of the players and not brood in a corner.
He quit 4 minutes later. After the others picked a quest off a job board to do.
This is one of my few rules I give my players on charactercreation. If you're playing in a group game, make a character that works in a group
I like to give my characters like that some sort of connection to one other party member, or a reason to care about what the party is doing. Playing a lone wolf type character is totally doable while still keeping with the party, you just have to do it right. The begrudging allies thing works really well, and is the sort of thing that can lead to great character growth, as they bond with the rest of the party and come to actually care about the others.
i honestly just quit playing, because people are idiots, you can barely have a game anymore without some moron ruining everything or being so irritating you dont even want to finish the game
I’ve got a rules lawyer, and I love him. Been playing off and on since the late ‘70’s. New to 5e, don’t have it all down, yet. He is a walking encyclopedia. And, if I say it doesn’t apply for this game for x reason, he gets excited about the home brew change.
I don't think that ur friend could be a problem at all. For me, it only gets annoying when they're super defensive with the rules thing, like: "Hey, i saw this really cool homebrew..." and they go "but by the rules in the book...". It's more when it affects the little twists in you're trying to do with your storytelling.
I wouldn't call him a rule lawyer. A lawyer's job is to prosecute.
Sounds like he's just helpful to have around.
Hes like a rules audio book
Helpful rules lawyer
I have a similar player, but with lore instead of rules, which is great, because I make mistakes with the lore all the time.
Attention Hogs are easy to deal with. "You start searching the room; it's going to take you 10 minutes to make your roll. While you're doing so, The bar owner looks at you nervously. 'Ya don't think this place I bought got anythin' bad in it do ya?'" In short, actions take time. Enforce that.
DnD i've learned is VERY much about time scale. Like working with time is REALLY freaking important.
People generally know a round in combat is 6 seconds, if you're in a city you could be going by minutes if you're walking through a festival or something, or hours if you're going around doing shopping and just general busy work. Then if you're traveling to another town you take it in days or potentially weeks if it's a LONG journey without too much in the middle.
However things also happen, simultaneously. If you've got a character doing a ritual to identify something you've found, don't just go. Ok 10 minutes pass and this is what it does.
One character is taking ten minutes, what's everyone else doing? Is everyone just kinda catching their breath after a tough fight, just wanna figure out what this loot does and divvy it up? Ok, fine, they all relax for 10 minutes while the wizard casts his spell. If they have something else they want to do, maybe a conversation some characters want to have, this is a good time to go "Ok, so the wizard is going to take 10 minutes to cast his spell. Do you guys have anything you want to talk about or do in this time?"
And then the bard can go "yeah, i'm going to pull the Ranger a bit to the side" and they have their talk, the fighter and monk want to see if they can find some fish in a river that's close by. Everyone's got SOMETHING to do, players that wanna character build can do that, players that want to just do something to pass the time can do that, players that want to discover cool magic can do that. Everyone gets what they want, and if someone starts bitching about it, you've got a bit more work to do to either smooth them over or if needed, kick them out.
I am an attention hog. I don't mean to be, I just get excited ans start talking. My group knows this about me and they remind me that it another person's turn to talk. I don't get mad because I know about this flaw of mine and just have a hard time controlling it when I get excited.
They don't get mad either by the way. It is actually a running joke in my group that I can't keep my mouth shut. And a chorus of shut up Tony is not unheard of. 😁
I've always liked asking the "spotlight hog" players for their help and ask them to help me highlight one of the quieter players who might not be saying as much. It helps the shy player find more confidence and leverages the spotlight hog's enthusiasm in a positive way.
yep, and as a typically shy player i love to attach my backstory to a spotlight hog. then i always have someone to play off of and i can keep them busy in side rp to help the GM.
As someone whose bad about I try and always do something with a buddy
These types of people are in general a DM's best friend as long as they don't overdo it.
I used to have this problem a bit but I reformed and now I mostly play the sidekick and I frequently discuss with the DM in private and we find ways to make the game a little more hype and entertaining, to have people shine and the storytelling be a bit more intriguing, scenes more flamboyant etc
It really helps create a more entertaining story in the end if you work hand in hand with these players because chances are, if someone knows how to make something exciting, it's them. If you discuss with them, they'll get their col scenes but they'll also give you ideas to make it cool for other players as well and you'll also see that they don't take the spotlight so much now that they have some guaranteed coolness and they'll more readily let others bask as well
That is an excellent way to divert spotlight players into enjoying the game for everyone! I know that there are times when I become a spotlight hog so I always check in with the DM about who’s been quiet etc.
This isn't a D&D guide, this is a Leadership lesson! Great video!
Fully agree
that is what being a DM is about.
Very true. Important life lessons here.
The self insert: creates a character based on themself and then takes all rp very personally
omg I had one of these
Another Players character had his mother insulted by the bard and went ballistic.
OH MY GOD I HAVE ONE OF THESE
I base my characters on myself, but make them alcoholic hoes, and almost always chaotic good
Oh god. I hate when people do that
An even better use of sandwich technique is “hey I really love how enthusiastic you are while playing, it always gets me excited to run a game. It does slightly overwhelm some of the quieter players, and if you could help me give them a little more air time to bring them up to our level it would help everyone have more fun!”
So it should go “1/positive remark about situation 2/CONSTRUCTIVE criticism 3/ways to use this criticism positively “
Yeah! Like incorporate the quieter players more into your RPing so that you both can have that interaction
I have a friend like this and I am prepared to repeat those words every session, I don't think she can help herself or have any self awareness.
I have a group of mostly new player that all ended up being power gamers. It pissed me off for ages, to the point that I didn't wanna run the campaign any more cause I let them all run too strong of characters for the campaign I wanted to run. I finally realized I was being a dumb baby making it about myself and turned the campaign into demigod campaign filled with set peice battles and homebrew monsters to try and make the power gamers still feel strong but challenged. As a DM its hard sometimes to remember that you are God and can control what the players face. If they all wanna be legends that walk through ages, set them up with equally strong demigod antagonists.
if you only have one power gamers that's making it difficult, here's the solution, slow spell, that's all you need
If your adventure module is too low-level, homebrew it to be a little deadlier and add some extra flair to it. Mention that nobody has gone in that place and left alive in 10 years, that even skilled adventurers don't return. They powergame because being optimal and powerful is fun for them, so make the challenges tougher both in stats and lore so that they feel more powerful for having overcome it.
Same situation here so when the players started to make some big brain plays with their powered up characters they ended up sparking a war with gods getting involved as the Mindflayers and Aboleths allied. Now the gods are starting to get killed off and the players are freaking out having really tough fights on their hands as they are facing Mindflayer demi-gods and are caught in a three way war between the Gith, the mindflayer alliance and the gods. Now they can't wait for each session, and yes it is pretty much all homebrew now. As a result DMing for them has become a blast. ^_^
@@Hurdleizer the campaign is part of a bigger homebrewed multiverse that contains multiple campaigns, including one another player is running. so I'm just making them part of the "old lore".
@@dragonbane97x Sounds awesome keep up the great work! sounds like your players are having a blast too! As DMs that is the best reward for our craft. ^_^
What about the: But why guy?
"But why would that happen?"
"But why would I want to do that?"
"But why? But why? But why?"
This problem as been adressed since times immemorial. At least in French, I don't know for English folks. We have the mythical sentence : "Ta gueule, c'est magique !", or "Shut up, it's magic!". ^^
You mean the 2 year old?
@@Cbrule35
Ah the "The magic of.... just magic!"? :D
@@Cbrule35 In our group, we call it "Magic. Ain't gotta explain shit"
I think these types of players are just curious about the world that was built and have an inquisitive nature. I ask a lot of questions to make sure I know what's going on or incase I'm missing something... And sometimes it's to just gather as much knowledge I can about the GM's game world, but hey. I can see how that might get annoying after awhile but from seeing other players that do the same thing, they stop after awhile for the most part.
I’ve got a subclass of The Boss/The Critic. The Nostalgia Creep. The ones who play 5e and constantly bring up how 3.5 did something better.
3.5 did a lot better fun wise compared to 5 e.
Matthew you just summoned one
Heard it did. Played 2nd 3rd then 9-11 so missed 3.5 and 4th. Now back with 5th
Ugh I hate those people. They should just go play 3.5 then...
The middle of the game session is probably the wrong time to bring it up, but if they want to introduce a house rule that was in an early edition, that could be good. The beauty of tabletop games lies in their flexibility.
I'm a spotlight hog accidentally, I just realized from watching this. I just get excited to play the game. It's like when I'm writing my own stories, I get the scene in my head and love to keep it going faster and get hyped.
better get that checked
MY dm has started making us roll initiative when we get to talking over each other. I have that problem too, at times but getting better. I'm trying to let the best player for the job do the action. Roll play IG and tell party , who's the best at the skill being tried. Try RPGing "hey you know I have knowledge and studied that".. Sneaky guy sneaks, talky guy talks et cetra yada yada. Think in team mode.
I really like how this guy is so honest about his flaws as both a GM and a player, new to the channel but definitely gonna be watching more.
same :) I'm new aswell, hope to see more
This video boils down to "learn how to deal with people" and I'm here for it
Same thoughts
Something that a lot of people seem to Omit is there's more to the game than just rolling Dice and knowing the rules it's how you interact with each other too
@@zuleanservant I agree and I know role play is important to the game, but it is just not my favorite part of the game. I do enjoy persuasion and deception and stuff but having to literally act like someone that I'm not isn't as fun for me as the battles and ability checks. I am trying to work on it though, I know its an important part of the game and I'm hoping I will get better at it and enjoy the role play more.
I've often thought DMing is great training for any manager or position of leadership.
You forgot one more: The Flake. They have a lot of trouble committing to the game and constantly cause the others to have to reschedule sessions.
We had a few Flakes in my group but we simply stopped inviting them, every single one of them. If the player doesn't have the time and/or disposition to play they shouldn't be scheduling games at all. They're just making things more complicated for everyone, especially the DM who has to balance encounters for a party that may or may not have an extra character in it. Finally, constant rescheduling is disrespectful and makes them look like they don't give a shit about the game, so why would we keep inviting them?
He addressed that. It's the flippant person.
Did you mean: half of the group I tried to dm for
Yeah, that's the flippant player. Either move on without them, or if you're willing to do a more work and have flakes that are interested but busy, set up a West Marches or solo campaign. Something where they're not putting the game on hold for a whole group if they can only show up once every 6 sessions.
My dnd group has 12 players (I don’t know what are dm was thinking) and some players in particular can’t make it often at all. My dm cancels if more than 2 players are absent, so we hardly ever get to play. It’s even worse because not only is this my first campaign, but we’re only scheduled meet once a week, for 2 hours. I’m a month and a half in, and I’ve been to 2 sessions.
I like how this video is not just about the "problem players" but also how to communicate with anyone in a lot of confrontational situations
As someone who has (at various times in my life) been accused of being both a Rules Lawyer AND a Power Gamer, getting them on YOUR side as a GM is the best thing that could ever happen. Need to know what the obscure rule for X is? Ask the Rules Lawyer (if they don't know, they'll be happy to find it for you while you do other things). Have a new player who is very enthusiastic, but know nothing about how to build a character? Ask the Power Gamer to help! Turn the natural inclinations of these types of player to the advantage of the group (including you), and you campaigns will profit.
As someone who naturally optimizes my characters, I absolutely love helping the other players do the same with their characters. I like it when my character is really effective, but I love it when everyone else's characters are just as effective. I don't want anyone to feel ineffective or overshadowed.
This also extends to giving advice during play. I don't cross over into being the Boss/Critic (I think), but I like to give tips when someone is unsure what to do, Jut a simple "Hey, you should totally cast grease on the floor by the door so that the orcs will get stuck" can show other people effective (or cool/funny) ways to use their spells. I never get mad or upset when my advice isn't followed or anything like that, and I love hearing suggestions from other people for cool ideas for my character to do.
I love this tip so much. In my game, I’ve played with one of of the players before. When we played together, we kind of power gamed together, but also cared about the roleplay. So now, I usually put them up to helping another character with creation. I was also the closest we’d get to a lawyer, (I was never insistent that the rules be followed, but I understood the value that good mechanics can have over good stats. If you know what I mean) so now that I’m DMing it’s pretty coherent.
Someone who is both consistently plays at my table all the time, they are the greatest asset I've ever had in keeping the game flowing smoothly. It sucks if they decide to play a Cleric though.
Utilize a problem and turn it into something helpful is a great approach. But, I see one issue here...
In my experience some (or more like many) Power Gamers think that there is a *right* way to create a character, and there is a *wrong* way (every other approach than their powerful perfectionist). When such a Power Gamer tells someone else how to build their character, they give them the feeling that if they don't follow their perfect approach, then they're building the character the wrong way. But, if your new and unexperienced player just wants to *roleplay* (and that's something great, even better than having the perfect stats IMO) and is trying to create a *"personality"* rather than a *"weapon wielded by optimized stats",* your problem player just became an even bigger issue.
So, if the Power Gamer is like Steve Mahar, who said "I never get mad when my advice isn't followed", then it's a great approach. With most Power Gamers I've encountered, this is a bad idea. They will just annoy the hell out of the new player before the game has even started.
You have a great GM mindset!
When players abuse metagaming, I the (DM) get an inspiration die.
I've always found the idea hilarious but I've never actually done it to my group. Has anyone here tried it?
That's actually brilliant.
Instead, I'd be down with giving time-wasters "negative inspiration" - i.e. disadvantage - on their next roll where their problem conduct would have worked against them. Too much time wasting? The problem players get disadvantage on the next initiative roll to reflect the time enemies had to observe and plot against them. Spotlight hogging? Player gets disadvantage on the next skill that would traditionally be done by another PC's class to reflect the party tension caused by pre-empting their comrades. And so on.
@@spaceranger7683 I would ask the other players if they mind the spotlight hogging. If the players are fine with it, I wouldn't punish the hogger for creating fun in the game
I DM for a group of players.
If I run into metagaming in the midst of an encounter etc. and the players are making plans mid-battle, I just continue the initiative count by skipping to the next enemy's turn. If it is mid roleplay, I have the NPCs make comments like, "I am right here and can hear you planning to con me into x" or whatever is relevant. The battle stuff has been taken well by my group as they can't help wanting to chat out their actions to get the best possible outcome, and they understand that mid-battle is not the time to stop and make plans. Note on this, I give the players ample opportunity to plan ahead when it fits the situation and if they approach it say with stealth and scouting, then mid-fight I allow some chat, but when it gets ridiculous I step in and move the enemies, make an attack or whatever seems appropriate.
Exactly the right number of types to make an alignment chart!
Lawful Genuine: Rules Lawyer
Neutral Genuine: Spotlight Hog
Chaotic Genuine: The Jokester
Lawful Selfish: Powergaming
Neutral Selfish: Metagaming
Chaotic Selfish: Cheating/Dice Fudging
Lawful Malignant: The Boss/Critic
Neutral Malignant: Flippant Player
Chaotic Malignant: Instigator
(ofc none of these are Always The Case, i just wanted to make a chart)
I love genuine, selfish and malignant so much more than good, neutral and evil.
Eh. I place asshole off the alignment chart. An asshole is just an asshole. Simple as that.
Genuine, Selfish and Malignant...really...lets try to pick the most asinine words we can to put in an alignment chart...not aimed at the poster but the rules themselves. Good, Neutral and Evil leaves everyone knowing exactly what they mean.
@@gr3yh4wk1 except some people get confused about what evil actually means as an alignment.
@@Ghorda9 Its D&D, it is what you make it. Good is good, evil is bad, neutral is switzerland...whats to confuse? Interpret evil how you want. Your DM will let you know if your going off-course. Good people can be selflish too. Your average Lawful Good Paladin will pursue law and good whatever the price...sod the wife at home and 3 kids. So whats that? Lawful Selfish? Even saying it just sounds bizarre. Lawful good. You do good and stick to a code of honour and ethics. Lawful Genuine, means...who the hell knows... :D Sorry but We'll stick with Good, Switzerland and Evil thanks.
In one campaign I was a player in, "the instigator" let me go first into a room he knew had a giant spider in, then when I got attacked he spent nearly a dozen turns standing in the doorway, and every time it came to him in the initiative, his response to the DM was "I do nothing", to the point that another player had to threaten to throw his character at the spider to save me.
That is absolutely horrible and should not have even been allowed, in my opinion. I hope either you don't have to deal with that player anymore, or they grew and changed their game play.
@@breebree2842 Honestly, it was a very fun group and I am still friends with him to this day, however, I haven't played with him since, partially because I haven't had a chance to play since then.
The interrupter : The player who will talk over another player when the other player is talking to the DM or talking over and interrupting the DM. Especially when their character is not involved in what is happening.
I have to deal with one of them, sadly
I ended up quitting a game because one of these players not too long ago. I made it known that the person interrupting me consistently was bothering me and nothing changed. So after awhile I ended up just leaving cause it wasn't worth getting irritated over.
@@Sirschlonky I do my best to let players know to wait their turn when they start interrupting, and if they continue I tune them out. Then when I'm done talking to the original person I turn back to them an ask them, what they had to say. Eventually they got the hint and things are better. Sorry that your experience was not as good.
So are they the match, or the kerosene?
I've played in some adventures where I rolled up a social or piloting class, being assured on session zero that there will be challenges for my class. Only to play through the adventure and find out this wasn't true. Constant physical checks and intense combat, constantly being targeted even though i had the combat effectiveness of a wet noodle, was assured this would not be an issue at the start of the game because my guy was supposed to be in a vehicle. Was never once given the opportunity to man a vehicle even when they were on the battle map.
If you play an adventure for half a year, and only get to roll for your relevant skills 3 or 4 times, you have to start being the interruptor unless you want to silently stare at your sheet each session.
Re- Attacking guards: Ask their party if they are with this fool, and kill/arrest that player's character and ask them to make a new one, they'll get the hint eventually. If the rest of the party wants to attack the guards too, cowabunga it is.
I'm the DM that will ask with a straight face: "Are you sure you want to do this?" And if the answer in the scenario is yes, I will roll an initiative of 20d20 and have at least two "Hero Guards" that are basically high level PCs that will spank the offending party members. It's not railroading if the players play on the train tracks.
COWABUNGA IT ISSS!!
relying on players "getting the hint" sounds like avoiding uncomfortable direct communication. communicating directly, if post-game/privately, in my experience works better than the subtle approach.
@@vernonhampton5863 Having high level NPCs to discourage this kind of behaviour is a tradition that dates back to some of the earliest settings of the game.
Had an edgelord in my party attack a merchant right in front of some guards. DM called for initiative and I rolled high. On my turn I announced that I turn my back on the guards and use my action to withdraw my rope facing the edgelord character. DM had the guards read my body language & Ally with me
For the Jokesters my DM set up a group chat where we all had on silent. We could put in our funny jabs in text form while not interrupting the DM and currently role playing character(s). I liked this solution.
yeah, when I get the urge to make puns on NPC names and stuff, I do it in the game chat (since D&D is an online game these days) so I’m not talking over exposition or RP dialogue. It’s a system that works pretty well. And it’s still rewarding when I hear the DM lose his train of thought 30 seconds later when he reads back and tries not to laugh.
I'm a terrible jokester, and this would be fantastic. If only this worked outside of a chat setting. XD
@@TakeWalkerText messaging.
@@KCBCollier This! As a DM my players do this in either Roll20 or Discord, especially if I'm having a serious moment with a certain player and just roleplaying with them. 5-10 minutes later I'll go back to read what they RP'ed and my brain just stops completely, while I'm shaking my head at their antics.
One time, we left an innocent npc somewhere (it was safe) and the dm said "as you walk away, he sits down and stares at the grass" (he was some kind of golem, i think) and I went to are group message and put "Starin at that grAss😂" I was cackling, and the dm laughed, but then rolled a d4 and dealt me psychic damage😅
The biggest obstacle is when the dm doesn't just talk to the "problem player"
...and makes excuses for the behaviour when other players mention that it's really sucking out the fun.
The thing is it’s always awkward cause often they are a friend and you don’t want to upset them
@@christiaancoetzee1696 while true to an extent, real friends can deliver hard truths to each other without giving offense.
You missed the “edgelord”, the “unnecessary murder hobo” (as in they kill anyone and everyone, even non-enemies, towns folk and the DM’s NPC’s) and the “creep”. The one who tries to RP getting freaky and makes other players feel uncomfortable. The sort who clearly has no luck irl.
Its funny that you mention these. I commented before and the cheater is a murder hobo as well. I have no luck either. Its insane the number of 1's I roll.
edgelords are just a fact of life, though some advice to deal with them would be welcome. the unnecessary murder hobos are usually instigators or people who are disengaged. I think murder hobo pcs who aren't otherwise unpleasant are more solved by clever worldbuilding and general dm skills than labeling them problem players and trying to deal with them
I hope by edgelords you mean players who roleplay their characters as mysterious, angsty, pessimistic weebs. Because I would accidentally make a character like that. My advice would be to treat them in game the same way you would treat someone like that out of game. Try to be upbeat and optimistic towards them, the worst that could happen is it turns into a comedy of pessimism and optimism. Most likely the edgelord will grow as a character and stop being an edgelord. :)
@@gabrielarchangel2658 I'm fine with mysterious and pessimistic. Roleplayed right they can be cool. By "edgelord" I mean the sort of player who made a Mary Sue character that sits in the corner brooding, has no personality outside of unexplained nihilism and being a loner, gives either NO info about their "dark and tragic past" whilst constantly mentioning it or CONSTANTLY talk about it, attacks NPCs and is self serving in game. Like intentionally going against the group (such as killing someone the rest of the group went out of their way to NOT kill).
Its when the PLAYER is the edgelord that its a problem. Edgelord characters "can" be awesome.
Hell every time I play a rogue I'm pretty much a walking shrine to edgelordness. I've even played a evil necromancer before who was edgier than the edgiest edge of something edgy. But I played him like a 80s/90s cartoon super villain and had a blast whilst making the other players laugh.
@@Scotch20 It depends what type of "Edgelord" you're dealing with?
If the player is an edgelord themselves, there is no fix until they grow out of it. Better to kick them. (this only applies to edgelords in personality. Not alternatives who look "edgy", like goths and metalheads. We can be pretty chill and friendly. My GF is goth and covered in tattoos and piercing and she's one of the bubbliest people you'd ever meet. I have hair down to my knees and am the guy who makes everyone laugh)
If they are new to roleplay or a shy person, they're likely just trying to play it safe. It gives them an excuse to be quiet. Just let them be and in time they will likely become more open.
Edgy characters can be fun when done right though. Just look at Batman, Red Hood, Spawn, Venom, The Punisher, Wolverine, The Crow, Prince Zuko, OG Dante from DMC, Raven from Teen Titans, Guts, Sooooo many Anime charaters and EVERY Warhammer character lol. So don't dismiss a good player who can play an edgelord the "right way". I.E. doesn't ruin it for other players.
Next video: The 9 Problem Dungeon Masters in a Dungeons and Dragons Group
yes
Yeah. A bad DM makes for a Bad/Rebellious player
Yes plz :)
The metagaming DM, in a recent boss battle the Boss kept throwing fire attacks against my barbarian while using physical attacks at the squishier targets. I would argue the boss should not know I am resistant to physical damage without having attacked me at least once. The DM should not play the monsters in the most optimal way, he should play them as they ought to act from a roleplaying perspective.
@@DaDunge THIS is probably the thing I hate the most.
Also, the amount of time things really take to do or how much work a normal person can do.
You left out a kind of specific one that's part boss, part spotlight hog: the steamroller.
Steamroller: We wanna kill this guy, right?
Player 2: My paladin would not want to kill randos.
Player 3: Yeah my cleric definitely opposes that.
Player 4: My monk would want to avoid unnecessary violence. Let's settle this peacfu-
Steamroller: Ok, so we're killing this guy, right?
Dominant, uncooperative, can often only hear their own plans/intentions. It's not super common, but I think it's common enough to be worth mentioning.
ah yes the independent murderhobo
I have a player like that, but I’ve talked to him about it, and he understands how he was upsetting other players and was kinda mad at himself for It, he’s a gotten better, he’s a new player and was just excited to be playing and having fun with friends.
I’ve seen this a couple of times. And the worst part is that I play online, so we can never be sure if they can’t hear us, or are just being a jerk
The Paladin in my party is this exact way. He’s so tunnel visioned for his own goals that during my arc, where a very important and powerful artifact was stolen from my character’s people/family, he instead wanted to go and visit some holy place or whatever. I was so pissed off that I nearly just had my character split off and go by himself
I played a character similar to this but I always kept it within reason. I only killed/attacked things that had more then enough reason to be suspicious of or problems that keep occurring throughout the campaign. I did however give fair warning out of game to what was about to happen and usually said something in game to make sure characters could react before I attacked
I played with my family who have never played before. I was scared my mum would be a rules lawyer. So I took her through the book and then showed her the page that says: it all comes down to the dungeon masters. She was perfectly happy helping enforcing the home brew rules a little to much.
Homebrew rules are cop outs. There are books full of actual, balanced rules for a reason. No one will never make an aspect of the game better by giving out gross advantages through bogus rules. I have a member in my group that always wants to be a fucking animal and it's annoying as shit. Be a goddamn normal race, an ogre would smash you to death, you're a fucking cat. Go read Garfield if you love stupid ass cats so much. Also, I hope every tryhard loser from critical role gets colon cancer. Hexbloods are so painfully stupid and their PC SJW shit is physically painful.
Had a player actively say he was going to cut the rope the rest of the party was climbing down. No player characters were there, all were on the rope. But they all heard him. It was a near 200 foot drop, and would have killed several or all the characters.
So I just said no. He said he wanted to cut the rope again, and I raised my voice a little and said no. At this point the party was chastising him, and he backed off, claiming he was 'just joking.' He then complained that I was actively taking player agency away, to which I responded that ruining everyone else's night was not something I would tolerate. If you want to play a jerk character, fine, but the moment you openly declare you are wiping the party and walking away is when you are welcome to leave the group.
As you said, that's not taking player agency away. that's stopping him from ruining everyone else's fun. You are a good DM is to stand your ground!
similarly, I had a player who wasn't paying attention think that they party was on the cliff's rope cut it while he was still on the top... When he already said "yeah" to being on it and forgot to climb off. Really, he just cut the rope he was on and killed himself even though I gave him two warnings.
I like being the Insta-Gator. Just play a Sorcerer and use a Quickened Spell Polymorph.
Hilarious
Lol I love this
Counter argument: moon druid
@@fancifulbread8040 Counter-Counterpoint Lizardfolk Moon Druid
Insta-Gator: Just add water!
I had an incident where i knew exactly what monster my dm threw against my party so what did i do i announced that the monster sounded familiar and had my character look up the monster in a book effectively taking me out of combat for a few turn until the party realized the flail snail has spell reflection
That's a really creative and honest way to add metagame into the actual game.
Trade some turns for information... neat idea
Okay, didn't see this type here, but I'm looking for advice: "The Over Invested." That player who has the opposite problem to the flippant or the metagamer, where their character is their baby and they get unreasonably upset when bad things happen to their character. Sometimes even going so far as to blame the DM and say they're being targeted unfairly, or to view characters having disagreements (in roleplay) with their character as a personal attack on them? I have both DM'd with, and played with, this person and it has become increasingly uncomfortable in every campaign we're in. They're a good friend, but they get too emotional over the game and it's hurting the experience for every other player as well as the DM. Any advice?
I've dealt with this player before on varying levels. Sometimes you can reason with them, sometimes not. But the biggest thing is to question whether they are having fun or not. Because as it's said in this video, the object of Dnd is not only for everyone to have fun, but to tell a story that creates tension with a reasonable amount of risk. If this person isn't comfortable exposing this character to such risk, maybe they should be writing a book about the character rather than playing a game where it is possible to lose, and roll a new character that they can professionally distance themself from.
I used to be like this, not because of any emotional investment in the character, but because I rolled really well on their stats. Almost died during a fight and was panicky for the rest of the session, and even after the session. All I had to do to ease that tension was to make a backup character that I liked an equal amount. Simply knowing that I have a safety net character that I will still enjoy playing as is enough to soothe the panic of losing a character every session.
I recommend second checking if he really is getting bullied by the DM, happens to me a lot :P
This can be a lot harder to deal with than some realize because of the relationship between the people involved. I speak from experience because I basically lost a friend over this one. Short version: they were in denial about having a textbook extreme edgelord (not mentioned in your video Cody, missed that one) with lots of super big deal secrets they couldn't allow anyone to find out. Their character was not very endearing to anyone to say the least, my character decided they wanted to figure out what their deal is (why they're so shady and a brat), dice rolls went my way, some character secrets were revealed... and they quit the game after that session. I've known them for many years so I know they placed too much value on the character they made, but despite my efforts to try and reason with them that it's a game and it's a *character* quarrel not a *personal* one, but they didn't want to listen. Good luck to anyone who has to deal with the problem player I would call the "insecure edgelord" because it's the natural 1 of player drama and it still kind of hurts my heart that having a fictional character "embarrassed" was enough reason for them to cut ties with someone they've been friends with for over a decade.
@@bjiggles8145 I always find this behaviour really kind of weird. It's okay to play things close to your chest now and then… but ultimately, secrets you're including in your character's backstory should be secrets that will come up in play. What's the point in having them if they exist only to never be found out by anyone at all ever? That's not meaningful _anything._ Secrets in a tabletop setting exist to be aired eventually, and used for character development.
The interrupter. There are 2 people in the game I am dming that will always, and I mean ALWAYS inturrupt my description of an area the second something catches their eye.
"You walk into the grand hall, with ceilings 40 ft high and long tapestries draping fro-" "can i steal the tapestries?"
Like dude.... let me just get this out and then decide what to do. Your focused on the tapestries but are missjng the dinnner table full of vampires
That happened in one of my campaigns. The party encountered two nagas, and the idea was that the nagas were supposed to tell them where the tower was that they were supposed to go to. But one of the players attacked the nagas before they could say anything. I tried to ask if they were sure about their decision, but they'd already dropped the dice, so it was too late. So yeah, they failed the adventure because of that, and the game ended up taking a completely different direction with the person who gave out the quest effectively becoming the antagonist. Never interrupt the DM.
Or in your case, I would have just said, 'You got it.', but have them be trapped. As they grab the tapestries and they're distracted with that, have a bunch of poison darts or have a spike trap deploy on them. You don't have to explain it. If they'd have let you finish, maybe they would have known about it.
Omg.... That's me..... I need to go apologize to my DM real quick!
@@SBaby This, this right here. I get so annoyed. Middle of describing the room, and talking about a lever that is attached to this huge heavy door that literally takes up the wall. About to explain what they can see through the top windows of the door and the important plaque when the rogue says "I PULL THE LEVER". I'm sitting there going... wait are you sure cause i wasn't finished "Okay well I still pull the lever." I'm like okay fine. What they didn't seem to remember is the Queen of this land keeps a TARASQUE as a pet. The beast is normally harmless... as long as the queen is there. They end up trying to survive this beast while I"m rolling in the back ground praying the queen gets there before the team wipe. No one died but most of them were extremely injured and the guard that was with them was traumatized by the experience.
@@nicolewolfcry7408 They're lucky it wasn't me running it. A Tarrasque would've been a TPK in my game. But that's my point. When players interrupt the DM, it often opens doors they might not want open.
One you missed: the discouraged player, who will stop having fun after a series of bad rolls and sours the mood for everyone with unwillingness to engage. My solution has been to have lots of "roll-free" RP encounters and backup plans for converting an encounter from lots of checks to very few checks if it starts to go downhill, but that can sometimes reduce the fun for players who just love rolling dice.
technically that one can be split into 2 sub categories, The player who is discouraged easily due to the rolls and the player who is discouraged by the dm, one is a problem, the other is the result of a problem but that's probably for a different video
Personally, whenever I get a series of bad rolls (literally every time I play) I get really amused by it.
@Papa Pjort I can say I'm that kind of player; I try to not get discouraged from a small streak of bad luck, but after a while you start naturally wondering if there's anything else you could do that doesn't require rolling. Unfortunately, and especially in combat, there is not much use a PC can be to the group directly without rolling a die, so you just start to figure there's no point in engaging because your failures will usually actively harm the (luckier) group's efforts.
@@mr.goldfish1530 same. 3 nat ones last session. My druid is the only one who can't identify the mushrooms and fails the con save
I would definitely like to know how to help a discouraged player. Heck, a discouraged person in general.
The Spotlight Hog can also be redirected to become a role playing playmaker. "Hey your enthusiasm is infectious. Could your character play a scene with XYZ?"
I have someone who’s a spotlight hog in our group I’m kinda shy and don’t like talking over people both of our characters are very similar as in technology based backgrounds but he ends up taking up the spotlight and doing everything that we could be doing as team or that I could be doing since my technology base stat is high then his since I’m a technomancer but I don’t really care or get too upset with him about it. I don’t like to interrupt and I have a fun time either way because we’re all friends, plus I’m just not that good at role playing I like the idea of it but I’m not good at acting my character out.
@@Name.......... I don't have a lot of experience, but judging from what I was just told in this video, you could (between sessions, or discreetly during a session) ask them to maybe let up a little - perhaps what you need to become good at acting your character out is a little bit of practice and experience. Of course, you also need to let them understand that you don't exactly mind - you would just like to participate a little more.
Also, you could make a suggestion/request like, hey man, could I get you to do a little scene the next time we are making X contraption, I feel like I want to participate more when making stuff, and perhaps we could work together on some of the things we make.
Of course, this is only with an outsiders perspective, and I have close to no experience playing D&D :)
I feel like a category you missed is the shy character. They are afraid to stand out or roleplay and are worried that they will "mess up". I find that the best methods for this are to ask the players that excel at RP to try and include them or to design a small arc in which their character is the expert.
These players aren't problems though. Some people like just chilling in the crowd and then getting to roll dice in combat. The occasional passive player is fine.
Having a party full of them is difficult.
These aren't problems, and barely players, see?
One example of this from my own experiences are the characters that constantly ask if they "can" do something. "Can I walk over here? Can I maybe talk to this guy?" I often respond with, "I don't know, *can* you?" and it usually gets the point across that *they* are the dictators of what their character says and does, not the DM. Usually happens with newer players. It's also good to, of course, point this fact out directly. "You don't need my permission to speak with the NPC/make a dumb decision/buy that cool item." A co-DM I was with used this to good effect when a player repeatedly kept asking for permission to attempt to scale a totally flat, vertical wall. Eventually he was like "Look, you can do that if you want to, it's your character". Of course, because it was a flat, vertical wall, and exceptionally difficult to climb... Well, he failed miserably, but he was at least empowered from that point on to make his own decisions without asking for our input all the time.
Had an instigator attack a guard in my last campaign, he got parried and dogpiled by other guards ending up spending the rest of the session in jail. The rest of the party let him stew for a bit before going to talk to the sheriff to negotiate his release.
On power gamers, I also tend to find they like helping other players so after a little while I end up with a group of power players and I can amp up combat encounters for all.
Yeah I had a power gamer. He was a big healer so nobody died in the party. I was fine with it
Well not erveryone wants help from a power player, sometimes these kind of people try to change or ridicule charakter ideas of other people because they are not "stong" enough.
@@keithconrad9033 It's good to give people help and advice, so they can manage expectations. If they're trying to do something that's inefficient or falls off, isn't it better for them to know that than to hit that point and start being disappointed by their lack in performance?
Keith Conrad yeah I get that but our party was fine with it
@@keithconrad9033 Being ridiculed for 'not being strong enough' is probably one of my biggest fears in D&D
The chaotic un-invested player: Person who does not give a F in game about their character living or dying, as they have another character concept they want to play. They sulk when the group want's to do things like roll play, or invest in a long term world and story building as non of their characters live long enough to be a real part of that. So it's boring to them and then they do more chaotic things to alleviate their boredom. OHHH and the player who can not separate between what another persons character does, with the person who is playing them-- have seen this be a big issue a few times and it often is not pretty.
I mean, personally I find character death to bring out some of the best roleplay moments and hilarity at the table. Often times I look for opportunities for my character to go out in a blaze of glory defending their friends
so i have a scenario that cropped up where some people might look at it and go "why would you do that", but it was a very in-character thing. i sprinted through 3 platoons of enemies, dying to attacks of opportunity at the end of the process. but it was one of the most glorious moments i have ever seen in D&D. my character was a partially insane goblin raid captain. Storm Herald Barbarian and Phoenix Sorcerer (this was an MTG setting, so i was permitted to cast in rage so long as my spells made sense for the character. because everyone needed a spellcasting section to their character to be a planeswalker). the BBEG was channeling something on an obelisk on the other side of those armies. one of the NPCs with us gave me a one round haste spell (i was informed one round prior to accepting it). i had already been in rage (arcing lightning). i then activated mantle of flame, then cast Haste on myself, before taking off at 70 feet/second sprinting through the 70-ish enemies in front of us (420 feet of movement in a turn). the DM told me i could also cast Wall of Flame, with it being in my wake, if i so chose. i did. so you have a half-insane goblin on fire, arcing lightning, yelling "BONSAI!" at the top of his lungs sprinting through a small army at 40 mph. the group loved it, and actually put their own little segment into it. one of them asked if, upon seeing that, they could make a group intimidation check. nobody rolled less than 18 on their dice. the armies actually gave ground, running back into my wall of fire (which stuck around for 1 full round). i also managed to knocked the BBEG prone before getting launched several hundred feet backwards, though nobody knew where i ended up other than me.
@@edschramm6757 I was reading this intently until... "bonsai"? That's the miniature tree, I think you mean "banzai".
But a gruul orc screaming "bonsai" does seem rather fitting
@@zyibesixdouze4863 goblin, not orc
I often become this player as a result of the DM shutting down my attempts to roleplay or express my character
I have a Rules Lawyer who is also an instigator. Suprise!, He is the rogue.
At the last Monday's game, he tried to pickpocket the obviously-above-their-level wizard the party was talking with.
Just for the flair, I have used an extended version of Matt Mercer's new "Wristpocket" spell for the wizard when he showed his coins to the party. It was only put there for the players to "oooh" and "aaaah" about the powerful wizard who plucks the coins out of thin air and put them back.
So when the rogue tried to pickpocket him and rolled a natural twenty, I could still deny his disruption saying, "your invisible magehand catches nothing but empty air".
He replied with what is in line of "I am Hidden from him and I had a crit".
To which I gleefully replied, "With the crit, you gather the information that the coins are not in this plane of existence".
And that is how the party avoided being TPKed and being raised as zombies last week.
Natural 20s don't do anything special on skill checks. Crits are only a thing in combat. I find the whole "The laws of reality should bend to my whims 5% of the time" mentality pretty annoying. Especially for players who just go ahead and roll without being asked to roll.
@@mgb360 He used to do that as well. Rolls investigation or stealth before being told. I stopped (or reduced) it by point-blank asking him to roll again.
For a rules lawyer he seemed to forget that a Natural 20 is only an automatic success when rolling to hit. His pick pocket check isnt an auto success.
Should we remind him for you?
@@joshshin6819 This is his first time playing 5E. He said he has played older versions and a number of other RPGs. But yes, I too had to remind this rule to him the very first day he played and critted on a lock-picking check. There he even proceeded to describe how the door clicked open. I had to stop him and point out that, no, the door doesn't open. Then I assume he googled the rule and this kind of behaviour on crits did not come up for a while until the incident I mentioned above.
@@NisansaDdS but i want to remind him. With a book to his face. John Wick style like part 3 in the library.
one missing so far as i can tell: The Space Cadet. the player who's never paying attention unless the story is about them and then never knows what's going on, creating drag time catching them up...
Oh my gosh, i have been the space cadet before, thank god i had a good group to help me mature and be more interested in other characters.
I think that is just a flavor of "flippant player." 19:40
God I hate these players so fucking much. This is my version of Cody's cheater, where I probably should be dealing with them better, but they just make me irrationally angry. If you aren't gonna pay attention to the story as a whole, and only care about yourself, stop playing D&D and go write a book about your oh-so-special original-OC-don't-steal.
Here's a funny thing: I have become this type of player as an attempt to not be an attention hog/jokester. I've realized that I have a hard time not being those two things, and also that they can drag the game down. So by distracting myself when my character's not doing anything, I can create a period of time where I'm being neither a jokester or a hog, time which the other players can use to do what they need to do. It does create it's own drawback though, which you described: sometimes I have to be caught up and/or am now constantly asking about things I missed or just wanting to confirm something I didnt fully understand.
Honestly, I still prefer it. It doesn't get to the point where I'm a flippant player, since by nature I'm always excited as shit to play, and it does mitigate the other two problems I could be creating. It's also not something I do all the time.
@@VCofdaG why not just give full attention to other players?
1:50 The rules lawyer really only have one problem, they bring it up during the session. If they save it for after the session they're just a really interested player.
It is actually 2, but the second is mostly present on the "terminal cases". First is disrupting the game, and the second is not accepting a ruling and making a fuss about it.
I feel like it depends on the situation. If I suspect the DM may just have forgotten about a specific rule or feature, and that it can be solved quickly with next to no impact on the flow of the game, I just tell them as a friendly reminder; whether or not they decide to correct themselves, I'll respect the decision and keep my mouth shut. Most of the time, it's solved by a "oh, you're right, thank you" or a "Yes, but in these circumstances, I decided to rule it that way".
Now, if after that I feel the ruling didn't make sense, or was unfair to a specific player, I'll wait until between sessions before mentioning it, because I don't want to ruin a scene by starting a 15 minutes argument in the middle of the game.
@@bouboulroz This is the kind of rules lawyer my fellow DM that's a player in my campaigns is like and its greatly appreciated. The other player that WAS in my campaigns was the disruptive type of rules lawyer I had to boot from the group as talking to him outside of game wasn't helping and he would constantly interrupt gameplay to argue rulings with me. If it had just been affecting me I would have dealt with it, but it was becoming toxic to the other players to the point they would join in to defend my rulings and he would argue with basically everyone at the table till either we conceded or X amount of time had been wasted.
The rest of my group is a mixed menagerie of types (most are seasoned players), I have 2 power gamers, the helpful rules lawyer, 1 overly engaged player (not bad), 2 people living on their phones but still want to play, and a newbie. If I had to peg myself as a type, I would be a lesser version of the boss/critic. I get super excited about builds that I tend to OVER-help my colleagues build their chars and get visually saddened/frustrated when they ignore my ideas. I've been working on lessening this and I must be doing ok as none of my players have gotten upset at me over it.
@@cloudstrife8 I'm also a personnal mix of the boss/critic, though I made huge progress on it, and the helpful rule lawyer. I'm a bit of a powergamer too, but I mostly keep that in check. Now I merely discuss with other players what they could do with their characters between sessions and upon level up ("yeah, sure, that feat is good, but a +2 Dex is VERY strong for your character"). In the end, I just stop at talking about the pros and cons, and let them do the choice themselves. I feel like that's the best balance the boss type (and, honestly, most types from that list) can achieve : make that quirk helpful, and understand that everyone at table has their own. By keeping the behaviour between the boundaries of what's healthy for the group and keeping the fun at the table is how you can truly be respected as a player.
In fact, most issues players have can work if you keep in mind that the game isn't just about you. I mean, I ran multiple occurrences of DMPCs, a vastly frowned upon concept, and made my table enjoy them everytime.
@@bouboulroz I don't think it is rules lawyering if the player does not continues to argue beyond the DMs first response.
I mean i pointed out a rule mistake my DM did last session, we were fighting a boss and I did reckless attack, and the next turn the DM forgot the boss had advantage when attacking me so I told him "You forgot to role for advantage", the boss proceeded to crit me instead of missing and I took half my max HP from a single attack.
It wasn't entirely selfless though I want the boss to attack me because I am essentially a tank.
Being a fellow (hopefully former) Spotlight Hog. I really appreciate the way you explained how to deal with them. A lot of Spolight Hogs don't realize they are doing what they are doing and are just really excited to play. I've dmed for a while now and have realized that I used to do it. So yeah.
I feel like it makes more sense to have the individual player trying to hide something a slight of hand roll or something against passive perception of other players. Feels a lot less targeted that way.
I think a good way of dealing with the spotlight hog is to compliment them by asking for their help in getting other players to participate more. I walk a line between being a spotlight hog and passively letting nothing happen because no one speaks up. If I want to do something but feel like I've been too dominant in a session I ask one of the quieter players for their advice on what to do or if they want to join me in checking this thing out, in character of course. Or give them something that gives them more to do, like I found a panther kitten and really wanted to keep it and raise it as a pet but I gave it to a new player that was shy so she could have something to interact with more that's all her own. She's training it to basically be a bloodhound! :D
I'm a spotlight hog due to unwanted attention as a child. The compliments help more than the actual objection in the middle.
I’m dealing with a very difficult flippant player: the stoner. Shows up an hour and a half late, stoned af and disrupts the game while not really caring about the game, cause they see it as a group hangout for smoking and talking rather than playing
My group has 4 people who smoke (myself included) and one who doesn't. I've definitely noticed a lull in interest or attention with us smokers once we get too stoned. Fun to smoke and play but once you cross over into antisocial, attention-deficit territory there's a problem.
@@balloonfiesta15 exactly, he’s not the only one who smokes in that group, but he’s the only one who cares about it more than actually playing. But that problem has been solved on itself a month ago after he just decided to leave without us even saying anything cause he just really wasn’t interested in the game. And no, it’s not cause my game was boring, he is generally bored from d&d as a whole while the other players only want more
@@balloonfiesta15 tldr weed might work for people who also like the game and don’t see the meet ups only as opportunities to smoke , so just pick actual players
Solution: Start smoking weed immediately. Get more stoned than the other stoner. They will seem far more on point by comparison.
@@ironangel667 I smoke weed everyday (not proud of it), just not when I’m running a session
Is there a “toxic DMs” video as well?
ua-cam.com/video/FaO1JaUKmec/v-deo.html
The crab has much to say on this.
ua-cam.com/video/CnoMgm_qkn8/v-deo.html
Ha, jokes on you, we never receive inspiration from our DM. So he can't take it away either :-P
You get negative inspiration. I can make you reroll at any time and you have to use the lowest result.
@@yanderenejoyer don't give him any ideas 😁
Wait is it normal to receive Inspiration Dice in a regular basis? Even our bard dosent give us inspiration dice
Zack Nowlin, unless that bard is RP’ing a very selfish and mean character, they probably don’t realize what it means to give bardic inspiration. Either talk to them or ask the DM to talk to them and make sure they understand their class abilities better.
@@zacknowlin3214 Ever since I went lore bard I save all my inspiration for cutting words, unless it's a really cool roleplaying scenario where I want to 'instruct' a player to do something.
I have had a jokester plaguing my games for a while, however i recently started testing a way to mitigate the joking. See this character constantly makes jokes, but because they don’t use a voice for when they are in character it can be hard to tell when they are joking in character or out of character. So now whenever they make a joke that has no connection to what is currently happening I immediately play it as if their character said this in game.
So. You dont like jokes. Yikes
Let the man say some jokes. What type of jokes are they?
I love jokes the only issue is they have nothing to do with the game. Even a joke that boiled down to “this thing in game funny” is great. What they do is constantly interrupt my descriptions, and break everyone elses immersion
@@jackwhitch1015 Maybe ask them to not do that so much and explain that it's ruining immersion then lol
The issue with jokes (to the commenters) is it breaks tension. This can be fine if its that kind of game. But if you want high tension OOC jokes kill it. Forcing thin character is the best way to do without killing player agency.
3:48 For anyone confused, or disagreeing there's a difference between the problem player instigator here and the instigator player type used in other places/videos
The instigator player type is a player that does something unexpected but also still logical, or at least in-character without being terrible for everyone else. A good instigator can push the plot forward when it's slowing down, not like when a party is just chilling around a campfire, that's a necessary slowdown and good RP time, I mean when a party is indecisive about choosing which direction to go to, instead of taking like 30 minutes of arguing and decision making to end up going left, the instigator went left after like 5 minutes of discussion.
It's a balance like most things, if the party is constantly wasting healing on you because you keep going down from reckless decisions, that's hampering their fun. Smart but decisive, and has the party's best interest in mind. I think that's what makes a good instigator
I like playing with good instigators
yeah a good instigator is a gift for a Dm who is unprepared but can adapt quickly
Are you trying to correct him about a term that he invented for this video to describe a common and problematic behavior? He is not talking about what you think an instigator is.
@@jaimemnds I'm trying to correct other people that might not be as knowledgeable on terms and are confused when they see the term "instigator" in other videos, and the term means something different in that video
Absolutely. Players that show initiative when needed do a great job of greasing the wheels of a good session. Some players will spend far too long on things that don't matter in the slightest.
@@jaimemnds Yes Cody ABSOLUTELY INVENTED the word instigator! Cyanic is just as right as Cody is in the video. I have seen, played in, and run games where people didn't want to do anything so someone had to be the "Let's get this story moving." person, I appreciated that person very much. I also have had the "I'm wanna attack the guard!" player, and they piss me off!
I have honestly had more than one of these issues in a single player over the many years I have been playing, I also remember when negative AC was good and how hindsight has made me REALLY dislike THAC0!
A dm in an online group has set up a memes channel and a quotes channel, and it makes a really nice side place to keep the running humor recorded and available without it interrupting play for anyone who's super in deep. Idk if that would have worked out as smoothly in the before times but we're here now...
"DM would my character know ______"
"hmm make an intelligence check for me really quick"
players love rolling dice and at this point you leave it entirely up to them. plus you can set multiple DC checks for it too. below 10 is an absolute no. 10-15 is a yes but. and 15-20 is a yes. and 20+ usually gives a little bonus
to give an example my players ran into a tunnel dug by umber hulks. the player with high intelligence who went to school asked if he would know. intelligence check of like 18 or so. with that number he got to learn that yes it was umber hulks that dug the cave and that they're very tough and sturdy bastards. if he had rolled 20+ then i would have also told him about their gaze ability
I like the way we handle it at my table. If it's from around the area a character is from, they have a better chance to know. Also if their background would make it reasonable. For example, my Cleric has the Acolyte background, worked with angels, and lived in a large city surrounded by wilderness. He has decent knowledge of angels, demons, devils, and the surrounding area. But when it comes to strange creatures in areas he's never visited, he has to experiment with combat, making him more cautious, even if I, the player, know.
Honestly some things should be a 5 like hey dm does my character know kobolds are tricky little buggers
@@davidholmes3728 well yeah thats a given. They started out in my game at level 5 so they had base knowledge of things like that
@@kyle21843 fair id honestly put trolls weakness to fire at dc 5 as well
Funny story about rules lawyers. I have a player who's _actually_ a lawyer.
Last year when I was running the group through Curse of Strahd, just as the group is plotting their confrontation with the Mad Mage (the Tarroka deck had given him as a potential ally), she marches into the session and shoves a couple of densely handwritten pages of text into my hands and orders me to read it. There was seriously a part of me that thought that she had finally had enough of ... well, _something_ that I'd done and this was some kind of cease and desist letter.
But no. This was a detailed explanation of a series of experiments her Knowledge Cleric PC was conducting using a number of smooth river rocks, the spell Glyph of Warding and the party's Portable Hole. Basically, the purpose was to find out whether I would rule that a Glyphed object placed in the Hole's extradimensional space was regarded as being stationary or not. I ended up ruling that - provided the hole was otherwise empty; no other objects to interfere - her Glyphed stones were technically stationary even if the Hole itself were moved, thus retaining their enchantment.
Basically, she'd found a way around the restriction on Concentration spells. Provided, of course, she spent like a full day setting this stuff up and dumped all the stuff they were normally carrying around in the Hole (they _looted_ the Amber Temple; there was a lot of stuff). People could just jump into the Hole and trigger one of the stones, gaining a powerful buff that required no Concentration to maintain. The party walked into the confrontation with the Mad Mage virtually invulnerable. I actually felt bad for them when a couple good rolls meant their precautions were unnecessary: the Druid successfully dispelled the Mad Mage's Mind Blank protection on the first try and my lawyer's Heal spell restored his mind. But if the fight had gone badly (and it could have), the extra resilience would have been great.
I need to remember this trick
I should probably say that this is not an example of a "problem player". Actually, I was flattered as hell that this player had put the amount of thought she did into her plan.
That is awesome
In my experience (well, mostly me and my DM, over a variety of games) actual lawyers aren't usually as problematic as the untrained "dungeonhouse rules lawyers".
Maybe part of it is, whether you're a trial lawyer or not, you know arguing with the judge is usually pointless. Raise your issue when it comes up, then if the judge rules against you, politely preserve the issue for appeal. But throwing a tantrum in the middle of court never helps....
That's actually so cool! Personally, I love when people find loopholes in the roles and do awesome things, it really brings an extra element to the game I feel.
For number 2, My DM ALWAYS makes us role perception checks when other party members try to hide things or something is hidden in the background.
Honestly yeah, having the party roll perception would be my preferred way, might even give advantage if they're close since they would know what their party members are doing. Particularly if its not the first time.
I don't think loot hiding is that bad honestly, so long as you remember there's hidden loot and use it as rp opportunities and disadvantages for the character. Treat it like a flaw, and it can turn into something interesting instead of a big deal
@@dweebicusmaximus
I mean no ones saying the people who perceive it being stolen have to say or do anything about it. Maybe they let him get away with it only to bring it up later.
Thats how much failed deception checks between players go, at least as far as I've seen, since ya know, calling a person a liar to their face is kinda odd.
It can be good role-playing fodder regardless of how the DM plays it but I feel like at least asking for a perception check gives the rest of the party the idea that this isn't going to be an unchecked power in the game
When it comes to spotlight hogs, I've found that something like "I appreciate your eager go-getter attitude, butet's give the other players a chance to join in and try to save some of that can-do energy for later events" usually slows them down a bit without provoking any major issues.
yup, as an excited attention hog myself, I just have to be reminded that others want to do things as well and then I will settle back down and wait my turn.
Cody, you missed the emotional player who cant take being wrong or character deaths
This is def real. I def have struggled with my “attachment to a character” Vs the “wild nature of the game”. After time and effort, “the unexpected” is an amazing part of the narrative and the game, and it’s good to embrace it.
Yeah man. The player who doesn’t cheat but gets mad as hell at bad rolls? Damn, that makes DMing uncomfortable for me.
I personally find it ok if you get emotional about a character death. But the player cant let it ruin the game for them or others. Also, even worse, they should not become angry at the dm, and blame the dm for their problems.
Jack Bellinger 100% that’s fine, I get emotional when anyone’s character dies. I had a player though, who whenever he would roll bad (which was half the time usually because, you know, it’s dice), he would swear and pout. At one point, he even threw his dice across the room. It was very awkward and very much killed the vibe
Marcus, those kinds of players really confuse me. It's like your playing a game with a ton of luck involved. How can you be surprised if one day your luck is good, and the next it's awful. Hopefully the player got better overtime, or you just kicked them out.
I used to be a spotlight hog; I had my first DM send me “Travis willingham: how to be a good player” and since then, I’ve done my best to let everyone talk and see if other people get the initiate to do something first. I’m a little self conscious about it now so I wait a while before doing anything
Does it start with "be the most boring and generic stereotype of your class" because that's what he plays.
@@DaDunge Sorry that not everyone is as quirky and chaotic as you Fredrik. I guess not everyone wants to play a lizardfolk wizard with a 8 in intelligence Fredrik. Is it so inconceivable to you that people actually just like playing this game with their friends and having a good time Fredrik. People can play whatever they want, its D&D that's the whole point.
@@theowilman9782 Wow overreact much to what was just a snarky comment?
@@DaDunge In my opinion being generic has nothing to do with giving others the spotlight/work towards making other players feel amazing. Every player can do that no matter the character. I think you should separate player from character here.
On a side note: it can be a fun challenge to make a generic/stereotype player be interesting, compelling or entertaining. Insert "human fighters can be creative"-argument here. :)
I can relate to that. I sometimes feel like a spotlight hog and was also inspired by Travis willingham among others. In my experience it feels much better and earned when I take the spotlight, because anytime else I give others time to shine.
The advice for the spotlighter and powergamer instantly fixed nearly all the issues I had with one player in my group. Now he's a major contributor that flows with the group so well and it's all just so much better! Thanks, man!
I had a great friend who set up a d&d group with me and some other people but he insisted I DM, even though he had more experience with the game as a whole and was much smarter, even for being a few years younger than me. What was memorable though was how he had chosen a power character. He would deliberately manipulate the campaign story with his plethora of abilities. But he never once took away from the fun, the difficulty, and the story. He held his character back when he needed to and under his creative assisstance the story I had written blossomed into something so much better and different. A great player.
Spotlight hog: the most annoying trait to me. I have a fellow player in my group that will always interject himself into any situation even if he’s in another part of the city/dungeon/town whatever. Once my character (a sorcerer) used her strength to open a door that was stuck and he got upset and slammed the door back shut to he could open it himself and then said “that’s what my character would do”. So I offered to feed him to a demon dog...because that’s what my character would do.
sounds like something that can be quite comedic? maybe with a neurotic twist, competitive nature, maybe an insecure gentleman who wants to impress a lady or something... depends on the tone of the adventure and how frequent it happens of course. but maybe people like him need a bit more inspiration to flesh out ideas?
I imagine a big dumb barbarian going "No. I got it." and proceeding to re open the door. But obviously in this case it's different and I would probably just let them die at the next available opportunity if it was a on going thing.
Every dnd problem is always the same. "I have a problem I'm doing nothing about it and it doesn't solve itself". Every solution is always the same. Communicate in private your problem with respect, explain the expected attitude, offer solutions, congratulate players for efforts to better themselves.
And then if the problem people can't or aren't willing to change, either walk away gracefully or drop them like yesterday's business.
THANK YOU! This sums up my experience.
You'd think that people would be better about talking to others in a hobby that relies so much on your ability to talk and explain things to other people. Unfortunately, that isn't the case so people usually skip the first step of "talk to the person causing the issue".
You will either fix the situation by explaining why what the player is negatively affecting the game or you will expedite that player leaving the game. Either way your game will be better for it.
I have read quite a few posts on the various DnD subreddits from DMs asking how to handle Player D that is doing Behavior R. It's almost always the same answer: communicate with them. Be direct but respectful.
Unfortunately, not everyone is up to the task of handling confrontation.
Case in point: I was playing in a Star Trek play-by-post (PbP) game, hosted by someone who was a friend. He had a core group of us for the first ship, and had essentially promised the captain's chair to two of us, myself and another friend. Neither of us knew the other had been promised it, and neither of us chased it. The game master gave the position to me, but told the other player I was given it because I threatened to quit.
A while back I was a big spotlight hog then my dm took me aside and we sorted it I didn’t improve right away but I improved slowly. I’m better now for it.
Good on you man
Good to see you improved as a player. None of us are perfect, and I hope to continue to improve as well. Good on you.
Sinister Thoughts thank u dude
I actually realized that I was a spotlight hog when I had 2 OP characters in a row, so OP they had to be pulled and swapped out. In the same campaign. So now I'm playing a support wizard to learn some humility and help the newer players at the table have fun and get their spotlight time.
As a "teachers pet" and someone really into the fantasy genre playing with groups who are almost entirely new to rpgs I have to try very hard not to be the spotlight hog.
So often if feels like "Am i the only one who cares to rp at all!?" But taking a few seconds to let others pipe up sometimes encourages people to do so. It also can make for long silences that make everyone uncomfortable...
Ive acctually debated crippling my ability to do this by creating a character who is mute or a big part of his character is how little he speaks. But then I fear I will end up speaking all the more to describe what they do. Lol
As a DM, and someone who is both a power gamer and a rules lawyer, I approve of this video
Got a cheater for years in our group... We tried subtility, passive-aggressive things like : wow u always dealing Massive damage man or like The man that never fails a saving Throw.
We did put rules that if a dice is rolled and u touch it it's a automatic 1 since the first version was a reroll and he were constantly picking up bad rolls to have a free new one.
What have been the most successful is me just pulling out everything he did all in one session and saying : I'm not comfortable DMing you since you're constantly cheating so this is your last chance. If u cheat again and I spot it, you're out.
Cheated on his last boss fight. PWKed him and tell him to leave. Never been to a game since.
We've been too tolerant with him, but it's a close friend and we knew that it was the kinda thing that could affect our friendship so we (2 rotating DMs) tried to be subtle... Would've been better to be strong from the beginning and just call him out every single time
Did you try having a tablet or similar to roll the dice in? Should also make so that any dice he rolls doesn't count unless it's right in front of the DM.
Yeah thats pretty bad.
I'll admit there have been a few occasions where I've fudged a roll, maybe added like a 2 or 3 to it (when its like a number more towards the middle like a 12 or something), but ive only done that when I'm concerned it will lead to someone dying if I fuck up the roll. And once or twice in a really difficult fight (like a DM having us fight an owlbear at level 1), I've rolled two 20's at the same time and take the highest whatever it is.
I try not to do this, and when I get a really shit roll like a 2 I'm honest. I don't cheat to "Win" I cheat because I'm too attached to my characters 😭 and I don't want them to die.
For the Spotlight hog I use a different method. I use the "spotlight" method. I try to make sure that each character gets a specific scene where they are the primary. Something specific for them. Making one player character the focus for a scene, gives them ability to control that part of the narrative for a few minutes, with me. They get the rolls, unless the ask someone in the scene to roll for them. I have group scenes where I say what happens but, I want to make sure each player has roughly the same amount of spotlight time. If you have someone who is super dominate in the general scenes, maybe they don't get one or they get one last that's shorter.
This method has helped ME be a better player too. I've started to develop a feel for it and I will turn and directly ask others what we should do to engage them, when I'm the leader. When I'm playing a supporting character, I do the same thing to the characters that are not as engaged or intimidated.
Heck, if we are just doing a dungeon crawl, I will try to RP with a character that's not getting to do as many actions. Ask them about their past or bring up something that happened before. It's not that the Spotlight hog is being a jerk, it's just they need to learn to be more aware. Unless they are being a jerk and that's another problem.
Something My Group Is Doing For Our Upcoming Game Is That Everyone Get's Their Own,Little Arcs To Grow Their Character And Just Kinda Get Their Chance In The Sun (Example: My Human Cleric Is Very Pure And Innocent With NO Life Experience But Will Slowly Start To Grow As She Battles And Uses Rest Time To Learn About The World She's Been Forced Into To The Point That It Will Be Reviled That She's Half Dragon And Will Then Slowly Start To Awaken Her Dragon Powers And Be Forced To Choose Between Her Religion And Her Heritage. Another Example Is That Another Player Is A Tiefling Artificer That Dreams Of One Day Creating A Legendary Weapon And Part Of That Will Be Us Meeting A Dwarven Gunsmith (The World Is Slightly Steampunk) That She Will Take Some Time Out To Learn Under That Will Help In Her Personal Quest). That Way,Everyone Get's Their Shot At Being In The Spotlight And Everyone Is Happy.
This makes me want to play a light annoyance character called "The Insta-gator" that starts crap at every tavern. Then when a fight breaks out, turns into a toothless pygmy albino alligator and scurries under the floor boards.
Basically edgelord
This is super helpful as a player! I don't always realize that I'm being a problem player, but I sometimes fall under like 4 of these categories... So I really appreciate this
He forgot the sadist. I knew a guy who consistently would torture every single npc we came accross by cutting all of their tendons even if they were always willing to coorporate.
I had a player like that, I think it's because they're bored with DND, and a closet psychopath. At some point they were asking my pc how to cook a dead person into a pie.
A friend of mine would play the same character every time we played. Some sort of mid-teenage girl who was an overly sexualized sadist and an complete instigator. Some of our best moments in D20 were when we knocked him out, tied him up and tossed him in a dumpster before going into a dialog heavy part of the game. We also knocked him out and stuck him in a wheelchair and bluffed our way into a museum's archive to find a lost artefact, by pretending he was Steven Hawking and needed to do some primary research on it.
We choose not to play with him anymore.
Bro I usually just throw dudes in the bag of holding and use it as my main toilet until they die
@@ValuesNotFound what in the actual fuck thats even worse
@@ValuesNotFound
So, the key to your fantasy experience is to turn other sentient beings into garbage to reinforce your own self worth, doing in the fantasy world what you do not dare to do in real space, and skew the narrative to make everyone else have to deal with your mood-killing contempt for all things?
A problem I run into is the character that forgets everyone has autonomy. Too often I hear people say "Anita and I are going to go flank," and I have to tell them " only if Anita wants to, you can't take her autonomy"
These videos are funny to me as someone in education. It’s like “the 8 problem students you have in your classroom.” Very similar rules apply
Lol, that was my exact reaction too! I was like, "Wow! He has classroom management down!"
His solutions are all about keeping people in game (in the classroom and engaged), and trying to minimize players (students) self-marginalizing themselves. Exactly what you want in classroom management.
I was the power gamer in a Power Rangers game. Became the single strongest player ranger in our world. Being that strong was fun, but the best part was the characters history and development. He went from a sadistic and violent villain, to a hero slowly discovering his humanity and learning to deal with the trauma of his past. Definitely a character and story I'll always remember.
How to beat a meta gamer: Threaten them with homebrew. Never say what monsters are homebrewed and which arnt. All there knowledge goes out the window and it can become great roleplay. "*Rolls well* Stereotypicaly they have high physical and low mental stats, so that may be good to try, but keep you eyes out, I could be wrong."
A comment that should give them pause - "That's what the book says, yes." If after that subtle warning (delivered as unsubtly as you like) they continue to assume the book is gospel, they will probably have a nasty shock when the monster they are fighting turns out to differ substantially from the as-written archetype.
One thing I used to do was penalize xp for them for ruining an encounter with bad role playing. I always reminded players before the campaign that they were playing a new character and their characters have no initial experience or very little experience with most of the monsters in the realm. If they didnt act like it and began spewing stats out of character from the monster manual during an encounter I would dock everyone's experience for the encounter. At the end of the night I let everyone know how much exp. they lost because of that one players antics. Usually much glaring and mumbling under the breath ensued at the guilty party and that person got the message. If they got pissy and decided to do it anyways just to ruin the fun then I would stop penalizing everyone and just their character. If it persisted then their character would meet with an unfortunate situation that caused them to get their tongue cut out and I would tell them they weren't allowed to speak until someone cast regeneration on them. (Which would be when they exited the dungeon and went back to town as they were low level players without regeneration spells) If they tried to continue to speak anyways without mumbling incoherently and roleplaying what happened to their character then I would politely kick them from the game session and told them they could come back whenever they felt like playing right.
@@badbishop1049 You sound like an asshole, if your playing with players with experience come up with unique monsters or something different rather than forcing your players to intentionally play the game poorly, their comes a time for roleplay but expecting players to do stuff that they know is wrong and avoid stuff they know is right because its meta knowledge is just bad form. If players are opening the monsters manual mid encounter or trying to learn new Out of game knowledge during the game you should have a go at them obviously but you cant expect a player to not play as if a troll is weak to fire, or a barbarian is weak to psychic abilities or magical attacks or a coloured dragon has resistance to that type of damage.
@@majorscrub2856 Maybe I was. I'm willing to consider that possibility. But it got results and I only had one player ever quit on me because they didn't like the way I ran the game. Maybe you're just a little to sensitive if you think my way was to harsh.. Ever consider that possibility? Also this was 3rd edition.. I havent played in well over a decade so I wouldn't worry myself about it to much if I were you. The D&D days are dead, done and over with for me and my friends.✌ Edit: Also the player I was referencing that was calling out monster stats and abilities was ruining the game for the ones that didn't have his knowledge and I didnt feel like making up monsters or artificial stats because he couldn't just keep his mouth shut. Example: Linda- "I'm going to cast fireball! Yay! I just got this spell and haven't had a chance to fry something with it.
Player who knows stats- "Why would you do that when he only has 10 hp left? I've been counting damage. You're just gonna waste your spell. Dont be stupid and waste a fireball."
Que Linda's disappointed look that she isn't going to get to cast her new spell that she wanted to cast for the first time without being considered stupid for doing so. That's why I didn't like it and I gave him plenty of opportunities to correct his behavior to make the game fun for everyone and he refused so it escalated from there until he finally got the picture and stopped.
@@badbishop1049 Fair enough man if it worked for your group it worked but i think there are much better methods of dealing with this shit.
One kind of player that I’ve been dealing with is a Critical Role enthusiast. I know plenty of people have done videos about the Matt Mercer Effect, but man, once I had a player with that expectation, I was shocked to see just how much they think every session should be like theirs.
Agreed
Also they tend to never fucking shut up
Xavier Wiegand “Hey, in an episode of Critical Role, when this same situation happened, they did this! So let’s try that!” *Goes poorly* “What!? That’s not how it happened on Critical Role! Somethings obviously wrong here.”
The last two groups I played in specifically had to have conversations when we started about the Mercer Effect, and to temper expectations as the DM is just doing their best with the far more limited resources compared to what Mercer has.
Critical Role is to D&D what Disney moves are to relationships.
Edit: just in case it looks like I'm trashing CC, I love both the show and Matthew Mercer, in fact I think we should clone him so that future generations can experience him as well, but like others have said CC sometimes create insane expectations on what a normal game should look like. Players need to keep in mind that not only the people from CC are veterans with plenty of time and resources to pull those amazing gaming sessions, they're also creating content for an audience.
Yeah, it can sometimes be a real big problem. This is why I NEVER suggest Critical Role to brand new players who have never played in a "normal" home game.
Something interesting is that in my tables, the rules lawyer and the power player kind of overlap. The one guy who knows the rules and want them followed is the one most capable of abusing it.
I mean it makes sense. If you know what the rules are, you can do whatever that is allowed within them.
Honestly I have a power player who doesn’t know how the game works, once he tried to buy scale mail because he thought it was dragon scale mail, to make it worse he’s a sorcerer he can’t use heavy armor like that
When I play I am both power gamer and rules lawyer because as you stated the (RL) knows the rules and the (PG) knows how to abuse them; however, because I make a min maxed character based on whatever concept I wanted to run I work with the DM to make a backstory that gives me my own goals that can easily be accomplished whilst travelling with the party and intentionally take a back seat in most moments, stepping in if the party looks to be lost. I also mostly play supporting roles like: healer, knowledge dump, buff caster, party smith, or face if no one else wants to so that others can be the big dam heroes dealing all the damage and slaying the monsters and that’s how I have fun as a power gamer/rules lawyer.
@@BESTdonglewenis7254 so whats the problem? Let him buy the armor and fail. Enough mistakes, he might start learning tge rules, if not maybe die and roll a new character. Your problems I understand a little annoying, but seems easily remedied. I might be missing something.
Sinister Thoughts well it wasn’t as straight forward as I said, There is one magic shop in my world and he tried to commission something that could tell him where dragons are in a 1 mile radius, when I gave him a rough estimate for a price he said “scale mail doesn’t cost that much”, and I was like “did you think normal scale mail could track dragons” and he came up with some excuse, overall that’s not the problem with him though
I think the biggest issue I had was players who connect to their character so much that they have trouble separating their character from themselves. This led to them taking things that happen to their character personally and even exploding at the DM over character deaths despite it being addressed as a possibility in session 0. I had to talk with players and they told me their character was a coping mechanism for some issues they were dealing with irl.
This was addressed by reassuring the player I wanted to support them emotionally but also setting clear boundaries. To help we presented character creation as a new exciting opportunity to explore and honoring their character's death in a respectful way.
Helping the player generalize D&D as an escape instead of a particular character while alsl setting boundaries so everyone can have fun ended up helping a lot.
this deserve to be way higher up in the comments, why is it not?
I've never really played DnD, and I don't know what any of this means but I am fascinated-
I hope you get to play it one day!!! It's amazing!
Oh you poor thing, you are missing out on so much😂😭
You really have to play it one time. If it doesn't suit you who cares. A year ago I didn't think good of this game and now I have characters with more than 10 pages of backstory and so on. This game had such a great impact on my life till now and I don't think that I will stop playing it. It's one of the little things that make life much sweeter
I've played once and it was not fun, however I don't think that it's a bad game, I really hope to play again someday, just with different people.
My friends got me started in D&D last month, and we've been having a lot of fun, and it's pretty easy to learn by doing. 😊
Our group cheater was bought a dice tray by his gf and now every pc rolls into the same central dice tray so he can't really pull anything anymore. The rest of the table basically handled it for me.
I was the attention hog at one point, until one of the other players looked me in the eye and said "The game isn't just about you, you know". Which burned, but also got me to rethink my attitude.
"I was a million dollar sales rep at 23" humble brag
He sounds like an internet guru except all he’s trying to sell you is free advice about dnd
if i catch someone cheating on purpose then i'm giving them one warning. if i catch them cheating again then they're out of the game. no tolerance.
I start every session zero with my 3 game rules, which usually go a long way to curtailing most negative behavior. They are easy to remember and players often use them to keep each other in check. They are 1. Be Heroic 2. Be Respectful and 3. Be Responsible.I then give examples of what I mean by each of these, but it's funny how a problem player gets corrected by a peer without any DM involvement at all. Just two weeks ago, a player was getting a little frustrated that his character was being chastised in-game by another character for in-game behavior that inadvertently harmed the other character. The player didn't like his character being confronted and said, "I punch him in the face." Before I even had to say a word, two other players jumped in and reminded him that PVP breaks rule 1 since heroes in a group would talk it through and accept criticism without resorting to violence and also rule 2 since he wasn't being respectful to the other player by allowing him to role-play the event naturally. This was an online game, so I muted myself and turned away from the camera so I could laugh without the player thinking I was making fun of him. I wasn't. I found it not only funny that they immediately enforced the rules on themselves collectively, but also extremely heartwarming that they cared enough about the game and each other's fun, that they wanted to use their agreed upon rules of conduct to ensure this. The result was great. The player said, "Yeah, OK. I didn't think about that." He then jumped back into the role and, in character, said, "Yeah, well it wasn't my fault. The spell was cool, and you didn't get out of the way." It was perfect. That's what his character would say and do. His character wouldn't punch the others. He'd blame them for his recklessness. They all know he's a loose cannon, so he's not exactly wrong.
I'm not sure I'd 100% agree with your "be heroic" rule, unless your party is literally filled with nothing but Lawful Good paladins and their ilk.
The best stories and characters in all of fantasy tend to be characters with flaws, not characters who are always heroic all the time. Frodo was scared and lacked the inner courage to take the ring all the way to Mordor, and this let Sam become a much stronger supporting character. But in your world: "No, Frodo has to be heroic, he isn't allowed to get scared."
Or take someone like Tony Stark, an arrogant narcissist that is an extremely memorable character. But in your world: "No, Tony Stark isn't allowed to get mad at Captain America. THEY MUST BE HEROIC AT ALL TIMES"
@@trapical You telling him what he means with your straw man version of his rules is pathetic.
@@trapical I agree. Being getting isn't flawless. Like I stated, I give examples of each of the rules. I just like to make them short for reference. It's a trick used in education for easy recall. Being heroic in our games is standard since I only allow evil characters for one shots. I just don't enjoy evil campaigns, so we run them from the heroes side.
These three rules are great! I'll definitely keep that in mind if I ever DM!
1:20 Rules lawyer
3:47 The Instigator
6:57 The Spotlight Hog
8:45 The Cheater
10:05 The Power Gamer
14:50 The Jokester
16:08 The Metagamer
18:10 The Boss/The Critic
19:40 The Flippant Player
One time a group I was in had an "instigator" Barbarian who literally attacked city guard for stopping him on the street. This was early on (level 2) so with a little buff from our Cleric my Paladin managed to grapple him down and help the guards tie him up. The session ended on a bit of a cliff-hangar not only for the characters, but also for the players because Barb wasn't very happy that we ganged up on him, even though he was "role playing" his super prideful Conan facsimile (fair enough, but he didn't have to take it to such an extreme), and we weren't very happy with him for trying to start a war with the only city in the area.
Our DM however, was a goddamn genius. In our next session he went through what the rest of the party was doing after Barb was hauled off the jail, then turned to the Barb and started a separate 1-on-1 scene with him in the jail. He used the Barbarian being in prison as a plot point to meet a very important NPC in the cell next to him; the overthrown Lord of the city. This led to a great plot of intrigue and secret cults all from the Barb wanting to start a riot over nothing because he was bored. Suffice to say, we the players turned the instigator into a real team player by showing him that: his actions have consequences (we won't tolerate any BS) and the DM still encouraged him to roll with the punches by making said consequences into a plot point.
I find that setting clear expectations early on is massively important - I run my Session 0 almost like a formal meeting, but I'd rather have a serious platform where I can discuss the social contract with my players. It goes both ways of course; as much as I talk about my expectations, they can also let me know of their expectations.
On rules lawyers: my rules lawyer is a beloved member at my table. I'm a relatively new GM and I told him to help me with rules. This takes a huge load off of me, gives him validation, and since we have already established expectations, he knows to interrupt by way of "gentle reminders", and respects my final ruling. It's such a mutually beneficial relationship and I wouldn't trade that quality of his for anything else.
I also think DMs need the strength to admit when they don't know something. It is only human to forget things. Simply by saying "I actualy have no idea, does someone?" the rules lawyer can come in handy.
As a rules lawyer myself I also think we are really fair players because rules set equality for everybody and we kinda "demand" it to be as equal as it gets for us and all the other players. In good or bad situations, rules are rules and lawyering a rule can have good or bad consequences, which is the fun about sticking by rules.
An example of dealing with a jokester is like when sam on critical role has that sound board and Matt sed “if you do that during the game you take 1d10 force” and like 10 min in to the game sam did it and he quietly sed you take 4 points and then he did not do it again.
With the metagaming part, I've noticed with my groups several players try real hard to avoid metagaming by asking the dm if they can make an appropriate roll to see if their character would know things related to the knowledge they have as a player. The dm will often times let them roll and dispense what knowledge the character has and the player will have to go with that and play off what information their character knows. It makes things easier for everyone by establishing the distinction between character and player knowledge right off the bat.
My DM does that. I thought it was pretty standard, but apparently not for everyone.
I'd say I'm the "newbie"
-not really sure what most things do
-gets worried when it's my turn, because I don't want to slow down the game
I chose sorcerer, and I was very bamboozled, I didn't even know what scorcery points did until like the 5th session
I'm just going to pick fighter next time ;~;
Don't feel bad, I'm playing druid, were level like 6 now and I just found out that cantrips aren't something I can swap out like my prepared spells.
I had it in my brain that cantrip just meant "free spell" and so of course I can swap it daily after my morning meditation bc why wouldn't I?
Then I found the lvl perk for druids that I could swap 1 cantrip out at x lvl and had my "wait a second.." moment
Our DM is new and the party is pretty big so I can't fault them for not catching it sooner but yeah xD there's plenty of stuff to catch newbies up lol
I totally understand it, I wanted to play a caster but there is too much information for new players, plus you need some experience to know when is the perfect time to use your spell slots etc. I advice every new player to go for martial types especially fighters or any archery class can be as simple as you want in combat and rp .
I fully support any decision you make for future characters, but I have a suggestion for you. If you're still having trouble figuring out the nuances of how to play a sorcerer, then you can reach out to one of your group members who maybe has more experience with it, or your DM, or even a friend outside the group who may have experience with it, and ask them for help with learning how to play your class as effectively as possible. If there's one thing I've learned about D&D players, it's that they're one of the most welcoming and helpful communities out there. You can have them help you learn how to use the mechanics to greatest effect, go over sample combat sequences with them, or look up videos here on youtube that go over the best ways to play a sorcerer. If you have a question, there's almost definitely at least one really good answer out there.
Also, that hesitancy can be a really interesting facet to your roleplaying; you can have your character be gunshy, or pacifist, or just not confident in themselves. This sort of thing leads to GREAT character building as the campaign continues on. Even if you're no master, there will inevitably be times when things click into place and you know EXACTLY how to deal with a situation you're facing, or you save the party, or you are the secret weapon who proves to be the difference against a tough boss. And because of that contrast against your struggles at the beginning, these moments will make you look even more like a badass, and it'll also be that much more fulfilling for you personally.
Besides, that's the natural process of character development in D&D in the first place: at the beginning, your character is... well, a beginner, and they have to gain a lot of their strength and power the hard way over the course of a rugged campaign where you're ultimately doing things that normal people couldn't do, and so you have to grow gradually into the role of being an extraordinary person to meet this seemingly impossible challenge. Because even though it seems impossible at level 2... it won't be impossible once you're at max level and wasting fools.
New players are not "problem players", they're a glorious gift to the entire hobby community. Every single one of us, from the grognard neckbeard chowing down on meatbread while telling tales of elder days when "Dwarf" was a Class, to the complete rookie who's wondering what all these weirdly shaped dice are for share one thing: We were all new once.
May your ale always be cold, your loot always plentiful, your party never split, and your Natural 1's always be dramatic.
Welcome to the hobby, friend.
I realized I’m the flippant player, and this video helped me to realize that, and I’ve been trying to stop, so thanks
The most important thing about all of this is communication. I see so many posts online from people asking for help on how to combat a problematic situation at the table, without having talked about it with the person who‘s causing it.
Most of the problems I have been part of or witnessed while playing dungeons and dragons were solved by just talking it out. People often don’t know that their behavior is upsetting somebody and making them aware of that is often the easiest way to success.
That is if they‘re a decent human being and capable of taking critique gracefully and bettering themselves.
This should probably be the takeaway. If you‘re having a problem at your table, talk about it and if the other person is a decent human being, they‘ll make an effort to change their behavior. If they don’t and continue to ruin the precious time you guys have together, give `em the boot.
Bingo! Most of these issues can be resolved through managing expectations and communicating effectively.
These same basic rules apply to any set of interpereonal relationships. It's almost as if players are...people!
As someone relatively new to D&D, playing in a large party for the first time. I really appreciated having a rules lawyer in our group. I could check things with them without having to interrupt our DM or slow down combat. Within three short sessions I was competent enough that they weren’t really shooting corrections at me anymore.
yeah, my experience as well, it's really helpful not always having to interrupt play to discuss some rule-questions =)
Imagine a party of 9 and it's just these 9 types
thats my party.... Im gonna make em all watch this video.
We had to introduce the "Three Second Rule" for one player many years ago.
He was nimble, (the player... not his characters so much...) he could roll a d20 with real precision. It rarely rolled more than 5 or 6 inches out of his reach, and he was able to scoop it up with his other hand the instant it stopped rolling. Long enough for him to see the result, but no one else.
He got a LOT of good of rolls.
He was a bit of an ass out of character, and none of us wanted to deal with his inevitable bullshit if anyone called him out on this behaviour.
So Chris... (one of my longest running players, and my absolute hero in this instance) decided, "OK... I will start doing it... I'll make a really obvious cheat, Eden can catch me out and we can introduce a house rule that all dice have to sit for three seconds before they can be picked up!"
He took one for the team and all three of us had to control ourselves to not laugh like hyenas when Paul, (the real cheater...) was the one most annoyed at Chris for his "Cheating!"
We all knew that he was really annoyed that his favourite cheat was over...
He hit for crits a lot less often afterwards.
Funny, that...
For spotlight hogs: I have one in an upcoming campaign, and I have preemptively asked for his "help to get the other players involved in play" so it shifts the attention from him over playing to players that could be doing more (given a chance) and he was super receptive
Many of the players in my group are power gamers, and I've never found it to be a problem. Giving decent magic items that are based on characters can be a great way to artificially balance the group as well (sometimes). While yes, it does take more time to make encounters interesting and challenging, you can have a lot more fun experimenting with abilities. Facing an ancient white dragon in its lair? Take out the dark souls playbook and give it a lair action that spawns hundreds of sharp icicles on the ceiling that fire upon characters on the battlefield; which then summon ice elementals to attack the party. Give it spells it can cast as a legendary action if needed, and a rampage ability that lets it stomp around the battlefield while incased in a magical ice layer that gives it temporary nullification to certain conditions. Just enjoy creating ridiculous encounters that your party will need to work together to come out on top. That being said, if you are running a published adventure, (not AL) dig into the lore of the foes you face and buff them how they are portrayed to be. I've never had players complain that monsters were "too unfair" as long as everything is thematically appropriate.
It just gets rough when you have a basic party except krogg the destroyer with a 32 str, and 187 HP at level 6. Anything the rest of tge party are capable of fighting he one hits before thet even get a chance to play. So nobody else gets to participate. And when you send something thay challenges him, the rest of the party gets one shotted. It can be managed but it is a pain.
@@sinisterthoughts2896 If you do have a player that is so unbelievably overpowered that they completely overshadow other players, (within the rules of course) then you can then go Cody's route of having a conversation with said player. Every group is different and my solution definitely isn't a one size fits all option (I imagine most groups aren't like mine). It was simply a call for the DM to play to their creative abilities when confronted with a party that punches above their weight.
@@thesargeras1532 Definitely a strong solution. I've run games in other systems where it is intended that the players work towards demi-godhood, and outrageous encounters are the standard. If the group (as a whole, mind) enjoys the high powered lifestyle, then as a GM there is no need to hold back. Throwing some ridiculous overpowered behemoth at the group and seeing how they can juggled their obscene powersets to stop it can actually be entertaining in its own way.
But I think thats something to address near the outset - if half the group are playing Krogg the Destroyer and his Dreadnaughts (I may steal that name @Sinister Thoughts) and the rest have put together a gumshoe detective team, something needs to be adjusted right at the start.
@@stealthington Again, this was simply the solution for my table. If you and your players have a different way of playing, then they'll obviously need a different solution.
@@thesargeras1532 Sure, every table is going to be different. Apologies if I sounded critical - your example was amazing, by the way.
I love your psychology on the importance of language for getting people on your side.
I've literally given talks at conferences to medical professionals on the importance of doing things like saying "help me out" and "I know you'll understand because you seem very smart" etc.
It starts you and the 'problem person' on the same 'side' so their energy goes towards progressing the common goal instead of progressing the oppositional goal.