Hi there, /tg/. Long time reader, rookie commenter. I have my first real That Guy story, and I want to share it. It's kind of weak compared to the greats, but it's just so fucking absurd I need to share it before I go insane.
Give me a moment to type everything up, and I'll tell you the whole thing.
For context, it's a high-powered supers game where the player characters and all other supers are average schmoes who are suddenly given the chance to slowly accrue godlike power, but none of them have any idea what to do with it. This will become relevant soon.
I killed a player character tonight.
And not just "Oh, you're dead but they can resurrect you/your immortality kicks in during the funeral and it gets wacky!"
Like actually 100% dead for realsies, no take-backs.
I'm a bit angry.
Partly at him, but also at myself. I'm normally a very lenient DM, because I work with players who are more interested in narrative than crunch.
So, he has an alien symbiote that gives him new powers in response to situations.
He noticed that it gives him new abilities especially when it feels threatened.
So he started putting himself in ever more dangerous situations.
Some of them were reasonable, and worked.
Some of them...
He teleported to 10,000ft and hoped he could develop the power of flight.
When he realised it wasn't working, he tried to teleport away, flubbed the roll, and hit the ground at terminal velocity.
That wasn't what killed him.
The alien symbiote makes him tough as nails.
He broke most of his bones and spent several hours unconscious trying not to die.
The symbiote healed him up, and he eventually managed to teleport away and he started recovering at abnormal speed because of his symbiote.
So today he declared he "wanted to teleport to the turtle the elephants that carry the world stand on."
And I was like "You know this is Earth, right?"
Yes, he assured me, he did.
"You know that the Earth isn't on elephants or turtles, right?"
He assured me he did.
"Your character knows this, right?"
He assured me his character was aware of this.
"You know what's really under the Earth, right?"
He nodded.
"Instead of being a flat disk with a turtle under it, it's a sphere. To be underneath it, you'd be well inside the planet."
He grinned like an idiot.
"Are you going ahead with this?"
Yes, he assured me, he was.
"You teleport to the closest analogue to your intended destination and proceed to eat shit in billions of tons of molten iron. You are dead. Congratulations. What did you fucking expect was going to happen?"
I made it clear in previous sessions that while this setting has the capability to be fun and goofy, it is ultimately a game of childish and capricious gods who have no idea what they're doing, and awful horrible no good very bad things will happen around them and to them, and if they intentionally make fucking terrible choices, those awful horrible no good very bad things will happen right the fuck to them extremely hard.
Am I the asshole here?
>>43830664
You gave the dude five warnings it wasn't gonna work in that one conversation.
Any one of those was a red flag even for a newbie.
So, what's the problem? He obviously wasn't really invested in that character, so he did a stupid thing and died. Did he sperg after it or something? Because otherwise it feels like a mediocre situation.
>>43830643
I'm actually applauding you. That was well handled in my book. And hilarious.
>>43830858
He acted shocked and confused. His response was something like "I expected to arrive in the Galapagos Islands or something on top of a giant turtle."
Forgetting of course that that Galapagos Islands are home to the giant TORTOISE. At that point another player turned around and patiently tried to explain to him that turtles aren't really definable points in space that are easy to teleport to, whereas the centre of the Earth is.
>>43830643
> You teleport to the center to the earth. Rest in peace.
That's fucking hilarious.
Ok I think he meant well but did he think how the rest of the group would know where to put his tomb stone?
I am actually really curious about this campaign concept. Could you tell us more OP?
I don't get it. I just don't get it.
>>43830643
i would have transported him into the sun
he wanted to go to the place that carried the world
closest analog i can think of is the sun carries the earth through space following its orbit
I would love to have explained it to him like this.
That it isn't so much the turtle part that is important, its the focus on being the load bearing point of the world.
I take two morals away from this tale
Don't be an asshole and don't play with teleportation.
>>43832285
OP is long asleep (he lives in England), but I'm a friend of his and can try answering in his stead.
The main premise is that fragments/shards of unbelievably advanced alien technology have rained down on Earth. They bind to those who find them, and while they're separate parts, they also join together with any other parts an individual gathers. They form into suits, and if you get enough of them, you wind up with godlike powers. Someone with just a few shards could move half the speed of light, hear sounds on the other side of the planet, or observe details of the moon's craters just by looking up. Someone with a full suit could take a casual stroll on the surface of a neutron star, which they "walked to" in minutes by bending the fabric of space with each step (I may be getting the logistics of this wrong, OP forgive me if I'm misremembering).
So people all over the world are beginning to compile these suits. Loads of people are more or less deities now, and they don't know what to do with that power. Or they do, for better or worse. Everybody has their own designs.
I don't know how the symbiotic alien comes into play, though--that's a new one for me in terms of this setting.
Oh, but I do know that the guy who had it didn't have any shards. If he did, he could've survived.
>>43830664
Learn to enjoy it, cause one day you'll get someone worse and this be looked upon fondly.
>>43830664
No, you aren't the assole.
As I've inferred, the guy is just an idiot or inexperienced.
Why should you care though? Have him just make another character and let bygones be bygones.
>>43831000
>At that point another player turned around and patiently tried to explain to him that turtles aren't really definable points in space that are easy to teleport to, whereas the centre of the Earth is.
My friend summed up the setting pretty well. The alien symbiote was meant to be an alternative to the shards for a player who wanted a more biological source of power. In this instance just having a few shards wouldn't have protected him. Only a fully armoured suit pilot could have survived that, and we don't have any of those in the party.
I'm actually dealing with my first that guy as well.
It hasn't gotten bad yet because i've been keeping them in check as much as possible but its a pain in the ass,
We have a homebrew setting that our group sets our games in that we've been running different games in for nearly 5 years now.
We've lost players and gained players but one of my mates has been there since the start.
However my friend just got a girlfriend, and we'd just lost a player, so he invited her along.
The game high powered and anime inspired, i encouraged the players to ham it up a bit.
The players made a muscle bound norse gladiator with massive points in strength and apperence.
A gunblade wielding ronin who's fallen on hard times.
A combat maid style character who fights with over sized cooking utensiles and bakes a tasty pie.
Then the new gfs character... a kitty cat.
Literally a cat, not even a furry catgirl just a straight up cat.
I eventually convinced her to play a cat girl but it was not a great start.
Since then its been getting worse, she'll refuse to play any part in situations claiming that shes going to find the warmest place and curl up to go to sleep.
The worst part has been her fighting me on everything,
She insisted that a grapple should kill an enemy instantly because it said "squeeze the life out of an enemy"
When i pulled rule 0 on her she started saying
"oh someone wants to hold onto their precious character"
I told her as DM my word is law but she keeps trying to push it.
So far thats about it i'll post if anything note worthy happens
>>43838261
>The worst part has been her fighting me on everything,
Drop her.
Now.
I know you shouldn't trust random advice from tg, but try to trust me on this one. I've seen enough players like that and by god, it's all downhill from here on out.
>>43838332
dude's got a point. had to kick one of my own who did the same damn thing from a shadowrun game. dude thought pain tolerance gave him damage reduction and wouldnt give up the fight.
>>43838261
Drop her.
Someone both rules lawyering and attempting to cow you into submission to get her way is NOT going to be healthy for the group. It'll probably hurt the group but better now than later when the rot hasn't set in.
Just tell her that she's not working out as a player.
>>43838415
>>43838383
>>43838332
Or....
>>43838261
Talk to her outside of the game, preferably not in front of everyone about it.
Speak clearly and in a direct and mature manner about the issues while stressing the point that you don't have a problem with her as a person and that these issues sometimes arise when new players join a group.
Then, when she continues to act like hot potato salad, drop her.
>>43830595
>>43830643
>>43830664
>>43831000
>He acted shocked and confused. His response was something like "I expected to arrive in the Galapagos Islands or something on top of a giant turtle."
You did nothing wrong.
When playing games with the mentally retarded, or any individuals with special needs, it is very important to remain consistent.
They might never learn, but your remaining consistent with the rules and how the setting works is the only hope they have of ever improving to a nearly functional level.
God bless you for your patience and compassion.
>>43832205
I mean, you could put it pretty much anywhere and it would be over his corpse.
>>43838759
Or go with the original threee and don't delude yourself that she can hear to any kind of reason.
>>43838804
It may be deluded to think she can reason,but not offering reason and discourse to resolve the issue would make the GM, well, unreasonable.
Right now, she is in the wrong and being unreasonable.
The GM should not lower himself to her level.
>>43838759
This is actually a really good idea, mainly because if it fails i've still taken the moral highground and can kick her out consequence free.
We actually left the last session with the players facing off against their first real challenge, a giant terrifying warforged monster with paladinly holy powers (the players are sort of undead) and its a situation that i can perceive being a problem for her.
>>43833950
Sounds like the symbiote thing could be a reference to Worm.
>>43838261
> She insisted that a grapple should kill an enemy instantly because it said "squeeze the life out of an enemy"
What if... it does. What if she meets a better grappler. She can't even throw a fit because "oh someone wants to hold onto their precious character".
My real advice is to make it work. Make it work so well they don't want it to work anymore. Make it work so well they'll resent her character. Go full Undertale-No-Hit-Genocide-Run for a spectator.
Pic related.
>>43839056
>if it fails i've still taken the moral highground and can kick her out consequence free.
Exactly.
I wish you luck.
Its amazing how many perfectly normal people turn into complete assholes when they participate in an RPG.
Kudos DM, you did good.
I don't know why, but the roleplaying community seems filled with people who just don't want to be there. They don't want to participate or play by the rules, and cause problems at every opportunity.
Its weird because some of them are assholes outside of game, but not all of them are.
Its weird, cause its like, "I don't come into your house and shit on your hobbies, why you gotta shit on mine?"
>>43839601
You are missing the greater point.
With many of these people, that is simply how they interact with the world.
With an entitled sense of animosity.
The feel the world should be how they want it and get upset when it is not.
In short, manchildren.
They are still enjoying themselves but they remain immature dickbags.
>>43839573
Honestly, those people were probably already assholes, the game just brought it to light.
>>43841879
Jesus....are...are ttrpg's a litmus test for assholery and retardation?!
>>43830539
Considering /tg/ was never famous for staying on topic...
Am I the only one who has noticed a huge drop in quailty in the NC's work? It started around the time of his comeback but it seems he has only gotten worse and worse ever since. Like he's running out of ideas. He even reviewed Mad Max Fury Road while it was still in cinemas, how is that even nostalgic?
>>43841934
Mad Max is a nostalgic IP. Same with Jurassic World.
>>43841934
Nostalgia has lost its nostalgia. In todays 5 attosecond attention span society what was new 3 days ago is old now comparing to what was new 30 years ago is old now for older generations. In order to keep viewers he's had to change tacts. Ever watch yogcast and gamegrumps? Just this past year they've lost enough viewers to warrant add placements in video to keep up revenue. Times change, we don't.
>>43841996
>Just this past year they've lost enough viewers to warrant add placements in video to keep up revenue.
Does this really prove anything about short attention spans though? Channels prosper and decline, it's just the way things go. Pewdiepie may appear to be the uncontested number 1 but soon enough he'll lose followers as well. It's just the way things go.
That doesn't really justify the NC's drop in quality though.
>>43842028
They lost viewers due to videos being to long and not putting out more than a video a day. Game grumps now does at least 3 a day and use a timer to keep it as near 12 minutes as possible. They used to do 30 minute one a day videos of a single series and be giant hits.
>>43842028
What happened was that Walker wanted to do more sketch comedy than the reaction based NC, so he tried retiring the character and doing that godawful Demo Reel show. People didn't like it, mostly because the humore was old and tired jokes that everyone and their mother have seen a hundred times over. When it bombed, he took the NC out of retirement and started again.
But he still wanted it to be a sketch show and tried injecting the skethes in the videos. Unfortunately, most of them are cringe inducing slogs to get through. The past few months though, it seems that he's running out of ideas, trying to make more sketches and less reviews.
Honestly, I'd prefer if he had one sketch show and one review show, alternating between them. Trying to mush the two together, just isn't working.
>>43838759
This guy's getting closer.
By pulling her away from the others, you're making it a ' thing.' and a confrontation. Just ask her, whenever, like it doesn't matter who's around, "are you still cool with playing? You don't seem to like the way I do things, and since I'm not really gonna change things up I don't want you feeling forced or anything."
>>43841934
It's because he's trying to appeal to the social justice crowd. He's not just doing it for laughs anymore, but now every review has to be "oh, how taboo and bad for today's times!" or "lol mras amirite guys?" like the Mad Max review where it doesn't even fit into anything remotely related to the show. So, basically, he's trying way too fucking hard and rather than just reviewing stuff and enjoying the charm of things, he's putting in hamfisted messages as well and taking you out of the experience.
As a counterpoint, the Cinema Snob is an actual SJW outside of his character, but the guy manages to review shit in a funny way and leaves his personal politics at the door and just makes jokes. His material has been just fine over time. He's a guy I love watching despite his politics precisely because he doesn't throw it into every review.
>>43842117
>"are you still cool with playing? You don't seem to like the way I do things, and since I'm not really gonna change things up I don't want you feeling forced or anything."
This is good dialog for this.
Ah, but you see the trick is to ask away from everyone without "pulling her away" in a dramatic way.
Don't do it in the middle of a session, do it before, after, or in between.
Some people feel put on the spot or singled out when their behavior is questioned in front of others.
If OP knew her well enough to know if she was one of them, he would likely not be in this situation.
So, he should assume she might have an issue with it and approach it cautiously but also casually.
>>43842134
>As a counterpoint, the Cinema Snob is an actual SJW outside of his character
Really? Wow, he's the last guy I'd expect to be one. He reviews exploitation porn.
I guess that just proves your point: he keeps his political views out of his show so much that they actually come as a surprise.
>>43841934
Having discover him only relatively recently and having had to go through a fucking huge archive of his videos I got to say nope.
No real drop in quality so far as I can tell.
I laughed from start to finish.
But thats jut my opinion and humor is subjective.
>>43842956
>humor is subjective
Biggest lie in the world. You either have good humor or you're a baby that laughs at literaly anything with a distorted face.
>>43842987
This. If you find yourself laughing at everything somethings wrong.
>>43842987
Not him, but I find you using that dichotomy amusing, whereas you either don't (unless you are a troll) so thus, a subjective assessment of humor.
I would add that I found it amusing and yet was able to refrain from laughing like a tickled toddler, so not only is humor subjective, there is also a scale.
>>43843023
>If you find yourself laughing at everything somethings wrong.
Whereas this is a much more true statement about the easily amused.
>>43841934
he's never been funny. he relies too much on lolsorandom comedy skits and an infinite amount of guest watchers.
At least James Rolfe seems to care about the medium.
>>43843045
>i use $10 words to sound cool the post.
>>43843392
Yo man, that's how I be thinkin' so that's how I be postin'
Don't be trippin'
>>43838261
Cutesy aloof comic relief characters are a staple of anime, if you described you setting as "high power and anime inspired" but then didn't allow me to play a character like that I'd probably think you were being unreasonably controlling. Knowing the sequence of events is pretty important here for that reason. If she started out being told she couldn't be a character that appears perfectly reasonable then that might have created a resentment which is now manifesting by fighting you on other issues in less reasonable ways. Like >>43838759 said you should talk to her, but you should also be prepared to confront the possibility that you did kind of pick this fight. The best solution might be apologizing about not letting her play the way she wanted to and giving her more freedom to do that (maybe start putting in more encounters suited for three characters so that when she takes a nap in the corner it works out and when she joins in the fights go so much easier, which suits the trope as well) with the agreement that she will stop fighting you on rule debates.
What system were you using?
>>43842192
yeah i don't know her well at all, though i feel she's the type i'd want to pull to one side.
>>43844749
oh yeah the cutesy character would be great, like the combat maid, but a literal cat, no powers no motivations just a freakin cat...
also the players were given the backstory that they could be anything they wanted, however they had all just recently been killed in an apocalyptic battle that took place at the end of one of our previous games.
They were then bought back by a fae god that is trying to overthrow the current grim reaper and steal his power.
They are all basically intelligent undead, and a literal cat does not fit into that group.
My compromise was a catgirl, mainly because there was a group of cat people in one of our first sessions that got completely exterminated, we skinned it as her being the last survivor.
>>43844866
i'm using a simplified version of Exalted 2.5ed
>>43838792
Underrated
I have a That Guy story, might not be noteworthy or anything but whatever.
GM is doing a homebrew system with me, That Guy, and two of his friends. Post-apocalyptic setting, essentially Fallout universe.
GM does introductions by having the characters all bump into each other in the same trader town, immediately following That Guy procedes to use the explosives he bought to blow up some store because lolsorandom.
We try to get an answer from him, but he speaks so fast literally no one can understand him. One of GM's buddies rolls to "knock some sense into him," succeeds, and is subsequently tackled by That Guy's character because he hit him.
Later on we find a job board and see what there is to be found, everyone agrees on a job except That Guy because he doesn't like the job.
Session ends after That Guy spergs out because we make him feel unwelcome or some shit, when he is doing nothing for the cohesion of the group. IC the GM says he went off to the job he saw, and that was all we saw of him, while the party went to an inn for the night.
Sorry if it isn't very good, happened a while ago and I'm not the best storyteller.
>>43830539
The alien symbiote survives loses most of its powers but adapts to Magma later is collected by villain clairvoyant using another villain to reach it teams thr symbiote up with lesser villain that the pary trounced.
Grats Op you now made it interesting and showed that things will come back and bite you in the ass
>>43843124
correction:
James Rolfe is fucking professional compared to almost every other you tube persona out there...
that guy is awesome.
>>43850392
Yeah, that movie he made was really great...
>>43850289
So all he really learned is that no matter how retarded he is he'll come out fine? No real consequences? You know he'll just do something similar down the road and OP will have to bend over, again, because he did it before or seem like an ultra douche with no consistency.
>>43831000
>He acted shocked and confused. His response was something like "I expected to arrive in the Galapagos Islands or something on top of a giant turtle."
And what exactly, does a Galapagos Tortoise have to do with elephants? What a fucking moron. You did the right thing OP.
