What are your red flags that a game is going to be a painful ordeal? What triggers your autism in your gaming group? What are some warning signs of an impending magical realm that you've personally experienced? What do you just not enjoy in your group or in gaming in general and just want to bitch about?
To get started, I know a couple people who fancy themselves amateur RPG designers. They're always trying to get me to playtest their games, and normally I would be happy to do this, except for one problem.
They never take any advice anyone gives them. Try to tell them that this rule doesn't make sense, this mechanic doesn't scale well with the rest of the numbers, there's no reason for this many skills, that nobody in their right mind would ever take this option when that one is available, and they get huffy and offended as if they had just been personally insulted.
>Make DM utilizing female DMPCs who are all romancable
>>43864462
So the DM does this, or this is requested by the players?
>>43864326
As a Rogue Trader player, anything that suggests the character is affiliated with Chaos.
We're pretty lenient on tech-heresy and xenophilia that involves Man ending up on top, but start bringing Daemons into the equation and we were murderfuck you with our tricked out Sentinels and Stormtroopers and an Astropath who likes to turn people inside-out with her mind because she just does.
>>43864326
Why oh why do players always insisting on capturing and torturing enemies? Like every player I've had has seemed totally nice and honest but then as soon as the chance comes, they're busting out knives and hot pokers.
>>43865348
I read that as "knives and hot pockets." Glad it wasn't, there's a line even when it comes to torture.
Mostly for me, it's just the people.
Two players in particular at my FLGS
Anon 1; will blatantly yell rules at you if you make even the slightest mistake, or if he just believes you've made a mistake when you haven't. He stares at you like you are disabled for not knowing an abstract rule that hardly comes into play
Anon 2; Thinks it's funny to be 'that guy' in every single fucking game. It was funny once or twice, now he is a burden to be around
![1446469554570[1].png](https://i.imgur.com/pHl910e.png "1446469554570[1].png")
I hate when players make unasked for skill check. Sometimes I skip checks to speed up encounters that don't interest my playersand they start looking up shit on their cell phonesbut I have a player who's always rolling dice.
>enters the tavern
>rolls D20
>I made a spot check, what do I see?
>rolls D20
>I made a listen check, what do I hear?
I keep reminding him that I'll ask for rolls when I need it and some skills are secret rolls/unnecessary but he keeps rolling.
Then I have a player who's always asking when he can act but doesn't follow who's turn it is during combat encounters. When we're out of combat he'll still ask if he can act/speak while the others are already role playing. It wasn't a big deal at first, but now it irritates me more every session.
It absolutely disgust me whenplayers starts texting/checking facebook/reddit/youtube/what ever the fuck they browse on their phone while we play. It had gone to the point were one of them had audio on, showing some dumb 9gag shit to an other player.A lot have change since.I don't mind if they look up roles or talk OOC but the cellphone is plain disrespectful when I spend my weeks preparing for those games
>mfw it feels good to get it out
>>43864326
>Anybody uses the word loli, shota or any fetish words out of context of sexy times.
>HFY shit
>Edgy, angsty or emo characters with long backstories for a level 1 PC
>Chaotic Randumb
>/tg/ memes
>Magical realm, not fading to black, and superfluous sex houserules.
I've actually left a campaign when this one popped up. I don't want some 60 year old grognard with an old school neckbeard talking about sweaty sex between an elf and dwarf while in his cramped basement. And then giving them bonuses to attack, reflex, and other things the next day. For a 4e D&D game.
>Immature, idiotic, or otherwise dumb characters and players that wont get into the mood of the game
>Being a creepy weirdo above and beyond average nerdiness levels aka you come off as a serial killer
>Hygiene issues
>Degree metagaming (Having a physics, chemistry or such major and trying to bullshit the game with it)
>>43865348
I'll never torture as a good person, or a soft person, and I'll always intimidate and coerce before ever trying to actually apply the knife to the poor sap.
It's not like torture is actually that effective, besides.
>>43864326
Red flags?
There's a list somewhere of the classic mistakes of DMing. I've stumbled into games where many of these have been made, one or another. And one game with all of them.
>DMPC accompaniment that is needed to solve all problems
>NPC introduced via one-shotting an encounter that would challenge the party
>experienced party seeks-aid/taken-prisoner of organization that vastly out matches them, wonders why said organization isn't solving the plot already
>all non-damsel women in-universe are evil somehow
>all NPCs are always skeptical of the party, never lending even basic aid unless leaned on with skill checks or bribery
>any NPC that provides major assistance or information always gates it behind some form of quest or errand, no matter how inane the situation or how obviously beneficial for everyone their helping the party would be
>random encounters are almost purely so, with little sense of environment or ecology, but always happen during the third shift at night
>the world exists only to enable the broad plot, the dungeons, and the existence of the BBEG and the MacGuffn; everything else has no history and is a shallow set piece you are expected to travel by without question or thought
>>43865588
>>Degree metagaming (Having a physics, chemistry or such major and trying to bullshit the game with it)
I had this happen once and had to call the guy out on trying to make gunpowder with his 8 intelligence barbarian that had no skills in alchemy or nature.
For such a smart guy, he sure was an idiot.
>>43865476
Tell them to at least ask if they can roll first before rolling their dice. Basic etiquette there, otherwise you can just void the roll.
For the other guy, I'm not sure what to suggest. I'm assuming you're in a real world game, so try to get your party to try and act a certain way or use an accent when talking in character so it's clear what's IC and OOC.
You can't avoid looking up rules or talking OOC (though you should encourage players who aren't involved in what's going on to pay attention anyway), but just tell people to leave their phones in their pockets and on silent during game time. Confiscate them for a session if they're being insistent about it, and maybe they'll actually follow along and realize they can have more fun this way.
>>43864326
>ok we're playing a scifi game
>but you're suddenly dropped into a fantasy world, WOOOOOAAAAAH
>ok we're playing a fantasy game
>but you're suddenly dropped into a scifi world, WOOOOOAAAAAH
You're not clever. You're a cunt.
>>43866485
I feel like you're still salty from Banished Quest.
>>43866496
Last time I had anything to do with a quest was my attempt at running one half a decade ago.
>>43866496
I'm just salty because I lost the waifu war but whatever
>>43865348
Ive seen so many people do this, but my current group wont at all, they catch me off guard because I have stuff prepared for interrogations but they will usually just kill if they seem like fighting to the death, or disarm them and send them on their way. Its kinda nice for a change.
>>43864326
>They never take any advice anyone gives them.
People who can't handle a critique have no business sharing their creations, in my opinion.
>>43864462
>>Make DM utilizing female DMPCs who are all romancable
That would certainly be a red flag, I'm just wondering how one would know they are all able to be romanced.
Because if the GM is straight up stating that and romance isn't a core mechanic of the game, I'm out.
>>43864326
The spoiler here >>43865476 is my major trigger, even though I've mostly just seen it here on /tg/.
Other than that, I just have a pretty good sense of dickbaggery and won't put up with it from strangers and don't befriend people who engage in it.
To put it in words, if a player makes it clear that their enjoyment is more important than anything else going on, then they are acting like a dickbag.
>>43864326
Blatant, shameless favoritism. Including, but not limited to;
>party wizard is DM's wife and is a pyromaniac in an all-good party, items that exclusively benefit this drop every fight, without fail (some characters only received one magic item since starting the campaign a year ago)
>DM used to run WoD LARPs, invites 20+ people to his small house, then decides to only interact with/give plot to an engaged mutual friend with the biggest tits/whomever he feels is a great roleplayer thus a part of his "inner circle"
>DM is gay and frequently goes to a strip club, invites random guys over and tries to woo them with his "generosity" in a game with far too much backstory to absorb in one sitting, but insists on telling him anyway. This wastes the entire slot for the session and most of us had given up to do something else for the day.
I do have a wife of my own that I game with frequently, but I don't pander to that bullshit. Probably because my wife doesn't need to be bribed to stay in my/our games anyway.
>>43864326
>What are your red flags that a game is going to be a painful ordeal?
The GM threatening to pull off the mask.
>invited to a Pathfinder game
>GM pulls out a binder of houserules three fingers thick
I mean, Pathfinder is busted-ass trash garbage, but we might as well be playing something else entirely at this point.
>>43869000
That about sums up the experience with one of the people I was talking about, yeah. The other one tries to defend his indefensible choices and gets mopey when he's shown how bad his designs were, and by that point he's too far gone to listen to suggestions or advice to fix anything.
>The GM kept prompting us to check for glory holes
>>43865846
I never understood why people need to make DMPCs solve problems that are not pre-destined to be failed by the group. The only time i've done something like that when my DMPC was an ancient lich who knew a dead language (pun not intended) that was needed to open a door. But even then the party could've kept searching for other ways to get through/behind the door. Otherwise the DMPC was just there to guide, make snarky remarks and help in a few fights designed to be unfair without the lich (that is to say the BBEG was there which the lich had to grapple with while the party was dealing with the mooks).
>>43864326
>"My character is the bastard of the king"
>First major encounter we are confronted by a dragon GOD
>GM never prompts the party to do everything and says "well you yourselves should have a little bit of initiative"
>WoD
>"This game is X-friendly" no matter what friendly it is
>Every NPC has a tragic backstory
>Homebrew steampunk elements in a fantasy setting
>>43864326
>>43871045
>and help in a few fights designed to be unfair without the lich (that is to say the BBEG was there which the lich had to grapple with while the party was dealing with the mooks).
That bullshit right there.
>>43871120
I've nothing to defend it with, it was bullshit, but shit has happened once and never again.
>>43866429
>Tell them to at least ask if they can roll first before rolling their dice. Basic etiquette there, otherwise you can just void the roll.
This, when ever I described a scene and they "roll for spot" I restart my narration from the beginning so they understand there's nothing more to see. Samething with diplomacy on NPCs that are already friendly.
>You enter the room and see a table
>I roll for spot!
>You enter the room and see a table
players asking me to include a new race into our lore
>you see , these thing are from the parrallel world of the "nothing"
>why is it called nothing ? there are a lot of things
>okay , everything looks and acts evil , because of the anti-mana , which is comparable to the anti-matter in the way it reacts with...
>but why should it make them evil?
>because it is the anti-form of...
>BUT PHYSICAL OR ARCANE LAWS HAVE BY THEMSELVES NOT THE POWER TO ENFORCE IDEAS INTO BEINGS ,EXCEPT WHEN A GOD IS INFLUENCING THINGS TO BE EVIL BY INJECTION THE CONCEPT OF EVIL INTO THEIR HEADS AND MAKE THEM FOLLOW IT.png
>but muh moralic justification for bashing their heads in
thats the problem i have with my players , people thinking i am this much of a democrate when it comes to campains
>>43871474
if you're a demo crate you shouldn't be so explosive
Our GM haves an obsession for massive breasts, so quite often a female NPC shows to be a sex bombshell with boobs the size of medicine balls.
>>43865588
>Degree Metagaming
Oh jesus christ, I've had this happen a lot with my Uni group. Most of the group is in engineering/physics/chem so this kinda shit pops up from time to time. I'll never forget the time the DM busted out a graphing calculator to determine the exact time and fall distance for a jump check off of a roof. There was another time, with a Mutants and Masterminds game. One guy made basically The Flash, if he was made out of lightning. Super speed, lightning powers, the works. DM can't contain his autism at figuring out exactly how that would work, being made of energy, blah blah blah. Nevermind that one member of the party was a magic bird person, and I was a cloud of nanobots, lightning man just couldn't make sense.
>>43871782
Nice.
>>43871474
>BUT PHYSICAL OR ARCANE LAWS HAVE BY THEMSELVES NOT THE POWER TO ENFORCE IDEAS INTO BEINGS
There are no alignment elementals?
>>43871819
I take great joy in fucking with the asshole who does this. I'll let him do the maths and explain the physics before I tell him "fantastic, now roll the Athletics check at the DC I already gave you. Shit's magic, Sean."
>>43870708
Have the other one for your trouble, anon.
>>43871819
This makes me ashamed to be in STEM. I mean, for fucks sake it's fiction, it doesn't follow real world rules, it follows fiction rules!
>>43864326
Teenaged characters.
Teenaged tiefling characters.
Teenaged tiefling characters being played by people in their thirties.
The realization that the edges are not meant as parody.
>>43871913
Oh yeah, there was a guy who tried to cheese a bunch of extra damage by dropping down onto a dragon with his sword pointed down. He went and calculated the total amount of force that would cause. I directed him to the Falling Object Damage table and told him to make and attack with his sword
>>43871856
The problem is that we do have a player that is a SJW who freaked out when the GM just joked about his character, a female elf wizard, getting big tits for being on an alchemical food diet during weeks.
>>43871961
>He went and calculated the total amount of force that would cause
Then he didn't know what the fuck he was talking about.
>>43872045
Maybe the guy just doesn't want his character to have big ol tiddies or be a part of the DM's creepy fetish.
Very SJW-ey.
The last time I ran a D&D game. Was talked into doing a one-shot prequel to the main campaign with high level characters (~ level 16). One of new recruits seemed very interested. Asked lots of questions. But one stood out as being odd:
> Are you using the encumbrance system?
Umm... no? Just be reasonable, alright?
> I know you don't allow extra dimensional storage like Bags of Holding, but can I have one anyways? I can reskin it as an amulet that shrinks items so they can be portable.
No... alright fine, whatever. These are suppose to be high level action heroes.
> Can I have this as my inventory? I can afford it with the excess gold.
> ATTACHED DOC IS TWO FUCKING PAGES LONG
WTF. Sure, whatever. It's not like any of it is really game breaking. I don't run dungeon crawls that hinge on minutiae. Can you actually send me your character sheet? Game is tomorrow.
> Still working on it.
> BTW, I looked through every other player's characters and found a few problems
> Proceeds to cite A DOZEN DIFFERENT PROBLEMS, including a few powers that were changed in errata.
Ugh. Alright. Thanks I guess. I'll talk to them about it.
> Other player freaks out about having her character sheet OCD-policed, and that one of her powers was nerfed in errata. Throws a fit about changing the character entirely to a minmaxed build. I let her keep her pre-errata power. She wants the other player out. Threatens to quit the game. I manage to calm her the shit down.
Games goes on to be a train wreck anyways. FML.
Needless to say, that was the last time I played with anyone in that group. Sorry, not sorry.
Also, I run Fate. Fuck inventories.
>>43872227
This.
The GM taking your character from you and warping it without cause to something you KNOW is his magical realm?
Fuck to the hell no.
>>43871871
not in our homebrew
>>43864462
>players who call all NPCs DMPCs
It's like you want the DM to only play mindless mobs for you to slaughter
>>43872185
Yeah, I'm not entirely convinced that he did. Then again, I'm not a physics major, so he might've been right. But, I don't give a shit about how many Newtons you're landing with, there's a table for this, stop trying to cheese extra damage
>GM spends more than 3-4 sentences describing the physical appearance of an NPC
OH BOY HERE WE GO! I hope all of you are ready for a recurring spotlight-stealing special snowflake waifu!
>>43865476
>I have a player who's always asking when he can act but doesn't follow who's turn it is during combat encounters
God I HATE this shit.
>>43871924
>miscolored noses
Stop this
>>43872321
Thats at least partly your fault.
You said no encumbrance, then a player took advantage of it by cramming their inventory full of crap.
Then with confronted with said crap, you didn't do anything about it, you just said, "fine, sure, whatever."
You basically dissed the one guy who was playing by the rules by letting all the other shit slide.
You have to be consistent, bro.
>no roll, gear stolen, locked up
great i can't wait to spend 6 sessions trying to figure out the super obscure autist puzzle on how to escape the magical prison so i can actually play the fucking game
Used to referee a bunch of Cyberpunk 2.0.2.0. campaigns. Heres some of my triggers
>Can I start with a linear frame Omega (BODY 16 on a scale of 1 to 10)?
>Simple Nomad Scout with a family of 10...
>RPing a bunch of bikers like 24/7
>Letting the party babysit the Netrunner
>Players who are buttmad about me using cased weapons in lieu of caseless
>Those same players asking if they can handload ammo
>>43864326
When the GM tells me to make x backup characters, for a one-shot.
> 43873607
No, I was playing peacekeeper between two players who were major OCD in different ways. Because you know, I wanted the players to have fun.
But it turns out that's the sort of game you just have to walk away from.
>>43873516
>>miscolored noses
>Stop this
Speaking of triggers, heh
Seriously, if I could prevent or undo those noses, I would.
All I can say is that will not refrain from posting relevant images simply because the artist sometimes colors noses oddly.
>Turn up with a female character
>GM asks, "How do you feel about rape?"
>Red flag goes straight up the pole.
>"Uh, I'd rather leave it out."
>GM spends next 3 hours trying to convice me to be OK with rape. Seriously, he was creepily keen to include it.
>>43870510
What were some of the rules?
Guy I game with rarely, mostly just hang out with him at this juncture. Every game...every fucking game in the past 6 years he makes the same three characters.
>Scientist guy whose somehow a master gunfighter despite only USAF Basic training ever mentioned in background. Apparently the Air Force churns out Simo Haya level guys in boot. Tries to sleep with every female character.
> Samus Aran ripoff with the name of Sumas, Red Head instead of blonde. Tries to pawn her off in every SW game we're in without fail. Always attempts to sleep with at least 5/4's of the party.
>Wolverine/Psylocke rip off in any setting that will allow for superheroes or can feasible pull off regeneration an energy blades. Also God Tier Hacker, Master of no less than 5 martial arts, Tries to sleep with everyone and everything. Character is always described as being Megan Fox in appearance and personality.
> Never ever sticks to his characters role when we do manage to force him into accepting that his characters have limits an are starting characters. "I wanna be the hacker" always up in front trying to slug it out. "I wanna be the social guy" Always sneaking about not talking. Unless of course he's trying to nail someone, in which case, no matter how shitty his stats are, he's convinced he should be able to succeed. Pretty sure he's a virgin.
More triggers incoming
Yeah, I know this isn't really meta, but there was this one guy - it was so subtle, I didn't even notice it at first - this one guy, let's call him Mr. Ed, who would [trigger warning] always, ALWAYS, clear his throat before he spoke.
Yeah, I know, hear me out -
He didn't "ahem" or straight-up cough, but he'd do this suppressed horse whinny, "MmHMhmhmhm!" so everyone would look at him, and then "Blah-blah-yadda-yadda-yackedy-shmackedy." Every. Fucking. Time.
Looking back, I hardly noticed it the first session, but by the third, I cringed every time. I'm surprised myself, in retrospect, just how much Ed ground on my nerves, but it's a true story - hand to heart - I felt physical relief when he stopped showing-up, and I've never taken issue with personal quirks in anyone else before or since.
Weird.
>>43878912
>megan Fox in appearance and personality
>personality
>>43877524
Just a few
>combat maneuver overhaul to make them more useful at high levels, including allowing all of them to be used as part of full attacks
>entire elaborate talent system for fighters, making them a fun and good class capable of doing useful things that aren't full attacking
>homebrew monk that incorporated qinggong monk archetype into it by default
>full attack overhaul where you roll once and are treated as hitting with an extra attack for every 5 by which you beat the enemy's defense (but still allowing you to use combat maneuvers, further complicating things by allowing you to "split" your attacks)
>armor as damage reduction homebrew with defense score based on your attack bonus and class type
>new spell lists for all casting classes, limiting clerics and druids to smaller spell lists with fewer per day and fewer known
>at least 50 homebrew spells
>set of five homebrew Tome of Battle style disciplines, all with lore tying into his campaign setting
>race overhauls to give more and useful racial traits that stayed useful into high levels
>trait system overhaul designed specifically to give more trained skills (actually resembled D&D 5e's background system)
>convoluted "social combat" subsystem using social skills (Persuasion, Deception, Intimidation, Perception, Sense Motive, etc.) he said was inspired by Deus Ex: Human Revolution and Alpha Protocol, using sub-skills like Rhetoric, Philosophy, Suaveness, Browbeating, Circular Logic, Ad Hominem, and others to break down enemy Resolve and change their mind before they break your Resolve to change yours
And more that I can't remember right now. It was like learning a whole new game, except at its core it was still broken-ass old Pathfinder.
I have a theory that he didn't actually like Pathfinder that much, but really wanted to make a good game out of it, even if it meant ripping out the game's guts and stuffing in his own creations.
>>43879183
I have seen way too many people try and fail to fix 3.PF. I confronted one such man about it, and he actually gave me a good response as to why he even bothered
>I had fun trying to.
That man also now plays a different system, which is something I hope most people come around to.
>>43879329
I went through something similar to the guy I was describing there but didn't get quite as far as "three finger thick binder of houserules." I gave up trying to fix 3.PF long before I hit that point and decided to just make my own, until D&D 5e came along and gave me pretty much what I wanted.
>>43879080
yeah trust me I know. That is my reaction every goddamned time.
Another player from that same group, one who has been thrown out due to her constant fuck ups.
>Since 2013 and she caught a midnight premire of Frozen. She forced Elsa as her character in every game. EVERY. Star Wars: Cryo powers. Mutants and Masterminds: Ice Witch, Shadowrun, DnD...the list goes.
> Incapable of learning her goddamned character sheet no matter how many times we went over it. 1 year. ONE WHOLE calender year, still could not figure out a 3.5 character sheet. Wasn't asking her to be an expert...but for fucksake know where your AC and HP are and what they are.
> HATED any other female gamer that showed up as she had a crush on the guy I mentioned earlier. Like obsessively in love with him and hated every other chick that showed up to game, regardless of their interest in him (which virtually of them wanted nothing to do with him). Drove out five gamers over the years before I managed to convince everyone to boot her ass.
> Overly obsessed with Downtime activities. Which is all fine and well on occasion...but I don't give one hot shit that you want to spend 11 hours fake shopping and carrying on conversations with shopkeepers. If you want to use up your slice of time with the GM to do that, fine so be it. Don't fucking cut into everyone elses time to fake shop at the mall with fake money.
> Would rage over pick up games that occurred without her. Because you know what my character is off doing by himself is her business, because she took up the whole session with her bullshit and I have stuff to get accomplished before we go on our next quest.
>>43880214
>She had a crush on the guy I mentioned earlier
Gad, talk about a match made in hell.
Hopefully you've had better luck with other female players just playing decently.
>>43880526
Oh yes, the majority of the ones I've met (about 80%) have been competent people at and away from the table. Have one that's taking a bit of work to get into a good gamer, she's used to (IMO) shitty ass freeform RPs. So getting her used to a sheet, rolling, limits is challenging on occasion. BUT she is improving at a pretty good pace. But time for some other triggers.
> Tell player the setting. Player makes something that absolutely will not work within the group at all. IE: Party of Divinely Good characters. 2 Paladins, 1 Cleric and 1 Fighter whose sworn to the Cleric as a bodyguard. We specifically are fighting against Fiends and Tiefling minions. Husband and Wife join the group as a pair of Tieflings, Hubby: Evil Warlock, Wife Evil Rogue. Dafuq.
>Don't know if this one others share, but I fucking hate it when people can only show up or are only willing to do like 2-3 hour games. Thats just about the time everyone in most of my groups is hitting their stride, fully immersed, brains rolling around the right tracks. Is it just my local groups that do 8+ hour games?
>>43865588
>Degree metagaming (Having a physics, chemistry or such major and trying to bullshit the game with it)
Fun side note: Every game of DnD I've ever run has had the potential for gunpowder in it. How it works is based on a chemical formula that works entirely within the realm of the world's physics. It is not the same as the formula for gunpowder in our world - all that gives you is a bright flash and some noxious smoke, no actual explosion to go with it. If you really, REALLY want to, you can experiment and do ACTUAL science and figure out gunpowder.
No player has yet taken the challenge.
>>43880871
>inappropriate characters
I've had this happen in so many games it's unreal. It feels like otherwise good players suddenly turn into drooling retards when it's time to make characters. It happens even when I'm not running the game, so I have to look on awkwardly as the DM stammers and fumbles to find the resolve to say no.
>GM: Races A, B, and C are common in this setting, with A being the most numerous. Races D and E are uncommon, F and G are rare outside of this one area, and race H doesn't exist in this setting. All classes are available except for This Class and That Class.
>Player: I want to play Race H with That class!
>>43878912
>Always attempts to sleep with at least 5/4's of the party
Was this intentional?
>>43881077
Hate it so much....
>>43881115
Yes, as he had attempted to proposition several threeways and orgies.
>>43868246
Who won the waifu war in Banished Quest? I stopped following it to let the content accumulate
Dark Heresy: The group gets new members.
They all die in the end. It doesn't matter how terrible I am at everything or how low the odds of survival are.
I'll live, the Inquisition will drag me out of whatever bar I end up after everything died, sober me up, and give me four more poor bastards to watch die.
I like my servoskulls
I'll just have one little drink and talk with my old friends.
The new ones will get along with them better soon enough.
>>43865381
Hahaha!
>>43881077
For me it's always that one evil guy who just does utterly crazy shit. It was the worst with one DM I had who was new and seemed to think everyone deserved an equal go at gamesing (meaning he showered the evil dude with stuff to keep the rest of us from pulling his limbs off)
Also holy shit sleeps with everything guy. I've made some manwhores before but there's a right way and a wrong way to do that.
Just accept the fade to black because you're making the DM uncomfortable...
>>43869113
>dm's wife
>dm is gay
waiiiit a second...
>>43882981
Most likely two different DM's.
>hey guys I'm bringing my gf to the next campaign
>>43873947
>great i can't wait to spend 6 sessions trying to figure out the super obscure autist puzzle
This shit right here. If I wanted to figure out a pixelbitch puzzle or some "clever" wordplay passcode bullshit I'd fucking fire up any game from Sierra in the 90s. Just let me roll my goddamned skill or stat or whatever and let's move to the good shit.
>>43880928
>If you really, REALLY want to, you can experiment and do ACTUAL science and figure out gunpowder.
Can I just roll my alchemy skill instead? I don't want to get a degree in Fake Chemistry any more than I want to get a degree in Real Chemistry.
>>43883447
Yes, but it's an extended roll, and it may get you "None of the things you currently have available combine into it, though you can tell you're missing <this thing>."
>>43872321
I love it when players threaten to quit
>guy gets flustered because he can't get anything higher than +1 magic weapons in a low-tier Magic game (all explained to him at onset of game)
>makes a big display of it, trying to turn the other players on me by bitching about it during the whole 4hr session
>get to the end of the session
>he says that him and player x (a good player, got a ride to mine with that guy) aren't coming next week because of magic item problems
>he's all smug thinking that I'll cave with him taking 2/4 players
>don't respond, call up a uni friend tell him a spot opened up and he can play with us next week.
>turn to player x "hey do you mind getting a lift with y? They're about 10min from you and they said it's all good"
His face was priceless. Stormed out in a huff, had to drive y home but was worth it.
>>43865381
HA
>>43866307
>For such a smart guy, he sure was an idiot.
High INT, low WIS
>>43884414that's me ;/
>>43880871
>8+ hour games
I'll be honest, this is one of my triggers. I simply can't focus that long, and it means I basically miss the second half of the session while making the session that much worse for everyone else. 4 hours is pushing it for me sometimes, but if I'm invested in the game I can always get that 4-5 hour session in.
It wouldn't be so bad except that a local DM with a hardon for rails likes to run absurdly long sessions. He's still in that awkward post-school pre-real job state where he has tons of time, and the rest of the players are all still in school. Meanwhile I'm an introvert and have a full time job, so the free time I get I'd like to split between gaming and simply recovering from work exhaustion. With that, I can get to about 4 hours before I'm just done. Fortunately, he's finally figured this out and mostly goes for short sessions, so I'm willing to do a long one every once in a while... but not every other week like it used to be.
People who can't handle their drugs, but insist on bringing them to the table.
>"Hey, we should play D&D high sometime. It's fucking great."
>explaining to him none of us smoke, so no
>"But come OOON, it'll be HEE-LAR-EEYUS."
>Firmly tell him no, no drugs at the table
>Next week, he shows up and fucking reeks, smells like he hadn't showered in weeks. Takes him 10 minutes to explain why he smells like shit.
>"Haha, you said no drugs at the table, so I smoked before the game LOOOL."
>He actually yelled out "lol" for real, and that explanation took about 10 minutes, interspersed with him looking for something to eat or nearly tipping over in his seat.
>He proceeds to spend the entire game not paying attention, when he's not just nearly falling out of his chair.
>When he is paying attention, half the time he's either doing "LAWL RANDUMB" stuff like stabbing the mayor because "It'll be lawlzy"(despite playing a Paladin) or just just doing shit he can't do, like trying to turn into a dragon or fly, again "because lulzy."
>Game finally fucking ends, and the dude can barely remember any of it. We tell him don't bother showing up next time if he's high.
>He's not next time, thank fuck, but tries to badger us into playing D&D high because "It was so funny last time, we had some much fun LAWL."
Needless to say, we don't play with him anymore. He tried to show up wasted again a few weeks later and the DM just shut the door in his face as soon as the wave of reek hit him.
>>43885935
Everyone at my group works a full time job. But 4-5 hours isn't too bad, it beats 2 hour sessions by a lot. But I can understand the need to decompress from work, when I was bartending I didn't even want to game at all ever.
>WoD
>one of the characters makes a literally brick-level stupid character, who only knows how to shoot at things
>the player says that his character tries to make hollow-point bullets
>out of regular .357 bullets
>with a literal fucking kitchen knife
>because "it's easy, everyone can do that"
>say that he can't because his character doesn't know how to do that and you can't make reliable hollow-point bullets with a kitchen knife
>an hour of bitching ensues, the only argument is "it's simple" rephrased over and over and over
>did I mention the player never even saw an actual gun?
>get tired of this shit
>"Fine, roll Intelligence + Crafting, difficulty 8 for lack of tools"
>botches
>"You made some fucking hollow-point bullets, you think that they will do awesomely"
>skip time to combat
>tries to shoot his projectiles of awesomeness
>"The bullet expands too early and fills the barrel, your gun jams and explodes due to powder gases, your hand flies off, and a fountain of blood sprincles out of your stump. You will die in one minute. Next, please."
I may be an asshole or that DM, but I regret nothing.
>>43885935
I mostly played and DM'd 8 hours and more sessions. The exception being conventions where sessions have fixed durations (normally 4 hours).
What I like with long sessions is that you can really advance in the story. Also, you finish a campaign twice as fast and need to coordinate meetings for half the sessions.
Usually the last hours get really funny as the player start to mix up words. We have a special notebook where we writing all nonsens that gets spoken during play.
>>43864326
>What are your red flags that a game is going to be a painful ordeal?
Text based games
There is no surer sign of a purely mediocre game to a godawful one that will eat twice as much time to do twice as little stuff while you endure the amateur writings of 3 other people who constantly trip over one another as they write out paragraph-long actions that don't take into account anything the other people are doing, resulting in less of a coherent narrative and more four or five people just kind of talking over one another.
This, of course, is made all the worse by virtue of the fact that people who can't get IRL games are usually obnoxious and antisocial as hell.
>>43886947
Maybe I've had better luck, maybe I've been good about vetting my groups, but the problems you listed have always been more specific to forums for me; I've had some damn good sessions in Roll20.
The problem I have seen with groups around a virtual tabletop is that they flake at the first opportunity.
>>43871045
>First major encounter we are confronted by a dragon GOD
Skyrim?
>>43886918
we tend to do a 9 hour game, 2-11pm. With an hour break at 6-7 for dinner, recap, note catchup, etc...
>>43886947
I do a textbased campaign on skype going on 2 years now. Had a little bit of a bumpy road in the beginning with one particular player but he was dealt with (The Samus Megan Fox guy I mentioned in an earlier post). We tend to do pretty good, use Voice for OOC to keep the chat from getting retarded.
>>43886947
You assume and generalize too much.
>>43886947
My first ever online game was text based, a one-shot CoC game that was amazing. I wish I still had the text file.
Cellphones and laptops.
Unless the phone's being used for a dice rolling app. I've had players I've killed because they were poking around on a phone during combat rounds. I treat it like tabletop lag.
I'm pretty patient when it comes to being a GM/ST. When I host a game it involves food, drink and usually activities after if they want to partake. Everything from vidya, to alcohol to chiling in the pool or hot tub.
Hell I'm patient enough to let some players kids go Lord of the Flies in my living room.
Just show some respect for the other players. I'm there to entertain them more than me.
>As a player
"Chaos Magic"
every now and then you'll run into that one huy who's homebrewed some whacky list of odd magic effects that happen randomly when casting spells. I've seen a guy with a full blown 100 effect list. From backfiring on the caster/party up to (and I'm serious) ending the world.
>>43888147
>I've had players I've killed because they were poking around on a phone during combat rounds.
>players I've killed because they were poking around on a phone
>players I've killed
>players
Doing it right.
>>43888147
>that one huy who's homebrewed some whacky list of odd magic effects that happen randomly when casting spells
Actually, I resemble this remark.
Although, the wild magic is always optional for characters or limited to specific areas, and never that retardedly severe.
>First thing a guy asks when he enters a town is where the brothel is
>He's not even a bard
>>43888426
See this
>>First thing a guy asks when he enters a town is where the brothel is
is fine.
This
>>First thing a paladin asks when he enters a town is where the brothel is
is less fine.
>>43888426
That sounds quite historically accurate.
>>43888147
I found two lists of 10.000 effects each from one of the pdf sharing threads. Here´s the first one because why not.
>>43868246
>>43866496
Did he go Shadow Quest? This is terribad.
>>43864326
>What are your red flags that a game is going to be a painful ordeal?
-Drop ins not cleared with the rest of the group. Can be girlfriends, siblings or whatever, but more often than not they're terrible. Your blood/romantic/work relationships are as much people as your regular players are, and neither wants to be used as a trophy or background setpiece.
-Metal shirts. I don't mind the music, but people who feel like wearing band shirts are beyond tacky and usually some sort of pariah who became that way for a reason.
-Fetish/cartoon porn references. I don't mind sexuality in my games, but please don't think yourself clever for sneaking in 'witty' Ero anime or BDSM lines.
-To contrast the above: Exceeding sensitivity. If someone brings up X-Cards they'll be uninvited, and throwing a shitfit about one of the party wanting to play a Neotenic means that #1 you probably have some desires of your own to work out and #2 You probably didn't even bother to read what you agreed to play. Either way, get out.
-GMs below 30 who exhibit faux nostalgia in regards to old RPG editions and can't stop shittalking new ones. This might seem stupidly specific, but it's always a bad sign.
-Online, people trying to worm out of doing voice. Either find a text game or do voice. We won't account for your sperg, and the "I got no mic" excuse #1 Terrible and #2 see above and don't sign up if you can't fulfill the conditions.
-Mentioning character/player orientation out of context. I'm pretty queer myself but that's not enough to make me give a damn. Your guy's grieving after his boyfriend died? Fine. "AERITH IS A PROUD LESBIAN LIKE MYSELF"? There's the door.
.
-Persuasion-based builds played by people of the opposite biological sex. Crossplaying can be fine and I allow it, but this combination is 100% bad news.
>>43888540
>Gender disclaimer at the start
>>43884177
Well played anon, well played.
>>43888540
>gender disclaimer
Why? Why does this have to be a thing?
>>43871474
>BUT PHYSICAL OR ARCANE LAWS HAVE BY THEMSELVES NOT THE POWER TO ENFORCE IDEAS INTO BEINGS ,EXCEPT WHEN A GOD IS INFLUENCING THINGS TO BE EVIL BY INJECTION THE CONCEPT OF EVIL INTO THEIR HEADS AND MAKE THEM FOLLOW IT.png
I find it hard to believe you managed to convey all of that in an image
>>43889840
>I find it hard to believe you managed to convey all of that in an image
I know this can be done.
I can't be bothered to make one, so here is the closest I could find.
Sorry, it's a bit too /pol/
>>43888470
>Paladin wants to try and talk some of the whores into becoming nuns for his church, he knows of a convent nearby where they can get some help
>>43890830
Yeah, I thought of that as soon as I posted it.
But you get my point.
>>43888147
>>43885935
I agree with this.
I work full time, so I try to push gaming into the weeknights. I currently have a steady 2,5 hour biweekly session going.
I like it alot. It might seem like not alot of time, but because veryone knows it's a limited amount of time, were all focused on the game. Hardly any tangents or monty python citations at all.
>>43890618
There is nothing inherently /pol/ about guns. Talking about using them to purge the "lesser races" however...
>>43888540
>A late model Ford suddenly appears in the caster's new driveway.
What
>>43888147
>Unless the phone's being used for a dice rolling app. I've had players I've killed because they were poking around on a phone during combat rounds. I treat it like tabletop lag.
What if they're playing a caster in a DnD version and it's easier to look up spells on the app than in the book?
I fucking hate when a player presents to me a character that has no reason to exist in that game's setting. These improbable and often impossible combinations of races, templates, classes, and prestige classes that these fucking people keep trying to force into games is what pushed me to stop playing 3.PF completely.
Okay, your character is a kitsune with the vampire, celestial, infernal, half-giant, and half-dragon templates, has 2 levels in this class, 3 levels in that class, 1 level each in this, that, and those classes, and has dipped into five different prestige classes, two of which don't exist in this campaign setting (which isn't even homebrew).
So, where was your character born? What was their upbringing like? What hobbies do they have? What are their parents like? Who trained them in the dozen different arts they know? Where did they get their starting gear? How did they learn the languages they know? What are their goals in life?
Oh, you haven't figured any of that out? Fancy that.
>>43893895
I'm now going to look up one of these absurd builds, put it together level by level, and then try to figure out a backstory.
I feel like generally speaking, you could follow one of those stereotypical Asian kid paths - parents pushed them into basically anything and everything as a kid, keeping them from actually developing as an individual, and then the character in the campaign gets to experience a sort of self discovery arc. Details would change depending on build, and naturally some of the builds would actually be impossible, but I feel like that could be an interesting exercise for the more story-oriented of us.
>>43894801
I don't actually mind that kind of shit if it's a nonsense game and people just want to test out the limits of a system, but if the GM actually wants to tell a collaborative story with the PCs in a consistent setting, then that sort of character just doesn't belong.
>>43894903
For sure. Playing a character like that wouldn't be that fun outside situations where their min-maxed build excelled, anyway, at least not for me. If you want to be an overpowered murderbot, skyrim is a thing.
>>43893895
I once told the GM I wanted to play a dragonborn, even though dborn weren't really a thing in his setting. He ended up saying that most dborn live in the mountains hiding from the rest of the world and that my character would be an extreme exception.
Other than that he was just a bog-standard greatsword Fighter. I just thought that it would be cool to have a melee fighter that spits fire. So I don't know if this counts.
>DMPC
That is the worst. Every time it's Mary Sue shit and OP. It's never an average character.
>>43886826
He might be picking up the cross-cut dumdums myth from noir fiction.
With jacketed soft-cored bullets you could gouge a deep X in the tip to enhance expansion. I'm not convinced it was effective but it was certainly done and with simple tools.
>>43895553
It sounds like an excellent way to fuck up the round's ballistics, for minimal benefit.
>>43888470
>>First thing a paladin asks when he enters a town is where the brothel is
>is less fine.
What if I'm playing a Paladin of Workers Rights? Sex workers are often the easiest targets for scumbags, with abusive environments and criminally poor pay for their work. The whores have rights too! And by the gods, I shall ensure that they have them!
>>43895707
You know how it goes. One douchebag reads a wikipedia article about a thing and suddenly he's convinced he's an expert and knows better than anyone.
>>43895553
Yeah, I remember seeing it done in Taxi Driver I think and I was like 'whoa, it's that simple?'
>>43895344
Eh, it's kind of the first step towards it. I used to kind of do this, but more and more I'm realizing I'd rather play a character that already has an investment in the setting somehow. Since then I've played a lot of humans, as it turns out... Gotta get some variety in there, now that I think about it.
>>43896234
Keep in mind that the protagonist of Taxi Driver is a loon on a power trip and that what he does is not really the best idea.
>>43884177
> guy gets flustered because he can't get anything higher than +1 magic weapons in a low-tier Magic game (all explained to him at onset of game)
Could they make their own magic items? Was the opposition substantially nerfed to compensate for the sparser amount of gear? How clear were you about the gear?Is your first name Gabriel?
