Habits that kill fun in a session.

[Iceforge]

Oh man, I hate people who make one trick ponies and then complain that they are useless in other situations. That alone completely destroys their argument of "but this is all I do." If the one thing you do is the only thing you ever allow the group to do, then it KINDA isn't fair is it? I wonder how people like that would react if someone else created a one trick pony (for a different trick of course) and always complained they are useless when forced to do the problem player's stuff. Actually I would love to see that happen, get an uber combat munchkin and an uber diplomancer munchkin together in a group and grab the popcorn....

I make one trick ponies myself on occasion, but I do so knowing that when outside my one thing I am going to be improvising like mad.

Also may as well add another one that I have noticed more often recently, that is really more sad then anything:

Mr. Lost Potential-As a player, this is the guy who writes a long and complex backstory, and otherwise just works with the DM to create a truly great character with great personality quirks and a great history. Then plays said character like a combat bot. If the player is new and/or has poor social/acting skills this is excusable, but I am talking about players that actually KNOW how to RP and have done it before, but for some reason just don't feel like it this time. As DM, this is the guy who creates a living, breathing world that is completely fleshed out, and then proceeds to run a kick in the door, monster of the week type game.

I guess both types of the above can just be summed up as having high expectations and then being let down. I guess some people wear themselves out before the game even starts!

Not to mention the related one:

Mr. Smashes the Potential
This is when you roll a one-trick pony, but make sure your character has, to you, some interesting aspects to him/her outside of the one-trick they can do really good and you have the DM work with you on it and approve of it, and then the DM never let you do anything related to the other interesting aspects of your character and you feel basicly useless.

Made worse when Mr. Smashes the Potential also makes sure you can almost never do the one-trick you are good at.

Made even worse, when you are NEVER allowed to do what you are good at

[Flame of Anor]

Not ragemode worthy, but still kinda annoying:

Mr. Can't/Won't get into the spirit of the game

This is particularly annoying when doing a horror game. My first campaign was a horror game in fact. Two players (out of 5) either couldn't or wouldn't get into the horror "mode". One was Mormon, so I reckon he didn't have much of a horror genre frame of reference, and the other was (I suppose) just not genre savvy enough (the guy went upstairs alone in a newly discovered house. Should have thrown the Evolved Shadows at him then).

Was that the guy that read the floating, glowing book?

[Claudius Maximus]

I don't see how that stuff isn't keeping in the spirit of the horror genre. How many horror stories have the characters just wisely back away from the dangerous element? Not many I can think of.

[Steward]

I don't see how that stuff isn't keeping in the spirit of the horror genre. How many horror stories have the characters just wisely back away from the dangerous element? Not many I can think of.

In a story, you're pretty much doomed. Reading the evil demon book, or walking into murky basement of the evil castle, or licking your finger and jamming it into the eyeball of a rampaging Mummy Lord... sure, they're bad ideas, but you're going to die a cold and lonely death even if you just go home and hide under your sheets, so you might as well have fun first.

In a game, there's at least a chance that your character will still be more or less in one piece at the end of the session. Strategic thinking is a lot more welcome since most games -- railroading aside -- aren't a relentless march to oblivion.

That being said, I don't see what's "not keeping with the spirit" of the genre to play a character who isn't genre-savvy. If the character has a reason to mess with the demon scroll, then they can do it. Is it really good role-playing to avoid something for no other reason than, "I -- the player -- know this is a horror game and to avoid everything that looks even vaguely innocuous."

[Choco]

Mr. Cracks Under Pressure-This guy is usually cool, but as soon as his character is in a life-or-death situation with the odds stacked against him, he starts to crack. He screams with rage at low rolls and lucky enemy rolls. He snaps at everyone when they try to offer advice or even talk strategy. Basically he just becomes an unpleasant person in general for the duration of the tense situation.

[lord pringle]

The Pun-maker:
At first its kinda of amusing, then when puns just keep being made you want to bang your head against the wall

In one game I got a pun allowance. (I was playing a divine trickster of the god of comedy)

It might have been mentioned but:

The "Can't I make a reflex save?" guy
This guy wants to make a reflex save for almost anything that should involve armor class. Shot at by an Arrow? "can't I make a reflex save?" Bonus points if they've been playing for years and still ask this.

I had a player that insisted that critical hits could be negated with reflex saves.

The "one skill is as good as the other" guy
This guy wants to use his Craft: Alchemy to make a dress, or craft: Armor Smith to make a boat. Alternatively if he failed a Knowledge Arcana roll to remember important traits of some magical beast, he'll want to try again with Knowledge Religion, and then Knowledge Dungeoneering. No, Magical Beasts is Arcana, any info the other knowledges would give you is fringe at best.

The player inspiring this one played a cleric of some God of Secrets and forbidden knowledge. And he insisted that because of his god he could make Knowledge Religion rolls for everything under the sun.

Those were the same guy in my group until I did my trademarked condescending 10th time rule explanation.

You know what might have been interesting? If you took his secret knowledge religion roll and applied to to creating some sort of fluff background info like how these creatures were first created, or the knowledge that the displacer beast is oddly allergic to rutabagas. When he complains just say, "Hey, your god is one of SECRET information, not useful information. Displacer beasts try very hard to hide their allergies!

Can I sig this and put it in a game?

The One PC show:
It happens every so often, but occasionally, an entire game session ends up revolving around one PC. Most of us have probably done this one time or another, and we've probably all had to deal with it at least once.

The reason why it kills fun is simple enough: it's because everyone else ends up doing nothing.

I did this once but it introduced everyone's favorite NPC, the nymphomaniac blue dragon epic-level bard. He was the half-dragon's father.

Also on the jerk character, I had one who doubled as comic relief. People loved to hate him.

[Flame of Anor]

I did this once but it introduced everyone's favorite NPC, the nymphomaniac blue dragon epic-level bard. He was the half-dragon's father.

Nymphomania refers solely to female hypersexuality.

[Traab]

Nymphomania refers solely to female hypersexuality.

Satyrmania is the male version. /nod

[Flame of Anor]

Satyrmania is the male version. /nod

Satyriasis, actually, I believe.

[Hierarchy9990]

• Players who always play the same character. Every game, even completely different systems and settings, they go out of their way to make their one pet character concept work. Bonus points if said concept was annoying as hell to everyone the first time.

Well.. I see how that can be a tad annoying at times. But I guess some people like me just have more fun or are just better at playing a specific role or two. For example I prefer playing the more magical/agile classes more than say.. A tank.

[Choco]

Well.. I see how that can be a tad annoying at times. But I guess some people like me just have more fun or are just better at playing a specific role or two. For example I prefer playing the more magical/agile classes more than say.. A tank.

Oh I'm not talking about people who play classes/archetypes all the time. I am talking about people who play the same CHARACTER each time. Exact same looks, exact same personality, exact same backstory (modified a little for the setting, but the major parts are all the same), exact same abilities (however close they can get in the given system's class/point buy system) etc.

You know the guy who always plays Drizzt clones? Imagine if he took it one step further and went out of his way to play that same character in your next Champions game. Even Dark Heresy ain't gonna stop him .

[Hierarchy9990]

Oh I'm not talking about people who play classes/archetypes all the time. I am talking about people who play the same CHARACTER each time. Exact same looks, exact same personality, exact same backstory (modified a little for the setting, but the major parts are all the same), exact same abilities (however close they can get in the given system's class/point buy system) etc.

You know the guy who always plays Drizzt clones? Imagine if he took it one step further and went out of his way to play that same character in your next Champions game. Even Dark Heresy ain't gonna stop him .

Ooooooh. I see what your getting at. You mean who literally play's the exact same person every setting. Yeah playing with the same exact persona every game would a bit boring. I don't think I have that problem I sort of like to mix it up a bit each game, even if the characters play similar roles being the same person all the time would get tiring.

The only character's I don't play is a lore/tech buff, or the evil guy.
Maybe your guy just like playing as "himself" or something like that?

[WarKitty]

Incidentally? Groups who try to ignore or apply penalties for things outside the player's control. E.g. penalizing the character if the player legitimately has an emergency and can't show up. Or getting mad because the player with language processing difficulties wants things repeated.

[Hierarchy9990]

Incidentally? Groups who try to ignore or apply penalties for things outside the player's control. E.g. penalizing the character if the player legitimately has an emergency and can't show up. Or getting mad because the player with language processing difficulties wants things repeated.

Do some GM's actually do this? That's pretty douchey.

[big teej]

personally, the only penalty I enforce as a DM for someone missing out is them missing out on all the fun, and a slightly reduced xp gain.

everyone present gets XP for how many people are actually present.

everyone not present gains XP as if the entire party took part.

so if you have 4 people present out of a 6 man party.

the 4 players that show up gain XP as a 4 person party. (larger xp value, given less players) whereas players 5 and 6 gain xp as if everyone had been present (divided by 6 instead of 4)

beyond that, I don't penalize people for not showing up.


except for persistent absences, but that's not really a "punishment" thing, more of a "fill the empty spot" thing.

[Honest Tiefling]

Incidentally? Groups who try to ignore or apply penalties for things outside the player's control. E.g. penalizing the character if the player legitimately has an emergency and can't show up. Or getting mad because the player with language processing difficulties wants things repeated.

...Ouch. I agree, this is pretty mean. I can understand as I have hearing difficulties. I would probably drop the group for that reason alone, if I couldn't even understand and they were angry for it.

[jguy]

Mr. Cracks Under Pressure-This guy is usually cool, but as soon as his character is in a life-or-death situation with the odds stacked against him, he starts to crack. He screams with rage at low rolls and lucky enemy rolls. He snaps at everyone when they try to offer advice or even talk strategy. Basically he just becomes an unpleasant person in general for the duration of the tense situation.

Oh one of my players is just like this. He is an awesome guy and we all love him, but man does he have a bad time coping with anything that either penalizes him or hurts him to a large degree. Played a DFA with an absurd amount of HP, felt very safe with his gobs of HP, until he met my kobolds. Flew into the middle of a room to entangle everyone before taking almost 40 points of damage from a bunch of kobold warlock's eldritch blasts. He got very upset that he was hurt and had the potential to die. Got snappy at everyone too and one of our players has an anxiety problem and had to leave the room.

This reminds me of another one that ruins fun:

Mr. Can't Stand Not Contributing: Now this is a tricky one but can be just as draining on fun as any other. See, not every player can contribute to every combat and social encounter, at least mechanically. The Face will Bluff and Diplomacy much better than the Tank more often then not. This comes up most often in combat for me but it might be different then others. Sometimes the circumstances of a fight means that not everyone can contribute, but to this guy, it drives him insane. Plays a rogue? Will throw a hissy fit every time undead or constructs show up. Chain Tripper? Best not show him any flying monsters if you don't want an upset creature. Uber Charger? Tight Corridors will be met with angry muttering the whole time. Heaven Forbid they ever fail a fort or will save against anything that can paralyze them or debuff them.

Ironically they don't play casters, even though it would help fix these situations. Though they will get upset at the party casters if they cannot immediately solve their problem that prevents them from getting into the meat of the fight.

[WarKitty]

...Ouch. I agree, this is pretty mean. I can understand as I have hearing difficulties. I would probably drop the group for that reason alone, if I couldn't even understand and they were angry for it.

Mine is mainly difficult because it's a little hard to explain and it can look an awful lot like I just wasn't paying attention. It's not even really a disorder - I just have a slightly harder time than usual tuning out background noise. And our group tends to engage in a fair amount of table talk, which results in me sometimes missing what's going on.

[Hierarchy9990]

Mine is mainly difficult because it's a little hard to explain and it can look an awful lot like I just wasn't paying attention. It's not even really a disorder - I just have a slightly harder time than usual tuning out background noise. And our group tends to engage in a fair amount of table talk, which results in me sometimes missing what's going on.

I assume you've talked to the GM about this? I doesn't seem fair or right to be penalized for something like that. Also I can sympathize sometimes I have to read things a few times to understand it, I would hate to lose out just because I missed a word or phrase or something.

[WarKitty]

I assume you've talked to the GM about this? I doesn't seem fair or right to be penalized for something like that. Also I can sympathize sometimes I have to read things a few times to understand it, I would hate to lose out just because I missed a word or phrase or something.

We did work it out. And I admittedly did not handle it well the first time. I was just pissed because I almost lost a character due to not realizing there was an AoE effect in place.

[Elm11]

Mr. Cracks Under Pressure-This guy is usually cool, but as soon as his character is in a life-or-death situation with the odds stacked against him, he starts to crack. He screams with rage at low rolls and lucky enemy rolls. He snaps at everyone when they try to offer advice or even talk strategy. Basically he just becomes an unpleasant person in general for the duration of the tense situation.

Sadly, this is me. Usually i'm decent in terms of politeness and friendliness, but if a character I really like ends up in a life threatening situation, I very rapidly become snappy and get really annoyed by every non-perfect dice roll.

[Zerg Cookie]

Last year we had a D&D group in my boarding school. We had sessions on Tuesday because every other day is occupied by something for at least one grade.
Because of this very same reason, movies are screened on tuesdays as well. On occasion, we'd cancel a session to watch a movie.
But then there's Mr. I wanna see that movie. You have two of them at the same day and a session is pretty much useless, and might even be called off.
Thanks, guys. Really, thank you. I told my girlfriend I'm gonna play with you so we're not going out today. I guess it's another Starcraft II evening, then.
Next year I'm DMing and my girlfriend is in charge of movie screening, so this shouldn't happen as often

[Poil]

Dm who gives unfair rewards

First, I have no issues with things like awarding extra xp for good roleplaying individually or other stuff you can control to some extent. I do have a issue with things like when the dm rewards some players more than others for really poor reasons.

Shadowrun example: Wow you guys picked the right room by random, have some extra karma. No you losers who were told to stand guard outside don't get anything.

DnD: This is a magical forcefield that only lets through elves, like my dmpc* drow with a ludicrously oversized chest, and that guy's wood elf. You have to leave the room while we rp what goes on in there and when you get back in we'll have some really sweet new gear and hint about how our characters had sex.

*I've spent essentially all of my rping with dm pc's present and this was one of the few times it ever bugged me.

[Choco]

Dm who gives unfair rewards

Ugh, yeah, it gets old real quick when the DM arbitrarily splits up the party and one group gets some reward while the other doesn't, and of course the players had absolutely no say in the matter. I don't mind if this happens cause a player chose to not come on an adventure or something, but when the DM determines the player is not going and then punishes him... The only time I've seen this personally is in the well-known situation where the DM has a crush on or is currently dating a certain player and tends to favor them.

The Ultimatum Issuer-"Compromise" is not in this guy's vocabulary, and you have a choice of either doing things EXACTLY like he wants, or not at all. This could be limited to in character ("We are either doing my plan or I am sitting this one out"), but often it is also OOC ("We are either going to do <x>, or I am leaving").

I had a player like that once and dropped him ASAP. Unfortunately he was the ride for 2 other players and I then had to spend an extra hour total driving around town collecting everyone and then dropping them off. That was totally worth seeing the look on his face when we told him to get lost though, he really thought he had more leverage in the ride department then he really did.

[ryu]

About how big was it on a scale of one to luke I am your father silliness?

[Choco]

I would say at least an 8. Started out just plain shocked, then went to confused, then to rage all in about .5 seconds.

[ryu]

And stuff like that is why bad players are fun sometimes. Good on ya.

[big teej]

@ choco

I approve of your reaction immensly, in a similar given situation, anybody who's known me for more than 15 minuts knows almost exactly how i would react.

jumped-up-popinjay: we're either doing X or I'm leaving
teej-the-DM: okay, leave.

I must confess.

I've managed to land 2 mature, and fairly solid (or perhaps solid and fairly mature) groups back to back, and for some reason this seems to have caused a massive irritation directed towards any imaturity in gamers in general.

[navar100]

Dm who gives unfair rewards

First, I have no issues with things like awarding extra xp for good roleplaying individually or other stuff you can control to some extent. I do have a issue with things like when the dm rewards some players more than others for really poor reasons.

Shadowrun example: Wow you guys picked the right room by random, have some extra karma. No you losers who were told to stand guard outside don't get anything.

DnD: This is a magical forcefield that only lets through elves, like my dmpc* drow with a ludicrously oversized chest, and that guy's wood elf. You have to leave the room while we rp what goes on in there and when you get back in we'll have some really sweet new gear and hint about how our characters had sex.

*I've spent essentially all of my rping with dm pc's present and this was one of the few times it ever bugged me.

Happened to me in a combat earlier this campaign. The game session before ended when we were about to attack ogres. For the game session in question, by DM fiat ghouls attacked from behind. The party got split into two combats. Though I was going to help in the ogre fight, those who were already involved appeared capable of handling it while those with the ghouls needed some help. I chose to help in the ghoul fight. Combat over, those in the ogre fight got almost double the XP than those in the ghoul fight because it was higher CR.

[Flame of Anor]

@ choco

I approve of your reaction immensly, in a similar given situation, anybody who's known me for more than 15 minuts knows almost exactly how i would react.

jumped-up-popinjay: we're either doing X or I'm leaving
teej-the-DM: okay, leave.

I must confess.

I've managed to land 2 mature, and fairly solid (or perhaps solid and fairly mature) groups back to back, and for some reason this seems to have caused a massive irritation directed towards any imaturity in gamers in general.

I both agree with you and applaud your use of an excellent word like popinjay, which has unfortunately fallen into disfavor.