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A little handy gaming advice #1: How to be invited back to a game table.

Started by The Good Reverend Roger, February 10, 2011, 04:57:59 PM

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The Good Reverend Roger

Quote from: Cramulus on February 10, 2011, 06:19:40 PM
#5 is my biggest pet peeve. I ran a game where the rogue would always wake up early the day before they started excavating a dungeon, just so he could sneak through it without them and map it out. He wanted this cool moment of the party waking up and he's already got a detailed map of the dungeon and some notes about the monsters. He got pissed when I told him he couldn't do that. "Buh-buh-buh.. but that's what my character wants to do..." Yeah dude, but that means that you and I play D&D for 30 minutes while everybody else's character is asleep. BOGUS.

Have him come over early.

And then have him run into 3 carrion crawlers in the dungeon (hint:  rogues don't do well solo, and their fort save sucks).

When he rolls up his new character, have him decide if rogue is really his best option.
" It's just that Depeche Mode were a bunch of optimistic loveburgers."
- TGRR, shaming himself forever, 7/8/2017

"Billy, when I say that ethics is our number one priority and safety is also our number one priority, you should take that to mean exactly what I said. Also quality. That's our number one priority as well. Don't look at me that way, you're in the corporate world now and this is how it works."
- TGRR, raising the bar at work.

Faust

Quote from: Cramulus on February 10, 2011, 06:19:40 PM
:mittens:

been hooked on D&D since like ... 1994? Jesus, I was 12. My enjoyment of it has increased as the average age of people at my table has increased. I still think the hardest part of running a game is getting everybody together every week.

I'm playing with a group of complete newbies right now, it's kind of refreshing, but it's also a bit frustrating.


#5 is my biggest pet peeve. I ran a game where the rogue would always wake up early the day before they started excavating a dungeon, just so he could sneak through it without them and map it out. He wanted this cool moment of the party waking up and he's already got a detailed map of the dungeon and some notes about the monsters. He got pissed when I told him he couldn't do that. "Buh-buh-buh.. but that's what my character wants to do..." Yeah dude, but that means that you and I play D&D for 30 minutes while everybody else's character is asleep. BOGUS.

Incidentally, that same character would always try to start businesses in the adventurer's home city. So when they got back from an adventure, his clam farm would have some more pearls waiting for him. But jesus christ, this is D&D, not Sim City. The amount of time we spent talking about his goddamn clam farm could have been spent drinking ale of out skulls and we all would be better for it.

I got sick of the sim city behavior and the spending real life hours while they dick around in the shop. The shop keepers became the most ill tempered and dangerous aspects of the game, and like The Man, I kept them down in a poverty bracket that owning land or a business was forever out of reach (or until it became a convenient reward).
Sleepless nights at the chateau

Nephew Twiddleton

Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on February 10, 2011, 06:14:45 PM
Quote from: Faust on February 10, 2011, 06:08:57 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on February 10, 2011, 05:59:44 PM
Quote from: Faust on February 10, 2011, 05:58:10 PM
The saddest thing, Barring the laptop thing which I've never seen and would probably have a shitfit about if I ever saw it, is that you see this shit in every group.
And even more baffling is that the slim few who appreciate this usually have at some stage been a gm.

The worst habit I had to stomp out of the group was the magpie syndrome.
They see a shiny object and nearly the whole group fall all over each other trying to get it first.

That's candy.   :lulz:  Illusion + pit o' vipers = WIN.

I've also stopped handing out "best roleplay" & "MVP" bonus XP, because everyone gets butthurt.
Cursed ring of circumcision nipped it in the bud pretty well.

Cork gaming Horror stories:

The guy who eats sugar packets keeping the shared dice in his bellybutton that hangs over his trousers, then putting the shared dice in his toothless mouth.

The misogynist creep who nearly drove away the one girl in the gaming group by continuously coming onto her, when not belittling her.

The guy who insisted on crossing his fingers and putting on a paper hat when he was speaking out of character.

The scat guy.



I've dealt with shit like that.

Also, trying running an all-female group sometimes.

Lastly, cross-gender roleplaying is horrormirthy as hell.  We had this big scary biker that played with us for 2 years, and he ran a female elf bard.

:horrormirth:

Also, stupidity:

"I bullrush the gelatinous cube."
- Randy the dumbass, on his 4th character in a campaign that hadn't yet reached 4th level.



Played with a dude whose character was a teenage cat girl. He was very proud of her. Even drew a nice little anime type picture of her and showed it to all of us. The fact that he habitually rubbed his legs and had a strange chuckle didn't help.
Strange and Terrible Organ Laminator of Yesterday's Heavy Scene
Sentence or sentence fragment pending

Soy El Vaquero Peludo de Oro

TIM AM I, PRIMARY OF THE EXTRA-ATMOSPHERIC SIMIANS

Luna

Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on February 10, 2011, 06:23:35 PM
Quote from: Cramulus on February 10, 2011, 06:19:40 PM
#5 is my biggest pet peeve. I ran a game where the rogue would always wake up early the day before they started excavating a dungeon, just so he could sneak through it without them and map it out. He wanted this cool moment of the party waking up and he's already got a detailed map of the dungeon and some notes about the monsters. He got pissed when I told him he couldn't do that. "Buh-buh-buh.. but that's what my character wants to do..." Yeah dude, but that means that you and I play D&D for 30 minutes while everybody else's character is asleep. BOGUS.

Have him come over early.

And then have him run into 3 carrion crawlers in the dungeon (hint:  rogues don't do well solo, and their fort save sucks).

When he rolls up his new character, have him decide if rogue is really his best option.

This.  If you can't gack a character who's wandered off to explore alone in ten minutes or less, you're not trying.

Cross-gender RP can actually be done very well.  However, anybody who can't RP someone of their own gender should never be permitted to RP someone of the other.  It's gonna suck worse.
Death-dealing hormone freak of deliciousness
Pagan-Stomping Valkyrie of the Interbutts™
Rampaging Slayer of Shit-Fountain Habitues

"My father says that almost the whole world is asleep. Everybody you know, everybody you see, everybody you talk to. He says that only a few people are awake, and they live in a state of constant, total amazement."

Quote from: The Payne on November 16, 2011, 07:08:55 PM
If Luna was a furry, she'd sex humans and scream "BEASTIALITY!" at the top of her lungs at inopportune times.

Quote from: Nigel on March 24, 2011, 01:54:48 AM
I like the Luna one. She is a good one.

Quote
"Stop talking to yourself.  You don't like you any better than anyone else who knows you."

Cramulus

Quote from: Faust on February 10, 2011, 06:28:50 PM
I got sick of the sim city behavior and the spending real life hours while they dick around in the shop. The shop keepers became the most ill tempered and dangerous aspects of the game, and like The Man, I kept them down in a poverty bracket that owning land or a business was forever out of reach (or until it became a convenient reward).

two of the good pieces of advice in the 4th edition Dungeon Master's Guide --

1. Encounters are the meat and bones of D&D. When players talk about cool shit that happened, 90% of the time they're talking about an encounter. If you're not in an encounter, you should be pushing the game towards the next one. Stop dicking around in shops, it doesn't increase people's enjoyment unless they're really into RPing their characters. Just get to the fucking action!

2. Everybody should get to play in every encounter. If it's a social scene, you need to come up with ways to keep the low-charisma players involved. Write traps so that it doesn't become the DM and the rogue rolling dice at each other while everybody else waits. If a divine being appears, he should talk to the whole party, not just the cleric.

The Good Reverend Roger

Quote from: Cramulus on February 10, 2011, 06:37:48 PM
If a divine being appears, he should talk to the whole party, not just the cleric. get a new DM

Unless the PCs are epic level, Gods and their immediate henchthings shouldn't even have the PCs on their radar screens.
" It's just that Depeche Mode were a bunch of optimistic loveburgers."
- TGRR, shaming himself forever, 7/8/2017

"Billy, when I say that ethics is our number one priority and safety is also our number one priority, you should take that to mean exactly what I said. Also quality. That's our number one priority as well. Don't look at me that way, you're in the corporate world now and this is how it works."
- TGRR, raising the bar at work.

Cramulus

That really depends on what your story is about and how you tell it.

Sister Fracture

Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on February 10, 2011, 05:59:44 PM
Quote from: Faust on February 10, 2011, 05:58:10 PM
The saddest thing, Barring the laptop thing which I've never seen and would probably have a shitfit about if I ever saw it, is that you see this shit in every group.
And even more baffling is that the slim few who appreciate this usually have at some stage been a gm.

The worst habit I had to stomp out of the group was the magpie syndrome.
They see a shiny object and nearly the whole group fall all over each other trying to get it first.

That's candy.   :lulz:  Illusion + pit o' vipers = WIN.

I've also stopped handing out "best roleplay" & "MVP" bonus XP, because everyone gets butthurt.

I thought it was because we were getting too high level. :(


Also, #4 and #8 :crankey: SO VERY TRUE
Roaring Berserkery Bunny of the North End™

A Tucsonite is like a Christian in several important ways.  For one thing, they believe what they say about their god in the most literal, straightfaced way possible.  For another, they both know their god can hear them.  The difference between the two, however, is quite vast in terms of their relationship with their god; Christians believe in His benevolence, but Tucsonites KNOW of The City's spite and hate.

The Good Reverend Roger

Quote from: Cramulus on February 10, 2011, 06:46:16 PM
That really depends on what your story is about and how you tell it.

Sure, if your players enjoy the notion of Odin showing up and chatting over tea when they're 3rd level, I guess that works.

But it smells a bit too Deus Ex Dungeon Master to me.
" It's just that Depeche Mode were a bunch of optimistic loveburgers."
- TGRR, shaming himself forever, 7/8/2017

"Billy, when I say that ethics is our number one priority and safety is also our number one priority, you should take that to mean exactly what I said. Also quality. That's our number one priority as well. Don't look at me that way, you're in the corporate world now and this is how it works."
- TGRR, raising the bar at work.

The Good Reverend Roger

Quote from: Sister Fracture on February 10, 2011, 06:54:05 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on February 10, 2011, 05:59:44 PM
Quote from: Faust on February 10, 2011, 05:58:10 PM
The saddest thing, Barring the laptop thing which I've never seen and would probably have a shitfit about if I ever saw it, is that you see this shit in every group.
And even more baffling is that the slim few who appreciate this usually have at some stage been a gm.

The worst habit I had to stomp out of the group was the magpie syndrome.
They see a shiny object and nearly the whole group fall all over each other trying to get it first.

That's candy.   :lulz:  Illusion + pit o' vipers = WIN.

I've also stopped handing out "best roleplay" & "MVP" bonus XP, because everyone gets butthurt.

I thought it was because we were getting too high level. :(


Also, #4 and #8 :crankey: SO VERY TRUE

It was both.  I stopped doing it because

1.  The party was on track for the campaign, experience-wise, and

2.  I didn't want to deal with the post-game one-upsmanship, especially for the role play bonus.  It came down to someone getting butthurt every session, and one or two people expecting it every time.

I'm supposed to be having fun, too, and dealing with XP feeding frenzies at the end of the evening wasn't helping matters.
" It's just that Depeche Mode were a bunch of optimistic loveburgers."
- TGRR, shaming himself forever, 7/8/2017

"Billy, when I say that ethics is our number one priority and safety is also our number one priority, you should take that to mean exactly what I said. Also quality. That's our number one priority as well. Don't look at me that way, you're in the corporate world now and this is how it works."
- TGRR, raising the bar at work.

Sister Fracture

Roaring Berserkery Bunny of the North End™

A Tucsonite is like a Christian in several important ways.  For one thing, they believe what they say about their god in the most literal, straightfaced way possible.  For another, they both know their god can hear them.  The difference between the two, however, is quite vast in terms of their relationship with their god; Christians believe in His benevolence, but Tucsonites KNOW of The City's spite and hate.

The Good Reverend Roger

Quote from: Sister Fracture on February 10, 2011, 06:58:04 PM
Oh. My bad. :sad:

Wasn't just you.  Hell, Enabler would try to turn down the award when she got it, because she didn't want to deal with anyone else stressing that they didn't get it.
" It's just that Depeche Mode were a bunch of optimistic loveburgers."
- TGRR, shaming himself forever, 7/8/2017

"Billy, when I say that ethics is our number one priority and safety is also our number one priority, you should take that to mean exactly what I said. Also quality. That's our number one priority as well. Don't look at me that way, you're in the corporate world now and this is how it works."
- TGRR, raising the bar at work.

Sister Fracture

Roaring Berserkery Bunny of the North End™

A Tucsonite is like a Christian in several important ways.  For one thing, they believe what they say about their god in the most literal, straightfaced way possible.  For another, they both know their god can hear them.  The difference between the two, however, is quite vast in terms of their relationship with their god; Christians believe in His benevolence, but Tucsonites KNOW of The City's spite and hate.

The Good Reverend Roger

Quote from: Sister Fracture on February 10, 2011, 07:02:02 PM
Probably for the best, then.

Yep.  I'm holding onto the cleansweep bonus, though, because it discourages table talk and the wandering off of players.
" It's just that Depeche Mode were a bunch of optimistic loveburgers."
- TGRR, shaming himself forever, 7/8/2017

"Billy, when I say that ethics is our number one priority and safety is also our number one priority, you should take that to mean exactly what I said. Also quality. That's our number one priority as well. Don't look at me that way, you're in the corporate world now and this is how it works."
- TGRR, raising the bar at work.