| Post/Author/DateTime | Post |
|---|---|
| ALRUFF05-25-07, 12:18 PM | Has a DM ever just come after you? Has he/she ever read fifty pages of backstory and expected you to memorize everything? Did he/she ever give a +5 Vorpal sword to his/her wife/husband/best bud whilst throwing the absolute tiniest magic items your way? Was there ever a "chosen one" in your game to whom you were constantly forced to play second fiddle? This is your spot to vent! I want to hear the absolute worst of the worst. Show me stories from your games that make me happy I was never there! |
| Warforged Goblin05-25-07, 01:39 PM | My 3rd level bard got hold person and disintegrate. That's all I'm gonna say... |
| ALRUFF05-25-07, 01:41 PM | "Got" like could use? Or "got" like "got hit with?" |
| Warforged Goblin05-25-07, 01:52 PM | Oh yeah, right to the face... Little pile of bardic dust. And, to make matters worse, a couple bone devils were hired to grab my character's soul at Kelemvor's plane. Last I heard, he was being raped by two pit fiends... at the same time. |
| MHolland05-25-07, 02:00 PM | Joined a game DMed by a guy I had played with before. He was a horrible player but people swore he was a good DM. Spent a couple hours before the game session building a character background with him that I am still proud of to this day. The character was already the cornerstone of several major plots in his campaign world which is impressive for a level 1 elven fighter, the character he wanted me to play btw. The other players show up and game session starts. He turns and says, "You are at a campfire in the [BLAH] forest. Suddenly a rampaging dinosaur leaps from the brush and attacks you!" We roll initiative. I lose. Dinosaur attacks. Kills me in one attack. I am thinking there is some twist about to happen or something but then he says, "Okay, roll up a new character real quick." I said, 'Okay, one sec. I need to call my wife real quick." I walked out with my backpack and went home because that was just damned ridiculous. That is the only bad experience I have ever had with a DM. |
| DreadArchon05-25-07, 03:12 PM | The party: 3 Sorcerers, level 6, about 2000 gp worth of stuff each The enemies: Greenspawn Razorfiends. Three per encounter. Multiple times per day. Starting in melee. The DM: Did away with AC and adjudicated hits & misses "when it feels right," which means that multiple consecutive attacks at +3 to +8 would hit a 25 AC every time "because something that big shouldn't miss a mage." |
| Prof. Pacali05-25-07, 03:16 PM | My Living Greyhawk rogue has been killed by a vindictive DM because I interrupted him reading the adventure's boxed text. |
| ALRUFF05-25-07, 03:24 PM | My Living Greyhawk rogue has been killed by a vindictive DM because I interrupted him reading the adventure's boxed text. Oooh! That's pretty bad! |
| ALRUFF05-25-07, 03:25 PM | Oh yeah, right to the face... Little pile of bardic dust. And, to make matters worse, a couple bone devils were hired to grab my character's soul at Kelemvor's plane. Last I heard, he was being raped by two pit fiends... at the same time. Level 3? Was the party higher-level than you? |
| ALRUFF05-25-07, 03:26 PM | Joined a game DMed by a guy I had played with before. He was a horrible player but people swore he was a good DM. Spent a couple hours before the game session building a character background with him that I am still proud of to this day. The character was already the cornerstone of several major plots in his campaign world which is impressive for a level 1 elven fighter, the character he wanted me to play btw. The other players show up and game session starts. He turns and says, "You are at a campfire in the [BLAH] forest. Suddenly a rampaging dinosaur leaps from the brush and attacks you!" We roll initiative. I lose. Dinosaur attacks. Kills me in one attack. I am thinking there is some twist about to happen or something but then he says, "Okay, roll up a new character real quick." I said, 'Okay, one sec. I need to call my wife real quick." I walked out with my backpack and went home because that was just damned ridiculous. That is the only bad experience I have ever had with a DM. In all fairness, you totally made up for all of the bad experiences you DIDN'T have with that one really-freaking-bad one. |
| V812205-25-07, 06:47 PM | Last night- Me (Necro 21) ///007! (I really said that.) We Killed him- okay, we should get... woah. (DM looks into DMG for treasure: 21st level rogue.) You get 20,000 gold! 10,000 each. Me::OMG! :weep: (I was saving for an 80 ton grell crystal castle. Roughly 2M gold.) |
| navar10005-25-07, 07:19 PM | I've had good DMs and fun campaigns, really, but here goes my list: 1) Playing a 2E cleric in college using a spell point system where as there was no such thing as memorization, I casted a few spells that were not Cure Light Wounds and even swung my staff in combat a few rounds. Next day a fellow player confronts me in the Student Union yelling at me for 5 minutes about what I did saying how I was playing a cleric wrong. Whenever he DMed from then on, NPCs disliked me, any plan my character tried always failed, etc. I think the worse, though, was when he had a crush on a girl and she started to learn D&D, playing in his game first. Her character was Absolutely Perfect In Every Way. 2) Different DM, new campaign started. My wizard was not with the rest of the party at campaign start by DM fiat. They roleplayed. A battle ensued. Let's say it took an hour. My character doesn't show up yet. They roleplay some more. Another combat commences. I leave. 3) Playing a 1st level paladin in a new campaign, I live in a country where slavery is legal. Two clerics of the church were "accidentally" taken as slaves. I am requested to find them. To bring the party together, every character has a quest that a Sage can help us with. I go to the Sage. He demands 5,000gp. Naturally I don't have it. He then says if the party were to break into a rival wizard's house and get a book of evil that was stolen from him he'll help us. I ask what the wizard wanted with the book. He said to do evil. I asked what he wanted with the book. He said to hold onto it since it was his. As the party made plans, we had to sneak around, break into the wizard's place, grab the book, then sneak out of town, i.e. become burglers. I told the Sage "Your price is too high". I did not partake of the adventure. I sat there while the rest of the party went through it. The party got 800XP each. I got 200XP. 4) There's another, but it involved an out of game but related to the game situation. I think this thread is more geared towards game play experiences. |
| Bruunwald05-25-07, 07:50 PM | Has a DM ever just come after you? Has he/she ever read fifty pages of backstory and expected you to memorize everything? As opposed to players with the attention spans of gnats who can't remember any plot point more sophisticated than "go to dungeon and kill" because they are too busy yakking, daydreaming and toiling with belly button lint? Did he/she ever give a +5 Vorpal sword to his/her wife/husband/best bud whilst throwing the absolute tiniest magic items your way? As opposed to waiting an hour until the next hoard comes up and one of you gets something good, too, but, naw, who cares; it's more fun to jump to conclusions than to give anyone the benefit of the doubt and to admit that the +5 whatever was randomly chosen by the first person who picked it up? Was there ever a "chosen one" in your game to whom you were constantly forced to play second fiddle? Even though if you waited until a particular plotline was completed, you'd find the next plotline centered around somebody else's character, and that a measure of patience would reveal that everybody was to get a turn as "the star?" Yes, I've had a bad DM experience or two myself. I'm just pointing out that all of your examples could be legitimate devices that have alternate explanations, but that having no patience/faith/trust tends to prevent us from ever knowing them. There's a lot the players don't know about going on behind the screen, that they may understand if they give the matter time. An impatient player can upset this, and really ruin any and all surprise for the rest of the group. I had a player in my game for years, who over the course of that time, managed to accuse me (falsely and wrongly) of just about every crime you can imagine a DM committing, from railroading to favoritism, to you-name-it. At first it seemed he was just teasing me. But in time, it became apparent that he had major trust issues, not just in-game, but out. I still run several games for all the rest of the players because they learned through patience and trust that he was wrong. I just thought it was important to point out that there are two sides to this sort of thing. That said, here's a horror story of my own. Was playing a Sinbad-type fighter/thief (2nd Ed), very superstitous and quick-to-fight. We invaded an evil wizard's lair, and came upon an old man, who evidentally was the wizard's servant. We tied him up to a chair. Anyway, he begins screaming that we're going to die, and calling out for help. The DM describes it as though he is summoning something, so I hit him to shut him up, but the DM didn't understand non-lethal damage, so I ended up killing him. The DM stopped the game to tell me (not my character) what an awful person I was for killing an old man. On and on he went. After another ten minutes, we gave up trying to play. He went on to rag on me about it for years afterward. |
| Warforged Goblin05-25-07, 09:50 PM | Level 3? Was the party higher-level than you? No, all 3rd level. We stopped were-rats from killing babies, unwittingly disrupting the cleric of Bane's flow of dead babies. When I recognized the cleric, her bodyguard, and her wizard while performing alone at a noble dinner, I got zapped. Granted, I had the chance to make an escape, but the DM said I couldn't use any of the ideas the others players had given, which would've been useful 5 minutes earlier when they started spouting off ideas and I could've told them to shut up. Tell the cleric of Waukeen what's up (note, in-game my PC is 17 and human) and she says she'll get me to a safe house. We open the door, hold person, failed save, disintegrate, failed save, make a new character. The entire campaign ****** me off... |
| ALRUFF05-26-07, 01:49 AM | As opposed to players with the attention spans of gnats who can't remember any plot point more sophisticated than "go to dungeon and kill" because they are too busy yakking, daydreaming and toiling with belly button lint? As opposed to waiting an hour until the next hoard comes up and one of you gets something good, too, but, naw, who cares; it's more fun to jump to conclusions than to give anyone the benefit of the doubt and to admit that the +5 whatever was randomly chosen by the first person who picked it up? Whoa, homie. Chill. I was providing a springboard using some examples that have turned out truly horribly in games that I've played. And honestly? You came to this thread with a story of your own, so you know what I'm talking about! I realize that a player teased you and violated your trust, but you're being totally hostile to me. I didn't do anything! |
| SephDragoon05-26-07, 03:24 AM | One time I was playing a rogue/fiend of possession in the party. Well... Evidently I had simply gotten on the DM's nerves SO badly with that character (though I still tell the tale of tricking 5 evil clerics into killing each other without even rolling init to this day) that he specifically created a character just to kill mine. I mean, actually tailored every feat and ability to kill him, and it was higher level, and only pulled it when I couldn't get help from the party. He admitted he did it too, for the sole purpose of killing my character off. I played it cool, and created a new character, who ****** him off even more, simply dealing massive amounts of damage each hit. He learned not to kill off my good RP characters like that, because my rogue was to this day my favorite character, who solved things through actual trickery, not fighting. |
| Bruunwald05-26-07, 03:37 AM | Whoa, homie. Chill. I was providing a springboard using some examples that have turned out truly horribly in games that I've played. And honestly? You came to this thread with a story of your own, so you know what I'm talking about! I realize that a player teased you and violated your trust, but you're being totally hostile to me. I didn't do anything! Since I am the one who posted my story, I hardly need you to point out to me that I did, "honestly" or not. I don't see anything hostile aimed at you at all. I merely pointed out that your examples were of the type that could have alternate explanations. I don't see any name calling. I don't see me implying any inferiority on your part. I don't see any accusations. Except the one where you accused me of being hostile. Alas, that is your interpretation, not my intent. For my part, I stated very clearly that I simply thought it was worth pointing out that there are two sides to these things. |
| V812205-26-07, 07:04 AM | Since I am the one who posted my story, I hardly need you to point out to me that I did, "honestly" or not. I don't see anything hostile aimed at you at all. I merely pointed out that your examples were of the type that could have alternate explanations. I don't see any name calling. I don't see me implying any inferiority on your part. I don't see any accusations. Except the one where you accused me of being hostile. Alas, that is your interpretation, not my intent. For my part, I stated very clearly that I simply thought it was worth pointing out that there are two sides to these things. Of course. My players shift from Player to Dm often, so I can assure you that player horror stories are even more common than DM stories (Ever Tell you about THUG the Barbarian/Warhulk whith an intel. of 3 And wis. of 5...) |
| Optimized_Commoner05-26-07, 07:10 AM | Ever Tell you about THUG the Barbarian/Warhulk whith an intel. of 3 And wis. of 5... One of my players once played the same character. With the same name. Weird, huh? (actually I think mine was THUNK) |
| tuffn00gies05-26-07, 09:06 AM | Since I am the one who posted my story, I hardly need you to point out to me that I did, "honestly" or not. ...rest deleted to keep it short... Actually, Bruunwald, you came off as kinda hostile IMO also. How about giving him the benefit of the doubt since he was there and you weren't? Most of the stories in this thread will have another POV that we're not getting. |
| Dragon Snack05-26-07, 02:06 PM | Well, let's start off with a minor one... I had killed the DMs PC (in my alternate week campaign) the WEEK BEFORE. Oddly, my Dwarven Fighter was chopped in half by a large Gnoll weilding a large (pre-errata) Mercurial Greatsword (with a conveniently timed critical). Hmm. He never admitted it was a grudge kill, but he never denied it either (and his giggling about it when first asked leads me to believe the former). The other DM was a little more problematic. Campaign one wasn't that bad, however there was the dungeon we had cleared and headed back to town the previous session. He starts the session by saying "Oops, I forgot - you found a secret compartment behind the evil alter, you're still in the dungeon." OK, I search for traps, find none, open the compartment. Bam, FINGER OF DEATH. I should mention we were 5th level. I sat there the entire game session waiting for the group to either get me Raised or bring in a new character. He made it impossible for them to do either until the end. Thanks, if I knew all I was going to be doing was making two near impossible rolls (and rolling up a character that was not going to be used), I could have done that over the phone... Campaign two was a train wreck from the almost the first session, but we unfortunately gave him the benefit of the doubt (as I said, his first campaign wasn't that bad). He demanded a 2 page backstory that ended up with us in Waterdeep. First session, we leave Waterdeep - never to return. On said trip, the party ends up encountering a Werewolf who happens to surprise us and catch the Wizard flat footed. Only, he misses with ALL of his attacks (surprise round AND full attack in the first round). OK, DM fiat, he doesn't want to kill a PC in the first session - we can deal with that. But it didn't end, the Wizard unfortunately found himself in that position MANY times - yet each time would escape with nary a scratch (to be fair, he did get hit once by the party's NPC Ranger, some might call him a DMPC, under a Confusion spell, but somehow his damage dealing was low that week). Perhaps the worst part is, the player of said Wizard was just as upset about his "luck" as the rest of us were, since he knew it looked bad. But it went beyond just favoring one player. He actively shafted the other players. He had the NPC Ranger step away from flanking positions with the Rogue (for no other tactical benefits or any RP reasons). When I basically suicided my character at 8th level (low on spells, I stayed to fight Hill Giants while the rest of the party fled), I still had the same trusty MW longbow I had started the campaign with (I was an archer Cleric, so that was my main weapon). Oh, I had a +1 longbow on order from some Dwarves who had given everyone else in the party a magic item and snubbed me (but then 'relented' when the rest of the party called 'them' on it), but it was too little, too late. When I said I was leaving the campaign after that, everybody else left too. Oh, that 2 page backstory that he demanded? Never once was it used - unless you count when I was infected with Cackle Fever, since being a Cleric of Shevarash I had taken an oath to not laugh or smile until all Drow were wiped from the face of Faerun (yeah, we never fought Drow either). They aren't the only ones, but I could put up with the one DMs nonsensical plots and encounters (a Hook Horror, in a 10' by 10' room?) and annoying NPCs (we threw one of his Halflings in a barrel and left it, only to hear it's "crying in our hearts"). Even the wannabe killer DM who constantly put us up against EL+3-5 (or more) encounters ("but you're surviving, it can't be that bad" - yeah, because we're running away) was tolerable in it's own way (I quit his campaign, but was lured back by being allowed to min/max my new character - although eventually everyone tired of the campaign and it went "on hiatus"). Now I'm the only one my group allows to DM. I have to get in my playing in different groups (in a Serenity game and a Savage Worlds game). |
| Mordent_Sage05-27-07, 06:21 AM | The party: 3 Sorcerers, level 6, about 2000 gp worth of stuff each The enemies: Greenspawn Razorfiends. Three per encounter. Multiple times per day. Starting in melee. The DM: Did away with AC and adjudicated hits & misses "when it feels right," which means that multiple consecutive attacks at +3 to +8 would hit a 25 AC every time "because something that big shouldn't miss a mage." What the hell? That DM needs jabbing with a stick - a sharp one. Start jabbing now, and I'll tell you when to stop. |
| V812205-27-07, 07:46 AM | What the hell? That DM needs jabbing with a stick - a sharp one. Start jabbing now, and I'll tell you when to stop. I agree that the DM is an idiot (And needs poking whith a sharp steel stick:D ) But why was everyone in the party sorcerers? Just wondering. |
| DreadArchon05-27-07, 04:02 PM | But why was everyone in the party sorcerers? Just wondering. (1) Actually, we were Spellcasters (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/genericClasses.htm#spellcaster), which is to say that were Sorcerers with fewer spells and no options for prestige classes. It's just easier to say "Sorcerer" and not get all the "Which spellcaster?" responses most of the time. (2) Fighter are bad, right? Well, the melee Generic class is a Fighter with fewer proficiencies (i.e. no heavy armor or tower shields). And the third class option under those rules is the NPC Expert class, but with a second good save and bonus feats every fourth level. They're not exactly appealing, especially when you're not allowed to have items costing more than 1,000 gp unless you make them yourself (which was the rule, though we didn't have enough gold to ever make it an issue). (3) He told us that he liked uneven parties and would alter the encounter balance to suit one. (4) The three non-Spellcasters had quit by then. No poking with pointy bitz and hammerguns was necessary, however. I just started my own game instead. |
| GatorBurf05-27-07, 11:19 PM | What the hell? That DM needs jabbing with a stick - a sharp one. Start jabbing now, and I'll tell you when to stop. I second that. That's hilarious! Keep jabbing by the way |
| SlanderPanic05-28-07, 01:32 AM | About 15 years ago, I played with a guy who liked his D&D old-school and on hard mode. We rolled ability scores 3d6, straight down, assigning as we went. (No swapping anything around.) My scores came out as Str 7, Dex 11, Con 9, Int 3, Wis 15, Cha 12. Salvageable, right? Just go with a human cleric, you say? Wrong. By 1st. Edition rules, any character with an Intelligence of less than 5 could only qualify for the fighter class. Yeah, a fighter with a Strength of 7. Most useless character ever, I have to say. A year ago, I was playing in a Forgotten Realms campaign. We all started at 3rd level... except for one guy, who was playing a minotaur fighter 2/Thayan Gladiator 2. That's right: an ECL 12 character in a Waterdeep-based campaign wherein everyone else is 3rd level. It gets worse. The character was based on the player's favorite WoW character. He frequently used WoW terms (including referring to his character as a Tauren on many occasions,) advocated the use of a DKP system for splitting up loot, and justified all of this by saying that he wrote a 12-page backstory that got approved by the DM before anyone else's. (His reasoning was that, in MMOs, high-level characters will bring low-levels along with them so the low-level characters can level faster. D&D is designed to close a 1-level gap within a reasonable amount of time, but not a 9-level gap.) He'd mock the rest of us for dying too fast when the DM put us face-to-face with a half-dozen trolls and orc archers. continuously whined about how he wasn't getting enough of the loot, about how he wasn't getting any XP, etc. The DM defended him at every turn, saying he was important to the plot, etc. After going through three really good characters (and having to restart at level 3 each time) because of having to keep up with the stupid minotaur, I stopped wasting my time with that campaign. Such abject DM favoritism isn't my cup of tea. I've got a few other stories, and I'm sure there are DM horror stories wherein I'm the villain, but those two pretty much take the cake. |
| Poison_Dusk05-28-07, 02:29 AM | The only bad experience was when a DM had us all enter a gladiator tornement. To the death. After spitting us up. One team had a human fighter 6, an elven ranger 6, and a human cleric 5(had died). The other group was my Wild Elf druid 6 and a dwarven rogue 6. The first fight, the other team, was against an ogre and a couple orcs. Not sure if they had levels or whatever. The good guys won and collected a lot of gold. Our turn, it was the two of us and my constrictor against three ogres. We were pounded into nothing. I find out after, from the DM, that my character was killed because his animal companion was being more effective than any of the characters. And this was BEFORE I discovered how to build a powerful character. This was 3.0 BTW. |
| Tobus Neth05-28-07, 02:41 AM | 1982 october 7th-DM from Hell!!! My character 7th level fighter named Icar Blacksword NE joins forces with the Thief 8th Talon Telgle CN Human and Elf Wizard 9th Faust CE and the dm's charcters are these two Ebon of the Blackhand cleric7th and his side kick Renchek the assassin 6th. When exploring the swamps north of Saltmarsh(This is the beginning tale of the evil characters we played through U1 U2 and U3 modules from the heyday of D&D.) We find this black tower deep in the swamps on a craggy knoll. We quickly find the tower is guarded by sixteen gargoyles we fight hard and win. Many potions later we decide to press on into the tower. We are greeted by a green dragon!chlorine gas fills our lungs and burns our skin! Faust goes to like -6hp!Renchek and Icar and Ebon battle the greendragon and subdued it! after healing and chaining up the dragon(Yeah we made sure we carried stuff like this we where always making up stuff ) We came to a large wood circular platform in the Tower cellar. A Elevator we search for traps and found now. We pulled the switch and we went down about 100ft when it happened. The platformed stopped eruptly! The passage back up was suddenly sealed by hidden doors and a strange red rusty gas poured in from the walls. Everyone had to make save vs poison or Die!said our Dm. I was up first for Icar I rolled a 2 and died!next up was my friend dave's wizard Faust He rolls a 5 and dies!my cousin bill thief Talon makes his save as does the Dm characters. The Dm tells Talon to make another save vs poison bill says"Why? DM: because you were just shot by Renchek the assassins poison arrow save or die!. With that the Dm robs our corpses and flees on a green dragon laughing. |
| Vaalingrade Ashland05-28-07, 02:43 AM | From a con: DM: "You wake up and the inn's on fire, take 5 fire damage." Me: "Wait, I've got a ring of sustenence and I've gotten my two hours for today. I wasn't asleep." DM: "Yes you were, you were tired." Me: "No, I really wasn't. That's the point of the 2500gp ring." DM: "Maybe it's not working right." Me: "What?! Did you just break one of my magic items to keep me from noticing a plot-fire before it started?!" DM: "...Yes." Me: "Then I want my 2500gp back retroactively." DM: "Why?" Me: "I wouldn't have bought a freaking broken ring of sustinance. Hello0000, bard here. Bardic Knowledge, Gather information, diplomacy, I know the history of all my equipment form birth to abortion." DM: "Fine." Me: "Good. Then I hired a guard. He sleeps during the day and guards my room at night. He'll wake me up before the fire starts." DM: "..." Me: "If you had been reasonable, I would have followed your traintracks, but when you screwed with my magic mojo, you reaped the whirlwind, Pal." |
| V812205-28-07, 08:54 AM | Me: "If you had been reasonable, I would have followed your traintracks, but when you screwed with my magic mojo, you reaped the whirlwind, Pal." Sigged! |
| Nevarre05-28-07, 09:34 AM | Many years ago the DM had by character captured and raped - "For plot purposes". The guy was my friend first and my DM second. I forgave him, though made it clear that I was VERY unhappy with him for a variety of reasons. Fast forward twenty years and a similar thing happens again (same DM - who clearly hasn't learnt, and is now beginning to scare me) This time however I attempted to kill the NPC (I was playing an assassin) but found that my character had been 'conditioned (no save)' not to attack him or hurt him in any way, directly or indirectly. Nice. I withdrew my character (one of my favourites for a number of years) from the game and sent the DM a scathing email on conduct - not only had he horrifically abused my PC, he had taken away free-thought as well. I refuse to play female characters in his games and am exceedingly wary of any attempt by him to manipulate characters. |
| Tobus Neth05-28-07, 07:02 PM | We played the slavelords modules back in 1e around say 1984. I played a female paladin named Joelene Silvermane our first few adventures were great and our dm ran them well. As our characters progress I drew a picture of my paladin, a copy off a dragon mag cover. He our Dm thought it was cool and loved it saying how hawt she was. while exploring the sewers we became seperated, my paladin was captured from behind by three half-orcs that sacked her head took her into a secret room and raped her several times as the party search for a secret door. Our Dm had suddenly gotten nasty and mean. As players scrambled rolling dice for searches our Dm would go into detail of my characters rape. He rolled 3d6+8(11-24 inches to say how big the orc's flesh swords were. After a while the Dm says no more searches your content to believe Jolene has fled the sewers. As the party backtracks our Dm continues Raping of my character-after having their way with you the half-orcs throw acid in my face making my charisma drop below that of a paladin needed ability. Then one of the half-orcs cut off her breast as a keep sake he said he was gonna make a coin purse out of it.! |
| kentonblack05-28-07, 07:36 PM | Is anyone else mortified by how many sexual deviants there seem to be playing the roles of DM? Good god...so much rape...:weep: :mymy::tissue: |
| navar10005-28-07, 07:40 PM | Is anyone else mortified by how many sexual deviants there seem to be playing the roles of DM? Good god...so much rape...:weep: :mymy::tissue: They don't have girlfriends; hence the need to lash out. |
| Sajek05-28-07, 09:05 PM | Just check out the guy in my Sig for one of the worst DMs ever. |
| fun222305-28-07, 09:09 PM | My DM is fine, but the items we roll (randomly) are ALWAYS awefull |
| Tobus Neth05-29-07, 12:09 AM | Is anyone else mortified by how many sexual deviants there seem to be playing the roles of DM? Good god...so much rape...:weep: :mymy::tissue: That's the same DM from my two post He was great for a while but then he started getting wiggy and out there, we all knew it was the drugs he was unable to get girls. He Dm'ed some great games but boy could he p*** you off by his rulings and destroy your character, eh it's kinda like in real life he got his ass handed to him many a time and took it out on player characters I guess that's better than what some people do. |
| scienceman4705-29-07, 02:42 AM | My DM is fine, but the items we roll (randomly) are ALWAYS awefull You can't complain about random item rolls. Maybe recommend MIC charts to roll on? And show me a DM that has a PC raped, and I'll show you a player thats never playing a game with that DM ever again. |
| AffableDoomwalker05-29-07, 03:23 AM | I had a DM that allowed a Minotaur Barbarian2/Mage2 with 5 INT in a Level 4 campaign. But he wouldn't let my ECL +1 Character start at level 4. "Nope, you start at level 3, sorry, its for balance reasons." |
| Kaldric05-29-07, 03:51 AM | Remember, kids. If you're playing around a table, the DM is always within arm's reach. If D&D has taught me anything, it's that you can fix all interpersonal problems with swift and blinding physical violence. |
| docjack05-29-07, 04:43 AM | This is one about me being a GM as opposed to a DM. This was the last time I RPed with people and the straw that broke the camel's back, if you will. Let me start off by saying that I don't think I was wrong, but I would really like ya'll to PEACH this. (I think PEACH is the right word; I'm not really up on my terms.) I was GMing a Conspiracy X game a few years back. For those that are not familiar to Con X it's kinda like the X-Files. There are two clandestine organizations within the government that are fighting each other over ideology about what to do about the aliens planning to take over the planet. The first group, Aegis, works in a cell format and while somewhat familiar with the aliens spend a great deal of their time investigating ways to stop the alien menace. The other group, the Black Book, have made a deal with the aliens. They support their experiments and whatnot on earth and help them out occasionally in return for technology. The aliens, of course, have superior tech and the BB feels that the best way to fight the aliens is through cooperation and the gaining of said tech. The feeling of Con X is paranoia, so I thought let's do something really fun. There were two characters, Felix and Gwen, and both were DEA agents and members of Aegis. At the start of the game I asked my players to trust me. I explained that I was trying to do something a little different and begged their indugence. Both agreed. "Just remember," I said, "this is just a game." Felix begin the game with a -1 to all rolls because he was tired. When asked why he was tired, I just said, "You didn't sleep well last night," Felix was none too happy about the -1 and he made it well known but I reminded him that he promised me his patience and that this is just a game. They are contacted and told about the murder of an Aegis scientist who had been working on reverse engineering of an alien engine. His lab had been ransacked and Felix and Gwen were sent to investigate. Here I tell Gwen, "Felix is going to find something...but you're not." "Why not?" "You just won't. To tell you the truth, you're just not that good of an agent," They search and Felix, by chance, discovers a disc with a partial spec of what the doctor had been working. "See, Gwen, I told you," Felix took the disc with him to his house and later took it to a drop so Aegis could take it back. Two days later the disc is corrupted and Aegis suspects a mole in the organization and Felix and Gwen must investigate. Felix still has a -1 because he's not sleeping well and on top of that he has a toothache. The toothache gets him to the dentist (yes, I did have to railroad him there) where he's laying there under the light and I tell him that the drill the doc is about to use is not right. The doctor is coming at him wanting to kill him. Felix breaks the guys nose and sends him to the floor. The assistant in the room starts screaming and there is blood everywhere. Felix jumps up ready to fight. "Why are you doing that?" "What do you mean? The guy was trying to kill me." "No, he wasn't." "You just said he was!" " I made a mistake. He wasn't trying to kill you." "Then I didn't hit the guy." Yes, you did." So this started a fight and I said, "Remember, it's just a game. I'm doing something different." So, the investigation goes on and everytime they get close to something concrete the evidence either disappears or the person they need to find winds up dead (there is always one clue, but the stuff they need to crack the case and Felix still has a -1 because he's tired. No matter what time he goes to bed he's always tired. Also, from time to time I say something negative to Gwen. One time I pull her out of the room: "Remember, we are playing a game." Looking at her to make a point. "Yeah," "Do you feel alright?" "Yeah, why?" "You're not distracted with something else?" "No, why?" "Because you're really stinking it up in there. I mean, bad." "What?!" "I mean, I know you're just a girl trying to be a DEA agent but, c'mon, you're not finding clues, you're not really pulling your weight." "What are you talking about?! I found clues. I found X, Y, and Z!" "What about that encounter with the BB agents?" "I killed one of them! That's how I found clue Y!" "Yeah, but the other got away. I mean, Felix would have killed them both." "**** you! I've had it. I don't want to play in your game any more." So, we go back into the room and both Felix and Gwen are ready to end the game because of me and that I won't let them get anywhere in this investigation. "Fine," I say, "listen. The investigation is not the story. You two are the story. The person whose been going around messing up the investigation is Felix. He was abducted by aliens. There is an implant in his head. During the day he's been investigating for Aegis, at night he's been going around sabotaging the investigation. Felix, you've only been getting two to three hours of sleep a night. That's why you have a chronic -1. The story was for you to figure out that you were abducted. That's why I've been doing things like the dentist visit and why the BB agents didn't kill you when they had a chance at the warehouse. In the history of Aegis when has a BB agent ever let a Aegis agent live? These clues to your past were going to become more blatant as the game went on, as the mind wipe begin to wear off. You were getting agitated with me and that's fine because you haven't been sleeping. You should be agitated." "Gwen, you're a fine Rper. There is nothing wrong with you. This character is a strong, independent woman except she has confidence issues that she won't admit. It stems from your childhood and that was a part of the story we were going to investigate next. That's why I've been so negative toward you. You were getting mad at me and that's fine because I was playing that little voice in your head. So, in fact, you were getting mad at yourself. You notice that when you roll for a search and you win, I don't say anything. When you do something that helps, I keep quiet. Both of you, that's why I kept saying this is a game. I've been playing a game with your head from the beginning so you'll know what its really like to have confidence issues and what it's really like to be abducted." "That's stupid," Felix said "If aliens were going to abduct me, I should have had the chance to fight them... etc." So they quit the game. So my question is: was I a bad GM? I guess I could have told them that this was going to be a head game but that would have put them on guard and I didn't want them to be. I wanted to instill in them the paranoia. I welcome your comments. Jack |
| Kaldric05-29-07, 05:05 AM | Yes, you were a bad GM. Your players didn't have fun, and they quit the game. There isn't really any other criteria. It might have been a good idea to stop when you realized that they weren't having fun, and your "something new" was a failed experiment. |
| Error 40105-29-07, 06:11 AM | Problem: DMs who have characters raped. Solution A: A swift beating. But sometimes that won't work, and maybe it isn't worth getting arrested for, so there's: Solution B: * Locate an appropriately unpleasant and explicit story, aiming for about 50% to 100% worse than what happened to your character. * Search/Replace the primary victim's name with the DM's name. * Bring the story to the next game, and read it aloud. Ask the DM whether its so funny now. |
| Particle_Man05-29-07, 07:03 AM | Yes, you were a bad GM. Seconded. |
| Arkrite05-29-07, 10:19 AM | docjack, I think you came up with a very interesting concept for trying to set up the paranoia game you were aiming for. Unfortunately, in my opinion, you're delivery was a little off. Most players don't like it when you start controlling what they do. Not much fun to play a game where you don't even get say in what you're own character is doing. That's kind of how the "dentist" situation felt like. Instead of just saying "Why did you do that, he wasn't going to kill you" you probably should have tried a different tactic. While conceptually good at giving that paranoia feel, it's very poor for a game situation. It probably made it sound to the players like you were a indecisive or poor GM because you kept going back on what you had already said. It also makes it hard for them to trust you from then on in. The part with Gwen is really bad though, it makes me cringe just to think about it. You need to, very... VERY... explicitly explain that you are still playing the game before you ever talk to a player like that. Mostly because it sounds like an extremely harsh chewing out. If she doesn't realize the game is still on, all it seems to her is that you're being abusive and cruel. Again, I liked your concept, but your delivery was poor. Sounds like the player didn't understand your intent and took your words to be a personal attack. Not fun. And finally, taking away their evidence at every turn is very frustrating from the player's perspective. I've played a game where every time I had almost tracked down the "dingus" I had been hired to find a new twist appeared and the dingus disappeared once again, forcing me to hunt it down all over again. You can pull it off a few times before the players start getting tired of it. I realize it works well for TV series like the X-Files, where almost every episode involved their evidence being discredited or lost. Unfortunately it doesn't work so well in the player's eyes unless they know implicitly ahead of time that it will likely happen, and in either case it makes them less enthusiastic about trying to hunt down evidence. Why bother when you know it'll just go "missing", right? The players need victories, even little victories, to reward them for their efforts. Maybe the evidence is useless to them, but an NPC is willing to help them out for their discovery, offering money, weapons, etc. Or maybe a witness they manage to save might not be able to help them solve their mystery, but they gain a loyal NPC assistant/friend/informant. In D&D there is always the option of magical swag. Not sure what it would be for Conspiracy X, but you get the idea. You can only push players so far without rewarding them for their perseverance. Two of the major criteria for being a good DM involve the Players having fun, and the DM having fun. Though my criteria for "bad DM" usually involves the DM being incapable of learning from the past, so while the session wasn't a success it doesn't mean you can't still be a good DM in the future. |
| Poison_Dusk05-29-07, 10:23 AM | It sounded like you had a good idea Doc, but the execution was less than perfect. You should have given them a little more info and not just played with their head. As someone who enjoys playing with other peoples heads I can tell you, they don't like it. |
| Optimized_Commoner05-29-07, 11:27 AM | So my question is: was I a bad GM? Yes. |
| Optimized_Commoner05-29-07, 11:37 AM | Not sure what it would be for Conspiracy X Con X doesn't really have magic swag. Yeah, there's some alien tech in the game, but your job is to collect it and send it back to the folks at the lab. The "rewards" in Con X, are: Training to improve your skills. Increased trust by Aegis (resulting in giving you more strings you can pull). Increased allocation of resources (your group now has a secret facility to work from, or have been given a genetics lab, etc). But mostly the reward of the game is succeeding on your mission and saving people from being abducted by the greys or stopping an attempt to create a Saurian bridgehead on the Earth or tracking down and killing a werewolf. It's a very mission focused game and in some ways it's a lot more similar to Supernatural than it is to X-files. (You're in on the conspiracy, you know all about the monsters-aliens-etc and you're interested only in stopping the supernatural menace, not brining it to the public's attention). It's a REALLY good game by the way. One of my favourite systems. |
| fun222305-29-07, 01:26 PM | You can't complain about random item rolls. Maybe recommend MIC charts to roll on? And show me a DM that has a PC raped, and I'll show you a player thats never playing a game with that DM ever again. We are using the Mic charts And we have so many potions and scrolls But Nothing Else plus if we get hit with fire damage we roll a D100 to see how many take effect instantly. ITS BAD. |
| AffableDoomwalker05-29-07, 01:36 PM | There was that one DM I had about a year ago... the one that removed five foot steps from the game... |
| dpetroc05-29-07, 01:55 PM | I was in a a PBEM game where I am convinced the DM was using us for therapy. Communications between players would 'go astray'. He would tell players the other players were bad mouthing them, and situations would increase in lethality if you didn't behave exactly like he wanted you to. Never gamed with the guy after that. Re: those who feel that some players are 'favored' over others. As a DM, I can be guilty of that. If two players will ALWAYS show up, and two may or may not let you know they are coming the night before the game, I write my reliable PCs better parts of the plot. I'm stingy with magic items etc. anyway, so some players who don't lose all their loot when they get captured by a gnoll army tend to make out better... DM's shouldn't play favorites because they don't LIKE someone -- unless that player is a cheating b*****d in which case its open season... :D |
| ALRUFF05-29-07, 02:40 PM | 1) No raping in game, man. That's just sickening to do to a player. D&D is about living out your fantasies to a certain extent, and it disgusts me that anyone could play for a DM that has rape fantasies. 2) Be extremely careful with what you do to people out of character. Sometimes it's cute, but you should usually stop there. Doc, your belligerent attitude hurt the PLAYERS, not the characters, and that's why they quit. It was a cool idea, but I would have told you that you went too far the second you attacked me personally. |
| the_Luggage05-29-07, 02:55 PM | Rape in game is a big ****ing no no. The furthest I'd go is implying that it may have happened at some point in the past. Actually going into detail in game? **** off, right now. Jaysus. That is really too much. I've never heard of a GM doing that before, but I'd quite likely tell him to shove his game and leave, right there, right then. |
| Shiftkitty05-29-07, 03:39 PM | This is a post I put in another thread. I thought it would fit here, too:I've been a DM for almost all of the 26 years I've been playing, and I wanted to be a PC for awhile. I soon found out that I can't stand Monty Haul syndrome. We had one DM who seemed to believe that every lair was A) guarded by four or five monsters of no more than 8 or 9 hp each, and B) bursting at the seams with treasure and at least one major artifact. After "defeating" this horrific horde, your 1st level PC could expect to have his or her reputation known around the world. Nations would pay a king's ransom for your services, and bards would sing your praises and accomplishments (?) in far off lands that you've never even heard of before. This same DM also believed that you could only have one PC at a time, that you had to play the one you rolled until he or she died, and... no PC should really die. I was trying to retire a Barbarian I had gotten tired of. I preferred playing the untamed wilderness in his personality, and as he became more and more entrenched in the world of his civilized cohorts, he became less of a Barbarian and more of just an ill-mannered fighter. I started taking crazy chances with him and kept getting these really great die rolls! When he finally got beheaded, I started preparing a new character. This one would be a Thief/Acrobat (2e Unearthed Arcana). I figured she would be good for a campaign that seemed to be spending more time in cities. After I put in the work of creating this nifty new PC, the DM set it at the next session (without consulting me) that the gods were so impressed with my Barbarian's fury that they granted him not only new life, but immortality! I wasn't aware the gods prized brash stupidity so highly... And one more about this DM (Damned Moron)... Although he had this habit of creating "unbeatable" monsters, which we would soundly thrash into oblivion in one session, he never used the tactic of rolling the dice behind a screen so he could arbitrarily decide if you succeeded or failed, depending on what he needed you to do. He'd just make you re-roll over and over again until you got the result he wanted. He even insisted that one player had to roll all 0s on 6d10 in order to survive a strike. We were about to end the game and tell him where to go, but the player took one d10 and said "1d10, six times...". He then proceeded to make the roll. This guy had been hanging around my father, who was very good at palming dice. It hadn't taken my father too long to figure out how to get the D&D dice to come up exactly how he wanted them, provided they were relatively well-made. (ALL of my dice are well-made except for the set of original Basic D&D dice ca.1980.) We never suspected the player had been learning how to pull this dirty trick because he had, and still has, a reputation for fair play and honesty. He didn't want to see the players quit, he wanted to make the DM quit! After this bad chapter in our circle, I was asked never to hand the reins over to another DM. On the subject of rape, yes this same DM had one of the male characters butt-raped by three orcs. I think he did it to humiliate the player, the guy who wound up doing that spectacular roll. This was before the die roll incident, and he wouldn't even allow any combat rolls, any chances for the character to call for help, the rest of us just slept soundly in the inn while three orcs broke in and butt-raped our wizard. We insisted that we would have heard something, as we had been able to get rooms right next to each other. Nope, he insisted, we slept through it. Magic? It seems a magic-dead area had breezed into town and was disrupting the magic fields. (Magic-oriented storms like this were an accepted part of our campaign, but that didn't explain why we couldn't hear an assault taking place right next door when it was declared to other party members that the elven fighter's snoring had drawn complaints from downstairs where a party was taking place.) We don't use violent sex-crimes in our campaign unless it's vital to the plot. Even then, we don't need the lurid details. The aftermath is usually enough to spur even our most neutral character into action, like the line from Kenny Rogers' "Coward of the County": "...the torn dress, the shattered look, was more than he could stand..." |
| Nevarre05-29-07, 03:44 PM | Rape in game is a big ****ing no no. The furthest I'd go is implying that it may have happened at some point in the past. Actually going into detail in game? **** off, right now. Jaysus. That is really too much. I've never heard of a GM doing that before, but I'd quite likely tell him to shove his game and leave, right there, right then. I know what you mean. I think the difference for me is that he was a friend long before he was a DM. If anything I felt sorry for him (and angry, and sickened). He knows he's stepped waaaay over the line. No more excuses. |
| dpetroc05-29-07, 04:00 PM | I pride myself on the evocative imagery I utilize to create atmosphere or generate emotions from my gamers. That said... Description of rape in game is totally unacceptable. Having the characters BE raped is still worse. As a DM, I can't imagine doing that. The farthest I might go is to mention the army of evil will visit horrors untold upon the innocent populace...or some other such non-specific description. Let the characters infer from that if they will (or not, if they chose to dial down the imagery). I can't think of anything that will make a person more uncomfortable at the gaming table than rape. |
| the_Luggage05-29-07, 04:16 PM | I mean, rape is a tabboo subject obviously. And there's a stigma attached to talking about it, and that is a bad thing. And some people like to use role playing games to tackle serious topics. But what those DMs did was not tackle a serious topic. They made an entirely innapropiate game out of it. When I think of how upset someone would be who had had the misfortune to have experienced a sexual assault to hear this arsehole describing it in a game he or she plays for fun and escapism... Jaysus. |
| ALRUFF05-29-07, 04:19 PM | I can't think of anything that will make a person more uncomfortable at the gaming table than rape. Amen to that. In my game, sexuality of any nature tends to be a "roll-for-result" type affair. I'm not interested in erotic fantasy (though some people obviously are), and my players and I are just a bunch of dudes hanging out. We don't need the baggage that sexual contact brings. If one of the players wants to seduce a bar wench, fine. Diplomacy check. Fade to black. Done. |
| Zyrusticae05-29-07, 04:31 PM | Yiiiikes. I might entertain fantasies of the type from time to time, but... Gawdayum. This is the sort of thing I'd never talk about in public, much less at the table, actually describing the affair. Oii. Heh. Well, fortunate for me that I haven't met too many DMs, and those I have met are fairly good at what they do, if a little unorthodox. |
| SlanderPanic05-29-07, 04:39 PM | There are two things worse than rape in D&D: 1.) Players and DMs who aren't bothered, disturbed, appaled, and sickened by the thought of people being sexually violated. 2.) Players and DMs who think it's funny or cool. That said, and I hope I'm not venturing too far into Mature Topics territory here, most adults have rape fantasies at some point. We're usually revulsed by them and that's the normal, healthy reaction. Some people choose to explore those fantasies in safe, healthy ways in order to resolve the underlying psychological issue. With a mature group that knows what it's getting into, roleplaying can be a cathartic outlet for those feelings. The mature roleplayer knows that it's only a fantasy and knows where to draw the line. The mature roleplayer also knows that Dungeons and Dragons is very rarely the place for such exploration, especially as part of a casual game. |
| Optimized_Commoner05-29-07, 05:24 PM | he wouldn't even allow any combat rolls, any chances for the character to call for help, the rest of us just slept soundly in the inn while three orcs broke in and butt-raped our wizard. This is why god invented hammerguns. Seriously, there are few reasons why I'd just stand up and leave the table, that'd be on the list. That's if I didn't punch the DM. "...the torn dress, the shattered look, was more than he could stand..." Exactly. How is that not enough for anyone? |
| Nevarre05-29-07, 05:26 PM | There are two things worse than rape in D&D: 1.) Players and DMs who aren't bothered, disturbed, appaled, and sickened by the thought of people being sexually violated. 2.) Players and DMs who think it's funny or cool. Well said and very true. Abuse, sexual or otherwise, is a violation. I could go on for some time about this particular subject, but I don't think this is the place for that. Though not even close to the same level (and I would never dream or imply that it was), as far as I'm concerned the DM in question abused his power and as such violated the trust I had placed in him. This is by far the worst DM horror story I have come across. I do have another: This was at a 'con and it wasn't actually D&D (but that's irrelevant). The party encountered a big nasty critter and we all had to make a 'fear' check. Two off us made the check, everyone else failed and DM told them they all ran. Before we could actually do anything (like say... run as well!) the critter attacked us and killed us both. Incredulously we both asked "why couldn't we run like everyone else - or at least take SOME action??" and the DM responded "because you made your fear check so you can't run." Go figure... :rolleyes: |
| the_Luggage05-29-07, 05:35 PM | The mature roleplayer knows that it's only a fantasy and knows where to draw the line. The mature roleplayer also knows that Dungeons and Dragons is very rarely the place for such exploration, especially as part of a casual game. I would say, in a casual game that is let's face it a way to escape from harsh reality for most of us, rape should never be explored. Especially considering everyone there might not be comfortable with it and others might be really upset. I would worry about someone who felt the need to roleplay something like that- if for their total lack of social graces than anything else. |
| ALRUFF05-29-07, 05:36 PM | The mature roleplayer knows that it's only a fantasy and knows where to draw the line. The mature roleplayer also knows that Dungeons and Dragons is very rarely the place for such exploration, especially as part of a casual game. Agreed. Certain groups can handle mature topics and most groups can't. Knowing the difference can make your game fun or make you an outcast. In other words, play to the audience. For example, when I play evil, I play EVIL. My characters like to do things like murder avariciously and create armies of undead to do my bidding. I collect slaves and have my way with them. That's the way I roll when I roll evil. However, I remember one specific occasion when things went a little sour. Up until that point, the campaign had been dark-yet-humorous, with an accent on power gain and corruption. I was playing a slave-trading wizard, and I casually said to the DM, "I get up that morning and have my morning coffee and slave girl." He solicited me for more information, to which I replied, "I don't cook and eat her, if that's what you mean. I don't really want to RP this." The dude kept prodding me for the details of my character's actions, wanting to hear everything. He wouldn't let the game progress until he'd heard more. As for me, I was suddenly very uncomfortable at the turn things had taken. I told him that I was kidding, and that my character didn't take that action after all. He said that I said it, so I did it. He started to describe what the character did in lieu of me, and I cut him off. "Can we skip this? I was just trying to come off as evil and hedonistic." Suddenly very aware of himself, the DM got angry and closed the game down. I'm not sure I've really talked with him in any capacity other than casually since. |
| the_Luggage05-29-07, 05:55 PM | :eek: Very odd. Never played an all evil campaign. Might get round to it at some stage. It doesn't tickle my fancy as much as a neutral/good campaign. Do I have a DM horror story... Yeah. Here's one. It was a Warhammer 40000 roleplaying game idea. My character had two bionic arms that he tried to keep hidden. in one arm was a machine spirit called Brenton who I asked the DM to play as much smarter than me and slightly exasperated. My idea was a sort of PI type, asking questions and sneaking around, not much armour. So, i get off my transport, and immediately get attacked by a maniac with a chainsword because my fly was down. (In real life). Then, later, I was grabbed by a tech priest and had another machine spirit grafted into my arm. This one had an airheaded girly personality. The GM roleplayed constant arguments between my arms. Funny for a minute, incredibly tedious after 5. The machine spirit came with a conversion field- A force field that converted incoming kinetic energy into light. So now my lightly armoured, sneaky character was heavily armoured and emitted piercing flashes of light whenever he was shot. Cheers. (Al this without asking me at all, and with no chance to resist) He also like long, drawn out NPC to NPC conversations. He's a better GM now, but when he started, he was rough. |
| Optimized_Commoner05-29-07, 05:57 PM | The dude kept prodding me for the details of my character's actions, wanting to hear everything. He wouldn't let the game progress until he'd heard more. As for me, I was suddenly very uncomfortable at the turn things had taken. I told him that I was kidding, and that my character didn't take that action after all. He said that I said it, so I did it. He started to describe what the character did in lieu of me, and I cut him off. That's... disturbing. |
| Ariath Ska'Vhor05-29-07, 08:18 PM | I have a DM who's really really bad at being a DM. Dungeons are thrown together shoddily, randomly (not in a good way) and filled with impossible monsters. But there's a talent for making an encounter 'seem' doable when it comes to CR, but there was a time where the party consisted of a wizard, a sorcerer and a bard where we had to fight a gloom golem. Magic immunity and damage reduction none of us could overcome. Another time, before that one, I think the DM just has it out for one of my friends. Every 5 minutes, more **** rape. |
| kentonblack05-29-07, 10:37 PM | *realises he opened a can of worms* SO, HOWS THAT TARRASQUE DOING THESE DAYS? TERRORIZING THE POPULACE AS PER USUAL EH? GOOD GOOOOD? *nrevous looks, slight perspiration* |
| Shiftkitty05-30-07, 12:27 AM | Oookay, let's leave the r-word behind for a little, but you gotta admit, it can be a game-killer if not handled properly. That guy who was such a lousy DM had one aggravating quality that I still nash my teeth over to this day: HE HAD SOME AWESOME IDEAS! But he never put the effort into his plots for good gameplay. I still have some of his notes. He drew up maps, set some awesome descriptions for the text, put in some sneaky traps, then that was about it. "Zefarden's Lair" ended right there. Nothing populated it, no treasure existed to lure anyone inside. His introductory text was a great hook. He had been running some rumors through other games that a demon lord of some sort was about to put in a personal appearance, so when we were told at the end of one session that this thing that looked like a crypt had just thrust itself out of the ground smelling like fire and brimstone, we couldn't wait! We thought he'd finally come up with something to make the BS worth it. Next weekend, he wanted to run a Sci-Fi game. We never went into Zefarden's Lair. But now that I have his notes, perhaps Zefarden will put in his appearance after all...:devil: |
| AffableDoomwalker05-30-07, 05:15 AM | *realises he opened a can of worms* SO, HOWS THAT TARRASQUE DOING THESE DAYS? TERRORIZING THE POPULACE AS PER USUAL EH? GOOD GOOOOD? *nrevous looks, slight perspiration* the scissors are in the wastebasket behind the president's camouflaged limousine. Anywho... One time, I had a fellow player who amounted to the golden girl of the universe an unbeatable woman of epic proportions, the most powerful and strong in all of the universe. She was the DM's Girlfriend. |
| Shiftkitty05-30-07, 10:15 AM | Ugh! That reminds me of the player who swore he'd legitimately rolled all 18s for his stats. Granted, in Cyberpunk I had rolled up some absolutely unbelievable scores and had a character who was amazingly strong, amazingly dextrous, and amazingly intelligent and focused, had drop-dead spectacular looks, and more than enough skill points to start out as a grand master in Shotokan karate and was financially loaded right from the start. The GM and three other players were witness to this amazing genesis, but as he was too good for the level of game we were playing, I agreed not to use him until a more levelled character had died. |
| ALRUFF05-30-07, 12:33 PM | Ugh! That reminds me of the player who swore he'd legitimately rolled all 18s for his stats. Granted, in Cyberpunk I had rolled up some absolutely unbelievable scores and had a character who was amazingly strong, amazingly dextrous, and amazingly intelligent and focused, had drop-dead spectacular looks, and more than enough skill points to start out as a grand master in Shotokan karate and was financially loaded right from the start. The GM and three other players were witness to this amazing genesis, but as he was too good for the level of game we were playing, I agreed not to use him until a more levelled character had died. HAH! Every time I have a setup like that, I die in the first session. Never fails. Karmic balance or something. |
| Optimized_Commoner05-30-07, 01:07 PM | Ugh! That reminds me of the player who swore he'd legitimately rolled all 18s for his stats. You think that's bad. I had a player who rolled three 20s for their stats. Yes, this is before racial adjustments. On 3d6 (well 4d6 drop one). Edit: End of the session he left and the rest of us got together with his character sheet and spent several hours finding the hundreds of ways he'd cheated. We didn't invite him back again. |
| SlanderPanic05-31-07, 02:29 PM | I have a Spycraft d20 character who rolled three natural 18s during chargen. (I made him a wheelman, not realizing at the time that wheelmen are the clerics of Spycraft: good at everything.) Karma has not struck him down, though he did get his first vehicle shot to hell. |
| ALRUFF05-31-07, 03:17 PM | I have a Spycraft d20 character who rolled three natural 18s during chargen. (I made him a wheelman, not realizing at the time that wheelmen are the clerics of Spycraft: good at everything.) Karma has not struck him down, though he did get his first vehicle shot to hell. 3 18s can happen. 6 18s would be like the singularity that created the universe. |
| DreadArchon05-31-07, 08:52 PM | 3 18s can happen. 6 18s would be like the singularity that created the universe. You'd have a 9.8464 * 10^-13 % chance, specifically. That's about one in 100 trillion. (I don't, however, know the chances of a "singularity that created the universe." I'd actually imagine it to be lower, though.) Edit: But 3 18's is a 9.8464 * 10^-6 % chance, which is one in 10 million--unlikely, but much better. |
| ranewen05-31-07, 11:23 PM | one of my very first DM's, and one of the absolute worst sessions ever spent on D&D.. we met around 9am or so on Sat and gamed until like 8-10pm, or whenever.. full day.. the first game goes like this.. we're all Zero level characters (yes i said ZERO).. we have to earn it our first level. so we game the entire day, and finally we're esteemed enough to get a level. :rolleyes: so then, he intro's another character into the story (a dwarf something or other), i'm a human paladin from Damara. he walks up to me, and hands me this scroll with a note inside. apparently, my family (with whom i didn't have much relationship with anyway as the mother had left little Kida on her grandfather's porch and went off to Thask to marry a horse trader.. the grandfather was of course a retired paladin) had made a pact with another family (of dwarves, can you guess where this is headed?) and i was now betrothed to this dwarf to seal the deal between our families. and it was MY choice to marry him, or not, but by not would disrupt the betrothment. after even my fellow gamers telling me, it wouldn't be against the paladin code if i did, i did what only i could do. i found a PrC that demanded i keep my viriginity, and could never marry (did i mention i got a unicorn mount too?) and to top it off, we're in this cavern, and the idiot dwarf misses the target with his crossbow and hits MY shoulder for 2 points of damage. to which i turned around and said "no way i'm marrying you" fast forward.. the next week, i can't really game due to a prior family commitment, so my character wasn't there, this DM was one of those that i fyou missed, ZAP you're character disappeared, and the next time you returned, ZAP you're back. yes i know this is bad on my part, but i did know ahead of time, and i did tell them when i couldn't make it. the group gets beaucoup XP, liek they don't even know what to do with it all. they all level. so i come back, i'm a level one, they're all level twos. it's diplmacy role play time, i get maybe 50XP for the whole session (remember the whole day sessions?) it also takes 6 hrs before he brings my character back into the story so i have to miss a week again.. and there's so much combat and XP, i'ts spilling everywhere. i come back, its' minimize XP day.. i get like 100XP. So now the rest of the party are all level 3's, i'm still level one.. and no where near level two. oh and before the game, he pulls me into the backroom (taht private DM/player chat for my ears only) and he tells me that the night before i had this bad dream of being on this rack, and having this pendulum of razor sharp blade swinging overhead, lowering and lowering.. back to game. he never adresses it again in that session.. he also had family issues after that game and can't return.. and that mental imagery still haunts me to this day. |
| kentonblack06-01-07, 12:09 AM | lordy, why does it always come back to pendulums... that and whats with the "penalize a player spitefully by having a low xp day"? |
| skywyze06-01-07, 12:37 AM | I believe that every single female character I've ever played, with any DM, has at some point been raped. The only one who escaped was 6 years old, and the DM probably just never got around to it because I retired her early. |
| ALRUFF06-01-07, 11:10 AM | I believe that every single female character I've ever played, with any DM, has at some point been raped. The only one who escaped was 6 years old, and the DM probably just never got around to it because I retired her early. Yowzah. |
| StormKnight06-01-07, 02:37 PM | I really can't compete with some of these, but here are some notably bad ones I recall: DM 1: seemed to feel the only way to get the group into any adventure was to get us captured and have them force us to help. This would invariably invovle into a combat ended by DM-fiat, which we were winning (or escaping) up to that point. Then we would be shoved into the quest, which would usually be something that the group would happily have just gone along with given the slightest hook to get us there. Then, he would be baffled by why we would then be trying to double cross our captors and get out of things. Sure, we have compatible goals; but c'mon, they beat us up and forced us to help at swordpoint! DM 2: Set up the initial party to have lots of serious internal conflict, saying that it would be ok because "if one of tried to turn on another, all the others would surely stand against them". Riiight. Half a session in, a fight indeed does break out - and all the esentially honorable characters team up against the nasty manipulative ones. The GM is utterly baffled by this turn of events. DM 3: Offers to run a bit since most of the group isn't there. The two of us who are there have decidely non-combaty characters. Everything is combat. No matter what we do. Get a perfect roll from my social character to talk someone out of attacking us (who was only attacking because he stumbled into a trap and blamed us, who had nothing to do with and just happened to be in the area for)? Nope. Still have to fight. Need to get across the bridge? Well, I can fly, and I can carry her - nope, I can't make it all the way across. I have to land right in front of the monster. Finally, we are travelling along and hear something large coming through the woods - really large. We start to run. We get told how incredibly fast its moving. We look for hiding places and decide to hide, and ambush it IF it looks like its spotting us. A huge creature shows up, sniffs us out instantly and attacks. For our ambush set up? He gives us a +1 to initiative. Since it has something like a +12, it wins anyway. A few rounds later, I can barely scratch it and the wizard is running low on spells. We both try to run - no luck, its much faster than us. I try to fly around and get its attention with a few arrows (which can barely scratch it) and at least give her a chance to get away. Oh, I can't fly out of its reach - it swats me out of the sky. Then, an NPC shows up and draws it away from us. Said NPC shows up later, horribly injured by it, and we are given a guilt trip about we got the poor little guy nearly killed. Then we are told "You should have known you were outmatched, why didn't you run away?" We never let him DM again. |
| ALRUFF06-01-07, 03:08 PM | HAHAHA Classic. |
| Shiftkitty06-01-07, 07:52 PM | Wow, is there, like, a Suckworth University for bad DMs? We were running a sci-fi game. I was a PC this night. "Predator" had just hit the screens and our DM was smitten with this creature. He came up with these no-frikkin'-way stats for it (2e) and sicced it on us. Our "party" was a bunch of drunken rednecks drawn up for us by the DM for this one-shot deal. (I love character acting.) We had a lot of fun at first trying to hunt this thing down. He showed us a photo of the critter, and based on the costume's coloration I asked in my best rednecky voice "Whudja thank it'll taste like on a bobby-cue?" (If you saw the photo he'd gotten, you might've noticed it had a seafood texture to it, like crabmeat.) Well, he told us we were going to be a bunch of rednecks, so that's what we acted like. I guess we were supposed to sober up at some point, because shortly after we got our rifles out of our pick-ups, he started playing this thing really well. Now were a bunch of drunken scared sh**less rednecks. We crammed into the truck that had the crewcab and tried to get our butts outta there. The thing jumped onto the roof of the truck and rammed it's spiky glove through the roof. My character grabbed a dead-blow hammer from the floorboard and started hitting the claws, bending them sideways and trapping the critter to the roof. I then yelled to the driver to find a drain tunnel with a low enough overhead. I didn't need to explain anything else. Based on the map provided earlier by the DM, the tunnel that I guess we were supposed to take shelter in was really close-by. His predator failed to remove the gauntlet in time and wound up as a glowing splat on the overhead of the tunnel. We received no xp for the session because we'd taken it in a completely different direction than the DM wanted to go. You know, any good DM would have derailed our direction by simply rolling and declaring that I found nothing in the cab to hammer those claws with, or that the hammer was having no effect. Still, that's not as bad as your "low xp" days. |
| Optimized_Commoner06-02-07, 12:32 AM | We received no xp for the session because we'd taken it in a completely different direction than the DM wanted to go. Oh dear god, I've had that happen before. We walk into a room with the BBEG in it. Conversation starts. Part way through it one of the players goes, "I pull out my gun and shoot the BBEG" (basically the BBEG started rubbing his crimes in our faces). Now IC I didn't much approve of this action, the BBEG was bond-villain style spilling his plans and I figured drawing him out in conversation was a good strategy, but I can understand why the other PC felt the need to shoot him when he starts bragging about how evil he is. So the BBEG runs off (I think he was just DM-fiated away), the walls vanish and a ridiculously too high CR bunch of demons comes in and attack us, permanently killing a different PC in the fight. Then the BBEG's plan starts off and basically everything we do is DM decreed to fail, because the one PC shot the BBEG at the start of the scene. Finally to cap it all off, at the end of the session we got no XP because we went off track. The most annoying thing is, this DM is usually a good DM. That was annoying. |
| Pimpwytch06-03-07, 06:08 AM | Our party was 5th-5 characters Fighter, cleric,wizard,ranger and the Dm's Barbarian. We entered in to a dungeon he created after running us through the Sunless Citadel and Forge of Fury and a few sidetrek adventures are party found a map at the end of Forge of Fury. The Map lead us to the Dungeon of Ironfire. We enter into this great underground complex built by dwarves long ago. Room 1: 12 Hell hounds! What the F**K!!! Roll initiative After several rounds of combat we are sure not to survive this, his(Dm) Barbarian Baldor the great starts rolling crits and twenties everytime he attacks and starts killing the Hell hounds every round. When it all said and done the cleric and Wizard are like -5. My fighter is like 12 hp left out of 50 and the ranger is wounded by half. The Baldor has a scratch and some burnt forearm hair! My fighter suggest we leave at once and head back to town for we are Greatly unmatched here! The rest of the party agrees. The Dm Barbarian Intimidates the entire party! saying we are more afraid of him than the dungeon! What! Room 2: 40 stirges fly out from holes in this long hall way, our wizard managed a web spell and he fireballed from the distance. 3: This chamber was the size of Foot ball field with 3 T-rexes- Everyone died except his barbarian and he killed the t-rexes with critcals! |
| Shiftkitty06-03-07, 11:09 AM | Let me guess. Those criticals were rolled behind a DM screen. I don't use one because I manipulate my sessions in other ways. If my scenario starts to get derailed, I just get creative. You gotta wonder when the DM's character is somehow the savior of the day against incredible odds while your characters are left sitting on the curb and clapping, why have anyone else over at all? Just run a solo session. We used to call that sort of thing "showcasing", when one character (usually the DM's) is the one getting all the action. This DM we had for a bit had it in for the wizard. At the start of a huge run, he suddenly declared it a magic-dead area. We had stuck by the rules and Uffy had only a dagger and a quarterstaff. He was pretty much useless for the whole run, and the game had been stacked wildly against us, so we beat a retreat, declaring that we'd go back in after we got a little more experience elsewhere. Meanwhile, I dug through some old books and we found some training rules that allowed Uffy to develop a good sword arm. He supplemented his AC with some bracers, talismans, rings, etc. that had some protection from the effects of the null-magic. When we went back in to this magic-dead area, (which had repopulated, even the "unique" monsters) at the first encounter Uffy came out swinging. The DM protested it as against the rules (he was a rules lawyer when he found it convenient), so at his insistence we handed over Uffy's sheet and I had thought to bring the book with the page marked. He got pretty upset and challenged us to find one instance in mythology where a mage was as good a warrior as he was a spellcaster. I swear, we all said in unison "Obi-Wan Kenobi". Then he tried to declare that Star Wars didn't count because it wasn't mythology, so we had to start bringing out the Joseph Campbell essays, Bullfinch's Mythology, etc. For awhile the basement sounded like a Harvard symposium on warriors and mystics in ancient legends. We won the argument, but then the DM "realized how late it was" and shut the game down. It was 11PM on a Saturday.:rolleyes: |
| baby_kamikaize_kobold06-03-07, 08:36 PM | I had a bad experience once. We were tracking a vampire that we had to bring back alive (sort of). Then I made the mistake of pointing out that we had no plan of what to do when we caught up to it. The DM forced us to stop for an hour and devise a plan and discuss tactics. Just as we are about to capture the darned thing it escapes in the most logic defying way. The DM’s reasoning was that the big bad guy shouldn’t be taken out in such an anti-climatic way. But our revenge was swift as it was awesome. The vampire had crappy saves due to a flaw in the mind of the creator of the adventure (not the DM) and we simply cast control undead on it and made it walk home and explain how sorry he was and go to bed with no supper. ( last part about no supper and the apology were not real I just thought it was a funny thing) But other than that the DM has been pretty cool. |
| Shiftkitty06-03-07, 09:55 PM | Argh! Uncreativity points to your DM for that one. He should have read the stats and seen how screwed up they were. He could have then tweaked it accordingly! |
| Ty06-03-07, 10:51 PM | I was the horror DM yesterday. Sad to say, I used a published adventure (which shall remain nameless) because I did not have time to really prepare a new adventure/campaign because of work, etc. I *thought* the PC's could handle it, even after the rogue decided to push up daisies. One encounter later, TPK. I've come to the conclusion that trying to DM with too full of a life is NOT a good idea for your players, no matter how much they want to play. Cancelling a session due to time constraints is the lesser of two evils. |
| Doleth06-04-07, 02:10 AM | We received no xp for the session because we'd taken it in a completely different direction than the DM wanted to go. Was that the reason your DM gaves? I'm asking this question only because you said it was a one-shot deal with pre-made characters and I don't see the point in handing xp at the end of a one-shot game. I don't have much to add on topic, the bad DM I saw were not that horrible, mostly inexperienced. Well except one, his game are funny and all, but they can't be more than humoristic one-shot thing. He always create his own worlds that don't make sense, he always put us against npc where anything we'll try to do will fail because these guy are omnipotent, and kid will always be the most lethal and omnipotent force in the universe. So for now on, when I play in one of his game, my character go to a colliseum and bet on any kid fighting a giant draconic lich god of legend... and I usually win the bet. Well, at least his game are funny. |
| Chris_The_Guy06-04-07, 03:28 AM | So we all play a game where the primary goal is generally to kill many, many different things and people and steal their belongings, and our characters face trials that range from falling down trap doors and being impaled by massive metal spikes, having every bone in our bodies being crushed by a giant's club, or having every fiber of our body reduced to its elemental particles, but the idea of rape is completely and utterly out of the question? I ask this not to be confrontational, because I'm also uncomfortable with the idea of rape (at least, raping PCs and detailed descriptions of rape) in a game. I'm really curious why it's OK for most gamers to say "I shove my greatsword into the orc's chest, and blood spurts wildly in a glorious rain of blood and terror as he screams in helpless agony," but describing rape, even on a basic level, seems to be out of bounds. |
| skywyze06-04-07, 07:09 AM | Because in D&D, rape is a kind of trauma that the character has to live with forever. Death and injury are only temporary and easily fixed with spells.:rolleyes: To me, it's more the fact that the DM imposes this earth-shaking, life-changing experience on the character, permanently changing everything about their outlook on the world and so forth, without even consulting the player first. I'd much rather my character die than get raped. At least they'll die being the character that *I* made. Not what the DM forced my character to become. The last thing I'm going to mention (though there are more reasons, I feel that these are the most important) is how all my DMs see the word "female" on my character sheet and immediately go into a frothy-mouthed raping frenzy where they see every encounter as a chance to have the character abused. Being female does not equal being a female reproductive organ. Yet all my DMs see women as nothing but creatures waiting to be horribly raped by gross creatures. Let me go around and ask the opposite question: Why do so many DMs feel that everything remotely female MUST be raped at every turn? I mean, one DM I could understand, but I've had four, no wait, five DMs now who all insisted on raping every female player, female cohort, female ANYthing. It's not "epic", does not make for a better story (certainly not without player-DM interaction), does not make things more realistic or fun and is at times both inappropriate to the players in general and rude to the poor sod who just wanted to try playing a female character. Seriously, do you have to graduate from Pervert High in order to become a DM or something? |
| Shiftkitty06-04-07, 10:05 AM | Doleth-The reason we wanted the xp was because we were notorious record keepers, and if another one-shot night came up, we'd have characters with levels all ready to go. We may not use them often, but we could use them generically in any session of their particular genre. It's like having stock actors. Even though the points may not have counted for much, they at least counted for something. Maybe he had a tougher monster for the next redneck campaign should one happen to arise. We'd have tougher PCs ready to go. (Or drunker...) |
| Particle_Man06-04-07, 10:39 AM | No player has experienced death and very few have experienced murdering others at the time that they are playing characters that kill and die. But if statistics are a guide, 1 in 4 women at least have been on the receiving end of sexual assault, and all women have to worry about it. That makes D&D rape "too real" on the squick level (especially for female players), while D&D murder, etc., is fake enough that it can be treated as part of the fantasy only scenario. |
| dpetroc06-04-07, 11:18 AM | Seriously, do you have to graduate from Pervert High in order to become a DM or something? I think it goes back to some of the stereotypes that surround RPG gamers. Problem is with stereotypes is that sometimes there is truth to them. Whereas I will gleefully describe horrors of combat to my players, I would not ever visit rape upon any character or even NPC (though it might be inferred for an NPC if there is a VERY good reason for it -- again even then it would not be described). A DM who looks to get his rocks off by having a female character raped (and then claiming plot legitimacy) is immature at best, and seriously in need of counselling at the other ends of the spectrum. The DM's who enjoy visiting rape on pcs have read WAAAAYYY too much John Norman. |
| SlanderPanic06-04-07, 11:29 AM | But if statistics are a guide, 1 in 4 women at least have been on the receiving end of sexual assault. What they don't tell you is that one in six men has been sexually assaulted. Given the stigma attached to men who are victims of sexual assault, the actual ratio may be (and probably is) higher. About 40% of reported domestic violence cases have male victims, with most female abusers using weapons and the element of surprise. As I've said earlier in this thread, a character getting raped shouldn't be done outside a group that doesn't have the maturity to handle it. Additionally, it should not be done without consent and discussion with the player beforehand and the consent of the group as a whole. Some players at the table may not be comfortable with going down such a dark story path. If even one player isn't comfortable with it, then it isn't appropriate for that group. (And the DM doesn't have any business asking why a player is uncomfortable with it, either.) We've ventured pretty far into Mature waters here. Perhaps a WizO will see fit to move the thread. |
| Sulacu06-04-07, 12:46 PM | I've had really sound roleplaying experiences so far, but there was one so particularly strange that it couldn't help but stand out like a skyscraper in the middle of the desert. It wasn't necessarily bad in the end, though, because he got what's coming to him. It was pretty late at night, we were playing, traditionally as it were, by the light of lanterns, which was always pretty cool. We were eight people, split up in two parties of four. I played a 16th level female monk. Our usual DM is a witty fellow called Shayn, who played a Cleric 3/Wizard 3/Mystic Theurge 10. Everything was awesome until Shayn went on holiday for two weeks, to the south of France. The surrogate DM was the point man of the other four-man party. You know, these guys are somewhat dimwitted. To emphasize the point, they all had hit dice of d10 or larger. Fighter, Paladin, Barbarian and Barbarian. DM played the paladin, and the only recurring problem of the RP up till then was how he very often let his paladin partake in obviously derogatory activities, whether it was inciting fights, going into bordellos whenever our parties were lodged in a city, etcetera. When he became DM, the entire roleplay was turned around. For one, he completely forgot about the three of us not in his four-man party and kept giving us random encounters while they were pursuing some farcical subplot. To get some roleplay in, we decided to try and catch up with their four characters, which in itself took about an entire day of playing... "no, it's curfew tonight.", "no, you've reached the shore, you need to find another path", "no, you can't go through the generic dark forest, as it is infested by Nightwalkers". Ehum!... Eventually they could no longer ignore our endeavours to reach their party, and we traveled on as a seven man party. I thought from here on in it'd become somewhat more interesting, but no... You see, the next day of play the surrogate DM had had a bit too much to drink. The day began by his paladin and the other three hitting on every character that was female adopting the crude methods that he would have most likely used himself in real life, if he had ever puckered up the courage to do so. Luckily, except for his paladin, his party consisted of utter blockheads with the charisma of a brick. So, he tried to roll as shiftily as possible when he made a charming check under increased modifiers he blatantly thought up. From there on in, it got even worse, though, their four prepubescent minds having cooked up a situation with a succubus advanced some 10 or so HDs. Now, I like a little looseness in roleplay now and then, but I wasn't ready to stand for this. At first point, I was playing a monk, and I centered her character and background around a bushido-inspired monastic code that among other things required 'abstinence from sex', you know, for retaining physical and spiritual purity. So, when their increasing intoxication instilled within them some kind of towering Jesus-phase of carnal urges and they started literally having four on one graphpaper-sex with that succubus, I had my monk walk up and quivering palm her. I don't remember ever being so gleeful as when the succubus failed her save and died. After that, he started raging and jibbering at me, and over the next hour he went into some kind of vindictive phase where he tried to present my character with a deadly obstacle at every turn or in every room. Eventually we entered a room through an overhead walkway and he was like 'you entered first (I knew I didn't), behind me, and you encounter a spiked iron fence spanning the full width of the walkway speeding forward to impale you. Damage on contact: unavoidable, ignominious death. No save, no nothing. He was probably just behind me to block my path back through the door. Instead, I simply had my monk jump off the walkway down to the ground a hundred feet below instead :P. His paladin bought it instead by the hands of his own munchkin trap, and I had my monk slow-fall (80 ft) down along one of the walkway's pillars down to the ground, coming off it with a mere 1d6 damage. I found it all terribly funny, until he started yelling and trying to find a way to worm out of his character's death. It felt like kindergarten playground all over again. It went on for two hours in which all kinds of issues were addressed. Even the issue of 'how long the spikes on the trap were', that they could never have impaled him fully, and that he should only be dealt 10d6 damage instead. At that point I simply collected the two in my party and went to play at home, trying to clumsily DM until Shayn came back home. |
| ALRUFF06-04-07, 01:27 PM | Of course, in all of these guys' (not the rapists) defenses, I botched my first DMing job as well. I thought that 4 CR 2s were a good match for an inexperienced party of four 2nd level characters. It was sort of the right math, except that that meant they only had a 50% chance of survival! TPK... However, I ALWAYS give experience for combat- even the most ridiculous ones. I don't penalize XP for in-character actions, I simply adjust the consequences of the world. |
| Wildfire2806-04-07, 02:58 PM | Well.. Ive got a small story about DM nightmares.. Truly. Let me start off with a spicer-upper: Copy Machine gone Bad. Now, I dont mind if ideas from one campaign is used for another but IF you copy, please make sure you copy right. In this case, it went from very extremely cool (Other DM) to downright boring and disastrous (The really really bad DM) First a bit about the original: The players were trapped in a village. It got all horrific things going on. The players were downright scared and the problems seemed like mounting every time. It was really Emo play. No dice rolls what so ever. I played a priest of kelemvorn. Stern yet deceisive, no fun kinda guy. Just like the priest of that god. Now we stopped up to a point when a dragon was rebuilding the city but in favor for a Evil sorceres and a few assasins who got the other player in a choke hold (She owed them gold, lots of gold.) Now this is what the dweeb made of it : The players were trapped in a cartbord city. A paladin with 200+ Hitpoints was battling some bane liches. The dragon was really really extreemly powerfull, and the players were only level 7. The paladin was doing everything, the players were doing nothing but being hunted by the villagers. So the general, "Run away" was the thing to do. Note : This was ADnd 2.0 But : The same DM; Ok.. you are walking with this lvl20/lvl20 gold dragon paladin. Yes, the whole campaign revolved around this gold dragon. The players were just hopping allong. I still dont know what the plot is! Same DM again: We are playing a starwars campaign. Really nice start, middle but not the end. No sir, by God himself no. So we where in that same pub as in the starwars movie number 4. Same atmosphere, same band, same creepy green guy's. So one of the players started to threaten an NPC for info. In that bar, even killing someone is nothing new. But guess what! Suddenly every NPC in the bar was a soldier of the JiHad. Blew us sky high and ended a otherwise perfect nice campaign. Nope.. Still the same DM; He shouts "Ive got a plot!", we went.. well, ok <Sigh> Go for it. Dune like world. Very complicated. Went out of the way writing for it. All Kudo's, but! We are sitting in a pub. A job was being offered. My character was not in the mood to go into the sewers. The others werent that intrested either. Not being an ass about it the dwarf goes down the drain. Right into the sewers. The rest are too willing to be clean. We were expecting a plot. So, we were kinda waiting for it. Suddenly, we were teleported away! In a dark cavern. Held hostage by a god. For no apparent reason. The next day. The campaign chrasht. These are my nightmares... Sadly enough, he isnt a better player. Always want to be a shining beacon in the night. Ends up mostly being the trubble maker in the party. Kills other players. ect. ect. |
| ALRUFF06-04-07, 05:55 PM | Why did you keep playing?! |
| Leo06-04-07, 06:32 PM | Some years ago, I met a new DM, and joined his campaign with a rogue. 2 Sessions later, I had learned I had made the worst decision possible, since half the skills of the game were nerfed.´ Hide: we were in a savannah and constantly being suprised despite high spot. Aparently the tall herbs give huge hide bonus to the enemies. But when my rogue tries to hide, it seems as EVERY enemy knows my exact location, even the lowiest ones. Actually, it seemd as unless there was a brick wall between me and the observers, I couldn't hide at all. Move silently:see above. Bluff:Don't know why bothered to put ranks into it. The Dm wouldn't even roll and the NPC's would just as tought I had said nothing. Use magic device: Yes, you can activate devices. No, not scrolls. Or wands. It doesn't make sense a non caster can do that. What can you do then? Well, you can read them loudly(100% true). Search:aparently every traps had DC's over 50 to find. Disable device:See above. Sneak attack:Only with weapons of the 3.0 rogue list. And if the enemy is bigger than normal size I can't reach it's vigal organs so I don't sneak attack at all. I almost gave graces to the heavens when my characvter died after 3 critical hits and refused to be brought back to life so I could make a new one. 3 levels behind the party and with level 1 equipment but a nonrogue! My god, how hard was to find a decent DM back then. Strangest thing is that his hate seemed to be only towards the rogue class, since when I started my new wizard there were no more bizzarre houserules. |
| ALRUFF06-05-07, 02:37 PM | Oh, I've been told by DMs that I can't do things like that... Like grappling horses (I know they get a bonus), flanking dragons, hiding during the daytime or surprising the enemy. |
| Wildfire2806-05-07, 04:52 PM | Frankly, because I'm forving incarnate. Honestly. I'm a Dm, have been for many many many years. Ive seen him go from stupidly arrogant to catastrophic dimwitted. He's out of the group now. Suddenly we are role playing again. Him and me though, go back a long time. Ive known him when he outgeeked me whilst wearing a startrek suit on a costume party. But then again, I was intrested in one thing at that party and that was beer. He brought me beer. He cought my interest. I suspect he hasn't a social life. If he has one, it's on WoW. But, I haven't played dnd with him for a time now either. Somehow A relief :D Yeah call me stupid. I call myself a Sheppard of the hopeless. That gives a better ring to it! Wildfire |
| Zandolit06-06-07, 02:05 AM | Wow. Some of these are really awful. Makes me feel very lucky to have such a good DM. I haven't loved every moment of every single session of course, but in general he does a great job. This thread reminds me I should thank him more for that. (I try to make a point of saying something after a particularly good session, or at the end of a campaign, so that's something, but I'm all for appreciating the DM.) I'm really curious why it's OK for most gamers to say "I shove my greatsword into the orc's chest, and blood spurts wildly in a glorious rain of blood and terror as he screams in helpless agony," but describing rape, even on a basic level, seems to be out of bounds. Well, as I see it, it's because rape is often about dominance, and having power over and humiliating the victim. Because of the DM/player power dynamic, depictions of rape make a woman a victim not only of violence, but of having her status as a person worthy of respect denied both in and out of game. Yet all my DMs see women as nothing but creatures waiting to be horribly raped by gross creatures. I am especially glad not to be in a group like that. That would make me really, really uncomfortable. Consensual stuff is fine in our games (we're all adults and have no issue with it, and nothing is described in much detail,) but rape is definitely not alright. None of our PCs, female or male, have ever been raped, nor been in danger of it. I can think of only one time rape ever came up, and that was a male NPC attempting to rape a female NPC. My character (also female) heard the woman screaming and prevented her from being harmed. I suppose I technically could have done nothing, but the way the scenario was set up it was pretty clear the expectation was for me to prevent her from being raped. In a lot of the cases described it sounds like the DMs are really taking pleasure in describing sexual assault, and that freaks me out. A lot. I am really glad I have a good DM... *shudders* |
| skywyze06-06-07, 02:56 AM | *snip**grabs your DM and runs cackling into then night* |
| WhiteRaven81006-06-07, 04:25 AM | This is long, you may want to stretch or get snack first. My first experience as a plain PC (I've been a DM since day zero of starting D&D) I joined a group at my local friendly gaming store and was happy to find they had just started a new game and the party was at level three. So me and my brother roll up a pair of character's. I was a Human Druid who embraced a True Neutral alignment, neither fearing death, nor worshipping any diety because of it. In fact my Druid did not even believe the gods existed. My brother rolled up a pretty stale Orc Barbarian. Maybe twenty minutes in we're added to the story. Found tied up and gearless in a pair of crates. Now my brother didn't have a backstory, so the Dungeon Master up and handed him one. Normally I would not object to his, but little option was given as to weither or not he could reject the story or not. So whatever, it wasn't the worse thing. We were new to the game and just wanted to get into some battle's. But nope. Despite my Druid's willingness to aid the adventure's, I was removed from the team not fifteen minutes in because of my refusal to acknowledge Moradin as a god, or because I wouldn't worship Moradin, or something weak along those lines. All the while I kept my Druid in character and simply nonchantly exited the dungeon and proceeded to roll up a new character. I was heavily disappointed. In mid-November I had begun looking into D&D, visting this forum, checking out SRD, learning the rules with the Basic Game. And from day one, I wanted to play a Druid (not aware they were so powerful). I just wanted the animal companion and aloof, alternate life-style of an enlightened worshipper with a list of philophsical view points to roleplay with. A Dwarven Cleric of Kord was what I rolled up. The DM sorta nudged for Heironious or Moradin, but I rejected. He wasn't asshatting nudging me, just a soft suggestion, it was fine. But again the DM gave me my backstory. Since his first 3.0 character was a Dwarven Cleric of Kord, I was that character. Took his name (Whytefyre) and the same greatsword with the same name that his character once had. I was then made in command of the party, since Whytefyre was appearently incredibly important among Dwarves (whom most of the party was). So a combat encounter again a pair of Owlbear's. Some nice description of the area and even a bit of role playing preceded this. Then BAM! The session became player roll, DM confirm hit or miss, player roll damage, Owlbear die. Although I didn't try to role play the encounter, I recieved a vibe that if I were to try, social awkwardness would result. Shortly after somebody in the group mentioned a ring that they needed to have identified (that they had found in a previous session). My brother blurts out that he will try it on. Note, his character said that he would try it on, not that he put it on. But as if he had, the DM ruled that he had to try on the ring. The cursed ring. The ring that made my brother's Orc Barbarian fly into some sort of rage and attack the party. I coup de grad'ed up without too much havoc. I do regret in hind sight that I took his character down rather then simply making him unconscious. But you'll have that. At this time some party in fighting had begun in the other group, and they were starting fresh, so my brother jumped ship and began playing with them. Meanwhile while all this is happening, we are continiously and constantly taking smoke breaks. Play for forty-five minutes, smoke for twenty seemed to be way too common. Also, during the game, player's appearntly could become bored with their character's and just *poof* become something new. Warforged Rogue out, Stonechild something or another in. All without any in game explantion. I didn't return. Not because of how I was treated, but because the place was nearly an hour away and at the time I was short one driver's license. Only eleven weeks ago I joined another group at the same store (this time having my license, so I've been able to attend each and every other week (we alternate Saturday nights with GURPS or Munchkin or Hackmaster, I forget which). The group I'm in actually alternate's DM's (and thus campaignes) every now and again. So I join a party that is only one session in, and I'm excited to hear this because I enjoy starting game's low and working my character level up. The first snag is that the game is Core only. That's fine. I own almost every 3.5 Wizard's supplement but ultimately I'm fine with it because I acknowledge that the DM gets to make that choice. It gets worse though. To stop people from repeating the same character over and over, your race is randomly determined. Also, while rolling stats, you roll a kicker, and if you take it you get a character quirk. So I arrive with this impression of playing a noble and brave to a fault Human Monk. Instead I end up with a cowardice idiot Dwarf Monk with a gas problem. Argh! I never seem to be able to be what I want. Oh darn, that's life. So we play, and over all the session was fun. So I arrive two weeks later to find the DM has not had enough sleep and so we ended up playing Risk. This is fine. I'm mighty disappointed, but over all I am fine. Though I'm not asking myself why we simply didn't run the other campaigne. If (at the time) I'd known a second game was being ran, I would of suggested it, but that's how life goes. Show up two weeks after that and find that half our group is away (they re-inact the Civil War) and so were not going to play. I took off and saw a movie instead of sticking around for more Risk. The next week, for one reason or another, we switch to the other campaigne. I ask if I should roll up a character, to which I'm told I have my Dwarf Monk (first level) and it could be implemented without any trouble. I'm OK with this. About thirty minutes before we begin I ask what level the party is at (because I over heard a party member talking about his character and his character's abilities). Turns out that character was at level seven. And I was suppose to be added at level one. Quickly I ask the DM if it's alright that I roll up a higher level character and I do, being told to roll up a person at level six. Additionally, this game is also Core, which is fine. But the DM's husband, has a Complete Warrior Prestige Class and possibly a magic item from that supplement as well. To be fair, I'm sure if I presented her with something from another book I could probably get it. With this Dungeon Mistress, I'm conviced it's just that this paticular person is a new DM, not that they are trying to screw anybody over, as she's kinda sorta a friend back from my days of playing Yu-Gi-Oh. Why I'm at level six and everybody else at seven (and the party Paladin at eleven I believe) I'm still lost for. As to why I never questioned why I'm at level six when the person who tipped me off was at seven, I'm at even a bigger loss for. Two weeks after that (so one week ago), I show yet again, and this time we have most of our party (save one of the Civil War guys and his daughter) plus a new person. One DM couldn't find his notes (his office is buried in crap as he prepairs to go to a convention) and the other DM left her's at home. So I ran the Shackled City (which I've begun to bring with me, just in case). Long story short, that was probably the best role playing session of my life. Over all, I think I'm a ***** when it comes to confronting my DM. |
| RobbyPants06-06-07, 12:46 PM | I'm really curious why it's OK for most gamers to say "I shove my greatsword into the orc's chest, and blood spurts wildly in a glorious rain of blood and terror as he screams in helpless agony," but describing rape, even on a basic level, seems to be out of bounds. I can think of three reasons for this: 1) Some cultures (particulary american culture) have desensitized violence, but still see sexuality as taboo. 2) As mentioned by Zandolit, rape is about dominance. To make matters worse, this gives the DM the ability to force an in-character rape on the player's PC. This can often seem to be about one to two steps away from the DM raping the player. Granted, this is all symbolic, and different people will take it differently. Still, it's, at best, a DM abusing their station of power. 3) I have a feeling most people (the players) are more likely to know someone (or be someone) who has been the victim of a sexaul assault as opposed to someone who has been violently killed. It seems like it's more likely to "hit home" to more players. |
| FoamingPipeSnake06-06-07, 12:57 PM | I posted these in the Modern forum, but they are far more relevant here. I had a DM who, for some reason unknown to me, was out to get me. First game I played with him I had a Paladin. The first hit she took was a crit from a scythe that wiped her out. Harsh, but not too bad, I guess. So I write up a dwarven ranger "Tunnel Runner" type. I am describing my character as we all sit in the inn. I mention that he is beardless because it gets in the way in close tunnels. He then immediately tells me that the dwarves in the inn beat the hell out of me and rob me penniless for being a freak. I was left with one hit point and my underwear. I suicided the character later in the adventure. Third time I was ready for him. I told my wife to call me an hour after the game started. I made a gnome illusionist. I really liked that guy. The first thing he meets is a hill giant who wasn't particularly mean. I try to distract him with cantrips and banter while my party sneaks by. The giant decides he likes me and stuffs me into his bag and walks off. No attack roll. No save. NOTHING. I fall unconsious as soon as I enter the bag. My firends chase the giant, peppering it with arrows as they go. The DM rules that the giant doesn't feel the tiny little arrows. This continues until the giant is down to 10 hit points. The my friend leaps on to the giant's waist to cut the bag. Turns out it was a bag of holding that instantly kills me as it ruptures. 10 minutes later my wife called me with an "emergency" and I went home. The DM later called me and asked me if I didn't want to play anymore because of my string of bad luck, and told me he really wanted me back. I told him to stuff it. Later on I recruited about half of his players into my own campaign. Also, My first time ever playing D&D my little wizard got prison raped by an orc. I almost never played again, but my friends told me that that wasn't the normal DM, and they tried to never let him run a game because he ALWAYS raped characters. Boy had some problems. |
| RobbyPants06-06-07, 01:53 PM | Later on I recruited about half of his players into my own campaign. That, sometimes, is the best revenge! I always thought it would be funny to comendeer a bad DM's game. After he's TPKed, plunderd, and raped the party for the fifth time, they just decide enough's enough. Suddenly, the players all refuse to accept what's happening, and collectively decide what they'd like to happen. The furious DM says it doesn't work, but he's ignored, and the players take over the game, one of them assuming the role of DM! DM: The orc prison rapes your elf! Player 1: No, I think I'm not in prison anymore, because this whole setup was stupid to begin with. Player 2: Agreed. We shouldn't be in prison in the first place. Total railroading! DM: It doesn't matter. I'm the DM! Player 1: Okay. So we're walking down the road, like we were before this whole incedent, and we come across a group of four gnolls. Player 2: I draw my bow. Player 3: I cast mage armor. DM: What gnolls!?! You're in prison getting raped!!! Player 1: Roll initiative. DM: Stop!!! This is stupid!!! Player 2: I can't hear over his whining. Same time at your place next week? Player 1: Sounds fine to me! DM: :weep: Perhaps this is a little childish and passive-aggressive, but man would it be funny! That's the problem with irking your players like that all the time: you lose them (and consequently, your game). |
| FoamingPipeSnake06-06-07, 02:07 PM | This happened to my group once, but not so perfectly. DM: Ummmmm... OK, you guys are working on a reeeeeaaaally big pirate ship. You are attacked by some water orcs (?!). First round of combat sees me getting punted off the ship by an orc with 1 HP left. Me: OK, I start to swim back to the ship and... DM: You are still falling, you won't hit for 10 rounds. Th ship..it's REEEEAAAAAALLLY big, remember? Me: Ok dude, this blows. Here, take my character sheet, I'll Dm from here. Other PC's: Yay! DM: Whatever dude, you guys suck, you know that? Me: Ok ummm, you are seated at an inn in am mining town in Icewind Dale.....proceeds to ad hoc a decently entertaining adventure We were all pretty close friends already, or this may have gotten violent, or least whiny and petty. |
| skywyze06-06-07, 02:13 PM | Hahaha, all these mutineering stories are awesome. Wish our players could've pulled something like that off on one of our old DMs. |
| DreadArchon06-06-07, 02:45 PM | I'm really curious why it's OK for most gamers to say "I shove my greatsword into the orc's chest, and blood spurts wildly in a glorious rain of blood and terror as he screams in helpless agony," but describing rape, even on a basic level, seems to be out of bounds. I'd go with "unmistakably spiteful." There's no practical value in raping someone, it's just superfluous hostility. Killing, looting, etc. may not be all nice and good, but at least it usually serves some purpose or advances some goal. |
| FoamingPipeSnake06-06-07, 03:28 PM | I'd go with, "It's creepy to have a demented DM act out his sick fantasies on your intellectual property." |
| skywyze06-06-07, 05:36 PM | I'd go with, "It's creepy to have a demented DM act out his sick fantasies on your intellectual property.":clap: *writes down for future use* |
| ALRUFF06-06-07, 06:51 PM | I remember what was probably the worst game I ever played. The DM just kind of arbitrarily said stuff happened as long as it suited him. First, he slammed us with some terrible backstory that centered around just one character. That guy was the "chosen one." We were all bodyguards for the aforementioned chosen one, who was the DM's best friend. Then best friend gets a +10 (+5, +5 special abilities- at LEAST) sword. We're level five at the time. Heh. I'm playing a bad-mutha grappler monk. I've become quite good at tactically grappling megavillains and stunning them with my Touch of Golden Ice and Holy Aura feats. The best friend gets a free turning ability that DESTROYS all of the frikkin' undead I'm fighting. Then, whilst alone, I manage to grapple one of the Halfling theives behind the whole fiasco. His assistant knocks me off the Halfling- no roll, no save. Then I grapple the vampire BBEG while the cleric/Chosen One blows a hole in the sunlit roof. The Chosen One automatically succeeds. I automagically fail. At that point, I decided to have a talk with the DM. He promised to never fudge another roll. That's when I killed the "chosen one" character with my grappling abilities and sold off his sword to the BBEG. The DM ruled that the BBEG double-crossed and killed me in the end, but it didn't matter. His game was OVER. |
| skywyze06-06-07, 06:54 PM | His game was OVER.*shudders* Good thing too. Seriously, that DM needs to have some ****ing manners towards the rest of the players too. |
| Shiftkitty06-06-07, 07:57 PM | I loathe stories that center on a "chosen one". |
| TinyHowie06-06-07, 08:11 PM | *sighs* One, and only one player powerplayed his character, buffed himself up like no others, he alone could beat up the whole party. Same level, just because he fine tuned it. Fine, we have no gauge against powerplayers. So the DM didn't feel satisfied when his mobs were just wasted by the powerplayer. He designed a mob capable to beat him up. Needless to say, that powerplayer was the only one survived the encounter. A sad example of DM vs. Player craps. |
| TinyHowie06-06-07, 08:27 PM | Rapes could be "good" when it's a horror game the DM's running, and the details of rape scene could be skipped pretty much easily to avoid disturbing your players. Yeah some DMs do have issues on that subject. In my group there's a woman whose character got raped like 3 times and she had no special feeling on that, some people are just that. The DM handled it well tho without going into details and described only the aftermaths. It was a semi-Ravenloft type goth horror game. |
| ranewen06-06-07, 08:36 PM | So we all play a game where the primary goal is generally to kill many, many different things and people and steal their belongings, and our characters face trials that range from falling down trap doors and being impaled by massive metal spikes, having every bone in our bodies being crushed by a giant's club, or having every fiber of our body reduced to its elemental particles, but the idea of rape is completely and utterly out of the question? I ask this not to be confrontational, because I'm also uncomfortable with the idea of rape (at least, raping PCs and detailed descriptions of rape) in a game. I'm really curious why it's OK for most gamers to say "I shove my greatsword into the orc's chest, and blood spurts wildly in a glorious rain of blood and terror as he screams in helpless agony," but describing rape, even on a basic level, seems to be out of bounds. A simple reason I do not wish it detailed out. is that I have dealt with trauma similar to rape. It's difficult at best to deal and live everyday in the real world with the scarring that this causes. To greatly detail such an event in game, first, i game to escape from real life (three hours a week I can pretend i'm normal), and when it confronts me in instances such as this, it drives me into panic attacks, and leaves me unable to move, speak, or function. Death on the other hand, is something i've never experienced, and doesn't induce the trauma detailing a rape would. In a panic attack, you feel as though your chest is going to explode, and you feel death coming. but the trigger to this was trauma related. And second, I've never once detailed the bloody gore in my characters actions. Maybe a cut that's bleeding, but not Old Faithful. |
| ranewen06-06-07, 08:48 PM | I had my monk slow-fall (80 ft) down along one of the walkway's pillars down to the ground, coming off it with a mere 1d6 damage. add insult to injury. Tumble DC 15, treat fall distance as 10 feet shorter. Could've negated your 1d6 damage? WTG on your idea. gotta love the Monk |
| Shiftkitty06-06-07, 09:49 PM | A simple reason I do not wish it detailed out. is that I have dealt with trauma similar to rape. It's difficult at best to deal and live everyday in the real world with the scarring that this causes. To greatly detail such an event in game, first, i game to escape from real life (three hours a week I can pretend i'm normal), and when it confronts me in instances such as this, it drives me into panic attacks, and leaves me unable to move, speak, or function. Death on the other hand, is something i've never experienced, and doesn't induce the trauma detailing a rape would. In a panic attack, you feel as though your chest is going to explode, and you feel death coming. but the trigger to this was trauma related. And second, I've never once detailed the bloody gore in my characters actions. Maybe a cut that's bleeding, but not Old Faithful. I hear ya on the descriptions. I don't use rape a lot in my campaigns unless it's absolutely integral to the plot, and I have never had a PC raped, although I have used sexual aggression (such as when the party is captured and the drooling orc-hobgoblin crossbreed with the obvious "situation" in his nether-regions is leering at them and feeling them to see which one he's going to have first) as a means to drive home the seriousness of the situation and to emphasize that they'd better get out of there fast. My players have good imaginations, so I don't really have to describe a death too far. They'll paint the picture themselves. A couple of these guys in one session were combat veterans and knew damn well what a disemboweling looked like. But even I say that so-and-so has disemboweled his opponent, I don't have to describe the intestines splatting onto the floor below. It's pretty much a given, and he can decide for himself what it looks like. But sometimes a more vivid description is called for for the sake of driving home a point. One character in a sci-fi game, a rough and rowdy swinger type who wasn't taking the war seriously (the player wasn't, either, bit of a joker), was sitting at a bar with a girl npc he was really starting to like, and for more than just a one-nighter. I let him really start to get to know her, then I had the local insurgents set off a bomb. He had no time to react except to say that he closed his eyes and turned his head, which was perfect. I informed him of the feeling he had of being coated with something sticky and kind of lumpy (Player at this point: "Oh, no..."). He could feel something gooey on his chest (Player:" Oh, no, no, no,..."). Finally I described the somewhat heavy feeling of something resting awkwardly his lap. (Player: "I refuse to open my eyes..."). He knew what had happened, and when his PC finally did open his eyes, he had the remains of the npc girl's head in his lap and all over his face and chest, and a burning desire for revenge in his heart. He played the change in his PC's personality very well, but his joking still showed through as his PC took on a very dark sense of humor and delighted in his kills a little too much. These guys were excellent players. |
| TinyHowie06-06-07, 11:57 PM | A simple reason I do not wish it detailed out. is that I have dealt with trauma similar to rape. It's difficult at best to deal and live everyday in the real world with the scarring that this causes. To greatly detail such an event in game, first, i game to escape from real life (three hours a week I can pretend i'm normal), and when it confronts me in instances such as this, it drives me into panic attacks, and leaves me unable to move, speak, or function. Death on the other hand, is something i've never experienced, and doesn't induce the trauma detailing a rape would. In a panic attack, you feel as though your chest is going to explode, and you feel death coming. but the trigger to this was trauma related. And second, I've never once detailed the bloody gore in my characters actions. Maybe a cut that's bleeding, but not Old Faithful. Both DM and Players should come into agreement on how far could the players go through. As a game it is essential to make sure everyone feels alright with what is going on. I always ask my players to what extend they could handle before running themes that could possibly taboo to the society I live in. |