Our party ended up being only 3 of us (the other 3 couldn't make it...don't get me started on that). We were in the middle of an encounter, and I fell unconscious. My other party member fell unconscious shortly after. The encounter was really close to being over, and our last party member, who is "evil" and "wants power" decided to run for it, leaving us there. The DM had him get trapped by more enemies, and instead of killing us, we were captured by this cult and awoke and had to break out of our prison and what not (the DM said it advanced his plot anyway. I feel like he didn't kill us all simply because we're first level and still figuring things out).
At the end of the day, the "evil" player decides that when the reward of gold is handed to him in front of everybody, he can choose to withhold dividing it up. His character and mine fight, and the gold ends up getting divided, but he gets a little more because the other player says he "doesn't care about the eveness".
He also chooses to withhold information to the party and not inform players of the items he's found, which are sometimes items needed to further drive the plot.
Now I'm not a Good aligned character. I'm neutral. However, my character will make sure that he looks our for himself, so I was able to argue about the gold. The part that drives me nuts is that this guy ran out on us to save his own skin, but because both myself and my other ally were unconscious, we have no idea that he did this, therefore we can't kick him out of the party or do something else.
I'm not writing this to bash evil aligned players, but the guy in my group seems to think that evil means you're a jerk every time. While I"ll admit trying to save his own skin probably fits, holding out on the reward that we all worked to get would clearly show his intentions and would make a lot of people not want to work with him. Being evil doesn't mean that evil act has to be malicious and selfish. Tom Riddle wanted power, but he was able to find ways to make it so nobody knew what was going on until it was too late. Same with Palpatine.
How do we get this guy to play as a team member and still be evil? Or, if I'm complaining too much, let me know. I'm trying to play the game, but this guy's actions are driving me nuts.
He makes his intentions known though by trying to keep all the spoils for himself. Out of game you should get the others including the DM to talk to him about his play style, the importance of party cohesion, and give him examples of evil characters the act differently. Maybe he'll decide he prefers another method. If he insists that this is how he wants to run the character then the entire group needs to decide what to do about it. I can a primarily chaotic group doing something at the first sign of trouble or due to mere suspicion. A primarily lawful group would probably bide their time and gather evidence of his misdeeds before doing anything drastic. Either way someone's bound to be upset, especially if the group is newly formed.
Good luck.
Despite what steven says, its not something inherent to the alignment, but something inherent to jerks who can't get away with it in the real world.
D&D isn't for playing out one's sociopathic fantasies.
Haha, I have the exact same problem, opposite alignment in my game.
Despite what steven says, its not something inherent to the alignment, but something inherent to jerks who can't get away with it in the real world.
I think I made it clear that it's not something inherent to the alignment, maybe you should reread my comments. I simply said that most people I've played with choose to play like jerks and thus I try to sway people from evil alignments. If a player proves that they are a good enough role-player that they can handle an evil character without destroying party cohesion then I'd be happy to let them play whatever alignment they want.
It irks me to no end that there are still Real Jerks like this player around. Tell this donkey cavity to knock it off. Either play well with others or don't play at all. Get the DM to tell him this too. If the DM refuses, then quit. Seriously, because if the DM enables this behavior you will not have fun. A Real Jerk only thrives when the DM allows it. Don't accept "I'm just roleplaying" or "That's how my character would behave" as an excuse. The player chose to be such a huckfead. There is no excuse for it.
* It doesn't make sense for evil characters to withhold information that can further the plot. An evil character should be just as motivated to solve the problems as a nonevil character. I'd suggest that the DM not give the Evil character anything that's plot related if he doesn't share information.
* Don't let anyone divy up the gold. Don't roleplay gold distribution. Just have the DM state how much gold each player gets.
Now all that doesn't mean that an 'evil' character should never be played. I've seen in my time some exceptionally well done and entertaining evil characters. The trick however is that wether the party 'knows' or not, badguys can always give their allies very good reasons to keep them around. Just as the evil-doer has very good reasons to keep the party members around. Perhaps in time as part of a major plotline, our badboy will betray his mates as he sees (or thinks he sees) his ultimate goal finally in reach. Such a moment can provide a truely awesome dramatic climax for the story, when it's done at the right time. For the right reasons. And done the right way.
So to the main question. Offer the lad a chance to "play evil more intelligently." If he turns things around, good for him! If not, time to kick him and tell your other three friends that they need to pony up and not ditch the rest of you. I don't care if they found a new mushroom patch, it's D&D night!
The others are right..an example is right now I am playing an purely evil being in one rp- yet they don't go around killing for fun or stiffing everyone. Granted, theyve left soemone to die of a plague, to study them after death, but still.. that wa smore hidden.
Haha, I have the exact same problem, opposite alignment in my game.
Despite what steven says, its not something inherent to the alignment, but something inherent to jerks who can't get away with it in the real world.
I think I made it clear that it's not something inherent to the alignment, maybe you should reread my comments. I simply said that most people I've played with choose to play like jerks and thus I try to sway people from evil alignments. If a player proves that they are a good enough role-player that they can handle an evil character without destroying party cohesion then I'd be happy to let them play whatever alignment they want.
No, you still seem to have that tinge on it being more inherent of evil players. Your last line for example in this is very simply "If you want to play evil, you have to be a good role-player and not destroy party cohesion."
What you should say is "If you want to play a jerk, you have to be a good enough role-player for it not to destroy party cohesion."
As a jerk can easily be lawful good just as easy as it is for him to be evil (anything.)
My examples as such is one player in our second edition games. He has yet to play an evil character, and has instead played chaotic good, chaotic neutral and lawful good. All three times, even with a pregen character given to him by the DM, the characters have all devolved into being a jerk.
The Lawful Good Caliviler for example is the latest offense from the jerk. (who I don't have any choice but to play with, at least he only comes every other week we play.) He has done practically everything that the Evil character in the OP did. Except for the running away bit. (Three healers in the party make them not go down easy.)
He has withheld information, attempted to split up the party as he essentially drags us from one destination to another.
When he played the only cleric, he would take every potion we collected. Since he only showed up every other week, we would go a week without healing.
Ok its not that hes evil its that hes a jerk.
The others are right..an example is right now I am playing an purely evil being in one rp- yet they don't go around killing for fun or stiffing everyone. Granted, theyve left soemone to die of a plague, to study them after death, but still.. that wa smore hidden.
Pretty much. I'm also the "evil" player in the party.. Which is amusing since I'm one of the most dedicated healers too. 90% of the time the rest of the party expects me to zombify something when I start trying to heal. But I never do, nor will I ever... if it isn't a "Monster" (Aka, something that attacked us, and we killed.) And even then, Its only for a temporary time.
Thanks for all the suggestions. I will talk to the original DM (we are taking turns DMing..I'm up next and will be sure to use the advice for gold/treasure).
My only other thought is that I seem to be the only other person that really cares about this. Obviously the DM isn't so sure about things, because he's the DM, but the other PC's just kind of let this stuff happen. My biggest fear is that I'm going to bring up this complaint, and everybody is just going to say "Well he's evil. He's allowed to roleplay however he wants." Then I'm just stuck in a bad situation. I don't think it helps my case that in the past I try and stick to the rules or what the published material says. I've also used logic on some other cases on building our world (for example, saying that high elves are eladrin, not a seperate race), and I've been accused of just wanting to get my way. It's happend before in Magic when a bizzare ruling comes up, and then I have to prove everything. Sometimes it's not worth it and I let things go, but we just started playing DnD and after three play sessions I've already had it with this whole "my character is evil".
The thing is, I've never had any problems with the guy playing the evil character, and when we play, I've found myself getting really ticked off at him and thinking that he really is a jerk because of all the things that he's done.
I hope I'm not sounding like a crazy or a stickler myself, it's just that I want to play with teamwork and actually build something up, not destroy our party from the inside out.
Now being as this is written from my personal standpoint, as a DM I'll say up front I have zero tolerance for one PC "taking advantage" of another without mutual consent of the players. I work with the players to make sure their characters are actually compatible enough to function as a group before the game gets going.
If one player wants to be an evil PC in an otherwise "good" party, we'll definitely go over how I will not deal with him stealing from other PCs, killing them, or withholding important elements for literally no real reason. He/she would have to come up with a backstory rich enough to explain why the PC does "play well" with the rest of the PCs despite being Evil, and specifically why the PC will not betray the party. (Usually it has to do with an ultimate goal that is more important to the PC than temporary theft, and which he/she needs trustworthy and powerful companions for.)
Anyway.
It's my experience, and what seems to frequently be backed up on these message boards, that usually a player makes the decision to play evil as "Hey, you know what would be cool? What if I played an evil character? What's that DM? I can? Sweet! I'm evil!"
And that's as far as the character development goes. All he has as motivation is "Do evil stuff each session."
And since it's just one evil PC out of a group, normally no effort is given by a new DM to designing outlets for the Evil PC's "evilness," and so the only way to ever express that he's evil is by continually preying on fellow PCs. Obviously you're all killing monsters, and doing whatever mission regardless of alignment, so all that's left to express himself is petty theft and lying for no reason.
So it's a version of "Grand Theft Auto" Syndrome. Just random stuff for the sake of it. He is being a jerk, because those are the "commands" he keeps inputting for his character to perform.
An Evil PC in a party of Good PCs is a recipe for disaster 9 times out of 10.
The only way the lone Evil PC can both plausibly and functionally stay in the group is if he has a reason to be with the group for the long run. If the character has no reason for being evil in a group of good PCs, then logically he wouldn't want to hang out with them, and the good PCs would share the sentiment.
This most often would mean the evil PC is intelligent enough to play along with the others. The PC needs some kind of goal that is reached by getting along with the other PCs. If all he can come up with for his characters are reasons to screw over the other PCs, then he hasn't made a "group member," but just some kind of leech the other players are afraid to get rid of for out-of-game reasons.
Not caring about being in the party is usually the end result of a one-dimensional character, or a closet-jerk player.
The way this often plays out is that Evil Guy does "evil" stuff (meaning just destructive or greedy) as much as possible, when the other PCs are in a different room. Then despite all logic, whenever another player calls him on it, the Evil Guy accuses them of metagaming.
Metagaming is possible -- but the opposite should not be "The rest of the PCs are complete idiots, who can't notice that the shifty guy keeps running ahead of them, and that his pockets are bulging more and more each time."
It's frankly impossible to continue skimming off the top of an adventuring group's wealth indefinitely, when your victims have one or more of the following qualities: An IQ over 200, Eyes like a hawk, No need to sleep, Super sensitive to truths, Magic pets, etc.
The reason "Stupid Evil" characters stay in groups so long is because everyone initially thinks, "It doesn't matter that much," when he does stuff against the party, and they feel social pressure to keep the adventuring group together so everybody can play -- to the exclusion of logic. It just builds up though until eventually everyone is bothered.
Frequently, the DM is "bullied" into allowing it by the Evil Guy invariably being played by a very vocal and/or whiny player who complains every time another player questions his PC. Or, the DM is naturally afraid of "conflict," which just ends up making the other players annoyed. (If the Evil PC wasn't causing problems, there would be no need for any of those behaviors.)
If the other players don't seem to "care" that the one player is continually acting to their detriment, it's probably because they also want to avoid conflict, and feel it's "not their place." But it is, because you're all in the same group, and one player is preying on the others' fun. Fun shouldn't come at the expense of others at the table.
The most compelling way is probably to talk to the player one on one. You should talk with the player directly outside of the game environment, and explain very carefully that you don't particularly care that his character is "evil," but you do care as a fellow player that his PC's actions are making the game less fun for you. Even if your character doesn't know something, you're still a human being at the table.
If at all possible, mention something "evil" he did that was entertaining and was not to your detriment. It's likely hard to find any of those however, so at least try to cite times when his evilness didn't adversely affect you or the group substantially.
Talk about your character as an actual personality, not just "The Cleric" or whatever. Give some of your character's motivations, and why breeches of trust would not go over well.
Not only do stupid evil PCs often fail to have much depth, the player doesn't always recognize the lack and doesn't see any depth in his fellow PCs -- they're merely there for his own entertainment. Your explaining your character, his backstory and whatever goes toward making it seem like a "person," which is the kind of thing the Evil PC would notice inside the game world, but which the player is oblivious to if you don't tell him. Remind him that you're all there, and you all have characters, and no you don't trust his character implicitly.
If your PC is of the sort, mention that he would undoubtedly seek retribution on the other PC when his activities inevitably come to light, and you as a player would prefer to not have that situation.
Give some alternatives though for better "evil" outlets. There are many threads on this site that are better at explaining this floating around somewhere, about how to successfully play an Evil PC in a group of Good ones. Look those up, and try to share.
Offer to roleplay his PC being "found out" about the skimming, and then eventually becoming a "normal" member of the party. Maybe work with the DM to arrange ways for you guys to save his life and make him actually "like" you.
You can certainly write it up first to make sure you're saying things right, and send it as an email or such.
Sometimes you have to talk with the DM directly, and express your concerns as well as possible. But if your only recourse to enjoy the game will eventually be to have one of the characters leave, and a different one enter the party -- perhaps yours is replaced only because the new one is paranoid and murderous, and will "take care" of anyone stealing from him -- or else your own quitting the game, then that's information a DM should probably like to have.
Sometimes people don't understand the degree of annoyance being caused just by your saying you would like something to stop.
Now your unconscious character probably shouldn't have "known" the other one ran away. But did he "ask" what happened after he was knocked out?
Nine successful tips from the "how to be a cold blooded bastard without anyone knowing" book of arch villainy.
1. Do not write down your alignment on your character sheet. Tell your DM in private and tell him to keep it to himself.
2. Decide what your short term and long term goals are, tell the DM but tell him to keep it to himself. Find a way to accomplish those goals without giving away your alignment. Have some other goals the party can know about and make them believe that is your true focus.
3. The less your allies know about you, the more power you have over them. Get to know them as best as you can. The more you know about them, the more power you have over them. Do not abuse this power, because you may lose it before you need it. When you need it, exploit it to its fullest. At that point, it won't matter. Come up with a false persona. Allow your allies to get to know this persona well. They will believe they know you and can trust you. This gives you power over them. The key to being a successful villain is living the lie. This persona is your shield and will protect you from the cunning of others.
4. Weak villains need to resort to brutality. Powerful villains are intelligent. Keep your mind as sharp as your blade. When faced with difficult situations where you need to remove a potential threat that your allies may try to defend, frame the threat. Make the threat appear to be the villain.
Corruption is commonplace as is crime. Stack the evidence against the threat and allow your allies to deal the killing blow. When you can, keep your hands clean while others get theirs bloody.
5. When you must act yourself, act alone or hire disposable tools. Never use your traveling allies, as that is wasteful. Never allow others to see the true objects of your desire. Never allows others to know your true goals. To do so gives others power over you. Be vigilant. Never leave witnesses and never leave a threat behind, for if you do, you will be greeted by a knife in the back.
6. Put on a show. When you know you can win, make it look like you're willing to sacrifice for your allies. Be generous with that which does not matter. Greed is a weakness. When giving a coin earns you two in return, do so. That which is easily acquired is worthless, yet valued by fools. Use what is worthless to gain what is valuable.
7. Power is fleeting. When you believe you have accomplished your goal, do not forget yourself. Many would be villains become weak when they gain that which they desire and end up killed by their own foolish tools. It is vital to remember the above when power is in your grasp, otherwise you allow yourself a weakness and will lose that hard earned power.
8. Dumb Luck. Never turn on your allies, even when you gain that which you seek. Separate yourself from your old allies and find new tools to eliminate old ties. Time and time again a would be villain gains power just to die at the very hands of his allies. Never betray your old allies until you have miles of distance and a dozen powerful tools between you. Even then, never allow your betrayal to be known. For if you do, you offer a weakness that others will exploit.
9. Always have a way out. You travel with allies for a reason. They're your shield against sword and spell. If death can be the only result of a course of action, abandon your allies and flee. They will believe you a coward and nothing more. Survival is always priority one in this business. You can find more tools to further your goals. Although you should never waste useful tools.
"Hey Bill, I know you wrote evil on your character sheet and all, but I would appreciate if your character wasn't a total dick to his friends and allies. I get that you are 'just rping' but we have to respond appropriately, so that we can rp, which would traditionally be to kill your pc. We have to really metagame to not do this."
If that doesn't work, and it should if this player is a friend or decent person.
" I talked to the other players (You better have done this before coming to the internet and complaining) and we all agreed if your PC is still a dick by the end of this session, we won't be adventuring with him anymore. That probably means you have to reroll, and if the next PC is just as bad, we won't bring him with us."
Even if the theme of the campaign requires or encourages the characters to be evil, you should only play with people who can handle it. Period. No exceptions.
A DM should never allow an evil character into his campaign unless he is absolutely sure he can trust the player not to be a jerk.
Even if the theme of the campaign requires or encourages the characters to be evil, you should only play with people who can handle it. Period. No exceptions.
Honestly, do you really even need to make that about evil characters? How about this instead:
"A DM should never allow a character into his campaign unless he is absolutely sure he can trust the player not to be a jerk.
Even if the theme of the campaign requires or encourages the characters to be evil, you should only play with people who can handle it. Period. No exceptions."
If the guy is acting like that and you can get the rest of the group to agree to it, just kick him out of the group. Or, you can stop playing if the rest of the group doesn't care and will put up with his antics. I take it you have made your concerns clear to the DM. The next thing that needs to happen is that someone needs to walk away. If the others need an explanation, be honest. Its's obvious that the guy is making the game not fun for you.
In game: Handle the situation the way you think your character would. Abandoning you to a possible death? Witholding information and money that would help the group? I wouldn't venture into life or death situations with that kind of guy. At a minimum, his character should probably be kicked out of the party. Any further transgressions (like him tailing you to get revenge or steal from you) would probably result in his character being killed. If he objects, point out that evil douchebags are not tolerated by survivalists of any alignment.
Out of game: Pull the player aside and explain he's being a douche. Give him a choice: he either changes his character's ways, rolls up a new character, or he doesn't play anymore.
If the player insists on playing his character "realistically" and refuses to follow the metagame convention that characters play nice with the rest of the party, then he shouldn't (but probably does) expect his character to be protected from the consequences of his actions by the same convention...
A DM should never allow an evil character into his campaign unless he is absolutely sure he can trust the player not to be a jerk.
Even if the theme of the campaign requires or encourages the characters to be evil, you should only play with people who can handle it. Period. No exceptions.
Honestly, do you really even need to make that about evil characters? How about this instead:
"A DM should never allow a character into his campaign unless he is absolutely sure he can trust the player not to be a jerk.
Even if the theme of the campaign requires or encourages the characters to be evil, you should only play with people who can handle it. Period. No exceptions."
Indeed Mech. These fools who keep thinking that if you don't allow evil then the person can't be a jerk.
Paladins do this all the time, always impossing thier strict code of honor on the rest of the party, sometimes to absured degrees.
A DM should never allow an evil character into his campaign unless he is absolutely sure he can trust the player not to be a jerk.
Even if the theme of the campaign requires or encourages the characters to be evil, you should only play with people who can handle it. Period. No exceptions.
Honestly, do you really even need to make that about evil characters? How about this instead:
"A DM should never allow a character into his campaign unless he is absolutely sure he can trust the player not to be a jerk.
Even if the theme of the campaign requires or encourages the characters to be evil, you should only play with people who can handle it. Period. No exceptions."
Indeed Mech. These fools who keep thinking that if you don't allow evil then the person can't be a jerk.
Paladins do this all the time, always impossing thier strict code of honor on the rest of the party, sometimes to absured degrees.
In reply to OP,
If the guy is acting like that and you can get the rest of the group to agree to it, just kick him out of the group. Or, you can stop playing if the rest of the group doesn't care and will put up with his antics. I take it you have made your concerns clear to the DM. The next thing that needs to happen is that someone needs to walk away. If the others need an explanation, be honest. Its's obvious that the guy is making the game not fun for you.
The guy who's doing this is a friend of a friend, and I've never had issues with him at all before this. I don't plan on kicking him out (I don't really have the power), and I really don't want to leave. I'm hoping to solve everything to make everybody happy.
In response to everybody else, I did talk to the DM, and he said he understands, and before our next session, we're going to talk to him as a group. So far, I'm the only person that's complained (but I think a lot other people don't want confrontation), and so hopefully we'll sort it out. I feel like as long as I stress the importance of a team game, it should go over well. I also find it strange that the evil player has said (out of character) that his character wants power, yet he is going the wrong way to get it.
I did almost have a little bit of trouble talking to the DM about it. We're a new group, and even the DM was like, "well if I was an evil character, I would take more money". The DM has a lawful good paladin to play as, and I asked him if his paladin would allow that guy to keep doing that with his knowledge. Then everything seemed to sink in.
Thanks for the advice everybody, and hopefully everything will go well and get fixed. I really want to play the game and have fun, and having to deal with this so early in the game makes me shake my head.
Found loot, which you get from adventuring, is always at the top tier of effectiveness for your characters, and very rarely can the party, even if pooling resources, afford to make or buy an equal-level item if they also want to split the loot somewhat.
Consequently, you will mostly "buy" items of several levels lower than your own level, and so they would be too weak to be competitive compared with found weapons and armor, so it works better for clothing, Wondrous Items, and consumables.
It's not feasible to buy your way to powerful gear unless the DM wants to run treasure completely differently.
It puts extra pressure on the player in question, which may make him defensive.
It is also likely to include many "unwise" sorts of unplanned statements and put everyone "on the spot" to give their vote, which is also subject to "intimidation" by personal presence.
For instance, the DM might say something bad and unplanned like, "OK guys we're going to have a talk about Bill's character before the game, because Jimmy has a problem with him." Kind of true, but not in any way constructive to frame it as a you vs. Bill subject, it involves everyone.
It also eats up game time as an unexpected task all players are presented with without time to think on their own in advance. They should at least get some kind of advance notice that the group will discuss the issue next time you meet, if you must do it as a group.
Ad-hoc group discussions about things directly concerning just one PC's behavior or mechanics are normally pretty uncomfortable for everyone.
I understand that every alignment can be jerks, but it seems like there are more stories about the evil aligned players doing it.
Jerk-ness takes different forms. It's just that bad roleplayers and natural jerks seem to be attracted to the whole category of evil, and think that it excuses (or even requires) jerk-ness.
At the other extreme, there is a certain class feature of paladins that is often played out as being a jerk.
A poster above put a list of 9 ways for evil characters to behave, generally on the assumption that the evil PC secretly despised all the other PCs and was simply using them as tools. The advice was great . . . if you're playing a closet psycopath.
I frimly believe that "evil" and "socipathic" are not the same thing. They frequently can be the same thing, but not always. Evil PCs can, and should, be able to actually like and appreciate their companions as more than just tools. If it comes down to the wire, he'd save his own skin before theirs, but that doesn't mean he has to be weaving an immensely complex plot to secretly betray them at some later date.
I recall a PC who was a companion in a game I DM'd in a while back. He was LE blackguard. Another of the PCs was a LN priest. They both served the same LN deity, got along swimmingly, and were genuine friends in a darkly humorous sort of way. That's not to say they were nice to each other, but the blackguard stabbing the priest in the back was the farthest thing from his mind.
A poster above put a list of 9 ways for evil characters to behave, generally on the assumption that the evil PC secretly despised all the other PCs and was simply using them as tools. The advice was great . . . if you're playing a closet psycopath.
The evil character has goals, just like the good character does.
The goals may not be the same, and what the evil character is willing to do to achieve them almost certainly IS not the same.
But this does not mean the evil character will pursue his goals less intelligently.
Would slitting an ally's throat in the middle of the night help the evil character achieve his goals? Probably not. In fact it stands a pretty good chance of getting the evil character killed, one way or another. (Local authorities, other members of the party, the monsters that the party could have handled if the deceased ally were still around to help,...)
How about stealing from other party members? Maybe just as the evil character leaves the party... otherwise, probably not, because the evil character benefits from being in a well-equipped party with the equipment distributed in an optimal fashion for party effectiveness.
Knifing assorted non-monster NPCs? Depending on what the goals are and who the NPCs are, maybe - but in general, you have those pesky local authorities, and the other party members might want to be able to come back to this town peacefully (and be free to leave again, peacefully).
Granted, there is the Stupid Evil alignment. But there is also the Stupid Good alignment. As well as Lawful Stupid and Chaotic Stupid.
Even psychopaths are careful to do their killing in ways that allow them to appear to live ordinary day-to-day lives.
So someone who's out to tear the world down to elemental chaos, will want to get himself in position to tear a good-size chunk of it down - not one little adventuring party of no importance. Or he'll want to leave the bits of the world near him with hidden weaknesses so they seem to collapse of their own accord after he leaves - allowing him to do the same sort of thing in the next place he goes.
Lets observe a few movies and other TV shows.
Dexter, a nut job, but very smart in how he does stuff. Americain psycho, same thing. They both set things up so that they appear normal, while they are really murderers.
Along came a spider, One of the people who was working to catch the criminal was actually the criminal.
There are more and more examples out there of people setting up various ways of killing but at the same time appearing normal, even as the good guys.
Evil is spiteful. Evil is vindictive. Evil is callous. Evil is hurting someone just to get your way. Evil is picking up the defeated villain, and tossing him into the death trap, rather than letting him go or even giving him a "humane" death. But most of all, Evil is clever. Evil is intelligent.
Evil is Patient.
oh and, a well-played evil character is indistinguishable from a well-played good character ;)
This thread pretty much summarizes why there's such a effort by WotC to discourage evil characters. I know several people who simply fail at being evil. On accusations of being a "Moral Strawman" by one of these friends, I'm actually planning on playing a Unaligned/ Evil character in the next campaign. I'll show them that evil isn't about being a deranged psychopath or a jerk with a stick up his bum.
Evil is spiteful. Evil is vindictive. Evil is callous. Evil is hurting someone just to get your way. Evil is picking up the defeated villain, and tossing him into the death trap, rather than letting him go or even giving him a "humane" death. But most of all, Evil is clever. Evil is intelligent.
Evil is Patient.
It's also a lot of fun when evil is creepy. My best evil character actually loved little kids (and not in the bad way). She used to give them candy, pat them on the head, and tell them delightfully twisted fairy tales. If you've ever seen the episode of Angel, where he went evil and sang "teddy bear picnic", you know the kind of evil/creepy mood I'm talking about.
Looking over how he plays, it looks like he's going with a "Bullying Thug" build. Kinda lowball, mookish evil. He tries to intimidate the good guys, is greedy, withholds information and runs when things go South, but he isn't actively plotting the PCs doom, stealing from their packs or engaging in wanton destruction in towns.
I could easily get into playing (and I usually DM) with this kind of player in a group and so could the majority of my fellow players.
I think he's much less an actual "jerk" and this whole thing is more of a powerplay by the OP to get his own playstyle brought to the forefront as the baseline format for current and future sessions.
The whole "Play as a group" mentality goes ALL the way around the table, and that means YOU have to accept that you're not the only one who's ideas on how the game should be played is important. By your own admittion, nobody else has had any complaints regarding his playstyle and the flow seems to be "Well, he's EVIL"
I think the best scenario here would be to get everyone together. And I mean EVERYONE. And find out EXACTLY what each player wants to get out of playing D&D. It might sound cornballish and dumb, but you'll learn a lot about each other if you're all honest and it will help out huge before your game dissolves due to hostile feelings across the game table.
I hate to say it, but I've got groups that would have LOVED to have this evil "jerk" player along in some of our more experienced circles.
Looking over how he plays, it looks like he's going with a "Bullying Thug" build. Kinda lowball, mookish evil. He tries to intimidate the good guys, is greedy, withholds information and runs when things go South, but he isn't actively plotting the PCs doom, stealing from their packs or engaging in wanton destruction in towns.
I could easily get into playing (and I usually DM) with this kind of player in a group and so could the majority of my fellow players.
I think he's much less an actual "jerk" and this whole thing is more of a powerplay by the OP to get his own playstyle brought to the forefront as the baseline format for current and future sessions.
The whole "Play as a group" mentality goes ALL the way around the table, and that means YOU have to accept that you're not the only one who's ideas on how the game should be played is important. By your own admittion, nobody else has had any complaints regarding his playstyle and the flow seems to be "Well, he's EVIL"
I think the best scenario here would be to get everyone together. And I mean EVERYONE. And find out EXACTLY what each player wants to get out of playing D&D. It might sound cornballish and dumb, but you'll learn a lot about each other if you're all honest and it will help out huge before your game dissolves due to hostile feelings across the game table.
"Well, I got into gaming with FATAL-" "GET OUT OF MY HOUSE."
Pretty much. I'm also the "evil" player in the party.. Which is amusing since I'm one of the most dedicated healers too. 90% of the time the rest of the party expects me to zombify something when I start trying to heal. But I never do, nor will I ever... if it isn't a "Monster" (Aka, something that attacked us, and we killed.) And even then, Its only for a temporary time.
You know, I'd actually like to see a guy who fights with zombies in a respectful manner. Kind of a "lend me your strength" type thing (Like Shaman King I guess, except a bit less ethereal).
That's just my theory at least, I know not every new player plays chaotic stupid their first time and I might just be trying to grasp at some reasonable explanation to try and justify the behavior. If I were to ever start playing with new people though I think I'd run one or two short, story lite games so they could get this behavior out of their system while still learning the rules and what not, then propose an actual serious game to them and make sure they're aware the consquences of their actions.
Jerk players will be jerks whether or not they have a space on their character sheet where they can print the words "evil". 4.5 or 5e or whatever the next edition is could completely remove anything besides Lawful Good and jerk players will still find a reason to burn down orphanges and murder other players in their sleep. Generally the "I'm evil" excuse just turns into "They're evil". It seems like its become more and more common for new players to treat the game like Grand Theft: Dragon. I think the mentality comes from their experiences with other sand box games...its fun to blow up Megaton just to see the explosion, its fun to steal a car and run people down on a sidewalk, etc...but all those single player games feature the reload system because more often then not, the game is unwinnable after performing random mass butcherings, a game over in D&D though is much more of a big deal since it effects the whole party and all the work the DM has done up until that point.
That's just my theory at least, I know not every new player plays chaotic stupid their first time and I might just be trying to grasp at some reasonable explanation to try and justify the behavior. If I were to ever start playing with new people though I think I'd run one or two short, story lite games so they could get this behavior out of their system while still learning the rules and what not, then propose an actual serious game to them and make sure they're aware the consquences of their actions.
Real Jerks D&D players have existed long before Xbox, Playstation, and Personal Computers.
Pretty much. I'm also the "evil" player in the party.. Which is amusing since I'm one of the most dedicated healers too. 90% of the time the rest of the party expects me to zombify something when I start trying to heal. But I never do, nor will I ever... if it isn't a "Monster" (Aka, something that attacked us, and we killed.) And even then, Its only for a temporary time.
You know, I'd actually like to see a guy who fights with zombies in a respectful manner. Kind of a "lend me your strength" type thing (Like Shaman King I guess, except a bit less ethereal).
Thats actually my character. Through the campain I've raised so far exactly two zombies. One was originally created in desperation (Later became a packmule and then was killed.), while the other was created to clear out an avalanche.
I don't know if the second one is dead or not. I told the zombie to clear out the avalanche then pull off its head, since commanding it to kill itself would be pointless.
I've got a camapin coming up where I'm suppose to play the evil character who eventually turns on the party. Mostly because the person who is going to DM that one, is liking my characters methods in our current game. I help the party out a lot, but typically I tend to get them into trouble.
Like some mushrooms that where impassable at first. My character has a heavy immunity to poisons, so after they explained to me what the mushrooms where, I'm like "Okay stay here, I'll chop them down." And I did. Just didn't realize how big the clouds would be... (Player wise. Maaaybe not character wise.)
Jerk players will be jerks whether or not they have a space on their character sheet where they can print the words "evil". 4.5 or 5e or whatever the next edition is could completely remove anything besides Lawful Good and jerk players will still find a reason to burn down orphanges and murder other players in their sleep. Generally the "I'm evil" excuse just turns into "They're evil". It seems like its become more and more common for new players to treat the game like Grand Theft: Dragon. I think the mentality comes from their experiences with other sand box games...its fun to blow up Megaton just to see the explosion, its fun to steal a car and run people down on a sidewalk, etc...but all those single player games feature the reload system because more often then not, the game is unwinnable after performing random mass butcherings, a game over in D&D though is much more of a big deal since it effects the whole party and all the work the DM has done up until that point.
That's just my theory at least, I know not every new player plays chaotic stupid their first time and I might just be trying to grasp at some reasonable explanation to try and justify the behavior. If I were to ever start playing with new people though I think I'd run one or two short, story lite games so they could get this behavior out of their system while still learning the rules and what not, then propose an actual serious game to them and make sure they're aware the consquences of their actions.
Real Jerks D&D players have existed long before Xbox, Playstation, and Personal Computers.
Fair point, it is a little difficult to say its become a new trend when there weren't really mediums to make it publically known and people are less inclined to recite older tales when there's plenty of more recent examples.
Real Jerks D&D players have existed long before Xbox, Playstation, and Personal Computers.
Fair point, it is a little difficult to say its become a new trend when there weren't really mediums to make it publically known and people are less inclined to recite older tales when there's plenty of more recent examples.
The difference is today Real Jerk players are no longer commonly accepted. Thankfully, "I'm just roleplaying" or "That's just how my character would behave" are no longer being accepted as an excuse. Unfortunately, there are still a few DMs who enable such behavior so Real Jerks still appear. Such DMs are mostly newbies who haven't learned better yet or experienced DMs who are Killer DMs and/or Real Jerks themselves when they play.
As a player I would never have accepted that myself. I remember way back when in 1st edition a party member stole a lot of money from my church on his free time (being a cleric myself at the time). I did not accept this unregardless his alignment or class. I was not satisfy untill I had killed him for the crime and was using his reanimated body as cigar lightner!
Here's a quick update: the game is going well for our group. The evil player has stopped being jerkish and the last session went really well. Roleplaying and character development has taken a higher priority, and people seem to be better understanding the game.
I guess the biggest thing is that everybody is taking alignment kind of seriously. We had a player jump in at Level 2, and to introduce him, the DM made it so that he was getting attacked and the PC's needed to rescue him, thereby helping him out and giving them a reason to meet. The PC's took a long time debating if they would even help this guy because "I'm unaligned. I don't care what happens to him". In short, very frustrating. I'm a new player myself, but I'm starting to think new players take alignment way to seriously and don't even think about acting humane because of their alignment. Maybe it's just me.
This can be really simple, such as "OK, this campaign is focusing mostly on heroes doing good stuff. You don't have to be Good, but your character should have a reason to stick with and cooperate with the party most of the time." Adding "no evil" is often a good idea for new participants as well.
New players and new DMs mean a lot of stuff has to be figured out as you go along, because there's usually no firm example being set at the table.
Some players take on Unaligned (or Neutral, Chaotic Neutral etc.) in order to justify their also being jerks though.
"I saw the puppy, so since I don't care about anything I kicked it, and defended myself with lethal force when the owner accosted me. I'm unaligned, that's what I'd do." No, that's Chaotic Evil.
EDIT: If it's really just the player being unsure of what it means to be Unaligned, you can remind him of such principles as the Golden Rule, as well as all sorts of reasons that helping is more beneficial for everyone.
"Why should I do that quest?"
"Because 'A.' you're getting paid for it, 'B' you know there's gonna be treasure, and 'C,' saving the town is not only good PR but gives you more options for shopping as well as keeps the overall stability of the region in check without having refugees running all over the place." etc.
Ideally the player will come up with reasons for why his character would want to participate in the majority of instances, rather than only thinking of why he wouldn't want to do things.
If he can't think of anything, going along with the flow of the group and staying on their good sides is usually not a bad idea, and you can always figure out a reason later on.
Q: "Why should I help that guy getting attacked? It's dangerous."
A: "You've got awesome fighting skills, and besides he may be able to reward us better alive. Plus the monster is just gonna come over here next anyway."
i played a few times as chaotic evil, and i found that there was jerkish things to do at any time. i could have stolen stuff in the middle of the night but i didn't, even chaotic people do use common sense to a degree, however you can still go kill whatnot, just be prepared for the consequences. such as one time i burnt the hotel down that my party was staying at for being too good and helping small woodland animals (it's called an overabundance of druids, so i culled the herd) afterwards people thought i did it, but noticed that my stuff was more burnt. As chaotic evil you don't care, if you lose your stuff to amuse you its good. they left me alone, then i burnt down the forest they lived nearby and just caused havoc, we finally got a consensus, they stop playing around and do their job, and i don't club the seals XD
What are the alternatives of not helping this guy?
1. Run away like a coward to save yourself before the monster sees you.
2. Hide and wait until the monster kills the guy, then try to loot the body (evil).
3. Stand around while the rest of your party members do something productive, thus annoying them with your uncooperativeness.