Well, it is now Tuesday and I can barely bring myself to write this article. Sunday's game was the worst session of D&D I have had in years. When it was over, I wanted to quit running these things altogether.
I don't even know how to write this. I want to tell you what happened, but I don't know the fair and polite way to do so.
I've decided for now to edit this and leave it alone A lot of stuff is happening. As of now I am no longer running games at the game store. I'll probably have more to say in a few days when the smoke clears, so to speak.
Sorry to be a "tease", but I don't want to write things that I might regret down the road.
9 comments:
Good for you for standing up and giving him the boot afterward.
Yeah, as soon as you said you had a problem I suspected who it'd be. It seems fair, given the track record.
I've had players pull the 'I know the rules better than you' before. I simply lifted the book (my own) showed it to the played and hefted it backwards over my head and sat in silence while it made a crashing sound. I Then explained calmly that my ruling was against the book to create an internal consistency that the rule as written failed to show (it was a D20 supers game and one set of power combinations just...glitched).
To be fair to the player he's not only never done it a again but thoroughly enjoyed playing ever since. Once he got the 'book as god' approach out of his head, he was able to see where I was coming from.
Ouch, sounds like a rough session.
I gotta say I hate when that happens, I have a similar issue in one of my two current phandelver games. The group has mainly young players who have never played pnp games before and one who has played many games and is a 3.5e diehard.
What this has resulted in is a player telling the new players that their class/race choices aren't optimal, telling them what formation to be in, telling them what spells to cast.
And complaining to me because I didn't tpk the party for doing silly stuff at level 1 and with players that haven't roleplayed before. (who the hell does that?)
It was worse the latest session though, he started arguing about how surprise works and attacks of opportunity work in 5e.
He was suggesting that in heavy armour he could, cross a river, walk through heavy shrubbery AND make a surprise attack because he had succeeded a stealth check when he first entered the area. And was grumpy that I wanted to make him roll again each time he wanted to move through an obstacle.
The attack of opportunity thing became an issue because he doesn't like that you can move within threatened reach without provoking an attack of opportunity aslong as you don't move out of their reach.
So he started telling other players to "circle around the enemies because you can"
I really hate metagaming personally and hope the sessions can go back to being fun soon. GM burnout sucks.
Really sorry to read about your session. Your PotA recaps have been really compelling and you are a very inspiring DM. Here's hoping things clear up!
Wow, this is a terrible news. So sorry to hear about this after all the time and efforts you put there.
I have been a silent follower of your always very inspired articles for a while now and I have to say your blog gave me a lot of awsome ideas on all level of the game.
The social interactions and the way you manage it at the table when it came to public D&D sessions at the store had given me such an interesting read.
But reading that you won't continue doing that was such a shock I must admit. Especially as I am reading the edited article and have no clue of what actually happened.
I know I would be very interested to read your initial blog post to get a better understanding of the situation, and perhaps learn myself from it.
But I totally understand your position and respect it.
I truly hope all will work out for you.
Looking forward reading more of your words.
That really sucks! I've been enjoying your write ups and getting a feel for adventures I don't have the chance to play. Hopefully your future games (wherever they may be) will be more pleasant.
Having read the article before you got rid of it, I'm sorry to hear this appears to have gone south since because it all seemed dealt with. Gutted for you that things have gone a way that means you aren't running things. Hope you get that back soon, you seemed to love it. If you lived in england, this'd be the bit where I'd invite you run stuff at my table, you sound like an awesome DM and it suck for you and the rest of your players. Hang in there, you'll find some light.
CD Gallant-King: Thanks! The boot didn't quite take, haha but hey every man has his limits.
Benji: Awesome. Maybe I'll try that next time.
Jake Mitchell: Wow that sounds very similar to my situation. I don't get grown men playing games with kids and being all cut throat. They're kids! Sit back and enjoy the ride!
John Johnston: Thanks! I am working on solutions as we speak.
Remi: It's so hard to figure out what is ok for me to write and when I'm being a dick. I don't want to make people look bad, but I want to depict what it really is like to run a game in a game store. I just posted a new article that explains what happened in this session.
Anonymous: Thanks! I still have the Great Modron March and I might have more stuff soon too.
Benji: England! That would be awesome. Maybe some day I will travel the world, running D&D games and writing about it. Thank you!
“You can't go, all the plants are gonna die!”
https://youtu.be/0EikCTFv18A
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