I Experienced A Shitty Player Today

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Today, I had a player leave my game. For the first time I can recall, I had a player leave because he didn't like the system.  But was the system really the problem? I don't think so.

He was a 5e player, incredibly excited about the idea of Lion & Dragon. He said he was excited about medieval role-playing, that he felt as though D&D didn't really scratch that particular itch for historical accuracy. I briefed him on how this would be VERY low magic and very grounded in medieval realism. 

I welcomed him aboard with open arms. Problem is, he brought his presuppositions from 5e with him in spite of my warnings. I should have seen the writing on the wall after he argued with me about the possibility of a 6 INT Cleric in a game where a 6 is only a -1 and a Cleric is really a Templar Knight with miracles.  He got me very pissed off (an incredible feat) and I was tempted to ask him to leave then and there, but I deescalated and we were cool. I should have known better.

When it came time to play the game, he did a fantastic job participating in a heavy social roleplay session. He met with the party, had introductions (in character), spoke with the Mayor, saw the crime scene, found tons of clues... Everything was going great...

Until he wanted to have powers. Like a switch was flipped, he suddenly started throwing a fit about how Magisters are weak in battle unless you roll lucky and he didn't like how you can't just choose what abilities you get and he was going to be useless and blah de blah. He went on and on about how his stats were horrible (they weren't for OSR) and he'd be useless in fights (he wouldn't).

The whole fucking session was derailed because he couldn't just make a roll to identify the "creature" plaguing the town even though they have nothing but suspicion. So far everything points to men being the culprits. That complaint cascaded into more complaints. Eventually he just said "I'll finish the session and I'll talk to you after." I said "No, it's okay. You can leave."

The biggest problem wasn't the system. He KNEW this was low fantasy, and I specifically referenced "Game of Thrones" many times. Maesters in GoT aren't competent fighters. His character's virtues were not in fighting, but he wasn't a pushover either. He was a college educated Nobleman (a Lord) educated in Medicine in Medieval England. Along with the obvious social benefits of being part of the aristocracy, he was allowed to wear a sword (which does a lot of damage) and wear armor. 

He genuinely just kept on devaluing EVERYTHING as we played because it wasn't fitting his 5e D&D mindset. He didn't even give it a chance.

I'm willing to work with players to make things more enjoyable if there's something that they'd like to see tweaked to increase their enjoyment, so long as it's agreed upon by the players and it doesn't betray the spirit of the game.

I'm not willing to work with players who are argumentative, pessimistic, and obsessively focused on being able to do cool shit whenever they feel like it.

After he left, the other players and I were pretty deflated. The gaming high fell flat. So we shot the shit for a couple hours and called it a day. We're picking things up again next week.

Good riddance. Looking for a new player.

Don't be that guy.



Comments

  1. Venger SatanisJune 14, 2020 at 6:31 AM

    That's fucking lame! Some adults still act like children, not sure why or how to break them of immaturity. Better he left. But why was his leaving a downer? I would have been smiling.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Aaron The PedanticAugust 22, 2020 at 2:44 PM

    Who knows, man. Who knows. I bet he thinks back to it and wonders what the game would have ended up like if he didn't act like such a baby.

    ReplyDelete
  3. A.F.W JuniorSeptember 27, 2020 at 9:08 AM

    This is why i don't invite long time new school players to ride my ad&d 1st campaign anymore.
    When i go to old school way of play i have some experiences like that you report.
    Today i have 2 regular groups of flesh meat people, plus the ocasional players.

    ReplyDelete

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