Not a very bad horror story, but SO irritating.

So I am a very beginner GM for my own homebrew campaign I’m running with some of my friends as the players. We barely got through session 0 because one of my friends, who we’ll call Charles, was an hour late. No problem, I thought. Nobody had plans that day so it didn’t really matter and we spent some time talking and having a lot of fun.

Then, the next week, session 1 was scheduled to begin at 4:30 pm. Charles is an hour late, yet again. I’m kinda annoyed, but give him the benefit of the doubt. But then it wasn’t just Charles doing it. EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. We tried to play and everybody is constantly late, or they can’t actually do it anymore.

Charles is especially bad with this. He always cancels or we have to change the schedule the day we’re supposed to play. I don’t understand why he does this. I ALWAYS check to make sure his times are good, and he consistently says, “Yeah I should be good to play at 4:30.” And then 4:30 comes around and suddenly “Guys I’m so sorry but I actually can’t make it because XXX came up and I have to do that.”

The worst part is that I feel like I can’t be angry because Charles is like a brother to me. But sometimes, I just want to slap him. It makes me feel like he’s being selfish, and then I feel guilty for being mad at him because it’s not like it’s his fault for something popping up.

Just today we not only had to delay the session AGAIN, but we were missing a player because she had a hair appointment. EVEN THOUGH WE SCHEDULED THIS BEFORE SHE MADE AN APPOINTMENT.

You would think it’d be easy to make a hair appointment on a different day. What irritates me the most is that I worked SO hard on this because all I wanted was for my players to have fun, but they can’t even schedule around this to participate.

I understand that you can’t just completely stop your life for a ttrpg, but they were the ones who agreed to this. I didn’t push them into this. I always check with them to make sure we play on a day they aren’t busy, and they always say that they’re good to play, and then they just up and ditch it THE DAY OF. Maybe if they told me before hand it wouldn’t be a problem, but it’s so seriously getting on my nerves. I want to cry. I worked so hard and I feel like it’s just going to go to waste, and I feel like I’m being a dick for getting so angry. I haven’t blow up at them, thank God, but I’m close to.

So a few years back I responded to a posting on Roll20. The group was looking for a DM for a streaming project they were planning on starting. Being comfortable streaming I replied throwing out the type of game I run and a brief overview of the setting I like to use. Eventually we met in discord and they decided to give me a try.

I'm not going into specific about the entire group as they don't really matter this story. The one player that does matter though, Jen for sake of the story. She wanted to play a female Barbarian and provided me with 6 pages of back story. Please don't misunderstand me, I have no issue with players who are that involved with their character and presenting it to me and ensuring It was 'ok' for game is my preference. Her character was interesting as she was born into a male dominated clan but had the mark of the leader. She faked her way into taking the trials of maturity which was for only male clan members proving her strength...ect. It was trope but honestly very well written.

Our first session started well, the character had loose connections to each other with Jen's being tied to 'Dawn' the half orc druid character who she met upon arriving in the civilized lands. Two things occured to me as we played. Jen was playing her character with a gender chip on her shoulder. When her actions were questioned her default statement was, "Because I am Female?". It wasn't annoying and actually created a number of laughs. Four out of the Six characters were female which made her claims of being targeted because she was female even funnier. The other thing I noticed was Dawn rarely seemed to get a chance to interact in the first session. Jen would always do the talking for her.

When we finished the first session I went over notes clarified some of the rule tweaks that came up during play...ect. I commented I liked the way Jen played up her gender chip. Jen said it's not hard with the world stacked against females. I clarified that it wasn't and she more or less brushed me off. When I asked Dawn if she was uncomfortable with dialogue she said no but since she was playing a half orc she didn't want racial bias to hurt the group. Confused I explained that the world or at least the part of it they are in doesn't harbor racial insecurities except to gnomes (Long Story). I also clarified that this had been mentioned in my write up of the world I had sent out. Jen chimed in that she was handling things because Orcs usually are treated poorly in normal settings. I simply reiterated that was not true for my setting and felt like Jen brushed it off again.

Second session doubled down on the trope. Jen made sure to accuse most NPCs of undervaluing her and the group because of their female status. She accused a guard of racism when they arrested Dawn who was discovered standing over a vagrants decapitated body. The session was fine till the end when the group discovered that the big boss for the small adventure was a Hag. The group defeated her using a macguffin, got the hook for the next adventure and everything ended on a good note.

We met up in discord a day later to discuss things going forward. Jen came out and said she felt I was a poor fit for the group as my game world lacked the realism they were looking for. When I asked the others most said they had a good time but needed a DM they all enjoyed. Jen told me a fantasy world lacking misogyny invalidated her characters story. She also felt like I purposely made male characters more accepting to turn her characters struggle into comedy relief. She also felt like a world without racism toward orcs was simply lazy and lacked "representative struggle against oppression." I thanked them for the game before getting booted from the discord. I still gamed with 2 of the other players who asked to join one of my other games. Last I heard I was the 3rd DM and they were up to the 5th and still hadn't started streaming as of a year later.

So I guess I have two questions.

First giving the information I provided Is it possible by not having my NPCs act sexist I invalidated or mocked her character unknowingly?

Two, what in the hell is Representative struggle against oppression?

TL/DR
Accused of turning strong female character concept into comic relief by using a campaign setting without misogyny. Also accused of lazy world building by not having NPCs who were racist towards half orc player.

Summer 2000

Back when I was in college, we had one person in our gaming club who was a huge GURPS fangirl. She was clearly a few years older than the rest of us (probably in her late 20's or early 30's by that point) and had some apparent mental health issues, but we didn't mind any of that.

Whenever we were together, for years, hanging out and socializing, when we'd tell stories of games we were in or talk about our favorite movies, TV shows, game settings etc. . .she'd ONLY talk about GURPS and how it was a far superior system to any other game, especially D&D, and how GURPS was more realistic, more accurate, had a better magic system, a better psionics system etc. She'd gush on and on about how everyone should only ever play GURPS. . .the rest of us really didn't care for GURPS much, so she couldn't really get a game going.

Not just that, but she was a big fan of classic sci-fi novels. She'd even created her own homebrew GURPS setting, which we could quickly figure out was apparently a pastiche of Herbert's Dune, Asimov's Foundation, and a lot of other more obscure space opera novels.

She'd talk about her own homebrew setting more than she'd talk about almost anything else (the only other thing she'd ever talk about was Zelazny's Amber, both the novels and the RPG, which also was something she was the only one in the group interested in).

Eventually after her pestering us for 3+ years, she finally talked us into a campaign of GURPS using her homebrew setting. We met to create characters. . .which was an ordeal because she assumed we all knew her setting (we didn't, she'd make random, disjointed references to it in conversation but it's not like we knew specifics) and didn't know GURPS very well. . .and she was frustrated we weren't creating characters richly embedded in deep details of lore of her setting, and that we were wanting to choose character options that weren't available in her game, or that were seriously sub-par options for a GURPS character. After hours of tedium, we all had our characters created, which were apparently troubleshooters working for some feudal Great House of some vast galaxy-spanning Empire many millennia in the future (she'd never say what year it was on our calendar, because she said it wasn't relevant and would be like someone from ancient Mesopotamia arriving the modern day asking what year it was on their calendar, nobody would ).

The night before the first game she sends us required reading: A gigantic set of files through e-mail of a half-dozen novels she'd written set in that setting, and a big bulk file of setting information that was hundreds of pages long and NOT well-formatted for easy reading or comprehension. . .just dense paragraphs of information about various subjects that didn't have any kind of coherent organization or index or way to quickly understand things. Most of us generally skimmed some of these files, but we had all separately decided we weren't going to read the multiple novels she'd written and hundreds of pages of reference material just to play in a game.

So, the game itself begins. It only went one session because of three problems.

One, she was an awful GM. She spent most of the time giving long-winded narration of events like she was a novelist describing a scene, spending many minutes describing every little thing like landing on a planet, jumping into hyperspace, or simply what a settlement was. The adventure itself was a pure railroad where we were supposed to do something for the Great House that employed us, and it was very clear there was only one right way to do it, that she'd already decided on, and the entire thing felt like she had no idea how to be a GM.

Two, she was the only one who knew GURPS, and she was awful at teaching it. She knew that system back and forth, but none of us did. . .and she didn't know that until we sat down, despite us not knowing character creation the week before, and us telling her repeatedly over the years that we really didn't know GURPS. She just seemed to assume that we all knew everything about playing the game, and really wasn't good at teaching it. . .she wasn't any better at teaching the game than she was at teaching character creation.

Three, she assumed we were all experts in her homebrew setting and the adventure she'd written had assumed as such. She was rather frustrated we didn't know this setting that well, thinking that her making random babble about it and references to it over the years, and that somehow we didn't read her six novels and several-hundred page reference book the night before. The adventure was an intricate political intrigue where we were troubleshooters working for a Great House, trying to manipulate a galaxy-spanning megacorporation into doing something that would cause them to be scandalized and lose face with the Emperor and allow another megacorporation our Great House had influence over to instead become predominant in that field (or something). . .and she was frustrated we didn't understand the political intricacies of the setting, the different social mores and norms of this impossibly distant future (she'd specifically created a future with myriad new religions, family structures, and various other elements of society as integral parts. . .that none of us really knew), and that we were all fumbling around in this setting and didn't know how to manipulate the Chairman of a galaxy-spanning megacorporation into a specific faux-pas in the presence of the Emperor. The adventure plodded along until we succeeded basically by GM fiat because I think she wanted to end the session.

After that, she really stopped hanging out with us. When we would reach out to her, she'd blow us off saying she was busy or not feeling well. Before long, we never really saw her again after that.

I did look up whatever happened to her, and found out that a few years after that, in the early 2000's, she apparently released her setting as a very obscure small-press independent game with a very limited print run. . .that was absolutely savaged by the reviews I could find that called the setting a nonsensical parody of space opera and that the book itself was poorly formatted and atrociously edited (and one review pointed out how most of the various alien races were physically impossible, the various solar systems she'd described didn't make sense, and it was clearly written by someone who didn't really understand chemistry and physics but wanted to write sci-fi) and more than one review said the game system for the setting was an obvious knockoff of GURPS.

Hello guys, here is a little story that happened to me today, not as awful as what usually goes by these parts but funny nonetheless.
We play in a classical fantasy setting using a homebrew system. I'm used to the system and thus help our dm with creating spells and items. It's going great and to this point none of the players have complained about the rulings I have made about their spells. Now to the crux, I couldn't attend the last spell creation so the dm had to do it all by herself, which I had no problem with, at least until I checked the spells : The character I play is a summoner specialised in frogs, toads and other such critters, during the game he fraternised with another player character and promised to teach her how to summon animals, and during spell creation she asked for such a spell, to which the dm agreed, but when I read the spell I realised it was just a copy of one of my own, but about 30% stronger. When I told the dm why the spell of a beginner was better than those of a character who had it as his whole shtick, she told me that "life is unfair" and left me to it.
As said before, it's just a silly tale compared to the wierd and unsettling things that we can read here, but I thought something more light toned would be nice.

So many of the horrorstories here are real awfull, but do you know what the worst feeling is?

I hosted a game online and had 4 strangers + 2 of my friends as players. Some of the strangers were New to the game so i helped them however i could. I made a character with someone etc.

Session comes around and i realise that all of them have a personality that just doesn't click with me.

One guy was Toxic. Second one was a typical loner. Third guy finished his char one hour after start. Last guy played a typical troll character.

So the Session went on and there were some hikups but nothing major. The real problem started at the end, when all of them tolled me they would like to play another session and me just arkwardly thanking them.

What should I do know? It is not like I dislike them personaly.

TW: Sucidal Ideation

So, this story starts idek when, but the earliest relevant point of the story starts back in October 2023. I am the DM of this campaign, posting here to get everything out and dump it somewhere.

Long story for this section: I had a bit of a mental breakdown during this time leading to severe suicidal ideation. On a night that I was seriously considering just ending it, I deleted the campaign on Roll 20 and the Campaign Discord server. My gf at the time pulled me back from the brink and got me calmed down, and I (thankfully) didn't give in. When I recovered my wits, I apologized to everyone in the campaign, let them speak their minds about what happened, asked them if they wanted to continue the campaign (letting them know that 'no' was an acceptable answer), and took a few weeks off to let things breathe and give everyone a break from that drama.

As I realized that what happened wasn't cool, and tried to make sure that it *couldn't* happen again, I let two of my players control the Discord and Roll20 so that I physically wasn't able to just nuke everything again, and the game went on.

Around this time, the party met an NPC that they saved from a ruinous land who we're going to call 'Creator'. The party didn't know it when they saved her, but she was the (depowered) Creator deity of the world (more than a little coded after myself). The intent behind the character was that she was going to be the final boss and it was gonna be a little meta joke that they had to slay me to 'win' D&D. When the party found out that she was the Creator god who was trying to destroy the world (cause evil god), they *loved* the reveal. It was honestly one of the best sessions of the campaign. A few players were viscerally *pissed* at her, which was the intended reaction, and most players told me that they loved the reveal.

Except, one of the players in the campaign wanted to redeem the Creator instead of trying to fight her. This player (Artificer), convinced the rest of the party to go along with it and it seemed fine. This came out of left field to me, but I gave them opportunities to help sway her viewpoint, and thought it was chill.

I tried to pull back a little on the comparisons to me and depowered her further since she wasn't intended to be a BBEG anymore, and let this character's flaws stem from my own. She was never intended to be seen as 'right', and very often she was derided by PCs and NPCs alike as 'wrong, but powerful'.

Despite the fact that the character was intended to be portrayed as wrong, though, the players never really called her on her bullshit (despite the fact that she was depowered and if worse came to worst, the PCs could have easily taken her).

The campaign continues, and we fast forward to last month. The PCs (from my perspective) are fine just going along with whatever plot hook I'm throwing their way. I throw them a plot hook, they ask a few questions, and then decide to follow it, to the point that an offhand mention about what's going on with Creator leads them going fully across the country to check in with her, despite my plan had that just being an offhand mention.

So, I say 'okay, well when you get there, there's this thing happening over here' and moved on with it. Calling it out here because it may or may not be relevant (probably is), but this session Paladin says they're not gonna be able to make it to session. I say 'aw shucks, see you next week'.

They go to find Creator and see what's going on with her, but the thing that I had planned for them back where they already were didn't just stop happening. There was a battle going on back in the city they'd left, and as they're looking for Creator, an NPC (Rogue) they knew and were more or less friendly with died in the battle. Consequences of leaving the battle, they couldn't stop what was happening up there. Another NPC brought Rogue to the party, begging them to find a way to help. They beseech Creator for help resurrecting the NPC, and she agrees, at a cost. The party doesn't like the cost, but pays it to revive Rogue.

It's worth noting that Paladin misses that session without saying a word.

For attendance, I never really worry about things too much unless there are *excessive* absences/people showing up whenever they want, but I do expect some heads up (when available). I dm Paladin checking to see if everything's alright, and they say (paraphrasing), 'yeah, it's all good, I just wasn't in a good mental place last night'. I tell them it's chill but reinforce that I do expect peeps to give me a heads up if they're not feeling it, and I won't pry on reasons, it's just nice to know when someone's going to miss.

Whatever.

The next session, I prep, but I'm reading the writing on the wall, and put the campaign on hiatus. We take a month off, sometimes playing video games on DND nights, sometimes just chilling off on our own. Nobody's required to join, jump in when you want to.

About a month after the hiatus starts, I send out a poll asking when/if the party wants to continue the campaign. I added an option 'Let's just call the campaign here', which I hope nobody needs, but I leave the option open.

Paladin chooses it, but the rest of the party chooses to continue the campaign. So, I dm Paladin. I ask them if they're wanting to step out of the campaign, if they want to talk through anything, and they say 'oh, no I hit the wrong button, I'm down to keep going, but I may miss a session'.

I'm doubting their truthfulness here, but I don't have reason to push, and convince myself that I'm just over thinking it.

The campaign begins again, and we have three (3) sessions. The three sessions aren't anything unusual by my standards, but there are times when Paladin does start rubbing my nerves wrong. I ask them what they're doing when they wake up in the morning, and they say that they're praying in the chapel. I ask them what they're intending to accomplish, ask them to make a check, and then give them the results and narrate them heading to the dining room to rejoin up with the party.

The party starts having a discussion. I haven't heard from Paladin or Blood Hunter (another PC) for a minute, so I check in with them and see if they have anything to contribute to the conversation, and Paladin comes back (with what seems to me a little bit of a tone) 'I'm still in the chapel, I never left'. I roll my eyes, get a little bit of a tone myself, and come back with 'That would've been nice for me to know, thank you for correcting me earlier', and then ask them if there's anything else they wanna do in there, or are they just planning to meet back with the party later. We get past that and move on.

Everything comes to a head during the third session back (last night and this afternoon). We're going through the session as normal, and Paladin is having a discussion with an NPC from their backstory. They're trying to convince the NPC of something that seems outlandish (and even prefaces the conversation with 'this is going to sound insane, but...'). They roll a persuasion check to see if they can convince the NPC, and they roll a 9. That's with buffs and everything. I have the NPC start responding, and Paladin jumps over and starts trying to shout the NPC down, not letting me finish what the NPC was saying. I mollify them for the moment (or seem to), and finish the scene, but I'm really not happy with Paladin right now.

We go through the remainder of the session and everything seems fine.

Still kinda not fine with Paladin yelling over me last night when I was talking I did two (2) things. 1. An anonymous survey to ask the players how they're feeling about everything and give them a way to voice their feelings. and 2. Draft a message to Paladin about them jumping down my throat last night. I sent the draft to Artificer cause I realize that I can come off a bit more assholey than I intend, and he looks it over and gives me the greenlight, saying that it's not too much, and it gets the point across well.

I send it to Paladin, and thirty minutes later, Paladin (not even messaging me), drops a message in the DND discord server saying they're leaving cause they're constantly feeling anxious/upset and like they have to psych themselves up for DND. In my opinion, feelings are never wrong. If they're feeling bad about the campaign, that's valid. I let them know that I'm still collecting feedback from the survey and am planning on making changes based on the feedback I already have (more on that in a minute), and that I'm here to talk if they decide to change their mind.

They never respond, and I'm looking through the survey replies I have. Overall, of the responses I have in the survey, I'm hearing a lot of 'I don't feel the players have agency' 'we don't want to see as much from Creator' 'It feels like we're bit players in the NPCs' story' which are all valid points of feedback, but they take me off guard because from my perspective, the PCs are the ones who have gone out looking for Creator, and the fact that the PCs have (and are) actively changing the narrative to the point that I had to come up with a full session on the fly.

Saying none of that to my players, cause honestly my perspective is a flawed one, and if multiple people are reporting the same problem, then it certainly *is* a problem, and (as I said earlier), feelings are never wrong.

So, I jump into the DND discord, and say 'Hey, guys. Please come talk to me if you're not having fun in the campaign. We cannot fix the things that are upsetting yall without communication. I send out surveys when I feel like things are going wrong, but it'd be much more helpful if you could reach out to me and communicate your feelings so that feelings don't fester'.

After a little bit, Artificer replies to my message essentially saying 'Hey (DM), I can't speak for others, but I don't feel like I can talk to you. There have been times when I've tried to communicate something, but I felt like you brushed it off, or berated me for it'. I don't recall this ever happened, but *feelings are never wrong*. They continue to say 'After what happened in October, I'm afraid of giving you feedback out of fear of you taking it personally and nuking the campaign again.' Also, very valid.

So I send back (again paraphrased), 'That's fair. I'm not always the easiest person to talk to, and I recognize that. I apologize if I've ever made you feel unheard/berated, and I'll try to be better about it in the future, however I don't see the alternative. The survey is telling me that people have serious problems with the campaign, and at least one person is wanting to leave over everything. So, I'm not seeing an alternative. If you're having issues with the campaign, but are unwilling/unable to communicate them, then maybe the campaign *should* end'.

About half an hour passes and another PC (Warlock) posts that they're leaving the campaign too. They say that it's not that they're hating the campaign or anything, they're just not feeling it anymore and are peacing out (while being v sweet and messaging me to make it clear that they still wanna be my friend outside the campaign).

At this point, I post the message to the DND server: "Hey, if peeps wanna continue the campaign, the campaign will continue with whosever left (but with changes to how I handle/run things). If you don't feel like you want to continue, don't be afraid to step out of the campaign. Either way, good night y'all."

And that's where the horror story ends (for now).

Minor spoilers for Dragon of Icespire Peak coming up!

A while ago, I joined a small server on Discord to play DoIP with a group of randoms. We got a really good group together! A whimsical satyr bard that would cause mischief and flirt with barmaids (we were warned ahead of time and we're fine with it), a clever gnome artificer with really cool flavor for his spells, a human draconic sorcerer that treated my character like his father, and me, a silver dragonborn fighter with dark iron scales that worked in a forge.

Several sessions in, we came across a seemingly abandoned dungeon that was full of gnomes before. It turned out that they were hiding, because a mimic was on the loose, and nobody could find out what it was. We chanced upon it, killed it, and then we navigated through rooms of spinning blade traps, to eventually hear from one of the inhabitants there was a second mimic, last disguised as a table.

The bard and artificer dashed out to find it, while me and the sorcerer stayed behind. Once they were pretty far away, the bookshelf behind us transformed into a mimic and attacked. I had already used my second wind in the earlier fight, and so I was pretty weak. After the sorcerer took one hit, it was clear he wouldn't survive another. And so, I grappled the mimic and tanked its hits while I kept shoving it into a blade trap room, where I kept it grappled while the sorcerer turned on the trap. Unfortunately... I did not survive, rolling a nat 1 on my second death roll.

In the end, Khann Iron-scale was given a funeral procession by the gnomes all the way back to the starting village. A good end for him.

I would like to leave this here: please don't go about blaming the DM or other players. The vibe was laid-back and we were mostly new.

TLDR: Party splits up, leaving me to grapple an enemy inside a trap and sacrifice myself to save my surrogate son sorcerer.

I could make 3 or 4 posts about this game but for context and continuity I guess it would be best to group them here. For context: this is a 6 player + DM campaign. The game started with 5 players and I joined after 3-4 sessions. We are all friends together so despite what happens on these games (and we often argue), we still play together other games and talk to each other almost every day. Also, consider that any monster being used has at least +2 to +4 bonuses to both AC and attack rolls compared to monster manual equivalent and max possible health and could do more actions than specified, and damage of ordinary weapons of NPC/enemies are boosted to do x1.5 to x3 damage (more about this later).

Part 1: Shadowfell shenanigans - Level 5 party

Party was going to a cave filled with cultist goblins and ended up in the shadowfell, where I joined as part of another group of adventurers that got captured and killed. Things that happened here, in order:

• We fought a custom necromancer that could throw "dark balls", which were fireballs that did 9d8 psychic damage and would KILL YOU INSTANTLY if you dropped to 0 hp. At this point these balls could oneshot half the party if they failed the save and the damage roll was slightly above average.
• This necromancer could and did grab a player and used it as a human shield (increasing its AC too btw), meaning attacks we did against it that missed would instead hit the grappled player. On top of that, each turn the necromancer would apply 1d4 points of exhaustion to the grappled player. This grappled player DIED OF EXHAUSTION and could not do anything on its turn as it would have disadvange or directly fail any attempt to ungrapple himself due to exhaustion. He later complained about it to the DM.
• The way to exit this dungeon was to kill the spirit of a ghost-like dragon that was trapped and chained there. We agreed that one player would do it while the others would gather at the exit gate. The player that did that got inmediately cursed (no save, no warning by the DM, nothing) with "dragonthropy" against its will. Assume that remove curse does not work 90% of times. More on this later.

Part 2: Hag fest - Level 7 party

We went to a small village that was ravaged by a hag. On this town we fought some plantoids and get some info on where to go next.

• We fought plants taken from Tomb of Annihilation that could BURROW AND TRAVEL 50ft UNDERGROUND on each of their turns. While the plant is underground you cannot do anything about it, you couldn't ready any action, try to dodge, you would have to sit there like an idiot. The plant just appears behind you and makes a spore attack and then try to eat you. If you failed the spore attack to stun you he would eat you instantly, but if you passed the spore attack it could still try to eat you (spore was wisdom ST and eating dex ST).
• We fought a small hag that lead the plants, killed it and I used detect thoughts on its head to get information (it was still alive despite being decapitated). My reward for trying to get info using a spell? I had to roll a wisdom saving throw (rolled 16 and wasnt enough) or be cursed with some sort of permanent poison/exhaustion effect because the head was connected to a greater hag of some sort and IT COULD CURSE ME THROUGH DETECT THOUGHTS. Thankfully remove curse worked this time or I would have walked out of the game at that point.
• We arrived at the hag's lair which turned out to be a "young" green dragon lair. The hag left and we fought the dragon. This dragon had 20AC, had regen that the DM would not notify us until like 3 rounds in, no perception check to notice it was healing, he just said "did any of you do fire damage in any of these rounds?" and went with it. This dragon could do EVERYTHING ON ITS ACTION SECTION. He did in fact do breath attack and then multiattack on the same turn.
• The dragon downed 2 players on the same turn and the DM said, quite literally: "if I don't finish any of you off, I lose my remaining attacks". The DM killed 2 players because he didnt want to lose attacks because he had no other targets at that moment. Other 4 players were a bit further away and could reach them next turn easily.
• When we killed the dragon and got the loot, there was a chest protected with magic. A player tried to open it with a lockpick, the DM said he couldnt because it had magic protection. Another player used dispel magic. The chest exploded instantly, no throw or anything. We still don't know what we were supposed to do to open it, maybe use knock?

Part 3: Problems at home - Level 8 party

Remember the player that got cursed with dragonthropy? He transformed into a "shadowfell dragon" at home while sleeping. The player lost all control of his character and could only try to make the dragon not attack us. Despite this, the dragon ended up killing a player. This player could be revived because a squirrel companion of a druid player was suddenly an archfey and used the reincarnate spell on him almost against his will because he didnt really want to change race. Revivify would not work (and had never worked to begin with).

The party went to the sewers to fight some "bandits" and found a entire mafia setup. The bandits had both sleeping and "drunkness" poisons that would make your character do nothing on your turn, basically skip your turn. 2 assassins (manual monster) showed up, and they had +9 to hit compared to their regular +6. It was at this point that chances to hit of monsters were equal or even higher than ours. Random bandit in sewers? Same bonus to hit than you. The only reason the party could take any fight is because we forged a legendary weapon we got from the shadowfell that did 2d12 radiant damage on hit and could attack an extra time (so 6d12 radiant damage per turn, yikes) and had the effect to heal the player a lot. We made a pact to get out of the sewers and I retired my character that I had grown fond of and had already completed her campaign objective and didnt want her to die in an unfair battle. I then made a eldritch knight with 2 levels into war wizard. This character barely any background as the DM would either not use it or only bring it for negative things.

Part 4: Ice Fort - Level 8 party

We are currently here and this is where it turned into a shitfest and most of us stoped caring about the game. We went to this fort that sent a distress signal asking for help. We went there and found some marauding gang of northern goliaths. We fought a exploration party without much trouble and reached the fort. We had a talk and discussed the defense and started the raid. Things that happened:

• The walls were non existent. Before the assault started we asked how tall were the walls. DM said 50-60 feet. A few giants show up and they just "jump" the wall like its nothing. The DM had passed an image of how tall giants were. These giants had to jump DOUBLE THEIR HEIGHT to reach the top of the wall and did it like nothing, no athletics check. Some monsters and some npc started ignoring movement limit in order to reach their destination easier.
• 3 frost wyverns appeared. The DM said "these wyverns are not as strong as dragons, dont worry". The wyverns had stats stronger than young white dragons, a breath attack that did the same damage, could do 2 stingers attack per turn (double poison) and had a spellcaster on top that could use ice storm.
• The DM had noticed that my character's gimmick was tanking. I knew I could not do more damage than the DM's custom monsters and weapons, so my character was just a 21 AC tank (26 with shield), had absorb elements and resistance to piercing damage, my job was to make enemies miss attacks and let the NPCs do the damage. The only weakness my character had was +0 to dex saving throws (+4 with arcane deflection from war wizard). The DM had used ice storm with a con save before, but when one of these hit only me, he said I had to make a dex saving throw. I confronted him that he had used con before and the spell says con saving throw. He didn't care and forced me to roll dex, which I failed. He then used a custom grapple attack that forced me to do another dex save (16 was not enough btw) instead of athletics (I argued it was not fair because I had +8 to athletics and already changed ice storm to dex too, he didn't care), grappled me and throw me off the wall of the fort, taking 9d6 fall damage. A player next to it asked if he could help with a reaction and the DM told him to do A FCKING ATHLETICS CHECK. I went afk for a while until it was my turn again, I really started to not care about this. Also, previous to this, I had casted blur on myself. The next enemy spellcaster used dispel magic on me and the DM literally said: "I will keep doing this" because he doesnt want to miss his attacks on me.
• Like the green dragon, some blessed warriors could do some sort of breath attack that REMOVED THE RESISTANCE TO ICE we had from potions we bought. He then could do 2 attacks on the same turn. Damage of regular weapons from half the enemies and helping NPCs were 3d8, 3d12 and similar. There was a helper paladin with a warhammer that did 3d8 damage each attack. We joked that at the end of the combat we should kill him to get his weapon because ours sucked. Our "legendary" weapon was doing less damage than regular weapons from these raiders and npcs. Any large creature that had a ranged attack (like throwing a rock) could do it as a bonus action too.
• The combat then ended because a giant white dragon "said so", and session ended. We have 3 ingame days to prepare for another attack, but none of us care at this point really.

And here is where we are currently. The party leveled to 9 after this combat.

I play Dungeons and Dragons with a group of friends who I go to school with. Me (tabaxi druid), two other guys (human warlock and hobgoblin fighter) and human warlock’s sister (human monk). Then of course the DM. Its a campaign full of back and forth travel between the 9 hells and Prime Material plane. We usually meet up at the DM’s house. She lives with much of her extended family. Including her uncle. He is her mother’s younger brother. And about 5 sessions in, he started begging DM to let him play too. She was kind of reluctant at first because in her words “He’s kinda cringe and a manchild.” But two sessions later, she let him roll up a character (lizardfolk wizard).

So he joined us in a random town that wasn’t really noteworthy. We had a few sessions on the road where nothing of note happened. But once we got to the city, his antics really started getting going. He would from here on out be a wild horndog and be as maximally weird about it as possible and when his niece refused some of the more graphic and/or creepy requests (like him using mage hand on a princess to “grab her pussy”) he would then go on a rant about how he feels women shouldn’t be DM and then play off the rant like “I’m just teasing you (DM)”.

And that is not even counting his frequent rants about “modern women”. Usually prompted by some bad interaction with the opposite sex in game. Like when he tried aggressively flirting (more like sexually harassing) a barmaid and got rejected and warned to back off, he went on a rant about how impossible it is for men to get laid these days and how “You can’t even look at a woman nowadays without the bitch crying rape”. He legitimately seemed to think what he was saying was funny or a relatable. Granted this was the time he got wasted at the table and he did apologize for that particular outburst but he still would occasionally drop the mini sexist rant here and there.

The final straw though was when we encountered a family of travelers who happened to be carrying loot. “That guy” was drunk…again. A mom, a dad, a son (young adult), and a daughter (young teen). Hobgoblin fighter killed the parents and the son cause he is kind of a murderhobo and uncle lizard wizard helped him kill them. After they died, he then said “Leave the girl, she’s mine! In a fit of adrenaline, I can’t help myself as I pin the screaming little bitch down, rip her clothes off, and start fucking her til she bleeds.”

DM then said “Before you do literally any of that, she reveals herself to be a dragon made of magma. Your dick burns off before you even get within an inch of her”. He then says “Well what the fuck?” She just says “Sorry but sometimes these things happen”. And then he said “They happen when the DM ruins the fun just to be a politically correct pussy!” She then said “Well if you hate my DMing style so much then go.” He then stormed off to his room and threw a big fat temper tantrum that we could hear for HOURS. She was just glad her parents weren’t home so she could avoid the family drama.

Afterwards he begged to be let in again and again over the course of the week. And unfortunately DM agreed on the condition that he is to abstain from alcohol the entire day before playing a Dnd game. One more fuck up and he’s out out. I told her I think letting him back was a bad idea and that I genuinely feel he is ruining the game but she is going to give him one more chance so we just told her we will be there to support her if he acts like a jackass again in or out of game.

tldr DM lets her uncle play Dnd with us only for him to act like a total drunk incel the entire game and throw a tantrum when he gets kicked. She decided to give him another chance.

This mostly just blowing off steam, and brainstorming a way to approach the GM or the problem player in a constructive way, so if anyone has any feedback or options it is appreciated.

I play in a monthly TTRPG (Pathfinder) over discord, because most of the players live across the country. we've been playing this campaign for nearly 5 years. Our group is large for a discord game, 6 players plus GM for stories sake I'll call this Game A. A different game (Game B) that some of us played in was put on hiatus due to various reasons, and the GM getting busy IRL. Player from Game B is invited to be a temporary character while the other game is on hiatus by Game A's GM, pushing Game A to 7+ GM. Now this player has some problematic tendencies IE: talking over people, spotlighting, overtaking scenes, trying to hoard and gatekeep any lore, making rolls when not prompted or asking the GM, meta-ing story lines or private conversations between other PCs, the list goes on. This guy also acts like a whiny brat when confronted with any attempt to curb the behavior.

You can guess that a few of us were reluctant/irritated by this but the GM didn't ask the group from Game A and added the guy to the next session. After the plot line resolved in Game A that he was a guest character in the GM decided to invite the guy to be a permanent addition to the game, which many of us are not happy about. This player has continued previous behavior to the point where I called him out after he continued to talk over one of our players (NB AFAB) multiple times in one session, and was jumping in front of them to try and make as many rolls as possible before they could. Last game he inserted himself in a private scene and just started making rolls without prompting from the GM and telling people what he got, so that he could get the cool lore before anyone else in the scene. (I also feel like this guy cheats something fierce as I've never seen someone get that many nat 20s a session.) We use the honesty system so everyone can roll their own dice, since many of us had custom or personalized dice for our characters prior to going online during the pandemic, and this player takes full advantage of it. The GM never calls this guy out for any of his behavior, and almost seems to cater to his behavior in some cases. I've attempted to prompt a conversation with the GM, but have not received a response, one of the other players was going to do the same. Most of the group is nonconfrontational and avoids any form of player conflict, so it's difficult to get anyone to say anything even when they agree that this guy is problematic. The game is still fun but most of the sessions are now overshadowed by this guy's poor behavior.

Tw: suicidal ideation

I made a homebrew campaign for DnD that has been made a bit of an inside joke woth myself an my friend groups of revealing assholes in our midst. I dont know WHAT it is, but it just has that kind of luck. It's not like there's some magical moral dilema or some special political GOTCHA!! its more that theres always someone in our friend group that just somehow outs red flag behavior. This campaign has never been finished, and it actually makes me a little scared to ever run it again due to all this because, well....I like my friends and such.

Some of the people this has revealed to me have been: A psuedo-pedophile who at the time when I tried running the campaign thought I was underaged and THAT was the thing he was into, the fact that I was 20 looking 17. A constant flake who wanted to just be baked all the time one someone else's weed and was controlling of other pcs and mean to the players. A 40 year old who was a walking Bad Redditor/4Chan Stereotype and wanted to start getting completely trashed before we held the game when it was my first time running and I was super nervous.

This story isnt about them and is actually about the longest running game of the campaign, who had by far one of my worst players ever.

Del (nb, we all are/were) had been a close online friend of mine for around 2 years when I wanted to try for a second time to run this campaign. I gathered another 2 friends (Caelum and Aquila) and one of Their friends (Cygnus) and we made a discord to play the campaign. I trusted them all to be honest, and I had a habit of being very "Yaaay Good Time Fun :))" So even if rolls were fudged, I went more by rule of cool and there was less combat in this game.

I did not know...of a certain fact about Del. One that they had been hiding for a long time, and also that I was VERY oblivious to.

Del had a massive crush on me.

I however was in a longterm relationship with my now spouse, then datemate. And also VERY not interested. I liked them as a friend!

Del had apparently been flirting with me in very odd ways, ways that I didnt pick up on. One of their biggest ways was to tear down aspects of my partner online (ex: claim wiccans stole from Judaism because of the pentacle and seeing one of a 6 pointed star on wish (SUPER reliable /sar) when my spouse is and was raised wiccan, claiming specific stuff about things that they so happened to like were Cringe or Creepy or Inappropriate, claiming sexworkers and porn was disgusting when my spouse was raised very sex positive and did nsfw comms ect) and then turning around and doing those things. Suddenly got into tarots to an actually dangerous amount, liking the same things Partner did, ect.

I didnt get that this was a thing to i guess...get me to dump my spouse and go to them? Everything came to a head when they asked me out and i declined. They then said "Well i need to ghost you for a month to get my feelings in order" and then immediately dipped. I tried talking to them, seeing if we could talk it all out, nothing. A month later, they came back, and pretended nothing happened and it was all fine and dandy. Okay.

....This is all important context.

When Del came back, we talked, everything seemed fine, and we decided, hey, dnd. Cue set up and getting friends and starting my campaign.

Everything goes great for the first 2 chapters. Play once a week every other week due to scheduling. It all seems fine. I start notice like. Weird sorta...self depreciating stuff from Del's character. I do my best to make sure they feel Special a BIT. I didnt want to cause Main Character Syndrome but also wanted to maybe show no hard feelings. We worked together on a special patron for them so they could play their character how they wanted. Neat trinkets for everyone. Del starts getting a Little Clingy with a PC but its ...fine. Or so I thought.

and then...Caelum, the pc being clung to, starts saying they cant make games. Very odd, but Caelum is in college, going through stuff, ect. And then...Del's IC and OOC depreciation and depressive ENERGY is just. Worse. took em aside and asked but they brushed it off. But! Hey. Maybe its just that this chapter unfortunately had a romance plot between 2 npcs, yknow? sore nerves.

And then....Del's cleric Died.

Granted, this was my fault. I made a far too overpowered boss fight for this and it managed to deal too much damage to them and it killed them. 3 bad rolls, whoops. However, I DID have a failsafe built into the campaign. I had the characters go through a little mourning at the end of the session, and then, for the cliffhanger, Del's character came back with a tattoo that was an emblem of that npc they became obsessed with. She granted them all One Extra Life!! Thats great, right?

Except Del was ....mad. Because Del was apparently fudging their rolls WORSE. And their cleric dying had been a suicidal ideation fantasy come to life for them. They wanted to die, and since they couldnt kill themself, they sorta selfharmed by playing out the fantasy and making EVERYONE ELSE be involved.

I had no idea at all. None. I was blindsided hard. I mean, I knew they struggled with their mental health but this?? This was not okay. I pulled them aside in dms and told them Hey maybe take a break for your mental health bc this??? tricking me into rping out your suicide fantasy for you? NOT okay. ESPECIALLY because I struggled heavily with suicidal thoughts back then and had made attempts not long before (I'm way better now but it was Bad) and this? this triggered me hard and made me suddenly start second guessing everything and become hyper paranoid. I then told Del they were not playing until they saught help. They made a TON of excuses, many valid, but at that point it was not my responsibility because I wasnt the only one set off by that.

And THEN....the DMs from Caelum came about.

It turned out, Caelum had been so quiet and such because APPARENTLY Del had been suddenly fixated on Caelum and had been harassing them and trying to get them to date them. And in fact...they had been doing VERY similar things that they did with me, to Caelum and someone they were interested in. Then Del ghosted Caelum after the first rejection like me, but came back and played nice if kind of weird. This started a week after I rejected them and when Caelum rejected Del's advances AGAIN?

Cue this whole episode.

I told Del this was unacceptable behavior, dnd wasnt therapy, i wasnt their therapist, and they cant USE people to become that and until they sought help of SOME VARIETY they couldnt play anymore. Del said something, threw some kind of tantrum and I think brought up Caelum being a liar (They had screenshots, Caelum wasnt into lying), and I told them bye and blocked them on all accounts and kicked them from the server. I then talked to the others, explained Del wasnt coming back, but with that stunt they pulled and how everyone felt, the game became a lot more...tarnished. We shelved it and never played dnd to this day.

TLDR: My homebrew campaign has a habit of revealing the worst in people somehow, and one of the worst ones used me and the other players as a way to play out their suicide dream.

So I placed this in meta discussion (if it’s not feel free to change, mods) because I need outside help. I don’t know how to handle this

Cast:

OP (DM)

Cathy, Goblin Artificer

Kayden, Archfey warlock

Cathy, for as long as she played dnd, has stuck with the goblin race. She likes goblins, like playing them, likes what stories she can make. She usually goes all out in character personality, classes, no two characters are the same, except for being a goblin. She is great with backstory, and aids me with a reason to why she is with the party.

Last night, her character was killed. And when the session ended, we talked about how she can roll up a new character, and let me know what to do before next session. This morning I woke up, and I saw a one sided argument play out in the discord chat.

Basically, Cathy wanted to make a goblin artificer, and another player, Kayden, just EXPLODED on Cathy, saying the following:

“Oh for gods sake, can you PLEASE choose something other than goblin for once?? There’s SO MANY OTHER OPTIONS, but here is goblin number 339!”

Cathy responded with how she likes playing new classes, but the familiarity of the goblin species helps her be able to fit into the character a bit more.

Kayden continued texting, but Cathy hasn’t been on since. And I don’t know what to do.

Cathy isn’t a “chaotic gremlin that does shit for the lulz”, she does make characters that jive with the group, and are fun to play. But I don’t know what to do. I still want to allow Cathy to have fun with her character, but I’m just stuck on what to do.

This happened a few years back, when a group of strangers decided to play Shadowrun (the then relatively recent 5th edition) together. This isn't so much a horror story, but just a collection of memories about my experience with that Guy. And drugs. This isn't a funny story.

The group were: the Surgeon, the Military Pilot, School Teacher #1, and School Teacher #2 (which would be me), as well as Elvi. Again, we didn't know each other beforehand and it was a rather odd, but for the most part, very cool group. And Elvi.

Elvi was... odd. During the first meeting of the group at a pub, he only introduced himself as Elvi, which wasn't his real Name, just the name he used. Which was fine with everybody - it is just a name. But also mentioning that he uses this name to avoid "doxing himself" to a group of people meeting for a Shadowrun players was... weird. When we also discussed where we could play, he also proudly proclaimed that he would never give us his adress or would want us to visit him. Which... okay, strangers and so on. Still, it is weird if you meet at some person's home anyway.

Elvi claimed to be an IT specialist for a larger company. I don't know if this is true, because which company that supposed to be changed between him telling this. He seemed to earn well enough (for a time) and was easily the one of us with the most expensive car and clothes. Always very well maintained.

Playing with Elvi was similarly ...weird. He played a very aggressive, very competitve, highly sexualized female Elf. Shadowrun is a game that favours specialist characters and min-maxing, and from a strictly powergaming perspective, this wasn't a particular strong character. That didn't change a thing about how Elvi played her as the designated leader of the team, and tried to talk the others into following his orders. At least when he was around, because Elvi was reliably unreliable when it came to regular appearances. We had a fixed weekly date, and in one out of three to four sessions he either didn't show up at all, or at least an hour late.

When Elvi was around though, we had frequent in-character quarrels. He constantly snarled at me and teacher #1, the only woman in the group, for nearly anything. At one point, he almost killed my character during some sort of goof (his character drove the team van, my character rode along on his motorcycle, I supposed some sort of race because it seemed fun, and Elvi decided it was a good idea to ram me or push me off the road).

He also needlessly escalated conflicts all the time, in-game, leading to frequent firefights that could just have been completely avoidable. He also constantly murdered people, and literally scolded us for using non-violent or at least non-lethal options first. That was a constant point of argument between the two of us, especially. He once told me he hated my character because I used a taser.

At another time, he shouted at me (teacher #1 had at that point left the group) in-character, because I had supposedly fucked up a mission while I was the only player who was actually there during all its sessions and basically had to do the whole thing alone without any support).

The reason for this animosity was, apparently: We usually played at my place, and I a) didn't want him to smoke indoors, including his vape, b) told him not to smoke pot in my garden because our neighbour is a cop and c) asked Elvi - just like everybody else - if he thought it was a good idea to have a third beer when he had arrived by car. I also shared the opinion that d) stimulants other than coffee, cocaine in particular, just seems like a bad idea to me, as well as e) smoking weed and moderate to heavy drinking is probably a bad idea while also taking anti-depressants.

Basically, I was the scolding moral apostle to his cool and hip Lifestyle (we were both in our 30s, by the way). Also, I didn't share his taste in music (you do you, but I find most Goa, Trance etc. super repetitive and boring). And maybe some sort of hypocrite - considering we played at my place, I had 0 problems opening that 3rd beer.

However, since I basically forbade him from doing drugs in my house, Elvi started to disappear mid session because 'he had forgotten something in his car'. These trips became more frequent when Elvi's relationship and apparently his mental health deteriorated. He also became more aggressive. When we had the talk about 'you should not combine dope and anti-depressants', Elvi's answer was that he had stopped taking the anti-depressants, because 'he couldn't even cry when taking them.'

So, we never kicked him out officially, but after shouting match number 3, I was about to leave the group if nothing would change, and Elvi also felt some animosity. At that point, we mostly tolerated him because we honestly worried about him and didn't want to add stress to him, after his wife had left him (again, allegedly, because we never met said wife or his child, even showing pictures was 'too much private information'). But, the writing on the wall was so clear that Elvi left by his own decision before he would have been asked to leave.

And we others continued to play Shadowrun. New players eventually joined the group (teacher #3, and military officer #2... the game was very tactical at this point), for years, until Covid regulations effectively put an end to the group.

In the Summer 2021, Elvi contacted me again, out of the blue. The police had confiscated his car after stooping him in an alcohol control, and he needed someone - anyone - to pick him up, accompany him to the police precinct so that he could up his car keys and drive him home, because his driver's licence was suspended. Apparently, I was one of the options to call in that situation, and to be fair, I picked him up, listening to him having a barely hidden panic attack about the idea that the police could have searched his car. He had lost about 10 kg of weight (and he had been a skinny guy all the time)

When we went back to his car, he basically ripped the car keys out of my hand, cheered about whatever he found hidden in the car's ashtray, and insisted on driving home himself. We had another argument, but honestly, I was so eager to get out of this situation that I didn't insist on driving him home very hard. At least he seemed sober.

The last thing he told me was, "Maybe I should get more friends who are like you... the reliable types."

Two days later, he rwng at my door and gave me a (rather mid) bottle of wine as a thank you present. He had arrived in his own car, of course.

So, i wanna start by saying this happened when i was 13, and im 20 now and im not as cringe anymore.

I had some friends on Discord, one of whom im still best friends with to this day. they were both up to 3 years older than me, forgot the exact age of one of them, hence why i say that. But i was a very cringe kid. Im still cringe to some degree: im a furry, my hyperfixations are the warrior cats, mlp, and homestuck fandom, etc. etc. but this was a different cringe.

Me and some classmates made up a religion based off khakis bc we were bored on the bus. My two internet pals invited me to play dnd with them in chat, which i had NEVER played before EVER. i agreed, and i continuously asked questions and i kinda had to have them railroad my decisions bc i had NO IDEA what i was doing. and then i decided "im bored. how about i throw the khaki god into this." and i begged and pleaded for my character to wear khakis and worship the khaki god. i also at some point got an orc gf in the campaign but that doesnt matter for this story. but i was so annoying about it that Friend 1 was like "khakis are never allowed ever again in my dnd campaigns jfc." and the campaign eventually died bc my mom passed and i moved away and had no laptop.

i look back and cringe at how freakish i was back then. i have much more experience with ttrpgs now, and i am no longer that annoying.

FEEL FREE TO DUNK ON 13 YEAR OLD ME IN THE COMMENTS BTW ITS DESERVED.

I’m really upset and need to get this off my chest- so here’s the context!

I’m a baby dm who’s running their first homebrew campaign, and I’ve assembled two teams to play it for. One I’ve named Team Vernian who plays on Sundays @ 3 PM CST and the other I’ve named Team Wellsian who plays on Fridays @ 4-5 PM CST. I discussed these dates & times with my players before session 0, and I didn’t have anyone say anything about the time. Not a single “Can we do another time instead that doesn’t work for me”. So I start up session 0 for Team Vernian (keep that team in mind) and all goes well, except that one of the players don’t show up. I don’t think much of it and decide to give the player another chance, allowing them to hop in to session 1 so they can still join the party. About an hour of waiting on them later, and due to another player on team Vernian cancelling, I had to cancel the session. I dm the player asking “hey I’ve noticed you’ve been having some issue with showing up to the session, so I was wondering if you’d like to join Team Wellsian instead” because I understand life gets in the way of things, and wanted to accommodate the player. Y’know what they tell me in response??? Paraphrasing here but, basically the player tells me that they were logged out of discord and then asks if can do it around 4-5 EST, which in my time zone, is literally the time frame that the session takes place in. They also tell me that they work the day of the campaign, only telling me this when the party was already a session and a half in. And it’s just so mind boggling to me that, the player didn’t tell me about something this important when I was discussing date & time with everyone else!! Thanks for listening to my rant, it feels so much better to get this out of my system 😭.

TLDR: Player didn’t tell me that they work during the scheduled time for the campaign session until after session 0 and asks if I can change the date.

Edit; I’ve been trying to get in contact with this player, ever since I asked my Vernian team if they were okay with that time and them saying nay, to which I informed this player of. They’ve ignored my dm for two days straight now. Do I just kick them at this point or wait for them to respond? :(?

Edit no.2: I let him know that I had to remove him from the campaign and that I was really sorry about the time not working out for him. His response is “it’s all because I was EST :(“ like?? No dude- not at all- I have German & British players so clearly it wasn’t your time zone 🤦

(Trying to cut as much fluff I can, not sure how much I'll succeed)

This happened a fair few years ago. The system in question is DnD 3.5e. Cast: Me, DM, Cleric, Fighter (there was a Wizard who did nothing of note and left at some point)

Important note: I was 17 at the time (lying about being 18 lol) playing my first ever TTRPG, and the youngest of the group, the DM, was in his mid-30s, the rest were 40s. Cleric and Fighter was a married couple and we played at their house. Nobody was creepy, but the social dynamic and xp gap definitely affected the game.

First session I showed up, the players and the DM helped me make my character, which amounted to me saying I'd like to play a bard and them telling me how to allocate my stats and spells, which resulted in my character being hyper-optimized for charisma and buffing. To be fair I was pretty overwhelmed with making a lv12 chracter with only a cursory read of the PHB beforehand, but I had very little input on my build besides the initial class choice, and it's been a while so I'm not even 100% sure playing bard was an original idea.

Okay, I join the party, we head off into a dungeon that was related to the main plot I either forgot or was never told in the first place. Combat starts. Cleric, who has been constantly advising me on what to do, tells me to cast Greater Invisibility on myself and put up all of my buffing songs on Fighter (I have zero memory of 3.5e mechanics anymore so idk how I played that out). For the remainder of the battle, I'm told to sit in the corner with the also invisible Cleric, "pick at my pubes", and keep up my buffs so the Fighter can mop up the enemies. At one point I wanted to shoot my crossbow just so I'd be doing something, but was told no because I wouldn't hit anyway and it would be a waste of time.

This happens a few times in different dungeons (we travel via floating cloud between them and the group doesn't like RP so it's basically a loading screen), until we come across a devil. My character, attached to a 17 year old girl with 0 social skills, is thrust forward to be the face because she has 22 Charisma. The devil seems to recognize me! Finally, something interesting happening! Now, my character (a naive church orphan and also a 18 year old) has a scroll of unknown language from her father. The devil asks to see it and I, happy that I'm getting a plot going, hand it over. Then the devil disappears. With my scroll. The DM stops the game and tells us that due to my foolish actions, we'd need to go on a lengthy sidequest to recover the scroll and he's been working on a system that we could try instead. Fed up with doing absolutely nothing, I vote yes to the new game.

(Long story short the system was awful and punished people for taking damage or trying to do any sort of magic. It also rewarded people for making a combat-relevant backstory and the group relentlessly made fun of me when I did so. At some point I just emailed them that I'm leaving the group and deleted any reply emails like a well-adjusted and mature by-then-18-year-old.)

Edited for clarity

Background: a campaign with a first-time GM. Most of us are novices. The Problem Player is the one most experienced. He has GMed for our current GM in the past but none of the other players had played with him.

The story: The Problem Player was annoying from the very beginning. Classic Problem Player repertoire: Interrupting others, offtop, not paying attention, paying too much attention (as in commenting and talking over others when his character is absent), assuming his plans are the only right ones, hoarding equipment, joking in an obnoxious way (I mean, ligma in 2024 when the GM is describing a scene? Really?), being aggressive towards NPCs, etc. Just imagine any typical issue and he probably did it.

I've tried asking others whether they have an issue with him but all I got was general "I'm inexperienced so I don't want to rock the boat" or "I do agree but I don't want to speak up because I don't feel like I have the authority to do that". Alright, maybe this group is just not for me. I messaged the GM that I'd like to leave and explained my reasons. They agreed that his behaviour is too much and asked whether I'd like to stay if they talked to the Problem Player because he's not usually like that. I agreed.

A day later the GM messaged our group chat to notify them if something's bothering us and that they'll be introducing the X card. Great! Then the Problem Player piped up that the X card is a fine tool but it's better to be assertive instead of passive-agressiveness! I've tried to multiple times but he was constantly speaking over everybody and didn't even hear what I was saying!

I've explained in the group chat that I intended to leave due to clashing playstyles and asked whether he meant that me complaining to the GM is what he considers being passive-aggressive. He replied that he actually doesn't even know what my issue was because when the GM talked to him it was to "fluid" without any particular issues. So I gave him a looong answer with multiple points.

While he agreed that he has an issue with interrupting other players, he mentioned that he doesn't feel bad or even responsible for his aggressive roleplay. He then explained that he's been GMing for our current GM for a few years now and that they're extremely hostile towards his NPCs. Also that they've been "infantilising" his Star Wars campaigns. Therefore, it's his right to do the same to them.

The GM explained that yes, while that would be the case if they were playing one on one, there are other people he has to consider. He answered that he'd feel a "cognitive dissonance" behaving in any other way becaue he's so used to this playstyle when our current GM is around and while he might be bothered to work on other issues, his character will be as hostile as he was. I mentioned that it's a serious clash of interests for me because I'm there to have fun and not to clean messes made by another player. He then decided that he's had enough and left.

To sum it up, yes, he used the campaign as a revenge ploy against the current GM to teach them a lesson how it feels to deal with a hostile PC, without any regard for the other players.

I promised I would post a followup to https://www.reddit.com/r/rpghorrorstories/comments/1dw7q4s/guy_threatened_to_murder_anothers_character/

For those not in the know, someone in that thread TL;DR'd it very nicely:

players are all government officials, problem player got mad at OP for opening a nightclub to help keep the populace happy, OP delivered a sealed letter to the office of the problem player explaining why they believed it was a good idea, problem player decided that their character doesn't have an office, never receives any paperwork and runs the city entirely based on word-of-mouth, and that therefore that OP must have broken into their house to deliver the letter, so they publicly threaten to murder OP. This is obviously insane, so OP tries to sort things out OOC, then the problem player decides to double down, refuses to explain their logic, and calls OP a clown for not understanding WTF they are talking about.

Special thank you to u/OneElfWonder for the excellent TL;DR.

I had set up proverbial mines for all sorts of in-character interactions - including attacking my character, attacking the messenger my character sent to summon him, etc. - but none got stepped on. So, when our characters met, I decided to give peace a shot, and I explained things plainly:

To summarize, 'If emotional outbursts like this are what can be expected then how can we go on missions together? Because people that are emotionally compromised do not get sent on missions, nor go on story-critical missions like going after their own missing wife. So, now that the entire capital city is aware of your threat to murder me, how do we fix this?'

What I got as a reply was a very slow talking, somber sounding man that stated that several things had been going on and it led to a buildup in emotion and that he was sorry.

And I decided, well... as long as this wasn't repeated, I didn't need to destroy the campaign for him. I messaged the GM about retconning my character using the information I had collected pertaining to his wife's location and rescuing her in downtime, to simply being recovering the information and rescuing someone else, whom then became my secretary out of gratitude. The GM allowed it.

I then, back in public chat, provided the details on the location to him, which he was quite thankful for. It was clear that this questline was central to his character and had been a defining point since before I joined the campaign, had been his driving goal for the parts of the campaign I had been present for, and I didn't feel the need to crush it.

This left one loose end: the letter. No one saw him post it, and if anyone did, well illusion magic is a thing and this is a high-magic capital city, so I immediately came up with a solution to blame it on dissidents that were trying to capitalize on sewing discord by impersonating a council member and nailing an incriminating document to a public place.

This was easy enough to pull off as my character's domains of influence included the secret police (true neutral 3.5 urban-druid - ya hear a lot of rumors when the city itself talks to you).

Plus, now I have an Erinyes secretary that has reality-bending contracts she'll make for my soul benefit. True, I had to edit her using her truename to make her less evil, not loyal to hell, and unwilling to betray me, but she was willing to consent to all this when it meant getting out of soul-prison and not being used as currency by some demonic reprobate.

Remember, "neutral druid" does not mean "idle hippie"

It means "The statues in the public parks were made with Flesh to Stone, if the Yuan Ti attack again I'll disappear them to the feywild, experiment on them with every disease known to man, and some which are not known to man. Or make them into lawn gnomes. Depends on the artistic vision."

This story starts three years ago and covers a lot of ground – including my own mistakes as a DM – and ends in me finally losing it and torching an entire campaign to avoid blowing up a friend group, which then results in the entire friend group still imploding.

TL;DR: I poorly vet new players I didn’t know very well into a slow-burn sequel campaign. Several problems with two players/friends get brushed off on the “but we’re friends” excuse. Resentment builds, I lose interest in playing with their characters at all, they complain, I finally put the game on hold to save feelings. They beg to bring the game back but use the new session zero as an excuse to trash my partner. I blow up on them, get kicked out of their wedding, and split the campaign into two separate arcs with the players that are having a good time, and we never speak to part of the friend group again.

A few years ago, I (DM) left the military and moved to a new state. I’ve been playing various editions of D&D since childhood, but most of my DMing experience came from the barracks, where we had a group of us that liked to run games, and we built a shared world that we ran arcs in together with a semi-weekly revolving cast of characters and players, based on who was available at any given time. It was pretty much a given in that game that you’d have multiple PCs to play in different arcs, because field ops, duty, and deployments are always going to cause a bit of a shuffle on things like that. That system worked beautifully for a group of Marines all living in the same building, but in defense of my new players, even the two featured in this story, it’s by no means the “norm” for most players and I definitely should have gone in with different expectations of how to handle a more traditional game. I acknowledge that I absolutely could have done better on that; that’s totally on me.

When I first moved, I joined a campaign that was actually coming to an early end. The DM found out he was moving out of state only a few months after I joined. He'd been seeding a lot of time travel, trouble with gods/titans, and fracturing between realms, but none of it had come into play yet. The whole group was disappointed to see it ending and discussed other ways to pick up the story.

Those themes heavily aligned with what I intended for my campaign, which featured a mysterious world-eating entity awoken by mortals playing with the power of the gods. Pre-enlistment, I’d been a literature and folklore major and I really wanted to play around with a world that was already at its end, and with the concept of societal collapse. I offered to pick up the story in a future setting and proposed the time travel that had been hinted at finally coming into play. The players were happy with this. The DM turned over his notes on the BBEG to me, we collabed on how to tweak my story to adhere to what had already happened previously during his lore before I arrived, and we got ready for my game being a sequel to that first game. Then one of the players got a dream job offer and had to also move out of state. Since I’d already done the work of building the campaign, I decided to run it anyway and invite some coworkers who had been wanting to try D&D.

I invited my desk mate (Fighter) and another coworker (Problem Player 1, aka Druid). Druid asked if her partner could play (Problem Player 2, aka Monk.) Fighter had some experience with TTRPGs, but not much, whereas Druid and Monk were totally new but basically played WoW nonstop every second they weren’t at the office. Because of this, they wanted to start at level 1 instead of 8, where I’d intended. After discussing it with Cleric and Wizard, it was agreed that since they were coming to the new game alone, they would create temporary PCs for the first few levels, and when I was done building the transition, they’d get to continue with their characters from Arc 1. A caveat to this was that while I wasn’t going to railroad them or kill off/totally remove their last party member (my old PC, whom they were very attached to both in and out of character), I had no intention of running a DMPC. I told them to expect her to be taken away by the villain pretty much immediately, with a promise that restoring their family would be part of their arc by the end of the game. I let Druid, Monk, and Fighter know all this from the get-go as well.

As a preliminary for session 0, I doled out consent sheets and mini character questionnaires. Aside from the standard why is your character travelling with a party bit, I always ask a few things of players:

1. What does your character want from their adventures? What’s a goal they’d love to achieve before the end?
2. Is there a particular arc or moral quandary you’d like to explore? IE – do you want a romance arc? A corruption arc? Are you starting from a place of villainy and want to find healing or answer? What are you looking for from this story?
3. What’s your ideal ending for this character? Assuming they see the end, where do you see them in twenty years? What’s the most satisfying outcome for you and what should I set up/put in place over the journey to get them there?

The way I DM, I craft the story entirely around those answers. For Druid, the goal was to seek out and live among mythical celestial whales she’d heard of in childhood. For Fighter, it was finding answers to a message he found engraved on his armor when he awoke after being trapped in a strange stasis spell for 600 years and finding purpose for why he’d been ripped away from his home Rip Van Winkle style. Monk didn’t create a backstory and was only playing for Druid’s sake but gave me a vague concept of a mysterious lost temple he was searching for. Cleric wanted to find a way to save his sister, knowing I’d be taking her away. Wizard wanted to make a new home for his family in this strange place. I didn’t incorporate Wizard or Cleric’s temporary PCs in the main arc, given they'd only be around for a few levels, but I did put some fun things in for them to still experience with those characters while they played them.

All the players were into the idea of the Big Heroes, Big Problems trope, and from talking to Fighter and Druid, I could tell they wanted Chosen One arcs for their characters. Which is fine by me; I always find a way to connect everyone’s above answers in such a way that at some point down the line, there’s one culminating location or event that makes every player feel like they were meant to be there, in that moment. Like the road of destiny was always taking them to that place.

For this game, it was the Monk’s temple – I made a remote, impossible to get to, steeped in myth island that no one ever returned from journeying to. Once they arrived there, which I estimated at being around level 15 or 16, they’d find a society withdrawn from this world’s many problems. There, they’d find Monk’s temple, which had loyal monks dedicated to preserving the secrets of the mythical celestial whales that guarded the border between realms. A piece of text on display in their library contained a passage of what had been written on Fighter’s armor, which would tip them off to who the BBEG was, and how to stop them. Wizard and Cleric would find the solution to how to save their sister, as well as some information about the past they’d left behind for this strange future.

The problems started at the very first session. Fighter showed up with his wife, Rogue, without asking if I was prepared to handle a sixth player. Being used to juggling larger groups because of the barracks games, I said it was fine and let it go. She also was just playing for her partner’s sake and had no real idea what she wanted for her backstory other than being an orphan looking for the family she was separated from. Fine, no worries, I swapped out a few NPCs to suit her needs, and incorporated a surviving family member who had made it to the temple years ago but had been unable to return to her unaided so that she’d have a nice reunion and feel included in the main arc. I know I didn’t touch base with her that Cleric and Wizard’s PCs were temporary, since her session 0 was so delayed compared to everyone else.

The game runs relatively smoothly after that for several levels. Cleric and Wizard played very beginner friendly/passive characters to help foster RP with the new players, but Fighter especially was eager to level up to the point where he’d meet their actual characters, having heard about the first arc and being excited to get past what we were all jokingly calling the “tutorial phase” of the game and into the gritty “end of the world” bits I’d promised at the start. Rogue ended up being the surprise MVP, getting really into the “drama” side of RP, stating once that she “needed her fix between Bridgerton seasons”. Druid and Monk were passively present: I noticed pretty much out the gate that unless they were the star of the moment or there was combat, they were on their iPads playing League of Legends, watching videos, or drawing. They’d both frequently interrupt the game to show people a video or meme, and while it was irritating, I let it go because everyone was having a good time.

After the first few sessions, we ended up having to change play locations. When Rogue and Fighter couldn’t get a sitter, we’d go to theirs, but being the DM, I mostly offered up my own place. Right away it became clear that hosting was going to be something of an issue. I’m a very casual host, in that I won’t get up and offer drinks/snacks a million times. I showed everyone where glasses were, showed them to which cupboard had the game snacks, and told them to make themselves at home and get their own drinks etc. This backfired immediately, when Monk and Druid apparently took this to mean go through any cabinet you want and don’t clean up after yourself. They’d help themselves to anything in the fridge or in the liquor cabinet, and at the end of each game, they were the first out the door. They never threw away their own trash, and at one point, Monk knocked over his beer and just left the puddle the entire game, then packed up and left. They’d get upset if anyone else sat on the couch, which they’d claimed as their own, and would roll their eyes and make snarky comments anytime they had to sit in the folding chairs – mind you, at one point Rogue was heavily pregnant and I’m disabled, so they absolutely got overruled sometimes and it was always a fuss.

They also only ever brought things for themselves – while Cleric and Wizard didn’t have much money, they’d try to bring coffee for everyone when they could afford it. Fighter and Rogue consistently brought beer, and sometimes snacks. I bought most of the food – sometimes using it as part of the theme of the game/as a clue to something in the story, and sometimes just because no one else would if I didn’t. Monk and Druid would bring themselves food, or single bottles of fancy beers or wines, and while they were more than happy to help themselves to anything Fighter or I served, they outright refused to share what they brought, and would then leave their takeout boxes and empty bottles for Fighter, Cleric, and I to clean up at the end of games. I put a polite message out on the game Discord reminding everyone that cleaning up each week takes a lot of time, and if they could please remember to pick up trash when they leave. I immediately received a nasty message from Monk saying that he and Druid “always” cleaned up or at least “offered” and that he “hoped that wasn’t meant for him”. I ignored it and let it go because, again, people had become friends and I also worked with three of them and was trying to be polite.

Eventually Fighter and I both left that job, and that should have been when we pulled the plug. We didn’t. This continued for two and a half more years – we eventually switched to playing at Fighter and Rogue’s house full time because of the kids, and along the way we picked up Player 7, Ranger. She was a close friend who expressed interest in playing for a little while during a short arc, and everyone got extremely attached to her character and the other players asked if I could handle 7 full time so she could stay. I could, and had before, so I said ok with the understanding it might make the games a bit longer each week. It became a weekly event, where we’d spend Saturday afternoon and evening at Rogue/Fighter’s playing with the kids, playing D&D, and catching up on our weeks. Rogue complained about the same issues with hosting, but Cleric and I officially started dating and thus carpooling, so we made sure to stick around with Wizard and do most cleanup for her so she could get her kids to bed. Around this time, they finally reached level 8 and Cleric and Wizard began the transition to playing Cleric and Wizard. Here’s where things get messy.

At some point along the way, Druid, Monk, and Rogue had forgotten that Cleric and Wizard were not going to be Bard and Artificer forever. Those characters were removed from the story in a very climactic way, which was intended to lead to some good RP, maybe a bit of crossover at later levels if the players wanted to take a break from their regular PCs, and a cathartic, happy ending for those characters. But the road to the Nine Hells is paved with good intentions, and the party – despite urging from Cleric, Wizard, and Ranger – really tried to force the issue of keeping the other characters around, and I was subjected to more than a few rants, long-winded texts, and pleas to have them stay. Both players said it was fine, and that their arc 1 characters were pretty devastated/still reeling from losing their sister so “suddenly” (a somewhat scripted extraction after 5 sessions, which actually brought Rogue and Ranger to tears, but that’s another story) and that they wouldn’t be talking much anyway, so they’d just deal with it and “play” two characters for a few sessions while everyone “adjusted” to the transition.

This never happened, and every time they tried over the course of several games to remove those characters, it was met with resistance – especially from Monk and Druid, and Rogue. Now, given that Cleric and I were dating at this point and Wizard is Cleric’s brother IRL as well, I was trying really hard to make sure it never felt like there were any “favorites”. My games always run as a collection of smaller arcs or “chapters”, which tie into a larger whole. So, while the first few sessions of the new PCs arrival was definitely a mini “arc” of getting them settled, I pivoted right away to an arc focused on Ranger and Monk. Monk was, as usual, glued to his iPad and when asked multiple times if he wanted to change his character or add more to his story to make it more fun, he always said he was fine as is, and cited ADHD meds for not being present at the table. Several other players have table accommodations for either mental health or physical disabilities, so I tried to shift the game to suit his needs, but he’d just wave it off and say we couldn’t get mad because his meds made the game hard to focus on, so I let it go and let him do his thing while Ranger took the wheel, figuring if he wanted more later, I’d work with him.

At the same time as this, another issue arose involving Fighter. Because my DMing experience had almost all been collaborative up to this point, I’d told everyone if they ever wanted to run a one shot or mini arc in the world, it was open to them. A few one-shots were run, some with the PCs and some with new characters. Then, Wizard approached me and said he wanted to run a mini-campaign in the Nine Hells. Fighter is a huge fan of NH lore and really wanted to have a reason for his character to join it. He was also personally struggling with some stuff that he wanted to work out using his character.

Against what maybe should have been my better judgement, I okayed him playing out a Betrayal/Corruption arc with his character. Over 4 sessions, he betrayed the party and worked for a villain they were dealing with. I gave everyone a heads up that a player was “betraying” them but promised it wouldn’t affect the work they’d done against the villain so far. Being married to Fighter, Rogue knew the most and she actually came into the big reveal with a beautiful speech she’d written for “confronting” him. The PCs then “voted” to banish Fighter from the party and he happily played a goofy, friendly joke character for a bit while his Fighter hopped on over to the mini arc. I don’t know if Druid and Monk just couldn’t separate the PC from the Player wanting a different thing, or if they’d just gotten used to having their way when Cleric was playing Bard and letting them boss him around significantly more than he did as Cleric, or what, but they were livid, in and out of game. And they wanted everyone to know it. We didn’t get through a single session for weeks after without them complaining and refusing to understand that the in-character “vote” was superficial at best, and that they didn’t ACTUALLY have any control over the fate of another Player’s character.

Monk, especially, started getting more and more hostile with Cleric and Wizard – not just the characters, but the players as well. It became clear pretty quickly that because Cleric and Wizard were Fighter’s best friends out of game and helped him orchestrate his big reveal, that they viewed it as Cleric and Wizard “taking over” the “vote” and “controlling” the outcome. I spoke to them and tried to remind them that it was fiction and that Fighter as a PLAYER had wanted his character to leave that way, but it still started to tip into visible bullying, with Monk making inappropriate jokes about Cleric and telling him to shut up in character a lot. He was told off more than once by multiple players and would always play dumb after being called out. Monk has always been something of a Schrodinger's Douchebag – he decides whether he’s joking based on how you react to what he says, and he threw in two SA “jokes” and one MAP “joke” that yes, I know, really should have been grounds for immediate table removal. However, Druid had just asked Rogue and I to be her bridesmaids and Wizard and Cleric are both insisted that I keep my mouth shut in respect to Monk being Druid’s future spouse. Beyond that, Cleric was adamant that I stay out of it to avoid it being seen as him having “special treatment” as my partner and promised to handle it himself. Which he never did, as I found out later.

Sometime during the drama, I guess I just checked out. I couldn’t deal with it anymore, and I 100% acknowledge that it’s my fault for not sitting them down and talking to them about literally ANY of these issues beforehand. But the more they acted out or complained, the less I engaged with their characters. I’d given every player a magic item that grew with them as the story progressed, and Monk and Druid by far had the most “broken” items because I’d gotten really excited about building whale and anti-magic (Monk went fully anti-caster during his arc) items and kind of overdid it. But they never once used them and they spent most of their time complaining that other players “had more” than them, despite them never using what they were given and refusing to engage in anything where they weren’t the exclusive stars of the show. I gave up on engaging with them and started pivoting toward Rogue, Ranger, Cleric, and Wizard. Fighter started night shift at work and had his temporary character head back home very peacefully, and only played in the Nine Hells arc, which fit his schedule.

This was obvious to Monk and Druid, who confronted me via text and told me they were burnt out and not having fun. They assigned all blame to Cleric and Wizard for not playing Bard and Artificer anymore. Druid sent me a series of long paragraphs about how she was upset with them for “banishing” Fighter, didn’t like that they’d both had big moments with unlocking the next level of their magic items while she hadn’t, and resented that they had more magic items, despite using the several periods of “downtime” we’d had where we took breaks for life events to earn money or complete side quests – an option she and Monk had also always had and turned down. Mind you, there was no acknowledgement that Ranger and Rogue also had all the things she was complaining about. She’d decided that because Cleric and I lived together by this point, that I was favoring him and his brother. Meanwhile, I’d actually been pulled aside by Fighter and Ranger at one point and told that they were a little concerned I was being “too harsh” with the rules when it came to Cleric and Wizard in comparison to how lax everyone else had it. Everyone except Monk and Druid thought I was being too hard on Cleric and Wizard, and asked me to ease up on them, which I did immediately apologize for and correct.

Monk hopped on the bandwagon with his fiancee, and sent me a text making fun of Cleric and whining about the same things. Cleric and I have access to each other’s phones and I certainly wasn’t going to lie to the person I’m planning to marry, so I was honest with him about their complaints and asked what he wanted to do. I fully expected him to say “kick them from the table” but instead, he thought it over and said, “Wizard and I will leave the game, and we’ll just play Bard and Artifcer. If it makes them happy, we can deal with it.”

I should have told him to kick rocks, and I deeply regret not doing so. The only reason they favored Bard and Artificer was because they were easy to bully and would do anything the rest of the party told them to, and Cleric and Wizard had been feeling taken advantage of at the table the entire time they were playing them. But he was adamant that he wanted this, so I didn’t argue. I still can’t believe I just let it go when they were being awful to my partner. It was a horrible decision, and I will never do so again.

Cutting their actual PCs out meant gutting part of what I had planned for the next several levels, and finding a way to mash in reasons Bard and Artificer were connected to the main plot, when nothing else had tied them there before. I did a bit of slapdash work and tried to alter the trajectory of the story, but I didn’t make it two sessions before I broke down and told Cleric I didn’t want to play anymore. As any DM knows, gutting your campaign is always a grieving process and I wanted to take a break to restructure so I could return to the table without any regrets or resentment. As soon as I hit pause, instantly life got a lot better. I was a player in the Nine Hells arc alongside Fighter, Ranger, and Cleric (Monk and Druid denied the invitation and Rogue wanted the reunion with Fighter to be a surprise, so we invited another friend to play instead). I ran a mini-arc of one-shots on what Cleric and Wizard were up to since they’d separated. What’s wild is that Druid begged to join that mini-arc, and created a character that was a “huge fangirl” of Cleric, Druid, and their sister from history books/kind of a true crime buff who was interested in the heroes that disappeared so long ago. She was happily playing alongside them again in a new arc, and I started to think well, okay, maybe I could just run two smaller arcs with the different characters and then have everyone get the big level 20 session to fight the villain together, and it would be like a cool reunion moment.

Right around that time, Druid and Monk started asking when we’d begin playing their game again. The “temporary break” had been almost 6 months long at this point, and they were ready to play their characters again. I was hesitant, but after being encouraged by Cleric and Fighter to give it a go, I reached out to start a new session 0 for the new arc and asked Druid if she was still interested in her own corruption arc, or if she wanted to go a different route given some new information they’d gotten the last session.

What followed was a novel of texts from her “explaining” (re- complaining again) that Druid hated Cleric and Wizard, hated them so much that she wanted power to take back control from them for “ruining” everything for her, and how she was, both in and out of game, still very angry that “they” had “forced” Fighter to leave. And how she “totally loved the players as friends” but “hated” playing with them with their more serious characters.

I couldn’t believe the first thing out of her mouth, when I had gutted my campaign for her, created whole new arcs for her, and had sat back and held my tongue while she and her fiance trampled over mine and my family’s boundaries, was to seriously play the victim again. I lost it. I wrote a very long, very unkind response in my notes app, saved it, and waited to speak to Cleric when I got home. He read both, told me absolutely do not send that, calm down and be civil. I cooled it for a few days, talked it over with all the other players, my therapist, and a few adjacent people who had played in one shots or mini-arcs with them, and the resounding conclusion from every single person I spoke to was that they were not table compatible with us and that I was a jerk for letting it go on as long as it did. I apologized to the rest of my players a billion times, listened to their feedback on times they wished I’d set more boundaries or communicated the intent of the game better so there wouldn’t be any argument, and crafted a very respectful In the interest of preserving friendships, I think we should play at other tables message. Druid immediately asked to get coffee, Monk sent a smarmy Does that breakup text include me? along with a casual “I don’t even know how I could have hurt anyone’s feelings, I’m not part of this” message despite being the one to, at one point, say that playing with Cleric is like listening to a Twitter social justice warrior tell you to feel bad about your choices, but we’re stuck with him if we want to play. Which came as the response to Cleric stepping outside with him and addressing him making SA jokes to the SA victim at the table.

We met up, I reiterated that there wasn’t a wrong way to play D&D, but that our game had been a lot of foreshadowing, clue building, and long-term heavy RP that required a level of engagement they didn’t seem to enjoy, and that I as the DM didn’t want to run the kind of casual, low-stakes, social hour game they were looking for. They disagreed, and spent the better part of an hour explaining why I was wrong for that, and they were actually great players, and the victims. Cleric tried to listen and discuss his perspective with them, and how they’d made him feel, and they dismissed it and basically said their own feelings were more valid. I mentally checked out and just smiled and nodded and let them say what they felt they needed to, then made it clear that my answer wasn’t going to change. She removed me from her bridesmaids group chat without saying anything, and we haven’t heard from them since.

As for the rest of the party? Rogue, Ranger, Bard, and Artificer have continued their journey without Monk and Druid, and are having a grand time trying to convince a dragon to un-adopt a city it’s decided is its hoard, and Cleric, Wizard, Fighter, Ranger (playing her Warlock from the Nine Hells game that ended recently) and the other cleric from that game played by another friend have departed the Nine Hells and are making their way to the Feywilds to deal with an unseelie fey that’s supposedly stealing the faces of people it meets. Both games have mostly the same players, so we’ve made each into different weekly “family dinner” nights, and the RP coming out of these tables now that it isn’t interrupted by memes or League of Legends playing at full volume in the background has been heartwrenching and amazing and has caused both me as the DM and several players to cry more than once. I am so grateful for the players at both of these tables, and I’m working very hard to make it up to them for keeping people it turns out pretty much everyone quietly hated and was just dealing with for each other in their games for so long.

The moral of this story is to prioritize communicating with your players and to set boundaries before you allow your players to be miserable for almost three years. And listen the first time people show you who they are. If they’re entitled houseguests or meanspirited, self-absorbed people, they’re probably entitled, meanspirited, and self-absorbed at the D&D table as well.

So, to continue my lousy luck with PTP, here's another story about trying to find a game that didn't implode at the start. I joined a traveler PTP game that showed a good deal of promise. It was split into two groups in the same world based on Time zones. The server was pretty active, and the character ideas flowed as we rolled up characters and came up (at least in the American camp) with some of the weirdest characters we had ever played.

Well, the European timezone group had more straightforward characters like a retired doctor who was looking to help people on the road, an engineer fresh out of school trying to make a living as a traveller, or a solder scrubbed out of forces be it age or personal reasons and now want to travel on their own as a guard or merc. Understandable characters to make and fit the core mission of being spies for the Terran union during the war vs. the Vilani empire that would form the 2nd imperium in the setting.

We, in the American time zone, were playing characters like the nurse who found her husband with another doctor and decided to get the best lawyer possible, Dino-Mite, and ended up spending time in prison for domestic terrorism. A heavy metal puck rock star who, thanks to several riots breaking out at hers on top of the drug and personal assaults, ended up in jail several times. I was playing a Tewp (humanoid gecko) who, after violently failing to be a trader like his noble family or getting into a bureaucratic branch like most of his species does for the Vilani, became a popular Alex Jones/Joe Rogan-style conspiracy theorist and playboy. He was one of the only two characters in this six-person group who didn't go to jail, the Irish engineer who was straight Arrow for his whole life mostly because he could afford lawyers. We were all on the 2nd spy team because we all wanted our criminal history expunged or to escape our prison sentences.

We got to work setting character relationships, making maps for the ship and cargo compartments, and even figuring out how our rooms looked. We rolled for cargo and got creative on describing the narcotics being meth snails we hide with aquatic agriculture spiders. I even got confirmation to use my fame stat to help get high-paying passengers who the eng's self-made distillery would serve fresh craft beer and hard spirits. We met the spymaster got the info on where we needed to go, and got ready for take-off....which is where we were left as the DM focused on the 2nd group that was more in their timezone. At first the Ref wanted to focus on the 2nd group before switching back to us for about a month to figure out what to do for us. After that first month, we asked when we could lift off, and Ref said to roll. We already did, but the Ref said he lost the roll and needed us to roll again. We did and even marked the roll on the rolling bot channel and were asked if we rolled for the J-drive or power, and we had already done that.

Ref told us that he would get to it and told us we could do "in-between" scenes until he could see move the story forward. We got a better idea of character interactions, but after a month or two of trying to keep the alcoholic salamander man from bathing in the distilling tank, it gets a little old. We asked the ref about the check, and we got that we passed. They would move the story when he could, as he was tired. Mind you, the 2nd group is already on mission 2 or 3. Another month passed, and we, the American group, were doing more outside the game. We asked again if we could move forward. Ref again said that it needs time to set up stuff and that it doesn't seem fair for us to post for a day at a time compared to the euro group, which can do multiple posts in hours, so it has to find the time for us to do the same. We pointed out that as a Play-by-post, it's to be expected, and we're ready for things to be slow, but not THIS slow. The Ref points out how hard it is to keep track of time zones, and if we can help, then do so. We spend a month, maybe two, getting time tracking bots to work on the server and teaching the Ref how to use them. To the Ref's surprise, the Ref appreciated, he didn't think we were taking this game that seriously. We just asked him to start the game for us finally. Ref announced he must take a month's break to think things out for both groups.

So, come the end of the break, he told both groups (the euros were constantly bugging Ref too about why they were so far ahead) that He did not understand what the fuss was about, as this was the longest game he had ever run by text. the first group was going into its 4th mission, and the 2nd group started. Ref questioned why the 2nd group was pissed off about this, as this did not affect them at all, and finally, why did we have an issue with the pacing as this was a PbP and even said we were ok with the slower pace. we tried explaining why and what the issues were, like posting one a day to getting a post once every other month at best. that one group is way ahead of another story-wise when both groups played at once as advertised.

The ref was still confused about the issues and pointed out that our characters were all too odd for a normal game. This clearly showed that we never showed any interest in playing or even the setting. We left at this point and started our own PbP, which didn't last long. All of us were pretty burned out by the months of waiting and did everything we wanted to do with our characters in free play.

so, TLDR, join a traveler play-by-post and get split off with the people outside of the Refs time zone. set everything up for a great game with interesting characters.... We made to wait for the Ref to start our story as we waited on the pad until, after literal months, we were told by the ref that he did not see anything wrong as this game didn't fall apart nearly instantly and was told are characters didn't match what he was planning.

"UwU, with Cthulhu!"

TL:DR dm rapeds players character because he doesn't like a joke.

Edit: oehoe= UwU thanks everyone for letting me know

I (F30) play D&D with a group of 4 players and 1 DM. We’re kind of a chaotic bunch, very goblin-esque. A few weeks ago, we fought a Cthulhu-like monster, which led to a running joke in our group: “UwU, with Cthulhu!”

It was all fun and games until our DM decided to punish one of the players, the fighter, for making the joke. At first, it was 1d6 psychic damage every time he said it. But I could make the joke without any penalty. It turned into a bit of a game.

Then last session happened. We had a sauna day with the goblins, which was hilarious and full of steamy jokes. I was reading “50 Shades of Green” and stuff like that. The whole group was having a blast. Then the fighter made the “UwU, with Cthulhu!” joke once.

At the end of the session, I started packing up, and our DM says: “Oh, fighter, as you lay in bed that night, you dream you’re in a dark world and being raped by Cthulhu from all sides.” I was like, WTF. I didn’t know what to say. The fighter says, “What happens to my character?” DM says, “You have to roll on the madness table when you get home.” Fighter is a bit shocked and asks, “Which table?” DM replies, “Oh, you know, now you always feel the need to clean yourself.”

At that point, I’d had enough. I took the fighter outside and out of the house. The fighter was angry but also confused, asking me, “What did I do to the DM? This wasn’t okay.”

I told him I would talk to the DM about it, but he could also speak up for himself if he wanted to.

The next day, I confronted the DM. He wouldn't explain why he did it but admitted he knew he had gone too far. I must say, I didn't sleep well at all after all of this.

So, what do we do now? I love the group, but the DM went far over the line.

I need to rant about a recent experience I had, or I won't be able to sleep tonight. Most likely this will be long.

So, I'm playing as a LG conquest paladin, that swore to use fear as a tactic of liberation, as the main plot involves removing an enemy that occupied our lands (to be Frank, the DM is more political and we are fighting N@zi and their leader, a certain Adolf)

My character is just Escanor, from Seven Deadly Sins, minus the fire magic, more in the fear department, I was planning on playing ego and triggering my enemies, Dueling them, and destroying their minds and hearts before their physical body. My character has a family: a wife, a 10 year old son, and his parents.

The other player is playing Ajani Goldmane from MTG, but he just took the face of Ajani, because none of us knows who or what Ajani is like. He's playing a homebrew Barbarian that is a third caster: druid.

My character was supposed to badmouth the enemy to get their best shot, then tank it and badmouth even more, to prove to the enemy that they are incapable. I got the heavy armor master, and the dm allowed this feat to scale with my level rather than a flat 3.

Now comes the rant part:

This DM's campaigns are not simply railroading, they are literally scripted (like a movie): if the script says someone is gonna die, that person is gonna die no matter what you do, or what you have. That's one.

My character has been shoved around and order to do many things, because we need to build alliances with cities and that requires labour. But that's not the issue, the issue is when you send me in combat, the dm will always send 7 more people to help, they'll prove useless and some die immediately, I take heavy blows and drop from 100 hp to 5 hp, I smite, and they finish the enemy. OR I fight the enemy, the enemy nearly kills me, then suddenly reinforcement, they make the fight easier by being meat Shields, and on one occasion I died and the reinforcement finished the job. My character can no longer duel because he'll die in two turns. So far, I've died 4 times as a tank, high AC, high HP, and high saving throws.

90% of enemies we face have magical strikes, so that negates my heavy armor master, and recently, the lowest attack roll I ate was a 26, and my character's AC is 22, and I'm eating heavy shots that kill me easily but the Barbarian lives because of resistance. Meanwhile Ajani is duelling one enemy after another and his living my dream.

Our characters are also dumb (like -5 intelligence dumb) they never know anything, they always need someone to tell them what to do or where to go, the enemies are constantly cheating, having abilities like "If you kill me, you instantly die". Once an enemy was attacking my son with an wbility and I was within 5 ft of the enemy, the dm gave me two options: try to strike the enemy to make him roll with disadvantage, or take the blow (auto hits you instead of attacking the boy), I chose to risk it and attacked and hit, the enemy simply changed hands and attacked my boy no problem. And enemies have BS abilities that the dm doesn't even hint, it feels like scripted traps, and if you fell for their scripted traps, there is no way to reverse the effect: "Oh, the enemy sent your only weapon to outer space, guess you have to deal with it"

And finally, the straw that broke the camel's back. My son got Cancer in his stomach, and my character has to go seek medicine from 1 specific NPC or else my son will die. When I met the NPC, she started flaming me because of a past massacre (10 years ago: humans, elves, and dwarves were mislead to mass murder many other races simply because of looks, because they believed a child). The issue here is that my character's family were persecuted because of their religion, so we also suffered the same as she did. She simply said "Fuck you, I'm racist" and didn't believe me. And the dm hinted that the only to solve this dilemma is to BEG. Me? The lion's sin of pride? Begging? And then she has the audacity to invite me and my wife to live with her people, as my son is now one of her people.

This is where I've lost it: I can't badmouth, I can't duel, I can't even fight properly, my son is now a half monster that lives in the protect of a racist lady that I despise with my very existance. Each time the dm did something, I felt Mt fingerprints on my character were getting washed away, until today, where my character became a blank slate, an empty soldier, no better than an NPC.

I'm not seeking advice or validation, I know th dm is bad, and I know I should switch, but I'm not here for this, I'm here to simply ask other DMs to feel and care for their players and their characters, they also want to have fun. I just wanted to share my current experience, I don't think there will be part 2.

I wasn’t sure what to game this. I’m trying to figure out what to do from here and if I’m in the wrong. I’m worried I’m overthinking it and it’s not that big of a deal or that I’m under thinking it and need to address this soon. Please give me your opinions.

(I’d like to apologize for my poor punctuation skills. Grammar should be fine but don’t expect much from me. I have never truly understood commas.)

Context: I’m a new DM and decided to run a roleplay heavy, mystery campaign, which the players knew from the start. I sat with them one by one and talked about the world, the history, their backstories and their roles in the recent war that occurred. One of them chose to be a General which was great!

Generals command and train pretty large groups of people. It even carried over into one of his main character traits; he does not kill people anymore. It was such an important part of his character that he used non-lethal bullets and tried to steer away from violence because he’d killed and hated killing enough in war. I thought that, compared an entire fleet, working through a mystery with 3 other people would be doable right? Even easy! Maybe he’d be able to help me out a little too since OOC he’s been DMing the longest and knows I’m new to this.

Another thing to mention about this war: in game, the war ended 5 years ago and biological warfare was used a lot. A lab generated disease meant to target magic users called MTD was the main weapon used. MTD would target the most used part of someone’s body. This could be an organ or a limb or (in magic users) the thismun that would be used to produce magic. People would lose limbs, organs etc. it’s wizard shit please I’ve gotten enough crap for it lol. Anyway, keep this in mind.

The players are sent to find a member of war who got an award and then didn’t return any forms of communication after. Not strange for this NPC but since they were just put back into the public eye the PCs were sent in their general direction to make sure they’re okay as the political climate was rough and the treatment of veterans was varied.

So far the PCs have found out that the NPC was in a small town him and his wife ran that ended up having a huge shield around it and an underground base. Very strange, very mysterious, clearly, or at least hopefully, a mystery is afoot. The town was near a large mountain in a snowy region and they had to solve a small puzzle to get into town first. The place was not well traveled so the NPCs were not used to newcomers in the slightest. Most of them were indifferent to the PCs but would humor them. I did this in the hopes that they’d grow a relationship with them overtime.

After talking to most of the the NPCs the PCs travel to the aforementioned basement and searched through it.

Something to note: they have shown to get frustrated very easily. For example, After finding out the NPC they were coming to find was dead, (which I’d been hinting at since the start so they expected it) they’d usually come in and ask the NPCs, “who killed X” or “how did X die” or “Where is X” to which the NPCs would respond with a bit of confusion and fear. It’s like they walked into some rural, southern, American town where the people only see others when they have to pick up their mail. It’s just a bit strange to them. Usually they’d mention that X was shot to death and I tried to lead them into more conversations but they’d usually get frustrated and give up. I tried to learn from it and teach them more but it’s hard with no guidance or reassurance that I’m doing this right or that the players are having fun besides asking how the session was.

Like one of the NPCs was just a dick to the players and wasn’t giving them much info but they’d only asked 2 questions (those being the same ones from above). So they just decided to not talk to him and left. He was a dick and was giving them pretty one word answers but I thought it was a bit fast.

Another time they came to a puzzle and I gave them all the variables to it. A table, a saw, a riddle and a door. After I was done explaining one of them looked at me with that, “And?” Type look. Make big eyes and moved their hands like they were waiting impatiently for more. I kindof panicked and texted a player that was grabbing food the answer and told them to solve it for the party on my cue when they got back. They fumbled for like 5 minutes before they seemed really upset and I just told them to solve it. The rest of the game they seemed upset (which was probably in character but it still worried me) and whenever I’d explain things I’d kindof fumble around it and missed things which would make them more upset due to the miscommunication. Now I just write out descriptions of each room and read from that instead of describing through a list of important things within the room.

The General seemed the most upset which I felt real bad about but they said it was all in character. Outside of the game me and the party would have arguments or “discussions” in which they’d ask me questions about plot holes and things they were confused about and I’d try to answer without giving everything away (the plot holes were often a lack of knowledge and not me forgetting stuff thankfully) but they seemed to be very upset at times. I’d try to explain that it’s a mystery and it’ll take time but they still seemed upset. Sometimes in game everyone would just seem pissed and I’d try to ask if they’re okay and get a, “yes, let’s keep going” but I was still really worried that they weren’t having fun or something because they were so hard to read. It might’ve had something to do with in character vs out but it worried me nonetheless

As they’re going through the basement they find a secret, locked door with a keypad which was supposed to be a whole puzzle but they proceed to roll a 31 to unlock a door with thieves tools. Nice. I gotta let them in. So they get in and figure out that the disease (MTD) that killed millions and started a war was made in this town itself. Most of the players process this and decide they need to figure out the mystery soon and if all else fails they burn the whole place down the second they can get out of here. Okay. Sensible. They then decide that all the NPCs in town are in on it because they weren’t open with the players right away. Alright, I guess that makes sense. Out of all the players The General is the most upset by this (makes sense. Trauma and all) and runs to the next room

This room is small but colorful despite being underground. It’s filled with crochet, knitting and sewing needles, fabric, yarn, small crafts, a messy desk, a bed and a ladder leading upstairs. It’s clear immediately that this room is lilacs room! She’s a halfling monk who specializes in crafts and attached to the players quickly. One of the players asks, “which one of them did the fabric stuff?” And two others go, “Lilac!” Which was exactly the impression I wanted her to have. One of the players sits down on the floor and asks if they can roll to crochet something with a pattern to calm themselves down and I say “yes” immediately and have them roll for how long it takes. They make two little Bees pretty quickly while The General tears the room apart for evidence.

The stuff I’d planted there was a hand made map of the underground area with secret places marked out and question marks by the door to the biological warfare room. Things like, “4 letters”, “tried birthdays, favorite numbers, etc.” which was supposed to be part of the puzzle to get into the room. Newspapers and other spy type stuff as if she was trying to figure out the mystery like then. All used in an attempt to show the players that Esmene was on their side. I tried to see if they got it but they moved on pretty quick so it was hard to tell.

Finally out of the basement, they came to a sort of developing room. Small basins of red, glimmering potions were around the room with long strips of cloth inside soaking. They stole all the liquid. One of the walls was a large tapestry that was kindof like a shower curtain so eventually Lilac came over and quickly slid the tapestry aside to get to her infusions. She greeted them happily but cautiously because they just spawned in her house all suspiciously. Suddenly The General grabs Lilac and shoves her chest first into the wall and puts a gun to her head and started yelling. Maybe it wasn’t really yelling but it kinda of felt like it.

His player is 40 something and I’m a minor. They’re the parent of one of my players and hosts for us. I guess he didn’t really get how terrifying it is to have a fully grown man raise his voice at you like that. Especially since the NPC I was playing hadn’t done anything to hurt them or make them think she’s bad. He started loudly asking, “tell us the truth” without context so she didn’t tell them anything.

After the game I tried to explain why none of the NPCs would respond to this advance. Imagine someone has broken in to your home from the basement and then puts a gun to your head and yells, “tell me the truth.” I get that in their context it makes sense but to the NPC they have no idea what they’re talking about. They can assume but they’re not gonna give away info without knowing the full extent of this question. Lilac already believed silence is sometimes the best way to communicate with someone (being a monk and all) so shutting up was in her character to do.

Honestly I can’t fully remember this part. I remember him pinning her up against the wall and then I remember a few minutes later when he let go and she just continued her work silently. That’s when the player who’d made the plushies came up to her and handed her one of them. Lilac, being the grandma of the town, took it proudly and said, “I will cherish this.” It was so confusing as a DM to see this play out. I didn’t know where they were taking this and the other players besides The General were mostly just watching him get more and more frustrated. I was trying so hard to read what the players were feeling but was just so lost by this point that I just tried my best to continue.

They got outside the shop and tried to figure out where to go. They wanted to go to the main NPC but if they attacked her like they did Lilac she’d fight back and I’d have to start combat. I hadn’t finished her stat block yet so, I reminded them of some evidence they found and should touch back on. It was a paper with a bunch of potion recipes scribbled on it. One of them mentioned an ingredient they recognized so I told them it might be a good idea to go find out what the potion does.

They went in to the potion masters store to find a salty store owner (they stole a bunch of his stuff earlier) who was repacking things and making sure everything was accounted for. He’s blind but also a tabaxi so he could tell they were coming in from their sent. He was indifferent to them but also needed something done so he chose to humor them.

See he’s got this pet that helped him out when he first went blind and is now just his best friend. This pet, named Spoons, ran off while the NPC was dealing with the theft. It’s named Spoons because it responds to the sound of spoons clinking instead of its name. To prep for this, I’d gone around and bought a bunch of vintage spoons at the thrift stores nearby and was planning on giving them to the players. Was this a bad idea? A bunch of childlike individuals with two spoons each being told to clink them together occasionally? Sure, but I thought it’d be fun.

Sadly, didn’t work because The General attacked the NPC again. Asking him for the truth. I’d even put the spoons on the table by my stuff and was flipping them in my fingers sometimes so the players never got to see what they were for. (sorry y’all)

Eventually I broke down a bit and just put my head in my hands and said, “I shouldn’t have run a mystery” in kindof a joking but also serious manner. This statement came from a video I saw saying that running a mystery first thing was a real bad idea and I felt like i’d failed. Tried to do it despite advice and fucked it up. Instead of making an interesting and fun campaign I just frustrated my players and made them upset at me. I really feel like I’ve failed them

For some more context on The Generals player that session: They had stayed home while the rest of their family had went to visit grandparents in another state. They were messaging him during game saying that they were dealing with flare ups involving health problems and the heat in that area was getting to them. He was really worried about his family and so was his daughter who was also playing so I think he was just out of it.

After they left to go on a drive the other two players said they wanted to figure things out so I led them through and had them talk to a knowledgeable NPC and tried to help them but the more I helped them the more I worried that maybe I just made it all way too difficult for them? Each section of the clue has about 5 hints. 2 small and 3 big. They were supposed to get pushed in the right direction by the NPCs but that didn’t quite work for above reasons so they’re missing some clues I was hoping they’d have found by now. Not to mention that they haven’t gone everywhere in town. They haven’t talked to 4 NPCs or gone to 3 places yet. The point of this session was to clear the rest of those up but it got a bit off track.

I dunno what to think at this point. I’m considering just ending the campaign and explaining the story to them. I won’t go over it here in case they find it this post but god I just feel so terrible. Maybe I did make it too complicated and have too many NPCs. I tried to make it easy for them to recognize each NPC by their job like Lilac does fabric and Gerald does potions and Brutus does metalwork etc. I also tried to make sure to put the important characters more frontward and the others less important but maybe having so many characters that would just be walking around or working as waitresses/secretaries or just the patrons in the bar that they’d talk to was the wrong choice? Maybe I should’ve made the Clues more obvious and pushed them harder but it felt like railroading if I did. Something they had criticized me of is not telling them the answer when they’re close. For example they’d ask me something like, “we think this is X’s gun. Is it X’s gun” and i’d say, “I don’t know, you tell me” or “trust your gut” or something like that when I should’ve told them if they had it or not. That’s my bad

At the same time. They’ve done things like taking all of an NPCs supplies, tying one of them up, yelling at them, pushing them around, getting upset at me when a NPC had panicked when they forced her to stop an important spell, pushing an NPC when I’d made it clear he wasn’t up to talking, giving up on them after only 2-3 questions, finding clues just to ignore them, attacking innocent people, etc. it kindof feels like they aren’t treating this world like it’s real? Like I get it’s fake but I put alot of time in making the world feel alive and the NPCs all have wants and needs and high/low stats and quirks and personalities and voices. Like two of them are close so they both have a Norwegian accent and speak occasionally Norwegian because I’m learning, I went out and bought spoons for them to use, I invited them for an in game picnic so they can discuss what they’ve found so far, I’ve made maps and minis and given dice out for their characters, created a mini game instead of combat because it didn’t fit at that time and one of them even said, “the worst part of your game is that the other 4 players in our group who aren’t in this game can’t experience it,” I’ve really pushed them to think about their backstories and character relationships, etc. They keep saying that even if they get it OOC they wouldn’t in character so I’ve tried to ask them what they’re not getting in character so I can help them out but they don’t tell me what they know. They say that their -1 to +1 intelligence isn’t enough but that’s only 20% smarter/dumber than the average person. Which is bad but it’s not that bad? Is it? I just feel so lost but I don’t want to disappoint them and I’ve been having so much fun working on this and developing the world and making maps and all.

I need some guidance. The next session won’t be for awhile due to work but I still need somewhere to go from. I know I could talk to them but I’m scared it’ll turn out like every other time I’ve tried to have serious talks with people. It tends to become a me against them which is 1 v 4-5 and you just can’t get shit from that. The last time I tried to talk to a friend group about problems I literally said, “can you give me a leg to stand on here?“ and they said “no!” If that happens again I’d just see myself out honestly. Plus that game The General wasn’t feeling good and otherwise him and the rest of the group are amazing people who genuinely care about me and have said I’m always welcome at their home and I’m a player for them often. I haven’t played a game with them in awhile and whenever I go over we don’t talk much so I have no idea what to do at this point. Help me out Reddit. Am I the Asshole?

So I play Dnd in Discord with some friends who I got to college with. We all kind of float around in our campus’ gaming club. Last semester we started a campaign run by this guy I had become friends with. He was very much into eccentric worldbuilding and genuinely had a very creative side to him. Which makes what happened all the more tragic.

He created this campaign on planet Venus billions of years ago when it was habitable. The forces of hell were emerging though and the climate was getting hotter and hotter. Initially, we had like 11 players but after like 3 sessions, the campaign naturally whittled down to no more than 4-5 players per session. The relevant players were me (dragonborn cleric), my other good friend (tiefling druid), an acquaintance (Yuan-Ti fighter), and a 40 year old dude going back to college who just wanted to play Dnd (drow bard).

The DM seemed to have a crush on Tiefling druid’s player and definitely tried flirting with her–both in game using NPCs and out of game. It eventually became kind of obvious that she wasn’t into him so the flirtation just kind of fizzled out.

The game got really good when the shit went down. The first town we had explored had now been evacuated due to the scorching heat. Other towns and cities were hiring mages to cast cold based spells to keep the temperature habitable and people traveled seldomly. Demons were ravaging the world as this was all going on. Time was running out and we were desperate. Will we change history or will the Venus we all know come into being.

Well we will never find out because our DM and Yuan-Ti’s player turned out to be a massive fucking creep. One day, after Yuan-Ti fighter slept with a young princess in exchange for a magic item that would dispel the heat in the town we were in. Drow bard then said “Bro, tell me next time you bang a hot princess. We can have a devil’s threeway”. And they started laughing. Yuan-Ti fighter’s player took this as a green light to invite Drow bard to a private discord that only he, DM, and a couple of other dudes were in.

It was full of AI generated nudes of women they knew along with deepfakes involving them in sexual situations with the DM and other creepy guys on the server. These images and videos included tiefling druid’s player (my friend) AND her 13 year old sister that DM apparently found in an Instagram post. Drow bard’s player messaged me and my friend and told us what he saw and that he reported the server but it was still up. We confronted the DM and Yuan-Ti’s player and they tried to deny it but Drow bard’s player had screenshot what he saw so he couldn’t just delete the server and lie about it.

Then DM just admitted he AI generated the nudes but tried to make it out like it was no big deal because they were fake. My friend was especially pissed about her 13 year old sister having her image used like that but DM just said “I also used another AI to age her up first.” She still wasn’t having it and he just kept downplaying what he did and even eventually said “Its not like I raped anyone! Its a private server anyway. Technically, I could sue you guys for invading it by proxy.” Eventually as she was angry and crying, I just told her, “Come on, lets go.” And we all left and told the club organizers and got him banned (and eventually expelled from school and they may be facing legal consequences depending on how Title IX deals with cases like this). The Discord is obviously nuked now and their accounts are gone and we haven’t seen him or his creepy friend since.

tldr DM AI generates nudes of his player and her young sister, gets banned from the gaming club and expelled from school

I have two boys who are just under a year apart; we'll call them Nipsy the Druid and Chopsy the Barbarian

When the boys were in 6th and 7th grade, Nipsy (the elder of the two) was really bummed because the RPG club at school was only catering to the older kids, and that he and his friends were pretty much ignored.

I told him to just have a few of his friends over on Saturdays, and I'd run a homebrew game for them.

He tapped three friends for the game, and Chopsy asked his friend from the neighborhood to play. We'll call her Shootsy the ranger.

My wife and I played host for these kids every Saturday. The first campaign was 2 years long, running from first to 15th level. My wife co-DM'ed, we made D&D themed food for special occasions, and gave out reroll coupons on birthdays. When that was finished, we ran a few shorter games.

The game was fantastic, and for the most part everyone had fun. But I occasionally had to juggle roles between DM, host, and Dad; correcting some inappropriate behavior, offering advice, keeping other parents informed. This was important socializing time for Chopsy, because he's on the spectrum and has a hard time making friends

I added the kids who had phones into a chat group so that we could post schedule changes, ask questions, and do some downtime stuff during the week.

Nipsy is going into his senior year, and most of the kids have dropped out due to either scheduling or drama. Only my boys and Shootsy remain. I wanted to run one last hurrah before he graduated, so I posted a campaign premise, and had them roll up characters.

Shootsy was excited as always. When I carpooled the kids home, she would discuss her character until she was dropped off. Since my number is listed in the chat group, she has texted me personally with character details and asking when we can start. She'd stop over while the boys are busy and just...hang out. We've told all these kids that our doors always open if they need anything, so at first this wasn't a big deal.

Nipsy didn't roll a sheet, and generally made himself absent whenever she was over. I asked him about it and he admitted that things have been awkward between him and Shootsy since they had tried dating for a few weeks. Supposedly, they both agreed there was no chemistry, but it left him with a bitter taste. For her part, Shootsy had apparently stopped socializing with both the boys, pretty much all together.

Realizing that my sons were not part of the picture, and that I had a teenage girl texting and visiting me, left me with a bad case of ick. We never talked about anything outside of the tabletop games, and my games were decidedly PG-13, but I was suddenly very concerned about being a miscommunication away from serious issues with any of the kids or parents involved.

I probably should have sat Shootsy down and had an honest talk about it. Instead I chose the coward's way out, and had the boys tell her that my schedule is too full to run a game this Summer. The boys are looking into alternate transportation to school, this fall.

My wife thinks I worry too much, but agrees that the game was for our boys, and we shouldn't be forcing them to play with someone they don't feel like running with. I feel like I could have handled it in a more mature fashion, but it definitely felt safer to distance myself from the whole thing as quickly as possible.

Not a horror story but this is where I thought to share this. The bard in my campaign has been flirting with the king of their city for a months worth of sessions now, usually it’s played off as a joke that’s simply just annoying the king as he lets her down gently, but in my session today things went wild. She managed to essentially bug the king so much that he agreed to have her for dinner ONE time, as long as there is a guard in the room with them. The thing is, one of my players is a changeling and knows what the guards looks like so he changed to look like the guard and got himself to be the dude watching the dinner. Before the dinner started the rogue was giving her some pointers for how to win over the king, “be yourself” “ask him questions about himself” stuff like that. Which I thought would be quite inspiring to hear so as such I decided she gets one inspiration token that can only be used during the dinner for advantage one time.

I already knew going into this dinner that there would be a slew of persuasion checks that she’d have to make for this to even remotely go well. She starts by moving her chair from the opposite side of the long table, to right next to him. He then tries to force his way through the dinner by just asking how they got through the last adventure he sent them on, and basically every answer she gives is something like “it was okay, but I was just thinking about you the whole time 👀” and unfortunately she was rolling very well, like 15+ every time.

Then she pulls out the dead wife card and asks if his children want a new baby mama since the queen died. In my head I’m like “yeah right” and ask for a persuasion check. She goes “please please please 20” rolls The whole table exploded with cheers and she rolls a 20. I’m trying to think of a way to make his response make actual sense so he says “well it has been quite lonely around here without her and I don’t get to interact with them much since I’m so busy” and she throws another long shot response of “I can fix that for you 👀” once again, I think there’s no shot, she goes “I’m using my inspiration on this” and rolls a 19 and I say my usual “roll again, MAYBE you get a 20”… she gets the damn 20. And then the king, perhaps in a moment of desperation and chronic horniness since his wife died, goes against his best wishes and agrees, I skip over the actual deed and tell the party they see her emerge from the kings room the next morning. Then the session ended, I have no idea where to go from here 💀

Edit: I’ve already gotten a few of these comments so I want to clear it up. I’m NOT mad this happened, I thought it was hilarious and a great moment for the table. And I know that nat 20s are not necessarily an auto success but I try to let them be when it’s in the realm of possibility, I won’t let anyone seduce a dragon or convince someone to jump off a cliff, but for stuff that there’s a SLIM chance of actually happening, I like to entertain natural 20s

I have been playing in a Phandelver and Below adventure at my local gaming store for almost a year now with things planned to wrap up by September when the new core rulebook begin to released.

I am currently playing a cleric and the rest of my fellow party members are a wizard, a rogue, and a sorcerer. During our most recent session, the rogue and the sorcerer both nearly died from an otyugh and we only have one diamond that I can use to cast Revivify on one of my partner members if need be and I have also been saving a third level spell slot in case of emergency. I had caution all my fellow party members that perhaps it would be best if we kept our distance, O must have repeated this three or four times and the last time I definitely put some emphasis on it. Now I am all for letting players do whatever they want to do but we ended our session in the midst of combat as the gaming store was closing with both the rogue and the sorcerer within melee range of some enemies.

So the question I pose is AITA for letting them die after repeatedly cautioning them to maintain some distance?

So I'm assuming everyone knows the problematic rogue, dark egdy crimical types that is likely to the main murderhobo than the pally and wizard. I also have taken note of stories where the DM ends up pegin holding the rogue player for the possable of being a problem in the future. That or for not leaning into the egdey stereotypes.

Now I'm someone who love playing rogues, mostly been leaning away from the edge due to reddit stories and don't find the edge very appealing. The last few rogues been more stuff like playful burgers, gentleman theves and loud pirate types. I even play some anti rogues like counter spys and security experts.

Kind of wondering how people feel about the stereotypes and people overreacting trying to combat the problem before hand?

Hey this is my first time posting, i didn't really know where else to post this but i thought this would be a good place to start.

Some background info:
I'm playing with a group of friends i have known since high school.
We've been playing for couple of years now and we used to switch DM's so that nobody got stuck as a DM.
This was mostly me and one other friend. He stopped playing a year ago so it was just me left.
One of my players wanted to try DMing. We agreed and started with just one-shots or modules so he could get a feeling for this. Now we are at the point that he runs most games and i do some one-shots since i've lost a lot of free time with work.

Current situation:
Last week he didn't feel like he liked the campaign anymore and wanted to start over.
A complete new campaign, now none of us were really against it since there wasn't a real story this was more just for fun. We all agreed on the term that some of us could use our old characters since we really liked them, and we didn't want their story to end. This was fine to him.

We decided to hold a session zero in 2 weeks, for new character ideas and to get to know more about the campaign. Yesterday we received a message in our whatsapp group with a list with all the things he is gonna ban and what he is gonna allow in his new campaign. i understand you don't want any broken unearthed arcana etc. This is where the problem starts.

The first thing that doesn't sit right with me is the fact he doesn't want darkvision. We are allowed to play as races who get darkvision or by any class means (Warlock invocations for example). But he will just rule out that darkvision doesn't exist.

His argument for this was that he could not do anything with the surroundings since 2 of the 5 players had darkvision. so he couldn't do any surprise attacks etc according to him.

Next thing he goes on about is that he is gonna ban races that to him don't feel like is something he could work with for his story. he gave as an example for Aasimar since he doesn't understand the race or their backstory. (This was something a player was not happy with since the character he wanted to keep playing was a Aasimar paladin, which was approved first)

He is also starting to suggested character classes and idea's / build to 2 players who are really new to dnd and don't really know anything. According to one of them he already made a character for them to play so he is really forcing it. He hasn't even agreed to it yet.

The rest of the list he wants to explain more once we get to session zero.

Does anybody have any tips that i could use to talk with him about?
I don't feel that its justified to restrict your players in character ways just because you as a DM don't like the way the character is, and i want to talk this out rather than to just drop the campaign since we have had a lot of fun in the last year

I want to do a part 2 after we had the session zero to see what else he wants to go do.
But in the meantime any advice is welcome.

We where supposed to be playing a “oriental” themes campaign (yes, that’s the word he used) and asked everyone to make characters that would fit that “style”

The DM was the kind of dude who lived and breathed anime, had body pillows, unashamedly talked IRL about his “waifu tier lists” etc (you get the idea) - this was before the internet was seriously picking up enough to allow people to play online so local was all we had and games where sparse

I decided I wanted to make a sort of mystic/old wise man vibe, but I’d also always wanted to try a “Dragonborn” style character, so I ran it by him and he liked the idea of my character looking a bit like one of those dragons from Japanese lore/myth with a beard

Great, right? Sorted! Officially a “Dragonborn” Cleric but you get the idea

Anyway, the game starts and someone at the table (can’t remember who, doesn’t matter really) says:

“Oh, you’re playing a cleric and a Dragonborn? That’s like that raptor Jesus meme, right? Is that why you’re playing raptor Jesus, because of a meme?”

I stare at him blankly as, to be honest, that was a super weird leap for anyone to make but eventually said “Er, no, that was not the inspiration at all”

However, I noticed the DM giving me a weird look but paid it no mind

The whole table started joking about how my character “Raptor Jesus” was definitely that meme and how funny that was that the DM let it slide in a “serious campaign”

So, I’m away for the second session because of family issues, come back to session 3 and get told before I even set my back down or say hello:

“Roll a new character”

I’m confused, obviously, so I ask what the DM is talking about. He goes on to explain that I “tricked him into allowing a meme character at the table” and that “he expected better of me” and how it was “only appropriate that my character got crushed to death by an avalanche” (that the rest of them miraculously survived)

I asked again, what the hell he was talking about, but just said:

“Roll a new character or leave - and no memes this time, don’t fuck with my setting”

I left