What are the most annoying player habits!

[Brandi]

Oddly enough, no-- in the one game I was in with him his female character only flirted (very odiously) with another male player's male character. And his male characters weren't necessarily Lotharios.

 

BTW, my husband, who witnessed the aforementioned 14-year-old catastrophe, noted to me that the Mind Control power had Area Effect and Always On...

[tkdguy]

I see. You may wish to have your husband with you when he's around anyway.

 

Of course, he may have just been trying to be funny.

[Blue]

We've got a new annoying habit that has broken out in the past three game sessions. My fellow players don't often read this board, but if they do they'll know exactly who I'm talking about.

 

Basically, a game of MAGIC: THE GATHERING will break out int he middle of a game of whatever we are already playing.

 

At first I had no problem with this. Of course if I had been the GM I would have smacked their heads together! I'm guilty of certain things as a player... I sometimes lapse in concentration, or I fall into seperate Role Playing with whoever is seated next to me (especially during Vampire games), and sometimes I draw... but I know when to set the drawing aside.

 

But as a GM I know how much prep goes into setting up a game. If you've got a few seconds of spare time that the GM isn't entertaining you and you decide to break out another game, that's just plain wrong.

[Jhereg]

I notice a lot of gripes add up to a “player archetype†that really bugs me.

 

- Trigger-happy players

- Players with lack of respect for consequences

- Players who act invulnerable

- Players who always have to be the star

- D&D Hack n’ Slashers

 

All these equal my most hated player: The player that treats role-playing like a $%@!*&% video game!

[Jhereg]

Originally posted by Solomon

Player (flipping through a magazine, raises his head and looks around puzzled): "Uh... wha... are you talking to me?"

 

Kill him. Not the character. The player.

[Doug McCrae]

Excessive flatulence.

[Vondy]

Players: We kick their ass.

GM: You don't know who they are yet.

Players: So?

[Brandi]

Originally posted by tkdguy

I see. You may wish to have your husband with you when he's around anyway.

 

Oh, I just don't game with him anymore. Life's too short, and even if he isn't coming up with pervy characters any more he was kind of not an easy guy to game with for other reasons.

[Lamrok]

The thing I hate the most, as a GM, is players who are overly deliberative. Players who spend an hour coming up with a plan to open a door. Players who never push the big, red button. Players who cannot be compelled to enter through the front door. Players who would rather prove that they are not trapped in the old house than to find the source of the mystery. All of these actions make them think they are clever - I just think they are unimaginative and afraid to gamble.

 

About three out of four players naturally fall into this category. They've been beaten down by GMs who tell them they are too quick on the trigger, who tell them that role-playing their character does not mean endangering the group, who tell them that they need to slow down and think more about the consequences of their actions. Bah. Those aren't the heroes I'm looking for.

 

Give me a quick witted impetuous soul willing to dive right into the center of DANGER with a devil-may-care grin. I run heroic games, and, dammit, I want heroic characters played by people who want to have fun.

 

On the other hand, as a player, these people don't bug me too much. They tend to make a good audience, and, when you throw caution to the winds, it tends to stick to other players.

[ChocolateMousje]

Originally posted by Doug McCrae

Even when the GM's asking? WTF??!!

 

Well, it's been a few months since it got that bad... he just seems to always have to have some sort of secret mission or other advantage.

 

IIRC:

Player: I cast a spell.

Rest of Party: What are you doing?

Player: I don't have to tell you.

GM: What are you casting?

Player: I don't have to tell you. (!)

GM: Yes you do, I'm the GM.

Player: No I don't, nothing visible has happened yet.

GM (annoyed now): Tell me, I'm the GM. Just because I know doesn't mean the monsters I'm running have to know.

Player: I can't tell you.

(eventually GM convinces him that they can leave the room so he can tell without the rest of the party hearing what it was)

 

I don't remember exactly what it was, some minor buffing spell that should've been visible to the rest of us, I think.

 

Currently the only campaign where we let him play, he's got the "good" party cleric... which it took the rest of us less than one session to guess that she's actually a servant of the evil death cult side of her goddess.

[Supreme Serpent]

That's just asking for the Random Damage Table to be taken out...

 

I don't see that particular behavior, but do see players (thankfully, not often when I'm GM'ing) who make very vague statements of actions ("I shoot him." "Which him? There's like 20 guys in the room.") or roll dice for things before saying what they're doing, amazingly succeeding more often than not.

[Caped Crusader]

Well, let's see...

 

The player who is reading a book (not a game book, a book-book) during the game, and has no idea what's going on. And then complains that they're not having any fun.

 

The player who insists on playing the bizarre character in EVERY game. I mean mess-with-the-GM bizarre. I mean warp-the-whole-game bizarre. Every game.

 

The player who refuses to step out of one or two genres. "We have to play Swords & Sorcery, I won't play anything else".

 

Hmmmm. Venting is good.

[nexus]

Players that assume everything they know or can do, their character knows or can do. Particularly since, as gamers, I think we all tend to be at least slightly above average in intelligence. Or at least, have vast stores of unususal trivia in our heads. This leads to farmhands that have never been to school knowing the basics behind nuclear explosives.

[Korvar]

Especially when it's in game knowledge. Something learned by one of the player's characters is immediately known by all the others.

[nexus]

And this drives me up the wall. Players that ALWAYS play the same character. Always. Everyone has some archtype or quality that they like. RPing is a hobby and should be fun. But this player's character are always the same, or as bloody close to it as he can come.

 

For example. I have one player that always plays catgirls. Not just catgirls, but the same catgirl. With superhuman strength (often getting average agility to pay for it), no claws, low IQ and a complete sex pot. He has played this character in genres ranging from fantasy to superheroes to cyberpunk in settings from the Champions Universe to Transhuman Space.

[CrosshairCollie]

Ah, yes, the classic frustrated-player "Sex Kitten". Sounds like someone I heard about who wanted to take "Cannot Have Sex" as a separate Phys Lim for 25 points (Fully Impairing, All The Time) relating to being in a containment suit because that, itself, was so important as to be worth 25 points.

[Koshka]

It only happened once, but back in college a couple players decided to take a smoke break in the lounge where we were playing. Turned out those hand-rolled "cigarettes" didn't contain tobacco .

 

I suppose it was vaguely useful for me to learn that secondhand pot smoke gives me a screaming headache, but since I wasn't planning to try the stuff anyway ....

 

To be fair, I will say the dorm lounges weren't posted as non-smoking. They still should have asked before lighting up, though.

[Korvar]

From when I was just starting out: Player Vendettas expressed through their characters. For example, if Fred's Fighter was accidentally killed by Dave's Dwarf, Fred's next character, who could be an Elf, would immediately attack Dave's Dwarf on sight. And so Dave's next character would turn up and attack Fred's, etc., etc.

[Jhereg]

Originally posted by Caped Crusader

I mean mess-with-the-GM bizarre.

I really hate those mess-with-the-GM players . My group always had 1 at any given time. I’m not sure why they do it. Maybe they’re trying to see how good the GM is. Maybe they’re trying to see how much the GM is willing to deal with. Maybe they want attention. But maybe they just have that “GM’s the enemy†way of thinking.

 

My current one is the single most obnoxious roleplayer I’ve ever had the obligation of playing with. He purposefully makes every game more difficult. And he’s flat out said he does it all to see how much the GM can handle before he breaks.

[SomeAsianKid]

I'm sad to say that I am one of those players who plays the same style of characters over and over (though I have changed styles on occassion). Druid type characters just prove too irresitable to me.

 

As for my pet peeves, it really, really bugs me when the player doesn't think about what they're going to do in combat until it's their turn. Combat already takes forever, it helps if people could strategize while others are acting.

 

And let's not forget the players who roll their dice in a dark hidden corner and ask, "What did I need to roll?" and when supplied with answer say "I just made it." Or people who roll an attack roll and say they hit without even knowing the dcv/ac of the opponent.

 

Or the people who complain about your character being broken when their character can flatten the entire party.

[Mike W]

I have a couple of favored characters or archetypes(though I'm trying to move away from the archetypes), but I always make sure to put a good chunk of points into skills. I like being a skill monger, though different characters pick up different skill sets.

 

I hate people who play game breaking characters. People who have so many defenses or such huge attacks that the GM has to pull out people that are way out of power for the rest of the group who can do little more than try to set up the big gun for a haymaker. If you can't play within the power guidelines of the game, then don't play.

[Kristopher]

My two habits:

A) I never create incompetent characters.

I really like having all the little defenses. In HERO, this would be Life Support stuff, Power Def, Mental Def, etc.

 

I've run into certain players who insists on playing utterly useless and/or gratuitously bizarre characters, in every game they're in. Drives me insane.

 

Note that I'm not talking about playing a novice hero, or someone who isn't good in combat. I mean characters with no useful powers, skills, contacts, or anything, and who can't even hide or defend himself when a fight starts...or a character who, despite having useful abilities on paper, is a severe net burden to the team for whatever reason.

 

By gratuitously bizarre, I mean very strange for the sake of strange, sick for juvenile shock value, purely comedic in a fairly serious game, etc.

[Doug McCrae]

Originally posted by nexus

I have one player that always plays catgirls. Not just catgirls, but the same catgirl. With superhuman strength (often getting average agility to pay for it), no claws, low IQ and a complete sex pot. He has played this character in genres ranging from fantasy to superheroes to cyberpunk in settings from the Champions Universe to Transhuman Space.

I have to admit, I've just played basically the same catgirl in a BESM fantasy campaign and Champions. The first had a magic talking sword and the second has cybernetic bits but they're very nearly the same character. I love playing them too, probably my second favourite PCs ever.

 

Aaagh! I'm a furry!

[lemming]

Originally posted by Doug McCrae

Aaagh! I'm a furry!

*raises hand* I've got one catgirl PC, but I always played her more like the tough stray...

[rayoman]

JMOZ, I agree with this one. I HATE THIS!

 

Originally posted by JmOz

Biggest one for me is "Back Peddling"

 

What do you mean I wasn't invisible, OF COURCE I Would have turned invisible first.

 

What do you mean I didn't wait to kidnap the reporter till she was alone, I'm smart enough to not do it in front of a camera (This was an actual event in a story)