What are the most annoying GM habits?

[tkdguy]

Originally posted by freakboy6117

tkd i was sure you where refering to The Authority story where Apollo was raped by warped wildstorm version of the Avengers

 

No, this was a PC getting that treatment from the X Men. The player thinks it was payback for challenging a GM's call, although the GM denies it.

[tkdguy]

What exactly happened there, freakboy? I don't read comic books for the most part, except for Blade of the Immortal and GI Joe.

[nexus]

Originally posted by tkdguy

No, this was a PC getting that treatment from the X Men. The player thinks it was payback for challenging a GM's call, although the GM denies it.

 

I know there are always two sides to any story, but I have to say from this side of the fence: "Yeah right." Exactly what "in game" explaination can there be for being a character being gang raped by the X men?

[nexus]

Originally posted by Karma

Players buy all their stuff at the beginning of the campaign and pack it into their van for easy transport, because this GM is known for his 'road trip' campaigns (allows him to show off his knowledge of geography).

How do the Bag Guys decide to 'get our attention'?

That's correct "Blow up the Van".

 

Oh yes and the aformentioned Deus ex Machina NPC (which usually happen to be his characters in another game and which he insists on having all the 'cool stuff' and 'XP' that he gave it in this game when it goes back to the other)

In fact he did this so often we named the character type after him.

Hello Cambell if your reading this.

 

You create a character whose core ability (that you've spent a great deal of XP on) is haggling and bartering so that she doesn't have to spend her hard earned money and the GM says after a few sessions "O.k. your all now so rich that money is no longer a concern"

Really he's great GM, but I wish he'd warn us that this was going to be the case so I wouldn't have wasted time, XP and money (since it was before we 'got rich' in a system where you have to pay money for training) on what is now a useless skill.

 

Gms who get stroppy and sulk when the PCs act totally logically, in character and in genre and it ruins his carefully prepared scenereo.

Case in point (A Cyberpunk game):

NPC: I need you to kill this person for me. I'll give you 10,000 credits to do so.

PC: We'll need the money up front. Expenses and such, you know how it is.

NPC: Sure... here you go.

PC: Thanks (pulls out gun and shoots NPC)

GM: Wha? Why did you shoot him.

Player: We had his money and he didn't seem like a repeat customer.

GM: But you'll build a rep for killing your employers.

Player: I'd prefer to see it as killing the stupid. I mean paying people whose 'credentials' are "having no moral fibre" BEFORE they complete the mission? How did this guy survive this long in this society?

GM: B-but. You did that on purpose... (goes on to sulk about us picking on him by ruining his adventure or worse creates a killer GM adventure to 'get back at us')

 

OTOH, there is such a thing as "Street Loyal". When your bought you stay bought, honor your "Contract" at least the letter, of them, etc. Most Cyberpunk style rpg setting assume something like that or their "societies" can't function. Getting a rep for betrayal would be a bad thing. Not to mention why kill someone with unknown potential backing and connections? Thats just asking for trouble.

 

All that being said, sulking or vengence is a bad way to handle it. The GM should have used that as story material. You're group does get a rep as backstabbers or nutcases. You're jobs gets more dangerous, your employers (the few that will work with you) are more paranoid and/or vile. The person you shot was somone else's lover, friend or favorite flunky and now they want a peice of you. All sorts of things. In character consequences for in character actions.

[Doug McCrae]

Originally posted by Karma

NPC: I need you to kill this person for me. I'll give you 10,000 credits to do so.

PC: We'll need the money up front. Expenses and such, you know how it is.

NPC: Sure... here you go.

PC: Thanks (pulls out gun and shoots NPC)

GM: Wha? Why did you shoot him.

Player: We had his money and he didn't seem like a repeat customer.

I have a great deal of sympathy for the GM in this example.

[McCoy]

Originally posted by Karma

Players buy all their stuff at the beginning of the campaign and pack it into their van for easy transport, because this GM is known for his 'road trip' campaigns (allows him to show off his knowledge of geography).

How do the Bag Guys decide to 'get our attention'?

That's correct "Blow up the Van"

Luckly, I have to go back to the D&D days for the really bad GM's.

 

Once at a convention, GM in a pick-up game begain to describe the NPC's accompaning us. He got to the second one, and I said "Cast of Conan, the Destroyer, everyone seen it?" Everyone had, and figured we could fast forward past the descriptions.

 

We were wrong.

 

OK, we finally get the introductions over, get on the horses, and start off through the hills. My character, a magic user, thinks this is a good place for an ambush, so she hands the reigns of her horse to another PC, released her familiar, a hawk, and concentrated on seeing through the familiar's eyes to scout the road ahead.

 

From out of a clear blue sky a tornado touches down and kills the hawk.

[lemming]

Originally posted by Doug McCrae

I have a great deal of sympathy for the GM in this example.

Reminds me of a Danger International game I played in. Though, that would of been a typical response and the GM by that point would of expected it.

We might of tortured the guy to see if there was more money somewhere though. Just shooting someone would of been wasting an opportunity.

Hmm, possibly could of gotten money out of the target as well.

[Hugh Neilson]

Originally posted by McCoy

Once at a convention, GM in a pick-up game begain to describe the NPC's accompaning us. He got to the second one, and I said "Cast of Conan, the Destroyer, everyone seen it?" Everyone had, and figured we could fast forward past the descriptions.

 

We were wrong.

 

OK, we finally get the introductions over, get on the horses, and start off through the hills. My character, a magic user, thinks this is a good place for an ambush, so she hands the reigns of her horse to another PC, released her familiar, a hawk, and concentrated on seeing through the familiar's eyes to scout the road ahead.

 

From out of a clear blue sky a tornado touches down and kills the hawk.

 

Hmmm...A DM so original he steals his characters from a movie. ONe whose scenario is so tightly driven that he can't skip the intro's even when everyone already KNOWS who he's introducing. And you're surprised that he couldn't allow you to take steps which could foil his ambush?

 

Originally posted by McCoy

Luckly, I have to go back to the D&D days for the really bad GM's.

 

That's definitely a "winner" in the Bad GM's contest!

[austenandrews]

Originally posted by Doug McCrae

I have a great deal of sympathy for the GM in this example.

 

Seconded. If I found myself part of a group who considered that to be acceptable behavior, I would quickly find myself part of another group instead.

 

-AA

[Zed-F]

Originally posted by AtomicGladiator

I like to have some sense of success in a campaign as a player. Even if my character might not be "important" in a way that affects the entire campaign world, I like to feel that he has made an "important" contribution at least on some smaller level. I like to achieve goals that go beyond paying the bills each month.

Right -- a "survival" game done well includes some measure of accomplishment for the players, though they may not be the main beneficiaries of their accomplisments. This was what I was talking about in my earlier response.

 

The above description strikes me as a campaign where the PC's are kept as supporting characters, never allowed to accomplish anything significant. They never get to be the ones to throw the One Ring into the Cracks of Doom, they only get to be lowly bit-players, watching on the sidelines. At least that's the way I understand what the above post is talking about. I've heard about this kind of GM who really doesn't want the PC's to progress past a low-level character, and kills them off if they start getting too much experience.

The PCs should not be supporting characters in their own campaign, but in a low-importance setting their successes should be scaled appropriately to what they are nominally capable of. Throwing the One Ring into the Cracks of Doom might be a bit overmuch... but there's always people who are even worse off than the players that can be helped, or potentially serious problems that can be nipped in the bud by someone in the right place at the right time, before they grow too big for the PCs to handle. Fighting off a group of pursuers can also be a significant accomplishment; PCs usually relish the chance to give those that hound them some payback, and simultaneously buy themselves a temporary respite from pursuit.

 

A GM that kills off his players because they are getting "too high level" is fighting his own game system. In any game system that gives out XP, the fact that the PCs will get more powerful over time is unavoidable. There are solutions to this "problem" -- retire the PCs with a suitably grand finale where they finally gain some measure of importance in the game world and then start over with new characters, send the PCs into enemy or unexplored territory where the issue of whether they should have influence in the campaign world is a moot point, and more. Killing the PCs off randomly is ultimately self-destructive to the campaign.

 

There are ways to do a survival-oriented game well, and ways to do one poorly. I'd agree that games that are run poorly are to be avoided, and those that are run well are to be cherished, but that applies regardless of whether the game is survival-oriented.

[ghost-angel]

Originally posted by Karma

Gms who get stroppy and sulk when the PCs act totally logically, in character and in genre and it ruins his carefully prepared scenereo.

Case in point (A Cyberpunk game):

NPC: I need you to kill this person for me. I'll give you 10,000 credits to do so.

PC: We'll need the money up front. Expenses and such, you know how it is.

NPC: Sure... here you go.

PC: Thanks (pulls out gun and shoots NPC)

GM: Wha? Why did you shoot him.

Player: We had his money and he didn't seem like a repeat customer.

GM: But you'll build a rep for killing your employers.

Player: I'd prefer to see it as killing the stupid. I mean paying people whose 'credentials' are "having no moral fibre" BEFORE they complete the mission? How did this guy survive this long in this society?

GM: B-but. You did that on purpose... (goes on to sulk about us picking on him by ruining his adventure or worse creates a killer GM adventure to 'get back at us')

 

You know, I'm going to be on the GMs side here. In a Cyberpunk .. a REAL cyberpunk .. game that kind of crap would NOT fly. Sure the GM stepped a bit out of genre with the money up front bit, but you guys left the genre all together and entered some DnD land fantasy that has no consequences I think. You don't EVER kill your emplyer in a CP game without knowing everything about them, who do they work for? their contacts? friends? any other number of factors. Not to mention much needed Street Cred on your part, not to mention lack of future employment.

 

Yeah, make the claim the guy was "stupid" for giving you all up front. Or possibly he was desperate. Whatever, that's not a bad GM habit, that's bad player habit.

[Klytus]

I've not seen anyone mention this yet: a GM who gets bored with the present campaign, and decides to have players make up characters for an entirely different game, and then start that game before the last one was finished! I can't count the number of times our former GM used to do this too us. And once, he did it just before the climactic much-anticipated big-battle in a Werewolf game.

 

That led us into another game in which he pulled another GM-boner: pigeon-holeing the characters. He wanted to run a Star Wars (WEG version) game where we were all pilots in training for the Rebel Alliance at the Alliance Academy. We had no limits on race, background, or personality... so long as we were all good-little-soldiers for the Alliance.

 

We didn't get to finish that campaign either.

[The Mind Master]

Originally posted by ghost-angel

You know, I'm going to be on the GMs side here. In a Cyberpunk .. a REAL cyberpunk .. game that kind of crap would NOT fly. Sure the GM stepped a bit out of genre with the money up front bit, but you guys left the genre all together and entered some DnD land fantasy that has no consequences I think. You don't EVER kill your emplyer in a CP game without knowing everything about them, who do they work for? their contacts? friends? any other number of factors. Not to mention much needed Street Cred on your part, not to mention lack of future employment.

 

Yeah, make the claim the guy was "stupid" for giving you all up front. Or possibly he was desperate. Whatever, that's not a bad GM habit, that's bad player habit.

 

I kind of hesitate to jump in here, since I've never played a Cyberpunk campaign...and I don't know if perhaps the original character had some kind of psyche lim like "casual killer", or "loves to murder" or that sort of thing. But when I read the original post, my initial reaction was that a PC who did this would not be swiftly invited back to my gaming table.

 

Aside from the genre, there are certain conventions of courtesy, it seem to me, that when a GM is trying to bring the PC's into a scenario, you go along with his setup even if there may be some flaws. GM's can't anticipate everything, and in the opening things sometimes get glossed over. The action of killing the guy who hired you may have been in character if he was a murderous backstabber, but it certainly doesn't strike me as logical, given the possible consequences of such an act.

 

And on a purely gaming level, it does seem as if it were a deliberate attempt to screw the GM.

 

But, I admit, I don't know much about the Cyberpunk genre. If this is part of it, I'm just as glad I don't.

[lemming]

Originally posted by The Mind Master

And on a purely gaming level, it does seem as if it were a deliberate attempt to screw the GM.

 

But, I admit, I don't know much about the Cyberpunk genre. If this is part of it, I'm just as glad I don't.

I think you're right that the player was screwing with the GM in that point.

My example was where the GM would of expected that sort of reaction.

 

I guess it comes down to, are the GM & the players playing the same game?

[Lamrok]

Originally posted by Klytus

That led us into another game in which he pulled another GM-boner: pigeon-holeing the characters. He wanted to run a Star Wars (WEG version) game where we were all pilots in training for the Rebel Alliance at the Alliance Academy. We had no limits on race, background, or personality... so long as we were all good-little-soldiers for the Alliance.

 

We didn't get to finish that campaign either.

 

There's nothing wrong with that. I personally think it is a good policy for a GM to clearly lay out what he expects from PCs at the outset of a game. Some players won't like it - they will have good information upon which to base their decision about whether to participate or not. Making these things clear at the outset avoids a lot of rancor on down the line - I've learned that the hard way. As a GM, I now pretty much always lay out strict character creation guidelines to reflect the type of game I want to run. The stricter (and loopier) the guidelines, the better the game. In my opinion, of course.

 

In my Deadlands game, for example, I said that all characters had to start out in jail. I didn't care whether they were guilty or innocent, but I preferred guilty. They knew that all the other players got the same guidelines and would be building characters accordingly. I think it made for some interesting character designs that took players out of the usual molds. Prismatic's psychopathicly murderous, but disarmingly humerous, bandito and Zornwil's amazingly well-spoken gambler were characters who might have been frowned on in other games, but who were a lot of fun in this one.

 

In my (currently parked) pulp game, I said all players would have to be the sorts of people who might be invited to a black tie social. I get tired of trying to artificially shoehorn characters into situations in which they would never belong, but I want to run mysteries in those settings. Also, I prohibited characters with knowledge of the paranormal - I want the players to do actual research, and not just make a skill roll to advance a plot. These strictures make it a lot easier for me to come up with adventures that keep players entertained.

[Chuckg]

I concur. There is nothing wrong with starting out a 'theme' campaign, so long as the players are all told what's going on when going in.

 

Problem is, you do get people who seem to think that any scenario guidelines whatsoever, however broad, are completely out of it and attempts to restrict their freedom.

 

I tried a vaguelly Stargate-ish campaign once -- the restriction was "You are humanity's First Contact Team, being sent through a captured stargate to see if it leads anywhere. Outside of one unmanned probe return, we have no, repeat no clue of what's on the other side. Your mission is to find out. All-volunteer mission, high risk. Create the sort of people that the US government would scout, from everybody available, for such a task." (300-point GURPS campaign)

 

I got one Air Force major general with diplomatic experience and xenosociology, one civilian scientific genius with wilderness survival experience, a Special Forces sniper/scout badass (genuine Apache tracker, too), an Airborne Ranger combat engineer/mechanical genius, and a master chief hospital corpsman, Navy SEAL... granted, several of these character concepts were suggestions from me, when various players went "I can't think of anything!", but at least I got them...

 

... and I got an all-out player rebellion on the last guy, because if *he* couldn't get to play his amnesiac CIA assassin, then *he* would just ruin the game for everyone, so there.

 

Sheesh.

 

(And we never did get the damn thing started.)

 

Oh, sorry, should that have gone in the 'player habits' thread?

 

Anyway, the point is, there are a lot more stories that can be told with a "limited concept" group (all military, all able to move in high social circles, all wanted fugitives, etc.) then there is with the "you all meet in a bar" party. In the hands of the right GM, it allows for far more specificity and more depth.

 

And the wrong GM can totally screw it up, of course, but that's true of anything.

[Klytus]

Originally posted by Lamrok

There's nothing wrong with that. I personally think it is a good policy for a GM to clearly lay out what he expects from PCs at the outset of a game.

I agree, to a certain extent. For example, I started a D&D game where everyone started out as slaves with no gear in a slave camp. But there, the only way I was limiting the characters was their starting point - they were under no obligation to stick together if the characters didn't gel after the escape.

 

But when you are all officers in the military, and you do not go on adventures so much as you are given order by your superiors to do a specific task in a specific way with specific parameters in a specific time frame, its stifling.

 

I guess to me, it is a matter of degree, and the GM in question (IMHO) went over the top.

[BishopofB&W]

Originally posted by tkdguy

Unfortunately, this is a true story. I heard a lady who can control the weather say, "Leave him alone! I'll show you how it's done." But I'm not naming any names.

 

I would have walked away from that GM and not returned. With all the in-game options available for making a point about player behavior (not to mention a simple out-of-game conversation), there's no excuse for that.

 

I remember my first Champions game. The GM and most of the players were newbies (what a combination!). The GM said to make up superheroes. No other hints on what kind it would be. We ended up with mostly slugfests. This was fine for the characters built primarily for that, but the rest of us had very little to do but watch.

[Vondy]

Originally posted by Doug McCrae

I have a great deal of sympathy for the GM in this example.

 

I don't.

 

Anyone who pays for illicit services up front from untested criminals with no insurance policy in place is... unwise. Especially when the business is assassination. The scenario sounded extremely realistic to me.

 

Now, if the GM wanted to he could decide the executee was fronting for a more powerful organization, or was very well liked and respected by some hard to amuse types, and give the PCs a world of trouble for the murder.

 

Just like its unwise to give killers you don't know all the money up-front, its unwise to kill an idiot if you don't know who he works for...

[Chuckg]

> But when you are all officers in the military, and you do not

> go on adventures so much as you are given order by your

> superiors to do a specific task in a specific way with

> specific parameters in a specific time frame, its stifling.

 

Three words - GURPS Special Ops.

 

Hell, four more -- GURPS World War II.

 

(I use GURPS because they're the most readily available examples at present, not the only ones.)

 

All-military campaigns, especially in a cinematic setting like Star Wars, are quite possible. Even in the real-world military, there's such a thing as 'initiative'.

[Vondy]

Originally posted by Klytus

 

But when you are all officers in the military, and you do not go on adventures so much as you are given order by your superiors to do a specific task in a specific way with specific parameters in a specific time frame, its stifling.

 

Two words: Gray Fox.

Okay, two more words: James Bond.

 

If the characters are a part of a special operations or covert action team that has a great deal of latitude in executing said orders it can work very well.

 

And Bond is subject to orders too - he just tends to have his own "unique" style for carrying them out.

 

If the GM treats the players like a bunch of PFCs, however...

[Chuckg]

Originally posted by Von D-Man

If the GM treats the players like a bunch of PFCs, however...

 

... then either you have a group of players who love RP'ing military soap opera in the trenches from the grunt's-eye POV, or else you need a new campaign, yup.

 

On the other hand, being under the iron thumb of authority doesn't mean that your characters have no opportunity for adventures -- heck, you can have adventures in *prison*, for God's sake. Think "Stalag 17" or "The Great Escape", or for a comedy game, "Hogan's Heroes".

[Zed-F]

Another couple of words: detatched duty.

 

Your platoon is given orders to perform some vague task, or to accomodate person X's requests, and very little guidance beyond that. Saving Private Ryan, anyone?

[The Mind Master]

Originally posted by Lamrok

I personally think it is a good policy for a GM to clearly lay out what he expects from PCs at the outset of a game. Some players won't like it - they will have good information upon which to base their decision about whether to participate or not. Making these things clear at the outset avoids a lot of rancor on down the line - I've learned that the hard way. As a GM, I now pretty much always lay out strict character creation guidelines to reflect the type of game I want to run. The stricter (and loopier) the guidelines, the better the game. In my opinion, of course.

 

In my Deadlands game, for example, I said that all characters had to start out in jail. I didn't care whether they were guilty or innocent, but I preferred guilty. They knew that all the other players got the same guidelines and would be building characters accordingly. I think it made for some interesting character designs that took players out of the usual molds. Prismatic's psychopathicly murderous, but disarmingly humerous, bandito and Zornwil's amazingly well-spoken gambler were characters who might have been frowned on in other games, but who were a lot of fun in this one.

 

In my (currently parked) pulp game, I said all players would have to be the sorts of people who might be invited to a black tie social. I get tired of trying to artificially shoehorn characters into situations in which they would never belong, but I want to run mysteries in those settings. Also, I prohibited characters with knowledge of the paranormal - I want the players to do actual research, and not just make a skill roll to advance a plot. These strictures make it a lot easier for me to come up with adventures that keep players entertained.

 

Man, I definitely know where you're coming from. I think laying out guidelines for a specific type of campaign is important, and I have tried to do that as well in my games. However, I have learned the hard way that if a player isn't interested in his character, then it's going to drag the campaign down. Players may be willing to go along with the guidelines, but find themselves in the middle of the adventure not enjoying themselves. It's no good trying to run certain types of campaigns if the players ultimately aren't interested.

And then the campaign just kind of dies a slow death.

 

I guess the key is to find those players who are interested in running the same kind of campaign you want to run...not always easy.

[AtomicGladiator]

Originally posted by Zed-F

There are ways to do a survival-oriented game well, and ways to do one poorly. I'd agree that games that are run poorly are to be avoided, and those that are run well are to be cherished, but that applies regardless of whether the game is survival-oriented.

 

The point I was making is that the original post was describing a poorly-run game. I don't know if it was intended to be a "survival-oriented" campaign or not.

 

I'm not sure, but it seems that what you describe as a "survival-oriented" game is really just a campaign with nothing more than a cosmetically different setting. If characters are still allowed to achieve goals that are important in the context of the story (though they may not be important to the entire region or world), then it's just a matter of scale. We're not talking about anything really different.

 

For a specific example, assume a post-holocaust campaign where resources are scarce. Low-powered characters manage to help a starving village fight off bandits who are stealing the crops. That kind of adventure is not different, except in a cosmetic way, from super-hero saves the city.

 

Then, perhaps the PC's wander to another city and there help find a plant that provides medicine, possibly help get a rough sort of hospital built. Whatever. Again, this is just a cosmetic difference, a variant of the old knight-errant scenario. The point is the PC's do have significance in their setting and make a contribution.

 

Is this the type of thing you are talking about? If so, I don't really see a difference except in scale and scenery.

 

But if you are talking about a campaign where the main accomplishment a PC can hope for is to escape with his skin, that just doesn't interest me.

 

Have you played in the type of "survival-oriented" campaign you mention? Can you describe it more specifically? Because what I'm envisioning from your comments is just the cosmetic difference I detailed, not the more radical difference.

 

Maybe we should start a different thread for this...