How I dealt with a meta-gaming jackwagon
Mar 28, 2013 19:11:21 GMT -8
Post by Forresst on Mar 28, 2013 19:11:21 GMT -8
Afternoon my friends!
I wanted to pass along a little story that recently resolved (as in last weekend) about an irritating player in a Hackmaster game I'm playing in every other Saturday.
Every group seems to have that one guy. The one who knows the system better than the GM does. In this case, it's fair to note, roughly half the time this is a good thing because the GM of our game is just trying the system out to see what it's all about, and this system is definitely an old-school homage system. The rules are complex, and not consistent, and some of the stuff makes no sense while other stuff is very reasonable. So, having a person who can explain the dumb things is actually quite useful! On the other hand, the other half of the time it becomes irritating and obstructionist.
For example: when we built my character, the GM and I agreed that since she's an assassin who'd lived in one city her entire life, it would make sense for her to be in or at least connected to the local assassin's guild. We didn't give any particular mechanical advantages out for this affiliation, but we decided that I could spend my downtime between adventures carrying out contracts if I wanted to, and that mechanical advantages would only be conferred on my character if she managed to up her standing with the guild, or do something interesting that brought reasonable consequences, etc. This guy, on hearing me narrate out taking a quiet trip to the guild house to see about picking up a contract or two on our return from a field mission, immediately piped up with "you can't be in the assassin's guild you're only level 1 and you can't join until you're level 5. It says so in the book," to which we replied "but this is something that we discussed at character gen and has no mechanical benefits at all. It's pure flavour." Which didn't really pacify him in the slightest. When the GM finally put his foot down and told him that it was now built into the game and would stand no matter what the book says, the irritating guy responded with "then I want to be in a guild too". My GM, completely unfazed, told him to figure out what kind of guild or club he wanted to be in and they'd do sidebars on non-game days just like I would. Sounds good right?
Wrong! As it turns out, he's apparently not creative enough to think up a cool guild/club/whatever to belong to as a fighter/thief. Which makes no sense to me (because, hello, the gnomish mafia?!) So he spent two whole weeks whining to our GM that it simply wasn't fair that I had interesting subplots to follow but he couldn't and didn't the GM know it's not right and I shouldn't have guild contracts to do anyway jeeeeze whine whine.
Anyway, at the game before our last one, I RPed out going to the guild, taking a look at the contracts, picking one out and taking it on. The last thing that happened in that game was that my mark walked in to our bar as we were finishing up an in-game conversation. So, in a small sidebar on a different night my GM and I took 20 minutes and RPed my contract out over a pizza. At the end of the little adventure, I had a dead body, a cauldron of something I don't understand, a chemistry textbook I can't read, and a warehouse full of highly illegal chemical stuff (I'd followed my mark all the way back to his medieval meth lab, see). So I finish up my job, and when I get back to the guild house, I ask the contract giver-out guy (look, I'm not a real assassin, I don't know the right words) to point me to a master poisoner, and basically hand the whole thing over because hey, I figure the guild controlling that kind of wealth and resources ultimately helps me out. So now I can buy basic bandages with poultices and minor poisons at a discount because the poisoner and guild owe me. So I write this on one of my cool little note cards and stick it in the back of my character book. I also get 10 gold coins, which is A LOT of money in the world we're in. That's the going rate to kill a dude.
Fast forward to last game. As I'm coming in and getting my stuff settled, I put my character book down on the table, and go to grab a drink like you do, and so on and so forth, just getting ready to play. When I get back to the table, I see irritating guy SITTING IN MY SPOT WITH MY CHARACTER BOOK OPEN FLIPPING THROUGH MY NOTECARDS. I am generally fairly possessive about my character books. With all the time and effort I put into them, that sheet in its little plastic duotang really become symbolic of my character, and it's MY character. So I ask him "why are you reading my character book?" and he answers "I wanna know what happened with your assassin contract, because it's still not in the rules that you can even do them." At that point I get really really mad.
So, summoning all my self-control, and resisting mightily the urge to punch this guy in the face (it is his house and that would be bad), I tell him to get up, close my character, and back away from it before I decide we need to have words in the hall. I appear to have made my point. He does what I say. I sit down, put my character book back in my bag and I tell him "look. I don't know why you're so stuck on this. I also don't really understand what made you think you have the right to go perusing my character while my back is turned but I want you to understand this one salient fact right now until we no longer talk to each other. If I ever find you rifling through my stuff or my character again, I will never game or speak with you again. I don't care who else you play with who doesn't mind you reading their things, this is a big issue to me. I do you the respect of not rummaging in your cupboards or your nightstand, do me the same respect in kind."
He nods, and the rest of the group gets in, and we get underway. Except now, he wants to know why I have so much money. And he's asking me in character how I got to be so rich. And he's asking me out of character where that money came from and didn't I know that at character gen I was only supposed to have 2d6x10+3d6 silver pieces and there's NO WAY I should have 10g more than anyone else at the table?
I get irritated again and ask "has your character at any point attempted to cut my purse or try to find out what my character has for money? No? Then you have no idea, shut the hell up." Now he's mad because I cussed at him (such a delicate flower).
It finally devolves into a big fight as I tell him to stop metagaming and stop prying so hard, he tells me I'm in flagrant violation of all the money rules, and the poor GM is trying to explain to irritating guy he's wrong and he'd be glad to explain after the session and please Forresst he's just trying to be helpful even though he's being a great big jerk but for the love of god can we please play the game etc etc etc.
So we settle down. And we play. And it was actually a REALLY GOOD session. And then we go for coffee afterward. And that's when the GM lays down The Law(tm). Irritating guy gets told not to go looking through my character book. He explains that my character, being an assassin, is generally going to have secrets from the rest of the party. Further, my character may have more or less money at any given point during the campaign. Finally, my character may decide at some point to open up but only if, in-character, the party earns her trust enough for her to be comfortable doing so. And that no matter how excited he gets to help or interfere or whatever, obviously these are boundaries he needs to respect. I was told to keep my temper and that there should be no next time on this issue, and that in the future I really should explain this hard line I take before it becomes an issue.
So, not quite as entertaining as a gamers gone horribly wrong story, but I wanted to tell it because it makes me happy to share a good story once in a while.
I wanted to pass along a little story that recently resolved (as in last weekend) about an irritating player in a Hackmaster game I'm playing in every other Saturday.
Every group seems to have that one guy. The one who knows the system better than the GM does. In this case, it's fair to note, roughly half the time this is a good thing because the GM of our game is just trying the system out to see what it's all about, and this system is definitely an old-school homage system. The rules are complex, and not consistent, and some of the stuff makes no sense while other stuff is very reasonable. So, having a person who can explain the dumb things is actually quite useful! On the other hand, the other half of the time it becomes irritating and obstructionist.
For example: when we built my character, the GM and I agreed that since she's an assassin who'd lived in one city her entire life, it would make sense for her to be in or at least connected to the local assassin's guild. We didn't give any particular mechanical advantages out for this affiliation, but we decided that I could spend my downtime between adventures carrying out contracts if I wanted to, and that mechanical advantages would only be conferred on my character if she managed to up her standing with the guild, or do something interesting that brought reasonable consequences, etc. This guy, on hearing me narrate out taking a quiet trip to the guild house to see about picking up a contract or two on our return from a field mission, immediately piped up with "you can't be in the assassin's guild you're only level 1 and you can't join until you're level 5. It says so in the book," to which we replied "but this is something that we discussed at character gen and has no mechanical benefits at all. It's pure flavour." Which didn't really pacify him in the slightest. When the GM finally put his foot down and told him that it was now built into the game and would stand no matter what the book says, the irritating guy responded with "then I want to be in a guild too". My GM, completely unfazed, told him to figure out what kind of guild or club he wanted to be in and they'd do sidebars on non-game days just like I would. Sounds good right?
Wrong! As it turns out, he's apparently not creative enough to think up a cool guild/club/whatever to belong to as a fighter/thief. Which makes no sense to me (because, hello, the gnomish mafia?!) So he spent two whole weeks whining to our GM that it simply wasn't fair that I had interesting subplots to follow but he couldn't and didn't the GM know it's not right and I shouldn't have guild contracts to do anyway jeeeeze whine whine.
Anyway, at the game before our last one, I RPed out going to the guild, taking a look at the contracts, picking one out and taking it on. The last thing that happened in that game was that my mark walked in to our bar as we were finishing up an in-game conversation. So, in a small sidebar on a different night my GM and I took 20 minutes and RPed my contract out over a pizza. At the end of the little adventure, I had a dead body, a cauldron of something I don't understand, a chemistry textbook I can't read, and a warehouse full of highly illegal chemical stuff (I'd followed my mark all the way back to his medieval meth lab, see). So I finish up my job, and when I get back to the guild house, I ask the contract giver-out guy (look, I'm not a real assassin, I don't know the right words) to point me to a master poisoner, and basically hand the whole thing over because hey, I figure the guild controlling that kind of wealth and resources ultimately helps me out. So now I can buy basic bandages with poultices and minor poisons at a discount because the poisoner and guild owe me. So I write this on one of my cool little note cards and stick it in the back of my character book. I also get 10 gold coins, which is A LOT of money in the world we're in. That's the going rate to kill a dude.
Fast forward to last game. As I'm coming in and getting my stuff settled, I put my character book down on the table, and go to grab a drink like you do, and so on and so forth, just getting ready to play. When I get back to the table, I see irritating guy SITTING IN MY SPOT WITH MY CHARACTER BOOK OPEN FLIPPING THROUGH MY NOTECARDS. I am generally fairly possessive about my character books. With all the time and effort I put into them, that sheet in its little plastic duotang really become symbolic of my character, and it's MY character. So I ask him "why are you reading my character book?" and he answers "I wanna know what happened with your assassin contract, because it's still not in the rules that you can even do them." At that point I get really really mad.
So, summoning all my self-control, and resisting mightily the urge to punch this guy in the face (it is his house and that would be bad), I tell him to get up, close my character, and back away from it before I decide we need to have words in the hall. I appear to have made my point. He does what I say. I sit down, put my character book back in my bag and I tell him "look. I don't know why you're so stuck on this. I also don't really understand what made you think you have the right to go perusing my character while my back is turned but I want you to understand this one salient fact right now until we no longer talk to each other. If I ever find you rifling through my stuff or my character again, I will never game or speak with you again. I don't care who else you play with who doesn't mind you reading their things, this is a big issue to me. I do you the respect of not rummaging in your cupboards or your nightstand, do me the same respect in kind."
He nods, and the rest of the group gets in, and we get underway. Except now, he wants to know why I have so much money. And he's asking me in character how I got to be so rich. And he's asking me out of character where that money came from and didn't I know that at character gen I was only supposed to have 2d6x10+3d6 silver pieces and there's NO WAY I should have 10g more than anyone else at the table?
I get irritated again and ask "has your character at any point attempted to cut my purse or try to find out what my character has for money? No? Then you have no idea, shut the hell up." Now he's mad because I cussed at him (such a delicate flower).
It finally devolves into a big fight as I tell him to stop metagaming and stop prying so hard, he tells me I'm in flagrant violation of all the money rules, and the poor GM is trying to explain to irritating guy he's wrong and he'd be glad to explain after the session and please Forresst he's just trying to be helpful even though he's being a great big jerk but for the love of god can we please play the game etc etc etc.
So we settle down. And we play. And it was actually a REALLY GOOD session. And then we go for coffee afterward. And that's when the GM lays down The Law(tm). Irritating guy gets told not to go looking through my character book. He explains that my character, being an assassin, is generally going to have secrets from the rest of the party. Further, my character may have more or less money at any given point during the campaign. Finally, my character may decide at some point to open up but only if, in-character, the party earns her trust enough for her to be comfortable doing so. And that no matter how excited he gets to help or interfere or whatever, obviously these are boundaries he needs to respect. I was told to keep my temper and that there should be no next time on this issue, and that in the future I really should explain this hard line I take before it becomes an issue.
So, not quite as entertaining as a gamers gone horribly wrong story, but I wanted to tell it because it makes me happy to share a good story once in a while.