Why to RPG players say these things...

[Karousawai]

Vent time!

I love it when people in my pen and paper RPG circle come out with stuff like this.

"Haha man, you're totally gonna hate my new cleric for this Pathfinder game. He's a healing beast. He's got like 8 channel energies a day and the healing domain, he's never gonna let any of the party die and he cures diseases like a boss. You're gonna have a hell of a time dealing with him."

Two things brosef:

1. You assume sole goal is to murder each and every one of you in the most creative way possible with the utmost swiftness. This is simply idiotic. Like most other GMs out there my goal is to tell a story while playing a game. Killing PCs left and right mucks up the story, especially if one of the players has to re-roll mid dungeon and just 'appears' out of nowhere because of dramatic convenience. And anyway how hard is it to tell a decent story when the protagonists keep changing because they get horribly done in by trolls? Imagine watching Star Wars but every other scene a character dies and gets replaced by some chump you've never seen before.

If anything your healing is actually helping me greatly. Truly thanks for that mate. It's hard enough to get anybody to roll even an off-healer these days, and building challenging encounters without a healer in mind is a pain.

2. You assume that I couldn't come up with some way to deal with the guy healing things if I wanted. If I ever truly need to kill a cleric all I need to do is have a pitfall trap with a pool of deep water under it. Your reflex save sucks and if you haven't prepped something to help you breathe underwater you'll be sleeping with the fishes thanks to all that armour you wear. Ever tried to unstrap a suit of chainmail and unship a heavy steel shield underwater?

Seriously, why do people say this kind of shit to GMs? You'd think they'd learn that messing with the guy with god powers is suicide, even though I'm loath to abuse it just to kick some punk cleric in the teeth.

Any other GMs out here got any good over-confident PC stories they want to share?

 

[Eamar]

Eh, I wouldn't take it so seriously. From a player's point of view, I'd say occasionally messing with the GM is just a bit of fun, as it is with any authority figure really. Last campaign I played we went through a phase where we'd try and work out what our GM had put time into preparing, then deliberately try to make sure we ended up doing something completely different so he had to make everything up on the spot. I've made deliberately awkward or overpowered characters before now too. Of course, the GM's perfectly entitled to do a bit of messing around of their own in that situation too.

Obviously if someone's taking it too far or just being a dick about it that's a problem, but otherwise I think it's just part of the banter. It should be noted that I'm not one to take RPGs super seriously all the time (obviously) and my groups' approaches tend to be somewhat light-hearted. If I haven't spent a good portion of the evening laughing, it's not been a good session imo.

 

[Anachronism]

Calm down. It's expected, and practically encouraged in our games, that the players are going to screw with the GM. It's just part of the fun. No one really intends to try and make life difficult for anyone else, it's just entertaining to play up the stereotype of the GM trying to kill the players and the players trying to outsmart the GM.

We even had a joke rule where the first person to make the GM cry got bonus XP.

 

[RJ 17]

Yeah, whenever I GM a game, I have a tendency to smite those who get too overconfident. How do I do this? Simple

Spoiler: I apply to the Tycho School of Trap Design:

I actually used the Chalice of Immortality trap once, though with a different death-dealer.

Deep in a dungeon, the players found themselves within a bright white, gloriously gilded room...quite different than the dank, creepy ruins they had been traversing at the time. It was a pain in the ass to find this room involving a secret passage within a secret passage, so it seemed like I was hiding something there that was really special. In the center of the room on a golden pedestal was the Chalice of Immortality, "Whoever Drinks From This Chalice Shall Exist To See The End of Time" read the description.

Turns out all the Chalice did was turn you undead, at which point you'd be instantly vaporized by the powerful holy aura that the chamber had been consecrated with. Trying to remove the chalice from the room caused it to turn to dust. :3

 

[Riverwolf]

The great thing about pen and paper/tabletop RPGs is that there's a human running things who can take minmaxing into account and creatively come up with solutions to deal with such players. Unless the game itself was balanced poorly (and I don't mean deliberate and carefully implemented imbalance), there's no such thing as an invincible character build; the GM can always do something to that one player.

A character minmaxed someone to be an unstoppable firepower, capable of killing most level 5 monsters in one hit at level 1? That's not going to do much good against falling rocks. Near-100% accuracy and high-damage with a bow or other long-range weapon? Guess who's getting a knife to the throat while sleeping? (A thing to note on how I play: I don't care how many hit points you have or how high your level is; if your throat is slit, you're dead.) Massive splash damage either from spells or alchemist fire? Especially in the latter case, guess where that splash damage is going on the next roll of 1?

Of course, there's always the one biggest thing you can do to a player who is actually causing trouble like this on a regular basis: kick him/her out of the game.

EDIT: I've never actually had to deal with that problem, but I almost did with a guy who said he would minmax a character but never got around to joining our game.

 

[Zykon TheLich_v1legacy]

I've never really come across that kind of attitude in players. Id say that was due to

A)I quite like the joint storytelling aspect, or referee style of GMing rather than adversarial.

B)Usually only playing with friends who's preferences I generally know.

C)Mostly played Cyberpunk 2020 and Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay V1, both of which are really good at killing off PCs. Anyone getting cocky in them probably hasn't played before or has had a really kind GM.

 

[aegix drakan_v1legacy]

I love it when people in my pen and paper RPG circle come out with stuff like this.

"Haha man, you're totally gonna hate my new cleric for this Pathfinder game. He's a healing beast. He's got like 8 channel energies a day and the healing domain, he's never gonna let any of the party die and he cures diseases like a boss. You're gonna have a hell of a time dealing with him."

My response:
"Oh good! I guess I can throw you all against monsters WAY too strong for your level now! Or make you visit the elemental plane of disease, where your cleric will have to choose between healing the party, or stopping the endless tide of disease! More power for you = more challenge from me! "

(I treat my players gently as first, until they get used to the game, but when they're used to it, I like to push them to their limits with the challenge).

As for players who try to deliberately push their luck...I push back. One of my players in my (now defunct, sadly) Changeling the Lost group (world of darkness tabletop game) basically was planning to use his charms to become "changeling jesus" for the endless amount of free energy he'd get from the nonstop worshiping. After realizing that although he was doing it mostly for the power, he was also genuine about helping people (meaning I couldn't use the Morality system to smack him into place), I decided that if he did follow through on the plan, I'd bring in government Hunters, the "Men in Black" if you know what I mean, to come investigate and crush. Sadly, we never did get that far. I would have enjoyed seeing him deal with having an entire government task force come to get them.

Deep in a dungeon, the players found themselves within a bright white, gloriously gilded room...quite different than the dank, creepy ruins they had been traversing at the time. It was a pain in the ass to find this room involving a secret passage within a secret passage, so it seemed like I was hiding something there that was really special. In the center of the room on a golden pedestal was the Chalice of Immortality, "Whoever Drinks From This Chalice Shall Exist To See The End of Time" read the description.

Turns out all the Chalice did was turn you undead, at which point you'd be instantly vaporized by the powerful holy aura that the chamber had been consecrated with. Trying to remove the chalice from the room cause it to turn to dust. :3

You just made a grown man giggle like a schoolgirl.

That's EVIIIL! That gets my seal of approval!

 

[RJ 17]

Deep in a dungeon, the players found themselves within a bright white, gloriously gilded room...quite different than the dank, creepy ruins they had been traversing at the time. It was a pain in the ass to find this room involving a secret passage within a secret passage, so it seemed like I was hiding something there that was really special. In the center of the room on a golden pedestal was the Chalice of Immortality, "Whoever Drinks From This Chalice Shall Exist To See The End of Time" read the description.

Turns out all the Chalice did was turn you undead, at which point you'd be instantly vaporized by the powerful holy aura that the chamber had been consecrated with. Trying to remove the chalice from the room cause it to turn to dust. :3

You just made a grown man giggle like a schoolgirl.

That's EVIIIL! That gets my seal of approval!

Mwa ha ha ha! The best part is that it turned out to be a party-wipe. After checking for traps, of which there were technically none, and thus becoming assured that this was a super-secret freebie, they all drank from it like a bunch of idiots. You'd think they'd let someone "test" it first, but no, they all drank before the effects kicked in. The pedestal now has 5 piles of ash lying around it. >

But that was my style: The GM Giveth, The GM Taketh Away.

On the "Giveth" side of things, I had "The Cute One". This mysterious creature is said to be an ancient God of Treasure from a long since forgotten culture, appearing before adventurers in the form of an absolutely adorable animal,

Spoiler: often times something like this:

Legend has it that if you dare to attack The Cute One, you will suffer his wrath for all eternity (trasnlation: he yawns and opens a portal that sucks you into a plane in which you're torn apart by rampaging tentacle monsters...I won't go into the details of what "torn apart" necessarily means... ). However if you play with him and rub his tummy, he might just spit out something very nice (silly but powerful items).

Such as the Dagger of Unending Rust. This dagger has been completely consumed by rust and will most assuredly break on contact with whatever it hits. However the rust is an enchantment...and the enchantment is contagious, passing on to whatever breaks the item that is currently enchanted. For instance: throw the dagger at that giant knight's adamantium shield and the shield becomes covered in rust and absolutely useless. Whatever goes on to break that shield will in turn be covered in rust, and so on and so forth.

Then there was the Cloak of Not Quite Invisibility: makes the wearer completely invisible...as long as no one is looking at them. However, it gives a pretty substantial bonus to back-stab damage which is, needless to say, when the target isn't looking.

 

[Little Woodsman]

Why do people say those sorts of things?
Well at a guess, I'd say vanity or not understanding what the gameplay is all about..
OtOH, maybe he was just really happy with his character design, and didn't mean what he said, or at least not the way that he said it...

In my current game group we don't have anyone who mouths off to the GM's like that, we do have a couple of people who do try to put ridonculous tweaks on their characters, and one of those people always has to be the best at *everything* in the group... and even if his character isn't actually the best, he'll spend enormous amounts of time/energy explaining why his character really should be the one to attempt any given task "for the good of everyone". It can make some game sessions really fun, in the same sense that gargling razor blades is fun.
(Sorry, had to vent a little bit myself....)

 

[likalaruku]

I learned from Spoony's Counter Monkey series that if you create a character with the intention of trolling the DM, he's just going to troll you right back & then some.

 

[Frankster]

I only really started getting into rping from last year really but honestly unless it's playful banter that kinda attitude just makes me :/

I feel gm and players gotta work together to a degree to make a good story, gm isn't really someone you're trying to "beat", at least in the rps I played. If anything I was more likely to inform the gm about my characters weaknesses and vices then I was to tell about my characters strengths.

Then again seeing other peoples responses and series like Spoony's countermonkey series.. Maybe it's just a style of rp gaming I simply haven't gotten around to trying.

 

[RJ 17]

I actually used the Chalice of Immortality trap once, though with a different death-dealer.

Well, this would not work on my fighter.

Ahhhh so he'd have no interest in becoming immortal. Fair enough, however for every character there's a trap that can kill them. With enough time and knowledge of your character's personality/traits/skills, I promise you I could devise a trap specifically designed for sending him to meet his god at the gates of hell. =P

 

[Rellik San]

It's more to do with just light ribbing, the thing is a lot of GM's do hate OP'd characters, I will now give an example of one of my friends characters in a Vampire chronicle, this chronicle is also the one that resulted in us legitimately throwing a spanner into White Wolfs works so hard we have a framed letter where the head of product development called us "An absolute pack of bastards", they went ahead with the NWoD anyway but had to continue supporting OWoD.

Samildinac; Assamite vampire assassin.
His feats included:
Jumping from a helicopter onto a harrier jump jet missing and getting up without a scratch, running through solid concrete walls to get to the centre of a labyrinth, launching another vampire as an intercontinental ballistic missile, playing a game of slaps with a greater daemon letting the daemon go first and then proceeding to one shot the thing, actually cursed himself to stop him being so powerful, diablorised Brujah and gained temporis and managed to prevent Caines awakening by having Lilith kill him and then killing her.

All of which started by being able to game the character gen system for maximum effect, combined with an over confident GM who thought he could handle it. If you wanna know the best way to deal with power gaming players, it's not to power game back, that's how things like the above happened. Some players just like to be able to have the gary stu, can handle any situation style character, sometimes it's thrust upon them, but usually what they mean by "you'll hate this character" is you'll have a hard time balancing a challenge for them.

Of course a lot of it is also down to player tactics, i.e. in my werewolf group the 2 non-combat characters have a 10-1 kill ratio compared to the rest of the party, including giant wyrm beasties, it's not that the characters are OP, it's just that reading the combat guides and weapon rules and understanding them (whilst still maintaining the spirit) as a player can give you an absurd leg up in many situations in a combat heavy environment.

 

[thedoclc]

Vent time!

I love it when people in my pen and paper RPG circle come out with stuff like this.

"Haha man, you're totally gonna hate my new cleric for this Pathfinder game. He's a healing beast. He's got like 8 channel energies a day and the healing domain, he's never gonna let any of the party die and he cures diseases like a boss. You're gonna have a hell of a time dealing with him."

Two things brosef:

1. You assume sole goal is to murder each and every one of you in the most creative way possible with the utmost swiftness. This is simply idiotic. Like most other GMs out there my goal is to tell a story while playing a game. Killing PCs left and right mucks up the story, especially if one of the players has to re-roll mid dungeon and just 'appears' out of nowhere because of dramatic convenience. And anyway how hard is it to tell a decent story when the protagonists keep changing because they get horribly done in by trolls? Imagine watching Star Wars but every other scene a character dies and gets replaced by some chump you've never seen before.

If anything your healing is actually helping me greatly. Truly thanks for that mate. It's hard enough to get anybody to roll even an off-healer these days, and building challenging encounters without a healer in mind is a pain.

2. You assume that I couldn't come up with some way to deal with the guy healing things if I wanted. If I ever truly need to kill a cleric all I need to do is have a pitfall trap with a pool of deep water under it. Your reflex save sucks and if you haven't prepped something to help you breathe underwater you'll be sleeping with the fishes thanks to all that armour you wear. Ever tried to unstrap a suit of chainmail and unship a heavy steel shield underwater?

Seriously, why do people say this kind of shit to GMs? You'd think they'd learn that messing with the guy with god powers is suicide, even though I'm loath to abuse it just to kick some punk cleric in the teeth.

Any other GMs out here got any good over-confident PC stories they want to share?

First, completely agreed about the healer in a combat-based fantasy RPG and the role of the GM, but that's...GMing 101.

Honestly, it sounds to me like part of the story is you haven't played a lot of games where violence is a bad option all around. You say "RPG-players" but only use terms which are clearly straight out of D&D 3.5, PFRPG, or D&D 4e. Now, I love me some good PFRPG, and my campaigns have my players well-aware that just because the game comes from the old roots of pure dungeon-delving doesn't mean I'm not going to do some crazy-intricate political backstabbing story where murder is a really good way to wreck everything you've ever worked on. That said, it's because we've been weaned away from the "dungeon-delving is the whole game" mindset. Branch out. Try something new. Set some Call of Cthulhu sheets down in front of the party and spin a mystery which can't be solved with the barrel of a gun. Bring them in to a Hunter game and show them exactly how horrible it can be when you botch your gratuitous Firearms roll, shoot a kid, and now have state and local cops relentlessly hunting you. Hell, even in PFRPG, set them up with a mysterious murder where the murderer was smart enough to plan for the divination spells in the world, or have them have to rush around gathering evidence and follow leads as a looming court case draws near a close.

I also hasten to add that when someone starts with a bragging description of the stats their character possesses, and not either what they've gotten to do with that character or how cool the character concept is, that that is red-flag warning for munchkinism.

 

[Rellik San]

Bring them in to a Hunter game and show them exactly how horrible it can be when you botch your gratuitous Firearms roll, shoot a kid, and now have state and local cops relentlessly hunting you.

Just never let them take a combination of Resources 4+ and contacts 3+... that silver nitrate scud missile they got... yeeeeeeaaahhhhhhh.... I was n00b GM, they'd been playing for years.

 

[Scow2]

The great thing about pen and paper/tabletop RPGs is that there's a human running things who can take minmaxing into account and creatively come up with solutions to deal with such players. Unless the game itself was balanced poorly (and I don't mean deliberate and carefully implemented imbalance), there's no such thing as an invincible character build; the GM can always do something to that one player.

A character minmaxed someone to be an unstoppable firepower, capable of killing most level 5 monsters in one hit at level 1? That's not going to do much good against falling rocks. Near-100% accuracy and high-damage with a bow or other long-range weapon? Guess who's getting a knife to the throat while sleeping? (A thing to note on how I play: I don't care how many hit points you have or how high your level is; if your throat is slit, you're dead.) Massive splash damage either from spells or alchemist fire? Especially in the latter case, guess where that splash damage is going on the next roll of 1?

Of course, there's always the one biggest thing you can do to a player who is actually causing trouble like this on a regular basis: kick him/her out of the game.

EDIT: I've never actually had to deal with that problem, but I almost did with a guy who said he would minmax a character but never got around to joining our game.

You sound like a terrible DM, given that your idea of 'countering overpowered characters' is "Hit them with no-save InstantDeath!"

A dagger in the throat at night is more appropriate for the heavily-armored melee juggernaut who no man or beast can kill in combat when he's awake, not for the squishy archer who has to be able to take enemies down before they reach him (At which point its game over). Someone great at dishing out massive amounts of damage? Try a phalanx of Hobgoblins, instead of Monster of 9000 HP. "Yeah, it's great you can deal 500 points of damage in a single attack. Too bad no monster has more than 200 HP. While you're overkilling single targets, his friends are murdering yours."

If someone makes a maximum-power character, don't hit them in the weakspots unless you intend to allow them to respec, and don't hit them head on, either. Side blows are more satisfying for everyone involved. Yes, players are proud of their characters - they should be, though, because that's all they've got. As a DM, you've got dozens of monsters and tons of dungeons.