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Conquer Conflict
22 Plays1 month ago
In this episode, we dive into a crucial topic for every GM—how to handle and resolve conflicts within the group. From differing expectations about the game to personality clashes and in-game character disputes, conflicts can arise in many forms. We'll explore common sources of tension, like combat-focused players vs. storytellers, rules disagreements, and even external life stressors that spill into the game. Learn how to manage conflicts as the GM, from listening to players' concerns and helping them reach a consensus, to knowing when it’s time to make a hard decision to preserve the group. By the end of the episode, you'll have strategies for de-escalating conflicts, rebuilding group dynamics, and ensuring that your sessions remain enjoyable and inclusive for everyone involved.
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Transcript
Humorous Opening: Joseph Gordon's Trick
00:00:00
Speaker
I am Joseph Gordon Die Hard and I am only here to hug my father, which I now do. It's a trick. I'm not letting him hug me. I hug my father. He has gunpowder in his pants. I draw my sword. Stay back. draw an arrow. So do I. Trolls out. Jeff, do you lower your sword? No. Dean, are you?
00:00:17
Speaker
I hug my father. You're impaled.
Synth-wave Music in Community
00:00:53
Speaker
Wow, I guess that guy really wanted a hug.
00:00:58
Speaker
it sounds like the music is in conflict with that scene. very ah Very upbeat. Very upbeat music, yeah. ah i love that so synth wave, though.
00:01:09
Speaker
I'll put that with all kinds of things, even when it shouldn't be. ah that That scene, by the way, from Community, if you've not seen it, is fantastic. Is that the first or the second Dungeons & Dragons episode? I think that's the second one.
00:01:25
Speaker
ah so So ridiculous. So good.
Introduction to Managing Conflict in Tabletop Games
00:01:27
Speaker
Good times. Well, speaking of things going chaotically off the rails, friends, we're here with our latest episode of Tabletop Tune-Up to talk about table conflict.
00:01:37
Speaker
Oh, conflict. God, it happens too often. Too often. This is a game that is social in nature. And of course, anytime you spend lots of time with people and gosh, I mean, these sessions go like four hours at a time normally, more or less. I mean, usually I'm i'm somewhere, i don't know about you, Mark, but i'm I'm usually in the three to five hour range somewhere.
00:01:58
Speaker
Yeah, that's a lot of time to spend with people in a confined space. You're going to youre goingnna get some conflict every once in a while. Every
Sources of Conflict: Expectations vs. Reality
00:02:06
Speaker
once in a while you will. So today we're going to talk about sources of conflict, what to do as a GM, how you can kind of mediate that and ideally save your game or maybe sometimes that's not the right answer.
00:02:18
Speaker
Ben, he do you enjoy just a little bit of conflict or just don't like it at all? You know what? I think that if people are mature about it and they can manage their way through it so that I don't have to do it for them, that's a good day.
00:02:33
Speaker
I'll say this. Character conflict, if done right, can be a lot of fun, but player conflict... I don't know if that's ever fun. No, I think you're right. i don't ever want let's let's talk about that we'll talk about both of these, actually.
00:02:48
Speaker
But we're going to focus more on the player player and player conflicts, I think. That's right. So let's start with what it is that generates conflict. And I think the thing that drives conflict in almost every case is just that people have different mismatched expectations for something about the game, either what kind of game it's going to be, how they want to play the game, or even like what the rules of the game might
Player Engagement and Personality Clashes
00:03:12
Speaker
be.
00:03:12
Speaker
Well, I mean, I'm surely with with within the bounds of their expectations of the game, yes. But conflict can, of course, come from many different sources yeah outside games. so That's right. So within the game, there's different things. But then also there can be personality issues and people not getting along and all kinds of stuff like that.
00:03:29
Speaker
So with game expectations, what are we what are we talking about here? Like just what one person's expectations of what they want to get out of the game? What are we talking about? Yeah, I think so. So when you think about what people play games for, role-playing games, you know role-playing games can be played in lots of different ways.
00:03:46
Speaker
Sometimes people want to play them very much with a kind of ah a combat romp kind of model. Sometimes people want to play them as deep storytelling kinds of models.
00:03:57
Speaker
Sometimes people want to play them um as a kind of simulation or wish fulfillment. There's so many different things you could you could name on this list. Maybe for people that are interested, it's a little dated now, but go check out Ron Edwards' sort three-part analysis of what it is that he thinks players are into. He talks about people to want simulation, people that want narrative, people that want a kind of heightened game.
00:04:20
Speaker
If those are useful to
Character Decisions and Conflict Management
00:04:21
Speaker
you, great. If not, that's fine too. but The point here is that when those expectations are mismatched, when you have somebody who wants to come in and tell a great story, but then they are matched up with, say, a player who wants to go in and and murder Hobo the way through or or have a big combat romp, that's a mismatch. That's going to lead to conflict.
00:04:41
Speaker
Yeah, and that would be like the type of style of game, really. That's, ah you know, different types of game styles. I don't know if I'd be terribly happy in a, you know, murderhobo kind of game. um I'd probably roll my eyes enough times that people go. Yeah.
00:04:58
Speaker
I'm not really into being a psychopath when I play the game. Some people are. I guess we're not here to judge, although it's probably not the kind of game you and I are going to be likely to get into. Unless I'm playing the GM and I have a villain who's a psychopath. Anyway. Yeah.
00:05:11
Speaker
Well, the villains are a different matter. yeah But I mean, think about some of those rules-like games that really favor narrative stuff. Think about games like Fate, where really your stats are essentially like the...
00:05:24
Speaker
the way that The phrase that you ascribe to your character. This guy was the high school jock. Is that like a numerical thing? How many pounds of weight can they lift? How fast can they move?
00:05:34
Speaker
Those are the kind of things that you're going to get out of say, a Pathfinder player. you know They're going to want to know all that stuff really explicitly. I think they might. ah there's I've played games with people who just did not care about the crunchiness of some of the games.
00:05:48
Speaker
They wanted to focus on the character or this and that. And you could have those mismatches at the table. And sometimes I've seen people get frustrated with... Maybe just a lack of curiosity about those rules. But they just weren't that curious about the rules because the rules were
Influence of Personal Relationships on Gameplay
00:06:03
Speaker
just something that kind of carried them through the game. And if the GM knew it, they didn't have to.
00:06:08
Speaker
So those could be all sorts different types of conflicts. So on the matter of rules, though, sometimes people get into disagreements because the rules layers. And this is a famous phenomenon within role-playing games. People that have really deeply studied the rules, they've got interesting tricks and exploits, especially the more complex rule systems.
00:06:26
Speaker
You know, when you have those complex rule systems, that can create issues and of interpretation. You know, it's like people are doing great debates and theology and politics and stuff like this with these rule systems sometimes. So...
00:06:38
Speaker
And it also, ah it that comes up a lot when you have other players who are who have GMs themselves back and forth. People have different ways they like to run their games. Now they're at a player's seat.
00:06:50
Speaker
they They might think of some types of rules that the other person's for running with as lesser than. Right. they might They might not like the way the other GMs are doing their thing. That's kind of like that thing about doctors make the worst patients.
00:07:02
Speaker
Oh my gosh. I work at a hospital, Ben, and that is, it's the, it's so true. They are for you doctors. If there's any doctors that are listening, you're horrible patients. That's great. Okay. So, so there's differences in expectations about what kind of game we're going to play. There's differences in expectations about how game rules might work, but let's, let's now depart from the game situation talk about personalities. Mark, what are some of the things that are personality issues that can drive conflict at your table?
00:07:30
Speaker
One is ah that can be frustrating for for players is the various degrees of level of engagement like players might have. So like if one person's really into a certain game or a genre and the others are just not, it sometimes that can cause some issues where maybe somebody's not paying attention and the GM has to repeat themselves.
00:07:55
Speaker
that could get That can get old pretty quick for some of the people who are engaged. Maybe they're on their phones or something like that. Yeah, that's a real thing for ah um GMs, I think, and players, right, is that can lead to some conflict between players and their GMs. Do you find also, though, that like players, relative to other players, get frustrated by... do. Are you as a player frustrated when another player is not as engaged?
00:08:18
Speaker
I, you know, maybe cause I'm sensitive to, cause I, I am also a GM, but like, if I see other players, I'm player, I see other people on their phone. That really just, that just pisses me off, man.
00:08:29
Speaker
Like it makes me, it it kills me as a GM to see all the players on their phones. But like, as a player, it it also just like, what's going on here?
00:08:40
Speaker
Like engage yourself, man. Right. Yeah. Okay, so different levels of engagement. um What about about different ages or maturity levels or things like that? Have you ever played games where it was kind of a mix of kids and adults, let's say?
00:08:54
Speaker
Yeah, I used to run games, um random games, kind of pick up games for a while at a yeah ah local meetup kind of thing. and And we would get pretty wildly different ages. And there can be different styles of play that
External Life Issues and Game Balance
00:09:10
Speaker
you can kind of get from different age groups.
00:09:13
Speaker
Usually some of the newer players might be a little bit more akin to being murder hobos. Just a generalization. Keep in mind, this is not true for everybody. But you can have those...
00:09:25
Speaker
those age gaps could have different styles of play that you, you see. um It could be a problem. Yeah. Sometimes I find um people have very different senses of humor or haven't helped me even different kinds of political stuff. and And I've been at tables where people will,
00:09:41
Speaker
crack a quick joke or say a quick witty thing like they're actually ah like, you know, on Twitter or whatever their favorite social media thing is. yeah And, you know, it's, it's one of these things where it can really change the mood in the room if all of a sudden people get really polarized.
00:09:57
Speaker
So that's actually one of my session zero things. You guys no politics. We're not doing any kind of here's yeah issues of the day. Here's your news items. That can be a real killer. I mean, I've had, i mean, one of my best friends, I had to actually exercise on the table. i One of the players another group was, they just were tired of the politics.
00:10:18
Speaker
And I felt horrible to this day. It's one of the worst things I've ever had to do. as a GM. And it it gutted me. And even when I think about it now, I feel sick to my stomach because that was somebody who I cared greatly for.
00:10:33
Speaker
Politics can really ruin your table experience. So let's keep that keep that out of there. Yeah, and it can also it can also you know have that kind of impact on friendships and things like that.
00:10:45
Speaker
So, yeah, I think you know what's interesting about you know all of these things is is going into the game, realizing that it's a social thing and that other people are going to have other expectations, I think.
00:10:56
Speaker
um Creating room for that, I think, is an important thing. So one kind of related idea to that is just... People are going to have outside life issues. Maybe somebody is going to go through a divorce or maybe somebody you know has a sick kid that week or maybe some other thing is happening that's going to either distract them. It's going to take them out of the game. Maybe it's going to make their temper a little shorter than it could be. Yeah, like maybe they can't really quite disconnect from that phone if they have a sick, you know, somebody at home or things like that. So you're going to to be sensitive to all that. But let me just put one thing clear.
00:11:31
Speaker
Those, if if it's disruptive at the table, if they can't separate that out a little bit, over time, that's there's going to be an issue there.
00:11:43
Speaker
Yeah. you know we are all given grace for short periods of time but this things or upate in the balance of your social life then there's going to be problems yeah so i think the trick with those is like to be sensitive but at the same time do what you can to make that temporary and if that means a player needs to step away from for a little while while they get things sorted out that's totally fine Yeah, and if you're playing with these people week in and week out, you're going to start building relationships with with them.
00:12:11
Speaker
And if you didn't already come
Managing Disruptive Behaviors
00:12:12
Speaker
into the game you know with relationships, then you're going to have one somewhere along the point of this campaign or this game. So with that in mind, all these issues that we just kind of talked about, they're going to be have to be handled with a certain amount of sensitivity.
00:12:27
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Now, Mark, ah speaking of relationships and sensitivity, have you ever run games with married couples, boyfriend and girlfriend, things like that, where there's relationships at the table that are possibly infecting some of the relationships between the characters?
00:12:43
Speaker
Honestly, they've not all been very good. I've had some that have been great. I want to put make that very clear. But on a whole, um sometimes they haven't been terribly great, particularly if one is the GM, one is the player.
00:12:58
Speaker
If they're both players, I've had much better you know success with that. Mm-hmm. I don't know that I've got a rule for it, but I definitely think it requires a lot of care and attention on the part of that couple in question. Oh, yeah, for sure. i i don't know how they they do that.
00:13:15
Speaker
But um it definitely it requires sensitivity and and and mindfulness. Okay, so let's talk about a different kind of conflict now that actually also can drive player-to-player conflicts character conflicts. And this this kind of thing comes up a lot when players say things like, but that's what my character would do.
00:13:34
Speaker
So, Mark, when you've got characters like this, how do you manage that? How
Conflict Resolution Techniques
00:13:39
Speaker
do you how do you keep that from blowing up the actual in-person player-to-player dynamic?
00:13:45
Speaker
This kind of behavior, it's just it can get annoying pretty quick. When people continue to fall behind this, this is what my character would do. Where they're clearly breaking some sort of social contract at the table.
00:13:57
Speaker
That could be like stealing stuff from other you know characters at the table. Oh, I'm a rogue. I'm going to... steal. ah That's what I do.
00:14:07
Speaker
you know Don't try to neuter my character. you know It can be handled in ah in a good way, but there's also a very disruptive way. And that can cause some serious problems at the table. People get annoyed by that.
00:14:19
Speaker
So make sure you like address that kind of stuff on the character creation. Set this kind of stuff up beforehand. Have that conversation about like how are we going to treat character to character theft and things of that nature.
00:14:32
Speaker
Yeah, that's a good session zero thing. I mean, it could be violence too, right? You could have a character who goes into a rage. Ill-conceived at creation almost, yeah ah paradwise. we I'm not joking. we had a i had a game I ran where one of the players was it playing like a ah bit of a ah voodoo kind headhunter.
00:14:51
Speaker
okay And one of his things, you'd have these little talismans of of creatures they've killed and monsters they fought and and one of the other characters was playing like ah a bit of a tarzan kind of kind of character it was a lord of the apes and so to speak and if it came to a head when the head was of one of the lord one of the apes no no And that was the end of that. Like, it just, it was just a kind of an idea that like, okay, maybe the characters were conceived poorly at the beginning, or maybe there was a choice that you would have to have made for the case of the story to not do a certain thing.
00:15:30
Speaker
This is the classic kind of necromancer meets paladin in the party kind of problem, right? Yeah. And it's not like... This is not going to work out. And in this particular case, wouldn't really particularly... It's not anybody's particular fault per se.
00:15:44
Speaker
It's just these are characters that wouldn't exist in the same room. That's right. You know, in real life, one of them would would kill the other. right Yeah. The best case scenario, they are going to part company amicably. Yeah.
00:15:56
Speaker
But that means they're not going to be in the same party. And this kind of goes back to what we were talking about with you know party theft and things of that nature. At some point you ask yourself, would these people adventure together?
00:16:07
Speaker
Would they put up with that person? I mean, we all love Wolverine in the comics, but would they really put up with that that guy's psychotic personality? i I don't know.
00:16:19
Speaker
There's a kind of another angle on this that's interesting too, is that sometimes players are creating the kinds of characters that give them an outlet for personality traits or for behaviors that they want to take on. You know, role-playing games are a way that people can try out different personalities. They can try out different kinds of of social lives in a certain way. And so sometimes you find people will...
00:16:45
Speaker
create the kinds of characters that they want to have the experience of. You want to create the character who everybody loves and adores, right? You, you roll that character up and then, you know, if the player doesn't get the kind of attention they want from either NPCs or even other players, then sometimes they can get a little tiffed about that,
Reshuffling Groups to Resolve Persistent Conflicts
00:17:04
Speaker
you know?
00:17:04
Speaker
And I find that one of the things you need to address in those cases is just the like, Hey, you know, player, this isn't your therapy session. This is not fair to other people that you are drawing them into this relationship that's here to give you, you know, emotional or psychological feedback that you want. It's, it's not here to do that for you.
00:17:25
Speaker
At least you've got to get everybody to agree to that first, you know, correct but, but this is typically not what we say all sit down to do this for. so you know I think sometimes you've got to be thoughtful about what kinds of characters people are making from that point of view, too. is like Are you making a kind of character that is that is for the kind of game we're all going to play, or is this something that you're creating to service your own kind of specific psychological needs?
00:17:49
Speaker
Yeah, and you know good characters kind of can stand their own, a good character. But a great character, Ben, is embraced by the rest of the party. And they're you know that's a great character.
00:18:01
Speaker
When people get it and they want to encourage you to play that character. So if you are that kind of want to play that that thiefy rogue who maybe even steals from the party,
00:18:13
Speaker
If the other players are enjoying it enjoying that character's personality, they'll make space for that to happen and in the context of the story where it won't be disruptive to their experience as well.
00:18:24
Speaker
So I'll give you just a just a real quick, easy example. we had a We had a character that when it played, was a bit of a kleptomaniac. It would steal from the party often. we basically just kind of made room for it. where i like We just kind of wrote that 10% of the treasure was just that pair. It just disappeared. It just disappeared into their pocket.
00:18:43
Speaker
And we kind of winked and winked and we all kind of agreed that like that's what's going to happen. That's the Rogue Premium? Yeah. Yeah. And we were fine with it ah because we just enjoyed the personality that that character brought to it.
00:18:55
Speaker
But we also wanted to set some boundaries of saying, okay, just don't be stealing our special magic items or potions. is that youre just We're just going to give you 10% of the cat. ah good catoff Leave us alone.
00:19:07
Speaker
Yeah. And it worked. It was a good agreement. That's great. You know, the other thing I'm thinking about too is also how long that game is going to last probably plays a role in how upset you should be if you do have somebody steal from you. Because I remember Gen Con game you and I played a couple of years back.
00:19:23
Speaker
You stole my horse. You stole my horse. We're playing a Western game. Oh, that's the horse liked me better. All right. Well, let's move forward here. So we've talked about in character conflicts leading to player conflicts. We've talked about expectations for the game and personality issues.
00:19:42
Speaker
Mark, it's time for us to start fixing these conflicts. You're the GM. You've got a sort of mature mediating role to play here. Let's ah walk down the the road here. What do you do? How do you address things when conflicts happen?
00:19:55
Speaker
When you're the GM, whether you like it or not, everybody's going to be looking at you to fix some of these problems. I don't care who you are. If you're the active GM at the table, everybody looks at you.
00:20:06
Speaker
So yeah this is part of the role of the GM. It's probably everybody's least favorite part of that role, honestly. So now, Mark, how do you fulfill that role? What do you do when you need to address conflict at the game?
00:20:17
Speaker
You should be aware of the conflict. See, if you're not aware, you need to be listening right away. You should be seeing some of this stuff kind of happening if you're being attentive. It doesn't just go from like zero to everybody's fighting, right? Yeah. Usually you can kind of foresee.
00:20:31
Speaker
There's usually hints along the way. And if you're paying attention, you're going to catch up. But let's say you didn't. It's time to listen. And you need to listen to what what they're telling you. Ben, you've had to hear and field complaints from listeners. What are your thoughts?
00:20:47
Speaker
I think the listening thing is the first point. And I think what's nice is that if you make small adjustments, you probably won't have things flare up into worse situations. So, you know, trying to find a way that you can, you know, manage people's expectations, listening, asking people proactively for feedback um after a given session or two, maybe the first couple of sessions.
00:21:07
Speaker
Hey, how are things going? Are you having fun? Is this character working out for you? Talking about that kind of stuff. People will tell you if you're careful with it. And one one thing too, Ben, in when people openly complain to you and they they got a problem, they're complaining about something.
00:21:23
Speaker
i want people to really keep this in their mind. People who complain, people who have these issues and they're vocalizing it, that means they care. at the yeah At the baseline is that they're actually invested in your game.
00:21:38
Speaker
So like I know it at the time it it can be tough, even if it's criticism toward you. But just know this, they're only complaining because they they care. They really want to have a good experience and they're saying something about it because they've got expectations. that are maybe being disappointed. But the point is, those expectations are things that you can play to.
00:21:58
Speaker
It's the people who don't complain i'm I'm probably more worried about, to be honest with you. Those are the ones i can't I can't really deal with because they're not vested. And so they can walk away from the game at any time.
00:22:09
Speaker
So keep that in mind, you guys. All right, so we've spent some time listening. We've been listening to what people care about. What's the next step here? Now that you've got the issues out in the open, what do you do?
00:22:21
Speaker
Well, we have to start deliberating. so Yeah, kind of read it reach a consensus or something. if Can it be reached? Can this consensus be reached? Yeah, are there ways to kind of help people adjust their behavior, help people understand the impact their choices and their words are making on others?
00:22:38
Speaker
I feel like this is all kind of like... Conflict mediation 101, there's probably better Wikipedia pages than any of our kind of standard stuff. But that's the next thing I would do is just start trying to bring people into that dialogue, assume goodwill and see where you can get to.
00:22:53
Speaker
Yeah, if there's something you can adjust, if the players can adjust, you know do that adjustment, see if it works. But you know what, Ben, there might be situations that, you know, can't be resolved quite readily.
00:23:04
Speaker
And you as a GM might have to just pick a side. And I know that sounds a little harsh, but like, some things can't be resolved. Yeah, what's interesting here is that as a GM, you have a role to, in some sense, try to preserve the game.
00:23:17
Speaker
And that example you had a minute ago where you had to have a friend leave a game, a good friend, that's that's tough. But in a certain sense in a certain sense, it's the right call because what you're trying to do is you're trying to preserve the integrity of the game for the people that are playing it.
00:23:32
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, it's true. And maybe that that time off for that player might might do them well as well. It might do them well. Yeah, it's certainly the case that that when emotions are running high, giving people space to cool off and then re-approach that discussion is can be really valuable.
00:23:48
Speaker
But picking a side is brutal. and Nobody wants to get to that far. So if you can kind of nip these things in the bud. Had I been a little bit more attentive, maybe more deft at conflict mitigation, maybe I wouldn't have had to do that.
00:24:03
Speaker
But that's also kind of my inexperience at the time. so You know, I'll say this too. I've never, ah I'll bet you kind of would say this too, but at least I can say I've never had one of these kind of player conflict things.
00:24:15
Speaker
However it got worked out, positive or not, that I didn't end up like replaying in my head all like a lot later and just working over in my head and kind of going, well, could i have done this better? Could I have done that better? Yeah.
00:24:26
Speaker
they're just They're just horrible experiences to have. But, you know, guys, keep it cool. If you're going to be kind of at at the center of this thing, you're going to have to kind of not rise to a histrionics or anything like that.
00:24:40
Speaker
So you need to keep cool so you can help to deescalate. It'll lead to better outcomes. At the end of this, it may not be that the answer is to have the game continue. ah Conflict resolution doesn't necessarily mean that your game is going to keep going. even if Even if your role as the GM is to do what you can to preserve that game.
00:24:57
Speaker
I had a friend of mine who was running a game for years. He'd been running this game for time. I want to say five years or more. It wasn't always the same game. You know, he'd play a campaign here, play a different system there. But the point, it was the same group.
00:25:09
Speaker
And then one day, he kind of looked around. He was GMing, and everybody was on their phone. I actually wasn't there for this, but he looked around, everybody's on their phone and he just goes yeah, I'm done. This is it. You know, I'm not going to do this anymore. It's not fun. Cause you guys are all on your phones. and And that was it. That was how they, yeah ah was telling you that that is probably the biggest dagger.
00:25:29
Speaker
i would I, as a GM, that's one of the ones that just guts me when I see people on their phone. um So yeah, ah that's amazing. Like I can't even imagine how the air must have left the room right then.
00:25:43
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Well, so let's talk about air leaving the room and what happens next. So what kinds of things should people expect? Let's say we've done the conflict management. Maybe the group stayed together. Maybe people adjusted. Maybe they didn't. And the group kind of blew up and went sideways.
00:25:58
Speaker
Like what what kinds of things can happen down the road if these kinds of things come up? Groups can you know kind of reshuffle, reform. Maybe they pick up the pieces. Maybe there's some people that really enjoyed each other's company.
00:26:11
Speaker
So it could just reshuffle and continue on. I will say I've certainly played games with a large segment of people. Right. And I've had games where I tried to put person A and person B in a group.
00:26:23
Speaker
And those two people didn't work out together. But then later when I reshuffled those groups and it was like person A was with some other people, person B was with some other people. I had great games with each of them independently. Yeah.
00:26:34
Speaker
And reshuffling your groups to kind of try to find that optimal player chemistry, that is one of your great skills and strengths as a GM. Because it doesn't mean you have to stop playing with anybody if it's just something about two players' personalities is it not getting along. You just need to yeah reshuffle that group, and and then maybe you can just keep going.
00:26:55
Speaker
Sometimes that works. Sometimes switching up GMs was a good way to kind of kind of do that. Maybe that person is kind of being really ah aggressively, maybe a pessimistic or something like that.
00:27:09
Speaker
Maybe they get ah a chance to GM for a little bit and get that experience of like what it's like. was going to say, it's interesting when you put a rules lawyer in the GM seat, what happens. All of a sudden, it starts being a little bit more empathy at the table.
00:27:21
Speaker
Yeah, a little bit. Sometimes it works. Sometimes. and And everybody gets a fun new game. um So and like we talked about a little bit. Sometimes it's just good to have people cool off.
00:27:32
Speaker
Yeah. Change the context if you can. Right. Maybe that's about creating some distance. Hey, guys, we're not going to meet next week We're going to meet in two weeks. Or um maybe it's even playing a different game. You know, if you've got people, as we were saying before, who have expectations frustrated by the kind of game they're playing, they'd be happier playing a different game.
00:27:50
Speaker
Maybe you just play a different game and that'll fix itself. That's certainly possible. And I've had that happen before, too. Yeah, and you know sometimes these things, if you can if you could manage all this stuff well, you know if you're on your game and you manage these conflicts, your table could be better for it.
00:28:07
Speaker
you know Everybody there could be better for it. Yeah, people, when you've resolved a conflict, all of a sudden the group feels tighter because they go, well, we got through that. um i will say if you have too much of this kind of stuff happening and it's happening all the time, yeah.
00:28:21
Speaker
that's gonna wear things down. But you know what, in general, if we're playing a game and you and I have conflict and I say, you know what, I recognize that Mark kind of met me halfway or this thing that I was having a hard time with, he made some adjustments.
00:28:33
Speaker
Well, now we've got some goodwill. And lastly, before we kind of go on to our tune-up segment, you know for anybody who's listening who might think think they might be a party to any of these stories that we're kind of we're telling, we we still love you.
00:28:49
Speaker
I hope you reciprocate that as well. um These games, are they can be a challenge sometimes. They push you They take you to places that you don't often expect. Isn't that right?
00:29:00
Speaker
That's really true. So, ah but we do enjoy them and we enjoy, ah we enjoy you as well.
00:29:11
Speaker
So this week's tune-up segment, we have something that's very much in the spirit of a lot of this discussion we've just had. have a question. How do you manage players who create criminal characters?
00:29:22
Speaker
Rogues who steal are going to stir up quite a bit of trouble for the party. in this case, I think the person has in mind stealing from the local folks in the town, and then all of a sudden the town starts to turn on them or something like that. yeah Sometimes they might even steal from other party members. We've talked about that.
00:29:36
Speaker
This is one of the traditional kinds of things in like a D&D game is the rogue. There's characters who are running around with swords for a reason. How do we manage when players are creating these kind anti-social characters?
00:29:47
Speaker
Yeah, and we kind of already talked a little bit about this prior to this episode, but this kind of brings it back. Let's bring it back kind of in focus. You had mentioned, and I think let's kind of start from the beginning, is have those expectations would you at at the character creation.
00:30:03
Speaker
Like what kind of distractions do you want? Like how much of a distraction do you want your character to be at the table? Right. You know, and um it's not just between player and player sometimes.
00:30:15
Speaker
You can really derail a game by getting run out of town. Right. When maybe you had some big storyline that had to do with your characters being in town. Yeah. I needed you guys to have the audience in front of the ah local noble, except the problem is now his daughter's pregnant. So ah you guys have to go Thanks, Bard.
00:30:34
Speaker
Yeah. So on that note, like set that stuff up in the beginning. so you have those expectations. Then you could maybe come up with some things to do on the side when they get there. Like maybe maybe they want to do like a quick little solo thing that you can do after a session about stealing something. I don't know.
00:30:50
Speaker
Whatever their wish fulfillment might be. Yeah, I've seen, we've talked in the past about different solutions to this. Sometimes if they're super antisocial, at some point the GM goes, yoink, that's my NPC now, make a new character.
00:31:04
Speaker
think that's hilarious. I've seen that. I had had a player who was, one of our players was a little bit dysfunctional in personality. and um And it was clear that they were not goingnna this character was were not going to get along in the game.
00:31:19
Speaker
And I just remember our GM reaching across the table and grabbing that character sheet because this character is mine now. It is now one of my villains. You go make a new character.
00:31:31
Speaker
And I just remember like, oh, I cannot wait for that villain to appear so I can kick his ass. That's Yeah. It was fantastic. So there's an easy way to handle that right there, you guys.
00:31:44
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Maybe more moderately, right? Yeah. I will say there's there is a kind of a room for sandbox games where you don't necessarily have a story in mind that's got a deep narrative thread that you've got to be pulling players around.
00:32:00
Speaker
Sometimes it could be, hey, you're in a wide open environment. You, generally speaking, can pursue your characters' interests and aims, and we'll see what happens. Those kinds of things are going to be a little more amenable to some of these kinds of criminal behaviors and things.
00:32:13
Speaker
But I find that if players are thinking that's the kind of game they're in and GMs are not thinking that, then to your point earlier, that's something you want to really settle early on and make sure people understand what they're signing up for.
00:32:25
Speaker
really as a GM, you you do want to be giving them the experience that they're kind of ah expecting as long as you've kind of agreed to that. So don't shortchange him on the experience of being that criminal.
00:32:39
Speaker
Like what would Han Solo be without him being a bit of a smuggler and a thief? Yeah, I think something that could be really fun, if you think about the sort of let's call them story positive ways you can turn that behavior.
00:32:54
Speaker
Think about great heist movies, you know, think about what the Rose Guild wants you to do if they're going to give you that information or help you find that very rare, you know, herb or something.
00:33:05
Speaker
There's so many things you could do that could play into those strengths and let that character, that rogue, that criminal character shine. it doesn't have to be just a rogue. I mean, it could be a thug or a bully or something like that too. And if you're giving them enough opportunities to kind of explore that and have fun with that, they're going to be less disruptive player to player because you've let them have that outlet.
00:33:26
Speaker
Yeah, that's that's been mostly my experience too. um Again, to the extent that it matters, I tend to tell people up front that We're playing a heroic game. Try to be heroic even if you're not entirely above the law.
00:33:39
Speaker
so So that matters. Okay, friends. Well, I think that is our segment for this week. We've got other great stuff coming up. And ah we'll look forward to bringing you another episode of Tabletop Tune Up soon.
00:33:51
Speaker
You can, if you would like, email us your tune-up questions, thoughts, and ideas at tabletoptuneup at gmail.com give us some comments on the YouTube channel or wherever it is that you're getting this podcast.
00:34:04
Speaker
Thanks for joining us this week. And until we meet again, keep those dice rolling.
00:34:31
Speaker
We'll show you how it's done
00:35:45
Speaker
Show up.