Anyone have some good ideas on stopping one player not PC from domineering the game? This player acts like it's his story. He uses player knowledge too often for my tastes. (How would a 15 year old with maybe 4th grade education know CSI type knowledge? Favorite line, I go into Grissom mode. No skills to back it up.) He makes comments to me/my character that I want to step OOC and ask is that IC or OOC?

I've mentioned a few times that I didn't realise his character was present when he dictates a course of action. When his character is present, he jumps the gun and says what action he will take before anyone else can offer an idea. I have pointed out the folly of some of these choices, but the GM doesn't seem to want to make everyone pay for his impulsiveness. I don't think the character has impulsive as a flaw, maybe I'll suggest he get it if he keeps up this behavior.

In fairness, few of his ideas are really bad, it's just that he rarely let's anyone else react first to anything the GM presents, and then the OOC stuff on top is getting to be too much.

[edit] Sorry, thought you were the GM. As such, maybe you should direct him/her to this thread.

Enforce some "Anit-metagaming" things at your table.

ie. Unless he has skills to back it up, look at him and say "How would you know that?"

If he insists on things, let him default to intelligence for such skills. And then assign some sort of obscenely high target number, on top of the +4 for defaulting.

As to the impulsiveness flaw, nail the guys characters with the Impulsive flaw, without getting points.

As a note, I would do any of these things (and several more) at my own table.

Grim Shear
"I ain't cut out to be king."

Have you tried straight out talking to him and telling he needs to cool down a bit? It sounds like he enjoys the game and is probably a good hearted player, but seems to be a little weak on some of the concepts. Just talk with him like a normal person and see if that helps anything.

Firstly: Ask your GM about it. He's the one in the best position to deal with it.

Secondly: Talk to the players about it. Are ther est of them as pissed-off about it as you are? If they are, talk to them about speaking to the GM. If all of the players speak to the GM about it then something will happen. If you don't have the rest of the group's support; you become the one causing the problem.

Also: Ask your GM to define the world slightly more, or define it more yourself. IE: ask the player what the character is doing, or if they are even there. Then if he performs some course of action, suggest that people looking that way can act first ETC.

Speak to the player some more. Maybe even have some fun. Tell them OOC that you heard the GM mention that an assasin is going to kill their character if they don't get out of town, then watch the character go uber-paranoid.

Finally: Physically stop the character if they keep doing something stupid. Your character has power in the world, probably guns too. If their character is about to do something particularily stupid; restrain them.

Grimshear pretty much hit what needs to be done. The GM needs to have the player make skill rolls (or default, as appropriate) and then tell him what the results of the rolls are. The player cannot dictate the results. The first few times he spoils evidence, erases paydata, or makes other assorted mistakes should get the point across.

If this doesn't discourage the behavior, then force how his karma is spent. Everyone else gets X karma and he gets X karma applied to whatever skill(s) he decided his character had this session. If the character is interested in the material sufficiently to attempt to use it, then they should focus on that outside of "work", too.

Maybe the player really wants to play a forensic specialist instead of whatever he's actually playing? If so, talk him into making a new character. Ask him how he'd make a forensic specialist under the SR rules and talk about how useful such a character could be.

Along the same line, maybe recommend he make a "skills" character (skillwires or just a LOT of skill points)? Sure, they end up spread too thin to be effective at any one or two things, but they fill a lot of gaps that are left open in a group and can at least contribute in other areas.

A GM can also work to direct the game a little better. Pointing or nodding at each player in succession to indicate who they want to hear from - while ignoring players who speak out of turn - can go a long way toward bringing a game back under control.

Finally, I don't have anything wrong with a player who acts quickly. Some groups are terminally slow, taking five or more minutes at a time just to figure out who is going to open an unlocked door or talking out the tactics for the combat round ad nauseum while they're in combat! When time is of the essence, a group shouldn't have time to talk things out; they should have to make a decision quickly. I've had a GM take away characters' actions because they piddled around too long. While it may seem mean, it's realistic and it does a lot to keep a game rolling. For SR, all a GM has to do is enforce the restrictions on how much can be communicated with a free action.

Many many years ago, in Dragon managinze of all things, they published a list of D&D alignments but instead of alignments for PCs, they were alignment for the players. I mention this because out of the extensive list of amusing alignments we only ever remembered the one, Chaotic Everywhere.

Sounds to me like your friend is definitely Chaotic Everywhere and usually, it can be solved by poiting it out to the player, least it's always worked for us.

Player1: Ok I'm gonna head on out to meet with my fixer
Player2: I'll be meeting my contact at "6 Feet Under"
Player1: Oh ya! I forgot, I head to 6 Feet Under to meet with...
GM: Eeeeeeeeeasy there Chaotic Everywhere, mind if the rest of them play?

As far as a player constantly using info his character doesn't have, it's his job as a PC who SHOULD be striving for a good story to knock it off, and if he won't knock it off, it's up to the GM to maim him and get the message across. =)

Likewise, since he has NO skills to back his BS up, I would have a LOT of fun with that.

EX: gangers robbed a corner store, the PCs are for whatever reason, searching the place for clues. Yahooboy goes into "Grissom" mode but without any skill to show for it. Have him make a roll using whatever default he has and then work with the roll. This usually means inventing completely outlandish scenarios that the player with his massive NO skills relevant would "deduce" using his no training. By the time he's done checking out the corner store, he might be convinced the entire robbery was a decoy by cyber assassins who were trying to get a clear look into the restaurant across the street, they were 4, very well armed and one of them was a mage. Truth of it is, it was a basic robbery, had nothing to do with assassins or anything else, just bored gangers. You have no investigative skills? Be prepared to come up with all the wrong assumptions. Least, that's what I'd do, but then, I'm a bastard.

Sunday

If all fails, a length of steel pipe or rebar works wonders.

"Behaviour mod!"

~J

Hmmm. overly enthusiastic, eh? Question: does this person have Attention Deficit Disorder? Or another disorder that may help explain his behavior? If so, well, not much can be done about that.

It sounds like he loves to play. He sounds like a relatively new player, but with a good grasp of the game's base. He sounds a lot like when I started roleplaying. Perhaps all he needs is time and an occasional "Slow down there, Tex," from the other players/GM. Also, if he is the type to jump the gun, perhaps other players could jump the gun first! Be assertive. The ones who don't jump in with opinions and ideas generally don't get heard in my experience. Perhaps the first thing said in any scene should be, "Before Grissom can do anything..." then ask for more detail, propose an idea, or heck, even stall for time.

It might be good to keep sugary/ high caffiene snacks away from him too.

I hear a lot about "What to do about the disruptive player." That's good. But don't forget to think about what you can do about yourself.

Just curious, who is Grissom?

Grissom is the 'lead' protagonist on the show "CSI"

I've not been following all of this post just some of it, and i think i got the basic points.

Does this person know/ understand the term METAGAMING
Cos apart from his "oh me, me, pick me" stlye of attension seeking. Thats what i see as the main issue.

But then i might of missed something

One thing, if you do talk to him about the problems you have and he goes opposite, bring it up to the GM. And then to the rest of group.

I do this a lot. You get wrapped up in the game and you want to do everything. You're like a kid in a candy store! Everything is possible and you want to do it all before you have to be a lazy college student again.

We really just need reminders.

Tell the GM that your character pees on his character.
Then, pull out your dick and pee on his character sheet.
Ask the player if he now understands playing in-character and out-of-character?

Sorry, man, but this is the kind of player that needs immediate guidance and correction or immediate termination. If someone this obnoxious somehow managed to join my group without anyone noticing at first, he'd get pancaked pretty damn fast by the other players, then by me.

That's a little extreme. We want people to join the community, right? And how your acting, you'd try and scare off everyone.

Edit: And I am aware that the first part is kidding, although only slightly.

Hey, Moosegod, believe you me when I say I know where you're coming from - I've spent over a decade mentoring new players and GMs from here to the Greenwich Mean Time - but there are a LOT of people that need scaring away from our community and I'm happy to do it.

Hehe, and, yes, pissing on the guy's character sheet is extreme and was meant as a joke. I have burned someone's character sheet before when the player got all self-righteous after another player made a crack at his expense. He disrupted the game from then on after that and wouldn't leave so out came the lighter ....

I don't have any problems with veteran players venting on me or each other when they need to - I trust my regulars to be mature enough to know when to stop. I also don't have a problem with newbies who may be a little over-enthusiastic - my regulars are good enough to teach them the ropes very quickly or I will. But I don't have an ounce of patience for nitwits who are completely out of their depth and neither possess the rudimentary intelligence to realise it nor the humility to be able to taught.

What? Wrap 'em up and send them to WW?



Mentoring is so rewarding, I must say. Although I've only managed to keep about 2/5 of my total recruitment pool.

Sounds like an apt punishment. Or if they're munchkins, give them a copy of the Fringeworthy core rulebook.

~J

Tisoz, it sounds like you have a pretty good grasp on stuff, just don't pee on anyone. But BitBasher brings up an excellent point. If you go up to the guy and say 'hey, you're a buttmunch, let other people play too' (not that you would), he'll respond poorly. Before you confront the player, brush up on the 10 rules of arguing. I hope you don't end up actually arguing, but they're useful rules for everyone, nonetheless. The biggest one is try not to say what the person is doing, but what you're feeling. Then it sounds like you are asking for a favor and not condemning the other player. So say 'I feel like, when you jump in, that you don't give me time to play' or something like. In my experience, it tends to get a better reaction than urine or fire.

It's pretty simple, really. See what the GM thinks. If the GM doesn't see anything wrong with the player's behavior, then no amount of player to player argument, discussion, or bribery is going to fix the problem. The way to fix the problem is through the GM as well, as many people have said.

It is the GM that sets the tone of the game, in most cases, and in the cases where he doesn't directly set the tone, he does influence it heavily. What the GM allows is what is going to be acceptable (obviously) so if your GM makes a point of giving everyone their 15 minutes and enforcing die rolls for things that should require them then that's the kind of game you'll have.

DISCLAIMER: The above serious post was written as an alternative to adapting the following quote from Resevour Dogs to cover RPG players:

Tell him that he's acting like a first-year fragging thief, and you're acting like a professional.

~J

Nez really gives good advice, but I'll add another tid-bit.

Give it time, and reinforcement. Ask this 'favour' well in advance of the next game session - that way the temper-tantrum occurs well outside the game. He can stew and muddle with his emotions on his own time.

People have this thing called reactance where they do the opposite of what they're asked because. (Like walking on "Keep off the grass" lawn). You gotta give him time to work through these demons.

As well, remind him before the game about your 'favour'. 'Cause some people forget these things.