What will you not allow?

[RyanW]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Same goes for party betraying disadvantages and actions. No, Lucy, not everyone is okay with your rogue stealing from their characters, in or out of character.

I've seen (in games I've played in, but not ones I've run) people justify the most disruptive actions by saying they are just playing their character realistically, then get upset when anyone else plays their character's realistic response to it. In D&D, that sort of behavior seems to be the default assumption of chaotic neutral, so if I ran that game (I don't, but if) I would be very reluctant to allow that alignment.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by RyanW

I've seen (in games I've played in, but not ones I've run) people justify the most disruptive actions by saying they are just playing their character realistically, then get upset when anyone else plays their character's realistic response to it. In D&D, that sort of behavior seems to be the default assumption of chaotic neutral, so if I ran that game (I don't, but if) I would be very reluctant to allow that alignment.

I think it's more that Chaotic Neutral tends to be the default alignment of choice for players who want to do that sort of thing.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by RyanW

I've seen (in games I've played in, but not ones I've run) people justify the most disruptive actions by saying they are just playing their character realistically, then get upset when anyone else plays their character's realistic response to it. In D&D, that sort of behavior seems to be the default assumption of chaotic neutral, so if I ran that game (I don't, but if) I would be very reluctant to allow that alignment.

I ran into that in a campaign decades ago using one of my sets of homebrew rules. The PCs were a group of superheroes; but one of them was a thief in her civilian life. So during combat with a group of villains, she used her powers to pick up some of the current villains' loot. Another PC spotted her doing it, and used HER powers to shut down the first PC's powers, which was embarrassing and hazardous, though it didn't actually harm her.

The first player complained about this not being appropriate, because he was just playing his character as he had defined her. The second player said that he was playing HIS character as he had defined her: as someone who was morally opposed to theft and who didn't want a teammate stealing during missions. The argument lasted for months, because the first player simply couldn't get the idea that his character didn't have "PC immunity."

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by whswhs

I ran into that in a campaign decades ago using one of my sets of homebrew rules. The PCs were a group of superheroes; but one of them was a thief in her civilian life. So during combat with a group of villains, she used her powers to pick up some of the current villains' loot. Another PC spotted her doing it, and used HER powers to shut down the first PC's powers, which was embarrassing and hazardous, though it didn't actually harm her.

The first player complained about this not being appropriate, because he was just playing his character as he had defined her. The second player said that he was playing HIS character as he had defined her: as someone who was morally opposed to theft and who didn't want a teammate stealing during missions. The argument lasted for months, because the first player simply couldn't get the idea that his character didn't have "PC immunity."

The somewhat common (explicit or implicit) prohibition on PVP activity can amount to a blank check for a certain sort of antisocial behavior, if the group doesn't provide other controls.

[AlexanderHowl]

Wait, people actually expect PC immunity? I mean, I know that you cannot tell players how their characters will react, that it part of their RP, but their characters are supposed to benefit and suffer according to their actions. If a player steps in with their character to punish the character of another player, it just means that I do not have to do it as GM.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Wait, people actually expect PC immunity? I mean, I know that you cannot tell players how their characters will react, that it part of their RP, but their characters are supposed to benefit and suffer according to their actions. If a player steps in with their character to punish the character of another player, it just means that I do not have to do it as GM.

It's seriously very common for PvP to be seen as a bad thing in a variety of ways. There are plenty of good reasons for that, depending on the game you're playing and what kinds of game-sabotaging behaviors you're worried about seeing.

You absolutely can constrain how players will RP, in many (probably most) gaming groups.

[Litvyak]

Originally Posted by whswhs

I ran into that in a campaign decades ago using one of my sets of homebrew rules. The PCs were a group of superheroes; but one of them was a thief in her civilian life. So during combat with a group of villains, she used her powers to pick up some of the current villains' loot. Another PC spotted her doing it, and used HER powers to shut down the first PC's powers, which was embarrassing and hazardous, though it didn't actually harm her.

The first player complained about this not being appropriate, because he was just playing his character as he had defined her. The second player said that he was playing HIS character as he had defined her: as someone who was morally opposed to theft and who didn't want a teammate stealing during missions. The argument lasted for months, because the first player simply couldn't get the idea that his character didn't have "PC immunity."

I guess it's a matter of perspective, but screwing over your teammate during battle sounds like kind of a jerk move. I mean, why not confront them about the theft when the fighting was over?

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Litvyak

I guess it's a matter of perspective, but screwing over your teammate during battle sounds like kind of a jerk move. I mean, why not confront them about the theft when the fighting was over?

That's an argument, but it's not the argument that the player advanced. He was arguing that the other player's character should not do anything at all to prevent his character from doing what he chose to have her do.

[JoelSammallahti]

This is a great thread. I'm really enjoying the little hints and implications about how people have really different expectations and standards when it comes to RPGs.

I've thought about this before: our hobby is really exceptional in its insularity. Over 20 years, I've played with about 25 people total, aside from a handful of one-shot convention games. That's all the people I've ever seen play a roleplaying game! An amateur jazz musician has heard hundreds of people play jazz; a soccer player's seen hundreds of people play soccer, etc., but a roleplayer has a sample of peers roughly an order of magnitude smaller, and a sample of individual performances (game sessions) maybe two orders of magnitude.

We have these little, largely separate pockets of roleplaying, like isolated populations of a dispersed species, where only once every couple of generations does somebody move from one population to another and mix up the gene pool a little. And they grow really distinct from one another, on top of the founder effect of any given local rpg scene having usually been started by some specific couple of guys who happened to buy D&D long ago.

Nowadays, of course, with podcasts and livestreams and whatnot, that's bound to change - people starting out today are likely exposed to and influenced by the playing style of many groups they'll never interact with IRL. That's another interesting question: what are traditions or habits that are going to spread, what's going to change. I hope there are some anthropologists or folklorists or sociologists working on documenting this stuff.

[mr beer]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Wait, people actually expect PC immunity? I mean, I know that you cannot tell players how their characters will react, that it part of their RP, but their characters are supposed to benefit and suffer according to their actions. If a player steps in with their character to punish the character of another player, it just means that I do not have to do it as GM.

Jerkface players who play jerkface characters are often the kind of people who expect being a jerkface to be an entirely one way street. They can ruin everyone else's fun but consequences are crossing a line.