I'm playing this for different worlds, not to be super awesome, Ace Rimmer ultimately is boring. When I liked comics, it was Weird War Tales, then later Heavy Metal, and certain graphic novels. Troublesome players I will either a) automatically kick or b) try to talk them down. Depends on my mood though.

Quote from: yabaziou;783066I know it is not very important, but havn't paladins access to healing spells and lay of hands for healing purpose in AD&D 1 ?

Yes but the 1e paladin does not get a lot of spells compared to a cleric.
He also would have to have memorized cure spells.
Lay on hands was a bit 'weak' in 1E, at least for purposes of healing a fighter.

Quote from: tenbones;783074This is precisely my point. I don't give a shit how powerful a power-gamer thinks his/her character is. A GM with experience doesn't need a whole lot of effort to create conflict that will force the PC into being challenged.

Good work btw - Bill!

A tactic I would have used would have been flocks of cloakers. Let the Paladin and Fighter do the work for you - hacking their friends to pieces. Cheap ploy, but effective.

I had a similar experience when a GM dropped out of his slot due to sudden illness at a con. And it was an free-form game, so I filled in because I know the slot had been filled by pre-registers and didn't want to leave them hanging.

So I rolled in and they pulled out all their pet snow-flake characters (mind you - this was the intent of the adventure unbeknownst to me until I arrived) - so I said fuck it, sure let's do this. I whipped out Throne of Bloodstone - they had their 50th lvl characters and were delightfully happy to play them. And I ran the module straight up, no pretense, no need to get tricky - they wiped before getting even through the first third of the module due to party-infighting trying to out-snowflake each other, and not working as a team.

Powergamers are easy to GM once you're a little seasoned in the GM-seat.

Bloodstone rules! I got to play in a campaign including those modules and it rocked.

My illusionist survived Orcus but died from Tiamat's poison tail stinger.

Those natural 1's hurt

I made it to Orcus with my party barely intact. I was playing a jicked out 15th lvl Kensai/16th lvl Yakuza (yeah... it was sick) and my party was three men down, leaving four of us, all powerhouses to deal with him.

He beat me to initiative and took me out with one hit from that wand.

Quote from: tenbones;783149I made it to Orcus with my party barely intact. I was playing a jicked out 15th lvl Kensai/16th lvl Yakuza (yeah... it was sick) and my party was three men down, leaving four of us, all powerhouses to deal with him.

He beat me to initiative and took me out with one hit from that wand.

1E Orcus has something sweet that makes his wand of death even more insane.

Time Stop.

Quote from: tenbones;783074And I ran the module straight up, no pretense, no need to get tricky - they wiped before getting even through the first third of the module due to party-infighting trying to out-snowflake each other, and not working as a team.

I'd scarcely be surprised.  50th level characters are the product of "I'm So Überrrrr!!!" gaming.  Playing well with others isn't a hallmark of that sort, let alone taking a back seat and being a wingman or REMF.

Quote from: daniel_ream;783081This paragraph nicely sums up why I stopped reading mainstream superhero comics in the 1990's, and why I stopped playing superhero RPGs at all until Marvel Heroic.

I don't disagree with your sentiment.  I just think that the vast majority of gamers generally -- and not just those playing supers games -- look to the obviously toughest character around for leadership, as opposed to the one whose character sheet states should be the boss.  The only exceptions are when certain players have the confidence of the others, no matter what the sheet says.

I've an anecdote.  I was in a startup boffer fantasy LARP once; the premise was that we were all shipwreck survivors, from three different vessels, on an uncharted island.  We all needed to turn in a page of background about our characters, and of the forty-some odd players, I was the only one who had any nautical or boatbuilding skills.  So, okay: I built me a catboat, and between me and my wife (who did up a tavernkeeper/apothecary, the only examples of both) we soaked up about a third of the minted coinage in the outfit.  (Fifteen years down the road, I use them for counters to represent hordes of crunchies in my tabletop games.)

One of the shticks was that my wife's and my characters were part of an ethnic minority, and the dozen or so PCs of that minority decided to start up our own "village" so we could be governed by our own.  As such, we needed to pick a leader.  And every single face turned to me.

See, we were all from a large LARP.  In that group, I was the game's most powerful wizard, and had been for over a dozen years.  I was a national leader, the knight-commander of a major order, and besides which I was at least ten years older than anyone else in that circle.  They were used to me being in a leadership position.

Except I didn't want to be.  I'd deliberately rolled up a schmuck peasant sailor so I could get away from it, because let me tell you, running a sixty person nation in a LARP with 35 events a year is a damn headache. And so I started to sputter: why, you, sir, you're a noble!  And you, ma'am, you're a knight!  Me, giving orders to you?  The very idea!  No sir, no sirree.

Quote from: tenbones;782959I should note so people understand I'm not a dick

I don't see why anyone would think your response to armour dude was dickish. Sounds pretty legit to me.

Quote from: Bill;783052It worked out well, but a party better at planning would have had a much easier time.

They'd obviously made up their characters on the spot, rather than taking them from 1st level.

One of the benefits of the level system is that it gives you time to learn, to develop tactics and teamwork. You lose a few characters and many more combats, and you get better. If you just write up a 99th level drowlesbianstripperninja, you won't be as effective as even a 5th level fighter someone dragged up from 1st.

Playing well, whether thespily or hacking, is a skill.

Quote from: Ravenswing;783357 I just think that the vast majority of gamers generally -- and not just those playing supers games -- look to the obviously toughest character around for leadership, as opposed to the one whose character sheet states should be the boss.

It's been my experience that this is true in games based mostly on combat, but that's 90% of traditional RPGs, so.

Quote from: Ravenswing;783357I just think that the vast majority of gamers generally -- and not just those playing supers games -- look to the obviously toughest character around for leadership, as opposed to the one whose character sheet states should be the boss.  The only exceptions are when certain players have the confidence of the others, no matter what the sheet says.

As a dissenting voice, my experience is the reverse of yours. The vast majority of gamers I've seen look for a leader based on player skills and traits, not based on character skills and traits. However, if and when they are going to look for a leader based on the character, then who leads is based on character leadership traits not character combat ability.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;783541They'd obviously made up their characters on the spot, rather than taking them from 1st level.

One of the benefits of the level system is that it gives you time to learn, to develop tactics and teamwork. You lose a few characters and many more combats, and you get better. If you just write up a 99th level drowlesbianstripperninja, you won't be as effective as even a 5th level fighter someone dragged up from 1st.

Playing well, whether thespily or hacking, is a skill.

I guess when you are a level 53 Wizard, or a 99th level drowlesbianstripperninja; you don't do teamwork.