So I've heard stories of when a GM for whatever reason finally snaps with unruly players and does something rash and TPKs the party in a fit of rage.
I've only seen this happening once in a DnD 5e gaming club a few years ago.
He was a railroady DM anyway and the players wouldn't "Do what he wanted", that and they were being quite unruly, mostly being made up of teenage boys.
Anyway, so the setting was a sort of lost Dinosaur Valley/Lost world type thing.
Things got out of hand when the players wouldn't "Do what they were supposed to do" and the session broke down into bickering with each other, including the DM.
In the end, the DM lost it and said in a fit of rage "A Tarrasque turns up" and it proceeded to destroy the entire party, resulting in a TPK.
He was banned from DMing after that.
So a combination of bad DMing and unruly players. But still very funny!
So do you have any stories of the GM losing it?
Not since middle school.
I learned about myself in high school that if I GM'd too long and got too tired, that a TPK was almost surely the result. We had a marathon weekend starting Friday afternoon and finishing mid-morning on Sunday with about 2 hours sleep each night. Three or four incidents of a TPK or near TPK. I was discussing with the players later why it happened and they realized that there had been warning signs of ratcheted up difficulty about an hour before each TPK. After that, it was not uncommon for a player to say, "We want push on, but not until Steve has had some sleep." :)
I've never seen it myself. I think the closest I've ever seen was when we were playing a slightly modified 3E with one character who was effectively a wild mage (before the rules for it came out). Her first spell misfired and we nearly lost half the party, only saved by a number of well-rolled Reflex saves and Strength checks (the surge created a hole in the dungeon floor that punched through into a larger cavern beneath).
As we prepped rope and pitons to rappel down, the GM looked at his maps, then casually tossed a couple sheets over his shoulder while saying, "Well, not gonna need THESE any more..." It was more funny than angry, and even he was amused at the way the campaign went completely pear shaped after a while.
Does simply stopping play and saying, "Game over. I'm done. I will not be hosting another session, and if you guys want to continue, I am not interested in joining you" count? If so, I did it with my 5e game last summer.
Quote from: HappyDaze on January 28, 2021, 09:36:42 AM
Does simply stopping play and saying, "Game over. I'm done. I will not be hosting another session, and if you guys want to continue, I am not interested in joining you" count? If so, I did it with my 5e game last summer.
I'd say it does. What did the players do to make you bail?
Quote from: Eirikrautha on January 28, 2021, 11:16:19 AM
Quote from: HappyDaze on January 28, 2021, 09:36:42 AM
Does simply stopping play and saying, "Game over. I'm done. I will not be hosting another session, and if you guys want to continue, I am not interested in joining you" count? If so, I did it with my 5e game last summer.
I'd say it does. What did the players do to make you bail?
One guy over-analysed everything and insisted that all locations be mapped out if there was any chance of combat so he could show his tactical acumen (which wasn't all that great). Another was a lump that barely interacted and took forever to make a decision. A third was into taking nothing seriously and always trying to do the craziest shit possible (and asking to push the boundaries of what was possible at every opportunity). Beyond that, I just wasn't enjoying the "modern 5e experience" all that much (preferring something more like WFRP).
Quote from: danskmacabre on January 27, 2021, 11:08:29 PM
So I've heard stories of when a GM for whatever reason finally snaps with unruly players and does something rash and TPKs the party in a fit of rage.
I've only seen this happening once in a DnD 5e gaming club a few years ago.
He was a railroady DM anyway and the players wouldn't "Do what he wanted", that and they were being quite unruly, mostly being made up of teenage boys.
Anyway, so the setting was a sort of lost Dinosaur Valley/Lost world type thing.
Things got out of hand when the players wouldn't "Do what they were supposed to do" and the session broke down into bickering with each other, including the DM.
In the end, the DM lost it and said in a fit of rage "A Tarrasque turns up" and it proceeded to destroy the entire party, resulting in a TPK.
He was banned from DMing after that.
So a combination of bad DMing and unruly players. But still very funny!
So do you have any stories of the GM losing it?
Introducing the Total Party
Self-Kill (TPSK)
I don't know if it qualifies, but this and the reverse happened in high school.
The DM was big into Eye of the beholder II, a videogame about a party entrapped in a dungeon. So, he tried to replicate it in his campaigns: when you entered the megadungeon, the entrance door closed behind you and it was impossible to open or to teleport outside, except maybe with a
Wish and you had to gain you freedom by clearing the dungeon.
One time he sent us to an island (even prisoners get yard time!) and we got a ship, some retainers and we decided to set up a pirate enterprise. He strongly disliked it and he sent us
500 years into the future (!) where a patron ordered us to clear a 2000-room dungeon (or so it looked to us). We players were so pissed off...
Out of game we players agreed to kill all our characters in order to end the dungeon and campaign.
During a fight we spread flammable oil all over the place and we lighted it.
DM : But this way you'll kill your characters. Wait, a saving-throw....
Me: I doesn't matter: we fucked up big time, we're not going to survive. It happens...
We remember the face of the Dm to this day, he was speeechless.
I hvae been running games (as a DM/GM/etc.) since 1981 and I am intimately familiar with the PC's not going the way you expect, or would like them to go.
In fact my teenage gaming buddies would try to sabotage whatever adventure I had planned. They woukd attack quest givers, or random people, fireball taverns, mouth off to the king. I just learned to roll with it and figured out how to improvise. I had a plethora of fantasy novels and movies that I had consumed to draw on for plots and encounters, so when one did entice the players, I would just throw out another hook until they bit. If none of them worked, it was time to roll for "random" encounters (in which I would disregard whatever the dice said and pick the result that I thought would be the most fun.
If the players wandered aimlessly, they could stumble upon any adventure site that I had tried to get them to go to in the past and they had utterly ignored.
During the first couple years that I DM'd I did so for 5e. Although I never TPK'd a party in that system (nor any other for that matter to this day), I did resort to cheating on my side of the screen. Generally this would happen when I was worried about the players being bored, although sometimes it was simply because I wanted a "boss" to get to use a special ability. I would call out rolls as hits without even calculating the odds, beef up monsters mid-fight, or power-through a creature's ability even if it went against tradition or the rules. I didn't do this out of dislike of the players, more out of frustration that the game seemed to be going poorly or if it felt like I had miscalculated a big set piece and the fight was going to end "to soon".
I'm strongly opposed to that way of playing, and am thankful that I have matured as a player and grown as a GM to the point that I do not feel such urges, and understand that the players are not going to care more about the game if their PCs lose a bunch of hitpoints.
Quote from: HappyDaze on January 28, 2021, 11:36:44 AM
Quote from: Eirikrautha on January 28, 2021, 11:16:19 AM
Quote from: HappyDaze on January 28, 2021, 09:36:42 AM
Does simply stopping play and saying, "Game over. I'm done. I will not be hosting another session, and if you guys want to continue, I am not interested in joining you" count? If so, I did it with my 5e game last summer.
I'd say it does. What did the players do to make you bail?
One guy over-analysed everything and insisted that all locations be mapped out if there was any chance of combat so he could show his tactical acumen (which wasn't all that great). Another was a lump that barely interacted and took forever to make a decision. A third was into taking nothing seriously and always trying to do the craziest shit possible (and asking to push the boundaries of what was possible at every opportunity). Beyond that, I just wasn't enjoying the "modern 5e experience" all that much (preferring something more like WFRP).
Was this online?
I had a good one whan I was one was running a pirate game....
"Ok, you have a ship, what will you do next?"
"....Not sure.....sail to a port and look for a job"
"LOOK FOR A JOB, YOU'RE PIRATES FFS, GRAB THE WORLD BY THE THROAT AND SHAKE IT UNTIL WHAT YOU WANT DROPS OUT!!!"
I give you, a ship, provisions, powder, shot and you want to go working for other men?!?!?
I wouldn't call it a ragequit, but one group did slowly just fade out because of various drama issues. It just stopped being fun, and the game became more about the drama than the game anymore. I just stopped running it eventually since people couldn't put it aside and act like adults. Sometimes I think about bringing the band back together and trying again, because it was amazing before it went sour, but once you lose that original energy it's hard to recapture the magic.
Quote from: Altheus on February 01, 2021, 11:39:47 AM
I had a good one whan I was one was running a pirate game....
"Ok, you have a ship, what will you do next?"
"....Not sure.....sail to a port and look for a job"
"LOOK FOR A JOB, YOU'RE PIRATES FFS, GRAB THE WORLD BY THE THROAT AND SHAKE IT UNTIL WHAT YOU WANT DROPS OUT!!!"
I give you, a ship, provisions, powder, shot and you want to go working for other men?!?!?
Can see how that assumption could arise. 90% of published adventures ever written are turgid shit in which some random hires the PCs as cheap muscle to do a thing.
Maybe they just thought that's what rpgs were - a game where you play a kind of armed day labourer.
QuoteCan see how that assumption could arise. 90% of published adventures ever written are turgid shit in which some random hires the PCs as cheap muscle to do a thing.
TBH PCs as mercenary band is quite common trope, used by teams all around the world.
Easy to connect team, easy to find shit to do, lot of cultural/histoircal inspirations, and so on.
Quote from: HappyDaze on January 28, 2021, 09:36:42 AM
Does simply stopping play and saying, "Game over. I'm done. I will not be hosting another session, and if you guys want to continue, I am not interested in joining you" count? If so, I did it with my 5e game last summer.
I have done this once with a group of players a long time ago. They were just horrible.
Fighting with each other as characters and players at the table most of the time. Attacked just about everything moving.
Lots of shouting, fighting, bickering etc.
I ran one session and at the end of it I told them I would never run a game for them aver again.
Not really a rage quit, as I finished the session barely. But I knew I was wasting my time and made it very clear I wasn't returning.
That's what you get I suppose if you answer an ad in a games store looking for a GM. This was pre-internet days, late 80s.
saw a fist fight over psionics vs antimagic field once. antimagic won.