The Gaming Den

Once upon a time, it seemed I could find players that sucked shit from a tube, and yet they had enough manic life energy to make for some decent stories. Now, I never seem to find players who can provide that minimal degree of entertainment.

I have one good player. He's a solid guy, and he occasionally even runs short campaigns. We've had a dream of actually being players in a game at the same time, but nine years of gaming together has not produced a GM capable of fulfilling that fantasy (aside from short-lived disasters like my wife's failure in Whores of the Dragon Queen).

The other players I find tend to fall into two categories: Non-entities and the Fun-Allergic.

Fuck passive players. My friend couldn't show up to a game one night and I found myself seated before three people who were all looking at their phones. I'm not some infantilizing Luddite who is going to introduce some "no technology" rule at the table, because anybody who goes to any social gathering and stares at their fucking phone instead of socializing just shouldn't be there to begin with.

After watching my wife and her friend show each other Facebook posts for a solid ten minutes, while a third player played Clash of Clans on a tablet, I began to seriously consider whipping out my dick, to see if anyone had a reaction, or announcing my intention to file for divorce (I believe ignoring your husband while he's DMing is grounds for a full annulment).

Clash of Clans guy is one of the far too many fun allergy guys I've dealt with. I honestly don't know why he shows up to games, much less what he considers a "good" game to be. I've asked him, and I don't think he knows either. As a player, he consistently bogs the game down in minutiae of things that nobody else cares about. He spent half an hour, as DM, making a player consider the pros and cons of parking spots. There was no consequence to the parking decision more significant than some 2 copper parking fee.

His times behind the DM screen are almost always first session total party kills. Want to test drive your freshly made character with a "kill bandits on the road" quest? Too fucking bad, because the bandits are all heavily armed barbarians that outnumber you, out-level you, have advantageous terrain, and are about to descend upon you with advanced, small-unit tactics.

Now, I would never actually condone violence against someone over a game, but I am considering a sign for my kitchen wall that says, "If the word 'overpowered' comes out of your mouth, I may punch your teeth down your throat." The Clans-man spent an obnoxious amount of time crying about Entangle being overpowered, shortly before murder-fucking us with a horde of barbarians.

My wife's friend offered to DM a game. It consisted of her reading a story to us that she typed up the night before. It included what our characters said in response to NPCs and how we reacted to various events. Our attempts to actually influence the game were shut down, and she flatly told me to stop interfering with her story.

I've been keeping this shit group of life support primarily for the opportunity to spend time with my friend, and I'm seriously near done with it.

/rant

At that point I'd have a more charitable response of "give up and whip out Settlers of Catan". Your average Euro game innately has less buy-in required than D&D what with the not having to come up with backstories or synergistic characters or such crap, so if it's worth keeping on life support it's worth keeping on *less strenuous* life support.

Omegonthesane wrote:At that point I'd have a more charitable response of "give up and whip out Settlers of Catan". Your average Euro game innately has less buy-in required than D&D what with the not having to come up with backstories or synergistic characters or such crap, so if it's worth keeping on life support it's worth keeping on *less strenuous* life support.

My wife refuses to play anything competitive. Her friend gives up on anything more complex than Cards Against Humanity. Clash whines bitterly about any offensive action taken against him in the hopes that we can be annoyed into leaving him alone to win.

So get a cooperative board game like Pandemic?

Grek wrote:So get a cooperative board game like Pandemic?

That is a good suggestion.

We've burned out Arkham Horror and Fury of Dracula, but I've had an eye on Pandemic. My local game store gives 20% off coupons if you participate in their board game nights.

Descent might be worth a shot. The lack of character building and real advancement doesn't scratch my RPG itch, but the dungeon crawling and little bits of jokey character development hits the spot for my old group that can't really play anymore.

While I'm sympathetic as all get out to this situation, I'm half intrigued by thinking of non-complex cooperative games over which your wife's friend won't pitch a fit. At this point I'd suggest Sentinels of the Multiverse and Forbidden Island, if angrily kicking this person out of your house isn't an option.

How about card games? I know the rules to Liverpool, that's pretty nice with four people.

Nebuchadnezzar wrote:While I'm sympathetic as all get out to this situation, I'm half intrigued by thinking of non-complex cooperative games over which your wife's friend won't pitch a fit. At this point I'd suggest Sentinels of the Multiverse and Forbidden Island, if angrily kicking this person out of your house isn't an option.

I'm waiting for the FLGS to restock Forbidden Island and Desert. I'll have to look up Sentinels.

Stinktopus wrote:because anybody who goes to any social gathering and stares at their fucking phone instead of socializing just shouldn't be there to begin with.

A-fraggin-men to that, when ye said "passive" figured you meant shy-folk, but I've great disdain for that kind of technology at the time. If you have to have a laptop for the game sure, can be nice to look something up, otherwise put down the phone when you're gonna game, and play dammit.

These kats sound like some pretty terrible folk, if they're nerdy at all, they put em to fraggin shame (though I guess RPGfans have a repute for being stupid too). Speaking of your "wife" you never told us how that game concluded. So can ye finish that up, I was kinda wondering where that went!

Also the whiny clash of clans bisatch, have you tried playing PARANOIA with him? Maybe he'll create ironically funny things in his "anti-fun" tardation? Lastly, what else do the "fun Allergic" all consist of doing, in part to what you've mentioned?

Aryxbez wrote: Speaking of your "wife" you never told us how that game concluded. So can ye finish that up, I was kinda wondering where that went!

My wife decided that running a module is hard, so she stopped. Then I ran a Star Wars Traveller game that went fairly well largely because my friend was the driving force/leader of the party. Then my friend ran a Star Wars Traveller game that went pretty well because I was the driving force/leader of the party.

In both Traveller games, the wife's friend stared at her tablet and didn't do anything unless I specifically told her to. Part of the tragedy of this is that she rolled really well on unarmed combat, meaning that she had a pretty good chance of disarming, grappling, and pinning Space Marines. I explained to her how all of those things worked, but, when her turn came around, her strategy would be to walk into the nearest group of heavily armed men and kick one.

In one game, Clash apprenticed himself to my friend and just obediently followed him around. In the other game he had Lightsaber Skill +$TEXAS and no personality worth noting.

Lastly, what else do the "fun Allergic" all consist of doing, in part to what you've mentioned?

It's hard to describe now obnoxious Clash can get. It's sort of like if someone walked up to you and started speaking in Mandarin (assuming you know no language even remotely related to Mandarin). If someone asked you what the person said, you wouldn't be able to recreate the sounds exactly because you don't have the proper framework in your head to even remember them properly.

Usually, when Clash is done talking, I'm furious and can't even articulate why.