Not looking for advice here; just to get this off my chest.
A couple years ago, my fledgling group included myself and two other players. We live in upstate NY, and finding players is a huge pain in the tuckus. So when player M mentioned that her brother loved games, I suggested that he give D&D a try. I knew that the brother, K, was autistic but I also knew he was very smart. Just socially challenged in the extreme; he has a condition called prognosia which means that he can't recognize faces at all. But whatever, he likes games and his older sister M would be chaperoning him. What could go wrong?
For a while, things worked out just fine. Our group expanded by two players. K sometimes got upset when he missed with a daily power, but M reigned him in. And he learned the rules in no time flat. He got his own books and dived right into the game. But then he started optimizing. He never tried to pull any hundreds-of-damage shenanigans, but he did get upset when I wouldn't let him make his paladin invisible to his own marked enemy. WotC errataed that combo so it didn't work shortly afterward. In fact, WotC has published a couple materials that are strikingly similar to my own homebrew stuff after I let my players use it. (It's hard not brag, 'cause as K himself said, some of the similarities are frighteningly close.)
Then he started complaining about my house rules, of which I have quite a few. (The other players like my rules overall, because they tend to benefit the PCs.) He started a blog, the first two posts of which were devoted to whining about my rules. He posted passive aggressive comments in my own blog. In an effort to be affable, I humored him and even got advice from the charop forum on how to make one of my rules better. But no matter what I say, he takes it as a challenge or arrogance or a threat. In fact, the last thing he emailed to me was an actual threat. Turns out autism often comes with paranoia, as M told me afterward.
So I've disinvited him to my campaign. Unfortunately, the damage has already been done. His parents are giving M hel because I won't have K anymore. She was so angry at the situation that she didn't show up last session, despite assuring me that she wouldn't let her parents guilt trip her about the issue. If I were the group's only DM, I'd cut the group's losses and look for new players. But we pass the DM scepter around every month or two, and the other DMs aren't as involved as I've been in this insanity. They aren't fans of K either, but they feel that putting up with him is an acceptable price of gaming with M. Unless he does something outrageous, at least. Since I recently passed the scepter on to another DM, M and K will both be coming back for next session. I'm hoping that K does do something outrageous so that the group boots him permanently.
The sad thing is, the reason that this is all a problem is that I invited K to try D&D in the first place, and now I regret doing that. If I had been a bit more small-minded about autism, it would have ultimately saved us all a lot of grief. Even sadder, it might not matter in the end because M's parents are apparently shipping her off to the military. It'll be good for her to get out of her parent's house and hopefully get some nurse training so she can eventually come back and get a decent job. But I'm a kobold if I don't feel like giving her father a good kick to the gut and her mother a few choice words about treating her daughter with respect and drawing a line somewhere with her son.
So there's nothing to be done at the moment. K will probably be gaming with us for a month or two until M goes off to take orders from angry drill sergeants, at which point we'll be down two players. Or M won't make it in the army, and she'll come back to her cr@ppy job and her bitter parents, and I'll have to put up with K while other DMs hold the scepter.
*sigh* Life's a b!tch, ain't it?
You have my sympathies for your ugly, and complex sistuation.
However, a threat is a threat. That is not acceptable. It looks like you are trying to make the hard right in not allowing a player that is not only 'out of sync' with your play style, but is beligerent as well!
I also feel bad for M, getting caught in the middle.
Best of luck, and I hope you get this resolved.
GNOME
Do you feel in danger due to the threat K leveled against you?
If so, you need to make this clear to the group, M, and her family--all while being clear you know the situation is not M's fault. You should not feel forced to associate with someone who has threatened you, regardless of their mental condition.
That, to me, is the main issue here.
The rest is a very complicated situation; it's difficult to comment further.
Do you feel in danger due to the threat K leveled against you?
Not likely. K has made empty threats before, though those involved him quitting the game rather than having his father assault me. Still, ya never know, so I won't be turning my back on him.
I think it's great that you took the chance on playing with a kid with autism. People with autism spectrum disorders need opportunities to interact with mainstream groups. But they also need to be held accountable for unacceptible behaviors like making bodily threats. I don't think, from the information I know, that you're doing anything wrong and I sympatize with you.
I hope you can keep some measure of sympathy for K's and M's parents, though. Having a kid with any developmental disability is a seriously trying experience. It can be really damaging, turning people who would otherwise be decent and well-adjusted parents into... something else. And it's often the other kids (or the marriage itself) that suffer from that simply because the kid with the disability needs so much to come close to the quality of life an even slightly neglected sibling already has.
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I agree with Bill's sentiments, but that is not a license for K to be beligerent or threaten people (I understand your not saying that it is, Bill). He should be told that behavior is not to be tolerated, and that if he isnt happy with the rules of the game, he should feel free to sit out til another DM comes up to the plate.
Since you seem to be past that option, Id say you should definitely talk to the parents about it. Let them know how you feel, and about how it wont be tolerated (ie, depending on what he threatened, you might insinuate if he continues to play and continues to threaten, then youll call the cops, or something along those lines).
I agree with Bill's sentiments, but that is not a license for K to be beligerent or threaten people (I understand your not saying that it is, Bill). He should be told that behavior is not to be tolerated, and that if he isnt happy with the rules of the game, he should feel free to sit out til another DM comes up to the plate.
The pathetic thing is, I've told him exactly that, as have several WotC charoppers. If he really doesn't like how I DM, well, no D&D is better than bad D&D. No hard feelings, and all that. And as I mentioned, he's threatened several times to quit due to my style but he always shows up on game day bright eyed and bushy tailed.
He's convinced that he can argue me into DMing by RAW. He won't sit out or quit to make a point, but he won't accept that different DMs use different rules. (I often wonder how he would deal with pre-3e, or other games entirely, where GMs are basically expected to be part-time game devs.)
Funny you mention talking to his parents, because M just emailed me to invite me to a crash course in autism with her mom, and dinner. Normally I'd be happy to learn a bit about autism, but I don't feel like having anything to do with her family at all. Granted, I haven't been communicating with her parents directly, but from M's words and actions they haven't displayed much more maturity than K. Every time I've tried to reach out to K, he gets upset and M misses a game session, so I feel like talking to her parents is just asking for trouble. And I certainly don't feel like eating with anyone but M.
Funny you mention talking to his parents, because M just emailed me to invite me to a crash course in autism with her mom, and dinner. Normally I'd be happy to learn a bit about autism, but I don't feel like having anything to do with her family at all. Granted, I haven't been communicating with her parents directly, but from M's words and actions they haven't displayed much more maturity than K. Every time I've tried to reach out to K, he gets upset and M misses a game session, so I feel like talking to her parents is just asking for trouble. And I certainly don't feel like eating with anyone but M.
I'm not sure I'd be terribly willing to go to that dinner either. Mom may find it hard to resist trying to rake you over the coals. But if you do decide to go for it, suggest neutral territory like a restaurant and bring a printout of the threats K made so you can show her the unacceptible behavior that has gotten him uninvited from your game.
Turns out autism often comes with paranoia, as M told me afterward.
I have a friend whose child is autistic. My GF job is helping take care of two autistic children. Her ex is mildly autistic. I have never herd of paranoia being a part of it and none of the autistic individuals I or they have had contact with had any sort of paranoia. I'd bet money you are being fed a line there.
Poking around on Google and I found at least one article that purports that there is a link between Asperger's and Paranoia. Link. I'm no expert - make of it what you will.
Poking around on Google and I found at least one article that purports that there is a link between Asperger's and Paranoia. Link. I'm no expert - make of it what you will.
I have a child with high-functioning autism and that's the first I've ever heard of that. Anxiety, sometimes extreme anxiety, is quite common however. And the examples they give don't really fit the definition of paranoia. I've had to defuse more than a few situations that have spiralled out of control due to teasing not being understood, and have had to leave family functions early because family members refuse to respect the need for no teasing. For a child who still doesn't understand the concept of lying it can be very traumatic.
Well it could be that he's paranoid just because he's paranoid, although I don't know why M would invent or mistake a correlation between autism and paranoia. Either way, K clearly thinks that I'm out to get him.
I wonder how he would react to one of those horror story gamers who actually was out to get him.