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So I decide to take a batch of players I've never met and undergo the Age of Worms...they knew about this for two weeks before the game date. I get there and we do the intros...the first hint I get from one of the players thats something's amiss: "I know a little about Diamond Lake..." (Huh?....Don't tell me...)anyway most of the group are nice guys and all so we go on....finally half the group tells me they were DM'ing Whispering Cairn for their own group "But don't worry, they all died at the Wing Warriors encounter...we didn't get very far" Far? Isn't that near the END of the first adventure? What to do? Well, they find two dead wolves and a third comes running out from the crypt chased by two hell hounds...now the 'in the know'players are a little surprised. Fortunatly I've read up to Adventure 4, and rather than a coffin, they find an elevator down.."What the hell? You totally changed this..." They encounter tieflings and get their asses beat, come back and get ambushed by Grimlocks (yeah the Cult is below the whispering cairn)...3 party members are at negatives, two are exactly at '0'...the two remainign grims roll lousy on sense motive and the halfing barbarain with his greatsword and one of two clerics of saint cuthbert roll great on bluff....when the grims leave for assistance, the '0' hp folk use tiefling potions to revive and run away with the rest of the party. But it still pisses me off they neglected to tell me half the party has read the entire first adventure....three of the guys are descent players who just want to have fun, but a few are critical of how the adventures running since they would handle a few NPC diffrently...should I continue the game or no? I'm running the game for local players as well on opposite weekends, so I have an easy out...
As a DM who doesn't get a chance to play, I'm sympathetic to those DMs who are willing to play an adventure "as if" they haven't read it. I think it depends on the way your folks are playing. If they are clearly taking advantage of their OOC knowledge, then you should address it with them. If they are just surprised because you are making some changes, then tell them to deal and give them a chance to role play properly.
Just my thoughts,
rooster
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As a DM who doesn't get a chance to play, I'm sympathetic to those DMs who are willing to play an adventure "as if" they haven't read it. I think it depends on the way your folks are playing. If they are clearly taking advantage of their OOC knowledge, then you should address it with them. If they are just surprised because you are making some changes, then tell them to deal and give them a chance to role play properly.
Just my thoughts,
rooster
You'd think they'd bother to tell me they were DM'ing it...with all the notice
Sounds like there will be little trust here -- not mentioning anything to start with, trying to scam you with the 'we only got through...' bit, then jumping on your efforts to make it surprising and challenging.
Do you need or want to play with them?
Regards,
Jack
Sounds to me like some folks are not being truly honest.
If it was me...
I'd drop this thing right away. Since they broke somewhat lied from the start, I personally would not want to deal with them. Players like that are not my kind of players...
or continue to make major modifications to the module, and if they don't like it, too damn bad. Half the fun of playing is 'not' knowing what is going to happen.
just my 2 bits...
I had this exact thing happen to me when I was a new DM. I started running the adventure and about 3 weeks in someone finally decide to tell me that all but one of the players had already played the adventure. I'll have to say, I was pretty mad. The players said they would still play and not use thier OOC knowledge. That didn't work at all. I think that they can say all they want that they won't use the OOC knowledge, but I believe that that's much easier said than done. I think you will need to change the adventure completely for it to be fun. I would just try to find something different to run if it was me.
Beldar
Drop these losers! They betrayed your trust from the get-go (NOT an acceptable thing) and now they're giving you grief over your attempts at originality and unknown danger? Who needs to deal with such behavior? If you have some unspoken personal motivation to play with these people then scrap AoW and start again with them with a whole new campaign (possibly some homebrew they can't possibly have played before).
DMs who put up with such stunts just encourage bad player behavior (which they will eventually take on to some other poor unsuspecting DM).
I'd have a LOOONG talk with these people before moving forward a single step toward game play.
I would have halted play and ended the game session the moment I learned that they'd read the adventure.
Who needs that kind of aggravation?
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Segue immediately to the Doomgrinder scenario and have them trampled to death by a massive war machine from the Age of the Gods. I'm starting to suspect one my players in my game as well. He subscribes to Dragon and has been coming to me about the Wormfood articles. I've never specifically called the game "Age of Worms" to prevent some of these issues though it doesn't take a genius to figure out what is being run. Still this last game he knew how to spell the names of NPCs with unconvential spellings which seemed odd to me. Once I suspect the jig is up the Doomgrinder will start up and all hell breaks loose.
Have they no respect?
as Dm's themselves they must understand the sheer amount of time and energy and money it takes to prepare these games. While they swann off on their nights out your stuck at home preparing, if your at work your constantly thinking about the upcomming sessions. while they stit at home watching movies you are hard at work in your study or bedroom planning and preparing, checking and rechecking,
You are a good DM you tailored the campaign, you pressed ahead with it once the penny had dropped,and you swatted aside thier misgivings, You are a generous DM
They shouldn't be allowed to play or DM they are wingers and cheats and i wouldn't want a DM like that running my games. The one true calling of a DM is that they should be Fair and entertaining.
I bet they even cheat on their character sheets.
Get rid you don't need the hassle, they probably never knew they had it so good sat at your table probably in your house.
Phil.T
This is the risk you take whenever you DM an off-the-storeshelf published adventure as written.
Just make drastic changes or change your campaign to a different adventure. Swap encounters like you have already done, or better yet just start a completely different campaign.
(I wouldn't continue running Age of Worms because it sounds like the group will just continue to read the magazine behind your back)
But don't give up the group or stop playing, if you like D&D and your players then there's no sense in abandoning the group.
Just change adventures.
continued from my last post....
did they say "thankyou at the end of the night"?
did they say "wow, i had a great time you really changed that adventure"?
did they even bring Pizza?
you aught to smack 'em round the head with a +5 rubber monk
Phil. T
Well you have a dishonest group but that doesn't mean you need to jump to conclusions. It's within the realm of possibility that they really wanted to play this adventure after they read it, and were afraid that you might not let them if you knew they had. Hence the half-truths and little white lies.
I suggest you front with them during the next session. Say "I think we got off on the wrong foot. Although I was caught off guard by the fact that you guys appear to have already played this, I'm not angry because I understand how much you sometimes want to play a module that you've already read. I want to see if we can make this work."
Then present them with some options. It's possible they like role-playing a lot and won't try to meta-game (it always happens a little though, we're only human). If that's the case, offer to run the module as is. If you don't feel they are truly that kind of role-player, then you could offer to run the game as more of a tactical simulation for them. They'd get to fight the battles and most of the storyline would be fairly simplified. You can also tell them you intend to alter the storyline to tailor-fit your campaign. You can either present one of these options and let them take it or leave it, or present several and let them vote on which they prefer. Obviously, you may come up with your own variations on these options of wholly unique options of your own.
In the event you suspect the players just can't get their grubby paws off the modules, you needn't fret. If you still desire to game with them, you can always write your own adventures (not as hard as it sounds) or even let someone else DM and play yourself!
I dunno - this is a pretty hard game to play if your players are not honest. I'm not sure I would put up with it. If nothing else I'd start setting some firm ground rules right know and if they can't or won't comply I'd walk. This game is a lot of work for a DM and the DM should expect the full co-operation from his players ... within certian understood constraints - driving your DM certifiably insane is a time honoured practice and while not exactly endorsed by DMs is implied as a possibility when they choose to sit behind the screen - but your not allowed to cheat at the game or act in a dishonest manner while driving them to the point where they start frothing at the mouth.