hi to all!!
i recently read about a DM who has problems dealign with a too smart player. a difficult issue. i have a similar problem. I thik one of my players read the adventures in advance. As long as it goes, it's only a suspicion, but i've asked our last DM (who now plays savage tide with him, and were Age of worms Ap DM)) and he said he is near sure that this player readed age of worms in advance. I can't have evidences of dirty play, but what happend until now is this:
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he is runnig a rogue
in first encounter, aboard the blue nixie, he wants to set the hold on fire "trapping the pirates in ". Luckily, other players convinced him that the mission was recover the ship, not destroying it.
the he figured the vanderboren's vault combination at the very first moment of finding the ring. Another player readed the handout aloud, and he inmediatly states "looks like a combination. could be tied to the number of eyes".
he buyed 4 vials of antitoxin (with lavinia's payment) before entering the vault. (of course, opening the vault was 30 secs of roleplaying)
he insisted in exploring parrot's island, even before lavinia ask them to find vanthus (i not allow them to find nothing until the informant revealed) and then he said that " must leave some guards on the entrance, or find another acces, maybe underwater". inside, P4 was the one and only room in all dungeon he cares to search for secret doors.
He was the first and only player to say "looks like an illusion" whe Roblach animated his animals.
Now, they just enterd the Lotus drangons guild, but i guess things will stay the same.
i don't know what to do. If i kill his character (diabolic laugh here)he will simply roll a new one and leave me with the problem. if posible, i'd like to keep him in the group (we've been playing for 15 years, from second edition, and also are close friends). i don't know why he does it, but is ruining fun for me and some other players (specially the other DM, who helps me a lot pulling him again into the story)
so, that's the question. I eternally thanks any advice you can give me.
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Move a secret room's entrance from one room to another. When he searches and can't find, note his reaction.
That's all it takes really. Go through the module prior to running and change some of the details. The iron cobra doesn't do poison damage, it does acid damage. The secret door isn't in B34, it's in B27. The room doesn't have 4 zombies, it has 6 skeletons. Little changes like that can really throw off a player that has preread an adventure.
Make sure you make the changes prior to running the module, instead of making them on the fly in reaction to something he does. In other words, don't change the iron cobra from poison to acid because he bought antitoxin. If the players theink you're just trying to mess with them, it'll discourage planning and cause them to lose interest in your game.
It's more work for you, but not alot more work. And it will put the unknown back into the campaign. Once the player figures out that prereading the adventure doesn't do any good because you mix things up, he might stop doing it.
Alternatively, you could just ask the entire group if any of them have read the adventure. Not in an accusatory tone, but just ask for the sake of keeping metagame knowledge to a minimum.
-Skeld
Make some arbitrary changes to the storyline, such as switching who the villains and victims are. When his game knowledge drops him into a world of hot water, he'll be sorry he tried to pull such a stunt.
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SirWulf's suggestion would have been mine, some years ago. But i think it punishes the wrong entity (the PC, and the rest of the party, suffer because the player is being a dink.)
And it's a lot more work than it sounds like. If you start turning around little details, he'll know that he can't trust those, but he'll still be confident he knows the bigger picture plot points. If you start changing those, then he'll be off his game. Start by making Vanthus a good guy; he won't be expecting that!! And change the villains from demon lords to, say, major devils in league with Modrons! But expect more work than you bargained for when you began to DM the adventure path.
So, talk to the offending player, away from the game. Explain the situation. Explain that you are trying to find a way for him to stay in the campaign. Ask him how far ahead he's read, and to what detail. This isn't an issue of blame; make it easy for him to explain.
If he levels with you, and you can have his character sit out a couple of adventures, then all's well. If he's read too far ahead, or if he won't 'fess up, then he's out.
This thread really saddens me, even the possibility that someone would do it.
I say change something up on him, If your noticing too many coincedinces stop him In his tracks by springing something totally new! So the look on his face will be like hey that's not suppose to be there! Just an Idea, I like to change the adventures around just a little bit If not completely. Not so much for the problem you have but just that i usually like to make It my own. Good luck.
DAve
I have all the mags, but save for the pictures, I haven't looked through them once. What would be the point in spoiling the adventure for yourself and others?
Totally, and even if I had read them I would tell the DM and make a point of not metagaming.
What a bummer.
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I have all the mags, but save for the pictures, I haven't looked through them once. What would be the point in spoiling the adventure for yourself and others?Totally, and even if I had read them I would tell the DM and make a point of not metagaming.
What a bummer.
I agree. There seem to be far too many people who think this game is a contest between the DM and the players to 'win' the game, instead of everyone having fun.
I have read the adventures; I hope to DM them one day. I learned not to metagame a long time ago, though, because it ruins the fun for everyone, and all for the sake of letting you swell your ego a bit at how 'kewl' you are for handling it all so easily.
I have read the adventures; I hope to DM them one day. I learned not to metagame a long time ago, though, because it ruins the fun for everyone, and all for the sake of letting you swell your ego a bit at how 'kewl' you are for handling it all so easily.
Many, if not most of my PbP players have read the APs I'm GMing. At least one of my RotRL PbP players is running his own version of the game.
I expect people to be adults and not metagame.
I also accept the honor system for dice rolls, also expecting people to be adults.
Expecting people to be adults should not be beyond the pale or surprising. What is surprising to me is the number of people who have problems acting like an adult.
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I love the poison to acid idea.
It blows when this happens, but it's bound to since the adventures are so available.
Change some things around.
Change the names of the NPC's. Find some other adventure and take the names and use them for STAP. Sometimes that's enough to mess with them. Also, don't refer to any of the NPC's by their class. Refer to all melee types as warriors, spellcasters as oracles or priests, and anyone else as a merchant. (I've noticed that people latch onto the classes of a NPC/villain for some reason.) Or call all melee warblades, spellcasters as wizards, and everything else as uncanny tricksters.
I would definitely move the secret doors around and move the traps. Heck, if you are putting numbers on the map while they are going through it... change the system. Use 21-H instead of B2.
It's a bit of work for you but it should help things.
If he starts to become a problem you'll need to talk to him, maybe ask him to leave. (last resort)
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I actually had a group break up because of this.
It did put an extra burdin on the DM, he was changing things, the player would look for them, and then question things when they weren't there. Are you sure there isn't a secret door there?? What a knob!! Many of the players didn't even realize what was going on until the DM asked us what could be done about it.
All of us have about 20 years of gameing in. We were surprised to say the least that he was doing it. We thought we knew him well enough to talk to him about it. We were wrong. He was very offended when we talked about it and he left taking another person from the group.
I still think that talking to the person is the thing to do. Just know your audiance and be honest. If things go south from there you did what you could. The game is for eveyone not just that person.
I have all the mags, but save for the pictures, I haven't looked through them once. What would be the point in spoiling the adventure for yourself and others?Totally, and even if I had read them I would tell the DM and make a point of not metagaming.
What a bummer.
I'd hope the DM ran something else - If the DM had his heart set on it and the adventure was not to large I'd inform everyone in the group that I'd read this adventure already and was not going to participate in the idea parts of the game - instead I'd just role play my character and follow whatever suggestions the other players offered.
I actually had a group break up because of this.
It did put an extra burdin on the DM, he was changing things, the player would look for them, and then question things when they weren't there. Are you sure there isn't a secret door there?? What a knob!! Many of the players didn't even realize what was going on until the DM asked us what could be done about it.
All of us have about 20 years of gameing in. We were surprised to say the least that he was doing it. We thought we knew him well enough to talk to him about it. We were wrong. He was very offended when we talked about it and he left taking another person from the group.
I still think that talking to the person is the thing to do. Just know your audiance and be honest. If things go south from there you did what you could. The game is for eveyone not just that person.
In the end maybe it was for the best - now the situation is resolved and the remaining players can try and put the game back together and possibly recruit some fresh blood.
thanks to all for your comments. It's true than best solution is changing things so he doesn't know what o expect. But i also had troubles changing things. Last summer, my players want to run a old-flavored adventure, so i agreed to run "the mud sorcerer's tomb", published in dungeon. Expecting this player reads it in advance, i'd do some changes in the setting. with many others, one of this was changing one illusory trap (teleporting)into a real trap (blade barrier). the result was that two other players (not him) were killed in the trap.
days later, talking about this player with them, y confess the changes, saying i put that trap willingly. One of the players get angry (i must admit i killed his favourite 15 level bladesinger), and said that changing adventures on my own was unbalancing and foul play. i argue that if changes are not on th fly, its fair play, but he states that he don't want to play more modified "unbalanced adentures".
of course, this is one of my savage tide players.
Also, i don't want to change the plot, and, even if i move secret chambers and encounter locations, he still knows most of the big picture (like malcathet plot with the fang, and shadow pearls peculiarities), not to mention the riddles and misteries, wich are my players favourite. I fear i face a full campaign rework, or some bad arguing with him (out of play).
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One of the players get angry (i must admit i killed his favourite 15 level bladesinger), and said that changing adventures on my own was unbalancing and foul play. i argue that if changes are not on th fly, its fair play, but he states that he don't want to play more modified "unbalanced adentures".
See me raise my hand and vote, "That's ridiculous." No module writer can prepare an adventure for YOUR group; nobody else knows what classes and levels the PC's have taken, what magic items they own, what aspects of play your players like or dread. There are all sorts of modifications DM's ought to make, all the time.
I suspect it wasn't the modifications that upset the player. Rather, it was the fact that his character died.
By the way, you didn't kill his favorite 15th-Level bladesinger. Whoever was playing the rogue who didn't check for traps in the room, killed the character. You set up a fair trap and adjudicated the results.
Also, i don't want to change the plot, and, even if i move secret chambers and encounter locations, he still knows most of the big picture (like malcathet plot with the fang, and shadow pearls peculiarities), not to mention the riddles and misteries, wich are my players favourite. I fear i face a full campaign rework, or some bad arguing with him (out of play).
Very true. Honestly, I think the "change stuff around" suggestions, by themselves, only trap you into playing this other guy's game. I would disinvite the cheating player, either immediately or after the next time he demonstrates amazing prescience.
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I'd call Shenanigans!
After attempting to be polite, be blunt. Tell the player if he keeps using out of character info he will be removed. Call him out. Preferably not in front of the other players. If he persists, remove the player, finish the campaign. After the campaign, you can give the player a 2nd chance in your new campaign.
I've called players on dice cheating, giving there toons too many skill points, writing in gear on there sheet after finding out the party could use something out in the wild.
You have to break an egg to make an omelet. Egg=Cheating player. Omelet=fun. Fun being the goal here.
Very early in my ST game, I had one of my players mention (in passing) something he'd read in an online game summary.
I nearly hit the roof. It was two days before I trusted my self-control enough to politely email him and ask not to read any further ahead rather than call him every name in the book and do my rabid damndest to get the group to kick him out.
Sure sometimes it's unavoidable if a player is GMing for a different group of something, but if this isn't an issue then actually going online and seeking out a summary (or Dungeon mag for that matter) shows a staggering amount of contempt for the GM and what he's trying to do. Personally, I find GMing is a lot of work (without the personal satisfaction of having a PC of my own to revel in the victories of...) and I get a lot of my payoff when I can surprise PCs or see how they react to unexpected situations. Having a player short-circuit that for his own selfish reasons really leaves me steamed.
most of you advice me to talk with this player about his actitude. may be a solution (none of us has done it, and i'm the second GM who has to deal with him in an adventure path), but i've been playing with him about 15 years, and i'm almost sure than he will deny any foul playing. i cannot present any proof, save the suspicious actitude. when he buye the infamous antitoxin i asked him what he want to do with it, he said "may be poisoned traps, or something". wich is relatively fair answer.
I'm considering simply get his character killed again and again until it makes sense to him, and stops pre-reading. i really don't want to rework all AP. it likes me very much as it is, and i fear to make mistakes that ruin the spirit of AP.
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most of you advice me to talk with this player about his actitude. may be a solution (none of us has done it, and i'm the second GM who has to deal with him in an adventure path), but i've been playing with him about 15 years, and i'm almost sure than he will deny any foul playing. i cannot present any proof, save the suspicious actitude. when he buye the infamous antitoxin i asked him what he want to do with it, he said "may be poisoned traps, or something". wich is relatively fair answer.
I'm considering simply get his character killed again and again until it makes sense to him, and stops pre-reading. i really don't want to rework all AP. it likes me very much as it is, and i fear to make mistakes that ruin the spirit of AP.
Don't let him deny it. Its a non issue at this point. You are not accusing him, your telling him stop. This is a one way, one phrase conversation. Done. This elevates him having to defend himself and concoct a lie that in essence is calling you and your players stupid. You don't have to be aggressive or mean. It's being direct.
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most of you advice me to talk with this player about his actitude. may be a solution (none of us has done it, and i'm the second GM who has to deal with him in an adventure path), but i've been playing with him about 15 years, and i'm almost sure than he will deny any foul playing. i cannot present any proof, save the suspicious actitude. when he buye the infamous antitoxin i asked him what he want to do with it, he said "may be poisoned traps, or something". wich is relatively fair answer.
I'm considering simply get his character killed again and again until it makes sense to him, and stops pre-reading. i really don't want to rework all AP. it likes me very much as it is, and i fear to make mistakes that ruin the spirit of AP.
It sounds like the question you are asking is: "How can I get the player to stop reading the adventures without confronting him about it?" The best answer I can give is that I don't know if it's possible. Changing things around might help, but it definitely makes more work for you and the player still has incentive to read ahead to get the answers to riddles and understand the plot of the AP before anyone else. This will still be the case even if you kill off a few of his characters, unless he gets the impression that you're doing it because you've caught on that he's cheating. In any case, simply talking to the group about it and asking that they respect you by not reading ahead is the easiest solution.
If you really don't want to confront him without proof, my advice would be to look for a situation in the AP where there is a piece of treasure that the player will want, but that is hidden in a spot PCs would be fairly unlikely to search, then place a trap over it that wouldn't otherwise be there just to gauge his reaction. If the trap does enough damage, he might blurt something out about how it wasn't supposed to be there. Again, though, I still think having a discussion would be the easiest thing to do.
Avoiding the confrontation isn't going to accomplish anything. All it does is yeild the "high ground" to him, because you're "sneakily" making changes and reacting to your suspicions, whereas he's maintaining his pretense of innocence.
You need to talk to him. Don't let it turn into an argument. Don't justify his attempts at denial. Prepare your statement in advance. And don't necessarily accuse, because the goal isn't to get an admission or an apology, the goal is to make him cooperate and, hopefully, to keep the friendship.
The points I would cover when you talk to him are as follows:
1) He seems to have a lot of knowledge about what's going to happen. He's made far too many "lucky guesses" about what is about to happen and what things are in the area. EITHER he's read ahead or he's a very lucky guesser.
2) The "lucky guesses" are ruining the game for some members of the group. (In this case, by the way, you count as one of those members.) There has been discussion in his absence about the fact he seems to know too much ahead of time.
3) If he's read ahead, he needs to fess up, tell you how far, and stop reading any further, and he needs to keep his meta-game knowledge out of the group. If he's making lucky guesses, he needs to think about what he's saying before he blurts things out, and let more of the game events happen without "spoiling" them for everyone else. Making a bee-line for the end of a scenario without exploring it, or guessing the answer to a puzzle without letting the group try to solve it, takes the fun out of the game for the rest of the group, and he needs to stop hogging the spotlight in this way.
4) If he can't cooperate with the group more and stop this pattern of behavior, you'll make the decision whether it's continuing to cause problems. You might decide he needs to replace his character and play a "stupid" character that isn't allowed to contribute ideas and suggestions (e.g. a barely-verbal barbarian); or you may have to ask him to leave the group for the rest of this adventure path if he can't share the spotlight more equally.
Be prepared - he may deny everything and get angry. Hold the moral high ground. It's possible he's completely innocent and has made lucky guesses. It's the way he's using his knowledge/guesses that's causing the problem. Don't accuse. Advise a change in behavior.
If he insists on anger, that's about 90% likely to mean he knows he's in the wrong but he intends to make you back down rather than admitting it - which means he's probably not ever going to change. At that point, you'll have to ask yourself why you value this friendship, when he obviously doesn't. My recommendation if this happens - talk to the rest of the group, and kick him out.
If the rest of the group is hesitant, I suppose you can try a full-group intervention instead, but those never work...
thank you to all
i've decided to have "the conversation". after all, we are friends, and i hope i can approach him the soft way. At least, perhaps i can convice him to not metagame even if he continues pre-reading. i will post what happens finally.
puntualizing devil's advoacte, he tried to torch blue nixie. i figure he did the numbers and decided that 7 pirates and a raghodessa were too much to deal with at first level (i have only 3 players).
so thank you to all again. as promised, you will know about the ending of this.
hmm, I would sincerly recommend swapping stuff and changing things throughout the adventure, taking away his unfair advantage. Which I have been doing for years anyway, in order to tailor adventures more to my tastes and the groups capabilities - but it has proven highly effective as a deterrent for those players employing "advanced intelligence" besides.
I had this problem in another group I GMed the SCAP for, where I had been doing minor reconfigurations of the first few adventures ( and added a few sidetreks of my own, in which two players' "skill" in reacting to encounters suddenly dropped to a bare shadow of their previous abilities ), but changed "Test of the Smoking Eye" thoroughly, because the orginal versions didn't cut it for me.
Said player died thrice (!) , always in situations where going by the original script a recognisable scene seemed to take place, which actually wasn't the case (and he could have told, if he had looked carefully ) ... the player actually suicided himself by going for "glory points" in each and every one of these scenes, by taking courses of action which would have worked splendidly in the original installment.
At his third death one of our mates spoke up, and reprimanded him for "acting as if he knew what was about to happen, because it sucked having to compensate for his foolishness". It was obvious to all what was actually being said, and an embarassed silence ensued.
The peer-pressure really worked out wonderfully though - while I guess, having confronted him about it face to face would not have worked, since who would admit to cheating unless confronted by incontrovertible proof ? The only thing that it would have done, is having sent him into a defensive, destructive mode of denial and resentment at having been caught and "called" on it. Spoiling the fun for everyone.
Just my 2 cents
And yes, I am a player in the STAP, but while I have the mags, and of course having been unable not to wonder about some of the cover artwork (like the gargantuan croc ) , I have tried hard to let that metagame knowledge not affect ingame decisions. My character certainly bears the scars of having run flat into some stuff I would have avoided if I had known about it. Like the "mirror of opposition" effect in the demon-temple on the Isle.... Now that wasn't fun for anyone except our GM !
I've decided to have "the conversation". After all, we are friends, and I hope I can approach him the soft way. At least, perhaps I can convice him to not metagame even if he continues pre-reading. I will post what happens finally.
If I recall correctly, you have a very unusual party running through the path. If you "need" an excuse for making changes to the adventure path, the party's screwy makeup certainly justifies a few alterations. Make a few of the good guys into villains and vice versa. That'll screw him up if he keeps pre-reading, but it's completely justified: "Since the plot as written didn't suit your party, I had to change a few characters around to make it work."
Over the years, I have played in a few scenarios that I'd already seen. I just told the DM that I would not be suggesting any tactics or direction to the party since I had seen the adventure: My character was there purely as firepower. The DM also had a blank check to change things as needed to keep the suspense up.
I had a player do this in a Shadowrun Second Edition game I ran a long time ago. I had strung together a bunch of adventures I had and this guy knew every detail of every one. It was hard because he was ready for every twist and double cross and he was a good friend. After that game I just ran a custom built campaign and he couldn't do that. He never admitted to cheating but was called on it a few times in other games when someone was posted to police his dice rolls. He just made faces and kept on playing.
I don't have any advice for Savage Tide since you can't just scrap it and write your own game but I feel for your problems. It is a pain when players do things like that.
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Makes me think of an old adventure called Changeling (Dungeon #32) in which the party goes out hunting a white dragon tormenting the local farmers, only to discover that it is a rare albino-red. Surprise. Granted, in the case of that adventure the entire party was misdirected ... you need a situation where they don't know what they will be fighting and then hit him with the seriously unexpected. I might make the dragon undead so that it's Type changed as well, negating his preparations for energy damage and dragon-Type damaging ("good thing I have a new dragon-bane greatsword") while hitting him with Negative and Dead-effects against an Undead-type ("oh, and it's skeletal with DR 10/bludgeoning, so sorry about that sword").
Going off topic, I remember hearing a similar story, only it was the party heard that they were fighting a white dragon. They prepared thusly, and were quite surprised when they ended up fighting a red dragon that was a wight.
That tangent said, everyone here has pretty much said what needs to be said. I particularly like the suggestion of changing the roles of the major players (anti-hero Vanthus, anyone? who made a huge mistake with the demon summoning, and is only trying to protect Lavinia?).
hmm, most of the relevant stuff has already been stated, though I would add, that in all probability, "having a stern talk" is not going to change much. It seems that this guy plays either to win the most glory through his eruidte "guesses" or he is simply very afraid of screwing up, and desparately wants to avoid this.
In both cases, admitting to using "advanced intelligence" (consider that one stolen, nevermind ) will mean loosing face massively, which he is unlikely to appreciate.
On the other hand, it will probably not stop him from keeping on his advance planning either, so the only way to deal with it - unless you are prepared to have him steal all the thunder, and have him disarm every tricky and ambiguous encounter - will be to change key moments and events in ways that will make him fall onto his own sword, causing him to screw up through his own cheating.
That will probably drive the point home, and if he appreciates his character in any way, cost him dearly.
Things that will be easy to accomplish is switching around the Bullywugs inside the manor, or change the layout (say by moving the suite of bedrooms ), and perhaps install some nasty traps in rooms usually unlikely to be searched. Say by adding a glyph in the hidden armoury (where Kaskus and several useful weapons are to be found ) or by rigging some tripwires onto the stairs leading up to the private quarters, dropping vases of oil or other stuff onto their heads while sneaking stealthily up on the BBEG's position...
hi to all!!
as promised, i'm back to told the end of the story.
oficially, i call my "mole" player for a drinks and told him to "please stop pre reading" he tried to argue, (i don't do that, and the like) but i stated that we're not there to argue about if he did it or nit, just to stop a fun ruining situation. I told him i wouldn't mind what happened until this point, but please i don't want to see more "inusual clever ideas" if it happens to go trought a situation he already knows, please stay silent and leave the other players to solve.
He said a gruffy, "if thats what you want...."
And result is that he has missed all sessions for nearly two months!!! he politely excused himself as being busy or working, but the fact is that i had to run a copy of his character for last 9 sessions (as npc)
i think i annoyed him, but i really hope he can pass it off. other players are begunning to ask abou find another player to fill the gap....
so that's all for now.
greetings and thaks to all!!
hi to all!!
as promised, i'm back to told the end of the story.
oficially, i call my "mole" player for a drinks and told him to "please stop pre reading" he tried to argue, (i don't do that, and the like) but i stated that we're not there to argue about if he did it or nit, just to stop a fun ruining situation. I told him i wouldn't mind what happened until this point, but please i don't want to see more "inusual clever ideas" if it happens to go trought a situation he already knows, please stay silent and leave the other players to solve.He said a gruffy, "if thats what you want...."
And result is that he has missed all sessions for nearly two months!!! he politely excused himself as being busy or working, but the fact is that i had to run a copy of his character for last 9 sessions (as npc)
i think i annoyed him, but i really hope he can pass it off. other players are begunning to ask abou find another player to fill the gap....
so that's all for now.
greetings and thaks to all!!
Good for you. Its unfortunate that it came to this and maybe he'll be able to reform but I'd not count on it and maybe it is time to get another player into the group. In the end you get a game thats not being ruined by this guy and ultimatly I think you'll have a more enjoyable game because of it.
hi to all!!
as promised, i'm back to told the end of the story.
oficially, i call my "mole" player for a drinks and told him to "please stop pre reading" he tried to argue, (i don't do that, and the like) but i stated that we're not there to argue about if he did it or nit, just to stop a fun ruining situation. I told him i wouldn't mind what happened until this point, but please i don't want to see more "inusual clever ideas" if it happens to go trought a situation he already knows, please stay silent and leave the other players to solve.He said a gruffy, "if thats what you want...."
And result is that he has missed all sessions for nearly two months!!! he politely excused himself as being busy or working, but the fact is that i had to run a copy of his character for last 9 sessions (as npc)
i think i annoyed him, but i really hope he can pass it off. other players are begunning to ask abou find another player to fill the gap....
so that's all for now.
greetings and thaks to all!!
Cool! Have the other players missed him? I mean did they get to run some of the puzzles/combat/traps and enjoy it? If so then it is a win.