First off, this campaign is in 5e, not pathfinder but the WotC D&D forums are filled with people who are less than useless, but i digress. I have just started a campaign with 2 of my players from pathfinder in 5e, and one of them is playing a rogue, he is trying to bullshit to get items and he just murders everything and only does stealth, and then gets upset when the cleric makes noise in his chainmail, i really need help with this. How should i handle this?
What exactly is he doing to get items?
If he only does stealth, the Cleric should just welcome him to go on ahead without him. That's really what Stealth is best for most of the time; scouting operations.
If he's murdering people, authorities tend to catch onto that sort of thing. And look poorly on it. Hello there, arrest warrants. Hell-- if he's done it to somebody important and gets caught, and is truly disrupting the campaign, he can be looking at much worse than jail time.
Does this player behave this way when you play Pathfinder?
Letting him go ahead to often will diminish the experience of the other player.
In pathfinder there is the teamwork feat "Stealth Synergy".
Other than that, I agree with kestral287 that authorities don't like murders in general.
I do not fully grasp what he does, or how that makes him a dick. Could you elaborate on the issues and why you think they are bad? Then I may be able to provide input.
-Nearyn
That ^ though he might just suffer from some "rogues suck" syndrome from pathfinder and so trying to offset his perceived lackings by hogging all the glory and stuff he can gret his hands on.
That said he should still be made aware that the world around him, and even the party (especially lawful members) will not take lightly to that behavious for long. Explain the for "teamwork" to him for one thing, warn him he's making enemies in the game world and start taking consequences - authorities taking action being just one option, but a particularly clear one, as that gives the rest of the party a chance to shun him to avoid the whole group suffering if guards start asking nasty questions.
Still, could use more detail to give more detail
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I keep seeing topics like this, which is why I banned people named Richard from my game years ago, really cuts down on the number of Dick players.
When it comes to general player antipathy threads, It's best not to touch them with a 10' pole (or 6", as the case may be).
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Just sounds like a bad player to me. I think the main problem is it's 5E and not Pathfinder. ;)
Brother Fen wrote: Just sounds like a bad player to me. I think the main problem is it's 5E and not Pathfinder. ;) Well, obviously. All the sheeple play 5e. Of course that means more problem players in that customer base.
yazo wrote: First off, this campaign is in 5e, not pathfinder but the WotC D&D forums are filled with people who are less than useless, but i digress. I have just started a campaign with 2 of my players from pathfinder in 5e, and one of them is playing a rogue, he is trying to b*%$&~&& to get items and he just murders everything and only does stealth, and then gets upset when the cleric makes noise in his chainmail, i really need help with this. How should i handle this? Well that is certainly a comprehensible and specific list of charges and well-established patterns of Jerk behavior.
...Okay, that was too sarcastic, lemme tone it down some. What's his alignment?
From the sound of things, and I don't know you or your game or your gang, he's playing a chaotic neutral (or evil) rogue. He's playing Kev from Zogonia, the untrustworthy (and somewhat classic) jerk thief. He is playing a character that has a long, rich tradition throughout tabletop RPGs from 1st edition on. Read the quotes in the following with the voice of Rocket, or a similar "puckish rogue."
-His concept of private property is strange ("I stole it because I wanted it, the fact I succeeded clearly means I wanted it more").
-He solves most of his problems with murder, ("Dead men don't want 'their' stuff back, and you should only turn your back on a corpse.")
-He always prefers to attack from stealth, and kill without being seen or exposing himself to danger. ("I don't like to *fight*, I like to win.")
-He is in it for the money, and only the money. ("People say money can't buy happiness, heh, people say that.")
-He finds his fellow party member to be annoying but necessary. ("I swear, if I didn't need you to heal my ass when stuff goes wrong I'd just do all this by myself. Slitting throats is WAY easier than screaming battlecries and beating down some big mother hubbard in fullplate.")
Now, All the back and forth and up and down about whether or not someone SHOULD play that kind of character and what is GoodRightFun vs. BadWrongFun is a personal problem. One of you wants to play monopoly and one of you wants to play sorry, you need to figure out what kind of game you're going to play.
But from the sound of things, and again I am guessing, you don't know the stealth fighting/killing rules well enough to know when he's doing things he can't do. A rogue, even a super-amazing ninja rogue of doom, cannot attack and still be in stealth. Not unless 5th edition is WAY different from 2nd, 3rd, and 4th edition. Pathfinder allows sniping at a -20 penalty, one shot per round. If the rogue has such a high stealth that the guards have no chance of seeing him as he plunks away at them with arrows, he deserves to win.
Likewise, murderers get hunted. Eventually someone will get a dog, or a half-orc with scent, and end up tracking this crazed mass-murderer down. They can throw down Dust of Appearance, at higher levels they can use critters with tremorsense and blindsight. You can have a stealth of +99999 and as long as you are touching the ground within 60 feet a Xorn knows exactly where you are and where the Wizard needs to drop the cloudkill spell. I doubt that pattern has changed in 5.0.
But killing the rogue through superior tactics or rocks falling from the sky won't change the player's desire to play a chaotic evil rogue. For that you have to work out why s/he wants to play that character and your own feelings regarding what kind of game and characters are allowed.
And a game with 2 players is a game where stealth and trickery are a lot more important anyway. I don't know 5th edition that well, but I'm betting it's built for 4-6 characters. When you roll 2 you're changing the dynamic, and creating a certain "selective pressure" towards more Darwinian characters.
Nearyn wrote: I do not fully grasp what he does, or how that makes him a dick. Could you elaborate on the issues and why you think they are bad? Then I may be able to provide input. Yeah, it is vague. I assume there is a personality component present that is not being communicated through the post. Some special just need to be experienced first hand.
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yazo wrote: the WotC D&D forums are filled with people who are less than useless, When you can classify an entire group as 'less than useless' I'm unsure the player is the problem.
I'd suggest being open to others ideas and how they might like to play the game - and corroborate rather than shuffle people you disagree with as less than useless.
But by the end of this post I'm sure I fit into that category.
Well, from the limited info we have, my advice as a dm would be to have a chat with the rogue player. Hey, friend, this is not the type of game myself or the cleric player want to play.
Personaly I would even call it out at the table since there is only the three of you. But that's me.
We are wanting a team game while you are playing Thief single player....
yazo wrote: First off, this campaign is in 5e, not pathfinder but the WotC D&D forums are filled with people who are less than useless, but i digress. I have just started a campaign with 2 of my players from pathfinder in 5e, and one of them is playing a rogue, he is trying to b%~*@&+$ to get items and he just murders everything and only does stealth, and then gets upset when the cleric makes noise in his chainmail, i really need help with this. How should i handle this? Vis a vis less-than-useless people, I don't think that is a 5e forum problem. That is an Internet problem. Tolkein and EGG (may he roll ever on) didn't invent trolls, they only described them. They've come out from under bridges and now live on online forums and comments sections. I've met a few here, and I've challenged more than my share of billy goats who thought they could just cross my bridge. I'm sympathetic, but I don't think you're safe from trolls here, either.
You might change the game from D&D to Munchkin, and his behavior will be entirely appropriate.
Your player has some right to be roguish and is not necessarily in the wrong to do some of the things he is doing, but if he is disrupting things at the table, you are right to call him out about it. Have a talk about it. Hear him out. Hear everybody out. To what extent do you and your players see Dungeons and Dragons as an elaborate combination of Risk, Doom, and Sudoku, and to what extent do you see it as improvisational theater? As you play out more and more scenarios on the tabletop and/or collaborate to create a fantasy story, things might just smooth out, and you might need do little more than let it ride.
There is a long history of game mechanics designed for reigning in troublesome players. Training in 1e used to take in-game time and cost 1500gp/level/week, maybe more depending on the players' conduct.
Hackmaster has a character statistic called Honor, which is a way of rewarding and punishing the degree to which players roleplay their characters well.
Remember that you have lots of power to achieve your goals as DM, buttake some time to examine your own goals and the players', including that guy's.
I would focus on making sure that there are realistic consequences for bad character behavior.
Turn him in to the authorities, even if it means joining LE to do so, lol.
Talk to the other players, without the problem player present. This way they won't be influenced by pouting, bullying, or martyrdom. If they are cool with him then keep on. If they don't want him playing, kick him out. The worst thing that you can do is to alienate all the other players in order to placate one jerk. I have been in games in which the DM went out of her way to placate one jerk, and the other four players all left. Sometimes you have to be hard, but is it better to keep one jerk and lose four good players, or get rid of the jerk?
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