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Way too much disinformation about kender in the world.
The fact is anything you read about kender is likely simply wrong or written humorously in a serious style.....Which means reading things literally and saying that's how kender are is wrong, of course others say to play a non-annoying kender requires the major sin of meta-gaming...
Kender Damned if you do and damned if you don't.
Kender are annoying, wait your kender is not annoying your playing it wrong!
Altho reading about and playing a annoying character is fun- playing *WITH* an annoying character is not. They are... annoying.
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And the random table for starting junk :-)
I can't tell you how many times I pissed off my brother trying to find a use for all that crap "hold on! I got something for that..." was my catchphrase, I was never a big stealer tho, never did understand the allure of stealing from your fellow party members :-)
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Let's say "many" not "most". It might be a majority, it might be a majority in one corner of the gaming community, or it might not be a majority at all. Since we have no valid way to measure it, lets avoid claims that it is absolutely a majority and just agree that it would bother a significant portion of the gaming community.
You're right of course, I should have said "many". Thank you for calmly and rationally calling me out on the flaws of my post. I guess I came here looking for a fight, and had the wrong attitude going in.
And yes, there is a preference from many gamers that GMs and players should keep their roles separate. I, myself, don't quite understand that viewpoint, but then I am more of a beer and pretzels type of gamer. I want to hang out with people I like and do fun stuff. I'm not looking to play a versus type of game most of the time.
Now let me return the favor :) In this statement you seem to be implying that anyone that doesn't like GMPC's (no matter how they're defined) is a "versus" type of gamer. This is completely untrue. I am very much a "beer and pretzels" type of gamer, and can't stand the "versus" attitude on either side.
Look, I will be honest here. Anytime I hear something like this it strikes me as a "backfire effect" comment. The "backfire effect" is one someone who holds a strongly held opinion is faced with data (notice I am not saying proof or truth or fact) that contradicts that opinion. In some cases instead of reevaluating their opinion with the new data they try to dismiss the data. That is what this looks like to me. GMs and players that said they had good experience are being told, "You are too stupid to be aware that the players hated the experience and didn't want to upset you by telling you."
Fair enough, then let me amend that statement and add "in my experience". Now let me talk about my experience. I'm 42 years old and started playing D&D when I was 7. I moved 6 different times between 7 years old and 18 usually to different states in the Northeast US. At 18 I joined the military and was in the Navy for 21 years. I've played RPG's all during that time. I've played in groups, literally, all over the planet. At least every 3 years I got a completely new gaming group, although it usually happened sooner as people transferred in or transferred out. One of the things that generally remained a constant was the universal hatred of the GMPC (again, no matter how you define them). I've even been part of groups (more than once) where the GM asked us "Hey what do you think of Zenor? I want to keep him as a GMPC so I can play some too" and we've all sat around saying "Yeah mean that's great do that", then on the way to our cars one person would say "I hate GMPC's" and we all would unanimously agree. We went a lot with it because we didn't want to deny the GM his fun, we hated it, but felt that playing with that was better than not playing at all.
There are some groups that do in fact ask for GMPCs to be included without the GM suggesting it. There are groups that will go out of their way to resurrect a GMPC, despite the GM suggesting they not bother. Different groups have different ways of having fun.
There could be a TON of reasons for this that have nothing to do with player hatred for GMPC's. I've recently been in a game that "asked for a DMPC". No one wanted to play the healer, so in Jade Regent there's a pixie-like character that we carried around with us. Her entire contribution would be in the rare times we needed in combat healing we'd say "Heal-Bot, selectively channel" and we'd figure she leveled with us and so a level X cleric would have so many healing dice. That or we'd miss a knowledge religion roll, Heal-Bot should have that! And that was the extent of their interaction.
I would bet that 2-3 people would say get rid of it, 2-3 people say keep the damn thing I love it, and 4-6 would say "Huh?" Of course there is no way to take a valid sample, so let's drop it how about?
Again, that hasn't been my experience at all. 2-3 people say get rid of it, 2-3 people say get rid of it, and 4-6 people say get rid of it, but I understand the GM needs to have fun too.
Haven't played the game, could you give some context?
The first two dwarves hang out at your camp and sell you things between adventures, the third one can be one of your party members.
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Fair enough, then let me amend that statement and add "in my experience". Now let me talk about my experience. I'm 42 years old and started playing D&D when I was 7. I moved 6 different times between 7 years old and 18 usually to different states in the Northeast US. At 18 I joined the military and was in the Navy for 21 years. I've played RPG's all during that time. I've played in groups, literally, all over the planet. At least every 3 years I got a completely new gaming group, although it usually happened sooner as people transferred in or transferred out. One of the things that generally remained a constant was the universal hatred of the GMPC (again, no matter how you define them). I've even been part of groups (more than once) where the GM asked us "Hey what do you think of Zenor? I want to keep him as a GMPC so I can play some too" and we've all sat around saying "Yeah mean that's great do that", then on the way to our cars one person would say "I hate GMPC's" and we all would unanimously agree. We went a lot with it because we didn't want to deny the GM his fun, we hated it, but felt that playing with that was better than not playing at all.
The bolded above is important. Rather than being truthful with the GM, everyone went along and made themselves miserable rather than being honest.
Rather than doing that, would it have been less troublesome and awful for someone else to bite the bullet and run a game every once in a while for the guy that is GMing primarily? Perhaps that would remove their desire for a GMPC, the chance to play and do something.
Honesty and communication is the heart of any relationship.
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Also there is something deliciously ironic about someone assuming everyone in the group was 100% lying when they agreed to the GM running a GMPC, but were 100% honest when they agreed with someone complaining about GMPCs. Isn't it possible that someone didn't really care either way and just agreed either way in order to not make waves?
@ Jodokai - if I'm following you right, do you pretty much just resent having any NPC combat allies at all?
Not sure if anyone posted it already, but it might be cool to have a GMPC who was an NPC class like an aristocrat or expert (or even a commoner) who tags along just to keep the story moving. Just capable enough to defend him/herself so it's not one long escort mission. Is killing him off Obi-Wan style a cliche at this point?
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The one time I played a successful kender, it involved her getting her backside kicked once too many times for inappropriate inspections of other people's property.
She had a fairly high wisdom score and wasn't TOO shabby in the intelligence-department either, so she sat down and put two and two together.
She formed a partnership with two other kender, both of a nautical persuasion, in creating a trading company.
Due to the other two kender being of nautical persuasions (one was a fisherman and the other sailed on a trading ship ... he was their bilge-rat), the company became the Kender Fishing Consortium ... or the KFC for short.
My kender was placed in charge of trading with people. Basically, it was a matter of trading up and only two rules were enforced:
1) she only bartered. Item for item. No coin involved. Coin is boring.
2) she had to be allowed to see what stuff people kept in their bags or carts or purses for herself.
That way, I managed to create probably the only kender ever, who had people voluntarily opening their bags to let her look in. She was also remarkably un-annoying.
I think I just played kender all wrong.
One of the things that generally remained a constant was the universal hatred of the GMPC (again, no matter how you define them). I've even been part of groups (more than once) where the GM asked us "Hey what do you think of Zenor? I want to keep him as a GMPC so I can play some too" and we've all sat around saying "Yeah mean that's great do that", then on the way to our cars one person would say "I hate GMPC's" and we all would unanimously agree. We went a lot with it because we didn't want to deny the GM his fun, we hated it, but felt that playing with that was better than not playing at all.
This has happened to me several times too.
Fair enough, then let me amend that statement and add "in my experience". Now let me talk about my experience. I'm 42 years old and started playing D&D when I was 7. I moved 6 different times between 7 years old and 18 usually to different states in the Northeast US. At 18 I joined the military and was in the Navy for 21 years. I've played RPG's all during that time. I've played in groups, literally, all over the planet. At least every 3 years I got a completely new gaming group, although it usually happened sooner as people transferred in or transferred out. One of the things that generally remained a constant was the universal hatred of the GMPC (again, no matter how you define them). I've even been part of groups (more than once) where the GM asked us "Hey what do you think of Zenor? I want to keep him as a GMPC so I can play some too" and we've all sat around saying "Yeah mean that's great do that", then on the way to our cars one person would say "I hate GMPC's" and we all would unanimously agree. We went a lot with it because we didn't want to deny the GM his fun, we hated it, but felt that playing with that was better than not playing at all.The bolded above is important. Rather than being truthful with the GM, everyone went along and made themselves miserable rather than being honest.
Honesty and communication is the heart of any relationship.
Yeah, but you also dont want to hurt someones feelings and if you're all having fun, why do it? There's a difference between liking the DM's campaign overall but being annoyed by a couple little things- and something BIG ruining the fun. Most of the times I have seen DMPCs they are minor annoyances, things we as players accept as a small price to pay for a otherwise fun game. And- there's nothing wrong with that. In fact- I have never had a perfect DM or campaign. You dont need "perfect' to have a lot of fun.
The really BAD horrible DMPCs are the ones that actually ruin the game to the point where few or no players are having fun. Those are rare.
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Way too much disinformation about kender in the world.Are we perhaps referring to the "disinformation" in the Campaign Setting book? Or maybe the "disinformation" in the canon Dragonlance novels?Yes exactly that! The original write-up was done in a very humorous (tongue in cheek) way and reading it literally defeats the entire point of the message...If you don't get the joke you can't see how it works.....
(even though it has blatant impossibilities written into it)
...this is not how rules sourcebooks work.
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A rules sourcebook isn't supposed to lie to people reading it. I find it exceedingly unlikely that the Kender write up is supposed to be read any other way than as in-world truth- anything else would be utterly useless to someone unfamiliar with Kender and have no purpose in the book.
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Yeah lets throw shit at Tasselhoff
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Fair enough, then let me amend that statement and add "in my experience". Now let me talk about my experience. I'm 42 years old and started playing D&D when I was 7. I moved 6 different times between 7 years old and 18 usually to different states in the Northeast US. At 18 I joined the military and was in the Navy for 21 years. I've played RPG's all during that time. I've played in groups, literally, all over the planet. At least every 3 years I got a completely new gaming group, although it usually happened sooner as people transferred in or transferred out. One of the things that generally remained a constant was the universal hatred of the GMPC (again, no matter how you define them). I've even been part of groups (more than once) where the GM asked us "Hey what do you think of Zenor? I want to keep him as a GMPC so I can play some too" and we've all sat around saying "Yeah mean that's great do that", then on the way to our cars one person would say "I hate GMPC's" and we all would unanimously agree. We went a lot with it because we didn't want to deny the GM his fun, we hated it, but felt that playing with that was better than not playing at all.The bolded above is important. Rather than being truthful with the GM, everyone went along and made themselves miserable rather than being honest.
Honesty and communication is the heart of any relationship.
Yeah, but you also dont want to hurt someones feelings and if you're all having fun, why do it? There's a difference between liking the DM's campaign overall but being annoyed by a couple little things- and something BIG ruining the fun. Most of the times I have seen DMPCs they are minor annoyances, things we as players accept as a small price to pay for a otherwise fun game. And- there's nothing wrong with that. In fact- I have never had a perfect DM or campaign. You dont need "perfect' to have a lot of fun.
The really BAD horrible DMPCs are the ones that actually ruin the game to the...
Read a little further back in the same quote, DrDeth. Universal hatred. That seems to indicate a bit more than a minor annoyance. Read further back in the thread for comments like "would not join any game with a GMPC." Again, more than a minor annoyance.
It is clear that fun isn't being had if we're to the point of not playing at all or utterly hating the idea. I mean, maybe it is just me but that's how I read it.
Talk to each other. Is it going to hurt the GM's feelings that you say "Hey, we really don't want a GMPC but Bob here will GM for you on Saturdays" or to let it fester to the point that you are so unhappy that you'd rather not play at all if GMPCs are around?
No one is asking or even looking for/expecting perfect to have fun with. But if you cannot communicate on the little things, how do you expect to do so on the bigger? Get it out in the open rather than sitting quiet.
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Cracking jokes is one thing. "Tongue in cheek" explanations that are the opposite of the truth are another. That's not supposed to go in the sole guidelines most players get for how the race works.
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I'm still trying to determine the entendres, if any.Ew. That is quite possibly the grossest thing I've ever heard about elves. (but I believe it)No, let's be real here. GMPCs are one thing, but nobody should play kender. They exist as a food source for more highly evolved species, albeit as junk food.
Just as some people can play kender and some can/should not.Nahh, too high on the cholestorol. Same as halflings or gnomes. Too much cuteness packed into a tiny package=insane cholestorol-count.
Eat elf, the other sweat meat.
Maybe it means they give you the meat sweats? I don't actually know what those are because I'm a hippie vegetarian but I learned of them recently!
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Cracking jokes is one thing. "Tongue in cheek" explanations that are the opposite of the truth are another. That's not supposed to go in the sole guidelines most players get for how the race works.But how they can or should be played is the essential problem is it not?.
The same thing that happens when certain persons read the alignment Chaotic Neutral.Which is to say some people want to be obnoxious dicks and find rules to justify dickiness!
Chaotic Neutral describes someone who is otherwise normal except they value freedom above all else. Kender describes a disease. :)
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Also there is something deliciously ironic about someone assuming everyone in the group was 100% lying when they agreed to the GM running a GMPC, but were 100% honest when they agreed with someone complaining about GMPCs. Isn't it possible that someone didn't really care either way and just agreed either way in order to not make waves?
So is your argument that if someone lies once, they must be pathological lairs? If someone didn't care, they could have just kept walking to their car without any input what-so-ever. If they didn't want to make waves, saying nothing would be the best way to do that. One person said it, and we all went back to that person to discuss it. Lying at that point served no purpose. So either we assume that people are generally pathological in their lying and do it all the time for no reason and for no gain, or we have to assume that people will usually only lie for a reason, like not upsetting the GM.
@ Jodokai - if I'm following you right, do you pretty much just resent having any NPC combat allies at all?
Not exactly. There are a lot of reasons I feel having a GMPC is a bad idea.
Generally speaking, a GM gets at least 50% of the "air time" in a game. He's controlling the other side of what ever the party is interacting with, which means the (let's say) four players get the other 50%. That means each player gets around 13% of the spot light. Add a GMPC and now the GM is getting 60% of the air time meaning our 4 players are only getting 10%.
Then you have accept that the GM is talking whenever that GMPC is talking. That will always be on your mind, so if his character suggests something or says something you are more likely to follow that suggestion or believe what is said.
This is the hardest part to explain, but a GM has all the power over a player's perceptions. If the GM says we feel Dudley DoRight is the most honorable man we've ever met, we trust that the GM is saying he won't backstab us. Our characters aren't there. As players, we can't get a "hunch" about a certain situation, or a "bad feeling" about a person. The GM has to give us those feelings.
For example, a few years ago I was playing PFS and my faction mission was to destroy a suit of evil armor. I found the armor and I hacked it to pieces with my adamantine longsword. I asked the GM if it was destroyed and he said yes. I assumed he knew I was asking if my faction mission was complete and he was answering as the GM. It turns out the what the GM meant was that my character thought it was destroyed. What he should have said was "Your character thinks so yes" or "It looks to be". Now some of you may be thinking the GM didn't do anything wrong everything should be IC, but he did. You see Jodokai isn't in the room and can't see the armor, my character can. The armor heals itself, we spent an hour in the room searching and talking my character would have noticed the armor healing. But because I didn't specifically say I look at the armor he didn't tell me about it. That is very flawed logic. For that to work, every time my character takes a step in the woods, the GM would have to tell me, "before you step your eyes notice 12 leaves and a twig, do you still want to step there?" That's how detailed a GM would have to be to have that situation work. No one wants to spend that much time on every character's every step, so we take shortcuts. We rely on the GM to not mislead us.
Now that example is why I have issues with GMPC's. We rely on the GM to not trick us.
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It's a conflict of interest. Even if the GM is totally fair and free of bias about the GMPC, it still has the appearance and potential of abuse.
It's like being a judge at your relative's trial. Just don't do it.
Thinking back to 2nd edition D&D I had a follower who was a fighter/apprentice blacksmith.
I was focused on RP'ing my character so the GM handled running my follower's personality and spoke for him when necessary. But I always ran the character in battle.
It was so long ago that I don't recall why we broke up the duties like that but it worked for us.
Has anyone else had a similar arrangement?
Thinking back to 2nd edition D&D I had a follower who was a fighter/apprentice blacksmith.
I was focused on RP'ing my character so the GM handled running my follower's personality and spoke for him when necessary. But I always ran the character in battle.
It was so long ago that I don't recall why we broke up the duties like that but it worked for us.
Has anyone else had a similar arrangement?
Only in the case when their was a hireling or cohort with the party connected to that PC.
Thinking back to 2nd edition D&D I had a follower who was a fighter/apprentice blacksmith.
I was focused on RP'ing my character so the GM handled running my follower's personality and spoke for him when necessary. But I always ran the character in battle.
It was so long ago that I don't recall why we broke up the duties like that but it worked for us.
Has anyone else had a similar arrangement?
Typically this is how I run such NPCs. One notable exception being that there was kind of a communal cohort that players would take turns running if their character was absent (it was a city campaign at the time, so people were often doing separate things).
I don't view the cohort, hireling, etc to be MY character when I'm the GM. I view it as just another NPC that I provide the voice for, but when it comes to bookkeeping and combat, I hand those duties over to the player because I have more important things to do.
We rely on the GM to not trick us
That's part of the job description...
Man, if my players believed everything I said, they would be in so much trouble...We rely on the GM to not trick usThat's part of the job description...
There's a difference between "The baron says he's not an evil demon" and:
Player: What does the terrain look like?GM: Solid ground.
Player: I walk forward
GM: HAHA You're dead you tried to walk across lava
Player: Umm you said it was solid ground.
GM: And you believed me? You're so stupid.
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Man, if my players believed everything I said, they would be in so much trouble...We rely on the GM to not trick usThat's part of the job description...
Pretty much. A classic example:
Player: "Is the door trapped?"
GM: "It doesn't seem to be."
If you believe that and don't check, then he isn't tricking you, you are just taking every statement at face value. The character has perceptions and skills for a reason.
As far as Jodokai's individual GM, he should likely have given more visual clues about the armour or even asked for a roll.
I'm not sure, however, what any of this has to do with the GMPC or how it is tricking you as well? Unless you are just not trusting the GM at all?
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I'm not sure, however, what any of this has to do with the GMPC or how it is tricking you as well? Unless you are just not trusting the GM at all?
Because the GM is talking whenever his GMPC is talking. Those words are coming out of the GM's mouth so they have more weight. Whether he wants to be the leader or not, the party is going to be more inclined to listen to the GMPC.
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I personally pity any player that confuses me the GM with Thog, the full orc CG cleric.
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Man, if my players believed everything I said, they would be in so much trouble...We rely on the GM to not trick usThat's part of the job description...There's a difference between "The baron says he's not an evil demon" and:
Player: What does the terrain look like?
GM: Solid ground.
Player: I walk forward
GM: HAHA You're dead you tried to walk across lava
Player: Umm you said it was solid ground.
GM: And you believed me? You're so stupid.
Ahhh this brings back memories.
I had a GM who did just the opposite... he would tell you NOTHING unless you specifically asked about it... after the undead at night incident his games devolved into 20 questions with every new scene.The undead incident:
Player 1: Ok we have finished our breakfast and planned our attack on the tomb. Lets head over to the graveyard to set up.
Players: Yeah we head out.
GM: about two blocks out you are ambushed by the horde of undead!
Players: ...what?!
Player 3: Hey these undead have only been coming out at night, what the hell are they doing swarming in the day?!
GM: It's night time.
Player 1: Huh? We just finished breakfast!
GM: I ruled that your planning session took a day.
Player 3: We only took an hour planning that in real time!
GM: This is game time, roll initiative!
Player 2: Wouldn't we have noticed it was night as we left the bar?!
GM: You never asked.
Bad GMs do make memorable games.
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I'm not sure, however, what any of this has to do with the GMPC or how it is tricking you as well? Unless you are just not trusting the GM at all?Because the GM is talking whenever his GMPC is talking. Those words are coming out of the GM's mouth so they have more weight. Whether he wants to be the leader or not, the party is going to be more inclined to listen to the GMPC.
There should be (and is) a difference in Bob the GMPC talking and Steve the GM talking. The amount of weight that might be given to a GMPC is given to them by the players themselves; in other words, the GM shouldn't be giving game data through the GMPC and leading you around by the nose.
The GM is talking when any NPC is talking -- that doesn't mean every word is the truth, or should be taken with the same weight as the GM giving data outside of a persona they are inhabiting.
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I had an idiot who, unless we said we put our clothes on would walk out on the street naked, and would explode if we didn't take number 1 or 2 occasionally. Let's just say that nobody plays with that guy anymore.
I had a DM like that. When I said "I look all around" you ruled I didnt look up. later he ruled we were all down on health as we never actually said we were stopping to eat. I then did this.
"I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. ..."
After about ten minutes he snapped and agreed that some things could be left unsaid if we had a list if daily duties.
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After a bit it devolved into a dull monotone chant.
He had a serious commitment to taking the piss. Admirable.
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I had an idiot who, unless we said we put our clothes on would walk out on the street naked, and would explode if we didn't take number 1 or 2 occasionally. Let's just say that nobody plays with that guy anymore.I had a DM like that. When I said "I look all around" you ruled I didnt look up. later he ruled we were all down on health as we never actually said we were stopping to eat. I then did this.
"I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. I breath in, I breath out, I take a step, I look around. ..."
After about ten minutes he snapped and agreed that some things could be left unsaid if we had a list if daily duties.
That is just beautiful.
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Because the GM is talking whenever his GMPC is talking.The hell you say. The character is talking, not the GM. I even do my best to have a funny voice for them so the players can HEAR the difference.
A simple change of tone, body language or the like is usually good for making the differentiation.
Sometimes I just summarize the statements the guy is providing if they aren't talking to someone who's personality matters as much like...
DM: "The city guard imparts to you that he really isn't a fan of adventurers showing up. Apparently there's been a lot of you in town lately."
Or
DM (As City Guard): More sodding adventurers?! Hrrrrrrg.
I really hope nobody misinterprets what I say in the 'kobold voice' as being DM speak. That'd be bizarrely awkward and make me sound like I was hideously fatalistic.
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My curiosity about this thread is the trend of some number of players who seem to be uncommunicative gits... and the suggestion that such a thing is common.
Huh.
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My curiosity about this thread is the trend of some number of players who seem to be uncommunicative gits...
Hey, I resent that! I am a very communicative git.