Quote from: Rincewind1;506528If someone does not have fun in a gaming group, and destroys that fun for others, and talking about it and trying to perhaps adjust one's playstyle a bit did not help - the weakest link should be removed.

So what do you do when you consider the player the weakest link, but not everyone else agrees?

For instance, I've had a case where there's a player I don't particularly like in the group.  The player is moody, full of personal issues to complain about at the table, and not particularly fun in the game, either, as they tended to not do much.  That person was there because they wanted social interaction (largely just an audience for their "woe is me" show), and didn't care so much about the game.

But, that player is close friends with at least 3 other players.  If I kick that player out, I have to kick out the other 3, too, because they are not going to sit idly by while I emotionally injure a friend.

Do you go ahead and create the great schism that will in all likelihood destroy the group?

Just to reference the tactical discussion from the other day:

I have noticed that quite often I am far more tactically capable than the players. Some of this is natural, some of it is system mastery/gaming experience and some of it is just superior teamwork that naturally comes from a single person running all of one side.


A GM doesn't REALLY need ot learn tactics from the players.  Even a GM with a sucky grasp of tactics and even poor system mastery.

Why?

Because a GM has infinite resources.  If the PCs are regularly walking through gangs of ten orcs, I can always start to send gangs of fifeteen orcs or twenty orcs.  

More importantly, if hte PCs snipe-lock every orc to death with minimal risk, I'm 'still in the game'.   If I snipe-lock the PC's, and kill them, they are out until they get a new character.

This fundamental imbalance means that the PCs deserve tactical advantages that they earn, and that I am not in competetion with them to be the deadliest player.

Spike, this is also why I think rules lawyering is stupid. Why bother stopping the game to argue about your powerup when the gm just picks his sides' strengths anyway.

Quote from: Cranewings;506565Spike, this is also why I think rules lawyering is stupid. Why bother stopping the game to argue about your powerup when the gm just picks his sides' strengths anyway.

Its funny, but I've got a permanent 'problem player' who is both a horrible min-maxer and even a dice cheater.  

What this player fails to realize is that in order to keep the game interesting I have to throw challenges at the party that can't be done away with a single awesome dice roll by a over-powered twink, and that I can't let the party go 'well, so-and-so will be our tank since they are effectively immune to harm'.

Thus they are frequently on the verge of being overwhelmed by devestating hordes because I can't account for the power of a player who is three times more powerful than everyone else AND rolls a crit on every third or fourth throw.

Balancing against that is hard work. I've lost good players to a bad one. Kicking, however, is not an option.

The only option I have, as the GM, is to either ignore the characters and let the party waltz through more level appropriate challenges or scale up the challenges to where the group actually is based on one powerful character...

Its frustrating, but I does force me to hone my GMing skills something fierce.

Quote from: Spike;506582Its funny, but I've got a permanent 'problem player' who is both a horrible min-maxer and even a dice cheater.  

What this player fails to realize is that in order to keep the game interesting I have to throw challenges at the party that can't be done away with a single awesome dice roll by a over-powered twink, and that I can't let the party go 'well, so-and-so will be our tank since they are effectively immune to harm'.

Thus they are frequently on the verge of being overwhelmed by devestating hordes because I can't account for the power of a player who is three times more powerful than everyone else AND rolls a crit on every third or fourth throw.

Balancing against that is hard work. I've lost good players to a bad one. Kicking, however, is not an option.

The only option I have, as the GM, is to either ignore the characters and let the party waltz through more level appropriate challenges or scale up the challenges to where the group actually is based on one powerful character...

Its frustrating, but I does force me to hone my GMing skills something fierce.

Why isn't kicking the twink out of the game an option? Especially if you are losing good Players because of this guy.

I used to have 3-4 problem players at different times. One was an especially obvious cheater. I got in the habit of just watching her roll. A lot of the time, I'd just take her out with a hit, counting on her crit bow to whittle the enemy down to something everyone could deal with.

Well Jeff, lets just say its something no self respecting cannibalistic forest dwelling pika would admit to in public and leave it at that, hmm?

Can't you at least say "No" to his PC builds and explain to the table as a whole as to why? State that the goal is to not overcomplicate builds and that there is no "win" at this campaign. It'd be one of the first things I'd do, besides not touch D&D 3e with a 10' pole, but I digress...

Quote from: Spike;506582The only option I have, as the GM, is to either ignore the characters and let the party waltz through more level appropriate challenges or scale up the challenges to where the group actually is based on one powerful character...

Its frustrating, but I does force me to hone my GMing skills something fierce.

Couldn't you do something to power up the other PCs?  Give them various opportunities or individual options to put them more on the same page as the optimized PC.  

I've run a couple of games where there are very different combat power-levels among the PCs, for many different reasons.  It can definitely be tricky, but I think it's can also be very interesting to have a Merry and a Pippin alongside Aragorn and/or Gimli.  (or Triplicate Girl alongside Superman, to take an alternate example)

Quote from: Spike;506614Well Jeff, lets just say its something no self respecting cannibalistic forest dwelling pika would admit to in public and leave it at that, hmm?

Ugh.

I have not experienced this, but I have witnessed it. Yes, that is a crappy situation.

Quote from: jeff37923;504841Except it isn't a problem with the rules, it is a problem with munchkin Players and ineffective GMs which is then blamed upon the rules of 3.x. If it were a problem with the rules, then it would be far more prevalent than it is.

From what I've seen, its pretty prevalent, in games where the rules encourage this tacitly.  There are certainly "bad" players who try to do this in every game, but I've seen a lot of good, even great players, who see a bad system, and understand that "this is what you do in that game", and end up trying to take advantage because in that game it would be stupid for them not to.

From my point of view, you can't really blame players for that!

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