I've been playing D&D off and on with the same group of people for about 20 years now. Very rarely do we all get together at once to play, but more or less, we all know each others' playing styles. We've had new people drop in and out of campaigns here and there over the years, but the core of the group has remained the same. When I first brought up the idea of this new campaign, one of my friends wanted to invite a mutual friend of ours who was relatively new to D&D to the campaign. I know this guy, and he's a good person and not a weirdo, so I agreed without really knowing his play style. In the first session, he was fairly quiet. Mostly observing, but putting in his thoughts here and there on things that came up. The second session was a bit different, and it wasn't long before I realized, yes, despite my best efforts, my campaign has been invaded by a munchkin.
My first warning sign should have been the fact that his character's stats were ridiculous. Our mutual friend assured me that he rolled these stats legitimately using the 4d6 drop the lowest method (which is the standard method we use in the game.) This mutual friend is not a munchkin player, and in fact has a lot of GM time under his own belt, although he tends to run very story based campaigns where the PCs are chess pieces in his D&D "novel," but I digress. My gut told me I should have simply made him roll a new character in front of me, but in an effort to speed things up so we could all start the campaign, I simply let it go. Of course, being the DM I am, I really didn't care about stats, and I still don't truly. High stats may help in certain situations in my campaign, but outsmarting the bad guy is what ensures survivability. After spending two sessions now with this player, and talking to him on the side about the game, it has become quite obvious that he is simply consumed with powering up his character and to hell with the consequences. So, now I face a dilemma I haven't dealt with in many years, but in the immortal words of Ivan Drago, I will break him.
His first near death experience came without him even realizing it, which is disappointing to me as a DM dealing with this type of player. If you've read the session two summary, you probably already know that the party had to gain access to a tunnel system outside of the city which connects to the sewers. This tunnel system was blocked by a portcullis and guarded by a blind man. Life-sized stone statues stood in the antechamber leading into this hall as well. There was enough for them, as players, to put two and two together and realize that if this meek looking blind man can somehow control the entry point to a major black market trade route, he must have some power behind him. The munchkin didn't realize this. Fortunately for him, the others quickly reigned him in. He was distraut over the required payment of 200 gold pieces, especially considering they had just looted a bandit camp and managed to pick up about 240 gold. His immediate reaction at the table was "kill the blind man and open the portcullis." After all, his character has an 18 exceptional STR. He could smite this blind dude with his hammer in one round and raise the portcullis with a little help probably. What he didn't realize is the entry point is protected by a medusa who uses her blind slave to take money to enter, and the portcullis is enchanted with lightning which means any character touching it will sustain 3d6 damage. Had the others not intervened, we would have experienced a very quick and sudden character death. For their own sake, however, they decided to just pay the blind guardian, and get the hell into the tunnels.
Throughout the session there were several facepalm and eye roll moments from my other players in regards to this munchkin's actions, which left me smirking at times. They know the deal, and a wrong move, or a foolish mistake can result in a death quickly. I have made this point clear to them at the start of the campaign, so they tread even more carefully...except our munchkin of course. So, now that it has become painfully obvious how this player intends to run his character, I've got a few tricks up my sleeve for him. First of all, he is running a cleric/fighter Dwarf, and he is foregoing any attempt at roleplaying the priestly aspect of his class. For him, priest spells are useful for healing and casting Bless for the party when he's not smashing things with his maul. In fact, after capturing a bandit to interrogate, he stood by and essentially allowed the bandit to be tortured and even joined in himself. I warned him, this continued behavior could result in an alignment change, but I did not warn him of the fact that such behavior from a cleric, without seeking penance, will result in him calling for a priest spell when needed the most, and not receiving the spell from his god. No, I think it better for him to discover this on his own through his gameplay.
I am still toying with the idea of a new mini-dungeon for the next session, only rather than a labyrinth crawling with monsters and undead, it will be a tomb of horrors style puzzle/trap maze where a wrong move can easily result in character death. My only concern with such a dungeon is the fact that I have to expose the other good players to this exercise simply in order to teach a lesson to a munchkin. If they're smart, they'll simply let him take the lead, as he will assuredly do, and let Darwin take over. I could easily invoke some method to kill him as a DM and be done with it, but it goes against my code as a DM to simply use my "DM hand of God" to kill a character. I want to present the challenge, and allow the character to make a choice, and let the consequences of the choice take over. That's how it should be done in fairness, and I'm a fair DM.
Now that I know what I'm dealing with in regards to this player, I doubt it will take long before he realizes munchkinism does not work at my table. That is my hope anyway.
I have a regular munchkin player has been playing in my groups for years now, I long time ago while playing a 2e campaign the group came across what they thought was a Small Red Dragon, a young one the thought. As they went in to slay the beast they soon discovered the creature was breathing fire way to much. This peeved of the munchkin, he claimed I was cheating.
ReplyDeleteThe melee continued and the dragon know began breath a Cone of Cold, they assumed the dragons was a spellcaster, again the Munchkin claimed I was cheating.
Soon it happened the young "red" was able to slay the hole group, the Munchkin wanted to see the monsters stats, I showed him, it was an Ancient White Dragon that had used a prismatic hue potion to change his color and a potion of fire breathing.
I Munchkined the Munchkin.
Eric
I love how sometimes munchkins, or any player, says the DM is "cheating." It's a fantasy world with the rules established by the DM. Who says you can't have a color shifting dragon which has multiple breath weapon attacks? Just because a PC doesn't know how to deal with a creature he's never encountered as a player doesn't mean you're "cheating" as a DM. I'm sure the munchkin was taught a lesson, but at the expense of the entire party it seems, if it resulted in a TPK. That is something I'd like to avoid if at all possible, but again, if his boneheaded decisions result in a TPK they will have him to blame, not me. Thanks for sharing the story, Eric!
ReplyDeleteI've got to say, especially given that you're the one telling it, you don't come off very well in this story. Don't get me wrong; he's playing his character waaaay against stated alignment, and your *initial* response to it was good. But did you speak of alignment violations to your other players? The ones who started off the torture session? If not, then he'd be right to leave, because you ARE singling him out. I haven't met your players but it sounds more like they're worried about a punitive TPK than that they disapprove of his antics. You're irked with him for legitimately rolling high stats (it happens! I rolled three 18s on 3d6 once) but if high stats aren't kosher with you then why let them roll at all? Why not just use an array? You criticize your fellow DM for story-motivated railroading, but if there's only one path your players can take that doesn't result in a meteor falling on their heads how are you different? It sound like the 'power gamer' bothers you because you yourself are a 'power DM'.
ReplyDeleteBut did you speak of alignment violations to your other players? The ones who started off the torture session? If not, then he'd be right to leave, because you ARE singling him out.
DeleteTo the alignment shift, the players involved in said interrogation aren't exactly on the side of the coin that would require an alignment change. The dwarf cleric (aka the munchkin) was. The impact of the alignment change for him would be more severe because he casts spells through the worship of his god. While any others might only suffer an xp penalty for blatantly going against their alignment, there was more at stake for him. Plus, for his own benefit of being a new player, I thought it wise to address it with him. It wasn't a case of singling him out, just trying to better develop his play because he was a newbie is all.
I haven't met your players but it sounds more like they're worried about a punitive TPK than that they disapprove of his antics.
Indeed, you haven't met my players and if you did, you'd certainly see that they definitely disapprove of his antics, although he is getting better with each session, and more cautious. If they fear the TPK at all, it is because they fear what situation he might put them in that they might have otherwise avoided/prepared better for as opposed to being fearful that I'm out to kill the party on a weekly basis (I'm not by the way.)
You're irked with him for legitimately rolling high stats (it happens! I rolled three 18s on 3d6 once) but if high stats aren't kosher with you then why let them roll at all? Why not just use an array?
As to the legitimacy of his highly rolled stats, it has come into question recently. My friend who saw the stats rolled attested to their legitimacy in the beginning, but has since somewhat reneged on that saying, he believes this player may have "cheated" so to speak. My problem with the stats is that I didn't see them rolled myself. I have no one to blame but myself for this, but as I mentioned in the post, we were anxious to get the campaign kicked off. Had I realized at the time what I might be dealing with, I would have made him roll up a new character. This is why I have not yet asked him to stop playing the character (even though I have my doubt he legitimately rolled the stats) because I allowed him in as-is to begin with, so why should the player have to suffer for that? He shouldn't. I take the responsibility for that. And yes, I'm well aware it is possible to roll those stats legitimately, but it seems that anytime we play a game a character he generated suddenly has an 18/95+ STR.
You criticize your fellow DM for story-motivated railroading, but if there's only one path your players can take that doesn't result in a meteor falling on their heads how are you different?
DeleteI have no idea what you are implying with this comment. I presume you are referring to the medusa encounter? I wasn't railroading them. They could have opted to not pay the gold, attack the blind man and the medusa, or try and find another way in. There were many ways they could have approached it, the most sensible being, pay the fee and go through. That is the option they chose. But at the same time, I don't scale encounters. They made the best judgment they could at the time, but it wasn't the only option. There is never only one option.
It sound like the 'power gamer' bothers you because you yourself are a 'power DM'.
Jack, I could understand after reading this post, how you might draw the conclusion that I'm a "power DM." I could simply retort with the "I'm not" but then again, your definition of such might differ from my own. I tend to present an acceptable and negotiable challenge to my players each and every session, which provides multiple ways to negotiate. I do not restrict them to one course of action at any point. Rather I present the environment, let them work out how they want to handle it, and see if it works.
When I say in this post, the players know they could die easily in the campaign, that is more due to the fact that I don't scale encounters, and they know this. Thus, it is possible for them to encounter something randomly that might be impossible for them to defeat at their present level of experience. It was not a means for me to say I am running death trap style scenarios every session. I'm not. Far to the contrary in fact. I have had but one PC "death" so to speak, and that was in the very first session.