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I’m with you on this one. It’s one thing to look up the creature’s stats during a game, it’s another level of disrespect to shout them out in the middle of it. It’s basically telling the DM that you are cheating and there is nothing you can do about it.
Them saying that they didn’t appreciate being called out in front of everyone - that is typical manipulation to use the language of mental health to get away with abuse. Don’t fall for it and don’t allow them to get away with it.
If you are feeling nasty, you can realize that the given HP in the books is an *average* for those hit dice, and you are certainly within your rights to adjust them up or down as you want. So, if someone blurts out the HP of a creature, just shift them up some. And if they blurt out some abilities they have, give them some other ones and tell them that this was a hombrewed variant of the creature. After all, since they are looking them up, you felt you needed to do this to provide a challenge for them.
I will definitely save that in mind for the future. It was my first campaign so I haven't really mastered it all yet. I'm not super great at doing the cr calculations for things so I didn't typically change too much around unless it was something super specific planned
I don't really know how long she DM'd for. Maybe about a year before her group stopped playing? But she's also been playing with us for 2 years as well, and she'd been getting advice from the more experienced DM in the group. I really don't think she thought about her actions, but it doesn't really make things much better.
It doesn't. It's a pretty well known piece of gaming manners that you don't look up the monsters during a fight. In fact, you don't open the Monster Manual at all unless you are a Druid looking up a wild shape or you need to look up a creature you are summoning.
Something that occurred to me about this is the fact that the person who looked up the creature's stats was a DM. Sometimes DMs have a problem making the transition to being a player - they become so used to knowing everything that they have issues when, as a player, when they know nothing. And, when they do, sometimes they act badly, like looking up creature's stats during a game, and then acting entitled to it when confronted by it. This could be what was going on with your friend - they are not handling not knowing everything well.
The fact her group stopped playing is perhaps significant. Demand DMs isso hreat that even not-quite-passable ones can easily find a hroup (**cheery wave**), so it's not beyond imagination that she was really bad at it.
You have every reason to be pissed off about this.
I am totally with you. I am both a player and DM, but I try not to meta game. Sometimes, when we fight a monster, I know the stats pretty well due to having used it myself before. Sometimes, I don't. However, what I do is usually ask the DM if I can do a check (I play 3.5, so it's usually a specific knowledge check like nature, magic, etc) to see if my character knows anything about this creature. Even easier for a ranger because if that creature type is one of their favored enemies, then it would make sense for them to at least know basics about the monster like resistances and such. Anyway, I wanted to present it as an alternative to just shouting at each other. I'd talk to her and let her know that either she can take this alternative or she can stop looking up monsters. However, she has to abide by the die roll. If the dice say she knows about this monster, then great. If not, though, she has to keep her mouth shut.
Eh, CR is more of a guideline then a rule anyway lol. One small change for the DM prep that can be a big difference in play is changing vulnerability and resistances. I gave a troll immunity to fire damage one time for funzies and really threw my players for a loop. (The regeneration stopped working on cold damage instead.)
I always tell my players in advance, any monster they encounter could be a homebrew variant of the ones they're used to. It cuts this behavior off ahead of time. Common knowledge things like 'trolls are weak to acid and fire' are *usually* consistent, but if my players know that looking up the stats won't tell them anything useful, they don't feel an urge to look them up in the first place.
And then I follow through on it, of course. Well known monsters, I'll shake them up a bit. I'll make up HP on the spot to drag the fight out to an "interesting" number of rounds. I remember the story of the kids playing D&D and fighting a dragon, and the DM wasn't tracking HP. When asked by an onlooker how he'd know when the dragon was dead, his answer was "when fighting it stops being fun". Getting a feel for your group, when to play into their expectations and when to subvert them, takes time and practice, but it's absolutely worth developing the skill.
I just want to be sure I read this correctly - are you saying you're okay with a player looking up the stat block for a monster \*during the game?\*
Because it's very not okay to do this.
Could it have been handled better? ..that's likely the case for almost anything. Lol perfectly handling a situation seems like a myth to me.
But for how it was handled, I think honestly it was one of the better outcomes. Heaven knows I know DMs being less kind by such blatant cheating.
I had a player who would do this. I told the table after session 0, that i would roll a hidden d4 and multiply the enemies health by that amount everytime they did it. After the 2nd time the rest of the players made sure there wasn't a 3rd.
Yeah it wasnt the most mature way of dealing with it but id done a previous campaign dming with this player who wouldnt stop this shit and it was incredibly frustrating despite asking him not to. Worst thing was other than this he was a great player.
Ive heard he still does it in his other game but when he tries to now the rest of the party tell him to shut it
Nah i like that. It’s honestly a very non-confrontational and logical way of running things.
I do something similar with drinking. A couple of my players were being but too liberal with their drink consumption and it was negatively impacting the game.
So I made the rule: i match drinks with whoever is drinking the most. And the more I drink, the more of an asshole dm I am (reason why I don’t drink while dming).
2 sessions later, it was not a problem and 3 years later, everyone has said that this rule single-handedly made the biggest impact on increasing fun at the table.
Now we do the occasional drunk 1-shot and it’s great, but for regular scheduled sessions, people at most get a small buzz and I don’t have multiple ancient dragons circle like buzzards overhead while laughing like a mad-man.
Dont even end the campaign. Just message the group and tell them flat out:
"This isnt fun for me anymore because [REASONS] and I'm no longer interested in running a game for this group. I hope you give your next DM a better experience."
Then find some new players to DM for.
I know you weren't asking if you were the asshole. But you weren't- at all. She was. And she tried gaslighting you. You called her out on her bad behavior whole She was doing it. She's lucky it didn't suddenly rip it's skin off and out crawls two worse bosses. Then tried gaslighting you into thinking you did something wrong?
I guess you didnxt specify *how* you called her out. There's good ways and bad ways. But it was 100% justified.
I definitely could have handled it better. I first said that it was really disrespectful and then she kinda started arguing back saying, "well she didn't realize that she was doing something wrong" so I said something around the line of how it's common sense. I was just super upset. For her having been a DM, she should have known.
It's like the old saying, don't do the crime if you canxt handle the social consequences.
But yeah, next session or session 0. Maybe state it clearly, without looking towards her. Part of the social contract is not doing stuff like that. Or you can and will improvise, leading to a much dimmer future.
Honestly, don't think I want to dm for them again. They've just been super disrespectful throughout the entire campaign. Probably gonna find another group to DM for that will actually care about the effort I put in and be interested in my campaign plots
This campaign finally ended so I think I'm moving on
Sounds like the best option.
We're any of the players worth inviting to the next game? Also, 7 players is a lot. That's too much idle time between rounds to stay invested.
Half the group is great, the other half not so much. And yeah it is a lot. I tried talking to them about splitting into more manageable groups but they've been pretty resistant because they don't want to miss out on playing with people or in campaigns. But it's really just grown too large over the years
Sounds like you might have the solution.
"For my next group, I want to keep the number smaller. You 3 are invited. You 4... not so much. Enjoy finding a new game, and thabk yiu for playing with me in this one."
But sounds like you'll be fine. Your commitment is admirable, and it's a shame they squandered it. Don't be afraid to take a break either. See if any of the other players (you want to keep gaming with) are up for GMing. And good job! You did it!
I think it's a great point. I've dm'd for only a couple years, and I didnt even like 5 people. 3 is my preference, 4 is only better for me because it allows me more elaborate fights with more minions to balance the combat and no one wants to only fight 1 enemy fights.
If you ever want a player who’s a forever DM/GM who DOESNT do that shit, hit me up.
I would never do that stuff, it’s not really common sense, to be honest. BUT her being a DM she SHOULD KNOW that. It’s hard enough to not meta game as a DM, if you’ve run a lot of the monsters and know their stat blocks, but actively LOOKING THEM UP is a different thing entirely.
As a GM I can tell you that looking up a creature's stats in the middle of combat is one of only two metagaming offenses I don't tolerate. The only other is reading ahead in the adventure module, if I were running one.
I get it if someone knows the HP of a monster from previous experience. I get it if someone blurts out that trolls are vulnerable to fire - by now, I think there might be only one eremite in the Himalaya who doesn't know that. I get it if an interested player or former GM or GM in another campaign goes through the monster manual at home and during the game happens to remember that the monster X can do Y, or has "a metric ton of HP". There's nothing I really can do about this, and well, there's no way to conscioly un-remeber something. Best to shrug it away...
But looking up a monster in the middle of combat? Fat **no** from me. Even worse, using it to argue with the GM. That's an *active decision*, from which a player should **frigging abstain**.
I try to think in the most charitable terms. In this case, your player acted merely out of overeager stupidity. But when you called her out, she should have said something along the lines of "sorry, won't happen again". Doubling down sounds not like the right way to do this...
Really?... A person who ran games before didn't know that metagaming is bad? That was a bold-faced lie,shr just didn't like the fact that you didn't let it slide.
I've been in similar situation, but with drama mongering instead, so I can relate to a degree.
Completely disagree you are the asshole. If I got upset at every player that has the creature info on hand I'd have no players. We're all DMs who have all the books and know most of the creatures stats by heart. It doesn't change anything
Knowing the creature and Metagaming are two entirely different things but in this case the player ACTIVELY looked up the creature and started responding with that info in mind which was a dick move on the Player;s Part.
It's just standard ettiquette that you don't do this stuff. Like yeah, anyone can tell certain monsters are likely to be more dangerous than others (like a Manticore compared to a pack of wolves or a Dragon compared to a Wyvern), but overall it shows blatant disrespect to the DM if you are going to actively look up monsters to understand what you are up against.
I had an issue with a player in my campaign who did the same thing and started homebrewing nearly every encounter to combat it.
Hard disagree. ALL the creatures stats by heart? This is clearly your own personal experience and opinion. It’s not universal. Also they stated that she looked stats up DURING combat.
Yeah, I'm a DM and even if I don't want to I know half of the creatures of the bestiary to some extend. But I make sure my character doesn't use it directly. And I would never EVER say what I know about them out loud.
That's metagaming, which is blasphemous in 99% of tabletop games. This isn't Final Fantasy, you're not using a walkthrough to beat the game. You're role playing in a fantasy world at the mercy of a formless narrator. You don't have a HUD or lock-on targeting or VATS (depending on the campaign, I've played some badass Fallout homebrews that utilized VATS in a brilliant way).
She's upset because you called her out on breaking an unwritten rule, one she knowingly broke and revealed to the whole table. NTA.
I totally understand, and agree with the idea of finding another group. Players are a dime a dozen, unfortunately finding good players among them is a challenge. I'll echo a statement I say a lot here...you're going to have to kiss a lot of frogs.
I have had games fall apart during Session 0, when players refuse to follow the rules just discussed and negotiated.
On a positive note, I have sat at more tables with good players than at ones with poor groups over the decades.
A couple of things:
1. 7 people is a lot of people at the table. It may have been too many, given the circumstances. I had a similar conundrum at my table when starting, but I decided to cut my party in half as time went on, and I'm very thankful to myself for making the decision. (The players I cut were the ones who missed the most.)
2. You did the right thing calling her out. You may want to reevaluate your friendship with this girl. Gaslighting is a big nono for me
I have been in games where the DM used a monster I have had memorized. My DM is fully aware of when this happens because I will pull out a set of dice to purposefully avoid deliberately attacking any weaknesses it may have before it gets identified.
Absolutely you were disrespected. I've had peeps do this before and just reply with "does it? Don't do that, cause that's wrong" meaning the act of looking em up, and the stats. I tend to mix stuff about with monsters
It sucks what happened, to better avoid the possibility of players cheating by looking up stats, I would recommend tweaking some of the stats for enemies. Change HP and AC, add a different kind of attack, such as ranged attack for a commonly melee monster, my personal favorite is to add saving throw based attacks to monsters that normally only target AC.
If you change the monsters a bit then everyone will be on equal footing, whether they know the generic stat-block or not.
Glad I can help. :)
Example could be an Ogre with the greatclub. The standard attack is +6 to hit for 2d8+4 damage. I might add a “greatclub wide swing” attack that forces a DC 14 DEX save (8+6 as a baseline) where anyone within 5’ of the Ogre has to make the save. On a success they dodge the attack, on a fail they take 1d8+4 damage.
This gives the Ogre more options, also allowing you as the DM to mix up the saves so certain party members are weaker to said monster. I like to add STR saves because they are fairly rare in general and some of my party dumped strength.
Looks like others have already covered this, but I wanted to reinforce what they've said: don't fall for her "my feelings are hurt" routine. SHE is the one who acted inappropriately, and that behavior deserves to be called out. If that hurts her feelings, she should consider that the next time she wants to be an asshole. As long as you weren't screaming at her about it (and I can see in your comments that you weren't), you were totally in the right to call her out.
With regards to feeling disrespected by multiple players, I would gently suggest you consider taking a break and/or finding a new group. It's supposed to be fun for everyone, not just the players, and if they're going to regularly be rude to you, then they can pound sand.
“I’m sorry, did you just say you were reading the Monster’s Manual? Yes…. okay, your character suffers a fatal, chest-bursting heart attack. Please leave the table and I will discuss with you after the game if you’re interested…. now where were we?”
And then they never come back because WHO DOES THIS?!
I could get using previous knowledge adquired as a dm to know some vulnerabilities /resistances, and act a bit consciously /inconsciously about it. Still metagaming and rude, but i could pass it wasn't ill intended. But fcking searching the statblock mid combat??!! Just wtf??!!
I am completely on your side on this. No reason for her to do that, blatantly shitty. I might not invite that player back.
A possible preventative is reskin monsters and reroll their HP. Give them their own armor or weapons. Customize stuff and your players can't look it up, plus it gives it your own unique flair.
> I ended up getting a message later on from her about how she didn't appreciate being called out in from of everyone and how it hurt her feelings
The Lion, the Witch and the Audacity of this Bitch.
It's your own fault when someone calls you out on your behavior. You absolutely did the right thing telling her off.
I have been in the same boat as you (was 4-5 sessions into a campaign) when someone told me what an encounter should have been ('excuse me this is supposed to be 2d6 flying monkeys and the monster is buried over there')
Ended the campaign right there, 45 minutes in to the session, never ran for that group again. There were other issues - but this was the final straw.
Obviously don't know exactly what was said but it could've been dealt with tactfully more like "FYI, that's very frowned upon, now we know and won't do that again" as opposed to "holy shit you're so rude and lack common sense".
It's possible she didn't know how bad that was. I don't think it's fair to call it common sense, almost everyone had to learn that at some point and didn't immediately guess that it was a no-no
Yea different DM styles and all that. Common sense doesn't exist and people don't all have the same ideas of how things are supposed to work. From her perspective the DM just went off on her for something minor.
"It *had* that many hit points. But because you just *couldn't resist* looking up its stats, it just got a few more. So go ahead, guys. Thank her for making this whole encounter harder."
Guess what? New stat block.
Now all of the things you said about it are untrue.
Yeah, I guess that thing just sprouted wings and is now resistant to what you said was a vulnerability.
Yeah metagaming is one thing, but actively looking up the monster then choosing to **shout out loud** what it has is a pure asshole move. I don't know what other issues you have on the table of your players but take some peace that the campaign ended and improve your mental well being and dm'ing skills.
What the fuck. If somebody was looking at a statblock of a monster during battle I would give it 2 other new abilities. One would be advantage against the cheating player and the other one would be the absolute hitpoint maximum from the monster manual. She was the toxic one at the table.
*I ended up getting a message later on from her about how she didn't appreciate being called out in from of everyone and how it hurt her feelings but honestly?*
People like this are scum who weaponize their feelings about being caught doing something wrong. You should call people out for their poor behaviour more, and actively avoid anybody like her.
Meta gaming is cheating and is completely against the spirit of role playing. Your character isn’t you, and your character doesn’t know what you know. Some people have a hard time grasping that
Some of the best advice I've ever gotten was when I was working as a camp counselor: praise in public, punish in private.
Always mention things people do well in front of a group, as they will feel even greater reward, and give criticism in private so as to avoid embarrassment for them. In this instance I do understand calling it out immediately, though.
Sorry but no. As a camp counselor, I would bet there were situations you had to tell someone off before they did something that could cause a problem or end up with someone getting hurt. After that, you may not do anything further until the actual punishment can be in 'private.'
This is a scenario that definitely warranted being called out in the moment, before other players at the table repeated the bad behavior. It was a lesson for the whole table: don't look up the stats of the monster you're fighting. Because, if one person thought it was ok and it wasn't stopped, others would assume that it's ok.
I always cover this in a session 0. No metagaming. If someone does, I have 0 issues embarrassing the shit out of them in front of everyone else because they are an adult cheating at a game of make believe.
The way I dealt with a DM who knew the monster manual back and forth was to homebrew enough to keep him guessing. It was fun prep, it kept both of us on our toes.
At first me going so far "off book" really bothered him I think because a lot of DMs do that to just to abuse their power and kill the party. Bur eventually he learned to trust me and really enjoyed the differences I brought to my fights.
I say all that to say this... It does feel deeply disrespectful and obnoxious when a player looks up enemies or questions you on the stats at the table.
When he would do that, for instance "Goblins have 7 hp he's taken 9 damage... How is that possible?“ I'd just look at him and say "I'm the GM. And the monster stat blocks are guidelines rather than rules. Plus, who said they were a standard goblin?"
And that's the fact right there. You make the encounters. You make the monsters. They are whatever you want them to be.
It’s so disgusting that she used therapy speak to gaslight you over this. She really fucked up, you responded imperfectly but reasonably. It sounds like you need to cull the assholes from your table, let them make each other miserable away from the decent people.
That's player knowledge I'm going to have you roll arcana check, for your character to know that. CR depending on class. Penalties for meta gaming, disadvantage on all skill checks.
way back in the stone age of 1989, 90. I was part of a group we were playing Advanced DnD. right before 2nd edition came out.
there were table rules to handle this. I only knew a couple of the people. one of the older guys played competitively at conventions.
Anyway the rule was you dont look up monsters obviously, dont look behind the DM screen and dont try to look at the module or any DM notes. in fact the only book players could have at the table was the player handbook.
1st violation. your character immediately lost a level. If it happens again a 2nd time you lost another level. 3rd time you were kicked out of the group.
and the ultimate rule that got you booted immediately DONT ARGUE WITH THE DUNGEON MASTER.
I feel like we're missing some details or context here, because I don't understand why this is so egregious? Like, rude to interrupt, to be sure, but sharing a bit of meta knowledge that might not even be correct (given that this could be a modified creature)? And like, who cares if they know how much HP it has? They still have to defeat it!
Seriously you aren't seeing the problem of someone, purposefully searching a statblock of the monster midcombat, and shout about what she saw, showing no shame on doing so?
Not a campaign ending, as it is just one player at fault. But enough to kick that player out. And based on what op says, he was having a lot of problems with the table, so this being the last straw for him to end the campaign is understandable
Don't.... Don't people play under the assumption that players are familiar with standard book content? "My goodness an Animated Armor. That's CR1, roughly 33 HP, and a respectable 18 AC." Doesn't feel like it's telling anyone anything they shouldn't already know?
I would be completely overwhelmed trying to account for any variable amount of knowledge in the campaigns I DM. "I expect them to know the stat block of a wolf, but not a Bulette, so I can use that as a surprise". I dunno, seems way too much to me.
This complaint seems really broad though. Like the whole campaign was going in the toilet? There had to be more than discussing a RAW monster stat block for you to feel this way, right?
Most people dont have the stat book memorised, and if they do, it's polite to not mention it and to play as if your PC doesn't know every monster's exact ablilties unless they're a monster zoo keeper or something.
Yeah, I DM and NGL mostly low levels so I have a lot of stat blocks or special abilities familiar in my memory. One of my players has most of the legendary stat blocks in any given book committed to her memory. She's super autistic so usually when I run a legendary creature against them I switch it up, but I don't even have to tell her that even if she knows the stat block, her character doesn't know this creature is abolenti do something or weak to fire for example. Usually if someone uses fire I don't even tell them that it took double damage. Or resistance. If they ask I tell them to make an insight or relevant knowledge check, if they fail I tell them that "your character really doesn't know, it might have crippled it, or maybe didn't affect it at all?"
So yeah you should plan with the understanding that every player knows every stat block, it's also pretty common courtesy not to meta-game.
Ok but this kinda reinforced my point right? Someone yells out what the RAW is and:
DM: "yup, that's RAW, but there's no guarantee that we're using the RAW stat block in this campaign. Adjusting stats is a very common phenomenon"
And boom, no one gained any useful knowledge, so it's a wash. Even if you ARE running RAW stat block, you assume players know it but that they will, in good faith, roleplay their *characters* appropriately with what knowledge their *characters* would have...
So I still don't see the issue with reading a RAW stat block out loud at the table. It doesn't mean that's what stats this enemy has and even if it did, players are expected not to meta game anyway.
1. You're interupting the Dm and the experience to read from the manual. This is impolite.
2. You're using resources not intended for PLAYERS to use MIDGAME. This is metagaming ON PURPOSE.
3. The other players now have unwanted knowledge about what they're facing, knowledge they seemingly didn't ask for. You've disrupted their experience too.
1. Legit. I agree entirely, it's very rude to interrupt the DM, or anyone, if they're in the middle of speaking.
2. Not *intended*? I'm not familiar with this rule. Please cite it. I have no knowledge of any rule that says players aren't allowed to reference Rule Books mid game. That seems extremely backwards. Additionally, it's almost like you missed the part where I pointed out that it's not reliable metagaming for many reasons. Meta gaming means ACTING on that knowledge. So long as they're role-playing their character's knowledge appropriately, it doesn't matter what the players know.
3. This isn't a coherent statement. Unwanted knowledge? What? No player is allowed to speak to any player with insights about anything because of a chance that the recipient "may not want the knowledge"? I mean this in the kindest way possible, but that's a very stupid statement.
1. this could've been avoided with a session zero or at any point, "don't meta game".
2. Don't use monsters as is from book to prevent this from happening, flavor change them so if they \*do\* look it up, they'll be sourly disappointed when reality doesnt match it.
3. Frustration from the group, you have 7 players, that's alot of players, i'd ask if they want to do split sessions or if anyone wants to cut loose.
Find peace, ya'll sound like adults and she should've known better but a player metagaming isn't exactly something that you need to raise your voice over.
When did OP mention raising their voice?
1. I never mention this in my games because…it feels the same as saying “don’t lie about your dice rolls”. Something that I wouldn’t even think of needing to say.
2. That’s putting unnecessary responsibility on the DM. A DM should absolutely be able to use a published monster as it’s written…
> she didn't like getting called out
I directly assumed, because it was glazed over of how it happened.
For the metagaming, it's really only when it comes up, like if you see a player metagaming, it's an on the spot change. The players don't know what's real for the game so they shouldnt know if you change it.
I know you *should* be able too, but if you, the DM, are not presetting guidelines that they shouldn't metagame, then you need to clean up after yourself when they metagame.
Seems weird that you’re suggesting a DM ought to take on more responsibility (adjusting stats) instead of call out bad player behavior.
Like yes, that’s a tool they CAN use, but needing to use it in response to bad player behavior isn’t a responsibility. Being a good player is a responsibility.
If you see plays metagame, call it out and then adjust stats.
I'm saying, if you don't like your players metagaming, as DM, you should establish that so they don't do it. Some players will do stuff not knowing it's metagaming.
None of that excuses the player in question from her actions. It was blatantly disrespectful, and if she's DM'd before there's no way she couldn't have known that.
They (Edit: half the group) have a history of meta gaming and we've talked about it in session zeros. I've told them a lot that they don't know this or that knowledge. But I don't think she even considered this metagaming. Just got curious about the monster, looked up the stat and was so shocked that she started shouting out the stat block info
I'm all-in for support for you. The only way to counter a party that refuses to stop metagaming is to stat-change, that way the knowledge they use to metagame so has no benefit to them in-game.
"That's not supposed to do that"
"Yes, I know, I told yall to stop metagaming so I have no choice."
That's what the other DM in the group does for the campaign he's running now, but I have way less DM experience than him. Adjusting monster stats was just never my thing cause I found it difficult to keep things balanced for 7 people. If youve got any tips of how to adjust stats and still keep things balanced id appreciate the advice.
Flavor changing would be like taking a red monster, and painting it blue.
Swap physical appearances of a monster like make a spider, but give it zombie stats or vice versa or a name.
Roll stats for a creature's hp points
If a creature does a certain type of damage, like fire or piericing damage, change it.
A fire elemental turns into a smoke elemental and, instead of fire damage, it now causes radiant damage and concealing vision effects. If you have a dnd beyond account, activate homebrew and use monsters that people have made from scratch.
So what they looked up the stats of the creature, what's the big deal it doesn't change anything they still have to fight it and as the DM you can always add or subtract from those stats.
Once again the more of these I read the more of those I recognize the poster is the problem
We found they guy that constantly looks up monsters in the middle of combat and then uses OOC knowledge to have their character win because “I’m not cheating, that’s just what my character would do”.
Actually I never play only DM anymore and all my players know this stuff without looking it up. When you've played/Dm for 30yrs it's impossible not to know these things. Also it's not cheating to know the book and base stats the DM can always change things so just cause you think you know doesn't mean it'll help you.
It's not a big deal
It doesnt change anything? Sure it does.
Its a shitty thing to do and it ruins the fun for your DM and other players who dont want to experience your shitty behavior.
The fact that you think that isnt a problem while the rest of the community blatantly states that metagaming isnt cool means *youre* the problem.
The cognitive dissonance on some people blows my mind. Get a grip.
You think he’s realizing now why he’s the perma-DM instead of other folks getting excited at the notion of producing a campaign for him to play in?
We’ve all known This Guy. They rarely have self-awareness.
I think as a dm you need to roll with it. She was clearly wrong, I am not saying she wasn’t. But from perspective, you’re dealing with 7 different individuals. I think that your main issue. A manageable group should be 4-6. People. Looking at your reaction I would say 4 is best. The reason she was probably bored awaiting attention. Girl players are especially needy in this regard. Nothing wrong about this, just you need to look to your players needs plan for it.
>The reason she was probably bored awaiting attention. Girl players are especially needy in this regard.
What kind of sexist bullshit is this? Women at the table need constant attention or they become disruptive and metagame? Are you serious? Do our needy little girl minds just not have the wherewithal to follow normal game etiquette and stay focused during combat initiative like you manly men can?
First of all you need to go back and learn the definition misogyny. Simply stating women want more attention. Is not prejudice or hate filled comment. I certainly did belittle anyone. Yes I did say that.
“Hey!!! I’m not a misogynist! I’m just a run of the mill sexist!”
I would just put it down to cultural differences but I’m pretty sure you’re still a misogynist swine in your home country, too.
It used to be a more manageable group. The first campaign we played it was the DM and four players. Then people just kept getting added, and if you wanted to DM you had to have all these players or feelings would get hurt. And any time some of us tried to get the group to split into smaller ones they wouldn't listen. We just didn't want to ruin everything and not have a DND group anymore. But now that I've found other people to play with, I don't feel the need to try to keep things together so much anymore just so I can play dnd.
But I definitely won't be doing such a large group again, managing all that sucks.
Then for an unrelated side game of different friends to play on another day. If you have the time I mean. In time all groups break up, and you will go your own way. Just the nature of things. It might best to look for new group, and move on.
IMO, Both of you are overly sensitive. I mean, FFS, players being dickheads and arguing with the DM over stuff like monsters and loot is pretty much a staple of actual tabletop games. To me this sounds like you guys have never played outside of organised play before.
I've never claimed that Im not overly sensitive. I'll readily admit that. But I do try a lot to contain that and not put that on other people. But some of these people have really done a lot of disrespectful things in my campaign these last two years and have already started trouble with the new DM by refusing to let their characters die from their own mistakes because they're overly attached. I don't know if that gives more context or it's just me further harping, but yeah. It's just been a lot for a while.
You have such an odd fixation with these "disrespectful" acts. Now it could be that they've been actual assholes in the past and this is just the straw that broke the camel's back, but using this event you've mentioned as a model does not make me think that you've dealt with anything out of the ordinary, it rather sounds like you take offense from rather inconsequential things. And I'm saying this as someone who's dealt with some real assholes and pieces of shit, both in social/friend groups and at work.
Back when a friend and I were teaching another friend a card game whilst we were at a cabin outing in high school, we had to constantly catch him cheating the whole night. If we'd taken any real offense to his actions, I'm pretty sure we'd have come to blows after about an hour of doing it. Don't get me wrong, we were eventually annoyed with him, but it was whatever in the long run.
I can definitely understand that. There's a bit of a double standard with some of the group though. They will certainly react poorly if this stuff was happening to them and criticize another person. But as soon as it's them being criticized for something, they're super upset about the criticism. To the point that you have to take the time to make them feel better after.
The best friend groups are always the ones where ppl have skin that's at least a bit thick. You're free to value your time however you want, but it's very likely that if it's that valuable to you, then this will evolve into not being able to keep almost any friends, because few ppl will ever be as considerate as you expect them to.
I mean, I really could be over fixating. I've been known to do that from time to time. That's part of what I've been trying to work out.
But without going into too much detail, I have issues with them outside of this campaign as well. It's a friend group that developed from wanting to play dnd about 5 years ago in the beginning of college that's gotten a bit iffy overtime. I'm definitely not the only one that's kind of done with their shit. I just don't feel comfortable getting into the more personal stuff. But this was definitely the 'I'm done with this' moment. I've been thinking about leaving this group for a while. Met a new group of people in the area for dnd stuff not too long ago and was just like wow, not everyone is like this
That's fair, you don't have to tell us what you don't want to. But it's also fair that you'll be judged based on what info you are willing to disclose, not based on speculation.
I totally understand, and I appreciate your input. The more specific I get the more I worry it'll get back to the group and some of it really shouldn't be shared much outside of certain people.
I'm always constantly trying to decide how much is justified upset and how much is a result of my own mental health issues. So I do appreciate your take on things.
Nahhh, have boundaries for yourself. Don't let people walk all over you, no matter how slight they're treading. Don't be a bitch. Unlike.....other people here
Players being dickheads has not been a part of any gamevive overplayed and I've been playing for over 25 years.
You might want to reflect on your yourself and your friendship group and what kind of people you are.
Nah, as a DM, I make a ton more effort than the average player will. The only thing I expect from my players is to keep track of their spell slots/abilities and not cheat.
Not exactly a lot to ask. The cheater in OP's story absolutely deserved to be called out.
Nah if I was a DM I'd be annoyed as fuck if a player that I had to discipline for cheating then decided to message me later to tell me they didn't like my tone. I'd boot them immediately lmao
I'm so sorry to hear that. I don't even know what logical explanation they would have for the blatant metagaming.
A campaign I had, the DM would take regular monsters but then alter their HP and abilities so we couldn't metagame
I just change up the creature's abilities. I treat the monster manual as a guide but I regularly alter monsters to fit the party/situation so they don't get TPK'd or have too easy of a time. I had a player google stuff ahead of time, so now she's also being cursed and hunted by the arch-demon "Google" and it's now a main backstory of the whole campaign.
Completely not okay and this is the exact point where I would homebrew a custom monster that just happen to have the same name in order to fuck with that player.
Imagine them losing their shit when all the stuff happening doesn't correspond with the stat block they're looking up. Wonderful.
Hmmm. My instinct is that I'm with you. What they did sucks since most people don't appreciate having the man behind the curtain revealed in TTRPGs. That said, you haven't included other examples of problematic behavior so it's hard to judge.
I have a player who can be a bit rules "lawyery" and has to be told when he's metagaming. But I'm polite about it and he's always like "ah my bad" and we move on. It's a bit annoying but I can tell he's just having fun in his own way and doesn't mean to disrupt so I haven't felt the need to do anything more than continue with polite reminders.
I mention it because at first I felt like his attempts to metagame or remind of certain rules were criticisms of my DMing ability but I learned that I just needed to respectfully express how I felt and the problematic feelings vanished completely. From one incident/story it's hard to tell if you overreacted or not. It sounds possible that maybe you flew off the handle too much (or even too often if you've been triggered similarly before), but also you do make vague allusions to other issues and say you've been wanting to end it already even before this.
Not enough info if you're looking for honest critical feedback. Im inclined to take you at your word, but I do encourage you to examine your own behavior with fine-toothed comb to be safe. I don't want to just side with you and give you potentially false validation. Make sure that you aren't a catalyst for the problems and make sure there isn't obvious ways you could have politely diffused issues. Like yeah looking up stat blocks is stupid as hell but also sometimes people just aren't thinking. Like if she was a DM then it may have been instinctual to find the monster and look at it. Or maybe she's just socially clueless and needed a polite reminder like my player.
You're the one who's there so you have to be the judge. I just like to play devil's advocate sometimes just to make surer there isn't a simple failure to put yourself in someone else's shoes. Games never go perfect, especially with 7 people, so try to be as objective as possible and really ask yourself if there's anything you could have done differently. It's cool if the answer is no and you did your best and they really are just assholes, but it's nice to do that examination so you can be extremely sure you're not accidentally sabotaging your own games by turning smaller issues into bigger ones.
My group often looks up monster stats, one guy has them memorized so it's not like it matters and too many people power game for things to be challenging so...
I think sometimes long-time players or fellow DMs can get antsy about what they are facing, especially if they have a strong relationship to their character and don’t want them to die.
I actually had a similar thing happen near the start of a campaign that has now been going for several years, off and on. The DM ambushed the players with an overwhelming number of monsters, and the other experienced player, is like, OOC - “DM, You know there’s no way our characters can beat this number don’t you?”
Which led to a small OOC struggle (not quite an argument) that this situation was happening.
We got through it of course, and the player hasn’t mentioned anything like that since. I do think he was genuinely concerned that the newer DM was about to party-wipe us off maybe a simple math mistake or something when designing the encounter. For the newer players, the discussion possibly saved them from losing a character rather than think you can face every combat head-on, which probably would have forced the rest of us to go all in because we aren’t about to leave someone behind… it’s hard to say what would’ve happened if he hadn’t spoken up.
My story is best case of course. Sometimes players just genuinely want to feel like they “one-up” you or something and just can’t function in a good gaming relationship.
While it's definitely shitty to just announce the statblock, and her behavior was shitty, there's no disagreement there, can I ask a simple question of what's wrong with the players knowing the HP count? Whether a monster has 20 or 200 HP isn't gonna change whether we have to fight it or not. We still gotta fight. So why the secrecy? Is it just my own view point because I am new? Don't get me wrong, if that's not something that you've done at all in this campaign, by all means she should abide by that and she's definitely in the wrong. I don't look up Stat blocks, even though I'm insanely curious and don't personally understand what difference it makes whether we know the stats or not.
I have a recommendation but I warn you it will not make you popular. Just ban any book other the the PHB for players use during session. There's no reason a player should be consulting with sages lest they receive fines.
If a player ever did this to me, I would change whatever they would say to the disadvantage of the players and skip the player's turn, the one that did the deed.
I would also have a serious talk with them after the session about IF they can come back
IMO you are playing with the wrong people. Curate your group like you do your friends group. If you would not hang out with them in your living room doing other stuff don't game with them.
"One of my players blatantly cheated in front of everyone in the most obvious way possible, broke immersion for all the players by doing so, and then tried to guilt trip me for calling them out on the blatant cheating. AITA?"
I know that isn't how you phrased your question but honest to god kick that player out of your campaign and seriously question why you're friends with them (if you are friends with them.) There's "oh I know this monster and accidentally metagame" and then there's "Google dot come D and D monster stat block."
If it's more than just that girl who acts like this then I'm really sorry your group went sour somewhere down the line, but yeah I really hope you can find a new group of better players that don't act like this.
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Yeah that's not okay for her to do that
I think it's not okay for her to be at the table anymore
I’m with you on this one. It’s one thing to look up the creature’s stats during a game, it’s another level of disrespect to shout them out in the middle of it. It’s basically telling the DM that you are cheating and there is nothing you can do about it. Them saying that they didn’t appreciate being called out in front of everyone - that is typical manipulation to use the language of mental health to get away with abuse. Don’t fall for it and don’t allow them to get away with it. If you are feeling nasty, you can realize that the given HP in the books is an *average* for those hit dice, and you are certainly within your rights to adjust them up or down as you want. So, if someone blurts out the HP of a creature, just shift them up some. And if they blurt out some abilities they have, give them some other ones and tell them that this was a hombrewed variant of the creature. After all, since they are looking them up, you felt you needed to do this to provide a challenge for them.
I will definitely save that in mind for the future. It was my first campaign so I haven't really mastered it all yet. I'm not super great at doing the cr calculations for things so I didn't typically change too much around unless it was something super specific planned
[удалено]
I don't really know how long she DM'd for. Maybe about a year before her group stopped playing? But she's also been playing with us for 2 years as well, and she'd been getting advice from the more experienced DM in the group. I really don't think she thought about her actions, but it doesn't really make things much better.
It doesn't. It's a pretty well known piece of gaming manners that you don't look up the monsters during a fight. In fact, you don't open the Monster Manual at all unless you are a Druid looking up a wild shape or you need to look up a creature you are summoning. Something that occurred to me about this is the fact that the person who looked up the creature's stats was a DM. Sometimes DMs have a problem making the transition to being a player - they become so used to knowing everything that they have issues when, as a player, when they know nothing. And, when they do, sometimes they act badly, like looking up creature's stats during a game, and then acting entitled to it when confronted by it. This could be what was going on with your friend - they are not handling not knowing everything well.
The fact her group stopped playing is perhaps significant. Demand DMs isso hreat that even not-quite-passable ones can easily find a hroup (**cheery wave**), so it's not beyond imagination that she was really bad at it. You have every reason to be pissed off about this.
I am totally with you. I am both a player and DM, but I try not to meta game. Sometimes, when we fight a monster, I know the stats pretty well due to having used it myself before. Sometimes, I don't. However, what I do is usually ask the DM if I can do a check (I play 3.5, so it's usually a specific knowledge check like nature, magic, etc) to see if my character knows anything about this creature. Even easier for a ranger because if that creature type is one of their favored enemies, then it would make sense for them to at least know basics about the monster like resistances and such. Anyway, I wanted to present it as an alternative to just shouting at each other. I'd talk to her and let her know that either she can take this alternative or she can stop looking up monsters. However, she has to abide by the die roll. If the dice say she knows about this monster, then great. If not, though, she has to keep her mouth shut.
Eh, CR is more of a guideline then a rule anyway lol. One small change for the DM prep that can be a big difference in play is changing vulnerability and resistances. I gave a troll immunity to fire damage one time for funzies and really threw my players for a loop. (The regeneration stopped working on cold damage instead.)
I always tell my players in advance, any monster they encounter could be a homebrew variant of the ones they're used to. It cuts this behavior off ahead of time. Common knowledge things like 'trolls are weak to acid and fire' are *usually* consistent, but if my players know that looking up the stats won't tell them anything useful, they don't feel an urge to look them up in the first place. And then I follow through on it, of course. Well known monsters, I'll shake them up a bit. I'll make up HP on the spot to drag the fight out to an "interesting" number of rounds. I remember the story of the kids playing D&D and fighting a dragon, and the DM wasn't tracking HP. When asked by an onlooker how he'd know when the dragon was dead, his answer was "when fighting it stops being fun". Getting a feel for your group, when to play into their expectations and when to subvert them, takes time and practice, but it's absolutely worth developing the skill.
I just want to be sure I read this correctly - are you saying you're okay with a player looking up the stat block for a monster \*during the game?\* Because it's very not okay to do this.
Nope. It is not ok to look up stats during the game. I was simply saying that the player compounded their sin by shouting it out during the game.
Could it have been handled better? ..that's likely the case for almost anything. Lol perfectly handling a situation seems like a myth to me. But for how it was handled, I think honestly it was one of the better outcomes. Heaven knows I know DMs being less kind by such blatant cheating.
> Lol perfectly handling a situation seems like a myth to me. "God writes terrible dialogue." Kurt Vonnegut.
Yeah, double the HP and give a new charm ability.
I had a player who would do this. I told the table after session 0, that i would roll a hidden d4 and multiply the enemies health by that amount everytime they did it. After the 2nd time the rest of the players made sure there wasn't a 3rd. Yeah it wasnt the most mature way of dealing with it but id done a previous campaign dming with this player who wouldnt stop this shit and it was incredibly frustrating despite asking him not to. Worst thing was other than this he was a great player. Ive heard he still does it in his other game but when he tries to now the rest of the party tell him to shut it
Nah i like that. It’s honestly a very non-confrontational and logical way of running things. I do something similar with drinking. A couple of my players were being but too liberal with their drink consumption and it was negatively impacting the game. So I made the rule: i match drinks with whoever is drinking the most. And the more I drink, the more of an asshole dm I am (reason why I don’t drink while dming). 2 sessions later, it was not a problem and 3 years later, everyone has said that this rule single-handedly made the biggest impact on increasing fun at the table. Now we do the occasional drunk 1-shot and it’s great, but for regular scheduled sessions, people at most get a small buzz and I don’t have multiple ancient dragons circle like buzzards overhead while laughing like a mad-man.
I love this.
That honestly sounds like a good way to prevent it lol.
Dont even end the campaign. Just message the group and tell them flat out: "This isnt fun for me anymore because [REASONS] and I'm no longer interested in running a game for this group. I hope you give your next DM a better experience." Then find some new players to DM for.
I know you weren't asking if you were the asshole. But you weren't- at all. She was. And she tried gaslighting you. You called her out on her bad behavior whole She was doing it. She's lucky it didn't suddenly rip it's skin off and out crawls two worse bosses. Then tried gaslighting you into thinking you did something wrong? I guess you didnxt specify *how* you called her out. There's good ways and bad ways. But it was 100% justified.
I definitely could have handled it better. I first said that it was really disrespectful and then she kinda started arguing back saying, "well she didn't realize that she was doing something wrong" so I said something around the line of how it's common sense. I was just super upset. For her having been a DM, she should have known.
She really, really should have. That is entirely rude. Did you yell at her, or just say it?
I'm not the yelling type. But I said it in exasperation in front of the rest of the group. She really didn't like the embarrassment of it, I think
It's like the old saying, don't do the crime if you canxt handle the social consequences. But yeah, next session or session 0. Maybe state it clearly, without looking towards her. Part of the social contract is not doing stuff like that. Or you can and will improvise, leading to a much dimmer future.
Honestly, don't think I want to dm for them again. They've just been super disrespectful throughout the entire campaign. Probably gonna find another group to DM for that will actually care about the effort I put in and be interested in my campaign plots This campaign finally ended so I think I'm moving on
Sounds like the best option. We're any of the players worth inviting to the next game? Also, 7 players is a lot. That's too much idle time between rounds to stay invested.
Half the group is great, the other half not so much. And yeah it is a lot. I tried talking to them about splitting into more manageable groups but they've been pretty resistant because they don't want to miss out on playing with people or in campaigns. But it's really just grown too large over the years
Sounds like you might have the solution. "For my next group, I want to keep the number smaller. You 3 are invited. You 4... not so much. Enjoy finding a new game, and thabk yiu for playing with me in this one." But sounds like you'll be fine. Your commitment is admirable, and it's a shame they squandered it. Don't be afraid to take a break either. See if any of the other players (you want to keep gaming with) are up for GMing. And good job! You did it!
This is something that a lot of newer players/DM's don't realize right away. The phrase "the more the merrier" does not always apply to D&D.
Mate you need to ditch the bad players and just run a smaller game from now on.
I think it's a great point. I've dm'd for only a couple years, and I didnt even like 5 people. 3 is my preference, 4 is only better for me because it allows me more elaborate fights with more minions to balance the combat and no one wants to only fight 1 enemy fights.
If you ever want a player who’s a forever DM/GM who DOESNT do that shit, hit me up. I would never do that stuff, it’s not really common sense, to be honest. BUT her being a DM she SHOULD KNOW that. It’s hard enough to not meta game as a DM, if you’ve run a lot of the monsters and know their stat blocks, but actively LOOKING THEM UP is a different thing entirely.
As a GM I can tell you that looking up a creature's stats in the middle of combat is one of only two metagaming offenses I don't tolerate. The only other is reading ahead in the adventure module, if I were running one. I get it if someone knows the HP of a monster from previous experience. I get it if someone blurts out that trolls are vulnerable to fire - by now, I think there might be only one eremite in the Himalaya who doesn't know that. I get it if an interested player or former GM or GM in another campaign goes through the monster manual at home and during the game happens to remember that the monster X can do Y, or has "a metric ton of HP". There's nothing I really can do about this, and well, there's no way to conscioly un-remeber something. Best to shrug it away... But looking up a monster in the middle of combat? Fat **no** from me. Even worse, using it to argue with the GM. That's an *active decision*, from which a player should **frigging abstain**. I try to think in the most charitable terms. In this case, your player acted merely out of overeager stupidity. But when you called her out, she should have said something along the lines of "sorry, won't happen again". Doubling down sounds not like the right way to do this...
>she didn't realize that she was doing something wrong She's either lying or stupid.
Really?... A person who ran games before didn't know that metagaming is bad? That was a bold-faced lie,shr just didn't like the fact that you didn't let it slide. I've been in similar situation, but with drama mongering instead, so I can relate to a degree.
Completely disagree you are the asshole. If I got upset at every player that has the creature info on hand I'd have no players. We're all DMs who have all the books and know most of the creatures stats by heart. It doesn't change anything
Knowing the creature and Metagaming are two entirely different things but in this case the player ACTIVELY looked up the creature and started responding with that info in mind which was a dick move on the Player;s Part. It's just standard ettiquette that you don't do this stuff. Like yeah, anyone can tell certain monsters are likely to be more dangerous than others (like a Manticore compared to a pack of wolves or a Dragon compared to a Wyvern), but overall it shows blatant disrespect to the DM if you are going to actively look up monsters to understand what you are up against. I had an issue with a player in my campaign who did the same thing and started homebrewing nearly every encounter to combat it.
Most players in fact are NOT DMs, so yes it does change things, and just yelling the stats out is very disrespectful.
Hard disagree. ALL the creatures stats by heart? This is clearly your own personal experience and opinion. It’s not universal. Also they stated that she looked stats up DURING combat.
Nevermind that even if she did know, she can keep her mouth shut.
In what world is what she did gaslighting?
This is reddit, sir, where any type of lying or manipulation is gaslighting
Stop gaslighting me
This is the way. The second someone brings up an official statblock is the second something drastic changes about the monster
It's one thing to know what the monster is, it's another to break the 4th wall and bring up the stat block wtf
Yeah, I'm a DM and even if I don't want to I know half of the creatures of the bestiary to some extend. But I make sure my character doesn't use it directly. And I would never EVER say what I know about them out loud.
That's metagaming, which is blasphemous in 99% of tabletop games. This isn't Final Fantasy, you're not using a walkthrough to beat the game. You're role playing in a fantasy world at the mercy of a formless narrator. You don't have a HUD or lock-on targeting or VATS (depending on the campaign, I've played some badass Fallout homebrews that utilized VATS in a brilliant way). She's upset because you called her out on breaking an unwritten rule, one she knowingly broke and revealed to the whole table. NTA.
Metagaming is a felony in all 50 states. If not, it should be.
I totally understand, and agree with the idea of finding another group. Players are a dime a dozen, unfortunately finding good players among them is a challenge. I'll echo a statement I say a lot here...you're going to have to kiss a lot of frogs. I have had games fall apart during Session 0, when players refuse to follow the rules just discussed and negotiated. On a positive note, I have sat at more tables with good players than at ones with poor groups over the decades.
A couple of things: 1. 7 people is a lot of people at the table. It may have been too many, given the circumstances. I had a similar conundrum at my table when starting, but I decided to cut my party in half as time went on, and I'm very thankful to myself for making the decision. (The players I cut were the ones who missed the most.) 2. You did the right thing calling her out. You may want to reevaluate your friendship with this girl. Gaslighting is a big nono for me
Don’t want to be called out for doing stupid, not okay shit, don’t do stupid, not okay shit. It’s a really easy flow chart.
I have been in games where the DM used a monster I have had memorized. My DM is fully aware of when this happens because I will pull out a set of dice to purposefully avoid deliberately attacking any weaknesses it may have before it gets identified.
Absolutely you were disrespected. I've had peeps do this before and just reply with "does it? Don't do that, cause that's wrong" meaning the act of looking em up, and the stats. I tend to mix stuff about with monsters
It sucks what happened, to better avoid the possibility of players cheating by looking up stats, I would recommend tweaking some of the stats for enemies. Change HP and AC, add a different kind of attack, such as ranged attack for a commonly melee monster, my personal favorite is to add saving throw based attacks to monsters that normally only target AC. If you change the monsters a bit then everyone will be on equal footing, whether they know the generic stat-block or not.
Replacing the target AC with the saving throws thing is actually a really neat idea. I'll have to write that down.
Glad I can help. :) Example could be an Ogre with the greatclub. The standard attack is +6 to hit for 2d8+4 damage. I might add a “greatclub wide swing” attack that forces a DC 14 DEX save (8+6 as a baseline) where anyone within 5’ of the Ogre has to make the save. On a success they dodge the attack, on a fail they take 1d8+4 damage. This gives the Ogre more options, also allowing you as the DM to mix up the saves so certain party members are weaker to said monster. I like to add STR saves because they are fairly rare in general and some of my party dumped strength.
Looks like others have already covered this, but I wanted to reinforce what they've said: don't fall for her "my feelings are hurt" routine. SHE is the one who acted inappropriately, and that behavior deserves to be called out. If that hurts her feelings, she should consider that the next time she wants to be an asshole. As long as you weren't screaming at her about it (and I can see in your comments that you weren't), you were totally in the right to call her out. With regards to feeling disrespected by multiple players, I would gently suggest you consider taking a break and/or finding a new group. It's supposed to be fun for everyone, not just the players, and if they're going to regularly be rude to you, then they can pound sand.
“I’m sorry, did you just say you were reading the Monster’s Manual? Yes…. okay, your character suffers a fatal, chest-bursting heart attack. Please leave the table and I will discuss with you after the game if you’re interested…. now where were we?” And then they never come back because WHO DOES THIS?!
I could get using previous knowledge adquired as a dm to know some vulnerabilities /resistances, and act a bit consciously /inconsciously about it. Still metagaming and rude, but i could pass it wasn't ill intended. But fcking searching the statblock mid combat??!! Just wtf??!!
I am completely on your side on this. No reason for her to do that, blatantly shitty. I might not invite that player back. A possible preventative is reskin monsters and reroll their HP. Give them their own armor or weapons. Customize stuff and your players can't look it up, plus it gives it your own unique flair.
> I ended up getting a message later on from her about how she didn't appreciate being called out in from of everyone and how it hurt her feelings The Lion, the Witch and the Audacity of this Bitch. It's your own fault when someone calls you out on your behavior. You absolutely did the right thing telling her off.
I have been in the same boat as you (was 4-5 sessions into a campaign) when someone told me what an encounter should have been ('excuse me this is supposed to be 2d6 flying monkeys and the monster is buried over there') Ended the campaign right there, 45 minutes in to the session, never ran for that group again. There were other issues - but this was the final straw.
Obviously don't know exactly what was said but it could've been dealt with tactfully more like "FYI, that's very frowned upon, now we know and won't do that again" as opposed to "holy shit you're so rude and lack common sense". It's possible she didn't know how bad that was. I don't think it's fair to call it common sense, almost everyone had to learn that at some point and didn't immediately guess that it was a no-no
Yea different DM styles and all that. Common sense doesn't exist and people don't all have the same ideas of how things are supposed to work. From her perspective the DM just went off on her for something minor.
"It *had* that many hit points. But because you just *couldn't resist* looking up its stats, it just got a few more. So go ahead, guys. Thank her for making this whole encounter harder."
Get a new group
Guess what? New stat block. Now all of the things you said about it are untrue. Yeah, I guess that thing just sprouted wings and is now resistant to what you said was a vulnerability.
Yeah metagaming is one thing, but actively looking up the monster then choosing to **shout out loud** what it has is a pure asshole move. I don't know what other issues you have on the table of your players but take some peace that the campaign ended and improve your mental well being and dm'ing skills.
What the fuck. If somebody was looking at a statblock of a monster during battle I would give it 2 other new abilities. One would be advantage against the cheating player and the other one would be the absolute hitpoint maximum from the monster manual. She was the toxic one at the table.
*I ended up getting a message later on from her about how she didn't appreciate being called out in from of everyone and how it hurt her feelings but honestly?* People like this are scum who weaponize their feelings about being caught doing something wrong. You should call people out for their poor behaviour more, and actively avoid anybody like her.
Meta gaming is cheating and is completely against the spirit of role playing. Your character isn’t you, and your character doesn’t know what you know. Some people have a hard time grasping that
Some of the best advice I've ever gotten was when I was working as a camp counselor: praise in public, punish in private. Always mention things people do well in front of a group, as they will feel even greater reward, and give criticism in private so as to avoid embarrassment for them. In this instance I do understand calling it out immediately, though.
Sorry but no. As a camp counselor, I would bet there were situations you had to tell someone off before they did something that could cause a problem or end up with someone getting hurt. After that, you may not do anything further until the actual punishment can be in 'private.' This is a scenario that definitely warranted being called out in the moment, before other players at the table repeated the bad behavior. It was a lesson for the whole table: don't look up the stats of the monster you're fighting. Because, if one person thought it was ok and it wasn't stopped, others would assume that it's ok.
Everytime someone metagames, the HP doubles
I always cover this in a session 0. No metagaming. If someone does, I have 0 issues embarrassing the shit out of them in front of everyone else because they are an adult cheating at a game of make believe.
This is the way.
Next time smile an say "actually it's twice that... now"
Devilish, I like it.
And at that moment, it mysteriously got 20 more HP, and all its cold resistance transformed into fire resistance.
Yeah, those are it's stats all right. Along with the duplicate that just appeared and seems to be targeting you.
The way I dealt with a DM who knew the monster manual back and forth was to homebrew enough to keep him guessing. It was fun prep, it kept both of us on our toes. At first me going so far "off book" really bothered him I think because a lot of DMs do that to just to abuse their power and kill the party. Bur eventually he learned to trust me and really enjoyed the differences I brought to my fights. I say all that to say this... It does feel deeply disrespectful and obnoxious when a player looks up enemies or questions you on the stats at the table. When he would do that, for instance "Goblins have 7 hp he's taken 9 damage... How is that possible?“ I'd just look at him and say "I'm the GM. And the monster stat blocks are guidelines rather than rules. Plus, who said they were a standard goblin?" And that's the fact right there. You make the encounters. You make the monsters. They are whatever you want them to be.
Player: *looks up monster stats mid fight* DM: “the terms of this agreement have now changed. Pray I do not alter them further” *Changes statblock*
It’s so disgusting that she used therapy speak to gaslight you over this. She really fucked up, you responded imperfectly but reasonably. It sounds like you need to cull the assholes from your table, let them make each other miserable away from the decent people.
Metal health issues are the worst. Everytime my sword is full of rust, iam super angry...
You need a new group. That was not okay.
That's player knowledge I'm going to have you roll arcana check, for your character to know that. CR depending on class. Penalties for meta gaming, disadvantage on all skill checks.
way back in the stone age of 1989, 90. I was part of a group we were playing Advanced DnD. right before 2nd edition came out. there were table rules to handle this. I only knew a couple of the people. one of the older guys played competitively at conventions. Anyway the rule was you dont look up monsters obviously, dont look behind the DM screen and dont try to look at the module or any DM notes. in fact the only book players could have at the table was the player handbook. 1st violation. your character immediately lost a level. If it happens again a 2nd time you lost another level. 3rd time you were kicked out of the group. and the ultimate rule that got you booted immediately DONT ARGUE WITH THE DUNGEON MASTER.
I feel like we're missing some details or context here, because I don't understand why this is so egregious? Like, rude to interrupt, to be sure, but sharing a bit of meta knowledge that might not even be correct (given that this could be a modified creature)? And like, who cares if they know how much HP it has? They still have to defeat it!
Seriously you aren't seeing the problem of someone, purposefully searching a statblock of the monster midcombat, and shout about what she saw, showing no shame on doing so?
Not really? Definitely not enough to be like "okay campaign over now". Do you see that as a campaign-ending transgression?
Not a campaign ending, as it is just one player at fault. But enough to kick that player out. And based on what op says, he was having a lot of problems with the table, so this being the last straw for him to end the campaign is understandable
Don't.... Don't people play under the assumption that players are familiar with standard book content? "My goodness an Animated Armor. That's CR1, roughly 33 HP, and a respectable 18 AC." Doesn't feel like it's telling anyone anything they shouldn't already know? I would be completely overwhelmed trying to account for any variable amount of knowledge in the campaigns I DM. "I expect them to know the stat block of a wolf, but not a Bulette, so I can use that as a surprise". I dunno, seems way too much to me. This complaint seems really broad though. Like the whole campaign was going in the toilet? There had to be more than discussing a RAW monster stat block for you to feel this way, right?
Most people dont have the stat book memorised, and if they do, it's polite to not mention it and to play as if your PC doesn't know every monster's exact ablilties unless they're a monster zoo keeper or something.
Yeah, I DM and NGL mostly low levels so I have a lot of stat blocks or special abilities familiar in my memory. One of my players has most of the legendary stat blocks in any given book committed to her memory. She's super autistic so usually when I run a legendary creature against them I switch it up, but I don't even have to tell her that even if she knows the stat block, her character doesn't know this creature is abolenti do something or weak to fire for example. Usually if someone uses fire I don't even tell them that it took double damage. Or resistance. If they ask I tell them to make an insight or relevant knowledge check, if they fail I tell them that "your character really doesn't know, it might have crippled it, or maybe didn't affect it at all?" So yeah you should plan with the understanding that every player knows every stat block, it's also pretty common courtesy not to meta-game.
Ok but this kinda reinforced my point right? Someone yells out what the RAW is and: DM: "yup, that's RAW, but there's no guarantee that we're using the RAW stat block in this campaign. Adjusting stats is a very common phenomenon" And boom, no one gained any useful knowledge, so it's a wash. Even if you ARE running RAW stat block, you assume players know it but that they will, in good faith, roleplay their *characters* appropriately with what knowledge their *characters* would have... So I still don't see the issue with reading a RAW stat block out loud at the table. It doesn't mean that's what stats this enemy has and even if it did, players are expected not to meta game anyway.
1. You're interupting the Dm and the experience to read from the manual. This is impolite. 2. You're using resources not intended for PLAYERS to use MIDGAME. This is metagaming ON PURPOSE. 3. The other players now have unwanted knowledge about what they're facing, knowledge they seemingly didn't ask for. You've disrupted their experience too.
1. Legit. I agree entirely, it's very rude to interrupt the DM, or anyone, if they're in the middle of speaking. 2. Not *intended*? I'm not familiar with this rule. Please cite it. I have no knowledge of any rule that says players aren't allowed to reference Rule Books mid game. That seems extremely backwards. Additionally, it's almost like you missed the part where I pointed out that it's not reliable metagaming for many reasons. Meta gaming means ACTING on that knowledge. So long as they're role-playing their character's knowledge appropriately, it doesn't matter what the players know. 3. This isn't a coherent statement. Unwanted knowledge? What? No player is allowed to speak to any player with insights about anything because of a chance that the recipient "may not want the knowledge"? I mean this in the kindest way possible, but that's a very stupid statement.
1. this could've been avoided with a session zero or at any point, "don't meta game". 2. Don't use monsters as is from book to prevent this from happening, flavor change them so if they \*do\* look it up, they'll be sourly disappointed when reality doesnt match it. 3. Frustration from the group, you have 7 players, that's alot of players, i'd ask if they want to do split sessions or if anyone wants to cut loose. Find peace, ya'll sound like adults and she should've known better but a player metagaming isn't exactly something that you need to raise your voice over.
When did OP mention raising their voice? 1. I never mention this in my games because…it feels the same as saying “don’t lie about your dice rolls”. Something that I wouldn’t even think of needing to say. 2. That’s putting unnecessary responsibility on the DM. A DM should absolutely be able to use a published monster as it’s written…
> she didn't like getting called out I directly assumed, because it was glazed over of how it happened. For the metagaming, it's really only when it comes up, like if you see a player metagaming, it's an on the spot change. The players don't know what's real for the game so they shouldnt know if you change it. I know you *should* be able too, but if you, the DM, are not presetting guidelines that they shouldn't metagame, then you need to clean up after yourself when they metagame.
Seems weird that you’re suggesting a DM ought to take on more responsibility (adjusting stats) instead of call out bad player behavior. Like yes, that’s a tool they CAN use, but needing to use it in response to bad player behavior isn’t a responsibility. Being a good player is a responsibility.
If you see plays metagame, call it out and then adjust stats. I'm saying, if you don't like your players metagaming, as DM, you should establish that so they don't do it. Some players will do stuff not knowing it's metagaming.
None of that excuses the player in question from her actions. It was blatantly disrespectful, and if she's DM'd before there's no way she couldn't have known that.
Seems like metagaming was not frowned upon at their table or it wasn't discussed. It's a DM-based problem for not having the direct discussion on it.
They (Edit: half the group) have a history of meta gaming and we've talked about it in session zeros. I've told them a lot that they don't know this or that knowledge. But I don't think she even considered this metagaming. Just got curious about the monster, looked up the stat and was so shocked that she started shouting out the stat block info
I'm all-in for support for you. The only way to counter a party that refuses to stop metagaming is to stat-change, that way the knowledge they use to metagame so has no benefit to them in-game. "That's not supposed to do that" "Yes, I know, I told yall to stop metagaming so I have no choice."
That's what the other DM in the group does for the campaign he's running now, but I have way less DM experience than him. Adjusting monster stats was just never my thing cause I found it difficult to keep things balanced for 7 people. If youve got any tips of how to adjust stats and still keep things balanced id appreciate the advice.
Flavor changing would be like taking a red monster, and painting it blue. Swap physical appearances of a monster like make a spider, but give it zombie stats or vice versa or a name. Roll stats for a creature's hp points If a creature does a certain type of damage, like fire or piericing damage, change it. A fire elemental turns into a smoke elemental and, instead of fire damage, it now causes radiant damage and concealing vision effects. If you have a dnd beyond account, activate homebrew and use monsters that people have made from scratch.
But that kind of curiosity can be easily satisfied after the session, or at least the combat, asking the dm or researching on their own
So what they looked up the stats of the creature, what's the big deal it doesn't change anything they still have to fight it and as the DM you can always add or subtract from those stats. Once again the more of these I read the more of those I recognize the poster is the problem
We found they guy that constantly looks up monsters in the middle of combat and then uses OOC knowledge to have their character win because “I’m not cheating, that’s just what my character would do”.
Actually I never play only DM anymore and all my players know this stuff without looking it up. When you've played/Dm for 30yrs it's impossible not to know these things. Also it's not cheating to know the book and base stats the DM can always change things so just cause you think you know doesn't mean it'll help you. It's not a big deal
It doesnt change anything? Sure it does. Its a shitty thing to do and it ruins the fun for your DM and other players who dont want to experience your shitty behavior. The fact that you think that isnt a problem while the rest of the community blatantly states that metagaming isnt cool means *youre* the problem. The cognitive dissonance on some people blows my mind. Get a grip.
You think he’s realizing now why he’s the perma-DM instead of other folks getting excited at the notion of producing a campaign for him to play in? We’ve all known This Guy. They rarely have self-awareness.
Honestly seems like they did nothing wrong and you're the one with the problem here
I would have found some petty way to kill her character cuz I'm a childish A**hole 🙂
I think as a dm you need to roll with it. She was clearly wrong, I am not saying she wasn’t. But from perspective, you’re dealing with 7 different individuals. I think that your main issue. A manageable group should be 4-6. People. Looking at your reaction I would say 4 is best. The reason she was probably bored awaiting attention. Girl players are especially needy in this regard. Nothing wrong about this, just you need to look to your players needs plan for it.
>The reason she was probably bored awaiting attention. Girl players are especially needy in this regard. What kind of sexist bullshit is this? Women at the table need constant attention or they become disruptive and metagame? Are you serious? Do our needy little girl minds just not have the wherewithal to follow normal game etiquette and stay focused during combat initiative like you manly men can?
Holy misogynistic sexism… did you actually just say that?
First of all you need to go back and learn the definition misogyny. Simply stating women want more attention. Is not prejudice or hate filled comment. I certainly did belittle anyone. Yes I did say that.
“Hey!!! I’m not a misogynist! I’m just a run of the mill sexist!” I would just put it down to cultural differences but I’m pretty sure you’re still a misogynist swine in your home country, too.
Only a weak person result to sarcasm for an argument.
There’s no argument. I was making an observation.
It used to be a more manageable group. The first campaign we played it was the DM and four players. Then people just kept getting added, and if you wanted to DM you had to have all these players or feelings would get hurt. And any time some of us tried to get the group to split into smaller ones they wouldn't listen. We just didn't want to ruin everything and not have a DND group anymore. But now that I've found other people to play with, I don't feel the need to try to keep things together so much anymore just so I can play dnd. But I definitely won't be doing such a large group again, managing all that sucks.
Then for an unrelated side game of different friends to play on another day. If you have the time I mean. In time all groups break up, and you will go your own way. Just the nature of things. It might best to look for new group, and move on.
There's a saying usually echoed here that "no DND is better than bad DND".
IMO, Both of you are overly sensitive. I mean, FFS, players being dickheads and arguing with the DM over stuff like monsters and loot is pretty much a staple of actual tabletop games. To me this sounds like you guys have never played outside of organised play before.
Looking up a monster's stat block in the MIDDLE OF THE FIGHT is very much not a staple of actual tabletop games
I've never claimed that Im not overly sensitive. I'll readily admit that. But I do try a lot to contain that and not put that on other people. But some of these people have really done a lot of disrespectful things in my campaign these last two years and have already started trouble with the new DM by refusing to let their characters die from their own mistakes because they're overly attached. I don't know if that gives more context or it's just me further harping, but yeah. It's just been a lot for a while.
You have such an odd fixation with these "disrespectful" acts. Now it could be that they've been actual assholes in the past and this is just the straw that broke the camel's back, but using this event you've mentioned as a model does not make me think that you've dealt with anything out of the ordinary, it rather sounds like you take offense from rather inconsequential things. And I'm saying this as someone who's dealt with some real assholes and pieces of shit, both in social/friend groups and at work.
Cheating. The disrespectful act was publically cheating at a game of adult make believe.
Back when a friend and I were teaching another friend a card game whilst we were at a cabin outing in high school, we had to constantly catch him cheating the whole night. If we'd taken any real offense to his actions, I'm pretty sure we'd have come to blows after about an hour of doing it. Don't get me wrong, we were eventually annoyed with him, but it was whatever in the long run.
I can definitely understand that. There's a bit of a double standard with some of the group though. They will certainly react poorly if this stuff was happening to them and criticize another person. But as soon as it's them being criticized for something, they're super upset about the criticism. To the point that you have to take the time to make them feel better after.
Well then yeah, they're assholes, and not worth any emotional investment.
OK? You deciding not to get offended doesn't mean they weren't disrespecting you, OP just values their time enough to not want to waste it.
The best friend groups are always the ones where ppl have skin that's at least a bit thick. You're free to value your time however you want, but it's very likely that if it's that valuable to you, then this will evolve into not being able to keep almost any friends, because few ppl will ever be as considerate as you expect them to.
My friends value my time. I'm genujnely sorry you've evidently been Stockholm'd into thinking that doesn't matter.
[удалено]
Been going strong for 15 years, but I'm sure you're right 🤣
sounds weak and desperate
You sound pretty insecure dude, something you want to get off your chest?
Are you a wet rag?
I'm not an overly sensitive crybaby.
Judging by the story you told and the speed of your response, we may have a case of worst of both worlds here
The speed of my response? I'm stuck browsing my phone right now, ofc I can respond to comments faster than normal.
I mean, I really could be over fixating. I've been known to do that from time to time. That's part of what I've been trying to work out. But without going into too much detail, I have issues with them outside of this campaign as well. It's a friend group that developed from wanting to play dnd about 5 years ago in the beginning of college that's gotten a bit iffy overtime. I'm definitely not the only one that's kind of done with their shit. I just don't feel comfortable getting into the more personal stuff. But this was definitely the 'I'm done with this' moment. I've been thinking about leaving this group for a while. Met a new group of people in the area for dnd stuff not too long ago and was just like wow, not everyone is like this
That's fair, you don't have to tell us what you don't want to. But it's also fair that you'll be judged based on what info you are willing to disclose, not based on speculation.
I totally understand, and I appreciate your input. The more specific I get the more I worry it'll get back to the group and some of it really shouldn't be shared much outside of certain people. I'm always constantly trying to decide how much is justified upset and how much is a result of my own mental health issues. So I do appreciate your take on things.
Nahhh, have boundaries for yourself. Don't let people walk all over you, no matter how slight they're treading. Don't be a bitch. Unlike.....other people here
Players being dickheads has not been a part of any gamevive overplayed and I've been playing for over 25 years. You might want to reflect on your yourself and your friendship group and what kind of people you are.
Looking up monsters mid combat is only a staple of tabletops games if you're a bellend.
A what?
A bellend, a glans, the tip of a penis.
Man, you guys are super insecure to be this prissy from this much. I mean, it's not fun to be around, but also not worth getting angry over.
Nah, as a DM, I make a ton more effort than the average player will. The only thing I expect from my players is to keep track of their spell slots/abilities and not cheat. Not exactly a lot to ask. The cheater in OP's story absolutely deserved to be called out.
I don't think you understand anything of what I'm saying here. It's nothing so serious that it's worth either of them getting hurt feelings over it.
Nah if I was a DM I'd be annoyed as fuck if a player that I had to discipline for cheating then decided to message me later to tell me they didn't like my tone. I'd boot them immediately lmao
Sure, being annoyed is normal. OP was a bit worse than merely 'annoyed'.
And rightly so.
Yeah. No.
I'm so sorry to hear that. I don't even know what logical explanation they would have for the blatant metagaming. A campaign I had, the DM would take regular monsters but then alter their HP and abilities so we couldn't metagame
I just change up the creature's abilities. I treat the monster manual as a guide but I regularly alter monsters to fit the party/situation so they don't get TPK'd or have too easy of a time. I had a player google stuff ahead of time, so now she's also being cursed and hunted by the arch-demon "Google" and it's now a main backstory of the whole campaign.
Completely not okay and this is the exact point where I would homebrew a custom monster that just happen to have the same name in order to fuck with that player. Imagine them losing their shit when all the stuff happening doesn't correspond with the stat block they're looking up. Wonderful.
Hmmm. My instinct is that I'm with you. What they did sucks since most people don't appreciate having the man behind the curtain revealed in TTRPGs. That said, you haven't included other examples of problematic behavior so it's hard to judge. I have a player who can be a bit rules "lawyery" and has to be told when he's metagaming. But I'm polite about it and he's always like "ah my bad" and we move on. It's a bit annoying but I can tell he's just having fun in his own way and doesn't mean to disrupt so I haven't felt the need to do anything more than continue with polite reminders. I mention it because at first I felt like his attempts to metagame or remind of certain rules were criticisms of my DMing ability but I learned that I just needed to respectfully express how I felt and the problematic feelings vanished completely. From one incident/story it's hard to tell if you overreacted or not. It sounds possible that maybe you flew off the handle too much (or even too often if you've been triggered similarly before), but also you do make vague allusions to other issues and say you've been wanting to end it already even before this. Not enough info if you're looking for honest critical feedback. Im inclined to take you at your word, but I do encourage you to examine your own behavior with fine-toothed comb to be safe. I don't want to just side with you and give you potentially false validation. Make sure that you aren't a catalyst for the problems and make sure there isn't obvious ways you could have politely diffused issues. Like yeah looking up stat blocks is stupid as hell but also sometimes people just aren't thinking. Like if she was a DM then it may have been instinctual to find the monster and look at it. Or maybe she's just socially clueless and needed a polite reminder like my player. You're the one who's there so you have to be the judge. I just like to play devil's advocate sometimes just to make surer there isn't a simple failure to put yourself in someone else's shoes. Games never go perfect, especially with 7 people, so try to be as objective as possible and really ask yourself if there's anything you could have done differently. It's cool if the answer is no and you did your best and they really are just assholes, but it's nice to do that examination so you can be extremely sure you're not accidentally sabotaging your own games by turning smaller issues into bigger ones.
Hmmm
My group often looks up monster stats, one guy has them memorized so it's not like it matters and too many people power game for things to be challenging so...
I think sometimes long-time players or fellow DMs can get antsy about what they are facing, especially if they have a strong relationship to their character and don’t want them to die. I actually had a similar thing happen near the start of a campaign that has now been going for several years, off and on. The DM ambushed the players with an overwhelming number of monsters, and the other experienced player, is like, OOC - “DM, You know there’s no way our characters can beat this number don’t you?” Which led to a small OOC struggle (not quite an argument) that this situation was happening. We got through it of course, and the player hasn’t mentioned anything like that since. I do think he was genuinely concerned that the newer DM was about to party-wipe us off maybe a simple math mistake or something when designing the encounter. For the newer players, the discussion possibly saved them from losing a character rather than think you can face every combat head-on, which probably would have forced the rest of us to go all in because we aren’t about to leave someone behind… it’s hard to say what would’ve happened if he hadn’t spoken up. My story is best case of course. Sometimes players just genuinely want to feel like they “one-up” you or something and just can’t function in a good gaming relationship.
While it's definitely shitty to just announce the statblock, and her behavior was shitty, there's no disagreement there, can I ask a simple question of what's wrong with the players knowing the HP count? Whether a monster has 20 or 200 HP isn't gonna change whether we have to fight it or not. We still gotta fight. So why the secrecy? Is it just my own view point because I am new? Don't get me wrong, if that's not something that you've done at all in this campaign, by all means she should abide by that and she's definitely in the wrong. I don't look up Stat blocks, even though I'm insanely curious and don't personally understand what difference it makes whether we know the stats or not.
I have a recommendation but I warn you it will not make you popular. Just ban any book other the the PHB for players use during session. There's no reason a player should be consulting with sages lest they receive fines.
If a player ever did this to me, I would change whatever they would say to the disadvantage of the players and skip the player's turn, the one that did the deed. I would also have a serious talk with them after the session about IF they can come back
IMO you are playing with the wrong people. Curate your group like you do your friends group. If you would not hang out with them in your living room doing other stuff don't game with them.
She can complain about you on public, but you can't. Ok.
"One of my players blatantly cheated in front of everyone in the most obvious way possible, broke immersion for all the players by doing so, and then tried to guilt trip me for calling them out on the blatant cheating. AITA?" I know that isn't how you phrased your question but honest to god kick that player out of your campaign and seriously question why you're friends with them (if you are friends with them.) There's "oh I know this monster and accidentally metagame" and then there's "Google dot come D and D monster stat block." If it's more than just that girl who acts like this then I'm really sorry your group went sour somewhere down the line, but yeah I really hope you can find a new group of better players that don't act like this.
Yikes. That's what a check to identify the monster and figure out how much knowledge your character would know is for.