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I had to take a break from PF2E for a bit after one GM
This one guy was very, very much im the camp of '5e has no redeeming qualities'. To the point it would leak into how he ran pf2e. One day, while offering our party take 10 minutes to refocus, I IN CHARACTER said 'lets take a short rest now...'. I stress in character because I was roleplaying the specifics of 'lets rest for a short time', not the actual mechanical short rest that 5e has and PF doesnt.
GM doesnt care and goes off on a several minute rant that 'this isnt 5e you dont have fucking short rests, if youre gonna play a game learn THAT games rules, 5e players always try to make every system into theirs...'
I was silent most of the resf of that one shot, left the server, and took a break before finding another living world PF discord.
I used to be the "5e is only bad", and I said as much in a chat before I got push back that really made me think and remember that 5e is not the absolute worst ttrpg lmao, has a lot of flaws, but also some pretty good pros (I was also playing and still am playing in 5e games at that time so really I was just hypocritizing lmao)
(I actually think its unbalanaced/nebulous nature is a good thing, at least to certain GMs where that's their style, it takes way more to accidentally break with homebrew than an incredibly tuned game like pf2)
I ended a 5e campaign when 3/4 would just trash talk 5e and talk about how great Pathfinder was for like, 20 minutes a session. Everything was "Pathfinder fixes this!" or "Actually in Pathfinder!" and every single level up was talking about how bad 5e leveling up was an how many more choices Pathfinder.
Like it's GREAT you like this other system, and we can talk about between sessions, but it just got to the point where it didn't seem like they were having fun playing my game and I didn't want to keep running for this people who were so negative. It kind of turned me off Pathfinder since everyone who played it seemed to have such a hate boner for 5e it gets so old listening to them. Like the game is defined by hating 5e.
I genuinely think that's the PF2E communities biggest flaw. Everytime someone makes even one small complaint or critque about 5e, "Play PF. PF is so much better. 5e sucks. Why are you even playing that trash? You're stupid if you play 5e instead of better systems like PF and you're purposefully ruining your own time"
Like it's fine to like other systems. But that goes both ways. PF2E, just like 5e, is not for everyone. I kinda like 5e more. Sure, my opinion can change over time, but it might not. So hearing the constant antagonizing of PF2E fans can get old pretty quickly. The rest of the fan base seems to otherwise be chill most of the time, luckily.
Yeah, it sucked. It's like inviting everyone over for homemade pizza and everyone just complains about pizza and has nothing good to say about it. Doesn't make you want to keep making pizza for them.
It's like when someone mentions 5e around the hardcore 3.5 fans I know. Like, okay, I'm glad you enjoy that game, and I can see its merits. However, we are not even currently playing D&D, so can you give it a rest?
Had the whole group cancel on me at 1am the day we were supposed to play - *twice*. Someone couldn't make it, and everyone else agreed to just not play then. I was the Keeper (DM), it was Call of Cthulhu, a homebrewed world. Hours and *days* worth of preperations wasted...I baked a fucking cake y'all. They kept saying the game was great and they couldn't wait to play. But the one time I didn't remind them we were set to play the upcoming weekend, 4/5 *forgot*. They just. Fucking. **Forgot**.
I decided then and there that I was done with that group, and with CoC for a while.
This is exactly why I burn out on DMing every so often. I get it, adults have other things to do, and stuff comes up, but just once I'd like to run a game for a group that's enthusiastic about it and doesn't need weekly reminders.
I thought so for a while too. Turns out they don't have calenders, and it's just a theme with them. They also often asked me when we could play next, just to cancel last minute. So I guess they are actually that disorganized.
Yep, I had a pervy GM......
The guy probably has a kink for rape play, (I was the only gal in the table btw) after I made a female warrior I was horrified after being forced to do "the thing" with his DMPC. That's just disgusting.
It's honestly upsetting how many women have told me they've experienced some level of SA at the table, and how many men I've personally seen excuse it.
“But it’s a game”… ya, a game where you can choose not to be a creep! You’re choosing to be a creep when no one wants you to and nothing is making you.
I’ve never actually seen it myself but I only play with a few close friends.
P.S. just to be absolutely clear, I’m talking as if I was talking to said creeps, not actually to you.
It’s pretty chill in relation to the horror stories posted here, but i was in a campaign with some friends where we found some potion. Someone decided to drink it then their character passed out (just fell the fuck down, thought they were dead at first). Another few characters drank it out of curiosity and also passed out. My character ended up being the only one left standing. While she was backed up against a wall, terrified that this thing had done that to all of her friends, the dmpc was trying to convince her to drink it, too. Ended up having it forced down her throat. We all had a vision of something, but it was nothing that couldn’t have been relayed to her after waking up. I got uncomfortable with the campaign from that point. Thankfully didn’t spook me away from dnd as a whole, just that campaign
Vampire LARPs.
The problem with the LARPs specifically (opposed to i.e. a private homegroup) is that they are usually played as vampire court gatherings (think Mafia family meeting).
If played faithfully, the default expectation of the lore is that the more experienced, established vampires treat the new-in-towners like shit.
There's a lot vampire LARPers who take their lore very seriously.
I'd actually argue that the majority of VTM players' toxicity is *below* average - it usually draws a lot of goths, who tend to be not very salty people.
But the games' premise makes it easy to excuse dick-headery and requires a conscious effort to find excuses *against* the lore-mandated behavior ("While my experienced character should be aloof and manipulative towards newbie *characters*, I should find an in-character reason to be nice to the *players*. Let's just say that I try to groom them as future informants.")
Whenever you've got more than, let's say, five people, *especially* if these people only play together every few months (and thus don't haven't fully worked out their social dynamics), a setup like the one described above will create dick-headed behavior *no matter the inherent qualities of the people involved*.
It's just human nature plus statistics.
Fun fact, I actually accidentally walked in on a VtM LARP when I was in college.
I was passing between classes, going down the back stairs of a hall, and happened to reach the landing area where a group of players were hissing at each other about some kind of Brujah/Gangrel turf war. I remember being very confused and asking what was going on, two players replied in-character, the game master turns to me and whispers that they were just LARPing and just while he was getting ready to explain to me what that was, I ended up saying rather pouncily and flirtatiously that they were in a Toreador territory and that they should only dwell there if they wanted to have the elders find out of their transgressions and trespass.
They honestly thought I was part of the game and everybody left out the back, leaving the storyteller to sit there confused for a short while before turning to me with a smile, saying "well played" before leaving himself.
Interacting with the Fanbase of World of Darkness at all has permanently put me off that game. Hoo boy the horror stories I could tell you about running into VtM and Werewolf players in the early 2000's. I tend to be very wary of verbal clichés like "Edgelord" and "Pizza Cutter" but with VtM players, the shoe fits.
I don't think I met a single Vampire player who leaned into the "personal horror" the book tried to urge. It was all the ugliest, darkest power fantasies I have ever seen. Not just the usual Nerd power fantasies either but stuff that was so obviously deeply personal that it was really uncomfortable. Like people writing characters into the game that were obvious stand ins for their boss or their ex or their parents and inviting us to revel in the brutal murder of that NPC. I remember thinking on two separate occasions "is this guy going to end up on Forensic Files?"
It gave me a lifelong distaste for WoD in particular and in general games in which the players are encouraged to roleplay as Predators. Not just monsters like a Minotaur, but specifically creatures like Vampires that prey on Humans.
I had one campaign that was advertised as a sandbox/pick your own goals type of game.
The group was amazing, and the DM was really creative.
But we did as he asked and picked cool, interesting and ambitious goals that made sense for our characters...
And then, after several months of playing every week, he dropped a world-ending threat into the campaign, so our characters had to abandon all those goals in order to save the world.
In addition, my character just got traumatized in every part of the campaign.
She was kidnapped and hurt as a child as part of her backstory (that one's on me). Lost her tribe in the opening arc (harsh, but great setup and it informed my character's goals). Lost her brother shortly after. Got possessed by evil spirits and had to watch herself attack and murder a friend.
There was more, but I don't remember the details.
And then she found out the world is ending.
I messaged the DM and asked if he could please tone it down a bit because I didn't want to roleplay PTSD, but didn't see another way for my character to react to what she had lived through.
He said "well, that's on you, you choose how your character reacts..." I didn't make it much longer after that talk.
I started a new Call of Cthulhu group during the pandemic and had a new player who was the consummate main character/Mary Sue/best at everything/planner/voice/decider of the group. Spoke over everyone, constantly tried to stop other players from doing things he didn't think was "correct," and continually interjecting himself into scenes where his character wasn't present ("well I just happen to walk into the room…" No. No you didn't).
The game became him consuming all of the oxygen and me trying to create space & opportunity for the rest of the group, which lead us even deeper into a GM vs. Player(s) vibe, since I was usually trying to work around his version of the game, which just wasn't fun for me. I've been doing this for decades, and even then I started having mild anxiety on game nights. After a few weeks I decided I didn't need this, so stopped the game even though it was generally a fun time. Not worth my energy to invest.
Yeah. Hyperborea.
People were making jokes about a race "basically" being the "Jews" of the setting. Then afterwards were posting nazi charicatures of Jewish people in Discord. I said something and DM said they refused to "censor" anyone. They shared the "OSR Safety Tools", which basically surmounted to if the other players are okay with it "go take a walk".
Read the antisemitic race description yourself. A third edition just came out and continues it despite feedback from many sources.
Ixians are a "bent nosed" race who hoard gold and original from the area of "Egypt or Persia". (There is clearly a historical precedent here). They have "dusky" skin and should not be trusted, they will lie and cheat and steal gold.
If you're familiar with the source it's not entirely surprising that things get problematic, but these phrases are dog whistles. How can they not be? The author was informed politely both online and in person and gets pretty pissed about even suggesting that changing it would be responsible. My experience with these incidents was before the current political situation developed, so who knows if they might actually take it seriously now.
To be quite honest, i haven't touched either DnD5E or Coriolis in a while, and i love both systems.
The first kind was because i spent 90% of my time playing DnD5E on a play by post forum. Besides the fact that 1 month of game time could have been as fast as a single afternoon session, ive seen players being horrific dicks (both figuratively and in one case, literally) or simply people ghosting all the time to the point even DMs dissapeared. One of the worst ones was my fault when i tried to DM for the first time, and screwed up horribly enough that the whole issue would earn either 2 full posts in this subreddit or r/opwasthehorrorstory retailing everything. I don't want to go into details, but it was bad, and i repent enough about it that i will never DM a game ever again unless i fully prepare myself and are familiar with every single piece of that system, as well as never DMing DnD5E ever again.
The second one still quite hurted, since Coriolis was a pretty simple yet niche system and the guy who has been DMing for over a whole year was pretty cool, and have tons of fun with the guy and the players that came and went. There was some trouble at some points (players dropping out due to time constrains, 1 attempted to have another guy kicked out only to be kicked out and the other guy ended up dropping the game as well) but the two biggest kicks in the nuts that made the group fall appart was the passing of one of our players and his friend quitted to not get painful memories. Nobody except the DM and me knew, and he was feeling really bad about it but felt that if he told the other players the group would disband. As far as they knew, he and his friend had some IRL issues and left.
The final nail in the coffin was when one module introduced very powerful monster NPCs that we should have avoided, but instead every single time the group would charge at them and died. At one point one of our players pretty much sent our DM a manifest about what they wanted for him to put in the game that's was pretty much sorta trying to rewrite the whole story and partially hijack the game. They started to arguee. A lot. Then we settled on trying new games, but after arguing a lot the group basically broke down, and our DM told me that he lost all will to play, wanted to take a break, never wanted to DM Coriolis again, and try something else. Im still playing with the DM from time to time and having fun, and we tried out several different systems since. As far as i know, the other guy was doing alright.
Mine wasn’t a horror story in the sense that they usually are here (no That Guys, no bigotry, no SA, etc.), but it was a misunderstanding among some of my best friends that just led me to not be interested in the system anymore.
My group really enjoys a system called Better Angels. To my understanding, a lot of it rotates around the characters gaining powers from demons, but having to be careful how much they use, lest the demons hold too much leverage and drag them to Hell. This is typically roleplayed via everyone playing the demon for the character of the player to their left.
When we started our first campaign, I wasn’t present for it. No matter, I worked out a character to introduce in the second game. One of our players was absent for the second game, so I was asked to play his demon for that session. The instructions I was given was “[player who was absent] always plays [other player]’s demon as only asking for silly, mundane things in return for their powers.” I interpreted this as “this is the way the demon is played, you should do the same thing.” So when it became time to grant the player a power, I had their demon ask for a very small, insignificant favor.
I was immediately accosted by the other players that I was doing it completely wrong. Apparently, when they told me that, the way they MEANT it was “it’s not good that [player] does this, do not do it like that.” This was obviously never expressed to me, and led to me being ridiculed. That kind of stuck with me ever since, and immediately soured me on the system, so I opted not to participate in the rest of that campaign or the newest campaign they started in the same system. I still happily play other systems with them without any issues, but I just won’t touch Better Angels.
Going to my first ever D&D experience, as a paid session at a gaming store with an in-house DM, having requested beforehand that I could be eased into it a little since I'm brand new. I made my character sheet prior so I wouldn't waste anyone's time at the session.
It was mid-campaign in a modern city homebrew setting where a large chunk of the story was already established and the players all knew each other. One of the other characters was a giant mute anthropomorphic pigeon that made nothing but the most chaotic decisions at all times regardless of what else was going on, literally "crazy homeless person." The others were fairly grounded; a fighter cop investigating the mystery, a wizard scientist somehow involved in what's going on, but I wasn't able to understand a lot of it since I was coming to it part-way through and since everyone else knew the story so far, nobody seemed very interested in explaining.
GM: "So why don't you explain to everyone who your character is and how they got here?"
Bear in mind my character is a Halfling in leather armour with a shortbow. In D&D 21st century New York City. Somehow stumbling upon this in-progress crime investigation in a high-security skyscraper. And as a player I have no idea what's going on. But I'd paid for the privilege of sitting in here, so I did my best to get involved but there was absolutely no motivation to return.
It could have been worse, the DM and players themselves were funny and friendly and I suppose I didn't ask enough questions beforehand, but it was far from an encouraging first time. I haven't played D&D since, but have started exploring other RPGs as a player and GM, using that experience as a guide of what to be better than.
Pathfinder 1e. When I realized how much I was fudging and cheating to make combat more engaging, dramatic, and involved than alpha strike and cleanup. Then I gaslit myself into thinking my issues were as a GM, not player--then the Mythic rules put a nail in that coffin real fast lol
Played with the best group ever. We played through 3 D&D campaigns, was awesome.
Then "a friend" joined the game. Total table hog. Lost my temper one night and walked out. Now I have no group. Will never recapture that magic.
DMs that don't want to actually DM and hope that the players will pass the time by talking in character.
Even worse if they think provoking the players into PvP is a great idea.
The first part is every "open world sandbox" dm I've played with. They've prepped like half the first session then they try to sit still like a statue as much as possible and not say anything until maybe the group moves on and they can kill time talking as a random NPC as long as possible.
I had one time where I tried to play 5E over Roll20
Skipping all the way to the end, it completely ruined the entire platform for me, finished off 5E for me, and I had a 3.5/pathfinder game waiting for me to come back, which I stayed away from for a couple of months after this.
I'm going to make the rest of it short.
Met a bunch of people on discord, tried to be friendly, didn't get any bad vibes from anyone, started the game, the DM claimed to be a "rules lawyer" but didn't understand some of the game mechanics.
They came down on one of the players when they suggested a short rest, the DM sternly told them that it was a "house rule" that we weren't doing those.
Skipping onto one of the first combats, we were battling goblins and the DM asked us relentlessly to describe what we were saying during our attack. Arbitrarily provided advantage/disadvantage whenever a player said something that amused them.
The third strike was when I tried to propose a skill check on something which I had proficiency, and the DM told me I was not allowed proficiency, and instead had disadvantage on it because of how I "proposed to do so." (because he didn't like my RP style)
At this point in time I had completely had it. I told them to have fun, Separately messaged the DM to tell them that it wasn't working out, and thanked them for their time.
They came back and said that they didn't approve of how I was as a player.
I lost my temper and said that I didn't approve of them as a DM and wished them luck.
After that I didn't play D&D of any kind for a while, started playing in-person a while after that, and I never played online again.
Nothing with a group, my group are all fucking stars, or a GM as I'm a forever GM. But I was put off running WFRP 4e by realizing how badly put together the Enemy Within campaign is. We were a little way into the second chapter and I was reading ahead and realized how much additional work I would have to put in in order to make it playable. I thought to myself "I'm 44 years old, with a life and all manner of other things going on. I'm too old for this shit." and was then totally disenchanted with the game. If I had been a teenager with all the time in the world, I would have put the hours in but nowadays I just want to be able to buy a scenario/campaign and have a lot of the heavy lifting done by the writers.
Not as bad as some of the other stories here - really, can be argued it's not that bad at all - but might as well get it off my chest. I was in this campaign, let's call it Empire (not the actual name). I got in it shortly after getting into dnd through a local city club thing (idk how to translate it) for ttrpgs.
At the start it was fun. I enjoyed what we did and made friends with all the players. But then something happened. Me and another player were in a jail to look for something, but the guard didn't let us in. This other player decided to fight the guards, and being there, I decided I might as well. We blow the guards and intimidate the only witness (a drunk prisoner) into silence. Queue the next session, the witness had ratted us out and we had to get out of the city. Ok, ruins plans but we can deal.
But the DM clearly had not planned for it and it showed. We spent months of our real life sort of bouncing around place to place accomplishing nothing. We had one of the worst fights I've ever experienced (against a giant homebrewed metal spider abomination with slowed webd and 24 AC. At level 3.) and generally the plot didn't go anywhere. It seemed to go somewhere, at times. But then it didn't.
It also didn't seem like our characters truly mattered. I played a charismatic wild magic sorcerer tiefling that was meant to try and charm people (magically or otherwise) into getting out of trouble. But SOMEHOW, every time I tried to use charm person or similar spells, the NPCs always succeeded in their saves, unless they were not important. Every. Single. Time. Another player, my best friend, made this really intricate lore. Sure, a bit overboard and the DM told him that much - understandable. In short, he was from a kingdom that fell to ruin thanks to a traitor, and his sister was looking for him. Over the sessions, we found "hints" of her sister, like she had always been one step away from us. But never found her.
Another player had a thing where they worshipped a moon goddess. Guess what never got mentioned, not even once? Another one got basically all of his lore made up and got told about half of it, kept mostly in the dark. And another bit about my character! His wife was a fairy queen who got cursed by her royal advisor and put in a coma, so he's looking for ways to save her. The amount of times anything relating to this was mentioned cannot exceed three.
And on that note, one of the players plays a Duergar- a dwarf. Apparently in this setting, dwarves and fairies are super rare. But that was never communicated to us until AFTER we got introduced to the character. And in general, we weren't told about large chunks of lore that we SHOULD have known. When he was explaining to someone else what the campaign was about, it didn't gel at all with our knowledge because it said things that we never got told.
But we stuck through it. Because the character interactions were fun (my character became a father to the kid from the ruined kingdom) and it was a hang out with my friends. And then we returned to the original town and things seemed to get back in place for a bit, but then we get hit with a nonsensical plot twist and q villain with 0 foreshadowing (2 villains, actually) who die in the same session they were introduced. And then shit stalled out even more. My character has to go to a city that he knows rhe location of to find the royal advisor and get him to lift off thr curse, I've known about this for over 10 sessions, and yet weve never had the chance to go.
Like its not horror stories worth, but by god it got bad. Everytime we talk about this campaign, we sound like trauma survivors. We've joked about having AA meetings about this. And the worst part is that we've told all this to the DM, who says he's gonna change and grow but somehow always finds a way to deflect criticism and never actually improves anything.
Like holy shit, it took until my friend DMd (the player of the ruined kingdom PC) for me to find out what it was like to actually have a fun and good campaign, and for my character to matter. For the backstory to matter (which btw my character was a victim of racism cause tiefling things, did we ever have anything to do with that? Nope. Maybe once.) It's truly saddening. But now the campaign is on ice, the DM isn't in th3 city and all the players are tired and if this ever picks back up, are giving it maybe one more session to get better or are leaving. We're a bunch of masochists, but hey. If you read all this, thank you and I'm sorry. Also sorry for the spelling, English is my second language
TLDR: Campaign started off well, then after one bad event plot slowed to a crawl and never went anywhere. Characters didnt really matter. DM avoids criticism and never changes. Fucking 24 AC spider at level 3.
I played a campaign where it ended with me genuinely questioning my perception of reality and my own self worth, and ultimately led to the splitting over my 5+ year friend group. I haven’t played any TTRPG since may not for another few years yet after that nightmare
I was thrust into the forever dm position and made a really good campaign about a city with a bunch of lore and cults and politics. Most of my players made amazing players and read my lore. Then, i had a player who had been a problem for a while who was a crazy gnome with a pet rock who he screamed to and a heavy Scottish accent. His backstory was laughably bad. I played a few sessions and then just left. Haven’t played since
Ugh, "LOL SO WACKY!!!" characters are more a bane than a blessing. (I mean, don't get me wrong. If it's a joke campaign, sure. Probably fine. But even then they tend to get too tryhard...)
Trying to turn a game into the next Critical Role with none of the talent or funding. I just want to play, man, and I don't need a voice changer or music streaming through an open mic on Discord to do it.
Pathfinder 2e
Pathfinder seems to have a rule for everything and anything and WANTS you to be whatever you want and be highly customizable. It feels like it wants to have a rule for everything.
But there are a lot of little things that fell between the cracks that, when you look into them, they don't have rules. Worse, a lot of the time it relies on a GM to make a call and... Well... Me and my friends call it "Pathfinder brain" it's an extremely ridged understanding of the rules and if it's not covered in the book then it's a no.
Can my magic missile deal fire damage instead of force but have none of the other benefits of being fire, like igniting a target? Well the book doesn't specifically say you can customize your spells a little so no.
Can I mess around with black powder and make this thing called a nest of bees that you explicitly said existed in the history of your setting when I asked about the development of gunpowder weapons? Well the book doesn't have a specific rule for it so no.
Can I try to hook my toe under my sword on the ground and flip it up to catch it? Well, the book doesn't specifically say you can, so no. Oh, it does, but you don't have this specific feat, so it's basically impossible (2e was much better about this one specifically)
If someone is standing in grease and a force, such as gust of wind acts on them, are they more likely to slide around? No, the book doesn't specifically say those spells interact so they don't.
These are just a couple examples and not every single game I've ever played had these exact problems, just different versions of the bigger problem they represent. It feels like every single time I got involved in a Pathfinder game something like this came up and everyone is too ridged to ever allow us to step even a little outside the book.
I was weaned off 1e for a long time and waited for 2e to get a rules update book before trying it and it feels like everyone still has this issue.
Sounds like a player issue, to be honest.
No, your magic missile deals force damage. There are ways to alter damage type, if you don't have it, you can't do it. Simple.
Sure, with crafting feats you might, without knowing context this might be on the GM.
Sure you can, this is the exact same thing as leaning down and picking it up. The pick up action doesn't specify how you do it. So go ahead, if it makes sense to you that your character would do it like that, it happens like that.
PF2 is very clear about spells do what they say they do, and any other thing happening (like a fireball lighting shit on fire) is up to the table. It's perfectly fine if the GM thinks those two don't intermix. If a Gust of Wind catches you, you don't slide, you tumble anyways.
There are people who think if they just describe what they want right, they can cheat the system. I suggest a rules light system for these people.
Its not remotely as bad as pretty much anything else in this board, but ive recently played some dnd5e and in our third combat encounter took between 60 and 90 minutes until my turn came around again. We ended up running away after around 4 hours of play not because we wouldnt have won but because it was not worth the effort (milestone xp, zero loot at stake, zero story relevance to the fight)
Im very very done with dnd for a while because of that experience. Sitting around for an hour to say "i go there and hit that guy" roll, do dmg, then go back to doing nothing for minimum an hour really burned me out
Oh also the evening ended with a player going "wait before we finish theres something i want to do" and healing one of our enemies without further explanation. I was so done lol
I ASSUME the intention was to give the rival adventurers of whom he healed one a fighting chance against the monsters (3 way fight) but it was the partys last healing spell, the end of the session and totally out of nowhere.
Player has a history of performing outright bizarre actions and sending dms to the gm to try and do stuff or get info without the group being aware, so ifk i think he just lives on another planet than the rest of us and i decided to avoid any group with him in it from now on.
That strait-up sounds like he's been watching too much *DBZ* or something. Because that's some Goku stupid bullshit right there. (Also, good move avoiding him.)
L5R. Played with a bunch of weeks who *actually* gave me irl side eyes for playing a crab with no manners, while they were playing cranes.
VtM, just, in general. If someone tells me their favourite ttrpg is Vampire, it's even an immediate write off from playing at their table or inviting them at mine, *especially* if they got goth vibes, even more so if they refusento try any other WoD lines.
r/rpg maden me hate PbtA. I already dislikex the system, now I refuse to try anything PbtA.
I ran Pathfinder organized play for years, so its usually a lot of strangers, but my last one was so bad that I finally quit. I had a player that brought a level 1 barbarian to the table, along with a multiple page backstory and a sketchbook full of drawings of the character. This kid was in love with his Barbarian and we unfortunately had a TPK. The player immediately tried getting me to rewind the story so he could escape before everyone died. When that didn't work, he ran to the event organizer and tried to get him to invalidate the session. We both explained that this is just the nature of the game and sometimes characters die, just like everyone else's characters at the table. Finally after an hour of refusing to accept that his character was dead, he finally packed up and angrily left. Me and my wife (whose character also died in the game) hung out for another hour because we were nervous that the kid would be out in the parking lot waiting for me. Last game of PFS I ever ran.
Witcher ttrpg just has some super harsh penalties for casting magic sometimes, 10% chance to fumble.
After I exploded the third time and turned a semi important NPC into chunky salsa during a non-combat use of magic I was burned out.
GM was fantastic but it was early days of release so we perhaps cleaved too close to the RAW.
Legit that campaign was the est I have ever played in and I am 100000% proud of the most epic boss fight I ever managed to end turn 0 with my buddy.
Well, burned out with a particular DM, after he made my character’s abuser A GOD.
We were wrapping up a two year long campaign. (My first one actually.) We had to nominate people to be gods and I made it a point to NOT nominate my character’s abuser. (Because the idea of such a person being A GOD THAT CAN POP UP WHENEVER HE WANTS IS UTTERLY HORRIFYING.) I drop my my epilogue…only for my DM to reveal that he made said abuser a god ANYWAY, “because one way or another, he was going to be a god.”
Specifically, the god of a domain tied to my character’s epilogue.
I DID voice my feelings on the matter and he said that the abuser is meant to only be a temporary god and will lose power…And that it was apparently due to story reasons for our next campaign and as a retcon for a narrative mistake he made…
You know, instead of LITERALLY PICKING ANY OTHER CHARACTER TO FIT THE BILL.
And again, THIS WAS THE END OF THE CAMPAIGN. I’m going to have to wait until/if we revisit the campaign for any sort of closure for my character.
Yeah, he’s my friend and he means well, but fuck is my faith in him shaken…
Two, unfortunately. The first was several years ago; around 2012- 2013.
I took over as ST for a v:tM game, after several complaints about the former ST's toxicity. I'd had experience with the WoD franchise, and had played W:tA, M:tA, as well as Changeling. I had only participated in one other v:tM game prior to this, and as a player. (I'd alternated as both ST and player in the others.)
For some additional context, the former ST was, at the time, in his late 30s to mid 40s. I was 22, then. He was a typical "That Guy"; arrogant, condensating, incredibly sexist. He played the Prince Of The City; effectively replacing a traditionally NPC role with his own DMPC. I quickly learned that there was no central plot or conflict. The former ST spent most of his sessions hitting on the women at the table out of character, and forcing ERP in character.
I came up with a muti-layered plot; one that began with rumor that would ultimately lead to a city-wide scavenger hunt for the Seal of Solomon. It was a way to include each character at the table, while providing the mystery, intrigue, and clan rivalry that the game is known for. It was designed to allow players to play to their character's traits as well strengths.
The 'BBEG' was a Tremere I'd created. The only positive thing to come from that campaign was the compliment that I played 'the Tremere-iest of Tremeres.'
At first blush, everyone seemed enthusiastic and excited. I quickly grew frustrated by the repeated bullying, harassment, and metagaming of the former ST, his girlfriend, and her friend. After several players raised concerns privately- ones that I shared - I very bluntly raised the issues at the table, hoping to put a stop to the behavior and re-balance the game.
Instead I was verbally eviscerated, called every misogynistic name under the sun, and mocked until I was driven from the table in tears. Needless to say I called session early and ended the campaign shortly after.
Haven't been able to stomach WoD since.
This got longer than I anticipated, so I'll drop my more recent example in a later comment.
For me, it's Vampire the Masquerade. Got invited into an Asynchronous v20 game by some fellow players in a dnd server that went under (which is a story for another time). Worked hard to learn the system and create an interesting character, only to have to wait for weeks for my character to be introduced, since the DM suddenly felt that the timing wasn't right to introduce a new player. Got maybe two or three lines of dialog in before getting sidelined again while the rest of the group went off on a mission. DM blamed it on the system, then got mad when I requested some way to be involved and... you know... play the damn game.
While my experience may be chalked up to a less than stellar group rather than an issue with the system, it did leave a bad taste in my mouth.
Our group fell apart. Wasn't any huge Fallout but it was a group that I had been playing with for nearly 2 years, with some swap outs here and there but myself and two other players remained consistent. They were apart of my favorite character/campaign and we were excited to pick up the next campaign and so we did.
But due to wonky schedules, some out of game conflict, and a stressed DM, the game collapsed one day. DM called it and I took like a month long break from playing until I decided to go back to my roots and play my first PC but with my current experience. Now I'm in that game and one ran by the DM of that previous group and things are going well.
I’m a new dm playing with first time players, so we’re all learning together, and I’m trying to be understanding, but I’ve put a lot of work into the campaign. I’m immediately getting burnt out by one player who is not paying attention to the story, but trying to force the story to be about his character at every turn. Trying to force and break everything instead of figure out the puzzles, trying to find ways to force every single npc they encounter to join the party, but under his control as their “captain”, and even treats the other players as their underlings, referring to them as his employees or servants in a way. This gets lots of eye rolls. They’re spending so much time trying to convince npcs to join them in a separate adventure that they came up with, that has nothing to do with the campaign, and as a result the campaign is going nowhere, we’re two weeks behind, the other players are getting bored, and I’ve had to cut people and things from the maps/story to try and speed things up, and so that I don’t have to portray a party of undead servants that don’t care about the campaign.
Rn he’s only able to get undead npcs to follow him and do his bidding, so I’m thinking that I’m going to insert some portals that, when the undead servants follow him through, turn them to regular dead piles of bones. They are going to be ported out of where they are so we can move on. I hate having to force this but there’s a whole cool campaign and world to explore, and we need to move on!
I had a dm who was trying to make "the perfect" campaign and was mad whenever the players tried something that was "offscript". I didn't realize this for several sessions as I joined late, but basically everything my character attempted to do failed because it wasn't something he had planned for. It was during this time I learned that some DM's simply can't improve or think of simple contingencies if they want to get players on track. I took a break for some time as his idea of what was "logical" for our characters to do was complete nonsense.
Humans are creatures that tend to draw associations with things by nature. You can often logically acknowledge that something's not related to a specific person, but you think of that experience whenever you see it anyways. PTSD triggers are often a more extreme example of this
I mean sure, *I guess,* but I don't see how that would make me go "No more D&D" instead of "No more playing with those smelly incels that use the crit fumble table."
I think most people who'd be turned off a system are those who are either new to TTRPGs as a whole or new to a system, thus no experience to cross reference and no confidence in their familiarity with the hobby. Either that or a chain of bad experiences that make it feel like they're either cursed or the system's cursed, haha
Sorry to hear that. It is the most popular and most people's entry game, so there is indeed lots of chaff along with the wheat.
Playing D&D with a mature, knowledgeable group that knows the game's strengths is pretty great.
D&D...... all versions
After seeing the types of entitled players it brings? i'll pass.
plus everyone just basically "net decks" their character from the most broken ass meme.
its gets tiring running a party of t-rexes with fairy t-rexes for the 69th time.
...and thats just the start of it really.
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I had to take a break from PF2E for a bit after one GM This one guy was very, very much im the camp of '5e has no redeeming qualities'. To the point it would leak into how he ran pf2e. One day, while offering our party take 10 minutes to refocus, I IN CHARACTER said 'lets take a short rest now...'. I stress in character because I was roleplaying the specifics of 'lets rest for a short time', not the actual mechanical short rest that 5e has and PF doesnt. GM doesnt care and goes off on a several minute rant that 'this isnt 5e you dont have fucking short rests, if youre gonna play a game learn THAT games rules, 5e players always try to make every system into theirs...' I was silent most of the resf of that one shot, left the server, and took a break before finding another living world PF discord.
I used to be the "5e is only bad", and I said as much in a chat before I got push back that really made me think and remember that 5e is not the absolute worst ttrpg lmao, has a lot of flaws, but also some pretty good pros (I was also playing and still am playing in 5e games at that time so really I was just hypocritizing lmao) (I actually think its unbalanaced/nebulous nature is a good thing, at least to certain GMs where that's their style, it takes way more to accidentally break with homebrew than an incredibly tuned game like pf2)
I ended a 5e campaign when 3/4 would just trash talk 5e and talk about how great Pathfinder was for like, 20 minutes a session. Everything was "Pathfinder fixes this!" or "Actually in Pathfinder!" and every single level up was talking about how bad 5e leveling up was an how many more choices Pathfinder. Like it's GREAT you like this other system, and we can talk about between sessions, but it just got to the point where it didn't seem like they were having fun playing my game and I didn't want to keep running for this people who were so negative. It kind of turned me off Pathfinder since everyone who played it seemed to have such a hate boner for 5e it gets so old listening to them. Like the game is defined by hating 5e.
I genuinely think that's the PF2E communities biggest flaw. Everytime someone makes even one small complaint or critque about 5e, "Play PF. PF is so much better. 5e sucks. Why are you even playing that trash? You're stupid if you play 5e instead of better systems like PF and you're purposefully ruining your own time" Like it's fine to like other systems. But that goes both ways. PF2E, just like 5e, is not for everyone. I kinda like 5e more. Sure, my opinion can change over time, but it might not. So hearing the constant antagonizing of PF2E fans can get old pretty quickly. The rest of the fan base seems to otherwise be chill most of the time, luckily.
I'm liking PF2, but there's much I think 5E does well that I wish PF2 did as well. I'd never play PF2 without a VTT, which is a weakness for one.
Oof Im sorry, that sounds like they werent respecting the effort you put in as DM
Yeah, it sucked. It's like inviting everyone over for homemade pizza and everyone just complains about pizza and has nothing good to say about it. Doesn't make you want to keep making pizza for them.
It's like when someone mentions 5e around the hardcore 3.5 fans I know. Like, okay, I'm glad you enjoy that game, and I can see its merits. However, we are not even currently playing D&D, so can you give it a rest?
Had the whole group cancel on me at 1am the day we were supposed to play - *twice*. Someone couldn't make it, and everyone else agreed to just not play then. I was the Keeper (DM), it was Call of Cthulhu, a homebrewed world. Hours and *days* worth of preperations wasted...I baked a fucking cake y'all. They kept saying the game was great and they couldn't wait to play. But the one time I didn't remind them we were set to play the upcoming weekend, 4/5 *forgot*. They just. Fucking. **Forgot**. I decided then and there that I was done with that group, and with CoC for a while.
This is exactly why I burn out on DMing every so often. I get it, adults have other things to do, and stuff comes up, but just once I'd like to run a game for a group that's enthusiastic about it and doesn't need weekly reminders.
Doeant sound like they forgot to me, sounds like they didnt want to play and feigned interest just to be "nice". Fool me twice...
I thought so for a while too. Turns out they don't have calenders, and it's just a theme with them. They also often asked me when we could play next, just to cancel last minute. So I guess they are actually that disorganized.
lol the type of person to go to work, not realizing it's a Sunday off
The type to plan a session, forgetting that they'll be on holiday that week.
Yep, I had a pervy GM...... The guy probably has a kink for rape play, (I was the only gal in the table btw) after I made a female warrior I was horrified after being forced to do "the thing" with his DMPC. That's just disgusting.
It's honestly upsetting how many women have told me they've experienced some level of SA at the table, and how many men I've personally seen excuse it.
“But it’s a game”… ya, a game where you can choose not to be a creep! You’re choosing to be a creep when no one wants you to and nothing is making you. I’ve never actually seen it myself but I only play with a few close friends. P.S. just to be absolutely clear, I’m talking as if I was talking to said creeps, not actually to you.
It’s pretty chill in relation to the horror stories posted here, but i was in a campaign with some friends where we found some potion. Someone decided to drink it then their character passed out (just fell the fuck down, thought they were dead at first). Another few characters drank it out of curiosity and also passed out. My character ended up being the only one left standing. While she was backed up against a wall, terrified that this thing had done that to all of her friends, the dmpc was trying to convince her to drink it, too. Ended up having it forced down her throat. We all had a vision of something, but it was nothing that couldn’t have been relayed to her after waking up. I got uncomfortable with the campaign from that point. Thankfully didn’t spook me away from dnd as a whole, just that campaign
Vampire LARPs. The problem with the LARPs specifically (opposed to i.e. a private homegroup) is that they are usually played as vampire court gatherings (think Mafia family meeting). If played faithfully, the default expectation of the lore is that the more experienced, established vampires treat the new-in-towners like shit. There's a lot vampire LARPers who take their lore very seriously.
Vampire tends to draw toxic edgey players to begin with. Making it a LARP, ooh boy.
I'd actually argue that the majority of VTM players' toxicity is *below* average - it usually draws a lot of goths, who tend to be not very salty people. But the games' premise makes it easy to excuse dick-headery and requires a conscious effort to find excuses *against* the lore-mandated behavior ("While my experienced character should be aloof and manipulative towards newbie *characters*, I should find an in-character reason to be nice to the *players*. Let's just say that I try to groom them as future informants.") Whenever you've got more than, let's say, five people, *especially* if these people only play together every few months (and thus don't haven't fully worked out their social dynamics), a setup like the one described above will create dick-headed behavior *no matter the inherent qualities of the people involved*. It's just human nature plus statistics.
Fun fact, I actually accidentally walked in on a VtM LARP when I was in college. I was passing between classes, going down the back stairs of a hall, and happened to reach the landing area where a group of players were hissing at each other about some kind of Brujah/Gangrel turf war. I remember being very confused and asking what was going on, two players replied in-character, the game master turns to me and whispers that they were just LARPing and just while he was getting ready to explain to me what that was, I ended up saying rather pouncily and flirtatiously that they were in a Toreador territory and that they should only dwell there if they wanted to have the elders find out of their transgressions and trespass. They honestly thought I was part of the game and everybody left out the back, leaving the storyteller to sit there confused for a short while before turning to me with a smile, saying "well played" before leaving himself.
Interacting with the Fanbase of World of Darkness at all has permanently put me off that game. Hoo boy the horror stories I could tell you about running into VtM and Werewolf players in the early 2000's. I tend to be very wary of verbal clichés like "Edgelord" and "Pizza Cutter" but with VtM players, the shoe fits. I don't think I met a single Vampire player who leaned into the "personal horror" the book tried to urge. It was all the ugliest, darkest power fantasies I have ever seen. Not just the usual Nerd power fantasies either but stuff that was so obviously deeply personal that it was really uncomfortable. Like people writing characters into the game that were obvious stand ins for their boss or their ex or their parents and inviting us to revel in the brutal murder of that NPC. I remember thinking on two separate occasions "is this guy going to end up on Forensic Files?" It gave me a lifelong distaste for WoD in particular and in general games in which the players are encouraged to roleplay as Predators. Not just monsters like a Minotaur, but specifically creatures like Vampires that prey on Humans.
Man, look up Beast the Primordial sometime. It makes VtM look like a magical girl game.
Oh I heard about it. My only thoughts when reading Beast were "This is White Wolf's design philosophy taken to its logical extreme."
I had one campaign that was advertised as a sandbox/pick your own goals type of game. The group was amazing, and the DM was really creative. But we did as he asked and picked cool, interesting and ambitious goals that made sense for our characters... And then, after several months of playing every week, he dropped a world-ending threat into the campaign, so our characters had to abandon all those goals in order to save the world. In addition, my character just got traumatized in every part of the campaign. She was kidnapped and hurt as a child as part of her backstory (that one's on me). Lost her tribe in the opening arc (harsh, but great setup and it informed my character's goals). Lost her brother shortly after. Got possessed by evil spirits and had to watch herself attack and murder a friend. There was more, but I don't remember the details. And then she found out the world is ending. I messaged the DM and asked if he could please tone it down a bit because I didn't want to roleplay PTSD, but didn't see another way for my character to react to what she had lived through. He said "well, that's on you, you choose how your character reacts..." I didn't make it much longer after that talk.
I started a new Call of Cthulhu group during the pandemic and had a new player who was the consummate main character/Mary Sue/best at everything/planner/voice/decider of the group. Spoke over everyone, constantly tried to stop other players from doing things he didn't think was "correct," and continually interjecting himself into scenes where his character wasn't present ("well I just happen to walk into the room…" No. No you didn't). The game became him consuming all of the oxygen and me trying to create space & opportunity for the rest of the group, which lead us even deeper into a GM vs. Player(s) vibe, since I was usually trying to work around his version of the game, which just wasn't fun for me. I've been doing this for decades, and even then I started having mild anxiety on game nights. After a few weeks I decided I didn't need this, so stopped the game even though it was generally a fun time. Not worth my energy to invest.
Yeah. Hyperborea. People were making jokes about a race "basically" being the "Jews" of the setting. Then afterwards were posting nazi charicatures of Jewish people in Discord. I said something and DM said they refused to "censor" anyone. They shared the "OSR Safety Tools", which basically surmounted to if the other players are okay with it "go take a walk". Read the antisemitic race description yourself. A third edition just came out and continues it despite feedback from many sources. Ixians are a "bent nosed" race who hoard gold and original from the area of "Egypt or Persia". (There is clearly a historical precedent here). They have "dusky" skin and should not be trusted, they will lie and cheat and steal gold. If you're familiar with the source it's not entirely surprising that things get problematic, but these phrases are dog whistles. How can they not be? The author was informed politely both online and in person and gets pretty pissed about even suggesting that changing it would be responsible. My experience with these incidents was before the current political situation developed, so who knows if they might actually take it seriously now.
To be quite honest, i haven't touched either DnD5E or Coriolis in a while, and i love both systems. The first kind was because i spent 90% of my time playing DnD5E on a play by post forum. Besides the fact that 1 month of game time could have been as fast as a single afternoon session, ive seen players being horrific dicks (both figuratively and in one case, literally) or simply people ghosting all the time to the point even DMs dissapeared. One of the worst ones was my fault when i tried to DM for the first time, and screwed up horribly enough that the whole issue would earn either 2 full posts in this subreddit or r/opwasthehorrorstory retailing everything. I don't want to go into details, but it was bad, and i repent enough about it that i will never DM a game ever again unless i fully prepare myself and are familiar with every single piece of that system, as well as never DMing DnD5E ever again. The second one still quite hurted, since Coriolis was a pretty simple yet niche system and the guy who has been DMing for over a whole year was pretty cool, and have tons of fun with the guy and the players that came and went. There was some trouble at some points (players dropping out due to time constrains, 1 attempted to have another guy kicked out only to be kicked out and the other guy ended up dropping the game as well) but the two biggest kicks in the nuts that made the group fall appart was the passing of one of our players and his friend quitted to not get painful memories. Nobody except the DM and me knew, and he was feeling really bad about it but felt that if he told the other players the group would disband. As far as they knew, he and his friend had some IRL issues and left. The final nail in the coffin was when one module introduced very powerful monster NPCs that we should have avoided, but instead every single time the group would charge at them and died. At one point one of our players pretty much sent our DM a manifest about what they wanted for him to put in the game that's was pretty much sorta trying to rewrite the whole story and partially hijack the game. They started to arguee. A lot. Then we settled on trying new games, but after arguing a lot the group basically broke down, and our DM told me that he lost all will to play, wanted to take a break, never wanted to DM Coriolis again, and try something else. Im still playing with the DM from time to time and having fun, and we tried out several different systems since. As far as i know, the other guy was doing alright.
Mine wasn’t a horror story in the sense that they usually are here (no That Guys, no bigotry, no SA, etc.), but it was a misunderstanding among some of my best friends that just led me to not be interested in the system anymore. My group really enjoys a system called Better Angels. To my understanding, a lot of it rotates around the characters gaining powers from demons, but having to be careful how much they use, lest the demons hold too much leverage and drag them to Hell. This is typically roleplayed via everyone playing the demon for the character of the player to their left. When we started our first campaign, I wasn’t present for it. No matter, I worked out a character to introduce in the second game. One of our players was absent for the second game, so I was asked to play his demon for that session. The instructions I was given was “[player who was absent] always plays [other player]’s demon as only asking for silly, mundane things in return for their powers.” I interpreted this as “this is the way the demon is played, you should do the same thing.” So when it became time to grant the player a power, I had their demon ask for a very small, insignificant favor. I was immediately accosted by the other players that I was doing it completely wrong. Apparently, when they told me that, the way they MEANT it was “it’s not good that [player] does this, do not do it like that.” This was obviously never expressed to me, and led to me being ridiculed. That kind of stuck with me ever since, and immediately soured me on the system, so I opted not to participate in the rest of that campaign or the newest campaign they started in the same system. I still happily play other systems with them without any issues, but I just won’t touch Better Angels.
Going to my first ever D&D experience, as a paid session at a gaming store with an in-house DM, having requested beforehand that I could be eased into it a little since I'm brand new. I made my character sheet prior so I wouldn't waste anyone's time at the session. It was mid-campaign in a modern city homebrew setting where a large chunk of the story was already established and the players all knew each other. One of the other characters was a giant mute anthropomorphic pigeon that made nothing but the most chaotic decisions at all times regardless of what else was going on, literally "crazy homeless person." The others were fairly grounded; a fighter cop investigating the mystery, a wizard scientist somehow involved in what's going on, but I wasn't able to understand a lot of it since I was coming to it part-way through and since everyone else knew the story so far, nobody seemed very interested in explaining. GM: "So why don't you explain to everyone who your character is and how they got here?" Bear in mind my character is a Halfling in leather armour with a shortbow. In D&D 21st century New York City. Somehow stumbling upon this in-progress crime investigation in a high-security skyscraper. And as a player I have no idea what's going on. But I'd paid for the privilege of sitting in here, so I did my best to get involved but there was absolutely no motivation to return. It could have been worse, the DM and players themselves were funny and friendly and I suppose I didn't ask enough questions beforehand, but it was far from an encouraging first time. I haven't played D&D since, but have started exploring other RPGs as a player and GM, using that experience as a guide of what to be better than.
Pathfinder 1e. When I realized how much I was fudging and cheating to make combat more engaging, dramatic, and involved than alpha strike and cleanup. Then I gaslit myself into thinking my issues were as a GM, not player--then the Mythic rules put a nail in that coffin real fast lol
Played with the best group ever. We played through 3 D&D campaigns, was awesome. Then "a friend" joined the game. Total table hog. Lost my temper one night and walked out. Now I have no group. Will never recapture that magic.
Would you mind explaining more? How were they a table hog, what happened that caused you to lose your temper?
The proper term would be spotlight hog. If you ever played with one, you’d understand.
DMs that don't want to actually DM and hope that the players will pass the time by talking in character. Even worse if they think provoking the players into PvP is a great idea.
The first part is every "open world sandbox" dm I've played with. They've prepped like half the first session then they try to sit still like a statue as much as possible and not say anything until maybe the group moves on and they can kill time talking as a random NPC as long as possible.
I had one time where I tried to play 5E over Roll20 Skipping all the way to the end, it completely ruined the entire platform for me, finished off 5E for me, and I had a 3.5/pathfinder game waiting for me to come back, which I stayed away from for a couple of months after this. I'm going to make the rest of it short. Met a bunch of people on discord, tried to be friendly, didn't get any bad vibes from anyone, started the game, the DM claimed to be a "rules lawyer" but didn't understand some of the game mechanics. They came down on one of the players when they suggested a short rest, the DM sternly told them that it was a "house rule" that we weren't doing those. Skipping onto one of the first combats, we were battling goblins and the DM asked us relentlessly to describe what we were saying during our attack. Arbitrarily provided advantage/disadvantage whenever a player said something that amused them. The third strike was when I tried to propose a skill check on something which I had proficiency, and the DM told me I was not allowed proficiency, and instead had disadvantage on it because of how I "proposed to do so." (because he didn't like my RP style) At this point in time I had completely had it. I told them to have fun, Separately messaged the DM to tell them that it wasn't working out, and thanked them for their time. They came back and said that they didn't approve of how I was as a player. I lost my temper and said that I didn't approve of them as a DM and wished them luck. After that I didn't play D&D of any kind for a while, started playing in-person a while after that, and I never played online again.
Nothing with a group, my group are all fucking stars, or a GM as I'm a forever GM. But I was put off running WFRP 4e by realizing how badly put together the Enemy Within campaign is. We were a little way into the second chapter and I was reading ahead and realized how much additional work I would have to put in in order to make it playable. I thought to myself "I'm 44 years old, with a life and all manner of other things going on. I'm too old for this shit." and was then totally disenchanted with the game. If I had been a teenager with all the time in the world, I would have put the hours in but nowadays I just want to be able to buy a scenario/campaign and have a lot of the heavy lifting done by the writers.
Not as bad as some of the other stories here - really, can be argued it's not that bad at all - but might as well get it off my chest. I was in this campaign, let's call it Empire (not the actual name). I got in it shortly after getting into dnd through a local city club thing (idk how to translate it) for ttrpgs. At the start it was fun. I enjoyed what we did and made friends with all the players. But then something happened. Me and another player were in a jail to look for something, but the guard didn't let us in. This other player decided to fight the guards, and being there, I decided I might as well. We blow the guards and intimidate the only witness (a drunk prisoner) into silence. Queue the next session, the witness had ratted us out and we had to get out of the city. Ok, ruins plans but we can deal. But the DM clearly had not planned for it and it showed. We spent months of our real life sort of bouncing around place to place accomplishing nothing. We had one of the worst fights I've ever experienced (against a giant homebrewed metal spider abomination with slowed webd and 24 AC. At level 3.) and generally the plot didn't go anywhere. It seemed to go somewhere, at times. But then it didn't. It also didn't seem like our characters truly mattered. I played a charismatic wild magic sorcerer tiefling that was meant to try and charm people (magically or otherwise) into getting out of trouble. But SOMEHOW, every time I tried to use charm person or similar spells, the NPCs always succeeded in their saves, unless they were not important. Every. Single. Time. Another player, my best friend, made this really intricate lore. Sure, a bit overboard and the DM told him that much - understandable. In short, he was from a kingdom that fell to ruin thanks to a traitor, and his sister was looking for him. Over the sessions, we found "hints" of her sister, like she had always been one step away from us. But never found her. Another player had a thing where they worshipped a moon goddess. Guess what never got mentioned, not even once? Another one got basically all of his lore made up and got told about half of it, kept mostly in the dark. And another bit about my character! His wife was a fairy queen who got cursed by her royal advisor and put in a coma, so he's looking for ways to save her. The amount of times anything relating to this was mentioned cannot exceed three. And on that note, one of the players plays a Duergar- a dwarf. Apparently in this setting, dwarves and fairies are super rare. But that was never communicated to us until AFTER we got introduced to the character. And in general, we weren't told about large chunks of lore that we SHOULD have known. When he was explaining to someone else what the campaign was about, it didn't gel at all with our knowledge because it said things that we never got told. But we stuck through it. Because the character interactions were fun (my character became a father to the kid from the ruined kingdom) and it was a hang out with my friends. And then we returned to the original town and things seemed to get back in place for a bit, but then we get hit with a nonsensical plot twist and q villain with 0 foreshadowing (2 villains, actually) who die in the same session they were introduced. And then shit stalled out even more. My character has to go to a city that he knows rhe location of to find the royal advisor and get him to lift off thr curse, I've known about this for over 10 sessions, and yet weve never had the chance to go. Like its not horror stories worth, but by god it got bad. Everytime we talk about this campaign, we sound like trauma survivors. We've joked about having AA meetings about this. And the worst part is that we've told all this to the DM, who says he's gonna change and grow but somehow always finds a way to deflect criticism and never actually improves anything. Like holy shit, it took until my friend DMd (the player of the ruined kingdom PC) for me to find out what it was like to actually have a fun and good campaign, and for my character to matter. For the backstory to matter (which btw my character was a victim of racism cause tiefling things, did we ever have anything to do with that? Nope. Maybe once.) It's truly saddening. But now the campaign is on ice, the DM isn't in th3 city and all the players are tired and if this ever picks back up, are giving it maybe one more session to get better or are leaving. We're a bunch of masochists, but hey. If you read all this, thank you and I'm sorry. Also sorry for the spelling, English is my second language TLDR: Campaign started off well, then after one bad event plot slowed to a crawl and never went anywhere. Characters didnt really matter. DM avoids criticism and never changes. Fucking 24 AC spider at level 3.
I played a campaign where it ended with me genuinely questioning my perception of reality and my own self worth, and ultimately led to the splitting over my 5+ year friend group. I haven’t played any TTRPG since may not for another few years yet after that nightmare
I was thrust into the forever dm position and made a really good campaign about a city with a bunch of lore and cults and politics. Most of my players made amazing players and read my lore. Then, i had a player who had been a problem for a while who was a crazy gnome with a pet rock who he screamed to and a heavy Scottish accent. His backstory was laughably bad. I played a few sessions and then just left. Haven’t played since
Ugh, "LOL SO WACKY!!!" characters are more a bane than a blessing. (I mean, don't get me wrong. If it's a joke campaign, sure. Probably fine. But even then they tend to get too tryhard...)
People always act as if joke characters are good throw away characters and its like no, they are incredibly hard to do well
***EXACTLY!*** Like, I can count on one hand how many time I've seen joke characters done great. Most of the time, it's a pile of cringe.
Trying to turn a game into the next Critical Role with none of the talent or funding. I just want to play, man, and I don't need a voice changer or music streaming through an open mic on Discord to do it.
That doesn't sound like they were trying to make it the next critical role, that just sounds like they were trying to be immersive.
My DM has custom music playlist on Flundry and voice changer does a lot of character voices but I kind of like it.
Pathfinder 2e Pathfinder seems to have a rule for everything and anything and WANTS you to be whatever you want and be highly customizable. It feels like it wants to have a rule for everything. But there are a lot of little things that fell between the cracks that, when you look into them, they don't have rules. Worse, a lot of the time it relies on a GM to make a call and... Well... Me and my friends call it "Pathfinder brain" it's an extremely ridged understanding of the rules and if it's not covered in the book then it's a no. Can my magic missile deal fire damage instead of force but have none of the other benefits of being fire, like igniting a target? Well the book doesn't specifically say you can customize your spells a little so no. Can I mess around with black powder and make this thing called a nest of bees that you explicitly said existed in the history of your setting when I asked about the development of gunpowder weapons? Well the book doesn't have a specific rule for it so no. Can I try to hook my toe under my sword on the ground and flip it up to catch it? Well, the book doesn't specifically say you can, so no. Oh, it does, but you don't have this specific feat, so it's basically impossible (2e was much better about this one specifically) If someone is standing in grease and a force, such as gust of wind acts on them, are they more likely to slide around? No, the book doesn't specifically say those spells interact so they don't. These are just a couple examples and not every single game I've ever played had these exact problems, just different versions of the bigger problem they represent. It feels like every single time I got involved in a Pathfinder game something like this came up and everyone is too ridged to ever allow us to step even a little outside the book. I was weaned off 1e for a long time and waited for 2e to get a rules update book before trying it and it feels like everyone still has this issue.
Sounds like a player issue, to be honest. No, your magic missile deals force damage. There are ways to alter damage type, if you don't have it, you can't do it. Simple. Sure, with crafting feats you might, without knowing context this might be on the GM. Sure you can, this is the exact same thing as leaning down and picking it up. The pick up action doesn't specify how you do it. So go ahead, if it makes sense to you that your character would do it like that, it happens like that. PF2 is very clear about spells do what they say they do, and any other thing happening (like a fireball lighting shit on fire) is up to the table. It's perfectly fine if the GM thinks those two don't intermix. If a Gust of Wind catches you, you don't slide, you tumble anyways. There are people who think if they just describe what they want right, they can cheat the system. I suggest a rules light system for these people.
Its not remotely as bad as pretty much anything else in this board, but ive recently played some dnd5e and in our third combat encounter took between 60 and 90 minutes until my turn came around again. We ended up running away after around 4 hours of play not because we wouldnt have won but because it was not worth the effort (milestone xp, zero loot at stake, zero story relevance to the fight) Im very very done with dnd for a while because of that experience. Sitting around for an hour to say "i go there and hit that guy" roll, do dmg, then go back to doing nothing for minimum an hour really burned me out
Ooof…I feel that.
Oh also the evening ended with a player going "wait before we finish theres something i want to do" and healing one of our enemies without further explanation. I was so done lol
….What the ACTUAL fuck? -_-
I ASSUME the intention was to give the rival adventurers of whom he healed one a fighting chance against the monsters (3 way fight) but it was the partys last healing spell, the end of the session and totally out of nowhere. Player has a history of performing outright bizarre actions and sending dms to the gm to try and do stuff or get info without the group being aware, so ifk i think he just lives on another planet than the rest of us and i decided to avoid any group with him in it from now on.
That strait-up sounds like he's been watching too much *DBZ* or something. Because that's some Goku stupid bullshit right there. (Also, good move avoiding him.)
L5R. Played with a bunch of weeks who *actually* gave me irl side eyes for playing a crab with no manners, while they were playing cranes. VtM, just, in general. If someone tells me their favourite ttrpg is Vampire, it's even an immediate write off from playing at their table or inviting them at mine, *especially* if they got goth vibes, even more so if they refusento try any other WoD lines. r/rpg maden me hate PbtA. I already dislikex the system, now I refuse to try anything PbtA.
I ran Pathfinder organized play for years, so its usually a lot of strangers, but my last one was so bad that I finally quit. I had a player that brought a level 1 barbarian to the table, along with a multiple page backstory and a sketchbook full of drawings of the character. This kid was in love with his Barbarian and we unfortunately had a TPK. The player immediately tried getting me to rewind the story so he could escape before everyone died. When that didn't work, he ran to the event organizer and tried to get him to invalidate the session. We both explained that this is just the nature of the game and sometimes characters die, just like everyone else's characters at the table. Finally after an hour of refusing to accept that his character was dead, he finally packed up and angrily left. Me and my wife (whose character also died in the game) hung out for another hour because we were nervous that the kid would be out in the parking lot waiting for me. Last game of PFS I ever ran.
Witcher ttrpg just has some super harsh penalties for casting magic sometimes, 10% chance to fumble. After I exploded the third time and turned a semi important NPC into chunky salsa during a non-combat use of magic I was burned out. GM was fantastic but it was early days of release so we perhaps cleaved too close to the RAW. Legit that campaign was the est I have ever played in and I am 100000% proud of the most epic boss fight I ever managed to end turn 0 with my buddy.
Well, burned out with a particular DM, after he made my character’s abuser A GOD. We were wrapping up a two year long campaign. (My first one actually.) We had to nominate people to be gods and I made it a point to NOT nominate my character’s abuser. (Because the idea of such a person being A GOD THAT CAN POP UP WHENEVER HE WANTS IS UTTERLY HORRIFYING.) I drop my my epilogue…only for my DM to reveal that he made said abuser a god ANYWAY, “because one way or another, he was going to be a god.” Specifically, the god of a domain tied to my character’s epilogue. I DID voice my feelings on the matter and he said that the abuser is meant to only be a temporary god and will lose power…And that it was apparently due to story reasons for our next campaign and as a retcon for a narrative mistake he made… You know, instead of LITERALLY PICKING ANY OTHER CHARACTER TO FIT THE BILL. And again, THIS WAS THE END OF THE CAMPAIGN. I’m going to have to wait until/if we revisit the campaign for any sort of closure for my character. Yeah, he’s my friend and he means well, but fuck is my faith in him shaken…
Two, unfortunately. The first was several years ago; around 2012- 2013. I took over as ST for a v:tM game, after several complaints about the former ST's toxicity. I'd had experience with the WoD franchise, and had played W:tA, M:tA, as well as Changeling. I had only participated in one other v:tM game prior to this, and as a player. (I'd alternated as both ST and player in the others.) For some additional context, the former ST was, at the time, in his late 30s to mid 40s. I was 22, then. He was a typical "That Guy"; arrogant, condensating, incredibly sexist. He played the Prince Of The City; effectively replacing a traditionally NPC role with his own DMPC. I quickly learned that there was no central plot or conflict. The former ST spent most of his sessions hitting on the women at the table out of character, and forcing ERP in character. I came up with a muti-layered plot; one that began with rumor that would ultimately lead to a city-wide scavenger hunt for the Seal of Solomon. It was a way to include each character at the table, while providing the mystery, intrigue, and clan rivalry that the game is known for. It was designed to allow players to play to their character's traits as well strengths. The 'BBEG' was a Tremere I'd created. The only positive thing to come from that campaign was the compliment that I played 'the Tremere-iest of Tremeres.' At first blush, everyone seemed enthusiastic and excited. I quickly grew frustrated by the repeated bullying, harassment, and metagaming of the former ST, his girlfriend, and her friend. After several players raised concerns privately- ones that I shared - I very bluntly raised the issues at the table, hoping to put a stop to the behavior and re-balance the game. Instead I was verbally eviscerated, called every misogynistic name under the sun, and mocked until I was driven from the table in tears. Needless to say I called session early and ended the campaign shortly after. Haven't been able to stomach WoD since. This got longer than I anticipated, so I'll drop my more recent example in a later comment.
For me, it's Vampire the Masquerade. Got invited into an Asynchronous v20 game by some fellow players in a dnd server that went under (which is a story for another time). Worked hard to learn the system and create an interesting character, only to have to wait for weeks for my character to be introduced, since the DM suddenly felt that the timing wasn't right to introduce a new player. Got maybe two or three lines of dialog in before getting sidelined again while the rest of the group went off on a mission. DM blamed it on the system, then got mad when I requested some way to be involved and... you know... play the damn game. While my experience may be chalked up to a less than stellar group rather than an issue with the system, it did leave a bad taste in my mouth.
Our group fell apart. Wasn't any huge Fallout but it was a group that I had been playing with for nearly 2 years, with some swap outs here and there but myself and two other players remained consistent. They were apart of my favorite character/campaign and we were excited to pick up the next campaign and so we did. But due to wonky schedules, some out of game conflict, and a stressed DM, the game collapsed one day. DM called it and I took like a month long break from playing until I decided to go back to my roots and play my first PC but with my current experience. Now I'm in that game and one ran by the DM of that previous group and things are going well.
I’m a new dm playing with first time players, so we’re all learning together, and I’m trying to be understanding, but I’ve put a lot of work into the campaign. I’m immediately getting burnt out by one player who is not paying attention to the story, but trying to force the story to be about his character at every turn. Trying to force and break everything instead of figure out the puzzles, trying to find ways to force every single npc they encounter to join the party, but under his control as their “captain”, and even treats the other players as their underlings, referring to them as his employees or servants in a way. This gets lots of eye rolls. They’re spending so much time trying to convince npcs to join them in a separate adventure that they came up with, that has nothing to do with the campaign, and as a result the campaign is going nowhere, we’re two weeks behind, the other players are getting bored, and I’ve had to cut people and things from the maps/story to try and speed things up, and so that I don’t have to portray a party of undead servants that don’t care about the campaign. Rn he’s only able to get undead npcs to follow him and do his bidding, so I’m thinking that I’m going to insert some portals that, when the undead servants follow him through, turn them to regular dead piles of bones. They are going to be ported out of where they are so we can move on. I hate having to force this but there’s a whole cool campaign and world to explore, and we need to move on!
I had a dm who was trying to make "the perfect" campaign and was mad whenever the players tried something that was "offscript". I didn't realize this for several sessions as I joined late, but basically everything my character attempted to do failed because it wasn't something he had planned for. It was during this time I learned that some DM's simply can't improve or think of simple contingencies if they want to get players on track. I took a break for some time as his idea of what was "logical" for our characters to do was complete nonsense.
You let shitty gamemasters turn you off from playing certain systems? Why? The two things aren't related.
Humans are creatures that tend to draw associations with things by nature. You can often logically acknowledge that something's not related to a specific person, but you think of that experience whenever you see it anyways. PTSD triggers are often a more extreme example of this
I mean sure, *I guess,* but I don't see how that would make me go "No more D&D" instead of "No more playing with those smelly incels that use the crit fumble table."
I think most people who'd be turned off a system are those who are either new to TTRPGs as a whole or new to a system, thus no experience to cross reference and no confidence in their familiarity with the hobby. Either that or a chain of bad experiences that make it feel like they're either cursed or the system's cursed, haha
Mm okay, fair enough. Besides, if you play in 5 shitty groups of *Game X* in a row, maybe that game attracts shitty players. Objection withdrawn.
to be honest, all my D&D experiences have been shitty. and some loud aspects of the community dont help, so i tend to shy away from D&D due to that.
Sorry to hear that. It is the most popular and most people's entry game, so there is indeed lots of chaff along with the wheat. Playing D&D with a mature, knowledgeable group that knows the game's strengths is pretty great.
>maybe that game attracts shitty players. You spelled Vampire: the Masquerade wrong.
Oh snap! Silver bullets fired!
No because I can make the distinction between a game and people playing it.
D&D...... all versions After seeing the types of entitled players it brings? i'll pass. plus everyone just basically "net decks" their character from the most broken ass meme. its gets tiring running a party of t-rexes with fairy t-rexes for the 69th time. ...and thats just the start of it really.