I need help. One of my players (who was a former dm that I’ve played with) is getting really controlling. I’ll explain. so basically, this dm and I are friends and he knows I’m new at being a dm. He has done the campaign that is very similar to the one I’m doing. (I’m doing the spin off of the original and he did the original) so they start roughly the same. I like to improvising and am using the book as a guide for the adventure, mostly just making up my own stuff and making my own encounters. Now this is where I’m having issues, he keeps telling me that I should use the book more and he keeps making calls of what other players should roll. He seems like he’s trying to dm, even though he is a player. It’s starting to really frustrate me and I’ve tried to bring it up with him, but he refuses to listen and says that I am not doing it right and that, again, I should follow the book more. The other players like my style and the way I’m running the campaign. he is the only one with the issue. And before anyone says anything, he has come out straight and told me that he is going to take over my campaign. I don’t know what to do cuz if I try to kick him out of the campaign, I don’t have enough players
My first suggestion in situations like this is to have an out-of-game conversation with the player, and you've done that.
At this point, you need to have a second conversation, which needs to be much more one-sided, laying out the problems, and telling him he needs to either straighten up or leave. I'd suggest approaching it as "I'm sure you think you're trying to help, but it's not. I need to do this for myself."
Another relevant point is that, if he knows the original campaign well enough to know when you're off-book, he probably shouldn't be playing it to begin with. He certainly shouldn't be bringing his knowledge up at the table.
If he's not willing to change, you're probably going to have to bounce him. You're a player, too, and if you're not having fun, there's a problem.
We have 3 players (not including me) and I think he just wants to have control of the campaign. I can try and be a player as well as DM, but since this is my first campaign I think I’ll be doing too much.
Have a 1 on 1 conversation laying out your concerns and see if he agrees to step it back (sounds like you tried this).
Have a more direct 'conversation' in which you set hard limits and consequences for violating those limits, explaining that the reason you are having the conversation is that you hope to resolve the issue, but at the end of the day YOU are the DM (sounds like you tried this too).
This leaves only one option remaining - remove this former DM from the campaign.
You can run a campaign for 2 players (yes the encounters will need to be greatly adjusted), they can also hire/attract NPCs to round out the group. Perhaps make up a statblock for a couple NPCs that the group decides to hire, and let your players control them alongside their characters (nothing says you have to be the one to do it).
Start looking for more players, but in the meantime, there's nothing wrong with tailoring a campaign to just 2 players.
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Playing D&D since 1982
Have played every version of the game since Basic (Red Box Set), except that abomination sometimes called 4e.
On using the book more - I'd tell him it's essentially the way you are going to run things.
on telling players what to roll - this is a grey area. If people are asking "Can i do this" and he's saying stuff like "oh if you are looking for tracks of an animal in the woods that falls under survival" then it's not as bad as say cutting in and telling you that someone is going to roll something and you need to give an answer to it. one would be clear out of line, and one would just be something i'd let slide.
he's going to take over your campaign in his own words = Punt, cut and dry. Especially if you are doing it for free, theres no reason to have someone like that around who thinks it's cool to take someones campaign over. You should be able to fill your campaign out with an additional member or two within a week or two, you could make an NPC character and let them control said character between them in the mean time if the additional NPC character would be too overwhelming for you to do it.
We have 3 players (not including me) and I think he just wants to have control of the campaign. I can try and be a player as well as DM, but since this is my first campaign I think I’ll be doing too much.
To reiterate, when Jl8e says "you're a player too", they didn't mean that you should roll up a player character and join the party. What they mean is that the DM is a participant in the game and that your fun matters too. As a person playing the game with your friends, you should have fun too.
We have 3 players (not including me) and I think he just wants to have control of the campaign.
You can run for two. At low levels, the big risk is some bad luck snowballs rapidly and both players go down.
I can try and be a player as well as DM, but since this is my first campaign I think I’ll be doing too much.
As has been suggested, support NPCs can be made, and they can be delegated to your players for combat. (Which is, admittedly, still a potential problem if your players are also new, but it does divide up the load.) If you have access to Tasha's, take a look at the Sidekick rules. (If not, it's not that big a deal to use a character for the purpose.) Your primary goal will be to provide combat support without stealing focus from the players.
So far, you seem to have good instincts on how to manage all this.
You can run a campaign for 2 players (yes the encounters will need to be greatly adjusted), they can also hire/attract NPCs to round out the group. Perhaps make up a statblock for a couple NPCs that the group decides to hire, and let your players control them alongside their characters (nothing says you have to be the one to do it).
From the sound of it, Lokey, you're running the retooled Phandelver -- it would be pretty easy to introduce a couple hireling NPCs into that to bolster the party's numbers
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Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
Telling you he's going to take over your campaign is straight up disrespectful. Also, calling for rolls as a player is somewhere in between unnecessary (maybe there's no way the character would succeed in finding the bad guy's tracks even with a natural 20, in which case rolling a survival check is irrelevant) and obnoxious (it slows the game down and can lead to other players feeling bossed around). Your campaign is your campaign and you are free to run it as you wish, not how he thinks you should do it (even if it's a continuation, similar to his, etc.). It's one thing to take player feedback (almost always a good idea, even if you don't use it, at least hear it) it's something else entirely to be told you're doing it wrong.
In my free (and worth every penny) opinion, you're probably best off setting very clear guidelines about expectations and behaviors with this guy, full stop. When it's his turn to DM again, he can do it however he likes. You might also try telling him that he can only offer feedback outside of the session.
He has to leave the campaign. All you really need is three players and the game will work with two. He clearly wants to DM and not play.
I suppose the book part may have some merit. For example if you told me you were going to run Wild Beyond the Witchlight as a player I would expect the game to be roughly based on around the book. You may make alterations, but at some point id have to ask why you said we were playing wild beyond the Witchlight if you changed everything.
However in this case it seems more like he is upset things changed to the point he doesn't know what is going to happen more so than being upset you aren't running the material you said you were.
I'm a firm believer that you should never roll dice until the DM tells you to. Therefore no one else should be saying what you should roll.
As for taking your compaign over, that is a no go. It's clear he doesn't want to play. Being a DM he should be more understanding and the fact he isnt makes it clear he is just trying to cause problems.
We have 3 players (not including me) and I think he just wants to have control of the campaign. I can try and be a player as well as DM, but since this is my first campaign I think I’ll be doing too much.
You have three choices:
1) Just let him take over the campaign and you be a player again and him be DM.
2) Talk to all the other players at the table to 'gang up' on him and tell him to knock it off as a group.
3) Leave and start a new group to DM potentially inviting the other players who aren't the problem to join.
This all good advice per say - I DM several groups that are DM heavy (2/3 per out of 6/7) - Yes its a hassle to remind folks that well this is my game and this is how I'm doing it - honestly most of the time i think its just their learned behavior of jumping in as they are normally running the table. With regards to them telling players what to roll I will just say hey Joey lets let Lizzie play her character. I think just being simple and direct without heat or drama usually fixes these things or at least it has for me.
To those that listed him leaving and starting a new campaign elsewhere as an option, no way - hold your ground. You're in the right. I would never leave your own campaign - it's your campaign, you run it the way you want. First of all, it's not possible for him to take over your campaign, short of him hacking your account. That he even threatened it is grounds enough to boot him, IMO, but especially its grounds to boot him for announcing to the other players who haven't played the campaign or its spin off before all the ways you're going off book - that's not only disrespectful to you, its disrespectful to the other players, who sound like they'd otherwise be having a good time.
It's every DM's right to choose what happens next - books are just suggestions. Shit, the frickin RULES are just suggestions. When you're the DM, there's no WRONG way to decide what happens next or on what to use from a book vs. making up, or on how to approach the mechanics of the game. There ARE what I would say bad DMing behaviors, but those aren't examples of them.
Poor DMing behaviors are like playing obvious favorites, ignoring certain players, gushing over others, making all the content so that it appeals to only one or two of the people without considering the others needs or wants, incorporating one player into the backstory, but leaving the others out, failing to even read their backstories at all, etc. I mean, any one of those things done once in a while doesn't make you a poor DM - it's just not a good habit to get into and should be avoided. But going off-book?
It sounds like he just doesn't know how to be flexible, and may just be jealous that you do, because being flexible is an extremely positive quality for a DM. It allows you to adapt to the player's choices and adjust the campaign accordingly. If you stick to the book and only the book no matter how hard the players try to do something else, you just keep saying 'no, you can't do that, you have to go to the town fair so you can meet the NPC you're supposed to meet', or whatever, that's like the definition of heavy-fisted writing in computer games - the kind where no matter what you do, the result is the same, even if it makes no sense whatsoever. But in a computer game, it can be understandable because there's only so much they can anticipate and code for in advance, providing all the artwork to go with it, etc.
But the beauty of tabletop is that it's NOT a computer game. He sounds like he just wants you to be a computer. Send him a copy of dosbox and some goldbox games, and let him play out the same adventure the same way over and over until his head explodes. Meanwhile, you do you, and stay flexible. It's what makes TTRPGs better than CRPGs, ultimately.
It sounds like he just doesn't know how to be flexible, and may just be jealous that you do, because being flexible is an extremely positive quality for a DM. It allows you to adapt to the player's choices and adjust the campaign accordingly. If you stick to the book and only the book no matter how hard the players try to do something else, you just keep saying 'no, you can't do that, you have to go to the town fair so you can meet the NPC you're supposed to meet', or whatever, that's like the definition of heavy-fisted writing in computer games - the kind where no matter what you do, the result is the same, even if it makes no sense whatsoever. But in a computer game, it can be understandable because there's only so much they can anticipate and code for in advance, providing all the artwork to go with it, etc.
But the beauty of tabletop is that it's NOT a computer game. He sounds like he just wants you to be a computer. Send him a copy of dosbox and some goldbox games, and let him play out the same adventure the same way over and over until his head explodes. Meanwhile, you do you, and stay flexible. It's what makes TTRPGs better than CRPGs, ultimately.
I think this is pretty good shout actually. If he’s always playing exactly to the book then they don’t sound like a particularly creative (dare a say a particularly good) DM and maybe they’re feeling threatened by you on your first game giving a better experience than they normally do,, especially if theyre someone who prizes their self identity as a DM. That doesn’t make them any less of a massive problem player that I think you definitely need to boot from the game but it’s definitely a possible reason for their behaviour
I was in a campaign years ago where the party were exploring Undermountain level 2 (2nd Edition). One player bought the boxed set and read ahead so he could prepare the most likely needed spells for each session. When our GM decided to stray off the published encounters, he got upset. When he demanded that the GM follow the book, she gave him an ultimatum right there in front of the entire group- If you don't like it, leave. He got up and left. Good riddance.
Don't allow your 'friend' to ruin a fun experience for you and your other players. Your ultimatum need not be public, but he needs to submit or move on. As others have expressed- 'Your table, Your rules'.
I got him out of my campaign. I figured it wasn't worth the stress. He just WAS NOT listening at all.
and I talked to my other players about the issue and they said HE was making it less fun. So As much as I didn't want to, I told him that if he was going to continue to control the game, than he is out, and he left on his own after I said that and now the other players seem to be really happy about that. :)
I need help.
One of my players (who was a former dm that I’ve played with) is getting really controlling.
I’ll explain.
so basically, this dm and I are friends and he knows I’m new at being a dm. He has done the campaign that is very similar to the one I’m doing. (I’m doing the spin off of the original and he did the original) so they start roughly the same.
I like to improvising and am using the book as a guide for the adventure, mostly just making up my own stuff and making my own encounters. Now this is where I’m having issues, he keeps telling me that I should use the book more and he keeps making calls of what other players should roll. He seems like he’s trying to dm, even though he is a player. It’s starting to really frustrate me and I’ve tried to bring it up with him, but he refuses to listen and says that I am not doing it right and that, again, I should follow the book more. The other players like my style and the way I’m running the campaign. he is the only one with the issue.
And before anyone says anything, he has come out straight and told me that he is going to take over my campaign.
I don’t know what to do cuz if I try to kick him out of the campaign, I don’t have enough players
How many players do you have?
My first suggestion in situations like this is to have an out-of-game conversation with the player, and you've done that.
At this point, you need to have a second conversation, which needs to be much more one-sided, laying out the problems, and telling him he needs to either straighten up or leave. I'd suggest approaching it as "I'm sure you think you're trying to help, but it's not. I need to do this for myself."
Another relevant point is that, if he knows the original campaign well enough to know when you're off-book, he probably shouldn't be playing it to begin with. He certainly shouldn't be bringing his knowledge up at the table.
If he's not willing to change, you're probably going to have to bounce him. You're a player, too, and if you're not having fun, there's a problem.
We have 3 players (not including me) and I think he just wants to have control of the campaign. I can try and be a player as well as DM, but since this is my first campaign I think I’ll be doing too much.
It is important to maintain that this is YOUR campaign. He can't just steal it from you. If your other players like your style, then more so.
If he says you're doing it wrong, ignore that crap. You can run your game how you want. If he doesn't like it, he can take a hike.
YOUR table, YOUR rules.
I'm sure Han and Chewbacca will be fine without him.
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale
As has already been said:
Have a 1 on 1 conversation laying out your concerns and see if he agrees to step it back (sounds like you tried this).
Have a more direct 'conversation' in which you set hard limits and consequences for violating those limits, explaining that the reason you are having the conversation is that you hope to resolve the issue, but at the end of the day YOU are the DM (sounds like you tried this too).
This leaves only one option remaining - remove this former DM from the campaign.
You can run a campaign for 2 players (yes the encounters will need to be greatly adjusted), they can also hire/attract NPCs to round out the group. Perhaps make up a statblock for a couple NPCs that the group decides to hire, and let your players control them alongside their characters (nothing says you have to be the one to do it).
Start looking for more players, but in the meantime, there's nothing wrong with tailoring a campaign to just 2 players.
Playing D&D since 1982
Have played every version of the game since Basic (Red Box Set), except that abomination sometimes called 4e.
On using the book more - I'd tell him it's essentially the way you are going to run things.
on telling players what to roll - this is a grey area. If people are asking "Can i do this" and he's saying stuff like "oh if you are looking for tracks of an animal in the woods that falls under survival" then it's not as bad as say cutting in and telling you that someone is going to roll something and you need to give an answer to it. one would be clear out of line, and one would just be something i'd let slide.
he's going to take over your campaign in his own words = Punt, cut and dry. Especially if you are doing it for free, theres no reason to have someone like that around who thinks it's cool to take someones campaign over. You should be able to fill your campaign out with an additional member or two within a week or two, you could make an NPC character and let them control said character between them in the mean time if the additional NPC character would be too overwhelming for you to do it.
To reiterate, when Jl8e says "you're a player too", they didn't mean that you should roll up a player character and join the party. What they mean is that the DM is a participant in the game and that your fun matters too. As a person playing the game with your friends, you should have fun too.
You can run for two. At low levels, the big risk is some bad luck snowballs rapidly and both players go down.
As has been suggested, support NPCs can be made, and they can be delegated to your players for combat. (Which is, admittedly, still a potential problem if your players are also new, but it does divide up the load.) If you have access to Tasha's, take a look at the Sidekick rules. (If not, it's not that big a deal to use a character for the purpose.) Your primary goal will be to provide combat support without stealing focus from the players.
So far, you seem to have good instincts on how to manage all this.
From the sound of it, Lokey, you're running the retooled Phandelver -- it would be pretty easy to introduce a couple hireling NPCs into that to bolster the party's numbers
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
Telling you he's going to take over your campaign is straight up disrespectful. Also, calling for rolls as a player is somewhere in between unnecessary (maybe there's no way the character would succeed in finding the bad guy's tracks even with a natural 20, in which case rolling a survival check is irrelevant) and obnoxious (it slows the game down and can lead to other players feeling bossed around). Your campaign is your campaign and you are free to run it as you wish, not how he thinks you should do it (even if it's a continuation, similar to his, etc.). It's one thing to take player feedback (almost always a good idea, even if you don't use it, at least hear it) it's something else entirely to be told you're doing it wrong.
In my free (and worth every penny) opinion, you're probably best off setting very clear guidelines about expectations and behaviors with this guy, full stop. When it's his turn to DM again, he can do it however he likes. You might also try telling him that he can only offer feedback outside of the session.
Good luck!
He has to leave the campaign. All you really need is three players and the game will work with two. He clearly wants to DM and not play.
I suppose the book part may have some merit. For example if you told me you were going to run Wild Beyond the Witchlight as a player I would expect the game to be roughly based on around the book. You may make alterations, but at some point id have to ask why you said we were playing wild beyond the Witchlight if you changed everything.
However in this case it seems more like he is upset things changed to the point he doesn't know what is going to happen more so than being upset you aren't running the material you said you were.
I'm a firm believer that you should never roll dice until the DM tells you to. Therefore no one else should be saying what you should roll.
As for taking your compaign over, that is a no go. It's clear he doesn't want to play. Being a DM he should be more understanding and the fact he isnt makes it clear he is just trying to cause problems.
Can I join your campaign
You have three choices:
1) Just let him take over the campaign and you be a player again and him be DM.
2) Talk to all the other players at the table to 'gang up' on him and tell him to knock it off as a group.
3) Leave and start a new group to DM potentially inviting the other players who aren't the problem to join.
This all good advice per say - I DM several groups that are DM heavy (2/3 per out of 6/7) - Yes its a hassle to remind folks that well this is my game and this is how I'm doing it - honestly most of the time i think its just their learned behavior of jumping in as they are normally running the table. With regards to them telling players what to roll I will just say hey Joey lets let Lizzie play her character. I think just being simple and direct without heat or drama usually fixes these things or at least it has for me.
To those that listed him leaving and starting a new campaign elsewhere as an option, no way - hold your ground. You're in the right. I would never leave your own campaign - it's your campaign, you run it the way you want. First of all, it's not possible for him to take over your campaign, short of him hacking your account. That he even threatened it is grounds enough to boot him, IMO, but especially its grounds to boot him for announcing to the other players who haven't played the campaign or its spin off before all the ways you're going off book - that's not only disrespectful to you, its disrespectful to the other players, who sound like they'd otherwise be having a good time.
It's every DM's right to choose what happens next - books are just suggestions. Shit, the frickin RULES are just suggestions. When you're the DM, there's no WRONG way to decide what happens next or on what to use from a book vs. making up, or on how to approach the mechanics of the game. There ARE what I would say bad DMing behaviors, but those aren't examples of them.
Poor DMing behaviors are like playing obvious favorites, ignoring certain players, gushing over others, making all the content so that it appeals to only one or two of the people without considering the others needs or wants, incorporating one player into the backstory, but leaving the others out, failing to even read their backstories at all, etc. I mean, any one of those things done once in a while doesn't make you a poor DM - it's just not a good habit to get into and should be avoided. But going off-book?
It sounds like he just doesn't know how to be flexible, and may just be jealous that you do, because being flexible is an extremely positive quality for a DM. It allows you to adapt to the player's choices and adjust the campaign accordingly. If you stick to the book and only the book no matter how hard the players try to do something else, you just keep saying 'no, you can't do that, you have to go to the town fair so you can meet the NPC you're supposed to meet', or whatever, that's like the definition of heavy-fisted writing in computer games - the kind where no matter what you do, the result is the same, even if it makes no sense whatsoever. But in a computer game, it can be understandable because there's only so much they can anticipate and code for in advance, providing all the artwork to go with it, etc.
But the beauty of tabletop is that it's NOT a computer game. He sounds like he just wants you to be a computer. Send him a copy of dosbox and some goldbox games, and let him play out the same adventure the same way over and over until his head explodes. Meanwhile, you do you, and stay flexible. It's what makes TTRPGs better than CRPGs, ultimately.
I think this is pretty good shout actually. If he’s always playing exactly to the book then they don’t sound like a particularly creative (dare a say a particularly good) DM and maybe they’re feeling threatened by you on your first game giving a better experience than they normally do,, especially if theyre someone who prizes their self identity as a DM. That doesn’t make them any less of a massive problem player that I think you definitely need to boot from the game but it’s definitely a possible reason for their behaviour
I was in a campaign years ago where the party were exploring Undermountain level 2 (2nd Edition). One player bought the boxed set and read ahead so he could prepare the most likely needed spells for each session. When our GM decided to stray off the published encounters, he got upset. When he demanded that the GM follow the book, she gave him an ultimatum right there in front of the entire group- If you don't like it, leave. He got up and left. Good riddance.
Don't allow your 'friend' to ruin a fun experience for you and your other players. Your ultimatum need not be public, but he needs to submit or move on. As others have expressed- 'Your table, Your rules'.
I got him out of my campaign. I figured it wasn't worth the stress. He just WAS NOT listening at all.
and I talked to my other players about the issue and they said HE was making it less fun. So As much as I didn't want to, I told him that if he was going to continue to control the game, than he is out, and he left on his own after I said that and now the other players seem to be really happy about that. :)
Thanks for all the advice! :)
Congratulations! Not easy to do, I bet, but you definitely did the right thing. Hope the rest of your campaign goes well!
Well done, never an easy thing to do. Have fun with the rest of the campaign