So I'm running Descent into Avernus (will avoid spoilers dw). That campaign is notoriusly a bit of a railroad with two fairly rigid paths as written. However, I've done a lot of work to flesh it out, completely rewire the structure to make it into a sandbox, and to use all of the different paths as quest trees and side quests that each have benefits to completing.
The issue? All that work is currently going unused because while several players have expressed interest in exploring that content, I have a very loud and insistent player who is dictating to the rest of the group exactly what they're doing & when, avoiding all the side content and beelining straight for the magical dohicky at the end of the adventure path, to the detriment of both my excitement of seeing my players discover all of these locations & characters, and my players since they're actively prevented from investigating the plot threads they're interested in or developing their characters.
Ofcourse this player thinks he's some kind of mastermind leader of the group and him pulling the plot forward will mean success is assured. He even threatened to kill another character when they made a small mistake that could have caused them to deviate from that path (and investigate all the other cool content the adventure has to offer).
Any advice on how to approach this? I need to speak to him & tell him the effect he's having. I'm a bit worried he'll turn round and say I'm taking away his player agency but then, if none of the other players are getting to choose what to do that's not really fair is it? I've just never really heard any stories of players railroading players before until I experienced it. Not gonna invite him to my future campaigns either way.
Good choice on not inviting him to future campaigns. That said, I'd ask him why he's doing it. Doesn't he want to see all the cool stuff the game has to offer? Does he think they will "lose" if they don't hurry to the finish? Also, if talking to him doesn't work, you can just throw in the extra stuff anyways. "Oh, you want to go here? Well, youäre gonna ned to go over here first to get the whatever..."
Descent into Avernus is designed for 3-5 player characters and runs from 1st to 13th level. It takes a good deal of experience to run it, and a long time to play it all out.
"That campaign is notoriously a bit of a railroad with two fairly rigid paths as written. However, I've done a lot of work to flesh it out, completely rewire the structure to make it into a sandbox." I'm sorry to have to say this, but the first mistake was one you made. You got too excited and you took something you knew perfectly well was a railroad into a sandbox. What did you expect to happen?
It's clear that one of the people involved was not all that experienced with playing D&D.
The problem player appointed himself as the leader of the party, he didn't like where the story was heading. After all, it's headed into Hell itself, so he started bossing around the other players. He stepped way over the line when he threatened to have his player character kill another player's character because you added too much cool content that he didn't want to explore while the other player wanted to see it.
Really, all you need to do with new players is take your railroad, decide where it's headed, and add a few sub-plots as train stations so the players can hop off and explore if they want to.
Might I suggest that the next game session you run, put Decent into Avernus on hold, and run The Lost Mines of Pheldaver instead? People rave about that one. It's got an engaging story, with simple objectives. Have your players made new characters and let them play it out. That one goes from level 1 to 5. By the time they have finished it, they'll be ready for something more challenging, so you can pick up where you left off and run Decent into Avernus as written, and they will be a lot better prepared for the difficulty by then.
It's perfectly fine for a player to want to go straight at the core of the story. That's the kind of player that I am, too: I don't want to wander around exploring, I want to follow a storyline, and my characters are usually dedicated to achieving the goal. If the player is not interested in the other things you've designed, then that's because they aren't forming important parts of the core storyline. Here's the problem with this 'sandbox' idea (a generally bad idea people have created a myth about being the 'superior' way to play): D&D is at its core a game where you create a story. It's fantastic if the players have a lot of free agency in how they follow it, but you should never expect them to willingly engage in sub-quests that don't affect their goals.
To resolve this, put in a 'lock and key' system. My current game has a core storyline but is ultimately free-roaming (a better term than sandbox), and at one point, the players decided at level 7 that they wanted to go straight to the final citadel and take on the boss. They don't stand a chance doing that; fortunately, I already have a plot device that 'locks' the area and takes them on other quests. When they get there (they actually diverted after casting Guidance when they hit level 8), they will find the citadel is protected by a massive Wall of Force that they need to go to 2 other locations (travelling back in time, then dropping a mountain on it) to break it. This will keep them out of the fortress until level 10 when they have a chance. So the forcefield is the "Lock", and 2 other dungeon crawls are the "Key." If you run a free-roaming/sandbox type area, you need to lock the areas or you get the nonsense you get in modules like Curse of Strahd where the characters can freely wander into an area and get one-shot at level 3 by a group of CR9 monsters, a CR12 monster, or that CR16 monster supported by a CR11 monster that it's impossible to be realistically warned about and that ends most CoS campaigns early. Lock the players out until it's time to move on!
If you make optional content then it's optional. You can't have your cake and eat it.
The second issue, much more pressing, is that the player has started engaging in PvP activity in the game in order to dominate. Take them aside, tell them that it's not acceptable and remind them that this isn't their game. The party can kick the character (not the player) if the character is toxic in game. The player has forgotten that, and needs reminding.
Pre-made adventures are a linear plot-in-a-box. (Linear ≠ Railroad) The allure of a pre-made adventure is that you don't have to do all of the work of creating the entire world. You chose to expand on that, and good on you, but it wasn't required content for your players to follow. (Requiring players to follow your story = Railroad) Being upset that your work went unnoticed and unused is disappointing, but an unfortunate side effect of being a DM. (I've hurled reams of ideas out of my campaign binder at the end of a campaign that weren't used.) No plan ever survives first contact with the PCs.
I'm with the consensus on your player issue. Talk with them. Talk with all of your players and get their consensus on what effect your toxic player has on the group. If one bad apple is ruining the bunch, get rid of the bad apple. You may feel really uncomfortable at the moment that you have the conversation. It won't be equivalent to the amount of uncomfortable that can, and most likely will be felt at your table if this person is present.
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” - Mark Twain - Innocents Abroad
Sounds like his character is treating the plot with a sense of urgency that doesn't jibe with an open world. Did you tell the players beforehand that that's what you were planning on making?
Ok lemme add some context to this because people are making a few false assumptions that are thus mischaracterising what's happening.
First of all, this isn't a new player. Infact he's a very experienced one who is the DM for the other game we play regularly. Although having played in that game we've found this guy to be fairly controlling with both people's backstories & their characters actions, to the point we're very close to bailing on that campaign too. Far as we can tell he wants to turn his campaigns into grimdark novels & anything that detracts from his vision for it is banned. His next campaign idea is for us to be slaves in a grimdark world trying to escape being hunted for 8 levels (!?), because why be subtle about controlling your players characters when you can literally claim ownership of them. Slavery in general seems to be a biiiiig thing in his world. So let's just say, essentially this isn't an isolated issue.
Second, making Avernus more open is nothing new and there are several guides on how to do so. And it's going well! The main work that was done was figuring out my ideal main quest path & then tying in the characters backstories & actions to the other bits to entice them to try it. And again, many of them do! But every time they say they wanna do it this guy says no (and he's rather literally driving them so to speak, so he's just like you wanna go there? Go walk). It's basically a situation where if this was a democracy he'd be overruled at every turn, but he's the loudest and most insistent person there so it's just ended up with him getting his way every time thus far.
And also yes, the group were very well aware of the set up of the campaign & the freedom they'd have to choose their own path through it.
Otherwise yeah I agree with what some have said about needing to speak to everyone & get a consensus of how they're feeling about it. If there is a serious pvp altercation (rather than just the blatant threats I've seen so far) I've already made plans to ensure it's the instigator that gets punished and the innocent players not planning on killing each other don't permanently lose their character or anything.
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” - Mark Twain - Innocents Abroad
Additional information assimilated, no changes to my previous comment.
Being a DM in a different campaign doesn't excuse being a bad player in this one.
Oh yeah no I 100% agree, I was more referring to the comment by Geann of "they must be new, go run lost mines of phandelver", since that is not remotely helpful in this situation haha
Ok lemme add some context to this because people are making a few false assumptions that are thus mischaracterising what's happening.
First of all, this isn't a new player. Infact he's a very experienced one who is the DM for the other game we play regularly.
Err, any chance they've played DiA before (or at least read the module) and are trying to play it the way it "should" be played?
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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)
The whole table chat might be good, although if it were my table, I would try to get the rest together first, to ensure they, too, have issue with Mr Control Freak. Once that's determined (you said they seem less than happy with his train-like charge) he gets informed that the group has taken a vote, and he is no longer their spokesperson/leader. If (WHEN, more likely) he rails and protests, he can be informed that there are 2 options open to him now. 1. Agree to be a party member and behave accordingly, one vote per one player for what we do and such. 2. Find a new group, this one is done with your bullying and controlling.
As a few have said, it will be an uncomfortable meeting and discussion, for sure, but the truth is, as quoted at least once here: "No D&D is far better than bad D&D"
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Talk to your Players.Talk to your DM. If more people used this advice, there would be 24.74% fewer threads on Tactics, Rules and DM discussions.
RPGs are cooperative ventures. It sounds like Mr. Railroad is not being cooperative. An out of character discussion by the whole table is probably warranted at this point. It's possible, though unlikely, the other players are having fun and don't mind Mr. Railroad doing his thing.
On the topic of railroads, I think the term has become a "4-letter-word" in the RPG community and it shouldn't be. There is nothing wrong with a single-path adventure. Literally every story arc in the classic MMORPG "City of Heroes" is a literal railroad (once you are on a story arc, you cannot get off it, and there is only one path of missions through each arc... if you fail a mission you just have to re-try it until you complete it). They have some of the best "quest lines" (story arcs) I have ever seen in any game. I go out of my way to take them on every character, even though I already know them, and they are railroads.
The only relevant question at the RPG table is: "are we having fun?" If so, then nothing else matters. If a railroad is fun, then that is all that counts.
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WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
First, the issue as originally stated was that you made alot of unused content and you're disappointed. That's on you. The players decided to stay on rails, and yes, they did decide because they are complicit with the problem player's actions. Next time, it happens call a vote, and if they go along with problem players plan, then let them skip to the end and die if they don't retreat. A TPK during the campaign is an issue; a TPK at the end of the campaign is just one of the possible outcomes... a memorable one at that. Some people enjoy a linear pursuit.
Otherwise, role-play the scene with the larger group first without any input from the problem player or others who join him because their characters are not there, and then schedule a time to role-play their pursuit... maybe his character will die because he split the party, and the other characters will discover his remains teaching them all a valuable lesson, and they get to split his loot.
Second, the real issue with the problem player is the in-character death threats and the meta-game ride threats; that is your problem to address, and you should probably address it on the side so as not to embarress the guy. You don't need a consensus from the other players because you are uncomfortable with it and you run the game... for fun presumably. All it takes is one person to be not okay with something. Just be honest, and state that it's unacceptable behaviour in your game, and it's not cool. The other players may have to arrange different rides in the short term. Also, find out what he enjoys out of gaming or this campaign in particular: is it really bossing other players around or does he just want to pursue the main plot line for the story or the puzzle it offers? You may be doing something that irks him.
Finally, I think you personally have a problem with this individual. You don't have to play in his Grimdark game. Just have an honest talk with him: "Hey, after a long week of work, I don't want to suffer through a Grimdark world, and I'm not comfortable with slavery. I'm lookiing for high fantasy, quippy jokes, and a chance to relax. I'm going to have to pass on this campaign." A little separation will do you good, and if enough players say no, maybe he reconsiders and runs something else.
1: The problem player seems to know the story already, so is effectively speedrunning it
2: You're letting them!
If the problem player is makign a beeline for where they know a powerful magic doohicky is, then move it to one of your homebrewed places - have them find a signature glove from a renowned cat burglar instead, showing it has already been stolen. Move the entrance so they have to find a guide to get to it, who happens to be in one of your homebrew towns. As with the lock and key method, make them go to your places before they can go to the ones this guy wants to steam towards!
Basically, the best way to deal with someone who thinks they know the story is to make them look like a fool. If they players were offered a side-quest to find a magic gem, put a door on the place he's been steaming towards with a magic-gem-shaped keyhole. Make him realise that you, the DM, are steering this game, not him! He can try to plough past everything, but he will hit a brick wall every time until he straightens up and plays right.
As for PVP, you're best talking to him about not going there in person.
I don't mean to trivialise the problem, but have you just tried chatting with this problem player? Explain to them out of game away from everyone that they are being domineering and detracting from content you have created. They may not realise, and might play ball in future if you approach them in a diplomatic way. If he tells you that you are in fact "taking away his player agency", maybe suggest that he is taking away everyone else's? If he continues to be stubborn about the issue, implement votes on courses of action within the game and make that a non negotiable game rule.
1: The problem player seems to know the story already, so is effectively speedrunning it
I'm glad I'm not the only one that got those vibes.
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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)
As far as the "taking away his player agency" arguement, just acknowledge it: "Yes. Yes, I am taking away your player agency if that includes death threats towards other players characters." And as ThatGumYouLiked posted, inform him that he's taking away from the group's agency, and I wouldn't be subtle about it. Mistakes are allowed to be made; they make cool story moments.
I mean it just seems like the rest of the players are just lying down and taking it.
If it were me, my character would just be ignoring him and imploring the rest of the group to come to a consensus about what we want to do. And would be daring him to do something if he threated PvP.
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So I'm running Descent into Avernus (will avoid spoilers dw). That campaign is notoriusly a bit of a railroad with two fairly rigid paths as written. However, I've done a lot of work to flesh it out, completely rewire the structure to make it into a sandbox, and to use all of the different paths as quest trees and side quests that each have benefits to completing.
The issue? All that work is currently going unused because while several players have expressed interest in exploring that content, I have a very loud and insistent player who is dictating to the rest of the group exactly what they're doing & when, avoiding all the side content and beelining straight for the magical dohicky at the end of the adventure path, to the detriment of both my excitement of seeing my players discover all of these locations & characters, and my players since they're actively prevented from investigating the plot threads they're interested in or developing their characters.
Ofcourse this player thinks he's some kind of mastermind leader of the group and him pulling the plot forward will mean success is assured. He even threatened to kill another character when they made a small mistake that could have caused them to deviate from that path (and investigate all the other cool content the adventure has to offer).
Any advice on how to approach this? I need to speak to him & tell him the effect he's having. I'm a bit worried he'll turn round and say I'm taking away his player agency but then, if none of the other players are getting to choose what to do that's not really fair is it? I've just never really heard any stories of players railroading players before until I experienced it. Not gonna invite him to my future campaigns either way.
Good choice on not inviting him to future campaigns. That said, I'd ask him why he's doing it. Doesn't he want to see all the cool stuff the game has to offer? Does he think they will "lose" if they don't hurry to the finish? Also, if talking to him doesn't work, you can just throw in the extra stuff anyways. "Oh, you want to go here? Well, youäre gonna ned to go over here first to get the whatever..."
Descent into Avernus is designed for 3-5 player characters and runs from 1st to 13th level. It takes a good deal of experience to run it, and a long time to play it all out.
"That campaign is notoriously a bit of a railroad with two fairly rigid paths as written. However, I've done a lot of work to flesh it out, completely rewire the structure to make it into a sandbox." I'm sorry to have to say this, but the first mistake was one you made. You got too excited and you took something you knew perfectly well was a railroad into a sandbox. What did you expect to happen?
It's clear that one of the people involved was not all that experienced with playing D&D.
The problem player appointed himself as the leader of the party, he didn't like where the story was heading. After all, it's headed into Hell itself, so he started bossing around the other players. He stepped way over the line when he threatened to have his player character kill another player's character because you added too much cool content that he didn't want to explore while the other player wanted to see it.
Really, all you need to do with new players is take your railroad, decide where it's headed, and add a few sub-plots as train stations so the players can hop off and explore if they want to.
Might I suggest that the next game session you run, put Decent into Avernus on hold, and run The Lost Mines of Pheldaver instead? People rave about that one. It's got an engaging story, with simple objectives. Have your players made new characters and let them play it out. That one goes from level 1 to 5. By the time they have finished it, they'll be ready for something more challenging, so you can pick up where you left off and run Decent into Avernus as written, and they will be a lot better prepared for the difficulty by then.
<Insert clever signature here>
There are two separate issues here.
It's perfectly fine for a player to want to go straight at the core of the story. That's the kind of player that I am, too: I don't want to wander around exploring, I want to follow a storyline, and my characters are usually dedicated to achieving the goal. If the player is not interested in the other things you've designed, then that's because they aren't forming important parts of the core storyline. Here's the problem with this 'sandbox' idea (a generally bad idea people have created a myth about being the 'superior' way to play): D&D is at its core a game where you create a story. It's fantastic if the players have a lot of free agency in how they follow it, but you should never expect them to willingly engage in sub-quests that don't affect their goals.
To resolve this, put in a 'lock and key' system. My current game has a core storyline but is ultimately free-roaming (a better term than sandbox), and at one point, the players decided at level 7 that they wanted to go straight to the final citadel and take on the boss. They don't stand a chance doing that; fortunately, I already have a plot device that 'locks' the area and takes them on other quests. When they get there (they actually diverted after casting Guidance when they hit level 8), they will find the citadel is protected by a massive Wall of Force that they need to go to 2 other locations (travelling back in time, then dropping a mountain on it) to break it. This will keep them out of the fortress until level 10 when they have a chance. So the forcefield is the "Lock", and 2 other dungeon crawls are the "Key." If you run a free-roaming/sandbox type area, you need to lock the areas or you get the nonsense you get in modules like Curse of Strahd where the characters can freely wander into an area and get one-shot at level 3 by a group of CR9 monsters, a CR12 monster, or that CR16 monster supported by a CR11 monster that it's impossible to be realistically warned about and that ends most CoS campaigns early. Lock the players out until it's time to move on!
If you make optional content then it's optional. You can't have your cake and eat it.
The second issue, much more pressing, is that the player has started engaging in PvP activity in the game in order to dominate. Take them aside, tell them that it's not acceptable and remind them that this isn't their game. The party can kick the character (not the player) if the character is toxic in game. The player has forgotten that, and needs reminding.
Gonna lead with this - Running the Game - How to deal with problem players.
Pre-made adventures are a linear plot-in-a-box. (Linear ≠ Railroad) The allure of a pre-made adventure is that you don't have to do all of the work of creating the entire world. You chose to expand on that, and good on you, but it wasn't required content for your players to follow. (Requiring players to follow your story = Railroad) Being upset that your work went unnoticed and unused is disappointing, but an unfortunate side effect of being a DM. (I've hurled reams of ideas out of my campaign binder at the end of a campaign that weren't used.) No plan ever survives first contact with the PCs.
I'm with the consensus on your player issue. Talk with them. Talk with all of your players and get their consensus on what effect your toxic player has on the group. If one bad apple is ruining the bunch, get rid of the bad apple. You may feel really uncomfortable at the moment that you have the conversation. It won't be equivalent to the amount of uncomfortable that can, and most likely will be felt at your table if this person is present.
No D&D is better than bad D&D
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” - Mark Twain - Innocents Abroad
Sounds like his character is treating the plot with a sense of urgency that doesn't jibe with an open world. Did you tell the players beforehand that that's what you were planning on making?
I am absolutely going to use the Lock and Key approach to storytelling. I wish I'd thought that one up.
<Insert clever signature here>
Ok lemme add some context to this because people are making a few false assumptions that are thus mischaracterising what's happening.
First of all, this isn't a new player. Infact he's a very experienced one who is the DM for the other game we play regularly. Although having played in that game we've found this guy to be fairly controlling with both people's backstories & their characters actions, to the point we're very close to bailing on that campaign too. Far as we can tell he wants to turn his campaigns into grimdark novels & anything that detracts from his vision for it is banned. His next campaign idea is for us to be slaves in a grimdark world trying to escape being hunted for 8 levels (!?), because why be subtle about controlling your players characters when you can literally claim ownership of them. Slavery in general seems to be a biiiiig thing in his world. So let's just say, essentially this isn't an isolated issue.
Second, making Avernus more open is nothing new and there are several guides on how to do so. And it's going well! The main work that was done was figuring out my ideal main quest path & then tying in the characters backstories & actions to the other bits to entice them to try it. And again, many of them do! But every time they say they wanna do it this guy says no (and he's rather literally driving them so to speak, so he's just like you wanna go there? Go walk). It's basically a situation where if this was a democracy he'd be overruled at every turn, but he's the loudest and most insistent person there so it's just ended up with him getting his way every time thus far.
And also yes, the group were very well aware of the set up of the campaign & the freedom they'd have to choose their own path through it.
Otherwise yeah I agree with what some have said about needing to speak to everyone & get a consensus of how they're feeling about it. If there is a serious pvp altercation (rather than just the blatant threats I've seen so far) I've already made plans to ensure it's the instigator that gets punished and the innocent players not planning on killing each other don't permanently lose their character or anything.
Additional information assimilated, no changes to my previous comment.
Being a DM in a different campaign doesn't excuse being a bad player in this one.
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” - Mark Twain - Innocents Abroad
Oh yeah no I 100% agree, I was more referring to the comment by Geann of "they must be new, go run lost mines of phandelver", since that is not remotely helpful in this situation haha
Err, any chance they've played DiA before (or at least read the module) and are trying to play it the way it "should" be played?
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)
The whole table chat might be good, although if it were my table, I would try to get the rest together first, to ensure they, too, have issue with Mr Control Freak. Once that's determined (you said they seem less than happy with his train-like charge) he gets informed that the group has taken a vote, and he is no longer their spokesperson/leader. If (WHEN, more likely) he rails and protests, he can be informed that there are 2 options open to him now.
1. Agree to be a party member and behave accordingly, one vote per one player for what we do and such.
2. Find a new group, this one is done with your bullying and controlling.
As a few have said, it will be an uncomfortable meeting and discussion, for sure, but the truth is, as quoted at least once here:
"No D&D is far better than bad D&D"
Talk to your Players. Talk to your DM. If more people used this advice, there would be 24.74% fewer threads on Tactics, Rules and DM discussions.
RPGs are cooperative ventures. It sounds like Mr. Railroad is not being cooperative. An out of character discussion by the whole table is probably warranted at this point. It's possible, though unlikely, the other players are having fun and don't mind Mr. Railroad doing his thing.
On the topic of railroads, I think the term has become a "4-letter-word" in the RPG community and it shouldn't be. There is nothing wrong with a single-path adventure. Literally every story arc in the classic MMORPG "City of Heroes" is a literal railroad (once you are on a story arc, you cannot get off it, and there is only one path of missions through each arc... if you fail a mission you just have to re-try it until you complete it). They have some of the best "quest lines" (story arcs) I have ever seen in any game. I go out of my way to take them on every character, even though I already know them, and they are railroads.
The only relevant question at the RPG table is: "are we having fun?" If so, then nothing else matters. If a railroad is fun, then that is all that counts.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
I'll offer a different point of view.
First, the issue as originally stated was that you made alot of unused content and you're disappointed. That's on you. The players decided to stay on rails, and yes, they did decide because they are complicit with the problem player's actions. Next time, it happens call a vote, and if they go along with problem players plan, then let them skip to the end and die if they don't retreat. A TPK during the campaign is an issue; a TPK at the end of the campaign is just one of the possible outcomes... a memorable one at that. Some people enjoy a linear pursuit.
Otherwise, role-play the scene with the larger group first without any input from the problem player or others who join him because their characters are not there, and then schedule a time to role-play their pursuit... maybe his character will die because he split the party, and the other characters will discover his remains teaching them all a valuable lesson, and they get to split his loot.
Second, the real issue with the problem player is the in-character death threats and the meta-game ride threats; that is your problem to address, and you should probably address it on the side so as not to embarress the guy. You don't need a consensus from the other players because you are uncomfortable with it and you run the game... for fun presumably. All it takes is one person to be not okay with something. Just be honest, and state that it's unacceptable behaviour in your game, and it's not cool. The other players may have to arrange different rides in the short term. Also, find out what he enjoys out of gaming or this campaign in particular: is it really bossing other players around or does he just want to pursue the main plot line for the story or the puzzle it offers? You may be doing something that irks him.
Finally, I think you personally have a problem with this individual. You don't have to play in his Grimdark game. Just have an honest talk with him: "Hey, after a long week of work, I don't want to suffer through a Grimdark world, and I'm not comfortable with slavery. I'm lookiing for high fantasy, quippy jokes, and a chance to relax. I'm going to have to pass on this campaign." A little separation will do you good, and if enough players say no, maybe he reconsiders and runs something else.
It is always a great pleasure to offer, in the clearest way I know how, and in detail, useless information. Glad to have been of help.
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It sounds to me like the problem is twofold:
1: The problem player seems to know the story already, so is effectively speedrunning it
2: You're letting them!
If the problem player is makign a beeline for where they know a powerful magic doohicky is, then move it to one of your homebrewed places - have them find a signature glove from a renowned cat burglar instead, showing it has already been stolen. Move the entrance so they have to find a guide to get to it, who happens to be in one of your homebrew towns. As with the lock and key method, make them go to your places before they can go to the ones this guy wants to steam towards!
Basically, the best way to deal with someone who thinks they know the story is to make them look like a fool. If they players were offered a side-quest to find a magic gem, put a door on the place he's been steaming towards with a magic-gem-shaped keyhole. Make him realise that you, the DM, are steering this game, not him! He can try to plough past everything, but he will hit a brick wall every time until he straightens up and plays right.
As for PVP, you're best talking to him about not going there in person.
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I don't mean to trivialise the problem, but have you just tried chatting with this problem player? Explain to them out of game away from everyone that they are being domineering and detracting from content you have created. They may not realise, and might play ball in future if you approach them in a diplomatic way. If he tells you that you are in fact "taking away his player agency", maybe suggest that he is taking away everyone else's? If he continues to be stubborn about the issue, implement votes on courses of action within the game and make that a non negotiable game rule.
I'm glad I'm not the only one that got those vibes.
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)
As far as the "taking away his player agency" arguement, just acknowledge it: "Yes. Yes, I am taking away your player agency if that includes death threats towards other players characters." And as ThatGumYouLiked posted, inform him that he's taking away from the group's agency, and I wouldn't be subtle about it. Mistakes are allowed to be made; they make cool story moments.
I mean it just seems like the rest of the players are just lying down and taking it.
If it were me, my character would just be ignoring him and imploring the rest of the group to come to a consensus about what we want to do. And would be daring him to do something if he threated PvP.