Hi. I'm someone who made a thread a looong time ago titled something akin to "Evil Characters? Good or bad for the game?"
So I was wanting to throw this out there. I realize this WILL be a very contentious topic, as everyone has their opinion on the matter.
Some say, the party should never fight about anything. They should all have roughly the same, clear goal. And no matter what happens, everyone should hold hands, for the sake of the story.
Others say that it's more realistic roleplay if the party argues, or in some cases, even outright fights with each other, especially in the case where none of the players characters knew each other until 'meeting' at wherever the campaign starts so long as the argument is natural, and not forced/intentional 'just because.'
Obviously I have a bias towards what I feel is more realistic Roleplay, in the sense that party strife can exist, and feel it makes the game better, and the roleplay stronger, because it encourages character development, in my opinion.
Below, I will do my best to lay out the general points of both arguements.
Anti-Party-Strife Arguement:
It sucks the fun out of the campaign if party members fight with each other, whether it be due to misunderstandings, in party theft/violence, out of party theft/violence, etc. It makes it harder for the group to be a cohesive unit, to achieve the endgoal of the campaign, or the persons character goals for one reason or another. It makes a player feel bullied/ostracized, etc. It leads to a toxic environment that detracts from gameplay, and any (its what my character would do, etc) argument to the otherwise is simply an excuse by the player for their actions. (I really can't think of anything else to put here...)
Pro-Party-Strife Arguement:
It's realistic, outside of the group pre-planning that everyone is already good friends with eachother, a bunch of random people thrown into a chaotic situation, each of them unique, and having their own opinions, personalities, goals, and life experience on whats best to do can potentially lead to arguments or even in-fighting, because that's just how people are. it makes no sense that no matter what happens, everyone's just super-special-rainbow friends who never argue with anyone for any reason - all for the sake of the end-goal, and that fighting/disagreements can lead to character growth/development, in such as the two people in the party fighting early on, can become friends who respect each other, or even lovers later as they fight alongside one another despite their differences. And that people need to realize they are roleplayimg their character, but they are not, their character, so none of it is a personal attack on the player unless it bleeds to OOC arguments.
I personally don't see any kind of problem with in-party arguing of the IC nature. If it's OOC then yeah, that can get a bit awkward.
Currently my fortnight sessions on Sundays consist of a group of six people: 3 good, 2 evil and 1 neutral. It's cool because you're getting a sense of what both sides are doing, what the other doesn't like, and that gives us room to try and push our characters point across on why something is right or wrong.
While the evildoers go off and murder some random dwarf, my Chaotic Good Gnome just goes in to a huff and refuses to leave the tavern to let them do it (due to contract story fluff, he would've saved the dwarf if he was allowed).
Thankfully the DM keeps a tab on how much murder hobo'ing goes on before he has to put his foot down. The guys that I play with know what they're doing with their characters and how to roleplay instead of trying to kill everything that moves; they stick to being sly and being underhanded with their actions so ICly us other PC's wouldn't know unless they told us or someone else caught them in the act and THEN told us.
When we DO catch them, hoo boy, it makes a bit of a mess of things because we're conflicted. On one hand we have a couple of powerful people on the other end of the party that may or may not beat our heads in to the dirt, but on the other we're trying to get by without getting innocent blood on our hands while fulfilling a contract. So at some point or another an argument or fight will break out and we'll have to settle our differences aside or reach an agreement.
So yes, I do think in-party fighting is a good basis for getting more interaction out of your players. They don't necessarily have to be bad, even good PC's have their own ideals that can clash about what is right and wrong and it's fun seeing how people portray those ideas.
Some is okey. But a lot of players who want's a lot of party conflict often don't like the consequences. If you're gonna be angry and leave the table because the other PC's killed/arrested and left behind your beloved rouge for stealing from the party or you warlock for sacrifizing innocents to your patron then maybe you shouldn't try playing that kind of game.
I have seen in party fighting destroy so many campaigns.
I had one player who would constantly and obviously plot with his buddy against the rest of the party. When he wasn't he was acting against them on his own. It pretty much destroyed the game.
@dave that would, however, not go with the topic here. I don't mean arbitrary, and intentional. The point of this was referring to disagreements that happen naturally. Such as what to do with a prisoner, when one wants to kill, and the other doesnt, as a tiny example. I did mention out murder/theft, but i wasn't specifically meaning people going out of their way to cause it.
Arguing about what do with prisoners is fine. At least as long as it is kept IC and doesn't spill over to hard feelings between the players instead of the characters. Some natural disagreement is going to be unavoidable.
i just for fun decided my character didn't like bards due to some incidents in his past. this was before i found out a couple of players had worked with the campaign story with the dm and one of the main themes was going to be with racism between the races in the world and our characters over 4 months of sessions with lots of pointed comments and arguents my dwarven barbarian and the elven bard learned to tolerate each other and work together on a few small things like a song for those two characters wedding that we performed together even though we still don't like each other. this was all done before everything of the main plot was revealed to us. but it was kinda awesome when me and the bard got to tell off the elders who didn't want integration in the forest so persuasively using our story about being able to coexist the dm skipped the 3rd to last combat of this chapter of the campaign when she gave us both advantage to a persuasion roll and both of us got 20s.
Longer answer: don't **** with another player unless it serves a party/story constructive purpose, is entirely & rapidly resolvable, and will not have a permanent/lasting effect on the player's character.
NEVER steal from another player. Nobody cares if you're roleplaying a kleptomaniac. You will anger everyone: players, characters, and DM. Doesn't matter if it's a legendary item or a single copper coin. It's the quickest way to not only derail a campaign, but an entire gaming group.
Violence is a little more grey, but mostly the same. Full-scale character combat? Yeah, that's almost never going to result in a net-positive experience. RP violence? That can be interesting.
Years ago I was in a campaign where I played a "hardened" ranger. He was a veteran, tactician, survivalist, and realist. He knew what "needed to be done" to ensure the safety of the party, and the success of their mission. He was a kind person, but also knew that kindness does not always beget kindness in return.
At one point our party was on a mission deep in a jungle occupied by hostile lizard folk, and we'd been hired by a small village that was being threatened by them. During one of the final encounters, we captured one of the lizard folk to get information. In the process, we learned that we had actually crashed a lizard folk wedding, and the magical object we had been sent to retrieve was something they were using for the ceremony. Broke my character's heart, but what was done was done. Despite the tugging heartstrings, these lizard folk were still a major threat to the region.
One of our other players (monk) promised the captive that they would release them in exchange for information. I never made that promise. They spilled the beans. Knowing the rest of the party would not understand what I needed to do, I suggested they start heading back, and I'd be right behind after "releasing" the hostage.
Monk didn't quite buy it, and I tried to explain the reasons why we could not risk leaving a survivor: we had a job, the tribe was actively attacking others, and any survivor could easily inform the rest of the tribe that we had been sent by the human village. Monk did not agree with my position. Rather than force further argument (still in hostile territory), my character judged action to be the prudent decision. I slit the captive's throat (they were bound) and threw them off the top of the building we were on (sorta like a Mayan pyramid). Of course the monk took exception to this, flew into a rage and punched my character. I didn't attempt to stop him. It was the kind of reaction I expected. He saw that I wasn't resisting/defending myself/fighting back, and calmed down. Didn't need to go any farther.
Toward the end of that session, our party was back in civilization at the inn. I sat next to the monk, bought us a round, and asked if he'd ever heard of (improvised name) village. He hadn't (of course), and I started telling him the story of that village. A village very similar to the one we had been hired to help. A village that no longer exists.
Disagreement amongst the party can be a excellent opportunity for character growth, and unexpected storytelling avenues. Once you start rolling dice against each other, you've got a problem.
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You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
Sometimes it's needed. It can add flavor to your game. Plenty of teammates fight and argue with each other. The guardians of the galaxy are a great example. Another is Legolas and Gimli contesting over who has the most kills. What I do is have all attacks deal one damage so fighters are not one shot killing wizards. Most of my characters keep it verbal anyway though so I rarely need to use that rule.
Sometimes it's needed. It can add flavor to your game. Plenty of teammates fight and argue with each other. The guardians of the galaxy are a great example. Another is Legolas and Gimli contesting over who has the most kills. What I do is have all attacks deal one damage so fighters are not one shot killing wizards. Most of my characters keep it verbal anyway though so I rarely need to use that rule.
You're describing bickering with Guardians of the Galaxy or Legolas and Gimli. We're talking about what happens when those kind of bickering situations evolve negatively, and individuals end up coming to blows. The Guardians frequently disagree, but they don't actually fight in any way. And Legolas and Gimli develop a very close, brotherly relationship as they spend time competing and fighting alongside each other.
We're talking about the Paladin catching the Rogue stealing from the townspeople for the third time, despite several very long and angry conversations on the subject, pulling out his Warhammer, and lighting off a Divine Smite because he's just plain tired of this senseless lawlessness.
In one of my favorite campaigns, my character and another PC tried to kill each other. There were huge fights between characters that we all loved. HOWEVER, we went into the campaign knowing we wanted to create inter-character drama with a super dark tone. Thse sessions after our characters got the most heated and violent with each other were our favorites lol. But I think if in-fighting hasn't been discussed beforehand, it should be quelled as soon as it starts.
I've seen many a stream where the parties begin as tentative alliances among strangers and, later in the campaign or in later campaigns, evolve into a most fun dysfunctional family of widely differing philosophies.
Get familiar with the players and the characters first to isolate personal feelings from RP - don't start the campaign swinging at a bunch of strange characters even if the players aren't strangers. Don't push others' limits for your own story. You're all writing the story together. Aggressive drama is fine as long as it's cooperative storytelling.
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Human. Male. Possibly. Don't be a divider. My characters' backgrounds are written like instruction manuals rather than stories. My opinion and preferences don't mean you're wrong. I am 99.7603% convinced that the digital dice are messing with me. I roll high when nobody's looking and low when anyone else can see.🎲 “It's a bit early to be thinking about an epitaph. No?” will be my epitaph.
I wouldn't say intra-party combat is "realistic" unless you think Captain America: Civil War (which I once saw described as more like Captain America: Intramural Pick Up Game) is somehow a realistic portrayal of group dynamics and conflict resolution.
D&D Adventurers aren't usually soldiers (though many adventurers do have choose a military or mercenary background, so may bring the following ethos with them) ... but I think within a party there's something to be said for the bonds and latitude and tolerance people in that world give each other having a shared experience of violence and having to rely on each other for their lives (sure there's training doctrine to encourage that dynamic, but unit cohesion between a new team in a combat zone versus a team that's been in combat is noticeable). Sure cross words can be shared, and maybe even some physical tussling, but taking a divine smite to a party member should not be done casually (of course in my game, violence is never engaged in casually) and if I was a DM I would take a "meta" moment to get at what's going on here. But if a DM wants to referee an intra-party professional wrestling ring, that's fine, but let's call it what it is and not take comic book group dynamics as "realism".
If the characters are at such cross purposes to want to go Thor's hammer on the Loki or Jack Sparrow wannabe, it would be unrealistic for the party to just "get on getting on" after the blows and counterblows are made, maybe even a PvP kill. So if this is the sort of play a DM would tolerate or allow, the DM will have to support it and likely change campaign gears to reflect the conflict that will further fall out. That's if you're actually playing realistically. Otherwise, sure comic book rules can come into play, and there's nothing wrong with that, if your table finds intra party combat entertaining, which is why you're all there in the first place, it's supposed to be fun. That begs the question if two characters come to blows and the DM is stuck managing combat, are the other characters supposed to get involved, or just wait it out, and is the latter fun? And from there you spill into whatever "realism" or "comic book logic" you want in the game world maybe souring the play experience of your players.
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Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Longer answer: don't **** with another player unless it serves a party/story constructive purpose, is entirely & rapidly resolvable, and will not have a permanent/lasting effect on the player's character.
I would add to the last part... "and unless you and the other player have agreed OOC to do it and are both on board." If you include the other player in the mischief, and they consented, it's OK. If you are springing it on another player -- not OK.
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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.
Yeah it can actually be really interesting if two players agree out of character if their characters had a contentious relationship. That can add to the drama, and maybe even occasionally come to blows. Again, only if both players are actively going for this kind of dynamic.
And I don't think everyone in the party has to 100% agree on everything, or have a single unified goal. They just need to have enough of a reason to justify sticking together. Remember, evil on the alignment chart doesn't mean completely inept. An evil character is still capable of reason and cooperation with goody goody heroe types when it is in their best interests to do so, so you just need to figure out with your DM when you make an evil character *why* it is in their best interests to go along with the party. Likewise, a good character doesn't have to like the evil character in the party to recognize what they're bringing to the table and recognize that their particular skill set has its uses. In the right situation, these characters can function side by side, and if the players want to even clash at times, while not ruining anyone's fun.
In my opinion, CR C1E40 is a great example of in-party fighting. In general you might try to stay away form it, but if the rp opportunity arises, go for it.
It really depends. I once played a D&D campaign with my sister where I was both the Narrator and a member of the party (exhausting, but I knew my character well enough to do it). I was very close to my sister, so it came as a surprise to both of us when our characters suddenly blew up in each other’s faces and nearly came to blows with each other (the characters, that is. Not IRL). We let the fight continue, we took none of the argument personally, and then we dragged our characters back and let them continue the adventure as though it had never happened.
I think it depends on who you’re playing with. A bunch of close-knit friends might take character in-fighting as a hilarious sub plot, but party in-fighting with people who don’t know each other very well might quickly spiral out of control. Often it helps to say: [Insert name of character here] is very mad at [insert name of other character here], but I am not. Just to remind people that the characters are the ones arguing, not the people playing them.
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Hi. I'm someone who made a thread a looong time ago titled something akin to "Evil Characters? Good or bad for the game?"
So I was wanting to throw this out there. I realize this WILL be a very contentious topic, as everyone has their opinion on the matter.
Some say, the party should never fight about anything. They should all have roughly the same, clear goal. And no matter what happens, everyone should hold hands, for the sake of the story.
Others say that it's more realistic roleplay if the party argues, or in some cases, even outright fights with each other, especially in the case where none of the players characters knew each other until 'meeting' at wherever the campaign starts so long as the argument is natural, and not forced/intentional 'just because.'
Obviously I have a bias towards what I feel is more realistic Roleplay, in the sense that party strife can exist, and feel it makes the game better, and the roleplay stronger, because it encourages character development, in my opinion.
Below, I will do my best to lay out the general points of both arguements.
Anti-Party-Strife Arguement:
It sucks the fun out of the campaign if party members fight with each other, whether it be due to misunderstandings, in party theft/violence, out of party theft/violence, etc. It makes it harder for the group to be a cohesive unit, to achieve the endgoal of the campaign, or the persons character goals for one reason or another. It makes a player feel bullied/ostracized, etc. It leads to a toxic environment that detracts from gameplay, and any (its what my character would do, etc) argument to the otherwise is simply an excuse by the player for their actions. (I really can't think of anything else to put here...)
Pro-Party-Strife Arguement:
It's realistic, outside of the group pre-planning that everyone is already good friends with eachother, a bunch of random people thrown into a chaotic situation, each of them unique, and having their own opinions, personalities, goals, and life experience on whats best to do can potentially lead to arguments or even in-fighting, because that's just how people are. it makes no sense that no matter what happens, everyone's just super-special-rainbow friends who never argue with anyone for any reason - all for the sake of the end-goal, and that fighting/disagreements can lead to character growth/development, in such as the two people in the party fighting early on, can become friends who respect each other, or even lovers later as they fight alongside one another despite their differences. And that people need to realize they are roleplayimg their character, but they are not, their character, so none of it is a personal attack on the player unless it bleeds to OOC arguments.
Occassional Dungeon Master.
I personally don't see any kind of problem with in-party arguing of the IC nature. If it's OOC then yeah, that can get a bit awkward.
Currently my fortnight sessions on Sundays consist of a group of six people: 3 good, 2 evil and 1 neutral. It's cool because you're getting a sense of what both sides are doing, what the other doesn't like, and that gives us room to try and push our characters point across on why something is right or wrong.
While the evildoers go off and murder some random dwarf, my Chaotic Good Gnome just goes in to a huff and refuses to leave the tavern to let them do it (due to contract story fluff, he would've saved the dwarf if he was allowed).
Thankfully the DM keeps a tab on how much murder hobo'ing goes on before he has to put his foot down. The guys that I play with know what they're doing with their characters and how to roleplay instead of trying to kill everything that moves; they stick to being sly and being underhanded with their actions so ICly us other PC's wouldn't know unless they told us or someone else caught them in the act and THEN told us.
When we DO catch them, hoo boy, it makes a bit of a mess of things because we're conflicted. On one hand we have a couple of powerful people on the other end of the party that may or may not beat our heads in to the dirt, but on the other we're trying to get by without getting innocent blood on our hands while fulfilling a contract. So at some point or another an argument or fight will break out and we'll have to settle our differences aside or reach an agreement.
So yes, I do think in-party fighting is a good basis for getting more interaction out of your players. They don't necessarily have to be bad, even good PC's have their own ideals that can clash about what is right and wrong and it's fun seeing how people portray those ideas.
Some is okey. But a lot of players who want's a lot of party conflict often don't like the consequences. If you're gonna be angry and leave the table because the other PC's killed/arrested and left behind your beloved rouge for stealing from the party or you warlock for sacrifizing innocents to your patron then maybe you shouldn't try playing that kind of game.
In party fighting is the best way to make a campaign implode. I don't recommend it.
I have seen in party fighting destroy so many campaigns.
I had one player who would constantly and obviously plot with his buddy against the rest of the party. When he wasn't he was acting against them on his own. It pretty much destroyed the game.
@dave that would, however, not go with the topic here. I don't mean arbitrary, and intentional. The point of this was referring to disagreements that happen naturally. Such as what to do with a prisoner, when one wants to kill, and the other doesnt, as a tiny example. I did mention out murder/theft, but i wasn't specifically meaning people going out of their way to cause it.
Occassional Dungeon Master.
Arguing about what do with prisoners is fine. At least as long as it is kept IC and doesn't spill over to hard feelings between the players instead of the characters. Some natural disagreement is going to be unavoidable.
i just for fun decided my character didn't like bards due to some incidents in his past. this was before i found out a couple of players had worked with the campaign story with the dm and one of the main themes was going to be with racism between the races in the world and our characters over 4 months of sessions with lots of pointed comments and arguents my dwarven barbarian and the elven bard learned to tolerate each other and work together on a few small things like a song for those two characters wedding that we performed together even though we still don't like each other. this was all done before everything of the main plot was revealed to us. but it was kinda awesome when me and the bard got to tell off the elders who didn't want integration in the forest so persuasively using our story about being able to coexist the dm skipped the 3rd to last combat of this chapter of the campaign when she gave us both advantage to a persuasion roll and both of us got 20s.
Short answer: don't **** with another player
Longer answer: don't **** with another player unless it serves a party/story constructive purpose, is entirely & rapidly resolvable, and will not have a permanent/lasting effect on the player's character.
NEVER steal from another player. Nobody cares if you're roleplaying a kleptomaniac. You will anger everyone: players, characters, and DM. Doesn't matter if it's a legendary item or a single copper coin. It's the quickest way to not only derail a campaign, but an entire gaming group.
Violence is a little more grey, but mostly the same. Full-scale character combat? Yeah, that's almost never going to result in a net-positive experience. RP violence? That can be interesting.
Years ago I was in a campaign where I played a "hardened" ranger. He was a veteran, tactician, survivalist, and realist. He knew what "needed to be done" to ensure the safety of the party, and the success of their mission. He was a kind person, but also knew that kindness does not always beget kindness in return.
At one point our party was on a mission deep in a jungle occupied by hostile lizard folk, and we'd been hired by a small village that was being threatened by them. During one of the final encounters, we captured one of the lizard folk to get information. In the process, we learned that we had actually crashed a lizard folk wedding, and the magical object we had been sent to retrieve was something they were using for the ceremony. Broke my character's heart, but what was done was done. Despite the tugging heartstrings, these lizard folk were still a major threat to the region.
One of our other players (monk) promised the captive that they would release them in exchange for information. I never made that promise. They spilled the beans. Knowing the rest of the party would not understand what I needed to do, I suggested they start heading back, and I'd be right behind after "releasing" the hostage.
Monk didn't quite buy it, and I tried to explain the reasons why we could not risk leaving a survivor: we had a job, the tribe was actively attacking others, and any survivor could easily inform the rest of the tribe that we had been sent by the human village. Monk did not agree with my position. Rather than force further argument (still in hostile territory), my character judged action to be the prudent decision. I slit the captive's throat (they were bound) and threw them off the top of the building we were on (sorta like a Mayan pyramid). Of course the monk took exception to this, flew into a rage and punched my character. I didn't attempt to stop him. It was the kind of reaction I expected. He saw that I wasn't resisting/defending myself/fighting back, and calmed down. Didn't need to go any farther.
Toward the end of that session, our party was back in civilization at the inn. I sat next to the monk, bought us a round, and asked if he'd ever heard of (improvised name) village. He hadn't (of course), and I started telling him the story of that village. A village very similar to the one we had been hired to help. A village that no longer exists.
Disagreement amongst the party can be a excellent opportunity for character growth, and unexpected storytelling avenues. Once you start rolling dice against each other, you've got a problem.
You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
Sometimes it's needed. It can add flavor to your game. Plenty of teammates fight and argue with each other. The guardians of the galaxy are a great example. Another is Legolas and Gimli contesting over who has the most kills. What I do is have all attacks deal one damage so fighters are not one shot killing wizards. Most of my characters keep it verbal anyway though so I rarely need to use that rule.
You're describing bickering with Guardians of the Galaxy or Legolas and Gimli. We're talking about what happens when those kind of bickering situations evolve negatively, and individuals end up coming to blows. The Guardians frequently disagree, but they don't actually fight in any way. And Legolas and Gimli develop a very close, brotherly relationship as they spend time competing and fighting alongside each other.
We're talking about the Paladin catching the Rogue stealing from the townspeople for the third time, despite several very long and angry conversations on the subject, pulling out his Warhammer, and lighting off a Divine Smite because he's just plain tired of this senseless lawlessness.
Inevitable, and sometimes necessary - but should be amicably resolved, and not left to fester.
In one of my favorite campaigns, my character and another PC tried to kill each other. There were huge fights between characters that we all loved. HOWEVER, we went into the campaign knowing we wanted to create inter-character drama with a super dark tone. Thse sessions after our characters got the most heated and violent with each other were our favorites lol. But I think if in-fighting hasn't been discussed beforehand, it should be quelled as soon as it starts.
I've seen many a stream where the parties begin as tentative alliances among strangers and, later in the campaign or in later campaigns, evolve into a most fun dysfunctional family of widely differing philosophies.
Get familiar with the players and the characters first to isolate personal feelings from RP - don't start the campaign swinging at a bunch of strange characters even if the players aren't strangers. Don't push others' limits for your own story. You're all writing the story together. Aggressive drama is fine as long as it's cooperative storytelling.
Human. Male. Possibly. Don't be a divider.
My characters' backgrounds are written like instruction manuals rather than stories. My opinion and preferences don't mean you're wrong.
I am 99.7603% convinced that the digital dice are messing with me. I roll high when nobody's looking and low when anyone else can see.🎲
“It's a bit early to be thinking about an epitaph. No?” will be my epitaph.
I wouldn't say intra-party combat is "realistic" unless you think Captain America: Civil War (which I once saw described as more like Captain America: Intramural Pick Up Game) is somehow a realistic portrayal of group dynamics and conflict resolution.
D&D Adventurers aren't usually soldiers (though many adventurers do have choose a military or mercenary background, so may bring the following ethos with them) ... but I think within a party there's something to be said for the bonds and latitude and tolerance people in that world give each other having a shared experience of violence and having to rely on each other for their lives (sure there's training doctrine to encourage that dynamic, but unit cohesion between a new team in a combat zone versus a team that's been in combat is noticeable). Sure cross words can be shared, and maybe even some physical tussling, but taking a divine smite to a party member should not be done casually (of course in my game, violence is never engaged in casually) and if I was a DM I would take a "meta" moment to get at what's going on here. But if a DM wants to referee an intra-party professional wrestling ring, that's fine, but let's call it what it is and not take comic book group dynamics as "realism".
If the characters are at such cross purposes to want to go Thor's hammer on the Loki or Jack Sparrow wannabe, it would be unrealistic for the party to just "get on getting on" after the blows and counterblows are made, maybe even a PvP kill. So if this is the sort of play a DM would tolerate or allow, the DM will have to support it and likely change campaign gears to reflect the conflict that will further fall out. That's if you're actually playing realistically. Otherwise, sure comic book rules can come into play, and there's nothing wrong with that, if your table finds intra party combat entertaining, which is why you're all there in the first place, it's supposed to be fun. That begs the question if two characters come to blows and the DM is stuck managing combat, are the other characters supposed to get involved, or just wait it out, and is the latter fun? And from there you spill into whatever "realism" or "comic book logic" you want in the game world maybe souring the play experience of your players.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
"You are not actually your character"? Do not count on that. It might be very personal and lead to discord among brethren.
I would add to the last part... "and unless you and the other player have agreed OOC to do it and are both on board." If you include the other player in the mischief, and they consented, it's OK. If you are springing it on another player -- not OK.
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.
Yeah it can actually be really interesting if two players agree out of character if their characters had a contentious relationship. That can add to the drama, and maybe even occasionally come to blows. Again, only if both players are actively going for this kind of dynamic.
And I don't think everyone in the party has to 100% agree on everything, or have a single unified goal. They just need to have enough of a reason to justify sticking together. Remember, evil on the alignment chart doesn't mean completely inept. An evil character is still capable of reason and cooperation with goody goody heroe types when it is in their best interests to do so, so you just need to figure out with your DM when you make an evil character *why* it is in their best interests to go along with the party. Likewise, a good character doesn't have to like the evil character in the party to recognize what they're bringing to the table and recognize that their particular skill set has its uses. In the right situation, these characters can function side by side, and if the players want to even clash at times, while not ruining anyone's fun.
In my opinion, CR C1E40 is a great example of in-party fighting. In general you might try to stay away form it, but if the rp opportunity arises, go for it.
Alton Thorngage- (Klein’s One Shot String Adventure)
Holden Stonefist-(A Tale of Mercenaries)
Fenrick Wolfsbane- (Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden)
DMing-Ctleath13’s Lost Mines of Phandelver and Ctleath13’s Out of the Abyss
It really depends. I once played a D&D campaign with my sister where I was both the Narrator and a member of the party (exhausting, but I knew my character well enough to do it). I was very close to my sister, so it came as a surprise to both of us when our characters suddenly blew up in each other’s faces and nearly came to blows with each other (the characters, that is. Not IRL). We let the fight continue, we took none of the argument personally, and then we dragged our characters back and let them continue the adventure as though it had never happened.
I think it depends on who you’re playing with. A bunch of close-knit friends might take character in-fighting as a hilarious sub plot, but party in-fighting with people who don’t know each other very well might quickly spiral out of control. Often it helps to say: [Insert name of character here] is very mad at [insert name of other character here], but I am not. Just to remind people that the characters are the ones arguing, not the people playing them.