I knew it was coming for months, and I tried to control the situation as best I could, but the inevitable has occurred in my campaign last night:
Rules Lawyering.
I know what you’re thinking. You shouldn’t have to justify yourself to your players on how things work in your campaign. And you’d be correct. Yet, the following scenario that took place last night was a final straw in a severely, overburdened camel.
The group was traveling through the mountains of NE Turmish in the Forgotten Realms, making their way to the small city of Telpir along the coast of the Sea of Fallen Stars. After successfully avoiding a rather nasty looking group of 20+ goblins (1st level characters), the group noticed that the sky was getting ominously dark and gloomy. They continued their trek northeast, wanting to make the city by the end of the day. Well, the weather beat them to the mark. First, it started raining lightly, then it just opened up. A downpour they(the players too!) haven’t seen the likes of in quite some time. Now, it was no Flood, mind you, but it was raining so hard that they lost their way. If you know rain, and we in the Pacific Northwest do, it can rain so hard, it’ll force you to pull over to the side of the road because you can’t see where you’re going! 🙂
Well, when they start searching for a location to try and get out of this weather, the person who started all this wanted to make a campfire in the middle of this deluge! She claimed that since she has Fire Building NWP that there should be ample DRY wood around to start a fire with! I told her that that was an impossibility because of the sheer volume of rain soaking everything! She got all upset( the player, not the character, well, maybe the character too…) claiming that I was “changing the rules”, and that she should somehow be able to magically make waterlogged wood burn, just by using a NWP. She grabbed her book, looked it up, and said that the NWP allows characters to start fires under THESE conditions! I said that yes, it does say that characters should be able to make fires under bad conditions, but come on! I had it raining so hard that it would have been akin to trying to light a fire under water, it was that wet and soaking of a rain.
Anyways, she got all pissed and claimed that I was changing the NWP. And then she starts making personal, verbal attacks on me. I lost it. I ALWAYS try and give the players the benefit of the doubt, but this time, I knew I had to stand up to this one, lest I always cave in to “their” version of how the rules should be interpreted. I left the table, visibly upset that she wouldn’t let it go, and took a break out in the living room. When I returned, we talked about it for a bit more than she stormed out, taking everything with her. As far as I’m concerned, don’t let the door hit ya in the ass! I couldn’t believe that a rules lawyering player could ever provoke me into that kind of anger over a f–king roleplaying game, but she did. She made me feel like it wasn’t worth it, like everything I do to try and make a good game for my players and friends was sh-t because I wouldn’t bend on something like this.
What would all of you done? Would you have allowed a fire to be created from waterlogged wood merely because the characters had “fire building”? It wasn’t a game breaking situation, either; I wasn’t going to kill them from exposure if they didn’t get a fire started. They were just to be shown that it can get f–king MISERABLE out there, and it’s not always from monsters! 🙁
Anyways, I think she’s history. We pissed each other off so bad I don’t think she’ll ever return, and I’m not sure with a rules lawyering style like that that I would even want her to. And she is a good friend outside the game, and her husband is my best friend as well, that’s the hardest part. Thanks for reading this far, if you got this far, and letting me vent. Thanks for any opinions on this matter, hot or not. 🙂
Plucked from:
http://groups.google.com/groups?q=g:thl532099600d&dq=&hl=en&lr=&selm=384A9CAB.4FA534A8%40premier1.net
Great article Nexeh. It’s important to remember we’re doing this to have a good time. Ultimately the DM makes the call and while we may not always like it we have to accept their decision.
Yes Greytome I agree, we all have to remember that we play the the fun, read that as love, of the game. That being said she is a great friend outside of game make sure that the friction in game didn’t carry over, as I’m sure you all ready have. As a GM I have had similar things happen. In my opinion now would be a good time to talk with all the players about the role of the GM. Part of it is to adjudicate the rules that are the frame work of any gaming world. Let them know that if there is ever a ruling that is not in there favor it’s not done with the intention of making things hard for the players but in the interest of making the game more immersive. A good GM should listen to a players point of view, but when the call is made a good player needs to respect that call. All that having been said, as a GM that has had to make the hard call for reasons of game integrity that have hurt the feelings of the PC people forget that can hurt the GM just a much as it hurt the player so I close with this. Been there Nexeh Bro. I feel for ya.
Both of you have made great points and I agree. The issue I have with rule lawyers is that at times they can bog down the game play. And as we get older time is so precious. I am still haunted by the lightning bolt discussion that lasted 2 1/2 hours.
I now take a stance that unless it is for the life of a character I will not spend more than 10 minutes on a specific rule. I will give 20-30 minutes if the character life hangs in the balance 😉 (I do have a heart)