First, in case anyone happens to follow this blog and was worried about the long time since the last post, I am okay. I moved, changed jobs, got started on new health insurance, made appointments with new doctors who take that insurance, and I started selling art at local pop-up markets. Things have been busy on my end.
Second, this post is a radical departure from what I have posted up until now. While it does not constitute a permanent change in the types of posts I will be making from now on, I might make more in the future as various things bother me. So without further ado, I'll get to the main topic at hand.
Something I have noticed on TTRPG advice forums is that there are way more people than I am comfortable with who believe that the correct way to address poor player behavior with in-game punishments. To clarify, I mean when a GM or player makes a post complaining about another player in their group using their character to sabotage the party, harm other player characters, or otherwise work against the goals of the group, I will inevitably see more than one response suggesting that the GM respond to this behavior by harming the offending player's character or even having that character removed from the story somehow. While this kind of advice is rarely the most popular response, I also do not tend to see much opposition to it . I believe this shows that the idea of punishing players with in-game consequences is considered broadly acceptable, and I have to say that I think it is bad advice. My stance is that any issues that the GM or other players have with one player ought to be dealt with outside of the game, in the form of a respectful discussion between friends and equals.
Now this is not to say that player characters should never suffer negative consequences for their actions in the game, that would make for pretty boring games. If a character's actions are not bothering the other players at the table, GM included, and they have natural negative consequences, then play ought to proceed like normal. The whole point of this hobby is to have fun, and I am by no means saying that a fun time should be stopped just because it could be seen as a punishment. What I am talking about is when a player is playing their character in a way that is making it harder for other players to have a good time. A person's right to do whatever they want and have fun with the game ends the moment they impact someone else's ability to have a good time, and as GM there are many ways to help make sure no player takes away from another player's good time. In-game consequences for the player's character are not one of these tools. I have seen several people seriously suggest the best way to deal with problematic player behavior is to have their character removed from the narrative and then either force the player to make a new character, or hand them a premade character. I think this kind of response is ultimately going to do more to harm the game than help it, and I have a few reasons why I think that.
One reason, and I think this one is the most obvious, is that removing a player's character from the game and forcing the player to use a new character is a fairly extreme punishment that is more likely to kill that player's investment in the game than correct their behavior. While they may have been using that character to bother and frustrate other people, that is also the character that player brought to the table and wanted to play. Respectfully talking to the player out of game and asking them to change the way they play their character avoids this issue entirely since the player inherently gets to keep using whatever cool character they came up with. This ties into the more important reason not to take a player's character away from them, which is that removing their character and forcing them to play a new one is disrespectful to that player as a person. When you take their character away, you are robbing them of their agency as a real person to take constructive criticism and change their behavior. Using the GM's power over the game world in such a way is vindictive, and doesn't address the human being behind the character in any meaningful way. By talking to the real person sitting at the table with you about how their behavior, even if it is through a game character, is harming the other people at the table, you give them the chance to change. Odds are also pretty good that the player in question was unaware of the way they were making other people feel, and once they are told, will want to change for the sake of not wanting to upset the people they are playing the game with. Of course, some people may choose to continue their harmful behavior. Those people ought to be kicked from the group once it becomes clear that they are unwilling or unable to change. While this can be difficult, it is often for the best.
Now, with all of that out of that way, I would like to go over some strategies that I have successfully used in the past to prevent real-world issues from arising from game-world actions. The most important strategy I have to do this is to always set certain expectations about how people treat each other at the game table and what things are off limits for player characters to do to each other. I always make sure to use part of session zero to explain that I expect the players to control their characters in a way that is generally helpful to the overall group goals and not obstructive to any other player's individual goals. Furthermore, at my tables, I do not generally allow players to roll against other players. There are, of course, exceptions for situations involving mutual consent and non-harmful competitions between player characters, but usually such situations can be handled through roleplaying and the dice don't need to come out. This basically results in a game where the player characters only ever interact with each other in ways that all players involved agree to, and supports the generally cooperative style of play I like to cultivate.
Another important strategy I have for maintaining healthy player interactions is that I, as GM, reserve the right to hold or even veto any given player action. This power is inherent to being the GM and running the setting, really, but I think it helps to explain to the players in session zero that I do, in fact, have that power and that I will, in fact, use it to protect the good times and the feelings of any player at the table. Holds on player actions are primarily used to explain something their character would know that they don't which might change the action they want to make. Usually this is just because someone declared an action before I was done describing a room, but occasionally I use it to explain that what that player wants to do will have an impact on the other players as well. Vetoes usually come in the form of a reminder about the house rule against player vs player dice rolls, since that's the main type of action that I would want to veto, but it also tends to come up for blatantly suicidal or antisocial actions. Luckily, by setting expectations early on, these types of situations don't come up very often and are rarely much of a disturbance when they do. I find that the people I play with are understanding, and no one I have ever played with has ever felt so entitled to ruining other people's fun that I have had to kick them from the group. Perhaps I'm lucky in that regard, but I like to think that if I ever did encounter such a problematic player, I would be able to handle them.
So to sum all of this up, I think that the proper response to a player who uses their character to negatively impact the experiences of the other players at the table is to nip the problem in the bud by setting firm expectations of how players will act towards each other before the game even starts, these expectations backed up by rules that everyone agrees to follow. Failing that, the best response is to talk to the player causing the issue outside of the game, explain what it is that they are doing, that it is making it harder for others to enjoy the game, and that they need to stop or risk not being asked to return to the group. While I don't think anyone trying to solve a player's behavior with in-game punishments is a bad person, or bad at TTRPGs, or anything like that, I do think they need to take a step back and think about their reasons for using an in-game punishment over an out-of-game conversation. In many cases, the people giving such punishment-oriented advice give it casually and act as if such a punishment is used without much thought or warning in their games. I think this is sad, and I would ask these people to put a bit more thought into their actions and how they might be making other people feel.
So yeah, those are my thoughts on using in-game punishments, the role of the GM in maintaining the group's fun, and how such problems can be avoided in the first place through solid rules and expectations. I hope anyone who reads this finds it useful, or at the very least considers it sound advice. I use these strategies at my table and everyone tends to have a good time, so I figure I'm doing something right.
