The Saga of Angry Guy, Chapter Two
The Saga of Angry Guy Chapter Two- Meet Rick
In the last installment, we were introduced to two members of the D&D group- Angry Guy and Geosci dude. We witnessed Angry Guys tantrum after being awakened by Geosci dude. That, my friends, was just the tip of the angsty iceberg. Submitted for your perusal is a tale of dice and graphite; a story of raeg, wank, and drama. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you, the saga of Angry Guy, Chapter Two.
Things quieted down for a while after the initial tantrum. Angry Guy apologized to Geosci Dude for his outburst, and things seemed good. While he would occasionally complain that his character (The Walking Worms/Cleric who couldn’t die) was not ‘powerful’ enough, or challenge people about the rules, he nevertheless behaved himself relatively well- well, for Angry guy, anyway. He even occasionally told off people who misbehaved during sessions- but those are stories for another day. Mind you, there WAS the odd roadblock.
There were a great many situations where he assumed I’d put his character in an unwinnable situation, and he would simply give up and decide that I was either trying to kill the party, or didn’t know what I was doing; this is something he was quite vocal about. At one point, I think I caught him staring at my computer and my DM notes. All in all, though, he was improving. Foolishly, surrounded by a miasma of delusion, I allowed myself to believe that the problem was over with.
I could not have been more wrong. After playing his character for a few weeks- to level 9- Angry guy decided that he was bored of his indestructible medieval Deadpool. He came to me, asking if he could create a new character; the maggot man wasn’t really created by him, he said. As a result, he didn’t really feel a ‘connection’ with this character. Seeing no problem with his request, I said ‘yes’.
Later in the week, I’m hanging out with a friend for her birthday- the night before the weekly D&D session. Angry Guy comes on MSN and begins talking to me about his character. He has ultimately decided to create a warforged. Ladies and gentlemen, meet Rick, the interdimensional warforged druid/fighter.
Rick is from Eberron. My campaign is not set in Eberron. Therefore Rick cannot feasibly exist in my campaign setting. He understood this, but still insisted on having him just so. I shall spare you the entire chat log- I doubt you’d all care to read through a three hour long MSN argument.
Instead, I shall merely post a few excerpts. I will begin with Rick’s backstory:
“My character backstory is a fairly uneventfull but interesting one. After being created in eberron as one of the last warforged made shortly after the end of the last war I could not find meaning in life and went to a powerfull wizard to end my life. The wizard, finding my new, maleable, mind a pitiful mess decided to take pity on me. Sending me into a void to give me time to think. This spell was a powerfull one, and with time lost its stability, sending me from eberron to a new world, one without constant war.”
Wait, what? So basically, Rick, the last created warforged, sought out a Magical Mister Kevorkian because he was sad? However, instead of killing him, this superman-in a feat that gods aren’t even supposed to be capable of (which Angry Guy affirmed later in the conversation) -teleported him to a spot between dimensions? Something tells me that if a wizard like this actually existed in Eberron, or really, ANY campaign world, the gods miiiiiight just be a tiny bit miffed at them.. I mean, maybe I’m overgeneralizing, but isn’t a divine bitchslap generally part of the package in situations where mortals toy with That Which Man Must Not Know?
What do you suppose my answer to this was? If you guessed no, you are correct. Of course, Angry Guy seemed very set on playing a warforged, so I decided I would meet him halfway. He couldn’t play Rick from Eberron, but he could play Rick from the Plane of Mechanus. Here’s another excerpt:
Angry Guy:
seriously.
1 of a kind.
not allowed at all?
Me:
Not if the backstory is simply "from Eberron"
Angry Guy:
No, from another realm
most of the character development happens in your world.
Me:
Okay. warforged are from the plane of Mechanus.
Angry Guy:
in a forest where he meets a druid who teaches him the peacefull ways.
Me:
Basically, lawful-aligned plane of machines.
Me:
There you go. Work with that.
Angry Guy:
... I know this is gonna sound whiney, but god you are anal.
Me:
It is not ANAL to be controlling the backstory of my world.,
Angry Guy:
I feel that in a realm where magic exists to teleport you through time and space exists that being teleported INTO the world is unreasonable.
Me:
And again. I stress that I would NOT be this 'anal' if you gave me a bit more time to think about all of this, rather than going "by the way, I'm developing a new character.”
Angry Guy:
Seriously, my character does not interfere with your divine story.
Me:
Stop with the sarcasm.
Angry Guy:
that is not sarcasm.
Me:
"your divine story" sounds like either sarcasm or spite to me.
Angry Guy:
Spite...
dungeon masters guide
Angry Guy:
page 45
bad structure.
I’ll spare you all further details- it’s about here that he proceeds to launch into a raeg-filled tirade, claiming all I did was railroad and lead the party by the nose. Brace yourselves, folks: you’re about to get a taste of Angry Guy’s logic. Headaches are a common symptom of being subjected to it; and I cannot be held responsible for any brain damage that might be suffered as a result.
I admit it. This was my first time DMing. I was inexperienced. Mistakes may have been made. Hell, for all I know, I COULD have unconsciously railroaded the party at certain points. But isn’t the fact that angry guy only brings up his complaints during a hissy fit about my rejecting his character rather suspicious? Isn’t the fact that he only makes his problems known to me when he doesn’t get his way odd?
At one point, I turned the party loose and said “You guys have a month in the largest city in the game world. Do whatever you want for that time.” No one did anything. Nothing happened. Angry guy conveniently ignored this, saying the players weren’t given choices. The only choice that I forced on the party- bar none- was that they started in the employ of the empire. That’s it.
That said, I’ll clarify how my campaign started: The original party were soldiers and mercenaries in the employ of the continent’s primary empire; during a war against a general who’d already conquered the northern half of said empire. They had clear goals; they would not have bothered staying together had this not been so. Truthfully, the only player in group who HAD any sort of obligation to the army was a kleptomaniac changeling. Her player had agreed to this beforehand. As expected, the moment the collar was removed, his character split- the party hasn’t seen her since.
Here’s a further glimpse into Angry Guy’s thought process: the party has chosen to take path A. Angry guy’s character wishes to travel path B. The party refuses to go with him, and hence leave him behind. Therefore the DM is leading the party by the nose. Someone drinks ale that was obviously poisoned. They die. Therefore the DM is leading the party by the nose. I am being dead serious: this is actually how he seems to think.
Eventually, after three hours of BAWW-ing, insulting all the work I put into the campaign, pulling the ‘poor me’ routine, and threatening to raeg quit, he’d worn me down. I gave up trying to dissuade him and accepted his character. Yeah, it was a mistake. But I guess that’s what happens when someone’s your friend for several years- they learn the best ways to manipulate you.
But hey…the backstory is at least moderately unique, right? I mean, he really did seem like he put a lot of thought into it, didn’t he? He felt a connection with the character, which meant he would actually roleplay this time, right? And at least this would cancel out the occurrence of any future incidents, right? Right?
Yeah. It didn’t.
TL; DR: Angry Guy throws a shitfit because he can't play an interdimensional warforged, and attacks with flawed logic.