I am currently running a 2e AD&D campaign, and I have this one boring ass mother fucker who just doesn't want to get into it. It's like he went out of his way to make a boring ass hat. First off, he is a human fighter. Fine. I like that actually. But then, I asked him. "Alright, what are your goals?" he just gives me a fucking shrug and says "I dunno, he just got bored one day and started adventuring," He swears up and down that he is a fucking Lawful Neutral, but i think he is trying to be a fucking Chaotic Neutral so he can do whatever the fuck he wants with no consequence. I never allow CN in my campaigns except in very specific situations. He is fairly new, and I get that it can be a bit weird for new roleplayers but it is so fucking boring having him in the party. He has no god damned personality whatsoever and he NEVER initiates or joins in on conversations. He is pretty much just there to act as a fucking big guy with a sword. How do I get him to interact with the story a bit more?
Boring Player Characters
Create a character that idolizes him, or is otherwise drawn to him. Try to get him to care for that character, get invested in him and try to interact. Have that character ask him questions about his adventuring and fighting. Then pull a Cowboy Bebop Waltz for Venus, and take him away from him. Preferably leave some kind of memento, and some kind of unfinished goal of the NPC for the player to want to fulfill.
It might not work, it's a long term plan, and potentially a bit of a dick move, but if you can get him to care about this character he might get more into it.
I know players like this, I also hate them. He's here to throw dice and kill goblins, OP, you can't force him to roleplay.
That is an excellent idea. I will try that.
That's the thing though, he doesn't just want to kill shit, he wants to roleplay, but I don't think he knows how. But honestly, the rest of the players are pretty good, got a pretty diverse party and all so maybe they will make up for his boring ass.
Step 1: Stop obsessing over alignments, they're fucking retarded and actually HINDER roleplay alot more than they encourage it. Roleplaying requires real characters, the complexities and depth of real characters can't be shoved into an asspulled grid of 9 personalities that don't even make sense.
>I never allow CN in my campaigns except in very specific situations.
That DM red flag.
I actually agree with , take a shot at getting him invested in a personal story. If he won't bite on that than there's no hope and he'll just fade out of the group eventually and go back to playing vidya, where he can skip all the cutscenes.
It's a shame you don't allow Chaotic Neutral, it's one of my favorite alignments. Fantastic for making complex characters.
Characters like Nathan Drake or Catwoman would be considered Chaotic Neutral. Yes, it also gets used by edgy faggots who just want to have a free pass to randomly murder people and say they're not evil, but so do Tieflings, Dragonborn, Drow, Warlocks, and Rogues. It's bad DM practice to lock of things that experienced players can use to great effect just because dumbass teens misuse them occasion.
not him, but how does DM preference institute a red flag?
A GM who instantly writes off things that can make good characters tends to be a flag that GM has a certain vision in their head of the kind of game he wants to play and will railroad in order to get that game. See Also this: Alignments are garbage, and people who use them don't understand anything about how human behavior ACTUALLY works.
Right back at you. How does player preference institute a red flag?
If a DM bans CN, it means one or two things. One, that he's an overreacting Chicken Little. Two, that he lacks the ability to explain to people how to do CN properly, or more precisely, how to make CN characters who can operate well within a party.
Both of those are bad traits in a DM.
Alignment is a good tool for a DM, as long as players understand it's not the be-all and end-all for everything personality related. It's a good shorthand for saying "My character is generally going to act within these general parameters".
The problem is not the alignment system in of itself. It's players that don't bother to step beyond saying "My character is X alignment." When a player can't expand on that any further, explain motivations, or have some ideas about character progression down the line, then THAT is the red flag. For ANY alignment.
To the first, I'm not sure, thus far I haven't had a problem I couldn't work with.
To the second, I would go so far as to say that an explanation of something like this is a two way street, and that while it may not be solely the DM's responsibility, it is partially at least the players, as they are (usually) far from incompetent.
I see, but I believe the automatic jump to railroading may not be entirely correct, but based on preference, so I'll cede that.
As to alignments being garbage, eh, they've worked well for me and my groups in the past, but mostly because I don't make too large a fuss over them and leave it to the players to work out how they fit into the world at large and ask them questions about them when they seem contradictory.
RAW wise I agree though, mostly.
Give him things to fuck around with. Have choices present themselves and check what he likes doing.
And if he still wants to be boring, let the rest of the players move the game forward. If he complains that he's bored, tell him to do something fun.
Did you say big guy ?
>How does player preference institute a red flag?
When that particular player preference is a known issue, perhaps?
CN is by far the most abused alignment, and the most constantly misrepresented, among players, and if people use it as a replacement for an Evil alignment, then the DM has the right to cut it.
You are essentially saying the DM is bad for running his game the way he chooses and is comfortable with.
Fuck you, man, you clearly never ran a game.
To everyone in this thread:
Will you kindly reread the section in every single PHB of D&D ever released before you start talking about what alignments are and how they work?
Because 90% of you do not know at all, and clearly are working off what you have heard people say, not from experience.
An alternative to consider: Characters do not roleplay alignments, but their roleplaying determines their alignment for the purposes of spell effects. Rather than a human being stuck in any particular given alignment, their actions and recent actions determine where they fall. If they are unpredictable, they become chaotic. If they perform evil deeds, they become evil.
The character can choose to not be evil, but it's a long road up from the bottom.
>Characters do not roleplay alignments, but their roleplaying determines their alignment
This is already how it is, if people actually read the books.
Alignment is nothing more than the inclination of your character put into words; if your character would usually behave in a manner that measures up to Lawful Neutral, then you put Lawful Neutral on your character sheet.
If you have to "roleplay your alignment", then you clearly didn't spend enough time thinking about your character's very basic personality and motivations, ie you have a shit character.
>op wants to know how to get a player interested in a story
>devolves into alignment shitposting
>shitposting = things I'm not interested in
No.
>Alignment is a good tool for a DM, as long as players understand it's not the be-all and end-all for everything personality related.
They cannot and will not ever understand this. It's very existence shuts off their ability to conceive of a character that functions beyond it's bounds.
Describe to a person a box, and they'll think nothing exists outside it
>OP wants to know how to get players interested in a story
>People respond by telling OP to cut out the worst narrative/mechanical concept to have come out of DnD, and the TTRPG genre in general.
>OMG SHITPOSTING!
2/10 got me to reply.
Also echoing that alignments are fucking stupid. In before that "the roleplaying comes first" shit. If your players are actually roleplaying, then alignments become completely unnecessary, except as a vaguely-interpretted way for the GM to fuck over certain classes like Paladins or fuck you over with alignment-based spells. There's a reason 90% of that shit was thrown out with 5th edition.
I like LN but whoever wrote this chart is a mong
Had one of those in my group. Also a newbie. He just wanted to "be himself" because he couldn't think of anything else.
I started with his equipment. You're skilled using this weapon. Why? Who taught you? And where? The old man in your town, nice. And where did you get this particular weapon? You bought it from a shop? But there's no swords in shops in little towns. Oh, in the city? that's good. Where did you get the money to get a weapon? Working so hard? So you worked very hard and then went to the city to get a sword. And that's all out of boredom? Maybe you'd heard some songs of adventure and just though farm life wasn't for you?
It's not that hard, you just have to ask a lot of why and how, and sometimes offer something simple but effective yourself that they can use ("bored so he left" is just escaping from something, but "bored so he left hoping someone would someday sing a song about him" is actually moving him towards a goal).
Keep going a little. If he can't be arsed to think on a past life or in future goals, then just have him explain his skills and equipment. It doesn't have to be big, you just have to help him find a little footing, give him a little taste of the right mindset.
If that doesn't work, consider asking him about a character he likes and try making him roleplay that, or something similar. It's a beginning, and probably easier than making up someone completely new.
You clearly never ran a game with retarded players*
fix'd
Alignments aren't personalities.
It's your fault he's a boring turd because you let him make one.
Deal. With. It.
Or you know, talk to him like an adult?