As a DM, what is the ethical thing to do if the "that guy" of the party has just informed me he desires to betray the party at some point in the game?
The first adventure hasn't even started yet. And I mean I'm not going to stop him, but now with this in mind I could have a friendly NPC with ranks in sense motive call him on his shit.
Should I just try to drop subtle hints to the rest of the table? I feel like outright telling everyone would be a shitty move.
Let him do it, then send his ass to Ravenloft the moment he does something and host a separate campaign from the rest of the party.
Make his solo campaign torturous as fuck and make him regret every life desicion he's ever made. Have every NPC ally he finds betray him at somepoint.
Warn the other PCs or kick him out, your choice. And now, don't wait. Maybe he'll change his character plans for the better.
>I feel like outright telling everyone would be a shitty move.
You know what would be a shitty move? The good character that always helped and made the party great suddenly backstabbing all his friends for no good reason when they're low HP.
>I want to do it at the end
>didn't say how
Nothing to worry about, OP. Let the party do a good deed that doesn't get found out, then have That Guy's character get recognized as the do-gooder, presto- he's betrayed the party. Then they all eat cake as a consequence.
Tell "That Guy" to tell the other players that he plans to do so, and to ask them if they're willing to cooperate with that idea. If the other players are cool with it, great. If they aren't, then tell "That Guy" that the idea won't fly.
What I find miffs people isn't that there was betrayal, but rather that they were caught off guard by it. I find that if people know and are willing to cooperate, they'll work to make that betrayal all the better.
Go along with it, then the moment he pulls his assholishness, tell him to roll up a new character since his old one just became an NPC.
Remove from party and if a friend real life, gradually decrease involvement until you can comfortably drop him without drama.
If he feels comfortable to state this point blankly without gauging your reaction or inquiring about the future, he is a drain on your effort and work and will continue to do such and ask for more and more concessions until he drives off worthwhile players.
>Holy Bible
Good to see you're reading the DMG
So I was in a party that was betrayed by one of the PCs. Everyone was shocked. One player shut down completely and was doing a passive aggressive 'my character is so angry he's not doing anything'. I did my best to carry the others because everyone was so mad. This betrayal didn't even last long because the PC had a change of heart and helped us to escape but even after all was clear the other PCs wanted to kill the traitor (and I wasn't arguing that strongly against it even though the DM was sending me private messages asking me not to let the other players kill the traitor).
We let her stick around and that was the last time it happened but it was bad. Really bad. DM thought it would be 'fun' and make for good drama but the campaign was on a knife's edge. That campaign ended awhile ago but it still sticks with us, and a few of us made promises never to betray the party. I don't know what your players are like but you should be careful with this.
Confirm with the whole party whether they approve of PvP, and if so, to what degree. If the answer is 'anything goes', let him do his thing. If the answer is 'none whatsoever' or limited to minor quibbling, tell the player privately not to enact his plans.
This way you don't out him and it's something that the group as a whole needs to decide on anyway.
Ask him what his character's motivation is for doing this, and make it clear that 'for the lulz' is not a valid answer.
If he can't come up with anything valid, tell him no.
Hint: as the DM, it is entirely up to you to determine if something is valid or not in your setting.
>For the lulz
I recommend kicking him before he can fuck everything up.
You need to have a conversation about party betrayals and PvP in general with the entire party. Salt from this shit happens because of OOC surprise, not IC. They need to be cool with the concept of it and know that's a thing this dude is thinking of doing at some point to make things interesting.
Depends how you do it. If one of my players wanted to do it then I'd allow it, but they would have to do a damn good job at covering their tracks so the rest of the party doesn't figure it out.
I have no issues with these kinds of things and my players know full well that pvp is allowed as long as they have a legit reason. As far as a betrayal goes, I'd definitely try to throw in a few extra clues for the party to find and interpret however they wish. Always give them a chance to figure out the betrayers assholiness. That way if it comes as a shock, then it's their fault for not paying attention.
1. You will not be "the villain." After you betray the party, if you survive and escape them, your character will become an NPC. I may ask you what this NPC might do, but I decide in the end.
2. I cannot guarantee your character's safety if the rest of the party attacks you.
3. If you want to continue playing, you will need to have another character prepared. Understand that the party may have trouble trusting you as a player again. I will do my best to ensure they don't metagame, but remember that it may be a factor.
This is bad. You shouldn't allow a situation where lasting OOC distrust at the table is a possibility. It's a fucking game, they need to have a meeting before the next session about this and talk about it. It'll be exciting for everyone if they're all on board and good with the situation. There'll also be no metagame if that happens, unless you're playing with literal five year olds.
This desu.
90+% of the time one player wants to keep something secret, it's not that they think it'll be more fun as a surprise (but that is what they'll always SAY), but it is because they think the other players won't like it and/or would try to stop them if they knew.
Just boot him. You don't need those edgelords in your games.
Not OP, but i've had this situation in many of my games.
Why is this such a bad idea though? Why are you guys against it?
The way i've dealt with it (same as some of you guys mentioned), i'll allow them to play the character until it leaves the rest of the group, or simply exits the current situation. Most often it doesn't even get that far and simply resolves with the backstabber being horribly killed. Since the backstabber is always "that guy", the players have lots of pent-up anger anyway, and it almost serves as a relief. When they do get away with it though, the players are emotionally invested in stopping the new villain, which i'm totally down with. Sometimes it has resulted in a total party wipe, which kinda sucks, but i'm a big fan of punishing them for stupid things.
So again, why exactly is this so frowned upon?
It's a problem because it's selfish and takes the draw of the story and turns it onto the player trying to betray the party.
are you a girl, OP?
No testosterone ridden man would use that image as profile
That's only a problem if the story is meant to be some sort of prewritten, preplanned script with minimal input from the players. If the story stops functioning entirely because one character decides they don't want to follow the group anymore, that sounds like there wasn't much freedom.
Underrated post
I wouldn't say that. If you have something written as the ultimate evil destroying the land or some such and this asshole betrays the party for some inane reason, it detracts from the story you're trying to make. It also forces the other players to deal with it somehow.
The way OP's player is phrasing it is that he wants to be the big bad. Maybe it could work if you talked with him about being a secret agent of whoever you plan to be the villain.
New player? Explain your grievances and suggest he play a different character. I've played characters who betray the party for their own allegiances and the table has had amazing fun every time because I work with the DM to incorporate it properly and sensibly
I can see that. I was the guy who wrote so my point there was that the character is free to be a villain, but how much of a villain they are, and how successful they are, is up to the DM at that point. If it turns out that the villainous NPC just turns into a local bandit while the party ignores him and goes on to fight the god that's destroying the world, that's a natural result of the scope of the campaign and the villainous NPC's abilities, and he has no right to blame the DM for ruining his idea.
It's not such a bad idea per se, but it needs to fit the theme of the campaing and the relationships between the members of the party for it to work.
>Guys, this is going to be a "dark" adventure with evil/selfish pc who party together just because of necesity and or greed. Be careful with everything
In this case it's even a good idea to allow the fucker to betray the others, since everybody is more or less aware of what may be going on
>Guys, this is going to be a "just have fun" adventure with some good characters, companionship and slaying some bad orcs
Then tell That Guy to fuck off right now
Inform the rest of the group and come up with a plan to fuck with "that guy" with the others in the group.
Let that guy think you are letting him betray the group, and then right as he is about to, spring the trap with the others and laugh at that guy who spergs out about how much it is bullshit that he was betrayed. Have laughs with the others and never invite that guy back after he rage quits.
If this is a very important campaign to you or any other player, then dump his ass creatively.
Otherwise just drop subtle (FUCKING SUBTLE) hints that he may have some clandestine plans involving the party's downfall. If your groups characters aren't smart enough to figure it out by the time he unveils his silly master plan then they deserve whatever outcome they get.
Have him roll for it. Unless he knows the system much better than the rest of the party, a single characte beating 3-5 others is impossible and they'll easily get their revenge on him.
He'll have to roll a new character and everyone will be wary.
Just steal the ending from VTMB
Ask the other players indirectly what level of PvP and backstabing they want in the campaign then base your answer around that
On a side note, betrayals can be fun if done correctly. I remember one time my DM had the BBEG of the module try to buy my merc character to his side; in the final confrontation, my character turned his crossbow on the wizard while the rest of the party was being held by the BBEG's guards. I demanded my pay, arguing that I can't trust someone who buys and sells loyalty; once I managed to convince him to give it to me, I shot the BBEG in the face for full sneak attack and shared the added cash among the party
Shit was hilarious
If they're not literal five year olds they wouldn't react like the way you described in the first place.
The problem with that is these people tend to wait until people are low on hp or right during a big fight where everyone is on the ropes, it is rarely a head on solo fight, they will hide behind bigger threats.
The one time someone tried this shit when I was around was when we encountered a major enemy and a few minions, whereupon he simply pivoted to their side and then tried to cast fireball on the party (the fool, he forgot I was a fucking abjuration wizard designed to meme shit like this).
>phone displays are now 1440x2560
The hell is going on
You're on an anime imageboard, fagtron
I just flat-out ban PvP. You'd be surprised how much bullshit that kills on day 1.
Why do you guys hate betrayal so much?
Or is it because the muder hobo in question is doing it "for fun" without a proper motive/reason?
I'm currently playing a session where my PC has a whole backstory and everything is already set with the DM for the eventual betrayal to happen, he also already dropped huge hints to people who got good perception/inspection checks on me. And I believe the occultist in the party probably has already figured out that it's a bad idea to let my character roam free.
While this guy certainly doesn't seem capable of doing what I'll describe below, betrayals can actually work really well.
That is to say, last act betrayals. Splitting into two opposing groups in the middle of the campaign is a death sentence, because unless PCs literally kill each other, there's no way to compare their power without automatic favoritism. But if the backstab happens when you won't need to reconsile the side afterwards, it's totally fine. Furthermore, this helps to create bittersweet endings that do not feel artificial - certain things went awry not because DM decided to punish the party or create drama, but because of internal conflict. Players are basically all-powerful, in the sense that they possess agency, and 99% they will choose the best possible option; you can give them a choice between multiple evils or reveal that they screwed up without their knowledge, but first option reeks of vidya and the second is just plain cheap. So players won't knowingly screw themselves, provided they are not RP gods, which makes screwing each other a nice way to inject authentic drama into the equation.
And what's cool is that players are usually OK with betrayals at the very end of campaigns, if the betrayer doesn't make their characters look weak, stupid or less important. "I gamed you all from the very start" never works, but "I'm sorry, but I have my reasons" usually does.
Anyone who justifies something they want to do with the phrase "for the lulz" should be considered suspect at best. There are ways for in character betrayal to actually work, but nothing in that message indicates that the player is interested in anything but trolling the other players.
ITT: Fully grown adults give pointers on being passive-aggressive and not just talking to another adult about a problem
>And I mean I'm not going to stop him
Then you have already failed.
Probably, anyway. Different campaigns with different groups are... different, but for most games, a surprise betrayal is bullshit.
Most of the time, I flat out don't allow PCs to try to kill each other. Role-playing is a cooperative game, and letting PCs attack each other is usually a good way to bring everything to a screeching halt. It's also inherently unfair, as the disruptive "that guy" player gets the considerable advantage of striking first against the guy who's trying to reign himself in and "play ball" for the good of the game. And then there are grudges held, and suddenly everybody in the party is bunkering up, putting their back against a wall and refusing to do anything that might expose themselves to a peer. That doesn't make for a very fun game, and quite often this will carry over into the next campaign you play with the same group. Now, if players know where to draw the line, and I trust them to reign their characters in before anything really bad happens, that's another story. But outright trying to kill a compatriot is a big no-no.
When it comes right down to it, you might want to explicitly endorse a certain degree of meta-gaming. The players should keep in mind that they're playing in a game for fun, and try to steer their characters away from doing things that would ruin this. That means trying to find excuses to cooperate with one another and to act in ways constructive to having a successful adventure. There are plenty of experienced players who never really do this sort of thing, and it's hard to achieve good results if you've got a group full of people like this.
Yes, playing in character and acting in accordance to your character's motivations is a good thing, but the welfare of the overall game is more important than your character's integrity. It's every player's job to create a character that will work well with the group and the campaign, and to sacrifice the integrity of that character if they don't manage to achieve this. The player's should absolutely be trying to behave in a manner that aids the GM in producing a fun and successful campaign. (Of course, the GM should keep in mind that his job is first and foremost to entertain the players and not just force them to be actors in his own fanfic, but that doesn't include letting players sabotage the game by doing shit like attacking each other.)
There are many reasons for the PCs not to be adventuring together, or at least not to be cooperating the way they are. Whether you recognize it or not, players are constantly having their characters behave in ways that make adventuring together possible, not because it's the natural thing for their characters to do, but because on some level they understand that they have to cooperate with the game to make it work. One of the crucial aspects of this is collaborating openly with the other PCs. A betrayal then is cheap because this collaboration is necessitated by meta-concerns and therefore shouldn't be exploited in the game. It can also lead to the group rejecting the meta-need for open collaboration (because look what it got them last time!) and at that point, it becomes much harder to run a successful adventure.
You want your players to question this PC's loyalty.
But not because you hinted at it.
You want to write your plot around this character such that he is put in sensitive situations, so that other factors (UNRELATED to his future betrayal) cause the rest of the party to start looking at him funny. Give him a chance to prove his loyalty in some minor way. Encourage friendship between that character and the other PCs; look at the OTHER players' background and look for a place to insert the traitor, "Hey remember how your backstory says that one of the torturers took pity on you and gave you water and that changed your whole outlook? Well guess what."
The goal, in other words, is to engineer a situation where his betrayal is cool and dramatic and satisfying. It shouldn't feel like some dick move out of left field; you can't THINK of it as "problem player" behavior, because your other players will absorb that from you and it will spoil it. You should think as though it was your idea all along, own it, work with it.
Or just tell him to come up with a new character idea. One or the other.
Sorry that was confusing.
I'm saying, yes, do things that make them suspicious of him, but also do think that would make the party like or trust him more.
Make it so that his loyalty is a THEME, in other words. Jerk them back and forth. "Is he really on our side?" should be a question they've already asked before.
Role playing is a group activity, the baseline for play is everyone working together towards a common goal. I mean, that's basically the reason people run alignment restricted games.
If someone wants to run a betrayal plot line, it's something that needs to be discussed, at least individually. OP can go to each and hint that someone at the table wants to pull a Brutus at the end of the campaign and ask if everyone is ok individually. To just spring it on the group when everyone else thought it was something else isn't cool.
I get that isn't how this works in real life, but this isn't real life, it's a game we all pretend is real life to a certain extent.
not even that, as soon as he goes "I do x where x is the evil act that signifies the betrayal" he stops being a pc
Which is how you deal with this. Let him do his thing, let him say his peace, then take his character sheet away and go from there. Then let the rest of the party decide if he needs to take a break after this or if he should come back.
You're the gm, dude. You're the fucking boss. If you don't like that kind of shit, but don't want to kick him out, just inform the rest of the group.
That guy doesn't even have to know you did, if you don't want him to; he's given the gm information to be used at your discretion!
You give the other players checks to notice his bullshit, and tell him to have a backup character sheet ready. One that won't clash with the group this time.
If he tries again, kick him to the curb.