My D&D group is learning the 3rd edition right now. We’re doing two campaigns, one for 2nd and one for 3rd. I am the newest member and so I’m still getting into the 2nd edition, let’s not mention all the rules lawyering for the 3rd…
ok, LET’S!
My SO is “technical man” when it comes to rules and he’s a great DM (swear I’m not biased). He runs 2nd edition and he’s very brainy when it comes to stats and how things work. No problems, unless our mututal pal is trying to pull off something ridiculous. That’s when things start to get… annoying (lots of eye-rolling and shaking of heads).
Our mutual pal is running a campaign in 3rd, it’s absolutely NUTS! We can hardly get through an hour before we are nose deep in the guides to figure out something. I don’t really mind this, we need to learn it but what I do mind when he and his wife go at it over rules or interpretations of the rules. This makes the game a chore. It’s not fun, they get seriously pissed at each other. I let trivial stuff slide and I truly enjoy playing either edition until the marriage spats start.
Do any of you D&Ders play with married folk? Do you have trouble with arguments turning into outright angry shit storms of emotional warfare?
We’re going to be playing this weekend and I kind of dread going. I’ll go because I’ll be with my hunnybunny (we got over my stupidity from last time) and I love playing. Why can’t this couple just get over things? They both have the whole “know-it-all” attitude, this is the problem.
And many a time when we’re adventuring and come upon creatures attacking, the wife gets all pissy that we have to fight. She gets “that” look on her face and just barely rolls her die as if this whole thing is a pain in the ass. She can’t roll for shit when she’s healing either and gets all huffy when her hubby makes comments about her abilities. I know he’s joking, my SO knows he’s joking but she feels “attacked” by it. Why play if you don’t enjoy it?
UGH UGH UGH UGH UGH!!! You can’t talk to her about this stuff, she’d get even more pissy. I’ll just keep it between me and my hunnybunny, it annoys him, too.
I play D&D (Hamish is the DM) and two of our players are a married couple.
They’re nice, and they don’t squabble as you’ve described, but… The wife is kind of like that guy who runs the universe in the Hitchhiker’s Guide series. Very … oracular, and prone to doing things on a whim. For example, she just signed up for language classes on Saturday, completely failing to take into account that Saturday was our game day. As the husband tells it, she didn’t decide that language classes were a bigger priority… she just completely zoned out of it. Anyway, the result may be that she and her husband both disappear, or else that we reset it for another day (if possible).
sigh And we were getting to a really interesting part of the adventure, too, and it involved her character.
My wife and I play regularly, and I’m the DM (at the moment, anyway). Two of my other players are involved, though not married. We definitely don’t get into this sort of problem. Almost no conflict at all between the players, though occasionally the role-playing gets pretty intense, and we’ve had instances of characters pissed enough at each other that they’ve refused to talk. It stays in the game, though.
I am eternally grateful to have such a great group of players. My biggest concerns are generally whether or not I made the session interesting enough.
I’m sorry that you have to deal with that sort of thing. It can easily take the fun out of gaming.
I played V:tM and W:tA with some married/involved couples but nothing like that ever happened. Or if they did it was kept out of view of the rest of the gamers. I’ve even dealt with that myself (my ex stopped coming to games because he didn’t want to face me, when he did come around I played like always in game, out of game I ignored him.) and that was weird enough.
Thankfully our Storytellers (equivalent of D&D GM’s) who were involved, if they had problems worked it out beforehand.
My wife, son and I play D&D, and we game with a married couple. I’m the DM. We’re still learning the 3.0 rules. No, I’m not going to pay $$$ to upgrade to the 3.5 rules. I only buy .0 versions of the D&D rules, which is kind of ironic if you think about it… Everybody gets along fairly well, provided we keep a few house rules in mind.
This is a game. It’s a hobby, something we do in our spare time for fun. If you don’t have the time, or it’s not fun, stay home and watch Dr. Who reruns.
The game system exists for two reasons: (a) to give us a platform of rules for stuff we don’t know how to do (climb walls, cast spells, be monsters, etc.) and (b) to keep everybody honest over the long run (if you roll something one game and get a particular result, all else being equal, chances are the same roll will have the same result next game).
If there’s a rule that doesn’t work, or that isn’t fun (1st level wizard gets hit by one (1) attack. He goes to -1 hp. He’s dead. Start rolling up a new character), we can do something about it (he’s just unconscious) (actually, we started at 3rd level to avoid just this very issue…).
If you have a question, here’s a copy of the Player’s Handbook/DMG/whatever. We have most of the books and I haven’t read all of them. There are six other players at the table who want my attention. Let me know when you find your answer, and if it fits in with what I understand, we’ll go with it.
It helps that my son (age 16) has absolutely devoured the 3.0 rules. If I have a question, he knows the answer.
I’m one of the involved ones in our D&D group. We’ve never had problems because we’re involved. We get into more problems with the roommates picking on each other because of OOG problems.
It’s been a while since I played.
But, IIRC, the whole set of rules is just to be used as guidelines.
Whatever the DM says goes.
As I see it, it’s just like when I was a kid and we pretended make-believe. Just as we all got older, we had to have rules to settle differences.
The DM is the ‘author’ of the story. The players are characters in the story.
I don’t have any rule bppks handy at the moment, but, IIRC, it says somewhere in there that the DM is The Final Arbiter of all disputes.
As far a advice, all that I could suggest is that you find the sentence that alludes to teh DM deific status. Then the know-it-all in them can be sated.
It may be in one of the DMG intros?
My wife and I are both gamers. She’s actually been playing longer than I have. We met at a gameing session, and gamed together until the last few years when her CFS has made it impossible for her to attend regular game sessions. (She runs an online gaming world now instead.)
We get along just fine in the games, with minimal arguments relating to rules interpretation. Of course, our gameing groups have always used the “GM’s say-so is law even if contradicted by the books” rule.
I suspect that animosity at the gaming table may be symptomatic of problems in the marrige in this case.
Yeah, D&D arguments between me and the wife of an old friend of mine is what resulted in me starting the “Geekiest Argument Ever” thread in IMHO.
I’ve come to the conclusion that gaming with any woman is asking for trouble. I was in one group where the husband didn’t play in his wife’s D&D campaign. She wound up leaving him for one of her players. Three other husband & wife teams that I know of are now splitsville.
I game with my husband (he’s our GM right now - we play TOON because our group can’t get together on a regular basis anymore) with another two married couples. No problems there! Especially not like this.
I understand that the problems are at least mostly the wife’s fault, when she gets all hissy if you have to do something she doesn’t care for, like fighting, but I don’t think it’s all her fault:
I have to wonder why HE makes those comments when he knows she’s going to take it personally. I mean, if I say something to someone, and everyone except them knows I’m joking and they get upset, I apologize, explain that I meant it as a joke but obviously it didn’t work, and I don’t make those comments anymore. I think AndrewL is right - there’s more going on there than just problems at the gaming; it’s just that gaming is the only time you have to really see it.
Actually, in 3.0/3.5 you are unconscious at -1. You don’t die until you hit -10 hp.
I run a game in which my husband plays. He runs a game in which I’m a player. We have another married couple in the game he runs. None of us cause any problems, and we certainly don’t fight.
I’ve played with a married couple before and never witnessed any serious squabbling. Sounds like it’s other personality/relationship issues that are causing the problems, and the game is just a trigger.
Also IMHO the 3rd ed. rules are much better than 2nd.
You DO realize I’m female, don’t you? Heh, like I mentioned before, I let stuff slide. My character almost died the second time I played… oh well. Life goes on and I can roll up a new one. No biggie. I started out 5th level in 2nd and 4th level in 3rd since anything less would be pointless. I love adventuring, fighting, and adding some insight to the party. Why my gal pal is so grouchy about everything is a drag but hey, I’m hoping my enthusiasm will rub off.
I know it’s not all her fault but she knows how her hubby can be. She’s warned me time and time again about his humor. I’ve been teased mercilessly over a mistake I made and I’m cool with it. My cheeks flame up, oh sure, but it’s just all in fun. These are known as “inside jokes”, it’s what makes the sessions hilarious. My hunnybunny has player quotes written on the backside of his DM screen, which is also a part of the hijinks.
“Your mother was an ogre and your father was sober!” - this one regarding my gal pal’s dwarf.
IMHO, house rules rule.
My most favorite games involved blends of several systems as it suited the story line. If you don’t like it, chuck it and use something else.
It’s Pictionary, done on a giant pad. First
up, the Flanderses.
Ned: Oh, that’s a noodle-scratcher.
[starts drawing a few random dots]
Maude: [gasps] Cornstarch!
Ned: Oh, righty-o! [both laugh] It’s good for keepin’ down the urges!
Next up are the Van Houtens.
Kirk: Ah, come on Luanne, you know what this is.
Luanne: Kirk, I don’t know what it is.
Kirk: [sighs] It could not be more simple, Luanne. You want me to show this to the cat, and have the cat tell you what it is? 'Cause the cat’s going to get it. Luanne: I’m sorry, I’m not as smart as you, Kirk. We didn’t all go to Gudger College.
[timer dings]
Kirk: It’s dignity! Gah! Don’t you even know dignity when you see it?
Luanne: Kirk, you’re spitting.
Kirk: Okay, genius, why don’t you draw dignity.
[she does so]
[everyone gasps in recognition – we can’t see it, however]
Hibbert: Worthy of Webster’s.
Kirk fights back, and Rev. Lovejoy tries to interpose.
Lovejoy: Now, Kirk, it’s only a game. Sometimes, we…
Kirk: Aw, cram it, churchy!
No, I don’t game with folks like that. Well, I don’t game at all, actually, but if I did game I would flatly refuse to game with folks like that. I don’t play checkers with people who are that argumentative, much less something as involved as a D&D campaign. I don’t know if they’re like that because there’s trouble in the marriage, or if it’s just the way they are in general. I do know, however, that people like that will suck all the fun out of any sort of game with their sniping and carping about the semantics of the rules. I’d also be willing to bet they’d be like this even if they weren’t a couple. Some folks just don’t play well with others, and when you get two of them in a room together you’re just begging for a shitstorm.
Now, I’ll freely admit that there are certain games I flatly refuse to play with Dr.J, because I get cranky about it. I absolutely will NOT play card games of any type with him, nor will I play pool where he can even watch me. He tends to feel the need to make comments that cause me to feel the need to rip off his head and shit down his neck, and that just sucks all the fun right out of it. There’s no point in playing a game if it’s not fun, so I just don’t even waste my time. I sounds as though this couple is either not that self-aware or actually enjoys the arguments. Given the frequency with which this happens, I’d lean toward the latter option.
I’ve gamed for many a year, although I’m not involved in any campaigns right now (my players are getting antsy for me to start another world, but that’s another subject). In my experience, marital status has nothing to do with how much fun it is to play with someone.
Rules lawyers are a plague upon humanity. I played in one Shadowrun campaign that I promptly left because the rules lawyers managed to drag 2 rounds of combat out into 2 hours real time. Arguing over the rules sucks the life out of a game faster than anything else I’ve encountered. Yes, it’s helpful to have consistent rules and stick by them. But a good GM should be able to make consistent rulings on events even when he or she doesn’t remember the letter of the law that applies. Deal with it, and move on. Keep the game moving. The point is to entertain everyone.
It also sounds like these two folks may have other problems between them, but that’s just speculation.
Yeah, sorry. I was in a sour mood when I wrote that post, and I didn’t mean to insult you.
Looking back on it, I can’t really say that the three couples split up because of D&D arguments. It was a lot of other issues. But one couple’s main reason for the split was that they rarely spent enough time together anyway (because he was off gaming), so they may as well divorce.