Conflict within the gaming group

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**Happyjew**

cvtuttle wrote:
What was the problem you experienced with the group or individual?

Group was very competitive. I was looking for a more friendly, I'm gonna do something incredibly stupid just to see what happens, type game.

Can you provide at least one example of how this played out in your group?

No real examples come to mind. Based on attitudes there were certain players I did not care to play.

What did you, or someone else in the group do about the situation?

I ended up playing at a different store, where most of the players were just starting out. This allowed me to pull some wacky shenanigans and have some fun.

What was the end result of the actions your or another took?

I play with a different group entirely, still stop in at the first store on occasion, and with the different locations, neither store really impacts the other.

**Runic**

gummyofallbears wrote:
Situations like these were followed by thrown dice and occasionally literal tears from the parties affected by my models who did their job.

What, someone actually cried over a game of WH40K?

Dear lord. Proper manchild.

Over here in Finland I've never witnessed any kind of drama in games, it's frowned upon quite heavily and interpreted as highly shameful. The worst I've seen is probably someone commenting on something being overpowered and seeming irritated, but that's about it.

**Lammikkovalas**

Runic wrote:
gummyofallbears wrote:
Situations like these were followed by thrown dice and occasionally literal tears from the parties affected by my models who did their job.

What, someone actually cried over a game of WH40K?

Dear lord. Proper manchild.

Over here in Finland I've never witnessed any kind of drama in games, it's frowned upon quite heavily and interpreted as highly shameful. The worst I've seen is probably someone commenting on something being overpowered and seeming irritated, but that's about it.

Bitching and moaning about perceived imbalance is like 50% of the hobby for Chaos players! I've never actually witnessed any proper gaming drama myself. Maybe it's because of the generally reserved nature of the Finnish people, maybe I've just been lucky to avoid the kind of gak described in this thread. The worst I've seen is someone storming off to cool their head after I've intercepted their Baledrake with my Sicaran before they could roast my bikes, so not much to write about.

One thing I could see growing into a real problem over time is how a certain player acts like a martyr because his fluffy CSM lists generally lose most of the games he plays. Of course it's his choice to determine how to play the game, but just about everyone else in my group seems to be under the impression that he's going to reject any advice or houserule buffs to CSM because he wants to lose and wants to be able to complain.

**TheManWithNoPlan**

Here around Kuala Lumpur the gaming community is generally very nice. A bunch of friendly guys who take 40k for the mess that it is and just decide to have some fun for an afternoon. But at a store that I don't really frequent anymore (ever since the official Warhammer Store opened I've not played in any other stores) that had a serious power gamer mentality. They weren't bad guys necessarily, and they were totally open about how the tried to bring the most cheese they could to the table with none of that "MSU spam in a Gladius is balanced because otherwise it wouldn't be in the rules' nonsense. So they were cool people, just really really competitive, and in fact in a group of six real power gamers I'd say only two or three were real poor sportsmen. So I basically just ended up not enjoying games because they were focused purely on winning.

However there was once this problem guy while I and a friend of mine had just started the hobby. I'd just painted my Eldar Battleforce and I was happy as could be walking in and asking for a 500 point game, this guy agrees and then pulls out a Landraider. 500 points. He bought a Landraider. Basically he just played broken lists against new players so he could increase the W/D/L tally he had, he also tried to tell me that the Lance rule for Brightlances didn't count against his Space Marines (*Ahem* The Landraider at 500 points *Ahem*) because they had 'more advanced Adamantium armour that was better than anything else in the Imperium because after all the Space Marines get the best equipment'. Being new in the group I didn't have a great standing to call him out, but luckily two more experienced guys came along and told him off for abusing new players' lack of knowledge and just not being very pleasant. Haven't seen him in years though.

There's a few guys here and there who I just think aren't quite there on the social front, but I've found most people are good at taking them to one side and having a quiet conversation about any wrongdoings and that's generally the end of it, so it's not a big problem.

**gummyofallbears**

Lammikkovalas wrote:
Runic wrote:
gummyofallbears wrote:
Situations like these were followed by thrown dice and occasionally literal tears from the parties affected by my models who did their job.

What, someone actually cried over a game of WH40K?

Dear lord. Proper manchild.

Over here in Finland I've never witnessed any kind of drama in games, it's frowned upon quite heavily and interpreted as highly shameful. The worst I've seen is probably someone commenting on something being overpowered and seeming irritated, but that's about it.

Bitching and moaning about perceived imbalance is like 50% of the hobby for Chaos players! I've never actually witnessed any proper gaming drama myself. Maybe it's because of the generally reserved nature of the Finnish people, maybe I've just been lucky to avoid the kind of gak described in this thread. The worst I've seen is someone storming off to cool their head after I've intercepted their Baledrake with my Sicaran before they could roast my bikes, so not much to write about.

One thing I could see growing into a real problem over time is how a certain player acts like a martyr because his fluffy CSM lists generally lose most of the games he plays. Of course it's his choice to determine how to play the game, but just about everyone else in my group seems to be under the impression that he's going to reject any advice or houserule buffs to CSM because he wants to lose and wants to be able to complain.

You lucky europeans! That type of manchild is very common here, at least in Colorado.

My newer place is a lot better though, a nice friendly divide between the competitive and non-competitive players, most kow to warn you if they have an insane list.

Birds of a feather flock together, eh?

**jreilly89**

gummyofallbears wrote:
Lammikkovalas wrote:
Runic wrote:
gummyofallbears wrote:
Situations like these were followed by thrown dice and occasionally literal tears from the parties affected by my models who did their job.

What, someone actually cried over a game of WH40K?

Dear lord. Proper manchild.

Over here in Finland I've never witnessed any kind of drama in games, it's frowned upon quite heavily and interpreted as highly shameful. The worst I've seen is probably someone commenting on something being overpowered and seeming irritated, but that's about it.

Bitching and moaning about perceived imbalance is like 50% of the hobby for Chaos players! I've never actually witnessed any proper gaming drama myself. Maybe it's because of the generally reserved nature of the Finnish people, maybe I've just been lucky to avoid the kind of gak described in this thread. The worst I've seen is someone storming off to cool their head after I've intercepted their Baledrake with my Sicaran before they could roast my bikes, so not much to write about.

One thing I could see growing into a real problem over time is how a certain player acts like a martyr because his fluffy CSM lists generally lose most of the games he plays. Of course it's his choice to determine how to play the game, but just about everyone else in my group seems to be under the impression that he's going to reject any advice or houserule buffs to CSM because he wants to lose and wants to be able to complain.

You lucky europeans! That type of manchild is very common here, at least in Colorado.

My newer place is a lot better though, a nice friendly divide between the competitive and non-competitive players, most kow to warn you if they have an insane list.

Birds of a feather flock together, eh?

Hey, speak for your part of Colorado

. Ours has no man-childs to speak of (barring two, but no one really plays the one and the other left permanently)

**Kap'n Krump**

it's not too bad here in east Denver/aurora. I do sometimes get a little salty when stuff goes really wrong, but that's part of the game. Can't say I've ever seen anyone get genuinely upset over a game so far.

**jreilly89**

Kap'n Krump wrote:
it's not too bad here in east Denver/aurora. I do sometimes get a little salty when stuff goes really wrong, but that's part of the game. Can't say I've ever seen anyone get genuinely upset over a game so far.

I've gotten fairly salty over some games, but then I've tried to settle down and go "Hey, it's a game"

**Freytag93**

Speaking of man-child, that reminds me of a store I used to play at back when I first started gaming.

There was a little hobby store out a way aways from where I lived. However, it was the only one I knew, and it was the first place I saw ever 40k being played. So it was my main store for a couple years. Most of the gamers there were good guys and girls. All of us were a little awkward (of course), but we had a healthy group and had a lot of fun.

Except this one guy... Let's call him C. C was exactly what the average person pictures when they think of a table-top/D&D gamer. He was very overweight, no real social skills, lots of acne, and just had this reek that followed him around the store to the point where we would know when he entered the store before we turned around to see him. All of this I could have forgiven, however, because being gamers and nerds we generally didn't like to judge people the way we had been judged. We were just there to have fun and anyone was invited.

However, what really made C's presence uncomfortable for our group were 2 things. The first was that he constantly lied about anything and everything. Both in game and in real life, he just would not be honest. Whether it was about his job (he worked from home and made 100k doing something, it never was really specified), what he had rolled (always seemed to pass Ld checks and an abnormally high number of saves), etc. We caught him a few times making up rules when playing new people, and his excuse usually was either "I forgot" or "But it would be so cool and fluffy if it worked that way!".

The second issue was how creepy he was around the girls of the group. He would just stare at them constantly and make them really uncomfortable. Sometimes he would make "jokes" that were incredibly crude to them as well. Most of our group was in high school or college (as was he), so there wasn't much of an age factor. But there were a couple girls that just stopped coming because of him, and the others made sure that they were never near him alone.

Me and a couple of the guys tried to talk to him at different points to help him understand what was bothering people, like showering more regularly and stopping the inappropriate comments. But he never wanted to listen. He would just fall back to lying about how awesome he was, and we eventually just dropped it. Somehow, he eventually got hired by the store owner to run it part-time for the gaming group (why someone who supposedly made 100k would want to do that is anyone's guess). Having been given power, he started to abuse it almost immediately, such as taking terrain home, making rules for "fluffy battles" that were extremely in his favor, and being even more creepy to the girls in the group. I wound up leaving for a college in a different state a few months after that, so I didn't see the end of our group. But eventually most just left and went to different stores.

Looking back, I wish that I had done more to try and address the issues sooner. He pretty much single-handily killed our gaming group at that store. I also found out later on from my SO at that time that he had been propositioning girls at the store and had even groped a couple of them after he started working there, including her. I wish I had known about that at the time or could do something about it now, but C's long gone and the store is a shell of what it was before with effectively no gaming space besides one 4x4 table. I also was in high school at the time and just didn't have the confidence or internal will to be forceful with this person. We all had felt the sting of being judged and didn't realize the extent of the problem (I know, gamer fallacies 101). If I had known at the time that he had been doing things to the girls of the group, maybe things would have gone different. But there's no way to know.

In summary to the OP: our problem was with an individual, as explained above. We tried to do something, but it was ineffective. Eventually we all just left and let him run the store into the ground.

**gummyofallbears**

jreilly89 wrote:
Kap'n Krump wrote:
it's not too bad here in east Denver/aurora. I do sometimes get a little salty when stuff goes really wrong, but that's part of the game. Can't say I've ever seen anyone get genuinely upset over a game so far.

I've gotten fairly salty over some games, but then I've tried to settle down and go "Hey, it's a game"

I am specifically speaking of the Gamers Guild if you're familiar. The Boulder store is pretty good, but I think I've met a few immature guys who aren't worthy of being called out, but can get on one's nerves.

**cvtuttle**

Red__Thirst wrote:
I've got a little situation brewing locally.

First, a little backstory:

Our FLGS has just recently come under new management and the new management is VERY excited about the 40k, Sigmar, and Blood Bowl franchises and wants them to be played at the store. They've invested A LOT of money into tabletops and terrain for 40k specifically and are trying to get Sigmar more present in the local gaming community as well.
I've been volunteering to run the events, which to-date have only been a couple of Kill Team tournaments for the newer players to get their feet wet in the game. This month (next weekend, actually) I'm hosing the first 'real' (as in non-Kill Team) tournament, but with an eye toward our new playerbase and knowing many do not have large collections, it's going to be a 500 point, Sunday afternoon affair. After the first of the year we're going to expand into larger tournaments with regular Kill Team games and events as well.

Our last kill team event had 8 participants, with me being a ringer for a 9th player had we had one more show up. The store is also very happy to provide store credit for those participating and even brings in free pizza for the participants to munch on. Overall it's a pretty swanky place to play and we have a great blend of veteran and new players participating.

Now, with that out of the way, we encounter the wrinkle.

One of the more veteran players is, how to put this, off-putting. He is friendly enough, on the outset, but he's just got an air of overconfidence (far more than he needs to have) and tends to just have TFG behavior qualities.

He and I both work in similar fields, (I'm Law Enforcement, Police specifically, and he's in Corrections/Jail side) and he loves to compare our work and insinuate that his job is more dangerous and thusly he is 'more badass' than anyone else in the room. It's, in a word, grating. I've had two of our new players (both brand new to the hobby) come to me and say they really didn't enjoy playing him, and found the games with him frustrating and just not fun. He's fast and loose with the rules, especially with new players who are still learning, and when they ask what something is or what rule he's referencing, he brushes them off and keeps on trucking. This has been the main source of frustration I've been hearing about from folks.

Secondly, he has a rather unusual habit of inserting himself into a conversation that does not include him. This isn't a terribly big deal on occasion, especially to interject something in general conversation, but it happens more frequently than what would be considered normal. This includes going off on tangents such as trying to explain to a new player the difference between a glancing and penetrating hit by pulling up video on youtube on his phone of the movie Fury (WW2 Tank film for any unfamiliar) and spending 15 minutes going over the nuance of something that shouldn't take more than about a minute to explain to someone. Again, this example being what I mean when I use the word: Grating.

Speaking from personal experience, the first time I played him (a while back) I brought my Vostroyan Guard with no Lords of War featuring a smattering of allied Blood Angels built to be battleforged and a take-all-comers list. I had told him what I was bringing (Guard + Allied Blood Angels) and told him to bring a 1500 point list of his preference, knowing he had Tempestus Scions and a few other fun things for allies, but mentioning that I would not be bringing any Lord of War/Superheavies to the game and asked him to abstain from Lords of War also if he wouldn't mind.

On the afternoon we meet to play, he plops a few squads of Scions and a couple of Taroxes (Tauroxi?) and then proudly sets a Knight on the tabletop. I give his a rather incredulous look and comment that I was under the impression that no Lords of War would be brought in, and he triumphantly says it's not a Lord of War but an allied detachment of one Knight. I shrug, as he is correct, and we proceed to play. I had no real answer for a superheavy in my list, consisting mostly of 4 Leman Russes, some Chimera Veteran Squads and light artillery, backed up by a few Blood Angels Tacticals in a Rhino and a Command Squad + HQ. I managed to pull a very close win thanks to some lucky Malestrom objectives. Overall it was a grating game, as he was very quick to throw his knight at my lines and laugh as it carved tank after tank up, preening over his 'tactical acumen'. I managed to knock it down to 3 hull points which gave me the winning victory point and which irked him far more than he wanted to let on as he was expecting an easy victory while his knight carved and stomped its way through my force. Thankfully the run away and feed chaff to the big thing while you kill everything else on the board and take objectives worked out for me.

This weekend, if he shows up and begins his antics, I'm going to pull him aside and explain to him that he needs to straighten up and fly right or he's going to find out what it feels like to not have anyone want to play him.

I'll pause and note that I don't personally dislike the guy, I have nothing against him, and do respect what he does for a living and who he is. I just want to see him step down off the proverbial pedestal he's standing on and try to be a little less TFG/Grating and a little more genuine and easy going. He is fairly respectful, but it's one of those things where you just have to say "You have to have seen the type" to fully understand his personality.

If there's any update in the future I'll be sure to let folks know. In the mean time, take it easy for now folks.

-Red__Thirst-

This was an incredibly helpful story. I understand this kind of guy exactly. Thank you for sharing this.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Freytag93 wrote:
Speaking of man-child, that reminds me of a store I used to play at back when I first started gaming.

There was a little hobby store out a way aways from where I lived. However, it was the only one I knew, and it was the first place I saw ever 40k being played. So it was my main store for a couple years. Most of the gamers there were good guys and girls. All of us were a little awkward (of course), but we had a healthy group and had a lot of fun.

Except this one guy... Let's call him C. C was exactly what the average person pictures when they think of a table-top/D&D gamer. He was very overweight, no real social skills, lots of acne, and just had this reek that followed him around the store to the point where we would know when he entered the store before we turned around to see him. All of this I could have forgiven, however, because being gamers and nerds we generally didn't like to judge people the way we had been judged. We were just there to have fun and anyone was invited.

However, what really made C's presence uncomfortable for our group were 2 things. The first was that he constantly lied about anything and everything. Both in game and in real life, he just would not be honest. Whether it was about his job (he worked from home and made 100k doing something, it never was really specified), what he had rolled (always seemed to pass Ld checks and an abnormally high number of saves), etc. We caught him a few times making up rules when playing new people, and his excuse usually was either "I forgot" or "But it would be so cool and fluffy if it worked that way!".

The second issue was how creepy he was around the girls of the group. He would just stare at them constantly and make them really uncomfortable. Sometimes he would make "jokes" that were incredibly crude to them as well. Most of our group was in high school or college (as was he), so there wasn't much of an age factor. But there were a couple girls that just stopped coming because of him, and the others made sure that they were never near him alone.

Me and a couple of the guys tried to talk to him at different points to help him understand what was bothering people, like showering more regularly and stopping the inappropriate comments. But he never wanted to listen. He would just fall back to lying about how awesome he was, and we eventually just dropped it. Somehow, he eventually got hired by the store owner to run it part-time for the gaming group (why someone who supposedly made 100k would want to do that is anyone's guess). Having been given power, he started to abuse it almost immediately, such as taking terrain home, making rules for "fluffy battles" that were extremely in his favor, and being even more creepy to the girls in the group. I wound up leaving for a college in a different state a few months after that, so I didn't see the end of our group. But eventually most just left and went to different stores.

Looking back, I wish that I had done more to try and address the issues sooner. He pretty much single-handily killed our gaming group at that store. I also found out later on from my SO at that time that he had been propositioning girls at the store and had even groped a couple of them after he started working there, including her. I wish I had known about that at the time or could do something about it now, but C's long gone and the store is a shell of what it was before with effectively no gaming space besides one 4x4 table. I also was in high school at the time and just didn't have the confidence or internal will to be forceful with this person. We all had felt the sting of being judged and didn't realize the extent of the problem (I know, gamer fallacies 101). If I had known at the time that he had been doing things to the girls of the group, maybe things would have gone different. But there's no way to know.

In summary to the OP: our problem was with an individual, as explained above. We tried to do something, but it was ineffective. Eventually we all just left and let him run the store into the ground.

Thanks for sharing this nightmare scenario. Perfect example of the type of thing I was looking for.

**conker249**

Recent one. I played at a FLGS for a few years and had a lot of fun. Then out of the blue this guy walks in and I know instantly who he was, he was the guy my (ex)wife cheated on me with while I was in Iraq. So I was quiet and keeping my thoughts to myself. Was mid game with another dude and suddenly my Ex-wife shows up to play with her space Wolves. We havent had contact at that point for almost 8 years. A lot of Anger flowed from me. I made a smart decision and starting throwing my models in my bag, at that point I didn't care about breaking them honestly. grabbed everything quickly and went straight to my truck without saying a word. I now never go to that FLGS, She can have it. I have a new FLGS that I like to go where she doesn't. I am glad that I left when I did. I almost went full on Khorne in the store out of sheer stupidity. But luckily I thought quicker to leave than resort to Praising Khorne and screaming blood for the blood god.

**satris**

So I`ve been lurking this forum for quite a while, and decided to finally register coming along this thread...

At my local D&D group (we play an independent universe, self made, and sometimes w40k with my models) this happened...

We were deep in our fantasy storyline, where one of our buds decided to play a ratling. No biggie (to most

), but at some point he decided to headbut an angel during one of the more chaotic nights. The Gamemaster tried to talk him out of it, telling him the test would be almost impossible. well the sneaky gak rolled INCREDIBLE, so he headbutted the angel to death (yes this just happened...). His Roleplay however was awful, so the Gamemaster decided to trick him a little. From that point on his character was known as "rattadin the Exalted", the single most fanatic and frantic worshipper of the given god. No more freedom of choice, if he wanted to roleplay good from that point on, he had to do it church-style. And he was fine with it, almost thriving in his new position as our morale instance.

quick sidenote: good roleplay = good rewards

Our group has always been more of a chaotic-neutral at best, with bloodthirsty berserkers, assassins and necromancers and whatnot. So "Rattadin" decided to rat us out to the inquisition, threatening our whole campaign - a funny idea, but it all played out plain bad. This whole betrayal came to it`s climax, when our group was cornered in the market square by the inquisition - and rattadin standing with them.

From this point on it all goes downhill very fast. His girlfriend - upon reckoning the character - immediately throws her axe at him, hitting him in the foot (oooh yeah good rolls!), and the deity that was protecting us saved our sorry behinds. So after we got through the "what just saved us" and "what the gak?" we came to the next question: wth was he doing, betraying us to the inquisition. So my bud (i really like him, but he can be a salty one...) kept his roleplay up. he broke with the group, basically severing all hies ties to us (and we let him, because why not. he betrayed us once so why not do it again?).

However after these (i think it was 2 nights) he had a hard time getting back into the group roleplaywise. this got to the point where the gamemaster told him (out of roleplay) to just ignore it, find a way that is somewhat satisfactory, and just get back in. He on the other hand, went full re... (never go full re.... kids) and basically wasted 4 saturdays just sitting next to us, not doing anything but pouting. Just like that little spoiled child in kindergarden you hated. With his arms crossed, we came to "rediscover" his character, who has not been travelling with us at that point, i think... 4 times. and 4 times he just went "no i dont wanna play with you guys" and kept silent again.

so at one night i got really pissed about this, because it was ruining not only his night but ours as well. So I told him what i thought of his behaviour, and what he was doing to our saturday nights. I also told him that I like him, but that I didnt want to have him with me during these. After that he never showed up again, but we still hang out and do other stuff.

However, the fantasy universe is dead to the group (sadly).

PS: sorry for eventual typos and bad english, i kind of got heated up again over it.

**Kojiro**

cvtuttle wrote:

Without naming names or upsetting any friends you may have on this forum, can you tell me:

What was the problem you experienced with the group or individual?

A local TO getting too big for his britches. After what should have been a very large tournament, feedback was given (and discussions had) about the location and time of the event. Namely the event was not in the ideal location (for player numbers), was being held at a larger convention (so in addition to travel and tournament cost, convention ticket costs were added) and to cap it all off, the event was being held on the same weekend as the AFL (Australian football) grand final. All in all a recipe for low attendance.

Can you provide at least one example of how this played out in your group?

When the players got together to discuss the event and put forward suggestions for next year, we were sternly told it wasn't out business, that we should stop discussing things and that we should wait until asked for any feedback. This prompted us to say go to hell, we'll discuss whatever the hell we want. Further attempts to maintain authority resulted in more animosity. Then were told we would be consulted, only to find out a week later the event was rescheduled for next year with all the same problems.

What did you, or someone else in the group do about the situation?

Openly stated we wouldn't attend the event again and stayed away from those events by that TO.

What was the end result of the actions your or another took?

While not solely us, the greater event in question failed to get numbers the following year and was cancelled and the tournament with it. Of course some people had already booked flights and accommodation... And it caused a fracture in the group which was only exacerbated when other venues of play opened up.

**cvtuttle**

satris wrote:
So I`ve been lurking this forum for quite a while, and decided to finally register coming along this thread...

At my local D&D group (we play an independent universe, self made, and sometimes w40k with my models) this happened...

We were deep in our fantasy storyline, where one of our buds decided to play a ratling. No biggie (to most ), but at some point he decided to headbut an angel during one of the more chaotic nights. The Gamemaster tried to talk him out of it, telling him the test would be almost impossible. well the sneaky gak rolled INCREDIBLE, so he headbutted the angel to death (yes this just happened...). His Roleplay however was awful, so the Gamemaster decided to trick him a little. From that point on his character was known as "rattadin the Exalted", the single most fanatic and frantic worshipper of the given god. No more freedom of choice, if he wanted to roleplay good from that point on, he had to do it church-style. And he was fine with it, almost thriving in his new position as our morale instance.

quick sidenote: good roleplay = good rewards

Our group has always been more of a chaotic-neutral at best, with bloodthirsty berserkers, assassins and necromancers and whatnot. So "Rattadin" decided to rat us out to the inquisition, threatening our whole campaign - a funny idea, but it all played out plain bad. This whole betrayal came to it`s climax, when our group was cornered in the market square by the inquisition - and rattadin standing with them.

From this point on it all goes downhill very fast. His girlfriend - upon reckoning the character - immediately throws her axe at him, hitting him in the foot (oooh yeah good rolls!), and the deity that was protecting us saved our sorry behinds. So after we got through the "what just saved us" and "what the gak?" we came to the next question: wth was he doing, betraying us to the inquisition. So my bud (i really like him, but he can be a salty one...) kept his roleplay up. he broke with the group, basically severing all hies ties to us (and we let him, because why not. he betrayed us once so why not do it again?).

However after these (i think it was 2 nights) he had a hard time getting back into the group roleplaywise. this got to the point where the gamemaster told him (out of roleplay) to just ignore it, find a way that is somewhat satisfactory, and just get back in. He on the other hand, went full re... (never go full re.... kids) and basically wasted 4 saturdays just sitting next to us, not doing anything but pouting. Just like that little spoiled child in kindergarden you hated. With his arms crossed, we came to "rediscover" his character, who has not been travelling with us at that point, i think... 4 times. and 4 times he just went "no i dont wanna play with you guys" and kept silent again.

so at one night i got really pissed about this, because it was ruining not only his night but ours as well. So I told him what i thought of his behaviour, and what he was doing to our saturday nights. I also told him that I like him, but that I didnt want to have him with me during these. After that he never showed up again, but we still hang out and do other stuff.

However, the fantasy universe is dead to the group (sadly).

PS: sorry for eventual typos and bad english, i kind of got heated up again over it.

I think - even more than groups of 40k players - Roleplaying Groups walk a tightrope you have to balance very carefully with personalities and such. It is really hard to find a good group that gets along well for the perfect roleplaying experience.

**SplinteredShield**

It is an extremely hard balance for sure. I used to have a guy in my gaming group that cheated out the wazoo. Down side for me was that he was one of 3 people who taught me the game, and for a long time I thought his skill was impressive. I looked up to him, hung around him a lot, and thought he was amazing. Looking back knowing what I know now it's pretty strange this guy tried his best to stomp new kids to seem really cool, and lame 13 year old me bought it up. The good news is though with the dozens of people I've taught to roleplay and play 40k since, I've never been that guy, so he was helpful in a way. Also, when did so many Colorado people show up out of nowhere? I haven't had a gaming group out here since, like, 6 years ago, where y'all hiding?!

**satris**

Yeah Powergaming is OK in my opinion, but your opponent has to be OK with it, too. My very first game of 40k was a 2on2, 1500 points per side. i put up my 1000 points CSM, and our local tourney wrecker (who was in my team, thank the gods) put up 500 points guard. I still dont know what EXACTLY he put on the table, 2 basically naked guardtroops, some artillery commander HQ i think with a name, and some artillery piece. Also an... Aegies? defense line.

He then went on to wreck 1500 points of Orks and CSM (the other team) with his 500 points of guard, and my CSM were left footslogging along the table not really doing anything at all.

These were the early days, where this dude commenced pulling off deathstars and just destroyed the noobs. We as a group got him to a point though, where he`s able to tell when he`s up to a casual and/or a noob, and be more friendly in his setup. he still wins a lot - on the other hand he has been playing since 4th edition or something. So i think he should be winning.

Also i enjoy playing him SOMETIMES, because I always learn stuff. He`s basically a walking rulebook.

So i guess in the end the two opponents just gotta be clear about their stuff before they jump into it, and everything should be fine, shouldnt it.

**gummyofallbears**

SplinteredShield wrote:
It is an extremely hard balance for sure. I used to have a guy in my gaming group that cheated out the wazoo. Down side for me was that he was one of 3 people who taught me the game, and for a long time I thought his skill was impressive. I looked up to him, hung around him a lot, and thought he was amazing. Looking back knowing what I know now it's pretty strange this guy tried his best to stomp new kids to seem really cool, and lame 13 year old me bought it up. The good news is though with the dozens of people I've taught to roleplay and play 40k since, I've never been that guy, so he was helpful in a way. Also, when did so many Colorado people show up out of nowhere? I haven't had a gaming group out here since, like, 6 years ago, where y'all hiding?!

QFT

(sorry for OT)
I didn;t know there were so many coloridians on this forum.

There is pretty good gaming around the boulder area.

Total Escape does 40k on Thursdays (I think, haven't been for a year or two), great terrain, nice people.

The Boulder GW is a godsend. The owner is awesome and the people are great.

The Denver GW kinda sucks from what I hear, crappy community and the such, crappy store too.

The gamers guild exists in North Boulder but don't waste your time going there.

There is also Atomic Goblin, but I recommend against going there, I hear the 40k leader can be a donkey cave (Just rumors from friends)

**jreilly89**

gummyofallbears wrote:
SplinteredShield wrote:
It is an extremely hard balance for sure. I used to have a guy in my gaming group that cheated out the wazoo. Down side for me was that he was one of 3 people who taught me the game, and for a long time I thought his skill was impressive. I looked up to him, hung around him a lot, and thought he was amazing. Looking back knowing what I know now it's pretty strange this guy tried his best to stomp new kids to seem really cool, and lame 13 year old me bought it up. The good news is though with the dozens of people I've taught to roleplay and play 40k since, I've never been that guy, so he was helpful in a way. Also, when did so many Colorado people show up out of nowhere? I haven't had a gaming group out here since, like, 6 years ago, where y'all hiding?!

QFT

(sorry for OT)
I didn;t know there were so many coloridians on this forum.

There is pretty good gaming around the boulder area.

Total Escape does 40k on Thursdays (I think, haven't been for a year or two), great terrain, nice people.

The Boulder GW is a godsend. The owner is awesome and the people are great.

The Denver GW kinda sucks from what I hear, crappy community and the such, crappy store too.

The gamers guild exists in North Boulder but don't waste your time going there.

There is also Atomic Goblin, but I recommend against going there, I hear the 40k leader can be a donkey cave (Just rumors from friends)

There's a couple groups interspersed between the Springs and Pueblo too.

**Red__Thirst**

I have a follow up/update on my situation after running the tournament yesterday.

Was a small affair, as I figured it might be this close to Christmas, but as usual, the troublemaker showed up.

He immediately began his braggart ways, crowing about how his Scions would finally be able to compete now that they were able to deep strike. (Prior to now we've only really been doing Kill Team since a good 2/3rds of the player base is brand new and just building their armies).

Was a 3 round tournament, with me playing him in the second round (I was the ringer, playing so one person didn't have to sit out each round). I managed to beat him fairly handily. It was about as much fun as our first game was, that is to say, not much at all.

Our next tournament will be a 2 man team 2000 point affair, and he's already started trying to source out a team mate, and I'm going to have to sit down and explain to him that nobody wants to be his team mate. Literally nobody. Hopefully he'll listen to me when I try and explain what he's doing and how his behavior is having a negative impact on not only the people he's playing but is also making people just not want to come to the store to play.

Further updates to come. Take it easy.

-Red__Thirst-

**Pouncey**

Hmm, my group is me and my mom, but there was a very persistent, recurring issue.

When we would game, our household pets would come to the door of the gaming room and beg to be let in. Since space in the gaming room was very limited, I preferred if they were left outside the door. However, my mom would invariably let them in. The cat would jump up on the gaming table, which my mom found adorable. The dog would make himself at home on the floor, making it very, very difficult to step around him. Every time I had to go to the other side of the table, I would get snapped and barked at. It became very, very stressful and unpleasant, as it happened without fail every time we gamed, and no matter my pleading to just leave them to whine and meow at the door, she would always, ALWAYS let them in.

Eventually I just stopped wanting to play altogether. We haven't played a game in a few years now.

**gummyofallbears**

jreilly89 wrote:
gummyofallbears wrote:
SplinteredShield wrote:
It is an extremely hard balance for sure. I used to have a guy in my gaming group that cheated out the wazoo. Down side for me was that he was one of 3 people who taught me the game, and for a long time I thought his skill was impressive. I looked up to him, hung around him a lot, and thought he was amazing. Looking back knowing what I know now it's pretty strange this guy tried his best to stomp new kids to seem really cool, and lame 13 year old me bought it up. The good news is though with the dozens of people I've taught to roleplay and play 40k since, I've never been that guy, so he was helpful in a way. Also, when did so many Colorado people show up out of nowhere? I haven't had a gaming group out here since, like, 6 years ago, where y'all hiding?!

QFT

(sorry for OT)
I didn;t know there were so many coloridians on this forum.

There is pretty good gaming around the boulder area.

Total Escape does 40k on Thursdays (I think, haven't been for a year or two), great terrain, nice people.

The Boulder GW is a godsend. The owner is awesome and the people are great.

The Denver GW kinda sucks from what I hear, crappy community and the such, crappy store too.

The gamers guild exists in North Boulder but don't waste your time going there.

There is also Atomic Goblin, but I recommend against going there, I hear the 40k leader can be a donkey cave (Just rumors from friends)

There's a couple groups interspersed between the Springs and Pueblo too.

Oh yeah? I never really get out that far as it is quite a drive. In fact, the only reason I've even gone to the Denver GW is because of the I was in that area for an audition or something of the such I can't seem to recall.

**Formosa**

We had a guy and he is difficult, I wont get into specifics as others on here know him, but suffice to say he would turn up drunk, drugged up, slur his way around the game, leave rubbish behind, make a general mess, he would just make up rules etc.

I sadly had the displeasure of playing him again recently and I had just got back from being on exercise for 3 months, so I wasn't as patient as I normally am, and basically chewed him out for his bad behaviour, the shame is he is a good guy, just has issues.

**Red__Thirst**

Yet another update.

Chatted with the store owners earlier this evening (at work here tonight, haven't had time to stop till now) and learned that there have been multiple complaints regarding our trouble maker to them over the last few months, with more coming in since Sunday's tournament.

I knew of one players general displeasure with our trouble maker, because he's spoken with me about it privately, but I was unaware of the other complaints or that said complaints had been made to the owners.

It looks as though there's going to be a reckoning involving not only me, but the owners as well. There's strong potential the guy could be driving other players away from the store. I'm going to be deferring to the store owners (obviously) but they also asked if I could be there when a conversation happens and have also given me permission to, if he does not learn how to 'chill out', to tell him he is not allowed to play in future tournaments. I do not plan on doing that until he's given a shot at fixing the behaviors and shows that he either won't or refuses to try and improve his negative behaviors.

Once I know what Paul Harvey would call "The rest of the story" I will update further.

Till then, take it easy folks.

-Red__Thirst-

**Vector Strike**

Red__Thirst wrote:
I give his a rather incredulous look and comment that I was under the impression that no Lords of War would be brought in, and he triumphantly says it's not a Lord of War but an allied detachment of one Knight. I shrug, as he is correct, and we proceed to play.

Lawyers... hehe

**Waaaghpower**

Vector Strike wrote:
Red__Thirst wrote:
I give his a rather incredulous look and comment that I was under the impression that no Lords of War would be brought in, and he triumphantly says it's not a Lord of War but an allied detachment of one Knight. I shrug, as he is correct, and we proceed to play.

Lawyers... hehe

He's actually wrong on that front. The allied choice for Imperial Knights is still Lords of War. The detachment only calls for Lords of War, nothing else, but it's still Lords of War.

**Red__Thirst**

Waaaghpower wrote:
Vector Strike wrote:
Red__Thirst wrote:
I give his a rather incredulous look and comment that I was under the impression that no Lords of War would be brought in, and he triumphantly says it's not a Lord of War but an allied detachment of one Knight. I shrug, as he is correct, and we proceed to play.

Lawyers... hehe

He's actually wrong on that front. The allied choice for Imperial Knights is still Lords of War. The detachment only calls for Lords of War, nothing else, but it's still Lords of War.

That was my argument, and he disagreed, stating that it wasn't a Lord of War since it was an allied detachment and didn't take up his CAD Lord of War slot. It was my first time playing him so I didn't want to just pack up and leave, which would have made me TFG. Like I said, worked out in the end as I managed a victory, all-be-it a narrow one. The game was overall not terrible, just his antics were but a preview of what was to come.

C'est la vie. He'll make his bed and deal with the consequences if he doesn't heed what folks are about to tell him.

Like I said, will update more once I have more info for those following along.

For now, take it easy.

-Red__Thirst-

**cvtuttle**

The episode on this topic has dropped by the way. Just for some follow up. Thank you to everyone who contributed to the thread - the insights you presented made me think about things in a different light than my own experiences... which was kind of the point.

You can listen to the episode here or by searching for The Independent Characters in any Podcast provider you choose.

http://theindependentcharacters.com/blog/?p=3813

Thanks again!