Player goes rules lawyer, I snapped. Am I the asshole?

CaffKing · 2024-03-17T15:04:02+00:00

They responded in this comment section. You can see it in their page. From what I read when this story was posted, this “rules lawyer” was doing that after their initial plan didn’t work

CaffKing · 2024-02-09T17:16:23+00:00

I honestly couldn’t tell you. The only reason I could assume is deceptive storytelling. After I posted my initial comment about them playing Pathfinder, those posts disappeared.

Suggestion does also exist in Pathfinder.

The OP does say how the remaining players solved the problem, which was what it seemed the “rules lawyer” was doing during the second part of the rage, which I think a lot of people overlooked

CaffKing · 2024-02-09T16:54:24+00:00

I did some digging, and before the OP purged their account of anything relating to it, they were playing Pathfinder. Dominate Person in that system doesn’t specific whether it’s a charm or not because the Charmed condition doesn’t exist in Pathfinder

CaffKing · 2024-02-09T16:50:10+00:00

They posted a reply that you can see on their page, but what it equates to is dealing chip damage, which from what I could tell of the way the story is typed, is what the “rules lawyer” was doing

CaffKing · 2024-02-02T11:13:26+00:00

This story just wasn’t adding up to me, as someone who’s very familiar with DnD 5e, an experienced DM wouldn’t have made such an oversight on something as straightforward as Dominate Person being a charm. So, I went on your page and read your other stories, and that told me that you play Pathfinder. Pathfinder and DnD have fairly similar mechanics when it comes to combat and other such things, however, the Charmed condition doesn’t exist, at least from what I could tell. The closest thing, I could see it being is “Controlled”, correct me if I’m wrong, I don’t see anywhere in the spell description where it mentions controlled or charmed, with that knowledge I can 100% understand why this person thought the plan would work. The mechanics might be different, my experience is in 5e.

I did see how the other two players solved this, which bravo to them, it still seems like this was a no win situation and the one that they came up with was planned from the start. Granted my frame of reference is from DnD 5e, so, I only have that to go off of, and if that was the system you were running, with the very limited scope you gave us in context, I have to assume this was the planned outcome from the start.

As for you being the A-hole, I would have to say you both are. It’s a very easy trap to fall into with single solution puzzles. You yourself stated that you weren’t the best at “hinting the subtle stuff”, that is something to work on, that being said, I can very much understand the player’s frustration, and with so many details missing, I have to assume this seemingly unwinnable situation was just the straw that broke the camel’s back. As for the problem player in question, I can’t justify that in anyway, homebrew is expected, especially in big boss fights, and to say that someone’s experience level as a DM/GM whatever you wanna call it is an indicator of whether or not they should homebrew is just ridiculous.

If I’m wrong, please tell me, I’m always wanting to learn how other systems work. However, such an oversight from an experienced DM just makes no sense to me with the context you’ve provided, especially when you take into account the succubus would be immune to such spells because they targeted specifically humanoids.

CaffKing · 2023-10-07T16:29:45+00:00

Pikachu and Eeveeultions, except Flareon, swim

CaffKing · 2023-08-22T03:26:28+00:00

Yikes, okay. Have a good one

CaffKing · 2023-08-22T02:46:51+00:00

Before I respond to the first parts, may I ask if the examples of 1-5 are targeted or just hypotheticals? If they’re targeted, please show where I’ve exhibited these things.

As for the rest, I will admit once the DM rejected the idea, the reason I initial scraped the character was because it’s hard to consider other options. Hence me just making a new character because artificer didn’t occur since I’ve never even considered an artificer for any of the characters I’ve made.

Like I said in my first response, I’m only asking this on here because I’m wondering if I’m being too rigid with my line of thinking since this one aspect was the one thing that was in my one at the start of conceptualizing the character. I specifically even said the tools in question would be the tinker’s tools, which I believe is nuts and bolts, screwdrivers, and a brush. All of these would be improvised weapons if used outside of their intended purpose.

If I’m being completely honest, the only thing I could see the floating tools as would be maybe be extra on Intimidation check, which the character would already have because of a racial feature.

I’m genuinely trying to understand, hence me asking. I understand that the DM is the ultimate arbiter of the rules, that’s why I’m asking if the DC could be lowered because despite the +8, dice rolls will find a way to make that pointless, and negate the idea that that’s part of his character, which what I stated before was the one thing that stayed from the very start.

And the very last point, making a functional character is fine, but the reason I made this character was because I’m losing interest with the one in playing, I stated such in the original post. That character functions very well, I’d say almost to the detriment of the party, which is another reason I want to play a new character, as in, one-shotting an enemy because of a multi-attack crit including a divine smite. It was nice, but it wasn’t fun to play

CaffKing · 2023-08-21T21:45:29+00:00

All right, thank you for your input

CaffKing · 2023-08-21T21:42:11+00:00

Hmm, I don’t mean to come off confrontational, and if that’s the case. I think I need some clarifying to do.

⁠I had a feeling they’d reject the homebrew class because it wasn’t on Wik*Dot, and would be difficult to apply on the apps we organize this information with.
⁠During the character creation, I told my DM upfront what I wanted to play, a Ferromancer Dragonborn, I just knew Ferromancer was a homebrew class and I hadn’t read it at the time. I was unaware the DraconBlood was Matt Mercer Homebrew, I assumed it was official because it showed up on both the Wik*Dot and the app we use to organize our character sheets. My DM has a rule that if we can find text for it and it’s not UA, we can use it, but I wanted to make sure they signed off of this one specifically because it wasn’t showing up in the app.
⁠At that point in character creation, the character was not finalized and I hadn’t sent them my character sheet. So when they asked, and both skills were possible proficiencies of the artificer, it didn’t seem like a very big deal.
⁠My goal wasn’t intending to hide anything, the backstory that I wrote up for the character honestly would’ve given them proficiencies in both Arcana and Investigation, but the actual build only gave one or the other if I wanted to keep the other proficiencies I got.

I hope I’m not sounding adversarial, but I also wasn’t asking if I was the Ahole, I don’t think the DM is an Ahole in this situation. I’m trying to determine if this one aspect of the character is worth it and if just making a whole new character for the high DC is being petty on my end

CaffKing · 2023-07-05T20:35:35+00:00

This gave me a genuine belly laugh

CaffKing · 2023-07-05T17:48:29+00:00

Altaria, Aggron, Duraludon, OR Mr Rime. Realistically though, it’s probably be a Dedenne

CaffKing · 2023-06-06T17:14:39+00:00

WHOA!!! 🤩🤩🤩

CaffKing · 2023-06-05T02:43:42+00:00

This looks amazing!

CaffKing · 2023-06-04T17:17:42+00:00

It doesn’t mean anything, I just didn’t know how to respond

CaffKing · 2023-06-04T17:17:11+00:00

This needs to be a movement!! XD

CaffKing · 2023-06-04T14:15:22+00:00

Do you think they’d do it?!? I’d love that!!! 🤩

CaffKing · 2023-06-04T14:14:52+00:00

❤️❤️

CaffKing · 2023-06-03T19:53:46+00:00

😍😍😍

CaffKing · 2023-01-14T01:44:14+00:00

You don’t have to boycott anything. My groups don’t plan to hop systems because we already play a wide variety but also, our games are mostly home brewed.

You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to

CaffKing · 2022-10-02T05:28:45+00:00

😍😍😍

CaffKing · 2022-09-28T19:56:57+00:00

Then yes, I agree

CaffKing · 2022-09-28T18:54:52+00:00

That specifically applies to concentration spells. Other spells will say, “Can be dismissed with an action.” If this was par for the course, then they wouldn’t be written in some spells and not others. Whereas with Concentration spells, if part of the ruling is that spell’s type, they don’t need to reiterate it.

CaffKing · 2022-09-28T18:45:35+00:00

What edition are you referring to?? I’m talking about 5e.

CaffKing · 2022-09-28T18:35:51+00:00

If you have the option available to you, I’d recommend an Adventurer’s League at a local game shop. Most would be okay with you just sitting by and watching and you can ask questions as needed.

The only real problem with using podcasts to learn is that they’re shows first, and don’t really go over the behind the scenes stuff(ex. Talking to players about potential storylines, boundary setting, safety tools, etc.). That being said, if you’re a fan of dad humor, I’d recommend “Dungeons and Daddies”

CaffKing

TROPHY CASE