GM's worst punishment

[JimmyRay73]

I've rarely had to punish PCs except for cheaters, and maybe one annoying drunk. Last we saw of his character he was fighting a nasty case of food poisoning in a hostlie wilderness...

I've actually been much harder on PCs when I'm playing (9 PC kills in 3 battlelords sessions, including two duels and a a few flushed out an airlock for not listening), though my old Ninjas & Superspies group might disagree. I swear it was just coincidence that one PC got crippled, another suffered a debilitating brain injury, and a third died when he was blown through a wall and fell three stories into a truckbed (through the roof of the cap on it) the night after a bad date.

I've also been known to allow PCs to plot against each other sometimes (mostly in Vampire and such) but a memorable one was a MechWarrior campaign where one PC bribed another's technician to wire his auto-eject into his fire control computer. Everything seemed normal until the guy triggered an alpha strike and got sent for a jack-in-the-box ride in the middle of a firefight. Of course the guy that arranged it all quit laughing when he realized he was left with no backup against a Demolisher in a city. His head got blown clean off a round or two later...

[pmulcahy11b]

I found that most of the time, you don't have to punish a player. The other players will do it for you!

[headquarters]

yes and no

sometimes a group is like politicians - they dont tell on others if they are indicted - that would leavre them out in the cold in a way .

I "punish" players who dont act their part of being in a FTF sesseion .talking out of hand ,doodeling when I try to explain something ,texting on their cell ( or worse -talking while at the table ), being wasted or disorderly - the punishment is simple - just skip their turn until they have composed their weak shit again -or ask them to leave the room if they are disturbing the proceedings .Warnings are given and then by stating that they now have lost x number of xp or initiativ points ( severe )- escalate .

I dont believe in punishing by cursing them ,saying that they have been killed ,having them loose limbs or otherwise doing them a bad turn - but I DO believe in stating that there is risk of being killed,cursed,disabled,maimed,bankrupt,ill, or whatever -if this or that course of action is pursued.

Then ,when their dicerolls against the odds of making it I am with Paul - the players punish themselves..

I found that most of the time, you don't have to punish a player. The other players will do it for you!

[Marc]

Worst than dying

Ive never punished a player but Im always use extremely consequent with the game setup, so I havent any kind of mercy and Ive never change my occult rolls to save a characters live or the final result of a gaming session. I know some masters recommend not doing it and that its better to change or to ignore the result of hidden rolls to keep the rhythm, the fun or the climatic situation. But as a player, I would feel myself swindled I would know that in the critical moment of the game, a deciding action of my character or a risky situation was not so deciding or so risky because the master has decided a happy ending in advance. Of course, its always my opinion.

And following with this principle, the cruelest end of a group of players in gaming session was the conclusion of the longest campaign Ive ever run. The characters didnt die, but for them the final was worst than dying. The game was Traveller and, near the end of the campaign (the final fate of the human race was at stake, of course ) one of the main bad guys, an alien infiltrated as a head of an important intelligence agency, manipulated their minds, changing their memories and sending the characters, back home. They arrived safely to their homeworlds, at time for the End, happy and ignorant of what was about to come. Of course, the players knew it A sad end of end epic campaign with a lot of great adventures

[Legbreaker]

I think that counts as a GM's punishment for stupid ideas.

[bobcat]

...would giving the PC's a short ranged nuclear recoilless rifle count as GM punishment. seeing how they won't die if they don't do anything retarded with it(but you know they're going to.)

[WallShadow]

Role-playing jiu-jitsu

...would giving the PC's a short ranged nuclear recoilless rifle count as GM punishment. seeing how they won't die if they don't do anything retarded with it(but you know they're going to.)

I agree wholeheartedly--put the offending player(s) into situations where their own annoying character traits will eventually draw them into "pushing the red button" and erasing themselves (and hopefully not too many undeserving others) from this dimension. If greed is their draw, and they're cutting gold rings off corpses fingers, just make sure they get a bunch from a group that was hit by a nuke--irradiated gold, so his fingers'll fall off, or he'll get a nice rad burn next to the pocket he's keeping them in.