I'm going to post here to repeat my plea at the beginning of the column, in hopes of getting a reply.
I don't know if I did this topic justice, and I would like to get a discussion going about this: how do you handle a problematic person in a group when you one of you can't just walk away from it?
We've got a few people in our group who have abrasive personalities. They're not catpissmen, and I think that makes them more difficult to deal with. Real terrible individuals, that's easy, if you can lock down a real example of bad behavior and show them that it bothers others. But it's the more subtle ones...they have aggressive senses of humor, they stand too close, they butt in on your conversations. Those are the ones we wish we could get rid of, but we don't have anything specifically bad enough where we can really intervene.
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The one way that my group got rid of the real catpiss people was to add the caveat that if you game, you go out with the group afterward. Anywhere we went out afterward. Every single time.
Now, we were a combination of RPG club and LARP group so that tended to cull the herd a bit but I noted a quick reduction in non-optimal returns if we chose a dance club instead of Denny's with the added bonus of being able to help a few people who were a bit reclusive to open up a bit. Some of my best memories of that time were getting the gaming geeks to dance in public and *gasp!* ask girls/guys they thought were attractive out!
Worked like a charm and we had many more successes than failures including helping a friend with undiagnosed OCD get some help.
Best advice IMO is to be firm but reasonable. Explain not only the situation and listen to their replies, but also go into emotions and how this unacceptable behavior makes the people around them feel. Most of the time they simply don't realize that the behavior is unacceptable or disruptive to the level that it is and they will be happy to tone it down a bit. This not only makes everyone in the group happier overall as the behavior ceases, but it also helps the offensive person in the future as they will hopefully not make the same mistake at a later date with another group of people.
Hate to say it, but de-catpissing people is like being a big brother or sister more than anything. Take ownership of the situation, tell them the probs and stats of their behavior, and guide them via corrective action(s) up to an including expulsion.
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"Equations are the Devil's sentences." - anonymous college math student
The one way that my group got rid of the real catpiss people was to add the caveat that if you game, you go out with the group afterward. Anywhere we went out afterward. Every single time.
That is absolutely awesome. A personal rule of mine is that I never game with anyone I wouldn't feel comfortable clubbing or going to a bar with. This also means that when they come to a game, they need to be well washed and dressed because they're clubbing afterwards.
Where us your club located?
CB
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"I play to be awesome, and I run games for others to be awesome in." - Scurvy Platypus, 7/31/07
-- Hidden Prophet of the rpg.net Solar Exalted fanboy junta
I think it's great that we talk straight with the people needing help, but--and this is the key question--what can you do if expulsion isn't an option? In college RPG groups, you can't kick someone out for being a jerk. Sure, you can get rid of them if they're in your specific gaming group, but what about the group at large?
I tend to have infinite patience in regards to my fellow gamer. Still, we leave it to gradual social ostracizing and simple signals to let people know "hey! Hey you! Quit doing that or leave!"
Generally it works. When it doesn't it escalates to minor insults. Doesn't go any farther then that. At that point if you haven't left you're probably at least worth the effort in convincing you to bathe regularly.
Now, we were a combination of RPG club and LARP group so that tended to cull the herd a bit but I noted a quick reduction in non-optimal returns if we chose a dance club instead of Denny's with the added bonus of being able to help a few people who were a bit reclusive to open up a bit. Some of my best memories of that time were getting the gaming geeks to dance in public and *gasp!* ask girls/guys they thought were attractive out!
Sounds fun, but it is possible to be shy without being a catpissman. RPG societies are good for the kind of people that don't want to go clubbing, but still want to socialize. Shy != smelly wierdo.
Real terrible individuals, that's easy, if you can lock down a real example of bad behavior and show them that it bothers others. But it's the more subtle ones...they have aggressive senses of humor, they stand too close, they butt in on your conversations. Those are the ones we wish we could get rid of, but we don't have anything specifically bad enough where we can really intervene.
You're not obliged to let people spend time with you, you know. And neither are you obliged to give them a reason they can agree with as to why you'd like them to stop coming around to game. The words "you're a recurring pain in the arse and I don't want you at my games anymore" don't need footnotes and cites.
And neither are you obliged to give them a reason they can agree with as to why you'd like them to stop coming around to game.
A game, perhaps, but not a gaming society. If a person is toxic enough, they'll also drive away the kinds of people you want to attract, which is usually why a nice way of dealing with said people is required in college.
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