(Sub account because I am paranoid) I have a friend. Let's call her Betty. She has a boyfriend. Let's call him Charlie. Betty and Charlie have been dating for about 3 years. They live together. Betty has been unhappy with the relationship for a while. She's currently trying to make her mind up as to what she wants to do about it. The rest of us are standing by to support her in whatever she decides. We don't especially like Charlie. He's fussy, judgemental and hyper sensitive. We get along with him for Betty's sake, but he has absolutely been getting on our last nerve for a while now. For me, the straw that broke the camel's back was when he told me in all seriousness that I don't respect my parents and that it was wrong of me to go out partying when I was younger. He has never met my parents. He also decided to lay this particular opinion on me at my birthday party. Which was great. So we don't look to spend more time with him than we have to. But this year, over new years, Betty will be out of the country on business. So he's hit the rest of us up suggesting we meet up and play board games all night. We'd all already planned not to do anything this year and just chill at our respective homes. We really don't like the idea of spending the whole night having to simultaneously tiptoe around him because he's so sensitive, whilst also dealing with him side eyeing us for drinking, etc. But if we don't make plans with him Betty will have to deal with the brunt of him complaining that he'll be alone on New Years. Part of me feels sorry for him, but the other part of me feels drained just contemplating essentially babysitting him all night. So do we stick to our guns and say we don't want to make plans this year? Do we make plans with him anyway for Betty's sake and so that he's not alone that night? If we do that, how do we retain our sanity and patience on the night? I know Betty knows we don't like Charlie that much and she wouldn't want us to be uncomfortable. But we also don't want her to have to deal with his reaction to us saying no. Halp pls.
Charlie is not your problem to manage. He's not a child who needs to be taken on playdates; he's a grownup who's choosing to behave badly. Inviting him places only makes everyone miserable - and that includes Betty, because she knows everyone has to tiptoe around his bad behavior. That's probably upsetting and humiliating for her, even if she's making an effort not to show it, and it's enabling for him, because there are no consequences for his poor behavior. It's kind of you to not want her to have to deal with the fallout from him being excluded, but based on my experiences with my own 'Charlie', I'm betting he's going to find something to pick at her about anyway. Give her the option for a night of freedom - makes plans and invite her, and only her. Make it clear that you all want some 'just Betty' time. She may protest that Charlie is going to feel one way or another about this, but she needs to know that it's on her to deal with that in a way she feels appropriate, not on the rest of you to manage him for her. If she declines because of him, make sure to stress that you all value her as a friend and would love to have some 'just Betty' time when she gets back from her trip, and wish her well. (That work trip is probably going to be a relief for her, come to think of it, unless Charlie somehow managed to finagle himself along.) Ultimately, it's Betty's choice whether or not to continue being saddled with Charlie and his bad behavior, but that doesn't mean the rest of you have to be miserable for her sake. It's okay to establish your friendship as a Charlie-free (or at least Charlie-low) zone! A person doesn't have to be friends with all of their SO's friends, and/or doesn't have to be included in all the friend-things their SO does with their friends.
These are all true things. I'm trying to do the balancing act of mitigating what negativity I can for Betty's sake, whilst also trying to keep my distance from Charlie. And you're right: he isn't our problem to manage. I do need to remind myself of that. You're also right about there always being something else for him to pick at her about. If it wasn't this it really would be something else. And it is so, so frustrating. Because Betty has the patience of a saint and consistently tries to see the good in everyone, and, whether consciously or not, Charlie is taking advantage of that. Luckily I do get some alone time with Betty today, and will be having a quiet evening with her and another friend that's been party to the whole issue on Saturday. It does seem like the work trip will be a bit of relief. She went away for a work event last weekend which turned in to an absolute fiasco, but despite that she said it was nice getting some time away from home. Charlie definitely won't be going with her for the one over new years, which is good. Since my initial post one person has responded to Charlie in the group chat with something along the lines of 'Possibly, but me and my gf might not be in the country so we'll have to see'. Charlie has responded with 'ok' and that's it so far. Another friend of ours spoke to Betty separately to ask what the fallout would be if we didn't make plans with him. She said she knows he doesn't have many people to hang out with, but she doesn't want us to have to babysit. She's going to suggest to him that he goes home to be with his family, because it's been a while since he spent new years with them. No idea how that suggestion went down as of yet. One thing I did forget to mention: we do see Charlie semi-regularly without Betty for gaming once a week. It was set up prior to these issues taking root. Betty doesn't attend because it's not her kind of thing. We haven't had a session for a few weeks due to outside circumstances, so it's been a while since I've seen Charlie in person. But there's a chance we might all be meeting up next week, which could be awkward depending on what happens between now and then.
I hear you. :( I hope that if he won't shape the hell up, frequent time away from him will give Betty better perspective on how not okay his bad behavior is. Awkward. Is he any better behaved during gaming?
Erm... sort of? But also not. He hasn't behaved badly enough that we've planned to shut the sessions down. But we do still have to baby him somewhat, and that's something that's increased over the past few months. Like, we all take the piss out of each other and out of each others' characters all the time. We can't really do that with Charlie because he takes it very personally. And if things were different that would be fine: not everyone goes in for that type of humour. But Charlie seems comfortable with dishing it out to other people. He just gets sulky when he gets it in return. He's also a very stubborn player in that he'll get an idea in his head and be determined to follow it through, even if the rest of the party is telling him that it's a bad idea. He got his second character of the session killed a few weeks back. He'd decided to take on a minotaur in a fighting pit so he could get the prize money for the group. We didn't want the money. We told him we didn't want the money. He went in anyway. And he died, very quickly and very unceremoniously. After that point we didn't hear the end of it. 'But I was getting the money for the group! And my character died and it's so unfair because I was doing it for you guys'. The DM gave him a temporary character while we did a few side quests, and once we completed them he resurrected Charlie's main character. (Note that this is something he would have done for any of our characters - we get a second chance. Charlie just happens to be on his third because the DM couldn't be arsed with the inevitable sulk). And like, I game with some other people that would have taken on the minotaur even though they didn't stand a chance of winning. But in their case it would be because the character they came up with was known for being hotheaded and a bit stupid and they were just roleplaying what they thought would happen as a result. And if the character died they would just shrug and start rolling up a new one. But this wasn't Charlie roleplaying an impulsive character - it was Charlie deciding to be the hero OOC and totally misjudging it. He recently told another member of the group that if his character hadn't been resurrected he would have quit. And it wouldn't have been a 'Guys I'm not feeling this anymore and this seems like an easy point for me to duck out' thing. It would have been a 'My characters keep dying and so I don't want to play anymore' sulk. I'm pretty confident that if he dies again there won't be any further miraculous recoveries, though. Our DM is super chill, but even he has limits. It's just... Charlie has this sense of entitlement coupled with a stubborn refusal to put in the work required. Both in gaming and in the rest of his life. And when the stuff he wants doesn't just fall in to his lap he resorts to sulking, because making an effort is hard.
Yeah, I'm seconding going "yeah, sorry, I've already got plans for New Year's". And it's true. You have plans to stay at home and be chill and enjoy yourself. As for his behaviour in the gaming sessions - eegh. It sorta feels like it'll sort itself out there, though? In that he's probably going to get some other fool-ass idea into his head, get his character killed as a result of refusing to listen to anyone going "hey, this is a bad idea", and sulk out of the group. That still leaves him attached to Betty, but there's really only so much you can do there.
We're probably going to just say we're not making plans this year, yeah. Like, it's not even December yet and I am already totally over the idea of New Years. This all depends on how he acts on Thursday though. If he complains enough there's a chance one of us will snap and just invite him over to get him to stop. I hope we can stick to our guns, but there's a chance we may not be able to. The possibility of a flounce is high. He won't learn from this last character death, because he didn't learn from the one before that. We've warned Betty and she's resigned to the inevitable sulk. Further updates on the situation: He's shot down Betty's suggestion that he visits his parents. She went on to say that literally the only thing she can do is offer to have him fly out with her to Vegas over the holiday so they can celebrate there together, but he doesn't seem keen on that either. More moping about the fact that everyone will be busy and he has no plans. But my sympathy is limited because it turns out that he did precisely 0 of the very simple household tasks Betty asked him to get done while she was away last week. So she had to do them herself as soon as she got back. Apparently he was also trying to get both himself and Betty invited to the Christmas dinner me and my bf are hosting for our D&D group. This dinner will include playing D&D for most of the day. Charlie is not part of that campaign, Betty dislikes D&D, and we've already made separate plans to see her and Charlie and some other non-D&D group friends. So I'm confused as to why he's trying to wedge himself in to that plan. Please spare a thought for us on Thursday evening. It could all get rather awkward.
Ergh. Can you send a text or something around to the group going "okay, can we all resolve that whatever our plans for New Year's are, they do not involve Charlie in any form? We probably shouldn't give any sign that the sort of behaviour he's been displaying can get results, and he's a grown adult who's perfectly capable of arranging something for himself to do on New Year's"? Obviously, not including Betty or Charlie in there, since that'd increase the awkward rather than decrease it. ...honestly, thinking about it? This sounds like he's starting an extinction burst - "no one's responding when I do the thing, I WILL DO THE THING HARDER". What he wants, I think, is some idealized thing where Betty tosses aside the work event she's going to and stays home with him during the holiday, never mind the consequences; that's pretty obviously not gonna happen. Failing that, he wants to be consoled about How Very Much he is suffering, with a girlfriend who prioritizes keeping her job over making him happy. And he's not gonna get that either - even if it didn't sound like everyone was very team Betty, it's pretty obvious no one's leaping for joy at the idea of hosting him and his sulkfest for New Year's. The 'attempting to weasel in on something that explicitly doesn't include Betty or Charlie' is what makes me suspect an extinction burst; he's trying to force someone to entertain his sulkfest, and he doesn't much care who, at this point. Crossing my fingers for you and hopefully, Thursday goes well.
@turtleDove 'Extinction burst' is exactly the right phrase. I Googled it and read the explanation to my bf and he agreed. It really is a case of 'increase the thing to gain results and just keep increasing until satisfied'. I made it through the evening! No talk about New Years from Charlie. However... Because it's been a while since our last session, we'd forgotten where we were. Turns out we were about to fight a giant frost worm. This thing was hench. During its first turn it managed to kill my character. And Charlie's. The DM did some very quick thinking to save me, casually giving me a couple of bonuses because of my clothing etc, which meant that I was just unconscious rather than dead. I've never died before, so that was my second chance (as I mentioned above). Because he did that for me he did it for Charlie too. We both survived. My character went on to be a drama queen about how he'd 'seen the light and heard the choirs of angels' etc. Charlie did a lot of muttering about how he'd only just got his character back. Charlie also: Scoffed at everyone's initiative rolls, and was totally perplexed when it turned out he'd rolled lowest. Scoffed at my defense stats, totally ignoring the fact that my character is a summoner so doesn't tend to run in to battle with everyone else. Kept on and on about being the tank, while the actual tank kept diplomatically quiet. Kept talking over everyone. Including the DM. Insisted on doing skill checks meant for other people and was affronted when the DM ignored his rolls. Didn't listen to the party when we were coming up with strategies for infiltrating a frost giant camp. Us: 'We're going down the stealth/sabotage route.' Charlie: 'So we set a fireball off!' Us: 'No, we want to take our time and chip away at their infrastructure without them knowing it was us.' Charlie: 'Or I could teleport in to the middle of the camp and blow the dragon summoning horn!' Us: 'No...' Again, as mentioned above, this wasn't Charlie role playing a warlike character. It was Charlie OOC wanting to be the big goddamn hero without listening to the rest of the group. When we resolutely shot him down and started an in depth discussion about cutting off water supplies / poisoning crops etc he went in to a bit of a sulk. Once me and my bf were alone in the car, the first thing my bf said was, 'Holy shit he was being extra annoying tonight'. My bf is super chill, so for it to have gotten to him you know it had to be pretty bad. We dealt with it by asserting ourselves and not letting him dictate, and I defused some of it by being hyperbolic about my brush with death. But jesus christ.
Holy shit. I mean - I get wanting to have your character to in and be the big damn hero, but...that's not always viable! In fact, a lot of the time, it's probably not going to be especially viable, either because of the situation or because it's someone else's turn to have their character get the spotlight for a bit. And - I can see mis-hearing and assuming that the skill check was being addressed to him? Buuuut that's being incredibly generous to him and is probably not at all what was actually happening there. (And "we set a fireball off" - how is that stealthy at all? how does that qualify as sabotage?)
