Nosy People = Annoying (geeky and long)

[MaggieTheCat]

I wasn't sure if this should go in Sightings or not, so feel free to move if appropriate.

Anyway, this seems to happen every week when my boyfriend and I play D&D. Our group used to always play at one of the player's houses, but since 2 more members joined our group, we have a total of 8 players if everyone shows up, which gets a little cramped since no one has a really big place. So we started playing at one of the local game stores that has free tables for groups to sit and play at. Almost every week since we've started playing there (almost 2 months now) some other random person will walk up to our group in the middle of our game and interrupt us or watch us.

Examples:

#1: The very first time we played there, a friend of the DM's, K, showed up. None of the rest of us knew him, so they said hello, what's up, chatted for a few minutes, then the DM got back to our game. K stood there for a while, watching us...then pulled up a chair and literally joined the table. We all sort of ignored him, although he added a few comments (stuff that I thought was unnecessary, like "Why did you do THAT?" or "That was a stupid move" etc.) Finally the DM asked us if we'd mind if his friend joined us for the rest of the game, as obviously he wanted to play. We're a nice bunch, we didn't care, so K rolled up a character. It became very apparent very quickly that K's attitude toward us didn't change a bit once he was invited to the group; he thought he knew everything and criticized all the players while trying to tell the DM how to run his game. After 1 more game like this, the rest of us approached the DM and told him that K just wasn't fitting in with our group. Our DM was one of our two new members to our group, who had only been playing with us for a couple weeks, so...we sort of had final say as to who we wanted to play with. Fortunately, the DM completely understood, had a talk with K, and we haven't heard from or seen him since.

#2: Two guys (I'll call them A and B) approached our group and said hello. We all said hello back, then one of our players, J, seemed to recognize one of the newcomers, A. They hadn't seen each other for a while, so they started chatting and catching up. That's cool, no problem. After a few minutes, A asked us what we were playing. We told him about our game, and our DM threw in the comment, "We can only play till about 5:30 today since one of our members has to leave them." It was about 4:45 at the time and we were trying to get to a good stopping point before 5:30. The DM started DMing again after this, and A...starting talking to J again. Right over our DM (The DM was seated between where J was sitting and A was standing, so A was LITERALLY having to talk right over the DM.) We all ignored A, J was a little flustered as he was trying to follow the DM while not completely ignoring A. While this is happening, B approached me (the only female in the group and typically the only female in the entire store) and stood right behind my shoulder. I looked back at him and gave him a "WTF get out of my bubble" look and he backed off a little. A finally got the message (maybe he saw the look on my face) and said, "Let's go, man, we've already interrupted them." B got all defensive and said something like, "What? We were just talking and being friendly! We don't need to leave!" By this time, they had been hanging around for at least 10 minutes, and I think the whole group gave A a nasty look, so he hastily dragged his friend away. We all commented about it after the game, after J had left; we didn't blame him for trying to be friendly to an old friend, but we seriously thought those guys were rude.

We also get a lot of people who just come up, don't say anything, and stand next to our table, watching us. I don't know, maybe it's just me, but I consider that rude. If you're curious about what we're playing, introduce yourself and ask if we mind you watching, or just ask us about the game. Does anyone else ever have these kinds of issues?

[CaroPhoenix]

That happens all the time when Mr. Rum or I or the both of us are gaming.

It's par for the course.

Not everyone plays Dungeons & Dragons. Or not everyone has played 3.0, 3.5 or 4.0 edition(s).

No matter where you're at. If you're in public, you're going to get the gawkers.'

As I said. It happens. It even happens at D&D conventions. (And I should know this as Mr. Rum, me, & his old gaming group used to run a 250+ person convention).

If it bothers you and your group so much, you're going to have to start going back to playing in someone's house.

[ArcticChicken]

Honestly, you're in a public space, you're going to have people watching you. If you don't want them watching, you'll need to move to a private location.

I, myself, would be rather annoyed at someone who interrupted my game in order to introduce themselves.

[Anriana]

The first two examples were definitely rude. People walking up and just watching aren't rude though - it's to be expected in a public place and interrupting to introduce themselves would be ruder.

[4love]

I'm afraid I have to agree with what the others have said- you're in a free, public space, there will be people who take interest in what you're doing. It's partly a compliment- it must look interesting.

On the other hand, you're entirely right that this can hurt the D&D experience. The first two stories, especially, but even just random people quietly watching. It can be hard enough to think in-character without wondering what strangers think of my 'performance.' Does this game store also rent rooms for playing? Maybe it would be worth shelling out for a more private meeting space. Or investigate your local libraries- some of them, or maybe local schools, might be willing to rent/loan space. Also check any churches that any of the gaming members have ties to- who knows, maybe there's a cool pastor somewhere with an empty fellowship hall on certain weeknights? (BTW, I'm getting these ideas from Girl Scout experience- I have no idea how much easier/harder it might be to get space for a D&D group.)

[MaggieTheCat]

It can be hard enough to think in-character without wondering what strangers think of my 'performance.'

That's my main gripe. I get kinda nervous when random strangers come up and start watching us. We do sit in the back room of the game store we go to, but it's a fairly big room and at least 2 or 3 groups can play there. So we don't get a TON of traffic (there's no merchandise for sale where we sit, just tables to sit at). But I sometimes get the impression that some of the people who do come up to watch us do so because they're waiting for an invite to our group. K obviously did that; I also remember another guy asking us if we played at the store regularly and what days/times. After we told him, he looked at us expectantly, like he was waiting for us to ask, "Are you available then, would you like to play?"

I dunno...I guess it's just me. I understand being in a public place and getting some traffic and whatnot. I guess I'm just not used to having an audience when roleplaying. It would be different if we were playing a board game, or something, and there was actually something to watch, but we do a lot of actual roleplaying, so we don't even use minis very much (only during battle, and sometimes we go 5-hr long sessions with no battles.) So there's nothing to watch. Just listen to.

One of the guys is moving to a large house (on our end of town, too!) in a month or so, so hopefully he'll have enough room that we can play at his place sometimes. The other thing we don't like about this game store is that they have a sign that says, "No outside food or drink" so we always buy snacks/soda right from them...but other groups (who appear to be "regulars") bring McDonalds, Pizza Hut, KFC, you name it in, and nobody says anything to them. I used to like to bring food for the whole group when we played at someone's house, or at least bring our own snacks and soda and stuff. So it'll be nice if we can do that again when our friend moves.

[ArcticChicken]

It would be different if we were playing a board game, or something, and there was actually something to watch, but we do a lot of actual roleplaying, so we don't even use minis very much (only during battle, and sometimes we go 5-hr long sessions with no battles.) So there's nothing to watch. Just listen to.

Good roleplaying is quite interesting, even when you're not involved. Some of my favorite sessions of the Star Wars game I was recently in, I wasn't in the scene at all, just the DM (as an NPC) and the party leader talking about philosophy, which had nothing to do with the long-term plot.

[edible_hat]

At my gaming club it's the D&D players who are the rude ones... they complain about the noise of the video games. So us video gamers turn the sound down. Then the D&D players talk louder and louder until we can't hear the video games. So we turn the volume up. So they talk louder. And a volume war develops.

[Geek King]

I agree, if you're playing in public, you deal with folks wandering by and stoping to observe. That's just goes with the location. People who interrupt constantly are the ones that bug me a bit.

As for public playing horror stories, I've got most beat. Playing AD&D in the lobby of a dorm at a primarily Christian college just coming off the 80's hysteria about D&D and Satanism. Some fundies walked in and, well, I'll let your imagination do the rest of the work. Just know that I like to debate, and that the fundies had come down to watch the Simpsons. The word "hypocrite" might have been thrown about.

[Shards]

Gotta say, the second example didn't strike me as rude. Yeah, it would have been better if he'd walked over to his friend's side and talked there, but it's not that big a deal. Then again, in my groups, I tend to roleplay most out of the party, and we tend to just use D&D as an excuse to get together and hang out with some frequency. We'll have 5 hour sessions where we end up playing Rock Band by the end. We're a pretty casual group, which I think is the issue. You're in a public place, where a lot of people are casual gamers, and you're trying to be serious gamers. The two sub-cultures clash for good reason.