I've been a fan of Critcrab for a long time and for each story I thought to myself, "How do these things happen so often for people playing DnD?"
Well, I understand now.
I've been a DM for the better part for 15 years. I've been running a game for my friends that lasted over a year thus far and they are about halfway through the story. My niece's boyfriend (16M) approached me asking to run a game for him and his (teenage) friends. I thought about it and eventually decided to go for it. Thinking it'd be a good thing. Our area isn't very kind to kids and nerdy kids like me/them is even worse to grow up. I'm 33, I've been where they are, so I can relate to how hard our town can be. The first time talking to the group it was clear that they had no concept of DnD at all, which was fine. They had character concepts, but ultimately thought they were going to start the game as literal gods. I explained to them that they were starting adventurers and if they gave me some back story I could make the story I would write more catered to them and thus we would all have a better experience. Some of them gave me really good back stories, some gave me half thought out back stories, but enough to help me build them into the world.
I love world building and making maps, so I did. I had a map for adult group and a story they were playing through. I decided that instead of writing a year long story, I would write a story that factored into the Adult campaign and could be completed in 5 to 10 sessions depending on how it was played, with the idea that it could be expanded further if they liked to play, if they didn't then, well, it is what it is and I didn't waste time and still got to share the experience of DnD with some kids that wouldn't have had this chance any other time.
We had 5 players. The oldest was 18, Jay. Jay played a Goblin Rouge. Sam was 15 and wanted to play a warforged Wizard. Sam wanted to be a 1000 year old robot that couldn't die. Andy was a God, a literal god. He didn't have a race at first and his backstory was that he was a God. Eventually, I got him to understand that he wouldn't be able to be a God. So he came up with him being a God, but from another universe that was exiled to this universe and lost all his powers (I wrote this into the story and made it a large part of the quest.) Henry was a giant goose. Yes, a giant goose, and I loved every bit of his creativity. Henry had a very good story, but no understanding of DnD. He was something else that was turned into a goose (we settled on hippogriff) and just wanted to lead his flock to a paradise to be protected, so he left his flock in search of the paradise. (Henry was my favorite by far, and I know I should pick favorites, but all in due time.)
Now that the set up is out of the way, the problem with running this game for these guys. The kid, boyfriend to my niece, that asked me to run the game for the kids turned out to be absolutely insufferable. We'll call him Frank. Frank made a character that was supposed to be an assassin. All well and good. But he didn't like it after the 3rd session. That's fine, we made him another character that was literally named Frieren and based off of the anime character. Which I laughed about and helped him write her up. The problems actually started back in our Session 0. While everyone was making characters and asking questions, Sam was doing nothing. He asked if I would just make his character for him. I obviously said no and told him that as DM there are a multitude of things I have to do to even set up for our story and that if he didn't even want to make his character would he be more comfortable just hanging out with us while we play. He insisted that he wanted to play, so I helped him make his character. Same got annoying, but Frank criticized everyone else's characters in the most unhinged way possible. At some points he would actually yell at them for being stupid and making "gay" characters. I told Frank that he needed to calm down and everyone can be what ever they want, its a game and we're going to try to have fun.
Session 1, Everyone is introduced as having known each other before the adventure starts to ease them into play. Sam is on his phone. Jay is asking about skill checks. Andy is talking to NPC's on the street. Henry is a goose. (Henry can talk, it's part of the effects of the potion he drank.) Frank is sitting there. Staring into blank space. Sam asks if it's his turn and while frank has done absolutely nothing and Sam is on his phone, Frank yells, not talks loud, not exclaims, YELLS "If you were paying attention you would know when it's your turn!" I raised my voice a bit and told him to calm down, he wasn't doing anything either. He put his head down and said nothing the rest of the night.
Session 2, Frank doesn't show up. The session goes great. Sam gets involved way more and everyone has a great time. We message on discord after everyone gets homes and talk about the session with Frank getting absolutely pissed that he missed the session. (His choice to not come)
Session 3 and 4 are about the same as session 1. However, session 4 everything kind of blows up. Frank loses his mind and it was total nonsense. We shut down early because I had made some mistakes in timing and planning. It was my fault and I acknowledged that. I apologized to everyone and told them I would make it up to them on the next session. Frank lost it. He didn't saying anything in person, but later got on discord and told everyone that they weren't his friends and if they tried to talk to him that he would fight them. He told everyone that it'd their fault the sessions were going poorly and that his parents were taking his car because of them (Or something like that, definitely something about the car and his parents, won't lie, I stopped paying attention to the chat that day because of him.) Henry told me later that Frank left the discord and wouldn't be coming to DnD anymore. I was fine with this.
But, it's not over. We had a 5 session and it went great. Sam asked if I would have Frank back and I told him that it wasn't likely. I ran into Frank a few weeks later at my sister's house while helping them move after they just lost everything. Frank was supposed to be helping them move as well. I asked him to grab some boxes and his exact words were "I'm not touching anything that isn't (My niece's, his girlfriend's)." So, I turned around and told him "Well, you aren't much use in helping move, are you? You can just head on out then." Yes, I was a little harsh, I know, but this was unwarranted and not exactly helpful. Everyone was already stressed and Frank was only there to (His words, not mine) "Make sure (My niece) wasn't doing anything she wasn't supposed to." After Frank said he wasn't touching anything that wasn't my niece's and I said what I said, I turned away. He mumbled something under his breathe, I turned around and asked him to repeat himself, he yelled out "Why don't you shut the fuck up and go home." I was livid. I raised my voice and yelled out "You disrespectful little shit, you either help or you leave, those are your fucking options." He grabbed a box and brought it into the moving truck then left.
The following day, I get a message from his dad. Frank's dad threatens to come to my house and Kick my ass, within 3 message exchanges, he is now threatening to kill me. I understand why his dad is mad, and honestly I would have been to if my son came home crying saying that an adult cornered him and threatened to beat him up while another grown man held a knife at him. Yes, he went run to his dad and told his dad that I and my brother in law threatened his life. Eventually, I got his dad to understand that none of that happened and that his son was being disrespectful and I told him what I told him. Days after this event, Frank's dad messages me again, telling me I better stop calling and harassing his son. Frank is still lying to his dad and telling him I'm messing with him still. I go to the discord and Sam, of all people, is telling everyone that Frank wouldn't do that. Frank wouldn't lie about that. I told them my piece and showed them the messages and THE VIDEO AND AUDIO RECORDING OUTSIDE OF MY SISTER'S HOUSE of what happened. Sam tried saying that I doctored the video and it was AI. I just deleted the discord and left it at that.
About a week ago, my niece gets a letter in the mail about her SATs. (Can't prove this, but I know it was him.) He logged into her email and emailed the SAT test taking place that my niece applied to (It was a college thing, I don't have all the information on this part) and unenrolled her from the program. The letter stated that she voluntarily unenrolled and wouldn't be eligible to reenroll until the following year. He then went onto her Snapchat and Instagram and posted a bunch of picture (None NSFW) and deleted the accounts.
She broke up with him and he blamed me for all of it because I ruined his DnD experience with his friends. The campaign started as a way to give a group of kids a fun introduction to DnD. It ended up becoming a reminder of how quickly things can spiral when one person refuses to engage with the table.