Inter-Party Conflict: Is it Really Necessary???
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Inter-party conflict has occasionally cropped up here and there and I am not speaking of a passing comment such as “my character glares at yours” or “well, my character is going to go that way”. I think that is perfectly good for character and plot development. I am talking about long and drawn out battle of wills with intimidation and strength checks involved.
Put em' up.... Put em' up....
My question is: does it really need to be there? I have yet to find a circumstance where it’s been necessary or helped the story in any way. I honestly find it to be extremely uncomfortable for those other players who are just sitting by. You find yourself looking around and almost feeling like you wish you weren’t there. It feels voyeuristic but in an uncomfortable way. It makes you want to avert your eyes so no one thinks you’re watching.
Now, I don’t have a problem with conflict against enemies, people trying to do our party wrong or even with a disgruntled NPC. But I don’t feel that there is much need for two players in the same adventuring party to be constantly ‘measuring dicks’ if you will. It’s especially disruptive when there is no reason for it other than one person wants to see if they ‘can’. It stops the flow of the game and takes the rest of the party time to get going again.
Perhaps there are times and places that inter-party conflict is beneficial and in that case I would be open to it. Have any of you experienced a time when this was a good thing in your campaign? Have you ever experienced a time when it was a distraction? What is your advice in dealing with players who like to fight because they can?
“But I don’t feel that there is much need for two players in the same adventuring party to be constantly ‘measuring dicks’ if you will.”
Word to that.
Although the main reason I dislike inter-party conflict is that nine times out of ten it is mind-numbingly boring, even for the GM.
Save the interparty conflicts for big things, like when killing the final big-bad is going to result in two different different moral outcomes. Proper moral dilemma stuff rather then posturing between characters.
Or do it tongue-in cheek like the Legolas/Gimli rivalry from LOTR.
I had a campaign where part-way through 2 of the players really decided they didn’t like each other. A girl was involved and there wasn’t a whole lot I could do about it but the final fight, which dragged in every other character on one side or the other, was a TERRIFIC explosive end to the campaign. EVERYONE died in that fight.
Was it useful? Kind of. We were going to have to break up the party anyhow given the irreconcilable nature of the conflict between the two players and how many of the others had taken sides on the issue. (One slept with the other’s girlfriend… Yuck.) And we’d played the campaign for 7 years! Also having it end that way actually reconciled everyone but the 2 with the original argument.
They all still talk about that fight today, 6 years later
I don’t think it needs to be there, and it can certainly cause more trouble than it’s worth a lot of the time.
That said, my current “dark” campaign draws its atmosphere as much from the suspicions and conflicting motivations of the party as from anything I do. They don’t snipe at each other (much) or draw steel on each other, but they do hide things and try to trick one another.
I think intra-party conflict gets a bad rap because it usually happens in immature groups when people take OOC conflicts and bring them into the game. That is NEVER good. But well-roleplayed conflicts between party members can be great for the story and the game.
I was playing a character who was entangled in an inter-party conflict. It was part of the story development by the GM. The other guy had nightmares that my character was going to bring about the end of the world, and it was his morale obligation to convince others, and when that failed, to kill my character.
Now, this was all planned out with the GM, but it was still very difficult to be the target in the inter-party conflict pair.
The player was very good about it, he developed the conflict well with in-character dialog with me. In the end, it brought a heightened sense of intrigue, but at the same time, it also brought a lot of in-character stress.
If it’s conflict for the sake of conflict, that can be sometimes be pointless. If it’s conflict for the sake of plot, make sure you’re comfortable with it, and if not, talk to the GM.