Advice/Help Group Help, a Bad Apple

[LiviathRose]

Okay, this may be or be not for me. Safety net.

There was a group roleplay created by someone, no big restrictions on characters or anything crazy. Pretty casual, but still asking for quality. SO. The roleplay begins and one of the members is replying with short, not capitalized, and just crummy posts. No effort in them. While other members are putting effort, but this one member might be affecting the other player as now their posts are shortening because no one has anything to go off of. The GM/DM doesn't want to be mean but feel like they will be the reason a RP dies. What do they do?

Was trying to be short because don't want anyone to... get the wrong impression or start anything.

 

[Spoiled Bread]

The GM should gather their guts and warn that player, if after the warning the player still do it then the GM has the right to kick that player. It's not mean, it's decisive!

 

[Nenawa]

If the GM is feeling diplomatic then they should try contacting this member privately to mention that they've been giving rather short responses lately and ask them if there's a problem or if they're not really interested in participating after all. This way they're actually communicating with that member about what's going on and might be able to help coax them into giving proper responses instead, while if the member no longer wants to be part of the roleplay then they can also take that opportunity to step back from it.

Of course, if none of that works, well, then it's probably best to remove that member from the group for the other members' sakes. But it's nice when a GM makes an effort to patch things up first.

 

[Crayons]

GM should just chuck them out tbh. I know that sounds harsh, but I do feel like sometimes these things are tiptoed around too much when it's one person making everyone else unhappy. Don't be afraid to crack the whip a little.

But yeah communication first is good. XD

 

[M.J. Saulnier]

Every GM should know what they're getting into. When someone expresses interest in a project, they should look into their RP history. Locate other projects they've been in, and check the quality of characters, creativity, literacy and length.

I'm the type who hates surprises and wants to know what people are like, and if they seem like they will be a good fit for the story in question. I like to see how well people create characters for RPs, because not everyone is good at fitting characters to projects. The responsibility of the GM is to look after the project. if they've blindly thrown a sketchy group together it's their fault, not the person falling short of the project requirements.

I believe in responsibility and actual management. It saves a lot of problems and misunderstandings like the situation you described. Could have easily been avoided altogether.