I was the only girl in a 5 member Pathfinder party (including the DM). It was my first time playing a pen and paper RPG in years and I was excited to finally have a group again. We all worked together and had a common interest for D&D and the like, and so our 6 month campaign began.
I wasn't invited to the group until after they had already had their session 0, so my character clashed with the party entirely. My original idea was to play a Tiefling Paladin who was out to prove your race didn't define if you were good or evil, but when the DM told me that anti-paladins existed I couldn't resist the temptation.
Our party was comprised of a human wizard/sword-smith N/G, a halfling rogue/bard C/G, a lizard ranger L/G, and me the chaotic neutral moon cultist from the underdark clothed from head to toe in black robes. We didn't get off to a bad start, I was never underhanded, saved my other party members from life threatening situations, and was transparent about my motives from the get-go; but my party members wanted to roleplay that they didn't trust me because I was "evil."
The in-fighting first started over a ring, a magic ring that – if the wearer was dealt an amount of damage by an enemy that would otherwise incapacitate them, it would instead break and deal that much damage back at the enemy. So if you happened to set yourself on fire (as our bard did) the ring would not save you from dying.
"Well I found it and do most of the up-front combat so I should have the ring, since I'm the most likely to die," I said.
"But I have the least health and am the main healer, so I should have the ring," the bard argued. The DM settled it, and I kept the ring, but the fighting wasn't over.
The bard continued to complain about the ring, both in and out of session, and devised a plan with the lizardman to overtake my church. The DM extended a plothook to let this happen, but the bard didnt take it because it was "too soon", and he only got grumpier after that.
There were a few other issues. In the early game I railroaded the campaign, but I recognised I was being overbearing and took a step back to let my other psrty members decide which way the story should go. Then there was the issue of levelling. Each time we levelled up I was berated by my other party members for not picking the stat or feat that they would have, or not buying the kind of armour I should have. It was frustrating to say the least. I didn't care if my character could have been more powerful if I had listened to them, because the point of D&D was to build your own character, the way you want to be. I digress.
In our last session we reached the moment we'd all waited for for a long time, we were going to take on the black dragon. This was far from the climax of the campaign, but it was our first big dragon fight. We descended into the cave where we knew the dragon was hiding, we weren't expecting to also find 2 of the reoccurring NPCs we'd encountered before down there. During the fight our group had to split to take on the 3 enemies. Party members were incapacitated multiple times but they always got back up. The lizard got stuck at the far end of the cave fighting the dragon alone amd his HP was getting low. I ran over to give him a chance to escape, but now I was alone.
My sword strikes weren't doing enough damage, and I was getting hit too many times. I needed to do as much damage as possible. Touch of Corruption helped, but it still wasn't enough. I checked my stat aheet again for any ability that could help me. Then I saw I had Channel Negative Energy (3×D6 damage within a 30ft radious). I had 2 HP left and I was desperate, so I asked my party, "hey, who'll be downed by this?" the wizard said it'll hurt but he'll be okay, the lizard would be incapacitated. "sucks to be you," I said, and rolled. I rolled decently, but it still wasn't enough. The dragon hit me for 11 damage, I rolled to stabilize and failed. I died.
There was a moment of silence at my table, we were about to carry on when the bard remebered, "the ring!" He exclaimed. Excitedly we rewound time as the ring shattered and dealt that 11 damage right back at the dragon in a pulse of bright light. I tooke my 2 HP and full-retreated out of combat. The bard and the wizard converged on and slew the black dragon and the wizard was revived!
You might think this was a happy ending, but the wizard decided to teach me a lesson, he said, "I walk right up to her and slap her on the back of the head." This would have been fine, but our wizard was a roll-or-it-didn't-happen kind of player. I hadn't healed yet, and an unarmed strike would have incapacitated me. An argument started, the DM trued to de-escalate it, but the wizard wasn't listening. The bard and the lizard also decided to take the opportunity to tell me everything I'd done wrong during the campaign, and every mistake I'd made during that fight. I pointed out to all of them that I was the only one who actually died, and they stopped. The DM appologised to me, and forced everyone else too as well. He suggested we take a break. I spoke to him a week later and said I wasn't sure I wanted to play anymore, and he told me he didn't plan to run another game with that group, and that he saw it coming from the very start.
Shortly thereafter for unrelated reasons I stopped working at the store with all the rest of them, and I've hardly spoken a word to them since. It was a long 6 months of constantly being told everything I did wrong, and that session was the straw that broke the camel's back.
As far as I'm concerned, my character died that day, and for me the game was over.
[zombify_post]
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