As to the whole You Cant Have a Murderer as a Sympathetic Hero thing, I give you my counter argument:

Yes, Mickey Mouse is a man who is trying to atone and is seeking redemption, but he still has a long history of murdering people. None of the people he kills are innocent by a long shot, but he still guns down a ton of folks over the course of the movie.

"Murder" vs "Killing"?

Just a thought.

The dude's a murderer, an assassin man for the triads, a gun for hire. The movie starts out with him on a hit that blinds the girl and there's a second hit half way through that sets the whole revenge plot in motion. He's not a random gun a fellow down in a bar for talking smack, but he's not a good man either, despite his attempts to atone.

The dude's a murderer, an assassin man for the triads, a gun for hire. The movie starts out with him on a hit that blinds the girl and there's a second hit half way through that sets the whole revenge plot in motion. He's not a random gun a fellow down in a bar for talking smack, but he's not a good man either, despite his attempts to atone.

I'll have to watch it at some point.

I've seen "murder" and "killing" thrown around interchangably a bit, and mainly I wanted to see if people had a distinction in mind.

Both "assassin" and "gun for hire" show up as character types in Edge. I never assumed such characters are all good guys at their cores. Some them are PCs and some of them are murderous psychopaths. It's quite possible that some are both.

Murder is the unlawful taking of another life. Killing is generally causing the end of life with no distinction in regards to legality or circumstance. Murder obviously would have to be fleshed out a bit when things like AI's are considered in generic scifi, in the context of Star Wars and The Clone Wars, clearly droids are not viewed fondly.

I'll have to watch it at some point.

You. . . you've never seen The Killer? Man, where is that Block User button - you are dead to me.

Mind you, go watch Hard Boiled first. They're not related or anything (beyond it being a John Woo film with Chow Yun Fat as the lead), but it's the superior film.

I think there's a slight difference between a tragic anti-hero killing people out of a twisted sense of responsibility and a protagonist who flips their lid and guns down someone who called them a mean name.

Because this hasn't been done yet and I can't stand not seeing this happen:

Mama, just killed a man

Put a gun against his head

Pulled my trigger, now he's dead

Mama, life had just begun

But now I've gone and thrown it all away

Mama, ooo

Didn't mean to make you cry

If I'm not back again this time tomorrow

Carry on, carry on, as if nothing really matters

Too late, my time has come

Sends shivers down my spine

Body's aching all the time

Goodbye everybody I've got to go

Gotta leave you all behind and face the truth

Mama, ooo (anyway the wind blows)

I don't want to die

I sometimes wish I'd never been born at all

I see a little silhouetto of a man

Scaramouch, scaramouch will you do the fandango

Thunderbolt and lightning very very frightening me

Gallileo, Gallileo,

Gallileo, Gallileo,

Gallileo Figaro - magnifico

But I'm just a poor boy and nobody loves me

He's just a poor boy from a poor family

Spare him his life from this monstrosity

Easy come easy go will you let me go

Bismillah! No we will not let you go - let him go

Bismillah! We will not let you go - let him go

Bismillah! We will not let you go let me go

Will not let you go let me go (never)

Never let you go let me go

Never let me go ooo

No, no, no, no, no, no, no

Oh mama mia, mama mia, mama mia let me go

Beelzebub has a devil put aside for me

For me

For me

So you think you can stop me and spit in my eye

So you think you can love me and leave me to die

Oh baby can't do this to me baby

Just gotta get out just gotta get right outta here

Ooh yeah, ooh yeah

Nothing really matters

Anyone can see

Nothing really matters nothing really matters to me

Anyway the wind blows

EDIT: A lot of people have given you a lot of advice on GMing and presenting things. You choose to ignore it and assume that your crap doesn't stink. Sorry, but the fault lies entirely at your feet for what the player did. You had a quest NPC that was hostile to the group and got ventilated for making a speciesist comment. You think that the problem is with the player, but it isn't it. If you had not had a hostile NPC and made the remark then the player had no justification for shooting him.

Disagree. Strongly disagree.

It was a nice bar. Mild racist or species-ist comments should not be met with murder.

That seems pretty simple. I don’t see why you’re getting so aggressive in your responses on this.

I think there's a slight difference between a tragic anti-hero killing people out of a twisted sense of responsibility and a protagonist who flips their lid and guns down someone who called them a mean name.

There are only means.

I think there's a slight difference between a tragic anti-hero killing people out of a twisted sense of responsibility and a protagonist who flips their lid and guns down someone who called them a mean name.

There are only means.

Nope, try again.

I'll have to watch it at some point.

You. . . you've never seen The Killer? Man, where is that Block User button - you are dead to me.

Mind you, go watch Hard Boiled first. They're not related or anything (beyond it being a John Woo film with Chow Yun Fat as the lead), but it's the superior film.

I've seen Hard Boiled.

EDIT: A lot of people have given you a lot of advice on GMing and presenting things. You choose to ignore it and assume that your crap doesn't stink. Sorry, but the fault lies entirely at your feet for what the player did. You had a quest NPC that was hostile to the group and got ventilated for making a speciesist comment. You think that the problem is with the player, but it isn't it. If you had not had a hostile NPC and made the remark then the player had no justification for shooting him.

Disagree. Strongly disagree.

It was a nice bar. Mild racist or species-ist comments should not be met with murder.

That seems pretty simple. I don’t see why you’re getting so aggressive in your responses on this.

The point that people are ignoring is that in a narrative game the players and the GM work together to create the story. Part of that creation process is the use of the narrative dice. As it has been pointed out the player was expecting the GM to follow the rules on how to handle the situation. When the GM decided that the player killed the NPC without the use of the dice or even consulting the player that's what bothers me. The player stated a general action of what he would like to do and the GM skips 4-5 steps in the resolution process to issue a decree through fiat. The player protested by saying that he didn't want to kill the NPC, but only hurt him. The GM refused to do a retcon or even discuss the miscommunication with the player.

The GM refused to do a retcon or even discuss the miscommunication with the player.

See that right there is where this whole process breaks down, why I think the GM dropped the ball. The issue isnt if the player overreacted or that the GM bypassed the rules for an arbitrary decision (I think in that position, if the players wanted to shoot-to-kill a mook outside of combat, I would have said "Okay - he's dead, no need for dice" too). It's that the GM failed to work with the players to deliver a good story.

There was a breakdown of communication. It happens to all of us. But once everyone winds up back on the same page, the GM should take steps to fix the problem. Something simple like this was an easy fix, a minor change - and the GM totally screwed up.

10 pages? Really? Go me!

But seriously, ThePatriot, my first post actually asked for advice, including whether I should do a retcon. I'm pretty sure that indicates I myself am unwilling to let my in-the-moment ruling stand.

There' been some good discussion here. I've taken the advice of some. I think it's time we shut this down, now.

Thank you.

The GM refused to do a retcon or even discuss the miscommunication with the player.

See that right there is where this whole process breaks down, why I think the GM dropped the ball. The issue isnt if the player overreacted or that the GM bypassed the rules for an arbitrary decision (I think in that position, if the players wanted to shoot-to-kill a mook outside of combat, I would have said "Okay - he's dead, no need for dice" too). It's that the GM failed to work with the players to deliver a good story.

There was a breakdown of communication. It happens to all of us. But once everyone winds up back on the same page, the GM should take steps to fix the problem. Something simple like this was an easy fix, a minor change - and the GM totally screwed up.

We don't have all the details, but I know I've been in a situation as a GM where I've tried to steer players away from dialing the violence up to 11 at the first instance of trouble, giving them chances for "backsies" and having them give me confused looks in return, contriving events so that they skirt major trouble for the sake of the game (making it clear that they're lucky to avoid bigger trouble), repeatedly, and then finally just said (internally) something like "fine, you want it, this guy was defenseless and unprepared, so he's dead, and the whole room saw you do it, here come the consequences".

There' been some good discussion here. I've taken the advice of some. I think it's time we shut this down, now.

We don't have all the details, but I know I've been in a situation as a GM where I've tried to steer players away from dialing the violence up to 11 at the first instance of trouble, giving them chances for "backsies" and having them give me confused looks in return, contriving events so that they skirt major trouble for the sake of the game, repeatedly, and then finally just said (internally) something like "fine, you want it, this guy was defenseless and unprepared, so he's dead, and the whole room saw you do it, here come the consequences".

Yes, I've had players who pushed for something similar to what you described. Once back in college, there was a player who was trying to open an armored airlock that was open to space because he was convinced that there was something important or valuable behind it (Why else would it be locked SO securely?) and he did his damnest to open it despite me throwing warning signs like "Hey, there's a blinking red light saying NO ATMOSPHERE" or that warning alarms started going off and the like. But he pressed on and finally I said "F it" and said "You get the door open and there is nothing on the other side of the door as you get blown into the nothing".

But that's not what happened here.

If the guy taken half an hour of real time and had gone on a Grand Theft Auto five star rampage, killing patrons and then cops and then imperials who showed up to reinforce the cops and then asked for a mulligan, you absolutely let the rampage stand. That is not a breakdown of communication.

But this was one minor incident, one action that was easily changed. The GM and player failed to work together to tell a story. THAT is what happened here, not that the player is a murderhobo or that the GM is heavy handed. Both sides moved away from the basic core concept of the game: Märchen Uber Alis

Actually, while we don't have all the details, here's what we do know, in four posts from the GM / thread-starter.

https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/201858-mama-just-killed-a-man/#entry2039835

https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/201858-mama-just-killed-a-man/#entry2040150

https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/201858-mama-just-killed-a-man/#entry2040304

https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/201858-mama-just-killed-a-man/#entry2043406

To me, there's strong implication there of a situation in which the player flatly should have known better, and it probably wasn't the first time.

Edit: also, evidently, "stun" attacks aren't much safer to the target than lethal attacks...

https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/201785-set-to-stun/?p=2042033

In my style of GMing I will allow the players to do just about anything to NPCs. I have made that clear to them. What I have also made clear is that while they can do anything they would want to NPCs or the situations I present, there will always be consequences, good or bad.

For instance: One of my groups was able to best a group of gang members in combat, leaving them with only 2 left alive. One of the players decided to convince them to put down their guns and surrender. They did so and the group went about questioning them (they had not encountered this gang before). This all came towards a large debate between the players because one of them wanted to kill them (murderous droid). Eventually, while the debate raged on, another player asked them for more information. After getting said information, the droid player executed the prisoners.

I can tell some of the group was not too happy about that but they didn't object out loud. This is going to bite the droid in his shiny metal butt later on. For instance, this was inside the hangar of a starport. There was not only patrons around but security cameras that none of the group thought to erase footage from. I had mentioned the cameras earlier and the group was able avoid them once, earlier in the encounter but they quickly forgot the cameras were there.

At the moment they think they took over the starport just by replacing the current person in charge on duty. They had to go but were expecting a cut of the profits of the starport like they would just get cold hard credits from wrecking an establishment, murder and public endangerment. They didn't think about the security tapes, the rest of the staff, corporate managers that would make regular visits to ensure things are in proper working condition, all the civilians would likely alert someone to what is going on... part of the hangar wall was blown out and the entire place erupted with blaster fire at one point.

Yeah, they are going to run into some trouble when they come back to that starport.

Actually, while we don't have all the details, here's what we do know, in four posts from the GM / thread-starter.

You're too focused on the game engine and mechanics and not looking at the bigger picture. Who cares if one side is right or not. That's not the issue. Neither side is listening to the other, both sides failed to work out an issue and the story suffered for it. THAT is what is important here, not who is a murderhobo or who is being heavy handed.

Actually, while we don't have all the details, here's what we do know, in four posts from the GM / thread-starter.

You're too focused on the game engine and mechanics and not looking at the bigger picture. Who cares if one side is right or not. That's not the issue. Neither side is listening to the other, both sides failed to work out an issue and the story suffered for it. THAT is what is important here, not who is a murderhobo or who is being heavy handed.

I don't appear to have said anything about the game engine or mechanics in that post, and I don't recall focusing on that in this thread.

The comment regarding stun attacks was simply to point out that someone was arguing "he could have stunned him!" here, while arguing that stun attacks should, story-wise, risk doing real damage in another thread.

The bigger picture is that the character casually fired on an NPC in a peaceful setting, and then tried to call "backsies" when the result wasn't to his liking.

Whatever dude. Your fixation on who is right or wrong in this is completely missing the point. Both parties were wrong here.

Whatever dude. Your fixation on who is right or wrong in this is completely missing the point. Both parties were wrong here.

I disagree, as clearly noted.

Furthermore, it's a bit ironic that you keep coming back to tell us they were both wrong and then insist that someone else is fixated on who was wrong.