How do you prevent your players from being stupid?

>"Guys please don't be stupid"

You don't.

>>51716190
>>51716190

I play with intelligent people.

>>51716190

Stupidity: a lack of intelligence. If this is a baseline problem, i.e your players are not smart people, then you can't do much. If however they're making stupid decisions out of laziness or false assumptions then those can be corrected.

Foolishess: a lack of wisdom. Generally, critical thinking skills and learning facts are how this is cured.

>>51716190
By careful choice of players. Remember, half the people out there are below average intellect.

Get better players

>>51716239
It doesn't stop the stupid; just turns it into educated stupid

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>>51716190
Natural selection.

In all seriousness though, I've found it helps by making it clear in the beginning that you don't want them to fuck around. If they do, let the consequences play out, and they'll be inclined to rethink their actions.

>>51716398

Intelligent=/=educated, even tough you are probably neither.

>>51716484
>even tough

hah

>>51716190
>low-level-Call-of-Cthulhu-encounters.jpg

Why bother? So long as they're not making "LMAO nat20" jokes like the human fecal matter on Critical Role, I'd say they're fine. Just punish them for their stupid actions and after a few TPKs they will learn.

>>51716190
I train them to not be stupid.

>>51716484
IRONY!

>>51716190
Depends on how they're being stupid.

If it's that they're not taking the game seriously, and just fucking around, I suggest you roll with the punches. Have the world respond in an equally absurd way that somehow swings them back around on track, or just follow their idiocy to it's fruition for shits and giggles.

If it's that they keep coming up with stupid plans, I'd say there are three options:
1. Mercilessly let them fail repeatedly until they learn.
2. Go easy on and let they're plans work by luck and fate for a more relaxed game.
3. Have an NPC to tell them why that's stupid.

I give them enough rope to hang themselves, then after everyone is dead/in prison/otherwise unplayable I walk them back through the events that led up to the Bad End. The first couple of times they responded with something to the tune of
>"well, when you put it like that yeah that plan was retarded."

After five TPK's across three systems they got the message and wised up.

>>51716190
before an opportunity to wreck themselves is presented, offer a similar one with less severe and more immediate consequences.

>>51716190
Realistic consequences.

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>>51716190
I dont. Often one stupid decision or out of the blue, WTF type solution to a problem is the most entertaining thing to happen in a session.
>group of new players who take role playing and character creation really seriously and have avoided being murder hobos by and large
>PCs come across a group of villagers beating up an npc who has the plot hook info
>they ask why they are beating the guy once
>"he's a cultist!"
>resume beating
>they dont intimidate, persuade, or nonlethal attack the local bartender, blacksmith, and butcher
>they don't sense motive, or try to ask them to stop
>the group barbarian steps behind one of them with his great axe, and "swings it upward between the man's legs"
>rolls a natural 20
>the man is explosively bisected from the crotch up
>whole group including me is laughing uproariously
They tied up the other two villagers who shat themselves. But they committed a brutal murderer in the middle of the only major city on the continent, on their first quest. Then took the bartender hostage in his own bar and left the city.
Next adventure will involve them getting arrested and dealing with the consequences.

Players being stupid leads to the most fun moments, and the best fallout adventures.

>>51720183
I still don't get why Chaotic Good is some sort of angel. You think it'd be Robin Hood-ish or something.

>>51720241
I don't either, I just found this burger alignment chart and I didn't have a good picture for my post

All you have to do is have reasonable consequences for their stupidity.

When they figure out that stupidity will get them killed, they'll wisen up real quick. At the start of a session, tell them that you work hard to make this stuff for them and you're going to take things seriously, even if they arent.

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Pro-tip you can't

Actually just punish the shit out 9f them whenever they do something retarded. Say your in a science fiction home brew and they decided to spacewalk to the enemy ship and blow up the cockpit, have the resulting explosive decompression jettison them out like 80 some feet and break someone's spine.

>>51720570
Except dont punish them for something that's actually cool like that.

My players make decently smart decisions, my problem is actually having them make decisions

they will, if I give them the opportunity, debate the best way to approach and open a chest for about 10 minutes.

They also often really lean on me for help doing shit, which in the past has been necessary since they're all first timers, but now they're level 4 almost 5 and the campaigns about 6-7 sessions deep and I feel like they should have it all down by now, I mean I had 5e down by my 3rd sess and I had never played any TTRPG before ever.

tldr how do I make my players more decisive/ more independent? I can't just put actual in-game timers on everything, the poison gas room trick only works once or twice before it's just played out

>>51720570
>player does a cool thing
>use your poor understanding of physics in space to punish them

???

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>>51716203
This^

I constantly give my players out of character knowledge they can use in character. whether it is telling them the immediate consequences of their actions or letting them know how tough a battle is, information must always flow both ways or information about the system that they might be missing.

A lot of the time, players do "stupid" shit because they don't understand your thought process and assume a different set of consequences to their actions from the ones you will take. The most common ones being them underestimating NPC reactions to their deeds or assuming things will go their way because they are the players.

Maintaining communication with them and ensuring you're all on the same page is simply the most efficient way. Keeping non-plot information to yourself for the sake of going "gotcha! You're such fools!" is antagonistic and generally will just lead to frustration. If you're thinking to yourself "Why are my players doing this thing? They are such idiots, this other thing is going to happen!", but don't say anything, you are the one who is enabling their "stupidity".

>>51716239
This just leads to willful stupidity. An intelligent person determined to be stupid is really fucking dangerous.

>>51720640
If this debating is done in-character, have them attract attention inside the dungeon. If it's out of character, tell them to stop wasting time and hurry up. Actually you can tell them to hurry up even if they're doing it in character, because that's just silly, but dont discourage roleplaying.

As for not knowing the rules, you just gotta tell people to read the goddamn rules. Nothing else works. Sometimes players just will not read the rules period, so you might have to go over things with them.

>>51720570
Do the complete opposite of what this social retard just told you.

>>51716190
By letting them be stupid. They must face the consequences of their actions if they are ever to grow. Fuck's sake, how do you not know this already? Please tell me you don't have children.

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>>51716190
You mean there's other options?

>>51716214
This and only this

>>51716190
How do you stop the sun from rising?

This thread is the embodiment of stupidity and foolishness.
You can't cure stupidity, this condition is genetic or product of brain damage and our medical science is completely unable to fix it in both cases.
The only thing you can do is to play with people that is not below average IQ.

>>51716190
Why would I want to do that?

>>51716190
Simple: I prevent stupid from being my players.

>>51722595
This. You can't fix stupid, but you can keep stupid from playing.

>>51716190

You can't, all you can do is punish it harshly. Coming from someone who does stupid things out of boredom because every session i play in is 80% dialogue and snail pace advancement.

>>51716190
Make sure that stupid actions aren't just poor understanding of settings lore.