Nervous players – do they get to you?

[sundancer 42979xp 0]

So I just watched a short video from LVO 2019 and one player was continuously twitching and bouncing with one leg. All the time. This annoyed me so much I had to stop watching. And then I started thinking on it. I can’t remember playing against someone in real life you had this kind of restless limbs or something similar and if my opponent would have it it would drive me up the walls. It makes me fell like the other one isn’t enjoying the game or relaxing. I know that for some people it’s a condition they can’t help but that doesn’t make it less annoying (like snoring)

How do you handle such situations? What do you do if your opponent constantly does something you can’t stand. (Eat with mouth open, check phone all the time, run out to smoke every 5 minutens etc)

[brennonKeymaster 31029xp 0]

I don’t mind a nervous player if they are genuinely nervous – if that’s the case then I’ll do my best to make them feel comfortable and just have a laugh with them.

If they are just fidgeting (which I think is the real issue here) then by the gods that is annoying. For example, someone who continually shuffles their cards in their hands when playing a game or messes with their tokens. You can see them doing this continually when you watch games of Magic/Netrunner/Destiny…practically any LCG/CCG.

[sundancer 42979xp 0]

If someone is truly nervous you can do something against that by making the game comforting and relaxing so yes, that is not what I meant. How do handle those “fidgeteers”?

[brennonKeymaster 31029xp 0]

You don’t, you just have to tolerate them, unfortunately – you can’t really tell someone to stop shuffling their cards and playing with tokens.

It only seems to be something I see when I go to/watch tournaments and see things at a high level. Some people that aren’t at all fidgety in their normal life suddenly start doing it during games. I swear its to put people off.

[lancorzParticipant 5700xp 2]

I fidget, I’m aware of it in the off chance it annoys others. It does help me focus. Naturally different things annoy others and we just gotta live with it.

[sundancer 42979xp 0]

Usually the token or card shuffling isn’t the problem for me but when someone makes the table go “wobble wobble” because his feet can’t stay still. and when minis start to move on their own it starts getting hard to ignore for me. :S

[laughingboy 20728xp 2]

I have four kids when sitting bounce my knee happens without me even knowing it is just ingrained in me because of jigging or rocking a baby to sleep for sooo many years.

I am very nervous when playing games because often it is new and I am not entirely sure what I am doing, the nervousness is there because I am worried I won’t give the other player a good experience because of my lack of skill/experience.

I understand fidgetting etc could be annoying but I can tell you one thing that is way more annoying than fidgets and that those gamers that avoid some basic hygiene which seems to be quite a high number sadly.

But hey none of us is perfect….. game on

[collins 16358xp 1]

I fidget. I always have, usually its a bouncing knee or a swinging/twitching foot. you could say its a coping mechanism for me to deal with anything that makes me uneasy, work, play, stress, dinner, TV, whether that fart was actually a dump etc. my wife just calls it annoying and chastises me for it.

also, i tend to do it when concentrating really hard, when really bored and when nervous.

call me crazy if you like but i expect if you took a sample of gamers you would find that most of us are on the spectrum somewhere and maybe all our ‘ticks’ can be explained by that (along with the stereotypes that exist around gamers)

Eitherway i am aware it can be offputting and if someone tells me i do try to stop for as long as i can but it is mostly involuntary on my part through years of doing it.

I must agree with @laughingboy however. personal hygiene is a real killer. take a shower for the love of god

[sundancer 42979xp 0]

The great John Kovalic (creator of dorktower and responsible for most Munchkin art) did this:

[torros 23816xp 0]

Maybe they were fidgeting deliberately

[greyhunter88 1654xp 1]

I don’t really play with strangers enough for it to be a huge issue in card or war games, but the thing that absolutely kills me is people rolling their dice constantly during an RPG.

When you’re playing on a hard wood table or something, especially.

You’ll be trying to describe something or pay attention, and all you can hear are like 4 pairs of dice constantly clattering onto the table. Inevitably someone will roll a die onto the floor as well, and halt the action as they lean back and all ask everyone to check under their chairs.

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