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PaperclipPerfector  1d ago (text post)   661 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for July 26, 2026

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More of vent/advise post rather than a small question.

Background: I run a board game meetup, formally around the social deduction game Blood on the Clocktower (Think very involved werewolf/mafia but with a DM). Some of the regulars have become addicted to the game and spun off a separate discord to play more often, which is fine, because I joinws it and play I just don't want to have to run the game every weekend which is the occurrence they seem to want to play at.

The Problem: Somehow a minor infiltrated our group. The main group is public and meets a local game hall so its whatever, but this person seemingly got invited to the separate discord full of all the addicts. We just played at someone's house last night. This minor is now 18, an autistic woman. The average age of this group is early 30s, quantitatively 32. We do have some mid 20s and occasionally some folks in their 23-24 range show up and several folks in their 40s that come play but 18 is extremely young. Consequently (thankfully) everyone is very uncomfortable with this development.

Extra Tea: She needed a ride to our event last night, she doesn't really advertise her age, so a male member of the group picked her up because it was on his way and he's a helpful person. He immediately regretted offering to help when he saw her. People where discretely playing hot potato with who was going to drive her home. Her parents apparently don't care that she is attempting to hang out with a bunch of 30 year olds. They seem to be living out of a hotel for some reason (likely poverty), but it's unclear if this is a recent thing or not. She's very clearly autistic with a severely awkward demeanor and lacking the ability to at all process anything not spoken directly to her in the environment.

The Question: Is there any advice on how to boot this person from the group. Obviously it's going to happen but the question is how to handle it in such a way as to not scar this already likely friendless young adult. I currently lean on just ripping the band aid off, but technically since this is an offshoot group I am pushing towards making the moronic discord head who added her do it as penance for being a fucking retard and adding her in the first place.

I guess I’ll be the weird one and say I understand your objection. I don’t think there’s inherently anything wrong with an 18 year old spending time with 30+ year olds, but it seems like the combination of gender, age, and general situation makes it uncomfortable to have her around.

Some of your other comments seem to suggest that women aren’t frequent attendees of this private group. The gay guy… going to the bathroom to talk about abilities? (Is this a common tabletop RPG thing?) with the sexual humor is an element I suspect would be difficult to sustain if you had a lot of female participants, it’s just not their kind of scene. For the record, I think it is entirely fair to be a male-only group, or “we only invite women if they’re chill with our vibe.”

It strikes me that you have a middle ground. There’s a public group and a private group. Tell her that this is a small public gathering of old friends, and while you enjoyed her company the transportation situation and private nature of the group means that you’d prefer she not join you in the future, and that you apologize but she wasn’t supposed to be invited to the private discord. You can make clear that she’s welcome at the public group and this isn’t a judgment of her character.

Anything that you say might be hurtful. But there’s no Konami cheat code out of saying hurtful, but true, things sometimes. Tact, and compassion, are important attributes, but ultimately you’re not responsible for how people feel about a situation if you’re honest and polite with them.

(Is this a common tabletop RPG thing?)

Yes. If the DM needs to communicate information to exactly one player, stepping into another room is the easiest way. We sometimes DM on Discord instead, if it's just a quick note.

I agree with @4bpp. The specifics kinda don't matter; kicking someone out of a group is always going to be painful and awkward. If you must kick her out (and for the record, I don't think you should, there's nothing wrong with an 18 year old hanging out with other adults if she wants), then best thing is to be kind but direct. "Hey $name, the group doesn't think that you fit in with the rest of us, we noticed that you don't always enjoy our sense of humor and because we are at a very different life stage than you are it's a bit hard to find common ground when we chat about stuff. I'm sorry, but I think it would be best if we went our separate ways". Something like that. It's really hard to not be mean while also being firm that no, we really are asking you to leave.

You asked how to do this without scarring this girl for life, and to be blunt I don't think you can. You are going to hurt her, no matter how hard you try, because it is intrinsically painful to be asked to not hang out with a group of friends any more. And if she really is lonely and doesn't have other friends, it's going to hurt even more. Them's the breaks.

Probably the most relevant response, thanks.

I don't think I have much to add to the "you are being weird for making it an age thing" near-consensus emerging in the responses, so perhaps instead a question to throw back at you: do you have a script in mind for solving the same problem ("most of the group wants this person out but we can't find a good socially acceptable excuse to kick them") if it were not an autistic 18-year-old woman newcomer, but, say, an autistic 30-year-old guy? If you do have one, what is stopping you from applying that script here? If not, think of one, because that's a problem you will probably have to deal with earlier or later either way.

an autistic 30-year-old guy?

There's plenty of them in the group, and I have a general rule around including them as long as they take advice on when they are being anti-social spergs that people don't want to hang out with. The script to kick anyone out these days is pretty much: "You are making people uncomfortable about some concrete things, and we've talked about about it and you seem pretty unrepentant and unwilling to change so I think the majority of other people don't want to hang out with you." Unfortunately thats hard to apply here because the things that are making people uncomfortable, ie being an awkward 18 year old in a group of 32 year olds isn't something they can change.

Yeah, I think I have nothing much to say apart from +1ing @SubstantialFrivolity's comment. If you have a group consensus to make the policy essentially "no under-21s allowed", then it seems to be your job as the leader to own up to it and tell her. I should also say, though, that it seems possible to me that the consensus may not be as strong as you make it out to be, because you may have created social pressure to agree ("Are there any creeps in our midst who think it's not weird for us to hang out with this 18 year old child? No? Good").

Perhaps, if you need to justify it to yourself, you could think of it as a useful life lesson - a somewhat autistic girl I am friends with, though much older, does sometimes need to be persuaded (over her own stubborn objections) that 50 year old guys showering her with gifts and inviting her to go on vacation on them within hours of first meeting are not in fact just being unusually kind. Frame it as a lecture about social expectations in your circles and how all men are wolves; if you really want to drive it home, sacrifice some of your own and your group's good reputation and tell her that the boys can't control themselves around her and you don't like what it does to the group dynamic.

We're reaching a new frontier with age-gap discourse: board games.

She's young enough to be your younger sister or cousin, you sick fucks!

occasionally some folks in their 23-24 range show up

Scandalous! Their brains haven't even fully developed yet; how can they consent to playing the board game?

Her parents apparently don't care that she is attempting to hang out with a bunch of 30 year olds.

I mean... being amongst the company of boardgamers is probably one of the least likely environments for an 18-year-old daughter to engage in fatherless behavior when she goes out. Given her... different ableness... her parents might be glad someone's taking her off their hands for a few hours.

If she's not a good fit for the squad, you guys can just stop inviting her or picking her up. Freedom of association; you don't need to justify it via some age-gap related reason. Your meetup; your choice.

Scandalous! Their brains haven't even fully developed yet.

Bruh nobody thinks this. Absolute brainrot thought, touch grass already. 23-24 year olds are fine. They have a job/gradschool, can drink, pretty much not different than a proper adult of 30 years.

She's young enough to be your younger sister or cousin, you sick fucks!

Literally a month ago she was 17... So yes I guess if you like barely legal "age is just a number" mentalities then go off queen!

You may need to learn Slootspeak. I would bet he was being sarcastic in most of his comment until the last bits there.

So yes I guess if you like barely legal "age is just a number" mentalities

But that's the thing, though, right?

18 is 18. Uncle Sam has no problem getting her to sign papers that might lead to death in one direction or another. She can take out enough debt via auto-loans, college loans, and credit cards to destroy her life permanently. She can marry anyone in any state.

Either the age of majority has real, meaningful weight or it doesn't. "Yes, you're 18 now, but don't do 18 year old things for, you know, a little while longer" destroys the whole concept.

But this is all besides the point. If you're not comfortable with her being in the group, I would say something along the liens of "We're not comfortable with you being in our group."

I am a little lost as to why this is a problem. If it is her age... why is that a problem? She's an adult!

I suspect the real reason is you guys don't like her. Don't make me tap the sign (The Five Geek Social Fallacies). Just tell her it's not a good fit and cut her out, she'll survive

If it is her age

I guess I just find it weird. The age difference is just too wide. Something about pre-21 year olds when you are in your 30s. It's interesting what a bubble I exist in. My local friends also find it odd but here everyone thinks the reverse is odd.

How much heavy lifting is the autism doing? If she is just too lacking in social awareness to fit in with group dynamics, that is your problem and not "she's twelve or more years younger than the youngest of us".

But this is my point about age differences in the discussion about marriage etc. on the Culture War thread, where I've been assured that ten or more years age difference between men and women is fine and not a problem. Gotta get the gals at peak fertility and attractiveness to men (sixteen to twenty) before they age out into wizened hags of thirty, while the guys are only hitting their prime at thirty-five! 😁

I was in a 20 - 60 book club at around that age. It seemed fine? This is the demographics of community college art classes as well, or even more: 16 - 70, because the 16 year olds go for high school, and the elders for entertainment. Also fine. Just don't have sex with her.

A book club just feels like a different sort of community that lends itself to cross generational community. Private game groups meeting at someone's house just feels closer to a local friend group.

Admittedly, I'm not familiar with the scene, but it seems pretty mean, that she can't even play games with people. Kind of the prototypical young person activity? Hence why Among Us got taken over by eight year old kids?

I think the response is that she absolutely can play games with people, but should probably keep doing so in public places in public groups. Hopefully with people her own age.

I guess. I do agree with others that since it's private you certainly can boot her out. Just realize that it's for your own preferences, not for her. It would be convenient you and negative for her.

Edit: to be clear, I think the stance that 18 year olds are basically children is bad. This is a much worse stance than to just say that you dislike her as a person. because she's annoying, because it's like trying to pretend that there's a moral stance there, and you're on the right side of it when it's not, you're absolutely just kicking her out because you don't like her being there. (I think there's a much stronger case for a policy of No Women, than "no women under 30")

Well, if they'd also kick out guys who were 18, then it's about age and bad culture fit, as it were. If it's only women under 30, okay a bit discriminatory. Mostly it sounds like a combination of younger than the youngest there, private friends group, and the 'tism is causing the problems.

(Maybe the parents are happy to have her go out and play social deduction game because it's like therapy to help her improve social awareness, as well as letting her do normal activities like "hang out with friends" and "engage in normal social interactions"? But you're a games group not group therapy so you didn't sign up for that).

I'll lean in with the other posters: why must you boot her? I do not believe it is such a harmful experience for her to spend time with (gasp!) 30 year olds in a controlled environment. If you just don't want to be responsible for keeping the environment controlled then own it and boot her yourself. But I disagreee that it's "disturbing" in any way. Society should get over this "18 years old isn't a real adult" bullshit, evidently all it does is keep people from maturing.

I think the implication OP's worried about is: if she's 18 and hanging with the group now, then external people (including future potential players) will infer that she was intentionally courted to join the group before she turned 18. Or, that aside, given that she's so awkward, there's an element of "why can't she find friends her own age?" (a question that has many legitimate answers, I'm sure) and "are these older people taking advantage of a young woman who can't find friends her own age?". It's like the 40-year-old who never moved on from hanging around the college anime club: didn't you make friends while you were a student and shouldn't you be in a different phase of life?

You could build the group out to a less lopsided age distribution, which would make it feel better (and give her friends her own age to carpool with) but it seems like you're not interested in doing that. You're not morally required to do so, obviously, but if she's autistic and awkward you at least owe here an explanation. Especially since her situation doesn't seem the best.

Also: what is it about Blood on the Clocktower that seems to really suck in a certain kind of nerd? I see a fair amount of it these days.

Also: what is it about Blood on the Clocktower that seems to really suck in a certain kind of nerd? I see a fair amount of it these days.

Honestly the wider BotC community is pretty toxic and ass. Super oriented around parasocial relationships with streamers and minor celebrities. Half the people you see at Cons are the sort of weird af people who should be solved into lockers. I disagreed with that thread in the culture war section about stopping your kids from being weird, but then I remembered the other BotC people I meet at cons and I shuddered.

Why should we moderate our natural humor for an 18 year old? The storyteller(DM) last night was gay, he kept going into the bathroom for private chats with players for their abilities. We joked that we were all running train on him. Everyone laughed. 18 year old was uncomfortable. I don't feel like it is on us to change our group dynamic because of them. It's not a managed environment and I don't think anyone wants to step up and manage it that heavy handedly

Never got a formal diagnosis, but speaking as a former 18 year old young woman who was sheltered, probably on the spectrum, and very lacking in social skills - I too would have been uncomfortable because I wasn't accustomed to that kind of humour and didn't find it funny. Autistic people are very rules-oriented and "jokes about group sex/gay sex" don't fit into "this is the model of social behaviour as I understand it, also morals". Can you imagine a situation where making a joke about running a train on a gay guy would not be well-received in a particular group? And if she copies that behaviour learned from you elsewhere, it could get her into trouble?

I agree it's not your problem or responsibility, but for people who don't get subtle social mores, "wait I thought this wasn't allowed?" is very confusing.

If she's uncomfortable she can leave. I attended a nude drawing class at 17. Walked out the first time, then finished the class. it was fine, actually, just a bunch of nude 30 year old models.

Edit: to be clear, I was an extremely sheltered Christian homeschool girl 17 year old. It was still fine.

This is more of a woman thing than a 18-year-old thing; after all, teenaged boys are probably peak when it comes to crude humor. I assure you 30-year-old women are, on average, no more fond of crude, edgy humor than 18-year-old women—if anything, less so, as overtime they've spent increasing time in HR/Karen-approved spaces and less time with teenaged boys and young men in unmanaged settings.

Don't? being uncomfortable with edgy humor is not a function of her age, because there are plenty of teenagers who are very, very comfortable with edgy humor. Continue as you are and if she doesn't like it she can choose to leave. But she is an adult so it's nothing to do with that.

If she dislikes crude jokes, she can leave on her own, without needing others to remove her.

What's likely going to happen is that nobody wants to pick her up for events. I suppose that's a natural solution.

If you just don't want to be responsible for keeping the environment controlled then own it and boot her yourself.

Why should the environment even have to be controlled if all the participants want it to be uncontrolled? That is, more than with any other recent addition from a different background.

I do not understand what is wrong with an(I assume) high school senior participating in niche hobbies with full on adults? Let her go if someone's willing to drive her, it's just being nice. Doesn't seem like your group is going to take advantage of her or anything.

I just think that a high school senior wanting to hang out with 30 year olds and vice versa is disturbing. It adds a lot of risk to the group. Now newcomers need to be vetted to see if they are creeps around this 18 year old. It creates a vector for people to private message this vulnerable young adult and we are the ecosystem to let that happen. Non-adults hanging out with adults is just odd.

I just think that a high school senior wanting to hang out with 30 year olds and vice versa is disturbing.

She doesn't want to hang out with 30 year olds. She wants to hang out with people playing this niche nerd game. Once when I was fifteen, I got into a car with a much older man that I had just met and allowed him to take me to a second location because the local game shop was closing and he offered us more D&D. I don't even remember the guy's name, but I remember the cleric I played.

Wouldn't you tell any creepy new comers to knock it off? Why should it matter if they're creepy towards person A vs person B?

No young people could join Ham radio clubs if they adhered to your standards. Or become masons. I hear VFW halls also run really old. And DAR meetings!

Wouldn't you tell any creepy new comers to knock it off? Why should it matter if they're creepy towards person A vs person B?

I'm not running a group to police other people. But I imagine we'll cross that bridge when it comes up.

No young people could join Ham radio clubs if they adhered to your standards. Or become masons. I hear VFW halls also run really old. And DAR meetings!

Not my problem and not one I am trying to solve. Those groups can run their own standards and solve their own problems.

I don’t think this is as odd as you’re making it out to be. I regularly participate in multiple social groups whose members range in age from 18 to 35. Eighteen year olds are adults, so what you’re describing isn’t a case of non-adults hanging out with adults. Now, from what you’ve said, this young woman might be a bad fit for other reasons, but age doesn’t seem like it should be a factor.

It seems like a perfectly normal part of maturation? She's going to start hanging around thirty year olds at some point.

hopefully when she's 25-29 not at 18.

Why? It's healthy for teenagers to hang around adults and see how they behave instead of going off of movies about frathouses. I remember when I was a teen and ran the grill when my dad's friends were watching football; nobody asked who drank the one mormon's share of the beer if it didn't get more than that.

You do know teenagers are supposed to become adults, right? Like that's the whole point.

It's healthy for teenagers to hang around adults

Is it? It sounds like a recipe for disaster and abuse.

see how they behave instead of going off of movies about frathouses.

I don't care how they learn to behave and frathouses that have 32 year olds in them are creepy. If a 17 year old wants to hang out with 21 years olds I think that is significantly less creepy than hanging out with 32 year olds.

I was a teen and ran the grill when my dad's friends were watching football

You were related to your father and it was his friends. Very different dynamic.

Is it? It sounds like a recipe for disaster and abuse.

Because all you hear about (especially in leftier circles with all their sexual disfunctions and neuroses) are the horror stories. Friendships and meaningful platonic relationships across much wider age gaps are normal and healthy. The thing where everyone spends their first 22 years dealing with peers within 10 months of their own age is an extreme historical oddity.

My best friend is five years older. The relationship has a certain parity now, but we met when I was fourteen and other friends used to joke that he was basically my dad. But it was really helpful to have someone a life stage ahead around to offer advice and buy booze. Two of my other friends had similar relationships with guys from his friend group. It was almost a bootleg Big Brothers program.

Half my actual dad's golf buddies are my age. He's mentored a double handful of men even younger through AA.

I'm not saying your concerns are baseless, but having the group collectively treat her as a kid sister is reasonable and healthy for everyone. And if you just don't want to deal with that, that's fine too. I refuse to let my similarly aged daughter come to D&D because I want to crack jokes with my friends without being in Dad Mode.

Yes, not everyone has a dad, I get it. Try to take care of bastards, learning how to be an adult from normie adults is the way to learn. Should she learn things from retarded woke ideology, instead?

Should she learn things from retarded woke ideology, instead?

She already has considering she goes by They/Them, uses a male name, has blue hair, dresses like a woman, and has two lesbian mothers as parents.

There's no saving that, and I'm not inclined to try.

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You could always hand her a stack of printed booklets warning her about the dangers of technically-legal-but-practically-danger-fraught romances with large age gaps. (This is approximately one-third a joke.)

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