AITA for apparently being the cause of our trivia team breaking up and no longer playing together?

A cozy pub, a tight-knit trivia team, and a decade of camaraderie—until one night when a new girlfriend’s antics turned the tables. For one player, the arrival of their teammate’s partner brought chaos to their beloved quiz night, with wrong answers and ultimatums flying. In a bold move, they rallied the team to score a deliberate zero for a quirky prize, only to spark a chocolate-fueled feud that shattered their group.

Now, facing exile from their trivia family, they’re left wondering if keeping the prize was worth the fallout. This tale dives into the hilarity and heartbreak of group dynamics, petty power plays, and the cost of standing your ground over a box of chocolates.

‘AITA for apparently being the cause of our trivia team breaking up and no longer playing together?’

I go to a pub trivia with some friends. We've been a team for about 10 years. We all actually met at trivia when we belonged to different teams. Recently one of the guys on the team got a new girlfriend and decided to bring her along which was no problem, or so I thought.

All night she ends up disagreeing with basically all of our answers. The issue ended up being that her boyfriend is our team scribe because he's the only one with neat handwriting. So after being outvoted a few times on her answers she starts with the, 'Write my answer down or you know what you're not getting when we get home.'

Well.... no prize for guessing what he does and we end up going from getting almost every question right to getting almost everything wrong. Before the final round there is a bonus question. You get to gamble as many of your points as you want on the bonus question. Now, we're really far behind so we choose to gamble all of our points.. We all agree on the answer except for her. Hers is written down. It's wrong.

One of the interesting things at this trivia is that there's a mystery prize for any team that manages to get a first. Previous firsts are written on a board. A final score of 1 is one of the firsts. I point out that if we purposefully get 0 as our overall score for the night we'll get a First and get the mystery prize. Everyone on the team starts laughing and agrees we should do it... except her. She wants us to try our best for some reason.

So they come around and hand out the cards for the final round and I jump up and take it. I ask and everyone except him and her agrees that I can be the scribe. She announces that she won't be part of something lame and walks off. We end up getting 0 for the round because we don't write anything.

The overall scores are read out and she returns. The host announces that we have achieved the First of a 0 score overall and brings over the mystery box. It's chocolate. She says she's claiming it so I jump in first and grab it and say it's a team prize so we need to decide how to split it.

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She is staring daggers at me.. I ask everyone multiple times if they want a share. They all say no, including her boyfriend.. I then say, 'I love this chocolate so I'm keeping it.' She goes bug eyed and demands her share. In a calm voice I tell her that she's been rude to us all night, refused to take part in getting 0 and so she doesn't deserve it..

Everyone else doesn't want to get involved and leaves. He's now blocked all of us on everything and the team are now saying I went too far, I should have understood that she's his girlfriend and should have just shared it with her.

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Everyone but one voted to kick me out of the team so now we've formed a breakaway team. I think they're all overreacting in ending this (the other team didn't even speak to us at the last trivia) because we've been going over each other's houses for game nights, etc for years and now it's all over.. So, AITA?

Trivia nights thrive on teamwork, but this one crashed under the weight of one person’s ego. The girlfriend’s insistence on wrong answers and manipulative tactics disrupted the group’s harmony, while the poster’s zero-score gambit was a cheeky but divisive retaliation. Keeping the chocolate prize solo, though, tipped the scales from playful to personal.

Dr. Susan Krauss Whitbourne, a group dynamics expert, notes, “Conflict in groups often arises from clashing roles and unaddressed tensions” (Psychology Today). The girlfriend’s behavior screamed for attention, undermining the team’s collaborative spirit. The poster’s decision to exclude her from the prize, while satisfying, ignored group consensus, alienating allies.

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This reflects broader issues in social groups. A 2021 study by the American Psychological Association found 65% of recreational groups face conflicts over new members (APA). The poster could have shared the prize to keep peace or discussed the girlfriend’s behavior openly with the team. Moving forward, setting clear team rules—like majority voting—can prevent such meltdowns. Apologizing and reforming the breakaway team might salvage old bonds.

Heres what people had to say to OP:

Reddit brought the sass and sympathy, serving up takes hotter than a pub’s trivia mic. It’s like a game night where everyone’s got a score to settle and a quip to share. Here’s the unfiltered buzz from the crowd:

[Reddit User] − NTA but the new gf is. Manipulating her bf with s**? GTFO

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VividEfficiency7347 − Assuming there isn’t more to the story - because I can’t see why people other than the bf would block you for not sharing chocolate, NTA. She manipulated her bf, ruined the evening, constantly overwrote everyone else’s opinions and sulked if she didn’t get to choose the answer each time. Count it as a win that you don’t have to play with her again

NotThatBlackGuy − As an avid bar trivia player, we have a core of 5 players and we've had some extras come and go over the years. We have rather set rules about answering questions. Usually, we come to quick agreement but if we don't,

all vote, majority wins unless someone is willing to 'Die On This Hill'. DOTH is reserved for special cases and luckily, no one abuses it. **If someone unilaterally started answering questions like that, they would be uninvited next time.**. ​. Playing tonight so wish us luck!

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Not_Jo_Mama − Umm, what? I’m a competitive trivia player so here’s my take:. 1: holding s** hostage for something like this?? Give me a break, lady! F**k off with your manipulation! 2: BF needs to stop thinking with his d**k. If he allowed her to continue writing the wrong answers after two or three times, that’s not on.

He should have shut her down. 3: anyone willing to side with Girly’s obvious n**cissism deserves to be put to the side. Go make a new team and kick some trivia ass!! 4: after everything was said and done,

the team deserved the chocolate for achieving a first. Girly was being as malicious as possible to the team (with bf aiding and abetting), so I’m with you on the no sharing of the prize. Enjoy every last morsel!. If it wasn’t obvious by now: NTA

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kraken-Lurking − NTA she sounds like a massive narcissist and it's a shame your friend is so spineless he cares more about getting laid than being a good person to their friends. Shes the a, her bf is also the a.

locke0479 − This might be unpopular but ESH. First, let’s assume this story is 100% accurate (and I’m not sure I buy that because this story paints GF as being horrific, unfailingly awful in every way, ruining an entire night for everyone, but then the entire group including multiple people that have no relationship with her kicked you out;

I have a hard time seeing why based on the story given to us here, a story of an awful person destroying a game night and a long time friend being upset about it, and they all turned on the long time friend). In that case, GF is terrible, ruining the night and doing a lot of bad things. Up to the point of the chocolate I’d be on your side.

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Here’s where I think you’re also wrong here. You keep correctly saying the chocolate is a group prize and GF can’t just claim it. 100% accurate! You say it has to be split up by the group as a whole. Accurate! But then you…don’t do that. You declare entirely on your own that you have decided she gets none.

You go through a show of forcing everyone to give up their share and apparently use that as justification to say they no longer get to decide how it’s split up. I completely understand why you wouldn’t want GF to get any, and if the group had a majority vote and decided she gets none, awesome, I’d be totally on board for that cause she was awful.

But it sounds like YOU decided entirely on your own to split it up how YOU wanted to, and everyone else (except maybe one person) disagreed with you. No matter how awful she was, as you said, it’s a group prize to be divided by the group. Not you.

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You just decided on your own to take the entire prize for yourself without giving the rest of the group the chance to decide (because saying they don’t want the chocolate does not mean they get no say in denying other members a share).

StellarManatee − NTA. Sounds to me like new girlfriend is threatened by his trivia friends and set out to sabotage your evening and his relationship with all of you. Which is exactly what she did.

LookAtNarnia − NTA, time to form a new team. They'll get sick and tired of that gf eventually, but she'll continue effing up everything until then.

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throwaway_cay − I feel like you aren't telling us the whole story. If she was as insufferable as you're making her out to be, why did almost everyone on the team vote to kick you out for how you acted?

[Reddit User] − NTA. Your team kicked out the wrong person.

These Redditors cheered the poster’s stand but questioned the team’s loyalty flip. Do their spicy takes hit the mark, or are they just stirring the trivia pot? One thing’s sure: this chocolate caper has everyone buzzing.

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This trivia night tale shows how fast fun can turn to feud when egos clash. The girlfriend’s disruption and the poster’s prize grab split a decade-long team, proving even small stakes can break big bonds. Reconciliation starts with clear rules and open talks. Ever had a group fall apart over a petty dispute? What would you do with that chocolate prize? Share your thoughts below and let’s keep the quiz going!

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