How to deal with Charmed PCs

[Professor P]

How do you handle PCs charmed by a magic-user/nixie/etc.

Does the DM take control of the PC while charmed?

Does the DM pass a note to the charmed PC's player and have the player act as if friendly to the charmer (if the charm takes place in combat)?

If the PC's player controls the character, is that player supposed to attempt to hide that the PC is charmed (if the charm takes place out of combat)?

Or does it depend on the situation?

Thanks in advance.

[busman]

I've always DM'd the player who was charmed until they get uncharmed or killed.

[coffee]

We had one player in my original group who pretty much played himself. The only way you could get him to do anything different was to charm his character. Then he'd act completely different (which some thought was an improvement!).

Anyway, to answer the base question, I've always seen the player play the charmed character. Usually a note was passed from the DM, but occasionally he was just told.

So I guess it varies with the group.

[zargon]

If you have good role players then the charm can be a whole lot of fun I pass a note under the table to the affected player which details the situation. Then they start vouching for the NPC who charmed them (without be super obvious about it). This eventually seems strange to the other players and they set about dealing with it. But initially the party is actually convinced by the whole thing!