Need some advice because I'm worried about the state if my campaign.
I'm a first time DM, about 4 sessions into a game that I've put a lot of thought and work into over several weeks, establishing a good lore, world, and characters. I just finished a session in which my players arrived to a town, under contract to investigate reports of vampires. After introducing some key NPCs to the players and letting them explore the town a bit, they found their way to a key location, and trouble immediately began.
The area in question is very religious, and 2 of the players, one of whom is brand new, began poking around the outside of the church and a mausoleum. They unlock the door to the mausoleum, meeting the 25 D, and find it blocked from the inside. Obv suspicious, the fighter, who this post is centralized on, starts shooting at the door to open it. Guards come in, and after some bad negotiations and continued hacking away at the door, they arrest him.
A short while later, as part of the same day, a big combat breaks out- one that was really well balanced imo and would be a fun challenge. Despite being let out of jail, the player ostensibly refused to do anything, saying "I'm arrested, I can't do anything sorry" despite the jail door being open and a key to his handcuffs 10ft away. Was only when the NPC that arrested him, who I planned to be a recurring guy, died, that he finally tried to leave. Ofc by then a lot of the town and all but one dm npc were killed, and the rest of the party was beat up. The characters are low level and he's the only melee with a magic weapon, but also has a necklace of Fireballs from a really lucky loot roll, both would have been incredible additions to the fight
Game ended shortly after, and he kept making comments about why he couldn't help in the combat, and I'm so burnt up that I can't can't tell if he was ******* around or not.
Story time over, what do I do here? Our other groups we play with refer to him as a problem player but I never saw it myself until tonight, but it's also never been this bad. He's a friend and someone who got me into d&d, and while I know that things will never go how I plan, I honestly can't tell if this is that, or a legit problem player situation.
Please, any advice would be very appreciated