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View Full Version : What's wrong with being thorough?



onthetown
2011-01-27, 06:36 AM
My friend and I are traipsing through the Temple of Elemental Evil. We've had about 10 4-hour sessions so far, and we're still on the first dungeon level (not the upstairs temple with the funky pattern, but the one below it). Our DM is getting frustrated.

We want to be thorough. We think this is a great dungeon and we want to see every room of it. The DM, on the other hand, wants us to get on with it already. He constantly makes snide remarks about how long we're taking, and even sent in two characters from the "government" (a knight and a wizard) to "ensure that the party is taking care of the problem". He thought it would push us to go faster, but no. We now simply have more support for our encounters, and we continue to steadfastly explore every nook and cranny.

He gave us a map of the floor we're on, which I'm allowed to mark on. I've shaded in the areas that we've been to, and there's honestly not much left. I thought we were making great progress, and we're getting a ton of EXP to boot. Our characters even have a reason for taking their time -- neither of them really have "save the world" on their agenda, they were just lured in by the promise of power and riches. Yeah, we're going to do the whole hero bit, but we want to get our treasure and EXP first.

It's coming to a point where we're starting to take our time out of spite rather than out of a desire to explore. He's just constantly on our backs and it's starting to ruin the fun of the adventure. Either way, he did a bit of a poor job making the actual point of the quest very clear -- the only thing I really know or remember from the minor encounters and plot expositions is that we have a couple of daggers and they're really nasty, and there's probably some encounters within the Temple that will have to do with saving the world. And something about a cult. Which is somehow tied to the daggers. Oh, there were letters. And I think the moathouse was somehow important. For me, anyway, I'm more inclined to take my time and explore if I don't feel a pressing need to do anything plot-important -- and there really doesn't seem to be a pressing need to do anything plot-important in our sessions.

What's wrong with wanting to explore a really awesome dungeon? (And get lots of EXP before you go on to the more deadlier levels?) How would you handle it? And do you prefer to burn through dungeons or see every inch of them?

Comet
2011-01-27, 06:51 AM
I thought that was the whole point of diving into dungeons: to explore and conquer. If the GM (or the company, in case of pre-made dungeons) has prepared an entire dungeon for you to have fun in, why on earth would anyone want to skip any part of it? :smallconfused:

A time limit on a dungeon can be fun, too, but most times the act of exploring every room and mapping out the dungeon is the whole point.

Just keep on exploring and every time the GM makes a point of your slowness, just smile and say that you're having a blast cleaning the place up.

FelixG
2011-01-27, 06:55 AM
The way I look at it: They designed all those rooms and encounters for a purpose, to be played with! You are honoring the creators of that dungeon by playing it to its fullest.

I have known a few GMs who looked crestfallen when the dungeon they spent days preparing got blitzed through and no one took the time to explore.

kamikasei
2011-01-27, 07:02 AM
The DM, on the other hand, wants us to get on with it already.
Why?

I think that's the question you as a group need to address. Apparently the players don't feel any ticking-clock urgency that you need to hurry deeper in to the dungeon to resolve, so why does the DM think you ought to?

It sounds like the DM has attempted to hook you on some time-sensitive plot, but you haven't bitten. Of course that's likely to be frustrating for him, but then he needs to try harder to hook you, not get annoyed because you're not acting on knowledge you don't have.

BobVosh
2011-01-27, 07:05 AM
That is just it, he didn't design it. So it is less his concern of "oh, I hope my X gets them by surprised" and more of "I read this about 10 weeks ago all the way through, and am getting bored."

That is the issue with modules at times.

Premier
2011-01-27, 07:28 AM
Somewhere deep down in this situation there's the opposition of old-school and new-school mentality, and it's really surfacing probably because Temple of Elemental Evil was originally an old-school module but you're playing it (I assume) with some new-school rules - and more importantly, with some new-school mindset.

See, old-school dungeon delving, even in very large dungeons that required careful exploration, always supported a get in - get the objective - get out mentality. Your resources were constantly diminishing - food, torches, potions, spells and the like were running out.
Also, dungeons were dynamic, which, in its simplest form, manifested in wandering monsters. If you were methodically charting every single room and searching every corridor, you'd explore, say, only 8 rooms between random encounters on average; while if you were moving on fast, you'd explore 16 or more, and therefore had a much better chance of getting to the real good loot (and/or the real tough enemies) before wandering monsters whittled you down.
Add to this that the XP system awarded avoiding unnecessary combat and staying focused. You got more XP from large treasure hauls then from killing stuff, and in fact unnecessary combat probably cost more in terms of resources than it raked in in terms of XP.
And finally, old-school D&D didn't cultivate the notion of "guaranteed fairness" new-school seems to be so hung up on. There was always the chance of running into something really damn hard, and the more rooms you explored that weren't relevant to the Big Haul, the higher the chance was for such an encounter. The fact that your party had an average level of 5 didn't ensure that you'll only ever encounter low-to-middle enemies and in quantities that didn't threaten to overwhelm you. It was much more realistic, in a way: if there's a dragon or a mummy commanding an army of the dead residing in that place, what reason would they have for playing sportsmanlike? Nothing, if you were careless or unlucky and ran into them, you'd probably go down hard (unless you ran).

All this required a different set of player skills to thrive, skills which were, in a sense, much more 'realistic' than in modern editions. It was all about on-the-fly decision making, lateral thinking, and such tactical skills that are, at their heart, reminiscent of modern-day military tactics (appropriately, since D&D evolved from wargames).

But to get back to the original thought, one factor in the issue might be that you're playing with a new-school mentality which is really jarring to the DM who might have experience (and therefore expectations) with the original Temple.

Yahzi
2011-01-27, 08:04 AM
Somewhere deep down in this situation there's the opposition of old-school and new-school mentality
An excellent analysis. One that makes me realize I really should be running 2E, not 3E...

panaikhan
2011-01-27, 08:18 AM
Old-school dungeons (from my experience) sometimes suffered from the "just another empty room" syndrome.
The maps were so huge, that if there was an encounter in all of them, the party would drop off the high end of the XP chart before meeting the EoLM.
3e deals with this by making the XP tail off - you might get to a higher level than expected, but eventually the encounters are worthless (XP-wise).

Our group, whoever is GM at the time, kind of expect to chobble the place... and even get upset when this doesn't (or can't) happen.
The only gripe I have as GM, is if the party ask for details that are not there, or are not relevant. I've even said once or twice "If you really need to know, I'll make something up" just to get the point across.

Shpadoinkle
2011-01-27, 09:05 AM
Probably he's looking forward to something that's up ahead and he's getting frustrated because you guys are dawdling and examining this kinda neat looking but otherwise unremarkable and nonmagical rock of absolutely no significance for half an hour. But he can't tell you that because he'd blow the surprise of whatever it is he wants to get to.

onthetown
2011-01-27, 10:11 AM
We are playing this as 3.5/Pathfinder rules, so yeah... New-school in an old-school dungeon.

And there are some empty rooms, but we're so on edge from the ambushes and encounters we've had so far that it's just spurring us to explore even more to see what else is in store.

He's also provided us with practically unlimited resources... We've secured a large dining hall as our base, there is a kitchen with food, and we're constantly finding more food and drink around the dungeon (which we always drag back with us -- at this point our characters are happily filling their flasks with water and mead); from exploring so much, we've gotten a ton of gold that we've used to send allies into town to buy food and supplies when we're running low (whoever isn't in the active adventuring party gets to go run errands, and by the time we return our grocery list is filled). Our Bard and Rogue are always coming up with innovative little ways of getting other supplies and keeping us alive, as well.

So there isn't any reason for us not to take our time and explore. We're comfy.


Probably he's looking forward to something that's up ahead and he's getting frustrated because you guys are dawdling and examining this kinda neat looking but otherwise unremarkable and nonmagical rock of absolutely no significance for half an hour. But he can't tell you that because he'd blow the surprise of whatever it is he wants to get to.

We're actually pretty swift when it comes to getting through rooms. We go in, defeat the encounter/solve the puzzle, get the prize, go out. But, being human (IRL), all of us (including the DM) get distracted and sometimes we spend more time RPing (which he encourages) in between rooms.

Comet
2011-01-27, 12:01 PM
Funnily enough, when I was talking about exploring every nook and cranny of every dungeon, I was thinking exactly about the older editions of D&D.

Sure, the dungeons were difficult and you were constantly under threat of running out of resources, but that was exactly what made the quest to visit every room so much fun!
There are exceptions, of course. Sometimes the quest comes first and exploring comes second. Those are exceptions, though, since to me dungeons have always been about "Okay, here's the entrance. Now go out there and map out every room systematically until you run into the thing you're searching for." The magic artefact might be at the bottom, or it might be on the first floor, so it never hurts to check, right?

In 3th edition and up, I haven't even bothered with dungeons much. If the lethality and stress isn't there, the traps are just speedbumps and monsters can be fought elsewhere.

Vladislav
2011-01-27, 12:09 PM
Axiom: Character problems should be solved in-game, player problems out of game.

In this case, seems the DM has a problem with the in-game behavior of characters, and he should solve it in-game. Logically, of course, in a way that makes sense and fits the world.

Logically, it could happen that new monsters move into previously-cleared rooms, possibly setting deadly traps where the PCs thought it was safe to pass.
Or, PCs arrive to what could have been an interesting encounter only to find the area was already looted of its riches.
Or, PCs are on a clock - the Mega Artifact of Doom must be found before the stroke of midnight or else!

But, if the DM isn't doing any of this to limit you in-game, and in fact providing you with further incentive to go slowly, he really has no reason to complain out of game.

Captain Kidd
2011-01-27, 12:32 PM
He's also provided us with practically unlimited resources... We've secured a large dining hall as our base, there is a kitchen with food, and we're constantly finding more food and drink around the dungeon (which we always drag back with us -- at this point our characters are happily filling their flasks with water and mead); from exploring so much, we've gotten a ton of gold that we've used to send allies into town to buy food and supplies when we're running low (whoever isn't in the active adventuring party gets to go run errands, and by the time we return our grocery list is filled). Our Bard and Rogue are always coming up with innovative little ways of getting other supplies and keeping us alive, as well.

So there isn't any reason for us not to take our time and explore. We're comfy.
This right here points the finger at him not you. If he wanted you to hurry up and get the adventure done, then he shouldn't have giving you such a base of operations and ample supplies.

He's got multiple solutions open to him, most of them fairly elegant and not too railroadish. He could have the monsters get wise to what's going on. Sounds like your group is spending in-game days there. At some point somebody surely has to be wondering why reports from that level stopped coming in and send in the bruisers to check it out. I'd even argue that, again assuming days are going by in-game, it's unrealistic for you to have had such free reign of the place. Unless he's set the dungeon up where the encounters are all predetermined and thus frozen in stasis until you enter that room, it should become apparent that somebody is killing off fellow monsters. If it's a free-for-all sort of dungeon, it's still doable. You're creating power vacuums, somebody should be attempting to snatch up all that suddenly available territory.

Another option is that you said the NPCs sent to check up on you are still with you. Did any return to tell the government? If not, now there's two groups gone missing; that should be quite worrying to the authorities. So one day you go back to your base and discover another adventuring party there, sent by the government. Now you're on a race with them to finish the job, winner gets the reward.

Edit: Oh, and when I said all that free territory, that includes your lair base. You return tired and exhausted to find that invaders have either trashed it, taking everything, or set up camp. Now you've lost off the loot you were storing there and probably are low on supplies. Said invaders could also be hunting you down. If you had such great loot for the taking, imagine what you must be carrying.

I avoided saying monsters because, if he was so inclined, the invaders could be another adventuring party. Maybe one not so inclined to team up; after all what dies in the dungeon stays in the dungeon with no authority the wiser.

Captain Kidd
2011-01-27, 12:41 PM
dang it, this was suppose to be an edit not a double post, sorry.

Venerable
2011-01-27, 04:02 PM
Problem: your DM is weak at some parts of the game. How do you as a player respond? Do you (a) exploit his weakness to your benefit, or (b) acknowledge his weakness, and make up for it by working a bit harder to keep the game fun for everybody?

From what you've written, it sounds like you've chosen (a), exploitation. That's led to frustration on his part. Even worse, you've chosen to escalate the situation. That's a road that eventually leads to "rocks fall, everyone dies."

My suggestion: fix the problem. Give in a little. You don't have to power through the remainder of the temple in one go, but pick up the pace. If the encounters are too easy, conveniently "forget" the magic item that could one-shot a tough monster or evade a skill challenge. Put some peril back into the game.

You've got an opportunity here to become a better player, one whose primary concern is the fun of everybody at the gaming table. Take it. Be the better player. Make a small sacrifice and make your DM happy. You might be surprised at how good it feels.

The first rule of my local gaming group is Help other people have fun. They're words to live by.

Occasional Sage
2011-01-27, 06:47 PM
*Lots of clever suggestions for the DM*

Kidd, I want to play in your game!
But really, shouldn't the DM have fun, too?

onthetown
2011-01-27, 07:08 PM
The first rule of my local gaming group is Help other people have fun. They're words to live by.

I really don't see this as exploiting a weakness -- we, as in the entire party, are just trying to have fun. We want to see everything there is to see. He just seems to have gotten bored with DMing a giant dungeon that has a ton for us to see.

In any case! We've almost finished the first floor, much to his delight, and he's eagerly awaiting our descent into the second. I talked to him a bit out of game about his remarks, and he said our pace is fine and he is just getting a bit bored with the first floor. Mostly, he says, because the rest of the dungeon is pretty damn exciting. So that's something to look forward to.

Shpadoinkle had it right on the money. He read it weeks ago and he can't wait to get to the good stuff. :smallamused: That aside, he is actually happy that we're taking the initiative to explore places that we don't have to (we've already found the stairs down) and he foresees the next few floors as being very... interesting. Curiosity killed the cat.

Edit: As for the base of operations and supplies, all he'll say about that bit of generosity is, "You're going to need it as you go on, trust me," with a horrible glint in his eyes and a sadistic grin plastered on his face. Dear god.

Captain Kidd
2011-01-27, 09:59 PM
Kidd, I want to play in your game!
But really, shouldn't the DM have fun, too?
What in those suggestions wasn't fun? :)

RP as the players try to make a truce or explain why they're not done yet to a large group of government-backed adventures that are probably of higher level than them. Start worrying the players with unexpected ambushes in rooms they thought cleared or hit-and-run sniping attacks as monsters start to come back into the rooms. The look of shock as the players find their base ransacked and the creeping comprehension that the only supplies they have left are what's in their backpacks. I see those as fun for the DM, shakes things up some and adds interest to a published adventure or an new angle to a custom one.

Basically, the DM gave them a huge area to explore, a base of operations, and "practically unlimited resources." Were I a player, that would be a big invitation to do exactly what these guys started out doing: exploring until there's nothing left to explore. Saying "come on and get on with it" is too much direct DM arm twisting. Although, dragging feet out of spite is wrong.

I've blundered like this myself as a DM, giving the players way too much of an area for them to ramble around in and way too much time to do it. I solved that by coming up with a timer that fit well with the story. The item was some sort of cure for a sickness, but now they've received word that it is starting to spread faster and if there's any hope of stopping it the gem needs to be found now. Yeah it was a bit of DM fiat, but it made for an exciting race to the finish that everyone loved.

Vangor
2011-01-27, 10:04 PM
Frankly, I dislike when my party does not explore everything in the lands I have created. Ignoring people of interest and features of rooms was common for a while, and now they thoroughly investigate anything I mention, with members going back over to assure nothing was missed.

BobSutan
2011-01-28, 04:37 AM
I thought that was the whole point of diving into dungeons: to explore and conquer. If the GM (or the company, in case of pre-made dungeons) has prepared an entire dungeon for you to have fun in, why on earth would anyone want to skip any part of it? :smallconfused:

A time limit on a dungeon can be fun, too, but most times the act of exploring every room and mapping out the dungeon is the whole point.

Just keep on exploring and every time the GM makes a point of your slowness, just smile and say that you're having a blast cleaning the place up.

A simple fix to this is to make things respawn or have new/more/different mobs fill in the dungeon after them. As you never know what you might run into, if the PCs take too much time dallying that should they need to make a hasty retreat they could find themselves between a rock and a hard place. For example:


DM: You open the door and see a small army of orcs. They see you and are just as surprised as you are to see them. A gong rings out and they charge.

PCs: We run back the way we came.

DM: You run and the orc forces give chase. It's an even chase that lasts for a LONG while. Make endurance checks.

PCs: :roll: :roll: :roll:

DM: You are all now exhausted. You turn a corner to the room you cleared out two days ago where the kobolds had a small camp and run squarly into a large web of some sort. Make reflex saves. You hear the noise of a hundred strong force of orcs closing in not far behind. To the left above you see a large spider decent down the web towards you....


See how this can play out?

Weimann
2011-01-28, 04:51 AM
Well, if the GM finds that the party spends too much time looking at sshiny pebbles, he can just declare "that was the last room in here," couldn't he? He can do that, and should do that, if there's nothing particularly interesting around, which there doesn't seem to be. In fact, why doesn't he just move some of the encounters on the next floor onto this one, if you refuse to sally forth?

That said, I can undersatnd why he'd be frustrated. He has to use his imagination to describe and make living lots of scenery that will, in the end, not be relevant, and that drains on his powers. The players get to be reactive, but he must be proactive. He wants to get to the good stuff.

Remeber; your GM is a player too. If you notice he isn't happy with were the campaign is going, you as PCs can take that hint just as much as the other way around.