SoundCake
2015-02-04, 02:21 AM
Hi everybody, this has a long setup so thanks for your time. As D&D is first about relationships between people and second about dice and story, I have questions about both and in that order of importance.
I've been playing with a crew for about four years now, and a core has been maintained of myself and who I'll call pop, his son, and Bill. We've had a few additions in the last year with the beginning of an excellent campaign run by son. Bill has been with pop and son longer than I have, and though faithful and creative is not always the quickest with the numbers.
We have worked in this campaign from level 1 to level 9. The only living characters from then are pop's ranger, a monk/cleric/some other stuff follower of Karaan from BoVD, and my character, Trundle the barbarian General. Hailing from a halfling wagon maker family, he's a CG and has been from the start. The ranger and monk were NE and LE but very mild early on. They've fought many battles under the banner of the greater good. At present the characters are amassing an army to defend one kingdom against another, and spending time in a major city I'll call Starshine. (My attempt at anonymity is due to the suspicion that some of my friends read these boards, if you guys do please PM me and/or keep this quiet at present!)
Trundle is a perceptive General for a Barbarian, I built him with the apprentice (Philosopher) feat and have a substantial sense motive modifier and 16 int. If you're interested I can give you more build info later but he's been fun to play. The "General" title has been flavor since the beginning, he and Bill's earliest PC were in charge of a unit we never really used as a character asset and had in the background. Unfortunately in an early battle the DM ruled that my crit fail on an attack roll with a scythe meant Trundle struck his right hand, Bill's fighter, and a reroll critted and sliced him in half. This may be relevant later, it has been referenced by Bill since and with sadness in character for Trundle.
We acquired a new player who was as up on rules as pop and I, and perhaps even more of a powergamer than the two of us. Regarding my own powergamer tendencies- I should express that I make no effort to steal playtime. We're a party of 7, and have managed to find decent balance. I do enjoy the good smashing hit every now and then, but the "General" title is again just that. I have no interest in ordering around the other players. When my apprenticeship feat became "mentor", I grabbed up an archivist with the primary intention of buffing the party and secondary of helping cage the rage, as I was headed towards frenzied berserker. Regarding the berserker- it's part of what makes the pint-sized Barbarian thing fun; I've worked hard to build his will saves including raising wis at 4 & 8 just to prevent hurting party members. The apprentice caster would basically be saved for summon monster, and spells to buff all characters. IRL as a genuine Jesus freak I really am out to make everyone's day and lives a little better by knowing me.
On to player agency and group dynamics. While I don't like to dwell on the tendencies outlined in BoVD, it has its place in narrative and I don't want to be the police telling other players what they can and can't play. I can't anyways, I'm not the DM. However, I do think the DM, being son of said pop, has a healthy respect for his father and doesn't want to wreck his day, though last weekend there arose another argument about what the ranger could and could not do in a given situation. The character literally gets away with murder. Though we've had arguments we stick together pretty well, and for other occasions I have to give the group kudos for putting up with Bill's number problems and Bill for putting up with everyone else's flak.
Here is some in character history for the party.
The ranger. I ask myself, where to begin? Early on he was caught stealing party loot. In one instance where his character died, he said that the party got their revenge. He may be right but I don't remember this situation well.
In a major battle near the end of the first conflict, his character was ready to kill a girl that housed a demon holding the sun at bay. Additionally, due to an earlier deal with a devil, the situation held the ranger and Trundle's fates in the balance. This is typical NE behavior and OOC excusable. In swooped "the fae", as I'll refer to another player who had a helpful NG caster, and after the demon was dealt with rescued the girl and fled to parts unknown. I was not present at this session, were Trundle there there would likely have been a fight since on rescuing the little girl, the ranger swore to eliminate the fae. Trundle, regardless of perceived personal risk, would have fought for her safety. This manifested later, when at another session where the fae was not present but Trundle was, the ranger gave a "for or against me" line. Trundle being strategic wished to wait until he'd heard from both parties together, with this indecision the ranger attacked Trundle & we had a one session civil war. We managed to part with lives intact after the monk got knocked out and the ranger picked him up to resurrect him. The person driving the fae though found little outlet for his character to return and rolled up a new, LE character whose sheet boldly declares the campaign name, "Evil hijacks the show"
I'd like to point out the ranger build here. His stats are excellent, and he carries a manyshot bow, the rapid shot feat and some other ability and wording that he's basically combined into 12 attacks in a round. Those rules conscious among us have all agreed this is a little egregious, as has son, but not much has been done about it. I find it off putting but don't want to complain weekly.
The ranger made no effort to hide that the little girl was on his hit list. During a major stopover in Starshine, the ranger, along with Dragonkith (I'll explain this later), monk, and thief approached the temple of Heironious, where the fae had apparently dropped her off for protection. Trundle knew of the threat and I warned the temple earlier, but as to this action Trundle was not aware at the time. There the ranger in disguise as Heironious made a terrible attempt to assassinate the girl surrounded by a dozen or so tough pallys, and on failure the thief chucked a fireball pearl that the pallys survived easily but the girl got cooked, and later rezzed by the DM (I argued that she was not level one, as she had been something of a participant in the party's earlier encounter with a high level demon.).
The following day as wanted posters went up for the Heironious imposter, I made the assumption that Trundle would have a very good idea what had happened while his friends were out. Later that same day, the party stopped at the mayor's place to discuss a new threat that had been uncovered and mostly dealt with (a self destruct for the town held by a fire mage; in writing this humor strikes me you'll see later). Half the party left for some other business, leaving the mayor, ranger, monk, and Trundle in his office. Threats were made by the ranger regarding the installation of the ranger's pregnant enchantress as a new mayor. The mayor referenced his cred with the king and several good reasons why he should stay in power. The ranger announces he launches several shots into the mayor's chest. At this point I ask about when the ranger had his bow out to do that, initiatives are rolled, and for the first time in a long time I was not at the far bottom of the initiative, and readied an action. DM son and a couple other players talked the ranger down from the action for many good reasons. Later in the conversation the DM/mayor slipped in an insult on the monk's Karaan religion, and the monk proceeded to assault the mayor. On my reminder that I had an action readied, he announced that this was nonlethal damage, and in fear of the ranger decided this was not the right time to strike.
About the monk/cleric/....thing. He's a very interesting character, actually, human skins and threats of doom to civilization and all. I think he's been rezzed a few times and is a level below the others but has held on. OOC I can't really fault him for much, aside from supporting the tyrannical ranger. Though IC he does have an obvious master/slave ring setup going on with some subjects.
The other powergamer (outside myself and the ranger) is a NE dragon acolyte (not disciple?) of a black dragon with psionic focus powers and crazy casting/melee combos. In a recent session, the party was together at a temple of Kas in Starshine. On discovery of a secret door, the party asked doorman (Bill's ninja) to open it. It went bad for doorman, and on his poisoning it seemed good for Trundle to take him for healing, which led to a separate story encounter from what the rest of the party was up to. The rest of the party (ranger, dragonthing, monk, and dragonNoble (thief was not present)) proceeded through the open door, and on defeating a lich sacrificed 40 or so of his prisoners. The ranger eliminated chemosh cultists and the dragonthing went after Baphamut worshippers, while the monk executed all the rest who wouldn't convert to Karaan and join the army.
Again I make an assumption, but I think it fair, that an intelligent, suspicious general on seeing new troops enter the army under the religious affiliation of Karaan would probably pick up on what a few of them had witnessed. OOC they should have left no survivors, but here I'm trying to build the case that the party has gone into stupid evil territory.
As to dragonNoble, that's the player who built the fae's "Evil hijacks the campaign" character. His character has yet to speak anything other than draconic and considers the rest of the party his subjects.
As to the thief, he's a well-played neutral character who took Trundle's side in the early civil war and later on went with the group to take out the girl; I think he's just following the power.
Finally there's Bill's set of characters. His first fighter fell in an accident from Trundle. A later ninja died in a more traditional manner. His second, who everyone thought should just be a doorman (he wasn't the best build, to be fair), turned out to be feeding information to the opposing side. While I was running late for a session, the group basically gave him time for seppuku which he used to escape. It seems everything bad happens when I'm not around. IC even Trundle would have been fine with harsh discipline, OOC another player really tore into him about some rule the same day and I think his IC actions had been based on overall frustration with the group. I don't know what he'll bring to the table next but I won't know until he returns in a few weeks from some other business.
Early in my RP'ing days, a party member took out a hit on my character. It was a SWRPG game, and I had entered late but put a lot of time into it. He died with practically nothing I could do about it. The older, more experienced gamer informed me that there were several times his character (a paranoid hacker) had warned my pilot that increased strength with the force would lead to danger. I was very frustrated at the time but got over it; if it has bearing here it's that I'm empathetic and not bitter about what I plan to do.
I've spent a week or so coming up with my Batman plan. I think it's worth it, for all the time the other guys have put into their characters I should likewise make a solid effort to take them down. I think ranger will take it the hardest, dragonthing's a vet and dragonNoble has the fae in the wings. I don't know how monk will do and I plan to keep thief alive if possible.
Trundle all started from me liking the word 'trundle'. Laugh if you like. The skill craft (wagons) was a natural fit. While working on the Batman plan, I came across the Halfling war-wagon. I pored over details, and offered the party four options to go in on with me. They chose the third, the "deluxe", while its modifications had reduced the passengers to 3 and driver to 1. I threw luxury accommodations into the deluxe along with a light catapult on top and a few other mods. As we discussed it over email, dragonNoble commented on how obvious it was that such finery was meant for himself and two of his strongest followers, and not for the ninja (who at the time was still with the party). They are doing some of the work for me apparently. I grabbed four suspension spheres (fire, the least common resisted energy type among the four (ranger/monk/thing/Noble). Each 1500Gp, 10d6 30' Ref DC15 1/2) and built them into the wagon, with no secret doors, but only a secret trigger line running forward to the harnesses. A "self-destruct" mechanism, as DM son put it when I consulted him secretly, not unlike the one for the town. The dray creatures are giant mantises, because why not?
I plan to have Trundle send a letter to the temple of Heironious outlining the group's crimes with instructions to set an ambush outside of town. This will likely involve help from the mayor. OOC, I'll be rolling a few "handle animal" checks casually, trying to teach the mantises to bark, because Halflings are used to dogs. I'll play this off with Trundle riding forward with the animals. The letter outlines the pallys to bring with them some giant birds and have the spoor near the road, Trundle will unhitch the mantises to calm them down.
The plan will have one of the pallys come out and offer the wagon terms of surrender, to exit with their hands up. Does this sound too lawful? Of course. Which is why as soon as he's clear, Trundle's going to pull the trigger. The best case scenario has three or four of the power players knocked out quickly. The worst case is why he's going to give the pallys gold for disarming and dragonhunter arrows, among other things. The monk is not likely to be in the wagon but should be walking nearby, as the pallys presented a threat to the party (-Trundle) earlier, cleanup shouldn't be too hard. I plan to finish with putting all remains into the haversack the ranger possesses which holds the sword of Kas, and dumping it into a portable hole.
Should things go very badly, I plan to use dust of disappearance in conjunction with disarming arrows and arrows outfitted with Quall's feather tokens (boat), to drop boats on the ranger first and then others. It's a weird mechanic, but early on the thief figured out he could drop trees on people in combat with moderate reflex DC's, and it's been fun and not exploitative since. DM son is sharp and probably suspects a fair amount, and the party may get a chance at redemption. As it seems some only respect the power in the story, I don't see a way to go about this without drastic action, and the action I propose takes some of the heat off the son I think.
Question 1- How should I go about this problem with the other players?
Question 2- What do you think of the plan? Is it too complicated? Are there any items or NPCs you think I've overlooked that could be helpful?
Thanks all for your time, I hope you enjoyed this and hope to give you a survivor's report next week.
I've been playing with a crew for about four years now, and a core has been maintained of myself and who I'll call pop, his son, and Bill. We've had a few additions in the last year with the beginning of an excellent campaign run by son. Bill has been with pop and son longer than I have, and though faithful and creative is not always the quickest with the numbers.
We have worked in this campaign from level 1 to level 9. The only living characters from then are pop's ranger, a monk/cleric/some other stuff follower of Karaan from BoVD, and my character, Trundle the barbarian General. Hailing from a halfling wagon maker family, he's a CG and has been from the start. The ranger and monk were NE and LE but very mild early on. They've fought many battles under the banner of the greater good. At present the characters are amassing an army to defend one kingdom against another, and spending time in a major city I'll call Starshine. (My attempt at anonymity is due to the suspicion that some of my friends read these boards, if you guys do please PM me and/or keep this quiet at present!)
Trundle is a perceptive General for a Barbarian, I built him with the apprentice (Philosopher) feat and have a substantial sense motive modifier and 16 int. If you're interested I can give you more build info later but he's been fun to play. The "General" title has been flavor since the beginning, he and Bill's earliest PC were in charge of a unit we never really used as a character asset and had in the background. Unfortunately in an early battle the DM ruled that my crit fail on an attack roll with a scythe meant Trundle struck his right hand, Bill's fighter, and a reroll critted and sliced him in half. This may be relevant later, it has been referenced by Bill since and with sadness in character for Trundle.
We acquired a new player who was as up on rules as pop and I, and perhaps even more of a powergamer than the two of us. Regarding my own powergamer tendencies- I should express that I make no effort to steal playtime. We're a party of 7, and have managed to find decent balance. I do enjoy the good smashing hit every now and then, but the "General" title is again just that. I have no interest in ordering around the other players. When my apprenticeship feat became "mentor", I grabbed up an archivist with the primary intention of buffing the party and secondary of helping cage the rage, as I was headed towards frenzied berserker. Regarding the berserker- it's part of what makes the pint-sized Barbarian thing fun; I've worked hard to build his will saves including raising wis at 4 & 8 just to prevent hurting party members. The apprentice caster would basically be saved for summon monster, and spells to buff all characters. IRL as a genuine Jesus freak I really am out to make everyone's day and lives a little better by knowing me.
On to player agency and group dynamics. While I don't like to dwell on the tendencies outlined in BoVD, it has its place in narrative and I don't want to be the police telling other players what they can and can't play. I can't anyways, I'm not the DM. However, I do think the DM, being son of said pop, has a healthy respect for his father and doesn't want to wreck his day, though last weekend there arose another argument about what the ranger could and could not do in a given situation. The character literally gets away with murder. Though we've had arguments we stick together pretty well, and for other occasions I have to give the group kudos for putting up with Bill's number problems and Bill for putting up with everyone else's flak.
Here is some in character history for the party.
The ranger. I ask myself, where to begin? Early on he was caught stealing party loot. In one instance where his character died, he said that the party got their revenge. He may be right but I don't remember this situation well.
In a major battle near the end of the first conflict, his character was ready to kill a girl that housed a demon holding the sun at bay. Additionally, due to an earlier deal with a devil, the situation held the ranger and Trundle's fates in the balance. This is typical NE behavior and OOC excusable. In swooped "the fae", as I'll refer to another player who had a helpful NG caster, and after the demon was dealt with rescued the girl and fled to parts unknown. I was not present at this session, were Trundle there there would likely have been a fight since on rescuing the little girl, the ranger swore to eliminate the fae. Trundle, regardless of perceived personal risk, would have fought for her safety. This manifested later, when at another session where the fae was not present but Trundle was, the ranger gave a "for or against me" line. Trundle being strategic wished to wait until he'd heard from both parties together, with this indecision the ranger attacked Trundle & we had a one session civil war. We managed to part with lives intact after the monk got knocked out and the ranger picked him up to resurrect him. The person driving the fae though found little outlet for his character to return and rolled up a new, LE character whose sheet boldly declares the campaign name, "Evil hijacks the show"
I'd like to point out the ranger build here. His stats are excellent, and he carries a manyshot bow, the rapid shot feat and some other ability and wording that he's basically combined into 12 attacks in a round. Those rules conscious among us have all agreed this is a little egregious, as has son, but not much has been done about it. I find it off putting but don't want to complain weekly.
The ranger made no effort to hide that the little girl was on his hit list. During a major stopover in Starshine, the ranger, along with Dragonkith (I'll explain this later), monk, and thief approached the temple of Heironious, where the fae had apparently dropped her off for protection. Trundle knew of the threat and I warned the temple earlier, but as to this action Trundle was not aware at the time. There the ranger in disguise as Heironious made a terrible attempt to assassinate the girl surrounded by a dozen or so tough pallys, and on failure the thief chucked a fireball pearl that the pallys survived easily but the girl got cooked, and later rezzed by the DM (I argued that she was not level one, as she had been something of a participant in the party's earlier encounter with a high level demon.).
The following day as wanted posters went up for the Heironious imposter, I made the assumption that Trundle would have a very good idea what had happened while his friends were out. Later that same day, the party stopped at the mayor's place to discuss a new threat that had been uncovered and mostly dealt with (a self destruct for the town held by a fire mage; in writing this humor strikes me you'll see later). Half the party left for some other business, leaving the mayor, ranger, monk, and Trundle in his office. Threats were made by the ranger regarding the installation of the ranger's pregnant enchantress as a new mayor. The mayor referenced his cred with the king and several good reasons why he should stay in power. The ranger announces he launches several shots into the mayor's chest. At this point I ask about when the ranger had his bow out to do that, initiatives are rolled, and for the first time in a long time I was not at the far bottom of the initiative, and readied an action. DM son and a couple other players talked the ranger down from the action for many good reasons. Later in the conversation the DM/mayor slipped in an insult on the monk's Karaan religion, and the monk proceeded to assault the mayor. On my reminder that I had an action readied, he announced that this was nonlethal damage, and in fear of the ranger decided this was not the right time to strike.
About the monk/cleric/....thing. He's a very interesting character, actually, human skins and threats of doom to civilization and all. I think he's been rezzed a few times and is a level below the others but has held on. OOC I can't really fault him for much, aside from supporting the tyrannical ranger. Though IC he does have an obvious master/slave ring setup going on with some subjects.
The other powergamer (outside myself and the ranger) is a NE dragon acolyte (not disciple?) of a black dragon with psionic focus powers and crazy casting/melee combos. In a recent session, the party was together at a temple of Kas in Starshine. On discovery of a secret door, the party asked doorman (Bill's ninja) to open it. It went bad for doorman, and on his poisoning it seemed good for Trundle to take him for healing, which led to a separate story encounter from what the rest of the party was up to. The rest of the party (ranger, dragonthing, monk, and dragonNoble (thief was not present)) proceeded through the open door, and on defeating a lich sacrificed 40 or so of his prisoners. The ranger eliminated chemosh cultists and the dragonthing went after Baphamut worshippers, while the monk executed all the rest who wouldn't convert to Karaan and join the army.
Again I make an assumption, but I think it fair, that an intelligent, suspicious general on seeing new troops enter the army under the religious affiliation of Karaan would probably pick up on what a few of them had witnessed. OOC they should have left no survivors, but here I'm trying to build the case that the party has gone into stupid evil territory.
As to dragonNoble, that's the player who built the fae's "Evil hijacks the campaign" character. His character has yet to speak anything other than draconic and considers the rest of the party his subjects.
As to the thief, he's a well-played neutral character who took Trundle's side in the early civil war and later on went with the group to take out the girl; I think he's just following the power.
Finally there's Bill's set of characters. His first fighter fell in an accident from Trundle. A later ninja died in a more traditional manner. His second, who everyone thought should just be a doorman (he wasn't the best build, to be fair), turned out to be feeding information to the opposing side. While I was running late for a session, the group basically gave him time for seppuku which he used to escape. It seems everything bad happens when I'm not around. IC even Trundle would have been fine with harsh discipline, OOC another player really tore into him about some rule the same day and I think his IC actions had been based on overall frustration with the group. I don't know what he'll bring to the table next but I won't know until he returns in a few weeks from some other business.
Early in my RP'ing days, a party member took out a hit on my character. It was a SWRPG game, and I had entered late but put a lot of time into it. He died with practically nothing I could do about it. The older, more experienced gamer informed me that there were several times his character (a paranoid hacker) had warned my pilot that increased strength with the force would lead to danger. I was very frustrated at the time but got over it; if it has bearing here it's that I'm empathetic and not bitter about what I plan to do.
I've spent a week or so coming up with my Batman plan. I think it's worth it, for all the time the other guys have put into their characters I should likewise make a solid effort to take them down. I think ranger will take it the hardest, dragonthing's a vet and dragonNoble has the fae in the wings. I don't know how monk will do and I plan to keep thief alive if possible.
Trundle all started from me liking the word 'trundle'. Laugh if you like. The skill craft (wagons) was a natural fit. While working on the Batman plan, I came across the Halfling war-wagon. I pored over details, and offered the party four options to go in on with me. They chose the third, the "deluxe", while its modifications had reduced the passengers to 3 and driver to 1. I threw luxury accommodations into the deluxe along with a light catapult on top and a few other mods. As we discussed it over email, dragonNoble commented on how obvious it was that such finery was meant for himself and two of his strongest followers, and not for the ninja (who at the time was still with the party). They are doing some of the work for me apparently. I grabbed four suspension spheres (fire, the least common resisted energy type among the four (ranger/monk/thing/Noble). Each 1500Gp, 10d6 30' Ref DC15 1/2) and built them into the wagon, with no secret doors, but only a secret trigger line running forward to the harnesses. A "self-destruct" mechanism, as DM son put it when I consulted him secretly, not unlike the one for the town. The dray creatures are giant mantises, because why not?
I plan to have Trundle send a letter to the temple of Heironious outlining the group's crimes with instructions to set an ambush outside of town. This will likely involve help from the mayor. OOC, I'll be rolling a few "handle animal" checks casually, trying to teach the mantises to bark, because Halflings are used to dogs. I'll play this off with Trundle riding forward with the animals. The letter outlines the pallys to bring with them some giant birds and have the spoor near the road, Trundle will unhitch the mantises to calm them down.
The plan will have one of the pallys come out and offer the wagon terms of surrender, to exit with their hands up. Does this sound too lawful? Of course. Which is why as soon as he's clear, Trundle's going to pull the trigger. The best case scenario has three or four of the power players knocked out quickly. The worst case is why he's going to give the pallys gold for disarming and dragonhunter arrows, among other things. The monk is not likely to be in the wagon but should be walking nearby, as the pallys presented a threat to the party (-Trundle) earlier, cleanup shouldn't be too hard. I plan to finish with putting all remains into the haversack the ranger possesses which holds the sword of Kas, and dumping it into a portable hole.
Should things go very badly, I plan to use dust of disappearance in conjunction with disarming arrows and arrows outfitted with Quall's feather tokens (boat), to drop boats on the ranger first and then others. It's a weird mechanic, but early on the thief figured out he could drop trees on people in combat with moderate reflex DC's, and it's been fun and not exploitative since. DM son is sharp and probably suspects a fair amount, and the party may get a chance at redemption. As it seems some only respect the power in the story, I don't see a way to go about this without drastic action, and the action I propose takes some of the heat off the son I think.
Question 1- How should I go about this problem with the other players?
Question 2- What do you think of the plan? Is it too complicated? Are there any items or NPCs you think I've overlooked that could be helpful?
Thanks all for your time, I hope you enjoyed this and hope to give you a survivor's report next week.