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Mr. Mask
2015-03-04, 02:05 AM
There were a few threads about lethality, recently. Putting aside the questions of why and whether they should exist, why don't we discuss how to run a high-lethality game. This thread may, but probably won't apply to games like Kobolds Ate My Baby, as I think they already have good rules and guidelines for replacing the regular deaths.


First thoughts:

You have to decide how much the narrative is focused on a few heroes on an epic quest. If you're framing it heavily in that direction, things may be quite tricky, unless you have very skilled players and give them options. The more your players need to replace major characters, the more it'll go against the theme and narrative.

Injuries take a while to heal in most realistic/high lethality games, so make sure your players have the option of waiting a month after a really rough fight. Alternatively, you can have each player keep several characters, shuffling between them when injury and death occurs.

For any given situation, the harder it is the more options your players should have. If you have them constantly fight DnD style encounters, their deaths are only a matter of time. Engaging threats strategically should be rewarded and encouraged.

LibraryOgre
2015-03-04, 02:39 AM
With a high-lethality game, you pretty much have to be willing to dispose of "chosen ones", because chances are, the chosen one is gonna die. You can have a few heroes on an epic quest, but you have to have those roles flexible enough to accommodate new characters coming in to replace the dead. Consider, for example, Game of Thrones. There's a lot of protagonists and major characters... but those major characters die and go out of the story. The story grinds on without them... different than it might have gone if they'd survived, but the story doesn't end just because one character or another bites the dust... it's bigger than that.

Geddy2112
2015-03-04, 02:40 AM
If your running a really lethal game, you can run it as a 1 shot each week with an extended plot. It is great for players who like to try out different mechanics and builds without requiring long backstories or heavy roleplay.


Call of Cthulu is a system that has high mortality but is a lot of fun. If the DM and all players go in accepting that the game is gonna have a high turnover that means they can build a lot of characters and test mechanics/personalities without having to commit to a long campaign.

I agree about rewarding players for creativity, but not about rotating characters for long healing. If you want death and horror, make it. Rotating characters basically eliminates high mortality.

Yora
2015-03-04, 03:18 AM
There is quite a difference between "high risk" and "high casualties". A game in which combat is best avoided, and should always be done with a big advantage for your side, is very different from a game where players are regularly starting new characters.

Kane0
2015-03-04, 03:43 AM
With a high-lethality game, you pretty much have to be willing to dispose of "chosen ones", because chances are, the chosen one is gonna die.

But (http://www.thebardstale.com/soundtrack/song_chosenone_01.mp3) that (http://www.thebardstale.com/soundtrack/song_chosenone_02.mp3) can (http://www.thebardstale.com/soundtrack/song_chosenone_03.mp3) still (http://www.thebardstale.com/soundtrack/song_chosenone_04.mp3) work (http://www.thebardstale.com/soundtrack/song_chosenone_05.mp3) just (http://www.thebardstale.com/soundtrack/song_chosenone_06.mp3) fine (http://www.thebardstale.com/soundtrack/song_chosenone_07.mp3) :smallbiggrin:

Just make sure your players are okay with dying. If they are, let them have it.

Mr. Mask
2015-03-04, 04:01 AM
I agree about rewarding players for creativity, but not about rotating characters for long healing. If you want death and horror, make it. Rotating characters basically eliminates high mortality.Well, that's how I would logically approach the situation. If someone is busy recovering from pneumonia, and I needed to run a bank heist, I'd pick up their cousin or someone else available.


There is quite a difference between "high risk" and "high casualties". A game in which combat is best avoided, and should always be done with a big advantage for your side, is very different from a game where players are regularly starting new characters. Yeah. If you regularly force your players into combat without an advantage, or even sizeable disadvantages, the combat has to be pretty non-deadly for it to not result in death. Lethal games should make combat rare and dramatic.


Mark: Theoretically, if you wanted to do a chosen one game you could make all the player character high-powered to give that epic hero feel, while the deadliness of the system would still make them feel at risk. Then if one character dies, that player could play as a weaker underling. Every so often the players would meet another epic hero of destiny at sort of check-points. That could be interesting.

goto124
2015-03-04, 05:27 AM
Firstly, is it high-risk low-combat kind, or die-every-5-seconds kind?

Which systems support which kind? I imagine DnD isn't one of them.

Yora
2015-03-04, 05:48 AM
There are plenty of D&Ds. Older editions in particular favor and encourage avoiding fights by giving XP for finding and keeping treasure, which can often be done without having to defeat the current owners.

hifidelity2
2015-03-04, 06:34 AM
There is quite a difference between "high risk" and "high casualties". A game in which combat is best avoided, and should always be done with a big advantage for your side, is very different from a game where players are regularly starting new characters.

High Casualty
Obviously something like Paranoia where you expect to lose characters as indeed thats half the fun


High Risk
This could be (and I am in a game with this) modern day GURPS. Weapons are lethal, armour is minimal and healing is very slow but unless you charge in you have a good chance of surviving. In the game I am in we have a number of characters as “back-up” we can use if our main one is out for R&R

So long as the Players know what the game "type" is then there are no issues

Beta Centauri
2015-03-04, 11:21 AM
The problem with character death or disablement, as I think you picked up on, is that it can remove a player's ability to contribute meaningfully. That condition has to be considered carefully, because it can result in a waste of the player's time, which is one of the worst offenses a game can be guilty of. D&D itself understands this, and has taken numerous steps to push that possibility back, many of which are disabled by people who want death.

So, it depends what you're trying to accomplish with the high lethality.

If your goal is to get the players to be strategic and think things through, you don't need high lethality, you just some kind of stakes that the players are willing to play for. Failure doesn't have to mean death.

If your goal is not to have to worry about balancing encounters or fudging things, then apart from using different stakes, just make sure there are quick replacements for them to use. Competent henchmen, fellow guild members, lost adventurers, friendly natives, remorseful prisoners, etc. Give the player the new sheet (or have them pull out a new one) and carry on. They may not get attached to their characters but attachment was not your goal.

If your goal is realism, I cannot and will not help you. On your own head be any problems you encounter in trying to make a fictional game meet your particular idea of realism.

dream
2015-03-04, 01:17 PM
I always thought the GM managed combat with the rules. I've never heard of PCs waiting a month to recover before continuing a mission. A few days maybe. Usually there's an element of time attached to an adventure, forcing the PCs to press forward, rather than relaxing. That always maintains the tension.

My experience is: most PC deaths have less to do with system lethality & more to do with poor player decisions. Some situations you run from. Most of the coolest & most capable heroes throughout fiction have run away at one point of another (Lord of the Rings has a series of scenes depicting the main characters being chased). But, I've seen players essentially "suicide" their PCs, fighting when they were over-matched. It takes experience playing I imagine to really get a feel for how dangerous a situation is. What's funny is even when I've warned players, some have still charged to their PC's destruction.

Managing the lethality is letting players know that, based on the rules/setting, their PCs can die, and if they play foolishly, will die. After that, it's on them, not the Gamemaster. But when a GM creates a safety-net for players, so that no matter what they do, their PCs will be okay, that GM effectively eliminates any sense of danger or risk from the "narrative".

At that point, might as well write a childrens' book, right?

kaoskonfety
2015-03-04, 01:41 PM
I always thought the GM managed combat with the rules. I've never heard of PCs waiting a month to recover before continuing a mission. A few days maybe. Usually there's an element of time attached to an adventure, forcing the PCs to press forward, rather than relaxing. That always maintains the tension.


Old D&D without a healer weeks at least.
World of Darkness games with high levels of Lethal or Aggravated damage are in months
Nearly any "realistic combat" system with bones and organ damage being a thing - you are looking at weeks minimum before you are "adventure ready"
Heck in Ars Magica I found mid-combat wounds killing you is only slightly more frequent than dying of them in bed, months afterwards - but that's a game playing the LONG game with decades passing with ease and old age being a serious concern over time.

Some times the combat, even in victory ans survival, means you failed the goal as you can no longer physically do the task. And that can still make a cool story - the heroes don't always win

veti
2015-03-04, 02:19 PM
With a high-lethality game, you pretty much have to be willing to dispose of "chosen ones", because chances are, the chosen one is gonna die.

Suits me. If your story hinges on a PC who's a "Chosen One", you're already guilty of significant railroading. Any "Chosen One" needs to be an NPC, and one who stays well out of sight of the PCs for 90% of the time.

When I design a campaign, it's not a story about the PCs: it's a story about something happening in a world that the PCs are in. It's up to the players, how and to what extent they actually want to get involved in that story.

If your character dies - well, there are generally plenty of NPCs knocking about. Pick one. It's only difficult to engineer when the party is in the middle of nowhere, and even then there are often miscellaneous hangers-on who can be played on a temporary basis (e.g. the wizard's familiar).

Beta Centauri
2015-03-04, 03:21 PM
My experience is: most PC deaths have less to do with system lethality & more to do with poor player decisions. Some situations you run from. Most of the coolest & most capable heroes throughout fiction have run away at one point of another (Lord of the Rings has a series of scenes depicting the main characters being chased). But, I've seen players essentially "suicide" their PCs, fighting when they were over-matched. It takes experience playing I imagine to really get a feel for how dangerous a situation is. What's funny is even when I've warned players, some have still charged to their PC's destruction. And then what happened. Was the game over? Did everyone just sit around for the rest of the session? Did the players get new characters and start over?

Running away is boring and not heroic. That's fine in a story, but not as fine in a game. If my choice is between fighting and dying or running away and having to backtrack, I might very well fight and die. The only reason I wouldn't is if the consequence for character death was worse boredom than retreat. But why would I play a game where the consequences of my decisions had a good chance of resulting in boredom, and the only way to avoid it was to make marginal


Managing the lethality is letting players know that, based on the rules/setting, their PCs can die, and if they play foolishly, will die. After that, it's on them, not the Gamemaster. But when a GM creates a safety-net for players, so that no matter what they do, their PCs will be okay, that GM effectively eliminates any sense of danger or risk from the "narrative". That's not the only alternative. Another alternative is that the PCs are not "okay," but are still alive. There are other stakes that don't have to result in player ejection from the group activity or a grinding halt to everyone's fun. Oops, the villain was able to kill the king due to my bad decisions, but at least my character is still alive to deal with the interesting aftermath.

Sure, have a lethal game if you want, but don't do it because you think that's the only way to threaten the characters. Frankly, loss of a character is a very poor threat, because you can always make another one. But you can't make another Alderaan after you drop the ball and it gets vaporized.

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-04, 03:33 PM
That's not the only alternative. Another alternative is that the PCs are not "okay," but are still alive. There are other stakes that don't have to result in player ejection from the group activity or a grinding halt to everyone's fun. Roleplaying games got their start with high lethality. I feel like if dying ruins a player's fun, the player is the problem not the death. While I understand your argument, those kind of consequences still put very little skin in the game.

If Alderaan blows up, my character has skin in the game. I, as a player, do not. When the guy whose a little short for a stormtrooper rescues my character, the campaign goes on with no consequence to me personally. From my point of view, no real consequence has be incurred.

But if my character dies? All that effort, equipment, and roleplaying goes to waste.

See the difference? Death incurs an incentive personal to the player, not the character. That's why you can die in video games.

Mr. Mask
2015-03-04, 03:52 PM
Firstly, is it high-risk low-combat kind, or die-every-5-seconds kind?

Which systems support which kind? I imagine DnD isn't one of them. Old DnD certainly can fall into it. Low level 3.5 DnD arguably falls into it. Though whether a game is high risk low combat or die every 5 seconds is less dependant on the system and more dependant on the game's structure. If you play a deadly combat system like high level DnD, people will die.


If your goal is realism, I cannot and will not help you. On your own head be any problems you encounter in trying to make a fictional game meet your particular idea of realism. I'm sensing some hostility.


My experience is: most PC deaths have less to do with system lethality & more to do with poor player decisions. Some situations you run from. Most of the coolest & most capable heroes throughout fiction have run away at one point of another (Lord of the Rings has a series of scenes depicting the main characters being chased). But, I've seen players essentially "suicide" their PCs, fighting when they were over-matched. It takes experience playing I imagine to really get a feel for how dangerous a situation is. What's funny is even when I've warned players, some have still charged to their PC's destruction.

Managing the lethality is letting players know that, based on the rules/setting, their PCs can die, and if they play foolishly, will die. After that, it's on them, not the Gamemaster. But when a GM creates a safety-net for players, so that no matter what they do, their PCs will be okay, that GM effectively eliminates any sense of danger or risk from the "narrative".

At that point, might as well write a childrens' book, right? Indeed. I've heard of players who hated strategy, or even argued with their GM that addressing every threat head on was how special forces handle threats in real life. It does seem they do want a linear tale of success, so they're probably not the right audience for grittier games.


Old D&D without a healer weeks at least.
World of Darkness games with high levels of Lethal or Aggravated damage are in months
Nearly any "realistic combat" system with bones and organ damage being a thing - you are looking at weeks minimum before you are "adventure ready"
Heck in Ars Magica I found mid-combat wounds killing you is only slightly more frequent than dying of them in bed, months afterwards - but that's a game playing the LONG game with decades passing with ease and old age being a serious concern over time.

Some times the combat, even in victory ans survival, means you failed the goal as you can no longer physically do the task. And that can still make a cool story - the heroes don't always win With games like Darkest Dungeon and the like, I feel this is a pretty good system. It gives you a variety of characters to play, and you feel so much relief when your favourite character survived with an injury they'll recover from.

You potentially don't even need to switch players. If it's a game about bank heists, there tends to be a reasonable space of time planning the next one rather than having a fight every week.


Roleplaying games got their start with high lethality. I feel like if dying ruins a player's fun, the player is the problem not the the death. While I understand your argument, those kind of consequences still put very little skin in the game.

If Alderaan blows up, my character has skin in the game. I, as a player, do not. The campaign goes on with no consequence personally. From my point of view, no real consequence has be incurred.

But if my character dies? All that effort, equipment, and roleplaying goes to waste.

See the difference? Death incurs an incentive personal to the player, not character. That's why you can die in video games. Yeah, it gives players an incentive to care about their actions, and tends to lead to a more interesting game. There is the potential of loss, which makes victory sweeter. Necessity is also the mother of invention, so players can become pretty sneaky when the situation is tough, with some practice.

Metahuman1
2015-03-04, 05:08 PM
Actually, no, no it doesn't. If anything, it will very, very, Very rapidly, kill all incentive to care.

Why the hell am I gonna get invested enough in my character to bother making effort for role playing or worth reading backstory's or personality, or bothering to care about who they are or what they have done or will do or are doing, or them as a person, or there story or setting, when I know full well they are gonna die and die very soon, no if's and's or but's about it?

Answer: I won't. At all.


And it doesn't matter how much you assure me that the next character won't have that happen, unless your increasing the space of time before death markedly each time, I'm gonna rapidly catch on, and that's just gonna mean you stalled the problem, and made me not trust you as the GM as the trade off for that.





And of course some people want to just charge in head long. It's a power fantasy. You can't walk into work, walk up to your incompetent boss or that one piece of work co-worker who's purpose in life seems to be to make your life harder and worse then it has to be, let them have it, verbally or even physically, and then go about life with impunity or better still positive consequences to this 99.9999999% of the time. Your playing the game cause that's were your suppose to be able to do those sorts of things. Trying to make the game Realistic ruins that instantly on principle. (and depending on the system might well be a fools erred anyway and as such will only compound irritation for the players.)

Mr. Mask
2015-03-04, 05:18 PM
This is a good example of attitudes. If you want to treat the game as a power fantasy, it will go very poorly. You will do something that gets you killed, when you could have addressed the problem more cautiously. Then, because your expectation was thwarted, you will be angry and care less, leading you to continue to do risky things with the next character. This is a vicious cycle, that tends to lead to cannonfodder characters, or eventually the player gives up and makes a cautious character, but they have demoralized themselves too much to be inventive and creative, believing the game will kill them no matter what, so they lose the proactivity that would prevent such.

In the end: Know what you're playing. False expectations will only make it an unenjoyable experience.

Metahuman1
2015-03-04, 05:58 PM
Except that you specifically said you wanted a high lethality game, which by definition would be high lethality. And if characters aren't dieing constantly, it stops being a high lethality game, so no matter what, the characters must be getting killed off constantly barring and style/genera/tone shift. A considerable one at that.

And that means, you guessed it, that even if your cautious and careful and smart and realistic as all crap and even paranoid with enough contingency plans to make batman blush, you will die, and not very many sessions into the game. Period.

Meaning the supposed actions to prevent this are an illusion, because by definition, they cannot be allowed to work for any meaningful length of time.


Which means, it's all pointless, and there's no reason to invest and bother, even if the game's foundation wasn't being a power fantasy, there's no success to be had that's worth even bothering to try for, and certainly no reason to bother role playing or backstory writing or the like. And when there's no reason to invest and bother, why play at all?

And no, having a game were charging in head long isn't always/is seldom the correct tactic for the situation and can get you killed more then other tactics will in that same situation isn't a high lethality game. That's just a game geared to not favor one particular tactic. THAT is fine because as soon as you build that sniper or that ambush fighter instead, you'll have success as a thing that can happen, and survival for long enough to bother with character or personality or back story to be worth while.





Oh, and I meant to post this earlier, but, yeah, once upon a time, D&D was a very high lethality game. It also took a fraction the time and energy to make the mechanical side of the character at the time. Further, once upon a time, you progressed your character via gold earned. Multyclassing either wasn't a think to turned you into a Multy-stalt character depending on how many classes you were in. Gaming has advanced and changed quite a bit since then.

Mr. Mask
2015-03-04, 06:03 PM
I'm afraid I don't understand. If a group of players gets through the tomb of horrors with no deaths, does it stop being high lethality?

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-04, 06:11 PM
Actually, no, no it doesn't. If anything, it will very, very, Very rapidly, kill all incentive to care.

Why the hell am I gonna get invested enough in my character to bother making effort for role playing or worth reading backstory's or personality, or bothering to care about who they are or what they have done or will do or are doing, or them as a person, or there story or setting, when I know full well they are gonna die and die very soon, no if's and's or but's about it?

Answer: I won't. At all. If you make that argument, welcome fellow existentialist! Note the same thing applies IRL. Now feel sad, and embrace the nihilism! We all die, no ifs ands or buts about it. Making all our actions meaningless! So who cares what we all do, right?


Here's why you're wrong. You see, if a character is run intelligently, thet won't die. They'll only die if they make a poor choice. Which is the point. If a 1st level charges against the Dragon, they've made a poor choice. That character would die. If the GM saves them, all the GM's done is reward poor decision making. The player paid no consequence. Why does the player even have HP then?

HP exist for a reason. To let you know when characters are dead. Because character's die.

And most of the time, characters die because of the decisions their player made. And the only things to blame are the players and the dice.

Metahuman1
2015-03-04, 06:13 PM
Did they die? No? Then where's the lethality part? Nothing ended up being lethal, there all alive. It wasn't a high lethality game, no one died. A Hard game? Sure, give you that, but Hard and Lethal are two entirely different things.



Granted I find the idea of ANY party getting through Tome of Horror's with no deaths utterly preposterous unless there coming at it as WAY higher level casters then ToH was intended for with exhaustive use to Divination and Conjuration and Transmutations first. But if there doing that there not charging in head long, there using a different plan which suits the game better.


Edit: Freaking ninja's.


Yes, that's exactly the philosophy such a game style relys on by default.


And why was that first level character fighting a dragon to begin with? Because someone wanted him dead, and didn't want to risk and enemy he had any chance of beating. And at the advancement level a dragon has to be to be 100% beat proof to a first level character, there also gonna be 100% escape proof, cause your never gonna out stealth it, never gonna legitimately persuade it of anything barring blatant DM fiat, Never gonna be able to out run or maneuver it, and it can beat any magic you have with out even blinking, and track you by magic besides.

There are no options that don't lead to "Your dead, roll a new character."

Thank you for proving my point about High Lethality games.

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-04, 06:18 PM
Granted I find the idea of ANY party getting through Tome of Horror's with no deaths utterly preposterous unless there coming at it as WAY higher level casters then ToH was intended for with exhaustive use to Divination and Conjuration and Transmutations first. But if there doing that there not charging in head long, there using a different plan which suits the game better. Cleared it with a three player party. A artificer, a sorceror, and a dread necromancer.

You'd be surprised how many of its dangers can be remedied by equipment and using summons as cannon fodder.

Metahuman1
2015-03-04, 06:21 PM
Cleared it with a three player party. A artificer, a sorceror, and a necromancy wizard.

You'd be surprised how many of its dangers can be remedied by equipment and using summons as cannon fodder.

So, you used 2 Teir 1 Game shatterers and a Teir 2 Casual Game Buster to maximum potential and accomplished the goal.



I rest my case until you can come in and tell me it was a 4 person party of Warblade, Wild-shape Ranger, Beguiler and Binder or something similarly reasonably teired.

LibraryOgre
2015-03-04, 06:22 PM
I always thought the GM managed combat with the rules. I've never heard of PCs waiting a month to recover before continuing a mission. A few days maybe. Usually there's an element of time attached to an adventure, forcing the PCs to press forward, rather than relaxing. That always maintains the tension.


In Hackmaster, a wound from a longsword could easily take 140 days or more to heal... a longsword does 2d8p plus bonuses. Assuming it does 16 points of damage, it would take 136 days to completely heal, without magical or medical assistance (16 days to get from 16 to 15, 15 days from 15 to 14, etc.). Conversely, you could heal entirely in only a day or two, if you took several small wounds instead of one massive one.

Even a little bit of magical or medical attention can save you months of downtime... even if all that happens is someone with First Aid provides 10 minutes of "critical care" within an hour of you being hurt, and you're saved 16 days.

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-04, 06:26 PM
And why was that first level character fighting a dragon to begin with? Because someone wanted him dead, and didn't want to risk and enemy he had any chance of beating. And at the advancement level a dragon has to be to be 100% beat proof to a first level character, there also gonna be 100% escape proof, cause your never gonna out stealth it, never gonna legitimately persuade it of anything barring blatant DM fiat, Never gonna be able to out run or maneuver it, and it can beat any magic you have with out even blinking, and track you by magic besides. If there's an ant in my room, I don't care about it. Until it bites me. I'll concede your point. When you explain to me how a colossal dragon fits down a 8ft by 5ft corridor.

The problem is, you assume that every encounter has to be a contest. Instead of assuming that random events can place players into unwinnable circumstances and that players should be smart enough to recognize that. Low level characters don't live in a high level vacuum, you know.

The logistical issue of a high lethality campaign is simple to enforce action and consequence. Push the players to play smart. If they make a bad decision, they live (or die) with it. And you let the dice stay where they lay.


So, you used 2 Teir 1 Game shatterers and a Teir 2 Casual Game Buster to maximum potential and accomplished the goal.

I rest my case until you can come in and tell me it was a 4 person party of Warblade, Wild-shape Ranger, Beguiler and Binder or something similarly reasonably teired. The Sorc did next to nothing. We could have cleared it without him.

A 9th level pure classed tier 1 isn't exactly over powered there, man.

Beta Centauri
2015-03-04, 06:27 PM
Roleplaying games got their start with high lethality. Irrelevant at this point so long after their start, particularly since that high lethality wasn't concurrent with other aspects of the game that are present today. The idea of "story" in a game really only came about with Dragonlance.


I feel like if dying ruins a player's fun, the player is the problem not the death. While I understand your argument, those kind of consequences still put very little skin in the game. I didn't use the phrase "ruins their fun." That's your phrase. And you're missing the point.

If the death of a character removes the player's ability to participate in the game, then the player isn't actually a player anymore. That's fine for a game in which the elimination of a player means the game is over and it's either time to do other things or to play again. But if the death means that the player is essentially stuck sitting at the table and not participating, then it's hard to see how that's good game design, or good GMing. Most games don't eject players from the ongoing action due to their skill level, as long as they're abiding by the rules.


If Alderaan blows up, my character has skin in the game. I, as a player, do not. That sounds like a problem with the player.


When the guy whose a little short for a stormtrooper rescues my character, the campaign goes on with no consequence to me personally. From my point of view, no real consequence has be incurred.

But if my character dies? All that effort, equipment, and roleplaying goes to waste. As opposed to going to what? Even if the character never dies, eventually you're going to stop playing it. Has it gone to waste then?


See the difference? Death incurs an incentive personal to the player, not the character. No, I don't see the difference. Perhaps from my example, you're assuming the character has as much connection with Alderaan as the viewer of Star Wars does. We meet the planet for about five seconds before it's gone, and have only the movie to tell us (and not that well) how significant that is. Now, suppose the game involved your character growing up on Alderaan, and there developing as a leader, solving a number of important problems, forging wonderful relationships, and amassing vast personal property.

And now, it's gone.

Nearly all that effort, equipment and roleplaying has gone to waste. Almost all of what the character was is gone. It's not powerful anymore, it has no close family, no childhood friends, no real possessions.

So, no, I don't see the difference.


That's why you can die in video games. Yeah, and then I just start over. No loss. No skin in the game.

Is what you're getting at that the game suddenly becomes boring or less entertaining for the player whose character died, because they have to start over? Is that the skin you're talking about? If so, I'm confused. The character died, but that shouldn't ruin the player's fun, right? So, exactly what impact should it have? As far as I can tell, they just pick up their next sheet and carry on. Heck, they might even be able to pick up the old character's equipment.

And, as others have said, the threat of effort, equipment and roleplaying going away is merely an incentive not to invest in those things. What we're eventually left with is that only people who want to feel the sting of death do so. Seems like there's not much left to manage, in that case.

Mr. Mask
2015-03-04, 06:31 PM
Mark: At 116 days, it's probably a sign the wound is repeatedly getting infected or just not healing. Sorry, that interjection was off-topic, just thinking about it.



One thing we haven't talked about much is the structure of a high-lethality game. In old DnD, you would do it Diablo style, making trips into the dungeon then recuperating in town inbetween. Similarly, in Aces and Eights and some games like the Game of Thrones RPGs, Ars Magica etc., you have a town/house/clan/home-base you operate from, periodically dealing with threats on something like a monthly basis, or sometimes rotating characters to deal with several threats at once or a sequence of threats (namely Ars Magica). This is a different style than the typical 3.5 or 4e DnD one, where the game is generally expects you to get through the dungeon/adventure/session in one go, with GMs adding time limits so you can't keep resting to recharge spells.

One thing that does stay roughly the same, is the way you rotate in new characters.

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-04, 06:40 PM
If a player can't die, what meaning do hit point rules even function? Why have them anyway?

If tomorrow, you woke up and you could never die, you want me to believe that it would not not change your decision making paradigm? You want me to believe you wouldn't be reckless? Without death's sting, life has no meaning. With a threat of death, players have the free rein to make horrible decision after horrible decision. At that point, what exactly is the GM supposed to do? He's suck cleaning up their messes until the somehow dig themselves out of the hole.

It'd be fun in football if you could kick off-sides. But you can't, because doing so radically alters the nature of the game. And not in a good way.

LibraryOgre
2015-03-04, 06:45 PM
Mark: At 116 days, it's probably a sign the wound is repeatedly getting infected or just not healing. Sorry, that interjection was off-topic, just thinking about it.

Keep in mind that a 16 point wound is pretty massive... a 1st level human fighter will have only 38 HP at max. With an 18 Con, a 16 point wound is 55% likely to knock you out of the fight for 5 seconds to several minutes, and represents you being beaten half-way to death by a single swipe of a sword. That's 136 days to get up to perfect fighting trim, mind you... and as someone who broke his ankle about 6 months ago and STILL has some lingering problems, it doesn't seem too unreasonable.

Beta Centauri
2015-03-04, 06:56 PM
If you make that argument, welcome fellow existentialist! Note the same thing applies to you IRL. Now feel sad, and embrace the nihilism! We all die, no ifs ands or buts about it. Making all your actions meaningless! So who cares what you do, right? It's not the same, because I can't just make another character in real life. And since this isn't a game, there's no expectation that it be enjoyable: the consequence of screwing around isn't that I just go home early and do something else, but could be a lot of pain and suffering without the luxury of a metastate that allows me to admire how realistic this all is.


Here's why you're wrong. You see, if you run your character intelligently, you won't die. You'll only die if you make a poor choice. Which is the point. If a 1st level charges against the Dragon, they've made a poor choice. Then what are we even talking about? No one does something like that who either didn't read the rules, or is deliberately trying to screw around. The idea of lethality seems to be, for you, just a way to make yourself feel superior to some imaginary group of screw-ups.


That character would die. If the GM saves them, all the GM's done is reward poor decision making. The player paid no consequence. Why does the player even have HP then? Continuation of the false dichotomy. It isn't "live" or "die," where one is always the reward and one is always the consequence. It's "succeed" or "fail," and one can fail even if they survive, and succeed even if they die.

If all the GM can think to do with a dragon is have it kill a character, then that sounds like a GM problem to me. I won't bother listing the dozens of alternatives that pop almost instantly into my brain, that a clear failures for the character, but not death; I'm sure you can think of your own.


HP exist for a reason. To let you know when characters are dead. Because character's die. And you make another one and keep going. So what?


And most of the time, characters die because of the decisions their player made. And the only things to blame are the players and the dice. Ah, yes: don't blame the GM, right? Never the GM.

No, most of the time, players die because of a decision the GM made. Even if the GM rolled on a random table, they were the one the one who decided to do that, and who interpreted the results.

You say:


The problem is, you assume that every encounter has to be a contest. Instead of assuming that random events can place players into unwinnable circumstances and that players should be smart enough to recognize that. Whether or not it's unwinnable, and whether or not that's going to be recognizable to the players, is almost entirely in the GM's hands. If they roll "green dragon" on the table, then the GM is the one who decides whether the dragon is able to just surprise them and gas them all, or if it's a situation they can deal with. In the latter case, if they survive, didn't the GM "save them"?

It's the same with player ideas. If the player wants to run and attack the dragon, the GM is the one who decides whether that's fatal or something else. The GM decides what's "foolish" or not.

So, if you're saying that lethality is about consequences for poor decision making: great! I can have a"high lethality" game, and simply decide that the "poor" decisions are poor for unfortunate (to the character) reasons, but not lethal. Done!

Try to respond to this post without using the words "jump" or "cliff." Let's keep things original here, shall we?


If a player can't die, what meaning do hit point rules even function? Why have them anyway? Unconsicousness, for one thing.

And HP can really mean anything. They're just a pacing mechanism for combat. A table could decide, for a given combat, that 0 HP means the opponent drops the McGuffin they're holding and teleports away.


If tomorrow, you woke up and you could never die, you want me to believe that it would not not change your decision making paradigm? No, but the characters don't know they can never die. And before you say "But the characters would figure out that they can't die": My characters don't figure out anything I don't want them to figure out, the same as any other fictional creation.


You want me to believe you wouldn't be reckless? No, because my recklessness could have serious consequences for things I hold dear.


Without death's sting, life has no meaning. Untrue. The threat of cessation of the things around us can also give life meaning.


With a threat of death, players have the free rein to make horrible decision after horrible decision. Only if death is the only consequence you can imagine. But I'm sure you're smarter than that.


At that point, what exactly is the GM supposed to do? He's suck cleaning up their messes until the somehow dig themselves out of the hole. I'm not sure what this means. The GM doesn't have to care if they dig themselves out of their "hole." But the GM can help make that hole worth the players spending their free time on.


It'd be fun in football if you could kick off-sides. But you can't, because doing so radically alters the nature of the game. And not in a good way. Says you. I don't personally see how it would make a big difference. One side will still win and the other will still lose. Individuals will still rack up statistics, meaning that even a player on the losing team can actually come out far ahead.

Failure other than death isn't cheating, the way trying to kick offsides would be. It's just a different set of stakes.

Thrudd
2015-03-04, 07:41 PM
Assuming by "high lethality", you are talking about something like Basic/Expert D&D completely by the book, no fudging. (Or retro clone like labyrinth lords, dark dungeons, ACKS)
Possibly 1e AD&D by the book, as well (though that is a bit more forgiving). This means random encounters, wandering monsters, xp for treasure, morale and reaction rolls, etc.

Note that this does not mean characters will inevitably be killed in every adventure, nor that the DM is always sending overpowered things at the players purposely trying to kill them. We should assume a good, responsible DM that is doing their best to make the game fair and fun.

The assumed format is that the pc's will begin in a town or city or other safe location where they can procure equipment and find out about possible adventures. They need such a place to return to or retreat to in between dungeon expeditions.

Any particular adventure and the game world as a whole should be able to take into account the fact that the characters will likely need to make more than one trip to the dungeon, and will possibly need to wait weeks in between expeditions in order to heal wounds. If your adventure breaks because the players retreat and need to heal before coming back, you have designed your adventure inappropriately.

When a character dies, there are different options depending on the level of the characters and the resources available to them. At low levels where resurrection isn't an option, the player generally rolls up a new character and waits for a chance to be introduced to the party. Usually the party will be looking for a replacement for their fallen member, so it makes sense to bring in the new guy. Since it is likely they will be retreating back to town shortly after losing someone anyway, it shouldn't take too long.

At mid and higher levels, the party will have henchmen, lower level NPCs that are members of the party they can boss around. If a player loses their main character at this point, they might choose to play as a well liked henchmen instead, "promoting" them to full party member.

One alternative possibility that I think is fun is to have each player roll up a few different characters at the start of the game. This group if characters is an adventuring company or part of a guild. On each expedition, each player chooses one character from their stable to participate. Players could switch characters for every adventure if they want to. If a character dies, you have more ready to go, and a built in reason for them to be there. When they reach high enough level to get henchmen, this also makes sense, they are new recruits for the company.

Having a character die is not the end of the game or the end of fun. Sometimes you need to wait a few minutes before you can get back into it. Forced into being a bystander temporarily is one possible motivation to do your best to avoid your characters death.

Duke of URRL
2015-03-05, 12:08 AM
You have to decide how much the narrative is focused on a few heroes on an epic quest. If you're framing it heavily in that direction, things may be quite tricky, unless you have very skilled players and give them options. The more your players need to replace major characters, the more it'll go against the theme and narrative.

It's a bit wrong to think this view. This is the storytelling view. Like this is the story of Luke, so Luke can never die as the story must come to a happy ending. It's classic Lord of the Rings, or even Eberron thinking: ''only the small handful of people can save the world and everyone else is useless.'' It's just as easy to replace a character as it is to give them immortality.



Injuries take a while to heal in most realistic/high lethality games, so make sure your players have the option of waiting a month after a really rough fight. Alternatively, you can have each player keep several characters, shuffling between them when injury and death occurs.

The shuffle works great. But High Lethality can have whatever healing you have in any game. If you like having heal bots in the game so all characters are at 100% at all times or doing 15 minute days, those can both work for a high lethality game.

High Lethality really has nothing to do with injuries. low or high injuries is really separate.



For any given situation, the harder it is the more options your players should have. If you have them constantly fight DnD style encounters, their deaths are only a matter of time. Engaging threats strategically should be rewarded and encouraged.

There is no reason high lethality needs more options. Death is not just a matter of time.

Would you say ''in a no lethality game it is only a matter of time before the DM fudges, twists, breaks, ignores or rewrites the rules to keep a character alive? Like: ''The giant throws a boulder at Zorm! '' DM looks over his notes sees that Zorm has three hit points left and rolls damage total of 22 and says ''the boulder does 2 damage!'' Player of Zorm "Wow, Zorm lives, he was at three hit points!'' DM-"er, um, yea, wow....what luck''

Knaight
2015-03-05, 12:14 AM
If tomorrow, you woke up and you could never die, you want me to believe that it would not not change your decision making paradigm? You want me to believe you wouldn't be reckless? Without death's sting, life has no meaning. With a threat of death, players have the free rein to make horrible decision after horrible decision. At that point, what exactly is the GM supposed to do? He's suck cleaning up their messes until the somehow dig themselves out of the hole.

The vast majority of risks I don't take don't have death as the likely failure condition. There are tons of ways things can go horribly wrong without you dying in the process, and the absence of the threat of personal death by no means implies that every other threat out there disappears.

Arbane
2015-03-05, 04:55 AM
Here's why you're wrong. You see, if a character is run intelligently, thet won't die. They'll only die if they make a poor choice.

Sometimes, the 'poor choice' turns out to be 'turn left instead of right' or 'talk to this person' or 'play in this group'. And sometimes, in some games, 'playing intelligently' requires a definition of intelligent that includes actual mind-reading capacity to figure out what that sadist of a GM is expecting.


Granted I find the idea of ANY party getting through Tome of Horror's with no deaths utterly preposterous unless there coming at it as WAY higher level casters then ToH was intended for with exhaustive use to Divination and Conjuration and Transmutations first. But if there doing that there not charging in head long, there using a different plan which suits the game better.


ISTR one of Gygax's players managed it - as a FIGHTER. He did this by
a: knowing Gygax's favorite screw-you traps and
b: herding about 200 prisoners (orcs, I think) ahead of them.


If a player can't die, what meaning do hit point rules even function? Why have them anyway?

"I can't kill you, but you'd be surprised what you can live through."


If tomorrow, you woke up and you could never die, you want me to believe that it would not not change your decision making paradigm? You want me to believe you wouldn't be reckless? Without death's sting, life has no meaning. With a threat of death, players have the free rein to make horrible decision after horrible decision. At that point, what exactly is the GM supposed to do? He's suck cleaning up their messes until the somehow dig themselves out of the hole.

There are PLENTY of ways people can screw up their lives and everything they care about that don't involve dying. (The noted Killer GM John Wick once ran a Champions campaign where he promised not to kill any PCs - instead, he BROKE them in ways that were custom-designed to make the players rage-quit or be completely useless. He wrote an essay about it called 'Play Dirty' which I don't recommend reading except as a cautionary tale, as he carried this philosophy forward in his work on Legend of the Five Rings and various other games. :smallmad: )



The vast majority of risks I don't take don't have death as the likely failure condition. There are tons of ways things can go horribly wrong without you dying in the process, and the absence of the threat of personal death by no means implies that every other threat out there disappears.

...what he said.


It's a bit wrong to think this view. This is the storytelling view. Like this is the story of Luke, so Luke can never die as the story must come to a happy ending. It's classic Lord of the Rings, or even Eberron thinking: ''only the small handful of people can save the world and everyone else is useless.'' It's just as easy to replace a character as it is to give them immortality.

Of course, that approach can have its own problems. (http://albruno3.blogspot.com/2010/06/rpgnet-rant-16-great-gamma-world-death.html) (Warning: Contains F-bombs.)

goto124
2015-03-05, 06:15 AM
Sometimes, the 'poor choice' turns out to be 'turn left instead of right' or 'talk to this There are PLENTY of ways people can screw up their lives and everything they care about that don't involve dying. (The noted Killer GM John Wick once ran a Champions campaign where he promised not to kill any PCs - instead, he BROKE them in ways that were custom-designed to make the players rage-quit or be completely useless. He wrote an essay about it called 'Play Dirty' which I don't recommend reading except as a cautionary tale, as he carried this philosophy forward in his work on Legend of the Five Rings and various other games. :smallmad: )

*sunders players' weapons*

Jay R
2015-03-05, 11:12 AM
Roleplaying games got their start with high lethality.

Not as much as most people think. Tomb of Horrors is famous because it was so unusual.

Of my first ten characters, starting in 1975, only two ever died. There was high risk, but we worked hard to avoid it.

I don't remember ever finding a campaign, or anybody who talked about a campaign, in which characters routinely died. But we all know we could, if we didn't sometimes cut and run.

Beta Centauri
2015-03-05, 02:19 PM
When a character dies, there are different options depending on the level of the characters and the resources available to them. Yes, like you said, resurrection (which many tables flat out remove, because it "cheapens" death), replacement characters (likely somewhat boring unless the henchmen were chosen for their suitability as back-ups), or back-up characters. I prefer the last option. With some forethought, there doesn't have to be any delay in the player's ability to participate.


Having a character die is not the end of the game or the end of fun. Agreed. That's why I don't understand what's particularly tricky about running a "high-lethality" game. If someone dies, they just go to a back up. I believe that in Dark Sun, which was originally designed to be a very lethal setting, players were advised to have a "tree" of several connected characters, each of whom could step in quickly if their primary one died.


Sometimes you need to wait a few minutes before you can get back into it. Forced into being a bystander temporarily is one possible motivation to do your best to avoid your characters death. I'm very much against this. Sure, even when one's character is alive and present there are going to be lulls for the player, but I don't see why we should accept a game that can completely eject players, for any amount of time at all, who are playing legally. If people are happy to sit out, or enjoy risk-mitigation for its own sake, great, but "you won't get to play the game" is a preposterous incentive in a friendly, cooperative game.

Thrudd
2015-03-05, 02:38 PM
I'm very much against this. Sure, even when one's character is alive and present there are going to be lulls for the player, but I don't see why we should accept a game that can completely eject players, for any amount of time at all, who are playing legally. If people are happy to sit out, or enjoy risk-mitigation for its own sake, great, but "you won't get to play the game" is a preposterous incentive in a friendly, cooperative game.

There are concessions that need to be made in the cause of verisimilitude and immersion in the game world. Unless the backup character was in the same location already (henchmen or players running multiple characters simultaneously), you have to wait until it makes sense for another character to show up. Every time a character finds themselves incapacitated, you can't have someone else coincidentally show up exactly at that moment. Once the players' actions and the environment gives you an opening to fit in a newcomer, that's when it happens.

aspekt
2015-03-05, 02:51 PM
For my part I plan on including magical healing. My players would find sitting around for a month boring. They have day jobs ; )

So what I'm trying to determine is if I make the encounters deadly enough can I let the "magic flow baby!" Or do I really need to consider limiting it?

veti
2015-03-05, 02:58 PM
Not as much as most people think. Tomb of Horrors is famous because it was so unusual.

Of my first ten characters, starting in 1975, only two ever died. There was high risk, but we worked hard to avoid it.

I don't remember ever finding a campaign, or anybody who talked about a campaign, in which characters routinely died. But we all know we could, if we didn't sometimes cut and run.

Yeah, there seems to be a slight disconnect in this thread about what "high lethality" really means.

To me, it means Kenny Rogers playstyle: "Know when to walk away, and know when to run". Play cautiously, and there's every chance you'll live to become rich and powerful enough to survive those sorts of risks. But some people seem to interpret it as "the GM plays against you, and throws in threats for the specific purpose of killing you". That's a different thing entirely.

It seems to me there's a large middle ground between "bring a dozen prerolled characters" and "DM-supplied invincible plot armour". But there's no real agreement about where, on this spectrum, "high lethality" begins.

Beta Centauri
2015-03-05, 03:02 PM
There are concessions that need to be made in the cause of verisimilitude and immersion in the game world. Depends. What's more likely to pull a player out of their immersion? A slightly unrealistic world, or literally being pulled out of the game they were immersed in?


Unless the backup character was in the same location already (henchmen or players running multiple characters simultaneously), you have to wait until it makes sense for another character to show up. Every time a character finds themselves incapacitated, you can't have someone else coincidentally show up exactly at that moment. Once the players' actions and the environment gives you an opening to fit in a newcomer, that's when it happens. With a little forethought and preparation, it's not too hard to find a plausible way to bring in replacements. The writers of Babylon 5 created "trapdoor" characters, who could quickly and easily be slotted into another character's storyline should the character have to disappear due to an issue with the actor.

But okay, sure, if your group can't manage that, then the henchmen idea might become the better one. Sure, you're playing a scrubby, nigh-useless character but at least it has verisimilitude realistic! Woo-hoo!

Or, resurrection magic. Because that's much more plausible than another living being happening to come by.

The other thing is that it doesn't have to be instantaneous and coincidental for the characters, just the player. A character dying, the PCs heading back to town, and a new character joining the group doesn't have to take any more time than reading this sentence. It probably will, but at least the player of the dead character can be involved, and "immersed" in that activity.


To me, it means Kenny Rogers playstyle: "Know when to walk away, and know when to run". Play cautiously, and there's every chance you'll live to become rich and powerful enough to survive those sorts of risks. But some people seem to interpret it as "the GM plays against you, and throws in threats for the specific purpose of killing you". That's a different thing entirely. They can easily amount to the same thing, if the players have a different understanding than the GM about when they should walk away. The GM can either shrug and let the players kill their characters (which means it's a relatively high-lethality game), or can drop heavy-handed hints about the wisdom of such action (which means the players effectively have DM-supplied invincible plot-armour).

But that's all just a ridiculous hypothetical, right, because who's ever heard of players having a different understanding than the GM?


It seems to me there's a large middle ground between "bring a dozen prerolled characters" and "DM-supplied invincible plot armour". But there's no real agreement about where, on this spectrum, "high lethality" begins. Yes, that middle ground is "You probably won't die, but you will (sometimes/frequently) suffer failure."

Mr. Mask
2015-03-05, 03:25 PM
Mark: It's harder to say with full recoveries, and it depends what's hit. If its tendons, they won't ever heal. Even really bad cuts to muscle can heal within a couple of weeks. Ribs tend to have complications, in that you can't immobilize the bones.


Jay R: That's what I consider a high-lethality game. You could have additional grit, like less common magical healing, infection, etc..


I recall a podcast from some of the Penny Arcade workers (not Gabe and Tycho) which I found had a great example of doing lethality wrong. If they were meant to engage enemies strategically, it never seemed to come up. Perhaps they were meant to run away from the threats, but everywhere seemed equally dangerous so I'm not sure if there'd be point. Whenever someone died, another character happened to turn up, with a randomized character sheet. So, death was constant, but it was also entirely trivial.

Beta Centauri
2015-03-05, 03:41 PM
So, death was constant, but it was also entirely trivial. I'm still stuck on this: how can it not be trivial unless the player doesn't want it to be?

If your character dies, you simply continue with another one. The only way for one to feel that this is anything but trivial is for one to tell oneself that it is significant because one wants to. Even if one is resurrected instantly, one could find the experience significant.

If one doesn't want to find it significant, then they won't. They'll disengage from their characters and treat the whole thing lightly.

I'm dismissing here the threat of being sidelined, because if the only way to make an in-game event significant is to attach an out-of-game consequence to it, then the game is clearly flawed.

kardar233
2015-03-05, 03:59 PM
If a player can't die, what meaning do hit point rules even function? Why have them anyway?

If tomorrow, you woke up and you could never die, you want me to believe that it would not not change your decision making paradigm? You want me to believe you wouldn't be reckless? Without death's sting, life has no meaning. With a threat of death, players have the free rein to make horrible decision after horrible decision. At that point, what exactly is the GM supposed to do? He's suck cleaning up their messes until the somehow dig themselves out of the hole.


If any idiot ever tells you that life would be meaningless without death, Hyperion recommends killing them!

Okay, imagine a hypothetical D&D game where you could not die; instead, when you "died", you're knocked unconscious instead. Now, when the plucky heroes are asked by the King of Somewhere to save his daughter, Lady Someplace from the evil warlord Everywhere, your 'death' at Everywhere's hands means that rather than dying, you drag yourself back to consciousness to find that Lady Someplace had been taken to Everywhere's fortress and sacrificed to the evil god Omnipresence. Everyone in Somewhere spits on your name for failing to save their beloved princess and the King casts you out of his lands in a grief-stricken rage. Your only hope of redemption is to storm Everywhere's fortress and retrieve Lady Someplace's soul gem before the new moon, when Everywhere completes his ritual to desecrate the entire world.

In Khan's words: "I've done far worse than kill you. I've hurt you. And I wish to go on . . . hurting you." There are far more awful things to do to a character than simply killing them.

I actually wanted to address this:


Roleplaying games got their start with high lethality. I feel like if dying ruins a player's fun, the player is the problem not the death. While I understand your argument, those kind of consequences still put very little skin in the game.

If Alderaan blows up, my character has skin in the game. I, as a player, do not. When the guy whose a little short for a stormtrooper rescues my character, the campaign goes on with no consequence to me personally. From my point of view, no real consequence has be incurred.

But if my character dies? All that effort, equipment, and roleplaying goes to waste.

See the difference? Death incurs an incentive personal to the player, not the character. That's why you can die in video games.

Okay, so the problem you're having is that your players don't care about in-character consequences for their actions (such as Alderaan blowing up), so instead you're instituting out-of-character consequences for their actions (such as the loss of a character they enjoy, having to spend time out of the game until the new character is introduced, etc). Correct?

That indicates to me that the players don't care strongly enough about their characters to care about the things the character cares about. If someone were playing Princess Leia and strongly cared about the character, they would likely care too about Alderaan and its destruction because of its importance to the character.

Now, having players that don't care that deeply about the character is a fairly common occurrence, but I'd like to propose something: roleplayers such as myself, a couple of friends in my playgroup (and, if I may assume, Metahuman1 and Beta Centauri as well) are inclined to care deeply about our characters, but tend to care less when there is a high chance of character death. Consider that if there are players of that type in your group, the reason why they don't care about any consequences other than character death is that the prevalence of character death has made it so they don't care about their characters. If that's the case then you're trying to solve the problem of lack of investment by perpetuating the lack of investment.

I think the really important thing is to know your audience. High lethality gameplay works for certain kinds of people and very much does not work for other kinds, and it's very easy to misinterpret a style mismatch as an attempt to disrupt the game or lack of interest in it.

Arbane
2015-03-05, 04:17 PM
I recall a podcast from some of the Penny Arcade workers (not Gabe and Tycho) which I found had a great example of doing lethality wrong. If they were meant to engage enemies strategically, it never seemed to come up. Perhaps they were meant to run away from the threats, but everywhere seemed equally dangerous so I'm not sure if there'd be point. Whenever someone died, another character happened to turn up, with a randomized character sheet. So, death was constant, but it was also entirely trivial.

"Hide behind the pile of dead bards!"

Mr. Mask
2015-03-05, 04:36 PM
Arbane: That about sums it up.


Kadar: You have to be careful with that sort of thing. Some players will take offence if the GM hammers in the fact they lost. If deaths are infrequent, they serve as dramatic points in the group's story. If townsfolk spit at them, and they can't kill said townsfolk... the game, for some, gets to be an exercise in frustration. Killing off likeable NPCs can be a better angle, but it requires you to get NPCs the players care about.


Podcast: With no way to avoid dying, and then you trivialize the death by a literally random character just happening to join their party, with a randomized character sheet so that the player can't play the cool original character concept. It just seems the worst of all worlds.

Metahuman1
2015-03-05, 05:16 PM
Mr. Mask: Precisely.

Gygax having a lone fighter beat the Tome of Horrors: 1: How many DM's do you know who would let the fighter successfully sacrifice 200 or so prisoner NPC's to beat there dungeon? None? That's what I thought. 2: I'm familiar with that story. It was in the beta test and Gygax really upped the anti on the module after that cause he never wanted it to happen again. 3: He was only able to do that to him cause he New Gygax inside and out. Most people don't have that kind of intimate ability to second guess there DM to the point were said DM has to seriously start considering the player, not the character, the player, has either become precognitive or telepathic.

kardar22: Damn Straight. Nail on the head man, you have hit the nail on the head.

Let me put it another way. Let's say I'm playing a game based on Fairy Tail. I'll be heavily invested in my character and the world. Game Biased on One Piece? Sure, still heavily invested even though death can happen. (It's rare, but it can happen.)

Attack on Titan? Nope. Not giving a crap about any characters, party members, NPC's, or the world, because I know there is no possible way to win or even survive for more then a few minutes of game time. Period. And that every plan will always fail, period. (Yes, if the canon main characters are NPC's, they can make success happen, but there also wearing more plot armor then the entire cast of every Shonen Anime in the last decade combined, per character, to get that. And it is decidedly DMPC/Mary Sue behavior to bring them in as NPC's. If you have them as the PC's, it's not a high lethality game anymore, it's a "Watch everyone around you die and kill stuff." game.)


Beta Centauri: You've got it.




BootStrapTommy: 2 characters cleared and infamously high lethality module that's designed for 4-6 characters by themselves with minimal effort, and that doesn't scream with a bull horn "THESE CHARACTERS ARE SO FAR BEYOND BROKEN IT'S MIND BOGGLING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" to you? If so, you have just expressed you don't have as good a grasp on game balance as you seem to think you do.

Mr. Mask
2015-03-05, 05:34 PM
Wouldn't you be interested in playing an Attack on Titan game?

Beta Centauri
2015-03-05, 05:41 PM
Podcast: With no way to avoid dying, and then you trivialize the death by a literally random character just happening to join their party, with a randomized character sheet so that the player can't play the cool original character concept. It just seems the worst of all worlds. To me it seems like a Roguelike.

I never really got into Rogue, but I've been playing a lot of Pixel Dungeon which is sort of a lighter, less complex Rogue. You get to pick your class and subclass, and the stats and equipment are always the same, but the dungeons are randomized, so you might not get the same cool weapon you had before, let alone the same supply of potions and scrolls (which are also randomized so they're unidentifiable from game to game). Sometimes you'll score an awesome weapon and armor, other times you'll score a wand that conjures sheep. You make the best of what you have.

Now, the game certainly rewards caution, and playing to one's strengths. The wizard will want wands, the warrior will want heavy weapons. After the first level, you shouldn't walk on open floor unless you've searched it, because it could be trapped. It's advisable to open doors from a distance in case there's something right behind it.

I have different moods when I play it. Sometimes I want to just get as far as I can in a short amount of time, traps, lurking enemies and dangerous experimentation with potions be darned. I die quickly, but survival wasn't my goal. Sometimes I'll be very cautions, never moving without searching, and never barging into a doorway. Mostly, though, I find both of those modes tiresome and I strike a balance. I'll search as I move, but I'll barge through doors. I'll blithely blow through potions and scrolls and equip potentially cursed equipment, just because I'm more interested in moving things along than being perfectly "smart." Maybe it's not possible to win without either absolute caution and a lot of luck, but I'm okay with that.

I do experience some frustration at some deaths, if I think the game was being cheap or if I misclicked something, but I can just put it down or start right over again. There's no expectation that I sit around watching others have fun, the way there would be at a gaming table. I'm also not expected to play a scrubby character on the level where I just died, so I never feel like I'm not able to do anything. I get to have fun until I decide I'm done.

Point being the one I keep trying to make: lethality is fine as long as downtime is minimized or prevented, and everyone knows what they're in for. But don't expect a lot of player engagement with the characters or the setting.

Metahuman1
2015-03-05, 05:47 PM
Wouldn't you be interested in playing an Attack on Titan game?

Nope. For reasons stated above. Among, other things. If you want to know about those other things, I'd suggest popping over to the Attack on Titan thread in media, and asking them about Metahuman1 and his general feelings on the series.

I'm, kinda infamous in my utter loathing of it.

Mr. Mask
2015-03-05, 05:49 PM
Beta: Yeah, time not playing has to be minimized. If a player sits around doing nothing, that is an issue. Still, having a randomly generated character just happen to run into the party as soon as they die seems a poor solution. At that rate, you're better off having a wand of resurrection. Henchmen characters, rest points the party can retreat to to pick up allies and lick their wounds, or interesting hooks for new characters, like prisoners or turncoats or survivors from another adventuring party.

Arbane
2015-03-05, 05:59 PM
Wouldn't you be interested in playing an Attack on Titan game?

There's a fan-made game called Titan World. It's an Apocalypse World hack, and one of the rules that amuses me the most is that new recruits start at level 0, and only have a first name. They need to survive at least one mission to bother giving them a second name. :smallbiggrin:
(It is, unsurprisingly, VERY high-fatality for zero-level characters. Each level-up, characters gain luck points that go a _long_ way towards allowing survival.)

Beta Centauri
2015-03-05, 06:04 PM
Beta: Yeah, time not playing has to be minimized. If a player sits around doing nothing, that is an issue. Still, having a randomly generated character just happen to run into the party as soon as they die seems a poor solution. Again, it's not "as soon as they die," it's "as soon as the player loses the character." Time in the characters is not time for the players. That new character might come along weeks later, even though five seconds passed in real life.


At that rate, you're better off having a wand of resurrection. That's precisely the reason resurrection is in the game. Other approaches work, but they either require planning and creativity on the part of the GM or they limit the kinds of adventures that can happen. Henchmen are frankly a pain to deal with, and when you're tired after a week of work, and a little drunk, figuring out a plausible reason why a new character has appeared on a lonely mountaintop might be asking a bit much. So: raise that corpse and keep going!


Henchmen characters, rest points the party can retreat to to pick up allies and lick their wounds, or interesting hooks for new characters, like prisoners or turncoats or survivors from another adventuring party. Yep. All have downsides or require some pre-planning. Lots of reasons either not to make death the primary default mode, or just go ahead and cheapen death.

I'm talking about this from the GM's side. The GM can expect the players to be cautious, and expect them to be okay with death, but the GM doesn't control that. But the GM does control what the penalties for failure are.

kardar233
2015-03-05, 06:19 PM
Kadar: You have to be careful with that sort of thing. Some players will take offence if the GM hammers in the fact they lost. If deaths are infrequent, they serve as dramatic points in the group's story. If townsfolk spit at them, and they can't kill said townsfolk... the game, for some, gets to be an exercise in frustration. Killing off likeable NPCs can be a better angle, but it requires you to get NPCs the players care about.

What do you mean by "can't kill said townsfolk"? Of course the PCs can kill the townsfolk, they're low-level or zero-level commoners. The question is whether the characters are willing to commit murder to soothe their own pride, in the process burning all bridges and ruining any chance of regaining their good name.

If not, they can run from the ridicule to somewhere where someone doesn't know of their failure, or suck it up and try to work to redeem themselves.

To make it clear: I'm not advocating these as the "correct" way to treat the characters in-game; I know how much it can suck if you lose too much this way, as one of our campaigns fell apart because my character lost nearly all ability to contribute. I'm saying that if you want to have harsh penalties for failure they don't have to involve character death.

Mr. Mask
2015-03-05, 06:45 PM
Arbane: HA! Sounds great. I should really look into that one. Some day, I ought to get a dedicated group together, and we'd play through a whole bunch of systems over a campaign.


Beta: Yes, the player is not required to wait real life time for the characters to reach a reasonable point. The thing is, the very slight change of, "OK, our group is depressed by our friends' death. We finish this battle (or retreat if it's not going well), pick any loot we can, get our friend's body if applicable, and head back to town." Then a couple of lines about how they meet the new character, and suddenly the verisimilitude does a lot better than a randomly generated char appearing the very next combat round after a character dies.

If a game has resurrection, it ought to be built around it. You could make it Dark Souls, for example. DnD also does it pretty well, I guess.

Well, I figure the GM should plan for these things in advance, even if death isn't too likely. It generally shouldn't be too hard to improvise. Have the next event in the dungeon be a goblin prisoner train or such, with one of the prisoners being the new recruit. The prisoner could even help the adventurers fight the goblins.


Kadar: I've known GMs who put in unbearable jerks the players are meant to put up with, sometimes as a punishment. If you did anything to them, you'd more or less get rocks falled later on, or it'd devolve into an argument about your character wouldn't do that due to alignment or such. So, I'm advising caution.

Beta Centauri
2015-03-05, 06:45 PM
Kadar: You have to be careful with that sort of thing. Some players will take offence if the GM hammers in the fact they lost. If deaths are infrequent, they serve as dramatic points in the group's story. If townsfolk spit at them, and they can't kill said townsfolk... the game, for some, gets to be an exercise in frustration. Killing off likeable NPCs can be a better angle, but it requires you to get NPCs the players care about. The same things can be said about lethality. Some players will take offense if the GM kills their character or forces them to act with extreme caution. The game, for some, gets to be an exercise in frustration.

Mr. Mask
2015-03-05, 06:46 PM
Indeed. Players need to agree to the deadly nature of the game beforehand, or it will almost certainly go poorly.

Beta Centauri
2015-03-05, 07:18 PM
Beta: Yes, the player is not required to wait real life time for the characters to reach a reasonable point. The thing is, the very slight change of, "OK, our group is depressed by our friends' death. We finish this battle (or retreat if it's not going well), pick any loot we can, get our friend's body if applicable, and head back to town." Then a couple of lines about how they meet the new character, and suddenly the verisimilitude does a lot better than a randomly generated char appearing the very next combat round after a character dies. Sure, but if it happens often enough eventually people are going to get tired of going through the motions and something will give.


If a game has resurrection, it ought to be built around it. You could make it Dark Souls, for example. DnD also does it pretty well, I guess. I was mainly thinking of D&D, yes.

For D&D, resurrection magic seems like an afterthought, and it has always been fraught with odd compromises. Its existence appears to acknowledge that character death is a pain, but... only past a certain level, and only at great expense, and only if the character has suffered system shock, etc. The can is just kicked down the road with every edition, though I don't know how it's handled in 5th Edition. Frankly, the whole thing needs reflavoring, starting with hit points and what 0 HP means.


Well, I figure the GM should plan for these things in advance, even if death isn't too likely. It generally shouldn't be too hard to improvise. Have the next event in the dungeon be a goblin prisoner train or such, with one of the prisoners being the new recruit. The prisoner could even help the adventurers fight the goblins. Exactly. I have a lot of fun getting creative with stuff like this. I once ran an occasional game at a game store, where I couldn't be certain of having the same players every time, and I was expected to find room for customers who wanted to join. The party was off on a mission, and couldn't "head back to town." New players had to accept pre-generated characters, but I had fun coming up with those and how they could pop in. One character was a warforged who had been sealed up inside a room for several years. Another was someone who had just been killed and had woken up in a new body that had been created (without his knowledge) as part of a clone spell.


Kadar: I've known GMs who put in unbearable jerks the players are meant to put up with, sometimes as a punishment. If you did anything to them, you'd more or less get rocks falled later on, or it'd devolve into an argument about your character wouldn't do that due to alignment or such. So, I'm advising caution. Again, I see the same issue with death. Some of the worst arguments I've seen have been about whether or not a character should have died. Often, it's just about whether the character should have taken damage, because even having death loom prompts unpleasant, game-stressing feelings.


Indeed. Players need to agree to the deadly nature of the game beforehand, or it will almost certainly go poorly. It's likely to go poorly even if they do agree. It's one thing to agree to an unpleasant hypothetical that one believes one is too smart to have happen to them, it's quite another for it to actually happen to them.

Mr. Mask
2015-03-05, 07:30 PM
Played much of Kirby's Epic Yarn, Fable or Wario World (Gamecube)? What are your thoughts on games where players compete, where there are clear winners and losers, or cooperative ones like Forbidden Desert?

mephnick
2015-03-05, 08:54 PM
I agree with Beta for the most part. I've tried to figure out a way to make character death poignant, but after years of playing I've never succeeded. Players will pick up a new character if there's no resurrection, or resurrect immediately if there is resurrection. The first is usually preceded by a very bored "sigh, guess I'll whip something up." The latter is tantamount to hand waving the death completely. I've tried resurrection quests, low magic, high magic, and all kinds of things. I'm starting to just see it as a waste of time.

I've started tossing around the idea of just saying, "Your character has been reduced to 0, would you like to die, retire or take a significant injury?" and just leave it up to them. Maybe after a few injuries you're forced to retire or die. It would at least give the player some narrative control..

Mr. Mask
2015-03-05, 09:00 PM
I recall a game where a player's character didn't believe in resurrection. The party felt quite sad when she was killed, and took along a keepsake. I think she turned up again as another character, can't remember.

Thrudd
2015-03-05, 11:11 PM
People have been dealing with their characters dying for decades. It's a game, and that's part of the game. It isn't the big deal folks seem to be implying. Waiting a few minutes for your new character to be introduced is not a terrible punishment that people quit the game over. If it was, I would think they didn't really want to play anyway.

Mr. Mask
2015-03-06, 12:09 AM
I can see unfair deaths from an unreasonable GM being a big deal. An unreasonable GM, sadly, is going to cause some significant problems at some point, even if you remove death from the system.

In the case that death was an unnecessary part of games, it makes me wonder why games with death have continued to be mainstream in RPGs and computer games (and in board games).

Duke of URRL
2015-03-06, 01:36 AM
In the case that death was an unnecessary part of games, it makes me wonder why games with death have continued to be mainstream in RPGs and computer games (and in board games).

Death is a big deal. So that makes it a big part of games. I find immortal games boring. Like playing a video game on god mode. ''Oh look I was just hit 205 times''.

A game is no fun, if you can loose.

Metahuman1
2015-03-06, 01:40 AM
A game is no fun, if you can loose.

Well, someone's a bad sport.


Ok, that was snark and a joke, I'm sorry, didn't mean to offend.

And I realize that was probably a typo but the set up was just there.

Jay R
2015-03-06, 09:36 AM
They can easily amount to the same thing, if the players have a different understanding than the GM about when they should walk away.

I dislike this phrasing, which implies that the party consistently making poor tactical decisions can be hand-waved as a misunderstanding, rather than poor play.

In chess, checkers, Monopoly and poker, some players are better than others. And all players start off not very good. It's true in D&D, too.


The GM can either shrug and let the players kill their characters (which means it's a relatively high-lethality game),...

If it's just a "different understanding", then this only happens once. Then the players know that their choices matter, and the characters can die.


... or can drop heavy-handed hints about the wisdom of such action (which means the players effectively have DM-supplied invincible plot-armour).

Again, this only has to happen once. If the DM says, "Your three first level characters are pretty sure that those fifty goblins would win in a straight-up fight," then she shouldn't have to say it later on about sixth levels vs. a pair of dragons.

In either direction, once the players find out that they can die, they can choose to work hard to become better players, like we all have to do with chess, checkers, Monopoly and poker, or they can continue to make poor decisions, and blame the DM's "different understanding" and the lethality of the game.

Thrawn4
2015-03-06, 10:12 AM
Character death and in-game-consequences like losing your house can both have a huge impact. It just depends whether players are invested in their character and the game world. If they treat it like a boardgame where you move a character like a chess-piece, then even the best DM will be unable to present striking or meaningful consequences. But if the players put a lot of effort into their characters and the game, any loss can be significant.

Beta Centauri
2015-03-06, 03:28 PM
Played much of Kirby's Epic Yarn, Fable or Wario World (Gamecube)? No.


What are your thoughts on games where players compete, where there are clear winners and losers, or cooperative ones like Forbidden Desert? I prefer cooperative games, by and large. I simply do not trust that anyone will be a good sport, so neither defeating them nor losing to them holds much appeal to me.

I used to really like the game Bang! until it was pointed out, by a D&D designer no less, that it's pretty awful to have a game in which you can be quickly eliminated, even if you're a good player, and have to sit out for what could be an hour or more. Sure, one's "team" might even still win, but are they terribly likely to care at that point? I'd prefer losing to sitting out of the game.


I've started tossing around the idea of just saying, "Your character has been reduced to 0, would you like to die, retire or take a significant injury?" and just leave it up to them. Maybe after a few injuries you're forced to retire or die. It would at least give the player some narrative control.. Yes, this is about where I am, except I like to head it off before that point by finding out what stakes the players are willing to play for. If they don't want to lose their character, fine: we figure out what 0 HP means for them, or some other stakes they're willing to risk.


I recall a game where a player's character didn't believe in resurrection. The party felt quite sad when she was killed, and took along a keepsake. I think she turned up again as another character, can't remember. Very cool. I don't think any edition of D&D requires a player to resurrect a character, so if permanent death would be more enjoyable then that's what happens.


People have been dealing with their characters dying for decades. It's a game, and that's part of the game. It isn't the big deal folks seem to be implying. Waiting a few minutes for your new character to be introduced is not a terrible punishment that people quit the game over. If it was, I would think they didn't really want to play anyway. If it wasn't, I would think that resurrection options never would have been introduced.

You're speaking from a great deal of assumption. If death isn't a big deal for you for you, great. If it is a big deal for someone else, maybe there are other options besides implying that they shouldn't play. And, it turns out there are.


I can see unfair deaths from an unreasonable GM being a big deal. An unreasonable GM, sadly, is going to cause some significant problems at some point, even if you remove death from the system. If there were some objective measurement of unreasonableness, yes. But it's easy to find discussions on this board in which two different and entirely reasonable and intelligent people disagree about whether a GM's actions were reasonable. When things impact our enjoyment of a game, we tend to find them unreasonable. When they impact someone else's enjoyment of the game, we tend to find them reasonable and that person unreasonable.


In the case that death was an unnecessary part of games, it makes me wonder why games with death have continued to be mainstream in RPGs and computer games (and in board games). Do you now? Did you give it any thought at all? Because I know you're smart enough to see though this point.

Are any of those games equivalent to permanent death in D&D? In D&D, you can't save and start over. In D&D, if your character dies, the game doesn't necessarily end quickly so everyone can start over again fresh. In Torchlight, there's permanent character death, but it's an option that defaults to off.

And death isn't "unnecessary," it's just not always the only possible way to fail. Lots of games have alternate win conditions or timers, because "kill 'em all or die trying" gets tiresome. StarCraft was quite good at this. In D&D, avoiding a fight or successfully escaping can be considered an alternate goal, but those approaches also get tiresome, and sometimes it's nice to have a fight in which the enemy can win even without killing the PCs.


Death is a big deal. So that makes it a big part of games. I find immortal games boring. Like playing a video game on god mode. ''Oh look I was just hit 205 times''.

A game is no fun, if you can loose. Oh my gosh, will people figure out that "losing" isn't the same as "dying." Dying is only one way to lose, and sometimes you can win even if you die.


I dislike this phrasing, which implies that the party consistently making poor tactical decisions can be hand-waved as a misunderstanding, rather than poor play. Why are you so intent on if being about poor play? Is it important to you to have poor play punished? D&D is not a competition, so "good" play hardly matters at all.


In chess, checkers, Monopoly and poker, some players are better than others. And all players start off not very good. It's true in D&D, too. All of those are competitive games. D&D is not. Players start off "not very good," sure, and they generally get better, sure, but it's possible to have a fun game even without being very good. There's a long, long history of that.


If it's just a "different understanding", then this only happens once. Then the players know that their choices matter, and the characters can die. I don't mean a different understanding about the lethality of the game, I mean a different understanding about the lethality of a given situation.


Again, this only has to happen once. If the DM says, "Your three first level characters are pretty sure that those fifty goblins would win in a straight-up fight," then she shouldn't have to say it later on about sixth levels vs. a pair of dragons. That's a good example of the GM protecting the players.

So, when do the players not run from those fifty goblins? What if the GM understands that the players can now beat that kind of a threat and sends it against them and they run? Oops, they're being poor players again, right? No, it's just a misunderstanding.

Everything in D&D is a poor idea, because adventuring itself is a poor idea. Two GMs might both say that no one has ever returned from the dark forest, and one of those GMs will expect the players to enter, and the other one will expect them to stay away. It's all up to the GM.


In either direction, once the players find out that they can die, they can choose to work hard to become better players, like we all have to do with chess, checkers, Monopoly and poker, or they can continue to make poor decisions, and blame the DM's "different understanding" and the lethality of the game. Or, they can find out what the consequences are for dying, and come to terms with those, and get only as good at the game as they have to in order to keep having fun.

I don't have to get better at chess. I'm right were I want to be. There are lots of other players who could beat me and if I don't think I would enjoy losing to them, I just wouldn't play with them. Heck, they probably wouldn't enjoy beating me, and wouldn't want to play me. I don't have to get better at D&D. I have, but I didn't need to. If my character dies, I'll just make another one.

I really don't see the need to get better at D&D. I've never seen anyone particularly lauded for their skill at D&D. Skill at chess or poker implies (sort of) skill with other useful life skills, like strategy and reading people. Skill at a sport implies physical prowess. Skill at D&D implies none of those, even if the GM is some sort of computerized meat grinder, which hardly any of them are.


Character death and in-game-consequences like losing your house can both have a huge impact. It just depends whether players are invested in their character and the game world. If they treat it like a boardgame where you move a character like a chess-piece, then even the best DM will be unable to present striking or meaningful consequences. But if the players put a lot of effort into their characters and the game, any loss can be significant. Exactly. And how much investment players put into their characters and the game is entirely up to them and can't be forced. The most control a GM really has is to game only with people who are going to make that investment. Anything further they do to make the game "lethal" is really just theater, because no one at the table actually needs that in order to become invested.

Mr. Mask
2015-03-06, 03:41 PM
I would like to think I am smart enough, Beta, or at least that I'm not too stupid to see a point. Sadly, I do not see your point. As far as I'm aware, many successful RPGs that have released since DnD have continued to have death, and many without resurrection options.

Beta Centauri
2015-03-06, 03:51 PM
I would like to think I am smart enough, Beta, or at least that I'm not too stupid to see a point. Sadly, I do not see your point. As far as I'm aware, many successful RPGs that have released since DnD have continued to have death, and many without resurrection options. That's true, but it's not a valid argument. It's a strawman: You're the one arguing that if death is a thorny issue, then no one will include it in their games I'm not required to defend an argument you are making, and your disproof of your own argument is not proof of the idea that death isn't a thorny issue.

That said, of the many games I can think of, the only one I can think of that offers any official, rules-based guidance for GMs on what to do when a character dies. That's the Dark Sun rules for D&D which, I'm told, recommend having a set of backup characters. Every other game I can think of leaves the handling of death, and the handling of the ongoing participation of the player entirely up to the group playing the game, with the result that some handle it in ways that are functional and some handle it in ways that are dysfunctional.

Mr. Mask
2015-03-06, 04:04 PM
That's true, but it's not a valid argument. It's a strawman: You're the one arguing that if death is a thorny issue, then no one will include it in their games I'm not required to defend an argument you are making, and your disproof of your own argument is not proof of the idea that death isn't a thorny issue. As I said in the beginning, I sense hostility. I honestly cannot understand the logic of your post. I suppose I lack the necessary intelligence.

LibraryOgre
2015-03-06, 04:47 PM
That said, of the many games I can think of, the only one I can think of that offers any official, rules-based guidance for GMs on what to do when a character dies. That's the Dark Sun rules for D&D which, I'm told, recommend having a set of backup characters. Every other game I can think of leaves the handling of death, and the handling of the ongoing participation of the player entirely up to the group playing the game, with the result that some handle it in ways that are functional and some handle it in ways that are dysfunctional.

Hackmaster has the protege system; as you are playing you allocate a portion of your XP to a defined protege, and take part in his/her training; you also give that protege gifts of weapons and equipment. If your character dies or is forced to retire, then you activate your protege, who already has an established relationship with you, and through you with the group.

Ars Magica uses a troupe system, whereby each player has 2 primary characters (a consortes and a magus/a), as well as the communal pool of grogs. If a primary character dies, there are no explicit mechanics for replacing them, but the other character is still available, as are the grogs.

AD&D, of course, had henchmen, and explicit advice that, if someone's character died, it was very appropriate for them to take over the role of one of their henchmen; not quite as elegant as the protege system from Hackmaster, but the alternative was the other DMs suggestion... work the new character in as soon as possible, in whatever situation you deem proper (i.e. "captured by orcs and shoved in a pickle barrel").

AD&D's Oriental Adventures had a separate system, whereby the Honor of your dead character contributed to the attribute rolls of your replacement character (1/10th of any honor you had above your class's starting amount as bonus points). It does little to integrate the new character, but since you were also supposed to develop a family, that provided ample fodder for new characters.

This is in addition to Dark Sun's character tree, or even the simple expedience of a military game, where new characters can be brought in as transfers, or a semi-episodic game (like core Shadowrun), where common contacts might bring people together for a job ("The fixer suggested all of you for a job.")

Arbane
2015-03-06, 05:13 PM
Why are you so intent on if being about poor play? Is it important to you to have poor play punished? D&D is not a competition, so "good" play hardly matters at all.

If you don't punish players for their stupidity, how else will they realize your inherent intellectual superiority?


That said, of the many games I can think of, the only one I can think of that offers any official, rules-based guidance for GMs on what to do when a character dies. That's the Dark Sun rules for D&D which, I'm told, recommend having a set of backup characters. Every other game I can think of leaves the handling of death, and the handling of the ongoing participation of the player entirely up to the group playing the game, with the result that some handle it in ways that are functional and some handle it in ways that are dysfunctional.

Paranoia provides each character with a set of six clones, because you're EXPECTED to have them all die early and often.

Toon doesn't have death AT ALL, since it's based on Looney Toons & similar cartoon mayhem.

IIRC, Pendragon has a generational game, where the amount of Glory your knight PC earned before they die can be passed on to their heir. (So going out in a blaze of glory can be a coldly pragmatic move in that game.)

Beta Centauri
2015-03-06, 07:23 PM
Hackmaster has the protege system; as you are playing you allocate a portion of your XP to a defined protege, and take part in his/her training; you also give that protege gifts of weapons and equipment. If your character dies or is forced to retire, then you activate your protege, who already has an established relationship with you, and through you with the group. I wasn't aware of that and I like that approach, though it depends on the master character lasting long enough to make the other character any good. The other character probably isn't as good as the master, which sort of implies that the protege will die even more quickly, which makes things even worse for their protege and so on.


Ars Magica uses a troupe system, whereby each player has 2 primary characters (a consortes and a magus/a), as well as the communal pool of grogs. If a primary character dies, there are no explicit mechanics for replacing them, but the other character is still available, as are the grogs. Ah, yes, I have heard of this, as a way to have different sorts of challenges in a game without needing a character that's good at all of them. If that's how it's meant to work, then the player would still be sidelined for certain portions of the game that involved the kind of character he no longer had. And the existence of the secondary character makes me wonder how a replacement for the first could ever be brought in, assuming the two original characters were linked in some way.


AD&D, of course, had henchmen, and explicit advice that, if someone's character died, it was very appropriate for them to take over the role of one of their henchmen; not quite as elegant as the protege system from Hackmaster, but the alternative was the other DMs suggestion... work the new character in as soon as possible, in whatever situation you deem proper (i.e. "captured by orcs and shoved in a pickle barrel"). I think the latter is what most people figure out to do. But the advice falls short, I feel, since it (as far as I'm aware) is silent on how that player can contribute in the meantime. I know some GMs let them play a ghost or help run monsters, but that's not official advice to my knowledge.


AD&D's Oriental Adventures had a separate system, whereby the Honor of your dead character contributed to the attribute rolls of your replacement character (1/10th of any honor you had above your class's starting amount as bonus points). It does little to integrate the new character, but since you were also supposed to develop a family, that provided ample fodder for new characters. Very cool, but a similar issue to the Hackmaster approach, in that it seems to assume the character will at least live long enough or die well enough for the player to have an equally useful next character.


This is in addition to Dark Sun's character tree, or even the simple expedience of a military game, where new characters can be brought in as transfers, or a semi-episodic game (like core Shadowrun), where common contacts might bring people together for a job ("The fixer suggested all of you for a job.") Yes, this sort of thing works reasonably well. Overall, though, I feel like the general approach to death is like the general approach to healthcare for the uninsured: don't get hurt. Few enough people are trying to get hurt, but it still happens, even to smart people, and even to smart players. So, there should be some kind of insurance.


If you don't punish players for their stupidity, how else will they realize your inherent intellectual superiority? Heh, exactly how the "yay, character death" argument often comes across. Only in the high-flyingest theory do they really think of death as something that will happen to their character, because by definition it only happens to fools. Fools, of course, deserve it, and no one is so foolish that they can't see that they're not a fool and therefore only playing their part in the formation of a just universe. So why would anyone but an inconceivably foolish person complain?

It reminds me of people who are all for laws that punish behavior they don't think they'll ever engage in. But sometimes they do, and it takes a pretty strong person not to feel like they're being treated unreasonably.


Paranoia provides each character with a set of six clones, because you're EXPECTED to have them all die early and often. I always thought this was meant as a send-up of "lethal games." Hey, people are just rolling up the same character again and having them show up in implausible ways, so why not play a game where the new character is the old character, and they show up in the most ridiculous way possible?


Toon doesn't have death AT ALL, since it's based on Looney Toons & similar cartoon mayhem. Yep, and this sort of makes a good point: sure D&D stemmed from wargames, but as soon as they added halflings, it was "based" on Tolkien enough for his estate to talk to their lawyers. And Tolkien has death, but there are certain characters (particularly the halflings) who don't seem to suffer the ultimate disaster nearly as much as it would make sense for them to. But the game didn't really cover that aspect of Tolkien, except for whatever resurrection Gandalf went through.


IIRC, Pendragon has a generational game, where the amount of Glory your knight PC earned before they die can be passed on to their heir. (So going out in a blaze of glory can be a coldly pragmatic move in that game.) Interesting. I'm especially fond of rules that go out of their way to actually make bad things for the characters into an interesting move for the player.

Duke of URRL
2015-03-07, 01:12 AM
Character death really does make for a different game. It's the Walking Dead vs Just About All Other Shows. Watch any action/adventure show, and you know the main characters won't die. No matter how ''bad'' it looks, the good guys will live. You just need to pretend you don't know that to enjoy the show. Then take the Walking Dead. Well, any character might die any time....even the main characters.

So take a typical adventure to destroy a lich. You can have random ''failure'' like ''the character breaks his sword''. So for five minutes or so the character ''fails'', and then buys another sword and continues the adventure. Now take death. The character dies. Story is over. The lich wins and does his evil plan. Quite a bit more impact then the ''broken sword''.

Metahuman1
2015-03-07, 01:31 AM
And as a result, by, at the latest, the end of season 2 of the Walking Dead, I generally found that I had made myself stop caring about everyone.

Agent's of S.H.E.I.L.D., on the other hand, has had major characters die, double cross the group, and die after double crossing the group. Difference? The latter show does it far, far, far less frequently, which means I don't go apathetic and numb to it because it's happening all the time, so it still actually matters, and I continue to bother to invest.



Let me use a different example. Let's look at the Marvel Ultimate Canon. For the first, oh, 4-6 years or so, depending on how you count it, characters could die, but seldom did. Main characters could die, but seldom did. And unlike other Comic-book Canon's, Dead meant Dead, no coming back, period.

2 Major character deaths happened in this space of time, and they were well treated and well handled. Done with the respect and dignity and send off they deserved.

And there was a mix of character types, some characters, like Hank Pym, were horrible Ass Holes. Others, Like Spider-man and Captain America, were generally good guys.




Then, The Ultimatum event happened. In the course of that one event, over 30 characters were killed off, most needlessly and senselessly, most with out the dignity and gravity that should have come with it in favor of shock value, and perhaps most insulting, more then 2/3rds of these deaths were off screen kills were just told about. And the dead means dead rule? Strictly enforced. Oh, and the casualty's of none ass hole characters FAR exceeded the casualty's among the unlikeable jerks. Further, this inspired droves of previously likeable characters to become jerks if they stayed alive.

Fast forward a few years later, the entire universe line has spiraled out of control into a mess basically all readers were apathetic two, everyone was either dead or an unlikeable jerk with the arguable exception of Miles Morals, who took over for Peter Parker as Spiderman after Spiderman was murdered horribly in the face, and no one gave a crap cause if you weren't an unlikeable jerk, you were dead with 1 exception (Assuming you weren't in the camp who were pissed off at the killing of Peter to make room for Miles, given that it was needless, poorly handled and obviously a ratings stunt.), and it was generally excepted that every character was only there to die horribly for shock value.

LibraryOgre
2015-03-07, 08:58 AM
I wasn't aware of that and I like that approach, though it depends on the master character lasting long enough to make the other character any good. The other character probably isn't as good as the master, which sort of implies that the protege will die even more quickly, which makes things even worse for their protege and so on.

The thing is, though Hackmaster is fairly high lethality, it's also swingy; a character a couple levels lower than the party can still contribute significantly, even in major fights. And since you determine how much XP you give your protege (with the limit that you can give no more than 50%, and your protege must remain at least 1 level lower than you), and what gifts you give them, if you have a crappy protege, or no protege, that's entirely on you.


Ah, yes, I have heard of this, as a way to have different sorts of challenges in a game without needing a character that's good at all of them. If that's how it's meant to work, then the player would still be sidelined for certain portions of the game that involved the kind of character he no longer had. And the existence of the secondary character makes me wonder how a replacement for the first could ever be brought in, assuming the two original characters were linked in some way.

Most likely, your two characters are not linked, because you never play them simultaneously. Except for a few circumstances, it is supposed to be rare to have several magi in the same session... instead, it is one magus, a few companions, and any balance made up by grogs. It is far more likely that my consortes will be linked to Bob's magus, and Mary's consortes will be linked to my magus, so when a story that interests my magus comes up, it's natural that Mary's consortes (who either has similar interests or a personal tie to my magus) comes along.

Since time scales are relatively long (the game tends to run in seasons, with no more than 1 "adventure" a season), and down time doesn't penalize a character (you gain just as many XP studying or training as you do adventuring, though perhaps not in the same things), AND one of the central "characters" is the covenant (the local association of magi who agree to share their resources), it's relatively smooth to integrate new characters. Even if my magus or consortes dies, I can be smoothly integrated at the change in season, or even in a couple seasons, without losing out on play time, or being significantly disadvantaged.


I think the latter is what most people figure out to do. But the advice falls short, I feel, since it (as far as I'm aware) is silent on how that player can contribute in the meantime. I know some GMs let them play a ghost or help run monsters, but that's not official advice to my knowledge.

Depends a lot on the GM. Since the system has relatively few things that require direct oversight of a player, a DM can easily let the player go create his character given a few guidelines, and work him in when he comes back in 10-30 minutes; the downtime doesn't need to be much greater than the time it takes to make a character, plus the time it would normally take for the DM to get back around to you in a round of town actions, or a fight where you'd been knocked unconscious.


Very cool, but a similar issue to the Hackmaster approach, in that it seems to assume the character will at least live long enough or die well enough for the player to have an equally useful next character.

Again, only if the GM is going to drop a level 1 newbie in with a pack of hardened 6th level characters.

The thing is, while death is one of the worst things that can happen to a character*, and might well take them out of the game, it's never really been the only consequence in D&D; the 1e DMG contains advice to take PCs hostage, hold them for ransom, sell them into slavery, etc.. There's also standing advice that many of the random deaths happen to NPCs first... a loss to the PCs (friends, companions, and fighting power), and a warning to take something seriously. A Birthright character might well lose his kingdom on the battlefield. Combat and Tactics (and other critical hit systems) introduced all sorts of semi-permanent maladies that could be a result of combat. And there are many ways to mitigate death, even in the old-school games... resurrection, reincarnation, even something as simple as the "death's door" rules (which were originally far more difficult to overcome; even with magical healing, falling into negatives was supposed to weaken you for weeks).

IME, poor player choices are the most frequent cause of death, followed by bad luck on the dice. But long down-times where the player can do nothing because he's waiting for the DM to work him in? That's usually down to the DMs skill, not the system. There's relatively few games where it will take more than 10 minutes to work in a new character if the DM wants them in.

*"Old school players only really fear two things: level drain and **** that turns your ass to stone.

Jay R
2015-03-07, 12:37 PM
Why are you so intent on if being about poor play? Is it important to you to have poor play punished? D&D is not a competition, so "good" play hardly matters at all.

I'm not "intent on i[t] being about poor play". I am intent on truth. Describing poor tactics as merely a "different understanding" is very often not the truth.

And no, it's not important to me to have poor play punished, not did I say anything that can be twisted to be about punishment. It is important to me that my poor play have consequences, so I can learn to be better. This is true in any area of life, not just those that are competitive. I wish to swim well, play video games competently, read with excellent understanding and retention, and yes, play D&D well.


All of those are competitive games. D&D is not. Players start off "not very good," sure, and they generally get better, sure, but it's possible to have a fun game even without being very good. There's a long, long history of that.

D&D is certainly a competitive game. The team is trying to outsmart politicians, defeat goblins, disable traps, etc. The fact that the competition is with simulated foes does not change the fact that we are competing. And how tactically sound the playing is can often be the difference between cleverly defeating a larger force with misdirection and subtlety, and facing them straight up and either running away in defeat or dying.

I'm not competing with the other players; they're on my team. But we are simulating a number of encounters, many of which are directly competitive.


I don't mean a different understanding about the lethality of the game, I mean a different understanding about the lethality of a given situation.

The ability to judge that is indeed part of what makes good, effective play. If the players consistently misread the situation, that might be poor explanation by the DM, but very often it is poor play by the players.


That's a good example of the GM protecting the players.

Or training them, helping them to grow so they can have a more fun experience.


So, when do the players not run from those fifty goblins? What if the GM understands that the players can now beat that kind of a threat and sends it against them and they run? Oops, they're being poor players again, right? No, it's just a misunderstanding.

Yes, there are mistakes on both sides. But also, there is poor play. I'm not claiming that level of ability is everything, only that it's real, and affects many games, and people won't get better unless they stop blaming everything that happens on misunderstandings.


Everything in D&D is a poor idea, because adventuring itself is a poor idea. Two GMs might both say that no one has ever returned from the dark forest, and one of those GMs will expect the players to enter, and the other one will expect them to stay away. It's all up to the GM.

Adventuring is not a poor idea. It is a high-risk, high-gain venture, similar to what vikings, Columbus, Dr. Livingstone, or any explorers, sailors, or astronauts have done.

And learning how the particular DM works is part of great play. There is an old legal maxim, "Any lawyer knows teh law. A good lawyer knows the exceptions. A great lawyer knows the judge."

Similarly, and player knows the basic rules. A good player knows the relevant expansions. A great player knows the DM. I play in Dirk's game very differently than I play in Wil's, or Mike's, or Nolen's.


Or, they can find out what the consequences are for dying, and come to terms with those, and get only as good at the game as they have to in order to keep having fun.

I don't have to get better at chess. I'm right were I want to be. There are lots of other players who could beat me and if I don't think I would enjoy losing to them, I just wouldn't play with them. Heck, they probably wouldn't enjoy beating me, and wouldn't want to play me. I don't have to get better at D&D. I have, but I didn't need to. If my character dies, I'll just make another one.

Of course. Not everybody wants to play well. That's fine. But:
A. I do want to play well, and
B. If you don't want to get better at D&D, that's fine, but don't blame continued character deaths on misunderstandings.


I really don't see the need to get better at D&D. I've never seen anyone particularly lauded for their skill at D&D. Skill at chess or poker implies (sort of) skill with other useful life skills, like strategy and reading people. Skill at a sport implies physical prowess. Skill at D&D implies none of those, even if the GM is some sort of computerized meat grinder, which hardly any of them are.

Well, my team won the first D&D tournament I ever entered, and I have a DMG signed by Gygax as a prize for another. In last week's game, I complimented two players for very clever solutions, and a third for a consistently well-played illusionist. Many DMs give additional experience points for well-played characters or clever plans. So I have seen people lauded for their skills at D&D.

And strategy and reading people are in fact part of skill at D&D.

Of course, I have studied operations research (the mathematics of optimization and decision-making), and used game theory in my dissertation to solve a previously unsolved problem, so I think in terms of improving the skills of decision-making more than most people do. But your abilities at D&D tactics, reading and understanding the DM, and problem solving do affect your game whether you think of it that way or not.

Frozen_Feet
2015-03-07, 02:31 PM
In order to play a game with high character turnover rate properly, the players have to assume a mindset in many ways similar to a traditional GM: don't get too invested in a single character, don't spend too much time on character creation, be ready to improvize and act the hell out of a personality written down as three-word-note. Don't wait too long before getting to the interesting parts, because the other players (mostly, the GM) might ruin your plan unexpectedly. If you character has something to do, do it, or at least try your hardest.

Mechanically, the only thing with a lot of impact is speed of character creation. Ideally character generation should be fast so a player doesn't have to wait too long to get back into action. On the other hand, slow character creation can work if it's an interesting process in itself and the player can do it without help from the GM. Both work as solutions to the problem Beta Centauri mentioned.

One thing that will hamper games like this is if they're incredibly slow-paced - known in fiction and freeforming as "day/night that lasts forever". Remember to keep track of in-game time and progress it in reasonable steps. A player having to sit out one hour or half of a single session are usually not a problem - the player can eat nachos or do something else while the game concludes (in addition to character creation mentioned above). Or, the GM could give them some of their play pieces and allow them to play some of the hostile NPCs against the other players (yes, sometimes, PvP is the solution. :smalltongue:).

A player having to sit out multiple sessions because the game's not really progressing anywhere? Now that's bad. I've not seen this happen in any tabletop game, though I imagine it could come up in case of a megadungeon. It does happen frequently in play-by-post. Granted, the concept of "session" is not as clear in play-by-post.

Eric Tolle
2015-03-08, 12:08 AM
The assumed format is that the pc's will begin in a town or city or other safe location where they can procure equipment and find out about possible adventures. They need such a place to return to or retreat to in between dungeon expeditions.

Any particular adventure and the game world as a whole should be able to take into account the fact that the characters will likely need to make more than one trip to the dungeon, and will possibly need to wait weeks in between expeditions in order to heal wounds. If your adventure breaks because the players retreat and need to heal before coming back, you have designed your adventure inappropriately.

That's a really big assumption, when the party could be miles down in the Underdark, exploring a new continent, on another plane, or simply facing that fact that every journey back and forth means they are gong to be facing random encounters or reinforcements. I've seen more than a few games where parties have been whittled down while trying to return to town, simply from random encounters. And then there's te dungeons where your party is essentially trapped, and has to work their way out (Hello, Barrier Peaks, Slave Lords). it wasn't that uncommon for there to be four or five weeks in between supply trips. In that case, the best option is to have as many henchmen and hirelings as possible, and also have each player play two or three characters. It makes a huge difference whether your party is six people, or thirty people.

Seriously, if you're playing Subterranean Fantasy ****ing Vietnam, you'll want a lot of characters to soak up damage. I even recommend using a "Random Endearing Personality Quirk" table to distinguish them from all the other characters that appear and die in game.


Death is a big deal. So that makes it a big part of games. I find immortal games boring. Like playing a video game on god mode. ''Oh look I was just hit 205 times''.

I've been in games that had at least one character die every session, and games that went on for years with no character deaths. All were equally fun- in fact one of them had a "Pulp Hero" rule where nobody died when defeated unless their was mutual agreement. It worked well.

And then of course there are games like "Golden Sky Stories" and "Pilgrims of the Flying Temple" where death is not only off the table, lethal conflict is just not going to happen. And I've been in some awesome games of that as well.

Thrudd
2015-03-08, 12:24 AM
That's a really big assumption, when the party could be miles down in the Underdark, exploring a new continent, on another plane, or simply facing that fact that every journey back and forth means they are gong to be facing random encounters or reinforcements. I've seen more than a few games where parties have been whittled down while trying to return to town, simply from random encounters. And then there's te dungeons where your party is essentially trapped, and has to work their way out (Hello, Barrier Peaks, Slave Lords). it wasn't that uncommon for there to be four or five weeks in between supply trips. In that case, the best option is to have as many henchmen and hirelings as possible, and also have each player play two or three characters. It makes a huge difference whether your party is six people, or thirty people.


Most of those adventures are mid-higher level, so there would be henchmen about.

The Slave lords modules were made for tournament play. You were going for the most points relative to the other players, so you could advance and be in the party that played the next module in the series. The same group was not assumed to move from one module to the next in a long continuous adventure.

If you're dealing with a mega dungeon, you can still return to town in between expeditions. Low level characters are not going very far down before they retreat to level up. Remember, there is no gaining xp or leveling until the treasure is returned to a safe location, and sufficient time spent in training with a mentor (at least 1-4 weeks). The game absolutely expected you to leave the dungeon regularly to claim your xp and levels.

Metahuman1
2015-03-09, 07:46 AM
In order to play a game with high character turnover rate properly, the players have to assume a mindset in many ways similar to a traditional GM: don't get too invested in a single character, don't spend too much time on character creation, be ready to improvize and act the hell out of a personality written down as three-word-note. Don't wait too long before getting to the interesting parts, because the other players (mostly, the GM) might ruin your plan unexpectedly. If you character has something to do, do it, or at least try your hardest.

Mechanically, the only thing with a lot of impact is speed of character creation. Ideally character generation should be fast so a player doesn't have to wait too long to get back into action. On the other hand, slow character creation can work if it's an interesting process in itself and the player can do it without help from the GM. Both work as solutions to the problem Beta Centauri mentioned.

One thing that will hamper games like this is if they're incredibly slow-paced - known in fiction and freeforming as "day/night that lasts forever". Remember to keep track of in-game time and progress it in reasonable steps. A player having to sit out one hour or half of a single session are usually not a problem - the player can eat nachos or do something else while the game concludes (in addition to character creation mentioned above). Or, the GM could give them some of their play pieces and allow them to play some of the hostile NPCs against the other players (yes, sometimes, PvP is the solution. :smalltongue:).

A player having to sit out multiple sessions because the game's not really progressing anywhere? Now that's bad. I've not seen this happen in any tabletop game, though I imagine it could come up in case of a megadungeon. It does happen frequently in play-by-post. Granted, the concept of "session" is not as clear in play-by-post.

Character generation in 3.5 if you want your character to have a prayer of being able to function, let alone preform well (which, according to many of the people who seem to be lauding the virtues of high lethality games and sundering as an A-ok tactic for the GM to randomly whip out on players indiscriminately and the like, is a major, major, major, essential function of the game that if a character fails to meet they should be killed for.), tends to be rather time demanding to figure out spells, classes, skills, feats, gear, prestige classes, and gear, among lots of other little fiddly bits and rules. You can easily have several hours just to build one character, before back story. And yes, the GM has to be heavily involved given the fact that he's gonna have things to say. (I don't want leap attack/tome of battle/pounce, there broken! No Psionics, they don't exist in this world! No Incantatrix, I'm banning that supplement! No, the DMM feat is banned, but I'll let you take that extra wild shape feat form the same book if you like. Ext, ext.)

And then the majority of DM's insist the game is more about the story then the mechanics, and insist on long, intricate backstorys that justify EVERYTHING on your sheet perfectly.

So, the game system is not well suited to fast character creation, and the average GM insists on exasperating that. Result? Unless you have all week to do nothing but monopolize the DM's time to approve things, and then spend the rest of your time crunching out a dozen or more sheets, and writing up long, intricate backstory's. And unless on top of that your DM doesn't play with the third most common house rule in the hobby of "Must make the character at the table and show me everything in every book your using before it can be on the sheet.", that high lethality game is gonna do nothing but grind play to a halt.


And before you say, "Never seen it happen." I've seen it happen. To the point were I have had multiple sessions in a row were I got about 5 minutes of play time, give or take a smig, and then had to go right back to character creation cause that character died. Party thought it was a hoot cause they got to loot the body that that bump in wealth was what was keeping THEM alive.




And as bad as all that is, the worse part? You just admitted my initial argument is dead to rights on the money. It's a play style that makes you, by default, not give a crap about the game, the character, the party, the NPC's, or the world. Which, is generally considered HORRIBLE for game play!!!!!!!

Frozen_Feet
2015-03-09, 10:06 AM
Character generation in 3.x is...

... in a word, slow, yes. Luckily, it's also pretty interesting in itself. The bigger problem, as you noted, is that DMs often take a micromanaging attitude to character creation, so they'll have hard time running the game and helping to create characters.

The quick solution is for the DM to write down an allow list of sub-systems or game books that are in use, and be willing to accept anything in those systems / books. The next quickest solution is to write down a specific banlist (a la Test of Spite on these boards) and be willing to accept anything not on the list.



And then the majority of DM's insist the game is more about the story then the mechanics, and insist on long, intricate backstorys that justify EVERYTHING on your sheet perfectly.

I'd wager these are not the DMs who are going to run games with high character turnover rate in the first place.



And as bad as all that is, the worse part? You just admitted my initial argument is dead to rights on the money. It's a play style that makes you, by default, not give a crap about the game, the character, the party, the NPC's, or the world. Which, is generally considered HORRIBLE for game play!!!!!!!

By that argument, a traditional GM, by default, doesn't give crap about the game or the world and characters they created. 'Cause all the characters they make could be ignored or destroyed by the players at the drop of a hat.

If you want to see what's really horrible for play, try a GM adopting the opposite mentality: preplan everything, get upset everytime players break your plan, decide the pace of the game beforehand with players required to do certain things to get to the interesting bits, don't improvize etc. What you get is an overworked GM who runs an incredibly slow-paced game and will get frustrated each time a player does something they didn't anticipate, or a control freak who will just railroad the players along the set path so they won't. The players in the game have to spend a long time waiting or act in extremely specific ways to satisfy the premade plan.

Some marks of a skilled GM are the abilities to create meaningful game content in minimal time and to add detail and personality to things that he just rolled randomly from an encounter chart. You can't get a GM like that unless they can both care about those characters, the game, and the world and avoid getting too invested or upset about their content being dismissed. Now explain how players are so different from GMs that making them follow the same guidelines will ruin a game.

Metahuman1
2015-03-09, 10:14 AM
It can be interesting, it depends on a number of variables. One of the reasons so many people swapped over to 4E and 5E was the streamlining I'm told.



You'd loose that Wager if my first several foray's into 3.5 and 4E and, coincidentally, Table Top Gaming, taught me nothing else.




Simple: The players aren't several calibers higher then God. The DM, is. The DM, sooner or later, will, somehow, get there way if they choose to press and issue enough. Period. Ignored this NPC in-favor of that NPC, well, fine, let them have there fun for five minutes and make them regret that choice by killing off the NPC or finding out the NPC is a douche and they'll figure out to get with the program and NPC number 1 that they ignored.

Since you asked.

Frozen_Feet
2015-03-09, 10:32 AM
Ignored this NPC in-favor of that NPC, well, fine, let them have there fun for five minutes and make them regret that choice by killing off the NPC or finding out the NPC is a douche and they'll figure out to get with the program and NPC number 1 that they ignored.

There is very, very little in most games stopping me from doing this as a player. In high character turnover rate games, it's actually quite easy. "They said my rogue underperformed, okay, I'll retire the rogue and make a wizard then and overshadow them all! By the end of the session, they'll be begging for the rogue to come back."

Also, speaking as a GM, it's not that simple. Killing a liked NPC in favor of some earlier NPC needed to "get on with the program" is a good way to get accused of railroading. It's far easier to do away with the notion of a "progam" and learning to like and play the sort of NPCs that are also liked by the players.

Metahuman1
2015-03-09, 10:49 AM
Player: *Does as you suggest.*

DM: You rest to regain your spells, when you wake up, you find your book has been stolen. Someone beat the protective spells you had on it. Wow, they must have been really good.

Player: Fine, I'll buy a new book and spells.

DM: Great, here's what's available. *Nothing the DM isn't effortlessly able to mitigate.*





Wow, that took 30 seconds to think up. Also, I did mention "or it could turn out he's not likeable". For example, maybe he stole that spell book? That took 5 seconds to think up.

Frozen_Feet
2015-03-09, 11:33 AM
... and as a player, I can just kill or retire that wizard and roll a sorcerer next time. Repeat ad nauseam. As a point of fact, this is how lot of high-lethality games end up playing practice anyway. If both the player and the GM are following the virtues are listed, the arm's race becomes natural part of the game and it won't get in the way of anyone having fun.

This will loop back to you complaining about how no-one's "giving a crap for their characters!", but what the short summary won't tell you is the excitement, drama, jokes etc. surrounding the situation that will make the characters memorable after their passing.

Let's take the example of thieves trying to steal that spellbook. Played out, that's a good encounter, with multiple rolls to see whether anyone wakes up amidst it, a possible chase sequence etc. - even if it has potential to cripple a character. And the crippled character's parting or suicide could be a good encounter too, with lot of roleplaying and in-game tears shed on it.

If a GM's just dictating it happened, no players or gaming were involved. Ask yourself: is the GM following the virtues I listed? Or is he actually doing the exact opposite, being so adamant on the outcome that no chance for anything else to happen is allowed?

Metahuman1
2015-03-09, 12:53 PM
You roll up the sorcerer, and congrats, your now playing a gear independent class. Enjoy lording it over everyone who needed gear to keep pace.

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-09, 01:53 PM
BootStrapTommy: 2 characters cleared and infamously high lethality module that's designed for 4-6 characters by themselves with minimal effort, and that doesn't scream with a bull horn "THESE CHARACTERS ARE SO FAR BEYOND BROKEN IT'S MIND BOGGLING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" to you? If so, you have just expressed you don't have as good a grasp on game balance as you seem to think you do. It was far from "minimal effort", I suppose. And there were three of us, thank you very much. One of us just happen to be next to useless outside a fight.

The Time of Horrors has a reputation largely, though not wholly, undeserved, IMHO. You'd be surprised how much of it can be countered by preparedness and not playing "I should stick my head in this obvious trap." Seriously, it's sadly predictable. And judicious use of the resources can overcome it, assuming you take the time to think.

So what you guys are referring to as "broken" was simply just playing well and playing cautiously. You are less likely to die if you act cautiously.

We acted accordingly to the idea that at any point we could die.

veti
2015-03-09, 02:19 PM
The Time of Horrors has a reputation largely, though not wholly, undeserved, IMHO.

Yeah well, "summoning" was a lot harder when the module was first published. In 1e, spells were much harder to acquire and replenish, the Summoning spells were higher level (Monster Summoning I was a 3rd level spell), you had no control over what kind of creatures you'd get with it, and they didn't always obey you absolutely.

Yes, most of the dungeon can be mitigated by sufficient quantities of trap fodder. Doesn't even need summonings - I heard of someone doing it by blowing their starting budget on chickens - but "things that can trigger human-sized traps and scream when appropriate" make it borderline-easy, if you've got no scruples about using them.

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-09, 02:28 PM
Understandable.

If you go into the mine, though, it's not broken to take a canary. It's smart.



To me, it means Kenny Rogers playstyle: "Know when to walk away, and know when to run". Play cautiously, and there's every chance you'll live to become rich and powerful enough to survive those sorts of risks. More or less what I'm espousing. I'll only kill you if you do something really, really stupid. Discretion is the better part of valor.

Metahuman1
2015-03-09, 04:44 PM
It was far from "minimal effort", I suppose. And there were three of us, thank you very much. One of us just happen to be next to useless outside a fight.

The Time of Horrors has a reputation largely, though not wholly, undeserved, IMHO. You'd be surprised how much of it can be countered by preparedness and not playing "I should stick my head in this obvious trap." Seriously, it's sadly predictable. And judicious use of the resources can overcome it, assuming you take the time to think.

So what you guys are referring to as "broken" was simply just playing well and playing cautiously. You are less likely to die if you act cautiously.

We acted accordingly to the idea that at any point we could die.

... ... ... You caste a few daily spells, by your own admission you let your third party member sit back and chill the whole way through, and you still cleared it with out dieing or suffering any meaningful death, injury's or other such set backs personally, even though it's suppose to be a highly lethal module for 4-6 players.


No, no, decidedly broken.

Beta Centauri
2015-03-09, 05:36 PM
If you want to be "better" at D&D, great. What that means is entirely up to you.

Sure, "my character survives" is a simple, obvious one. Along those lines is "my character is perfectly optimized," though that doesn't even actually require playing, and even if the character is killed it might still have been "perfect."

Outside of actual contests with prizes, D&D is not really competitive. Sure, in the fiction there are situations with opposing sides, but the GM isn't necessarily playing to win, and if the GM is "training" the players or killing the NPCs first, then it's clear that the GM has the players' interests at heart, and probably is also interested in seeing their game continue.

The bottom line continues to be: "So what if your character dies?" Unless that ejects them from the overall game, such as might be the case in a judged contest, any impact that outcome has on a player is entirely up to the player. The same "poor" choice might be gut wrenching or it might be shrugged off. The "lethality" or not of the game doesn't really drive that, and might drive one when the other is intended.

So, to manage a high-lethality game, manage your expectations about how the players will react to the lethality. Don't expect them to either take it calmly, or to react with strong emotion, or anything else. Focus on making sure their participation in the game is minimally impacted. Some games provide ways to do that, others not so much.

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-09, 09:11 PM
... ... ... You caste a few daily spells, by your own admission you let your third party member sit back and chill the whole way through, and you still cleared it with out dieing or suffering any meaningful death, injury's or other such set backs personally, even though it's suppose to be a highly lethal module for 4-6 players.


No, no, decidedly broken. A dungeon full of traps is only highly lethal if you fall for the traps.

You give the Tomb of Horrors too much credit. Its lethality in entirely determined by how the players proceed. Approached the right way, with the right luck, and it can be rendered impotent.

goto124
2015-03-09, 09:30 PM
Still, it's been pointed out that it's the wrong kind of lethality. You just hope you pass the Spot or Disable Device check. No tricks, no clues to avoid or reduce the damage, just pure luck.

Mr. Mask
2015-03-09, 10:04 PM
A good example to compare luck elements in gaming to is poker. Poker theoretically is a game of chance, but a professional poker player will still beat you every game (even if not every hand).

Metahuman1
2015-03-09, 10:52 PM
A dungeon full of traps is only highly lethal if you fall for the traps.

You give the Tomb of Horrors too much credit. Its lethality in entirely determined by how the players proceed. Approached the right way, with the right luck, and it can be rendered impotent.

Right, play broken classes using broken spells and schools of magic and a broken tactic to overwhelm the challenges with disposable minions and not give a crap about consequences till the traps are all used up or broken. Gotcha.

Eric Tolle
2015-03-09, 11:36 PM
Still, it's been pointed out that it's the wrong kind of lethality. You just hope you pass the Spot or Disable Device check. No tricks, no clues to avoid or reduce the damage, just pure luck.

Spot? Disable Device? Back when the people I knew were going through the first version of Tomb of Horrors, we didn't HAVE a Spot skill. We described various strategies to get through the traps; no rolling spot checks, no trusting to dodgy thief skills. The whole idea behind the scenario was to reason things out. I think one of the most useful devices one of the parties had was a Decanter of Endless Water. Another carted around a fifty-pound ball on a rope add used that to set of the pit traps. And hey, being roped together helped too.

More recently, I heard tell of a pair of 4E characters that went through Tomb of Horrors (original) and survived because they had the same element of caution and common sense. I think they were a pair of 5th level Monks.

Mr. Mask
2015-03-10, 03:31 AM
In history, some people had the devil's own luck. They survived ridiculous things. I wonder how you would best simulate those people? It can occur naturally, if your players are tactical and get lucky rolls, they can survive long, surprising careers. I sort of wonder if you could give a systematic incentive, though. As a soldier survives encounters, their chance of surviving in future tends to increase by a lot. Something like, they have no luck at first, but build luck up over time, particularly by taking risky actions and surviving.

Some systems have modelled something similar to this, I expect.

Frozen_Feet
2015-03-10, 11:45 AM
If you want to be "better" at D&D, great. What that means is entirely up to you . . . Outside of actual contests with prizes, D&D is not really competitive. Sure, in the fiction there are situations with opposing sides, but the GM isn't necessarily playing to win, and if the GM is "training" the players or killing the NPCs first, then it's clear that the GM has the players' interests at heart, and probably is also interested in seeing their game continue.

You could say the same about Chess, or Poker, or Judo, or boxing. There's competition there, allright, and there are techniques which are demonstrably better - but beyond trying to win, you're also doing it because the hobby or game is interesting in itself. Also, losing is fun. (http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/v0.34:Losing) Intentional bad play or breaking away from an established metagame in order to give the other guy a chance are all things that happen, even if gloves come off when the other player displays parity with your skill level.

The point about "training" is a bit funny, because originally, character level was supposed to serve a similar purpose to belt ranks in martial arts. Ergo, as new players started at level 1, you could roughly tell how good they're at playing the game by seeing how high they've made it. In 1st Ed AD&D, Gygax specifically adviced against putting complete greenhorns in the same group as skilled players, as it would rob the new player from a sense of discovery and a chance to try their own way of playing first. I think the point has since become lost, due to experienced player outnumbering new ones in the hobby.

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-10, 01:26 PM
Right, play broken classes using broken spells and schools of magic and a broken tactic to overwhelm the challenges with disposable minions and not give a crap about consequences till the traps are all used up or broken. Gotcha. I realize you are the kinda person who actually plays the Samurai, but there is nothing broken about actually using your brain to tackle a task instead of beating it upside your face.

And an artificer hardly breaks it. Useful as I was for finding the odd DMG traps and equipping the party, the tier 3 dread necromancer (lowest tier in the party) was the one who broke the dungeon, not me.

Unless you wanna rail on about how broken bards, warblades, and Wildshape variant rangers are...

Your issue continues to be putting to much credence in the Tomb of Horrors' reputation.


Still, it's been pointed out that it's the wrong kind of lethality. You just hope you pass the Spot or Disable Device check. No tricks, no clues to avoid or reduce the damage, just pure luck. The vast majority of traps in the Tomb of Horrors are not of the traditional "DMG trap with a Search DC and Disable Device DC" type. Case and point, the very attractive looking carved face with an annihilation sphere in its mouth at the end of the first hallway (which could easily be used to clear the rest of the dungeon by an entromancer). Or the magic mist filled hallway next to it.


Spot? Disable Device? Back when the people I knew were going through the first version of Tomb of Horrors, we didn't HAVE a Spot skill. We described various strategies to get through the traps; no rolling spot checks, no trusting to dodgy thief skills. The whole idea behind the scenario was to reason things out. I think one of the most useful devices one of the parties had was a Decanter of Endless Water. Another carted around a fifty-pound ball on a rope add used that to set of the pit traps. And hey, being roped together helped too.

More recently, I heard tell of a pair of 4E characters that went through Tomb of Horrors (original) and survived because they had the same element of caution and common sense. I think they were a pair of 5th level Monks. This. Gygax designed it to test out players who said their characters were nigh invincible, to demonstrate that the character is only as good as its player. Its reputation derives from players who think they can overcome it mechanically, instead of using their brains.

Good saves would beat out good skill checks (thus the Monks). But common sense and caution beat even good saves (the Monks' players).

Metahuman1
2015-03-10, 02:47 PM
BootStrapTommy: Go read the Tier system. Go read the "Why each class is in it's Tier." supplement.

Then go post up a separate 3.5 D&D thread and ask "Hey, would you let a DreadNecromancer start with X many minions with out having to bother earning them?" And read the long list of people who are gonna go "No." as there answer.


Then we can continue this conversation. You used a Tier 3 class to pull an infamously game breaking exploit that caster classes get exclusive easy access too (Extreme Minionmancy.), and you used one of the top 6 most game breaking classes in 3.5, the artificer. Generally only even remotely rivaled by The Druid, The Cleric, The Archivist, The Wizard, and the Spell to Power Erudite. And you think this is normal, balanced game play that should be rewarded.




I don't overrate the module, you don't know nearly as much as you are convinced you know about game balance or a little thing called Caster Supremacy. Or if you do you are of a mind to advocate in favor of caster supremacy cause you want your personal style to be "The best and only viable option." Like someone else who made an argument in a thread a few years ago on this forum advocating that Wall of Force if used "Properly" should be a No-Save-Just-Die spell against all targets to which nothing could ever have immunity, but then in a separate thread called a player who wanted to use Rules legal (Which the wall of force thing he was advocating clearly and plainly was not.) and historically supported technique of half swording to explain doing two handed power attacks with a Rapier a "Muchkin" whom he'd Ban instantly for that kind of Munchkinry because everyone knows you can't Two handed power attack with a rapier, or even use two hands on a rapier worth anything. (Hint: He was dead to rights wrong from both a RAW and a historical martial arts perspective.)

Arbane
2015-03-10, 03:25 PM
This. Gygax designed it to test out players who said their characters were nigh invincible, to demonstrate that the character is only as good as its player. Its reputation derives from players who think they can overcome it mechanically, instead of using their brains.

Good saves would beat out good skill checks (thus the Monks). But common sense and caution beat even good saves (the Monks' players).

I'm not a big fan of any game where the only thing that matters is your ability to read the GM's mind, and Tomb of Horrors definitely fits that description. It was deliberately designed as a one-shot killer dungeon for conventions, NOT something to be used in a campaign unless the GM was sick and tired of running it. So it's kind of a statistical outlier in D&D design.

Darth Ultron
2015-03-10, 03:41 PM
Still, it's been pointed out that it's the wrong kind of lethality. You just hope you pass the Spot or Disable Device check. No tricks, no clues to avoid or reduce the damage, just pure luck.

The character killer DM is a type of high lethality, just like the random rolls and your character dies. The same way a munchkin is a type of optimizer.

I love the random rolls of character death myself, it adds a lot to the game. It makes players pay attention and they don't take the kind of silly risks someone safe and sound at a dinner table says they take.

Beta Centauri
2015-03-10, 03:58 PM
How "silly" a risk is is really up to the GM. Some GMs will see a particular action as "silly" and set the DCs and the consequences for failure in a way to make the player feel silly to even think about it, let alone trying it. Other GMs will see the same action as cool and thematic and will set the DCs and consequences for failure in a way that encourages the player to try, even if they might fail.

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-10, 04:16 PM
BootStrapTommy: Go read the Tier system. Go read the "Why each class is in it's Tier." supplement.

Then go post up a separate 3.5 D&D thread and ask "Hey, would you let a DreadNecromancer start with X many minions with out having to bother earning them?" And read the long list of people who are gonna go "No." as there answer.

Then we can continue this conversation. You used a Tier 3 class to pull an infamously game breaking exploit that caster classes get exclusive easy access too (Extreme Minionmancy.), and you used one of the top 6 most game breaking classes in 3.5, the artificer. Generally only even remotely rivaled by The Druid, The Cleric, The Archivist, The Wizard, and the Spell to Power Erudite. And you think this is normal, balanced game play that should be rewarded.
Tier 3: Capable of doing one thing quite well, while still being useful when that one thing is inappropriate, or capable of doing all things, but not as well as classes that specialize in that area. Occasionally has a mechanical ability that can solve an encounter, but this is relatively rare and easy to deal with. So you argument against the Dread Necromancer is that the one thing it is capable of doing quite well (Minionmancy) happens to be an easy solution to traps? And since that happens to be the weakness of the most infamous trap based dungeon, it's broken?

Might I reminder you that a Commoner (tier 6) could do the same by buying enough livestock?

As for the artificer, my biggest role in the endeavor (finding and disabling the traps that could be) could have been similarly filled by a rogue, a Tier 4 class. That being said, you're railing about tier 1s when the Tomb of Horrors was made with the knowledge that wizards, druids, and clerics were all things which existed. Acererak himself was a wizard!

You've just assumed munchkinry, when we could have pulled the same off with a rich enough ranger and rogue, and maybe a hexblade or bard. Because the secret was approaching it with preparedness and caution.

kardar233
2015-03-10, 04:21 PM
I love the random rolls of character death myself, it adds a lot to the game. It makes players pay attention and they don't take the kind of silly risks someone safe and sound at a dinner table says they take.

Wouldn't randomly rolling for character deaths encourage random actions by effectively saying that no matter your skill or clever decisions you're subject to death at any time? In that situation I'd just do whatever I felt like because I'm going to die anyway.


How "silly" a risk is is really up to the GM. Some GMs will see a particular action as "silly" and set the DCs and the consequences for failure in a way to make the player feel silly to even think about it, let alone trying it. Other GMs will see the same action as cool and thematic and will set the DCs and consequences for failure in a way that encourages the player to try, even if they might fail.

Yeah, this varies a lot; for example, in the last session of a Dungeon World game I'm in, my character leaped off a two-story building to deliver a flying mechanically-assisted elbow drop to the dragon we were fighting. In some games that would be silly and have a ridiculously high chance of death, and in other's it's totally awesome and we didn't know your character was a luchador and wow.

Metahuman1
2015-03-10, 04:29 PM
Except that the DM would look at any ranger or bard or commoner trying that and tell them "No.". But because your using spell casting, you got a special snowflake exception that no one else would be allowed.



And yes, casters were a thing. They had to sell bits of there soul and keep track of bat poop and giants hair's and eye of newt and a billion other components, all separately, to use any of there spells, anything at all happening around them while they tried to cast ruined there spells, which took longer and longer to cast the higher level you got. Buff spells had to be concentrated on, summons disappeared very shortly after you got them so Minionmancy wasn't even really an option, they had a fraction the amount of HP they do now on average (getting into double digit HP was a darn good trick.) leveled up at a fraction the pace of anyone else. So, yeah, they existed, but that's like saying "Well, multy-celled organisms existed 1-million years ago. How different form modern man could they possible have been?".



And I love how even though it's an established broken tactic (and honestly, how you got so darn many undead that they could do EVERYTHING except for a couple of Disable Device checks for the freaking Tome of Horror's make's me think some kind of Shinanigans had to be involved anyway.), your still ignoring the Artificer being a Tier 1 class based on "Well, he only did X" even though he could have given the party the pass wall ability and bypassed the Tome all together. And by your definition, this would be balanced and ok and "smart good play-style.".




And one of the reasons casters are broken is because unlike other classes, casters get disposable minionmancy, one of the absolute most powerful and game breaking options in the game, for free, out of the box, with out having to even try. The only reason the Dread Necro isn't Tier 1 is because of some heafty limits placed on the sorts of minions it can have. Don't believe me? Ask around the forum.

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-10, 04:56 PM
And I love how even though it's an established broken tactic (and honestly, how you got so darn many undead that they could do EVERYTHING except for a couple of Disable Device checks for the freaking Tome of Horror's make's me think some kind of Shinanigans had to be involved anyway.), your still ignoring the Artificer being a Tier 1 class based on "Well, he only did X" even though he could have given the party the pass wall ability and bypassed the Tome all together. And by your definition, this would be balanced and ok and "smart good play-style.". You may be overestimating the number of minions we were fielding.


And one of the reasons casters are broken is because unlike other classes, casters get disposable minionmancy, one of the absolute most powerful and game breaking options in the game, for free, out of the box, with out having to even try. The only reason the Dread Necro isn't Tier 1 is because of some heafty limits placed on the sorts of minions it can have. Don't believe me? Ask around the forum.
Tier 1: Capable of doing absolutely everything, often better than classes that specialize in that thing. Often capable of solving encounters with a single mechanical ability and little thought from the player. Has world changing powers at high levels. These guys, if played well, can break a campaign and can be very hard to challenge without extreme DM fiat, especially if Tier 3s and below are in the party. Not even close to describing the one trick pony that is the Dread Necromancer, whose only real skill is incredibly useful minion spamming. Notice the last part too, where it defines the non-game breakers as Tier 3 and under.

You've made the common mistake of associating Tier with power, when Tier is versatility and power. It doesn't matter how powerful one tactic is if there is a way to shut it down without a back up. The Dread Necromancer isn't Tier 1 because it isn't even as versatile as the tier 2 sorc, regardless of how good it is at summoning (mind, grossly limited even to undead). Shut down a wizard's or sorc's minion spam, they have many other options. Shut down a Dread Necromancer's minion spam, you shut down the Dread Necromancer, who is now just a mediocre debuffer.

Metahuman1
2015-03-10, 05:21 PM
Shut down the Wizard or the Sorcerer's Minion Spam, and honestly the tricks you've have to use for that probably meant shutting down magic, period.

And the Sorcerer and Wizard not being grossly limited to undead is why Conjuration is THE most broken school of magic bar nothing. Need that ability? There's a summon for that. Need a spell, there's a summon that has it. And you can shred the action economy to boot, AND there disposable. That breaks the game with little effort and warps reality pretty darn well all on it's own, and requires serious Fiat to challenge it, particularly if Tier 3's or lower are in the party.

And the Dreadnecro's limits on what he can summon are why he doesn't get outside Tier 3. Take the limits on what he can summon away, and he's Tier 1. High Tier 2 at the absolute lowest.



And I'd be less hung up on it if you weren't presenting it as "No big deal that the DM let me do something cause fluff says spell that he'd never allow characters that can't fluff it as a spell to do" and that doing this is "Smart and good game-play" and not doing it is "Stupid and bad game-play that should be punished horribly, all the time, period, no exceptions." While also trying to sit there and claim that having this one trick Solo a dungeon designed to TPK a six person party is "Balanced." and telling me that "Sorcerer's and Artificers aren't broken.". While only selectively paying attention to the things I advised you to read and taking the one segment that you can make give you a leg to stand on and running with it and ignoring the multiple other segments (Like the listing of Artificer and Sorcerer in the Tier listings, or checking in a separate thread and asking "hey, is minionmancy broken?") that would impede that.





And precisely how Many undead did you use during this run through? Cause if the answer isn't well into triple digits, I know something's amiss here alright.

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-10, 05:48 PM
Shut down the Wizard or the Sorcerer's Minion Spam, and honestly the tricks you've have to use for that probably meant shutting down magic, period.

And the Sorcerer and Wizard not being grossly limited to undead is why Conjuration is THE most broken school of magic bar nothing. Need that ability? There's a summon for that. Need a spell, there's a summon that has it. And you can shred the action economy to boot, AND there disposable. That breaks the game with little effort and warps reality pretty darn well all on it's own, and requires serious Fiat to challenge it, particularly if Tier 3's or lower are in the party. Dispel magic. AOE attacks. Enemy Tier 1 spell casters. Antimagic fields. Creative traps.

All are solutions to summoning without DM fiat. I recently took out all of a party's minions in a campaign with just a cannon down a hallway.

The issue with Sorcs and Wizards is they have ten other things up their sleeve. Dread Necromancer not so much.


And I'd be less hung up on it if you weren't presenting it as "No big deal that the DM let me do something cause fluff says spell that he'd never allow characters that can't fluff it as a spell to do" and that doing this is "Smart and good game-play" and not doing it is "Stupid and bad game-play that should be punished horribly, all the time, period, no exceptions." This, combined with other posts in the Material Possessions thread, lead me to believe that your GM is kind of a huge jerk.

Because if you feel that it is wrong, you're right. And I totally agree.

Also that last part puts words in my mouth. Tactics are situational. And despite what you seem to think, using the best tactic for each situation is a smart thing to do.


While also trying to sit there and claim that having this one trick Solo a dungeon designed to TPK a six person party is "Balanced." and telling me that "Sorcerer's and Artificers aren't broken." This is why I keep saying you give the Tomb of Horrors too much credit. If a single, specialist class from one of the more balanced tiers can solo a dungeon, it is not " designed to TPK a six person party". You're letting the myth of the Tomb of Horrors get in the way of the reality. Clearly it can be overcome with some thought by certain tactics (not just minionry). The tactic we used could be easily replicated by supposed low-tier classes with the right resources!


And precisely how Many undead did you use during this run through? Cause if the answer isn't well into triple digits, I know something's amiss here alright. Yep, you're overestimating. You do realize there is not a triple digit number of traps in the Tomb of Horrors, yes? Even if you had a single minion for every trap, all of them don't have to die if you used them intelligently.

Frozen_Feet
2015-03-10, 06:37 PM
The best tactic to deal with Tomb of Horrors is actually to take perfectly mundane digging tools and go around majority of the obstacles. You can do it with just four to six player characters, it will just take more time than if you'd hire few dozen NPC helpers. This is how one group won a tournament using the module. The irony here being that the Tomb is designed to account for all the commonly-used magical tricks and dungeon by-passes, being the obvious "easy solution" in D&D. Mundanes have a lot of options that are completely overlooked in D&D because the system has magic. It'll become even more obvious if you choose to play a game like Praedor or STALKER, both of which center around player characters investigating similarly weird and dangerous contraptions, but aren't allowed to play wizards or aliens themselves.

Metahuman1
2015-03-10, 06:57 PM
Shuts down magic, Doesn't even begin to solve the problem with out Fiat, If it doesn't shut down magic it means it opted to kill you before you knew it was there in your sleep, shuts down magic, doesn't even being to solve the problem with our Fiat.

So, yeah, we've got, "Doesn't work with out blatant Fiat" options, "Kills them before there's even a fight" options, and "Shuts down magic period." options.


Yes, I've had plenty of bad DM's. Most of the GOOD DM's I've had would have looked at this stunt for a moment and informed you that the next room was an Anti-magic field, and then had it be full of spike traps in every tile in the floor, ceiling and Walls for trying to caster supremacy your way through it solo. The guy with the OA game would have loved this tactic except for it being Necromancy (But make it none organic golems or summoned monsters/natures ally....). Though Ironically if you just used an dominate spell on a magistrate and got access to a few hundred condimed prisoners that way I'd imagine it would have worked too in his case.

That said, there's a difference between "Used good tactics." and "I have some spells built into my class that get the DM to give me a resource no one else can get that let me auto-win.". This is the latter. The digging around the thing trick? THAT'S the former and THAT is brilliant and if I ever end up doing Tome of Horror's again I'm doing it.


And no, no, having seen the TPK's, no, I'm not letting the myth get in the way. I'm remembering the reality. And I'm also keeping in mind just how stupidly broken and biased in favor of casters 3.5 D&D is.


You have traps that can auto reset, and traps that can sometimes be there and sometimes not, and traps that can hit more then one person. And plenty of them. If you weren't up against that, you were having someone take it VERY easy on you running the module, which explains a good chunk actually, particularly when combined with Caster Supremacy and the fact that many people don't recognize it's existence or the extent to which it permeates the edition.

Arbane
2015-03-10, 07:10 PM
"The Tomb of Horrors is an intelligence test.

If you enter it, YOU FAILED."

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-10, 08:00 PM
Shuts down magic, Doesn't even begin to solve the problem with out Fiat, If it doesn't shut down magic it means it opted to kill you before you knew it was there in your sleep, shuts down magic, doesn't even being to solve the problem with our Fiat.

So, yeah, we've got, "Doesn't work with out blatant Fiat" options, "Kills them before there's even a fight" options, and "Shuts down magic period." options. You're not being creative enough. Casters can be shut down from almost any tactic with just the DMG. A fact that most people overlook when yammering about caster supremacy. The truth is in a equitable game these obstacles should be abundant. DMs rarely use them, however. Which is one of the roots of caster supremacy, outside design. And its mainly because casters cry about it when DMs do, as if it's fair that they can fly but the fighter has to climb.

But for some reason you've dismissed half the solutions, then claimed the other half require fudging. Which simply isn't true.


Yes, I've had plenty of bad DM's. Most of the GOOD DM's I've had would have looked at this stunt for a moment and informed you that the next room was an Anti-magic field, and then had it be full of spike traps in every tile in the floor, ceiling and Walls for trying to caster supremacy your way through it solo. Last time I checked, deliberately sabotaging the efforts of a player out of spite is bad DMing, not good. And what you described sounds spiteful. "How dare you devise solutions to my puzzles with your abilities!?" But it more or less illustrates my earlier point about solutions for caster supremacy existing. But of course for some reason you are arguing that antimagic precautions (of which the ToH has many) are some how unacceptable. Which is strange.


That said, there's a difference between "Used good tactics." and "I have some spells built into my class that get the DM to give me a resource no one else can get that let me auto-win.". This is the latter. The digging around the thing trick? THAT'S the former and THAT is brilliant and if I ever end up doing Tome of Horror's again I'm doing it. Strange argument. Unfortunately universalizable. Last I checked rogues sneak better than barbarians. But I can't argue that simply because rogues possess abilities that can make them better at sneaking that it is unfair to barbarians, who don't have that feature in circumstances where sneaking around would be a better option. Inb4 "But broken magic!"

Also, arguing that digging is a legitimate strategy, but trap finding, minion fodder, and creative caution are not, is internally inconsistent. You'd be playing favoritism there. Both are sneaking past holes in the dungeon's design. It seems your only issue is that the one involves magic. And magic is EVIL!


And no, no, having seen the TPK's, no, I'm not letting the myth get in the way. I'm remembering the reality. And I'm also keeping in mind just how stupidly broken and biased in favor of casters 3.5 D&D is.

You have traps that can auto reset, and traps that can sometimes be there and sometimes not, and traps that can hit more then one person. And plenty of them. If you weren't up against that, you were having someone take it VERY easy on you running the module, which explains a good chunk actually, particularly when combined with Caster Supremacy and the fact that many people don't recognize it's existence or the extent to which it permeates the edition. Here we go again with the "but its designed a certain way!" thing. You ignore the many holes that now exist in that design. You treat it like it's perfect. It's deadly to the unprepared. But it is just a chore to those prepared. A fact the countless number of players who creatively tackled it over the years illustrates.

And I'm not seeing where those traps are a problem. There are ways around those issues which you are completely ignoring. You'd be surprised how many of the ToH's dangers can be averted by simply seeing them coming. Which seems to be the real issue here. You don't seem to think that's possible.

Darth Ultron
2015-03-10, 10:32 PM
Wouldn't randomly rolling for character deaths encourage random actions by effectively saying that no matter your skill or clever decisions you're subject to death at any time? In that situation I'd just do whatever I felt like because I'm going to die anyway.

I guess we could call this the DeathWind Fallacy: That a player in a high lethality game won't play the game and will just do whatever until their character dies. It's exactly like saying an optimizer won't role play.

aspekt
2015-03-10, 10:39 PM
Character generation in 3.5 if you want your character to have a prayer of being able to function, let alone preform well (which, according to many of the people who seem to be lauding the virtues of high lethality games and sundering as an A-ok tactic for the GM to randomly whip out on players indiscriminately and the like, is a major, major, major, essential function of the game that if a character fails to meet they should be killed for.), tends to be rather time demanding to figure out spells, classes, skills, feats, gear, prestige classes, and gear, among lots of other little fiddly bits and rules. You can easily have several hours just to build one character, before back story. And yes, the GM has to be heavily involved given the fact that he's gonna have things to say. (I don't want leap attack/tome of battle/pounce, there broken! No Psionics, they don't exist in this world! No Incantatrix, I'm banning that supplement! No, the DMM feat is banned, but I'll let you take that extra wild shape feat form the same book if you like. Ext, ext.)

And then the majority of DM's insist the game is more about the story then the mechanics, and insist on long, intricate backstorys that justify EVERYTHING on your sheet perfectly.

So, the game system is not well suited to fast character creation, and the average GM insists on exasperating that. Result? Unless you have all week to do nothing but monopolize the DM's time to approve things, and then spend the rest of your time crunching out a dozen or more sheets, and writing up long, intricate backstory's. And unless on top of that your DM doesn't play with the third most common house rule in the hobby of "Must make the character at the table and show me everything in every book your using before it can be on the sheet.", that high lethality game is gonna do nothing but grind play to a halt.


And before you say, "Never seen it happen." I've seen it happen. To the point were I have had multiple sessions in a row were I got about 5 minutes of play time, give or take a smig, and then had to go right back to character creation cause that character died. Party thought it was a hoot cause they got to loot the body that that bump in wealth was what was keeping THEM alive.




And as bad as all that is, the worse part? You just admitted my initial argument is dead to rights on the money. It's a play style that makes you, by default, not give a crap about the game, the character, the party, the NPC's, or the world. Which, is generally considered HORRIBLE for game play!!!!!!!

I'm sorry it sounds like a downright crappy experience. And I do agree an optimized character can take a long time to build in 3.x. So that is a big drawback for high lethality games in that system.

However, I'm going to have to side with BootStrap here. It sounds like you've also been playing with some hardcore munchkins and some crappy DMs. People playing specifically to spite players, DMs who view their relationship to players as a competition or as fundamentally antagonistic are bad DMs. I don't care how great their roleplay is, or fascinating the lore they've created, they aren't doing their job. The last time most of us DMd like that we were in middle school. (And I mean that literally. We were really young and treated the game like a poker game with winners and losers.)

To reiterate, you are totally correct 3.x is not built for speedy character development when optimizing, without an eidetic memory. But a lot of the players at my table enjoy creating characters. Honestly, it's as much playing the game for them as combat or roleplaying are.

Pardon my strong reaction. It just riles me up to see players treated the way you are describing. I have been a DM for a long time and it honestly just hurts to see that happen.

veti
2015-03-10, 11:12 PM
And I'm not seeing where those traps are a problem. There are ways around those issues which you are completely ignoring. You'd be surprised how many of the ToH's dangers can be averted by simply seeing them coming. Which seems to be the real issue here. You don't seem to think that's possible.

You know what did for me, the one time I tried to play ToH?

The demi-lich. You know, the boss monster at the end of the whole thing. We got that far, without knowing anything about the module in advance, except for "we hear it's really hard".

But the demi-lich? It had a list of very, very specific things that could harm it, none of which we had access to. (Well, technically we could have done it a dozen or so HP of damage by slinging gemstones at it, for some weird reason. But nowhere near enough to kill it.) Seriously, things like "Power Word: Kill from an astral or ethereal magic user" - things that require very specific combinations of effects and characters, and there's (a) no guarantee you brought any of them with you, and (b) no way of knowing That Particular Combination would work anyway.

Meanwhile, it absorbed and chewed up our souls one by one. No defence, no saving throw. The only option was to run away, and once three of us were soulless husks on the floor, that's precisely what the rest did.

Frozen_Feet
2015-03-11, 11:43 AM
Someone here mentioned "random quirk list". Random character generation, if sufficiently fast, is generally a good idea for high turnover rate games, as it prevents a player from being stymied by lack of ideas, and ideally encourages a "make most of what you have" attitude. It fails if it's too slow or if the randomization system produces too many similar characters.

SowZ
2015-03-11, 12:12 PM
Did they die? No? Then where's the lethality part? Nothing ended up being lethal, there all alive. It wasn't a high lethality game, no one died. A Hard game? Sure, give you that, but Hard and Lethal are two entirely different things.



Granted I find the idea of ANY party getting through Tome of Horror's with no deaths utterly preposterous unless there coming at it as WAY higher level casters then ToH was intended for with exhaustive use to Divination and Conjuration and Transmutations first. But if there doing that there not charging in head long, there using a different plan which suits the game better.


Edit: Freaking ninja's.


Yes, that's exactly the philosophy such a game style relys on by default.


And why was that first level character fighting a dragon to begin with? Because someone wanted him dead, and didn't want to risk and enemy he had any chance of beating. And at the advancement level a dragon has to be to be 100% beat proof to a first level character, there also gonna be 100% escape proof, cause your never gonna out stealth it, never gonna legitimately persuade it of anything barring blatant DM fiat, Never gonna be able to out run or maneuver it, and it can beat any magic you have with out even blinking, and track you by magic besides.

There are no options that don't lead to "Your dead, roll a new character."

Thank you for proving my point about High Lethality games.

Part of it is GMing style. I run, (mostly,) fairly high lethality games and player death is reasonably common, (a death every third session or so in a group of 5-8 players.) But in years and years of running said game, it has always been the direct result of player machinations catching up to them, not once as the result of encounters I planned or a stray bullet/bad die roll. (I mean, those cases happen fairly frequently, but resurrection has always been available in such instances.)

Players in my games generally have characters with at least two motivations. The overall game/party goal and the individual goal.

Examples include: Betraying the party by trying to kill them, betraying the party by trying to dominate them, basically the laundry list goes on of people trying to achieve their goals by opposing the party. It's understood in my games that intrigue and betrayal are staples in stories and in the games themselves.

(Players who are pure victims of another players machinations have either A. participated in the intrigue and betrayal and just lost or B. they were just victims and as such either didn't die or I gave them another chance at life/resurrection.)

It has happened a few times where a players character became an NPC by virtue of something in game or what-have-you. Like, once a player got turned into a dragon and didn't really fit with the party anymore but the player was more than happy with this. Once a player's machinations succeeded and they became the BBEG and had to roll up a new character.

Only twice can I recall a player just dying in combat to NPCs. Once was a starting character charging literally 200 police officers and once was a player with no spells and low on health jumping into a lake filled with sharks and a water elemental. In both instances the whole party was nearby and these actions were by no means necessary. So, you know, basically suicide charges. Actually, no, there are a couple other instances. But both were similar scenarios, one where a character was playing their last session so I am pretty sure they were just going out in battle. The other where the player just didn't care and found his ludicrous gambit amusing and was happy to risk blowing up an entire cave they were inside to kill all the (non-hostile) NPCs there.

So, anyway, I guess my point is that you can DM games where PCs die as a result of their choices without the players feeling like a stray bullet will end their career or that you as the DM are against them.

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-11, 01:08 PM
Examples include: Betraying the party by trying to kill them, betraying the party by trying to dominate them, basically the laundry list goes on of people trying to achieve their goals by opposing the party. It's understood in my games that intrigue and betrayal are staples in stories and in the games themselves.

(Players who are pure victims of another players machinations have either A. participated in the intrigue and betrayal and just lost or B. they were just victims and as such either didn't die or I gave them another chance at life/resurrection.)

It has happened a few times where a players character became an NPC by virtue of something in game or what-have-you. Like, once a player got turned into a dragon and didn't really fit with the party anymore but the player was more than happy with this. Once a player's machinations succeeded and they became the BBEG and had to roll up a new character.
Recently played in a high lethality campaign to this effect. We entered knowing full PvP and faced off against a band of assassins and their dragon leader.

The party was shocked when during the BBG fight, I turned coat. I was the cleric and party healer. The party rogue joined me. The remaining four party member's died.

Needless to say my cleric and the rogue are gunna be future BBGs. PvP is a whole nother animal in terms of lethality.

In my experience with lethality in TTRPGs, players are usually the cause of their own demise. After low-levels, freak dice rolls rarely kill. I've always heard it said "Look out for the interests of your players. But don't let them know that you are." I try to follow that. But some actions can inexcusable, especially the ones that are disruptive to the rest of the party. And if a player is dumb enough to pursue those, I let the dice lie where they land.

LibraryOgre
2015-03-11, 04:21 PM
Someone here mentioned "random quirk list". Random character generation, if sufficiently fast, is generally a good idea for high turnover rate games, as it prevents a player from being stymied by lack of ideas, and ideally encourages a "make most of what you have" attitude. It fails if it's too slow or if the randomization system produces too many similar characters.

Hackmaster's system greatly encourages random creation (by giving you bonus points for not moving your attributes around, and by giving less points for "cherry picked" quirks and flaws), while still giving you options (for example, you can spend a BP to reroll a quirk or flaw you REALLY don't want to play, and the "shopkeeper rule", which means your stats won't suck TOO badly).

You can wind up with some memorable characters with that system. My favorite, that I wrote up for a Con Demo, was the Halfling Thief with the flaw Pocking (as in, pockmarks), a 4 intelligence, and an abnormally high skill in Firebuilding. I envisioned him as being a bit of an idiot firebug... someone who lit fires because they were pretty. A related character (for the same demo) had starts that were just this side of shopkeeper... but he had a good Charisma and improbably good looks for a gnome.... and the Needy trait.

Metahuman1
2015-03-11, 05:34 PM
aspekt: Yup. It was also my first actual D&D experience. I got to third level, and then the girl in the group that the DM wasn't dating but did have the hots for decided she was sick of this pesky cleric of this pesky not evil god being in her party and making it hard for her to be a properly evil Necromancer and hard to desecrate lost temples of that clerics Goddess, so she just up and murdered him in the middle of the night.

Incidentally that character was the primary healer for the party at the time and I'd rolled a pair of 16's, a pair of 17's, an 18 and a 19 on a house rule that when you rolled 4d6 if you rolled 4 Six's it came up as a 19. I haven't rolled stats like that since, and they were utterly wasted as a result. (What I'd give to have that set again on a level 1 character knowing what I know now.)

Then the monk. Two hours of sitting out and being told I should totally roll a monk because monks are amazing, and he finally got into the game, met with the party. Not ten minutes later we hada random encounter with an earth elemental and he was killed and his corpse looted.

So I though about rolling a Paladin and the DM said I was not allowed to roll one as he'd have to murder the party. So I looked at rolling a Knight and couldn't get the DM to agree to let me use PHB 2's affiliation rules to set something up so that I could advance my cool Knight stuff like Knights challenge while PRCing into Dragonrider (It was a Dragonlance campaign. Pre-written and published one.). And so abandoned that idea. Instead, Ranger, cause the DM said rangers are awesome. Well, having died from not keeping distance twice, I opted to be an archer, naively thinking that range actually mattered in this game. The DM agreed since it was a ranger it would make sense for him to meet the party while they were having a random encounter. Instead, he @*(!ed up, and had the RANGER in the middle of the encounter, which the party took there sweet time getting involved in. (The encounter was 2 Basilisks and I rolled a nat 1 the first time one of them used a Gaze attack.). The party protested that they didn't get to loot the body (Not "Hey, DM, how about we reset that fight so that he can get in like he was suppose to.").

So after I pointed out, publicly, that this was not what the plan was, he offered to just pretend that guy had a different name and introduce the ranger again. And The party's resident serial killer character offed him a couple of sessions later for protesting using torture on a prisoner. Then I rolled a rouge with an Assassin level and intent to progress in Assassin, again, they all said "hey, this'll work, there awesome!" and I was consistently trying not to be a duplicate of what the party already had. So I made my entrance by sneaking up on them as THEY had a random encounter, watching, and when they won, clapping. And was promptly attacked and killed by the party. Why? They'd spent the three hours I was working on that character by myself fighting an assassin's guild, had finished it twenty minutes or so (One day game time.) before I got back to the table and got the character approved by the DM, and there leader had entered exactly the same way before attacking him. So, in character, they did the logial thing there characters would do after that. Kill first, don't ask questions, then loot the corps.

I was eventually asked to leave this group by the DM for not "Roleplaying" well enough and being "Too much of a Munchkin.".

Yeah, I came very close in my early exposures to the hobby to writing it off in it's entirety with more then one group. VERY close indeed. But, it did teach me some valuable things about the hobby. Like the fact that High Lethality tends to be god awful in 3.5, as does sundering Items. The difference is the latter camp seems to have agreed over in the other thread that part of why that DM was bad was that they engaged in the tactic in the first place.



veti: Sounds like even if you can "Intelligently" and "Creatively" bypass the traps, it still requires you to read the DM's mind or cheat and look at the ending of the module and use meta knowledge in order to beat the Demi-Litch. Which would mean that, no, even if the traps aren't as bad (They are but for sake of argument.), that the Module is still all but 100% Assured to inflict if not a TPK then major casualty's and defeat.


SowZ: Don't get me started on PVP. PVP has just cemented my though that I'm wholly uninterested in Evil or hell even neutral aligned games.


BootStrapTommy: Read the above. Keep in mind that last story reminds me heartily of the one I told at the top of this post. That is all.

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-11, 06:34 PM
BootStrapTommy: Read the above. Keep in mind that last story reminds me heartily of the one I told at the top of this post. That is all. There is a huge difference between the two.

In my campaign, its nature as a PvP campaign was discussed, planned, and encouraged. No one who was a part of the campaign did not consent to PvP from the get go. The entire purpose of this campaign was to promote the idea of intraparty conflict, a break from form with our normal campaigns. And those who died knew they would have to sit the rest out. It was competitive. Any discontent with the results would have been akin to bad sportsmanship. All in all, we emerged with our fellow players' respect.

Which is a different animal than simply the DM letting a normal session turn into a free-for-all.

Which I think more or less brings up an important point with regard to how to run high lethality: Don't do it, unless your players are informed that it is the case before hand.

Arbane
2015-03-11, 07:21 PM
aspekt: Yup. It was also my first actual D&D experience. I got to third level, and then the girl in the group that the DM wasn't dating but did have the hots for decided she was sick of this pesky cleric of this pesky not evil god being in her party....

This is WAY more a problem with the players than with the rules, I'd say.

goto124
2015-03-11, 07:27 PM
I'm curious about WHY the players made bad decisions in a High Lethality (if it's the be-careful-avoid-combat-to-survive kind of high lethality, not the die-every-5-seconds kind)

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-11, 07:37 PM
I'm curious about WHY the players made bad decisions in a High Lethality (if it's the be-careful-avoid-combat-to-survive kind of high lethality, not the die-every-5-seconds kind)
Things like this (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?400935-Character-Suicide&highlight=suicidal+character).

YossarianLives
2015-03-11, 07:52 PM
In my experience with lethality in TTRPGs, players are usually the cause of their own demise. After low-levels, freak dice rolls rarely kill. I've always heard it said "Look out for the interests of your players. But don't let them know that you are." I try to follow that. But some actions can inexcusable, especially the ones that are disruptive to the rest of the party. And if a player is dumb enough to pursue those, I let the dice lie where they land.
I completely agree! Players in my games never die because of poor dice rolls. In many ways I would say that the death of a beloved character because of bad luck is rather harsh. However in the campaign I'm currently DMing two players were killed in the same session because they ran into danger with single-digit hit points.

SowZ
2015-03-11, 10:04 PM
SowZ: Don't get me started on PVP. PVP has just cemented my though that I'm wholly uninterested in Evil or hell even neutral aligned games.


BootStrapTommy: Read the above. Keep in mind that last story reminds me heartily of the one I told at the top of this post. That is all.

That has nothing to do with alignment and everything to do with immature players. Two good characters might easily end up in PvP if their goals are misaligned. A neutral or evil person is no more likely to betray their friends and allies unless the player is being Chaotic Stupid.

PvP can be handled very well in a way that allows more story options without disrupting the game, but it has to have an active GM and mature players who understand everyone's fun is important and 'slitting Tim's throat for the LulZ' makes for a terrible story. Like I said, I allow PvP, but players must do a few things. First, I want them to talk with me about any of their PvP plans beforehand, out of game. We then talk about how far is too far, who they shouldn't target, etc. etc. based on what I know people will be cool with. Basically, people don't die from PvP if they have chosen not to engage in PvP and players have never fought me on that because they understand everyone's fun.

Also, if I feel like plot events are coming up that make a particular PC dying is likely, I will talk with said player out of game to get a feel for how they would react. I will tweak the scenario so that the death outcome can be avoided or to make the death satisfying and good for the story accordingly.

As for evil clerics sacrificing party members to their gods and dumb crap, yeah, that's a problem. But it comes from player ideas about mustache twirling/dog kicking evil and DM permissiveness. For some reason, a DM will try and dissuade Good and Neutral PCs from disruptive PvP but not even bat an eye when the evil rogue does the same. But Neutral or Evil characters can be entirely reasonable characters. Writing them off as disruptive is the same as writing off Paladins as potential PCs. A higher percentage of Paladin PCs are disruptive and PvP trigger happy than evil PCs, in my experience.

That you've had disruptive players or people who think an evil alignment is a blank check to do anything doesn't mean cutting of a significant number of the potential characters people can play will lead to a better game.


I'm curious about WHY the players made bad decisions in a High Lethality (if it's the be-careful-avoid-combat-to-survive kind of high lethality, not the die-every-5-seconds kind)

Commitment to character and story, in my opinion. Players in my games frequently make the most interesting decision/best for the story as opposed to the best for their character. So they engage in these elaborate, sometimes PVP plots, not because they expect them to succeed but because it will be the most interesting/memorable thing.

Talakeal
2015-03-12, 02:23 PM
aspekt: Yup. It was also my first actual D&D experience. I got to third level, and then the girl in the group that the DM wasn't dating but did have the hots for decided she was sick of this pesky cleric of this pesky not evil god being in her party and making it hard for her to be a properly evil Necromancer and hard to desecrate lost temples of that clerics Goddess, so she just up and murdered him in the middle of the night.

Incidentally that character was the primary healer for the party at the time and I'd rolled a pair of 16's, a pair of 17's, an 18 and a 19 on a house rule that when you rolled 4d6 if you rolled 4 Six's it came up as a 19. I haven't rolled stats like that since, and they were utterly wasted as a result. (What I'd give to have that set again on a level 1 character knowing what I know now.)

Then the monk. Two hours of sitting out and being told I should totally roll a monk because monks are amazing, and he finally got into the game, met with the party. Not ten minutes later we hada random encounter with an earth elemental and he was killed and his corpse looted.

So I though about rolling a Paladin and the DM said I was not allowed to roll one as he'd have to murder the party. So I looked at rolling a Knight and couldn't get the DM to agree to let me use PHB 2's affiliation rules to set something up so that I could advance my cool Knight stuff like Knights challenge while PRCing into Dragonrider (It was a Dragonlance campaign. Pre-written and published one.). And so abandoned that idea. Instead, Ranger, cause the DM said rangers are awesome. Well, having died from not keeping distance twice, I opted to be an archer, naively thinking that range actually mattered in this game. The DM agreed since it was a ranger it would make sense for him to meet the party while they were having a random encounter. Instead, he @*(!ed up, and had the RANGER in the middle of the encounter, which the party took there sweet time getting involved in. (The encounter was 2 Basilisks and I rolled a nat 1 the first time one of them used a Gaze attack.). The party protested that they didn't get to loot the body (Not "Hey, DM, how about we reset that fight so that he can get in like he was suppose to.").

So after I pointed out, publicly, that this was not what the plan was, he offered to just pretend that guy had a different name and introduce the ranger again. And The party's resident serial killer character offed him a couple of sessions later for protesting using torture on a prisoner. Then I rolled a rouge with an Assassin level and intent to progress in Assassin, again, they all said "hey, this'll work, there awesome!" and I was consistently trying not to be a duplicate of what the party already had. So I made my entrance by sneaking up on them as THEY had a random encounter, watching, and when they won, clapping. And was promptly attacked and killed by the party. Why? They'd spent the three hours I was working on that character by myself fighting an assassin's guild, had finished it twenty minutes or so (One day game time.) before I got back to the table and got the character approved by the DM, and there leader had entered exactly the same way before attacking him. So, in character, they did the logial thing there characters would do after that. Kill first, don't ask questions, then loot the corps.

I was eventually asked to leave this group by the DM for not "Roleplaying" well enough and being "Too much of a Munchkin.".

Yeah, I came very close in my early exposures to the hobby to writing it off in it's entirety with more then one group. VERY close indeed. But, it did teach me some valuable things about the hobby. Like the fact that High Lethality tends to be god awful in 3.5, as does sundering Items. The difference is the latter camp seems to have agreed over in the other thread that part of why that DM was bad was that they engaged in the tactic in the first place.



veti: Sounds like even if you can "Intelligently" and "Creatively" bypass the traps, it still requires you to read the DM's mind or cheat and look at the ending of the module and use meta knowledge in order to beat the Demi-Litch. Which would mean that, no, even if the traps aren't as bad (They are but for sake of argument.), that the Module is still all but 100% Assured to inflict if not a TPK then major casualty's and defeat.


SowZ: Don't get me started on PVP. PVP has just cemented my though that I'm wholly uninterested in Evil or hell even neutral aligned games.


BootStrapTommy: Read the above. Keep in mind that last story reminds me heartily of the one I told at the top of this post. That is all.

This really doesn't have anything to do with the game rules or even the DM's style. These people are flat out jerks and imo were trying to tell you they didn't want to hang out with you for whatever reason and you just didn't get the hint. I can't think of any other explanation for this sort of behavior, and I have seen my share of terrible groups in my day.

SowZ
2015-03-12, 02:53 PM
This really doesn't have anything to do with the game rules or even the DM's style. These people are flat out jerks and imo were trying to tell you they didn't want to hang out with you for whatever reason and you just didn't get the hint. I can't think of any other explanation for this sort of behavior, and I have seen my share of terrible groups in my day.

Agreed. People I've played with gauge other people's enjoyment and what they are comfortable with, especially in regards to PvP.

Metahuman1
2015-03-12, 04:43 PM
BootStrapTommy: Really? Cause according to you at least 99.99% of that is because i wasn't playing right. Now, sure, if I'd built an Artificer and made a continuous item of magic mouth for 1% market Value before level 3 I'd have had at least a chance of killing the Necromancer in PVP, but that requires you to be able to read the DM and the entire party's minds. Which is ridiculous. I told that story to illustrate that point, and to illustrate that the system is NOT well suited to this kind of game. Earlier editions? Sure. Hell, I'd even hear an argument for 4th or 5th edition. Since the former made most things quite samish so once you know the gist of the formulas and costs you can grab things very quickly mechanically and have the crunch done in 15 or 20 minutes even at high levels and with out virtual tools, so it's just a matter of the DM needing to understand that the bulk of the out time is gonna be doing fluff, and to just let you cut the fluff a serious break. (the fact that Most DM's don't could still be argued to be a failing of the system but my 4E experience was that cookie cutter fluff, on the light side, was strongly, strongly encouraged in that system.).

Not played 5th, so, don't know there.

Now, course, if you didn't want to argue that pc death was all but universally the pc's fault, well, that might change the equation a bit. But you have been arguing that. Staunchly.



Arbane: That would explain the first death and refusing to help me with the Knight and denying Paladin (Along with the fact that Yeah, I'd have had to kill at least 2 PC's and the others would have jumped in. Course, with a lance, smite evil 2 a day, spirited charge, mount and ride by attack and Mostly D10's and a decent Con, I could have killed the 3 actually evil members of the party before I went down, including the Necromancer, and MAYBE offed at least one of the other 2 before succumbing to death. Couldn't have the necromaner's player dieing in a "Death is a consequence in the rules after all, if your not using it your playing wrong!" environment.), it does NOT explain the Monk, Or the ranger both freaking times, or the Assassin/Rogue.


Talakeal: No, this has to do with Evil characters deciding that a strangers life is less valuable then a gold bump to them when there group is repeatedly proving there strong enough on Man power as is and don't need help. Because hey, that's how evil plays. And this is the first time (including after posting that story a couple of times on this very forum over the years.) I've seriously heard "There just *******s." instead of "There evil, it makes sense, the only thing the DM should have been doing was forcing them away form Lawful toward Chaotic more firmly and frequently and making the neutral characters move to Evil while he was at it."


SowZ: No, no, not the impression I got. One of them was perfectly nice to play with during her first two characters. Then on character 3, she decided to do something different, go Neutral Evil, and that's how the ranger got killed off the second time.

The rouge, while he never helped with the problem, never contributed to it either. Then he died and got replaced by a druid that was even more morally ambiguous. Around that time the fighter went from CN to CE to accommodate more "Ruthless" in character thinking patterns. Guess who lead the charge on the assassin right around that time?

No, the DM should have been shifting alignments more, the DM should NOT have been taking it easy on the girl he wanted to sleep with (Which is why he wasn't, it's dragon lance, wizards are clerics with a different spell selection and casting mechanics, but the cleric alignment restrictions still in play. If he's moved her to CE like he should have, she'd have to atone, and can't have that. Same with the cleric of the same god in the party, and later the serial killer ranger and HER casting.) , the DM should have had the sense to pay enough attention to the introduction plan for the ranger so as to avoid that death, the DM should NOT have been recommending things that could be killed so easily as awesome while calling more viable options "not fitting the setting" or "broken." and giving the girl he wanted to sleep with special considerations. And that's all about style, and that fact that his style as a DM sucked.


So, no, when I signed up for this hobby, I did it because of a desire to get to play the hero. I was willing initially to put up with less shiny party members cause hey, why should I care what the rest of the group's playing, that's not by business unless they specifically ask.

I had to learn the error inherit to that though process. The hard way. Though a painful and frustrating series of hands on experiences. At least now I know better.

SowZ
2015-03-12, 05:05 PM
BootStrapTommy: Really? Cause according to you at least 99.99% of that is because i wasn't playing right. Now, sure, if I'd built an Artificer and made a continuous item of magic mouth for 1% market Value before level 3 I'd have had at least a chance of killing the Necromancer in PVP, but that requires you to be able to read the DM and the entire party's minds. Which is ridiculous. I told that story to illustrate that point, and to illustrate that the system is NOT well suited to this kind of game. Earlier editions? Sure. Hell, I'd even hear an argument for 4th or 5th edition. Since the former made most things quite samish so once you know the gist of the formulas and costs you can grab things very quickly mechanically and have the crunch done in 15 or 20 minutes even at high levels and with out virtual tools, so it's just a matter of the DM needing to understand that the bulk of the out time is gonna be doing fluff, and to just let you cut the fluff a serious break. (the fact that Most DM's don't could still be argued to be a failing of the system but my 4E experience was that cookie cutter fluff, on the light side, was strongly, strongly encouraged in that system.).

Not played 5th, so, don't know there.

Now, course, if you didn't want to argue that pc death was all but universally the pc's fault, well, that might change the equation a bit. But you have been arguing that. Staunchly.



Arbane: That would explain the first death and refusing to help me with the Knight and denying Paladin (Along with the fact that Yeah, I'd have had to kill at least 2 PC's and the others would have jumped in. Course, with a lance, smite evil 2 a day, spirited charge, mount and ride by attack and Mostly D10's and a decent Con, I could have killed the 3 actually evil members of the party before I went down, including the Necromancer, and MAYBE offed at least one of the other 2 before succumbing to death. Couldn't have the necromaner's player dieing in a "Death is a consequence in the rules after all, if your not using it your playing wrong!" environment.), it does NOT explain the Monk, Or the ranger both freaking times, or the Assassin/Rogue.


Talakeal: No, this has to do with Evil characters deciding that a strangers life is less valuable then a gold bump to them when there group is repeatedly proving there strong enough on Man power as is and don't need help. Because hey, that's how evil plays. And this is the first time (including after posting that story a couple of times on this very forum over the years.) I've seriously heard "There just *******s." instead of "There evil, it makes sense, the only thing the DM should have been doing was forcing them away form Lawful toward Chaotic more firmly and frequently and making the neutral characters move to Evil while he was at it."


SowZ: No, no, not the impression I got. One of them was perfectly nice to play with during her first two characters. Then on character 3, she decided to do something different, go Neutral Evil, and that's how the ranger got killed off the second time.

The rouge, while he never helped with the problem, never contributed to it either. Then he died and got replaced by a druid that was even more morally ambiguous. Around that time the fighter went from CN to CE to accommodate more "Ruthless" in character thinking patterns. Guess who lead the charge on the assassin right around that time?

No, the DM should have been shifting alignments more, the DM should NOT have been taking it easy on the girl he wanted to sleep with (Which is why he wasn't, it's dragon lance, wizards are clerics with a different spell selection and casting mechanics, but the cleric alignment restrictions still in play. If he's moved her to CE like he should have, she'd have to atone, and can't have that. Same with the cleric of the same god in the party, and later the serial killer ranger and HER casting.) , the DM should have had the sense to pay enough attention to the introduction plan for the ranger so as to avoid that death, the DM should NOT have been recommending things that could be killed so easily as awesome while calling more viable options "not fitting the setting" or "broken." and giving the girl he wanted to sleep with special considerations. And that's all about style, and that fact that his style as a DM sucked.


So, no, when I signed up for this hobby, I did it because of a desire to get to play the hero. I was willing initially to put up with less shiny party members cause hey, why should I care what the rest of the group's playing, that's not by business unless they specifically ask.

I had to learn the error inherit to that though process. The hard way. Though a painful and frustrating series of hands on experiences. At least now I know better.

If the lesson you learned was, "Evil characters do PvP and make the game harder to play," I think you learned an incomplete lesson. Players thinking the Evil on their character sheet is a license to violate the social contract and piss on everyone's fun, and DMs facilitating them because they think 'that's what evil does.' That's the problem, and it is a big one. Good characters are 100% as able to make just as disruptive and anti-social decisions, I've seen it plenty of times especially with Paladins. The only difference is DMs are more likely to punish said player. It isn't a matter of Evil characters more likely to do said things. There are no evil characters, they don't exist. There are only players making decisions.

Talakeal
2015-03-12, 06:36 PM
If that is the case it actually sounds like the game isn't lethal enough. If the party can afford to just roll everyone they come across and turn away potential allies it seems to me like they aren't being challenged enough. If the DM actually made them need your help, or not want to risk attacking random strangers for fear of injury or death, this wouldn't be a smart move.

Also, I love DMs who keep bringing in new PCs with full WBL and letting other players loot them when they die. I remember a group like that where there was a group of players who would periodically suicide when they got bored of their character just so they could get more loot.

Frozen_Feet
2015-03-13, 12:35 PM
I'm curious about WHY the players made bad decisions in a High Lethality.

Because Losing Is Fun.

Not good enough? Fine:

In one corner of the room, we have the Loonies. They do bad decisions because they find the consequences humorous. And bad decisions often are humorous precisely because they offend expectations and common sense of the audience. E.g. "I moon at the king and throw pies at the queen."

In second corner of the room, we have the Roleplayers. They do bad decisions because those are the decisions their characters would do. Following and portraying whatever set of traits their character has is as or more important to them than whether the character succeeds or fails. E.g. "I attack the dwarf, because my character is a chaotic elf."

In third corner of the room, we have the Storytellers. They do bad decisions because rules of drama dictate it. The second act needs to have the protagonist facing increasing difficulties, so they can triumph magnificently or fail horribly in the climactic third act. E.g. "I press the Big Red Button so the GM's lovingly-crafted zombie outbreak scenario can happen".

In fourth corner of the room, we have the Strategists... or rather, failed ones. They did their damnest to read the situation in the game right to make the most optimal choices for their goals, yet they still got something wrong. Eg. "I've checked the door and it has no traps, and I've listened at the door and heard nothing, and I've checked the map to see this is the right place, so I guess I can safely open- OH MY GOD WHY IS THERE GREEN SLIME ON MY FACE!?!"

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-13, 03:17 PM
BootStrapTommy: Really? Cause according to you at least 99.99% of that is because i wasn't playing right. Now, sure, if I'd built an Artificer and made a continuous item of magic mouth for 1% market Value before level 3 I'd have had at least a chance of killing the Necromancer in PVP, but that requires you to be able to read the DM and the entire party's minds. Which is ridiculous. I told that story to illustrate that point, and to illustrate that the system is NOT well suited to this kind of game. Earlier editions? Sure. Hell, I'd even hear an argument for 4th or 5th edition. Since the former made most things quite samish so once you know the gist of the formulas and costs you can grab things very quickly mechanically and have the crunch done in 15 or 20 minutes even at high levels and with out virtual tools, so it's just a matter of the DM needing to understand that the bulk of the out time is gonna be doing fluff, and to just let you cut the fluff a serious break. (the fact that Most DM's don't could still be argued to be a failing of the system but my 4E experience was that cookie cutter fluff, on the light side, was strongly, strongly encouraged in that system.).

Not played 5th, so, don't know there.

Now, course, if you didn't want to argue that pc death was all but universally the pc's fault, well, that might change the equation a bit. But you have been arguing that. Staunchly.
PvP is a whole nother animal in terms of lethality.
I already acknowledged the dangers of PvP. Also, to head you off here, my PvP story was 5e.

Or the ranger both freaking times, or the Assassin/Rogue.
Gunna say the second was in your court. You made the mistake of mimicking the actions of a previous hostile NPC. Which doesn't seem like a good idea.

Metahuman1
2015-03-13, 04:47 PM
I "Mimiced" it once, with the Rouge/Assassin (Neither time with the ranger thank you very much. Though, yeah, shockingly, they still died.). And why did I mimic it? Oh, that's right, I had died previously, and had to spend 3 hours of game time out of the room to work up a new character, and could only have known about that if the DM had warned me in advance (Which he didn't.) or if I could have read there minds.

So, it's my fault I'm not telepathic. And even if it was, that justify's 1 death. 1. Singular. Out of many. Which STILL shoots down your theory that there overwhelmingly my fault.




SowZ: Except that Dm's will then either just turn the game into an evil one and change alignments, or screw the PC's over cause good doesn't work that way. Also doesn't help your argument that they argued that Evil could have friends and meant they wouldn't just betray me and then proceeded to do it.

Talakeal: Unless, perhaps they decided to just play the game, throw out the "It's what my character would do." justification when bad teamwork was pointed out, and not care about dieing cause hey, character death is common? I.E., the thing I warned against happening up thread?

SowZ
2015-03-13, 05:27 PM
SowZ: Except that Dm's will then either just turn the game into an evil one and change alignments, or screw the PC's over cause good doesn't work that way. Also doesn't help your argument that they argued that Evil could have friends and meant they wouldn't just betray me and then proceeded to do it.

No, good DMs I've had, not to mention myself, wouldn't do any of those things. Some will, of course.

Talakeal
2015-03-13, 05:56 PM
Wait, so they are repeatedly killing your characters just because it is fun?

Not because they are RPing their characters, not because they are munchkining for extra wealth, and not because they have a personal vendetta against you?

These people are terrible people, you should punch them in the face with a hammer. This has nothing to do with DM styles.

Metahuman1
2015-03-13, 06:10 PM
No, there doing it cause "That's how the game works, or death wouldn't be a thing that could happen." and "That's what my character would do.". was in place with characters who were Evil, and Evil is generally not particularly, well, good. Especially to random people they just met or people who get in the way of doing what they want for what every reason. ("Oh, you don't want me to loot and desecrate this abandoned temple to your goddess just cause she's your goddess? And you turn undead instead of Rebuke them? Yeah, my Necromancer would totally kill you."

Or

"Your freedom loving Chaotic Good Ranger wouldn't want us torturing the prisoner for info? To bad, were doing it, and hey, I'm a serial killer and you kinda fit my nitch anyway (Human male.), so, yeah." )




And as for a good DM won't do that to good characters, perhaps, but that would still mean that if that's what good does and they let them do it, then when Evil does what Evil Does because it's Evil they have to let them do it too.

SowZ
2015-03-13, 06:28 PM
No, there doing it cause "That's how the game works, or death wouldn't be a thing that could happen." and "That's what my character would do.". was in place with characters who were Evil, and Evil is generally not particularly, well, good. Especially to random people they just met or people who get in the way of doing what they want for what every reason. ("Oh, you don't want me to loot and desecrate this abandoned temple to your goddess just cause she's your goddess? And you turn undead instead of Rebuke them? Yeah, my Necromancer would totally kill you."

Or

"Your freedom loving Chaotic Good Ranger wouldn't want us torturing the prisoner for info? To bad, were doing it, and hey, I'm a serial killer and you kinda fit my nitch anyway (Human male.), so, yeah." )




And as for a good DM won't do that to good characters, perhaps, but that would still mean that if that's what good does and they let them do it, then when Evil does what Evil Does because it's Evil they have to let them do it too.

If that's their excuse, it is complete and utter horse crap. Evil doesn't do that because it isn't 'what evil does.' 1/3 of the population of the planet are not inhuman creatures incapable of human motivations. People take actions because they are motivated by something. A player saying, "I kill her because I'm Eevvviiill," isn't roleplaying. That is the definition of trolling.

You made a claim that, "Dm's will then either just turn the game into an evil one and change alignments, or screw the PC's over cause good doesn't work that way. Also doesn't help your argument that they argued that Evil could have friends and meant they wouldn't just betray me and then proceeded to do it." I then said a good DM wouldn't do that. I didn't claim a good DM wouldn't do that with Good characters. Just, like, they wouldn't do it in general.

An evil character should be just as complicated and motivated as a good character. And, ultimately, the character isn't truly capable of anything. Anything anti-social as far as the game is concerned that the character commits, the player is actually the one doing that thing.

This has absolutely zero to do with alignments. Really, it is not at all the natural consequence of letting people play evil characters. It is the consequence of immature players using the 'Evil' on their character sheet to justify their immaturity as 'part of the game.' Such players can be equally or more disruptive with a Lawful Good paladin, and in my experience are even more likely to commit disruptive PvP than evil characters.

Is that the fault of the Paladin class, and would it be fair of me to blame those actions on paladins?

Metahuman1
2015-03-13, 06:49 PM
Oh she had a reason. See, if I'm turning undead and being all good cleric, it's gonna ruin her ability to raise hordes of them to do her bidding which was the whole point of being a necromancer. So, off with mr. clerics head.


And the ranger, as I said, serial killer. Elf who's mom was killed by a human male so she has favored enemy: Humanoid Human and uses it to target males. She waited a couple of sessions to off me cause, hey, time and place. Which turned out to be when I was gonna oppose her torturing and then murdering a prisoner for Intel rather then just questioning him.


You keep talking about Paladin's, who do at least have a mechanical excuse in the form of the god awfully written paladin code. Play a good game with out someone with Paladin levels. Better yet, play a good game with out someone being Lawful Good. My experience is that you do that, the problem evaporates entirely. Hell, it slackens off considerably even with the paladin as long as the characters and players are smart and insightful enough and the characters are good. (And the DM is NOT abusing the Paladin Code cause Paladin's can't be interesting unless they fall or similar crap.)


Also the setting was dragon lance. I seem to recall a lot of junk about the nature of Evil being totally different in setting then much of anywhere else, including any place remotely logical, and the DM was sticking to what the books said of the setting like glue.

SowZ
2015-03-13, 07:27 PM
Oh she had a reason. See, if I'm turning undead and being all good cleric, it's gonna ruin her ability to raise hordes of them to do her bidding which was the whole point of being a necromancer. So, off with mr. clerics head.


And the ranger, as I said, serial killer. Elf who's mom was killed by a human male so she has favored enemy: Humanoid Human and uses it to target males. She waited a couple of sessions to off me cause, hey, time and place. Which turned out to be when I was gonna oppose her torturing and then murdering a prisoner for Intel rather then just questioning him.


You keep talking about Paladin's, who do at least have a mechanical excuse in the form of the god awfully written paladin code. Play a good game with out someone with Paladin levels. Better yet, play a good game with out someone being Lawful Good. My experience is that you do that, the problem evaporates entirely. Hell, it slackens off considerably even with the paladin as long as the characters and players are smart and insightful enough and the characters are good. (And the DM is NOT abusing the Paladin Code cause Paladin's can't be interesting unless they fall or similar crap.)


Also the setting was dragon lance. I seem to recall a lot of junk about the nature of Evil being totally different in setting then much of anywhere else, including any place remotely logical, and the DM was sticking to what the books said of the setting like glue.

All this is a perfect reason to ditch the whole alignment thing entirely. It's never added much, in my experience, and only encourages cookie cutter views of morality and discourages more nuanced characters that might technically be Evil based on their actions or profession, but otherwise are pretty reasonable, okay guys. And if somebody wants to do something like blatantly PK for no good reason, they can't just say, "Because I'm Chaotic Evil." Besides, the DM should not have approved the concept if she planned on slitting the throats of other PCs for absolutely no reason.

I suppose I did allow a serial killer once, because a character died on a prison island and I was basically letting him play an NPC villain for a session or two until we got to a place where we could reasonably fit in whatever long-term character concept he came up with. (He hadn't come up with one, and it seemed a reasonable thing to allow in the interrum. He understood that he was probably just going to be a recurring enemy for a couple sessions before the PCs inevitably killed him.) He killed one PC, but she came back almost right away basically because of plot reasons that already existed, (hence why I sort of egged him to target her first and he complied.)

It just seems like immature players, a DM incompetent at dealing with appropriate PvP not ending in needless and uncalled for character deaths, and that group having a horrible interpretation of the alignment system.

Arbane
2015-03-13, 07:32 PM
Oh she had a reason. See, if I'm turning undead and being all good cleric, it's gonna ruin her ability to raise hordes of them to do her bidding which was the whole point of being a necromancer. So, off with mr. clerics head.


And the ranger, as I said, serial killer. Elf who's mom was killed by a human male so she has favored enemy: Humanoid Human and uses it to target males. She waited a couple of sessions to off me cause, hey, time and place. Which turned out to be when I was gonna oppose her torturing and then murdering a prisoner for Intel rather then just questioning him.
(SNIP)

Also the setting was dragon lance. I seem to recall a lot of junk about the nature of Evil being totally different in setting then much of anywhere else, including any place remotely logical, and the DM was sticking to what the books said of the setting like glue.

You're in a better place now, which is to say, NOT in that game.

Metahuman1
2015-03-14, 01:26 AM
I'm not feeling "Immature" players, as I said, when playing not amoral characters, they were perfectly fine. (Also apparently somewhere in mid levels when I was out of the room rolling one of a series of characters (Freaking high lethality play.) they decided they'd add a couple of levels into epic after the actual end of the campaign were they'd take over the world and wipe out 3 of the big Evils of the setting (Cause Evils nature is to feed on Evil so that only the strongest Evil will be left yadda yadda don't care.) and because were racist against them anyway, obliterate 99.8% of the Kinder Race (See, they can't have been THAT bad as players. XD! I mean, only reason they didn't got 100% was the DM would only go that far.) and, to use a metaphore, have used the campaign to put Hitler (The elf cleric of the God of Vengence.) and his inner circle (the surviving members of the party. ) in power.


And then time skip like 100 years down the line and spend the next game taking them out of power, using there former PC's as the biggest bosses.



It was not a bad idea, and I kinda would like to revisit the idea one of these days. Have suspiciously similar characters running the show (Which I did once for awhile but that group fell apart due to several people having work related scheduled changes. Only got about half way through. ). Course, I'd like to try playing that published campaign through with a better group and DM too. Particularly knowing what I know now of the game.


And yeah the DM kinda sucked but I didn't realize that at the time. It was my introduction to Table Top RPG's.



Anyway, yeah, I'm not with that group anymore. I got kicked out. For spending too much time on mechanics and not enough on fluff cause that made me a munchkin. Yeah, I did get a bit short with the DM, and got totally ripped in return form the Necromancer's player. (god would it be Satisfying to Iron Heart Surge one of her spells and then do a mounted full power attacking spirited charge on her and take her out in one hit. She didn't have much in way of HP and had squat for a fort save as I recall so that plan would likely actually work too.)

SowZ
2015-03-14, 02:59 AM
I'm not feeling "Immature" players, as I said, when playing not amoral characters, they were perfectly fine. (Also apparently somewhere in mid levels when I was out of the room rolling one of a series of characters (Freaking high lethality play.) they decided they'd add a couple of levels into epic after the actual end of the campaign were they'd take over the world and wipe out 3 of the big Evils of the setting (Cause Evils nature is to feed on Evil so that only the strongest Evil will be left yadda yadda don't care.) and because were racist against them anyway, obliterate 99.8% of the Kinder Race (See, they can't have been THAT bad as players. XD! I mean, only reason they didn't got 100% was the DM would only go that far.) and, to use a metaphore, have used the campaign to put Hitler (The elf cleric of the God of Vengence.) and his inner circle (the surviving members of the party. ) in power.


And then time skip like 100 years down the line and spend the next game taking them out of power, using there former PC's as the biggest bosses.



It was not a bad idea, and I kinda would like to revisit the idea one of these days. Have suspiciously similar characters running the show (Which I did once for awhile but that group fell apart due to several people having work related scheduled changes. Only got about half way through. ). Course, I'd like to try playing that published campaign through with a better group and DM too. Particularly knowing what I know now of the game.


And yeah the DM kinda sucked but I didn't realize that at the time. It was my introduction to Table Top RPG's.



Anyway, yeah, I'm not with that group anymore. I got kicked out. For spending too much time on mechanics and not enough on fluff cause that made me a munchkin. Yeah, I did get a bit short with the DM, and got totally ripped in return form the Necromancer's player. (god would it be Satisfying to Iron Heart Surge one of her spells and then do a mounted full power attacking spirited charge on her and take her out in one hit. She didn't have much in way of HP and had squat for a fort save as I recall so that plan would likely actually work too.)

You keep attributing it to Evil characters but that has nothing to do with it. It's entirely the choices of the human players you were with. Whatever justification about 'But I'm Evil' your fellow players came up with is entirely on them and not indicative of what has to or even usually happens.

Metahuman1
2015-03-15, 11:42 AM
By that logic, there is no such thing as Roleplaying and every character should be Minmaxed to the limit.

SowZ
2015-03-15, 11:51 AM
By that logic, there is no such thing as Roleplaying and every character should be Minmaxed to the limit.


Uhh, what? Please explain.

The scenarios you described were ******* moves on part of the players. That they said, "Well, I'm Evil," is a jerk move on their part. Other players play evil characters and don't do the same jerk moves. Ergo, the deciding factor here is the players. Not the alignment itself.

I could enter a typical dungeon crawling game then turn around and slay every other character the first session I join them with my NG Fighter. I could then say they had entered a sentient monsters home and murdered him for its stuff and that is why I thought the world would be better off without murder hobos. It would be in line with a Good character to defend victims from murderers, but OOC it would be a totally anti-social move on my part.

Again, it isn't NG that is the problem. It is me being a disruptive player.

Metahuman1
2015-03-15, 12:23 PM
You said "It's entirely the choices of the human players you were with. Whatever justification about 'But I'm Evil' your fellow players came up with is entirely on them and not indicative of what has to or even usually happens."

By that particular logic, everything is entirely the choice of human players your with in any game, and trying to role play or be in character doesn't matter, cause at the end of the day it's still the players making all the choices.

And, taken to the next logical step, if role play doesn't matter, fluff and flavor doesn't matter, all that matters, is mechanics, and they should be trying to build there characters as powerful as possible, because that's all that matters.

SowZ
2015-03-15, 12:48 PM
You said "It's entirely the choices of the human players you were with. Whatever justification about 'But I'm Evil' your fellow players came up with is entirely on them and not indicative of what has to or even usually happens."

By that particular logic, everything is entirely the choice of human players your with in any game, and trying to role play or be in character doesn't matter, cause at the end of the day it's still the players making all the choices.

And, taken to the next logical step, if role play doesn't matter, fluff and flavor doesn't matter, all that matters, is mechanics, and they should be trying to build there characters as powerful as possible, because that's all that matters.

You got the wrong message. My point isn't you shouldn't be in character. My point is that if you make an anti-social choice that hurts the enjoyment of the game for others, 'it's what my character would do' is not a good reason to be a jerk.

Either find some other in character justification or don't play a character that ruins everyone else's fun. It's not because you made an evil character that you PK someone for the lulz. It is because you made a character who will PK someone for the lulz and that character happens to be evil. You could make a good character who would PK someone for almost no reason just as you could make an evil character that would never do that.

It comes down to being a jerk. And you can make in character decisions that are jerk moves in real life.

Lacco
2015-03-23, 12:19 PM
Hello everyone, long time lurker, first time poster (and English is my second language, so bear with me - or skip to tl:dr section below). I'd like to address Mr.Mask's original question – how to run a high lethality game (so it is fun for all players/GMs) - since I personally prefer these.

At first I would like to make a distinction between high lethality games and high mortality rate games. What happened to metahuman1 is clearly the second – high mortality rate of characters (also, not very good GMing and clearly a problem with group playing - so I'm not going to discuss this, it has been done from each possible point of view - so, for this post, I assume that neither GM nor players actively try to destroy the game). Primary characteristic of high mortality game is – people die, often and fast. If this is the issue - I'm oficially out of topic since I seldom have dead PCs and still no TPKs.

The question I see, is really: how to make deaths (I think this was the word used a little more back) more poignant (to remove "Ok, another ressurect coming up! Next time duck."). How to make playes play more cautiously, maybe even more realistically (to eliminate "you want to do what???" question - I would ask this if the "jump-elbow a dragon" action came up - not that it doesn't sound cool, but it would get the character killed in most of my games).
Most of what I am going to write comes from my experience as GM of Riddle of Steel (RoS) games.

So - high lethality game, as far as I see it, has following characteristics


fights are lethal, gritty, faster and more realistic,
even small weapons (daggers come to mind) are highly lethal – you wouldn’t like a dagger in your gut, so wouldn’t your character,
combat against more skilled opponent, without consideration of tactic or any advantages will go badly for your character; but even highly skilled character may be taken down if he underestimates the opponent or goes against the odds (let me tell you about this expert fencer killed by peasant with a stick…because the fencer took the fight as “already won”),
frontal fight against 2 opponents is highly challenging. Frontal fight against 3 opponents is suicidal at least,
if you do something stupid, you will get hurt (in game of course…),
if you get hit, you will feel it (mechanically) – it will not be just “lose 2 hit points”, but “lose 2 fingers” or “you suddenly see nothing due to blood in your eyes from the wound on your head”,
wounds get long to heal and will fairly burden the character,
if your character dies, get a new character sheet.



For the game to be enjoyable this way, following should be ensured:


MOST IMPORTANT – players have to know that the game has high lethality and must know what that means – I usually let them know by telling them the points above – most of them (total newbies) understand well… the MMORPG crowd and AD&D-experienced people usually don’t (this is my experience),
there should be ways to escape death (RoS handles it by possibility to get rerolls for actions, I personally handle it by a personal discussion with “death” or “gods” who send the character back – that works for newbies or characters the player doesn’t want to retire), but it should never be for free and must fit into the story,
the system should allow fast generation of characters (under half hour with GMs/skilled player’s assistance),
even beginning character must fully capable to handle himself in combat (again, in RoS you start as quite powerful character – imagine Conan after the escape; in D&D equivalents it may be a higher starting level) – this goes for its skills, as well as for its equipment,
the GM should be skilled enough to insert the character as soon as it is finished (players should actively suggest possible entry points),
the players should know, that they are up against the world – I personally like to play a backstabbing b******d, but the rule is – we work together (I can cheat them out of money, but no intra-party stealing and other kender-y fun),
players should have the opportunity to choose their battles, and running away to get advantage should be possible (e.g. try another way, set up ambush, get help...) tactic,
surrendering should be accepted (on both sides...),
PvP should be kept to the “we have discussed it and we both want it” - if only one of the players want to do the PvP, he is NPC (or a compromise should be done – we had a nonlethal fistfight, “first blood” duel, with “pulled punches”).



From my point of view… AD&D (I played & GMed 3.5) and the alike are not very well suited for this type of play. Chargen takes a lot of time (especially for higher level characters) and magic items are a necessity at higher levels.

As for the high lethality vs. mortality – I have (as GM) “killed” 3 characters while playing RoS for last 5 years. They got better:

One of the characters was already mentioned “expert fencer” who went against guy with a stick. She saved the character by burning “drama” for lower wound level and ended in KO instead of crushed brains (the other characters saved her).

Another was a character, whose destiny was to die in one specific battle (to prove that his country is not full of evil guys). Player played this character for 3 years, it was very powerful at that time – he was revived by his god, who sent him back as his champion (he lost an eye in the process). This was basically an offer from me – either retire the character as “fallen hero” or continue, but with a new story. And – due to player’s skill – he nearly won the fight in which he was supposed to die (RoS has a specific attribute called “destiny” – if you are fulfilling it, it helps you, but if you have it set so you die somewhere, it starts hindering you).

And the third… well, experienced player playing big, burly, tough guy in armour with big axe. He got lazy. Didn’t care about dangers. And all it took was one assassin with precise hit of poisoned stilleto (main antagonist of that episode). He also burned “drama” to save character – and survived. For following 2 games he was impaired by the wounds/poison – still could fight, but wasn’t so bold. Lead to some serious character development.
So, in my games – you can die easily, but it’s always your choice (case one – underestimation; case two – selected destiny during character creation; case three – “nothing can hurt me” attitude, relaxing in dark hallway of assassins hideout, not caring about the noise behind).

So...any thoughts? :smallsmile:

For tl:dr crowd:

High lethality is not equal to high mortality rates ("you can die easily if not careful" vs. "you will die each 5 minutes, so just put the stack of character sheets nearby").
If you want to try high lethality, change system to something that supports it (I recommend Riddle of Steel, early D&D, 3.5 is not well-suited by my opinion...or get rid of HPs).
High lethality games may be fun with the correct group/GM, but you must expect the lethality there – warn the players up front, make them cooperate by always having common enemy.
The players who view the high lethality game as “GM will kill my character, so I don’t invest in it” should try viewing it as “one shot” – do your best and enjoy it. The philosophy “eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die!” applies well.

Mr. Mask
2015-03-23, 08:51 PM
Very good breakdown, Lacco! I'd say your style is one of the best for lethal games.


It'd be interesting to have an RPG where sometimes you want your character to die. Say, you build up a sort of score of points outside of that character, and you can increase it substantially by having the character die in an awesome way, particularly if it was thematic to the game (maybe something based of Norse Sagas, where characters can take many wounds before at last being felled).

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-23, 09:03 PM
It'd be interesting to have an RPG where sometimes you want your character to die. Say, you build up a sort of score of points outside of that character, and you can increase it substantially by having the character die in an awesome way, particularly if it was thematic to the game (maybe something based of Norse Sagas, where characters can take many wounds before at last being felled). Every game has that mechanic. It's called having an awesome story to tell after the fact. Just like those guys from the Norse Sagas!

Lacco
2015-03-24, 12:17 AM
I agree with Bootstraptommy, except for the "mechanic" part :smallsmile:

Ok, so if you want to "reward" players for dying in awesome way, so both the high lethality AND high mortality games are more fun... then setting a destiny/anti-destiny and mechanically manage the rewarding would be maybe way how to do it.

RoS handles it through the spiritual attributes (such as already mentioned destiny, then drive, passion and conscience) - you get points to them when you act within them and they provide you mechanical advantage (you have conscience 3 and you see granny attacked by four men? if you help her, GM can give you additional point and you add 3 dice to your pool for each combat round) and you can use these points for improving your character. When you spend the points (on improvements or rerolls) you get the same amount you spent into "insight" pool.
When you retire the character (or simply get killed), the amount of insight points lets you have better character to start with (e.g. basically it is priority creation with ABCDEF priorities, insight 50 lets you have I think ABCCDE; it's possible to get AAABCD character at best).

So basically, the players are rewarded for playing their character and their stories. If they have "anti-destiny", they get rewarded for dying awesomely. And - of course - they can try to fight the destiny. Directly (by winning the fight that should kill them) or indirectly (if you have destiny "dies leading a charge in battle" then staying out of battles can help).

So for aD&D and the likes... well, you already have the levels - so you can handle it there. Not enough?

As a GM, you could try "compelling" the players. Daring them. If you stay on the bridge and slow down the unstoppable horde of orcs, you get character 1 level higher then current (you run the risk of angering other players though or even risk that whole party stays)... or other mechanical advantage.

A word from players would be appropriate there. I am not a good source of information - because most of my characters suffer a lot (get maimed, killed, have horrible lives) and I like it that way.

So, tl:dr: players, what "reward mechanic" (such as stronger new character, rerolls on attribute rolls, additional levels) would make your character stay on a bridge to slow down unstoppable horde of orcs, knowing it would surely get killed (either "off screen" or in 1-on-1 session)? What would make you "die with a smile"?
And the answer "great story" has been already given. So - ideas? :smallsmile:

Talakeal
2015-03-24, 05:27 PM
So I got a lecture this weekend about how I am not nearly hardcore enough as a DM.

I had a game where the majority of the party started doing stupid random things and when that didn't kill them they literally went kamikaze and killed their own characters to spite their enemies. I was told this was because it is too hard to die in my games, and that the players who think they are invincible will continually push the limits just to test the DM until he pushes back, and if they get too far they stop caring about the game or thinking about it as something with consequences.

If the players are about to do something stupid I normally warn them, and if they forget something I normally let them do a small take back and replay it. I was told that this is terrible DMing as it made the players not care about their characters.

The DM in question told me about how one of his players was knocked unconscious fighting a monster with a damaging aura. The other players didn't think to drag his body away, and he didn't warn them, so as a result he secretly rolled damage against the unconscious character each round until he was dead and did not announce it until after the fight. He told me that they player then had to sit out of the game for THREE MONTHS of real time until they could find someone who could resurrect him.

This seems pretty contrary to a lot of the advice in this thread which implies that the more lethal the game the less players care about their characters and the setting.

Rad Mage
2015-03-24, 05:31 PM
So I got a lecture this weekend about how I am not nearly hardcore enough as a DM.

I had a game where the majority of the party started doing stupid random things and when that didn't kill them they literally went kamikaze and killed their own characters to spite their enemies. I was told this was because it is too hard to die in my games, and that the players who think they are invincible will continually push the limits just to test the DM until he pushes back, and if they get too far they stop caring about the game or thinking about it as something with consequences.

If the players are about to do something stupid I normally warn them, and if they forget something I normally let them do a small take back and replay it. I was told that this is terrible DMing as it made the players not care about their characters.

The DM in question told me about how one of his players was knocked unconscious fighting a monster with a damaging aura. The other players didn't think to drag his body away, and he didn't warn them, so as a result he secretly rolled damage against the unconscious character each round until he was dead and did not announce it until after the fight. He told me that they player then had to sit out of the game for THREE MONTHS of real time until they could find someone who could resurrect him.

This seems pretty contrary to a lot of the advice in this thread which implies that the more lethal the game the less players care about their characters and the setting.

Seems to me like you got a TPK without even trying. I don't see what the problem is :P

Thrudd
2015-03-24, 05:43 PM
So I got a lecture this weekend about how I am not nearly hardcore enough as a DM.

I had a game where the majority of the party started doing stupid random things and when that didn't kill them they literally went kamikaze and killed their own characters to spite their enemies. I was told this was because it is too hard to die in my games, and that the players who think they are invincible will continually push the limits just to test the DM until he pushes back, and if they get too far they stop caring about the game or thinking about it as something with consequences.

If the players are about to do something stupid I normally warn them, and if they forget something I normally let them do a small take back and replay it. I was told that this is terrible DMing as it made the players not care about their characters.

The DM in question told me about how one of his players was knocked unconscious fighting a monster with a damaging aura. The other players didn't think to drag his body away, and he didn't warn them, so as a result he secretly rolled damage against the unconscious character each round until he was dead and did not announce it until after the fight. He told me that they player then had to sit out of the game for THREE MONTHS of real time until they could find someone who could resurrect him.

This seems pretty contrary to a lot of the advice in this thread which implies that the more lethal the game the less players care about their characters and the setting.

It all depends on the group, I guess. Some groups are whiny babies that cry whenever their characters experience a setback and others expect you to be actively and aggressively trying to kill their characters at every turn.

So for this new group, don't pull the punches, that should be a huge relief. It's way easier when you don't need to worry about hurting anyone's feelings every time they take damage. If the dice say dead, tell them they're dead.

Beta Centauri
2015-03-24, 06:23 PM
The DM in question told me about how one of his players was knocked unconscious fighting a monster with a damaging aura. The other players didn't think to drag his body away, and he didn't warn them, so as a result he secretly rolled damage against the unconscious character each round until he was dead and did not announce it until after the fight. He told me that they player then had to sit out of the game for THREE MONTHS of real time until they could find someone who could resurrect him.

This seems pretty contrary to a lot of the advice in this thread which implies that the more lethal the game the less players care about their characters and the setting. But look at how the GM is trying to get the players to care: "Care to the degree the GM expects of you, or you don't get to play." That GM could have worked in a way to resurrect that character sooner, but he wanted to punish those players, and make them regret not playing up to his standards.

I haven't kept up with this thread, but there was plenty of advice about bringing in players as quickly as possible, and preparing for the possibility of character death. I've never seen any game advise the GM to essentially kick a player out of the game if their character dies.

It's a game, not bootcamp.

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-24, 07:59 PM
Talakeal, you know the most interesting people.

"Look out for the interests of your players. But don't let them know that you are." It is okay to have the players' backs. So long as they don't know it. If they know it, they've been given license to go off the rails. So kill them occasionally, just to keep up the illusion. Just be ready to work them back into the campaign.

Lacco
2015-03-25, 01:37 AM
Sorry to hear that, Talakeal - but it reminds me of my own GMin several years ago.

Players were wreaking havoc on game world, while I was waiting for them to get on with the story. Solutions of in-game issues included parking helicopter into retirement home and leaving messages to other PCs through carvings in dead bodies (of both allies and enemies). I tried to provide balanced enemies and interesting plots and they just exploded everything.

I disliked the game. And that's the worst part - everyone is at the table to enjoy themselves, but what happens if the GM actively hates what is happening in the game? I didn't want to railroad them...didn't want to TPK them.

And then... well, I read Blackjack's guide to gamemastering :smallbiggrin:

I must say you have my sympathy. But I agree with the GM from your story - the way you lead the game (the same as I did in the beginning) will make them only do even worse in the future.

So my advice:
I think we all agree that all players want one thing - to make impact on the game world. And the easiest way how to do it are consequences.
What you should try is - to make them accountable for their actions. Make NPCs react to their actions. Make the world react. And if they do something stupid - react the way the world would react.

I'm not against replaying a scene if a player messes up. But if he messes up because he wants to - no take backs. It has been done, the NPC's eyes are wide open as he screams for town guard/police/his seven well-armed brothers who are - surprisingly - well trained.

And it's not about dying in a game. Dying is the easy way out. You die, you get a new character. There are better ways. Losing equipment. Losing limbs. Losing respect of all the NPCs. Consequences. Every time they do something stupid - voluntarily - it should cost them something.

And no, I don't think that more lethal = less caring. More lethal usually comes to more cautious (please be aware of my distinction between lethality and mortality rate). If your character's actions couldn't lead him to trouble - would you care about him? On the other hand, if you knew that if you do something stupid, it may kill the character - would you care less?


Talakeal, you know the most interesting people.
It is okay to have the players' backs. So long as they don't know it. If they know it, they've been given license to go off the rails. So kill them occasionally, just to keep up the illusion. Just be ready to work them back into the campaign.

Yeah, I can get behind that. Still - I prefer other ways than killing, but yes. The players may suspect that you want them alive, but must also know, that they are not invincible and everything they do will cost them something. Even temporarily.

Beta Centauri - you are correct, it's not a boot camp. In boot camp that kind of actions would get them court-martialed. :smallbiggrin:
As for the GM in question - I think three months is a bit radical. I would make it maybe one-and-half session. But yes, if there is resurrection available in game world, then dying is no real setback for players. So the GM invented one. I would like to ask - did he make him wait for the three months? Or was it due to the fact that party got sidetracked on their way to resurrecting him?
And yes, the advice about getting the players back to game as soon as possible is still valid. But sometimes it's easier to show than to tell :smallsmile:
So if you disagree with the way the GM made them care... how would you motivate the players to care about the game world? Let's take the basic assumption that interesting plot & NPCs didn't work (plot derailed completely, NPCs dead - cause has been determined as "aggressive assault by PC"). I'd like to know your ideas.

tl:dr: the players are not the only ones who should have fun playing the game - the GM should also. If they go and do the kind of things Talakeal mentioned, GM should apply consequences to every action they make. Not only the positive ones.

goto124
2015-03-25, 01:49 AM
More lethal usually comes to more cautious (please be aware of my distinction between lethality and mortality rate). If your character's actions couldn't lead him to trouble - would you care about him? On the other hand, if you knew that if you do something stupid, it may kill the character - would you care less?

What do you mean by 'stupid' anyway? There's a whole spectrum between a highly well-thought-out detailed strategic plan, and the stupidest of insane actions.

Lacco
2015-03-25, 02:06 AM
What do you mean by 'stupid' anyway? There's a whole spectrum between a highly well-thought-out detailed strategic plan, and the stupidest of insane actions.

I agree. Maybe I should have said "reckless". If you want actual examples, see C.L.U.E. files for Shadowrun. My own examples: riding into the court on a horse, then telling the king to shut up (in no courtly terms) and go to hell and then attacking him (he is sitting on a throne, in front of him his whole royal guard and the adventurer in this case is surrounded by guards and the court), because he gets upset and doesn't want to negotiate the price. Crashing a helicopter into retirement home, because "the guy that went after us might have survived the sniper shot to his head". Blowing up a whole hotel to get to safe on 11th floor. And - when being told that they have a large price on their heads & very skilled sniper/assassin has taken the job...playing cards on the street in front of burning building (their safehouse). Stupid enough?

I'm not against going into action without planning. Acting on impulse. Or sometimes doing something silly. Ideally if they stay in character. If we were playing Paranoia, I would encourage them to do such things. But not in the games we play.

SowZ
2015-03-25, 11:10 AM
But look at how the GM is trying to get the players to care: "Care to the degree the GM expects of you, or you don't get to play." That GM could have worked in a way to resurrect that character sooner, but he wanted to punish those players, and make them regret not playing up to his standards.

I haven't kept up with this thread, but there was plenty of advice about bringing in players as quickly as possible, and preparing for the possibility of character death. I've never seen any game advise the GM to essentially kick a player out of the game if their character dies.

It's a game, not bootcamp.

http://e.thumbs.redditmedia.com/uIKz1wJPY-Af3koR.jpg

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-25, 11:57 AM
What do you mean by 'stupid' anyway? There's a whole spectrum between a highly well-thought-out detailed strategic plan, and the stupidest of insane actions. As before:

Things like this (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?400935-Character-Suicide&highlight=suicidal+character).

Iacco is right. Not so much stupid as reckless.

Taking on something which both player and character know are out of their league or choosing a strategy without the small concern for potential outcome ("throwing stones in a house of glass" comes to mind).

No offense, but a 1st level character walking up to the Duke, dropping their trousers and showing him a full moon is just dumb. Make a new character, because your old one rots in prison for the rest of their life!

Talakeal
2015-03-26, 12:42 PM
Sorry to hear that, Talakeal - but it reminds me of my own GMin several years ago.

Players were wreaking havoc on game world, while I was waiting for them to get on with the story. Solutions of in-game issues included parking helicopter into retirement home and leaving messages to other PCs through carvings in dead bodies (of both allies and enemies). I tried to provide balanced enemies and interesting plots and they just exploded everything.

I disliked the game. And that's the worst part - everyone is at the table to enjoy themselves, but what happens if the GM actively hates what is happening in the game? I didn't want to railroad them...didn't want to TPK them.

And then... well, I read Blackjack's guide to gamemastering :smallbiggrin:

I must say you have my sympathy. But I agree with the GM from your story - the way you lead the game (the same as I did in the beginning) will make them only do even worse in the future.

So my advice:
I think we all agree that all players want one thing - to make impact on the game world. And the easiest way how to do it are consequences.
What you should try is - to make them accountable for their actions. Make NPCs react to their actions. Make the world react. And if they do something stupid - react the way the world would react.

I'm not against replaying a scene if a player messes up. But if he messes up because he wants to - no take backs. It has been done, the NPC's eyes are wide open as he screams for town guard/police/his seven well-armed brothers who are - surprisingly - well trained.

And it's not about dying in a game. Dying is the easy way out. You die, you get a new character. There are better ways. Losing equipment. Losing limbs. Losing respect of all the NPCs. Consequences. Every time they do something stupid - voluntarily - it should cost them something.

And no, I don't think that more lethal = less caring. More lethal usually comes to more cautious (please be aware of my distinction between lethality and mortality rate). If your character's actions couldn't lead him to trouble - would you care about him? On the other hand, if you knew that if you do something stupid, it may kill the character - would you care less?



Yeah, I can get behind that. Still - I prefer other ways than killing, but yes. The players may suspect that you want them alive, but must also know, that they are not invincible and everything they do will cost them something. Even temporarily.

Beta Centauri - you are correct, it's not a boot camp. In boot camp that kind of actions would get them court-martialed. :smallbiggrin:
As for the GM in question - I think three months is a bit radical. I would make it maybe one-and-half session. But yes, if there is resurrection available in game world, then dying is no real setback for players. So the GM invented one. I would like to ask - did he make him wait for the three months? Or was it due to the fact that party got sidetracked on their way to resurrecting him?
And yes, the advice about getting the players back to game as soon as possible is still valid. But sometimes it's easier to show than to tell :smallsmile:
So if you disagree with the way the GM made them care... how would you motivate the players to care about the game world? Let's take the basic assumption that interesting plot & NPCs didn't work (plot derailed completely, NPCs dead - cause has been determined as "aggressive assault by PC"). I'd like to know your ideas.

tl:dr: the players are not the only ones who should have fun playing the game - the GM should also. If they go and do the kind of things Talakeal mentioned, GM should apply consequences to every action they make. Not only the positive ones.

Ok, TRUST ME, when I say that my problem is not a lack of consequences. My players always bitch at me because of consequences. I may not kill them but I sure do make the consequences stick, be they social, financial, strategically, psychological, or merely being beaten into unconsciousness.

My PCs are always doing something dumb like calling an NPCs bluff, shooting first and asking questions later, sneak past or trick an enemy without actually neutralizing it, using innocent NPCs as bait, or going all out offense while leaving their assets / home base exposed. More often than not something bad happens and I make the consequences stick, and they throw a fit.

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-26, 01:20 PM
Sounds like your players are as big of wankers as your GMs! Tell them to stop not thinking before they act! Also, consider if they have thought anything through at all before you apply consequences. If they tried to think thing through to avoid consequences, sometimes it's best to give them the benefit of the doubt and not poke too many holes in their plans.

Lacco
2015-03-26, 03:46 PM
Now I feel quite proud of my players :smallsmile:

They usually don't throw fits (I suppose they know it wouldn't work). Only once per last year there was something like a fit, but we discussed it out.

And that's my advice to you, Talakeal. Did you ask them why they play that way? Maybe they don't know you expect something more (I know my players didn't know what I expected when we started to play - one played Shadowrun as Paranoia, second one as AD&D - including looting of corpses - and third one as shoot-em-up - I expected noir-style stories...now we have paranoia noir story, which usually ends as a high-octane shoot-em-up and briefcase full of loot - everybody is satisfied). Maybe they don't know what to do.

And maybe they want to play it easy - I had a friend (very intelligent, quite empathic...) who always played stupid brawny guy and always dealt with trouble by bashing them - he explained that he uses RPGs as relaxation so he doesn't want to use the brain. So discuss it with them. If you already did, please post how they reacted. That could maybe help.

BTW, all of the "dumb things" you mentioned may be a valid tactic in a case (as goto124 correctly pointed it out). E.g. the "going all offense and leaving their bases vulnerable" may be a good tactic. Or they just don't expect active opponents. Maybe they want to play snakes and ladders and you want to play 3D chess... :smallsmile:

And maybe you could ask them to GM. See what they want to play. And maybe show them how it's done your way.

Talakeal
2015-03-26, 04:33 PM
Now I feel quite proud of my players :smallsmile:

They usually don't throw fits (I suppose they know it wouldn't work). Only once per last year there was something like a fit, but we discussed it out.

And that's my advice to you, Talakeal. Did you ask them why they play that way? Maybe they don't know you expect something more (I know my players didn't know what I expected when we started to play - one played Shadowrun as Paranoia, second one as AD&D - including looting of corpses - and third one as shoot-em-up - I expected noir-style stories...now we have paranoia noir story, which usually ends as a high-octane shoot-em-up and briefcase full of loot - everybody is satisfied). Maybe they don't know what to do.

And maybe they want to play it easy - I had a friend (very intelligent, quite empathic...) who always played stupid brawny guy and always dealt with trouble by bashing them - he explained that he uses RPGs as relaxation so he doesn't want to use the brain. So discuss it with them. If you already did, please post how they reacted. That could maybe help.

BTW, all of the "dumb things" you mentioned may be a valid tactic in a case (as goto124 correctly pointed it out). E.g. the "going all offense and leaving their bases vulnerable" may be a good tactic. Or they just don't expect active opponents. Maybe they want to play snakes and ladders and you want to play 3D chess... :smallsmile:

And maybe you could ask them to GM. See what they want to play. And maybe show them how it's done your way.

Yes, we have had many conversations about it. The problem is I am pretty bad at reading people and each of the players wants something different out of the game. Also, I am pretty sure one of them actually has a personality disorder which causes her to throw temper tantrums when she gets even the slightest bit frustrated.

The problem isn't that they don't want to think, the problem is they want to think just the right amount more often than not. A classic example is rather than just going in and slaying a dragon, they would tie a princess to a stake to use as bait to lure the dragon into an ambush, then during the ambush the princess gets caught in a blast of fire and now her father has declared the PCs outlaws. That sort of thing.

They like to think up a plan, but can't / won't accept the implications of it.

Rad Mage
2015-03-26, 11:30 PM
They like to think up a plan, but can't / won't accept that the implications of it.

Man, if I had a copper piece for every time this happened.

goto124
2015-03-27, 12:31 AM
The last time I played a high-lethality (not high-mortality), I feared nearly everything in the game, and felt powerless and bored (anything can kill me, so there's very little I could do). It also made me metagame a LOT just to survive, to the point where I was practically cheating. After a while, I was told to stop metagaming, and that's when I quitted in rage. Had no idea what I was doing besides 'do X and Y or else a PC will kill you'.

I guess jerk players were a factor, but I really wonder how a high lethality is SUPPOSED to feel like. As opposed to 'I can't do a single **** or else I drop dead'.

Maybe High-lethality keeps you on your toes, and I don't like being kept on my toes. If you only want your players to not make the sillest and stupidest of decisions, OOC agreement or a medium-lethality should be sufficient. IMHO.

Metahuman1
2015-03-27, 01:15 AM
The last time I played a high-lethality (not high-mortality), I feared nearly everything in the game, and felt powerless and bored (anything can kill me, so there's very little I could do). It also made me metagame a LOT just to survive, to the point where I was practically cheating. After a while, I was told to stop metagaming, and that's when I quitted in rage. Had no idea what I was doing besides 'do X and Y or else a PC will kill you'.

I guess jerk players were a factor, but I really wonder how a high lethality is SUPPOSED to feel like. As opposed to 'I can't do a single **** or else I drop dead'.

Maybe High-lethality keeps you on your toes, and I don't like being kept on my toes. If you only want your players to not make the sillest and stupidest of decisions, OOC agreement or a medium-lethality should be sufficient. IMHO.

I tend not to agree with this distinction between high lethality and high Mortality. As I elaborated aways back, if characters arn't dieing, it's not high lethality, cause the lethality is 0, cause the characters have not died there for whatever's happened up to that point has not proven actually lethal or fatal. (And still not convince it was immature jerk players and not evil alignments can/do/will work that way when there are entire supplements about evil alignments can/will/do work that way. Not buying it.).


But yes, if your making any headway in the game at all, it's because you accepted you are literally less powerful/effective in this game then you are in your real life (Which should NEVER be the case.) and that thinking in character is an act of ritual suicide and your better of metagaming as flagrantly possible in the hope that sooner or later you'll get powerful enough that you can stop. Maybe. If your lucky.


Talakeal: Dude, there has to be a way for you to game with better gamers then these circles you keep finding yourself in. Virtual table tops, Skype, something, anything.

That said, It's a pity I'm short time. I should run a game for these players of yours. Impress upon them the wisdom of the expression "Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it." Yeah, I go in annoyed enough I'd imagine I could teach them all kinds of crappy RAW ways for them to suck and die and spend more time doing character gen then actual play. Cause, hey, they wanted higher lethality. Now there getting it. Bet I could have them begging to have you DMing in your normal style before long.

Lacco
2015-03-27, 03:12 AM
The last time I played a high-lethality (not high-mortality), I feared nearly everything in the game, and felt powerless and bored (anything can kill me, so there's very little I could do). It also made me metagame a LOT just to survive, to the point where I was practically cheating. After a while, I was told to stop metagaming, and that's when I quitted in rage. Had no idea what I was doing besides 'do X and Y or else a PC will kill you'.

I guess jerk players were a factor, but I really wonder how a high lethality is SUPPOSED to feel like. As opposed to 'I can't do a single **** or else I drop dead'.

Maybe High-lethality keeps you on your toes, and I don't like being kept on my toes. If you only want your players to not make the sillest and stupidest of decisions, OOC agreement or a medium-lethality should be sufficient. IMHO.

This is clearly a matter of preferred playstyle. And feeling powerless and bored? You shouldn't be, even in high lethality game. Yes, anything can kill you (just like in real life), but your character should be on appropriate power level (I suggested that a good high lethality game should be a one which makes even starting characters effective enough - Shadowrun comes to mind as a good example), although there should be - as in real life - threats that cannot be defeated easily (or not at all).

By my experiences, D&D on first and second level is a good example of high lethality game (e.g. halfling with dagger can one-shot kill you if you are not careful; you can take one or two small wounds before you go down, but not 20 slashes from greatsword). Does it make you feel powerless/bored?

The 'do X and Y or else a PC will kill you' - did you mean NPC or PC? Because jerk players are always a factor - and always a negative one. :smallsmile:

How is high-lethality supposed to make you feel? It is supposed to make you feel great after you tackle a threat. It makes you feel like you actually are a hero after a won fight. It makes you jump off the chair and do high-fives all around the table after a fight - and makes every fight exciting and suspense. It makes you take a deep breath after you finish an superior opponent - where you realize you didn't breathe while the rolls were going (instead of just asking "ok, he's dead...what loot do we get?"). No fight is trivial. No encounter is boring. You fight for the life of your character and you fight with all that you got.

For example, the system we game is highly lethal. There are ways how to reduce damage and fighting system is more of the tactical one than only random (so you can fight really defensively or offensively or whatever you come up with). My players (5 of them, group of one fencer, one barbarian swordsman, one barbarian axeman, two archers; three experienced players, one newb and one ocassional player) were able to defeat a slaver band (19 members) who occupied a small village. The enemy had even a magician (and quite powerful one) on staff.

Only one of the group was hurt - and it was a minor wound. 19 enemies dead or incapacitated. I pulled no punches, but they went in carefully, but aggressively. Made use of environment. Concealed themselves, posted archers on good places, dispatched the guards quickly and silently, started fire to distract opponents (started fire of one of the huts in which the enemies slept, barricaded the door). They used their resources well and they emerged victorious.


I tend not to agree with this distinction between high lethality and high Mortality. As I elaborated aways back, if characters arn't dieing, it's not high lethality, cause the lethality is 0, cause the characters have not died there for whatever's happened up to that point has not proven actually lethal or fatal. (And still not convince it was immature jerk players and not evil alignments can/do/will work that way when there are entire supplements about evil alignments can/will/do work that way. Not buying it.).

You are not obliged to :smallsmile:. But I make the distinction - and it helps me keep the players happy and in the meantime play the game like I want too (lethal, with consequences). Mortality is 0 in my games usually, but not because the system or the game is not lethal enough. In previous example, if they went directly to the center of the village and started a loud fight with the guards, they would get massacred. And I'm not going to talk about alignments - my personal opinion is that alignments solve nothing and you can be jerk if you play LG, CE or TN - nothing stops you. So no, I don't play with alignments. I play with characters.


But yes, if your making any headway in the game at all, it's because you accepted you are literally less powerful/effective in this game then you are in your real life (Which should NEVER be the case.) and that thinking in character is an act of ritual suicide and your better of metagaming as flagrantly possible in the hope that sooner or later you'll get powerful enough that you can stop. Maybe. If your lucky.

I partially agree. For a player to enjoy playing high-lethality games, he must enjoy, that there are things more powerful than he is. That the wounds his character receives are no fictional hitpoints, but real bruises, cuts and other kinds of damage. And the duty of GM is to inform/show the players what the power level of this specific game is. If the players want to play children lost in dark horror manor - their power level is really lower than the one in their real life. But again, my opinion is, that for high-lethality game, the power level should be set to larger-than life, but still realistic ranges.

So basically, for me the starting level for a fighter in my games is something like above-average athlete, skilled in fencing and able to take on (for example) two not very skilled foes at once or one skilled and win without taking hit. With advantages on his side (higher ground, light behind back, bad terrain of his opponent) he can plow through two skilled foes or one expert enemy. If he attacks a dragon, frontally, he is toast in any case.

I liked the "less powerful/effective in this game then you are in your real life" - in real life, I fence a little and practice german longsword - I am quite a novice there. I know the theory, but only started to actively fence a year ago. My expectation would be - I could kill a goblin in face-to-face fight. But a trained orc would most probably kill me. For starting characters in my game, I wouldn't be even a threat (my combat pool - number of dice for a round of fight - would be about 5-6, their average is 12-14). Still, if I could choose conditions of the fight (I start with my weapon at hand, they have their sheated, they are surprised, I have the higher ground, they have uneven footing), I could hurt them and maybe even kill them. If they only stood and gave me the first hit opportunity, I could even one-shot them. So no, the "less powerful/effective than in real life" is not mandatory for high-lethality game.

And I think that thinking in character should NEVER kill your character (except, if you play heroic knight or puss in boots, and are standing on the bridge mentioned before - IC thinking should be "My honor demands I stand here and slow them. You go, finish the quest." or "Today, I repay my debt"). But, if you are thinking in character, you are the fighter. You risk your life for some reason. But do you like to get hurt in battle? Even if you are a fighter in armor, it will hurt. Wounds hurt (HP loss doesn't so much). Try to get into this kind of thinking next time you game - and every time you "are hit for 12 HP" imagine the pain, the blood loss, the cuts and bruises.

I have the experience, that when players enter a fight, they stop roleplaying. They discuss tactics. They count modifiers. They do their routine. They don't roleplay, they game. Maybe in your games it is different - I don't know. But maybe you should stop for a moment and imagine it. Through the eyes of your character. The fights are bloody, lethal and the adrenaline and the wound on your head is making your head spin. What do you feel?


Talakeal: Dude, there has to be a way for you to game with better gamers then these circles you keep finding yourself in. Virtual table tops, Skype, something, anything.

I was just going to suggest Talakeal to try gaming with different people. I - for once - would like to play, not GM a high lethality game :smallbiggrin:
Or try to switch places. Let them GM.

Oh my, again I wrote a lot. Sorry :smallbiggrin:

Lacco
2015-03-27, 03:35 AM
Yes, we have had many conversations about it. The problem is I am pretty bad at reading people and each of the players wants something different out of the game. Also, I am pretty sure one of them actually has a personality disorder which causes her to throw temper tantrums when she gets even the slightest bit frustrated.

The problem isn't that they don't want to think, the problem is they want to think just the right amount more often than not. A classic example is rather than just going in and slaying a dragon, they would tie a princess to a stake to use as bait to lure the dragon into an ambush, then during the ambush the princess gets caught in a blast of fire and now her father has declared the PCs outlaws. That sort of thing.

They like to think up a plan, but can't / won't accept the implications of it.

As for the one with personality disorder - no experience with this one, so I can not help in any way.

Then maybe a discussion of what they want from the game and setting of clear assumptions (e.g. I will try to prevent character death, but there will always be consequences; the NPCs don't disappear from game as soon as they are out of scene) could help. And maybe explaining to them, that this is the kind of game you want to play - and if they disagree, you have to find a compromise entertaining for both them and you.

I personally like your style man :smallbiggrin:.

I had similar issue with my group long time ago - no one came up with any plan or action (it was Shadowrun) and they just waited for me to drop hints/make things happen. One of the players (reckless action guy) usually got fed up and came with... well... reckless plan. He didn't discuss it. He just said "I have a plan." Answer to any question? "Don't worry. I have a plan.".


Mission: protect guy's daughter from mob
Opposition: 2 vans of hitmen on their way
Situation: girl is in school
Complication: it's a school for magically active kids, so the staff is able to defend themselves.
Action guy solution: player buys a big plush bear and enters the school - alone, in black trenchcoat and a glowing tatoo, meets first teacher and asks for the girl. In a hilarious fashion he explains: "Errr...I am...well... her father's colleague. He sent me. I bring her this present. She needs to go with me.".
Rolls horribly.
The teacher, cautious and expecting a problem, calls the girl, but assesses him in astral and starts preventively counterspelling. He tries to knock her out with sleep spell...mage duel ensues in main hall, while the rest of group waits in the van parked in front of the school...oh! The mob hitmen are coming!... they survived, through lucky rolls, burned edge and good idea of group's hacker).

What I did? I talked to them - explained my beef with the game. Told them I should have killed them (interesting reaction - they asked me why I didn't kill them...and that I should have done it if they really messed up). We agreed that they will try to play more cautious and I will help them. I talked to each player separately. After each game. Went over what they could have done. Went over their equipment/skills/spells/powers explained how they could have used it. I discusses tactics and planning with the "reckless action/ guy". Asked him several times to tell the plan to other players and to discuss it. During the game, I sometimes chimed in to suggest a flaw in a plan (usually based on a roll by - "roll tactics... success? Ok, you realize that if they have backup in this hall, that plan will go badly").

How did it go? See the previous post, the example with the slavers. Reckless action guy lead the group to the village. He still does the "reckless" thing and the "I have a plan!" became his catchphrase for the character. But it's now fun for them and for me.

goto124
2015-03-27, 08:33 AM
This is clearly a matter of preferred playstyle. And feeling powerless and bored? You shouldn't be, even in high lethality game. Yes, anything can kill you (just like in real life), but your character should be on appropriate power level (I suggested that a good high lethality game should be a one which makes even starting characters effective enough - Shadowrun comes to mind as a good example), although there should be - as in real life - threats that cannot be defeated easily (or not at all).

By my experiences, D&D on first and second level is a good example of high lethality game (e.g. halfling with dagger can one-shot kill you if you are not careful; you can take one or two small wounds before you go down, but not 20 slashes from greatsword). Does it make you feel powerless/bored?

The 'do X and Y or else a PC will kill you' - did you mean NPC or PC? Because jerk players are always a factor - and always a negative one. :smallsmile:

Yes, PCs. Players. They made social encounters as scary as combat ones. Just agreeing with what you said.



How is high-lethality supposed to make you feel? It is supposed to make you feel great after you tackle a threat. It makes you feel like you actually are a hero after a won fight. It makes you jump off the chair and do high-fives all around the table after a fight - and makes every fight exciting and suspense. It makes you take a deep breath after you finish an superior opponent - where you realize you didn't breathe while the rolls were going (instead of just asking "ok, he's dead...what loot do we get?"). No fight is trivial. No encounter is boring. You fight for the life of your character and you fight with all that you got.

To be fair, it did feel like that for a while. But once the novelty wore off, fights didn't leave me feeling triumphed- it left me exhausted. I didn't think 'Woot I really won the battle!', I though 'ok, it's dead... so erm what will try to kill me next? Lions? Starvation? Thirst?'. And I got tired of planning for every threat and encounter, which led to me not bothering to do almost anything. I holed myself up in the safest place, and never went far from it. So much for adventuring.

I was constantly told by the other players to act in-character. It led to attachment, and when my character died despite precautions (I was bound to slip up sooner or later)... I'd rather not talk about it.

It's... wierd, really.

Mr. Mask
2015-03-27, 09:00 AM
Going at a lethal game DnD style is a pretty miserable idea, unless you like regularly dying. Lethal games are suited more for avoiding threats and engaging them on your own terms, making plans to achieve an objective, not for being pushed into ambush after ambush. Heck, non-lethal games can get dull that way too.

Broken Twin
2015-03-27, 09:03 AM
@goto124: I think the problem you were having was less the high lethality of the game and more the constantly high tension. Games should have peaks and dips in the tension. Periods where you can relax, and periods where everything is on the line. Keep it red lined, and your players burn out. But if you flat line it, then the players become bored and restless. And the contrast between the two helps the high points feel higher, and the low points feel lower.

Lacco
2015-03-27, 09:20 AM
To be fair, it did feel like that for a while. But once the novelty wore off, fights didn't leave me feeling triumphed- it left me exhausted. I didn't think 'Woot I really won the battle!', I though 'ok, it's dead... so erm what will try to kill me next? Lions? Starvation? Thirst?'. And I got tired of planning for every threat and encounter, which led to me not bothering to do almost anything. I holed myself up in the safest place, and never went far from it. So much for adventuring.

I was constantly told by the other players to act in-character. It led to attachment, and when my character died despite precautions (I was bound to slip up sooner or later)... I'd rather not talk about it.

It's... wierd, really.

It's not wierd. I can understand that.

One of the GM's jobs (and there are plenty of them) is to understand the group and players and to make them entertained. It's important to understand the ebbs and flows of players' moods.

If I see them full of energy, ready for a hard fight, I present them with one. If I see they are tired and need a break, I don't hesitate to provide an easy encounter. I usually insert some paper tigers (NPCs with big mouth, sure to annoy and provoke a fight with the PCs, but easily defeatable) once per several games. And there are games completely without the fights - based purely on roleplay. Once we had a game (lasted for about 4 hours), where all they did was sit around the fire and discuss things. From fighting techniques & tactics (RoS is quite heavy on tactics), to family issues (IC), to their dreams, backstories... it was... well, very nice. All I had to do was change music & ambience and listen. I had a night fight planned for this game, but at the end, all I said was that the night passed peacefully. It just didn't fit in.

The story is not written in stone and the game needs to be entertaining, so I have no qualms about changing the encounter danger to appropriate level - it's not my task to kill the group (it's not a high mortality rate game), but to entertain them and provide interesting adventures. And the internal logic of the world does not fall apart if the bandits in this part of world are a bit incompetent (well, maybe they are used to just waving weapons at merchants and getting loot...).

Oh and sometimes just I tire them out, go at them from every side, attack every weakness and make them feel as tired as their characters are. I had a special NPC in Shadowrun to do this (a fixer, who was built in a way he needed to sleep every three days for 2 hours to survive and work; sending them small tasks, but tons of them). But they are warned beforehand and these are only ocassional events - and up to this time, they enjoyed each one, because it was a change of pace, usually followed by really mellow and relaxing jobs.

He died. One of the players, a girl, nearly cried at the moment. The others swore revenge. It was hard to make them like the obnoxious, annoying, chain-smoking, job-providing guy, but they did at the end. He was one of the good guys, however strange it is.

So, it's all in balance. Too much of everything makes people burn out. And I'm sorry to hear about the unwarranted death. Don't tell my players, but I prefer their characters alive (ok, they know it, but pretend that they don't and try to look scared to make me happy) :smallbiggrin:.

SowZ
2015-03-27, 10:35 AM
I tend not to agree with this distinction between high lethality and high Mortality. As I elaborated aways back, if characters arn't dieing, it's not high lethality, cause the lethality is 0, cause the characters have not died there for whatever's happened up to that point has not proven actually lethal or fatal. (And still not convince it was immature jerk players and not evil alignments can/do/will work that way when there are entire supplements about evil alignments can/will/do work that way. Not buying it.).


But yes, if your making any headway in the game at all, it's because you accepted you are literally less powerful/effective in this game then you are in your real life (Which should NEVER be the case.) and that thinking in character is an act of ritual suicide and your better of metagaming as flagrantly possible in the hope that sooner or later you'll get powerful enough that you can stop. Maybe. If your lucky.


Talakeal: Dude, there has to be a way for you to game with better gamers then these circles you keep finding yourself in. Virtual table tops, Skype, something, anything.

That said, It's a pity I'm short time. I should run a game for these players of yours. Impress upon them the wisdom of the expression "Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it." Yeah, I go in annoyed enough I'd imagine I could teach them all kinds of crappy RAW ways for them to suck and die and spend more time doing character gen then actual play. Cause, hey, they wanted higher lethality. Now there getting it. Bet I could have them begging to have you DMing in your normal style before long.

Do you deny that Good characters can just as easily do jerk/anti-social/PvP moves even though tons of people have examples of that? Paladins are especially guilty of this.

If either Good or Evil characters can and do betray the party and ruin the game, and there are both Good and Evil characters/parties that are perfectly social and cohesive, that shows there has to be another factor causing this betrayal separate from the Good/Evil axis.

I think you are trapped in this mind-set that "Evil=Stupid Crazy Psychopath" which is wrong. Those supplements specifically say that Evil can have relationships and love their loved ones and be just as loyal to their friends as good people. That's what the supplements say. That "Evil people betray each other" is a mind-set your fellow players are trapped in is not an argument for your cause.

Anyway, the fact that many people run evil games without any PvP proves that no, Evil does not mean PvP.

Your experiences are just that. Your experiences. My experiences are very different. Neither one is indicative of how it works overall. I've never known a mature player who would pull the kind of crap you said even with Evil alignments, but I've known people who played that way who would pull that stuff regardless of Good/Evil axis.

goto124
2015-03-27, 11:24 AM
@goto124: I think the problem you were having was less the high lethality of the game and more the constantly high tension. Games should have peaks and dips in the tension. Periods where you can relax, and periods where everything is on the line. Keep it red lined, and your players burn out. But if you flat line it, then the players become bored and restless. And the contrast between the two helps the high points feel higher, and the low points feel lower.

The game was online, so emotion-reading is a lot harder.

There were supposed to be high and low times. Trouble is, even low times were pretty risky, and 'high times' even more so. Later on I spent so much time in 'low times' preparing for 'high times', I just stopped going to the 'high times' altogether.

I think it contributed to my character not getting fleshed out or roleplayed.

Then I got killed by a PC, due to flubbing a social encounter with said PC. Never really found out what exactly went wrong.

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-27, 11:44 AM
This is clearly a matter of preferred playstyle. And feeling powerless and bored? You shouldn't be, even in high lethality game. Yes, anything can kill you (just like in real life), but your character should be on appropriate power level (I suggested that a good high lethality game should be a one which makes even starting characters effective enough - Shadowrun comes to mind as a good example), although there should be - as in real life - threats that cannot be defeated easily (or not at all).
This is what I find strange about the idea that high lethality makes things boring or makes players paranoid around every corner...

The velocity imparted on a skull by the acceleration due to gravity over the distance of average human height is enough to cause a force, striking a surface the right way, that is lethal. In other words, your whole life is one freak slip away from death. But last time I checked, you don't live like you claim you play your characters in a high lethality campaign. Unless you do, in which case I pity you.

So the question is, if you don't live your life that way, why are you living your characters that way?

Thrudd
2015-03-27, 11:54 AM
To be fair, it did feel like that for a while. But once the novelty wore off, fights didn't leave me feeling triumphed- it left me exhausted. I didn't think 'Woot I really won the battle!', I though 'ok, it's dead... so erm what will try to kill me next? Lions? Starvation? Thirst?'. And I got tired of planning for every threat and encounter, which led to me not bothering to do almost anything. I holed myself up in the safest place, and never went far from it. So much for adventuring.

The language you used here, "what will try to kill me next", makes me feel like part of this problem is a lack of agency in the game. When the game is a string of things that happen to your character, without much input on your part, I can fully imagine arriving at the feeling you describe of just not caring, regardless of the lethality of the system.

This is why I would desire to make a game where players choose their characters' goals, in a broad sense, and have a world in which they can pursue those goals how they choose. You choose when to go into danger, knowing that you are doing so, and have at least a general idea of what the character will face and get from it, being able to weigh risk and reward.

Of course, this does assume that the player will make a character that has something they want bad enough to go into danger willingly and repeatedly. That's the basic premise of the game which all characters need to be built around.

If a player conceives that their character is tired of adventuring and doesn't want to go into danger anymore, time to retire the character and make a new one that is willing to take risks (or adjust how you think about the character).

Lacco
2015-03-27, 12:32 PM
This is what I find strange about the idea that high lethality makes things boring or makes players paranoid around every corner...

The velocity imparted on a skull by the acceleration due to gravity over the distance of average human height is enough to cause a force, striking a surface the right way, that is lethal. In other words, your whole life is one freak slip away from death. But last time I checked, you don't live like you claim you play your characters in a high lethality campaign. Unless you do, in which case I pity you.

So the question is, if you don't live your life that way, why are you living your characters that way?

If this was a question for me, please rephrase :) I am not sure if I understand correctly...

...but that seldom stops one from trying to answer, does it?

Well, it does stop me! :smallsmile:

Do I understand your question correctly - are you asking why does anyone like to play lethal rpgs if they would refrain from such activities in real life...?

Lacco
2015-03-27, 01:13 PM
This is why I would desire to make a game where players choose their characters' goals, in a broad sense, and have a world in which they can pursue those goals how they choose. You choose when to go into danger, knowing that you are doing so, and have at least a general idea of what the character will face and get from it, being able to weigh risk and reward.

Of course, this does assume that the player will make a character that has something they want bad enough to go into danger willingly and repeatedly. That's the basic premise of the game which all characters need to be built around.

If a player conceives that their character is tired of adventuring and doesn't want to go into danger anymore, time to retire the character and make a new one that is willing to take risks (or adjust how you think about the character).

Again, if you desire a system which supports this, I can only recommend Riddle of Steel.

The premise of the whole game is about answering the question "what does your character live for?" and "what does your character find so important, he would fight for or die for?".

RoS has a mechanic exactly for what you wrote - it's called Spiritual attributes (SA).
Usual SA are Destiny (what the character is destined to become/carry out...or how he dies), Drive (what he wants to do/become), Passion (what he hates, loves, is loyal to), Faith (exactly what it says on the label) and Conscience (if he chooses it, he is rewarded for "good" deeds; this doesn't mean that he is evil if he doesn't choose it, he just isn't driven by desire to do good deeds). Player usually chooses between 3 and 5 of them (you can take multiple Passions).

These represent both the player's and character's goals, driving forces and significant personal traits, and at the same time - hooks for GM. It is a manifest of what the player wants to do within the story.

Player specifies (in some cases the GM may do it - such as in case of "hidden" destiny, which is then revealed through oracles, seers, dreams and character's actions) the SAs. E.g. Drive - To become best fencer in the world; Passion - Hatred for slavers (this one is popular). Destiny - to be killed by three teeth. And for example - conscience (usually is not specified, only if you have very specific code).

The value of each SA is between 0 and 5.

Now each time the SA comes into play (our fencer is going to duel with a well known fencer), it is added to the dice pool (so if you have all SAs on 2, you get 2 dice). This is cummulative (our fencer is going to duel with another well known fencer, who is a well known slaver over a poor guy's life, you get additional 6 dice.

This represents the motivation of the character to win the duel.

And the reward? You spend SAs to improve your character. Each point you spend goes to "Insight" which you use after you retire the character to get a better starting character.

So basically, you improve by going after your goals. If the fight is not important for you (in case of our fencer, going to a duel as a second to the slaver), you don't get additional dice (makes it riskier to fight) or even lose dice (well, he is a slaver and you hate him...).

Oh, and if you reach the upper level in your SAs (5), usually something important including your character and his SA should occur (this is especially important for Destiny - in case of the mentioned destiny, a man with spetum in his hand would challenge our fencer to a duel).

Mr. Mask
2015-03-27, 01:49 PM
Lacco: On that note, got to try the sequel to Riddle of Steel? What do you think of it, if so?

Lacco
2015-03-27, 02:10 PM
Lacco: On that note, got to try the sequel to Riddle of Steel? What do you think of it, if so?

I have the rules, but I must say it's not as different as one would expect and doesn't bring so much new ideas. It tries to move a bit away from the traditional "tombs and loot", but that can be done also with the original. But it has quite interesting section on GMing and especially scene framing from what I remember. I am waiting for the other spin-off, Band of Bastards.

What discouraged me from transfer to these rules is the change of "traditional" attributes (STR, AGI...) to new ones. Also, if it works, I'm not going to change.

So no, I have only theoretical knowledge. And I prefer the original rules.

BTW, should we take this to PM? I'm new to the forum, but this discussion may go a bit off topic.

Talakeal
2015-03-27, 02:14 PM
Again, if you desire a system which supports this, I can only recommend Riddle of Steel.

The premise of the whole game is about answering the question "what does your character live for?" and "what does your character find so important, he would fight for or die for?".

RoS has a mechanic exactly for what you wrote - it's called Spiritual attributes (SA).
Usual SA are Destiny (what the character is destined to become/carry out...or how he dies), Drive (what he wants to do/become), Passion (what he hates, loves, is loyal to), Faith (exactly what it says on the label) and Conscience (if he chooses it, he is rewarded for "good" deeds; this doesn't mean that he is evil if he doesn't choose it, he just isn't driven by desire to do good deeds). Player usually chooses between 3 and 5 of them (you can take multiple Passions).

These represent both the player's and character's goals, driving forces and significant personal traits, and at the same time - hooks for GM. It is a manifest of what the player wants to do within the story.

Player specifies (in some cases the GM may do it - such as in case of "hidden" destiny, which is then revealed through oracles, seers, dreams and character's actions) the SAs. E.g. Drive - To become best fencer in the world; Passion - Hatred for slavers (this one is popular). Destiny - to be killed by three teeth. And for example - conscience (usually is not specified, only if you have very specific code).

The value of each SA is between 0 and 5.

Now each time the SA comes into play (our fencer is going to duel with a well known fencer), it is added to the dice pool (so if you have all SAs on 2, you get 2 dice). This is cummulative (our fencer is going to duel with another well known fencer, who is a well known slaver over a poor guy's life, you get additional 6 dice.

This represents the motivation of the character to win the duel.

And the reward? You spend SAs to improve your character. Each point you spend goes to "Insight" which you use after you retire the character to get a better starting character.

So basically, you improve by going after your goals. If the fight is not important for you (in case of our fencer, going to a duel as a second to the slaver), you don't get additional dice (makes it riskier to fight) or even lose dice (well, he is a slaver and you hate him...).

Oh, and if you reach the upper level in your SAs (5), usually something important including your character and his SA should occur (this is especially important for Destiny - in case of the mentioned destiny, a man with spetum in his hand would challenge our fencer to a duel).


Lacco: On that note, got to try the sequel to Riddle of Steel? What do you think of it, if so?

There is a sequel to Riddle of Steel?

Personally I like the idea, but hated the execution. You are always driven between doing what your character would do and what will get you the best RP rewards, and iirc there was some disconnect between long term advancement only coming at the cost of short term effectiveness.

huttj509
2015-03-27, 02:14 PM
If this was a question for me, please rephrase :) I am not sure if I understand correctly...

...but that seldom stops one from trying to answer, does it?

Well, it does stop me! :smallsmile:

Do I understand your question correctly - are you asking why does anyone like to play lethal rpgs if they would refrain from such activities in real life...?

If I understand correctly:

The argument (call it Argument A) has been made that high lethality games, where many actions can result in death, even accidental, results in various character and player behaviors that are withdrawn and overcautious.

Real Life can be considered high lethality, due to the number of actions and accidental results that can result in death.

Real Life does not result in those same behaviors.

Thus, the validity of Argument A is questioned.

Lacco
2015-03-27, 02:24 PM
There is a sequel to Riddle of Steel?

Personally I like the idea, but hated the execution. You are always driven between doing what your character would do and what will get you the best RP rewards, and iirc there was some disconnect between long term advancement only coming at the cost of short term effectiveness.

Yes, it's called Blade of the Iron Throne. Group of fans from the official forum made it (the original author approved it).

The short-term effectiveness/long-term advancement issue you speak of is the advancement through spending of the SA points (which make you effective in the scene). Yes, that can be seen this way. That's why most players spend their points at the end of story, or during the scenes where they are activated.

And the point of the SA points was to drive the character and to push you to RP what your character would do - they represent his/hers goals, desires. Usually if you played your character accordingly, you got the RP rewards too.


If I understand correctly:

The argument (call it Argument A) has been made that high lethality games, where many actions can result in death, even accidental, results in various character and player behaviors that are withdrawn and overcautious.

Real Life can be considered high lethality, due to the number of actions and accidental results that can result in death.

Real Life does not result in those same behaviors.

Thus, the validity of Argument A is questioned.

Thank you for explaining. If this is the point, I have no comment :smallsmile:

Talakeal
2015-03-27, 02:35 PM
Yes, it's called Blade of the Iron Throne. Group of fans from the official forum made it (the original author approved it).

The short-term effectiveness/long-term advancement issue you speak of is the advancement through spending of the SA points (which make you effective in the scene). Yes, that can be seen this way. That's why most players spend their points at the end of story, or during the scenes where they are activated.

And the point of the SA points was to drive the character and to push you to RP what your character would do - they represent his/hers goals, desires. Usually if you played your character accordingly, you got the RP rewards too.



Its been a while since I played RoS so my memory is a bit fuzzy. One of the guys in my old gaming group went to college with the author (Jacob Norwood?) and was taught the game by him personally, and he taught it to us. A lot of guys in the group where crazy about it, and I thought it had a lot of potential but I could never quite get into it. The (ic) horror of the magic system always turned me off a bit.

Now, iirc, my problem with the rewarding RP system forced you to play to a stereotype. It forced you to define yourself in very specific and narrow ways that didn't really meld with my image of the character, and if I wanted to react to the specific situation in a nuanced manner I wasn't rewarded vs. just grubbing for rewards by trying to tick off the boxes on my sheet.

Beta Centauri
2015-03-27, 02:36 PM
This is what I find strange about the idea that high lethality makes things boring or makes players paranoid around every corner...

The velocity imparted on a skull by the acceleration due to gravity over the distance of average human height is enough to cause a force, striking a surface the right way, that is lethal. In other words, your whole life is one freak slip away from death. But last time I checked, you don't live like you claim you play your characters in a high lethality campaign. Unless you do, in which case I pity you.

So the question is, if you don't live your life that way, why are you living your characters that way? I do live my life that way. Most people do.

I don't take any unnecessary risks. I don't run along ledges or over unstable ground. I go carefully when the ground is slippery. When I'm moving over rocky terrain, I maintain three point of contact at all time. I wear a helmet when I ride a bike or do anything else that might involve a fall.

But I want my character to be different. I don't want my character to be me. I want my character to run along ledges, leap over gaps, cross crumbling bridges, fight running battles through fields of rubble, ride a motorcycle through a high-speed chase wearing nothing but a tuxedo. I don't want my character to be cautious, to make sure everything is entirely safe before proceeding, because that gets in the way of the adventure.

So, the risks or at least the consequences for me having my character take those kinds of actions can't be equivalent to me taking them. If I took them, I'd be likely to fail, and likely to die or be so seriously injured that I'd be in the hospital and therapy for months, and maybe never recover. Obviously that can't happen to me because of a game choice, but what could happen is that the character dies or is incapacitated and is effectively out of the game for good. If that takes me out of the game for good, then there is absolutely no reason for me to take that risk, because what's at stake is my ability to even participate in the game.

Now, if the death of my character means that I just move right to a backup, or that the character is resurrected at some cost or temporary debilitation (or even the failure of a major mission), I'm fine with it. I'll take pretty much any risk to do something cool in that case. If I fail, oh well. Next character.

But if the GM is specifically trying to get players to be cautious, then pretty much the only thing they can hold over the players' head is their participation (which can include making the character so underpowered after coming back that the player can't meaningfully participate). That's the only way to give death the "bite" that they want.

If a player is bought into that, great. But I'm done wasting my free time sitting out of a game that I was ejected from even though I did nothing illegal. RPGs aren't even the only kinds of games that do that. Player elimination games, on the whole, have this issue. Why should not playing the game be considered part of the game?

Lacco
2015-03-27, 02:45 PM
Its been a while since I played RoS so my memory is a bit fuzzy. One of the guys in my old gaming group went to college with the author (Jacob Norwood?) and was taught the game by him personally, and he taught it to us. A lot of guys in the group where crazy about it, and I thought it had a lot of potential but I could never quite get into it. The (ic) horror of the magic system always turned me off a bit.

Now, iirc, my problem with the rewarding RP system forced you to play to a stereotype. It forced you to define yourself in very specific and narrow ways that didn't really meld with my image of the character, and if I wanted to react to the specific situation in a nuanced manner I wasn't rewarded vs. just grubbing for rewards by trying to tick off the boxes on my sheet.

Oh, the magic system... yes, that's fundamentally broken in my opinion. I refuse to let any player, unless very skilled, to even suggest a magician in this system. Strangely, only one guy ever wanted to play magician... and the only magicians they ever met were on the opposite side.

This is also a question of approach and the playing the system vs. breaking the system mentality. The system can be used to "grub for rewards" and get ahead quickly, but it's again a matter of use. I would need a bit more information/specific situation to understand what exactly discouraged you. My experience is, that the SAs are used more as "guidelines" and are not again set in stone. So maybe more info would be helpful.

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-27, 02:47 PM
The argument (call it Argument A) has been made that high lethality games, where many actions can result in death, even accidental, results in various character and player behaviors that are withdrawn and overcautious.

Real Life can be considered high lethality, due to the number of actions and accidental results that can result in death.

Real Life does not result in those same behaviors.

Thus, the validity of Argument A is questioned. Yes, this^

To clarify Iacco, I was piggy backing on your statement, but the question was directed mostly at goto.

Metahuman1
2015-03-27, 02:54 PM
Do you deny that Good characters can just as easily do jerk/anti-social/PvP moves even though tons of people have examples of that? Paladins are especially guilty of this.

If either Good or Evil characters can and do betray the party and ruin the game, and there are both Good and Evil characters/parties that are perfectly social and cohesive, that shows there has to be another factor causing this betrayal separate from the Good/Evil axis.

I think you are trapped in this mind-set that "Evil=Stupid Crazy Psychopath" which is wrong. Those supplements specifically say that Evil can have relationships and love their loved ones and be just as loyal to their friends as good people. That's what the supplements say. That "Evil people betray each other" is a mind-set your fellow players are trapped in is not an argument for your cause.

Anyway, the fact that many people run evil games without any PvP proves that no, Evil does not mean PvP.

Your experiences are just that. Your experiences. My experiences are very different. Neither one is indicative of how it works overall. I've never known a mature player who would pull the kind of crap you said even with Evil alignments, but I've known people who played that way who would pull that stuff regardless of Good/Evil axis.

No, sometimes Evil can be fascists or religious fanatics who have a logical progression for killing there party member. Or Magnificent Bastard types who have a strict code of people who are off limits, tough break for you your not one of them. Or who will kill you cause necessary in there eyes and apologize for it, but your still dead, so...

Or They can be just straight up self serving.

And all of them can and will straight up murder you, and as long as they throw out at most two or three sentences of justification and have few if any witnesses, will do so with impunity. That Paladin, on the other hand, is gonna spend all session, all week after the session, and the next session, justifying it because if they don't they fall and now have been penalized. THEY loose out on relationships and valuable NPC allies and mechanical benefits for that kind of behavior. Evil, it's accounted for that there gonna do that so they don't get punished for it.


So yes, the paladin can disrupt it, as can the Chaotic Good/Neutral Rogue. And there gonna be made to regret it. But that Lawful Evil Cleric or Neutral Evil Necromancer or Chaotic Evil Rouge? No, no there not, cause now your just hampering there play style. Evils suppose to be easier then good after all.






Beta Centauri: I would like to add that even if it's a case of "next sheet in the stack.", it means I'm gonna put far less effort into things like back story and actual RP because I'm gonna be dead the first time I try to do anything worth doing anyway, so there's zero point wasting my time and creative energy's on that back story and role play. Thus, I'm not invested. At all.

SowZ
2015-03-27, 03:00 PM
No, sometimes Evil can be fascists or religious fanatics who have a logical progression for killing there party member. Or Magnificent Bastard types who have a strict code of people who are off limits, tough break for you your not one of them. Or who will kill you cause necessary in there eyes and apologize for it, but your still dead, so...

Or They can be just straight up self serving.

And all of them can and will straight up murder you, and as long as they throw out at most two or three sentences of justification and have few if any witnesses, will do so with impunity. That Paladin, on the other hand, is gonna spend all session, all week after the session, and the next session, justifying it because if they don't they fall and now have been penalized. THEY loose out on relationships and valuable NPC allies and mechanical benefits for that kind of behavior. Evil, it's accounted for that there gonna do that so they don't get punished for it.


So yes, the paladin can disrupt it, as can the Chaotic Good/Neutral Rogue. And there gonna be made to regret it. But that Lawful Evil Cleric or Neutral Evil Necromancer or Chaotic Evil Rouge? No, no there not, cause now your just hampering there play style. Evils suppose to be easier then good after all.






Beta Centauri: I would like to add that even if it's a case of "next sheet in the stack.", it means I'm gonna put far less effort into things like back story and actual RP because I'm gonna be dead the first time I try to do anything worth doing anyway, so there's zero point wasting my time and creative energy's on that back story and role play. Thus, I'm not invested. At all.

None of these things you are saying are givens. It is purely DM style and group style. When I've played Evil characters, I am not more likely to engage in anti-social behavior that will ruin the game. And I've played Good characters more likely to go against party interests because of their code, but there's still a line in how far I will go.

As a GM, I've had literal serial killers in my games, (the characters, not the players,) and managed to keep the game together. You keep assuming your experiences and the way people interpret alignment/play-style is universal, which is your problem here.

Lacco
2015-03-27, 03:52 PM
So, the risks or at least the consequences for me having my character take those kinds of actions can't be equivalent to me taking them. If I took them, I'd be likely to fail, and likely to die or be so seriously injured that I'd be in the hospital and therapy for months, and maybe never recover. Obviously that can't happen to me because of a game choice, but what could happen is that the character dies or is incapacitated and is effectively out of the game for good. If that takes me out of the game for good, then there is absolutely no reason for me to take that risk, because what's at stake is my ability to even participate in the game.

It's not given that the risks/consequences of character (let's use the example here) who goes to a duel to death with his enemy would be the same as you taking them. The character is, in game, trained to duel, has experience, knows the technique and has the proper guts. So the risks are not the same. It's the consequences that are similar - and that's why I like the high lethality games. I have less trouble getting into the character's head, since he is in this way like me - he has his fears (including fear of death). If your character doesn't fear death...well, I dunno. I couldn't well roleplay that (maybe except in Toon or Paranoia). Maybe that's a failure on my side.


Now, if the death of my character means that I just move right to a backup, or that the character is resurrected at some cost or temporary debilitation (or even the failure of a major mission), I'm fine with it. I'll take pretty much any risk to do something cool in that case. If I fail, oh well. Next character.

My characters will take pretty much any risk to do something that they care about enough to risk their own life. 10 000 orcs threaten their home village and they are the only ones who will defend it? Well, bring it, greenskins.


But if the GM is specifically trying to get players to be cautious, then pretty much the only thing they can hold over the players' head is their participation (which can include making the character so underpowered after coming back that the player can't meaningfully participate). That's the only way to give death the "bite" that they want.

Nope. It's not the only way to give death "bite". The best way is to have players invested in characters. To care. People protect things they care about.

The other possibility is the "coolness factor" of death. You died because you mooned the duke? Or you died because you stood against the 8752 orcs? Which one would you pick? And no, the answer "I'd pick to survive" is not an option :smallsmile:

And one of the basic elements how to get players to enjoy the high-lethality game is to provide characters that are capable and effective from start. So yes, if you die a cool death, you get another fine character, not Wimpy from Wimpsville. Best way is to provide a reward system, which will allow your next character be even better than a starting one - based ideally on their previous successes and coolness factor of their death.


If a player is bought into that, great. But I'm done wasting my free time sitting out of a game that I was ejected from even though I did nothing illegal. RPGs aren't even the only kinds of games that do that. Player elimination games, on the whole, have this issue. Why should not playing the game be considered part of the game?

There I agree. Not playing the game shouldn't be considered playing it. That's why I keep the "dead to alive" time the shortest I can.

Lacco
2015-03-27, 04:05 PM
I'm not going to join the alignment debate (I don't play alignments). But...


Beta Centauri: I would like to add that even if it's a case of "next sheet in the stack.", it means I'm gonna put far less effort into things like back story and actual RP because I'm gonna be dead the first time I try to do anything worth doing anyway, so there's zero point wasting my time and creative energy's on that back story and role play. Thus, I'm not invested. At all.

Let's forget the past grievances for a moment.

Let's assume you would play with a group, which doesn't kill you "just because", and which helps you survive against the odds in a high-lethality game (after all, you are all in it together). The character you get is capable and skilled (a sword to gut may kill you, but you are skilled enough to dodge/parry and fight back so an Average Joe has no chance in straight fight against you) from the beginning. There are mechanics for rerolls in the system (so yes, the first unlucky roll will not kill you). The story is centered on the characters (yes, assume there is a story, not a series of deathtrap dungeons and mazes designed to kill you).

Would you get invested in the character in this case?

And as for backstory - I prefer short ones. The character will either be fun to play and the player will come to me with ideas to flesh him out (and I will have my own ideas prepared by that time) or it will be changed until it is fun to play.

Metahuman1
2015-03-27, 04:19 PM
Yes, but that's not the situation Beta described that I was responding too. The Situation Beta Described is a situation were you keep a big stack of sheets next too you cause your characters are gonna die, frequently and rapidly, and your gonna be expected to just jump to the next one. Which means that the characters, story or not, are NOT surviving more then at absolute best a session or two.

At which point, it didn't matter that I'm a Pirate trying to reform except maybe for influencing the weapons I liked cause now, he's dead, and it might very well not even have had a chance to come up or effect things. Or that I went to mage collage. Or that I'm form planet Katasunri. Or that I worship Crom and wished to spread his word. So, I'm gonna focus less on it.


I could invest in what your describing, but what your describing is a whole different animal from what Beta described. (And hell, if they make it through with no fatality's or only 1-2 through out the game for a decently long campaign, again, I wouldn't define it as high lethality. A game that rewards using available tactical options and not charging in like Lancealot, but not high lethality.)


And you seem to be in something of a minority. The Majority of DM's I've had wanted freaking epics written in terms of back story for every character.

Beta Centauri
2015-03-27, 04:34 PM
It's the consequences that are similar - nd that's why I like the high lethality games. I have less trouble getting into the character's head, since he is in this way like me - he has his fears (including fear of death). If your character doesn't fear death...well, I dunno. I couldn't well roleplay that (maybe except in Toon or Paranoia). Maybe that's a failure on my side. The character fears death, but why should I be experiencing it? Even if there's a high risk of the character dying, I'll just make another one. Paranoia made fun of this, but that's what a high-lethality game leads to for many people. Some get more cautions, and some just stop caring so much.


My characters will take pretty much any risk to do something that they care about enough to risk their own life. 10 000 orcs threaten their home village and they are the only ones who will defend it? Well, bring it, greenskins. Yep, cool, but that doesn't always make sense. Sometimes there's a risk of a serious downside and not much of a plausible reason why the character would take that risk. It happens in TV and stories all the time, and the reason for that is that it's cool. We like the character's confidence in the face of danger, because that's hard to muster in real life, because it's generally not worth the risk. But since it's just a game, why not take the risk to be cool?


Nope. It's not the only way to give death "bite". The best way is to have players invested in characters. To care. People protect things they care about. But why should I care if an easy misstep could take it away?

I think the disconnect here might be that I'm not talking just about games in which lethal consequences are possible. I'm talking about games that require a great deal of risk analysis and mitigation. I'm not talking about a game where if the character doesn't wait for the cars to stop before crossing they could be killed. I'm talking about a game in which there's not necessarily a easy way to judge the risk of a particular action. By default in D&D, any single stone in the floor of a hallway could kill a character, and so not checking every single stone for safety is the equivalent of running blindly into traffic. Things usually aren't that bad, but you get the idea. Can we have a cool combat encounter, or can this guy just wipe us out? I guess we'd better not risk it.

Some GMs "telegraph" threats, to bring them to the equivalent of seeing a busy street, so that the players have to be blind or careless to actually encounter the danger, but that's also not the kind of thing I'm talking about, because that's not "lethal." The GM wants the lethality avoided, rather than risked. I hate that kind of play, but not because it's lethal, just because it's cheesy.


The other possibility is the "coolness factor" of death. You died because you mooned the duke? Or you died because you stood against the 8752 orcs? Which one would you pick? Yeah, but I'm talking about "you died because you chose to walk down the hallway without checking it for traps." That's not an entirely unreasonable thing to do, in many games, but it's not really a very cool way to lose a character, especially if it's one the player was made to care for. Again, if I have a back up that I can slide right into the game, I don't care if the death is not very cool. That doesn't mean (for me) that I'm going to do ridiculous stuff, but if stuff I think should be harmless results in my character's death, oh, well. Next!


And one of the basic elements how to get players to enjoy the high-lethality game is to provide characters that are capable and effective from start. So yes, if you die a cool death, you get another fine character, not Wimpy from Wimpsville. Best way is to provide a reward system, which will allow your next character be even better than a starting one - based ideally on their previous successes and coolness factor of their death. Yeah, someone mentioned some games that worked that way, but there's still a risk that the player winds up with a less cool character, and less ability to contribute, compared to other players. Is it really a good idea for that to depend on the player's skill? I can sort of see that, with a big player base and easy mobility, but if it's a fixed group at one table, having characters of different capability levels can be a pain.

I like 4e's approach. Raise Dead inflicts a penalty on rolls that lasts for a certain number encounters, rather than a specific length of time. The player must experience that weakness for a time, but then it goes away. Lots of people dismiss Raise Dead, of course, but the same sort of penalty could be applied to a new character. It could be thought of as being caused by the character adjusting to the new group.


There I agree. Not playing the game shouldn't be considered playing it. That's why I keep the "dead to alive" time the shortest I can. Glad to hear it.

Lacco
2015-03-27, 04:48 PM
I could invest in what your describing, but what your describing is a whole different animal from what Beta described. (And hell, if they make it through with no fatality's or only 1-2 through out the game for a decently long campaign, again, I wouldn't define it as high lethality. A game that rewards using available tactical options and not charging in like Lancealot, but not high lethality.)

And you seem to be in something of a minority. The Majority of DM's I've had wanted freaking epics written in terms of back story for every character.

It's possible that Beta described something else, but I try to stay on topic (and I fail at that often). So what I wanted to find out is what would make specifically you enjoy the high lethality game.

And again, we struggle with definitions. I still keep my definition of high lethality - it is the potential deadliness, not the mortality rate. And a game that rewards using tactical options by surviving (nothing else, nothing more) and punishes the reckless and suicidal tactics by final death (as opposed to multiple resurrections) is by my opinion lethal.

As for the backstories... I like backstories. But I can find no use for long backstories which don't influence the game. A sufficient backstory for starting (only for starting) character is "she is a member of disgraced noble family, wants to find her family (knows only that they are disgraced and their sigil), comes from this country and his foster father is a fencing teacher - in some part of her life she lived on a street and picked some thieving skills". That I can work with. After 2-3 games, I start to elaborate upon it together with player (and sometimes only by myself...I twist some twisty little twists inside). If the player wants to give me more, I accept it, but I prefer if they flesh the character out during play. But that's my preference.

Beta Centauri
2015-03-27, 05:40 PM
And again, we struggle with definitions. I still keep my definition of high lethality - it is the potential deadliness, not the mortality rate. I think someone else made this distinction several pages back.


And a game that rewards using tactical options by surviving (nothing else, nothing more) and punishes the reckless and suicidal tactics by final death (as opposed to multiple resurrections) is by my opinion lethal. "Punishes." An unfortunate term. Again, I find that players won't let themselves be punished. You want to kill their character for the choice they made? Fine. Didn't hurt. They'll just play another one.

I think that's why people (such as myself) assume that "high lethality" means "high mortality." There's almost no reward you could give me that would make me want to make tactical choices, if those choices are boring. If I can leap a chasm in a moment, or swing across in a few moments, or spend an out-of-game hour working the kinks out of a complicated set of pulleys, and each one of those leads to the same cool encounter on the other side, what do I really have an incentive to try to do? Some GMs will happily let a player try the jump and die and then wind up having to sit around for that hour anyway, while the completely safe "tactical" option is tried by the surviving characters.

And that's part of what I find odd about the idea of a "lethal" game. People who are going to enjoy it are the people who already like making those tactical choices. The "lethality" never really comes into play, because they're not reckless. It's like playing "lava" in the living room: there's no actual danger, we just liked climbing on the furniture, but it was funny to imagine that we had to climb on the furniture.

So, I think that's why I bristle at the term "lethality" to mean "tactics are 'rewarded,' and recklessness is 'punished.'" What it really means is "please don't play in this game if you'd rather be reckless." Which is fine, but it winds up muddling the issue, and making people who find excessive tactics boring seem immature.

I want to run a game of Dark Sun soon, and I want to play it "lethally," but in the sense that it's not actually possible to play tactically enough to guarantee success. Sometimes, characters will just get in over their heads, despite playing perfectly. In fact, sometimes I might just decide that they do, to drive home that the world is harsh and capricious. I will be upfront about that, though, and the players will have back up characters to switch to. Heck, they might even decide themselves that a character just dies, simply to get to bring out another character. I've done that myself, as a player in Gamma World.

That is what I think of as lethal: not an incentive for players to play conservatively in order to survive (an incentive certain players don't need anyway), but an incentive for them to be great now, since tomorrow they may be dead (which certain other players don't need anyway, actually).

BootStrapTommy
2015-03-27, 06:02 PM
No, sometimes Evil can be fascists or religious fanatics who have a logical progression for killing there party member. Or Magnificent Bastard types who have a strict code of people who are off limits, tough break for you your not one of them. Or who will kill you cause necessary in there eyes and apologize for it, but your still dead, so...

Or They can be just straight up self serving.

And all of them can and will straight up murder you, and as long as they throw out at most two or three sentences of justification and have few if any witnesses, will do so with impunity.
I recently had to tackle this problem myself. The fighter from my GMs, Favors, and Experience thread recently made a new character for the bard (who is now DMing). During character creation the fighter complained about not getting to play Evil, when myself and bard explained to him the problem.

You see, when he plays Evil, he plays just what your are talking about. "Mustache twiddling, baby candy stealing, puppy kicking" Evil as we coined it. Or Stupid Evil for short. Since that Evil sucks, we advised him against it. Shortly into the campaign however, he began figuratively twiddling his mustache, stealing candy from babies, and kicking puppies. So we had to intervene.

Which we did by pointing out Evil doesn't have to be any of those things. In fact, some one can be evil and never murder a soul. We explained that evil can be subtle and that evil can still value life.

His murderhobo turned into a subtle, cool Frankenstein clone who is obsessed with finding a cure for death (by questionable means, if necessary) while ultimately believing he is the incarnation of Anubis. So far the character is fun and even compatible with the party's Paladin.

Lacco
2015-03-27, 06:17 PM
I think someone else made this distinction several pages back.

It was me.


"Punishes." An unfortunate term. Again, I find that players won't let themselves be punished. You want to kill their character for the choice they made? Fine. Didn't hurt. They'll just play another one.

Correct. An unfortunate term. Caused by the fact that it's nearly midnight and I'm too tired to think in English, so I will continue tomorrow. :smallsmile:

But if we want to play the word game, "you want to kill their character for the choice they made?" Nope. I don't want to kill them. And I don't kill them. They get killed because of their choices (e.g. I don't do the "rocks fall everyone dies" or "don't roll, it's too far, you fall into chasm" - I do the "you pissed on his shoes? roll for initiative, he wants to return the favor by stabbing you in the eye" and "you want to jump with wounded leg? well, you will roll with a negative modifier and you have no rerolls left...). On the other hand:


sometimes I might just decide that they do, to drive home that the world is harsh and capricious

seems like you want to kill them for the choice they didn't make :smallsmile:

Basically, we can agree to disagree. Your view of lethality is different from mine (since you put my concepts "lethality" and "mortality" together). No problem with that. And we both enjoy our style of play. And our players do the same, so no problem there. The topic is "managing high-lethality games", so basically we represent two different views (I like to put the "end" into the hands of the players, you like to handle it by yourself if I understand you well).


And that's part of what I find odd about the idea of a "lethal" game. People who are going to enjoy it are the people who already like making those tactical choices. The "lethality" never really comes into play, because they're not reckless. It's like playing "lava" in the living room: there's no actual danger, we just liked climbing on the furniture, but it was funny to imagine that we had to climb on the furniture.

And there is no actual danger in playing RPGs also - it is just fun to imagine. The lethality never really comes into play (we would run out of players pretty soon).


So, I think that's why I bristle at the term "lethality" to mean "tactics are 'rewarded,' and recklessness is 'punished.'" What it really means is "please don't play in this game if you'd rather be reckless." Which is fine, but it winds up muddling the issue, and making people who find excessive tactics boring seem immature.

FYI, I had to look up "bristle". But I disagree here. In my view it means: this game will most probably (there are lucky breaks and lucky rolls) kill you if you do the reckless thing - be aware of that and if you want to be reckless, go out with a bang.

And I find excessive tactics quite boring. But I like excessive intrigues :smallbiggrin:


I want to run a game of Dark Sun soon, and I want to play it "lethally," but in the sense that it's not actually possible to play tactically enough to guarantee success. Sometimes, characters will just get in over their heads, despite playing perfectly. In fact, sometimes I might just decide that they do, to drive home that the world is harsh and capricious. I will be upfront about that, though, and the players will have back up characters to switch to. Heck, they might even decide themselves that a character just dies, simply to get to bring out another character. I've done that myself, as a player in Gamma World.

Good luck :smallsmile: I wouldn't personally play it (I'm a fan of stories where protagonists overcome the odds at huge personal costs, or by sacrificing themselves), but I would like to hear the stories after. And maybe even get some additional advice how to manage such game to be enjoyable even to players, who are put off by the "warning: lethal" label.


That is what I think of as lethal: not an incentive for players to play conservatively in order to survive (an incentive certain players don't need anyway), but an incentive for them to be great now, since tomorrow they may be dead (which certain other players don't need anyway, actually).

With the second part I agree. Eat, drink and be merry and give your best today, for tomorrow, your character may be dead (and not because of today's excessive drinking). That would be also my advice to players, how to enjoy these games. As for the first part, that is what you think of as lethal - and I can respect that. I also have to cater to my players' tastes - and that is why I play the way I play.

So all in all, it is still a matter of specific playstyle.

And I'm off to bed. Thank you all for today's discussion!:smallsmile:

Beta Centauri
2015-03-27, 06:38 PM
It was me. In that case, thank you for getting to the heart of the matter.


But if we want to play the word game, "you want to kill their character for the choice they made?" Nope. I don't kill them. They get killed because of their choices (e.g. I don't do the "rocks fall everyone dies" or "don't roll, it's too far, you fall into chasm"). I've heard this sort of thing before, and it's not quite what I said, but also not quite what you're saying. You want there to be consequences for reckless behavior, so you design the game in such a way that there will be. If a player was consistently reckless but the dice always went his way, I expect that you would check to see what was going wrong and make some kind of adjustment so that his streak would end, and further streaks of that nature would not occur.

If that's what you would do, then, in some way, you "want" to kill their characters for the choice they made.


You want to kill them for the choice they didn't make :smallsmile: Yes, in that particular game. In general, I don't kill characters at all, unless a player wants their character to die. Which doesn't mean there aren't consequences, just that there are only consequences the players think are cool.


The topic is "managing high-lethality games", so basically we represent two different views (I like to put the "end" into the hands of the players, you like to handle it by yourself if I understand you well). Only in that hypothetical Dark Sun game. In most of my games, consequences for actions are arrived at collaboratively, so that players are happy with the stakes involved.


And there is no actual danger in playing RPGs also - it is just fun to imagine.Right, but there isn't even really "fake" danger in a "lethal if you're reckless" game, because the danger is rather easy to avoid. It's less like pretending the floor is lava when you're climbing around, and more like imagining it's lava when you're laying on a bed: it would only matter as a result of extreme silliness.


FYI, I had to look up "bristle". But I disagree here. In my view it means: this game will most probably (there are lucky breaks and lucky rolls) kill you if you do the reckless thing - be aware of that and if you want to be reckless, save it for the "big finale". And how is it arranged that the game will "most probably" kill them? By the choices the GM makes to bring that about. I still maintain that the "lethal" label is really about "seriousness" and "tactics" rather than the "lethality."


And I find excessive tactics quite boring. But I like excessive intrigues :smallbiggrin: For example?


Good luck :smallsmile: I wouldn't personally play it (I'm a fan of stories where protagonists overcome the odds at huge personal costs, or by sacrificing themselves) So am I, but sometimes the dark, hopeless story can be fun too.


, but I would like to hear the stories after. And maybe even get some additional advice how to manage such game to be enjoyable even to players, who are put off by the "warning: lethal" label. Thanks, I'll try to let you know. I haven't even posted it yet. I'm waiting for some of my other games to conclude.

I think the biggest thing is not to resort to the shorthand of "lethality," and focus on what is desired by the use of that phrase. As we've seen here, some people think it means having a lot of characters ready, and others think it means being tactical. If someone comes in thinking it's one when it's they other, there's going to be an issue.


With the second part I agree. Eat, drink and be merry and give your best today, for tomorrow, your character may be dead (and not because of today's excessive drinking). That would be also my advice to players, how to enjoy these games. I don't see why they should think they might be dead, unless they planned on being reckless. And it seems like if there's any chance of a bad roll, then they're being reckless.


As for the first part, that is what you think of as lethal - and I can respect that. I also have to cater to my players' tastes - and that is why I play the way I play. And that's why I think that your game doesn't actually have to be lethal. If they're never, ever going to risk touching the floor, then it doesn't matter if it's actually going to hurt them or not.


And I'm off to bed. Thank you all for today's discussion!:smallsmile: Sure, and thanks to you too. I'm glad I looked in at the thread again.

malkarnivore
2015-04-16, 05:36 PM
First post so please bear with me.

I am actually running a high-lethality potential game. It's turning out extremely well so far, and the other players seem fairly enthusiastic about it even when I have them within two bad rolls of a total wipe. Usually at least once per session. Last session a character was placed in a situation that he had to overcome by sheer balls and thought which would have killed his character in such a way that resurrection would never work without the direct intervention of a deity.

But I also set the game up a specific way and was very open about it. I deliberately spelled out exactly what the game was before they started, but I have a few rules that I'm abiding by as the GM to keep it from being a one-sided bloodfest of atrocity.

I'm not looking to justify or condemn the people who say it's good or bad to run a high lethality game. I do, however, recommend that people stay within certain guielines when deciding whether to do so. I'm going to use the campaign I'm running, which is default golarion pathfinder.



Be honest with the players. Tell them before the game starts that you're going be a horrific bastard.
give them a reason why you are doing this. I set out deliberately to create a mythic campaign that moves from humble roots, through varisia, a nightmare ride through mechitar, and eventually potentially cataclysmic encounters with the Starstone Cathedral and finally moving to sarkoris to put them through my hacked version of Wrath of the Righteous.
Give them more options than you would normally allow for a standard campaign. No one likes feeling helpless, and even with my buddies who are HORRENDOUS optimization fiends, their progress has been paid for with blood and they have come within a hair of death too many times. I'm basically doing a limited gestalt of prestige classes to the characters from level 1 on and using the hero point rules.
Evoke a sense that the characters, not the players, are deeply in over their heads and must persevere. Be descriptive, be involved, add more to each encounter than "You see goblins! they attack!" I'm going to bang this drum a LOT because I firmly believe that if you're going to put the players through hell, then it needs to be a memorable hell that they will actually enjoy telling the story of to anyone patient enough to listen to the story.
Use everything on the monster and NPC sheets. Anything less is half-assed and unworthy of the above goal of giving the players a good story. If the monsters are putting in half the effort, then the players won't be forced to work as a team, coordinate or cooperate, and players that work together well can be rewarded with greater spoils, and more importantly, greater challenges.
Give the players an out. It's not always heroic to run the hell away, but when three level 8 characters are running in a panic through the daytime streets of mechitar ducking into crowds of unsuspecting ghouls, humans thralls and miscellaneous horrors it seems like another day living the nightmare. Until you realize they are being chased through those streets by a stalking Astradaemon. Most of their activity was distracting it with the unsuspecting souls around them until they could get it into range of the NPC artillery and kill it.
Another out is resurrection. If you're running high potential lethality, make sure to leave options. I ran them through the second shattered star module and let them trigger Sorshen's clone trap in case of wipe later (the dwarf survived the actual trap). I also have given them an item that can provide resurrection magics... at a pace described best as geologic when dealing with a lot of the fast-paced nightmare. Having a few outs, even outs the players wouldn't necessarily choose for themselves works amazingly towards making sure the campaign won't randomly be brought to a sudden, screaming halt.
finally, combat isn't always the answer to a mythic challenge with deadly ramifications. Being faced with the need to execute a chained and bound, fallen solar brings it's own horror when you are able to put across that before you sits one fo the brightest points of light in the universe, and you must snuff it out. Choices matter. they SHOULD matter, and those choices can be nothing short of cataclysmic. Each thing that you set in front of a party should be singular, memorable and have a solution.



Death doesn't always have to come by a sword or the claws of a demon. It can come from a song, a kiss, a choice, a misspoken word.

But no matter what death comes to the characters, if the death is memorable, and the death MATTERS, if the players can end that character's book with a worthy story, then you are doing the lethal campaign right.

because "you happened to roll a one and get eaten by a random encounter grothlut half your CR" is about as fun as getting your tender bits caught in a engine fan on a semi truck.

Lethal campaigns have a place at every table, but not without careful thought. just making a "deadly dungeon" can be fun as a one-off. but if your characters are facing potential fatality every time they deal with an enemy because they are in over their heads?

Do your players the courtesy of giving them a STORY, rather than just another encounter.

I also just now realized this thread is over a month old from the last post.

goto124
2015-04-16, 07:28 PM
My now dead PC has been in the death-due-to-misspoke-word situation. Ever since she said the word, she lived in even more fear of death than ever before (before she actually died). Which is the point of high lethalities. I get that you're supposed to get the feeling of a living workd with real consequnces for everything you do. Except I couldn't figure out what I COULD do without dying. I didn't dare do anything. If even social encounters are deadly, what should I do?

I just became bored and scared at the same time. Argh.

The pleasures of a high lethality shall always elude me.

Talakeal
2015-04-16, 07:40 PM
My now dead PC has been in the death-due-to-misspoke-word situation. Ever since she said the word, she lived in even more fear of death than ever before (before she actually died). Which is the point of high lethalities. I get that you're supposed to get the feeling of a living workd with real consequnces for everything you do. Except I couldn't figure out what I COULD do without dying. I didn't dare do anything. If even social encounters are deadly, what should I do?

I just became bored and scared at the same time. Argh.

The pleasures of a high lethality shall always elude me.

Mind sharing the rest of the story?

malkarnivore
2015-04-16, 07:41 PM
Except I couldn't figure out what I COULD do without dying. I didn't dare do anything. If even social encounters are deadly, what should I do?

throttle the GM?

My "misspoken word" scenario is actually one of the characters' mythic trials.


The misspoken word is more because in order to approach the solar to be executed, the player must actually break the angel's resolve and shake his absolute conviction. The weaker the resolve of the angel, the closer he can bring himself as the light dims. If he screws it up at the last moment, the Solar's bonds will shatter in his fury. Character's level 8. So it's a mythic challenge that tests roleplay and the choices a character makes rather than his combat prowess. The only way to kill the solar is to weaken his resolve until he sees exactly what he has become, then strike him down before he can fully fall, while he is vulnerable.


It's not meant to be a combat challenge, but a unique encounter where the peril is not only real, but horrendously obvious. You must poke the walking apocalypse. Or you can walk away, and wonder what would have happened if you had taken the risk?

simply mis-speaking and getting randomly ganked is...

dumb.

Things like that should absolutely be critical and climactic points in a character's life. Like I said, when things like this happen? they should matter.

Metahuman1
2015-04-16, 08:33 PM
My now dead PC has been in the death-due-to-misspoke-word situation. Ever since she said the word, she lived in even more fear of death than ever before (before she actually died). Which is the point of high lethalities. I get that you're supposed to get the feeling of a living workd with real consequnces for everything you do. Except I couldn't figure out what I COULD do without dying. I didn't dare do anything. If even social encounters are deadly, what should I do?

I just became bored and scared at the same time. Argh.

The pleasures of a high lethality shall always elude me.

Pretty much. As for the other break down of this is how to do it right, fine. But for every 1 Alan Moore or 1980's and arguably 1990's Frank Miller tackling this, there's gonna be tens or scores of Rob Liefiels, Todd MacFarlanes, post 2001 Frank Miller or Hajime Isayama running about. Good luck avoiding them.

For every half way reasonable miss-spoke word were feeling out what you'd do and testing frame of mind, there's tens and scores of "I have this exact script and if you don't telepathically known to follow it I'm gonna TPK the party HaHa aren't I amazing! And no what the hell are you doing stop trying to take a logical third option that gives you an out! There IS nothing but grimdarkness in this setting stop trying to win without following the script were the twist was even in winning you lost! That's it, TPK time! That'll teach ya!" In my experience, the latter is gonna be FAR more common in how that kind of a scenario is handled in a game that can be described as "High Lethality.".

malkarnivore
2015-04-17, 01:09 AM
Hence why I give advice on how to handle it.

Make no mistake, my commentary is how I feel a high lethality campaign should be run, not my drlusion about how I believe it commonly IS run.

You hit the nail on the head as to what the problem is, and that's the GM having a script in his head. I used to be guilty of that when I was just a kid playing because the idea that the GMs vision of the campaign being only one part of the story hadn't clicked yet.

So I offer advice on ways to keep from falling into that trap. Reading both sides of this argument, the people who have a problem with the concept seem to be those who have dealt with the notorious "killer GM" class of game. I will never defend the killer GM.

But most of the argument for "high lethality" seem to be more along lined better described as "high difficulty." I'm not getting a vibe that seems assumed that they are some kind of emotional masochist. More along the lines of people who play a video game and automatically set the difficulty to hard from thr word go.

there's a lot of good points on both sides but the topic has drifted from the OPs desire for a discussion on how to handle it and into whether it is good or bad.

Rather than commenting on whether or not a killer gm will ruin an experience, I propose we discuss what we consider to be things that would make a high lethality potential game fun.

For me I feel cheated out of a good story if the GM just lets the players walk all over the campaign. I enjoy being forced to think and be able to react on the fly. If the campaign is flexible and the challenges not scripted so there can be only one (bafflingly obscure) solution ever it's not fun.

When running a game it's really not fun to have an epic story and have the players casually paste the bads into the floor.

But there is one rule I do adhere to that some would call me a killer GM for.

I enforce the rule that stupidity not only should, but will be punished. I don't mean simple mistakes. I mean that one player who tries to con you into thinking that your horde of daemons will be made perfectly reasonable with a diplomacy check right after they uncover the lore which reveals that the creatures are nihilists of the worst order that feast upon souls and whose fondest desire is to devour the last soul and to be the last pair (or set of pairs) of eyes that get to enjoy the show as the ladt light of the universe dies.

Stupid things like that? I'm going to torch you. Trying to attack the king while he is surrounded by his guard? Randomly?

But theres this thing about events having to make sense that keeps me from going past casual kills for willful and flagrant violations of Intelligence.

If you're running a high difficulty game, odds are your players are going to be on edge enough without trying to force theem into a script not shared with deadly consequence. If it was done to you, and you would get mad, you should probably not be doing it to your players.

Lacco
2015-04-17, 05:51 AM
Rather than commenting on whether or not a killer gm will ruin an experience, I propose we discuss what we consider to be things that would make a high lethality potential game fun.

Hello malkarnivore! Thank you for the nice breakdown of your style of play. I agree with most points, so I will address only the points where we differ/I have something to add.



Evoke a sense that the characters, not the players, are deeply in over their heads and must persevere. Be descriptive, be involved, add more to each encounter than "You see goblins! they attack!" I'm going to bang this drum a LOT because I firmly believe that if you're going to put the players through hell, then it needs to be a memorable hell that they will actually enjoy telling the story of to anyone patient enough to listen to the story.

Do I understand correctly that you do not use "wandering monsters"? Or how do you use them?
Again, I agree - in high-lethality game, each fight should be meaningful and memorable. Because it could be the last one.



Use everything on the monster and NPC sheets. Anything less is half-assed and unworthy of the above goal of giving the players a good story. If the monsters are putting in half the effort, then the players won't be forced to work as a team, coordinate or cooperate, and players that work together well can be rewarded with greater spoils, and more importantly, greater challenges.
I would add that once in a while a "paper tiger" (weaker opponent, who is easily defeatable - e.g. overconfident group of bandits) is fine, allowing PCs to take a breath, but if the players are consistently mowing down opposition without effort, you as a GM should try harder - the enemies are also fighting for their lives.



Another out is resurrection. If you're running high potential lethality, make sure to leave options.
Another option could be reroll mechanic (in games without resurrection) or something similar to "concede" mechanic from Fate/"hand of god" from Shadowrun. Basically, it gives players possibility to "cheat death", based on player's skill (the rerolls should come also at a price).



But no matter what death comes to the characters, if the death is memorable, and the death MATTERS, if the players can end that character's book with a worthy story, then you are doing the lethal campaign right.

because "you happened to roll a one and get eaten by a random encounter grothlut half your CR" is about as fun as getting your tender bits caught in a engine fan on a semi truck.

There it would help the GM to know, what is considered to be "memorable"/cool enough way for a PC to die. E.g. saving of the whole party by heroic sacrifice? Challenging and wounding (and getting killed by) a really dangerous enemy?

From my experience, there is a difference from the player's point of view between the death of PC who dies because they attempted something and the dice fell the wrong way (the dreaded roll of 1), and the death of PC, who accomplished something by their death (e.g. demonstrated a weak point of a really dangerous enemy).

I could be wrong - I am mostly a GM :smallsmile:


When running a game it's really not fun to have an epic story and have the players casually paste the bads into the floor.
Depends on player preference, but my feelings are similar. It reminds me of one old article on playstyles - I can't really remember the title or most of it, but there were two "extreme" playstyles according to it - the one, where your characters are "supers", with stories that are epic because you can fight 10 000 orcs with a single guy and win , and the one where you are "normals", with stories focused on battle against insurmountable odds (e.g. three university professors against spawn of Yog-Sothoth). It was long ago, so it may have been differently classified/written.

malkarnivore
2015-04-17, 11:15 AM
Hello malkarnivore! Thank you for the nice breakdown of your style of play. I agree with most points, so I will address only the points where we differ/I have something to add.

Hit me.


Do I understand correctly that you do not use "wandering monsters"? Or how do you use them?
Again, I agree - in high-lethality game, each fight should be meaningful and memorable. Because it could be the last one.

My version of "wandering monsters" is you took a break, and one of the encounters from another part of the adventure decides to get froggy and look for brunch or something. If you kill a wanderer you're likely to find an empty lair later. Random crap can kill campaigns, or just bog down progress. The last thing I need is to have a derp moment with a random encounter bulette with the characters out of spells, and running on under 20 HP apiece. Slavishly utilizing the random tables will kill players in a carefully prepared campaign, and meaninglessly.


I would add that once in a while a "paper tiger" (weaker opponent, who is easily defeatable - e.g. overconfident group of bandits) is fine, allowing PCs to take a breath, but if the players are consistently mowing down opposition without effort, you as a GM should try harder - the enemies are also fighting for their lives.

paper tigers nibble away at both HP and spell slots. Paper tigers might be a breather, but if they don't serve a purpose they don't need to be there. that purpose can be strategic depletion of resources for a climax intended to be faced by weary heroes, or it can be a plot point that has importance. I don't believe in "just because."


Another option could be reroll mechanic (in games without resurrection) or something similar to "concede" mechanic from Fate/"hand of god" from Shadowrun. Basically, it gives players possibility to "cheat death", based on player's skill (the rerolls should come also at a price).

Good examples, and exactly in line with my thoughts. People play RPGs because they want to place themselves in the boots of the protagonist. The protagonist needs to have a feeling of agency, control over their own destiny. Your examples illustrate the point well.


There it would help the GM to know, what is considered to be "memorable"/cool enough way for a PC to die. E.g. saving of the whole party by heroic sacrifice? Challenging and wounding (and getting killed by) a really dangerous enemy?

When your players are generating their characters, be an active participant. let them bounce ideas off you, bounce ideas back, discuss the setting and the parameters of the campaign. For example I don't use the "chosen one" BS anymore. I am hideously fond of broken destinies, and stolen fates. You were meant for something different, but were denied that potentially glorious fate/disaster/sacrifice. Can you take your fate out of the hands of those who would control you and seize the epic destiny you were denied?

In one of my games I have a duty-bound samurai. I know the player well enough to know that sacrifice and stoicism are going to be key character points. I have another who is seeking vengeance because he served Ragathiel. Dying serving the general of vengeance directly hardly seems inappropriate.


From my experience, there is a difference from the player's point of view between the death of PC who dies because they attempted something and the dice fell the wrong way (the dreaded roll of 1), and the death of PC, who accomplished something by their death (e.g. demonstrated a weak point of a really dangerous enemy).

I could be wrong - I am mostly a GM :smallsmile:

when it's just a dice roll, and nothing to do with the actions and choices of the player? Then it comes off arbitrary. Remember I mentioned a dwarf who lived through the sorshen clone trap which can cause you to reincarnate in the clone of a runelord? If that player doesn't roll 5 1's in a session, it's a damn red-letter day.

All of those 1's inevitably, and oddly invariably, happen in the middle of heavy combat. I am ACUTELY aware of this one. There's a reason I tag him as the party's "safety anchor."


Depends on player preference, but my feelings are similar. It reminds me of one old article on playstyles - I can't really remember the title or most of it, but there were two "extreme" playstyles according to it - the one, where your characters are "supers", with stories that are epic because you can fight 10 000 orcs with a single guy and win , and the one where you are "normals", with stories focused on battle against insurmountable odds (e.g. three university professors against spawn of Yog-Sothoth). It was long ago, so it may have been differently classified/written.

I prefer to start lower, with "merely" exceptional characters who grow into the powerhouses I intend for them to be. Singlehandedly kill 10,000 Orcs? No. The Troop template is hilariously good at teaching humility. But I'd expect the characters to be capable of raining enough devastation when they reach their apex to make the Orc horde think twice about simply assaulting that villiage the players have decided to erect walls around (as if the Archons the players sacrificed a good portion of their wealth to attain the services of through planar ally wasn't the first clue)

malkarnivore
2015-04-18, 09:22 AM
To expand upon my wandering monsters bit, I firmly believe in high-risk games the GM should absolutely micromanage the monsters and keep them within the intended lethality range.

But on reflection, there is a trend among GMs who go "killer" to want to micromanage the players too.

Personally I think that is the most common failure point. There's always got to be allowances for player actions outside of the script. If there's a railroad track with no deviations allowed?

It's no longer an RPG. Because player choices don't matter.

Lacco
2015-04-18, 11:13 AM
My version of "wandering monsters" is you took a break, and one of the encounters from another part of the adventure decides to get froggy and look for brunch or something. If you kill a wanderer you're likely to find an empty lair later. Random crap can kill campaigns, or just bog down progress. The last thing I need is to have a derp moment with a random encounter bulette with the characters out of spells, and running on under 20 HP apiece. Slavishly utilizing the random tables will kill players in a carefully prepared campaign, and meaninglessly.
I usually don't use wandering monsters. It is mostly because I run low-magic, low-monster campaign currently (also, I don’t use a d20 system). So if there is a monster in the area, it is usually an important point in the adventure and not a random encounter. And the same goes for random bandits/humanoids.

The closest I usually get to random encounters is now - I need to simulate a really large, but mostly empty dungeon (huge underground temple in size of smaller city), so I prepared a list of rooms/encounters in each "district" and a small flowchart with transitions from district to district. My players are not much for mapkeeping so they will roll randomly for what they find. I myself am not very happy with the random rolling, so I am trying to think of something else (don't want to map the whole thing, since they are not happy with large dungeons).

But that's something for a new thread maybe.


paper tigers nibble away at both HP and spell slots. Paper tigers might be a breather, but if they don't serve a purpose they don't need to be there. that purpose can be strategic depletion of resources for a climax intended to be faced by weary heroes, or it can be a plot point that has importance. I don't believe in "just because."
As for paper tigers, I use two types - one is inserted only for local ambiance (e.g. pack of wolves, aggressive drunkard in a tavern) – usually easy to overcome encounters to set the feeling for the area or used during „downtime“. I allow quick way out for this type of encounter.
The second type is basically „big mouth lieutnant“ – so someone they have to overcome, but who does not provide a challenge. These are planned in advance and usually have their place in the story.


When your players are generating their characters, be an active participant. let them bounce ideas off you, bounce ideas back, discuss the setting and the parameters of the campaign. For example I don't use the "chosen one" BS anymore. I am hideously fond of broken destinies, and stolen fates. You were meant for something different, but were denied that potentially glorious fate/disaster/sacrifice. Can you take your fate out of the hands of those who would control you and seize the epic destiny you were denied?
Luckily for me, this is handled within the system I play. If a player wants his hero to be „chosen one“, he writes it as his destiny. Whether he takes active role in his destiny or lets it pass away is his choice.


I prefer to start lower, with "merely" exceptional characters who grow into the powerhouses I intend for them to be. Singlehandedly kill 10,000 Orcs? No. The Troop template is hilariously good at teaching humility. But I'd expect the characters to be capable of raining enough devastation when they reach their apex to make the Orc horde think twice about simply assaulting that villiage the players have decided to erect walls around (as if the Archons the players sacrificed a good portion of their wealth to attain the services of through planar ally wasn't the first clue)
I prefer the same, except even more low-level. My best player and his „powerhouse“ character can take on 3 good swordsmen simultaneously and survive with only a scratch or two. The second best character can – due to her choice of fighting style – simultaneously fight 4 above average fencers to a standstill. In the world we play, that’s an epic achievement. If they can pick their battle, prepare tactic and know their enemy, they become even more dangerous. Their current „quest“ will make them face 15 foes, some good, some average – but they have the advantage of surprise if they play their cards right.

To expand upon my wandering monsters bit, I firmly believe in high-risk games the GM should absolutely micromanage the monsters and keep them within the intended lethality range.
But on reflection, there is a trend among GMs who go "killer" to want to micromanage the players too.
Can you give an example of GMs micromanaging players? I’m not sure I understand.

Personally I think that is the most common failure point. There's always got to be allowances for player actions outside of the script. If there's a railroad track with no deviations allowed?
It's no longer an RPG. Because player choices don't matter.
Well, this is one of the points where GMs that want to play more lethal – and still entertaining – games should pay attention to. If the players don’t have any choice in how they approach an enemy/combat/situation in a high-lethality game, it will take one of the greatest weapon out of their arsenal.
This can be interesting for some players (and valid for high mortality game, where anyone can die at any time) and once in a while (surprise attacks, ambushes) it may work, but if the trap is sprung before they can react every time... for me, it wouldn’t work.

malkarnivore
2015-04-18, 12:49 PM
Micromanaging players is when you try to railroad them into the nareative "script" rather than trying to allow the narrative to flow around them.

Or in another person's example playing off one of my examples. You said the wrong thing that does not conform to the win condition! Off with your head!