Consequences?

[Thuran]

Heya folks! Had something happen to my character, and could use some advice on how recent events would affect her.

We just started a new campaign tonight and this time it features my wood elf druid who was, in fact, raised by wolves :smallbiggrin:

Usually she stuck to the forest and her pack, but this was one of the times where she visited a nearby settlement out of curiosity for the urban way of life. Whilst there, she was informed that a rogue druid was manipulating the forest and corrupting it, just as the town was attacked by rabid beasts. She hurried off to make sure that it was not a bear or such intruding upon the town, which she had come to consider part of her territory, and in case it was, to chase it off. It turned out to be a pack of beserked wolves, aided by two bears. After ascertaining that it was not her own pack, she tried warning them to leave or they would be wiped, and whilst a few ran off, the rest proceeded to attack and she engaged them.

A quick and well-placed spiked growth massacred out all the wolves in a single go, and the other bystanders (my future party) took care of the bears in short order. Inspecting the scene afterwards it turned out, to her horror, that it HAD been her own pack, but that they had been twisted by rage beyond recognition :smalleek: This sent her into a blind rage and she chased into the forest on her own, questioning the animals to find the source of the corruption, and when she found the group responsible, slaughtered them all and brutally mutilated their corpses and destroyed everything in her sight that belonged to them, before finally collapsing as rage gave way to the sheer overwhelming and nauseating pain.

For now, she is still in mourning and have closed herself completely off from the world, doesn't speak and doesn't speak to anyone else, often spending hours and hours curled up and sobbing.

The real question i am asking myself is; What would the real long-term psychological damage be to her? How would a person react and cope with finding out they have accidentally slaughtered most of their own family?

[Geddy2112]

That is going to seriously mess somebody up, and they probably would not be able to handle that very well. Since you did it with the best of intentions, not knowing that it was them, and then killed the source of the corruption, it brings some closure and the "at least you avenged their death thing. Still, that is incredibly dark-you might become a mad avenging force, blindly killing everything that corrupts good into evil. Maybe the grief overwhelmes her and the character commits suicide. Maybe find a way to resurrect them? Maybe she wants to wash the blood from her hands by spending the rest of her days never doing wrong.

Other thoughts
1. Is your character Princess Mononoke?
2. Your DM is either running a very dark/edgy campaign, or a jerk. Tricking you into killing the only family you ever knew...dang.

[Thuran]

Hm, I do like the repentance-line of things, although now that you mention it, having to walk the fine line between seeking some sort of redemption and fighting off a sense of guilt could lead to some interesting internal conflict for the character :smallwink:

regarding other questions:

1: Nope, we decided to try out rolling random traits and the dice just happened to tell me i was raised by wolves and i decided to explore what that kind of person would become like. So much fun to work in little references to real-life wolf behaviour into her, even into the way she grieves. :smallbiggrin:

2: it actually turned out to be a slight accident. He also wanted to have our characters reveal themselves a little over time, and when i noted that i wanted to make sure it wasn't MY pack of wolves, he misinterpreted it as just your regular group of druid-animal-buddies. You should have seen how shocked he was when, after the session, i explained to him just WHY she had reacted so violently to the event :smalleek: The best (worst) part is that it was intended as a fairly bright and happy-go-lucky adventure that just suddenly has this shockingly dark element to it. I do apreciate it though, as i find complex characters to be the most enjoyable, and it has lead to some very very nice RP moments from the other characters. By now they even seem to have accepted that something is very very wrong and that it isn't the right moment to talk to her about it. One of them even tried to comfort her, and i think the players have a lot of questions about just what the heck actually caused her to first go on a murderous, almost suicidal, rampage, only to almost immiediately after break completely down. From a campaign perspective I absolutely love how things are starting out andthe first session accidentally ended up actually being her origin story in a sense :smallbiggrin::smallbiggrin::smallbiggrin:

[Strigon]

It depends on your personality.
Alcohol and drug abuse is certainly a possibility, but probably the worst option here due to it being: a) dark, b) occasionally a sensitive subject, c) actively a hindrance to your character, and d) not much fun to roleplay (or play with) a depressed addict. Maybe mix alcoholism with one of the other suggestions if you feel it works, but that's as far as I can recommend going.

Some people might become pacifists, vowing never to harm another living being in their lives.

Another might seek to right the wrong - not just the individual people, but the source of the problem. Figure out why these people did what they did, and make sure nobody does it again; sort of like Batman. His parents died (in some storylines, he
considered it his fault), and so after he got revenge, he tried to make Gotham a better place.

Some might mourn for a while, and then move on to more or less how they were before - still haunted by the experience, but not a totally different person.

Some might even learn to hate themselves for it, throwing themselves into more and more dangerous situations trying to remove evil, but believing the only way they could fully atone is through martyrdom.

[Geddy2112]

Hm, I do like the repentance-line of things, although now that you mention it, having to walk the fine line between seeking some sort of redemption and fighting off a sense of guilt could lead to some interesting internal conflict for the character :smallwink:
I think this is the best way-there is blood on your hands, but unlike Lady Macbeth, it should wash off. Good people don't usually do bad things, and if they do they end up feeling terrible. You accidentally killed your friends and family when you only were trying to protect others(and risk your life doing so) and even when you killed those awful corrupting people, It clearly did not make things suddenly okay. Redemption will eventually wash away the guilt, and the guilt will drive redemption.


The best (worst) part is that it was intended as a fairly bright and happy-go-lucky adventure that just suddenly has this shockingly dark element to it. I do apreciate it though, as i find complex characters to be the most enjoyable, and it has lead to some very very nice RP moments from the other characters. From a campaign perspective I absolutely love how things are starting out andthe first session accidentally ended up actually being her origin story in a sense :smallbiggrin::smallbiggrin::smallbiggrin: I really like this too, when character actions really make the story instead of just walking along and doing quest X, then Y, etc.


It depends on your personality.
Alcohol and drug abuse is certainly a possibility, but probably the worst option here due to it being: a) dark, b) occasionally a sensitive subject, c) actively a hindrance to your character, and d) not much fun to roleplay (or play with) a depressed addict. Maybe mix alcoholism with one of the other suggestions if you feel it works, but that's as far as I can recommend going.
I agree, but addicts can be fun to roleplay as and with. Depressed addicts though, I would avoid. You could certainly roleplay as much more of the happy go lucky type when under psychoactive effects, or perhaps drugs and alcohol make it worse, and you swear off of them. I think it is something for your character to experiment with, and see which one happens, but only to help learn about and come to terms with such an experience. Not to go and drink dry every tavern the party stops in.

[Shadowsend]

Sometimes the natural world can be terribly savage (forest fires, tsunamis, hurricanes and tornadoes). I personally would probably play her as withdrawn for a while, or distracted, like she's always thinking about her past. Depressed isn't quite the right word for it, and I would go with heartbroken. She may fail to see the good in actions for a while, and not really engage in social interactions (unfortunately, given her background, this was probably already the case, but it would be like even more-so, like creating a distance between herself and the party members...this becomes problematic because the group is supposed to be working as a team and should be supporting each other, and while her support is somewhat there, it's lacking...it could lead to mistrust amongst the party. If the leader of the party begins actively pushing her away, I'm not sure she would have reasons to stick around.)

So while it is a good, flawed character, it may end up in the "retired adventurer" bin because of this. And that really sucks because it's only the first outing.

[Strigon]

So while it is a good, flawed character, it may end up in the "retired adventurer" bin because of this. And that really sucks because it's only the first outing.

Of course, that all depends on how the character is actually played. Even if your scenario is the most logical, there's no rule that says that's how the character must act; it's all based on the player's choice, and the player wants our ideas. I wouldn't lop it in the retired adventurer bin just yet.

[Shadowsend]

Sure, I meant that it may increase the IC conflict with the rest of the party, which isn't always a good thing.

[Strigon]

Ah; see, I thought you were saying that since this happened, the character should react this way, and thus is not a good character to play.
My bad!

[Red Fel]

The real question i am asking myself is; What would the real long-term psychological damage be to her? How would a person react and cope with finding out they have accidentally slaughtered most of their own family?

First off, I'm going to echo what's been said - unless you came into this expecting a dark and soul-crushing campaign, having a DM trick you into basically massacring your family is pretty messed up. If you as a player liked it, great, but if not, talk to your DM about avoiding "gotcha" tricks like that in the future.

That said, I can kinda see why he did it. You describe your character as someone tied to that forest and the pack therein. If your campaign is centered around a single location, that works fine, but if your party will eventually be exploring the wide world, or your PC spent more time with NPC animals than with the other PCs, that's a problem of your creation, and the DM wasn't inherently wrong for trying to nudge you out of the forest and into adventure. I may take some issue with the methods, but if this was the goal, I can't fault the goal.

Now, onto the psychology. Per forum rules, it would be inappropriate to discuss actual psychology in great detail, so I'm going to limit myself to what psychological effects would be appropriate and conducive to play in a TTRPG. Here's what I see. Get out of the forest. Whatever the reason - anger at people who would do things like what happened to you, a desire to protect packs from similarly bad people, a feeling of anguish that you can't even look at the same forest anymore without a lot of painful memories - just get away. It gets you out of the woods and into adventure. Abandonment issues. Either your PC withdraws into herself, or she becomes desperate to form a new pack. I would recommend the latter, because "brooding solo artist" doesn't play well in a social game. In fact, the latter is great for party play, because it justifies her flying into a rage when her new "pack" (e.g. the PCs) is threatened. Denial/delusion. Believing that it never happened. This is tricky, because it would justify you going back into the woods and pretending the tragedy never happened, and you really should be getting out of there and moving on. It strikes me that it would be counterproductive. Self-loathing. I generally hate "emo" characters, but blaming yourself for killing your pack isn't a far-fetched idea, and believing yourself to be a horrible person as a result isn't an unreasonable conclusion. Plus side, it lets you explore the dark side of the alignment grid - once you decide you're a bad person, you have fewer qualms about doing bad things. Dark side. Another alternative, mentioned by others, is to partition your personality. I wouldn't suggest full-blown separate identities, but a little angry side (same person, just more violent) who comes out from time to time is a nice touch.
The most important thing is to get your character out of isolation as quickly as possible. It's great that you want to RP realistic consequences, but keep in mind that doing so would likely be tantamount to retiring this character. Unless that's what you want, I would suggest softening the impact a bit and getting back on your feet. Remember, your PC is an adventurer; they deal with shocking, disturbing, and scarring experiences with alarming frequency. Most of them are at least slightly unstable, many are either inured to or irreparably damaged by emotional trauma already. Let her hurt, but also roll with the punch a bit.

[goto124]

If you as a player liked it, great, but if not, talk to your DM about avoiding "gotcha" tricks like that in the future.

It was an accidental gotcha at best. As stated earlier on, it was due to a misunderstanding that was understandly not realised until much later on.

[Psykenthrope]

If there was any evidence of others being in charge of those who caused the berserking of the wolves, others that weren't there to be killed, you could have your character shove all her anger deep down inside her so that she can focus on finding these people. And then, over time, the pain and rage would burn and fester, slowly changing her and warping her until the empty place in her heart that her pack used to occupy becomes a yawning, hungry void sated only by the pain and blood of those who would perpetuate such evils upon the world.

Mind you, this would be extremely psychologically unhealthy and would have serious long term effects.

Regardless of how you roleplay it, you might consider finding someone for her to talk to about it. Talking tends to help.

[Sith_Happens]

Abandonment issues. Either your PC withdraws into herself, or she becomes desperate to form a new pack. I would recommend the latter, because "brooding solo artist" doesn't play well in a social game. In fact, the latter is great for party play, because it justifies her flying into a rage when her new "pack" (e.g. the PCs) is threatened.

Seconding this. Have her immediately get really clingy to the other PCs and basically treat them like she would her old pack.

[aditemonroe12]

I agree with you. It completely depends on the personality. Alcohol and drug abuse is one of the possibility. Even Though it is an occasionally sensitive subject, it has its relevance and a good topic to be discussed. Alcoholism is one of the major issues that has to be discussed along with drug abuse. Nowadays, it has been a common issue in our society. The amount of people who are taken to addiction treatment centres for rehab (http://www.bellwood.ca/) are increasing day by day, this shows nothing else but the severity of drug abuse and how it has influence our community.

[Arbane]

Seconding this. Have her immediately get really clingy to the other PCs and basically treat them like she would her old pack.

Good idea. Also, this gives you a really good motivation to get as far away from 'home' as possible, to minimize the painful memories.