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Ruslan
2016-12-28, 02:52 PM
Traveling the wilderness, the PCs met with a certain knight and his retainers. One PC was proficient in Knowledge (Nobility and Royalty), and was told he remembers this knight as a winner of the King's Jousting Tournament. Another PC, upon hearing this, immediately decided to challenge the knight to a joust.

Knight: "I don't carry my tourney lance with me."
Player: "Excuses already?"
Knight: "No excuses, I'm just saying, my lance is a combat weapon. Not the blunted one I use for tourneys."
Player: "Haha, what a coincidence, so is mine!"
Knight: "If risk of fatality is to be accepted, I must have an incentive to fight. Winner takes loser's gear?"
Player: "Hell yeah!"

They get on their horses, charge each other, knight wins initiative and deals 85 damage. The PC only had 30-something hit points. The knight promptly proceeds to undress the dead PC, take all his gear and money as the rest of the party is too scared to intervene, and rides away, dropping a small purse with 10 gp.

"Funeral expenses."

Geddy2112
2016-12-28, 04:17 PM
I love when this kind of thing happens. Good on the player for only putting his character up for ante. Far too many times the foolish actions of one get the whole party killed.

But if they want to play dumb, and only they will die...let em have it!

JeenLeen
2016-12-28, 04:21 PM
While funny as a story, I think at the actual table the DM should warn the player that this is not necessarily a combat encounter. I recall that, when my group stopped playing D&D and moved to oWoD, it took us a while to figure out that we shouldn't just kill folk who attack us and that an enemy base is not necessarily the next target to attack. (Didn't realize killing gang members in broad daylight in the bad side of town was stupid, then took us a while to figure out we shouldn't just storm the Technocrat base. Fortunately, figured out the latter before we tried it.)

I think the DM should make sure players understand what is the case in a game, especially if the assumption is that things are level-appropriate.

I guess I'm agreeing with Geddy2112's comment, if the player is really putting his character up for ante and not working on false assumptions. (But definite yay that only the one PC was harmed and not drag the party down with it.)

Grac
2016-12-28, 04:38 PM
That'll learn 'em.

I'm fine with doing that sort of thing when I know it's not winnable. I try to push the old school sensibilities towards exploration and negotiation and retreat, but myself, I Leroy Jenkins all the time
:D

Yukitsu
2016-12-28, 04:47 PM
When I do it? My DM sort of gets that thousand mile stare and starts re-writing notes. I have a knack for surviving really hard encounters.

Esprit15
2016-12-28, 05:55 PM
Good on the player for accepting the risk.

Can't say I've had the same problem. Ive actually had players die in fights against encounters they were should have laughed through. Once had an assassin take a job to kill a mage who was the main weapons guy for a rival gang. Literally just an old warmage, two levels under him, maybe a few more, with nothing but item creation feats. Guy fails every check to notice that the mage is onto him, sneaks into his house, gets grappled by tentacles, and is eventually killed by a orb of electricity.

Gotta give props to players who only get their own characters killed, rather than the rest of the party.

SilverLeaf167
2016-12-28, 06:55 PM
I'm playing in a Pathfinder game with the Kingmaker module (no spoilers beyond the minor ones I mention here, please!). Our very first encounter a few sessions back consisted of us ambushing a bunch of bandits coming to extort protection money from a trading post. We had some bad luck, but pulled through in the end. Thing is, one of the bandits ended up escaping, and we assumed we'd be screwed if he alerted his allies.

So we gave chase.

Y'see, we didn't realize it at the time, but Kingmaker is a pretty unusual module. It's a sandbox that actively expects the party to seek out random encounters for MMO-style grinding, even when there are more immediate concerns. With no other clear plot hooks, we made the entirely reasonable assumption that we should follow the fleeing bandit.
Long story short, we ran directly into the apparent "mid-boss" of the chapter, another group of bandits definitely not designed for our level 1 party. We only barely scraped by because my Alchemist, the last man standing, chugged a Dexterity-boosting mutagen and a Shield extract, a marvelous maneuver we dubbed "Protocol Hammer". You know, because nothing but a natural 20 could touch AC 23 at that level?

After a long duel between myself and the bandit leader (plus the Paladin who briefly woke up only to get off-handedly critted into a coma), involving a lot of close calls, napalm and close calls with napalm, the battle was finally won with a clutch arrow through the leader's armpit one round before my Shield fizzled.

We made almost the exact same mistake two sessions later. :smalltongue: I think we're very slowly figuring out how to approach Kingmaker. Protocol Hammer remains a panic button I have yet to use again, but one I'm definitely keeping ready.

Noje
2016-12-28, 07:14 PM
That is a fantastically well executed encounter! there are ways to make unbalanced encounters fun and feel fair, and I think you hit it right on the nose. The player was told the risk in character and had the option to back out, the list goes on. This gets full marks in my book!

Freed
2016-12-29, 12:39 AM
I reccomend you have that player come back as a zombie and eat that knight's head off.

Tzonarin
2016-12-29, 12:46 AM
I had a couple of these when I was DMing a game. PC's got upset with me on more than one occasion.

This is an interesting question - do we level every encounter to what the party will face or do we look at reality, such as sometimes, you have really really easy encounters (level 20 party finds a small group of kobolds in the cave) or really really hard ones (level 1 party happens across an adult dragon with a growl in its stomach).

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/564x/3b/b9/7f/3bb97fe65fa44eaf1248623936e529e9.jpg

But then, there is this point - the DM has to sometimes fix the encounters, because at the end of the day, if the players are not having fun with the game, then the game has failed, no matter how close to reality it may be.

DM has to play this based on the party.

Tzo

Yukitsu
2016-12-29, 01:58 AM
I had a couple of these when I was DMing a game. PC's got upset with me on more than one occasion.

This is an interesting question - do we level every encounter to what the party will face or do we look at reality, such as sometimes, you have really really easy encounters (level 20 party finds a small group of kobolds in the cave) or really really hard ones (level 1 party happens across an adult dragon with a growl in its stomach).


The problem I have with high, high power encounters is that if I can't meaningfully interact with them, why are they even in the game? It's just you talking at me about things that I'm not supposed to do anything about. You could have skipped it to something that's interesting or that I could actually do something about instead of wasting 10 minutes talking about that jouster that I can't possibly beat. (not that I think the OP really did that or that I'd really mind that much)

Similarly, you wouldn't want to litter the world with low levels since they get back hand slapped and you end up just wasting the time of the group.

They both can be interesting for setting up some sort of tone to the world or emphasize some kind of narrative point or to show players they're in a place they don't need to be in anymore, but when overused, both over and under powered encounters are a negative experience for the party and I personally hate it when they're in the world just to add "realism" to it.

Think about it this way: The party probably saw dozens of people along the road, and almost none of them warranted the DM commenting on it. If the players can't actually do anything relevant to the jouster, I wouldn't feel it necessary to even mention it since the only thing it can do is bait a player into getting their character killed.

A lot of people on the other hand love this kind of thing (almost all that vocally advocate for it are DMs though), but this is just me going and answering what the worst that can happen is.


vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv
Sorry, but I almost get the feeling you didn't even read the entire post, nor the one I was responding to.

Ruslan
2016-12-29, 02:17 AM
The problem I have with high, high power encounters is that if I can't meaningfully interact with them, why are they even in the game? <snip> Think about it this way: The party probably saw dozens of people along the road, and almost none of them warranted the DM commenting on it. If the players can't actually do anything relevant to the jouster, I wouldn't feel it necessary to even mention it since the only thing it can do is bait a player into getting their character killed.If I would think about it this way, I would be thinking wrong.

You seem to use "interact" as a synonym for "fight", or otherwise engage in numeric interplay, when side A compares its statistics to side B, with some random numbers added for a good measure, and an outcome is thus created.

If we take a slightly less narrow view of the word 'interact', we can immediately see that, indeed, they could interact with him in a variety of ways. They could ask for the latest court gossip. They could ask about his travels. They could flatter him on his victory, so that the next time he saw them, he would remember them and put a good word for them at court. They could share the story of their own travels, possibly pointing out places of interest. They could fed him with false information, hoping to lead him into a trap with the intent to loot his corpse later. Speaking of fighting, they could have attacked him all together (he was decidedly stronger than any individual party member, of course, but not decidedly stronger than all of them together, especially if taken by surprise). Or, they could have just ignored him and be on their way.

To say that the 'only thing it can do is bait a player into getting their character killed' is an extremely narrow view of the situation.

John Longarrow
2016-12-29, 03:59 AM
As a DM, I allow players to interact with characters above and below their character level for many reasons. Most of them are not combat related though. As a DM, I'd use a character much as outlined above for one of several reasons all of which the players can choose from; Quest giver, source of information, patron to impress, rich traveler to trade with, or just RP encounter for the fun of it.

If the players want to interact, fine. If they don't, fine. Trying to make him "CR appropriate" for a fight though, only if it seems like it would make sense in game.

In game I've had players encounter what would otherwise be a BBEG traveling along a road and just talk to them. No fight even though the BBEG screamed "Bad guy" because it was pretty obvious he had the deck stacked in his favor. The players were able to get info from him regarding the mission they were on so it worked out well.

If they'd have attacked him odds are they wouldn't all have walked away.. at least not as living beings. That said, if I'd changed it to be a level appropriate encounter after a fight started the players would have felt let down.

Professor Chimp
2016-12-29, 05:12 AM
Stories like that are always fun.

I've had a similar one when my players (~lv 7-8 at the time) decided to take up some bounty hunting to pass the time while they were having some new gear crafted. I had prepared a number of bounties suitable for a wide variety of party levels, all of which were available. Of course, my players didn't know that and cocky as they were, they chose to go after the one with the highest pay-off: a 50.000gp barbarian named Krogar wanted for a laundry list of crimes, including murder, pillaging, theft, the rape of several noble ladies, and public urinating.

The players had already been warned that they are not the top dogs in the setting and the high bounty should've tipped them off Krogar was no wimp, but I suppose the green-eyed monster got to them. Safe to say, they got their butts soundly trounced by a highlevel werebear barbarian. Luckily for them, turned out Krogar is actually a decent guy, albeit a bit obsessed with fighting, and got most of his 'infamy' for getting on the wrong side of some powerful, evil rulers.

Stealth Marmot
2016-12-29, 08:48 AM
"Funeral expenses."

http://i3.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/facebook/000/018/774/c54650b7278f88a3eeaa7aa7d5fce4f7.jpg

Grod_The_Giant
2016-12-29, 09:54 AM
The problem I have with high, high power encounters is that if I can't meaningfully interact with them, why are they even in the game? It's just you talking at me about things that I'm not supposed to do anything about. You could have skipped it to something that's interesting or that I could actually do something about instead of wasting 10 minutes talking about that jouster that I can't possibly beat. (not that I think the OP really did that or that I'd really mind that much)
That's one more downside, especially prevalent in open worlds, that I feel doesn't get discussed often enough: player paranoia. A little caution is one thing, but too many unwinnable encounters, GMs boasting about how "killer" they are, or both can lead to players who are afraid to do anything. Games where players argue and discuss and plan for hours before biting at any plot hook because they're afraid it's a trap are no fun-- not for the players, and not for GMs.

My approach is usually "whatever you do, I'll try to make it interesting. Every encounter will have a win condition somewhere, though it won't necessarily be through violence. I won't surprise you with death traps, and I'll try to find a way to warn you if you're creating one for yourself*. And even if things go wrong, losses will progress the story as well as victories will-- I won't just dump <large scary thing> on you and walk away."



*As in "your character would know that a noble house will have about ten times as many soldiers on hand as you're thinking, Bob."

Jormengand
2016-12-29, 01:46 PM
I usually allow players a chance to back down in the case of them trying to fight someone they shouldn't.

"Yes, the paladin that your third-level party is trying to fight casts a third-level sanctified spell and grows wings of blazing fiery death. Do you wish to continue?"

And just because he's way stronger than them doesn't mean that he's immune to, say, being talked to.

PhoenixPhyre
2016-12-29, 02:11 PM
I mostly DM 5e for teenagers (as the faculty advisor for a D&D club at a high school). Most of them have no experience with TTRPGs and have only played MMOs and CRPGs. At the beginning of each year (when I have new players) I try to introduce a few "encounters" to try to drive home the point that this is not a world conveniently leveled for them.

This year I had two: a wyvern and a Dire Sasquatch (refluffed from an abominable yeti).

The wyvern attacked a caravan they were guarding (at level 1) with the intent of taking one of the oxen. That one was specifically designed to hurt somebody badly but not kill them before they drove it off. I ran this with 3 separate groups (2 teenagers and one adult group) as part of their first session:
Group 1 firebolted it as soon as they saw it. It ran after hitting the dwarven fighter with a tail spike, dropping him to 0 HP. The cleric metagamed a bit (knowing he'd have 3 death saves) and spent a round berating the wizard for attacking it on sight. The fighter failed his first save, then the cleric went. On his second turn unconscious, the fighter rolled a 1. Oops. We ended up retconning that second turn as a vision of the future.
Group 2 ran around in panic. One person got knocked to 0, but they brought him up immediately. The first death save was a 1, though. The dice were being evil that day.
The adult group instead cut one ox free and sent it off as bait. None of them got hurt.

The Dire Sasquatch was hibernating in a cave. Not particularly part of the quest, just a cave in a forest. They were level 2 at this point, the beast was CR 9.
Group 1: The dragonborn paladin decides to go running into the cave without any precautions. Fails his perception check (badly). Spends 3 rounds yelling at the beast as I describe this big man-like creature slowly getting up, stretching, licking huge lips, and staring very hungrily at him. Refuses to run. The rest of the group (except for one rogue) milled about at the entrance, not doing much. After 3 turns, the sasquatch swats the paladin. Does 2x HP - 1 (ie 1 more damage and he'd auto-die). The rogue grabs the body and tries to drag him out. At this point I bent the rules a little bit and had the attack of opportunity hit the paladin instead of the rogue. This hit did something like 3x his max HP. I then described the beast loudly and messily crunching through the armor and bones of their party member. The rest of them ran.
Group 2: They were more cautious, but one monk tried to talk to it and got punched. Didn't take him out (rolled low for damage). They ran. The warlock had repelling blast and slowed it down.
Adults: Sneaked into the cave, saw the beast, and ran without really waking it up.

I've thrown in a few other NPCs who would have destroyed them in a fight, but they've been smart enough not to attack or be hostile.

Quertus
2016-12-29, 02:47 PM
The problem I have with high, high power encounters is that if I can't meaningfully interact with them, why are they even in the game?

Fortunately for my signature character, every dragon he has ever encountered (usually by himself, and usually way over his CR) in point of fact has read his book. He's gotten a lot of feedback from "randomly" encountering dragons on dozens of worlds.

Personally, I love for the world to feel alive, to not feel custom tailored to the PCs (unless, of course, it actually is custom tailored to the PCs, such as by being their collective dream or something). I love helping build player skills, like old-school games used to rely on. And I love experiencing as diverse an array of encounters as possible.

So, yeah, so long as I have the option to attempt to interact with it meaningfully, and it isn't just a railroaded set piece, I'm all for CR-inappropriate encounters.

Yukitsu
2016-12-29, 05:21 PM
Fortunately for my signature character, every dragon he has ever encountered (usually by himself, and usually way over his CR) in point of fact has read his book. He's gotten a lot of feedback from "randomly" encountering dragons on dozens of worlds.

Personally, I love for the world to feel alive, to not feel custom tailored to the PCs (unless, of course, it actually is custom tailored to the PCs, such as by being their collective dream or something). I love helping build player skills, like old-school games used to rely on. And I love experiencing as diverse an array of encounters as possible.

So, yeah, so long as I have the option to attempt to interact with it meaningfully, and it isn't just a railroaded set piece, I'm all for CR-inappropriate encounters.

While I kind of agree, I also find those situations really immersion shattering rather than the opposite. To me, it's almost incomprehensible that a CR 20 dragon would even bother looking at a CR 1 adventurer. Maybe accidental, awkward eye contact at most.

Even at a lower scale, a nobleman isn't going to really going to bother giving the time of day to some random guy that walks up to him on the road, there were people who's literal job was to shoo people away from their lord's carriage because they didn't want to converse with the lower classes or have such obstacles slowing their journey. If this guy is not only someone of importance, but is also strong enough that he can just ignore a random adventurer, it makes far more sense to me that they would and similarly, unless your party is someone who has equal social status to this guy or similar social status, they should probably know that there isn't really any point conversing with someone of that sort of status.

Now maybe a high level adventurer could walk by and maybe feel compelled to give some pointers or otherwise talk to the group but most of my worlds don't have a huge number of adventurers and especially not ones that are higher level than the party. Other than that, a lot of the examples that people give of this simply feel like they break my immersion, not reinforce the world as a "real" place.

The OP example is fine though on the other hand, it's not that I feel the jouster was way out of their league, it's just that the character opted to give that NPC every advantage he could have.

Ruslan
2016-12-29, 06:27 PM
It's true that a dragon is unlikely to engage in exhilarating conversation with a low-level guy, but still, even then, interaction is possible, even if something like this:


DM: "You see a dragon flying overhead."
PCs: "We hide!"
DM: "It flies away."
PCs: "Whew."

One may, again, say it's meaningless, but think how much better the memory of this little moment makes them feel when 12 levels later they slay that same dragon! Running away from X and later being able to defeat X is a kind of measure of character growth.

Slipperychicken
2016-12-29, 06:45 PM
The best part is, this sort of thing happens all the time in Arthurian legend. Some random dude bumps into one of the bigwig round table knights on the road, insists on challenging him for some huge stakes, and then gets annihilated.

I think it's good to shake players out of the mindset that they can fight and kill everything they see for a good fun challenge. Though if you do that you should reasonably signpost the relevant threat levels, and be prepared for them to start refusing quests or looking for alternative approaches when things get tough.

Vinyadan
2016-12-29, 07:28 PM
I guess you could say, "what happens when you think every encounter is a match".

oxybe
2016-12-29, 09:21 PM
Imagine you're at work.

Some VIP comes in, drags you into a meeting for whatever reason and starts talking and giving out orders. Nothing you can say will get them to change their minds as you're an entry level (or just above that) scrub, unless it's a very radical or revolutionary idea, and even then you fear of speaking out and embarrassing yourself or angering them because it could potentially cost you your job. And you can't deke out of there. They're at that level of VIP. All you can really do is sit there, listen to their monologue and bob your head like a dashboard chihuahua.

Bravo, you've just met the High Level NPC Encounter IRL. Was that fun? Was that a meaningful encounter? Was your work session made better because of it (I guess in one hand you got out of work, but on the other you're behind on what you were currently working on)? Was this so revolutionary that you feel the need to impart this experience onto your friends in their game of magical dwarves and elves?

Likely not.

This is the main issue I find when it comes to dealing with large power discrepancies between PC and NPCs and I try to avoid this when possible when GMing: Higher level NPCs, esp. in games like D&D with it's scaling, usually have abilities or defenses that make mechanical interaction near impossible.

You kinda just have to sit there, bob your head and wait for the GM to finish narrating stuff so you can continue to actually interact with the game world in a meaningful way. Or the GM has failed to properly let you know that his is a thing you shouldn't interact with and get killed because "realism".

I work nearly 50 hours a week doing tech support. All I want to do is pretend I'm a magical elf in a somewhat consistent heroic world. If I cared for realism, I'd go running in the snow outside.

and I probably wouldn't be playing a magical elf.

Vitruviansquid
2016-12-29, 09:23 PM
As much as I enjoy the idea of this, it occurs to me that what happens when you show your players everything isn't level-appropriate encounters is they'll start to prepare for everything as if they are level-inappropriate encounters.

And I can't think of very much that would be worse for me as a GM than that.

Psikerlord
2016-12-30, 12:37 AM
Low Fantasy Gaming RPG uses random encounter tables that are set by geographical location, with no reference to PC level. It also has a formal "Party Retreat" rule, allowing players the option of (very probably) disengaging from a battle at a cost. So "Level appropriate" encounters doesnt really exist. The adventurers encounter what they encounter, and the players decide whether to talk, fight, run or something else :)

RazorChain
2016-12-30, 01:02 AM
Imagine you're at work.

Some VIP comes in, drags you into a meeting for whatever reason and starts talking and giving out orders. Nothing you can say will get them to change their minds as you're an entry level (or just above that) scrub, unless it's a very radical or revolutionary idea, and even then you fear of speaking out and embarrassing yourself or angering them because it could potentially cost you your job. And you can't deke out of there. They're at that level of VIP. All you can really do is sit there, listen to their monologue and bob your head like a dashboard chihuahua.

Bravo, you've just met the High Level NPC Encounter IRL. Was that fun? Was that a meaningful encounter? Was your work session made better because of it (I guess in one hand you got out of work, but on the other you're behind on what you were currently working on)? Was this so revolutionary that you feel the need to impart this experience onto your friends in their game of magical dwarves and elves?

Likely not.

This is the main issue I find when it comes to dealing with large power discrepancies between PC and NPCs and I try to avoid this when possible when GMing: Higher level NPCs, esp. in games like D&D with it's scaling, usually have abilities or defenses that make mechanical interaction near impossible.

You kinda just have to sit there, bob your head and wait for the GM to finish narrating stuff so you can continue to actually interact with the game world in a meaningful way. Or the GM has failed to properly let you know that his is a thing you shouldn't interact with and get killed because "realism".

I work nearly 50 hours a week doing tech support. All I want to do is pretend I'm a magical elf in a somewhat consistent heroic world. If I cared for realism, I'd go running in the snow outside.

and I probably wouldn't be playing a magical elf.

Well I beg to differ, mechanical interaction is just a fraction of the game unless you are constantly rolling dice.

You can be the deadliest swordsman in the world but that doesn't mean people are going to listen to you. Social power and personal power are two very distinct things, the king might be a lazy slob who can't do anything in a fight but the PC's should probably not disrespect him in his own house.

DnD has a very high power discrepancy compared to most other systems and therefore the PC's in lot of other systems aren't picking fights needlessly.

thirdkingdom
2016-12-30, 07:07 AM
Traveling the wilderness, the PCs met with a certain knight and his retainers. One PC was proficient in Knowledge (Nobility and Royalty), and was told he remembers this knight as a winner of the King's Jousting Tournament. Another PC, upon hearing this, immediately decided to challenge the knight to a joust.

Knight: "I don't carry my tourney lance with me."
Player: "Excuses already?"
Knight: "No excuses, I'm just saying, my lance is a combat weapon. Not the blunted one I use for tourneys."
Player: "Haha, what a coincidence, so is mine!"
Knight: "If risk of fatality is to be accepted, I must have an incentive to fight. Winner takes loser's gear?"
Player: "Hell yeah!"

They get on their horses, charge each other, knight wins initiative and deals 85 damage. The PC only had 30-something hit points. The knight promptly proceeds to undress the dead PC, take all his gear and money as the rest of the party is too scared to intervene, and rides away, dropping a small purse with 10 gp.

"Funeral expenses."

I think this is great, and am also of the opinion that the game world should be a living, dynamic place where the PCs decide what is a "Level Appropriate Encounter". Good DMs leave clues (such as the fact that the knight won the King's jousting tournament), good players pick up on said clues.

One of the reasons I enjoy OSR games is because of the use of the Reaction Roll, which means that not every encounter -- in fact, fewer than half of all random encounters -- will end up in hostilities. If you go in with the mindset that "encounter" means "fight", than of course this is not the sort of game you'd want to play in.

Knaight
2016-12-30, 12:32 PM
That's one more downside, especially prevalent in open worlds, that I feel doesn't get discussed often enough: player paranoia. A little caution is one thing, but too many unwinnable encounters, GMs boasting about how "killer" they are, or both can lead to players who are afraid to do anything. Games where players argue and discuss and plan for hours before biting at any plot hook because they're afraid it's a trap are no fun-- not for the players, and not for GMs.
This is more an argument for telegraphing danger than anything. In the story in the OP the character in question had just explicitly won the king's jousting tournament. Other comparably obvious examples I've seen was a player who decided it was a good idea to get into a dogfight with a small strike craft, while they had a jetpack and a rifle - after provoking said fight by engaging in an act of fairly unsubtle sabotage on a critical part of the planetary geoengineering system. Similarly there have been cases where the PCs come into contact with things that don't even approach their league, like when this same group was doing mercenary work for a small merchant and decided to hop into a known ambush. Said ambush was a couple of space pirates in small fighters expecting to deal with a merchant vessel, they got a warship and it went roughly as it sounds like it would. The paranoia doesn't tend to crop up in the context of just running a world, only with GMs being killer GMs as some sort of philosophical thing.


Imagine you're at work.

Some VIP comes in, drags you into a meeting for whatever reason and starts talking and giving out orders. Nothing you can say will get them to change their minds as you're an entry level (or just above that) scrub, unless it's a very radical or revolutionary idea, and even then you fear of speaking out and embarrassing yourself or angering them because it could potentially cost you your job. And you can't deke out of there. They're at that level of VIP. All you can really do is sit there, listen to their monologue and bob your head like a dashboard chihuahua.

Bravo, you've just met the High Level NPC Encounter IRL. Was that fun? Was that a meaningful encounter? Was your work session made better because of it (I guess in one hand you got out of work, but on the other you're behind on what you were currently working on)? Was this so revolutionary that you feel the need to impart this experience onto your friends in their game of magical dwarves and elves?
That's one way to look at it. On the other hand, there are tons of situations where normal people go out of their way to meet people much better known (and often more accomplished) than they are. Say you're a musician, maybe you're in some sort of local band, and someone who is an absolute legend at playing your instrument comes to town. That's a High Level NPC Encounter IRL right there, and yet every musician I know looks forward to that sort of thing.

The Extinguisher
2016-12-30, 02:31 PM
Traveling the wilderness, the PCs met with a certain knight and his retainers. One PC was proficient in Knowledge (Nobility and Royalty), and was told he remembers this knight as a winner of the King's Jousting Tournament. Another PC, upon hearing this, immediately decided to challenge the knight to a joust.

Knight: "I don't carry my tourney lance with me."
Player: "Excuses already?"
Knight: "No excuses, I'm just saying, my lance is a combat weapon. Not the blunted one I use for tourneys."
Player: "Haha, what a coincidence, so is mine!"
Knight: "If risk of fatality is to be accepted, I must have an incentive to fight. Winner takes loser's gear?"
Player: "Hell yeah!"

They get on their horses, charge each other, knight wins initiative and deals 85 damage. The PC only had 30-something hit points. The knight promptly proceeds to undress the dead PC, take all his gear and money as the rest of the party is too scared to intervene, and rides away, dropping a small purse with 10 gp.

"Funeral expenses."

That player must have had so much fun getting one-shotted by a guy he had no reason to believe was that powerful, and then getting laughed at by the DM for getting killed by a much more powerful NPC :smallannoyed:

I would be super annoyed by this, because there's absolutely no telegraphing that the character is going to die here. Yes, the knight is question just won a jousting tournament, but that certainly doesn't mean will more than double your hit points with one attack. And the knight is hardly insistent that they don't fight. There's no "jousting with combat lances is dangerous" or "my honour says I cannot." He says it might be lethal, then straight up offers a deal that is very attractive to a player that has no idea how strong this knight is, and the penalty for losing is already very high without death being involved in the first place.

Maybe you're paraphrasing and it played out differently in game, but this feels really bad to me. This is not a player rushing into danger despite warnings. This is a player not knowing the risk and being punished anyway.

Is this encounter fun for anyone? The player that died isn't. He was killed in one hit like it was nothing. The other party members aren't, they lost an ally and all of their gear and were forced to stand and watch as the DM punished them. The DM was probably having fun, but a game where only one person was having fun is not a very good game. There a so many ways this encounter could have gone, even if the player insisted on the duel, that would have been much more fun for everyone involved, instead of just a feel bad moment and the DM laughing at the players.

thirdkingdom
2016-12-30, 05:30 PM
That player must have had so much fun getting one-shotted by a guy he had no reason to believe was that powerful, and then getting laughed at by the DM for getting killed by a much more powerful NPC :smallannoyed:

I would be super annoyed by this, because there's absolutely no telegraphing that the character is going to die here. Yes, the knight is question just won a jousting tournament, but that certainly doesn't mean will more than double your hit points with one attack. And the knight is hardly insistent that they don't fight. There's no "jousting with combat lances is dangerous" or "my honour says I cannot." He says it might be lethal, then straight up offers a deal that is very attractive to a player that has no idea how strong this knight is, and the penalty for losing is already very high without death being involved in the first place.

Maybe you're paraphrasing and it played out differently in game, but this feels really bad to me. This is not a player rushing into danger despite warnings. This is a player not knowing the risk and being punished anyway.

Is this encounter fun for anyone? The player that died isn't. He was killed in one hit like it was nothing. The other party members aren't, they lost an ally and all of their gear and were forced to stand and watch as the DM punished them. The DM was probably having fun, but a game where only one person was having fun is not a very good game. There a so many ways this encounter could have gone, even if the player insisted on the duel, that would have been much more fun for everyone involved, instead of just a feel bad moment and the DM laughing at the players.

The glaring flaw with this argument, of course, is the premise -- baked in with the phrase "level-appropriate challenge -- that every combat needs to be resolved through combat. I agree, if the encounter were set up by the DM in such a way that it *had* to be resolved through combat, then yes, it would be a jerk move. But my impression from the OP was that there were multiple ways the encounter could be resolved, of which combat is only one potential way.

Even describing encounters as "level appropriate" subtly suggests that every encounter is really designed to be resolved through combat.

Knaight
2016-12-30, 05:39 PM
Is this encounter fun for anyone? The player that died isn't. He was killed in one hit like it was nothing. The other party members aren't, they lost an ally and all of their gear and were forced to stand and watch as the DM punished them. The DM was probably having fun, but a game where only one person was having fun is not a very good game. There a so many ways this encounter could have gone, even if the player insisted on the duel, that would have been much more fun for everyone involved, instead of just a feel bad moment and the DM laughing at the players.

You're assuming that they didn't have fun because your criteria for fun weren't met. That's not a safe assumption.

RazorChain
2016-12-30, 06:45 PM
That player must have had so much fun getting one-shotted by a guy he had no reason to believe was that powerful, and then getting laughed at by the DM for getting killed by a much more powerful NPC :smallannoyed:

I would be super annoyed by this, because there's absolutely no telegraphing that the character is going to die here. Yes, the knight is question just won a jousting tournament, but that certainly doesn't mean will more than double your hit points with one attack. And the knight is hardly insistent that they don't fight. There's no "jousting with combat lances is dangerous" or "my honour says I cannot." He says it might be lethal, then straight up offers a deal that is very attractive to a player that has no idea how strong this knight is, and the penalty for losing is already very high without death being involved in the first place.

Maybe you're paraphrasing and it played out differently in game, but this feels really bad to me. This is not a player rushing into danger despite warnings. This is a player not knowing the risk and being punished anyway.

Is this encounter fun for anyone? The player that died isn't. He was killed in one hit like it was nothing. The other party members aren't, they lost an ally and all of their gear and were forced to stand and watch as the DM punished them. The DM was probably having fun, but a game where only one person was having fun is not a very good game. There a so many ways this encounter could have gone, even if the player insisted on the duel, that would have been much more fun for everyone involved, instead of just a feel bad moment and the DM laughing at the players.

Let's look at this from another perspective. Let's say the setting is the wild west and the PC's meet a cowboy and one of them recognizes him as one of the fastest guns in the west. One PC who is a competent gunman challenges him to a duel.

The cowboy warns him that they will be using real guns and the PC scoffs saying "Hell yeah". Then the cowboy promply ends him in the duel making sure the PC doesnt get off a shot.

The death is on the players head not the GM. He chose to put his character at risk against a deadly foe.

neriractor
2016-12-30, 07:20 PM
That player must have had so much fun getting one-shotted by a guy he had no reason to believe was that powerful, and then getting laughed at by the DM for getting killed by a much more powerful NPC :smallannoyed:

I would be super annoyed by this, because there's absolutely no telegraphing that the character is going to die here. Yes, the knight is question just won a jousting tournament, but that certainly doesn't mean will more than double your hit points with one attack. And the knight is hardly insistent that they don't fight. There's no "jousting with combat lances is dangerous" or "my honour says I cannot." He says it might be lethal, then straight up offers a deal that is very attractive to a player that has no idea how strong this knight is, and the penalty for losing is already very high without death being involved in the first place.

just a small nitpick here, the knight didn´t just win a joust tournament, he won the king´s joust tournament, as in the tournament where only the best and biggest of that particular kingdom (and perhaps some close ones as well) get to fight. That seems like plenty of information about the guy´s threath level, also if (on an RPG) somebody that already told me he is using a lethal weapon told me that "fighting with lethal weapons is dangerous" I would take it as an insult and a challenge, instead of an actual warning (unless your DM is one of those "are you reallly REALLY sure?" types).

The deal was made after the PC picked a fight, and it was more so that if the PC won he was allowed to take the wealth of the knight, that happened to have company, whitout being attacked or seeing as an honorless bandit.

John Longarrow
2016-12-31, 01:08 AM
That player must have had so much fun getting one-shotted by a guy he had no reason to believe was that powerful, and then getting laughed at by the DM for getting killed by a much more powerful NPC :smallannoyed:

I would be super annoyed by this, because there's absolutely no telegraphing that the character is going to die here. Yes, the knight is question just won a jousting tournament, but that certainly doesn't mean will more than double your hit points with one attack. And the knight is hardly insistent that they don't fight. There's no "jousting with combat lances is dangerous" or "my honour says I cannot." He says it might be lethal, then straight up offers a deal that is very attractive to a player that has no idea how strong this knight is, and the penalty for losing is already very high without death being involved in the first place.

Maybe you're paraphrasing and it played out differently in game, but this feels really bad to me. This is not a player rushing into danger despite warnings. This is a player not knowing the risk and being punished anyway.

Is this encounter fun for anyone? The player that died isn't. He was killed in one hit like it was nothing. The other party members aren't, they lost an ally and all of their gear and were forced to stand and watch as the DM punished them. The DM was probably having fun, but a game where only one person was having fun is not a very good game. There a so many ways this encounter could have gone, even if the player insisted on the duel, that would have been much more fun for everyone involved, instead of just a feel bad moment and the DM laughing at the players.

Just so we are clear, the OP posted


Traveling the wilderness, the PCs met with a certain knight and his retainers. One PC was proficient in Knowledge (Nobility and Royalty), and was told he remembers this knight as a winner of the King's Jousting Tournament. Another PC, upon hearing this, immediately decided to challenge the knight to a joust.

Lets make this a level appropriate encounter. 4th level party encounters an Ogre who is guarding a bridge. Ogre challenges the party to unarmed combat, one on one. Party wizard, upon hearing this, immediately decides to challenge the ogre. Stakes are if the ogre wins it gets the characters gear. If the character wins the party gets to pass and takes the ogres fancy ring.

At this point if an unbuffed wizard not built for melee steps up and gets clobbered by the ogre no one is going to bat an eye. Dumb mistake.

In the OPs post its obvious that the knight is built around charge attack (jousting) and the PC decided to take him on in his specialty.

To me, its pretty obvious that even if it was level appropriate the PC would probably loose just as badly since dedicated charger builds are pretty lethal when they charge. That the knight was higher level isn't nearly as relevant as a PC choosing to go against the obvious strength of an opponent.

Telok
2016-12-31, 02:45 AM
I've had things go like this. In a Traveller game the players were flying a low/mid sized merchant ship and hauling something perfectly normal, agricultural machinery of some sort I think, when a couple of imperial cruisers overtake them and demand to send over a boarding party for an inspection. So a merchanter armed with a mining laser and capable of pulling 4g is pulled over by military ships sporting high powered lasers, missiles, and capable of 6g acceleration.

The players decide to fight. Specifically to ambush the imspection team, rig the shuttles to explode, and send the shuttles back to the cruisers. Long story short they killed about half the inspection team, the rest got back on the shuttles and left, and the cruisers cut their ship into chunks. End of game.

When everything is "level appropriate" then fighting is an option that the players expect to win. That leads to fighting often being the best or only option, especially if the game system doesn't have robust or well defined non-combat sections. Playing lots of games like that trains players to treat everything as a combat encounter to fight, and often it train them to just rush in attacking and never retreat.

Not everything has to be a combat encounter and not every game is built or run with the expectation that you should win all the fights. But some games train people to expect that.

The Extinguisher
2016-12-31, 03:35 AM
You're assuming that they didn't have fun because your criteria for fun weren't met. That's not a safe assumption.

You're absolutely right actually. I can't assume they aren't having fun, and really shouldn't have brought it up.
It's still back encounter design though.


just a small nitpick here, the knight didn´t just win a joust tournament, he won the king´s joust tournament, as in the tournament where only the best and biggest of that particular kingdom (and perhaps some close ones as well) get to fight. That seems like plenty of information about the guy´s threath level, also if (on an RPG) somebody that already told me he is using a lethal weapon told me that "fighting with lethal weapons is dangerous" I would take it as an insult and a challenge, instead of an actual warning (unless your DM is one of those "are you reallly REALLY sure?" types).

The deal was made after the PC picked a fight, and it was more so that if the PC won he was allowed to take the wealth of the knight, that happened to have company, whitout being attacked or seeing as an honorless bandit.

The details of the joust tournament don't matter. Being (very) good at jousting does not translate into this kind of outlandish amounts of damage. There was no way the PC was winning this fight and that is bad design. This was not "the knight rolled a natural 20 and maxed out damage and just barely killed him wow" kind of fight. That's exciting and is the kind of thing that is brought up in posts like this. The amount of damage dished out here was more than double the PC's health. That's ridiculous. There's discouraging combat encounters and then there is straight up punishing your players for not doing things how you wanted them to.

Yeah the deal was made after the fight was picked, but if the fight was not supposed to be had, then why make the deal so attractive. This is inviting your player to die. Why not have the player offer the stakes, and go from there. Don't encourage your players to do things they aren't supposed to do, then punish them when they do it.


Just so we are clear, the OP posted



Lets make this a level appropriate encounter. 4th level party encounters an Ogre who is guarding a bridge. Ogre challenges the party to unarmed combat, one on one. Party wizard, upon hearing this, immediately decides to challenge the ogre. Stakes are if the ogre wins it gets the characters gear. If the character wins the party gets to pass and takes the ogres fancy ring.

At this point if an unbuffed wizard not built for melee steps up and gets clobbered by the ogre no one is going to bat an eye. Dumb mistake.

In the OPs post its obvious that the knight is built around charge attack (jousting) and the PC decided to take him on in his specialty.

To me, its pretty obvious that even if it was level appropriate the PC would probably loose just as badly since dedicated charger builds are pretty lethal when they charge. That the knight was higher level isn't nearly as relevant as a PC choosing to go against the obvious strength of an opponent.

100% not this situation, because I think it's a pretty safe assumption that the character who challenged this very good jouster to a jousting match who also carried a lance with them is a character who is good at jousting. This is your fighter challenging the ogre to a fight and getting killed because actually he's much much stronger than all of you and you were supposed to convince him to answer riddles or something else


Let's look at this from another perspective. Let's say the setting is the wild west and the PC's meet a cowboy and one of them recognizes him as one of the fastest guns in the west. One PC who is a competent gunman challenges him to a duel.

The cowboy warns him that they will be using real guns and the PC scoffs saying "Hell yeah". Then the cowboy promply ends him in the duel making sure the PC doesn't get off a shot.

The death is on the players head not the GM. He chose to put his character at risk against a deadly foe.

If you put a duelist in front of your players, and one of them is a duelist, expect a duel. If that duelist will 100% kill your players if they duel, you've put in a mousetrap, not a good encounter.


-

This encounter is bad because it takes a likely and frankly pretty reasonable solution to the obstacle, and makes it kill you out of nowhere. That kind of red herring encounter design is good in iterative gameplay, where you're expected to lose and lose and lose, and come back again looking at the encounter in unique ways. But that's not the case here. The player doesn't get to respawn with the knowledge of how lethal this knight really is and work a different angle. Instead they just lost, and all of their stuff was stolen and they feel bad. They don't learn to solve encounters through methods other than combat. They learn to be scared of doing to wrong thing in your encounters.
(quick side note, this isn't even combat. It's a joust. It already has a fail state that isn't death. It's losing the joust)
If you really want your players to explore solutions that aren't combat, you need to give them incentive. There are better consequences than player death. Maybe if you hadn't randomly killed that knight on the road and befriended him instead, you'd have a much easier time trying to talk to the king.

The point is, the player was presented with an obstacle and tried a solution. Instead of being given an honest attempt with their solution, they immediately failed and were killed. All because the DM didn't want them trying that solution. If this were reversed, about trying a noncombat solution when the DM wanted a fight, how many would say the encounter was bad?

RazorChain
2016-12-31, 03:54 AM
If you put a duelist in front of your players, and one of them is a duelist, expect a duel. If that duelist will 100% kill your players if they duel, you've put in a mousetrap, not a good encounter.


Wait! What? So if I put a fighter in front of my players and one of them is a fighter, I should expect a fight?


So if Khelben Blackstaff shows up then the party wizard will immediately challenge him to a magical duel because he's a wizard as well?

So by this logic the world should never have more powerful NPC's than the PC's. Because if the PC's should bump into them and decide to fight them for no reason at all they could lose?

Yukitsu
2016-12-31, 04:03 AM
Wait! What? So if I put a fighter in front of my players and one of them is a fighter, I should expect a fight?


So if Khelben Blackstaff shows up then the party wizard will immediately challenge him to a magical duel because he's a wizard as well?

So by this logic the world should never have more powerful NPC's than the PC's. Because if the PC's should bump into them and decide to fight them for no reason at all they could lose?

I think duelist is a special exception since unlike "wizard" or "fighter" duelists are individuals who seek out others and fight them in honourable(ish) combat one on one to test their abilities. A jouster is a type of one but I can't tell from the anecdote if the PC was one as well or not.

hamishspence
2016-12-31, 04:54 AM
The difference is that this kind of duellist normally only duels at tourneys - with blunted weapons.

(Given that tourney lances break - you'd expect the tourney to provide them - and the jouster not to go around the countryside with one).

And he told the party that, and said his only weapons were lethal.

thirdkingdom
2016-12-31, 11:02 AM
I think duelist is a special exception since unlike "wizard" or "fighter" duelists are individuals who seek out others and fight them in honourable(ish) combat one on one to test their abilities. A jouster is a type of one but I can't tell from the anecdote if the PC was one as well or not.

Are you seriously suggesting that there's a certain class out there that challenges *everybody* with a sword/bow/lance they encounter to a fight? That the only type of encounter possible with said class is combat?

Knaight
2016-12-31, 11:48 AM
The details of the joust tournament don't matter. Being (very) good at jousting does not translate into this kind of outlandish amounts of damage. There was no way the PC was winning this fight and that is bad design. This was not "the knight rolled a natural 20 and maxed out damage and just barely killed him wow" kind of fight. That's exciting and is the kind of thing that is brought up in posts like this. The amount of damage dished out here was more than double the PC's health. That's ridiculous. There's discouraging combat encounters and then there is straight up punishing your players for not doing things how you wanted them to.
No, there was no way that they were winning this fight. However, even if we ignore the numerous things that aren't fighting that are possible, that doesn't mean a different fight involving the same people wouldn't be winnable. Lets say this guy wasn't just the winner of the tourney who they bumped into on the road, but the winner of the tourney who had killed one of the PCs best friends and who they were out for revenge on (but who didn't know that about them) - that makes this much more likely to be a combat encounter. Now there's actually an implicit goal, and it's to put this guy down if at all possible. Even in that situation, that doesn't make the PCs decision ending in death a case of bad design. Knowing that the guy was extremely dangerous puts them in a position to take that into account for a fight, and even if this fight was unwinnable something like a night ambush that starts with picking off the guards then lighting the knight's tent on fire while they sleep while outside of it in full kit may well have been winnable.

As far as outlandish damage goes, it's a fight consisting of people running straight at each other with lances. This is a combat type that is immediately recognizable as the sort that does a lot of damage to one person all at once.


If you put a duelist in front of your players, and one of them is a duelist, expect a duel. If that duelist will 100% kill your players if they duel, you've put in a mousetrap, not a good encounter.
There's a few things here. One is that this wouldn't be expected of a lot of duelists, plenty of them are likely to avoid duels that they can't lose. The second is that duelists who will get in duels pretty nonchalantly when they aren't to the death are still likely to be much more cautious about duels to the death. We're not talking about a rapier duel to first blood that ended in the PC dead here, we're talking about a type of dueling which is made nonlethal by not putting a point on the weapon involved and still going in in extremely heavy armor. The mechanics almost certainly reflect that.


This encounter is bad because it takes a likely and frankly pretty reasonable solution to the obstacle, and makes it kill you out of nowhere. That kind of red herring encounter design is good in iterative gameplay, where you're expected to lose and lose and lose, and come back again looking at the encounter in unique ways. But that's not the case here. The player doesn't get to respawn with the knowledge of how lethal this knight really is and work a different angle. Instead they just lost, and all of their stuff was stolen and they feel bad. They don't learn to solve encounters through methods other than combat. They learn to be scared of doing to wrong thing in your encounters.
(quick side note, this isn't even combat. It's a joust. It already has a fail state that isn't death. It's losing the joust)
If you really want your players to explore solutions that aren't combat, you need to give them incentive. There are better consequences than player death. Maybe if you hadn't randomly killed that knight on the road and befriended him instead, you'd have a much easier time trying to talk to the king.
What obstacle? The knight isn't in their way. The knight isn't an enemy. On top of that there are a bunch of good reasons to have an encounter* that aren't a fight. That it's not an obstacle takes the approach outside of the realm of solutions all on its lonesome. As for whether or not it's reasonable, the approach consisted of picking a needless one on one fair duel with an enemy that was telegraphed as extremely dangerous. It's a dumb decision, and while it may well be a good decision in character that the player deserves credit for making that doesn't somehow mean that the ending was unreasonable.

On a different note, I routinely create encounters where a direct fight is a great way to get killed, but where the opposition actually is an obstacle. Yet PC death is extremely rare in my games - I suspect that the average is less than 1 PC per campaign, and that average is heavily skewed by a couple of outliers where the death count is entirely on the PCs working against each other in large part because that's what that particular group of players likes doing. As just one example, one session of a game I was running where the PCs were a space mercenary group involved being contracted by a mining corporation to recover some highly valuable missing cargo. Said cargo was in fact so valuable that some space pirates had built an improvised space station around it by connecting three warships in a triangle around the box then building from there, while constantly trying to bypass the boxes defenses so that it could be transported without destroying the precious cargo. The players had a fairly light ship roughly equivalent to a fighter squadron. I'm sure if they had gone in guns blazing and gotten killed then that would be presented as bad encounter design too. Instead they went in pretending to be pirates, earned the trust of the pirates running it, got access to the ship's jump drive systems and box security, then convinced the pirates that a naval fleet was incoming and they had to warp out now. The pirates warped out, and the PCs then spent the precious time of their warp drive recharging taking all the cargo and warping away. It ended with them taking the last piece of cargo into their ship and jumping out just in time to dodge the incoming missiles of the pirate fortress after it had recharged and warped back, and was one of the more memorable encounters in the game. I'd count that as a success. Every player counts it as a success. Yet it was all only possible by using encounter design that makes certain approaches extremely likely to be fatal. It was capable of killing out of nowhere pretty comparably to the knight encounter, it just ended differently and provides a different story from the result.

*In the sense of running into something significant enough to be worth commenting on.

John Longarrow
2016-12-31, 12:25 PM
The point is, the player was presented with an obstacle and tried a solution. Instead of being given an honest attempt with their solution, they immediately failed and were killed. All because the DM didn't want them trying that solution. If this were reversed, about trying a noncombat solution when the DM wanted a fight, how many would say the encounter was bad?

You do realize that you just self-identified as a murderhobo, right? This was a chance encounter on the road, not an "obstacle". If you treat every person you meet and have a chance to interact with as an "obstacle" and assume combat is a viable way to deal with said "obstacle" I don't think your looking for a role playing game. You may be more interested in something like Warhammer of another wargame.

TheCountAlucard
2016-12-31, 12:31 PM
Incidentally, one of my games has some pretty high-powered PCs (one in particular can be pretty reasonably compared to Heracles from the Greek myths), but they still know better than to try to resolve all their encounters with stand-there-and-trade-blows-until-one-side-is-dead combat.

It helps that they're on a ship, mind. If the ship sinks more than a certain distance from the shore, their chances ain't pretty.

hymer
2016-12-31, 12:39 PM
So by this logic the world should never have more powerful NPC's than the PC's. Because if the PC's should bump into them and decide to fight them for no reason at all they could lose?

You also need to lower mountain ranges and temple towers if any of the PCs has points in Climb, or make them roguher and easier to climb. But they can grow gradually in height and smoothness over the campaign, except if that PC is injured. Then you must lower them again, so s/he can climb them with little to no risk.

Seriously, there's almost bound to be stuff out there that can kill the PCs, particularly in such specialized ways as the OP tells us about. Players who seek out danger with little or no discrimination are liable to get their PCs in trouble, and eventually killed. That's what's supposed to happen. Knowing when to back down is an important skill, and being gung-ho carries risks. If there are no consequences to your actions, your actions mean nothing.

hamishspence
2016-12-31, 12:40 PM
You do realize that you just self-identified as a murderhobo, right? This was a chance encounter on the road, not an "obstacle".

Indeed. Whether it was the kudos of "defeating a great tourney champion" or "the possibility of winning gear" that motivated the challenge - the knight had himself done nothing to be challenged for.

Yukitsu
2016-12-31, 12:59 PM
Are you seriously suggesting that there's a certain class out there that challenges *everybody* with a sword/bow/lance they encounter to a fight? That the only type of encounter possible with said class is combat?

Duelist not as a class, no. Duelist as a profession in the world however, are what they are because they challenge people to duels, fight in tournements, get in fights to gain more fame and prestige etc. etc. And they aren't going to challenge someone that doesn't fight duels to one, so it is certainly possible in theory for them to have other encounters. Duelists didn't exactly go out of their way to go duel a duck for example.

hamishspence
2016-12-31, 01:23 PM
In a world as dangerous as D&D, "tourneys" may be less a competitive sport, and more "training for war/monster fighting". Thus, the fact that this person won a tournament, does not mean their career is "jousting".

As such, they may not be a duelist themselves - and may not like being challenged, outside of tourneys - and thus, act accordingly - doing as much damage as they can to their challenger.

thirdkingdom
2016-12-31, 01:41 PM
Duelist not as a class, no. Duelist as a profession in the world however, are what they are because they challenge people to duels, fight in tournements, get in fights to gain more fame and prestige etc. etc. And they aren't going to challenge someone that doesn't fight duels to one, so it is certainly possible in theory for them to have other encounters. Duelists didn't exactly go out of their way to go duel a duck for example.

Protip: The best way to livend a long time as a duelist*? Don't pick fights with every Tom, **** and Harry you see.

*Also applicable to adventurers, which was kinda the point of the OP.

Yukitsu
2016-12-31, 01:46 PM
Protip: The best way to livend a long time as a duelist*? Don't pick fights with every Tom, **** and Harry you see.

*Also applicable to adventurers, which was kinda the point of the OP.

You're not going to be a very famous duelist with that kind of attitude, you may as well go plant turnips instead.

I'm not even being that sarcastic here. There are people who fight hundreds of duels either against people at the top of the profession and against many, many people trying to prove they can beat him. You can't really earn any renown as a duelist if you only fight weaklings.

The Extinguisher
2016-12-31, 01:54 PM
Please, I haven't advocated for random murder being a solution for everything. I haven't said that challenge shouldn't exist, or that consequences for poor decisions are bad. My whole argument is that putting mousetraps in front of your players is bad design. Encouraging your players to do something that will only get them killed is bad design. Punishing your players instead of creating consequences is bad design.

This is a game. This is a not a real world populated by real people, things needs to be placed intentionally in the world in real time for them to exist. Whether or not combat is an option, the knight is still put in front of the players. They are doing something, and the encounter interrupts what they were doing. In order to continue, they need to resolve the encounter with the knight. That's an obstacle. What else would you call it. Resolving the encounter could me killing the knight, passing by without a word, convincing the knight that their lord is corrupt, or helping the knight bring someone to justice. But the encounter still needs to be resolved for the story/game to continue, so the knight is an obstacle to continuing the story/game.

There are certainly times where rushing head on into combat is a bad idea. There are also times where trying to talk your way out of something is a bad idea. This is fine. It's okay. Unless you've spent the whole game reinforcing that one particular solution will always work and is the best way to solve things, only to make one encounter where it isn't. Then it's bad. But I'm not even going to assume that's the case because it's typically much more extreme then what you'll find in tabletop games (think of a call of duty type game where in one level you lose if you shoot people). You can enforce consequences when your players do decide to make a bad idea. But you can do that without punishing your players. Give them a chance. A small one, sure, and they need to be smart about it. But giving players options that will always fail is bad. If you don't want them to shoot their way out, take away their guns.

Moving back to the original encounter:
-> It's reasonable to expect that the player that carries a lance and rides around on a horse jousts. It's also reasonable to expect that upon meeting a famous jouster, if the player thinks highly of their abilities they would challenge them to a round.
-> If the player is not supposed to joust the knight, don't let them. Why would a knight accept a challenge from some random on the road who doesn't even have the proper gear? The knight is hot of winning the award for Best at Jousting, he doesn't need to prove himself. The knight practically jumps at the challenge, offering no reason why they shouldn't because the knight is one who creates the terms for the joust. By doing this, you are telling your player that winning is possible.
-> But winning isn't possible. It's easy to do a lot of damage charging with a lance. But the best I can work out, without taking action to be extra lethal, a particularly strong knight is going to 45 damage on a maxed out roll. Which is more than enough to kill the player anyway. I can't for the life of me figure out how to innately get that extra forty damage without making him strong enough to pick up a car like it was a baby. Why does the knight do this much damage? Is it necessary?
-> More to the point, you want your player to face consequences for needlessly challenging people. The joust already had pretty high stakes. The player loses the joust roll and now they lose all of their stuff.

My point seems to have gotten away from everyone (including myself really). This isn't about combat, or player death or anything. It's about not leading players into traps. About not punishing players when they try something you didn't want them to. And about creating encounters that are appropriate to the players, both in terms of difficulty and in approach.

Telok
2016-12-31, 01:54 PM
The point is, the player was presented with an obstacle and tried a solution. Instead of being given an honest attempt with their solution, they immediately failed and were killed. All because the DM didn't want them trying that solution. If this were reversed, about trying a noncombat solution when the DM wanted a fight, how many would say the encounter was bad?

Here's your issue, treating everything like a combat encounter.

I've seen it go the other way too where the NPCs involved were weaker than the PCs. The party came across two groups fighting, one demonic and the other was just normal people. The intent was for the PCs to kill off the demonic guys and get help and info from the normal people. Instead one of the combat-only players just nuked the whole area with a spell and killed everything on the first round. The party got no XP (no challenge in just killing everything), and the 'loot' was aid and information which got nuked along with the people.

It's often not about how the DM wants players to "solve" an encounter. Some DMs don't set up encounters to be solved, they're just things that happen. You meet a wandering knight, see a dragon in the distance, bump into a sphinx, find two people fighting each other, or run into a merchant with a broken wagon wheel. The DM doesn't have to scrip an outcome, I generally don't because that doesn't work. The DM defines a situation and how the NPCs in that situation react. If there's a script the NPCs react to force the script, if the NPCs have personalities and goals then the NPCs react in accordance to those.

thirdkingdom
2016-12-31, 02:05 PM
You're not going to be a very famous duelist with that kind of attitude, you may as well go plant turnips instead.

I'm not even being that sarcastic here. There are people who fight hundreds of duels either against people at the top of the profession and against many, many people trying to prove they can beat him. You can't really earn any renown as a duelist if you only fight weaklings.

Seriously, dude? Your only alternative to "attack everything you see" is to become a farmer?

Yukitsu
2016-12-31, 02:06 PM
Seriously, dude? Your only alternative to "attack everything you see" is to become a farmer?

Fight every other duelist. Especially ones that are extremely good. I think you missed a major part of what I mentioned earlier.

Vinyadan
2016-12-31, 02:11 PM
You're not going to be a very famous duelist with that kind of attitude, you may as well go plant turnips instead.

I'm not even being that sarcastic here. There are people who fight hundreds of duels either against people at the top of the profession and against many, many people trying to prove they can beat him. You can't really earn any renown as a duelist if you only fight weaklings.

I am now curious to see how many challenges boxe champions accept.

In general, a sportsman tries to avoid accepting challenges from lesser opponents, if they can cost him too much (even in case of victory). Some time ago a player from Germany complained about a Germany-S. Marino match, because he saw it as just dangerous for the players and ultimately useless. If I were a man looking for fame & glory as a swordsman, and already in good standing in my discipline, I would avoid fighting some unknown guy I probably could kill in a minute, but who might still manage to hurt my eye or cut my knee, because I would have nothing to gain from the match, only to lose. Now, if an equal opponent appears? Sure, let's roll. (I guess that in boxing the limiting factors are the recovery time after the match and the preparation before the next one).

I think that's what thirdkingdom meant when saying not to fight people of no note.

The Extinguisher
2016-12-31, 03:04 PM
Here's your issue, treating everything like a combat encounter.

I've seen it go the other way too where the NPCs involved were weaker than the PCs. The party came across two groups fighting, one demonic and the other was just normal people. The intent was for the PCs to kill off the demonic guys and get help and info from the normal people. Instead one of the combat-only players just nuked the whole area with a spell and killed everything on the first round. The party got no XP (no challenge in just killing everything), and the 'loot' was aid and information which got nuked along with the people.

It's often not about how the DM wants players to "solve" an encounter. Some DMs don't set up encounters to be solved, they're just things that happen. You meet a wandering knight, see a dragon in the distance, bump into a sphinx, find two people fighting each other, or run into a merchant with a broken wagon wheel. The DM doesn't have to scrip an outcome, I generally don't because that doesn't work. The DM defines a situation and how the NPCs in that situation react. If there's a script the NPCs react to force the script, if the NPCs have personalities and goals then the NPCs react in accordance to those.

We posted at the same time, so I'm guessing you missed this. But every situation that is placed in front of the players is done so intentionally. This isn't real life where things just happen. This isn't even an open world video game where all the components of the world are predetermined and you run into them where they happen. The encounter interrupts the continuation of the narrative or gamestate (even if it's in service of the narrative or gamestate). It must be resolved to continue the narrative or gamestate. Sometimes it's a simple as the DM describe where the dragon in the distance is going and continuing on.

thirdkingdom
2016-12-31, 04:05 PM
We posted at the same time, so I'm guessing you missed this. But every situation that is placed in front of the players is done so intentionally. isn't real life where things just happen. This isn't even an open world video game where all the components of the world are predetermined and you run into them where they happen. The encounter interrupts the continuation of the narrative or gamestate (even if it's in service of the narrative or gamestate). It must be resolved to continue the narrative or gamestate. Sometimes it's a simple as the DM describe where the dragon in the distance is going and continuing

The bolded part of your statement is not true. Pre 3e versions of D&D, for example, rely heavily on the use of random encounters.

Velaryon
2016-12-31, 04:25 PM
The players had already been warned that they are not the top dogs in the setting and the high bounty should've tipped them off Krogar was no wimp, but I suppose the green-eyed monster got to them. Safe to say, they got their butts soundly trounced by a highlevel werebear barbarian. Luckily for them, turned out Krogar is actually a decent guy, albeit a bit obsessed with fighting, and got most of his 'infamy' for getting on the wrong side of some powerful, evil rulers.

While a lot of players would regard the high bounty as a tip off, I think the crimes he was wanted for could have conveyed the message a little more powerfully. Instead of being wanted for murder, he could have been wanted for killing six members of the city watch at once, or killing a couatl that was sacred to the local church of <insert deity>, or something like that which gives the players a more concrete frame of reference.


Imagine you're at work.

Some VIP comes in, drags you into a meeting for whatever reason and starts talking and giving out orders. Nothing you can say will get them to change their minds as you're an entry level (or just above that) scrub, unless it's a very radical or revolutionary idea, and even then you fear of speaking out and embarrassing yourself or angering them because it could potentially cost you your job. And you can't deke out of there. They're at that level of VIP. All you can really do is sit there, listen to their monologue and bob your head like a dashboard chihuahua.

Bravo, you've just met the High Level NPC Encounter IRL. Was that fun? Was that a meaningful encounter? Was your work session made better because of it (I guess in one hand you got out of work, but on the other you're behind on what you were currently working on)? Was this so revolutionary that you feel the need to impart this experience onto your friends in their game of magical dwarves and elves?

Likely not.

This is the main issue I find when it comes to dealing with large power discrepancies between PC and NPCs and I try to avoid this when possible when GMing: Higher level NPCs, esp. in games like D&D with it's scaling, usually have abilities or defenses that make mechanical interaction near impossible.

You kinda just have to sit there, bob your head and wait for the GM to finish narrating stuff so you can continue to actually interact with the game world in a meaningful way. Or the GM has failed to properly let you know that his is a thing you shouldn't interact with and get killed because "realism".

I work nearly 50 hours a week doing tech support. All I want to do is pretend I'm a magical elf in a somewhat consistent heroic world. If I cared for realism, I'd go running in the snow outside.

and I probably wouldn't be playing a magical elf.

The office encounter you've described, in which the VIP drags you into a meeting then bosses you around for an extended period of time, is more analogous to using a high-level NPC to railroad the party into a quest. The scenario presented involved the PC's encountering the VIP passing through the office, then challenging him in front of his employees to a competition that the VIP is known to be proficient at. VIP replies that he's unable to do this for play, but that he will put his job on the line against the other employee's. Party member accepts this risk, is humiliated and loses his job while his coworkers look on in awkward silence.

You say that you don't care about realism in the game, and that's perfectly valid. But extending this office metaphor a little further, wouldn't it be a little weird if you went into work and you never encountered managers, VP's, or anyone ranked higher than you until you were promoted to their level?



This encounter is bad because it takes a likely and frankly pretty reasonable solution to the obstacle, and makes it kill you out of nowhere. That kind of red herring encounter design is good in iterative gameplay, where you're expected to lose and lose and lose, and come back again looking at the encounter in unique ways. But that's not the case here. The player doesn't get to respawn with the knowledge of how lethal this knight really is and work a different angle. Instead they just lost, and all of their stuff was stolen and they feel bad. They don't learn to solve encounters through methods other than combat. They learn to be scared of doing to wrong thing in your encounters.
(quick side note, this isn't even combat. It's a joust. It already has a fail state that isn't death. It's losing the joust)
If you really want your players to explore solutions that aren't combat, you need to give them incentive. There are better consequences than player death. Maybe if you hadn't randomly killed that knight on the road and befriended him instead, you'd have a much easier time trying to talk to the king.

The point is, the player was presented with an obstacle and tried a solution. Instead of being given an honest attempt with their solution, they immediately failed and were killed. All because the DM didn't want them trying that solution. If this were reversed, about trying a noncombat solution when the DM wanted a fight, how many would say the encounter was bad?

What obstacle? They met an NPC on the road who they heard was a pretty tough dude and decided to challenge him to a fight because he was there. He wasn't blocking their way, or threatening them or impeding their progress on a quest, he was just there. For all we know, OP was expecting them to try to make a friend, or get some information, or buy a magic item off of the knight. He tried to hint that the knight was above their pay grade without breaking character outright by saying "dude, this isn't a good idea."

For a game where literally everything is just there to be killed, why not just play Grand Theft Auto?

Esprit15
2016-12-31, 04:48 PM
Are we ignoring the part where the knight warns the guy that this will be lethal combat? I feel like that was the DM warning the player IC that this would be dangerous.

As for damage, Just spirited charge, possibly shock trooper (level six seems reasonable for him) easily gets to 60 damage, more on an above average roll.

thirdkingdom
2016-12-31, 05:09 PM
Are we ignoring the part where the knight warns the guy that this will be lethal combat? I feel like that was the DM warning the player IC that this would be dangerous.

As for damage, Just spirited charge, possibly shock trooper (level six seems reasonable for him) easily gets to 60 damage, more on an above average roll.

Yeah, that's an "are you sure you want to do this?" if I've ever heard one.

Berenger
2016-12-31, 05:12 PM
Being (very) good at jousting does not translate into this kind of outlandish amounts of damage.
Seriously? The notion of the most powerful personal weapon on the medieval battlefield wielded by the one of the best warriors of the realm felling a dude in one hit strikes you as outlandish? By the way, it's not called a joust if real lances are used. That's like taking a Desert Eagle loaded with live ammunition, shooting at someones head from a short distance and calling it a paintball match.

Vitruviansquid
2016-12-31, 05:18 PM
I get that it can be difficult to have a handle on power levels in a tabletop RPG about medieval hero guys.

But come on, unless the OP was straight up lying about how that played out, the DM was dropping strong OOC hints that this isn't a good idea. The knight as much says "I'm the best of the best" and then "this is really dangerous, we probably shouldn't do this."

Actana
2016-12-31, 05:22 PM
I'm mostly just concerned about the sort of society where a (presumably) high ranking knight can murder and rob someone just like that and leave the scene with witnesses.

Telok
2016-12-31, 05:24 PM
The encounter interrupts the continuation of the narrative or gamestate (even if it's in service of the narrative or gamestate). It must be resolved to continue the narrative or gamestate.

I think this is part of the disconnect. From my point of view the encounter is the narrative. It's not an interruption or problem, it's the point of the game.

It's like having the characters go see the king and when one of them tries to start a fight and getting beaten down be the guards. Or going to talk to a paranoid archmage and one of the characters casts Charm Person on him and gets blasted by magic defences. It's not a problem that there was a non-combat encounter with a powerful NPC. The only problem is the player deciding that all encounters are level appropriate and therefore can be "solved" by combat.

Berenger
2016-12-31, 05:38 PM
I'm mostly just concerned about the sort of society where a (presumably) high ranking knight can murder and rob someone just like that and leave the scene with witnesses.

It's neither murder (the presumably sane victim literally insisted on being charged with a war lance) nor robbery (the equipment was wagered and lost of the presumably sane victims own accord). The society is probably better off without a lunatic challenging people to lethal fights just for the heck of it.

The Extinguisher
2016-12-31, 05:42 PM
I get that it can be difficult to have a handle on power levels in a tabletop RPG about medieval hero guys.

But come on, unless the OP was straight up lying about how that played out, the DM was dropping strong OOC hints that this isn't a good idea. The knight as much says "I'm the best of the best" and then "this is really dangerous, we probably shouldn't do this."

I don't see it. The knight doesn't actually say they shouldn't do it. All he does is say it's going to be risky, and then offer stakes to compensate for the risk. Honestly that's what bothers me here. Like if the knight had said "I'm not going to do it unless there's something worth winning" and then the player offers the stakes, you as the DM then get to decide if the offered reward is worth the risk. Which also shows off how dangerous the encounter is. If the PC offers a high reward and the knight declines, that means it's going to be dangerous. It's up to the PC to escalate.


I think this is part of the disconnect. From my point of view the encounter is the narrative. It's not an interruption or problem, it's the point of the game.

It's like having the characters go see the king and when one of them tries to start a fight and getting beaten down be the guards. Or going to talk to a paranoid archmage and one of the characters casts Charm Person on him and gets blasted by magic defences. It's not a problem that there was a non-combat encounter with a powerful NPC. The only problem is the player deciding that all encounters are level appropriate and therefore can be "solved" by combat.

Yes, the encounter is the narrative. But from the perspective of the game it interupts the narrative and must be resolved before the narrative to continue. Unless your players have no agency in the encounter and it just plays out on its on in which case I have to ask why is the encounter there?
All encounters should be appropriate for the party. Doesn't mean combat has to always be a viable option, but it should still be appropriate for the party.

Actana
2016-12-31, 05:43 PM
It's neither murder (the presumably sane victim literally insisted on being charged with a war lance) nor robbery (the equipment was wagered and lost of the presumably sane victims own accord). The society is probably better off without a lunatic challenging people to lethal fights just for the heck of it.

Just because you agree that dying is possible doesn't make killing someone and walking away legal. At best it could be considered a duel, but those weren't to the death often and when they were there were legal sanctions to be had (of course, depending on the setting it might differ). But even trials by combat had some sort of legal authority overseeing the duel.

The robbery of gear, on the other hand, sure. I'll grant that it was agreed upon beforehand, but killing someone is still killing someone, whether or not they agreed to it beforehand.

The appropriate response from the knight would be to decline the challenge since he's not a common murderer, and then proceed to go about his merry way because he's above such lunatics.

Berenger
2016-12-31, 05:58 PM
@Actana: That's how modern humanistic ethics work, sure. It's not necessarily how medieval warrior ethos works. But I'll grant you that the knight could have made another decision ("not declining a challenge" may be knightly behaviour, but so are humility and mercy, at least in the ideal case) and I can imagine medieval-ish periods and areas where the described behaviour is a crime as well as those where it is perfectly legal.

thirdkingdom
2016-12-31, 05:58 PM
Yes, the encounter is the narrative. But from the perspective of the game it interupts the narrative and must be resolved before the narrative to continue. Unless your players have no agency in the encounter and it just plays out on its on in which case I have to ask why is the encounter there?
All encounters should be appropriate for the party. Doesn't mean combat has to always be a viable option, but it should still be appropriate for the party.

I literally have no idea what this means.

Actana
2016-12-31, 06:06 PM
@Actana: That's how modern humanistic ethics work, sure. It's not necessarily how medieval warrior ethos works. But I'll grant you that the knight could have made another decision ("not declining a challenge" may be knightly behaviour, but so are humility and mercy, at least in the ideal case) and I can imagine medieval-ish periods and areas where the described behaviour is a crime as well as those where it is perfectly legal.

I'm sure there could be some authentic medieval documents of law to purview on the matter, but I feel that'd be getting a bit too much into something that was meant as a somewhat flippant side comment. :smalltongue:

That said, even medieval law means very little because it's a fantasy setting we're talking about, where such a thing might well be legal. But as I said, I fear for the society where that can happen.

From what I've read though, early honor duels could end with death (even if the opponent surrendered), but by the "high medieval" time (which I'd say most accurately describes the current situation), it wasn't necessarily so. Even then, most duels were not spontaneous things, but planned beforehand at a certain time and place, and often had some legal entity presiding over it to give it the legal authority befit a duel about honor. What was described in this thread sounds more like a simple brawl: both sides just go fight for no reason other than to prove their superiority.

The Extinguisher
2016-12-31, 06:08 PM
I literally have no idea what this means.

It means stuff that happens in a game need to finish happening so the game continues. And since it's a game it happens due to player input. Therefore the players need to find the right input to end the thing that is happening and move on to the next thing. People keep taking issue with words like obstacle and solve and that's all I'm trying to get.

And presenting inputs that are ultimately traps is bad design for role playing games.

Berenger
2016-12-31, 06:09 PM
@Actana: I can basically agree with that assassment.

Vinyadan
2016-12-31, 06:25 PM
Following a bit of Antana's thought, I once read a question somewhere about a hypothetical boxer who kills whoever he punches in one punch, and the person asking wondered how this boxer would have fared. The answer was that laws didn't matter much in this case: this person would probably have never wished to boxe again, after the first two matches, because people who like boxing normally don't like killing their opponent.
I think that this could have been the case here. A jouster practicing a non lethal sport would probably have been extremely distressed at the idea of fighting a lethal fight "4 da lulz". So while the challenger was a weirdo, the knight probably also wasn't exactly normal.

This is just a hint for future characterization, anyway. In D&D you just say "swap lethal and non lethal damage", and it doesn't seem to do much, because the mechanics don't really change. If you try to represent this situation in your mind, however, it's really, really, really different. It's like meeting a national fencing champion and challenging him with real smallswords.

Vitruviansquid
2016-12-31, 06:29 PM
Following a bit of Antana's thought, I once read a question somewhere about a hypothetical boxer who kills whoever he punches in one punch, and the person asking wondered how this boxer would have fared. The answer was that laws didn't matter much in this case: this person would probably have never wished to boxe again, after the first two matches, because people who like boxing normally don't like killing their opponent.
I think that this could have been the case here. A jouster practicing a non lethal sport would probably have been extremely distressed at the idea of fighting a lethal fight "4 da lulz". So while the challenger was a weirdo, the knight probably also wasn't exactly normal.

This is just a hint for future characterization, anyway. In D&D you just say "swap lethal and non lethal damage", and it doesn't seem to do much, because the mechanics don't really change. If you try to represent this situation in your mind, however, it's really, really, really different. It's like meeting a national fencing champion and challenging him with real smallswords.

I suspect it's different in a culture with a medieval warrior ethos, but even if not historical, this is a thing in a lot of genre fiction.

Miyamoto Musashi was reputed to be harassed by people challenging him to deadly duels just to show they were better swordsmen than he was fairly often.

The name of the phenomenon escapes me, but I believe it's also a thing for knights to set up camp on the side of roads and challenge random knightly passersby to fairly dangerous contests for the love of fighting. In fiction at least, these contests can get pretty bloody, and to be fair to the OP's scenario, it was mentioned that actually using lethal lances in this sort of random contest was somewhat different from norm for the jouster.

Koo Rehtorb
2016-12-31, 06:34 PM
In Arthurian legend it is totally a common thing for random knights to challenge each other to potentially lethal duels. The honourable thing is to accept their yield if they offer it, but people dying is common and accepted. Declining this duel would probably have been outright cowardly and dishonourable.

At least if the PC was someone with at least some social standing. He would have been within his rights to decline a duel with some peasant woodsman.

Actana
2016-12-31, 06:38 PM
The name of the phenomenon escapes me, but I believe it's also a thing for knights to set up camp on the side of roads and challenge random knightly passersby to fairly dangerous contests for the love of fighting. In fiction at least, these contests can get pretty bloody, and to be fair to the OP's scenario, it was mentioned that actually using lethal lances in this sort of random contest was somewhat different from norm for the jouster.

Pas d'armes? (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pas_d%27armes)

PersonMan
2016-12-31, 06:39 PM
Yes, the encounter is the narrative. But from the perspective of the game it interupts the narrative and must be resolved before the narrative to continue.

I disagree on this one; it's a matter of playstyle. For some people, the narrative isn't just "X heroes do Y quest to stop Z evil" but also "characters XYZ travel and meet characters ABC (who are NPCs) and interesting things happen". A genre difference, one could say - fantasy slice of life mixed with adventure/action vs a more "pure" action/adventure setup, where "you meet a random guy on the road" is an interruption.



All encounters should be appropriate for the party. Doesn't mean combat has to always be a viable option, but it should still be appropriate for the party.

I think a key part of this is the definition of 'appropriate', and the communication of the factors in play.

If combat is/is not a viable option, is this communicated well? More importantly, do the people on the other end think so? Different people expect different things; the 'no, don't mess with him' of player A is the 'put him in the ground I believe in you' of player B.

Vitruviansquid
2016-12-31, 07:14 PM
Pas d'armes? (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pas_d%27armes)

Ah yes. That.

Slipperychicken
2016-12-31, 07:17 PM
Protip: The best way to livend a long time as a duelist*? Don't pick fights with every Tom, **** and Harry you see.

*Also applicable to adventurers, which was kinda the point of the OP.

I think dueling everyone is fine. You just don't want to make them all death-matches. You know, because you can die in a death-match!


That's just how it works: you can have friendly less-lethal duels whenever you like, but save the death matches for when you actually want to put your life on the line. I find it depressing that this needs to be said at all, as it should be blisteringly obvious.

thirdkingdom
2016-12-31, 08:11 PM
It means stuff that happens in a game need to finish happening so the game continues. And since it's a game it happens due to player input. Therefore the players need to find the right input to end the thing that is happening and move on to the next thing. People keep taking issue with words like obstacle and solve and that's all I'm trying to get.

And presenting inputs that are ultimately traps is bad design for role playing games.

Just out of curiosity, what kind of tabletop rpgs do you normally play?

thirdkingdom
2016-12-31, 08:12 PM
I think dueling everyone is fine. You just don't want to make them all death-matches. You know, because you can die in a death-match!


That's just how it works: you can have friendly less-lethal duels whenever you like, but save the death matches for when you actually want to put your life on the line. I find it depressing that this needs to be said at all, as it should be blisteringly obvious.

Er, my point really wasn't really about duelists.

John Longarrow
2016-12-31, 08:38 PM
My point seems to have gotten away from everyone (including myself really). This isn't about combat, or player death or anything. It's about not leading players into traps. About not punishing players when they try something you didn't want them to. And about creating encounters that are appropriate to the players, both in terms of difficulty and in approach.

Dude, can you run a game then? I wanna take a first level fighter, go challenge every lord/king/ruler around, and go on to take over the world!! I get to cuz every thing is a "Level appropriate encounter"!! KEWL!!

I wanna I wanna I wanna for the lulz!!

More seriously, if you are saying "DM probably should have made it more obvious that the knight was more powerful, especially in their chosen style of combat" that is a fairly reasonable statement. To say "Every encounter needs to be level appropriate in any way the characters interact with it" is to support the blue text above.

More important, if you assume that anything the players try should be equally viable as a solution to any encounter, you've just supported one of the previous posts involving growing and shrinking mountains. You've also defined a game that is going to get really boring since everything is 'level appropriate' in any way its approached, so leveling (or choosing anything besides "Kill it/Talk to it/climb it/<insert preferred solution here>" is equally valid. Pretty much a "Roll a die, if its over N you win, otherwise you lose".

Hawkstar
2016-12-31, 08:43 PM
On the duelist analogy... Do you know how famous duelists get famous? By beating other duelists who challenge them, whether they're famous or not. Except here's the thing - The world doesn't care which duelist wins. They're both fighting for fame, fortune, and their lives. Being a PC doesn't guarantee victory in a duel - for every Duelist who gets famous for defeating another famous duelist, there are dozens or hundreds dead or disgraced trying the same damn thing.

And for the jousting knight - The man is a knight. Not some pansy sport performer (Though that may be his hobby) - A knight. An armed, honorable professional soldier. He is comfortable with killing in circumstances where they're warranted. Y'all are also talking about honor duels - Most duels actually were to the death, and sanctioned as such. The entire purpose of a duel is to settle an unsettlable difference, or right an unrightable wrong. Challenging someone to a duel is very much a case of saying "I'll let this happen over my dead body," and meaning it (And also saying "This is a matter I care so much about that I will put my life on the line for it"). The loser of such a duel loses their life, but retains their prestige, standing, and honor (which are more important and valuable than individual life itself. A concept hard to grasp with modern morals).

And yes, Lances are "One hit, one kill" weapons. That's they're whole point. That said, D&D doesn't really have rules for handling the simultaneous, "Aim to dismount instead of kill" nature of a joust.

thirdkingdom
2016-12-31, 09:19 PM
On the duelist analogy... Do you know how famous duelists get famous? By beating other duelists who challenge them, whether they're famous or not. Except here's the thing - The world doesn't care which duelist wins. They're both fighting for fame, fortune, and their lives. Being a PC doesn't guarantee victory in a duel - for every Duelist who gets famous for defeating another famous duelist, there are dozens or hundreds dead or disgraced trying the same damn thing.

And for the jousting knight - The man is a knight. Not some pansy sport performer (Though that may be his hobby) - A knight. An armed, honorable professional soldier. He is comfortable with killing in circumstances where they're warranted. Y'all are also talking about honor duels - Most duels actually were to the death, and sanctioned as such. The entire purpose of a duel is to settle an unsettlable difference, or right an unrightable wrong. Challenging someone to a duel is very much a case of saying "I'll let this happen over my dead body," and meaning it (And also saying "This is a matter I care so much about that I will put my life on the line for it"). The loser of such a duel loses their life, but retains their prestige, standing, and honor (which are more important and valuable than individual life itself. A concept hard to grasp with modern morals).

And yes, Lances are "One hit, one kill" weapons. That's they're whole point. That said, D&D doesn't really have rules for handling the simultaneous, "Aim to dismount instead of kill" nature of a joust.

BECMI Companion Set, DM's Guide, p. 7.

SilverLeaf167
2016-12-31, 10:24 PM
BECMI Companion Set, DM's Guide, p. 7.

That's for Basic D&D (or something similarly ancient), right? How applicable is it for later editions? Not very, I'd imagine.

thirdkingdom
2016-12-31, 10:38 PM
That's for Basic D&D (or something similarly ancient), right? How applicable is it for later editions? Not very, I'd imagine.

Why would you think it wouldn't be applicable?

SilverLeaf167
2016-12-31, 10:45 PM
Why would you think it wouldn't be applicable?

Not for any specific reason. I'm just under the general impression that there have been pretty massive changes to the rules over the decades (that's why they're different editions, after all)... especially combat rules like AC and such.

If they are applicable (I don't exactly have the book on hand), cool.

The Extinguisher
2016-12-31, 11:04 PM
Just out of curiosity, what kind of tabletop rpgs do you normally play?

I've done my fair share of D&D 3.5 and up, as well as Firefly, Nobilis, and I did a small campaign in one of the Warhammer 40k systems but I can't remember which ones

Quertus
2017-01-01, 03:25 PM
It's true that a dragon is unlikely to engage in exhilarating conversation with a low-level guy, but still, even then, interaction is possible, even if something like this:



One may, again, say it's meaningless, but think how much better the memory of this little moment makes them feel when 12 levels later they slay that same dragon! Running away from X and later being able to defeat X is a kind of measure of character growth.


Duelist not as a class, no. Duelist as a profession in the world however, are what they are because they challenge people to duels, fight in tournements, get in fights to gain more fame and prestige etc. etc. And they aren't going to challenge someone that doesn't fight duels to one, so it is certainly possible in theory for them to have other encounters. Duelists didn't exactly go out of their way to go duel a duck for example.

Not a low level guy - a multi-world published famous author! And one who clearly telegraphs that defeating him would earn a dragon all the cred of stepping on a duck. :smallwink:

Quertus has written special thanks in the forward of his book to the various dragons who have contributed to the updated version. He certainly hasn't gone and hunted them down to kill them. Although, if I still gamed with any of those DMs, I suppose that would be an interesting plot twist, if the BBEG turned out to be one of the dragons who Quertus previously interacted amicably with. Heck, AFAIK, Quertus has never had a combat encounter against a dragon. He has fought a couple of dragon-shaped demons, some undead dragons, several drolems, a mechanical dragon, and some beings polymorphed into dragons, but every real dragon he's encountered this far has enjoyed parlay and flattery. So even being forced to fight an actual dragon would itself would feel odd.


As much as I enjoy the idea of this, it occurs to me that what happens when you show your players everything isn't level-appropriate encounters is they'll start to prepare for everything as if they are level-inappropriate encounters.

And I can't think of very much that would be worse for me as a GM than that.

... Or maybe they'll work on learning skills with which to evaluate the world? Skills like listening to the DM's not so subtle hints?


I think this is great, and am also of the opinion that the game world should be a living, dynamic place where the PCs decide what is a "Level Appropriate Encounter". Good DMs leave clues (such as the fact that the knight won the King's jousting tournament), good players pick up on said clues.

IMO, better players realize that not all DMs leave clues, and actively attempt to a) determine whether a given DM does; b) have the skills to gather the necessary Intel even under DMs who do not leave clues.

That's the kind of thing I mean when I talk about building player skills.


This is more an argument for telegraphing danger than anything. In the story in the OP the character in question had just explicitly won the king's jousting tournament. Other comparably obvious examples I've seen was a player who decided it was a good idea to get into a dogfight with a small strike craft, while they had a jetpack and a rifle - after provoking said fight by engaging in an act of fairly unsubtle sabotage on a critical part of the planetary geoengineering system. Similarly there have been cases where the PCs come into contact with things that don't even approach their league, like when this same group was doing mercenary work for a small merchant and decided to hop into a known ambush. Said ambush was a couple of space pirates in small fighters expecting to deal with a merchant vessel, they got a warship and it went roughly as it sounds like it would. The paranoia doesn't tend to crop up in the context of just running a world, only with GMs being killer GMs as some sort of philosophical thing.


That's one way to look at it. On the other hand, there are tons of situations where normal people go out of their way to meet people much better known (and often more accomplished) than they are. Say you're a musician, maybe you're in some sort of local band, and someone who is an absolute legend at playing your instrument comes to town. That's a High Level NPC Encounter IRL right there, and yet every musician I know looks forward to that sort of thing.

If your players aren't looking forward to encountering level-inappropriate high level NPCs, you're probably doing something wrong.


You're not going to be a very famous duelist with that kind of attitude, you may as well go plant turnips instead.

I'm not even being that sarcastic here. There are people who fight hundreds of duels either against people at the top of the profession and against many, many people trying to prove they can beat him. You can't really earn any renown as a duelist if you only fight weaklings.

Hundreds of lethal duels? Against level-appropriate challenges? Really? Hmmm... If you have a 50/50 chance of surviving reach duel, that's less than a 1/1000 chance of surviving 10 duels. For 100? That'd be less than one in 1*10^30. Which, to put that into perspective, if, for every single human on the planet, we created an entire new copy of Earth, then, for each inhabitant of those billions of copy Earths, we created a while new Earth... And set up each of those copy copy inhabitants up with 100 "CR appropriate" lethal duels... We still wouldn't expect any of them to survive, let alone for multiple to succeed, for there to be people with that claim to fame.

Oh, wait, you said hundreds. Plural. That's over 1*10^30 times less likely. Ok, so for each of those copy copy inhabitants...

Yeah, no.

Mr Beer
2017-01-01, 03:45 PM
Hundreds of lethal duels? Against level-appropriate challenges? Really? Hmmm... If you have a 50/50 chance of surviving reach duel, that's less than a 1/1000 chance of surviving 10 duels. For 100? That'd be less than one in 1*10^30. Which, to put that into perspective, if, for every single human on the planet, we created an entire new copy of Earth, then, for each inhabitant of those billions of copy Earths, we created a while new Earth... And set up each of those copy copy inhabitants up with 100 "CR appropriate" lethal duels... We still wouldn't expect any of them to survive, let alone for multiple to succeed, for there to be people with that claim to fame.

Oh, wait, you said hundreds. Plural. That's over 1*10^30 times less likely. Ok, so for each of those copy copy inhabitants...

Yeah, no.

As you've demonstrated here, certainly no-one ever fought even one hundred fights which were a) to the death and b) against someone as competent as themselves and c) a 'fair fight'. There has to be a significant skill disparity involved and probably rules preventing automatic death to the loser (e.g. options to yield, fight to first blood etc.) plus likely just getting lucky sometimes.

thirdkingdom
2017-01-01, 03:55 PM
Not for any specific reason. I'm just under the general impression that there have been pretty massive changes to the rules over the decades (that's why they're different editions, after all)... especially combat rules like AC and such.

If they are applicable (I don't exactly have the book on hand), cool.

Mechanically it's pretty simple. The two contestants charge each other and make to-hit rolls. If a contestant is hit they make an appropriate save (Wands, in this case) to avoid being unseated. First one to three hits win. So, it's possible that both contestants are unseated at the same time, only one is, or neither, but the important thing is to score a hit. Not complicated (there are additional rules for who can challenge who, etc.), but I was more looking to make the point that there *are* rules for jousting in D&D. I'm sure a game like Pendragon has more involved rules.

Koo Rehtorb
2017-01-01, 04:14 PM
This is a total tangent, but it suddenly strikes me as odd that jousting would use initiative at all. It's not about reacting faster at all, really. Both people are going to hit each other at pretty much the same time.

Jousting should probably use simultaneous attacks.

hamishspence
2017-01-01, 04:15 PM
For 3.5 ed, Complete Warrior had rules for jousting with blunted lances. A blunted lance always does nonlethal damage, and if it hits the jouster can choose to either make a trip attack to unseat the rider (normally lances don't get that) or a sunder attempt at the target's weapon or shield. The Ride By Attack feat granting a +4 bonus to attack rolls in a joust.

Neither the sunder attempt nor the trip attack will provoke an attack of opportunity, unlike in normal combat.

It's worth remembering that a DC5 Ride check to "stay in saddle" after being damaged (possibly including nonlethal) while mounted, may be necessary even without the intentional unseating attempt.

goatmeal
2017-01-01, 04:36 PM
If I would think about it this way, I would be thinking wrong.

You seem to use "interact" as a synonym for "fight", or otherwise engage in numeric interplay, when side A compares its statistics to side B, with some random numbers added for a good measure, and an outcome is thus created.

If we take a slightly less narrow view of the word 'interact', we can immediately see that, indeed, they could interact with him in a variety of ways. They could ask for the latest court gossip. They could ask about his travels. They could flatter him on his victory, so that the next time he saw them, he would remember them and put a good word for them at court. They could share the story of their own travels, possibly pointing out places of interest. They could fed him with false information, hoping to lead him into a trap with the intent to loot his corpse later. Speaking of fighting, they could have attacked him all together (he was decidedly stronger than any individual party member, of course, but not decidedly stronger than all of them together, especially if taken by surprise). Or, they could have just ignored him and be on their way.

To say that the 'only thing it can do is bait a player into getting their character killed' is an extremely narrow view of the situation.

Very much agree with this.

Also, I think having a time to run away adds value to the story. This often occurs in the 2nd act of the story so the protagonist can come back victorious in the 3rd act. Many successful stories/movies/etc use this formula, why not do the same in an RPG? In fact, with leveling, it almost encourages this. The key is to be very clear to the players that this is a possibility for the game.

Frozen_Feet
2017-01-01, 05:09 PM
I think the thread title is a bit odd, because a similar scenario could've happened even if the combatants were equal level, or even if the player character was higher level.

For example, the NPC might've rolled a critical hit, and the PC might've rolled 1 (an automatic fail) on their massive damage save, leading to the same result.

So the lesson is less "don't expect all encounters to be level-appropriate" and more "if you take risks, don't always expect to win".

John Longarrow
2017-01-01, 11:53 PM
Traveling the wilderness, the PCs met with a certain knight and his retainers. One PC was proficient in Knowledge (Nobility and Royalty), and was told he remembers this knight as a winner of the King's Jousting Tournament. Another PC, upon hearing this, immediately decided to challenge the knight to a joust.

Knight: "I don't carry my tourney lance with me."
Player: "Excuses already?"
Knight: "No excuses, I'm just saying, my lance is a combat weapon. Not the blunted one I use for tourneys."
Player: "Haha, what a coincidence, so is mine!"
Knight: "If risk of fatality is to be accepted, I must have an incentive to fight. Winner takes loser's gear?"
Player: "Hell yeah!"

They get on their horses, charge each other, knight wins initiative and deals 85 damage. The PC only had 30-something hit points. The knight promptly proceeds to undress the dead PC, take all his gear and money as the rest of the party is too scared to intervene, and rides away, dropping a small purse with 10 gp.

"Funeral expenses."

Couple questions that should help explain exactly what happened in context:
1) What was the PC's build? ie. was their character a dedicated mounted charger build?
2) How well known is this kings tourney?
3) Did you explain the mechanics of how you'd run the joust to the player and give them an option to retract their challenge if they didn't like it?

Knaight
2017-01-02, 03:36 AM
As you've demonstrated here, certainly no-one ever fought even one hundred fights which were a) to the death and b) against someone as competent as themselves and c) a 'fair fight'. There has to be a significant skill disparity involved and probably rules preventing automatic death to the loser (e.g. options to yield, fight to first blood etc.) plus likely just getting lucky sometimes.

For instance, in this particular context there's the matter of using blunted lances.

RazorChain
2017-01-02, 09:27 AM
Just because you agree that dying is possible doesn't make killing someone and walking away legal. At best it could be considered a duel, but those weren't to the death often and when they were there were legal sanctions to be had (of course, depending on the setting it might differ). But even trials by combat had some sort of legal authority overseeing the duel.

The robbery of gear, on the other hand, sure. I'll grant that it was agreed upon beforehand, but killing someone is still killing someone, whether or not they agreed to it beforehand.

The appropriate response from the knight would be to decline the challenge since he's not a common murderer, and then proceed to go about his merry way because he's above such lunatics.

People died in medieval tournaments and there were no legal repercussions. In the 12th century the church tried to ban tournaments and threatened that those who died wouldnt get a christian burial.

So in essence if you died nobody did anything about it other than throwing you unceremoniously into a ditch.

I really dont think anyone would care about the PC's fate unless he was of higher nobility.

Berenger
2017-01-02, 09:38 AM
So in essence if you died nobody did anything about it other than throwing you unceremoniously into a ditch.

Except that it is highly unlikely that a nobleman with any remaining relatives or retainers is "unceremoniously into a ditch" and it's also highly unlikely that there is no priest available that is willing to ignore that particular decision of the church.

Yukitsu
2017-01-02, 02:47 PM
Very much agree with this.

Also, I think having a time to run away adds value to the story. This often occurs in the 2nd act of the story so the protagonist can come back victorious in the 3rd act. Many successful stories/movies/etc use this formula, why not do the same in an RPG? In fact, with leveling, it almost encourages this. The key is to be very clear to the players that this is a possibility for the game.

Because if an encounter is dangerous, it's usually faster than the party or it can kill them from longer range and if it can't, it can be killed from long range making it unnecessary to run from it. I never bother trying to run if we are already in a fight with something and it's clear that it's higher level than us because I have a higher chance to win the fight than I have of running away. If the DM is just letting players get away that needs to be directly stated out of character, otherwise our party is just gonna have to let their 20 move speed dwarf cleric get killed.

goatmeal
2017-01-02, 04:17 PM
Because if an encounter is dangerous, it's usually faster than the party or it can kill them from longer range and if it can't, it can be killed from long range making it unnecessary to run from it. I never bother trying to run if we are already in a fight with something and it's clear that it's higher level than us because I have a higher chance to win the fight than I have of running away. If the DM is just letting players get away that needs to be directly stated out of character, otherwise our party is just gonna have to let their 20 move speed dwarf cleric get killed.

Of course it’s important to communicate this stuff OOC with the players. Especially these days when everyone expects they can just bash every challenge to death in order to win as opposed to finding other ways of overcoming a challenge.

It’s also important not to overdo it and provide escape mechanisms for them when designing the encounter. Maybe put the dragon in a chamber with an exit that it is too big to enter. Maybe the Ettin on the other side of the lake won’t chase them if they let it get the deer they just killed. Maybe the pirates won’t pursue if the PCs jump overboard during a mutiny. These are some things I’ve used in my games. Again, important not to use these things too much for the sake of avoiding railroading, but they can provide greater satisfaction when the PCs are able to come back later and fight something they once ran away from.

Yukitsu
2017-01-02, 04:27 PM
Of course it’s important to communicate this stuff OOC with the players. Especially these days when everyone expects they can just bash every challenge to death in order to win as opposed to finding other ways of overcoming a challenge.

It’s also important not to overdo it and provide escape mechanisms for them when designing the encounter. Maybe put the dragon in a chamber with an exit that it is too big to enter. Maybe the Ettin on the other side of the lake won’t chase them if they let it get the deer they just killed. Maybe the pirates won’t pursue if the PCs jump overboard during a mutiny. These are some things I’ve used in my games. Again, important not to use these things too much for the sake of avoiding railroading, but they can provide greater satisfaction when the PCs are able to come back later and fight something they once ran away from.

I still find those encounters to be flat out boring since it's just then the DM telling us what to do, I might as well just go play a video game if the DM is just telling us "do X or die." up until the point where we can again do something meaningful.

I don't mind less combat encounters but running away from fights is never interesting since the only way you can come to that conclusion is either through deus ex machina or out of character the DM flat out telling you he'll let it work. Similarly, I don't particularly get excited coming back and beating a difficult encounter later in the game simply because it's no longer a difficult fight, it sort of tells me my numbers have gotten higher but because they have, it's become a less interesting fight. Certainly the game to me is more interesting when the DM expects the party to have to fight and win against odds that are heavily stacked against them.

goatmeal
2017-01-02, 05:30 PM
Obviously we have different perspectives. Good thing there is more than 1 way to play the game.

Noje
2017-01-02, 06:47 PM
I still find those encounters to be flat out boring since it's just then the DM telling us what to do, I might as well just go play a video game if the DM is just telling us "do X or die." up until the point where we can again do something meaningful.

I don't mind less combat encounters but running away from fights is never interesting since the only way you can come to that conclusion is either through deus ex machina or out of character the DM flat out telling you he'll let it work. Similarly, I don't particularly get excited coming back and beating a difficult encounter later in the game simply because it's no longer a difficult fight, it sort of tells me my numbers have gotten higher but because they have, it's become a less interesting fight. Certainly the game to me is more interesting when the DM expects the party to have to fight and win against odds that are heavily stacked against them.

Wait, your first statement was that you do not like binary decisions in TTRPGs, which is totally fair. But then you go on to say any fight that you have to run away from is not interesting, which is literally "defeat your opponent or die," which uses the formula that you said yourself negates the point of an rpg. Just saying, it's a tad contradictory

Running away or avoiding combat is a totally legitimate strategy (and sometimes strategically superior to fighting) for players to take in many situations. Especially at low levels, where a few bad dice rolls can completely change the tides of a battle, it is perfectly acceptable to run. When going through long dungeon crawls, it is smart to avoid enemies when you can to conserve your HP, which is a limited resource. The DM is not at fault if his players decide to run. Honestly I find it more exciting on both fronts. A game where all combats have to end in one side subduing the other sounds more videogamey to me.

You can run the game however you want two, and if you're having fun with it that's great. But some ways of running the game are better than others. Yours is functional, but seems very restrictive on what kind of encounters the DM can produce and what actions the players can make.

Yukitsu
2017-01-03, 02:45 AM
Wait, your first statement was that you do not like binary decisions in TTRPGs, which is totally fair. But then you go on to say any fight that you have to run away from is not interesting, which is literally "defeat your opponent or die," which uses the formula that you said yourself negates the point of an rpg. Just saying, it's a tad contradictory

Running away or avoiding combat is a totally legitimate strategy (and sometimes strategically superior to fighting) for players to take in many situations. Especially at low levels, where a few bad dice rolls can completely change the tides of a battle, it is perfectly acceptable to run. When going through long dungeon crawls, it is smart to avoid enemies when you can to conserve your HP, which is a limited resource. The DM is not at fault if his players decide to run. Honestly I find it more exciting on both fronts. A game where all combats have to end in one side subduing the other sounds more videogamey to me.

You can run the game however you want two, and if you're having fun with it that's great. But some ways of running the game are better than others. Yours is functional, but seems very restrictive on what kind of encounters the DM can produce and what actions the players can make.

I don't like that, but it's a consequence of a system where generally you have 3 scenarios.

1: You are faster than your opponent and they do not have longer range than you or equal range to you (this includes range because of terrain constraints).
This encounter is never above your ability to beat. You move to beyond their range and use your superior ranged attacks to kill your opponent.

2: You are faster than your opponent but have inferior range.
This encounter you lose as combat in most RPGs favour attacks enough that you are more likely to die running. If you would survive enough rounds to escape the superior range of your opponent, you can most often beat them anyway. Sometimes it's valid to run in this scenario but it's often not clear that it is since the offense of your opponent that you are fleeing from clearly isn't enough to kill you too quickly, it simply is a question of how many rounds you would take to kill it. Beholders are a prime example of this in my groups I've played in and I personally favour fighting them, even if we're really low level compared to it.

3: You are slower than your opponent.
This is self explanatory.

The biggest problem I have is that more difficult encounters often take point 1 as a given and grant higher level encounters more options for speed and range making it less likely for me to think I can escape from an encounter that's more difficult. Running should be a valid option but I find in practice it's often a more dangerous one than simply fighting. Some DMs however seem willing to allow players easier escapes than I feel is reasonable since they sort of just completely disregard any abilities the enemy may have to chase down a fleeing opponent.

In other words, you're generally setting players up for a binary scenario if you are putting them into combat situations against more powerful opponents. I don't necessarily think that powerful beings are always a problem, the knight in the OP isn't really a problem. The problem is asking yourself what you've put them in the world for. Most DMs simply put them in because they add to some sense of it being a living world so they're largely a form of set dressing, they aren't really meant to be fully interacted with. This makes them fine if sometimes put in but I honestly don't think they should be used very often. To me, it's less of a living world and more an MMO if there's loads of high powered people around and I would bet a lot of players start to question why they're bothering doing any of the quests if so many others are that much better than them.

Zombimode
2017-01-03, 03:48 AM
Because if an encounter is dangerous, it's usually faster than the party or it can kill them from longer range and if it can't, it can be killed from long range making it unnecessary to run from it. I never bother trying to run if we are already in a fight with something and it's clear that it's higher level than us because I have a higher chance to win the fight than I have of running away. If the DM is just letting players get away that needs to be directly stated out of character, otherwise our party is just gonna have to let their 20 move speed dwarf cleric get killed.

I think your assumption on what constitutes a dangerous Encounter and what possibilities there are for escape are wrong.

Having higher Speed and/or longer range doesn't mean you can win (Terrain constrains, resistance to the parties ranged attacks, good enough Regeneration/fast heal).
Also, in D&D, move and attacking at range will get you one move Action away from the target, while a Charge can cover two move Actions.

Being slower then your opponents doesn't mean that you can't escape. You can used the Terrain or abilities to slow the enemy down. You can use means of escape that don't depend on Speed, like Teleportation, Invisibility, Fly etc. Or you can disengage because you think that the enemy will not pursue you.
Especially in D&D which you seem to Play there are many Encounter Setups where escaping is both possible and a useful tactical Option.

Yukitsu
2017-01-03, 03:58 AM
I think your assumption on what constitutes a dangerous Encounter and what possibilities there are for escape are wrong.

Having higher Speed and/or longer range doesn't mean you can win (Terrain constrains, resistance to the parties ranged attacks, good enough Regeneration/fast heal).
Also, in D&D, move and attacking at range will get you one move Action away from the target, while a Charge can cover two move Actions.

Being slower then your opponents doesn't mean that you can't escape. You can used the Terrain or abilities to slow the enemy down. You can use means of escape that don't depend on Speed, like Teleportation, Invisibility, Fly etc. Or you can disengage because you think that the enemy will not pursue you.
Especially in D&D which you seem to Play there are many Encounter Setups where escaping is both possible and a useful tactical Option.

I can't honestly think of any encounter in D&D that is slow, doesn't have ranged attacks yet has enough DR, regen and fast heal to out pace a typical adventuring party's long range damage. Even at the extreme end of things, you're going to need to do just over 20 damage a round.

If I'm faster, I can opt to full run a round, then move/fire. If I'm faster, there will be some ratio of full run to move fire or full run then full attack which will work. Also, if the party start running in slightly different directions, then several can simply opt to full attack every round.

Most of my characters and most characters I've seen played are not immune to terrain, hence if I'm using it to slow an enemy, I will be slowed as well.

Teleportation does work some of the time but the others only really help yourself or a few others. I basically don't consider it a good tactical option to lose 3-4 party members, escape invisibly by myself or through the air and leave the entire remaining party behind. Also, if you have someone that flies and that's enough of an excuse to escape, you can often also use flight to win the encounter. I don't think it's a great idea to rely on teleport as your only option for the party as a DM however.

It's not too hard to get 1-2 players in a group of 4 to escape, but I think it's a bit awful to cut the party in half and then have those players sitting out of things just because you think it's fair to kill half the party just so the other half can retreat.

Volthawk
2017-01-03, 04:54 AM
A thought I had looking at this: It's kinda hard to judge a lot of encounters from a PC's perspective as regards to whether they're fair/appropriate or not. I mean, a lot of monsters are fairly easy - bigger and more savage-looking is worse - but even then when you've got some levels it's hard to guess where you are. This is especially worse with more humanoid enemies, whether people with class levels or stuff like undead.

One part of dealing with this is knowing the kind of class level range of the world - this is especially relevant here. I mean, sticking with D&D for ease, I know of settings where people at level 5 or 6 are the bigshots, and other settings where you get stuff like a level 20 commoner. Depending on that, these PCs who I guess are level 4 could be either fairly up there or still basically peons. In the former setting, the PC would expect to perhaps be outclassed, but still not annihilated, while in the latter setting what did they expect.

The issue really is that this issue is the kind of thing where mitigating it can fall on everyone involved, on both sides of the table. Yes, it's fairly a part of the DM's role to make sure the PCs are enjoying themselves and aren't gonna feel screwed over due to miscommunication, but at the same time most systems give PCs tools to learn - lore skills, some kind of assessment skill, stuff like that. There's also the issue that different system have different degrees you can punch above your weight - I mean, compare a system like D&D where a high level guy can be a pincushion for a level 1 dude's bow to a more lethal one like standard GURPS, where humans don't get too much more robust and Mr spec ops badass still goes down after a few bullets to the brain.

In this particular situation, I can see some differences in perception/uncertainty over the threat presented by the knight, and at least in my opinion the knight talking about the combat being potentially lethal doesn't automatically imply that the PCs gonna get rapidly murderised. I mean, I can see that being just as valid a statement in any version of the fight. If it was a fair fight, then it's saying "this is the kind of fight that can go both ways so you have a chance of getting hurt badly", or if the situation was perfectly reversed, it's saying "you have a good chance of killing a knight, can you seal with the circumstances?". It's a messy kind of thing, really, that ultimately just boils down into a mismatch in communication and expectations.

Knaight
2017-01-03, 04:57 AM
Because if an encounter is dangerous, it's usually faster than the party or it can kill them from longer range and if it can't, it can be killed from long range making it unnecessary to run from it. I never bother trying to run if we are already in a fight with something and it's clear that it's higher level than us because I have a higher chance to win the fight than I have of running away. If the DM is just letting players get away that needs to be directly stated out of character, otherwise our party is just gonna have to let their 20 move speed dwarf cleric get killed.
That's not an issue with running away in general, it's an issue with how chases are implemented in D&D specifically. Even within that context though, there's potentially a lot more variety than this. If someone is generally slower but capable of extreme jumps, they might be able to escape by going up on top of something (a ledge on a mountain, a building in a city, whatever); similar things apply to swimming, climbing, etc. Pursuers may only be willing to go so far. I would argue that pursuit is often neglected in RPGs, but that doesn't mean it's not a viable option.

This is all besides the point in this particular example - the knight was dangerous, they weren't hostile.

Zombimode
2017-01-03, 05:07 AM
I can't honestly think of any encounter in D&D that is slow, doesn't have ranged attacks yet has enough DR, regen and fast heal to out pace a typical adventuring party's long range damage. Even at the extreme end of things, you're going to need to do just over 20 damage a round.

Any Encounter where one side can simply block Line of Sight or Line of Effect to nullify the other side's ranged attacks. And this is not a contrivance. Any enclosed space will do, which is pretty much every Terrain besides a flat huge featureless plain.


If I'm faster, I can opt to full run a round, then move/fire. If I'm faster, there will be some ratio of full run to move fire or full run then full attack which will work. Also, if the party start running in slightly different directions, then several can simply opt to full attack every round.

Are we fighting on a featureless plain again?


Most of my characters and most characters I've seen played are not immune to terrain, hence if I'm using it to slow an enemy, I will be slowed as well.

Blocking a passage. Using passage that is large enough for your Party, but not large enough for the enemy. Creating hindering effects (like Web).
Also, yes, abilities that let you ignore harmful Terrain effects are usefull in part because they create new Avenues for escape.


Teleportation does work some of the time but the others only really help yourself or a few others. I basically don't consider it a good tactical option to lose 3-4 party members, escape invisibly by myself or through the air and leave the entire remaining party behind. Also, if you have someone that flies and that's enough of an excuse to escape, you can often also use flight to win the encounter. I don't think it's a great idea to rely on teleport as your only option for the party as a DM however.

I don't know what Kind of teleportation you are thinking of, but the usual spells and powers all teleport the whole Group.
Also, escapes can be coordinated. There might be a particularly fast Party member. There are Party members with invisbility powers. Also, there are potions. 2nd Level potions are cheap. There is no reason not to give one Invisibility Potion to every Party member.

The bottom line is: D&D is a Group effort. Planing for different tactical situations in advance, and that include plans for escape, is something both possible and important.
I agree that if your Group never talks about the possibility of escape and makes no plans whatsoever, then an escape with the whole Group is not likely to succeed. But thats a fault of the Group, not a lack of Option in the game.


Edit: You know, in Addition of talking about escape in General Terms I will provide a recent example from my latest session:

Eberron, Sharn. The Mission was to Infiltrate the headquaters of an upstart business with suspected crime activities. We went in, found what we needed and bailed out. Sadly this "bailing out" didn't went as smoothly and we set of the Alarm.
As we passed the Exit, the following were on our tails, in various distances: a very angry hobgoblin artificer, several squads of goblin and hobgoblin guards and a Minotaur. My 3rd Level Hexbalde and the 4th Level Rogue would have been hoplessly outmatched in a fight.

Since we were not faster then our pursuers and our pursuers had some ranged weapons, we should be dead by your Standards. And yet we are well alive and kicking. Because this is Sharn and not a featureless plain.

We only needed to get as far as to the next Sky Coach. In order to slow down our pursuers I used Intimidate to control the crowd on the street (moving through a crowds slows you down by half; with an Intimidate DC 20 check as a free Action you can Control the crowd to a limited degree, for instance to let you pass through unhindered). Our pursuers failed to do the same and we reached the Sky Coach which lifted of with us to safety.

I used and ability (Intimidate) in combination with a Feature of the Scene (typical crowed Sharn streets) to slow down our opponents but not us and reached a Point where we could Change our means for escape to put distance and Elevation to effectively escape our landbound pursuers.
This is, like always, a combination of personal abilities, planing and context.

This is why the *where* is important. This why looking for escape routes is a worthwhile Thing to do, and also why blocking said escape routes is a Sound strategic move.

Yukitsu
2017-01-03, 12:59 PM
Any Encounter where one side can simply block Line of Sight or Line of Effect to nullify the other side's ranged attacks. And this is not a contrivance. Any enclosed space will do, which is pretty much every Terrain besides a flat huge featureless plain.

Not any terrain, it would largely need to be indoors for this to be true.


Are we fighting on a featureless plain again?

This still applies largely to anywhere that isn't a small narrow tunnel.


Blocking a passage. Using passage that is large enough for your Party, but not large enough for the enemy. Creating hindering effects (like Web).
Also, yes, abilities that let you ignore harmful Terrain effects are usefull in part because they create new Avenues for escape.

This is half true, it relies on it being in narrow areas without many alternate paths. I've had groups attempt this in larger cities and fail because there are other paths that you can take.


I don't know what Kind of teleportation you are thinking of, but the usual spells and powers all teleport the whole Group.

I said teleport works. I'm saying none of your other solutions do. I would maintain that teleport working is no reason to balance encounters in a manner where the party "can run." since the realization that the party is in over their head may be the wizard getting incapacitated in one go, or it may not be prepared or they may have already used teleport for travel and didn't have enough additional ones prepared.


Also, escapes can be coordinated. There might be a particularly fast Party member. There are Party members with invisbility powers. Also, there are potions. 2nd Level potions are cheap. There is no reason not to give one Invisibility Potion to every Party member.

That may be true but not only do my players not buy them, I also don't see them as standard gear perusing through many other campaigns and in any event, by the time they are cheap enough to simply have on hand, it isn't a guarantee against a higher level enemy. That artificer that you mention in your example could easily have had an item allowing him to see invisible creatures for a short time and direct people to stick to you for the duration. And even then, flat out running while invisible practically negates the hide bonus. Invisibility powers can allow players to easily bypass encounters, though in many cases I can use an uncountered invisibility power to win an encounter instead.


The bottom line is: D&D is a Group effort. Planing for different tactical situations in advance, and that include plans for escape, is something both possible and important.
I agree that if your Group never talks about the possibility of escape and makes no plans whatsoever, then an escape with the whole Group is not likely to succeed. But thats a fault of the Group, not a lack of Option in the game.

Planning an escape only works in the context of knowing approximately what you're getting into. Any sort of encounter that happens to you, such as the encounter with the knight, isn't one that is planned in a familiar area and it's not reasonable for the party to spend time every time someone walks up to them to come up with a specific escape plan. Having a general plan on how to escape makes sense but because each encounter is dangerous for very different reasons having one isn't going to guarantee many successes.


Edit: You know, in Addition of talking about escape in General Terms I will provide a recent example from my latest session:

Eberron, Sharn. The Mission was to Infiltrate the headquaters of an upstart business with suspected crime activities. We went in, found what we needed and bailed out. Sadly this "bailing out" didn't went as smoothly and we set of the Alarm.
As we passed the Exit, the following were on our tails, in various distances: a very angry hobgoblin artificer, several squads of goblin and hobgoblin guards and a Minotaur. My 3rd Level Hexbalde and the 4th Level Rogue would have been hoplessly outmatched in a fight.

Since we were not faster then our pursuers and our pursuers had some ranged weapons, we should be dead by your Standards. And yet we are well alive and kicking. Because this is Sharn and not a featureless plain.

We only needed to get as far as to the next Sky Coach. In order to slow down our pursuers I used Intimidate to control the crowd on the street (moving through a crowds slows you down by half; with an Intimidate DC 20 check as a free Action you can Control the crowd to a limited degree, for instance to let you pass through unhindered). Our pursuers failed to do the same and we reached the Sky Coach which lifted of with us to safety.

I used and ability (Intimidate) in combination with a Feature of the Scene (typical crowed Sharn streets) to slow down our opponents but not us and reached a Point where we could Change our means for escape to put distance and Elevation to effectively escape our landbound pursuers.
This is, like always, a combination of personal abilities, planing and context.

This is why the *where* is important. This why looking for escape routes is a worthwhile Thing to do, and also why blocking said escape routes is a Sound strategic move.


As DM, I would have had the artificer who was as you say, very angry, use spells which doesn't seem to have been the case here. You escaped because the goblins used the least effective means at their disposal to try and keep up. The Minotaur certainly could have tried to intimidate past the crowd but at the same time, others should have been attempting their own way to get towards you. Not only that, but it seems that the hideout alarm only caught on to you after you had left the compound and gotten past all the security, and it lead very directly it seems to the crowded rail station where no security seems to have acted on you despite you setting off an alarm right beside them? I'm absolutely certain the details are different from what you're saying here but I can't help but feel the DM was allowing you to escape rather than playing it out as the NPCs would act.

Koo Rehtorb
2017-01-03, 01:06 PM
There's always the good old "pour oil on the ground, set it on fire, and then run".

goatmeal
2017-01-03, 05:09 PM
Wait, your first statement was that you do not like binary decisions in TTRPGs, which is totally fair. But then you go on to say any fight that you have to run away from is not interesting, which is literally "defeat your opponent or die," which uses the formula that you said yourself negates the point of an rpg. Just saying, it's a tad contradictory

Running away or avoiding combat is a totally legitimate strategy (and sometimes strategically superior to fighting) for players to take in many situations. Especially at low levels, where a few bad dice rolls can completely change the tides of a battle, it is perfectly acceptable to run. When going through long dungeon crawls, it is smart to avoid enemies when you can to conserve your HP, which is a limited resource. The DM is not at fault if his players decide to run. Honestly I find it more exciting on both fronts. A game where all combats have to end in one side subduing the other sounds more videogamey to me.

You can run the game however you want two, and if you're having fun with it that's great. But some ways of running the game are better than others. Yours is functional, but seems very restrictive on what kind of encounters the DM can produce and what actions the players can make.

Some other things level 1 characters can do to avoid fighting:
obscuring mist
silent image to make a wall
grease spell on the floor.
expeditious retreat
caltrops
wild empathy if it's an animal.
diplomacy if its a humanoid.
Maybe just not drawing your damn sword every time you meet someone if it's a humanoid.
Deciding that if something is territorial that perhaps it might not be worth your life to enter its territory.
Stealth checks to pass through an area without resulting in a fight if it is important to pass through the territory.

So many options besides just fighting.

15+ years ago I was playing an underpowered bard in 2e that got separated from the party and ended up in the barracks of the orcs. Everyone thought I was dead for sure, but I just had the bard sing them a song. There were no rules for that at the time (or if there were, the DM didn't know it), so the DM let it work until the fighters and paladins showed up and killed all the orcs. It was the highlight of that gaming session, if not the entire campaign.

Noje
2017-01-03, 06:35 PM
Some other things level 1 characters can do to avoid fighting:
obscuring mist
silent image to make a wall
grease spell on the floor.
expeditious retreat
caltrops
wild empathy if it's an animal.
diplomacy if its a humanoid.
Maybe just not drawing your damn sword every time you meet someone if it's a humanoid.
Deciding that if something is territorial that perhaps it might not be worth your life to enter its territory.
Stealth checks to pass through an area without resulting in a fight if it is important to pass through the territory.

So many options besides just fighting.

15+ years ago I was playing an underpowered bard in 2e that got separated from the party and ended up in the barracks of the orcs. Everyone thought I was dead for sure, but I just had the bard sing them a song. There were no rules for that at the time (or if there were, the DM didn't know it), so the DM let it work until the fighters and paladins showed up and killed all the orcs. It was the highlight of that gaming session, if not the entire campaign.

This list brings up some fond memories for me. My first big campaign that I ran was in first edition. Every session we had ended in the players running away from something. Palace guards, hordes of rats... Man, I miss that group.

Yukitsu
2017-01-04, 01:05 AM
Some other things level 1 characters can do to avoid fighting:
obscuring mist
silent image to make a wall
grease spell on the floor.
expeditious retreat
caltrops
wild empathy if it's an animal.
diplomacy if its a humanoid.
Maybe just not drawing your damn sword every time you meet someone if it's a humanoid.
Deciding that if something is territorial that perhaps it might not be worth your life to enter its territory.
Stealth checks to pass through an area without resulting in a fight if it is important to pass through the territory.

So many options besides just fighting.

15+ years ago I was playing an underpowered bard in 2e that got separated from the party and ended up in the barracks of the orcs. Everyone thought I was dead for sure, but I just had the bard sing them a song. There were no rules for that at the time (or if there were, the DM didn't know it), so the DM let it work until the fighters and paladins showed up and killed all the orcs. It was the highlight of that gaming session, if not the entire campaign.

Avoiding fighting is usually pretty possible in D&D. It's being in a fight and then getting away from it that is not easily modelled in the system. For example, obscuring mist only works if you can cast it and get far enough away that they can't just walk through the mist to get at you anyway, silent image only works if they don't know illusions exist and thus don't attempt to walk through the wall seeing as they may as well, expeditious retreat only works if the encounter isn't deadly enough to kill you during that round you spent casting it instead of running and lets all your allies die, caltrops are stopped by shoes as well as a myriad other things like the jump skill, diplomacy takes a full minute without running or attacking back, wild empathy is just a diplomacy check used on animals and also takes a full minute.

Even in your example, your DM flat out let you succeed at delaying combat despite the mechanics not backing that up. That's fine. DMs can let their players win encounters if it's more fun for them. But if your DM isn't going to just allow you to succeed where you don't have the mechanics backing up what you're doing, then those examples don't work.

John Longarrow
2017-01-04, 01:27 AM
Avoiding fighting is usually pretty possible in D&D. It's being in a fight and then getting away from it that is not easily modelled in the system. For example, obscuring mist only works if you can cast it and get far enough away that they can't just walk through the mist to get at you anyway, silent image only works if they don't know illusions exist and thus don't attempt to walk through the wall seeing as they may as well, expeditious retreat only works if the encounter isn't deadly enough to kill you during that round you spent casting it instead of running and lets all your allies die, caltrops are stopped by shoes as well as a myriad other things like the jump skill, diplomacy takes a full minute without running or attacking back, wild empathy is just a diplomacy check used on animals and also takes a full minute.

Even in your example, your DM flat out let you succeed at delaying combat despite the mechanics not backing that up. That's fine. DMs can let their players win encounters if it's more fun for them. But if your DM isn't going to just allow you to succeed where you don't have the mechanics backing up what you're doing, then those examples don't work.

So to extract what you are saying, if the DM doesn't set up an encounter where you can escape, you can't escape. If the DM doesn't set up an encounter you can avoid, you can't avoid it. If the DM doesn't set up an encounter you can win, you can't win.

Everything is based off of what the DM puts into the encounter.

So far you've only stated that the DMs you play with set up encounters that discourage retreat as an option. Nothing in the rules say they HAVE to set up encounters like this though.

Yukitsu
2017-01-04, 01:48 AM
So to extract what you are saying, if the DM doesn't set up an encounter where you can escape, you can't escape. If the DM doesn't set up an encounter you can avoid, you can't avoid it. If the DM doesn't set up an encounter you can win, you can't win.

Everything is based off of what the DM puts into the encounter.

So far you've only stated that the DMs you play with set up encounters that discourage retreat as an option. Nothing in the rules say they HAVE to set up encounters like this though.

Just the escape one. D&D actually has really great mechanics in place to prevent combat if you don't want to fight. It's just that as in the very example that came up of retreating, it happened not because it followed the mechanics, it happened because the mechanics weren't followed. Every time I have DMed and my players tried to run, I didn't specifically try to set the encounter up so they could not run from it but in most cases they were incapable of running from the encounter. By contrast my players have no problem in avoiding combat if they are playing well and not making really dumb choices. Same when I'm not DM, it's not too hard to avoid a combat situation if we really want to avoid it since the in game options that let you, including just not picking fights are much more reliable than the fleeing from combat options.

John Longarrow
2017-01-04, 02:20 AM
Every time I have DMed and my players tried to run, I didn't specifically try to set the encounter up so they could not run from it but in most cases they were incapable of running from the encounter.

So your encounters make it so that running is not viable. Regardless of this being intentional or not, you set the party up to fail if they tried to run. This is something you may want to take into account the next time you set up an encounter. If you don't take it into account you are reinforcing a "Win or Die" mentality.

I'd talk to your players also. If they are fine with it, don't worry about it. If they say "Yea, we'd really like it if not every fight was to the death since we can't retreat", then take it into account.

Yukitsu
2017-01-04, 02:51 AM
So your encounters make it so that running is not viable. Regardless of this being intentional or not, you set the party up to fail if they tried to run. This is something you may want to take into account the next time you set up an encounter. If you don't take it into account you are reinforcing a "Win or Die" mentality.

I'd talk to your players also. If they are fine with it, don't worry about it. If they say "Yea, we'd really like it if not every fight was to the death since we can't retreat", then take it into account.

What's happened in my group is that players have a "pick your fights" mentality. Like I said, most RPG systems are fine at letting you not fight at all. It's just that once you are in a fight, many seem to be better at resolving the combat rather than having the entire group flee safely.

The other problem with my group is inconsistency. Sometimes they beat a CR 16 dragon at level 10. Sometimes they get killed by a CR 4 rogue at level 6. Guess which of the two they decided to try and run from. :smallconfused:

RazorChain
2017-01-04, 03:47 AM
Except that it is highly unlikely that a nobleman with any remaining relatives or retainers is "unceremoniously into a ditch" and it's also highly unlikely that there is no priest available that is willing to ignore that particular decision of the church.

Well might have happened if you are a no name knight from Poland competing in a tourney in France.

thirdkingdom
2017-01-04, 07:27 AM
I can't honestly think of any encounter in D&D the edition of D&D I'm most familiar with that is slow, <snip>


Avoiding fighting is usually pretty possible in D&D the edition of D&D I'm most familiar with. <snip>


Just the escape one. D&DThe edition of D&D I'm most familiar with actually has really great mechanics in place to prevent combat if you don't want to fight. <snip>

Fixed that for you. I'm guessing that the edition you're most familiar with is 3.5? Believe it or not, there are other editions of D&D that *do* have robust mechanics for evading or fleeing from the enemy.

Zombimode
2017-01-04, 07:36 AM
Fixed that for you. I'm guessing that the edition you're most familiar with is 3.5? Believe it or not, there are other editions of D&D that *do* have robust mechanics for evading or fleeing from the enemy.

Actually his Statements are untrue for 3.5 as well. They may be true for his own games where his Party is not competent enough to stage a retreat or he consciously or subconsciouly fiats away his party's attempts to retreat.

Actually I would even go further and challange your Statement that other Editions of D&D have better mechanics or Options for fleeing or evading enemies. Which Edition are you thinking of?

thirdkingdom
2017-01-04, 07:48 AM
Actually his Statements are untrue for 3.5 as well. They may be true for his own games where his Party is not competent enough to stage a retreat or he consciously or subconsciouly fiats away his party's attempts to retreat.

Actually I would even go further and challange your Statement that other Editions of D&D have better mechanics or Options for fleeing or evading enemies. Which Edition are you thinking of?

I don't have my B/X books present, but I'll copypaste from ACKS, which is essentially the same thing:


It is up to the adventurers to decide when they stop pursuing fleeing monsters. A monster will stop chasing the adventurers if they manage to get out of the monster’s range of vision. If the monsters enjoy treasure, they have a 50% probability that they will stop pursuing characters to collect any treasure the characters drop (roll 4-6 on 1d6). Hungry or less intelligent monsters may do the same if the characters drop food.


Encounters will generally occur at much longer ranges in the
wilderness, and adventurers and monsters will have far more directions available to flee. When one side is surprised in a wilderness encounter, the other side can automatically flee successfully. Otherwise, in order for one party to escape from another, it must make a successful throw on the Wilderness Evasion table. The more pursuing group members there are relative to the fleeing party, the greater chances the fleeing party may escape. This is because larger groups cannot move as fast, or as quietly. Note that the fleeing side will have a minimum of a 5% probability of escaping.

...

If the fleeing party does not successfully escape, then the other group has managed to keep them within sight. They have a 50% (11+ on d20) chance of catching them up close if they have a greater movement than the group they are pursuing. If this roll fails, then the fleeing side may again attempt to escape. This cycle is repeated daily until either one side escapes or the other manages to catch up.


Both are to be found on p. 100 of the ACKS core book (not sure of the equivalent page numbers in B/X or BECMI), and I've quoted the most relevant sections. I've got little experience with 3.5 (or other editions beyond OD&D and 1st, honestly), so can't speak to their evasion rules, but I can say that older versions tend to favor play where fighting everything you encounter is a BAD IDEA (as per the OP).

Braininthejar2
2017-01-04, 07:51 AM
"Why did you set us against a dragon at level 1?"

"Don't attack the decorations."

goatmeal
2017-01-04, 10:28 AM
Avoiding fighting is usually pretty possible in D&D. It's being in a fight and then getting away from it that is not easily modelled in the system. For example, obscuring mist only works if you can cast it and get far enough away that they can't just walk through the mist to get at you anyway, silent image only works if they don't know illusions exist and thus don't attempt to walk through the wall seeing as they may as well, expeditious retreat only works if the encounter isn't deadly enough to kill you during that round you spent casting it instead of running and lets all your allies die, caltrops are stopped by shoes as well as a myriad other things like the jump skill, diplomacy takes a full minute without running or attacking back, wild empathy is just a diplomacy check used on animals and also takes a full minute.

Even in your example, your DM flat out let you succeed at delaying combat despite the mechanics not backing that up. That's fine. DMs can let their players win encounters if it's more fun for them. But if your DM isn't going to just allow you to succeed where you don't have the mechanics backing up what you're doing, then those examples don't work.

Have you ever played 1e or 2e? That's kind of how they worked. Fewer rules meant you could be more creative as a player.

Yukitsu
2017-01-04, 01:47 PM
Fixed that for you. I'm guessing that the edition you're most familiar with is 3.5? Believe it or not, there are other editions of D&D that *do* have robust mechanics for evading or fleeing from the enemy.

Pathfinder, 4th and 5th as well, though I don't play them as much. I've also played/made characters for second and advanced but I could not at all claim to be even remotely familiar with them. 4th I found had some classes that were individually good at escaping but that's not what I'm talking about here since I don't view it as positive if the party loses members trying to flee from combat. 5th I find to have many of the same problems as 3.5 in that regard but I play it less so perhaps I'm missing something or missed a supplement.

Shadowrun is the system I'm familiar with that has the most mechanically sound way to flee combat even though it's not ideal. It's a die off between the driver in both cases until the distance is too high for it to remain a chase.


Have you ever played 1e or 2e? That's kind of how they worked. Fewer rules meant you could be more creative as a player.

Very minimally. I didn't particularly like second which is the one I played a little of but it may have just been a bad DM. The system in general felt a little slower than others though and I can't say I'm a fan of anything that leans closer to freeform.

Telok
2017-01-04, 03:40 PM
Pathfinder, 4th and 5th as well, though I don't play them as much.

Yeah, WotC is a big believer in a "everything is a level-appropriate encounter" model that means the PCs never have to run away.

Koo Rehtorb
2017-01-04, 03:46 PM
I have to say few things ruin my immersion harder than the "Everything is a level appropriate encounter" style of gameplay.

kyoryu
2017-01-04, 04:01 PM
"Why did you set us against a dragon at level 1?"

"Don't attack the decorations."

As has been said, encounter != fight.

Encouter means exactly that. You encounter the thing. At 1st level, maybe that means you see a dragon fly overhead and do your damnedest to not get noticed by the thing.

Reverse that for kobolds/crappy bandits. They're not going to engage with a heavily armed knight, a mage leaking arcane power over everything, and a hardened looking archer with a thousand-yard stare. They're going to hide and wait for better targets.

As far as the knight goes - I consider it generally appropriate to "calibrate" players at the beginning of a game. "A level 1 character is basically this. A level 3 character is basically this. A knight is probably level 7 or higher" and so on and so forth. Give the PCs an idea of their relative strength.

In the knight example, again, I'd probably point out to the players that they probably have a good idea of how their skill would match up to a tourney-winning knight. That's the kind of info the *character* would certainly know (unless there were some character-related reason for him to not know that or to overestimate his own abilities), and so should be available to the *player*.

The problem I typically see here is when the GM gives information that the GM believes should be sufficient, but actually isn't. That's why when I see a player acting on what appears to be false assumptions *that the player should know*, I make sure to give that info pretty directly. "Yeah, you know you're going to be badly outclassed by this guy, right?" Or, more IC - "you know one of your old teachers, who you're still convinced would be at least your equal, got in a tourney and didn't make it past the second round. So to win a tourney you'd have to be pretty tough."

goatmeal
2017-01-04, 05:38 PM
Very minimally. I didn't particularly like second which is the one I played a little of but it may have just been a bad DM. The system in general felt a little slower than others though and I can't say I'm a fan of anything that leans closer to freeform.

I remember the first time playing 3.5 it seemed much better than 2e simply for the lack of THAC0. I also initially liked having more options. We resisted 3rd edition for a long time because it seemed to make things easier to survive than 2e. It did turn out to be a bit clunky at first, and it actually felt like having more things codified somehow limited my options. I changed my character after a few sessions because the concept that I had from 2e wasn't working as well in 3.5. (Or maybe it's that I was using the 2e splat to have a 1st level forest gnome illusionist with AC0 that I missed...)

Also, the best DM I had for 2e didn't seem to be that great when we got to 3.5. Probably not ever going back to 1e or 2e, but there were things I did like about them.

Jormengand
2017-01-04, 06:04 PM
Yeah, WotC is a big believer in a "everything is a level-appropriate encounter" model that means the PCs never have to run away.
I'm away from books, but from memory:

The PCs should run. If they don't, they will surely die.

prufock
2017-01-06, 10:48 AM
This encounter is bad because it takes a likely and frankly pretty reasonable solution to the obstacle, and makes it kill you out of nowhere.
What obstacle? The scenario presented is basically:
"Hi, I'm Bob the knight."
"Let's joust to the death!"

This isn't a situation where a solution is necessary. This is an encounter created purely by the will of the PC in question. And as you point out

Yeah the deal was made after the fight was picked, but if the fight was not supposed to be had, then why make the deal so attractive.
You gloss this over, but it's important to note that the PC was willing to engage in this joust to the death for no stakes. The knight was the one that demanded some reward for risking his neck, not the player. The player was just being headstrong.


(quick side note, this isn't even combat. It's a joust. It already has a fail state that isn't death. It's losing the joust)
Which would be fine if the PC had suggested that they wait until they could get tournament lances, but he pushes the NPC to do it with lethal ones. It's like saying "Let's play Pie Face!" when all you have are poison pies.


If you really want your players to explore solutions that aren't combat, you need to give them incentive.
I agree with this, but with no context, we don't know whether non-combat incentives were offered. Maybe they were. Maybe they were implicit.


The point is, the player was presented with an obstacle and tried a solution. Instead of being given an honest attempt with their solution, they immediately failed and were killed. All because the DM didn't want them trying that solution. If this were reversed, about trying a noncombat solution when the DM wanted a fight, how many would say the encounter was bad?
Here's an analogy. The PCs (level 3) are in a dungeon. They encounter The Path of Doom. They have heard stories of adventurers who have tried the Path and failed. They can easily take an obvious alternate path. Yes, there's treasure at the end of the Path, but he can't see it until he's halfway down the Path already. The player says "I run down the path toward the treasure."

In both, the encounter could have been avoided. In both, the reward isn't presented until the player already commits. In both, it is the player that initiates the action. In both, it is obvious that it will be difficult. In both, it is lethal.

Stealth Marmot
2017-01-06, 02:12 PM
Here's an analogy. The PCs (level 3) are in a dungeon. They encounter The Path of Doom. They have heard stories of adventurers who have tried the Path and failed. They can easily take an obvious alternate path. Yes, there's treasure at the end of the Path, but he can't see it until he's halfway down the Path already. The player says "I run down the path toward the treasure."


Frilick jumps into the pit to gather the treasure, how much does he get?

Telok
2017-01-06, 05:53 PM
Frilick jumps into the pit to gather the treasure, how much does he get?

DM: "It's a really deep pit. Are you sure?"
Player: "Yeah, but it's just a pit and there's treasure. I jump."
DM: <rolls damage> "A high roll, how many hit points do you have?"
Player: "Not that many."

Shackel
2017-01-06, 06:08 PM
Considering the general tone of the forum when it comes to no-win scenarios and/or DMs screwing over players, I'm kind of surprised this has gotten such good "ha ha serves him right" reactions. To me this can easily mean that the world itself was just poorly defined, as was the tone and level of the entire campaign, just to set up some "gotcha" moment and feel good about one's self.

"The greatest jouster" can mean a lot of things. It could mean the Warrior 3 protecting the Aristocrat 2 king. It could mean the Fighter 5 who is top tier compared to all of the non-adventurers. It could also mean the Knight 20 optimized Mounted Ubercharger build whose damage and AC while charging is somewhere between infinite and yes.

And frankly from the "ha ha that idiot" tone of the OP OOC and IC("funeral expenses"), it doesn't sound to me like the level of the world was really stated. At least, that's how it sounds to me. Not to mention that due to the way the game is set up, "this is spooky land don't go here" is usually what tells the adventurers yes, in fact, they should go here.

Ruslan
2017-01-06, 06:21 PM
I definitely wasn't setting up a gotcha moment. I was as surprised as everyone else at the table that he decided to fight the knight. And the tone was pretty well stated, IMHO, given the fact that everyone else understood that the headstrong PC is about to die. Except, of course, the PC himself. And he later confided in me, "I guess I should have seen that coming. I don't know what I was thinking."

So, definitely not intending to kill a PC, but, you know, once it already happened, might as well tell the story for everyone's amusement.

Knaight
2017-01-06, 06:26 PM
Considering the general tone of the forum when it comes to no-win scenarios and/or DMs screwing over players, I'm kind of surprised this has gotten such good "ha ha serves him right" reactions. To me this can easily mean that the world itself was just poorly defined, as was the tone and level of the entire campaign, just to set up some "gotcha" moment and feel good about one's self.

If this was either a no-win scenario or the DM screwing over players, the forum would probably have reacted differently. As for setting up a gotcha moment, that would have to involve the DM predicting a player deciding that it would be a good idea to pick a fight with a knight they have no beef with using war lances. A trap needs bait, and this didn't have any.

The Extinguisher
2017-01-06, 06:42 PM
What obstacle? The scenario presented is basically:
"Hi, I'm Bob the knight."
"Let's joust to the death!"

This isn't a situation where a solution is necessary. This is an encounter created purely by the will of the PC in question. And as you point out

You gloss this over, but it's important to note that the PC was willing to engage in this joust to the death for no stakes. The knight was the one that demanded some reward for risking his neck, not the player. The player was just being headstrong.


Which would be fine if the PC had suggested that they wait until they could get tournament lances, but he pushes the NPC to do it with lethal ones. It's like saying "Let's play Pie Face!" when all you have are poison pies.


I agree with this, but with no context, we don't know whether non-combat incentives were offered. Maybe they were. Maybe they were implicit.


It comes down to how the danger is presented. I can tell I'm in the minority here, but I don't see how absolute lethality could be determined here. This is not implied to be a joust to the death. This is a joust with a greater chance of danger. Given the amount of times players are shot and hacked at by pointy bits of metal, I can see how being stabbed by a point bit of metal isn't an immediate red flag. More to the point, if the player challenges the knight, and you know that the knight is going to kill the player, don't say yes. You have a built in reason to stop the player from doing something stupid through the agency of a another character. Maybe the knight doesn't have time to joust. Maybe he doesn't see the worthiness in jousting with this nobody. But by encouraging the players actions in this situation you are telling the player that it is a good idea to go forward.

Or you're putting up a mousetrap and laughing when they fall for it.



Here's an analogy. The PCs (level 3) are in a dungeon. They encounter The Path of Doom. They have heard stories of adventurers who have tried the Path and failed. They can easily take an obvious alternate path. Yes, there's treasure at the end of the Path, but he can't see it until he's halfway down the Path already. The player says "I run down the path toward the treasure."

In both, the encounter could have been avoided. In both, the reward isn't presented until the player already commits. In both, it is the player that initiates the action. In both, it is obvious that it will be difficult. In both, it is lethal.

I'm replying to this separately because I don't feel the situations are at all applicable. I wonder why the path is there if it's supposed to be avoided. Also, if my character is "good at avoiding traps" then I expect that running in and avoiding traps is a good strategy. And if the traps are so powerful that my character who is good at avoiding them has no chance, then it was a bad thing to put in the game.



If this was either a no-win scenario or the DM screwing over players, the forum would probably have reacted differently. As for setting up a gotcha moment, that would have to involve the DM predicting a player deciding that it would be a good idea to pick a fight with a knight they have no beef with using war lances. A trap needs bait, and this didn't have any.

I think it's easy money to predict that a character that jousts would challenge a famous jouster to a match. (and it's also pretty easy to stop a character that doesn't joust from doing something stupid)

Shackel
2017-01-06, 07:32 PM
I definitely wasn't setting up a gotcha moment. I was as surprised as everyone else at the table that he decided to fight the knight. And the tone was pretty well stated, IMHO, given the fact that everyone else understood that the headstrong PC is about to die. Except, of course, the PC himself. And he later confided in me, "I guess I should have seen that coming. I don't know what I was thinking."

So, definitely not intending to kill a PC, but, you know, once it already happened, might as well tell the story for everyone's amusement.

Then there was a grave misunderstanding between that PC and the setting you established and it was an OOC problem you probably should've clarified rather than take it from that to "well if I win I get all your stuff" and then the knight all but teasing him afterwards with the "funeral expenses" which seems rather callous for someone who was warning him repeatedly beforehand and was against senseless killing.


If this was either a no-win scenario or the DM screwing over players, the forum would probably have reacted differently. As for setting up a gotcha moment, that would have to involve the DM predicting a player deciding that it would be a good idea to pick a fight with a knight they have no beef with using war lances. A trap needs bait, and this didn't have any.

Hence "to me this can mean"; the situation's rather vague and doesn't have a lot of context, meaning it's a little odd to completely ignore the big possibility. It doesn't help that the tone of even the title is so "high and mighty", which doesn't lend itself to good will.

John Longarrow
2017-01-06, 08:05 PM
The Extinguisher

So your saying it should be fine for the players to just try and storm a kings castle at first level? If its in the game, it had better be level appropriate?

The Extinguisher
2017-01-06, 08:16 PM
The Extinguisher

So your saying it should be fine for the players to just try and storm a kings castle at first level? If its in the game, it had better be level appropriate?

Yes. If your players really want to storm the castle, then letting them do so and making it fun for them will make the game better than just killing them because they did something they weren't "supposed to"

Ruslan
2017-01-06, 08:19 PM
I am quite conflicted. On one hand, I really want to play with the above poster as a DM. Everything is allowed, and furthermore, everything is guaranteed to be fun!

On the other hand, deep down inside, I have a suspicion it will get old fast. If there's no risk of failure, then success just isn't as much fun. In fact, if there's no failure, what does a success even mean?

Shackel
2017-01-06, 08:21 PM
The Extinguisher

So your saying it should be fine for the players to just try and storm a kings castle at first level? If its in the game, it had better be level appropriate?

From the point of view of someone who doesn't think everything needs to be level appropriate, I think the DM should just OOC warn them that it's very unlikely to work. They have Int/Wis scores above 8.

The Extinguisher
2017-01-06, 08:23 PM
I am quite conflicted. On one hand, I really want to play with the above poster as a DM. Everything is allowed, and furthermore, everything is guaranteed to be fun!

On the other hand, deep down inside, I have a suspicion it will get old fast. If there's no risk of failure, then success just isn't as much fun. In fact, if there's no failure, what does a success even mean?

Why does "this should be fun and level appropriate" mean "this should be easy with no risk of failure"?

neriractor
2017-01-06, 08:30 PM
-snip-

so, let me see if I got this right. The way to play the game is to only have encounters in wich the PCs can murder (or otherwise beat) the problem with no chance of death or consequences (because a PC dying from a high power enemy is functionally indistinguishable to being critted by a mook), and if any DM ever chooses to put somebody who can take a single player 1 on 1, or hell somebody who can get them to pay for whatever they do (like laws), they must hold the players hand tight and make sure they go in the right direction, because asmodeus forbid that a PC do something stupid and beats unbeatable odds from time to time :smallconfused:

I may have exaggerated a little, but the jump from what you imply and this is not exactly big.

Ruslan
2017-01-06, 08:31 PM
Because "level-appropriate" is a synonym for "the numbers are stacked in a way to make the natural outcome a PC victory". Well, sometimes they just aren't. There are conflicts where the natural result is NOT a PC victory.

By the way, aside rant.

The best games I ever had, as a player, are ones when I felt frustrated and disappointed at least some of the time. Ones where, some of the time, things didn't work. Because, when they finally do, it's just so much sweeter.

Now, it's not the type of game I try to inflict on my PCs on purpose. I don't have a goal where "PCs have to feel frustrated 10% of the time", or anything like that. But, having learned the importance of disappointment and frustration, I definitely don't go out of my way to avoid them. If the game is naturally heading toward a moment that seems it's going to be frustrating or disappointing for the PCs, or one PC, so be it.

John Longarrow
2017-01-06, 08:40 PM
Yes. If your players really want to storm the castle, then letting them do so and making it fun for them will make the game better than just killing them because they did something they weren't "supposed to"

To me, this would make for a very disjointed and unbelievable game. One without any feeling of progress. If our first level party can overthrow the king why hasn't someone else done it? Also I'd never get a chance to interact with higher level characters.

Course the counter is that as I go up in levels, so does everyone else. If I'm level 10, that means the guy plowing the field would need to be "level appropriate". It means that I never have something I can't face but also nothing I can walk over.

More important I can never be given a glimpse of what it to come. I can't see the archmage in his tower (because I may attack it), I can't see a wing of cavalry ride by (I may charge them) and I certainly can't have a quest that involves seeing a powerful dragon (that I may attack) until I hit the right level.

This would, to me, make for a horribly boring story that must omit all of the details I find fun. It also means the DM would be telling me "NO" all of the time, since my low level character can never go seek out a healer who's higher level than the party cleric or seek a sage who may answer a question (too high of a level). Likewise I can never encounter a lowly commoner on their own since that wouldn't be level appropriate either.

Koo Rehtorb
2017-01-06, 08:42 PM
Yes. If your players really want to storm the castle, then letting them do so and making it fun for them will make the game better than just killing them because they did something they weren't "supposed to"

If you want to storm a castle (in D&D because I assume that's what we're discussing), the solution is to start the game at a level where storming a castle would be an achievable goal, not to make the castle easy enough for a level 1 party to storm.

The Extinguisher
2017-01-06, 08:45 PM
so, let me see if I got this right. The way to play the game is to only have encounters in wich the PCs can murder (or otherwise beat) the problem with no chance of death or consequences (because a PC dying from a high power enemy is functionally indistinguishable to being critted by a mook), and if any DM ever chooses to put somebody who can take a single player 1 on 1, or hell somebody who can get them to pay for whatever they do (like laws), they must hold the players hand tight and make sure they go in the right direction, because asmodeus forbid that a PC do something stupid and beats unbeatable odds from time to time :smallconfused:

I may have exaggerated a little, but the jump from what you imply and this is not exactly big.

◔_◔


Because "level-appropriate" is a synonym for "the numbers are stacked in a way to make the natural outcome a PC victory". Well, sometimes they just aren't. There are conflicts where the natural result is NOT a PC victory.

By the way, aside rant.

The best games I ever had, as a player, are ones when I felt frustrated and disappointed at least some of the time. Ones where, some of the time, things didn't work. Because, when they finally do, it's just so much sweeter.

Now, it's not the type of game I try to inflict on my PCs on purpose. I don't have a goal where "PCs have to feel frustrated 10% of the time", or anything like that. But, having learned the importance of disappointment and frustration, I definitely don't go out of my way to avoid them. If the game is naturally heading toward a moment that seems it's going to be frustrating or disappointing for the PCs, or one PC, so be it.

Level appropriate simply means the level of challenge is appropriate to the players. For some players that means minimally challenging. For some it means very difficult.

Frustration and difficulty are important to creating fun and engaging games. But like you said, they work when they make success feel better. They require iteration, which is hard to do in traditional RPGs. A random knight killing you on the side of the road isn't something you can iterate and that player has no chance to retry the encounter with the knowledge they got from failing. And succeeding on something else isn't going to have the same satisfaction that dispels the frustration.

Just making things frustrating isn't good game design.

neriractor
2017-01-06, 08:55 PM
◔_◔

apologies, its kind of hard to measure my tone from time to time and maybe I went just a bit too snarky there for actual polite discussion :smallbiggrin:

Erys
2017-01-06, 09:04 PM
I got to say; this thread reminds me of one of my favorite memes:

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/b3/a9/6b/b3a96b4ab8cedca3d69221f6b1664d6c.jpg

Players that think they can just do whatever cause the world is their level deserve the reality check the OP gave. He warned them and the PC was too daft to realize it. Had he been wiser he could have said something to the effect of, 'you're right, we don't have the right joust lances. Can we meet some other day at such and such?'

Reminds me of a player I had long, looooong ago. I had a specific kind of uber-elf called 'witch elves' (totally cribbed form warhammer) that had magic blades that killed on contact. I made this very clear when the group saw one and most steered clear... but no, there had to be the one guy who, instead of hiding and evading the obviously OP bad gal he runs up to her and attacks.

Needless to say it didn't end well for him.

In my humble opinion if you want a world that scales with you: play a video game.

Ruslan
2017-01-06, 09:11 PM
Frustration and difficulty are important to creating fun and engaging games. But like you said, they work when they make success feel better. They require iteration, which is hard to do in traditional RPGs. A random knight killing you on the side of the road isn't something you can iterate and that player has no chance to retry the encounter with the knowledge they got from failing. With all respect, I can't agree.

True, as you astutely noted twice now, this is not a video game, and you don't iterate combats. And thank god for that. We try different combats. We do different things. Sometimes, we succeed, sometimes we fail. Sometimes, things work, and sometimes, a single player has to die and become a humorous story while the other 4 players can go "whew, it's a good thing *I* didn't challenge that knight".



And succeeding on something else isn't going to have the same satisfaction that dispels the frustration.So, basically, have the PCs never fail, because a single failure is FOREVER. Again, I can't agree.



Just making things frustrating isn't good game design.Which is why, as luck would have it, I don't just make things frustrating. I have stuff in my game, which the PCs interact with, and sometimes, what can you do, interactions turn out to be frustrating. C'est la vie.

sleepy hedgehog
2017-01-06, 10:02 PM
As a DM I really like encounters that are over-leveled, assuming the PC's have been at least warned that it may be impossible. And assuming there exists at least 1 method of escape they have access to. (Even if it's just their 30ft move speed)
The problem is I don't like doing that in DND, since escaping from an opponent once combat started can be near impossible, because often enemies move faster than you.

PhoenixPhyre
2017-01-06, 10:09 PM
The problem is I don't like doing that in DND, since escaping from an opponent once combat started can be near impossible, because often enemies move faster than you.

But not everything will give chase forever. My players woke up a hibernating cr 9 yeti at level 2 (by yelling into its cave). It chased them out, they ran. It got tired, and went back to bed. No deaths.

Another group (really one stupid paladin) stood their ground in a very similar circumstance. The paladin died, messily.

Parvum
2017-01-07, 12:29 AM
Hi.

DnD assumes that all your encounters will be level appropriate and survivable because that has stood the test of time and proven to be more fun.

It's in the books. You, as a DM, are told that you can do whatever you want. But if you want the best game possible, as near as the designers of the game have been able to refine it, you should use these guidelines. Those guidelines say to make the entire game survivable. Space your encounters so that players can recover. Never put in a challenge that will completely crush them- only ones that the players can beat with heavy losses, clever planning, or luck. It doesn't always work out that way, but that's what's in the books.

That's what your players have to work with. "Not everything is easy, but you can beat everything." Any other assumptions you have about how the game ought to run are in your head. The players won't know until you tell them, and then they will forget because of course they will and you will need to remind them BEFORE THEY SUFFER CONSEQUENCES- otherwise, you're punishing them for being human and for not remembering how the game works when you run it. You might say that getting punished for fortgetting how the rules work is just life- BUT THIS ISN'T LIFE. IT IS A GAME. And when you decide to be the DM, you have not signed onto the job of simulating a realistic world that punishes people for being people. You have put on the fun hat. Your job (your most important job) is to make the game fun.

Fun requires challenges. Fun can be seeing the cocky player's character destroyed for being... well, played by the cocky player. I think we all have that player. And... yes, I will admit, it is fun to watch our cocky player get taken down a peg. Like, absolutely hilarious. BUT. That cocky player came here to have fun too. And I am willing to bet that your cocky player (like our cocky player) made a brash sword swinging duelist to swing off a chandelier, kick a corrupt wizard into the fire, grab the macguffin and rescue the hostage while spewing snarky one liners.

You know. To play a fantasy game and indulge in their fantasy. Not to hear, "Grow up Flynn Rider this is the REAL WORLD. Actions have CONSEQUENCES and you pay TAXES."

These things have a place. I adore horror games, and other sorts of games where you can actually be curb stomped by anything at any time. But before running any of these I CANNOT STRESS ENOUGH: make it clear to the players. They need to know what your making and everybody needs to be on board for it. Let them know they can be one shot at any time, even in the first adventure. Remind them when they first meet an enemy. Remind them when they first meet a scary enemy. Remind them when they're setting up camp.

Because if you don't, they will use the default assumption that the books (and every other game ever) have ground into their heads: you can beat it. When you want your gritty game to make your players feel powerless, remember that not only are you fighting against every other game in existence but against the very power fantasy role playing game you have chosen to support your story. It's not enough to say, "The fists of this beast look like they could crush your skull like a grape." Your line of dialogue has too much working against it. DnD's entire levelling system, in fact. And that's bad.

If your player can't keep a character alive for more than a session, that's probably their problem. But the very first time any character dies and the player doesn't feel like it was justified? Felt like it came out of nowhere? Felt cheated? That first time is ALWAYS going to be the DM's fault. Figure out where you failed and do better next time.

Ruslan
2017-01-07, 12:57 AM
Hi.

DnD assumes that all your encounters will be level appropriate and survivable because that has stood the test of time and proven to be more fun.

It's in the books.It most certainly is not. As was correctly noted above, the D&D 3.5 DMG recommends for 5% of all encounters to be Overwhelming (ie. PCs will die unless they run or otherwise avoid the encounter).

As for what is "more fun", that's just your personal perspective talking. I don't like a game where everything is guaranteed to be level-appropriate and survivable, not as a DM, and not as a player.

Hawkstar
2017-01-07, 12:58 AM
Hi.

DnD assumes that all your encounters will be level appropriate and survivable because that has stood the test of time and proven to be more fun.

It's in the books.No, it isn't, at all. The books explicitly state that you should throw in wildly level-inappropriate encounters on a somewhat regular, but not overwhelming, basis.

In D&D 3.5, the game assumes and tells DMs that one in every twenty 'encounters' should be so difficult that the players need to be able to run away. Less than half should be at their CR±1 (With a sizeable number below their CR, and a few well above it but still beatable).

Even 4e assumes players encounter challenges of their CR ±5 (A full Tier range)

Going back - AD&D had almost no concept of "Level Appropriate encounters"

5e is built explicitly to accommodate massively imbalanced encounters, with Bounded Accuracy giving players an ability to make long-shot successes, an illusion of having a chance, or a slightly better chance of escaping alive when they realize their chance of victory is just an illusion.

Erys
2017-01-07, 01:07 AM
If your player can't keep a character alive for more than a session, that's probably their problem. But the very first time any character dies and the player doesn't feel like it was justified? Felt like it came out of nowhere? Felt cheated? That first time is ALWAYS going to be the DM's fault. Figure out where you failed and do better next time..

This is complete and total BS.

If your character dies to a bad crit against him, odds are they will feel cheated. That the DMs fault?

Nope.

What about when you put a plot device like an ancient red dragon and the party opts to attack it... at level 4? That a bad DM.

Again, nope.

If you want to make a world that is static and similar Roy's afterlife with the 'dungeon of moderately hard encounters' that is on you. I prefer dynamic games, there will be dragons and liches that will destroy you, knights and heroes that are your betters (at least for most the game); and on the flip side not every fight has to be difficult. Sometimes the small band of bandits doesn't realize they just attacked a party of adventurers way out of their league. The pendulum does swing both ways after all.

A DM who coddles his players and is too scared to let them die to their own hubris will have players that will always walk all over him and his game will likely be a lot less fun because of it.

Knaight
2017-01-07, 01:54 AM
Hi.

DnD assumes that all your encounters will be level appropriate and survivable because that has stood the test of time and proven to be more fun.

It's in the books. You, as a DM, are told that you can do whatever you want. But if you want the best game possible, as near as the designers of the game have been able to refine it, you should use these guidelines. Those guidelines say to make the entire game survivable. Space your encounters so that players can recover. Never put in a challenge that will completely crush them- only ones that the players can beat with heavy losses, clever planning, or luck. It doesn't always work out that way, but that's what's in the books.

This isn't just a D&D thread, and even among the D&D community the DMing advice is considered suspect, full of infamously bad ideas. The 3.5 DMG 2 hails the benefits of episodic games as including making it easier for the DM to run their story without players getting to change it; I'm not going to read that line and take up railroading just because the designers are apparently on board with it.

TheCountAlucard
2017-01-07, 02:06 AM
I think this is one more case of a PC making his own encounter; incidentally, in a game of mine, a PC not too long ago lost his life in an encounter with sharks, but it wasn't the sharks that killed him - it was the dumb decisions he made.

(Going down into a lifeboat wearing full armor was only one way he made things harder for himself. Convincing the crew he was homicidal-crazy didn't help either. Or displaying demonic powers to them. Or threatening their lives. Point is, while he was down there, they fired the ship's ballista into the lifeboat and sank him, and by no means was it a "level-inappropriate encounter.")

Yukitsu
2017-01-07, 02:13 AM
A DM who coddles his players and is too scared to let them die to their own hubris will have players that will always walk all over him and his game will likely be a lot less fun because of it.

My group used to have a DM with that attitude and the current result is a group that runs from everything which also isn't fun for me or the party.

Erys
2017-01-07, 02:30 AM
My group used to have a DM with that attitude and the current result is a group that runs from everything which also isn't fun for me or the party.

I feel you.

I once had a DM kill half the party with an ancient red dragon on a whim because he felt he had too many players (there were 6 of us, I think the highest level was 5th, give or take a level). That wasn't fun at all. (Probably preaching to the choir here) but there is a big difference between an ancient red just flying over and arbitrarily attacking the party of low level toons and a known ancient red in the nearby mountains that the PC's just insist on trying to slay when they are way to low to try.

In my experience DMs that are always killing the players or forcing them to run isn't playing the game with the right mindset. Games should be cooperative, not DM v Player. If you are experiencing the bulk of your encounters as deadly and beyond, your DM is likely opting to play the latter instead of the former. :smallfrown:

DM V Player is rarely fun.

What happened with the OP definitely wasn't DM V Player either, it was just a player (as TheCountAlucard points out) that ignored the warnings and made his own encounter with the wrong dude.

kyoryu
2017-01-07, 12:59 PM
Now, to be fair, there are situations where the GM really should only throw "level-appropriate" encounters at the players.

1) When it's the GM and not the players deciding what encounters happen.

and

2) When encounter is synonymous with fight.

If both of these things are true, then yes, you should only throw level appropriate encounters at the players, because it's not fair if they die over something they have no control of.

Of course, if both of those things are true, you're also running the *exact type* of game I'm least interested in, so the idea of "level appropriate" encounters has zero practical value for me.

prufock
2017-01-07, 01:05 PM
It comes down to how the danger is presented. I can tell I'm in the minority here, but I don't see how absolute lethality could be determined here. This is not implied to be a joust to the death.
The knight explicitly says "If risk of fatality is to be accepted." This is 2 guys on horseback charging at each other at full speed with sharpened metal poles. And not just any 2 guys - one is the best jouster in the kingdom. Even if the knight is a level-appropriate encounter for the group as most encounters are designed, the PC opts to tackle it one-on-one, which makes the average party level 1/4 of that intended by game design. A CR 8 encounter vs an APL 8 group is fair. A CR 8 encounter vs a single member of an APL 8 group is six levels over.


More to the point, if the player challenges the knight, and you know that the knight is going to kill the player, don't say yes.
This is an option, but we don't know that the player's death was guaranteed. The knight may have had a string of good rolls (initiative, to hit, damage).

And of course the DM could refuse the challenge. What happens when the overzealous player attacks the knight anyway? Should the knight stand there and take it, not fighting back? I'm not saying that this particular player would have done so, but some would. The precedent you seem to want to set is that PCs should be able to run roughshod without fear of consequence.

I don't advocate laughing about it, and as a DM I would have given the player a couple more outs before allowing it to continue, but some players are headstrong and would force the issue.


I'm replying to this separately because I don't feel the situations are at all applicable. I wonder why the path is there if it's supposed to be avoided.
There are a number of metagame reasons why the path might exist. It could be a recurring hook for the players - just because they can't defeat it now doesn't mean they won't in the future with more experience. In a continuous story, there should be things that are meant to recur. The treasure behind the path may be unexceptional at this point, but based on things they learn down the road, it may become important. It could be that the path IS accessible but is linked to a later puzzle, key, or code. It could be to imply a world that is bigger than the PCs - not everything out there is created purely for you to curbstomp. Yes, the PCs are the protagonists of the story, but sometimes, Boromir dies (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqjfq5gsfYk).


Also, if my character is "good at avoiding traps" then I expect that running in and avoiding traps is a good strategy. And if the traps are so powerful that my character who is good at avoiding them has no chance, then it was a bad thing to put in the game.
Yes, your character is good at avoiding traps. So were all those others whose corpses now litter the floor of the hallway.

It was a bad thing for your character right now. You seem to have a concept of the game world where things spring into existence only when you are likely to defeat it. I don't find this concept satisfying. If Darth Vader exists, it should be possible for me to try and seek him out to fight at level 1. His stormtroopers may kill me, his personal guards may kill me, or he may kill me, but he shouldn't simply phase in and out of existence based on what level I am. Nor should his level be reduced to match mine. If he's rumoured to be a powerful force-user, the leader of an army, and one of the greatest swordsmen in the galaxy, a 1-on-1 fight should have no other result than my death.

Another objection I have to this concept of "the world conforms to your level" is that it is darn near impossible to create, especially at low levels. A PC can always create an encounter of his own accord, and if you follow the rules, it can be fatal. If you attempt to remove anything that could possibly kill him, you get a very flat world. If you de-level things that could kill him, you get a logically inconsistent world.

A PC, fresh off his first adventure, could use his 400 gp to buy a heavy warhorse, pen it in, and attempt to fight it barehanded (he has Improved Unarmed Strike, after all) "for practice." A heavy warhorse has a good chance of defeating a level 1 character one-on-one (CR 2 vs APL 1/4). So does the horse not fight back? Are horses more expensive than printed in the PHB, such that he can't afford one (and then, what if he steals one)? Do warhorses simply not exist until you hit a level high enough to fight one?

A level one character can also die from falling 50 feet. Do trees not grow that high? Are there no 50-foot high buildings? Are there no canyons of that height? Does the earth soften to absorb the fall? What about water? Being underwater for, say, 3 minutes will kill a character. Are there no oceans? Or if a player says "I'm going to swim across the ocean!" they just automatically succeed? "Ah, the ocean isn't that big anyway."

You said earlier that a character should be able to storm a castle at level 1 if they want. So either the castle has very few guards OR has incompetent guards. So why haven't the commoners overthrown the king? Where's the logical consistency? Should everything fall beneath the feet of a PC who decides to tackle it?

Heck, let's be completely reductionist here. If a PC says "I'm going to bend this blade by pushing it into my abdomen," does the blade bend? Yes, this is ridiculous, but I'm wondering how far you would extend this concept of protecting the PCs.

Is there any action foolhardy and suicidal enough that justifies no longer protecting the PC?

Should anything exist in the world that could potentially kill a foolhardy PC?

Yukitsu
2017-01-07, 01:28 PM
Is there any action foolhardy and suicidal enough that justifies no longer protecting the PC?

Should anything exist in the world that could potentially kill a foolhardy PC?

In general, I view it as most interesting when every encounter I make theoretically can be won using any number of means, including combat. That doesn't mean I don't think the players should die if they act foolishly, but that doesn't mean that they shouldn't get to interact with the world in the way they think is most fun.

For example, I've had players in my games win fighting against encounters 6 or more levels above them because they played to their strengths and managed to get the rolls they needed. By contrast, I've had a player die in a fight against a combat 2 CR below his level where I expected it to be pretty easy because they failed to understand their opponents strengths and weaknesses. In other words, I don't bend the game to make the players certainly live, but I certainly don't put things into the game that they flat out can't fight.

Parvum
2017-01-07, 02:25 PM
It most certainly is not. As was correctly noted above, the D&D 3.5 DMG recommends for 5% of all encounters to be Overwhelming (ie. PCs will die unless they run or otherwise avoid the encounter).

You are in fact totally right! There is a line in that book I had completely forgotten about. You could justify the occasional player killing with that line. But I still think that would be incredibly sloppy. As Hawkster pointed out, each successive edition has been moving closer to tuning encounters based on the players and what they are able to overcome. But that doesn't matter in the end, because:


This isn't just a D&D thread

That line isn't just working against D&D. You are working against almost every game that's out there, that your players have likely played, D&D among them. They're power fantasies, designed to make the people playing them feel strong and unstoppable. They get levels, get stronger, get itemized lists of impossible abilities that literally change the world around them. There are exceptions to this rule, and I love them. But I love those incredibly vulnerable games because they are exceptions, and they shake up the normal power fantasy formula that most games embrace.

If you aren't clear that you intend to avoid this, players will enter your game expecting it. Heck, they might do it even if you are clear because that's what they've been conditioned to expect. But you took the fun hat. It's your job to make the game fun. So if you intend to run a lethal, disempowering game, you need to make that clear. If everyone agrees to it, you have to make it rewarding. You need to make sure the players are actually aware of the mortality of their characters- bearing in mind that they would probably forget they could turn doorknobs with their hands if you gave them a wand of knock. Their immersion is your responsibility. It's up to you to make sure that they are actually fearing death, and surprised to make it out of deadly encounters alive, to expend resources avoiding deadly situations rather than facing them head on. Because:


That the DMs fault?

The first time you've made a player feel that they were killed by an obstacle they should have easily overcome, that is your fault.

The first time a player feels it was unfair to die to a single unlucky roll, that is your fault.

Again, if the player makes a habit it's safe to say that's on them. But the first time you, the person who promised to make a fun game for everyone, deliver an experience to your player that frustrates or otherwise drains the fun out of the game for them, it's on you. Don't justify it. Just make the game better.

Erys
2017-01-07, 03:20 PM
The first time you've made a player feel that they were killed by an obstacle they should have easily overcome, that is your fault.

The first time a player feels it was unfair to die to a single unlucky roll, that is your fault.

Again, if the player makes a habit it's safe to say that's on them. But the first time you, the person who promised to make a fun game for everyone, deliver an experience to your player that frustrates or otherwise drains the fun out of the game for them, it's on you. Don't justify it. Just make the game better.

Yeah, it's totally the DMs fault the dice killed a PC.

/roll

Is this special-snowflake-gaming now where we have account for everyone's feelings and make sure the scary dice don't ruin the game. Where we fudge rolls and lower the bar on all obstacles because the PC's "feel" they should be able to kill a lich at 3rd level?

No offense, but that is completely ridiculous.

If you want to run your games that way, so be it. But that sounds like something that would get remarkable boring after about 15 minutes of play.

goatmeal
2017-01-07, 04:49 PM
Hi.

DnD assumes that all your encounters will be level appropriate and survivable because that has stood the test of time and proven to be more fun.

It's in the books. You, as a DM, are told that you can do whatever you want. But if you want the best game possible, as near as the designers of the game have been able to refine it, you should use these guidelines. Those guidelines say to make the entire game survivable. Space your encounters so that players can recover. Never put in a challenge that will completely crush them- only ones that the players can beat with heavy losses, clever planning, or luck. It doesn't always work out that way, but that's what's in the books.

That's what your players have to work with. "Not everything is easy, but you can beat everything." Any other assumptions you have about how the game ought to run are in your head. The players won't know until you tell them, and then they will forget because of course they will and you will need to remind them BEFORE THEY SUFFER CONSEQUENCES- otherwise, you're punishing them for being human and for not remembering how the game works when you run it. You might say that getting punished for fortgetting how the rules work is just life- BUT THIS ISN'T LIFE. IT IS A GAME. And when you decide to be the DM, you have not signed onto the job of simulating a realistic world that punishes people for being people. You have put on the fun hat. Your job (your most important job) is to make the game fun.

Fun requires challenges. Fun can be seeing the cocky player's character destroyed for being... well, played by the cocky player. I think we all have that player. And... yes, I will admit, it is fun to watch our cocky player get taken down a peg. Like, absolutely hilarious. BUT. That cocky player came here to have fun too. And I am willing to bet that your cocky player (like our cocky player) made a brash sword swinging duelist to swing off a chandelier, kick a corrupt wizard into the fire, grab the macguffin and rescue the hostage while spewing snarky one liners.

You know. To play a fantasy game and indulge in their fantasy. Not to hear, "Grow up Flynn Rider this is the REAL WORLD. Actions have CONSEQUENCES and you pay TAXES."

These things have a place. I adore horror games, and other sorts of games where you can actually be curb stomped by anything at any time. But before running any of these I CANNOT STRESS ENOUGH: make it clear to the players. They need to know what your making and everybody needs to be on board for it. Let them know they can be one shot at any time, even in the first adventure. Remind them when they first meet an enemy. Remind them when they first meet a scary enemy. Remind them when they're setting up camp.

Because if you don't, they will use the default assumption that the books (and every other game ever) have ground into their heads: you can beat it. When you want your gritty game to make your players feel powerless, remember that not only are you fighting against every other game in existence but against the very power fantasy role playing game you have chosen to support your story. It's not enough to say, "The fists of this beast look like they could crush your skull like a grape." Your line of dialogue has too much working against it. DnD's entire levelling system, in fact. And that's bad.

If your player can't keep a character alive for more than a session, that's probably their problem. But the very first time any character dies and the player doesn't feel like it was justified? Felt like it came out of nowhere? Felt cheated? That first time is ALWAYS going to be the DM's fault. Figure out where you failed and do better next time.

We must be reading different books, because every book I've seen says the opposite. Please provide a quote with a source if you feel otherwise.

John Longarrow
2017-01-07, 05:29 PM
The first time you've made a player feel that they were killed by an obstacle they should have easily overcome, that is your fault.

The first time a player feels it was unfair to die to a single unlucky roll, that is your fault.

Again, if the player makes a habit it's safe to say that's on them. But the first time you, the person who promised to make a fun game for everyone, deliver an experience to your player that frustrates or otherwise drains the fun out of the game for them, it's on you. Don't justify it. Just make the game better.

Kewl! So running the game not only lets you see the future, it also lets you read players minds so you know their emotional responses!

More seriously, if a player rolls bad, how is that the DMs fault? If the player makes a bad decision, how is it the DMs fault? If the PLAYER can't tell the DM what they expect in the game, how is it the DMs fault?

Or, if this isn't related to your intended message would it be fair to say its all your fault that you didn't explain yourself?

Truth is in any game everyone needs to communicated what they expect and what they enjoy. If the players don't enjoy a DMs game they are free to not play. DMs should listen to players for what the players like, but DMs should never run a game they don't enjoy running. No fault on either side.

kyoryu
2017-01-07, 06:52 PM
In general, I view it as most interesting when every encounter I make theoretically can be won using any number of means, including combat. That doesn't mean I don't think the players should die if they act foolishly, but that doesn't mean that they shouldn't get to interact with the world in the way they think is most fun.

The interesting dissection here is that you consider an "encounter" to be something that is there to be "won".

Sometimes it's literally just "I encounter this thing".

That's not necessarily a thing for every game, of course. But it's a thing that exists in some types of games.

Yukitsu
2017-01-08, 11:13 AM
The interesting dissection here is that you consider an "encounter" to be something that is there to be "won".

Sometimes it's literally just "I encounter this thing".

That's not necessarily a thing for every game, of course. But it's a thing that exists in some types of games.

People go into every encounter with goals in mind and you as the DM generally should reward EXP for encounters. Whether you are thinking of it as "winning" or not, people can definitely come away from an encounter with what they wanted or not and coming away with what I had as a goal even if it's one I came up with as the encounter progressed is winning in my book. Similarly, I believe DMs are supposed to give parties EXP for surviving encounters, so I certainly don't count a chance meeting with something that isn't meant to be any sort of challenge, puzzle, social situation or combat an encounter. That includes that level 50 dragon that flies past the party, to me that isn't an encounter anyway.

John Longarrow
2017-01-08, 12:06 PM
People go into every encounter with goals in mind and you as the DM generally should reward EXP for encounters. Whether you are thinking of it as "winning" or not, people can definitely come away from an encounter with what they wanted or not and coming away with what I had as a goal even if it's one I came up with as the encounter progressed is winning in my book. Similarly, I believe DMs are supposed to give parties EXP for surviving encounters, so I certainly don't count a chance meeting with something that isn't meant to be any sort of challenge, puzzle, social situation or combat an encounter. That includes that level 50 dragon that flies past the party, to me that isn't an encounter anyway.

So if the party tries to attack said Dragon when they are not level appropriate, do you just tell them "Sorry, you can't do that" or just have the dragon ignore it? What happens when the players decide "Oh, its a dragon so we MUST be able to kill it" and then try their best to hunt it down?

Or do you just never have the players see it because its not level appropriate and they could try to do something that isn't a good idea?

Yukitsu
2017-01-08, 12:18 PM
So if the party tries to attack said Dragon when they are not level appropriate, do you just tell them "Sorry, you can't do that" or just have the dragon ignore it? What happens when the players decide "Oh, its a dragon so we MUST be able to kill it" and then try their best to hunt it down?

Or do you just never have the players see it because its not level appropriate and they could try to do something that isn't a good idea?

I've said already I don't think that I would ever include it in the game at all since it's clearly meant to be non-interactive.

But if I did I'd probably just outright tell them that they can't, yeah.

Erys
2017-01-08, 12:33 PM
I've said already I don't think that I would ever include it in the game at all since it's clearly meant to be non-interactive.

But if I did I'd probably just outright tell them that they can't, yeah.

While I can see the point, I fee that's kind of boring.

Not too long ago I had placed a purple worm in the distance of the party, the intent was just to set the mood of the area, the ground was broken and they felt slight tremors then see the worm a little while later (I had a bulette encounter planned). Naturally I assume they are going to let it be, as they are pretty low level at the time but no... someone shoots an arrow at it and even with the penalties hits the dang thing. Next thing they know its charging towards them.

It turned into a fun little encounter as they realized very fast they made a mistake and spent the rest of their time trying to figure a way to evade the massive beast. It forced some pretty impressive outside-the-box thinking and turned into a great encounter.

I jokingly gave the worm a level for chasing off the PCs.

kyoryu
2017-01-08, 12:47 PM
People go into every encounter with goals in mind and you as the DM generally should reward EXP for encounters. Whether you are thinking of it as "winning" or not, people can definitely come away from an encounter with what they wanted or not and coming away with what I had as a goal even if it's one I came up with as the encounter progressed is winning in my book. Similarly, I believe DMs are supposed to give parties EXP for surviving encounters, so I certainly don't count a chance meeting with something that isn't meant to be any sort of challenge, puzzle, social situation or combat an encounter. That includes that level 50 dragon that flies past the party, to me that isn't an encounter anyway.

Again, the number of assumptions in this post are staggering.

That's a fine way to play, of course. But it's not the only way to play.

And, to be fair, I don't even know *how* to give EXP in Fate, or many other systems.

But snark aside, the big question here is really whether every encounter (meaning, you meet up with something/someone) needs to be an Encounter (a challenge/puzzle/social situation/combat that rewards EXP).

Yukitsu
2017-01-08, 12:54 PM
But snark aside, the big question here is really whether every encounter (meaning, you meet up with something/someone) needs to be an Encounter (a challenge/puzzle/social situation/combat that rewards EXP).

It's not, I'm just clarifying that that's how I'm using the term. I don't narrate to my players 99% of the things they meet up with since every day that could be hundreds of NPCs of varying importance, so I mostly only narrate the kind that are an "Encounter".

John Longarrow
2017-01-08, 12:58 PM
I've said already I don't think that I would ever include it in the game at all since it's clearly meant to be non-interactive.

But if I did I'd probably just outright tell them that they can't, yeah.

Must make it hell when the players need to get info. Can't find anyone who'd be notably better than what the players can do themselves since they COULD decide to attack the sage. Also means if they go into a bar there can't be many patrons in case the party decides to attack. Would also make for very empty cities since a large number of people would be too high of a challenge for most low level parties.

Course if you really make everything "level appropriate" then that archmage had better not piss off the commoner in the field, else they may have a "level appropriate" encounter with the guy who is shoveling manure.

To me this is a horrible horrible way to present the world since the players can NEVER encounter something outside some arbitrary limit based on the assumption someone may decide to attack it. I'd never play in such a game. I'd never run such a game. To me, such a game should be restricted to table top mini wargames, computer RPGs (which won't let you attack just everything) or dedicated murderhobo games where you have to assume the party attacks anyone and everyone. Course if that's your cup of tea go for it.

Yukitsu
2017-01-08, 01:06 PM
Must make it hell when the players need to get info. Can't find anyone who'd be notably better than what the players can do themselves since they COULD decide to attack the sage. Also means if they go into a bar there can't be many patrons in case the party decides to attack. Would also make for very empty cities since a large number of people would be too high of a challenge for most low level parties.

Course if you really make everything "level appropriate" then that archmage had better not piss off the commoner in the field, else they may have a "level appropriate" encounter with the guy who is shoveling manure.

To me this is a horrible horrible way to present the world since the players can NEVER encounter something outside some arbitrary limit based on the assumption someone may decide to attack it. I'd never play in such a game. I'd never run such a game. To me, such a game should be restricted to table top mini wargames, computer RPGs (which won't let you attack just everything) or dedicated murderhobo games where you have to assume the party attacks anyone and everyone. Course if that's your cup of tea go for it.

I already mentioned I'm not saying every random person in the world is an encounter, they're there but largely not something that the players need to talk to. So sure, perhaps there is a lowly low level farmer and if for some incomprehensible reason the wizard decides to fight it... Actually scratch that, I'd just say "OK, you kill the farmer" and move on with it because there isn't much fun for the rest of the table spending the time and effort rolling the combat between the archmage and the level 1 commoner or the other hundreds of level 1 farmers that player may decide they want to attack.

But all my "information brokers" are typically lower level than the party themselves, or a similar level, or a higher level but designed for information gathering rather than combat. There really is no verisimilitude added to the game if the information brokers are all somehow way stronger than the party. Nor would a single large city ever constitute a single encounter, almost everyone in it would, in my view, flee from a powerful adventurer rather than fight them.

John Longarrow
2017-01-08, 01:13 PM
Nor would a single large city ever constitute a single encounter, almost everyone in it would, in my view, flee from a powerful adventurer rather than fight them.

So 1st level adventurers are "Powerful" and would scare off the entire population of a city?

I agree, just killing off the commoner should be pretty much hand waived but if your entire argument has been that every encounter needs to be level appropriate and "combat" is part of your definition, then you may want to restate your position. It seems your more of the opinion that "PCs should never meet anything a lot more powerful than themselves". It also means you won't let your PCs interact with high level spell casters who can cast spell the PCs can't (say going to a temple to bring back a dead PC at 5th level) because they party "May attack".

Once more, for me this would be a horrible, horrible environment to play in since I'd never get a chance to deal with anything really powerful until the DM spoon feeds it to the party in a safe way since the DM is concerned the party may get into a fight with it.

My players agree and like that I can put them situations where combat is not a good idea since they can deal with and get help from those more powerful than themselves, even if it is only to get a sword enchanted.

Yukitsu
2017-01-09, 12:50 AM
So 1st level adventurers are "Powerful" and would scare off the entire population of a city?

To be fair, I don't think I've ever started a party at first level and if I ever did I'd start them off in a small hamlet rather than a large city. Not just because I feel that yes, sometimes players just attack cities or don't seem to comprehend that what they're doing is attacking the city, and frankly I'd rather not have my campaign derailed to an end that early but also because I tend to find that a really large city should happen after the characters get a feel for the world as a small place which they are not entirely insignificant in. Narratively, that seems to be a common thing and I suspect it's because it gives a stronger incentive to adventure.

Also, I'm the same level IRL as a crazed gunman, I and almost everyone I know in my city would run from him or avoid going near.


I agree, just killing off the commoner should be pretty much hand waived but if your entire argument has been that every encounter needs to be level appropriate and "combat" is part of your definition, then you may want to restate your position. It seems your more of the opinion that "PCs should never meet anything a lot more powerful than themselves". It also means you won't let your PCs interact with high level spell casters who can cast spell the PCs can't (say going to a temple to bring back a dead PC at 5th level) because they party "May attack".

There's an awful lot that I would specify if I thought any of this detracts from my opinion or that I disagree with inherently but other than me creating an encounter, that farmer simply isn't one. That's the party asking "is there a level 1 farmer we can go beat up." to which I'm honestly as likely to say "no, I don't plan on running a campaign where you spend the entire evening attacking level 1 farmers." Same with if there's a level 40 dragon in my world. If the party says "we want to go find a level 40 dragon" I'll be like "OK." but I'm not going to fly a dragon past the party, be all coy about how it's strong and then claim they were stupid when they thought it was appropriate. I'm fully aware that not only is my descriptive text for impossible encounters identical to that of climactic boss battles, I know full well it's the same when other DMs describe them too, so unless I just say "The dragon will kill you, I don't care to run it, if you do you die." the party is probably going to think their chance is as good there as if that were the climactic story boss.


Once more, for me this would be a horrible, horrible environment to play in since I'd never get a chance to deal with anything really powerful until the DM spoon feeds it to the party in a safe way since the DM is concerned the party may get into a fight with it.

To be fair, from experience I've stretched "appropriate CR" in D&D to go further than +4 since realistically, you can easily have a party beat a CR+4 encounter with little danger. I think by level 10 it's fair to stretch it to +6 and expect the party to win with difficulty and since I play every creature as though they were fighting for their lives and at their int score, my players have traditionally been challenged (thought less lethally) by fairly under CR encounters. Then again, my players may just be particularly weak.

And even then, why exactly can't I throw incredibly powerful encounters at my party with my philosophy? I almost always try to include one every few sessions as a climax to things. The difference is you want it to be so far out of the party's reach that it's OK to deride them for even trying to fight it whereas I expect my players to find a way to win. Admittedly they often don't but it's rarely a one sided battle when they do lose.


My players agree and like that I can put them situations where combat is not a good idea since they can deal with and get help from those more powerful than themselves, even if it is only to get a sword enchanted.

As a player, I love it when combat isn't a good idea. I just am not interested when it's an impossible idea. As a player, I welcome fighting things that have a CR 8 or more above my level. While I don't always choose combat, or I don't always pick direct combat, it's definitely fun to be in that kind of challenging encounter.

kyoryu
2017-01-09, 01:19 AM
It's not, I'm just clarifying that that's how I'm using the term. I don't narrate to my players 99% of the things they meet up with since every day that could be hundreds of NPCs of varying importance, so I mostly only narrate the kind that are an "Encounter".

"They happen, I just don't tell the players about them" and "they don't happen" are functionally equivalent.

Yukitsu
2017-01-09, 01:23 AM
"They happen, I just don't tell the players about them" and "they don't happen" are functionally equivalent.

It's true and it's why for like, 99% of situations, I don't think that they should be "added" to the game. The exception is when the party asks in which case they should exist and they can also exist in the abstract. For example you say it's a cozy town of 700, most of them farmers. You don't have the party encounter farmers 600 times and then go through the other 100 that aren't.

kyoryu
2017-01-09, 01:31 AM
It's true and it's why for like, 99% of situations, I don't think that they should be "added" to the game. The exception is when the party asks in which case they should exist and they can also exist in the abstract. For example you say it's a cozy town of 700, most of them farmers. You don't have the party encounter farmers 600 times and then go through the other 100 that aren't.

That would be weird unless anyone gets in a line, anyway. You don't need to strawman quite that hard.

I just don't necessarily think that games, especially of a certain type, need to have every situation encountered be a "gameable" one. For other types and expectations, that's awesome.

It's personal preference and game type, *not* an objective, universally true principle.

Yukitsu
2017-01-09, 01:41 AM
That would be weird unless anyone gets in a line, anyway. You don't need to strawman quite that hard.

I just don't necessarily think that games, especially of a certain type, need to have every situation encountered be a "gameable" one. For other types and expectations, that's awesome.

It's personal preference and game type, *not* an objective, universally true principle.

I think it makes sense to assume that every situation you create as a DM may end up being a "gamed" one, and it's there that we find the arguments I'm talking about here. They say it should be "characters die." I argue "it should be something interactive."

I don't think you can deny that players may opt to turn anything you explicitly mention into a quest, adventure or encounter, be it social RP, economic, skill focused or even combat and that should be awesome, it shouldn't be "Oh well that was stupid of you for even trying."

Edit: And no, that's not a strawman, there was a poster asking why my farmers aren't "fair encounters".

Koo Rehtorb
2017-01-09, 01:44 AM
If you're really doubling down on the whole "Players should never encounter anything that could be more powerful than them" thing then wouldn't it be easier and make at least somewhat more sense for the setting to instead say "If characters are beaten by an encounter too powerful for them then they'll never be killed by it. They'll be captured or left for dead, or something else like that."?

I don't think either of those options are good, but the second strikes me as at least mildly better.

Yukitsu
2017-01-09, 02:28 AM
If you're really doubling down on the whole "Players should never encounter anything that could be more powerful than them" thing then wouldn't it be easier and make at least somewhat more sense for the setting to instead say "If characters are beaten by an encounter too powerful for them then they'll never be killed by it. They'll be captured or left for dead, or something else like that."?

I don't think either of those options are good, but the second strikes me as at least mildly better.

Well because I don't think they shouldn't ever encounter someone stronger than them. I just happen to think they should always have a chance at winning, and a realistic chance to win.

Part of the whole issue is the idea that players are idiots if they try to hit above their pay grade. I dismiss that notion entirely and think that you should enable players that want to beat their way through an encounter. You can make it hard, you can make it so certain very narrow approaches fail (as in the OP where the party probably could have won a more normal fight) or you can just cut away the NPC that is so high above your player's level that they simply couldn't ever beat him. And of course you could make it so that a more peaceful approach is more profitable and easier.

I think for the same sort of reasoning though, both myself and people I'm arguing with wouldn't want a deathless world. I do agree that players that can't ever be killed by encounters aren't going to have the same kind of tension as when they're playing with the thought that their character may die. I simply don't want that death to be some thing based around miscommunication of difficulty, an ad-hoc decision that something should just be too hard, or a failure of that player to fully min-max their fleeing capabilities. (I'm currently in a campaign where I've survived 6 party wipes since the only person at the table who optimized for fleeing was me and my DM loves throwing in "this is supposed to be an impossible CR encounter" at us. This isn't even D&D.)

Knaight
2017-01-09, 04:04 AM
To be fair, I don't think I've ever started a party at first level and if I ever did I'd start them off in a small hamlet rather than a large city. Not just because I feel that yes, sometimes players just attack cities or don't seem to comprehend that what they're doing is attacking the city, and frankly I'd rather not have my campaign derailed to an end that early but also because I tend to find that a really large city should happen after the characters get a feel for the world as a small place which they are not entirely insignificant in. Narratively, that seems to be a common thing and I suspect it's because it gives a stronger incentive to adventure.
Yet the large city is presumably in the world at first level, so what happens when the PCs decide that they're going to go to the large city to try and find something that is easier to find in a large city than elsewhere?


As a player, I love it when combat isn't a good idea. I just am not interested when it's an impossible idea. As a player, I welcome fighting things that have a CR 8 or more above my level. While I don't always choose combat, or I don't always pick direct combat, it's definitely fun to be in that kind of challenging encounter.
So lets say that you're playing in an Arthurian Knights game, because that's what the group wanted to play. The round table is presumably there. The PCs then decide to attempt to fight the entire round table simultaneously, all 100+ elite knights. Should they really have a chance of victory? Probably not.

Yukitsu
2017-01-09, 04:23 AM
Yet the large city is presumably in the world at first level, so what happens when the PCs decide that they're going to go to the large city to try and find something that is easier to find in a large city than elsewhere?

Then that, like the level 1 farmer, isn't me crafting an encounter. I didn't put it there for them to interact with, I didn't show it to them.

I don't mind things that are above the abilities of the party. I don't mind if the players go looking for things they can't deal with, but at that point the onus is on them, not me. And I either make a story that fits what they want to do, or if I really don't want to DM what they want to do, I don't DM.


So lets say that you're playing in an Arthurian Knights game, because that's what the group wanted to play. The round table is presumably there. The PCs then decide to attempt to fight the entire round table simultaneously, all 100+ elite knights. Should they really have a chance of victory? Probably not.

Why can't I make a more interesting story than the one I'm trying to write using exactly that as the pretext if that's what the party wants?

The issue there would be if one PC decides to go do all that and the rest of the table doesn't, or if I really don't want to DM that. That's a different issue in general though, one that's much harder to deal with.

Knaight
2017-01-09, 04:33 AM
I don't mind things that are above the abilities of the party. I don't mind if the players go looking for things they can't deal with, but at that point the onus is on them, not me.

This gets into a pretty big gradient though. The city is an example of something effectively guaranteed to be in its location (they tend not to move), where if the PCs go there they will find it. What about cases where if they go somewhere they will probably find something? If they take the high road to the capital when the king is having a tournament, running across a high end jouster is pretty likely, but not guaranteed. Should they never run into them? What about a case where the odds are lower, but the action is repeated - say the PCs decide that they like cutting across some plains that are occupied by some nomads that tend to have patrols out that will investigate strangers. On any given plains trip they probably won't run into said nomads, as the plains are fairly large and sparsely populated, but should the nomad patrols only ever show up once the PCs are capable of taking them in a fight?

Then there's how blurry the line between passing description and an encounter is. Setting a scene is frequently going to involve mentioning something that can be interacted with as a matter of course, and all it takes is players taking an interest to bump that into an encounter. You could casually mention that some nomad patrols ask the PCs their business on the aforementioned plain as part of the descripiton, and as soon as any player decides that they want to do more than just have it glossed over you have an encounter. Why should that be something they can reliably take in all instances, particularly when they aren't even hostile?

Yukitsu
2017-01-09, 05:16 AM
This gets into a pretty big gradient though. The city is an example of something effectively guaranteed to be in its location (they tend not to move), where if the PCs go there they will find it. What about cases where if they go somewhere they will probably find something? If they take the high road to the capital when the king is having a tournament, running across a high end jouster is pretty likely, but not guaranteed. Should they never run into them? What about a case where the odds are lower, but the action is repeated - say the PCs decide that they like cutting across some plains that are occupied by some nomads that tend to have patrols out that will investigate strangers. On any given plains trip they probably won't run into said nomads, as the plains are fairly large and sparsely populated, but should the nomad patrols only ever show up once the PCs are capable of taking them in a fight?

Then there's how blurry the line between passing description and an encounter is. Setting a scene is frequently going to involve mentioning something that can be interacted with as a matter of course, and all it takes is players taking an interest to bump that into an encounter. You could casually mention that some nomad patrols ask the PCs their business on the aforementioned plain as part of the descripiton, and as soon as any player decides that they want to do more than just have it glossed over you have an encounter. Why should that be something they can reliably take in all instances, particularly when they aren't even hostile?

In either cases, I simply don't see them as being higher level encounters. Certainly I'd never peg either as being so difficult an encounter as to warrant an unbeatable encounter, that simply doesn't make sense in either context to me. I don't view a tournament jouster as being this super powerful combatant that should be unbeatable to normal people. I don't view a small number of nomads, particularly ones that are meant to be patrolling as ones that would be even remotely formidable. I view both as inherently lower level but if to you, "nomad" equates to a level 6 character, if a jouster equates to someone levels and levels above an average adventurer, I think that's your choice but to me that strains my sense of immersion more than reinforces it. If the world is in some sort of peril, or even just the kingdom or whatever the bad guy of your campaign is threatening, why isn't the jouster out doing it? Why are these level 1 adventurers doing it when the average ruffian on a horse is level 6? And in fact, how did someone manage to get to adult age and remain level 1 when doing normal human things is capable of getting you to those sorts of heights?

And I didn't ever say reliably, so that's disingenuous in the first place. I said it should be possible for them to win that encounter. (and no, I don't mean "if the players only roll 20s and the DM only rolls 1s" kind of possible, I mean in the sense that if you ran it 100 times using different strategies, some would work rather than none.)

Knaight
2017-01-09, 05:38 AM
In either cases, I simply don't see them as being higher level encounters. Certainly I'd never peg either as being so difficult an encounter as to warrant an unbeatable encounter, that simply doesn't make sense in either context to me. I don't view a tournament jouster as being this super powerful combatant that should be unbeatable to normal people. I don't view a small number of nomads, particularly ones that are meant to be patrolling as ones that would be even remotely formidable. I view both as inherently lower level but if to you, "nomad" equates to a level 6 character, if a jouster equates to someone levels and levels above an average adventurer, I think that's your choice but to me that strains my sense of immersion more than reinforces it.

I'm assuming low level PCs here - the nomads are in D&D terms probably mostly low level warriors (and even then only because it's a military patrol), but picking a 4 on 30 fight is the sort of thing that tends to end poorly unless there's a substantial power gap in favor of the 4. As for the jouster example, keep in mind that I'm not talking about a standard jouster here, but rather the sort of background that makes the situation in the OP probable.


If the world is in some sort of peril, or even just the kingdom or whatever the bad guy of your campaign is threatening, why isn't the jouster out doing it? Why are these level 1 adventurers doing it when the average ruffian on a horse is level 6? And in fact, how did someone manage to get to adult age and remain level 1 when doing normal human things is capable of getting you to those sorts of heights?
Who said anything about having "the bad guy of your campaign", or having a world or kingdom in peril? Those aren't standard assumptions, and yeah, if you assume that the PCs are innately larger than life world saving heroes then they probably should be able to take most anything they run into. That's not a safe assumption. Establishing the PCs as world saving badasses and then having them get wiped out when they pick a fight that is only established as dangerous to normal people is the sort of thing that rightfully earns reputations as killer DMs.

Nobody is suggesting doing that though.

Yukitsu
2017-01-09, 05:53 AM
I'm assuming low level PCs here - the nomads are in D&D terms probably mostly low level warriors (and even then only because it's a military patrol), but picking a 4 on 30 fight is the sort of thing that tends to end poorly unless there's a substantial power gap in favor of the 4. As for the jouster example, keep in mind that I'm not talking about a standard jouster here, but rather the sort of background that makes the situation in the OP probable.

I'm going to note I like the OPs story and think that was handled relatively well. I'd argue against the interpretation that this translates into the jouster being unbeatable which I don't believe in this case he was. He was hard to beat for this PC in a formalized joust which is the only thing that NPC was established as being good at. This should not translate into someone the party couldn't defeat.


Who said anything about having "the bad guy of your campaign", or having a world or kingdom in peril? Those aren't standard assumptions, and yeah, if you assume that the PCs are innately larger than life world saving heroes then they probably should be able to take most anything they run into. That's not a safe assumption. Establishing the PCs as world saving badasses and then having them get wiped out when they pick a fight that is only established as dangerous to normal people is the sort of thing that rightfully earns reputations as killer DMs.

Nobody is suggesting doing that though.

Even where it isn't, it's about of people trying to overcome some difficult challenge to stop something, help someone or acquire some thing. In all cases, it does make sense to ask the same question of why isn't the more competent group doing the adventurous thing. Why wasn't that magical artifact already found ages ago by more competent people? Why are these guys who are inferior architects rebuilding the dam when there's this other guy that vastly outstrips them right here? Why are these guys helping the local shaman make it to the sacred grove through nomad land when the nomads rove around in really, really large patrols when he could have just hired a mercenary band for probably cheaper? I mean, if your campaign isn't at all about overcoming something to do or acquire something, I'd ask what it is about then, or if that could really be considered standard.

hifidelity2
2017-01-09, 05:58 AM
I don't mind things that are above the abilities of the party. I don't mind if the players go looking for things they can't deal with, but at that point the onus is on them, not me.



I agree - I have no issue with the PC’s looking / stumbling into higher level encounters but if they go for the combative approach then its on their heads

As a DM its up to me to warn them (not directly) but by how I describe the encounter / NPC etc

Recently in one adventure the PCs needed to get some items by stealing them from a number of houses (all “level appropriate” – party approx. 3rd level ). After the 2nd house they were summons to meet the head of the local thieves guild as they had not paid the for a permit”

They then had a number of options from accepting the “invite” and pay (this is what they did) to attacking the whole of the thieves guild.
As a DM I was able to describe the guild & what info the party thief was able to pick up “on the street”. Had they refused to deal with the guild they would have had escalating difficulties ending in either death or being sold into slavery

Knaight
2017-01-09, 06:31 AM
Even where it isn't, it's about of people trying to overcome some difficult challenge to stop something, help someone or acquire some thing. In all cases, it does make sense to ask the same question of why isn't the more competent group doing the adventurous thing. Why wasn't that magical artifact already found ages ago by more competent people? Why are these guys who are inferior architects rebuilding the dam when there's this other guy that vastly outstrips them right here? Why are these guys helping the local shaman make it to the sacred grove through nomad land when the nomads rove around in really, really large patrols when he could have just hired a mercenary band for probably cheaper? I mean, if your campaign isn't at all about overcoming something to do or acquire something, I'd ask what it is about then, or if that could really be considered standard.

Here's some examples of cases where the PCs have goals, there's a reason that what they're doing is being done by them and not someone else, and yet there's still plenty of things much more dangerous than them in the world.

Port Alhabri: The PCs were members of one guild in one city, who were trying to keep it afloat. They were highly competent but human scale, and they took that into account. Someone being put out as an extremely dangerous combatant could be taken as dangerous but not necessarily more so than the PCs, there was exactly one death due to overwhelming force, and it was when a player who believed he had freakish dice luck picked a fight with four PC-comparable NPCs at the same time, and the entire rest of the group was expecting a loss there, which then happened. Overwhelming encounters that showed up (e.g. a large force of guards dispersing a riot the PCs had deliberately instigated, or the known heavy hitter of the primary antagonist and her troops) were generally treated as such, and there was generally running. Why is it them? Most of the rest of the guild scattered to other cities, what's left is pushing the same goal, and for everyone who wasn't a member of the Port Alhabri Alchemists Guild, who cares? Sure, their opposition has other opposition, but the PCs are probably the best suited for their specific goal from the people who actually care about it.

Fishermen of the Toxic Sea: The PCs are explicitly a group of poor fishermen and some convicts who decided to run from the law, and they're caught up in something big because they pulled something up in a fishing net by sheer dumb luck (as the start of the campaign). They've generally avoided fights so far, and are playing normal people and not professional adventurers. They know this, and as such take the sort of threats that threaten normal people (e.g. a small local criminal gang) seriously even when adventurers could stomp them. That doesn't mean that they don't deal with them, but it does mean that anything highlighted as extremely dangerous will be taken as extremely dangerous and won't be some sort of killer GM ambush. As for why it's them - they found the item, they'll be taking it across the world to where they can sell it so they can change their fortunes for the better. Could professional adventurers or members of a widespread merchant guild or whatever do much better? Yes. Do any of them seem interested in paying the PCs anywhere near full price. Not so much.

Bringers of the Gift: The player group are fish out of water nomads who happened to survive an apocalyptic (but fairly localized) plague. They also happen to have accidentally found both magic itself and the way it's accessed, and are the most versatile mages on the planet (though not the most powerful). As such, they can treat certain signs of danger as cues to get involved rather than avoid it, while others are still very much signs to avoid. That includes direct combat - the PCs were able to change the fortune of a war by some scouting magic and because they're the only people who had certain magic powers that let them provide a logistical advantage, but that doesn't mean that they can reliably handle the actual professional fighting class.

Schrodinger's Hummingbird: The PCs are a broadly competent mercenary group with a small and pretty typically built warship. They get pulled up for contracts within a particular pay scale, but it's obvious that there are things much more dangerous than them in setting, and they tend to advertise (partially because ship size is a pretty decent indicator for ship threat, and there are ships hundreds of times bigger than their little craft). At first, they were doing typical jobs for small operative teams with a ship of their size, and most of what they'd run across in the context of their missions were things that they could handle - trying to take over a big space station would be suicide, trying to steal the data from the research group operating out of one office on said big station like they were being paid to do could probably be handled. Later in the campaign they started getting missions that would have been suicide to approach by combat, but that it was the case was clearly indicated (again, ship size is a pretty good indicator and it's not exactly subtle, same thing with number of troops), and it also only happened because the party developed a reputation for being clever, sneaky, and capable of hitting way above their pay scale. Sure, most of their jobs came from corporations that would have had the budget to go with the nuclear option and just pay one of the big groups to go in with overwhelming force, but that's expensive and big corporations hate spending more money than they have to. Thus, the PCs get the contract.

The Four Dark Riders: The PCs are legendary heroes and established adventurers who are called to help the populace of a kingdom ravaged by pestilence, famine, war, and death. Also by Pestilence, Famine, War, and Death, four supernatural riders who nobody wants to touch, against whom the PCs represent a substantial fraction of their real opposition all by their lonesome. Just about anything the PCs come across is likely to be within the realm of being handled, and something like them getting dropped by the winner of a tournament is abject nonsense. The pitch of this game was "we haven't done legendary heroes for a long time, let's play a game centering them", and that's what sets expectations. So yeah, in this game your assumption that any encounter is one that there is at least a chance of winning as a fight holds.

Looking across these, and across other games, there's an obvious trend - the PCs have a goal, and if the goal is external (e.g. they're questing heroes or hired mercenaries) and they've been brought in they're probably capable of handling what they got brought in for. They also share a world with a whole bunch of other people, other creatures, etc. Being the big fish in the pond of what they're doing does not mean that they'll be the big fish in the pond of where they are, unless they're doing something really huge. Given the aforementioned blurriness between an encounter and mentioning something in passing, that means that even if the bigger fish are never presented as things up in your face that need to be dealt with the PCs will run across them eventually.

Given all that, why in the world would fighting all of these things be broadly doable?

prufock
2017-01-09, 07:52 AM
In general, I view it as most interesting when every encounter I make theoretically can be won using any number of means, including combat. That doesn't mean I don't think the players should die if they act foolishly, but that doesn't mean that they shouldn't get to interact with the world in the way they think is most fun.
Notably, you stop short of saying that all encounters should be able to be solved by combat. For example, the players are on a rickety bridge over a boiling lake of lava. Player 1 states "I attack the bridge!"


For example, I've had players in my games win fighting against encounters 6 or more levels above them because they played to their strengths and managed to get the rolls they needed. By contrast, I've had a player die in a fight against a combat 2 CR below his level where I expected it to be pretty easy because they failed to understand their opponents strengths and weaknesses. In other words, I don't bend the game to make the players certainly live, but I certainly don't put things into the game that they flat out can't fight.
If you're talking about D&D 3.5, an EL 6 levels above the average party level is defined as "overpowering" by the game mechanics, as in "the PCs should run." Situational advantages may lower the EL, but lucky rolls shouldn't be factored into encounter design.

TheCountAlucard
2017-01-09, 12:06 PM
It's not just that they had no chance of winning in the OP's post - they specifically let just one PC challenge him and specifically do so in the knight's area of specialty. You can't fault the DM any more than if the player had decided to try it with one arm tied behind his back.

Yukitsu
2017-01-09, 02:02 PM
Notably, you stop short of saying that all encounters should be able to be solved by combat. For example, the players are on a rickety bridge over a boiling lake of lava. Player 1 states "I attack the bridge!"

I think that all encounters, that is challenges that need to be overcome, should be resolvable by combat. But they should also be resolvable through any number of other means as well. If the players say to me "I don't trust that bridge, let's go kill a treant and use it to span the chasm." I'm gonna say to them "It'll be hard, but OK." or "The bridge is fine, I'm just telling you so we don't waste time ooc."


If you're talking about D&D 3.5, an EL 6 levels above the average party level is defined as "overpowering" by the game mechanics, as in "the PCs should run." Situational advantages may lower the EL, but lucky rolls shouldn't be factored into encounter design.

Yeah, but the DMG is seriously bad when it comes to guessing how its own game is or should be played at times. CR +6 is something I don't view as unreasonable and would almost find it a little too low for a climactic story based battle depending on how many players I have. Just like how CR-3 isn't worth rolling at all or granting experience for, but the DMG recommends some encounters fit there. And similarly, it shouldn't be static as you progress. CR +3 at level 1 actually is pretty much reaching into unwinnable territory, and that example from earlier of 30 nomad brutes according to the DMG, is a fair encounter for a level 3 party.

Ruslan
2017-01-09, 02:11 PM
If the players say to me "I don't trust that bridge, let's go kill a treant and use it to span the chasm." I'm gonna say to them "It'll be hard, but OK."Yukitsu, I think you talked yourself into a corner with your "all encounters should be solvable by combat" claim, and your last resort is to engage in crazy goalpost shifting as to what exactly constitutes "solving an encounter by combat".

For reference, you just pulled a scenario in which players encounter X and out of the blue decide to go and fight Y, and that, in your opinion, is "solving encounter X by combat".

By the same criteria, "That knight seems too powerful, let's go kill goblins instead to gain XP" constitutes "solving the knight encounter by combat". Therefore, the knight encounter was indeed solvable by combat. QED. Case closed.

Yukitsu
2017-01-09, 02:12 PM
Yukitsu, I think you talked yourself into a corner, and your last resort is to engage in crazy goalpost shifting as to what exactly constitutes "solving an encounter by combat".

For reference, you just pulled a scenario in which players encounter X and out of the blue decide to go and fight Y, and that, in your opinion, is "solving encounter X by combat".

By the same criteria, "That knight seems too powerful, let's go kill goblins instead to gain XP" constitutes "solving the knight encounter by combat". Therefore, the knight encounter was indeed solvable by combat. QED. Case closed.

Actually, that example comes from real campaigning, like I think I've alluded to, my party members aren't what I'd call particularly brilliant planners.

I think I need to point out as well, this is the same party that once decided to make a boat of dismembered arms and sail it across a literal ocean of acid. Expecting them to react to literally anything I mention in a way that you'd think "yeah, I planned for this " is futile, hence why I think I've adopted the mentality of just run with it.

Ruslan
2017-01-09, 02:13 PM
I see. So your DMing philosophy just caters to the lowest common denominator that is your players. Luckily, I don't need to go there.

Yukitsu
2017-01-09, 02:16 PM
I see. So your DMing philosophy just caters to the lowest common denominator that is your players. Luckily, I don't need to go there.

That's all 5 of my players all of the time.'

It did give me a sort of epiphany though when DMing. I sort of realized, why aren't I spending more time directing the game so that whatever the players are doing, it's maximally engaging? We already have a DM that doesn't believe in this, and it's resulted in a group that doesn't like their characters since they assume they'll just die, they don't engage with the story since it stopped making sense 3 character sheets ago and we outright assume we can't accomplish anything. I think in context, I'm simply overcompensating for both my player's incompetence and the outright killer DM mentality of our other DM, but I definitely get a "DM of the Rings" vibe out of a DM that spends a lot of time building a world while I'm there listening to him.

Ruslan
2017-01-09, 02:35 PM
There's a huge gap between "everything you do is maximally engaging" and "your characters just die". A lot of enjoyable games can be built in this gap. In fact, now that I think of it, every enjoyable game I've been in was in this gap.

Segev
2017-01-09, 03:08 PM
Level appropriate simply means the level of challenge is appropriate to the players.

Technically, the level of challenge WAS appropriate to the players. In fact, it might've been below what would be appropriate. The "challenge" here required nothing for them to succeed. There was no combat planned. There was no need for this confrontation, nor this joust.

To use an analogy, imagine a level-appropriate encounter with a group of kobold raiders. Now, imagine one of the players argues that they should give the kobolds all the time they need to turn the walls the party is defending into a series of death traps, "for the challenge." He then agrees with the kobolds that they should only use kobold-made weapons, putting down his made-for-a-Medium-sized-character greatsword and picking up their made-for-a-small-sized-character dagger.

Then he chases them, on foot, all around the wall.

Is that a level-appropriate encounter? Absolutely. Is it winnable after all the choices the PC made? Definitely not. He gave up all that made it survivable (even achievable) and sought out the worst possible way to deal with it. So he lost.

Shinn
2017-01-09, 05:20 PM
When my PC are challenging (by fighting) something really above their ECL, such as when they met the BBEG of the campaign at first level, I usually "pretend" the fight :

Generic PC - I hit it with my axe !
DM - You stare at it again, and then you'll try to figure how it would come :
[Some combat rounds ; the generic PC drops dead]
DM - Now that you finished to imagine how dangerous this encounter would be, do you still want to hit it with your axe ?
Generic PC - Hrmm... No.

And if they still want to fight, hence their low level compared to the encounter ? Welp, it usually goes like that : (Warning : french. Translation below)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76HRfJMNCys
Generic PC - I finished to my character sheet !
DM - Now a huge dragon's charging at you, I roll for damage !
(Dices rolls)
DM - You're dead ! You're dead ! You're dead ! YAAAAAAAH !

Ruslan
2017-01-09, 05:21 PM
When my PC are challenging (by fighting) something really above their ECL, such as when they met the BBEG of the campaign at first level, I usually "pretend" the fight :
Holmes-Vision? Could be cool, I guess, if the circumstances are right.

kyoryu
2017-01-09, 05:39 PM
There's a huge gap between "everything you do is maximally engaging" and "your characters just die". A lot of enjoyable games can be built in this gap. In fact, now that I think of it, every enjoyable game I've been in was in this gap.

Nobody argues "your characters just die".

In fact, while I"ve been fairly against the idea that everything is level-appropriate, I've also pointed out that everything being level-appropriate is a *must* if the PCs are given encounters that they have no choice but to fight their way through.

You can only have non-level-appropriate encounters in scenarios where the PCs get a choice of what they will engage with, or at the bare minimum, how they engage with those things. If your game is a series of set-piece encounters that the PCs are just expected to go through, then yes, those preset encounters need to be level appropriate.

Ruslan
2017-01-09, 05:45 PM
Nobody argues "your characters just die".That was in response to Yukitsu, who mentioned that
We already have a DM that doesn't believe in this, and it's resulted in a group that doesn't like their characters since they assume they'll just die

kyoryu
2017-01-09, 06:18 PM
That was in response to Yukitsu, who mentioned that

I'm sure some players think that's a given, but I don't know of a single GM, ever, who thinks that characters should die from a bad roll with no choices by the players whatsoever.

And if there *is* one, I'm fairly sure we can all agree that they're just a bad GM :smallbiggrin:

Erys
2017-01-09, 06:39 PM
I'm sure some players think that's a given, but I don't know of a single GM, ever, who thinks that characters should die from a bad roll with no choices by the players whatsoever.

And if there *is* one, I'm fairly sure we can all agree that they're just a bad GM :smallbiggrin:

Again with this nonsense?

The perils of using random numbers in a game: sometimes those random numbers are going to come up short for the PC's. Case in point, a bad crit against a low level toon. First level wizard has 8 hitpoints, gets crit for 20... sucks! But that is the nature of the game (also why I don't start players that low, cause, it does suck).

But the same goes at higher levels.

You get hit by a disintegrate, fail your save (heck, sometimes even when you make the save) and it reduces you to zero => you're dust. No way will I coddle my players and say, 'oh, that sucks, it didn't kill you'. To do so invites reckless players who know nothing can kill them- so why not attack the kings castle and claim his kingdom as their own?

The best motto is always: "Let the dice fall as they will."

kyoryu
2017-01-09, 07:13 PM
Again with this nonsense?

Calling someone's opinion nonsense isn't really a great way to start a conversation.


The perils of using random numbers in a game: sometimes those random numbers are going to come up short for the PC's. Case in point, a bad crit against a low level toon. First level wizard has 8 hitpoints, gets crit for 20... sucks!

Right. And what happened before then? Generally by that point you've made a lot of decisions, and had lots of opportunities/ways to minimize danger.

You know, exactly what I said *should* happen.

I never said that PCs should never die. I said they shouldn't die to a single roll *without an opportunity to make decisions that would impact their fate*.


But that is the nature of the game (also who I don't start players that low, cause, it does suck).

That's the nature of *a* game. D&D is (for most versions) a comparatively lethal game.


You get hit by a disintegrate, fail your save (heck, sometime even when you make the save) and it reduces you below zero - your dust. No way will I coddle my players and say, 'oh, that sucks, it didn't kill you'. To do so invites reckless players who know nothing can kill them- so why not attack the kings castle and claim his kingdom as their own.

The best motto is always: "Let the dice fall as they will."

Again, in those situations, the players have had plenty of choices to make before the die roll. The lethal die roll is the culmination of a series of decisions - not the first thing that happens before any decisions are made.

Mr Beer
2017-01-09, 07:22 PM
The best motto is always: "Let the dice fall as they will."

Always? LOL hell no. For example, if I screw up a minor combat encounter and look like I'm going to get a TPK because I didn't judge it properly, no way are the dice falling as they will.

Seems like one of those mottos that is group and game and setting dependant rather than a universal Law of RPGs.

Koo Rehtorb
2017-01-09, 08:05 PM
Fudging dice rolls is universally bad.

If you don't want to kill people by accidentally misjudging a combat encounter there's other options. Like taking the PCs captive, or another group attacking and distracting the first one, or just relying on the PCs to have the good judgement to flee when they're outmatched.

thirdkingdom
2017-01-09, 08:13 PM
Fudging dice rolls is universally bad.

If you don't want to kill people by accidentally misjudging a combat encounter there's other options. Like taking the PCs captive, or another group attacking and distracting the first one, or just relying on the PCs to have the good judgement to flee when they're outmatched.

I agree. I think the Fellowship of the Bling (https://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?676099-B-X-Misadventures-in-randomly-generated-dungeons) is a good example of how to handle character death and overwhelming odds, btw.

Erys
2017-01-09, 08:24 PM
Right. And what happened before then? Generally by that point you've made a lot of decisions, and had lots of opportunities/ways to minimize danger.

Again, in those situations, the players have had plenty of choices to make before the die roll. The lethal die roll is the culmination of a series of decisions - not the first thing that happens before any decisions are made.

Usually all that happened was a combat encounter started.

In the former example the very first attack against a first level PC could kill him.

In the latter, say you are fighting a beholder, have a fair chunk of HP and fail the save against the ray... really, what choice could you have made to mitigate that? Run away before the fight? Seriously, would love to hear all these choices you think are present.

The fact is, sometimes the dice work against you. Sometimes you roll several crits in a row. Such is the nature of games involving chance.

kyoryu
2017-01-09, 08:48 PM
Usually all that happened was a combat encounter started.

And what happened before that? Did the PCs just nonchalantly charge into whatever lair or situation? Or did they scout the area, try to do recon, etc?

Are the fighters doing their bit to target the ranged attackers? Is the wizard using terrain and range to do their best to stay out of danger?

If you as a GM are just saying "oh, combat starts now. The archers are firing before you do anything. Yup, you died. Make a new character." Then, um, that may be fun for some folks but I'll pass. And for the love of all that's holy do NOT strawman that into me saying that PC death shouldn't happen because I did NOT say that, will NOT say that, and have NEVER said that.

Fiery Diamond
2017-01-09, 09:19 PM
Fudging dice rolls is universally bad.

I disagree with you. Your assertion is about something which has subjective components. Therefore, your assertion isn't a factual one, just your opinion.

Erys
2017-01-09, 09:33 PM
And what happened before that? Did the PCs just nonchalantly charge into whatever lair or situation? Or did they scout the area, try to do recon, etc?

Are the fighters doing their bit to target the ranged attackers? Is the wizard using terrain and range to do their best to stay out of danger?

If you as a GM are just saying "oh, combat starts now. The archers are firing before you do anything. Yup, you died. Make a new character." Then, um, that may be fun for some folks but I'll pass. And for the love of all that's holy do NOT strawman that into me saying that PC death shouldn't happen because I did NOT say that, will NOT say that, and have NEVER said that.

Even if the archers don't go before you, even if you recon and know the layout first, sometimes when the archers get their turn - they kill you.

What about using assassins? Their whole schtick is to get a sneak attack off and do a boat ton of damage, if played smart they will target someone squishy like the wizard... is using one suddenly the mark of a bad dm?

I don't think so.

BUT, I will concede one point, and maybe this is more in line with what you are saying (that I perhaps did not fully understand prior) there is a difference between bad dice rolls on the players part and a dm who is out to get the players. A friend of mine, long, long ago, had a killer dm who once killed the entire party with one goblin. He was in a tree some 50 feet up and armed with a ballista. He got the surprise, had the range, and decimated the group.

I didn't think that sounded fun then, and still don't think it sounds fun now.

I guess, ultimately, there is no right or wrong way to do things. If the dm and group are happy with the run/play style and are having fun, don't let anyone tell you that you are doing it wrong.

prufock
2017-01-09, 10:29 PM
Fudging dice rolls is universally bad.
Friend Computer would like to remind you that knowledge of the rules is forbidden. Friend Computer would like to remind you of that. Unfortunately, you've already been vaporized for suggesting that Friend Computer is cheating. Welcome to Alpha Complex. Have a nice daycycle, citizen!

Elderand
2017-01-09, 10:32 PM
I'm of the opinion that if you feel the need to fudge the roll, you either failed somewhere mechanicly and misjudged something; in which case it's okay to fudge. Or you shouldn't have rolled in the first place. If you only accept one outcome, don't bother to roll.

Mr Beer
2017-01-09, 10:38 PM
Fudging dice rolls is universally bad.

If you don't want to kill people by accidentally misjudging a combat encounter there's other options. Like taking the PCs captive, or another group attacking and distracting the first one, or just relying on the PCs to have the good judgement to flee when they're outmatched.

Using GM fiat to alter reality is fudging, whether you change the results of a dice roll or have the cavalry come flying over the top of the hill.

"Universally bad" sounds a lot like "badwrongfun" to me.

Erys
2017-01-09, 11:40 PM
I'm of the opinion that if you feel the need to fudge the roll, you either failed somewhere mechanicly and misjudged something; in which case it's okay to fudge. Or you shouldn't have rolled in the first place. If you only accept one outcome, don't bother to roll.

This confuses me.

So, in the case of the 1st lvl character who gets killed by an unlucky crit... should the dm not have rolled in the first place? How does that even work?

Your 'one outcome' is dependent on the die roll, you either accept it or fudge it.

While I have done the latter, the more I game the more I realize doing so can cheapen the game. Triumph is much more satisfying when you know that you did it on your own and not because the dm gave it to you.

Yukitsu
2017-01-10, 12:10 AM
I'm sure some players think that's a given, but I don't know of a single GM, ever, who thinks that characters should die from a bad roll with no choices by the players whatsoever.

And if there *is* one, I'm fairly sure we can all agree that they're just a bad GM :smallbiggrin:

He is just a bad GM.

Elderand
2017-01-10, 12:23 AM
This confuses me.

So, in the case of the 1st lvl character who gets killed by an unlucky crit... should the dm not have rolled in the first place? How does that even work?

Your 'one outcome' is dependent on the die roll, you either accept it or fudge it.

While I have done the latter, the more I game the more I realize doing so can cheapen the game. Triumph is much more satisfying when you know that you did it on your own and not because the dm gave it to you.

There are things other than combat, if a character get killed by a crit so be it. that's just part of the risk. But if you fudge the tracking roll result because your player have to be able to get to the bandit hideout somehow, then you shouldn't have rolled at all.

Erys
2017-01-10, 12:26 AM
There are things other than combat, if a character get killed by a crit so be it. that's just part of the risk. But if you fudge the tracking roll result because your player have to be able to get to the bandit hideout somehow, then you shouldn't have rolled at all.

I agree.

If for some reason the PC's have to make a roll to continue the adventure then there is no point rolling. However, if they are looking for the bandit hideout and not finding it isn't the end of the game, let the dice fall where the will.

Koo Rehtorb
2017-01-10, 12:44 AM
I disagree with you. Your assertion is about something which has subjective components. Therefore, your assertion isn't a factual one, just your opinion.

And the only thing we can know with certainty is that we ourselves exist. You could be the only person that exists imagining you're playing a game you invented called D&D with other people that you also invented. Dice fudging is still bad.


Friend Computer would like to remind you that knowledge of the rules is forbidden. Friend Computer would like to remind you of that. Unfortunately, you've already been vaporized for suggesting that Friend Computer is cheating. Welcome to Alpha Complex. Have a nice daycycle, citizen!

Yes, anyone who fudges dice rolls is GMing like they're playing Paranoia. Don't GM like Paranoia if you're not actually playing Paranoia, as much fun as Paranoia is!


Using GM fiat to alter reality is fudging, whether you change the results of a dice roll or have the cavalry come flying over the top of the hill.

"Universally bad" sounds a lot like "badwrongfun" to me.

Inventing reality is literally the GM's job. Breaking the rules of the game is not the GM's job. I'm not saying it's a great thing to be doing, but it's better than cheating.

If you fudge dice rolls you're cheapening the entire experience and will damage the game for everyone involved.


I agree.

If for some reason the PC's have to make a roll to continue the adventure then there is no point rolling. However, if they are looking for the bandit hideout and not finding it isn't the end of the game, let the dice fall where the will.

The other option is make the roll, and when failure would stall out the game instead give them success with a complication. You find the bandit hideout, but you get ambushed on the way there, etc.

kyoryu
2017-01-10, 01:05 AM
BUT, I will concede one point, and maybe this is more in line with what you are saying (that I perhaps did not fully understand prior) there is a difference between bad dice rolls on the players part and a dm who is out to get the players. A friend of mine, long, long ago, had a killer dm who once killed the entire party with one goblin. He was in a tree some 50 feet up and armed with a ballista. He got the surprise, had the range, and decimated the group.

I didn't think that sounded fun then, and still don't think it sounds fun now.

This is basically my point.

To put it a different way a core loop of RPGs is:

GM: "This is the situation. What do you do?"
Player: "I do the thing!"
GM: "This is now the situation. What do you do?"

The following, I think, is acceptable.

GM: "This is the situation. What do you do?"
Player: "I do the thing!"
GM: "That went really poorly. You are dead."

The following, I think, is not really acceptable.

GM: "This is the situation. Things happen. You die."
Player: "Um.... so I couldn't do anything?"
GM: "Nope. You are dead."

We can quibble about details and specifics all day, but if you're doing the first, I think that's perfectly fine (though some might prefer more or less lethality, which is also their preference).

The second one is the one where I think there's a problem. However, even that sometimes will be a matter of the situation being a result of previous decisions...

Hawkstar
2017-01-10, 01:31 AM
Usually all that happened was a combat encounter started.
Play lethal games, win lethal prizes.

hifidelity2
2017-01-10, 07:09 AM
I'm of the opinion that if you feel the need to fudge the roll, you either failed somewhere mechanicly and misjudged something; in which case it's okay to fudge. Or you shouldn't have rolled in the first place. If you only accept one outcome, don't bother to roll.

I agree

We tend to play more lethal systems (GURPS, RuneQuest) etc – there one hit can kill – very unlikely at all bust the very lowest level in D&D
Personally I am not into killing PCs needlessly

If its a combat and they have IMO taken reasonable precautions (i.e. have not charged the Red Dragon, 1001 elite troops etc in which case its all gloves off ) then I will fudge rolls – that critical hit followed by Max damage to the head might become a critical hit, min damage to the head (so knocked unconscious rather than die), or damage to the hand (lose the hand)

If it’s (for example) a Listen roll to over hear the BBEG’s plans at a party and they fail then they fail – if I really wanted them to overhead the BBEG’s plan then I would have just told them they are near the BBEG at the party and you overhear him discussing his plans

prufock
2017-01-10, 07:31 AM
To put it a different way a core loop of RPGs is:

GM: "This is the situation. What do you do?"
Player: "I do the thing!"
GM: "This is now the situation. What do you do?"

The following, I think, is acceptable.

GM: "This is the situation. What do you do?"
Player: "I do the thing!"
GM: "That went really poorly. You are dead."

The following, I think, is not really acceptable.

GM: "This is the situation. Things happen. You die."
Player: "Um.... so I couldn't do anything?"
GM: "Nope. You are dead."

Succinct and agreed.

goatmeal
2017-01-10, 09:50 AM
This is basically my point.

To put it a different way a core loop of RPGs is:

GM: "This is the situation. What do you do?"
Player: "I do the thing!"
GM: "This is now the situation. What do you do?"

The following, I think, is acceptable.

GM: "This is the situation. What do you do?"
Player: "I do the thing!"
GM: "That went really poorly. You are dead."

The following, I think, is not really acceptable.

GM: "This is the situation. Things happen. You die."
Player: "Um.... so I couldn't do anything?"
GM: "Nope. You are dead."

We can quibble about details and specifics all day, but if you're doing the first, I think that's perfectly fine (though some might prefer more or less lethality, which is also their preference).

The second one is the one where I think there's a problem. However, even that sometimes will be a matter of the situation being a result of previous decisions...

This is something I hope we could all agree on, even the more old school such as myself. The third example is something that 2e DMG addresses with the door opening into a bottomless pit and some other examples.

Telok
2017-01-10, 01:16 PM
I think that all encounters, that is challenges that need to be overcome, should be resolvable by combat.

This is a D&D/wargame mentality. It is not true in many other games. Pendragon, Paranoia, Call of Cthulhu, Shadowrun, and many of the superhero systems all lack the assumption that "I hit it with an axe" is always a valid option.

kyoryu
2017-01-10, 01:58 PM
This is a D&D/wargame mentality. It is not true in many other games. Pendragon, Paranoia, Call of Cthulhu, Shadowrun, and many of the superhero systems all lack the assumption that "I hit it with an axe" is always a valid option.

Even more, it's specific to *certain versions* of D&D.

Yukitsu
2017-01-10, 11:50 PM
This is a D&D/wargame mentality. It is not true in many other games. Pendragon, Paranoia, Call of Cthulhu, Shadowrun, and many of the superhero systems all lack the assumption that "I hit it with an axe" is always a valid option.

To be fair, I've found it equally valid to every other option in CoC since just about everything I see done results in death or insanity, including getting the tools the DM wants you to so you can progress, and conversely I've had no trouble so far with the mentality of it always being valid in shadowrun with the caveat that yeah, sure it's sometimes a really bad idea but it's still as good as a lot of the others on the table. Paranoia is a bit like CoC in that I don't think there is supposed to be any "correct" way to play it, or if there is, knowing about it is cheating so frankly I again don't think it's ever any worse than any other solution out there. Pendragon I admit I outright don't know however.

Mr Beer
2017-01-11, 12:07 AM
Inventing reality is literally the GM's job. Breaking the rules of the game is not the GM's job. I'm not saying it's a great thing to be doing, but it's better than cheating.

If you fudge dice rolls you're cheapening the entire experience and will damage the game for everyone involved.

You're making an arbitrary distinction between altering reality that you label a 'job' and altering reality that you label 'cheating'.

Telok
2017-01-11, 12:59 AM
To be fair, I've found it equally valid to every other option..

It really sounds like you're just playing D&D with different systems and fluff. Lots of TPKs?

Yukitsu
2017-01-11, 01:21 AM
It really sounds like you're just playing D&D with different systems and fluff. Lots of TPKs?

I have an uncanny knack for making them TPKs minus 1 but other than that, yeah, hence the comment about my killer DM a while back. Though admittedly, our other DMs that aren't deliberately trying to kill us cause some TPKs as well. Then again, none of them like Shadowrun, Call of Cthulhu or Paranoia whereas the killer DM does as all those have a reputation for being the character equivalent of wood chippers, rightly earned or not.

Fiery Diamond
2017-01-11, 02:41 AM
You're making an arbitrary distinction between altering reality that you label a 'job' and altering reality that you label 'cheating'.

So he is. I think the core of our disagreement, and why that poster does this, is that that poster is one of the "the rules are the game" type people. I am not. Using the GNS (as much as I dislike it), I am, in terms of preference strength, Narrative foremost, then Simulation, then Game - to the extent that I am somewhat anti-gamist in a number of situations. The rules are not god; almost nothing is subservient to the rules. The rules exist to make it not-freeform, to give a certain kind of structure and lead you to certain kinds of gameplay. The rules are subservient to every other concern. If something would be decidedly unfun, the rules are bent or broken, and that's not a bad thing; in games like D&D, that's how it is SUPPOSED to be. Fudging rolls is just one of the many ways this can take place. In order to maintain tension, suspense, trust, consistency, and verisimilitude, fudging and its kin should probably be relatively rare. The important thing is that you do right by your players - if that involves never ever fudging regardless of anything because your players irrationally hate the concept, then fudging will, if discovered, completely shatter their trust in you as a GM and therefore should be avoided. If your players are not of the "DM is slave to the rules" sort of people, you should use your best judgment on what would produce an outcome most enjoyable to your players, both in the short term and the long run.

Koo Rehtorb
2017-01-11, 03:25 AM
You're making an arbitrary distinction between altering reality that you label a 'job' and altering reality that you label 'cheating'.

It's not an arbitrary distinction in the slightest. Without someone portraying the world the world does not exist. This is typically the GM, in some games it can be the players as well. The rules are an independent thing that exist that makes certain everyone in the game are on the same page. You're playing a game, ignoring the rules is cheating. The GM lying about a die roll is cheating just as much as a player lying about a die roll would be.

Now, if you don't like some implications of the rules, you have options. You can play a different game with rules you like more or you can modify the rules of the game in a transparent manner to better suit the experience you want to have. If you don't want players to die randomly in a minor encounter then make a rule that all damage in "minor encounters" is non-lethal, or something. That sounds terribly boring to me, but if you and your players are on the same page about it it's certainly fair to do.

What you don't do is look at the presumably hundreds of pages of rules and go "None of this actually matters. Do whatever you want." That's the grownup version of playing Cops and Robbers. It undermines the entire experience of the game and takes away any possible tension. If you become known as a GM that fudges rolls then literally no victory the players have can ever be legitimate again because it's impossible to know if they earned it fairly or if you gave it to them because you felt like it. Losing now and then because you played poorly or because the dice screwed you is what makes victory meaningful when it does come.

Cozzer
2017-01-11, 08:56 AM
I agree with the notion that if the DM finds himself wanting/needing to fudge rolls (or ignoring parts of the rules in a similar way), it means he has already done a mistake.

That said, I also think that in some cases, since he can't just change the past and unmake the original mistake, fudging the rule is the lesser evil. As long as the GM keeps in mind that it's not a good thing and that it would be good to avoid finding himself in that situation in the future, I think it's better than "letting the dice fall as they may" and potentially ending a fun campaign (or simply having a very boring/annoying session) because of a single mistake (or a few mistakes) on the GM's part.

I mean, my point is that I agree that a GM fudging his roll (or making his enemies forget their own special attacks for a turn, or doubling/halving their HP...) means that he made a mistake somewhere. But that's exactly why it's his job to deal with that mistake in the less disrupting way for the campaign. He can't just say "well I made a mistake but rules trump everything so now you're going to suffer the consequences of my mistakes". I mean, he can, but I don't think he'd be right.

So yeah, fudging rolls is bad if it's an habit or if the GM doesn't see the negative consequences of doing it. But saying that it's "universally bad" is an absolute, and only Sith deal in absolutes.

Jay R
2017-01-11, 10:50 AM
I think I agree with everybody's basic stance, and think most people's statement of their conclusion is too simplistic. For example:


If you fudge dice rolls you're cheapening the entire experience and will damage the game for everyone involved.

I agree with your emotion, but your statement is not entirely true. If you're caught fudging dice rolls, then you are potentially cheapening the entire experience. Those are two very important qualifications.

First, I think that fudging, while rare, is a legitimate tool to make the game more fun. If they don't know I fudged, then it cannot affect their experience. [Note that if I fudge in the same direction ion every encounter, they will soon know it. This is one reason why fudging should be rare.]

Secondly, it only potentially cheapens it. If their lives are saved because they are captured and put in a new, challenging situation, then that doesn't cheapen the experience, and it can enhance it.

I think that after a TPK, the characters should wake up chained to an oar in the hold of a ship, or locked in a dungeon, or possibly on a bed being healed by a BBEG who plans to blackmail them.

Applying the rules is like eating food. That should always happen. Ignoring the rules is like taking medicine; it's only a good idea if something is wrong.

Taking medicine is essential when you're sick, but don't get addicted to it.

Like anything else, fudging die rolls can be done well or poorly, and after you've seen a DM doing it poorly, you have every reason to be leery of it. In fact, I want the DM who sometime fudges die rolls to be extremely cautious of it, just like you are cautious about deciding it's time to take medicine.

It doesn't matter what the general rule is, there are always innumerable exceptions. Therefore, the DM needs to make individual judgment calls based on the situation of the moment more than he needs any general rule, including "If you fudge dice rolls you're cheapening the entire experience", and including whatever general rule I would come up with.

In my ideal game, the risk of death is ever-present and real, but the probability of it occurring is much, much less than it appears. This maximizes the fun from suspense, while minimizing the annoyance of dying.

What the players want today is an easy, safe way to beat the encounter. But what they will want tomorrow is to have brilliantly and bravely turned the tables to barely survive a deadly encounter where it looked like they were all about to die.

Vinyadan
2017-01-11, 11:15 AM
I guess the guy at the beginning of the thread saying that it all depends on group habits was very right. This whole "they must be able to!" depends on habit. You don't have to RP a reckless guy who is told "There's the ugly fortress of the TurboEvil Emperor, He Who Breaks Anvils With His Fists, which is populated by his best and finest guards, all of whom are lightening-fast, have 100 eyes, and also have 100 arms, each of which is strong enough to destroy the Eiffel Tower by slapping it" and immediately sets off to said fortress. You can be a little weak guy who needs to get into that fortress and therefore tries to get intel about it, prepares himself and then enters it and does his best to get what he needs.

Seeing monsters you can't handle in combat can be the same thing. Avoid them until ready, and, if forced to face them, try to think before you do. Now, a DM forcing a TPK is doing his job wrong (you can do a good TPK, but it can't be the DM who decides, the players may want their party to die rather than surrender, or may want to use grenades while in a black powder depot). But that doesn't mean that you can't give the chance of a TPK.

There's also the fact that you don't need everything to be handled through combat, and you don't need to kill everything you meet. Again, group culture.

Koo Rehtorb
2017-01-11, 01:27 PM
I agree with your emotion, but your statement is not entirely true. If you're caught fudging dice rolls, then you are potentially cheapening the entire experience. Those are two very important qualifications.

Okay yes I admit it is possible to get away with cheating once in a while without getting caught at it, and it's not going to ruin the game.

But here's the thing, even if you don't get caught at it and everyone's comfortable in the illusion, you're still cheapening the game for yourself. The GM is playing the game too, and if the GM is breaking the rules then they're robbing themselves of the thrill of randomness.

Mr Beer
2017-01-11, 02:09 PM
It's not an arbitrary distinction in the slightest. Without someone portraying the world the world does not exist. This is typically the GM, in some games it can be the players as well. The rules are an independent thing that exist that makes certain everyone in the game are on the same page. You're playing a game, ignoring the rules is cheating. The GM lying about a die roll is cheating just as much as a player lying about a die roll would be.

Now, if you don't like some implications of the rules, you have options. You can play a different game with rules you like more or you can modify the rules of the game in a transparent manner to better suit the experience you want to have. If you don't want players to die randomly in a minor encounter then make a rule that all damage in "minor encounters" is non-lethal, or something. That sounds terribly boring to me, but if you and your players are on the same page about it it's certainly fair to do.

What you don't do is look at the presumably hundreds of pages of rules and go "None of this actually matters. Do whatever you want." That's the grownup version of playing Cops and Robbers. It undermines the entire experience of the game and takes away any possible tension. If you become known as a GM that fudges rolls then literally no victory the players have can ever be legitimate again because it's impossible to know if they earned it fairly or if you gave it to them because you felt like it. Losing now and then because you played poorly or because the dice screwed you is what makes victory meaningful when it does come.

Yeah, it's an arbitrary distinction. You're saying it's OK to rescue PCs via narrative, by simply conjuring up a deus ex machina, but absolutely wrong to change the results of a dice roll. In fact, this is the same thing; we're changing the outcome as desired.

Also it's a strawman to imply that fudging a dice roll is the same thing as throwing away "of pages of rules and go "None of this actually matters. Do whatever you want." ".

By that logic, ignoring or bending or guessing at any rule ever is the same as throwing away the rule book and playing free form Lets Pretend. Every GM has done one or more of these things on occasion, and yet here we are, playing TTRPGs.

prufock
2017-01-11, 02:09 PM
Yes, anyone who fudges dice rolls is GMing like they're playing Paranoia. Don't GM like Paranoia if you're not actually playing Paranoia, as much fun as Paranoia is!
You claim fudging dice rolls is universally bad. Paranoia recommends fudging dice rolls. You admit that Paranoia is fun. You are not being consistent.

kyoryu
2017-01-11, 02:28 PM
Fudging is, in my mind, the least best way to solve issues. Sometimes, though, it's the best solution you have.


You claim fudging dice rolls is universally bad. Paranoia recommends fudging dice rolls. You admit that Paranoia is fun. You are not being consistent.

Paranoia is definitely a game that proves not all RPGs operate under the same assumption. I don't think it's really a good idea to apply Paranoia advice to other games :)

Koo Rehtorb
2017-01-11, 02:29 PM
Yeah, it's an arbitrary distinction. You're saying it's OK to rescue PCs via narrative, by simply conjuring up a deus ex machina, but absolutely wrong to change the results of a dice roll. In fact, this is the same thing; we're changing the outcome as desired.

That's not what Deux ex Machina means. :smallsmile:

Any setting related changes are required to make sense in the fiction as established. If you're in a bandit infested forest then bandits showing up is something that makes sense. Zeus randomly showing up does not. It's not the best option, but it is an option.


Also it's a strawman to imply that fudging a dice roll is the same thing as throwing away "of pages of rules and go "None of this actually matters. Do whatever you want." ".

No, it's not. If you're saying ignoring the rules sometimes is okay you're saying the rules don't matter.


By that logic, ignoring or bending or guessing at any rule ever is the same as throwing away the rule book and playing free form Lets Pretend. Every GM has done one or more of these things on occasion, and yet here we are, playing TTRPGs.

Ignoring the rules is not the same as filling in the blanks of the rules when a situation comes up that isn't covered. If there are no rules that cover a situation it's fine to make up a rule that covers that situation. If there is an existing rule that you don't like then the time to change it is in advance, transparently.

You're bein' a bad GM. But I believe in you. You have the power to stop being a bad GM and start being a good GM, Mr Beer.


You claim fudging dice rolls is universally bad. Paranoia recommends fudging dice rolls. You admit that Paranoia is fun. You are not being consistent.

Oh nooooo you have caught me in a logical trap. I am banished back to the abyss for 666 years...

Or maybe you could put in a little bit of effort and try your hardest to interpret those statements in the way they're clearly intended.

prufock
2017-01-11, 03:07 PM
Or maybe you could put in a little bit of effort and try your hardest to interpret those statements in the way they're clearly intended.
I struggle to understand what "universally bad" could mean other than universally bad, especially when it's the thesis statement of your argument. If fudging dice rolls isn't universally bad, on which you seem to agree, then there are situations where it is okay to fudge dice rolls. In that case, it's purely a matter of the amount of fudging with which you're comfortable - a much less binary discussion. It's like that famous punchline (often attributed to Winston Churchill): we're just haggling over price.

Koo Rehtorb
2017-01-11, 03:09 PM
I struggle to understand what "universally bad" could mean other than universally bad, especially when it's the thesis statement of your argument. If fudging dice rolls isn't universally bad, on which you seem to agree, then there are situations where it is okay to fudge dice rolls. In that case, it's purely a matter of the amount of fudging with which you're comfortable - a much less binary discussion. It's like that famous punchline (often attributed to Winston Churchill): we're just haggling over price.

Paranoia is not like other games. If you GM other games like Paranoia you are messing up. Hope this helps.

Jay R
2017-01-11, 04:20 PM
Okay yes I admit it is possible to get away with cheating once in a while without getting caught at it, and it's not going to ruin the game.

You're assuming that making an exception to the rules is cheating. In most games I've played, that is simply not true. The rules as written have included that since the game was first published:

Dungeons and Dragons, The Underground and Wilderness Adventures, p. 36: "... everything herein is fantastic, and the best way is to decide how you would like it to be, and then make it that way."

AD&D 1e, DMG, p. 9: "The game is the thing, and certain rules can be distorted or disregarded altogether in favor of play."

AD&D 2E, DMG, p. 3: "At conventions, in letters, and over the phone, I'm often asked for the instant answer to a fine point of the game rules. More often than not, I come back with a question -- what do you feel is right? And the people asking the question discover that not only can they create an answer, but that their answer is as good as anyone else's. The rules are only guidelines."

D&D 3.5 DMG, p. 6: "Good players will always realize that you have ultimate authority over the game mechanics, even superseding something in a rulebook."

Overriding a rule for good reason isn’t cheating. It’s part of the overall rules.




But here's the thing, even if you don't get caught at it and everyone's comfortable in the illusion, you're still cheapening the game for yourself. The GM is playing the game too, and if the GM is breaking the rules then they're robbing [i]themselves of the thrill of randomness.

Only in the same sense that the referee is playing football, or the timekeeper is running a race. What a GM is doing is very different from what a player is doing, and has a very different set of requirements and responsibilities.

I once set the miniatures out for the giant spiders about to attack the party. And then I saw the look of horror on one player's face. She was petrified. So they instantly became the wimpiest giant spiders in the history of D&D. Each one died to a single hit, and the minis were off the table in less than a minute.

It was the best way I had to deal with her phobia without calling other people's attention to it. And I have never once felt that my game was cheapened, or that I was robbed of the thrill of randomness, for doing it.

Koo Rehtorb
2017-01-11, 04:28 PM
You're assuming that making an exception to the rules is cheating. In most games I've played, that is simply not true. The rules as written have included that since the game was first published:

Yup. It's common knowledge that earlier editions of D&D and WW games in particular have had a bunch of absolutely terrible GM advice that have done a lot of harm to the hobby as a whole. It's one of the reasons D&D GMing culture in general is so poisonous.


Only in the same sense that the referee is playing football, or the timekeeper is running a race. What a GM is doing is very different from what a player is doing, and has a very different set of requirements and responsibilities.

To expand on this, cheating in D&D is like if a referee in tennis decided that it would be more entertaining for everyone involved if the game was close, so he calls the ball out when it isn't just to keep a competitive match going.