Any DMs completely change things on their players right at the start?

[Barstro]

A different web comic had an interesting turn of events for some players
EDIT: I just realized the comic is mildly politically charged. I think that fact can be ignored and we can dwell simply on the punchline.

EDIT 2:After a well-intended message from another member, I decided it was prudent to simply remove the link.

Main fact is;
DM gives some brief background about the likelihood of an unwelcome event occuring.
Player: So... what should we do to stop this guy?
DM: You already missed your chance. This is your life now. Everyone hand in their character sheets.
That basically has whatever plans the players made become completely moot.

I'm a fan of twists like that. However, I also spend hours figuring out what type of character would best mesh with the characters my fellow players have made and coming up with backstories, motivations, advancement trees, etc. I'm usually fully invested in my character weeks before the campaign starts. Not sure how I would feel if the start of the campaign included throwing away that character.

Just wondering if anyone else has done this or had this done to them, and what the result was.

[Zanos]

I'd get up and leave if the DM told me to make a character then said we weren't actually using the characters we made, because I spend a pretty long time making characters. Not a huge fan of having my time wasted for no reason, just tell me not to bother.

[Barstro]

I was more reminded of a story I read somewhere about a rather lengthy speech given by a DM about what a character was doing while the DM walked around the table and reviewed character sheets.

One of the players sensed something was wrong and jumped away from the table before the DM could approach him. That act prevented that the DM from touching that player and thus prevented the player's character from receiving a very malevolent touch-attach spell that had rendered everyone else unconscious.

I agree if that if a DM requested me to make a character and then, without any way to avoid it, did not allow me to play it, I would be upset. However, I think that an opportunity to save the character, that I simply missed at the time, is completely on me.

[Segev]

From what is presented in the OP after the edits, yeah, it just sounds disappointing. "You signed up for this, and made characters for it. Surprise! You don't get to play that. At all. Not even for the first session, while I try to sell the switch."

If I wanted to play Dungeons and Dragons and found out, before I so much as introduced my character, that we were really playing Paranoia, and that my character had already died as a "defective clone" (and here's my new, real character that isn't insanely believing he's Tavar the Warblade) I would be annoyed.

[Flickerdart]

One of the players sensed something was wrong and jumped away from the table before the DM could approach him. That act prevented that the DM from touching that player and thus prevented the player's character from receiving a very malevolent touch-attach spell that had rendered everyone else unconscious.

This is absurd. The fighter'splayed doesn't need to pull out his longsword every time initiative is rolled - why does the DM touching the player trigger a touch attack?

[Barstro]

I think it also comes down to trust of your DM. A good DM might have a hidden plan. Maybe the characters you rolled were captured and your new characters will be (unknowingly) rescuing them.

I've played with a lot of people who are unable or unwilling to separate character knowledge from player knowledge. This would certainly prevent some of that.

[Barstro]

This is absurd. The fighter'splayed doesn't need to pull out his longsword every time initiative is rolled - why does the DM touching the player trigger a touch attack?

I could be misquoting the actual event, since it was something I read online a few years ago. I think it was something to do with the actual enemy talking to the PCs in game (and going up to each of them around the dinner table).

Whatever it was, it made sense when I read it and sounded very interesting. Please don't discount what someone else did based purely on my shoddy memory and inarticulate language.:smalleek:

[OldTrees1]

Communication is important, especially when you are playing around with using miscommunication for an effect!

I would be quite upset with the initial example for 2 reasons:
1) It feels like my time was intentionally wasted
2) It appears I had no idea of the kind of game I was signing up for
3) It was done badly

Here are some ways I would alter the example. You need to find a solution that fits your players so not every one of these will even be an improvement in their eyes. But they might be a start.

Example 1:
Tell the players the true genre of the game so they know what to expect however do not give any details. They will show up to the first session with characters fitting the actual campaign. Then you give the initial campaign opening description. In that description they are given a momentary flash of optimism before it all crashes back down to what they were expecting. Note that all their character generation work is still valid and they are playing what they signed up for.

Example 2:
Do not have character generation precede the first session. Give a vague description of the genre so that it could be either the real or fake game. This should attract players that are okay with either while also preparing them to expect either. At character gen tell them the character generation rules and that you will be giving some vital campaign information during that time. Then launch your switch fairly early on in the character generation period. The players might have to make some changes to their characters, but they are already in that zone so it will not be so bad. Note that most of their character generation work is still valid and they are playing something that is technically within the description they signed up for.

[Rhyltran]

No offense but as a DM this is a bad idea. My players trust me completely to the point where they accept that character death can and will happen. They also know I do allow resurrection spells, quests to bring back lost characters, or the ability to make new ones if something happens. They are also aware that I will never force a Paladin to fall, put them in a no win situation (even when I intend to have the pc's lose or get captured there's ways out) etc. Despite all of this I can't see my players being happy at a turn of an event like this. I think this would wound their trust in me and in the future question anytime we start a campaign or if there's anything secretive going on.

Not only that but let's assume I make them hand over their sheets right from the start and let's assume for a moment that I have them make new characters without them knowing that those characters will save the first characters they wrote up... What then? Even if I convinced them to go this far they now have two sets of character sheets of different characters. Which one do they ditch? No matter what one of the sheets is a waste of time even if they got to play the character for a brief period of time. I don't think this would make the situation any better, if anything, it might make it worse. Fool me twice, shame on me. They'll just be increasingly more wary of my (the dm's) actions in the future. That's not good for the gaming table.

[unseenmage]

I have had this happen in game. There was time travel then a dream sequence the whole plot and world xhanged twice in the span of two event. By the time we were done we were not playing the game we'd signed on for and everyone just left.

The other time was more an accident. GM okayed an Artificer but there were no action points, every fight was a surprise, there were no shops let alone a magicmart, and the extensive equipment list had to be pared back for the GM's sanity.
By the time was all said and done the character was inept and neutralized reduced to plinking with crossbow shots each and every combat.
Without preptime nor a market artificers can suck pretty bad.

[Stealth Marmot]

Just wondering if anyone else has done this or had this done to them, and what the result was.

Moving along from the politics...

I have said this story before, but I played in a first edition game where the DM decided to ruin something a player worked really hard on. Long story short, we were playing a game where we renovated an old tower and basically became lords of a keep. We were having fun, but the DM introduced an artifact without reading what its effects would be, and it ended up killing everyone in our keep, the nearby small town, destroyed the keep, and ended up with all of our characters being sent to the 7th level of hell, except for the ones that weren't there at the time.

Despite being the luckiest one there, only having one of my 2 characters present and they even survived technically, I decided to leave that game.

[Fouredged Sword]

I have thrown twists at my players. I have thrown twists at my players from the first session of a game. This Dm made three mistakes. One thing I have not done is fail to forewarn the group. "Ok guys, let's play some roleplaying. How does 3.5 sound? Fair warning, there will be a twist." The second thing I would not do is make players work without need. "Prep to play, but don't bother fleshing out your character, just give me a skirt background and rough level 7 class set." The third thing is you absolutely must set up your players to play the correct TONE of game. "Expect silliness and insanity."

For example, here is a twist I could see myself doing.

"Ok guys, let's play some city based 3.5 with a twist. You are a group of city detectives/guardsmen in the employ of the king of Ironhold, a fairly racist but LN king who has built a human empire. Build for level 4, all male humans. You start with NPC wealth per level, but that will correct itself. Prepare for city intrigue and investigation with a side of dungeon delving."

What I don't tell the party is that the first session is a brief investigation of abductions followed by the party being abducted by mindflayers. They are "freed" by a Drow raid and taken as spoils by a drow house that as designs on becoming the lead house of the underdark drow city.

I start them with NPC wealth so they build their characters to function without special items and so they don't spend hours selecting items and getting pissed when I take them all away. The game is still city intrigue with a side of dungeon delving but they are in an unfamiliar and unfriendly city and they will be several sessions just adapting to the environment and learning to deal with the completely different threats. The game is about being four male humans in a world of underdark drow matriarchy.

To carry the "twist" metaphor, you should not have sudden 90 degree twists into something completely different. A twist should re-frame what the group is expecting into a new light, make them consider the story from a different direction, or branch off in unexpected ways. It should not defy the player's understanding of the game. They came to sit down and play the game you informed them you are playing. To break this is to break their trust. Longterm groups with long standing trust in a good DM can survive this sort of break in expectations. Most groups can't.

[Geddy2112]

Take their character sheets and rob them of all the work they put into that? Absolutely jerk move.

That said, I love a good twist at the start of a campaign. I once got told we were starting in a prison/slave campaign and we were going to have the initial adventure be a Spartacus style rebellion we would be joining etc etc. So we spent the majority of the first session planning the rebellion, hiding our weapons, etc. Wake up a couple days before and the entire prison is empty. Our cells are unlocked, not a soul around, not a single sign of anything happening. Prison is in the middle of BFE desert wasteland.

It was a really cool twist.

[SimonMoon6]

Here's the closest that I've come to doing something like this. And it wasn't really intentional but I did get accused of wasting the players' time at the beginning of the game.

This was a game where the players were playing themselves from the real world. They were about to embark on an adventure in another reality. In preparation, they were allowed to stock up on whatever they wanted from the real world, and some players had incredibly long lists of utterly mundane items, like Walkmans with a bunch of audio tapes, packets of hot sauce, needle and thread, rolls of toilet paper, cans of shaving cream, etc.

And then, early on, they get captured and all their stuff was taken from them.

To be fair, they did have a chance to go back later and liberate their equipment (at least, the important items), but to at least one player, it felt like I had wasted their time by having them make these really long lists of equipment that they were carrying. (I didn't force them to take a lot of stuff though!)

[Flickerdart]

I could be misquoting the actual event, since it was something I read online a few years ago. I think it was something to do with the actual enemy talking to the PCs in game (and going up to each of them around the dinner table).

Doesn't matter. The problem is that a physical out-of-game action (rather than in-game decision) of a player affected the game world.

[icefractal]

Doesn't matter. The problem is that a physical out-of-game action (rather than in-game decision) of a player affected the game world.Whether that's a problem depends on whether the group enjoyed it. The basic way most RPGs work is already not a perfect simulation (for example, the players are using their OOC mental scores to decide on plans and tactics), and it's for the entertainment of the group, nothing else really, so if people have fun blurring the 4th wall then there's no problem there.


On the OP, not a fan of bait-n-switch setups. Not only is there the time-wasting factor, or the fact that some players might have been on-board for the supposed game but wouldn't have joined the actual game, but the switch itself can turn players off of the game. For a lot of people, including myself, if we spend some time getting hyped up about a campaign concept, planning for it, thinking of good angles - then throwing that away in favor of something else entirely is going to leave a bad taste. Even if the second concept would have been equally good to start with.

Although that said, if you say up front that there's going to be a big twist, some of these problems are solved. Or if the players don't care much about the game concept, just want to play some RPGs in general.

[Zanos]

Doesn't matter. The problem is that a physical out-of-game action (rather than in-game decision) of a player affected the game world.
Yeah, unless this was already an established feature of the game, going around to each Player(not character) and then saying "haha I got you" because you were eating cheetos like an (approximately) normal person is stupid. I don't have any ranks in spellcraft or spot IRL.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Barstro
I'm usually fully invested in my character weeks before the campaign starts. Not sure how I would feel if the start of the campaign included throwing away that character.

Just wondering if anyone else has done this or had this done to them, and what the result was.

I’ve had major twists like this happen twice in the same campaign—in consecutive sessions. The first time was deliberate, the second an accident.

Before the first session, I’d spent a lot of time preparing my character and fitting him into the DM’s custom setting. I’d just been reading The Prince, so I designed my character as a young Machiavelli, a promising minor noble who’d fallen afoul of politics and been exiled to the great northern wilderness. This mapped nicely onto the DM’s favorite part of his campaign world, where he said we’d be starting.

I thought it would be fun to play a silver-tongued nobleman who was out of his depth in the northern forests, especially since the other party members were a sword-and-board paladin and a werebear druid. And it was indeed fun, for all of 1.5 sessions.

Then, out of nowhere, a trusted ally hit us with some unspecified high-level spell, took us down without a fight, and when we woke up we were lying in unbreakable force-cages on a prison barge, where we stayed imprisoned for several weeks in-game. We arrived at a military town on the front lines of a high-magic war zone involving trench warfare with waves of undead, and we were conscripted into the army as grunts.

My nobleman was a third-level beguiler, and we were shanghaied to fight in a war against undead hordes. Huge twist, not entirely fun.

Arriving for the next session, I had just decided to roll with it and do the best I could (Silent Image those zombies, booyah!) when the DM showed up with a profoundly long face. He had managed to spill a Big Gulp across his hundred-page stack of handwritten campaign notes, merging them into a soppy sugary mass. All was lost.

After a good deal of discussion, we ended up rolling new characters for a new and different campaign set in a completely separate part of his campaign world. This time we started at first level—and while I generally enjoy starting at first, dropping back two levels after so much prep for third level was a real jolt. I couldn’t get any traction with my new character, and for that and other reasons I ended up leaving the campaign.

[Flickerdart]

Whether that's a problem depends on whether the group enjoyed it.

The group might enjoy what happened despite the DM betraying the rules of the game, but not because of it. This is a crucial distinction.

[icefractal]

The group might enjoy what happened despite the DM betraying the rules of the game, but not because of it. This is a crucial distinction.So you're saying that you don't enjoy 4th wall breakage. Ok, fine. Some people do.

And really, "betraying the rules of the game"? The rules don't have feelings, they're not going to be upset that someone broke them. It's only a problem if the actual humans involved are unhappy.

[Flickerdart]

So you're saying that you don't enjoy 4th wall breakage. Ok, fine. Some people do.

And really, "betraying the rules of the game"? The rules don't have feelings, they're not going to be upset that someone broke them. It's only a problem if the actual humans involved are unhappy.

Again, you don't understand the distinction I am making.

Of course the rules are not upset. That's not the point. The point is that breaking the rules is not the thing that is enjoyable/not enjoyable. Saying "it's okay to break the rules because they'll like it" makes no sense. Instead, the claim should be "it's okay to break the rules because I want to do something outside the rules that the players will like."

The reason this is an important distinction is because you can weigh the thing you want to do (the benefit) vs the reaction to breaking the rules (the cost). Without separating the two concepts, you can't compare them, because if you think the goal is to break rules then the cost is the benefit and you cannot think the consequences of your actions through. And we already get too many threads where DMs don't think things through and are upset their players weren't into the "twist."

[Der_DWSage]

I was more reminded of a story I read somewhere about a rather lengthy speech given by a DM about what a character was doing while the DM walked around the table and reviewed character sheets.

One of the players sensed something was wrong and jumped away from the table before the DM could approach him. That act prevented that the DM from touching that player and thus prevented the player's character from receiving a very malevolent touch-attach spell that had rendered everyone else unconscious.

I agree if that if a DM requested me to make a character and then, without any way to avoid it, did not allow me to play it, I would be upset. However, I think that an opportunity to save the character, that I simply missed at the time, is completely on me.

I...could see that working, but that takes a really good GM to pull off, not to mention it's just kind of weird. That kind of thing is generally handled with Sense Motive, an in-game skill, not an out-of-game one. It's one of those things that requires exactly the right group, with exactly the right GM and exactly the right mindset, to handle well. I think it'd also change depending on what exactly happened with it.

If it were a maguffiny plot element, where everyone touched had a geas on them to do X quest before the moon sets 3 times? Sure, okay. It's just a way to introduce tactile elements to the story. If it were 'You die, no save, lol' then I'll be packing up and heading out before you finish the 'lol.'

But back to the whole twist thing? Let me turn it around a bit. Let's say Jeff is planning a party. He's making cakes, and he wants to get everyone's opinion on what kind of cakes everyone likes. Everyone spends 10-30 minutes planning elements of the cakes, the flavor, the recipe, telling him allergies, sharing stories of the cakes their mother used to make...

And then, the day of the party, Jeff reveals that he wasn't making cakes, he was never making cakes. He instead has fruit salad for everyone. Gotcha! Isn't Jeff so clever?

Some people might hang around just to be in the party, and enjoy each others' company. Some might hang around because they feel like it's rude to call Jeff out on the bait-and-switch. Some might just enjoy Jeff's company. Some people might even enjoy the fruit salad! But no one is hanging around because they were lied to, they are hanging around in spite of it.

That's what that initial twist would be like. Everyone wasted some time, some people doubtlessly got emotionally charged, and then it ends with a 'Gotcha!' Not exactly...thrilling.

[John Longarrow]

A different web comic had an interesting turn of events for some players
EDIT: I just realized the comic is mildly politically charged. I think that fact can be ignored and we can dwell simply on the punchline.

EDIT 2:After a well-intended message from another member, I decided it was prudent to simply remove the link.

Main fact is;
DM gives some brief background about the likelihood of an unwelcome event occuring.
Player: So... what should we do to stop this guy?
DM: You already missed your chance. This is your life now. Everyone hand in their character sheets.
That basically has whatever plans the players made become completely moot.

I'm a fan of twists like that. However, I also spend hours figuring out what type of character would best mesh with the characters my fellow players have made and coming up with backstories, motivations, advancement trees, etc. I'm usually fully invested in my character weeks before the campaign starts. Not sure how I would feel if the start of the campaign included throwing away that character.

Just wondering if anyone else has done this or had this done to them, and what the result was.

DM thought it would be good to have the party head some place by sea. Relatively low level characters so no big deal there. DM Then had the boat 'sink in a storm' and we wind up on an island without any gear. Changed the entire campaign from being "Head out to the dungeon" to "Survivor". I wasn't interested in this kind of game, especially with a low level wizard who no longer has spell books. I bailed. I found out later that the game went on for over a year until the party manages to get off the island. That was the end of the campaign.

Funny thing is players wouldn't play with that person DMing again...

[Seto]

I... don't get it?
Maybe it's just jet-lag and tiredness, but the context given within spoiler tags in the OP makes no sense to me (and even to begin with, "a different webcomic" - different from what?). Could you modify/explain it? (Or better yet, PM me the link)

[Fizban]

Really the biggest problem with the scenario is the "hand in your sheets" part. Even ignoring the barbaric "I'm taking your sheets" nonsense, the point is that the story has ended before it begun. The correct response to "What can we do to stop this guy?" for this twist is "Too late, you didn't have enough time to stop him, what do you do now?" You're basically doing session 0 and defining the backstory and intent of the campaign, but after character creation instead of before it like usual. Makes for a more natural group of characters that might not be perfectly suited to whatever they decide to do, because events changed and they might be doing something different.

[kuhaica]

I had a friend do something similar. Pretty sure he got the idea from an online post somewhere but I feel it's fair to share it.

He had all his players make up character sheets and then took them at the beginning of the game before handing out some lower level pre made sheets. At first the players where upset but after explaining that it was important they agreed.

The first session ended with a TPK of the pre made party and the second session begun with the player made character being hired to find out what happened to the first party.

According to him the players loved the twist even though at first they disliked it. End of the day I think it all matters on trust as someone else said.

[OldTrees1]

I had a friend do something similar. Pretty sure he got the idea from an online post somewhere but I feel it's fair to share it.

He had all his players make up character sheets and then took them at the beginning of the game before handing out some lower level pre made sheets. At first the players where upset but after explaining that it was important they agreed.

The first session ended with a TPK of the pre made party and the second session begun with the player made character being hired to find out what happened to the first party.

According to him the players loved the twist even though at first they disliked it. End of the day I think it all matters on trust as someone else said.

Doesn't ask for wasted effort: Check
Doesn't mislead about style of game: Check
Is done well: Check(based on player reviews)

The opening session (the 1st switch) possibly could have been handled better since the players were initially upset, however next time it will be easier since the players have already witnessed the DM's trustworthiness this time (based on their 20/20 hindsight reevaluations).

It does all matter on Trust, but Trust is more complicated than one might otherwise think. We overestimate how much we trust each other when we are in a position of safety. Only when the other holds a weapon do we honestly estimate how much we trust them with that weapon. Them not stabbing us with that weapon, despite the opportunity, is strong evidence that builds trust further. Although there are other ways to build trust than by picking up weapons. :smalltongue::smallwink: So when the DM was in a position where their trustworthiness mattered, their behavior built future trust for similar situations.

[Elkad]

I... don't get it?
Maybe it's just jet-lag and tiredness, but the context given within spoiler tags in the OP makes no sense to me (and even to begin with, "a different webcomic" - different from what?). Could you modify/explain it? (Or better yet, PM me the link)

It's pvponline. Yes, the latest comic could be considered political, but in general the strip is not, and hasn't been for the 20 years I've been reading it. (holy crap! 20 years!)

[Ualaa]

I ran a campaign where everyone was given the build rules.
Where we had the suggestion of covering these roles, etc...

But the players could make whatever they wanted, and disregard those roles.

Players were told to not have any kind of backstory...
Just to have the mechanics covered, ie., race, class, feats, etc.

We started in what looked like a battle...
Everyone woke up.
No one had any memory of what had happened.

Had to piece things together from there.

That's not really twisting things in the first session.
But there was a lot going on that no one had a clue about.
And there was a twist involved, but it took most of the campaign to build to that point.
With hints along the way, which were sometimes interpreted interestingly.
But everyone had fun.