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NecroDancer
2017-01-28, 10:54 PM
Currently I'm running a D&D campaign for some beginning players. The combat is a bit tedious because one player is totally new to RPGs and the warlock character accidentally used a darkness spell to shut down the other players. After the session was over everybody a good time but the warlock player said that he wanted to make a campaign of his own in the future. However the warlock player wanted to use this horrible house rule: the DM only gives XP to the person who landed the death blow. He wants to use this "rule" because it speeds up combat and encourages everyone to deal damage. He ignore the fact some people may just want to play classes other than DPS. Every time I've tried to get him to realize this rule is stupid he disagrees. How can I explain to him that this is the worst house rule ever?

(Sorry for any grammar/spelling errors I'm doing this on mobile)

Gellhorn
2017-01-28, 11:44 PM
Point out that healing/ crowd control/ buffing are valid options and penalising them is stupid.

Alternatively, play someone with high damage and just ready your actions to steal as many kills as possible. Show him why the house rule is bad.

fishyfishyfishy
2017-01-28, 11:55 PM
"It's a bad idea because it promotes potentially unfair competition in what is supposed to be a group socialization effort. Perhaps you'd find that a board game or card game is more to your preferences?"

Thrudd
2017-01-29, 12:01 AM
show him all the reasons it is a bad idea
A.) it creates competition between the players instead of cooperation, since they will now be competing to get the last blow on every creature. The game usually requires players cooperating to defeat the challenges. Instead, they will be jockeying for position to get in the last hit instead of helping each other, and making stupid tactical decisions. At least, they will do this if they want XP.

B.) It will give character classes that deal more damage and that have more attacks a huge advantage, to the point that they may be the only classes that even get to level up. Some characters just aren't huge damage dealers, they support the party in different ways.

C.) Why would it speed up combat? Do people just sit around not doing anything when they are being attacked by monsters? Players are always trying to deal damage, no matter what. There's no reason to think it will have any effect on combat speed.

D.) Ask what they think the real issue is, that would make them want a rule like this. Why do they think combat is too slow? Do they think players are thinking too much on their turns and making it drag on? The answer to that is not by insisting that everyone rush in and deal damage without thinking, they will get killed. The DM would need to be playing all bad guys like idiots in order to keep the PCs alive.


The answer to faster combat is to get more familiar with the rules - it just takes time. After that, you can speed things up by changing to per-side initiative instead of per-character. Whichever side wins, all the characters go at the same time in any order they want. Reroll initiative after every round of combat.
Or, start using a timer for each player's turn. You get a set amount of time, maybe 10 or 20 seconds to say what you're doing and take your actions, not counting the rolling of dice and looking up results if needed. When the time is up, you say what you're doing or move on to the next player.

tensai_oni
2017-01-29, 12:53 AM
The "potential" DM sounds like he needs a lot more experience with the system and understanding why some things are a good or a bad idea before he should run anything.

daniel_ream
2017-01-29, 02:26 AM
Every time I've tried to get him to realize this rule is stupid he disagrees. How can I explain to him that this is the worst house rule ever?

Do you particularly need to? It sounds like he's going to run his game this way no matter what. The inevitable skewed results will happen, followed by the just-as-inevitable exodus of people from his game. Seems like a self-correcting problem. Sometimes you just have to let the baby grab the hot pan, because they aren't going to learn any other way.

As an aside, you seem quite emotionally invested in convincing him of this. While it can be frustrating to watch someone walk straight into the open sewer grate after you've shouted a warning at them repeatedly, what does it truly matter to you if he runs this campaign? Has the group somehow committed to playing in his game no matter what? Some kind of rotating GM schedule, perhaps?

Mr Blobby
2017-01-29, 06:09 AM
Invoke what I call 'the striker issue'.

In professional football [soccer], the main goal-scorers [strikers] are nearly always the most highly paid and valued. On the surface this makes sense, for they're the ones who score the vast majority of goals, and that wins the game. But anyone knowledgeable about football knows this is really bollocks - for the striker quite often is simply the final foot in a chain where defenders intercepted the rival striker, the midfielders did a successful pass to the striker and so on. The goal is a *team effort*; for if the striker was the only important position in a game, professional clubs would simply have 10 strikers and one goalkeeper... aka like watching primary school kids playing football in their breaktime at school.

Just like the football team needs the other players to allow the striker to score, the party needs the rogue to get rid of the traps, the healer to keep the party in fighting form, the archer / mage to thin out the wave[s] of mook enemies before close combat starts etc.

John Longarrow
2017-01-29, 02:09 PM
Hmm...

Give him this scenario.

Evil cleric with both close wounds and a reverse of it (open wounds?) and the ability to know when someone is "Dying". Said cleric uses close wounds to prevent PCs from "Killing" enemies they drop and then takes the kills himself after the enemy has been dropped.

Ask him if he's like to play anything OTHER than said evil cleric knowing full well he'll never get XPs in game.

If he's like "Yea, that's how the game should be played" then introduce him to a trap-heavy dungeon (or other adventure that does NOT emphasize fighting) and ask if anyone should get XPs after 6 or 7 sessions of play. Your other players will come up with a LOT of reasons they should get XPs even if they didn't "Kill" anything.

Freed
2017-01-29, 03:41 PM
Well, you can propose a alternative idea (I mean, it's still not great, but if he won't completely change the rule) that the XP is given to all of those who damaged that enemy...
Furthermore, does he only give XP for last blows in combat, or only give combat XP to last blows in combat, and still give xp for non-combat things normally?

Cazero
2017-01-29, 04:01 PM
Introduce him to the MOBA genre.
In many of those games, you are expected to grind some gold from enemy minions. And the only hit that earns gold is the fatal blow. Every time an enemy minion dies from allies minions, you lose gold. Consequently, good players do the logical thing and deal as little damage as possible, refraining to attack to ensure they can time their attack animation to get the last hit, the one that earns money, while bad players just attack continuously and eventualy get trashed from lack of gold [and overextending, but that's beside the point].
What he proposes will have the exact opposite effect of what he expects : people won't rush to deal as many damage as they can as fast as possible, they will conserve ressources until they're confident in their ability to finish enemies in one hit, leading to constant overkill, wasted damage potential, actively not wanting to crit for more damage, and long hesitation on wether you can one-shot the enemy or not.

Then there are all those other issues with class balance and support characters thrown out of the window.

ProphetSword
2017-01-29, 06:33 PM
Ask him how he'd feel if he were the fighter in this situation:

FIGHTER: I wade into battle. With my sword, I should kill many of these goblins and gain some xp!

WIZARD: Fireball. All the goblins die. I gain all the xp.

FIGHTER: Nooooo!!!!

Berenger
2017-01-29, 07:44 PM
Just strike a deal with your fellow players: cooperate to capture your enemies alive whenever possible. The character with the lowest XP total gets to execute prisoners until his XP average out, then the Executioner's Axe of Party Level Balance +1 is passed to the character with the second lowest XP total and he carries on with the slaughter until the screaming stops. Buy a few bags of XP at the local slave market and sacrifice them if the enemy can't be captured for any reason.




What?

Andrewmoreton
2017-01-30, 06:20 AM
It makes perfect sense he just needs to follow through. The person responsible for the killing blow gets the xp
(so Using pathfinder as an example to show how simple the paperwork would be)

Fighter 1 lands every killing blow
However 1 of his attacks is due to haste so anyone killed by that goes to the Wizard, the wizard also gives him +1 to hit (see later)
The bard used Good Hope +2 Hit , +2 damage and is performing for +3 to hit and +3 damage
The Wizard also dispelled a blur spell(20% miss chance)
And on round 3 the cleric healed him of enough hp so that he remained standing

So XP award
If the figher kills with the hasted attack xp to wizard
Any hit which kills had a 20% chance of missing due to blur so roll that 20% and if it triggers xp to wizard
Fighter has an attack bonus of +14 boosted by another 6 from the bard and wizard so every time a killing blow occures roll a d20 and if he gets 15 it's the wizards kill , 16-20 the bard
Also every time a killing blow is landed check if the +5 damage from the bard pushed it over the edge if so kill to bard
Finally all kills after round 3 go to the cleric instead of the fighter if it was not awarded to someone else.

I leave to the user how to work out the effects of the enemy being debuffed it should be a nice simple exercise. This will encourage the most effective use of class abilities and the extra paperwork should not cause any problems:smallamused:

Mr Blobby
2017-01-30, 06:29 AM
...except the support PC's will rarely, if ever get any XP.

So either make sure you give them other ways to shine [and earn XP], or simply make everyone play a fighter and expect battles to be similar to mediaeval ones in RL where every noble was ignoring commands and simply looking for the 'best' enemy noble to fight one-on-one so they could either get the glory of killing them or the pile of cash for capturing them and ransoming them later.

As a player, I would never play this type of game, period.

Stealth Marmot
2017-01-30, 07:27 AM
Currently I'm running a D&D campaign for some beginning players. The combat is a bit tedious because one player is totally new to RPGs and the warlock character accidentally used a darkness spell to shut down the other players. After the session was over everybody a good time but the warlock player said that he wanted to make a campaign of his own in the future. However the warlock player wanted to use this horrible house rule: the DM only gives XP to the person who landed the death blow. He wants to use this "rule" because it speeds up combat and encourages everyone to deal damage. He ignore the fact some people may just want to play classes other than DPS. Every time I've tried to get him to realize this rule is stupid he disagrees. How can I explain to him that this is the worst house rule ever?

(Sorry for any grammar/spelling errors I'm doing this on mobile)

Tell him that every person who has played a tabletop you asked about this option says it is a universally bad idea with no practical benefits, including "speeding up combat" because it won't. It will make combat more reckless and lethal, particularly for the party. It will also cause party disharmony. ("YOU KILL STEALING SON OF A-")

More to the point, XP is an entirely meta concept, and characters acting differently because of it breaks the narrative. Outside of parody material (OotS) the concept of characters understanding XP is ludicrous. XP as a concept is actually ludicrous as well, but we accept it as part of the narrative of a character. XP represents character growth. But people don't go "Hey I'm going to kill that giant demon by myself." and end up gaining 10 levels for it in character (Well except for Gandalf).

Tell him StealthMarmot says that it is a bad idea, and that StealthMarmot is one smart cookie. And handsome. And generally awesome in every way. And totally deserves a cookie. Mmmmm...cookie.

John Longarrow
2017-01-30, 08:47 AM
Tell him StealthMarmot says that it is a bad idea, and that StealthMarmot is one smart cookie. And handsome. And generally awesome in every way. And totally deserves a cookie. Mmmmm...cookie.

Sorry, no cookies for you. Girl scouts came by yesterday and you didn't have your order in so you don't get any of my cookies and you should have told me you wanted cookies but you didn't so I'm keeping my cookies!!!

Stealth Marmot
2017-01-30, 09:10 AM
Sorry, no cookies for you. Girl scouts came by yesterday and you didn't have your order in so you don't get any of my cookies and you should have told me you wanted cookies but you didn't so I'm keeping my cookies!!!

http://s2.quickmeme.com/img/18/18df2b56513f75a0930a1b8f8eada16b1acb44ed986b69144e 9f0abb8b2c5b33.jpg

Khedrac
2017-01-30, 10:35 AM
What type of characters does this potential DM usually play?
If they always play damage dealers then their lack of understanding of other roles' usefulness makes more sense (indeed people have posted stories on these boards of playing a competent CC wizard and being kicked for not "pulling their weight" by doing damage).

See if you can get the player to play a buff or crowd control class - they should soon see how powerful and important to the group such roles are, and then you can ask them to re-visit their "xp for kill" idea.
Also, does your party usually have a dedicated healer (i.e. someone who mainly heals, even if they do other stuff too). Point out that with his suggestion there will be no in combat healing - and ask the healer not to heal his character in combat for a few sessions to demonstrate the result. Be open about this though - if they object to not being healed ask them to re-think their idea again.
As usual, the best answer for an out-of-character problem is an out-of-character solution, but from what you say they are not seeing that the arguments have merit. What I suggest is trying to demonstrate the arguments, but not in a hostile manner, try to be constructive and always point out that this is a demonstration of results.

Maglubiyet
2017-01-30, 02:05 PM
I suspect this plan won't survive the first session with other players.

JNAProductions
2017-01-30, 02:18 PM
Talk to the other players. See how they feel about it-if they're with you, that'll help more than all the logic in the world.

icefractal
2017-01-30, 02:43 PM
So first, as a player, he (possibly accidentally) locks the other PCs out of a fight by his use of darkness.

And now he's proposing running using a house-rule whereby they would not only have been locked out from playing but also gotten no xp?

Are you sure this guy is not a jerk-ass? Is he planning to run a DMPC in this proposed campaign? Because if so I recommend against getting anywhere near it; it would probably be the adventures of King Warlock and his ****ty sidekicks.

I think you should explain a key point of TTRPGs to him - if someone monopolizes a session to the point the other players shouldn't even have shown up, that person didn't "win" - they lost, they failed at being a good player.

kyoryu
2017-01-30, 02:47 PM
He ignore the fact some people may just want to play classes other than DPS. Every time I've tried to get him to realize this rule is stupid he disagrees. How can I explain to him that this is the worst house rule ever?

"Okay, so, realistically, how often do you think the cleric will get the killing blow? Okay, so, what level will the cleric be compared to the rest of the party? And what will this do to the ability of the party to heal itself?"

ExLibrisMortis
2017-01-30, 04:17 PM
1) Tie goblin to chair.
2) Put goblin at 1 hp.
3) Have Martial Spirit active.
4) Enter loop.

5) Attack goblin for 2 damage.
6) Goblin drops to -1 hp.
7) Get XP.
8) Direct Martial Spirit at goblin.
9) Unconscious creatures are willing.
10) Goblin heals to 1 hp.
11) Repeat loop.


For a first-level character, the CR 1/3 goblin provides 100 XP per kill.

In 10 rounds, you will be level 2.
In 30 rounds, level 3.
In 60 rounds, level 4.
In 100 rounds, level 5.
In 150 rounds, level 6.

At this point, switch to a CR 6 ettin, for an initial 1800 XP per kill.

In 154 rounds, you reach level 7.
In 159 rounds, you reach level 8.
In 165 rounds, you reach level 9.
In 175 rounds, you reach level 10.
In 188 rounds, you reach level 11.
In 208 rounds, you reach level 12.
In 235 rounds, you reach level 13.
In 275 rounds, you reach level 14.

At this point, switch to a CR 14 truly horrid umber hulk, for an initial 4200 XP per kill.

In 279 rounds, you reach level 15.
In 284 rounds, you reach level 16.
In 290 rounds, you reach level 17.
In 300 rounds, you reach level 18.

You are now a god-powered wizard with 9th-level spells, and XP is meaningless to you. So, this is a good houserule, because it allows first-level fighters to become as powerful as wizards in only 30 minutes, narrowing the gap between tier 5 and tier 1.

N.B. Even a wizard gets iterative attacks at level 11, allowing multiple kills per round. In fact, an optimized Lightning Maces adept could achieve practically limitless XP in one round, by repeatedly hitting a helpless monster in and out of consciousness.

ellindsey
2017-01-30, 04:20 PM
In the last Pathfinder game I was in, I played a Witch. Focused on healing, buffs and debuffs. Not only did I never score a killing blow, I don't think I ever actually did direct hit point damage to a single opponent. Despite that, I was a huge factor in turning unwinnable situations into victories - Enlarge Person and other buff spells on the meatshields, Sleep/Hold Person/Blindness on the enemies, and healing everyone when the combat was over. Under this rule, I wouldn't get a single XP.

NecroDancer
2017-01-30, 04:59 PM
Yeah, i hope as we play more he will learn more about why his rule is so bad

raspberrybadger
2017-01-30, 05:18 PM
Sadly, it's probably best to just let him find out on his own why it's a bad idea, and if you've already said its a bad idea, not say or do anything 'I told you so'.

John Longarrow
2017-01-30, 05:29 PM
OP, what type of characters does your friend want to play?

Just asking to see if he's trying to kill his own characters progress unintentionally.

KillianHawkeye
2017-01-30, 05:45 PM
1) Tie goblin to chair.
2) Put goblin at 1 hp.
3) Have Martial Spirit active.
4) Enter loop.

5) Attack goblin for 2 damage.
6) Goblin drops to -1 hp.
7) Get XP.
8) Direct Martial Spirit at goblin.
9) Unconscious creatures are willing.
10) Goblin heals to 1 hp.
11) Repeat loop.


For a first-level character, the CR 1/3 goblin provides 100 XP per kill.

In 10 rounds, you will be level 2.
In 30 rounds, level 3.
In 60 rounds, level 4.
In 100 rounds, level 5.
In 150 rounds, level 6.

At this point, switch to a CR 6 ettin, for an initial 1800 XP per kill.

In 154 rounds, you reach level 7.
In 159 rounds, you reach level 8.
In 165 rounds, you reach level 9.
In 175 rounds, you reach level 10.
In 188 rounds, you reach level 11.
In 208 rounds, you reach level 12.
In 235 rounds, you reach level 13.
In 275 rounds, you reach level 14.

At this point, switch to a CR 14 truly horrid umber hulk, for an initial 4200 XP per kill.

In 279 rounds, you reach level 15.
In 284 rounds, you reach level 16.
In 290 rounds, you reach level 17.
In 300 rounds, you reach level 18.

You are now a god-powered wizard with 9th-level spells, and XP is meaningless to you. So, this is a good houserule, because it allows first-level fighters to become as powerful as wizards in only 30 minutes, narrowing the gap between tier 5 and tier 1.

N.B. Even a wizard gets iterative attacks at level 11, allowing multiple kills per round. In fact, an optimized Lightning Maces adept could achieve practically limitless XP in one round, by repeatedly hitting a helpless monster in and out of consciousness.

So... how are you getting kill XP if you never actually kill the monster? I'm not sure you understand how the proposed house rule works, or how XP works in general.

ExLibrisMortis
2017-01-30, 08:00 PM
So... how are you getting kill XP if you never actually kill the monster? I'm not sure you understand how the proposed house rule works, or how XP works in general.
1) It's a joke. Don't overanalyze.
2) The question you ask should be asked to the OP's potential DM.
3) 'Dead', that is, defeated, overcome, and beyond the PC's care, is de facto at -1 hp (for mooks, anyway), and that's what XP is awarded for*. It's an interpretation that works for the joke. Again: don't overanalyze.
4) The point is that a 'killing blow' system of awarding XP is very easy to exploit if you don't define some Terms & Conditions, and this novice player doesn't seem to have thought it through.


*Clearly you should only ever get XP for capturing the goblin in the first place, but that's exactly what our prospective DM is looking to change. By changing the XP-gaining moment from an abstract metagame concept ("challenge overcome"), which is essentially up to the DM, to a specifically player-identifyiable moment ("-1 hp" or whatever you prefer), we get to manipulate the XP-gaining moment using character actions. Thus, the opportunity to squeeze multiple XP moments out of one monster. Other options include the hunting of large amounts of low-CR monsters using efficient area damage - after all, everybody levels up by killing blows and killing blows only, so why even bother with quests, social encounters, or tournaments?

D+1
2017-01-30, 09:24 PM
I've played in such games before. They actually get boring at best and cause otherwise good players to behave like jerks at most other times. It truly makes D&D a competition - and not a competition between players and DM - which is bad enough. It's a competition between players. The name of this game is Kill-Stealing. You don't want other PC's anywhere near you - you want them far away from you and doing poorly in combat so that you can finish off any and all opponents in front of you - and then go finish off the opponents fighting anyone else. You let the other players rack up damage on a large opponent and then save your best attacks to steal the kill. Your motivation is ALL about ME ME ME - NOBODY but ME! The other PC's are at best only there to do the BORING work for you. You don't even attack - you PARRY. You prevent damage to yourself and let the other PC's soften up YOUR targets. THEN you finish them and take all the XP. Sounds like fun doesn't it?

Maybe for a session or two. Maybe even longer than that, but eventually will come a time when it will be realized by even not-very-intuitive players that being anyone but the finisher is for suckers. Playing a mage is surely for suckers because you'll never get the XP that fighters get. They will get WAY ahead of you and stay there. YOU will take what scraps of XP out of combats that you can, but mostly you'll suck it. By the time you get proper area-effect spells that might have put you in a good position to get XP, you'll be fighting opponents who just don't go down with one fireball. You'll just be making the kill-stealing easier for the fighters. You'll never have enough spells to compete with their inexhaustible melee attacks. If you're a thief you'll never get enough backstabs or enough of a backstab multiplier to take out enough enemies to supply you with the XP that the fighters get.

A better option, MIGHT be a cleric. You cease being anything even remotely like a support character though. Every spell you cast should either buff your combat ability, finish, or otherwise prep-for-finishing one of YOUR opponents. And again - you don't want the fighters anywhere near you or they will only step up to YOUR prepped opponent and steal the kill for the XP.

Nope. There is simply nothing good about the idea or anything similar to it. IME it produces campaigns and characters that make the game a boring one-note joke.

As a player, I would simply tell this DM-to-be that I WILL NOT play in their campaign if they use that rule. And anyone who decides to play in that game only to do their level best to disrupt it and prove a point only makes themselves the jerk. A really HUGE jerk - because you KNOW how po'd you'd be if players were doing that to you. It will NEVER teach a newb DM to be a better DM - only to be a VINDICTIVE one in order to combat JERK players - if they can get anyone as players in their games at all.

denthor
2017-01-30, 09:30 PM
Ask this joker about spells that disabled. If someone goes down to a color spray? how running off the field due to fear spell 1st or 4th level. There is no death involved with these.

kyoryu
2017-01-31, 12:48 AM
I have played in a game before where xp was granted proportional to the damage you did.

Still a crap system, in my mind, but better than the killing blow one.

Knaight
2017-01-31, 04:01 AM
I have played in a game before where xp was granted proportional to the damage you did.

Still a crap system, in my mind, but better than the killing blow one.

Between the two, I'd honestly prefer the killing blow. Adding yet more accounting to D&D (or some other system which uses per combat XP, but that's not a long list) just seems like a mistake.

Angelmaker
2017-01-31, 05:09 AM
Everything has been said, but not everybody said it: its a terrible concept for a game. So agree to what he said and play...

An apostle of peace with the vow of nonviolentness or whatever it is called. I remember there be ing an (exalted?) class that revolves around not doing combat and preventing everybody else from doing the same.

The class sucks hardcore, but for this type of game it sounds perfect. :smallbiggrin: trollolololol

Segev
2017-01-31, 09:15 AM
Oh, a mage could exploit this system to his party's detriment, too. "Accidentally" catching the fighters in the color spray at low level, and then coup de grace-ing the fallen while they're stunned, would be perfectly viable. You get last blows, after letting the fighters soften up big targets. Use burning hands on little targets for multikills before the fighter can get around to them.

And once you get to the point that quadratic wizardry kicks in, you make sure your summons and your AoEs get all the last hits.

Definitely tell them why it's a bad idea. If they go through with it, play the game they've outlined, and demonstrate why it's a bad idea. Not even maliciously. Just play optimally in this system. It is encouraging you to do so.

Herobizkit
2017-02-01, 06:51 AM
Interestingly enough, OD&D used to operate this way. Woe to the Elf who needed 4k XP to hit level 2.

On the surface, I can see where he might THINK this is a good idea. It does encourage a more proactive "kill them before they kill us" mentality and, assuming the party works together, ensures everyone does their "fair share".

If you're using a version of D&D where the XP/level varies by class, you might be in for some struggles as the players skip turns all the time so that the "right" player gets the XP. On the dark side of that, it encourages damage-heavy classes to be damage-hogs and can walk all over other classes' progress.

It's *A* way to play, but the game has evolved to be team-based and to everyone sharing in rewards for a reason.

sahut652
2017-03-08, 11:40 AM
Have him go through part of the campaign where he only gets XP if he lands the killing blow. and show him how crippling it is.

Lord Torath
2017-03-08, 12:34 PM
Invoke what I call 'the striker issue'.

In professional football [soccer], the main goal-scorers [strikers] are nearly always the most highly paid and valued. On the surface this makes sense, for they're the ones who score the vast majority of goals, and that wins the game. But anyone knowledgeable about football knows this is really bollocks - for the striker quite often is simply the final foot in a chain where defenders intercepted the rival striker, the midfielders did a successful pass to the striker and so on. The goal is a *team effort*; for if the striker was the only important position in a game, professional clubs would simply have 10 strikers and one goalkeeper... aka like watching primary school kids playing football in their breaktime at school.

Just like the football team needs the other players to allow the striker to score, the party needs the rogue to get rid of the traps, the healer to keep the party in fighting form, the archer / mage to thin out the wave[s] of mook enemies before close combat starts etc.What team sports is the potential DM familiar with? Is PotDM (potential DM) familiar with American Football? No offense to Mr Blobby, but American Football is even more role-defined than regular Football (Soccer to those of us in the States). The center hikes the ball to the quarterback, who hands it off to a running back, who runs through a break in the line opened by two offensive linesmen, and said running back evades another tackle because a wide receive got in the tackler's way, letting the running back score. Should the running back be the only one who gets paid, because he scored all the points? Would the play have gone better if the wide receiver tried to strip the ball from his teammate so he could get paid, instead of blocking a tackle? What about the linesmen? They didn't even touch the ball, but the running back couldn't have scored if they hadn't done their jobs.

If PotDM wants to encourage teamwork, this rule will have an opposite effect. It will instead become a PvP contest for who can become the biggest glass cannon.

Does PotDM play Magic the Gathering, or any similar game? Ask if he would he recommend getting rid of the "support" cards that allow you play your big killer cards? After all, the support cards don't inflict any damage. Wouldn't getting rid of them speed up his victory?

If it comes down to it, just tell him you WILL NOT PLAY in a game with that house rule. :smallannoyed:

Stealth Marmot
2017-03-08, 12:42 PM
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/f7/f9/dd/f7f9dd432f1f0ddc50c1b467b0aa76f6.jpg

Lord Torath
2017-03-08, 02:18 PM
*snip*It's only been 35 days. Don't we have 45 days before it's Threadomancy?

Necrodancer, do you have any status update on PotDM?

NecroDancer
2017-03-08, 04:57 PM
It's only been 35 days. Don't we have 45 days before it's Threadomancy?

Necrodancer, do you have any status update on PotDM?

We talked him out of doing XP by kill. Luckily everyone in the group was against it

Mr Blobby
2017-03-08, 07:57 PM
My example can be converted to pretty much any team sport or RL groups, for example the military or surgeon teams. For the former, aircraft maintenance people, transport crews, the chef, quartermaster and even the commanding brass don't 'get any kills' [well, usually] but only an utter idiot would say 'they were not needed' - their presence helps the front line increase their kills.

The suggestion is a prime example of a on the surface fair idea, but fails as soon as you think deeper. Human beings have, in my opinion an almost-inbuilt tendency to attempt to game any system they come across.