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View Full Version : Talakeal's Campaign Diary (1 Day without a horror story!)



Talakeal
2021-08-15, 08:22 PM
Last weekend I finally got my new campaign off the ground, and it went surprisingly ok, especially considering Bob was recovering from dental surgery at the time.

The game is my own Heart of Darkness system. Its a gothic fantasy adventure game, with a setting that is a cross between Arthurian Romance and Wierd Western, reminiscent of Stephen King's Dark Tower series.

The mechanics are like a cross between Exalted and Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, but I am going to keep the summary mechanically neutral and present archetypes in D&D terms so that everyone can follow.


I told them that the game was going to be about a mercenary company operating out of Golgotha in the year 1113, and that they needed to make characters with the motivation, skills, and moral flexibility to be a part of this, and that each needed to pick a faction to be aligned with. Rather than a group session zero, I worked with each of them independently to make characters, and though I was prepared to guide them if they created anything that would be incompatible with the rest of the party or step on their fellow's toes, none did. This is what they came back to me with:

Bob was playing Krystal, a CE female tiefling rogue / warlock
Johnny was playing Quincy, a CN male human ranger.
Sara was playing Anani, a LG female human cleric with the darkness domain
Brian was playing Kim, a LN trans-feminine human Eldritch Knight who specializes in earth magic
Dave created Valentine, a N female aasimar bard, but dropped out of the campaign before we started and she was relegated to Brian's cohort
and the New Guy is playing Fuer, a LN male human elemental monk with a focus on time magic

And the game summary:


May 1113

It doesn’t rain often in the badlands, but when it does, it comes down hard.

Our story starts outside of the Green Gator; a small inn in the shadow of Golgotha’s famous Golden Gharial casino.

A young woman in traveling leathers walks down the street, up to her ankles in a flood of warm water. She steps into the inn, pulling back her sodden hood and revealing crimson skin and horns upon her brow.

A very short, stout woman with a blonde crewcut and an oil-stained undershirt walks up to her and shakes her hand, saying that she must be Krystal. She introduces herself as Zara, a tinker who Valentine hired to maintain their gear and asked her to sit in on auditions for the crew; an experienced hand to guide them along if they get stuck. Krystal asks what the job is, and Zara says Valentine didn’t tell her, she just promised a bag of gold and that was enough.

They move into the back room, lit by flickering lantern light, and move the table into position, set out bottles of cheap beer and a communal bowl of bowchow, a Golgothan dish resembling a pizza casserole, for their guests, and then sit in silence.

Sometime later a tall woman with long blonde hair enters the room, and Krystal tells her that she is late. Valentine says that she didn’t expect the rain, it’s tough to fly in, as she shakes out the large swan-like wings that emerge from her back. She joins them at the table where they make small talk and wait for the applicants to arrive. In the end, there are only two.

The first is Feur, a man of unremarkable appearance, with short white hair. His cloth is poor, his knuckles calloused, and the only sign of wealth is a large golden medallion of station wresting upon his heavily scarred chest. He doesn’t say much about himself, but claims to be a competent bodyguard.

The second is Quincy, a slightly older man wearing a ragged military uniform, who is here for the huntsman position, and says that he has been in the region tracking down hengeyokai for the bounty and already has nineteen confirmed kills.

They both ask Valentine what the job is, and she tells them that it is a routine missing persons case in Vladispol. A cannery owner is offering six stone of silver for their return, and she has insider information that they culprits are holed up in a nameless city on the southern coast of the Misty Sea. She clearly doesn’t know as much as she is letting on.

As they are dickering over travel expenses and shares, they are joined by a slender woman with maroon hair who is wearing an expensive blue and purple dress covered in holy symbols, arcane rules, and with lacquered armor plates sewn into it. She introduces herself as Anani and asks to come along.

She is evasive about who she is or how she heard about the job, but when asked what she can do she tells them that she is a healer, and Zara tells them to sign her on, it’s always good to have a sawbones on the crew.

Feur sees that magical energy simply falls into Anani like water down a whirlpool, and Quincy notices that her shadow moves slightly out of sync with her body.
Then, with contracts signed, Zara tells them to meet her in front of the temple of Cronus at dawn.

The next morning Krystal arrives early and scopes the place out for danger, but the streets are deserted save for a few friars hoping to get their chores finished before the morning prayers. As each of her companions arrives, she tests them by seeing how close she can sneak up to them.

Once the group gets together, they are startled by a low rumbling, which at first they fear is an earthquake, but turns out to be a massive coach like none they have ever seen, nearly ten meters long, mounted on eight heavy wheels, and clad in thick steel, and moved by its own power with no need for horses. It pulls up next to them and the door opens to reveal Zara at the helm. She tells them to climb aboard, but they are hesitant about the strange conveyance.

Once aboard, she silences their questions. Inside there are twelve seats that can double as six beds a work bench / operating table in the back, and metal shudders for windows. Zara tells them only that it can safely do about 25 knots, and that, weather permitting, they will be able to make the hundred league journey to Vladispol before nightfall.

They have the day to get to know one another, and some talk more than others.

Anani says almost nothing, but reveals that she is a priestess of Magnum Tenobrusum and gives each of them her blessing, save Quincy who declines.

Feur still does not say where he is from, save that it is out west. It is obvious that they use a different system of measurement where he comes from; the rest of the group gives him a hard time about not understanding stones or leagues.

Quincy is a career soldier from Dungenus, where he was a member of Balthazar’s dragoon corps. After more than a decade of fighting, he wanted a change and got himself transferred to the frontier where he can work as a free agent hunting bounties for the Warlord, although he is still technically under commission.

Krystal and Valentine are both from Concordance, and are currently on the run after double-crossing their previous employer, the outlaw trade prince Valen. They have known one another almost all of their lives.

Zara reveals nothing about her past save for correcting the others that she is not a dwarf, although she declines to state what she is.

They arrive in Vladispol just after sunset to find the town blanketed in rain and fog. Valentine refuses to leave the coach, and sends Feur out to buy her an oilskin. He is given directions to the Cram-Shack, what passes for a general store around here, and is given the outsider’s discount.

The dour people of Vladispol make their living on the gloomy shores of the Misty Sea. The ground is swampy and no crops grow, they depend upon the sea for their livelihood. The fishing is poor, and most is canned and sent to feed the Warlord’s soldiers in distant lands, and the only true source of profit is in whaling. Some are even desperate enough to hunt the blind worms; sightless serpents whose flesh is bland but can be compressed to make oil that burns bright even in the dark and damp that surrounds them. One must always be careful though, for the smaller serpents aren’t worth the risk and the larger beasts can smash a ship to splinters.

Once they have adequate clothes, the group makes their way through the fog to the cannery, where the workers are all crippled old men who can no longer work the boats.

The office is as ramshackle as the rest of the building, but given the air of sophistication with expensive furniture and tapestries. They are each served a goblet of brandy and further briefed by the owner, Errol Wiggun.

Six days ago his son Loren was kidnapped by a group of wandering lizardmen who had been chased out of town the week prior. He was out on a bluff outside of the town with three of his friends, a popular spot for young people to go and build bonfires, get drunk, make out, and race horses just outside of their parent’s notice.

Once the townsfolk learned what had happened, they formed a posse to chase them down. They tracked them down to a cypress grove two days to the south, where they found that the missing youths had been slaughtered and eaten like hogs. Past that they lost their trail in the mangroves to the south.

When asked about a ruined city, he says that he doesn’t know of any such place, and when the group inquires as to the Warlord’s involvement, he says they rarely send patrols out this way anymore, too many of them have gone missing. They take their taxes and draft young men and women never to be seen again, and give almost nothing in return. Quincy nods knowingly, his own story was not so very different, taken as a youth from a country home he would never see again to fight for someone else’s cause in distant lands.

They ask if the disappearances might be related to his son, and he says he doubts it. They haven’t had much trouble here in town, although boats are often lost in the fog.

Anani asks permission to exhume the bodies, and Errol tells her that they don’t bury bodies here, with the water table so high that is just asking for a cholera outbreak. Their dead are sent out on funeral barges to be lost in the sea.

Anani investigates the remains, there isn’t much left. They appear to have been killed by slashed throats, the girls have had earrings brutally ripped off, and most of the flesh was eaten raw by teeth that are too large to be human but too small to be wild animals.

The travelers are put up in an inn, where they are fed a bland casserole made from mushrooms, worm meat, and fish. The locals are nervous around them, and many give them the evil eye. One small child is even put to tears at the sight of Krystal, believing his mother has finally made good on her threat to sell him to the devil if he doesn’t do his chores.

The next morning they are met by a well-dressed barrister who provides them with a map and a letter for some fishermen who live in a shack to the south. He flirts a bit with Valentine, and admits that he is actually somewhat happy the boy is gone, as that means when the old man dies the cannery will go up for auction, and as one of the few men of means and education in this town, he just might end up running the place.

The group is suspicious that he might have had something to do with it.

Zara tells them that she can’t risk driving any further south, the ground is too muddy, and instead she will stay here and do maintenance.

Their first stop is the bluff where the children were abducted, and they find six sets of heavy scaled tracks and one lighter pair wearing delicate shoes.

They follow the map and make for the main road. There, they encounter a patrol of soldiers bearing the emblem of Balthazar’s forces who tell them they will need to pay a weapon tax to cross the border. Quincy says this is a common shakedown tactic, not technically a law but not out of the ordinary either. Valentine talks them into letting her pay at a later time in exchange for information on their disappearing patrols, and they agree, but not until they take down the group’s information.

A few hours later they hear a whistling from the fog, and then come face to face with a slender man with mismatched guns on his hips and a large black bird on his shoulder. He introduces himself as Raven-Dies-Talking, a wandering treasure hunter, gun for hire, and flute-player at weddings, funerals, and quinceaneras. They ask him if he knows anything about their current mission, and he does not.

They ask if he wants to work with them, and he says they are a bit green to afford his rates, but he is sure they will collaborate at some point in the future. They look a less incompetent than the last group that came through here, a sharpshooter, an elf, a mentalist, a little girl with a big wolf, and fat man in an altogether too tight outfit who didn’t heed his warnings and charged headlong into a group of orcish raiders who had deserted from Ghort’zan’s horde.

He gives them a scroll he has written up with advice for new adventurers, but they find that it ends abruptly when giving instructions for how to deal with manargus. They ask what happened to the second page, and his bird suggests that he smoked it. He is puzzled, and she clarifies he used it as a rolling paper, when he apologizes and said he rolled his tobacco with it, she corrects him again that it was mescaline. When they ask what was on it, he tells them he has no idea, he was on mescaline.

Raven explains that manargus are like a cross between an ant and a praying mantis, but about the size of a jaguar. They aren’t too much trouble if you give them their space, especially during the day, but they will eat an entire town in a single night if they get it into their minds. Some people collect bounties on them, and alchemists will pay a fortune for a queen, but it’s not worth the risk. They probably aren’t around here though, the ground is too wet for them to build their tunnels.

They move off the road and find a place that is dry enough to build a campfire, and Raven-Dies-Talking regales them with stories of his travels long into the night. Feur reveals that he is initially from the kingdom of Zaikhan far to the west, and Raven says that he has never been there, but he hears they have great opium and asks in Feur has any. Valentine notices a flash of disappointment in Quincy’s eye when he says he does not.

When they tell Raven that they have come from Golgotha, he tells them that if they are ever in trouble, they should go to the abandoned cathedral library and ask for Christine and tell her that he sent them.

In the morning the mist is gone, and their companion with it.

They turn off the main road near a broken sign that advertises a long flooded highway leading to Pompur in the east. They find the Cyprus grove where the lizard folk allegedly made camp, and it is all as was described.

Moving south through the swamps, they spot what they think is the gleam of heavy armor in the mist. They find three steel figures in the shape of men, but with no buckles or seams and the makers mark of Avarus stamped into them. Anani says that the Warlord Livionia is known to supplement her forces with such mechanical homunculi. They appear to have been on the losing end of a fight, with several large bullet holes in them, but there is no sign of what did the deed.

Krystal subtly breaks the seal on the barrister’s letter, and finds it a simple demand that they provide the mercenaries with supplies and a boat if they don’t want to find their land foreclosed. She then reseals it and they head to the shack

with a horned mermaid painted on its side. They give the letter to Kull the fisherman, who is sad to hear of Lorren’s passing, for although the father has always been, and continues to be, a pain, the child had potential.

He feeds the group with shrimp gumbo and provide them with dry clothes and rope, as well as a rowboat, which they will need if they plan to go into the mangroves to the south. He has never heard of a ruined city, nor has his husband Peter, who says his family has lived in the area for four generations.

It is slow going through the mangroves, for although the sky is clear and bright, they are heavily overgrown and tracking is impossible. Still, Quincy can tell they aren’t the first people to come through here recently, he sees foliage cut be machetes, campfire ashes, and a few disturbed embankments.

Valentine takes to the sky, and spots right angles in some of the bends of the river, and they make for it, Krystal using her infernal powers to flit in and out of this dimension to scout ahead.
They notice that the islands do become more regular, and looking sideways they can see the sides of flooded buildings, their tops covered with greenery.

Quincy notices a very large carnivorous lungfish following them, and tells the group that they need to make landfall before it tries tipping the boat, as they will be little better than chum in the open water.

They pull ashore atop a building which is mostly covered in waist deep water and with only a few scattered trees atop a dry terrace. The fish, a monstrous Acipenser nearly the size of an orca, follows close by, and indeed capsizes the boat before circling around them. Quincy takes a shot at it, but this only draws the creature’s attention. It lunges at him, and though he does his best to keep a tree between them, it still manages to clamp its jaws down on his leg, blood spurting wildly.

Valentine takes to their air and Feur rushes forward, wading into the water and striking the beast hard in the jaw with his brass knuckles, dislocating the joint and allowing Quincy to slip free. He then hooks his hand into the gills, trying to distract the monstrous fish without letting himself get caught.

Quincy tries to shoot again, but he is shaken and his aim is shot. Anani conjures up tendrils of pure darkness that eat through stone like smokeless fire, but fail to penetrate the thick scales, so she moves to beat on its flank with her staff, hoping to drive it off, and Krystal moves to the opposite side, puncturing is with her rapier, which burns with magical light.

The beast is simply too large and too tough to be distracted, and after a long, exhausting, nerve wracking fight it finally gets ahold of Feur, shredding his arm and pulling it out of socket, and begins to drag him back into the water, but Quincy finally finishes reloading through shaky fingers, and fires a bullet clear through its side, spraying Anani and Krystal with blood and viscera. Valentine coldly tells him to finish it, and he walks up and places another shot between the wounded animal’s eyes.

Anani binds their wounds, and then Feur pulls out the Scroll of Aeons and reads from it while he enters a transcendental state, and then time seems to work backwards upon his arm, first the sutures are undone, and then the wounds disappear, before the bones move themselves back into place as if the injury had never occurred.

It takes a bit of work to get the boat out of the water, but it is done in short order, and they continue into the vast ruins, although Quincy doesn’t know how they are going to find their targets except by luck, if they are even here at all.

Hours later, at midday, they see a huge bipedal alligator sitting on the ledge of a building. It is mixing plant oil in bowls, and is watching them without turning its head. Valentine decides to greet it and ask for directions, and when the boat moves past, it reaches its hand down, and when she goes to shake it, the creature lifts her out of the boat and up onto the leafy ledge. He then does the same for each of her companions, save Krystal who finds her own way up.

The monstrous reptile introduces himself as Coraxe and says that this whole city is his wallow. He wasn’t born here, but he swam up the coast some fifty years ago. And once he has mastered the city so that the one in his mind matches the one outside, he will find mates and start his own tribe.

He finishes crushing the oil and pours it into a hollow gourd, and then hands the rest to Quincy, telling him to use it for his gun before the insects eat it.

Coraxe knows where the lizard folk are, and tells them he will show them if they help him solve a few mysteries, he doesn’t like mysteries in his city.

First he leads them to a wall covered in colorful ceramic tiles which slide about when touched, and Krystal is able to recognize them as a crude Stone Age version of a combination lock, although she can’t make sense of the pattern behind them. When unlocked, the panel swings open to reveal numerous bronze jaws ornamented with turquoise. Inside are powders and spices, pungent even after so many years, and Anani is able to identify only a few, she thinks they are likely for embalming the dead rather than for cooking, as they would not be very pleasant to taste, at least not for someone with a human pallet.

After learning how the wall works, Coraxe takes them to what he calls the glass woman. In the basement of a large collapsed building that was either a temple or a town hall, there is a long shard of smooth green crystal buried in rubble. If one washes off the dust, one can see a human woman sealed inside, short and thick with bright orange hair and a look of panic frozen on her face; like a crystalline cocoon.

Anani splashes holy water on the crystal, and soon it washes away, the woman within flopping onto the floor and coughing volcanic vapors from her lungs.

After she has gotten her bearings, she introduces herself as Kim, an agent of the Imperial Archeological Society out of Krackenrock. When told that Krackenrock was destroyed seventy years ago, she refuses to believe them, and insists the year is 1042. She tells them that she was exploring the ancient ruins when the sky went dark and the building began to collapse, and she instinctively summoned a crystalline shell to protect herself; she has always had an affinity for stones. As she digs around in the rubble for her gear, she is shocked to find that her armor and meteor hammer are caked in a thick coat of rust. As she begins to question this, Feur recites a few words in the language of magic and lays his hand upon her shoulder, and as he does so she feels the full weight of time fall upon her.

She grows quiet and unsteady on her feet, but Anani puts an arm around her and mutters reassuring words in her ear as she leads them back to Coraxe. They struggle to communicate at first, as she doesn’t expect the massive Sobek to speak Terran and he doesn’t expect her to speak Yokai. It confirms that he has been here for decades, long before he arrived.

Good to his word, Coraxe shows them the way to the lizard-folk camp, and a vista from which they can see the smoke of their campfire. He likewise warns them to avoid the stone bridges, and use only those made from wood or vines to avoid collapse. In thanks, they tell him about the dead lung fish, and Coraxe says that he used to hide from them when he was younger, but now they avoid one another. Quincy says the flesh is his, and Coraxe says that he knows; everything in the city is his.

The group treks on, to the large building that serves as the Lizard Folk’s camp. Before they enter, Krystal moves partway into the Hellscape to hide her from prying eyes.

There are seven of them, as expected, six large females and a smaller male in silk robes with long incandescent frills. He rises and bows deeply, introducing himself as Klarr and demanding one of his guards boil a pot of tea for his guests. When Valentine says that they are here for the children, he politely tells her that those items are unfortunately no longer for sale, they were unable to make a clean escape and decided to cut their losses and eat the captives. When asked what they took them for, they say they were to be sold at auction, for the dwarves of Tahrr and the Omukade have ensured that the price of slaves is at a premium.

Valentine demands their heads as payment, and Klarr slowly explains to her several times that the humans are no longer here. Kim could explain to her that the Lizard Folk have no concept of vengeance, but she is too busy listening to the stones around her screaming.

Quincy, tired of the pointless back and forth, draws his rifle and puts a round in Klarr’s chest, and he dies with a look of confusion on his eyes. His companions immediately charge Quincy while Kim and Feur move to meet them, when suddenly they begin to stumble and appear to keep falling and disappear from sight. It takes a moment for everyone to realize that the entire floor is collapsing, and before anyone can react they are tumbling down into darkness and buried alive.

Kim tries to remain conscious, remembering lessons from long ago, but soon her memories fade away into a dream, of a redheaded woman with hands on her throat, telling her to stay calm and focus on her voice, then moving Kim’s hands to her own throat and saying to watch how she does it, watch her breathing and watch how she keeps focus, and if the does pass out, to simply wake her with a kiss.

She would probably prefer to simply slip away here, lose herself in the past, but she is roughly pulled from the rubble by hairy hands. She sees the group has been dug out by Morlocks, short muscular humanoids with pale skin and large dark eyes who have adapted to life underground. They are quickly carried through tunnels, their weapons removed, and brought into a low meeting hall before the Morlock king, a hulking figure wearing a large crown like gilded stalagmites and an oversized velvet robe.

Kim sees her companions, as well as their reptilian foes, brought in one at a time; all save for Krystal who is not among them. She is, at least for the moment, lost in curiosity, asking a thousand questions.

The Morlock king introduces himself as Bothros, vassal of Cthon, Emperor of Tartarus. They say that the city above was once theirs, when it was called Glathos, but they abandoned it, along with the entire surface world, when black death descended from the sky. Kim asks if it was a dragon, or a demon, and Bothros says yes to both, they called it Tarsh.

Before she can ask more, Valentine interrupts and tries to explain the situation, and that they have a legitimate claim upon the lizard folk, who are slavers, kidnappers, and cannibals, but Bothros sees nothing wrong with that. However, trespassing in the city does offend him. At the same time, the lizard women tell him that the humans murdered their leader.

The king tells them he will deliberate their fates and has them taken away, where they are tended to buy malnourished human servants who speak no language Kim recognizes. They are fed a banquet consisting of a wide variety of delicious yogurts, and when they ask about them one of the guards tells them that they cultivate a wide variety of bacteria that feed upon the black blood of the Earth.
Their wounds are mended and salve is slathered upon them, and during the operation Valentine’s flight feathers are clipped.

Bothros returns and announces that they are to fight for the Morlock’s amusement in the arena; the loser’s bodies will be fed to the slaves and the winners will be used as breeding stock. Nobody is happy with this, and Valentine tries to covertly ask the lizard folk if they are interested in teaming up to escape, but the cold-blooded women do not trust the irrational mammals.

The arena is about four meters deep and ten across, with crowded Morlocks peering down above, held back by guards armed with scimitars. The groups are brought in unarmed, and the fight begins as the Morlock weapon master, a stern looking priest of the games, slowly tosses their weapons into the sandy center of the ring one after the other.

The two sides surge forward, rushing to be the first to grab them. Feur uses magic to slow his foes movements and his fists to push them back, he is as comfortable fighting unarmed as he is with a weapon.

Quincy tries to get to his rifle, even though he knows he is running low on bullets, but manages to get separated from his compatriots and finds himself surrounded and alone on the far side of the ring. Eventually he is surrounded and critically wounded by the lizard folk’s claws and teeth. Feur attempts to rewind time for him, but is unable to concentrate while fighting and pushes too hard, saving Quincy’s life but returning him to the unconscious state he had been in after being caught in the rockslide an hour before.

Valentine does her best to coordinate her allies while avoiding direct conflict, and at one point only avoids having her throat torn out by pulling away and leaving her opponent holding a clawful of bloody feathers.

Kim uses her magic to draw the arena walls in tight, crushing two of the lizard folk as well as knocking one of the morlock guards down with them, where he gets caught up in the fray.

Anani summons up a shade from the void, and the lizard folk are terrified by the living shadow that skulks across the arena walls. She has trouble controlling it though; it keeps trying to feed upon Valentine’s halo, and only manages to steal a single lizard person’s breath before the torchlight banishes it back to the Abyss.

Meanwhile, Krystal is attempting to track down her friends, but it is tough going, the morlock city has no open spaces as avenues, and thus she moves areas that alternate between cramped tunnels and gaping pits; it is overcrowded and chaotic, the noise, heat, and stench of bodies overwhelming, and the surface folk they have taken as slaves are treated worse than livestock.

Still, she is eventually able to find the arena, and as her comrades fight, she pushes through the press of spectators and sneaks up on the old weapon master, shoving him roughly into the pit. He lands near Kim, who attempts to wrestle her meteor hammer from his fists.

Krystal then slowly moves to assassinate the morlock guards one by one, slipping from shadow to shadow and dancing back and forth between Hell and Earth.

When Quincy finally comes to, he struggles to his feet and moves to pick up his rifle and slowly reloads it. When he does, it is not one of the lizard folk he fires upon, but the morlock king Borthas. The shot isn’t lethal, and he is more incensed than hurt, demanding his guards slay the humans for their insolence. The morlocks jump down into the ring and draw their scimitars, although one slips up and is badly hurt in the fall.

Valentine is subjected to a barrage of thrown debris from the crown, and is dazed when a pewter mug cracks her skull.

Krystal attempts to drive the Black Flame Blade into Borthas’ back, but his senses are keen and he hears her coming, and whipping around to bash her in the face with his scepter. She retreats, firing a single crossbow bolt which sticks in his voluminous robes. He then takes out his frustration by diving down into the arena himself, intent upon finishing off Valentine.

Feur engages him in single combat, and eventually proves triumphant even as Kim strangles the life from the weapon master. Quincy slays the remaining lizard folk, and Krystal the morlocks, all the while Anani is healing their injuries with life force stolen from the wounded and dying in a strange blood ritual.

When Bothras falls, the audience breaks into chaos, running and screaming, as Valentine commands Krystal to remember to take the lizard people’s heads, and Kim makes sure to liberate Bothros’ crown as a valuable historical artifact. The morlock who was injured in the fall exchanges his life for the way out, and he leads them limping through the tunnels, the underground city in turmoil behind them, no doubt rallying a posse to chase them down for murdering their king.

Moments later they emerge into the light, from a secret passage that even Coraxe is ashamed to say he had no idea existed. They find the alligator man feasting on the lungfish’s roe, and he wishes them farewell.

The mercenaries make their way north, Kim in tow, and return their rowboat as well as making good on their promise to stop by Balthazar’s local command post and pay their weapon fees; along with the report that Morlocks have been the one’s kidnapping their patrols. They aren’t sure if this is true, but Valentine figures that if the Warlords are on the lookout for morlock raiders, then it will be less likely that they will be able to exact vengeance on her crew.

They return to Vladispol and are paid the promised six stones of silver, and bear witness to the slain children’s funerals. Kim immerses herself in studying the local culture. She is shocked by Zara’s conveyance, and wonders if the modern world is filled with such marvels. Kim’s companions spend the long ride back to Golgotha catching her up on the last seventy three years.
Back in Golgotha, Valentine tells them that she is impressed with their first job, and is preparing contracts of long term employment for any who are interested. She then works on cutting them deals for better gear.

A treaty prevents weapons from being traded openly in Golgotha as an attempt to deescalate the tensions between foreign powers who seek to annex the city, and thus they have to track down the gun runners who operate out of the city’s rundown outskirts. Their leader, a dark elf named Decker, is very impressed by Krystal, having heard about how she stole Trade Prince Valen’s magic sword right out from under his nose, but he knows better than to extend them credit. He shows her how to replace the blade of her rapier, and explains that she will need to do this regularly, for the magic contained within eats the metal away every time it is activated.

When looking for arcane scrolls to add to their spell books, they are told to seek out Sammy Whin’s caravan. When they find him in the desert, he is riding on the back of a massive tortoise, laden down with odds and ends, shaded by a great parasol with the images of dancing ducks sewn into it. The man himself is desiccated, wrapped head to toe in bandages, he face a smiling mask. In a cheerful voice, he tells Kim that he knows her, although she doesn’t know him, for Master Gboro spoke much of his pupil, a little two-spirit child who could talk to rocks.

While shopping in the marketplace for medical instruments, Anani looks shocked to see a very tall woman who is wearing sunglasses and a long black ponytail. She asks Valentine who she is, and Valentine tells her that she is pretty sure she is Imperial Intelligence; a spy for the crown. When she asks Anani why she wanted to know, Anani says she merely thought she was very pretty, but Valentine can tell she is holding something back.

Before Valentine can pursue the matter further, a gilded carriage pulls up next to her, and a man steps out and says that the Lady Abasinia has heard about what she did down in Vladispol, and would like to contract her crew for a special job.


Overall it went really well.

Mechanically there were a few issues, but nothing major.
This was the first time a group has had someone who has good mercantile skills, and it makes purchasing so easy that they will be completely out of things to buy within a few sessions.
I adjusted skills so that modifiers were smaller and dice mattered more, but as a result it is now a little too easy for a rogue type to simply attack from hiding with impunity.
The party lacks any big damage dealer, and the first fight against the lung fish took forever as a result, nobody could really get through its armor.

As usual, bob bitched a bit, but nothing major.

He did his usual "If X had happened we would have been screwed" which is, afaict, as close as he will come to saying the game was too hard. In this case it was that they would have died if they had fought Coraxe or the Warlord's patrol; but it wasn't quite accurate as both Kim and Valentine ended the mission at basically 100%.

He didn't like how we made characters independently and I asked them to introduce themselves IC rather than OOC.

And he said that he hated "cut-scenes" when I had the party captured by morlocks, which is a fair cop, I was laying down the tracks a bit at that point because I was trying to wrap the session up rather than let it happen more organically.

Yeah, my biggest complaint was how the session went too long. This was a combination of in game and out of game factors, due to a combination of weather and covid we had to change venue at the last minute and got a late start, and the fight against the long fish took way longer than intended.

But overall, it went pretty well. If every session goes this way, my horror stories are over! Knock on wood! Can't wait to continue it in two weeks!

Squire Doodad
2021-08-16, 12:09 AM
Glad to hear you had a solid start!

You mentioned a lack of a damage dealer - since this is a mercenary campaign, I imagine it's combat focused, so keep that in mind for certain encounters
Probably avoid encounters that are meant to be firm damage sponges and hard walls until a bit later down the line. If you're worried, most likely the best course of action would be to let the party develop, if someone looks particularly into using their class for that role, give them a sidequest for a weapon that'd let them better take on the role, etc. Other people can probably give a decent example of how to handle this.
Of course, for now it's probably better to keep with what you're doing. If the party lacks any sort of tough damage and struggles a bit against bulkier foes, then hopefully one of the party members will try building towards that role. Otherwise it looks okay atm.

Talakeal
2021-08-31, 11:52 AM
I take the time to post a nine page, mostly positive story, and get one reply in over a week.

Not complaining, just mentioning it because people always wonder why I tend to post short summaries of the drama that often leave what details or give an impression that my games are entirely negative.


Glad to hear you had a solid start!

You mentioned a lack of a damage dealer - since this is a mercenary campaign, I imagine it's combat focused, so keep that in mind for certain encounters
Probably avoid encounters that are meant to be firm damage sponges and hard walls until a bit later down the line. If you're worried, most likely the best course of action would be to let the party develop, if someone looks particularly into using their class for that role, give them a sidequest for a weapon that'd let them better take on the role, etc. Other people can probably give a decent example of how to handle this.
Of course, for now it's probably better to keep with what you're doing. If the party lacks any sort of tough damage and struggles a bit against bulkier foes, then hopefully one of the party members will try building towards that role. Otherwise it looks okay atm.

Its mostly just an odd coincidence, nobody in the party has an above average strength score, they all went for speed and accuracy builds. The problem should disappear on its own as they grow into their characters, in the meantime I am just going to use large heavily armored foes sparingly.



So, we had another session.



When Valentine next calls the group together, it is with formal contracts of long term employment in hand. She explains that they are no longer a band of cut-throats, but professional mercenaries, and they will be paid a set rate regardless of the outcome of their mission; although there are options for bonuses or penalties based upon outstanding conduct. Further, she will provide their gear from now on; they are strongly discouraged from contributing their personal funds on the mission. While they all sign, only Feur does so enthusiastically; both Anani and Quincy express some reservations over conflicting loyalties, but Valentine reassures them that they will cross that bridge when they come to it.

Contracts signed, she tells them that their new job is simple; to escort a caravan of goods along a desert highway from the town of Rhybar to the Towers of Tahrr. She hopes the mission will be a good way to get their foot in the door with Lady Abasinia, one of the wealthiest employers in the region. Valentine thinks that she oversold their qualifications, but Krystal has the suspicion that Valentine is the one who is being set up.

Riding in Zara’s juggernaut they make great time, and it allows for a leisurely pace, with plenty of time for talking, hunting, and fishing along the way, although the barren land doesn’t provide much. They are able to spend a full weekend in Rhybar, getting to know the local culture, and many are relieved to find a town that is slower and less crowded than Golgotha.

The mining community is ancient, to the point where Kim has trouble putting her finger on the native culture or telling where history ends and myth begins. It was once a dwarven enclave, but long ago incorporated itself in the Imperium. No longer in the endless cycle of booms and busts that most mining towns face in their youth, it has entered into a slow and steady decline, its population mixing. Feur finds that the fabric of reality is thin here; likely a result of the same supernatural phenomenon that once endowed the town with such mineral wealth.

Unlike Golgotha, Rhybar is firmly in Templar hands, none of the Warlords have felt the need to claim it yet, for the modest loads of copper it still produces are unlikely to replace the losses suffered in its conquest.

They meet with the man who they have been contracted to protect, a drover named Bale Jerrison; and is introduced to his team, four porters, sixteen mules, and four wagons loaded heavy with dirt. Krystal suspects there is something buried within, but can find no evidence of codes or secret compartments. Kim is able to analyze the dirt with her mystic senses, and finds that it is just ore, and not particularly valuable ore at that, but of an unusual sort, with heavy concentrations of exotic isotopes of rare earth metals. As best as she can figure, it is too be used to catalyze some forging process, but her knowledge of metal-working is lacking.

The first three days of the journey pass uneventfully, but they are stopped on the edge of the desert by two men on horseback wearing dun colored armor. Quincy can see they have a squad of soldiers backing them up, and meets the gaze of one steely eyed man wearing the robes of a traveling priest who is accompanying them, a pair of chained hounds at his heels.

The soldiers explain that they are patrolling to borders of what is now Velonius’ territory, and that they have to take a tax from anyone passing through. Valentine pulls out a stack of papers showing the various fees and permits they have from all the local powers, but the men’s faces darken and they tell her that those mean nothing, this is Velonius’ land now, but if they are in league with his rivals they will not be permitted to enter under any circumstances. Kim, seeing where this is going, decides to get the drop on them and lashes out with her meteor hammer. She fails to do much except start a brawl.

The soldiers move into position and unleash a volley of arrows. Anani takes cover behind the juggernaut and Valentine flits atop it, surveying the battle while lying flat against its roof. Feur is hit by several arrows, and though he is not injured, he is pinned to the cart, and must hastily remove his armor to escape.

Several of the raiders break ranks and move up to the carts, holding the cowering drivers at sword point as they begin to untie the mules; their likely plan being to strand the goods out here until they can come back for them with a larger force, not realizing how useless the piles of dirt will be to them.

Quincy mounts his horse and puts some distance between them, and then fires a shot which strikes one of the enemy horsemen solidly in the back of the head, cracking his helmet and leaving the man comatose or dead from the impact.

Feur moves to defend the cargo, and Krystal slips past him, shrouded by invisibility, making for the back lines. But when she moves past the preacher, his dogs growl and bark at the smell of brimstone, and the assassin has scarce done more than cut a single bowman down before she is struck by a thrown vial of holy water that scorches her flesh like acid as well as dispelling the magical shroud that keeps her hidden from view. She squeaks in surprise and pain and teleports herself behind some nearby rocks.

Feur is able to knock one of their attackers out cold before the preacher turns his attention to him and expertly slashes the foreign warrior’s thigh with a saber, taking care to strike at the exposed area where the armor has been removed. Anani attempts to steal his life force with her magic, but finds his will is too strong, so she instead takes to firing void bolts at him, one of which decapitates the unconscious man lying near his feet. From her vantage point, Valentine almost thinks that she did this on purpose.

The preacher pulls out a dueling pistol and fires a shot at Anani, hitting her square in the chest and shattering her armor’s breastplate. Meanwhile, Quincy picks off the hounds, allowing for Krystal to return and stab the priest in the back, which gives Feur time to get into flanking position. The preacher then shields himself with an old weatherworn copy of the Imperial Tao and shouts to Cronus for protection.

Anani is shaken by the holy words and makes a break for the rocky scree on the far side of the road, while Krystal feels her soul boil and takes cover behind the juggernaut.

Kim and the remaining horseman go back and forth for a bit, neither his lance nor her lash are well suited for such close quarters combat, but in the end she is able to pull him from his mount and pummel him to death.

After Valentine assures the survivors of Velonius’ force that retreat is still an option, they cautiously withdraw into the southern desert, leaving the witch-hunter to stand alone, and it is not long before he is dispatched by Feur’s hands.

Wounds are mended and tools are repaired, and the party soon gets underway again. Feur takes time to carefully study his foe’s holy book, finding it to be passed down through many generations of the Lynch family.

As they go further south, the land becomes more barren and rocky, and the air grows foul. They are leaving the badlands and entering into the Dead Lands that border upon the wastes. Large square stones, which look natural to most, are seen by Kim and Zara as marking the borders of dwarven territory, and Zara tells her companions that she will not pass, and that they will need to get out of the juggernaut and onto the carts. When questioned about why she refuses to continue, she tells them that the dwarves will not welcome an outsider, but dismisses concerns that the rest of the caravan also falls into that category.

At sunset of the next day, Quincy warns the group that they are walking into an ambush, and that everyone needs to get on their guard.

They approach four armored figures standing across the road, rifles drawn, and in a hollow metallic voice one announces “Your cargo is forfeit. Flee, and you will not be pursued.” They immediately open fire.

Kim responds by clapping her hands together and slamming the walls of the canyon closed about them, badly damaging one and trapping another on the far side, while two are able to scramble toward the group. Kim moves forward to engage them, and discovers that they are the same lifeless homunculus that they found mired in the swamp south of Vladispol.

Anani and one of the drivers are both shot several times, and she responds by slitting the man’s throat and sucking in his dying breath to stabilize her own wounds.

At the same time, two groups of living warriors emerge from hiding behind boulders on either side, attempting to flank the caravan. Quincy, who had already planned for this, gets the leftmost group’s attention guides his horse down a side passage, leading them on a prolonged chase and using his superior speed and survivalist skills to pick them off one by one.

On the other side, Feur is mobbed and quickly overwhelmed. Anani attempts to intervene, sapping his attacker’s life force, but the spell gets out of her control and also target’s Feur himself. Krystal, knowing she needs to move quickly, teleports from her position atop the rocks and appears in midair above Feur’s prone form, quickly lashing out with her blade and inflicting horrible wounds while her enemies are still shocked by her sudden appearance.

At the same time, a robed figure who had been watching to battle unfold from its own perch atop a rock chimney, unfurls leathery demonic wings and swoops down upon them, moving to get Valentine with its claws. Anani conjures a shade to give her time to escape and the hellion lands upon one of the carts and dispatches the otherworldly entity with blasts of eerie blue hellfire.

Kim finds that her opponents have incredible strength, crushing her pauldron beneath their vicelike grips, and she casts a spell of protection upon herself, rendering their blows all but useless. They go back and forth for a bit, neither side really able to hurt one another.

Once Feur is back on his feet and able to rewind the worst of his injuries, Krystal leaves him, driving her blade into the hellion who is resuming his search for Valentine. She attempts to disappear back into the shadows, but finds her head caught in a clawed talon and bloody furroughs are carved into her forehead. The creature bellows in a reverberating screech, commanding its minions to focus upon the cowering angel and the slinking demon.

Feur and Quincy finish off their foes and return to help Krystal. Anani blesses Quincy’s rifle, and the holy shot pierces the hellion’s chest. It falls to the ground, thrashing wildly, until the demonic essence departs it, leaving it a still human corpse. The infernal spirit departs down a dark and twisted path that only Krystal can see, and she averts her gaze as it beckons her to follow.

The group then moves to assist Kim, who is growing exhausted attempting to keep the homunculi from drawing guns upon her. Feur slays one by sneaking up behind it and driving his feet into its back while yanking its chin, and Krystal drops from above and slices one nearly in two with the Blackflame Blade. Even as they die, they continue to repeat their message, “Your cargo is forfeit. Flee, and you will not be pursued.” Each of their bodies, as well as those of the soldiers and the formerly demonic officer, bares the gray sigil of Avarus.

They continue on, and the next day they find themselves escorted by a column of sturdy dwarven troops, flanked by oxen cavalry. Their leader, a young dwarven man with flowing golden hair and a gaudy uniform mounted upon an enormous crimson bull greets them. He introduces himself as Lanniel Brashton, major-general of Tahrr, and hopes that the cargo made it more intact than they did.

As they approach the Towers of Tahrr, the air is thick and hard to breathe, and the sky grows dark, weak shafts of sunlight barely penetrating the smog. The land is torn apart, filled with quarries and strip mines. The towers themselves are a marvel of the world, even grander than Kim’s memories of Necropolis, hundreds of stories high and held aloft by millions of fluted columns, one half again as tall as the other and connected by a sturdy open air bridge.

The group tells Lanniel about their journey, and has a million questions for him, although they can barely stand the heat baking off of his bull Tessie. He starts to talk about himself, before telling them that he has to go ask the Thane’s wife for permission to sweep their borders and clear up any more blockades which Livonia might have set up, and instead leaves them in the company of a bespectacled dwarven bureaucrat named Carrock.

Kim asks him about the small cairns of stones that line the path to the tower, and is told they are the remains of outcasts or vagrants (they are the same word in dwarven) who turned to stone waiting for their kin to apologize for their wrongs and let them back in. Feur is surprised by this, and makes a joke about how humans turn into potatoes when resting in one place for too long. The two laugh across the cultural barrier, and make a game of mocking one another’s accent, getting more pronounced and stereotypical each time.

Carrock tells them that they are neutral and sell weapons to the Imperium and all of the Warlords, and when Feur asks why people still buy from merchants who supply their hated enemies, Carrock asks what purpose refusing to buy from them would serve except to put them further behind in the war? He tells them that in dwarven they call that shaving your face to spite your arse, which Feur finds uproariously funny.

Kim is curious about why the dwarves here are so progressive and so very different from those of Rhybar, although she doesn’t find many answers. She learns that their original mountain home was abandoned centuries ago, and that the smaller tower is open to visitors and home to slaves, while the larger houses the dwarves themselves.

Jarrison is paid for his goods, and in turn pays Valentine for their work, and she distributes pay to her employees, allowing them to shop for fine dwarven goods in the marketplaces of Tahrr, although the adamant weapons and armor that the city is famous for are still beyond their means.

Unburdened by cargo, the return journey to Golgotha is much faster and less eventful.


I actually went into this thinking I didn't have enough material prepared, but that turned out to be the opposite of true.

We had to move the game TWICE, once for covid and once for weather, which took about three hours, meaning the session ran really late again. They also got a bit beaten up in the second fight, so from a mechanical perspective it worked out well. At this point RL logistics is more stressful than anything that happens in the game, as we have people in the group who are concerned about any confined location or one that is near strangers and children, so that's rough.

Bob is still bitching about the game being "too hard". The party pretty much steamrolled the first encounter, but because Bob took one good hit he insisted that the party was "almost entirely out of resources". I think I am just going to have to learn to drown him out.

Still worried about wealth, glad that I am getting feedback of how powerful the business skill is, but I am not sure whether to rework haggling in this game, give out less treasure, or simply go along as normal and accept the party has way too much gear.

Despite the fact that they are rolling in wealth and stockpiling consumables at an alarming rate, they are still bitter about the thought of ever actually using any.

Also concerned about players using agency in investigation or dialogue. I am working hard to put a lot of flavor into this game and creating detailed settings, cultures, and NPCs, but the players are really reluctant to actually take any initiative in instigating dialogue or investigating / following up with the mysteries and leads they are uncovering. I think I need to figure out how to change my approach.

Batcathat
2021-08-31, 12:03 PM
I take the time to post a nine page, mostly positive story, and get one reply in over a week.

Not complaining, just mentioning it because people always wonder why I tend to post short summaries of the drama that often leave what details or give an impression that my games are entirely negative.

I think that's just kind of how most people are in general. People complain about news mostly being negative but as almost anyone in news could tell you, it's also the negative news that most people are interested in. "Pleasant" is nice to experience, but it's kinda boring to hear about (and as horrifying as your "usual" stories are, I can't deny that they're interesting in a messed up sort of way).

The Glyphstone
2021-08-31, 12:48 PM
If you finished with something to talk about or discuss, you might get more replies too. As is, a good story is something to read but it doesn't really fuel discussion.

Talakeal
2021-08-31, 02:02 PM
If you finished with something to talk about or discuss, you might get more replies too. As is, a good story is something to read but it doesn't really fuel discussion.

I know.

Like I said, I am not surprised or angry, I am just pointing out that long, positive, stories don't generate as much discussion to the people who ask me why I mostly post drama and risk leaving out important context by briefly summarizing rather than writing long walls of text.

Pauly
2021-08-31, 09:22 PM
Kudos Talakeal.
You’ve obviously put a lot of effort into getting better communications with your group and it’s paying off.

As for the power of the business skill, I assume that will dry up when the group ventures into areas where there are less opportunities to negotiate/haggle prices. So whilst it’s powerful now in a friendly city, it will be next to useless in the wilds where they’re foraging for resources. I see it as a swings and roundabouts thing, unless the campaign is going to be based mostly in places where the business skill can be exploited.
Perhaps apply a penalty to the business skill when the players are in unfamiliar locations, as the don’t know local prices and local business customs.

Quertus
2021-09-01, 04:31 AM
I take the time to post a nine page, mostly positive story, and get one reply in over a week.

Not complaining, just mentioning it because people always wonder why I tend to post short summaries of the drama that often leave what details or give an impression that my games are entirely negative.


I know.

Like I said, I am not surprised or angry, I am just pointing out that long, positive, stories don't generate as much discussion to the people who ask me why I mostly post drama and risk leaving out important context by briefly summarizing rather than writing long walls of text.

Perhaps you should ask yourself whether what you want is "replies", or "accurate help improving your game". The answer will help determine your optimal strategy.

(Also, fwiw, I've actually *thought* more about your recent 'wall of text' posts than about most of your horror story / Bizarro World posts.)


Also concerned about players using agency in investigation or dialogue. I am working hard to put a lot of flavor into this game and creating detailed settings, cultures, and NPCs, but the players are really reluctant to actually take any initiative in instigating dialogue or investigating / following up with the mysteries and leads they are uncovering. I think I need to figure out how to change my approach.

If you figure this one out, let me know the answer!

Oldschool grognards, IME, seem to get it, whereas modern gamers get confused, and ask, "where's the 'engage with the fiction' button? I don't see it on my character sheet.". :smallannoyed:

Xervous
2021-09-01, 08:22 AM
If you figure this one out, let me know the answer!

Oldschool grognards, IME, seem to get it, whereas modern gamers get confused, and ask, "where's the 'engage with the fiction' button? I don't see it on my character sheet.". :smallannoyed:

The feedback I’ve gotten from my optimization goofballs points towards the importance of proper use of emphasis and careful throttling of the fiction flow. Presenting too vibrant a world or too many details leaves players floundering in uncertainty. Those heavily influenced by video games tend to do good with pattern recognition, but will grow frustrated if they are initially given too much data to sift through to arrive at some understanding of expected patterns. In other words if the players aren’t appropriately genre savvy for your table, don’t overwhelm them with inconsequential details. Remind them of patterns they’ve recognized in the past but might have forgotten. Be liberal with informing them what their characters would know about a given facet of society or situation. Comment on the viability of their plans to the extent that their characters would be able to understand.

The goal is to establish patterns they can trust to reduce the inaction and uncertainty inherent in approaching risky situations where they don’t know the value of the information they’ve been provided. By playing the voice of the PCs’ common sense the players know missteps due to miscommunication will generally be prevented. Moments of obvious risk will be clarified or at the very least heavily implied. Giving the players this consistent, trustable realm of interactions provides a wealth of cause+effect for them to analyze without adversely affecting the parts of your campaign and setting that you want to remain mysterious. Once they’ve built up their pattern recognition on the common examples you provide, they’ll feel more comfortable taking chances on the occasional uncertain interaction.

Don’t force them to learn dwarf fortress blind. Be their wiki reference and don’t worry much about it, you’re not giving them debug info.

Demostheknees
2021-09-01, 08:10 PM
In the past week or so I discovered some of your more recent posts and am very happy to see that this game seems to be going well!

It sounds like there is a lot more buy-in to the adventure this time around, and I am sure that is helping to keep the flow going. I'm sorry to hear about your RL struggles to find a gaming spot - and I hope that you can find something consistent. I've often found that RL chaos plays one of the biggest roles in the success of a campaign.

I really like the idea of campaign diaries in general and am looking forward to more of this!

Cluedrew
2021-09-01, 09:09 PM
I take the time to post a nine page, mostly positive story, and get one reply in over a week.I know I have said some things along these lines before. I am mostly looking for highlights, because I just want to know for sure they are actually happening. That being said I will try to give it a detailed read, but maybe not for a few days yet.


Oldschool grognards, IME, seem to get it, whereas modern gamers get confused, and ask, "where's the 'engage with the fiction' button? I don't see it on my character sheet.".My experience seems to suggest the opposite, although I'm not dealing with real "grognards" so maybe things where going down and are coming back up? And honestly its not so much what you describe as The Problem with Vincent. Which is roughly dealing with the fiction at very surface level, just assuming everything you will do work, not thinking of the setting as a world but just set dressing in which to use your abilities.

Talakeal
2021-09-02, 01:31 PM
Man, xeno-fiction is hard. Its so hard to make species with inhuman mindsets that don't leave them looking like irrational idiots to players, especially when I am using my own human brain to create them.

I spent a lot of time out of game trying to explain that lizard-folk in my game are a very materialistic culture, sort of like sociopathic Vulcans; who don't understand concepts like superstition or emotion, and only have use for traditions and honor as far as it benefits them; but my players rejected the idea that things that seem rational to the human mind would not be universally rational to any species.


As for the power of the business skill, I assume that will dry up when the group ventures into areas where there are less opportunities to negotiate/haggle prices. So whilst it’s powerful now in a friendly city, it will be next to useless in the wilds where they’re foraging for resources. I see it as a swings and roundabouts thing, unless the campaign is going to be based mostly in places where the business skill can be exploited.
Perhaps apply a penalty to the business skill when the players are in unfamiliar locations, as the don’t know local prices and local business customs.

That works as a temporary measure, but doesn't really work as a long term solution as this campaign is going to have them returning to their base at the end of most every mission. I think at this point I am just going to have to keep on going and accept that they will have better gear than expected, and maybe retune future balance appropriately. Its just a shame that the players aren't really going to interact with the economic side of the game due to my dumb mistake.


Perhaps you should ask yourself whether what you want is "replies", or "accurate help improving your game". The answer will help determine your optimal strategy.

Both? I would prefer not to have to choose one or the other, as I enjoy talking on the forum as well as gaming.


Also, fwiw, I've actually *thought* more about your recent 'wall of text' posts than about most of your horror story / Bizarro World posts.

That's good to hear. Any thoughts worth sharing?


I really like the idea of campaign diaries in general and am looking forward to more of this!

I got the idea from Kaveman's posts on here, and kind of regret not having done them all along as I miss not having a detailed record of my earlier campaigns. I am trying to go back and write them retroactively, but so much of the detail has inevitably been lost over time.

Most make for some pretty dry reading though.


I know I have said some things along these lines before. I am mostly looking for highlights, because I just want to know for sure they are actually happening. That being said I will try to give it a detailed read, but maybe not for a few days yet.

Not quite sure what you mean by that. Anything specific I can answer / point out for you?

Cluedrew
2021-09-02, 07:02 PM
Man, xeno-fiction is hard. Its so hard to make species with inhuman mindsets that don't leave them looking like irrational idiots to players, especially when I am using my own human brain to create them.I have seen some real interesting ones, its actually one of the few topics I would still suggest people go visit Stack Exchange fore. The World Building section does a lot of this kind of stuff.


Not quite sure what you mean by that. Anything specific I can answer / point out for you?Highlights, fun stories. Not just a normal good session, but the best moment from a better than average session. This all got started because when people asked "Why are you still playing with these people?" you always seemed to have very vague answers. And I mean yes a regular good session can still be kind of long and boring to talk about, but there should be some highlights in there right?

Pauly
2021-09-02, 08:12 PM
That works as a temporary measure, but doesn't really work as a long term solution as this campaign is going to have them returning to their base at the end of most every mission. I think at this point I am just going to have to keep on going and accept that they will have better gear than expected, and maybe retune future balance appropriately. Its just a shame that the players aren't really going to interact with the economic side of the game due to my dumb mistake.



My experience IRL has been that when you have a group doing the negotiation you should apply the worst discount, not the best. For example I am very white skinned and my wife is brown skinned. When traveling in areas where haggling is the norm such as SE Asia and South America whenever I am present the price doubles or more because the vendor assumes I’m a rich American. My wife makes me disappear if she wants to buy anything at a market. I have plenty of similar experiences negotiating in business too, when the other side is represented by a team you just pick on the weakest link until you get the deal at the price you like.

So if the party is shopping as a group they don’t get the fantastic bonus.

Also for items that require any degree of custom fitting such as weapons, armor, magic items then the party member who is going to use it has to be present, thus negating the effect of the business skill. The trope in fantasy is for one size fits all, but reality doesn’t work like that. Also for items the negotiator is unfamiliar with for example magic scrolls, the negotiator can easily get scammed and buy inferior products if the party expert in the field isn’t present.

Your business expert can still get bargains for generic components and his/her personal equipment, but it isn’t a party wide discount for every item the party wants

Edit to add:
Another way to put a brake on the effect of the business skill. The bonus is reduced by the level of fame of the party. Bob the Merchant might knock 50% off the top of something for a struggling bunch of plucky newcomers if it’s been a slow week, but for the mighty and fabulously wealthy Dragonslayers of Doom he’ll want the ticket price thank you very much.
If the party is equipping an army or building a castle then they’ll still be able to negotiate bulk discounts, but not for their personal equipment.

King of Nowhere
2021-09-04, 06:10 AM
Let's cross fingers, you may have finally found your place

Quertus
2021-09-04, 12:50 PM
Both? I would prefer not to have to choose one or the other, as I enjoy talking on the forum as well as gaming.



That's good to hear. Any thoughts worth sharing?



I got the idea from Kaveman's posts on here, and kind of regret not having done them all along as I miss not having a detailed record of my earlier campaigns. I am trying to go back and write them retroactively, but so much of the detail has inevitably been lost over time.

Most make for some pretty dry reading though.

So… I'm… not unlike an Earthdawn Demon (or a Dogma Muse, or Salieri in Amadeus(?)), IMO - I dearly love art, but find myself unable to create it. I decided I wanted to try writing after reading "Dragonlance" novels, if that gives any idea of my "quality" benchmarks. I've tried writing campaign journals, and I've found that… to the extent that I can write, less accurate renditions often would make for better stories. (Word of warning: I'll be subjecting the Playground to such a thing soon, once the dtd40k7e "troubleshooter" party finishes their mission on Hoth). But, yeah, it's quite a sadness how much is lost if you don't write it all down. (Note to self: Invent time machine, install surveillance devices at locations of old games).

Kaveman's works are great - definitely a good source for what good campaign journal write-ups look like.

But to get number and accuracy and usefulness of replies? If you want it all, you need people to be invested (which… we've already named your setting "Bizarro World" - I think we kinda are), good, detailed stories (getting that now), and problems to solve (I think). So, if this campaign has any issues, or even anything we see that we think could be better, you might have the perfect recipe.

So far (I've not read the latest story yet), I'm loving the idea of a Time Monk. Just the very concept screams "yes!" to me.

Largely watching the balance of the gunslinger, and the reaction to and mechanics of the demon.

Sad that your party / group doesn't appreciate your "alien mindset" world-building.

What makes for dry reading?

Talakeal
2021-09-05, 11:16 AM
So we had another session yesterday. I wouldn't say it was a bad session / horror story, but it was disappointing.

I will post a full write-up sometime this week, but basically the session (again) ran really long, and the players assumed that I put them in a "no win situation" without ever actually telling me this, which resulted in them committing the cardinal rule of gaming and splitting the party, essentially having Krystal solo the entire last act. Of course, she didn't have the ability to complete something designed for a six person party, which meant that the rest of the group spent a long time watching Bob play by himself and ultimately failed the mission.

Next session is going to be interesting, not sure if they can salvage this one or if the game is going to go in a very new unexpected direction.


I decided I wanted to try writing after reading "Dragonlance" novels, if that gives any idea of my "quality" benchmarks. I've tried writing campaign journals, and I've found that… to the extent that I can write, less accurate renditions often would make for better stories.

I actually really like the Dragon-lance novels, so no complaints there. Although admittedly I haven't really been able to get through anything but the core Weiss / Hickman books, most of the spinoffs are pretty bad.


So far (I've not read the latest story yet), I'm loving the idea of a Time Monk. Just the very concept screams "yes!" to me.

That character emerged almost completely organically through character creation. It took a bit of work to fit him in, but yeah, I think he came out very well. And I expect a lot more from it in the future, this campaign is probably going to have a very "Dr. Who" vibe as it goes on. I kind of wish it hadn't been delayed by the pandemic, as it is going to seem a lot less original now than it would have when I first came up with it due to people having seen Loki.



Sad that your party / group doesn't appreciate your "alien mindset" world-building.

I am not so sure that they don't, its just really hard for one human to explain to another human how an alien mind works without sounding crazy / stupid.



What makes for dry reading?

Hard to put my finger on it exactly.

I would say that its because they are mostly a record of events (and with a lot of combat encounters that just come across as padding) rather than a pre-planned story with all the drama that entails, and they rarely "go into scene" and have in depth dramatic dialogue and character interactions like a traditional novel would.

NichG
2021-09-05, 04:42 PM
Man, xeno-fiction is hard. Its so hard to make species with inhuman mindsets that don't leave them looking like irrational idiots to players, especially when I am using my own human brain to create them.

I spent a lot of time out of game trying to explain that lizard-folk in my game are a very materialistic culture, sort of like sociopathic Vulcans; who don't understand concepts like superstition or emotion, and only have use for traditions and honor as far as it benefits them; but my players rejected the idea that things that seem rational to the human mind would not be universally rational to any species.


Start from what is valued and what constraints an organism or society faces in order to exist in their environment and this is simpler I think. Rational means acting in a way consistent with what you want to happen, not valuing the same things as someone else. When you want to get very alien, make the face that the party interacts with not the same as the thing doing the valuing and the thing ensuring the persistence of the way of being.

It's not strange that undead will fight to the last because it's their necromancer's will they're carrying out, not their own.

But also don't automatically take an inability to empathize or value the same things to imply an inability to comprehend those motives. That may be what's making your lizardmen seem irrational, if e.g. even after having it explained to them that humans get angry when someone blasphemes their deities and are willing to kill and die for it, even their diplomats and leaders can't actually take that into account.

It's like, I don't have the predator instinct of a cougar to attack a running target that I was wary of a few seconds ago, but I can learn that I shouldn't turn my back on a cougar and run away just fine.

Some of the best stuff in scifi with alien psychology is when they act in a way that seems human until the situation would be beneficial to drop it and violate some very strong human instinct or cultural value, at which point they do so with zero hesitation.

Talakeal
2021-09-06, 11:18 AM
But also don't automatically take an inability to empathize or value the same things to imply an inability to comprehend those motives. That may be what's making your lizardmen seem irrational, if e.g. even after having it explained to them that humans get angry when someone blasphemes their deities and are willing to kill and die for it, even their diplomats and leaders can't actually take that into account.

It's like, I don't have the predator instinct of a cougar to attack a running target that I was wary of a few seconds ago, but I can learn that I shouldn't turn my back on a cougar and run away just fine.

Some of the best stuff in scifi with alien psychology is when they act in a way that seems human until the situation would be beneficial to drop it and violate some very strong human instinct or cultural value, at which point they do so with zero hesitation.

The issue wasn’t so much that these particular lizard people didn’t understand that humans would be vengeful as my players insisting that no society that didn’t have a concept of vengeance could ever exist as fear of retribution is the only thing thst keeps people in line.

Batcathat
2021-09-06, 11:26 AM
The issue wasn’t so much that these particular lizard people didn’t understand that humans would be vengeful as my players insisting that no society that didn’t have a concept of vengeance could ever exist as fear of retribution is the only thing thst keeps people in line.

Aside from being a rather human-centric view on things, it seems like an odd assumption. Especially since something like a justice system isn't (or at least shouldn't be) primarily about vengeance. I mean, a parent reprimanding their child (hopefully) isn't vengeful. Even retribution could exist without vengeance, existing simply to disincentivize a unwanted behavior.

I generally have a pretty low opinion of humans, but even I don't think fear of retribution is the only thing keeping people in line.

NichG
2021-09-06, 02:20 PM
The issue wasn’t so much that these particular lizard people didn’t understand that humans would be vengeful as my players insisting that no society that didn’t have a concept of vengeance could ever exist as fear of retribution is the only thing thst keeps people in line.

If you start from values and constraints for survival and derive the absence of vengeance, it would give you lots of good answers to that. So, let me try...

The main thing here is going to be 'constraints for survival'. We're assuming they're social, and that the point in question is how to prevent the spread of defection in interactions like Tragedy of the Commons or Prisoners Dilemma types of situations where it's easy for one person to extract value for themselves at the cost of others.

So we could add the constraint that the 'punish defection' family of strategies also has a serious issue along those lines, where using punishment also spirals out of control to destroy collective value. Or we could remove the need to worry about defection at all because the scale of agency is different than what's assumed in those games - e.g., you've really just got the one player (culture, biological instinct, etc) controlling both sides of the table.

If you have organisms where vengeant acts would be extremely effortless and wide in scope, then tit for tat gameplay might be more destabilizing than stabilizing. For example, something where everyone in a community is biologically dependent on one another in some kind of rigid upstream/downstream way, so anyone can kill anyone else if they're willing to also kill a bunch of others downstream of them just by withholding aid. In that case, vengeance against individuals at least would quickly lead to extinction of entire groups, so its functions would likely get folded into society-level things or ritualized in such a way that necessary stuff happens but individuals in the society don't experience it impulsively or viscerally. So you might have ostracization customs that amount to executions, but those customs might be something like 'each year at least 80% of the society must sacrifice something for you to stay, or you must leave'. Something that uses lots of obligate interdependency and fragility of social roles to prevent defection. This is sort of how cells in the body work - if they don't constantly receive signals from their neighbors telling them to live, they're programmed to die.

Any hive minds or forced-conformity cultures could similarly not need any kind of punishment-based behavioral regulation. Does one cut off one's own right hand when it fumbles and damages a valuable thing? Of course not. You don't need to suppress defection because individuals already lack the agency to defect. It's not a multiplayer game, just a single player game and the player is the collective. Expect lots of things that prevent individuals from establishing dynasties or indicating ownership in that society - children go to creches and are redistributed randomly to different adults than their parents. Or maybe reproduction is ritualized in a way that you can't know who your child is or who your parent is (easy with egg layers).

Societies with the ability to produce magically binding promises probably also don't need to use individual or collective punishment to avoid defection strategies.

And so on...

Talakeal
2021-09-07, 12:18 PM
Ok, so Session 3:

July 1113

The group’s next assignment comes from the Immaterium, a religious sect which nobody seems to know much about. The entire group decides to accompany Valentine to the briefing, although Krystal does so be sneaking in after them.

The Immaterium in Golgotha are based out of The Conquistador’s Dream, a pre-cataclysm health spa that was built in what mainlanders think of as the native Masarian style, with many tiles and water fountains. The walls are lined with thick ropes of jade that give the impression of overgrown vines. It is now used as a hospice, and one can hear the pained moans of the dying reverberating from deeper within.

Upon entering, there is a bright flash of light and a deep gong, and when the group regains their senses they are surrounded by armored guards in a phalanx formation. A thin monk with a long white tonsure rushes forward and apologizes profusely as he helps Krystal to her feet, he did not see her and didn’t lower the ward in time.

She does her best to focus her eyes and glower, and the monk escorts them to Father Genaro’s office for their meeting.

Father Genaro is a large man with a sunburnt face, who sits fanning himself behind a large polished desk. He tells them that Lady Abasinia had good things to say about them, and when she mentioned that their leader was an angel who had bound a demon to her will, well that just sealed the deal.

He needs them to make another expedition to enter into the outskirts of the wasteland to search for their missing mother superior, Ashley Wulfenkine. She was in the south, proselytizing to the Dandelion People, when she vanished. Last contact was from a letter delivered by a priest of Hermes about six weeks ago, and everything seemed to be going fine.

Valentine asks what she looked like, and Father Genaro tells her that Ashley was just the cutest little thing, porcelain skin, big blue eyes, long honey blonde hair, like a living doll.

Kim is distracted by her own memories. She has a vivid recollection of her youth, of one of her first expeditions, being seated on a horse next to a mounted warrior who told her “Don’t think less of them just because they lack steel or stirrups or penicillin. We have lost seven men on this expedition, and yet they have managed to live in these lands for generations, raise families here. We need their knowledge far more than they need ours.”

They bid Genaro farewell and promise success, and he lays Cronus’ blessings upon them as they depart.

The group purchases supplies for their journey and debate whether or not they should spend the money to take a train down to Avarus; which will save them several weeks travel. Valentine makes the call that they should instead have Zara drive them, and the next morning they cross the Arc-Line bridge over the Amber Flow and turn south into the wastes.

The trip is relatively uneventful. It is hot and boring, and they spend most of their days sleeping in the juggernaut.

When her companions finally approach the territory of the Dandelion People, Kim does her best to guide them, although the land is very different than she remembers; what once were broad plateaus of flowers with crystal clear streams running between them are now broken grey slabs of rock emerging from brackish swamps.

They find several abandoned campsites, and Zara says that she didn’t realize that they were raiders. Kim corrects her that they are not raiders, merely nomads, and Zara is confused, for she always thought they were the same thing; if one has no land of their own, then by definition they are pillaging other people’s lands each time they move.

They follow their trail, and come to a camp of perhaps seventy individuals spread across three hundred meters of rocky soil. Most of the people have pastel skin or hair, and Kim explains that they claim descent from ancient flower spirits, taking the name Dandelion because they move about as the wind guides them.

Their lookouts seem indifferent to the outsiders, and when they ask if anyone knows where the missing priestess is, they are told that Princess Seldeth might, and the guard goes to ask, entering a slightly larger tent and emerging a few minutes later telling them to go in. They ask if the group needs to disarm, and the lookout shrugs, saying that it will be harder for them to fight their way out than it would be to fight their way in.

The Princess’ tent is slightly larger than the others and filled with incense smoke. It has more than a bit of decoration and various knickknacks, but no more so than any working class family’s home would be within The Empire. Seldeth herself is reclining on a divan, with her long periwinkle hair trailing out behind her and a fluffy purple cat curled up at her side;

Kim steps forward and does her best to recall the traditional greeting of the Dandelion People, but upon hearing her accent the princess asks if she is from the Imperium. Kim nods, and she is spat upon.

In broken and heavily accented Terran, Princess Seldeth tells them that they have no use for people from The Empire. The Empire promised them the world; the secrets of steel and the Sleet protection of the Templar, took their seeds and their horses, copied their sacred scrolls, and enticed their children into leaving with them and never returning. Then, when the sky turned to fire and the water to mud, when Balthazar and Apollyon stole their babies, when the orcs ate their livestock, when Livonia tore their sacred sites from the Earth, and when the monsters came from the desert, there were no Templar, no swords, no aid, not even a word.

Kim explains that they are not with the Empire, they are from the Immaterium, and are looking for Ashley. The Princess dismisses them, saying the Immaterium’s stories of heavenly angels are no different than those the Imperials told of the Templar Knights, fairy stories to trick natives into giving up their valuables without a fight. Valentine scoffs and shuffles her wings, but Seldeth says that her wings are no more proof of the Olympian Host than the few knights who accompanied the Old Empire’s diplomats.

Still, if they are seeking the priests she will not stop them. She suspects they were with the people of River Camp when the Omukade took them.

The mercenaries ask what the Omukade were, remembering that Klarr had listed them potential slave buyers two months prior. Princess Seldeth tells them that they are like big men with too many legs; they come out of the Wasteland and steal her people.

“Centaurs?” asks Anani, but she is told that the Omukade have far more legs than that.

When asked what they do with the people they take, Seldeth says that the Omukade bite off the men’s genitals and fill the women’s bellies with poison.

She says that Ashley is probably already dead, but if they want to go after her, the creatures come from the blackened volcanic mountains that lie four days south east.

Thanking their hosts, the group returns to the juggernaut and tells Zara to floor it.

The next day makes for rough travel, the ground is too uneven and rocky, and many times they need to double back. Upon entering the mountains, they are caught in an ash storm, unable to see anything more than a few yards ahead of them except for the jagged bolts of lightning that dance among the clouds, and Zara tells them that they can’t go any further in the gloom.

They spend the night in the rocking vehicle, listening to the screaming wind, booming thunder, and stranger sounds coming from the waste. The storm finally settles down sometime in the small hours of the morning, and when the group finally wakes in the pre-dawn light they find the juggernaut half buried in ash.

Zara, Quincy, and Krystal move forward to scout and they discover that they made a good call to stop when they did, they are a scant few hundred meters from a jagged cliff face, at the bottom of which rests an ancient city.

In the dim light, all they can see are the shapes of adobe buildings and stone pyramids, with small fires being lit one by one. As the sun rises, they can eventually make out three sorts of things inhabiting the city, humanoids who are working hard to sweep up the ash, strange creatures that walk like men but with long wormlike necks and insectile heads, and what appear to be the ruling class with the torsos of large men and woman and the lower bodies of ten meter centipedes. They also have large beasts of burden, several species unknown to the northerners.

Quincy thinks they are some sort of Hengeyokai, but had no idea that there were those who took the form of invertebrates.

On the far side of the canyon, and presumably under their own feet as well, are numerous ziggurats built hanging upside down from the chasm walls. Zara is unsettled by them, saying they combine all of the worst features of a tower and a mineshaft, and proclaims that they were right under their beards the whole time.

They return and report their findings. After much deliberation, Valentine decides that Krystal is the only one who has a chance of traversing the Cliffside, let alone wandering the city undetected, and plans to send her in alone.

Feur performs two rituals of synchronicity, the first fating Krystal to find Ashley at the most opportune moment within the next six hours, and another to fate himself to aid Krystal at the moment when she gets in over her head.

Kim wants nothing more than to go and explore this strange city, but instead calms herself; she chips off a piece of the rock face above them and carves strange runes into it. She tells Krystal to give it to Ashley and have her read the runes while seated on a large rock and looking at the cliff face, and it will open up a conduit through the Plane of Earth to transport her back to them.

Krystal departs, and her companions alternate between digging out the carriage and spying upon those who dwell beneath them.

Krystal doubts she can climb down the cliffs, and knows she can’t climb back up, she doubts anyone with a human shape could. Instead she finds a break in the cliff and plans a route where she can jump from stable ledge to stable ledge using her infernal powers.

The devil girl descends into the town, cloaked by her magic and never leaving the shadows, and moves into the marketplace which appears to serve as the town center. There, she infiltrates a large slave market, where she witnesses a litany of horrors, watches slaves being ritually mutilated, castrated, and trepanned, with strange toxins poured directly onto their brains. She has no idea what is happening, but guesses they are somehow altering their hormones to make them more compliant or capable of performing their roles.

She searches the cages, pens, and cells that house prisoners of varying qualities, but doesn’t see any who match Ashley’s description or wear the trappings of the Immaterium. Krystal ambushes a slave who is serving as an errand boy, dragging him into an alley and telling the cowering child that if he answers her questions she will let him live.

She asks where the captives from the Immaterium are, and is told that all of the priests were purchased by Lord Slurrgash. He says he lives in the square estate with the pointed corners, and gestures to the southwest. Krystal tells him that if he is lying she will be back and knocks him to the ground with the butt of her sword. There he lies cowering, terrified and indecisive.

She moves on to what she thinks is the correct estate, a squat single floor building with a hooked guard tower in each corner. A centipede headed sentinel stands in each tower, and a massively fat human slave stands in the way of the main door. Krystal slips into the Hellscape and walks past, and into the dimly lit manor.

Inside, she finds numerous side rooms, each containing a small child with the legs of a white worm weaving elaborate tapestries, and a wretched human priestess perpetually walks among them, croaking out blessings of Persephone through cracked lips. In the center is an enormous centipede bodied man weaving together fabrics in some sort of advanced process Krystal doesn’t understand while slaves play oddly discordant instruments.

In a subterranean cell, Krystal finds another priestess. Her hands and feet have been mangled, her face scarred, and her belly is grossly distended. Krystal asks if she knows where Ashley is, and the woman mistakes her for Hermes and asks if she has come to guide her to the Underworld. Krystal says no, but she was sent by Genaro.

The woman doesn’t know where most of the captives were taken, they were split up shortly after arriving in this hellish place. The twin priests of Ares; Korwen and Kelwen, were taken to the barracks, while most of the women were used as breeding stock. The others didn’t survive the birthing, but in the month she has been here she has already produced two litters of Slurrgash’s spawn. She knows where Ashley is, but asks Krystal to kill her in exchange for the information. Krystal agrees, and learns that the mother superior was taken to a large ziggurat in the cliff’s shadow.

Krystal slays the woman; she doesn’t know how to make it painless, but can make it quick. She then plunges her glowing blade into the ex-priestess’ twitching belly.

As she moves towards the pyramid, she finds the movements of her jaunts through the other world strangely bent towards it, as if the structure was somehow growing into Hell, being much larger in those dimensions than it is in the physical or spiritual realms.

As Krystal climbs the steps, she spies three guards above her. All of the noble, centipede legged, variety and wielding odd polearms with fan shaped blades at either end, very different from the broad chopping swords of the soldier caste. One of them is mounted in a howdah upon a large, squat creature with thick olive green skin, with long ears, a flat face, and a huge mouth ringed by a plated red beard. She thinks it might be a hippopotamus, but is unsure, never having seen one in person.

As she draws close the creature snorts and stamps, and the guardian’s antennas twitch. One of them asks “Are you the Pumpkin Man?”

Krystal is silent, and then the guard shouts “Answer me demon!”

Krystal responds that she is not the pumpkin man, but that the ziggurat calls to her and she has business within. The guardian responds that his job is to make sure none but the pumpkin man enters.

They go back and forth for a while, Krystal attempting to imitate Valentine’s tricks and talk herself inside, and she plays many word games and strategies.

Over the course of the conversation she learns:

-The guardians have had dealings with demons, and believe her a trickster imp.

-They are of a caste consisting of religious guards who have not yet learned their gender.

-The Omukade are spawning too fast for this canyon, and they hope to soon have the power to burst forth.

-Their ultimate goal is to spread their bloodline to all the peoples of Pangaea.

-Ashley and this ziggurat play some sort of very important role in the plan, but they are unsure what.

-They are pure blooded, while the centipede headed half castes are created by mixing their blood with that of the slaves.

-They fear dwarves more than humans

-His mount is called a buraq. They are considered a gift from the gods. They were once plentiful, but not so anymore.

-The “serpent flesh” in their food is making them strange, and they are afraid that if do not escape the Wasteland soon they may no longer be themselves when the accomplish their goals.


Ultimately, tired of Krystal’s word games, they tell a slave messenger to go to an ale house and fetch a priest and a lawyer. When he returns, it is with a ritually scarred and tattooed human whose eyelids have been removes and a centipede-person whose skin is bright crimson and whose antennas take the shape of a bull’s horns.

The man apologizes and says that he sees no spirit, and Krystal laughs. She then teleports forward, still merely a shimmer in the air do to her protective shroud, and wraps her hand around the priest’s throat. “What mortal conjurer could teleport as many times in a day as do I?”

The priest stammers, and then a chilling voice answers “It depends on the route. If they took care to follow the same path as the world, they could move forever in a cursed day that never ends.”

Krystal asks who is there, and the voice apologizes for not showing itself. Then there is a sensation of velvet sheets being pulled away and standing in their midst is a towering figure, with a shaggy body, long lanky limbs ending in hooked claws, and with a burning jack o’ lantern for a head.

“The Pumpkin Man I presume?” Krystal asks, and the demonic creature responds that this isn’t his name, but closes enough.

She asks why he is here, and the monster tells her that he is merely fulfilling a contract on behalf of his master who dwells far away. She asks what he contracted to do, and the creature says he won’t tell her. She says she will answer a question of his in turn, and the pumpkin man agrees.

“A mortal priestess has become lost in the Labyrinth, and I am to use my powers to assist in recovering her.”

Krystal nods and asks for his question, and he tells her that he will wait to cash in that chip when he needs it. He then bows and departs, three strides from his freakishly long legs taking him into the Ziggurat’s cap.

The crimson skinned lawyer says that this was the shortest contract he has ever seen, and remarks that Krystal is either really good at negotiation or really bad at it. He then departs with the priest.

Krystal again tries talking to the guard, insinuating that demons only do things that benefit them, and says that the Pumpkin Man might be trying to sabotage them. She is able to convince one of the guards to check if everything is ok, and when that guard doesn’t return, she asks to go in to check on that guard, and is rebuffed, the Omukade guardians saying that they are not simple ogres to be bluffed so easily.

When their compatriot returns, it is with a long purple gash across her torso and she tells them that the poisoner did not appreciate being disturbed, and that she will pay them back later.

Krystal again tries to convince them that they are being set up, and asks if she can go in to make sure everything is ok, even if it is with an escort.

The guards, probably as much out of boredom and frustration as any genuine belief, tell Krystal to reveal herself, and she does. They quickly search her, and tell her that if she leaves her blades and lock-picks behind they will escort her inside, and she refuses, telling them that the sword does not leave her side, and where it goes she follows. She then teleports past them and makes a break for the entry passage, the guards close behind, although it is a narrow fit for them, the halls were not made for someone of superhuman stature.

There are numerous patrolling sentries within, and Krystal leads them on a chase for several tense minutes, their javelins clattering to the floor behind her. When she thinks she has lost them, she picks the lock of a side room and sees a victim, not the one she was looking for, chained to the wall and awaiting sacrifice. It isn’t who she came for, and Krystal leaves the woman to her fate.

She wanders the halls, always cloaked in shadow and a few steps in front of her guards, opening doors and always finding the wrong room.

Meanwhile, her companions see the commotion below; see numerous soldiers approaching the pyramid and climbing its sides. Feur calms his nerves and trusts to fate.

Krystal turns left and is spotted; she cuts the sentry’s antenna off and turns to run, but is surrounded and bitten, she feels her body begin to shut down from their venom, and she meekly surrenders.

Feur rewinds the threads of time, and Krystal instead turned right, narrowly evading the patrol.

She opens another door, and finds Ashley inside; curled up on a table, her body in a deep coma. A smaller centipede man stands over her, sticking a dizzying array of poisoned needles into her body in a perverse mockery of acupuncture.

Krystal sneaks up behind him and impales the creature with the Black Flame blade, a horrific injury that nearly cuts him in two and will almost certainly prove fatal in time. But his will is strong and he fights off the magic of the blade, and has the strength left to scream and throw a bottle of burning chemicals into Krystal’s face.

She shrieks in turn, and leaps blindly into the otherworld. She normally refrains from using her teleportation powers when she can’t see her destination, but she has no choice. She lies on the darkened planks of the floor in an unknown cell, and listens to the commotion outside.

She does her best to wipe her face, and when the pain becomes tolerable and she can somewhat see, she leans out and sees the poisoner’s room now heavily guarded, and she realizes this is a lost cause.

She transports herself straight up, onto the ziggurat’s terraced roof, and though she is blinded by the morning sun in her damaged eyes, she is just able to slip past the sentinels who are climbing up after her and trace her way back to the path up the canyon’s edge.

As Anani tries to neutralize the toxic chemicals, she tells them what happened. Kim curses; if Ashley was comatose the plan never could have worked to begin with.

Valentine is ready to call this a loss, and is already practicing her story about how the missionaries were eaten by mutant beasts come out of the Wasteland and there was nothing to recover except for a few scraps of cloth and fragments of bone, when Feur calmly states that he might just have a plan.

So, first off, we really need better time management, our games are running later yet we are doing less than in any previous group, not quite sure why.

Second, its frustrating. The players are basically in a no win situation here, and its going to be a real long shot to salvage it. I don't mind failure, but man, failing this particular mission is going to drastically alter the trajectory of the campaign into unknown territory.

I knew their plan to send Krystal in alone was extremely unlikely to work, but I didn't feel like I could say anything without breaking the fourth wall; maybe I should have. Like, I balance the game for six people, yet the players are assuming I have put them into a situation where 5 of them are forced to just sit out while one person solos the entire session? Frustrating.

Also, at one point I was banging my head against the table after the briefing with father Genaro. He asked if they had any questions, nobody did, and Bob even made a point of saying OOC that there is never a point to trying to ask a question of an NPC as you will never ask the right question and only end up more confused. But then ten minutes later they were asking one another very basic straightforward questions about the mission that would have been really important to ask the NPC and to which they would have gotten a straightforward useful answer; like "Does anyone remember if he said how many people were with her?"

The Glyphstone
2021-09-10, 11:28 AM
I feel like it offers a key insight into your players RL psychology when they insist that fear of retribution is the only thing that could possibly keep someone from misbehaving. In the confines of an RPG, there can be no genuine retribution, thus there is no reason why they should not act out as much as they want to.

Pauly
2021-09-11, 03:48 PM
Talakeal,

One of the issue seems to me to be one of ego validation. Your players want to be proven right and are taking steps to ensure they are proven right. One of your players in particular thinks you are an unfair railroady type GM. He wants to show other players that you are andin doing so ends up sabotaging the game. He isn't trying to sabotage the game, but that is the side effect if proving himself right.

Now if he’s doing that in character inside the game there is a different set of remedies, but when he is making OOC comments to the players that effect the game then there are several ways to handle it.
1) Call a time out and address the OOC issue OOC. I don’t recommend this but it may be necessary for something truly game breaking.
2) When Bob says something like there is never a point to trying to ask a question of an NPC as you will never ask the right question and only end up more confuse then get every other member of the party to make a wisdom (or charisma or whatever you think is appropriate) check. For the players that succeed pass them a note to the effect that “You feel this NPC has some valuable information if you ask some more questions”.
Make sure the player returns the note to you, never leave anything like that lying around.
3) If the players come up with a plan that is truly stupid and game breaking like splitting the party and trying to solo a 6 person quest then feel free to send a player or two a premonition, an omen, a psychic dream, a message from their god to the effect of “I’ve got a bad feeling about this”. Part of your role of DM is to prevent disaster. Maybe because of previous criticism that you railroad players you are giving them freedom. Now if the disaster is happening because the characters are making bad decisions inside the game then you can let the chips fall where they may, but if they’re making bad decisions in game because of OOC behavior of one of the players then it’s OK to give the characters a little in game guidance.

Generally speaking players will sabotage your game inadvertently all the time for many different reasons. As a GM you don’t have to let that happen. Just try to distinguish between a player issue (OOC commentry, meta gaming etc) and a character issue (but that’s what my character would do). You have to respond to these differently.

icefractal
2021-09-12, 04:08 AM
They return and report their findings. After much deliberation, Valentine decides that Krystal is the only one who has a chance of traversing the Cliffside, let alone wandering the city undetected, and plans to send her in alone.

...

Krystal doubts she can climb down the cliffs, and knows she can’t climb back up, she doubts anyone with a human shape could. Instead she finds a break in the cliff and plans a route where she can jump from stable ledge to stable ledge using her infernal powers.

The devil girl descends into the town, cloaked by her magic and never leaving the shadowsSo this I wonder about. Was Valentine wrong? Because it sounds like Krystal did require her teleportation and stealth powers to even get as far as she did. Was there an alternate path which the entire group could have taken?

Talakeal
2021-09-12, 11:45 AM
Make sure the player returns the note to you, never leave anything like that lying around.
3) If the players come up with a plan that is truly stupid and game breaking like splitting the party and trying to solo a 6 person quest then feel free to send a player or two a premonition, an omen, a psychic dream, a message from their god to the effect of “I’ve got a bad feeling about this”. Part of your role of DM is to prevent disaster. Maybe because of previous criticism that you railroad players you are giving them freedom. Now if the disaster is happening because the characters are making bad decisions inside the game then you can let the chips fall where they may, but if they’re making bad decisions in game because of OOC behavior of one of the players then it’s OK to give the characters a little in game guidance.

I just feel like I am caught between a rock and a hard place here.

If I give them enough rope to hang themselves; I am seen as a killer DM. If I try and tell them not to do something, I am seen as railroading.

Its very hard to find the right path.


So this I wonder about. Was Valentine wrong? Because it sounds like Krystal did require her teleportation and stealth powers to even get as far as she did. Was there an alternate path which the entire group could have taken?

Valentine has wings and bluffing skills, Kim has the ability to reshape earth, and Anani has illusion powers. Feur and Quincy are also pretty agile and athletic. Between the group I didn't expect them to have any problems getting to the bottom of the canyon and infiltrating the city in a variety of ways; if they wanted to go the more direct route they could have simply sent in a scout (or used some form of divination) to find the temple where she was being held, drive the juggernaut into the city through the canyon's mouth, and done a smash and grab before the defenders could really mount a defense.

Pauly
2021-09-12, 09:19 PM
I just feel like I am caught between a rock and a hard place here.

If I give them enough rope to hang themselves; I am seen as a killer DM. If I try and tell them not to do something, I am seen as railroading.

Its very hard to find the right path.
.

I know it’s easier said than done. When I GM I try to make a distinction between player errors and character errors.
If a player makes an error through forgetting something the character would know, or makes an error through meta-gaming/bringing outside knowledge into the game then I’m happy to try to nudge the character back into the boundaries of the game.
If the character makes the mistake, then I’m happy to let the character bear the consequences of their actions.

Talakeal
2021-09-19, 04:07 PM
Well, we finished the adventure.

I have to say, we are back in the swing of things. And I do not mean that in a good way.

Feur asks Krystal to tell him everything that happens, ignoring her insistence that they get as far away as possible, before the Omikudae can marshal their forces to scour the region for the invaders.

Feur then tells the group that he is going to try one last desperate gambit, and that they need to protect him as long as possible so that he can make everything all right. He begins a ritual within the juggernaut, even as enemy forces come over the canyon walls.

The group does their best to hold them off, and when the ritual completes Feur is gone, leaving his allies to be overwhelmed by the centipede people until they are consumed by darkness.

Feur then rewinds himself to dawn, and candidly explains the situations to his incredulous allies. He is an honest sort, and tells everything how it is. When he mentions Krystal’s bargain with the Pumpkin Head, he tells her that she is still bound to it, and she tells him that she has no intention of honoring a deal she never made.

In light of the new information, they decide to maneuver the juggernaut down from the mountains and park it in the flatlands where they can approach the mountain cleft openly, but far enough away that it is out of sight.

As they trudge through the ash wastes, they are stalked by a pack of creatures that resemble a cross between diseased rats and large wolves. Quincy shoots one, hoping to scare the others off, but instead they charge. Kim stands between them and the group and is knocked to the ground for her trouble, but her companions are able to make short work of the beasts.

They cannot identify them, although they remind Kim of the Mogdug, scavengers of the underworld that she remembers from stories of the Aesir she heard as a child. Judging by their malnourished and scabarous bodies, they look to have long since resorted to cannibalizing the smaller members of their own pack, which explains why they were so desperate to attack armed travelers.

As they approach the city, Kim, Fuer, and Anani are bound together in loose chains. She keeps Quincy armed, saying that they still need to look like it would be more trouble than it was worth to simply enslave her in turn.

They are stopped by a worm-headed patrol who asks their business in the Triumvirate’s lands, and Valentine says she is here to sell her slaves in the market and that Quincy is her guard. The creature is able to smell Krystal, and at first Valentine tries to feign ignorance before admitting she has a demonic advisor.

They are allowed entrance into the city and make straight for the ziggurat where Ashley was being held.

Kim realizes that the city in mountain cleft is not of the same architectural style as the ziggurats on the canyon walls. It was built by human hands, and she thinks it was an outpost of Casmir, a kingdom that was once a great power in the south, renowned for its art and warrior poets, before falling under the sway of a vampire queen.
They were allied with the Black King, and after his fall, the city of Casmir was sacked by the people of the nation of Kassandra whom they had long oppressed.

Several of her companions are unfamiliar with the story of the Black King, and Kim explains that he was the lord of all the undead who nearly conquered the world before being destroyed by Imperial Templar five hundred years ago.

Likewise, when they approach the ziggurat, Kim realizes that it is actually the top of a pyramid, half buried in ash and with the covering stones worn away by time and harsh weather.

They boldly stride forward and Valentine insists to the guards that the Poisoner sent for them. History repeats itself, as when they send one of their number in to check she returns with a long purple gash across her torso, punishment for disturbing the Poisoner.

Valentine charges her, while Quincy shoots her companion and their allies throw off their chains.

They have the element of surprise, and Feur casts a haste spell to allow them to charge up the steps with great rapidity.

Krystal transports herself onto the Buraq’s back and slays its rider, while Kim, who has magically warded herself from blades, gets the beast’s attention and is scooped up into its cavernous jaws.

Anani, strangely, casts a spell which unmakes one of the ziggurat’s steps. She also senses a malefic presence in the air and catalogues the spirit’s Ren.

Valentine flits about the head of her foe, forcing the centipede creature to rear up to reach her, but failing to strike true time and again.

The sound of Quincy’s rifle attracts reinforcements, and he is soon overwhelmed at the base of the pyramid.

Feur doubles back to help him make his escape, but Quincy stumbles and falls into the gap in the steps created by Anani, and Feur is soon bitten several times, and though he is able to purge the poison from his system, he is still gravely wounded.

Anani creates a shadow gate between the darkened chasm and the door at the top of the stairs, and she and Feur step through it to bypass the Buraq and the surviving guardian. Kim casts a spell of fortification upon herself, slides free of the Buraq’s jaws, and scrambles up the side of the pyramid after them. She then commands the gate to seal itself behind them, and the walls seamlessly slide together, trapping the Buraq outside along with the rising tide of reinforcements.

Feur collpases, and they don’t know where Quincy is.

The four bipedal guards inside of the pyramid are soon taken down Kim, Krystal, and the shade, and even Anani is able to bludgeon one into unconsciousness with her staff.

Krystal then makes for the room where she though Ashley was being held based on the description that Feur repeated back to her, but finds it empty.

Then a magical gateway opens in the pyramid’s side, likely the work of the Pumpkin Man.

Down their best fighters, Valentine knows they will soon be overwhelmed, and surrenders.

She is taken, along with Anani and Kim, from the pyramid. Krystal is overlooked and Feur is left for dead.

They are brought to an office and interrogated by some sort of agent of the Triumvirate, a woman with the body of a long venomous worm.

They tell the truth, mostly, although when threatened to reveal their accomplices, she does attempt to implicate her old enemy Valen. They plead that they are just mercenaries with no loyalty to the Immaterium, and will gladly fight on behalf of the Omukudae to pay off their blood debt. The interrogator doesn’t seem to buy it, but before she comes to a solid conclusion the ground begins to shake, and she leaves to find the source of the commotion.

Meanwhile, Quincy has been stumbling around in the dark for several hours. Lacking a match, he wandered the darkened halls beneath the pyramid, and found himself in a chamber filled with what he assumed were terracotta warriors. Thousands, perhaps tens or hundreds of thousands, of armored humanoid figures standing in ranks, still in the darkness. And then, their eyes began to glow like soft orange candles, and he could see that they were skeletal men wearing ancient rusted armor.

Then the pyramid began to rise from the earth, shaking of centuries of ash, and exposing its lower layers, and the skeletal legion began to march outward into the city, slaying any they came across. At the pyramid’s apex was a human woman clad in armor of frozen bone, a blinding corona of magical energy about her, as she surveyed the city with eyes that burned with blue light.

Krystal snuck into her teammate’s cell and freed them in the chaos, and when they emerged they saw the massacre of the centipede people and their slaves in the street below, as well as greenish gas oozing down the streets and alleyways that reanimated the dead and compelled them to join in with the legion.

Kim looks down at the apocalyptic scene, and wonders if the Omukadae Poisoner failed in whatever it was trying to do. Or perhaps, she wonders, if it simply succeeded too well. Could it have been betrayal on his part or on that of the pumpkin demon?

She doesn’t have much time to ponder, for the building they are in will soon be surrounded by the walking dead.

They flee, but notice Anani is not following. Instead, she whispers to herself “She will never be able to survive this. It is over.” And then black smoke pours from her eyes and her shadow grows so large that it blocks out the sun, causing night to fall over the mountains. And then, throughout the city, black fires start, consuming the buildings and mountains, the living and the undead.

Kim flees from this apocalyptic horror, but soon finds herself caught in a dead end, surrounded by a mass of crawling disfigured flesh. Then, there are several gunshots, and she is hauled to her feet by a man who identifies himself as Nathaniel Bloodbourne. He is one of about a dozen men and women clad in ornate but battle worn black armor with crimson highlights who are battling the undead and clearing debris. She starts to ask questions, but all he can say is that they are here to rescue who they can, and escort her from the city and out into the ashen desert before departing.

It grows so dark that she can see nothing beyond her feet, and she trudges through the ash; for how long she doesn’t know. But eventually she loses consciousness.


In the pre-dawn light, Zara’s juggernaut is moving swiftly through the desert. Her mercenary clients, Velentine, Krystal, Quincy, Anani, and Feur sleep in the back. She spies a figure collapsed on the side of the road, and asks Valentine if she should stop. The half-angel thinks for a second and nods.

The sudden stop jostles them and sends Feur and Krystal spilling onto the floor but does not wake them, both are notoriously deep sleepers.

They drag the redheaded woman onto the juggernaut and lay her on the workbench in the back. Anani says she is in bad shape; several days exposure without food or drink, been chewed up by some large creature, and several poisonous insect bites, but she is tough and will likely survive.

After being given water, Kim comes to her senses, and is overjoyed to see that all of her companions made it out alive, but is puzzled to find that none of them recognize her.

She babbles about her experiences, and even shows them her journal to verify that she isn’t just making it up. Valentine plays along trying to get more information out of her, while Krystal suspects she is one of Valen’s assassins, for that is the only way she could know so much.

Valentine orders Zara to return to the cleft in the mountains where the Omokudae city once stood and Kim is horrified and protests, but is ignored. Once they are within sight of it, they see that it is as Kim described, but without any sign of an undead apocalypse or unnatural firestorm.

Valentine and Quincy go off to investigate, and she tells Feur to make sure Kim and Krystal don’t kill one another while she is gone.

While they wait, they compare histories, and find them to be remarkably similar; although Feur and Anani insist that they never found anyone buried beneath the nameless city. Likewise, they couldn’t find the Dandelion People, and have spent the past few days wandering the desert looking for any clues as to the whereabouts of the missing missionaries.

Feur gets an idea, and decides to read from the scroll of aeons and scan Kim for temporal anomalies, and finds that she appears to be flotsam that is somehow left over from an alternate timeline that has since collapsed. It’s extremely unusual, but not completely unheard of.

Valentine and Quincy return with a cloth wrapped bundle. She explains that they got here too late, that Ashley died under interrogation, but she was able to purchase the body. Kim wants to look inside, but is shooed away and told that it will start to stink, and Feur performs a minor ritual to stave off rot and preserve the body until they are home.

The group returns to Golgotha, and Kim does her best to catchup with those she thought were her friends and to gain some measure of Krystal’s trust.

Anani tries to commune with her god about the whole thing, but finds it strangely silent.

Back in Golgotha, they return to the Immaterium. Father Genero is saddened by their failure, but thanks them for their tenacity in bringing back what they could. Kim smiles sadly and tells him that he has no idea.

Father Genero talks about how disappointed he is that it turned out this way. Ashley had a bright future in front of her, that she might have even been the next Deacon after Zoltan stepped down. She was a troubled child, full of all sorts of demons and hoodoo, but through years of therapy and faith they were able to transform her into a righteous young woman.

Velentine ask more about what the Immaterium does, and are told that they take in lost souls, witches and those possessed by demons, and guide them into the light. Anani asks if they are exorcists and is told they are not; and Kim says that surely they don’t attempt to bind demons to their will, and Father Genaro merely gives her a conspiratorial smile.

Father Genero reimburses them for their time and their expenses, but does pay out the promised reward. He does tell them that he will keep their name in mind for future missions if they are looking for a second chance to prove themselves. He asks what their company calls themselves, and they all shrug. The priest says that they should come up with one; it shouldn’t be too hard to figure out something catchy with the gimmick of an angel and a devil working together to lead them.

Valentine takes Kim to meet Tatters, who likewise has no memory of her. Kim thanks her, saying that if it wasn’t for her guidance, she would still be buried in stone. Valentine prods Kim to tell her story, and Tatters says that she knows of Kim’s mysterious rescuers garbed in Red and Black, although she didn’t get their names.

When her house collapsed in the battle between the city’s defenders and Lady Umbriel last year, the same warriors pulled her from the rubble and escorted her away from the fighting to sanctuary in the old cathedral.

Upon hearing the name Umbriel, Feur perks up and asks Tatters for more information about the attack. She doesn’t know much, but suggests that the local Templar might.

Well, so this follows the old pattern of bad sessions to a tea.

1: The players approach a fight with a gimmick without any thought and bash their heads against it.
2: The dice get cold and the players get in over their heads.
3: The players get frustrated and decide to suicide their characters rather than changing tactics or falling back.
4: The players insist the mission was impossible.
5: I get defensive and start listing out tactical mistakes the player's made that could have changed the outcome.
6: The players think I am calling them dumb and get mad.
7: We start gas-lighting one another and then the screaming starts.
8: The players calm down and admit it wasn't impossible, but still insist it was not "balanced".

Now, in this case it felt really bad because this was their second attempt at the mission. Honestly, I can see why they sent Kyrstal in alone, this scenario kind of requires a mixed approach where one or more PCs create a diversion while one or more PCs infiltrate the pyramid, and turning it into a straight fight against the entire city guard didn't work out any better.

At this point I really want to try having one of them run the scenario for me so that I can show them how its not impossible, but I am sure that will only come across as rubbing salt in their wounds.

The odd thing was that it was actually Quincy's player Johnny who got mad rather than Bob, although that kind of makes sense as Krystal didn't get a scratch the whole session while Quincy was the one who was beaten up and sidelined first. I still maintain that he could have avoided this by not standing alone a hundred paces behind the rest of the party in hostile territory or by buying some mundane gear like rope or a match, but I can see why it was frustrating.

What got the argument really heated was him insisting that he was surrounded on the first turn. My recollection was that the party got a surprise round, won initiative, get a bonus turn due to Feur's hate spell, and Quincy was out of range of both the reinforcements (who couldn't act on the turn they came in anyway) and the pyramid's guards. So no matter how you count it, it was at the very least the second turn and more likely the third or fourth turn before he was surrounded, but he wouldn't budge. Likewise, the players insisted that I had doubled the number of rooms and guards in the pyramid even though both my memory of the event and my adventure notes disagree.

I actually tried to point out a mistake they were about to make to Brian at one point, and as usual he took it as criticism and got mad. Still don't know how to offer advice, it seems like damned if you do damned if you don't.


At that point I was ready to end the campaign, but everyone insisted they were still having fun and wanting to play, especially the new guy who I was afraid we had scared off.

So, I had to figure out how to end this. I had planned on the Immaterium being long term patrons, and also having Ashley be a long term villain, ally, and / or love interest. So, I had to think fast, and I decided to compress her entire character arc to into a single session. I also leaned a lot more heavily into the time travel stuff, which was always intended to be a core theme of the story, but was supposed to be a lot more subtle and gradual.

As a result, the latter part of the session probably seems like a lot of crazy stuff that came out of nowhere, but it was really just premature. What was going on will hopefully be revealed in time, but if anyone has any questions or needs any explanations I will be happy to answer them.


One last note, damn COVID delay. I knew that the players would assume I ripped several plot points off from the Disney+ Marvel shows, and sure enough as soon as the collapsed timelines talk occurred they all started talking about Loki's TVA, and I was like "No guys, really, I came up with all this back during the last campaign in 2019" and they were all "Uh huh sure."



So, on a tangent that might be worthy of a new thread, I also heard that weekend that one of my former players is warning people away from my game because I "raped his character." The instance he is talking about is when he decided to seduce an NPC, made his seduction roll, she followed him to the bedroom, and fade to black. When asked why he considers that rape, he said because I took him initiating the seduction as consent, and he was too embarrassed OOC to say anything to stop it, but since I never explicitly asked for his consent OOC it counts as raping the character. Or something. Wierd web of IC and OOC issues that may warrant or a new thread or may just cross a line.

Jakinbandw
2021-09-20, 01:24 PM
So, on a tangent that might be worthy of a new thread, I also heard that weekend that one of my former players is warning people away from my game because I "raped his character." The instance he is talking about is when he decided to seduce an NPC, made his seduction roll, she followed him to the bedroom, and fade to black. When asked why he considers that rape, he said because I took him initiating the seduction as consent, and he was too embarrassed OOC to say anything to stop it, but since I never explicitly asked for his consent OOC it counts as raping the character. Or something. Wierd web of IC and OOC issues that may warrant or a new thread or may just cross a line.

I put the question to a few of the more left wing people I know, and the consensus is that you didn't really do anything wrong. My advise would be to apologize for your part in the miscommunication, and to ask him to stop telling people you raped his character.

icefractal
2021-09-20, 02:40 PM
Some pretty interesting events! First off, some things I think needs clarification -

Why did this happen?

Then a magical gateway opens in the pyramid’s side, likely the work of the Pumpkin Man.

What's going on here? Clearly some funny business with time-lines, but I can't tell from the IC record what actually happened. Is a Kim a new PC being introduced?
Then the pyramid began to rise from the earth, shaking of centuries of ash, and exposing its lower layers, and the skeletal legion began to march outward into the city, slaying any they came across. At the pyramid’s apex was a human woman clad in armor of frozen bone, a blinding corona of magical energy about her, as she surveyed the city with eyes that burned with blue light.

...

They flee, but notice Anani is not following. Instead, she whispers to herself “She will never be able to survive this. It is over.” And then black smoke pours from her eyes and her shadow grows so large that it blocks out the sun, causing night to fall over the mountains. And then, throughout the city, black fires start, consuming the buildings and mountains, the living and the undead.

...

After being given water, Kim comes to her senses, and is overjoyed to see that all of her companions made it out alive, but is puzzled to find that none of them recognize her.

...

Valentine orders Zara to return to the cleft in the mountains where the Omokudae city once stood and Kim is horrified and protests, but is ignored. Once they are within sight of it, they see that it is as Kim described, but without any sign of an undead apocalypse or unnatural firestorm.

...

Feur gets an idea, and decides to read from the scroll of aeons and scan Kim for temporal anomalies, and finds that she appears to be flotsam that is somehow left over from an alternate timeline that has since collapsed. It’s extremely unusual, but not completely unheard of.


Secondly, I don't think you should be surprised that the players are taking this as a failure to be at least IC upset about, and it's not unnatural for that to bleed OOC a bit. They survives, yes, but here's what happened, from a slightly negative viewpoint (aka the viewpoint players who are frustrated by their previous plans not working probably have:

Father Genero talks about how disappointed he is that it turned out this way. Ashley had a bright future in front of her, that she might have even been the next Deacon after Zoltan stepped down. She was a troubled child, full of all sorts of demons and hoodoo, but through years of therapy and faith they were able to transform her into a righteous young woman."You ****ed up and you should feel bad. Let me explain how your ****-up is a tragedy."

Father Genero reimburses them for their time and their expenses, but does pay out the promised reward. He does tell them that he will keep their name in mind for future missions if they are looking for a second chance to prove themselves."You don't deserve the full reward, because you suck. Perhaps in the future you could prove yourselves not to be such losers ... maybe."


And that leads to the third point - I think you actually made this scenario too difficult.

if they wanted to go the more direct route they could have simply sent in a scout (or used some form of divination) to find the temple where she was being held, drive the juggernaut into the city through the canyon's mouth, and done a smash and grab before the defenders could really mount a defense.

Honestly, I can see why they sent Kyrstal in alone, this scenario kind of requires a mixed approach where one or more PCs create a diversion while one or more PCs infiltrate the pyramid, and turning it into a straight fight against the entire city guard didn't work out any better.
You yourself would not have been able to complete the scenario successfully without the benefit of hindsight. That's too difficult. You currently think that a diversion + assault plan would work, but are you even sure? Isn't there potential defenses the city could have had against that tactic also?

I wonder if you're falling into a trap that I've fallen into myself when GMing:
"I know what this group's resources and level of preparation are, so I don't need to determine their exact defenses ahead of time. I'll just fill in what would be reasonable when it comes up."

This sounds reasonable, but it's basically Schrödinger's Wizard in organization form. Because if the organization is equally or more powerful than the party, then there is likely to be a "reasonable" defense against anything that the party can do. Usually the only way that an underdog wins, other than sheer luck, is by exploting a blunder that the overdog makes. So if your opposition can be described as an "overdog" (more powerful than the PCs in aggregate, which is usually the scenario) then they need to make blunders! They need to not have thought of every contingency. So while it might seem like "an organization with many intelligent people in it should logically have better preparation than what I, a single person with other responsibilities, can provide", that's a path that leads to the PCs logically failing unless they outright overpower their opposition.

Talakeal
2021-09-20, 04:50 PM
Why did this happen?

The centaur folk make pacts with demons, and in this case The Poisoner needed help retrieving Ashley's soul from the Labyrinth in which it was bound. So he contracted Pumpkin Head, a fallen boggart, to assist him with the endeavour. The creature was lurking around in the ethereal plane to help as needed, and one of his spells allows him to open up short distance portals.



What's going on here? Clearly some funny business with time-lines, but I can't tell from the IC record what actually happened. Is a Kim a new PC being introduced?

Kim is Brian's PC.

On the meta level, the campaign is about several cosmic entities playing literal four-dimensional chess. In the "original" timeline the god of darkness, whom Anani is a priestess of, decided that it could not possibly win with the undead legion on the loose, and so it decided to just end the world.

A third party rescued Kim from the apocalypse. They then dumped her into a very similar timeline where A: she had died in the Cataclysm a century ago and B: the centipede folk failed in their endeavor to unlock Ashley's power.



Secondly, I don't think you should be surprised that the players are taking this as a failure to be at least IC upset about, and it's not unnatural for that to bleed OOC a bit. They survives, yes, but here's what happened, from a slightly negative viewpoint (aka the viewpoint players who are frustrated by their previous plans not working probably have:
"You ****ed up and you should feel bad. Let me explain how your ****-up is a tragedy."
"You don't deserve the full reward, because you suck. Perhaps in the future you could prove yourselves not to be such losers ... maybe."

Three things:

1: The bad feelings and meltdown actually occurred mid-fight, not after the session. By the end of the session everyone was (mostly) over it and in good spirits. They had not gotten to their debriefing or rewards yet.

2: There have to be some repercussions for failure on either a mechanical or narrative level. If not, there is no intensive for the players to try at all and the optimal strategy just becomes to bug out and abandon every adventure ASAP. I tried to make the consequences as light as I could without damaging verisimilitude though, as they players had wasted two sessions on the mission and I really needed them to continue their relationship with the Immaterium going forward.

3: Here we get the double edged sword of giving information. I was trying to give the PCs as much exposition as possible, but it is interpreted as rubbing the player's failures in their face. I literally feel like I can't win here, as no matter how much information I give it is never precisely the right amount. Too little and I am being cryptic, too much and I am rubbing it in.


And that leads to the third point - I think you actually made this scenario too difficult.

You yourself would not have been able to complete the scenario successfully without the benefit of hindsight. That's too difficult. You currently think that a diversion + assault plan would work, but are you even sure? Isn't there potential defenses the city could have had against that tactic also?

Its possible. At this point I am kind of doubting myself.

I really want to try having one of my players run me through the same scenario this weekend to see how it goes and troubleshoot it, but its hard to do without, again, looking like I am trying to prove myself the superior gamer and rub their failures in their face. The only problem with this, and it is one I am not quite sure how to handle, is how seriously the players take the encounter.

I don't see why you say I would not have been able to complete it, what gives you that impression?




I wonder if you're falling into a trap that I've fallen into myself when GMing:
"I know what this group's resources and level of preparation are, so I don't need to determine their exact defenses ahead of time. I'll just fill in what would be reasonable when it comes up."

This sounds reasonable, but it's basically Schrödinger's Wizard in organization form. Because if the organization is equally or more powerful than the party, then there is likely to be a "reasonable" defense against anything that the party can do. Usually the only way that an underdog wins, other than sheer luck, is by exploting a blunder that the overdog makes. So if your opposition can be described as an "overdog" (more powerful than the PCs in aggregate, which is usually the scenario) then they need to make blunders! They need to not have thought of every contingency. So while it might seem like "an organization with many intelligent people in it should logically have better preparation than what I, a single person with other responsibilities, can provide", that's a path that leads to the PCs logically failing unless they outright overpower their opposition.

Its funny, that is actually one of the go to rants for my players, but it didn't happen this time. Probably because Krystal got off without a scratch and Bob (Krystal's player) is normally the one who starts accusing the DM of ret-conning stuff to screw the PCs.


It is an overcast day.

Pyramids central chamber is 12x20 squares. The inside is divided into eight 3x3 square sacrificial chambers arranged in two rows of four. There are one meter wide corridors between them. Each is entered by a locked (dc 20) door which is located on the second and fourth vertical hallways.

The outer wall is three meters thick. The center of the wide edge has a one meter wide entrance corridor at the center of the long edge nearest the canyon entrance.

There is a three meter wide walk way all the way around.

There is a ten meter high slope all the way around the pyramid. It is rough terrain which can be climbed.

There is three meter wide stairway in the slope directly infront of the entrance corridor.

There are three guards at the top of the stairs. They are level 2 centipede folk warriors armed with polearms, javelins, and their poisoned pincers. The center one is riding a buraq.

Inside the pyramid, patrolling randomly, are four gods. These are smaller, only man-size, but are trained in alertness and wielding swords instead of pole-arms. They are otherwise identical to the outdoor guards.

Each time one of the sacrificial chambers is entered (or someone attempts to teleport in) they roll a difficulty 40 reason test. They receive a +5 bonus to this test for every room that has already been explored. On a success, they find Ashley (who is comatose) and The Poisoner who is experimenting upon her. The Poisoner is a level four centipede folk alchemist who will defend himself and call for help if he or Ashley are disturbed.

Pumpkin Head, a third circle fallen boggart, is hanging around the ethereal assisting the poisoner as needed. He has spells that involve fear and spatial manipulation. His first act will be to ward the room The Poisoner is in against teleportation.

At the start of each enemy turn, roll a d20. If the result is equal to or less than the turn number, a reinforcement appears at the edge of the board. It has identical stats to the guards and cannot act the turn it enters. The d20 roll receives a -4 penalty if the players performed any especially loud actions (shouting, firing a gun, explosions, etc.) and a +4 bonus if they performed only quiet actions (whispering, sneaking, attacking from ambush, etc.)

The three outer guards and the Buraq are an "appropriate encounter" that should use up ~20% of the party's resources and go down in 3-6 turns.
The four inner guards and the Poisoner are an "appropriate encounter" that should use up ~20% of the party's resources and go down in 3-6 turns.
Pumpkin Head and the Reinforcements are, by themselves, trivial encounters that should use up >10% of the party's resources individual, but can overwhelm the party if encountered at the wrong time and place.


The party had nobody who could see spirits and didn't think to summon any spiritual allies of their own, so Pumpkin Head could move about and act unchecked. This was bad luck.
The first two reinforcement rolls succeeded. This was bad luck.
They kept Quincy alone on the back edge of the board with nobody to protect or support him and no ability to move up. This was bad tactics.
Anani didn't summon a shade until very late in the fight. This was bad tactics.
Rather than pushing forward, the party just stood on the stairs fighting and letting their enemies surround them. By the time they were in a favorable position, Quincy and Feur were down and Anani was out of mana, and that point they would eventually lose to attrition.

It was not over-tuned on paper, but this is a fight that requires an unusual strategy and an uncommon amount of tact, so I can see how it was too hard for the players in practice. I have no doubt that if they tried again and spent some time talking tactics they could clear it 99% of the time. But I really hope to get one of them to run it for me this weekend so I can test it to see how it goes from the other side.

icefractal
2021-09-20, 05:06 PM
I don't see why you say I would not have been able to complete it, what gives you that impression?Because you initially said that a direct raid on the pyramid would be a viable plan, which it then wasn't and you mentioned that a diversion was really needed as well. But it sounds like the same strategy with different tactics would have worked?


It was not over-tuned on paper, but this is a fight that requires an unusual strategy and an uncommon amount of tact, so I can see how it was too hard for the players in practice. I have no doubt that if they tried again and spent some time talking tactics they could clear it 99% of the time. But I really hope to get one of them to run it for me this weekend so I can test it to see how it goes from the other side.Requires an unusual strategy that's not really intuitive if you don't know the rules the encounter operates under.

For example, pushing past the initial enemies and getting inside ASAP makes sense in your version (unlimited reinforcements, searching the inside is fairly fast). But if the scenario was different:
A) If there was a limited supply of reinforcements and those reinforcements would follow the party inside, then it makes sense to take them on ahead of time rather than get surrounded inside.
B) If reinforcements would keep arriving while the party is inside, and searching the inside takes a fair amount of time, then this is kind a no-win situation, and no tactic other than having an escape power like Teleport would really work (except it would fail because of Pumpkin Head).

So I'd say that if you want to take on the challenge yourself - don't use the one you wrote, because of course you'd know how to solve that. Have one of the players make some changes to the scenario, then try to defeat that. Lack of information makes a big difference.

Talakeal
2021-09-20, 05:23 PM
Because you initially said that a direct raid on the pyramid would be a viable plan, which it then wasn't and you mentioned that a diversion was really needed as well. But it sounds like the same strategy with different tactics would have worked?

Note that in post #2 I said "perform a smash and grab before the defenders could mount a defense".

The idea is to keep moving forward and not get bogged down in reinforcements, which is precisely what the PCs didn't do.

Neither the forces outside or inside are a match for the party, or even half of the party. But exactly how they split up their forces really depends on how things are going from moment to moment.


So I'd say that if you want to take on the challenge yourself - don't use the one you wrote, because of course you'd know how to solve that. Have one of the players make some changes to the scenario, then try to defeat that. Lack of information makes a big difference.

What changes would you recommend to make it a "fair" challenge though?

The players hypothesis is that I put them in an impossible scenario, and my hypothesis is that it is perfectly winnnabl, they just went about it in the wrong way (and had some cold dice).

I don't know how you would test either of those hypothesis while changing the scenario.

Especially when you consider that going into it they already had full information of the scenario thanks to Krystal's scouting and Feur's time manipulation.

BRC
2021-09-20, 05:25 PM
It is an overcast day.

Pyramids central chamber is 12x20 squares. The inside is divided into eight 3x3 square sacrificial chambers arranged in two rows of four. There are one meter wide corridors between them. Each is entered by a locked (dc 20) door which is located on the second and fourth vertical hallways.

The outer wall is three meters thick. The center of the wide edge has a one meter wide entrance corridor at the center of the long edge nearest the canyon entrance.

There is a three meter wide walk way all the way around.

There is a ten meter high slope all the way around the pyramid. It is rough terrain which can be climbed.

There is three meter wide stairway in the slope directly infront of the entrance corridor.

There are three guards at the top of the stairs. They are level 2 centipede folk warriors armed with polearms, javelins, and their poisoned pincers. The center one is riding a buraq.

Inside the pyramid, patrolling randomly, are four gods. These are smaller, only man-size, but are trained in alertness and wielding swords instead of pole-arms. They are otherwise identical to the outdoor guards.

Each time one of the sacrificial chambers is entered (or someone attempts to teleport in) they roll a difficulty 40 reason test. They receive a +5 bonus to this test for every room that has already been explored. On a success, they find Ashley (who is comatose) and The Poisoner who is experimenting upon her. The Poisoner is a level four centipede folk alchemist who will defend himself and call for help if he or Ashley are disturbed.

Pumpkin Head, a third circle fallen boggart, is hanging around the ethereal assisting the poisoner as needed. He has spells that involve fear and spatial manipulation. His first act will be to ward the room The Poisoner is in against teleportation.

At the start of each enemy turn, roll a d20. If the result is equal to or less than the turn number, a reinforcement appears at the edge of the board. It has identical stats to the guards and cannot act the turn it enters. The d20 roll receives a -4 penalty if the players performed any especially loud actions (shouting, firing a gun, explosions, etc.) and a +4 bonus if they performed only quiet actions (whispering, sneaking, attacking from ambush, etc.)

The three outer guards and the Buraq are an "appropriate encounter" that should use up ~20% of the party's resources and go down in 3-6 turns.
The four inner guards and the Poisoner are an "appropriate encounter" that should use up ~20% of the party's resources and go down in 3-6 turns.
Pumpkin Head and the Reinforcements are, by themselves, trivial encounters that should use up >10% of the party's resources individual, but can overwhelm the party if encountered at the wrong time and place.


The party had nobody who could see spirits and didn't think to summon any spiritual allies of their own, so Pumpkin Head could move about and act unchecked. This was bad luck.
The first two reinforcement rolls succeeded. This was bad luck.
They kept Quincy alone on the back edge of the board with nobody to protect or support him and no ability to move up. This was bad tactics.
Anani didn't summon a shade until very late in the fight. This was bad tactics.
Rather than pushing forward, the party just stood on the stairs fighting and letting their enemies surround them. By the time they were in a favorable position, Quincy and Feur were down and Anani was out of mana, and that point they would eventually lose to attrition.

It was not over-tuned on paper, but this is a fight that requires an unusual strategy and an uncommon amount of tact, so I can see how it was too hard for the players in practice. I have no doubt that if they tried again and spent some time talking tactics they could clear it 99% of the time. But I really hope to get one of them to run it for me this weekend so I can test it to see how it goes from the other side.

reading through this, it sounds a bit like you fell into the common Gm's trap. Having read your notes, I'm reasonably sure I could clear this scenario, but your players didn't have your notes.

It sounds like you're a bit too cautious about telling them things, I don't see how "Rubbing it in" can be a thing if you're giving them intel ahead of time.



The big thing that I notice is the idea of speed. Your scenario calls for the PC's to break through the outside guards as quickly as possible, get inside, search the place, and get out. This makes sense, and isn't an unreasonable thing to expect, but the reinforcements mechanic does make the outdoor fight have a non-standard win condition, which can sometimes be difficult for Players to recognize.

Namely, that the goal was to get inside and close the door, not to take every enemy off the field. The PC's seemed to be approaching it mostly as a standard locked room encounter, where the purpose is to defeat all the enemies presented and then move on. I can't say for sure if that was just them having blinders on, or you not communicating properly, or what.
My gut tells me that Quincy stayed back because, at least subconsciously, he forgot that the world extended beyond the battlemap, and was approaching things from a "Kill all the enemies out here, and then go inside" perspective, two discrete encounters (outside and inside) rather than one full scenario.


A question: How good were you about communicating the mechanics of reinforcements? Driving home that more guards will just Keep Showing Up until the PC's get inside and shut the door.

Edit: How much do you use "GM Patter", how talkative are you outside of explicitly communicating game actions being taken?


were I running this scenario, I'd be going on about how the guards are trying to block the PC's from getting through, mentioning the shouts of reinforcements on the way, ect ect. Trying to keep "Get past and get inside" in everybody's heads.

If you're a bit less talkative, mostly just communicating direct actions ("The guard attacks you and misses, this one moves over here, another guard shows up") the players might have not gotten the message about "Endless Reinforcements" and the importance of forward momentum.

Specifically, the Players might think of this as an Impossible Scenario because they thought you just had 20 extra guards they were expected to fight through, who would spawn one at a time at the back for whatever reason, instead of their victory condtion being "Get through the door and close it".

Talakeal
2021-09-20, 05:57 PM
reading through this, it sounds a bit like you fell into the common Gm's trap. Having read your notes, I'm reasonably sure I could clear this scenario, but your players didn't have your notes.

The big thing that I notice is the idea of speed. Your scenario calls for the PC's to break through the outside guards as quickly as possible, get inside, search the place, and get out. This makes sense, and isn't an unreasonable thing to expect, but the reinforcements mechanic does make the outdoor fight have a non-standard win condition, which can sometimes be difficult for Players to recognize.

Namely, that the goal was to get inside and close the door, not to take every enemy off the field. The PC's seemed to be approaching it mostly as a standard locked room encounter, where the purpose is to defeat all the enemies presented and then move on. I can't say for sure if that was just them having blinders on, or you not communicating properly, or what.
My gut tells me that Quincy stayed back because, at least subconsciously, he forgot that the world extended beyond the battlemap, and was approaching things from a "Kill all the enemies out here, and then go inside" perspective, two discrete encounters (outside and inside) rather than one full scenario.

IMO this is all spot on.




It sounds like you're a bit too cautious about telling them things, I don't see how "Rubbing it in" can be a thing if you're giving them intel ahead of time.

Lots of ways.

Typically, they will either try and justify their mistakes, blame me, or just blow up.

Examples:

Q: Why aren't you guys buying any rope?

A1: Well, actually, I have crunched the numbers and found that rope is absolutely useless as my ability to climb a wall is 70% without it and the extra 25% is not worth the weight.
A2: Because you are so stingy with treasure that I can't even afford basic supplies!
A3: Because I FORGOT! There, are you happy now, you made me look like an idiot in front of the whole group!

(These all came up in this very session btw. Although the only one that was actually about rope was B, I forget what the A and C were about.)


If you're a bit less talkative, mostly just communicating direct actions ("The guard attacks you and misses, this one moves over here, another guard shows up") the players might have not gotten the message about "Endless Reinforcements" and the importance of forward momentum.

Specifically, the Players might think of this as an Impossible Scenario because they thought you just had 20 extra guards they were expected to fight through, who would spawn one at a time at the back for whatever reason, instead of their victory condition being "Get through the door and close it".

Not great, no, I tend to get tired of narrating everything as the session rolls on. I could definitely work on it.

In this case, unless they were totally absorbed in their phones (which is always a real risk) they knew there were reinforcements, knew it was based on a dice roll, and new how much noise they made modified the dice roll. They did not know the exact odds at any given time.

Dialogue is a bit trickier. Two of my players absolutely HATE when NPC's quip during combat. They consider a single sentence "a monologue" and have said in the past "If someone is talking in an RPG, they are the only person at the table is having fun," and have for years ranted and raved about dying characters being allowed to have "last words" before expiring.

zlefin
2021-09-21, 10:56 AM
Valentine has wings and bluffing skills, Kim has the ability to reshape earth, and Anani has illusion powers. Feur and Quincy are also pretty agile and athletic. Between the group I didn't expect them to have any problems getting to the bottom of the canyon and infiltrating the city in a variety of ways; if they wanted to go the more direct route they could have simply sent in a scout (or used some form of divination) to find the temple where she was being held, drive the juggernaut into the city through the canyon's mouth, and done a smash and grab before the defenders could really mount a defense.


Smash and grab seems totally non-viable. This is a city of some sort. In a dangerous world. A large, hostile, unidentified vehicle running through is going to provoke a massive response. They *might* be able to do a smash and grab fast enough, but it being a city, if they don't they WILL be overrun horribly. And sound travels far faster, so the moment they start, alarm bells (or equivalent) will result in a city-wide lockdown and hostiles all over. It also might be hard to get back out of the city, as the vehicle doesn't sound like it could handle the cliffs, and the main entrance probably has some sort of blockadeable system.

Overall it feels to me like the mission was beyond the PC's capabilities (admittedly I don't have a good sense of the actual limits of their capabilities), or at least well into the area where failure is likely.

All the timey-wimey stuff feels wrong to me, it feels like it's bringing in too many far more powerful people to decide things and involving matters far beyond what the PCs could reasonably handle/affect. Feels like NPCs deciding things.

BRC
2021-09-21, 01:17 PM
Not great, no, I tend to get tired of narrating everything as the session rolls on. I could definitely work on it.

In this case, unless they were totally absorbed in their phones (which is always a real risk) they knew there were reinforcements, knew it was based on a dice roll, and new how much noise they made modified the dice roll. They did not know the exact odds at any given time.

Dialogue is a bit trickier. Two of my players absolutely HATE when NPC's quip during combat. They consider a single sentence "a monologue" and have said in the past "If someone is talking in an RPG, they are the only person at the table is having fun," and have for years ranted and raved about dying characters being allowed to have "last words" before expiring.

It can be quite difficult to subtly course-correct when somebody thinks they understand what's going on and what the limitations of the constructed scenario are.

Like, if your players are used to thinking about things as Discreet Tactical Encounters, the idea that the goal was to get past the guards rather than kill them all can be frustratingly out of reach.


I'm going to go out on a limb here, but there's a phenomenon I see sometimes, I call it "Gamer Blinders". Video Games share enough tropes and similarities with tabletop RPGs that sometimes it can blind players to the possibilities, or the more fluid nature of a TTRPG scenario.


Imagine your first fight modeled in, say, Fire Emblem.

There would be a map with enemies. The gate would be marked "Goal!" and a mission card would say "Objective: move all units to the goal zone" or whatever.

Absent those markers, the default goal would be "defeat all enemies", after which point the map would end as the Players win and move inside the pyramid, or whatever.
There might be a "Reinforcements Arrive" turn timer or something.

If your players play a lot of that style of game, or if they've played TTRPGs for a long time that mostly consist of Discrete Tactical Battles, then they may instinctively start thinking about fights in those terms. Like, NARRATIVELY they're trying to get inside, sure, but the schema they're using for "Success" is "Defeat all enemies", rather than fitting their success into the narrative.


There are plenty of video games where the character's narrative goal is simply to escape, or get past some enemies, or what have you, but due to the nature of the game and it's mechanics, the game resolves it as a locked-room deathmatch (or, even if you can progress without killing all the enemies, that's the best way to approach it, potentially because trying to push forwards with enemies on your heels just leads to running into more enemies down the line, while the enemies chasing you catch up).

If you ask your players "Why did you just stand there and keep fighting", they probably won't go through this chain of logic. To them, the OBVIOUS goal was to Kill All The Enemies, they never questioned it.

I once saw a similar, if opposite, scenario occur. We fled into an enemy castle, the guards who had been supposed to stop us at the gate were a few rounds behind us.

The rouge's player snapped into a new Schema. "We cleared the "Get through the Gate" encounter, and are now exploring this castle", and decided to Scout Ahead.
In doing so, he ran into another pack of enemies, while we were still "In Combat" with the guards chasing us. Because once the enemy guards were 'Off Camera' as it were, the Rogue forgot they existed.


When GMing, I try to keep up a constant dialogue with the Players, to make sure everybody is on the same page about what their immediate goals are, but if you don't have a great rapport with your players, that can easily come across as railroading and telling them what to think.

Talakeal
2021-09-21, 04:09 PM
I once saw a similar, if opposite, scenario occur. We fled into an enemy castle, the guards who had been supposed to stop us at the gate were a few rounds behind us.

The rouge's player snapped into a new Schema. "We cleared the "Get through the Gate" encounter, and are now exploring this castle", and decided to Scout Ahead.
In doing so, he ran into another pack of enemies, while we were still "In Combat" with the guards chasing us. Because once the enemy guards were 'Off Camera' as it were, the Rogue forgot they existed.

That is actually a very common mishap in my gaming group.



Smash and grab seems totally non-viable. This is a city of some sort. In a dangerous world. A large, hostile, unidentified vehicle running through is going to provoke a massive response. They *might* be able to do a smash and grab fast enough, but it being a city, if they don't they WILL be overrun horribly. And sound travels far faster, so the moment they start, alarm bells (or equivalent) will result in a city-wide lockdown and hostiles all over. It also might be hard to get back out of the city, as the vehicle doesn't sound like it could handle the cliffs, and the main entrance probably has some sort of blockadeable system.

Note that I didn't say the smash and grab was the best plan, but it was the most direct and the one I mathematically balanced the combat encounters around.

About 15 years ago here in Colorado we had a guy go on a rampage in a fortified a bulldozer and flatten a number of government buildings in Granby. Not only could the local authorities do nothing to stop him, but even the Denver SWAT team decided to just wait until he ran out of gas. I imagine a properly executed frontal assault would have turned out similarly.

Nothing the centipede folk had could stop the juggernaut (bitch) on short notice. The juggernaut is basically a steam-punk tank, while the Omukudae have primarily bronze-age technology. I suppose with time or magic they could build ditches, swamps, and pallisades, but not out of the blue.

As it was, the city was not really fortified and didn't have walls, it is protected on three sides by mountains and a desert on the fourth, and all of the valuable buildings are up on the canyon walls where invader's simply can't reach them. It was also a market town, it was not the military hub of the centipede empire.

Now, sure, they would lock the place down, but the thing is that the juggernaut can outrun them, and those who hear it coming are likely to fortify themselves; keep in mind that they have no idea who the PCs are or what they are here for, and would first look to protecting their own rather than swarming to protect a pyramid that only a handful of them even know the significance of.

But yeah, I am sure I could pull some sort of schrodinger's wizard out of my butt to stop the PCs (which is what the assume I do anyway), but it just isn't feasible.



Overall it feels to me like the mission was beyond the PC's capabilities (admittedly I don't have a good sense of the actual limits of their capabilities), or at least well into the area where failure is likely.

I think with their current tactics and better luck or their current luck and better tactics they could have easily cleared it using the approach they did.

Not that it was an optimal approach mind you; for example if Krystal had brought Kim and / or Anani with her on her first foray they would have likely cleared the mission almost effortlessly and only had to kill the Poisoner and maybe a couple of his guards. Magical mastery of stone and darkness would have been really useful there.





All the timey-wimey stuff feels wrong to me, it feels like it's bringing in too many far more powerful people to decide things and involving matters far beyond what the PCs could reasonably handle/affect. Feels like NPCs deciding things.

I meant it to be more of a background element that it was. I didn't really have a good fail state for this mission, and kind of jumped the gun when put on the spot. Although with the party we have; a time-monk, a shadow priest, and a woman out of time it might be a little more appropriate to give it center stage.

As for the second part, I honestly think having powerful people pulling strings behind the scenes is pretty normal. I can't think of many adventures / campaign setting where there isn't some big epic good vs. evil conflict happening in the background that the PCs never have the power to address directly and only deal with the downstream ramifications of.

Quertus
2021-09-21, 06:39 PM
Simply put, Talakeal, the question isn't whether *you* could pass this encounter. The question is whether, if you hand your players your notes, they can pass your encounter.

And, if they can, stop trying (and failing) to communicate, and just hand them your notes. "Here's the mechanics of the scenario, what do you do?"

If not, why not?

Talakeal
2021-09-21, 07:32 PM
Simply put, Talakeal, the question isn't whether *you* could pass this encounter. The question is whether, if you hand your players your notes, they can pass your encounter.

And, if they can, stop trying (and failing) to communicate, and just hand them your notes. "Here's the mechanics of the scenario, what do you do?"

If not, why not?

In this case, its because they claim that the scenario is objectively impossible. Swapping roles shows them that it isn't; simply trying to run it again with full information doesn't prove anything because the incentive isn't there.


Now, if you are suggesting handing them the notes before future games its because nobody; not even my players, would enjoy that. People like the story and the exploration and the verisimilitude. In a previous thread you mentioned you prefer rules as physics because you don't like the cognitive dissonance, how much worse would that be if you were trying to play a character in a scenario with limited knowledge but as a player had access to all the DM's notes? I don't know about you, but that would be actively horrible for me.

And I don't think my players would even look at them if they did. Like, I have been doing what you suggested and putting NPC stats on index cards, and the players simply refuse to look at them, because they don't want to put effort into thinking about tactics and me giving them additional homework to do first doesn't encourage it.

And that's the real thing IMO, the players aren't actually stymied by a lack of information or constantly tricked by my insidious wordplay or put in impossible scenarios, they simply don't like to lose and then say whatever they think will justify their tantrum. Its like I said a few posts ago about why I don't ask questions about their curious tactical choices; there are a lot of really weak egos at my table and everything is perceived as an attempt to undermine somebody else's confidence.

Ameraaaaaa
2021-09-22, 12:15 AM
Ngl. You probably have 1 option for fixing this.

1 tell them that if they keep doing tantrums that your gonna stop playing with them at all. Then if they don't stop genuinely stop playing with them. If they try to change your mind tell them you aren't unless they stop throwing tantrums. Start playing online games. You said earlier that this escalated to gas lighting. If i were you I'd stop talking to them. But hey that's just me.

Satinavian
2021-09-22, 01:44 AM
In this case, its because they claim that the scenario is objectively impossible. Swapping roles shows them that it isn't; simply trying to run it again with full information doesn't prove anything because the incentive isn't there.
It is a scenario that can be beaten with a specific strategy which is
a) not obvious
b) a wrong move im most similar situations
c) relies on the surprise element so basically has to be used on the first try

Furthermore the details that make that strategy optimal, layout and enemy distribution in the pyramid and the details of reinforcements can't be known to the players. And what is more, they don't match the fiction either, Why would reinforcements come in one at a time ? Instead of e.g. securing and blocking the entrance until enough people are there to take on the whole group that went in and maybe then sent in people in force while still making sure that no one can escape ? Why are they mobilized one at a time anyway, not at unit level?

I know that fiction, especially pulp based fiction likes smash and grab scenarios. But it is something that hardly ever happens in reality because it usually is utterly stupid.


It the players want to storm the pyramid (which seems suicidal anyway but it was the only option, wasn't it) it is not surpising or wrong for them to want to secure the entrance before they go further in.

Talakeal
2021-09-22, 02:08 PM
You know, I am starting to think that maybe I need to start doing the things my players accuse me of; railroading, fudging dice, ret-conning my notes, and having NPCs meta-game.

Because playing games with a chance of failure never works out for anyone, losing upsets my players and, on my end, makes it much harder to tell a story from a narrative perspective.

A lot of good (and a lot of terrible) GMs run their games by pure illusionism, and while I am opposed to it on principle, it sure would make things a lot easier.


It is a scenario that can be beaten with a specific strategy which is
a) not obvious
b) a wrong move im most similar situations
c) relies on the surprise element so basically has to be used on the first try

So you appear to be falling into the same trap as my players; a: assuming that because their strategy didn't work that it couldn't have worked with better execution and / or dice rolls and that b: because their solution didn't work then no solution could have worked / the DM requires a very specific solution.

I merely said that I mathematically balanced the challenge of the encounters around the most direct approach, not that it was "the only solution that could have worked".

There are a vast variety of options they could have used; trying diplomatic approaches, tunneling into the pyramid from beneath, staging some sort of distraction to pull away all the nearby guards, etc. Perhaps even convincing the dandelion folk to help them or starting a slave revolt. Probably dozens of others I haven't even considered. Just because I didn't balance the combats around those solutions (or didn't think of them) doesn't mean that I am going to arbitrarily shoot them down.

Also, Feur can and did turn back time as a mechanically defined ability. They can keep trying this as long as he has spell slots to burn, so it is hardly one try.


Furthermore the details that make that strategy optimal, layout and enemy distribution in the pyramid and the details of reinforcements can't be known to the players. And what is more, they don't match the fiction either, Why would reinforcements come in one at a time ? Instead of e.g. securing and blocking the entrance until enough people are there to take on the whole group that went in and maybe then sent in people in force while still making sure that no one can escape ? Why are they mobilized one at a time anyway, not at unit level?

I have played lots of games, mostly wargames, with a staggered reinforcement roll.

It doesn't seem that weird in the fiction; every time I have called 911 IRL response units arrivals are staggered, and while they would probably create a perimiter around an active shooter situation, I find it hard to believe that they wouldn't assist as they arrived to find the suspects already engaged in an active firefight with their fellow officers.

But yeah, I could have done it that way. But imo that actually would make it more unfavorable for the players, because it essentially turns a combat encounter into another puzzle; how do you escape from the pyramid that is now on lock-down? (It also screws over the enemies, as that means they have also failed in their goal by sacrificing the alchemist whom they have trying to break the prisoner and potential risked the prisoner's death, and at that point the best they can hope for is revenge / interrogation).


It the players want to storm the pyramid (which seems suicidal anyway but it was the only option, wasn't it) it is not surprising or wrong for them to want to secure the entrance before they go further in.

The only option? Hardly.

Now, their goal was inside the pyramid, so most approaches would involve "storming" it in some manner, but a direct assault would not be my first choice.

Personally I think their best approach would probably be to have snuck in, have Krystal and Valentine do reconnaissance, have Kim and Anani buff Krystal and summon some shades to back her up, have Kim buff Krystal and open a tunnel into the pyramid, send Krystal and the shades in alone to grab the girl and kill her guards, have Feur manipulate time to make sure they came at just the right moment and stand by to rewind time if things go pear shaped, and then have Kim use her stone magic to create an escape route that closes behind them.

But yeah, this is the fundamental disconnect in my group; they want to play action / adventure games where they are big powerful heroes and paid and recognized as such, don't like to put thought into tactics beyond "have big numbers hit hard", and then consider any mission which has inherent risk in it as "suicidal".


Ngl. You probably have 1 option for fixing this.

1 tell them that if they keep doing tantrums that your gonna stop playing with them at all. Then if they don't stop genuinely stop playing with them. If they try to change your mind tell them you aren't unless they stop throwing tantrums. Start playing online games. You said earlier that this escalated to gas lighting. If i were you I'd stop talking to them. But hey that's just me.

Yeah. But I am really bad at holding grudges, and I know I can't actually step away. They know that to.

Its also really hypocritical of me to hold a single emotional outburst against them, as I know everyone (including myself) gets frustrated when they lose and says things they don't mean when they are upset from time to time.

The gas lighting stuff is a bit weirder. Basically, someone says something that just isn't true; like in the last session Krystal's player insisted that the enemies spotted him every single time (they spotted him once when he rolled a 2 on stealth and one time the beast was able to scent that something was in the area but not what or where it was) or when Quincy insisted he was completely surrounded on the first turn (again, the PCs went first, got a surprise round, and a bonus round from haste, and on the enemy's first turn they were all incapable of reaching him, some depending on how you define it, it was impossible for him to be surrounded before 2-4 turns in) and when I correct them they say I am lying, and at that point we are both convinced that the other side is gas-lighting the other.

Satinavian
2021-09-22, 03:06 PM
So you appear to be falling into the same trap as my players; a: assuming that because their strategy didn't work that it couldn't have worked with better execution and / or dice rolls and that b: because their solution didn't work then no solution could have worked / the DM requires a very specific solution.
My point was mostly about how your idea of replaying it with switched rolls is useless because you know all the critical details of the scenario to pick a good approach and your players didn't. That is not even remotely comparable a challenge and would prove nothing of value. It is a pure waste of time.
When dealing with an unknown, the standard approach should be the benchmark for difficulty, not some nonstandard one.

I have played lots of games, mostly wargames, with a staggered reinforcement roll.Sure, because that can be nice gameplay.

But how many of those games had one side of the players oblivious to the reinforcement mechanics so they could not plan their tactics around it?

But yeah, I could have done it that way. But imo that actually would make it more unfavorable for the players, Of course it is less favourable. Which is why players should expect their enemies to do exactly that if given the option. And thus avoid any strategy that would allow them to do that. And that is why pushing forward into the pyramid to search it with enemies in their back and at the only exit is quite stupid.

Quertus
2021-09-22, 03:25 PM
@Talakeal, from what you've told us, at the fiction layer, I agree with your players that this mission is impossible. (And your refusal to think about playing blind through a different set of mechanics that match your fiction likely means that, at some level, you understand this, too)

I agree with @Satinavian that your mechanics don't match the fiction layer (and with most everything else in their post).

I value Exploration most of all, so I don't recommend… no, not strong enough. Unless I had completely given up all hope of your games ever working, *or* I came to understand your players preferences and that Exploration wasn't among them, I would never suggest removing Exploration as a permanent solution.

However, what i was suggesting was, *at the latest*, when the videogame version of your game would switch to "combat mode", hand your players the mechanics of the engagement as the "load screen". (Also do it when their recon is "sufficient")

Also, your players have not employed bad tactics, your world has employed bad physics. No, seriously.

At the fiction layer, where should the sniper be? Clumped up with the party, or on overwatch a good distance away?

The reinforcements - could the sniper "see them coming"? At the fiction layer, probably. But, at the mechanics layer, no, because the reinforcements didn't exist until the roll says that they are there.

From the party's PoV, at the fiction layer, with limited mana resources, why would it make sense to summon something early in the fight, when there's a whole complex - let alone a whole city - of hostiles (that overran and killed their alternate reality selves already), rather than save the mana for when it really matters?

This mission is worse than impossible: it's possible in an illogical way. Showing your players how badly they need to approach the problem in order to win… almost certainly isn't the answer. Suppose I wrote a program and you said that it was impossible to make it work. If i showed you that, no, if you wear your pants on your head, and periodically shout "Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo", it works just fine, would that fill you with confidence in my programming ability?

In order to get your players to switch from the fiction layer to the mechanics layer… you need to either learn to lead them to the mechanics layer, or (as I strongly recommend you do until you learn such skills) to simply hand them the mechanics layer.

Had I been at your table, I would have been shocked to see these mechanics. (Well, probably - I wasn't exactly reading in full Player Exploration mode). But I could have (presumably) come up with a strategy that engages the reality of the mechanics layer, rather than the "fiction" of the fiction layer.

Still, I think that this mission was impossible, because, by RAW, round 750, when they emerge from the pyramid, there's at least 730 guards waiting for them at the only entrance (unless the sniper was out there killing them all in god mode). TPK,gg, who's up for a nice game of thermonuclear war?

Not that this addresses the Social issues at your table, which are a huge underlying issue. But at least it addresses the gaping chasm between the fiction and the rules, and how you need a way to get the group from one side to the other.

EDIT: several posts since I started writing this. And… OK, this mission is more possible than I thought (pumpkin head… blocks teleport, but not stone shaping? Did the party, in character, comprehend *any* of this? (I thought pumpkin head was… completely different than your intent, tbh, and IC would have attributed the defenses to the *structure*, not to some imp guardian)) *if* they're willing to play to win (CaW) rather than beer and pretzels (CaS). But… since you keep trying to insist to your players that it's all fair fights, I'm now really confused what both sides want out of this game.

ahyangyi
2021-09-22, 03:45 PM
Hmm. Could I put it this way?

D&D is a game where the game physics and the kind of (alternative) reality do not exactly match (not exactly its fault though).

How does the base game solve the problem? It describes the game physics in the book called "Player's Handbook" and encourages and requires the players to read it. The other books give DMs more know-how about how to run the game, but all game physics go to the Player's Handbook.

So, if a DM is introducing a new "world physics" rule, he is, in effect, amending the Player's Handbook. The new rule, hence, should be given to players in OOC languages and clearly labeled as rules.

Since it is a bit hard to imagine a stream of infinite reinforcement, outside a video game or a board game, it is a game mechanic, not fiction material. It's fine to have such a rule in your game, but let it be what it is. It belongs to the Player's Handbook, and wants to be public information for the players.

BRC
2021-09-22, 04:05 PM
@Talakeal, from what you've told us, at the fiction layer, I agree with your players that this mission is impossible. (And your refusal to think about playing blind through a different set of mechanics that match your fiction likely means that, at some level, you understand this, too)


Eh, if I may

So, at the Fiction layer, the mission is "Break into a hostile city to rescue somebody"


Were I writing a novel about this, it would be a pure stealth operation in the dead of night, since if the alarms sound before you're more than a quick sprint from the exit, you're basically toast.


But, unspoken rule at the table, The GM wouldn't send them to do this if it wasn't doable with their capabilities. Also, not everybody can stealth and splitting the party is usually bad.

From the Notes, we know that this is perfectly doable as an assault, so long as you prioritize moving fast to break through the guards and search the pyramid (haven't read everything too closely, not sure how they were planning to get out).

So, given that an Assault isn't an unreasonably approach, "Move fast to break through the guards" isn't an impossible strategy to guess, but it's not guaranteed. Like, you're not expecting your players to be 200 IQ Tactical Geniuses here, but you are expecting them to pick up the unspoken assumption that what they need to do is get inside the pyramid as fast as possible, which isn't a guaranteed standpoint for them to take.


I havn't read through everything in perfect detail, but the approach laid out (Rush the outdoor guards, get inside before you get swarmed by reinforcements) only makes sense if

1) The PC's know that they can "Lock out" the outdoor guards (Not guaranteed, Even if the PCs have a way to shut the door, the guards outside probably have somebody who knows how to open it again).

2) The PC's have a way to escape regardless of how many guards are outside (Once again, didn't fully read this, maybe they can teleport out?)


If the PC's assume that they need to/can clear their exit before heading in, and are acting under the assumption that an assault is a viable strategy, it's non unreasonble for them to assume that they CAN clear the entrance.

It's also not unreasonable for them to assume that they just need to get inside ASAP.

Unless I'm missing something, the scenario doesn't make a ton of sense either way. The "Realistic" thing is that the PC's will be swamped by endless reinforcements if they stay outside, and that if they go inside the enemy will open the door back up and the PC's will be stuck between the guards inside and the guards outside.

So the assumption they must make is either "We can clear all the guards outside" or "Once inside we can ignore the guards outside". Neither makes a ton of sense narratively, but that doesn't make this scenario unique among RPG scenarios. They made the wrong choice, but it was in line with an assumption no more absurd than the one they were "Supposed" to make.

The real issue is that this really needed to be approached as a Heist, and a Heist is very different from a tactical challenge. It doesn't seem like your players are interested in the level of planning needed for Heists.

Talakeal
2021-09-22, 04:57 PM
At the fiction layer, where should the sniper be? Clumped up with the party, or on overwatch a good distance away?

The reinforcements - could the sniper "see them coming"? At the fiction layer, probably. But, at the mechanics layer, no, because the reinforcements didn't exist until the roll says that they are there.

From the party's PoV, at the fiction layer, with limited mana resources, why would it make sense to summon something early in the fight, when there's a whole complex - let alone a whole city - of hostiles (that overran and killed their alternate reality selves already), rather than save the mana for when it really matters?

In order to get your players to switch from the fiction layer to the mechanics layer… you need to either learn to lead them to the mechanics layer, or (as I strongly recommend you do until you learn such skills) to simply hand them the mechanics layer.

Had I been at your table, I would have been shocked to see these mechanics. (Well, probably - I wasn't exactly reading in full Player Exploration mode). But I could have (presumably) come up with a strategy that engages the reality of the mechanics layer, rather than the "fiction" of the fiction layer.

Out of character, they know that they are in the middle of a market city with guards scattered periodically throughout. Every round I rolled a dice, told them the difficulty was based on how much noise they made, and if it rolled high told them that one of the guards in the town has noticed the commotion and is moving over to assist, and placed his model on the board's edge (making him a viable target but NOT allowing him to act that turn).

I am really not sure how one would more realistically handle that scenario on either the fiction or mechanical level.

I also mentioned that several slaves were dispatched to notify the military.

So yes, the sniper could absolutely see them coming. Also; I like your idea about the sniper covering them from a secure position. That is a really cool idea that neither I nor my players considered. Although it is a bit risky as he does need to escape and regroup with the party afterwards.

As far as summoning, it doesn't matter how long the scenario is, they are best cast at the beginning of the battle where they can make the most difference. Now, how MANY summons you use in a given battle is a more strategic issue, but not at what point of the battle you summon them.


Still, I think that this mission was impossible, because, by RAW, round 750, when they emerge from the pyramid, there's at least 730 guards waiting for them at the only entrance (unless the sniper was out there killing them all in god mode). TPK,gg, who's up for a nice game of thermonuclear war?

By RAW, at round 750 they would be long dead from exhaustion and reinforcements would be the least of their worries.

But yes, it was a "smash and grab", they would have zero chances of taking on the city's forces head on, and they know that getting in and out quickly was vital both in and out of character.


Hmm. Could I put it this way?

D&D is a game where the game physics and the kind of (alternative) reality do not exactly match (not exactly its fault though).

How does the base game solve the problem? It describes the game physics in the book called "Player's Handbook" and encourages and requires the players to read it. The other books give DMs more know-how about how to run the game, but all game physics go to the Player's Handbook.

So, if a DM is introducing a new "world physics" rule, he is, in effect, amending the Player's Handbook. The new rule, hence, should be given to players in OOC languages and clearly labeled as rules.

Since it is a bit hard to imagine a stream of infinite reinforcement, outside a video game or a board game, it is a game mechanic, not fiction material. It's fine to have such a rule in your game, but let it be what it is. It belongs to the Player's Handbook, and wants to be public information for the players.

Not playing dungeons and dragons. My system absolutely has rules for attracting attention to fights and they were followed (with situational modifiers).


Eh, if I may

So, at the Fiction layer, the mission is "Break into a hostile city to rescue somebody"


Were I writing a novel about this, it would be a pure stealth operation in the dead of night, since if the alarms sound before you're more than a quick sprint from the exit, you're basically toast.


But, unspoken rule at the table, The GM wouldn't send them to do this if it wasn't doable with their capabilities. Also, not everybody can stealth and splitting the party is usually bad.

From the Notes, we know that this is perfectly doable as an assault, so long as you prioritize moving fast to break through the guards and search the pyramid (haven't read everything too closely, not sure how they were planning to get out).

So, given that an Assault isn't an unreasonably approach, "Move fast to break through the guards" isn't an impossible strategy to guess, but it's not guaranteed. Like, you're not expecting your players to be 200 IQ Tactical Geniuses here, but you are expecting them to pick up the unspoken assumption that what they need to do is get inside the pyramid as fast as possible, which isn't a guaranteed standpoint for them to take.

Agreed.

Note that the party could have chosen a nighttime stealth mission, for even though not everyone can stealth, they have a shadow priest in the party who can cloak them in darkness (and whose powers are much more acute at night to begin with).

In addition, their current approach absolutely could have worked, they just didn't have great dice rolls or positioning.


The real issue is that this really needed to be approached as a Heist, and a Heist is very different from a tactical challenge. It doesn't seem like your players are interested in the level of planning needed for Heists.

Actually, its kind of the opposite. I expected them to either split the party or simply kill the main host of guards and deal with any reinforcements as they trickle in one by one.

The "locking them out" was actually something that Kim tried to do spontaneously, and was more or less countered by the boggart's magic.


The real issue is that this really needed to be approached as a Heist, and a Heist is very different from a tactical challenge. It doesn't seem like your players are interested in the level of planning needed for Heists.

Very much this.



My point was mostly about how your idea of replaying it with switched rolls is useless because you know all the critical details of the scenario to pick a good approach and your players didn't. That is not even remotely comparable a challenge and would prove nothing of value. It is a pure waste of time.
When dealing with an unknown, the standard approach should be the benchmark for difficulty, not some nonstandard one.


Agreed.

My players insisted that I set them up for a no win scenario and that it was impossible using the straightforward approach, and I want to show them that it can be solved using the exact same approach.

Sure, IMO I can come up with better (and worse) approaches, but that is not what I am responding to.



But how many of those games had one side of the players oblivious to the reinforcement mechanics so they could not plan their tactics around it?
Of course it is less favourable. Which is why players should expect their enemies to do exactly that if given the option. And thus avoid any strategy that would allow them to do that. And that is why pushing forward into the pyramid to search it with enemies in their back and at the only exit is quite stupid.

Why do you say they were oblivious?

While I didn't reveal the exact target number, they knew they I was rolling a dice based on the amount of noise they made and placing models on the board (or not) based on the result. On a fiction layer, they knew guards were in the city (and that the military would eventually be mobilized so they needed to hurry) and that said guards were, in a disorganized fashion, coming over to investigate the commotion.

Aside from the specific target number of the roll, what more information could I have given them?

Quertus
2021-09-22, 08:20 PM
As far as summoning, it doesn't matter how long the scenario is, they are best cast at the beginning of the battle where they can make the most difference. Now, how MANY summons you use in a given battle is a more strategic issue, but not at what point of the battle you summon them.

Although my tactically-inept signature academia mage would agree with you that summons are best used at the start of (or before) a fight, I do not.

Granted, that's because I'm making certain assumptions… or, rather, *not* making those assumptions. Because I don't know your system.

If summons are "encounter" powers, using them first is likely good. If they're "daily" powers (or your system uses mana), you might not want to use them at all this encounter.

If character X can summon monster A, that points to early use. But if, instead, character X can summon one of [A,B,C…], that serve very different roles, that favors waiting to see which role is most needed.

If summons are easily "countered" (a Mass Dismissal spell, fireball, whatever), and especially if multiple people in your party have summons, it can be better to wait / stagger the summons, to find / destroy / limit the action economy usefulness of such counters.

Some systems, some summons, some battles, the summons get crushed far too easily early on, but are devastating once the enemy forces are otherwise engaged.

Many systems, something summoned at "the start of the assault on the pyramid" would not still be around at "the boss fight against the poisoner, where we really need it", or "the escape from the archdeacon pumpkin head, where we really need it".

But… at the *fiction* layer, I've never really seen a Summoner who summons things for no reason being tactically sound.

Cluedrew
2021-09-22, 08:33 PM
Yeah. But I am really bad at holding grudges, and I know I can't actually step away. They know that to.Do they have any reason to change? Is there any reason they should stop complaining every time something goes wrong until you give up?


Its also really hypocritical of me to hold a single emotional outburst against them, as I know everyone (including myself) gets frustrated when they lose and says things they don't mean when they are upset from time to time.Yes, "single" that is why this is coming up now after years of happy play. Except that isn't true. This is roughly once a month each? And they don't appear to be trying to improve or are at all apologetic about it? That I think you can hold against them.

Morgaln
2021-09-23, 04:19 AM
So yes, the sniper could absolutely see them coming. Also; I like your idea about the sniper covering them from a secure position. That is a really cool idea that neither I nor my players considered. Although it is a bit risky as he does need to escape and regroup with the party afterwards.


I'm somewhat surprised about this, considering that covering allies and taking out key targets from a secure position is the whole point of a sniper. Admittedly, this can be problematic in this kind of scenario, since it requires the sniper to stay outside while the other characters infiltrate the pyramid. But I know my players would almost certainly have done that because they've done that kind of thing before. Of course how well that works also depends on whether the characters have a way to communicate over long distances.

Anyway, you said you balanced the encounter around a smash and grab; but I honestly don't see how that was supposed to work. I assume the pyramid was not just a room or two. The characters would have to explore the pyramid to find their target; after all the one person that has been there doesn't remember it due to time having been rewinded, not to mention that she was chased during that scene and might not remember all the turns she took. By the time they come back out, their retreat would likely have been cut off by reinforcements. Therefore, leaving the gards and make a run for the objective doesn't seem a viable strategy.

As for the reinforcements, I'm not sure you considered the numbers there. First of all, that -4 penalty for loud noise will happen every round because the guards will be shouting for help. Doesn't really matter what the characters do, because its in the best interest of the enemy to alert their comrades. So you're already starting at a one in four chance that reinforcements show up; after five rounds, you're at a full 50% chance. By your numbers, reinfocements have about half the strength of the initial group, meaning you expect them to take about half the time to defeat, which is 1-3 rounds. If you do the math, you'll find that very quickly, reinforcements will show up faster than they can be dispatched. If the players try to conserve resources for what is to come, they pretty much fight a losing battle from the beginning.

I'm curious; had you considered that the party might split up? Half of them stay at the front to fight the guards and keep their way of retreat open, while the other half goes and gets the target? How would that have affected your encounter balance?

Talakeal
2021-09-23, 11:17 AM
Anyway, you said you balanced the encounter around a smash and grab; but I honestly don't see how that was supposed to work. I assume the pyramid was not just a room or two. The characters would have to explore the pyramid to find their target; after all the one person that has been there doesn't remember it due to time having been rewinded, not to mention that she was chased during that scene and might not remember all the turns she took. By the time they come back out, their retreat would likely have been cut off by reinforcements. Therefore, leaving the gards and make a run for the objective doesn't seem a viable strategy.

Honestly, for a generic party it might not have been viable.

But with Krystal's ability to teleport and Kim's ability to shape stone, it was perfectly doable. Actually going from room to room unlocking or kicking in doors may have taken to long.


As for the reinforcements, I'm not sure you considered the numbers there. First of all, that -4 penalty for loud noise will happen every round because the guards will be shouting for help. Doesn't really matter what the characters do, because its in the best interest of the enemy to alert their comrades. So you're already starting at a one in four chance that reinforcements show up; after five rounds, you're at a full 50% chance. By your numbers, reinforcements have about half the strength of the initial group, meaning you expect them to take about half the time to defeat, which is 1-3 rounds. If you do the math, you'll find that very quickly, reinforcements will show up faster than they can be dispatched. If the players try to conserve resources for what is to come, they pretty much fight a losing battle from the beginning.

The modifiers were purely based on the noise level of the party, the noise level of the guards was factored into the base roll (if neither side had been making noise for some reason there would have been no roll at all). It is a bit of a mechanical abstraction I agree, but I don't think the scenario would have been helped by additional mathematics calculating difficulty based on every person's cumulative noise.

Note that I said >10%; a given reinforcement is unlikely to survive even a single round (or even get an action!) before dying if the party focuses fire on it.


I'm curious; had you considered that the party might split up? Half of them stay at the front to fight the guards and keep their way of retreat open, while the other half goes and gets the target? How would that have affected your encounter balance?

Oh absolutely. I assumed Krystal would go in an investigate the interior and Kim would stay and guard the door, and the rest of the party would move between them based on how much heat each location currently had.

Quertus
2021-09-23, 05:36 PM
Oh absolutely. I assumed Krystal would go in an investigate the interior and Kim would stay and guard the door, and the rest of the party would move between them based on how much heat each location currently had.

And the characters would know how each was doing… how?

Talakeal
2021-09-23, 07:55 PM
And the characters would know how each was doing… how?

Because no point in the building is more than 15 meters from the entrance?

Not that I am really that much a stickler for meta gaming to being with.

Morgaln
2021-09-24, 03:56 AM
The modifiers were purely based on the noise level of the party, the noise level of the guards was factored into the base roll (if neither side had been making noise for some reason there would have been no roll at all). It is a bit of a mechanical abstraction I agree, but I don't think the scenario would have been helped by additional mathematics calculating difficulty based on every person's cumulative noise.

Note that I said >10%; a given reinforcement is unlikely to survive even a single round (or even get an action!) before dying if the party focuses fire on it.



Are you sure your numbers are correct? You estimated 3-6 rounds of combat for a fight that should take about 20% of party resources. But you estimate less than a round for a group that still takesmore than half of that amount of resources. That sounds incongruous to me. Did you maybe mean <10% (less than 10%) instead of >10% (more than 10%)?


Because no point in the building is more than 15 meters from the entrance?

Not that I am really that much a stickler for meta gaming to being with.

That does not fit the description of what happened previously in that building. Quote from the infiltration attempt in the previous session:


There are numerous patrolling sentries within, and Krystal leads them on a chase for several tense minutes, their javelins clattering to the floor behind her. When she thinks she has lost them, she picks the lock of a side room and sees a victim, not the one she was looking for, chained to the wall and awaiting sacrifice. It isn’t who she came for, and Krystal leaves the woman to her fate.

She wanders the halls, always cloaked in shadow and a few steps in front of her guards, opening doors and always finding the wrong room.

You can cover 15 meters in about 20 steps. That takes a few seconds. You simply can't lead anyone in a minutes-long chase in that confined of an area, especially if they know the layout and thus know exactly how to cut you off. There also wouldn't be enough room for numerous patrols to be around. You've certainly implied that this place is much larger than that.

In fact, I did a quick calculation; assuming the door is in the middle of a wall, and the place is a square (it's a pyramid, it probably is):

The underlying formula is a² + b² = c²
The walls are equal length, and the door halfs that for one side, so b = 2a
The distance from the door to the far corner (the furthest point form the door) is 15 meters, so c= 15

a² + (2a)² = 15²
a² + 4a² = 225
5a² = 225
a² = 45
a ~ 6.7

The length of the side of the pyramid is 2a so about 13.2 meters (or 43 feet for the Americans among you). That's roughly the length of three cars. Honestly, that's tiny. Maybe rethink your numbers, because they don't work out.

Talakeal
2021-09-24, 03:23 PM
Are you sure your numbers are correct? You estimated 3-6 rounds of combat for a fight that should take about 20% of party resources. But you estimate less than a round for a group that still takesmore than half of that amount of resources. That sounds incongruous to me. Did you maybe mean <10% (less than 10%) instead of >10% (more than 10%)?



That does not fit the description of what happened previously in that building. Quote from the infiltration attempt in the previous session:



You can cover 15 meters in about 20 steps. That takes a few seconds. You simply can't lead anyone in a minutes-long chase in that confined of an area, especially if they know the layout and thus know exactly how to cut you off. There also wouldn't be enough room for numerous patrols to be around. You've certainly implied that this place is much larger than that.

In fact, I did a quick calculation; assuming the door is in the middle of a wall, and the place is a square (it's a pyramid, it probably is):

The underlying formula is a² + b² = c²
The walls are equal length, and the door halfs that for one side, so b = 2a
The distance from the door to the far corner (the furthest point form the door) is 15 meters, so c= 15

a² + (2a)² = 15²
a² + 4a² = 225
5a² = 225
a² = 45
a ~ 6.7

The length of the side of the pyramid is 2a so about 13.2 meters (or 43 feet for the Americans among you). That's roughly the length of three cars. Honestly, that's tiny. Maybe rethink your numbers, because they don't work out.

The interior of the top floor of the pyramid is 9x12 meters, but consists of numerous dimply lit corridors. There were four guards patrolling the inside, plus the two door guards who followed Krystal inside and the few reinforcements who arrived later. She can teleport and turn invisible, and was able to evade them for several minutes before being cornered.

But yes, I did mean less than 10%.


Although my tactically-inept signature academia mage would agree with you that summons are best used at the start of (or before) a fight, I do not.

Granted, that's because I'm making certain assumptions… or, rather, *not* making those assumptions. Because I don't know your system.

If summons are "encounter" powers, using them first is likely good. If they're "daily" powers (or your system uses mana), you might not want to use them at all this encounter.

If character X can summon monster A, that points to early use. But if, instead, character X can summon one of [A,B,C…], that serve very different roles, that favors waiting to see which role is most needed.

If summons are easily "countered" (a Mass Dismissal spell, fireball, whatever), and especially if multiple people in your party have summons, it can be better to wait / stagger the summons, to find / destroy / limit the action economy usefulness of such counters.

Some systems, some summons, some battles, the summons get crushed far too easily early on, but are devastating once the enemy forces are otherwise engaged.

Many systems, something summoned at "the start of the assault on the pyramid" would not still be around at "the boss fight against the poisoner, where we really need it", or "the escape from the archdeacon pumpkin head, where we really need it".

But… at the *fiction* layer, I've never really seen a Summoner who summons things for no reason being tactically sound.

Each of the players can only summon a single thing. If the battle is serious enough to warrant using a spell, there is no reason not to do so as early as possible under ordinary circcumstances.


I put the question to a few of the more left wing people I know, and the consensus is that you didn't really do anything wrong. My advise would be to apologize for your part in the miscommunication, and to ask him to stop telling people you raped his character.

Everyone whom I have talked to has given a similar response.

I posed the same question on rpg.net and received a lifetime ban, not for violating any rule, but because even asking the question demonstrated that I was a “bad fit” for their community.

Have I mentioned how much I love the community here at giantitp recently? :smallsmile:


@
This mission is worse than impossible: it's possible in an illogical way. Showing your players how badly they need to approach the problem in order to win… almost certainly isn't the answer. Suppose I wrote a program and you said that it was impossible to make it work. If i showed you that, no, if you wear your pants on your head, and periodically shout "Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo", it works just fine, would that fill you with confidence in my programming ability?

This baffles me.

If I was presented with a mission of “rescue a hostage from enemy territory” my first thought would be to get in and out as fast as possible and drawing as little attentin to myself as possible.

To me, nothing in this scenario seems counter intuitive, let alone random and arbitrary like your examples.

Could you please show me specifically why it is so very counter intuitive or how you would have approached it?

zlefin
2021-09-24, 07:47 PM
It seems to me like the core problem is that you're not designing to the table. You're not planning encounters for players of their competence level/tactical ability. You're planning for much smarter players.

I'd also ask your players just how 'clear' it is to them that their steampunk tank really is that tough, especially in a world full of strange magic and fantastic beasts.

In that denver swat team case you mentioned, I bet that if they were more willing to use lethal force they'd have been quite able to stop it.

Lord Raziere
2021-09-24, 07:48 PM
Everyone whom I have talked to has given a similar response.

I posed the same question on rpg.net and received a lifetime ban, not for violating any rule, but because even asking the question demonstrated that I was a “bad fit” for their community.

Have I mentioned how much I love the community here at giantitp recently? :smallsmile:


Oh trust me, I know that feel.

All I did was get involved with DnD discussion on there, expressed something that was slightly less than nice and they banned me for the same reason.

Talakeal
2021-09-25, 12:10 AM
It seems to me like the core problem is that you're not designing to the table. You're not planning encounters for players of their competence level/tactical ability. You're planning for much smarter players.

I wouldn't say not smart enough, sometimes they do very clever things and have outsmarted me on more than one occasion.

Its more like single minded; once they have decided on a course of action they refuse to modify it or even consider switching tactics.


I'd also ask your players just how 'clear' it is to them that their steampunk tank really is that tough, especially in a world full of strange magic and fantastic beasts.

Maybe so.

It is certainly not invulnerable; but it is going to take said magic or fantastic beasts to take it down without a lot of prep-work.


In that Denver swat team case you mentioned, I bet that if they were more willing to use lethal force they'd have been quite able to stop it.

Reading the wikipedia article (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_Heemeyer), it appears that they tried numerous weapons, including guns, grenades, and explosives in attempts to both disable the vehicle and kill the driver to no effect. It is rumored that the governor was considering calling in the national guard to deploy anti-tank missiles when the bulldozer became stuck in a basement and made it unnecessary.

Quertus
2021-09-25, 12:19 AM
Have I mentioned how much I love the community here at giantitp recently? :smallsmile:

This is so right! The Playground is just so awesome! :smallbiggrin:


This baffles me.

If I was presented with a mission of “rescue a hostage from enemy territory” my first thought would be to get in and out as fast as possible and drawing as little attentin to myself as possible.

To me, nothing in this scenario seems counter intuitive, let alone random and arbitrary like your examples.

Could you please show me specifically why it is so very counter intuitive or how you would have approached it?

Well, in part, it *should* baffle you, because part of my statement was made in ignorance.

In part, it *will* baffle you, because it's one of those "put the sniper on overwatch" things.

And in part, it *shouldn't* baffle you, because, as I already said, even *knowing* the mechanics, by RAW, the gathering guards should overpower the party on round 750 when they exit the pyramid.

Ignorance first: you're absolutely right, things like "using earth bending to tunnel under and into the pyramid" is a great plan, and it's your good for… not being a railroad GM, and allowing such solutions. And my bad for either being too shell shocked to put it forward, or for not trusting you to accept it.

That said, a short combat seemed to take the wind out of the PCs / deplete their mana, so I'm… struggling to gauge just how much they can accomplish.

Afaict, they've got a whole slaver city of unknown disposition to search, some finite number of rewinds (which… aren't instantaneous, and, thus, aren't guaranteed), and an unknown timeframe.

Also, unknown enemy capabilities… but their detection powers, at least, quickly seem reasonably high.

The terrain is… uh… "death trap"? Might die just trying to get *to* the city; escape with pursuit sounds impossible.



… gah. Last time I tried to build a big "if then" flowchart, I had my post scrubbed into meaninglessness, so I'll not bother trying that again. Instead, I'll just hit a few random highlights.

At T=0(iteration 1), the party doesn't even know what kind of reception they'll get - IC, simply showing up might get them killed / enslaved. So they have to "scout it out" in a way that doesn't risk their ability to rewind time - ie, pretty much exactly what they did.

Based on knowledge of the mechanics of the encounter, they cannot let anyone sound the alarm until after they're out of the pyramid. *Or* they need to leave a sufficient force topside to eat the endless pez dispenser of guards (ie, sufficient ranged attacks, with infinite ammo - summons, maybe?).

"Creating a distraction" might have helped. Or it might have put the guards on alert, increasing their arrival rate. Or it might have caused the enemy to put the city on lockdown, or to start killing all foreigners. Alien mindset, remember.

The best plan I had in that scenario was "invisibility" the Earth Bender, drive the tank up to the pyramid, have the Earth Bender pop out the bottom and bend their way into the pyramid, pull a Toph to avoid guards / find the target, grab the target, and escape unseen while the entire rest of the party (sans chronomancer, who is preparing a rewind inside the tank) is keeping the guards distracted.

How? Well, they didn't have the foresight to bring slaves to trade/sell, and most questions should probably be asked elsewhere, so… *maybe* they can say that they were told to speak to the poisoner? Or, *if* they understood the mechanics, the time displaced demon could be asking to speak to pumpkin bread… although that itself might trigger the alarms.

If they don't know the mechanics of the encounter, they have to plan for the possibility that there's a barracks / guard post, or even a retired old Archmagi's house, nearby, and in X rounds after the alarm sounds, they'll be overrun.

And they know that, last time, the city put out so many defenders, the tank was being overrun. So *not* aggroing the city seems the smart move… except that Diplomacy at the pyramid also seems to auto-fail.

Even with a chronomancer, there's just too many unknowns (for anyone who isn't the GM) to make a working plan. Especially when the GM is themselves one of those unknowns. Does the GM grok "sniper"? Does the GM grok "Toph"? Does the GM grok "scouting"? The GM believes in alien mindsets - how do these creatures think? Is it worth aggroing this city/nation just to please the current patron? Would we be better off selling our patron out to the slavers? Maybe even get them to hand over the target as your payment for helping them defeat said patron, thus preserving your reputation as the ever-victorious company.

Would any of that work? Depends on the specifics of the scenario, that aren't visible to the players.

Thus, impossible. For the players.

So… what tests could the players have performed to determine the likely outcome of Diplomacy vs bluff vs trade vs "clear the outer defenses" vs "clear the pyramid" then fight their way out vs split the party (sniper on overwatch) vs Toph vs Talakeal buff vs set the city on fire vs ram the pyramid vs illusion "everything's fine" -> no alarm vs assassinate archbishop pumpkin bread vs assassinate the poisoner (does he live in the pyramid?) vs impersonate the poisoner vs impersonate pumpkin bread vs bribe the guards vs betraying their patron vs…?

EDIT: oh, and if the target *hadn't* been locked up in a pyramid, my plan was to "assassinate" the target, Romeo and Juliet style. Retrieve and revive their body after it is disposed, no hard feelings. *Might* even work with the target in the pyramid, with the application of enough Toph… except that her keeper is known as "the poisoner".

Talakeal
2021-09-25, 12:11 PM
@Quertus:

It seems like most of the unknown's there could be solved with simple investigation or just breaking character and asking the DM how the mechanics work to make sure there isn't a disconnect with the narrative.

But it also seems like a lot of this seems less like the scenario itself is actually counter intuitive and more like the PCs can't be sure that it isn't.

As the old saying goes, you can't disprove a negative. Just because the PCs can't be assured that the GM doesn't have some nasty surprise in their pocket doesn't mean they need to react to the scenario as if they did; reasonable precautions and trust in a reasonable GM should be enough.


EDIT: oh, and if the target *hadn't* been locked up in a pyramid, my plan was to "assassinate" the target, Romeo and Juliet style. Retrieve and revive their body after it is disposed, no hard feelings. *Might* even work with the target in the pyramid, with the application of enough Toph… except that her keeper is known as "the poisoner".

I love that plan!

Although finding someone who can bring back the dead is a lot easier said than done.

Talakeal
2021-09-26, 11:18 AM
So, I tried my experiment of of switching sides and having one of my players run the encounter and I ran the PCs.

First, Quincy is absolutely useless here. An unarmored sniper with a big loud gun is a terrible fit for a low-key close quarters mission, and I couldn't think of any plan where he wasn't a liability. I ended up wasting a bunch of spells to silence his gun, only to have the enemies focus fire on him and knocked him out in one round. Given that Quincy's player was the one who lost his temper and called the scenario impossible in the first place, I can see where he was coming from and owe him an apology. The fact that the first time around he fell in a hole without any rope or light source compounded this.

I was able to kill the guards and the poisoner and search the entire floor without losing any PCs or using consumables. So I think it is safe to say that it is doable.

However, the player who was running it had the boggart fill the pyramid with a bunch of summoned monsters to slow me down and then teleported the prisoner off site, which meant that the scenario was functionally impossible, and by the time I realized this, it was too late to make my escape without breaking into the consumables. IMO this only proves that a if the GM is not going to adhere to the monster's motivations that they can turn a challenging scenario into an impossible one; in this case the poisoner needed the boggart's help with his operation, and instead the boggart got him killed and made his operation a failure, so neither of them got what they wanted out of the scenario any more than the PCs did.

In short, I think this scenario was possible, but a bit too hard, and I probably should have waited a few sessions for the players to have bit more experience (both in and out of character) under their belt first.

Xervous
2021-09-27, 07:59 AM
Oh trust me, I know that feel.

All I did was get involved with DnD discussion on there, expressed something that was slightly less than nice and they banned me for the same reason.

One google search of “rpg net ban” told me all I need to know. A place best Left alone it seems.

Talakeal
2021-09-27, 11:10 AM
First half of a short session:

August 1113

Valentine, still curious about the lost city, decides to pay a visit to her informant. She finds her in a hovel in the outskirts of town, where there are no casinos or plantations to protect and the street gangs are the only rule of law. She is a thin young woman, with pale pock-marked skin and faded pink hair. Her real name is Terra, but she goes by Tatters.

She tells them that she had read about the lost city on the southern shores of the misty sea in the local paper three or four years ago when the Templar raided it after discovering that slavers were using it as a base of operations, and felt that the two might be connected. Kim is incensed, after everything she had to go through to find the city that it was now public knowledge.

Kim goes to track down the paper by reading the archives in a local library, but can't find the story, and when she goes to the paper's offices to talk to the author finds that nobody has any memory of the story, let alone who wrote it.

Quincy, recognizing the signs of drug addiction in Tatters, asks her if she can point him to a local pharmacist, and when she nods in the affirmative he pays a visit to the dealer and spends most of the wages from the last mission on muscle relaxers to calm his nerves.

In conversation, Tatters mentions that her home was destroyed in Umbriel's raid on Golgotha the previous year. Feur is not around to press the matter.

Kim and Valentine go to ask some of the local Templar if they know anything about those who raided the nameless city, and are greeted by Sir Jakul and two of his comrades. He removes his helmet, kisses their hands, and supposes they are the hunters he asked for. Without missing a beat, Valentine says that they are.

They are told that a family of Questing Beasts has been raiding livestock near the Juju place, and the Templar Lord of Golgotha, Asmon Delacuer, has prohibited any of his men from hunting them, for he cannot waste their time or their lives on tests of valor, for everyone will be needed when the political stalemate finally breaks and open war comes to Golgotha. They would like to make mantles of them quickly, before their lord hires a third party to dispose of the animals. So, they would like the mercenaries to track down and slay the questing beasts and return with their pelts.

Valentine asks many questions about their quarry and the Templar say that their inexperience doesn't instill them with a lot of confidence, and they apologize and tell them that their hunt-master Quincy is currently taking some R&R and that they will instead direct their questions to him.

Upon reuniting with Quincy, he tells them that Questing Beasts, commonly called owl-bears, are huge predatory monotremes, or egg laying mammals, which live in temperate woodlands. Anani adds that Templar often hunt them for sport, because of something The Emperor allegedly said about knowing he was ready to be a Templar once he had dispatched one in single combat.

The group resupplies and heads north, to the outskirts of the Juju Place, a supposedly haunted forest between the badlands and the heartlands. Quincy is able to track the creatures by their spoor, they are not stealthy, and eventually the group finds their lair; a mated pair with their juvenile cub.

Kim quickly constructs a palisade from timber and sandbags, hoping to get it complete before they are noticed. She manages to create a crude barricade about a meter high, with curving sides and two entrances that are broad enough for a human to pass through but which should stop the larger beasts. She planned on fully enclosing it, but the wind shifts and the Questing Beasts catch their scent before she has a chance.


The shaggy monsters are roughly the size and shape of bears, but with large feathered heads and long hooked beaks. They bound toward the group, and Krystal and Quincy both take shots, wounding the mother and cub respectively.

Krystal immediately hides, and Feur and Kim move to lure the male and the cub into the narrow gap in the barricade.

The female chases Quincy, although he is able to mount his horse and keep his distance for a while. Eventually it is able to tackle him, toppling the horse and injuring it badly, but the marksman is able to expertly roll to his feet and avoid not only being injured, but isn't even slowed down.

Meanwhile, Feur and Kim keep the other pair's attention while Krystal darts out and strikes at them. Once they begin to tear down the barricade, Anani summons up a cloud of stinking miasma in the gap, causing them to choke and scratch at their eyes. They are quickly dispatched while stunned, the cub finished by a strong jab from Feur that fractures the center of its skull, and the male by having Kim's meteor hammer dropped on the back of its head.

The mother turns from the wounded horse and regards Anani with intelligent eyes, almost as if it can sense that she is the source of the supernatural mist. It turns upon her, leaping over the barricade and mauling her savagely before being put down by Quincy's rifle.

Feur does his best to stabilize Anani while Quincy skins the Questing Beasts. He searches the area for a nest, hoping to find an egg to try raising, but has no luck.

Upon returning the pelts to the Templar, they are overjoyed. They are disappointed to find that none of the hunters are experienced furriers, but still pay them far above market value for the hides.

Kim takes the opportunity to ask them about the raids on the nameless city, and is told that they know nothing about them. The Templar haven't really been active in that region since the cathedral of Athena at Parthenon was abandoned, the Holy Templar there choosing to give up the ground rather than risk their libraries being put to the torch. The only thing he could think of would be if some high profile target had been captured and a secret foray being made into Warlord territory to get them back.

That evening they take a trip to Sammy Whin's caravan to procure an elixir to help Anani with her recovery.

While they are negotiating, the desiccated merchant mentions that he would be willing to give them a discount if they could do a small favor for him the next time they have some free time.

He doesn't want to trouble them with the nature of the mission until they are ready to take it on, and Kim insists that they are free now. So Sam tells them that a small octopus like creature escaped from one of his bowls and stole a magic charm before wandering off into the desert. He doesn't think it will survive, but without its bowl it will begin to grow rapidly and it might hurt someone, and if it dies with the charm then it could attract a lot of unwanted attention.

Quincy asks how he is supposed to track something digging through the open dunes, and Sam tells them that if they don't have the means, he can sell them a locating scroll at a good price. Krystal reads the runes on the scroll, and the sensitive members of the party can feel a winding rope of energy leading them out into the desert.

Once they reach its end, they find it descends below them, and they begin to dig into the sand, when six long leathery tentacles burst forth and grapple them. Even Valentine is unable to take flight in time, and finds her ankles tightly grasped. Quincy cannot bring the long barrel of his rifle to bear, especially not while keeping his horse from panicking, and Kim finds that her blunt weapon does almost nothing to the rubbery flesh. Feur is the only one who is able to grapple with the tentacle and avoid being held, but he lacks the means to injure it.

Krystal slips free from her prison and begins slicing at the tentacles, and when she draws the creature's attention, its long squid-like beak emerges from the sand and she impales it with her magical blade, causing the creature's desiccated flesh to burst with magical light, leaving nothing but hollow gray skin which blows away in the desert wind.

They are able to dig up a small golden charm in the shape of a duck, and Anani senses powerful necromantic magic emanating from it. They return it to Whin, and Kim asks what it is, and the old man pats her on the head and tells her it is a simple charm for good fortune and long life. He then climbs about his tortoise Jorge, thanks them politely, and continues on his way.

Back in Golgotha, there is a message waiting for Anani at the embassy; the Fabled Motherlode, one of the town's smaller casinos, has been robbed and they would like her to consult on the case.

Quertus
2021-09-27, 11:51 AM
Y'know, trying to get into the details of this, I can't help but feel some parallels to my own struggles trying to get new-school modern players to actually investigate / engage the fiction.


@Quertus:

It seems like most of the unknowns there could be solved with simple investigation

They did perform simple investigation. But I still wouldn't know from your description of events which path(s) might or might not work.

That's why I asked you specifically what "tests they could perform" (ie, what specific investigation steps they could take) to get back meaningful information with which to answer for themselves the question of "what letter is the GM thinking?". (Where "what letter is the GM thinking" = "which one way of handling which one path is actually the promised 'balanced encounter', rather than obvious suicide?".)

Do note that they failed to guess which letter you were thinking. Twice.

How do you plan to make "which letter am i guessing" a fun, solvable minigame for your players?

Alternately, show me how you already followed the Rule of Three, and point to the 3 things you've already said, any of which should let me answer for myself, say, whether ramming the tank into the side of the pyramid would work to give the guards 0-1 rounds to gather before the party floors it, target acquired.


or just breaking character and asking the DM how the mechanics work to make sure there isn't a disconnect with the narrative..

You'd answer such questions? Do they know this?


But it also seems like a lot of this seems less like the scenario itself is actually counter intuitive and more like the PCs can't be sure that it isn't.

As the old saying goes, you can't disprove a negative. Just because the PCs can't be assured that the GM doesn't have some nasty surprise in their pocket doesn't mean they need to react to the scenario as if they did; reasonable precautions and trust in a reasonable GM should be enough..

Um… yeah, it really is counter-initiative that… hold on…


A city that overran them in an alternate timeline…

With multiple ways of penetrating their best stealth…

And magic and demons of their own…

Would respond to a small force creating a homicidal disturbance in the middle of town…

With nothing more than a "pez dispenser" response.

It is also counterintuitive that…


After raising the alarms…

When planning to enter a teleport-warded fort with but a single entrance…

Especially given the "guard arrival" mechanics of "one a round" (with only the first few rounds preceding that with a "maybe")…

But known sufficient forces to overrun them…

That there could be a successful response that doesn't involve minimizing the number of guards waiting for them when they leave.

Then there's things that just aren't intuitive, like the pez dispenser or that aggroing a group with that much power without destroying them could ever be a good idea, or aren't intuitive *to me*, like how your magic system works.


I love that plan!

Although finding someone who can bring back the dead is a lot easier said than done.

Obviously, I need to add "Romeo and Juliet" to the list of things that you don't grok. The original "death" was faked. No resurrection required. But likely to fail with someone named "the poisoner" being the jailor.

Besides, if it had been an option, they could presumably have used the Resurrection plan in your "failure" timeline.

-----

(I'm going to use "strategy" and "tactics" interchangeably in this section, because I'm not actually sure which I'm taking about, and, barring a more thorough investigation, it doesn't matter)

There's a… competitive board game one of my groups plays, where every single dominant strategy in use is one I've introduced. Yes, I'm good at that kind of thing. Yet, even so, there's plenty of things I don't grok, including things that leave my friends confused by my "RPG military strategies". They've eventually moved from "it must be clever beyond my ability to understand" to "Quertus must just be crazy". As with most things, the truth lies somewhere in-between.

Point is, regardless of which group has bad strategy (my personal guess at this point is, both you and your players are terrible at strategy), y'all have very *different* ideas about strategy. So it's a game of "guess what letter the GM is thinking", unless you can turn "understanding Talakeal's strategic view of the game" into a playable minigame.

Also… the "consumes 20% of the party's resources" encounter was, functionally, a TPK. In the most hilarious fashion, where the entire campaign world died, and was replaced with one where the party failed differently. In a way that the players had no agency over. Which is a separate issue. And then got berated for. Which is a separate issue.

So, when the players guess wrong what letter the GM had chosen (and, recall, the things that you said were bad strategy, I rebutted with a brilliant "are not!" - IMO, they *did* make mistakes, but *not* the ones you called them on), they will fail spectacularly.

That's "too hard".

And… that's a lot of variance there between "20% resource expenditure" and "world ended". Have you considered trying to build scenarios where the wrong answer isn't quite so different from the right answer? Where is 20% vs 30% resources spent, instead of 20% vs TPK+? Where it really is just a matter of "having built the wrong game for your 'completionist' players", where they are *maybe* just highly frustrated while *maybe* being Incentivized to recognize and learn from their "mistakes", rather than suffering a complete failure completely at random whenever they guess wrong?

-----

You don't need to have someone run the scenario for you - you should be perfectly capable of running it for yourself. Or, heck, just handing me the math, and I'll write a program to run it a thousand times, and tell you the results.

-----

Moving up a level here, there's an issue of you promising "sporting" encounters, and the party failing at them.

When they engage the rules layer, as with the Avatar of Hate, you get upset with them. When they claim that the fiction layer is impossible, you insist is possible at the rules layer.

They can't win!

Your setup discourages them from engaging. You should work, instead, to encourage them to engage.

This is one reason why I told you to just hand them the rules. This gives them something to engage with!

Have you noticed how many posters have gotten frustrated with asking you questions, and never feeling like they're getting the answer they need? I can only assume that your players feel the same way, that they're deincentivized from asking you questions.

Not that there's ever much point to getting defensive, but there's definitely no point here, as it doesn't matter. If your players feel this way, you either have to change the way that they feel, or build a game that accommodates the way they subsequently approach the game. Either of which involves changing you (the only thing you can directly change (sadly)). Which is why I wanted you to just hand them information that the playground had already vetted as useful.

You didn't go that route.

So, how do you plan to get your players to engage the fiction and/or mechanics layer (choose one or both, and stick with it) meaningfully, in order to successfully complete missions? How are you going to get your players - who clearly have a different concept of tactics than you do - to not only guess what letter you're thinking, but furthermore use it to form a valid Talakeal Scrabble word?

I already gave you my solution-slash-test, and you didn't take it.

What's your plan?

Talakeal
2021-09-27, 12:56 PM
Y'know, trying to get into the details of this, I can't help but feel some parallels to my own struggles trying to get new-school modern players to actually investigate / engage the fiction.

They did perform simple investigation. But I still wouldn't know from your description of events which path(s) might or might not work.

That's why I asked you specifically what "tests they could perform" (ie, what specific investigation steps they could take) to get back meaningful information with which to answer for themselves the question of "what letter is the GM thinking?". (Where "what letter is the GM thinking" = "which one way of handling which one path is actually the promised 'balanced encounter', rather than obvious suicide?".)

Do note that they failed to guess which letter you were thinking. Twice.

How do you plan to make "which letter am i guessing" a fun, solvable minigame for your players?

Alternately, show me how you already followed the Rule of Three, and point to the 3 things you've already said, any of which should let me answer for myself, say, whether ramming the tank into the side of the pyramid would work to give the guards 0-1 rounds to gather before the party floors it, target acquired.

Do note though, that neither was a case of "guessing what the GM was thinking".

The first case was trying to solo an encounter that the GM has flat out told them was balanced for six players.

The second was simply making some really dumb tactical mistakes combined with having one PC who is really poorly suited for this type of mission.


How do you plan to make "which letter am i guessing" a fun, solvable minigame for your players?

You can't.

Or, more accurately, break character and ask the GM if your assumptions are correct, because I would never intentionally put the PCs into that situation.

One problem with my group is that not only do the players not ask me questions about their assumptions, they don't share their assumptions with one another. Even something as simple as "Could you please flank these guys for me?" is more discussion than they normally engage in. So even if one of the players has correctly "guessed what the GM is thinking" the other five are still in the dark.


You'd answer such questions? Do they know this?

Yes.

Generally if something is a "spoiler" I ask them if they are really sure first, and if they say yes I will answer it.

Remember though, that they do not trust me. For example, they insist that the avatar of violence scenario was caused because, even though I told them OOC what the gimmick was, they assumed that I was iplaying word games with them and tried to do the opposite.


Um… yeah, it really is counter-initiative that… hold on…


A city that overran them in an alternate timeline…

With multiple ways of penetrating their best stealth…

And magic and demons of their own…

Would respond to a small force creating a homicidal disturbance in the middle of town…

With nothing more than a "pez dispenser" response.

What is this "multiple ways of penetrating their best stealth"? They have zero ways of penetrating stealth. They can occasionally beat the rogue on a stealth test if she rolls really bad, but then again so can any random yokel fresh off the turnip truck. Do you mean that the one guy's mount was able to smell that something unfamiliar was nearby but unable to tell what or where?

The city didn't overrun anyone in the alternate timeline; one person tried to do the mission solo and was taking on six guards at a time and two more reinforcements eventually showed up.

They do have magic and demons of their own, although far less than the party itself does.

But yeah, IMO it is absolutely unrealistic to expect an organized response within 5 minutes of a surprise attack in a setting without radios or for local guards who see / hear their comrades under attack to not try and help at all.



After raising the alarms…

When planning to enter a teleport-warded fort with but a single entrance…

Especially given the "guard arrival" mechanics of "one a round" (with only the first few rounds preceding that with a "maybe")…

But known sufficient forces to overrun them…

That there could be a successful response that doesn't involve minimizing the number of guards waiting for them when they leave.

Define "first few rounds". Because 20 rounds in an EXTREMELY long combat.

But we seem to be in agreement here, which further confuses me. Yes, the idea is absolutely to minimize the number of guards waiting for them.


Obviously, I need to add "Romeo and Juliet" to the list of things that you don't grok. The original "death" was faked. No resurrection required. But likely to fail with someone named "the poisoner" being the jailor.

Besides, if it had been an option, they could presumably have used the Resurrection plan in your "failure" timeline.

Oh, I misunderstood which part of Romeo and Juliet you were referring to.

Yeah, she was already in an alchemically induced coma, that plan would absolutely not have worked without some amazing circumstances.



Point is, regardless of which group has bad strategy (my personal guess at this point is, both you and your players are terrible at strategy), y'all have very *different* ideas about strategy. So it's a game of "guess what letter the GM is thinking", unless you can turn "understanding Talakeal's strategic view of the game" into a playable minigame.

Would you say the same thing about chess?

Because once the mistakes are on the tactical level, that's more or less the same issue.

And there is a world of difference, imo, between setting up a puzzle with an arbitrary answer and trying to figure out your opponent's strategy in a tactical battle game.



Also… the "consumes 20% of the party's resources" encounter was, functionally, a TPK. In the most hilarious fashion, where the entire campaign world died, and was replaced with one where the party failed differently. In a way that the players had no agency over. Which is a separate issue. And then got berated for. Which is a separate issue.


Ok, serious question. Do you really believe this or is this hyperbole?

Because every part of this seems to be using intentionally disingenuous wording.

First off, a given encounter is 20% resource expenditure and will never ever risk a TPK. The mission as a whole, which consists of 3-6 such encounters, might overwhelm the party through attrition.

It was not functionally a TPK. The party was never in a position where they couldn't escape. Although Quincy did demand that the entire party suicide despite Feur being the only one who was actually in danger of death.

A god resetting the world to a previous state off screen could be argued to be technically a TPK, but not effectively. And I don't think anyone would ever claim as much in good faith, like for example in the first episode of Loki no Avengers fans are morning the off-screen deaths of the entire Avengers team off screen through no fault of their own when that reality was pruned because, even though it technically happened, it was not shown and in the reality we are shown they are all still alive and well (except for those who died in End Game, but that's a different story).

Does anything I wrote actually read like "berating" to you?

Further, you said you run sand-box games almost exclusively. Do you really not have anything important happening in your world beyond the immediate scope of the players?


And… that's a lot of variance there between "20% resource expenditure" and "world ended". Have you considered trying to build scenarios where the wrong answer isn't quite so different from the right answer? Where is 20% vs 30% resources spent, instead of 20% vs TPK+? Where it really is just a matter of "having built the wrong game for your 'completionist' players", where they are *maybe* just highly frustrated while *maybe* being Incentivized to recognize and learn from their "mistakes", rather than suffering a complete failure completely at random whenever they guess wrong?

No idea how to make an idiot proof scenario.



Moving up a level here, there's an issue of you promising "sporting" encounters, and the party failing at them.

Is there?

This is a game. Is being able to lose actually a problem for a game?

I certainly wouldn't want to play a game with god-mode on. And I doubt the vast majority of gamers would either.



When they engage the rules layer, as with the Avatar of Hate, you get upset with them. When they claim that the fiction layer is impossible, you insist is possible at the rules layer.

They can't win!

This may be a Quertus specific complaint.

I put this in the same category as drown-healing and commoner-railguns. I think most people just shake their heads and laugh when their players try such things. I don't think this is regarded as a no-win situation.



Have you noticed how many posters have gotten frustrated with asking you questions, and never feeling like they're getting the answer they need? I can only assume that your players feel the same way, that they're de-incentivized from asking you questions.

That's unfortunate. It may be true, but it takes two people to communicate, and they could try asking better questions rather than just getting mad and withdrawing.

Like, my parents often ask questions like "Have you eaten today" when what they mean is "Do you want to get dinner?" and then screaming and yelling when I answer the question they actually asked rather than the one they meant to ask.

It seems like once they know I take them literally it would be easier for them to just ask what they mean rather than making me play "guess what the GM is thinking".


I already gave you my solution-slash-test, and you didn't take it.

Which test was this again?


What's your plan?

Ok, so here's the thing.

The players only fail a mission once every ~2 years.

To me, that is perfectly acceptable.

When my players are calm and rational, they say it is acceptable to (infact they tell me they want a much higher rate of failure!)

So are you saying that the issue is that they can fail? Because I could solve that, I just don't want to.

My issue is that when they fail, they immediately start acting out; suiciding their characters, screaming, swearing, throwing models, calling names, insisting the scenario was impossible, accusing me of lying to them or tricking them, etc.

Satinavian
2021-09-27, 01:49 PM
The players only fail a mission once every ~2 years.

To me, that is perfectly acceptable.
With your new campaign journal and you having started over with a new group after a long time, we can actually track it this time around. So far, 4 sessions - one failed missions, two successful ones. Let's see if this becomes an outlier or a pattern before the campaign ends/is abandoned.

Talakeal
2021-09-27, 02:17 PM
With your new campaign journal and you having started over with a new group after a long time, we can actually track it this time around. So far, 4 sessions - one failed missions, two successful ones. Let's see if this becomes an outlier or a pattern before the campaign ends/is abandoned.

It depends on what metrics you use; but I have been keeping track for the last five or so campaigns, and have found overall success rate to be 93%. Most of those are early on in the game though.

Based on past metrics, I expect this game to last a year or two, have ~20 missions. During that time for them to fail 1-2 missions and lose 1-2 PCs, but I wouldn't be terribly surprised with a failure rate of 3-4 missions or a death rate of zero.

Of course, this current group's habit of declaring a mission impossible and suiciding their characters when things look bad might also skew things a bit against them.

Squire Doodad
2021-09-28, 12:39 AM
Ok, so here's the thing.

The players only fail a mission once every ~2 years.

To me, that is perfectly acceptable.

When my players are calm and rational, they say it is acceptable to (infact they tell me they want a much higher rate of failure!)

It's been mentioned before, but there's arguably more merit to looking at how many games were mostly enjoyable.
Not every campaign will be a big hit, but pure pass/fail ratios are not the best indicator.

So far, it sounds like you had a few good rounds, an iffy campaign that led to this current scenario, and then the pyramid was a fiasco. So far...not terrible, honestly, particularly given what you've mentioned in the past.

Talakeal
2021-09-28, 12:11 PM
It's been mentioned before, but there's arguably more merit to looking at how many games were mostly enjoyable.
Not every campaign will be a big hit, but pure pass/fail ratios are not the best indicator.

So far, it sounds like you had a few good rounds, an iffy campaign that led to this current scenario, and then the pyramid was a fiasco. So far...not terrible, honestly, particularly given what you've mentioned in the past.

The problem is that I have several players who get really upset when they lose, and though the losses are rare, that still means you are going to have any given player having a meltdown every ~5 sessions and the whole group having a meltdown every ~20 sessions, which tends to eclipse the whole rest of the campaign (especially when you consider that with 5 players the individual meltdowns happen more or less every time).

Batcathat
2021-09-28, 12:15 PM
The problem is that I have several players who get really upset when they lose, and though the losses are rare, that still means you are going to have any given player having a meltdown every ~5 sessions and the whole group having a meltdown every ~20 sessions, which tends to eclipse the whole rest of the campaign (especially when you consider that with 5 players the individual meltdowns happen more or less every time).

I know you've been told this already but I can't quite comprehend why you keep playing with people like that. It's like saying that my car is good, except every fifth drive it breaks down and every twentieth drive it explodes.

Quertus
2021-09-28, 01:50 PM
@Talakeal: we have a lot to discuss!

You've done a much better job understanding me than I could have hoped at some parts; in others, there's clearly a huge disconnect (often because I've completely misunderstood you, or the scenario).

Which is great, because there's not much grey area.

First things first: the PCs didn't know pumpkin's personality and script, so "impossible from the players' PoV" was 100% proven by the test you ran. "What's in your notes" is irrelevant to what the players know, perceive, and can plan around. Leaving secret loophole weaknesses in their otherwise impregnable defences only counts if the PCs learn them.

From my vantage, I think that the gunslinger isn't a poor fit for this one mission, I think he's just an underpowered character in general. In this mission, however, sniping silenced from high ground? He may actually be the *best* suited in the party for eating the endless pez.

I really don't know how to get you to differentiate between "information" and "assumptions". So… what would have happened had the PCs' plan been to ram the tank through the pyramid wall, grab the target, and floor it? Because I don't have enough information to evaluate that strategy.

More to the point, what facts did you use to come to your conclusion? How could the PCs have obtained those facts, to evaluate for themselves how to approach the problem / whether that was the approach they'd prefer to try?

What facts did you use to evaluate and choose your "running firefight extraction" plan? What could the PCs have done to obtain those facts?

You may have noticed, I'm rather "creative" - I came up with *lots* of possible approaches to the problem of "retrieve the target from slaver city". IME, most players cannot (or do not) come up with let alone evaluate that many different plans. IIRC, your players have not evidenced much ability/tendency to evaluate multiple strategies (although their dealings with the Avatar of Hate were… creative…).

Actually, this mission had, in a way, the same problem as the Avatar of Hate: you expected them to grab and run; they, being completionists, were aiming to actually clear your supposedly balanced encounter. So, were I to issue you advice moving forward, it's to never build a scenario where the PCs *have* to run from an "incomplete" encounter when GMing for this group. Where it will be *easier* if they do? Sure. In fact, I encourage that. Once they've already won, and are back at base celebrating a job well done, ask them why they didn't just leave after X. Repeat this pattern enough, of victories that could have been even easier, and they might learn to behave the way that you keep predicting and requiring. Some year. Maybe. But don't hold your breath.

And, again, to hammer this point home, I came up with lots of plans. IMO, from what I knew, all of them were "impossible". Choosing which of the "cannot possibly work" plans Talakeal thinks will work is the "guess what letter the GM is thinking" game. Implementing that plan successfully is forming a valid Talakeal Scrabble word using that letter.

Your comments about organized response being unrealistic in a society without radios? There's a reason societies like that often has gongs, whistles, telepaths, flares, smoke bombs, explosives, lights/mirrors, things that can be set on fire, messengers, messenger beasts, or other means of quickly getting centralized and/or large AoE attention. And creating a diversion? That pretty well serves as a replacement to the above, guaranteeing that the guards are on alert, and killing the chances of diplomatic attempts to obtain the target / maneuver the guards / gather intel (which, note, your group attempted).

20 round may be an extremely long combat, but it's an extremely short "search the pyramid". Iirc, the Demon led the guards on a chase for minutes - that's 10s of rounds right there. And don't forget the pumpkin head poisoner boss fight, plus however long they dither discussing how to carry the target, whether to loot the bodies / room, whether to bring the bodies, whether to release the rest of the prisoners, etc. By your mechanics, literally thousands if not tens of thousands of guards could have concerned on the pyramid by the time many of my groups were done debating. (OK, fine, your group has the opposite problem. Good for them. They could maybe actually clear your encounter.)

-----

There's a lot more, but let's start there.

Also… actually… in a hypothetical scenario, Quertus (my signature academia mage for whom this account is named) was intrigued by the Federation's transporters, and their transhumanist disregard for life, where they would kill their crew, and recreate a facsimile of them at the destination. I hold a not dissimilar view, where, yes, your examples involve lots of death. I know it's not a common stance, but, yes, it is my take on things, that they suffered a TPK.

Talakeal
2021-09-28, 03:14 PM
@Quertus: Were you being sarcastic about running a computer simulation of an encounter? Because that idea kind of boggles my mind, even things as simple as positioning and targeting boggle my mind, let alone spell effects and similar variables.


I know you've been told this already but I can't quite comprehend why you keep playing with people like that. It's like saying that my car is good, except every fifth drive it breaks down and every twentieth drive it explodes.

Partly it is because it is really hard to find players, especially players who will let you GM or who will play a system that isn't D&D, let alone homebrew.

But its also because I am used to that sort of environment; I have been playing with some of these people for decades, and my group is a lot better than some of I have been in in the past; and they are certainly less temperamental than playing board games with my family, my WoW guild, or even the guys at the local Games Workshop store.



From my vantage, I think that the gunslinger isn't a poor fit for this one mission, I think he's just an underpowered character in general. In this mission, however, sniping silenced from high ground? He may actually be the *best* suited in the party for eating the endless pez.

Technically, he isn't really a gunslinger, more of a sharpshooter.

He is a fine character if he can just sit across the battlefield plonking away at enemies from horseback; but any job that involves stealth or close quarters is going to be tough for him.

Lack of armor, lack of melee, and skills sunk into horsemanship are all big liabilities in a dungeon.

In this particular case, I couldn't think of a way that would allow him to attack, remain undetected, and escape that wouldn't eat up more of his companion's mana than it was worth, especially not using the same approach they did.




I really don't know how to get you to differentiate between "information" and "assumptions". So… what would have happened had the PCs' plan been to ram the tank through the pyramid wall, grab the target, and floor it? Because I don't have enough information to evaluate that strategy.

Ask.

In this case, if anyone with knowledge of architecture or engineering looked at the pyramid, I would tell them that the grade is too steep and the juggernaut too heavy, and the likely result would be it crashing through and becoming stuck in one of the lower levels.



What facts did you use to evaluate and choose your "running firefight extraction" plan? What could the PCs have done to obtain those facts?

And, again, to hammer this point home, I came up with lots of plans. IMO, from what I knew, all of them were "impossible". Choosing which of the "cannot possibly work" plans Talakeal thinks will work is the "guess what letter the GM is thinking" game. Implementing that plan successfully is forming a valid Talakeal Scrabble word using that letter.


They did everything they could to ascertain what they needed to know; it took a while but they really did their homework this time.

What baffles me is how they disprove a negative, i.e. the "how do we know they don't have X, Y, or Z?" or how that doesn't apply to every scenario.



Actually, this mission had, in a way, the same problem as the Avatar of Hate: you expected them to grab and run; they, being completionists, were aiming to actually clear your supposedly balanced encounter. So, were I to issue you advice moving forward, it's to never build a scenario where the PCs *have* to run from an "incomplete" encounter when GMing for this group. Where it will be *easier* if they do? Sure. In fact, I encourage that. Once they've already won, and are back at base celebrating a job well done, ask them why they didn't just leave after X. Repeat this pattern enough, of victories that could have been even easier, and they might learn to behave the way that you keep predicting and requiring. Some year. Maybe. But don't hold your breath.

Pretty much, yeah.

Any encounter they can't win by hitting the bad guy as hard as they can until it stops moving gives them a lot of trouble.

Reinforcements, hit and run, regenerating enemies, hostages, mind controlled enemies, self buffing enemies, things which are immune to their weapons, all are frequent sources of horror stories; I don't use them often, but when I do my players invariably get tripped up.



Your comments about organized response being unrealistic in a society without radios? There's a reason societies like that often has gongs, whistles, telepaths, flares, smoke bombs, explosives, lights/mirrors, things that can be set on fire, messengers, messenger beasts, or other means of quickly getting centralized and/or large AoE attention. And creating a diversion? That pretty well serves as a replacement to the above, guaranteeing that the guards are on alert, and killing the chances of diplomatic attempts to obtain the target / maneuver the guards / gather intel (which, note, your group attempted).

Ok, but how do they know that they need to get to the pyramid? Or how fast and with what forces?

The thing is, you (and apparently my players) have it in their head that the NPC's goal is to kill the PCs when it actually was to protect the poisoner until he finishes his operation. Teleporting Ashley away and having the poisoner rush outside and start attacking are completely counter-productive from an RP perspective.

I agree that creating a diversion, atleast publicly, is best done after recon / diplomancy is done.




20 round may be an extremely long combat, but it's an extremely short "search the pyramid". Iirc, the Demon led the guards on a chase for minutes - that's 10s of rounds right there. And don't forget the pumpkin head poisoner boss fight, plus however long they dither discussing how to carry the target, whether to loot the bodies / room, whether to bring the bodies, whether to release the rest of the prisoners, etc. By your mechanics, literally thousands if not tens of thousands of guards could have concerned on the pyramid by the time many of my groups were done debating. (OK, fine, your group has the opposite problem. Good for them. They could maybe actually clear your encounter.)

Yeah, sending Krystal in alone was a doomed plan from the start. Totally agree with you. All she was doing was treading water while the reinforcements had time to gather. Still; she almost made it, did a lot better than what I would have said.

But they know the alarm has been raised and reinforcements are coming; if you still spend thousands or rounds debating that is really on you imo.



Also… actually… in a hypothetical scenario, Quertus (my signature academia mage for whom this account is named) was intrigued by the Federation's transporters, and their transhumanist disregard for life, where they would kill their crew, and recreate a facsimile of them at the destination. I hold a not dissimilar view, where, yes, your examples involve lots of death. I know it's not a common stance, but, yes, it is my take on things, that they suffered a TPK.

Ok, sure. But I don't think it would be fair to call a session of the Star Trek RPG a TPK just because they used the transporter to get down to the planet.

Batcathat
2021-09-28, 03:38 PM
But its also because I am used to that sort of environment; I have been playing with some of these people for decades, and my group is a lot better than some of I have been in in the past; and they are certainly less temperamental than playing board games with my family, my WoW guild, or even the guys at the local Games Workshop store.

You've mentioned that before and it continues to baffle me. Any group being like yours is sort of shocking but I'm not really surprised that such groups do exist (even if I'm lucky enough to have never been in one anywhere close to it) but a majority being like that or worse? I have a fairly dim view of humanity in general but that's just sad. At least my experience seem a lot more common than yours, even if that obviously doesn't make it any better for you.

Lord Raziere
2021-09-28, 04:39 PM
Ok, sure. But I don't think it would be fair to call a session of the Star Trek RPG a TPK just because they used the transporter to get down to the planet.

Daily Reminder that this is why you use the warping space explanation for teleporters and not the particle deconstruction thing that leads to existentialist dread and horror.

icefractal
2021-09-28, 05:29 PM
It's only creepy if you believe in persistent consciousness - so I guess the Federation doesn't. :smalltongue:

Edit: But then if they don't, why do people ever die on away missions? Just keep their data saved and restore from it necessary. Not too unusual for a fictional setting to have an inconsistency though. :smallwink:

Jakinbandw
2021-09-28, 06:02 PM
It's only creepy if you believe in persistent consciousness - so I guess the Federation doesn't. :smalltongue:

Edit: But then if they don't, why do people ever die on away missions? Just keep their data saved and restore from it necessary. Not too unusual for a fictional setting to have an inconsistency though. :smallwink:

In a bunch of TOS novels I read there was no deconstruction reconstruction. The particles that made a person were turned into waves and picked up by the transporter. In the show they even talked on screen about stabilizing the waveform.

Morgaln
2021-09-29, 04:01 AM
It's only creepy if you believe in persistent consciousness - so I guess the Federation doesn't. :smalltongue:

Edit: But then if they don't, why do people ever die on away missions? Just keep their data saved and restore from it necessary. Not too unusual for a fictional setting to have an inconsistency though. :smallwink:

It wouldn't be quite as inconsistent if there weren't episodes where just that is done to fix the problem of the week; usually one caused by a transporter malfunction in the first place, but still...



Technically, he isn't really a gunslinger, more of a sharpshooter.

He is a fine character if he can just sit across the battlefield plonking away at enemies from horseback; but any job that involves stealth or close quarters is going to be tough for him.

Lack of armor, lack of melee, and skills sunk into horsemanship are all big liabilities in a dungeon.

In this particular case, I couldn't think of a way that would allow him to attack, remain undetected, and escape that wouldn't eat up more of his companion's mana than it was worth, especially not using the same approach they did.


What's the tech level on the sharpshooter's gun? How far away could he be from the enemy? Even WW1 snipers could reliably hit targets at a distance of several hundred meters (i.e. the enemy trench); more modern rifles can hit targets over a mile away. Your sharpshooter might not even need to enter the city, but find a vantage point outside. Even better, find several and switch locations after a few rounds so the enemy can't triangulate their position.
That's why Quertus said the sharpshooter might be the most suited to that situation; he can pick off reinforcements at low to no risk to himself, especially if the enemy is not familiar with guns.

Also, why does a sharpshooter of all people lack stealth? Hiding to wait for a good shot is part of what he's supposed to do. It feels like both you and the player are treating a sniper more like a gunslinger from a cowboy movie.

patchyman
2021-09-29, 09:52 AM
I really want to try having one of my players run me through the same scenario this weekend to see how it goes and troubleshoot it, but its hard to do without, again, looking like I am trying to prove myself the superior gamer and rub their failures in their face. The only problem with this, and it is one I am not quite sure how to handle, is how seriously the players take the encounter.

I don't see why you say I would not have been able to complete it, what gives you that impression?



Seriously, don’t do this. It is worse than useless, it is actively detrimental.

Of course you are going to blow through this scenario! You have perfect knowledge of what the city’s defenses are! You have the benefit of having thought about what you would do for two weeks! You have the benefit of knowing what WON’T work since the players have given you two examples of failed attempts.

Also, as a single player, you have the benefit of greater coordination that the party could ever have.

Talakeal
2021-09-29, 11:53 AM
Seriously, don’t do this. It is worse than useless, it is actively detrimental.

Of course you are going to blow through this scenario! You have perfect knowledge of what the city’s defenses are! You have the benefit of having thought about what you would do for two weeks! You have the benefit of knowing what WON’T work since the players have given you two examples of failed attempts.

Also, as a single player, you have the benefit of greater coordination that the party could ever have.

Well, I already ran it, and I disagree. I think it proved to me that it wasn't "impossible" but at the same time showed me how it was more difficult than intended and why the players were frustrated with it.

Note that the players already had two weeks to think about it as the previous session they had done all of the intelligence gathering, then tried soloing the scenario, and then rewound time to let them have a do over with the full time.

I also used the exact same approach that the party did; as I agree that simply doing something else using my superior knowledge wouldn't prove anything. As a rule, I always balance encounters assuming a direct approach as 90% of the time that is what the party will use.


I am not quite sure I agree with the idea that a single player is better than a time. I hear it often, but I have trouble believing that communication is so bad in the average group that it completely undoes all of the advantages of having five people working together to come up with and analyze solutions and to notice things. I actually started a thread about this a few months ago.

But yeah, if the group's communication really is that bad, then they really need to work on their teamwork; which doesn't actually do anything to disprove the premise that the scenario isn't impossible the players are just making tactical mistakes.



What's the tech level on the sharpshooter's gun? How far away could he be from the enemy? Even WW1 snipers could reliably hit targets at a distance of several hundred meters (i.e. the enemy trench); more modern rifles can hit targets over a mile away. Your sharpshooter might not even need to enter the city, but find a vantage point outside. Even better, find several and switch locations after a few rounds so the enemy can't triangulate their position.
That's why Quertus said the sharpshooter might be the most suited to that situation; he can pick off reinforcements at low to no risk to himself, especially if the enemy is not familiar with guns.

Also, why does a sharpshooter of all people lack stealth? Hiding to wait for a good shot is part of what he's supposed to do. It feels like both you and the player are treating a sniper more like a gunslinger from a cowboy movie.

Old west.

Those long range shots are seldom made under battlefield conditions, they are generally made against stationary targets. And there have only been ~10 recorded kills at ranges of over a mile in human history, hardly reliable.

The problem with that strategy is finding clear lines of fire and then managing his escape afterward. If they had, say, put him up on a cliff face, he would have been able to shoot the reinforcements; but he would have been suffering a range penalty and been completely unable to assist with anyone inside the pyramid, and they further would have had to come up with a plan to retreive him afterwards. It wouldn't have been a bad strategy, but it was one with some drawbacks and at the end of the day it wasn't the one that the party went with.


The character is built as a cavalry soldier, and his backstory is that he was a dragoon in the military. He isn't really a sniper or gunslinger, rather he is built to "kite" enemies at long range. Which is a fine build (although I would personally give him some sort of armor and backup close combat weapon), just one that is far better on open battlefields than in undercover urban missions.



Daily Reminder that this is why you use the warping space explanation for teleporters and not the particle deconstruction thing that leads to existentialist dread and horror.

I do use the warped space explanation in my personal setting.

But the horror is still present as PC's minds can be copied through other means; some of them naturally occurring due to the nature of reality and time travel.

Mordar
2021-09-29, 12:31 PM
Also, why does a sharpshooter of all people lack stealth? Hiding to wait for a good shot is part of what he's supposed to do. It feels like both you and the player are treating a sniper more like a gunslinger from a cowboy movie.

I'd say sharpshooter /= sniper...at least, it doesn't have to mean sniper.

@ Talakeal:

One of the things I believe I saw was you saying the defenses of the city were not set...that you establish them somewhat post hoc. If that is the case, even if it is to respond to the PCs plans to make them possible, I really recommend you don't. Clearly establish the parameters of the guards, the patrols routes and schedules, how they respond to issues, the obstacles, etc. Allow the PCs a chance to learn that through observation. Hold to what you established and do not have the parameters change. Give the PCs the opportunity to exploit the weaknesses and use those patterns against the defenders. It feels more fair, it provides a more even field, and gives them satisfaction if their plan works.

- M

Talakeal
2021-09-29, 01:47 PM
One of the things I believe I saw was you saying the defenses of the city were not set...that you establish them somewhat post hoc. If that is the case, even if it is to respond to the PCs plans to make them possible, I really recommend you don't. Clearly establish the parameters of the guards, the patrols routes and schedules, how they respond to issues, the obstacles, etc. Allow the PCs a chance to learn that through observation. Hold to what you established and do not have the parameters change. Give the PCs the opportunity to exploit the weaknesses and use those patterns against the defenders. It feels more fair, it provides a more even field, and gives them satisfaction if their plan works.

Mapping out an entire city would take a long freaking time; way more work than I am willing to put into a single encounter.

But no, the defenses of the pyramid were not host-hoc or built to counter the PCs.

There were three guards outside, four guards inside.

There were random guards throughout the city, and each turn I gave the closest one a roll to take notice of the pyramid. (cumulative 5% modified by how much noise the PCs were making.)

This was written down long before the PCs were even aware of the mission.

If the players had taken an indirect approach or done something dramatic to modify the chance of guards being able to notice / respond to them, I would have taken that into account.

Mordar
2021-09-29, 08:09 PM
Mapping out an entire city would take a long freaking time; way more work than I am willing to put into a single encounter.

But no, the defenses of the pyramid were not host-hoc or built to counter the PCs.

There were three guards outside, four guards inside.

There were random guards throughout the city, and each turn I gave the closest one a roll to take notice of the pyramid. (cumulative 5% modified by how much noise the PCs were making.)

This was written down long before the PCs were even aware of the mission.

If the players had taken an indirect approach or done something dramatic to modify the chance of guards being able to notice / respond to them, I would have taken that into account.

Certainly didn't mean mapping the city to any great degree...just things like identifying the guard houses, where and how they patrol, gates/gate guards, response time to respond to issues. Greater detail in the relevant area (call it 3 or 4 blocks). Would take no more than 10 minutes to sketch out and explain to the players...if they attempt to learn the information.

My immediate thought would have been arranging a distraction in some part of the city to draw off attention...but only if I have evidence it would work. Regardless, I would certainly "case" the place first, and that only works if the defenses are arranged ahead of time and demonstrably consistent.

That's the kind of simplistic information/plan that works for a "heist" in a non-heist game like D&D or analogues. Next time there is a tactical challenge, be sure you've built it reasonably and then give the players incentive/chance to see how it works before they have to engage it.

- M

Quertus
2021-10-03, 02:04 PM
Two things for now:

1) Talakeal, try looking at it this way: your players are tactical geniuses who did everything right based on the information they had. Now, try and figure out how you can change the campaign (sadly, the only thing you can change, unless you have access to Mindrape IRL) such that they get different information.

2) I asked my Evil overlord mandated 5-year-old advisor substitutes about this puzzle. Their responses were… interesting. Despite having no concept of the group's capabilities, they suggested…

Scout out the bugs. Learn how they patrol, how they think.

They're slavers? So they like slaves? Find someone we don't like, enslave them, and trade them for the hostage.

… how important is the hostage? Consider trading myself for the hostage (kudos to the future Paladin!!!).

Can we get a lot of <potions> to <Polymorph> them (into "real" bugs)?

Are they affected by <pheromones>? Can we control / manipulate them that way?

Sneak in, at night, silently assassinate anyone necessary, sneak target out. (Not unlike the demon solo plan)

(If only we had something like) a giant cannon, to launch a <giant hollow sphere> into the pyramid, <magic> the target inside somehow… and then get the sphere out (series of inventive exit strategies). (When they found out about the "tank", they liked it)

Talakeal
2021-10-06, 10:48 PM
Had another session this weekend. It went ok, short and simple. From a combat balance perspective it was a walk in the park for the PCs (although they still decided it was hopeless at one point and wanted to give up).

Very frustrating session for me though, as it was one of those analysis paralysis situations where the players spent six hours coming up with workable plans and then dismissing them for one reason or another, until everyone (mostly me) was very bored and frustrated.

Will post a full write-up in the next day or two.


Two things for now:

1) Talakeal, try looking at it this way: your players are tactical geniuses who did everything right based on the information they had. Now, try and figure out how you can change the campaign (sadly, the only thing you can change, unless you have access to Mindrape IRL) such that they get different information.

2) I asked my Evil overlord mandated 5-year-old advisor substitutes about this puzzle. Their responses were… interesting. Despite having no concept of the group's capabilities, they suggested…

Scout out the bugs. Learn how they patrol, how they think.

They're slavers? So they like slaves? Find someone we don't like, enslave them, and trade them for the hostage.

… how important is the hostage? Consider trading myself for the hostage (kudos to the future Paladin!!!).

Can we get a lot of <potions> to <Polymorph> them (into "real" bugs)?

Are they affected by <pheromones>? Can we control / manipulate them that way?

Sneak in, at night, silently assassinate anyone necessary, sneak target out. (Not unlike the demon solo plan)

(If only we had something like) a giant cannon, to launch a <giant hollow sphere> into the pyramid, <magic> the target inside somehow… and then get the sphere out (series of inventive exit strategies). (When they found out about the "tank", they liked it)

Some of those might work, others less well.

The problem with the hostage is (possible spoilers for my game, but at this point w/e) that they need someone who is both of royal blood and also a potent sorcerer to awaken the undead army. The poisoner knows this, as do his masters, so he is unlikely to exchange her for another slave unless the PCs can somehow make him an offer he can't refuse.

Pauly
2021-10-07, 02:54 AM
Had another session this weekend. It went ok, short and simple. From a combat balance perspective it was a walk in the park for the PCs (although they still decided it was hopeless at one point and wanted to give up).

Very frustrating session for me though, as it was one of those analysis paralysis situations where the players spent six hours coming up with workable plans and then dismissing them for one reason or another, until everyone (mostly me) was very bored and frustrated.

Will post a full write-up in the next day or two.

.

Considering their last venture ended in total disaster because they did insufficient planning, they are doing exactly what you’ve trained them to do.

Talakeal
2021-10-07, 03:27 AM
Considering their last venture ended in total disaster because they did insufficient planning, they are doing exactly what you’ve trained them to do.

Actually, no. I thought they did pretty decent planning last session. They did a lot of reconnaissance and discussed their strategy before hand; their mistakes were mostly on a tactical round to round level.

Honestly, IMO the problems with this group is more about following through on their preparation rather than a lack of preparation in the first place. They either reject perfectly good plans over and over, as they did this session, or simply abandon the plan once the action starts.

On a more fundamental level, yes, I agree, over-reaction to failure and assuming that the failure was intentional on the DM's part is very much in keeping with my players.

Morgaln
2021-10-07, 04:12 AM
Actually, no. I thought they did pretty decent planning last session. They did a lot of reconnaissance and discussed their strategy before hand; their mistakes were mostly on a tactical round to round level.

Honestly, IMO the problems with this group is more about following through on their preparation rather than a lack of preparation in the first place. They either reject perfectly good plans over and over, as they did this session, or simply abandon the plan once the action starts.

On a more fundamental level, yes, I agree, over-reaction to failure and assuming that the failure was intentional on the DM's part is very much in keeping with my players.

On what grounds do they usually reject their plans? Do they think the plans are not good enough? How do they react when someone points out a flaw in a plan? Do they discard the plan outright or do they try to modify the plan to take the flaw into account? How often do you take advantage of flaws in their plans and will you point that out afterwards?

As for abandoning the plan, that sounds like you're missing someone who will coordinate the group during the action, and the players on their own are not willing and/or able to view their actions as part of the greater team effort. Not much you can do there, unless one of the players steps up and assumes that role.

Quertus
2021-10-07, 08:09 AM
Had another session this weekend. It went ok, short and simple. From a combat balance perspective it was a walk in the park for the PCs (although they still decided it was hopeless at one point and wanted to give up).

Very frustrating session for me though, as it was one of those analysis paralysis situations where the players spent six hours coming up with workable plans and then dismissing them for one reason or another, until everyone (mostly me) was very bored and frustrated.

Will post a full write-up in the next day or two.



Some of those might work, others less well.

The problem with the hostage is (possible spoilers for my game, but at this point w/e) that they need someone who is both of royal blood and also a potent sorcerer to awaken the undead army. The poisoner knows this, as do his masters, so he is unlikely to exchange her for another slave unless the PCs can somehow make him an offer he can't refuse.


Considering their last venture ended in total disaster because they did insufficient planning, they are doing exactly what you’ve trained them to do.


Actually, no. I thought they did pretty decent planning last session. They did a lot of reconnaissance and discussed their strategy before hand; their mistakes were mostly on a tactical round to round level.

Honestly, IMO the problems with this group is more about following through on their preparation rather than a lack of preparation in the first place. They either reject perfectly good plans over and over, as they did this session, or simply abandon the plan once the action starts.

On a more fundamental level, yes, I agree, over-reaction to failure and assuming that the failure was intentional on the DM's part is very much in keeping with my players.

Again, hand them the rules during the planning phase, treat combat like a war game, and see if this behavior goes away.

Wait a minute - you play war games, don't you? Are they like this there, too?

Also, I'll reiterate the "boxed text", better by the Playground and read by someone else.

Lastly… how did they even know / suspect that the orphan hostage was nobility, to value her so?

EDIT: I don't think that that's "analysis paralysis", so much as… "trained behavior".

Talakeal
2021-10-07, 04:54 PM
On what grounds do they usually reject their plans? Do they think the plans are not good enough? How do they react when someone points out a flaw in a plan? Do they discard the plan outright or do they try to modify the plan to take the flaw into account? How often do you take advantage of flaws in their plans and will you point that out afterwards?

Most of the time they simply propose a plan, agree it would work, but then rather than implementing it immediately start brainstorming further plans and then forget about it entirely. Repeat for several hours until everyone (mostly me) is bored and frustrated.

If I point out a flaw in their plan they erupt at me for criticizing them and then discard the plan entirely.


As for abandoning the plan, that sounds like you're missing someone who will coordinate the group during the action, and the players on their own are not willing and/or able to view their actions as part of the greater team effort. Not much you can do there, unless one of the players steps up and assumes that role.

Absolutely. Nobody wants to play a leadership role in or out of character.

In fact, they always take an NPC cohort to handle the "party leader / party face" roll because none of them want to do it but they feel "entitled" to the buffs such a character would provide.

I am not really sure if they quite grok the connection though; they insist it is super boring to "sit in the back singing" not realizing that leader type characters should be doing a lot OOC to coordinate the party.


Lastly… how did they even know / suspect that the orphan hostage was nobility, to value her so?

I don't know precisely, it wasn't really relevant to the scenario. They have been studying the pyramid for ~70 years and have been scanning all the slaves that came through the markets. Maybe blood testing, maybe aura reading, maybe tasting pheremones, maybe divination, maybe consulting with spirits; the exact method wasn't really important and not something the PCs were likely to discover.



EDIT: I don't think that that's "analysis paralysis", so much as… "trained behavior".

I just don't see it.

They succeed at the vast majority of missions without any sort of planning at all. And the ~7% of missions they do fail are rarely failed because of lack of planning. I mean, yeah, you could say they have serious loss aversion issues, but that's like saying that blackjack players are "trained" to stand on a 12 when the dealer has a ten showing because sometimes they go bust.

The problem is almost never lack of planning, but rather a lack of communication and follow through on the turn to turn level.

Take for example the Avatar of Violence encounter. They had a perfectly workable plan there; send someone in to grab the artifact while the rest of the party distracted the avatar, have them run, then use haste spells to move the rest of the party out of the room and have the mage seal the door. Would have worked great (assuming passable dice rolls). But then Bob decided to cast a DoT on the avatar that would assure it would split because he "forgot the plan" and then Sara attacked the avatar with the artifact rather than running because "I was obviously playing word games OOC and trying to trick them", and turned the whole operation into a TPK poop-show.



Wait a minute - you play war games, don't you? Are they like this there, too?

Depends on what you mean by "like this".

Brian is the only war-game player in the group, and he tends to act out significantly more often in war-games. I have seen Bob and Johnny have more than their fair share of meltdowns when play video games however.

Quertus
2021-10-08, 04:34 PM
Depends on what you mean by "like this".

Brian is the only war-game player in the group, and he tends to act out significantly more often in war-games. I have seen Bob and Johnny have more than their fair share of meltdowns when play video games however.

No no no, not the meltdowns. The "analysis paralysis", the "oops, I forgot the plan", the three stooges of teamwork - are they like that?

Does Brian spend 45 minutes planning his turn, throwing away dozens of strategies that would have won, then lose because, despite picking a workable plan, be forgot to set his sniper on overwatch?

Do Bob and Johnny… well, same question, actually. :smalltongue:

Myself, I enjoy planning things out. And tend to prefer games with save/load features for when my senile mind forgets to follow the plan (or I have an "Oh, that's why…" moment). Dang, I sound like your players now. :smallredface:

But even so, I don't think I've ever come anything close to the behaviors you've described from your players when I've played an RPG.

So I'm wondering how they do playing other games.

Talakeal
2021-10-08, 05:15 PM
Ok, so here is the next part.

Back in Golgotha, there is a message waiting for Anani at the embassy; the Fabled Motherlode, one of the town's smaller casinos, has been robbed and they would like her to consult on the case.

The casino is not one of the largest in Golgotha, but nor is it a small seedy gambling den. It is adorned in red velvet and edged in faux gold. As the group enters, the concierge immediately pulls Krystal aside, separating her from the group and leading her to the high-rollers room as a small man takes her measurements.

In the center of the hall a large, apparently empty, fish tank stands, people crowding around it, betting slips gripped tight in their hands, as they watch a shark being lowered in. The creature swims around for a moment, confused and disoriented, before a long razor sharp tendril shoots out of the sediment and slices its fin, filling the tank with blood. The shark turns upon its attacker, and pulls an enormous worm from its hiding place. People cheer and hiss, and after a few moments the shark is slain and the gigantic worm begins to feed; those who wagered upon the worm’s victory collect their rewards.

Kim wonders how they got a shark here all the way from the ocean, and Quincy tells her it’s a bull shark, and that they are known to live in rivers. Kim jokingly mentions that she will rethink swimming in the future, and Quincy tells her that was nothing compared to the giant lungfish they encountered in the Nameless City.

There is a moment of silence as the group awkwardly reconciles their differing memories, when they are approached by the floor manager, a woman named Collette. She escorts Anani and Valentine to the back room, and hands the other three small stacks of chips to play with while they wait.

The vault is behind the cashier’s counter. A security guard sits on a stool with a clear view of the vault door and the cashiers. There is an empty hallway all around the vault. The vault is about ten feet across, made from foot thick concrete with a cold-iron mesh within. The door is solid iron, with two keys which must be turned together and a combination lock. The interior has smaller safes containing coins, ledgers, letters of credit, as well as miscellaneous valuable objects which customers have anted to the house to cover their bets. Once a month, the temple of Hermes sends a junior miracle worker named Laike by to ward it against spells.

Every hour, the floor manager and the security chief open the vault and put winnings inside. Twice a day, at dawn and dusk, an armed guard escorts the profits to the bank.

A week ago, everything was normal at the five AM deposit, but when they came to remove the riches at dawn, they found several of the safes had been opened and emptied of gold and letters of credit. That days ledgers were also missing.

They had a thorough investigation conducted by several detectives, but turned up nothing amiss. They concluded that witch-craft was at hand, and decided to bring in the emissary of the arch-mage Thanatos in as a consultant.

Valentine interviews the staff, while Anani investigates the vault.

Valentine does not turn up anything amiss. She doesn’t think anyone is lying. She talks to the head of casino security, an old man with a white crewcut named Quarken, who verifies the story she has already heard. He tells her that he personally interrogated the security guard who let it happen on his watch, and his story didn’t change under duress. He doesn’t believe the man new anything about the job, but still let him go for his incompetence.

All keys are accounted for.

Anani investigates the room with her supernatural senses. She finds that the wards are intact and nothing within has been subjected to a spell.

They call in Kim to inspect the area. She analyzes the materials of the vault and finds them as described, concrete over an iron grating on all six sides and an iron door. She speaks to the stone, and it tells her that a “little fish swam right through it,” but there is no indication of any sort of damage.

Next they bring in Feur; who rewinds his senses to the night of the robbery. Looking into the past, he sees what appears to be a common garter snake slither directly though the wall of the vault and then transform into a humanoid figure. They are wearing leather strips that cover all exposed skin, and are either a slender man or bulky woman. They pick the lock on several of the safes, and then shovel the contents into a leather pouch that appears too small to hold them before fading from sight.

Quincy is unable to find anything out of place, so he leaves to get a smoke and they finally decide to bring Krystal in, against the hotel staff’s objections.

They find her in the high roller’s room; she is wearing an expensive backless black evening gown and holding a mostly empty bottle of aged brandy, obviously gifts from the house. She is peeking out from behind a fortress of chips which she has assembled to shield her increasingly broken poker face from the other players. She is reluctant to go, and when Anani promises her that if will be even more fun, Krystal thinks she is being hit upon and goes with her.

The devil-girl is only allowed in the vault accompanied by several security guards as well as the house detective. She tries several times to get into the vault from the outside, and each time is rebuffed by the wards and barely catches herself before running face first into the wall. She then asks to borrow a pin and attempts to pick the locks; she is unable to penetrate the vault door and pronounces it satisfactory, but the smaller safes inside are easy pickings and she says that such cheap junk makes them easy marks.

Unsure of how to proceed with the investigation here, they ask around the local area for anyone fitting the burglar’s description with no luck. Likewise, when it comes to rivals or people who might have a grudge against the casino, the number is too great to count.

Lacking leads, they decide to call it a night, and the next day they visit Decker the Gun Runner and provide him a hefty bribe for any info. He tells them he will get back to them, and the following evening informs them that the Kelly Street Gang has recently purchased a plantation house on the edge of town and has been hiring Black Scar Mercenaries to defend it; that is either someone who came into a lot of dirty money without any idea of how to keep a low profile, or else the party is about to stick their noses in something way over their heads. Either way, the time frame matches up and that is their best lead.

They approach the plantation just after dusk. It is surrounded by three meter adobe walls, and the clean armored figures of Black Scar mercenaries can be seen walking it. Kim finds a small trench to the rear and shores it up with some sandbags, and then they signal their approach by letting Quincy take out one of the guards.

The mercenaries immediately sound the alarm and scramble for defensive positions. When she sees her opportunity, Kim charges forward and attempts to summon up a might earthquake to knock the walls down, but someone within the manor counters her spell, and the shaking does little more than knock the guards from their feet. Still, this gives Krystal time to move forward, teleport atop the wall, and sneak up behind them, Black Flame Blade in hand.

Her mana depleted, Kim runs back to cover, and a few of the heavy steel quarrels of the Black Scar crossbows penetrate her armor.

Quincy spends the next few minutes trading shots with them as the Kelly Street boys climb onto the walls and contribute to the fight with hurled daggers, Molotov cocktails, and a few small caliber pistols. Their sorcerer also casts a spell to reinforce the wall, rendering the adobe strong enough to stop bullets cold.

Kim calls out to the group to retreat, but Anani feels a sudden premonition of doom and gives an inspiring sermon urging her comrades to press on.

Feur and Anani move forward; she summons a shade inside the walls and he reads from the scroll of aeons, unleashing the blight of years upon his foes and causing them to drop dead from old age. At the same time, Krystal moves behind enemy lines, silently slitting one throat after another.

Their sorcerer unleashes a deadly fireball upon the party’s position, hoping to force them out of cover. It works for Kim and Quincy, but Valentine is too slow. She is badly burned and the force of the blast slams her face into the dirt and knocks her unconscious.

Anani finishes off the last of the mercenaries with a blood ritual, stealing their life forces to heal the few wounds she has suffered.

Krystal attempts to sneak up on the mage, but his mystical senses warn him at the last minute and he uses the last of his mana to set her on fire. Her demonic flesh is resistant to heat, and she isn’t badly wounded, but she delays for a moment to douse the flames. He attempts to take a crossbow from one of the fallen guards, but stumbles and falls from the wall. Feur rushes forward and attempts to subdue him, but he manages to get away, and after a few seconds hesitation Quincy decides to put him down with a bullet to the back.

Once Anani has finished tending to Valentine’s wounds, they track down the mage and she does her best to save his life.

Under interrogation, he identifies himself a Hraijian. When asked about his name, he says that he was named after his father, a longshoreman from the barbarian lands of Aureth whom his sailor mother had a dalliance with but whom he never met.

He tells them that he was a member of the Kelly Street gang for most of his short life, and a few years ago he began to develop strange powers after smoking indulcet, a drug which the Putrid Flag used to sell before being wiped out by the Templar. They did their best to teach him to control his powers, and he has been using them at the gang’s behest for years.

He admits to the casino job, and tells them that he stood in the back alley, disguised himself; cast a difficult phase spell to walk through the wall, then a short term metamorphosis spell to move through the cold iron bars. He had previously enchanted his pouch to be larger on the inside, stuffed what he could inside, and then cast an invisibility spell. When the vault was opened, he simply slipped out in the panic.

This was similar to what the party thought, although Kim assumed he used a Body of Earth spell rather than phasing to bypass the walls. The party offers to let him off the hook if he joins them, and Hraijian agrees.

He doesn’t know how the other gang members got the information on the casino’s security; he wasn’t the one who cased it and he doesn’t plan on ever going back to find out.

The plantation’s adobe walls conceal a large square patch with three fields of recreational crops, a well, a bunkhouse, and a manor house. The remaining members of the Kelly Street Gang, as well as the slaves who worked the fields, have had the life stolen from them by Anani’s shade. They find most of the stolen goods.

The group decides to keep the plantation for themselves as their new base of operations.

They turn the bodies of the Kelly Street Gang over to the sheriff and return to the casino with the agreed upon 60% of what was stolen.

They give a full report on how the heist was carried out, although they tell them that the magus was amongst the dead. They suggest the casino improve their security by having a finer mesh of iron or, if that is too expensive, several alternating layers. They should get better interior locks, make sure the doors to the sensitive areas are doubled up, to be opened one at a time with a narrow chamber between, and suggest putting several bead curtains in vital hallways, preferably ones that make lots of noise when walked through. This won’t prevent entrance per se, but it will certainly reduce crook’s ability to escape.

Kim tells them that she can set up a true magical alarm system, but doing so would be inordinately tricky and the casino declines the excessive cost.

A few days later, Sir Jakul is able to arrange a short meeting between the Templar Lord of Golgotha, Asmon Delaceur, and Feur. The Templar Lord is a powerfully built man who must be in his mid-nineties; although he doesn’t look his age. He tells Feur that the Lady Umbriel has not attacked Golgotha, and indeed the lands of the far west are almost a fairytale to the people of the Badlands. Still, he commends Feur’s people for holding out as long as they have, and promises to share any information he hears about Umbriel’s agents in the area if Feur will extend him the same courtesy.

He doesn’t know about the red and black armored knights, but will look into it. He identifies one of their heraldries as belonging to the house of Andrew Sure-Strike, who was head of the Imperial Guard during the Masarian Revolution, exiled along with those loyal to him after choosing to massacre civilians in Masaria rather than return home to fight off the Warlords in the wake of the Cataclysm.

When the group tells Tatters that the attack never happened, she dismisses them, and when shown the area where her house once stood, she insists someone must have rebuilt over the area. Feur casts a spell upon her and finds that she, much like Kim, is an artifact from a collapsed timeline.

Kim speculates that whoever these mysterious warriors are, they might be abducting people from alternate worlds to bring them together for something important. Krystal scoffs that she thinks so highly of herself, and Kim says that she doesn’t mean the people are innately special, but perhaps those they will do something vital at some point in the future.

Regardless, they decide to invite Tatters to stay in the bunkhouse at their new plantation, and begin looking for their next job.

Overall it was pretty average. I meant it to be a quick, simple, straightforward mission without a lot of challenge.

The problem was that, as with anything that resembles an investigation, the PCs fell to analysis paralysis; coming up with many working plans but not actually following through with any of them.

They also kept ham-stringing themselves by trying to overthink their plans in a sort of Roy at the Oracle manner; overly wording their divination spells to try and prevent me from playing word games (which I have told them I don't do) and lawyering themselves out of the information they actually need, and when performing social investigations rather than simply asking around for clues, they ask "Have any of the local shopkeepers seen a man dressed head to toe in strips of brown cloth", and then when these very specific avenues don't yield any results, they get frustrated and declare the puzzle impossible.

Eventually after stretching a fifteen minute seen into four hours I broke character and started just telling them which of their plans they should go with. It made them mad, but it did get the game moving.

Then, during combat, Kim blew all her mana on one big spell, and when it was countered Brian got mad and gave up, as usual. He declared the mission impossible and had Valentine order a retreat. OOC I knew that retreating would turn an easy encounter into a very dangerous one, so I had Anani receive a message from her patron telling her that this was a very bad idea. And then they wiped the floor with the enemies.

So yeah, not a terrible session, but a very long and uneventful one where I had to resort to more handholding than I would like to keep it from turning into a true horror story.



No no no, not the meltdowns. The "analysis paralysis", the "oops, I forgot the plan", the three stooges of teamwork - are they like that?

Does Brian spend 45 minutes planning his turn, throwing away dozens of strategies that would have won, then lose because, despite picking a workable plan, be forgot to set his sniper on overwatch?

Do Bob and Johnny… well, same question, actually. :smalltongue:

Myself, I enjoy planning things out. And tend to prefer games with save/load features for when my senile mind forgets to follow the plan (or I have an "Oh, that's why…" moment). Dang, I sound like your players now. :smallredface:

But even so, I don't think I've ever come anything close to the behaviors you've described from your players when I've played an RPG.

So I'm wondering how they do playing other games.

Hard to say.

Brian is really bad at wargames, and he tends to rage quit as soon as things look bad.

Bob doesn't really like planning, he likes grinding, and when rage quits video games as soon as he gets to an encounter that he can't simply brute force his way through.

I haven't played as many games with Johnny, but when I did play with him in Warcraft he was the raid leader and I wasn't privy to officer planning sessions. The guild did take an inordinate amount of time coming up with plans before pulls compared to other ones, and Johnny did scream and yell at the raid for not following his plans when they wipe, but that is hardly uncommon in WoW.

Quertus
2021-10-09, 05:43 AM
… all the magic sights / insights into the caper were great, but… how did you expect the party to be able to advance the plot from there?

Talakeal
2021-10-09, 05:48 AM
… all the magic sights / insights into the caper were great, but… how did you expect the party to be able to advance the plot from there?

Ask around.

Quertus
2021-10-09, 05:51 AM
Ask around.

… ask who what? "Have you seen this snake?"? (No, seriously, how big a deal is "turning into a snake" in your world? I have zero context -> I have zero clue how one would investigate this.)

Talakeal
2021-10-09, 03:29 PM
… ask who what? "Have you seen this snake?"? (No, seriously, how big a deal is "turning into a snake" in your world? I have zero context -> I have zero clue how one would investigate this.)

Well.. that could work. There are probably only two or three people in the entire city who can cast that spell.

But I didn't have a fixed solution in mind, my players don't like it when I tailor adventures to them and so I generally don't do it. If they had a diviner in their party (or hired one) they could solve the mystery trivially, an exceptionally good investigation roll would have uncovered some sort of smoking gun clue, and the spells they had could have revealed the culprit if they were willing to spend more mana on the investigation than they were.

But the simplest way was to just ask around town. The Kelly Street gang had not been subtle, and they have a lot of the same underworld contacts that the party does. Tracking them down was not meant to be the hard part of the mission.


You know, on a related tangent, I think one advantage of video games is that NPCs are more memorable. In a video game every time you go to town you interact with the same animated and voice acted NPCs, and most of them have memorable designs and say memorable or funny things. In my game the whole support network of NPCs that I create for the party tends to just get ignored and forgotten no matter how much effort I put into making them memorable.

Quertus
2021-10-09, 09:25 PM
Well.. that could work. There are probably only two or three people in the entire city who can cast that spell.

But I didn't have a fixed solution in mind, my players don't like it when I tailor adventures to them and so I generally don't do it. If they had a diviner in their party (or hired one) they could solve the mystery trivially, an exceptionally good investigation roll would have uncovered some sort of smoking gun clue, and the spells they had could have revealed the culprit if they were willing to spend more mana on the investigation than they were.

But the simplest way was to just ask around town. The Kelly Street gang had not been subtle, and they have a lot of the same underworld contacts that the party does. Tracking them down was not meant to be the hard part of the mission.


You know, on a related tangent, I think one advantage of video games is that NPCs are more memorable. In a video game every time you go to town you interact with the same animated and voice acted NPCs, and most of them have memorable designs and say memorable or funny things. In my game the whole support network of NPCs that I create for the party tends to just get ignored and forgotten no matter how much effort I put into making them memorable.

So… if tracking down the Kelly Street gang was supposed to be easy… then why had a "thorough investigation conducted by several detectives" not produced results? Why didn't the police (or whatever power was behind the $$$) find and bust the Kelly Street gang before the party got there, leaving them to find the site of a battle, and maybe some corpses?

Now, let's say I built a similar scenario, and asked how some characters might further the investigation on their own merits.

So… had I been playing…

Quertus: too easy. Scroll back time (much like… Quincy? No, that's probably the sniper… Feur?) to see what happened. Then… a) be functionally ineffectual, simply automatically recognizing a1) the extradimensional space; a2) any spell cast by that caster; a3) anyone who can cast those specific "spheres", or b) rewind time further, to a point "before he put on the mask", b1) and still be ineffectual, simply adding "the thief" to the list of things automatically recognized, or b2) actually sketching the thief and saying "anybody know who this is?", or c) tagging the thief, and just knowing where he is.

Armus? Uh, dogs, scent, tracking? Why are we still talking about this?

Sherlock Holmes? Harder for me to RP, but… obviously he had inside information. How? Is there a pattern to the vaults hit? How does "turning into a snake" work? Can the type of snake, or any identifying markings on the snake, tell us anything about the man (ie, a Floridian becomes a Florida snake, a 1-eyed man always becomes a 1-eyed snake; scars/tattoos carry over, whatever)? Their clothes - what are they made of? Condition? Recent purchase? What can we learn about their vocation from their tools and techniques? What did they take? Who can fence that kind of stuff? Their magic bag - who can make that? Was its materials native to this region?

So… I'm picturing that 3-man party going like this:

Quertus begins looking back in time. Armus has dogs (possibly magic dogs) sniff the area, and, (possibly) to his surprise, find a trail, and begins following it. Quertus eventually (likely after Armus has left) points out that, yeah, he simply became invisible. Eventually, Quertus draws the sketch, and tags the culprit. They catch up with Armus, likely already headed in that direction. Sherlock fills them in on what to expect of his personality and capabilities; Quertus scoffs at Sherlock's guesswork comprehension of magic. They get there, find it's not a lone guy, and likely surrender at crossbow point. Because surrender means negotiation, which my 3-man party is likely better at than combat.

Notice how that party did the investigation "on its own merits", in ways that it's reasonable to believe other teams could have failed?

So, my question is… actually, I'm not sure *what* my question is. Because I'm not 10% sure what your group cares about.

There were, IMO (limited by guesswork about both your system and your world-building) 4 things of interest in your description: the insider knowledge, the "spheres" of magic used, the outfit, and the snake.

Your group picked up on and fixated on one of those.

Why was that not a valid path to the answer?

Could the outfit have been a new purchase, trackable that way ("follow the money")? An old purchase, that the thief might have been recognized for? Innately recognizable or connected to an organization, like Mandalorian armor? Of exotic materials? Clearly cut to, or showing wear from, a specific purpose, that could lead back to the culprit, or at least move the story forward?

Because "the party tracked the thief by his clothes" is much cooler than "they were being really obvious; anytime could have told anyone that".

Trying to question the 3 ophidian anamagi in town could also have made for an interesting story. Does the Ministry of Magic require them to register automatically catch whenever they speak the name of "he who much not be named" register them when they gain the ability?

But the way the story turned out would have been very unsatisfying for me, as a player.

Speaking of unsatisfying: why was "retreat and regroup" a bad plan? They'd whittled down their opposition, and one PC was seemingly fairly unplayable (no mana and shot up) - sounds like a good time to fall back to avoid permanent losses to me. Why did you consider this such a horrible idea that you felt the need to intervene?

Talakeal
2021-10-10, 10:15 PM
So… if tracking down the Kelly Street gang was supposed to be easy… then why had a "thorough investigation conducted by several detectives" not produced results? Why didn't the police (or whatever power was behind the $$$) find and bust the Kelly Street gang before the party got there, leaving them to find the site of a battle, and maybe some corpses?

Now, let's say I built a similar scenario, and asked how some characters might further the investigation on their own merits.

So… had I been playing…

Quertus: too easy. Scroll back time (much like… Quincy? No, that's probably the sniper… Feur?) to see what happened. Then… a) be functionally ineffectual, simply automatically recognizing a1) the extradimensional space; a2) any spell cast by that caster; a3) anyone who can cast those specific "spheres", or b) rewind time further, to a point "before he put on the mask", b1) and still be ineffectual, simply adding "the thief" to the list of things automatically recognized, or b2) actually sketching the thief and saying "anybody know who this is?", or c) tagging the thief, and just knowing where he is.

Armus? Uh, dogs, scent, tracking? Why are we still talking about this?

Sherlock Holmes? Harder for me to RP, but… obviously he had inside information. How? Is there a pattern to the vaults hit? How does "turning into a snake" work? Can the type of snake, or any identifying markings on the snake, tell us anything about the man (ie, a Floridian becomes a Florida snake, a 1-eyed man always becomes a 1-eyed snake; scars/tattoos carry over, whatever)? Their clothes - what are they made of? Condition? Recent purchase? What can we learn about their vocation from their tools and techniques? What did they take? Who can fence that kind of stuff? Their magic bag - who can make that? Was its materials native to this region?

So… I'm picturing that 3-man party going like this:

Quertus begins looking back in time. Armus has dogs (possibly magic dogs) sniff the area, and, (possibly) to his surprise, find a trail, and begins following it. Quertus eventually (likely after Armus has left) points out that, yeah, he simply became invisible. Eventually, Quertus draws the sketch, and tags the culprit. They catch up with Armus, likely already headed in that direction. Sherlock fills them in on what to expect of his personality and capabilities; Quertus scoffs at Sherlock's guesswork comprehension of magic. They get there, find it's not a lone guy, and likely surrender at crossbow point. Because surrender means negotiation, which my 3-man party is likely better at than combat.

Notice how that party did the investigation "on its own merits", in ways that it's reasonable to believe other teams could have failed?

So, my question is… actually, I'm not sure *what* my question is. Because I'm not 10% sure what your group cares about.

There were, IMO (limited by guesswork about both your system and your world-building) 4 things of interest in your description: the insider knowledge, the "spheres" of magic used, the outfit, and the snake.

Your group picked up on and fixated on one of those.

Why was that not a valid path to the answer?

Could the outfit have been a new purchase, trackable that way ("follow the money")? An old purchase, that the thief might have been recognized for? Innately recognizable or connected to an organization, like Mandalorian armor? Of exotic materials? Clearly cut to, or showing wear from, a specific purpose, that could lead back to the culprit, or at least move the story forward?

Because "the party tracked the thief by his clothes" is much cooler than "they were being really obvious; anytime could have told anyone that".

Trying to question the 3 ophidian anamagi in town could also have made for an interesting story. Does the Ministry of Magic require them to register automatically catch whenever they speak the name of "he who much not be named" register them when they gain the ability?

But the way the story turned out would have been very unsatisfying for me, as a player.

Speaking of unsatisfying: why was "retreat and regroup" a bad plan? They'd whittled down their opposition, and one PC was seemingly fairly unplayable (no mana and shot up) - sounds like a good time to fall back to avoid permanent losses to me. Why did you consider this such a horrible idea that you felt the need to intervene?

First, you are obviously more clever than my players. Those are some good ideas.

Anani is as close to the "ministry of magic" as the town has. She could probably have checked with her underlings to get more leads, but didn't.

This was not a master thief with a unique costume and a calling card, this was a dumb kid doing the equivalent of wearing a ski mask before a robbery, so specifically asking people in the immediate area if they had seen someone with their face wrapped in brown cloth didn't turn up much. BUT you know, Fuer is a tailor and Valentine is a merchant, and they probably could have figured out some way to track him down by his clothes between them if the players had thought to go down that route, I sure didn't. That would have been a neat surprise.



So, what you mention about "anyone could have done it" is a recurring problem in low adventure design, and something I know we have talked about before. Low level characters can't simply overpower everything that they come up against. Usually, for the scenario to make any sense, this requires the party to be somewhat more clever or less risk averse than the people they are helping, although my players seem to be reluctant to do either of those things (and most forum posters seem to agree that they are right to do so) So, for this campaign I am trying to mellow out the "realism" a little and just drum up the incompetence of allies and authorities for the sake of the game.

Likewise, my players consider it cheating to tailor an encounter to the party.

So, in this case the party, particularly Valentine, have a large network of contacts, most of them illicit, and so I made it a point that the Kelly street gang wasn't being too careful with their newfound wealth and that it was something of an open secret in the local criminal element. But, at the same time, Trade Prince Valen, Krystal's old nemesis, is also aware of the situation and, once he learned that Krystal was the one investigating the case, has been covertly supporting the Kelly Street gang in the hopes that Krystal will get in over her head and end up losing it.


The local sheriff is rather weak, and it was concluded that something supernatural was at play here, they decided to step back and send in an expert.



Speaking of unsatisfying: why was "retreat and regroup" a bad plan? They'd whittled down their opposition, and one PC was seemingly fairly unplayable (no mana and shot up) - sounds like a good time to fall back to avoid permanent losses to me. Why did you consider this such a horrible idea that you felt the need to intervene?

Ok, so magic recovery in my game is based on lunar cycles rather than nightly resting, so Kim blowing all of her mana on one spell means that she is going to be out for most of the month, BUT she is just a single gish, and just because Brian is mad that his spell got countered and wanted to give up, did not mean the party as a whole was in a bad spot.

Indeed, they were in a pretty good spot, as even with Kim pouting and sitting out the entire fight, the group still managed to pretty much clean house with only a single serious wound being suffered.

Had they fallen back, they would now be on the defensive, and with Valen's resources supporting the Kelly Street gang, being on the defensive is not something they would want.

Reversefigure4
2021-10-10, 11:08 PM
They also kept ham-stringing themselves by trying to overthink their plans in a sort of Roy at the Oracle manner; overly wording their divination spells to try and prevent me from playing word games (which I have told them I don't do) and lawyering themselves out of the information they actually need, and when performing social investigations rather than simply asking around for clues, they ask "Have any of the local shopkeepers seen a man dressed head to toe in strips of brown cloth...

If you don't play word games as the GM, how is it possible for players to lawyer themselves out of the information? Can't you clarify their intentions of the Divination spells and give them appropriate answers? Are they drawing this information from deities seeking to help them, or entities seeking to screw them based on their word choice?

You "don't have a fixed solution in mind", but there are right questions and wrong questions the players can ask, apparently. Asking about the man's clothing was wrong, and so produced no results regardless of how it was done. Asking about the Kelly Street Gang was the right answer - no rolls required, apparently, just the right question - but none of the players thought of it, presumably because they don't have the GM's notes in front of them to know that. Is there any ability in here for them to make more generic statements, like "I want to make a Streetwise check to question people in the area about what they might have seen about the crime?" (A possible GM reply might be "Sure, your total is 22? OK, you find out nobody has seen anyone in those clothes - he obviously removed his mask shortly after committing the crime, but you do find out the Kelly Street gang has been free with their money after the crime, so it looks like they got a payout from it in some way. You'd need a 25 to reveal who in the gang has been spending the most money.")


Ok, so magic recovery in my game is based on lunar cycles rather than nightly resting, so Kim blowing all of her mana on one spell means that she is going to be out for most of the month, BUT she is just a single gish, and just because Brian is mad that his spell got countered and wanted to give up, did not mean the party as a whole was in a bad spot.

I think most parties and players would consider it time to retreat when a caster just spent a months (!) worth of spell energy to no effect. It sounds like a big red flag that things are about to go horribly wrong. And the question is, how could the players possibly know that retreat was the "wrong" option here?

Talakeal
2021-10-11, 12:17 AM
If you don't play word games as the GM, how is it possible for players to lawyer themselves out of the information? Can't you clarify their intentions of the Divination spells and give them appropriate answers? Are they drawing this information from deities seeking to help them, or entities seeking to screw them based on their word choice?

By asking overly specific questions in an attempt at lawyering, I would assume in an attempt to filter out red herrings.

IMO I would start with broad questions and then work to more general, my players start with very general and then give up.

And yeah, as a GM I can correct them OOC or insert something into the narrative, that is what I ultimately did, but it feels awkward and rail-roady.

To use a hypothetical, A both feels a lot more fair and less forced than B:

A:
Player: I ask around the train-station to see if anyone saw anything unusual last night.
DM: You find a young street urchin who tells you she saw a man in a yellow cape sneaking around at about 2 AM.

B:
Player: I ask the ticket seller if he sold a ticket to a man in a red cape at 4 AM.
DM: He tells you know, he didn't see anyone like that.
Player: Drat! Well, this is impossible. Time to go home and drink our sorrows away!
DM: As you are leaving, a young urchin who overheard your conversation comes up and says that while she didn't see a man in a red cape at 4 AM, she did see someone suspicious in a yellow cape at 2 am.


In this case the parties divinations consist of talking to rocks or sending one's senses back in time. Neither demons or gods, or any actor with a will of its own, is involved.



You "don't have a fixed solution in mind", but there are right questions and wrong questions the players can ask, apparently. Asking about the man's clothing was wrong, and so produced no results regardless of how it was done. Asking about the Kelly Street Gang was the right answer - no rolls required, apparently, just the right question - but none of the players thought of it, presumably because they don't have the GM's notes in front of them to know that. Is there any ability in here for them to make more generic statements, like "I want to make a Streetwise check to question people in the area about what they might have seen about the crime?" (A possible GM reply might be "Sure, your total is 22? OK, you find out nobody has seen anyone in those clothes - he obviously removed his mask shortly after committing the crime, but you do find out the Kelly Street gang has been free with their money after the crime, so it looks like they got a payout from it in some way. You'd need a 25 to reveal who in the gang has been spending the most money.")

There is a world of difference between having a fixed solution in mind and warping the narrative so they players always succeed.

To use another example; if the DM puts a locked door in front of the players they may not have a fixed solution in mind, the players can pick the lock, bash it down, unscrew the hinges, ask someone to open it for them, find a way around, magic themselves through the door, look for a key, etc. But that still doesn't mean that the DM is being unreasonable if giving the door a cupcake and saying "pretty please" doesn't make it swing open of its own accord.


What tends to happen is my players fixate on one very specific approach, and if that one very specific approach doesn't pan out, they give up and declare the whole affair impossible and start ranting and raving about puzzles and needing to read the GM's mind.

Not sure what you mean by "is there an ability here," but yeah, what you described is exactly how I would have foreseen the situation playing out. But the only social interaction the players made was asking shop owners if they had seen anyone walking around in a brown mask.


Although again, there is quite a bit of power in fast talking the DM. If someone had tried Quertus' Sherlock holmes approach by analyzing the specifics of the fabric and the species of the snake to track down the culprit, that would (dice willing) have worked in a very impressive and rewarding manner. But again, they didn't, they didn't do anything with that information except ask neighboring shop-keepers if they had seen anyone walking around wearing that specific mask.



I think most parties and players would consider it time to retreat when a caster just spent a months (!) worth of spell energy to no effect. It sounds like a big red flag that things are about to go horribly wrong.

Sometimes players over-commit and bad dice rolls happen. It has nothing to do with the encounter being un-winnable.

Like, if I spent 10k gold on an arrow of dragon slaying and then whiffed my attack roll, that has no bearing on what the CR of the dragon is. In this case Kim spent all of her mana adding metamagics to her one spell and then fluffed the roll so that it was easily countered by the enemy mage.

To use another example, just yesterday I was playing D&D, I cornered the BBEG, had a caster give me a spell to give me advantage, and then I burned my action surge for a whole bunch of attacks; but every one of them missed even with advantage because dice are fickle, so we ended up wasting both of our turns and a bunch of daily abilities (that might as well have been once in a lifetime abilities because it was a one shot) for absolutely no effect. But ultimately, it just wasn't that big a deal and we pressed on and still killed him two turns later.


And the question is, how could the players possibly know that retreat was the "wrong" option here?

As I said about the last session; the players just need to trust that the DM isn't out to TPK them.

There is no way to disprove a negative. There is no way for players to know that there isn't an army of invisible tarrasques hiding behind every door.

But, imo, unless you have some reason to believe that you are outclassed, you have to proceed under the assumption that most fights will be of the appropriate CR. Not that you shouldn't keep on your toes and plan for the worst mind you, just that you can't assume defeat is a given from the get-go.

Morgaln
2021-10-11, 04:27 AM
By asking overly specific questions in an attempt at lawyering, I would assume in an attempt to filter out red herrings.

IMO I would start with broad questions and then work to more general, my players start with very general and then give up.

And yeah, as a GM I can correct them OOC or insert something into the narrative, that is what I ultimately did, but it feels awkward and rail-roady.

To use a hypothetical, A both feels a lot more fair and less forced than B:

A:
Player: I ask around the train-station to see if anyone saw anything unusual last night.
DM: You find a young street urchin who tells you she saw a man in a yellow cape sneaking around at about 2 AM.

B:
Player: I ask the ticket seller if he sold a ticket to a man in a red cape at 4 AM.
DM: He tells you know, he didn't see anyone like that.
Player: Drat! Well, this is impossible. Time to go home and drink our sorrows away!
DM: As you are leaving, a young urchin who overheard your conversation comes up and says that while she didn't see a man in a red cape at 4 AM, she did see someone suspicious in a yellow cape at 2 am.


In this case the parties divinations consist of talking to rocks or sending one's senses back in time. Neither demons or gods, or any actor with a will of its own, is involved.




There is a world of difference between having a fixed solution in mind and warping the narrative so they players always succeed.

To use another example; if the DM puts a locked door in front of the players they may not have a fixed solution in mind, the players can pick the lock, bash it down, unscrew the hinges, ask someone to open it for them, find a way around, magic themselves through the door, look for a key, etc. But that still doesn't mean that the DM is being unreasonable if giving the door a cupcake and saying "pretty please" doesn't make it swing open of its own accord.


What tends to happen is my players fixate on one very specific approach, and if that one very specific approach doesn't pan out, they give up and declare the whole affair impossible and start ranting and raving about puzzles and needing to read the GM's mind.

Not sure what you mean by "is there an ability here," but yeah, what you described is exactly how I would have foreseen the situation playing out. But the only social interaction the players made was asking shop owners if they had seen anyone walking around in a brown mask.


Although again, there is quite a bit of power in fast talking the DM. If someone had tried Quertus' Sherlock holmes approach by analyzing the specifics of the fabric and the species of the snake to track down the culprit, that would (dice willing) have worked in a very impressive and rewarding manner. But again, they didn't, they didn't do anything with that information except ask neighboring shop-keepers if they had seen anyone walking around wearing that specific mask.


There's also a world of difference between warping the narrative and being lenient with player approaches. Your problem is that the players asked very specific questions because they wanted to make sure to get straight answers. That's because they don't trust you to be straight with them (as has been established in previous threads). So they tried to ask questions that wouldn't allow you to screw them over. What did you do? You screwed them over by answering their questions literally.
What you do is, assume that the characters are smarter in asking the questions than the players are, because the characters are not subject to those meta considerations about trust. Answer the direct question, but volunteer additional information. For example:

Player: I ask the ticket seller if he sold a ticket to a man in a red cape at 4 AM.
GM (as ticket seller): "Someone in a red cape? I don't think so. There was that young couple, they seemed to be on a date. The old guy with the cane. That sleazy guy at 2 am, but he wore a yellow cape, not a red one. And the fishwife on her way home.

That's not forced, that's a pretty normal way for people to remember, and you're letting hints drop that way.
If you want, you can also ask for a roll and tell them additional information:

Player: I ask the ticket seller if he sold a ticket to a man in a red cape at 4 AM.
GM: Alright, roll for gathering information
Player: 22
GM: He hasn't seen anyone in a red cape, but he mentions someone in a yellow cape during the conversation.

None of this is warping a narrative. It's working with your players to get a satisfying game.




Sometimes players over-commit and bad dice rolls happen. It has nothing to do with the encounter being un-winnable.

Like, if I spent 10k gold on an arrow of dragon slaying and then whiffed my attack roll, that has no bearing on what the CR of the dragon is. In this case Kim spent all of her mana adding metamagics to her one spell and then fluffed the roll so that it was easily countered by the enemy mage.

To use another example, just yesterday I was playing D&D, I cornered the BBEG, had a caster give me a spell to give me advantage, and then I burned my action surge for a whole bunch of attacks; but every one of them missed even with advantage because dice are fickle, so we ended up wasting both of our turns and a bunch of daily abilities (that might as well have been once in a lifetime abilities because it was a one shot) for absolutely no effect. But ultimately, it just wasn't that big a deal and we pressed on and still killed him two turns later.



As I said about the last session; the players just need to trust that the DM isn't out to TPK them.

There is no way to disprove a negative. There is no way for players to know that there isn't an army of invisible tarrasques hiding behind every door.

But, imo, unless you have some reason to believe that you are outclassed, you have to proceed under the assumption that most fights will be of the appropriate CR. Not that you shouldn't keep on your toes and plan for the worst mind you, just that you can't assume defeat is a given from the get-go.

But we have already established that your players don't trust you. By the time they know for sure they are outclassed, it might be too late to retreat for them, at least without casualties. Since they don't trust you, they might very well retreat prematurely because they don't want to risk it. Also, what is an appropriate encounter?`I know you plan your encounters around a certain amount of resources to be drained. But your players don't know how many resources they are supposed to spend on a certain encounter. This time, someone went all in and spent close to 100% of heir resources on an action, and that action got countered for no effect. Now, admittedly it's not especially smart to channel all your mana in a single spell like that, when it takes a month to refill. But I can also understand being frustrated when that kind of commitment then gets completely nullified.
I admittedly don't know how to judge spell power in your system. But I would assume that to nullify a spell that effectively, whoever does it would have to be at least on a similar power level as Kim. So a tactical retreat to assess this new situation is certainly not out of question.

And if they did retreat even though it wasn't necessary, so what? They made an enemy there. An opportunity to have the narrative shift into a different direction that can lead to more interesting, and possibly even personal developments down the line. How is that a bad thing?

Reversefigure4
2021-10-11, 04:46 AM
Player: I ask the ticket seller if he sold a ticket to a man in a red cape at 4 AM.
DM: He tells you know, he didn't see anyone like that.

"I didn't see anyone like that... except the man in the similarly coloured cape at a very similar time, but I obviously won't mention that".

If you're happy with the players having to read your mind to find the specific answer, then that's your business, but it doesn't seem to be working out well for you.

What I mean by 'is there an ability to ask X', is to ask what happens in your game if a players wants to just make a Streetwise check to ask about the crime? Do they have to come up with a specific question that's worded right to get the information? And as the GM, are you willing or capable to say on a more specific question "Red cape at 4am seems a little too focused. Do you want to just ask for general information about men in capes at the train station recently?"

Batcathat
2021-10-11, 05:20 AM
"I didn't see anyone like that... except the man in the similarly coloured cape at a very similar time, but I obviously won't mention that".

I'm not so sure about this. It depends on how public the location and how uncommon capes are, I think. If I was standing in a fairly crowded place and someone asked me about someone wearing a red coat, I probably wouldn't randomly give them information about someone wearing a yellow coat.

I think investigations are generally one of the toughest adventures to make just the right amount of challenging. A clue that's meant to be obvious could be completely missed or the party could luck right into the solution immediately.

Quertus
2021-10-11, 02:04 PM
"This was not a master thief with a unique costume and a calling card, this was a dumb kid doing the equivalent of wearing a ski mask before a robbery"

Sure. But, again, I'm ignorant of your world-building - how common are ski masks in the Sahara desert? Who would already own one vs who recently purchased one? What can the brand of ski mask tell us about the perpetrator?

As my characters are always "not from around here" to parallel my ignorance, they could have legitimately asked those questions; to not be pants-on-head, that should have been an OOC question to the GM (you) for any "natives".

-----

"Fuer is a tailor and Valentine is a merchant"

That is a neat surprise.

-----

"So, what you mention about "anyone could have done it" is a recurring problem in low adventure design, and something I know we have talked about before. Low level characters can't simply overpower everything that they come up against. Usually, for the scenario to make any sense, this requires the party to be somewhat more clever or less risk averse"

You keep saying that. And you're wrong. In fact, you've got it backwards.

Characters who are less risk averse fail. Characters who are less risk averse die. Characters who are more risk averse pull out 10' poles, Canaries, and bags of flour, and actually succeed where all the brave idiots charged in and failed.

It's probably important for you to understand this if you're going to continue to insist on your parties starting out low level, and you and/or your players want the party to succeed, let alone feel like BDHs.

-----

"Had they fallen back, they would now be on the defensive, and with Valen's resources supporting the Kelly Street gang, being on the defensive is not something they would want."

… (there's so many paths here. Multiple timelines converge, and, in this reality, we get…)

Are you sure?

Had I been a player at your table (and this scenario we run by one of several GMs I know), that's exactly what I would have wanted. (Yes, some of those GMs occasionally look confused, and either ask me, "are you sure?", or outright "you realize if you do X, then Y, right?". And I just smile a "cat that ate the canary" grin and respond "yes".)

Home turf advantage can be big. Especially if your opponents are idiots (as the Kelly Street gang already demonstrated themselves to be, per your plot).

Also, Krystal has an enemy, Valen. Getting him to commit more resources to this group of idiots can only turn out well for the long-term outcome of this conflict.


"Not for revenge. Not because they deserve it. Not because it'll make the world a better place. We need a heap of bloody bodies so when the trade prince Valen looks over his charts of profits and losses, he'll see what it cost him to mess with the mercenary company of Krystal."

I want him to invest as much as possible into losing. That's how I roll.

-----

"Ok, so magic recovery in my game is based on lunar cycles rather than nightly resting, so Kim blowing all of her mana on one spell means that she is going to be out for most of the month, BUT she is just a single gish, and just because Brian is mad that his spell got countered and wanted to give up, did not mean the party as a whole was in a bad spot."

Still ignorant of your system. Could a starting PC / what level of build resources would be required to…
turn into a snake
phase through stone
turn invisible
counter a massive spell
and whatever else he did off camera this month?


Because, depending upon the details of your system, "falling back and gathering more Intel", or even "moving to another country" might well be the correct response here.

-----

"By asking overly specific questions in an attempt at lawyering, I would assume in an attempt to filter out red herrings.

IMO I would start with broad questions and then work to more general, my players start with very general and then give up."

I assume you mean the opposite of what you said.

-----

"And yeah, as a GM I can correct them OOC or insert something into the narrative, that is what I ultimately did, but it feels awkward and rail-roady."

The way you do things often feels awkward and rail-roady, but that's a property of you, not inherent to the concept of responding.

IIRC, Cluedrew once asked me (IIRC, when I was ranting about the Tier system), if I could only give players & GMs one tool, what tool would i choose instead of the Tier system. IIRC (darn senility), I responded with something about general training in finding and debugging problems, which Cluedrew found quite surprising.

I suppose I should apply that same reasoning here, and encourage you learn debugging tools. (Actually, that's kinda what I was trying to hand you with the X-point plan you rejected).

On the plus side, in this specific instance, you recognize that your way is bad, and how it is bad. That's a lot of the battle already won right there!

Now you just need to not blame the wrong thing, recognize that there *are* good responses, and learn how to produce them yourself.

-----

"In this case the parties divinations consist of talking to rocks or sending one's senses back in time."

Senility willing, I'll circle back to this one. But it'll be part of its own post.

-----

"There is a world of difference between having a fixed solution in mind and warping the narrative so they players always succeed."

Oh, I fully agree! In fact, one of my (many) flaws is that, contrary to my players' beliefs, I *don't* improvise well, and, relevant here, I'm *not* good at handling "Sherlock Holmes" style PCs. I'm… passable… in very specific circumstances (I wrote the content myself. I *know* the content (I didn't *just* write it for this scenario, it's had a life of its own). And I've thought about the scenario with Sherlock Holmes in mind.); otherwise, it's a terrible experience for the player.

Oh, wait, that probably belonged somewhere else. :smallredface:

(Darn "cut and paste" errors).

Anyway, the part that was supposed to be here involved thoroughly agreeing that you shouldn't warp the narrative / the facts, and that some approaches can (and legitimately should) fail.

I'm all about the PCs failing… but, do keep in mind, most failures can be spun as "setbacks", not TPKs.

(Whereas, a failure of "sticking around when we should run" is much more likely a TPK.)

-----

"What tends to happen is my players fixate on one very specific approach, and if that one very specific approach doesn't pan out, they give up and declare the whole affair impossible and start ranting and raving about puzzles and needing to read the GM's mind."

Your players showed great creativity trying to deal with the Avatar of Hate…

Have I already asked my Evil overlord mandated 5-year-old advisor substitute(s) about that scenario?

Also… can we try a simply game of "what might you try?" with your players? Get them to practice brainstorming when nothing's on the line?

-----

"As I said about the last session; the players just need to trust that the DM isn't out to TPK them."

Now, I'm biased. Trust? A GM?

However, if some Mirror of Opposition version of myself played at your table, and encountered that scenario? Do you know what they'd do?

"By your powers combined, I am Captain Planet!"

That is, immediately have everyone summon their summons. Find some way to make it work mechanically, and then demand / ask / cajole / trick / or plead that they not (depending on the specifics of the individual's relationship with their summons) that they all join together *and* possess the tank. (I'd say "think Warhammer 40k demon tank", but apparently I'm from a collapsed timeline where it worked very differently)

Then proceed to have a "balanced encounter" destroying every man, woman, and child in slavery city. Just start at one end, and level the place. Bring down the mountain as needed.

Anyone worthy of being the high priestess should consider her life a suitable sacrifice to end this threat. And, if she doesn't look at it that way, my Necromancer would bring her spirit back to torment for all eternity (also to keep anyone from contacting her spirit to discredit our version of events).

-----

"Your problem is that the players asked very specific questions because they wanted to make sure to get straight answers. That's because they don't trust you to be straight with them (as has been established in previous threads). So they tried to ask questions that wouldn't allow you to screw them over. What did you do? You screwed them over by answering their questions literally."

Senility willing, I'll bring this up when I revisit my "your players cannot win" concept.

-----

I think I missed something, but I cannot remember what. Maybe next time.

Batcathat
2021-10-11, 02:11 PM
You keep saying that. And you're wrong. In fact, you've got it backwards.

Characters who are less risk averse fail. Characters who are less risk averse die. Characters who are more risk averse pull out 10' poles, Canaries, and bags of flour, and actually succeed where all the brave idiots charged in and failed.

It's probably important for you to understand this if you're going to continue to insist on your parties starting out low level, and you and/or your players want the party to succeed, let alone feel like BDHs.

I think the point is that adventurers are typically expected to be more prone to risks than the average NPC. Most people who encounter a dungeon (ie. a dark place full of traps, monsters and a dozen other ways to die) probably wouldn't even consider going in, no matter how many treasures awaited the survivors.

icefractal
2021-10-11, 02:37 PM
Characters who are less risk averse fail. Characters who are less risk averse die. Characters who are more risk averse pull out 10' poles, Canaries, and bags of flour, and actually succeed where all the brave idiots charged in and failed.
If you set up the scenario that way, sure. But you can also set it up so that quick action is the best route to victory. And if you're just letting things arise emergently, it could go either way.

For example, PCs in my game are about to raid an enemy facility which is relatively isolated from backup. If they get in and get out in one go, they'll only have to deal with the somewhat unprepared guards there and will be long gone before any backup arrives. If they retreat and come back a few hours later, still just the guards there but they'll be on high-alert and internal doors will have been sealed to create chokepoints. If they take several days, backup may arrive. If they take over a week, a lot of backup will arrive and they'll probably need to abandon this plan.

Meanwhile there aren't many traps to find with a 10' pole, because this is a facility in active use that the staff would need to freely move around inside.

Quertus
2021-10-11, 03:46 PM
For example, PCs in my game are about to raid an enemy facility which is relatively isolated from backup. If they get in and get out in one go, they'll only have to deal with the somewhat unprepared guards there and will be long gone before any backup arrives. If they retreat and come back a few hours later, still just the guards there but they'll be on high-alert and internal doors will have been sealed to create chokepoints. If they take several days, backup may arrive. If they take over a week, a lot of backup will arrive and they'll probably need to abandon this plan.

"In and out in one go" is irrelevant to whether they use explosives that risk bringing the roof down on themselves, vs use poison gas that incapacitates 100% of the resistance. vs actually check / don't just assume that the poison worked, vs being prepare for resistance that was somehow immune to poison, vs…

IME, fortune and RPGs do not favor brave idiots. Fortune and RPGs favor those who understand risk management, and are risk averse.

Talakeal
2021-10-11, 07:41 PM
There's also a world of difference between warping the narrative and being lenient with player approaches. Your problem is that the players asked very specific questions because they wanted to make sure to get straight answers. That's because they don't trust you to be straight with them (as has been established in previous threads). So they tried to ask questions that wouldn't allow you to screw them over. What did you do? You screwed them over by answering their questions literally.
What you do is, assume that the characters are smarter in asking the questions than the players are, because the characters are not subject to those meta considerations about trust. Answer the direct question, but volunteer additional information.

If I may be pedantic for a moment, I don't think answering a question directly and screwing them over by answering them directly.

For example; say the culprits are a pair of middle aged men, but the players got it in their heads they were children. If the players ask if the bartender saw a couple of kids come into a crowded bar, saying "No, no children," is a direct answer while saying "Kids, no, of course not! We don't allow goats in here!" would be a literal answer, and imo only the latter would be screwing someone over or playing word games.

But in a broader sense, there is a wide gulf between screwing players and playing their characters for them. I don't know about you, but if the GM assumed I was asking a question I didn't say I was asking, I would be incensed and feel that they were both railroading me and overstepping my bounds.

Volunteering information works, but only if it makes sense (see below).


Player: I ask the ticket seller if he sold a ticket to a man in a red cape at 4 AM.
GM (as ticket seller): "Someone in a red cape? I don't think so. There was that young couple, they seemed to be on a date. The old guy with the cane. That sleazy guy at 2 am, but he wore a yellow cape, not a red one. And the fishwife on her way home.

That's not forced, that's a pretty normal way for people to remember, and you're letting hints drop that way.
If you want, you can also ask for a roll and tell them additional information:

Player: I ask the ticket seller if he sold a ticket to a man in a red cape at 4 AM.
GM: Alright, roll for gathering information
Player: 22
GM: He hasn't seen anyone in a red cape, but he mentions someone in a yellow cape during the conversation.

None of this is warping a narrative. It's working with your players to get a satisfying game.

That assumes that:

The ticket seller saw the man in the yellow cape and that the man in the yellow cape stood out enough to warrant commenting upon. If it was a crowded train station with hundreds of customers over the course of the day in a society were capes are not uncommon dress items, I would find it extremely odd for someone to just blurt out that they saw a guy in a different colored cape two hours later unless there was something very unusual about his appearance or actions.


But we have already established that your players don't trust you. By the time they know for sure they are outclassed, it might be too late to retreat for them, at least without casualties. Since they don't trust you, they might very well retreat prematurely because they don't want to risk it. Also, what is an appropriate encounter? I know you plan your encounters around a certain amount of resources to be drained. But your players don't know how many resources they are supposed to spend on a certain encounter. This time, someone went all in and spent close to 100% of heir resources on an action, and that action got countered for no effect. Now, admittedly it's not especially smart to channel all your mana in a single spell like that, when it takes a month to refill. But I can also understand being frustrated when that kind of commitment then gets completely nullified.
I admittedly don't know how to judge spell power in your system. But I would assume that to nullify a spell that effectively, whoever does it would have to be at least on a similar power level as Kim. So a tactical retreat to assess this new situation is certainly not out of question.

This is all true.

That doesn't mean that it isn't counter-productive on the part of the players or frustrating for me.


And if they did retreat even though it wasn't necessary, so what? They made an enemy there. An opportunity to have the narrative shift into a different direction that can lead to more interesting, and possibly even personal developments down the line. How is that a bad thing?

The forum has told me to stop giving the players enough rope to hang themselves and warn them before they embark on a suicidal course of action.

When they announced their plan to retreat, I sat back and thought about what the enemy's reaction would be. I concluded it would be to go tell the mercenaries that the guys they were looking for showed up, and to then hire more and plan an ambush if they come back, and then to go on the offensive if not.

The players plan was to fall back, wait four hours, and then try again attacking the front door.

Going through with that plan would almost certainly result in a TPK.


"I didn't see anyone like that... except the man in the similarly coloured cape at a very similar time, but I obviously won't mention that".

Strawman much? Yeah, if he had seen a similar man at a similar time that would make sense, but that wasn't the case in either my example or the original scenario.


If you're happy with the players having to read your mind to find the specific answer, then that's your business, but it doesn't seem to be working out well for you.

That phrase is so over used that it has lost all meaning. AFAICT, "reading the DM's mind" is how players say "doing anything at all other than the very first thing that comes to my mind".

There are absolutely puzzles where there is a very small number of counter intuitive solutions. For example, almost every Delta Green module has one (I played through one last year that requires you smash the haunted mirror with an elder sign, despite the fact that no elder signs are ever even mentioned, let alone present, in the module). But stuff like that is NEVER what is actually happening in a scenario I have written and wild hyperbole to the point of uselessness.


What I mean by 'is there an ability to ask X', is to ask what happens in your game if a players wants to just make a Streetwise check to ask about the crime? Do they have to come up with a specific question that's worded right to get the information? And as the GM, are you willing or capable to say on a more specific question "Red cape at 4am seems a little too focused. Do you want to just ask for general information about men in capes at the train station recently?"

Its a spectrum. Generally, being specific alters the difficulty of the roll. So, "asking around" might be DC 20, but specifically asking someone who I have established as knowing something about the situation might lower it to DC 10 or less, while specifically asking only people who have nothing to do with it might increase the DC to 30 or higher.

But yes, ultimately that is what I did, I "broke the fourth wall" and flat out told them that they were pulling a Roy and that by asking such specifically worded questions they were making it impossible for me to actually convey any useful information and reminded them that Valentine has a vast array of underworld contacts.


I'm not so sure about this. It depends on how public the location and how uncommon capes are, I think. If I was standing in a fairly crowded place and someone asked me about someone wearing a red coat, I probably wouldn't randomly give them information about someone wearing a yellow coat.

I think investigations are generally one of the toughest adventures to make just the right amount of challenging. A clue that's meant to be obvious could be completely missed or the party could luck right into the solution immediately.

Yeah, my example assumed that capes were not outlandish fashion, the station was fairly crowded, and that the guy was sneaking around so that only the one girl saw him.

But yeah, investigations are hard. I would never willingly run a mystery adventure, but I have on frequent occasions had players decide they were going to solve a mystery and that ends up derailing the entire session. This was one of those sessions.

I meant for the investigation part of the mission to be short and optional (and with this particular party's skills solvable with a couple of spells). Valentine's social skills are high enough that she can't fail to track down the culprits, and I meant the combat to be the main part of the session.


Sure. But, again, I'm ignorant of your world-building - how common are ski masks in the Sahara desert? Who would already own one vs who recently purchased one? What can the brand of ski mask tell us about the perpetrator?

Yeah, sure. But that isn't what happened. They were convinced that it was some sort of unique costume and pulled all other thoughts out of their minds.

In retrospect, I think that they assumed from my description that the guy was a mummy or some sort of leper who had to be wrapped in bandages all the time, and so that was the detail the obsessed over.


You keep saying that. And you're wrong. In fact, you've got it backwards.

Characters who are less risk averse fail. Characters who are less risk averse die. Characters who are more risk averse pull out 10' poles, Canaries, and bags of flour, and actually succeed where all the brave idiots charged in and failed.

It's probably important for you to understand this if you're going to continue to insist on your parties starting out low level, and you and/or your players want the party to succeed, let alone feel like BDHs.

We have had this conversation many times. As I have said many times, to be a successful adventurer you need to be both clever and daring.

Being smart and cautious like in your example is GOOD. I would love to see that from my players.

But my players are either unwilling or incapable of being careful and cautious.

They fluctuate between two binaries; charging into the dungeon as mindless berserkers or running back to town and hiding for the entire session the first time they face danger.

And of course, in either case if something bad happens or I complain, they ping-pong to the other extreme and tell me they are only doing what I told them to do when they were on the other end.


"Had they fallen back, they would now be on the defensive, and with Valen's resources supporting the Kelly Street gang, being on the defensive is not something they would want."

Are you sure?

Had I been a player at your table (and this scenario we run by one of several GMs I know), that's exactly what I would have wanted. (Yes, some of those GMs occasionally look confused, and either ask me, "are you sure?", or outright "you realize if you do X, then Y, right?". And I just smile a "cat that ate the canary" grin and respond "yes".)

Home turf advantage can be big. Especially if your opponents are idiots (as the Kelly Street gang already demonstrated themselves to be, per your plot).

Also, Krystal has an enemy, Valen. Getting him to commit more resources to this group of idiots can only turn out well for the long-term outcome of this conflict.


"Not for revenge. Not because they deserve it. Not because it'll make the world a better place. We need a heap of bloody bodies so when the trade prince Valen looks over his charts of profits and losses, he'll see what it cost him to mess with the mercenary company of Krystal."

I want him to invest as much as possible into losing. That's how I roll.

That is how I would want it as a PC to.

But I think you are giving my players too much credit here.

They weren't thinking long term, they were thinking that they fight was too hard and they were running away, and following that up with an even harder fight that might actually defeat them (which this one had zero chance of doing) is not likely to work out well for anyone's enjoyment of the game.


Also… can we try a simply game of "what might you try?" with your players? Get them to practice brainstorming when nothing's on the line?

One issue is that we are all adults now with busy lives and gaming time is at a premium. Most of the players don't give the game a thought when we aren't at the table, and I can't imagine spending our limited gaming time doing exercises is going to be high on anyone's list.



Still ignorant of your system. Could a starting PC / what level of build resources would be required to…
turn into a snake
phase through stone
turn invisible
counter a massive spell
and whatever else he did off camera this month?


Because, depending upon the details of your system, "falling back and gathering more Intel", or even "moving to another country" might well be the correct response here.


Yes, a starting PC could do all of that.

He was individually a higher level than anyone else in the party. He was also a full caster rather than a "gish" like all of the party's casters. Phasing through a wall is more difficult than a counterspell, so they weren't getting new information here.

Still, I wouldn't place money on him winning a 1 on 1 fight with any of the PCs, and with all six of them there he is going to get crushed even with his gang's support.

I g2g now, I will reread your post later to see if I missed anything!

King of Nowhere
2021-10-12, 05:39 PM
There is no way to disprove a negative. There is no way for players to know that there isn't an army of invisible tarrasques hiding behind every door.

But, imo, unless you have some reason to believe that you are outclassed, you have to proceed under the assumption that most fights will be of the appropriate CR. Not that you shouldn't keep on your toes and plan for the worst mind you, just that you can't assume defeat is a given from the get-go.

how are they to figure out they are being outclassed?
imho, if the enemy just no-sells your most powerful attack, that implies a fairly high likelyhood that you are indeed being outclassed. Retreating and gathering more information is a perfectly valid strategy there.

Talakeal
2021-10-12, 06:09 PM
how are they to figure out they are being outclassed?

imho, if the enemy just no-sells your most powerful attack, that implies a fairly high likely-hood that you are indeed being outclassed. Retreating and gathering more information is a perfectly valid strategy there.

I guess it depends on you you define "no sells your most powerful attack".

Like, if I cast Meteor Swarm on a fire creature or Energy Drain on the undead, that means a ninth level spell did nothing, but that has zero indication of how strong the enemies are.

In this case, the enemy just cast a counterspell, which meant that they were facing an enemy caster who could cast mid level spells, which they knew before going into the fight.


Whether or not falling back to gather more information is a valid strategy really depends on the context; if maintaining the element of surprise is important or you are on a time critical mission (like stopping a ritual or saving a prisoner before they are executed) then falling back to gather more information might effectively be suicide.

Talakeal
2021-10-17, 08:33 PM
Session Five is in the bag. An early Halloween adventure!

Now that Quincy has a permanent address, it is easy for one of the local recruitment officers to track him down for a check on his progress, as it has been nearly six months since he last claimed a bounty. Quincy hems and haws a bit, before trying to turn the conversation around on the recruiter, who insists that he keeps plenty busy by tracking down AWOL soldiers and recruiting young men who will accept a tour in Balthazar’s army in exchange for paying off their gambling debts.

When Quincy seems in over his head, Valentine moves in to save him, telling the recruiter that they have been helping Quincy perform reconnaissance on a large army of hengeyokai who are amassing south of Livonia’s territory and planning on invading the frontier. Her descriptions of the Omukade are so graphic and horrifying that the man is visibly shaken. He thanks Quincy for the report, and says he will make sure the information goes all the way to the top.

He then sets up Quincy with an easy assignment: The small town of Havensbrook which lies on the edge of Balthazar’s territory has stopped paying tribute or sending soldiers for the draft, and asks Quincy if he could go out there, see what is up, and make sure the tribute starts to get paid again.

Quincy agrees, and the recruiter gives him directions to a small garrison near Havensbrook where he can go to rest and resupply before the mission, and gives him a letter authorizing the garrison to pay him, as well as his allies, standard mercenary rates.

Quincy prepares by purchasing a lightweight sawed off shotgun from Decker to protect himself at close range.

The garrison is not terribly far from Golgotha, and they decide to go on horseback rather than take the Juggernaut, leaving Zara to finish setting up a garage near their new plantation. The garrison itself is modest, built into a hillside out of wood and adobe, and is home to maybe a dozen of Balthazar’s troops. Their leader is Lance Corporal Sean Williamson, and he briefs Quincy on the situation in Havensbrook.

Havensbrook simply stopped paying their taxes about four years ago. The garrison doesn’t collect directly and has had no contact with the town. Their tribute was being sent to the nearby city of Lone Tree Hill and handled by the bureaucrats there, but was small enough that it was kind of lost in the shuffle. The soldiers have not visited the city personally. Tribute is normally four recruits a year and 20% of the town’s income; they will be expected to pay it back with interest. Quincy tells him that may be tough, as you can’t get blood from a stone, and Feur corrects him, saying that there are such things as bloodstones.

They stay the night at the garrison, and Feur makes friends with the local soldiers telling corny jokes.

Havensbrook is a small roadside town with a stream running through the middle. It consists of about half a dozen businesses on main street and various outlying farms. The group estimates that there are maybe two hundred people here. The town seems well maintained and not struggling.

Their first stop is the church, which is very dilapidated and doesn’t look to have seen service in years. The cemetery in the church yard is likewise ill kept, and Quincy notices that there are no fresh graves, indeed the dates on the tombstones indicate that nobody in town has died in the last four years. Some quick math says that they should have lost at least a dozen to natural causes in that time, even discounting the high chance of death by violence or misadventure that hangs over the frontier.

Asking around town, they find the mayor is the local miller and goes by the name of Brayden Rhys. He is a large, hirsute man, and when he shakes Valentine’s hand he nearly lifts her off the floor.
When asked about the tribute, Brayden explains that they have been paying it to Livonia and her “clankers”. Four years ago they came into town, their leader covered in clockwork limbs and with a robotic monocle, and gave a speech about how Balthazar’s forces in the region had been defeated and that from now on they would be working for the good of Avarus.

Valentine questions his honesty, and the mayor reluctantly admits that maybe the robotic monocle was a bit of an exaggeration.

He goes on to say that they were happy under Balhthazar, they have paid their dues to Dungenus for the past fifty years, and that Livonia’s forces don’t protect them or even bring money into the town when they are on leave. Three months back an ogre raider came down from the hills and they had to form a posse to put it down, and without any military backing they suffered four casualties in the attempt.

Quincy asks him why there are no graves if they lost four men, and the mayor quickly corrects him; casualties don’t mean fatalities, as a military man he should know that.

The group gets directions to Livonia’s nearest garrison two leagues away. The mayor tells them he is against attacking it, as Balthazar’s forces haven’t even checked in on the town for years, and he is afraid they won’t be able to protect Havensbrook from retribution. He then tells a story about how before the mill his family used to be ranchers, and how they normally just slaughtered a few animals each year to make sure there were enough to breed, but after the Cataclysm when a plague swept through the herds, they slaughtered them all to recoup what meat they could before it all went bad.

The mercenaries are undeterred. They find Livonia’s forces camped amongst the rocks and the tall grass, their tents surrounded by chainlink fences topped with barbed wire and surrounded by sandbags.

Four homunculus battle drones stand guard. The group approaches openly from the front while Krystal sneaks around the back. Once they are in range, Kim casts a spell to protect her companions from bullet.

The homunculi open fire, a bullet whizzing past the head of Quincy’s horse, startling the beast and spoiling his shot.

Anani calls forth a shade as well as conjuring a globe of darkness to protect it from the sun’s light. It falls upon the homunculi, but finds the artificial warriors to be immune to its life draining touch and instead flows through the fence to get at the living soldiers housed within. At the same time Krystal uses her magic to step through the fence on the far side and move in to assassinate their hellion commander in his tent.

The fight outside is short but brutal. Both sides are shot many times, but Kim’s magic manages to keep any of the wounds from being serious; though their clothes are perforated.

In the end, they leave no survivors. Within the camp, they find a strongbox full of golden thari and numerous papers. Kim goes over them and finds that Livonia’s forces had orders to secure the area but not to engage Balthazar’s men. Anani performs quick field surgery to remove the bullets that are imbedded in her companions’ flesh.

When they return to Havensbrook, the mayor acts a little too happy to see them, and jokes about how they are so holey that they must have gone to see the bishop. Then talk gets serious, and
Quincy says that he might be able to work out a protection arrangement, but they are going to have to send atleast thirty recruits to the military to make it worth Balthazar’s time. Rhys says that they can’t spare it, it would be the end of the town as there wouldn’t be enough laborer’s to justify its existence, and it would be a lose / lose proposition.

The group decides to stay the night at the roadhouse and return to the garrison in the morning. The proprietor is an elderly man named Winston with round red cheeks, puffy white hair, and a wheezing voice. He serves them milk and mead and meat and cheese, with promises of brazed mutton later.

As they eat, the group brainstorms ways for the town to make money for their tribute. They ask Winston what he thinks about the idea of a small toll on the road, and he says that it might work, although he is nervous that it might detour visitors.

Sometime later, Anani shrieks and falls backwards in her seat. As it happens, sharp eyed Quincy notices her shadow glance around nervously and then vanish entirely.

When Anani comes to her senses, she says that she felt a great wave of necromantic energy wash across the room, guided by small sparks of wild magic. The roadhouse wasn’t overly crowded, but now it has fallen gravely silent, and everyone seems to be on edge, as if they can subconsciously feel that something is very wrong.

Then the silence is broken by a deafening crash in the kitchen, and several people shriek in fright. Nobody moves, and Kim alone has the courage to investigate. She finds the floor covered in sticky broth and the pots nocked from the stove, and in the center is the butchered and cooked carcass of a skinned lamb. It flops about, and then lurches toward her on what is left of its shanks, turns eyeless sockets to her, and shrieks.

Kim marches into the main room and tells them matter of factly that the dead are rising and they need to barricade the doors.

Krystal steps into the Hellscape and climbs swiftly onto the roof of the inn. She doesn’t see any undead, but there are many candles burning on the upper floors of homes, as if people have been wakened from sleep by uneasy dreams. There appears to be a large gathering in the mill.

Valentine flies to the belfry of the dilapidated church and figures out how to get the bells ringing as a warning to the town, although it may only attract attention. As she passes above the cemetery, she can hear the ground itself screaming.

The rest of the group marches into the mill, where the townsfolk appear to be having some sort of late night meeting. They seem surprised and nervous, and many are clutching weapons, but when they are told that the dead are rising, they seem more confused than anything. Still, they listen when they are told to go find their families and secure themselves in their homes.

The group keeps on the lookout for the undead. They decide fortify the bridge that crosses the stream in front of the old church. Kim uses her magic to create a fine mesh of razor sharp wire main street, and transforms the side roads into sheets of razor sharp stalagmites. Quincy retrieves his horse from the stable and mounts up for battle. Feur gathers up all the broken pews in the church and starts a massive bonfire in the churchyard. Anani goes to consecrate the ground, but finds that her god has gone silent and her prayers fall on deaf ears.

Half an hour passes before the group’s suspicions prove to be correct. The first to approach the party are the remains of local livestock, half butchered and nearly skeletal, as well as swarms of desiccated rats, white eyed and maggot-filled. They are put down by sturdy blow to the head or the spine without too much fuss, and the only serious injury suffered is when a large skeletal goat charges Feur from behind and rams its molded horns into his kidneys.

Then a group of atleast a dozen human zombies comes staggering out of the woods to east of town. They are of all ages and dressed in the manner of the local people. Kim conjures magical barriers that funnel them through her traps, but they are insensible to pain and enough get through that the group falls behind the curve, and undead show up faster than they can be put down. Krystal darts in and out of the shadows, the Black Flame Blade singing as she moves about, slicing the slow moving creatures to ribbons before they can react.

The zombies are joined by dead creatures of the forest, mangled and half eaten. Deer, foxes, weasels, even a monitor lizard with a burst stomach and a pack of freshly slain wolves coated in dried blood. And then older human remains, mostly skeletal, dried by the summer sun and missing skin and limbs, and many bearing the weapons and uniforms of soldiers killed in some border skirmish and forgotten in unmarked graves.

At one point, the party is surrounded. Quincy is pulled from his horse by an aged pair of forest hyenas, brought back to engage in one last hunt, and has his throat town out. Kim, likewise, smashes skeletal skulls with ease, but when the ribcage of one of her foes gets entangled in the chain haft of her weapon, she finds herself surrounded and overborne, suffocating beneath a tide of rotting flesh.

Feur quickly rewinds the strands of time to save them from their fates, but in doing so exposes himself to injury and is forced to fall back into the church.

Among the last of the undead to show up are a group of zombified soldiers bearing the marks of Livonia, and they seem to be the very same group that our heroes slew this very morning, although they can’t fathom how they could have covered such a distance in this short a time.

The warriors do their best to stem the tide and defend the town, but one by one they fall.

Valentine, who had perched upon the roof of the church to direct her compatriots, is taken by surprise when a skeletal eagle descends from the sky and tears at her face with its talons, and she stumbles backwards, falling from the roof, and her wings fail to catch her as she smashes unconscious into the ground. Krystal breaks her normally cool composition and cuts a swath to her, smashing the skeletal bird beneath her hoof, and dragging the fallen angel into the defunct vestibule.

Anani is doing her best to hold off the skeletons with the blunt head of her staff, and is holding her own until a massive frog’s corpse emerges from the stream and engulfs her foot in its slimy mouth. This does no real damage, but distracts her long enough for a skeletal soldier is able to bring its machete down on the back of her head, and soon she passes out from a combination of head trauma and blood loss.

Kim takes two nasty hits from the battle axe which is wielded by the undead creature that led Livonia’s forces in life, one in the small of her back and another across her temple. She manages to remain conscious long enough to smash its skull with her meteor hammer, but only just.

In the small hours of the morning, Quincy and Krystal are the only ones left, but the wilderness seems to have run out of corpses to disgorge upon them. By the end, they are both exhausted and Quincy has resorted to smashing skulls with the butt of his rifle, but they think that the worst is behind them.

Then they hear heavy footsteps coming down the street, and see a fetid hulk moving toward them, the foul remains of the ogre which the townsfolk said to have put down some months earlier has come back for revenge.

Quincy gets its attention with the very last of his ammunition, and it lumbers towards him and gets caught in the razor webs that Kim erected. Black blood pours from the hulk, but it is too massive to keep trapped for long and soon pulls the entire net down. Quincy tries to distract the giant zombie, riding in a broad circle to give Krystal the opportunity to flank it, but he doesn’t account for the sheer length of its arms and is knocked from the saddle by a bone-rattling clothesline. Fortunately, the ogre is distracted chasing the bolting horse, allowing the wounded man to crawl away to safety.
Krystal, seeing the battle is lost, drops a smoke bomb at her feet and disappears.

From her hiding place, the young rogue hears the sound of the ogres smashing down the walls of the general store and then the cries of those sheltered within. In an uncharacteristic display of heroism, she uncloaks herself and follows the creature inside, sneaks up behind it, and drives the Black Flame Blade up to its basket hilt in the creature’s flabby back. Unfortunately for her, this does almost nothing aside from getting her rapier stuck. Still, it gets the ogre’s attention, and the beast turns around and bellows, a cloud of putrid gas filling the air, and swats her away.
Krystal rolls to a stop and stands up unsteadily after suffering her first wound of the battle. She decides to go for one last desperate gambit before abandoning the townsfolk to their fate. She draws her crossbow and fires two bolts into the ogre with no effect.

Then she turns and runs across the gauntlet of razor-sharp rocks that Kim conjured before the battle, trusting in her goat-like hooves and cat-like reflexes to keep her safe. She corners herself on the far side, continuing to fire meaningless bolts at the ogre, each one sinking into its rotten flesh with a soft slurping sound.

She isn’t really trapped of course, if worse comes to worse she readies herself to escape into the Hellscape, grab Valentine, and make her way into the wilderness, letting the gods decide what is to become of her wounded companions and the huddling townsfolk.

But, the ogre takes her bait, and its big feet are immediately sliced to ribbons as it moves. It continues on its knees, and then crawls along on its stomach, its gangrenous flesh bursting and oozing between the rocks. Still, it keeps coming, and by the time it reaches her, it is just a blindly chomping head attached to a ten meter smear of stinking gore.

She holds her nose and braves the sharp rocks and cloud of flies to recover her sword, and then gathers up her companions one by one, returning them to their rooms above the roadhouse.

A few more of the walking dead stagger into town, but there are no more large waves, and the townsfolk are able to put them down with pitchforks and sledgehammers and then toss them onto the bonfire in the church yard, the ancient remains trapped below still giving voice to their insatiable hunger.

In the morning, Krystal makes back to Golgotha alone, making fast time traveling the paths of the underworld, and fetches Zara and her juggernaut to retrieve her injured companions.
At sunset, Anani’s shadow returns unceremoniously, and her powers with it.

Before the group leaves Havensbrook, Quincy gives an impassioned plea to the young townsfolk to step up and join the army, to defend their town and their lands, but nobody volunteers.

Kim, on the other hand, is convinced there is something more to this mystery, and grills the townsfolk to see if any of them are aware of the source of dark magic; a local wizard, a strange artifact, a cursed temple, an evil cult, a forgotten ruin, anything really, but doesn’t come up with anything except puzzled looks.

The townsfolk do thank the mercenaries for selflessly defending the town, and many of the families reward them with small trinkets that have no intrinsic value but great worth to a collector who knows what they are.

They learn from the small towns along the road that the event was not confined to Havensbrook, and some of the smaller homesteads were even wiped out by the undead, but the corpses laid down and stopped moving again when the sun rose, so the damage was not too extensive.

They report to Balthazar’s soldiers, who seem to be more interested in the presence of Livonia’s troops than with the undead. They make Quincy write two reports, one for the ambassador within Golgotha and one for their military commander to pass up the chain. Quincy tries to turn over the moneybox they took from Livonia’s camp, but they give it back and tell them to keep it. They say that Havensbrook and its tribute are no longer their concern.

Back in Golgotha, they find that the city was also beset by the walking dead, but there were relatively few corpses in the large urban area and most were quickly defeated; the outlying plantations were the only ones hit hard. Strangely, the large cemetery at Boot Hill was completely unaffected. Reports from the Templar of Hades at Sheol indicate that, as far as anyone can tell, the phenomenon was global, affecting every corpse in the world, from those who died that very night to the inhabitants of millennia old mausoleums. There were even a few instances of leather coats reanimating and strangling their wearers.

Still, it was just one night, and was swiftly forgotten. Pangaea is a strange and dangerous land, and this is far from the first global cataclysm in living memory.

The group will take some time to heal up from this, all except for Krystal. One evening as the cambion is replacing the blade on her sword, it speaks to her in a raspy voice:
“Did I ever tell you that I think I knew your father?”
“You never mentioned that you could speak at all,” she replies cooly.
“Oh. Guess I never had anything to say. Anyway, I recognize your fighting style, and I think maybe I served with your father during The Reckoning. You are making the same mistake he did, getting so caught up in your enemies’ physical defenses that you are neglecting their spiritual. Mind if I show you how to correct for that?”
“Please do.”


The game went rather well.

Pacing was a problem; we started a full three hours behind schedule, and the game went four hours past our stop time. We really need to learn how to focus and manage our time, it seems like every session is less productive than the last.


The finale battle really came down to a nail-biter. By choosing the defend the town, they chose the highest risk highest reward path, and it could have gone very badly for them, but they pulled through and, more importantly, didn't complain! Even Anani, who was deprived of her powers for half the mission and had every right to sore over it.

The only mistakes I think the players made was, again, not knowing where to put Quincy (imo they should have either made a sniper's nest for him on the roof / second floor of one of the buildings or created a corral where he could kite the slow moving zombies from horseback) and that Kim didn't have any sort of protective magic up on herself, which with her build is a huge mistake.

Kind of disappointment that they didn't get to the bottom of the conspiracy going on in Havensbrook, but I prefer it to the non-investigation that occured last session, and there is always the future.

Quertus
2021-10-21, 11:49 AM
They weren't giving tribute… and the quest-giver didn't order the entire town executed? How can adventurers possibly have anything to do in such a world?

Squire Doodad
2021-10-31, 10:34 AM
Session Five is in the bag. An early Halloween adventure!

The game went rather well.

Pacing was a problem; we started a full three hours behind schedule, and the game went four hours past our stop time. We really need to learn how to focus and manage our time, it seems like every session is less productive than the last.

From what I can tell, this is a relatively common issue. I've seen people spend an entire hour of a session arguing over whether to beat up or ignore a swarm of piercers. As long as people are enjoying themselves, I would say it is "productive".
Having a bit more focus and better time management may be a good idea, but it seems like better scheduling would be just as effective. If the game had started on time, then going an hour over isn't actually that bad.

Talakeal
2021-11-06, 05:32 PM
Played again. It was a short simple session, honestly I planned on having it go a lot longer, but the players cut all negotiations short with naked brutality, almost going full murder hobo for the first time in quite a while.

I will have a full writeup sometime this week.


So, one issue that came up is that the players have decided to start murdering friendly NPCs. The claim that his is justified because "in my games NPCs always betray them". I asked for an example, because I legit can't think of any, and the best the players could come up with was:

Seventeen years ago (ooc) the PCs found a magic item that was significantly above their level, and decided to sell it rather than use it because they couldn't decide who to give it. They took it to a local arms merchant who told them that the best he could do was (GP limit for the community). They took him up on the offer. After the session, I told them that I was really disappointed they decided to sell such a powerful item, especially for less than full value. They immediately got mad at being swindled, and I told them they didn't get swindled, literally no body in town had the money to buy the item at full price and gave them all they had, but the players insists that because the NPCs didn't tell them the item's full market value upfront, they betrayed the PCs and all had to die.

So yeah, we had a miscommunication about buying and selling seventeen years ago, and they are using that as justification for cold blooded murder.

Quertus
2021-11-09, 08:55 AM
Sounds like they want a game that they can win by their own power, with no help from allies.

Honestly, I'd expect nothing less from your players.

The Glyphstone
2021-11-09, 12:35 PM
Or/and that they're continuing to take advantage of you and your endlessly tolerant nature because they're shallow and immature people. "I'm hurting you because of this thing you did seventeen years ago" sounds like a line out of a cheesy PSA about domestic abuse.

Talakeal
2021-11-09, 04:37 PM
Sounds like they want a game that they can win by their own power, with no help from allies.

Honestly, I'd expect nothing less from your players.


Or/and that they're continuing to take advantage of you and your endlessly tolerant nature because they're shallow and immature people. "I'm hurting you because of this thing you did seventeen years ago" sounds like a line out of a cheesy PSA about domestic abuse.

Both are probably correct.



Anyway, Session Six:

One evening while Feur is convalescing, his room fills with golden smoke. At first he thinks that he is dreaming, or maybe having a reaction to his painkillers, but then endless coils of burning golden scales emerge from the mist, and he realizes he is in the presence of one of the shen-lung.

The dragon god identifies itself as Asgorath, talon of Hyperion. It tells Feur that the events of the previous month were not restricted to Earth. Throughout the elemental planes, slumbering spirits abruptly arose as half-dead monstrosities, and the Tribunal is stretched thin trying to hold them back. As a result, they have had to pass many of their low priority investigations over to mortal agents such as Feur. Recently, someone in the Golgotha area has been mangling mortal souls in violation of the Gotterdamerung, and they would like Feur to investigate.

He asks for more information, but there is nothing to give, finding out will be his job.

Feur asks the group to assist with this task, and they reluctantly agree, although Krystal tells him that there better be some form of compensation for her.

They ask Tatters, and she has nothing. She tells them urban legends of the Golgotha Ripper and of Dream Demons, but nothing about mutilated souls. She will keep her eye out, but might need more information to go on.

Likewise, Father Genaro at the Immaterium doesn’t know anything about it, although he does say that the matter is of interest to him, and that if they do find any fellows whose souls have been chopped up, they should send them his way for more information. He suggests consulting with a witch.

Valentine says that they have a witch in the form of Anani, and Feur spends the rest of the day making bad puns involving Anani and the word “which”.

That night, Anani seals herself in a windowless room and communes with the spirit of darkness itself. The cold voice whispers to her that the one she seeks is the Dark Elf Akatosh. It also warns her that if his magic grows unchecked, he could well be a threat to the darkness, but if he dies, then all magical creatures on Earth might die with him.

The next morning Valentine decides to ask Decker if he knows Akatosh. Decker is incensed that she thinks that all elves know one another, but says that she is in luck, because in this case not only does he know Akatosh, but he has a score to settle against the man and gives her his address, with a warning that he is some sort of sorcerer.

They find an old Victorian house in the low part of town, centuries old even in Kim’s time. It is rundown, but unlike the rest of the neighborhood it seems to have enjoyed continuous occupation. They set up an observation post on the second floor of an abandoned home down the street, and Quincy keeps watch until nightfall.

Mid-morning, a half-elven boy of about ten or twelve leaves the house and unhitches a mule which he walks into town. Valentine tells Krystal to tail him, and she follows him to a local chemist’s shop where she decided to grab him. She drags the lad into an ally; roughly gags him and binds his wrists and ankles before hoisting him over her shoulder and then returning to their hideout, dragging him through the hellscape.

Valentine removes his gag and he stares at her coolly. He mutters a few words in a language that Kim thinks might by Sylvan but doesn’t recognize.

“My name is Valentine, what is yours?”

“Why should I tell you anything?” The boy states in an oddly calm voice.

“Because it’s polite.”

He glances down at his bindings and responds “I think the time for politeness is past.”

Valentine is unnerved by his calm and verbose nature, and pauses to think. Quincy notices a rat crawl up the boy’s pant-leg and when he doesn’t react, the sharpshooter immediately trains his rifle on his head and tells him to get rid of the rat now or die.

“You’re going to need to untie my hands for that,” he says.

Anani moves to remove the rat herself, and the creature bites and scratches at her. It is cold and stiff, with white eyes and maggoty flesh, and she knows it died of some horrible disease. She shrieks and tosses it away.

At this, Valentine nods and Krystal impales the child from behind, sticking her rapier through his heart.

He falls to the ground without a scream. A pool of blood spreads out and then stops. They tell Feur to dispose of the body.

That evening, they decide to raid the house.

Kim will come in the front, with Quincy and Valentine; Feur will come in the back with Anani and Krystal.

Kim has little trouble breaking down the front door.

They find the dark elf sitting at his breakfast table, dining from glass plates upon a salad of pears and pine nuts drizzled with honey while drinking butter-tea. He is tall and slender, with dark receding hair and craggy features, and is caught totally off-guard.

As Kim races toward him, Akatosh rises to his feet and fumbles with his spell-book, casting a quick spell of protection and barely avoiding the crash of Kim’s meteor-hammer, which sends dinnerware and wooden splinters flying.

Unseen to the mortals, a small rakshasah who serves as his familiar, slides out of the shadows and reinforces Akatosh’ magic, allowing him to steal Kim’s vitality, trading his delicate elven constitution for her hardy nature. This is all that allows him to survive when Quincy’s rifle roars out and blasts a gaping hole in his shoulder.

His protective ward goes off a moment later, and Quincy finds searing golden light inflicting an identical wound upon himself, and he drops from the fight.

Feur took several strikes to shatter the backdoor, and Krystal gets impatient, instead using her powers to walk through the walls in an attempt to flank her foe. When she arrives, she attempts to sneak up on the magus, but finds his elven ears hear her coming and he steps aside.

When Feur and Anani burst into the room, Akatosh reveals a polished bloodstone amulet and raises it, the magics within stealing the life-forces from his attackers, healing his wound and leaving his foes weak.

They struggle for a few moments, the elf evades most of their blows, and those that they land are mirrored onto themselves by his protective spell. He uses his magic and that of his amulet to attack their animus directly, healing his own damage in turn.

Anani is finally able to smash a vial of holy-water upon his chest, which dispels the magical protections. Kim then trips him with her meteor hammer, and Valentine moves forwards and slips a garrote around the elf’s throat. Feur wraps his strong hands around her slender arms and pulls back, choking the breath from the elf and leaving him unable to speak the words of magic.

When Akatosh loses consciousness, Krystal moves to finish him but Anani bids her to wait. She has been warned against killing him, but also against letting him go, and decides now is time to try an experiment.

She hastily does her best to perform the same ritual that the Archmage Thanatos attempted upon her so long ago, conjuring up the very essence of the Abyss and shattering Akatosh’s soul.

When the dark elf awakens, he attempts to cast a spell, but finds his magic gone. His confusion turns to despair and he wails in frustration. He starts to sob, but when no tears come he realizes the true extent of the damage that was done, and coldly composes himself.

“You have taken everything from me, even my grief. Why? Who am I to you?”

Feur answers that he is merely doing the bidding of the great cosmic dragon.

Akatosh laughs hollowly and tells them they are pawns of gods who care nothing for them, gladly aiding in their own subjugation.

Valentine says that he was mutilating souls and needed to be stopped.

Akatosh explains that he was doing a public service. His clients came to him willingly, asking to have the darkness, the anger and hatred that prevented them from living a normal life, excised from their souls and he obliged.

When asked what he was to get out of it, he said that he was adding their miniscule necromantic powers to his own, and eventually, once his technique was perfected, he would perform it on a mass scale, allowing humans to live short, utopian, lives while he ascended to demi-godhood and claimed the moon for his own.

Kim asks why he would want the moon, and he tells them that it is the source of all magic; but he has noticed its power waning over time. The effect is subtle, but is growing asymptotically, and he imagines that within the next twenty years the magic will be entirely gone, but if stored and rationed out, it could still change the world.

Valentine says that surely the gods would stop such a thing, and Akatosh laughs and tells them that they sound like the fools at the Immaterium. No, the gods would not help, they never approved of their sacred fire being stolen in the first place, and would be quite happy to see magic stripped from the world and the mortals put back in their proper place.

Anani asks about the bloodstone pendant, and he tells that it allows its bearer to cast the Blood Ritual spell indefinitely, stealing others’ life forces to heal one’s own wounds. She asks for it, and he tells her coldly that it is of no use to him anymore, and that the magic word is “Hemotroph”.

Quincy and Krystal have been busy ransacking the house, stealing books of arcane lore as well as art objects and relics of the Sidhe. Akatosh does not try and stop them, for they have already taken his dreams from him, what more harm are a few trinkets.

Kim asks if the plague of restless dead that attacked the world last month was his doing. Akatosh smiles and shakes his head, and says that it was far beyond his power. “No, there is only one being who could have cast such a spell. Salebenothan, the Black King, walks the world once again.”

They ask if the boy was his son, and he says it is unlikely, for he has no interest in human women. The boy, whose name was Mordeth, was his apprentice, a lost and damaged soul, who could have great magical potential if guided along the right path. They nod and do not elaborate on his fate.

After stripping his house of anything of value, they tell Akatosh to leave Golgotha to seek his own penance, lest they return and put an end to him. They loosen his bindings and depart. They do not look back.

That night, Asgorath returns to Feur. It tells him that his work was surprisingly direct. Though efficient, he might have uncovered the full extent of the conspiracy if he had taken a more measured approach. Still, the dragon-spirit cannot dispute his results. It breaths its fiery golden breath upon his master-crafted cestuses, and imbues them with the power of pure justice. It tells him that he is now a full member of the Tribunal, authorized and expected to enforce oaths across the cosmos. His fists will now turn the weight of the subject’s sins against them, striking harder and harder the more evil is in their target’s heart, although he shouldn’t expect it to do much at all the next time he decides to murder a child.

A few days later, Feur receives a letter from Lord Delacuer saying that he was able to pull some strings and found that the order of knights garbed in red and black have been occupying hidden
Templar bases in the desert that were abandoned in the Cataclysm, and he spoke to someone who had a run-in with them. He asks Feur not to investigate further, as he had to use several unofficial channels that were beyond his authority to even get this much information, and does not wish to play his hand by getting civilians involved at this time.

At the same time, Valentine is summoned for a personal audience with her mysterious patron, Lady Abasinia.


This session had kind of a Knights of the Dinner Table feel for me.

Not bad, but very direct. I had planned on a bit more investigation (although I did like that they cut to divination rather than stumbling around blind) followed by conversation. The killing of the apprentice and then attacking Akatosh without finding out what he was doing or why shocked me a bit, but whatever, it turned out ok in the end.

Now Bob is planning on betraying Hraijin (the mage they recruited last session); killing him in his sleep, looting his stuff, and sacrificing his soul, and justifying it saying that she is only doing it before he can betray them in turn. Although, to be fair, that is pretty much their MO, to take offense at something an NPC says and then use it as an excuse to kill and rob them "in self defense", so I shouldn't be surprised that they are just being a bit proactive at once.

Batcathat
2021-11-09, 04:57 PM
Both are probably correct.

I'd say something about running far, far away from this group but at this point it seems clear that you will keep shoving your hand into the garbage disposal that is playing with this group. (The metaphor feels kinda mean even for me, but after reading only a small fraction of your posts about them, it feels rather apt.)


Now Bob is planning on betraying Hraijin (the mage they recruited last session); killing him in his sleep, looting his stuff, and sacrificing his soul, and justifying it saying that she is only doing it before he can betray them in turn. Although, to be fair, that is pretty much their MO, to take offense at something an NPC says and then use it as an excuse to kill and rob them "in self defense", so I shouldn't be surprised that they are just being a bit proactive at once.

I can understand killing someone preemptively if you think they'll betray you (and once they're dead, you might as well take their stuff) but I feel like preemptively sacrificing someone's soul would be really tricky to justify as any sort of self defense.

Talakeal
2021-11-09, 05:10 PM
I'd say something about running far, far away from this group but at this point it seems clear that you will keep shoving your hand into the garbage disposal that is playing with this group. (The metaphor feels kinda mean even for me, but after reading only a small fraction of your posts about them, it feels rather apt.)



I can understand killing someone preemptively if you think they'll betray you (and once they're dead, you might as well take their stuff) but I feel like preemptively sacrificing someone's soul would be really tricky to justify as any sort of self defense.

Yeah.

They have no evidence whatsoever in or out of character that he plans to betray them (cards on the table, he doesn't).

It just seems really weird to spare his life, to the point of lying to the casino owners, only to kill him in his sleep afterward.

From an OOC strategic perspective it makes sense, as the value of a stolen stole is based on the mana it contains, and he was depleted when they defeated him, while if they kill him in his sleep he will, presumably, be close to full. But it feels like a bit of a tosser move either way, and if Krystal gets killed in the attempt we are in for another full fledged episode of Talakeal's gaming horror stories.

icefractal
2021-11-09, 05:48 PM
I'd suggest pushing back on that, IC or OOC ... but your players would probably whine about it.
On a system level, I'd suggest not having direct incentives for murdering people, but it's a bit late for that in this particular case.

Since it won't change anything once he's dead, I'd be tempted to just flat out state. "Oh btw, he had no plan to double-cross you or anything," when they give that as their justification after the fact, but I'm sure they'd just claim you're lying or complain about "trying to make them feel bad".

Their (OOC) behavior's bad and they should feel bad.

Duff
2021-11-10, 07:26 PM
Ok, so here is the next part.


So yeah, not a terrible session, but a very long and uneventful one where I had to resort to more handholding than I would like to keep it from turning into a true horror story.

.

Well done on successfully adjusting your GMing to suit the players

Talakeal
2021-11-15, 12:44 PM
Well, had another session. Went well, if a bit long (as usual) and was a fairly traditional dungeon-crawl, with the added complication of a rival adventuring party.


Only had one issue. Game stalled because the PCs wanted something from an NPC but refused to talk in character or to actually tell me how they were asking or what they were offering in turn. So we got a situation that essentially boiled down to an old classic:

"I tell the guard to let us past."
"Ok, how are you going to do that?"
"By rolling diplomacy!"
"Ok, but just bluntly telling a guard to let you past for no reason is going to be a pretty tough roll."
"I got a 13."
"No, that's not going to do it. The guard tells you to get lost."
"Ok, well then we spend the next hour twiddling our thumbs."

Will post a full write-up of the session later this week.



Well done on successfully adjusting your GMing to suit the players

Thanks. But I am not quite sure what exactly I did in that regard.

Jakinbandw
2021-11-15, 01:49 PM
My first thought is that your players need to read thr angry gms player tutorial:

https://theangrygm.com/memo-to-the-players-1/

Talakeal
2021-11-15, 02:23 PM
My first thought is that your players need to read the angry gm's player tutorial:

https://theangrygm.com/memo-to-the-players-1/

I actually already had them read it.

It seems to have gone completely went over their heads.

They just reduce his XYZ structure to "I want to get the guard to let me past by talking to him using my diplomacy skill" and nothing changes.

Xervous
2021-11-15, 03:02 PM
Seems to be misaligned expectations on the scenic significance of a guard. Sometimes bonking a faceless NPC with a skill roll is acceptable because they’re not supposed to be a focus of table time. Other times the exact phrasing is important. What are you doing to highlight important interaction points?

Batcathat
2021-11-15, 04:15 PM
Only had one issue. Game stalled because the PCs wanted something from an NPC but refused to talk in character or to actually tell me how they were asking or what they were offering in turn. So we got a situation that essentially boiled down to an old classic:

"I tell the guard to let us past."
"Ok, how are you going to do that?"
"By rolling diplomacy!"
"Ok, but just bluntly telling a guard to let you past for no reason is going to be a pretty tough roll."
"I got a 13."
"No, that's not going to do it. The guard tells you to get lost."
"Ok, well then we spend the next hour twiddling our thumbs."

In my experience those situations are kinda tricky, even without accounting for the particular problems of your group, because I feel like its kind of unfair regardless of solution. On one hand, a character should be able to be good at something without the player being good at it (most players aren't great at swinging swords or casting spells, after all) but on the other hand, I instinctively want to reward the player who comes up with an eloquent speech or well-crafted lie while punishing the player who... well, does what your player did.

Though I suppose you were looking for kind of a middle ground, like the player at least coming up with the basic lie, even if the delivery is done through the roll of a die? (Which would be the equivalent of the player coming up with the tactics while the character's skill does the actual sword-swinging, I suppose).

BRC
2021-11-15, 04:19 PM
In my experience those situations are kinda tricky, even without accounting for the particular problems of your group, because I feel like its kind of unfair regardless of solution. On one hand, a character should be able to be good at something without the player being good at it (most players aren't great at swinging swords or casting spells, after all) but on the other hand, I instinctively want to reward the player who comes up with an eloquent speech or well-crafted lie while punishing the player who... well, does what your player did.

Though I suppose you were looking for kind of a middle ground, like the player at least coming up with the basic lie, even if the delivery is done through the roll of a die? (Which would be the equivalent of the player coming up with the tactics while the character's skill does the actual sword-swinging, I suppose).

In these sorts of situations I don't generally require the player to actually roleplay their argument unless they want to, but I DO request that they at least describe the argument they are making.

If you're not providing a reason, that basically means you're trying to do this with Charm alone (represented by a high DC), you're just trying to quickly make them like you so much that they'll do something they wouldn't do otherwise.

Batcathat
2021-11-15, 04:30 PM
In these sorts of situations I don't generally require the player to actually roleplay their argument unless they want to, but I DO request that they at least describe the argument they are making.

If you're not providing a reason, that basically means you're trying to do this with Charm alone (represented by a high DC), you're just trying to quickly make them like you so much that they'll do something they wouldn't do otherwise.

Yes, that is probably the fairest way of doing it, though I do find it somewhat unsatisfactory. I suppose part of it is the binary, decision-less nature of rolling for it (compared to something like combat, where there are usually quite a few decision points).

NichG
2021-11-15, 05:19 PM
I don't see the problem as being whether the players could roleplay their argument or not. The problem is that the players and DM had no way or method to move on after a failure. Even if you use a pure stats based approach, whenever a roll happens it means that both failure and success should be valid options. If the game totally breaks down on one of those paths, that's going to have the potential to create issues no matter what.

Talakeal
2021-11-15, 05:33 PM
So, the whole "I roll diplomacy" situation has been a repeating problem at my table for at least twenty years, and is one I have often seen in the forums.

This case was a bit unique though. As I said, I will write up the full session sometime later this week, but in short:

The PCs were in a tomb which they suspected of being a false tomb to hide the real one.

It is a square room about five meters on the side.
The room contains four statues of warriors holding spears and a sarcophagus.
Analysis of the floor indicated it was slightly sloped.
The statues could be turned, but not moved. They show no signs of hidden mechanisms (although the rogue rolled a nat 1 when searching them).
The floor shows no signs of being scratched, but the area in front of the sarcophagus is relatively free of dust.
The walls showed no signs of secret passages and when tapped on did not sound hollow.
The sarcophagus contains the remains of a man in ceremonial golden armor. Though his tomb is labelled as belonging to Sir Daniel, his bones appear to be those of a commoner, and he is posed like he was buried alive and is trying to escape.


So, I expected this to be a very brief puzzle. The answer is that the sarcophagus is on rollers, and there are four bars holding it in place. The statues are connected to them by wired under the floor, and the bars retract when their spears are lowered. Of course, the rogue rolling a 1 to search the statues was a bit of bad luck, as they failed to notice that the wrists were articulated.


But, no matter, I thought, the party has tons of resources, and worse comes to worse they can just smash the place up. Of course, none of them had picks or hammers of any sort, the closest they had was a set of lapidary tools, Shawshank Redemption style.

But, Kim was a master of earth magic, and so everyone turned to her.

Now, at this point she could have done a dozen or more things, but she decided to cast speak with rocks and demands that the statues tell her how to enter the tomb.

I didn't expect this, but it is a cool and creative solution, so I quickly improv personalities for the statues; they are named after the Atlantean heroes they are carved in the likeness of and believe themselves to be the guardians of the tomb, albeit ones who are naive and (if you will pardon the pun) dumb as rocks.

I task Kim's player how they are asking, and they repeat they are demanding they tell her how to enter the tomb.

At this point I have her NPC companion, a con-artist named Valentine, pull her aside in character and explain the basics of persuasion to her, but Kim ignores her and simply demands the statues tell her how to pass more loudly.

At this point I break character and say that its ok if he doesn't want to role-play the dialogue for some reason, but he should probably at least come up with an angle. He tells me he can't think of one, and its unfair of me to ask him how to RP because he doesn't have a high charisma in real life and I don't demand he swing a sword to attack and all the usual, so I sigh and say fine, give me a charisma roll.

And then he blows the roll, and the statues ignore his demands.

And then the PCs say I have put them in another "impossible" puzzle and spend the next hour twiddling their thumbs and everyone (myself included) is bored to tears.





In my experience those situations are kinda tricky, even without accounting for the particular problems of your group, because I feel like its kind of unfair regardless of solution. On one hand, a character should be able to be good at something without the player being good at it (most players aren't great at swinging swords or casting spells, after all) but on the other hand, I instinctively want to reward the player who comes up with an eloquent speech or well-crafted lie while punishing the player who... well, does what your player did.

Though I suppose you were looking for kind of a middle ground, like the player at least coming up with the basic lie, even if the delivery is done through the roll of a die? (Which would be the equivalent of the player coming up with the tactics while the character's skill does the actual sword-swinging, I suppose).

Pretty much this.


I don't see the problem as being whether the players could roleplay their argument or not. The problem is that the players and DM had no way or method to move on after a failure. Even if you use a pure stats based approach, whenever a roll happens it means that both failure and success should be valid options. If the game totally breaks down on one of those paths, that's going to have the potential to create issues no matter what.

Agreed.

The problem is that my players are so married to their ideas that they simply give up after the first failure and assume I am demanding some very specific solution from them which requires "reading the DM's mind".

Batcathat
2021-11-15, 05:38 PM
The sarcophagus contains the remains of a man in ceremonial golden armor. Though his tomb is labelled as belonging to Sir Daniel, his bones appear to be those of a commoner, and he is posed like he was buried alive and is trying to escape.

Out of curiosity, how does the bones of a commoner differ from the bones of nobility?

(I suppose a realistic answer might be different signs of wear and tear, but I like to imagine that this setting's nobility have jewel-encrusted bones. :smallsmile: )

BRC
2021-11-15, 06:02 PM
Ah, it was a Puzzle.

So, first of all, you have the issue of the Search Check Nat 1 kind of blocking off the information needed to proceed. The puzzle wasn't "impossible", but a nat 1 roll locked them out of most of the information they would need, with the most direct path blocked.

I'd actually argue that this was a better use of the "Let me just Roll Persuasion" than most cases, since the communication in question was Via magic spell that let you "Speak" to previously inanimate objects. Such spells usually have some built-in mechanism by which speaking to the thing in question is actually Useful. The idea of giving the statutes personalities is a fun one, and I don't know the wording on that "Speak with Stone" spell, but all things considered, a Persuasion roll as "I'm the one who gave the stones sentience, I can Compel information out of them" isn't unreasonable. It's less Persuasion by argument and more Mystical Force of Personality Compelling The Rocks to Obey.


In such situations, I like to keep in mind the concept of Failing Forward, which is to say that, especially for critical stuff (Like solving a puzzle), the PC's should always get SOMETHING out of making a roll. Give them somewhere else to go.

"With a Nat 1, you have no idea how to open this tomb, short of just smashing the place to smithereens" (Point them towards Smashing the place up)

Or, the Statues might refuse to tell the Players how to open the tomb, but in doing so, reveal that their Spears are the key.


For stuff like this I follow a general rule of "Resources, Rolls, or cReativity"

Which is to say that the PC's can progress forwards either by spending resources, rolling well, or being creative. Using "Speak with Stone" qualifies as both Resources and Creativity, so I'd be inclined to say that they've solved the puzzle right there, or at least earned themselves some guaranteed forward progress.

Talakeal
2021-11-15, 06:05 PM
Out of curiosity, how does the bones of a commoner differ from the bones of nobility?

(I suppose a realistic answer might be different signs of wear and tear, but I like to imagine that this setting's nobility have jewel-encrusted bones. :smallsmile: )

In short, access to genetic engineering.


snip.

I mostly agree.

Indeed, I did tell them that smashing it up was an option, only to find out not a single person in the party had a tool that could be used for smashing.


Likewise, it was supposed to be a trivial obstacle and I really wanted the speak with stone plan to work, but by insisting it be resolved with a dice roll rather than any attempt to RP, that means that success has to hinge solely on the dice roll. I made that statues both stupid and good natured, and it would have been super simple to trick or convince them to let the party past if they had been willing to try most any apporach.

NichG
2021-11-15, 08:42 PM
Given the details, I probably would have had one of the statues attack on a failed roll, leveling their spear in the process, and prompting a Perception/Listen/whatever check to hear something click under the sarcophagus... And if it's destroyed during the fight, or moves off of the base, then there'd be exposed machinery.

Xervous
2021-11-16, 09:04 AM
Given the details, I probably would have had one of the statues attack on a failed roll, leveling their spear in the process, and prompting a Perception/Listen/whatever check to hear something click under the sarcophagus... And if it's destroyed during the fight, or moves off of the base, then there'd be exposed machinery.

The statues aren’t animate. The players are being asked to roll persuasion against inanimate, non magical rock.

The obvious side consequence is that bards can probably seduce the rocks.

Jakinbandw
2021-11-16, 09:48 AM
So, the whole "I roll diplomacy" situation has been a repeating problem at my table for at least twenty years, and is one I have often seen in the forums.

...

I task Kim's player how they are asking, and they repeat they are demanding they tell her how to enter the tomb.

At this point I have her NPC companion, a con-artist named Valentine, pull her aside in character and explain the basics of persuasion to her, but Kim ignores her and simply demands the statues tell her how to pass more loudly.

At this point I break character and say that its ok if he doesn't want to role-play the dialogue for some reason, but he should probably at least come up with an angle. He tells me he can't think of one, and its unfair of me to ask him how to RP because he doesn't have a high charisma in real life and I don't demand he swing a sword to attack and all the usual, so I sigh and say fine, give me a charisma roll.

And then he blows the roll, and the statues ignore his demands.

So from my angle you did your own version of 'roll diplomacy'. You've said that the statues were friendly and dumb, but you haven't given any reason why they wouldn't give up the information. No obstacle to overcome or think through for the players.

If I don't know what I'm pushing against as a player I'm going to have a hard time being creative. If they didn't want to let the players through because they didn't think they were allowed, then it leads naturally into a deception check, but as it was you gave nothing.

From a game that I'm designing:

"Characters will go along with any goal of a social action unless they have at least 1 specific reason not to"

The goal of the social action was to get the stones to tell the pc how to get through, so in my playstyle the pc should have just succeeded, no roll required as the stones had no reason to hide that information.

Edit: Basically, I don't see anything about you thinking through the stones reason to keep the pcs out any more than the pc thought through theirs to talk the stones into telling them the information.

BRC
2021-11-16, 11:19 AM
Likewise, it was supposed to be a trivial obstacle and I really wanted the speak with stone plan to work, but by insisting it be resolved with a dice roll rather than any attempt to RP, that means that success has to hinge solely on the dice roll. I made that statues both stupid and good natured, and it would have been super simple to trick or convince them to let the party past if they had been willing to try most any apporach.

So, I'm curious how you approached this, at a couple points

1) What are the exact rules for the "Speak with Stone" Spell that was used

2) You improvised some personality into the statues. How much of that was made clear before you asked for the RP/ the roll was made?

The key behind the question "How do you convince them" is that you need to know somebody about the target. Previously inanimate Rocks don't have a lot to go on from a persuasion perspective. Even if they're dumb as bricks, what do Rocks want? What arguments might persuade them? I don't know, and I'm over here with plenty of time to think. The best things I can think of is a deception to trick the rocks into thinking we're here to check to make sure the traps are on, or whatever, but the point is, these are Rocks brought to sentience by this spell, so the idea of them having any sort of Agenda to subvert is kind of surprising. You were not WRONG to give the statues the personalities of the heroes they depict, but I could see a player getting off-footed by a sudden request to come up with an argument that would persuade some rocks.

NichG
2021-11-16, 12:33 PM
The statues aren’t animate. The players are being asked to roll persuasion against inanimate, non magical rock.

The obvious side consequence is that bards can probably seduce the rocks.

Yeah okay, the fact that the statues identified as guards gave me more Awaken vibes.

I guess the question then is, why would Speak with Stone access a personality according to how the rocks were shaped at all? If you made a stone effigy of your enemy, could you Speak with Stone to interrogate it about your enemy's motives or personality or even secrets? Would recarving the statues let you change their personality?

Talakeal
2021-11-16, 12:39 PM
So from my angle you did your own version of 'roll diplomacy'. You've said that the statues were friendly and dumb, but you haven't given any reason why they wouldn't give up the information. No obstacle to overcome or think through for the players.

Yeah, sutbborness does come from both sides of the screen.

Frequently what happens at my table is that if the player's first plan doesn't work, they refuse to try anything else, and I refuse to break verisimilitude / the rules and pull a deus ex machina to let them succeed anyway, and so we end up in a staring contest to see who gets bored first.

Its interesting though, the idea of "role play" vs. "roll play". Like here, the player refused to describe their actions and just wanted the dice to decide and then get stuck when the roll failed. There were several other times in the session where the players detected a trap, failed the roll to disarm it, and then tried to come up with ways to disarm the trap anyway.

Both create awkward situations.


If I don't know what I'm pushing against as a player I'm going to have a hard time being creative. If they didn't want to let the players through because they didn't think they were allowed, then it leads naturally into a deception check, but as it was you gave nothing.

I wouldn't say I "gave them nothing". I told them both OOC and IC that they weren't responding to a blunt demand for answers and that maybe trying to get to know them before either tricking them or hitting them with a sob story might be a better approach.

Stones have long memories, and to those who know how to listen to their low rumbling whispers, contain all the memories of the earth. This spell can be used to hear about interesting events that once occurred in the subject’s presence, and can reveal clues about the nature of the abjurer’s current quest that other means of investigation would never uncover.


1) What are the exact rules for the "Speak with Stone" Spell that was used


Its kind of a custom power, so the write-up is pretty vague and could probably do with a rewrite:

"Stones have long memories, and to those who know how to listen to their low rumbling whispers, contain all the memories of the earth. This spell can be used to hear about interesting events that once occurred in the subject’s presence, and can reveal clues about the nature of the abjurer’s current quest that other means of investigation would never uncover."

Is the text of the ability I gave the player.

From a fluff perspective, I have made it clear that Kim literally talks with rocks. The world is animistic in nature and everything, even inanimate objects and immaterial concepts, has a spirit. What the spell does is translate said spirits "thoughts" into words the caster can understand and vice versa. In this case, I decided the statues were sort of like the paintings in Harry Potter; simple guardians who exist as vestiges of the people they were patterned after.




2) You improvised some personality into the statues. How much of that was made clear before you asked for the RP/ the roll was made?

The key behind the question "How do you convince them" is that you need to know somebody about the target. Previously inanimate Rocks don't have a lot to go on from a persuasion perspective. Even if they're dumb as bricks, what do Rocks want? What arguments might persuade them? I don't know, and I'm over here with plenty of time to think. The best things I can think of is a deception to trick the rocks into thinking we're here to check to make sure the traps are on, or whatever, but the point is, these are Rocks brought to sentience by this spell, so the idea of them having any sort of Agenda to subvert is kind of surprising. You were not WRONG to give the statues the personalities of the heroes they depict, but I could see a player getting off-footed by a sudden request to come up with an argument that would persuade some rocks.

This is pretty much exactly what I told the player at the time.

I said you need to talk to them first to get some sort of grasp on who they are or what they want; they aren't going to respond to blunt demands. He declined and just wanted to skip the RP and "roll diplomacy" and then when the roll failed, got stymied.

Talakeal
2021-11-16, 12:45 PM
I guess the question then is, why would Speak with Stone access a personality according to how the rocks were shaped at all? If you made a stone effigy of your enemy, could you Speak with Stone to interrogate it about your enemy's motives or personality or even secrets? Would recarving the statues let you change their personality?

Yes; but all of that is going to take time and the personality of the stone is going to be based on the creator's impression of said enemy (as well as that of the collective unconscious) rather than actually tapping into his mind and personality.

NichG
2021-11-16, 01:10 PM
Yes; but all of that is going to take time and the personality of the stone is going to be based on the creator's impression of said enemy (as well as that of the collective unconscious) rather than actually tapping into his mind and personality.

Given lapidary tools, probably I'd mostly just try to change the expression on the faces of the stone statues. Rather than whatever stern 'I'm guarding' expression the original sculptor gave them, I'd try to alter it into some kind of 'I'm miserable/trapped in this role' expression of anguish and go from there.

Talakeal
2021-11-16, 01:38 PM
Given lapidary tools, probably I'd mostly just try to change the expression on the faces of the stone statues. Rather than whatever stern 'I'm guarding' expression the original sculptor gave them, I'd try to alter it into some kind of 'I'm miserable/trapped in this role' expression of anguish and go from there.

I don’t mean time to physically make the statue, I mean time for the object’s soul to change to match its new countenance, which could take moments or centuries, depending on how much psychic energy is expended by people thinking about the statue (which in this particular case is, not a lot).

NichG
2021-11-16, 03:03 PM
I don’t mean time to physically make the statue, I mean time for the object’s soul to change to match its new countenance, which could take moments or centuries, depending on how much psychic energy is expended by people thinking about the statue (which in this particular case is, not a lot).

A lot of people were thinking about a statue made to be a decoration of a tomb? Those specific statues?

Talakeal
2021-11-16, 03:14 PM
A lot of people were thinking about a statue made to be a decoration of a tomb? Those specific statues?

No, not at all. Which is precisely why change comes so slowly.

Their sculptor obviously put some thought into them, and those who passed through the tomb a little but very few people knew these particular statues ever existed, let alone spent much time thinking or feeling about them.

Instead, most of their “personality” was cobbled together over the centuries from the universal concepts of statue, tomb, guardian, etc. as well as the stories about the ancient heroes in whose likenesses they were carved.

Now, intense emotions in their presence could speed up the process, for example if someone were murdered on their spears or if they were venerated as idols, or young lovers carved their initials on them, or if they become symbolic of s9meth8ng important in the mind of a passionate person.


But, this is all really deep lore for my world. For most gameplay, its usually enough to acknowledge that objects have souls and certain wizards can converse with those souls.

Duff
2021-11-16, 06:05 PM
In these sorts of situations I don't generally require the player to actually roleplay their argument unless they want to, but I DO request that they at least describe the argument they are making.

If you're not providing a reason, that basically means you're trying to do this with Charm alone (represented by a high DC), you're just trying to quickly make them like you so much that they'll do something they wouldn't do otherwise.


Maybe wording could go like...
GM "At this stage it's a Hard* roll, if you give me a vaguely plausible line, I'll bring it down to Easy*, even a bad line will make it Less Hard, and of course a genius line will make it Very Easy

Be overly generous in rewarding the behavior you want to see and maybe you can help your players become comfortable with speaking in character. It's partly a skill and partly a habit.

* Given your group, you might want to give actual numbers.

Talakeal
2021-11-16, 06:07 PM
Maybe wording could go like...
GM "At this stage it's a Hard* roll, if you give me a vaguely plausible line, I'll bring it down to Easy*, even a bad line will make it Less Hard, and of course a genius line will make it Very Easy

Be overly generous in rewarding the behavior you want to see and maybe you can help your players become comfortable with speaking in character. It's partly a skill and partly a habit.

* Given your group, you might want to give actual numbers.

This is absolutely what I do.

The players still clam up and insist and refuse, complaining that I don’t make them do push ups for a strength check, so why are they required to speak for a charisma check?

icefractal
2021-11-16, 06:22 PM
On the one hand that's a faulty metaphor - when faced with a combat situation, you can't just say "I fight them all and win the battle ... *rolls* I got a 37" You still have to say who you're attacking with what in what order, and you can't stab someone who's 100' up in the air just by rolling well enough.

On the other hand, these are your players we're talking about, and I doubt they care whether the argument they're making is entirely consistent. And also, if they really dislike playing out conversation even minimally, IDK there's any benefit from making them do so.

Talakeal
2021-11-16, 06:51 PM
On the one hand that's a faulty metaphor - when faced with a combat situation, you can't just say "I fight them all and win the battle ... *rolls* I got a 37" You still have to say who you're attacking with what in what order, and you can't stab someone who's 100' up in the air just by rolling well enough.

Preaching to the choir here.

This isn't a new argument, and I have seen it play out at my table and on forums for decades now.


On the other hand, these are your players we're talking about, and I doubt they care whether the argument they're making is entirely consistent. And also, if they really dislike playing out conversation even minimally, IDK there's any benefit from making them do so.

Its not that they dislike playing out conversation. And indeed, I don't require them to "play it out" merely to tell me what approach they are going with. "I try and get him to comply by threatening his son" works just as well as a full on monologue. IMO, actually playing out a conversation is like nicely painted minis, its a frill that can make the game more fun, but is hardly required.

The problem is that my players, for whatever reason, clam up if their first approach doesn't work and preemptively come up with reasons why I might shoot down further approaches and thus don't even try.

As I have said before, I would consider a monster that is immune to fire an obstacle, not a puzzle, while a monster that can ONLY be killed by fire is a bit more of a puzzle. But in my player's case, if their first shot against the former is fire, it might as well be a monster that is immune to everything under the sun because they are not going to try a different approach. I never have quite figured out what is going on in their heads in this regard.

icefractal
2021-11-16, 07:13 PM
They really, really hate making mistakes, or even looking like less than geniuses, to the extent that they'd rather assume a situation is impossible than admit they didn't instantly grok how to solve it?

NichG
2021-11-16, 07:49 PM
No, not at all. Which is precisely why change comes so slowly.

Their sculptor obviously put some thought into them, and those who passed through the tomb a little but very few people knew these particular statues ever existed, let alone spent much time thinking or feeling about them.

Instead, most of their “personality” was cobbled together over the centuries from the universal concepts of statue, tomb, guardian, etc. as well as the stories about the ancient heroes in whose likenesses they were carved.


I guess what I'm questioning is something like, if no one much really cared about these statues, why would their default personality be something just perfect to act as a tomb guard but also just slowly changing enough that playing on the form-function relationship is beyond PC timescales. As opposed to e.g. the primary spiritual echo being a volcanic extrusion 100000 years ago that gave rise to the rock being on the surface...

Like from a meta sense, why did you decide on specific details which extended the puzzle's challenge compared to other choices you could have made?

Talakeal
2021-11-16, 09:10 PM
I guess what I'm questioning is something like, if no one much really cared about these statues, why would their default personality be something just perfect to act as a tomb guard but also just slowly changing enough that playing on the form-function relationship is beyond PC timescales. As opposed to e.g. the primary spiritual echo being a volcanic extrusion 100000 years ago that gave rise to the rock being on the surface...

Like from a meta sense, why did you decide on specific details which extended the puzzle's challenge compared to other choices you could have made?

Because its more interesting to talk to a statue than to a rock, and in the few seconds I had to come up with a personality for them I didn't foresee the players shutting down

Again though, its weird to think of this as a puzzle; there were no clues or expected solutions; the players could have trivially gotten through this in dozens of ways with zero effort in or out of character.


Oftentimes I feel like running a game feels a lot like having a contest of wills with a small child.

NichG
2021-11-16, 09:39 PM
Because its more interesting to talk to a statue than to a rock, and in the few seconds I had to come up with a personality for them I didn't foresee the players shutting down

Again though, its weird to think of this as a puzzle; there were no clues or expected solutions; the players could have trivially gotten through this in dozens of ways with zero effort in or out of character.

Oftentimes I feel like running a game feels a lot like having a contest of wills with a small child.

Well, there were things which would have worked and things which would not have worked, and the players had to figure out what to try. So that's really the simplest example of a puzzle. That scene could have gone 'Hey, great idea, you start to talk with the stone. In a slow and mumbly voice it describes the whirlwind that the last few millenia have been for it, being forced out of a warm and close place and strewn out over the land, with this persistent thing sizzling through its form and wearing it away, and then finally being struck repeatedly until it shattered and then carefully chipped into this shape that it doesn't understand the point of. Why did it need to be hollow? Why take other stones from other places and join them together into these sort of fake matrices in conditions with millions of times less pressure than needed to actually make it feel right.' etc etc. Which would basically be 'The puzzle was to find some way to know how to access hidden things in this room. You had a good guess that the statues would be connected, and figured out an ability that you have which let you get at that information. Congratulations, you solved it!'

But your instinct was somehow to push to extend the challenge. That's what I want you to inspect.

Talakeal
2021-11-16, 10:45 PM
Well, there were things which would have worked and things which would not have worked, and the players had to figure out what to try. So that's really the simplest example of a puzzle. That scene could have gone 'Hey, great idea, you start to talk with the stone. In a slow and mumbly voice it describes the whirlwind that the last few millennia have been for it, being forced out of a warm and close place and strewn out over the land, with this persistent thing sizzling through its form and wearing it away, and then finally being struck repeatedly until it shattered and then carefully chipped into this shape that it doesn't understand the point of. Why did it need to be hollow? Why take other stones from other places and join them together into these sort of fake matrices in conditions with millions of times less pressure than needed to actually make it feel right.' etc. etc. Which would basically be 'The puzzle was to find some way to know how to access hidden things in this room. You had a good guess that the statues would be connected, and figured out an ability that you have which let you get at that information. Congratulations, you solved it!'

But your instinct was somehow to push to extend the challenge. That's what I want you to inspect.

Yeah, and I assume that's the sort of thing my players expect as well; because I can hand them an automatic victory that I must hand them an automatic victory.

That's not any sort of game or any sort of narrative I would want to be a part of on either side of the screen though.


And in your example above, I would explicitly be denying my players agency, and there is a very good chance that they would call me on it and refuse to go along on principal. Heck, I don't know how many time-skip travel scenes have turned into long complicated ordeals with tons of bad blood because players insist their characters would never set foot on a boat.


But let me emphatically again that this was not supposed to be any sort of a "challenge", it was basically just dungeon dressing that the players decided to throw a fit over because they rolled 1 on their first attempt and refused to try an alternate attempt.



Edit: Actually, this is a bit of a tangent, because the issue is the dice. The game isn't "succeed or fail based on DM fiat"; the game is about rolling dice when success in in question. So they searched the room; rolled the dice, failed, cast a spell, rolled the dice, failed, and then pouted for an hour rather than trying a third approach.

NichG
2021-11-16, 11:28 PM
Yeah, and I assume that's the sort of thing my players expect as well; because I can hand them an automatic victory that I must hand them an automatic victory.

That's not any sort of game or any sort of narrative I would want to be a part of on either side of the screen though.

This isn't a situation that you planned in advance for. It's not like you'd be making it easier for them artificially by choosing that the stone was in a helpful state of mind rather than an obstinate one. Both were equally valid ways for things to be given the established fiction and your notes. So this is a marvelous place to look at the principle of 'you have the ability to choose differently'. If one choice makes the game get stuck and the other has things go forward, and it really is a free choice that isn't being demanded by existing information, then when you choose the method that gets the game stuck it also means you could have chosen different and prevented the game from getting stuck.

And the thing about 'the dice should be involved' is even more worrying. If you consistently pick the thing which is harder for the players time and time again, especially if you find ways to justify it like 'they should have to pass a roll', then it's completely understandable to me that your players would feel frustrated and like nothing they come up with matters. After all, if they came up with an idea that they think should just work, and every single time you find a reason why they have to jump through an extra hoop or succeed in some roll, why bother trying to come up with ideas any more? I'm not going to say they're great players for this or anything like that, but it makes some sense for them to just sit back and ask "Seriously, how much do you actually want game to go forward?" and hand it back to you to make something happen.

It'd be better if they had an alternate idea of how to go forward on a failed roll, sure. But it'd be better if whenever you introduce a roll, you make sure that the game has a way to go forward and sustain momentum on both sides of that result.

Talakeal
2021-11-16, 11:59 PM
This isn't a situation that you planned in advance for. It's not like you'd be making it easier for them artificially by choosing that the stone was in a helpful state of mind rather than an obstinate one. Both were equally valid ways for things to be given the established fiction and your notes. So this is a marvelous place to look at the principle of 'you have the ability to choose differently'. If one choice makes the game get stuck and the other has things go forward, and it really is a free choice that isn't being demanded by existing information, then when you choose the method that gets the game stuck it also means you could have chosen different and prevented the game from getting stuck.

And the thing about 'the dice should be involved' is even more worrying. If you consistently pick the thing which is harder for the players time and time again, especially if you find ways to justify it like 'they should have to pass a roll', then it's completely understandable to me that your players would feel frustrated and like nothing they come up with matters. After all, if they came up with an idea that they think should just work, and every single time you find a reason why they have to jump through an extra hoop or succeed in some roll, why bother trying to come up with ideas any more? I'm not going to say they're great players for this or anything like that, but it makes some sense for them to just sit back and ask "Seriously, how much do you actually want game to go forward?" and hand it back to you to make something happen.

It'd be better if they had an alternate idea of how to go forward on a failed roll, sure. But it'd be better if whenever you introduce a roll, you make sure that the game has a way to go forward and sustain momentum on both sides of that result.

That doesn't really seem like a game to me, that just seems like a bad railroad. It also presumes that I can tell in advance when the players are going to pout and stall out the game.

The statue was absolutely in a helpful state of mind, just not a servile one, and so I left whether or not barking orders at it would work up to a roll of the dice.

All the spell does is allow someone to speak to stones. Would you say that if, for example, they had been elves, simply speaking elven should have "just worked" and that no roll should be required to get them to help?

Not quite sure what you mean by "consistently pick the thing which is harder for the players". Could you please elaborate for me?

NichG
2021-11-17, 12:35 AM
That doesn't really seem like a game to me, that just seems like a bad railroad. It also presumes that I can tell in advance when the players are going to pout and stall out the game.

The statue was absolutely in a helpful state of mind, just not a servile one, and so I left whether or not barking orders at it would work up to a roll of the dice.

All the spell does is allow someone to speak to stones. Would you say that if, for example, they had been elves, simply speaking elven should have "just worked" and that no roll should be required to get them to help?

Not quite sure what you mean by "consistently pick the thing which is harder for the players". Could you please elaborate for me?

So there are things which are established in advance which might make things easier or harder for players to get where they want to go. But there are also things that haven't been decided in advance, where as the GM you have to make a choice about them. Choosing something that is good for the players there or choosing something that is bad for the players there are, a priori, equal. Neither is forced or fake or 'making things artificially easy' or 'making things artificially hard' or whatever - you have a choice and the choices are equal, and if you generally go either way equally often then there's no real bias. However if when that happens your instinct is to find a 'but' rather than find an 'and', then that's no longer equal. You might not even do it consciously or intentionally. But when a player proposes something, if you find yourself more frequently thinking about why it wouldn't work rather than why it would work, then you're consistently biasing the game to be against the players.

So as far as what I'd do... for a Speak with Stones spell I'd probably take a sort of animistic interpretation that the fact that the character even has that spell means that in some sense they're on good working terms with the spirits of things for whatever offscreen reason - if they weren't, they wouldn't be able to cast such a spell. So when they start to speak with stones, I would need quite a strong reason for the stones to actually refuse to say something to the caster even after they've invested whatever build resources in having the spell, and whatever adventuring resources in casting it. Depending on the group and circumstances I might do that 'extend the challenge' move, but I'd almost always do a 90 degree turn than a 180 degree resistance - the stones say 'we can't tell you the secret of this room, a spell binds our tongues, its source is to the east' or 'the stones speak of two structures they were once part of and the empty spaces and connections of them, but are which of the two structures corresponds to this tomb' or 'the stones are willing to tell you of the secrets of this room, but they want a piece of themselves to be carried away from here' or whatever. Since this is a spell to speak with something that can't speak, I wouldn't pay any mind to what language the party used and what race the statues were depicted to be - the wizard is speaking Spirit and the stones understand Spirit, and that's fine.

And as far as designing rolls so failures fail forward, a simple example here would have been that if the party really did manage to piss off the stones enough they don't refuse to talk, they actively lie in a way that encourages the PCs to go to some room where they will be ambushed or trigger a trap or get involved in some other events. Or the stones shout 'There are tomb raiders here! Help! Help!' or whatever.

Morgaln
2021-11-17, 04:09 AM
Because its more interesting to talk to a statue than to a rock, and in the few seconds I had to come up with a personality for them I didn't foresee the players shutting down

Again though, its weird to think of this as a puzzle; there were no clues or expected solutions; the players could have trivially gotten through this in dozens of ways with zero effort in or out of character.


Oftentimes I feel like running a game feels a lot like having a contest of wills with a small child.

I want to point out that you were the one who called this a puzzle when first describing it to us, but that's just an aside.

Far more importantly, you're telling us that the players could have gotten through this trivially easy with zero effort. NichG's posts afterwards are basically pointing out that you could have made "Speak with Stone" one of those trivially easy ways. But you didn't and keep telling them that this would be "bad railroading" and "handing out automatic victories".
So what ways would there have been that would have been trivially easy, and why do they not count as automatic victories? Why did you decide that "Speak with Stones" would not be one of those trivially easy ways? You did demand your player come up with additional ideas, after all, so this one wasn't zero effort.

Talakeal
2021-11-17, 01:04 PM
I want to point out that you were the one who called this a puzzle when first describing it to us, but that's just an aside.

Well... I'll be a monkey's uncle, so I did. I get upset by people referring to obstacles as puzzles, and there I go and do the exact same thing. My apologies.


Far more importantly, you're telling us that the players could have gotten through this trivially easy with zero effort. NichG's posts afterwards are basically pointing out that you could have made "Speak with Stone" one of those trivially easy ways. But you didn't and keep telling them that this would be "bad railroading" and "handing out automatic victories".

I am having trouble parsing this bit; does the "them" in the last sentence refer to NichG or my players?

The railroading part is telling the players how their characters act. For example, if I say "Excuse me, may I please have a cookie," that could be an automatic charisma test, whereas "Hey bitch, gimme that!" would be significantly less likely to have a much higher difficulty. BUT, the latter might be much more characterful, and I would not enjoy a game where the GM treated the latter as the former.

Which, I think, is probably where the disconnect is coming from. I see each scene as an opportunity for the player's to express their characters and explore the world, while my players see them as obstacles standing between them and the loot / XP.

The rules of the game are that when success is in question, roll a dice. I find that the DM declaring automatic success OR failure to be overstepping their bounds for anything which is not trivial or impossible. It is also a form of railroading as you are negating the players decisions both in play and in character builds as any action they take propels them forward.

I have never played in a table with a "yes and" GM, but I can't imagine it would be any fun; it honestly sounds super stressful, and I think I would just default to murder hobo mode to give myself a break.


So there are things which are established in advance which might make things easier or harder for players to get where they want to go. But there are also things that haven't been decided in advance, where as the GM you have to make a choice about them. Choosing something that is good for the players there or choosing something that is bad for the players there are, a priori, equal. Neither is forced or fake or 'making things artificially easy' or 'making things artificially hard' or whatever - you have a choice and the choices are equal, and if you generally go either way equally often then there's no real bias. However if when that happens your instinct is to find a 'but' rather than find an 'and', then that's no longer equal. You might not even do it consciously or intentionally. But when a player proposes something, if you find yourself more frequently thinking about why it wouldn't work rather than why it would work, then you're consistently biasing the game to be against the players.

But as I said, my default is, "that could work, roll for it." Not sure how that is biased in either way.



And as far as designing rolls so failures fail forward, a simple example here would have been that if the party really did manage to piss off the stones enough they don't refuse to talk, they actively lie in a way that encourages the PCs to go to some room where they will be ambushed or trigger a trap or get involved in some other events. Or the stones shout 'There are tomb raiders here! Help! Help!' or whatever.

As I said upthread, they already want to murder helpful NPCs because they took a bad offer from a pawnshop seventeen years ago; I can't imagine that NPCs feigning helpfulness and then leading them into a trap would lead anywhere good.

NichG
2021-11-17, 01:40 PM
But as I said, my default is, "that could work, roll for it." Not sure how that is biased in either way.


Every time you add a roll, you decrease the overall chances of success. Neutral would be that you decide that an idea is good enough to bypass a roll or introduce fail-forward mechanisms as often as you add rolls which gate whether the players can continue down a path they've started or hit a wall.

Compare these two cases:

1. Player: I want to journey to this temple in the jungle. GM: Okay, roll a difficult Survival check [with a 40% chance of success given your stats] to see if you prep correctly, find your way, deal with the hazards of the jungle, etc and eventually get there safely or not.

2. Player: I want to journey to this temple in the jungle. GM: Okay, first lets talk supplies. How do you deal with that? Player: I'll go and buy them. GM: Okay, roll an Appraise check [80% chance of success] where failure means there's something wrong with the supplies. Player: *rolls* Okay, I want to leave town through the gate. GM: There are some guards there who are looking for criminals or contraband, roll a Diplomacy check or Bluff check to get past [80% chance of success]. Player: *rolls* Okay, traveling to the temple now... GM: Alright, lets see if you get lost. Roll a Survival check [80% chance of success] to see if you're on track the first day. Player: *rolls* I keep on going. GM: It's the first night, roll a Search check [80%] to find an appropriate camp site. Player: *rolls* Okay, I camp, wake up, keep on going. GM: Now the second day, see if you keep on track [80% chance]. Player: Okay, *rolls*. GM: Did you get a disease from going through the swampy terrain? Roll an easy Fortitude check [80% chance of success] or you might have to turn back. Player: *rolls* Do I find the temple yet? GM: Good point! Roll a Search check to see if you can locate the Temple in the dense jungle [80% chance]. Player: *rolls* GM: Alright, you found the temple.'

In the first case it might be a hard check, but it's actually much easier than the second case which, because the GM cut things finely and injected a roll every time there was some kind of aspect of the journey that they thought 'could work, roll for it' about, the actual overall chance of success becomes 0.8 ^ 7 = about 20% if all rolls are 'go/no-go' types of things.

So every time you add a go/no-go roll to a process, e.g. one where that particular avenue dead-ends on failure rather than fails forward, you increase the chances that basically that avenue is just not going to go forward at all. If your instinct is to increase the number of steps along a given avenue or approach and to find justifications for adding rolls (or just to think of what rolls you could add to the approach), it will tend to make things fail more often than if you looked at things at a higher level of abstraction.

Edit: This why things that are designed to have lots of rolls, e.g. stuff like 4e skill challenges, use stuff like 'need 3 successes before 2 failures' or 'need at least 50% of rolls to be successes' or other ways of compounding rolls than via sequential gates. Those are patterns designed so that changing the number of rolls doesn't change the difficulty.


As I said upthread, they already want to murder helpful NPCs because they took a bad offer from a pawnshop seventeen years ago; I can't imagine that NPCs feigning helpfulness and then leading them into a trap would lead anywhere good.

They might not be happy with the result, but the game would move on rather than getting stuck with hours of thumb-twiddling.

Talakeal
2021-11-17, 02:15 PM
Every time you add a roll, you decrease the overall chances of success. Neutral would be that you decide that an idea is good enough to bypass a roll or introduce fail-forward mechanisms as often as you add rolls which gate whether the players can continue down a path they've started or hit a wall.

Compare these two cases:

1. Player: I want to journey to this temple in the jungle. GM: Okay, roll a difficult Survival check [with a 40% chance of success given your stats] to see if you prep correctly, find your way, deal with the hazards of the jungle, etc and eventually get there safely or not.

2. Player: I want to journey to this temple in the jungle. GM: Okay, first lets talk supplies. How do you deal with that? Player: I'll go and buy them. GM: Okay, roll an Appraise check [80% chance of success] where failure means there's something wrong with the supplies. Player: *rolls* Okay, I want to leave town through the gate. GM: There are some guards there who are looking for criminals or contraband, roll a Diplomacy check or Bluff check to get past [80% chance of success]. Player: *rolls* Okay, traveling to the temple now... GM: Alright, lets see if you get lost. Roll a Survival check [80% chance of success] to see if you're on track the first day. Player: *rolls* I keep on going. GM: It's the first night, roll a Search check [80%] to find an appropriate camp site. Player: *rolls* Okay, I camp, wake up, keep on going. GM: Now the second day, see if you keep on track [80% chance]. Player: Okay, *rolls*. GM: Did you get a disease from going through the swampy terrain? Roll an easy Fortitude check [80% chance of success] or you might have to turn back. Player: *rolls* Do I find the temple yet? GM: Good point! Roll a Search check to see if you can locate the Temple in the dense jungle [80% chance]. Player: *rolls* GM: Alright, you found the temple.'

In the first case it might be a hard check, but it's actually much easier than the second case which, because the GM cut things finely and injected a roll every time there was some kind of aspect of the journey that they thought 'could work, roll for it' about, the actual overall chance of success becomes 0.8 ^ 7 = about 20% if all rolls are 'go/no-go' types of things.

So every time you add a go/no-go roll to a process, e.g. one where that particular avenue dead-ends on failure rather than fails forward, you increase the chances that basically that avenue is just not going to go forward at all. If your instinct is to increase the number of steps along a given avenue or approach and to find justifications for adding rolls (or just to think of what rolls you could add to the approach), it will tend to make things fail more often than if you looked at things at a higher level of abstraction.

Fully agree there. But that isn't what is happening here, indeed, its almost the opposite.

They only need a single success to move on, and are allowed an arbitrarily high number of rolls.

Its make a search check, if succeed move on, if fail make a larceny check, if succeed move on, if fail make a stoneworking test, if succeed move on, if fail make a persuade test...

Now some of these rolls might have a cost to them (for example attempting to persuade the stones requires a spell slot first), but ultimately only a single roll is needed.


They might not be happy with the result, but the game would move on rather than getting stuck with hours of thumb-twiddling.

Here's the thing though, the game doesn't actually get "stuck" so much as we end up with a contest of wills.

The players know how to progress, they just refuse to do so because they don't like the cost. They might need to spend gold, or a spell slot, or risk damage, or compromise their ethics, or admit they are in over their heads, or even talk in character, and they refuse to pay those costs.

Thus it comes down to a matter of pride / stubbornness where they dig in their heels like a mule and demand I provide some sort of deus ex machina that will bypass the costs.

Also, if I break character and try and give them advice, they blow up at me because I am "making them feel dumb".

Changing things to "fail forward" is just taking away their choices and throwing consequences at them, and I don't think that will make them happy.

NichG
2021-11-17, 02:39 PM
Fully agree there. But that isn't what is happening here, indeed, its almost the opposite.

They only need a single success to move on, and are allowed an arbitrarily high number of rolls.

Its make a search check, if succeed move on, if fail make a larceny check, if succeed move on, if fail make a stoneworking test, if succeed move on, if fail make a persuade test...

Now some of these rolls might have a cost to them (for example attempting to persuade the stones requires a spell slot first), but ultimately only a single roll is needed.


Every failure requires a new viable idea though, which are finite and indeed for this group as you've put it, limited in number to 1.

So in practice you're using a different group in your head to model whether an approach is reasonable than the one in front of you.

Given that they only ever really come up with single ideas, design a schema that works for that reality.

For example, pass = move forward with benefit / fail = move forward with penalty. Or pass = move forward for free / fail = move forward with resource expense.



Here's the thing though, the game doesn't actually get "stuck" so much as we end up with a contest of wills.

The players know how to progress, they just refuse to do so because they don't like the cost. They might need to spend gold, or a spell slot, or risk damage, or compromise their ethics, or admit they are in over their heads, or even talk in character, and they refuse to pay those costs.

Thus it comes down to a matter of pride / stubbornness where they dig in their heels like a mule and demand I provide some sort of deus ex machina that will bypass the costs.


Regardless of the reasons, stuck is stuck.

Rather than engaging in a power struggle, design things so that non-action is an active choice and moves things forward.

"Last call for ideas for this room, anything, no? Moving on then..."

They have a choice. By doing nothing, they're choosing inaction. Skipping over two hours of glowering at each-other OOC is not removing their choices or railroading them. If someone is willing to declare their action to be 'I stay in the room and keep trying' let them, but prioritize keep the game going for everyone else doing other things.

BRC
2021-11-17, 03:35 PM
Every failure requires a new viable idea though, which are finite and indeed for this group as you've put it, limited in number to 1.

So in practice you're using a different group in your head to model whether an approach is reasonable than the one in front of you.

Given that they only ever really come up with single ideas, design a schema that works for that reality.

For example, pass = move forward with benefit / fail = move forward with penalty. Or pass = move forward for free / fail = move forward with resource expense.



Regardless of the reasons, stuck is stuck.

Rather than engaging in a power struggle, design things so that non-action is an active choice and moves things forward.

"Last call for ideas for this room, anything, no? Moving on then..."

They have a choice. By doing nothing, they're choosing inaction. Skipping over two hours of glowering at each-other OOC is not removing their choices or railroading them. If someone is willing to declare their action to be 'I stay in the room and keep trying' let them, but prioritize keep the game going for everyone else doing other things.
I mean, there needs to be a failure condition of some sort (usually "Expend a resource") otherwise what's the point.
Like, this is exactly why "Take 20" used to be a thing.

But if the consequence for Failure is "Proceed with a cost" and the Players just...won't pay that cost, that's a stopping point.

Lord Raziere
2021-11-17, 03:38 PM
But if the consequence for Failure is "Proceed with a cost" and the Players just...won't pay that cost, that's a stopping point.

Then the game is dead either way. At least by forcing the issue you make sure it dies quickly so you can move on.

NichG
2021-11-17, 03:57 PM
I mean, there needs to be a failure condition of some sort (usually "Expend a resource") otherwise what's the point.
Like, this is exactly why "Take 20" used to be a thing.

But if the consequence for Failure is "Proceed with a cost" and the Players just...won't pay that cost, that's a stopping point.

The consequence wouldn't be 'choose whether or not to expend a cost in order to proceed', it would be 'you proceed and must expend a cost'. Basically, the choice whether to risk spending the cost should be when you initiated the action that led to the roll, not after the roll concludes.

In the case of the Speak with Stones spell, since this is basically spirit diplomacy you could do it something like this: The caster can force the spirits to give them the information they want, but that would cost a 'favor point', which is basically that some time in the future the GM can require a condition of them before they can refresh one of their spell slots / before they can prepare this spell or cast this spell again in the future. If they can convince the spirits to give the information without force, they avoid having to spend the favor point. Before casting the spell in the first place, you have to decide whether you're willing to spend the favor to force the issue if you fail to persuade them because it determines details of the casting.

Talakeal
2021-11-17, 04:05 PM
The consequence wouldn't be 'choose whether or not to expend a cost in order to proceed', it would be 'you proceed and must expend a cost'. Basically, the choice whether to risk spending the cost should be when you initiated the action that led to the roll, not after the roll concludes.

In the case of the Speak with Stones spell, since this is basically spirit diplomacy you could do it something like this: The caster can force the spirits to give them the information they want, but that would cost a 'favor point', which is basically that some time in the future the GM can require a condition of them before they can refresh one of their spell slots / before they can prepare this spell or cast this spell again in the future. If they can convince the spirits to give the information without force, they avoid having to spend the favor point. Before casting the spell in the first place, you have to decide whether you're willing to spend the favor to force the issue if you fail to persuade them because it determines details of the casting.

And the end result is that the game stalls out earlier when the players refuse to cast the spell in the first place.

NichG
2021-11-17, 04:12 PM
And the end result is that the game stalls out earlier when the players refuse to cast the spell in the first place.

Again 'any more interactions with this room? Last call? No, then moving on."

You have players who default to inaction, so don't make games where inaction can paralyze the table. One method is to build everything with timers of events going on around, so if the players stall out, you just trigger the next timer. Another method is to stop asking the group and go in a circle asking each player 'Do you have an action here? What do you want to do now?' and if you make a full circle with no one saying they have an action, move on.

Letting one or two players freeze the game because you want to get into a contest of wills with them and as a result forcing everyone else to sit there is a disservice to your other players.

tyckspoon
2021-11-17, 04:19 PM
Also, if I break character and try and give them advice, they blow up at me because I am "making them feel dumb".

Changing things to "fail forward" is just taking away their choices and throwing consequences at them, and I don't think that will make them happy.

I am coming around to the idea that for at least some of your players the actual game they are playing isn't .. well, not D&D, whatever you refer to your customized system as, but they're not there for the RPG. They're playing "have a stupid argument with Talakeal" and showing up for the RPG session is how they sucker you into starting to play their game instead. I have no idea how to fix that, and I would like to be wrong about it, but if that is the motivation for a player or players that is the kind of situation that often is resolved with 'next game don't invite them.'

That or you have people with the maturity of children and if you want to continue running a game for them you will in fact have to adjust your decisions to coddling children who can be easily provoked into having a tantrum.

Talakeal
2021-11-17, 04:34 PM
Again 'any more interactions with this room? Last call? No, then moving on."

You have players who default to inaction, so don't make games where inaction can paralyze the table. One method is to build everything with timers of events going on around, so if the players stall out, you just trigger the next timer. Another method is to stop asking the group and go in a circle asking each player 'Do you have an action here? What do you want to do now?' and if you make a full circle with no one saying they have an action, move on.

Letting one or two players freeze the game because you want to get into a contest of wills with them and as a result forcing everyone else to sit there is a disservice to your other players.

I try, its just hard to preserve verisimilitude. If there is no mystery / defense, its hard to rationalize how this tomb could have existed for 800 years without someone else plundering it.

Also, I am not quite sure what you mean by wanting to get into a contest of wills with one or two players; I consider this a fail state rather than a goal, and every time I hope and pray that one of the other players will come up with something to break the stalemate.


I am coming around to the idea that for at least some of your players the actual game they are playing isn't .. well, not D&D, whatever you refer to your customized system as, but they're not there for the RPG. They're playing "have a stupid argument with Talakeal" and showing up for the RPG session is how they sucker you into starting to play their game instead. I have no idea how to fix that, and I would like to be wrong about it, but if that is the motivation for a player or players that is the kind of situation that often is resolved with 'next game don't invite them.'

That or you have people with the maturity of children and if you want to continue running a game for them you will in fact have to adjust your decisions to coddling children who can be easily provoked into having a tantrum.

IMO that's close to the truth, but not quite.

There are some very fragile egos at my table, and I think a big part of what they want out of the game is sort of an "actualization fantasy"; they like to imagine that they are the smartest, strongest, richest most important, most powerful, etc... heroes around to give their egos a boost that real life rarely does. But then, when something in the game happens to challenge that fantasy and deflate their ego, they either become sullen and withdrawn or explode in rage.

NichG
2021-11-17, 05:11 PM
I try, its just hard to preserve verisimilitude. If there is no mystery / defense, its hard to rationalize how this tomb could have existed for 800 years without someone else plundering it.

Also, I am not quite sure what you mean by wanting to get into a contest of wills with one or two players; I consider this a fail state rather than a goal, and every time I hope and pray that one of the other players will come up with something to break the stalemate.


You set things up where basically in order for game to continue, you have something you want the players to do - come up with a better argument to convince the stones, change their tone when interacting, come up with alternate plans, spend resources, etc. Those are things that they don't want to do. So you end up stuck against each-other where the winner of the power dynamic is the one who can make things miserable enough at the table that the other side backs down. Whether it's for sake of verisimilitude or because of instincts or driven by pride or ego or whatever doesn't matter, the end result is that you get into a state whose exits all consist of 'someone backs down'.

Again this has something to do with choices you're implicitly making. You were the one who chose to imagine a tomb which would require a lot of justification in order to be the people who got to plunder it. Instead figure out something that in your head it would make sense for these players and this party to accomplish given how they play. And play lightly, don't commit so much that things become blocking points. If you want to have a rare and hard-to-loot tomb exist in the flow of things, you can have it so long as the party gets a short amount of time OOC to try to figure it out, and then must move on and allow game to continue. If they don't get it in the first few ideas, don't keep pushing them to come up with new ideas, just make a habit of setting up things so that there's only time or opportunity to try a few ideas and then if nothing worked, move on.

Quertus
2021-11-17, 08:54 PM
Talakeal, how did up ever manage to put together a group composed exclusively of members who would fail kindergarten? I'm not sure if even the… failing my "Descendants" lore roll… fairy godmother?… teaching remedial cooperation could make this work.

On a lighter note,



The obvious side consequence is that bards can probably seduce the rocks.

That brings new meaning to the phrase… never mind. :smalltongue:

Anyway, on this specific issue…

I can fully appreciate Talakeal's desire for a consistent world. I don't like it, but I can even agree with the idea of "I came up with their personalities on the fly", and the personalities the statues had, *if*
it's established lore that world physics work this way
the character knew that works physics work this way *or* had an established really **** good reason not to know this
the player understood what their character knew about world physics here.


But, even so, Talakeal, you really need to understand that you gave your players nothing to work with here.

Do you understand that? Do you understand the difference between something to work with, and nothing to work with?

Yes, yes, the *scenario* had plenty of solutions. Except, they weren't "solutions", they were "roll for chance of solution". Now, despite the flak you're getting over that, I not only don't inherently disagree with you, I'm generally on your side there, from a versimilitude angle. That is, if it's *reasonably* possible to fail, it's possible to fail. I'm fine with that.

Your players aren't.

So, up to that point, I say you're running a perfectly fine game, and it just sounds like you need a good player. Well, two, in case one is having an off night. Two good players, and your game would be fine.

You don't have that.

But that's just a (horrible, meltdown-inducing) mismatch between your style and your group, nothing inherently wrong with your style.

With me so far?

However, when you gave the statues personalities? That's where you gave the party nothing to work with.

Oh, sure, you gave yourself lots of cool, spontaneous notes about how they worked. But none of that was player facing. None of what you told your players was anything they could build off of. It's a Scrabble board with no open letters.

But wait, you might say, what if I had inquisitive players, who talked with the statues, to learn about their personalities? Well, sure, if that didn't risk costing them more resources, or failing at more rolls, that might be a valid option… for players other than the ones you have. But it still means that you didn't give them anything to work with to begin with.

And I'm not even saying that's *wrong*. I'm just saying that you need to see the difference.

How, if you had a statue of a guard RP sternly stating, "halt, who goes there", or a hero commenting on their homeland, or a small child statue saying, "hey, mister, can I eat that girl's liver", it gives your players something to build off of, clues them in to potential motivations.

On the flip side, I'm all about the concept of Wizards impressing spirits with their power. That's a perfectly cromulent trope in my book. To "fail forward" there, I could absolutely see, "you failed your roll by 17 - would you like to spend 17 mana to cowl the spirit, or attempt a different social strategy?" In fact, were I a player at your table, and had taken those actions, I probably would have requested that solution.

And, for "cool GM" bonus points, think about what cool, "doesn't bite the party" extra things could happen because of that power expenditure. For "doesn't bite the party", kinda like how you rejected the "lead them into a trap" option.

Never forget, this is who you're dealing with as players:



They really, really hate making mistakes, or even looking like less than geniuses, to the extent that they'd rather assume a situation is impossible than admit they didn't instantly grok how to solve it?

Yet you've designed a system that gives them lots of opportunities to fail. That's a bad match for your players. They need win buttons, abilities that just work. Like a "speak with stone" spell that just accepts orders. Or an "investigate" ability that just returns "here's what you found". No rolls, no chance of failure for choosing the correct answer.

Do you disagree?

Batcathat
2021-11-18, 02:19 AM
Talakeal, how did up ever manage to put together a group composed exclusively of members who would fail kindergarten? I'm not sure if even the… failing my "Descendants" lore roll… fairy godmother?… teaching remedial cooperation could make this work.

I'm also very curious about this, but it's only my second biggest question — the largest is about Talakeal's claim that when he's tried playing with other people, it's been even worse. I don't exactly have a high opinion on humanity in general, but I'm still pretty convinced that Talakeal actually lives in some sort of parallel jerk dimension, connected to ours through these forums.

Talakeal
2021-11-18, 01:06 PM
I'm also very curious about this, but it's only my second biggest question — the largest is about Talakeal's claim that when he's tried playing with other people, it's been even worse. I don't exactly have a high opinion on humanity in general, but I'm still pretty convinced that Talakeal actually lives in some sort of parallel jerk dimension, connected to ours through these forums.

Sad but true.

Although to be fair, most groups I have been a part of have fine players, but a crazy DM, where one person sours the whole thing.


Talakeal, how did up ever manage to put together a group composed exclusively of members who would fail kindergarten? I'm not sure if even the… failing my "Descendants" lore roll… fairy godmother?… teaching remedial cooperation could make this work.

Its weird, but for some reason being a PC chops your IQ in half. I find the same thing is true when I am a player, its just really hard to think for some reason.

And I know I am not the only one who has this problem, I see plenty of gaming meme's about replacing clue bats with clue 2x4s and DMs prepping by reading books about logic puzzles for preschoolers.



I can fully appreciate Talakeal's desire for a consistent world. I don't like it, but I can even agree with the idea of "I came up with their personalities on the fly", and the personalities the statues had, *if*
it's established lore that world physics work this way
the character knew that works physics work this way *or* had an established really **** good reason not to know this
the player understood what their character knew about world physics here.


But, even so, Talakeal, you really need to understand that you gave your players nothing to work with here.

Do you understand that? Do you understand the difference between something to work with, and nothing to work with?

Yes, yes, the *scenario* had plenty of solutions. Except, they weren't "solutions", they were "roll for chance of solution". Now, despite the flak you're getting over that, I not only don't inherently disagree with you, I'm generally on your side there, from a versimilitude angle. That is, if it's *reasonably* possible to fail, it's possible to fail. I'm fine with that.

Your players aren't.

I would say the players gave themselves nothing to work with by refusing to engage with the statues in any way; not even a "Hello, what's your name?"




But wait, you might say, what if I had inquisitive players, who talked with the statues, to learn about their personalities? Well, sure, if that didn't risk costing them more resources, or failing at more rolls, that might be a valid option… for players other than the ones you have. But it still means that you didn't give them anything to work with to begin with.

They had already cast a speak with stones spell though. The resources and rolls are in the past. Why would they cast a spell and then refuse to use it?



On the flip side, I'm all about the concept of Wizards impressing spirits with their power. That's a perfectly cromulent trope in my book. To "fail forward" there, I could absolutely see, "you failed your roll by 17 - would you like to spend 17 mana to cowl the spirit, or attempt a different social strategy?" In fact, were I a player at your table, and had taken those actions, I probably would have requested that solution.

That's actually already a rule in my system.

Keep in mind, the problem is not that they players are "stuck", its that the players refuse to expend more resources than are absolutely necessary to solve the problem.



Yet you've designed a system that gives them lots of opportunities to fail. That's a bad match for your players. They need win buttons, abilities that just work. Like a "speak with stone" spell that just accepts orders. Or an "investigate" ability that just returns "here's what you found". No rolls, no chance of failure for choosing the correct answer.

Even win buttons need to be chosen correctly. I can't just magic missile a wall and expect that to make it rain.


You set things up where basically in order for game to continue, you have something you want the players to do - come up with a better argument to convince the stones, change their tone when interacting, come up with alternate plans, spend resources, etc. Those are things that they don't want to do. So you end up stuck against each-other where the winner of the power dynamic is the one who can make things miserable enough at the table that the other side backs down. Whether it's for sake of verisimilitude or because of instincts or driven by pride or ego or whatever doesn't matter, the end result is that you get into a state whose exits all consist of 'someone backs down'.

Again this has something to do with choices you're implicitly making. You were the one who chose to imagine a tomb which would require a lot of justification in order to be the people who got to plunder it. Instead figure out something that in your head it would make sense for these players and this party to accomplish given how they play. And play lightly, don't commit so much that things become blocking points. If you want to have a rare and hard-to-loot tomb exist in the flow of things, you can have it so long as the party gets a short amount of time OOC to try to figure it out, and then must move on and allow game to continue. If they don't get it in the first few ideas, don't keep pushing them to come up with new ideas, just make a habit of setting up things so that there's only time or opportunity to try a few ideas and then if nothing worked, move on.

You aren't wrong per se, I just wish I could run a normal game.

Also, it isn't that its supposed to be hard to loot, as that was not the focus of the adventure in any way. What frequently happens is I put the absolute minimum amount of obstacles I can in the player's way to avoid breaking verisimilitude, and that still ends up being a huge stumbling block for them.

Xervous
2021-11-18, 01:52 PM
They had already cast a speak with stones spell though. The resources and rolls are in the past. Why would they cast a spell and then refuse to use it?


My guess is they didn’t view the spell how you viewed it. The spell being rather generally defined, and your narration of all other spells being yes/no/number, I wouldn’t be surprised if they expected it to just work. “It speaks with stones, clearly for getting information. It doesn’t have any spelled out failure clauses. Most other spells that lack failure clauses just work. So presumably this spell just works too. “

NichG
2021-11-18, 03:10 PM
You aren't wrong per se, I just wish I could run a normal game.

Also, it isn't that its supposed to be hard to loot, as that was not the focus of the adventure in any way. What frequently happens is I put the absolute minimum amount of obstacles I can in the player's way to avoid breaking verisimilitude, and that still ends up being a huge stumbling block for them.

Yet you said that you had difficulty believing that it would have gone un-plundered unless there were obstacles. So even if it 'isn't supposed to be hard to loot', you wrote yourself into a corner where you couldn't believe them looting it unless there was some minimum amount of friction they had to go through to deserve to do so. So you're not actually putting the 'absolute minimum amount of obstacles' here, or rather you're choosing game elements which force you to put obstacles instead of choosing game elements which don't force you to do that to preserve verisimilitude.

Also, a lot of this is going to be training these players with even worse habits. If they had targeted a brick in the wall rather than the statues, would you have still needed them to come up with some kind of way of convincing it to give out the information? If they hadn't actually RP'd at all and just said 'I use the spell and ask it to tell me about the room', would you have required a roll, or was it just because the caster was rude? If ignoring the actual detailed stuff and not risking actually saying anything has a higher probability of success, then players are basically being rewarded for being less and less connected to things.

Lacco
2021-11-18, 03:37 PM
Its weird, but for some reason being a PC chops your IQ in half. I find the same thing is true when I am a player, its just really hard to think for some reason.

And I know I am not the only one who has this problem, I see plenty of gaming meme's about replacing clue bats with clue 2x4s and DMs prepping by reading books about logic puzzles for preschoolers.

It actually does not chop your IQ in half. It just removes 4 out of 5 senses in most cases, and leaves the player with only the input from the GM. If the input - and the communication - does not flow the right way, then yes. It is hard to think.

Imagine your living room being in RPG. You, the GM, have to describe it in a paragraph. How many things would you have to omit for it to be "palatable" for a player? And possible for you to say without having to spend hours on? There are just so many details that a player has to imagine - that the GM has to convey - for the player to actually "be" in the scene that it's almost impossible. So we reduce. That's the first bottleneck.

Second one is communication.

So when you give a reduced information (reduced by the player not actually seeing/hearing/feeling/tasting/smelling the location, reduced by the time requirement) using imperfect communication, you are basically creating a situation where the player has to make a conscious decision based on insufficient data. And that is when most brains just switch to emergency systems.

Obviously, at that point they do not work at 100% capacity. :smallbiggrin:

The point is: you as the GM "see", "feel", ... the location. You are there, in your mind. You know the solutions, because you see everything clearly.

If your players saw the same as you, they would most probably work on a different level.

Or not. Because Talakealverse works differently :smallwink: But I'd be very interested in you describing an encounter, like you do at a table.

BRC
2021-11-18, 04:25 PM
I mean the impression we get from Tala, possibly tainted by bias (No offense Talakeal, removing ones own bias from recollections of events is basically impossible, and also sometimes people ARE just obstinate jerks) is that Talakeal's players enjoy the pattern of challenge -> overcome challenge -> Success, but get frustrated and lock up easily when their first try doesn't work, and have a habit of resorting to throwing accusations or sulking/checking out when asked to deal with failure, including a reluctance to spend the sort of resources that exist to turn marginal failures into successes.

Talakeal
2021-11-18, 04:27 PM
Yet you said that you had difficulty believing that it would have gone un-plundered unless there were obstacles. So even if it 'isn't supposed to be hard to loot', you wrote yourself into a corner where you couldn't believe them looting it unless there was some minimum amount of friction they had to go through to deserve to do so. So you're not actually putting the 'absolute minimum amount of obstacles' here, or rather you're choosing game elements which force you to put obstacles instead of choosing game elements which don't force you to do that to preserve verisimilitude.

Yeah, like I said its hard. My players want a game which is impossible to fail, but also where they are treated like the greatest / smartest / richest / most powerful / most famous people in the land, but they also want it to be so easy that they can't possibly fail, but also don't want to be railroaded.

I personally don't enjoy games without world-building and immersion.

It is really really hard to satisfy all of those things at the same time.


Also, a lot of this is going to be training these players with even worse habits. If they had targeted a brick in the wall rather than the statues, would you have still needed them to come up with some kind of way of convincing it to give out the information? If they hadn't actually RP'd at all and just said 'I use the spell and ask it to tell me about the room', would you have required a roll, or was it just because the caster was rude? If ignoring the actual detailed stuff and not risking actually saying anything has a higher probability of success, then players are basically being rewarded for being less and less connected to things.

Again, all the spell does is allow speech with rocks. Just like I wanted let a "tongues" spell auto-succeed on all charisma checks against people, it doesn't force compliance.

And 'I use the spell and ask it to tell me about the room' is basically exactly what they did, and I gave them a straight charisma roll to see if it works. If they had come up with a better plan the DC would have been much lower.

I agree that punishing players for bad plans isn't good policy; but at the same time some players like being allowed to make things more difficult for themselves as a matter of pride, immersion, expression, or just the sense of freedom, I know I do.




It actually does not chop your IQ in half. It just removes 4 out of 5 senses in most cases, and leaves the player with only the input from the GM. If the input - and the communication - does not flow the right way, then yes. It is hard to think.

Imagine your living room being in RPG. You, the GM, have to describe it in a paragraph. How many things would you have to omit for it to be "palatable" for a player? And possible for you to say without having to spend hours on? There are just so many details that a player has to imagine - that the GM has to convey - for the player to actually "be" in the scene that it's almost impossible. So we reduce. That's the first bottleneck.

Second one is communication.

So when you give a reduced information (reduced by the player not actually seeing/hearing/feeling/tasting/smelling the location, reduced by the time requirement) using imperfect communication, you are basically creating a situation where the player has to make a conscious decision based on insufficient data. And that is when most brains just switch to emergency systems.

Obviously, at that point they do not work at 100% capacity. :smallbiggrin:

The point is: you as the GM "see", "feel", ... the location. You are there, in your mind. You know the solutions, because you see everything clearly.

If your players saw the same as you, they would most probably work on a different level.

Or not. Because Talakealverse works differently :smallwink: But I'd be very interested in you describing an encounter, like you do at a table.

That's pretty common wisdom, but I don't think I agree with it.

The same puzzle written down as a forum anecdote or as a lateral thinking riddle doesn't engage my additional senses, but is still exponentially easier to solve than it is at the table. Especially when, at the table, you can ask for clarification and additional context.

I personally think it has a lot more to do with the additional cognitive load of trying to keep in character, imagine the scene, and the pressure of whatever stakes are on the line.


I mean the impression we get from Tala, possibly tainted by bias (No offense Talakeal, removing ones own bias from recollections of events is basically impossible, and also sometimes people ARE just obstinate jerks) is that Talakeal's players enjoy the pattern of challenge -> overcome challenge -> Success, but get frustrated and lock up easily when their first try doesn't work, and have a habit of resorting to throwing accusations or sulking/checking out when asked to deal with failure, including a reluctance to spend the sort of resources that exist to turn marginal failures into successes.

This is 100% correct afaict.

tyckspoon
2021-11-18, 04:46 PM
Yet you said that you had difficulty believing that it would have gone un-plundered unless there were obstacles. So even if it 'isn't supposed to be hard to loot', you wrote yourself into a corner where you couldn't believe them looting it unless there was some minimum amount of friction they had to go through to deserve to do so. So you're not actually putting the 'absolute minimum amount of obstacles' here, or rather you're choosing game elements which force you to put obstacles instead of choosing game elements which don't force you to do that to preserve verisimilitude.


In fairness here 'dungeons full of treasure that are just challenging enough to make it fun to loot them but not challenging enough that you can't successfully loot them' are basically axiomatic to a certain genre of game, which is to say they must exist for everything else to work and you can build the rest of the system off them.. but you can't justify their existence from anything else. If you worry too much about the reason and sensibility of them then they stop existing - there'd be no treasure left or the defenses would be excessively lethal or any of the myriad of reasons why the traditional dungeon as an adventure site makes no sense.

Wintermoot
2021-11-18, 05:12 PM
I remember a published module from my youth in which the dungeon contained such multitude as room one: five goblins play poker. room two: two cockatrices. room three: seven gnolls on a hunting patrol.

There was no logic how this happened or why. How the cockatrices lived in the tiny room and no gnoll or goblin had ever mistakenly opened the door between rooms and turned to stone.

And, as a kid playing the game, no one cared.

Now, as an older kid, I try to use some kind of logic when building my own dungeons. But I never forgot the lesson from my youth which is that a LOT is forgiven as long as you are having fun.

NichG
2021-11-18, 05:13 PM
Again, all the spell does is allow speech with rocks. Just like I wanted let a "tongues" spell auto-succeed on all charisma checks against people, it doesn't force compliance.

And 'I use the spell and ask it to tell me about the room' is basically exactly what they did, and I gave them a straight charisma roll to see if it works. If they had come up with a better plan the DC would have been much lower.

You had said somewhere upthread that in particular it was because the caster was very rude and insulting in how they interacted with the stones that you thought it was a negotiation that had a chance of failure. In particular I think it was to do with the idea that you felt that ignoring the fact that they were so brusque would be railroading them by making their RP not matter, or something like that.


In fairness here 'dungeons full of treasure that are just challenging enough to make it fun to loot them but not challenging enough that you can't successfully loot them' are basically axiomatic to a certain genre of game, which is to say they must exist for everything else to work and you can build the rest of the system off them.. but you can't justify their existence from anything else. If you worry too much about the reason and sensibility of them then they stop existing - there'd be no treasure left or the defenses would be excessively lethal or any of the myriad of reasons why the traditional dungeon as an adventure site makes no sense.

This might be violent agreement?

My point was something like, Talakeal is saying 'I have no choice but to do things this way because of all of these mutually exclusive constraints I'm operating under.' and I'm saying 'You had a choice, but you made the choice at a different moment in the process than the moment you think is the one where you have to choose.' E.g. by building the world differently, it'd be possible to make something that would be easier to run for this kind of group without trampling verisimilitude so much. Basically I'm pushing back against the 'I'm so helpless here' narrative. Talakeal isn't helpless here, they've just systematically made choices that accumulate difficulty - retaining the two particular problem players, letting them set the pace of the table as a whole as far as things like not providing GM assists because those players will call 'railroading!', making particularly epic stories which require clever heroes to seem reasonable when the players aren't willing or interested in actually trying to be clever and avoiding chosen-one types of setups where the cleverness could just be a number on the players' sheets rather than something that has to be provided OOC (or again being afraid that it will be called 'railroading' and cause the players to have a fit), etc.

The ability to change a situation originates from recognizing what choices you have the power to make, so I don't want to leave excuses that abandon potential agency that Talakeal could assert on the table unaddressed.

Talakeal
2021-11-18, 06:07 PM
You had said somewhere upthread that in particular it was because the caster was very rude and insulting in how they interacted with the stones that you thought it was a negotiation that had a chance of failure. In particular I think it was to do with the idea that you felt that ignoring the fact that they were so brusque would be railroading them by making their RP not matter, or something like that.

I don't believe I said that.

I said that bluntly making a demand of them called for a straight charisma roll.

Coming up with some sort of good plan could have reduced the difficulty, and letting the information slip out over the course of a conversation might have obliviated the need for a roll at all.

Now, I said that I often go out of my way to be rude or to do things in a more difficult manner to express my character, and would feel railroaded if the DM just ignored that and assumed I went with a polite response.


My point was something like, Talakeal is saying 'I have no choice but to do things this way because of all of these mutually exclusive constraints I'm operating under.' and I'm saying 'You had a choice, but you made the choice at a different moment in the process than the moment you think is the one where you have to choose.' E.g. by building the world differently, it'd be possible to make something that would be easier to run for this kind of group without trampling verisimilitude so much. Basically I'm pushing back against the 'I'm so helpless here' narrative. Talakeal isn't helpless here, they've just systematically made choices that accumulate difficulty - retaining the two particular problem players, letting them set the pace of the table as a whole as far as things like not providing GM assists because those players will call 'railroading!', making particularly epic stories which require clever heroes to seem reasonable when the players aren't willing or interested in actually trying to be clever and avoiding chosen-one types of setups where the cleverness could just be a number on the players' sheets rather than something that has to be provided OOC (or again being afraid that it will be called 'railroading' and cause the players to have a fit), etc.

The ability to change a situation originates from recognizing what choices you have the power to make, so I don't want to leave excuses that abandon potential agency that Talakeal could assert on the table unaddressed.

You are making me sound like one of my players.

Its not about being "helpless;" its about having multiple priorities and recognizing that each decision is going to have costs and consequences, and trying to find an acceptable compromise between them.

I absolutely could run a game the way you want, or the way one of my players wants, or the way I want; but when I am sitting at the table with five other people, I have to find a compromise, and doing so is a conscious decision.

Now, the one thing I cannot do is read my players minds; and I do have trouble telling when they are going to dig in their heels or have a temper tantrum, or cry railroading, and so I do sort of feel helpless in that regard. Now, I can and do try and minimize these things, but I am not going to completely sacrifice my own enjoyment of the game (or that of the other four players) to do so.

NichG
2021-11-18, 06:41 PM
I don't believe I said that.

I said that bluntly making a demand of them called for a straight charisma roll.




The statue was absolutely in a helpful state of mind, just not a servile one, and so I left whether or not barking orders at it would work up to a roll of the dice.


Then you're choosing to interpret a neutral 'hey, is there anything interesting in this room?' as barking orders and demanding a servile attitude.



You are making me sound like one of my players.

Its not about being "helpless;" its about having multiple priorities and recognizing that each decision is going to have costs and consequences, and trying to find an acceptable compromise between them.


You've trained each-other into abusive patterns which make it hard to escape, because you flinch away from the things you could do which would just solve the problem. Every time there's one of these threads, you're like 'yeah I know I shouldn't game with these guys, but maybe next time it will be okay, they gave some indication that maybe they're mellowing out'. There have been dozens of suggestions as to how to fix your circumstance, but in each case you find a reason to not try rather than to try. So yeah, I do think you and your players have this in common.

Talakeal
2021-11-18, 07:01 PM
Then you're choosing to interpret a neutral 'hey, is there anything interesting in this room?' as barking orders and demanding a servile attitude.

You've trained each-other into abusive patterns which make it hard to escape, because you flinch away from the things you could do which would just solve the problem. Every time there's one of these threads, you're like 'yeah I know I shouldn't game with these guys, but maybe next time it will be okay, they gave some indication that maybe they're mellowing out'. There have been dozens of suggestions as to how to fix your circumstance, but in each case you find a reason to not try rather than to try. So yeah, I do think you and your players have this in common.

NichG, at this point I feel like you are just twisting my wording in order to score internet points.

"Demanding a servile attitude" and "Hey, is there anything interesting in this room," were never said. I explicitly said that she did not ask any questions, and instead bluntly gave the statue an order, and that because it was in a friendly but not servile state of mind it felt no compulsion to follow her orders, and left it up to a straight charisma roll.


Likewise, this "advice" is worthless and, if I may be honest, borders on both hypocrisy and victim blaming. Choosing to try and fix a problem and reach a compromise is not "being helpless". Kicking players out of the group (or just completely giving up on trying to make the game enjoyable for myself) is just giving up rather than actually trying to fix a problem. I find it funny that you are saying I am "acting helpless" because I am choosing to try and fix a problem rather than just giving up because some stranger on the internet told me to.

And no, I don't "know I shouldn't game with these people". The idea that I should abandon an activity that brings me great joy and ruin my relationships with some of my closest friends because some guys on a forum told me to is so absolutely comical I am having trouble putting it into words.

If it really bothers you that much that I am asking for advice and working to correct problems rather than just nuking the game, you can just put me on /ignore and not have to worry about my problems anymore.


Edit: And to be clear, I am not saying all of your advice is bad. Much like my gaming group, I enjoy most of our interactions. I just think that the "black and white thinking" of being told to either kick players out of the group or give into them 100% with no compromise is not helpful as either of those will make me less happy in the long run, where as working towards compromise and fixing communication issues could make me more happy in the long run. Just like I am not going to put you on /ignore because, on the whole, our interactions and pleasant and your advice is good, even if this particular line of dialogue does little more than frustrate me.

NichG
2021-11-18, 07:20 PM
NichG, at this point I feel like you are just twisting my wording in order to score internet points.

"Demanding a servile attitude" and "Hey, is there anything interesting in this room," were never said. I explicitly said that she did not ask any questions, and instead bluntly gave the statue an order, and that because it was in a friendly but not servile state of mind it felt no compulsion to follow her orders, and left it up to a straight charisma roll.


Would you demand a Charisma check if a character asked a random person on the street directions to the nearest inn? Or if someone asked a shopkeeper if they had any swords for sale? What I want here is for you to recognize and own the choice you made to demand a roll in this case. Because you're talking as if you had to call for a roll, as if it were the only fair or non-railroading or verisimiltudinous thing to do in that situation. And that's what's coming off as an excuse to me, to justify something that you either habitually just did, or even something you actually wanted to do but didn't want to actually own.



Likewise, this "advice" is worthless and, if I may be honest, borders on both hypocrisy and victim blaming. Choosing to try and fix a problem and reach a compromise is not "being helpless". Kicking players out of the group (or just completely giving up on trying to make the game enjoyable for myself) is just giving up rather than actually trying to fix a problem. I find it funny that you are saying I am "acting helpless" because I am choosing to try and fix a problem rather than just giving up because some stranger on the internet told me to.

And no, I don't "know I shouldn't game with these people". The idea that I should abandon an activity that brings me great joy and ruin my relationships with some of my closest friends because some guys on a forum told me to is so absolutely comical I am having trouble putting it into words.

If it really bothers you that much that I am asking for advice and working to correct problems rather than just nuking the game, you can just put me on /ignore and not have to worry about my problems anymore.


I mean, I've honestly been tempted. What bothers me is that this is a situation where I think you and your players are doing harm to each-other, and to others who join your group. And in that circumstance, and given that I do honestly think that something harmful is going on here, it doesn't feel like I should stand by and just say nothing. But I should probably recognize my own advice here that it's very unlikely anything I say will cause you to change this pattern of behavior. So yeah, for my own sanity I guess I'm done with these threads.

Talakeal
2021-11-18, 07:31 PM
Would you demand a Charisma check if a character asked a random person on the street directions to the nearest inn? Or if someone asked a shopkeeper if they had any swords for sale? What I want here is for you to recognize and own the choice you made to demand a roll in this case. Because you're talking as if you had to call for a roll, as if it were the only fair or non-railroading or verisimiltudinous thing to do in that situation. And that's what's coming off as an excuse to me, to justify something that you either habitually just did, or even something you actually wanted to do but didn't want to actually own.

That's actually a pretty good point.

Asking someone a question is generally no test.
Demanding someone do something for you generally requires a test.

But, I suppose demanding someone tell you something really is just asking a question in a really rude manner.


I mean, I've honestly been tempted. What bothers me is that this is a situation where I think you and your players are doing harm to each-other, and to others who join your group. And in that circumstance, and given that I do honestly think that something harmful is going on here, it doesn't feel like I should stand by and just say nothing. But I should probably recognize my own advice here that it's very unlikely anything I say will cause you to change this pattern of behavior. So yeah, for my own sanity I guess I'm done with these threads.

Well, if you are really done with me, I am sorry to see you go and thank you for your input.

As I said in the above, I really do appreciate most of your advice, and I really do believe that feedback I get form this forum has greatly improved the quality of my gaming sessions even if you would prefer to see me abandon them entirely.

Batcathat
2021-11-19, 02:11 AM
And no, I don't "know I shouldn't game with these people". The idea that I should abandon an activity that brings me great joy and ruin my relationships with some of my closest friends because some guys on a forum told me to is so absolutely comical I am having trouble putting it into words.

I don't think anyone has suggested that you should abandon the activity, merely to avoid doing it with a group of people where there's a significant chance any given session of someone having a meltdown and ruining the session. I suppose the latter part is true, but the relationships sounds so unhealthy (and that's coming from someone whose definition of friendship is pretty close to "someone I can argue with forever and who I don't have to bother being nice to") that I'm not sure ruining them is a bad thing. Besides, you can presumably keep hanging out with the people while doing an activity that doesn't provoke quite so many meltdowns.

Lacco
2021-11-19, 03:06 AM
That's pretty common wisdom, but I don't think I agree with it.

The same puzzle written down as a forum anecdote or as a lateral thinking riddle doesn't engage my additional senses, but is still exponentially easier to solve than it is at the table. Especially when, at the table, you can ask for clarification and additional context.

I personally think it has a lot more to do with the additional cognitive load of trying to keep in character, imagine the scene, and the pressure of whatever stakes are on the line.

I agree with the point of additional cognitive load of IC/imagination and pressure, but these are all additional factors - not the main reason.

As you stated: the same puzzle, written down, is exponentially easier to solve. Why?

Because when written down, the puzzle is communicated in written form. Not spoken. Question - do you read the text at the table? Or do you narrate it from your head? I'd suggest an experiment: post a puzzle, as you would communicate it at your table. Word to word. I'd love to know how you actually communicate at the table: it would help a lot.

Talakeal
2021-11-19, 11:41 AM
I don't think anyone has suggested that you should abandon the activity, merely to avoid doing it with a group of people where there's a significant chance any given session of someone having a meltdown and ruining the session. I suppose the latter part is true, but the relationships sounds so unhealthy (and that's coming from someone whose definition of friendship is pretty close to "someone I can argue with forever and who I don't have to bother being nice to") that I'm not sure ruining them is a bad thing. Besides, you can presumably keep hanging out with the people while doing an activity that doesn't provoke quite so many meltdowns.

But see, my games are genuinely getting better. There has only been a single meltdown all campaign at that was very brief.

My last session only had a single hitch, and that was just the players deciding to play staring contest with the GM for an hour was a productive use of their time and then we continued on with the game. Just a bit of boredom in an otherwise fine session lacking in any sort of OOC conflict whatsoever.

BRC
2021-11-19, 11:50 AM
But see, my games are genuinely getting better. There has only been a single meltdown all campaign at that was very brief.

My last session only had a single hitch, and that was just the players deciding to play staring contest with the GM for an hour was a productive use of their time and then we continued on with the game. Just a bit of boredom in an otherwise fine session lacking in any sort of OOC conflict whatsoever.

How did that actually get resolved after an hour of pouting? Did they give in and do something else?

Talakeal
2021-11-19, 12:27 PM
How did that actually get resolved after an hour of pouting? Did they give in and do something else?

Yes. She summoned an earth elemental to scout inside the walls and explain the mechanisms to them.

Quertus
2021-11-20, 06:28 PM
Its weird, but for some reason being a PC chops your IQ in half. I find the same thing is true when I am a player, its just really hard to think for some reason.

And I know I am not the only one who has this problem, I see plenty of gaming meme's about replacing clue bats with clue 2x4s and DMs prepping by reading books about logic puzzles for preschoolers.


I agree with the point of additional cognitive load of IC/imagination and pressure, but these are all additional factors - not the main reason.

As you stated: the same puzzle, written down, is exponentially easier to solve. Why?

Because when written down, the puzzle is communicated in written form. Not spoken. Question - do you read the text at the table? Or do you narrate it from your head? I'd suggest an experiment: post a puzzle, as you would communicate it at your table. Word to word. I'd love to know how you actually communicate at the table: it would help a lot.

Hmmm… I seem to recall that my rejected 5-point plan included writing down all the facts you needed the players to know… getting it pre-vetted by the Playground… and handing it to them in written form, for them to read.


I would say the players gave themselves nothing to work with by refusing to engage with the statues in any way; not even a "Hello, what's your name?"

I'm sure you would.

And the truth of that statement is completely irrelevant to the fact that, the part you have control over is you, not them. And that you gave them nothing to work with.

Their skill (or lack thereof) at setting their Scrabble tiles has nothing to do with how you set the board for them. Except, of course, that your skill at setting the board determines the DC of their skill roll for utilizing it.

That's the basic premise - and the basic lesson - of 3e: skill plus chance, vs difficulty.

Only one of those variables is under your control: the difficulty.

Why would you choose to make things more difficult for your players? Why wouldn't you take the opportunity to learn to make things easier for your players?


They had already cast a speak with stones spell though. The resources and rolls are in the past. Why would they cast a spell and then refuse to use it?

Perhaps because you turned their spell into "talk to one of Talakeal's NPCs", something you know that they hate to do.


That's actually already a rule in my system.

Keep in mind, the problem is not that they players are "stuck", its that the players refuse to expend more resources than are absolutely necessary to solve the problem.

Something your system trains them to do, and/or exacerbates.

Your history doesn't help, either.

What is your plan to turn this around?


Even win buttons need to be chosen correctly. I can't just magic missile a wall and expect that to make it rain.


I agree that punishing players for bad plans isn't good policy;

You seem to be under the mistaken impression that they had a bad idea. They didn't.

What you did was punish them having a good idea.

And that, you really shouldn't do.

It's no wonder they shut down.

What do you expect them to do when you punish them for having a good idea?


Yeah, like I said its hard. My players want a game which is impossible to fail, but also where they are treated like the greatest / smartest / richest / most powerful / most famous people in the land, but they also want it to be so easy that they can't possibly fail, but also don't want to be railroaded.

I personally don't enjoy games without world-building and immersion.

It is really really hard to satisfy all of those things at the same time.

Seems really easy to satisfy if they're playing the gods.

Probably pretty easy to satisfy before then, too.

So what's the problem?

Talakeal
2021-11-20, 07:00 PM
And that you gave them nothing to work with.

What's your definition of giving them something to work with then?

I am not sure what more I could have done besides yanking their character sheets away from them and playing their PCs for them... I even broke the fourth wall and flat out told them what they needed to do and they still refused to do it out of stubborn pride.



Why would you choose to make things more difficult for your players? Why wouldn't you take the opportunity to learn to make things easier for your players?


Seriously?

Like, I am having trouble taking this seriously.

Are you really saying that easier games always equal more fun and that nobody enjoys challenge in either the long or short runs?

I have to be missing something here.

Heck, if nothing else, because it teaches them how to solve problems on their own so we can play better games in the future.



Perhaps because you turned their spell into "talk to one of Talakeal's NPCs", something you know that they hate to do.

Out of curiosity, why would you think a spell called "Speak with stones," wouldn't involve talking? Where is the transformation here? Why would they cast the spell if they hate talking?

And as I have said hundreds of times, they don't need to actually talk in character or anything, talking to an NPC requires no more cognitive or social effort than declaring what weapon they are attacking with or whether they are getting through a door with lockpicks or by bashing it down.



Something your system trains them to do, and/or exacerbates.

I don't know about that. Hoarding resources keeps biting them in the ass both in and out of character; I am hoping eventually they will get the message that a resource you are too scared to use is just a number on a character sheet rather than something that solves problems or makes the game more fun.


Your history doesn't help, either.

Could you please do me a favor and actually say what you mean?

Saying something super vague that also vaguely insulting is just kind of the worst of both worlds.


What you did was punish them having a good idea.

And that, you really shouldn't do.

It's no wonder they shut down.

What do you expect them to do when you punish them for having a good idea?

Could you explain where "Ok, you can now speak to the stones. What do you say to them?" is either a punishment or cause to shut down?


That's a bit like saying that if the PCs bring a ghost-touch weapon to fight a wraith, you are punishing them by actually rolling out the combat.


Seems really easy to satisfy if they're playing the gods.

Probably pretty easy to satisfy before then, too.

So what's the problem?

Games without risk or uncertainty are super boring for everyone involved.

They refuse to play at high level.

I find violent narratives where one side has no chance to be morally unsettling and not something I would enjoy being a part of.

Quertus
2021-11-21, 12:03 PM
What's your definition of giving them something to work with then?

I am not sure what more I could have done besides yanking their character sheets away from them and playing their PCs for them... I even broke the fourth wall and flat out told them what they needed to do and they still refused to do it out of stubborn pride.




Seriously?

Like, I am having trouble taking this seriously.

Are you really saying that easier games always equal more fun and that nobody enjoys challenge in either the long or short runs?

I have to be missing something here.

Heck, if nothing else, because it teaches them how to solve problems on their own so we can play better games in the future.




Out of curiosity, why would you think a spell called "Speak with stones," wouldn't involve talking? Where is the transformation here? Why would they cast the spell if they hate talking?

And as I have said hundreds of times, they don't need to actually talk in character or anything, talking to an NPC requires no more cognitive or social effort than declaring what weapon they are attacking with or whether they are getting through a door with lockpicks or by bashing it down.




I don't know about that. Hoarding resources keeps biting them in the ass both in and out of character; I am hoping eventually they will get the message that a resource you are too scared to use is just a number on a character sheet rather than something that solves problems or makes the game more fun.



Could you please do me a favor and actually say what you mean?

Saying something super vague that also vaguely insulting is just kind of the worst of both worlds.



Could you explain where "Ok, you can now speak to the stones. What do you say to them?" is either a punishment or cause to shut down?


That's a bit like saying that if the PCs bring a ghost-touch weapon to fight a wraith, you are punishing them by actually rolling out the combat.



Games without risk or uncertainty are super boring for everyone involved.

They refuse to play at high level.

I find violent narratives where one side has no chance to be morally unsettling and not something I would enjoy being a part of.

I gave you an example of "something to work with", in terms of the slightest bit of personality being evident from the statues. "Halt, who goes there" "what do you offer" "can I eat her liver?"

If you want them to want to interact with your NPCs, give them things to latch onto. Just like you would with plot hooks, to get them to (initially) interact with your world.

*That's* what you want to make easy.

There's a difference between "make it easy for them to play the game" and "make the game easy".

Don't give them unnecessary difficulty.

Make the things you want them to do, easy to do. If you want them to talk to NPCs, don't give unnecessary resistance to them talking to NPCs.

I can say this a few more ways, if you need me to. Do I need to, or can you hear what I'm saying yet?

Give the players something to work with - or, at the very least, own that you didn't give them anything to work with, and that that makes the game harder for them. Recognize and own the choices you do have.

IME, completely my bias from other games I've played, no, I don't expect stones to have personalities, especially in relation to a spell named "Speak with Stones". And you didn't give the players any player-facing personality traits for those statues. So I could totally see me failing the "DC Talakeal" roll there.

-----

"Could you please do me a favor and actually say what you mean?

Saying something super vague that also vaguely insulting is just kind of the worst of both worlds."

You have history with these players. Because of this history, they don't trust your NPCs, have no desire to spend time talking to your NPCs, and would prefer to murder helpful NPCs.

It doesn't matter how unreasonable those conclusions are, they exist. They're baggage you should consider when evaluating your path forward.

-----

"Could you explain where "Ok, you can now speak to the stones. What do you say to them?" is either a punishment or cause to shut down?

That's a bit like saying that if the PCs bring a ghost-touch weapon to fight a wraith, you are punishing them by actually rolling out the combat."

If you cannot answer those questions yourself, *I* am not the right person to try to show you the answer.

So the literal answer to, "could you explain" is "no - at least, not to you, not at this time".

At best, I could comment that the result of choosing the correct answer of talking to the stone… was to sit bored for an hour… and then perform the hated act of wasting yet more mana on another path.

That's not how you encourage such behavior.

Talakeal
2021-11-21, 01:30 PM
Write up is almost done, gonna take a few more days.

So... I had a conversation with my players and it turns out that there was actually a miscommunication over what caused the game to halt and the resulting forum drama.

It wasn't that they were afraid to speak in character / come up with something for their PC to say, its that they are still stuck in the "word game" mode and were trying to find a precise order to give the statues that couldn't possibly be misinterpreted or twisted.

And so every time I told them they needed to come up with some reason for the statues to want to help them, that went in one ear and out the other, and then when I asked them what they say they were actually subtly changing the wording of the orders they gave to the statues each time without me noticing hoping to find some perfect combination of words that couldn't be willfully misinterpreted or twisted.

Which is actually an even bigger problem; as they are always trying to play contract lawyer with their actions and screwing themselves over (see Roy and the Oracle) or accusing me of tricking them by using wordings that could be twisted and then not twisting them.



I gave you an example of "something to work with", in terms of the slightest bit of personality being evident from the statues. "Halt, who goes there" "what do you offer" "can I eat her liver?"

If you want them to want to interact with your NPCs, give them things to latch onto. Just like you would with plot hooks, to get them to (initially) interact with your world.

*That's* what you want to make easy.

There's a difference between "make it easy for them to play the game" and "make the game easy".

Don't give them unnecessary difficulty.

Make the things you want them to do, easy to do. If you want them to talk to NPCs, don't give unnecessary resistance to them talking to NPCs.

I can say this a few more ways, if you need me to. Do I need to, or can you hear what I'm saying yet?

Give the players something to work with - or, at the very least, own that you didn't give them anything to work with, and that that makes the game harder for them. Recognize and own the choices you do have.

IME, completely my bias from other games I've played, no, I don't expect stones to have personalities, especially in relation to a spell named "Speak with Stones". And you didn't give the players any player-facing personality traits for those statues. So I could totally see me failing the "DC Talakeal" roll there.

That makes a bit more sense.

The thing in this case is that the statues don't realize they are under the spell so Kim has to be the one who initiates contact.

Again though, I gave her a straight charisma roll to convince them, which is the same as I would have done if they had been living creatures in the same situation.





You have history with these players. Because of this history, they don't trust your NPCs, have no desire to spend time talking to your NPCs, and would prefer to murder helpful NPCs.

It doesn't matter how unreasonable those conclusions are, they exist. They're baggage you should consider when evaluating your path forward.

Thank you! That's much clearer.

Well, at least on your part. I still don't understand where my players are coming from though, as this "history of NPCs betraying them" seems to be almost entirely in their heads.



If you cannot answer those questions yourself, *I* am not the right person to try to show you the answer.

So the literal answer to, "could you explain" is "no - at least, not to you, not at this time".

At best, I could comment that the result of choosing the correct answer of talking to the stone… was to sit bored for an hour… and then perform the hated act of wasting yet more mana on another path.

That's not how you encourage such behavior.

At this point I feel like I need a child psychology book.

It seems like anytime I tell my players "no"* they either sit down and pout for an hour or explode and accuse me of railroading. And of course, the solution of never saying no is equally disruptive to the game and seems to reward them for their bad behavior. Its very frustrating (although as I said to NichG, it is getting much better, we just have ~hour long delays rather than wasting whole sessions with this bull).


I am still curious about why you think my system encourages this behavior though, as it isn't really any different than any other game outside of 15MWD D&D; which as someone who grey up on AD&D, WHFRP, and World of Darkness sure comes across as the aberration rather than the norm. I really think the problem is that my players are a unique combination of miserly, perfectionist, and casual.


*: Or, far more often, if I say maybe and have them roll for it and the dice run cold.

Reversefigure4
2021-11-21, 04:03 PM
So, on previous uses of Speak with Stone:


In this case the parties divinations consist of talking to rocks or sending one's senses back in time. Neither demons or gods, or any actor with a will of its own, is involved.

... Except these new stones do have wills of their own, defy your requests to speak to them, and require Charisma checks and/or a good argument to persuade them for the spell to be useful. On other occassions, that hasn't been the case. Again, you're leaving the players to guess and play Read The DM's Mind to work out whether these particular stones are acceptable targets for providing useful information, or if it just won't work.

It doesn't surprise me players are worried about getting contract lawyered out of their goal by picking the wrong wording.

Since the player has no idea why Speak With Stones suddenly isn't working the way it did previously, all outcomes become possible for them. If they say they've come to rob the tomb, maybe the statues come to life and attack them. Maybe the solution is to invoke the name of a long-dead hero they have no way of knowing. Maybe these stones will never reveal the information since they're here to guard it, and Speak With Stones isn't an acceptable solution to this puzzle. Maybe the statues really want to see the sun and need to be physically carried out of the temple. Maybe touching them will set off a death trap. The player has no idea because they can't see what the GM wants them to offer. All they know is they've spent resources to no effect, and it looks like a bad idea to spend more since Speak With Stones didn't work as a solution even though it should have based on past play.

Now, this isn't a big problem if the players trust the GM. Sometimes the spell fails because it's more fun that way is sometimes fine (there are systems that actively pay out Fate Points precisely to allow the GM to do this kind of thing). If the players know they're up for some cool run-away-from-the-boulder Indiana Jones action, they're probably fine with being told it doesn't work. But if they don't trust the GM - and your players don't trust you at all - it's just another arbitrary failure point from their point of view.

With a different group this might work. But your group have openly told you they don't like puzzles, and they don't like talking to NPCs. "You spend mana on a spell, which turns into a puzzle where you have to talk to NPCs to figure out their motivation" was pretty obviously not going to go over well.

Talakeal
2021-11-21, 05:26 PM
Again, you're leaving the players to guess and play Read The DM's Mind to work out whether these particular stones are acceptable targets for providing useful information, or if it just won't work.

Again, when defined so broadly, every action in every RPG ever is "read the DM's mind" and it is thus a useless phrase.


It doesn't surprise me players are worried about getting contract lawyered out of their goal by picking the wrong wording.

Ironic; you are twisting my wording to justify my players being afraid that that I will twist there :)

But no, the rocks don't have any goals or agency, and will happily answer any questions asked of them, but they do have a rudimentary personality and are not compelled to follow orders. This is always how the spell has worked.


Since the player has no idea why Speak With Stones suddenly isn't working the way it did previously, all outcomes become possible for them. If they say they've come to rob the tomb, maybe the statues come to life and attack them. Maybe the solution is to invoke the name of a long-dead hero they have no way of knowing. Maybe these stones will never reveal the information since they're here to guard it, and Speak With Stones isn't an acceptable solution to this puzzle. Maybe the statues really want to see the sun and need to be physically carried out of the temple. Maybe touching them will set off a death trap. The player has no idea because they can't see what the GM wants them to offer. All they know is they've spent resources to no effect, and it looks like a bad idea to spend more since Speak With Stones didn't work as a solution even though it should have based on past play.

Now, this isn't a big problem if the players trust the GM. Sometimes the spell fails because it's more fun that way is sometimes fine (there are systems that actively pay out Fate Points precisely to allow the GM to do this kind of thing). If the players know they're up for some cool run-away-from-the-boulder Indiana Jones action, they're probably fine with being told it doesn't work. But if they don't trust the GM - and your players don't trust you at all - it's just another arbitrary failure point from their point of view.

I see where your coming from here, but this isn't quite the case.

The issue is that the spell allows the caster to ask questions of the stones, not to give them orders. As I said to NichG a few posts up, this really just comes down to phrasing, and if someone at the table had explained it the way NichG did I would have let it worked at the time.

But again, there is no puzzle or guessing or mind reading here; I flat out to them both in and out of character that the spell allowed them to ask questions not give orders. The player refused, and so I said ok, fine, just make a charisma roll. This failed, which led to an hour of pouting.



With a different group this might work. But your group have openly told you they don't like puzzles, and they don't like talking to NPCs. "You spend mana on a spell, which turns into a puzzle where you have to talk to NPCs to figure out their motivation" was pretty obviously not going to go over well.

Honestly, I don't know if my players have said they hate puzzles. I hate puzzles with a passion and only use them as a last resort if it makes sense within the world. But again, people have a habit of labelling any obstacle as a puzzle, just like they label being told "no" as either railroading or being asked to read the DM's mind, so your definition, my definition, and my player's definitions might not line up exactly.

Only one player has said that they hate talking to NPCs, and he wasn't the one playing the earth mage. The rest of the group quite enjoy talking to NPCs; and one of them flat out said that he wouldn't play in any game without it when I offered to just run a mega-dungeon. Brian's problem is that he has "mental blocks"* where he simply cannot speak in or out of character and leaves everyone else guessing as to his motivation.

*: His word not mine. It may be a side effect of his clinical depression, I don't know I am not a doctor. I assumed this is what was happening here, but now said that this was wrong, instead he was still riding the "word game" train and leaving me to guess about why.

Reversefigure4
2021-11-21, 05:46 PM
But no, the rocks don't have any goals or agency, and will happily answer any questions asked of them, but they do have a rudimentary personality and are not compelled to follow orders. This is always how the spell has worked.

...

The issue is that the spell allows the caster to ask questions of the stones, not to give them orders.

If I understand this correctly, it failed because they said "I demand you tell me how to enter the tomb.", and that phrasing makes it an order rather than a question?

If they had said "I ask the stone how to enter the tomb", would it have told them with no further rolls or obstacles to overcome?

If they had said "I request you tell me how to enter the tomb", it also would have failed because that's a request, not a question? "Tell me how to enter the tomb" is not a question, and the pendantic answer to "Can you tell me how to enter the tomb?" is only "Yes".

This seems like exactly the outcome you're trying to avoid where the players have to pick their wording precisely and 'contract lawyer' to avoid getting caught out.

Talakeal
2021-11-21, 05:56 PM
If I understand this correctly, it failed because they said "I demand you tell me how to enter the tomb.", and that phrasing makes it an order rather than a question?

If they had said "I ask the stone how to enter the tomb", would it have told them with no further rolls or obstacles to overcome?

If they had said "I request you tell me how to enter the tomb", it also would have failed because that's a request, not a question? "Tell me how to enter the tomb" is not a question, and the pendantic answer to "Can you tell me how to enter the tomb?" is only "Yes".

This seems like exactly the outcome you're trying to avoid where the players have to pick their wording precisely and 'contract lawyer' to avoid getting caught out.

Agreed. As I mentioned, I said as much to NichG upthead.

The player demanded the statues tell them how to access the tomb, I reminded them that the spell lets them ask questions not give orders, player said they can't think of a question to ask and wanted to stick with orders, so I let it be decided by a straight persuasion roll; much like if they went to a random NPC to get information but couldn't think of a question to ask I would leave it up to a straight gather information roll.


The problem is that the players have it in their heads that I am trying to trick them when, often times, I just don't understand what they are asking. So we get into this weird game were they try and use legalese that makes the answers less useful, and worse, interpret my answers as if they were tricks, sometimes even going so far as to do the opposite of what I tell them because they assumed I was tricking them and then accuse me of tricking them by not trying to trick them because I knew they would do the opposite of what I said. Its a really toxic situation that I am trying to untangle with more open communication.


Although, I do think the core of it is probably how I view RPGs. As I mentioned, I see it as an opportunity to express your character and explore the world, while my players see it as a self-actualization exercise where I am standing between them and the fantasy of power and wealth. So when the player casts speak with stones I think of it as a cool opportunity to talk in character and learn more about the setting, while the players see it only as a way to get closer to their goal.

Reversefigure4
2021-11-21, 06:11 PM
The problem is that the players have it in their heads that I am trying to trick them when, often times, I just don't understand what they are asking. So we get into this weird game were they try and use legalese that makes the answers less useful, and worse, interpret my answers as if they were tricks, sometimes even going so far as to do the opposite of what I tell them because they assumed I was tricking them and then accuse me of tricking them by not trying to trick them because I knew they would do the opposite of what I said. Its a really toxic situation that I am trying to untangle with more open communication.


That's because you are trying to trick them, or at least obfuscating the outcome for them so much it might as well be a trick.

Literally, in this case, it would have worked if they had picked ONE word differently, and said 'ask' instead of 'demand'.

Most GMs would just let this slide past without any commentary, assume the character knew how their own spell worked and had phrased it correctly, and give the information.

Some pendantic GMs might insist it be a question, but tell the player "Your character knows that demand won't work, and you need to rephrase the statement as 'I ask them to tell me how to open the tomb" or "How do I open the tomb?". But you won't tell the players exactly what it is that you want them to do because that's railroading them... even though there's only one type of answer that you'd accept to solve this 'How to use Speak with Stones correctly' scenario.

(Many DnD systems require a magic word to activate an item, but very few GMs require the players to state the word every time their character uses the item, and fewer again demand it be pronounced correctly every time. It's commonly handwaved away).

There's a direct cause and effect between requiring the players to be pedantic and precise with their wording, and why the players get pedantic and precise and concerned about using the wrong wording.

Talakeal
2021-11-21, 06:23 PM
That's because you are trying to trick them, or at least obfuscating the outcome for them so much it might as well be a trick.

Literally, in this case, it would have worked if they had picked ONE word differently, and said 'ask' instead of 'demand'.

Most GMs would just let this slide past without any commentary, assume the character knew how their own spell worked and had phrased it correctly, and give the information.

Some pendantic GMs might insist it be a question, but tell the player "Your character knows that demand won't work, and you need to rephrase the statement as 'I ask them to tell me how to open the tomb" or "How do I open the tomb?". But you won't tell the players exactly what it is that you want them to do because that's railroading them... even though there's only one type of answer that you'd accept to solve this 'How to use Speak with Stones correctly' scenario.

(Many DnD systems require a magic word to activate an item, but very few GMs require the players to state the word every time their character uses the item, and fewer again demand it be pronounced correctly every time. It's commonly handwaved away).

There's a direct cause and effect between requiring the players to be pedantic and precise with their wording, and why the players get pedantic and precise and concerned about using the wrong wording.

The problem here is attribution of malice.

I was not trying to trick them, I was misunderstanding.

As I have said, if someone merely said to me "Wait, isn't this just a question phrased as a demand?" I would have said "Oh, yeah. Good point."


Some pedantic GMs might insist it be a question, but tell the player "Your character knows that demand won't work, and you need to rephrase the statement as 'I ask them to tell me how to open the tomb" or "How do I open the tomb?".

This is almost exactly what I did. Although, I wouldn't say it was being pedantic; it legitimately didn't occur to me until NichG explained it to me that they were essentially just framing a question as a demand.


(Many DnD systems require a magic word to activate an item, but very few GMs require the players to state the word every time their character uses the item, and fewer again demand it be pronounced correctly every time. It's commonly handwaved away).

As I have said umpteen times already, there is a world of difference between requiring someone to act something out and requiring someone to tell you what they are doing.

Simply saying "I say the magic word" or "I activate my magic item" are plenty good enough.



There's a direct cause and effect between requiring the players to be pedantic and precise with their wording, and why the players get pedantic and precise and concerned about using the wrong wording.

Assuming every mistake was made with malice and then doubling down on it is extremely toxic behavior.

And, considering how many times they have lawyered themselves into trouble or ignored helpful advice for fear of a trick, its stupid and self-defeating as well.

Reversefigure4
2021-11-21, 08:31 PM
The problem here is attribution of malice.
I was not trying to trick them, I was misunderstanding.

But the difference is totally indistinguishable from a player POV, as you know full well you have toxic players who will take the most hostile interpretation. The key words "What are you trying to achieve?" need to be a question for your players whenever you hit this point, following by you immediately taking the most charitable interpretation of their competence levels and giving them the best outcome that can be generated from the circumstance, or being very specific and clear about WHY something won't work, AND what the solution to it should be.

All talking past each other isn't getting you anywhere.

Assume that the characters are competent, successful people, who know how their own spells and abilities work, then directly inform the players what the problem is if one of them isn't working. Or, you know, be more permissive with your vaguely written spells and abilities.

It looks like this:

Kim: "I cast Speak With Stones and demand the statues tell me how to open the tomb."
T: "It doesn't work." (having missed the point that this is a question).
Kim: "Why not?"
T: "What are you trying to achieve?"
Kim: "I want them to tell me how to open the tomb."
T: "That needs to be phrased in the form of a question. When you do so, they tell you that you need to pull the level under the 4th statue, etc..." (Don't make them do it, just assume the characters who are smart enough to cast magic to speak with stones know how to actually speak with stones...)

Talakeal
2021-11-22, 01:05 PM
Assume that the characters are competent, successful people, who know how their own spells and abilities work, then directly inform the players what the problem is if one of them isn't working. Or, you know, be more permissive with your vaguely written spells and abilities.

It looks like this:

Kim: "I cast Speak With Stones and demand the statues tell me how to open the tomb."
T: "It doesn't work." (having missed the point that this is a question).
Kim: "Why not?"
T: "What are you trying to achieve?"
Kim: "I want them to tell me how to open the tomb."
T: "That needs to be phrased in the form of a question. When you do so, they tell you that you need to pull the level under the 4th statue, etc..." (Don't make them do it, just assume the characters who are smart enough to cast magic to speak with stones know how to actually speak with stones...)

As I said before, this is almost exactly what happened.


But the difference is totally indistinguishable from a player POV, as you know full well you have toxic players who will take the most hostile interpretation. The key words "What are you trying to achieve?" need to be a question for your players whenever you hit this point, following by you immediately taking the most charitable interpretation of their competence levels and giving them the best outcome that can be generated from the circumstance, or being very specific and clear about WHY something won't work, AND what the solution to it should be.

All talking past each other isn't getting you anywhere.


Agreed.

Talking past one another is very much the problem.

In this case, even though we had the above exchange, it didn't work because we were on different wave-lengths.

In the past, Brian has said that he lacks the social skills to decide what his characters say (again, I am NOT talking about acting it out or talking in character, just basic stuff like "I politely tell the king that I will require payment up front" or "I intimidate the guard into letting me past by threatening his family) and says it is more fair to resolve social situations by a straight die roll so that the characters skills rather than the players get to control the outcome. So, when he shut down here, I assumed this is what he was saying and thought that giving him a dice roll to get the information was what he wanted.

At the same time, he was convinced that I was trying to twist his words in order to ignore the command, so was trying to find the perfect phrasing to his commands so that the statues couldn't possibly ignore or misinterpret it using legalese.


So yeah, very much talking past one another.


And of course, it still doesn't excuse the pouting for an hour before trying something else, which is of course the real issue, not the miscommunication or the bad ruling.

Azuresun
2021-11-26, 07:15 PM
And no, I don't "know I shouldn't game with these people". The idea that I should abandon an activity that brings me great joy and ruin my relationships with some of my closest friends because some guys on a forum told me to is so absolutely comical I am having trouble putting it into words.

Honestly, and just speaking for myself.....nothing you have ever posted has given me the impression you enjoy these sessions or that you and your players particularly like each other. Time after time you describe an incredibly suspicious and toxic group that jumps on you and each other the first time something goes wrong, with zero trust or goodwill in evidence.

Talakeal
2021-11-26, 07:31 PM
Sorry this took so long. Busy week. But here is the full write-up.

Valentine calls the group together in the morning. She tells them that she met with Lady Abasinia and was given a special priority contract, written on odd circular paper. They are to retrieve an artifact called the Mandala of Dreams, which was being transported from an excavation in the Wasteland to Golgotha, some fifteen years ago, when it was stolen by Velonious’ raiders. The device resembled a collection of ornate type-writer keys held together by piano wire, and although its true operation is beyond her, in layman’s terms it influences the strands of fate in much the same way that a spirit’s kismet ability influences probability. Her companions believe she is describing either a dreamcatcher or a wind-chime.

They ask tatters, and she says she doesn’t know anything about it, but perhaps their Raven friend might, for he is Velonious’ partner, and has a similar relationship to the warlord as Valentine does with

Krystal, although she is vague about what exactly she means by that. The group is surprised by this revelation. They ask around the Old Cathedral if anyone knows where Raven-Dies-Talking is, and are told he was last seen camping out in the willow groves south of Black Lantern Hill; less than a day’s walk from Golgotha. Also, they learn that they were not the first people to have asked about him.

When they find him, Raven-Dies-Talking explains that while it is true that he was once Velonious’ partner, that the two parted ways almost a decade ago, and tells the group that since that has happened, both have become more eccentric, Raven doubling down on his restless wanderings, and Velonious fixating on megalomaniacal power fantasies. He advises the group that they should always journey with people who are a different sort of crazy than they are, so that they can keep one another in check while still daring to push the boundaries.

As for the Mandala, he and his siblings hid it, along with other potentially dangerous artifacts that they had no use for, in their slush fund, an old Golden Age Imperial tomb in the Dead Lands. He gives
Quincy directions from Basewater Station that only he understands. When asked about defenses, he says that he is sure that dangerous critters have wandered in there from the Wasteland, but no serious resistance. He tells them that there were no undead, and when asked about traps, Raven apologizes and says that traps were his brother’s specialty.

Given the urgent nature of their quest, the group buys tickets on the next train to the Dead Lands, a journey of at least three days. On the second evening, the group is approached by a large bearded man who introduces himself as Damon DeLucia. He tells Valentine that he was talking with her companion in first-class and would love to make her acquaintance as well.

Valentine looks around, at first assuming Krystal is causing trouble by slipping into first-class uninvited, but when she sees that all of her companions are accounted for, she tells Damon that she doesn’t know who he is talking about. The man, flustered, apologizes and says that it is so rare to see an angel, that he just assumed that two of them on the same train must be traveling together.

Damon tells the group that he is a lore-master for the Sidhe, and when they say that he looks human, he tells them that he is in fact not one of the fey, but is indeed what is called an “elf-friend”, an honorary member of their courts. He is on his way south to Marhanna, where he is going to attempt to mediate a conflict between the humans and the Fomorian Under Kings before it escalates into war.

As Damon and Kim fall into a deep discussion about their cultures, Valentine slips away and goes to investigate this other angel in first class. She finds a tall armored man sitting at the bar, with four arms, wings, and a halo of golden light; and she assumes he is some mixture of human, angel, and asura. She slips next to him and introduces herself, and he awkwardly rises to his feet, kisses her hand, and introduces himself as Samuel. Looking around the crowded car, he sees every seat taken, and offers Valentine his own, but she declines, but he remains standing.

They make small talk, and she tells him of her adventures. In an attempt to impress her, Samuel says that he once had tea with a golden dragon, at which point his companions have a lively debate about whether all dragons are evil or only most, and Samuel offers to resume this conversation someplace more private, an offer which she declines, for now.

She inquires as to his business, and Samuel says that he can’t say, it’s a matter of national security. She presses him, and he strokes his mustache thoughtfully before telling her that he is on a secret mission for the Imperial Justiciar. Valentine tries to bluff him that she has clearance, dropping Lord Delacour’s name, but Samuel rebuffs her and says that the Justiciar are a civilian authority and have no dealings with the Templar.

Two days later, they arrive at Basewater Station. The sun is blinding white against the sands of the Dead Lands, and the group can smell the distant ocean on the air, some of them for the first time in their life. They fill their packs with alkaline water, camel jerky, and biscuits which are harder than anything they ever imagined possible.
They set off into the desert, Quincy following the trail signs.

One night, Kim is awakened from a deep sleep by the most beautiful music she has ever heard calling her name. She leaves camp, and climbs to the top of a tall dune, and looks toward the coast, where she sees a crystalline monolith on the horizon. She makes to set off toward it when Krystal, who had been on watch, pulls her back and sternly tells her to focus on their current mission.

The next day, it is apparent that they are being followed. Quincy spots four people, as well as something small and glowing that flits about.

Valentine suspects Samuel, and as the sun climbs in the sky her suspicions are confirmed. They approach the other group cautiously, and Valentine asks why they are following them as delicately as she can.

Samuel confesses that he suspects they are after the same treasure. Valentine reveals they are here for the Mandala of Dreams, and Samuel is relieved, for they are attempting to retrieve the Swords of Hakkake for Alice Shar of the Imperial Justiciar, and that they learned that its previous owner, Raven-Dies-Talking, stashed it in a tomb in the Dead Lands.

The groups agree to work together to reclaim the artifacts, and to evenly split any other treasures they might find. Samuel introduces his companions; he is a crusader and a mystic, Vogel is a glaive master and outlaw who has slender black wings inherited from an ancestor who was either an air elemental or a bird spirit; Kale Blackheart is a young gunslinger and wandering philosopher, Carrie Jidan is a redheaded woman who serves as medic and quartermaster, and he has never caught their fairy’s true name, but they all call her Tinkerbell and she serves as their scout and enchanter.

He also beckons for his last hidden companion; a glaistig named Shade. The creature resembles a large velociraptor with charcoal scales, and who serves as their tracker and poisoner.

Valentine admits that she also has an ally hidden, and bids Krystal to reveal herself.

The groups travel together, following Raven’s directions, but have trouble finding the tomb; it appears that the region has suffered earthquake damage and the entrance has been obscured by a rockslide. Eventually, they find a trail of blood that Shade identifies as belonging to an Oryx which climbs a rock wall and disappears into a crevasse.

Quincy is reminded of the tail of the Sandewan, a creature that is said to live in the south and which leaves trails like this. None know what the creature looks like, but it is said that any who are brave enough to follow its trail and kill the beast may bring it before the king for great wealth.

Before entering, the group stops for lunch, and Samuel brews tea in an enchanted pot that invigorates the souls of all of his companions, new and old alike.

The groups climb the rocks and find that the crevasse leads into the tomb, although several side passages are completely collapsed, buried, or otherwise inaccessible.

They find a few sarcophagi and open them to reveal jumbled bones and plundered grave goods. Some are trapped; Krystal can disarm most, although in one instance Samuel has to push her out of the way to deflect a poisoned crossbow bolt with his shield.

They follow the blood trail down a long and slanted corridor and find a larger burial chamber. Within are three furry creatures that resemble overlarge wolverines with eight legs, their eyes and coats gleaming in the brazier light, one mother and two pups. Quincy thinks he could distract them with food, but the group doesn’t want to risk leaving such aggressive creatures alive behind them and decide to exterminate them. The creatures are put down relatively easily, but fight with incredible ferocity, and inflict more than a few wounds.

As Anani and Carrie treat the group’s injuries and Quincy and Shade skin the creatures, the rest of the group investigates the tomb and cleans out the gory remains of the Sandewans’ previous kills.

The braziers burn with eternal flames, likely connected by pipes to some deep underground well of natural gas. There are four statues of Atlantean warriors holding spears, two male and two female. The sarcophagus is that of a Templar, and is labeled as belonging to Sir Daniel, whom Kim thinks might be one of the Knights of the Round Table.

Inside is a skeleton wearing ornate golden armor, whose position suggests he was trying to escape. Kim thinks he was buried alive, but Feur says that it is more likely he was reanimated by the necromantic wave that occurred last October. They take the armor, and Anani notices that the bones are those of a commoner, as a golden age Templar would almost certainly show signs of Atlantean lineage. Feur says this is a false tomb, and orders his companions to search for secret passages.

Tinkerbelle and Kim search the room, find no evidence of hidden doors or hollow walls. The statues show no signs of articulation. Samuel is the only one strong enough to move them, but finds that they catch on a plinth of some sort if moved more than a few inches. The floor is sloped, and the dust in front of the coffin shows signs of being disturbed.

Feur casts his senses back in time to the last time Raven-Dies-Talking was here, and sees a brief scene of a younger Raven standing in this room with a strawberry-blonde woman and an older man in a worn duster, and they appear to be having a bitter conversation about breaking their family ties before departing, but he doesn’t see a solution about how to open the tomb.

The group is puzzled as to how to proceed, having no masonry tools heavier than Kim’s lapidary pick, and so she casts a spell to speak with the statues, demanding that they reveal their secrets to her, but they remain silent. Valentine advises that she maybe adjust her technique, and gives her a quick rundown on how to influence people by starting with small talk and working up to the asks, but Kim obstinately keeps the course.

When it reveals no answers, she casts a passage spell upon the ground under the sarcophagus, and reveals a hole with four iron bars crossing it. Perplexed, she summons an earth elemental and commands it to examine the workings of the mechanics.

In an empty voice, the creature tells her that it agrees with her, that surely the best use for an invincible colossus of earth and stone with power over all solid matter is to have it inspect the plumbing. It melds with the floor, and a few moments later emerges to tell them that cables run from the metal bars to the statue’s spears.

Everyone glares at Tinkerbell for a moment before she shrugs and proclaims that they shouldn’t have sent a fairy to try and move rocks.
When the spears are lowered, the bars retract, and the sarcophagus slides forward, nearly barreling Anani over as it does so, and revealing a sloping passage leading down into the true tomb.

As they move down the sloped tunnel, Quincy notices a panel on the wall that was once flush but has shifted, revealing a chamber hidden beyond. Inside appears to be an embalming room, with numerous bodies wrapped or dismembered on tables, many of them in a disassembled state and tossed about the chamber. Kim takes a stash of books, and while Anani moves to pull some valuable chemicals off the shelf, the rotten wood collapses and fills the room with toxic gas that sears Quincy’s lungs. They do their best to seal the room behind them and move on.

The hall is flanked by large statues of animal-headed figures, and a pair of them animate and block the companion’s path. Valentine tries to talk their way through, but when she tells them that she was sent by Raven-Dies-Talking, they attack. The group is surrounded on three sides, leaving the more vulnerable members flanked, and what follows is a short but brutal battle. The only serious wound occurs when Samuel finds his head caught between the fists of the golems on either side, and Feur needs to re-spool his timeline to prevent his death.

Beyond the guardians is the gateway into the tomb proper. Feur, Samuel, and Kim, who make up the front rank of the group, suddenly begin convulsing and spasming. After a moment, it is revealed that they stepped on a large metal plate which was buried in sand and dust, and it released an electric charge into them. If a single person had attempted to cross, or a group of less hardy individuals, it may well have caused death by cardiac arrest, but the three hale warriors are only momentarily stunned. As they clamber backward, the trap appears to reset, and nobody can figure out how to disarm it or how much charge it has left, and Kim instead commands the stones on either side to create a stone bridge across it.

After passing several more collapsed side passages, they follow an acrid chemical odor and enter into a large room with a pool of dark liquid in the center. Kim moves close to magically analyze it, detecting crude oil, human viscera, embalming chemicals, and venom. As she does so, a large tomb basilisk rises from the water and strikes.

Samuel immediately puts his shield between Kim and the venomous reptile, and then pushes it into the wall, making sure not to let the creature get off even a single strike, for its venom can kill a man a hundred times over. His companions quickly rush into the room and cut its scaly body to bits.

As Shade harvests the venom, the rest of the parties loot the six tombs that branch of from this chamber. In each, they find an obsidian sarcophagus, and inside a Templar’s skeleton clutching a ceremonial silver sword. In the last, they find the coffin shattered and filled with a strange red liquid, which congeals and moves towards them like a giant amoeba.

It lurches out of the tomb, and Kale reacts swiftly, blowing it to pieces with a sudden rain of bullets, but each piece continues to move about on its own. What follows is an intense melee, with the ooze eating away at exposed skin as it is chopped into smaller and smaller pieces by its opponents. Eventually, it is reduced to such minuscule portions that can do no harm and only writhe around blindly. But it is not dead, and is slowly coalescing again. Anani tries to drain its life force, but doing so makes her feel light-headed and speeds her pulse to a dangerous rate.

Within its remains are bits of bone and metal, and one decayed hand wearing a plain steel ring. Upon the ring is a stone that resembles a human eyeball, and Kim picks it up and wipes it clean. As she examines it, she notices the word “Isochrome” written on the inside. She slips on the ring and speaks the word aloud.

The stone rolls from the ring, and Kim is suddenly overcome by vertigo and falls to her knees as her vision splits. After a few moments of getting oriented and experimentation, the group discovers that one can see through the stone eye as if it were their own, regardless of distance. They debate the usefulness of such a trinket.

In the next large chamber, they see a score of mummified soldiers, seated about their own sarcophagi as if they were tables at a feast, as a pair of undead priests recite patriotic hymns in old Imperial.

At the head of the room, a mummified knight sits upon a throne, and when he notices the living men and women, he raises his head and looks at them with burning emerald eyes.

Shocked, they stammer for a moment and then say that they have slain the sandewan and are here for their reward.

The skeletal figure, in a dry and ageless voice, tells them that he is neither savage nor king, let alone the king of the savages.

Valentine then says they are here for the Sword of Hakkake and the Mandala of dreams, at which point the skeletal figure proclaims that that they are tomb robbers, how droll, and gestures for his minions to annihilate them.

The mummies draw their weapons and move to surround the group, but Anani raises her holy symbol and commands them to stay back.

While they are cowed by the aura of divine power, Kale and Quincy open fire, while Krystal and Shade move into ambush positions. Samuel charges forward, smiting the king’s guard with blasts of mystic energy. Vogel moves to assist him, but the ceiling is too low for him to fly out of reach and he is quickly born down, forcing Kim to decide to leave Anani’s protective shield and pull him back, the desiccated warriors crumbling beneath her lash.

The mummified lord challenges Samuel to single combat, and the two square off, neither able to penetrate the other’s skillful defense.

Once both of the undead priests are torn to pieces by gunfire, their lackeys lose faith and begin to falter, and Samuel offers his opponent the chance to surrender. After a moment’s consideration, the old warriors lays down his sword and tells them they are free to plunder his wife’s grave goods so long as they leave her body unmolested, for the return of the true king is neigh. Samuel swears to the oath.

The surviving undead lay their fallen companions to rest, and as they do, Kim follows their master about, asking a million questions. He responds as little as is polite, but she learns that he lived approximately a century after Arthur’s death, and is descended both from the Knights of the Round Table and the monarchy that ruled this land before the coming of the Imperium and which vanished into the deserts after its decline.

The groups search the room, but finds no evidence of either the Mandala or the sword. They do, however, detect a draft, and find a secret passage behind a tapestry; apparently not manmade but rather opened in the Cataclysm. They wonder how Raven-Dies-Talking got past the undead, but given the golem’s response to his name, they decide not to ask.

The tapestry itself depicts an image of Arthur’s coronation which the mummy-lord assures them were weaved by someone who actually beheld the event. Kim studies it as objectively as she can and takes notes, but is disturbed to see several strange figures in the background, large crooked creatures like bald vultures with purple skin, four long gangly arms, and blood-red robes. She asks what they are, and the mummy does not know, but assumes they were emissaries from the fey or the Under Kings.

Beyond the tapestry is a narrow ledge, slick with slime. It slopes down into the darkness, on the left side a rocky wall, on the right a drop into the darkness and the foul water a hundred paces below. It is slow going, with Shade leading the way as he is the only one who can easily keep his footing. Quincy spies a pair of enormous scorpions camouflaged on the wall above, and in a split second decision fires upon them before they can ambush those at the front of the line.

The chitinous creatures descend upon them, cutting Shade off from the rest of the group. The saurian creature turns around and gets the front scorpion’s attention, deftly dodging its darting pincers and toxic tail.

As the rest of the companions engage the scorpion’s mate, they also find themselves beset by the pincers of long-bodied arthropods which cling to the side of the ledge below. It is uncertain whether these creatures are opportunistic scavengers, the scorpion’s offspring, the scorpion’s prey, or all of them at once. The disgusting creatures use their long crablike claws to pull the less stable fighters from the ledge and leave them dangling over the abyss, unable to slay their attackers lest they be dropped.

Carrie is able to stun one of the scorpions with her Atlantean pistol, although incapacitating a creature so large completely drains the weapon and it will be useless for the rest of the mission. Still, this gives Krystal the opening she needs to drive the Blackflame Blade into the twitching beast’s body and destroy what passes for its brain.

Vogel and Samuel spend the entirety of the fight swooping out over the abyss and rescuing their comrades, while Kim reshapes the ledge, creating a stable platform below them. Eventually, the creatures are killed or driven off, scorpion and scavenger alike, although Anani is poisoned in the battle and left nearly out of commission for the remainder of the expedition.

Descending into the natural caverns, they eventually find a passage that leads into a deeper tomb, larger and more elegant than the one above, built-in many ways like a palace, with marble columns, polished floors, and lit by hanging chandeliers.

They pass into a large hall, so vast that the far end is lost to shadow, and with two exits on either side. Shade moves to explore one of these side halls, and finds a narrow passage littered with mummified cats, but then heavy portcullises drop down in front of all three doors, separating shade from the rest of the group.

The party hears heavy stone grinding towards them, and soon they see a massive stone vehicle like Zara’s juggernaut but four times as large rumbling towards them. It is an ancient construct, piloted by a huge stone figure, a very stylized carving in the style of the indigenous people, and clad in ceremonial armor. Tinkerbell conjures a forcefield in its path, but its momentum is so great that this only slows it down.

Kale and Quincy open fire upon the driver, but their bullets do little, and when it crashes through a support pillar, the group is sprayed by flying debris, and Quincy is knocked unconscious by falling rocks as the chamber begins to collapse.

Kim deduces that this guardian’s function is to collapse the entire tomb rather than allow intruders to plunder its secrets. She again summons forth the earth elemental and bids it to use its influence the make sure none of the falling rocks strike her companions, and it tells her that she summoned it from an endless sea of featureless gray stone, and still its finds her task to be tedious.

Kim then attempts to slow the juggernaut by casting spells which soften the earth beneath its wheels, transforming them into a muddy quagmire. This gives Samuel, Vogel, and Krystal the chance to mount it and strike at the driver, who swipes at them ineffectively with huge stone firsts. It takes some doing, but eventually, Samuel decapitates the colossus, and Vogel is able to jam the haft of his polearm into the mechanisms it was manipulating to bring the juggernaut to a shuddering stop.

With the crisis averted, at least for the moment, they are able to open the portcullises. They then cross the grand hall into the tomb beyond. It is a relatively small room, but decorated with mirrors, hanging paintings, and carved walls. In the center is a throne, and atop it is the remains of a tall woman adorned in the adamant armor of a templar lord. The runes upon the base of her seat identify her as Lady Deionarra. Though Valentine is tempted to take her armor for the dwarves of Tahrr to refit, Kim tells her that this is probably the mummy’s wife and that they should respect their oath.

Still, Krystal helps herself to the woman’s necklace. It resembles seven rectangles made from mirrored glass and Tinkerbell says it radiates illusion magic. The devil-girl fastens it about her own neck, but doesn’t sense any enchantment or notice any effect.

Still, there is no sign of the artifacts that drew them here, so they continue on, although if it weren’t for Feur’s vision of the past, they would doubt they were even in the right tomb.

Beyond the hall of mummified pets, they find another crevasse that leads into a large natural cavern with a sandy floor. Krystal can make out the form of a large creature sleeping in the gloom, and all of them can hear its breathing. They think it a dragon, although one lacking in wings. It is a saurian creature, with four dexterous limbs, a sinuous tail, and a long neck. Its head is fearsome, with curving horns and a pair of large fanlike ears.

They fall back to discuss the creature, and conclude that they might not be able to take it in a fight, even at full strength, which they are certainly not at. They debate turning back and searching elsewhere, but shoot the idea down. Krystal volunteers to try and slay the beast alone, and Shade coats the Blackflame blade in the basilisk’s venom.

Krystal creeps ahead and drives the envenomed blade into what she thinks is the dragon’s heart, and though the monster awakes, shaking and seizing, it is not killed outright, and it turns upon its attacker with startling speed. Krystal is nearly devoured, but Samuel rushes to her aid and jams his shield into the beast’s gaping maw, doing his best to choke the creature. It doesn’t work, and his shield is smashed to splinters, but the attempt serves as a distraction, allowing Vogel to swoop in and jam his voulge into the base of the creature’s neck, and the sudden blood loss, combined with the basilisk’s venom, is enough to send it into shock.

Once the monster’s death cries stop, the cavern is filled with the soft wound of a woman wailing from beneath the sand. The tomb-raiders quickly move to uncover the source, and discover a ruby red blade buried in the sand beneath the monster’s nest. Samuel immediately wraps it in a heavy oilskin and binds it tight. He proclaims that this is what he is here for, but none are to touch it or even look upon it long, for it bears an insidious curse.

He thanks his companions, and tells them he will not abandon them until they have found the Mandala of Dreams. They move to explore the rest of the tomb, but each of the companions can hear the blade in their minds, sobbing and pleading to be set free.

On the other side of the grand hall, they find the architecture becoming crude and archaic, with heavy stone slabs roughly hewed. Mummified bodies are seen on spikes, and this looks like the remains of a gruesome torture chamber. In the center is a massive charnel pit filled with old bones, and above stands a huge sacrificial altar. Resting on the edge of the pit is a huge hideous creature which can barely be described, with a body like a bulldog or a bear, two-stories tall at the shoulders, with a dark oily carapace, burning eyes, lunatic teeth jutting in every direction, and long curling tusks so disproportionate they seem almost unreal.

Vogel mutters that he has seen such creatures in the Wasteland, and warns his group that its anatomy is strange, it won’t be felled by any poisons they carry, and its flesh will sicken and twist anyone who tries to eat it. Anani, eager to get back some of her strength, asks if this extends to stealing its life force, and Vogel assures her that he knows nothing of such affairs.

Again, they don’t fancy their chances against this monster. They aren’t even sure how it got down here, let alone what it eats. Valentine slips Quincy something she has been saving, a bandolier of adamant bullets she had forged in Tahrr, and tells the group she has a plan.

Quincy, an expert at night-fighting, will use the Isochrome ring to get a clear image of the monster and then assumes a sniping position near the entrance to the grand hall, where his companions will set up an ambush point. Kim will then ward the area, so that the creature cannot pursue them should it survive.

Quincy takes the magic ring and says the magic word, and then spends a few minutes getting used to it before having Tinkerbell place the eye stone in a place equidistant between him and the creature and with a good vantage point of the entire path between. Then he says a prayer and takes aim.

The first shot rings loud in the corridors, and the monstrous aberration is immediately on its feet, sniffing about for the source of its sudden pain.

The dragoon fires again, and the beast is off like a shot. He fires four more times, each time striking true and coating the stones with the creature’s sickly blood, but it never even slows down, and once the last bullet is out of his gun, Quincy immediately turns to flee, the nightmarish beast hot on his heels.

Quincy leaves his rifle behind and fumbles for his sawed-off sidearm. As the creature fills the chamber with its wretched breath, his companions move to flank it and cut it to pieces with their various blades and bludgeons, Valentine coordinating their every move and Tinkerbell guiding them with cantrips.

Quincy thinks it is probably already dead when he fires the scattergun into the monster’s eyes, blinding it, but the creature’s body hasn’t gotten the message. As Krystal teleports into a flanking position and jams her rapier repeatedly into its guts, the monster turns upon her, the only one of its attackers it can get to without testing its will against Kim’s wards.

The demonic rogue runs from the dying, twitching, biting, bleeding thing, and Quincy is once more disoriented by the magic, for while he can see Krystal with his own eyes, she is completely invisible to the magic ring, and it looks as if the monster is attempting to do battle with something that isn’t there at all.

After it finally stops moving, the group attempts to find Krystal and explore the charnel pit. Vogel warns them not to touch the creature’s body, its blood is poison and even in death, its jaws will bite anything they can and will never let go.

Kim is shocked at the brutality of the chamber, and doesn’t understand how something like this could have existed in the golden age Empire, wondering if it isn’t perhaps a relic of something older.

Digging through the dead, they find one ancient body which has been decorated with lipstick, and assumes it is one of Raven’s jokes. Slicing it open, they find the object they seek within its hollowed-out abdominal cavity, a strange and incomprehensible relic made of brass trinkets and runes and coils of wire and stranger things, which can only be the Mandala of Dreams. Valentine does her best to untangle it and place it gingerly within her pack.

There are more tombs, but nobody wants to explore them, especially with the sound of weeping that fills their minds, and they move back to the surface, nodding silently as they pass the skeletal guardian, once more seated on his dreary throne.

Once safely above ground, they take a rest and split up the treasure. Valentine offers Samuel his choice of the enchanted ring or the enchanted necklace, but he declines, and says that if he knows his companions, they likely already helped themselves to something when nobody was looking. But, as for mundane treasures, they do their best to split them evenly into twelve parts.

They don’t make camp here, there are signs of lindwurms in the region, and instead press on. Kim wants to head toward the spires, but her companions refuse, although the blade of Tears tells her that if she sets it free, it will take her to the spires and show her all of their secrets. Kim doesn’t, but she is sorely tempted.

When the group reaches Basewater Station, they part ways. Valentine offers her new friends positions in her warband, but they politely decline, they already have a mistress, and will be away on a secret mission in Masaria for some time.

Valentine puts her charms on Samuel, and gives him her information, and he promises to visit her the next time his companions are near Golgotha.

Once they have departed on a southbound train, Krystal sternly tells Valentine that she better not be planning on seducing the quarter-angel, but when Valentine asks her why not, Krystal falls silent and pouts sullenly.

The train ride back to Golgotha is long and mostly silent.

Overall good session, if a bit long.

As I have said, the only real stumbling block was the party locking up after Kim was unsure how to talk to the statues, but that resolved quickly enough with no lasting bitterness.


The other party searching for the sword was actually a PC party from a different campaign I ran almost 20 years ago, and it was good to see them again. I had the adventure set up so that things would drastically change depending on how they dealt with the rival party. It was a pleasant surprise to see them work together diplomatically and not betray anyone, for an overall fairly easy time of it.



Honestly, and just speaking for myself.....nothing you have ever posted has given me the impression you enjoy these sessions or that you and your players particularly like each other. Time after time you describe an incredibly suspicious and toxic group that jumps on you and each other the first time something goes wrong, with zero trust or goodwill in evidence.

That's the nature of forum communication.

You don't make threads about ordinary things, and you don't ask for help fixing things that aren't broken.

Like, I could make a thread about one of the many times that we all fell on the floor laughing about an old joke, but what would be the point? You guys wouldn't even get it without the context.

zlefin
2021-12-06, 12:00 PM
Finally got around to reading the next round of the campaign. I'm utterly shocked, your players fully cooperated with another team, a suspicious team at that, without any backstabbing at all! Were your players replaced by doppelgangers?

Talakeal
2021-12-06, 01:52 PM
Finally got around to reading the next round of the campaign. I'm utterly shocked, your players fully cooperated with another team, a suspicious team at that, without any backstabbing at all! Were your players replaced by doppelgangers?

I was surprised as well!

I think a big part of it was that Samuel was Bob’s PC in a previous campaign, and so Bob, the most paranoid of my players, knew OOC that he was a standup guy.

Next session is done, hopefully I will have it posted in the next 48 hours.

Talakeal
2021-12-07, 12:32 PM
So, I had some drama in my OTHER game last night. Not sure if it bears posting, let alone starting a new thread, but I thought I would share it to get some advice.


Other game is D&D 5E, I am playing a level 5 wizard.

A death knight threatens our part, the warlock and I try and talk it down.

The cleric then blasts it with a guiding bolt, and the rogue shoots him with a sneak attack arrow.

I cast protection from evil on the warlock.

DK's turn, he takes the warlock down in one round even with protection from evil.

I start desperately trying to come up with a plan, and most of them assume the warlock will be healed on the clerics turn.

When the clerics turn comes around again, he hits the DK with another guiding bolt.

Start of my turn, I say "Oh crap, you didn't heal (warlock)? Give me a sec" as I desperately try and come up with a plan to keep the warlock alive.

Cleric's player then says "How about from now on you play your character and I play mine? This is the second time you have told me what to do (I have no idea what the first time was) and I am really pissed off."

I am too shocked to reply directly, and instead just mumble that I am casting shield and bladeward on myself and standing over the fallen warlock.


We keep fighting, and barely beat the DK through a combination of good rolls and the DM holding back and not using its most powerful abilities.


After the session, the cleric's player say's that people telling him what to do is a major trigger, and if it happens again he is done with the game. I, still pretty shocked and not sure what to say, mumble a brief apology and tell him it won't happen again.


So, I am kind of conflicted here.

What I said could be seen as telling him what to do (although, since I didn't say it until after it was already done, I would say its more questioning / criticizing than demanding).

But, I don't know, isn't players communicating and coordinating a good thing? I know as a DM many of my horror stories would have been prevented if the players talked to one another about tactics and coordinate their actions as a team.

And I feel it was kind of an unfair kender situation in the first place, where his actions spoil our fun and nearly get us killed, and we don't say anything and roll with the punches, but then he gets mad.

But yeah, I respect that he was upset, and would never dream of telling someone else how to RP their character as I have been "that guy" plenty of times where I put character motivation before the needs of the group. And I also enjoy the group and want to keep playing with them.

Any advice for how I should handle this or what I should say or not say to the guy?

Xervous
2021-12-07, 01:14 PM
This looks like yet another case of not everyone being on the same page. Questions to ask may include “Were the situation reversed, what would you expect to happen and what would you want to happen?”

Picking the warlock up is the right tactical choice, it is the right ‘ensure everyone has participation fun’ choice, but it’s maybe the wrong RP choice for that specific character. Does the group highly value the ability for players to make IC choices that make sense but aren’t fun for the rest of the group? Will the characters not want to adventure with other characters who don’t seem to care about them?

What did the warlock’s player think of this?

BRC
2021-12-07, 01:25 PM
Sounds like the player has had some bad experience in the past with table captaincy. If your account is correct, you weren't telling him what to do, you were reacting to him not doing what you expected.


I'd ask him what the first time was that you told him what to do to get a sense of what behavior he interprets as being ordered around, and in the future try to phrase things as asking him what his plan is so you can prepare appropriately.

Satinavian
2021-12-07, 02:46 PM
But, I don't know, isn't players communicating and coordinating a good thing? I know as a DM many of my horror stories would have been prevented if the players talked to one another about tactics and coordinate their actions as a team.
That honestly depends on the group and the players. In most of my groups players only get to coordinate when their characters do the same in game. There is also some "asking for strategic advice" allowed, but that can only come from a player who doesn't know what to do when their character suppossedly should know better. And that also never includes coordination as such.
But other groups might be more lenient as far as metagaming is concerned and allow or even invite OT coordination as a default.


However a celric being "reminded" that he could have used a healing spell instead of a damage spell ... i can see how someone reacts agressively to that. D&D has unfortunately a long history of clerics being relegated to healbot and that comes on top of the usual problems of telling people what to do.


How to proceed urther ? Be careful to never again suggest an action for that character if it is not something your character says. Maybe even not ten. The player seems to value his authority over his character and might be prone to overreaction and it doesn't cost you much to accommodate him. It would be nice if yll the other problems were as easy to solve.

icefractal
2021-12-07, 02:57 PM
Kind of a problem with the "healer" role in RPGs - if healing is important enough to be fulfilling as a primary role, then it's also pretty much necessary to have, meaning those who can heal are somewhat forced into doing so. The negative side of niche protection.

Does the Cleric player not like to spend actions healing in general? Because if so then maybe the group needs an additional healer, PC or NPC. Or for the GM to factor that into the difficulty.

Quertus
2021-12-07, 03:36 PM
So, I had some drama in my OTHER game last night. Not sure if it bears posting, let alone starting a new thread, but I thought I would share it to get some advice.


Other game is D&D 5E, I am playing a level 5 wizard.

A death knight threatens our part, the warlock and I try and talk it down.

The cleric then blasts it with a guiding bolt, and the rogue shoots him with a sneak attack arrow.

I cast protection from evil on the warlock.

DK's turn, he takes the warlock down in one round even with protection from evil.

I start desperately trying to come up with a plan, and most of them assume the warlock will be healed on the clerics turn.

When the clerics turn comes around again, he hits the DK with another guiding bolt.

Start of my turn, I say "Oh crap, you didn't heal (warlock)? Give me a sec" as I desperately try and come up with a plan to keep the warlock alive.

Cleric's player then says "How about from now on you play your character and I play mine? This is the second time you have told me what to do (I have no idea what the first time was) and I am really pissed off."

I am too shocked to reply directly, and instead just mumble that I am casting shield and bladeward on myself and standing over the fallen warlock.


We keep fighting, and barely beat the DK through a combination of good rolls and the DM holding back and not using its most powerful abilities.


After the session, the cleric's player say's that people telling him what to do is a major trigger, and if it happens again he is done with the game. I, still pretty shocked and not sure what to say, mumble a brief apology and tell him it won't happen again.


So, I am kind of conflicted here.

What I said could be seen as telling him what to do (although, since I didn't say it until after it was already done, I would say its more questioning / criticizing than demanding).

But, I don't know, isn't players communicating and coordinating a good thing? I know as a DM many of my horror stories would have been prevented if the players talked to one another about tactics and coordinate their actions as a team.

And I feel it was kind of an unfair kender situation in the first place, where his actions spoil our fun and nearly get us killed, and we don't say anything and roll with the punches, but then he gets mad.

But yeah, I respect that he was upset, and would never dream of telling someone else how to RP their character as I have been "that guy" plenty of times where I put character motivation before the needs of the group. And I also enjoy the group and want to keep playing with them.

Any advice for how I should handle this or what I should say or not say to the guy?

Well, I'm a ****, so I can only tell you what *not* to do.

"Yo, moron, you gonna heal the fallen Warlock, or have the rest of us gotta plan around your idiocy again?"

Figure out what looks *least* like the way some of my low-Charisma characters would respond to his seeming ineptitude, and that's probably a good approach

Granted, it's perfectly in character for a Cleric to dislike a Warlock on purely religious grounds. Then again, it's perfectly in character to harass the Cleric got failing to do their job, or even to kick them out of the party. So "it's what my character would do" + victim blaming? It continues to be as bad a defense as ever.

So… yeah, talk to the player about what their triggers are, and find out if that's someone you really want to play with. Because, from the sound of it, I wouldn't.

That said, there might be a salvageable, good player buried deep, deep in there somewhere.

Batcathat
2021-12-07, 04:09 PM
So, I had some drama in my OTHER game last night. Not sure if it bears posting, let alone starting a new thread, but I thought I would share it to get some advice.

As with a lot of your stories, the main issue seems to be someone reacting way out of proportion. In quite a few situations, I don't like people telling me what to do (or, worse, how to do it) myself. So I understand the player being annoyed with you (in their opinion, at least) doing that, especially if they have previous experience with people doing it excessively and/or if you do it more than you realize.

That said, reacting to that with anything more than a snarky comment or perhaps a request to stop seems far too much, in my experience. Maybe I'm biased from hearing other stories about the people you play with, but I kind of doubt this is the one issue a person like that would overreact to.

So yeah, I suspect your only options are to either walk on eggshells or say "screw it", stomp the eggs and make an omelet. (I guess the metaphorical omelet would be playing with different, preferably more stable, people).

Talakeal
2021-12-09, 10:32 PM
Session Eight:

Upon returning to Golgotha, Valentine is told that she will personally hand over the Mandala to Lady Abasinia at a banquet in two nights, and that her companion’s presence is requested.

Valentine works to get them ready, showing Quincy how to requisition a dress uniform and giving Feur money for more presentable clothes. She takes Kim out, first to the tailor and then to a salon. Over the course of the day, the two get to know each other a little better, exchanging stories of their early adventurers and lore about their peoples, as well as correcting stereotypes about other species.

Valentine also discovers that Kim had a wife prior to the Cataclysm, but has done nothing to search her out since, assuming that even if she survived the eruption she would have been finished off in the
seventy years since.

The next evening, the group is picked up by a coach outside of their plantation and driven across the city, through the low-town, and into the hills that were once home to Imperial nobility but have since been abandoned. Lady Abasinia’s house is off Old Ardilla Road, a rectangular three-story building built of plaster in imitation of the Atlantean style. It is showing its age, the gates rusty, the whitewash faded, the trees in the yard skeletal and dry.

The inside of the house is much better kept, the very image of opulence. Servants lead them into the dining hall, where they are introduced to all manner of bankers and businessmen, and served veal, pasta, and seasoned bread along with wine and a sauce none of them can identify.

When their hostess finally appears, it is obvious to everyone, for she is a striking figure. A tall, attractive, middle-aged woman with long blue hair and an expensive dress, with a thrakken-fur stole. The lady’s first action is to berate one of the servants for not following her precise orders about how the table was to be set, something seemingly small and influential.

Lady Abasinia takes her seat at the head of the table, and Valentine does her best to make a good impression, but is chagrinned when her host politely thanks her for retrieving the Mandala, but seems otherwise more interested in her companions.

She questions each of their allegiances, and asks who they plan to serve in the future. The lady offers to buy Quincy’s contract, but he declines. She asks Anani how she can be both an apprentice of Thanatos and a priestess of That Which Must Not be Named, as well as testing Feur’s allegiance to the Tribunal.

Kim, she finds the most fascinating of all, and Lady Abasinia asks many questions of her, for she says that she too is lost in time. They discuss trivial affairs of the pre-Cataclysm world, sharing songs and jokes and gossip, as well as the fates of public figures, most of which have been forgotten since.
In turn, they ask what Lady Abasinia does, and she claims to be an independent broker of services, goods, and people.

Kim surmises from her ageless nature, as well as her cerulean hair, that she must be a changeling, the immortal child of a being from the spirit world. But she seems far older than Kim, who eventually asks where she is from.

She says she is from an island kingdom, and was born before the wars between knights and demons, before the falling of the sky and the battles against the sun, a land of beauty and indescribable wonders, when the sea and the stars were one, an age of gods and heroes, and of magic unrestrained, where time was fluid and a night could be an eternity or a lifetime but a day, and before the fall and the loss of true human potential.

Feur wonders what she means, and Lady Abasinia tells him that even such a feat as imagining a color he has never seen is beyond him in this fallen world that remains.
Kim asks if she is from Atlantis, and she says it is possible, for she has walked the sunken city in her dreams, but has trouble recalling such times, for she was only a small child and had not yet awakened.

Anani then asks how she could find the darkness and the time before the sun beautiful, but also be terrified of the Night. Lady Abasinia responds by stating that things can be the same on some levels of reality, but not on others. For example, an astronomer might say the sun is a star, and Feur might say that the sun is the Golden Palace of Judgement, and they are both correct. Likewise, many people say that the stars are the souls of dead heroes placed in the sky by the gods, and they too are correct. But nobody has ever made the claim, falsely or otherwise, that the Golden Palace of Judgement is created from the soul of a dead hero. Why, even now, Anani herself exists in no less than three separate levels of reality.

Anani still doesn’t understand, but seems quieted by a voice that only she can hear.

Krystal spends most of the meal avoiding conversation, finding excuses to leave her seat and orbit the room, relieving no few of the guests of their valuables while she does. Eventually, Lady Abasinia catches her attention, and the cambion doesn’t say anything, only smiles. The lady asks to see her sword, says that it looks to be a product of the Black Forge, but Krystal stubbornly refuses.

The Lady Abasinia says she has been trading relics for centuries, and has a knack for identifying them, and with some pushing from Valentine, Krystal hands over her mirrored necklace. The instant she does so, her head seems to clear and the room comes into sharp focus.

Lady Abasinia identifies it as an Oculus, a talisman that renders its bearer invisible to all forms of divination, clairvoyance, and magical detection.
They spend the rest of the night talking idly before being given their next assignment, to transport the Mandala of Dreams to the Towers of Tahrr, and then to stay with the dwarves for the next two months, performing whatever tasks are required to assist the dwarves with the Immaterium’s projects.

The group awakens the next morning well-rested, and without even a hint of a hangover despite the copious amounts of wine they drank with the meal and the brandy they had with their cakes in the small hours of the morning. One of the bankers who had been at the party stops by and gives them their next two month’s wages in advance, and in the afternoon they leave Harijan and Tatters in charge of their plantation while they ride Zara’s juggernaut as close as she is willing to go to dwarven lands.

When they find themselves walking the left few leagues, Kim has to explain to the rest of the group that the reason Zara won’t approach is that she is an outcast. Feur says that he thought she wasn’t a dwarf, and Kim says that true, she isn’t a dwarf anymore because her identity was stripped from her for whatever crimes she committed.

When they finally approach the smog-shrouded towers, Carrack comes out to greet them. He tells Feur that since the humans left, he has bought a glass coffin, and when Feur asks why, he tells him that it remains to be seen.

They are escorted by heavily armored dwarven guards into the heart of the second tower, to the vast forge. Kim refuses to remove her armor, and swelters in the heat. Carrack comments to Feur that she must be turning into a baked potato and the two snicker.

The bureaucrat then tells the warriors that the dwarves are having trouble figuring out how to properly smelt the ore which they previously delivered and that they will need to consult with the deep ones; and that the mercenaries will need to escort him to keep the deep ones’ tribute safe, for their military forces are stretched thin.

The mercenaries accompany Carrack through a twisting labyrinth of rock towards the lair of the deep ones, two people always carrying a steel tribute chest between them atop two long poles. After an entire day, they finally find the deep ones’ lair, its entrance camouflaged between several large boulders. The group then climbs, single file, down tunnels deep into the cold earth, and carrying the tribute becomes laborious.

As they descend, they hear strange booming echoes in the rocks, and Carrack explains that it is the Tommyknockers, deep earth spirits who are never far off from where the deep ones are found. As they pause, they are startled by a small high-pitched voice speaking over their shoulders. They look around to find a small gnome standing upon a ledge. They introduce themselves to him, and he tells them that he thinks his name is Edwin, although it is hard to remember sometimes as he so rarely refers to himself in the third person.

He walks with the group, his thoughts and words strange, and his memory strained. But Carrack treats him with the utmost respect, like a cherished grandparent whose mind has begun to slip into senility. It eventually comes out that he is the patriarch of the deep one clan, and that it is made up of his extended family. Edwin leads the big people to his home, where he and his kin dig through the tribute, revealing fine-cut crystal lenses as well as delicate pieces of machinery.

They sit upon toadstools and drink mushroom tea for a bit, Krystal driven near to violence by the inanity of speaking with such eccentric creatures. Edwin tries to talk Feur into marrying his daughter, and the red-faced martial artist does his best to politely avoid the tiny woman’s affections.

Eventually, they get down to discussing business. Edwin tells Carrack that the minotaurs he posted to keep the area safe have wandered off, and requests a new band of mercenaries take over the job, and for a moment the companions fear they will be drafted into this roll. Then they discuss the plans, and the gnomes look over the material that the dwarves are trying to build.

Carrack insists he doesn’t know what it is for, but the gnomes seem to think it will act as a sort of “theurgic super-conductor” able to permanently absorb divine power. One could use it to turn a divine curse into a terrible weapon, or even to usurp a god.

Then the gnomes get down to business, donning large colorful pointed hats which they refer to as their thinking caps, and communing with a fast, high-pitched language that sounds almost like the chirping of birds. Several hours of heated discussion later, they hand over a scroll with the required formulas and techniques to forge such a material, but warn them that the ingredients will be quite rare, some of them will not be found in this world at all.

Valentine asks where one might find a source of otherworldly metal, and the gnomes shrug, and suggest maybe meteorites. Edwin says that when he was young, he once saw a strangle blue craft embedded in a cliffside in the deserts far to the west, and that it may be a good place to start.

After departing the deep ones’ home, the group goes to visit an astronomer named Ellessaire for help calibrating some of the instruments that the dwarves need for the Immaterium’s projects. He is found in a rundown cottage in the nearby hills, but is not eager to help, first ignoring them and then threatening them with a shotgun. He is a vertial, a member of an asocial species, and has yellow skin, pointed ears, six fingers, and long gray muttonchops that hang nearly to his waist.

Eventually, he tells them that he will help, but only if they agree to clear out a group of fachan that have infested his observatory, and a deal is struck.

The observatory is old, likely Imperial ruins from before the Cataclysm, and consists of three towers in various states of decay. The fachan are like two ogres in four bodies, large, cannibalistic, vaguely humanoid creatures each with a single leg, a single arm, and a single eye.

As the warriors climb the hill, the fachan throw pieces of masonry at them, and Quincy returns fire.

Kim rushes one, and does battle with it, driving it back a set of circular stairs, although every time it is cornered, it simply leaps up or down a level.

Krystal enters the hellscape and ambushes the creature atop the largest tower, and then moves to help Feur, who has become surrounded on the steps of the main observatory building.

The fight is not long, and no serious injuries are inflicted, but the fachan are hard to pin down, as their powerful legs allow them to leap onto balconies and catwalks and take advantage of the ruined towers before being driven off.

The vertial astronomer does not thank them for their efforts, and indeed asks why he should help them at all. Krystal tells him that honoring his deal will be the fastest way to get rid of them, and he quickly performs the calibrations, grumbling about how he should have listened to his mother and never set out for human lands.
Ellessaire also makes note of some coordinates which have been included in the specifications and asks if he was meant to watch them, but everyone, including Carrack, can only shrug.
Upon returning to Tahrr with their work, the mercenaries are then asked if they have had any dealings with the Morlocks. Valentine says yes, and then does her best to stop her companions from elaborating.

They are told that the dwarves need an additional three-hundred slaves to finish their contracts on time, and that they are to travel to a nearby morlock enclave and convince them to part with them.

The journey is miserable across the hot and sooty ground. The morlock enclave is found in what was once a strip mine, guarded by ogres and holding onto what must be a thousand human slaves. The morlocks, however, refuse to sell any. The Omukade need seven thousand slaves, which the morlocks can’t provide, and they are afraid of retribution from the centipede hengeyokai should they fail to deliver.

Valentine tries charm, bargaining, bribery, and even contract legalese, but the morlocks are adamant against selling. One of the morlocks tells the humans that this wouldn’t be an issue if the Imperium had kept to their ancient oaths, and Kim asks what he means. The morlock tells them that King Arthur promised one in twenty humans born would go to the morlocks to replenish the losses they suffered protecting the surface world from the underground horrors. Kim denies any such deal ever existed, and the morlock agrees that the humans have no honored it since long before her time, not since the time of the Empress.

Returning empty-handed, the humans meet with Major General Brashton, and Valentine proposes a more drastic idea; entering into a permanent alliance with Balthazar, for Balthazar has plenty of manpower but little in the way of industry, and is on the verge of war with the dwarves primary competitor, the forges of Avarus. They could fight together, defeat both Livonia and the Hengeyokai, and shift the balance of power on Pangaea.

Brashton loves the idea, although he obviously needs to get permission from his masters. He tosses Valentine a bag of gold, and tells them to give it to the morlocks to pay their own ransom, and inform them that in three days the dwarves will be taking their slaves by force.

He then tells the humans that for this to work, he needs to free up some of his nearby forces. He was planning on raiding a nearby nest of fire trolls which had been fraternizing, and perhaps fornicating, with the Omukade, but needs the soldiers for his raid on the morlocks, and would like the outsiders to do it for them. Valentine agrees to the deal.

The Ember Thorn troll tribe has lived in the volcanoes of the badlands for centuries, and though they are a small clan, they are well adapted to the heat. Quincy tracks down their subterranean lair, and then Kim sings to the stones, creating a small and well-fortified tunnel right into the middle of their village.

The humans strike first and with surprise, and Quincy puts a round into the belly of the nearest troll. The lanky humanoids are covered in soot, and their wounds reveal angry red skin beneath that looks like it is badly burned, but their injuries only slow them down, for the flesh begins to reknit itself.

As the trolls grab spears and raise the alarm, Feur and Kim move forward to create a vanguard. Kim finds herself attacked by a pair of domesticated Bandersnatches, hunting beasts which resemble huge and muscular hounds, bereft of fur but with claws and horns. One grabs her by the ankle and they drag her away into the dark.

Feur finds a group of four Omukade and engages them in a slow combat. He deftly dodges their blows, and each time one of their poisonous forcipules strikes him, he uses his magic to rewind time and allow the moment to play out differently.

Valentine flies around the low cavern, the limber trolls chasing after her, while Anani attempts to drain their life forces so that Quincy’s bullets might put them down for good.

Krystal is able to rescue Kim, slaying the hounds before they can push her into a burning geothermal vent. Quincy swears at the loss of life, for they would have made excellent hunting hounds.

Kim and Krystal move back to the group and rejoin the battle, just as the troll’s leader, a massive tusked Jotun decides that he is not content merely to give orders and decides to enter the fray himself.

He smashes Kim’s barricades aside and nearly decapitates Quincy with a swipe of his claws.

Anani reacts by summoning a trio of elder shades from the Abyss. These shadowy creatures do scarcely more damage to the enormous troll than Quincy’s bullets, but they unnerve the creature who is unable to strike back at them.

The chieftain retreats, climbing over piles of burning rocks and pools of molten lava, the light of which dispels the shades, although the Jotun’s rocky flesh is also burned in the process. Feur takes the opportunity to warp time, compounding the time he spends in the burning heat a hundred times over, reducing the mighty troll to a charred skeleton.

With the death of their leader, the fire trolls lose the will to fight, their warriors collecting children and fleeing into the burning depths. The mercenaries decide that genocide is not necessary this day, and once they are sure all of the Omukade are dead, they help themselves to the chieftain’s trinkets and trophies of the victory and return to the dwarves of Tahrr; to rest up, to recuperate, and to restock before returning to Golgotha and the service of the Warlord Balthazar.  

Overall a pretty smooth session, although there was some tension with Bob over when Krystal was allowed to start a fight hidden (see other thread).

The game had another stall, albeit a short one, when the players were unable to convince the morlocks to sell their slaves. They insisted I sent them on an impossible task, and I had to break character and tell them that this was meant as an opportunity for them to take some initiative and actually influence the course of the campaign rather than just following orders.


Well, next week is going to be a double, trying to wrap up the arc before we break for the holidays, maternity, and god-forbid another lockdown. The first should tie up a lot of lose ends, and the second should be a climactic battle that will end this chapter and bridge the way toward the next. The players should expect some high highs and some low lows (and the tantrums that come with), so wish me luck!

Talakeal
2021-12-12, 01:34 PM
Played again.

Game went well. Players were able to work together despite the challenges and didn't bite off more than they could chew.

I will have a write up of both adventures sometime over the holidays, hard to say when I will get the time to write it up though with traveling and family and what not.

One thing troubles me though.


It seems that, as adults, the games are a lot less rich.

When we were in school, we could game almost anytime, and often went all day and / or all night, and we could have sessions that were just improv, exploring the world and talking to NPCs. Everyone had a deeper understanding of their character and the setting, and NPCs seemed to be almost like real people, and PCs genuinely developed friendships, rivalries, and sometimes even romances with them that felt real and organic.

Now, we tend to play in a scheduled 4-8 hour block every two weeks, and each game session has to have an objective and a certain number of combats, and it seems like NPCs are just one dimensional plots who show up, say a few scripted lines to advance the plot, and then disappear.

Furthermore, during conversation scenes, it seems like only one player (usually Brian) ever does any talking, the rest of the group gets immediately bored, heads go down, and phones come out.

And its not just that the players want hack and slash (although they do), the same players seem less interested in RP as they get older, and every time I have suggested we run a less intellectual campaign like a mega-dungeon they all tell me no, if they just wanted that they would play a video game.

Maybe its just that as we grow older, we are becoming more aware that it is a game and more anchored in real life, but it seems that the older we get, the shallower and less mature that game actually becomes.

Any thoughts? Does this warrant its own thread?

Quertus
2021-12-12, 02:34 PM
It seems that, as adults, the games are a lot less rich.

that the older we get, the shallower and less mature that game actually becomes.

Any thoughts? Does this warrant its own thread?

Sounds like a good candidate for its own thread, yeah.

TexAvery
2022-01-08, 07:58 PM
You are making me sound like one of my players.

You're very close to a breakthrough there.


I don't know about that. Hoarding resources keeps biting them in the ass both in and out of character; I am hoping eventually they will get the message that a resource you are too scared to use is just a number on a character sheet rather than something that solves problems or makes the game more fun.

Do you see how this is equivalent to "the beatings will continue until morale improves"? "I'm going to punish the way they want to play until they play the way I want them to play".


But no, the rocks don't have any goals or agency, and will happily answer any questions asked of them, but they do have a rudimentary personality and are not compelled to follow orders.

"No agency" means "no agency" not "I'm going to decide whether to respond positively based on how the question is phrased". My car has no agency and turns on when I press the button (unless it's broken). My coworker has agency and has a (more than rudimentary) personality and is not compelled to follow (my) orders, and it is thus important how I phrase requests. See the difference? Your statues have agency as described, but by saying they don't, you're absolving yourself of responsibility for the fact that made them behave in exactly the manner that would frustrate your players as much as possible.

Like your players, you are persisting in a path that you assume will eventually lead to your goal and reject most or all advice or options other than continuing. This, to the point of my first quote from you here, is the exact same macro situation as their behavior.

Talakeal
2022-01-09, 09:30 PM
Well, its been a while, but I finally got the next session down.

March 1114

Soon after recovering from their sortie with the fire trolls, the mercenaries find themselves escorted into the senate chambers within the heights of the second tower. Once there they get their first glance at the ruler of Tahrr, Lady Ophelia, the wife of the late thane. She is middle-aged and plump, large for a dwarf, with fiery hair and soot gray skin. Although she is trying to remain composed, she is clearly upset that Major Brashton has forced her hand, but throughout the interview, she does not let her temper show save for a few sharp tongued jabs. The Lady Ophelia makes it clear to the counselors that Major Brashton has presumed her wishes to end their alliance with the morlocks, and now forced their hands into finding new allies, and that the Warlord Balthazar, who is rich on slaves but poor on industry, is about to make war on Livonia, the dwarves sole economic power in the south. The proposal is simple, the dwarves of Tahrr make a surprise attack on Livonia’s granary at Antilles, and in exchange, Balthazar will include the Omukudae in her war on hengeyokai, and will supply her war with Livonia using exclusively dwarven made arms and armor purchased with the rich human crops of Dungenus.

The councilors debate her proposal and then vote on the alliance, and are deadlocked, three for and three against. And thus they sit glaring at one another, as if the fate of nations can be decided by a child’s staring contest. To settle the tie, Carrock tells the outsiders that they will consult Griselda the Crone. They send for her, and Carrock explains that in times of uncertainty, they seek the wisdom of their elders, and none are more ancient than Griselda, who was old when his grandfather was a babe.

The woman returns, wobbling into the room and balanced between two young dwarven shield-maidens, so stooped and gray that she resembles a boulder, a long scraggly beard dangling from her chin. She listens quietly as Ophelia explains the situation, and she seems to fall into a deep sleep, but when the time comes for her to make her decision, she is alert, with intelligence shining in her eyes, and announces that if the dwarves are to survive, their neutrality must perish.

The two women exchange a few muttered words, and then Ophelia orders Brasthton to prepare his troops for an attack on Livonia’s lands, and he is unable to restrain his whoops of joy. The Thane’s wife then tells Carrock to accompany the humans back to their lands to formally cement the alliance.

Kim moves forward to talk to Griselda, a million questions about the crone’s life and her culture, but her companions hold her back and tell her that now is not the time.

They gather their things and return to the edge of dwarven lands, where Zara awaits for them in her juggernaut. Carrock and Zara do not acknowledge one another’s existence at all, save to murmur insults under the breath just at the edge of hearing, Carrock calling Zara “tailings” and her referring to him as “piss-boy”. Carrock sits in the back near Feur, the two of them sharing corny jokes and laughing the journey away.

Four days later in the light of dawn, the juggernaut is moving along a narrow mountain pass, and Kim is the first to awake. Zara calls her to the front of the vehicle and says that Carrock isn’t laughing with them, he is laughing at them, and Kim nods and says she knows. Zara then asks if she knows that what the humans think of as a dwarven accent is nothing of the sort, rather it’s the dwarf laughing how they think humans sound, and if one is peppering their speech with all manner of “Ochs! and Ayes!” they surely think they are getting one over on you. Kim asks Zara to say something in dwarven, and Zara is hesitant before she lets out an indecipherable murmuring sound occasionally punctuated by harsh guttural consonants. Kim asks what it means, and Zara tells her “Nosey outsiders make for shallow holes.”

Before Kim can respond, something hits the juggernaut, hard and from above. Zara looks about, but can’t see the source, and figures it must be on the roof, but it takes all her concentration to simply keep the vehicle from leaving the road and rolling down the hillside into the ravine below.

Quincy and Valentine are awakened by the motion, and Quincy immediately grabs his rifle, while the angel-girl attempts to rouse her slumbering companions.

The dragoon moves to the vehicle's door and slams it upon. Above him, he sees an enormous creature, shaped like a manta-ray, but with baleful red eyes and a ragged toothy maw. Its fifty-foot wings do not move, it merely hovers above the road, perfectly keeping pace with the juggernaut like a living kite. He recognizes it from tales as a garuda, the horror of the heights.

He immediately fires upward, the powerful bullet punching into its leather flesh and producing a spray of milky yellow blood. The creature squeals in an unnaturally low register, and immediately strikes back with its whipping tail. It is lightning fast, and Kim takes the only action she can to keep the rifleman from being impaled on the creature’s harpoon-like stinger, and shoves him from the door of the moving vehicle, leaving him rolling in the dirt as they leave him behind.

Once she is roused, Krystal immediately recognizes the situation for what it is and uses the infernal powers that are her birthright to teleport through the hellscape and onto the vehicle's roof, and then again onto the garuda’s back. She stabs at it, and it moves to shake her off even as the disappears from the material world to rematerialize safe inside her transport.
Kim does her best to get the monster’s attention, but her weapon just isn’t long enough, and once Quincy has come to a stop and caught his breath, he takes aim and continues firing at the flying monster, serving only to draw its attention.

As their attacker floats away, Valentine orders Zara to stop, and the four of them exit, rushing to save Quincy from being paralyzed or swallowed whole. Anani conjures up the shade of a gargoyle to distract it, although its power is rapidly waning with the rising sun.

Still, it works long enough for Kim and Krystal to reach Quincy, and which point the hovering creature decides to seek easier prey, wheeling away from the hillside and casting its dark shadow across the rocky scrubland valleys below.

The next evening they reach Golgotha, and are happy to be out of the confined space. Each goes about their own business.

Kim finds an official letter to her summoning her to a meeting downtown with a mister David Nash. The letter is almost a month old, so she wastes no time in finding her way to the office. Nash is a handsome well dressed human man with an awkward manner and an eastern accent. He tells Kim that he has recently acquired a law firm and, in looking through their back records, discovered that they were holding her inheritance. Nash gives her a long crooked staff with a moss agate hanging from it and is told that it is the staff of her former master, Nboru. Kim asks what happened to her master, and Nash looks through some old papers and tells her that he was apparently burned at the stake some fifty years, and that his previous representatives had long since given up looking for Kim. The archeologist is too sad to question the situation, and merely gives him Valentine’s business card and departs. In the waiting room, she passes a tall graceful elf with an injured hand, and the two bow politely.

The next day Kim arranges a meeting with Lady Abasinia in a café. The broker is able to identify the staff of power as being able to lay a protective enchantment upon anyone it touches, when the magic word “Almasi” is spoken. She is very happy to see Kim, calling her poppet and patting her on the head almost like a pet, and says that the two of them will have more business soon, and hopefully will find the time to get to know one another better.

At the same time, Anani, Quincy, and Carrock are meeting Balthazar’s ambassador in secret in the city park. The park is an anomaly in the desert, green and overgrown, bounded by iron fence posts, its trees and streams crossed by neat stone paths and footbridges that almost disappear into the foliage. Balthazar’s ambassador is a woman named Baftis, with pixie cut blonde hair and a mischievous grin, who looks to be too young for her position. They make small talk at first, and she mentions that the park is haunted, they say a large figure can be seen lugging a mysterious sack through the darkness each night it rains.

She says that this meager park is nothing compared to the hanging gardens of Dungenus, and asks if Quincy has ever seen them. “Not up close,” he says, and she agrees that one of his rank would be unlikely to be allowed into the palace grounds.

When they get down to business, Baftis says that Balthazar is always looking for new allies. She has tried to keep this meeting secret from old Harlan, Livonia’s ambassador, and she hopes that Anani will be able to convince the arch-mage Thanatos to assist in driving Livonia from the region, although the shadow priestess is uncertain she has that sort of pull.

Baftis takes Quincy’s statements and then departs with Carrock, bound for a riverboat which will take them up the Amber Flow to Concordance where they can get an official military vessel to travel down the great river Sangrael to Balthazar’s capital of Dungenus by the sea.

They leave Valentine’s group with orders to track down anything that might be useful in the coming battle, for open war with Livonia is now inevitable and Balthazar will need every advantage he can get.
Anani heads north, accompanied by her Forsythe, her sergeant, and Decarion, her scribe, hoping to get word to the Tower of Morpheus without being intercepted by the Imperials or the other Warlords.
Deciding to tie up loose ends, the groups split up, with Zara, Krystal, and Valentine heading north to Havensbrook and Quincy, Feur, and Kim returning to Vladispol.

In Havensbrook, the group finds the townspeople still acting suspicious about them, some seeming grateful and others reviling them. Krystal decides to go snooping through the town hall in the dead of the night, and finds two nearly identical sets of tax records, one showing them as having paid tribute to Livonia and the other to Balthazar. Likewise, they show matched records of who was drafted, one going into the forces of Dungenus and the other Avarus. Upon showing these records to Valentine, she notes that most of the people who were drafted were very young or very old, and would likely not have been accepted, and puts two and two together, realizing that, along with the missing graves in the churchyard, that the townsfolk were simply hiding the bodies of those who died from natural causes and recording them as having gone off to war.

The trio decides to take the documents and confront the mayor directly. He tries to deny it before his façade collapses. Krystal tries to accuse him of embezzling money for himself, but he insists that everything he did was for the long-term survival of the town, it is simply not economically viable for it to exist with the tolls that the Warlords are demanding. When pressured, he tells them that he got the idea from a minstrel named Eorl who moved into town several years ago and assured them that every town on the frontier was pulling a similar scam, that the Warlords expected it, and that the people of Havensbrook were gullible rubes for not running such a scheme.

Valentine goes to visit this Eorl, and finds his house to be in the middle of being packed up, as if the minstrel was planning on moving on. She knocks on his door, and finds it answered by a slender man in an undershirt, with a thin goatee and large dark eyes. He immediately begins trying to flirt with Valentine, but she doesn’t play his game and is pure business. Still, she doesn’t get much out of him until Krystal slips up behind him and placed the Black Flame Blade to his throat, and demands answers. He doesn’t seem so much scared as uncaring, and eventually, let’s slip his backstory in exchange for promises of his safety and freedom. Eorl was a young rake from Pompur who made a deal with the “Thin Lady”, to pull scams like this across the disputed zone between Balthazar and Livonia’s borders, and now that the jig is up here, he is on his way to Suttersberg to pull the same, this town has lost interest for him.

As they ride back to Golgotha, Valentine and Krystal realize that maybe they are being manipulated.

Meanwhile, in the south, the group combs the shoreline of the Misty Sea, looking for more signs of missing patrols, and at one cold battle site they see that the bodies appear to have been dragged into the water. Lying in the mud is a cast-off magnetite pendant, and Kim is able to speak to it and learn that it is eager to show her the way home across the shrouded water.

They return to the fisherman whom they befriended the previous year and once more borrow their boat. They travel blindly through the water, guided by the stone, their boat lost in a sea of fog, until eventually they see a black tower rise above them, and a moment later their boat runs aground on jagged rocks.

They move cautiously onto the shore of a grassy island, small huts appearing in the mist, all at the base of a cyclopean tower. Though the group moves stealthily, they soon find themselves surrounded by a band of the inhabitants, amphibious creatures roughly the size of men, but with hairless green skin, long snouts, square set red eyes, and heavy dragging tails. Feur refers to them as lizardmen, but Kim corrects him, they are Fauth.

They do not speak Terran, but Kim can speak enough of their language to convince them to take her to their leader, and they are led into the castle. There, the guards have weapons of beaten bronze and shields of cold iron. Their king is an ancient scarred creature, missing one eye and much of his flesh, and with long curling horns and enormous fangs jutting from his skull. He introduces himself a Gadael Dwwr Clir, and demands to know what the outsiders are doing here. Kim returns the pendant, and he tells one of his servants to find its owner and chide them for their carelessness. He then has a servant fetch the humans jars of Kim Chee, the only food they have which he believes the outsiders will be able to stomach.

Kim should be asking about the missing patrols, but instead wants to know where they came from. Gadael tells her that he is over nine thousand years old, and his people originally come from the promised land in the north-east, a great wetland where their civilization flourished, before the drew the ire of the dragon goddess Eris, and she cursed the very land so that the flesh and souls of the dead would never separate.
Kim asks if it is normal for his people to be so old, and he says no, his father was cursed, a “leech person” who stole the life forces of those around him, and he retained enough of that curse to prolong his own life through drinking the blood of his own fallen before they could be cannibalized by the tribe.

He then says that the fauth stayed in the ruins along the misty sea, making the lost city their own, before the human Imperium came close and they went into hiding upon the islands, where they have stayed for centuries. But they are dying, as is the entire world. They say that the end of the world has already come and gone, but death is a process, none understand this better than they.

Kim finally asks about the patrols, and is told that the fauth used to raid human villages for their dead, digging up cemeteries and stealing preserves, and the people learned in time that it was easier to simply give their dead over to the fauth, setting them adrift on boats. Still, when their foragers began to find scenes of battles right on the shore, the dead left to rot, they could not help but partake.
Kim clarifies that they did not actually kill anyone, and Gadael confirms this. She then asks if they could see the bodies, and with some trepidation, the fauth allows them into the fermenting chambers beneath the castle, where the bodies are being pickled for later consumption. It is an unpleasant examination, but they find the bodies belong to both Livonia and Balthazar’s troops, and that random pieces of their gear have been taken with no apparent rime or reason.

The trio soon departs on tense but peaceful terms, and finds that their boat has been patched with pine tar. As they sail away, one of the fauth women shouts after them in broken Terran that the killers are the same humans, only wearing different clothes.

Once they have returned their boat and reclaimed their horses, they make their way to Balthazar’s nearest garrison. There, Feur casts a ritual of synchronicity linking them to the next ambush, and Quincy asks to accompany one of the patrols.

Several hours later, they find themselves under attack from soldiers wearing the uniform of Livonia’s troops and symbols of Avarus, but they are quickly and cleanly defeated after Kim and Feur use their magics to turn the tide of the battle. Searching the bodies, their uniforms are quickly shown to be counterfeit, although supplemented with enough actual insignias and apparel to hide this fact from casual observation. They also lack any homunculi amongst their ranks. As they lay dying, Feur hears one of the attackers speak in the language of his homeland, and immediately comes up with a theory.

As they ride back to Golgotha, Feur tells his companions of the reason he was first sent to Golgotha. A populist cult that wanted to overthrow the monarchy was operating out of Zaikhan, and under interrogation revealed that they were sent by the Warlord Umbriel, Lady of the West, and that she had sent other agents to several other independent city-states to bring them under her heel, including Golgotha.

A week later, the party reunites and shares what they have learned. Finding the news about The Warlord Umbriel to be most distressing, they ask Tara about her memories of Umbriel’s attack on Golgotha, and learn that she moved through the Medagora forests and along the northern edge of the Canyon Lands, eventually making her move on the city from a basecamp in an old Imperial military academy located in the hills.

The group decides to start their search there, but know that taking on a Warlord’s invasion force is likely beyond them, and so they make sure to bring their best equipment, and to prepare with numerous spells and runes created by Hraijyn.

They approach at night, Kim using her staff to protect them from their enemies’ weapons and Anani performing a ritual that makes Krystal become one with the darkness, virtually undetectable in the gloom and almost insubstantial to enemy attack.

They find the academy atop a hill, a tall stone building, unadorned and rising rectangular into the sky, resting atop a narrow rocky hill and connected to the foothills by a broad concrete bridge.

Standing guard are a dozen or more men and women, heavily garbed in the manner of bandits, but well-armed. When Valentine announces herself, they tell her to scram, that this is their territory. But Feur steps forward and tells them that he has come from Zaikhan, to bring justice for those who have fallen at their hands and those of their mistress.

A moment later his challenge is answered from inside the building but an enormous warrior wearing shining golden armor and wielding an immense chain, flanked on either side by a pair of standard bearers and honor guards. In a booming voice, he tells them that he is the Iron Swallow, Hand of the Warlord, and that he has been sent to churn the roiling chaos that is the East.

There is no more talking, only battle, as Feur strikes like lightning at those on the bridge. Krystal slips through the hellscape and the shadows, taking out their flags and attempting to disrupt their coordination, all the while staying outside of Valentine’s light.

Kim attempts to form a bulwark against her enemies, moving in front and attempting to control the battlefield with her meteor hammer, but the Iron Swallow is waiting for her; he wraps his weapon around hers from five paces and yanks her body towards him, raising his boot and planting his foot in her face, knocking sense from her as he moves towards Quincy and Anani in the back row.

Anani is thrown aside, and when she gets her bearing she summons a pair of elder shades from the Abyss to assist her. Quincy finds his bullets do little to the enraged hellion, and Kim’s wards do nothing to stop the Plutonian Steel that makes up his chain, and he is soon taken out of the fight, but Valentine distracts him long enough for Anani to pull Quincy’s prone form out of his path.

Kim comes to her senses finding herself being beaten down on the ground, surrounded by enemies. But she is able to center herself enough to protect herself with a mana shield, and when she sees Valentine jerk away from The Iron Swallow and fly out over the crevasse, a line of soldiers draw their bows and move to shoot her down, and Kim commands the bridge beneath them turn to mud, sending several plunging to their deaths, and those who struggle to keep themselves supported by the quagmire are easy pickings for Krystal.

Feur and the Shades are able to clear a path to Kim, and Anani is able to heal herself and Quincy with the stolen life forces of their victims. One by one the warlord’s minions fall, most by Quincy’s rifle, but The Iron Swallow is stronger than all of them put together, and is so far untouched.

Still, the hellion is alone and outnumbered, Valentine is able to coordinate her employees, Kim distracting the Iron Swallow while Krystal stabs him in the back and Feur rains down blow after blow upon him at supernatural speed, eventually smashing his golden helmet from his head to reveal an elderly warrior, his hair short and gray and his skin weathered. In a cracked voice, he tells them that he is defeated, and offers to let them take his place at the vanguard of Umbriel’s forces in the East.

Krystal asks what is in it for them, and he tells them that the streets of distant Xian are paved with jade and the rivers run with gold, and all shall come to them, but Feur will hear none of it.
So the Iron Swallow speaks to an unseen presence, telling it to go west and tell Umbriel that the Iron Swallow has fallen at the hands of Feur, warrior of the Tribunal. He then produces a hidden dagger and plunges it into his own heart, and as he does so the demon that was bound into his soul departs, carrying his message back to its mistress in Xian, the city of the west.
The group binds their wounds, and once dawn falls upon the compound they search it, finding within numerous uniforms and insignias fabricated or stolen from Balthazar and Livonia’s forces; there can be no doubt that Umbriel’s minions were attacking patrols while dressed in false colors.

The Iron Swallow’s armor is made of actual gold, and his chain is enchanted, impossibly heavy and infinitely long. Kim attempts to fasten the heads of her meteor hammer to the chain, but has trouble finding the ends until Anani creates a null zone, temporarily banishing all magic from the area.

The rest of the group basks in the riches they have won, living large and upgrading their equipment. Quincy purchases a well-trained new warhorse named Esper, which the merchant insists is from the finest Imperial line, until its Templar owner betrayed the Old Empire and went rogue before meeting his death in battle at the hands of a dragon ogre.

Feur returns to the Templar Lord Asmond Delacuer and tells him of their battle. The knight is overwhelmed that they took out the invaders on their own, but admits that he probably couldn’t have sent much help anyway, for the city is on the brink of war. Even if it were revealed that the machinations of Umbriel and Nereka were behind much of the strife, Balthazar and Livonia are pouring troops into the region, and it is only a matter of time before a small incident sparks off the final battle for the fate of Golgotha.

Overall it went well, and I was really proud of my players. They were able to wrap up a lot of loose ends and solve previously abandoned mysteries without much prodding and no stalling out of the game, and they were able to work together and prepare for a tough fight and actually follow through with their plan.

The game is currently on hiatus between acts with the holidays, the latest covid lockdown, and one of the players expected to give birth this month. I still have to write up and post the final session we played, which I hope to do in a week or two, and then we should start gaming again sometime in March.


You're very close to a breakthrough there.

Sorry, its been several months since the conversation you quoted, if you want me to take your point, you are going to have to be a bit more direct and a bit more verbose.


Do you see how this is equivalent to "the beatings will continue until morale improves"? "I'm going to punish the way they want to play until they play the way I want them to play".

Not at all, no.

Punishing people to improve morale is of course counter-productive, punishing people to force them to play a certain way could actually yield fruit.

Note however, that is absolutely not what I am doing. There is no "punishment" on my end, merely the observation that the players are making themselves bored and frustrated by refusing to spend plentiful resources, and I hope they will one day realize that they are punishing themselves for no gain.

I would say though, I am extremely curious as to how you are defining "punishment" here and whether one of us is misinterpreting the other's words.


"No agency" means "no agency" not "I'm going to decide whether to respond positively based on how the question is phrased". My car has no agency and turns on when I press the button (unless it's broken). My coworker has agency and has a (more than rudimentary) personality and is not compelled to follow (my) orders, and it is thus important how I phrase requests. See the difference? Your statues have agency as described, but by saying they don't, you're absolving yourself of responsibility for the fact that made them behave in exactly the manner that would frustrate your players as much as possible.

Agreed, the statues have rudimentary agency. The whole agency thing came from someone trying to "gotcha" me because several months before the statue incident I made an offhand comment about how communing with rocks and looking into the past was different than communing with dieties because they lacked agency.

So, to use your car example, if I refuse to press the ignition and instead just stand outside screaming at the car to "GO!", is that really the fault of the car maker?

Kim's spell allows her to talk to rocks, and the rocks are friendly and will answer her questions. It does not allow her to give them commands. In this case, the player flat out refused to RP and I, in the heat of the moment, said ok, let's resolve it with a charisma check instead. Probably not, in retrospect, the correct solution, but it was the call I made at the time.

TexAvery
2022-01-10, 11:41 AM
Sorry, its been several months since the conversation you quoted, if you want me to take your point, you are going to have to be a bit more direct and a bit more verbose.

Sorry; I occasionally go through backlog things when I am without my normal routine and need to kill some time. On vacation with the in-laws, which means lots of screen time in a hotel across the world instead of at home. And this one was the clearest example I could use to try to give my feedback.

Here, my point was that you indeed act exactly like your players but don't realize it, which is why the impasse continues (with the occasional interruption). See below.


Not at all, no.

Punishing people to improve morale is of course counter-productive, punishing people to force them to play a certain way could actually yield fruit.

Note however, that is absolutely not what I am doing. There is no "punishment" on my end, merely the observation that the players are making themselves bored and frustrated by refusing to spend plentiful resources, and I hope they will one day realize that they are punishing themselves for no gain.

I would say though, I am extremely curious as to how you are defining "punishment" here and whether one of us is misinterpreting the other's words.

The boredom and frustration is the punishment. You say "the players are making themselves bored and frustrated by..." but that is happening because you are arranging the sessions to do that. They are not playing the way you want them to play (spending resources at the pace you desire) so you arrange the adventure to make them unhappy with the way they play. Then they get unhappy and you blame them. You could work with their nature just as "easily" as they could work with yours, but you refuse to. What they actually learn, over the course of years, is that your adventures make them miserable but as you refuse to stop playing with them, they refuse to stop playing with you, and round and round we go. You are them, and they are you.

Also, the bolded... please reread that a few times. Punishing until they learn how to enjoy the game is functionally the same as "the beatings (boredom and frustration) will continue until morale improves (you start playing in the manner I approve of)".


Agreed, the statues have rudimentary agency. The whole agency thing came from someone trying to "gotcha" me because several months before the statue incident I made an offhand comment about how communing with rocks and looking into the past was different than communing with dieties because they lacked agency.

So, to use your car example, if I refuse to press the ignition and instead just stand outside screaming at the car to "GO!", is that really the fault of the car maker?

Kim's spell allows her to talk to rocks, and the rocks are friendly and will answer her questions. It does not allow her to give them commands. In this case, the player flat out refused to RP and I, in the heat of the moment, said ok, let's resolve it with a charisma check instead. Probably not, in retrospect, the correct solution, but it was the call I made at the time.

In the car example, I cast the spell (press the button) and it starts. It doesn't care if I cast the spell and yell at it, or cast the spell and say nice things, or cast the spell and remain silent because it has no agency. Kim did not stand there screaming at a rock; she cast the spell and expected to get the promised effect. She did not, and as a result the boredom and frustration appeared. And predictably, instead of learning the lesson you hoped, she learned that your game is unreliable and frustrating, as a rudimentary knowledge of psychology would make obvious.

The fact that this is your default reaction in the heat of the moment is, again, why you are like unto your players. Kim was likely frustrated and stressed and reacted by (in your words) refusing to RP (though I would term it "RPed a stressed character in a situation that felt impossible, or almost, to succeed"). You responded in a manner that you would term into the mirror "refused to RP and made an incorrect response", and... round and round we go.

You feed into the loop and it wonder why it doesn't break. You can work with them to provide an adventure that they're likely to enjoy the way they want to play, or you can continue to punish them (which is what deliberately boring and frustrating them during a hobby is) and wonder why the situation is dysfunctional.

Talakeal
2022-01-10, 12:53 PM
Sorry; I occasionally go through backlog things when I am without my normal routine and need to kill some time. On vacation with the in-laws, which means lots of screen time in a hotel across the world instead of at home. And this one was the clearest example I could use to try to give my feedback.

Here, my point was that you indeed act exactly like your players but don't realize it, which is why the impasse continues (with the occasional interruption). See below.


Don't worry about old threads, I like the bump, I just need a bit more context.

I get that you are saying I act like my players, I just need to know in what way, because by itself this just comes across as a meaningless jab along the lines of "they are bad but so are you, u all suck!".

In that particular case, I think I was saying that my players believe that the GM is all powerful; their choices or their dice rolls have no impact on anything, if they aren't on a railroad they wander about aimlessly, they never try and come up with outside of the box solutions, and if they come across in character resistance to a plan they take it as an OOC sign that they are doing something I don't want.

I really don't see this behavior in myself. Now, I fully admit that I am not blameless and my own stubbornness about adhering to game rules / fictional narrative over fun often contributes to situations, but that isn't, imo, the same thing.


Also, the bolded... please reread that a few times. Punishing until they learn how to enjoy the game is functionally the same as "the beatings (boredom and frustration) will continue until morale improves (you start playing in the manner I approve of)".

The thing about "beatings will continue until morale improves" is that it is funny because it is contradictory; morale is a measure of satisfaction and enjoyment, and beatings are sure to lower that. On the other hand, if I beat a dog for piddling on the carpet, it will likely stop piddling on the carpet; its not a joke, its just cruel.

In this case though, the boredom is totally self inflicted. Its less like punishment and more like "If you don't buy me a new toy, I am going to hold my breath until I pass out!"

Like, to use an example, the players come across a locked door. They say they are stuck, and I propose they could pick the lock, which would take an hour, break it down which will make noise, or cast an unlocking spell which will take mana. The players will say they don't like any of those costs, and simply sit staring at the door hoping that someone else comes up with a brilliant consequence free scheme for getting past the door or that I will deus ex machina the door out of existence.

What would you have me do in such a situation? What would you do?


That being said, I don't feel like hoping players get good at a game is really unreasonable. Saying things like "playing in the manner I approve of" is just a really negative way of saying it. I can't imagine, for example, getting a game over screen and going back to world 1 because you keep running Mario into enemies and jumping down pits is some form of tyrannical control over the players on the designers part, its merely how the game is meant to be played.



In the car example, I cast the spell (press the button) and it starts. It doesn't care if I cast the spell and yell at it, or cast the spell and say nice things, or cast the spell and remain silent because it has no agency. Kim did not stand there screaming at a rock; she cast the spell and expected to get the promised effect. She did not, and as a result the boredom and frustration appeared. And predictably, instead of learning the lesson you hoped, she learned that your game is unreliable and frustrating, as a rudimentary knowledge of psychology would make obvious.

The fact that this is your default reaction in the heat of the moment is, again, why you are like unto your players. Kim was likely frustrated and stressed and reacted by (in your words) refusing to RP (though I would term it "RPed a stressed character in a situation that felt impossible, or almost, to succeed"). You responded in a manner that you would term into the mirror "refused to RP and made an incorrect response", and... round and round we go.

You feed into the loop and it wonder why it doesn't break. You can work with them to provide an adventure that they're likely to enjoy the way they want to play, or you can continue to punish them (which is what deliberately boring and frustrating them during a hobby is) and wonder why the situation is dysfunctional.

The spell isn't command rock, its speak with rocks. To use a D&D analogy, its Tongues not Compel.

She cast the spell, I asked what she said, she said she gave a command, and I (both in and out of character) asked her what she was saying, and she refused. This is not the first time we have had this conversation, many times in the past she has insisted that talking in character is punishing to players with poor social skills and that all social interaction should be resolved with dice, and so that is what I gave her.

I have no reason to believe they were RPing a frustrated or confused character in a seemingly impossible situation. The closest analogy I can see is taking a wrong turn and pulling over and asking the nearest gas station attendant how to get back to the main road.

TexAvery
2022-01-10, 02:03 PM
Don't worry about old threads, I like the bump, I just need a bit more context.

I get that you are saying I act like my players, I just need to know in what way, because by itself this just comes across as a meaningless jab along the lines of "they are bad but so are you, u all suck!".

In that particular case, I think I was saying that my players believe that the GM is all powerful; their choices or their dice rolls have no impact on anything, if they aren't on a railroad they wander about aimlessly, they never try and come up with outside of the box solutions, and if they come across in character resistance to a plan they take it as an OOC sign that they are doing something I don't want.

I really don't see this behavior in myself. Now, I fully admit that I am not blameless and my own stubbornness about adhering to game rules / fictional narrative over fun often contributes to situations, but that isn't, imo, the same thing.

First of all, I definitely wasn't meaning to jab like that! Second, it wasn't specific to that context; I pulled it out and quoted it on its own because on its own, it makes the point I am trying to. Both you and your players are trying to force each other to play to your own (like, each's own) manner, and it doesn't work. When it doesn't work, there's conflict, and things deteriorate. That's what I meant by being close to a breakthrough - you are like your players. Different in flavor, but you both do the same things to each other and have for, apparently, close to two decades, like a fighting old married couple.


The thing about "beatings will continue until morale improves" is that it is funny because it is contradictory; morale is a measure of satisfaction and enjoyment, and beatings are sure to lower that. On the other hand, if I beat a dog for piddling on the carpet, it will likely stop piddling on the carpet; its not a joke, its just cruel.

In this case though, the boredom is totally self inflicted. Its less like punishment and more like "If you don't buy me a new toy, I am going to hold my breath until I pass out!"

Like, to use an example, the players come across a locked door. They say they are stuck, and I propose they could pick the lock, which would take an hour, break it down which will make noise, or cast an unlocking spell which will take mana. The players will say they don't like any of those costs, and simply sit staring at the door hoping that someone else comes up with a brilliant consequence free scheme for getting past the door or that I will deus ex machina the door out of existence.

What would you have me do in such a situation? What would you do?

Have you housebroken a puppy? I hope you don't beat them. You give positive reinforcement by using things like piddle pads moving closer to the door, taking them out preemptively and cooing when they do their business outside, and so on. Be nice when they do what you want to encourage; don't be mean when they do anything else. Think of the story of the runaway train with all the stop signs. That was the first book I liked.

What would I do? I wouldn't provide a locked door unless the players wanted a game to include locked doors. Do they not have a character who likes to pick locks, bash down doors, or cast knock? If not, I'd skip the locks and have the door guarded, if I wanted it "secured" by the story. That's if they like combat. If they like puzzles, I'd have a puzzle room.

This is exactly what I keep trying to communicate: exactly like your players, you are attempting to force the game to conform to your desires. This is not a world given to you that you must run as written, and it happens to not be what they like; you are specifically creating situations where they will be unhappy and then absolving yourself of responsibility for any part in the result.

For a neutral example, let's take Alice and Bob going out to dinner. Bob wants Italian, Alice wants Chinese. Alice takes them to a street with only Chinese restaurants and asks Bob where he wants to eat. Bob is frustrated and insulted. Alice asks "well there are only Chinese restaurants here; what do you expect?". Bob knows there are Italian restaurants on the other side of town, and Thai restaurants they both like in another neighborhood. Alice created a situation in which frustration was the only possible outcome by going to the street with Chinese restaurants in the first place. You're creating a situation with a locked door they don't want to deal with and acting as if that is a law of nature.

Or think of a rogue who likes backstabbing. If you create a module with lots of undead, golems, and oozes, he'll be frustrated. If you say "well that's what we have here", he's not going to be mollified; you still took the game in a direction where you should have predicted the player would be frustrated.

This is a theme I've seen throughout your threads.


That being said, I don't feel like hoping players get good at a game is really unreasonable. Saying things like "playing in the manner I approve of" is just a really negative way of saying it. I can't imagine, for example, getting a game over screen and going back to world 1 because you keep running Mario into enemies and jumping down pits is some form of tyrannical control over the players on the designers part, its merely how the game is meant to be played.

You are saying "get good at the game" is equivalent to "playing in the manner you approve of", as you specifically said you were trying to make playing in the manner they liked (conserving resources) boring and frustrating. If you don't like running Mario into an enemy sending you back to the beginning, you pull out a different cartridge. If I think AC: Paris (whatever the name was) sucks, as it did, I go back to Black Flag. But as a P&P DM, you are not locked into a deterministic procedure like a Nintendo is; you can respond to what your players do and like. Do they want to end each day with 50% resources remaining? Let them. Why did you use that analogy? It's something I'd encourage you to think about, because you keep acting as if you have no choice in your actions and no responsibility for the outcome.


The spell isn't command rock, its speak with rocks. To use a D&D analogy, its Tongues not Compel.

She cast the spell, I asked what she said, she said she gave a command, and I (both in and out of character) asked her what she was saying, and she refused. This is not the first time we have had this conversation, many times in the past she has insisted that talking in character is punishing to players with poor social skills and that all social interaction should be resolved with dice, and so that is what I gave her.

I have no reason to believe they were RPing a frustrated or confused character in a seemingly impossible situation. The closest analogy I can see is taking a wrong turn and pulling over and asking the nearest gas station attendant how to get back to the main road.

Is Kim possibly on the spectrum? I ask because things like acting in character can be stressful for people who are uncomfortable in social situations. You say you gave her "all social interaction resolved with dice", but then the result was a failure because of what she said to you, not a failed die roll base purely on the character sheet. In her situation I would be frustrated too, having thought you had agreed I didn't have to step that far outside of my comfort zone to enjoy my hobby and getting bait-and-switched in the end.

If it weren't the Covid era, I would ask to observe a session the next time I'm up there. I'm sure it would be enlightening.

Talakeal
2022-01-11, 01:09 PM
First of all, I definitely wasn't meaning to jab like that! Second, it wasn't specific to that context; I pulled it out and quoted it on its own because on its own, it makes the point I am trying to. Both you and your players are trying to force each other to play to your own (like, each's own) manner, and it doesn't work. When it doesn't work, there's conflict, and things deteriorate. That's what I meant by being close to a breakthrough - you are like your players. Different in flavor, but you both do the same things to each other and have for, apparently, close to two decades, like a fighting old married couple.

Ok sure, I'll agree with you there.



Have you housebroken a puppy? I hope you don't beat them. You give positive reinforcement by using things like piddle pads moving closer to the door, taking them out preemptively and cooing when they do their business outside, and so on. Be nice when they do what you want to encourage; don't be mean when they do anything else. Think of the story of the runaway train with all the stop signs. That was the first book I liked.

Yes, I have housebroken puppies, no I would never beat one. I was merely pointing it out as an example of a situation where a beating could produce the desired result, whereas beating someone to improve their morale is a contradiction.


What would I do? I wouldn't provide a locked door unless the players wanted a game to include locked doors. Do they not have a character who likes to pick locks, bash down doors, or cast knock? If not, I'd skip the locks and have the door guarded, if I wanted it "secured" by the story. That's if they like combat. If they like puzzles, I'd have a puzzle room.

I think I do this, at least to an extent.

They like combat, so I put in a lot of combat. They hate logic puzzles, so I skip puzzles. One of them is afraid of spiders, so I don't use spider monsters. They don't like violence toward children, so I don't put children in harm's way. Many players are uncomfortable with romance, so I keep it off screen. Etc.

On the other hand, I want a consistent world (as do they, anytime the inconsistency doesn't go in their favor they are sure to point it out!) and so it just doesn't make sense that I can completely strip some elements from the game entirely, but I do try and minimize them.

The problem, more often than not, isn't so much that a setting element exists, its that obstacles exist.

To continue my above example, locked doors are not a problem for them, they can happily open locked doors all day long. BUT the moment they FAIL to pick a lock, suddenly locked doors are the worst thing in the world and ruin the entire game.

The statue "puzzle" for example, was simply a search check that they succeeded on a 2 and was only there for versimilitude purposes. If they hadn't gotten unlucky and rolled a natural 1, it never would have even been the slightest of an issue.


You are saying "get good at the game" is equivalent to "playing in the manner you approve of", as you specifically said you were trying to make playing in the manner they liked (conserving resources) boring and frustrating.

I don't think I ever said that. Could you please link the context?

I said that THEY get bored and frustrated because they refuse to spend the necessary resources required to bypass obstacles. And, of course, once they do that I get bored and frustrated in turn.

Like, in the statue case above, they have bennies they could have used to reroll or modify their search roll to find the latching mechanism, and Kim has dozens of spells she can cast to solve the problem. But they don't want to spend the resources, so instead they sit there hoping that one of their fellow players will come up with a brilliant plan that bypasses the obstacle or that I will swoop in and solve their problems with a deus ex machina.



But as a P&P DM, you are not locked into a deterministic procedure like a Nintendo is; you can respond to what your players do and like. Do they want to end each day with 50% resources remaining? Let them. Why did you use that analogy? It's something I'd encourage you to think about, because you keep acting as if you have no choice in your actions and no responsibility for the outcome.

I seriously don't see how a game that you cannot lose is a game in any way, nor do I see how it could possibly be entertaining, or how decisions could matter. And I think that my players would agree both on a surface and subconscious level. Although I think pride also gets in the way of that, because they can't accept that they ever failed, and they have to tell themselves that they were somehow cheated any time they do fail, which, I think, is a seperate issue that doesn't actually have anything to do with difficulty.

They do complete most every mission with a substantial amount of resources remaining, it still isn't enough. 50% would soon turn to 60%, which would turn into 70%, etc. My players frequent battle cry is "this is way too hard, sometimes we barely even win!"

Last weekend I was playing a tabletop wargame with Brian. He was winning the game as a whole, and he was winning each individual fight. But he was still bitching that my models were too good because they weren't dying fast enough for his liking. Which is, IMO, kind of a microcosm of my gaming circle as a whole; lot's of weak egos that I don't have the skills to properly message.



Is Kim possibly on the spectrum? I ask because things like acting in character can be stressful for people who are uncomfortable in social situations. You say you gave her "all social interaction resolved with dice", but then the result was a failure because of what she said to you, not a failed die roll based purely on the character sheet. In her situation I would be frustrated too, having thought you had agreed I didn't have to step that far outside of my comfort zone to enjoy my hobby and getting bait-and-switched in the end.

I don't quite follow. Are you saying that in Kim's mind I promised her she would never have to speak IC and we would just assume she would always say exactly the right thing?

To clarify:

It's not that Kim is on the spectrum, just convinced that she doesn't know how to talk to people.

She says it is unfair for someone who is playing an eloquent character to be required to talk IC as that diminished their character build, and vice versa it is unfair for someone who is charming IRL to be allowed to talk IC because that gives them an advantage.

She says that all social interactions should be resolved purely by the dice rolls, which is what I gave her in this situation.

The problem though, is that bringing out the dice introduced another point of failure, and after a second botched roll we were right back at square one.


If it weren't the Covid era, I would ask to observe a session the next time I'm up there. I'm sure it would be enlightening.

You are always welcome, although I am not sure how enlightening it would be as we would surely alter our behavior if we knew we were being watched.

TexAvery
2022-01-11, 02:05 PM
Yes, I have housebroken puppies, no I would never beat one. I was merely pointing it out as an example of a situation where a beating could produce the desired result, whereas beating someone to improve their morale is a contradiction.

My point here is that beating would not produce the desired result...


I think I do this, at least to an extent.

They like combat, so I put in a lot of combat. They hate logic puzzles, so I skip puzzles. One of them is afraid of spiders, so I don't use spider monsters. They don't like violence toward children, so I don't put children in harm's way. Many players are uncomfortable with romance, so I keep it off screen. Etc.

On the other hand, I want a consistent world (as do they, anytime the inconsistency doesn't go in their favor they are sure to point it out!) and so it just doesn't make sense that I can completely strip some elements from the game entirely, but I do try and minimize them.

The problem, more often than not, isn't so much that a setting element exists, its that obstacles exist.

To continue my above example, locked doors are not a problem for them, they can happily open locked doors all day long. BUT the moment they FAIL to pick a lock, suddenly locked doors are the worst thing in the world and ruin the entire game.

The statue "puzzle" for example, was simply a search check that they succeeded on a 2 and was only there for versimilitude purposes. If they hadn't gotten unlucky and rolled a natural 1, it never would have even been the slightest of an issue.

That might be a confidence issue. I hit the same sort of thing at work; when I'm given a problem I can work on while relaxed, it's fine. When given the same problem as "you must get this done this week" I lock up mentally, even if it's a thing that I would do in a day in the first situation. In their case, it could be anxiety firing off and making it feel as if the world is ending because of a setback.

Now what to do with it is a harder problem, if that's even correct (meaning my hypothesis). I will also say that failing on a 1 is a problem I have with the d20 style systems as a whole; if I had more time my heartbreaker would run on cumulative successes and avoid the "5% chance of failure in what should be automatic" that plagues the d20 system, and gets worse with the GMs who have seasoned warriors cutting off their own feet on a 1 (not you, for that example, just my issue with the possibility existing).


I don't think I ever said that. Could you please link the context?

Of course. Here's what I was referring to:


Hoarding resources keeps biting them in the ass both in and out of character; I am hoping eventually they will get the message that a resource you are too scared to use is just a number on a character sheet rather than something that solves problems or makes the game more fun.


I said that THEY get bored and frustrated because they refuse to spend the necessary resources required to bypass obstacles. And, of course, once they do that I get bored and frustrated in turn.

Like, in the statue case above, they have bennies they could have used to reroll or modify their search roll to find the latching mechanism, and Kim has dozens of spells she can cast to solve the problem. But they don't want to spend the resources, so instead they sit there hoping that one of their fellow players will come up with a brilliant plan that bypasses the obstacle or that I will swoop in and solve their problems with a deus ex machina.

I do interpret "I am hoping that eventually they will get the message" is "I am creating these situations in an attempt to teach them to use those resources (as you want) instead of hoarding them (as they want)", which evaluates to "I am trying to get them to play they way I want instead of the way they want".

It is a behavior induced by limited-use resources instead of check-based; in that concept-only HB of mine there would be no Vancian prep, only "roll a casting check for the power of spell you are attempting". You could do it all you want, but your best effects will fail more often. Wipes out the 15-minute day BS too, which is something I want to see die a fiery death.


I seriously don't see how a game that you cannot lose is a game in any way, nor do I see how it could possibly be entertaining, or how decisions could matter. And I think that my players would agree both on a surface and subconscious level. Although I think pride also gets in the way of that, because they can't accept that they ever failed, and they have to tell themselves that they were somehow cheated any time they do fail, which, I think, is a seperate issue that doesn't actually have anything to do with difficulty.

Hmm. While they're video games, you can't "fail" Halo or Assassin's Creed; you just die and return to a checkpoint. Ditto Diablo on normal mode. Those are certainly games. Tabletop... I'd really try to avoid "lose" as an option. What, if there's a TPK you just close the campaign and do something else? I'd always have a way to carry on with a new party instead. But also, this is one of the problems that occurs with bad modules (again, speaking in generalities, not yours). If there's a lock and the PCs have one way to get past it as written, and they fail or the party doesn't include that power or the character with it died... it's stonewalled. Multiple solutions to everything.


They do complete most every mission with a substantial amount of resources remaining, it still isn't enough. 50% would soon turn to 60%, which would turn into 70%, etc. My players frequent battle cry is "this is way too hard, sometimes we barely even win!"

Last weekend I was playing a tabletop wargame with Brian. He was winning the game as a whole, and he was winning each individual fight. But he was still bitching that my models were too good because they weren't dying fast enough for his liking. Which is, IMO, kind of a microcosm of my gaming circle as a whole; lot's of weak egos that I don't have the skills to properly message.

And that, at face value, is when I'd have no patience to keep playing with them.


I don't quite follow. Are you saying that in Kim's mind I promised her she would never have to speak IC and we would just assume she would always say exactly the right thing?

To clarify:

It's not that Kim is on the spectrum, just convinced that she doesn't know how to talk to people.

She says it is unfair for someone who is playing an eloquent character to be required to talk IC as that diminished their character build, and vice versa it is unfair for someone who is charming IRL to be allowed to talk IC because that gives them an advantage.

She says that all social interactions should be resolved purely by the dice rolls, which is what I gave her in this situation.

The problem though, is that bringing out the dice introduced another point of failure, and after a second botched roll we were right back at square one.

I'm sorry, I thought you said the failure was because she issued a "command" instead of a "question", independent of the roll? And "convinced she doesn't know how to talk to people" is close enough...


You are always welcome, although I am not sure how enlightening it would be as we would surely alter our behavior if we knew we were being watched.

That is a problem that happens, but it might still be interesting. In any case, thank you, and I may take you up on that at some point. Maybe even this year.

Talakeal
2022-01-17, 04:52 PM
All right, here is the last session before we break.

April 1114

Anani is awakened from a deep sleep by the voice of her god flatly commanding her to “Wake up.”

She rises in the small hours of the morning and, as she dresses and washes up, she hears loud noises in the distance that she can’t quite make out. She moves out to climb the adobe wall that surrounds their plantation, and can discern the sound of distant explosions and gunshots, and when the wind shifts just right she can also hear screams and clashing blades.

“The war’s started,” Quincy says as he climbs up beside her, “sooner than I expected. Damn.”

One by one their companions awake. They see a light on the horizon which at first they mistake for dawn, but then Valentine realizes its true nature “Main Street is on fire, the casinos are burning.”

The group waits quietly in the dark as they watch the fires spread and hear the battle rage.

Tatters is still and silent, clearly paralyzed with terror.

Suddenly, the entire compound is rocked by an explosion, a noise like tenfold thunder, and a blast of scorching heat and light. They stare in awe as a giant pillar of fire stands stretching to the heavens, leaving most stunned in confusion and awe, trying to rationalize this strange witchcraft.

Valentine assures them “That was the old oil refinery going up,” but Tatters begins shrieking and trembling uncontrollably, obviously reliving past trauma.
“That’s less than two leagues from here,” Kim says, “pack up your things, we need to get going.”

Kim and Zara move to the makeshift garage they have built on the side of the complex to fetch the juggernaut while the rest of the group goes to gather what valuables and supplies they can carry with them.

As the mercenaries make to leave their compound, they spy a group of soldiers moving up the street towards their compound. They are wearing sleek black armor which covers them head to toe, edged in glowing crimson crystal, neon-bright in the gloom. Two of them are larger and more heavily armored than the rest, and one is clad in the robes of a priest and carries a flag with the same curious symbol upon it that was worn by Nathaniel Bloodbourne.

Before her companions can move to stop her, Tatters runs toward them, recognizing them as her one-time rescuers, waving her hands and calling out to them “We’re over here!”

As she approaches, they raise their rifles and fire, hitting her a half dozen times. The frail, pink-haired girl instantly collapses to the cobblestones in a spreading pool of blood.

One of the black knights proclaims “We are the Scourge; come to cleanse the world for the return of the true Emperor!” while the two heavily armored figures raise their flame-throwers and set the nearby buildings alight, before moving toward the plantation gates.

Cut off from Kim and Zara, Valentine makes the call to run, flitting over the back wall. Krystal and Hraijin transport themselves directly into the garage using their respective supernatural powers, while

Quincy mounts Esper, his new Templar steed, and leaps directly over the wall.

Feur and Anani, however, have no choice but to stand their ground, caught in the open as they are.

But, as the Scourge approaches, the priest raises his hand, looks Anani in the eye, and bows deeply. “Madam,” he says, and he turns on his heel and continues on his way, the armored soldiers following closely after.

Anani is mystified, but doesn’t waste the opportunity, moving to meet up with her companions in the juggernaut. Though the plantation is not burning, the buildings around it are, and the fire will spread.

Feur rushes to Tattter's side, hoping to save her, but sees that her wounds are too numerous and too severe, and too much time has passed for him to undo them. Desperate, he feels that now is the time to use the mysterious elixir which he has been carrying with him for so many years. He uncorks the ancient bottle and brings it to her cold lips.
Suddenly, her timeline rushes from her like a last breath, and Feur absorbs it. He finds himself in another world, another time, where he kneels over Tatters, who is not dead by gunshot, but merely unconscious under a pile of rubble. He can touch her, but not move her, and he realizes that he has entered the last moments of the doomed reality from which she originated.
He rises and walks about this strange dying world, seeing signs of carnage in the streets.
Soldiers bearing the golden sun of Xian overrun the streets, massacring any who stand against them, be they Templar, Justicar, Imperial Militia, or even the few who dare to oppose them from the casino’s private security, the Black Scar Mercenaries. Even the soldiers of the other Warlords who were sent to protect their ambassadors while waiting for an opportunity to take the city for their own.

Feur recognizes some of the combatants, such as Asmond Delecur and The Iron Swallow, but most are strangers to him. All of them ignore him, as he is unable to affect this world’s past in the strange, dream-like state, that he now occupies.

Eventually, Feur finds what can only be the Warlord Umbriel herself, an Amazonian woman with shining orichalcum armor and a mane of blood-red hair that she wears like a cloak. Even though the haze of non-existence, it is all Feur can do to steel himself and avoid falling down and worshipping her.

She is engaged in a dual with a man whom he recognizes from his vision in the desert tomb as Raven-Dies-Talking’s older brother. The old gunslinger is armed with ornate mithril revolvers that he wields with hawkish accuracy, and his steps bear in from one spot to another in the blink of an eye, fighting in much the same way that Feur has seen Krystal strike from the Hellscape.
Still, no matter what angle he strikes from, Lady Umbriel effortlessly blocks his bullets with a large obsidian shield emblazoned with a six-pointed star, and once she has learned his pattern, she brings him down by tossing the shield to his location just as he appears, and then she is upon him, crushing his throat beneath her heel, adding him to the pile of corpses at her feet.
As Feur watches Umbriel dispatch the city’s last few defenders, one of them, a blind man in monk’s garb, turns his head and looks directly at Feur with his sightless eyes, placidly ignoring the Warlord’s minion’s as they cut him down.

Umbriel’s final opponent comes in the form of a preteen girl, with long pointed ears and violet-tinged skin that marks her as one of the fey. She reads from a book of spells, and weaves what Feur can sense are potent enchantments about the Lady of the West, but few seem to have any effect beyond getting her attention.
The two engage in a brief duel of magic, which Feur can only perceive as alternating pulses of gold and silver energy, emerging from them like bubbles of power, before Umbriel proves triumphant, striding toward the smaller girl and grasping her about the throat. The Warlord laughs jovial, “You’re early. Your power is great, but has yet to bloom.” She then crushes the life from the small changeling girl, and swallows her soul, drawing ribbons of silver energy from her victim’s large eyes and into her own gaping mouth.

Once it is done, she drops the husk at her feet, her triumphant laughter echoing across the city, and a corona of golden hellfire envelops her, the sense of ascension at hand as she knows that nothing can stop her now; her destiny to become the Demon Empress is assured.

But then, the body of one of her victims rises from the pile of corpses which trails out behind the Warlord. It is a tall, pallid woman, whom Feur vaguely remembers Anani pointing out in the marketplace shortly after they first met.

Darkness spills from the corpse-woman’s hollow eyes, and she proclaims that Umbriel should have known better, for her power is infinite and her rule is eternal.

Umbriel looks around, confused, her confidence shaken for the first time, as even her patron in Hell is unable to explain what is happening, and her newfound godlike power helps her not.

Wherever the revenant looks, black fire springs forth, burning reality itself away.

As the world begins to bubble and break apart around them, Feur hears heavy metallic footfalls on the pavement below, and looks out across the ruined city to see knights in red and black armor, not quite the same as those of the Scourge, pulling Tatters from the rubble.

As Feur goes to meet them, he feels a hand about his ankle, and looks down into the bandaged face of the blind monk.

“Seek us out, in the castle beyond time,” he whispers, but before Feur can ask what he means, the world is lost to darkness, and he awakens back in his own timeline, on the blood-slicked cobblestones of Golgotha.

Kim is soon at his side, gathering Tatter's broken body in her arms, and bids Feur into the crowded juggernaut. They move through the chaotic streets, Quincy riding alongside.

The forces of The Scourge are everywhere.

Their first thought is to find Lady Abasinia, either to seek shelter in their patron's manor or evacuate it if it has already fallen. They drive down Old Ardilla Road, but try as they might they cannot locate the lane which branched off into the Lady’s estate, and after a bit, Krystal comes to the conclusion that it must be somehow magically warded from detection, and if that is the case she is probably all right.

They decide to leave town. As they roll down the highway out of Golgotha, they see that the street is lined with crucified bodies, Templar and Hellion alike. All those who defied the Scourge are made examples of. They recognize many of them, including Sir Jacul and Asmond Delacour, as well as the garrison which the Warlord Thanatos sent alongside Anani to protect her embassy.

The most numerous among them are the soldiers bearing the blue-flag of Balthazar and the gray wheel of Livonia, shipped in by the train load to fight one another, but in the end being blindsided by a foe more terrible than either could have imagined.

They drive all day, trying to put as much distance between themselves and the doomed city as possible, with no real destination in mind. Most are quiet and shell-shocked, and they say little. At sunset, they stop and bury Tatters in an unmarked grave on the edge of the plains.

That night, when total darkness has fallen, Anani communes with her master in the Abyss.

“Now you know your true purpose. The Scourge are agents of one who is known by many names; The Black King, Kain, The Sleeping King, Salebenothan, and more, but regardless of his title, he carries my heart within his chest, my power is his to draw upon.

He will fail me. He will fall in battle to the Queen of a Thousand Winters. It will happen. It has already happened. It is inevitable.

And when that happens, all of the power that I have given him will be hers to command; a child with access to weapons more devastating than anything you can conceive of, weapons that we will desperately need when our true enemies show their hands during the Age of Wonders.

You are to assist the Scourge. Not because you want them to achieve their goals, you don’t and they won’t, but because every ounce of power which their master need not draw upon is one drop less which the Queen of a Thousand Winters will steal from me at the Moonlit Hour. You must seek them out.

Share whatever you like with your companions, but know this, if The Black King learns of our plan, your use to me is at an end.”



Overall, I think it went well. Not a lot of action, mostly a big exposition dump, but this should provide a lot of context and clarification for the overall story, although there are still a few big mysteries waiting to be revealed. The players wisely decided not to engage with the Scourge, which is fortunate, because that was a fight they would very likely have lost, and as we all know, my players don't tend to handle losing well. As is, they are bummed enough that their stash gets reset between tiers (in this case justified by their manor burning), for even though its a net positive, they are misers who don't like parting with a single thing.

If all goes well, regular updates will resume in March, although we may have a few short interludes before then.



My point here is that beating would not produce the desired result...



Of course. Here's what I was referring to:


I do interpret "I am hoping that eventually they will get the message" is "I am creating these situations in an attempt to teach them to use those resources (as you want) instead of hoarding them (as they want)", which evaluates to "I am trying to get them to play they way I want instead of the way they want".

It is a behavior induced by limited-use resources instead of check-based; in that concept-only HB of mine there would be no Vancian prep, only "roll a casting check for the power of spell you are attempting". You could do it all you want, but your best effects will fail more often. Wipes out the 15-minute day BS too, which is something I want to see die a fiery death.

Its not an active attempt at punishing them, merely a natural consequence of their miserliness. Nor is it something unique to my system, my adventures, or my GMing.

My players are super reluctant to use any sort of resources. If they come to an obstacle where they need to use resources, they tend to either get beaten up, if its something active like a combat, or sit around bored if its something passive like a locked door. They then blame someone (usually the DM but sometimes one another) for their failure.

To use an example:
"Man, this dragon is super powerful."
"Maybe we should use that quiver of arrows of dragon-slaying we have been carrying around?"
"No, I am saving them for when we really need them!"
Party is defeated by the dragon.
"Man, that dragon was way stronger than we could deal with! Stupid killer DM wiped us on purpose!"

I am really hoping that one day they will associate cause and effect, or at the very least come to the conclusion that a resource which is never used is effectively a resource that never existed in the first place.

I have not been actively trying to teach them this lesson, let alone punish them, although if you can think of a way that I could do that which could produce results (and wouldn't cause them to over correct for the problem); I would genuinely love to hear it.


It is a behavior induced by limited-use resources instead of check-based; in that concept-only HB of mine there would be no Vancian prep, only "roll a casting check for the power of spell you are attempting". You could do it all you want, but your best effects will fail more often. Wipes out the 15-minute day BS too, which is something I want to see die a fiery death.

Its an interesting idea, but I feel like that system would be pretty limiting on player agency as the dice suddenly look all powerful.

You also couldn't use a lot of fantasy tropes like divination spells, item creation magic, or potions which could easily wreck everything if spammable.



Hmm. While they're video games, you can't "fail" Halo or Assassin's Creed; you just die and return to a checkpoint. Ditto Diablo on normal mode. Those are certainly games. Tabletop... I'd really try to avoid "lose" as an option. What, if there's a TPK you just close the campaign and do something else? I'd always have a way to carry on with a new party instead. But also, this is one of the problems that occurs with bad modules (again, speaking in generalities, not yours). If there's a lock and the PCs have one way to get past it as written, and they fail or the party doesn't include that power or the character with it died... it's stonewalled. Multiple solutions to everything.

Actually ending the game is super hard to do, especially if you have a chronomancer like Feur in the party.

I am not talking about campaign ending TPKs, merely ordinary failures like failing a skill check, becoming stymied by a puzzle/mystery, or being forced to fall back and regroup after a fight.



I'm sorry, I thought you said the failure was because she issued a "command" instead of a "question", independent of the roll? And "convinced she doesn't know how to talk to people" is close enough...

Ok, so this is a bit more complex because my understanding of the situation has evolved over time.

Refusing to talk in character and demanding we resolve social interactions with a dice roll has been a long time issue with Kim, and it is what I thought was going on here at the time. After talking to Kim's player and people in this thread, I now think what was happening is that she was convinced the spell was "command stone" rather than "speak with stone" and what I what we were saying was going in one ear and out the other; while I was asking her "What do you say to the stones?" She was interpreting it as "Come up with an order that the GM can't possibly twist the wording of or rules lawyer". So then, when she just kept repeating her orders with slightly different wording, I didn't pick up on it, and instead thought she was obstinately refusing to speak in character (which, as I said, is a repeated conflict) and so I did what I thought she wanted and just let her roll a charisma check, which she unfortunately failed (which, as I said above, is a risk you take anytime you leave something up to a dice roll).


So, in short, I have three problems:

1: Players who want to resolve all social interactions with a dice roll.
2: Players who are convinced that I am trying to twist their words or rules lawyer their statements.
3: A misunderstanding where I thought A was occuring whe