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View Full Version : Duel of Wills (Things not to do)



Talya
2008-04-02, 07:05 PM
This little use for intimidate in Tome of Battle, one of my players (an OA Samurai/Warblade) is in love with it. So they are aboard their ship, and one of the cargo crates contains *gasp* a coffin. And dirt. And one of the NPC crew members shows up drained of blood.

So they're hoisting the crate/coffin out of the hold, and he's down they're suppervising. A soft silky voice from the darkness says "You don't want to play with that."

Our little samurai/warblade immediately attempts to initiate a duel of wills--with a vampire--before initiative is rolled.

Oh yes, let's gaze eagerly into a vampire's eyes out of combat and try to stare him down.

One crappy will save later (even using moment of perfect thought), the ships crew is facing a vampire AND his Samurai/Warblade guardian.

I love my players.

mostlyharmful
2008-04-02, 07:07 PM
Yep. Low int scores for the suck! (and I'm not talking about their PC)

Had my own a while back, when in frankensteins lab while the lightning is flashing and the jars are bubbling and the scientist (ok, necro, whatever) is cackling... do NOT resort straight to violence and smash every regulatory device you see......:smallfurious:

Azerian Kelimon
2008-04-02, 07:07 PM
You DID do this, right:

N00B!

'Cause that's pretty much the only way to respond to something like that.

Reel On, Love
2008-04-02, 07:13 PM
Why didn't he have Moment of Perfect Mind?

RandomLunatic
2008-04-02, 07:16 PM
So who won the duel?:smallamused:

Try throwing a Medusa at him and see if he tries to stare that down.

TRM
2008-04-02, 07:22 PM
Why didn't he have Moment of Perfect Mind?
He did. edit: of course, I don't have ToB so I must assume the two quoted are the same ability.

One crappy will save later (even using moment of perfect thought), the ships crew is facing a vampire AND his Samurai/Warblade guardian.


On topic. He did what??!! I'm sorry. It's just, you never try and stare down the vampire... 7.7 oooh brother...:smallsigh: What would he have gained from staring it down anyway?:smallconfused:
I can't say that I've ever had a player do something that stupid. Thank the wombats.

SadisticFishing
2008-04-02, 07:28 PM
Well if he didn't know she was a vampire...

Once, my group almost sold a bag of holding they found on a BBEG. "Hrm, this guy didn't have much loot, how much would the bag sell for?"

*stab*

comicshorse
2008-04-02, 07:29 PM
In a mad moment one of my characters once tried to stare down a Lord of Change.
One Will roll made by more than 30 later the G.M. kindly concluded I only gained 6 Insanity Points rather than just going insane.
It seemed like a good idea at the time

Triaxx
2008-04-02, 07:35 PM
Silly Samurai, doesn't he know the proper method of fighting Vampires is to kick them in the nuts so they start the suprise round helpless? :smallbiggrin:

Love dumb player tricks. I had a player who tried to poke everything with his ten foot pole. Last thing he ever poked was a Mindflayer with a hang over.

There's also the barbarian who knocked the floating mechanism out of the airship. At five thousand feet.

toddex
2008-04-02, 07:36 PM
Yep. Low int scores for the suck! (and I'm not talking about their PC)

Had my own a while back, when in frankensteins lab while the lightning is flashing and the jars are bubbling and the scientist (ok, necro, whatever) is cackling... do NOT resort straight to violence and smash every regulatory device you see......:smallfurious:

Honestly thats really harsh to say. Some people like to play how they play. Its a game and we all do what makes it fun for us.

TheCountAlucard
2008-04-02, 07:50 PM
Man...

Staring down a vampire because you have ranks in Intimidate is like grappling the Tarrasque because you have spiked armor.

Reel On, Love
2008-04-02, 07:52 PM
Man, how do you have a crappy Will save *with* Moment of Perfect Mind?

I guess he should've dipped PsyWar for the Psionic Focus. Expend it as you use MoPM bam! Take 15 on your saving throw.

TheThan
2008-04-02, 08:44 PM
Man, how do you have a crappy Will save *with* Moment of Perfect Mind?

I guess he should've dipped PsyWar for the Psionic Focus. Expend it as you use MoPM bam! Take 15 on your saving throw.

well, he was playing a CW samurai (yet another reason why the class sucks, its staredown ability will get you killed or dominated).

RTGoodman
2008-04-02, 08:45 PM
well, he was playing a CW samurai (yet another reason why the class sucks, its staredown ability will get you killed or dominated).

No, Talya said he was using the Oriental Adventures Samurai, which (as far as I know) is considered much better than the version in CW.

TheThan
2008-04-02, 08:48 PM
No, Talya said he was using the Oriental Adventures Samurai, which (as far as I know) is considered much better than the version in CW.

oops my bad. but still it stands.

Zeful
2008-04-02, 09:17 PM
Moment of Perfect mind is the Diamond Mind discipline right? If he had Iron Heart Surge and could use it on the dominate effect, what would happen?

The effect would stop, but does that mean the vampire would vanish also?

Just a thought.

The_Snark
2008-04-02, 09:44 PM
Reminds me of a story that concluded with a player saying, "I grapple the mind flayer."

The group was a little new. Granted, this isn't quite as bad a mistake, since mind flayers aren't great at grappling non-stunned people, but still, risking death on a single botched roll...

(Yes, he botched it.)

Cuddly
2008-04-02, 10:13 PM
Reminds me of a story that concluded with a player saying, "I grapple the mind flayer."

The group was a little new. Granted, this isn't quite as bad a mistake, since mind flayers aren't great at grappling non-stunned people, but still, risking death on a single botched roll...

(Yes, he botched it.)

Not grappling a frail, spellcasting mindflayer would be metagaming.

Zincorium
2008-04-02, 10:20 PM
Not grappling a frail, spellcasting mindflayer would be metagaming.

Grappling anything with slick skin, tentacles, and blank white eyes should never be plan A however.

The_Snark
2008-04-02, 10:21 PM
Arguably, the samurai not turning around to try to stare down some undead creature he knew nothing about would have as well.

Collin152
2008-04-02, 10:24 PM
Grappling anything with slick skin, tentacles, and blank white eyes should never be plan A however.

Survival rule #1: If somethign wants to kill you, getting closer is a bad idea.

Squidmaster
2008-04-02, 10:26 PM
DM: You see a mirror of oppisition
Me: I gaze into it and say "What the hells is a mirror of opposition?"
later
Me: "Well, I'm nearly dead, but i killed that annoying copy. good thing there arent any more enemys here. One attack would probaly do me in
DM: Fireball
i can be an idiot sometimes:smalleek:

Da Beast
2008-04-02, 10:38 PM
Not grappling a frail, spellcasting mindflayer would be metagaming.

I think that in that situation a little metagaming is acceptable.

RTGoodman
2008-04-02, 10:42 PM
I don't even know if it's metagaming. I mean, I don't know any characters I've ever played that would be willing go give a big hug to a tentacle monster. From the future.

Okay, maybe that last part was metagaming. :smalltongue:

Hadrian_Emrys
2008-04-02, 11:26 PM
There is a certain level of metagaming that IS acceptable unless you are an anal tool of a DM. It's likely that people in your fantasy world have never heard of a Japan (or the perversions exported from such a place). However, I'm fairly certain that if a sentient slimy critter with a squid face came at me with malicious intent, I'd be attempting improvised plastic surgery on it's face with the nearest object within arm's reach instead of trying to agressively hug it. Hell, I hold that view as someone martially trained in grappling techniques. The only crisis I'D have as a DM, in dealing with the flipside of the scenario, is whether or not to punish the player's actions if his character was a paladin and the object wielded in self-defense was his stunned gnome companion. :smallamused:

Devils_Advocate
2008-04-03, 05:10 AM
Silly Samurai, doesn't he know the proper method of fighting Vampires is to kick them in the nuts so they start the suprise round helpless? :smallbiggrin:
Vampires aren't vulnerable to precision damage. :smallamused:

Except they can still be killed by being staked though the heart or decapitated. I'm fairly sure their nuts are safe, though.

Paragon Badger
2008-04-03, 05:23 AM
I dunno... Ann Rice vampires might be vulnerable.

They use their nuts alot.

Zenos
2008-04-03, 05:37 AM
Originally Posted by Triaxx View Post
Silly Samurai, doesn't he know the proper method of fighting Vampires is to kick them in the nuts so they start the suprise round helpless?

Silly Triaxx, don't you know nuts are small targets (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/GroinAttack) (well, they're according to DND Fine, but whatever)

Edit: Oops, i said nuts are fine targets :smallamused:

Skjaldbakka
2008-04-03, 05:42 AM
I would like to point out three things supporting the Warblade's actions:

1) It would have been totally awesome if he had pulled it off.
2) The Warblade had a will-save enhancing manuever (I don't remember if that is the concentration save or the bonus to saves manuever).
3) The player probably thought the possibility of awesome was worth the risk of failure, and the consequences there-of. He may have even expected the dominate, and equally expected to be able to throw it off with his manuever-enhanced will save.

Gorbash
2008-04-03, 07:41 AM
No, Talya said he was using the Oriental Adventures Samurai, which (as far as I know) is considered much better than the version in CW.

The Commoner is better than the Samurai from CW...

Does anyone have a link to that incredibly sarcastic post regarding the Samurai? How in fact, they're awesome etc...

Talya
2008-04-03, 09:10 AM
Reel on: He used Moment of Perfect Mind. Rolled a 2 on his check. Missed the DC by 2 points.

RTG: The OA Samurai is nice. It's not good, but it's not bad either. It's basically a fighter with 4+int skills, high will and fort saves, kensei-like ability to enchant their Daisho (that uses money instead of xp), and slightly fewer bonus feats. Mixed with Warblade, he's got a nice character there. He's created some ingenius use of maneuvers to render his target flatfooted so he can quickdraw his katana and use iajutsu focus for bonus damage once every battle.

SadisticFishing: ...not know it was a vampire? A crate filled with dirt, a coffin, and an NPC sailor drained of blood doesn't give it away?

SuperPanda
2008-04-03, 10:03 AM
The player knew it was a vampire, but the character might not have. Oriental Adventures has its own take on the undead and if he was playing a primarily Japanese character than his thoughts of what a Vampire is (Hopping Vampire) are very different from the western version.

---------------------

I myself plan every campaign around the assumption that something like that is going to happen sooner or later (or at least I do now).

My usually fall back example of this is the story of how my party (sent as part of a diplomatic envoy) managed to start a war when their quest had been to avert it.

A party of nearly all elves (one human, a half elf, and an outsider whose race I can't spell). The outsider (assassin with a contract on another player) is away shopping when the elves begin attacking humans in the middle of the street while people are on their way to work. A series of critical failures later and the elven PC's have managed to shoot the human Paladin PC three times in the back with arrows (one was a crit) in public view. The Paladin PC managed to kill a commoner holding a flag (another set of critical fail rolls) and become unarmed. The elven wizard blasts a person of similar height to the Paladin and while the fight is still going on the elven archers begin stripping the human in the street to get his expensive plate mail off him.

Now most of this was just the dice choosing to be mean to the players. They had provocation in that the humans they attacked were dealing with the drow, but they concealed the drow's body too quickly for the commoners to see it and didn't try to explain anything, instead they fled town.


Arriving in the next town, in disguise, they are told to be careful because there was a war starting. The Assassin mouths off to a guard captain who decides to double check their fake IDs to see if they've been drafted. (the party then runs).

In a shop where they are buying new disguises an obviously flustered draftee comes in to tell them to be careful as there are suspicious people on the loose. Our ranger decides this is a good time to "role play" and asks the flustered man "Really, what did they look like?"

They wound up knocking out the shop keeper and stealing things (the Paladin left money for her, but only for his own things) and then running for it.

((there were plenty of stupid moments for this group, "What did they look like" and "We strip his plate off him in the street... while people are watching and our allies are still fighting" just sort of stood out to me as ones worthy of note.))


Apart from that, my best story is of a Ranger in an Oriental Adventures game who managed to kill an NPC Shugenja by asking to have an item identified and leaving out very important information.

(He took an item off an incredibly tainted evil warrior, it had tainted blood and something he was told was a powerful poison on it. He took it without the knowledge of his teammates and smuggled it back into a city whereby he took it in private to a Shugenja, specifically stated that he was trying to avoid the Pheonix Inquisitors, or the people actually trained to deal with the taint, and then mention that the item "might be tainted." He never removed the poison which was a contact/CON poison. The shugenja failed both rolls and died while identifying the item. The Ranger got put on trial for murder and conspiracy to spread the taint... he was found innocent on grounds that his allies thought him too stupid to execute a plan of that scale on purpose).

Chronicled
2008-04-03, 11:33 AM
"We strip his plate off him in the street... while people are watching and our allies are still fighting" just sort of stood out to me as ones worthy of note.))

Sounds like a good chunk of the Illiad.

SadisticFishing
2008-04-03, 11:44 AM
Oh. I read "crate" and ignored all the "coffin"s unconsciously. Oops.

Person_Man
2008-04-03, 11:55 AM
He deserves what he gets for taking levels in Samurai. Even the OA version is garbage.

But looking directly into a Vampire's eyes has no effect. The Vampire has to use a Standard Action in order to activate its Dominate ability. So whether or not he used the Duel of Wills is a moot point. Though clearly, it makes for some hilariously cool roleplaying/storytelling.

Also, Moment of Perfect Mind is an Immediate Action, which means that you can't use it while Flat Footed, which means that its not always helpful in the Surprise Round or first round of combat.

Quorothorn
2008-04-03, 12:01 PM
The Commoner is better than the Samurai from CW...

Does anyone have a link to that incredibly sarcastic post regarding the Samurai? How in fact, they're awesome etc...

...Come now, the Commoner is quite literally the class of suck: they have nothing. At least a samurai can melee, y'know, a little. And has one good save (as opposed to none). And a solid HD (as opposed to the worst). They're the worst PC class: they're still better than Commoners (now I'd personally rather play an Expert or Adept, or an Aristocrat, than a CW Samurai--though that's actually partially because bushido is not for me--, but any class that gives you anything at all is automatically better than the Commoner).

Dervag
2008-04-03, 12:13 PM
Sounds like a good chunk of the Illiad.Hey, metal was expensive circa 1250 BC. You didn't want to risk letting a rich warrior's armor fall into the hands of the enemy.

Give a Homeric champion a break for once, why don't you?:smallwink:

F.H. Zebedee
2008-04-03, 12:31 PM
I think it must have been a very In Character kind of action. Really, kinda stupid in endangering the party, but yeah, it could have been total awesome on a good roll.

Did the party survive without any deaths?

Monk is also pretty feeble, down there with CW Samurai. Healer's somewhere in there too. Never played an OA Samurai, but I've heard they're about even with a fighter. Considering that they used TOB as well, with some degree of synchronicity, I think they were decently optimized. Not power-built, but still upper-mid-level. I approve of his originality.

Sstoopidtallkid
2008-04-03, 12:31 PM
The Ranger got put on trial for murder and conspiracy to spread the taint... he was found innocent on grounds that his allies thought him too stupid to execute a plan of that scale on purpose).Best defense ever. :smallbiggrin:

Also, did you consider that either the player or the character may not have known about the Dominate ability? If the player doesn't know the MM by heart, they may have forgotten it, or if the character doesn't know what a vampire is capable of, they might have ignored their OoC knowledge in favor of "My character would do it. Yes, this will screw me, but it's what my character would do. :smallfrown: "

Quorothorn
2008-04-03, 04:19 PM
Monk is also pretty feeble, down there with CW Samurai. Healer's somewhere in there too. Never played an OA Samurai, but I've heard they're about even with a fighter. Considering that they used TOB as well, with some degree of synchronicity, I think they were decently optimized. Not power-built, but still upper-mid-level. I approve of his originality.

Well, the Healer is explicitly not meant to be very powerful: it's a Healer. >_> I mean, Clerics can turn undead (and occasionally go 'zilla) in addition to throwing around cure and remove curse and the like, but the Healer is only supposed to use spells like that (well, and Goodberry); no Righteous Might or Flame Strike for them. The question is whether or not it pulls off even that much (I don't actually know: haven't really looked at it in-depth, but I think it does OK as the straight-up healbot it's meant to be). You better be willing to be fully a support member if you pick Healer, that's for sure.

Sstoopidtallkid
2008-04-03, 06:46 PM
Well, the Healer is explicitly not meant to be very powerful: it's a Healer. >_> I mean, Clerics can turn undead (and occasionally go 'zilla) in addition to throwing around cure and remove curse and the like, but the Healer is only supposed to use spells like that (well, and Goodberry); no Righteous Might or Flame Strike for them. The question is whether or not it pulls off even that much (I don't actually know: haven't really looked at it in-depth, but I think it does OK as the straight-up healbot it's meant to be). You better be willing to be fully a support member if you pick Healer, that's for sure.Actually, the Healer is viewed as worse than a Cleric, even when healing. It has one role to fulfill, and it doesn't even do that as well as it's core counterpart. that's why it's viewed as the same level of power as a Monk, and is really only viable as an NPC class.

Talya
2008-04-03, 07:24 PM
Did the party survive without any deaths?


That has yet to be seen. It's a PbP game...with all the slow pacing that goes with it. They haven't all rolled initiative yet.

puppyavenger
2008-04-03, 07:28 PM
In a mad moment one of my characters once tried to stare down a Lord of Change.
One Will roll made by more than 30 later the G.M. kindly concluded I only gained 6 Insanity Points rather than just going insane.
It seemed like a good idea at the time

Lord of Change?

also did you kill him?

comicshorse
2008-04-03, 09:10 PM
Lord of Change is a greater Demon of Tzeentch in 'Warhammer Fantasy'.
No I didn't kill him, I rolled up on the floor and sobbed as my sanity was temporarily blasted into little pieces.