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Atanuero
2008-10-19, 07:53 PM
I'm basically having to dumb down some of the scenarios in my campaign because my players won't put in the strategic thought to come up with an answer. Other times, it seems like they're waiting to be railroaded. For example, when they arrive at a new town, if I don't tell them specifically where they need to go in the form of an NPC acting as little more than a signpost, they'll stand around and literally do nothing.

Another time, a failed infiltration attempt into a lizardfolk temple city caused the lizardfolk to speed up their invasion plans and basically have their army go marching a few weeks ahead of time. The problem with this is, the human army, with the PCs in it (the PCs were the ones who failed the infiltration) had just fought a battle and had large amounts of dead and wounded and was in no position to fight off a huge enemy in its own habitat (the humans were invading lizardfolk territory). Due to a lack of necessary precautions, the PCs realized they were followed (by an army of hundreds, no less) when the army was only about an hour away from the human camp.

The humans are comprised of phalanx troops, low-level wizards and healers, and low-level Knights and Paladins in heavy armor and with mounts, which are more powerful than any elite the lizardmen have. They also have some archers and skirmishers. They are outnumbered around 2-1, but they have a defensive position if they deploy correctly. I have literally given them everything they need to win this battle, they simply need to suggest the correct formation to the general in their war council.

They can't. It simply doesn't work-a circle of spears simply doesn't occur to them. Over the next hour they put forth dozens of suggestions, each more infeasible than the last because of time constraints or simple inability to do this. One person even suggests building a castle. In an hour!

And these kinds of things happen all the time. I have no idea what to do. I have all sorts of ideas that can be made into difficult choices or encounters, but I'm not sure my party can handle it. Anyone have any suggestions?

Lappy9000
2008-10-19, 07:57 PM
I'm basically having to dumb down some of the scenarios in my campaign because my players won't put in the strategic thought to come up with an answer. Other times, it seems like they're waiting to be railroaded. For example, when they arrive at a new town, if I don't tell them specifically where they need to go in the form of an NPC acting as little more than a signpost, they'll stand around and literally do nothing.

Another time, a failed infiltration attempt into a lizardfolk temple city caused the lizardfolk to speed up their invasion plans and basically have their army go marching a few weeks ahead of time. The problem with this is, the human army, with the PCs in it (the PCs were the ones who failed the infiltration) had just fought a battle and had large amounts of dead and wounded and was in no position to fight off a huge enemy in its own habitat (the humans were invading lizardfolk territory). Due to a lack of necessary precautions, the PCs realized they were followed (by an army of hundreds, no less) when the army was only about an hour away from the human camp.

The humans are comprised of phalanx troops, low-level wizards and healers, and low-level Knights and Paladins in heavy armor and with mounts, which are more powerful than any elite the lizardmen have. They also have some archers and skirmishers. They are outnumbered around 2-1, but they have a defensive position if they deploy correctly. I have literally given them everything they need to win this battle, they simply need to suggest the correct formation to the general in their war council.

They can't. It simply doesn't work-a circle of spears simply doesn't occur to them. Over the next hour they put forth dozens of suggestions, each more infeasible than the last because of time constraints or simple inability to do this. One person even suggests building a castle. In an hour!

And these kinds of things happen all the time. I have no idea what to do. I have all sorts of ideas that can be made into difficult choices or encounters, but I'm not sure my party can handle it. Anyone have any suggestions?

Then let them lose the battle.

You provide the challenge. It's okay to fudge things in the player's favor occasionally, but you don't need to hold their hands. Getting creamed reminds everyone that they need to think prior to encounters, however, don't make it so difficult that it isn't fun. Just respond to their playing style.

Knaight
2008-10-19, 07:59 PM
Go get a massive whiteboard, and doodle useful things on it when they are planning, making it look accidental. If your players point it out mumble something about enemy tactics. Or just let them get their butts handed to them on a stick.

streakster
2008-10-19, 07:59 PM
Ahem. Tucker's Kobolds. (http://www.tuckerskobolds.com/)


If that doesn't teach them the value of strategy, nothing will.

Ricky S
2008-10-19, 08:03 PM
Hi,

Well your players do seem to be in a bit of a state... are they looking for tactical gaming or do they just want hack and slash? Also are they serious about dnd or do they waste a lot of time? My group only gets through about one encouter and some RP even in 4hours of gaming. Just tell them to think it through and try and get them to think laterally. You can also have the lizards decimate the army which would teach them a lesson or two. Although that may change the general layout of your campaign.

If I were you I would just go through with the plan and see what happens. As a DM you can just kill people sometimes. Especially if a player is being ridiculously stupid. Just let them roll up a new character until they get revived, or they can just use that one.

What level are you PC"s?

Jalor
2008-10-19, 08:11 PM
Ahem. Tucker's Kobolds. (http://www.tuckerskobolds.com/)


If that doesn't teach them the value of strategy, nothing will.

I second that. Repeatedly TPK them with kobolds or somesuch until they catch on.

erikun
2008-10-19, 08:16 PM
It sounds like your player are either:
1.) expecting to just bust in heads, which isn't what you're trying to play, or
2.) bored with the campaign, and just want to finish things.

Talk with your players, and find out which one it is. If it is the first, then you might want to change the "thinking" in the campaign. Rather than setup a complex trap for them to decipher and disarm, have them get into a fight while one of the opponents opens the floodgates; the party needs to move to one of the sides of the room (and quickly!) before getting swept away.

If it is the second, find out what is boring them. Perhaps they're tired of running through complex plans, and just want to kill stuff. Perhaps they think all day, and want some time off. Perhaps they like the game, and they're just sick of 3.5e mechanics getting in the way. Either way, you can't "fix" the problem until you know what it actually is.

TempusCCK
2008-10-19, 08:51 PM
A helpful NPC who might be a better tactician could be a way to help them.

Let them roll intelligence checks to "come up with ideas"?

Oracle_Hunter
2008-10-19, 09:05 PM
My first response when my PCs aren't acting like I think they should: find out why that's the case.

If they're just standing around and doing nothing, it's because they don't have a clue what the plot is about. No harm in sending a crier to the town square to sing out about a new quest, or even just suggest, as a DM, that they might want to find an inn. Sometimes players just get brainlocked.

If they're failing to plan military tactics like you'd want them too, it may be because they're not military history buffs. They might not have any concept of military strategy (it's not interesting to them) or they might not have realized they were supposed to be micromanaging the army. Here, it's best to cut the players some slack - this may just not be their bag. It's the same reason I don't use riddles or math puzzles in my games; if the players aren't big on them, then I'm just wasting everyone's time while they stare blankly at me and ask if they can roll Insight checks.

In your particular situation, it'd be best to get one of the Paladins or Knights to act like a Sergeant Rock (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SergeantRock) figure to settle down the PCs and make some basic suggestions for the deployment of the army. This still leaves the PCs with plenty of choices as to their personal deployment - which is probably what they're best at.

In short: never blame your players for failing to follow your train of thought. D&D is a cooperative activity, and if your players don't get what's going on, they're probably not having fun, and it's your job to fix that.

Hal
2008-10-19, 09:14 PM
I might add, sometimes an "obvious" solution to the DM might not be so obvious to the players. They may not know their options, or perhaps they think they've been put in a "Kobayashi Maru" style scenario.

Lord Tataraus
2008-10-19, 09:17 PM
I know exactly what you mean, my group at home is very much the same. The problem you have is that you're playing a different game than they are. You want a complex tactical war game while your players want a hack 'n' slash dungeon crawl. You need to shift gears and do what they want to do or switch groups. For me, I went off to college and the group I have here is a thinking group and I have a lot more fun with them because we both want the same type of game.

Porthos
2008-10-19, 09:38 PM
In short: never blame your players for failing to follow your train of thought. D&D is a cooperative activity, and if your players don't get what's going on, they're probably not having fun, and it's your job to fix that.

What he said.

Ask yourself this question: Are you trying to get players to play "your style" of gaming? If so: Why? Why beat yourself up and your players if they're just not interested in strategizing?

Sure you can keep beating them over the head in an attempt to get them to learn basic strategy, but I suspect they won't appreciate it.

Jayabalard
2008-10-19, 09:41 PM
I'm basically having to dumb down some of the scenarios in my campaign because my players won't put in the strategic thought to come up with an answer.

And these kinds of things happen all the time. I have no idea what to do. I have all sorts of ideas that can be made into difficult choices or encounters, but I'm not sure my party can handle it. Anyone have any suggestions?It sounds like you're just not a compatible DM for that group; you're not interested in the same type of game as they are. Either learn to like what they want or play, talk to them and see if they'd be willing to play your way,or agree to disagree and go your separate ways.

Flickerdart
2008-10-19, 09:44 PM
I tried to run a sandbox open-ended campaign once, and my players just sat around and waited for things to happen instead of taking initiative. Then I killed one of them out of spite. Or, rather, put them in a situation where not doing anything meant you died, and he just stood there.

Calinero
2008-10-19, 09:44 PM
I'd recommend talking to the players. Remind them that you need to treat the game realistically, and that sometimes planning is necessary. If possible, give them an example of how planning can save their butts from what would normally be a difficult encounter. A good demonstration of the value of strategy? Tucker's Kobolds.

Oracle_Hunter
2008-10-19, 09:50 PM
I gotta say that Tucker's Kobolds would be terrible here.

You're supposed to use Tucker's Kobolds when your PCs don't bother with tactics and are overconfident. Here, it just sounds like the PCs aren't particularly interested in military strategy. If you throw Tucker's Kobolds at them, they'll just get annoyed (particularly if you decide to spank them in this current scenario) because not only do they not care about what's going on, but they're losing too.

Calinero
2008-10-19, 09:54 PM
Well, show them a scenario with Tucker's Kobolds, but from the perspective of the kobolds. You're fighting against several opponents who outclass you ridiculously. In a fair fight, you'd be done for. But what's this? A bit of foresight, a few traps, and bam! They're running for their lives!

erikun
2008-10-19, 10:00 PM
But what if that's not what the players are looking for?

To you, it may look like you're encouraging strong tactical planning from the PCs. From their side, though, it may look like you're just dropping a family of adult red dragons into their laps, and expecting them to kill them off against all odds.

Find out what your players want, then work on providing that... on your own terms, of course. :smallamused: Even if they just want hack-and-slash, you can still make things "interesting" for them...

Jayabalard
2008-10-19, 10:01 PM
I gotta say that Tucker's Kobolds would be terrible here.

You're supposed to use Tucker's Kobolds when your PCs don't bother with tactics and are overconfident. Here, it just sounds like the PCs aren't particularly interested in military strategy. If you throw Tucker's Kobolds at them, they'll just get annoyed (particularly if you decide to spank them in this current scenario) because not only do they not care about what's going on, but they're losing too.Agreed; just throwing in something like Tucker's Kobolds isn't going to help the situation one bit; all it's going to accomplish is to make sure that noone is having fun.

JeminiZero
2008-10-19, 10:08 PM
Then let them lose the battle.

You provide the challenge. It's okay to fudge things in the player's favor occasionally, but you don't need to hold their hands. Getting creamed reminds everyone that they need to think prior to encounters, however, don't make it so difficult that it isn't fun. Just respond to their playing style.

Realistically however, there is still an experienced battle hardened general in charge of the army. If the suggestions he hears from the PCs are crap, he will most likely go facepalm, berate them for their stupidity, and then show them how it should be done.



If they're failing to plan military tactics like you'd want them too, it may be because they're not military history buffs. They might not have any concept of military strategy (it's not interesting to them) or they might not have realized they were supposed to be micromanaging the army. Here, it's best to cut the players some slack - this may just not be their bag. It's the same reason I don't use riddles or math puzzles in my games; if the players aren't big on them, then I'm just wasting everyone's time while they stare blankly at me and ask if they can roll Insight checks.


I agree with this assessment, not everyone is familiar with strategic medieval warfare beyond the basic "Archers charge in front, while spear-dudes cower in the back". Eh, or was it the other way round? :smallwink:

Nerd-o-rama
2008-10-19, 10:10 PM
To paraphrase many of the arguments before and put it in IC terms, the players clearly belong on the frontlines rather than the war council strategy committee. Leave the thinking to the NPCs if the players are incompetent, and just have them go kill stuff.

Really, a strategy that obvious should occur to a professional commander regardless of whether someone wearing a magic PC hat is around to suggest it.


I go through this whole thread without someone saying that, and then get ninja'd on it right as I post.

Yakk
2008-10-19, 10:48 PM
Back up a second.

So the players want plot leads. So... give it to them.

But instead of railroading, make it clear that there are two distinct options (an NPC could even say that there are two options), with consequences to each.

Once you have the players making decisions between two options, offer them 3.

Have some information provided "free" of charge (or at your prompting), and sometimes have information "just in case" the players show initiative.

When the players show initiative, reward them. If they come up with a bad plan that doesn't match yours? Is there any way you could make it work? If so, make it work (but be challenging).

Remember: when you produce a puzzle with a particular solution in mind, even if you don't tell the player what the solution is, it is railroading.

Possibly they have reached a point of learned helplessness -- they try a solution, it doesn't match what you think the solution is, and it fails horribly. If that is their experience, then why come up with solutions when (in their experience) the solutions fail horribly?

Let's look at the OP's post:

I'm basically having to dumb down some of the scenarios in my campaign because my players won't put in the strategic thought to come up with an answer. Other times, it seems like they're waiting to be railroaded. For example, when they arrive at a new town, if I don't tell them specifically where they need to go in the form of an NPC acting as little more than a signpost, they'll stand around and literally do nothing.

In your scenarios, was there a single good solution, or did you think up dozens? If the players think up a solution that you didn't plan, and you see flaws in, does it tend to result in a disaster for the players?

If so, you are training them not to come up with solutions. And then I'd expect them to sit around, waiting for your "the real solution bait" to show up, and then use the solution you already had in mind for the problem.


Another time, a failed infiltration attempt into a lizardfolk temple city caused the lizardfolk to speed up their invasion plans and basically have their army go marching a few weeks ahead of time.

So, their failed infiltration -- I presume they did something you consider tactically dumb, and the result was the failure of the infiltration and the resulting army moving earlier?

Did provoking the lizard army to attack earlier ever generate positive side effects? (after all, if it was the ideal time to march, they would have already marched -- so marching early due to being provoked should have weakend the action...)


The problem with this is, the human army, with the PCs in it (the PCs were the ones who failed the infiltration) had just fought a battle and had large amounts of dead and wounded and was in no position to fight off a huge enemy in its own habitat (the humans were invading lizardfolk territory). Due to a lack of necessary precautions, the PCs realized they were followed (by an army of hundreds, no less) when the army was only about an hour away from the human camp.So, the PCs did something (failed to presume an army would follow them), and this resulted in you punishing them with an army on their ass.

Was there, by any chance, a Ranger with survival skill in the group? Or anyone who (in the RP sense) might be tactically experienced? Did you offer a skill roll to say "you might be followed"?


The humans are comprised of phalanx troops, low-level wizards and healers, and low-level Knights and Paladins in heavy armor and with mounts, which are more powerful than any elite the lizardmen have. They also have some archers and skirmishers. They are outnumbered around 2-1, but they have a defensive position if they deploy correctly. I have literally given them everything they need to win this battle, they simply need to suggest the correct formation to the general in their war council.You used the singular -- 'the correct formation'. This implies that you had a single, solitary correct formation in mind when you set it up. And any other solution wouldn't solve the problem?


They can't. It simply doesn't work-a circle of spears simply doesn't occur to them.
Bingo.

Look, if you are going to railroad the players, let them know what the railroad is. Don't wait for them to make any mistake, and then screw them for the mistake. The bad guys should screw up as well.

I had a DM who did that kind of thing -- he's produce an adventure hook, we'd bite (and even come up with something sort of neat). He then found any flaws in our plan, had the NPCs attack those flaws directly, and punish the players for having a plan with any flaws. When asked afterwards, he stated "I figured the characters wouldn't take the adventure hook, given how impossible solving the problem was going to be if you did!"

Instead of making a "I build the world with problems that I know there exists at least 1 solution to", and punishing players who dare make decisions or miss choices that you decide are important, try working with the players in your metagame state. Produce a game that the players would enjoy, while slanting it in a non-putative way towards a style you enjoy.

Provide multiple, explicit choices. If the players miss something (covering their tracks), provide skill checks to say "maybe you are covering your tracks", or even make a skill check to see how well your Ranger covered their tracks (the character being a Ranger and all, fleeing from hostiles).

Default:
Players:: We run away.
You: (They didn't mention covering their tracks. The lizards can follow them easily...)
You arrive at the army. They say "what happened"?
Players: we explain that we where defeated and had t orun
You: The guards say "did you cover your tracks?"
Players: No, we where running
You: The guards look at you if you where idiots. "The army will be following you!"

Alternative prompting-based:
Players: We run away
You: If you move at full speed, your ranger is at a -10 to cover your tracks. How far do you go at full speed, and do you slow down to make your tracks harder to follow?

Branching:
Players: We run away
You: You can take a strait route, but that makes your tracks easy to follow (a -10 penalty). You can duck through a river, but that will slow you down a bit, and some scouts might catch up with you. You can run away in a different direction and then lose them, but that will take even longer.

---

Ie: in the prompting case, you prompt them with the possible consequences of their actions (the lizards will be able to track them) before it screws them. In the branching case, you provide them with various multiple options, and explain their possibly consequences.

Hawriel
2008-10-19, 11:20 PM
Your using the word strategy wrong. All of you. Strategy is the ability to use a nations political, economic, phycological and military forces. Sence your players are not kings, nobles or military officers in command of field armies, your players have no hand in active strategic planning. It makes my head hurt when peaple do not understand the big difference between strategy and tactics. Gamers and football coaches are particularly guilty if using these words as if they are the same.


You are hoping that your players can make simple opperational plans and have a general tactical ability.

If your military delema. Make the appropriate NPCs in this army respond as a person of there station should or would. IF the characters are not nobles then NPCs have a free hand in apposing them or just kicking them out of the army. If this is not possable let them see the consiquences of their actions. The army will be defeated by their ineptitude. Any one who servives will most likely never trust the PCs again. They will have to live (if they do) with that stigma. Even if a NPC can over turn bone head player decisions there should be consiquence for promoting such idiocy. The COs and NCOs of this army would lose trust in the PCs if not down right hate them. It most likley would spread to the common soldiers. I say let them hang themselves.

Dove
2008-10-20, 12:00 AM
Back up a second.

So the players want plot leads. So... give it to them.

But instead of railroading, make it clear that there are two distinct options (an NPC could even say that there are two options), with consequences to each.

Once you have the players making decisions between two options, offer them 3.

Have some information provided "free" of charge (or at your prompting), and sometimes have information "just in case" the players show initiative.

When the players show initiative, reward them. If they come up with a bad plan that doesn't match yours? Is there any way you could make it work? If so, make it work (but be challenging).

Remember: when you produce a puzzle with a particular solution in mind, even if you don't tell the player what the solution is, it is railroading.


I second this wholeheartedly. Always watch what you're rewarding and punishing. If you want the players to take initiative, you have to reward it when it happens, even in a flawed form. If you want the players to think tactically, you have to reward it when it happens, even if you think their plan should fail. Above all, if you punish them for not finding your solution to a problem, you're encouraging them to look for your solution. They'll just stare at you dumbly and wait for you to tell them what it is.

Players are remarkably trainable. Over time, you wind up with exactly the players you deserve.

To change things, I agree with Yakk: start easy. Start with just having the PCs make choices--clearly delineated choices were both options are right.

Make it clear they have to think, and--at least at the start--make failure safe. By that I mean, take the consequences of their actions seriously, but don't punish. Just let their actions define the direction the story goes. Once they catch on that they have real power over events, then you can start holding them accountable for how they wield it. But not until they routinely think that way.

Also, it sounds to me like you need more carrots and less sticks. Put situations out there where the default strategy works marginally, but a clever strategy works awesomely. Put 'bonus' encounters out there--monsters the PCs could chase if they wanted to, a giant stone dragon they could fleshify and fight . . . if they wanted to. PCs can get pretty darn creative when there's bonus lootz and XPs on the line.

Also, it can be hard for players to come up with things spur-of-the-moment. Strategies are born of detail, and of visible alternatives. If my party is about to be attacked by a swarm of orcs, and you ask me what I do, you're going to get a "Uhhhhh. . . I dunno" from me. I'll assume you have a solution and I don't have enough information to guess it yet. But if my party is on the top of a hill at midnight in the ruins of a fallen castle with a high tower, a muddy moat, and a series of working arcane traps, I'm going to have a lot more ideas. As DM, the world has a lot of detail in your head, and the players don't automatically know it. Draw the castle. Draw the moat. Describe the traps. Describe the NPCs. Describe the orcs. Heck, just keep talking until something sparks an idea.

Also, it's important to realize that D&D is fundamentally a game, and one of the important features of a game is that everyone is playing by the same rules. For example, D&D doesn't even have rules for massed combat that I know of, and certainly nothing on the effects of different formations. Were I facing the same situation as you described in the first post--injured and badly outnumbered, with an hour before a fight--I wouldn't be thinking about historical formations and precedents. I'd be thinking about where to put troops on a battle grid to take advantage of flanking and magical resources and PC actions, and what sort of terrain was around that we could get to in an hours' time, and any high level wizards we could get a Sending to for help. Because those are the rules of the game, as I understand it.

Which leads to a key part of the player-DM contract: play the same game. Always, always, always introduce a mechanic in a benign situation before you expect the players to use it. If bad guys can follow your tracks, you should be following a few of theirs before you have to think of covering yours. If formations matter in massed combat, you should be fighting a few bad guys with +2's to attacks and damage from their deployment before you have to think about doing the same. Some D&D games, going all vigilante on local criminals will get you run out of town; some games, the law is pretty blase about it. Don't make players guess--demonstrate which it is before they have to make a choice where it matters.

Don't make the machanics a riddle. If you have an encounter and plan for the PCs to use a certain mechanic, make sure it's been looked at recently. Goodness knows all sorts of games run on and on without players making full use of divinations and detect magic and discern lies and all the myriad clever tricks they have. You can't expect them to remember, at the drop of a hat, that anyone they let get captured will probably be charmed, mindraped, or used as a source of scrying implements. You have to demonstrate it first. Or, if worst comes to worst, just tell them. Yes, I'm serious. If they're missing something big, just tell them. "Now, you didn't think of it, but your character would have reason to know that . . . "

If that suggestion seems impossible--if telling your players outright, "Deploying in a phalanx would make you twice as strong as you are defensively"--would make the puzzle too easy, well, it's not a puzzle then. It's a guessing game. And that's bad game design right there. Your encounters need to be resilient enough to still be interesting after everyone understands all the rules in play.

I know, D&D is all about playing sadistic clever tricks on your players. But they have to be clever tricks. When they are revealed, the players should go, "Oh, of course, we should have seen that coming!" Playing the game by different rules than everyone else isn't clever. It's cheating.

Ethdred
2008-10-20, 04:51 AM
Your using the word strategy wrong. All of you. Strategy is the ability to use a nations political, economic, phycological and military forces. Sence your players are not kings, nobles or military officers in command of field armies, your players have no hand in active strategic planning. It makes my head hurt when peaple do not understand the big difference between strategy and tactics. Gamers and football coaches are particularly guilty if using these words as if they are the same.

If you're going to criticise people's use of words, it really helps if a) you can spell your own words properly and b) you are right. Strategy is not limited to use of a nation's forces and resources. There are varying levels of strategy, which can go down to quite low levels. Admittedly the word is badly understood and frequently mis-used, especially when people are actually talking about tactics. But it is quite possible for a party to have a strategy before a battle. (What's our main aim? To destroy the enemy, or just delay them, or cover our retreat etc.) Similarly, they could have a strategy for entering a dungeon (it might be as simple as 'kill everything and take their stuff' or 'cause as little disturbance as possible in order to free the prisoners') though very few parties would actually explicitly state this before going in. Your tactics are how you then implement your strategy (roughly speaking).


As for the OP, I agree with the others who say it sounds like you are trying to play 'guess what I'm thinking'. It sounds like your players just aren't cut out for this sort of adventure. So either, as suggested, mentor them with an NPC army commander - who can give them strategic direction while they sort out the tactics they will use - or just ask them what sort of adventures they would fell more comfortable with. And don't be so harsh on their ideas - can we build a castle in an hour - no, but can we build some sort of defences, even a simple palisade or wall of carts - very possibly.

only1doug
2008-10-20, 06:10 AM
I'm basically having to dumb down some of the scenarios in my campaign because my players won't put in the strategic thought to come up with an answer. Other times, it seems like they're waiting to be railroaded. For example, when they arrive at a new town, if I don't tell them specifically where they need to go in the form of an NPC acting as little more than a signpost, they'll stand around and literally do nothing.

<snip>

Its time to have a Teach PC's initiative 101:

You arrive in town, it's a large village, at the crossroads you can see a Tavern, an Inn, a Shrine to Ffallargn and what appears to be a general store.

(taverns are for drinking, Inns are lodging houses)

now wait for the Players to decide what to do, if they sit around looking at you waiting for you to speak (3mins of not discussing their options);

It's starting to get dark now, the sun is setting.

if they still don't choose what to do (again 3 mins of not talking about options);

It's been dark for awhile now and its starting to get cold; you are feeling hungry.

(still just standing there? tavern shuts, NPC's head to their huts, will give odd looks at adventurers standing in the middle of the road)

(still no movement? Inn shuts up for the night, if you feel kind have the innkeeper come and ask them if they want lodging, if they were nasty to NPC's leaving tavern then don't. either way its too late now for a warm meal, best they can get is bread and cheese).

(standing around in Inn? Innkeeper herds them to bed (he has to get up in morning))
(still standing in street? Fatigue rolls)


Morning (did they request a wakeup call?) at 11am the Innkeeper will rouse them or charge for another day.
(did they sleep in the street? town mayor (the blacksmith) requests they move on, vagrants aren't welcome)
(did they stand around all night? more fatigue tests, town mayor will speak to them (as above)


if they show no initative then they can remain in town forever, slowly starving to death (if they don't bother eating) or be run out of town by townsfolk who are nervous of people who stand in one place for 12 hours.

WychWeird
2008-10-20, 10:15 AM
Strategy: the science or art of combining and employing the means of war in planning and directing large military movements and operations.
Tactic: a plan, procedure, or expedient for promoting a desired end or result.

As has been stated previously by others, it would seem as though you're expecting your players to plan strategies and employ specific tactics in order to produce a specific outcome. I know that I'm not the greatest strategist or tactician so I couldn't be expected to emulate and employ the concepts of Sun Tzu, so perhaps you're simple expecting too much from them to begin with.

Try with something simpler, as an example: the party rogue has listened at a door and has advised that there are a number of people in the room beyond - the party will now enter into a discussion (of tactics) on what to do next - you can spice things up by giving them a time limit (DM: Surprise! The door opens and an angry looking kobold stares at you and calls to his friends...) With your army example, why not have an NPC pass the party the secret plans uttering with his dying breath, "Get these to the general as quickly as you can, all our lives depend on it...." Let the PCs then devise ways of finding and getting the info to the general - the end result if they succeed is everyone survives with medals and crumpets for all! Huzzah! (And the PCs feel like they've successfully contributed.)

As a suggestion, see if you can get hold of the old D&D basic and expert modules The Keep on the Borderlands and The Isle of Dread - (update to suit your campaign) these are great modules for getting into (A)D&D - there's plenty of hooks to link into a larger campaign or even follow up with the AD&D Drow or Giant series (I think I'm showing my age...) - these are classic adventures which encourage some thinking as gung-ho parties seldom make it past the first couple of rooms...

But above all else, it should be enjoyable for PCs and DM alike :smallwink:

Starbuck_II
2008-10-20, 10:31 AM
if they show no initative then they can remain in town forever, slowly starving to death (if they don't bother eating) or be run out of town by townsfolk who are nervous of people who stand in one place for 12 hours.

Hey, I'd be scared or impressed by a perrson who stood there for 12 hours as a commoner's viewpoint. Only a fool would run them out of town.

Kiero
2008-10-20, 11:38 AM
And these kinds of things happen all the time. I have no idea what to do. I have all sorts of ideas that can be made into difficult choices or encounters, but I'm not sure my party can handle it. Anyone have any suggestions?

Talk to them. As in sit them down and say you're unhappy with the amount of strategic nous they're showing, and see why that is. Perhaps they don't know you're expecting it of them, or they're not actually interested in doing it. Some players like being led by the nose, after all. Or perhaps their experiences and your table, and others, have schooled them against that kind of pro-activity.

chiasaur11
2008-10-20, 11:55 AM
Hey, I'd be scared or impressed by a perrson who stood there for 12 hours as a commoner's viewpoint. Only a fool would run them out of town.

Yeah.

A man stands in the middle of the road for twelve hours in heavy armor, I'd think he was waiting for something.

And I would think that something was in for a world of hurt.

valadil
2008-10-20, 12:11 PM
I've got a similar but different problem. My players are plenty tactical, but they have problems with misinformation in social situations. Basically they expect each piece of information I give them to neatly fit into the puzzle they're putting together. They've accepted that the bad guy can lie, but every other source of information should be true. If my NPCs accidentally give out bad information because they themselves don't know what's going on, the players just can't handle it. And redding herrings or line noise are almost entirely out of the question. The problem is that I'm trying to put them in a realistic simulation but they think I'm giving them a logic puzzle.

In your case and mine, both parties need to be made aware of what the GM is offering versus what the players are expecting.

Erk
2008-10-20, 02:16 PM
For the OP, I think it's an issue of tailoring your campaign more to suit the characters' needs. My current party is not as bad as yours, but they do like to have some leadership. I have two NPCs in the party that were initially meant to be the warlord's grunts, but everyone - me included - has been grateful to have them around when the players need a nudge in the right direction. To keep things interesting, I will often have the NPCs offer opposing suggestions for what to do next, forcing the PCs to have some involvement but giving them a starting point for their reasoning. It keeps the campaign running smoothly, and it keeps my players from getting frustrated at not knowing what I expect.

Bottom line: If your players don't want a sandbox, don't give them one. That doesn't mean you need a hack-and-slash game at all, you can still tell the same story.


In your case and mine, both parties need to be made aware of what the GM is offering versus what the players are expecting.I'd say your players just need you to remind them out-of-game not to believe everything they hear from strangers. Once you have told them that, feel free to design humourous consequences for assuming everything is true. For example, in my last social adventure the PCs heard numerous rumours about what was causing disappearances around town: cultists or slavers were the main ones. However, if I had players like yours, I'd have made the leading rumour something preposterous, and had it be the most popular (possibly spread by the Big Bad). After spending a fruitless campaign session searching for the sentient pork pie that was controlling the minds of the villagers from the top of the clocktower, they might learn a bit. Or not... but it'd be fun for you.

Dervag
2008-10-20, 02:29 PM
Its time to have a Teach PC's initiative 101:...

if they show no initative then they can remain in town forever, slowly starving to death (if they don't bother eating) or be run out of town by townsfolk who are nervous of people who stand in one place for 12 hours.In my opinion, the key here is that the PCs will not be attacked. There is no active danger here. All they have to do is show sufficient initiative to feed themselves and find a place to sleep- actions that normal people do all the time.

It also helps to make it clear that everyone around them is behaving exactly normally. Their concerns are the same ones that real-life police, motel and restaurant owners, and community leaders might have if a group of heavily armed people suddenly sat down in Main Street and did nothing all night.
_________


I've got a similar but different problem. My players are plenty tactical, but they have problems with misinformation in social situations. Basically they expect each piece of information I give them to neatly fit into the puzzle they're putting together. They've accepted that the bad guy can lie, but every other source of information should be true. If my NPCs accidentally give out bad information because they themselves don't know what's going on, the players just can't handle it. And redding herrings or line noise are almost entirely out of the question. The problem is that I'm trying to put them in a realistic simulation but they think I'm giving them a logic puzzle.

In your case and mine, both parties need to be made aware of what the GM is offering versus what the players are expecting.Have you tried giving them several mutually exclusive sets of rumors? Obviously, the disappearances can't be due to werewolf attacks and slaver raids and an vengeful ghost attacking all the people who laughed at him when he was a child.

Or does this just get your players horribly confused? Or do they just automatically follow the first rumor, ignoring all other sources of information?

valadil
2008-10-20, 03:33 PM
Have you tried giving them several mutually exclusive sets of rumors? Obviously, the disappearances can't be due to werewolf attacks and slaver raids and an vengeful ghost attacking all the people who laughed at him when he was a child.

Or does this just get your players horribly confused? Or do they just automatically follow the first rumor, ignoring all other sources of information?

This sort of thing frustrates them. I think what they like about the game is that they don't have to worry about sourcing information. When I've made it clear that I've given them more than a set of clues to piece together, they usually have a small outburst, then go overboard questioning everything, then accept it and move along. I'm not to worried about this long term. They're capable of figuring things out, once they realize it's not a logic puzzle. The more I run games for them the more they'll get used to this kind of thinking and it'll come quicker and easier to them each time.

Yahzi
2008-10-20, 08:34 PM
You can take a strait route, but that makes your tracks easy to follow (a -10 penalty). You can duck through a river, but that will slow you down a bit, and some scouts might catch up with you. You can run away in a different direction and then lose them, but that will take even longer.
This is exactly right. Tell the players what the dice rolls will be.

"You can run straight home, but it's +10 to their Tracking. You can try to cover your tracks, but then they have a %50 chance of catching up to you. Or you can strike off into the wild unknown, leading them away from the army, but you have a 15% chance of a random encounter."

Tell them the mechanics so they can make informed choices.

Dervag
2008-10-20, 09:28 PM
How much detail you want to give depends on your group. Groups I've played with would usually prefer something like:

"You can run straight home, but it will be really easy to track you. You can try to cover your tracks, but then they have a good chance of catching up to you. Or you can strike off into the wild unknown, leading them away from the army, but there's a chance you'll run into monsters or bandits."

It's purely a matter of preference, of course.

Breaw
2008-10-20, 11:11 PM
Ahem. Tucker's Kobolds. (http://www.tuckerskobolds.com/)


If that doesn't teach them the value of strategy, nothing will.

On a similar note I once had a DM nearly obliterate our party with 1 low level goblin druid, 10 goblins with shortbows, 2 goblins with spears and a couple trained wolves.

2 goblins had been chained behind a tree not far from our camp with bows. When we noticed them they ducked behind cover and we (naturally) went after them! As we stepped into the clearing between our camp and the 2 goblins, we were hit by an entangle. Those of us who failed our reflex saves then got riddled with arrows from the 8 remaining goblins that were positioned in trees around the clearing.

To be fair, a well placed sleep and the fact that the rogue could sneak attack the goblins once he got within 30 feet (as they were in trees) turned the battle around for us before any of us actually died. (The only thing that saved my ranger at the time was a high roll on a bluff check pretending to be dead).

Once we started to gain momentum we spotted the druid leading the attack and his two guards. The goblin then called for a retreat and two trained wolves were released, tripping the first two party members who chased after them. An obscuring mist the next round, and the druid got away.

All told, 2 of our 5 party members were at deaths doorstep and 1 NPC died. All of us were level 5 or higher. The goblins lost the 2 'bait' goblins, 3 of the ones that were in trees, and one of the wolves. I'd say they came out way ahead.


If you want your players to think up strategies, slap them around with level inappropriate encounters (way below them) involving smart tactics on the side of the enemy. They will either smarten up or die. Either way you'll get to have some fun watching your plan come to fruition. The only thing to make sure is that there is a reasonable solution for the party, and that you allow them to come up with their own novel solution (even if it means crippling you 'plan')

-B

Dove
2008-10-20, 11:55 PM
A couple other thoughts. When I was new to DMing, I was worried about accidentally creating railroads, so I forced myself to write three solutions to every encounter/storyline I ran. I tend to do things a bit more freeform these days, so I couldn't do that--I often don't fully know what the encounters will be until the players choose them. But I see that as an evolution of the same principle: honor player freedom. This is essential to a truly free roleplaying experience, if you ask me. DMs have to direct and present options, but taking too much control of the outcome of events is very bad. Making sure you've got multiple contingencies in mind is a good way to avoid that.

Also, if you don't seem to be on the same page as your players, you can always do a quick customer feedback session. I make a practice of doing it at the end of a campaign or major story arc. I just put together a sheet of questions--mostly benign things like, "What was your favorite session?" and "What's something you wish we'd done?" But I'll ask if the tone, difficulty, roleplaying level, narrative level, etc. is within everyone's desired zone. It's a really good exercise. Even when I think I've got my group totally figured out, their answers will still sometimes surprise me.

It's not a bad idea to do that at the beginning of a campaign either, so everyone's on the same page as to what they're expecting out of the game. Most folks are open to a wide range of gaming styles, but they do have to know what to expect.

MartinHarper
2008-10-21, 02:29 AM
They can't. It simply doesn't work-a circle of spears simply doesn't occur to them. Over the next hour they put forth dozens of suggestions, each more infeasible than the last because of time constraints or simple inability to do this. One person even suggests building a castle. In an hour!

So your players are thinking, and come up with dozens of suggestions, but none of them are the one true suggestion you were thinking of. Why not make one of the things they do think of the right answer? If the conversation is:

PC: "how about building a castle?"
NPC: "we don't have enough time!"

then you're punishing the player for thinking, by making them look bad. Instead, you could say yes:

PC: "how about building a castle?"
NPC: "Yes. The records say we have a Castle Token locked away in the magic vault underneath the armoury. It's not safe any more. The last folks to venture in never made it back. We don't know what happened to them."

Yakk
2008-10-21, 02:31 AM
Another way of looking at it:
If they think up a problem you didn't think up, one of three things happens:
1> Their preparations are worthless,

2> You think "good idea!", and all of a sudden the bad guys exploit the problem that you didn't think of in addition to everything else,

3> You toss out another thing that you figured the bad guys might have thought of, and change their attack to aim (somewhat) at the solution the players are working to patch over.

#1 ... basically, you are playing "read the DMs mind to figure out what the complications are", especially in an open-ended situation.

#2 ... massively discourages players from thinking up possibly problems. This is an example of implicit narrative disempowering of players.

#3 ... is interesting. Players might not even notice that the bad guys are doing that, and instead think that they are clever. Heck, the players might be more clever than you. This is an example of implicit narrative empowering of players.

Kompera
2008-10-21, 02:41 AM
I'm basically having to dumb down some of the scenarios in my campaign because my players won't put in the strategic thought to come up with an answer.
[...]
I have literally given them everything they need to win this battle, they simply need to suggest the correct formation to the general in their war council.
[...]
They can't. It simply doesn't work-a circle of spears simply doesn't occur to them.
[...]
And these kinds of things happen all the time. I have no idea what to do. I have all sorts of ideas that can be made into difficult choices or encounters, but I'm not sure my party can handle it. Anyone have any suggestions?

I have a few questions, followed by some suggestions.

What information do you give your players? What reason do they have to believe that it is their responsibility to offer up a winning strategy to the general? He is the general, after all, and without any hint from you that he is either incompetent or incapable of winning this fight without the players suggesting "the correct" way to win it. Do you tell the bartender how to mix your drink? No, you order it and leave the rest to him. What reasons have you given the players to make them feel that they must offer up an idea or the battle will be lost? And why would the general follow their advice? They are the group of bunglers who failed to infiltrate and then led the lizard man army back, after all. Even if they are on the war council they should be disliked by at least some of the NPCs for this reason alone, if not for the typical reasons any veteran army officer would have to dislike having to listen to any non-military type sit in on military meetings and offer up advice.

If you're going to put your players in a situation, it should feel real. Some NPCs should like them, some should dislike them. The reactions of the NPCs should be valid for the situation, and the players need to have some hints from you as to what is expected of them. Don't force your players to know anything about ancient warfare or troop formations in order to be successful. Most people do not, so this is setting up a losing scenario. If you expect the players to come up with ideas, you need to have the NPCs react to those ideas. When your players suggest building a castle in an hour, have an NPC say "Ha, that's a good jest Kompera! But, hmmm, now that you've said that, we might be able to throw up an earthen berm topped with a palisade and channel the lizards into killing ground. Good thinking!" Seriously, let the NPCs react to what the players suggest, no matter what they suggest, and use that interaction to help them come up with a workable solution. Don't limit the winning solution to only what you have thought of, give them a win for any reasonable course of action, and let them feel like they made a difference by their suggestions. Give them the credit for the win, and make it clear that they made a difference, again through the NPCs. "Were it not for your idea for the wall, many more lives would have been lost this day." This will hopefully excite them and give them incentive to do more independent thinking when faced with future challenges.

Dervag
2008-10-21, 12:36 PM
So your players are thinking, and come up with dozens of suggestions, but none of them are the one true suggestion you were thinking of. Why not make one of the things they do think of the right answer? If the conversation is:

PC: "how about building a castle?"
NPC: "we don't have enough time!"

then you're punishing the player for thinking, by making them look bad. Instead, you could say yes:Or, if you don't want to create a Castle Token and a minidungeon to put it in on the spot, you could do it like Kompera suggests:

PC: "How about building a castle?"
NPC: "We don't have enough time to build a huge stone building before their army gets here, but we could throw up some field fortifications. Maybe a ditch and a breastwork...

The key here is to try to be accomodating. If the only solution is to have a ring of spearmen with everyone else inside, then this isn't a planning session at all. It's a logic puzzle, a game of "guess the magic word."

Remember that the NPCs, in character, want to win. If the PCs make a bad suggestion that could easily be made good, like setting up fortifications, then it makes a lot of sense for the NPCs to modify their idea into something more workable. It's extremely unrealistic for the NPCs to sit on their thumbs waiting for the PCs to devise a brilliant plan without any outside input, especially if the PCs have already messed up some important task.

kbk
2008-10-21, 07:53 PM
Tactical gaming is not something I care for. I have a reasonable understanding of military tactics, but I would have no idea what to do off the top of my head from what you've posted. I guess you use the phalanx troops up front, and have pallies heal and buff. You'll want to try to find a position where you can minimize the effects of the archers, but I don't really know the landscape. A good chokepoint is ideal for a phalanx (300!).

Anyways..., Are you sure they give a crap about that stuff? Cause I wouldn't, and that's probably how I'd respond. IMO DnD is more about small party combat. This isn't warhammer or a number of other miniature games. It can be done, but its definitely not what the system excels at.

Now, as far as arriving in town and not doing anything.., it sounds like they don't have any specific goals or good leadership in the party. They're waiting for someone else to step up and direct the action. No one in the party wants to, so they don't do anything.

quillbreaker
2008-10-21, 08:52 PM
I tried to run a sandbox open-ended campaign once, and my players just sat around and waited for things to happen instead of taking initiative. Then I killed one of them out of spite. Or, rather, put them in a situation where not doing anything meant you died, and he just stood there.

Yeah, I used to think I wanted open-ended sandbox games. Then I was in one. Then I realized that they are the opposite of what I want. I want to be involved in a story, some kind of happening or events, with some problems to solve, things to do, and a happy ending - or unhappy ending. Either one's fine with me. I do enough sitting around trying to decide what to do in real life - in game, I want things to happen, and I'm sorry if I didn't dig the important bits out of the background exposition to realize that I was supposed to want to go to 322 elm street as soon as I reached town. Maybe I was tired from work.

In the second instance, with the lizardmen bearing down on them, I'd have the unled army rout (before the lizards arrive), leaving the players to be hounded by lizardmen for a few months (one session). While the lizardmen are playing "find the pcs" and "occupy the capital", some npcs start putting together a resistance, which has a good chance of succeeding, if it has some PCs with it. Now the players can get mission briefings from an organizing NPC on some kind of simple tactical objective for the greater good of the resistance. From there you can give them all kinds of different tasks, see what kind of thing they really like doing.

"My players don't think" is really a shortened version of "my players don't think like me". The players made a mistake - of course, if anyone in the group had tracking (or even a notable number of K:N ranks), perhaps you should have mentioned the trail they were leaving. They had hours to notice IC and maybe 10 minutes to think of it OOC. But regardless, the mistake stuck them inside a single problem with a single solution. It's a lot easier to invent the problem and the solution as the DM than to be told the problem and come up with the answer the DM thinks will work.

Over the years, I've moved from broad worlds and huge open ended problems to hard-to-ignore plots and site adventures, and I think I'm a better DM for it. Nothing wrong with a railroad if the players enjoy the ride, and our inspirations in fiction generally get the same treatment. See what your players think of Shadowrun. Shadowrun is famous for tight episodic play (Johnson, prep, run, aftermath) and could act as a litmus test for what your players want out of a game.

LurkerInPlayground
2008-10-21, 10:00 PM
Your using the word strategy wrong. All of you. Strategy is the ability to use a nations political, economic, phycological and military forces. Sence your players are not kings, nobles or military officers in command of field armies, your players have no hand in active strategic planning. It makes my head hurt when peaple do not understand the big difference between strategy and tactics. Gamers and football coaches are particularly guilty if using these words as if they are the same.
Why just a nation? You're telling me armed bands of roving thrill-seekers don't have political, economic, psychological or violent force to manage?

JupiterPaladin
2008-10-21, 10:16 PM
Don't feel bad, most of my players don't think either. I have to turn off all TV's and radios, close all doors and windows, take away all visible toys and sources of fire, and constantly demand their attention to keep a game moving more than half the time.

Teron
2008-10-22, 01:24 AM
Atanuero, in addition to the immediate solutions others have suggested, I recommend asking your players outright what they're looking for in an RPG. If you want to be diplomatic, wait until such a time as you can ask the question either casually or in apparent preparation for a future game, so it doesn't come across as an expression of frustration with the current situation. Also, ask each player privately if possible.


I tried to run a sandbox open-ended campaign once, and my players just sat around and waited for things to happen instead of taking initiative. Then I killed one of them out of spite. Or, rather, put them in a situation where not doing anything meant you died, and he just stood there.
Out of curiosity, what was the deadly situation?

BardicDuelist
2008-10-22, 01:50 AM
This sort of thing frustrates them. I think what they like about the game is that they don't have to worry about sourcing information. When I've made it clear that I've given them more than a set of clues to piece together, they usually have a small outburst, then go overboard questioning everything, then accept it and move along. I'm not to worried about this long term. They're capable of figuring things out, once they realize it's not a logic puzzle. The more I run games for them the more they'll get used to this kind of thinking and it'll come quicker and easier to them each time.

So stop giving them bad clues. Or do it considerably less. You said that they don't like it. It's not just your game. If you don't like that and HAVE to give them bad information to make it interesting for you, then don't DM for them. Have one of them DM for a while, and play or find a different group. I know that finding a new group is hard and often not an option, but really, you've said that they don't like what you're doing, but that you will keep doing it. How is that fun?

Khanderas
2008-10-22, 02:14 AM
.... who wrote a long but informative post
What O_H said.

Jayabalard
2008-10-22, 06:43 AM
This is exactly right. Tell the players what the dice rolls will be.

"You can run straight home, but it's +10 to their Tracking. You can try to cover your tracks, but then they have a %50 chance of catching up to you. Or you can strike off into the wild unknown, leading them away from the army, but you have a 15% chance of a random encounter."

Tell them the mechanics so they can make informed choices.This doesn't make any sense. The characters don't actually know how much it will help the other people's tracking. Nor do they have any way of knowing what % chance they have of catching up to them, or what chance they have of a random encounter.

Dublock
2008-10-22, 06:54 AM
This doesn't make any sense. The characters don't actually know how much it will help the other people's tracking. Nor do they have any way of knowing what % chance they have of catching up to them, or what chance they have of a random encounter.


In real life you won't know any of that either, that way the game is more realistic. I prefer that myself.

Atanuero
2008-10-22, 04:34 PM
Okay, but I would say that there were many ways to solve the problem, of which a ring of spears was simply the most straightforward (hence why I used it in my post). Eventually I did have the general put forward one solution, I didn't just make them lose because of their tactical ineptitude. I'm of the theory that losing due to your own stupidity isn't fun or educational, especially when due to the information I'd already given them it was really a 'do or die' situation and there was nothing I could do about it plot-wise without lots of retconning and still have the plot be plausible.

Now, I didn't actually start with strategic play with this group, I basically did what I usually do with a new group-I ran a straight dungeon with various traps and some encounters that were simply monsters to focus fire on and kill, and then I ran some medium-heavy RPing (to see what they'd respond to more), and they seemed to respond to 'strategery' fairly well. They just seem to lack initiative and have really low real-life wisdom. When they were leaving the Lizardfolk warcamp, I said something like 'You hear shouting and noises as you disappear into the treeline. You look behind you to see tents being collapsed and units of Lizardfolk assembling on the field in front of the camp. The enemy High Priest stands in the middle of the field, clearly making a rousing speech if the intermittent cheers of the lizardman army are any indication.' They also had a map at their disposal. They had a party tracker, and they had a sorcerer with some divination spells. I gave them huge clues, they just failed to make the connection between 'preparations to leave' and 'follow the intruders'.

The failure of an infiltration basically happened like this: they use the party casters to disguise the 2 most stealthy PCs and the party face as lizardfolk soldiers. They make some easy Bluff checks about having something to tell the High Priest. One of the stealthy people decides to run off to pour poison into the well the army is using as their solitary water supply. The other 2 walk up the stairs of the temple, and demand to speak to the High Priest while he's in the middle of a sermon. Then they start saying something about the human army having been decimated (when the opposite actually happened), and how the lizardfolk need some help to mop up. Then they give the High Priest the wrong directions. This whole time, the Priest has been rolling extraordinarily low Sense Motive checks, despite having ranks in the skill, until the part with the wrong directions. I have the Priest say, 'But the soldiers I sent had orders to go to (place where the human army actually is), why did they end up near (place that the PCs suggested, which is in the wrong direction from the lizardfolk camp)?' At this point, the PCs panic, turn around, and run. As they flee, the duration of their illusion spells runs out (I'd been warning the PCs about this for a while, but the party face thought they could make it) and they're exposed. The stealthy poisoner sees half the camp chasing the other PCs and uses a side entrance. The PCs escape.

If that isn't tactical thinking failure I don't know what is. Maybe it's one of my weaknesses as a DM, but I can't for the life of me figure out how to make the game interesting if the PCs can't stop underestimating danger, can't come up with working plans, and don't make simple connections such as 'angry lizardfolk+lizardfolk breaking camp+PCs running away in the direction of the human army=lizardfolk will find the human army'. It's entirely possible to stop trying to make my players learn strategy, but I can't very well remove all tactics or decisions from the game, can I?

MartinHarper
2008-10-22, 06:08 PM
This whole time, the Priest has been rolling extraordinarily low Sense Motive checks, despite having ranks in the skill, until the part with the wrong directions.

You only need to make a single Bluff vs Sense Motive check for the whole web of lies being spun. The problem with multiple checks is that the optimal way to lie becomes telling single sentences lies. This is not realistic. Unless the tale being told becomes much taller, just use the results of the first check.


If that isn't tactical thinking failure I don't know what is.

I don't see how it was a failure. They had a plan. They executed the plan. It failed because their estimate of the risk differed from your estimate of the risk. They adapted to the failure by adopting a new plan (running away). They executed the new plan. It succeeded.
The PCs tricked the lizardfolk into thinking that the human army had been decimated, when in fact the opposite had happened. This meant that the lizardfolk attacked a few weeks early, before they had finished their war preparations. The lizardfolk are lacking supplies, training, reconnaissance, and equipment, and marching cheerfully into a trap. The scene is set for a heroic battle and victory for the good guys.

Raum
2008-10-22, 06:13 PM
If that isn't tactical thinking failure I don't know what is. Maybe it's one of my weaknesses as a DM, but I can't for the life of me figure out how to make the game interesting if the PCs can't stop underestimating danger, can't come up with working plans, and don't make simple connections such as 'angry lizardfolk+lizardfolk breaking camp+PCs running away in the direction of the human army=lizardfolk will find the human army'. It's entirely possible to stop trying to make my players learn strategy, but I can't very well remove all tactics or decisions from the game, can I?Perhaps it's simply a matter of focus. As a GM, you don't need to play 'against' the player characters. Whether they win or lose any given encounter doesn't necessarily matter. What does matter is making the situation and it's resolution interesting and fun.

Take the situation you're describing, the PCs failed to be sneaky and may well lead their allies into an ambush. How can you make that interesting?

A running battle to help as many allies as possible to escape could be interesting. Or perhaps the lizardfolk will make a tactical mistake allowing the PCs to turn the battle. Maybe they can convince a third party to join. Maybe they lose the battle and have to figure out a way to secure the town / base from being conquered...or simply evacuate the town if there's no hope. Sometimes 'winning' is the least interesting possibility.