What I did wrong last session

[Earthwalker]

Hello all,

Well once again I was running the show. Once again I did something wrong, nothing big but wrong none the less. It wasn't a TPK or anything serious but I am writing here as a review, to ask for advice and for people to post similar mistakes so we can all learn.

Experiance is learning from your own mistakes.
Education is learning from other peoples mistakes.

What I did wrong was, say "no" to a player.

The players were playing poker, one player wanted to use diplomacy / bluff / seduction to put off other players at the table, thus helping the one player playing the game. Now I said no, I should have said. Roll the die, you can try to distract one player for the next D6 hands, your DC is his sense motive plus 10.

Why say "no" when you can say yes, here is the die roll you need to make for it to work, and hopfully here is what can go wrong :)

Anyone else have these issues after a game where you think I wish I...

[rakkoon]

Someone shot up my BBEG in the first round because I didn't understand the rules well enough. No matter how many good ideas you may have as a GM, learn the rules too

[Killer Angel]

What I did wrong was, say "no" to a player.

The players were playing poker, one player wanted to use diplomacy / bluff / seduction to put off other players at the table.

Well, if you're talking 3.5, you cannot use diplomacy against another PC.

[Earthwalker]

Well, if you're talking 3.5, you cannot use diplomacy against another PC.

LOL bad typing on my part there.
It was another Poker Player (An NPC) at the poker game, the game within a game so to speak.

[Heliomance]

Well, if you're talking 3.5, you cannot use diplomacy against another PC.

Something I always thought was daft. That way, you're forcing any player that wants to play a charismatic character to be charismatic themselves. If the barbarian rolls an attack on another party member, they can't just say "I don't want it to hit me, so it doesn't." Why, if the bard is trying to convince them of something, should they be allowed to say "I don't want it to change my mind, so it doesn't"?

[Killer Angel]

LOL bad typing on my part there.
It was another Poker Player (An NPC) at the poker game, the game within a game so to speak.

Ah, that explains a lot...

Something I always thought was daft. That way, you're forcing any player that wants to play a charismatic character to be charismatic themselves. If the barbarian rolls an attack on another party member, they can't just say "I don't want it to hit me, so it doesn't." Why, if the bard is trying to convince them of something, should they be allowed to say "I don't want it to change my mind, so it doesn't"?

I cannot disagree.

[oxybe]

seeing as how unless you have a VERY good reason (both in-character "why is this person, that the party is supposed to trust, attacking them?" and out of character in a "why the heck did you, the player, bring such a murderous PC at the table?" reason) to do so, i don't allow intra-party murder-fighting so the barbarian can't roll to attack fellow party members.

this follows the "Don't be a ****" rule i have in play where domineering the actions of other players, "volunteering" other characters to do things against the player's will, attacking other PCs... really, being a big 'ol unwanted jerkity-jerk is VERY much frowned upon and can cause you to lose control of your PC or worst, get uninvited from the table.

[101jir]

Why not just LARP poker games in the future?

EDIT: NM, time right? Oh well, its what I would do anyway (unless of course it was PbP)

[druid91]

Something I always thought was daft. That way, you're forcing any player that wants to play a charismatic character to be charismatic themselves. If the barbarian rolls an attack on another party member, they can't just say "I don't want it to hit me, so it doesn't." Why, if the bard is trying to convince them of something, should they be allowed to say "I don't want it to change my mind, so it doesn't"?

Because, Diplomacy makes people like you.

Assumedly your party members are already at helpful. And therefore the only effect a diplomacy roll could have would be to make them dislike you.

[Serpentine]

My PCs can use their skills against each other, so long as it's all in good spirits and everyone's fine with it. My party has a history of containing characters with high Bluff and low Sense Motive. Leads to some interesting shenanigans.

On-topic: Yeah. I was intending the party to go along the road to the next encounter. One member had recently acquired a folding boat and, consulting a map, decided it would be quicker to go down a river towards our ultimate destination. This would take us past this encounter/side-quest, which I'd spent a good deal of time planning, and I couldn't/didn't hide my consternation at this decision. I whinged a little, but then I started thinking about how I could handle it instead - e.g. an affected village down the river with survivors that could lead the party to this encounter. But, by the time I'd decided I could make this off-rails jaunt work, that player had changed his mind and decided he'd stick with the rails after all, to make it work for me.
I regret forcing my players onto my rails, and am determined that any other events are up to me to deal with.

[Badgerish]

There are times when you should say 'no', but admittedly this may not have been the time for it.

On the other hand, if I was simulating poker in an RPG, I would have it as a combination of a random roll (for luck in the cards) and opposed bluff/insight contests (for the bidding and bluffing. win by a good enough margin and the random roll isn't even checked).

This would keep the character's skills relevant without the player prompting.


The other thing to consider, is that deliberate social attacks as part of a game of cards should be result in attacks back (social or stabbing, depending on situation). If you have a RPG when PCs can't be swayed by social skills, this can present problems.

edit: <re-reads>. So player1 was playing cards, and player2 wanted to distract the NPCs but not take part in the card-game? That behaviour will make enemies.

edit: on-topic: What I did wrong last session?
I've lost focus on the current adventure/situation and got lazy, this resulted in the PCs bypassing the current objective and going on to an optional location that they expressed some interest in visiting. The problem was I have got lazy and had not written up the new location properly, this resulted in me (poorly) improvising the travel there, an encounter with clues that where apprently not easily noticed and a half-assed social encounter that I changed heavily at the end.

How to fix this?
Get a better understanding of your group's current goals, and prepare accordingly.

[Heliomance]

seeing as how unless you have a VERY good reason (both in-character "why is this person, that the party is supposed to trust, attacking them?" and out of character in a "why the heck did you, the player, bring such a murderous PC at the table?" reason) to do so, i don't allow intra-party murder-fighting so the barbarian can't roll to attack fellow party members.

Well, the second question is kinda pointless. The character is an adventurer, they're murderous by default. As for the first, there are all sorts of valid reasons why you'd want to attack a party member. Admittedly, most of them require said target to have already been a "big ol' jerkity-jerk", but still.

Because, Diplomacy makes people like you.

Assumedly your party members are already at helpful. And therefore the only effect a diplomacy roll could have would be to make them dislike you.

Does anyone actually run it like that, as opposed to (with a greater or lesser amount of formalisation) rolling to persuade someone to do you a specific favour?

[Serpentine]

Oh wow. I read that line much different - as in, "because they make people like you, Heliomance. People. Like. You." It's much less bitchy this way.
Yeah, seems like people forget the other uses of Diplomacy a lot. I would probably only allow Diplomacy to work between PCs with the permission of everyone involved, and probably just to resolve and in- and out-of-character deadlock.

[Tengu_temp]

Why say "no" when you can say yes, here is the die roll you need to make for it to work, and hopfully here is what can go wrong :)

Actually, sometimes you just have to say no. Example: the party is fighting a dragon, one of the PCs decides to take a poop and throw it at the dragon's eye. Do you let him do that, but at a huge attack penalty, or do you just say "no, that's ridiculous and disgusting and doesn't fit the game"? Because I sure as hell do the latter.

[Earthwalker]

Why not just LARP poker games in the future?

EDIT: NM, time right? Oh well, its what I would do anyway (unless of course it was PbP)

We did play out the poker hands, I just simplified the betting and allowed a profession(gambler) roll to add cards to your hand (as an abstraction to mean people with the skill did better in game)

I also tried to cover the use of bluff / sense motive / slieght of hand and perception. It wasn't a time issue it was making sure that character choices had an effect on game play.

A LARP of a poker game is me v the player in question and who is better at poker (as well as luck) of course.

[oxybe]

Well, the second question is kinda pointless. The character is an adventurer, they're murderous by default. As for the first, there are all sorts of valid reasons why you'd want to attack a party member. Admittedly, most of them require said target to have already been a "big ol' jerkity-jerk", but still.

being an adventurer doesn't require you to be a murderous hobo, just be able to defend yourself if needed.

most groups i play with resort to murder on things that either can't be reasoned with (golems, unintelligent undead, slimes, etc...) or unless absolutely needed (oh look, big scary demon that made it quite clear it's trying to destroy the city). we're pretty much over the whole "dungeon crawl/murderstorm the gates" style of games. we'll play them as a one-shot but in a campaign we generally try to avoid killing everything we meet if possible.

generally we try to avoid armed conflict if possible, if this isn't possible we do try to keep most mooks alive/unconscious if possible (these guys are normal folks simply doing their job if guards or of no concern if petty thugs) if combat does happen, usually blinding, paralyze/sleeping them via magic, etc... and letting them run.

intelligent but dangerous enemies/bosses, if they can be reasoned with, will be left alive and we'll try to convince them to help us/leave us alone if possible.

i'll admit we were a bit more vicious last wednesday's session then we normally were, but we haven't played in over a month and we were trying to repel a siege against a potential ally... casualties were to be expected (the GM starting the session with "roll initiative" didn't help), especially since our resident powergamer's gotten a hold of cloudkill recently...

as for attacking other PCs, the only time i've seen it done is because the character was played Chaotic Stupid. while intra-party conflict does happen often, we all make sure it never escalates to physical violence... mainly by not bringing in characters that would resort to slaying other characters over a slight.

[101jir]

We did play out the poker hands, I just simplified the betting and allowed a profession(gambler) roll to add cards to your hand (as an abstraction to mean people with the skill did better in game)

I also tried to cover the use of bluff / sense motive / slieght of hand and perception. It wasn't a time issue it was making sure that character choices had an effect on game play.

A LARP of a poker game is me v the player in question and who is better at poker (as well as luck) of course.

Complicated. Personally, I would ask if it is alright to leave out the skills that might complicate things too much. Gambler adding cards to your hand might be simple enough, but IMO the others seem to make it unnecassarily complicated, unless you can find a standard forcing system (Such as bluff DC "X" forces a fold and so forth)

[Earthwalker]

Actually, sometimes you just have to say no. Example: the party is fighting a dragon, one of the PCs decides to take a poop and throw it at the dragon's eye. Do you let him do that, but at a huge attack penalty, or do you just say "no, that's ridiculous and disgusting and doesn't fit the game"? Because I sure as hell do the latter.

I do see where you are coming from and with that kind of behavior it is proably better to just talk to the player. In the example if you explain that to do what the player wants its.

A full round action to remove enough armour to poop, also doing so provokes an attack of opertunity.
Another round pooping again provokes an aoo.
Finnaly treat the attack as a ranged attack with a +8 to hit, for the result of forcing the dragon to make a fort save lets say 10 + the PCs dex bonus or be blinded for one round.

I suspect the player will just give up on the idea and hit the dragon instead.

[Gravitron5000]

Actually, sometimes you just have to say no. Example: the party is fighting a dragon, one of the PCs decides to take a poop and throw it at the dragon's eye. Do you let him do that, but at a huge attack penalty, or do you just say "no, that's ridiculous and disgusting and doesn't fit the game"? Because I sure as hell do the latter.

Wouldn't it be better to state that pooping is not a free action. It'll take you at least 10 rounds to squeeze out that turd. If they still want to try, then you have 10 rounds to beat on their character while their pants are around their ankles.

*Edit: had to fix a their/there issue that was hurting my brain.

[Tiki Snakes]

Wouldn't it be better to state that pooping is not a free action. It'll take you at least 10 rounds to squeeze out that turd. If they still want to try, then you have 10 rounds to beat on their character while there pants are around their ankles.

This is my favourite example of 'Say yes' that I've encountered so far.
I endorse this message.

[Earthwalker]

Another one to add to this thread as a new problem.

This is a common one of mine I am adding it here as a reminder to learn from my mistakes.

Last session I gave away too many clues and too many options for the players to investigate. This lead to the usual rabbit caught in the head light stare as they try to work out what they should look at first.

Lots of clues is good, but its best to limit the time frame I hand them out in. If they only have half a day to investigate then make sure they can look up most things in that time or they can get confussed (I make them sound like 3 year olds here but hopfully people know what I mean)