How do you do game events?

[jedipotter]

So how do you do game events that effect a character? I only see two ways: either you sit down with the player and come up with an event or you just have things happen to the character without any player knowing so.

I have almost always done the second one. Just 'throwing things' at a player character, without their direct knowing input. A player can make suggestions or say the want or don not want or like or do not like something, but that is it.

But this came out in a game, with a new player. In the game I broke his character's magic sword. The player then went a little nuts saying that it was wrong for me to "effect his character with out his say so". My plan, unknown to the player was to have a warlord foe with a slightly better sword a couple of encounters later. So the player could have a chance to win another sword.

But he wanted to do it the first way, where I guess the player would know the whole plan? But I don't get that way. How to you avoid it being so fake and cardboardy? If the player knows they will loose an item of value in encounter three, but then get a replacement in encounter seven, how do you stop the pointlessness of it all? Where the player is just like "oh well, lost my sword....whatever, I just wait to get my new sword".

[NichG]

Well, my advice would be, don't create 'plans' like that. Instead, look for opportunities to link things together that have happened with what is about to happen. That is to say, you shouldn't be the one telling the character's story - you should create scenarios or situations that the character must choose how to deal with, and the intersection of the scenario with the character's choice creates the story.

To put it another way, you shouldn't just say 'okay you wake up to find your sword broken'. But throwing an enemy with Improved Sunder at the party (or whatever equivalent your system has) is reasonable. Once this becomes known, the player has a choice - continue to fight but take the risk that his sword will break, or back away from this fight and thus weakening the group in order to protect his gear. Either choice is valid and says something about the character.

Its even okay for the choice to be based on insufficient information or false information, though you have to be careful here to not do a Schroedinger's Choice where the sword gets broken either way (or to give that impression).

Then, if the sword breaks, the warlord's upgrade becomes relevant. If the sword doesn't break, maybe the warlord's sword is still an upgrade, or maybe you go with something else instead. Maybe the sundering enemy broke the archer's bow and now the warlord has an upgraded bow. You have a lot of freedom when it comes to anything that has yet to be introduced - unless you make it really obvious that you're consistently dropping replacement gear in via enemies, there's nothing to say that the warlord has this weapon or that weapon until the party actually meets him (unless you've established the fact already via the party's scouting or whatever).

Basically my point is, use what happens to guide what elements you introduce next, rather than relying too heavily on predicting or forcing the outcomes of the current scenario. That way if the player's sword breaks you can say 'well the guy was sundering stuff, so you had plenty of opportunity to back off or do things differently - the sword broke because of your decision'.

[Nooblet]

In my humble opinion, the worst thing to do is to make your PCs feel like their decisions are irrelevant. The way you broke your PCs weapon made him feel angry because he had no way to stop that event.

You need to be sneakier and make PCs feel like they are involved in events like that. Use more creativity.

Im posting on my tab, forgive my grammar and my short response.

[The Dark Fiddler]

In my humble opinion, the worst thing to do is to make your PCs feel like their decisions are irrelevant.

I agree, here, but what you've said about the specific event is a bit too vague if you want us to judge, jedipotter. So long as the player had a way to avoid getting the sword broken (i.e. an enemy went through the trouble of disarming him or sundering it, and taking out the enemy faster would have saved the sword) or the sword is literally the point of the character, I think the player just needs to take a deep breath and learn to roll with the punches.

As for whether you should just spring something on a player or work with them, it depends on the circumstances of the event. When doesn't it depend on circumstances, though? Seriously, though. If you're going to be making a major and permanent change to the character, such as taking away Superman's powers, that's something to talk to them about. If you're, say, going to bring in the character's wife and say they're going to be a villain, then you should at the very least make sure they're okay with the character's wife being involve (or existing in the first place).

You can't go too far with asking the players, though, or else you'd end up asking for permission every time you had an NPC attack their character! It's a balance, and everybody has their own cut-off point for where you need to ask, so it's tough.

[Knaight]

There's a concept pertinent to this that was fleshed out in some detail (I believe on the Forge) called "Lines and Veils". Basically, they are boundary conditions for the game, to be established prior to playing, with some implicit in the system. Lines establish the things that simply shouldn't come up in the game, veils the things that can come up but that are alluded to and not described in the here and now of the game. In this case, what appears to have happened is that one player decided that the loss of their items was behind a line, but everyone else assumed that it wasn't, which caused problems. I seriously doubt that it is a preference for everything being telegraphed, merely a preference for some stuff about the character (items, maybe them being alive) to be behind a line.

Given that this has already cropped up, it might be worth fleshing out particular lines and veils for the game with your group, and seeing what happens. I generally don't think it's necessary under most circumstances, but this one appears to be an exception.

[hymer]

I agree with what's been said above. I'll just stress two things.
One is that this is a new player. You may want to hold off on targeting them in particular with bad stuff, until you trust each other. If a GM destroyed my PC's favourite item in the second session I ever played with him, it's likely I wouldn't come to the third.
The second thing is, why destroy the sword to give him a better one? Why not just give him the better one? Is it for the drama? People with swords tend to be good at those swords and not much else. Taking his sword away could be anywhere from annoying to crippling for the mechanics of that character. Who wants to play a crippled character? Sounds like time to get back to town and get the sword fixed before we go on.

[Mr Beer]

IMO you don't need to consult with a player before breaking their stuff. That said, if you arbitarily announce "hey your magic sword is busted LOL", you can expect an adverse reaction. The player has no way of knowing that he's getting a better sword.

I'm not sure what your reasoning is to break it and give him a superior replacement, but assuming you have a decent plot in mind, hide it better. It's not you breaking the sword, it's an encounter which contains a suitable sword-breaking mechanic (preferably via standard rules) which the player can perceive as him getting unlucky and his sword got broken.

Players tend to identify with their loot, so you need a good reason to take it away from them. I personally don't like questing for a dozen sessions, acquiring some cool items and then have the GM fairly obviously take back the cream of the crop.

[Mastikator]

If you're playing a game where the players will have their toys broken and their nose bloodied then you need to tell them in advance.
If they then happen to get better toys, that's nice, but they won't take it for granted. If you plan on giving them better toys all the time they'll take it for granted and won't see the value in it.

How do I do game events? I prep the events and throw it at the players, I don't expect any results from them.
Sometimes players become risk-advense and dodge the events I throw at them, when that happens I stop throwing events and let them grow bored until they complain, at which point I'll just tell them they've dodged every event.
Sometimes players do stupid things, that's fine, we all do stupid things IRL every day, and I try at the consequences the best I can.
Sometimes players become pro-active and create their own quests, that's when things get interesting and I let them seek their goals to their hearts content.
If I DM then my job is only to referee, to set the setting and situations.

[Jay R]

When the player doesn't trust the DM, the problem isn't the broken sword, or the unbalanced encounter, or the cursed item. The problem is that the player doesn't trust the DM.

Sometimes that's caused by an immature player. Sometimes that's just lack of faith on the player's part. Sometimes it's a valid response to unfair DMing. Sometimes it's simply that the game the player wants to play is not consistent with the game the DM wants to run.

In this case, I can't tell. But the issue isn't the sword. It's that the player doesn't trust the DM.

[jedipotter]

I have always had players just 'roll with it' and not make a big deal about anything that happened in the game

It has worked out great in the past. One famous game Tyric lost his sword in the Broken Lands. This hurt the group as they were on a quest deep in the monster lands, and sure needed a good fighter. This lead to the famous sword quest, where a whole game night was nothing but, get the fighter a sword. It was tons and tons of fun for everyone. Everyone recalls Tyric using tree branches, rocks and dead kobolds as weapons. And memories like Selk the thief who stopped to pick up the sack of gold coins and let the Orc with the sword escape. Everyone was stunned and we all laughed for a

[kyoryu]

In this case, what appears to have happened is that one player decided that the loss of their items was behind a line, but everyone else assumed that it wasn't, which caused problems. I seriously doubt that it is a preference for everything being telegraphed, merely a preference for some stuff about the character (items, maybe them being alive) to be behind a line.

Given that this has already cropped up, it might be worth fleshing out particular lines and veils for the game with your group, and seeing what happens. I generally don't think it's necessary under most circumstances, but this one appears to be an exception.

Yeah, my initial reaction to this post is that it was a disconnect in expectations and assumptions.

There's two assumptions that are probably worth calling out explicitly, as they tend to have very negative reactions from players:

1) Things can happen to your stuff
2) You character's actions can be influenced/dictated in some scenarios

These are probably the two that I get see the biggest emotional reactions to if people assume that they can't happen.

[NichG]

You should add #3: Permanent or semi-permanent alterations can be made to your character as consequences for things.

For example, most players in D&D 3.5 would be shocked to lose an arm from something, or to suffer an irreversible reduction in a stat, or to have something permanently lower their MaxHP, burn away a skill rank forever, or cause XP damage. So its good to be upfront if that kind of thing happens in your campaign.

[Knaight]

Yeah, my initial reaction to this post is that it was a disconnect in expectations and assumptions.

There's two assumptions that are probably worth calling out explicitly, as they tend to have very negative reactions from players:

1) Things can happen to your stuff
2) You character's actions can be influenced/dictated in some scenarios

These are probably the two that I get see the biggest emotional reactions to if people assume that they can't happen.

I might throw in a third, regarding characters getting flat out killed. There are certainly cases where more are necessary, but that varies more heavily from campaign to campaign.

[The Fury]

When the player doesn't trust the DM, the problem isn't the broken sword, or the unbalanced encounter, or the cursed item. The problem is that the player doesn't trust the DM.

Sometimes that's caused by an immature player. Sometimes that's just lack of faith on the player's part. Sometimes it's a valid response to unfair DMing. Sometimes it's simply that the game the player wants to play is not consistent with the game the DM wants to run.

In this case, I can't tell. But the issue isn't the sword. It's that the player doesn't trust the DM.

Yes, that's it exactly. Trust is something that you also need to be careful with, it's difficult to earn and all too easy to damage. If you believe that your players do trust you, then these sorts of events are probably OK. If you're not sure breaking their stuff or something is probably not a good idea. At least not for a while yet.