Just finished up a game today in which our characters were on a mission to enter a dark/sinister castle and retrieve a specific item from the castle's master on behalf of one of his rivals (and our benefactor failed to tell us exactly what it was we were to retrieve for some reason).
Anyways, we were magically transported to the castle and appeared in some random hallway deep in its bowels. We were in a long hallway, about 15-feet wide, some 90 feet long, with lit torches in sconces and a REALLY low ceiling (maybe 6 feet?). There. Were. Bodies. Everywhere. Some hanging in manacles, some piled on the floor. Most were rotted, some were fresh, all were quite dead (and seemingly killed in gruesome fashion no less.
Wary of the bodies, I inform the party that my summoner's expendable eidolon shall make its way down the hall searching for traps with its ungodly perception skill.
The party barbarian said "I don't have the patience for this" and ran ahead of the eidolon. Corpses exploded and before he knew it he was infested with rot grubs. Not knowing what they were, nobody in the party made any (appropriate) attempts to remove them. Also, mummies rose from the bodies and attacked the party. Several more characters became infested with rot grubs as they maneuvered about during the battle. The barbarian sucked up 14 Constitution damage, the cleric 12, the ninja 8, and my eidolon 6. Only the party fighter and my summoner escaped the lil' bastards. What's more, both the fighter and the barbarian became cursed with mummy rot! Oh, and the hallway was littered with other traps (most of which involved spikes and scythes that would pop out).
Needless to say, it was a ROUGH battle. After we (barely) defeated the mummies, we fell back out of the hall to rest and recover in a secure looking room (which we barred tight with a number of defenses). The next day, the cleric used ALL of his spells to cure the party of "most" of its ability damage and hit point loss. He also failed spectacularly at trying to remove the mummy rot.
Though we were better, we were still pretty beat up.
And we still needed to go through the hall of the dead. The cleric came up with a brilliant idea: Rather than all get killed by more rot grubs and as-of-yet discovered traps, he would simply activate his boots of teleportation, and 'port the party to the other side of the hall.
I (OOG) cautioned him about using limited resources and was about to recommend alternate course of action when he interrupted me and said "fine, you can all wait here" before running down the hall!
He made it to the end covered with rot grubs, suffering from severe constitution loss (being unable to cure it for lack of spells) and bleeding from a number of wounds caused by previously undiscovered traps.
First, the HEALING FOCUSED CLERIC just abandoned the rest of the party to deal with this damned hall on our own.
Second, he let an out of game remark affect his in-game actions.
Third, he was assigned as "party leader" by our benefactor and was supposed to be responsible for everyone's safety as well as ensuring the success of the mission.
In game and out I'm thinking he's CRAZY! What would have taken us 10-seconds to cross (real time) then took us THREE HOURS to navigate. By the time the party made it across this ONE hallway (our first encounter!!!) we were once again so beat up as to barely remain standing.
I refused to cross with the others on principle. It was practically suicide! The nutso cleric then teleported over to me and 'ported me across.
We used up a crap ton of resources (wands, potions, and such) to bring the party up to "not quite dead."
By the time we crossed the stupid hallway we had lost SIX FREAKING HOURS of game time and had expended an unbelievable amount of resources unnecessarily.
I'm beginning to think that our illustrious leader doesn't give a damn about our safety or the success of the mission; or is simply a whack job. Perhaps both?
God knows what else is in this castle beyond said hall.
Has anyone ever had a similar situation. If so, what did you do about it? What should I do if anything? (In game or out.)
Have a serious talk about proper character play with your guys. I mean, seriously? That sort of suicidal behavior shows that they don't think in character at all. (except maybe they ALL play their characters as having a death wish)You only behave like that if you think in terms of "Meh, my char is a piece of paper, if he dies, I'll roll up a new one" not in terms of "F*$%f@&#f$$!, my life is in danger here, I'm to beautiful to diiiie!".
Additionally: Are these guys perchance the same people who are messing with your campaign and accusing you of railroading? Or do you simply have an uncanny talent for ending up in RPG groups full of idiots?
{sigh... yes... very much similar...}
Our group found a very obviously magically trapped treasure chest. From investigation we KNOW there are at least books, potions, magic wands, and magic crystals in chest. And we KNOW the trap is a 7th level spell that makes a magical explosion.
OOC we weren't supposed to have been able to find it this early in game. Got sneaky and luck at the same tme. We are only 3rd level. Wizard and rogue do spend quite a bit of time trying to figure out a plan to safely get into a chest that is out of our league. Fighter gets tired of waiting and tries to strike the lock off with his maul. Trap goes off, kills fighter (everyone else started running when he stated his actions) and destroyes all the treasure (hundreds of points of damage. Player of fighter proceeds to blame everyone else in party and the GM for his character's death.
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Different group. Party is hired to find out if merchants son has been taken by slavers. After virtually no ivestigation they find out a slave camp outside of town has a bunch of new slaves. (Keep in mind slavery is legal and accepted in this country, but still run by the crime syndicate.) Party does NOT infiltrate, spy on the camp, or put on a disguise and pose as customers. No, their choice is a frontal assault. They actually were fairly smart on their tactics and won through to rescue the son. Surprise, they did it! However, they OPENLY took all the rescued slaves right back into the town (where slavery is legal) and just let them go to fend for themselves. Then they actually went to the constable and told them what they did because they wanted to tell him about the evil magic items they found there. They actually told the constable that they were going back to the camp because the didn't kill all the guards.
It was the equivalent to (since you don't agree with prostitution) into a legal brothel (run by the mob), killing half the employees and management, striding back into town like a conquering army, taking all the tags into town and dumping them in the street, confessing to the cops, and then telling the cops you plan to go back and kill the rest of the employees and management.
The party refused any plot hooks that would take them out of town. The mob would be trying to kill them. The cops would arrest them. At that point, I had no idea what to do with the campaign that wouldn't be a TPK.
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Yet another group... Nope, sorry, this is getting too depressing.
Additionally: Are these guys perchance the same people who are messing with your campaign and accusing you of railroading? Or do you simply have an uncanny talent for ending up in RPG groups full of idiots?
Many of the players are the same, and many are not. My brother and another friend of mine are in this group, but not the other. The "child killer" from the other group is not present in this one. The player of the half-elf fighter in the other group (the only one to actively save the children as well as the one to scream "Tucker's Kobolds!?" at me) is the GM of this particular campaign (which is all homebrew).
As a GM, I find him to be particularly cutthroat, as well as slightly less knowledgeable on the rules than I would prefer (but he manages well enough to make for a fun, exciting, and very unique game).
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First, the HEALING FOCUSED CLERIC just abandoned the rest of the party to deal with this damned hall on our own.
Second, he let an out of game remark affect his in-game actions.
Third, he was assigned as "party leader" by our benefactor and was supposed to be responsible for everyone's safety as well as ensuring the success of the mission.
In game and out I'm thinking he's CRAZY! What would have taken us 10-seconds to cross (real time) then took us THREE HOURS to navigate. By the time the party made it across this ONE hallway (our first encounter!!!) we were once again so beat up as to barely remain standing.
Is this the same player who nuked the children in the other example?
If this was the standard of play in a typical session, I'd have walked long ago.
One thing, though. Your second point may not be quite valid, since telling someone they 'should conserve limited resources' is something that's equally justified, in-character. Unless you worded it in gamespeak, such as "That's a bad idea. On page xxx, paragraph y, it says you only get z no. of level 4 slots/day....", then there's justification for him assuming your PC is speaking directly to his.
It still makes him a tactical moron, who can't take criticism, but at least he's not using ooc knowledge...he's "just playin my chaaaaaracter, maaaaann.">
Nah, the cleric player is the fellow who plays the paladin in the other group/thread.
I consider him to be my best friend. He can be kinda wacky, often cracking inappropriate jokes and distracting others from the game, but he generally means well.
Let's face it, barbarians and fighters don't have any patience with traps/puzzles/15 minute workdays. And the players of said barbarians and fighters often have LESS patience, that's why they're playing barbarians and fighters. When the players get bored, the characters start trying to relieve the boredom by taking foolish risks.
I suspect a pacing problem. This can be very hard to deal with, as each player generally likes a different pace, and on those rare occasions where the rogue gets to shine he's not trying to speed through it.
The cleric, I have no explanation for.
SlimGauge, I disagree. I play fighters all the time and they're usually team players, sometimes team leader, but never impatient. They know the value of a team or else they'd be dead already.
@Gruingar, I'm beginning to see a pattern here...
... @Gruingar, I'm beginning to see a pattern here...
Yeah, I know what you mean. We're actually getting better though. Slowly... Very slowly... getting better.
Actually the current campaign is kinda hard for us. We have been constantly under extreme time pressure. Makes it very hard to plan, sneak, or scout when you are constantly having to rush or fail.