Hey all,
My group has reached a breaking point. One of the players does not have a car and lives all the way on the other side of town. In addition, he has made time commitments that conflict with our normal gaming time on the weekends. We've tried playing during the week but the inconvinience of picking him up coupled with the short amount of time we get to play (most have got 9-5 jobs) has made this unfeasible.
The rest of the players all live very close to me and we could easily get together at a moments notice. We've decided to proceed without the player. But there's a few problems:
1. How do we break this to him gently? He's our friend and such, but we're all just sick of driving him around and changing our schedules to coincide with his.
2. Each of the players (there are 3) plays 2 characters a piece so if this guy stops playing that will take out 1/3 of the party. I was thinking that each remaining player would adopt another character, but this could slow down our play considerably.
3. The player in question plays two very important characters. The arcane spell caster and the smoking eye ranger. I could justify these characters jagging off somewhere else, but they both are pretty integral to the story (esp. the smoking eye character). The arcane caster is Vortimax Weer (who post-eruption) is looking for money to re-open his shop. I can just have him go back there. But what of the smoking eye character...I guess he can go back to Occipitus and supervise there, but what about the final battle? What about Vhalantru's return.
4. The party is currently ~18th level and being run through the final rooms of "Root of Evil" (side trek). How can I justify 1/3 of the party leaving all of a sudden. If I do bring in more characters, how do I justify their arrival?
5. What characters would you recomend for a replacement? The previous party composition was
run by player A:
Paladin of Heironeous 18
Barbarian 17
run by player B:
Human Rouge/shadow dancer/fighter 18
Cleric 17
Run by player C:
Wizard/Archmage 18
Ranger/Aasimar/Smoking Eye 17 who's pretty much full on evil outsider bane (arrows, bow, favroed enemy)
I was thinking bring in a sorcerer 18 or 19 for Player A since he's not playing any primary caster. But what would you guys say I need for player B? He was thinking of going ranged fighter build as well, but I think that's not very powerful unless it's with a ranger (favored enemy evil outsider) at least for these last few levels. I dunno maybe a monk or something.
It really is a bummer that we can't put the campaign on hiatus but I may be leaving the area soon and thus, want to get it wrapped up. We've been playing for more than a year and just want to get it finished. So what do y'all think?
Probably easier to gestalt the characters (from Unearthed Arcana). That should solve your problem handily.
About the in-game reason to do x and y. I tend to deus ex machina situations like that. If I had to make an in game excuse for whay player x isnt their this week or player b stopped playing it would be all I would do. I run a game with 6 or 7 people but I usually only get 4 or 5 turning up.
As regards to your friend. Just be honest. Tell him its extremely inconvinent for everyone else and that the group can't continue like this. So you are out. Make it clear that he is welcome to come back anytime he can but you won't be changing the game time/structure just for one person.
I have a standing house rule that I play the game on day X and I will not change this date unless I don't get a minimum turning up (so 4 out of the 7 players). That way you are not playing favourites. Their is a clear rule everyone knows before the campaign starts.
1. How do we break this to him gently? He's our friend and such, but we're all just sick of driving him around and changing our schedules to coincide with his.
I have a similar problem with a player that lives very far away. He usually asks if we could prospone the game so he can take part but I just tell him we play if there are enough players at the table. Seems like the situation is different with your group though because you haven't got that many players. Are you sure there are enough players in your group to continue without this guy?
2. Each of the players (there are 3) plays 2 characters a piece so if this guy stops playing that will take out 1/3 of the party. I was thinking that each remaining player would adopt another character, but this could slow down our play considerably.
If playing two characters doesn't slow you down, playing three won't do so considerably. I prefer gaming with one character per player cause otherwise the roleplaying is strange ("you say WHAT with magusboy? ah, ok, you're talking as your barbarian character")
3. The player in question plays two very important characters. The arcane spell caster and the smoking eye ranger. I could justify these characters jagging off somewhere else, but they both are pretty integral to the story (esp. the smoking eye character). The arcane caster is Vortimax Weer (who post-eruption) is looking for money to re-open his shop. I can just have him go back there. But what of the smoking eye character...I guess he can go back to Occipitus and supervise there, but what about the final battle? What about Vhalantru's return.
In my opinion the best solution would be to let those characters jagg off somewhere else. Doesn't seem like the party is in need of Vortimax Weer so much and him looking for money is a good reason to quit adventuring for a while. The smoking-eye character could travel to Occipitus indeed, telling his friends what he is going to do. When the rest of the party are in need of this character (e.g. when they're trying to open Adimarchus' cage) let them find out that they need his help to do so. When they travel back to Occipitus to get him you could use him to include some cool and moody info about the slow transformation of this plane.
4. The party is currently ~18th level and being run through the final rooms of "Root of Evil" (side trek). How can I justify 1/3 of the party leaving all of a sudden. If I do bring in more characters, how do I justify their arrival?
The smoking-eye character feels the urge to return to Occipitus. The plane has become a part of his self and he no more feels the desire to adventure. You could portray this guy as if he had suddenly evolved with differing desires, wishes, personality. Some adventurers just stop after reaching a certain pont, agreeing that it's not their kind of life forever, Vortimax could be one of these. Of course your players will know why these things happen, but with some explanations why it happens it won't destroy your game.
Include the new characters in the plot of the campaign. They have some certain info about the cagewrights that the characters need (e.g. how to find Admimarchus). They could be sent by another powerful organisation (circle of eight?) to even things out. This way or the other, their appearance should be an event of note, as everyone will know these legends (if they start at such a high level).
|
I try to avoid letting players play more than one character. But if that is what you have to do to game, so be it. I do think though that 3 players playing 2 characters each will take the same amount of time as 2 players playing 3 characters each, or if there is a play difference then it will be nominal. And as long as all the characters go on their own initiative then you won't have one player waiting while the other takes three turns.
I keep current copies of all my players' character sheets. So I would just let each remaining player play one of the characters to continue.
Or to truely inspire a heroic end to the campaign, you can have the two characters die in an incredable manner, preferably due to a vial betrayal. Then adjust the rest of the campaign's encounters to be barely managable by the rest of the group.
Tam
1. If he's your friend, he should understand the effort the rest of you have been going through to keep him involved...and appreciate it. What it comes down to is you've got to consider the other players, and yourself too. Go with what works best for the majority; he's still welcome if he takes some responsibility upon himself & makes an effort to get there.
2. Most people run with 1 character per player, so you should still have enough characters to progress. Consider adding a DM run NPC to fill any perceived gaps.
3. It sounds like you have more than enough ideas for putting these characters on hiatus. They may not be leaving for good (as the player may still show up), but keep them occupied. If a character is integral to the story, perhaps have them imprisoned/captured by the baddies...giving the remainder of the party more personal incentive to continue the quest. Like I said, you sound like you have many ideas already so this will be the easy part for you.
In my own campaigns, we have many players & it's a different roster each time we get together. We've gotten used to working into story lines the individual absences of characters (players); after all, just because they're not at the forefront of a battle/adventure, they may still be involved. For example, a couple players missed 'The Spire of Long Shadows' adventure so I placed their mage characters with Tenser (Manzorian) digging up research on Kyuss.
Good luck! Hopefully your friend will understand and make some effort himself to make it.
J-
I try to avoid letting players play more than one character.
I agree. Thats why I suggestted gestalt characters. This solves the problem nicely.
Thanks everyone for the advice.
We've been playing with 2 characters per player since the begining. We just didn't have enough players at the time to run the AP. I agree that it makes roleplaying a little weird, but we still manage. Things tend to happen in the third person if that makes sense
I started making the sorcerer character with Player A last night and will make the ranged fighter w/ Player B tongight probably. Three characters a piece is going to be interesting. I'll let y'all know how it goes.