We all know this happens, someone is either going to be late or can't make it to the game. Sometimes this further complicates things because where the party left off was probably in the middle of a dungeon, out in the wilderness, or perhaps they were tangled up in the plot hook personally. The group doesn't want to cancel or have the game delayed. How do you like to handle your MIA players?
Personally I have experienced or used the old spontaneous teleportation to they are their but they are mere shadows and do not interact with the game.
I keep a copy of their character sheets for such occasions. Then another PC is offered the chance to run the other character for the night. The missing player's character misses out on RP exp, and half of the exp for any fights.
Now I'm sure I'll get flamed for that, but my logic is this. When someone else is playing your character, they are going to go out of their way to not get you killed. They won't take chances you would, or that they would, normally. They will also only use your consumables if it's life or death, to avoid using up your resources. So basically, the character is only going to die if it's a TPK, so reduced exp award.
The person that has to run your character I generally give a nice little boost of EXP as a payment for dealing with the headache. Usually a fraction of whatever the character lost for combats. Usually 25% of the lost exp, or 200exp, whichever is greater. At lower levels, it's 200exp.
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The missing player's character is always in the background, fighting a creature that is also in the background. A lot of things happen in that background...
If I would have a TPK then the character is also dead though I rarely do TPK's and rather go the direction of "you wake up in the goblin's prisoner tent strapped to a pole without your items".
I just do it that way cause it is easier on me and the players. If really needed I do use his skills etc.
I either just "background" them or give them an in-game excuse.
"Came down with a fever." or even integrate it into the night's plot if I can. I'm a big plot/cinematic play guy.
I don't kill of characters when they are not there.
A group I was part of always ends up putting MIA characters in a dress.
SBFC
special backpack for characters
they just aren't there, it might break belief, but in my games role-playing was never that hardcore.
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Either they go AFK in the background, or we temporal shift to a universe in which that character never existed. When the player shows up again, we temporal shift back to the usual universe.
In a less serious game, we just stuff the character in a bag of holding. Which led to a humorous moment when it was an exalted character with an aura of radiance. I asked the party what they were doing for a light source, and the fighter responded 'I pull Adam's head out of the bag!'
When I was GMing (taking a break from that) I use to allow the control of a late or absent player via another player until that player showed up. The group I am in now doesn't seem to like that, well this was perpetrated by another in our group, but I won't go into the details.
In someways I see the wisdom of this because often this means that such said player might be encouraged not to feel it is needed to show up on time. On the other hand it also gimps the group because planed encounters are usually set up to deal with the full compliment of the party.
One of the problems also that I have with this is that I really disliked it when players would show up late or not at all because when I use to GM I would craft the adventure so that it would effect everyone, but such behavior would often disrupt or ruin a storyline arc.
Sometimes it wasn't even about the story but would rather center around party dynamics. For instant, the player who usually plays the main healer doesn't show or is big time late. Plus this is effected even more if the group is small to begin with.
I read something recently advocating "cardboard cutout" mode. Meaning the character is assumed to be with the party, but doesn't contibute in combat or do any talking. In addition, once per session, each absent player can be used as a sort of "hero point" by the rest of the party to automatically accomplish some goal within that character's realm of expertise, like having the fighter force open a door, the bard talk to the angry mob, or the wizard dispel some effect that is otherwise going to wreck the party.
In a similar thread a while back, someone suggested "Kenny Mode".
The absent PC is killed at the first opportunity in the most grisly fashion imaginable. At the next session, he reappears, and nobody says anything about it.
Might work well for a light-hearted dungeon romp.
In a similar thread a while back, someone suggested "Kenny Mode".
The absent PC is killed at the first opportunity in the most grisly fashion imaginable. At the next session, he reappears, and nobody says anything about it.
Might work well for a light-hearted dungeon romp.
HAHA I might suggest this.
In a similar thread a while back, someone suggested "Kenny Mode".
The absent PC is killed at the first opportunity in the most grisly fashion imaginable. At the next session, he reappears, and nobody says anything about it.
Might work well for a light-hearted dungeon romp.
I kinda like that idea, provided my group is in a humorous mood.
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I keep a copy of their character sheets for such occasions. Then another PC is offered the chance to run the other character for the night. The missing player's character misses out on RP exp, and half of the exp for any fights.
I do something similar. I collect everyone's character sheets at the end of the session. If a player is unable to make the next session, another player will run that character (and their own).
This allows characters to "stay in the game" by cutting out the need for spontaneous disappearance/reappearance and ensures that we know, from one session to the next, what each character's capabilities are.
Unlike MDT, I don't penalize characters for experience, but this mostly because we don't use XP (I just tell them to level whenever I think it's appropriate).
Last session, only half my players were able to make it and we didn't miss a beat.
-Skeld
Since many of my fellow gamers are MIA and undependable if they show up or not, I decided not to do a campaign. Campaigns need a lot of work from the GM and they need players that show some commitment (showing up consistently at least). If you can't get any kind of commitment from your players, it's not worth it (as a GM) to sink all that time and energy into a campaign that could fizzle out at anytime. Imo, you might as well play Pathfinder Organized Society, which is exactly what I did.
PFS has worked out great for everyone, especially for me as GM. PFS:
1) Allows me to introduce other players easily into my home game with minimal effort on their part or my part. Pregens have allowed players to just "jump in" to try it out.
2) Allows me to play every month since I don't require player X to be there. If it was a campaign, due to conflicting schedules, we could only play every 6-8 weeks, which is not enough for campaign play.
3) PFS are one shot missions, so there's no need to keep "up-to-date" on what's going on.
4) It benefits me as a GM (in terms of GM rewards, variety of scenarios, and boosting my low level PCs with GM credit). Instead of planning and being forced to read each and every book in the AP, I can read 1-2 scenarios at a time and plan by reading reviews only.
5) Ironically, it has generated more consistency from the players I have.
6) It also allows other players to GM (while I play) without any problems, although no one has stepped up to do that yet.
In summary, I love campaigns, but PFS has been great so far and I can't imagine not having it around.
As mentioned before, MIA players often create a big disruption to campaign style play. Personally I love the story aspect as much as I do the tactics aspect which is why I usually only play campaign style games. Lately I have been thinking of running a game again eventually, but I rethinking both my styles and how I construct my campaigns. Usually I set up games that are flexible but rather linear however this is a bad set up for players who are often late or don't show up.
So with that in mind I have been playing around with a setup where all the characters who play in my campaign all share a similar background history and would be able to disappear or show up at any one point. By constructing the campaign like this I hope to relieve the stress of MIA players.
I'm a player not the DM.
We keep the DM with updated copies of our sheets online (not the originals- those are ours) and he can opt to play or us not or have another PC run us.
None of us make a terrible habit of not showing up but sometimes stuff just comes up.. when that happens we "play them" and they get full XP and loot for the session.
-S
I usually have the absent PC doing something related to the active quest, just not directly involved. Studying maps, dealing with logistical issues, distracting relevant plot complications, etc.
Sometimes characters come down with SPACE FLU! (or Sky Flu, or Alien Flu, or whatever Flu is humorously appropriate for the setting I'm running).
The group that I have been in has had a lot of shifting players and GMs. It wasn't until only recently when we stopped having the character actually be there when the player was not. At one point in time, our current GM although was a player at the time was going to be late to the game. He works as a waiter, so we joked that his character was teleported to the Millyways, Restaurant at the End of the Universe where his character served as a waiter there.
The game I currently run is pretty big, we have 6 players(was 7), so if we are only missing one person, we may still go forward with the game. Either I'll play a proxy of their character, in as simple a form as possible(basically does what they would do, with as few game mechanics interactions as possible), or if we have a copy of the character sheet, someone else can run it and get a xp bonus for the extra work.
If we happen to be missing more than one person, I'll just cancel the game for that week. I've gone ahead and ran games without some players before, but that starts a vicious cycle of catching up, missed details, forgetting who was here and when, etc. The more we can all stay on the same page, the more involved everyone usually is.
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Normally, we try to have someone else play the missing persons character.
In the Kingmaker Campaign I'm currently running it's a bit easier. If someone can't make it then we just say that PC had to go deal with affairs of state while the other guys go explore or whatever. If a person misses enough that I think he might lag too far behind in XP, then I might run that PC through a quickie solo game, just to get them back up a bit.
For one-off absences, the PC is played by another player and get 1/2 XP. We have a group of 5, so if 1 or 2 is missing we go ahead, if 3 can't make it, the game is cancelled for the week (I don't want 2 players having to control 5 characters).
For longer absences, (like when new babies arrive) it depends. A less essential character is deemed to have walked away and will be back when the player can start making regular appearances again. However, there are exceptions. Currently the player who plays the only cleric in the group just had his first child, so I don't expect to see him for a while. But since we are playing Age of Worms, and it's suicide without a cleric (a Radiant Servant of Pelor to boot), I'm going to let someone play him as a 1/2 character until he gets back.
Greg
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We just assume s/he's back at the fort handling the care and feeding of the NPC troops quartered there. Or maybe had some business in town. Basically, we hand-wave it. We seldom have all the players show up at once. If someone is late, we treat the character's arrival as a deus ex machina.
When our cleric was out, the GM had one of the 1st level NPC fighters suddenly "get religion" and take a level in cleric. Therefore we survived. Our GM is nice that way. He really prefers to avoid killing characters if possible (but he won't fudge die rolls).
