What concerns me is all the people indicating that legitimate character deaths to be replaced with actual new characters ought to be brought in at lower levels and under geared. All that will lead to is more character deaths for the player. I dont think that is reasonable.
Why not? As long as the character can catch back up with the others it is the fairest way to set this up. It won't lead to more deaths if the GM is doing his job. Encounters should be balanced to the party... if the party APL drops so should the difficulty of what they face.
If people make a new character you could just dock the cost of a restoration and possibly a raise dead or resurrection spell from his wealth and recreate it with the same wealth, so the players can not cheese their way out off consequences of a bad roll or a poor decision.
This does not mean that it is ok to be a mean GM just a way to prevent people from shortcutting the roleplay experience, basically you should just step up and tell the players what you expect, then they can decide wether the players want to play in your games or wether you want to GM for them. I try for a good mix of happy player/ happy GM sometimes this means you have to be a bit flexible or a bit tougher to keep the game fun over the longer term.
I'd like to add that, and I might be wrong, the problem might be a lack of immersion for your players. If a GM tells me OOC that something is to handle is not a way to convince players to identify with the game and their characters like you seem to want them to, I might be reading too much into it but you might want to consider what you can do to improve their level of immersion. A GM approaching the game as an excercise in mathematics breeds that behaviour in their players as well.
Thanks for the input guys...and to answer some questions.
Case in point for the "Mega encounters"
Party, at that point 4th level average, encounters a group of rabid wolves (effectively Worgs). The worgs attack, taking out a couple horses. The Worgs stop to eat the horses as the party regroups and heals. I tell them that they can see what the forces of chaos are doing to the area..(ie plot device)...and that it's equally obvious that the wolves are hungry enough to ignore them if they don't engage again. I then point out Out of character that this isn't an encounter that they should engage on, but if they want to take the risk knowing that, I won't hold back and the dice will determine the outcome.
The party comes up with a plan, attacks, and two characters die. Those two characters come back with different characters...same level and XP with all new equipment.
Net net? Party gains a ton of experience for defeating a force significantly above their level, which included the people who died to get the xp.
So where is the risk?
Also, the permanent loss of stats was from 3.5 admittedly, as I foolishly allowed a deck of many things...players drew from it til they got bonuses or negatives. Those who got any negatives immediately created new characters.
Also, I've asked the players if they are ok with being captured and having to regain their equipment instead of death. The response was it would only be "fair" if I left all of their equipment next to where they were captured so they could keep going.
The logic of "death is punishment enough" has been used by my players, at which point I have to ask. If you can come back with the same stats, equipment, etc, and I as GM have to come up with a way for the party to accept you...how is death a punishment?
Right now I'm trying something new in that each player has 5 characters akin to a character tree. They can swap out characters to fit the role they'd like to play in a given scenario...but only in cities. However, if any single player runs through all 5 characters...the campaign is over.
I guess my main frustration is that IMO failure has penalties. Not saying those penalites should be punitive. But even a raise dead costs gold. And currently the choice has been raised, pun intended, as "I can lose money...or I can respawn and lose nothing...why would I use raise dead?".
The situation leaves me with a sense of futility. I can't put anything out there that the party can't defeat...because if they attempt to attack the gold dragon who wants to help...they die and respawn right back again...and potentially try the same thing a different way. And as none of them are willing to GM...
You HAVE to watch this clip from The Gamers: Dorkness Rising
http://youtu.be/GrtClLRyY0Y
Go to 2 minutes into the clip.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
What concerns me is all the people indicating that legitimate character deaths to be replaced with actual new characters ought to be brought in at lower levels and under geared. All that will lead to is more character deaths for the player. I dont think that is reasonable.
Why not? As long as the character can catch back up with the others it is the fairest way to set this up. It won't lead to more deaths if the GM is doing his job. Encounters should be balanced to the party... if the party APL drops so should the difficulty of what they face.
Aside from the fact that you dont actually catch up in the rules in xp. And short of metagame restrictions there is no way to catch up in gear (assuming rewards are split evenly among the party, what makes this the 'fairest' way to set it up? Why is it more fair for a player to come in at a lower level? Because they didnt have to work for their xp? But they did, as a player they played through whatever encounters everyone else did, the just had bad luck or made a bad choice or what have you and got themselves killed. What injustice is there in a character death that requires an evening of the scales with the new character being worse off then everyone else?
Not to mention that balancing for APL doesnt mean individual threats are balanced for individual players. If death is punished at coming in at a lower level then it is easy to have 2 or 3 level differences in the party. There is a huge difference between what is a reasonable thread for a 6th level character and a 3rd level character. So either the 3rd level character is facing an overly dangerous threat, or the 6th level character is unchallenged. And usually it will be the former, meaning the character will have a greater chance of death, which will just increase the problem.
Institute a "new characters only get 1st level character starting wealth, regardless of their level" policy and it'll sort itself out pretty quick.It certainly will, since every player who has a character die will quit the group.
I've played in more than one campaign with that policy on wealth.
I sincerely have tried and can't come up with a word that describes the people you must play with that isn't vulgar.
RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16
|
The party comes up with a plan, attacks, and two characters die.
That's the decision of your players, and the results of fate.
Those two characters come back with different characters...same level and XP with all new equipment.
That's your decision. You could have instructed them 1st-level PCs with starting wealth. Or you could have given each player a choice among the villagers from the most recent town they came across: "choose which one you want as your next PC, and we'll stat him or her up together."
But, yeah, let them know how you're handling it from here on.
--
I haven't explained how my last campaign handled PC replacements. They came in at 2 levels below the lowest surviving party member, but the other PCs could donate experience points (on a 1-will-get-you-5 scale) to help the new characters advance in level.
If somebody did something stupid to get hisself killed, people let his replacement start lower. If a player sacrificed his PC to win the day in dire straits, the rest of the party spent the xp to bring the new character in at party level.
I always try to run a game where death is a very real threat and taken very seriously. As such, in the last campaign I ran, I had a house rule of "New characters enter play one level behind the lowest level member of the party, or level 4, whichever is higher. New characters start at XP halfway to their next level." (Campaign started at level 1 but I advanced everyone to level 4 before the bulk of it.) When the campaign ended (because a couple of my players moved across the country to grad schools) the party was made up of one very weak level 9, two level 8s (one hit level 8 before the last session), and two level 7s. The two most powerful characters were a level 8 barbarian and a level 7 fighter. There were no deaths, but I didn't reward characters XP unless they participated in a fight so missing a session meant missing XP. I did have a couple characters come in a lower levels in that campaign, but one of them moved away before the campaign ended, and the other was just a "tourist" that another player brought along to a session.
This was in 3.5e though, and its XP system rewarded more XP to lower level characters in a party if they all overcame the same challenge, so it was actually possible for characters to gain on other characters in the party if they were lower level. Pathfinder awards flat XP regardless of level. The only way a character can hope to catch-up is because the levels become increasingly wider apart. So it's harder to catch-up in Pathfinder than in 3.5e because of the flat XP system.
In Pathfinder, I would recommend for the new character joining the party that you frame it as a rescue and he starts without gear so he has to use gear recovered from the fallen comrade. BUT... He gets what the party allows him, they get first looting privileges. After all, he wasn't there when their buddy died. Make sure you keep in mind that this is a new character in social interactions too. NPCs in town might begin to wonder where this endless flow of adventurers comes from.
I might also consider starting at character a level lower (middle XP for the level), but awarding 110% XP to that character until he caught up. That way the character still suffers a penalty but it's more temporary.
Or have all new characters join the game with two permanent negative levels, as though they had been the subject of Raise Dead. It can be removed with Restoration/Greater Restoration, but there's gold involved in that, and they have to find someone to do it. There's also a time issue if they use Restoration since it can only remove one negative level per week. (This is still cheaper than getting the previous character Raised since that also has a 5,000 gp material component plus the restoration cost.)
Have you seen The Gamers: Dorkness Rising? It's got a bard in it that keeps dying and the player just keeps bringing in another bard as a reskin of the first one.
Does imposing a penalty on a new character punish the player? Yes, to some extent. I always set-out to run a horror game though, and what good is a horror game when the players have no fear of character death? The only character death I had in my last campaign was at level 1 (we got to level 2 before I bumped everyone to level 4), and it was because I ran a module monster's tactics as written, but my players never forgot it. One of my players was fond of saying "You're out to kill us." His was the character that had died. I'd retort that I only tried to make it seem like I was out to kill them, and I'd prefer they lived, but I'd let the dice resolve it if it came to that.
The most important thing is to have a clear understanding with your players of what you both expect. In Heroes of Horror, for D&D 3.5e, there's a DM-Player contract that expresses exactly what the two parties should expect from the horror campaign, what the goals are and what the responsibilities of players and DM are to the campaign, and to each other. I think this is a great idea, for any kind of campaign. It's important for players and GM to have a basic common ground in a campaign, and having it clearly written out doesn't hurt at all. In my campaign, I expect character death to be significant. I'm upfront about that, and I'll write very clear penalties into the campaign rules so everyone else is clear about it too. If it's not what the players are looking for, I'm open to discussing a revision, but ultimately if they're looking for penalty-free death, they're not going to find it in my game and they might consider looking elsewhere. Their best solution is not to die. I want players to care about their characters. Having death be mechanically meaningful is one way of doing that. I also wrote in specific rules for switching characters without dying too because one of my players wanted to play a new character every week.
Fighter: "I use Slippers of Spider Climb and fight from the ceiling."
Barbarian: "I climb over the hut and jump on the monster." He missed and landed prone on the ground. "It gets an attack of opportunity if I stand up? I remain prone and fight from the ground."
Fighter: "OK, I go over the hut too and jump on it." He succeeds.
Barbarian: "So if I'm under it, and he's on it, do we get flanking bonus?"
Me, as DM: "No, not flanking but I'll give you a +2 circumstance bonus to attack anyway. Don't forget your penalties for being prone." (Neither of them were rogues so flanking or not was irrelevant to their concerns.)
Archivist: He makes his knowledge check and I tell him about the metal bull. "That's a gorgon! They have petrifying breath."
After moving out of range and discussing tactics, they got the archivist to cast Dark Way (from Spell Compendium) and went around the gorgon.
I put the NPC cleric under tactical control of one of my players: "We can't go back, there's a gorgon behind us, and this dragon is going to kill us if we keep fighting it. The cleric summons hippogriffs so we can fly away." (Luckily for them, I ran the dragon's tactics as written too, and it didn't give chase. It was faster than a hippogriff.)
One time they had to retreat through a two-way portal. The NPC cleric (while under my DM control) dragged the paralyzed and dying PC barbarian into the portal and the PC ranger dragged out the dying NPC ranger who was written in the adventure as being suicidal and charging head-first into battles. (The NPC ranger did die later though. They weren't sad to see him go when he bit it, as he seemed to have a death-wish that kept endangering them.)
On a side note, I also introduced Plot Twist cards to that campaign once I got them, and my players would look over their Plot Twist cards like they were holding four aces, even though, party combined, they only ever used one. (It caused an enemy NPC to fall down some stairs while bumbling after being blinded.)
Kolokotroni, Just give lower level people an XP boost. And they will catch back up. As for equipment...admittedly you need a certain kind of game for stuff to balance back out. But smart monsters will target the more dangerous character first. That tends to be the higher level people. Being lower level offers you a measure of safety from smart opponents.
Just be grateful the players haven't figured out that if there are no penalties for death they can make 16 characters and have the others loot the bodies as they commit suicide. Granting them near limitless wealth.
Kolokotroni, Just give lower level people an XP boost. And they will catch back up. As for equipment...admittedly you need a certain kind of game for stuff to balance back out. But smart monsters will target the more dangerous character first. That tends to be the higher level people. Being lower level offers you a measure of safety from smart opponents.
Just be grateful the players haven't figured out that if there are no penalties for death they can make 16 characters and have the others loot the bodies as they commit suicide. Granting them near limitless wealth.
Let set up a situation:
You have two targets attacking you -- one is tougher and will take longer to wipe out and one is weaker and will be wiped out faster. With both there they can assist each other in the form of flanking and teamwork bonuses -- which do you take out first?
The weaker one.
Example: two opponents 1 with 15 hp one with 25 hp for the sake of simplicity you deal 5 points of damage a hit.
If you kill the 25 hp one first:
attack take damage twice
attack take damage twice
attack take damage twice
attack take damage twice
attack take damage 1~2(depending on initiative)
attack take damage once
attack take damage once
attack take damage once
If you attack the 15 hp one first:
attack take damage twice
attack take damage twice
attack take damage 1~2(depending on intiative)
attack take damage once
attack take damage once
attack take damage once
attack take damage once
attack take damage once
If you hit the more dangerous one first you'll take 12~13 attacks on yourself, if you take out the 15 hp one you'll take 10~11 attacks on yourself.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
In my WoW Guild we used to "gobble up" other guilds regularly. And almost yearly we had a guild breakup where a bunch of people who were unhappy with how things were would leave taking a bunch more people with them and leave us stranded till we could get back on our feet.
My officers and I always scratched our heads and wondered why, after all the precautions we'd take learning from our history, why this kept happening. The answer was simple, we never learned from history. We kept implementing new ways to protect from the old happenings but we never SOLVED THE PROBLEM.
Step back and solve the problem. There IS a problem here, it's obvious. The players are obviously interested in a computer RPG scenario where respawn means "try it a different way". There's NOTHING WRONG WITH THIS KIND OF PLAY. Let me say it again just to make certain it's heard...there's NOTHING WRONG WITH THIS KIND OF PLAY.
It is NOT, however, standard "Table Top" methodology. All of the GMs on the boards suggesting penalties and restart restrictions are not seeing this from your player's perspective.
Your players seem to see an unwinnable encounter as a chance to "try again and get it right this time". It's MMORPG Raid mentality...if you do every action perfect and focus fire all your character's abilities in the right order, you will beat the encounter. If you don't, try again.
RPGs are played for the sense of accomplishment...whether online or tabletop, the idea is to create a persona and use that persona to accomplish a goal or task. It seems your players want their sense of accomplishment to come from progression and overcoming challenges while you are looking for maybe a better story? Either way you have a fundamental difference in your approach. Till you solve that all you're doing is putting unacceptable terms on your games that your players will either say "screw you, I'm not dealing with that" or will work around.
You are in a competitive "I'll do it my way, you find your way around it" relationship with your players at this point. No Play group can sustain this, because in the end either the players go far enough to ruin the DM's fun and he stops DMing, or the DM goes far enough out of frustration to ruin the player's fun and the players stop playing.
Solve the problem. If your players are interested in a more MMO Experience at your game, increase the difficulty by 2 or 3 CR above where your hard encounters are even RIGHT NOW, and let the players wipe 2 or 10 times banging their heads on how to beat it...when they do they feel accomplished and walk away with new loot to experience the next part of your campaign.
That said, this does have to be fun for you also. If that simply isn't the campaign you want to run, I'll be the 200th person in this thread to say it...talk to your players. If this isn't the game they want to play and it's not the campaign you want to run reboot...do something else.
There's a hundred different solutions you can apply here that equate to a compromise...you can agree that you will include some encounters they want if they'll try to play the game the way you want, you can come to terms with each other and agree on what they want in return what you want from the campaign and agree, again as friends, to make the game enjoyable for EVERYONE.
I fully believe, however that NO solution on this board that starts with "Just tell them" or "You're the DM" will work. Not on a long term.
If 10 years in an MMO has taught me anything it's that no one online feels any connection or compulsion to stick with anything they don't like. "Life is too short" should be the internet's motto. The moment you put a restriction into your campaign that your players aren't interested in your campaign will be over. No one on the internet accepts the "I'm the DM, it's my game, you'll do as I say" mentality.
Work it out, don't put arbitrary rules into your game to box in your players...from the sound of it that would only provide them more opportunities to "work around" you and your game needs for what they want.
OK, I have had the EXACT same problem with my players. Sometimes it's not
"why would I be $X behind other players" sometimes the party doesn't roll alot of useful gear, so when a character dies, he comes in at that level with everything they needed...or sometimes when a character, say a social rogue, is in a dungeoncrawl environment, he jumps headstrong into combat to die and create a fighter-type.
I have made it a solid rule in my games, seeing as how you can negate the negative level penalty by using restoration spells...If you want to create a new character, then you come in at one level lower than the average party level. if they are 1st level, you come in with a -2con.
much to the same effect that AD&D 2nd edition did with dieing. The players should feel SOMETHING for their characters....the loss of a 12th level character they have built backstory on since 1st level should have more impact than...oh well time to roll up a new guy to kick it with you adventurers, ext.
keeps the RP up as well as making the players connect with their characters.
What are plot twist cards? Something you made up or something real?
|
There is a way to prevent this behavior which doesn't require replacement characters being lower level. Several recommendations:
-Any new character made while an active one still lives starts out 1 level lower (or less 1 level's worth of XP).
-Don't kill off characters as punishment, inflict "worse than death," "semi-permanent effects," or have the party captured as punishment.
-Replacement characters start at same level with reduced equipment or none at all. Have the new character rescued from being an enemy prisoner, naked with nothing.
I do agree with Abraham's post regarding player and GM expectations being important; however, I've rarely heard of roleplaying examples as bad as in the OP's post.
It seems to me that there is a difference between player and GM expectations. It also seems that is has been this way for a while. I think it will be too difficult to backflip on this. I think the OP may need to let it run its course, and see if they start to fear death when they have used up 4 or their 5 characters.
Alternatively, admit that as GM you are not enjoying the campaign and would like to start a new one (and I'd suggest making it a very different campaign) or let one of the players run one for a while.
Our local group has very recently had a big fall out regarding different expectations of the campaign. Some of us players have left the group because of it.
Step back and solve the problem. There IS a problem here, it's obvious. The players are obviously interested in a computer RPG scenario where respawn means "try it a different way". There's NOTHING WRONG WITH THIS KIND OF PLAY. Let me say it again just to make certain it's heard...there's NOTHING WRONG WITH THIS KIND OF PLAY.
It is NOT, however, standard "Table Top" methodology. All of the GMs on the boards suggesting penalties and restart restrictions are not seeing this from your player's perspective.
I enjoyed reading this perspective - I've never thought of things that way before. It is, however, something that I don't really enjoy about computer based RPGs, but I am not going to criticise anyone over that.
As Illydyth goes on to say, so long as GM and Player expectations are the same, this could be a great way to play Pathfinder.
When a PC "respawns" in my game, and in most I've played over the years, they are significantly lower level than the rest of the party. I don't have an issue with them making virtually the same character, but they will be at minimum 2/3 the level they were before the death. Up until level 5, you restart as a level 1 scrub, somewhere around 8 I let them start at 3, 10 at 6 etc... It seems harsher than it actually is, and I'll break down in my opinion why I think it isn't all that tough:
1) You are going to catch up to everyone else fairly quickly . A level 1 character in a group of 5s will catch back up at about level 6, and the same is pretty much true all the way up the scale.
2) It reinforces the idea that you shouldn't just charge into every situation Guns-A-Blazin' because when you first "respawn," in most cases you are more fragile than everyone else.
3) It may or may not even matter, but I feel like I'm cheating all of the people at the table who consistently show off their self preservation instinct by not running blindly into everything and keeping their characters alive.
With that said, the GM has to make clear the type of game they are running. Some people do not take kindly to games where there is any real threat of failure. There is a universal unspoken truth about the majority of rpg gaming that, if said, would go something like "the players are going to progressively overcome more and more serious threats and levels of Epicness". The problem is that a small minority of players take this to mean that they will never, ever get a come uppance. I am not in the camp of players that thinks it's good to be a meat grinding, teeth gnashing tyrant of a GM (except in very specific, generally one shot situations that the players buy into) that is constantly throwing the spiked gauntlet at the group, but I also don't agree with the idea that the game should be all about how the PCs just can't lose. Please, point out where the fun is for Most People in either of those extremes? I don't want to play long in a game where we always win or lose, and I sure as hell don't want to run either game for more than a night or two disconnected from the main game.
Have a talk with the players explaining where you're coming from. I think that imposing a discouraging rule at the table to force them into something other than they want to play is a little heavy handed and ultimately unnecessary if you just talk about the issues you're having. If they don't get it through talking, or maybe one of the less authoritarian suggestions in this thread, then slap on the chameleon clause that you suggested. Or just nuke the whole campaign and start from scratch...
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I think part of getting people to accept character death is keeping the dead PC as part of the game world.
They will be buried with proper rites. NPCs will inquire as to the missing PC. (good and bad intentions)
Perhaps the party will seekout the PC´s heirs/family. Future encounters will remind them of the PC in some way.
The PCs can invoke the memory of their fallen comrades where appropriate.
With all of this, players can feel that the death of the PC was MEANINGFUL, which is the main difference with the ´respawn´ player mentality which treats PC death as a meaningless speed-bump (with whatever minor mechanical penalties apply).
If stories of the brave death of the PC continue as a point of the game, players don´t feel like it was a failing of THEM as players when their PC dies. Spectacular deaths can and should be scattered along the adventure path of a band of heroes.
How to prevent player respawn
Laugh at the player loudly and ask what they are really going to play.
If they repeat themselves, stare. Repeat yourself slowly.
If they do not renege, it is now acceptable to honor kill them.
Another option (if you have players that are receptive to it, which from the sounds of things you may not) is to give individual characters interesting/unique things going on in the story. If a character dies, that stuff dies with them and it will take a while for a replacement character to get that kind of side story going.
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Institute a "new characters only get 1st level character starting wealth, regardless of their level" policy and it'll sort itself out pretty quick.
Even setting new recruits two levels back and making them use the NPC wealth table instead of the PC WBL table should be a sufficient bitter pill to swallow if the rest of the PCs are at WBL (and are higher level). (That won't weed out all of them. I'm infamous for my 'alt-itis,' and will happily play something lower-level and less wealthy, if it gets me out of playing a character I've gotten tired of...)
I tend to avoid doing things to mess up the characters without providing in-game methods of getting around them. (So, if there's level draining or ability drain or a blindness spell or bestow curse effect, the party will be able to pay for a restoration or whatever, in town.)
Role-players and roll-players *both* design their characters the way they are for a reason, and arbitrarily changing their PC, whether aesthetically or mechanically, can prompt them to lose interest and want to play something else. It's kind of the whole point of allowing them to design and build their own characters, after all, instead of forcing them to play pregens.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I agree with what Abraham was saying, you and your players have different expectations.
My personal opinion is that new characters (whether due to character death, or the introduction of a new player) should be on equal standing to the current characters. Make them too weak, and you diminish the fun they have in encounters (unless they have fun by being weaker...masochists).
Sometimes I get tired of the character I've been playing. Maybe I feel he has accomplished his goals and would at this point retire. Maybe the character simply no longer clicks with me. I've had fun with that character, but now I want a change. I'm going to tell the DM that I want to retire the character and make a new one.
I like to keep everyone at the same level and approximate wealth because it's more fun for me as a player when everyone has equal potential, and it's easier to balance encounters as a GM.
(As a side note: I do find it weird if players roll the same character twice. I don't mean they roll that character after dying. I mean if they ever roll him again in any campaign. I never go back to my old characters after they've had their chance at glory. But if players reroll the same character after death, they clearly want resurrection without cost. Again, a problem with player/GM expectations, and it's a matter of having fun. It's a different atmosphere, not power level (unless they resurrect mid-combat, which no one is suggesting)).
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
FYI on the Worg encounter I described. The Paladin of the group charged the "rustling in the bushes with the yellow reflected eyes staring back".
As they engaged, the worgs killed 1 horse, and 1 riding dog....who had no other equipment on them. So while admittedly they did lose a couple hundred gold in mounts...it was hardly a tragic loss of equipment.
This difficulty has been an ongoing discussion with the group, and one member in particular who described how a "perfect" game would be in terms of MMORPGs. In any case, I discussed it again and in the middle of the continuation of that argument, one of the players apparently translated what I was saying (I swear it sounded like the exact same words) and suddenly there was an epiphany from the loudest detractor.
So...long and short...death is painful once more, and equipment loss happens. However, for those players who have lost eqiupment/experience, they have the option of a "side quest" to regain the lost exp and equipment that is tailored to the specific character history.
Which gives more storyline for the party, and allows more capacity for building of the party loyalty.
Thank you all for your suggestions and thoughts!
Coriolis, it sounds like you get the main idea across, and I hope it continues to work out!
I think if players see they will be rewarded for more than just killing stuff and taking loot, they'll definitely remain on board. Good luck!
I played in a campaign from 1-20 with a very in depth story line in a very brutal setting. The GM was not forgiving. In the end my character ended up being feared so much because the GM popped a few dominate persons on my character and I slaughtered most of the party a couple of times. Ever since then, when he wants to convey a very dangerous foe, he uses my miniature to convey the idea that they will die. This method ended up being more of a preventative measure to get his point across.
I also dealt with a person who tried to recycle characters and I ended up just telling him that I would not allow any character class/concept to be reused and he would have to choose another class altogether. I also put in the caveat that he would be one level lower than the lowest level character and that he would have no magic items and have to rely on the kindness of the party to supply him.
Yeah it's always dependent on things of course -- however with some of the more... extreme suggestions coming in this thread it is something that I would expect a BBEG to pick up on and inform his minions of.
Item loss is a bit more of an odd thing to me... but on a few points I could understand... like a legacy item or something -- typically I'm willing to give a character a 'special item pass' that pretty much states I'm not going to permanent break/whatever the special special item.
In our games, it doesn't matter if the APL was 15th level or 5th level, if your character dies, the body gets looted then burned or buried. Occassionally, reincarnation is permitted, with the understanding that there is no guarantee you come back there is no guarantee that you will be humanoid...we use the 2E DnD Reincarnation table.
Occassionally, we allow respec at the levels in which you gain an extra attack - swapping out feats ONLY.
There are others. Our groups philosophy is that we are adventurers, we risk life and limb for an extraordinary pay out. Death happens. Regardless, you are still flesh and blood, human, elf, dwarf, etc. with the only thing seperating us from the rest of the peasants is the measure of insanity that is required to face the crap that adventurers face. Contrary to the bulk of the gaming public, we are not heroes, we are people looking to make a substantial amount of coin in the fastest amount of time, maybe garner some fame in the process.
TO new gamers entering the group, we always hit them with the following: Your character isn't a hero, he's just a 'man' that travels and risk death for a big reward. If you want a game to where your character is hero then play M&M, Marvel, DC Heroes or some other super - HERO type game.
Let set up a situation:
You have two targets attacking you -- one is tougher and will take longer to wipe out and one is weaker and will be wiped out faster. With both there they can assist each other in the form of flanking and teamwork bonuses -- which do you take out first?
The weaker one.
The error in your logic is that you are thinking as an individual and assuming the lower level guy with poorer equipment is tossing out the same DPS as his higher level buddy. If two bad guys attack and one is doing 30 points while the other is doing 17 points, trust me you would be foolish to attack the weaker one first. You would as a team eliminate the guy tossing around 30 point hits first. If your team concentrates on one guy then that guy will go down quickly.
if you do not want your players to act in this manner tell them that everytime they die or reroll a character, they take an xp and gp penalty. Then dying has an actual negative impact on them.Good suggestion.
I was going to suggest requiring them to make a completely different character the next time. ie New house rule to promote variety: Nobody can play two characters in a row of the same class.
This is basically what my group does, we all agreed that when we die we are not allowed to play the same class as the previous character (tho if the new character dies we can go back to the original class but none of us are willing to abuse this). We also have the character start at the minimum xp for the APL so if the party consisted of 3 level 4's and a level 5, and someone dies then the new character would be at the minimum xp for level 4. They would also start with average character wealth and be able to spend it how they please at the beginning so long as it isn't crazy like all gp on 1 weapon.
And to the OP I'd say for the loss of an item, tell the players no. A character isn't entitled to their items and don't deserve to get them back without some valid explanation as to how they did so simply because they were reckless and were unable to judge the level of threat. And as I see it losing an item or character life is a risk that is taken with any decision a character makes unless they decide to just sleep and eat all day.
~Aod43254
The error in your logic is that you are thinking as an individual and assuming the lower level guy with poorer equipment is tossing out the same DPS as his higher level buddy. If two bad guys attack and one is doing 30 points while the other is doing 17 points, trust me you would be foolish to attack the weaker one first. You would as a team eliminate the guy tossing around 30 point hits first. If your team concentrates on one guy then that guy will go down quickly.
Let set up a situation:
You have two targets attacking you -- one is tougher and will take longer to wipe out and one is weaker and will be wiped out faster. With both there they can assist each other in the form of flanking and teamwork bonuses -- which do you take out first?
The weaker one.
You are incorrect in calling it an error in logic (as the logic is sound even if the knowledge of the numbers behind the variables is lacking). It's all a math function with four variables -- damage of strong man, damage of weak man, time to drop strong man, time to drop weak man.
Variables:
t = time to drop the weaker opponent
z = time to drop stronger opponent
x = damage of stronger opponent
y = damage of weaker opponent
Is t(x+y)+zx greater than z(x+y)+ty?
Many times you'll be able to drop the weaker of the two in a single round, especially if he's hurting for equipment too. In which case you are stupid to not do so since if you attack the stronger first you are taking damage you don't have to the entire time you are fighting him + 1 round (the round to drop the weaker).
Mathematically I am not incorrect, we simply don't have enough knowledge of the exact numbers to predict when which is better. My experience has been it's easier, faster and more productive to stop the extra damage you don't need to take first and then drop the strong man.
Honestly since I've provided the formulas feel free to set up the ranges if you want.
|
If this is a home game (especially one run at his house), the the GM's desire for what he considers most enjoyable in his campaign trumps anything any individual player wants. A disgruntled player can be replaced. A disgruntled GM stops GMing."As a GM I sometimes simply kill the players when they move to engage when they shouldn't -- now I'm upset that they still want to play the same character in the same campaign and I've not provided a way for that to happen, so they simply reskin the character and play them again."
I'm sorry I'm seeing a disconnect here between what you are doing and what you are expecting as a GM.
Your players are explicitly telling you what they want -- to continue playing their current character so make it possible without respawning.
When in doubt give them what they want -- much like a GM they'll find a means of getting it anyways.
This isn't anything to do with the game and everything to do with mismatched expectations and miscommunication.
Don't you need to approve the new character before it comes in? You're the GM here, tell them no new characters unless theirs is dead.Well, it is easy enough to "accidentally" commit suicide in an RPG.
And if they do die and make a new character, put them at a lower level so they have to catch up.
Make dying a bad thing.
The problem with the "catching up" theory is that it's a holdover from D&D 2nd's exponential XP leveling mechanic.
In Pathfinder practice, you can't catch-up in any meaningful sense if you start back any significant number of levels, which means you're weak meat at the table (especially if you're a caster) and are going to suck-suck-suck endlessly unless the adventure is almost pure roleplay -- and given that the OP's players are already desiring to reboot after losing equipment, that implies a combat-heavy campaign in which PCs must constantly be on top of their game.
= = = = = =
Simple mechanisms to prevent 1) "one-trick pony" characters (i.e., the types that are instantly nerfed if they lose their Big Ticket Item piece of equipment), and 2) character-churning.
1) Create plot-lines whose missions not only require teamwork to survive, but which will be judged partial-failures if they lose men while doing so. I.e., rewards are lower, other mercenary guilds diss your "performance-rating" and trash your reputation, etc.
2) Replacement characters come in at the same level and WBL, but are saddled with the following rules:
a. Cannot be the same theme (archer/melee/face/caster/"critter-guy"/) as the previous.
b. Have "lowest rank" in the party, and that means everybody in the party, including side-kicks. If there's a pile of potatoes that needs peeling or a latrine that needs digging, you're doing it -- and magic ain't allowed during the "intro hazing" period (which will last several adventures minimum).
"Oh, you're really tough, eh? Excellent! That means you should be able to peel potatoes AND dig latrines without becoming fatigued, right? Man, are we lucky to have you along! Here's a dagger and a shovel; get to work."
c) Require all full-BAB melee builds to have Quick Draw on or before 7th level, and own at least three +1 weapons of different types.
"Sorry, but the Black Company doesn't hire 'one-trick ponies' -- we don't care how good you are if you don't have a back-up plan."
Mike Schneider has some good suggestions that i agree with as well. though i would also require a minimum initial personal reserve of 2,000 gold in diamonds. those things are used in a lot of cleric spells.
OK; I think it is poor form for players to ´re spawn´ clones of their dead PCs,
mostly because it strongly indicates a lack of dedication to real role-playing vs. a videogame mentality,
but assuming you DO want to allow this sort of thing, the question becomes:
OK, there apparently IS a bunch of NPCs walking around who happen to be totally identical to your PC. So what is stopping you from meeting these guys BEFORE said PC dies? Running into exact clones, with exact PC stats and gear, etc, who may or may not be allies or enemies (depending on situation) is the sort of thing to hilight the world-consistency and believability problems that come with ´style´ of play. Role-playing, the PCs back-story can be brought up for some reason, and the NPC would respond ´OH MY GOD! MY LIFE IS JUST LIKE YOURS!!!´ ...repeat that a couple of times, and the world-consistency situation should be clear to everybody involved.
...It sounds like thru talking it out, you guys came to your own solution that keeps everybody happy, so good on you! :-)
I think part of it is that each player can enjoy the story as a whole, independently of the power-level, etc, of their PC. That means that if their PC is under-power, that can be part of the story... Immediately returning to optimal power-point, with identical (optimal) build is less of an issue than story continuity. Sure, the player may still not want to play ´the weakling character´, but when the power of the story is the main thing, each person involved (players and GM) wants to see how they can best further the story, rather than shove that aside solely in the interest of how many big numbers are on their character sheet.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
If this is a home game (especially one run at his house), the the GM's desire for what he considers most enjoyable in his campaign trumps anything any individual player wants. A disgruntled player can be replaced. A disgruntled GM stops GMing.
Good he was a crap GM if he doesn't consider his player's needs/wants as important or considers himself somehow superior simply by playing a different role in a game.
His needs/wants aren't any more important -- your position in a game doesn't affect your position in life and that position is equal to not greater than any other player of the same game.
A GM is just a player in a different seat.
...You have two targets attacking you -- one is tougher and will take longer to wipe out and one is weaker and will be wiped out faster...Hold on. How do I know which one is the tougher opponent just by looking at 'em?
Situationally ;D
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Don't you need to approve the new character before it comes in? You're the GM here, tell them no new characters unless theirs is dead.
Not really, not if the GM has a decent sense motive anyway.
Not attacking a PC is an option. Jumping off a cliff will have you caught in midair by your "guardian angel". You go do stab yourself and the weapon blinks out before it makes contact. You try to starve yourself to death, but you never lose weight for some reason. ETC....
What's with all the childishness? It sounds a lot of the groups discussed here are younger then me, even if you add up all their ages.
Let me solve all your problems:
GM: Passive aggressive punishments for dead characters are sillier than Monty Python films, and those are supposed to be silly. The guy's character has died, adding insult to injury by giving him less XP or GP is just sadism.
Players: Retiring characters for trivial matters? Grow up. I mean, if your character is killed when he's level 4, and someone offers you a raise dead but you refuse because you don't want to run around with 2 permanent negative levels you cannot afford to get rid or(as you have a quarter of the money you are supposed to have according to the guidelines), as this is a ticking time bomb, then it's okay. Lost your magical backup weapon +1 at level 14? Not so much.
Everyone: Stop complaining behind each others' backs, sit your backsides down at the same table and discuss the situation.
Impossible encounters? They're fine as long as the group can still flee from it, and the players have a chance to find out they're in over their head, and you make sure beforehand that in such cases you won't put on the kid gloves, and we're not talking about something they have to beat for the story to continue.
Putting policies in place to prevent an endless string of new characters? Sure! I do it myself. The important thing is to make this clear beforehand and have everyone acknowledge it before the first session.
And remember you're not a bunch of machines. This doesn't have to be a ruling full of technicalities people can then exploit with impunity.
Allow them one redo - either introducing a new character or recreating the old one. Beyond that, minor tweaks are okay, too, as long as they get the GM's approval. Stuff like switching a feat or spell because you never used the old one, anyway.
This does not apply to new characters because the old one has died. This stuff happens. It's a dice game. In that case, you get a new character, of course, with no passive-aggressive downsides. Old power level and wealth.
Of course, if it is clear that the old character became suicidal because the player wanted to circumvent the consistency rules, the deal is off. In such a case, I suggest a good old Code Red to get the player back in line.
Seriously, people: You're supposed to be friends, or at least reasonable people.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
The problem with the "catching up" theory is that it's a holdover from D&D 2nd's exponential XP leveling mechanic.
As opposed to Pathfinder's exponential XP leveling mechanic?
In Pathfinder practice, you can't catch-up in any meaningful sense if you start back any significant number of levels[..]
A level 1 character joining a level 5 party will be behind by 10,000 experience points (on the fast chart). By the time the rest of the party reaches level 8, the lagging character will be level 7. How is that not catching up?
