This is not a GM vs Player thread. This is a GM'ing discussion thread.
Specifically, I want to talk about how do you determine bad things that happen to the players, but make those bad things interesting and fun for the players without seeming like you're just arbitrarily punishing them, or creating busy work for them to deal with.
Background: in most stories, movies/books/tv shows, bad things happen to the heroes. This is what makes their struggle feel like a struggle, instead of just a lazy Sunday afternoon reading the paper. Even a story of hyper competence (ex: Taken, Mission Impossible), the heroes don't just face challenges, but set backs as well. I enjoy this in stories, and when done well, I enjoy it in my RPG's as well.
The difficulty I face is sometimes these set backs feel like arbitrary decisions by the GM, or the make a previous scene feel irrelevant.
One method I try to use to avoid both of those issues, is to talk to the players. I ask them questions during the scene and tell them things so that they know what is going on. I might ask a player "What stops you from catching the thief as they get away with the MacGuffin?", the player gets to describe what happens as is appropriate to their character. Sometimes it's something from their background or personality, other times it's a moment of slapstick, but it lets the player take ownership of that information so that it becomes something significant and appropriate to them.
I'd love to hear other methods GM's use to do horrible things to their PC's, but keep their players coming back for more.
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I make regular use of the critical hit and fumble decks, and have consulted the 1000 resurrection mishaps thread when a player character has returned from the dead more than once.
Where would I find the resurrection mishap chart? Not exactly my cup of tea, but I have a group that would love it.
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It's not a chart so much as a thread of contributed ideas.
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I let the bad things happen naturally. If the PCs make bad decisions then they know at my table they will have to live with it. They usually do their homework and weigh the risks before doing so.
If you are talking about "rocks fall you lose a leg" as being some type of plot mover or story enhancer then no I don't do things like that.
I let the bad things happen naturally. If the PCs make bad decisions then they know at my table they will have to live with it. They usually do their homework and weigh the risks before doing so.
Cool, how do you determine what those consequences are? Do you have a method or just always by the seat of your pants? Have you had negative consequences that became mood killers, or others that got the players thinking about how to tackle the next part that really got them into the spirit of it?
lol I have a tendency to maim and beat up my players pretty badly, usually nothing too permanent I just have a flare for the dramatic when it comes to having big things throw them though walls.
I have done a few particularly brutal things, though for the most part I do my best to not make it too debilitating for them, and then tend not to mind for the most part. Most recently I had a lich pop the eyes of one of my players after slamming him against the wall, (player failed a save against the lich's paralyzing touch and a blindness spell) Player actually is really into it , working to build it into his character.
I only had one player that ever really had a problem and honestly his was a bit of a rage issue, He had been hit in the chest by a bone spike launched from a demon, Failed his strenth check to pull it out, and then started freaking out how his character was now completely useless and tore up his sheet right then and there..... note that I had not mentioned any debilitating effects of being stabbed with this spike, he just needed a higher roll to pull it out O.o, of course this is the same player who after a bit of bad choices and bad rolls one game ended up dying twice in one session, literally threw a book at me in a rage and I had to kick him out of the house.
My players know that generally if I mess them up I'll do something to balance it out so it's mostly just a flavour issue.
lol I have a tendency to maim and beat up my players pretty badly, usually nothing too permanent I just have a flare for the dramatic when it comes to having big things throw them though walls.
I have done a few particularly brutal things, though for the most part I do my best to not make it too debilitating for them, and then tend not to mind for the most part. Most recently I had a lich pop the eyes of one of my players after slamming him against the wall, (player failed a save against the lich's paralyzing touch and a blindness spell) Player actually is really into it , working to build it into his character.
I only had one player that ever really had a problem and honestly his was a bit of a rage issue, He had been hit in the chest by a bone spike launched from a demon, Failed his strenth check to pull it out, and then started freaking out how his character was now completely useless and tore up his sheet right then and there..... note that I had not mentioned any debilitating effects of being stabbed with this spike, he just needed a higher roll to pull it out O.o, of course this is the same player who after a bit of bad choices and bad rolls one game ended up dying twice in one session, literally threw a book at me in a rage and I had to kick him out of the house.
My players know that generally if I mess them up I'll do something to balance it out so it's mostly just a flavour issue.
yeah, that guy's gotta go.
In a current CoC campaign an investigator was rolled up with a Dexterity of 3. The first thing that popped into mind was "ok, how does this guy even walk from point A to point B without falling down and busting his face on stuff?"
The answer of course is "DEX x20" in d% when in stressful circumstances (such as getting stabbed). His Dodge started at 75%, so that investigator's Dodge ability was not skill so much as his own two left feet saving him time and again in clumsy fashion.
Naturally, when the time came to escape Baba Yaga's Hut from Crone and Daughter ... his two left feet betrayed him... tsk tsk. ^_____^
I'm with Pan, on just letting things happen as they will. I mean yes it's a game that we are playing for fun. But at the same time we all want some realism involved. So if they happen to make bad choices, then they know that they will have to deal with what ever happens.
I'm not saying, that you should go after them with a vengeance, but there has to be consequences for our actions.
I'm with Pan, on just letting things happen as they will. I mean yes it's a game that we are playing for fun. But at the same time we all want some realism involved. So if they happen to make bad choices, then they know that they will have to deal with what ever happens.
I'm not saying, that you should go after them with a vengeance, but there has to be consequences for our actions.
Cool, how do you determine what those consequences are? Do you decide what they are before hand, or in the moment?
Are there certain kinds of consequences you have found work better than others? Have there been times when the consequences have turned out to be really memorable and really enhanced the game?
I'm with Pan, on just letting things happen as they will. I mean yes it's a game that we are playing for fun. But at the same time we all want some realism involved. So if they happen to make bad choices, then they know that they will have to deal with what ever happens.
I'm not saying, that you should go after them with a vengeance, but there has to be consequences for our actions.Cool, how do you determine what those consequences are? Do you decide what they are before hand, or in the moment?
Are there certain kinds of consequences you have found work better than others? Have there been times when the consequences have turned out to be really memorable and really enhanced the game?
In the moment. Planning it out beforehand is fairly obvious to the players,believe it or not. The PC should feel like he is experiencing a bout of bad luck, not that you have it out for him or anything like that.
In the moment. Planning it out beforehand is fairly obvious to the players,believe it or not. The PC should feel like he is experiencing a bout of bad luck, not that you have it out for him or anything like that.I'm with Pan, on just letting things happen as they will. I mean yes it's a game that we are playing for fun. But at the same time we all want some realism involved. So if they happen to make bad choices, then they know that they will have to deal with what ever happens.
I'm not saying, that you should go after them with a vengeance, but there has to be consequences for our actions.Cool, how do you determine what those consequences are? Do you decide what they are before hand, or in the moment?
Are there certain kinds of consequences you have found work better than others? Have there been times when the consequences have turned out to be really memorable and really enhanced the game?
I don't disagree with you. I would love to hear a more in depth explanation though. This is why several of my posts are full of questions, I'm curious what other people think about the topic and I'm trying to solicit responses that aren't just hand waiving.
Regale us with a story of when you doled out bad consequences to the players and everyone had an awesome time. Or maybe a time you were a player and something bad happened to your character, but you thought it was awesome (either in the moment or in hindsight).
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I have been playing for quite a while now. I consider bad things happening to my character to be more or less their own reward. See, if the DM tells you "The old witch curses you!", that is a request for me to deal with it, and an assignment of character focus for me. Take Geordi la Forge in STtNG. Of the episodes I saw, I only ever saw one focused on him. Then it was back to "generally helpful cardboard guy". Understand this: the DM giving you screen time is THE BEST THING you could ask for, and Bad Things happening to your character is the best way to get it.
Okay, I'll try to move this forwards a little.
I was playing a cleric of the law and order type god in our homebrew setting. My domains were Community and Protection. We were hunting a villain who liked hunting clerics and murdering them, he kept their holy symbols as trophies. The party decided I should act as bait and I agreed. Unfortunately it was less a trap for the villain and more a trap for me. My holy symbol was tattooed on my eyelid, a sort of "the god is always watching you" motif.
The party got me raised. We organized a second effort and finally killed the bad guy (a third time, once while he was alive, second time he was undead, but he came back lich style). Since I was playing a low Dex cleric, ranged attacks weren't my style, so I asked the GM if I could just play with one eye and no penalties. It was more style, otherwise I would have just paid for the Regeneration.
Something bad happened to me with a chance of redemption. The penalties were temporary, or the GM and player came to an understanding.
One thing I have adopted for this is from the FATE rpg system. ASPECTS. These are character flaws that complicate their lives.
The dm invokes this aspet in a situation he thinks is appropriate. Something like 'Uncage the Beast' for a barbarian. He has a terrible temper and when he sees a slight, he rages and smashes. Well, maybe the party is in delicate negotiations with a hostile king. He makes insulting remarks, dm invokes the barbarian aspect, and the barbarian decides how he is going to complicate his life with it. He gets a hero point (or some other bonus) for his trouble, and the dm and player work together to tell the story of how the barbarian snaps, and throws a punch at the king, ending up in a dungeon, or on the run from the law.
The key here is there is tangible reward for the bad thing happening to the player, AND the dm gives some narrative control (but not the final say) in how the bad thing plays out. More and more I am leaning towards this kind of collective storytelling in my game and I think it works well to avoid dm vs player attitudes.
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Here's an example I used in my game IT.
An LG fighter in my group has a sword that is designed to kill shape changers and lycanthropes. Both take tremendous damage when hit by it, and it may force shape changers to switch back into their true forms (not lycanthropes though). The sword can also change its size upon command (dagger to two handed sword) and has a few moon magic related powers, etc.
This blade glows a silvery hue when shape shifters or shifted lycanthropes are around, and the character has had a few run ins with lycanthropes.
In one instance he killed a friendly who was a werewolf - actually the guy was not evil yet and he sort of suicided on his sword. The whole experience left the player very shaken - he liked the npc, they suspected that something was wrong with him (not lycanthropy). That situation occurred when they were taking out a cabal of werewolf druids (and getting injured - not bitten), the NPC in question being turned earlier by the druid who ran the cabal.
After all that mayhem and intensity I assigned him a no-benefit trait.
Mark of the Beast (from a bad claw scar on his chest and neck that he received during that scenario). Now lycanthropes can detect him at a distance and they know (in human or other form) that he has a powerful weapon that can hurt him. They will probably go after him first instead of other available targets if possible.
The player’s response to being saddled with a non-benefit trait:
"Bring it"
I love actual gaming examples Auxmaulous! That ones really cool too.
The PC lost a friend and it hurt. You helped him give the pain a name and it kind sounds like he used it to help focus/define his PC even further. Very cool.
A quote from the publisher of FATE and many other games:
A character sheet is a love letter to the GM.
I like to find things out about characters that the player finds interesting. I look for things to attack or threaten, to give the player a reason to go forth with the story. Not everyone likes that, but I tend towards players who do.
One game I play has the players choose from 6 pasts. They're all vague, but one is called The Mourner. Something bad has happened to someone or something the character loves and they feel sad about it. Usually it's about a family member that has died.
The scenario of that game is usually against Odin, who has the Einherjar, the honored and valiant dead. If I can work the dead family member in as a member of the Einherjar I do so shamelessly. The PC's are supposed to hate Odin and try to kill him, so anything I can do to make him more despicable. I even make it one of Odin's attacks (in that game, wounds of the spirit are often more grave than wounds of the flesh).
That's an example of how I like doing something bad to a PC that helps build a connection between them and the encounter that is happening. I don't use it all the time, or repeat it with the same players, but it works quite well in my experience (when you have players into that kind of thing).
I make regular use of the critical hit and fumble decks, and have consulted the 1000 resurrection mishaps thread when a player character has returned from the dead more than once.
Returning wrong is great. I had one game where they needed to make sacrifices of appropriate hit die to get someone back. Demons man. If they didn't pay the piper, they came back as Evil Dead, and needed to kill and devour hearts until the balance was paid. Incredibly powerful possessed monsters.
Pretty cool, they once raised a char which tore and ate the heart out of another character while the rest looked on terrified. Then the eater was fine, freed from the bargain, but still dripping blood from the mouth (but the heart disappeated into a mouth portal to hell).
Pretty cool.
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I'm with Pan, on just letting things happen as they will. I mean yes it's a game that we are playing for fun. But at the same time we all want some realism involved. So if they happen to make bad choices, then they know that they will have to deal with what ever happens.
I'm not saying, that you should go after them with a vengeance, but there has to be consequences for our actions.Cool, how do you determine what those consequences are? Do you decide what they are before hand, or in the moment?
Are there certain kinds of consequences you have found work better than others? Have there been times when the consequences have turned out to be really memorable and really enhanced the game?
Depends on the game. If the story involves werewolves or cthulhu baddies you can bet there are going to be some unpleasantness ahead. I tend to plant things and if the PCs proceed without caution or the dice fall against them, "dems da breaks." Key is to not make something terrible happen without any way for the PC to avoid it from happening even if that chance is slim.
I usually don't plan on it happening and definitely fly by the seat of my pants going forward once it happens. Once something is established though I include it in the plans going forward often times working behind the scenes with the PC. If players start investing considerable time and resources to get out; I'll let them. Clearly they don't want to play it out. Fortunately for me, my players usually consider these things to be opportunities for fun RP.
Game I am running currently had werewolves in it. A couple of PCs got bit. They didn't know they were infected right away. Each night they started having dreams about being an animal. Had a hilarious scene where the cleric was running like a dog in her sleep when the rogue came to wake her for her watch. One morning some NPCs wanted to do a wolf search and started cutting everyone's hand with a silver dagger. The cleric and Magus rolled well to hide the intense and surprising pain that resulted from the check. Once they realized they were infected they tried to hide it. This was a lot of fun to RP.
Eventually the PCs met a pack leader who outed them. He explained exactly what they had to look forward to once they turned. (No first full moon yet since infected.) After discussing it as a group they decided to get rid of the curse instead of trying to live with it. In exchange for helping the pack leader he helped them get rid of the curse.
Last thing I want to mention is to be careful with really debilitating consequences. If you have a ranger built for range combat lose a hand don't make him wait 4 levels that way until he can get his hand back. Some might say this is being a push over GM but nobody wants their characters main draw taken away for considerable time. Especially if nobody else has any such drawback in the group. Give the player some options don't sandbag them.
I still like to kill pcs with a trap once in a while (or have it be very very close), adds some of the old spice into the game.
I think it really depends on your players. My players are pretty cool, and I guess trust me not to just screw them over arbitrarily.
Likewise, my current character in a pbp Wheel of Time game just got severed - that is, he's an arcane caster who has suddenly been basically permanently cut off from the source of his magic. Major bummer. All he can do he is Intimidate people. It was brutal, unexpected, and rather arbitrary. But, I can definitely see the potential for a great story, and I'm actually looking forward to seeing how it all turns out.
Some people are just up for it, some just aren't. And some may be up for it, if the trust levels are high enough. For me, the key is (as a player), could the battle against/resolution of this negative situation lead to a fun story?
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at m table, the bad things deppends on characters deeds.
most of it in players behavior
for example: i has a cheater player, which always cheat with his remaining hp, so, in one battle, they (paladin, fighter, sorcerer, and a rogue )were at lvl 4 (the cheater was a fighter with 37 hp), and 2 ogres comes searching for meal and... so, i make a lot of damage to this player, i mean, almost 70+ hp in the whole combat, actualy the others players complain about his cheats!!
so, when that battle was over, i say to that player: after the struggle, you feel noizy, and if a lot of ants crawls beneath youre left arm... drop a fort save, after this, you was killed by a rare genetic illnes from your mother´s family... and how this is a natural death, you cannot be rised again!!
all at the table has a lot of fun with that death (except for the cheater), now he plays very well, actualy, today (12 years after that).
I think it really depends on your players. My players are pretty cool, and I guess trust me not to just screw them over arbitrarily.
Likewise, my current character in a pbp Wheel of Time game just got severed - that is, he's an arcane caster who has suddenly been basically permanently cut off from the source of his magic. Major bummer. All he can do he is Intimidate people. It was brutal, unexpected, and rather arbitrary. But, I can definitely see the potential for a great story, and I'm actually looking forward to seeing how it all turns out.
Some people are just up for it, some just aren't. And some may be up for it, if the trust levels are high enough. For me, the key is (as a player), could the battle against/resolution of this negative situation lead to a fun story?
I agree with what you're saying. There's a lot of talk about bad relationships on these boards, but we don't talk about how to build good ones, or advice for DM's on how to try and toe that line without going over (or recovering if you do accidentally).
I'm not looking for answers to the questions "why?" or "if?", but rather "how?".
How do you do the things you are talking about in your post?
How would a DM make your complete lack of magic fun for your character that only knew how to use magic?
How does a DM ensure a player feels like a consequence is natural and not arbitrary?
If I were to strip a wizard of his powers completely, I would do a few things to make it interesting. First, you need to know that this COULD happen, and have an inkling of how. This, of course, is best done by having it happen to someone else first. Either it is a mystery, to which you must be ready to provide an answer, or it's not, which means you need to give your player something to relate to.
Ages ago, there was a monster in 3PP that was called a fire flower. Plant that burnt people... but someone killed by them was not possible to restore to life. If I knew that could happen to my character, I would play exceedingly carefully around such plants. If it still happened, I would accept it if I knew beforehand.
So, once a wizard has lost his powers, he either needs an alternative path (trade in your levels for something else), a way to fix it, or knowing he could have done differently.
But hey, intimidating people is badass and much can be made of a storyline about lost powers.
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I tend to lean more towards reminding players that being an adventurer isn't all gold and roses.
This has included having to wade through waist deep 'stuff' in a city's sewer system while being attacked by ravenous cockroach swarms.
Being cursed by a deity to suffer horrific hangovers without the benefit of inebriation.
Having to fight monstrous jellyfish and sharks in an underwater dungeon hidden in the middle of a forest and guarded by skum/fishmen.
Dealing with a multi-leaved time dungeon involving a necromancer who drove his later self crazy and killed him so he could raise an infinite supply of his own corpses as zombies.
Having the party rack up a bill of over 1 million gold pieces due to crashing an air ship accidentally into a temple. And then finding out an alternative solution would be marriage to the then-as-of-yet unmarried priestesses. Yes, I threatened the party with monogamy.
Being covered in acidic slug vomit. Repeatedly.
Being covered in exploded slug. Repeatedly.
Being /held person/'d and then having an enemy cleric who was polymorphed into a bunny rabbit gnawing at one of their necks round after round, forcing absolutely ridiculously low coup de gras saves.
Forcing them to do math.
Being pursued mercilessly by zelekhuts for escaping from being executed by a fascist government (including the paladin's horse).
Being an adventurer comes with the territory of having odd, bizarre crap happen to you. The DM isn't really being arbitrary by having that sort of stuff occur. Its different though if its all focused on /one/ PC, or if it seems like it isn't organic.
I'm not looking for answers to the questions "why?" or "if?", but rather "how?".
Oh right. Well, that's a bit trickier...
How do you do the things you are talking about in your post?
How would a DM make your complete lack of magic fun for your character that only knew how to use magic?
How does a DM ensure a player feels like a consequence is natural and not arbitrary?
Hmm. Well, for starters, I do say "No" to some stuff, but in general I'll try and find ways for players to get what they want so that it fits the game and doesn't overpower anyone. So the fact that I'm open to discussion about stuff rather than a dictator sends a message that I'm not out to get them I suppose.
Also, the players see me cheering for their characters too. They see me backtrack when I'm shown to be wrong with a ruling, and I ask for feedback often. When they give criticisms (like I ask for), I take it on the chin, and take it away to reflect on. I know I'm far from a perfect GM, but I guess my players see how much I want them to have a good time.
On top of that, they're a pretty sweet bunch of guys and gals - that makes it easy too.
As far as my situation with the severed character, it only happened yesterday, so I'm still waiting to see how it's all gonna work out. As it's online, I don't know the GM personally, and I only recently joined the campaign, but it's been going for a long time, so the GM must be doing something right. Also, I like exploring things that I've never encountered.
Having said that, it may well turn out to be unfun. I'll give it a good shot, but if it totally sucks, and looks like it will forever, I'll be requesting to retire my poor old severed channeler.
I guess I've only played a total of 1 session with a crap GM, so I'm not psychologically scarred like some here on the boards seem to be :) I'm happy to give things a crack, and I'm happy to give GM's the benefit of the doubt.
If you can build that sort of atmosphere with your players, I guess they'll be the same.
Don't know if any of that is helpful in the slightest, but they're some pretty tough questions!
If I were to strip a wizard of his powers completely, I would do a few things to make it interesting. First, you need to know that this COULD happen, and have an inkling of how. This, of course, is best done by having it happen to someone else first. Either it is a mystery, to which you must be ready to provide an answer, or it's not, which means you need to give your player something to relate to.
Ages ago, there was a monster in 3PP that was called a fire flower. Plant that burnt people... but someone killed by them was not possible to restore to life. If I knew that could happen to my character, I would play exceedingly carefully around such plants. If it still happened, I would accept it if I knew beforehand.
So, once a wizard has lost his powers, he either needs an alternative path (trade in your levels for something else), a way to fix it, or knowing he could have done differently.
But hey, intimidating people is badass and much can be made of a storyline about lost powers.
Yeah, severing is always a danger in the setting we're in, so everyone's aware of it. And in the Wheel of Time novels it has happened to certain characters and managed semi-miraculously to be reversed, so I'm kinda hoping the GM engineers it that way at some point :) (Little hint if you're reading this boss!)
I also had a save where I needed a 7, but the dice were cruel.
I'll admit, when I posted and the 2 came up, I was pretty shattered for about 20 mins. But hey, it's a game about stories, and I'm willing to see where this story takes us.
I'm in see what happens mode.
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Being cursed by a deity to suffer horrific hangovers without the benefit of inebriation.
Having the party rack up a bill of over 1 million gold pieces due to crashing an air ship accidentally into a temple. And then finding out an alternative solution would be marriage to the then-as-of-yet unmarried priestesses. Yes, I threatened the party with monogamy.
Forcing them to do math.
I think the above demonstrate how horrible a person you really are :)
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The barbarian took knowledge(math) in response to the math..
But..As I say to my players (and am never believed), I am but a Neutral Arbiter of the Rules (tm).
In general though my experience with players is they're ok with stuff happening to them as long as it isn't petty, seems reasonable and is fair.
I have a critical fumble system in my house rules. However, there's also a mechanic for avoiding it. Its not much of one, but when it works, it works big.
Also, the players love seeing my monsters fumble as much as they do.
Play fair, have players who trust you, deserve that trust, and you can do anything.
Players need means to feel like they are in control of their own fate.
Hardships should be able to be overcome, or add strength to a character. They aren't just punishments. The PCs aren't rats in our mazes (well sometimes they are, but that involved polymorph spells).
Adventurers will often look on the things they've dealt wtih, no matter how ridiculous, humiliating or painful, as cherished things that made them who they are, provided you can do it right. They'll also sometimes find ways to overcome the threats they encounter through ways that make them feel pretty good about themselves.
As a DM I inflict plenty of san damage on my players. They tend to reward me with crazy awesome behavior.
I'm not looking for answers to the questions "why?" or "if?", but rather "how?".Oh right. Well, that's a bit trickier...
I agree, I thought I'd just try encouraging a little deeper sharing than we sometimes see. Thanks for adding your own thoughts and experiences!
Players need means to feel like they are in control of their own fate.
This is a concept I believe dearly in, but it runs somewhat counter to the idea of doing bad things to the character.
There's a game I go on about a lot, Mythender, because I love it. One of the things I really enjoy is that as the GM I have to hand over tremendous amounts of authority to the players. The game is about extremely powerful individuals working together to kill gods and reshape the world, when the PC's can reshape reality, there really isn't a whole lot I can dictate to them (because they'll just change it anyways).
Physically, the characters are nearly indestructible. In fact, when they 'die', I have to ask them "do you really die?" and they can just choose to get back up if they want. One character has his head severed, he just picked it up and used it to beat the enemy to death.
To really hurt the characters, or make them feel threatened, I really have to go at them emotionally or conceptually, like unintended consequences or side effects of their actions. An example:
The players are trying to free mortals from the chains of worshiping/fearing the gods. Part of how gods get power is by taking away a mortal's free will. After a minor skirmish left a village mostly devastated, one of the players used his powers to rebuild a longhouse for the villagers to take shelter in. Of course since he did this using his mythical powers, the villagers started to worship him as a god (which gave him power, but also brought him closer to losing his own free will and becoming a god... whose only goal would be to take other's free will away, it's a vicious cycle).
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Forcing them to do math.
You're more animal than man!!!
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I once had a situation where a halfling character had crawled into a carrion crawler nest, only to be surprised when the critter got home. The wild mage of the party shot it, but got an enlargement effect, which splurged the entire innards of the monster over the halfling... Who then had to crawl through the rest of the corpse to get out... The player still tells this story...
I once had a situation where a halfling character had crawled into a carrion crawler nest, only to be surprised when the critter got home. The wild mage of the party shot it, but got an enlargement effect, which splurged the entire innards of the monster over the halfling... Who then had to crawl through the rest of the corpse to get out... The player still tells this story...
That does sound like a good story.
I would love to hear you unpack it more. Like if you're using the story to help give advice to a new GM, what lesson/advice would you use this story to accentuate? Are there tips and tricks you think can help encourage this kind of scene without forcing it or making it feel forced? I understand it was a wild mage so likely included some random rolls, but it's the interpretation of those rolls that made the end result.
How would a GM improve the odds of cool memories like this?
You're more animal than man!!!
Forcing them to do math.
What are you talking about? That was the reward.
√1 2^3 Σ π, and it was delicious.
[gingerbread man] You're a monster! [/gingerbread man]
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I once had a situation where a halfling character had crawled into a carrion crawler nest, only to be surprised when the critter got home. The wild mage of the party shot it, but got an enlargement effect, which splurged the entire innards of the monster over the halfling... Who then had to crawl through the rest of the corpse to get out... The player still tells this story...That does sound like a good story.
I would love to hear you unpack it more. Like if you're using the story to help give advice to a new GM, what lesson/advice would you use this story to accentuate? Are there tips and tricks you think can help encourage this kind of scene without forcing it or making it feel forced? I understand it was a wild mage so likely included some random rolls, but it's the interpretation of those rolls that made the end result.
How would a GM improve the odds of cool memories like this?
I think it is vital that the scene is NOT planned in advance. If you plan it, the player will think it is your story that made it happen. If you improvise and "let the dice fall where they may", it will become a situation you two made together, which is key. As you say, it was a wild surge roll that made it happen. Even so, I could have chosen to follow the rules, which would mean the crawler expanded only as much as it could due to its surroundings. Knowing when to break the rules slightly is vital. I also didn't punish the PC for all the grossness, it wasn't her fault, beyond letting her stink to high heaven until she could bathe for a few hours.
I think it is vital that the scene is NOT planned in advance. If you plan it, the player will think it is your story that made it happen. If you improvise and "let the dice fall where they may", it will become a situation you two made together, which is key.
I get this and completely agree.
If you were a flying instructor, your advice would be the equivalent of "don't crash the plane... now get up there and show me what you can do" as the first lesson.
I'm not trying to criticize your viewpoint. I agree with you. I want to know more though, I want deeper information. I want the how. I want a pony. Oh wait, this isn't a general wishlist. Tell me what you've learned from your time GM'ing, get specific, tell me the nitty-gritty.
I think an important thing might be to always, always, always keep an eye out for opportunities, whether it's for springing nastiness on PCs, making deep relationships with NPCs, or focusing on the consequences of PCs actions for future plot lines/story ideas.
But you can't do it all at once, all the time, with everything. In my current campaign, I'm focusing on romantic relationship opportunities. Historically, my players virtually never have relationships, and I thought I'd like to explore that more, so I'm constantly looking for opportunities to subtly leave those doors open, hoping that PCs will walk through them.
It's worked pretty well, right off the bat. It's RotRL, so we had the Vender girl situation, which our charismatic half-Orc sorcerer took up, with long-lasting effects, both positive and negative.
Then the party's ranger did some horizontal folk dancing with Aldern Foxglove. Ok, that was just all kinds of bad.
A temp PC has just been retired, and has fallen into the arms of the school mistress from Turtleback Ferry, while there are a couple of subtle, long running, and unresolved romantic threads that will be interesting however they turn out.
Now, this is all very different to what you're enquiring about, but the point is, every time a PC talked to a member of the relevant sex, I've been on the look out for signs of possible interest.
I think if you try and keep an eye out, in every encounter or situation, for ways that you can give the characters setbacks or negative consequences that are related to their actions, you'll find some. You don't need to take up every opportunity you find, but if you're always looking (and reflecting after sessions I suppose), you will no doubt improve at being able to quickly latch onto chances to introduce this kind of thing at your table.
I think it is vital that the scene is NOT planned in advance. If you plan it, the player will think it is your story that made it happen. If you improvise and "let the dice fall where they may", it will become a situation you two made together, which is key.
I get this and completely agree.
If you were a flying instructor, your advice would be the equivalent of "don't crash the plane... now get up there and show me what you can do" as the first lesson.
I'm not trying to criticize your viewpoint. I agree with you. I want to know more though, I want deeper information. I want the how. I want a pony. Oh wait, this isn't a general wishlist. Tell me what you've learned from your time GM'ing, get specific, tell me the nitty-gritty.
I'd say it's more like "If you do X, you are going to crash the plane. Avoid it, and you'll be fine." But YMMV. To answer the question why certain events stay with people... hell, I could probably get rich if I could bottle it. There must be an element of surprise in it, some shifting expectations, something new. Another example I have is when the group was fighting some Kuo-toa on a high stair. The monk had been glued to the Kuo-toa shield by the special glue ability of the monster... so when the dwarf bull rushes the Kuo-toa over the edge of the stair, the monster manages to keep hold of the shield, dumping all three 20 feet down. It was a simple situation, but by checking if it held on to the shield, it became something unexpected and fresh.
I also think there is a situational part of it. You won't get a tired group of players beating down the last stragglers of a drawn-out fight to cheer at anything. You need to hit this when they are enthusiastic and on top of the game.
I think it's much more possible than you imagine, though probably far less profitable. There are indie games coming out that are very much trying to bottle the experience of their game. They include actual rules for the GM to follow about tone and mood. They still embrace rule 0, but they are attempting to more precisely define their intentions for the game's tone and mood to better reflect their goal with the game.
Good GMing isn't something that happens purely by chance. It's a collection of good decisions by the GM that help create or foster a good experience for the group.
In the carrion crawler lair, I think a possible bit of advice:
-Find inconsequential ways to break the rules that seem fun and strange, don't treat them as major precedents.
-Be descriptive and colorful.
-When applying penalties to players, make it clear what can be done to remove the penalty.
-On a lesser encounter, give greater latitude on rule breaking ideas.
Those are some things I see as potential take-aways, maybe you see it differently. Each could generate more discussion as well and how best to implement in different kinds of games.
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The organic nature of things also leads to fun stuff. The cake of fun is glazed with the screams of player characters.
This thread had me checking notes and I found one from an adventure I ran in the old days of plain old 3e.
I had preprared the adventure with four bottle necks. Now these bottlenecks had notes in my little graph paper notebook that were essentially lines like
'The umber hulk attacks the first guy through'
'The umber hulk attacks the last guy through'
'The umber hulk attacks the guy in the middle'
and finally
'The umber hulk attacks the first guy again.'
Well, for some reason through the first bottleneck, goes our intrepid sorceror. And rar, goes the umber hulk.
After much fighting, the beleagured (and repaired) sorceror decides 'You guys take point, why was I up there anyway..'
They go through the next chokepoint, and he's in the back. Once again, rar rar, umber hulk.
At this point, after patching up the sorceror again, the party cleric makes the decision of 'we need to protect the sorceror! Put him in the middle' and well...you see how this goes.
The party decided to test something scientifically. They put the monk in the sorc's pointy hat, had him wear the sorc's robes, and sent him ahead of the party. Bam. Umber Hulk.
The party concluded that umber hulks are either attracted to spellcasters or pointy hats.
The sorceror concluded he hated umber hulks.
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The party concluded that umber hulks are either attracted to spellcasters or pointy hats.
The sorceror concluded he hated umber hulks.
[pedantic grammarian]Not to quibble, but it's spelled, 'sorcerer.'[/pedantic grammarian]
That was so funny I just blew coffee out my nose.
I have run a few things in my current campaign over the past year-and-a-half that have stuck with the players. Some were planned, some were not.
This is an example of using player's past actions as basis for current events.
My party has an Ulfen barbarian. In "Burnt Offerings," the character was doling out trememdous damage to the goblins running amok in town. At one point, the PC confirmed a crit with a greataxe, while raging, doing 40 hp damage to a second-level goblin. I made a call in the moment to describe that the barbarian decapitated the goblin, sending the head flying through the air, and impaling itself on a flagpole above a carnie's tent. Onlookers applauded.
Later, the same character succumbed to the charms of a hero-worshipping shopkeeper's daughter. They had a physical relationship for a week or so, then the girl called it off in a public place, citing that her former boyfriend had asked her to marry him.
Three days later, both the girl and her fiancee were found dead in the local mill, with the man's body showing ritualistic mutilation.
The sherriff showed up at the barbarian's door, and arrested him on suspicion of murder. Back in the interrogation room, after hearing the charges, the barbaria said, "Come on! You know me! I'm a hero of Goblin Day-- you know I would never do something like that!"
The sheriff replied, "Listen-- your girlfriend broke up with you in a crowded restaurant, and now she and the man she left you for are both dead. We know how you get when you're angry... how far did that goblin head fly? So, actually, this looks pretty bad."
So I got to play Elliot Stabler interrogating a perp. It was awesome!
Rar goes the umber hulk.
What I like to do is ask for backgrounds from my players. This gives them rivals, enemies, love interests, etc. When it happens will be random, but anything they write in their backgrounds can come back to haunt them. Of course, I will throw in my own twists. Some of the best roleplay has happened this way.
The party concluded that umber hulks are either attracted to spellcasters or pointy hats.
The sorceror concluded he hated umber hulks.
roflmao!
Poor sorcerer.
What I like to do is ask for backgrounds from my players. This gives them rivals, enemies, love interests, etc. When it happens will be random, but anything they write in their backgrounds can come back to haunt them. Of course, I will throw in my own twists. Some of the best roleplay has happened this way.
I love this method as well. I referenced up the page a bit with the quote from a game author "A character sheet is a love letter to the GM". I try to make sure players know I'm looking for information to "hurt" them with, so they know to add things that will be interesting to them. I've heard of other people talking about an issue with players who then try to design backgrounds with nothing that can come back to haunt them, but I haven't run into it personally. If I did run into that, I would try to explain to the player that I'm just trying to make it interesting and personal to their character, instead of generic bad stuff.
I also sometimes tell the player something bad I'm going to do to them, but I ask them to fill in some blanks. In a recent Shadowrun game, the players were a special ops team for a megacorp. As we were talking about the game, describing some ideas, I asked one of the players "Why don't you trust the guy who gives the team missions?" I already had some ideas of how he was going to a problem for them, but the answer I got helped alter that and color the character more (turned out the player had been assigned to the team undercover to keep an eye on the supervisor, hinting at competing factions within the corp).