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Hi everybody,
Lately I have been GMing for my friends, but I have had a problem with my players in that they are constantly switching characters. They have not stayed with one character for more than three sessions. I had one die and he chose to remake exactly the same with the same name because he didn’t want to take the penalty from Raise dead or even Resurrection as a scroll. Do you have any advice on how to deal with this, I don’t want say they come back a lower level or it will end up with them being killed more often.
~Falcar
Tell them if they want the same guy with the same name and personality, they can get him raised.
Otherwise, he's a different guy.
If they try to pull that again, have him die of a few heart attacks, he gets the picture.
I remember one poster saying that in his campaign the players were free to change anything about their characters between sessions. A female halfling who'd crawled though some small tunnels could become a hulking orc barbarian, and no one would bat an eye ingame or out.
That might work for you if they just like to change things up every so often. If they're using it instead of adapting to new enemies and situations, have your NPCs pull the same thing. BBEG the First is dead? BBEG Junior is here with the exact same name! Do note that before you try this you should discuss your problems with your players. Trying to solve OOC problems IC never works.
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A couple of different thoughts come to mind...
A) Why do your players wish to constantly switch characters? A part of me feels that forcing them to continue to play characters they do not enjoy playing drains the fun out of the game, and that if swapping characters creates fun and engagement, than it is for the best. A different part of me feels that if they are so likely to switch characters, is that because they do not have any agency with their current characters. Do you give them agency? Do you help make their PCs unique and memorable? I find players have greater investment in their characters if you do things like refer to their characters by name, not by "Jill's wizard" or "the elf dude;" give the PCs meaningful relationships with NPCs, and let the PCs reputation precede them. I wonder if increasing player/character investment will help to alleviate your problems.
B) The person running the game (AKA YOU) gets to decide how new characters are introduced into a game, both regarding the crunch and the fluff. There are a lot of ways to mitigate players abusing character death:
* It's your game, just lay down the law & say "no you can't make the second guy the same as the last."
* Level penalties
* Gold/Gear penalties
* Repuation/RP penalties (the local NPCs/rest of the party don't know/trust the new guy in town)
C) Is it possible that your players are of a mindset that the concept of recurring characters/personalities is completely alien to their style of play? Maybe they don't care at all that their guy has a name and a backstory; maybe they don't have any interest in building a history with a team of like-minded PCs that can share stories and emotions. That's completely fine; that just means you need to change the way you approach things:
*Maybe they just like scenarios and when the module's done, it's done. They walk away from the characters, rewards, story, everything. That's fine. When planning a game like that, you just need to give the criteria: "OK guys, next time we're going to start a story that takes place in a city, you guys need level 7 characters, build them with usual WBL and the usual ability generation methods, this story should last approx. 3-4 sessions.
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Thanks Rynjin, I figured something along those lines would be good. Any advice on how to stop characters from remaking all the time? At first it was because we had just moved from 3.5 into Pathfinder so we wanted to try new classes but that has been about a year ago and it makes it hard to have a story that the main character change every other week.
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It sounds like instead of a campaign you should just run a series of one-offs or a bunch of 5-Room Dungeons until your players settle on something they want to stick with. It's not as interesting, story-wise, but it'll save you some headaches in the long run if the characters they're playing are essentially cartoon characters, respawning and/or having really no consistent timeline.
If, however, they insist on a campaign with continuity, then you have to be frank and tell them that it's almost entirely unfeasible and pretty lame to have the same guy basically be reborn because the player can't accept the RAW penalties for dying. You don't have to be a jerk about it, and you shouldn't, but if they insist then seriously consider just running one-offs.
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Also Tempus, The players do not care much about calling each other by their "names" I have tried to fix that but they rarely want to make a back story at all. We have had the same group for about five years and only in one campaign (not one of mine) did everyone really use the others names. I do like the idea of reputation loss, that could be a good plan. Thanks for the quick responses.
I agree with Puna'chong and my C) line of thought.
It sounds like you just need to run one-off adventures that don't have any continuity. It sounds like that's what your player base is asking for.
Kind of like playing a board game. Or maybe a video game. That's fine; there's nothing wrong with that. Some people like playing a full game of basketball, some like just shooting hoops.
The big thing to keep in mind is to only deliver as much game as they want. If they just want to chuck the ball at the net for a while, don't force them to adopt boundary lines, penalties, specific #s of players per side, etc.
Same thing in Pathfinder; if they just want to grab a miniature and go bust up a dungeon, that's fine, give them that. No more, no less. (Reminds me of playing the original Gauntlet on my Commodore. Good times...)
If they ever get bored of that in the future, they may want to take their game to the next dimension and add that extra layer of continuity, and that will be fine, too. When it happens. Don't force it.
if players are changing characters
the easiest solution would be to run
a guild themed campaign where the players are recruits of a guild where each equivalently level character is a different guild agent where players can swap to any of their other characters at the start of any mission or upon death
a new agent would get recruited to replace each dead one At APL
and each player has a preset number of agents to swap between based on player preferences, CAP of 10 agents at one time to one player, and no more than 2 of the same player's agents on the same team. not every player need to use all 10. but each agent must be different from the other 9 in some way. though similarities in builds may exist between similar agents
They do know that the penalties for resurrection aren't even that bad right? If your using Rez then it just takes a restoration following to get them back to prime fighting power. If its raise dead then it takes a bit longer if you're not strong enough for Greater Resto. 2 casts of Restoration will getcha back to fighting power in 2 ingame weeks.
Are characters made using Point Buy or rolling ability scores. Having to stick with ability scores I don't like would be the prime reason to get my character killed on purpose.
I also set new characters always at a level lower than the party average and with less magic gear. After all, new character should be a worse thing than being raised.
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I had one die and he chose to remake exactly the same with the same name because he didn’t want to take the penalty from Raise dead or even Resurrection as a scroll.
Make the penalty for making a new character the same (or worse) as being raised.
- wealth = previous wealth - 7000gp(cost of raise dead + 2xrestoration)- limited control over what magic items are owned
DO NOT LET THEM CHOOSE ALL THEIR STARTING MAGIC ITEMS. I DMed a long time game (1st - 17th). 1 session from the climax, in the last session, 1 of the original characters died killing his nemesis. The player decided he didn't want the character raised because it would cheapen the sacrifice. I let him make a new character for the last session and just let him choose everything. After all, the character was only going to last 1 session...big mistake. This character had perfect gear for his build and DOMINATED the final big fight. So when I wanted the final fight to be about the rest of the party, it was mostly about his character.
Make it harder to die, then ban Revivification magic.
Give out enough treasure that your PC's are a bit above average wealth by level.
New character coming in is below wealth by level.
And no the party does not get to keep all the stuff the previous guy had. it goes to his family, church, or is buried with him.
Also, and I don't think we can stress this enough, talk to your players and ask them to cut the cheesy factor down to a reasonable level.
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Thanks everybody, I do like the idea of having the guild with multiple people. My setting is Morrowind from the elder scrolls so it should be simple enough to put them in a guild, I think Dawn-Guard since they have a vendetta against Vampires although one is planning to become one. I think they will start a level lower than the main group though. Any ideas on how to enforce roleplaying more?
"Punish them - make it so they stop having fun and quit". Kidding!
Seriously, though - if you want a guy to stop playing or start having excuses for not coming, take away what he finds fun. Sounds like you have a great handle on this, though and got some great adivce.
Just to play the Devil's Advocate:
I have seen games where people want to switch up characters because they feel that their character is worthless due to things the GM has done.
1. I have an enchanter and all your monsters are immune to mind effecting spells.
2. I have a sneaky rogue and all your monsters have exceptionally high perception scores.
3. I have an anti-undead cleric build that you said was a great idea, but now I'm 9th level and we have never fought one.
4. I have a 18 STR 1/2 orc barbarian that you beat down with 2 middle aged human farmers in a waystation tavern.
These are all GM vs PCs style, and the "haha I got you!" kind of stuff that players hate and make them want different guys.
Now, if this scenario is not the issue, I agree 100% with 7heprofessor's post.
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I try to let the players use their abilities but i also do have a bad habit of stopping a tactic that comes up to often (as mentioned with the vampires most enemies have been undead and immune to mind effects, but there have been dominated humans) my main problem they have been having with the vampires is a two weapon rogue who can't hit them due to a high AC that vampires get, with 6 natural and a four dex bonus he is barely able to hit it unless he critically hits.
...my main problem they have been having with the vampires is a two weapon rogue who can't hit them due to a high AC that vampires get, with 6 natural and a four dex bonus he is barely able to hit it unless he critically hits.
This might be a time to help that character out a bit with magic items or just, y'know, sorta fudge the AC of the vampires against him. The point of the game, in my opinion, is for every player to feel like their character is doing something awesome and fill the shoes of their favorite hero every session, regardless of how mechanically feasible it is. I also think that the DM's job is to facilitate that however you can, not necessarily through freebies or gimmes or favoring a player, but through making sure that every adventure has an encounter where each player gets to shine and to make it so every character can contribute in some way to a fight. If the rogue is having trouble hitting then maybe have him/her go on a quest to get or craft a vampire-bane sword/dagger/etc. or even just find one that a cunning vampire stole so that it wouldn't be used against him/her.
RAW are there to be guidelines, and if someone is just not able to have fun with what the rulebooks give you then I think it's totally fine to help them out or set up certain encounters that make them feel like they're an important member of the party. The Bestiary/Monstrous Manual are there to show you what the average creature looks like; not every one of them is the same just like not every barbarian your players build is going to be the same (well, in your case this might be true =P).
DM's job is to make sure every player is having fun and to figure out how to take disparate elements and turn them into something everyone can enjoy. If your players just want to play Skyrim, let them. They may not give less than half a crap about their character's background, motivations, whether they like princes or tavern wenches, whatever, so you might need to cut that out. Everyone's been there. I have one group that loves their character backgrounds and coming up with plans. They're doing the Curse of the Crimson Throne AP completely differently than my other group, who had me basically hand them their backgrounds so they could hold that in the back of their heads while they hack up monsters. One player takes Throw Anything on all of his characters because he likes improvised weapons and throwing chairs and bricks at people; that's what's fun for him, so I've done my best to make it as viable as I can for him.
Good luck with your group! It sounds like you guys are on your way, and it does take time for people who are newer to pen-and-paper to figure out that the medium is really completely different than videogames or board games. It's what you make it, so make it the best thing you can and throw out or change rules if you need to.
Seriously. They're more like guidelines.
A little late, but for what it's worth:
I ran a game several years ago (a 3.5 game) where I let one player switch a character because she felt the character wasn't working out, and then suddenly everyone got character switch fever. In part, this was because some didn't feel they had picked a good character. In part, this was because they were new to the system and kept wanting to try new builds.
This is what I did:
1) At the beginning of the session and talked to the group. I explained that it was very hard for me to keep adapting the story and events with an ever-rotating cast of PCs. I also noted that it slowed the game/story down to keep having to introduce new people. BUT
2) At the same time, I acknowledged that sometimes we pick a character that just doesn't work out well, and that can be frustrating as a player. SO
3) I declared that everyone could change their character ONCE. Those who had already did so had gotten their one time. BUT
4) I also declared that whenever a character gained a level, they could opt to redistribute skills, feats, and spells known within reason, discussing it with me first, if something wasn't working well for them. This way they could tweak existing characters if they felt they had made mistakes, but they still had consistent characters and the story was able to carry on and get better.
5) I also reminded players it was easier to learn the game sticking with one character and seeing it through their eyes, as switching constantly meant learning new systems for new classes.
6) The players agreed to this. No one switched their character again, and only very few tweaks were made to feats and skills on very rare occasion, all of which were very reasonable (the one I remember happening was one character had thought he'd do a trip build, and it wasn't working out like he'd thought/he'd misunderstood the rules, so I let him retrain the Improved Trip feat he took).
I would suggest a similar discussion with your players.
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As for character death -- in beginner games, I have sometimes allowed a "one free resurrect" rule.
The way "one free resurrect" works is that a powerful NPC or some other force of GM nature raises the character without penalty or rescues them from the killing blow.
However: the PCs now owe the powerful NPC/force of nature/deity a favor. You can often use this to help drive the plot or a major sidequest.
I also make, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY clear, both in and out of character, that this is it. They have one get out of jail free card, and once it's used, it's done. Afterwards, you make a new character, or you pay for the raise, and you might have to do things like quest for the soul on its way to the afterlife and other things.
And no, you draw the line HARD on someone just rebuilding the same character over. New character -- can be same class and race, but they have a new background. It doesn't even have to be that creative of a new background -- I mean, I am embarrassed to admit it, but I did the cliche of cliches once, where I had a character die VERY quickly, not long after creation, so I created her twin sister, who took her sister's name and was out to avenge her twin's death. The new character in this case did have slightly different stats, but I could build off the old background without having to start entirely from scratch. It's not that hard to think of how a new character might be connected to the old one--so urge it as strongly as you can, and help the player think of ways of how he can use the old idea, but in a new direction.
Like sothold, I like to reward good backstories. I normally don't give a feat, but I will usually give a free trait, or hero point if the hero point system is used. Encouraging good backstories for the new hero after the old one dies can also.
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Make the encounters really, really easy ;)
If they try to do things out of the ordinary that the character wouldn't do, ask for an explanation before allowing them to do it.
Really, I don't think there's a good solution here. If the players are going to abuse the system like this, the only other way is to make it clear that they can possibly fail the campaign if they just continually die. And stay true to your word on that, don't make it an empty threat.
I have played so many games where someone really hated his character, but somehow by the way the dice fell that character became immortal. Don't let characters die for no good reason, and don't let new characters start at full wealth, fractional at best. That should discourage the need for new characters constantly.
Or better yet, allow for them to "own" more than one character with the rule that they can only play one at a time, and they can't metagame together a collected wealth or xp, you have to treat your two characters as if they were played by 2 different people. Some people just like playing with different classes.
For games like this, it's almost better to homebrew some one-shots or do a module, if your group likes to play something on an encounter basis, rather than traversing one super involved epic.
If the guild thing works for your group and setting, that's great; go with that. It will allow them to swap characters at will and hopefully eventually develop favorites.
It also allows you to curtail the death abuse. Here's how:
So you want to develop a guild? The guild is more than just a treehouse club. It needs to have goals. It needs to have allies and enemies. It needs to generate and expend resources. How it (and its' members) deal with these aspects of organization will determine the guild's REPUTATION.
The REPUTATION of your guild will help you retrain your players to adopt whatever mindset you desire.
If you have a copy of Ultimate Campaign available, I would adopt a system similar to the Reputation and Fame rules presented therein. Think of what goals the guild would have as an organization, and what the management team of the guild have to do to promote those goals. Build a list of circumstances that earn members points (things that promote the organization and its' reputation) and a list of circumstances that lose members points (things that are counterproductive to the organization and its' reputation.) Have the management present this "charter" to any new recruits with the stipulations that they are expected to live up to its' ideals.
*If there are any good habits that you wish your players to build (possible examples could be... gaining levels, defeating key rivals, paying dues, creating magic items,) then assign those things positive points and award your organization.
*If there are any bad habits that you wish to quash (possible examples could be... death of guild members, slander of the guild, treason, making unnecessary enemies,) then assign those things negative points and penalize your organization. (If this happens, it's likely that the organization will not forget who caused the loss of reputation.)
It isn't the characters the earn the points, it is the organization. As the organization grows or shrinks, its' members reap the benefits. This means you need to build a table of what perks and penalties activate at specific reputation levels.
Something following this format:
20 pts - free spells cast (up to a limit, set by you) by in-house wizards/clerics
15 pts - 10% discount on in-house made items
10 pts - management can lend you an item worth (a limit, set by you) for an adventure
5 pts - free meals/room & board at guildhouse
0 pts - no change.
- 5 pts - -5 to diplomacy/bluff/intimidate rolls vs. irate locals
-10 pts - locals get mad at members; charge 10% more for things
-15 pts - locals get really mad at members; 30% chance refusal of business
-20 pts - guild fails, game over
Something like this can really help you present *your* goals as *the guild's* goals.
Hopefully a toolset like this can help mold your players and promote a healthy camaraderie as the players work together to build something bigger than themselves.
Yup.
Ultimate Campaign, though I think cutting WBL is the wrong way to go about it (that can cripple a character, at least in the short term).
If the Guild thing isn't to your liking completely, a very simple way to do it would be to just apply all Raise Dead penalties to new characters brought in because of death (temporary negative levels, WBL reduced by the amount Raise Dead costs. More if Resurrection and so on is used, possibly without the penalties).
Would cut down on frivolous "Nah, I wanna stay dead, I can be more powerful that way" stuff, but I'd be hesitant to apply it to scenarios like "My character is dead weight, can I change?" however.
Allowing a limited rebuild (Same class role, same race, different Feats, traits, options, perhaps multiclassing allowed) for characters that people are dissatisfied with build-wise (not role-wise) every few levels can help that too.
Yar!
There has already been plenty of advice. However, there is one thing that instantly entered my mind when I read the OP. It is related to the OP's plight, and can only be given justice with a link:
Behold, an excerpt from The Gamers: Dorkness Rising (there is a swear at the 50 second mark).
~P
Pirate I love that movie its my favorite.
anyways if they continue remaking the same character's try implementing reincarnation rules (they exist or they did in 3.5) when you've had it say ok either make a new character or have your character be reincarnated. and when they pick reincarnation you roll and boom there a goblin all of a sudden or worse if you roll that you get pick making them a yearling or a woodland animal is always good for a laugh.
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/r/reincarnate
you would use the rules for the spell Reincarnate as if they were willing.
Also roll percentiles for gender that would make things interesting