Sounds like the GM is not very prepared - that would irritate me as well. Perhaps he's overwhelmed with the GM role. Maybe send him a copy of your character sheet via e-mail in-between sessions so he can read it at his leisure?
As always with these kinds of questions: Talk to your GM.
I, personally, would have told him off the first time he tried to retcon the Wizards turn. Sure he most likely had Knowledge(Planes), thats reasonable. That does not mean he knows everything about everything.
Agreeing with Tormsskull. With one exception. Everyone in the group needs to let the GM have copies of their character sheets.
Secondly, the GM needs to set parameters around what is OK to play and what is not OK. Yes, it was wrong of him to get aggravated with you. However, flip the coin on this and pretend you are him. You have no idea what anyone in the group is, has or can, do. So you try to make encounters to be balanced, but they are not. Due to the fact of not understand the group dynamic. Again, this is attributed to poor GMing, but going to assume here that he is new(ish) to it.
Every time I have played in groups and GM'd or even played, I wanted to see or at least hear what others were doing. Reason 1) To ensure there was not over staggering of roles. Nothing wrong with having an extra fighter, but when the entire group is one class, that gets stale quickly.
Reason 2) When the group comes together and makes a group of characters that balance each other out, meaning a well rounded group, encounters are very much more enjoyable to RP and to deal with. What you are explaining sounds like the GM, and assuming the group, no one really knows what the other people are bringing to the table. That would make me want to leave the group so fast, it's not even funny.
Reason 3) I don't want too much competition for treasure. Even playing online games or tabletop, I don't mind sharing with one person in a small group, but 2+ with a group of 5-10? NO thanks! This may make me look greedy, but at least being honest on the issue. :)
In short, I believe you had a good reason to be upset. However, take a step back and realize it is an issue of the group as a whole. Please, don't take this next part to heart or think it's an attack, but at this point, you are just as much as the problem as he is. But, it is something that with dialogue and helping each other out on, it can be fixed. :) Best of luck and hope things get worked out for your group.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I'm playing in a 3.5 game with a group and we're doing savage species. Now this particular group is not the best versed on the rules, and the GM has not bothered to read ANY of our character sheets.
So i picked to play an earth elemental, which obviously comes with certain immunities. The GM doesn't stat out his npc's beforehand so we meet with this npc wizard and the murder hobo of the party attacks within 5 lines of dialogue as usual.
I smash an enemy on the first round and the GM says "the wizard casts sleep on you." He tells me to make a will save and i ask why bother, i'm immune. He asks me why, and i show him the racial stuff. So he goes to casting hold person in the same round, aka paralysis.
Now its kinda annoying that he retcons what he's doing in the first place for the sole purpose that he didn't know my character was immune in the first place. He then rules that his wizard has knowledge (planes) because he never bothered to stat him out, rolls with what was likely about half of max ranks and tells us it comes out to an 18, a mediocre roll at best.
I then inform him that I'm immune to paralysis as well, and he yells "Is there anything you aren't immune to?" and claims the wizard would have known that and immediately retcons it again. So he's doing this wizards turn for the 3rd time and i'm getting really irritated but keep my mouth shut.
He ended up casting and failing to cast defensively the spell blur so he got destroyed that round anyways from an AOO, but the multiple retcons on enemy actions to ignore natural defenses that came with my race was kind of annoying, especially because he claimed an npc would know it because he never bothered to stat them out.
I let it go, let the game run the rest of the night and wished them all a good night, didn't make a big fuss. He's done this a few times though and its really starting to grate on me. Am i being too upset here, or is this legitimately something that would irritate other people as well?
As far as I'm concerned, the GM is in the wrong; way in the wrong. Pulling numbers and abilities out of nowhere, saying creatures can choose whatever action he wants, etc. He has little to no understanding of the rules, and people like that (no offense) will have a very difficult time of being a GM that runs the game smoothly as well as effectively.
I kid you not, our GM has those who can't add their modifiers write down each and every one of our action method modifiers (I'm good with numbers, so I haven't really had a need to do this) to keep the game smooth as well as make sure that the numbers add up properly.
I'm not sure if it has occurred to you yet, but the GM might need to learn by example, and I don't mean you need to GM for the group; if he's able to "retcon" turns because of things he would know, then it's time to fight fire with fire. As far as I'm concerned, if the creatures are able to retcon their turns, you as PCs have access to this turn of events, and spelling out why he shouldn't be able to "retcon" NPC turns would be a great learning experience for the entire group; the rules are there for a reason, and ignoring them leads to anarchy (time for typical Stupid Evil/Chaotic Stupid behavior again).
Even if it does leave to a big verbal fight between you and the GM and/or the group (and eventually a discontinuation of the group), it tells you that either A. The GM needs to learn the rules and gauge what kind of game he needs to play; and/or B. That's a group that you should not play with for much longer, if at all, and I would suggest you find a group that is more towards your speed and style of gameplay.
However, before you try to fight fire with fire, talk to him out of the session and compromise on how the group runs the game before the group meets again, so that the group is aware on what the rules are, and/or so everyone knows what kind of game they're expecting to play.
He ended up casting and failing to cast defensively the spell blur so he got destroyed that round anyways from an AOO
If you fail to cast defensively, you lose the spell, but you don't provoke an AoO.
It is bad form for the GM to keep changing things after the fact. That said, the GM is making an argument that is frequently made by players. For example, a player may be bad at diplomacy and role playing, but if their character has +20 in diplomacy, that should compensate for the player's lack of eloquence.
It seems the GM is in over their head in terms of the complexity of the game. Having characters playing standard races, instead of elementals and such, would help to reduce the level of complexity.
So, unless you want this GM to step down from being GM, you will need to cut them some slack until they can learn your characters and the game better. Tell the GM that you don't like retcon, and you would prefer if the GM did not do that.
Personally, if I was the GM, I'd let you cut the incompetent wizard down, but then have the real wizard fly into the room, and rant how you are all going to die for having killed his apprentice. The GM can cheat in so many ways, there is no need to retcon.
The GM did not prepare properly. But that is likely because he didn't expect anyone to play an earth elemental.
BTW, I'd love to see the backstory of an earth elemental cruising around with a tiefling and a couple of catfolk...
Anyway, his retcons were likely due to his desire to have a challenging encounter because he believed that would be more fun than the party just squishing his bad guy like a bug.
In the future if you are going to choose to play a race that might have the potential to be a bit of a challenge for your GM, you might want to spend a few minutes, or a few emails, discussing the potential unique characteristics of that race with the GM so that both of you are aware of the implications of playing a race that is immune to some of the basic tactics that the GM has used to create challenging encounters.
Though the GM sound inexperienced, he puts out books and says pick out things to play.
On the other hand, did anyone ever ask for example, you, 'Can I play an Earth Elemental?' After all, you knew it had all sorts of abilities to be that front liner.
There should be that two way conversation between player and GM and player. If that isn't there then something is wrong. As you have said you have given your charactersheet to him and he appears to not have looked at it.
If this is his first time GMing, I wouldn't climb all over him.
I think there has been mistakes on both sides.
Everyone always says TALK. Maybe you need to set one game session aside and not play but hash things out.
Using Savage Species PCs with a an inexperienced group is a terrible idea. You just saw a good reason why.
That said, I would not be terribly upset with the GM, myself, but that's out group. We tend to allow 'player didn't know, character should' takebacks, and as stated, it's unlikely the wizard wouldn't know elemental immunities. GM's, especially, have a lot on their plate having to juggle multiple characters, where the players only have one, and even if he had looked over your sheets, it would be easy to forget or get confused.
I'm of a mind that winging NPCs isn't cool. Wizards prepare spells in advance. If his wizard gets spells at-will, then he's always more powerful than he would be if he were a real NPC, because the DM can just give him whatever he wants every round. If the DM doesn't have time to make a wizard himself, he should appropriate one statted in a published source, not make it up as he goes.
Ret-conning his actions isn't cool either. There are a few situations where it might be OK (One person didn't understand what another said happened, for instance, and acted on it), but just because he didn't know your character's immunities isn't one. If your character is immune then the spell should have failed, and the wizard should make a check on his next turn to figure out if he knows why.
I don't think it's right to get annoyed about him making up numbers on the fly if you knew that was how he did things going in. If you know he doesn't stat up NPCs then it seems obvious he has to make up skills and NPC knowledge on the run. Sometimes he'll do that well, sometimes poorly - you're buying into that variance by playing with that kind of DM, in my view.
I have less sympathy with taking back actions that were doomed to fail. I think the acceptability of that is more about the group culture than a matter of DM fiat. As such, I'd bring it up with the group and see what others' views are.
Thomas, is there a reason an earth elemental would have fled into a jungle instead of into, say, the rocks of a nearby mountain range where he might find one of the ever-shifting portals back to his own plane?
I understand that you showed the GM the race, page number and probably said "read these paragraphs" or the like.
What I am saying is that based on the GM's apparent lack of experience overall, and lack of knowledge of your race, he clearly didn't read all that and you probably suspected that he hadn't.
I'm saying take the guy out to lunch one day before the game begins and go over the most important racial aspects, like immunity to sleep and paralysis, for example.
If I were to play an exotic race (and yes folks, playing an earth elemental character qualifies to me as an exotic race) I would make certain that my GM understood that sort of thing, even if it meant annoying him because clearly if he didn't understand it, the result would (as you demonstrated) annoy the whole table.
(and yes folks, playing an earth elemental character qualifies to me as an exotic race)
Woo, keep me away from the people that don't understand that one!
(and yes folks, playing an earth elemental character qualifies to me as an exotic race)Woo, keep me away from the people that don't understand that one!
I would consider playing an elemental akin to playing a monster with PC class levels, or like playing a race with racial HD (back in the yonder days of lore, when race abilities could be equal to that of a class level).
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
As much as I do advocate for DMs I do think the DM is at fault for not examining you character sheet and taking some notes on what you're immunities are. It sounds like you've actually gone out of your way to make sure your GM knew about this character. It does sound like you just have an inexperienced GM, not a bad thing but does require patience.
If I may though, I think the bigger problem is that you might be in an incompatible Pathfinder group. Your gaming style may not mesh with his GMing style. Still though, I don't have experience with your group or more context so I have a good chance of being wrong about this point.
In short, I believe you had a good reason to be upset. However, take a step back and realize it is an issue of the group as a whole. Please, don't take this next part to heart or think it's an attack, but at this point, you are just as much as the problem as he is. But, it is something that with dialogue and helping each other out on, it can be fixed. :) Best of luck and hope things get worked out for your group.Now I'm confused O.o There is no competition of roles. The GM told us to pick races from savage species.
We have:
catfolk scout (rogue)
catfolk shugenja (cleric)
tiefling warlock (arcane caster)
earth elemental (frontliner)We have literally not one overlap of roles and only 4 people.
And also, he keeps everyone's character sheets between sessions.
Okay, this has me scratching my head too. I was thinking he had not even looked at the character sheets. But to have them there and still ignore what you all rolled for characters? Think I would be asking him to either pick up the slack or turn the reigns over to someone else in the group.
I won't post anymore, too many meds and about to hit the hay, so all kinds of crazy could be typed. Group make up though sounds rather cool. Sorry for confusing you. Guess I missed that info in the OP.
The GM made some errors, but those were in preparation only. Honestly, it's totally legit for him to retcon his action. Firstly, rule-0. Secondly, he's absolutely right. Most wizards do end up taking Knowledge (planes). I'd say it's completely reasonable that he maxed it, giving him half-max ranks is throwing you a bone. If he made a check, he could easily know basic elemental immunities. He wouldn't cast a spell he knows is going to be ineffective against his target.
Especially since no save was actually rolled, no numbers were on the board, nothing was actually affected other than the action declared. Don't you allow people to change their minds about declared actions?
If your Cleric had max ranks in knowledge (religion) and declared that s/he was going to cast "Inflict Moderate Wounds" against a creature that was obviously undead (skeleton or something), and then the GM had him roll and informed him "skeletons wouldn't take damage from negative energy, in fact it would heal them". Wouldn't you agree that he should be allowed to change the declared action? I think that's completely reasonable. The situation is the same.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Just remember this argument you're having now when the GM later Banishes your elemental back to it's plane. Were you role playing an earth elemental or did you just write it on the sheet and then act like a regular person? An earth elemental is very common sight for adventurers and probably terrifying for random townsfolk to see wandering around, an earth elemental also probably would not react to things, like having to stop to eat or sleep, or needing to find a boat to cross a river, like a normal person would. With something like an elemental if your GM didn't already know you were one then you're probably not actually role playing it you're probably just cheesing some stats onto your normal dude. Step up your game, race for most of the abnormals should already be well established without having to look at the sheet unless you're actively trying to hide it
That was incredibly douchey and totally uncalled for.
The thing isn't that the DM didn't know the character was an elemental. The problem was he didn't know the game effects of being an elemental, all the immunities and such.
Thomas, I like to stretch and have played some pretty odd characters in my day, but I've never yet role played an elemental.
It strikes me as quite a challenge.
As far as your backstory is concerned, I just reacted to it as I would if one of my players brought me that sort of backstory, I wasn't suggesting there was any problem with it, just looking for more understanding of the motivations. Water under the bridge now anyway, (or maybe dirt under the river...) I don't see much sense in retconning or modifying a backstory once a game has begun.
Sometimes as the GM you say something stupid, for some of us it happens more often. In those cases it can be fine to say "Whoops, sorry. It makes no sense for him to cast that spell, he would have cast a different one".
Note that for this to be fair, you really have to offer the players the same courtesy. For example if the PC rogue sneak attacks a zombie because they weren't thinking clearly, they should be allowed to say "Sorry, my rogue knows that you can't sneak attack undead, it doesn't make sense for him to do that" and change their action.
In our group we do this sort of thing all the time, as long as it doesn't involve backtracking too far we'll undo actions if they just don't make any sense for the character to have done them. The reason this works, is because we all know this in advance and we trust one another to be fair with how we do this. It's our group's standard procedure. In some groups, you may do things a different way. Whatever you do is fine as long as you're all on the same page.
Maybe let him know that it bothered you. It doesn't have to be a heated or angry conversation, just talk to him about it. That way you can get things clear up front with how to handle situations like this and then everyone knows what to expect.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
It takes a good bit of experience to be able to both make up NPCs on the fly, and to also do it without retconning. For normal stuff, I can usually wing it. I occassionally foul up, but fortunately I'm good at bluffing, and I usually just make a face and say the NPC missed horribly but didn't critically fail when I remember he used something the PC is immune to at the last minute. :)
I'd say your GM is suffering from lack of experience, and has let the "RULE OF COOL" bite him in the posterior. One reason I hate the entire concept of "RULE OF COOL" is that it seriously derails games if you don't keep it under strict control. Whoever is the best bud of the GM tends to be the "COOLEST", or the guy who can talk fast (Like a used car salesman). If you stick with the rules, then the players all get to do something, even if they aren't used car salesmen or buttering up the GM.
Note that for this to be fair, you really have to offer the players the same courtesy. For example if the PC rogue sneak attacks a zombie because they weren't thinking clearly, they should be allowed to say "Sorry, my rogue knows that you can't sneak attack undead, it doesn't make sense for him to do that" and change their action.
I agree with the sentiment, but fyi... a rogue actually can sneak attack undead.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I agree with the sentiment, but fyi... a rogue actually can sneak attack undead.
Note that for this to be fair, you really have to offer the players the same courtesy. For example if the PC rogue sneak attacks a zombie because they weren't thinking clearly, they should be allowed to say "Sorry, my rogue knows that you can't sneak attack undead, it doesn't make sense for him to do that" and change their action.
Wow, that was a very 3rd edition example for me to use. Let's just call it an example of my earlier point that "Sometimes as the GM you say something stupid".
(Seriously, one of the hardest things with D&D is remembering which edition you're playing. I run into this problem all the time with pathfinder and discovering that I'm accidentally using a 2nd or 3rd edition rule by mistake).
The GM doesn't stat out his npc's beforehand so we meet with this npc wizard and the murder hobo of the party attacks within 5 lines of dialogue as usual.
I am curious, was this wizard supposed to be the enemy, or just the plot hook? Maybe you weren't supposed to fight him so the DM wasn't prepared.
I'm guessing this is a very new GM. If so, then I'd be prepared to cut him a break here and work with him on the first scenario or two as he gets more familiar with how the game works in general and with the characters in the party in particular.
The retconning... well, if we look at it from a normal game perspective, the GM would decide what they want to do and how they want to do it based upon their knowledge of the game, and then proceed. In this case, he's making mistakes due to his lack of game knowledge. It's not GM vs PC (or at least, it shouldn't be) so there's no need to force him into a "you declared your move, too late for a comeback" position.
As long as he understands he needs to improve, then I'd stick with it and help him along.
If he doesn't think there's any need to improve and he thinks that it's okay to play this way, that's another matter altogether.
@ OP
Here's your cookie for finding the exception to Rule Zero.
Ummm, Mr. Fishy would normally stand with the GM as final word but your GM is off the book. GMs are responsible for basic knowledge of PC's characters; class, race and special abilities that change the game.
Mr. Fishy collects character sheets every couple of sessions and ask at level up what feats/spells and the like are being added.
Your GM may need to run a practice game for a while; like a low lever dungeon crawl or a string of encounters to help him learn the rules.
Your GM needs to unwind a little. If you got a free pass because he wasn't paying attention, good for you. It's up to him to make sure it doesn't happen again, or change the line-up if your race choice rendered a lot of opposition ineffective.
Unless he screwed up something important to the story line and needs you to work with him, there's no reason for the guy that controls every monster in the world to fuss over one round in one combat.
This is a case of the GM not being prepared for game that they really need to be prepared for. If you are not going to allow monstrous races to played you need to prepare even more than you would normally. So the frustration this GM feels is purely due to the lack of planning and preparation.
This is not a totally invalid style of GMing in certain games. However, it is a particularly bad style when applied to Pathfinder. The 500 page rulebook is there for a reason. You don't just look for "close enough", you want to run a game that justifies or punishes the characters choices fairly. Instead, this GM sounds like he is punishing the players directly, and arbitrarily.
So yes, the GM holds a large share of the blame here (if you're being genuine in your description)... but a part of this is that you are all at fault. If you don't all take the game seriously enough to learn the rules and put the most knowledgable person in charge, you can't suddenly start taking the consequences seriously when they don't go your way.
RPGs are fundamentally about choosing to care about something. So being upset at the consequences is a choice. Putting your trust in a GM who is clearly not taking that responsibility seriously is your own fault.
Maybe you should fix this probably by running a less arbitrary game of your own? Or introduce the GM to a more lightweight system where improvisation is encouraged and not so much hinges on the mechanical choices of the players. There are lots of great games that fit that description — Fate and Fudge would both work well.
That's probably the easiest solution, since the GM can just keep doing his thing, and you can learn to play around his whims. Pathfinder requires a much higher degree of impartiality from GMs, and that's why it is among the hardest games to run well (IMO).
Just out of curiosity, how often does the GM let the players retcon actions based on "well, my character wouldn't have done that..."?
If this is allowed for the players, then it's reasonable for the GM to run the NPCs the same way. If the GM doesn't let the players do it, then he shouldn't do it for NPCs.
I ran a lot of different RPG systems for years where I created NPCs and entire adventures on the fly. But 3.5/Pathfinder is a really, really hard system to run games that way, and I would never try it now. If your GM is more familiar with an open-ended RPG like Hero System or GURPS, it might be that your GM hasn't has that "oh, crap, I can't do this in 3.5" revelation yet.
Yes, yes you are. Take a deep breath, start a few more threads to discuss gaming life, and realize we all love you man.
I have had GM's that just don't hold with the rules real tightly. They go with what seems right/logical at that point. It is not my favorite but yes, many people like to play that way.
I have had times as GM when I didn't have an opponent fully stat'd. Unexpected wondering monster, the party went somewhere that I didn't predict, made an enemy of a guy that was supposed to be neutral/friendly, etc...
Then yes, I've had to guess at stats out of the air. It would not seem unreasonable to me that a medium level wizard would be aware of some of the major immunities of elementals. However, if it really wasn't a major encounter I probably would not have bothered to retcon it either. (If it was a major encounter, I should have had it stat'd to begin with.)
But some people can't let it go like that. This wizard would know that even if I didn't bother to look it up. meh... either or...
Was he just having an off night? Is it a new GM still learning? Is he experienced and this is his standard way to run things? If that is the case you have to decide if you can deal with it.
To be in defense of the DM here, in a truly "Devil's Advocate" sort of way. Or rather in a "this isn't the right way to act, but I can see why it happened..." sort of way. Something similar happened to me when I was DMing a little while ago.
I had a BIG encounter planned. All sorts of mind-effecting things, all sorts of powers, etc etc. First round starts, and the witch casts "Unadulterated Loathing". He then chooses himself as the object of loathing, and proceeds to stand in front of the doorway. The room wasn't 60 ft across.
I responded fairly poorly, I'll admit. I spent a lot of time on this encounter, and a third level spell meant that the battle had ended before it began, with the spell effectively nauseating the boss encounter for 6 days. So I houseruled the spell effect. I made the claim that this totally isn't fair, even though I had time to look at the spell (and even used it myself) and should have seen the implications in close quarters. This was not the right move, probably. I stand by the fact that the spell is broken, but I easily could have handled it better.
I figure your DM realized your character was an earth elemental, but failed to see all the things that this inherently implied. Pathfinder is a rules heavy game and it's easy to miss the implications of things, even when they are obvious to more experienced characters.
Your DM probably spent a lot of time on that particular battle. New DMs usually lack in knowledge but often make up for it in drive and spirit. And to be real with you, it probably felt fairly soul crushing when he realized his encounter would mean nothing against you.
I sort of agree with your DM that the wizard should have known that. He still could have thrown you a bone on this one, though. It's always cool to get to abuse those immunities.
Let's say this much, though: your DM responded poorly because he felt his hard work was being destroyed. He also felt like you were the one destroying his campaign... And probably sort of lashed out at you because of frustration. It was his fault for not doing his research properly. But feeling personally about things probably goes both ways here.
My suggestion works off that, I guess. I would talk to him and discuss certain aspects of the game and your character. And since he sounds very new, I'd give him some advice about your group (out of the game, definitely not while actually playing). Give him some information on what makes elementals better than humanoids, but also what makes them worse. Make it as clear as you can that while you know your character is more difficult to design encounters around that it's not totally impossible. And hope he follows suit, really. Talking about it and voicing your concerns is good, but more importantly is the need to make it clear to him that you're on his side. You guys both want to have a good game with fun memorable encounters, after all.