What do the other players think? I quite like starting at lower levels than the party on death, but the rest of my group doesn't (so we don't do it). If the party (who havent died) all want the 'hardcore, no mercy' style of campaign, that's a really frustrating position to be in and I sympathise. Perhaps this is a mismatch of expectations?
Alternately, maybe he doesn't understand the differences between PF and AD&D (is that what he's used to playing?) and is just carrying over an approach which doesn't work very well. Not much you can do about that beyond pointing out that the games are different (maybe you could start adding one experience point for each gold piece you find?)
Ignoring all of the blubbering about how unfun it is to play at a lower level than the rest of the party, I'd like to counter the assertion that you will be permanently behind the rest of the party forever.
Can you explain why you would punish a player by forcing them to be under level? I don't get it, I play to have fun, and being a tag a long is not fun. (Yes at higher levels the difference is not as dramatic)
Honestly, I do the same thing regarding character deaths.
Fresh characters come in at base experience.
Raised characters get XP for the fight they died in, don't lose any XP.
The principle here is that I don't like fresh characters automatically being just as well off as the party they come into.
It's just me, honestly.
I feel like it takes away some of the punishment of death, cheapens it to the point of "Oh, I'll just roll a new character, no big loss!"
I also only award XP for characters played at a session.
If you're missing it, you can have your character NPCed or played by someone else, or you can have them played off.
If someone else plays your character, you have to accept the consequences of their choices, like it or not.
If you don't want your character played, you lose out on the XP.
Then, I counteract the difference with downtime rules.
Fresh characters and played out characters get a chance to catch up in XP, at the cost of gold, roleplay, and magic item creation that other characters may use their downtime for.
If the entire party wants to use downtime to let the fresh characters catch up without making use of downtime themselves, or taking even more downtime to do both let the fresh characters catch up AND let the fresh character have other downtime use, that's up to them.
I find this works well for my party; removes a bit of the harshness of death without cheapening the experience entirely, and allows characters to keep up with the party when the player has to miss while not cheapening the work done by players who show.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I feel like it takes away some of the punishment of death, cheapens it to the point of "Oh, I'll just roll a new character, no big loss!"
My goal as GM is to make the characters a significant part of the narrative, so even if the player receives no mechanical penalty, they still don't want to their PC to die. This is harder work than punishing them for dying, but seems worth the effort.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Pathfinder has no mechanic to help you catch up in levels.
It has!
It is non-linear XP costs to get to the next level. If you are behind lets say 30.000 XP, that may be 2 levels that you dont have. But later 30.000 XP only earn you half you way to the next level.
This way you have caught up, even thought the absolute difference in XP is still the same.
We are playing skulls and shackles.
The first death came from an admitadly dumb descision, having been drained of blood by stirges, I tried to get a shot off at the boss. He charged and swollowed me in two turns. I died after the first round of being swolowed.
The second was when my barbarian and the fighter tryed to sabatoge a cheliaxian man-o-war. He escaped, I did don't.
Then there was my inquisoter, the party fighter got dominated, and then refused the second save for an order against his nature. He then proceeded to kill me.
My druid I just stopped playing because he was causing to much of an argument at the table. The shaman was raising undead and my gm said if I didn't do something I would lose my druid powers so after 2 1/2 hours of argument I just decided that I was going to switch (hadent even played one session with him yet, in fact I missed the entire session after my inquisoter died waiting for him to be introduced)
Can you explain why you would punish a player by forcing them to be under level? I don't get it, I play to have fun, and being a tag a long is not fun. (Yes at higher levels the difference is not as dramatic)Ignoring all of the blubbering about how unfun it is to play at a lower level than the rest of the party, I'd like to counter the assertion that you will be permanently behind the rest of the party forever.
First off, love your handle.
Secondly, 'punish' means to harm one in response to a breach of the rule/law/etc. I prefer the term 'consequence', which is a bit more neutral in motivation. If you are on a cliff ledge, and it crumbles, you aren't being punished for being there. But there will be consequences. Sometimes consequences aren't things you are at fault for. To me, that's very life-like.
Thirdly, I don't feel that a one or two level gap is critical. I've had to deal with being a 1st level character in a 9th level party. You can still have fun, unless your only fun comes from incessantly comparing yourself to your fellow players' character. Especially with a DM who is able to put things into the encounters that play off your strengths, or your lack of strength.
Fourth, if you have not put as much work (ie playtime) into a character as the others, I see no reason you should have the same character power.
Finally, while I prefer some consequence to death and some reward to more play, my chief objection is to the idea that coming in a level lower (or at level 1) is A) insurmountable and B) a dick DM move. I don't personally make players come in at level 1, but I absolutely support the concept if the DM chooses to run the game like that. The player entitlement crowd has always irked me.
So through a lot of intermingling surcumstances I have died 4 TIMES IN THE FIRST 2 BOOKS OF THE ADVENTURE! In doing so I am now 2 levels behind the party with no way of catching up, (according to my gm I can't gain xp during down time without the risk of death) so I have no idea what to do now... Any ideas?
Accept it and move on. Sounds like it has awesome potential for roleplay and character growth.
If you feel like you aren't "contributing" or the net result of your level loss is "unfair" or "no longer balanced" I suggest you stop reading anything I have to say - I am obviously coming from the game in a badwrongfun manner.
Ask the GM if you can catch up by sidequesting and/or some kind of personal quest.
Either that or pound back Numerian fluids and pray.
The player entitlement crowd has always irked me.
I really hope I'm not coming off that way... I don't object to me being set back for dying, I just want a chance to catch back up to everyone else.
Look, it sounds like you had a rough trot - I'm not seeing the Undead/Druid thing the way your DM did, and it looks like you had a mix of bad luck and bad decisions.
Though I am confused - why have you had four characters? Didn't realise when I replied to your OP that there was a page of responses...)
Introducing a new character at the same level seems like a simple solution, which your DM has not opted for....
When these characters died we couldn't access raise dead or other such spells. When these new character where brought in the GM said they start at base XP for the level my previous character died at.
The player entitlement crowd has always irked me.I really hope I'm not coming off that way... I don't object to me being set back for dying, I just want a chance to catch back up to everyone else.
You absolutely are not. The self righteous indignation from some of those giving you advice is what I was responding to.
If you were my player, I would have let you solo session to catch up, if you'd wanted to make it happen quicker.
|
The player entitlement crowd has always irked me.I really hope I'm not coming off that way... I don't object to me being set back for dying, I just want a chance to catch back up to everyone else.
The way I see it you have two things you should do.
1) Given your GM's old-school mindset, I would suggest an XP bonus (+25% or so) for any character whose level is below the APL. You could also offer the converse for characters above the APL, though while it balances the XP out nicely, it may make the other players less than happy. This is a mechanic that existed in previous editions to offset the way they were built, namely, that new and raised characters would be lower XP/level. Basically, use the old-school solution to your old-school issue.
2) Build a more durable character, and make more self-preserving tactical decisions. Invest in save boosters and AC items. Be the first to run away. Hang back and shoot with a bow, or ready with a reach weapon. Having the opportunity to catch up only works if you stop dying long enough for it to work.
When these characters died we couldn't access raise dead or other such spells. When these new character where brought in the GM said they start at base XP for the level my previous character died at.
Seems like an odd decision, possibly one of many on your Dm's behalf. My condolences.
If there are no other options given, show the DM this thread, and see if you and he/she can come up with some creative solutions.
Well at least now the shaman can cast reincarnate... Not ideal but way better than starting over. Sadly though we can only play once a month due to time constraints (one of our group is our local venture captain and the GM has a pretty demanding job) so a solo session probably wouldn't work.
I will ask but I'm pretty sure.
Thank you all for the advice.
|
2 levels behind will get worse with higher levels because the progression is not linear (see the differences between spells of level and level+1).
Tell your GM that you are afraid that this will make the game boring for you and agree with him preemptively about what you can do if it indeed becomes boring ;-)
Your DM is being a jerk in the regard to not just putting a two after your dead characters name. We do that a lot in our campaigns.
That's sounds like the kind of thing that motivates 'punishing' deaths in the first place - when players stop treating their characters as real people and start treating them like easily replaceable clones.
Surprised by the number of people here who assume that death has no consequences and that anything else is a house-rule. "New characters appear at a lower level" is quite a common way to play - although not one I particularly like myself.
At least it isn't AD&D-style "all new characters appear at level 1"...
When you go back and look at earlier AD&D editions, the difference between the lower level and higher level characters wasn't huge. Adding in class abilities, feats, huge modifiers from attributes, etc., really skews the game even just for martial characters.
Swords and Wizardry has a SRD which compiles all the rules for the original D&D. In that, if you're a 20th level fighter with an 18 Con and 18 Str (the absolute max), you've got about 71 hit points and get one attack per round with your flaming longsword at a +17 to-hit doing 1d8+1d6+3 points of damage (average of 11). That's really the absolute maximum you could really see.
Yeah, the basic 1st level character next to him isn't going to be in his class but the scale between them is rather reasonable. The scale between a 20th level fighter and a 1st level one puts them in completely different worlds.
We are playing skulls and shackles.
The first death came from an admitadly dumb descision, having been drained of blood by stirges, I tried to get a shot off at the boss. He charged and swollowed me in two turns. I died after the first round of being swolowed.
As a GM for Skulls and Shackles - that section of the campaign is notorious for killing PCs.
As a GM for Skulls and Shackles - that section of the campaign is notorious for killing PCs.We are playing skulls and shackles.
The first death came from an admitadly dumb descision, having been drained of blood by stirges, I tried to get a shot off at the boss. He charged and swollowed me in two turns. I died after the first round of being swolowed.
Though the chellish man-o-war is totally on you. That situation could have been resolved much differently.
Though the chellish man-o-war is totally on you. That situation could have been resolved much differently.
How so?
Though the chellish man-o-war is totally on you. That situation could have been resolved much differently.How so?
If it's the one that came into port then you could have made friends.
I was thinking, and this may actually be a good opportunity to take the Leadership feat next level. That is, if your GM isn't alright with you catching up using the downtime rules.
My reading of DerpdiDruids post was that the shaman was animating dead and he was being punished for not stopping it. Losing your powers because of another characters actions is pretty low. As a player if my actions were going to destroy another players character I would stop. If however you all agreed to play the characters and you knew he would be playing a necromancer style shaman perhaps Druid wasn't wise.
A player refusing a mind control save offered is a bit low. As is a character leaving another behind (balls to the pirate code!) There are two sides to every story but it doesn't sound like your group is very cohesive to start with. i think.
Definitely talk to your GM and maybe the players and get their opinions/advice. Just set your own peace of mind that it isn't intentional and that the players/DM aren't trying to kill you off.
Being two levels lower is the equivalent to being half as good in theory. Tell the DM you don't want to be a side kick to the rest of the party.
If it's the one that came into port then you could have made friends.
It wasn't at a port. We had just started to come out of a bay when we saw it. They didn't see us yet, so we waited until night and me and the fighter took a scroll of water walk and I carried him to the ship. When we entered the room where we where supposed to sabatoge the ship 4 chellish soldiers came in and killed me while I was trying to buy the fighter time to run. (as I was faster than him)
A player refusing a mind control save offered is a bit low.
well honestly I should have expected it. The fighter is pretty much a sadist in and out of the game. He calls his character "pain" and NEVER role plays unless its to threaten one of my characters... The only reason I think he's still in the group is because he's the son of another player at the table who's actually a good guy.
Cohorts are 2 levels behind. Ask yourself: are you a cohort, or a hero?
yah know... Being reminded of this makes me a little mad... (Deep breath) can't get too mad...
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
After reading the thread your last few posts make me want to ask, why are you gaming with this group?
So let me get this straight. You're playing an AP, which resulted in 4 character deaths, two of which were just poor decisions, one of which was just bad rolling, and another of which was with a player being a Neutral Evil jerk who, after one of your previous characters basically saved him from getting killed, decided to voluntarily fail a saving throw just to make you die again. (I have more colorful phrases, but it's best I don't use them, so as to keep my response "mature".)
Your GM decides that you have to create new characters for each death (because you can't raise the dead ones), and each character possesses the same experience as the previous one, without understanding the loophole that A. You're missing out on a lot of experience, and B. He's not giving you any chance to gain this experience out of combat.
Do I have that right?
If so, that means you have a jerk player whose absolutely selfish, is Chaotic Stupid and doesn't enjoy playing with others, or if he does, he does so in a toxic and rude manner (by the way, you technically saved his life by being the distraction), you have a GM who purposefully keeps you weaker than what everyone else is, even though he's observed (and caused) you to die over four times now (and everyone else is A-Okay), and you have every other player at the table who doesn't help you with build advice, tactics advice, or anything like that.
It's okay to be friends with these people and interact with them outside of the game, but it's not okay to sit there and feign interest in something, especially when the thing you're supposed to be getting out of it (fun and entertainment), you're not getting. So it becomes pointless to follow through with the activity.
If it were me, I'd tell them that I'm not having fun being constantly killed, being constantly put at a lower level (which causes me to die even more, by the way), not receiving any help whatsoever, from the GM or my fellow players, to create a more useful and/or survivable character with precise tactics, and that this game (or to be more accurate, this table) isn't suitable to my playstyle. I would then state that they enjoy the rest of their sessions, and I'd bow out to find a table that follows my interests more.
Ditto.
If DMs are throwing 4 guards at your already weaker character then he isn't managing the difficulty of the encounters very well. Targeting a weakened ranged character with a melee beast is also a bit of a low blow. If it is the creature I'm thinking of in book one then it wasn't the most intelligent creature.
That said, never, never, never split the party!
Really I have been a little quite about it until recently as I didn't think it was that big of a problem. (Well, I knew that fighter guy was a jerk.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Really I have been a little quite about it until recently as I didn't think it was that big of a problem. (Well, I knew that fighter guy was a jerk.
If the 2 levels behind is set on stone do the following:
Create player
Make him coward
Player will be afraid of dying and play from behind, always having an Invisibility Potion.
When hurt, he will use it, and stay hidden.
It's a roleplaying possibility, you won't die, and load yourself up with protection items, even if you do ZERO damage.
If the DM has an issue with you, kindly remind him that:
- fighter refused to roll a save, which caused your death
- someone raising deads, DM forced you to roleplay something you maybe didn't want to
- you are 2 levels behind
We are playing skulls and shackles.
Awesome, I love that AP! Especially as the DM.
The first death came from an admitadly dumb descision, having been drained of blood by stirges, I tried to get a shot off at the boss. He charged and swollowed me in two turns. I died after the first round of being swolowed.
Hmm. Don't shoot the boss until your melee guys are tying him up.
You said you were a decently optimized gunslinger. So you shouldn't have much trouble tagging the boss in a melee.... And if he does come after you? Hopefully the melee guys can AoO him.The second was when my barbarian and the fighter tryed to sabatoge a cheliaxian man-o-war. He escaped, I did don't.
Kudos to you for being such a good shipmate you'd try & stall 4 guards for the other guy.
But yeah, if you find yourself on the wrong side of 4 to 1 odds it probably won't go well for you. Avoid doing that.Then there was my inquisoter, the party fighter got dominated, and then refused the second save for an order against his nature. He then proceeded to kill me.
Dominate happens. Especially to fighters:). So odds are even if he took the 2nd save, he'd still have failed & killed you.... Look on the bright side though: at least he stayed in character by refusing it.
But yeah, playing with the immature sucks. The good news is that they'll (probably)grow out of this blatant PvP joy. Eventually.Until then? Make sure your character stays well away from theirs when enemy casters are around.
My druid I just stopped playing because he was causing to much of an argument at the table. The shaman was raising undead and my gm said if I didn't do something I would lose my druid powers so after 2 1/2 hours of argument I just decided that I was going to switch (hadent even played one session with him yet, in fact I missed the entire session after my inquisoter died waiting for him to be introduced)
When making characters, consider the make up of the existing party. How will your character react to the actions of _________ (for ex; a shamen who's animating dead?)? Also ask the DM if there's any particular limitations you need to know about concerning his views on how classes should be reacting to party members actions.
So what are you thinking of rolling up now?
On the XP difference:
some thoughts
1) I can easily see how side quests/down time might not prove practical in this AP. I mean, you can't really get off the boat & run about as you please.... When I ran this one most of the groups action happened at sea.
Though there ARE points in this AP where you might be able to manage this.
2) What XP track is your group using? "Normal"?
If so, ask your DM if YOU can use the fast track until you catch up to the rest of the party. Then you revert to normal.
Think of this as a new recruit joining the crew & working really hard & learning alot from the PCs who're no doubt becoming local legends.
3) Work with your DM & shaman player. Have them reincarnate some at lv foe that the crew kills. You're reincarnated & bound (just as a general RP thing to make you a loyal crew member)to the shamans service for some reason.
For ex; maybe the party needs some bit of info from you (to say, help set up a future bit of the AP;) A few things come to mind.) & the deal that's struck is that you'll give them that + a year of service in exchange for a new life (and loot).
I think that the dire warnings about being 2 levels behind borders on hyperbole. If you were too low level for Raise Dead then the gap in XP between levels is pretty small. Later on the gap between levels gets much larger, so you should soon find yourself just 1 level behind. Later on you will probably end up being the same level as the rest of the PCs much of the time, especially if some of them die too. For instance, there's 30,000xp between 9th and 10th level, so you'd have to be more than 30k behind to not "catch up" at least temporarily at some point while the XP leaders are 10th level. Meanwhile the gap between 4th and 6th level is only 14k.
There's not much good I can say about the situation with the young Fighter. I thought they were teaching the kids these days not to bully, but maybe he figures that is OK in a game. That probably isn't much fun if gaming is your form of escapism or perhaps just a way to relax and have some fun.
I might consider playing a Bard or Skald and using Mirror Images and a position towards the back of the party to stay a little safer in combat. Maybe the buffs would make the Fighter appreciate you more. If he likes your buffs maybe threatening to withhold them would get him to behave better (or make him flip out and ramp up the abuse - kind of a judgement call there I guess). Charming him and forcing him to do your bidding is way outside of the social norms I'd normally consider for PC to PC interactions, but it sounds like your group might already lack what I'd consider appropriate decorum.
Paladin archer has good survivability - can heal self as swift action, good saves, and no need to go on the front line.
So what are you thinking of rolling up now?
Reach inquisitor. This one is about as optimized as I could make him in the defense department. Saves in the 10's, HP equal to our fighter and the ability to "nope" out of some situations with invisibility. No slouch with that long hammer either, +12 to hit for 4d6+13 DMG, all at level 6. (Pretty sure I'm outpacing the fighter at this point I just need to play more conservatively now.
If you really wanted to play a druid, you could roll up a CN Druid of Besmara. That wouldn't care at all about the dead being raised! Take the kraken caller archetype and even get tentacles, or take the aquatic domain to challenge a necromancer with your army of controlled aquatic creatures. If the GM tries to pull the 'druid must stop the undead offense against nature' thing, you can remind them that Besmara doesn't honor nature, she commands it, and you are just following your deities example by commanding the beasts of the sea.
And the playing a coward idea works really well in Skull and Shackles. In the campaign I'm in my character is totally a coward. Stays in the back, stays out of range of everything, will let the other party members go first at all times, and it's great. It helps that I'm playing a bard though, so I'm still helping the party even when exacting the better part of valor.
I was a CN druid of no god. I didn't see a problem in the druids code pertaining to undead? The GM said he warned me about it before hand, but I must have not heard him.
Its alright though, this inquisitor will be able to handle most things my gm throws at him.
Even evil Druids don't raise undead it's just not really their thing. Besides how can you raise undead it's not on the Druid spell list
Ooooooh. There has been a misunderstanding, it wasn't me raising the dead, it was the shaman in the party. My GM told me I would lose my druid powers if I didn't do something about it, and it got into a debate on whether or not druids HAVE to do something about undead right away.
also could you please link the material that says that druids in general hate undead? If it exists then I owe my GM an apology.
on the subject of the fighter, yea he seems to hate me. Dont know why , every time we come across something that seems to be a trap, he says "send the dwarf through!" or something similar to that. The rest of the party seems to like me for the most part, I mean we heckle each other but that's all in good fun and its not just me that they do it to.
also the fighter is actually older than me by 3-4 years, been playing since he was 7 or 8 so i don't think he will ever grow out of this style of play.