I've always had this issue with Pathfinder specifically high fantasy in general. Diseases, cruses, lack of food, lack of water, and poison are generally non-issues for players over like level 5. I don't want to just say you can't take the spells that fix these problems but it gets to the point where there's 0 consequences for swimming through diarrhea water or walking through something you really shouldn't. There seems to be a magic band-aid spell for everything. And I am meaning more long term rather than in a dungeon.
Homebrew the disease of the filth that they swim through, give it a redonk DC, and have it only curable by a spell they don’t have access to, or only curable by a special healer they then need to seek out. (There’s all kinds of complicated stuff that the PC’s must go through now to both cure it and to ensure they don’t spread it.... and what happens when they do spread it?)
If they’re traveling through a desert, why shouldn’t it be an enchanted desert? Every day they have to resist a Cup of Dust spell, and each successive day the DC increases by 1.
Around the point where parties get third-level spells and can afford bundles of wands or potions, they become totally unmoored from quotidian concerns and dangers almost as a matter of system design. Some people like that; some people don't. I'm with you in the latter camp, so I've got a couple of things that can help mitigate it.
- P6 games. This is a modified ruleset where players never have more than six class levels, which nips the problem just as it starts to rear its head. It won't totally solve your concerns, but it will address them with a minimum of fuss.
- No full casters. Restricting players to 4/9 or 6/9 casters pushes the problem back to somewhat higher levels. You may also need to limit which potions/scrolls/wands players have access to.
- Spheres of Power. The third-party Spherecasting system has a lot of merits, but one of my favorite aspects is how spellcasters have to meaningfully invest in abilities instead of trivially acquiring every spell on their list. You can still have someone who can cure diseases by level five, but he'd have to build as The Healer Guy and make it his schtick, so a GM can plan around his capabilities.
Overall, I enjoy stories where the heroes- even if they're larger-than-life figures- still have a few relatable vulnerabilities. The things we're most familiar with, the poison bottle with a skull on it and the frothy-mouthed rabid bear, are the things that have the most emotional salience to us as an audience. Removing them from the library of credible threats risks making the story that much less engaging.
Homebrew the disease of the filth that they swim through, give it a redonk DC, and have it only curable by a spell they don’t have access to, or only curable by a special healer they then meed to seek out. (There’s all kinds of complicated stuff that the PC’s must go through now to both cure it and to ensure they don’t spread it.... and what happens when they do spread it?)
If they’re traveling through a desert, why shouldn’t it be an enchanted desert? Every day they have to resist a Cup of Dust spell, and each successive day the DC increases by 1.
I dislike this kind of "magic treadmill" because it similarly risks the loss of emotional salience, not to mention stretching suspension of disbelief. One magic desert is okay. If every other hostile environment the PCs travel through seems to be supernaturally malevolent, though, they may start raising eyebrows.
It also makes countervailing magic on the PCs' side more necessary, not less.
Around the point where parties get third-level spells and can afford bundles of wands or potions, they become totally unmoored from quotidian concerns and dangers almost as a matter of system design. Some people like that; some people don't. I'm with you in the latter camp, so I've got a couple of things that can help mitigate it.
- P6 games. This is a modified ruleset where players never have more than six class levels, which nips the problem just as it starts to rear its head. It won't totally solve your concerns, but it will address them with a minimum of fuss.
- No full casters. Restricting players to 4/9 or 6/9 casters pushes the problem back to somewhat higher levels. You may also need to limit which potions/scrolls/wands players have access to.
- Spheres of Power. The third-party Spherecasting system has a lot of merits, but one of my favorite aspects is how spellcasters have to meaningfully invest in abilities instead of trivially acquiring every spell on their list. You can still have someone who can cure diseases by level five, but he'd have to build as The Healer Guy and make it his schtick, so a GM can plan around his capabilities.
Overall, I enjoy stories where the heroes- even if they're larger-than-life figures- still have a few relatable vulnerabilities. The things we're most familiar with, the poison bottle with a skull on it and the frothy-mouthed rabid bear, are the things that have the most emotional salience to us as an audience. Removing them from the library of credible threats risks making the story that much less engaging.
I respectfully disagree with all of this simply because I love playing from lvl1 to lvl20+. If that's your thing to go P6 or disallow 9/9 casters, then that's your thing. But, there is something intrinsically rewarding for the PCs to achieve the level of awesome that is lvl20 and still be as challenged as they were back at level 1.
I dislike this kind of "magic treadmill" because it similarly risks the loss of emotional salience, not to mention stretching suspension of disbelief. One magic desert is okay. If every other hostile environment the PCs travel through seems to be supernaturally malevolent, though, they may start raising eyebrows.
It also makes countervailing magic on the PCs' side more necessary, not less.
Obviously, not every desert is magic. As a responsible DM, you only throw these things at the PC's once. The only time to do something like this is to create awareness of thine weaknesses, and if the PC's ignore this warning, then pull off the DM kid gloves and let 'em have it.
I agree with invisible pink. If your story only works within a certain level range, then keep the game within that level range. I've been running a game on and off where everyone started at 4th level, and players level up by adding gestalt layers to their character. So far its been working out well.
I've found that players get annoyed when DCs are arbitrarily set to make mundane things threatening, or when magic makes obsolete challenges impassible. This creates the adamantine chest problem, where the challenge is more valuable than the reward, more frequently than it creates fun.
I agree with invisible pink. If your story only works within a certain level range, then keep the game within that level range. I've been running a game on and off where everyone started at 4th level, and players level up by adding gestalt layers to their character. So far its been working out well.
I've found that players get annoyed when DCs are arbitrarily set to make mundane things threatening, or when magic makes obsolete challenges impassible. This creates the adamantine chest problem, where the challenge is more valuable than the reward, more frequently than it creates fun.
The problem with diseases, curses, and poisons in this game is that they're entirely defunct at lvl 7. PC's have a panacea for every poison, disease, curse, and magical spell they might come across at this point in time.
It's probably not worth trying to make them care. Diseases are low-level character problems, like wolves and twenty-foot falls.
At high level, you have to give them high level problems. The murky sewer water contains a swarm of ghost rats. Instead of running out of water, they are running out of air. They don't just run out of food; they are cursed with eternal starvation by a hag.
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It's probably not worth trying to make them care. Diseases are low-level character problems, like wolves and twenty-foot falls.
At high level, you have to give them high level problems. The murky sewer water contains a swarm of ghost rats. Instead of running out of water, they are running out of air. They don't just run out of food; they are cursed with eternal starvation by a hag.
I don’t mean to say YAAAAAAAAS, but YAAAAAAAAS.
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Warhammer and other grimdark "swimming through sewage will likely land you an incurable disease and you'll die while your penis rots away because it's middle ages for reals" games are ---> that way.
Pathfinder/D&D is a game of quickly overcoming majority of mundane challenges and rising to be fantasy superhero who can hold her breath for 10 minutes and fall from 200 m and barely notice the damage. And that's without magic items or spells or feats factored in. It's one of foundations of D&D design, and one that has been consistent through all editions of the game. Simply put, if you want a game where mundane challenges are viable even for powerful and experienced PCs, there are games that give you that, but D&D and its offshots ain't one of them.
Better games for this sort of thing:
Warhammer FRP as mentioned.
GURPS can be set up to work this way.
Savage Worlds takes a little hacking, but it still might be easier than GURPS if you're not familiar with it.
Shadow of the Demon Lord if you just ban a couple of magic traditions (certainly Healing, there might be another in there somewhere).
The problems with doing it in PF are deep-set and amount to making it a different system anyway.
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It's not exactly a "little thing," but you can always just make up a disease and have it much nastier than your usual filth fever stuff.
The season nine PFS scenario "Salvation of the Sages" has an awesome example of how to make a disease that even a level 10 characters can't just laugh at.
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When you introduce higher level diseases, environmental dangers, etc. Make sure that you give the PCs fair warning. It doesn't have to be explicit but there should at least be signs that something about the area is unusual. The few survivors of the last expedition died as a result of a mysterious illness that the local church was unable to cure. Anyone entering the northern desert never returns if they go past a certain marker. Every time someone tries to establish a town in the eastern swamp the town fails in a few months.
These can make great adventure hooks and allow you to make "mundane problems" like diseases relevant. It also won't come across as arbitrary to the characters, when they get hit with things that would wipeout the local populace. Especially if the local populace was wiped out or has extraordinary means of combating the issue.
In my current game we had to make a side trip into the Numerian Wastes. Our 15th level characters suddenly had to take extreme precautions in order to survive the punishing environment long enough to get what we were after. We also had to be very careful with things we brought back. I never felt like magic we were using trivialized the situation, instead it allowed us to participate. It also made dispel magic a whole lot scarier.
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I've always had this issue with Pathfinder specifically high fantasy in general. Diseases, cruses, lack of food, lack of water, and poison are generally non-issues for players over like level 5. I don't want to just say you can't take the spells that fix these problems but it gets to the point where there's 0 consequences for swimming through diarrhea water or walking through something you really shouldn't. There seems to be a magic band-aid spell for everything. And I am meaning more long term rather than in a dungeon.
Before you try to make these things matters, you should consider whether it will be more fun for your players or not.
If your players are like myself, you want to become heroic. For me, it's not heroic to be taken out by lack of food or water, or getting sick from wading through scummy water.
So find out what they want to be challenged by and do that.
It sounds like the kind of game your players want might not mesh with what you want.
Adventure Path # 8 has a lot of good information on this subject.
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The name of the game is not "Campers & Campgrounds". It's "Dungeons & Dragons". It's about killing monsters, not going camping.
Just run your adventures. When these situations arise, let them play out and see how the PCs deal with it. Over fifth level is a very rare figure in-world. We don't think much about it because the game goes to 20th level, but the players amass magics and wealth quickly. Players should be able to use their character's abilities when applicable.
Dot.
I run a low magic item campaign and I have excellent roleplayers who take the small things into consideration where NPCs and the like are concerned. Of course there are many curative spells to choose from but in the event the Cleric has run out of spells for the day or didn't pray for Remove Curse or the like that day the players do get worried, even up into the mid to higher levels.
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Run low-level games. Disease can be a table-flip at 2nd level.
The name of the game is not "Campers & Campgrounds". It's "Dungeons & Dragons". It's about killing monsters, not going camping.
Just run your adventures. When these situations arise, let them play out and see how the PCs deal with it. Over fifth level is a very rare figure in-world. We don't think much about it because the game goes to 20th level, but the players amass magics and wealth quickly. Players should be able to use their character's abilities when applicable.
Yeah, I don't really need to see where the toilets are on the USS Enterprise, either. Heroic Fantasy isn't supposed to be about dying of dysentery, exposure, or starvation.
Unless it is. It is perfectly reasonable to force the characters to go without their Everfull Rations, for the Clerics' deities to refuse to grant them Create Food and Water for a time.
It is also perfectly reasonable to make it an issue in some other way, to make it the object of the quest. The party is approached by an ancient beggar who was once a wealthy and powerful business man, so everybody calls him the Once-ler. The Once-ler is cursed by a Druid until he can plant the last existing seed of a magical plant that can only grow in 1 place. The mission to keep the seed viable, or to keep the seedling viable depends on finding real water because unnatural water won't do for fulfilling a Druid Quest.
Maybe, but I still strongly recommend making sure your players are on board before you try to bring it into the campaign and to have sufficiently thought out reasons why "the sapling doesn't like magically created water even though it works just fine for people to drink". You also need to share those reasons and not keep them to yourself, otherwise if I was your player I'd be sitting their sulking thinking the whole thing was bullshit and praying to Bullshiticus to come up with an excuse to leave.
I never understood this entire school of thought. "My fantasy game isn't deadly enough, they just use magic to counter it.." Well, duh. Of course, THAT'S WHY IT'S THERE!!!! Diseases and poisons might be serious to your commoners, but your adventurers AREN'T commoners, they hsould be able to shake a good chunk off. Further more, its not like the spell casting and magical things are free. They are spending party resources on making that happen, spending money to have these defenses. Why not whine that all your enemies are being hacked to death with greataxes, and make your enemies immune to them? People that complain "magic fixes everything" really shouldn't being playing this type of game. Go design your own, call irt hardcore or something.
I mean FFS, Eliminster survived in HELL being eaten by worm demons that carry various horrible diseases and shook it off. Drizzt never even caught a common cold, Wulfgar only got sicked when horribly depressed and not sleeping or eating. Cadderly Bonaduce wiggled a finger and healed half a town from some unanmed affliction. Many paladins of the morninglord have healed entire villages overnight. Pwent should have died from like a billion afflictions due to his beyond unsanitary armor conditions and unique fighting style. Belwar had a hand ripped off, and had a magical pickaxe added to his arm with no issues. I could go on and on, but yea, magic does exactly what its designed to, PROVIDED you prepare and track resources accodingly, there is no issue.
You also need to share those reasons and not keep them to yourself, otherwise if I was your player I'd be sitting their sulking thinking the whole thing was b$@&##$@ and praying to B&@%#%!@icus to come up with an excuse to leave.
Thanks to you, my next divine caster will be a cleric of Bullshiticus.
I never understood this entire school of thought.
People want different things from their games, and that's fine. Whether or not Pathfinder elegantly supports said wants doesn't mean that those wants are somehow BadWrongFun.
Thanks to you, my next divine caster will be a cleric of B%+&$%~@icus.
I can't take credit for such a magnificent deity, I learned to worship his majesty when I was a graduate student.
I respectfully disagree with all of this simply because I love playing from lvl1 to lvl20+. If that's your thing to go P6 or disallow 9/9 casters, then that's your thing. But, there is something intrinsically rewarding for the PCs to achieve the level of awesome that is lvl20 and still be as challenged as they were back at level 1.Around the point where parties get third-level spells and can afford bundles of wands or potions, they become totally unmoored from quotidian concerns and dangers almost as a matter of system design. Some people like that; some people don't. I'm with you in the latter camp, so I've got a couple of things that can help mitigate it.
- P6 games. This is a modified ruleset where players never have more than six class levels, which nips the problem just as it starts to rear its head. It won't totally solve your concerns, but it will address them with a minimum of fuss.
- No full casters. Restricting players to 4/9 or 6/9 casters pushes the problem back to somewhat higher levels. You may also need to limit which potions/scrolls/wands players have access to.
- Spheres of Power. The third-party Spherecasting system has a lot of merits, but one of my favorite aspects is how spellcasters have to meaningfully invest in abilities instead of trivially acquiring every spell on their list. You can still have someone who can cure diseases by level five, but he'd have to build as The Healer Guy and make it his schtick, so a GM can plan around his capabilities.
Overall, I enjoy stories where the heroes- even if they're larger-than-life figures- still have a few relatable vulnerabilities. The things we're most familiar with, the poison bottle with a skull on it and the frothy-mouthed rabid bear, are the things that have the most emotional salience to us as an audience. Removing them from the library of credible threats risks making the story that much less engaging.
I have never played a 20th-level character, and frankly just don't even see the allure. I have maybe half-a-dozen "favorites" that I would be happy to play forever at some stable plateau. Even my wizards I have more fun with at low level. Street thugs and goblins are impressed by Color Spray. High-levels bosses, otoh, might croak when you frag 'em, but magic is something they've seen a million times by that point, and they won't be impressed by it no matter what it is.
So, paradoxically, you're more of a "god" in many NPCs' eyes at 1st-level than you are at 10th/20th/etc.