Well, I wouldn't whimsically throw a Medusa at the party at level 6
I'd be perfectly comfortable having a medusa as the climactic encounter for a party of four 3rd-level adventurers. She wouldn't have a crummy dagger, either.
If that's for a one-shot or the final boss of a short campaign, then I completely agree with you. But if it's for a campaign that intends to continue, I would at least warn the PC's first that there will in fact be a Medusa; either they'd find her Petrified Garden and the recent shedding of snakeskin, or someone in town would say "ye..ye..yer not actually gonna go up dere, are ye? Some folk say an evil medusa's up dere."
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I didn't respond to the rest of your post because making up for my inability to take my own turns by trying to take other players' turns for them is even worse. "Tension and drama" my ass, I've literally never seen a GM use a CDG before combat is over. Killing a neutralized PC when the rest of the party is still very much a threat is an irrational move by the NPC's and really is just your GM being a dick and telling you to reroll your character because they said so.
There are assassin focused no s whose entire combat style is about setting up for the coup de grace.
You would be doing them a disservice by not taking the coup de grace if not taking the chance.
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If your character dies from hit point damage, is that fun? If not, should we remove player character death entirely? Would that be more fun?
It seems a little absurd to try to twist "It's not fun to have nothing to do for extended periods of time" into "Nothing bad should ever happen to PCs ever obviously".
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I'm perfectly happy to use creatures with save or suck/die abilities against the party.
I expect the party to work as a team and to conduct reconnaissance before blundering ahead. Using the medusa as an example. A medusa's presence in an area would leave many clues (ie lots of randomly placed statues of people and/or creatures in strange poses) and the party should be able to prepare to deal with a medusa. If they blunder in unprepared and add to the medusa's collection then hopefully the players will have learned something and will play their next character more carefully.
If your character dies from hit point damage, is that fun? If not, should we remove player character death entirely? Would that be more fun?It seems a little absurd to try to twist "It's not fun to have nothing to do for extended periods of time" into "Nothing bad should ever happen to PCs ever obviously".
Seems a little absurd to twist 'Remove character death' (or at least implement the 'Death Flag' rule from 'Raising the Stakes' where the player gets to decide if their character can die or not) into 'Remove all bad things from ever happening', but one could make a fairly logical case for it...
(1) The game should be fun.(2) It's not fun to be paralysed for three rounds.
(3) Therefore the GM should try not to paralyse a PC for three rounds.
(4) It's also not fun to be out of the game because your character died of hit point damage.
(5) Therefore the GM should try not to inflict hit point damage.
...but I think what people here are actually debating is the idea that it's more interesting to have the character get into a progressively worse situation where they still have options to turn things around than it is to walk into a room, roll a single dice, and suddenly you don't get to play any more.
Ive had characters coup de graced before. Also killed before acting in a boss fight. :/
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(4) It's also not fun to be out of the game because your character died of hit point damage.
(5) Therefore the GM should try not to inflict hit point damage.
#4 does not logically lead to #5, unless you play in a game where everyone has 1 HP. Because you can deal HP damage to PCs without taking them out of the fight, while you can not inflict petrification on a PC without taking them out of the fight.
A proper #5 would be "Therefore the GM should try not to kill PCs in one round".
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Effects that instantly take players out are not fun, and unfortunately 3.5/PF is full of them.
Except for that one time I got charged by a boss cavalier (who maybe landed a crit?) with his lance while I was flat-footed, I don't remember characters dying in one shot from HP damage.
What makes HP damage more fun than petrification is that, usually, you can take on HP damage for many rounds before it kills you. You also have a lot of options, usually, to mitigate or cancel HP dmg. For petrification, you get, like, one save. And that's it. Medusas's got a DC 16 on her gaze, so even with my lvl 8 fighter, that'd be on a 1-5 roll, so, probably about 50% chance with my typical luck.
At least the cockatrice does dex damage now.
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Grognard here.
I remember playing where failing a save caused all your magic items to be subject to destruction, and not just faling on a natural 1. Getting hit by a fireball was every bit as dangerous for magic item loss as it was from hit point loss. Getting hit by several fireballs was devastating. This is called "hard mode". I had lots of fun.
It is all about expectations. Some want hard mode, others want cushions on all pointy objects to prevent damage. Some don't sweat character death because it is only a speed bump (costing gold to fix) while others wail when their character is hit.
As long as your expectations are met, it is fun.
/cevah
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It is all about expectations. Some want hard mode, others want cushions on all pointy objects to prevent damage. Some don't sweat character death because it is only a speed bump (costing gold to fix) while others wail when their character is hit.
As long as your expectations are met, it is fun.
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Grognard here.
I remember playing where failing a save caused all your magic items to be subject to destruction, and not just faling on a natural 1. Getting hit by a fireball was every bit as dangerous for magic item loss as it was from hit point loss. Getting hit by several fireballs was devastating. This is called "hard mode". I had lots of fun.It is all about expectations. Some want hard mode, others want cushions on all pointy objects to prevent damage. Some don't sweat character death because it is only a speed bump (costing gold to fix) while others wail when their character is hit.
As long as your expectations are met, it is fun.
/cevah
Corollary: If your expectations and those of the GM don't match or if yours don't match the rest of the players', you are in for a bumpy ride. So work those expectations out and adjust them, meld them, or find another table.
I'm perfectly happy to use creatures with save or suck/die abilities against the party.
I expect the party to work as a team and to conduct reconnaissance before blundering ahead. Using the medusa as an example. A medusa's presence in an area would leave many clues (ie lots of randomly placed statues of people and/or creatures in strange poses) and the party should be able to prepare to deal with a medusa. If they blunder in unprepared and add to the medusa's collection then hopefully the players will have learned something and will play their next character more carefully.
Returning to my examples because of this;
Example 1 with the Shrieking Medusa heads, we had no warning. Okay sure the building we're going through seems to have a bunch of monster trophy rooms but we didn't see any signs or warning of the heads being there. All we knew was "Hey Paladin who traded some abilities out to fight undead, you sense undead in the box". Open the box, combat starts and Paladin is removed for 4 turns.
Example 2, I suppose we did just kinda walk into it a bit. While we had no idea or clue it'd be a 2 stage boss fight, we had been fighting Fear effects the entire time so we did pick up a feat to help or a spell. But because we were locked into a central location, we couldn't really leave to shop for better supplies. This was however a game where the DM warned we could die(Though the act of killing someone later in the game with a bad ruling ended up breaking the group anyway so...)
A medusa's presence in an area would leave many clues (ie lots of randomly placed statues of people and/or creatures in strange poses) and the party should be able to prepare to deal with a medusa.Example 1 with the Shrieking Medusa heads, we had no warning. Okay sure the building we're going through seems to have a bunch of monster trophy rooms but we didn't see any signs or warning of the heads being there. All we knew was "Hey Paladin who traded some abilities out to fight undead, you sense undead in the box". Open the box, combat starts and Paladin is removed for 4 turns.
Well, the Shrieking Medusa head is a bit different. If they hit you, you take minor damage and get a Fortitude save. If you fail the save, you're petrified for 1d4 rounds. Annoying, but you're highly unlikely to die in that battle (unless someone tries to save you with a Stone to Flesh scroll).
The full Medusa doesn't need to roll to hit, and the petrification is permanent.
I guess the Shrieking Medusa is more relevant to this topic, since the original discussion was about players hating being removed from play for multiple rounds...
Here's the ting about hard cc against players. I pathfinder combat is a big focus of a lot of the game play. For a lot of players that's what they are there for when the sit down to do a session. Hard cc removes a character from play, and even if it's only for a few rounds, for a lot of folks that means for a fairly extended period of time. When a gm's character is removed from play no player is out of commission. The fight night be over and the moment lost, but gameplay keeps going with eveyone sitting down to play being involved. That's not true when it happens to a player. For a player once their character is out of commission they are effectively com playing. Sure they can spectate, but basically they are done. Some people enjoy that, but most players came to play.
Moral of the story, is it unfair when a gm doesn't get to use the same tools a player does? No.
Gm's should be mindful of this and use such effects with prudent discretion understanding that save or suck/die effects have a much bigger impact on a player than they do the other way around.
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Even if they're knocked unconscious or die, there's an unspoken agreement not to make them sit out for long- they can control an NPC or a follower while the other PCs try to get them back on their feet as quickly as possible.
I prefer this idea, letting them play an NPC, or 'run the monsters' with me, while their PC is petrified or whatever.
Even if they're knocked unconscious or die, there's an unspoken agreement not to make them sit out for long- they can control an NPC or a follower while the other PCs try to get them back on their feet as quickly as possible.I prefer this idea, letting them play an NPC, or 'run the monsters' with me, while their PC is petrified or whatever.
At my table people aren't really interested in picking up NPCs, though. Myself included. Especially at high levels, being dumped a character sheet you aren't familiar with can be a bit overwhelming. In the heat of a battle, it's hard to both familiarize yourself with this new character and keep track of what's going on.
Most of the time in the games I play there are no NPCs just hanging around with the party. There's a reason leadership is one of the most widely banned game mechanics. And turning around and playing a monster against your party really isn't much consolation.
I'm not saying that GM's shouldn't ever use hard cc, but they should be careful about it.
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I've recently GM'd a couple of PFS scenarios in which certain NPC's had multiple ways of CCing the PCs. They were long fights, and, yes, half the party was unable to control their characters. One of the players spoke to me after the game and thanked me for how I handled it.
Rather than, say, picking up a character's mini and moving it the way the character is compelled to move, allow them some choice. Let them be CC'd with style.
"That harpy up there is singing the most beautiful song you've ever heard. You want to get close to her. What will you do?"
"The cleric commands you to flee from him. That seems like a good idea - he's terrifying. How will you get away?"
Role-play the babbling allip and let the fascinated character babble along with you.
This doesn't sound like a much, but at least the players had some agency and were able to, somehow react in character to the situation.
Also, just because a character is removed from combat doesnt mean the player has to be. Have them make some NPC rolls or move some models.