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  1. In Memory of LAJ_FETT: Please share your remembrances and condolences HERE

JCC Amph Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies - The Tabletop RPG Discussion Thread

Discussion in 'Community' started by Ender Sai, Aug 13, 2015.

  1. Jedimarine

    Jedimarine Force Ghost star 5

    Registered:
    Feb 13, 2001
    No worries.

    I didn't say never ever give choices. I said when it is important. If a GM has gone to the trouble to craft certain beats for the campaign they want to run, it is not objectionable to incentivize a course of action or make other player choices carry a hefty penalty to steer them to course. An experienced GM can even pull this off with the players being none the wiser.

    Do we have moments where anything goes? Absolutely. But if every session was like that, we would be going into fights with brickwalls, pine trees, random local squirrels, and barnacles on boats for hours on end.

    Perhaps you have better luck with your players in being cooperative to exploring a narrative, but my usual experience leans more towards having to reign in player impulses and convincing them of worthwhile story beats instead of rushing headlong into over-matched or pointless encounters. Toss in the sprinkles of non-conformist "A? B? C?...I'll do K" and you can end up picking up the pieces of a much smaller experience then you had intended.

    I have consoled GMs who were so angry at having their time and effort thwarted by players unwilling to "make the right choices".

    The problem there is 2 fold:

    1) There is no such thing as a "wrong" choice.
    2) Not being prepared for that eventuality will get any GM in trouble.

    But, that doesn't mean a GM need be purely reactionary. There can be a plan. But it often requires social engineering. Know your players. Know your party. Know what triggers and what interests can lead to the targeted outcomes. Then you can craft "choices" that they will likely pick in the GMs favor.

    Plans within Plans within Plans.

    That way, when you get to the end of the night, the players start asking "how far off course did we get?" or even better "We were pretty well on tonight" cause they know the narrative was good and the encounters well laid out. They learn that and enjoy it and that helps to reinforce cooperation in players less inclined to do so.

    Random events can be fun and memorable, but truly phenomenal and lasting campaigns require planning, commitment, and cooperation. And a GM has to know when to pull the right levers to get the party through.
     
    Last edited: Feb 1, 2023
  2. 3sm1r

    3sm1r Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Dec 27, 2017
    Do players also have responsibility in that sense? That is, in understanding the tone of the story/motivations of the characters and dynamics among them, and act accordingly, or this is not a thing? For example, perhaps the story has a clear serious, dramatic tone but one of the players keep treating it like a comedy and it feels off to everyone else. Maybe that's part of the fun though... I guess that kind of balance is matured with experience playing.
     
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  3. JoinTheSchwarz

    JoinTheSchwarz Former Head Admin star 9 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Nov 21, 2002
    Playing with people that fit your DMing style, or at least are willing to give it a try, is very important. Often a skill developed with time, too, and it can be impossible if you're playing with randos in your LCS or VTT (that's why we do "session zero" and personal interviews!). I've had to kick friends out of games because they were interested in little more than a skirmish simulator when I was looking for something a bit deeper; I've had friends and randos give it a try and find out they were having fun with a more narrative approach.

    I still have many issues with @Jedimarine's approach, as I don't think it's a matter of "having luck" with your players being willing to collaborate but something you have to work towards, but that's something probably best not developed on my phone and during breakfast. I will write a long reply about my campaign design criteria and we'll all regret it.
     
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  4. dp4m

    dp4m Chosen One star 10

    Registered:
    Nov 8, 2001
    Our last DM was super surprised because he'd been playing with folks from the WoW guild for a while and I guess they were mostly murder-hobos usually, and in the first session I started a negotiation with a giant I'm pretty sure he intended as a combat encounter and we settled it non-violently... it's all about flexibility, especially when you add new players.
     
  5. VadersLaMent

    VadersLaMent Chosen One star 10

    Registered:
    Apr 3, 2002
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  6. blackmyron

    blackmyron Chosen One star 7

    Registered:
    Oct 29, 2005
    I love tables (what Chaosium, makers of Call of Cthulhu, quipped as the "Dropped Oil Lantern Table" style. Most of us never used them, apart from the Random Encounter Table and the Dungeon/Wilderness Generation Tables though.
     
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  7. AutumnLight91

    AutumnLight91 Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Jun 17, 2018
    So today was my 2nd session of DND

    Me the rogue, along with the Goliath barbarian, the horny wizard, and silent monk, were joined by 3 new players today. A mountain dwarf cleric, a paladin Dragonborn, and a ranger/artificer insect creature thing? Yeah, so 7 in the group.

    We first start off going to this place for a quest called Butterskull. Long story short, we find the owner and have to fight 10 orcs. our tanks of the paladin, dwarf cleric, barbarian, and monk can't land their hits at first. The insect didn't even join us, he just slipped away to other buildings to look down at first. I'm at least hitting with my bow. The wizard eventually kills 4 dudes alone with his magic. The insect kills two with his op ranged attack. The paladin finally kills two. I finish off one orc with my bow (Yay!). We keep the last orc alive to interrogate him. He claimed nothing else was going on, the dragon drove them out, this was all they had, etc. Well the barbarian kills him finally. This took like 2 hours to do, on this first part.

    Now, the next part. This took another 2 hours. Why you may ask? Well, it wasn't even a quest. See from the first campaign at the cave the wizard got these Cards of Many Things, and they decided to start pulling them.

    Well the barbarian pulls the Void card. His soul gets stuck in a jar somewhere, and he's incapacitated till we get it back. The dwarf cleric pulled a card which he could ask for info on something, so he asks where the soul is being kept. It's being kept in the dragon's lair....where the young white dragon is...

    Mind you this was supposed to be the FINAL part of our quest, but nope, now we got to get his soul back to continue with our barbarian. The paladin and insect drew cards which also gave them more levels, but the rest of us were at level 4. But we come up with a plan to sneak in and get the soul or to kill the dragon right now...so off we go to get the soul. We get to the lair, going QUIETLY, and discover its on the roof in a jar. Near the gold pile. Which the dragon is sleeping on. So we go back and forth of how to retrieve it, we think either me or the monk go over to grab it since we have good stealth. But before we get to a decision, the insect camoflauges himself and goes right up to it since it's in front of its face. It makes it over, and THROWS the jar back, but it only makes it halfway. The monk, using his flying carpet is able to get the jar back. We give it to the cleric who busts it open, and we get the soul back into the barbarian, and he's ready to fight.

    Since the dragon is still sleeping, me, the insect, and cleric attack for sneak attack to inflict damage. All in all, we take 100 points off almost. It wakes up, we kill it before it can even respond cause of our initiative rolls. Now it's dead and we got TONS of coin, more than I know what to freaking do with. Now I'm level 7 with this character, yay?

    But that was the final goal of the campaign, so now the DM has to come up with stuff cause it all got derailed by these sticking cards. And the others STILL want to pull more of them despite there being HORRIBLE choices.


    Welp, I maybe trying my one shot ideas the next time we play. We'll see. But man, talk about how badly can decisions go to make stuff go wrong lol
     
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  8. Lordban

    Lordban Isildur's Bane star 7

    Registered:
    Nov 9, 2000
    A lot of this sounds veeeeery random 8-}
     
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  9. AutumnLight91

    AutumnLight91 Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Jun 17, 2018
    It did so after that first quest once they started to pull those freaking cards...
     
  10. JoinTheSchwarz

    JoinTheSchwarz Former Head Admin star 9 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Nov 21, 2002
    The Deck of Many Things has “ended” every single campaign I’ve been in where it’s been featured.
     
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  11. AutumnLight91

    AutumnLight91 Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Jun 17, 2018
    Considering what options they read were available, I'm glad it didn't. But it did derail everything
     
  12. JoinTheSchwarz

    JoinTheSchwarz Former Head Admin star 9 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Nov 21, 2002
    Let’s see…

    First time it killed the cleric, summoned a Grim Reaper that killed the bard and the fighter. Two survivors (me included) and we decided to call it quits.

    Second time it snatched the soul of the sorcerer, turned the LG cleric into a CE madman, and gave the other cleric two enemies (a tanar’ri and the local feudal lord.) The following season the game ended in TPK.
     
  13. AutumnLight91

    AutumnLight91 Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Jun 17, 2018
    Yeah the monk pulled the balance card which changes alignment but because he was true neutral it did nothing
     
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  14. Iron_lord

    Iron_lord Chosen One star 10

    Registered:
    Sep 2, 2012
    I thought the standard principle for true neutral characters who get a "radically different alignment" change, was to randomly pick one of the 4 corner alignments?

    That's certainly how it worked for the Helm of Opposite Alignment, at least in 3e.

    On a failed save, the alignment of the wearer is radically altered to an alignment as different as possible from the former alignment—good to evil, chaotic to lawful, neutral to some extreme commitment (LE, LG, CE, or CG).

    To be fair, it doesn't work that way in 5e. If this is a 5e game it makes sense for it to have no effect.
     
    Last edited: Feb 13, 2023
  15. AutumnLight91

    AutumnLight91 Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Jun 17, 2018
    I guess 5e then cause its did nothing
     
  16. AutumnLight91

    AutumnLight91 Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Jun 17, 2018
    Well it's official, I'll be DM for first time running my ideas next time we play.
     
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  17. Lordban

    Lordban Isildur's Bane star 7

    Registered:
    Nov 9, 2000
    Same table, same PCs?
     
  18. AutumnLight91

    AutumnLight91 Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Jun 17, 2018
    Yup. So it's going to be interesting. It will give our DM time to come up with new stuff since they completely derailed what he had.

    edit: I'm working on my mini flyer for something in it now
     
    Last edited: Feb 13, 2023
  19. 3sm1r

    3sm1r Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Dec 27, 2017
    ^ DM seems super hard from the point of view of someone who never played, so I'm curious about how you'll feel DM-ing for the first time.

    From the videos I've watched, it seems to me that overall being an acceptable player boils down simply to be a nice person and to take the DM's work seriously, whereas DM-ing appear to require a good dose of impro skills, organizational skills, creativity, preparation, as well as knowing the rules well enough.
    It might be, on the other hand, that the experts/voice actors/writers who play on YT give me an unrealistic idea of what it's ultimately all about, and maybe doing an OK job is not so hard.
     
  20. Lordban

    Lordban Isildur's Bane star 7

    Registered:
    Nov 9, 2000
    Well, good luck. With a table that seems to enjoy chaos and random draws, be prepared to be derailed :p
     
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  21. AutumnLight91

    AutumnLight91 Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Jun 17, 2018
    I kinda made these one shot stories for this occasion in a way to mess with them so...[face_devil]
     
  22. JoinTheSchwarz

    JoinTheSchwarz Former Head Admin star 9 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Nov 21, 2002
    You’re not 100% wrong, as all those skills come in handy and DMing is a learned skill, but Actual Play is not the same as actual RPGing. Critical Role or Dimension20 are shows first and foremost. They have an audience, producers and sponsors, and their whole deal is oriented towards being seen by a third party. All you need to run your first adventure is the will to do so and the humility to know that it’s not going to be great but you will get better.

    (And of course no one expects will you to put on a thousand different professional-level voices or to spend $1,000 every week in a new high quality diorama (with actual lights and running water!)
     
    Last edited: Feb 13, 2023
  23. dp4m

    dp4m Chosen One star 10

    Registered:
    Nov 8, 2001
    Our last campaign was built entirely around a Deck being used through the years, and us having to basically secure the Deck in the modern era (after traipsing around in the past to see where The Fates had been used to affect the course of time, and try and prevent a Cataclysm Event. Was immense fun, especially with my PC repeatedly telling people "do not draw from the deck!" once we had it in our possession...
     
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  24. AutumnLight91

    AutumnLight91 Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Jun 17, 2018

    Yeah. Our barbarian immediately after being brought back and dragon dead wanted to pull another. Everyonevat the table said no except our chaotic wizard








     
  25. 3sm1r

    3sm1r Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Dec 27, 2017
    I followed a couple of episodes of Critical Role indeed. And Matt Mercer is the one I was thinking about when I said DM-ing seems a hard job. He is super talented. There was this episode in which the party was at a... party (in the actual sense of "celebration") and they had to steal a ring, and he could effortlessly describe in detail several NPCs they were meeting along the way, each one unique in their own way, as well as the dynamics of the evening, and he could keep track of what everyone was doing, and it was just entertaining and pleasant to follow.