Future of the current Adventure League

rooneg · Apr 24, 2017

Pauper said:
Sure it does -- some things that some tables do 'legally' aren't really in the spirit of the rules and are therefore not really legal. That's why the DM has the authority she has in the AL to review character sheets and logs and disallow items and abilities that don't seem to have been gained through normal play. Not doing this is almost guaranteed to ruin your session when players (even DM/players) with no interest other than to wreck your game with cheesily-constructed characters show up at your table.

What precisely do you consider "normal play"? There's nothing in the rules that says running one-shots or dropping in to ongoing SKT or other HC runs is illegal. If you're going to ban items just on the basis of that sort of thing you're going to catch both the people who are abusing the system (i.e. the guy who drops in at the tail end of Curse of Strahd just in time to loot castle ravenloft) as well as the people who are not (i.e. me, dropping in to a game at a random shop while I'm on a business trip). Honestly, you can run your table the way you want, but this seems pretty far beyond the DM discretion that's described in any rules I've read. DMs don't get a line-item veto on any magic items they don't like based on their particular interpretation of the log sheet.

skerritthegreen · Apr 24, 2017

I think best move is just to adjust the difficulty accordingly. If I sit down to run a table and someone has a familiar, a simulacrum, a shield guardian and enough powerful magic items to outfit them all, I just bump the difficulty a step and send the extra fight his or her way. The difficulty stays the same for the other players and the power gamer gets to have all the extra challenge they built for.

monkeydave · Apr 24, 2017

Pauper said:
Sure, it's legal, but it's also perfectly obvious when you sit down at a table with that sort of character. Case in point -- the last session I ran at the FLGS, a player came in at the last minute and asked to sit in on our Tier 2 game. He only had a level 4 character, but that was OK, because he had enough downtime to use the 'catching up' option before the game. Then, while reviewing his sheet, I noticed a few oddities, like an over 20 Strength and a scimitar of sharpness. When asked, the player claimed to have played through the entire Storm King's Thunder module, completing the final chapter while still level 4, and despite not having any log to support his assertions.

Except in my case, my character is level 10, and has full logs. And I don't claim to have completed all of SKT, only certain chapters played as stand alone. And that is perfectly within the rules of Adventure League. The admins have gone on record as saying that playing individual chapters of hardcovers is fine. So if I came to your table, you could audit my logs all you wanted. But I've got a level 10 character with specially chosen adventures and specific chapters, in addition to using the Facebook item trade group, in order to give him items, secret missions, etc...

Sure it does -- some things that some tables do 'legally' aren't really in the spirit of the rules and are therefore not really legal. That's why the DM has the authority she has in the AL to review character sheets and logs and disallow items and abilities that don't seem to have been gained through normal play. Not doing this is almost guaranteed to ruin your session when players (even DM/players) with no interest other than to wreck your game with cheesily-constructed characters show up at your table.

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Pauper

I'm not sure how you get to decide what is in the spirit of the rules. The rules are specific about what you can play, what must be logged, what is legal and what isn't. If you turned away my 100% legal, logged character because you didn't like that I played a few chapters of SKT out of context in order to get powerful items, I'd be making a pretty loud fuss to the admin.

My Curse of Strahd DM used to get mad because me and another player would take our character online to play the Season 4 modules between sessions. We'd come back with a bunch more gold, potions and some magic items and it would mess up his plans because he hadn't accounted for us to have outside gold and items. But that's what you face with AL. If you wanted to run an isolated game where you control everything given out, then don't play AL.

DM discretion shouldn't mean that you can turn me away from an event or an epic because you don't like the 100% legal way I play AL.

Pauper · Apr 24, 2017

monkeydave said:
in addition to using the Facebook item trade group, in order to give him items, secret missions, etc...

I was not aware that secret missions were tradable, especially on Facebook.

I'm not sure how you get to decide what is in the spirit of the rules.

See the section on 'Cheating' in the ALPG. Also the following in the ALDMG:

"Make decisions about how the group interacts with the adventure; adjusting or improvising is encouraged, so long as you maintain the adventure's spirit."

The section goes on to discuss not using house-rules or changing the rules of the AL, but the reality is that the DM has the final authority for interpreting those rules at the table. What counts as a house-rule versus an AL rule is, ultimately, up to the DM.

If you turned away my 100% legal, logged character because you didn't like that I played a few chapters of SKT out of context in order to get powerful items, I'd be making a pretty loud fuss to the admin.

It's weird that I keep getting responses like this -- heck, I didn't even turn away the guy who said he'd finished SKT at 4th level and had no log to support his assertion other than a couple of magic items. What I did do was "make decisions about how the group interacts with the adventure," which helped preserve the fun for the other six players at the table by not letting the clearly abusive character do what he showed up to do.

Just because you have a '100% legal' AL character doesn't give you the right to make the game all about you or your character.

But sure, make a fuss to the admin. Hope that works out for you.

My Curse of Strahd DM used to get mad because me and another player would take our character online to play the Season 4 modules between sessions. We'd come back with a bunch more gold, potions and some magic items and it would mess up his plans because he hadn't accounted for us to have outside gold and items.

Your Curse of Strahd DM was right to be upset, because you and your friend were being dicks -- though what you were doing was not illegal, it was problematic for exactly the reasons you state, and if you ask any admin, they will say that such play, while allowed, is discouraged -- especially if (as seems likely) your DM specifically asked that you not play other adventures while participating in the Curse of Strahd game.

Though the FAQ only mention's Wheaton's Law with respect to adjudicating Hazirawn, it's a solid rule for all AL DMs and players to follow.

DM discretion shouldn't mean that you can turn me away from an event or an epic because you don't like the 100% legal way I play AL.

As noted, I seldom turn players away from an event unless they are being disruptive (in which case I have the full support of the Code of Conduct behind me); if, however, you insist on being a dick at my table, you shouldn't be surprised if you find your 'fun' to be less privileged than that of the other non-dick players at the table.

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Pauper

rooneg · Apr 24, 2017

Pauper said:
Your Curse of Strahd DM was right to be upset, because you and your friend were being dicks -- though what you were doing was not illegal, it was problematic for exactly the reasons you state, and if you ask any admin, they will say that such play, while allowed, is discouraged -- especially if (as seems likely) your DM specifically asked that you not play other adventures while participating in the Curse of Strahd game.

For what it's worth, I kind of agree here. If I was running a regular HC table and the rest of the players were all on board with not playing their characters outside that table I'd be kind of annoyed if one or two players were going out and playing stuff on the side. It's not against the rules, but nothing in the rules says the DM has to let any particular player play at their table. It's a social contract thing, not an AL rules thing.

That said, that sort of social contract doesn't really extend beyond that game and that group of players. If you're going to allow random drop ins at your table (as is often required by game stores that host games) i'ts not appropriate (IMO) to go through their logs and say "Oh, you got this by running a RoT chapter as a one-shot? That's against the spirit of the rules, so you can't have it in my game." Similarly if you're DMing at an epic or a con or whatever.

Pauper · Apr 24, 2017

rooneg said:
If you're going to allow random drop ins at your table (as is often required by game stores that host games) i'ts not appropriate (IMO) to go through their logs and say "Oh, you got this by running a RoT chapter as a one-shot? That's against the spirit of the rules, so you can't have it in my game." Similarly if you're DMing at an epic or a con or whatever.

That's a good point, and it's even more significant at a con; at the FLGS, somebody probably just burned some gas and some free time to decide to try out your table, while at a con, that same player put down cash money to get a seat. (Though admittedly, as a con DM, you don't have to usually make that call on your own -- you can call over the con organizer to support you if you feel the character being presented is actually a result of cheating rather than just shady play practices.)

But here's the thing -- the admins have made it clear that running single encounters out of hardcovers solely to get treasure and magic items is not supported in AL (see p.14 of FAQ 6.1); if you as DM are convinced that this is what happened (because, for example, the character's log shows minimal XP for the chapter in which the magic item was awarded, which suggests that only the one encounter was run), then you as DM are absolutely in the right to restrict use of the item. (Kicking the player off the table is a wholly different option, and not one I'd recommend in this situation, unless the player becomes disruptive as a result of being denied use of the item.) If the same player comes back to the con next year with the same character and shows you the logs for the rest of the encounters in that chapter (which is allowed -- p.12 of FAQ 6.1), then you can allow the use of the item.

AL rules are not a license for players to do whatever they want and try to force those option down DMs' throats -- ideally, DMs shouldn't do that, either, but sometimes there's no other way to make a game go well (and in rare cases, it's the only way to prevent disaster).

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Pauper

rooneg · Apr 24, 2017

Pauper said:
But here's the thing -- the admins have made it clear that running single encounters out of hardcovers solely to get treasure and magic items is not supported in AL (see p.14 of FAQ 6.1); if you as DM are convinced that this is what happened (because, for example, the character's log shows minimal XP for the chapter in which the magic item was awarded, which suggests that only the one encounter was run), then you as DM are absolutely in the right to restrict use of the item. (Kicking the player off the table is a wholly different option, and not one I'd recommend in this situation, unless the player becomes disruptive as a result of being denied use of the item.) If the same player comes back to the con next year with the same character and shows you the logs for the rest of the encounters in that chapter (which is allowed -- p.12 of FAQ 6.1), then you can allow the use of the item.

Maybe you've got a different kind of powergamer than I've seen, but I see people running chapters, not encounters, just as the rules allow. You don't run the encounter with the Ettins in the Neronvain chapter of RoT because that's got the relevant magic item, you run the whole chapter, kill the Ettins, the Dragon, the Cultists, rescue the elves, etc. It's nice little 4 hour adventure. There are similar options in various other hardcovers, for example many of the dungeons in Princes of the Apocalypse, various chapters in Storm King's Thunder, etc. You can cherry pick a variety of different parts of the HCs for their loot and be totally within the rules to do so.

If you've got people who are actually just running through individual encounters, more power to you on showing them the error of their ways. Someone shouldn't be showing up with a log entry that says RoT: Neronvain, 450xp (or whatever one of the Ettins gives you), 1 Belt of Hill Giant Strength. My only objection is that some of what you seem to find problematic are indeed allowed by the rules, like the various things monkeydave describes.

monkeydave · Apr 24, 2017

Pauper said:
I was not aware that secret missions were tradable, especially on Facebook.

They aren't. Read the words immediately preceding what you quoted which said "specially chosen adventures". I.E. when I played adventures to level him up, I chose specific ones so that he would get secret missions. The facebook part was referring to the items.

maintain the adventure's spirit.

So adventure's spirit, not the spirit of the rules, but the adventure.

What counts as a house-rule versus an AL rule is, ultimately, up to the DM.

I mean, not really. The FAQ is very clear about which variant rules are allowed. Any thing beyond rules as written is a houserule, and while I know that AL tables use these house rules, such as 5-10 diagonal movement on a grid, flanking, critical miss, 20's on skill rolls auto-succeeding, etc... they are not AL rules. They aren't game breaking and don't transfer, so it is largely ignored. But any DM who uses them is breaking the AL rules.

Just because you have a '100% legal' AL character doesn't give you the right to make the game all about you or your character.

Who said that's what is going on? Wanting to have a min-maxed character has nothing to do with wanting the game to be about me. In fact, if I show up to a table where I'm the only optimized character, I find it very annoying because I don't WANT to stand out, but I also don't want to play a sub-optimized character just because other people aren't as good at building effective characters. I want a challenging game, where everyone is as strong as they can be within the rules and uses good strategy and teamwork when taking down challenging encounters. With my fighter, I'm happy to step back and let the social character take the lead in social situations. But I'm not going to gimp my fighter to keep him as weak as other players, especially at an Epic.

Your Curse of Strahd DM was right to be upset, because you and your friend were being dicks -- though what you were doing was not illegal, it was problematic for exactly the reasons you state, and if you ask any admin, they will say that such play, while allowed, is discouraged -- especially if (as seems likely) your DM specifically asked that you not play other adventures while participating in the Curse of Strahd game.

He did not specifically ask. He was annoyed, he realized that it was the trade-off for playing within AL, and he moved on. And in the end, he was actually grateful because otherwise the whole table would have been under leveled since the hardcovers do not provide enough combat XP to keep you at the recommended levels.

if, however, you insist on being a dick at my table, you shouldn't be surprised if you find your 'fun' to be less privileged than that of the other non-dick players at the table.

If having a min-maxed character is being a dick, then so be it. I am very happy to let others come up with the plan of attack, to engage or avoid combat as desired, lead the social situations. My fighter is an apathetic veteran mercenary. He isn't blood-thirsty or seeking combat. But he is a good fighter. I wanted to make him the best fighter he could be within the rules, and that included seeking out items that complement his abilities. Especially since I pretty much only use him in Epics and to play online in-between epics to boost him as needed.

rooneg said:
It's not against the rules, but nothing in the rules says the DM has to let any particular player play at their table. It's a social contract thing, not an AL rules thing.

Then don't run it as an AL game at a store. If you aren't interested in the portability that makes AL what it is, then you can play the hardcover as a non-AL easily enough. In fact, even easier since it gives you more control on giving out XP/milestones.

rooneg · Apr 24, 2017

monkeydave said:
Then don't run it as an AL game at a store. If you aren't interested in the portability that makes AL what it is, then you can play the hardcover as a non-AL easily enough. In fact, even easier since it gives you more control on giving out XP/milestones.

If the store wants to require it's DMs to take all players that show up that's the stores business. That said though, in my experience there's some leeway here. Some stores have hard and fast rules on this, some give DMs that use their space more control over who's at their table. Given the chronic shortage of DMs, if a DM wants the default to be "please nobody play their characters between games" and there are enough players to make up a table who agree with that, I can certainly understand a store being fine with that policy.

That said, if you don't agree with that, there's nothing requiring you to play at that table. Many DMs don't care what you do in between sessions. You don't get to blackmail the DM into letting you sit at his table though, AL or not. DMs are typically volunteers, and they don't owe you a damn thing. Nothing in the AL rules is going to require any given DM to run a game for you. Maybe the store policy will, or the convention policy, or whatever, but AL has no control over such things.

nswanson27 · Apr 24, 2017

rooneg said:
If the store wants to require it's DMs to take all players that show up that's the stores business. That said though, in my experience there's some leeway here. Some stores have hard and fast rules on this, some give DMs that use their space more control over who's at their table. Given the chronic shortage of DMs, if a DM wants the default to be "please nobody play their characters between games" and there are enough players to make up a table who agree with that, I can certainly understand a store being fine with that policy.

That said, if you don't agree with that, there's nothing requiring you to play at that table. Many DMs don't care what you do in between sessions. You don't get to blackmail the DM into letting you sit at his table though, AL or not. DMs are typically volunteers, and they don't owe you a damn thing. Nothing in the AL rules is going to require any given DM to run a game for you. Maybe the store policy will, or the convention policy, or whatever, but AL has no control over such things.

Complications arise if you have players with constrained schedules who don't have much of a choice on which module/sessions they get to play. I'm guessing in most instances this is worked out without much drama - most people (players and DMs) are pretty reasonable and are willing to bend a little if needed to make the game work.