find a balance between rules and role playing

During our last session I was very close to strangling our DM. He kept saying don't use game terms stay in character. So we came to a room I told the rest of the party to move away from the door that I had an idea. They did and I took some cover from the frame and cast a fireball into the room. I did this all in character. We did not have a battlemat drawn out. The fireball comes billowing out of the room and he ruled that everyone was in range and had to make saves.

This is something that I often find very frustrating with the game. It is hard to stay in character when you have to stop and say okay everyone move sixty feet down the hall count it out on the grid.

I think the battlemat is fine for combat so you can see where you are in realtion to everyone else. But is it really necessary to be that rules accurate every second in the game? Would it break the game balence to just say we move away and asume that they have seen enough fireballs from this character to know to get out of range?

I can understand if the fireball is coming from an enemy mage then it is important to know where everyone is.

So how to other DMs handle things like this?

Elf Witch said:

During our last session I was very close to strangling our DM. He kept saying don't use game terms stay in character. So we came to a room I told the rest of the party to move away from the door that I had an idea. They did and I took some cover from the frame and cast a fireball into the room. I did this all in character. We did not have a battlemat drawn out. The fireball comes billowing out of the room and he ruled that everyone was in range and had to make saves.

This is something that I often find very frustrating with the game. It is hard to stay in character when you have to stop and say okay everyone move sixty feet down the hall count it out on the grid.

I think the battlemat is fine for combat so you can see where you are in realtion to everyone else. But is it really necessary to be that rules accurate every second in the game? Would it break the game balence to just say we move away and asume that they have seen enough fireballs from this character to know to get out of range?

I can understand if the fireball is coming from an enemy mage then it is important to know where everyone is.

So how to other DMs handle things like this?

Click to expand...

I think that -in the fireball example above- it could go either way. If the party had seen the effects of fireball and the mage had cast it before in confined spaces, then common sense should indicate that the PCs would need to be more than one step away. If you had never cast it before or dealt with blowback, then maybe. IMO, I would think the DM should ask where exactly folks move if he plans on potentially damaging them with a spell effect like that.

I agree with the original poster in the fact that there are GM's out there who demand such detail ALL the time, regardless of the situation, and it's even worse when the GM demands more 'role-playing' without game mechanic description and stuff like that...IOW, stay in character as much as possible, then get screwed by a judgement call like that when the GM decides that everyone is in range despite lack of map, lack of dimensions described to the players, and just say that they all get hit, even if they are behind cover and know what the mage is planning on doing.

I would also want to strangle that GM, and I would definately let him know how I felt about it.

kengar said:

I think that -in the fireball example above- it could go either way. If the party had seen the effects of fireball and the mage had cast it before in confined spaces, then common sense should indicate that the PCs would need to be more than one step away. If you had never cast it before or dealt with blowback, then maybe. IMO, I would think the DM should ask where exactly folks move if he plans on potentially damaging them with a spell effect like that.

Click to expand...

Not only had they seen one in close quarters they had felt one.

As DM I'd ask for a Spellcraft check from the caster to place the spell centre so that the party won't be caught in it - which includes noticing that the rest of the party should move further down the hallway and warning them before the spell is cast. That kind of thing works only if the room is big enough of course! Fireballing a very small room will get you burnt. Badly.

Btw, a hint: you can't take cover from a Fireball behind a doorframe. It's a Spread effect, which means it spreads around corners. Check out PHB p. 175 (page given for 3.5).

As a player if there's no visual representation on the battlemat, I'll ask the DM whether the room looks big enough to cast safely - and I'll state I want to place the spell so that we won't get caught in the spread. Hopefully the DM will then give me the info I need and/or let me roll an appropriate check to do so.

Neither involves telling the other PCs to move '60 feet' - it just involves waving them back until you as the caster are happy with where they are. That's your responsibility and it may well involve some out-of-game querying of the DM for info, or (if this were my game) a successful Spellcraft check on your part. But no need for your PC to go out of character as towards the other PCs.

Elf Witch said:

I think the battlemat is fine for combat so you can see where you are in realtion to everyone else. But is it really necessary to be that rules accurate every second in the game? Would it break the game balence to just say we move away and asume that they have seen enough fireballs from this character to know to get out of range?

I can understand if the fireball is coming from an enemy mage then it is important to know where everyone is.

So how to other DMs handle things like this?

Click to expand...

If this is a situation where everybody knew what was coming and had made a point of getting out of the way, then the DM is just being a putz ... and when the DM is a putz, no map will help.

In my game, as a general rule, if there's going to be at least two rounds of real combat, out come the markers and the battlemat. Otherwise, I only map things out if there's a particular reason to, such as trying to establish a sense of scale or explain a wonky layout.

Having said that, I love the map, both as a DM and as a player, because I like the tactical aspect of play. It helps make the situation more concrete for me, and helps keep combat from turning into "I roll, I hit, I do X damage, I roll, I hit, I do X damage." The more detailed the layout, and the more "stuff" there is (from trees to treasure chests to dead bugbears), the more neat stunts I can come up with. (Think Jackie Chan using saplings to beat up braves in Shanghai Noon.)

-The Gneech

Yes, I would be very frustrated with this GM as a player. This is how many GMs lose player-GM trust, which is one of the most important aspects of being a good GM. I've seen so many GMs fall into the tempatation of screwing with the party. Trying to mess with every spell and every action, so that it backfires on the players. As if this is a good/proper way of challenging the players. It's like the "mess with the players" light goes on in their head. Oh, no the fireball will kill all these baddies and the players won't be scratched. How can I keep this from happening? The only answer they can come up with involves the party being a bunch of morons. It's like some sadistic streak manifests. This isn't fun for the players. It's just frustrating. Try challenging them some other way.


The following metagame tactic that I have seen work well with these types of GMs goes as follows. The next time you go to cast a spell, break out of character. Insist on setting up a battlemat and figures. Specifically instruct everyone to move 60ft or so down the hallway. Start bringing the game mechanic into the game. When the GM begins to protest, calmly and rationally point out that on several occasions the GM has been unreasonable with the party, and that this is the consequence of such behavior. Indicate that you have been forced into these actions as a result of the GMs actions and behavior. If done in a polite and nonconfronatational tone, you can sometimes get the GM to recant/relent their "mess with the party on every occasion" ways.

Elf Witch said:

So how to other DMs handle things like this?

Click to expand...

I work with a basic principle... the characters are good at what they do.

the fighter is good at fighting.
the mage is good at spelling.

etc...

as such, when i am about to make a decisions that says "your character was an idiot" I tend to stop and explain it before the action is cast.

if we HAD a battlemat, a drawn room and the player said "my guy throws his fireball here" and "here" meant his character would get fried... i would stop and say "your mage knows he will get scorched and is doing it anyway...right?"

if we did NOT have a battlemap, and we were just dialoging the combat, i would never assume that between the player's statement and my mental picture the mage was frying himself and the party. If i was absolutely sure there wasn't enough room... in my mental picture, i would point that out.

In other words, i don't assume you are incompetent, i make you prove it to me.

this is very critical in dialoged conflicts, where most of the setting is just mental and probably not even stated.

As such, as long as i have been doing this, i have had no "disagreements" with players ticked that I shortchanged them and have never ever had a plqayer balk at my presumption of competence.

its a win-win.

I would, in your case, have said either...

1 "your guy moves back to a safe range and throws his fireball when everyone is clear."

ot

2. "you look it over and there is just no way to get the fireball off safely."

Elf Witch said:

During our last session I was very close to strangling our DM. He kept saying don't use game terms stay in character. So we came to a room I told the rest of the party to move away from the door that I had an idea. They did and I took some cover from the frame and cast a fireball into the room. I did this all in character. We did not have a battlemat drawn out. The fireball comes billowing out of the room and he ruled that everyone was in range and had to make saves.

This is something that I often find very frustrating with the game. It is hard to stay in character when you have to stop and say okay everyone move sixty feet down the hall count it out on the grid.

I think the battlemat is fine for combat so you can see where you are in realtion to everyone else. But is it really necessary to be that rules accurate every second in the game? Would it break the game balence to just say we move away and asume that they have seen enough fireballs from this character to know to get out of range?

I can understand if the fireball is coming from an enemy mage then it is important to know where everyone is.

So how to other DMs handle things like this?

Click to expand...

OK, I'm confused. Did you just toss in a fireball without looking or did your DM give you any kind of description of the room? Did he describe it as "a very small room" or "you see a wall a short distance from the door"? Map or no map, you should be able to have to room described to some degree unless you aren't looking in first like if you operate like some kind of strike team who just opens doors and tosses spells in.

Now, you say you told your party to move away from the door, you had an idea. Did the DM assume they were close because you didn't tell the others what your idea was? Why didn;t you? Would it be using game terms to say: "move away from the door, I'm going to cast Fireball," because Fireball is a game term? Do spells in your campaign not have any kind of name, then? Would it have been ok to say "move away from the door, I'm going to release a ball of flame into the room," which would allow the players to state that they were standing back away from the door?

If I were DMing this situation (but I wouldn't be since I use a mat), I would have asked if the others were standing closer to the door than the mage or further back from the door. I also would have described the room to give a rough estimate about its size (I can tell the difference between a room that is about 10 X 10 versus one that is 20 X 20, I assume seasoned adventurers could do the same) before you cast your spell.

I work with a basic principle... the characters are good at what they do.

the fighter is good at fighting.
the mage is good at spelling.

Click to expand...

Agreed.

The scenerio you describe happend to me and other players several times in 1e (when fireballs were much larger). I always thoutght it wasa lame thing for the DM to do.

Also note that fireball requires a line of sight to the target area. Your character could not have cast it into an area that he hadn't seen yet. And if he did in fact have line of sight, then he could have seen that the room is too small for the blast.