"He's beyond my healing ability..."

[jimmifett]

This sort of thing causes DM's to be pelted with dice IME. And generally leads to player revolts.

If the players make the decision not to guard someone they want to keep alive until it is rested enough to talk, how is that the DM's fault? Gaurds can be bribed to look the other way, the BBEG could have been scrying the fight and dispatched an assassin to cut loose ends.

It's also an opportunity! The assassin leaves behind some sort of evidence/calling card/muddy foot print with dirt that only comes from a couple locations as a clue. Now, the party may not have a direct answer, but there is still a trail to follow. It may make the kill, but alert guards during it's escape, starting a chase scene with the adventurers.

I mean, Ras Al Gul is going to have an assassin to kill the person you want protected, and an assassin to kill that one, and probably another to kill that one. Thats where Batman the Inquisitve (or Abraxis Wren) comes into play to follow all the clues and piece things together.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Removed

 

[anest1s]

If there are clues he should be guarded, ok...if ''someone probably killed him just the next hour'' then wtf, how the assassin knew he would still be alive. I wouldn't throw any dice to the DM, but I would give him a look like that-->

 

[Quickleaf]

[MENTION=4937]Celebrim[/MENTION]
I read your post on railroading and it's clear you use a broader different definition than me. By your definition the "he's beyond my healing" setup I used was absolutely railroading, I believe on points 1, 2, and 8 in particular.

What I'm much more interested in is the "method" you mentioned.

For example, if the PCs were communicating with the dying NPC by magic mirror (and didnt have instant mass teleport), that would be ok? And it would be ok because it sidesteps the possibility of healing?

Or would the magic mirror still be problematic because it's pre-defining what the players "should" feel and takes away meaningful choice?

 

[prosfilaes]

Apparently, the GM also wants to write the story.

He gets absolute power to set up the situation for PCs, but once the PCs come into he has to work with them.

Players got to realize though, you may want to play a successful bank robber, but when you make mistakes and get caught, that ain't the kind of story you get to tell.

I said above it's not about winning. I'm fine if I make mistakes and get caught; I'm not fine if we have a dagger to the throat of the bank manager and the DM tells us we can't kill him because he still has a role in the plot.

And ultimately, the when it comes to the guy lying next to the tree, the GM could have just made the bastard dead. Is it so wrong that instead he made him wait to die until you showed up? Is that really a group destroying problem?

It's not a group destroying problem. It would, however, annoy the heck out of me.

It's like an invisible wall around the playing area in a video game; it's an arbitrary restriction that makes no sense except to remind you of the unreality of the game.

 

[Celebrim]

For example, if the PCs were communicating with the dying NPC by magic mirror (and didnt have instant mass teleport), that would be ok? And it would be ok because it sidesteps the possibility of healing?

Or would the magic mirror still be problematic because it's pre-defining what the players "should" feel and takes away meaningful choice?

These sorts of questions indicate to me that you are still primarily seeing my interaction with you in terms of me calling railroading badwrongfun, and that's not really my point at all. It's not an issue of what is problimatic or what is ok. It's an issue of what is skillful, doesn't destroy suspension of disbelief, doesn't tend to cause player drama and what is done with the best of motives - where here I would define best of motives as 'you want to empower the players' or 'you are putting the players desires ahead of your own'.

I'm not really that vested in the whole 'if you aren't running a sandbox you have badwrongfun' or 'if you are running a sandbox you have badwrongfun', and I think I indicate that you can engage in railroading without having a campaign or adventure which can be best summarized as a railroad. Of course, I'm not wholly convinced that a railroad couldn't be fun. However, I am wholly convinced that there have a lot of bad DM's who've used railroads. I'm also convinced that there are far more railroaders out there than believe it of themselves. My pet peeve is DM's who think that they are running a sandbox when they don't prep their games. Drives me nuts. Nothing is more likely to drive me from the table than the guy who thinks he's a great extemporaneous sandbox DM.

As for your specific question, I think that a 'magic mirror' would be one example of a more creative solution to the problem than a fiat 'No'.

A 'magic mirror' like solution is used in Star Trek II - Wrath of Kahn, to allow Spock to have a death scene in which Kirk cannot interfere. In this case the barrier is lethal radiation rather than distance, and the means of communication is an intercom and a transparent barrier, but its serving the same purpose. The secret to getting away with this is plan well ahead by doing a Checkov's Gun trick, so that when the magic mirror finally gets used as a plot device it will seem natural rather than artificial. If you spring these artificial barriers to player action up at the last minute, then they'll be seen for what they are. If you hide your rails, it will all look natural and the players will give you the benefit of the doubt.

I mean really, when it comes down to it, the house rules are just a version of this. From one angle, they are just me telescoping a plot point so that when it happens, it won't come as a suspension of disbelief shattering suprise. Of course, by making them random I'm also allowing the plot to develop in ways I didn't anticipate and can't control.

There are other ways to do it. You can introduce a villain who is particularly sadistic and leaves people behind to die in particularly slow and cruel ways. You can have the players encounter his handy work a couple of times with victims who are already dead, and with strangers. Then you can pull the trick with an NPC that they've developed a relationship with, and now you've got a doubly powerful effect - you've created pathos over the death of an NPC and you've enhanced the stature of your reoccuring villain and made it personal.

But the point is that thinking about these things ahead of time in some fashion is almost always better than just breaking the rules and saying, "No. You can't do that." Maybe you can get away with it sometimes, but that's a bad drug to get adicted to.

Railroading is neither good nor bad for me. It's all how you do it. Vyvyan Basterd is completely right about one thing - DM's must use fiat force all the time and so can't avoid railroading to some degree. He fails however to see where the qualitative differnces lie (and I'm going to have to answer him at some point, but not just at the moment).

 

[Umbran]

The problem is, once you've done it once, it calls into question every ruling from then on. If you're willing to change the rules here to suit your specific outcome, then what other rules are subject to change? Is it truly a one time thing? How can the player be sure?

I believe I already answered this, back in post #52:

The player would not mind, however, if I sometimes ruled she automatically failed. I asked, prior to campaign start, if the players minded if I drive a GM Fiat now and again.

So, that's how you know - you discuss it beforehand.

I'm not saying that this is the end of a game or something extreme like that, but, once a DM starts doing something like this, it's very damaging to the trust the players can put in the rules in the future.

To each their own, I suppose. For myself, I have more trust that a living GM can show me a good time than a set of static, inflexible, non-sentient rules. The GM can know me, The Rules cannot.

If you break the rules too many times, things go to heck in a handbasket, I agree. But that doesn't mean we should scowl and make "harumphharumph" noises at every suggestion that sometimes a GM might have a better idea than The Rules.

 

[Quickleaf]

These sorts of questions indicate to me that you are still primarily seeing my interaction with you in terms of me calling railroading badwrongfun, and that's not really my point at all.

The only kind of badwrongfun involves prairiedogs and firecrackers.

It's not an issue of what is problimatic or what is ok. It's an issue of what is skillful, doesn't destroy suspension of disbelief, doesn't tend to cause player drama and what is done with the best of motives - where here I would define best of motives as 'you want to empower the players' or 'you are putting the players desires ahead of your own'.

Well....if it sloppily executed, destroys suspension of disbelief, and causes static between players and DM - which seems to be what youre saying - then "problematic" and "ok" strike me as appropriate shorthand.

The secret to getting away with this is plan well ahead by doing a Checkov's Gun trick, so that when the magic mirror finally gets used as a plot device it will seem natural rather than artificial. If you spring these artificial barriers to player action up at the last minute, then they'll be seen for what they are.

Thing is my players had a real choice about going to the keep or through the portal (or whatever zany idea they came up with). It was clear that there were costs/benefits to both choices. Here's where me and my player had our disagreement: With this explicit foreshadowing I didn't perceive "he's beyond healing" as an artificial barrier, whereas he did. OTOH the magic mirror situation seems more contrived to me - a complex bending over backwards that has the same result. To my player I think something like this would have been more palatable.

There are other ways to do it. You can introduce a villain who is particularly sadistic and leaves people behind to die in particularly slow and cruel ways. You can have the players encounter his handy work a couple of times with victims who are already dead, and with strangers. Then you can pull the trick with an NPC that they've developed a relationship with, and now you've got a doubly powerful effect - you've created pathos over the death of an NPC and you've enhanced the stature of your reoccuring villain and made it personal.

This was exactly my setup. The difference is the NPC didn't die offscreen. I guess that's the crux of my question. Both scenarios (PCs present & PCs through the looking glass) could be seen as disempowering, but the magic mirror is more acceptable to some players because there is a built in assumption in D&D that if it's hurt you can heal it.

But the point is that thinking about these things ahead of time in some fashion is almost always better than just breaking the rules and saying, "No. You can't do that." Maybe you can get away with it sometimes, but that's a bad drug to get adicted to.

I get it. Since my group includes a fair number of newer players, they tend to get overwhelmed by house rules (their words not mine). At the same time switching games outside of what they're familiar with (3e or 4e) isn't something they look forward to.

 

[Elf Witch]

We have a house rule in our game called last breath. basically it allows a chance to say something short right before you die.

It is understood that its purpose is to allow an NPC or PC to give a clue or to allow a dying PC one last hurrah.

Also if the person starts talking and then the healer says I heal him isn't it possible that the spell did not have time to heal the guy before he took his last breath.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

We have a house rule in our game called last breath. basically it allows a chance to say something short right before you die.

It is understood that its purpose is to allow an NPC or PC to give a clue or to allow a dying PC one last hurrah.

Also if the person starts talking and then the healer says I heal him isn't it possible that the spell did not have time to heal the guy before he took his last breath.

Neat. Effective. Good.