Missing Players

[MarkCsigs]

I'm wondering how the rest of you handle missing players in game. I'm not concerned about the players being more active, my players have been great. But finding a night when everyone can make it is not always practical or even realistic.

But as DMs, how do you handle the missing player's PCs in the game?

I've always been an advocate of "If you're not there, your character is not there." For two reasons: One - As DM I have too much to do (including plenty of NPCs) to run the extra characters. And whether I've run the character or another player has, I've often seen hurt feelings when a magic item is used up, or a PC is harmed or killed and the PC wasn't there.

The second reason is I don't believe in giving out "free" experience points.

I've worked hard at making most of my adventures single capsules ... plus the PCs have very rich 'non-adventuring' lives, and it's been easy to make up reasons why they were not on a particular adventure.

But as they get to higher levels and their adventures stretch out further across the land and become more "world wide" in consequence ... it's getting harder to rationalize why a player wouldn't go. And harder to get them together. So I've found myself resorting to the dreaded cliche of PCs suddenly appearing in mid-adventure as if they'd been there all along ... or somehow "just catching up" with the party (somehow miraculously and safely covering ground that it took the PCs hours to fight their way through ...)

So what do you do in your campaigns? Do you run the missing PCs? Do you let another player do it? Do the PCs get experience points? Or is it more like that movie "The Gamers" where the missing PCs are sort of just standing around staring into space until called upon ... ?

--Mark C'sigs

 

[ChaosEvoker]

This is a tough issue and I'd say you have onyl a few options:

1) Get over not giving free XP. You don't want players to be behind in levels. Players don't like it and that causes grumbling and general worse-ness in gameplay. I hate giving free XP myself but I do this usually to handle this issue.

2) You may just have to wait until everyone can play. I hate this option becuase it oftentimes results in massive gaming droughts. I don't use this option.

Now, I'm not seeing many other options but there are many in the GMF more creative than I am (COUGHNightcloakCOUGH) perhaps someone (COUGHNightcloakCOUGH) could coem up with a better solution (COUGHNightcloakCOUGH).

 

[Nightcloak]

(COUGHNightcloakCOUGH).

D'oh! Ive been summoned.

Pours a vodka martini, shaken with ice, and consumes while contemplating the thorny question...

 

[Nightcloak]

OK, lets try and take the easyone first, maybe they will inspre other ideas from the galleries...

I'm wondering how the rest of you handle missing players in game. I'm not concerned about the players being more active, my players have been great. But finding a night when everyone can make it is not always practical or even realistic.

But as DMs, how do you handle the missing player's PCs in the game?

First rule we have, the game continues with one player short and is scrubbed if more than that. But we meet weekly and have a small group so that does make it easy to do that.

If a player is missing, he has two options. He either lets me "write him out" for the week and he gets no XP or he lets another player play him, if one agrees, and he gets half XP. The second option rarely happens.

"Writing out " a player is generally understood by the group that I will give some "Not to be looked at to closely" reason and the game goes on. It is usually something simple. If the players are in town then the character leaves them a note he is gone shopping for the day, or if the players are in a dungeon then something minor happens to the missing character who needs to be layed low to fix the issue.

Now this works for me because A) It happens infrequently and B) the players will just take the week off and play Settlers of Catan or something if we are at an important junction (they don't want to fight something big when they are down a player)

It sounds like your missing players are more frequent and the play is not easily put off for a week. So I'll take on the subject next with that assumption.

I've always been an advocate of "If you're not there, your character is not there." For two reasons: One - As DM I have too much to do (including plenty of NPCs) to run the extra characters. And whether I've run the character or another player has, I've often seen hurt feelings when a magic item is used up, or a PC is harmed or killed and the PC wasn't there.

The second reason is I don't believe in giving out "free" experience points.

Testify brother. I think everyone here will agree with you on that one.

I've worked hard at making most of my adventures single capsules ... plus the PCs have very rich 'non-adventuring' lives, and it's been easy to make up reasons why they were not on a particular adventure.

But as they get to higher levels and their adventures stretch out further across the land and become more "world wide" in consequence ... it's getting harder to rationalize why a player wouldn't go. And harder to get them together. So I've found myself resorting to the dreaded cliche of PCs suddenly appearing in mid-adventure as if they'd been there all along ... or somehow "just catching up" with the party (somehow miraculously and safely covering ground that it took the PCs hours to fight their way through ...)

High level adventures tend to do that. And player participation is a must. Plus it sounds like this is an every session event which really would hurt the XP developement of the players and story continuity.

First of all, if possible, I'd try to keep your adventures "single capsule" as you put it. Even bigger (and more fun!) high level adventures can be broken down to chapters or episodes with some planning. That might help you plan for missing players by creating the capsule effect by breaking a bigger adventure into smaller pieces. the down side is this could preclude some large dungeon crawls as they are a little harder to justify a clean break.

As far as XP goes, I don't blame you for not wanting to give out XP. Players should earn it. But your issue is a little more complicated - The problem is that your players miss enough games (from the sounds of it) that there could be an actual lag in levels eventually. That would throw the CR and EL off and mess up your adventures, or worse - leave the party under prepared of an end encounter with a BBEG. Worse, if you have some players who always make it to the game, they could feel resentment if you do give out XP to missing players. After all, they show up more than the others and have nothing more to show for their loyalty.

I think the solution here is to change the nature of the rewards given to the players. XP is nothing more than a reward for completeting an adventure - It just happens to be highly prized as it allows character advancement. You may be able to get away with giving out XP to everyone but offering a bonus reward to players who participate.

1. You could try only giving out 75% of the XP for an evening, but offering participating players a 25% bonus for roleplaying (i.e. full XP bonus in reality)

2. If you use hero points or action points, you can reduce the amount received by players at each level but give bonus points to players at the end of every evening with XP.
Player 1: "D'oh! I failed my save against the dragons breath. I'm so toast"
Player 2: "To bad you couldn't make it last week, you could have used the action points"

In otherwords, find a new reward for the players who participate. That way you reward players who show up while mildly punishing players who cannot make it.

Hope that helps!

 

[Blastin]

I ran a game a few years ago where I knew players were going to be out for one or two sessions with little warning because of jobs. What I did at the begining of the campaign to avoid the "suddenly, Tomak shows up just as you enter the next room" scenario, was to make it fit the game. In the first session (when all the players were there) I had them all be present when a magical accident happened ( they were watching two archmages spellduel and got caught in an unexpected, weird magical backlash). The effect of the accident was that they became subject to a "random" polymorph any object effect. The effect was that at "random" times (when that player couldn't make it) the character would suddenly polymorph into a ring, a dagger, or some other small, portable and mundane object. They would remain in this condition for a "random" amount of time (until the player showed up again) and then revert back to normal form. This made it easy to explain why characters could suddenly be out of the picture for a session or two, and then be right back in without pause.

It ended up being pretty funny in a few sessions, as I had it occur a few times just for comedic effect. The players all understood that "ring time", as they called it, did not earn xp. I also judged that the items were immune to random destruction from missed saves by the holding character.

The most entertaining session where this was involved was when a character used the wizard, who was poly'ed into a club, to kill an ogre. They all thought it was funny when the Wizard started bragging about how he had "been instrumental" in killing an ogre in melee combat.

 

[Nightcloak]

I ran a game a few years ago where I knew players were going to be out for one or two sessions with little warning because of jobs. What I did at the begining of the campaign to avoid the "suddenly, Tomak shows up just as you enter the next room" scenario, was to make it fit the game. In the first session (when all the players were there) I had them all be present when a magical accident happened ( they were watching two archmages spellduel and got caught in an unexpected, weird magical backlash). The effect of the accident was that they became subject to a "random" polymorph any object effect. The effect was that at "random" times (when that player couldn't make it) the character would suddenly polymorph into a ring, a dagger, or some other small, portable and mundane object. They would remain in this condition for a "random" amount of time (until the player showed up again) and then revert back to normal form. This made it easy to explain why characters could suddenly be out of the picture for a session or two, and then be right back in without pause.

It ended up being pretty funny in a few sessions, as I had it occur a few times just for comedic effect. The players all understood that "ring time", as they called it, did not earn xp. I also judged that the items were immune to random destruction from missed saves by the holding character.

The most entertaining session where this was involved was when a character used the wizard, who was poly'ed into a club, to kill an ogre. They all thought it was funny when the Wizard started bragging about how he had "been instrumental" in killing an ogre in melee combat.

That's pretty cool. A good explination that could become a story arc and adventutre into itself later.

 

[Blade of Desecration]

Usually when someones not there, and the PCs are on a mission, they just leave the PC out front and explain that he was watching their backs. Not always plausible, but good enough most times.

 

[Xen155]

I have a tride and true method. 6 guys, black van, net, tranquilizer.

 

[Xen155]

Just saw your sig, gona have to give that one one of the biggest lol's I have had all year. And hey, thats how I knew ya back at the Guild House *shiver* so can ya blame me?

 

[MarkCsigs]

I ran a game a few years ago ... (snip)

Blastin, that is awsome!! That is definitely something I'm going to consider ...

To all the others, thanks for your replies. I've tried the black van thing but the local constabulary seems to frown up on it ... as do my player's wives.