MarkB
Legend
Watchmen is another famous example - the only reason the genre-savvy antagonist allows them to get him monologuing is that he already put his plans into motion over half an hour ago.
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PCs that are too big for their britches...do they live or die?
- Thread starter Oryan77
- Start date
Watchmen is another famous example - the only reason the genre-savvy antagonist allows them to get him monologuing is that he already put his plans into motion over half an hour ago.
Oryan77
Adventurer
I haven't dealt with the "too big for their britches" stuff yet since some of the players involved in that have had to miss the last 2 sessions. But it's all in the works. Pretty much, some of the dwarves are going to bite the dust when the Baatezu come back for revenge. This will be a wake up call to why you might want to bite your tongue on occasion while traveling the planes. Then I have some roleplaying stuff planned involving a PCs backstory that I am integrating into this situation so that the group and their dwarven army isn't simply wiped out and they'll learn some new info for the PC amnesiac.
They led the dwarven army to Tradegate, where the merchant council was more than glad to welcome them to town so they could trade and spend money. Unfortunately, Master Trader refused to take an army into Bytopia. So they are heading to the Dwarven Mountain. I have no idea why they are going there, other than the fact that they have an army of dwarves and that's the "Dwarven" Mountain. They never bothered to ask around or do any research to find another way to Bytopia. They just said, "Well, let's try the Dwarven Mountain." I know you just wrote a lot of stuff for the mountain, right?
So I'm currently trying to come up with ideas on what I can do with the Dwarven Mountain and some encounters as they trek 8 days through the Outlands. It looks like the content I have written will be put off for a session since the two players involved in the Baatezu scenario won't be playing next session. So i'm trying to think of some sort of side quest for the 3 players that will be showing up next week.
Aenghus
Explorer
Despite the fact that I'm generally refereeing these, days, I still feel sympathy for the players in situations like the OPs,
There are two important facts for referees to remember
1)you know almost everything about your game and gameworld. The only thing you don't control is the PCs. Messing with PC control is immensely dangerous. What's blindingly obvious to you may not be to them, and that doesn't necessarily mean they aren't paying attention, its that you know far more than them, and to be honest probably care about the setting far more than they do.
2) The players don't know what you know and even what they think they know may be wrong, and you still expect them to carry on despite their imperfect information. Most antagonists will trash talk and exaggerate their own power, so I expect players to be critical of the information they receive from any source and compare it to what they know already for consistency. The more you punish players for their lack of information the more you discourage them from playing the game.
In D&D the crippled beggar and the hellgod impersonating a crippled beggar can look identical and sound identical right up to the reveal. There is something distinctly petty about putting the latter in the path of a rude PC who insults beggars with the intention of the hellgod flipping out and killing him.
i have rarely seen killing PCs change player behavior, theres a much better chance of an out of character discussion making some progress. The players who insult all their enemies probably don't mind making up new characters regularly, in my experience. A bunch of them get bored easily and like changing characters a lot, so killing their PC isn't a punishment and could even be a reward.
If i want to create scary NPCs I foreshadow them a lot, and make the players encounter the results of their actions long before they meet at last. Some villianous NPCs don't pan out, for various reasons, but that's ok, because I can always make more. The ones they feel strong emotion about are the keepers, the hate comes first, then they are worth fleshing out.
There are two important facts for referees to remember
1)you know almost everything about your game and gameworld. The only thing you don't control is the PCs. Messing with PC control is immensely dangerous. What's blindingly obvious to you may not be to them, and that doesn't necessarily mean they aren't paying attention, its that you know far more than them, and to be honest probably care about the setting far more than they do.
2) The players don't know what you know and even what they think they know may be wrong, and you still expect them to carry on despite their imperfect information. Most antagonists will trash talk and exaggerate their own power, so I expect players to be critical of the information they receive from any source and compare it to what they know already for consistency. The more you punish players for their lack of information the more you discourage them from playing the game.
In D&D the crippled beggar and the hellgod impersonating a crippled beggar can look identical and sound identical right up to the reveal. There is something distinctly petty about putting the latter in the path of a rude PC who insults beggars with the intention of the hellgod flipping out and killing him.
i have rarely seen killing PCs change player behavior, theres a much better chance of an out of character discussion making some progress. The players who insult all their enemies probably don't mind making up new characters regularly, in my experience. A bunch of them get bored easily and like changing characters a lot, so killing their PC isn't a punishment and could even be a reward.
If i want to create scary NPCs I foreshadow them a lot, and make the players encounter the results of their actions long before they meet at last. Some villianous NPCs don't pan out, for various reasons, but that's ok, because I can always make more. The ones they feel strong emotion about are the keepers, the hate comes first, then they are worth fleshing out.
Quickleaf
Legend
This may be perfectly in-character for the Baatezu NPC you have in mind, but I usually think of Baatezu taking a longer-term view... maybe they've *corrupted* some of the dwarves with false promises? Always wondered how duergar were made
Yeah, I did, over here: http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?356873-Adventures-in-Dwarven-Mountain-(now-with-sketches!)
I only detailed Strongale Hall (the first "gambling and booze" layer of Vergadain), not Dugmaren Brightmantle's layer or Dumathoin's layer.
Your players sound very unfamiliar with Planescape, taking normal fantasy gaming concepts and overlaying them onto the planes. Could be a cause for the disconnect.
Let me look at my Players Primer to the Outlands and On Hallowed Ground...Some ideas of likely encounters for the party en route to Dwarven Mountain, given the layout of the Outlands...
- Tir na Og - the "northeastern" areas include The Great Smithy of Goibhniu & The Pinnacle of Dunatis.
- Sheela Peryroyl's halfling realm - orchards used to outside invaders and so suspicious of outsiders at first, dwarves & Halflings gets along well but dwarves think Halflings can't leave a legacy or accomplish great tasks.
- Indep village - might be threatened by lost Blood War patrol, Slaadi raiders, or whatever else you concoct.
- Rilmani camp/fort - might be concerned with movement of a LG/LN army thru Outlands and lead to negotiations for safe passage or test to see if PCs respect "The Balance."
- Walking wizard's tower - wizard might try to recruit / blackmail PCs into performing a task for him or her.
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Reality. Generals have never been chosen based on marksmanship, and kings are the luck of the genetic draw, modified by the best education money can buy. Some may have serious combat skills, others will not -- not a prerequisite for the job.
I agree. I go with what Gygax did in Greyhawk . . . a lot of rulers are in the 7th-10th level range, some higher.
I disagree. Bond villains don't do their own killing. A king isn't going to sink to the level of the PC's and engage in fisticuffs. He's got people to do that for him, and more importantly, he has the political power of his office to make the PC's fighting him suicidally foolish. The guards may be mid-level, and may be well equipped, and the court vizier may well be a powerful mage. But it doesn't matter -- if the PC's get into combat in the throne room, they are hunted outlaws, with a short time left before they are all hunted down and killed.
That lesson -- political power > character sheet power, and being an outlaw sucks -- is a lesson I've never had to teach my players. A word to the wise OOC should be sufficient: "Seriously? Do you really want to play John Wilkes Booth? Do you really want to test what the good people of Kingdomistan will do to you if you attack the man who symbolizes their country? If you try it, you'd better watch your backs for the rest of your short lives."
You don't need to up the character sheet power of the king to match the PC's . . . he always outclasses them, regardless of actual levels involved.
The point is to teach the players to respect a form of power other than their own.
In my campaigns, the default is PC's start out as 1st level. If the party is higher than that, it's a good reason not to want to get your PC killed.
I find it hard to believe that most generals lack any ability to shoot a weapon. Every officer goes through military training and is required to meet physical capability requirements. Top if off with any officer who can't meet macho perception because they are little more than a paper pusher won't have the respect to earn the position. Patton most likely kicked butt.
Even current brittish royalty has grit, and have served in their military.
Sure, you can have an NPC leader who is not capable, but such an NPC is not going to be respected either by his own military or by his enemies who ARE lead by a fearsomely capable leader.
billd91
Not your screen monkey (he/him)
It's not a question of generals lacking any ability to shoot a weapon. But it's not like they'll be the best of the best at every military operational specialty outside of the things high officers need to do - coordinate, plan, and supply.
In an aristocracy, those aristocrats are probably getting training useful to the military - hunting, fencing, and so on - but they have their positions by privilege, not merit. Meritocratic armies weren't the in thing until the French Revolution's gutting of French elites kind of forced them into one. And in an aristocrat's army, if their men were better at soldiering, they had the respect demanded by their social position to fall back on (plus a disciplinary regime that would have been much harsher on the common soldier for forgetting "his place").
As far as the British royalty having grit and serving in the military - notice which ones actually get gritty postings. Their heir usually gets a protected position, the spare gets the combat option like George VI, Prince Andrew, and Prince Harry.
There is a world of difference between being a competent soldier and being a supreme bad-ass. I dare say Napoleon was a competent soldier, but there's no reason to think he was any better at hand-to-hand combat than the average schlub in his army. But I don't recall ever hearing that Napoleon had trouble earning the respect of his men.
PCs do tend to be supreme bad-asses, though. The standard NPC knight (and remember that knights were the elite of medieval armies, trained from early childhood and armed to the teeth) is only CR 3. A 5th- or 6th-level PC is a very tough customer indeed.
