Save or suck Medusa petrification

[Walking Dad]

...

So you believe in encounter balance and anything that upsets the apple cart like a Rust Monster is a no-no? What if the Rust Monster is not a random monster - but designed within adventure? Also its not always necessary to kill every beast a party sees. They could go around it; trick it; bar it from them; use fire to force it away; any other wonderful and creative methods to 'defeat' it, but to simply say no Rust Monster because I want my fighter to not lose his sword, well then it seems you place greater value on the equipment than character/team roleplay and problem solving.

???
my fighter? I'm the DM. And your last sentence is a bit insulting to quite a big portion of players, judging by the fact that the recent D&D variants (Pathfinder & 4e) both reduced the instant item destruction and were not selling all bad.
And yes, rustmonsters potentially destroy the pace of an adventure with one bad roll. You cannot plan before how much and what equipment is destroyed. Saw a dwarf paladin (3e) pummeled to death after insisting to continue exploration after loosing his plate.

No save or suck = not valuing roleplay and problem solving is a strange equation.

You know what the most common wonderful solutions I saw in actual play against rustmonster? Wizards blocking the way raining down spells, monk hand chops and beating it to death with a club after a strip. Not very creative...

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

So every mechanic should have a "save" mechanism (as in save the game, revert to previous save point, not saving throw) rather than being irreversible? Why not just rule out death and risk entirely? Monsters can just hand over their treasure as soon as the characters kick in the door, instead.

I'm not saying make save or die, level loss, equipment destruction, turning to stone, etc the norm. But I see nothing wrong with those mechanics for isolated cases. There should be challenges which cause both players and characters alike to wet themselves. Particularly since death in D&D isn't particularly final; something should be. Might as well be a rust monster using the paladin's holy avenger as an afternoon snack.

Well, except for falling in lava. You do that and you die, no save.

Good popcorn, by the way. Want some?

 

[Walking Dad]

So every mechanic should have a "save" mechanism (as in save the game, revert to previous save point, not saving throw) rather than being irreversible? Why not just rule out death and risk entirely? Monsters can just hand over their treasure as soon as the characters kick in the door, instead.

Actually, cheap death is a D&D trope I dislike. Raise dead is the the "ultimate death" save. I really like things like action/hero oints that allows heroes to avoid the fate instead of having a mechanic to resurrect them.

I'm not saying make save or die, level loss, equipment destruction, turning to stone, etc the norm. But I see nothing wrong with those mechanics for isolated cases.

Save or die makes HP less important, which is bad for both sides (characters and monsters), level loss is a mess, if you like groups of equivalent powerful characters (which helps giving everyone the same time in the spotlight), equipment destruction is most often a needless speedbump.

There should be challenges which cause both players and characters alike to wet themselves. Particularly since death in D&D isn't particularly final; something should be. Might as well be a rust monster using the paladin's holy avenger as an afternoon snack.

Then start to make death final and the holy avengers quest items a player has worked months to find instead random treasure to be lost and found. Imagine the Arthurian legend with a rustmonster eating Excalibur in the middle.

Well, except for falling in lava. You do that and you die, no save.

Good popcorn, by the way. Want some?

No save to avoid falling? you are becoming harsh

 

[Sadras]

??? my fighter? I'm the DM.

Speaking figuratively, "your fighter" being your fighter character within the group, whether you're DM or not.

And your last sentence is a bit insulting to quite a big portion of players, judging by the fact that the recent D&D variants (Pathfinder & 4e) both reduced the instant item destruction and were not selling all bad.

You are actually using sales to support your argument? So what about the D&DN playtest Medusa, how does that support your argument when SoD systems return? Or are you saying that removal of instant item destruction was the reason for 4E & Pathfinder's good sales?

And yes, rustmonsters potentially destroy the pace of an adventure with one bad roll.

More so than a crit on a character which kills him?

You cannot plan before how much and what equipment is destroyed.

You are not supposed to plan that much in advance anyways. And since Rust Monsters are usually found in dungeons with other critters who do carry weapons the solution would be for PCs to go back and use the poor quality weapons against it, to protect their heirlooms and masterwork weapons and armour.

Saw a dwarf paladin (3e) pummeled to death after insisting to continue exploration after loosing his plate.

Yes and what am I supposed to say about that. I'm so sorry the foolish, foolish Paladin. No dwarvern wisdom there.

You know what the most common wonderful solutions I saw in actual play against rustmonster? Wizards blocking the way raining down spells, monk hand chops and beating it to death with a club after a strip. Not very creative...

Sad. Next time, allow them intelligence checks to give them hints. Seriously they couldnt throw a couple of scrap equipment/rusty daggers at the monster one way, to distract it, and then rush past it as it moves away?

I'll give you an example of PC creativity from our campaign: I was DMing a group whose players were playing teenagers (no feats, no max abilities, no real equipment - nothing). They came across a bear in the woods, not fully grown, but still dangerous given their characters experience and powers. They only had a short sword between the 4 of them. So they formed a pyramid, climbed on each others backs (like cheerleaders), and pretended they were a creature who was greater in stature than the bear - they growled and howled and made threatening noises, and even threw stones/pebbles at it. They made a series of nature/intimidate checks and succeeded to ward off the bear.

I put that encounter in without any thought of how they were going to 'defeat' the bear. It felt realistic to throw the bear in the woods as an encounter and they came up with something great and on top of that they were pressed for time (they came up with that idea within seconds).
I cant see the big deal of using the Rust Monster. It's a state of mind. If the players are rigid in their thinking and unimaginative, sometimes they need that int check for that DM hint, but to blame a Rust Monster for poor roleplaying, thats just sad.

I might as well, what flavour you got?

 

[Walking Dad]

...


You are actually using sales to support your argument? So what about the D&DN playtest Medusa, how does that support your argument when SoD systems return? Or are you saying that removal of instant item destruction was the reason for 4E & Pathfinder's good sales?...

Only that the reduction of the rustmonster's power was after the Pathfinder playtest. And yes, I think products sale better if they have what the potential buyers want.

So they formed a pyramid, climbed on each others backs (like cheerleaders), and pretended they were a creature who was greater in stature than the bear - they growled and howled and made threatening noises, and even threw stones/pebbles at it. They made a series of intimidate checks and succeeded to ward off the bear.

I'm not sure this is the way I would have handled this idea...

 

[Hussar]

Uhm... what about sandbox campaigns? You're assuming everyone uses and enjoys the same playstyle (pre-planned story) as you... you really shouldn't.

Even in a sandbox adventure, the DM is still placing encounters. Unless, of course, you're running randomly generated adventures.

So, even in a sandbox campaign, the DM is still setting pace and determining when and where certain creatures are encountered.

This is not a "tailored" vs "sandbox" issue.

 

[billd91]

And others shouldn't assume that everyone does sandbox style.

And yes, I dislike PCs dying by a random die roll. I play mostly PbP, which means the player is out of the game for a month at least, even if a new character is reintroduced at the earliest opportunity.
I also like to fit my games to the players backgrounds. With enough players gone, the story isn't going to work.
I always roll open and never fudge rolls, so I look for rules that also support my preferred style of play.

There's a difference in broad and inclusive support implications, though. If you don't like save or die effects or gear destroying abilities like the rust monster's... then you can always elect to not use the monsters that have them. Those of us who don't mind a few save or dies or seeing the cleric's armor reduced to rust can use the medusas and rust monsters you don't like to use because their powers don't fit your style of game.

I am pretty certain there will be lots of monsters without save or die mechanics or gear destroying abilities capable of supporting your style of game. Can we get any agreement that those of us who like those powers should have ones available to support our style of game?

 

[howandwhy99]

Could you post the relevant sections from the DMG? Because the MM doesn't say what you think it says.

And again, what do you think Save vs Petrification actually means? Because it doesn't mean, "I look away in time" because the same save is used against a cockatrice.

Hey, I realize that people like this house rule, but, it's not what the rules say and claiming that 4e suddenly made big changes is not true.

You know I think you've convinced me. The cockatrice entry really put it home that petrification is part of aura and not an attack, a gaze aura for the medusae and a very close aura only only occurring when touched for the cockatrice. The save allows the petrification effect to be thrown off like a paralysis effect might be or a charm.

I must say I still see eye aversion as willful blindness with a particular set of consequences and that 5e is doing well with it in its own way. I don't think they are treating the play test's medusa as the one above. Somehow the one in the MMs gaze attack is a constant aura and it says nothing about opponents needing to even be sighted to be effected. It'd probably be more applicable as a Fort Save or perhaps Con Save against an area of effect in 3rd-5th . Whether it requires round by round saves isn't mentioned.

 

[Rogue Agent]

But, that gets to my point about having a different rule for everything. Why do we need a "jump check"? Something that I think 5e is really pushing for is much broader apply-able (if that's a word - Firefox spellchecker seems to think so) simpler rules. Instead of having a "jump" check and a "climb" check and a "swim" check, you simply have a "strength" check that covers everything strength related.

What you don't want is 5 different rulings on 5 different tables. Where one DM says, "Strength Check", the next one says, "Petrification save" and the next one says "Dex Check".

You do recognize that you're contradicting yourself, right?

 

[Hussar]

You do recognize that you're contradicting yourself, right?

How so?

With a single, broadly applicable rule, you have every table making roughly the same ruling. If you want to jump, it gets lumped in with anything that resembles a test of strength - thus a strength check. You don't need fifteen different skills, each one covering a small subset or, worse yet, no rules at all, thus leaving it to DM fiat to determine success.