So What Does Your Group Do When NOT in Combat?

[haakon1]

PC's in my email campaign spend a lot of time talking to each other and to NPC's. A lot of times, the focus is on trying to understand metaplot elements -- what was really going on when X happened -- and trying to get intel or other help from NPC's.

There's some drinking, comraderie, and womanizing. Plus of course, selling loot and reeuiping and talking to their patrons about what happened on adventures and new quests.

In my live tabletop game, the downtime is less significant. It's mostly shopping, with some following up on clues and drinking.

By downtime, I'm assuming you are talking about non-adventuring time. In the adventures themselves, the non-fighting time is generally travel, exploring, and/or searching, often in combination, and of course hiding out and recharging spells/hit points (I run 3.5).

 

[Crothian]

Investigate, research whatever they are trying to learn, piece together the puzzle they think they are trying to solve, drink heavily (both in game and out).

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

Breaking the statues and peeing on the altars.

 

[Festivus]

Attempt to gain political clout or discredit our competition in the city so that our business fares better and we get more income. Explore possibilities of mining for some rather expensive metal so that we can have better armor made for ourselves. Explore some of the larger mysteries of the area with local sages advice.

We seem to do a lot of that sort of thing, and there is a fair amount of combat too, typically our 5-6 hour game session contains 4 combats and the rest of the time doing roleplay situations that involve things we have aquired (business, a ship, a mine).

All combat games are the ones I walk away from.

 

[Jack7]

Why and How They don't Fight (and do fight)

On Missions - Assigned by their superiors specific tasks to accomplish which they must execute.

Travel and Open Field Exploration - Travel by foot, horse, wagon, or ship across open territory

Vadding and General Exploration - By this I mean secretive exploration (individually, or sometimes in groups of two or three - the party almost never Vads as an entire team) of urban sites, ruins, underground cisterns, exploration or infiltration of groups or organizations not to accomplish a mission objective (see above) or as part of an "adventure" but simply because they can and because some of them are very good at this kind of thing.

Emergency Services for the Empire - Help in investigating plagues, delivering medical supplies, delivering goods, in fighting fires, any kind of emergency services

Communications and Scouting - Acting as runners and scouts and reconnaissance through dangerous areas, along the frontiers, or infiltrating hostile territories

Tracking and Hunting - Tracking down and killing or capturing criminals, or raiding parties (such as Vikings, Goths, Huns, Persians, mercenaries, etc)

Skirmishing and War-fighting against enemies - Because of the nature of the Team this usually involves far more than direct combat, such as reconnaissance, sabotage, mislead and misdirect, guerilla tactics (steal their food, spoil their water, cut off resupply lines, etc), ambush (which does involve a type of combat, but is usually very quick hit and run operations - the point being to injure the enemy then escape unharmed, then do it again and again and thereby wear the enemy down and kill or force their surrender by that method).

Investigations - Sent by their superiors to investigate and discover things. Sometimes they also assist with criminal investigations.

Monster Tracking and Hunting - Sent by their superiors to investigate rumors of possible monsters abroad, and if necessary hunt the monsters down and then ambush them or wear them down by attrition. They can also end up being ambushed themselves through encountering monsters in prepared defenses at which time that becomes just normal combat (see below).

Research and Study - General research, visiting libraries, reading books, manuscripts, scrolls, investigating rumors, talking with sages and experts, etc.

Helping the Military - Sometimes they are tasked to help the Army or Special Forces, sail with the Navy, or act as escorts, advisors, or experts to help the military. Occasionally one of the party members is granted a military Rank with specific command functions or duties.

Politics - Sometimes they act as political advisors (rarely) or as bodyguards or escorts for political, governmental, or religious VIPs. Occasionally one of the party is granted a temporary political or administrative office to oversee or acts as a counselor.

Espionage - Good ole fashioned spying and covert operations.

Invention - Some of my players like to invent (as do I) so I allow and encourage this.

Dungeon Exploration - What is thought of as typical dungeon exploration or exploring lairs or ruins when monsters or enemies or both are around. Exploring "dungeons" in instances not involving combat or by avoiding combat.

Business, Banking, Investment - Some of the players have become wealthy over time, been given land grants and excused form taxation for their service, etc. Some of them have become active in real estate, have farms or ranches, lend money, bank, and invest. Breed horses, animals, and livestock for sale. They run or manage these affairs which provide steady streams of income and allow them to engage in other things such as commerce, to invent things, or to buy and build things not provided by the Empire. One of them has a trading vessel (which he sails for pleasure when it is not being used for trade) and one has built a fortified keep along the Theme Frontier in Armenia.

Entertainment and Relaxation - Hanging Around the Capital or some other city. Visiting forums and markets. Going to the Hippodrome to watch and gamble on the races. Going to the theatre or lecture. Occasionally vacationing. Visiting famous or historical sites. Going to restaurants to eat and drink. Visiting friends or having others come visit them. Visiting females.

Religious duties or vocations - Vesting and visiting monasteries, going to church and Mass, vesting and visiting shrines or going on pilgrimage, recovering or investigating relics, High Holy Days and Feasts and/or fasts, etc.

 

[Engilbrand]

I play 4e, so I don't understand this "outside of combat" of which you speak.

Roleplay. A lot of roleplay. I'm running a game for 2 guys. There have been a couple of sessions without any combat. While I'm usually all in favor for combat as a player, these guys like to focus on the roleplay and the narrative. As such, the combats that we have had have had a purpose and turned out really fun.
Recently: They went to the past and rescued a girl in an incredibly dangerous conflict. Insert roleplay. They got into another big combat. Insert roleplay. Insert realization that they had just killed the adult version of the little girl a few days before. Insert moral quandry. The following session had no combat that I can remember.

 

[Goonalan]

Breaking the statues and peeing on the altars.

Gah! You have Dwarves too.

My Players between fights (in my MapTools game)-

Cathal, Warrior of Kord- makes speeches about the glory of Kord, communicates in a I'm-better-than-you manner, and scowls at the other players (see Lucan & Nalfein); promises to right-wrongs! Gets embarrased when ladies take an interest in him, forgets what he was saying- polishes his armour, waxes his moustache.

Rock, Dwarven Fighter- chats up female dwarves (even in fights), drinks a lot, continues to plan and draw his bar, continues to work on building the Nentir Vale postal service (he has liberated a tribe of Orcs to work as postman and is on to designing their hats).

Farkill, Dwarven Priest of Moradin- smashes statues and pees on altars; that and a bit of research.

Eruan, Eladrin Wizard- screams at people a lot when he doesn't get his own way, taunts the DM and then polishes his latest shiny implement.

Lucan, Elven Rogue- in the hope that none of my players read this I'll be honest- Lucan plots (and carries out) a scheme to enrich himself on a fantastic scale, which of course involves the death of innocents etc. He gets his kicks by stealing from the other party members and generally making things much harder along the way. Lucan is by far the nastiest player (within the limits) that I have DM'ed. There was a moment two weeks ago when a Gelatinous Cube had sucked up four party members just leaving Lucan and Nalf (see below) everyone was waiting for Lucan's round- he doesn't like Nalf, but then again who does?

Nalfein, Drow er... specialist Thief er... Murderer, alright Assassin; wearing a Hat of Disguise. In his spare time Nalf plots the downfall of humanity, he's at part one getting people to trust him- which isn't going that well. Another member of the party (unknown) has already tried to Poison him, this for a slight- I'll let you guess who that was. No-one trusts Nalf.

With Maptools my players like always to be doing, the non-fight time, there's plenty of it- we've had sessions (5 hours) with no combate what so ever; it does however need to be to a point. My players are keen on just passing the time, there has to be to some purpose, a narrative- whether of their own designing or else something I've worked on.

They all had the opportunity to create detailed backstories that I have woven into the campaign arc, some of them have yet to do this (after 46 sessions), which leads to a fear of downtime...

Hope this answers the question.

Cheers PR

 

[ExploderWizard]

It depends on whether the group is pursuing adventuring goals or finding diversions between adventures.

During adventures the PC's will be engaged in activities that further thier goals. This will consist of speaking with NPC's, searching for something, exploring an area, planning thier next move, spying on someone or something, and traveling. Combat happens as a result of pursuing these activities or is planned if the operational goals involve the application of violence for a specisic purpose.

 

[Gilladian]

One of my PCs recently attended a political speech. He came away with a clear opinion that SOMEBODY needs to take charge and get the city out of its current mess.

Now I just have to dangle a plot thread in front of him, and we've got a whole new thing going!

Truly, my PCs spend less than 1/3 of their time in combat. During adventures, the rest of the time is either chatting with NPCs, dungeon delving with all the exploration, trap removal and etc... that that entails, or following up leads with NPCs. They just made a possible ally into a potential resentful problem last week, and the week before they scared a potential enemy into being no more than a resentful problem. We'll see if either of those tie into the political thread, later.

Outside actual adventure, they do the usual; get drunk, chase women, go shopping, hire servants, organize their business (which led to the whole possible ally becoming problem issue), read the newspaper (which led to the potential enemy becoming a problem issue), and argue with each other. They do LOVE to argue!

Many plots for future adventures come from these activities...

 

[maddman75]

Combat isn't all that common, but occurs one a session most of the time. Twice would be 'combat heavy'.

I tend to run mystery games, so there's a lot of investigation. I don't play D&D, but use the same idea in all games for investigating - let everyone help. One person is the primary investigator, the others assist. Everyone must assist in a different way. This lets people use a variety of skills. I prefer games like WoD and Unisystem because they work well with this method - each assistor adds to the primary actor's roll.

For crime scene/searching for clues I generally let them do both. Assistants add to the primary roller, but if there are multiple clues their successes might let them find one as well.

A great portion is spent in intra-party roleplay. Discussing the current issue, figuring out what is going on, all that good stuff. They tend to bicker and snipe as well, generating drama all their own. Sometimes, I don't need to do anything.