Do you "save" the PCs?

[Ariosto]

Gotta love those folks who are so duty bound to tell the rest of us that we're doing it wrong!

"You screwed up!"
"It's your fault!"

What is my fault? Can you please tell me?

No, you cannot, because you know all of zip-a-dee-doo-dah about a game you have never played and people you have never met. When you are told by one in the know, you refuse to listen.

 

[Reynard]

Gotta love those folks who are so duty bound to tell the rest of us that we're doing it wrong!

"You screwed up!"
"It's your fault!"

What is my fault? Can you please tell me?

No, you cannot, because you know all of zip-a-dee-doo-dah about a game you have never played and people you have never met. When you are told by one in the know, you refuse to listen.

The question now becomes: "What in the world are you talking about?" because none of that has appeared in this thread at all.

Here's the thing, as it relates to a couple of posts back by you: 1) The 1E DMG goes to great lengths to remind the prospective DM/referee that what the rules or the dice say don't matter one whit and what happens in the game is up to the DM and no one lese. Hence the asking about your playstyle: simply invoking Gyugax, even in the 1E DMG, doesn't say much considering the man himself obviously realized that each and every DM would do things differently.

In the long run, I would make a wild *guess* that what you are talking about is a sandboxy kind of game that hews pretty close to the guidelines presented in AD&D. And if that is the case, although you have game rules and suggestions to back you up, you still have to make decisions and present situations to your players, which ends up in the same place we all are, despiute edition: making decisions about whether we screwed up in landing certain challenges at the feet of our players and their characters.

There's no right answer of course, but we can presume that a responsible DM will make an effort to "play fair". So, in "playing fair" and finding that you have misjudged an encounter, do you "save" the PCs? That seems to be the question, devoid of debates over onetruewayism and the like,

 

[Ariosto]

The question now becomes: "What in the world are you talking about?" because none of that has appeared in this thread at all.

Actually, "you screwed up" was from just a few posts ago, and "it's your fault" (twice) was from the poster who first saw fit to "school" me on my game.

In the long run, I would make a wild *guess*

You go ahead and do that, since you refuse to accept what I have already posted twice.

So, in "playing fair" and finding that you have misjudged an encounter, do you "save" the PCs?

What does "misjudged an encounter" mean? On what basis is it to be "judged"? How would I know that I was not "misjudging" it again?

Finally, why should I break my word to my friends?

 

[Imaginary Number]

I've been away from this thread for a while, and it seems to be careening away from the original topic, which was (to paraphrase) whether and to what extent individual GMs provided some sort of plot immunity from death to the PCs. That issue arises in any game system in which PC death is possible, so the question is a good one. The responses have ranged from "never" through "under some conditions" to "always," with the majority clustering around the "never" end of the spectrum. In an attempt to re-rail the discussion, I'll ask a slightly modified version of the original question: how, if at all, does a GM signal to the PCs that they're getting in over their heads and risking a TPK? I'm assuming that even "let the dice fall where they may" GMs will have some mechanism in place such that the players are able to approximate the level of challenge a particular encounter represents and gauge whether they want to face it. How do you provide that information to the players in such a way that they will generally agree that a TPK is an appropriate consequence for their actions?

 

[pemerton]

I often find myself retreating from extreme, inflexible viewpoints. In my view, the basic point of breaking out the dice is to use a system to determine what happens in a situation.

Agreed.

However, it us up to the GM to decide when to break out the dice and how they will be used.

I don't agree with this. I prefer to leave this up to the group as a whole (who will presumably at least be guided by the rules of the game they're playing). In practice, the GM is likely to have more influence, but (in my preferred approach to play) doesn't have unilateral authority.

A complication is the role of the GM in setting difficulties. As Umbran (I think - and probably others) was sayting upthread, if the GM has unlimited discretion to set difficulties, then unless the rules allow for open-ended rolls or auto-successes (or, at the other extreme, fumbles/auto-failures) then the GM has the discretion to make the dice irrelevant. That's why I think the encounter-buidling guidelines for a game are just as important to the rules as are the action-resolution or character-building mechanics. They constrain the GM and therefore help to protagonise the players.

Letting it be done by GM fiat versus a game mechanic is not inherently inferior, but I think it's a good idea to design a campaign with game systems that will favor the outcomes you want.

I tend to think it is inferior. I therefore agree with you that the system should be one that produces the desired gaming experience. In practice, other considerations feed into system selection as well (eg what does everyone else want to play). In my case, I'm happy that 4e has a reasonable range of mechanics to let me ameliorate TPK possibilities without having to exercise GM-fiat (as opposed to GM-responsibilities in relation to encounter and adventure design).

 

[pemerton]

if you're playing a game about, say, exploring dark dungeons and trackless wastes filled with ravening monsters and evil villains, then it's reasonable to expect the adventurers to face hazards more dangerous than a torn ACL, a scathing review, or a well-funded primary opponent.

<snip>

those sensitive souls who would not have a good time playing a game where character death is on the table should perhaps play a game where character death is rare per the rules as written; Marvel Super Heroes comes to mind.

<snip>

And if we're playing a game where you can get a sword through your eye, you are explicitly agreeing to the fact that your character may die in the course of play.

If the player characters are wizards, warriors, etc. and thier adventures involve going into dangerous places infested with monsters, tricks, and deadly traps then life or death stakes are a normal part of life for these characters and thus part of the game.

Death is of course a possibility from the PC's point of view. But this doesn't tell us that it has to be a possibility from the players'/metagame point of view. And we don't necessarily have to change genres (eg to super-heroes). There are fantasy-adventure RPGs where the action resolution mechanics mean that PC death is not really on the table (eg ICE's HARP, with its Fate Point rules - one Fate Point is enough to turn a killing blow into a merely serious one). D&D doesn't have quite that sort of action resolution option, but there are other ways of proceeding that are quite legal within the rules (eg 4e's "unconscious at zero hp" rule).

Roleplaying games are not movies. Different medium entirely.

Movies are a different medium of entertainment

It doesn't follow that they have nothing to tell us about RPG design. Look at Robin Laws's advice in the DMG2, for example, which is cribbed from his advice in HeroWars/HeroQuest.

One enjoys a movie as a consumer of entertainment, not a participant in that entertainment. A movie story is set and canned. Viewers cannot change the outcome through active participation. In a game, it is the ability to create and modify the action that provides the entertainment.

Sure, but "creation and modification" is a long way from "possibillity of PC death as a result of random die rolls". In fact, in a game where (as a player) my main means of creating and modifying is by having my PC do things, than random chances of PC death might be seen as an obstacle to that creation.

Not always, of course - some games and playstyle make bringing in new PCs, or resurrecting dead ones, easy. Others do not. The link between PC death and deprotagonism is subtle. But it is not all one way. It is not inherently deprotagonising to take the possibility of PC death off the table. But of course it does depend on how that is done.

If one is playing a game in which situation X can happen and anytime X does indeed happen the results that produced X are changed or discarded then it has been decided that result X will not be a possibility.

I've played lots of sessions of fantasy RPGs, and never once confronted the possibility of a character dying from a burst bladder (as did Tycho Brahe). That's predetermination of a sort. I don't think it's ever mattered, however. That's not the sort of possibility we want on the table (unless, maybe, we're playing F.A.T.A.L.). Is PC death an important possibility or not? That's what's up for grabs in different approaches to play - it can't just be assumed to be important for everyone.

If one aproaches a game with the attitude that it is no fun to play if there is any possibility of losing then why play? Participate in story telling and dispense with the sham of dice rolling or mechanics.

Short answer - there can be other reasons to play RPGs besides winning/losing. One reason would be to create (pretty hackneyed and low-grade!) stories with friends. Why use dice and mechanics? Because they (i) create a framework in which to create stories, (ii) resolve issues about distribution of narrative power across participants, and (iii) interject randomness/novelty/tension etc.

When it makes sense for the NPC's to take captives then they should.

The real question here is - do we mean "makes sense" in the gameworld, or "makes sense" in the real world at the gametable. I think you mean the former. I would agree with what you've said, but only if "make sense" has the latter meaning. If it would "make sense" at the game table for the PCs to be captured - because this is what the players want, to keep playing their PCs rather than having them be killed - then that is what I would prefer to do when GMing my group. It's my job, as GM, to then find a way - retconning if necessary - to make this make sense within the gameworld.

Being beaten over the head by deus ex machina isn't my idea of a good time, but others' mileage certainly varies.

This is the kind of situation that players hate worse than being captured or killed-being rescued. Regardless of finesse the players may feel railroaded. If made to appear as part of the adventure as designed it's even worse because the DM put them in a situation that required a rescue.

I think there is more to it then railroading and deus ex machina. It depends a lot on what has come before in the game (eg were allies made or contingencies prepared for). Is the rescue a way of making a player background come into play? Is it a way of rewarding success in an earlier skill challenge (or penalising failure)? Some systems have better mechanics for this than D&D (eg Relationships in HeroQuest) but I don't think it's something that D&D can't handle.

You can even say to the players - do you prefer a TPK or a rescue? And if the latter, by whom, and at what cost? So rescuing is to me more about adventure design and GMing techniques than railroading and deus ex machina. As to the GM putting the players in a situation requiring a rescue - I'm kind of with Ariosto on that. It was the players who chose to go there - the GM just refereed the outcome.

 

[pemerton]

As a player, I prefer that outcomes be based on consistent rules, not on a GM's whim. PC deaths are no different.

Agreed.

There are many other games. The 40 years since the first expedition into the dungeons beneath Blackmoor Castle have not exhausted the possibilities in detail, but have certainly explored many more broadly different paths. There are games that owe relatively little to the historical-wargames campaigns that inspired the first distinct RPG. There are games in which character death is neither expected, nor left to chance, nor any sort of setback, but strictly a "narrative-authorial" option for a player. Other setbacks for a character may not even be that for a player! There are all sorts of other games as well, too many to relate at once. Some come with a lot of "baggage" from previous game forms, legacies adopted without much thought. Some go to the other extreme, that of novelty for its own sake. Some are very thoughtfully designed.

Different people want to get different things out of a "fantasy role-playing game", and so there are different FRP games.

And so, no, nothing is "necessarily good" -- but various games satisfying various tastes seems to me a state of affairs likely on balance to be better than uniformity.

I very much agree, but can't give you more XP at this time.

 

[airwalkrr]

I generally let the dice fall where they may. It is a game after all and character death is a part of that game. That said, I do my best to avoid killing a character just because of dumb luck. I try to prevent dumb luck being the cause of death by using a few proactive house rules. First, I use the softer critical hits variant from the 3.5 DMG while the PCs are low level (generally from 1st through 3rd). Second, I use the death and dying variant from the 3.5 Unearthed Arcana. But if, in spite of these rules, the dice still spell doom, I let it happen.

I don't ascribe to the notion that the PCs should always win. Obviously they have to win most of the time, otherwise the game wouldn't be able to move forward. But being a smart player character means knowing when you are beaten and when to call a retreat. It happened in the very first D&D campaign (read some of Gary Gygax's old articles in The Dragon) and it continues to happen today. Sometimes the dice don't roll your way. Sometimes you made a tactical blunder. Sometimes you just went poking your nose where it didn't belong. No matter how it happened, you, as a player, shouldn't act as if your player character is expendable unless you created a character who is truly unafraid of death. And if that's the case, then you don't deserve the right to say a thing when your PC does eventually die (notice I said when, not if). But by and large, player characters ought to behave like actual people when death is looking them in the eye, they need to turn tail and run. If the players can't realize when they've been beaten (and I usually tell them flat-out when that has occurred before the TPK), they deserve to have their characters killed.

"If we take the generally accepted definition of bravery as a quality which knows no fear, I have never seen a brave man. All men are frightened. The more intelligent they are, the more they are frightened."

-George S. Patton

 

[ExploderWizard]

I don't think I think that.

It's more that I don't think that a human can be truly impartial. If I sat at the table of somebody who disagreed vociferously on my opinion of this topic, would I get a fair game? There would always be that question based on the outcome of the game. it might even be that the GM would over-compensate, and thus bias the game the other way.

The human brain's decision tree starts in the emotion chip of the brain. Everything after that is in support of that emotional decision. Thus, there is no guarantee that the impartial GM is actually impartial.

Since I don't think the GM is impartial and I don't see an absolute mathematically tested model to ensure he is reigned in, I see no point in pretending he is impartial. Since the GM has ultimate power (remember, no absolute mathematically proven model to bound his power), it would be an abuse of power and true imbalance to play as an adversarial role.

Sure, the GM's gotta try to be fair. Impartial? No way, he's a human and has just as much right to pursue his goals within the game as the players.

I don't believe that a DM must be an emotionless robotic calculator to run a fair game.

It is interesting that you mention that the DM has a right to pursue his goals within the game. The nature of those goals is of great importance.

If these goals are adversarial in nature, meaning the DM is trying to "win" through the use of some "rules" then he has already failed at running a fair game. The DM is the caretaker of everything in the game environment apart from the PC's. Not every part of that environment is going to be hostile to the PC's. Also consider that a campaign with any mystery or sense of wonder will feature elements that the players must discover. The DM is aware of these hidden rules and elements so playing against the players is a pointless foregone conclusion.

The DM plays many roles. Some of those roles will involve portraying things that are hostile to the PC's. The role of Dungeon Master itself is not such a role.

So what is the goal of the DM? Why even bother playing a game that you are not trying to win?

My personal answer to this is that the DM isn't playing the game. He/she is running the game that others play. The tradeoff for participating in a game one cannot win or lose is being privy to the whole picture and enjoying the action of the game as it unfolds. This isn't something that everyone finds fun and is one of the reasons there are far more players than (good) DM's.

The short version: If a DM tries to put a horse in the race, the game is already over.

Now is the GM a puppet master? I don't necesarily think that either. Sure, a DM is in position to manipulate the players, and what GM doesn't. But ultimately, the GM has a game because he delivers a great experience for the players. And that means it can't be against the players will. Not truly.

The DM has a playing group because he/she delivers an enjoyable experience. The group has a game (or not) depending upon how they decide to spend thier time during that experience.

Death is of course a possibility from the PC's point of view. But this doesn't tell us that it has to be a possibility from the players'/metagame point of view. And we don't necessarily have to change genres (eg to super-heroes). There are fantasy-adventure RPGs where the action resolution mechanics mean that PC death is not really on the table (eg ICE's HARP, with its Fate Point rules - one Fate Point is enough to turn a killing blow into a merely serious one). D&D doesn't have quite that sort of action resolution option, but there are other ways of proceeding that are quite legal within the rules (eg 4e's "unconscious at zero hp" rule).

My answer to this is as simple as a Coke commercial: Ain't nothing like the real thing baby.

If the players are aware that character death is not likely then such knowledge will influence thier behavior in the game. Sooner or later it will become a factor. Browse through all the "how do I stop the PC's from hacking into everything"/ " how do I get my players' characters to act like people" threads. Chances are high that these players are in campaigns that feature some sort of protagonist protection that they are exploiting for all it's worth.

Sure, but "creation and modification" is a long way from "possibillity of PC death as a result of random die rolls". In fact, in a game where (as a player) my main means of creating and modifying is by having my PC do things, than random chances of PC death might be seen as an obstacle to that creation.

Of course it's an obstacle. A failure or setback is supposed to be an obstacle. PC death is simply the most severe of these.

Not always, of course - some games and playstyle make bringing in new PCs, or resurrecting dead ones, easy. Others do not. The link between PC death and deprotagonism is subtle. But it is not all one way. It is not inherently deprotagonising to take the possibility of PC death off the table. But of course it does depend on how that is done.

Players play to have fun. The concept of considering something like deprotagonism is anathema to our fun. Your mileage varies, and that is fine.

I've played lots of sessions of fantasy RPGs, and never once confronted the possibility of a character dying from a burst bladder (as did Tycho Brahe). That's predetermination of a sort. I don't think it's ever mattered, however. That's not the sort of possibility we want on the table (unless, maybe, we're playing F.A.T.A.L.). Is PC death an important possibility or not? That's what's up for grabs in different approaches to play - it can't just be assumed to be important for everyone.

I can't say that I have ever played anything like that either (unless it was on the Rolemaster tables and never came up)

The possibility of PC death isn't a condition for every possible game but that has been covered.

Short answer - there can be other reasons to play RPGs besides winning/losing. One reason would be to create (pretty hackneyed and low-grade!) stories with friends. Why use dice and mechanics? Because they (i) create a framework in which to create stories, (ii) resolve issues about distribution of narrative power across participants, and (iii) interject randomness/novelty/tension etc.

Winning/losing is the difference between a game and storytelling. As for tension/randomness, it seems tension is a non-issue if there is nothing to be won or lost and randomness isn't really random if we mold what results we get into whatever we like.

The real question here is - do we mean "makes sense" in the gameworld, or "makes sense" in the real world at the gametable. I think you mean the former. I would agree with what you've said, but only if "make sense" has the latter meaning. If it would "make sense" at the game table for the PCs to be captured - because this is what the players want, to keep playing their PCs rather than having them be killed - then that is what I would prefer to do when GMing my group. It's my job, as GM, to then find a way - retconning if necessary - to make this make sense within the gameworld.

I agree. The real question of what makes sense depends on if the players want a game or to be the main characters in a story. Once that is agreed upon it becomes easier to decide what makes sense in various situations.

 

[pemerton]

As for tension/randomness, it seems tension is a non-issue if there is nothing to be won or lost and randomness isn't really random if we mold what results we get into whatever we like.

But I still think there can be things at stake without any of them being PC life/death.

On the issue of "moulding results", I found a post by LostSoul on an old thread linking to this interesting blog about narration sharing. I don't mind the GM being able to impose adveristy on the PCs if the randomness makes that a possibility. I just don't see why PC death (as opposed to capture, or some other sort of story-twisting rather than story-ending possibility) has to be one of the options.

So I guess we kind of agree (but have different preferences) but I think maybe you're not putting the most sympathetic spin on your less-preferred playstyle (not that you're obliged to, obviously!).