What do your PCs do with prisoners?

[drowdude]

The few times I can recall the players taking prisoners, it was to extract information. I would say, 80% of the time the prisoner ended up being killed or left for dead afterwards (generally in circumstances where that amounted to being the same as just outright killing them). The other cases, the prisoner was generally let go, sans worthwhile equipment.

Although, I suppose that's par for the course since encounters usually end with the bad guys either dead or having escaped.

 

[Hussar]

Elf Witch - totally, totally agree. Ironically enough, in our current game, I was the only one to have a family in his character background, and, sure enough, by the fifth session, my family was dead. However, in this particular case, it was a lot of fun and totally made sense. Certainly no hard feelings.

But, I have seen the other side where any sort of lever the players leave out for the DM to abuse, the DM will invariably abuse it. I happened to see a lot of new players in my campaigns for a while - we ran into a period of rotating players. Almost every single PC that came in was an orphan with absolutely no ties. It became a running joke that that rest of the group identifies new group members by whether or not their families died horrible deaths at some point before joining the group.

 

[Elf Witch]

Elf Witch - totally, totally agree. Ironically enough, in our current game, I was the only one to have a family in his character background, and, sure enough, by the fifth session, my family was dead. However, in this particular case, it was a lot of fun and totally made sense. Certainly no hard feelings.

But, I have seen the other side where any sort of lever the players leave out for the DM to abuse, the DM will invariably abuse it. I happened to see a lot of new players in my campaigns for a while - we ran into a period of rotating players. Almost every single PC that came in was an orphan with absolutely no ties. It became a running joke that that rest of the group identifies new group members by whether or not their families died horrible deaths at some point before joining the group.

As a DM I will sometimes use family and friends as bait I have even used them to betray the party. But it has to be used sparingly and you have know your players and know that they are okay with stuff like this.

It is like using an NPC as sponsor for the party but he is really the BBEG in disguise that can be used for great dramatic effect and can make it really personal for the party.

If you things like this all the time then you will train your players to never have family , friends or to trust an NPC.

 

[Jhaelen]

The last time we took a 'prisoner' in D&D he was interrogated then a majority agreed to set him free. My pc was in disagreement so I bluffed successfully and volunteered to escort him outside the dungeon...

The last time we took prisoners in Earthdawn they were lynched by a mob of villagers who had suffered under their deprivations for a long time.

The last time we took a prisoner in Ars Magica, he was simply released after his fellows paid blood money.

 

[pemerton]

It depends on the prisoners and the PCs.

The wizard PC in my current game has a vendetta against all goblins and hobgoblins. On one occasion when he ended up on one side of a hill with a couple of unconscious hobgoblins while the other PCs were on the other side of the hill dealing with the last few hobgoblins, the wizard murdered the hobgoblins. The other PCs (and I think the other players) were shocked.

When less ruthless PCs have control of the situation, the general tendency is to take oaths of good conduct/renunciation of warfare.

Recently, the PCs took a cleric of Torog prisoner and first interrogated her, and then - againt everyone's better judgement - handed her over to the Baron of the town to be imprisoned, after extracting a promise from him not to execute her. The story of how this skill challenge played out is here.

EDIT: I agree with [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION] above - I think it's bad GMing to punish the players for having their PCs try and be less than murderous.

 

[Mishihari Lord]

Prisoners have been pretty rare in my games. Usually the bad guys are bad. They deserve to die. Otherwise why are the PCs fighting them with lethal weapons?

When prisoners are taken they're usually questioned or put to use as guides. If they're very helpful they might be let go. Otherwise they're executed. On the rare occasion that there are local authorities, the prisoners might be turned over to the authorities. The authorities then promptly execute the bad guys. Because they're bad, see?

 

[Kzach]

Because DMs let this kind of behavior go unpunished and they don't reward mercy.

But this is my point.

Why should there be any reward for moral behaviour?

Again, I get that it's just a game, but I'm talking about the fundamental nature of human beings. It seems that people, absent consequences, will do whatever is best for themselves no matter the morality of the situation. Even in an imaginary game where the 'difficulty' amounts to some more XP and in-game time that can be hand-waived, the immediate reaction for most people is to do the most selfish thing possible.

If you're playing a heroic character and you can't even be bothered doing the right thing in an imaginary game where the effort required to do so comes down to little more than saying, "Ok, we go back to town," what about when the chips are really down in real life and it's DIFFICULT to do the right thing?

This is why I find zombie apocalypse scenarios so fascinating. When the world collapses and the consequences for your actions are no longer governed by law or social mores, morality becomes an inconvenience and a luxury; and then, you meet the REAL person.

 

[was]

play a whack-a-mole style game

 

[malcolypse]

@ Elf Witch: "As a DM I will sometimes use family and friends as bait I have even used them to betray the party." The best use of a family member I've pulled off was in a Star Wars game where one of the characters had a little sister who was a Jedi Padawan. She was turned to the darkside and when the party finally defeated her master they ran into the issue of how dangerous she was. Drama and arguments for the rest of the session about what to do with her. It was great.

[MENTION=56189]Kzach[/MENTION]: " It seems that people, absent consequences, will do whatever is best for themselves no matter the morality of the situation." That pretty much sums up humanity for you. Sad but true.

As to the prisoner problem, I've seen it dealt with just about every way.

My worst experience as a merciful player was that we'd caught a little old lady poisoning people. While she was in our captivity she slit her wrists, and my character was accused of murdering her, because he was covered in her blood from trying to put pressure on the wounds.

My current DM pretty much never has anyone surrender, since in the first session our cleric ended up in a duel with an evil deity's cleric and chose to run him through instead of accept a plea for mercy.

As a DM, the best prisoner escape ever was a master thief that the party had captured and tied up. They didn't set up a watch for some reason. When they woke up, he was tying himself back up after taking care of their horses and making them breakfast. One of them freaked out that they had to kill him because he could escape anytime and murder them. Saner heads prevailed that time.

 

[Elf Witch]

But this is my point.

Why should there be any reward for moral behaviour?

Again, I get that it's just a game, but I'm talking about the fundamental nature of human beings. It seems that people, absent consequences, will do whatever is best for themselves no matter the morality of the situation. Even in an imaginary game where the 'difficulty' amounts to some more XP and in-game time that can be hand-waived, the immediate reaction for most people is to do the most selfish thing possible.

If you're playing a heroic character and you can't even be bothered doing the right thing in an imaginary game where the effort required to do so comes down to little more than saying, "Ok, we go back to town," what about when the chips are really down in real life and it's DIFFICULT to do the right thing?

This is why I find zombie apocalypse scenarios so fascinating. When the world collapses and the consequences for your actions are no longer governed by law or social mores, morality becomes an inconvenience and a luxury; and then, you meet the REAL person.

Personally I believe without laws a lot of people would choose to do what was the convenient thing to do. How many people don't steal because it is wrong or because getting caught and going to jail is something they are not willing to face.

But I also believe that people have self imposed limits of what they will do. For example I could not take a life easily or do anything to harm a child or an animal.

I think that games can allow us to explore different aspects of this. How far is your character willing to go.

In the current Age of Worms game I play in I have had two characters my wizard was lawful good. She would never kill a prisoner just because it was convenient . Though she backed the cleric of Herineous in executing two clerics of Hextra who when given the chance to repent and renounce the evil god refused and said they would rather die.

This wizard would never use dominate on an innocent person.

My new character is a chaotic neutral elven sorcerer. She looks down on humans and is very cynical she has no issue using dominate and has a young man whose only crimes was to cross her path dominated right now. As for killing prisoners unless they were elves she would let the party do what it wanted to do.

But the reason I said players need to be rewarded for showing mercy was simple it is a game. If as the DM you make it hard for them to show mercy then they are not going to because then it becomes unfun and to much work.

The same goes for anything in the game if you make it to hard to do anything and just frustrate your players then they are going to quit the game. It is not like they are training for the Olympics. In real life something maybe hard to accomplish but you keep at for the reward . But the same can't be said of a game you play for fun.