Ilbranteloth
Explorer
The bear ignoring a non threat is the bear reacting in response to the world around it and the player's choice to play a character that looks weaker than others. Their decisions have directly impacted the situation. There is greater player agency than there is with fudging because they're experiencing the consequences of their decisions.
First, I don't think a bear would assess threat in this manner. A weak human and a strong human are still humans. Regardless, it attacked the character within reach, as is what I would expect of a wild animal. The reason I explained where the concept came from is that it explains the motives I assigned the bear. It wasn't interested in attacking anybody, nor is it defending anything. It just happens to be in the same place at the same time as another creature that it is startled by. It instinctively hits it then runs away. Nothing more.
More importantly, I think that making the bear attack only the stronger character not only stronger Plot Armor than a contingency that would only affect the scenario 5% of the time. More troubling to me is that it also feels like favoritism.
I have no doubt that certain intelligent creatures will target specific players for different reasons (attack the spell casters!), but when general monsters ignore some characters because they might be too weak and die, so they can attack that ones that won't just sounds wrong to me.
I still fail to see the difference between my contingency and many of your suggestions, particularly since many of them change the risk and the challenge. If the bear only attacks the stronger human, who probably won't die, then the risk is not only lessened, but eliminated for the other players. In addition, the challenge is lessened for the players because the likelihood that they will all be available to attack each round is increased. In my scenario, the surprise attack weakens the character, increases the potential challenge, and doesn't rely on logic that I can't swallow, nor favoritism.
Beyond even that, my solution is a last resort, and otherwise doesn't change the dynamics at all. Yours inherently does.
I certainly don't expect you to change your position, I think it's a reasonable position, and one that works for you and many others. I guess the reason I don't throw out fudging as an option is I still think it's a useful tool occasionally.
Maybe it's poor DMing in some people's eyes. Or lazy, or I made a mistake. In this case, though, from an objective standpoint, my option has a lower impact on the encounter. It didn't require any modifications of the rules, the encounter, or the creatures involved, it doesn't alter the challenge, reduces the risk to a very small degree, and only momentarily, and I don't think it would alter the view of most players if they knew that the approach was a simple "I won't allow the first blow to be critical." The only issue (for some) is that it involves potential fudging.
I have used most if not all of the ideas you presented as well. Some others options are younger monsters, injured monsters, etc. But none of the other options would serve my intended purpose, and the other options were really unnecessary since all I needed to ensure is that it would not score a critical hit.
And before Zak S jumps in here - I did not change the challenge one little bit. The challenge and available actions to the players remained the same. I reduced the risk of the initial blow, and then the risk returned to the default of the game. The challenge remained the same - the chance of detecting the bear, and the chance of killing the bear never changed.
Ilbranteloth
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