Button Pusher, Lever Puller, Potion Taster (When players are absent)

[Hjorimir]

So a running joke at our table is that when a player misses a session that their character volunteers for all button pushing, lever pulling, and potion tasting activities. Honestly, we generally hand out the sheet to a different player to control in combat and the DM covers the RP for the absent player. How do you handle this at your table? Any interesting ideas out there?

 

[iserith]

At our tables, either the character fades to the background or, if it makes sense in the fiction, is off doing something else. Usually, we'll have set up in advance ways for players and their characters to drop in and out in a way that isn't disruptive to the game experience - the party travels in a caravan, perhaps, or the campaign mostly takes place in a city where they can do other things off camera. We don't ask anyone to play anyone but their own character.

 

[Shiroiken]

In the game I run, it's a West Marches style, so missing players simply don't take characters. If they are continuing an existing adventure, their character(s) fight extra enemies (not shown on the map or taking turns), taking no damage and spending no resources. They automatically succeed or fail rolls to the minimum possible effect, but refuse to partake in actions not taken by other characters. Even in the case of a TPK, they will somehow miraculously survive, to make it back and tell the tale. They earn no XP, but the players choose how they want to divide treasure (they usually divide based on present at the end of the adventure).

In the game I play in, the character is played by another player. If no one wants to volunteer (a rarity), they hang back and do nothing significant.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

When I run, missing characters just aren’t there, or are sick and unable to go adventuring. When the players return, pop, the character is back/recovered from their stomach flu.

On the converse, my brother sometimes comes up with an in-game reason why they weren’t there, and has a section of the next adventure spent explaining where they were. From a narrative stand-point, I get why he does it, but from a game perspective, the rest of us that were there end up spending a portion of that game just waiting around for our characters to show up again, doing nothing.

 

[jasper]

DM, The evil mists of chaos consumes your pc. When will she reappear?
Two weeks later.
DM, Out of the chaos misses comes a half-orc in army airborne bdus carrying a Thompson machine gun.
Shiroiken, look what I got.
Iserith, Sounds like the dwarf gnome wizard but does not look like him.
Hjorimor, Don't care, kill her and take her stuff.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

The running joke is that the now NPC lock arms and charge into danger with a zeal. We call them recklessly violent or violently reckless. Honestly the other players don't really do anything stupid with them, they run them like any other character. They get full XP since the PC is there and in action but they can die if things go bad at the same time.

 

[BookBarbarian]

At our tables, either the character fades to the background or, if it makes sense in the fiction, is off doing something else. Usually, we'll have set up in advance ways for players and their characters to drop in and out in a way that isn't disruptive to the game experience - the party travels in a caravan, perhaps, or the campaign mostly takes place in a city where they can do other things off camera. We don't ask anyone to play anyone but their own character.

This is how we do it. We might come up with an excuse why the character is incapacitated or gone, but mostly we just handwave it.

 

[iserith]

This is how we do it. We might come up with an excuse why the character is incapacitated or gone, but mostly we just handwave it.

Yeah. It helps if you don't think about it too hard. I've been in groups where that was just completely unacceptable though as they could not ignore the perceived inconsistency. So they'd have other people play the characters of the absent players, something I always found to be a total drag. I made sure to be the first to say "Not it!"

 

[Oofta]

We come up with various reasons why they aren't there. In one campaign, the group was cursed and if they weren't there they were turned into small forest animals.

Other times they get a mysterious message and have to leave, get sick from eating something bad on the trail, etc.

 

[BookBarbarian]

Yeah. It helps if you don't think about it too hard.

Yep. It's a bit like hitpoints in that regard

I've been in groups where that was just completely unacceptable though as they could not ignore the perceived inconsistency. So they'd have other people play the characters of the absent players, something I always found to be a total drag. I made sure to be the first to say "Not it!"

Yeah I don't play the game to make decisions for other people's characters. I don't like controlling them as a DM either.