D&D General Fighting Law and Order

[Oofta]

I think that many people - I'm one, and I wouldn't be surprised if @dave2008 is another - think there is a significant difference between an imagined in-fiction consequence ("You, the PC, get crisped by the dragon") and a real-life, at the table consequence ("You, the player, are now forbidden from playing your character

Whatever. End of the day it doesn't really matter.

I choose to not allow evil PCs. How that's enforced is a matter of meaningless semantics.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

They're action movie heroes, perhaps low-ish level superheroes at high levels. It's realistic for the genre and feel that it's trying to emulate. But I agree that physical or supernatural capabilities have nothing to do with mental stability. It's odd that you're correlating the two, they have nothing to do with each other.

Right, this I agree with. The PCs are like action heroes of some ilk or other. Maybe in your game they're closer to the A-Team (IE always basically good guys) and in some other games they're a bit darker or more ambiguous (80's vintage comic book heroes). I wasn't really trying to correlate 'super powers' with 'mental stability' as much as to say that super powers (or D&D spells etc.) are so far outside our ken that we should be wary of trying to imagine anything we conclude about these characters is highly speculative.

Honestly, I would fear greatly for a society in which such powers actually existed. The whole history of mankind is replete with examples of people who abuse power and become morally corrupt, even monstrous, when ordinary constraints on their power are removed. I am quite sure I do not personally want any such thing, as I suspect it would not end well. Imagine there were people in this world, who had learned some sort of trick equivalent to Charm Person. Hell, every woman on Earth would be locked up in a guarded location within a year! It would practically end modern society! We have no idea what 'Faerun' would be like realistically and its useless to even speculate.

 

[Oofta]

Right, this I agree with. The PCs are like action heroes of some ilk or other. Maybe in your game they're closer to the A-Team (IE always basically good guys) and in some other games they're a bit darker or more ambiguous (80's vintage comic book heroes). I wasn't really trying to correlate 'super powers' with 'mental stability' as much as to say that super powers (or D&D spells etc.) are so far outside our ken that we should be wary of trying to imagine anything we conclude about these characters is highly speculative.

Honestly, I would fear greatly for a society in which such powers actually existed. The whole history of mankind is replete with examples of people who abuse power and become morally corrupt, even monstrous, when ordinary constraints on their power are removed. I am quite sure I do not personally want any such thing, as I suspect it would not end well. Imagine there were people in this world, who had learned some sort of trick equivalent to Charm Person. Hell, every woman on Earth would be locked up in a guarded location within a year! It would practically end modern society! We have no idea what 'Faerun' would be like realistically and its useless to even speculate.

Where do you think all the evil NPCs come from.

 

[Flamestrike]

My position is that ALL of this behavior, even most 'normal PC behavior' is so abnormal when taken in the context of actual real people, that its impossible to even judge it.

No it's not impossible to judge it. I've been doing it for 40 odd years.

 

[bloodtide]

Update! Saturday comes quick! I ran the game...again.

So the game started with the players doing nothing. The characters are hiding, but the players can't decide what to do. they get some laughs when they slaughter the dumb and dumber bounty hunters. Then back to doing nothing.

Then their alternative PCs show up: pretending to be good and helpful but really the 'evil twins'. The players get all confused with the 'multiverse idea'. As the players follow any NPC as a DM, they fall for the trap where their alt PCs pretend like they will fix things....but then attack the players to "slaughter out what once went wrong".

The players go nuts as their PCs die as they are not familiar with the concept of character death. I tell them they can re make their characters as alt alt PCs crossing over to this world. They don't really "get" it and complain they "can't" play the same PCs "again". They do like the idea they can "get revenge" and sneak attack the evil twin alt PCs. They don't do anything to alter their PCs and just want to "use their old PCs as not new alt PCs".

So they pop in, and attack the evil twin PCs....and loose....and are all killed again. I offer to let them, again, remake the characters and try again. They give up and say "what is the point".

And the game ends. I sent the e-mail to the DM of this game....but no answer back yet.

 

[pemerton]

No it's not impossible to judge it. I've been doing it for 40 odd years.

I don't think that @AbdulAlhazred is denying that you can make decisions. He's denying that those have any grounding that justifies them as being "logical" or "verisimilitudinous".

 

[Flamestrike]

I don't think that @AbdulAlhazred is denying that you can make decisions. He's denying that those have any grounding that justifies them as being "logical" or "verisimilitudinous".

What on earth is not logical or verisimituldinous (spelling?) about PC actions (i.e. murder-hobo stuff) having consequences in game?

Including (but not limited to) the PCs having a bounty placed on their heads, being declared wanted men in the Kingdom, or having the Kings men or similar people coming after them, in the same way the FBI would come after you IRL?

How is that illogical or immersion breaking?

 

[Vaalingrade]

Welp. There's one DM that will never, ever ask someone to cover their game for them again...

 

[pemerton]

What on earth is not logical or verisimituldinous (spelling?) about PC actions (i.e. murder-hobo stuff) having consequences in game?

Including (but not limited to) the PCs having a bounty placed on their heads, being declared wanted men in the Kingdom, or having the Kings men or similar people coming after them, in the same way the FBI would come after you IRL?

How is that illogical or immersion breaking?

@AbdulAlhazred didn't assert that it's illogical or immersion-breaking.

He just asserted that there are (in practical terms if not literally) infinitely many other options, not all of which involve "punishing" the players, that are equally logical and verisimilitudinous. Hence the decisions that you've been making for 40 years are not grounded in logical and verisimilitude.

 

[pemerton]

Welp. There's one DM that will never, ever ask someone to cover their game for them again...

Only because the original DM is a wimp who can't handle the hardcore realism that the OP brings to their RPGing . . .