Advice: Consequences for a player's mistakes

[Henrix]

Prison break can definitely be fun - but it looks like just one of the PCs will be sent to prison, which makes for a rather dull game.

You could play it out as a one-on-one, of course. Or the others could help him out.

However, if you really are to punish the player/character it should perhaps not just be another adventure that gives loot and experience.

A one-on-one prison break where the character's stuff is taken away from him and all he has when he comes out is rat bites, dirty prison clothes, and a sharpened spoon. And a warrant.

 

[LostSoul]

Mistake 2:

War is hell. I can see him getting a reputation as a brutal heartless killer, but it's not like he betrayed anyone. He might get a job as an executioner, torturer, or something bad-ass like that.

Whether or not he likes it.

(The Duke calls on the PC, orders him to come to the keep; they take him to the dungeon where he's expected to get some information out of a prisoner. Will he? Does the prisoner even know anything? How will he react?)

Mistake 1:

This one is more troublesome for the PC. The family should demand some kind of justice. What kind of justice depends on your campaign setting. I'd imagine a "trial" (i.e., the noble goes to court and demands the PC is hung) would be fitting, though perhaps the NPCs will want to take bloody revenge into their own hands.

So all that depends on the setting, the NPCs, how justice is meted out, social customs, etc. Could be an interesting chance to explore some bits of the setting that might normally get that much screen time.

It is a time of war and the PC could be given a reprieve by the King. He might be given the opportunity to lead the "Forlorn Hope"; if he survives he'll be a hero and he'll be free, but no one expects him to.

 

[the Jester]

A trial scenario could be a lot of fun, especially if you can import a guest player as the judge so that you don't decide the outcome.

(Idea stolen from Piratecat and ruthlessly exploited by myself in my halfling campaign; it worked really well both times!)

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Create some evidences for possesion of the killed soldiers...

 

[Trihelios]

Thankyou for some great advice.

Mistake 2:

I agree that his kiling possessed soldiers would probably be viewed by many as at least justifiable, contributing towards a reputation for cold brutality. I imagine his comerades will at the very least start avoiding him, fearing him or mistreating him. He may well find himself being given the worst jobs and ostracised by the others.

I also like the idea of certain people seeing this as being useful. He may even receive a commendation for his work from the higher-ups, which makes those who know what happened in this battle being scornful of his new reputation. Some people who he would consider unsavoury may start thinking of him as a 'brother in arms'. The weird creepy guy from squad 3 who enjoys killing the enemy a little too much starts hanging out with him, saying "you're the only one who understands what it's like".

Plus each person he killed will have friends and family amongst all of that number certainly at least one will take it personally enough to want to do something about it.

 

[pawsplay]

I'm not sure I would consider situation #2 a "mistake." It's hard to restrain armed soldiers who are supposed to be on your own team. I'd probably kill my own grandmother if she was trying to breach the defenses of the castle I was guarding. Unless it comes out that he could be perceived as acting on a grudge against one of the guards, I think this is a case of "friendly fire, that's sad."

Mistake #1 probably wouldn't have immediate consequences, but it's clear that anyone who knows his secret probably regards him as a sorcerer and a psychopath. Combined with incident #2, very few "civilians" would want anything to do with him, but the king's personal advisors might find his moral flexibility useful.

 

[Miphon]

Mistake #1 will potentially affect the relationship between the noblewoman and the smuggler, perhaps leading to the smuggler seeking some kind of vengeance. Given that the duel was illegal in the first place, the noblewoman's family can't exactly pursue legal means against him, although they might hold a grudge (although he didn't kill his opponent, so in light of mistake #2 they might not press the issue too much).

Mistake #2 could possibly see him get some sort of reprimand from his superiors. Yes, he stopped the defences being breached, but his method were excessive from their point of view. An interesting twist may be that the noblewoman's family use whatever influence they have with the military to make this reprimand more severe than it otherwise might be.

 

[Janx]

if you go with direct brute force consequences, the PC should be in jail and suffer the legal consequences for his actions (likely execution). I don't want to raise the hacles of the train-spotting crowd, but this can derail a campaign if you've got something big planned. Or it can clear the tracks by getting rid of a PC who is too stupid to be on your major epic quest.

The alternative, which can do less damage to an overarching plot, is to have the offended parties seek retribution stealthily.

The woman might still love the smuggler, and hates the PC for trying to use what he did as leverage. But because she doesn't want to be associated with any wrong-doing, she strikes back in a different vector (or the smuggler does, because what she wants, he delivers).

In a battlefield, perhaps nobody noticed what happened exactly. At least nobody who reported it to authorities. Which means the PC thinks what happened was no big deal. However, he has made somebody angry, and that person will strike back.

By doing it this way, you continue the main story (whatever it was), and the consequences are more subtle.

Though the trial idea is also cool. If your campaign is pretty free-flowing, then you could easily focus on his actions and making it a pretty big deal. If you've got this witchcraft war thing going on, making this a headline news article will change the focus of the game.

Honestly, if you go big public consequence on the PC, you're going to take the PC out of commision because that is the most likely outcome.

I read somebody's blog on here about running a game for "psychopath" PCs that had some pretty good points about letting them get away with stuf. The core point was to have situations where the PC could obviously be evil and get away with it, and situations where the PC had to be smart and behave. A core point is, if you get all Perry Mason on him, he's going to jail, end of game.

 

[Haffrung Helleyes]

why punish him?

OK, so he made an enemy of the merchant guy in example 1, but otherwise why punish him?

How is his character expected to know that those guys were mind controlled, and not secret traitors? And even if he did, he could easily argue that defending the fort was worth the cost of sacrificing them -- the person to blame for their deaths is the evil witch who ensorcelled them, not the PC!

In general I'm against the DM 'punishing' PCs because they don't behave according to the DM's ideals. Your role is to change his alignment to align with his actions, and to portray the NPCs in a believable manner, not to punish him for making 'mistakes'.

Ken

 

[Janx]

In general I'm against the DM 'punishing' PCs because they don't behave according to the DM's ideals. Your role is to change his alignment to align with his actions, and to portray the NPCs in a believable manner, not to punish him for making 'mistakes'.

This is part of my point. For any PC action, the DM can choose a consequence that is big, or small. he can make it balloon into a big deal that gets the PC outcast, jailed or dead. Or he can make it something that blows over or comes back later to haunt him.

This is no different than real life. How many politicians (don't name names or incidents) have had a scandal AND are still in office. These things don't have to kill a career. But they can. Some folks make mistakes and get lucky anyway. Other folks make the same mistake and lose everything.