Armour Dilemma: Am I Wrong Here?

[Numion]

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he intended to teach a lesson about the problems of using heavy armor. He taught the lesson(though whether or not people learned is another issue). To have run it otherwise would have both nullified the lesson, and significantly changed the encounter.

Oh, it was a lesson, not a roleplaying game. I here thought he was trying to run an enjoyable game. Silly me.

 

[Elvinis75]

other stuff

A couple of things that got cut where the discussing with the player options:
The feat campaigner that lets players sleep in the heavy armor.

Magical Armor that instantly dons.

The question of why fighter get better at using their weapons but not their armor.

Extra money for snapping armor that goes together easier.

For the clerics as to sleeping in their armor:
Just do it:
In a pinch,
Restoration cures all temporary ability damage, and it restores all points permanently drained from a single ability score (caster’s choice if more than one is drained). I would think that this heal fatigue.

 

[Tsyr]

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Oh, it was a lesson, not a roleplaying game. I here thought he was trying to run an enjoyable game. Silly me.

Actualy, I was thinking he was trying to teach them that the rules can simulatiously work against them (Armour donning rules) and for him (The vampire's 10-hour-planned tactices including hearding of people...), and at the same time still not make any sense other places (The uber-speed of the duke situation)...

 

[Tiefling]

So do many other people. Even I'll admit that he was right. Rules were known very correctly.

However, had the DM made an alteration to the encounter by improvising outside his seemingly rigid timetable, the encounter would've been more satisfying. Many people on this thread have interpreted this wrongly as meaning that I'd suggest that the encounter be altered to make it easier on the PCs. I'm not suggesting that.

If you modify the encounter to allow PCs to escape the consequences of their choices, they are one and the same.

I'm suggesting that the DM should've tried to play the encounter in a way that the PCs can reach the encounter in due time, instead of the NPC Duke. If sticking to the rules is of such importance, fine, they shouldn't be broken. The DM could've just made the vampires killing operation a bit longer (within rules, of course, communicating takes time), and made convincing the duke of right action a little longer. Voila, the rest of the PCs and the Duke arrive at the same time at the scene, and butt-kicking ensues.

Four minutes is more than a bit. If the plan had been made well, the vampires all knew it well and they didn't have to improvise, I can't see how communication could reasonably take up that much time. Even a minute seems excessive.

 

[buzzard]

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Oh, it was a lesson, not a roleplaying game. I here thought he was trying to run an enjoyable game. Silly me.

Ahh yes, in your perfect, colored plastic, rounded edged world, the players always play nice and never abuse the rules. How could I possibly think otherwise. Therefore you would never have had the experience of most normal DMs of sending them a message.

Though I do have to admit, the messages I tend to send as DM are appreciably more lethal than Fungasites.

"Time Out!"

buzzard

 

[Elvinis75]

Hey guys take it easy. There was a lessen to be learned by both the DM and player alike. Find a solution to the armor over night and to keep players involved. A choice between certain doom and not playing is not a choice. It would about the same as asking a wisard to play through a session without his spells or not play because he is spending the hour studying off in a corner.

 

[fusangite]

I think some of the people posting have missed that I did in fact prepare for the eventuality of the entire party arriving too late (ie. after the tanks had donned their armour) and had stats, spells and fortifications prepared for such an eventuality. What I did not plan for effectively was one group of characters arriving 20 rounds before the other and the tanks deciding to continue donning their armour regardless of the meta-game information they were clearly taking in from the combat.

A question to Tsyr and others: assuming that you were stuck with running the combat I designed (though I grant that most of your quarrel is with design rather than execution), what would you have done differently? Would you have waived the armour donning rules? Would you have refused to let the duke come to aid the characters?

I'm also surprised that no one has ever expressed displeasure to you about your inconsistent application of the rules. Have you ever had players become concerned about the shifting goal posts in your campaigns and their inability to anticipate which rules will be in effect?

And just to clarify: my purpose in designing this combat was to create a climactic episode that really pushed the characters to the limit of their abilities. For me, this is what a climactic episode is about: one in which there is real dramatic tension and the players feel a sense of engagement and excitement. In last season's finale episode, the characters were pushed to their limits and loved it; they felt that the fight had been so close that it was their tactical acumen that made the difference between victory and defeat, instead of feeling like people voicing a scripted cartoon with an inevitable outcome.

 

[mmu1]

A question to Tsyr and others: assuming that you were stuck with running the combat I designed (though I grant that most of your quarrel is with design rather than execution), what would you have done differently? Would you have waived the armour donning rules? Would you have refused to let the duke come to aid the characters?

I'd have most likely ruled that the time it'd take some of the characters to figure out what was going on, decide what to do, talk to the Duke, etc. would have been sufficient to put on the armor using the "don hastily" rules - if they insisted on taking enough time to get it on without suffering penalties for taking shortcuts, I'd have started the combat without them. After all, the explosion waking everyone up is just a contrived hole in the Vampires' otherwise perfect plan designed to let players get involved - if you're doing that, talking about sticking to the plan is kind of pointless...

Regardless of how I'd have handled this situation, I'd never let half the players sit there for most of a session doing absolutely nothing. If my attemtps at solving things in-game weren't working, I'd have most likely said "Ok, time out, we seem to be having a major problem here, so let's figure out what the hell it is and then we can all get on with the game." People I wouldn't mind pulling passive-aggressive crap like that on are people I would never play D&D with to begin with...

 

[Tsyr]

A question to Tsyr and others: assuming that you were stuck with running the combat I designed (though I grant that most of your quarrel is with design rather than execution), what would you have done differently? Would you have waived the armour donning rules? Would you have refused to let the duke come to aid the characters?

I'm also surprised that no one has ever expressed displeasure to you about your inconsistent application of the rules. Have you ever had players become concerned about the shifting goal posts in your campaigns and their inability to anticipate which rules will be in effect?

Probably pretty much like MMU1. I've certainly had to think on my feet before.

My rules aren't (exactly) inconsistent. First, I've put in a number of house rules, to fix things I think the existing rules handle poorly (The speed of which the Duke was summoned has pointed out some other things I'm going to look into potentialy house-ruling, after I talk with my players).

Second, don't assume I'm a suger-and-sunshine DM or anything. Far from it. I run the type of games my players want me to run. If they wanted a game that constantly kept them on their toes, putting them in unfavorable situations, that is what they would get. Remember what I said earlier: It's about having fun. If that's how they have fun, fine. That's what they will get. If they aren't enjoying it, I'll try to make is so they *do* enjoy it. The game is all about having fun.

And third, and most relevent... If I were to fudge something (IE, having the vampires take a little longer than I originaly planned to do something), my players trust me enough to know that whatever I change is in the interests of having more fun, never to screw with them. I've worked hard to get that type of trust, and I'm not about to throw it away.

And just to clarify: my purpose in designing this combat was to create a climactic episode that really pushed the characters to the limit of their abilities. For me, this is what a climactic episode is about: one in which there is real dramatic tension and the players feel a sense of engagement and excitement. In last season's finale episode, the characters were pushed to their limits and loved it; they felt that the fight had been so close that it was their tactical acumen that made the difference between victory and defeat, instead of feeling like people voicing a scripted cartoon with an inevitable outcome.

Well, I think that's considerably different than the "He is clearly trying to teach his players a lesson" voice...

Fus, keep in mind. I have no objection to how you run the game; whatever is fun, go for it. My only concern is it seems that at least one, and possibly two others, did not have fun that session. If it wasn't for that, I would be all for what you did (Even if I do raise an eyebrow at your time table), because you and your group had fun.

 

[Numion]

If you modify the encounter to allow PCs to escape the consequences of their choices, they are one and the same.

No they're not. Mortal danger and death as a consequence of player decision is quite ok, and I've forced it several times. Missing all the action is not. For example, I'd have no qualms of killing a PC if they play poorly and get in to too much trouble. However, I would have trouble if that player then had to spend next 4 session with nothing to do since his PC is dead. I'd bend the suspension of disbelief a bit, and introduce his new character ASAP.

The difference being: I'll gladly make PCs pay the consequences - players not so easily. Even though the characters may suffer easily, it's not the point that players suffered through boring evenings. Even if that was a consequence of their action. In this instance players paid the consequence - not the PCs as you claimed in the quote above.

Besides, the encounter was much easier for the characters that deicided to don their armours. They were in no danger at all

Four minutes is more than a bit. If the plan had been made well, the vampires all knew it well and they didn't have to improvise, I can't see how communication could reasonably take up that much time. Even a minute seems excessive.

Maybe there was unexpected resistance from a few guards. Maybe there was a random paladin in the area. Maybe the explosion blocked a part of the entrance and the loading of the sheep .. ahem guards inside wasn't so quick. Maybe .. a million things could've happened. Use your imagination