Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Rocket your D&D 5E and Level Up: Advanced 5E games into space! Alpha Star Magazine Is Launching... Right Now!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="ExploderWizard" data-source="post: 4579349" data-attributes="member: 66434">I try and look at a lot of game elements from a player perspective, especially when I am running the game. I think that this helps me improve as a DM. Roleplaying is an important aspect of the game and the impact of player choice is also important.  When planning events and encounters I try not to envision them happening in any particular way. If a necromancer NPC were planning an assault on a town and the PC's get involved then I accept the possibility that they may find and bring down the necromancer before such an attack ever takes place. I plan out more or less how things play out if the PC's fail to act but once they get involved all plans are off and its down to what the PC's are able to do. The town may never know that they were in such danger if the PC's deal with the threat swiftly and expertly.  Saying in advance that the attack will happen no matter what would only happen if the PC's were unaware of the necromancer and his army in the first place. A surprise attack in the middle of the night that happens suddenly is different. Now the PC's are in a position where they must simply react to the threat. Even with this approach, the actions by the PC's will have observable consequences. The damage and death toll the town suffers rests on how well the situation is handled. The whole point in giving the PC's knowledge of an impending attack is in the hope that they will use this information to stop the attack and will undertake an adventure to do so.( assuming that the PC's are heroic and would WANT to) Of course the necromancer and the zombies are not "real" to the players but they should be very real to the characters. If an attack of strength X is going to happen no matter what then the world will start to seem less real to the characters. The game will play out like a video game cut scene. No matter how many kills the PC's rack up the next wave will be just as numerous because the game designer (DM) decided that this point in the game would be at a particular challenge level no matter what the player did. A thinking living DM should be able to deliver a better more reactionary gaming environment than that.</blockquote>

Verification