Chance of PC Failure

[Daven]

Always winning is not boring for me, because there are a lot of ways of winning. Winning with golden and paragon style is preferable for someones instead of winning with ruthless cruelty... and there are a lot of other styles of winning.
For what players' awareness of invincibility matters, it depends on the maturity of players: beginners can abuse this awareness and do a bad playing; instead expert ones can play well, even if they know there is little or absent chance of failure. I think that heroic roleplaying games like D&D have to be more heroic, with rules that go towards players' winning easier, than a game like Descent, that is a game, not a roleplaying one. But I understand that tastes may be different, so I think that optional rules that change "difficulty" of the game may exist.

 

[tlantl]

I'm not one to design huge plots where the world hinges on the actions of a couple of fly by night adventurers.

No one in any of the campaigns I write are super heroes out to save the world. I set up simple plots where the bad gut needs straightening out, some undead might be on the loose or a region is in need of some pest extermination.

The most eventful situation they might face is clearing land to set up a strong hold or a diplomatic mission to avoid having to slaughter a dwarven free hold or to keep the nearby band of wild elves from scalping some over zealous forresters.

Failure never results in my throwing away weeks or months of work because the players sitting at my table found a way to get themselves killed. As a rule, if a player character dies there is usually a way to get them back. If a player dies early in an adventure and can't be raised right away then they might have to play the NPC I use to fill out the party. I always play some one who is part of the group. Sometimes as a spy or as a guide, but most often as a hireling.

I don't make it a point of trying to end the lives of characters but there are deadly traps and strong foes to be encountered in their travels. You see I don't believe in level appropriate encounters. I place things in the world. Some are weak others not so weak. If you run into a strong monster you should retreat. If you run into a hundred goblins at level eight it would be smart to find a way around them. although at level twelve you might be able to go through them. But would it be wise to try?

Now with that said there is a place for dungeons that are designed to challenge a group at a certain level, otherwise what's the point. I put together stuff all the time. I just don't assume the world keeps pace with the players level.

 

[BryonD]

I like cinematic action scenes where the PC's swing across a chandelier, or run up the huge monster's back and try to stab it while it tries to fling them off. I want keep some chance of failure, but I set the DC low enough that most of the time the PCs can succeed (80% or more). I want to encourage them to try such things in the game.

Just speaking my own personal taste here....

If you describe the most awesome cinematic thing EVAR!!!! and give me an 80% chance of success it instantly became "routine" and the opposite of awesome. It is by definition simple and boring.

If I've got an 80% chance of success, I'm going to do that stuff over and over. Thus it is the very definition of "routine". By making it trivial you have stolen from the players the potential for doing ANYTHING truly memorable.

There are vastly better ways to handle this issue. Risk/reward is the main option. Players in my games DO turtle up some. They do play it safe. They know there are things they can try that are only going to have a 1 in 4 or 1 in 3 chance of success. And often they simply won't do it. Sometimes they decide the price of failure is not so bad that they try it anyway. And other times (really cool times) they decide that the price of failure is scary, but the reward for success is overwhelmingly attractive. And over half the time they fail and pay the price (sometimes even getting killed). But the times they succeed become awesome moments of celebration and stories that get retold over the table, in some cases for literally years to come.

You can tell cool stories. I love 007 movies. Bond does cool things and it can be fun to talk with friends about that time when Bond blah blah blah...

When a player made a choice and took a risk (a REAL risk) and pulled it off, THAT is a whole new tier of awesome cinematic coolness. The personal sense of achievement and heroics added into the story is irreplaceable. If I did something in your game that required rolling better than a 4 on a D20, it could be cool. It could be every bit as cool as the Bond thing. Because in the end it IS the Bond thing. It is virtually a scripted expectation. But it has no ability to be better than then Bond thing. I like it being a LOT better than anything that can happen in a movie.


There is also a secondary value. And this is certainly secondary, but it still adds value. A character may later in his career find himself facing a very similar task as he did long before. And now he has an 80% chance of success and it is "routine". And THAT also feels really cool. But only because it used to be hard.

 

[Mokona]

If you describe the most awesome cinematic thing EVAR!!!! and give me an 80% chance of success it instantly became "routine" and the opposite of awesome. It is by definition simple and boring.

Actually, there is a big difference in "risk" between a 20% chance of failure and a 0% chance of failure.

If climbing Mt. Rainier (in the state of Washington, USA) had a 20% chance of killing you then it would be foolish to try, though some still would. As it is I believe climbing Mt. Rainier has a 50% chance of failure, half of those who attempt it never make it to the top but they just turn back. I don't have a real number but probably less than 1% suffer real consequences.

The consequences of failure matter.

Attempting a 50/50 maneuver with serious consequences of failure is almost crazy.

 

[Hassassin]

Attempting a 50/50 maneuver with serious consequences of failure is almost crazy.

That depends on the consequences of not attempting it.

 

[The Shaman]

sorry for my not so good english

Your posts are perfectly understandable, [MENTION=61401]Daven[/MENTION] - don't sweat it!

 

[The Shaman]

Without the chance of failure, whats the point in playing? Problem is that failure can leave such a bitter taste on the players mouth that the resent having played (OH the rage quits from people having had characters die over the years!).

D&D puts alot of emphasis on character growth, and going backwards (i.e. having a character die and having to start a new one at lvl 1 or at least a couple of levels behind everyone else) just sux! Its the nature of D&D, you cant spend a year building a character through the levels then in one night of bad rolls have the character die and expect players will enjoy it. Its a bitter, bitter pill to swallow.

It's just a friggin' game.

 

[Sunseeker]

IMO, players should live or die by their own decisions. RNG is never a good way to die. Stupid decisions? Great way to die. Heroically swinging at the dragon one last time? Great way to die. Losing a death saving throw to a kobold, not so much.

 

[The Shaman]

How do you feel about the chance of pc failure?

Adventuring is fraught with hazards, some merely inconvenient, others instantly lethal.

Be prepared for all of them.

If you, as a dm, use a "world will end" plot in your campaign, are you prepared to end the world if you have a tpk?

Of course, or I wouldn't put the "world will end" on the table in the first place.

Do you prefer a "no pc dies without the player's permission" style?

A player gives her permission for her character to die when she joins the game.

Do you like a game where pc turnover is common or rare?

I don't think about "pc turnover." If every character lives to a ripe old age flushed with wealth and success, or if a lone bad guy offs them all in their first encounter, then it's all good. The campaign goes on.

Do you like it when there is a real chance of actual mission failure, and real consequences, or is it more fun when the pcs always win?

My character was beset by three opponents trying to steal his gambling winnings. As the trollop he picked up in the bar grabbed at his throat and a noble's lackey tried to beat him with a bastinado, the third, a bravo and swordsman, swung his rapier at my character's head. Based on the roll, it would be a serious wound if it landed, and from the damage roll, it would kill my character with the blow.

Unless I made the parry roll.

Which I did. Barely.

And then the same thing happened again the very next round. Fail to parry, character dies, made the roll - barely.

Now this bravo could parry my character pretty easily, so my character tried a trick, throwing his cape over the bravo's head. It was pretty slim chance it would work - I had to parry his blow, make my attack roll, and then he had to fail a Dexterity check. I did, and he did, and once he was fighting to get the cape off, my character ran him through with his rapier.

What makes this encounter memorable is not that my character won, but that I had to beat the odds to do it. Playing that same encounter with my finger on the scales would just be sad and lame.

 

[BryonD]

Actually, there is a big difference in "risk" between a 20% chance of failure and a 0% chance of failure.

If climbing Mt. Rainier (in the state of Washington, USA) had a 20% chance of killing you then it would be foolish to try, though some still would. As it is I believe climbing Mt. Rainier has a 50% chance of failure, half of those who attempt it never make it to the top but they just turn back. I don't have a real number but probably less than 1% suffer real consequences.

The consequences of failure matter.

Agreed.

And 20% chance of failure is still low enough that success is completely hollow.

Attempting a 50/50 maneuver with serious consequences of failure is almost crazy.

Without know the reward for success you can't being to even consider if you statement is accurate or not.

Again, the my games are loaded with AWESOME fun memories based on doing EXACTLY what you describe. So from a pure "why we play" point of view, doing anything OTHER than taking those chances is crazy.