DMs opinion wanted

[Agback]

What would be a suitable punishment for attaching a gate guard? Best case scenario if they pull some good RPGing or rolling? Worst case? What about if the gate guard dies? What about the guy who didn't actually "attack" the guards?

Hang 'em high.

Do you know what the original distinction between a felony and an misdemeanour? The penalty for a felony was death and fortfeiture of all property. The penalty for a misdemeanour was death, but your family got to keep your property.

And as for the fellow who 'only' tripped up guards, he is an accessory to the murder.

Besides which, as DM you have to step in now to stop your players from learning to take their characters hostage to control the campaign. If they work out that you will bend over backwards to protect their characters from the lethal consequences of their actions then they will start using that tendency of yours to overcome obstacles in your campaign. Slap them down right now.

Regards,


Agback

 

[Agback]

This is **exactly** why I hate running cities.

Step 1. DM creates a town.
Step 2. PCs trash town in ways their players would never ever do in real life.
Step 3. PCs get banished et al.
Step 4. DM takes aspirin.
Step 5. DM creates a new town.

Anyway, another vote for the adventure hook.

An adventure hook is a reward to the players. If you reward players for playing reckless homicidal gits, they'll play reckless homicidal gits. If you want to change the script, try this:

Step 1. DM creates a town.
Step 2. PCs trash town in ways their players would never ever do in real life.
Step 3. PCs get executed the way they would in real life
step 4. Players generate new characters at first level without any magical items.
Step 5. The DM uses the same town over, its verisimilitude intact.
Step 6. The players start playing sane, or they ship out.

Regards,


Agback

 

[Agback]

Depending upon in character discussions, I am leaning towards a heavy fine, loss of valuable item(s), and/or forced military service (it is primarilly a military/war type campaign).

That sounds okay, so long as the characters are unmistakeably punished. I think you are being lenient, but perhaps that is appropriate. Just make sure that your players don't get the impression that (1) this sort of unreasonable conduct is a useful tactic against your GMing, or that (2) the consistency of your world will fold like paper to get their characters out of trouble.

I would suggest that the authorities in your town start out by saying "Okay, we'll drop the charge of causing grievous bodily harm. That means it's just 'assault and battery' for your mate Flail-boy, and 'accessory to an assault and battery' for Lippy. So if you come around to the Sheriff's office after the hanging you can pick up their effects." Then let the other PCs talk them down to the punishment you have in mind.

Or how about this for an idea: because the charges are not so serious, the execution will be carried out in a way that the resulting corpses can be Raise Deaded, and will be handed over to the late culprit's friends. Only in cases of high treason, arson, and premeditated murder would the bodies of the culprits be chopped into bits and buried in quicklime.

A fine of 950 gp and a character level ought to get their attention.

Regards,

 

[jasper]

If you want to be nice,
one week in the pillory for the criminals.
Branding the one who started the fight.
So the ones who did get into town can stand and protect their friends for a week. Oh you do know unless a kind hearted person feeds and waters them they may not get grub. And no potty breaks. Stinky poo!

Or the stocks. Difference is the stocks are the two pieces of lumber attached to ankles. Will give the player a chance to deflect the rotten food toss add them.

You could also add a fine of his excess weapons.
Ex you now have only 1 sword and 1 dagger.

 

[alsih2o]

first, meleck, welcome to the boards.

have the dweb who attacked them branded on his cheek with an outlaw symbol and have hime pay a weregild to the gaurds family.

the brand should be mentioned frequently by all civilized npc's, making trading, or buying goods or negotiating much more difficult.

 

[MerakSpielman]

Don't bend over backwards to save the characters lives. If they do something as stupid as attack town guards, they should face the legal consiquences. This might not be a glorious end to their adventuring career, but then they shouldn't have gotten in that fight, should they? If they are not properly punished, the players will develop an "I can do whatever I want and the DM will save my character to save his campaign" attitude.

I could even imagine the guard that was bleeding, if he stabalizes, developing a hatred for the character and attempting to "do away" with him himself if the justice system fails.

 

[Humanophile]

Depends on how good the guards are...

Realistically, they probably wouldn't exert themselves to say "oh, no, this one was just rude but he didn't actually try to hurt us", especially if they're the kinds of people to ask for bribes. And assultinging a lawman with a deadly weapon should bring the death penalty, especially in a frontier town.

Having said that, I like to not kill players who try to play less than lethal in their fights with nonevil foes. I'd let both dying parties make stabilization checks, with the guard recieving help from the other guard. After that, lippy boy is tied up and stripped of his gear. If the other PC seems to be coming around, he is too. Throw both of them into seperate cells, have a magistrate hear everyone's story, and have the attacking PC killed. (Although I do agree with Agback. Let the body remain semi-accessable, if it's not given directly over to his companions to save the town the trouble of burying him. If the party can ressurect him and they want to, go for it.)

Lippy boy should probably be heavily fined (up to leaving him with just one weapon) and/or jailed for a period, but people in D&D worlds should understand how adventurers can be extremely loyal to their companions, and accept that it's a double edged sword. The same loyalty that can have him back up a complete idiot can also make him a shining citizen if he's teamed up with good people, especially if he shows restraint when he disagrees with a partymate. So a clear and solid punishment should be in order, but it should stop short of death or exile, at least on a first offense, considering that no real use of deadly force was made.

 

[ced1106]

An adventure hook is a reward to the players.

A reward??? Today's players sure have it easy!

Originally posted by Agback
Step 5. The DM uses the same town over, its verisimilitude intact.
Step 6. The players start playing sane, or they ship out.

Great way to keep the players, that. I understand the viewpoint that PC actions have consequences, but so do DM ones. IMO, The objective of play is to have fun and continue playing. I'd put the storyline ahead of the judicial system, myself.

That being said, some of our best moments were just before rolling on the Judge's Guild judicial "Punishable offenses" chart. The PCs would do their "Hey! Let's split up!" routine in the city, one of them would get into REAL trouble, and the rest of the players would do their best to play NPC barristers -- for the city state! Several impressive pleas to the court (usually for harsher sentences...) would result in -2 modifiers on a d20, resulting in "drawn and quartered" a little way too often.


Cedric.
aka. Washu! ^O^

 

[SHARK]

Greetings!

Well, I recommend that you send an unrelenting, stern message to the players, that such arrogant lawless behavior will not be tolerated! To wit:

"An attack upon soldiers of the King is the same as an attack upon the King himself!"

Therefore, the whole party should be rounded up, arrested, and tried by the Royal Magistrate. The party should be stretched upon the wrack, and laid into with the Scourge. After this, they should be taken out on a wagon in a procession through the town, with all the jeering crowds taunting them and throwing stuff at them, as they are taken to the stage and scaffold. There, the Lord or Magistrate pronounces the characters' crimes against the King, and declares that they shall be executed by being Hung from the neck until dead. They should then swing high before the screaming crowds!

Then have them make up new characters. The time they put into making up new characters will allow them to think more cautiously and act more responsibly with the new characters, and they most assuredly will be more respectful of the King's soldiers!

I had players that did something very similar in one campaign, and they were arrested, and executed as I described. The whole party has taken a dim view of players acting like ruffians ever since! Believe me, it works!

You, as the Game Master, must set an appropriate example of not only Law and Justice, but consequences for their actions. Forget saving them from the consequences by some form of contrived rescue, or miraculous healing on the part of the victim. They attacked the King's soldiers, and that fact--regardless of the soldier's fate--is a felony. They are thus Wolf'sheads, and should pay the awful price for Treason against their rightful King! No responsible officer of the King should even want to employ them, or trust them with anything. They have shown themselves to be Wolf'sheads, and they should thus die in public execution for all to see, so that all might know the King's wrath against such brigands.

That's my suggestion!

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

 

[Agback]

Great way to keep the players, that. I understand the viewpoint that PC actions have consequences, but so do DM ones. IMO, The objective of play is to have fun and continue playing. I'd put the storyline ahead of the judicial system, myself.

I've been GMing since 1981. Some players stay, some players go.

I learned the hard way that if you let the players bully the setting you don't get a story line. If the players learn that the best response to adversity is stupid aggressiveness you get a series of incidents in which PC responses to situations are nothing like those of real people or fantasy characters, and in which the setting doesn't behave convincingly either. It is perfectly possible to run stories in which PCs are never killed (I do this nearly all the time), but only so long as the PCs continue to behave like people who can be killed. Once the players start using their script immunity (which is game-level) as an asset of their characters (ie. at world level) everything goes to Hell in a hand-basket. I let this happen in my campaigns, and once I worked out what the problem was it took a lot of unpleasantness to get things back on track. It would have been much better all round if I had been firm (not harsh) about consequences from the beginning.

In my experience the long term choice is not 'either simulation or drama' but 'either simulation and drama or neither'.

Hence my advice: enforce setting integrity early and firmly and you will have plane sailing from there on. But if you allow your players to form the impression that their best tactic is to take the plotline hostage and make you bend over backwards to save them, then you are in for a period of drekky gaming followed by a stretch of harsh re-education that will involve much more unpleasantness than it would have taken to be firm from the outset. I learned this from my mistakes. Better that you should learn from them too than that you should have to make your own mistakes.

Regards,


Agback