find a balance between rules and role playing

[Djeta Thernadier]

During our last session I was very close to strangling our DM. He kept saying don't use game terms stay in character. So we came to a room I told the rest of the party to move away from the door that I had an idea. They did and I took some cover from the frame and cast a fireball into the room. I did this all in character. We did not have a battlemat drawn out. The fireball comes billowing out of the room and he ruled that everyone was in range and had to make saves.

This is something that I often find very frustrating with the game. It is hard to stay in character when you have to stop and say okay everyone move sixty feet down the hall count it out on the grid.

I think the battlemat is fine for combat so you can see where you are in realtion to everyone else. But is it really necessary to be that rules accurate every second in the game? Would it break the game balence to just say we move away and asume that they have seen enough fireballs from this character to know to get out of range?

I can understand if the fireball is coming from an enemy mage then it is important to know where everyone is.

So how to other DMs handle things like this?

Well, I'm not the DM in my game but I can understand what your saying. We have a few PCs who can cast spells like this, that could hurt party memeber sif they aren't out of the way. We do use a battle map so most of the time, we know if someone is in the way (although this did not stop one PC from casting thuderstone at a harpy last weekend , with a party member standing in front of it engaging it in melee...PC was deafened, Harpy wasn't.

).

I really think if you have no idea where your party members are during combat, you should either have your DM use a battle map so you can see where everyone is, or be allowed to ask them to move out of range. This is hard if your in initiative rounds and you have to wait for everyone's turn to do this. But your Dm should give you that option, rather than asuming everyone is standing in range, when they might be picturing it differently.

Good luck.

 

[Ozmar]

I completely agree with Zappo: "...the actual characters have a much better view of the situation than what the DM can describe to the players in a reasonable amount of time."

However, I also find that sometimes using the grid can lead to players acting on an artificially high level of situational awareness that is far above what their characters could possess. For example, I often see players carefully counting out the squares of a spell's area of effect and placing their spells precisely to catch every possible enemy while avoiding PCs. At times this is taken to rediculous extremes. As a DM, I usually let it slide, especially when I can rationalize it (such as when the gnome archmage has a 22 Intelligence - she should be pretty accurate with her spells.)

As with most things, its a balancing act. As a player, I usually eyeball where the spell should be and try not to carefully construct its precise position. I usually expect the DM to adjudicate the precise effects. But I vary this based on my character's intelligence and wisdom. If he is very smart and wise, I'll look up the spell first and double-check the parameters. If he's inexperienced, foolish, or not a quick thinker, then I'll eyeball it, or maybe even fudge the line too close to our front lines, and only look up the spell after I've committed myself to the action. However I do it, I always commit to my first selection (unless the DM points out new information that my character should have had). So if I send a lightning bolt down the corridor, and a player points out that this will hit the glass vase we're looking for at the end of the corridor (outside my range of sight), then I say "oops" and let the choice stand. If the DM points out that there is an ogre standing next to me and will take an AoO, but he just forgot to tell me or put the mini out for the ogre, then I'd change my action.

 

[Shallown]

I always did the range of spells and such not that the caster has a lasar range finder and knows I want the spell exactly 60 feet away but more as the caster "wants" the spell to do this. If possible the "magic" of the spell makes it happen. It my mind that explains a heck of a lot about magic that the Magic reads the caster's intent not some exact measurement. After all itis magic.

Later

 

[Elf Witch]

I have been finding this helpful soon I will be running my first table top game And I want to find away to encourage thinking outside of the box and to make the players feel like their characters are heroes.

There are times when the rules get in the way of the game and I want to be able to adjudicate in a manner that keeps game balance and the spirit of the game.

I have seen some players take rules and use them to totally mess with what was intended to allow something just does not make sense, but I have also seen the rules handicap the play.

I have also noticed in myself this last year that I have hard time role playing and staying in character that the game as become all about tacticts and rules and while I enjoy playing strategy games I don't enjoy RPGs as nothing but strategy games.

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

I completely agree with Zappo: "...the actual characters have a much better view of the situation than what the DM can describe to the players in a reasonable amount of time."

However, I also find that sometimes using the grid can lead to players acting on an artificially high level of situational awareness that is far above what their characters could possess. For example, I often see players carefully counting out the squares of a spell's area of effect and placing their spells precisely to catch every possible enemy while avoiding PCs. At times this is taken to rediculous extremes. As a DM, I usually let it slide, especially when I can rationalize it (such as when the gnome archmage has a 22 Intelligence - she should be pretty accurate with her spells.)

As with most things, its a balancing act. As a player, I usually eyeball where the spell should be and try not to carefully construct its precise position. I usually expect the DM to adjudicate the precise effects. But I vary this based on my character's intelligence and wisdom. If he is very smart and wise, I'll look up the spell first and double-check the parameters. If he's inexperienced, foolish, or not a quick thinker, then I'll eyeball it, or maybe even fudge the line too close to our front lines, and only look up the spell after I've committed myself to the action. However I do it, I always commit to my first selection (unless the DM points out new information that my character should have had). So if I send a lightning bolt down the corridor, and a player points out that this will hit the glass vase we're looking for at the end of the corridor (outside my range of sight), then I say "oops" and let the choice stand. If the DM points out that there is an ogre standing next to me and will take an AoO, but he just forgot to tell me or put the mini out for the ogre, then I'd change my action.

I agree that the metagame precision that a battle map can be as much of a problem as the pure judgement calls of the DM not using a map. I too try to estimate the location of a spell without counting out precise numbers of range and area of effect. I do dislike it when the druid can cast his entangle spell so precisely that it gets the opponents in melee with party members, but the party members are all right on the edge of the spell and are unaffected. Becausewe have this issue in a fairly regular basis, I plan to implement a new rule (yes, more rules, more rolls) that will require a spellcraft check to place a spell that precisely. I think I'll have it work similar to the grenade-like weapons. It will only be use when you are tyring to place it so that one person is out and another 5 feet away is in the area of effect, and I will drop the rule if people stop counting out exact squares as they mark the position of their spell.

Back on topic, I still contend that if you, in character, didn't in any way warn the other characters what you were going to do, the DM was in his rights. "I have an idea" does not necessarily tell the others much, unless casting Fireball is the only idea your character ever has, or is some kind of understood code for Fireball. Otherwise, the characters (not the players who know what you are casting) might have assumed that you had an idea such as a Wall of Fire, or a Web spell or something else that would have allowed them to wait right by the door and be safe.

 

[The_Gneech]

I do dislike it when the druid can cast his entangle spell so precisely that it gets the opponents in melee with party members, but the party members are all right on the edge of the spell and are unaffected. Becausewe have this issue in a fairly regular basis, I plan to implement a new rule (yes, more rules, more rolls) that will require a spellcraft check to place a spell that precisely. I think I'll have it work similar to the grenade-like weapons. It will only be use when you are tyring to place it so that one person is out and another 5 feet away is in the area of effect, and I will drop the rule if people stop counting out exact squares as they mark the position of their spell.

Why do you dislike it? Why shouldn't the druid be able to do that? Seriously. Do you see Gandalf accidentally taking out hobbits? [1] And what about the badguys? Do you want the evil wizards have to roll to avoid flubbing where they toss their own spells? It cuts both ways. When my players figure out exactly the right place to drop a web so that it catches the baddies and none of their allies, I prefer to applaud them for being clever! Not punish them for it.

-The Gneech

[1] Granted, in LotR, Gandalf barely does any magic at all. But my memories of The Hobbit seem to include some kind of flaming pinecone sort of fireworks vs. goblins.

 

[Evilhalfling]

Agreed.

The scenerio you describe happend to me and other players several times in 1e (when fireballs were much larger). I always thoutght it wasa lame thing for the DM to do.

QUOTE]

In 1st ed fireballs had blowback as in fills 33 10x10x10 cubes with fire. The players were well aware of this and fireball got very little use in dungeons- it was just to hard to figure as we never used a battlemap

In 3rd I will have to go with the majority - lame thing to due with an experianced flame user.

 

[Ozmar]

Why do you dislike it? Why shouldn't the druid be able to do that? Seriously. Do you see Gandalf accidentally taking out hobbits? [1] And what about the badguys? Do you want the evil wizards have to roll to avoid flubbing where they toss their own spells? It cuts both ways. When my players figure out exactly the right place to drop a web so that it catches the baddies and none of their allies, I prefer to applaud them for being clever! Not punish them for it.

I actually do do this for the bad guys when I am DM. I have kobold sorcerers take out their allies with burning hands, careless wizards engulf their orc minions with balls of fire, and even intelligent liches may blast their zombies with a cone of cold if they felt it was worth the cost. I have bad guys make mistakes (often drawing AoOs) according to their intelligence or wisdom, and I have NPCs choose less-than-optimal paths for their spells, particularly when they are not concerned with collateral damage.

Of course, this is all at the whim of the DM, so I guess its somewhat arbitrary, but I like to and try to RP the bad guys according to their abilities and nature, not according to my (usually superior) understanding of metagame tactics.

Ozmar the Fair DM

 

[Elf Witch]

I agree that the metagame precision that a battle map can be as much of a problem as the pure judgement calls of the DM not using a map. I too try to estimate the location of a spell without counting out precise numbers of range and area of effect. I do dislike it when the druid can cast his entangle spell so precisely that it gets the opponents in melee with party members, but the party members are all right on the edge of the spell and are unaffected. Becausewe have this issue in a fairly regular basis, I plan to implement a new rule (yes, more rules, more rolls) that will require a spellcraft check to place a spell that precisely. I think I'll have it work similar to the grenade-like weapons. It will only be use when you are tyring to place it so that one person is out and another 5 feet away is in the area of effect, and I will drop the rule if people stop counting out exact squares as they mark the position of their spell.

Back on topic, I still contend that if you, in character, didn't in any way warn the other characters what you were going to do, the DM was in his rights. "I have an idea" does not necessarily tell the others much, unless casting Fireball is the only idea your character ever has, or is some kind of understood code for Fireball. Otherwise, the characters (not the players who know what you are casting) might have assumed that you had an idea such as a Wall of Fire, or a Web spell or something else that would have allowed them to wait right by the door and be safe.

The characters have only seen her cast fireball as range spell all her other spells they have ever seen her cast reguire there to be something there to cast at you know magic missle. Besides the wizard did say I bet it is another damn fireball I move away. or something to that effect. And since they are 10 level characters who have traveled with mages they have some idea about getting out of the way.

I do like your idea for requiring a spellcraft check to place a spell so precisely in the middle of combat. You have six seconds so it makes perfect sense to me.

 

[Elf Witch]

Why do you dislike it? Why shouldn't the druid be able to do that? Seriously. Do you see Gandalf accidentally taking out hobbits? [1] And what about the badguys? Do you want the evil wizards have to roll to avoid flubbing where they toss their own spells? It cuts both ways. When my players figure out exactly the right place to drop a web so that it catches the baddies and none of their allies, I prefer to applaud them for being clever! Not punish them for it.

-The Gneech

[1] Granted, in LotR, Gandalf barely does any magic at all. But my memories of The Hobbit seem to include some kind of flaming pinecone sort of fireworks vs. goblins.

The rules should work both ways. I think a magic user gets more experienced as they age are less likely to catch their friends in the spell range but I will admit that it would be one way to speed up combat. It takes ten minutes for the player to count out the most optimal placement for a web. I am sorry but I think in the heat of battle with folks engaged in close melee it makes sense that the mage does not have time to look at it that closely. If you are firing a bow and don't have the feat precise shot you have to take a -4 to you roll to hit to illustrated the fact that you are being extra careful with your shot. I don't see any reason not to have something similar for mages.