Have I been a bad DM?

[Thurbane]

I've been DMing the same group for about 4 months or so now, and have had no PC deaths. The adventure (and characters) kicked off at about 9th level, and they are now pushing 11th (our games session aren't very long, we're lucky to get in more than 1 encounter or challenge per session). Up until last week, we had no PC deaths, only a couple of allied NPCs.

Anyway, last week the party Transmuter was slain by a Dracotaur Barbarian, after a combination of letting himself get into danger, and a critical hit with a battleaxe. To give a better picture, though, the character is a pseudo NPC, as its player is overseas for some time, and other players have been running it.

Then this week, the party Knight was slain by a Ghoul Dire Wolf (ToHR) - after he had been paralyzed and mauled for successive rounds.

My main concern is that up until this point, the party had been winning encounters pretty comfortably, with few genuinely "life or death" fights. As a result of this, I had been bumping up encounter levels slowly but surely, to give them more of a challenge (and more of a reward when they won).

One player, my flatmate (who plays the knight) is now a bit ticked off at the way I run a game, saying I'm putting them up against opponents who are too tough, and that all the sessions are all combat and no roleplay.

The leg of my campaign at the moment is unavoidably combat heavy - they are travelling through badlands where few mortals are brave enough to tread, and it is known to be overrun with all sorts of beasts. They knew those going in, but were hired to track down an item.

The same player also constantly accuses the Beguiler of being "useless" because he has few damage dealing spells. None of my players are powergamers, or especially efficient character builders - we generally chose a character on roleplay factors rather than crunch.

Anyhow, I'm wondering if by slowly bumping up encounters, if I have fallen into an adversrial, "killer DM" mindset. I'd like to think not - most encounters offer opportunities for parley, retreat or surrender, so if the fight is going poorly, they generally have options other than to fight to death. My main reason for pushing up enounters is that due to time constarints, it's easier to get through one tough battle in a session than it is to get through multiple easier encounters.

Please offer advice or criticism as you see fit - I'm pretty thick skinned. Also ask me if you need more details on my party.

Party:
Human Knight 10th
Dwarf Fighter 1st/Cleric 9th
1/2 Elf Beguiler 10th
Elf Transmuter 10th

 

[Phlebas]

Anyway, last week the party Transmuter was slain by a Dracotaur Barbarian, after a combination of letting himself get into danger, and a critical hit with a battleaxe. To give a better picture, though, the character is a pseudo NPC, as its player is overseas for some time, and other players have been running it.
..............

My main concern is that up until this point, the party had been winning encounters pretty comfortably, with few genuinely "life or death" fights. As a result of this, I had been bumping up encounter levels slowly but surely, to give them more of a challenge (and more of a reward when they won).
..................

Re: battleaxes and party deaths - link

adjusting ECL's is always difficult, and unfortunately the CR's dont always provide a precise scale. Advice i'd give is to add more monsters if you want to creep the power upwards rather than go for Higher CR monsters - at least initially

the party mix looks OK - i've definitely seen worse combinations and the description of the deaths look like a mix of bad luck & isolation

If the group is truly getting bored / worried about the constant combat you might want to give them a fast forward through the monster infested place (join a caravan of Djinn to where they need to go) and go straight into 'final encounter' before it starts to eat into enjjoyment

I did a trek to the swamps for my City based campaign, and after a few weeks of fun with big dinosaurs and lots of city slicker type jokes the group were getting a little bored so I had to move quickly to the final encounter and back to the city............

 

[rgard]

No, you are fine. Sometimes you have to turn up the CR difficulty to provide a challenge to the players. If you find they are over their heads, then back off the higher CRs. It's hit or miss sometimes. You can have one group of players who do well with CRs slightly above their party's strength and another group that consistently can't handle CRs that their PCs should be able to defeat.

As for the focus on combat as opposed to roleplaying, it's your call how much you put into the mix...that said it is a two way street and you probably should listen to the players about what types of encounters they want.

For the Knight player complaining about the Beguiler's lack of offensive power...sounds like a personal problem for the Knight player.

Thanks,
Rich

 

[WillieW]

I've been DMing the same group for about 4 months or so now, and have had no PC deaths. The adventure (and characters) kicked off at about 9th level, and they are now pushing 11th (our games session aren't very long, we're lucky to get in more than 1 encounter or challenge per session). Up until last week, we had no PC deaths, only a couple of allied NPCs.... <snip>

I don't think you're a bad DM, by the sounds of things. However, if your players aren't having fun any more then perhaps their expectations aren't being met. They expect roleplaying because they've had roleplaying up to now.

Although one player -- your room-mate -- is disgruntled, how are the others? The fact that you have to spend a lot of time listening to this chap's gripes might be magnifying the "problem". He has your ear more often than the others, most likely. Maybe you should ask the other players how they feel?

If you feel that the enjoyment element is genuinely diminshing for the other players, then can your scenarios be modifed a little more explicitly towards roleplaying solutions rather than combat? Maybe crippling or maiming damage might be a better method of teaching PCs that life out of the comfort zone is a little harsh. Or you could introduce an NPC ally who can take some of the heat from the PCs in tougher encounters.

But if you figure that you have placed plenty of workarounds and non-lethal solutions to problems in your game that the PCs aren't using, then I wouldn't let your conscience trouble you too much.

 

[BlackMoria]

No, your fine, based on what you have stated.

For this section of the adventure, it is fine to dial it up a bit but maybe not for every encounter. If you want to portray the badlands as the dangerous place, you can do it with the frequency of encounters rather than the nature of the encounters.

Throw encounters than are not inherently dangerous at the party as well. Large rainfalls in badlands to lead to flashfloods and mudslides which can envelope the party or impede them. An encounter in which they feel like they are being watched and are being followed but no one can spot anything is wonderful for putting the characters on edge without it leading to combat. Crazed hermit monks, misunderstood monsters, etc can provide roleplaying opportunities for the party that may or may not lead to combat depending on how the roleplaying plays out.

I think the dissatisfaction from your players is the frequency of higher CR combats and the lack of apparent roleplaying opportunities. Intersperse some encounters like I suggested above into mix and your players should be content.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

I've been DMing the same group for about 4 months or so now, and have had no PC deaths.

There you have it: Proof that you're a lousy DM!

Anyway, last week the party Transmuter was slain by a Dracotaur Barbarian, after a combination of letting himself get into danger, and a critical hit with a battleaxe. To give a better picture, though, the character is a pseudo NPC, as its player is overseas for some time, and other players have been running it.

I'd say that letting other people play that guy's character might not be a good idea, unless the player agreed to it beforehand. Otherwise, I'd have left that character at home while the rest is adventuring (or doing some off-the-screen adventuring so the player can rejoin the group at the appropriate wealth and character level). Other players might not show the same interest in keeping the character alive than the character's own player.

But that's nothing that makes you a bad DM.

Then this week, the party Knight was slain by a Ghoul Dire Wolf (ToHR) - after he had been paralyzed and mauled for successive rounds.

So he could have been rescued by his partymates?

Did the ghoul turn on more dangerous enemies before mauling the helpless knight?

Why didn't it just tear the knight's throat out (coup-de-grace)?


I'd say that might have been handled better, but I can't really say without knowing the whole battle. Doesn't sound like a lousy-DM situation to me, though.

My main concern is that up until this point, the party had been winning encounters pretty comfortably, with few genuinely "life or death" fights. As a result of this, I had been bumping up encounter levels slowly but surely, to give them more of a challenge (and more of a reward when they won).

Sounds like a good idea. Boring PCs to death does not make for an interesting game.

Was it too fast? Did you go from cake-walk to meat-grinder?

Was it too slow? Imperceptibly so?

One player, my flatmate (who plays the knight) is now a bit ticked off at the way I run a game, saying I'm putting them up against opponents who are too tough, and that all the sessions are all combat and no roleplay.

Tough enemies happen. As long as you don't overdo that, it's alright.

As for the accusation: Is it true? Are your sessions all combat? All your sessions? If not, he's wrong, and it's not impossible that he's exaggerating.

Personally, I think that periods of combat-heavy sessions are okay.

The same player also constantly accuses the Beguiler of being "useless" because he has few damage dealing spells.

So he complains about the combat-heaviness of the game but also complains if other players play characters that are geared toward non-combat situations? If the game shouldn't be all about combat, why should the characters be?

Anyhow, I'm wondering if by slowly bumping up encounters, if I have fallen into an adversrial, "killer DM" mindset.

What, by slowly bumping up the difficulty? Nah. If you were an adversial killer DM, you'd ramp up the difficulty in one fell swoop to catch them off guard. You'd also tailor the encounters to downplay the characters' strengths and capitalise on their weaknesses. You'd also use DM knowledge the enemies could not know and would probably engage in "unnatural" behaviour in favour of your monsters. (As opposed to unnatural behaviour in favour of the players, like a hungry animal not killing a helpless PC because you don't want to kill him. No, you would have enemies target helpless and unconscious characters even if the time would be better spent defending against acting enemies).

I had that once. The DM seemed dead set on making us lose. Our strengths were neutralised, and when we retreated and planned to overcome that encounter the next day with proper preparation, the enemy found us, and sicced lycanthropes on us. Their EL was significantly higher than our party level, and they managed to walk up on us without us getting any check to see whether those boars were just wandering around or stalking up on us, so of course they got a surprise round.
After we won that fight, he threw a fit and ended the campaign. It was no loss really.

I'd like to think not - most encounters offer opportunities for parley, retreat or surrender, so if the fight is going poorly, they generally have options other than to fight to death.

That's often the case, but players tend to overlook this. They think that all encounters have to be defeatable. Not everyone will react positively at realising that this isn't, in fact, the case.

 

[Peni Griffin]

One person complaining or praising enough can significantly skew your perception of the group's reaction, even when you're not rooming with that person. You know your roommate and I don't, so don't take my reactions too much to heart; however, a big red flag goes up for me based on his harping on the "uselessness" of another player's character. Anyone who focuses on someone else's behavior instead of his own (in games as in life) is treading a dangerous and futile path. Find a tactful way to tell him to mind his own yard and let the beguiler mind his, even if the player really isn't very good at playing. If the beguiler's player isn't disruptive, his choices aren't anybody else's business; if he is, that's a different problem. Just based on your statement so far, my knee-jerk reaction is that your roommate is picking on you in much the same way that he's picking on the beguiler, and that he doesn't have any business doing either, but you're the best judge of that.

Although you can't very well disrupt the situation as established - you're apparently the "mid-book slog" and all you can do is get through it - you can vary it somewhat. Introduce more roleplay by inserting more ambiguous encounters. Throw in a hostage situation, a monster city-state that they'd die tackling directly and need to get past on stealthily or by diplomacy, terrain problems that drain resources without draining hit points, that sort of thing. Maybe ease off on your pacing (despite the short time spent playing) and encourage the players to do in-party roleplaying, possibly making up for the limited face-time by using e-mail exchange, although depending on personalities this might make the metagame problem between your roommate and the beguiler into an ingame problem.

Relax. All you can do is the best you can do, and there is no shining standard of DMing that you have to match.

 

[Thunderfoot]

No, I think you have a few things you can tweak, but you are not a 'bad DM' based on your comments.

One thing you might want to think of is adding an oasis in your desert wasteland. Historically, oases were often left off of maps to keep their locations hidden. Those that knew of them would often station guards there to ensure it kept hidden, when they would get bored, well, nature would take it course.

The little cities that would spring up around these oasis would eventually become important stops on trade routes, especially for those that built the communities. I would consider adding one of these 'hidden' sites just to give your players a break from the hack n' slay monotony they seems to be encountering. This can be a great opportunity for you to fulfill some of the player's character goals as well (you are keeping a log, right?) and can be a great launch point for several smaller side plots and one off adventures. Once rested and ready, they can resume their regularly scheduled quest invigorated by the break and change of pace.

Properly planned, this can be one of those little nuggets you never expected to have that pans out into something much larger than you could have ever hoped for.

Hope this helps.

 

[delericho]

Sounds to me like you're doing just fine. Sometimes PCs die, and that's actually good for the game, even if the player in question is less than pleased. The only thing I would suggest:

The leg of my campaign at the moment is unavoidably combat heavy - they are travelling through badlands where few mortals are brave enough to tread, and it is known to be overrun with all sorts of beasts. They knew those going in, but were hired to track down an item.

...

One player is now a bit ticked off at the way I run a game, saying that all the sessions are all combat and no roleplay.

(Note: I've snipped heavily and reordered the two paragraphs to get at the point I'm addressing.)

Depending on whether this is just one player being awkward because his character died, or if this is the general feeling of the group as a whole, you might want to consider cutting this leg of the campaign short, and moving on to the next bit. There's no point in persevering with something your players aren't enjoying.

 

[Lockridge]

Your job as a DM is to entertain the players.
You've mentioned that your players are generally non-combat and non-powergamers. Putting them through a combat oriented type of adventure doesn't qualify as entertaining them.
Simply saying "PCs die once in a while" doesn't work if you lose your players.
See how the other players feel. If they all agree with your friend then adjust your style. If its just the one complainer then I wouldn't worry.

Some groups prefer heavy combat and danger while others just want to ride along a good story. Its all D&D but very different styles.