Last session, you entered Hell... Where's Bill?

[jmucchiello]

We press on. We have six players plus DM and if 3 people can't make it, everyone plays two characters that night. Most people play the second character as an NPC so they don't do much unless there's a real fight. (Always have a real character awake on watch.) At the end of the night only the characters played by their original players gain XP.

Loot is divided up in character so they get their share of the loot. It does the party no good to carry around a perfectly good suit of +2 chainmail to sell in town when the fighter who missed last session could be wearing it. We also tend to go long periods without heading back to town so why wouldn't the characters divvy up the loot evenly.

 

[Tobold Hornblower]

maybe he went to get some gnarly thrash boots

In the game I run for my daughters and their friends, they're all sorta Graduate Students at an adventuring academy. When on adventures away from school they all have a school pin. This allows the crazy guy who works the magic teleportation device at the school to recall them to the school, or project them into the presence of other pin wearers.

If a player isn't there, that crazy Master just zapa her character out of the dungeon to run some silly errand.

-------------------------

Where the Hell is Bill?

Where, where the Hell is Bill?
Where, where the Hell is Bill?
Where, where the Hell is Bill?
Where, where the Hell is Bill?

Well, maybe he went to get a sideways haircut
Maybe he went to get a striped shirt
Maybe he went to get some plastic shoes
Maybe he went to get some funny sunglasses

Well, maybe he went to get an Air Force parka
Maybe he went to get a Vespa scooter
Maybe he went to get a British flag
Maybe he went to go Mod Ska dancing

Well, maybe he went to get a mohawk
And maybe he went to get some gnarly thrash boots
Maybe he went to go ride his skateboard
Maybe he went to see the Circle Jerks

 

[Crowe]

I was once in a campaign where several of the players were doing contract hours that often required them to miss the odd setion of gaming due to odd working hours.

What the GM did was early on, have the characters cursed with a strange afliction. Every now and again they would phase into some sort of Ethereal plane.
They could not affect anything in the mortal planes, but they were drawn along with their companions..

So.. any time some one missed a session... Boom.. curse kicks in.. off they went... only to return some time later. (When the player was able to make the next session.. )

 

[Ruined]

Before I segue into the story, I'll give my quick response. If we're in a relaxed situation (i.e. non-dungeon), then I'll have the character exit stage left, and usually use it as a springboard for some side plot later on in the game. This presumes that the players are responsible and courteous about letting me know they won't be there. I'm fortunate enough to know a good number of players now, and my current group is hand-picked. In a dungeon encounter, then I'll run the character if possible, having them stick to the back and following the lead of the other characters. In case of TPK, oh well (but I've never had it happen).

Anyway, this reminds me of years ago when we were knee-deep playing in the Warhammer Campaign (Power Behind the Throne, Something Rotten In Kislev, etc.). Great series of modules, and they've been re-released should you seek them.

I was playing a cool non-combatant. A priestess of Shallya, goddess of Mercy. She started out as a Pharmacist, advanced to Physician, and then on through the ranks to become a successful priest. She was more of the group band-aid than I usually play, and I like playing clerics.

Well at the time, I had just gotten into a great long-distance relationship that had me occasionally driving between North Carolina and D.C. One weekend happened to fall when the campaign was going on. No problem, play on, I'll be there next session. I come back, and everyone looks kind of sheepish.

"What?"
"Your character, Sonia? She was killed."
"You guys killed my character? WTF?"
"An assassin went after her in her room on the riverboat. We were all drugged. There was feasibly no way she could have escaped..."
"No way? I had 3 Fate Points! You guys suck..."

Ugly little scene, but I heard that it was very dramatic for the players at the time. I eventually rolled up a Templar who actually got to wield the magic item that was the culmination of the campaign, but it was a pyrrhic victory. I wanted my healer back.

Side Note: The GM at the time is currently a player in my campaign. Muhahahahahaha!

 

[takyris]

Sounds like you have a somewhat adversarial relationship with your players. Among my friends we just try to run someone in character when their player isn't present. We don't run them from danger or have them hang back, but neither do we have them perform bold, life-threatening actions that are completely out-of-character. It's always nice to get advance notice, but sometimes players just can't make it.

Hey, ForceDude,

I don't have a specfically antagonistic relationship with my players. My quotes probably set that in a bad light. I'm going for comedy more than anything else. I would never have a character cast an XP-draining spell while the player was away, and I've only killed a character whose player was away one time -- in an "only one PC was left standing" battle.

My point was that if you're not there, and you didn't have the politeness to warn me first, your character is going to be mocked. The druid whose player is AWOL because "he had no clean socks" (actual reason given) is gonna show up at a party with an animated vine for a date and Leafblower as his new nickname.

Systematic mockery is much more effective than just killing someone. That ruins my plots.

-Tacky