"Let's rest now"

[korjik]

I my sound like a jack-ass when i say this but from reading this thread i do wonder how your players manage to get any enjoyment from this. If you were to give them any check or advice of any sort all you have done is subtract from their gaming experiance. Will it give you a headache if they die? Yes. Will they have to roll new charecters slowing down the pase of the game that day? Yes. Yet in my honist opinion if players are not punished (fairly) for making their own mistakes it tottaly takes away any enjoyment of a role playing game and turns it into a social group that should be playing a ps3 rpg that has save points.

The crutch of "BUT BUT THE CHARECTER WOULD KNOW THIS EVEN IF STUPID HUMAN DOESNT" is not ok. To eliminate this excuse each charecter should be given a campagain relevant background that lists from them usefull information that can even strongly hint about safe places to rest in the area etc because then if they forget it was the players fault. For the game to be intresting and challenging it is the players you need to test.

On the topic of how monsters react to rest it depends on the intelgence of the monster but i personally am normally inclined to quite heavily punish pc's for resting in dungeons where i can unless they take logical percausions that make it plausable

I personally dont find wasting one of my too few gaming sessions making a new character because of a stupid or uninformed decision to be all that enjoyable.

I certainly dont find tossing out multiple adventures because my players made a stupid or uninformed decision to be all that enjoyable either.

Taking two seconds out to say, 'hey, that is a iffy spot to rest' is hardly going to break immersion.

 

[terrya]

See my later posts for my opinion on your attitude of "i dont have the time" if this is where youve gotten to in life you should look for a different platform and take a long look and at why you now play dungeons and dragons. You end up finding that its for the social element more than anything else and therefor you would be better of playing some kind of computer game RPG and yes it does remove immersion and any test of skill involved in the game.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Oh, and we were all going to be warforged (no fatigue, no need to sleep...not even a need to stop marching).

Group Victorinox, Eh?

A bit like DC's Metal Men.

 

[Aberzanzorax]

Group Victorinox, Eh?

A bit like DC's Metal Men.

Actually, apart from the name, you're not too far off. We were going a bit "superhero-esque". Our name was going to be "The Unstoppables" which is a bit of a joke reference.

There was a line in John Carpenter's Vampires which went:

"If we don't stop them, they'll be unstoppable!"

 

[Crazy Jerome]

We like to run games that are tough on the characters. Meanwhile, our normal group of players consists of mostly middle-aged people that probably didn't get enough sleep last night, and are dealing with everything from toddlers to teens wandering randomly through the gaming space. Something had to give.

Our solution was that if the players start doing something that to the DM (usually me) might be boneheaded, we will stop for a moment and review what the characters know. The interesting thing about doing this, though, is that is hasn't always led to, "Oh well, since you put it that way, we won't camp here." Or even, like it did at first, "Oh no, he raised an objection. Something horrible will happen to us if we camp now." Rather, since the situation is usually tough enough, having a list of the known facts doesn't always give a clear best answer. This raises the tension instead of diminishing it. "Oh now that we thought about it, it is risky to camp here, but not all that great to press on, either. We are so up the creek without a paddle."

I might feel different if I had my first D&D group instead, who were all tactical and operational savvy. This group is great at solving mysteries, not so hot tactically. My goal is to be as much of a rat bastard DM as I can be while still giving them a reasonable chance to survive.

 

[billd91]

Our solution was that if the players start doing something that to the DM (usually me) might be boneheaded, we will stop for a moment and review what the characters know. The interesting thing about doing this, though, is that is hasn't always led to, "Oh well, since you put it that way, we won't camp here." Or even, like it did at first, "Oh no, he raised an objection. Something horrible will happen to us if we camp now." Rather, since the situation is usually tough enough, having a list of the known facts doesn't always give a clear best answer. This raises the tension instead of diminishing it. "Oh now that we thought about it, it is risky to camp here, but not all that great to press on, either. We are so up the creek without a paddle."

I think you make some excellent points. I'd also like to add that if a camping plan (or any other action) seems boneheaded to the DM, it probably would seem boneheaded to the players too if they had the same understanding of the situation as the DM. This probably means there's a disconnect between the DM's perception of the situation and the players' and that's probably the result of miscommunication that should be addressed.

In this case, I don't mean boneheaded to mean reasonably mistaken. It's a reasonable mistake to make camp on top of or near a well-hidden lair of predator who pops out and catches prey by surprise.

 

[S'mon]

take a long look and at why you now play dungeons and dragons. You end up finding that its for the social element more than anything else and therefor you would be better of playing some kind of computer game RPG...

Because computer RPGs have a superior social element to games where we sit around the table and (in my case) drink beer with people I like? I suppose I could just focus on the beer, but I like my RPGs too, thanks.

 

[prosfilaes]

See my later posts for my opinion on your attitude of "i dont have the time" if this is where youve gotten to in life you should look for a different platform and take a long look and at why you now play dungeons and dragons.

i'm dyslexic and often posting in a rush at work

I'm not seeing a consistent answer to the question of what you do if you don't have the time or ability to do it right.

 

[AeroDm]

Healing is a problematic issue in RPGs (in my opinion) because we insist on blurring the narrative and mechanical aspects. There are a great many narrative events that we don't presume should have a mechanical impact. There aren't hard coded rules for getting drunk, if you are hungry and eat you don't typically gain much, and 99% of "jumps" are checkless.

For whatever reason, though, resting always must return a bucket of resources. Therein lies the problem. I have personally argued for the decoupling of rest and the return of resources and I think it opens up a lot of interesting opportunities for the game. I included the general approach in my homebrew and I think it'll prove helpful in fighting the "we rest now" mentality and also in fostering a more balanced approach to how players spend the character's resources.

 

[D'karr]

Healing is a problematic issue in RPGs (in my opinion) because we insist on blurring the narrative and mechanical aspects. There are a great many narrative events that we don't presume should have a mechanical impact. There aren't hard coded rules for getting drunk, if you are hungry and eat you don't typically gain much, and 99% of "jumps" are checkless.

For whatever reason, though, resting always must return a bucket of resources. Therein lies the problem. I have personally argued for the decoupling of rest and the return of resources and I think it opens up a lot of interesting opportunities for the game. I included the general approach in my homebrew and I think it'll prove helpful in fighting the "we rest now" mentality and also in fostering a more balanced approach to how players spend the character's resources.

As a houserule or an optional element I totally agree on this. As a matter of fact I've implemented several things depending on what I was trying to accomplish. This requires a group that wants the same things as you, though. No use in implementing a lot of work into resource management after a rest, if the group is really more of a let's get on with it type.

See this for some ideas of what I've done.