Party Composition Concerns - Need GMing Advice

[pukunui]

Hi folks,

I'm currently GMing a Star Wars Saga Edition Dawn of Defiance campaign. We're partway through the second of ten modules, which run the full gamut of playstyles, from straight-up combat to subtle intrigue to shmoozing with celebrities. There's a lot more to the campaign than just killing things. For a group to succeed, they need to have a broad range of skills and abilities. A group that focuses too much on one extreme or another (combat, social skills, etc) is going to have a hard time.

My group's original PC line-up included a pretty good spread of characters and roles: a melee-oriented Kel Dor Jedi, two ranged combatants (a rifle-wielding, armored clone soldier and a stealthy pistol-wielding Sullustan scout), a Force-sensitive Jawa techie (trained in Use Computer and Mechanics), and a Human noble medic/frontman (trained in Deception, Gather Info, and Persuasion, with Skill Focus in the latter).

However, last session we had a pretty tough combat and the PCs were going up and down like yo-yos. By the end of it, two PCs were dead (the Jedi and the medic/frontman), but only because their players had chosen not to spend a Force Point to keep them alive. The player of the medic/frontman claimed this was because he was just bored with his character (about which I already had my suspicions), while the player of the Jedi stated that he was frustrated with Saga Edition's approach to melee combat and didn't want to play a melee character anymore.

Now both players have indicated that they wish to play fairly straightforward, one-dimensional "I just want to kill things without getting killed myself" soldiers. With three such characters in the group (what with the pre-existing clone trooper being cut from the same cloth), I'm worried that the party composition will be too one-dimensional with too great an emphasis on combat ability.

The party can do fine without a dedicated healer, but they'll really struggle without having anyone who's at least trained in the social skills (Deception, Gather Info, and Persuasion).


I guess what I'm getting at here is that while I firmly believe a successful group of PCs needs to have characters filling all the important roles, I do not want to tell people what to play. But at the same time, I'm tired of the neverending mis-adventures that my group always seems so happy to embark upon (it was the same for both my D&D 3.5 and 4e campaigns). For once, I'd like them to succeed instead of stumble blindly through everything. But that requires good teamwork, and that's something that my group has never had. The players in my group all prefer to just do their own thing, both when it comes to making their characters and when it comes to actually playing.


Does anyone have any suggestions for me? Is it OK for me to tell the players making new characters that they can't both make a one-dimensional soldier character? I don't want to tell the one player that he needs to make another party spokesman because that's what he was just playing and it's obvious he wasn't enjoying it. But I don't want to tell the other guy that he has to play that kind of character either. I know that as the GM, I make the rules, but I don't want to come across as an amateur dictator. My group already gives me a hard time for not allowing anyone to play a Gamorrean or a Gungan. I don't want them to start accusing me of telling them what to play as well as what not to play.

I'm sure I'm making a bigger deal out of this than I should, but I just want them to succeed for once -- and have fun doing so, of course -- and I'm just not sure that's going to happen if I let the group end up being overloaded with one-dimensional combat-oriented characters. I guess I'm also just not too sure when it's OK for me as the GM to put my foot down and when I should just suck it up and go with the flow.


Any advice you can give me will be very much appreciated.





Thanks in advance,
Jonathan

 

[billd91]

If they ask for advice, give them honest advice but always leave it up to them. Remind them that the SWSE system is pretty flexible about picking up new trained skills and multiclassing. As they're designing their new PCs, if there are major gaps in skills (like nobody with any interpersonal skills), point it out to them and let them know it's up to them as a group to figure out how to deal with deficiencies in party make up. And then let them build what they want (barring specific house rules like no gungans or gamoreans).

Unless you're really not having fun running the game, let them play it out the way they want to play it out. Don't pull punches because you don't think they'll succeed unless you do. Let them live or die by their own decisions. If they learn something from it, great. If not, perhaps you'll have good stories of PC failure to post on the internet.

 

[pukunui]

I have and I do and I'm just so tired of letting them learn the hard way. It just doesn't work. We just end up having misadventure after misadventure, which often leads to multiple PC deaths if not outright campaign-ending TPKs.

I guess the underlying problem is one of poor party tactics and synergy. My players are very individualistic in their approach to building and playing their characters.

 

[Herschel]

Then keep killing them until they get it through their heads they need to work together and compensate, even if it means going more delve/episodic for a while rather than running your full campaign.

 

[pukunui]

That's what I've been doing (the first part, at least). Doesn't work. They're too set in their ways, I guess. As for the latter, usually someone else GMs Star Wars, but he handed the reins over to me specifically to run this Dawn of Defiance campaign. So I need to try to get the guys to adjust their playstyle to work with me, rather than the other way around.

 

[Cor_Malek]

While it's important not to make game unfun for the players... It seems that they are making you unhappy with their approach. DM is not a player, but the idea is that he get's his kicks from adventure development. By putting emphasis on memeME!! the players don't take into account the time you have to put into creating their adventures.

One idea, would be to change the system to one that promotes individualistic approach, something that has zero chance of success in DnD. Problem is, I have hard time thinking of one...

I'm with Herschel and Billd on this one - make it clear, that a party of brutes can make a fun fodder encounter, but hardly a party of adventurers. If they disregard it - proceed as normally.
When you create adventure, present opportunities to have better spoils/easier time/fully fulfilling goals only with clever use of social skills. They only need to be Plywood Houses, as those characters won't be able to use those... But make sure they understand what they're missing out on.

 

[pukunui]

While it's important not to make game unfun for the players... It seems that they are making you unhappy with their approach. DM is not a player, but the idea is that he get's his kicks from adventure development. By putting emphasis on memeME!! the players don't take into account the time you have to put into creating their adventures.

Exactly. And the thing is: they're probably not even conscious of it. They're just playing the game how they've always played it (and thus how they undoubtedly think it ought to be played).

One idea, would be to change the system to one that promotes individualistic approach, something that has zero chance of success in DnD. Problem is, I have hard time thinking of one...

Mmm. Same with Star Wars Saga Edition. It's less of a synergistic, team-oriented system than D&D 4e is, but it's still not a "do whatever you want" style of game. You still need to have characters filling various roles in order for the party to succeed (techie, medic, spokesman, etc). Some gaps can be filled with NPC droids, but you really can't use that sort of thing for the social aspects of the game -- otherwise you'd end up with either one player effectively playing two characters (their main PC plus the NPC spokesman droid) or the GM roleplaying all the social encounters with himself.

I'm with Herschel and Billd on this one - make it clear, that a party of brutes can make a fun fodder encounter, but hardly a party of adventurers.

I'm just composing an e-mail in which I point out this very thing in what I hope is tactful language.

If they disregard it - proceed as normally.
When you create adventure, present opportunities to have better spoils/easier time/fully fulfilling goals only with clever use of social skills. They only need to be Plywood Houses, as those characters won't be able to use those... But make sure they understand what they're missing out on.

This is what I've been doing so far and what I will inevitably continue to do if they continue to not get the message. Sigh ...

 

[S'mon]

It's possible to run a campaign where every PC is a combat monster and nothing else. Even then, the PCs usually need to work together or suffer high attrition - maybe if you're running a Vietnam-war-movie game with dysfunctional PCs getting picked off by the enemy, otherwise no.

It sounds like Dawn of Defiance is not that kind of campaign. I think it's ok to tell the players that if they want to play Dawn of Defiance they need an appropriate PC lineup.

Now, from the players' POV they may be feeling defensive, that they need to play min-maxed combat brutes to survive the campaign. Two PCs dead in a session does sound a bit un-Star Warsy, but you've said that it's due to their poor tactics/not working together.

Some suggestions:

Siloing - let them make their combat brutes, but allocate them some interaction skills in addition for free.

NPC commander - Due to the team's poor performance, a Rebel tactical officer is assigned to them to get them performing effectively in combat. Of course they may just ignore him, or worse.

NPC Diplomat - can deal with the talkky stuff; no combat skills, the PCs need to keep him/her alive in combat so they still have a challenge.

 

[pukunui]

It's possible to run a campaign where every PC is a combat monster and nothing else. Even then, the PCs usually need to work together or suffer high attrition - maybe if you're running a Vietnam-war-movie game with dysfunctional PCs getting picked off by the enemy, otherwise no.

It sounds like Dawn of Defiance is not that kind of campaign. I think it's ok to tell the players that if they want to play Dawn of Defiance they need an appropriate PC lineup.

No, it's not that kind of campaign. There are elements of that (one episode is about insighting a rebellion amongst a species the Empire is using for slave labor), but that's not the campaign's main focus. As I said, the whole point of the campaign is to show off all the different playstyles and campaign styles you can run using the SWSE ruleset.

Now, from the players' POV they may be feeling defensive, that they need to play min-maxed combat brutes to survive the campaign. Two PCs dead in a session does sound a bit un-Star Warsy, but you've said that it's due to their poor tactics/not working together.

But the thing is: the only reason two PCs died is because their players chose to let them die. It's actually quite difficult to kill a PC in SWSE. First off, you have to deal enough damage to drop them to 0 hp and exceed their damage threshold, otherwise they just fall unconscious. And even if you do deal enough damage, if they've got a Force Point, they can spend it to fall unconscious instead (and I've put in a house rule where they can choose to sacrifice a body part instead of spending a Force Point, although no one's taken me up on that so far ...). The only way to make sure a PC dies is to coup de grace them while they're down - and that's an option I'd really only want to use sparingly.

Siloing - let them make their combat brutes, but allocate them some interaction skills in addition for free.

I've thought about this, but that might start to get a bit crazy. Some of them grumble about the number of house rules I've got already (and I don't even have that many).

NPC commander - Due to the team's poor performance, a Rebel tactical officer is assigned to them to get them performing effectively in combat. Of course they may just ignore him, or worse.

Possible. They always tell me I'm the most tactically-minded of the group, so maybe I just have high standards ... anyway, the issue with tactics is sort of secondary to the issue of team and character building. I think if I could get them to build their characters more synergistically, then they might start using better tactics automatically (by playing off each other's strengths).

NPC Diplomat - can deal with the talkky stuff; no combat skills, the PCs need to keep him/her alive in combat so they still have a challenge.

It's technically a possibility - they could get a protocol droid or something, but I think I'd just end up roleplaying all the social encounters with myself, which isn't really fun for anybody. Or else one person would end up with two characters ...


EDIT: Fortunately, in response to my e-mail about this, one of the guys making a new character has volunteered to rethink his character choice. I gave a big, long spiel about the campaign and making sure the group had all the bases covered, etc, but the TL;DR version was: "make your killer PCs if you want but please make sure they've got more to offer the group than just the ability to kill something before it kills them".

 

[Mark Chance]

DM is not a player....

Yes, the DM is a player. The DM plays the game, after all, just not the same way the other players do.

I'd say avoid NPCs to fill out a perceived lack of PC expertise. Instead, just handwave the interaction skills. If the players roleplay those scenes well, then they get good results. If not, not so much.

Modify the adventure to suit the party, not the other way around.