Party Composition Concerns - Need GMing Advice

[pneumatik]

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

Yeah, this is what I was thinking. Your players want to make combat machines and only worry about killing stuff. Running them through adventures when they have to talk or sneak or whatever that isn't killing will get them in trouble.

If they have trouble working together in fights maybe you should start with easy and simple fights and work them up to harder and more complex ones. This might not actually be helpful because you mention the group has been like this for a while.

 

[pukunui]

Thanks, but like I said, I was asked to run a Dawn of Defiance campaign. It's a series of premade modules that take characters from level 1 to level 20, and in the process, it exposes them to a broad range of playstyles and adventure goals. Yes, I could tailor the modules to better suit the PCs, and to a certain extent I already do, but that's a lot of work, and I don't necessarily have the time. So the players need to think about that when they build their characters. They also need to think holistically - with the party's needs in mind - when building their characters instead of just thinking "what do I want to play, the others be damned".

Also, I don't particularly want to run a hack 'n' slash-only game tailored for a bunch of combat monsters. That's just not Star Wars, in my point of view.

Luckily, one of my players making a new character has agreed to reconsider his character choice. And I may have found a new player who may be willing to take on the social skills role. So we'll see how things go.

 

[pneumatik]

I'm sorry, I didn't realize your players asked you to run a campaign they don't want to play. It's snarky, but that's what it looks like to me. I have no advice on how to make this situation better.

 

[billd91]

I'm sorry, I didn't realize your players asked you to run a campaign they don't want to play. It's snarky, but that's what it looks like to me. I have no advice on how to make this situation better.

It doesn't sound to me like it's a campaign they don't want to play, necessarily. It sounds more like they're losing focus on the big picture of the campaign and focusing on the small stuff like the individual combats (classic situation: not seeing the forest for the trees).

From the edits, it sounds like the OP is on the right track for getting the players to make characters that will help achieve the goals of the adventure path. So, good luck with the rest of the campaign.

 

[pukunui]

I'm sorry, I didn't realize your players asked you to run a campaign they don't want to play. It's snarky, but that's what it looks like to me. I have no advice on how to make this situation better.

I think it's not so much that they don't want to play it as it is that they just don't know how to adjust their playstyle. They're all fairly experienced RPGers and are thus somewhat set in their ways. I think I'm also the most gung-ho about it. As my wife put it, I play for the stimulation after a long week at home with the kids, while they play as a way to relax after a long week at work.

It doesn't sound to me like it's a campaign they don't want to play, necessarily. It sounds more like they're losing focus on the big picture of the campaign and focusing on the small stuff like the individual combats (classic situation: not seeing the forest for the trees).

Possibly. Or possibly it's just, as I said above, that they're too set in their ways and don't know how to adjust.

From the edits, it sounds like the OP is on the right track for getting the players to make characters that will help achieve the goals of the adventure path. So, good luck with the rest of the campaign.

Thanks. I'm still trying to convince the one player to give his first PC a second chance, even if he only keeps the fluff and completely rebuilds him mechanically. In an effort to personalize the campaign, I had tied his character into this particular module to a great extent (he's a Jedi who lost his master during the Clone Wars, and while infiltrating a Hutt crime lord's organization, they find a Jedi Master in a drug-induced coma ... and I had made it so she was the Jedi PC's lost master), and I'm very disappointed that I won't get to see his reaction to the big reveal. So I've asked him if he'd please reconsider playing his Jedi at least for the rest of this module ... for the sake of the story if nothing else. And if he's still not happy with the character by the end of the module, I've written in a much better way for him to exit the campaign than bleeding out on the floor of a Hutt crime lord's makeshift gladiator arena (hint: it involves a bounty hunter).

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I have always let party composition be in the hands of the players*- whatever problems that may cause tend to be self-correcting.

* Except when running something with newbies or pregens.

 

[pukunui]

Right, well, that's what we normally do, and the problems are not self-correcting, so that's why I'm looking for another solution.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

IMHO, there is nothing wrong with letting players getting their PCs killed over and over again using bad tactics.

I'd never presume to ask a player NOT to play something or otherwise change their PC unless it was inappropriate for the campaign, such as asking to play an elf in a humans only campaign.

But if someone complains or asks why they keep failing, tell them that there may be a problem with their tactics, and open the discussion. Or you could ask them why they keep choosing the PCs they do. While the problem seems to be in party makeup, you may be surprised by the conversation.

I was on the player side of that equation years ago, in a long established campaign with decade-old PCs, and we asked how to get past a certain obstacle that had utterly kicked our asses. He told us matter of factly and with a bit of disdain that we needed to use "X" to get past it. We explained to him that not only did nobody in the party have "X", nobody was even capable of using "X". Nobody was even close.

Your case is different. The players are on a death carousel, generating and killing PCs over and over again, and not recognizing that the problem may be in PC selection or tactics.

If it persists, you may be forced to manufacture a pot detour, but up until you get serious grumblings, I'd say let the killings continue.

 

[pukunui]

IMHO, there is nothing wrong with letting players getting their PCs killed over and over again using bad tactics.

No, there's nothing wrong with that. I'm just tired of doing it that way. It detracts from the fun for me.

Your case is different. The players are on a death carousel, generating and killing PCs over and over again, and not recognizing that the problem may be in PC selection or tactics.

Actually I'm pretty sure they're aware of it. They just don't seem capable of doing anything about it. Also, there hasn't been a death carousel in this campaign so far. But if you were to look at our group's overall history, which spans several D&D 3.5 and 4e campaigns, as well as several Star Wars Saga Edition campaigns, you'd see a recurring issue.

My first D&D 3.5 campaign with the core of this group had few PC deaths at first, but once we got into the Red Hand of Doom, we had not one but three near-TPKs. The last was the final straw. We abandoned that campaign altogether.

I abandoned my one and only D&D 4e campaign before it went on long enough to result in that sort of ending - but the guy who took it over managed to keep it going for a few more levels before all but one of us got turned to stone by a medusa in the Pyramid of Shadows. We abandoned that campaign too.

Our current 4e campaign is going well so far. I don't think anybody's died yet.

Our first Star Wars campaign didn't go too badly either. Can't remember if we had any character deaths in that one or not. The second one ended in a near-TPK that the GM transformed into a "you're all captured alive" scenario, but we still decided to end it after breaking out of prison.

My own SWSE campaign is also going well. These two PC deaths were the first and they only occurred because both players chose to let their players die.

However, I've just had some good news: the player of the Jedi PC has agreed to keep playing him at least until the end of this module. Hooray!


And I've also found a potential new player who's going to make a party leader/social skills guy, so that problem is solved too.

 

[Wednesday Boy]

Maybe look for opportunities for the non-combat characters to shine--possibly with custom tailoring based on their character. If the players see opportunities where they could have been super-awesome as the faceman, they may be enticed to play one over a combatant.

Or similarly give them roleplaying rewards based on the non-combat feats and talents they take to encourage more rounded characters. For example if they take the talent that lets them make a computer hostile to everyone but them, make sure it comes up in the game in meaningful ways. When they see how that scored them a big victory they may go for another computer hacking feat/talent instead of a purely combat one. (Although this may take some finagling with the Dawn of Defiance encounters.)

When you spoke about the party having poor tactics and noted the past campaigns where PCs died often, the possibility came to mind that maybe you are "to blame" for their deaths. You mentioned that you were seen as the most tactically savvy of the group. Could you be too good compared to them? One of the most tactically minded guys I play with in one game, GMs his own D&D game that I don't play in. From what I understand he's had a number of character deaths and I often wonder whether he needs to put on the kiddy gloves a little. Maybe you need to do the same?