Players, DMs and Save or Die

[Geron Raveneye]

Of course as DM you can cheat and pull a rabbit out of your a$$. Where's the game challenge for the players in that? Oh yeah, there isn't any.

Ah, right...so if a DM pulls out a save-or-die enemy for his adventure..oh let me just quote, your words are better...

Death is death if the DM decides that death is going to occur. The moment he pulls in save or die, that's his decision because he has no control over the save, hence, he no longer has control over the death.

...but as soon as I use my "DM powers" to offer the players ways to protect themselves before the encounter, or reward them, e.g. for luring the opponent into an area where they get a bonus on their saves by some effect that they heard or found out about, or by placing protective items that are tailored to the power of the opponent somewhere in the adventure for the characters to find if they work for it, or allow them to use something like I'm cheating, pulling a rabbit out of my backside, and am taking the whole challenge away from them.

Happy gaming, whatever you play.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

No ruleset can stop a DM who wants to kill your PC from killing your PC.

Disagree.

Without cheating (in a system in which it is understood that the GM can be validly accused of cheating if he goes against the rules), the GM cannot kill your PC in Dogs in the Vineyard without your choosing to make the stakes that high, or in Burning Empires without his defeating you using his also limited resources. (IIRC, the same could be said of Toon, but I don't know offhand what Toon's policy on "Rule 0" was.)

That's not to say those games will be ENJOYABLE with a bad GM, because they generally won't. They won't allow the bad GM to kill your PC, though.

 

[Raven Crowking]

That's not to say those games will be ENJOYABLE with a bad GM, because they generally won't. They won't allow the bad GM to kill your PC, though.

Okay, I'll grant that there might be systems which make it explicit that PCs cannot die without the player's say-so, and that these systems might not allow the GM to create houserules.

Either way, though, if you have a bad DM, no set of rules can be so comprehensive as to both have a GM role and prevent the person in that role from shafting you.

Going back to Jhulae's last post, I'd agree that some creatures shouldn't appear on generic random encounter tables, and that the DMG should give a heck of a lot more advice on how to use the toolset that is offered. But that doesn't equate to removing tools because you can't be bothered to train DMs in their use.

At least, not IMHO.


RC

 

[Hussar]

The whole problem with the whole "Well, PC's should be prepared for facing save or die situations" is that it assumes that the PC's have perfect knowledge. Unless you always put statuary out in front of every medusa lair, it's not reasonable to assume that the PC's will always know that a save or die monster lurks around that corner.

Now, save or be hurt I have no problem with. But, IME, save or die is disproportionately lethal. In my World's Largest Dungeon campaign, with a group of 6, I had 25 (ish) PC deaths (most of them permanent). Almost half were from save or die effects - and I'm counting being turned to stone in here too since the PC's had no way to retrieve those who failed their saves.

Half the fatalities were to SoD, but, far fewer than half the encounters were with SoD monsters. I would say that about 10% of the encounters are actually with SoD monsters or traps. Yet, that 10% (and that's not a certain number, just a rough guess) accounted for as many deaths as the other 90%.

That's why, IME, SoD is a very bad thing. I'm also starting to get a feeling that crits should maybe be in the same boat as well, but, I'm still on the fence on that one.

All I know is that in every edition that I've played, SoD killed FAR more than it should considering the number of times its faced.

 

[Geron Raveneye]

Disagree.

Without cheating (in a system in which it is understood that the GM can be validly accused of cheating if he goes against the rules), the GM cannot kill your PC in Dogs in the Vineyard without your choosing to make the stakes that high, or in Burning Empires without his defeating you using his also limited resources. (IIRC, the same could be said of Toon, but I don't know offhand what Toon's policy on "Rule 0" was.)

That's not to say those games will be ENJOYABLE with a bad GM, because they generally won't. They won't allow the bad GM to kill your PC, though.

Well, you definitely made me curious about those two games. I heard some things about Dogs in the Vineyard and am not sure the setting really draws me in, but Burning Empire is a blank slate for me. Thanks.

 

[Cadfan]

There's also an interesting philosophical question surrounding the whole "your PCs chose to encounter this monster" thing. If my character chooses to fight an evil wizard because fighting this evil wizard is the only way to save the world, and I choose to send my character to fight an evil wizard because fighting this evil wizard is the only way to continue the game my DM has written for the evening without reducing it to shambles, to what extent have I really consented to facing the wizard's save-or-die spells?

 

[ThirdWizard]

Again, perfectly logical response if you wake up with a bodak in your bed. Otherwise, I'm betting that you made decisions to get to the point where you met it.

What kind of game do you play in, where what creatures you meet are not based at all on your decisions?

That mentality is so odd to me.

PC: "I listen at the door" *rolls*
DM: "You hear nothing."
PC: "I open the door carefully and look inside."
DM: "You meet the gaze of a bodak. Make a Fortitude save."
PC: *rolls* "Ummm... 12..."
DM: "Your PC falls down dead."

Yeah, sure, the PC did decide to open the door. But, is the lethality proportional to the risk that the player believed he was subjugating himself to? The PC probably did this same thing dozens of times before, and it doesn't matter how careful he was.

And then with gaze attacks the PCs not only have to make saves because gaze attacks passively affect everyone within an area (for bodaks 30') but the bodak can also force a 2nd save with a Standard action. And, looking over the bodak stat block, he isn't doing much else.

And, that doesn't even get into high level clerics and wizards throwing around their implosion and finger of death spells. It's not a very fun choice between "Face the BBEG and save the kingdom but most likely one of you will die a round" and "Run away from the BBEG and let him win." GG. Of course, the PCs will be using their own death magic so it will probably be a short fight either way, though, right?

Now, this is coming from someone who has an average of one death a session. So, don't get me wrong, I have nothing against PCs dying. They've got SOP for that, with various options depending on how the PC died and how many resources they have left (and how many have died). But, I'd rather not have PCs die haphazardly.

 

[RFisher]

I apologize. I don't have time to completely catch up on this thread, but there's a couple of additional points I wanted to make...

Precisely. The problem with support for SoD is that its supporters are always trying to hide behind these hedges. Hedges like "you should have prepared Death Ward," or, "they should be in the game, but if you use them, you're a killer DM." It gets ridiculous.

I not even familiar with Death Ward. From what I've gathered in this discussion, it is one way to avoid saving throws, but it's not even one that I'd come up with. To me, avoiding making a saving throw (whether vs. death or not) is the whole point of saving throws.

It's like those tire spikes they use in some places. The spikes aren't intended to puncture anyone's tire. They're intended to cause people to avoid driving through a certain area in a certain direction.

Alright. This playsituation: You are in a dungeon. You keep open a door. Inside, there is some kind of cult, with 20 people in black robes scattered in a 18 x 48 metres room. What do you do?

This is a standard situation, and you have no way whatsoever to prevent the enemies from casting a spell on you.

But that's not a standard situation in my groups. We seldom go busting open a door with 20 cultists behind it without having a clue that there might be 20 cultists behind it.

Why? Because one way to avoid making saving throws is to not bust open doors without having a good idea what might be behind it. If we are going to open a door without a clue what might be behind it, were going to be as prepared-for-anything as possible & do it as stealthily as possible.

I'd be interested to find any work of fiction where the author kills off a defined character (not a red shirt) for no larger reason and then forgets about him for the rest of the work (a truly disposable character). Effectively, that is the literary equivalent to save or die: a random meaningless death that adds nothing to the larger narrative and serves only to be a "sucks to be you" to the Player.

In an effort not to spoil anything, I'll merely mention the movie Serenity. Not that I really think that has much bearing on this discussion.

 

[Geron Raveneye]

There's also an interesting philosophical question surrounding the whole "your PCs chose to encounter this monster" thing. If my character chooses to fight an evil wizard because fighting this evil wizard is the only way to save the world, and I choose to send my character to fight an evil wizard because fighting this evil wizard is the only way to continue the game my DM has written for the evening without reducing it to shambles, to what extent have I really consented to facing the wizard's save-or-die spells?

About to the same extent that you consented to facing this wizard's other spells, I'd say? Or not?

 

[RFisher]

The whole problem with the whole "Well, PC's should be prepared for facing save or die situations" is that it assumes that the PC's have perfect knowledge.

No. The saving throw acknowledges that PCs don't avoid fatal situation 100% of the time. Otherwise it'd be "just die" instead of "save or die".

Secondly, players don't have to have perfect knowledge to avoid lots of saving throws.

Thirdly, this is why I advocate that DMs make an effort at "fair warning". To (partially) account for both the imperfection of player knowledge & the imperfections of the game.

Finally, sure it's still not going to be perfect. That's OK.