cthulhucthulhu1453
Villager
Background:
This is a West Marches style game with over 20 players, about 10 of whom are actively participating, including myself. There are three Dungeon Masters (DMs), each responsible for their own storylines, and they do not know the contents of each other's stories. The game is conducted on a Discord server, with players role-playing in text channels while the actual sessions are run via voice chat.
The storyline revolves around everyone arriving at a frontier town and exploring the unknown surroundings.
After each adventure, players submit an adventure report to the mayor of the town. These reports are publicly available, allowing all players to track the progression of the game’s narrative.
The main DM is responsible for managing the entire town, playing as the mayor and the guards, among other roles. He has set the town’s atmosphere as lighthearted, with the guards being somewhat incompetent and only small crimes occurring, such as drunken brawls. In short, the tone is more "Japanese-style fantasy." The mayor is a mysterious old wizard who built the town. On the other hand, the main DM’s storyline is brutal and dangerous, involving a forest filled with undead creatures and beings like vampires who hold disdain for humanity.
The second DM, on the other hand, has created a storyline involving a tribe of wildlings. This tribe is trying to destroy the town and open a portal to the Fey Realm. They are also using dark magic to corrupt the environment around them. These wildlings have a strong warrior honor culture and spread corruption through a magical plague. At the time, the players had already investigated the origins and nature of the plague, successfully halting its spread and confirming the tribe’s hostility.
The Controversial Event: During one of the second DM's adventures, a controversial event occurred.
In this adventure, my character (a cleric of the god of knowledge) and my teammates captured a shaman and a warrior from the wildling tribe after a very dangerous battle. Fearing potential reinforcements from the tribe, we decided to bring the prisoners back to town to find a safer place to interrogate them. Since the main DM was not present at the time, the second DM assumed that the town gate guards were absent and allowed us to enter the town. We wanted to find a safe place for the interrogation, and one of my teammates suggested the prison, which has an anti-magic field to prevent the prisoners from escaping using magic. The second DM also assumed that the prison guards were absent, so we used the prison for the interrogation.
Shortly after the interrogation began, the shaman made a request: she wanted to speak to my character alone, as I was an outsider and had played the "good cop" during the interrogation. The shaman was willing to offer information, but only on the condition that she would be granted a quick death.
I agreed.
I spoke with the shaman alone while my teammates waited outside.
This conversation with the shaman was a very memorable scene for me. Our exchange felt more like a relaxed conversation between friends rather than an interrogation. The shaman opened up and shared valuable information—her tribe had lived in the area long before the town was built, and they harbored deep resentment toward the town and its residents. They were nomadic, and their leader had formed an alliance with a powerful extra-planar entity, planning to summon this being.
My character revealed that I was merely a "passerby" in the town, which made the shaman trust me even more. She even shared stories from her childhood. The entire process felt more like a friendly exchange than an interrogation. In the end, when the shaman asked for a swift death as her reward, I, respecting her warrior culture and fulfilling her wish, helped her complete this "transaction" by killing both the shaman and the other tribal member. To me, it was a consensual exchange—the shaman provided knowledge, and I gave her the death she requested. I saw it as akin to helping a friend with an honorable death.
Considering the hostile relationship between the town and the tribe, as I understood it, I believed that killing enemy members in a state of war should not be a significant issue.
Upon leaving the prison, I told my teammates what had happened. Their reactions were negative. One of them exclaimed, "What have you done? You killed two people in the middle of town!" Another began trying to clean the bloodstains in the prison, while the others discussed how to cover it up. At that moment, I realized I should have been more cautious and taken them outside the town walls to kill them.
In hindsight, if we had taken them to an inn for interrogation and killed them there, nothing would have happened. Or I could have just taken them outside the town gates and killed them.
Just as I came to this realization, the main DM logged in, paused the game, and decided to wait until everyone was ready to continue. The entire server became tense. One of my teammates, a paladin, proposed that we handle the situation through role-playing a public trial, but the main DM firmly refused. When someone asked about the town’s legal philosophy, the main DM half-jokingly replied, "An eye for an eye, a life for a life." He also made a mocking comment, implying that my character’s holy symbol might shatter in court if I lied. I felt a little insulted, but I chose to remain silent.
It’s worth mentioning that the teachings of Oghma, the god of knowledge, do not require adherence to secular laws. So, in my character’s view, breaking the law or lying in pursuit of knowledge (such as learning the history and plans of the wildlings) did not conflict with his faith.
The main DM was unfamiliar with the second DM's storyline, which led to the mayor being completely unaware of the events involving the wildlings. From the main DM’s perspective, my actions probably seemed indistinguishable from randomly killing townsfolk. However, we had been submitting adventure reports after each mission, so the mayor should have some knowledge of the wildling tribe spreading magical corruption and posing a threat to the town.
The main DM’s management style is quite "parental." He expects people to play according to his intended style but rarely expresses his expectations clearly. He seldom explains his motivations or reasons, perhaps to maintain a sense of mystery, or to use an old saying, "If the punishment is unknown, then the awe is immeasurable." I happen to be the opposite—I enjoy explaining my actions and the reasoning behind them. The main DM’s refusal to allow a trial further reflected his parental management style, whereas I was actually looking forward to a courtroom scene.
Returning to the Game: The DM resumed the game, stating that there were no guards around the prison. My teammates began trying to cover up the incident, attempting to move the bodies out of town and clean up the bloodstains. While things were a bit chaotic, I sensed that the DM was highly focused on this event, and I was worried that if we continued to hide or flee, the situation would only worsen. I thought that turning myself in might be a better option, allowing things to resolve in a more dignified way, and at least giving us a chance to explain ourselves.
So, I chose to hand the situation back to the DM, leaving my character in the prison while telling my teammates to return to the inn. About 20 in-game minutes later, the guards returned to the prison, and I turned myself in, admitting to killing the prisoners.
Perhaps the main DM had expected us to cover it up, but I didn’t pick up on any such hints. If he had given us a difficulty check (DC) for hiding the bloodstains or carrying the bodies out of town, the players would have understood the DM’s intention. Alternatively, if he had mentioned that there were conveniently buckets and mops in the prison, we would have caught the hint.
From the moment I turned myself in, things began to escalate. The guards and sheriff treated the incident as a murder case and detained all my teammates. The sheriff conducted one-on-one interrogations of each teammate, with the main DM role-playing the scenes excellently, making the players feel like they were being questioned as murder accomplices by police. My teammates were all deeply frustrated after their interrogations.
It’s important to note that this "interrogation" was part of the investigation process, not a public trial as punishment.
The town's handling of the situation seemed to treat the wildlings as a non-hostile group. In the end, the sheriff released my teammates but insisted they wear mysterious bracelets without revealing their purpose. We all assumed they were some kind of tracking devices.
During my interrogation, I shared the full truth about the tribe's threat and questioned the sheriff: "If you don’t consider the wildlings as enemies, then they have the right to enter the town armed, just like adventurers. So what will stop them from launching an attack from inside the walls?" The sheriff (and the main DM) became somewhat flustered and replied, "We’ll deal with that differently when the time comes!"
After the interrogation, the atmosphere on the server became tense. The main DM’s attitude softened slightly: "If this tribe truly poses a threat to the town, then eliminating them would be justified." Some players made sarcastic comments about how the wildlings could enter the town and perform their summoning ritual in front of the town hall. Another player joked that, since the town's jurisdiction only applied inside the walls, we could just torture prisoners right outside the gates in front of the guards. More players began questioning why the mayor wasn’t aware of the tribe’s existence.
The Next Day in Reality: The next day, the main DM decided that my character would be exiled. I had already anticipated this outcome and understood it as the DM's way of maintaining the town's atmosphere. However, outside of the game, I asked the DM if my teammates would also be punished for bringing prisoners into the town. The DM replied, "Do you want them to be arrested? I just want to resolve this quickly and move on with the game." I respected his decision but felt that this approach lacked a clear definition.
In the game, my character requested to write a letter to the other teammates before being exiled. The DM (and the sheriff) seemed a little surprised but agreed. In the letter, I detailed the history and threats posed by the wildling tribe and said goodbye to all the characters my character knew in town. The sheriff gave some of my belongings to my teammates and, before my exile, gave me a mysterious bracelet, hinting that it might be a future plot hook.
After the event, the DM did not issue any official announcement nor clarify how adventurers should handle prisoners in the future. This left me feeling disappointed because the event could have been an important opportunity for the town to recognize the external threats, but due to a lack of further action or regulation, it ended merely with my character’s exile.
I suspect the main DM found the situation too difficult to handle and opted for an easy resolution, letting my character be exiled and moving on. I understand it’s a free server, and I can't expect too much. In politics, some issues are difficult to weigh, and once they’re on the scales, they may spiral out of control. The main DM probably didn’t foresee the consequences of treating the event as a murder investigation.
The DM never issued any official announcement regarding the incident, only exiling my character without providing a clear definition of the crime or guidelines for handling future prisoners. This left me dissatisfied because there’s no clear direction on how we should handle similar situations in the future. The town life continues as lighthearted as ever, with no heightened awareness of external threats, making my character’s sacrifice feel meaningless.
My frustrations stem from three main points:
In the end, I might have become too invested in my character, but I can't help feeling that adventurers in this town are like the mayor’s "black gloves." We adventure for the town’s benefit, risking our lives to fight external threats, repelling wildling tribes, and stopping evil forces from invading. We’ve grown attached to this town, treating it as our home. But in the end, it seems we are just tools. Once these "black gloves" are stained with blood, they can easily be discarded.
The town stands on moral high ground, with the mayor and its residents continuing their cheerful, anime-style lives. However, it’s the adventurers who deal with the wildling tribe that threatens the town, and our hands are stained with blood, yet we receive no moral support. If our actions are accidentally exposed and the town sees the bloodstains on the "black gloves," then the gloves are discarded without hesitation, and the town remains clean and innocent. It feels very "cyberpunk."
P.S. Analyzing this from a political and legal perspective makes it even more perplexing. The main DM probably didn’t think too deeply about it and simply followed modern moral and legal concepts, where even prisoners of war have rights and can’t be summarily executed. This aligns with the tone of Japanese-style fantasy, where morals and laws resemble those of the real world.
But this town is dealing with a medieval situation, facing enemies that are trying to wipe them out entirely. Moreover, the town is working with adventurers who are essentially mercenaries—something quite unmodern.
If the server’s tone had been more aligned with dark fantasy from the start, it would have been much easier to handle.
This is a West Marches style game with over 20 players, about 10 of whom are actively participating, including myself. There are three Dungeon Masters (DMs), each responsible for their own storylines, and they do not know the contents of each other's stories. The game is conducted on a Discord server, with players role-playing in text channels while the actual sessions are run via voice chat.
The storyline revolves around everyone arriving at a frontier town and exploring the unknown surroundings.
After each adventure, players submit an adventure report to the mayor of the town. These reports are publicly available, allowing all players to track the progression of the game’s narrative.
The main DM is responsible for managing the entire town, playing as the mayor and the guards, among other roles. He has set the town’s atmosphere as lighthearted, with the guards being somewhat incompetent and only small crimes occurring, such as drunken brawls. In short, the tone is more "Japanese-style fantasy." The mayor is a mysterious old wizard who built the town. On the other hand, the main DM’s storyline is brutal and dangerous, involving a forest filled with undead creatures and beings like vampires who hold disdain for humanity.
The second DM, on the other hand, has created a storyline involving a tribe of wildlings. This tribe is trying to destroy the town and open a portal to the Fey Realm. They are also using dark magic to corrupt the environment around them. These wildlings have a strong warrior honor culture and spread corruption through a magical plague. At the time, the players had already investigated the origins and nature of the plague, successfully halting its spread and confirming the tribe’s hostility.
The Controversial Event: During one of the second DM's adventures, a controversial event occurred.
In this adventure, my character (a cleric of the god of knowledge) and my teammates captured a shaman and a warrior from the wildling tribe after a very dangerous battle. Fearing potential reinforcements from the tribe, we decided to bring the prisoners back to town to find a safer place to interrogate them. Since the main DM was not present at the time, the second DM assumed that the town gate guards were absent and allowed us to enter the town. We wanted to find a safe place for the interrogation, and one of my teammates suggested the prison, which has an anti-magic field to prevent the prisoners from escaping using magic. The second DM also assumed that the prison guards were absent, so we used the prison for the interrogation.
Shortly after the interrogation began, the shaman made a request: she wanted to speak to my character alone, as I was an outsider and had played the "good cop" during the interrogation. The shaman was willing to offer information, but only on the condition that she would be granted a quick death.
I agreed.
I spoke with the shaman alone while my teammates waited outside.
This conversation with the shaman was a very memorable scene for me. Our exchange felt more like a relaxed conversation between friends rather than an interrogation. The shaman opened up and shared valuable information—her tribe had lived in the area long before the town was built, and they harbored deep resentment toward the town and its residents. They were nomadic, and their leader had formed an alliance with a powerful extra-planar entity, planning to summon this being.
My character revealed that I was merely a "passerby" in the town, which made the shaman trust me even more. She even shared stories from her childhood. The entire process felt more like a friendly exchange than an interrogation. In the end, when the shaman asked for a swift death as her reward, I, respecting her warrior culture and fulfilling her wish, helped her complete this "transaction" by killing both the shaman and the other tribal member. To me, it was a consensual exchange—the shaman provided knowledge, and I gave her the death she requested. I saw it as akin to helping a friend with an honorable death.
Considering the hostile relationship between the town and the tribe, as I understood it, I believed that killing enemy members in a state of war should not be a significant issue.
Upon leaving the prison, I told my teammates what had happened. Their reactions were negative. One of them exclaimed, "What have you done? You killed two people in the middle of town!" Another began trying to clean the bloodstains in the prison, while the others discussed how to cover it up. At that moment, I realized I should have been more cautious and taken them outside the town walls to kill them.
In hindsight, if we had taken them to an inn for interrogation and killed them there, nothing would have happened. Or I could have just taken them outside the town gates and killed them.
Just as I came to this realization, the main DM logged in, paused the game, and decided to wait until everyone was ready to continue. The entire server became tense. One of my teammates, a paladin, proposed that we handle the situation through role-playing a public trial, but the main DM firmly refused. When someone asked about the town’s legal philosophy, the main DM half-jokingly replied, "An eye for an eye, a life for a life." He also made a mocking comment, implying that my character’s holy symbol might shatter in court if I lied. I felt a little insulted, but I chose to remain silent.
It’s worth mentioning that the teachings of Oghma, the god of knowledge, do not require adherence to secular laws. So, in my character’s view, breaking the law or lying in pursuit of knowledge (such as learning the history and plans of the wildlings) did not conflict with his faith.
The main DM was unfamiliar with the second DM's storyline, which led to the mayor being completely unaware of the events involving the wildlings. From the main DM’s perspective, my actions probably seemed indistinguishable from randomly killing townsfolk. However, we had been submitting adventure reports after each mission, so the mayor should have some knowledge of the wildling tribe spreading magical corruption and posing a threat to the town.
The main DM’s management style is quite "parental." He expects people to play according to his intended style but rarely expresses his expectations clearly. He seldom explains his motivations or reasons, perhaps to maintain a sense of mystery, or to use an old saying, "If the punishment is unknown, then the awe is immeasurable." I happen to be the opposite—I enjoy explaining my actions and the reasoning behind them. The main DM’s refusal to allow a trial further reflected his parental management style, whereas I was actually looking forward to a courtroom scene.
Returning to the Game: The DM resumed the game, stating that there were no guards around the prison. My teammates began trying to cover up the incident, attempting to move the bodies out of town and clean up the bloodstains. While things were a bit chaotic, I sensed that the DM was highly focused on this event, and I was worried that if we continued to hide or flee, the situation would only worsen. I thought that turning myself in might be a better option, allowing things to resolve in a more dignified way, and at least giving us a chance to explain ourselves.
So, I chose to hand the situation back to the DM, leaving my character in the prison while telling my teammates to return to the inn. About 20 in-game minutes later, the guards returned to the prison, and I turned myself in, admitting to killing the prisoners.
Perhaps the main DM had expected us to cover it up, but I didn’t pick up on any such hints. If he had given us a difficulty check (DC) for hiding the bloodstains or carrying the bodies out of town, the players would have understood the DM’s intention. Alternatively, if he had mentioned that there were conveniently buckets and mops in the prison, we would have caught the hint.
From the moment I turned myself in, things began to escalate. The guards and sheriff treated the incident as a murder case and detained all my teammates. The sheriff conducted one-on-one interrogations of each teammate, with the main DM role-playing the scenes excellently, making the players feel like they were being questioned as murder accomplices by police. My teammates were all deeply frustrated after their interrogations.
It’s important to note that this "interrogation" was part of the investigation process, not a public trial as punishment.
The town's handling of the situation seemed to treat the wildlings as a non-hostile group. In the end, the sheriff released my teammates but insisted they wear mysterious bracelets without revealing their purpose. We all assumed they were some kind of tracking devices.
During my interrogation, I shared the full truth about the tribe's threat and questioned the sheriff: "If you don’t consider the wildlings as enemies, then they have the right to enter the town armed, just like adventurers. So what will stop them from launching an attack from inside the walls?" The sheriff (and the main DM) became somewhat flustered and replied, "We’ll deal with that differently when the time comes!"
After the interrogation, the atmosphere on the server became tense. The main DM’s attitude softened slightly: "If this tribe truly poses a threat to the town, then eliminating them would be justified." Some players made sarcastic comments about how the wildlings could enter the town and perform their summoning ritual in front of the town hall. Another player joked that, since the town's jurisdiction only applied inside the walls, we could just torture prisoners right outside the gates in front of the guards. More players began questioning why the mayor wasn’t aware of the tribe’s existence.
The Next Day in Reality: The next day, the main DM decided that my character would be exiled. I had already anticipated this outcome and understood it as the DM's way of maintaining the town's atmosphere. However, outside of the game, I asked the DM if my teammates would also be punished for bringing prisoners into the town. The DM replied, "Do you want them to be arrested? I just want to resolve this quickly and move on with the game." I respected his decision but felt that this approach lacked a clear definition.
In the game, my character requested to write a letter to the other teammates before being exiled. The DM (and the sheriff) seemed a little surprised but agreed. In the letter, I detailed the history and threats posed by the wildling tribe and said goodbye to all the characters my character knew in town. The sheriff gave some of my belongings to my teammates and, before my exile, gave me a mysterious bracelet, hinting that it might be a future plot hook.
After the event, the DM did not issue any official announcement nor clarify how adventurers should handle prisoners in the future. This left me feeling disappointed because the event could have been an important opportunity for the town to recognize the external threats, but due to a lack of further action or regulation, it ended merely with my character’s exile.
I suspect the main DM found the situation too difficult to handle and opted for an easy resolution, letting my character be exiled and moving on. I understand it’s a free server, and I can't expect too much. In politics, some issues are difficult to weigh, and once they’re on the scales, they may spiral out of control. The main DM probably didn’t foresee the consequences of treating the event as a murder investigation.
The DM never issued any official announcement regarding the incident, only exiling my character without providing a clear definition of the crime or guidelines for handling future prisoners. This left me dissatisfied because there’s no clear direction on how we should handle similar situations in the future. The town life continues as lighthearted as ever, with no heightened awareness of external threats, making my character’s sacrifice feel meaningless.
My frustrations stem from three main points:
- Lack of definition: I would like to know what crime my character was charged with, so I can understand the boundaries of future behavior.
- Lack of closure: The event ended without a conclusion or future guidance on how to handle prisoners.
- Parental management: The DM's refusal to communicate made players feel distanced and left the game lacking in player agency.
In the end, I might have become too invested in my character, but I can't help feeling that adventurers in this town are like the mayor’s "black gloves." We adventure for the town’s benefit, risking our lives to fight external threats, repelling wildling tribes, and stopping evil forces from invading. We’ve grown attached to this town, treating it as our home. But in the end, it seems we are just tools. Once these "black gloves" are stained with blood, they can easily be discarded.
The town stands on moral high ground, with the mayor and its residents continuing their cheerful, anime-style lives. However, it’s the adventurers who deal with the wildling tribe that threatens the town, and our hands are stained with blood, yet we receive no moral support. If our actions are accidentally exposed and the town sees the bloodstains on the "black gloves," then the gloves are discarded without hesitation, and the town remains clean and innocent. It feels very "cyberpunk."
P.S. Analyzing this from a political and legal perspective makes it even more perplexing. The main DM probably didn’t think too deeply about it and simply followed modern moral and legal concepts, where even prisoners of war have rights and can’t be summarily executed. This aligns with the tone of Japanese-style fantasy, where morals and laws resemble those of the real world.
But this town is dealing with a medieval situation, facing enemies that are trying to wipe them out entirely. Moreover, the town is working with adventurers who are essentially mercenaries—something quite unmodern.
If the server’s tone had been more aligned with dark fantasy from the start, it would have been much easier to handle.
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