D&D General Should a low level character know to burn a troll?

[Guest 6801328]

Yeah, I warn players not to metagame in general.

There is one adventure where there is a random encounter with an NPC. He seems to be important, and believes himself to be so, but in reality he is quite mad. He leads them around to areas in the dungeon that don't matter.

When the players first met him and they were deciding whether to follow him one player said "We don't want to take the game off the rails, lets follow him to get on with the plot."

They were awfully confused when the NPC was not helpful whatsoever. They learned a lesson about metagaming that day.

The best part of this story is the correct usage of "metagaming".

 

[Tony Vargas]

. In earlier editions trolls had this problem and slower regeneration. Players had extremely limited resources to get fire. IE no cantrips and fewer spells per day.

...and no oil, no torches...

...uphill, in the snow... both ways!

 

[S'mon]

They should know if they want to survive!

Metagame: eh, yes in any typical D&D fantasy world. If your world has exactly one regenerating fire-vulnerable troll, probably not.

If you want a creature with unknown weaknesses, make a unique creature or use something much rarer. My group had no idea how to fight a Flying Polyp...

 

[Charlaquin]

This isn’t a problem of knowing or not knowing. The problem is availability and efficacy. In earlier editions trolls had this problem and slower regeneration. Players had extremely limited resources to get fire. IE no cantrips and fewer spells per day. Last but not least the spells that do fire damage are very very good. The problem is that trolls are losing an arms race.

Hell, when my players see a creature regenerate they just have one character hit it with Chill Touch and everyone else keeps wailing on it with whatever they would have used anyway.

 

[Reynard]

Yeah, I warn players not to metagame in general.

There is one adventure where there is a random encounter with an NPC. He seems to be important, and believes himself to be so, but in reality he is quite mad. He leads them around to areas in the dungeon that don't matter.

When the players first met him and they were deciding whether to follow him one player said "We don't want to take the game off the rails, lets follow him to get on with the plot."

They were awfully confused when the NPC was not helpful whatsoever. They learned a lesson about metagaming that day.

First of all, the game is the metagame. Every interaction a player conducts between their character and the world is metagaming.

Second, why in the world would you want to punish your players for biting the plot hook?

 

[Oofta]

It's funny. No one bats an eye when the PCs face down terrors that would send me running. That they should probably all be suffering PTSD and retire as soon as they have enough money to start a small business.

But the PCs generally don't do that because they're not us. Whether I'm playing a brutal barbarian or a wily wizard I'm trying to put myself into the shoes of an imaginary character. So while I can't ever recreate the time I played a game where I didn't know how to stop troll's regen (assuming there ever was a time, for me there wasn't) I can try to play the game from the PC's perspective.

 

[S'mon]

First of all, the game is the metagame.

 

[Krachek]

In fact a low level party should face only one troll,
And making focus fire on a single troll, regeneration won’t make a great difference,
A troll would be a hard threat for a party below level 5, even without regen.

Past level 5, the troll is an usual encounter.
Facing 2 or more trolls need a solid party who should know about troll regen.

 

[jasper]

No. But skill check DC 10 survival or history would make him remember his basic monster training he slept thru because he was hung over.

 

[Vaslov]

I play with a table of players with ages ranging between their 30's and 50's each with decades of rpg expereince. They all have characters whom have dealt with trolls. The group even has a long standing legend around some Ravenloft werewoles that could only be hurt with gold weapons. Once in a while we have someone new with no role playing experience, but someone at the table will know. When running the game if we want the players to know what to do when encountering a Troll the person running the game says "You encounter a Troll". If not they describe the creature in less certain terms. For example, a "wart covered, green skinned creature with sharp teeth" could be a troll. Or maybe we spent time using less optimal weapons burning an orc with a bad skin condition.

As Sigourney Weaver once said "... nuke the entire site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure".