Switching Characters

[thundershot]

I nipped this one in the bud YEARS ago, and my campaign has been bettered because of it. Each player has a "pool" of four characters from which to dip from, and they have to choose which one to use for a particular adventure. Then the others all go off and form a total of 4 parties. After each adventure is done, they all return home (assuming they survive, which they usually do) and get mixed up again. It's a lot of fun having different interactions between characters. The only bad adventure turned out the be the one full of people with no motivation... They had to be steered with NPC's since they didn't have a leader. I'll never have THAT group together again.


Chris

 

[boxstop7]

In our current campaign, I had a ranger/sorcerer who tried to escape an entrapment situation by throwing a fallen foe into the flaming barricade the enemy has set up at the mouth of the cave in which my party and I were trapped. My intent was to smash or knock the barricade over, giving us a route out. The DM (and indeed the rest of the party) thought I was simply throwing the body onto the fire. I was knocked unconcsious in the fight, and when I awoke our cleric said that he could no longer offer me healing until I atoned for my actions. The monk in the party wouldn't talk to my character any longer. I was growing dissatisfied with the situation, and I was rapidly becoming the outsider (the group left me behind to heal from injuries while they went on a quest given by our captors). Our DM sensed this, and once we escaped, he offered me a way out: one night on watch, my character spotted movement in the brush. My ranger was approached by a gold dragon in disguise who offered to send me home to my family and friends, and the party would never know what happened, only that I was safe and they need not worry.

Moral of the story: try to come up with some way to amicably resolve their discontent. Prior to being sent home, I had begun trying to kill off my character. The DM knew something was wrong. If you want to keep your players happy, there is a way to do it. Just look for a game or plot device that would allow them a quick out. Maybe they get an offer from a wealthy merchant to escort his goods across the sea, for a quick (and crappy) example. But try to keep the players happy. If everyone's happy, the game will roll along much, much better.

~ Box

 

[boxstop7]

In our current campaign, I had a ranger/sorcerer who tried to escape an entrapment situation by throwing a fallen foe into the flaming barricade the enemy has set up at the mouth of the cave in which my party and I were trapped. My intent was to smash or knock the barricade over, giving us a route out. The DM (and indeed the rest of the party) thought I was simply throwing the body onto the fire. I was knocked unconcsious in the fight, and when I awoke our cleric said that he could no longer offer me healing until I atoned for my actions. The monk in the party wouldn't talk to my character any longer. I was growing dissatisfied with the situation, and I was rapidly becoming the outsider (the group left me behind to heal from injuries while they went on a quest given by our captors). Our DM sensed this, and once we escaped, he offered me a way out: one night on watch, my character spotted movement in the brush. My ranger was approached by a gold dragon in disguise who offered to send me home to my family and friends, and the party would never know what happened, only that I was safe and they need not worry.

Moral of the story: try to come up with some way to amicably resolve their discontent. Prior to being sent home, I had begun trying to kill off my character. The DM knew something was wrong. If you want to keep your players happy, there is a way to do it. Just look for a game or plot device that would allow them a quick out. Maybe they get an offer from a wealthy merchant to escort his goods across the sea, for a quick (and crappy) example. But try to keep the players happy. If everyone's happy, the game will roll along much, much better.

~ Box

 

[boxstop7]

Sorry folks...I have no idea what happened there. Won't happen again.

 

[Silver Moon]

swithching characters

Each player has a "pool" of four characters from which to dip from, and they have to choose which one to use for a particular adventure.

Chris

Our group uses a system similar to this, where each player has several different characters. This allows for more variety, yet still maintains a balanced party. It also allows for the situations where a module may require multiple teams to act simultaneously.

 

[tleilaxu]

Just let them switch their characters. It is part of your responsibility as DM to make sure people are having as much fun as possible. Be flexible fer crissake

 

[starwolf]

It can be rather painful as a DM to have your story arc disrupted by revolving door character changes. If you have a long involved background and plot you may want to try this idea.
Rather than have the a few players change characters, run a whole new party! But not in the current story line.....have a "cutaway" adventure. If the current group is in the Swamp of Ick. then perhaps the new group is in the city of Al-Fwad (the city the last group happens to consider their "home") working on some tangential(sp?) adventure to the main story, or perhaps having to deal with some of the loose ends that any adventuring group is bound to have left behind. Run the second adventure for just a session or two....then perhaps the players will come back to the original characters, refreshed and ready to go.

 

[jdavis]

In our group we have a house rule that if you change characters you start one level below the lowest level in the group. That way you don't get people just messing around, but it isn't that much of a penalty for somebody who seriously wants a new character. Swithcing characters is fine as long as the player isn't just goofing off. We also normally set down as a group to discuss changing characters so as to maintain at least some kind of party balance, that way we don't end up with 5 rogues and a paladin or 6 fighters.

 

[Dextolen]

Thanks for all the advice.

What I said to the group is that if anyone wishes to create a new character, they may do so. I will only allow one switch per adventure and in the down time they must pen up a narrative of their old character's exit and their new character's entrance (or work something out with me for next session). The character starts at the level of the lowest level party member with equipment worked out as per the DMG.

 

[carpedavid]

Wow, I'm not the only one...

The mention of players trying to kill of their characters made me laugh. I'm just glad I'm not the only one.

Historically, I've been very big on character continuity. I encouraged players to stick with their characers, even if they had become somewhat bored with them. When some of the players started complaining when they didn't fail their saving throws, though, I knew I had to do something.

Just recently, I proposed the following system: if a player wants to play a new character, he can bring that character in, several levels lower than his current character's level, as a henchman, hireling, or follower of one of the current characters. He must then advance this new character by a level before his current character can retire.

I see a couple advantages to this system, and only one real disadvantage. The player can experiment, and "test out" his new character before retiring his old one. It's entirely possible that a player might find that the new character looked good on paper, but just doesn't cut it in game. This way, they can keep their old character if they don't like the new one.

The disadvantage is that the player is temporarily stuck playing two characters. As long as they players don't abuse this though, I think it will work well.

Any comments?

-Dave