The DM Giveth and the DM Taketh Away

[Riastlin]

So reading today's edition of the DM Experience by Chris Perkins (which unfortunately I cannot link to from here but which can be found on the front page of WotC's D&D site), I got to thinking. Chris advocates, with the right group, not only giving fun toys to the PCs but also taking them away (albeit with the chance for recovery most of the time). The example he uses certainly showed how this sort of thing can make a campaign much more interesting, but I can't help but see the potential risks as well.

For reference, in Chris' example, one of the players spent a considerable amount of time (and party gold) buying and upgrading a ship -- which then blew up and sunk to the bottom of the bay. The PC in question then literally struck a deal with a devil to get the ship back and the ship came back as a much more demonic version of its former self.

So my question to the DM's out there is: Have you done this sort of thing in your game and if so would you do it again. If not, is this something you'd consider.

To the players: How would you handle it if the DM did this in your game?

Before answering, I would assume that the DM should provide the ability for some sort of redress later in the campaign. Whether it be rebuilding the ship, finding a new one, striking a deal with the devil, etc. I would assume that its not a simple matter of "Your ship is gone. What do you want to do now?" At the same time, its also not a "You wake up in a cold sell with all of your equipment gone" where the players are likely to suspect that they'll find it on their captors pretty shortly.

For myself, I must admit that as a DM, I am intrigued by the potential story development that could arise from this sort of thing but fear that it would be equally likely to lead to a revolt. As a player, I would be really worried if I did not really trust the DM to provide an enjoyable experience.

Obviously trust is the key ingredient here, without it, the "plan" is doomed to fail. Even with a fair amount of trust though this would likely be a tough pill to swallow.

Anyhoo, curious to hear everyone's thoughts on the matter.

 

[phoffman]

In the senario it seems like the character investing himself in his ship, had a personal quest.

These kinds of campaigns can been great, where one or more characters personal quests drive the campaign, and as a DM they are often one of the most fun for me. I like active players that already know where they want to be,have an idea of how they want to get there and actively pursue it. It make my job easier in many ways by hitching the campaign plot to their schemes.

In this Kind of campaign players have to think of the role reversal that ends up happening. The players can often be seen as the BBEG, and the NPCs can be seen as those questing to maintain the status quo, or asserting their own conflicting goals. In this sense the player can make the conflict in the campaign with NPCs just by the nature of his goal.

That said players should expect set backs, much like in the more reactive campaigns where adventurers take down a strong hold of the BBEG, causing him to re-evaluate his plans and adjust. For example players could lose their flagship as they did reference campaign.

The player who wants to become the king, can be a great campaign.

 

[Dice4Hire]

Well, with a good OOC comment, like, "You know, this can be worked through." might work well with my group when I take something away. If not, it goes really close to the DM taking away the player's toys for the fun of it.

I guess it is trust lslo, but a good OOC comment does wonders, IME.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

So my question to the DM's out there is: Have you done this sort of thing in your game and if so would you do it again. If not, is this something you'd consider.

To the players: How would you handle it if the DM did this in your game?

As a DM I have tried this sorta thing before...and twice it blew up my games...

As a player the only time I got something like this taken away (my airship/moble base of us PCs) it went ok, until the Dm went to give us a new one...and another PC blew up the new one..and the game, but he was a destructive player, and we are better off without him...

 

[S'mon]

I would seek to avoid arbitrarily taking away something a player has worked & invested to acquire. OTOH if the loss is naturally emergent in play, that's ok - eg the PC works to acquire a ship, and uses it in a naval battle, and there are rules adjudicating whether the ship is sunk, and it gets sunk, then that's ok.

 

[delericho]

Be very, very careful when taking things away from the PCs.

Especially in 4e (or 3e/PF) where items are so important to the characters. (It's much less of an issue in most other games, which are much less gear-dependent.)

In general, my rule of thumb is that it is far better to err on the side of giving out too little (and giving the occasional windfall to redress the balance) than to give out too much (and have to try taking it away).

Indeed, one of the reasons why energy drain was removed from the game, and rust monsters so thoroughly nerfed, was precisely because players so hated losing something that they had worked for over time.

(Also due to the nature of the XP rules in 'modern' D&D, giving out too much treasure can have a long-term effect on power levels - because of the greater power given by their items, the PCs can seek out tougher challenges, which means they can get more XP/items at a faster rate, which means they can seek out tougher challenges, which means...)

In the specific example of the demonic ship, I would probably approach the player ahead of time and discuss the possibility. After all, if it's a major story element, it's probably worth that extra investment in time. And I'm sure the player would appreciate that more than suddenly being hit with the choice: deal with a devil or lose your ship.

 

[Riastlin]

Excellent replies so far. I have to agree that I would be very hesitant to do this sort of thing myself. Personally, I think that S'mon has it on the head. You don't let it seem arbitrary, though if they take the ship into battle and it sinks . . . so be it.

For clarification on the deal with the devil for those who have not read the article, it appears as though that idea came from the player, not Chris Perkins (the DM). He essentially made the decision to have the ship blown up (knowing that the PC had worked very hard to get it) with the thought being that he wanted to see where the party would take the story from there.

From a personal standpoint, if I were playing in Chris' game, I would probably be fine with it -- BUT that's because I know what an excellent DM he is and that there's certainly more going on there than just "taking my toy away". I would understand that Chris will leave open the possibility of some sort of redress should I really want to get it back.

On the other hand, with the DM whose game I am currently a player, and who is DM'ing for the first time, I would be pretty suspicious and/or skeptical. Its not that I don't trust the guy per se -- we are actually pretty good friends -- but I wouldn't necessarily be convinced that he has this thought out well enough.

I will give Chris credit though. Although his example I think shows how excellent this sort of thing can be -- indeed it sounds as though this will become an excellent plot line for the campaign -- he is also very clear that you have to be careful and have a good social contract in place to make it work (in other words you have to know that your players will give you the benefit of the doubt, and you have to be willing to give them some sort of redress to the situation). The idea is not to merely take away a toy, but to make recovery of said toy, or compensation for the loss, a fun and interesting campaign arc.

 

[delericho]

For clarification on the deal with the devil for those who have not read the article, it appears as though that idea came from the player, not Chris Perkins (the DM). He essentially made the decision to have the ship blown up (knowing that the PC had worked very hard to get it) with the thought being that he wanted to see where the party would take the story from there.

From a personal standpoint, if I were playing in Chris' game, I would probably be fine with it -- BUT that's because I know what an excellent DM he is and that there's certainly more going on there than just "taking my toy away".

Incidentally, these two paragraphs contradict one another. According to the first, Chris actually did just decide to take their toys away, to see where the players went with it. So there wasn't really anything more going on there.

I'm not saying that's necessarily a bad thing, but there it is.

 

[Barastrondo]

I would never actually plan to take the players' cool stuff away, full stop. I might have antagonists plan to take it away, and then put those plans in motion and see what happens. A series of bad decisions coupled with bad dice rolls might result in stuff going away. But plan to do it? No. That's pretty much like planning to kill the PCs because you have a really great resurrection story in mind; it's not bad to have a really great resurrection story in mind in case they die, but you don't pull that trigger regardless of what they do to stay alive.

When I read the article, honestly my first thought was "A DM actually feels the need to manually insert deep, dark nadirs where all seems hopeless to the players? Does he not use dice?" Because I think we can all agree, if you use dice, nadirs happen on their own.

 

[Nemesis Destiny]

...But plan to do it? No. That's pretty much like planning to kill the PCs because you have a really great resurrection story in mind; it's not bad to have a really great resurrection story in mind in case they die, but you don't pull that trigger regardless of what they do to stay alive.

Funny you should mention this.... If any of my players are reading this, please stop now!

[sblock]I had just that in mind for a later point in my current campaign, and I was worried about how I would pull it off. Perhaps I can bounce some ideas around in here (not to derail too much).

I've shown the party in a previous encounter that I'm not scared to kill off characters, which I don't think they were expecting from me - they think (correction: thought) I'm a soft DM. I want them to believe that they just end up with a TPK when I drop this part of the plot on them. They will be taking part as grunts in a large-scale battle that they know about from a previous game. The flavour from this game (a gritty viking-type game) would paint them as heroes for facing a glorious death in battle with courage, so I'm hoping it works out.

The key, I think, is to have them really buy into the fact that I either a) their deaths in this battle were unintentional, or b) the campaign was pretty much over anyway, and we decided to have them go out in a blaze of glory.[/sblock]

Again, sorry for the derail.