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Message: <blockquote data-quote="hawkeyefan" data-source="post: 8664410" data-attributes="member: 6785785">Sure, if you're starting the game this way, I'd expect that to be known. At the very least, the GM can help save some time by letting the players know not to bother selecting starting gear (unless the gear can be recovered or what have you). I think that being up front and open is a huge part of this. I think a lot of the time, players have been conditioned to think of a "capture" state as being a loss of some sort. Which I can understand and even agree with to an extent, but I don't think that having a loss here or there in a game is a bad thing. Well, as a consequence I meant like a direct consequence such as instead of a TPK, the PCs are captured, or similar. Also, I think calling it a "widespread psychosis" implies widespread brain damage among the community....and we all know how everyone thinks about that!But I do think it speaks to players being conditioned in certain ways. Many will often assume the worst will happen if they're captured... they'll lose all their cool gear and they'll be subjected to scenes of punishment or torture and humiliation. If that's what's on the menu, I can understand people not wanting to sit down to eat. But if instead, it's just the new situation, the new challenge to overcome, and the players are allowed to come up with ways to escape, or negotiate, or otherwise get themselves out of this predicament... if players expect this rather than losing their gear and being humbled.... then I think it can work just fine. It's a matter of how the GM presents such situations, and how the players are allowed to deal with them. In other words, if players can be conditioned to think of capture as being something to avoid at all costs with even PC death being preferrable, then they can also be conditioned to think of it differently. Very often the idea of "trust" is mentioned in these discussions. I think this is about trends that have been in place for some time that promote distrust of the GM by the players... that this is the default stance for many players when faced with PC capture. If that's to change, I think it has to start with the GM showing that things don't need to go according to those preconceived notions. Just last night, I was a player in a 5e game where this came up. We're playing through the Temple of Elemental Evil. The PCs are second level and we'd just entered the moathouse. We dealt with the bandits, and then foolishly rushed into battle against the ogre, Lugash.  With most of our abilities and spells spent, we barely managed to beat him. Our paladin was down, and the other four members of the party (a rogue, a warlock, a cleric, and my wizard) were banged up, with 6 HP or less for each of us. At this point, five bugbears arrived and told us to come with them to meet with Lareth, a cleric we'd heard of that dwells beneath the moathouse. A pretty dire situation. There was a natural inclination to fight, even though it likely would have led to disaster. We attempted to Persuade them to let us go, and the rogue even attempted to trick them with a Deception check, but the rolls went poorly, and the bugbears insisted we go with them. Cooler heads prevailed and we went with them, and met with Lareth, who basically offered us some information pointing us elsewhere in exchange for leaving him alone. We agreed to do so, and we were allowed to leave the moathouse. So although not a full on capture scenario, I think it's a pretty useful example. We trusted that the GM introduced the situation not to force our capture, but to see how we would navigate the situation, and how that would inform our relationship with the NPC Lareth. Had we not trusted the GM and given in to our initial urge to only and always fight, the characters would have almost assuredly been killed. I would say that they must. If I know that as a player I have the ability to shape the trajectory of play... I can influence how things go in the fictional world of the game... then I know I'll always have some input on how things play out. So if I'm captured, I won't expect the game to become a case of "be humbled until we guess the one way the GM has devised for us to escape". I can trust in my ability to introduce my own solution to the problem.</blockquote>

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