Why don’t players surrender... would we want them too?

[TheSword]

I guess what I don’t understand is why capture is seen as dishonorable when TV, Cinema and Literature is chock full of capture scenes. I can’t really think of any time when being a prisoner of war was dishonorable. Being a POW is generally seen as a massive sacrifice for the country.

Maybe d&d has more ‘fire and forget’ foes. You never learn enough about them to find out whether they would kill you on sight and you never learn their motivations enough to find out what would make them hold a killing stroke.

I also think it’s very difficult to tell a foe that’s overwhelming - and therefore needs surrendering too. After all while spell level may be easy to recognize, hp, attack bonus, etc aren’t - unless you role openly and players metagame it.

 

[Jd Smith1]

I guess what I don’t understand is why capture is seen as dishonorable when TV, Cinema and Literature is chock full of capture scenes. I can’t really think of any time when being a prisoner of war was dishonorable. Being a POW is generally seen as a massive sacrifice for the country.

Well, fictional stories generally ignore the fact that being taken prisoner means incredible hardships, torture, and frequently, death; they generally ignore reality in every particular. In the history of the USA, for example, the only time being taken prisoner meant even reasonable treatment was in WW1, and in WW2 by the Germans (and even then, hardships abounded and the shooting of POWs did occur).

Few nations had anything resembling humane treatment of prisoners before WW1, and when facing more primitive cultures, being captured simply meant a slow death.

In the US military, being a POW is not highly regarded; the Soviets imprisoned those Red Army troops who were captured by the Germans in WW2 (and who had survived the terrible conditions). The Imperial Japanese heaped great dishonor upon those who surrendered. Chinese and Vietnamese Communist governments imprisoned those of their troops who had been taken as prisoners. And so forth.

Historically, if you're not killed outright, being a prisoner means facing disease, starvation, and maltreatment at best, active torture at worst. In more primitive times, those of noble birth might see ransoms paid, but otherwise, why feed useless mouths?

 

[Derren]

Few nations had anything resembling humane treatment of prisoners before WW1, and when facing more primitive cultures, being captured simply meant a slow death.

Not sure if that is correct, especially in the Age of Sail in regards to captured sailors.

 

[Jd Smith1]

Not sure if that is correct, especially in the Age of Sail in regards to captured sailors.

You might want to check the British habit of prison hulks, for a single example.

The Royal Spanish treated captured British officers fairly decently during the Napoleonic wars, but they only captured a bare handful. The French treatment of prisoners was certainly bad.

The treatment of pressganged sailors was hardly better than that of prisoners.

 

[aco175]

For game purposes, it is a great tool for roleplay and story purposes. I think that there are some metagame reasons as well. The players may come to expect the DM to create encounters that are balanced to their level and that they should always be able to overcome. Some players also have been forced to play in the intro adventure where you all start off as prisoners and come to resent not having choices. It is almost a retaliation against players being told what their character will do. Players revolt thinking that the DM is taking away their choice and them determining how their PC acts.

 

[Helldritch]

Players forget that being captured can be a great RP opportunity. Remember that a prisonner's first duty is to escape. A DM's first priority in that case is to make escape a real possibility.

 

[TheSword]

Well, fictional stories generally ignore the fact that being taken prisoner means incredible hardships, torture, and frequently, death; they generally ignore reality in every particular. In the history of the USA, for example, the only time being taken prisoner meant even reasonable treatment was in WW1, and in WW2 by the Germans (and even then, hardships abounded and the shooting of POWs did occur).

Few nations had anything resembling humane treatment of prisoners before WW1, and when facing more primitive cultures, being captured simply meant a slow death.

In the US military, being a POW is not highly regarded; the Soviets imprisoned those Red Army troops who were captured by the Germans in WW2 (and who had survived the terrible conditions). The Imperial Japanese heaped great dishonor upon those who surrendered. Chinese and Vietnamese Communist governments imprisoned those of their troops who had been taken as prisoners. And so forth.

Historically, if you're not killed outright, being a prisoner means facing disease, starvation, and maltreatment at best, active torture at worst. In more primitive times, those of noble birth might see ransoms paid, but otherwise, why feed useless mouths?

I didn’t disagree with that, however we’re talking about fiction and story telling. The great escape, Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Pirates of the Caribbean, Lord of the Rings, film after film has surrender scenes. I’m not sure people draw on real world history more than they do media.

 

[aco175]

I don't think many of us would like to play a game based on real Earth middle ages with their hardships, and you thought Oregon Trail was hard.

 

[dragoner]

In The Great Monorail Job an adventure I made up for our game, the players did manage to get themselves captured by the army, after a shoot out with local bandits. They took on a technical with and auto-cannon only with gauss rifles with under-barrel grenade launchers. This resulted in driving off the bandits, except with one lead PC, and supporting NPC dead; so in the end, the army sort of saved them. However, at the same time, they sort of messed up their employment by killing their boss. They were put on trial, and would have had the book thrown at them, prison planet and all, but their other employer (this was a side job) the AI for a large independent Swiss style bank, used leverage to influence the outcome of the trial. They were let go, with losing all the military equipment they had purchased, as a penalty. That started a new round of adventure trying to reacquire gear on the black market so they could complete their original mission.

 

[TheSword]

Ok so they had the opportunity to surrender and was it overwhelming force at a time when they were wounded that caused them to surrender?