Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="Ovinomancer" data-source="post: 8380216" data-attributes="member: 16814">This is because the &quot;play your character like a stolen car&quot; doesn't mesh well with the usual approaches to 5e.&nbsp; Your examples show this out, because they assume that the challenges aren't related to the PC's goals, but rather the usual party-challenging GM curated challenge set.&nbsp; If your dealing with a literal death trap was directly tied to your goal of whatever, such that it was directly in your way, then how you approach it changes.&nbsp; Also, death being the only serious consequence to PCs is another factor, also from the usual way D&amp;D is framed.&nbsp; Take, for example, my character in the Blades game I'm playing in.&nbsp; This character has the Trauma (unwanted flaw, if you will, earned by stressing out) &quot;reckless.&quot;&nbsp; So, the character's mindset is that the character is reckless, which can be very detrimental.&nbsp; But, I, as a player, get to use this as a cue for how this character acts, and so if I'm leaning into playing my character strongly, then I'm going to declare the occasional reckless action.&nbsp; This came out in the last session, as during the score we had fully accomplished our mission but there was a chance to earn some more coin via engaging with some dangerous shades and attempting to capture them.&nbsp; This hit a number of my character's interest point -- they were shades of his nationality, killed during an attack, and I was an ex-solider, plus I am very money oriented, with a primary character vice of luxury, so coin is important, and one of the crew's motivations is to be ambitious, which coin allows us to engage.&nbsp; And then my PC is reckless.&nbsp; So, no hesitation, my PC immediately engaged the shades, and did so while the rest of the crew was occupied and could not immediately help (one was collecting the objects of the score and the other was guarding against the return of some Deathlands monstrosities she had chased off).&nbsp; THIS is playing like your character is a stolen car -- it's leaning into everything the character is about and jamming the pedal down on them.&nbsp; And it doesn't really work in D&amp;D mostly due to the party focus and the fact that consequences are usually death or nothing much.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Ovinomancer, post: 8380216, member: 16814"] This is because the "play your character like a stolen car" doesn't mesh well with the usual approaches to 5e. Your examples show this out, because they assume that the challenges aren't related to the PC's goals, but rather the usual party-challenging GM curated challenge set. If your dealing with a literal death trap was directly tied to your goal of whatever, such that it was directly in your way, then how you approach it changes. Also, death being the only serious consequence to PCs is another factor, also from the usual way D&D is framed. Take, for example, my character in the Blades game I'm playing in. This character has the Trauma (unwanted flaw, if you will, earned by stressing out) "reckless." So, the character's mindset is that the character is reckless, which can be very detrimental. But, I, as a player, get to use this as a cue for how this character acts, and so if I'm leaning into playing my character strongly, then I'm going to declare the occasional reckless action. This came out in the last session, as during the score we had fully accomplished our mission but there was a chance to earn some more coin via engaging with some dangerous shades and attempting to capture them. This hit a number of my character's interest point -- they were shades of his nationality, killed during an attack, and I was an ex-solider, plus I am very money oriented, with a primary character vice of luxury, so coin is important, and one of the crew's motivations is to be ambitious, which coin allows us to engage. And then my PC is reckless. So, no hesitation, my PC immediately engaged the shades, and did so while the rest of the crew was occupied and could not immediately help (one was collecting the objects of the score and the other was guarding against the return of some Deathlands monstrosities she had chased off). THIS is playing like your character is a stolen car -- it's leaning into everything the character is about and jamming the pedal down on them. And it doesn't really work in D&D mostly due to the party focus and the fact that consequences are usually death or nothing much. [/QUOTE]

Verification