You make the call: Spreading the Pain

[the Jester]

So, just to be clear...

If you believe that the tactically smart thing to do is stun-lock one of the players for the entire combat...that's okay, despite the fact that that player is going to have zero fun at all?

Let's then pretend it's the same character for all three combats in a session. Is that still okay?

I probably shouldn't have mentioned the specific scenario, since it's obfuscating things.

Bottom line...it it okay to sacrifice the fun of a single player in order to do the tactically smart thing?

Absolutely. It sucks for that player, just as it sucks for the dm to have his bad ass solo monster stun locked and die without getting to do anything cool. Hopefully it doesn't come up often- I won't bother to reiterate what everyone said upthread about fun encounter design vis-a-vis at will stuns- but if the party (f'rexample) charges into a warren full of dracoliches, so be it.

HOWEVER- and this is a huge "however"- it doesn't sound like the situation in the OP's case is really about stunning so much as being railroaded into a no-escape encounter with a highly superior enemy. Now, sometimes that happens, but I think the real issue here has more to do with the way the situation developed than the fact that the bad guy stunned him out of most of the fight. I suspect- and admittedly could be wrong- that if Arcane Springboard's group had sought out that fight, he would've been fine with how it played.

 

[KarinsDad]

HOWEVER- and this is a huge "however"- it doesn't sound like the situation in the OP's case is really about stunning so much as being railroaded into a no-escape encounter with a highly superior enemy. Now, sometimes that happens, but I think the real issue here has more to do with the way the situation developed than the fact that the bad guy stunned him out of most of the fight. I suspect- and admittedly could be wrong- that if Arcane Springboard's group had sought out that fight, he would've been fine with how it played.

Don't buy this.

Adventurers are there to adventure, not to be green grocers.

It doesn't matter if the encounter comes to the PCs or the PCs come to the encounter.

It's called occupational hazard.

And being stun or unconscious-locked is an occupational hazard as well. If the players want to avoid this, they should work towards items / feats / powers that give saves and heal allies, and they should work towards improving their tactics (like the healer delaying until after the monster goes so that the unconscious PC on the ground at leasts gets one round of actions in before the monster attacks it again). Investments in teleport (which is super cheap in 4E compared to fly or invisible) can help as well.

If the players do not adjust their abilities and tactics to shore up their weaknesses, then quite frankly, they get what they deserve. Not that the DM should throw this type of stuff at them often, but if they don't learn from the lesson, it should and will happen again with a challenging DM.

But, DMs typically shouldn't hold back on their PCs (with the caveat of a new group of players), just because they might get stun or unconscious-locked. The game is easy enough (it's seriously not that tough for most encounters below n+4 if the splat books are allowed) without the DM going out of his way to make it easier.

 

[ArcaneSpringboard]

Even having weighed in on it being the, at-the-time, most strategic and challenging choice to pound on your character, I believe it is also the DMs job to make sure the entire adventure is fun. If you were targeted for stunlocks for three encounters in a row, or KO'd then I'd say that the DM is either targeting you for personal reasons, OR because you guys are presenting said sorcerer as either the highest damage dealer and thus an important target, or leaving your sorcerer out in the open and "easy to hit and kill".

I'd suggest discussing tactics with your group, as well as asking the DM if the reason you were targeted were tactical and what you can do better in future encounters.

Just to be clear, the stun-lock 3 encounters in a roll was a hypothetical situation, and did not occur in this situation. But what I did want to demonstrate is that by flatly stating that the DM should do whatever strategically is best, no exceptions, then logically, stunlocking 3 encounters in a roll would be acceptable as well, if it was strategically the smartest thing to do.

 

[ArcaneSpringboard]

HOWEVER- and this is a huge "however"- it doesn't sound like the situation in the OP's case is really about stunning so much as being railroaded into a no-escape encounter with a highly superior enemy. Now, sometimes that happens, but I think the real issue here has more to do with the way the situation developed than the fact that the bad guy stunned him out of most of the fight. I suspect- and admittedly could be wrong- that if Arcane Springboard's group had sought out that fight, he would've been fine with how it played.

Absolutely. If we as players knew that we were about to get into what might be the 'big encounter' against something tough, we would have taken an extended rest.

There certainly were a lot of extenuating circumstances. In fact, if I'd been rolling hit after hit after hit with encounters, a daily, at-wills...basically making myself a trully pain in the ass, I wouldn't have had a problem with what occured. It would have been payback and at least I had got in a ton of licks early on.

However, it was the unexpected unescapable combat encounter, compounded poor-dice luck early on, compounded by a general difficulty to hit because of the higher level of the Solo, compounded by the fact that the Solo would stick around even longer due to the healing, compounded by the fact that we were down a player (and our defender no less) without adjusting the encounter, compounded by the 'kick the sorcerer when he's down', compounded by the DM's expression of enthusiasm while he did so...that got under my skin.

 

[ArcaneSpringboard]

Just wanted the OP to consider that stun-lock and/or KO may not be the GM's responsibility to worry about.

That was the whole point of the thread actually. My DMing philosophy is that my job is to provide an enviornment to allow the players to have fun.

But that isn't necessarily what other people feel, and that's what I wanted to find out.

 

[ArcaneSpringboard]

Don't buy this.

Adventurers are there to adventure, not to be green grocers.

I'm not an adventurer. I just play one on Friday nights (well I did...now I'm back to trying to kill them ).

However, I _am_ a player playing a game to have fun. Frankly, I don't think anything else matters.

It doesn't matter if the encounter comes to the PCs or the PCs come to the encounter.

It's called occupational hazard.

And being stun or unconscious-locked is an occupational hazard as well. If the players want to avoid this, they should work towards items / feats / powers that give saves and heal allies, and they should work towards improving their tactics (like the healer delaying until after the monster goes so that the unconscious PC on the ground at leasts gets one round of actions in before the monster attacks it again). Investments in teleport (which is super cheap in 4E compared to fly or invisible) can help as well.

If the players do not adjust their abilities and tactics to shore up their weaknesses, then quite frankly, they get what they deserve. Not that the DM should throw this type of stuff at them often, but if they don't learn from the lesson, it should and will happen again with a challenging DM.

But, DMs typically shouldn't hold back on their PCs (with the caveat of a new group of players), just because they might get stun or unconscious-locked. The game is easy enough (it's seriously not that tough for most encounters below n+4 if the splat books are allowed) without the DM going out of his way to make it easier.

So, I can safely conclude that you would place yourself in the:

"No, the DM does not have any responsibility to make sure the players are having fun." column?

As I've stated before, I would have been much happier with the situation if my PC had flat out _died_ right away. At least I would have been saved the frustration for trying to find a solution to my problem and having my solutions knocked down immediately for no good reason.

Remember, my PC was _not_ the biggest threat...I'd hardly done anything the entire combat. I just happened to be the guy on the ground.

I would have also been spared my DM laughing while he played wack-a-mole with my sorcerer. I know that he was doing that because he was having lot of fun and he wasn't being malicious. However, at the time given the circumstances I was not having fun (and in fact, I'd probably put it as the least fun I've ever had playing D&D...and I've been playing a long time).

One of the things I love about 4e is that the DM can just let lose on the PCs as a group and not hold anything back.

However, there are aspects of the game, that can make it very un-fun at times for an individual.

I just happen to think the DM has to be aware of those situations and adjust on the fly. This is nothing different than not killing PCs constantly at 1st or 2nd level in earlier editions by fudging the dice.

It wouldn't have changed the combat encounter significantly if the Solo had attacked one of the other characters nearby. We all still survived, and it still died.

However, it would have been a lot more fun for me as a player.

 

[Tony Vargas]

A similar situation would be if you had a monster who had an At-Will power that could stun someone until the end of it's next turn. Let's say that tactically the smartest thing to do would be to make sure the PC's Wizard couldn't do anything. So the monster puts all of his attacks, every time, on the Wizard...potentially keeping him out of the combat for the entire encounter.

Or you have a couple of monsters that can do a Stunned, save ends. The first hits...then you wait until it wears off and then hit the same PC with the second one...
What do you guys think?

I think the second one is pretty reasonable. Monsters with (save ends) attacks should generally try to spread the pain, prefering to attack those not already under the effect. It's only sensible from the Monster PoV, and it keeps things interesting.

The Stunned and Dominated conditions, OTOH, do have the potential to be problematic. 4e tries to stay away from the save-or-die and other fun-killers that just screw one player so hard he might as well leave the table.

However, I think the team play aspect of 4e helps, here. If a monster did decide to focus fire on the Wizard, for instance, he'll be doing so with a marked penalty, maybe also dealing with a leader who buffs the Wizards defenses, while enduring pain from the strikers and mark-punishment from the defender. It may be mean to the Wizard, but the monster potentially pays a high price to do it, so you have a rationale for it to stop....

 

[Saeviomagy]

However, there are aspects of the game, that can make it very un-fun at times for an individual.

I just happen to think the DM has to be aware of those situations and adjust on the fly. This is nothing different than not killing PCs constantly at 1st or 2nd level in earlier editions by fudging the dice.

This particular scenario is closer to "not fudging the dice when group retreats to leave the wizard facing the orc barbarians alone... for the second time".

Your group made a big tactical blunder... twice. If you don't think that warrants some sort of swing in how the fight plays out, why are you even using a game with a combat system?

It wouldn't have changed the combat encounter significantly if the Solo had attacked one of the other characters nearby. We all still survived, and it still died.

However, it would have been a lot more fun for me as a player.

The thing is that in your case, the situation was not caused by the DM: it was caused by the players. Healing the guy lying in front of the monster immediately before it goes is a tactical blunder. Doing it twice is ridiculous.

Hopefully next time your group will learn the use of the delay and ready actions, preparing you for more complex combats in future.

As the player who was most grievously affected, I suggest you make it your mission to teach them.

 

[ArcaneSpringboard]

Argh. I've admitted that we made a tactical mistake.

However, that is still not addressing my original point.

I should never have mentioned what actually inspired the post, since people keep getting caught up in what happened in that situation (really, it's almost like there are two threads going on here), as opposed to addressing the general situation I am actually curious about.

Is it okay for a DM to repeatedly attack a PC with an effect that removes him from the combat? Or should he spread that attack around? Obviously I believe the latter. ;-)

I've now felt the impact of that situation from the player side now, and I didn't like it at all. If I felt the frustration I felt that night on more than one occasion, I'd be tempted to quit to be honest. I don't have enough free time to have a night spent just getting frustrated.

Now, the general consensus appears to be 'suck it up, princess'. Which is fine to some degree. We certainly learned about the utility of delaying actions (which this group hasn't done much at all...).

However, it amazes me that other DMs would hold the enjoyment of the experience that their players have in such low regard.

Don't get me wrong...I'm not looking for easy combats. I really don't have a great attachment to my characters, and in fact in an earlier session I did something truly boneheaded and died...which just gave me an opportunity to make a new character and play something different.

However, a difficult combat doesn't mean that you have to target a single PC with an effect like stunning, dominate, unconscious or such that would eliminate him from having any impact on the combat for a large portion of that combat. The fact that combats in 4e, especially at higher levels, can take 1-2 hours makes that fact more acute.

If rounds only lasted say, 5 minutes, this wouldn't be an issue. But they don't...they're often lasting 15-20 minutes. Perhaps this is a design flaw in 4e...you should have effects that eliminate a characters turn, or you should have quick rounds...but not both.

 

[KarinsDad]

Is it okay for a DM to repeatedly attack a PC with an effect that removes him from the combat? Or should he spread that attack around? Obviously I believe the latter. ;-)

You seem to want everyone to agree with you. Personally, I do not. I think the DM should run the monsters as creatures that want to survive, not stupid creatures that want to die.

Your answer is: The players are not having fun if they are taken out of the encounter, hence, I should have the monsters help out the players in this area.

When you do so, you are encouraging your players to be lazy and haphazard in their decision making. They will not bother to try to come up with interesting and intelligent solutions to tactical problems because big brother DM is there to catch them in his safety net, all in the name of fun. All praise be its name. Amen.

I have played with many hundreds of players over the decades. The one thing that many of them want to do to have fun in combat is to shine. They want to roll a critical and do big damage. They want to save the party. Some of them are just happy when they hit.

But, a lot of them don't want the DM to hold their hand and protect them from themselves. Give them a clue or help them out a bit out of combat when they are stuck to move the game along? Sure.

Hold their hand and make sure they never lose an encounter or make sure that they are never incapacitated for more than a round or fudge dice or monster decision making in their favor? Not many. Some players might want that, but most want to solve their own problems in combat.

However, it amazes me that other DMs would hold the enjoyment of the experience that their players have in such low regard.

No, we are not doing that. We are advising you to help your players be better tactical players. A discussion after the game where the subject of delaying comes up will spark ideas within the minds of your players.

A discussion after the game where the subject of how much being unconscious sucks is counter-productive.

As DM, your job is to help facilitate fun. But fun comes in many flavors.

As a player, I have a lot of fun just hanging out and doing my job. But every once in a while, the chips are down and my allies are in trouble. That's when I have the most fun. I pull out some tactical combo and re-right the ship. This to me is fun. In your game, if I ended up being the dog food in front of the monster, I too would be frustrated. Not at the DM for playing the monster smart, but for playing a sorcerer too close to the monster.

Players learn from both good and bad experiences. Back in the 2E days, I was playing a Ranger. My Ranger and an ally were holding a 10 foot wide corridor against medium sized troll-like creatures. We had knockback house rules back in those days (similar to push) and my ally got knocked back 5 feet. I could have shifted back to reform the line, but didn't think to do so. So, the trolls shifted forward and instead of it being 2 on 2, it was suddenly 3 trolls against just my PC. He fell quickly with 3 creatures doing claw, claw, bite on him.

If the DM would have not done the smart move for the trolls, I would not have learned a valuable front line lesson that day. I appreciate the fact that the DM played the monsters intelligently because I learned something that has helped me in encounters to this day.

If he would have said "Well, this will probably kill the Ranger and then the player will not be having fun because he cannot play at all until he gets a new PC, I shouldn't do that" then I would not have learned that particular lesson as well.

That one lesson has helped in many different ways over the years. It doesn't just apply to front line fights. It's a lesson in controlling the squares around the PCs and the monsters, and applies to many aspects of an encounter.

You should have discussions about this one frustrating encounter, but the lessons and conclusions that you take away from it have should have nothing to do with the topic of how often the DM stun-locks or unconsciousness-locks a single PC. It should do with how the other players should act and react when the DM does it the very first round. That's the important lesson. It's one for the players, not one for the DM.

Your conclusion is that the DM should adjust his behavior. No, he did the right thing. The conclusion should be that in order for everyone to have fun and the party to function better as a whole, the PLAYERS should adjust their tactics when that happens.


The number one lesson here is: It is the job of the players to help out other PCs. It is the job of the DM to harm the other PCs. Shift responsibility here to the people at the table whose job it is to minimize other PCs from being taken out of the encounter. That's NOT the job of the DM. His job is not to help the PCs out in a fight. That's the job of the players.