If your players are doing things that you as a DM don't know how to deal with except to excute a boring consequence, then instead of deliberately allowing or causing your game to become boring talk to the players.
A player jumping off a cliff, or the like, isn't expecting not to get hurt. He's deliberately jerking the DM around.
A player who decides to commit a crime isn't necessarily jerking the DM around, and doesn't necessarily expect the game to get boring as a result, any more than they'd expect the game to get boring as a result of storming a wizard's tower. Why should the game get boring?
The game gets boring when a DM is trying to teach the lesson: play the way the DM wants or have a boring game. Why not make an effort to avert boredom and try to teach (and learn) the lesson: the DM wants the players to have an interesting time, no matter what?
[N]o difference is less easily overcome than the difference of opinion about semi-abstract questions. - L. Tolstoy
From your Q'barra description of how it works, it sounds like somebody eventually has to concede to the rest of the group. And knowing human nature, it's probably almost always the same person that gets stuck not getting their way. Which isn't fair. Having an impartial (YES, centauri, such people exist) DM helps insure a checks and balance against that happening.
I actually ran this game.
Knowing possible failure of the skill checks had no bearing on what would happen. This scene was actually more collaborative than Iserith let on. We also had player input from the other split scene players adding complications to the negotiations with the lizardfolk. This allowed for interesting results with very little planning. The player who wanted to fail just wanted to fight a dragon, we noted that and like Iserith said... there's that exact Black dragon to fight 2 sessions later.
Iserith's character is a drunk and his alcoholic breath sickened the lizardfolk. Hilarity ensued (if angry lizardfolk are funny, which in my opinion they are.) This was a complication added by another player. Everyone thought it was cool.
Good things happen if everyone says yes and adds to the scene. It's reminds me of Fiasco in that sense.
I'm not entirely knocking collaboration, just to be clear. It has its place and has merits.
What do you mean by you 'ran the game'? You mean you were DM. And a fair an impartial one, yes?
A rogue with a bowl of slop can be a controller.
WIZARD PC: Can I substitute Celestial Roc Guano for my fireball spells? DM: Awesome. Yes.
If your players are doing things that you as a DM don't know how to deal with except to excute a boring consequence, then instead of deliberately allowing or causing your game to become boring talk to the players.
A player jumping off a cliff, or the like, isn't expecting not to get hurt. He's deliberately jerking the DM around.
A player who decides to commit a crime isn't necessarily jerking the DM around, and doesn't necessarily expect the game to get boring as a result, any more than they'd expect the game to get boring as a result of storming a wizard's tower. Why should the game get boring?
The game gets boring when a DM is trying to teach the lesson: play the way the DM wants or have a boring game. Why not make an effort to avert boredom and try to teach (and learn) the lesson: the DM wants the players to have an interesting time, no matter what?
Actually, the cliff jumpers ARE often merely jerking around. Usually first-time players getting a feel of what is going to happen if their character does dumb stuff. To see if it matters if they do dumb stuff or not. Trying to see if the DM is going to baby them or not. So don't baby them. Let them jump. And die. They know their choices have meaning. Just watch... their next character is going to be epic.
Sometimes they do unexpected things hoping for a big payoff... usually involving some mathematical computations in their head based on average damage for a fall of a certain height subtracted from current hit points and possible statistics of any monsters at the bottom of the pit. If they can get to the bottom of the cliff first, they can hog the glory and get the best treasure so they become more powerful so they can hog the glory so they can get the best treasure so they become more powerful so they can hog the glory so they can get the best treasure so they become more powerful so they can hog the glory so they can get the best treasure. Break the cycle. The other players want their characters to be cool, too. They deserve as much fun as the min/max player.
What we're saying is that attempts to people-please actually keeps the players (many players, anyway) from having fun.
A rogue with a bowl of slop can be a controller.
WIZARD PC: Can I substitute Celestial Roc Guano for my fireball spells? DM: Awesome. Yes.
Actually, the cliff jumpers ARE often merely jerking around. Usually first-time players getting a feel of what is going to happen if their character does dumb stuff. To see if it matters if they do dumb stuff or not. Trying to see if the DM is going to baby them or not. So don't baby them. Let them jump. And die. They know their choices have meaning. Just watch... their next character is going to be epic.
It's not babying to talk to them and understand what they're after with that action.
Break the cycle. The other players want their characters to be cool, too. They deserve as much fun as the min/max player.
What do you think a DM should do there? Kill the character, regardless of the math the character did? That's not going to go well. This is another example of finding out what the player wants and giving it to them in a way that keeps the game fun for them and everyone else. Don't block or punish a player just to make another player feel better. Make players feel better by accepting and adding on to their ideas.
Honestly, I think Centauri has done pretty well at putting a solution out there. If you try, for awhile, to say "yes, and", your group might gel pretty well, enough that you don't necessarily need to say yes to everything. For instance, in our group, we'll frequently say "Let's leave that as a backup plan". Which you can only do if you say a better primary plan. Or, we'll say "I like the part of the plan where you said X - lets do more of that. "
So, in that case, we might have latched on to the deception part, and the fact that other groups WERE after the artifact to cook up a fake artifact as honeypot. That allows us to attack the other group, allows us to show the gnome how much we are better than the other groups morally speaking, and lets him see the danger of not working with someone. With ransacking the office "as a backup plan". And, unspoken, is that if we find another group, we'll be able to fight, which will stop the talking and start the fighting -- making the dragonborn happy.
Now, admittedly, our DM is GREAT, and is willing to listen to 'reasonable' suggestions, even when they are more 'hollywood' than realistic. I mean, sure, setting up a honeypot will involve some rolls, and a little straining of suspension of disbelief that another group Just Happens To Be In Town Now, and if your game is the kind of game where accidents don't happen, and kismet never helps the players, then you'll need another solution. But, hopefully your solution will build on the dragonborns interest in deception, and interest in violence.
You mentioned that " our group could work better together, ". Hopefully you'll work together to learn how to satisfy everyone. How you get there is up to you, but Centauri seems to be suggesting an easy way to start that process.
Actually, the cliff jumpers ARE often merely jerking around. Usually first-time players getting a feel of what is going to happen if their character does dumb stuff. To see if it matters if they do dumb stuff or not. Trying to see if the DM is going to baby them or not. So don't baby them. Let them jump. And die. They know their choices have meaning. Just watch... their next character is going to be epic.
It's not babying to talk to them and understand what they're after with that action.
Break the cycle. The other players want their characters to be cool, too. They deserve as much fun as the min/max player.
What do you think a DM should do there? Kill the character, regardless of the math the character did? That's not going to go well. This is another example of finding out what the player wants and giving it to them in a way that keeps the game fun for them and everyone else. Don't block or punish a player just to make another player feel better. Make players feel better by accepting and adding on to their ideas.
What we're saying is that attempts to people-please actually keeps the players (many players, anyway) from having fun.
Not if it's done in a trustworthy, open way.
Don't block or punish a player just to make another player feel better. Make players feel better by accepting and adding on to their ideas.
More irony. Blocking everyone's reasonable expectations of what should happen in a game so that one fool can feel better is the alternative. My players, heck most people I've met are smarter than that, and I am a cynic. And somewhat resent having to dumb it down. If we're not talking about a child or specially challenged person, there's no need to lower expectations just to please them. It isn't doing them a service to be a people pleaser.
What we're saying is that attempts to people-please actually keeps the players (many players, anyway) from having fun.
Not if it's done in a trustworthy, open way.
But that's the nature of people-pleasing. And why people don't like people-pleasers. It's hard to respect someone who only gives lip-service to self-respect. People spend a lot of money on therapy and self-help to get away from what you're advocating here. And people pleasers don't actually help the people they are trying to please... because they're co-dependent.
A rogue with a bowl of slop can be a controller.
WIZARD PC: Can I substitute Celestial Roc Guano for my fireball spells? DM: Awesome. Yes.
You are honestly saying that a DM attempting to ensure his players have fun is a sign of co-dependance and in need of therapy? Seriously?
On another note, Centauri and Iserith, you've convinced me; so much so that in reference to Sir_Joseph's thread I linked, I owe him an apology.
Sir_Joseph, I feel that your DM could have done a much better job of making the Buddha statue encounter much more interesting, instead of going with what he felt were the logical consequences. I didn't feel that way previously, and for that I am sorry that I ranged myself against you in that thread.
If it was the player intent for the character to fail, then you would be correct. However as most players don't want their characters to fail, the two are interrelated.
But doesn't the fact that "most" (?) players don't want their characters to fail come from being conditioned to think that the DM is going to make any character failure boring?
No, because there is a difference between a tragedy and a failure. D&D really doesn't lend itself to this kind of play, since it is ussually so combat oriented, unless you are playing a very social oriented game, remember that most characters are adventurers and so have adventurer's goals. In general trying to fail is counter-productive to the player's goals and since the loss of a group member changes the balance of a group it can even be catestrophic to the rest of the group.
That aside, working for failure requires it to fit the setting, it can be done, D&D games limits the effectiveness of this sort of play, so it really requires a request form the player in most cases. To this end I mostly deal with things like players who want to bring in a new character and are looking for an opportunity to retire the old one via heroic death in glorious battle, or dramatic allignment changes (a paladin that falls from grace to sell her soul to become a blackguard)
But back tot he difference between tragedy and failure. If a player seeks failure by doing something stupid, a bad choice, say a corridor of traps, called the guntlet (the bones of previous vitims scattered about) and he decides to just run through, well he is going to get what he wanted, to test his blind luck against impossible odds, likely resulting in a very nasty, horrible death. Thatès not tradegy, that is just a pointless death because of a stupid choice. Why reward that.
Tragedy is interesting, not because of the final act of failing or death, but because of the path leading to that point and the motivation behind it, or conversely, what happens after the tradegy, how the character overcomes it. But the tragedy itself is just a bad thing. What was the end of Romeo and Juliet, senseless, pointless death, the end of Hamlet, senseless, pointless death.
The actual failure itself is rarely as interesting as the journey to reach that point, so again, it is largely the player that makes it interesting.
Honestly, I think Centauri has done pretty well at putting a solution out there. If you try, for awhile, to say "yes, and", your group might gel pretty well, enough that you don't necessarily need to say yes to everything. For instance, in our group, we'll frequently say "Let's leave that as a backup plan". Which you can only do if you say a better primary plan. Or, we'll say "I like the part of the plan where you said X - lets do more of that. "
So, in that case, we might have latched on to the deception part, and the fact that other groups WERE after the artifact to cook up a fake artifact as honeypot. That allows us to attack the other group, allows us to show the gnome how much we are better than the other groups morally speaking, and lets him see the danger of not working with someone. With ransacking the office "as a backup plan". And, unspoken, is that if we find another group, we'll be able to fight, which will stop the talking and start the fighting -- making the dragonborn happy.
Now, admittedly, our DM is GREAT, and is willing to listen to 'reasonable' suggestions, even when they are more 'hollywood' than realistic. I mean, sure, setting up a honeypot will involve some rolls, and a little straining of suspension of disbelief that another group Just Happens To Be In Town Now, and if your game is the kind of game where accidents don't happen, and kismet never helps the players, then you'll need another solution. But, hopefully your solution will build on the dragonborns interest in deception, and interest in violence.
You mentioned that " our group could work better together, ". Hopefully you'll work together to learn how to satisfy everyone. How you get there is up to you, but Centauri seems to be suggesting an easy way to start that process.
Good stuff.
As far as the straining of suspension of disbelief, this wouldn't be an issue at a table like ours. If you don't prescribe to the notion that the DM controls everything other than PCs, then it's perfectly valid for the players to establish that there is, in fact, another group in town. This would stimulate a discussion about who that group is, what they're doing there, what their relationship is to the PCs (or a particular PC), who makes up that group, etc. That collaboration then exists in the world in whatever form it takes by the time the questions are answered. This works to make engaged players, a richer setting, new NPCs with which to interact (with ties to the PCs if the DM delved into it with questioning), and further character development. Plus, everyone's happy that their plan is moving forward, each with their own ideas included.
No amount of tips, tricks, or gimmicks will ever be better than simply talking directly to your fellow players to resolve your issues. Reduce DM Prep & Increase Player Engagement:Don't Prep the Plot | Structure First, Story Last | Collaborative Roleplay | "Yes, and..." | Prep Tips Games I'm Running on Roll20: Island of the Frog | Vanguard of Dis | Star*Juice | Tesseract | The Crucible | Fimbulvetr | The Delve | Draj, City of the Moon Follow me on Twitter:@is3rith
You are honestly saying that a DM attempting to ensure his players have fun is a sign of co-dependance and in need of therapy? Seriously?
On another note, Centauri and Iserith, you've convinced me; so much so that in reference to Sir_Joseph's thread I linked, I owe him an apology.
Sir_Joseph, I feel that your DM could have done a much better job of making the Buddha statue encounter much more interesting, instead of going with what he felt were the logical consequences. I didn't feel that way previously, and for that I am sorry that I ranged myself against you in that thread.
Got me. A little over the top. I'll try to tone down the rhetoric.
Although I understand that the attempt is to ensure players are having fun, I still think that rewarding bad ideas the same way as you reward good ones and giving them equal chances of success and failure doesn't have the intended effect. It may not be a punishment to the player who comes up with a good idea, but it sure feels like one.
Feels sort of like a salesperson working on commission giving 250% to attain a near-impossible goal and upon achieving it, being asked to share a Salesperson of the Month award -and split the monetary bonus- with another salesperson that didn't even make their minimum sales quota might feel. Maybe not QUITE that bad, but you get the idea.
-- My writing wasn't very clear on the Buddha encounter. I was a little unclear as to what exactly went wrong, but I knew something was wrong. Most of the folks on the forum thought it was the character death that was bothersome. I was more concerned with the statue. He seriously put a choke-hold on the statue. Seriously.
A rogue with a bowl of slop can be a controller.
WIZARD PC: Can I substitute Celestial Roc Guano for my fireball spells? DM: Awesome. Yes.
