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Western Land, because then you can force everyone into cowboy hats and have mandatory hootenannies. Also the PCs might be run over by a train.
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Nov 11, 2015 05:20
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Wario's Battle Canyon.
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Nov 11, 2015 07:46
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Morpheus posted:We have actually played through all of Kingmaker, the campaign - something like that may come up, but currently this is a party of level 2 adventurers. Commanding cities is a little beyond their grasps at the moment (unless the module has some really low level stuff to start with). As for bases, though....hmm. Might not be a bad idea to set up some sort of HQ, though we're not too far in at the moment. As Homullus said, having a 'base' might be enticing to the players. Run a caravan, build an adventurer's inn, or perhaps setting up a parish for the soul-eating lord at the centre of the universe, all are good for building a sense of purpose and community 
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Nov 11, 2015 08:55
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Many of the games I've run have involved some sort of base or town the players control or are heavily involved with and shape as the game goes on. For a lot of players something like this is like crack, it's something to pour treasure into and avoids the cycle of just endlessly buying better equipment. They're also handy for being a place to stash players that can't make it to a session. "oh, they're back at the town working on important project Y". It can also be a big ol' ball and chain around them the moment they become emotionally invested. It's their home, it's their investment, so they're going to defend it and fuss over it. The player's base can be a huge source of plots and adventures. It's of course important not to make the entire game about base management (unless your pc's love that poo poo) and to not make them feel totally trapped dealing with the town. If the idea of base/town burning to the ground fills your players with a sense of finally being free to adventure, you're not implementing it right.
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Nov 11, 2015 09:36
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I'd recommend if you go the base route to also have NPCs available who can offer to handle stuff behind the scenes in the PCs' stead. This gives them a way to just give general orders and rules and a way for the GM to hint "Maybe you guys should minimize how much you try to micromanage this stuff?"
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Nov 11, 2015 20:07
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chitoryu12 posted:I'd recommend if you go the base route to also have NPCs available who can offer to handle stuff behind the scenes in the PCs' stead. This gives them a way to just give general orders and rules and a way for the GM to hint "Maybe you guys should minimize how much you try to micromanage this stuff?" It's also fun to hire capable NPCs and even defeated enemies, for the running of the base.
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Nov 11, 2015 20:08
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Give them a fantasy fulton recovery system to kidnap mooks.
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Nov 11, 2015 21:13
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Tiny accelerated development dragon eggs.
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Nov 11, 2015 21:21
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Baronjutter posted:Many of the games I've run have involved some sort of base or town the players control or are heavily involved with and shape as the game goes on. For a lot of players something like this is like crack, it's something to pour treasure into and avoids the cycle of just endlessly buying better equipment. They're also handy for being a place to stash players that can't make it to a session. "oh, they're back at the town working on important project Y". I just had this happen in my homebrew world where they saved the city from the BBEG's plans of destroying the giant-fuckoff-crystal that powered the city. The difficult part was they saved it by the Paladin being overcome with Divine Might and shotputting the crystal out of the city. Mayor says, "Thanks for saving the town but we need that crystal back and powering the city." They decide to work with local wizards, including one they've met who specializes in large scale lifting of things/people/cities. When I asked them what they wanted for a reward, they decided to improve the city and "correct" the collateral damage of their time their (Rebuild the library that they fought a fire elemental in, make the Mayor fund an Orphanage, etc.). It was pretty special that they wanted to help the city instead of being a bunch of item grabbing hussies. How can I help reward them for doing more than just "saving the city, getting laid and bouncing"? I was going to throw them a parade but I was hoping that you might have some better insight. Also they're in a world where elementals power old technology. They were conscripted by the (then unknown to be) BBEG to find a Wind Spirit to power a Gyrocopter. Many betrayals later, the Wind Spirit (Zep) gave them the finger and shot off, fickle and pissed at the party for letting him be captured. Now they want to try to get him back to power their reclaimed/refurbished Gyrocopter, except as a bad DM I've left the character undeveloped in his motivations or how the party can find them. I've thought of putting him in a "Damsel in Distress" trope (Caught in a Spiderweb or something), but that seems cliche. The other idea I had was a Wind Spirit related to Zep also comes to track him down because he must owe some sort of debt/is a prodical elemental wind prince and needs to prove his worth. Ideas?
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Nov 12, 2015 01:29
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It sounds like they need a tower where they can land that awesome gyrocopter. Or a piece of property where they can build a castle or tower or airfield. Of course, none of that stuff is cheap, they will need caretakers and personnel that they can trust. Their elemental also needs a break room for when he isn't on the clock.
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Nov 12, 2015 03:41
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based on all the suggestions i have triangulated the best points of each and have decided i will be making my party go through a round on goomba's greedy gala. i will be sure to let you all know how fast i get kicked out of the dm seat after this
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Nov 12, 2015 05:28
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I had some friends immediately agree that they wanted to play a D&D 5e game as a touring band, which seemed like an incredible idea to me. I wrote some simple optional rules for a musical setting called Mellifluous and am currently writing an adventure. Mellifluous Setting Guide This one has info the players will see, including the 'Musical' Fighting Style and the 'Harmonies' rule which lets bands have magical effects. Mellifluous Adventure This one has the adventure as I'm writing it. The adventure summary is the good stuff here, and the rest is a mess. What do you guys think of the Musical Fighting Style, Harmonies, and Performing In Concert (Ch. 1 on the adventure document). Does this seem fun?
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Nov 12, 2015 07:35
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My first campaign I ever played in was a travelling band game. It was 4e, so we just used our Powers and refluffed them as performance stuff during Band Battles. Having both a storm sorceror and wizard in the party lead to concerts having pretty great pyrotechnics and light(ning) shows. Shetland Firestorm 4 life
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Nov 12, 2015 08:36
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incidentally, the reason mario party is relevant in my d&d campaign is because the current main villain of the campaign is a crazy, bored billionaire with a flair for crazy death games and i figured that a good way to introduce that side of the character would be pitting the team against mario party
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Nov 12, 2015 14:54
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BashfulBanana posted:I had some friends immediately agree that they wanted to play a D&D 5e game as a touring band, which seemed like an incredible idea to me. I wrote some simple optional rules for a musical setting called Mellifluous and am currently writing an adventure. Looks better than vanilla 5e by a long shot.
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Nov 12, 2015 15:16
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As someone who appreciates good presentation, that is a nice document. My GM documents are usually as fancy as I can be bothered to use tabs and italics.
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Nov 12, 2015 15:52
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Thanks, I made a big homebrew doc for another setting and just reuse the template to easily make stuff look good enough. I have no idea how well this musical stuff is going to play, besides speculation. I've got a pretty good group though.
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Nov 13, 2015 01:03
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alcharagia posted:incidentally, the reason mario party is relevant in my d&d campaign is because the current main villain of the campaign is a crazy, bored billionaire with a flair for crazy death games and i figured that a good way to introduce that side of the character would be pitting the team against mario party Have you considered having a normal fight, but with breaks to send the party to the Minigame Dimension, wherein you put them on (I unno, a minute or two) of timer and force them to figure out an easy puzzle fast? AKA: Do Warioware
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Nov 13, 2015 01:29
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BashfulBanana posted:I had some friends immediately agree that they wanted to play a D&D 5e game as a touring band, which seemed like an incredible idea to me. I wrote some simple optional rules for a musical setting called Mellifluous and am currently writing an adventure. This is awesome, you are awesome.
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Nov 13, 2015 01:38
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AlphaDog posted:This is awesome, you are awesome. I can't emptyquote, so let me also say that the Musical Fighting Style is just great.
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Nov 13, 2015 01:42
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Neopie posted:Have you considered having a normal fight, but with breaks to send the party to the Minigame Dimension, wherein you put them on (I unno, a minute or two) of timer and force them to figure out an easy puzzle fast? AKA: Do Warioware No, but that's a fantastic idea and your contribution is appreciated for the next time the party runs into him.
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Nov 13, 2015 03:07
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I recently started running Legacy of Fire in Pathfinder for an inexperienced group aside from one player, and am getting back into tabletop after a long hiatus. I had a question about friendly NPC cohorts ahead of time. I am considering changing a couple of the friendly NPCs that can be found/convinced to help, partially to fit with the characters' personalities and what would be useful in a group, and partially because gosh darn it, making builds apart from Core Only is fun and good experience for when I eventually homebrew stuff. Party is Swashbuckler, Rogue, Druid, and Sorcerer. My thoughts are: Felliped is replaced by a Paladin of Sarenrae, with the Sacred Shield archetype so s/he can buff characters' defense and add a bit of fighting power; we only have light armor characters and an animal companion on the front lines. May or may not have differences with party alignment, who are mostly shades of neutral; seems like it could be interesting. Is balancing a fall-worthy ambition to prove him/herself because s/he is from commoners and not the clergy, with the desire to genuinely do good. Also because there's a lot of Sarenrae in the story, as well as that rear end in a top hat Rovagug. Oxvard is replaced by an orc Warpriest of Gorum who ties specifically into one of the PCs' backgrounds. He's a rebellious slave and is introduced as a rescue from a not-Sarlacc cause the gnoll slavers get sick of his poo poo. Leans a bit on the nastier side of Chaotic Neutral, will pretty much respond with "we should use force" if asked for advice, which is only sometimes a good idea, and is motivated by proving his devotion to his god through Glorious Battle. Does some front line stuff and party buffs. Haleen isn't tied to any PC backgrounds because my players are crazy and didn't pick that broken-rear end trait, but will still be in the Battle Market as a potentially friendly face. In the module she's more or less a swashbuckler build before the ACG, but since we have a swashbuckler in the party, that seems redundant. Since my thoughts with these NPCs are to provide a bit of extra damage, as well as healing and buffs so they don't hog too much of the spotlight, I was thinking either the Dervish Dancer (fits the setting flavor) or Arcane Duelist (party buff utility) archetype for the Bard. My concerns are this: 1. Are any of these characters potentially overshadowing the PCs in terms of power? Don't want to accidentally make the dreaded DMPC; to that effect I am considering building them with 15 point-buy instead of the PCs' 20 point-buy. I'm also usually content keep them in the background if around, mostly speaking if asked or if something is relevant to their interests; if I wanted their story to be told I'd write fanfiction. 2. What are the best ways to handle multiple friendly NPCs in an adventure who are capable of assisting the party? What are ways to contrive only having a cohort or two at most with the party? Ideally the PCs would take a shine to just one of them (or some rando I introduce for a split second and need to hastily build, cause players are like that) and it would solve itself, but in the event they could convince all three to help, stuff could really get steamrolled. 3. My thought for their actions in combat are either: I play their actions but the players roll the dice, or the players crowdsource the cohorts' actions. What approach has worked better in the past for you DMs? 4. Where the Leadership feat is concerned, I'm thinking of joining the legions of DMs who say "no," and the cohorts would be willing to join if the players treat them well and split loot. K9 Philosopher fucked around with this message at 03:48 on Nov 13, 2015 |
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Nov 13, 2015 03:43
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BashfulBanana posted:Thanks, I made a big homebrew doc for another setting and just reuse the template to easily make stuff look good enough. I have no idea how well this musical stuff is going to play, besides speculation. I've got a pretty good group though. As a pretty pro, if lazy, gm, that's fantastic. It's really cleverly thought through to work in play and you've not fallen into the trap of too much detail, the adventure is just brimming with hooks. Gj geezer, rport back on ho it goes or start an AAR thread please!
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Nov 13, 2015 19:34
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Good news! My players don't hate me for making them go through Mario Party! In fact they had fun. Only once though. edit: that said one of my players is super hyped for a prospective future game of chutes and ladders with the same villain Kinu Nishimura fucked around with this message at 04:37 on Nov 16, 2015 |
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Nov 16, 2015 04:28
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Can I get some quick advice for dealing with large tables that want to invite more players? I'll grant this is a great problem to have, but it's still an issue for playability. I have a session later tonight and am going to have to scramble to make it work. I'm running a 5th level Pathfinder campaign for six players. We are coming back together after having taken a "season" break when the previous plot concluded. The players have a mix of skill levels but everyone has been at the game since it began a few months ago. The new players are getting more comfortable with their characters but still need help, especially with the game's crunch such as level up options. My roommate asked if he could invite his girlfriend over to observe the session. She hadn't initially been interested in playing, but now may be. That's fine, I want to accommodate her, but at six players the table is already as busy as I'm really comfortable running, plus she has (to my knowledge) never played anything more complex than Catan before (though I don't know this for certain.) If she sticks with the campaign, I may be able to move one of the other players to my side of the screen as a co-GM, but for now I'm not sure how best to allow her to participate without throwing her into the deep end of nerd games. Any thoughts?
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Nov 16, 2015 20:08
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I remember when that happened in my group. She's one of my favourite people to play with now. Start her out as a co-GM, have her take control of a monster during fights so she can ease into the mechanics without having to get into character building right away? Making it clear that monsters are there to lose but who knows it might turn into a situation where the party adopts a critter.
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Nov 16, 2015 21:11
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^Bingo. Also 6 is loving huge, almost 2 groups huge.
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Nov 16, 2015 21:21
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My Lovely Horse posted:I remember when that happened in my group. She's one of my favourite people to play with now. I'm not intending to put the new girl in as co-GM. I have another player at my table that wants to do some GMing I'd be bringing over. Moriatti posted:^Bingo. Would you believe that the table was briefly 11?! I split that into two tables but they were mercifully short lived because I can't write that much content without being paid. I had intended to keep this table capped at 6 (I've had more people ask to join), but when my roommate told me his new girl wanted to come around I didn't really want to be that much of a sperglord and say no, the table's full.
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Nov 16, 2015 22:01
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Yeah co-DM was the wrong choice of words there, was more trying to build on that and introduce the "have her start with a monster" idea. It'd be co-DMing only in that she'd technically work in tandem with you.
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Nov 16, 2015 22:08
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My players are starting to learn how reversible death is, that war priests, can heal people within 24 hours, and resurrection rituals are cheap and can work up until a month. They're wondering why assassination and death is such a big deal. I'm at a loss to explain why it's a huge deal, besides it being kind of expensive, but in the books it's only 700 GP
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Nov 17, 2015 00:01
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Turtlicious posted:My players are starting to learn how reversible death is, that war priests, can heal people within 24 hours, and resurrection rituals are cheap and can work up until a month. They're wondering why assassination and death is such a big deal. I'm at a loss to explain why it's a huge deal, besides it being kind of expensive, but in the books it's only 700 GP It's a newly discovered thing and society is still trying to figure out how to handle the sudden revelation that death is cheap?
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Nov 17, 2015 00:03
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My players are starting to learn how reversible death is, that war priests, can heal people within 24 hours, and resurrection rituals are cheap and can work up until a month. They're wondering why assassination and death is such a big deal. I'm at a loss to explain why it's a huge deal, besides it being kind of expensive, but in the books it's only 700 GP e: Woops meant to post this in the 4e thread, but I'll leave it. e2 AND DOUBLE POST!
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Nov 17, 2015 00:04
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Raise dead cost 10x as much in previous editions. The recipient also permanently lost an experience level, or 2 con if they were 1st level. I'm not sure why they made it so cheap and easy in 5e. I also seem to remember some role playing effects, maybe just homebrew. Assuming you could find a priest and could drum up thousands of gp, the priest went through drawbacks too. Each raising drained a year from their own life expectancy. So you would have to convince the priest as well. It shouldn't be easy to bring someone back. Making it too easy is a bad thing. It takes the power away from dying. What are the stakes if anyone can be raised?
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Nov 17, 2015 00:40
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captain innocuous posted:Raise dead cost 10x as much in previous editions. The recipient also permanently lost an experience level, or 2 con if they were 1st level. Aside from the cost in gold (which I guess is fine) the other two drawbacks there are dumb and stupid, which was perhaps a factor. In 4e fluff (for what that's worth) the explanation was that while Raise Dead is THEORETICALLY easy given the game rules, people who know the spell are and it's also harder the more powerful and important someone is, so while a poo poo eating peasant has the issue that he couldn't find a cleric and couldn't afford it if he did Emperor Gilgamesh Ultraking is such a legendary and awesome dude that all the magic in the world aint gonna bring him back. I mean, at real high levels various Epic Destinies can bring themselves back to life, but yeah for those dudes death isn't really a major hurdle anymore, that's the idea. 13th Age has a neat way of handling this, in that an individual can only cast it once per level and only something like 5 times reliably in their entire life and it gets harder and more taxing each time, starting off super easy and eventually just killing the caster permanently with no guarantee of the spell working. Rohan Kishibe fucked around with this message at 01:54 on Nov 17, 2015 |
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Nov 17, 2015 01:51
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Add in a spell component: a willing donor. Bringing back the target will off the donor, thus reinstating scarcity.
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Nov 17, 2015 02:06
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Prison Warden posted:Aside from the cost in gold (which I guess is fine) the other two drawbacks there are dumb and stupid, which was perhaps a factor. Just make your world assuming that for the rich, coming back to life is possible, and an average assassination is less an attempt at murder and more a friendly warning among rivals or enemies. People who actually want you dead will pay extra for the permakill via body destruction, body abduction, or soul prison. There's at least one series of novels that has done exactly this. In fact, have the PCs offered jobs killing people who are intended to be only slightly inconvenienced by the murder. And then, if they go the whole way, unasked for and unpaid for, have assassins show up bitching about scabs, and their client freaking out about how they didn't intend for the target to get permakilled. Basically what I'm saying is death being an inconvenience is just as great a story opportunity as the opposite. NinjaDebugger fucked around with this message at 02:20 on Nov 17, 2015 |
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Nov 17, 2015 02:17
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Eclipse Phase, where death is similarly cheap and easy to recover from for the rich and PCs (Who often are also the rich), touches on this. Assassination is usually more about sending a message or just getting someone out of your hair for a little while, as others have mentioned. Actually going the distance and making someone Really Dead is one of the worst crimes you can commit in many polities, although culturally that's because only like 10% of Earth's population survived their apocalypse and there's some notion that human life is now more precious than it was previously. Another option is one that one of my DMs used to remove resurrection from the game entirely: The gods really don't like it, and anyone resurrected comes back wrong. That might be a bit extreme in your case.
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Nov 17, 2015 02:50
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PCs are special and therefore Raise Dead only works on them and a select few others. Your average king, pope, etc. just doesn't qualify.
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Nov 17, 2015 04:15
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PCs are special and therefore only they can Raise Dead. And some unpopular king has just heard of that.
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Nov 17, 2015 06:20
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The other option is to have the life of the king (or similar important people) tied somehow to major consequences - i.e. load-bearing boss, basically. You assassinate the king and the magical protections stopping the elves from flooding into the kingdom suddenly vanish. Or whatever.
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Nov 17, 2015 18:31
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