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In any setting but star wars I could see trying to get to the bottom of a pit like that, but it was Star Wars. There are so many loving giant death pits with absolutely nothing at the bottom throughout the movies. E: the absolute best outcome that happens from jumping into a bottomless pit in star wars is slamming into some weird antennae at the bottom of Cloud City and hanging there in agony while your people come rescue you. Ravenfood fucked around with this message at 01:52 on Feb 25, 2024 |
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Feb 25, 2024 01:49
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Ravenfood posted:In any setting but star wars I could see trying to get to the bottom of a pit like that, but it was Star Wars. There are so many loving giant death pits with absolutely nothing at the bottom throughout the movies. I think the argument as a player is your TTRPG experience [of Star Wars] isn't necessarily reflective of the film experience. Ravenfood posted:E: the absolute best outcome that happens from jumping into a bottomless pit in star wars is slamming into some weird antennae at the bottom of Cloud City and hanging there in agony while your people come rescue you. NGL this sounds hilarious, but it has to happen that way every single time. "Where's Bob?" "Hanging from the antenna again." "Sigh, I'll get him."
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Feb 25, 2024 01:52
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Raenir Salazar posted:I think the argument as a player is your TTRPG experience [of Star Wars] isn't necessarily reflective of the film experience. In that, in the movies, the heroes know better than to dive down the eternal death-shaft? Absolutely.
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Feb 25, 2024 02:31
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I would try my best to make the campaign more interesting so that people don’t feel the need to jump to their characters death instead of advancing the plot.
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Feb 25, 2024 02:35
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El Fideo posted:In that, in the movies, the heroes know better than to dive down the eternal death-shaft? Absolutely. You say that but Luke, Palpatine, Maul, and Kylo Ren all fall down giant holes and survive.
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Feb 25, 2024 02:43
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Smh have you seen their stat sheet and feats It's ridiculous
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Feb 25, 2024 02:48
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theironjef posted:You say that but Luke, Palpatine, Maul, and Kylo Ren all fall down giant holes and survive. Sheev didn't survive his fall. 
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Feb 25, 2024 04:49
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Legit Businessman posted:Sheev didn't survive his fall. Man I wish but I saw those fuckin' things and now I gotta live in the world where they're real. If we're gonna pretend the sequels didn't happen, then Kylo also didn't survive his fall and I guess we should probably assume that Solo didn't happen so Maul only survived per a cartoon. I guess that also opens up the likelihood that Fett died in the Sarlacc. I mean realistically, setting aside the original argument (the lack of trust between players and DMs in these stories is wild, how much are DMs lying to people to get to that kind of level?), Star Wars death (for main good guys in an RPG context) seems like it should straight up be impossible unless the PC was choosing to for some kind of big narrative gain. Like the only person that dies without trading their death for big story power (assuming becoming a force ghost counts as that, which sure) is Han, and even he still gets to be a ... regular ghost or something. But yeah, what the gently caress is happening at these tables where PCs are just like "You are lying to me about that hole, I gotta jump in that hole." Who hurt these players and DMs? Aren't these people like at least socially friendly enough to sit at the same table?
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Feb 25, 2024 05:51
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I've never, even when I first did D&D at 12 years old, had an actual case of someone disbelieving what the GM is telling them out of character. Like, I can say "hey Sue, this is me, Leper, not the narrator in-game but the GM out of game, out of character, not fooling: your character knows that's a bad idea that will definitely 100% get them dead, and they are right, so you should only do this is you've decided you're done playing this character. And if that's the case, maybe we can find a more dramatic and meaningful end for your character than this very anticlimactic form of suicide?" Actually it's never even gotten that far, because I don't generally play with idiots who can't take a hint.
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Feb 25, 2024 06:00
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theironjef posted:Man I wish but I saw those fuckin' things and now I gotta live in the world where they're real. If we're gonna pretend the sequels didn't happen, then Kylo also didn't survive his fall and I guess we should probably assume that Solo didn't happen so Maul only survived per a cartoon. I guess that also opens up the likelihood that Fett died in the Sarlacc. Sheev died and was resurrected, no? Like when my character dies and the cleric raises dead, I don't spring up and say," thank God (of Night) I survived that dragon's breath." Unless I memory holed some significant plot outside of the sequels I thought the whole idea was that Sheev created a contingency if he died. I really don't remember Kylo falling down a hole and surviving. That's on me.
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Feb 25, 2024 06:03
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Legit Businessman posted:Sheev died and was resurrected, no? Like when my character dies and the cleric raises dead, I don't spring up and say," thank God (of Night) I survived that dragon's breath." Correct, he cast Clone before rolling into the final battle of Episode 6
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Feb 25, 2024 06:10
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Somehow, he returned. Also a good line to use if you can't figure out a new villain for your campaign.
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Feb 25, 2024 06:14
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Legit Businessman posted:Sheev died and was resurrected, no? Like when my character dies and the cleric raises dead, I don't spring up and say," thank God (of Night) I survived that dragon's breath." Eh, he's the same guy, so he survived. In a world where resurrection is real, I'd say the language isn't as precise as we might hope. Sheev hucks him down a big hole at the end of IX, and he survives to crawl back out, bring Rey back to life, and then die himself. At least as far as I remember, that movie still bothers me and i just saw Madame Web.
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Feb 25, 2024 06:19
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homeless snail posted:Somehow, he returned. Also a good line to use if you can't figure out a new villain for your campaign. If it's good enough for Hollywood, it's good enough for your kitchen table!
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Feb 25, 2024 06:26
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My friends insist on playing with no OOC DM interference outside of the occasional need for some rules lawyering because they want to live or die by whatever stakes they end up setting up for themselves, so I once lost a party to the weird bubble cave in white plume mountain. Despite repeatedly telling them the walls of the bubble were scaldingly hot to the touch and the water on the other side was very clearly boiling and under immense pressure, including visible signs of some holes in the skin already producing pressure-washer style streams of obviously scalding hot water to criss cross the path inside, they decided the best course of action was to have the barbarian slice open the bubble in some weird misguided attempt at befriending and freeing the giant crab boss instead of trying to fight it for the treasure it was guarding.
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Feb 25, 2024 14:00
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If I was GM'ing a game and a player asked to jump down a bottomless pit (or commit a similar violation of common sense) I would have asked them to make an Intelligence Check of DC 2. If they got a natural 1 or still otherwise wanted to go in, there's only so much I can do.
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Feb 25, 2024 14:07
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That's a good compromise for metagaming. I lost a character because we were walking along a tunnel, and there was a hole above us with 'weird noises' coming from it. Tonally, up to that point the campaign had been fairly light-hearted and easy going. Apparently I should have known that there was a mind-flayer and two intellect devourers up there, and was told I was the dumbass for investigating a passive check as we were exploring. The DM was probably lucky it was me who stuck my head up there, because if it had been the paladin who got instagibbed, there's no way in hell my sorceror or the other druid would have survived.
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Feb 25, 2024 14:22
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Honestly yeah if I ran into a "bottomless" pit in a star wars game I'd assume that was the exit to the trash compactor / next dungeon level.
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Feb 25, 2024 14:39
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theironjef posted:You say that but Luke, Palpatine, Maul, and Kylo Ren all fall down giant holes and survive. Luke is the only one of those who jumps into the pit, though, and it felt very much like a suicide that happens to work out. Palpatine and Maul fall in and seemingly die to get brought back much later. Same with Fett; for all three the visual language at the time is that they are dead. I'll be honest I can't remember when Kylo has a pit encounter.
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Feb 25, 2024 15:33
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I think Palpatine yeets him down a conveniently placed pit near the end of episode 9.
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Feb 25, 2024 16:05
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Indeed. I only saw it once but my recollection was he gets force blasted into a pit, though we might know he lands on a ledge in there maybe? But he's presumed dead until Rey wins, then he crawls out of the hole to bring her back to life and die himself.
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Feb 25, 2024 16:15
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theironjef posted:But yeah, what the gently caress is happening at these tables where PCs are just like "You are lying to me about that hole, I gotta jump in that hole." 
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Feb 25, 2024 17:20
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I usually tend to believe that any "bottomless pit" in D&D unless created by Magic is just so long dark pit that leads to the underdark, eventually. Catch up with the player later, they've fallen into a nice forest of mushrooms. If they're lucky.
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Feb 25, 2024 22:31
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I mean you also as a DM have the option to just turn your bottomless pit into a portal to another plane, or have there be a portable hole at the bottom that opens into a secret room, or some other thing. And your players can reasonably wonder if something like that is going on and want to investigate it, albeit hopefully with slightly more caution than just jumping in. There's also that scene in The Last Crusade when Indi figures out the "leap from the lion's head" is a leap of faith, and he takes it before figuring out there's a hidden bridge. If you've been putting puzzle encounters in front of your players for a while, they can reasonably think that this "bottomless pit" is another puzzle. But. If you establish that your OOC warnings aren't you, the DM, actively trying to trick or thwart your players, then they should believe you when you give OOC warnings and it's kinda on them if they insist on not doing that. You can also just not put bottomless pits or other insta-death things into your adventures? I guess it's hard to totally avoid them but make them slightly less mysterious and maybe players won't just like jump off ordinary 500' tall cliffs just to see what happens.
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Feb 26, 2024 19:59
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I think players should be allowed to do stupid things and suffer the consequences. I don't think DMs should go out of their way to protect them from their own foolishness. The world is not full of round-end scissors and safety pins. Doing something rash and dumb should hurt.
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Feb 26, 2024 20:06
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I like to have fun with my friends
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Feb 26, 2024 20:11
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Deteriorata posted:I think players should be allowed to do stupid things and suffer the consequences. I don't think DMs should go out of their way to protect them from their own foolishness. The world isn't full of bottomless pits either, though
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Feb 26, 2024 20:11
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Like if they are adamant about jumping down that pit I'll let them, but like I'm going to give them a "your character picks up that this is a bad idea"
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Feb 26, 2024 20:13
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Deteriorata posted:I think players should be allowed to do stupid things and suffer the consequences. I don't think DMs should go out of their way to protect them from their own foolishness. sure but I would also like to run and play this game, as a DM, and not watch my players walk themselves into an obvious derailment that will upset at least one person and ruin our collective night.
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Feb 26, 2024 20:27
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Sure jumping into bottomless pits is a bad idea 99% of the time but its worth it for that 1% chance there's a new magic grimoire down there.
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Feb 26, 2024 20:40
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After three minutes of free fall your character appears falling out of an identical hole in the ceiling. You can roll athletics to try to catch the edge as you fall past.
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Feb 26, 2024 20:42
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It's like the "this is not a place of honor" paradox - the more you emphasize that they shouldn't jump and will definitely die, the more strenuously you make them confirm that they really want to jump, the more they think you're bluffing and signposting that there's actually something really cool down there if they just don't back down
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Feb 26, 2024 20:49
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Ominous Jazz posted:I like to have fun with my friends
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Feb 26, 2024 20:54
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Deteriorata posted:I think players should be allowed to do stupid things and suffer the consequences. I don't think DMs should go out of their way to protect them from their own foolishness. I think there is a range of consequences that are less severe than "your character dies" (and, presumably, in a low enough leveled adventure that an immediate Resurrection isn't in the cards) that your players may be anticipating as likely outcomes of their choices. What we are really talking about here is a mismatch of player expectation and GM choices. The GM chose to put a "bottomless pit" there, or substitute in any other "instant death, no roll" thing; what was that choice for? If not to instantly kill a character, was it just supposed to be atmosphere, flavor? Maybe a place to instantly kill enemies by hucking them in? Interrogate that decision and then decide how you want that to interface with player choice. Because, and I said this already but I think it bears emphasis, it's OK to run a game where your players can make choices that get their characters killed, but they ought to be able to recognize when they're making that sort of choice. If they're being blindsided, they may feel very bad about that, and if they're being very weird about this situation in the game, then you as the GM are receiving contextual clues that there's an expectation mismatch that you should address as soon as possible. A lot of the bad things that mess up RPGs for people have expectation mismatches and communication failures at their base. What we're really saying is, talk to your players and set expectations so everyone's on the same page, about what could happen with a bottomless pit (or if they can expect to encounter enemies they have no hope of beating and should run away, or if there are save-or-die situations in the game, how available raise dead/ressurect/etc. spells are, whether or how PVP should ever happen, can/should players "be evil" and if so, how to reconcile that with this being a cooperative party-based adventure game, etc. etc.)
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Feb 26, 2024 20:58
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The player can't use ooc knowledge to justify a character's action. It's roleplaying, they have to play their character. A player can't accidentally seeing the DMs notes about the location of an invisible goblin and say 'Rufus shoots an arrow five squares in front of him'. Likewise a player can't say 'i step into the magma because I know it's an illusion even if my character doesn't'. Now if they've established their character is suicidal or regularly makes decisions that lead to certain death. Then yeah sure go for it. But it's certain death.
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Feb 26, 2024 21:05
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RPG players do have the meta knowledge that everything placed in the world had to be purposefully designed with the implicit function of them interacting with it somehow. Just "a big obvious bottomless pit" leaves a few questions. It's not a trap, it's just sitting there in plain sight. It's not a combat hazard. It in theory could just be set dressing, but it's such a huge weird attention-drawing thing to have. Bottomless pits show up in Star Wars all the time, but those are Chekov's Guns that tend to get someone falling down them at some point, they rarely just exist for ambiance. They're going to assume that if you went to the trouble of describing it, it must be important. Players tend to hyperfixate on irrelevant details sometimes, because they assume that any detail the GM went to the trouble of adding must have some larger utility, otherwise it's just poor editing. Annoyingly, this can go hand in hand with the tendency of completely overlooking important information, even when you think it's clearly signposted.
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Feb 26, 2024 21:08
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I think it's okay to sometimes just say, "no Frank. Your character does not do that. Let's move on."
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Feb 26, 2024 21:09
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If it doesn't light up when the player looks at it, it's not an interactable object.
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Feb 26, 2024 21:12
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Killing off characters with boring no-save death traps is a bottomless pit that DMs fall into. It’s a classic example of someone not understanding that just because a scenario is obvious to you, doesn’t mean that it’s obvious to someone with a different frame of reference. This is doubly true in a heroic fantasy game, where dying to mundane things like dysentery or poor electrical wiring isn’t part of the genre. As a DM, if you do have players throwing themselves at the scenery like that, it’s typically a sign that either you’re being too obscure in your descriptions, or there simply isn’t a strong enough narrative so they’re creating their own.
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Feb 26, 2024 21:38
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Kaal posted:As a DM, if you do have players throwing themselves at the scenery like that, it’s typically a sign that either you’re being too obscure in your descriptions, or there simply isn’t a strong enough narrative so they’re creating their own. Or maybe they are dumb.
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Feb 26, 2024 22:10
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