The GM Advice thread: Killing your players quickly

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Traditional Games > The GM Advice thread: Killing your players quickly

thetoughestbean: Apr 27, 2013; Keep On Shroomin

My Lovely Horse posted:

My group has hangups about character death. Every time we sit down and have a session zero-type talk we all agree it should be dangerous out there and death should be on the table, then every time a character dies we hem and haw over it and feel bad and eventually give them "one more pass". I feel like we're locked into it now.

Our first character death was when one character got hit by a confused ally. The player spent a story resource (13th Age icon relationship) to avoid death, we spun it into a character thing, and everyone was happy. Second time, same character, this time an unfortunate hit from an enemy. This was towards the end of a session full of badly balanced fights from a published adventure, we were all frustrated already, and the player flat out said he wasn't about to give up his character for bullshit like that. I honestly couldn't have agreed more (and checking later, that enemy shouldn't even have been in that fight, but I blindly trusted the numbers) so I gave him that one as a freebie.

So now here's character death #3 on the table, for a different player. And, well. It was a fight against named and important enemies, in a dramatic situation, the group had taken a huge gamble on even entering the fight and it actually paid off quite spectacularly, and it was the final minutes of the session. It was pretty much the textbook example of when, if you're serious about allowing character death, you can reasonably do it. And we still all went "eeeeh..."

In the heat of the moment, and wanting to wrap up, we went with something like "your patron revives you and you pretty much owe him your life, and he's the type that collects", which is a fine enough development, and the character is hilarious and I love the way my player plays her. But still, the more I think about it the more I feel like if we do it this way now, I'm selling the idea of character death, the danger of the adventure and the price of a resurrection all way short.

My group says death is only on the line if it�s a dramatic enough circumstance, and, frankly it sounds like that your group would prefer it that way too.

As for the last death, having the character is something to a powerful entity is a good enough alternative. If you really want resurrection to mean something, remind your players that in 13th Age�s rules, a character can only be revived 3 times before all death is final

Really, it sounds like you just need to sit down with your group again and redefine when you want death to be on the table, otherwise it sounds like it�s going pretty well

# ? Oct 14, 2019 13:40

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# ? Jun 12, 2024 15:14

Whybird: Aug 2, 2009; Phaiston have long avoided the tightly competetive defence sector, but the IRDA Act 2052 has given us the freedom we need to bring out something really special.

https://team-robostar.itch.io/robostar; Nap Ghost

My Lovely Horse posted:

My group has hangups about character death. Every time we sit down and have a session zero-type talk we all agree it should be dangerous out there and death should be on the table, then every time a character dies we hem and haw over it and feel bad and eventually give them "one more pass". I feel like we're locked into it now.

Our first character death was when one character got hit by a confused ally. The player spent a story resource (13th Age icon relationship) to avoid death, we spun it into a character thing, and everyone was happy. Second time, same character, this time an unfortunate hit from an enemy. This was towards the end of a session full of badly balanced fights from a published adventure, we were all frustrated already, and the player flat out said he wasn't about to give up his character for bullshit like that. I honestly couldn't have agreed more (and checking later, that enemy shouldn't even have been in that fight, but I blindly trusted the numbers) so I gave him that one as a freebie.

So now here's character death #3 on the table, for a different player. And, well. It was a fight against named and important enemies, in a dramatic situation, the group had taken a huge gamble on even entering the fight and it actually paid off quite spectacularly, and it was the final minutes of the session. It was pretty much the textbook example of when, if you're serious about allowing character death, you can reasonably do it. And we still all went "eeeeh..."

In the heat of the moment, and wanting to wrap up, we went with something like "your patron revives you and you pretty much owe him your life, and he's the type that collects", which is a fine enough development, and the character is hilarious and I love the way my player plays her. But still, the more I think about it the more I feel like if we do it this way now, I'm selling the idea of character death, the danger of the adventure and the price of a resurrection all way short.

I would suggest setting things up so that character death is always a choice. Run encounters with the stakes as something other than character death: it's not "do you defeat the wolves or get eaten by them?" but "do you defeat the wolves before or after they gnaw poor Timmy to death?" Then when it comes down to it, allow players to sacrifice their character in the interest of saving poor Timmy at the point the dice say he should be wolf food.

# ? Oct 14, 2019 13:42

SalmanBashi: Apr 4, 2007

Whybird posted:

I would suggest setting things up so that character death is always a choice. Run encounters with the stakes as something other than character death: it's not "do you defeat the wolves or get eaten by them?" but "do you defeat the wolves before or after they gnaw poor Timmy to death?" Then when it comes down to it, allow players to sacrifice their character in the interest of saving poor Timmy at the point the dice say he should be wolf food.

If you are using 13th Age then the Fleeing rules help to accomplish this as well on a broader scale. On any character's turn they can propose the group flee, and if all players agree then they somehow manage to extract themselves from whatever situation they're in and get to a place of safety. The consequence is a "campaign loss", examples being the ritual they were trying to stop fires, the captive they were rescuing gets killed etc. It firmly places the "is this important enough for you to risk death?" question in the court of the players. It might not work so well if you're using a system which can have a player just insta drop dead, but 13th age uses death saving throw mechanics after hitting 0hp so it works well there.

Of course it usually ends up in situations like a recent 5E session I had where 3/4 of the players were down, one dead, and they had firmly decided (even as the dead player was making their saving throws) death or killing the swine of a boss were their only acceptable outcomes. But because they'd made the group decision to specifically not Flee, they were all 100% happy with death or tpk being an outcome. They won, and shenanigans continue, but I feel it's a useful mechanic.

# ? Oct 14, 2019 16:37

Leraika: Jun 14, 2015; Luckily, I *did* save your old avatar. Fucked around and found out indeed.

This is why Tenra Bansho Zero continues to have the best death mechanics in tabletopdom; you choose when death's on the table and nothing's going to kill you until you make that choice (and making that choice gives you hefty bonuses, so it's literally 'do I want to risk going out in a blaze of glory to see X done?').

More games should consider using death as a mechanic in that way; even if just because it'd eliminate rusty dagger shanktown.

# ? Oct 14, 2019 16:51

Elderbean: Jun 10, 2013

I like how Fate handles "death". It's a narrative game designed to emulate movie and TV logic so your characters generally can't die, when they lose they get "taken out" instead. Every conflict is supposed to have a point, the PCs want something, someone else has it and won't back down. If a PC gets taken out, then they don't get what they want out of the conflict because they lost. They're not dead, but losing has consequences. The bad guy gets away, the hostage dies, the bombs goes off, the council decides to believe the corrupt senator, etc.

Fate is by nature a very pulpy game because of this, but if you have the kind of players who engage with the story it's fun watching what would normally be a TPK scenario become a life changing event for the PCs instead of ending their stories completely. It also gives the GM freedom to throw more dramatic/dynamic conflicts at the party.

Elderbean fucked around with this message at 17:10 on Oct 14, 2019

# ? Oct 14, 2019 17:03

My Lovely Horse: Aug 21, 2010

thetoughestbean posted:

My group says death is only on the line if it�s a dramatic enough circumstance, and, frankly it sounds like that your group would prefer it that way too.

As for the last death, having the character is something to a powerful entity is a good enough alternative. If you really want resurrection to mean something, remind your players that in 13th Age�s rules, a character can only be revived 3 times before all death is final

I agree but these circumstances were about as dramatic as it gets short of being a campaign ending boss fight. They wanted to rid themselves of two powerful enemies at once, allied themselves with one group to soften up the other, then backstabbed them mid-battle. All enemies were established characters and big players in the world. 100% the group's idea to play it this way, I should add.

Do you have a quote on the resurrection limit? All I see in the spell is how it can gently caress up the caster. Not that I need to stick with the spell's exact mechanics, I know.

SalmanBashi posted:

If you are using 13th Age then the Fleeing rules help to accomplish this as well on a broader scale. On any character's turn they can propose the group flee, and if all players agree then they somehow manage to extract themselves from whatever situation they're in and get to a place of safety. The consequence is a "campaign loss", examples being the ritual they were trying to stop fires, the captive they were rescuing gets killed etc. It firmly places the "is this important enough for you to risk death?" question in the court of the players. It might not work so well if you're using a system which can have a player just insta drop dead, but 13th age uses death saving throw mechanics after hitting 0hp so it works well there.

Yeah, and I love the fleeing mechanic, cause as you say, it takes care of having stakes right away. But in this particular situation, there was a crit from an enemy 5 levels higher (I did say they took a huge gamble) on the wizard. No chance at all, straight from full HP to way below staggered.

Which, yes, brings up the question of whether that should be allowed. But it is and we'd all at least implicitly agreed it would be. Plus the wizard killed one of the other +5-level enemies with a crit of her own the very turn before. Seems only fair.

Funny thing is, she would have survived if she'd picked more HP as an incremental advance. Or selected Shield. Or in fact picked up the magic item that would have allowed her to cast Shield the session before.

My Lovely Horse fucked around with this message at 17:16 on Oct 14, 2019

# ? Oct 14, 2019 17:09

Ignite Memories: Feb 27, 2005

Leraika posted:

This is why Tenra Bansho Zero continues to have the best death mechanics in tabletopdom; you choose when death's on the table and nothing's going to kill you until you make that choice (and making that choice gives you hefty bonuses, so it's literally 'do I want to risk going out in a blaze of glory to see X done?').

More games should consider using death as a mechanic in that way; even if just because it'd eliminate rusty dagger shanktown.

I've heard of this and it sounds rad as hell. You've gotta flip the sicko mode switch yourself if you want things to get sicko

# ? Oct 14, 2019 17:11

EthanSteele: Nov 18, 2007; I can hear you

My Lovely Horse posted:

My group has hangups about character death. Every time we sit down and have a session zero-type talk we all agree it should be dangerous out there and death should be on the table, then every time a character dies we hem and haw over it and feel bad and eventually give them "one more pass". I feel like we're locked into it now.

Just talk to the group and say that it seems like you all aren't actually ok with characters dying unless you want them to despite saying that you want it to be dangerous and deadly and that's fine if true.

Definitely don't have every combat be kill or be killed which is what 99% of trpg encounters end up being, have enemies run away or be ones that capture people for ransom if they bop the party, turns out a lot of people don't want a murder rap. There can still be stakes when death isn't on the table, they're just different.

My Lovely Horse posted:

Which, yes, brings up the question of whether that should be allowed. But it is and we'd all at least implicitly agreed it would be. Plus the wizard killed one of the other +5-level enemies with a crit of her own the very turn before. Seems only fair.

The situation can definitely be read as they took a big risk to take on powerful enemies and the risk was death and then they didn't like that the risk was real.

But here's the thing, it isn't fair, player crits and enemy crits are not worth the same amount. NPCs have infinite lives because there are 100 enemies to fight and only have to get lucky once to kill a player character. Players, by default, do not have infinite lives and have to get lucky several hundred times. Kevin Crawford games tend to not have crits for this very reason, an enemy rolling a 20 can kill a campaign, while a player rolling a 20 just ends the current encounter.

# ? Oct 14, 2019 17:26

My Lovely Horse: Aug 21, 2010

There is also the matter that if the wizard's patron can be so easily persuaded to revive her there's really no reason the two dead enemies' patron wouldn't do the same for them, they're much more crucial to their operations as well. But that I think would feel even cheaper and take all the impact from future encounters. "Why bother defeating them, they're just gonna get rezzed." I guess as long as we're working stuff out about death in the campaign we should address that too.

e: yah I'm with the imbalance stuff and all, I just feel strongly like when I one day look back on this game this is gonna be the one time where I'll regret not being the hardass DM, for unclear reasons even

I guess most of all we shouldn't have wrapped things up in a hurry but instead left things on the battlefield with a dead wizard to figure things out until the next time.

My Lovely Horse fucked around with this message at 17:37 on Oct 14, 2019

# ? Oct 14, 2019 17:29

Elderbean: Jun 10, 2013

I'll echo what Whybird said, give fights stakes outside of death and make them more personal. Think about TV shows and how they handle drama. Gritty shows like GoT often kill characters off somewhat unceremoniously but most don't. When the main characters fail, they usually don't die, but the people who were relying on them suffer.

# ? Oct 14, 2019 17:45

thetoughestbean: Apr 27, 2013; Keep On Shroomin

My Lovely Horse posted:

Do you have a quote on the resurrection limit? All I see in the spell is how it can gently caress up the caster. Not that I need to stick with the spell's exact mechanics, I know.

Limited Resurrection: If the target of your resurrection spell has been resurrected more times than you have cast the spell, there is a 50% chance that the experience will play out using their higher number of resurrections instead of the number of times you have cast the spell.

So, it�s not entirely a hard limit but being resurrected multiple times has its consequences

# ? Oct 14, 2019 18:50

My Lovely Horse: Aug 21, 2010

Still mostly bad for the caster though, the target always gets revived. Albeit at ever increasing levels of being wrecked afterwards and only with a 50% chance at the very last stage, true.

Hmm. Their patron is well established as unsavoury and I narrated it like he's forcing a cleric to cast the spell. That could be a way to give it more impact: he's only giving them a burnt out cleric and we leave it up to one last coin flip.

I did by the way ask my player how she felt about the issue of impact vs. feeling cheap and to leaf through replacement character options for a week or two. If she says it's the wizard or nothing that's it, too.

# ? Oct 14, 2019 20:01

kaffo: Jun 20, 2017; If it's broken, it's probably my fault

Not a question, but my two players in my new pokemon game have decided to play as two very old men
After both their wives passed away they've decided to take a crack at the whole pokemon trainer thing and explore the world as their Swan song

It's glorious, I can't wait for the golden oldies to hit up the local gym and show the kids who's boss

# ? Oct 17, 2019 09:35

thetoughestbean: Apr 27, 2013; Keep On Shroomin

kaffo posted:

Not a question, but my two players in my new pokemon game have decided to play as two very old men
After both their wives passed away they've decided to take a crack at the whole pokemon trainer thing and explore the world as their Swan song

It's glorious, I can't wait for the golden oldies to hit up the local gym and show the kids who's boss

This owns

# ? Oct 17, 2019 10:05

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

"Back in my day..."
"When I was your age..."
"... and we appreciated it!"
"Where's my Inceneroar Balm!"

# ? Oct 17, 2019 13:21

kaffo: Jun 20, 2017; If it's broken, it's probably my fault

I hope they make it all the way to the league just to out age everyone there by about 40 years, then kick most of their asses (maybe win?!)

# ? Oct 17, 2019 14:26

DalaranJ: Apr 15, 2008; Yosuke will now die for you.

Why are none of you whippersnappers in shorts? Don�t you know they�re comfy and easy to wear?

# ? Oct 17, 2019 15:50

My Lovely Horse: Aug 21, 2010

I thought some more about the PC death situation and I'm gonna let that player pick between options.

#1: the PC's dead, she's making a new one. Maybe the party still comes across a way to resurrect people at some point, but I'm not gonna actively work towards it. For all intents and purposes this is a permanent new character.

#2: the PC's dead but the party decides to travel to the underworld to get her back. The player makes a new PC for the next few sessions while that's going on, I'm gonna work it so this is the entire next chapter of the campaign, but the original PC will eventually return.

#3: the PC gets resurrected by their patron as we've discussed, but it's a botch job. She's still half dead and has to find a way to restore her soul (on a time limit of however long it takes us). This would actually tie nicely into her backstory, and would equally be the entire next chapter.

(Obviously if she's got a great idea of her own, I'm all ears.)

The big caveat, which I've told her about, is that whatever she picks is fair game for the competition. If the wizard stays dead, so do the two story NPCs the party killed. If it's the underworld trip, the party can expect to encounter the remains of the opposing party down there looking for their own companions. If it's the immediate resurrection-with-a-catch, at least one of the slain enemies will also make a return before very long.

# ? Oct 19, 2019 11:05

Bad Munki: Nov 4, 2008; We're all mad here.

My players accidentally invented a thing tonight. Maybe it's been done before! But it seems like a fun low-pressure thing, like a bunch of mini-games. It's silly! Anyhow, I'll present it here for your perusal in its original chat-based format. It started with an Imgur post about some really sick town terrain build, and a reaction gif (please tolerate that here, it sets the stage.)

quote:

quote:

https://imgur.com/gallery/sOcmsaK

quote:

Our group is easy all you need to make is a tavern

Then cave sections that can be rearranged

quote:

All located under the tavern

quote:

Go drinking/heal...

Kill/loot

Repeat

quote:

That�s just Torchlight with extra steps

quote:

In the heal/drink phase XXXXXXX�s overly aggressive character starts trouble that will inevitably get us all kicked out of town

quote:

Nah, you get kicked out of the tavern and have to go next door

A slightly seedier tavern with a slightly tougher dungeon in the basement

quote:

Fail upwards

quote:

This would make a fantastic one off

How many taverns can your party survive

quote:

Bar Hopping DnD

quote:

Ha!

Every drink changes at every tavern

It starts off light with beer

The next tavern is whisky

Actually that'd be my last one

But you get the idea

The harder the tavern/dungeon the stronger the drink

quote:

Kill tavern owner, install friendly barkeep/ get to drink for free

quote:

This is a perfectly awesome mini game, FYI

quote:

And works awesome from my standpoint because I just need a bunch of dungeons with critters

Each tavern earns a level

Play to death

tl;dr: Comedy option pen and paper Torchlight lite (Torchlite?) using whatever system you're already using. I'm excited.

# ? Oct 23, 2019 01:53

Dareon: Apr 6, 2009; by vyelkin

Thinking about low-stakes mook fights got me thinking about a party that TPKs to a batch of kobolds, and when they wake up, they're very lightly bound, about half their weapons are still on them, and the kobolds are panicking because this has never happened before and they don't know what to do.

# ? Oct 23, 2019 02:26

ILL Machina: Mar 25, 2004; Glory to Italia!

Ayy!! This text is-a the color of marinara! Ohhhh!! Dat's amore!!

Bad Munki posted:

tl;dr: Comedy option pen and paper Torchlight lite (Torchlite?) using whatever system you're already using. I'm excited.

Story reminded me of Red Dragon Inn

# ? Oct 23, 2019 08:34

Tias: May 25, 2008; Pictured: the patron saint of internet political arguments (probably)

This avatar made possible by a gift from the Religionthread Posters Relief Fund

Gamerofthegame posted:

I'm a little late here, but; Savage worlds has combat that is basically tabletop wargaming like Warhammer 40k and other similar character specific games, very fastpaced and easy. You have a collection of universal moves and you can gradually up the complexity by giving the PCs more friends, which traditionally they control.

No worries,and thanks, it's on the list

# ? Oct 23, 2019 12:55

Glagha: Oct 13, 2008; AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
AAAAAAaaAAAaaAAaAA
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AaaAaaAAAaaaaaAA

So I was brainstorming adventure ideas and wanted to get the players caught up in someone else's devil's bargain. Basically a wealthy lord got his money from making a deal with a devil of greed, but didn't keep up his end of the bargain so a curse had befallen him and the locals as the devils come to collect his debt. So I'm expecting to send players into places with gratuitous displays of wealth and excess but I'm worried if I do, they're going to go full D&D and start ripping down paintings and pocketing silverware, so I'm wondering what the best option is. My first impulses are either:
1: The stuff is cursed because it's been claimed by the devil in the contract and trying to steal it will have consequences like the Cave of Wonders.
2: Just let them. Make it so they're somewhat time limited so they can't just start carting everything of value out, and let them just have whatever they can manage to carry out of there.

Any thoughts on the better approach?

# ? Oct 23, 2019 16:51

Guildencrantz: May 1, 2012; IM ONE OF THE GOOD ONES

Quest hook! The stuff is cursed, and very obviously so (reeks of sulfur etc when removed from the place) but the curse can be removed. They need to find a Curse Removing McGuffin to actually sell any of it, but in the meantime the curse interferes with their quest for said McGuffin.

# ? Oct 23, 2019 17:31

Grey Hunter: Oct 17, 2007; Hero of the soviet union.
Accidental destroyer of planets

Make everything obviously marked - statues of him. Paintings of him. Based with his family crest on. Make it obvious to the players that no end would dare touch any of this stuff, bar the stuff you are willing to let them steal.

That stuff is the cursed stuff. Just for fun.

# ? Oct 23, 2019 17:42

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Any loot they steal, any of it, even a single bauble, leads to the next quest: the devil showing up with a Faustian bargain for them.

Optional: they can't remove the cursed items from their inventory until decursed with a mcguffin or completion of the bargain.

# ? Oct 23, 2019 17:44

Ceros_X: Aug 6, 2006; U.S. Marine

The stuff is all real, smells legit, doesn't appear cursed, etc. But when removed from the town, the gold turns to rusty iron, the jewels to shoddy glass, etc. Part of the devil getting his due, the wealth only appears wealthy because the noble lord hasn't kept up his parts. He's surrounded by it but it isn't worth anything outside the town and the town knows it - the devil does it to taunt him. Maybe make it become real after they complete the quest, but also make sure the town's people realize it as we and clean out a lot of it (except for the vault/hidden room/etc the PCs saw containing what you want them to get).

# ? Oct 23, 2019 20:49

Bad Munki: Nov 4, 2008; We're all mad here.

Ceros_X posted:

The stuff is all real, smells legit, doesn't appear cursed, etc. But when removed from the town, the gold turns to rusty iron, the jewels to shoddy glass, etc. Part of the devil getting his due, the wealth only appears wealthy because the noble lord hasn't kept up his parts. He's surrounded by it but it isn't worth anything outside the town and the town knows it - the devil does it to taunt him. Maybe make it become real after they complete the quest, but also make sure the town's people realize it as we and clean out a lot of it (except for the vault/hidden room/etc the PCs saw containing what you want them to get).

Non-cursed wealth suffers the same effect as it enters the area, although maybe it takes a while and progresses slowly. This prevents the town from addressing their situation through financial brute force.

# ? Oct 23, 2019 22:41

Whybird: Aug 2, 2009; Phaiston have long avoided the tightly competetive defence sector, but the IRDA Act 2052 has given us the freedom we need to bring out something really special.

https://team-robostar.itch.io/robostar; Nap Ghost

Glagha posted:

So I was brainstorming adventure ideas and wanted to get the players caught up in someone else's devil's bargain. Basically a wealthy lord got his money from making a deal with a devil of greed, but didn't keep up his end of the bargain so a curse had befallen him and the locals as the devils come to collect his debt. So I'm expecting to send players into places with gratuitous displays of wealth and excess but I'm worried if I do, they're going to go full D&D and start ripping down paintings and pocketing silverware, so I'm wondering what the best option is.

Go with number two! Fencing a haul like that can provide plenty of plot hooks in itself.

If a lot of the wealth is in fancy clothes, carpets, big statues, and so on they're going to have difficulty just running off with it and selling it, and most local storekeepers are going to recognise it as the stuff that got lifted from the Lord's manor. (E: And the only person locally with the kind of money to be able to pay them full price for it is... erm... the Lord they nicked it off.)

Also, since it presumably was created by a demon, all of it is going to give off an evil aura that sets any passing paladins' senses tingling.

Also, the Lord is going to be desperate to get it back; not only did they rob him, but they also screwed over any hope he had of salvaging the contract and now his soul's been hollowed out and replaced with a monstrous entity of pure greed.

Also, the demon is going to notice this impressively audacious display of wanton greed, and reconsider its options. A lord is one thing, but getting its talons into an adventuring party who are one day going to be high-level demigods? That would be a win.

Whybird fucked around with this message at 22:57 on Oct 23, 2019

# ? Oct 23, 2019 22:43

sebmojo: Oct 23, 2010; Legit Cyberpunk

yeah if you dangle treasure then always let them have it, then make it lead to entertaining complications.

# ? Oct 23, 2019 22:46

Heliotrope: Aug 17, 2007; You're fucking subhuman

Glagha posted:

So I was brainstorming adventure ideas and wanted to get the players caught up in someone else's devil's bargain. Basically a wealthy lord got his money from making a deal with a devil of greed, but didn't keep up his end of the bargain so a curse had befallen him and the locals as the devils come to collect his debt. So I'm expecting to send players into places with gratuitous displays of wealth and excess but I'm worried if I do, they're going to go full D&D and start ripping down paintings and pocketing silverware, so I'm wondering what the best option is. My first impulses are either:
1: The stuff is cursed because it's been claimed by the devil in the contract and trying to steal it will have consequences like the Cave of Wonders.
2: Just let them. Make it so they're somewhat time limited so they can't just start carting everything of value out, and let them just have whatever they can manage to carry out of there.

Any thoughts on the better approach?

How are they getting involved in the adventure? If the lord is hiring them, he is absolutely going to realize they stole from him when everything that isn't nailed down is missing. Even if they stumble on the situation, it's probably not going to be too hard for anyone involved to connect "the wandering adventures who solved the demon problem and then sold off a shitton of valuables they somehow acquired" and "the valuables that were stolen from the lord's properties." So they can steal poo poo and sell it, but make it obvious that people will do something about it once they find out.

# ? Oct 23, 2019 22:49

tanglewood1420: Oct 28, 2010; The importance of this mission cannot be overemphasized

I like the idea of the treasure reverting to useless junk as soon as it leaves town. How about when the PCs cart off their hoard and see it rust over before their eyes the devil appears and offers *them* a deal. He'll let them take as much of the treasure as they can carry out of town without it transforming into crap but they have to make the first guy follow through on his pact with the devil. How they do this the devil doesn't care.

Then the players can either try to persuade/force/trick the greedy guy into fulfilling the contact (which obviously involves something really terrible) OR figure out a way to trick the devil so he thinks it was fulfilled.

# ? Oct 23, 2019 22:58

Infinite Karma: Oct 23, 2004; Good as dead

tanglewood1420 posted:

OR figure out a way to trick the devil so he thinks it was fulfilled.

I don't like this precedent, devil deals are better when you can't trick them.

# ? Oct 23, 2019 23:25

Glagha: Oct 13, 2008; AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
AAAAAAaaAAAaaAAaAA
AAAAAAAaAAAAAaaAAA
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AaAAaaA
AAaaAAAAaaaAAAAAAA
AaaAaaAAAaaaaaAA

Heliotrope posted:

How are they getting involved in the adventure? If the lord is hiring them, he is absolutely going to realize they stole from him when everything that isn't nailed down is missing. Even if they stumble on the situation, it's probably not going to be too hard for anyone involved to connect "the wandering adventures who solved the demon problem and then sold off a shitton of valuables they somehow acquired" and "the valuables that were stolen from the lord's properties." So they can steal poo poo and sell it, but make it obvious that people will do something about it once they find out.

Well I somehow managed to almost forget that the initial idea came from seeing this magic card:

So the idea was gonna be that failure to pay up resulted in the lord, and pretty much anyone who used his money which is basically all the people living on his land, paying in blood. The curse is like a spreading plague causing people to cough up coins and such until they die, with the money being collected to pay off the debt. So the players were going to get roped in probably because they end up catching it because of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, because of course adventurers are going to end up gravitating toward this place where there's all this growth and opportunity from this wealthy lord throwing money around like nobody's business. So I figured the lord would probably be dead or wishing he was, maybe kept alive and captive so he can see what the price of his greed was and everything.

Edit: So part of the concern was that they might want to take the plague-coins which SEEMS obviously a bad idea but hey you never know, and second that I figured the lord's manner would probably be in the process of getting ransacked by the devil's minions taking what they were owed, so there'd be loot up for grabs because I figure any location full of monsters and treasure is going to be interpreted as free game.

Glagha fucked around with this message at 23:39 on Oct 23, 2019

# ? Oct 23, 2019 23:29

Yawgmoth: Sep 10, 2003; This post is cursed!

Whybird posted:

Go with number two! Fencing a haul like that can provide plenty of plot hooks in itself.

This is true, although coming up with those plot hooks can be a bit of a trial sometimes.

Which leads into my question for the thread! My players (3.5e Eberron), through a ridiculous set of rolls from The Rod of Wonder, have found themselves in possession of 170,000gp of Luhix. Luhix is basically magical heroin - it's viciously addictive, the withdrawal is potentially deadly, but the drug makes you immune to pain and buffs all your stats for a couple hours so it's potentially worth it if you have a huge fort save and know you're about to get into a big fight or something.

Anyways. I have no idea how they plan to unload all of this because that's 85 doses of the poo poo and (a) that's expensive even if they lowball themselves by half, (b) more money than an average family would see in a decade, (c) I don't really know what to do to convey appropriate consequences if/when they do. The last time they got it, they just wholesaled it off to the Boromar Clan (halfling mafia) in Sharn; this got them one hell of an underworld ally, but I feel like I didn't really play up the effects of a sudden influx of superdrugs as well as I should have.

So uh, how exactly do I run this without taking away from their overarching quest of figuring out a mystery involving a macguffin scroll for each school of magic while manifest zones are springing up more and more?

# ? Oct 24, 2019 00:38

ILL Machina: Mar 25, 2004; Glory to Italia!

Ayy!! This text is-a the color of marinara! Ohhhh!! Dat's amore!!

So if you flick a cursed coin at a person and they catch it are they forever cursed and, if so, at what range and DC can I flick it?

# ? Oct 24, 2019 02:01

ILL Machina: Mar 25, 2004; Glory to Italia!

Ayy!! This text is-a the color of marinara! Ohhhh!! Dat's amore!!

You have a dozen special forces missions worth of unique performance enhancers in play. Kings and people as rich as kings will buy it to secure and expand their influence.

Drugs, man, drugs.

ILL Machina fucked around with this message at 02:07 on Oct 24, 2019

# ? Oct 24, 2019 02:05

Nephzinho: Jan 25, 2008

Yawgmoth posted:

This is true, although coming up with those plot hooks can be a bit of a trial sometimes.

Which leads into my question for the thread! My players (3.5e Eberron), through a ridiculous set of rolls from The Rod of Wonder, have found themselves in possession of 170,000gp of Luhix. Luhix is basically magical heroin - it's viciously addictive, the withdrawal is potentially deadly, but the drug makes you immune to pain and buffs all your stats for a couple hours so it's potentially worth it if you have a huge fort save and know you're about to get into a big fight or something.

Anyways. I have no idea how they plan to unload all of this because that's 85 doses of the poo poo and (a) that's expensive even if they lowball themselves by half, (b) more money than an average family would see in a decade, (c) I don't really know what to do to convey appropriate consequences if/when they do. The last time they got it, they just wholesaled it off to the Boromar Clan (halfling mafia) in Sharn; this got them one hell of an underworld ally, but I feel like I didn't really play up the effects of a sudden influx of superdrugs as well as I should have.

So uh, how exactly do I run this without taking away from their overarching quest of figuring out a mystery involving a macguffin scroll for each school of magic while manifest zones are springing up more and more?

Who else knows they have it?

# ? Oct 24, 2019 13:31

habituallyred: Feb 6, 2015

Yawgmoth posted:

This is true, although coming up with those plot hooks can be a bit of a trial sometimes.

Which leads into my question for the thread! My players (3.5e Eberron), through a ridiculous set of rolls from The Rod of Wonder, have found themselves in possession of 170,000gp of Luhix. Luhix is basically magical heroin - it's viciously addictive, the withdrawal is potentially deadly, but the drug makes you immune to pain and buffs all your stats for a couple hours so it's potentially worth it if you have a huge fort save and know you're about to get into a big fight or something.

Anyways. I have no idea how they plan to unload all of this because that's 85 doses of the poo poo and (a) that's expensive even if they lowball themselves by half, (b) more money than an average family would see in a decade, (c) I don't really know what to do to convey appropriate consequences if/when they do. The last time they got it, they just wholesaled it off to the Boromar Clan (halfling mafia) in Sharn; this got them one hell of an underworld ally, but I feel like I didn't really play up the effects of a sudden influx of superdrugs as well as I should have.

So uh, how exactly do I run this without taking away from their overarching quest of figuring out a mystery involving a macguffin scroll for each school of magic while manifest zones are springing up more and more?

Probably too late, but I do have something to add to the advice about making it a national level event. Narrow down the scope of what happens to a single big event. I don't know if this means drugging a barbarian ambassador for a less subtle Manchurian candidate or Sharn-11. But make the players a big part of the post event investigation.

Parallel teams of adventurers and government officers are investigating each aspect of the case. Take a page out of [i]A Scanner Darkly[i] and let the players be on the team investigating, "where did all these high-end drugs come from."

# ? Oct 24, 2019 20:13

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# ? Jun 12, 2024 15:14

tanglewood1420: Oct 28, 2010; The importance of this mission cannot be overemphasized

Yawgmoth posted:

This is true, although coming up with those plot hooks can be a bit of a trial sometimes.

Which leads into my question for the thread! My players (3.5e Eberron), through a ridiculous set of rolls from The Rod of Wonder, have found themselves in possession of 170,000gp of Luhix. Luhix is basically magical heroin - it's viciously addictive, the withdrawal is potentially deadly, but the drug makes you immune to pain and buffs all your stats for a couple hours so it's potentially worth it if you have a huge fort save and know you're about to get into a big fight or something.

Anyways. I have no idea how they plan to unload all of this because that's 85 doses of the poo poo and (a) that's expensive even if they lowball themselves by half, (b) more money than an average family would see in a decade, (c) I don't really know what to do to convey appropriate consequences if/when they do. The last time they got it, they just wholesaled it off to the Boromar Clan (halfling mafia) in Sharn; this got them one hell of an underworld ally, but I feel like I didn't really play up the effects of a sudden influx of superdrugs as well as I should have.

So uh, how exactly do I run this without taking away from their overarching quest of figuring out a mystery involving a macguffin scroll for each school of magic while manifest zones are springing up more and more?

Maybe some big important NPC is a secret addict and when the new supply gets dumped on the market and crashes the price he gets giddy buying it up and ODs on it. This causes the authorities to take notice (because they only care about drugs when rich nobles are involved) , they crackdown on the Boromar Clan who subsequently cough up to the authorities that the PCs sold it to them. Now the Eberron equivalent of the DEA are on the trail of the players.

For many D&D settings that sounds pretty dark, for Eberron it seems fitting.

# ? Oct 24, 2019 20:35

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Traditional Games > The GM Advice thread: Killing your players quickly

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