In a hurry to get to a desert outpost, my travelers came across a tree by an oasis that had somehow learned to talk. They sat for a long time listening to the tree ramble on about birds and shade until they finally realized it was still just a tree and didn't have any amazing wisdom or secrets to impart. They lost valuable time not because they were merely interested in the phenomenon, but because they thought it was a guaranteed handout for information/insight.

The only thing you can expect from players is to try and derail anyhing you had set up as more than a "WoW or LOTR" clone story. play with an older or more experienced group. or convince them to read things other than WOW or LOTR books

Last time my players went all 'UGLY MONSTER, KILL IT' I had it arranged so they would have to watch from affar the creatures funeral, as attended my it's mate and children as they took the corpse to the communial graveyard.

One of the players found their coinpouch missing and beltloop broken. A crafty-looking woman from a race notorious as thieves was found to be in possession of the player's coinpouch. One of the players insisted on attacking her and another was prepared to strong-arm her into returning it.
The player who lost the bag in the first place asked for it back nicely and she returned it, and onlookers attested she had merely found it on the ground after the beltloop had broken.
The players narrowly avoided having a mob beat the shit out of them for beating up an innocent woman.

>>1634073
I giggled.

Poor guys. That is something we all take too much advantage of.

OH THIS MUST BE IMPORTANT. MAGIC TREE / NPC WITH A NAME / THE DM ACTUALLY MENTIONED THAT THE ITEM SPARKLES WITH A STRANGE LIGHT!

My players once found a shrieking, demonic-looking shadow creature in the desert. One person charged to kill it but another held him back, pointing out that the creature hadn't attacked yet.
It later turned out to be a child from a village nearby, run by a race of sentient, civilized creatures (who were nonetheless very large and dangerous and would not have taken the murder of one of their children lightly).

I've had several campaigns end early because my players are HACK SLASH KILL EVERYTHING and the town guards end up shoving swords up their asses.

For example, a necromancer was having a wedding for his daughter when my PCs bust in waving a bounty scroll and start slaughtering the wedding guests. I had the lead PC get personally hanged by the local Duke.

My players came upon a tall vial filled with some sort of sparkling green powder that glinted in the light. The budding alchemist emptied a fair amount onto his hand and rubbed it between his fingers. Another took a swig from the holy-looking vial before the alchemist was even done examining it.
It turned out to be powdered glass. The alchemist bloodied his hands badly and the imbiber nearly died.

>I had the lead PC get personally hanged by the local Duke.

Awesome.

Early on (they hadn't learned their lesson yet) my players ran into a group of men with black and white masks, tall spears, and ragged leather armor. The men were ended up waving steel at the players. The players, being too proud to back down (because they're the HEROES) drew steel in return.
The masked men were rude, insulting, and very much responsible for the confrontation.
They were also the town guards.

Dark creepy forest setting the entire party is paranoid that their going to be jumped so when a ent-like creature stumbles upon them after they get desperately lost they panic and kill it.

All four bodies were left impaled on the out skirts of the forest, as a warning to generations of adventurers yet to come that some creatures have too many friends that are not going to tolerate their bullshit.

The players burst, weapons drawn, into a temple in a small backwoods town they were investigating to find a woman tied to the altar and a dark priest smeared with blood standing over her with a sacrificial dagger.
Only after they had slaughtered the high priest and his aides did they learn that not only were annual sacrifices both common and accepted for that religion, but that the maiden in question was being willingly sacrificed. It was considered the highest honor possible in their faith.

>>1634106
One good reason to play a monk.

"You are the town guard? Oh.. no.. I was just.. waving.. really. "

In the last campaign I ran, they were held up by bandit gnolls on the road, which they were justified in killing, another time they found gnolls with men in cages by the side of the fire as the gnolls chewed on a gnomes roasted leg.

But then they went to the human town, and the pop of the town was like 10% gnoll, and these guys were peaceful.

>>1634121
Would be even funnier if the 'men in cages' were actually brutal criminals on the loose, with the gnolls being hired mercenaries to capture them.

>>1634115
Meah, people can make the case that sacrifice of a sentient being is still murder, willing or not.

Completely within the scope of belief of say a Lawful good, or Neutral Good character.

Players were sent to save the princess of a small tribe of a peaceful, societally-undeveloped woodland race. She had been kidnapped by the head warlord of a nearby tribe of an industrial, savage, violent race. The chieftan of the woodland race warned the players she may have already been raped, murdered, etc. and they had to find her as soon as possible.
She was tracked to a distant mountain where she was found in bed with the 'enemy' warlord, who looked very sheepish.
They'd eloped together.

>>1634130
>Meh, people can make the case that sacrifice of a sentient being is still murder, willing or not.
Human sacrifice was a societally-accepted practice in this gameworld, which is mostly tribal, almost more like a pre-medieval bronze-age.
They had no business or right to do what they did, and even if one of them had the belief that sacrificing a willing individual to a god was murder (which would have been an unusual belief at the time), then killing the high priest and his aides is definitely murder, too.

>Completely within the scope of belief of say a Lawful good, or Neutral Good character.
We don't go by D&D rules either -- those alignments don't exist in the technicalities of this gameworld.

>>1634130
>Meah, people can make the case that sacrifice of a sentient being is still murder, willing or not.
And killing the priest isn't murder?

I feel the pain, I really do.

Once I GM'd a game that also took place in a world I had made. I liked that world, I really put effort into it. I still use it in writing and such.

Too bad one of the players was an utter retard and acted like the biggest racist fantasy hillybilly ever. If something was ugly, dirty or took up a weapon (which is pretty expectable if you rush into its home), it should die right then and there. In an ironic way he actually played a damn well roleplayed zealot bent on eradicating all that's not human.

Take one time, for example. The characters are in a sewer. The HACKAN SLASHAN guy is on the lookout, prowling and trying to find the next innocent creature to slaughter. Suddenly, a large, almost man-sized rat comes into the view. The characters all have seen these questionably intelligent bastards. Calling it a rat-man would have been an overstatement, it was just a rat with thumbs and intelligence to apply them.
Anyways, the creature isn't hostile, and merely seems to want to get past. Other characters move, but the mad zealot steps up and charges without any warning. The intelligent animal is of course freaked by this and draws a club. This, without a question, is enough to make it a child-murdering, demon-worshipping monster. And soon the quest is pretty much derailed to finding every nest in the sewer and killing them all.
"Honourable knight" my ass. MY ASS.

This one was a nod to Gary Larson. And not really a lesson in expectations, either. I just wanted to fuck with their heads a little.

As they hiked through the murky jungle, the players slowly realized they were being stalked -- seeing shapes moving in the distance, hearing hushed voices, etc.
Suddenly a sharp pain in the neck and a feathered blowdart is sticking out of one of the players, who panics and screams about poison.

A father and son of a sub-race (think gnoll-like) pop up from behind a fallen tree and the father holds his hands up explaining in broken english that the dart isn't poisonous, and he's "just showing his kid the ropes".

>>1634115
..I still would have stopped that one myself..

>>1634129
It would, but really it was a way for me to introduce new characters to the party, as the old ones got wraith'd

>>1634139
Killing a person in defense of another life is acceptable. Questionable but the act of attempting murder does not need to come to fruition in order to take any action to prevent it. All the other killings would be considered unneeded unless the party was then threatened with death by stopping the sacrifice.

It only takes one character to believe that "Murder for a gods sake is wrong" and that snowballs the party right into the fight. Also your players have certain things beet into them from the Real world that would compel them to act out to stop that situation immediately rather than wait if it's normal in that part of the dirty little world.

Stopping a human sacrifice, willing or not is just what seems "right" to a lot of people. Your example is flawed.

The players played much of a sizeable campaign against a group of six educated banditlike adversaries who were half-Bonemen (a subrace, not undead. Think goblin, kobold, etc) and half-somethingelse. The local legend held that a raiding party of savage, violent Bonemen raided a defenseless farming village, killed all the men, and raped all the women, resulting in the birthing of the monstrosities the group now found themselves at odds with.

It eventually turned out that the raiding party had actually been comprised of a group of men from various major races and the peaceful farming village was actually occupied by agrarian Bonemen, who had been the real victims. But who writes the history books?

As an added bonus, the well-respected retired-world-traveling-adventurer general who led the militia the players fought alongside turned out to have been part of that raiding party, having fathered at least one of the half-breed adversaries.

Guys, to be fair: Players can be stupid, but it's the responsibility of the GM to give them cues as to the color/grittiness of the world in question.

Not that these stories aren't all highly amusing.

>>1634195

The same fuckwits have evolved an incredibly sensitive sensor that will make them scream "RAILROADRAILROADRAILROAD!" as soon as you even try to tell them to knock it off.

>>1634173
>Stopping a human sacrifice, willing or not is just what seems "right" to a lot of people.
In the real world. That's exactly my point.
They didn't stop it because they thought human sacrifice was naturally "wrong", they just thought this was some sort of unholy ritual of some evil sect. If they'd even stopped to find out what was going on or asked first and killed later, it would have been avoided.

I understand that IN THIS WORLD, people would object to something like that, but one of the biggest parts of successful roleplaying is trying to think like your character would. Consider: If you were in Aztec-ruled Tenochtitlan at the height of its success and you tried to start a petition to stop human sacrifice, you'd be thought of as crazy. And if you killed the high priest to try to prevent a willing sacrifice, you'd probably be tortured to death.

>>1634199
Crucify one character with railroad ties the next time they say that.

I love tossing in the "Glowing (insert item here)". The idiots fall for it every time.

"So what does it do?"
"Glows."
"And?"
"Thats it."
"SO I WENT OUT OF MY WAY TO KILL THE GUY JUST TO GET A GODDAMN GLOWSTICK?"
"Yep. Good job."

>>1634195
>Guys, to be fair: Players can be stupid, but it's the responsibility of the GM to give them cues as to the color/grittiness of the world in question.
I've built up a lot of lore and information and share it constantly. I let the players know they're in a world where things are mystical and very little of the natural world is understood, where the populace still sees themselves living in a world of gods and ghosts and magic.
That's the only reason most of these stories don't end up with them dying. Hell, >>1634089 is proof enough that they're learning the world.
They just sort of drop the ball sometimes.

in a fantasy setting, before refrigeration, there was little ice.
so a PC used to use ray of frost to make water into ice. and then sell it.
this worked ok for a while. then he tried to sell it to someone who wasnt a commoner and i had the businessman try and find out how he did it, so he'd have the formula not the product.
not wanting to give up his 'super secret ice idea' he turned down the businessmans offer for his icemaking apparatus and the PC was left with twenty buckets of cold water.

>>1634204
your players as you earlier said, were not from that area. And if the situation appears that talking is not going to solve the problem fast enough, (IE the sacrificial weapon looming over a person) My arrow or violent act will.

"Umm ok well attack the priest"
"You people do know that sacrifices are not only common but accepted and player fuckwit's character even believes in them too right?"
"Oh.. ok my mistake."

Also setting your players up for failure with bait like that is a real dick move.

My characters once gained access to a strange and magical land devoid of normal human life, where inanimate objects came to life around them. They were frightening and appeared menacing, huge golems of glass or steel or stone, a talking display of bones and skulls.
They all turned out to be completely benevolent, of course, but one of the players got in serious shit after smashing in and destroying the skull display simply for blocking their path. If it had been a flesh-and-blood person, they wouldn't have killed them, but since it wasn't, they didn't stop to see the harm.
Of course, that's essentially an unprovoked murder, since the skull was fully sentient and hundreds of years old. The godlike ruler of the land saw to it the player ended up getting a very stern lecture and a permanent curse.

>>1634223
>your players as you earlier said, were not from that area
The religion was not unique to that area. They had encountered it before. They KNEW explicitly human sacrifice was involved, and the only person who had a moral objection certainly didn't have a strong enough one to want to murder the priests who commit it just to stop it. In fact, he ended up being the only one, upon entering the church, who tried to stop the others.

>the sacrificial weapon looming over a person
It wasn't looming over. The priest was just standing next to the altar. He wasn't even brandishing the weapon, he just had it in-hand. Hell, the woman wasn't even struggling.

>"You people do know that sacrifices are not only common but accepted and player fuckwit's character even believes in them too right?"
See, here's the problem. They DID know that. And they KNEW that their CHARACTERS knew it. My whole point is that if you throw someone into a campaign like this blind and confront them with that, then YES, it's a dick move, because they don't know any better. But they DID know better, and they still played the fool, and were punished for it. That's the whole theme of this thread.

It wasn't even SUPPOSED to be a trap, or a bait, it was just a very memorable scene for them to enter on.

My players once (very enthusiastically) came upon a whorehouse while stopping in a town along a trade route. Just before a few of them were about to hand over their gold they asked what race the brothel employed.
It turned out the women working there were members of a race of nine-foot-tall reptilian snakelike-people.

One of them decided to hand over his gold anyway.

>>1634115
Okay, this is not "players being dense", this is "DM being an irritating dickhead."

All the moral relativism in the world isn't going to make human sacrificers not the bad guys.

(hah! chew on that grammar for a while!)

You might have told them, "This is a land where human sacrifice is common and accepted." (and they hear: this land is GRIPPED BY EVIL for you to fight against!) but I doubt very much that you told them, "This game is run under a moral code where the 'good' characters accept human sacrifice as a virtuous act."

Frankly, you just sound like an asshole.

>>1634261
that's what I was trying to get at, though in kinder words.

>>1634261
You're late to the party.
Read >>1634238 first.

>I doubt very much that you told them, "This game is run under a moral code where the 'good' characters accept human sacrifice as a virtuous act."
That's pretty much exactly what I told them.

Let me be perfectly clear here: They knew better. They really did. The characters knew, the players knew, and the players knew their characters knew. This isn't a world philosophy that had only just been introduced, or a very unfamiliar social climate.

>>1634261
Next time read the thread before replying.

>>1634265
I think your realizing the flaw in your original statement and are backpedaling or just blatantly lying.

>>1634224
What was the curse?

>>1634259
Well.. it makes sense in a world full of other sentient species.. you'd keep a more open mind about who you would bed..

>>1634259
9 foot tall reptilian hermaphrodites would have been funnier.

>>1634275
>I think your backpedaling or just blatantly lying.
Okay. Sure.

>>1634279
>What was the curse?
The player talked with me earlier and wanted to pick up a new disadvantage (namely, "cursed"), so I used it as a story point to introduce the disadvantage.
It's really one of my favorites to GM. Basically, any time something good happens to the party, it skips him. And when something bad happens, it hits him first and worst. And any time I just feel like hosing him, I can, and he has no complaint coming, because he is cursed.

You can't just outright KILL him, nor would I want to -- I try to keep my players alive anyway. But it does give you free reign to be a dick to that player sometimes, as long as you have a sense of humor about it and keep things fun.

For example, needing to maintain silence, he once wrote a message in the dirt with his fingers. He later got a serious infection under his fingernails and for a while thought his hand would be amputated (it wasn't).

>>1634265
I did read it.

I still know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that you failed to impress on them your expectation that their characters should be role-played as people who accept human sacrifice.

Anyway, once you start acting all annoyed that your players are so provincial as to be offended by little local peculiarities such as human sacrifice, YOU ARE BEING A DICK.

Moral relativism is a stupid concept. You can judge the moral standing of an entire society by objective standards.

You're not just expecting players to understand your game's world, you're demanding that they accept your wrong and stupid philosophical attitude toward it.

You're a vile little aspie.

>>1634275
Winner.
ITT: Asshole DM attempting to look cool on the internet.

>>1634290
>ROLEPLAYAN GAEMS SHOULD BE ROLEPLAYED WITH ALL CHARACTERS POSSESSING A CHRISTIAN MORAL STANDPOINT AND ANYTHING ELSE IS WRONG AND BAD. I AM A FURRY.

>>1634288
>9 foot tall reptilian hermaphrodites would have been funnier.
Technically, their race is actually hermaphromorphic: able to change gender at will.

>>1634290
>Anyway, once you start acting all annoyed that your players are so provincial as to be offended by little local peculiarities such as human sacrifice
If you read anything I'd said, you'd know that they weren't offended by it. I said specifically they did NOT morally object to it, as characters. They just got swept up in the sensationalism of the imagery and most of them (but not all) lost their heads and rushed in. The concept had been touched on before, and the players and characters respected it in terms of the game world, at least to the point they shouldn't do what they did. You seem incapable of grasping the concept that ANY world can exist where human sacrifice is okay, just because it isn't HERE. If they were playing as trolls, would you still be griping about it?

>Moral relativism is a stupid concept.
I believe Kant's ideas of categorical imperatives, and murdering someone who doesn't want to die should definitely be a no-go in any society. But if they're not only willing, but EAGER to die, then I think that's a whole other can of worms.

>>1634290
>>1634296
same moralfag

>>1634290
>Moral relativism is a stupid concept.
Just because you believe that doesn't mean the characters would believe it. The whole point is that the characters should be played accurately within their gameworld. The philosophical difference of opinion from the player shouldn't matter. That's why it's roleplaying.

In a scene not unlike the OP's image, down in a large dungeon there was a broken falling roof trap that would endlessly trigger and reset, it made a fuckton of noise and could be heard a long way off.
The PC's knew this area of the dungeon was inhabited by a group of giants but hadnt come into contact with them.
the party rogue assesses the big squishy crushy trap and rolls an exceptional disable device and manages to fix the trap and halt it. from down the corridor the PC's hear a deep voice say "hey... its stopped." "it has too."
the PCs duck around the corner and watch as two huge giants walk over to the far edge of the trap and assess the situation.
"i wonder what stopped it?"
"i dunno. you think we should tell <leader>?"
"nah, not yet. besides, i like the peace and quiet, its been a while since this area has been quiet."
"yeah, its very serene"

something inside the Azer fighter snaps and seeings an oppertunity he charges down the hallway and attacks the giants. the giants are supprised and go total defence as this bright burning thing runs at them waving an axe.
the party emerges and pleads the fighter to stop. one of the giants makes a startled cry and kicks the azer into the wall knocking him unconcious. the other one picks him up and the giants use him as a wall torch for the next 4 days while the rest of the party works up the balls to talk to the giants, peacefully.

in the end the giants were very peacable and even allowed the PC's to stay in their territory and rest in safety before heading out again. the azer had a severely bruise ego but was otherwise fine and the PC got the hint after that.

>>1634290
Well, think of it this way. He wasn't trying to set the PCs up for a fall, he was trying to highlight the moral relativism in having a woman willing to be sacrificed.

My turn? I had a sort of puzzle set up that I really need to perfect. The PCs walked into a ballroom occupied by what was a cross between one of the Silent Hill Nurses and a Maid. The ballroom was full of creepy music coming from nowhere, and I had made sure the PCs would have known that this beautifully grotesque woman with the bloody bandages was one of the enemies. One PC started to attack it when the other stopped him. She wasn't hurting anyone, she was just dancing. Then she gestured for one of them to come over to her, and they danced. A successful dance and she gave them the key to the Courtyard, curtsied, and left without bothering them.

To be fair, even if they had killed her they would have found the key, but I like little challenges like that.

>>1634301
>You seem incapable of grasping the concept that ANY world can exist where human sacrifice is okay, just because it isn't HERE.

You seem incapable of grasping the concept that this is a MORAL JUDGEMENT.

If you say "human sacrifice is okay in that world; it's accepted there." This is moral relativism.

If you don't agree with moral relativism, and most people don't, then you believe what's wrong in one world is wrong in any world.

This is what I mean by wrong and stupid philosophy.

And also what I mean by you being a vile little aspie.

>>1634317
>Then she gestured for one of them to come over to her, and they danced. A successful dance and she gave them the key to the Courtyard, curtsied, and left without bothering them.
That's fucking awesome.

>>1634319

So, what do you say about societies that still accept stoning to death as a legitimate response to crimes?

Or cannabalistic cultures?

>>1634322
I thought so too.

Though I probably should have made the puzzle a little more difficult than "Roll for DEX. You fail, she pushes you on your ass and goes to another part of the room. Your turn David, roll for DEX."

>>1634207
My group had that. Our Wizard was convinced that an enemies "Growing Rod" was a metamagic rod and had the party go out of our way to chase him. When we finally caught and murdered him, it was found that this "Glowing Rod" had been an Everburning Torch.

Once the venture was over, the Rogue beat with Wizard within an inch of his life with the Torch.

>>1634319
>You seem incapable of grasping the concept that this is a MORAL JUDGEMENT.
It's a moral judgement you're making from a completely different philosophical, moral, and societal upbringing the characters would have.
You don't have to be homicidal to play a murderer, and you don't have to be fine with human sacrifice to play a character who does.

The character grew up in a primitive, mystical world where human sacrifice was accepted. His morals would reflect that.

>If you say "human sacrifice is okay in that world; it's accepted there." This is moral relativism.
No it isn't. Saying "it's accepted there, and I approve of that society" is moral relativism. I'm not asking the players to condone that society in any way. They can be disgusted by it for all I care. But the point is their CHARACTERS aren't.

>you believe what's wrong in one world is wrong in any world.
By your standards and by my standards. But not by theirs. They're not on the same philosophical level, don't you see?
If you were dropped off in that world right now, I'm sure you would be appalled by it. If you were born and raised in that world, I'm sure you wouldn't be.

>>1634324
>So, what do you say about societies that still accept stoning to death as a legitimate response to crimes? Or cannibalistic cultures?
I believe (and I'm sure he believes) that those are morally wrong and largely reprehensible. But we come from a different philosophical and moral background than they do.

This is a perfect example, actually, regarding a culture that practices those things.
Even if you don't believe in what that culture does, the people within that culture DO.
That doesn't make it RIGHT on some universal level we have to agree with PERSONALLY, that just makes it accepted WITHIN THAT CULTURE.

>>1634330
>I'm not asking the players to condone that society in any way. They can be disgusted by it for all I care. But the point is their CHARACTERS aren't.
Expecting roleplayers to roleplay? Tell me more of this strange and unusual concept.

Characters from such a world wouldn't have a problem with it.

I would like to note, here, that the sacrificin' Kant-junkie DM has earned my respect by failing to even acknowledge his opponent calling him a "vile little aspie" twice now. He is above being troled by namecalling, and we need more people like him.

Nonetheless, both of you guys need to shut the fuck up now, kthanx.

>>1634334

>>That doesn't make it RIGHT on some universal level we have to agree with PERSONALLY, that just makes it accepted WITHIN THAT CULTURE.

Ex-fucking-actly.

>>1634207

lame

Fuck all this shit about moral relativism, if even ones of the PC's belonged to a different religion that said "sacrificing people is bad" then they were in the clear 100%. But other than that, it is obvious that it was a DM set-up or else they wouldn't be bragging about it in this thread.

Also touching the issue by saying "Hey these guys sacrifice people and everyone is cool with it" doesn't automatically mean the sacrifice is for goodness, or that people will even think of it that way. There can be shit like magic brainwashing and/or diplo-muchkinery going on, and we all know how often "the church is secretly evil" trope is played.

>>1634341
We need more vile little apsies?

>>1634325
>Though I probably should have made the puzzle a little more difficult than "Roll for DEX. You fail, she pushes you on your ass and goes to another part of the room. Your turn David, roll for DEX."
Well then it's probably a good thing she wanted a graceful ballroom dance and didn't want to do the Lindy-hop or something.

>Once the venture was over, the Rogue beat with Wizard within an inch of his life with the Torch.
All's well that ends well.
One of the best ways of turning clichéd genre expectations around is to make some baseless rumor or legend simply turn out to be wrong. Especially when it comes to bizarre weaknesses.

Pic related.

>>1634354
All of your points are incorrect and have already been answered.

My players open doors with dynamite. You bitches have nothing to whine about.

I love when players roleplay realistically within the diegesis of their gameworld. You don't have to support mass-murder to play an evil character.

Maybe it's just because I'm usually a player and not a DM, but I've always liked situations like pictured here, where the players are even more into the mindset of the world than the DM, and manage to outsmart him. Of course, the DM doesn't always take kindly to being outsmarted.

>>1634335
Sometimes it IS

>>1634369
If you gave them the dynamite and a reasonable motivation to use it, I don't see how they're to blame. Besides, even if it's a modern world, I'm sure that shit would be expensive, so it's not like it isn't costing them anything to recklessly blow up doors.

>>1634369

Plastic explosives make the best keys.

>>1634369
My players use vans as battering rams. They don't need a door.

Breaking from the main point a little I wanted to say I always thought worldgen was fucking amazing and I admire the people who actually have the patience to create an entirely new universe essentially from scratch. I don't have the attention span for that but it sounds awesome and I've actually played a fully player-created world once and it was good times.

>>1634381
The problem is most people just end up inventing new kinds of elves or remaking goblins with a different name and skin color.

If your world doesn't have rust monsters I'm not playing in it.

This entire thread (short of the moralfag debate) made me laugh my balls off. Unfortunately, I don't have much to contribute that hasn't already somewhat been touched on (>>1634259 in particular hit a chord. Went to a brothel with somewhat of the same thing. Guess my GM was on a similar brain wavelength with this one).
In summary, I lol'd. Keep up the good work!

>>1634384
And when that happens it gets hard to keep strait.. especially if they have weird ass names(bonus points if they are impossible to remember).

I was in one campaign where the DM himself couldn't remember the names of anything without looking it up on his own sheets. Everything had drawn out complicated names

So far I think the one with the giants using the guy as a torch and the one with the guy swigging powdered glass have been my favorites.

The rambling tree was pure gold. I can imagine it in my mind when the players realize it was a waste of time and facepalm themselves.

Oh the shit my players pulled...
Small mining town, early 1500s equivalent. Silver goes missing from the smelting company's store. Party's solution? Burn the town and kill everyone in it.
A party of four 3rd level characters.
Fuckers started a fire at night and proceeded to kill people running from their homes. Killed the entire party and didn't play with the retards for over a year.

>>1634439
It wasn't particularly intelligent, either. Mostly, it just complained. It talked about having to watch ugly people get naked and bathe in the oasis and how it did all this work shading other people but what did it get in return, and so on.

>>1634441

How did you kill the party?

>>1634441
>Small mining town, early 1500s equivalent. Silver goes missing from the smelting company's store. Party's solution? Burn the town and kill everyone in it.
How is that even a remotely logical progression?

One time I forgot which miniatures on the board were enemies. That was fun.

>>1634449
Town guard came (+level 5 cleric from the local temple od Daghda), captured some, tortured them for info about the rest. Burned them all at the stake.

>>1634450
Fuck if I know. Although to be honest the precious DM's adventures were all variations of the "you=good, they=evil, you kill they". This was my second time GMing (after a simple "kill the Ogre" adventure) for that group. They tried to "investigate" (by going to the three local taverns and asking if somebody knows who stole the silver) for about an hour and then went "Fuck it, let's just kill everyone".

>>1634462
>"Fuck it, let's just kill everyone".
I guess that's a reverse of "Rocks fall everyone dies"

>>1634450

If you group is composed of Hackan n' Slashan players logic doesnt factor into problems that can be made to go away with a sword

>>1634462
>(+level 5 cleric from the local temple of Daghda)
>cleric from the local temple of Daghda
>local temple of Daghda
>temple of Daghda
>Daghda
>DAGDA OH SHI-

OH U. I didn't know you had your own religion.

>>1634462

You did have an actual plot- didnt you?

>>1634470
>If you group is composed of Hackan n' Slashan players logic doesnt factor into problems that can be made to go away with a sword
This is why I'm glad my players are all relatively dynamic thinkers.
I had a murder mystery in one of the towns they went to.

They eventually solved it and confronted the perpetrator who'd been pretending to be crippled and he hurled himself off a cliff.

I'm actually impressed they picked it up as fast as they did, and it was a really fun plotline for all involved. Of course, they needed some monster bashing after that to even it out, but it was all in good fun.

>>1634482

Where the fuck do you live? I want in on your games.

>>1634475
SOMEone doesn't know his celtic mythology.

Although in reality it's Terry Brooks that I have to thank for the name.

>>1634476
5 fucking pages. Barely made it past the second paragraph (included a schism in the local thieves guild caused by a rogue Baatezu, so once the loyal memebers found out, they stole silver to make weapons).

Damn I'm getting pissy just thinking about it.

>>1634475
Celtic god of fertility.

>>1634491
My bad. Though it was one hell of a coincidence that the name just popped out in another session.

>>1634475
googles etc...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daghda

>>1634384
>>1634407
You know, when I read this I can't help but feel a spotlight on me. So in defense of the people like me, I'd just like to point out that showing things people are familiar with in a different light is sometimes just as hard as creating new things from cloth. And for some reason I find I facepalm less when something is an Elf, no matter how far removed from Tolkien's, than I do for something like, say an Argonian, no matter how lusty a maid she is.

Though incomprehensible names are a no no. Just corrupt the original. Though a corruption more along the lines of "Eldar" than "Orks"

>>1634488
Actually I host my games online, usually over IRC or something. Due to the text-based interface, games generally run slower but are much more cinematic in terms of action, descriptions, setting, etc. The logs read like a storybook.

Pic related, fanart a player did after the murder mystery. The included lines are the last words of the murderer (who was actually killing the people who had, years earlier, tortured and killed his wife) before he threw himself to his death.

>>1634498
I shamelessly stole human deities from the Celtic panthenon.
Goibhniu, Mannanah Mac Lir, Daghda, Oghma, Danu. Probably some others as well.

Dwarves worshipped the Aesir and Elves worshipped the Vanir.

>It turned out to be powdered glass. The alchemist bloodied his hands badly and the imbiber nearly died.

The others are good, but this one just shows that you failed at describing what the players were seeing adequately, not that the you managed to trick them in any clever fashion. Can you really imagine that happening?

In real life if you found a phial of ground glass and even if you GENUINELY EXPECTED it to be magical healing powder, sure you might pour some onto your hand, but once it was on your hand you would receive further feedback from your senses and realise it was not a soft, silky powder but rather ground glass. You would not proceed to rub it between your fingers.

Nor do you normally pour anything directly down your throat (except beer) but rather pour it into your mouth and get to taste and feel it before swallowing. If you get a mouthful of ground glass you really aren't going to feel much like swallowing.

In an RPG the players are effectively blind and unable to touch, smell or taste anything. All they can do is hear, and all they can hear is the GM and one another. The GM has to tell them all the relevant details about what they see and feel, and if, once they've declared an action, further details come to light, the GM must interrupt it to tell them.

"I open the door and walk through."

"You open the heavy stone door. The room on the other side is a raging inferno. You step into it and die, roll a new character."

"I do what?"

"You said you open the door and step through, right? You burned to death, roll a new character."

>>1634114

That would happen in LoTR too, you fail at confounding genre expectations.

>>1634513
>I'd just like to point out that showing things people are familiar with in a different light is sometimes just as hard as creating new things from cloth.
Oh, I agree completely. But I personally felt it was easier in my situation to start fresh than to try to work with my players through what was new and what was the same, largely because I was so unfamiliar with the traditional 'rules' myself .(How was I supposed to know trolls have regenerative abilities?)

>>1634505
I understand your point, and the guy who rubbed it between his fingers didn't get any kind of negative penalty like lost HP or anything, the blood was merely a descriptor.
As for the guy who swallowed it, his character is completely gung-ho, a real leap-before-you-look sort of character. He was so enthusiastic about it and literally said he "took a gulp" from the vial, so I easily assumed his character was so caught up in his enthusiasm he managed to swallow it before realizing his error. Fantasy characters shouldn't chug mysterious potions any more than modern characters should chug unlabeled chemical containers.

I agree it seems a little harsh, but it's not like I killed him off for it.

As a sort of field test for a world I was working on-not 100% original, but it wasn't a carbon copy by any means either-had a short campaign with some friends, to see what bugs I had to work out.
made shorter by two jackasses one friend brought along
The party was sent to bring a gift to a dragon-now, this dragon was not evil. The "treasure" it hoarded was a library-she only kept enough gold to sleep on, and the rest went to her book collection. A local wizard-a long time friend of said dragon-was sending her the latest by an author she had taken in interest in. Had things gone as planned, they would have gotten paid fairly well for a simple mission, learned a few important rumours/legends from the dragon, and would have gotten a fairly valuable magical tome.
This was all explained to the party. I emphasized "not evil" and "friend".
So, whats the first thing these people do? well, Jackass #1 launches into a spiel about how all dragons are evil, and must be stopped, etc, etc, etc, no dragon would horde books, she ahd to have some fabulous wealth lying around somewhere, etc and then Jackass #2 did a little pseudo kamikaze charge into her home, and gets pissed when she flicks him away like a fly, nearly killing him.
They both get huffy after I explain-in slow, easy to understand words-that the dragon was within her right to defend herself from anyone who charged in waving a sword, and that, No, his lvl 1 fighter couldnt kill her with one thrust of his sword. And, no, for the ninth time, She Is Not Fucking Evil. They pretty much acted like spoiled children and pouted the rest of the game.

Fortunately, they left soon after, and I havent seen hide nor hair of the pair since.

>>1634521
Yeah, cause all PCs are selfless heroes who risk their lives and doom others to save any maiden in trouble, they want it or not.

The players should've just stood there and ignored the thing, it had nothing at all to do with them.

One of my adventurers once picked up a smoky black crystal from which he would occasionally hear voices. It said it was benevolent and wanted to help him, so that plus mysterious talking talisman expectations meant that he believed it instantly, no questions asked.
For the rest of the campaign the voice from the stone tried to get him killed. It encouraged him into danger at every opportunity. It even went so far as to fuck with his judgement: it changed his perception so as to see a wide, spike-filled gap as shorter than it was. To the player's credit, his character had a confused argument with the other characters as to what the hell they were on, and of course that gap looks short enough to jump.
But every time he managed to survive. When pushed into a dangerous battle, he and his companions would always find a way to outwit the enemy. When led through trapped passages, he'd dodge or disarm them. Hell, he even managed to clear the spiked pit in a single jump (thus convincing him further that he was right, they were wrong, and the stone was telling the truth when it said he could make it).

It finally caught up with him when they went into an ossuary and he chugged a vial of bubbling white mortuary acid because the stone told him it would give him super-strength. Instead it killed him.

Now before you go off on me again for being unfair to my players, the soul of the evil sorcerer that was trapped in the stone all along was then able to take over his lifeless body and animate it again, but was shortly thereafter coerced back into the stone by the rest of the party, and the hapless hero got his rejuvenated body back. The only side effect was his breath smelled like death for a week.

>>1634507

What times and what game system? I'm interested if you would like another player.

>>1634569
as am I

For the record as a player I would have prevented the human sacrifice as well. Not only because I don't believe in moral relativism, but also because I expect to have a certain degree of free will when I play.

My character is supposed to be a hero, not in the sense of being excessively moral or in the sense of being untouchable but in the sense that he *does* stuff. He isn't a normal member of his society. He isn't a farmer and he isn't a rank and file soldier. He doesn't do what is expected of him. If you want me to play a member of some culture, say a Roman or an Aztec, and behave normally and consistently with the beliefs of that culture, I'm not a player anymore, I'm just running an NPC for you (which I have done, helping other GMs to run games.) Player agency is what sets PCs apart from NPCs.

Now I'm quite prepared to accept there will be consequences to my actions if I fuck up the priest and kidnap the sacrifice. He'll certainly have to get out of Dodge. He may even be caught and killed, if so, fair enough. I'll roll up my next character.

Who, if allowed, will be the sacrifice herself, having found herself with doubts, confused over why this stranger would sacrifice his life to save hers when she was ready to die, and wanting to live at least until she's figured it out.

Also you're a fool if you think nobody in Aztec times objected to human sacrifice, or nobody in the middle ages objected to burning witches. Cultures aren't monolithic, and faith isn't universal even in a culture with a strong central religion. Relativism is insulting to the countless people throughout history who HAVE stood up and pointed to something in their own culture and said 'no, that's wrong.'

>>1634523
Well, I was actually just talking about how I've got everything as either an Elf, Dwarf, or Orc, and the traditional elves are weak little scholars with MagiTek, the "traditional" Orcs are Arab swordsmen and Psychics, and the Dwarves are like Chinese monks.
And then there's the Ogres, which I just tossed everything out, turned them into Amazons and crossdressers; The Drow, who are now Japanese instead of sociopaths, and the Trolls, who are Indian Norsemen.

Well, okay, maybe I did toss out a lot. But it's the kind of world where normal fantasy expectations are gone. Dragons don't exist, except for the ones that aren't giant firebreathing lizards. Wyverns, the firebreathing lizardish things that do exist aren't always giant, or might not even breath fire, but shoot lightning. Magic is a science.

>>1634569
I use a simplified GURPS engine to keep gameplay dynamic and to emphasize player action over stats. Skills and abilities and rolls are all still very important, but story and player action takes precedent. Most rolls are hidden, save some things like damage. For the most part it's just to keep gameplay rolling.

As for times, that's the real problem. We haven't played recently, since over the last few months the real world's been rather hectic for me and most of my players. Generally when we do, we play as much as possible whenever possible, but more people means more schedules to set up and it makes things a bit complicated. Right now there's four players including myself, and it's already hard finding time to play.

Still, if you're interested drop me a line and I'll send you a heads-up next time we converge, you can sit in on a session, ask questions, see if it's the kind of thing that would appeal to you or not.

>>1634602

>simplified GURPS
>GURPS

>GURPS

uh oh.

>>1634598
Japanese instead of sociopaths? So... you made them into even more sadistic rapists than before? Except they now shriek in high-pitched voices a lot.

>>1634610

The thing about GURPS is that it's insanely complicated, but insanely crude at the same time. I'm not sure how you'd simplify it further and still have anything left, other than just leaving out all the pointless merits and flaws.

>>1634592
Jesus christ, not again.

I don't believe in moral relativism, but that's not what this is about. To be honest, I find your ethnocentric thinking to be far worse. Your belief that every culture has to think like you do is ridiculous. Whether or not YOU support human sacrifice isn't the issue. It's what your character believes that is the issue. And if you're incapable of playing a character that thinks differently than you do, then you're a shitty player.

>My next character, if allowed, will be the sacrifice herself, having found herself with doubts, confused over why this stranger would sacrifice his life to save hers when she was ready to die, and wanting to live at least until she's figured it out.
Jesus fucking christ. I'm not the GM in question but I sure as fuck wouldn't allow that.
This is like ripping up someone's ticket to the best seat in heaven. The sacrifice would be fucking pissed at you and would probably try to escape, kill you, or kill themselves at every possible turn.

>>1634611
Well, the Darrow are an honor driven society that strives to do what they try at, and are overly concerned with respect and relationships. They also happen to have what could be described as Samurai. And perhaps a few pederastic relationships.

It should go without saying that they like the Amazon/shota country alot.

>>1634610
>>1634621
I wasn't aware there was such a stigma about GURPS around here.

I just use it because it's a simple way to chain together whatever kind of encounters I want, without giving players crutches to lean on or unnecessary hurdles. It's just a way of taking what they want to do and seeing if and how it works.

>>1634630
lol @ OP saging every time he pretends to be posting as someone else.

>>1634592
goddammit internet.

>>1634621
...you pick what you want to use. You're either a goddamn retard or so thoroughly incompetent that it's not funny. If it's complex, it's because you're the one making it that way, not because of anything else.

>>1634643
different IPs, lurk moar newfag

>>1634633
Well, I don't know much about the stigma, but I know that I'm trying to get a GURPS game going on Thursday, and only about two people even replied to the thread.

I've been beating a dead horse trying to get candy...

>>1634655
Most people who won't play are moron D&Dfags who can't do anything without a class system, so you're not missing out on much.

>>1634649
>>1634621
I didn't mean for this to turn into a debate on gaming systems (or moral relativism for that matter), it's just the only system I'm really familiar with enough that is open-ended enough to immediately suit the kind of things I need.
Like I said, it's very player driven so most of what the engine comes into is simple success and failure checks on skills and random encounters, that sort of thing.

>>1634632
Because no campaign is complete without shota. Well, maybe.
Personally, I prefer viking elves. Ran them once. Players just stared... they wanted Tolkein elves. They got vikings elves. Tough shit.

>>1634630
If you're a GM and you think your players should do everything you expect them to do, you're a bad GM.

If you can't roleplay an NPC thrown into a morally confusing situation like that, you're a bad GM.

And anyway, OP ran this scene for the sake of tricking his players into doing something heroic, and through his dumb moral relativism and convoluted behind-the-scenes circumstances, call it "evil".

He (I should say "You") made up all of that stuff, about explaining the community standards in favor of human sacrifice in advance to his players, after everyone here reacted to it by calling him a dick and a bad GM.

>>1634633

The main problem with GURPS is that it's a mathematics nightmare to run if you're actually all sitting around a table, especially if the players don't know the rules perfectly and you only own one rulebook between the five of you and neither the GM nor the player remember to keep rolling for his 5pt disadvantage that comes into affect in one of twelve situations and so on. Of course, most of this doesn't apply when the game is run online, especially if it's Play-by-post where the players have a lot of time to look stuff up, but still.

And the fact that it's so general that it fails at being specific most of the time. GURPS might work for fantasy and pulp adventure and horror and superheroes and anime, but most of the time it's just easier to use D&D, SotC, CoC, M&M, and BESM. If you see what I mean.

And my axe!

>>1634662
That sounds interesting. Personally, my game has Jap Elves.

And before you say it, it's a lot more of the ugly side of Japan. Racism, society where failure is unforgivable, everything controlled by the mafias etc.

>>1634651
lol so hard to relay

>>1634666
And the problem with that is that GURPS is specifically built to be a pick-and-choose system. It's not a mathematics nightmare at all if you don't want it to be, especially not if you're able to use common sense. And if it's too hard for your players? You simplify or don't play with them for being retards.

If the players are new? You'll have more problems with making them learn d20, since everything but damage is handled in the same manner in GURPS. d20? AC, magic, etcetera.

Seriously, you faggots exaggerate GURPS' 'difficulty' way too much. It's not a hard system to use.

>>1634663
"Morally confusing situation".

What a load of bull. The woman would've slit her own throat the second she was "rescued". She most certainly wouldn't have started pondering on moral questions. It was her fervant hope that she be sacrificed. Either she would kill the players for disturbing the most holy ritual, or kill herself in the hopes of getting it done. The last thing she'd do would be to think that "What if I was wrong?". Also, if it was said the sacrifice were an, say, orc male, you wouldn't even have blinked an eye at that. Double standard.

>>1634139
That chlorinating the faith pool

>>1634666
>if the players don't know the rules perfectly
That's exactly the kind of situation I try to avoid. I try to let my players know about what they're capable of, and do my best to give them a good understanding of their situation, and let them have at it.
It's up to them to figure out what they want to do, and it's up to me to use the rules to figure out how to make it work.

The best part in GURPS is precisely that it isn't specific. It works perfectly for a time/dimension travel game. The players can make any kind of character they wish and it'll supposedly work. This is it's genius.

>>1634662

I have Viking elves (in addition to my standard Imperial Era British elves) in my current setting. Except they don't use boats, they just rush out of the forests to raid villages and stuff and are generally crazy-savage. You know how in your standard fantasy world, orcs always occupy the position of tribal raiders? I decided to make it viking-themed elves.

Also, my halflings and gnomes are a slight genetic quibble in the one race, and they're basically Arabic-themed, living in jeweled oasis-cities in the desert and summoning efreeti and djinni and demons as servants. I thought it was kinda interesting, at least.

>>1634662
Well, technically the Trow are viking elves. They dress in leather clothing, carry hueg leik xbawks weapons, tower over normal men, and tell great stories and sing bawdry songs. They also have ears so long the only thing I can compare them to are rabbits.

Also, point of note, Trow have mottled skin that ranges from brown to white, so technically they're the Dark Elves, while the Darrow, who are short, dark skinned and look like elves, are actually Dwarves. Humans are Dwarves as well.
>>1634669
There's bad parts to every one of my races (Like how a nazi type group of said MagiTek Evles tricked the Humans and the Orcs into going to war with each other. When both sides realized what was going on... well, anyone over about 30 isn't going to like the Alvain, and any Alvain over thirty is going to be as polite as possible when in the same city as an Orc or Human.)

>>1634674

You know, this has been a lot about moral relativism, which I don't think applies here, and the sanctity of life and the values that we hold given our own cultural upbringing. But one thing I haven't really seen drawn into this discussion is the god in question.

Consider this: Back in the times of Ancient Greece, it was a really bad move for anyone, even an entire army, to desecrate a temple, kill its priests, or what have you, regardless of whether they held highest regard to the same god. This was out of respect for the god, and fear of what would happen if they pissed off said god.

So if the world is highly mystical and everyone very much has the fear of god in them, wouldn't that add another reason not to interfere? I mean pissing off a god is a bad idea, and there's no quicker way to piss off a god than to kill one of his highest priests IN HIS TEMPLE.

Do the gods ever actually interact with the PCs/NPCs in this campaign? If so, killing the priest would be a bad idea not only for the characters but the players, because they could be making an enemy bigger than any of them could ever hope to handle!

>>1634655
>>1634661

I'm >>1634488 >>1634569

I don't know a thing about GURPS but damn, let me know when either of you are doing these things, I'll sit in and see if its something I can get into.

>I don't believe in moral relativism,

Yes you do.

>Your belief that every culture has to think like you do is ridiculous.

See, that's moral relativism. There is such a thing as right and wrong, and it doesn't vary by culture. Just because your culture thinks that exterminating the Tutsi is a righteous act doesn't mean it's ridiculous or insulting that other people disagree or think you savages because of it.

>you're a shitty player.

No, fuck off. I'm perfectly capable of playing a character who believes in human sacrifice. In WoD I played a Nephandus based on the Malfean idea that life is an aberration that seperates us from peace and unity with Father Wyrm and spent his time talking people into suicide, sacrificing people, and spreading misery. When threatened he'd attack the most vulnerable target with slow poison, forcing his enemies to worry about triage instead of chasing him. He was also a pretty nice, thoughtful guy, who genuinely had everyone's best interests at heart. He truly believed in what he was doing and was more civil and reasonable than the Garou trying to kill him. He could make better arguments than they could.

But I didn't make any excuses for him. His actions were evil, he was misguided. He wasn't just 'from a different culture'. That's insulting.

And I *chose* to play that character. It wasn't foisted on me by the GM.

>Jesus fucking christ. I'm not the GM in question but I sure as fuck wouldn't allow that.

That's my point, it would piss the GM off in *exactly* the same way he's trying to trap and piss off the players. He doesn't have to allow me to play it, sure, but bear in mind that the GM can't tell anyone what character to play - he can only say whether they're allowed to play it or not.

It's a small but an important distinction.

>This is like ripping up someone's ticket to the best seat in heaven. The sacrifice would be fucking pissed at you and would probably try to escape, kill you, or kill themselves at every possible turn.

People aren't animals. Sometimes they respond one way, sometimes they respond another. If someone died to stop you doing something your religion told you was a really good idea, you might be pissed at them and think them madmen, or you might wonder why and begin to have doubts. Both are plausible. Which actually happens? That's up to whoever's running the character, isn't it?

>>1634676
That's what I did as well: "Remember, this isn't Final Fantasy, you can do whatever you want (within reason) and I'll tell you what you need to roll" Which is why one player lit a book on fire and threw it at a monster. Of course, when he messed up trying it with a flask of liquer and a piece of paper he fumbled and burned his hand.

>>1634679
This thread should be about Elves

>>1634672

I didn't say I actually disliked GURPS; a few people in this thread said it sucked, and a few people, presumably including you, said it was great. I tried to give a reasonable description of a few flaws with the system, not to say that every single thing about it was bad. It's very useful for universal or genre-spanning games, as >>1634678 describes, and for people who don't want to have to remember several different sets of rules for different types of game. It's major flaw is just that it's complex to learn and difficult to play off the top of your head. In contrast, d20 is easy because everybody knows how to play it already, not because it's actually a better system, although I'd say it's specialised enough that it works better at not-that-serious pulp fantasy than GURPS does.

Anyway, I don't want to start a systemwar, so let's go back to just talking about stuff that happened in games, eh?

>>1634674
That's an absurdly oversimplified model of human thought and behavior.

No society is going to last long if they don't uphold the basic preference for life over death as a general value. Even for a fanatic, the sacrifice of their own life is always going to raise some doubt.

Once you isolate a willing sacrificial victim from the context in which they were willing to be sacrificed, they are likely to entertain contrary thoughts.

>Also, if it was said the sacrifice were an, say, orc male, you wouldn't even have blinked an eye at that. Double standard.
This is so offensively stupid, I'm tempted to assume it's a troll.

Even in the stereotypical fantasy settings you seem to be accusing me of adhering to, it would be strongly against the values and standards of "good" characters, who would kill "evil" orcs on sight, to ritually *sacrifice* a helpless one.

A god that hungers for the blood of intelligent creatures is not a "good" one.

>>1634689
Thursday. Just pick one of the races I mentioned before and tell me what kind of character you want to be, and I'll set you up.

>>1634692
While I don't agree with the guy who said he'd roll up the sacrifice, because he'd be a dick about it, the idea of the sacrifice wanting to live until she found out why they guy had stopped it is interesting. Then again, I have my cinematic goggles on, so I see brave warrior stopping the knife and thinking he's doing the right thing while the girl is just like, "y u do dis?" And then he gets an arrow in his back and his last words are something like, "Live on" so she travels with the party to understand the man who tried to save her when she didn't want to be. She doesn't need to give up her faith, but maybe she believes that she has more to do? And she doesn't even have to appreciate the effort. In fact it's better if she's rightfully upset, but can't go on without knowing why someone would do such a thing.

But like I said, cinematic goggles.

>>1634703
What if said god continuously performs deeds of ultimate goodness when given blood, but will die when deprived of it. Thus a society is born where only the willing are sacrificed to the good, for the good of the rest of the society. Surely such a god is not evil?

>>1634687
>>1634703
>This is so offensively stupid, I'm tempted to assume it's a troll.
Actually, the fact that most people would do nothing if it was an orc is obvious. In most settings orcs are there to die. They'd probably kill the priest and then kill the orc, reasoning that they get more EXP that way.

Though I'd like to point out that it's not likely a sacrifice would commit suicide. If it was that simple there wouldn't be priests.

>>1634674

This poster seems strangely enthusiastic about human sacrifice.

>>1634712
Perhaps the ritual was at such a stage that a suicide would be more or less the same as being sacrificed. The sacrifice would see that she'd best kill herself immediately, as her "rescuers" are unpredictable and might sully her chance to do so.

>>1634708
That sounds an awful lot like the argument that we should cut up healthy, highly-compatible people for their organs, since you can save multiple lives with the organs from one donor.

I'm not having it.

Pragmatic concerns can sometimes overrule moral ones, but that doesn't make the moral considerations any less problematic.

Anyway, how did this god survive before it had a steady flow of willing self-sacrificers?

Contrived scenario is contrived.

>>1634707

This is an awesome answer to the willing sacrifice problem. Whether or not it was reasonable given the stuff the original DM had set out, it'd be a fucking great story.

The original "oh lol, turned out that you're actually killing people who aren't evil" post was bad. Giving a bit more background so that it was "well, you really should've fucking known better rather than just assuming you're doing it wrong out of character" is average to good, depending on precisely how it was played.

The people who keep saying "no, they should've gone and killed the high priest because they know that sacrifice is wrong no matter what lol moral objectivism"... it doesn't matter if they're right or wrong. Just like it doesn't matter whether it was the DM's intention for >>1634707 's description of events to possibly happen doesn't matter. The point is, it turning out to be "lol moral objectivism" is just as bad a story as "lol moral relativitism". One of them might be right, but neither of them are any fun in a game.

now stop arguing bullshit in this thread.

>>1634720
True, if it was the stereotypical virgin sacrifice, it's not unthinkable that the people who just barged in and killed her beloved priest would rape and defile her.

God damnit, I should stop thinking before my cinematic goggles cause me to writefag the moment up...

>>1634723
If the healthy organ doners are willing, I see no reason why not to do so.

>>1634071

I play Eberron. Players already come in with an expectation that traditionally evil creature or individuals may still have goals that benefit the PCs, while Good characters will oppose them.

I personally just like situations where there is no clear cut answer. Where what you choose will be based more on your character's personal preferences and biases than ideals of justice.

Who's gonna die? The villagers who's town is experiencing a boom? Or the community of monsters that were minding their own business in their ancestral homeland before the villagers started expanding their farms to encroach on their territory and over hunting all their food. Both sides want each other to die/go away and neither side is going to leave. Everyone has families with females and children.

>>1634723
That is one of the dumbest fears I've ever heard in my entire life. You'd be better served being afraid of falling coconuts than a healthy person being killed for their organs. You should turn off your computer, unplug it, deactivate your internet, and throw all the wires and hardware away, because you are too cripplingly stupid to be near such a massively powerful tool of information. It will only make you dumber and more ridiculous as time goes on, resulting in the creation of another truly terrible assburger eating moron.

p.s. Die.

>>1634707
>She doesn't need to give up her faith, but maybe she believes that she has more to do?
That reminds me of another interesting plot turn.
Flash back to the campaign with the evil black stone containing the trapped soul of a sorcerer. He used to be a High Priest for the god of destruction. He's evil himself, but he believes his religion isn't -- that death and destruction is as necessary a part of existence as life and creation, two parts of a duplicitous whole. When he possessed that one guy who accidentally killed himself, he was about to kill the rest of the party -- but during their confrontation he was actually so moved by their resolve, unity, and moral fortitude he eventually backed down and willingly went back into the soul jar, giving the guy his body back.
After the ossuary acid incident, he's able to speak to the whole group, and becomes a sort disembodied NPC companion. Over time the party and the sorcerer begin to (almost reluctantly) warm up to each other, and the party begins to get a new perspective on the religion of Destruction.
At the end of that campaign, the heroes fought a God. This is a bad idea. One of them died and the others were about to, when one of the few adventurers left standing freed the physical seal holding prisoner ANOTHER god, who then wiped the floor with the first god. As a reward, the freed god resurrected the dead PC and restored the entire injured party to their pristine and unharmed original bodies.

...as an interesting side effect, this gave the soultrapped sorcerer his body back. Instead of resuming his post as High Priest, he continued to travel the world, feeling remarkably enlightened. He never lost his faith, but afterwards he'd learn to understand others as well, and respected creation and life a little bit more.

It was heartwarming in the way only a nine-foot-tall, 160-year-old hermaphromorphic snakeman could be.

>>1634707

So the Indian Norsemen Troll things or the Viking Elves, both sounded awesome. (I think those are races you mentioned).

Roughly what time Thursday and how would I get in touch with you?

>>1634723
Perhaps the god came out to being recently, or only recently has had the need for blood, since his life-force is going out. Or perhaps the people of this society created this god with magic and need the blood to keep it alive since it's not a real god.

>>1634723
Well, it would be more like a healthy, willing donor giving up their lives to ensure that the crops grow bountiful and their families are well fed. In the world the woman comes from she's not being murdered, she's performing a noble sacrifice and having a high honor bestowed upon her, by being among those who have ensured the continued existence of their way of life.

>>1634729
Might be interesting, if you succumb to the writefag urge, to look at it from both viewpoints, kinda contrasting the rescuers "holy fuck, must stop the evil guy with the knife" view with the sacrifices "wtf is going on?' view.

>>1634712
Exactly. They'd still disrupt the sacrifice ceremony, if they could.

A bloodthirsty god is generally not one you want to allow to be fed.

As for the orc, I think killing the sacrificial orc straight off would be bad role-play for "good" characters.

It's understandable to have a policy of "kill orcs on sight" if they've proven uniformly hostile, violent, and beyond reasoning, but the fact that he was chosen for sacrifice should make the characters at least a little curious about whether he's an exception.

>>1634728
>One of them might be right, but neither of them are any fun in a game.
That's the best answer to this shit I've heard in the whole thread. Seconded hard. Let's hope that's the end of it.

>>1634736
It never ceases to amuse me to be called stupid by someone who, by their accompanying comments, makes it completely obvious that they failed utterly at basic reading comprehension.

>>1634752
Yeah, I like vague criticism too, neckbeard. Be careful, someone might be trying to get your precious healthy kidney.

Soooooo, according to the people who would kill the high priest, let's have another hypothetical situation:

Person A knows that the only way to save his friends is to sacrifice himself by pulling a switch that unleashes a flow of lava upon himself, but away from his friends. His friends aren't going to stop him and are forever grateful for his sacrifice.

Now, the high-priest-killers would kill his friends because they aren't trying to stop him. Person A weeps bitterly as his sacrifice would have saved them, but he couldn't do it because some "heroes" killed his friends.

>While I don't agree with the guy who said he'd roll up the sacrifice, because he'd be a dick about it

Only to the extent that the GM was being a dick about it. People are too keen to post shit about how they outwitted their players without realising that they're just as vulnerable to it (and deserving of it) themselves.

I'd play it straight, the point would be to have a character who could realistically tackle the issues raised by the GM's 'trap' scene in a dramatically satisfying fashion.

>>1634757
Bonus points for doing it twice.

>Now, the high-priest-killers would kill his friends because they aren't trying to stop him.

Bad analogy is bad.

>>1634761
It wasn't a trap scene, we've been through this repeatedly.

>>1634760
A straw golem appears!

>>1634772
>It wasn't a trap scene, we've been through this repeatedly.

The title of the thread is "Playing with expectations".

It was a trap scene, despite OP's attempted retcon.

Okay, how's this:

Would the scene have played out any differently if the sacrificial maiden had been physically taking her OWN life? If she held the dagger?

Would you really stop someone who is not only willingly but eagerly sacrificing themselves?

And even if you would, consider this is obviously a world where gods are very real. It's much easier to tell someone that killing themselves won't get them God's favor when God himself doesn't routinely show up to chill for a while. And stopping a ceremony like that in the god's own temple is likely to earn you some righteous rage from the deity as well as his followers.

>>1634738
You want to be a Trow? Gotcha, you're a six foot tall warrior poet. If there are any bards they'll probably come up to you and ask if you know any good tales. Jovial and good natured, but also a sort of rugged type. A lot of Trow join the Wild Geese, a sort of Mercenary group.

Do you want to be a straight up fighter and just cut things, a Mag and shoot fireballs, or an Alchemist and basically punch things and break walls with your martial arts kung fu?

>>1634761
I don't think he was being a dick, he was highlighting cultural differences. He even said that the characters would have seen this kind of thing before. Also, what's that picture from?

I think I'll succumb to the writefaggotry after I go take a piss.

>It wasn't a trap scene, we've been through this repeatedly.

It was, all of these scenes were specifically designed to confound the players' expectations regarding traditional fantasy. That's why they're being posted in this thread, about confounding the players' expectations regarding traditional fantasy.

This doesn't always make for a good story. Stopping the sacrifice, even if it gets you into a fuckton of trouble, is many times more interesting than just shrugging, watching her get stabbed, and saying to the priest "okay, same time next year?"

>>1634777
>The title of the thread is "Playing with expectations".
You're right. The players charged into a scene using an ethnocentric understanding and ignored the way their characters were supposed to feel about it, instead reacting in a sensationalist manner. It's a good example of players not being able to distance themselves from their characters.

The players don't have to agree with the sacrifice on a moral level, nor do they have to agree with their characters letting it happen. They might think what their character is doing is wrong.
BUT THAT DOESN'T MEAN THE CHARACTER WOULD THINK THAT.
AND THAT'S THE WHOLE FUCKING POINT.

>>1634782

Straight up fighter sounds good to me.

>>1634737

Moralfaggotry aside, I really like the artwork. Are those races of your making? Could you poast moar? kthx.

>>1634761

<3 Sechs

If there's something that lies beyond tsundere, she's it.

I mean really...

The title of the thread is "Playing with expectations".

OP knew what he was doing. That's what this was about.

You send the players into a room with a classic evil cult human sacrifice scene, they react in the obvious way, and then you reveal it was all a misunderstanding and send them on a quest to atone.

THIS IS GOOD GAMING

However, OP acts annoyed and smug and superior that his players didn't understand that his blatant stereotypical "heroes arrive at the last moment to save the damsel from the wicked cultists" prompt was actually the complete opposite of what it appears.

THIS IS BAD GMING

You don't act exasperated with your players after you give them a standard urgent-action prompt unless you're an asshole.

That's really the beginning and the end of it.

>>1634778
They'd stop her, cast dominate person on her to stop her from ever killing herself, lock her in a cage and force feed her so that she won't starve herself to death.

>>1634778
I really hate to keep playing Devil's Advocate (ah, who am I kidding, Lucifer's Lawfirm has an open position I'd be first in line. I love to argue) but if she was taking her own life, the PCs probably would try to stop. And it has to be said that busting into a temple with no fear of repurcussion from a physical God is the kind of Big Damed Heroes moment PCs strive for.

>>1634792
Wow, that sounds way more humane than letting her die for what she believes in.

>>1634778
First, stop her evil act of human sacrifice.

Second, kill her for XP.

Third, go through her pockets for treasure.

>>1634791
>You send the players into a room with a classic evil cult human sacrifice scene, they react in the obvious way
I made it clear a dozen times now that they knew better. This was not some heretofore unknown occurrence. YES, if I had dropped them in blind and done this it would have been a dick move, and NO that's not what happened.

>You don't act exasperated with your players
I don't think I ever, at any point in this thread, made any comment about what happened afterwards or how I acted with them. You're attacking an argument that was never made.

>>1634798
>And it has to be said that busting into a temple with no fear of repurcussion from a physical God is the kind of Big Damed Heroes moment PCs strive for.
I'm all for PC empowerment, but in a campaign with this much focus on divine intervention my PCs should never be completely without fear of repercussion from the various Gods.
It's not that I haven't given them power: they faced off against a god and won, and on numerous occasions defeated the evil minions of an evil god in such a brilliant way that they had no repercussion coming.
But if they're going to violate ANY temple they should still be aware of the consequences.

This is kind of how I see this playing out. I can understand this logic in the real world but in a place where gods exist and interact with mortals on a regular basis I think a rescheduling of priorities is in order.

>>1634820
I know, I just think it makes an awesome Big Damed Heroes moment. Of course, the moment falls flat when it turns out they were in the wrong. Also, Arbiter, give me the names of the PCs and the NPCs.

>>1634822
>moral deadativism.jpg
I lol'd heartily.

This anon is passing the fuck out. (8:30AM)

Edward, Thursday, I'll strive to be there.

Arbiter, whenever you're doing your campaigns again, remember you have interested people here if you need more.

>>1634829
>Also, Arbiter, give me the names of the PCs and the NPCs.
Say what? What difference does that make?

>>1634830
Drop me a line, then. E-mail attached.

>>1634834

Will do.

Edward, anyway to get in touch with you?

>>1634817
>I made it clear a dozen times now that they knew better. This was not some heretofore unknown occurrence.

Oh, and this is just so plausible.

You start a "Playing with expectations" thread to brag about making your players look stupid (in the guise of bitching about them being stupid).

You post:
>The players burst, weapons drawn, into a temple in a small backwoods town they were investigating to find a woman tied to the altar and a dark priest smeared with blood standing over her with a sacrificial dagger.
>Only after they had slaughtered the high priest and his aides did they learn that not only were annual sacrifices both common and accepted for that religion, but that the maiden in question was being willingly sacrificed. It was considered the highest honor possible in their faith.

>Only after they had slaughtered the high priest and his aides did they learn

Then you try to backpedal and claim "they should have known!"

...yeah.

...after you set them up to burst in on a sacrifice ritual at the precise moment the priest was raising the dagger.

...this was not at all a double-dick move of first imposing your concept of moral relativity, that they are wrong to interfere with the sacrifice because it was the accepted custom of these people, and secondly of creating an absurdly contrived situation for the specific purpose of leading the players to take an action you would later sneer at them for taking.

...yeah.

>>1634842
meh, I guess send me an e-mail and I'll try to remember to look at it. Otherwise just say something to me when I post the "GURPS Game: NAO" thread tomorrow.
It should be sometime around five or six.

Also, I need names so I can writefag it up. At the moment her name is Sara and the priest's name is Garreth

>YES, if I had dropped them in blind and done this it would have been a dick move, and NO that's not what happened.

It was still a dick move, sorry. This thread is all about your desire to confound your players' cinematic expectations, you made that clear from the start.

>I don't think I ever, at any point in this thread, made any comment about what happened afterwards or how I acted with them. You're attacking an argument that was never made.

"THAT SAID, I can't fucking stand it when players play every campaign like it's Lord of the Rings or WoW and slaughter every ugly creature or bow to every good-looking woman or what have you. Players have become so comfortable in the genre of medieval fantasy that they always think they know what to expect and how to act, often ignoring their characters' motivations, understandings, limitations, etc."

How is this not exasperation, you fucking backpedalling liar?

>>1634852
oops, forgot to add my horrible e-mail.

>>1634850
>You start a "Playing with expectations" thread to brag about making your players look stupid
This thread was actually supposed to be about fun and entertaining stories about things not turning out as you expect.

>Only after they had slaughtered the high priest and his aides did they learn
I misspoke. Or rather, I used a simplified phrase to present a simplified version of what had happened. I'm sorry if that's somehow not good enough for you.

If I had realized it would make people like you turn this thread from something fun to a huge argument about how I'm a terrible GM and should have my license revoked and how I support cannibalism and stoning and all that, I never would have mentioned it.

I didn't kill my PCs for it. I didn't even get them in any serious trouble. I essentially let them run away and by and large put it behind them. I'm not saying the fault was all theirs, for obviously it wasn't.

I think you're overreacting.
And you should really just knock it off already.

>>1634822

>>1634853

>How is this not exasperation, you fucking backpedalling liar?
I liked it better when you were calling him a "vile little aspie"

>>1634853
>>1634850
Well, it's obvious from the first post that "Playing with Player Expectations" doesn't mean being a dickish DM, but having PCs who assume that generic Tolkien-esque rules are at play.

He's also pointed out that prior to this event the PCs had had experience with this sort of thing.

It's no more being a dick than the thing with the Dragon librarian. Playing with Expectations isn't setting them up to fail, it's them setting themselves up to fail by ignoring the rules.

>>1634791
>>1634850
>>1634853

Shut up. Seriously shut the fuck up.

I don't know why you've got a bug up your ass over all this or why you've made it your personal mission to try to make some random schlub look like the worst DM of the year but at this point we've all seen you have an enormous e-penis and you sure did take this guy down a notch with your namecalling and angry accusations like he was some sort of horrible archnemesis who killed your parents and raped your dog. Bravo. Congratulations. Job well done. Now just leave the thread because we were done talking about the sacrifice bullshit like four god damned hours ago.

>I misspoke. Or rather, I used a simplified phrase to present a simplified version of what had happened. I'm sorry if that's somehow not good enough for you.

I'd believe that if it weren't for your prior announcement that you thought it was awesome to catch your players out, but by all means keep backpedalling.

>If I had realized it would make people like you turn this thread from something fun to a huge argument about how I'm a terrible GM and should have my license revoked and how I support cannibalism and stoning and all that, I never would have mentioned it.

Yes, we realise that you were hoping everyone would just laugh at how clever you were and how stupid your players were.

>And you should really just knock it off already.

'should' = 'I would really like you to'

>>1634871
No, that was me.

I'm rather proud of "vile little aspie". It fits OP so perfectly, with his situational ethics, moral relativism, conveniently flexible sense of truth, and sneering self-superiority, all revealed over something as trivial as a make-believe circle jerk.

>I liked it better when you were calling him a "vile little aspie"

That wasn't me.

>Shut up. Seriously shut the fuck up.

WELCOME TO FUCKING 4CHAN

>>1634883
>>1634884

rofl

This thread's gotten ridiculously stupid.

when did /tg/ turn into /b/?

I once GM'd a game where a tribe of peaceful goblins sent a plea to the PCs to help them fight off a drow invasion.
The HACKANSLASHAN Paladin of the group flipped out and tried to kill the goblin that delivered the message, but was subdued by the team Fighter who had three levels of Reaping Mauler and used Sleeper Lock on him.
The same fighter went on to defeat the drow champion in one-on-one combat, saving the peaceful goblins and becoming a hero to their tribe.
(Reaping Mauler is from Complete Warrior, page 75.)

>>1634895
Oh look another smug-ass DM trying to brag about how stupid his players are.

Like all threads about DMing, this one's turned into yet another vitriolic accusationfest. As per standard, bonus points will be awarded to every poster who attacks a GM as if he caused a personal slight against said poster.

Everyone stop dissing Arbiter.
I kind of like twists like the ones he's used.

>>1634900
Fuck you. Players are stupid assholes.

>>1634895
Awesome story. I wish I was one of your players.

>>1634895
>The same fighter went on to defeat the drow champion in one-on-one combat, saving the peaceful goblins and becoming a hero to their tribe.
That sounds like a fucking epic final showdown.

>>1634900
If you'll notice, most of these are also tales of PCs who stayed in character and didn't kill the Dragon, Danced with the Zombie maid, and rescued the Goblins. All going against common Fantasy knowledge

>>1634908
>>1634900

same /b/tard trying to turn a good thread into a flamewar.

Man, all this talk about Viking Elves and sex-changing snakepeople and talking trees and amazon trows and shit really makes me yearn for an Original Content thread. DMs showcasing races and other stuff they've made up. I like reading worldgen more than I like having to make it.

>>1634922
fuck you!

different /b/tards!

>>1634921
None of these stories would be as interesting if they didn't have amusing outcomes.
Which is probably part of why so many people jumped on the sacrifice thing. But we don't even know how that ended.

Oh man, I have a good one for you. A lich, who was both lawful and good, had information the PCs wanted. Said lich, who was basically a request from one of my group members who wanted something out of the ordinary and funny, kept having his fingers fall off and was reattaching them with sovereign glue. My PCs stormed his tower, killed all of his non-hostile minions (he even had a zombie wal-mart greeter outside), kicked in his door. The smart PC was frantically apologising, but they ended up slaughtering the lich and collapsing the small island the tower was on.

As they sailed away, one of the HACKAN SLASHAN PCs turned to me and said "What were we supposed to be doing there, again?"

I damn near cried. The stupidity was literally painful.

At first I was wondering why so many people were so incredibly worked up in their argument against the OP, but then it occurred to me they might have been on the receiving end of a DM trick like this and kind of have a chip on their shoulder about the whole thing. Maybe the reason they're making this so personal is because it's happened to them with bad results.

>>1634935
I feel even more sorry for that one PC than I do for you as a GM, because he was fighting it every step of the way. That's a fucking shame, man. Sounds like you had quite an encounter lined up, too. A whole tower of weird stuff.

Also in b4 another accusation of smug GMing.

>>1634935
To be fair, according to the standard rules, all liches are evil. The process for becoming a lich is evil, and it's just not possible to have a good lich.

And further, the creation of zombies is evil, due to desecration of body, torment and enslavement of the spirit, mumble mumble something

etc. etc.

It does sound like an amusing set-up, but you do have to be true to the cosmic laws of the gaming universe, or there's no grounds for suspension of disbelief.

> Like all threads about DMing, this one's turned into yet another vitriolic accusationfest.

You fuck dogs.

>>1634948
>To be fair, according to the standard rules, all liches are evil.
Well, yeah, that's how it's traditionally understood. But there's nothing to say his gameworld didn't have rewritten rules on the subject. Most of the misunderstandings in this thread came from impressing understandings from one game world onto another.

The fact that most players wouldn't think it's possible should never outweigh a character's own judgement, and if the lich and his minions were displaying good manners and proper respect and so on, then how closed-minded would the characters have to be to ignore that completely?

>>1634924
I love making world gen, then reading other people's world gen and reallocating it to fit in my world.

Sort of like theft, but with more thinking.
As an example, there was something where someone had a demon or the like, and it was just something time sharing their body. I took that and the Stargate Goa'uld/Tokra and I'm sort of developing my own thing where "Demons" are just symbiotes time sharing a body, and they aren't really evil except on an individual basis.

And then I reallocated the fantasy races like I already said, and truth be told I reallocated the Matriarchal Drow society into the Risar, the Amazon/shota race.

The best example of my reallocation though, the Bean Nigh. Also the example I constantly use. The original Bean Nigh is a scottish faerie ghost that appears as an old woman washing bloody clothing. Whoever sees a Bean Nigh is said to be seeing their clothing being washed, and the event foretells a horrible death. Well, the superstition still exists, but it's not really got any basis in truth. In truth, the Bean Nigh is just a spidery woman who uses a silk net to catch and eat fish. That net ends up looking like bloody clothing to passersby though.

Faeries themselves are people looking Bugs that live like Ants and Wasps.

>and it's just not possible to have a good lich.

Wasn't there an LG lich king in Gayhawk?

>>1634957
>You fuck dogs.

Your mom fucks dogs.
I only fuck cats.

>>1634937
It's because OP is sneering superiorly at his players for responding as prompted to his deliberately misleading cues.

The attitude is the whole reason. You don't GM to outsmart your players. You don't maneuver as a GM to make your players look stupid so you can trash talk them behind their backs.

That is just not what gaming is about, and it's a really disgusting way to behave.

>>1634959
>I love making world gen, then reading other people's world gen and reallocating it to fit in my world.
As a fellow worldgenerator I couldn't agree more. I subconsciously steal shit all the time, and every once in a while I'll see something so cool I know I have to find a way to work in something similar into my world.

No world can be wholly original, but then, novelty is useless without appeal. It's a fine balance.

If there's a zombie in a well tailored vest greeting the NPCs all friendly like, they probably should have not tried to kill him.

>>1634937

Internet psychoanalyst detected.

Let's hear your theory on how all the people arguing the opposite side have a repressed desire to murder hookers next.

>I only fuck cats.

A cat is fine too.

>>1634964
>You don't GM to outsmart your players.

I know a lot of GMs who would disagree. I'm amazed you're so pissed at this one guy instead of taking up arms against all the GMs who toil to make instant-death traps with as many impossibly unforseeable catches as possible. Lots of GMs delight in massacring their players at every turn.
Come to think of it, did they even die from the whole sacrifice thing?

>>1634970
>Let's hear your theory on how all the people arguing the opposite side have a repressed desire to murder hookers next.

Fuck on a stick, man, ease off. All I said was that it's possible you've seen a very rank version of this kind of thing played on you by a very meanspirited DM and as a result it left a bad taste in your mouth. I never implied your mother was a whore or you like to fuck donkeys or any shit like that. I was just thinking out loud. Why are you so bloody angry? You're spitting acid at every person in the thread. Lighten up a little.

>>1634976
Yeah, and they completely miss the point of being a DM, too. The idea is that the players win in the end. Sure, a BAD END every once in a while adds a bit of 'realism' but a game that's Players vs. DM is basically harkening back to those playground days of make-believe where one side goes "uh-huh!" and the DM emphatically shouts "nuh-uh!" The idea of a DM is grounded in the very terminology of the setting. Seriously. Challenge rating? Encounter level? You're supposed to adjust it to a point where your players consider it an obstacle that must (and will be) overcome, not something that will kill them brutally or require running away. You want to add that bit of 'gritty reality?' Be up front about it. Don't just suddenly spring up an impossible situation and then ask "what do you do?!" -- There aren't nearly enough veterans out there that even have a response to that.

Goddamnit, this writefaggotry is just tempting me to write it as porn! I'm sitting in Class, I can't be writing porn!
Young nubile girl laying on a sacrificial alter, tied with ceremonial red string? Old man about to plunge a knife in her chest as she waits excitedly to fulfill her sacred duty?!

>>1634970
Wait, you mean other people don't?

>>1635007

Jesus fucking christ, YES. This is EXACTLY what a DM should be.

God damn i want to burn some of these old school ideals out, they're so fucking contrary and caustic to fun/good/interesting gaming.

>your mother was a whore
>you like to fuck donkeys

WHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT?!!!!

I'LL EAT YOUR KIDNEYS FOR THAT DIRTBAG

RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGE

>>1635007
RUNNING AWAY IS A FUCKING FANTASTIC OPTION.

FOR BOTH YOUR ENEMIES AND YOUR PLAYERS. PEOPLE WHO DON'T GET THAT DISCRETION IS THE BETTER PART OF VALOR ARE DEAD.

CRUISE CONTROL FOR COOL

>>1634964
>OP is sneering superiorly at his players
>deliberately misleading cues
>don't GM to outsmart your players
>don't maneuver as a GM to make your players look stupid so you can trash talk them behind their backs

I understand you've got this nice image of me as some big hot-air-filled prick who loves nothing more than to laugh at his players, but the truth is I love my players and we've been going on this gameworld nearly three years now. We've got a good relation, and I'm certainly not doing anything intentionally mean-spirited just to laugh at them or make them look or feel stupid.

After the whole sacrifice thing, everyone sort of realized what just happened and I was caught mostly flat-footed, so I essentially let them run off and by and large forget that it ever happened. It's not what I wanted to happen, so I basically wrote it off. It was partially due to the players and I'll also admit a lot of it was my fault, but at the time I honestly wasn't expecting that reaction. I posted the scene here because, in engaging traditional action, the scene played out in a non-traditional way.

They didn't get punished for making a "bad choice" and I didn't sneer at them for playing the scene out differently than I wanted them to or rub it in their faces or anything. I took it as at least as much my fault as theirs and gave them a free pass on account of my own shortcomings.

When all was said and done we'd all slipped up and we patched it over and went on with our game. No hurt feelings, no lasting injuries, no feelings of superiority -- just an odd anecdote to tell later. That's really the sum and whole of it.

And if you don't want to accept that then I don't know what else I can do for you.

>>1635007
As a DM it's my job to throw hordes of monsters, puzzles, and situations for the PCs to outsmart so that they have Big Damned Heroes moments.

Because that's what they are, Big Damed Heroes.

The people who think that the point of a DM is to kill the PCs have been doing it wrong.

>>1635007
No, I agree. I wasn't supporting those kind of DMs who kill their players at every turn. In fact I was saying they're much more deserving of internet rage than some amateur DM who just made a shoddy encounter. He didn't even kill them for it.

>>1635034
>>outsmart

I'm not sure who's side you are on.

>>1635034
>>Because that's what they are, Big Damed Heroes.

OMG, you powergamer. All your characters are probably optimized mary sues with a bajillion powers and D&D is trying to turn into a videopgame where you can do anything you want and take over the world and nobody can stop you waaah! Melee characters should never have a fraction of the power spellcasters do, blah blah!

>>1635030
I'm not talking about your behavior in your game session.

I'm talking about your behavior in this thread.

For all I know, you never even played a session. And frankly, I don't care.

But here you have been, describing how you set players up with clear cues, then sneering (here in this thread) at them for following them.

That is revolting behavior.

>Yeah, and they completely miss the point of being a DM, too. The idea is that the players win in the end.

>>1635054
That's punishing METAGAMING. Because the DM gave this guy a name, he must be important! Look, he very carefully described this sword! Must be a clue!

PLAYERS SHOULD NOT METAGAME!!!1111oneoneones

>>1635054

ITT we talk about other people acting superior and then in the same post act condescending and superior.

>>1635030
>I understand you've got this nice image of me as some big hot-air-filled prick who loves nothing more than to laugh at his players
I've got this nice image of you were you're the Arbiter thing from Halo 2 and you're dressed like you're going to a RenFair and you have a monocle and a miniature in your hand.

>>1635050
Well, they haven't Mary Sued yet. And I don't do DnD, I do GURPS. The point of a Big Damned Heroes moment is for the PCs to come out against all odds, to outsmart the Big Bad, to save people from guaranteed-or-your-money-back assured destruction. I mean, if they aren't feeling like Conan or something, what's the point of them playing? There's plaenty of moral relativism and Black and Grey Morality, but in the end, they're heroes. Big Damned ones.

>>1635046
No no, the Players are the ones outsmarting the enemies.

>>1635061
Werewizard?

Also, is that the Guide to DMing I've heard about? Got a link to a scan or something?

>>1635071
>>No no, the Players are the ones outsmarting the enemies.

So the DM should be smart enough to provide a challenge, but not try to actually outsmart them.

How are they supposed to have fun if they know they can't lose?

>>1635077
>>1635054
I know there's nothing much going on this time of day but jesus, do you really have to make every last reply into some sort of attack on the DM posting?

>>1635077
The DM has absolute control over what happens in the game.

If he tries to "outsmart" the players, if he makes it "DM vs. players", he's going to start caring about "winning", and that's going to ruin the players' fun every single time.

>>1635054
>>But here you have been, describing how you set players up with clear cues, then sneering (here in this thread) at them for following them.

Maybe it's just me, but I haven't seen a whole lot of that pompous sneering you describe so strongly in this thread, and definitely not any relating to the sacrifice thing. The worst I've seen is in the very first post where he talks about Players making bad choices cause they think they know what to expect, and that's a lukewarm putdown at best because players ARE stupid alot.

This thread's not bumping anymore, so I'm going to start a new one.

Suggestions on a topic? I'm thinking something about worldgen and original content like Edward and that other guy were talking about, or maybe just interesting clips from various campaigns we've been in. Any thoughts?

Also, taking bets on whether or not this whole argument is going to be dragged into the next thread too.

>>1635099
That was the opening post of the thread. That was the context for all the rest of his posts.

If someone starts a thread, "My players are FUCKING MORONS" and then starts making posts describing play experiences with his players, it's a reasonable assumption he is doing so as examples in which his players were fucking morons.

>>1635076

That's Monster Horrorshow, it's a simple RPG written by a magnificent lunatic named J.H. Brennan. It contains some very good basic advice on GMing.

Werewizard is what he calls a GM. Character creation consists of '100 life points each, any equipment the PLAYER is wearing or carrying.' There are monsters with names like 'Pondoozlewazzle Bird'.

I'm toying with the idea of scanning the whole thing.

>>1635111
Oh jesus, don't start a new one.

>This thread's not bumping anymore, so I'm going to start a new one.

>>1635121
>If someone starts a thread, "My players are FUCKING MORONS"
That wasn't what this thread was about. That's what you made it into.

>>1635121
>>1635125
>>1635134
same fag

>>1635111
I say world gen

>>1635111
If you make a new thread now, absolutely no matter what it is about, this same one butthurt dude is gonna roll up in your thread and start talking about how you're a SMUG CONDESCENDING GM and will respond to everything you say with YOU ARE SMUG AND DISGUSTING. It could be about painting miniatures and he'll be all YOU ARE REVOLTING YOU OUGHT TO BE SHOT OR SOMETHING and if you talk about space marines he'll say DAMN WILL YOU GUYS LOOK AT HOW HE'S SNEERING WHAT A FUCKING JERK

My players ran into some very major trouble when they were sent to a Border Fort to investigate why the garrison hadn't reported back in some time. Upon arrival they realize that something else has taken up living in the fort. They charge the fort, yelling and screaming, only to be shot at by crossbowmen on the parapets. They survive the hail of bolt fire only to find the front door is barred. After a few rounds of bashing and setting the door on fire, they find 4 WereRats standing in a defensive formation, ready for battle. Having no silver weapons, they get their asses kicked in a heart beat and are forced to retreat. Later returning w/silver weapons, they proceed to likewise bash in the door once again. However, one of the party members (a druid) manages to figure out that he can speak to them when using talk with animals. They rapidly find out that in fact, the Lycanthropes in the fort had been living there for sometime and there was never any garrison. The fort had been abandoned for some time and they simply took up living there. TL;DR : Players bashed in a den of Lycanthropes homes and got pwnt.

>>1635009
O.o damn that practically writs itself. I can see it, heaving bosom and all.

My PCs were attempting to track a necromancer through a snowy mountain pass, when they get the bright idea to send the monk up a tall tree about 50 feet off the path. He sees some goblins up ahead, lying in ambush and warns the party!

He yells "Ambush up ahead!"

Of course, yelling things in a snowy mountain pass isn't clever at the best of times, and they were all buried in a small avalanche. It worked out pretty well for the party though, through a variety of spells they managed to stay alive and all the goblins died...

>>1635139

Only the third one was me.

>>1635180

Sorry, I meant to do a bit of an expose on how I like to throw in some Man vs. Nature in my campaigns because players never seem to believe they should have to pay attention to the weather or how it affects them.

>>1634360
>>One of the best ways of turning clichéd genre expectations around is to make some baseless rumor or legend simply turn out to be wrong.

This works out pretty well, even if it's little things. My party once ran across a hill giant on a trek from point A to point B, but he was no source of real conflict. He threw a few large stones from what amounted to his maximum range atop the side of the valley the group were traveling through and the party loosed a few arrows and crossbow bolts before the giant backed down.

The party gets to where they were going and -- I admit to being somewhat guilty of being kind of dick here -- I let out a bit of information (through an NPC when the party mentioned a giant in the area) that's all but verbatim in the Monster Manual's giant section: Giants are RUMORED to be rich and hoarders of gold and jewels.

Really! Look it up!

So on the way back, the group keeps on the lookout for the giant and eventually spot him, standing jealously on a hillside, wanting only to scare off the party if they got too deep into his territory. The party goads him into a fight, as he's not bright enough to measure the odds or keep his temper in check.

He is quickly slain. The party spend almost a full day looking for his residence, eventually finding the place. They rush in immediately start looking for loot, by digging through the ex-giant's louse-infested straw bedding, the pile of leftover, rotting food and bones, and what amounted to the guy's laundry hamper.

The group finds a few items of interest, but hardly anything worth going out of the way for. Thankfully, I planned for finding the giant's cave as a segue into the next part of the campaign, so no one was the wiser.

>>1635220
In after JUST AS PLANNED

>>1634102
Ahahaha, I need to spring that on my players.