Last game session, we got to enjoy the telephone game - I mentioned this Friday, but it's worth repeating here.
"The telephone game is alive and well. One of my players suggested getting some arrows of dragon slaying, because Puissance +3 is cheap on arrows and any weapon with Puissance +3 is Slaying. So, almost none of that is actually true. But half-remembered rules and events get passed along and become, to paraphrase Phillip J. Fry, widely-believed facts.
You have to wonder how many things in Felltower are regarded differently than they actually are thanks to similar half-remembered details passed along, morphed, and then re-remembered. I'm half curious but mostly I deliberately tune out the player discussions to avoid giving away what I actually think."
It got me thinking about Felltower and the "played out" nature of it. It's been voiced repeatedly by my players, old and new, that Felltower really has no more easy areas and only near-certain death areas. You need to be X points to survive what's ahead, no one is X points, and getting those points requires new exploration or loot and that's all played out in the survivable areas. How true is that?
There are a good number of "unsolvable" encounters, auto-death locations, places that need special abilities to usefully interact with, and so on. But are they always what they seem?
There are a few places that newer players - and some vets alike - would like to go and deal with. But they're shot down when suggested because they are rejected by a sufficient number of players (a plurality, in general, of nos vs. a minority each of yesses and agnostic.) I think some of them are a variation of the telephone game. You get player memories of events their previous PC enountered, accounts written down by me after the game session, and what people remember being told second hand. It creates a stew of uncertainty.* My players are, to a degree, willing to risk their PCs in a fight, but only if they know it is winnable and has a reward. But what gets defined as "winnable" is colored heavily by the telephone game.
More than once I've heard people bring up an idea, and have it shot down for reasons I know are, at best, oversold. This can be a big downside to a megadungeon or any other repeat-play area. Because you can find out things now to make tasks easier later, there is a reluctance to take a jump into the unknown, and a strong reluctance to try where group memory says something is hard.
I am not really sure what a solution is for this problem. It remains one of the big issues of Felltower right now - people have combed over the "easy" stuff again and again and again, and take a shot at the risky stuff only when there is no choice. Or not even then. Sometimes they're right to do so . . . but other times, it's just a case of misinformation becoming common sense. How to resolve this? I don't actually know.
* I need to stat up Stew of Uncertainty at some point. Maybe next April 1st.
"How to resolve this? I don't actually know."
ReplyDeleteThis is why I don;t run this style of game, it is by nature adversarial. AS GM you feel you //have// to withhold information "to make it more fun", even when withholding information is in fact doing the opposite.
There are a number of methods to move forward, but all of them require lifting (to some degree) the information blackout. Either point out where they've over estimated the danger, or find a way to give or allow them access to information methods where the Players/Characters could clear up some of these misunderstandings (Intuition, spending exp for single use Impulse Buy information sources, etc).
Regardless the problem at hand is PC misinformation or poor/spotty information and your "old school" style of withholding everything the Players haven't discovered themselves and refusing to correct them when they get something wrong* are at odds.
* It's an old problem, Player vs Character information, how to separate the two, how much information to hold back or give, and how much to correct when Players misinterpret for various reasons. I prefer the more generous routes (as GM I know everything, the Players know next to nothing, but the Characters should have 'realistic' amounts on in game knowledge), and also constantly repeat the mantra, "That's why there are skills written on the character sheet.".
Not necessarily accurate forms of in-game information are available in Felltower, usually for zero in-game cost:
Delete- Prior game summaries
- Rumors
- Player memories
Accurate forms of in-game information are available, usually for a cost of money, time, effort, or energy. PCs have access to:
- Divination spells (sometimes vague, only inaccurate 1 in 216 times)
- Sages (more like 90-95% accurate)
- Hidden Lore skill rolls (accuracy depends on skill)
- a couple of divination-adjacent in-dungeon locations, including the oracular pool (accuracy 100% if you spend a point)
There are occasional GM pronouncements - I've told them the Ape Gate isn't a worthwhile destination unless a) they have a plan of something to do or b) just attack everyone. Going and hoping the apes give them a quest isn't going to work. I've told them the Jester Gate is very dangerous but very rewarding. I've told them the Forest Gate is done, not to go back unless I do something to clearly signal it's a worthwhile destination. I've told them when areas are totally played out. I've pointed out when they're potentially in way over their heads, and when not. So it's not like they get nothing from me. I just don't opine on things that would tilt the table one way or another based on information they don't have or I can't know is true. For example, I could probably just list some things they think that are inaccurate, but there is a big caveat. I may think that, say, the dragon is a doable fight, and then they may do poorly and die. I can tell them if it's the same beholder from both TPKs, or if it isn't, but will that change anything about how tough the fight is? No. I think they can win but they might not.
Additionally, I try to make do-over type magic pretty prevalent. Resurrection is as little as $5,000. I've placed a number of wishes and there are more out there. I've given out blesses and Luck items and don't penalize people for using cheapy tactics to investigate like Create Servant or Wizard Eye.
And I don't keep a Player vs. PC knowledge split. You get to know the stuff you do, it's just that your skills affect your ability to act on it. So they can read the monster manual if they choose, read the spell rules, etc. and use that information. Go for it. It's not always accurate but it's mostly so.
So I do feel like I make accurate information available, and provide a buffer of recovery if they're wrong. It's just not sufficient.
I'll have to see what my players think of all of this. I sometimes feel like I could play with all dice rolls open and enemy stats visible and it might just be as discouraging as not knowing. People seem to want certainty, but they want certainty of results more than certainty of knowledge.
Yeah, I forgot about your direct pronouncements and how many PC Knowledge sources you have.
DeleteI guess this is more a "Player Skill Issue" then, they need to organize their knowledge a bit better and make some actionable plans to accrue more knowledge to fill in their gaps.
Though they did "almost" make a run at the dragon last time when they thought they might catch it sleeping. Kinda wonder if said dragon isn't using magic to know when threats are approaching...
I know you are generally against such ideas, but a quest (to bring something specific from the depths of Felltower) or an overconfident NPC adventurer (who needs an escort to go to the depths of Felltower) or some other outside motivation for the PCs to go there might be useful to solve this problem.
ReplyDeleteI generally don't want NPCs directing actions. Even when I offered oversized rewards for activities, they've almost universally been rejected - either people don't feel the reward is worth it, or the task is so hard it can't be done. Even when I've offered a lot, unless the task is perceived as easy, the reward has been seen as too little. So I largely gave up on them.
DeletePerhaps you can use some other motivation for PCs if monetary rewards do not work. Maybe something based upon their disadvantages (such as Sense of Duty, Code of Honor Obsession and so on).
DeleteI struggle for a way to do that doesn't seem punitive (lose xp if you don't do XYZ like your disads say you would), double-rewarding disads (you get extra xp if you do XYZ like your disads say you would), or taking over your character (you have disad ABC, so you have to go do XYZ.)
Delete"Here is an opportunity to roleplay your disadvantages. You don't have to do this, but it would be more fun if you do." No extra XP nor XP penalties are involved (if I am not mistaken, DF doesn't suggest to give XP for roleplaying), and the final decision is made by the player. However, since players generally choose disadvantages they want to roleplay, it seems quite likely that a player playing a chivalrous knight will decide to fight a dragon that kidnapped a princess. Or a player playing a wizard obsessed with magical knowledge will decide to help an archimage who offers to teach a couple of forbidden spells to those who join his expedition.
DeleteI think I do need to let people know that their disads should have more consequences. We've had wizards obsessed with power that won't go near the Black Library, knights with a goal to kill a dragon avoid a dragon every time they came across it because they aren't sure this is the best time to try it, and overconfident guys who please Sense of Duty (Companions) overrides their need to take a risk. While the last bit is true, why not just take disads that don't force you to do things you don't want to do?
DeleteI think that to some extent this is just what happens when you run the same dungeon with (at least some of) the same players for a long time. They develop opinions, some of them correct.
ReplyDeleteMost players are like small children -- if they think that whining is the most profitable strategy then they will whine instead of doing something more fun. Whining about the game being hard is easier than actually figuring out a way to beat it -- maybe the GM will respond to the whining by giving them easier enemies or more rewards!
If the scared whiners take over the group and conspire to prevent bold action, maybe it's time to add a new player who's a chaos monkey. Someone who's willing to say "I've got a new 250-point PC with Curious and Overconfident and Daredevil, and if he dies I can make another one just like him. Who's with me?"
A 250-point guy built like that would get killed where 350-375 point guys fear to tread, so no one would really be enticed to follow along . . .
Delete