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The Dresden Files => DFRPG => Topic started by: Richard_Chilton on December 24, 2010, 06:03:51 PM
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Here's a question about style.
In the Dresden books, humans rarely die at the hands of the good guys. By humans I mean sorcerers and minor talents as well as random people. When the bad guy is a normal mortal he either walks, has problems with the law, or has a talk with Marcone. That, or it's the White Council killing someone who cannot be saved. At various times Dresden has problems brought on by him being associated with so many people who die or disappear.
In the Dresden game, there doesn't have to be much in the way of killing - taking someone out can easily be non-lethal, and I'm curious about the mortality levels of people's games. Do PCs keep the violence to a minimum or do they treat mortal threats like they are orcs?
Richard
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Seems like that might be on a character to character basis really. I was in a game a while back where most of us were trying to limit the mortal death however the supernatural berserker had a little less restraint...
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My people paly in a small city so they can't let the mortal body count get noticeable.
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My players are very death happy, but they excel at covering it up and placing blame. One of the PCs threw two guys out of a high rise last game, but the bad guy veiled the bodies to look like the PCs... so that's going to be a fun police investigation.
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Depends on certain factors, sometimes my PCs do not kill their enemies but leave them weakened and vulnerable. To draw out the second stringers to show themselves, to challenge for those positions. And let their enemies' enemies do the killing for them or better yet, wipe each other out. Every enemy is constantly evaluated whether it is better to kill or let live.
Hit them with Consequence: Extremely weakened/Utterly de-powered/No more Denarius or some such like what.
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Mostly, my PCs have been pretty good about the whole killing thing. However, there was that one scenario with the traveling carnival and the warlock cabal running it... That one got pretty messy, not the least because of the civvies in the area; the PCs were damn lucky, actually, that the subsequent fire and flooding managed to destroy most of the forensic evidence that would have incriminated them. Between the bad guys, the good guys, and the demon hit squad, there were close to 50 fatalities that session.
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Here's a question about style.
In the Dresden books, humans rarely die at the hands of the good guys. By humans I mean sorcerers and minor talents as well as random people. When the bad guy is a normal mortal he either walks, has problems with the law, or has a talk with Marcone. That, or it's the White Council killing someone who cannot be saved. At various times Dresden has problems brought on by him being associated with so many people who die or disappear.
In the Dresden game, there doesn't have to be much in the way of killing - taking someone out can easily be non-lethal, and I'm curious about the mortality levels of people's games. Do PCs keep the violence to a minimum or do they treat mortal threats like they are orcs?
Richard
Can't speak for DF games but every PC i've ever had when i was DMing ANYTHING, acted like The Inquisition from warhammer 40k. Moral threat? shoot first and then fail to ask questions. Threat threat? shoot first. Fluffy bunnies? shoot first, it could be the bunny from the holy grail. etc.
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My players have had their hack-and-slash moments in other games, but the First Law has been successfully discouraging outright murder of mortals in the all-Apprentice game we are playing now.
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My players have had their hack-and-slash moments in other games, but the First Law has been successfully discouraging outright murder of mortals in the all-Apprentice game we are playing now.
First law is not murder with MAGIC, said nothing about stabbing, blunt force, shooting, burning ect ;)
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First law is not murder with MAGIC, said nothing about stabbing, blunt force, shooting, burning ect ;)
Or grenades. Don't forget the grenades.
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I think that both character concept and player maturity play a role in how a group responds to this question.
With my players it is not a problem, especially since the PCs include a doctor [Really helpful if you dont want to explain to local authorities about a gun shot wound recieved in were-cougar form] who takes her Hippocratic oath very seroiusly.
If you are concerned about players going on a killing spree every session you could try talking to them about it...After all a few white court thralls are no challenge if you meet them with gun-fire and grenades, but can be an interesting encounter when you try to deal with them without causing lasting harm, in a public place, and while avoiding any damage to random bystanders etc.
Another good way to discourage excessive violence in any game setting is to have consistant and plausable consequences. Sure, a wizard will be able to escape arrest, but that will also leave him a fugative and likely lead to trouble with the White Council as well.
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"Do PCs keep the violence to a minimum or do they treat mortal threats like they are orcs?"
A question like this comes from a "orcs as items" mentality. My PC's are transplants from the HARN game system, which has so much detail that you simply cann't get away with the sort of killing too many "o level monsters" the way D&D allowed.
Anyone dies in my campaign, any campaign, there are consequences. Family may come after the killers, or maybe it was done because the PC's work for the guarde and this was an outlaw. I just think that there shouldn't ever be anyone that it's somehow "okay" to kill.
All that being said, I also love the "obscure death rule" which says that if the baddie fell off a cliff or for some other reason the PC's did not get to witness the death "for sure" - well, he, she or they are probably not really dead. But he/she/they now intend to make the PC's which they were.
Dian
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OK, I know I'm sticking my nose in since I'm not playing, but I thought all the various sides in the DV were against calling attention to themselves by mortal authorities, so wouldn't everyone avoid public displays of lethality? The White/Red/Black courts cleaned up their messes extremely well, and NN constructs turn to jelly and evaporate... actual Fey people leave a corpse, and humans of course do too, but it seems that at least one of the reasons there are so few bystander fatalities (innocent or otherwise) in the books is that people not directly involved seem get extremely uneasy and leave the area rather than get mowed down in a hail of bullets (or flame, or toads), and both sides pick their times and battles very well. Even the baddies try to establish a clear playing field... anyway, sorry to poke my nose in but the subject really piqued my interest.
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"Do PCs keep the violence to a minimum or do they treat mortal threats like they are orcs?"
A question like this comes from a "orcs as items" mentality.
That's basically what I was asking - do the PC treat others in the game as objects to be disposed of on whim? Does their level of lethal violence go far beyond what is shown in the books? Are PCs attempting to solve issues creatively or are they just in "kill the bad guy" mode.
Since "orc" is usually gamer shorthand for "see it, kill it, loot it, get praised for killing it" type things I used that term to simplify the question.
Speaking of Harn, how is the game making out since Robin Crossby's all too soon death? He, Gygax, and Wujcik all going that year made 2008 a very sad one for the RP role.
Richard
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We are working on not treating all opponents simply as targets to be killed.
Some players are having more trouble than others with the see foe kill it approach than others.
Strangely those are the folks that have not read any Dresden books.
Hmmmmm
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Hello,
"That's basically what I was asking - do the PC treat others in the game as objects to be disposed of on whim? Does their level of lethal violence go far beyond what is shown in the books? Are PCs attempting to solve issues creatively or are they just in "kill the bad guy" mode. Since "orc" is usually gamer shorthand for "see it, kill it, loot it, get praised for killing it" type things I used that term to simplify the question."
My point is that the "see it, kill it, loot it" stage of the game doesn't long for the intelligent, thoughtful people I have played with. Yes, I've had the "pee on such and so altar for the heck of it" player. Once. Kicked him out, and don't miss him. In my opinion, if the level of violence in any campaign goes beyond the level of violence in the average Dresden files book, then these are folks that aren't going to be enjoyable for me to game with.
"Speaking of Harn, how is the game making out since Robin Crossby's all too soon death? He, Gygax, and Wujcik all going that year made 2008 a very sad one for the RP role."
I'm not really sure. I still love it - the magic system (the original one, not all that 'multi-level spell' crap) is second to none, and it's really really good at portraying the mechanics of injury amazingly well. However I just cannot translate it to modern day and guns and such - so on that level, it's limited.
Dian
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So far, my primary game has killed several vampires (one Black Court and a few Reds) but only one mortal (warlock summoning somethings from Outside). The PC who shot him went off in character to seriously think about what he'd gotten himself into. He finally decided that if the group wasn't there to stop this sort of thing, who else would?
Right now the group has been contacted by the local Ghoul leader. He wants them to deal with an obsessed ghoul who's intent on breaking with the Red Court and killing RCVs...right now! (The leader isn't happy with the current situation vis a vis the Red Court, but wants to lay some groundwork first...) And the reason that the ghoul is obsessed with killing RCVs? Someone in the group with a IoP that can sway people's emotions manged to instill hatred of vampires in a particular ghoul...
The best games spring from prior decisions and actions of the PCs...
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My point is that the "see it, kill it, loot it" stage of the game doesn't long for the intelligent, thoughtful people I have played with. Yes, I've had the "pee on such and so altar for the heck of it" player. Once. Kicked him out, and don't miss him. In my opinion, if the level of violence in any campaign goes beyond the level of violence in the average Dresden files book, then these are folks that aren't going to be enjoyable for me to game with.
There are some gamers that I won't play with - but that's mostly over honesty issues (a game is a game and not worth cheating over; if someone calls a three a 18 then I don't want to know them). I've LARPed with people who haven't been involved in combat in years (that's years of playing the same character with lots of conflict but no actual combat) and I've game at conventions with people who talk about using on line optimizers to make the "best" D&D characters.
Different people game for different reasons and get different rewards from gaming.
"Speaking of Harn, how is the game making out since Robin Crossby's all too soon death? He, Gygax, and Wujcik all going that year made 2008 a very sad one for the RP role."
I'm not really sure. I still love it - the magic system (the original one, not all that 'multi-level spell' crap) is second to none, and it's really really good at portraying the mechanics of injury amazingly well. However I just cannot translate it to modern day and guns and such - so on that level, it's limited.
Here's hoping it survives the death of its creator. Some small press games can't.
Richard
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I've only used one mortal antagonist so far, and she was allowed to live, until she was later killed by an NPC for unrelated reasons.
Most players in my group are very quick to attack, though, and try to finish a fight by at the very least removing a particular enemy as a threat for the remainder of the story.
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"Do PCs keep the violence to a minimum or do they treat mortal threats like they are orcs?"
A question like this comes from a "orcs as items" mentality. My PC's are transplants from the HARN game system, which has so much detail that you simply cann't get away with the sort of killing too many "o level monsters" the way D&D allowed.
Anyone dies in my campaign, any campaign, there are consequences. Family may come after the killers, or maybe it was done because the PC's work for the guarde and this was an outlaw. I just think that there shouldn't ever be anyone that it's somehow "okay" to kill.
All that being said, I also love the "obscure death rule" which says that if the baddie fell off a cliff or for some other reason the PC's did not get to witness the death "for sure" - well, he, she or they are probably not really dead. But he/she/they now intend to make the PC's which they were.
Dian
Um not to sound like an idiot but what's harn i mean i've gathered as much as its a game but what's so special about it
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Killing makes for a GREAT story tool. I usually invoke aspects to make the characters get angry and kill their opponents so I can use that later. For example, I used one of my players (a were-leopard)'s aspect adreniline junkie to make him go to far on his adreniline, and he clawed a bad guy's stomach open and watched in shock as the bad guy died. I later had him in his apartment wondering if this thrill-seeking thing of his had gone too far.
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Anyone dies in my campaign, any campaign, there are consequences. Family may come after the killers, or maybe it was done because the PC's work for the guarde and this was an outlaw. I just think that there shouldn't ever be anyone that it's somehow "okay" to kill.
To me every death having a consequence is just as unrealistic as deaths never having any consequences. The number of unsolved murders in even a small city can be quite high and that assumes a body was found in order to classify it a murder. Otherwise it is a missing persons case and even then that assumes it was reported. To me it as depends on the circumstances surrounding the death.
Many people feel it is okay to kill. What do you think soldiers sometimes have to do as part of their job? However, there is a general belief that it is not okay to commit murder. In many cases the belief as to whether a death is viewed as "killing" or "murder" may depend on the laws of that person's culture. So a wizard may feel it is perfectly okay (perhaps even necessary) to kill the evil necromancer, while the mortal cop may not believe it is okay to murder him.
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So a wizard may feel it is perfectly okay (perhaps even necessary) to kill the evil necromancer, while the mortal cop may not believe it is okay to murder him.
The mortal cop in the know may be fine with justifiable homicide.
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One way to encourage players to be more careful with leaving biddies in there wake is to let them run to emissaries of a large power that they can't continue there normal life and persuading goals after making a mortal enemy of. One off my Hunter the Reckoning games became a game of being on the run from the cops and the FBI after shooting at the cops from a car licensed in there name. After that they where able to interact with the world in a less D&D way.
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One of my players summoned a flying fire spirit and sent it after an escaped bad guy, who was on a boat miles away. People in the area think a stray meteorite actually hit the boat, making it explode.
Killing is SO much more acceptable when you're evil. Of course, now the white counsel has a hitman... er, warden... in the area.
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Is the problem killing mortals or just killing in general? I ask because unless Harry facing a mortal, always "shoots to kill". Now granted in the earlier books he tends to investigate more just to make sure that he is getting the right person. In the later books however he never uses less than lethal force, when fighting Shagnasty, Denarians, Billy Goats Grimm, RCV, ghouls, BCV, oh and necromancers. I understand not wanting your Dresden game to be like a DnD game with wanton violence, but they don't shirk from using the stick in the books. I actually kind of view DFRPG to be like Feng Shui in that regards, it is about the cinematics and the story of the combat, not about the body count, that being said, the mosters need to die in order to keep humanity safe.
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What the heck are biddies?
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What the heck are biddies?
don't you have an auto "typo" translation option on your browser? That's biddies = bodies ...or so I believe.
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don't you have an auto "typo" translation option on your browser? That's biddies = bodies ...or so I believe.
I thought they might be "baddies."
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ahhh, good point! I'll give my translator a kick, it may be misbehaving! ;)
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biddies are old women.
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biddies are old women.
Well, yeah, I agree that's the most common meaning, but in the context below, it just doesn't track. Just a typo I think but a little ambiguous in this case. I do think that devonapple is right though and it's meant to be baddies, because bodies would be able to 'run to emissaries of power'.
One way to encourage players to be more careful with leaving biddies in there wake is to let them run to emissaries of a large power that they can't continue there normal life and persuading goals after making a mortal enemy of. One off my Hunter the Reckoning games became a game of being on the run from the cops and the FBI after shooting at the cops from a car licensed in there name. After that they where able to interact with the world in a less D&D way.
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it looks like I was getting to fast and loose with the spell check ;) I meant bodies. leaving a trail of old women in you wake might be problematic but at least you won't be dodging paternity suits.
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LOL or hens! Biddies is also a way of saying hens if you're a 'chicken person'! :D Thanks for clearing it up though pulphero, even though we were having fun with it for a while ;D
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Old women and hens are often synonymous.
And this just isn't a setting conducive to INDISCRIMINATE hack n' slash.
Scourge of vampires? Kindness of zombies? Knock yourself out. Heck, even certain corners of the Nevernever are rife for "culling."
But a big major aspect of the world is consequences. Every action, no matter how justified, has an equal but opposite reaction. Bitch vampiress got you over a barrel? Sure, burn her ass to the ground and salt the earth as warning to others. But you'll start a war.
Kill a mortal, risk the wrath of the White Council (all things depending of course).
Go monster hunting in the Never? Cool, but you may have just killed some Greater Power's favorite pets. You may ending up owing a favor you never wanted to owe.
And there's the WHICH mortal are you killing, question. Joe Blow citizen caught in the crossfire? The cops are gonna start getting interested. Member of law enforcement who's making your life difficult? As before but up by a factor of ten. Mobsters? They don't call it a family for no reason, and again, the cops. Even an evil wizard is a possible homicide investigation. And that's not even getting into the magical community. Human servitors of major powers, the obvious White Council reasons. It can't be stated enough that any Accords Signatory has every right to take a chunk outta your ass if you kill any of their "people" especially if they are on "company business." Now that may be about a quarter million dollar fine (rough estimate of a weregild from the books) or it could be a duel for blood.
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Harn is also called Harnmaster; it's a % based RPG that goes for graphic realism i.e. when you are damaged, you are damaged for "16 points to the left forearm" (15+ means it's broken and you can't use it ill healed below that number). You are more likely to die of infection after a wound than the wound itself. Very cool - but all this means that there is a lot of work, game mechanics wise, when putting together a campaign.
Killing in any game universe is something I use to gauge the players (not just the characters) and myself. While I think that some of the constraints of the Laws are not conducive to certain universes (like transformation and such), they do make overt some ideas that can be easily glossed over - like what you do (even "what your character does") shapes you.
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Since Harn's combat system is deadly you have to play smart. Any combat could leave your PC crippled or dead. The setting is also closer to the real middle ages, where there were slaves, serfs, etc all the way up to the nobles.
A while ago, on one of the main Harn sites, I stumbled over a file with 101 story seeds. (Note - I went looking for it when I was writing this post and found it at: http://www.lythia.com/2007/12/101-encounters/ (http://www.lythia.com/2007/12/101-encounters/) - but I typed the examples below from memory and hope that they match up with what's really in that file.)
They aren't "Orcs come to town and..." type adventure seeds.
Here's one that stuck in my mind...
The party is going somewhere and they stumble on this young (12 -13 year old) girl who's on the verge of panic. Her dad took her out into the woods, got her lost, then pointed her to the next village and vanished. She has a couple of days worth of food - and that's it. And she really wants to go home.
If the PCs return her to her village her parents are relieved to see that she's all right, but not happy that she came home. See, the local lord has a thing for girls around her age so they smuggled her out of the village. Everyone in the area knows about the lord, but since he only bothers peasant girls and is otherwise a good lord the rest of the gentry ignore how he treats young girls because, well, they are just serfs.
If the PCs smuggle the girl back out of the village then they are stealing a serf from his lands. If they turn her over to him they will be rewarded for returning a runaway serf. What will the PCs do?
(Note - since Harn is close to the real middle ages in some ways, killing the Lord is not an option. No, killing nobles (even with a good reason) will get the PCs hunted down and killed.)
Another encounter - you stumble across some escaped serfs living in the woods - what do you do? Leave them alone (for no reward) or turn them into their lord (they'll be flogged but you'll get a minor reward).
While near a beach you stumble across the shipwrecked son of a noble; pirates are in the area hunting for him - what do you do?
The ale served at a rustic inn is making people sick - but since they don't know there's a dead rat in the ale barrel they think it's a warlock laying curses. They burned "the warlock" before the PCs arrive in the village, but since people are still getting sick the local lord is now looking for his apprentices. Do the PCs investigate enough to find that it's the ale making people sick? And if so, do they try to convince the locals that there's no warlocks (after they already burned one) - and everyone knows that only a warlock would define warlocks so the PCs must be warlocks... Or do they set up someone as the Warlock? Or...
Well, you get the idea. Since the combat system is realistic most players prefer to think over fighting.
Richard
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"Since the combat system is realistic most players prefer to think over fighting."
That is Harn in a nutshell; play smart or die. My vague worry with Dresden Files is that it's so hard to die or kill, that the PC's may lose that immidiacy of reality... but then I suppose "The Laws" and wardens can be used to compensate for that.
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(Note - since Harn is close to the real middle ages in some ways, killing the Lord is not an option. No, killing nobles (even with a good reason) will get the PCs hunted down and killed.)
Assassinate the lord. Leave no trace of their being there at all. Or poison him and tell him unless he leaves the young girls alone, he's never going to his little lordship to stand up ever again.
Killing is always an option, you just need to do it right. Kill stupid and you deserve what comes to you, kill smart and you get your just rewards from God and him alone.
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What I think is quite interesting, compared to other RPG's, is the fact that PC can't say that they just "happened to kill a NPC" as a result of the dice (i.e. just happened to roll a very high damage roll). To kill an NPC in the DFRPG, most of the times, the player have to choose to do so after getting a "taken out" result in combat. I like that! No more hiding behind the dice...
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Assassinate the lord. Leave no trace of their being there at all. Or poison him and tell him unless he leaves the young girls alone, he's never going to his little lordship to stand up ever again.
Killing is always an option, you just need to do it right. Kill stupid and you deserve what comes to you, kill smart and you get your just rewards from God and him alone.
Few Lords of that era walked alone, ate alone, or even slept alone. Meaning that there would be men-at-arms who had to die and maybe some of the Lord's family members and servants. All that combat is risky (realistic combat system) when a lucky sword swing can kill or cripple you.
As for leaving no traces...
The girl knows your faces and probably your names. Ditto her parents and rest of her family, probably some others in the village do as well.
If you don't kill them then the word will spread. All it takes is someone who knows that the girl was brought back (in a small town or village there's always someone who knows - probably several someones) to point the finger at them and they won't have a choice... Okay, the choice is to be flogged, watch your wife be flogged, then your children as they try to beat the answers out of your family OR tell the legitimate authorities about that band of murderers who you have no real connection to.
But killing the people you wanted to save is always an option. That girl might die but the others that the creep would have bothered won't be victims, so that's a plus, right? Leave enough bodies behind and it will look like a bandit raid. And with all those men-at-arms dead, a bandit raid is believable.
And his men-at-arms would fight for him. He's not a real monster like Gilles de Rais was (who had loyal servants and men-at-arms) - just a run of the mill perv who doesn't bother anyone important.
Yes, a lot of bodies there - if you go that route.
Richard
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What I think is quite interesting, compared to other RPG's, is the fact that PC can't say that they just "happened to kill a NPC" as a result of the dice (i.e. just happened to roll a very high damage roll). To kill an NPC in the DFRPG, most of the times, the player have to choose to do so after getting a "taken out" result in combat. I like that! No more hiding behind the dice...
The players can, but the characters don't make that choice... So the PCs can regret the fact that the lucky bullet killed that NPC while all the players can agree that the witness had die.
Sometimes leaving people alive can open a really good (story wise) kettle of worms.
Richard
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"Sometimes leaving people alive can open a really good (story wise) kettle of worms."
Which is all the more reason to do it. I find that having NPCs willing to talk to the PCs tends to defray the fighting, or at least delay it. Somehow the act of having a conversation makes the PCs less likely to physically attack. I like that.
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"Do PCs keep the violence to a minimum or do they treat mortal threats like they are orcs?"
A question like this comes from a "orcs as items" mentality. My PC's are transplants from the HARN game system, which has so much detail that you simply cann't get away with the sort of killing too many "o level monsters" the way D&D allowed.
Anyone dies in my campaign, any campaign, there are consequences. Family may come after the killers, or maybe it was done because the PC's work for the guarde and this was an outlaw. I just think that there shouldn't ever be anyone that it's somehow "okay" to kill.
All that being said, I also love the "obscure death rule" which says that if the baddie fell off a cliff or for some other reason the PC's did not get to witness the death "for sure" - well, he, she or they are probably not really dead. But he/she/they now intend to make the PC's which they were.
Dian
As a player in this campaign, having gotten a glimpse of who the current "boss enemy" might be, this immediately came to mind. Sure, we know (or have been told) the bad guy is a red court vampire, but she's also a major land-owner, so obviously has full legal status. If we straight up murdered her somehow (not that any of us is any good at that- no ex-marine snipers or demolitions experts in the group, for some reason) then there would STILL be a big legal investigation, property passing on tho hiers, etc- in addition to any allies / superiors she has getting pissed off.
Really, I'm kinda curious how people who play this game DO deal with that. Dresden might get off with "self defense" if needed, and has a police contact, but what happens when folks go out and get in fights and end up killing some well known local figure who happens to be a monster?
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As a player in this campaign, having gotten a glimpse of who the current "boss enemy" might be, this immediately came to mind. Sure, we know (or have been told) the bad guy is a red court vampire, but she's also a major land-owner, so obviously has full legal status. If we straight up murdered her somehow (not that any of us is any good at that- no ex-marine snipers or demolitions experts in the group, for some reason) then there would STILL be a big legal investigation, property passing on tho hiers, etc- in addition to any allies / superiors she has getting pissed off.
Really, I'm kinda curious how people who play this game DO deal with that. Dresden might get off with "self defense" if needed, and has a police contact, but what happens when folks go out and get in fights and end up killing some well known local figure who happens to be a monster?
A simple answer is, as stated multiple times in the novels, the supernatural community never wants to involve mortal authorities if they can get away with it. This leads to every side trying to cover up things so they don't get noticed. As far as the well known and respected vampire, you can always have her chase you into the NeverNever, where your friends are there waiting to gang up on her. If she is killed there she doesn't leave a body. No body, no crime.
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As for leaving no traces...
Yes, a lot of bodies there - if you go that route.
Richard
Not really. If you are smart about it, the girl would have not have seen your faces. Or at least be able to identify the real you.
But of course if the GM has a hard-on to punish the characters for ruining the moral dilemma he has spent hours and hours on crafting (that light at the end of the tunnel is really a train, you are on a railroad), you can't really do much about it.
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As Red Court Vampires do not count for the first rule of magic you could kill the character of with a 'freak storm' considering how much the authorities like reasonable explanations for the supernatural they would just right of the entire case even if it seems improbable for a person too get hit by lightning 10 times in a row. Or there is accidentily crushed by falling tree and very unlikly direct hit by meteorite, if you had high enough conviction you could do a mcoy and bring some space detritis down on her head.
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Not really. If you are smart about it, the girl would have not have seen your faces. Or at least be able to identify the real you.
But of course if the GM has a hard-on to punish the characters for ruining the moral dilemma he has spent hours and hours on crafting (that light at the end of the tunnel is really a train, you are on a railroad), you can't really do much about it.
The story seed wasn't "peasants seek you out because Lord Blah likes them young" - it was "you stumble over a young girl in the woods".
So your PCs stumble over a young girl in the woods and immediately make sure that she doesn't see their faces? Before they know who she is or that there is a problem? As for spending hours on something, it was one of 101 story seeds - the author might have spend hours putting them all together but I really doubt he spent hours on that one. As for railroading - I fail to see how presenting a world where the powerful have power is railroading.
The question was asked what made Harn different, the answer is basically it's the deadly combat system and realistic setting. It's a setting where killing is often as inappropriate as it is in modern life...
Since I tracked down that file again, here's the story seed I summarised:
The Wild Child…
As the PCs march through the woodlands, or are ready to pitch camp, they come across a young girl who looks to be about 12 years old. She sits in the crook of a tree crying, and doesn't notice the PCs. Next to her is a burlap sack with food, water, and a blanket.
Her father, trying to save her from the lord of their village, dropped off the girl. The lord has taken an unnatural attraction to the young girl, and has a history of molesting the young girls of the village; including the girl's mother. While the girl has yet to be touched, the lord has made quite clear his intentions to the parents.
1) If the PCs let the girl alone, or she runs away (if the PCs are too intimidating and flees), they will not see her again.
2) If the PCs approach her in a friendly manner, she will tell them what has happened, though she only knows she was abandoned and knows nothing of the lord's intentions.
3) If the PCs offer to take the girl home, she can help them with general directions, but she rode with her father for almost two full days on a mule and is somewhat lost. A skilled tracker could follow the mule tracks with relative ease.
4) If the PCs make it to the village the girl will lead them to her cottage, which is on the outskirts of the village. Some villagers will glare at the PCs in anger, as they know why the girl was taken away. The mother will be very angry at the PCs though happy to see her daughter. She will bid the PCs to take the girl back to the woods. She will beg, plead and even offer to pay what pittance she has.
5) If the PCs accuse the mother (or even make a snide comment) of abandoning her daughter, she will pull the PCs aside so her daughter is out of sight and show them fresh lash wounds given by the lord when he found out the daughter was missing. She will then tell them the full story in angry sobs. About this time the father will have returned from the fields, having gotten word from a friend. He too bears wounds and will implore them to leave quietly with their daughter. Subtle questioning of some other villagers will find some verifying and others denying. Overt, public questioning will result denial from all asked.
6) If the PCs let the lord know about the girl, they will be paid 50d for returning a run away serf. He will be very concerned, acting in a very different manner than the parents have described. The lord is the foul molester as accused, and the little girl has a horrid future to face. Due to his power, position, the subtle nature of his assaults, and the social status of his victims, there will be little the PCs can do unless they wish to risk physically harming him. The ramifications will be severe in that case.
7) If the PCs do sneak the girl back out, they must do so quickly and quietly. The lord will hire bounty hunters and levy charges against them if he finds out. PCs who get away quietly must now either adopt or abandon the girl, though there is probably a Peonian establishment somewhere nearby who would accept her given the situation.
8) If the PCs leave the girl at a nearby village, the bounty hunters will find her about a week later and return her.
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I thought the point of the system was 'Actions have Consequences'. Even good actions. If doing 'the right thing' was easy, everyone would do it, and there would be no problems, no conflicts...and no game.
In a lot of fantasy RPGs, actions have no real consequences. Kill people, leave them alone...it comes out the same. But in a world where you want your characters to have an effect on the society...to be fair, that society should also have an effect on your characters.
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I thought the point of the system was 'Actions have Consequences'. Even good actions. If doing 'the right thing' was easy, everyone would do it, and there would be no problems, no conflicts...and no game.
Exactly.
And Harn is a S&S setting where actions have consequences - just as the modern world is.
Richard
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The story seed wasn't "peasants seek you out because Lord Blah likes them young" - it was "you stumble over a young girl in the woods".
So your PCs stumble over a young girl in the woods and immediately make sure that she doesn't see their faces? Before they know who she is or that there is a problem? As for spending hours on something, it was one of 101 story seeds - the author might have spend hours putting them all together but I really doubt he spent hours on that one. As for railroading - I fail to see how presenting a world where the powerful have power is railroading.
Why not? A paranoid PC group may well have 1 Face PC well disguised. The rest well hidden, with weapons ready covering the girl. The point here is that if the PCs have ways of short circuiting that power and the GM insists on foiling them, would that not be railroading?
While doing 'the right thing' was not easy for everyone, it could easy for the PCs. Hence there are still problems, there are still conflicts and there is still a game. The point of the system was 'Actions have Consequences' but those consequences could be good ones.
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Why not? A paranoid PC group may well have 1 Face PC well disguised. The rest well hidden, with weapons ready covering the girl. The point here is that if the PCs have ways of short circuiting that power and the GM insists on foiling them, would that not be railroading?
While doing 'the right thing' was not easy for everyone, it could easy for the PCs. Hence there are still problems, there are still conflicts and there is still a game. The point of the system was 'Actions have Consequences' but those consequences could be good ones.
The story seed did cover what happened if the PCs looked menacing - the little girl runs away and the rest of the drama is skipped.
As for 'foiling' the GM's plot, that seed I pasted covered several possible endings of the story seed.
Killing the Lord would mean that no more girls were assaulted. It could also look like a peasant rebellion - something that would bring very negative consequences.
Just like, okay, say there's a Sheriff who - or maybe his boss... Okay, let's pull out the Dukes of Hazard. The "authority" on that show was corrupt county official supported by a corrupt sheriff. The pair of them bootlegged and did all sorts of nasty things that the Duke boys railed against. The Duke boys occasionally called in higher authorities and when they did the corruption was hidden.
Everyone in town seemed to hate Boss Hog and the Sheriff, so why didn't the Duke boys just waste those crooks? Because if they did then would have been repercussions. For starters the state troopers would have come in and if there was a high reward offered I'm sure that someone would have fingered the Duke boys. Sure, the state troopers would have stumbled over Boss Hog's crimes, but the sentence for shooting a corrupt cop is generally the same for shooting an honest one. Cops just don't turn their backs on that.
And in the middle ages, killing a lord was killing a lord. If it wasn't a peer on the battlefield then it was bad for all lords. The lords might not have been good at math (they had clerks for that), but it doesn't take a genius to see that the peasants out number the lords and men-at-arms. Any sign of a revolt had to be crushed fast unless it spread.
That option is always there, but (to quote the guy who wrote the seed): "there will be little the PCs can do unless they wish to risk physically harming him. The ramifications will be severe in that case." Just as they would be severe if the Duke boys blew away Boss Hog. Just as it would be severe if Dresden started blowing away people because they were crooks. Or breaking the accords just because some red court vamps bit his girlfriend when she crashed their party.
"The ramifications will be severe..." - that's a great quote to use when bystanders are killed in a Dresden game.
Richard
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That option is always there, but (to quote the guy who wrote the seed): "there will be little the PCs can do unless they wish to risk physically harming him. The ramifications will be severe in that case."
Richard
You see... the point here is that the guy who wrote the seed has already fixed the outcome of a certain course of action - if the lord is physically harmed, the ramifications will be severe. So no matter how the lord is killed (likely made to appear like an accident), the "ramifications will be severe".
You are playing it like Diablo, a straight up brawl to kill the level boss. Think Hitman, maybe the lord has a heart condition, maybe he likes to keep his edge by sparring with his swordmaster... Maybe he has a likely successor with similar kinks, perhaps the PCs can arrange for the successor to wake up in the bedroom with a bloody knife.
If Dresden killed the RCVs sans witnesses or have witnesses on his side declaring that it was th RCVs who first broke the Accord, he could have wasted them all without them being able to have an excuse to declare war.
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For me, it's all about flavor.
In the Harn-seed-runaway-serf scenario, I think the oppotunity was to explore ideas such as things aren't aways what they seem, and power already has corrupted. If I'm GMing a group who is thinking in terms of "she never saw our faces" and "we have arrows trained on her from the woods" ... and this is vs a 12 year old peasant? This is not a group I'm going to be DMing for long. Too paranoid, too angry, too entitled.
In the Dresdenverse, I think the overt emphasis on the laws attempts to function as a sort of external conscience (sorry can't spell this morning); which I find grating only because the quality of players I DM don't need it. However it does offer plenty of opportunities for giving "some" information that if the PC's run with it too hastily, they can make some big mistakes.
Sure, they are the heroes of the story - as long as they act like heroes - and there is always someone or something out there:
1-tougher than they are
2-that needs help and won't get it
3-that has power and is abusing it
4-that they would like to help, and cannot. If the problems were easy - there would be no point to playing
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The laws can be used as an external conscience, or they can be a great source of drama. Dresden himself is a great example. He killed someone with magic and nearly constantly he worries about how that shaped him, about whether he might kill (or has killed) again. I had a character that was a neuromancer studying under one of the circle. She was all grey magic (nothing technically against the third or fourth law) and honestly believed she could use it to help people. Then there was a point where people she cared about had been hurt, and so she reached out in anger and crushed the mind of the person responsible. It was very dramatic and changed the way she viewed everything (for the worse actually, I wound up transferring her to antagonist the next time I was the GM). Anyway you can look at the laws as a way to keep the players in line, or you can look at them as great ways to really role-play fallible and fragile human characters.
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The laws can be used as an external conscience, or they can be a great source of drama. Dresden himself is a great example. He killed someone with magic and nearly constantly he worries about how that shaped him, about whether he might kill (or has killed) again. I had a character that was a neuromancer studying under one of the circle. She was all grey magic (nothing technically against the third or fourth law) and honestly believed she could use it to help people. Then there was a point where people she cared about had been hurt, and so she reached out in anger and crushed the mind of the person responsible. It was very dramatic and changed the way she viewed everything (for the worse actually, I wound up transferring her to antagonist the next time I was the GM). Anyway you can look at the laws as a way to keep the players in line, or you can look at them as great ways to really role-play fallible and fragile human characters.
This is a good way to put it.
I really don't think the laws are a good conscience for player's though. A player can still pretty much do what they want. They just cannot blast vanilla mortals with magic.
For instance, your wizard could blast a mortal with raw force, taking them out. However, the player could choose to have the person knocked unconscious.
The player then could slit the mortal's throat with a pocket knife. The mortal is not dead, and not killed by magic. Knocking someone out with magic is not against the rules - I mean, Harry does it occasionally with his force rings.
However, doing this would mean the player has used up a box of mental stress. This is kind of a big deal. Badguys have multiple magazines of 10-30-100 rounds each. A wizard really only has 2-5 evocation attacks before taking consequences.
As such, even the most pragmatic, steely eyed killer wizard is less likely to use magic to take out mortals.
I think the game mechanics promote fair behavior to mortals as much as the wizard laws do.