How to avoid killing your player characters as GM

[sjmdw45]

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

I gotta note that a fair fight means you're 50% likely to lose it. (A fight that would be fair except you have superior manipulation of events and the battlefield is not a fair fight.)

I haven't seen anybody who wants that at a tabletop.

It's kind of fun for professional gladiatorial combats and the like, where "losing" is not necessarily synonymous with "dying" even if it does always involve lesser pay and a potential loss of face/status (like losing the Super Bowl vs winning it).

I've run gameworlds where single combat between champions was the normal response to meeting foreigners (with a monetary prize called "kresim" at stake to buy the life of the loser). I used this to explain why e.g. drow and githyanki hadn't wiped each other out--it was mostly just their low-ranked warriors fighting each other, one at a time, mostly to claim kresim and not a life; not escalating to group battles unless the chosen champion from one side was so unimpressive that the other side felt confident about curbstomping them with no casualties.

This also happens to be the perfect setup for PCs to find adventure in. I should reuse this concept...

[Outlaw]

Originally Posted by Varyon

But when there's a burning truck hauling lithium, and the chemist PC's player (a player who's only real memory of his highschool chemistry class is that his lab partner was really pretty) grabs a bucket of water to throw on it to put it out, I think giving a chance for the character's knowledge to come into play is useful.

Seasoned players should know enough to ask if they can make a roll against "xxx"to see if they can determine a course of action. Of course, that takes time to learn and during that time, the above is the only way to go.

The con of playing players that are technically specialized/trained/educated above the level of the player is that it can quickly devolve into nothing but dice rolls. Like rolling against "hacking" skill to see if you can break into a network. Then rolling against "computer programming" to see if you can insert a virus into the system. Sure, you succeed, but what did you "do"? Geeks like me can relate to and make a plausible description of what it actually takes to break into a network and write a virus from scratch, but most can't. Lower tech levels don't run into anything that extreme. At least not the ones I run. Maybe that's why I like the fantasy genre so much. It can be as easy or complex as you like and still be a pretty good read.

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by hal

Hi All,
To start off with, nothing states that the GM has to play his NPCs as stone cold killers. He might say that his NPCs are afraid, and are making pop-up attacks with an additional -2 penalty to hit. He rationalizes that his NPCs are human too and do not want to die! He might rationalize that his NPCs are DRUNK, which adds a further -2 penalty to their skills. If he thinks their skill should be at DX-1 because they're not trained to use guns all too well (ie, they're not profesionals) then he can simply state that their gun skill is at best, a 9 or a 10. Just to hit a target that is 80 yards away, is penalized by a -10 to strike a target with a hasty shot.

The obvious one is to assume that most low-end combatants are Reluctant Killers, and thus take a -4 to hit the PCs (or anyone else) with lethal attacks in most circumstances.

Reiterating the one BIG rule I've come to realize is handy in GURPS for modern style games is this:

Death saving rolls that fail by less than 3, result in the player character - in the immortal words of Billy Crystal in PRINCESS BRIDE - being "Mostly dead". In a Cyberpunk campaign, missing your death saving roll does not mean the character is dead - especially if there are those who can be saved by prompt medical attention (Emergency Medical Response or Emergency Medical Technician). Add in the rules for the surgery required to save a mortally wounded character, and presto, last minute reprieve for dead or dying characters.

The RAW give Mortal Wounds for rolls failed by 1-2 (B419, B423), and Hard to Kill gives a similar but stronger effect within its margin. HT13 + Fit + Hard to Kill 2 gives a HT roll vs death of 16-, so the character cannot get worse than a Mortal Wound on the first check they have to make, and that's well within what the game considers 'non-cinematic human'.

Also - I think the bleeding rules for GURPS are TOO harsh and result in far higher a casualty rate for modern battlefields than is perhaps warranted. As a consequence, I don't use those rules as written, but tend to make it -1 per 10 points of damage. In short, GMs can make those rules they don't like, weaker in their application than the rules as written were intended to do.

I wouldn't use them except in conjunction with the rules in High-Tech for bleeding and bullet wounds (HT162)

For all others who want to chime in - how do YOU keep your player characters alive in a modern or future campaign?

In TL9+ games, where there's decent body armour, I encourage the players to have their PCs wear appropriate armour (though usually it's more a matter of pointing out the social penalties of wearing too much armour for the situation). Also, when stepping up the threat, increase the armour penetration of the bad guys' attack, not the raw damage. Ultra-Tech already does this for many weapons - most rifles in UT do 6d of damage and as the TL increases the armour penetration modifier improves.

In TL9+ games, watch out for weapons that have fully automatic fire and Rcl 1 or a high Acc. Laser rifles are especially dangerous because they have all three features, and it takes very little skill for someone with an Acc 12 laser to land most of a 10 round burst on someone, and modest skill will let them aim for somewhere like the Vitals.

On the other hand, as written in UT gauss weapons are good 'bad guy' guns - they hit reasonably often, penetrate armour well (so they're scary - the reliably do damage), but as they're pi- they don't do too much damage, as a rule (just don't have mooks take aimed shots at the Skull or Vitals). They're good for high-threat bad guys, too - they can be given sufficient skill to credibly take aimed shots, and suddenly those little wee gauss darts become really dangerous.

A good way of damaging and throwing PCs around in ultra-tech games, assuming they're wearing full-coverage armour, is explosives. Make sure the explosion is unlikely to do more damage than they have DR but still nearly overcome the DR (or let it do a little more), and if they're decently armoured it'll throw them around nicely (and do blunt trauma damage if they're in flexible armour). If they get thrown into a wall or off somewhere high they'll take damage even if in rigid armour, because falling damage does blunt trauma regardless (as far as I'm concerned, getting hurled into a wall counts as 'falling'). This lets you rough PCs up without killing them.

Finally, with high-damage weapons it's less lethal to roll random hit locations, rather than just assume that the NPCs aim for 'centre of mass ) (i.e. the Torso), because limb hits can't kill outright, whereas a high damage attack to the Torso can. This does risk instant death by random hit to the Skull, but given how much it reduces the chance of a Torso/Groin hit, it's worth it. For low-modest damage weapons, the reverse is better, because the main threat from them is taking a crippling injury and having it become long-term or permanent. Perhaps counter-intuitive, but there it is.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Outlaw

The con of playing players that are technically specialized/trained/educated above the level of the player is that it can quickly devolve into nothing but dice rolls. Like rolling against "hacking" skill to see if you can break into a network. Then rolling against "computer programming" to see if you can insert a virus into the system. Sure, you succeed, but what did you "do"? Geeks like me can relate to and make a plausible description of what it actually takes to break into a network and write a virus from scratch, but most can't. Lower tech levels don't run into anything that extreme. At least not the ones I run. Maybe that's why I like the fantasy genre so much. It can be as easy or complex as you like and still be a pretty good read.

That depends on what you're knowledgeable about.

Decades ago, I was invited to trade off with a household of gamers: I would run a session of D&D for them and then they would run one where I was a player. So when it was my turn to play, I created a fighting man, wanting something simple to let me focus on the quality of play. And when the fight started, and I was prepared to have my character attack the foe, they asked, "What do you do?" They wanted a description, or even an acting out, of the actual combat move. They were all members of the Society for Creative Anachronism and took it for granted that everyone was experienced with simulated medieval combat. And I had never done that sort of thing and hadn't a clue. I could do "I roll the d20 to hit the orc," but there was no way I could relate to what that actually involved.

And that, of course, was what GURPS calls "TL3."

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

Cover DR is based on HP and estimating a tree's HP is pretty easy. Average adult pine is 5,000 lbs and Homogeneous so 137 HP and it probably has DR 1, so Cover DR is 36.

B559 has a table for cover SRs, and it suggests wood has DR 0.5-1 per inch. For a fast-growing pine, such as you'd find in a plantation here in NZ I'd go with the low end - they're soft and mostly water. For the slower growing and much harder natives, I'd take the high end (and note that a decent native is going to be many feet thick, whereas the pine would be 2-feet thick at best). I'd assume that the bullets go through the thickest part of the tree, for simplicity and speed. So a pine tree in a fairly new plantation would be DR5-6, in one ready for felling, DR10-12. A native would be DR24+ and for most small arms I'd not bother with damage rolls - "The tree stops the bullet(s)".

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by Varyon

Yeah, that's a good idea. It's a lot easier to forget the Duchess you're secretly conspiring with your ally to frame for murder is literally standing right across from you when it's something the GM said about the scene 10 minutes ago alongside the rest of the infodump than it is to do the same when you can actually see her there.

I try and describe scene in roughly reverse order of importance if it's not a combat moment. That way hopefully the players will not have forgotten important stuff because it was early in the description. I try not to have too long a description so they don't tune out. However, if someone interrupts me part-way through, I'll probably answer their question, or resolve their stated action and skip the rest of the description - "You were so focussed on spotting and then charging the orc that you didn't pay attention to the rest of the room and didn't notice the bear-trap the orc had planted in the doorway. Ooops."

[mburr0003]

Originally Posted by whswhs

And when the fight started, and I was prepared to have my character attack the foe, they asked, "What do you do?" They wanted a description, or even an acting out, of the actual combat move. They were all members of the Society for Creative Anachronism and took it for granted that everyone was experienced with simulated medieval combat. And I had never done that sort of thing and hadn't a clue. I could do "I roll the d20 to hit the orc," but there was no way I could relate to what that actually involved.

Which is why I never require or reward grand descriptions with bonuses (MVP Awards are voted on by the Players though so that can go for anything the group finds valuable). I've had too many Players who couldn't, and they were there to play what they couldn't do. And as I've mentioned every time that fight comes up, I've been the Player who was penalized because I couldn't make the big grand speech, and I'll never do that to another Player.

If the Player has to roll the dice and say "I'm trying to diplomance the King", fine. roll away Player. (Though I will question "to what end?" and try to guide them into thinking about the 'how'? Are they playing up their similarities? Pointing out economic advantages of allying, describing the many ways the King's power can be increased? Etc. In other words, what lever are they trying to use to budge the NPC, as that will set the future relationship succeed or fail).

[Farmer]

Originally Posted by Rupert

I try and describe scene in roughly reverse order of importance if it's not a combat moment. That way hopefully the players will not have forgotten important stuff because it was early in the description. I try not to have too long a description so they don't tune out. However, if someone interrupts me part-way through, I'll probably answer their question, or resolve their stated action and skip the rest of the description - "You were so focussed on spotting and then charging the orc that you didn't pay attention to the rest of the room and didn't notice the bear-trap the orc had planted in the doorway. Ooops."

We have a running joke from a situation a long, long, time ago where the GM forgot to mention something critical to the players are they entered a room. The players acted on the information they had, and then the GM says, "The orcs wake up and attack you". Of course, he never said there were orcs, asleep or otherwise, in the clearly visible beds but he was sure he'd mentioned it and that the players were just being brazen and assumed the orcs wouldn't notice them moving through.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by Farmer

We have a running joke from a situation a long, long, time ago .

Our running joke dates from an adventure book where the text description had three paragraphs before it got to the purple dragon in the corner. No, it wasn't a Cormyrian man-at-arms either.

Bizatrrely it was some Hackmaster modules (which I bought cheap to adapt to Gurps) that were best organized. For every room there was a highlighted box listing how many monsters and how much treasure was in the room and what each was worth. Certainly better than burying such information amidst the flavor text.

[Tinman]

Originally Posted by Turhan's Bey Company

A non-trivial component of this is players keeping themselves from getting killed. They build characters who can figure out the battlefield and use conditions to their advantage with skills like Tactics, Observation, and Stealth.

This is the most important thing! The Build & tactics of the players are the most Important factors.

That said, there's stuff I can do on my end to help:

Especially for new players:
1) Make them buy luck (& save it for emergencies).
2) Make them buy destiny Points
(as per Monster Hunters 1 p.23)

For all players:
3) Match the opposition to the team.