Topic: RMC Arms Law - How do you keep your PCs alive?

[stefou]

My current group has not caught on yet how dangerous combat is.  So far, they have been very lucky.  But then again, we've only gamed twice so far in my new campaign...

That begs the following question: How do you keep your PCs alive?  It only takes a lucky roll to kill off any character at any level.

Do you guys fudge your rolls?  Or maybe use some kind of fate points?

[Rasyr-Mjolnir]

Parry!!!  That is the first thing that they need to learn... It will really up their survivability rate.

And, with new players, I will sometimes fudge results/rolls turning a killing crit into a death in xx rounds or a "knocked out" crit (and if I knock out enough of them, they end up as prisoners - perhaps to be sent to the mines or the stewpot, depending upon who captured them -- "they want you alive when they eat you"

The basic idea is to introduce the dangers to them in such a manner that they survive, but learn how dangerous things can be. Hack off a limb, and let them undertake a dangerous mission for the Healer to get it replaced (there is this rare cave flower, that grows in only 1 place, a dragon's lair, you are nowhere near powerful enough to defeat the dragon, but you might be able to sneak past him....)

[yammahoper]

Parry is important.  Long before fate points were introduced, we had a GM roll over" rule.  Basically, a player could ask the GM to reroll, but was stuck with that result no matter what.

Fate points are an optional rule that allows players to spend a fate point and get a reroll.  Basically, you give 3-5 fate points at level one, another 1-2 for each level gained, and can hand them out as rewards for great play, taking risk, etc.  It is a simple mechanic that removes MOST bad luck, but not all.  I have seen a 98 killing crit rerolled just to get a 99.  Bad luck is bad luck.  My freind Matt has a house rule that states no reroll from a fate point can have a worse result than the original.  He is much nicer than me, lol.

As I gained exp, I learned to interpret the damage listed on the tables to fit my needs and vision.  You might hand out a certain magic item, like a suit of armor, and a crit in the future would have to punch a hole through the armor, but as GM you find that highly unlikely, well, an RR may be called for, or simply play down the damage delivered, or change the location the damage was delivered to.  My point is resolving crits in RM is a skill in itself, because the tables cannot forsee every possible situation that might arise.

I recall a session were a lion like monster crited a plate wearing fighter, and the crit called for lethal chest wounds.  Well, I dont think a lions claws could tear through plate, so I maimed the fighters leg instead, and declared the lion had a hold of the leg, and was going to start rending it on following melee rounds.  If the lion was successful, my plan was to have it rip out/open major arteries in the leg, and then apply the bleeding and two minutes till death results.  Essentially I split the damage up and had it delivered over two rounds...except the fighter escaped the beast and the more serious damage was never delivered, which as GM, was fine with me. 

And then there is the unavoidable bad crit.  Remember every movie you have ever seen and play the drama.  Even a partial success first aid could stabilize a serious wound and add hours to live, belaying the 6 rnds till death.  Failing that, pull the trigger.  Sometimes death is unavoidable.  The suck part is when it is meaningless.  A fact your players will learn.  RM combat tends to drive good players to avoid unnecessary fights...just like in real life.

lynn

[vroomfogle]

Run!

Now obviously not every encounter is something to run away from, but the general attitude of players coming from other systems is that running isn't even an option.   In RM running should always be one of the options available to the PC's, and not all encounters are neccessarily meant to be solved by battle.   My players will know when they are outclassed or effectively outnumbered, or when the tide of battle tips in the opposite direction.  When that happens you cut your losses and run to survive.

[Setorn]

Fate points help, and no PC should die ignominiously just due to chance.  Now if the PC dies due to poor choices, foolhardiness, or just plain stupidity then yes they die ingloriously.  Yet, a lucky wandering kobold, who just got in a good swing should not kill a PC.  Keep an eye to story, drama and the needs of your/the game’s plot.

As I gained exp, I learned to interpret the damage listed on the tables to fit my needs and vision.

I agree completely. 

Don't be a slave to the dice, be fair and have an eye to drama. 

Also, have low level PC's see how crits can take down the mighty.  Stage a combat that they must observe and plan out the combat rolls before hand.  have the PC read the results to you and they may get the idea of how harsh it can be. 

[allenrmaher]

RME introduces a few options which are helpful as options... casters get the base pp option (also in spell law) and there is a non dice rolling system of determining body development which does make low levels more survivable and generally flattens the level power difference a little.

For our fall campaign we are debating using fate points from HARP.  Subtle GM fudging of the result works well too.

[Monteblanco]

The nicest thing about using Arms Law with a group used to D&D is watching them realize that the mindless charge is not an useful option anymore. Usually, Rolemaster players use real tactical choices, such as using the terrain in their advantage or strike and run to overcome their enemies. If they didn't got it yet, don't worry as a couple of deaths should make them think about it.

[Balhirath]

The nicest thing about using Arms Law with a group used to D&D is watching them realize that the mindless charge is not an useful option anymore. Usually, Rolemaster players use real tactical choices, such as using the terrain in their advantage or strike and run to overcome their enemies. If they didn't got it yet, don't worry as a couple of deaths should make them think about it.

Dont forget missile weapon.
Heavy crossbows are DEADLY in RM and people used to other systems are usually in for a unpleasent surprise.

[Marc R]

That was always my big beef with D&D or D20 . . .by those rules, if 5,000 average soldiers charged across a WWI battlefireld from their trenches across 100 yards of no-man's-land, at least 4,000 of them would reach the other side, though most of them would have non-debilitating injuries. . . .heh. . .the "Oh, so 6 city guardsmen have their heavy crossbows on me? I Charge them and hack them up with my Sword. . .at most they can do 6x1d6 damage, and I'll kill them before they can re-load."

[Dax]

The same thing for me.

In many historic or fantasy movies there is the moment where a person is threated
and the hero throws a spear or a knife (or ...) at the villain.
But in most RPG the thrown/missle weapons doesn't make a different.

This was the reason  fell in love with RM 20 years ago.

An undeadly hand-to-hand (ehm, weapon-to weapon) combat was never the problem
with my imagination - the combatants were just fighting half- (or more) parry 

The other in our group feel the same about the thrown/missle weapons:
We just started a RM campaign parallel to our normal one
(so we will play at a very low rate )
At character generation a player stopped DP distribution: "Does missle weapons do
have a realistic effect ? Yes ? Than I develop composite bow and javelin (thrown)."

[Monteblanco]

That was always my big beef with D&D or D20 . . .[...] the "Oh, so 6 city guardsmen have their heavy crossbows on me? I Charge them and hack them up with my Sword. . .at most they can do 6x1d6 damage, and I'll kill them before they can re-load."

I enjoyed that a lot when I was a teen. But it became boring and stupid after a while.

[Setorn]

I understand that RMC is leathal but up until the 5th or 10th lvl (when the story is taking off) the Main charactes should not die.  How do you deal with that.  For me fate point and a little fudging.  I only fudge when the pc's have been wize but the dice have been brutal.  My Pc (regardless of game system) know that if they play well, to character, to story, to drama and with wisdom that they will make it to a reasonable lvl.   

[yammahoper]

My Pc (regardless of game system) know that if they play well, to character, to story, to drama and with wisdom that they will make it to a reasonable lvl.   

See, I just don't like that.  My very first PC, a dwarf in TnT, died 3-5 minutes into the game.  Crushed by a rolling bolder.  For me, that was the coolest thing, the clincher that convinced me RPG's were for me.  They were not woosified or ever lasting, they were fun AND decisive.  I need and want the risk of death, and if a PC dies in any situation were death is a reasonable outcome, from jumping a chasm to pretty much ANY combat, then I have no complaints.  Does it suck for my level 2 mage to fumble his shock bolt and get hacked down by a lowly orc?  Yes.  Yet, without the risk, there seems no point.  I might as well sit there and let the GM tell me a story.

GM's can greatly increase the chance of death in a game, but staying alive is really the players responsibility.  I have lost many PC's who survived but lost a leg or were paralyzed and unable to "adventure" anymore.  Those are almost worse than death, but still happened because I choose to fight or climb or jump or cast spells or whatever.  Death is not always the GM's fault.

lynn

[Setorn]

yammahoper, I understand what you are saying, and it is a viable style of play.  However, in my style, I base much on the backgrounds of the players, and for the character to die ignominiously from the start seems pointless, and could lead to significant changes in plot.  If Elric, Jonathan Harker, or Luke Skywalker died at the beginning of saga, we would not have read/watched the rest. 

I am not saying that if the PC makes poor choices that they do not die.  I am merely saying that random acts in the beginning of the game/story will not be fatal.  Jumping a chasm that one should not attempt will get you killed regardless of when in the game or what level.  An attack from a wandering band of kobolds, who get a luck roll will not kill you early on, but will later.  It is just to set the story, character and plot.  The third element of Aristotelian drama is character.  Each game/story/drama needs to establish character that is all that I am trying to insure. 

[thrud]

It's supposed to be deadly... live ehhrr? or should I say die with it?
No, seriously. It's best when you can feel the cold fingers of death reaching for you but somehow you manage to stay alive to live another day.
Death among pc's is necessary. If no one gets killed, maimed or seriously injured the suspense is lost.

[Setorn]

I am not arguing that no one should be “killed, maimed or seriously injured.”  I am also not saying poor decisions, lack of wisdom, and stupidity that lead to debilitating or mortal consequences should be mitigated.  After the plot and the characters are established, fate, poor luck and chance have a place.  Death still looms early on, but not due to random rolls of the dice.  Later, those random acts of deadly chance are appropriate.
 
I must likewise say that I seldom need to do this.  Fate points and tailoring the game difficulty level usually allow characters to survive anyway, but a well place open-ended roll by a barmaid wielding a broken wine bottle followed by a high roll on a D slash crit. should not derail a hapless character at second level before the plot, theme and characters are established.  That is not to say that if the alleged barmaid had been sent/hired to kill the character it would not happen.  That has story consequences even early on, and helps to establish plot and character.
 
I see this as very similar to setting the level of opponents.  One would not send a party of second and third level characters up against a dragon or powerful demon, but they could accidentally run across one, especially using the old Creature & Treasure tables.  Using those tables would you let that roll stand and crush the party all at once.  I assume not. 
 
I guess my criteria to amend a roll would be:
1) Did the pc act reasonably?
2) Has character, theme and plot been satisfactorily established?
3) Is the roll justified due to luck or skill?
4) Does it severely hamper the plot?

 Answering one as a yes, two as a no, three as luck, and four as a yes, I would mitigate the roll, but if any of those answers were to change then I would not.   How often do the aforementioned criteria happen?  I would answer seldom.  Death still looms early on in my games. 

My style of GMing evenly distributes the importance of the drama across plot, theme and character.  The other style appears to focus more heavily upon plot and maybe theme.  Both styles have strengths and weaknesses, but I see neither as having superiority over the other objectively.  I prefer games with more character driven modality than plot driven.  That is a subjective opinion as how I like to play and GM.     

[Marc R]

That's all well and good, as long as the rails don't appear. If the Plot overwhelms the mechanics too much, or too obviously, the PCs will get either bored or overconfident.

I try not to go out of my way to kill my players, you can be a real jerk that way, the killer GM, and I will often give them the benefit of the doubt, or another die roll. . .but sometimes the dice are not your friend. (As a player, I try to keep in mind that any fight could be your last, and as a result provoke fewer fights.)

If you do fudge to keep a PC alive, they can't know. . . .it's not the safety or deadliness of the game that matters so much as the PCs perception of danger. . .if they feel safe from death, they'll often do stupid or foolhardy things.

Killing their PC can cure that, but you can resort to lesser measures. . .like the PC caravan guard foolishly provokes a fight with a strong group of orcs, and takes a mortal wound. . . . you could let them live, and have the caravan sacked, with just a couple of survivors. . . .of course, once the story gets out about the idiot guard who got his employer killed gets out, it creates all sorts of problems for them. . . .

Then again, some PCs will just shrug at negative opinions from NPCs. . .for them, snuffing their PC, or something severe like loosing an arm is usually the only cue they listen to.

[yammahoper]

Anyone remember the movie "To Live or Die in L.A."?  Towards the end of the movie, the star gets his face blown off and dies, a total shocker.  And the star was playing a Secret Service Officer, the good guy, chasing an evil counterfiter (the star of CSI was the agent and the counterfitter was the same guy who played Hobgoblin in Spiderman...my brain is total mush right now).

That moment was AWESOME because NO ONE ever does that in a movie, i.e. kills off the hero. 

I also like character development.  I have learned to stop tying the end game to PC's specific background, except on occassion of course.  Yet the cool thing about an RPG, there can be another hero there to pick up the story threads easilky enough.

Still, I have also gone out of my way to save a PC.  One of the most memorable was a 1st level druid who sverely fumbled an easy climb roll to get over a low stone wall outside a farm and broke his back or neck.  I conviently delayed the ritual taking place in the basement/cellar while a healer in town just happened to have the right instant cure herb that she gladly gave a servant of the old faith.  BTW, at the end of the adventure, the druid read an IRON HEART scroll, killing the entire party except himself.  I hardly ever use random treasure generation anymore.  The druid DID swear off all scrolls after that.

lynn

[Setorn]

Really, we seem to be all variations on a theme.  As I have said, in time in my games they can get more deadly.  I take each PC through a mock of combat prior each campaign to show them how deadly combat is and often that scares them away from mindless violence and foolish actions.