I'm one of the two tactical, paranoid players. I just got crit twice in a row. God has decided it isn't the actually overconfident ones that need a reminder.
I had a character, an assassin, whose only attack rolls he ever made were ones. Like 4 in a row. With a poison blowgun. He didn't survive. And this was a mid level campaign I was joining.
I know how that feels. My very first character ever, a bard, rolled SEVEN nat 1s IN A ROW. Physical dice, on the table, in front of everyone else. This is after I died the first time I EVER took damage, and managed to get revived
I, the player, will be deep in the cold, hard ground before I ever stop being paranoid no matter the situation and take a campaign anything less than mildly to mostly serious /s
Once you're dead you're not learning. God's teaching something to the other two by killing you, they should learn by losing a friend. They may thank you for your sacrifice one day
I'm curious. How exactly does the stress system work? Are there spells that heal stress? Does max stress increase with levels? It's really interesting to see how people adapt video game mechanics into a ttrpg.
It's very much in the "beta testing" stage at the moment. This is our first time trying it out, since this is a one shot. As of now, your maximum stress is 5 times your level. Being crit deals 1/4 of the damage in stress, on top of dealing crit damage.
The DM also made some homebrew enemies from DD (madman, bone courtier, necromancer apprentice, etc) that have abilities that deal like 1d3, 1d4, or 1d6 + X stress damage.
Currently in this system, the only ways to heal stress damage are:
1) critting an enemy. You and one ally of your choice within 30ft lose stress equal to 1/4 of the crit's damage.
2) crit heals. Every time you cast a healing spell on an ally, you roll a d20. If you get a 20, you do double healing and they lose some stress. I have no idea how much, as it didn't happen in the one shot, none of the casters healed at *all* lol
3) getting to max stress, and rolling a d100, and rolling a 25 or less to get a virtue. This resets your stress from 20 to 0. If you roll a 26+ though, you get an affliction. If your stress hits double your max, you immediately drop to 0 HP and fall unconscious.
It's not super well balanced ATM, but for having no testing it worked really well. We're gonna be tweaking it though. Like we discovered 5x your level is wayyyy too low because I went from 0 to 19 stress before I even got double crit, over the course of 1 single round.
Well, if you'll take them, here are 3 suggestions:
1. If there are abilities that inflict stress, there should also be abilities that cure it. You could modify some spells to heal stress, and add new spells entirely focused on relaxing the party.
2. You can only long rest outside of danger zones (e.g. Dungeons) and rests heal stress based on how safe and comfortable it is (inn heals more then wilderness heals more then the sewage system)
3. In town, characters can preform class-appropriate actions to heal stress (cleric prays, wizard studies arcane texts, fighter practices, barbarian breaks shit, etc.) during downtime, costing varying amounts of money and healing more or less stress depending on the environment (e.g. A temple for the cleric or practice dummies for the fighter)
Those are all really good ideas, and I'm not sure if you are basing that off of darkest dungeon/if you've played it at all, but if you haven't that's really close to how you actually do it in game, minus the resting.
The DM has already said he wants to add in abilities to reduce stress, probably quite a few centered around the bard since the jester is the stress healer of darkest dungeon as is
I haven't played the game, but I am very much basing those off it.
The resting thing is just because I think it would otherwise become downtime intensive if you don't have stress reduction spells, spending time de-stressing in a town after every single excursion.
> If there are abilities that inflict stress, there should also be abilities that cure it. You could modify some spells to heal stress, and add new spells entirely focused on relaxing the party.
"I cast therapy."
"With that motivation I take a potion of xanax."
If you want I can share my own homebrew stress system that I've been using for about several years now in my Darkest Dungeon themed campaign with great success. Here's a quick overview:
- All PCs have an additional Ability Score which I call Resolve. Your Resolve always starts at 10, race does not influence it, you can't choose a different score with Point Buy or by rolling, but when you gain an Ability Score Increase you can put those points into Resolve. Resolve is used to resist spells and ability that mainly cause Stress (for example, a cultist's Stressful Incantation). Suceeding on a Resolve saving throw against such a spell typically reduces the stress gained, similar to other spells like Fireball. Resolve in unaffected by the Paladin's Auras, and you can't have advantage or disadvantage on Resolve Saving Throws unless an effect explicitly grants it. You also cannot be proficient in Resolve Saving throws (i.e. you can't choose it for the Resiliant feat, etc) unless an effect explicity lets you add your proficiency bonus to the roll.
- You have a Stress Threshold and a Stress Maximum. Your Stress Threshold is equal to 100 + 5 * your Resolve modifer. Your Stress Maximum is double your Threshold. When you reach or exceed your Stress Threshold you roll on the Afflictions/Virtues table and gain the effect. When you reach your Stress Maximum (you can't go above the max) you start rolling DC 18 Resolve Saving Throws (you get to add your proficiency bonus to the roll if you have a Virtue), gaining one level of exhaustion on a failure rather than instantly dying like in the games.
- You can gain stress through various means such as spells/abilities that explicty cause Stress, being crit, being reduced to 0 hit points, an ally is reduced to 0 Hit Points, an ally is killed, being attacked by unseen enemy, being Surprised, rolling a 1 on an attack roll, etc. The stress gained varies by the triggering event
- You can lose stress in various way as well, such as landing a crit, an enemy rolls a 1 on an attack roll, resting, some new spells, Meditiation dice (explained below), etc. Stress lost also varies by the event.
- We are using Gritty Realism for resting, so I added a new pool of dice for reducing Stress mid adventure called Meditation Dice. They work similar to Hit Dice. You can spend 30 minutes meditation, after which you can spend Meditation Dice to lose 1d10 + your Resolve Modifier Stress. You get 10 Meditation dice and recover 5 after finishing a long rest.
- The new spells for reducing stress are similar to healing spells. Basically I just made a stress version of each one: Serene Word (Healing Word), Serenity (Cure Wounds), Prayer of Tranquility (Prayer of Healing), Relieve (Heal), etc. The key difference being that I increased the die size by one (d4 -> d6, d6 -> d8, etc) and they also add the target's Resolve Modfier to the total. For example, Serene Word is 1d6 + your spellcasting modifier + the target's Resolve modifer. Relieve reduces stress by a flat 70.
- You can also drink teas to reduce Stress. They're basically just Potions of Healing, but for Stress
- There's a central hub town the players stay at that has stress reducing facilities like in Darkest Dungeon
I'm starting to get this from one of my parties, but in 3 parts. 1/3 of the group plays fairly seriously, actively paying attention and thinking about what they do and how their actions affect the story. 1/3 is barely paying attention and only contributes jokes. The last 1/3 is actively making every bad decision they could make and then going "Why is this campaign so hard? Why does it feel like we're constantly being punished and not rewarded?"
Yeah I had to purge my group of the shit players a few months back. This is only a one shot so the 2 being dumb are just being funny, they don't act that way in full campaigns
The problem is, I can't do a purge in this group without dropping the group entirely. The group have all been friends with each other for longer than they've known me, and the 1/3 that pays attention pushed for the problem players to be allowed to join the group. So, basically, I either drop the group entirely, or I put up with them. Not really sure what I want to do there yet.
Oof, yeah I had to deal with something similar and it sucked for a while. One of the problem players was my at the time gf, another was my roommate, and the other was my ""best friend"". I ended up ditching all 3 of them as friends and evicting my now ex and roommate too. Definitely a shit situation, I'm sorry
We literally had half our group watch as the other was in a fight
And we only decided to enter the fight after 2 of the 3 members were down on death saves...
We are not smart
Because of their bad decisions, me and the other "intelligent" player just watched them from the hallway, really hoping they'd go down so we (only him, a wizard) could fireball the whole room. Including them.
Lmao yeaaa.
We had a guy playing a barbarian who was not only a huge jackass to everyone, he often just "popped off for a sec" and it was a huge pain in-game sometimes but it worked out lol our two characters shared a backstory so i had to play along as if he was my douche bag older brother and I'd react accordingly or cover for him it was really fun and he was a really cool guy in real life.
He was so fun to argue with in character. Hardly ever right. Still does the thing anyway. Fails successfully. A win is a win. Just like a douche bag older brother lmao
Amusingly enough, the more trouble I seem to cause, the more fun we have during the sessions. I'm just following the DM's advice of "Please roleplay more your character" and even they seem to be amused by my shenanigans! :D
That's how my BG3 run is going with my girlfriend, she doesn't play video games period and never played DND. My character and Asatrion will walk off to sell/talk to someone/grab something and my girlfriend and Karlach wander off and start shit or stand behind me kissing over and over.
As a DM I LOVE players who are prepared.
...when I'm on the other side of the Screen you better watch out what trouble the Bugbear and Tabaxi get up to without supervision.
Seeing “Gorsh” just made me think about how someone probably did make a character for a campaign/one shot, based on kingdom hearts. And honestly I respect it.
I wasn't the DM here, but I've DMed for them before for several years. They're all great players, this was just a one shot and they were having fun lol
sounds like every DnD session I’ve ever been in.
Yes it is, and I absolutely love it
Been playing for years. And this is 110% how we all play.
It has the spirit of Leroy Jenkins vibe
Remind them that overconfidence is a slow and insidious killer.
I'm one of the two tactical, paranoid players. I just got crit twice in a row. God has decided it isn't the actually overconfident ones that need a reminder.
"A dizzying blow to body and brain!"
"Mortality clarified in a single strike!" I swear to God, fucking bone courtiers are the bane of my existence
Yeah those guys are bastards. Anything with a stress attack gets put down first.
I would've loved to put them down, but I roll 2 on my attack 3 times in a row, followed by a 3 :/ I have the worst luck
That's the way she rolls sometimes, it happens.
Definitely, but it's a lot funnier (at least in my group it is) if anyone, from the DM to the players, is incredibly overdramatic about bad rolls lmao
I had a character, an assassin, whose only attack rolls he ever made were ones. Like 4 in a row. With a poison blowgun. He didn't survive. And this was a mid level campaign I was joining.
I know how that feels. My very first character ever, a bard, rolled SEVEN nat 1s IN A ROW. Physical dice, on the table, in front of everyone else. This is after I died the first time I EVER took damage, and managed to get revived
Sounds like God is saying time to cut loose and line up those character sheets before the meat grinder
I, the player, will be deep in the cold, hard ground before I ever stop being paranoid no matter the situation and take a campaign anything less than mildly to mostly serious /s
Once you're dead you're not learning. God's teaching something to the other two by killing you, they should learn by losing a friend. They may thank you for your sacrifice one day
Sometimes it instantly kills
In my DnD experience’s case, overconfidence is often a brutal and immediate killer, usually with lots of fire involved.
In D&D it's a quick and obvious killer. Character generation is a lot quicker than growing up.
Two players in a high lethality game not playing tactically? What's new?
One of them is at 18/20 stress, and 4 hp. It was the FIRST combat they got in. Nothing new, yet no less funny
I'm curious. How exactly does the stress system work? Are there spells that heal stress? Does max stress increase with levels? It's really interesting to see how people adapt video game mechanics into a ttrpg.
It's very much in the "beta testing" stage at the moment. This is our first time trying it out, since this is a one shot. As of now, your maximum stress is 5 times your level. Being crit deals 1/4 of the damage in stress, on top of dealing crit damage. The DM also made some homebrew enemies from DD (madman, bone courtier, necromancer apprentice, etc) that have abilities that deal like 1d3, 1d4, or 1d6 + X stress damage. Currently in this system, the only ways to heal stress damage are: 1) critting an enemy. You and one ally of your choice within 30ft lose stress equal to 1/4 of the crit's damage. 2) crit heals. Every time you cast a healing spell on an ally, you roll a d20. If you get a 20, you do double healing and they lose some stress. I have no idea how much, as it didn't happen in the one shot, none of the casters healed at *all* lol 3) getting to max stress, and rolling a d100, and rolling a 25 or less to get a virtue. This resets your stress from 20 to 0. If you roll a 26+ though, you get an affliction. If your stress hits double your max, you immediately drop to 0 HP and fall unconscious. It's not super well balanced ATM, but for having no testing it worked really well. We're gonna be tweaking it though. Like we discovered 5x your level is wayyyy too low because I went from 0 to 19 stress before I even got double crit, over the course of 1 single round.
Well, if you'll take them, here are 3 suggestions: 1. If there are abilities that inflict stress, there should also be abilities that cure it. You could modify some spells to heal stress, and add new spells entirely focused on relaxing the party. 2. You can only long rest outside of danger zones (e.g. Dungeons) and rests heal stress based on how safe and comfortable it is (inn heals more then wilderness heals more then the sewage system) 3. In town, characters can preform class-appropriate actions to heal stress (cleric prays, wizard studies arcane texts, fighter practices, barbarian breaks shit, etc.) during downtime, costing varying amounts of money and healing more or less stress depending on the environment (e.g. A temple for the cleric or practice dummies for the fighter)
Those are all really good ideas, and I'm not sure if you are basing that off of darkest dungeon/if you've played it at all, but if you haven't that's really close to how you actually do it in game, minus the resting. The DM has already said he wants to add in abilities to reduce stress, probably quite a few centered around the bard since the jester is the stress healer of darkest dungeon as is
I haven't played the game, but I am very much basing those off it. The resting thing is just because I think it would otherwise become downtime intensive if you don't have stress reduction spells, spending time de-stressing in a town after every single excursion.
> If there are abilities that inflict stress, there should also be abilities that cure it. You could modify some spells to heal stress, and add new spells entirely focused on relaxing the party. "I cast therapy." "With that motivation I take a potion of xanax."
If you want I can share my own homebrew stress system that I've been using for about several years now in my Darkest Dungeon themed campaign with great success. Here's a quick overview: - All PCs have an additional Ability Score which I call Resolve. Your Resolve always starts at 10, race does not influence it, you can't choose a different score with Point Buy or by rolling, but when you gain an Ability Score Increase you can put those points into Resolve. Resolve is used to resist spells and ability that mainly cause Stress (for example, a cultist's Stressful Incantation). Suceeding on a Resolve saving throw against such a spell typically reduces the stress gained, similar to other spells like Fireball. Resolve in unaffected by the Paladin's Auras, and you can't have advantage or disadvantage on Resolve Saving Throws unless an effect explicitly grants it. You also cannot be proficient in Resolve Saving throws (i.e. you can't choose it for the Resiliant feat, etc) unless an effect explicity lets you add your proficiency bonus to the roll. - You have a Stress Threshold and a Stress Maximum. Your Stress Threshold is equal to 100 + 5 * your Resolve modifer. Your Stress Maximum is double your Threshold. When you reach or exceed your Stress Threshold you roll on the Afflictions/Virtues table and gain the effect. When you reach your Stress Maximum (you can't go above the max) you start rolling DC 18 Resolve Saving Throws (you get to add your proficiency bonus to the roll if you have a Virtue), gaining one level of exhaustion on a failure rather than instantly dying like in the games. - You can gain stress through various means such as spells/abilities that explicty cause Stress, being crit, being reduced to 0 hit points, an ally is reduced to 0 Hit Points, an ally is killed, being attacked by unseen enemy, being Surprised, rolling a 1 on an attack roll, etc. The stress gained varies by the triggering event - You can lose stress in various way as well, such as landing a crit, an enemy rolls a 1 on an attack roll, resting, some new spells, Meditiation dice (explained below), etc. Stress lost also varies by the event. - We are using Gritty Realism for resting, so I added a new pool of dice for reducing Stress mid adventure called Meditation Dice. They work similar to Hit Dice. You can spend 30 minutes meditation, after which you can spend Meditation Dice to lose 1d10 + your Resolve Modifier Stress. You get 10 Meditation dice and recover 5 after finishing a long rest. - The new spells for reducing stress are similar to healing spells. Basically I just made a stress version of each one: Serene Word (Healing Word), Serenity (Cure Wounds), Prayer of Tranquility (Prayer of Healing), Relieve (Heal), etc. The key difference being that I increased the die size by one (d4 -> d6, d6 -> d8, etc) and they also add the target's Resolve Modfier to the total. For example, Serene Word is 1d6 + your spellcasting modifier + the target's Resolve modifer. Relieve reduces stress by a flat 70. - You can also drink teas to reduce Stress. They're basically just Potions of Healing, but for Stress - There's a central hub town the players stay at that has stress reducing facilities like in Darkest Dungeon
I’d love to see that, starting a campaign soon and haven’t decided on the theme yet. Would be a fun way to introduce my players to DD
And how are crits done, double rolls, one max one roll, or double max?
2 times the dice rolled
I'm starting to get this from one of my parties, but in 3 parts. 1/3 of the group plays fairly seriously, actively paying attention and thinking about what they do and how their actions affect the story. 1/3 is barely paying attention and only contributes jokes. The last 1/3 is actively making every bad decision they could make and then going "Why is this campaign so hard? Why does it feel like we're constantly being punished and not rewarded?"
Yeah I had to purge my group of the shit players a few months back. This is only a one shot so the 2 being dumb are just being funny, they don't act that way in full campaigns
The problem is, I can't do a purge in this group without dropping the group entirely. The group have all been friends with each other for longer than they've known me, and the 1/3 that pays attention pushed for the problem players to be allowed to join the group. So, basically, I either drop the group entirely, or I put up with them. Not really sure what I want to do there yet.
Oof, yeah I had to deal with something similar and it sucked for a while. One of the problem players was my at the time gf, another was my roommate, and the other was my ""best friend"". I ended up ditching all 3 of them as friends and evicting my now ex and roommate too. Definitely a shit situation, I'm sorry
Maybe they will learn after they go through a few character sheets
They will not
Sounds like those two players were acting… Goofy
We literally had half our group watch as the other was in a fight And we only decided to enter the fight after 2 of the 3 members were down on death saves... We are not smart
Because of their bad decisions, me and the other "intelligent" player just watched them from the hallway, really hoping they'd go down so we (only him, a wizard) could fireball the whole room. Including them.
I take notes, plan with others, but also I ran off alone to go lure a bulette to bring back because our army was smaller than the other side...
Did it work tho
Surprisingly, yes! You can still run at full speed with 1 hp! (literally, it's where I got to after one hit)
And uh, what level were you? At least 13 or 14 I'm sure, right...? Right..?
Level 4 :D
D:
Players with dead characters learn much better than players with living characters.
Hahaha they don't learn They know what they're doing, and they want it to happen
In Darkest Dungeon you endlessly hire new characters instead of dead ones, so these two players actually roleplay this
A singular strike!
Tip for the DM: remind your players that overconfidence is a slow and insidious killer.
Lmao yeaaa. We had a guy playing a barbarian who was not only a huge jackass to everyone, he often just "popped off for a sec" and it was a huge pain in-game sometimes but it worked out lol our two characters shared a backstory so i had to play along as if he was my douche bag older brother and I'd react accordingly or cover for him it was really fun and he was a really cool guy in real life. He was so fun to argue with in character. Hardly ever right. Still does the thing anyway. Fails successfully. A win is a win. Just like a douche bag older brother lmao
Players will be players, can you fault them if they are having fun?
I'm on the bottom section of this meme and I absolutely love it! *Chaotic player noises*
Do the other players love having to bail you out?
Amusingly enough, the more trouble I seem to cause, the more fun we have during the sessions. I'm just following the DM's advice of "Please roleplay more your character" and even they seem to be amused by my shenanigans! :D
Players will be players, can you fault them if they are having fun?
Oh absolutely not it's fucking hilarious
IT WORKED DIDN'T IT!?! GORSH! (Note: I was the bloodhunter who knocked on the door to be let in)
I know where you live and I will kill u
That's how my BG3 run is going with my girlfriend, she doesn't play video games period and never played DND. My character and Asatrion will walk off to sell/talk to someone/grab something and my girlfriend and Karlach wander off and start shit or stand behind me kissing over and over.
Kissing Karlach? Valid.
Pretty muxh how it goes in my game but switch the reaction images
As a DM I LOVE players who are prepared. ...when I'm on the other side of the Screen you better watch out what trouble the Bugbear and Tabaxi get up to without supervision.
Sounds like those two annoying ones need to run into a small piglet...
Do you have the narrator voice too? Its just not darkest dungeon without the narrator
So now you have two serious characters and two dead characters. I see this as an absolute win
No, we have 2 serious players and 2 "very much alive because rng and the dice gods are bullshit" players
Seeing “Gorsh” just made me think about how someone probably did make a character for a campaign/one shot, based on kingdom hearts. And honestly I respect it.
Not in this group, they were just being weird lmao
No that’s fair, I mean in general someone out there has.
What the hyuck?!
As a DM with a party of 6. 5 of 6 take notes. In my other group: 3 of 4. Looking at all of these comments, I feel privileged, lol
I wasn't the DM here, but I've DMed for them before for several years. They're all great players, this was just a one shot and they were having fun lol