New players filling 'necessary' party roles


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I'm wholly opposed to DMs saying, "Hey, we need a healer; play a cleric." To me, that's complete BS. Lack of balance on the party's part does not constitute sufficient reason for someone to play a class he or she despises.

I'm largely opposed to DMs saying, "Look, the party is martial heavy, and we could really, really use a full caster. Why don't you play a [insert one of those]? I'll let you do as you like but ... take one for the team, will you?" Same reasoning as above, and in my opinion a DM applying pressure inappropriately.

I'm slightly opposed to DMs saying, "Hey, the party consists of a fighter, barbarian, ranger, bard, and rogue. Does anything besides those appeal to you?" If I have my heart set on playing a barbarian, there's plenty of opportunity for role-playing as the Conan-come-lately. In my opinion, a DM with imagination should simply adjust his or her thinking to accommodate the newcomer.

From where I sit (behind the screen), a new player should know nothing about party composition, because it's meta-gaming. They should instead be allowed to conceptualize in a relative vacuum, creating and fleshing out a concept regardless of the established group's complement. The only exceptions that spring to mind are:

  • A character whose concept is diametrically opposed to the majority's make-up; i.e., forbid or strongly discourage a paladin in a group that consists of an evil cleric, wizard and anti-paladin
  • A player who's truly OK with playing whatever

I think synergy and cooperation should come into play only after players have made their role-play choices. Otherwise, it's an unfair and unnecessary compromise.

Opinions?


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Pathfinder Maps, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

Knowing something about the party composition and designing your character appropriately is not metagaming. The party members are already aware of their strengths and weaknesses and would in most cases look more favorably on somebody who complements them rather than duplicates what the existing party members are doing. The new player character is not a random individual but somebody who wants to join the party and whom the party wants to recruit.

As a DM, I would probably inform a new player of what the existing players are playing but not try to influence what the new player should play. As a new player, I would actively seek to fill in gaps in the party's talents so that it would make sense that they would want my character to join their presumably already tight knit group.


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I feel...oddly surprised that having players who ask "would anything be more useful or complimentary then others?" as an honest desire to contribute seems to be unusual.

To my players: Thanks for being you, guys!


David knott 242 wrote:
Knowing something about the party composition and designing your character appropriately is not metagaming.

Respectfully, David knott 242 ... the new player is looking at the composition of a party not to determine in-game whether his or her character wants to join it, but from outside the game to design a character that will fit in optimally with it (which would annoy me even more, as I'm an inveterate foe of hyper-optimization, and such is tangentially related). I do grant that many might consider the actions harmless, acceptable and/or even beneficial meta-gaming (and reasonably so) ... but it is, by definition, meta-gaming.


Most players in my groups tend to see what roles need filling and take them of their own accord. They may not do it with the class primarily associated with a particular role (for example, in the one Pathfinder game I'm playing in right now, my Bard is the primary healer, with the Druid providing some backup healing when necessary), but they try to fit in to an extent.

I always just figured that was how most groups played it.


A lot of times, new players don't really know or have any ideas about what they want to play. My first character was a Cleric and was suggested to me much like you describe. I enjoyed and still remember that character though and had a good time with it. Got my feet wet. And like others have mentioned, there's nothing worse than playing a character that has the same skills (but isn't as good) as someone else in the group. I may be misinterpreting what you mean by "new players" though.


I wasn't sufficiently clear, Frogboy. Either "new to playing the game" or "new to playing with a particular group" is acceptable.


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I'm largely ambivalent to the whole thing. While I don't think you should force someone to play something they aren't interested in, there are times when they have no idea what they want to play and a suggestion or two can get the fires going.

Knowing about the other player characters gives them the opportunity to tie their character to one of the other PCs and build a little story. I can't tell you how many siblings, cousins, child-hood friends, lord/servant combinations my players have come up with. It makes it a lot easier to start a game when the players have already figured out how all of the characters know each other.

I would much rather my players make their characters up together than do it separately. Saves me from having to deal with the pre-made character with three pages of back story that either has nothing to do with the current campaign or may not get used. Back story for a character is nice, but there is no guarantee that I will incorporate it into the game, and I would like to focus on the story the players make together than the one someone comes up with on their own.


my first D&D game back in 1997 or so. the party asked for a mage because they were under the impression they needed somebody to lob fireballs and wipe out lotsa mooks. DM was a guy whom refused to let players read any of the books nor bring their own books. then one guy brought up that they needed a thief for the traps, and recommended i play an elf for some obscure ability elves had. i played a human multiclass theif/mage of lawful evil alignment whom was played as a scheming young noblewoman. she dealt with diplomacy and used enchantment spells to persuade, a subversion to the groups desire for a fireballing trapfinder, she used a wand of elemental summoning to summon a small elemental to spring the traps with no risk to the party and had a few low level elemental summoning spells, plus a ring of wizarddry. she joined a 15th level party as a mage 5/thief 8. she couldn't use fireball, she threw alchemical grenades instead, having taken alchemy as a nonweapon proficiency. she could stab with a knife if needed, but the alchemy did more damage than her backstabbing and she got XP for pitting mind controlled foes against their allies. after 3 months, she was a mage 18/thief 25 in a 17th level party due to beneficial use of enchantments.


Aaron Whitley wrote:

...While I don't think you should force someone to play something they aren't interested in, there are times when they have no idea what they want to play and a suggestion or two can get the fires going.

Knowing about the other player characters gives them the opportunity to tie their character to one of the other PCs and build a little story. I can't tell you how many siblings, cousins, child-hood friends, lord/servant combinations my players have come up with...

I, too, have created such associations as you suggest. They can be a lot of fun and helpful. I just don't push them if I see any dislike of the idea, or ambivalence. Usually, I let the players suggest such a possibility.

I remember my ex-girlfriend approaching me to join our group—in which played her current boyfriend. We came up with his young, impudent opposite gender cousin, a female elven ranger (1st to his 4th at that point). It proved a master-stroke: Fun was had by all for many months afterwards.

I would never have forced it, though.

Grand Lodge

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Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Jaelithe wrote:

I'm wholly opposed to DMs saying, "Hey, we need a healer; play a cleric." To me, that's complete BS. Lack of balance on the party's part does not constitute sufficient reason for someone to play a class he or she despises.

I'm largely opposed to DMs saying, "Look, the party is martial heavy, and we could really, really use a full caster. Why don't you play a [insert one of those]? I'll let you do as you like but ... take one for the team, will you?" Same reasoning as above, and in my opinion a DM applying pressure inappropriately.

I'm slightly opposed to DMs saying, "Hey, the party consists of a fighter, barbarian, ranger, bard, and rogue. Does anything besides those appeal to you?" If I have my heart set on playing a barbarian, there's plenty of opportunity for role-playing as the Conan-come-lately. In my opinion, a DM with imagination should simply adjust his or her thinking to accommodate the newcomer.

From where I sit (behind the screen), a new player should know nothing about party composition, because it's meta-gaming. They should instead be allowed to conceptualize in a relative vacuum, creating and fleshing out a concept regardless of the established group's complement. The only exceptions that spring to mind are:

  • A character whose concept is diametrically opposed to the majority's make-up; i.e., forbid or strongly discourage a paladin in a group that consists of an evil cleric, wizard and anti-paladin
  • A player who's truly OK with playing whatever

I think synergy and cooperation should come into play only after players have made their role-play choices. Otherwise, it's an unfair and unnecessary compromise.

Opinions?

How a player and a group choose to interact with each other is something they best decide on their own. I don't think that seeking to fit in is an example of badwrongfun. I certainly would not want to waste time creating a character that simply is NOT going to fit in with the group, nor work well with it.

Gaming IS a group activity, I think that there is room for compromise from the absolute stance of MY CHARACTER MY WAY! A cleric of Baphomet would be a really BAD choice for a group being put together for Wrath of the Righteous.


I should rephrase: I think synergy and cooperation should only come into play before a player makes their role-play choices if said player so desires.


my thief/mage still did her role of taking out minions and dealing with traps. she did it in ways that gave her the lions share of XP without evocations. she used summoned elementals of small size to spring traps to locate them to disable them, and she used enchantments such as charm and confusion to turn minions against each other and against themselves. nothing like making a big bad balor demon commit suicide by self disembowelment because the demon failed a save against a charm monster spell.

Sovereign Court

Jaelithe wrote:

I'm wholly opposed to DMs saying, "Hey, we need a healer; play a cleric." To me, that's complete BS. Lack of balance on the party's part does not constitute sufficient reason for someone to play a class he or she despises.

I'm largely opposed to DMs saying, "Look, the party is martial heavy, and we could really, really use a full caster. Why don't you play a [insert one of those]? I'll let you do as you like but ... take one for the team, will you?" Same reasoning as above, and in my opinion a DM applying pressure inappropriately.

I'm slightly opposed to DMs saying, "Hey, the party consists of a fighter, barbarian, ranger, bard, and rogue. Does anything besides those appeal to you?" If I have my heart set on playing a barbarian, there's plenty of opportunity for role-playing as the Conan-come-lately. In my opinion, a DM with imagination should simply adjust his or her thinking to accommodate the newcomer.

Totally agree.

Jaelithe wrote:
From where I sit (behind the screen), a new player should know nothing about party composition, because it's meta-gaming. They should instead be allowed to conceptualize in a relative vacuum, creating and fleshing out a concept regardless of the established group's complement. The only exceptions that spring to mind are:
  • A character whose concept is diametrically opposed to the majority's make-up; i.e., forbid or strongly discourage a paladin in a group that consists of an evil cleric, wizard and anti-paladin
  • A player who's truly OK with playing whatever

I think synergy and cooperation should come into play only after players have made their role-play choices. Otherwise, it's an unfair and unnecessary compromise.

Opinions?

Here you lose me. I don't have a problem with the group synergizing their choices. In fact I like having character creation sessions where everyone at the table talks it out. Now if somebody new joins the group, I am going to let them do what they like. If that's add another wizard to the group fine. If they chose to play a cleric because the party could use buffs and heals, I'm cool with that too as long as its their choice. I have no problem with synergy and cooperation as long as the group reaches it on their own.


I simply prefer everyone playing the character they truly want, without concern for others' choices, and then having us employ our collective creativity to create a viable whole with whatever ingredients we have.

It's ultimately, in my experience, more rewarding.


Jaelithe wrote:

I'm wholly opposed to DMs saying, "Hey, we need a healer; play a cleric." To me, that's complete BS. Lack of balance on the party's part does not constitute sufficient reason for someone to play a class he or she despises.

I'm largely opposed to DMs saying, "Look, the party is martial heavy, and we could really, really use a full caster. Why don't you play a [insert one of those]? I'll let you do as you like but ... take one for the team, will you?" Same reasoning as above, and in my opinion a DM applying pressure inappropriately.

I'm slightly opposed to DMs saying, "Hey, the party consists of a fighter, barbarian, ranger, bard, and rogue. Does anything besides those appeal to you?" If I have my heart set on playing a barbarian, there's plenty of opportunity for role-playing as the Conan-come-lately. In my opinion, a DM with imagination should simply adjust his or her thinking to accommodate the newcomer.

From where I sit (behind the screen), a new player should know nothing about party composition, because it's meta-gaming. They should instead be allowed to conceptualize in a relative vacuum, creating and fleshing out a concept regardless of the established group's complement. The only exceptions that spring to mind are:

  • A character whose concept is diametrically opposed to the majority's make-up; i.e., forbid or strongly discourage a paladin in a group that consists of an evil cleric, wizard and anti-paladin
  • A player who's truly OK with playing whatever

I think synergy and cooperation should come into play only after players have made their role-play choices. Otherwise, it's an unfair and unnecessary compromise.

Opinions?

It's pretty silly to talk about metagaming when it comes to creation. Do you have all the Players put up their own DM screen when filling out sheets so no one knows what each other is playing?

"Hey, no peeking! Ok, it's like a game of Indian Poker aaaand.. Surprise! Everyone's a Wizard!"

Do you roll stats in order and random pick skills/feats because the characters don't have OOC knowledge of Pathfinder rules? Let's face the fact that people discuss what each other is playing, and as always it's first come first serve. Do I tell a new player he needs to play a cleric? No, but I'll definitely tell him the makeup of the group and that they could use a healer if they don't have one. People generally adjust what they were going to play based on party comp.

I'm not going to coddle a group based on their choices. If the group is 2 barbarians, a wizard, and a rogue and you go barbarian don't expect me to fill in all your gaps and just toss you cleric redshirts at a whim. You can play whatever you want but realize that if your group "min-maxes" a certain aspect I'm not going to adjust to ignore your flaws because you want ez mode toward your strengths. In the above situation you'll have to figure out someway to heal whether its UMD or spending money getting a cleric to come with you etc. At this point, I will no longer run long-term DMPCs because its another thing for me to wrangle with and the game is about the PCs, not NPCs.

The problem comes when the group was fine and someone drops from the game. Then you can have this glaring hole in your group that was no fault of the Players.

In either of these cases I'm likely to have a temp NPC come along but make it pretty clear he won't be there forever and someone in the group is going to need to pick up some healing class levels or figure out some other solution.


Jaelithe wrote:
David knott 242 wrote:
Knowing something about the party composition and designing your character appropriately is not metagaming.
Respectfully, David knott 242 ... the new player is looking at the composition of a party not to determine in-game whether his or her character wants to join it, but from outside the game to design a character that will fit in optimally with it

These are opposite perspectives on the same in-world scenario.

The character who gets recruited is the one who is a good fit, the player creates the character who gets recruited.

Or would you want to have the player randomly create 3-5 different characters he likes and make the party spend a session in-character interviewing these characters and making a decision based on said interviews?

"Don't Send us, we'll Send you."


Personally, I'm normally happy getting the right player far more than the right character. I can do my part to rebalance the game on-the-fly to make just about any party makeup work.

On the other hand, I also have no problem with how others want to run their games. If someone wants to recruit to fill a spot for a specific type of character that's their call, and I don't feel they have any responsibility to take anyone other than the right person to fill the spot, for any reason they care to name.

It's not inconceivable that I may have a specific niche I want to fill myself from time to time for storyline reasons. While I haven't done it before, I can see myself for example desperately needing, say, an elf player in order to make a particular storyline work, and advertising an open spot under the condition that it's an elf (obviously this would be a game that's already started in order for some condition to exist that make the race choice immutable, and it's not something I imagine would happen more than once in a blue moon.)

Shadow Lodge

Dont want to derail the thread but....

Umbriere Moonwhisper wrote:
my first D&D game back in 1997 or so. the party asked for a mage because they were under the impression they needed somebody to lob fireballs and wipe out lotsa mooks. DM was a guy whom refused to let players read any of the books nor bring their own books. then one guy brought up that they needed a thief for the traps, and recommended i play an elf for some obscure ability elves had. i played a human multiclass theif/mage of lawful evil alignment whom was played as a scheming young noblewoman. she dealt with diplomacy and used enchantment spells to persuade, a subversion to the groups desire for a fireballing trapfinder, she used a wand of elemental summoning to summon a small elemental to spring the traps with no risk to the party and had a few low level elemental summoning spells, plus a ring of wizarddry. she joined a 15th level party as a mage 5/thief 8. she couldn't use fireball, she threw alchemical grenades instead, having taken alchemy as a nonweapon proficiency. she could stab with a knife if needed, but the alchemy did more damage than her backstabbing and she got XP for pitting mind controlled foes against their allies. after 3 months, she was a mage 18/thief 25 in a 17th level party due to beneficial use of enchantments.
Auren "Rin" Cloudstrider wrote:
my thief/mage still did her role of taking out minions and dealing with traps. she did it in ways that gave her the lions share of XP without evocations. she used summoned elementals of small size to spring traps to locate them to disable them, and she used enchantments such as charm and confusion to turn minions against each other and against themselves. nothing like making a big bad balor demon commit suicide by self disembowelment because the demon failed a save against a charm monster spell.

Does your GM had out exp on a kill by kill basis (if you kill the monster you get exp and no one else)?

I thought that exp was a group thing.

Also, how do you get 26 level higher then all the other group members?


MattR1986 wrote:
It's pretty silly to talk about metagaming when it comes to creation.

Really? "Silly"? I'll assume your main criterion for 'silliness' consists of disagreeing with you. Instead of insulting you in turn, I'll just move on.

Quote:
Do you have all the Players put up their own DM screen when filling out sheets so no one knows what each other is playing?

No. I don't know that I've ever had all the players in the same room when character creation takes place. I always have individual meetings with players, and usually run an introductory individual scenario or two for each. Customarily, when I'm running a game, characters are all 2nd or even 3rd level before the party ever meets.

I certainly understand that most people don't have that kind of time, though. I no longer do, myself.

Generally, though, the players I recruit can actually keep their eyes on their own papers (or screens) if asked to do so.

Quote:
"Hey, no peeking! Ok, it's like a game of Indian Poker aaaand.. Surprise! Everyone's a Wizard!"

And if that occurred—it never has—I'd employ my imagination and create a campaign in which a gathering of neophyte wizards is needed. I've never in my life run a module or Adventure Path, so ... perhaps tailoring your own creation to serve is far easier.

I also understand that an Adventure Path might require more balance in party composition, so I'm not disparaging an encouragement towards balance if one is running one.

Quote:
Do you roll stats in order and random pick skills/feats because the characters don't have OOC knowledge of Pathfinder rules?

Actually, I've done everything from roll 3d6 in order to allowing players to set their own stats (within reason) to fit their vision.

And ... no, I don't. But to have selected your stats, feats, and skills to form a synergy with the other party members seems incredibly facile.

Quote:
Let's face the fact that people discuss what each other is playing, and as always it's first come first serve.

Let's not tell someone else what fact they need to face.

Actually, no, they don't. Some adults understand the concept of delayed gratification and like to learn about what's occurring during play, rather than eliminating one of the extremely entertaining aspects of the game.

"First come first serve" is also complete BS, and can be avoided by the simple expedient of allowing the player to play the character he or she wants to play. What a radical concept, eh?

If everyone's enthusiastically on board with saying, "Hey, let's work to compliment each other's abilities and build the perfectly crafted party!" well ... then I'd have no massive objection. I just think it's kinda boring.

Matt Thomason wrote:
Personally, I'm normally happy getting the right player far more than the right character. I can do my part to rebalance the game on-the-fly to make just about any party makeup work.

My point exactly.


I don't see a problem with it but generally when I recruit a new player while there's a gap in the party I don't go "I choose you, make a Cleric" I go "Calling all players, we need a guy who can cast divine magic and do some healing or these guys are going to get creamed. Who's up for it?" and then pick the guy I like best of people willing to work with that criteria.

But I only really recruit people for PbPs in that manner.


As a player I like to create a character that won't be second best in everything he does. I want to make a character that won't be exactly the same as another player's character. If I need metagaming for that, so be it.

As a GM, I won't care as long as I can spotlight each characters strength and weaknesses. If there are no healers I'll manage. It's easy to make two characters completely different in Pathfinder.

The Exchange

Jacob Saltband wrote:
...how did you get 26 levels higher then all the other group members?

In AD&D, multiclassing (which ordinarily didn't apply to humans... don't ask) worked rather differently than 3.0/PF. Imagine a gestalt who pays for the privilege by only gaining half the XP everybody else does and that level gap becomes a lot more comprehensible. Although still unusually high.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Lincoln Hills wrote:
Jacob Saltband wrote:
...how did you get 26 levels higher then all the other group members?
In AD&D, multiclassing (which ordinarily didn't apply to humans... don't ask) worked rather differently than 3.0/PF. Imagine a gestalt who pays for the privilege by only gaining half the XP everybody else does and that level gap becomes a lot more comprehensible. Although still unusually high.

No matter how you slice it, Umbriere's gulf with her fellow players is pretty extreme. In fact that's a factor in all of her posting, every aspect of her gaming is so far off the center beam, there's not much of a common ground for comparison.


Jaelithe wrote:
I think synergy and cooperation should come into play only after players have made their role-play choices.
Jaelithe wrote:
I think synergy and cooperation should only come into play before a player makes their role-play choices if said player so desires.

I think my head just asploded.

I think it is entirely up to the social dynamic of the people involved to figure it out. I know at least 4 different people in the various groups whom I pay with that will wait until the other party member have decided on a class/role and then choose their concept. I also have never seen any DM say "No, you can't play a Wizard even though you really want to because Dave is already a Wizard. Instead you should be a Cleric. But make sure to take the healing domain, and channel positive, and spontaneously cast cures... You're happy right? What you're still a full caster?!?"

I think people should just be able to play what they want, and I don't think calling people "metagamer" to make you feel better about how you choose what you want is helping.


BigDTBone wrote:
I think people should just be able to play what they want, and I don't think calling people "metagamer" to make you feel better about how you choose what you want is helping.

Neither is telling me I'm doing something I'm not doing.

I'm not calling people "meta-gamer," as if it's the defining characteristic of their gaming personality. I'm labeling certain actions meta-gaming because, wonder of wonders, they are. It's a matter of degree.

And, actually, I'm the one who's championing people playing what they want, by saying, "Come up with a concept, and don't worry about what the next guy is doing. There's no AP for which to carefully outfit, so just do as you please."

Now if people want a balanced party more than they want to play a particular character, so be it.


Jaelithe wrote:

I'm wholly opposed to DMs saying, "Hey, we need a healer; play a cleric." To me, that's complete BS. Lack of balance on the party's part does not constitute sufficient reason for someone to play a class he or she despises.

I'm largely opposed to DMs saying, "Look, the party is martial heavy, and we could really, really use a full caster. Why don't you play a [insert one of those]? I'll let you do as you like but ... take one for the team, will you?" Same reasoning as above, and in my opinion a DM applying pressure inappropriately.

I'm slightly opposed to DMs saying, "Hey, the party consists of a fighter, barbarian, ranger, bard, and rogue. Does anything besides those appeal to you?" If I have my heart set on playing a barbarian, there's plenty of opportunity for role-playing as the Conan-come-lately. In my opinion, a DM with imagination should simply adjust his or her thinking to accommodate the newcomer.

From where I sit (behind the screen), a new player should know nothing about party composition, because it's meta-gaming. They should instead be allowed to conceptualize in a relative vacuum, creating and fleshing out a concept regardless of the established group's complement. The only exceptions that spring to mind are:

  • A character whose concept is diametrically opposed to the majority's make-up; i.e., forbid or strongly discourage a paladin in a group that consists of an evil cleric, wizard and anti-paladin
  • A player who's truly OK with playing whatever

I think synergy and cooperation should come into play only after players have made their role-play choices. Otherwise, it's an unfair and unnecessary compromise.

Opinions?

I agree with what you are saying, and no one wants to be forced to be a healbot. However, over the years I have realised that clerics are not necessary and you can make plenty of really good teams without them.

A party can then have some great strengths (mutliple barbs are here to save the day, a team of paladins and monks are here to pass every will and fort save around), but of course if there is more speciality certain enemies really can harm the party - but then there is always magic weapons, ranged spam and wondrous items to save the day.

Basically I don't like the party of spread out classes, and I like to see interesting combinations. Our current group is very fun with a monk for the front, a switch hitter archer ranger for the middle or front, and a sorceress and a psion for battlefield control and blasting.

Another really good small team I remember from back in the day is a grappler (fighter rogue), a two weapon fighter and a ranger. Low on the magic, but it got the job done well.

Fighter-barbs and barbs are also a fantastic combination, and great for clearing out fort save inducing enemies like ghouls.


Jaelithe wrote:
BigDTBone wrote:
I think people should just be able to play what they want, and I don't think calling people "metagamer" to make you feel better about how you choose what you want is helping.

Neither is telling me I'm doing something I'm not doing.

I'm not calling people "meta-gamer," as if it's the defining characteristic of their gaming personality. I'm labeling certain actions meta-gaming because, wonder of wonders, they are. It's a matter of degree.

And, actually, I'm the one who's championing people playing what they want, by saying, "Come up with a concept, and don't worry about what the next guy is doing. There's no AP for which to carefully outfit, so just do as you please."

Now if people want a balanced party more than they want to play a particular character, so be it.

You used the term with a negative connotation and with the express sentiment that those who do it that way should not.

And it is no more meta-gaming than building a character in the first place. The act of going through the book and making choices and writing those choices down on paper is meta-gaming. There are actually super valid in-game world reasons why a party would seek out niches they cannot currently fill to join their party. I submit it is less meta-gamey to build what the party needs than to build whatever your fancy is. Your fancy is without question a meta-game decision. Not that there is anything wrong with that.

mandatory subtle wink which means that I really do think metagaming is bad even though I just said it was ok


I think its best if the game doesn't feel like you are required to feel roles to begin with, so people don't have to feel like they should be filling a role and they can go right to being who they want to be without a worry.

I might be a dreamer of some sort though.

Less vague, I like when people chat before a game starts. Always helps to chat and communicate I think, and to create the expectations about what the table and people and characters are like. Still plenty of room for creativity from there, especially if you create the expectations that they don't have to play a healbot or whatever if they don't want to. Can be nice if the players collaborate if they want anyway; a person can bring some crazy things to a table, two can compound that and if its up front you have a heads up.


As I've said before and as BigDTBone emphasized, metagaming is pretty central to creation in gaming and D&D especially. If you think your players aren't talking about what each other is doing and it's a coincidence you never end up with 4 wizards or barbarians I just don't know what to tell you.


Jacob Saltband wrote:

Dont want to derail the thread but....

Umbriere Moonwhisper wrote:
my first D&D game back in 1997 or so. the party asked for a mage because they were under the impression they needed somebody to lob fireballs and wipe out lotsa mooks. DM was a guy whom refused to let players read any of the books nor bring their own books. then one guy brought up that they needed a thief for the traps, and recommended i play an elf for some obscure ability elves had. i played a human multiclass theif/mage of lawful evil alignment whom was played as a scheming young noblewoman. she dealt with diplomacy and used enchantment spells to persuade, a subversion to the groups desire for a fireballing trapfinder, she used a wand of elemental summoning to summon a small elemental to spring the traps with no risk to the party and had a few low level elemental summoning spells, plus a ring of wizarddry. she joined a 15th level party as a mage 5/thief 8. she couldn't use fireball, she threw alchemical grenades instead, having taken alchemy as a nonweapon proficiency. she could stab with a knife if needed, but the alchemy did more damage than her backstabbing and she got XP for pitting mind controlled foes against their allies. after 3 months, she was a mage 18/thief 25 in a 17th level party due to beneficial use of enchantments.
Auren "Rin" Cloudstrider wrote:
my thief/mage still did her role of taking out minions and dealing with traps. she did it in ways that gave her the lions share of XP without evocations. she used summoned elementals of small size to spring traps to locate them to disable them, and she used enchantments such as charm and confusion to turn minions against each other and against themselves. nothing like making a big bad balor demon commit suicide by self disembowelment because the demon failed a save against a charm monster spell.

Does your GM had out exp on a kill by kill basis (if you kill the monster you get exp and no one else)?

I thought that exp was a group thing....

that was a different edition back in 1997, 3.0 wasn't out yet, and levels weren't universailized. each class had their own XP tables and that was a Different DM whom offered XP based on kills in a primitive edition. a character gained XP for the kills they contributed to, not for inflicting the finishing blow, and the seperate classes had seperate XP tables. it was closer to a hybrid of 1e and 2e with many houserules attached.


It is b+%%+&&& to say that there are necessary roles that must be filled. It is not b~$$$&!@, however, to a) point out that there is already someone playing a paladin, for example, which would mean your character will be very similar to another, and b) let the party lacking some important capability to find it a serious problem. It is not the GM's job to only put in monsters that a wizard only party can easily deal with, nor to provide multiple copies of loot for gunslingers/whatever.


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Speaking personally when a new player is joining a game, as GM I give them the rough outlines of the other players themes. "Heavy Armor Archer, Crowd Control Mage, Smite-is-right Paladin" etc. Not necessarily specific classes, but the type of role the existing players have chosen to give their characters.

That way they may or may not duplicate classes, but will know what they're getting into as far as existing characters' styles go. A smite-em-all Pali, for example, would still leave room in the party for a Lay-on-Hands+Mercies specialist support Pali.


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BigDTBone wrote:
You used the term with a negative connotation and with the express sentiment that those who do it that way should not.

If you don't see the distinction between what I said, and what you said I said, so be it. One person's semantics is another's subtle but important difference.

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And it is no more meta-gaming than building a character in the first place. The act of going through the book and making choices and writing those choices down on paper is meta-gaming.

Gee, really? Do you attend mass at Our Lady of the Patently Obvious? :)

Quote:
There are actually super valid in-game world reasons why a party would seek out niches they cannot currently fill to join their party.

I'd say that's self-evident. But those roles can be filled by the player characters' via whatever choices they make through the DM's subtle structuring or re-structuring of the upcoming adventures—which is better IMO than knowing what's coming in anything more than the broadest strokes.

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I submit it is less meta-gamey to build what the party needs than to build whatever your fancy is.

Submission rejected. [See below.]

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Your fancy is without question a meta-game decision. Not that there is anything wrong with that.

In the sense that it is technically outside the game, yes. In the sense that it does not look into the game to tailor itself to perceived complimentarity, it is a far less intrusive and objectionable form of meta-gaming. There's a huge difference between saying, "This is the life my character's lived until now; I'm inserting him into the game" and "Oh, so this is what would be best, insofar as party balance is concerned. Let me structure my character to conform to that."

Quote:
mandatory subtle wink which means that I really do think meta-gaming is bad even though I just said it was ok

Tee hee.


I'm just quoting this here since it still seems relevant and never got any replies earlier.

kyrt-ryder wrote:
Jaelithe wrote:
David knott 242 wrote:
Knowing something about the party composition and designing your character appropriately is not metagaming.
Respectfully, David knott 242 ... the new player is looking at the composition of a party not to determine in-game whether his or her character wants to join it, but from outside the game to design a character that will fit in optimally with it

These are opposite perspectives on the same in-world scenario.

The character who gets recruited is the one who is a good fit, the player creates the character who gets recruited.

Or would you want to have the player randomly create 3-5 different characters he likes and make the party spend a session in-character interviewing these characters and making a decision based on said interviews?

"Don't Send us, we'll Send you."


kyrt-ryder wrote:

I'm just quoting this here since it still seems relevant and never got any replies earlier.

kyrt-ryder wrote:
Jaelithe wrote:
David knott 242 wrote:
Knowing something about the party composition and designing your character appropriately is not metagaming.
Respectfully, David knott 242 ... the new player is looking at the composition of a party not to determine in-game whether his or her character wants to join it, but from outside the game to design a character that will fit in optimally with it

These are opposite perspectives on the same in-world scenario.

The character who gets recruited is the one who is a good fit, the player creates the character who gets recruited.

Or would you want to have the player randomly create 3-5 different characters he likes and make the party spend a session in-character interviewing these characters and making a decision based on said interviews?

"Don't Send us, we'll Send you."

You're assuming that the DM is running something he purchased, as opposed to devising or modifying a scenario after having seen the party's composition.

Since I've never run a module or AP, and never will, such isn't an issue for me. Parties can find NPCs to round out their complement as necessary, work suited to their current roster, or innovate with what they've got.

I think the limitations of pre-packaged scenarios may have a great deal to do with the need to meta-game while comprising a party.


I've never run one either Jaelithe (and never assume a DM is running a purchased adventure), but I also don't want the extra workload of having to customize encounters to my players' specific abilities. I prefer to just go with the flow of the story and throw together whatever encounters naturally occur.

I'm also not a big fan of adding NPCs to a party unless it's a particularly small party or the players themselves seek out the NPC aid (or drag an NPC along for the ride somehow.)


But once you've seen what the party has, kyrt-ryder, you're going to throw together encounters that work.

I don't push NPCs on a party ... but I've never really encountered that breed of player who feels that a fleshed-out NPC is "stealing our thunder."


Funny you should mention 'that breed of player'... because I did not :P

I just don't like the extra work of adding NPCs to the party unless the party is especially short on manpower or wants the NPCs of their own volition.


You didn't mention it, so since it was applicable, I did. :P

A long-standing campaign like mine has innumerable NPCs ... and considering how often I've created them just for my amusement, I have 'em lyin' around.


I think you might misunderstand. It's not that I care about the effort to make said NPCs, that part's easy enough. It's handling PC's who work with the party at the same time as handling the opposition that I find to be a pain in the ass.


kyrt-ryder wrote:
I think you might misunderstand. It's not that I care about the effort to make said NPCs, that part's easy enough. It's handling PC's who work with the party at the same time as handling the opposition that I find to be a pain in the ass.

(Ah. I did misunderstand or you weren't clear. No biggie either way.)

It never bothered me, but that's certainly understandable.


kyrt-ryder wrote:

Speaking personally when a new player is joining a game, as GM I give them the rough outlines of the other players themes. "Heavy Armor Archer, Crowd Control Mage, Smite-is-right Paladin" etc. Not necessarily specific classes, but the type of role the existing players have chosen to give their characters.

That way they may or may not duplicate classes, but will know what they're getting into as far as existing characters' styles go. A smite-em-all Pali, for example, would still leave room in the party for a Lay-on-Hands+Mercies specialist support Pali.

that is a really good idea, explain the general theme, not the class. on my monday online group, my Roomate/Childhood friend and i, share an account but play seperate characters as Co-DMs for a married couple of Co-DMs for 4 Co-DMs. for anywhere from 4-8 other players.

each of the 4 DMs in the council has a PC and we usually have 4-8 other PCs we can't keep track of due to a lack of players willing to commit, schedule problems and the like

the 4 Main Characters we have, not listed by class, but by general theme include

Kish, Male Tengu Spymaster for a lord of some sort. talents are currently unknown, but he provides lots of information and lots of leads to keep the group on track

Sonia Jendell, Daughter of Lord Jendel and Twin Sisters of the missing Acentes Jendel. a sickly and ravaged noblewoman with a variety of magical assets, provides both cures and channels, alongside magic missiles and burning hands. essentially a hybrid of blaster and healer. has a few face skills, and is the moral conscience of the party

Countess Umbriere of House Aniri, Heir of House Aniri and Second Cousin of Nymph Queen Synethra Aniri the second, Queen of a Fey Paradise whom shares a namesake with her. contributes a few minor heals and the occasional acid splash, but is generally built to be a diplomat and will eventually pick up a few important buff and debuff spells. highest intelligence and charisma in the party so far. wears a spidersilk dress that can stop small pointy objects with a small shield, eating small amounts of arcane failure until she gets a better shield later.

Auren "Rin" Cloudstrider of House Aniri, a fey blooded street magician whom was accepted as a Retainer of House Aniri and became Umbriere's Personal Knight. knows a bit about traps and locks, knows a bit about disabling humans, knows her way around a blade, dabbles a bit of sleight of hand, not a bad tracker, her big downside is she is so shy and timid, the only thing she feels comfortable conversing with are small urban birds. will eventually study a bit of Falconry and get a pet bird of her own for scouting and delivering messages. currently has a small armory of mundane non-masterworked weapons she picked up off some guards for emergencies.

we have 2 casters, a martial combatant and a spymaster whom is really good at making sure we don't know his talents beyond the fact he is decent with a small blade and decent at gathering information.

our other 4-8 members keep changing and we play like one week out of every 3-4 due to schedule issues on roll20. mondays from 6;00PM PST to 10;00PM PST with extensions made for resolving elongated combats, or 9;00PM EST to 1;00AM PST. because as we know, the big issue with gaming on weekends, is many people have IRL things they do on weekends and well, it gives the work week something to look forward to early on after you dealt with the monday stress found in most jobs and are tired from the IRL weekend outings that are likely spent either with family or with friends. because i realized, for many people that joined, weekends just aren't a good day to game.


Jaelithe wrote:
kyrt-ryder wrote:
I think you might misunderstand. It's not that I care about the effort to make said NPCs, that part's easy enough. It's handling PC's who work with the party at the same time as handling the opposition that I find to be a pain in the ass.

(Ah. I did misunderstand or you weren't clear. No biggie either way.)

It never bothered me, but that's certainly understandable.

the easiest solution to the DMPC problem, is the do a multi-person council of Co-DMs and let each DM play as if they were a player, collaberating with 3 other people like i do, can be difficult to schedule around, but it is 4 people split amongst 2 households. which makes things easier. a married couple as one pair, and the other, a pair of childhood friends whom live as roomates and failed to really date each other because they are more like big brother and younger sister, forcing the dating to break up, not that Ilina and i don't still have outings.


So if supposedly none of the players discuss it (doubt it but I'll go with that for a second) and they all show up as Barbarian, you are going to do what?

Run 3 long-term DMPCs or 3 Redshirts of an Arcane, Healer, trapfinder/skill monkey?

If so, maybe that sounds fun to you, but sounds like a pain, extra work, and most importantly a distraction from doing other things I could be doing to make a better story.

And doing that yields what? I greater risk of meta-gaming because either A) you have the npcs go "Durr I'll do whatever you wanna do boss" or B) you risk giving them breadcrumbs (either real or interpreted hints) based on what those NPCs want to do. You're running the risk of meta-gaming right there of how you build those characters going forward, intentionally or not building that character to help the party out knowing exactly what they'll be going against.

This is why I'd prefer to separate the protagonists (PCs) from the story. Its harder to do that when you have to throw in silly immersion-damaging things like a Rent-a-bot healer because the group wasn't self-sufficient.


He might opt to do the same thing I would, which is none of the above. I'd to run a badass manly campaign for a group of barbarians who decided to adventure together.

Granted they'd run into their own share of problems, and I might off-handedly suggest one of them swap the barbarian class for a barbarian-themed shaman (oracle, druid, cleric, something along those lines) to add a little diversity to the party, but at least at the low levels it could be fun. Probably more lethal than your average campaign, but fun.


kyrt-ryder wrote:

He might opt to do the same thing I would, which is none of the above. I'd to run a badass manly campaign for a group of barbarians who decided to adventure together.

Granted they'd run into their own share of problems, and I might off-handedly suggest one of them swap the barbarian class for a barbarian-themed shaman (oracle, druid, cleric, something along those lines) to add a little diversity to the party, but at least at the low levels it could be fun. Probably more lethal than your average campaign, but fun.

i would probably do that too. encourage one of the players to play a Shaman with a barbarian theme, though in my monday online group, we have a council 4 Co-DMs whom are all also players and have their own PCs. so if the no DMPCs applied, we would have 4 fewer players. the 4 of us each contribute 25% of the work, in the same session, but in the barbarian group, i wouldn't make a DMPC unless the group honestly sought or requested one. i would offhandedly suggest a Shaman to accompany the barbarians, probably an Oracle, Cleric or Druid and suggest something barbarian themed for an Arcane caster, which we could call anything from a Spirit Dancer to a Wind Speaker. which could probably be a Wizard, Sorcerer, Arcanist or Witch


I mentioned that earlier. With gaps I'll run a temp NPC but let them know he won't be around forever so someone is going to need to pick up levels in something else. They could opt not to, but I don't know how long they'll live depending on what they encounter.


Starfinder Charter Superscriber

So, if people should just bring whatever character they feel like, for RP reasons, is it also cool for the rest of the party to reject that character because they don't need anyone who does that task? Or should they just meta-game it away and accept the character because 'he's a PC.'

And some point, metagaming gets hard to avoid, unless you're cool with being dicks to each other "'cause my character would."


Shadrayl of the Mountain wrote:

So, if people should just bring whatever character they feel like, for RP reasons, is it also cool for the rest of the party to reject that character because they don't need anyone who does that task? Or should they just meta-game it away and accept the character because 'he's a PC.'

And some point, metagaming gets hard to avoid, unless you're cool with being dicks to each other "'cause my character would."

the party shouldn't be dicks to each other, but a few strong recommendations can be made as suggestions with incentives passed in that general direction, though i would rather the Party explain what they are looking for in detail rather than "we need a cleric" or "we need a divine caster." saying "we need somebody to Patch our Wounds" is fine though. though it needn't be answered immediately. the 1e/2e mishmash mage/thief i played in the regrettable 1997 Monty Haul of Mooks and Traps was a response to the Party's need to deal with traps and their need to take out Mooks. she just didn't do it the way they expected her too. i didn't even read the books because i wasn't allowed to and didn't own them, but got lucky on a lot of enchantment spells known and well, did all sorts of kill hogging. because there be lotsa mooks. it was a New DM whom loved to include lotsa mooks as his main challenge.

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