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  1. - Top - End - #1
    Halfling in the Playground
     
    ClericGirl

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    Default What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    In most systems there tends to be a default dynamic that a party can fall into, depending on their classes. Fighters and melee classes tank, there's a healer in the back, some kind of ranged combatant, etc. I would love to hear some stories about weird dynamics you have encountered/ been a part of that worked surprisingly well.

    As an example:

    I am currently running a 5e game with 3 players. A druid, a monk, and a sorcerer. Common sense/experience would expect the monk to be the main melee, druid bouncing between a bit of melee and lots of support/crowd control, and the sorc as the blaster. That is not how they are playing. The monk is much more of a skirmisher, darting in and out, and not really holding agro. The druid is the main tank (he has a stupid high AC with leather armor and a wooden shield) and the sorc is actually providing most of the support (Note, he's a storm sorc, not even divine soul.) Nearly all of the spells he's taken are ability enhancing in some way, and he keeps twinning them and throwing them at the others, using his cantrips to do extra damage. It sounds rather odd, but they've so far creamed everything I've thrown at them in four rounds or less.

    Example #2

    I wrapped up a mixed Supernatural CoD game. I was a werewolf, and the party included a hunter, a beast, and a vamp. Oddly enough the hunter was the muscle, the vamp was the "blaster" (as much as you can have in a CoD game) and I was the social/face character.
    "What are you going to do, bludgeon it with a rake?"
    "Hold up, did we just get a defective pocket dragon?"
    Why are you advocating cutting off hands? You're a paladin! Who's your god, Orcus?"

  2. - Top - End - #2
    Ettin in the Playground
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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    4 fighters then they pick up all wands and scrolls and then pretend to be wizards and proceed to roll over all the plot killing it efficiently and doing everything better than fighters not pretending to be wizards.

  3. - Top - End - #3
    Ettin in the Playground
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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    I ran a session where the sorcerer was the main melee character (without any magic), the cleric was the specialist/rogue (no magic), and the paladin was the arcane caster (a couple of scrolls and some UMD) but did no melee or ranged damage.






    This was when the 18th level group were tired of the fact that every adventure they'd been on for years had been being involved in the machinations of gods, the fate of nations and thousands of peoples' lives on the line, etc., and wanted to get away from it all. Back to a simpler time when there were just a few bandits around and failure didn't really matter. So they went to what is essentially a theme park.. Yes, Mystara has places where you can go on safari, LARPS, mini-'adventures' and adventure theme parks. They failed to save the poor villagers from the ogre's pot, and both the PCs and the players had a blast doing so.

  4. - Top - End - #4
    Firbolg in the Playground
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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    Monk, Fighter, Sorcerer, Wizard.

    The Fighter was striker and face.

    The Sorcerer was toolkit.

    The Monk was a MVP boss (tanked like a boss, plus striker and toolkit, and even that feels like I'm underselling her).

    The Wizard was... useless.

  5. - Top - End - #5
    Ettin in the Playground
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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    Quote Originally Posted by BWR View Post
    I ran a session where the sorcerer was the main melee character (without any magic), the cleric was the specialist/rogue (no magic), and the paladin was the arcane caster (a couple of scrolls and some UMD) but did no melee or ranged damage.
    Paladins are actually good at using magic devices even through it is not a class skill due to how paladins like charisma.

  6. - Top - End - #6
    Firbolg in the Playground
     
    Man_Over_Game's Avatar

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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    In 5E, Sorcerers can twin spells, choosing two targets for a spell that normally only allows one. The Life Cleric can get Heavy Armor and bonuses on healing. There's a feat you can get called Heavy Armor Master, which mitigates all non-magical weapon damage you receive by 3 as long as you have heavy armor. Lastly, a spell called Warding Bond gives an ally a defensive boost and splits the damage they receive onto you as if it was directly inflicted upon you.



    Combined, you can cast Warding Bond on 2 people at once, giving them both the defensive boons and it gets split onto you, which you then mitigate each impact of damage on you by 3 if the source wasn't magical. Then you heal yourself for insane amounts of health. For additional tankiness, the feat Tough gives you an additional 2*level in maximum HP, for your current levels and all future levels, effectively increasing your class hit die by 2 sizes.

    Effectively makes you a group healer and buffer, by wearing heavy armor, stacking massive amount of HP, and only healing yourself. With a couple of meat heads to protect, you could be a group of heavy melee fighters that just stomped on anything in your path.

    --------------------

    Alternatively, the Ancestral Guardian Barbarian can cause a target they hit to have massive penalties to attack anything other than the Barbarian. Top this on the fact that this attack can be made at range, and you can play hide-and-seek with the boss. With these penalties, even a squishy Wizard will be tankier than the raging Barbarian, so you could be a Barbarian that hides behind weaklings, and still be a very effective force.
    Last edited by Man_Over_Game; 2018-10-31 at 04:51 PM.
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  7. - Top - End - #7
    Dwarf in the Playground
     
    OrcBarbarianGuy

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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    My current party is a CN Alchemist, a LE Wizard, a CE Bardbarian, and a NG Gunslinger. The first three are also all werewolves.

    The gunslinger basically just acts like their moral conscience, and keeps one of her shotguns perpetually loaded with flaming silver bullets just in case.

    The wizard is more of an "ends justify the means" fella. He killed the local alchemist so our alchemist would get all of his ingredients.

    Together, they balance the party out.

    The alchemist helps keep the party topped off with healing potions, and actually works pretty well as a lock-down specialist thanks to the Long-Arm potion she makes herself. She also has 4 arms. The Bardbarian is just a cannibal who holds back their tendencies until they rage.
    Last edited by 16bearswutIdo; 2018-11-01 at 09:29 AM.

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    Bugbear in the Playground
     
    DrowGuy

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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    All of my groups have had experience playing RPG video games, so I think there’s yet to be a truly nonstandard composition in any of them...and thinking of that makes me kind of sad. Closest we came to was a tiefling barbarian, dwarf bard, and dragonborn monk in a three-man party, which I must admit was some of the most fun I’ve had on the player side of the table from a mechanics standpoint. Never thought a monk could be the most powerful member of a party before...
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  9. - Top - End - #9
    Firbolg in the Playground
     
    Man_Over_Game's Avatar

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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    Quote Originally Posted by JBPuffin View Post
    All of my groups have had experience playing RPG video games, so I think there’s yet to be a truly nonstandard composition in any of them...and thinking of that makes me kind of sad. Closest we came to was a tiefling barbarian, dwarf bard, and dragonborn monk in a three-man party, which I must admit was some of the most fun I’ve had on the player side of the table from a mechanics standpoint. Never thought a monk could be the most powerful member of a party before...
    I wouldn't say it's about being a non-standard composition. It's about standing out. The more diverse the characters, the more unique each one is, and the more often each one feels like a hero. Sure, a Rogue, Ranger and a Monk can pull off a heist together, but it's the Rogue's magic, the Ranger's sniping, and the Monk's tankiness that's going to make them feel more than just being "that other, OTHER stealth guy".

    As a result, most players try to decide on what classes to be before the start of the game. Once you start filling in the roles that are unique (Support caster, blaster, tank, thief, hunter) to identify a unique role in the group, the more cliché it appears.

    It's not because they're trying to be cliché. It's because the cliché was built around what was the most fun, which still continues to be fun.
    Last edited by Man_Over_Game; 2018-11-02 at 04:41 PM.
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    MOG, design a darn RPG system. Seriously, the amount of ideas I’ve gleaned from your posts has been valuable. You’re a gem of the community here.

    5th Edition Homebrewery
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    Pain, using Exhaustion to make tactical martial combatants.
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  10. - Top - End - #10
    Firbolg in the Playground
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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    So, I don't actually remember most of this party's antics very well, but, as far as my senile mind can remember, they didn't implode, they didn't TPK, so I suppose that they must have worked? The party was a Paladin, an Assassin, an Undead Hunter, and his childhood friend, the Undead Master. Oh, and my character.

    Role-wise, the party had a striker, a tank, a healer, and a tactician - and that was just the Paladin! ;) Honestly, our biggest challenge was not killing each other. I'd like to think that me demonstrating, first encounter, that I was playing something very TO ridiculous probably didn't hurt our cohesion (I'm rather anti-PK).

    So, one scene where the dysfunctional party "worked" - or, rather, where our dysfunctions worked to our advantage - was when the Undead Master fell into an extradimensional prison for a powerful Demon. My character quickly moved to block the "door", and cast Protection from Evil. The Demon threatened the Necromancer's life, saying that he'd kill our friend if we didn't let him out. The paladin moved up next to me, and said go ahead, kill him. My character, as always, had an expression of total unconcern*. Try as he might, the Demon made absolutely no headway in bargaining for its release. As the clock kept ticking, our characters remained unyielding, my character remained unconcerned... and the Demon still could not pass. From its PoV, the Protection from Evil I had cast was lasting forever. As my apparent level passed 20, the threats stopped, and the Demon paid attention my character's insane questions about its history. As my apparent level passed 30, the Demon grew visibly frightened, trying to understand what we wanted. As my apparent level approached 40, the Demon was all but begging our very low level characters for mercy.

    Eventually, I bargained for it to not harm us or our allies, or interfere in our/their plans, and to put its history in writing****. The Demon interpreted this as us wanting the Undead Hunter back, and the Paladin grudgingly let him back in the party.

    For me, the best part was that, at the time, I hadn't put 2 and 2 together. I was personally clueless why the Demon hadn't broken out and killed us ages ago, when my Protection from Evil wore off.

    * The GM knew that my character was rather powerful, as I demonstrated that power early. He also knew that I constantly "bluffed**" being unconcerned - including one time where he asked me afterwards what I would have done if my diplomatic efforts had failed, and a rather sizable group of Ogres had attacked me***. I responded, calmly, "died.".
    ** Is it really a bluff if your character has an alien mindset, and a dysfunctional lack of self preservation instincts?
    *** I had intentionally distanced myself from the party, because my character somewhat understood that they cared about their survival. So, alone, probably at first level, against all the Ogres I could gather.
    **** I initially wrote "to paper", because I couldn't remember the phrase "in writing". Turns out, that distinction matters, as the book I received made, not of paper, but human flesh. Oops!
    Last edited by Quertus; 2018-11-02 at 07:46 PM.

  11. - Top - End - #11
    Troll in the Playground
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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    Weird party dynamics?

    Does the time the 4 PCs split into two parties that spent the rest of the campaign (which was admitted short, but is also one of my favourites) fighting each other count? Technically two parties, each of which consisted of 1 front-line fighter with a big gun and a face/leader (with NPC allies).

    If not (or even so) may I submit: "A mercenary, a naïve mystic and a reality-TV show host, with camera crew, walk into a bar." They were later joined by a conscripted wild life photographer and a local hunter.

    The mercenary beat stuff up (and took more damage than the rest of the party combined*), the mystic financed the entire party and saved the day near the end by "dying"**, the reality-TV show host was the healer, the photographer made effect use of a radio and little else and the hunter just flew the plane and provided buff granting advice.

    I think that is pretty non standard.

    * Except for a moment of self sacrifice. The mystic's entire health bar pushes the total for the rest of the PCs just over what the mercenary took.
    ** But no one found the body.

    Quote Originally Posted by Quertus View Post
    The Wizard was... useless.
    Was it a particularly academic mage, for which your account is named?

  12. - Top - End - #12
    Firbolg in the Playground
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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    Quote Originally Posted by Cluedrew View Post
    Was it a particularly academic mage, for which your account is named?
    Absolutely!

    Honestly, I can't remember a single time where the sets "Quertus was actually really useful" and "the group had fun" intersect. But I can remember several instances where Quertus lived up to a small percentage of his potential, and nobody had a good time.
    Last edited by Quertus; 2018-11-02 at 07:52 PM.

  13. - Top - End - #13
    Bugbear in the Playground
     
    PirateWench

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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    Back in the days of 3.0, I joined a new group. I had made a wizard character specializing in armor class; for example, he took a level of monk for WIS to AC, and abused polymorph spells, while stacking Shield (with Persistent Spell) and Mage Armor. Another player had an archer character who sent out massive ranged damage every single round. And there were some other guys too (an average cleric, an ineffective paladin, and an ineffective monk/rogue). Eventually, the party was down to just my wizard character and the archer. My wizard was the tank, drawing all the close combat attacks, while the archer stayed far away and shot things until they died. This worked exceptionally well against some golem from the Epic Level Handbook (one of the weaker ones, I should add). My wizard could only be hit on a 20, so he was pretty safe (even though a few good hits would have squished him).

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    Ogre in the Playground
     
    BlackDragon

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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    Whelp Here Are a Few

    Summoner, Wizard, Vigilante
    We basically played it like kamen rider with the wizard as support staff the vigilante dons a costume and i'd don my power armour

    Cleric-Life, Cleric-Death, Paladin, Barbarian
    This was 5th edition and the barbarian is Zealot so they all are good aligned worshiping good deities. Or in death-clerics place the good side of death. So yeah because of random luck and other strokes they have made a comprehensive little religious party

    Meanwhile the fighter just sighs and drinks.

    Oh another good one
    Wizard, Sorcerer, Ranger, Inquisitor also worked or is working really well. Wizard just does bull**** cause we are high level sorcerer supports with disintegrate, and the ranger and inquisitor handle interrogations
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    Troll in the Playground
     
    ElfRangerGuy

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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    I was the GM of a group of Alternity Hoffmann Institute people who were going to alternate tangents and checked up on them. We had:
    -an ex-spetsnaz (Russian special forces) ranged combat monster
    -a idealistic melee fighter who had been exposed to a bit too much to Tibettan bhuddism (he could do more damage in melee than the spetsnaz with a sniper rifle)
    -an ex-police officer from the London Sweeney (their flying squad) who was supposed to be good at investigating (he was) and at shooting (not so much, he once shot the spetsnaz by accident)
    -an high IQ nerd with a specialisation in ancient cultures (think Daniel Jackson from SG-1).
    -a Russian computer specialist who was quite good at what she did, but tried to hack into just about anything she encountered and who's first question in every tangent was 'are there wifi signals here'.


    The most fun dynamic was between the spetsnaz and the melee fighter as the first had a mindset of 'the end justifies the means' and the other was quite idealistic, with a bhuddist mindset. During one mission they had gotten a couple of claymore mines and they had put one between the main building and the guard shack (if the guards came running in, they would be stopped) and while the melee fighter was standing guard, the rest had, unknown to him, placed the second one at the door of the guard's sleeping quarters. It was quite a lot of fun when there were not one but two explosions. In the after action debriefing there was about half an hour real time worth of idiological discussion. Great to see.

    In another mission both were fighting a group of people. The spetsnaz was standing on the first floor shooting, while the melee fighter was on the ground floor keeping them out. At one point the enemies were standing around the melee fighter and the other just dropped two grenades down to take them out with the words 'he can take it' (the melee fighter could, as he had some psionics that prevented him to take too much damage, but still).

    And that wasn't even the worst part. The melee fighter had the flaw divided loyalty (to the bhuddist monastery) and the spetsnaz had powerful enemy (some Russion higher ups). Using some of the canon organisations in the DarkMatter core book I managed to link those two up. They were very paranoid because their enemies always seemed to find them. Hilarious and quite fun when I told them at the end of the campaign.
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  16. - Top - End - #16
    Firbolg in the Playground
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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    Oh, how could I forget the majority of my 2e experience: double-digit Fighters, one Thief, and me playing a Mage. It may not be the Playground-approved configuration, but it meant a lot of characters with good defenses (AC, HP, saving throws), and a lot of chances to dish out damage to give stuff the "dead" condition.

    Which was very much like my first ShadowRun party - a whole bunch of Street Samurai (probably would have been double-digit, if everyone had shown up), one Shaman, and me as a Combat Mage.

    One 2e party was a Ranger/Thief, a Ranger/Mage, a Fighter/Psion, and a Cleric of Strength. Again, lots of raw damage-dealing potential, with every character passable as both striker and tank (the straight Cleric was, sadly, the worst at tanking), and then each bringing something extra to the table.

    That party dynamic worked amazingly well. Later, the party was joined by a Wild/Sylvan Elf Mage who broke the mold (kinda - he did have the highest Strength score in the party). Then the Fighter/Psion was swapped out for a straight Psion, and several other characters whose classes I don't know (but included at least one Psion) joined the party. Although I would have loved to keep playing with that party, I think that the original dynamic worked better.

    -----

    Another set of party dynamics that I think worked really well was whenever I played with as particular one of my friends. He played very solid, and often very samey characters. And he played them well. Then I would play some random build that would be more Timmy to his Jonny - he'd be consistently good, and I'd be occasionally awesome. So, to simplify, he'd dish out consistent top-tier damage, and I'd deal much less damage, with rare status effects. Gaming with him was always good, because I knew I could count on him to carry the party, even if my random build turned out to be The Load.

  17. - Top - End - #17
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    Kobold

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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    I dunno man. In my longest FATE campaign we had a three person team of:

    The vessel of a goddess
    A highly destructive android
    And
    A journalist.

    And it worked GREAT!

  18. - Top - End - #18
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    RFLS's Avatar

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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    Talon/Karma bot lane ~6 years ago.

    For my RHoD campaign several years back, the bard tanked, the druid did everything, the wizard died repeatedly, and the monk was DPS. It was a weird one.

  19. - Top - End - #19
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    WolfInSheepsClothing

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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    in a d&d 5th ed campaign set in late pseudo renaissance (we all have guns):
    1 hunters, a doctor and a returned dead guy. The hunter is class wise a fighter with some additional skill sets, the doctor an alchemist and the dead guy (me) a blood hunter, which is a ranger meets warlock -class.
    So, I expected the doctor to take the cleric seat, the hunter to be main tank and ranged attacks, while I planned to do knowledge / diplomacy and a bit of fighting support.

    Now, what really happened:
    the dead guy is a glass cannon, taking mostly the tank role
    the hunter does healing and sneak attacks, and is worse than the dead guy when it comes to ranged damage
    the doctor is like a druid, switching between boosting the group and being 2nd tank. he's also the one doing all knowledge rolls, as I've never managed to roll good at all on that

    Quote Originally Posted by farothel View Post
    I was the GM of a group of Alternity Hoffmann Institute people who were going to alternate tangents and checked up on them. We had:
    -an ex-spetsnaz (Russian special forces) ranged combat monster
    -a idealistic melee fighter who had been exposed to a bit too much to Tibettan bhuddism (he could do more damage in melee than the spetsnaz with a sniper rifle)
    -an ex-police officer from the London Sweeney (their flying squad) who was supposed to be good at investigating (he was) and at shooting (not so much, he once shot the spetsnaz by accident)
    -an high IQ nerd with a specialisation in ancient cultures (think Daniel Jackson from SG-1).
    -a Russian computer specialist who was quite good at what she did, but tried to hack into just about anything she encountered and who's first question in every tangent was 'are there wifi signals here'.
    that sounds like a fun game. I'm looking up the setting as I'm writing this. Will definitively try out
    Last edited by Narmoth; 2018-11-07 at 04:25 AM.
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  20. - Top - End - #20
    Pixie in the Playground
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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    Quote Originally Posted by Miz_Liz View Post
    In most systems there tends to be a default dynamic that a party can fall into, depending on their classes. Fighters and melee classes tank, there's a healer in the back, some kind of ranged combatant, etc. I would love to hear some stories about weird dynamics you have encountered/ been a part of that worked surprisingly well.
    A paranoid monk/arcane knight who was REALLY nosy, combined with a whole party of people with mysterious and less than inviting backstories, i.e. a ranger covered in tattoos he wouldn't explain, a barbarian with a rune-covered sword, and an arcane trickster who was literally pretending to be a different person for the first half of the campaign.

    Sounds like a recipe for disaster, but we actually managed to kill a god together. Go figure.
    Last edited by PandaPhobia; 2018-11-15 at 04:54 PM.

  21. - Top - End - #21
    Bugbear in the Playground
     
    DrowGuy

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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    the party:

    all ages modified to real world values.

    early 60's retired combat medic.
    late 50's retired merc.
    late 50's gypsy organ trafficker.
    early teenage bratty girl.

    the organ trafficker dealt dps, the merc tanked and tamed the wild animals, the teenager was the face and jack of all trades and the medic was the main scout and sniper. none of us talked to each other before rolling up our characters. our perceived roles were medic (medic), merc (dps), organ trafficker (face), and teenager (brat). we adapted on the fly and it led to a very memorable session halfway between war movie, film noir, the expendables, and the babysitter.

    it. was. glorious.
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  22. - Top - End - #22
    Bugbear in the Playground
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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    We did a party once where we decided no armour and no ranged attacks was the theme.

    Monk, Rogue, Ranger and Bard. Combat was based around stealth and mobility with the Bard specializing into illusions and distractions, while the other 3 took out high value targets with high criticals/backstabs/stuns/poisons whilst avoiding direct confrontation with minions.

    The party had next to zero staying power in a head on fight, but was glorious at assassinating the boss and getting out before the minions knew someone was inside their lair.

  23. - Top - End - #23

    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    I did an alternate reality campaign where the party found a curse neckless. Being cured I roled a die each new morning to see if the ulternate world came up. In this case the group was a good party but the ulternate world had bounties in there heads and were wanted. They had to figure out how to dispose of the cursed neckless. Really fun campaign

  24. - Top - End - #24
    Bugbear in the Playground
     
    DrowGuy

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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    i think my band has a knack of doing this, i posted one a few posts above, but here's another

    the face: a gypsy taken straight out of "snatch".
    the muscle: a dude that grew up in not-compton
    the medic: basically a not-amazonian tribal shaman
    the genius: a 14-year old eugenics project between the best beatstick ever and the most talented mechanic ever.

    the reality:

    the face: the amazonian
    the muscle-mad bomber: the 14 year old
    the face-dps: the gypsy and his sawn-off shotgun
    the genius-medic: the gangster (because he took ranks in "knowledge: survival instinct" and "knowledge: groin attacks and how to treat them").

    if anyone read my posts in "no context quotes", the "genius" was named edward. she ended up blowing up atomic bombs to solve her problems, most of which started with "plot". my dm still hates me for it 3 years later. "edward" is also the name we scream whenever overkill comes into play. the gypsy's name was kazu, and his accent is still used whenever we try to haggle our way out of problems. usually works, probably due to the accent.
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    regarding my choice of sustenance:
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    I'm going to judge you.
    My judgement is: That is awesome.
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    GM: “If it doesn't move and it should, use duct tape. If it moves and it shouldn't, use a shotgun.”
    dm is Miltonian, credit where credit is due.

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    Ask the beret wearing insect men of Athas.

  25. - Top - End - #25
    Barbarian in the Playground
     
    BardGuy

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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    The strangest character dynamic I ever ran was a Pathfinder paladin + NE cleric of a trickster deity of greed.

    My paladin was dim, never put more than 1 rank in know (religion) and failed the check to identify the holy symbol and the sense motive check when he told me who his deity was (actually failed that check a couple of times). I did get suspicious sometimes, by I knew evil clerics showed up super bright to detect evil, and he never did (24 hour Nondetection is a Trickery domain spell). By the mechanics of the game, i had every reaso to believe he was yhe neutral cleric of a merchant deity he claimec to be (so no knowingly associating with evil).

    And we got along great! We both hated the evil establishment of the area we were in, and worked to bring it down together (him for personal reasons, me for religious ones). We had similar, rough senses of humor, loved the same entertainments (drinking and horse racing). We complemented the hell out of each other mechanically, me playing muscle, him helping figure out what targets we could hit, and helping cover up what we needed to keep operating in the city we were trying to bring down. Plus the normal synergy of a cleric who didn't need to his spells on healing because of paladin support.

    The only time I've ever played characters with better chemistry, they were brothers designed to compliment one another. All because the trickster cleric managed to play clever.

    We never did find out what would happen if someone broke it to the paladin that his best friend was secretly evil, but it would have been very interesting.
    I consider myself an author first, a GM second and a player third.

    The three skill-sets are only tangentially related.

  26. - Top - End - #26
    Bugbear in the Playground
     
    Malphegor's Avatar

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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    In 3.5, what we’ve found is that it’s surprisingly manageable for all players to have a few pets, summons, cohorts, etc, at near player level in damage output.

    Combat is slow, and we sometimes forget to give the spider a turn (one day, spider, I will give you more arms then fuse your arms and legs into one beefy arm of PUNCH), but D&D works surprisingly smoothly when you scale it up to 30 characters per round.

    I honestly thought it would be an unpleasant experience, but since most of us prefer casters, there’s plenty of immediate actions and ongoing effects that longer rounds don’t seem too bad.

    Also a party of chaotic stoners and one lawful wizard who’s the Team Dad. I’m so tempted to lean into it and embrace Dadhood for our party. Once I can pull sage advice from the ether with magic i guess

  27. - Top - End - #27
    Titan in the Playground
     
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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    The title and OP suggest two different questions, so I figure I'll just cover both. Starting from the OP, where the dynamic seems to be combat role focused:

    I mostly play games where not everyone needs to be a combatant at all, and where the whole distinct combat roles don't necessarily hew that closely to distinct character roles. That said, there have still been a few cases which were particularly weird - usually in the context of a party that had a fairly conventional combat technique, but also enough distributed switch hitters that you could get really bizarre results once the switch hitting was in full effect.

    For instance, there was a fantasy game I ran where under normal circumstances you'd get a couple of melee combatants and some ranged backup. Under less normal circumstances that changed. You'd get the hybrid siege-engineer/weapon manufacturer using their improvise weapon skill to kick gates into shuriken, the dedicated fire spreader using their melee combat skills to get to contested positions to light things on fire, and the drugged-animal deployment specialist, sending out swarms of semidomesticated mostly extinct mammals high on pain killing drugs. Over in a different genre we had a team that under normal circumstances were either on the ground fighting with guns, or in space doing the whole pilot-engineer-gunner-boarding resistance thing. A few fights ended up well off normal circumstances though, including one where the party ended up effectively having a docked-ship weapons specialist, a hacker messing with artificial gravity, a knife fighter bringing knives to gunfights entirely too effectively, and a chemical weapons counterspecialist.

    The question in the title is about party dynamics though, and that's not just who's fighting who how. At least in my experience it's often here where it gets particularly weird in wonderfully workable ways. For instance, there was the ship crew that was running pretty close to an anarchist collective until they suddenly acquired a captain - because everybody threw the same person under the bus when the cops asked who was in charge after some legally dubious activity. Somehow this stuck, and that person genuinely was the captain in charge for the rest of the game.
    I would really like to see a game made by Obryn, Kurald Galain, and Knaight from these forums.

    I'm not joking one bit. I would buy the hell out of that.
    -- ChubbyRain

    Current Design Project: Legacy, a game of masters and apprentices for two players and a GM.

  28. - Top - End - #28
    Titan in the Playground
     
    Spore's Avatar

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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    In news other than D&D 5e, we had a post apocalyptic group consisting of:

    1) Bruiser/Zealot: Basically a religious guy with a twohanded sword. Dude did not act stupid but in an age of firearms - and shotguns especially - he almost died about 5-6 during the campaign of two years. When our gear level made it so basically every good challenge was a fire fight, he became more or less "heavy weapons guy".

    Heavy weapons guy embroidered with religious symbols. He was only missing power armor to go full on Space Marine.

    2) Hacker/Tech girl: A late addition switched out for a bored Scrapper and oddly enough charged right into melee. She was a capable sword fighter as well, and probably weirdly enough a better one than our dedicated tank #1. Because she was quicker and nimbler, she was hit a lot less often and could often sneak into melee.

    Imagine the hacker having a katana, you thinking it is some kind of joke until your first limb is missing.

    3) Assassin guy: Always was focussing on extremely expensive sniper rifles, uzi guns and quick reflexes, he basically was the most dangerous with a sharp knife and a bit of prep work.

    Was later reborn by nano technology (lost an arm to a bet) with all his limbs. Decided to have a non-too-subtle skull body tattoo as part of it.

    4) Face girl: Started as face, but quickly was tangled up in her own lies and bargains that made her an NPC for the last act of the game. And when your next best charisma character has a dice pool of 3 in one social skill and 2 in every other, things are bound to become a lot more expensive and harder to come by. though she never used it, I found out later she was as deadly with a knife as #3.

    Was NPC'd as she could only increase her influence in her cult by getting pregnant by some major NPC.

    4) Scrapper: I filled the role of resident mechanic, but over the time (sidegrading skills is a lot cheaper than specializing) I had a kind of "bardic" approach to things. At the end of the campaign, I could fight a bit, sneak a good bit, was clever and quick to react, basically everything barring social skills. I even blocked a lethal blow for our heavy weapons guy to allow our tech girl to get into melee range.

    After a bit of mechanics training, I decided to go into Medicine as we regularly got into fights and it was just fitting both his stat layout and the DIRE need for someone to stitch back together before wounds get infected. Never play a semi realistic setting when the DM is a nurse.

  29. - Top - End - #29
    Troll in the Playground
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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    Quote Originally Posted by Sporeegg View Post
    Imagine the hacker having a katana, you thinking it is some kind of joke until your first limb is missing.
    So, a Hack & Slasher?
    Imagine if all real-world conversations were like internet D&D conversations...
    Protip: DnD is an incredibly social game played by some of the most socially inept people on the planet - Lev
    I read this somewhere and I stick to it: "I would rather play a bad system with my friends than a great system with nobody". - Trevlac
    Quote Originally Posted by Kelb_Panthera View Post
    That said, trolling is entirely counterproductive (yes, even when it's hilarious).

  30. - Top - End - #30
    Titan in the Playground
     
    Spore's Avatar

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    Default Re: What are some weird party dynamics that have actually worked?

    Quote Originally Posted by Arbane View Post
    So, a Hack & Slasher?
    Uhh, so the campaign ended 2 years and NOW we have her code name?

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