Material Possessions are Fleeting

[gom jabbarwocky]

Apparently I have this tendency as a GM to be "mean" about the various stuff owned by the PCs. Weapons break, vehicles get stolen, homes are raided by enemies or blown up. This never seemed like such a big deal to me, since as a player I'd expect no less from a GM. I figure that what makes my character unique isn't their stuff, but their, you know, characteristics and skills. There are exceptions, of course, but, for the most part, I've always had that attitude, and my players are aware of this fact before they game with me. As a player, I'll basically throw away stuff unless I'm sure I'll need it, and my PCs prefer to travel light.

Last session of a game I'm running, one of my newer players majorly botched a roll and as a result her weapon broke, and while she didn't say anything to the effect, seemed super pissed about it. You'd have though I said that her character got her leg lopped off instead. I didn't even make up that the weapon broke, I pointed out that the fumble tables in the book ruled it, but that didn't help my case. Maybe it was just my 'cavalier' attitude toward the event. But what was I supposed to say? It was only a knife, geez.

I've been playing RPGs for almost ten years now and no one ever taught me that this attitude was "wrong." Yet I've come across players on the forums and the like who seem as though they'd rather have their characters die than get their gear broken or taken away, like that's somehow worse or more cruel than maiming or killing a PC. I don't really get this, except that if your PC dies you can just roll up another one with full HP and no sense of self-preservation while if your gear gets broke you just gotta deal with it, 'cause it ain't coming back.

Am I missing something here? I'm bringing this to the forum because I wanted to know how other people here might feel about this subject. Anyone have any stories to tell, or explain to me why I'm wrong? Does anyone feel the same way I do on the issue? Anyone want to tell me that I should be flayed alive for my crimes against players (get in line)?

[Sidmen]

Quite frankly, yeah. I'd be annoyed if all my stuff was constantly being broken, stolen, blown up, etc.

It depends on the system, but often times things are what players work for. And when you take those things away, you have literally just rendered their efforts moot. If I spent multiple sessions building myself a super cool home complete with koi pond and miniature waterfall - only to have it blown up by the bad guys via DM fiat. Well, why did I bother with any of it.

It can be similar with weapons, though I usually care less about them myself. If I'm playing a Swordsman, then having my sword destroyed in a fashion that stretches believability (which, most of the time, fumble rules that break weapons are). I'm no longer a swordsman, am I? No, I'm some bloke with a backup quarterstaff or knife.

It gets worse when a character puts thought into an object that he or she is carrying. If that was her grandfather's knife, etched with the family coat of arms and painstakingly sharpened every morning as part of a ritual - well, loosing it "because dice" is going to be nothing except irritating.

Sorry if its a ramble, hopefully it helps.

[Knaight]

This is extremely system dependent. In some editions of D&D, a lot of the equipment is basically a supplemental character power system, and it breaking with any frequency can get irritating. In other games, it can be a running joke that the characters go through a vehicle every session or two, and everyone in the group finds it funny.

[Forrestfire]

Well, what game were you playing? For example, in D&D 3.5, a significant portion of what makes a character's abilities function is their gear. If you break their gear, you may as well be removing them from the game, especially if it's something unique or something they tried hard to get in-game. Even breaking normal +numbers gear will leave them behind, while, say, chopping off a leg would instead lead to some sort of penalty (the DMG suggests -2 penalties to things, which isn't super debilitating, and Regenerate and robot limbs are cheaper than replacing some centerpiece item), and likely some fun roleplaying opportunities in the meantime.

And really, losing equipment isn't fun. You have fun toys, and the DM broke your toys. This is a different feel from the DM hurting your character, because the character is different. You expect your character to be wounded, or injured, or in grave danger (or killed), and that's part of the fun. The equipment is there often as a side factor to help the character work, and sometimes as an important part of characterization, but overall, in my experience, it's not really thought of as in the line of fire. It's like if you were playing a basketball game and moving to intercept a pass, but instead of throwing the pass, the opposing player ran to the sidelines and threw the basketball at your coach, breaking his nose. It's just not something you'd expect, and not something that's really fair, or right, in the eyes of many (including myself, depending on the game. In 3.5? Don't mess with equipment. Items form too much of a character's power and abilities [especially for the noncasters], and they're incredibly hard to replace if broken unless the DM replaces them).

Now, that's not to say that breaking items has no place. But just like doing something like chopping off a character's leg (which should be something major), breaking important items should be something major. Not the result of a critical fumble (also, shame on you for using critical fumble tables. They are almost universally terrible, turn the game into a bad attempt at slapstick comedy, and are generally designed by people who don't understand the game). If a magic sword is important to a character, and you break it, it should be done by some important event or NPC, with a chance at reforging it into something new, or a small arc for the character to overcome their loss and find some other way to fight. In many games especially D&D, items are just as important as anything else a character has.

Naturally, the majority of this post applies only to D&D and D&D-likes, but even then, you should make sure you're on the same page with your players before doing something like that.

[Vitruviansquid]

Why can't you just tell your player, after the fight, that she picks up another knife somewhere. Because basically everybody wants to have a knife for cooking, eating and day-to-day life so they are basically being sold everywhere or being given out by anyone isn't a total ******* if you ask nicely enough.

[Coidzor]

This is extremely system dependent. In some editions of D&D, a lot of the equipment is basically a supplemental character power system, and it breaking with any frequency can get irritating. In other games, it can be a running joke that the characters go through a vehicle every session or two, and everyone in the group finds it funny.

Yes, it entirely depends upon the system and there are systems where destroying the players' stuff all the time is doing it wrong.

Though, I must admit, I've yet to encounter a system where critical fumbles aren't loathed and detrimental, though I suppose there's some possibility that there are such systems somewhere out there.

Well, aside from joke systems, anyway, where the point is failing spectacularly and ludicrously, similar to how Paranoia is played in order to see who can die in the most humorous and/or humiliating ways possible.

[jaydubs]

Most people like to play competent, capable, extraordinary characters. Not sub-par, incompetent, perennially lagging characters. So as a general rule, long-term penalties are going to irritate a significant portion of players. The issue with destroying gear is that in a lot of systems, gear has a huge impact on character ability. So wiping out equipment is the equivalent of placing permanent handicaps on those characters.

That said, if you're playing a system where equipment doesn't play a huge role in character ability, or where most equipment is easy to replace (i.e. D&D 5e without magic items), it's much less of an issue.

But let's turn the question around. What, specifically, are you trying to accomplish by going after PC equipment and property? Do you think your pool of players would have less fun if you didn't destroy their stuff? If no, why are you doing it?

I'll also drop this thread here, in case it's relevant. Wherein several forumites make the argument that "bad stuff happens to PCs" should never be the goal in-and-of-itself. Rather, it's but one of several tools, to be used with care in order to make for a more entertaining game. Or alternatively, a side-effect of the actually important "challenge your PCs" DM responsibility.

[hymer]

But what was I supposed to say? It was only a knife, geez.

Yeah, that attitude from a DM can certainly be galling.
People have been very polite so far in this thread, but I'll go a little different:
I'm with the players here. There is no better yardstick for a game's performance than whether fun (and not necessarily 'ha-ha' kinda fun) is had. You seem bewildered that penalizing players and not taking their emotions into consideration is not fun for them.
Sit down and talk it out with your players. And don't belittle their feelings, or call the rules in to cover for players not having fun. Hear what they have to say and get on the same page about the game.

[Karl Aegis]

You're playing with critical fumble rules. Every character should have failed so spectacularly they shouldn't be relevant to the story. It strains belief that they avoided the mishap when they've had more than enough chances.

[Coidzor]

Yeah, that attitude from a DM can certainly be galling.
People have been very polite so far in this thread, but I'll go a little different:
I'm with the players here. There is no better yardstick for a game's performance than whether fun (and not necessarily 'ha-ha' kinda fun) is had. You seem bewildered that penalizing players and not taking their emotions into consideration is not fun for them.
Sit down and talk it out with your players. And don't belittle their feelings, or call the rules in to cover for players not having fun. Hear what they have to say and get on the same page about the game.

Yeah, being actively callous or even just a cold fish doesn't do a DM any favors.

[mephnick]

It depends entirely on your group and the expectations you've laid out for them. Even in 3.5 you can have a gritty "realistic" (what a stupid term) game where weapons get broken and homes get torched. That's fine, if your players agree to it and are given the opportunity to prepare for such a game. If I knew item degradation was a huge part of the campaign, I'd like the chance to play a character that can build or mend equipment, something I'd never consider in a generic game.

Did you have a session zero? In this session did you tell your players that nothing is safe and that their toys/friends/spirits will be broken, and that harsh critical fumble rules apply?

[Strigon]

The thing about most RPGs is that many characters are only as good as their equipment. Sure, the extra stats/skills/whatever you get from levelling up is pretty nice, but nothing feels better than finding a +3 sword of awesome at the end of a dungeon.
Likewise, nothing feels worse than losing that same sword because of rolling low once or twice. If you must play with fumbles, hurt the characters; nothing absurd, like chopping all of their limbs off, but going into town and getting healed/getting a replacement arm is far easier than replacing your favourite piece of loot.
Now, that's not to say every piece of loot should stay until your players let it go - stealing something from the players can motivate them quite effectively* - but the differences lie in both the frequency with which it happened (your players should be able to say "Hey, remember that time X lost his favourite toy and we had to get it back?", and everyone should be able to clearly recall the incident>), and the ability to get it back, preferably with a nice little bonus at the end for their trouble.

*Note: Some players get very attached to their gear. In this case, it'll be far more likely to get them mad at you, which is a very different scenario from their characters being mad at the thief. Exercise caution when using this technique.

[Maglubiyet]

Weapons break, vehicles get stolen, homes are raided by enemies or blown up. This never seemed like such a big deal to me

I'm betting you're not the oldest child in your family.

[Kid Jake]

I'm betting you're not the oldest child in your family.

As the oldest child in my family, I can verify that both of my sisters' stuff used to break all the time. Dolls, craft projects, etc.... It was hilarious mysterious.

[Knaight]

Though, I must admit, I've yet to encounter a system where critical fumbles aren't loathed and detrimental, though I suppose there's some possibility that there are such systems somewhere out there.

This does get into why things are breaking. Your shield breaking because you just used it to block an incoming sword from a three meter tall monstrosity of a golem? That's often something that can be pretty cool. Your shield breaking because you tripped and landed on it weird? Less so. I'm generally not too fond of fumbles, though I have seen them incorporated into games in an effective way (more with guns jamming than anything else, though I have GMed a game where the characters were versatile martial artists, the weapons tended to be wooden, and it was entirely common to break a staff over someone's head then have to fight unarmed for a while - because of the conceit of the game, that wasn't ever an issue).

To use a non-fumble item breaking example from one of my games, I ran a game which was about a bunch of futuristic treasure hunters trying to track down El Dorado - before the demons found it. Their big material assets were their armor, their weapons, and their jeep. The armor and weapons generally came through the game okay, but the jeeps were getting destroyed all the time. There was the one which fell into a canyon when the bridge was blown out from under it - the PCs ended up having to leap for the edge while it fell. There was the one that took a hellfire ball dead center when a very good fire roll went up against a pretty terrible driving roll, and had all of its moving metal parts welded together into not moving metal parts. There was the one that got buried under a rock slide.

It quickly became a running joke, and everyone involved had fun with it. It helped that replacements weren't too terribly difficult to come by, and it certainly helped that they went out in a particularly cinematic fashion. Contrast something like all the magical equipment of a D&D party being hit with Mordenkain's Disjunction. It's not cinematic, it's ridiculously hard to replace, and it's generally just irritating.

[Darth Ultron]

There is a type of game, lets call them materialists, who think they should never loose any objects or equipment. They are the type of person who is more playing the roll side of the game and don't go for the idea of role playing in the games alternate reality. They really do obsess over the +1 an item gives a character to a roll.

I play a lot more in the alternate reality style: When a character falls off a bridge they will drop things, when they get captured they will loose things and sometimes an enemy might even target their stuff. And this can lead to so very upset players. And the big problem is that it's hard to prepare for....

Should the GM say ''sigh, ok, just to make it clear before we start the game. I believe in the idea of game reality. And part of that is your character might loose some or all of their stuff , depending on the game reality of the situation.'' Most players will just nod and think that ''it will never happen'' or ''only happen once in a while, like once every ten games''. Then an hour later the player is all upset when the guards lock the character in a cell and take away the characters weapons.

I've had much more fun in games losing items then the type that are like ''you swim to shore....and find your sword laying on the beach, guess the tied brought it in....''

[VincentTakeda]

I do have mixed feelings all over the place for this one.

In the real world if I have an heirloom katana and an nsx, things that I place emotional value on, I'd never use the katana in combat or drive the nsx into a bad neighborhood. You are careful with the things you care about so one might assume that if she's got a knife she cared about, she wouldnt be using it in fights...

But in a fantasy game or cinematic game you'd rather be able to use the legacy sword of your people without worrying about it being destroyed in a bad roll... You'd rather be able to drive your cool toys into battle...

Yoda's light saber gets plot immunity but lukes blue one? Nope. Had to make a new green one. And having to make a new saber is actually kinda cool in that context... Just part of being a jedi... Indiana Jones's hat? Quite the opposite... He makes some pretty foolishly dangerous choices to protect his fedora.

So I swing both ways pretty strongly from moment to moment. Given the choice, I want my toys to survive, but if the system isn't designed to let my toys survive... I kinda talk myself out of having an emotional attatchment to them. In a world where cars are being destroyed every day, I wouldnt even own an nsx. And not every time, but a lot of times, thats less cool than a campaign where I can have and use my cool things with impunity. But in a system where stuff breaks often and arbitrarily? Not really a good option.

Best to either not care to start with, or to make 'fixing the blade' an important story element. If her knife had broken as a result of being used to block a deadly incoming blow? Yeah. Her heirloom blade saved her life... Took one for the team. That's its own kinda special.

I do feel like replacability/repairability is pertinent... If I could get hand crafted folded katanas ad nauseum from a local shop, i'd be less angsty about breaking one now and then. If its a zombie apocalypse and I'm in a neighborhood that has no other humans and a ferrari dealership i'm going to be pretty cavalier about wrecking ferraris for a while... We didnt feel bad about Dean's metallicar getting seriously banged up because we trust Dean to put it back together... Good as new.

[Knaight]

There is a type of game, lets call them materialists, who think they should never loose any objects or equipment. They are the type of person who is more playing the roll side of the game and don't go for the idea of role playing in the games alternate reality. They really do obsess over the +1 an item gives a character to a roll.

There are also people who feel that a particular thing a character has is a major component of the character, and who consider the loss of that thing to something like a fumble table a problem. King Arthur as a character is defined partially by his relationship to two items - Excalibur, and the grail. Excalibur being easily lost would undercut the character. The grail being easily found would undercut the character. A player playing a character like that can easily take the same approach, and it's not unreasonable, nor does it make them a rollplayer.

Then there's the matter of the system. If the system assumption is that stuff is impermanent, fortunes will be squandered, and that there's a fragility to most things in the environments the characters deal in, basically nobody is going to have an issue with their stuff breaking. People won't make characters which are at all defined by (or even which have any real relation to) a particular thing. If the system assumptions are exactly not that, there can be an issue.

[Gritmonger]

I'm going to say it depends on the tone of the game.

Losing stuff for no reason, probably not a tone most people would strive for.

But if you want an enemy that the players will really, really hate: have the enemy break their stuff.

I think it's partly the "why." If it's for no reason, it can get to be a bit much. If it's due to carelessness ("I swear I left my car here... right near where the mission was... and the bad-guys had seen it before... whoops...) or deliberate acts (I have twice sacrificed vehicles that I dearly, dearly loved to take out enemies) or as part of a "loss" instead of a "broken" (I might be able to get it back) or the theme of the game is one of being hard-luck characters...

But to say that a GM should never break anybody's stuff - in point-buy systems, the "equipment" very often is something you buy with the understanding that it's so "cheap" points-wise because it is expected to be broken, or taken away, or sacrificed, or lost.

tl;dr: If you break it, really mean it. Losing it for no reason is just galling because there's no reason, narratively, for it to be lost. It's like random encounter tables. They can be used, but shouldn't substitute for narrative flow.

[PurpleSocks]

One of my first campaigns with my regular group of players, I had all of their boots and 14gp stolen from them while they slept in a fairly trashy inn.

The rest of The campaign degenerated into a mad revenge rampage against some low-level cutpurses (who had to eventually be restatted into a thieves guild of awesome in order to provide a challenge) so they could get their boots back. My PC's literally spent thousands of gold, killed dozens of mooks and ruined my elaborately planned campaign because I decided to **** with them and steal 5 pairs of boots and 14 gold pieces.

So I dont mess with my players belongings anymore.

[Kid Jake]

One of my first campaigns with my regular group of players, I had all of their boots and 14gp stolen from them while they slept in a fairly trashy inn.

The rest of The campaign degenerated into a mad revenge rampage against some low-level cutpurses (who had to eventually be restatted into a thieves guild of awesome in order to provide a challenge) so they could get their boots back. My PC's literally spent thousands of gold, killed dozens of mooks and ruined my elaborately planned campaign because I decided to **** with them and steal 5 pairs of boots and 14 gold pieces.

So I dont mess with my players belongings anymore.

Kill a PC's father? Well that's just the cost of doing business.
Steal a PC's boots? Now it's personal.

[Mr Beer]

One of my first campaigns with my regular group of players, I had all of their boots and 14gp stolen from them while they slept in a fairly trashy inn.

The rest of The campaign degenerated into a mad revenge rampage against some low-level cutpurses (who had to eventually be restatted into a thieves guild of awesome in order to provide a challenge) so they could get their boots back. My PC's literally spent thousands of gold, killed dozens of mooks and ruined my elaborately planned campaign because I decided to **** with them and steal 5 pairs of boots and 14 gold pieces.

So I dont mess with my players belongings anymore.

That's great, I would make boot theft a recurring theme if it's going to reliably send them into badass vengeance mode.

[Darth Ultron]

King Arthur as a character is defined partially by his relationship to two items - Excalibur, and the grail. Excalibur being easily lost would undercut the character. The grail being easily found would undercut the character. A player playing a character like that can easily take the same approach, and it's not unreasonable, nor does it make them a rollplayer.

Well, the first problem is where the player will equate ''any item there character wants/needs'' with ''Excalibur''. The archer with the normal mundane bow thinking that they have the equal of Excalibur. And that is just for mundane items. It get's worse when it's a special item. But even a special items does not come close to ''Excalibur''.

And saying ''every magic or special item my character finds is equal in importance to the legendary artifact sword Excalibur'' is just weird.

Then there's the matter of the system. If the system assumption is that stuff is impermanent, fortunes will be squandered, and that there's a fragility to most things in the environments the characters deal in, basically nobody is going to have an issue with their stuff breaking. People won't make characters which are at all defined by (or even which have any real relation to) a particular thing. If the system assumptions are exactly not that, there can be an issue.

I'm not a fan of the System Complain.

[BootStrapTommy]

Kill a PC's father? Well that's just the cost of doing business.
Steal a PC's boots? Now it's personal.

Could I by chance Sig this?

[Kid Jake]

Have at it.

[Slipperychicken]

-snip-

To be fair to your players, having your stuff broken or stolen IRL can be really annoying too. Our possessions and territory (i.e. any area or thing thought of as belonging to us, including personal space) are a big part of our identity. I know I'd be pissed as hell if someone screwed with my computer or my walllet. Even messing with my bed would probably get a reaction, and I don't even own it.


Secondly, the people you're hearing are almost certainly playing 3.X, where a PC's +2 Special Weapon can easily be worth more than his own life. As in, a strong magic weapon (or a handful of medium-powered weapons) can literally cost more than being raised from the dead.

Thirdly, there's a mentality among 3.x players (particularly newbies, but veterans sometimes face it too) regarding consumables and equipment, which I think is caused partly by WBL and items' central role in character progression. It's like XP that you keep in your wallet. There's a feeling that you're only going to get so much money over the course of a campaign, which means you can only progress so much. Any loss, no matter how small, and no matter the cause, constitutes irreparable damage to your character and must be avenged or recovered. Heaven have mercy on the thief who steals a PCs' magic item and gets caught by him. I have personally come very close to having my PCs maim people over petty theft.

[Pex]

No equipment in the game exists without the DM's permission, especially magic items. When a PC gets a magic item, it's something he's earned. Doesn't matter if it's found in a treasure hoard or purchased with gold pieces found in a treasure hoard. XP is metagame accomplishment. Treasure is in game accomplishment. When the DM targets the equipment/magic items, players can feel the DM is targeting them to take away their accomplishment. It's not logical, but that's the way it is. That sense of loss is excruciating.

If the loss of an item is a logical consequence of happenstance of an adventure, that sense of loss is diminished. Players accept it as part of the game. However, too many happenstances and the players know the DM is doing it on purpose. Then it becomes a DM vs Player thing, and players will become upset. A DM purposely targeting equipment/magic items is also a DM vs Player thing. The DM gave it to them and now taking it away means the DM is toying with the players, and players will resent the manipulation.

[BootStrapTommy]

There are a few thing on which the Playground seems to agree. This seems to be one of those things.

[goto124]

Wait for it...

[BWR]

Expectations of the game varies from person to person. I full agree with object impermanence in general, but there is a limit. If I was breaking weapons or armor every combat or losing random items or money purses every single time I entered a town, if his horse disappeared every time my PC turned his back, if my Staff of the Magi was always taken in my sleep, I'd be pissed.
Having the GM say something like 'mundane gear like weapons and armor need to regularly maintained or replaced or they will break in combat' is fine. A little extra resource management and expense, it's true, but I'm the kind of player who will deduct maintenance costs on a regular basis anyway. Likewise, some enterprising thieves trying their luck and stealing from low-level PCs every now and then is fine. A master thief who specializes in stealing from the ridiculously well-armed and obviously extremely dangerous group of superheroes is fine as a once or twice in a campaign event.

Thing is, it shouldn't happen all the time. Magical items should generally not need to worry about damage from regular use. Most thieves will not try to steal or rob from heavily armed, borderline psychotic mercenaries unless they are desperate. Most really powerful thieves have better things to do that steal from a group of people who will probably find them and kill them pretty easily.