You must log in or register to comment.
Your DM casts “Are you sure about that?”
I vaguely remember a perk in some expansion book of some Shadowrun edition that was basically “common sense” and ruleswise it meant that once per game session the GM should ask you “are you sure about that” when you’re about to do something stupid. That’s it. If you go ahead, you go ahead. If you don’t realize that they are triggering the perk, you go ahead. If you never do anything stupid (yeah, right), they will never ask.
I tend to give that to my players “for free”, but I still love that it’s been encoded as a perk that’s worth some points at character generation.
It does make sense. Players aren’t their PCs, they don’t see the world as their PC does, so things that would be obvious from their PC’s perspective aren’t necessarily from the player’s. That disconnect means there are bound to be times when players do stupid stuff their PC wouldn’t actually do, so a nudge from the GM can set them straight
Yes, but there’s a fine line to draw here as a GM: as a theoretical extreme, if I intervened every time I thought their PC would “definitely know this” or “would never do this”, then I start to play the PC more than they do.
Or put differently: that disconnect between player knowledge/actions and PC knowledge/actions is unavoidable to some degree. How much of it is tolerated/expected pretty much depends on your goals/playstile/desires on the group. Some players really care about “playing the PC right” and others really just see them as a puppet to control (in which case they can’t “play them wrong”).
Oh absolutely. There’s always going to be disconnects between what the player knows/remembers, and what their PC should, but I mean intervening more when a player exceedingly defying their PC’s common sense.
Like in this example, both the player and PC know what this scepter does, both are aware they’re standing rather near it. As a wizard, the PC is likely more than wise and intelligent enough to come to the conclusion that casting destruction magic here would be bad.
But because the player isn’t physically there, and isn’t familiar with magic in the way a wizard would be, there is a disconnect in common sense.
Of course it varies by game and GM, but in this scenario I wouldn’t believe it a bad thing for the GM to give a little nudge to the player that what they’re suggesting to do is life-threateningly stupid, given their PC would’ve likely done the same if they could hear their player speak.
That’s also a core rulebook perk for Vampires: the Masquerade
It also exists in GURPS:
Common Sense
Cost: 10 points
Common Sense is a mental, mundane advantage that results in the GM making a Will roll when you have your character start to do something the GM feels is stupid. On a success the GM can warn the player ala “Hadn’t you better think about that?” (Basic Set 43)
The Wizard says, “Yes, I’m an Evocation Wizard so I use Sculpt Spells to choose all my party members. They automatically make the save and take no damage.”
That’s a nice way to replace a boring, old tomb with an exciting, cool mushroom cloud.
A very similar situation happened in an old campaign of mine where the player had some fair warning about consequences but went and did a thing that blew up a fucking moon of the setting.
The environmental consequences alone defined the next few generations of the setting. I just rolled with it and after a while I went from
to 
Wizard: “I say we nuke the whole site from doorway. …it’s the only way to be sure.”
The real question is why Azuth has big wooden sticks for fingers.
Same reason so many legendary sorcerers have giant gems for eyes or hearts.
Because it looks cool?
The rule of cool exists above all
Somewhere there exists a list of all TTRPG war crimes ever committed. Honestly, depending on location, this one could be anywhere pretty high on that list, but probably not in the top 100.
B-but I didn’t conjure anything! It was an evocation…
you can’t just introduce a gun in the first act and not expect the players to shoot it in random directions
Soooo they blow themselves up, because it amplifies their magic a hundredfold? :D
From my experience Fireball times 100 is leveling a nice city block.
Bro is leveling the entire city and surrounding countryside
they cast “the unmatched power of the sun”
Okay but a Sorcerer with Careful Spell could make it work. Imagine just standing there while the fcking Trinity bomb is exploding all around you.
Careful spell doesn’t prevent damage, just ensures you take half: 800d6 / 2 in this case. You’re thinking of the sculpt spells feature from the evocation wizard school.
Would a careful spell also be affected by the finger? And if so would 100x half be 800d6/50 or 800d6/(1.26 E30)?
What it do
800 d6 damage.
Complete answer: https://lemmy.world/comment/3129632
Tbh is the dm that had the dumb idea of putting that object there… What good would it do storywise?
It’s a powerful weapon to use in a safe situation, but you also must keep it safe until that moment. Adds difficulty temporarily and then it’s an absolutely astonishing grenade. Throw it at a dragon with magic and watch it burn itself to death. Or be careful to not use any small magic (tough for puzzles and stuff) in order to have a super dangerous weapon.
Also you can just make up something that nullifies it that some enemy brings and it never works again after that, like the main enemy of the dungeon it was found in or so who had hoped to act as a trap to kill you with it (just like these characters probably did)
