So I have a DM question regarding a decision on an event that happened. My players were in a challenging combat encounter, and one of the NPCs died. He was an important NPC for the players and the right hand to the King of the kingdom in which the story is currently taking place. The King, who is also an NPC, fought in the same encounter and, although heavily injured at the end of the fight, saw (he rolled a nat. 19 on perception) that one of the players approached his rights hand corpse and looted it. He took her gold, her weapon, and the key to her home, which happens to hold many magical items (she was a collector of such things). Now the law of that kingdom is very harsh, and thievery is punishable by cutting off a limb and banishment from the main town. And in a way, the player that looted the corps did a lot and changed the course of the fight to their victory but still looting the corpse of Kings' friend and right hand in his rule sounds to me like something done in poor taste. I'm asking what I should do and how the King should react to the scenery which he saw. Part of me thinks that he could tolerate taking her gold but threaten him to give back the key. It still seems like a big disrespect to the NPC that fought by their side. I talked outside of the game to one of the other players that had some DMing experience, and he thinks that the PC shouldn't be punished at all and should keep the loot. But I think he is trying to rule my decision to benefit the party and him since he has an eye for one of the magical items in that home.
I think you have your next plot point - don’t punish the player let it move the story along.
The King now has a piece of leverage on the party to turn them into a suicide squad. Have him confront the player and am show that he knows what they did and that thier life belongs to him now.
To me its easy. The king invites them back to his keep\castle and then confronts them about said actions. If they are honest, and return the looted items then all is forgiven; they did after all prove their worth in battle. But if they lie or choose to be deceptive in an attempt to keep the items, have the king use divination magic from his sage or similar to learn the truth. I mean, why would the king tolerate that behavior? Had one of the PC's fallen in this battle, would looting their body gone over well? Players need to know that the world around them doesn't bend to their whim.
There's no world where you can stop a D&D player from looting the corpses of family members and loved ones, let alone a stranger. But I agree that this is beyond the boundaries of good taste.
If the King was there and saw it AND the looter was crucial to the victory, I personally would do a couple things: 1) Quietly have a flunky change the locks on his friend's home and double the guard there; 2) make a big display of giving each of the players a purse of gold coins. If the looter took 12 gold, everyone else gets 15 and he gets 3, get me?; 3) When the looter complains about not getting enough gold, the King and the Royal Guard relieve him of the friend's weapon at swordpoint, thank him for his service, and make it clear that his face is no longer required anywhere in the kingdom; and finally 4) when the character tries to rob the NPC's house anyway and gets captured by the City Watch or the NPC's personal guard, or whoever...THEN a limb comes off.
This way, the player could theoretically just take the L and walk away with the looted weapon AND the looted gold AND an extra 3gp bonus. But they won't. They'll mouth off at the King and then he lowers the boom on them. If you ever saw Kenneth Brannagh's Henry V, I'm talking Act 2, Scene 2, getting slapped around while Brian Blessed yells in your face. And even THEN, they could just cut their losses and walk away...
The proper time for the King to act is usually in the moment, though. The King is the one person in the entire kingdom who never has to be shy or say "I didn't want to mention this at the time..." If you loot the King's friend's corpse in front of him, you've metaphorically insulted the whole kingdom. But if the King watches you do it and keeps his mouth shut, he has given silent acquiescence to the deed. So you can't just go right to the limb-chopping.
Did the dead NPC have any family/heirs? I could see the player arguing you can’t steal from the dead, but it could be said he stole from their heirs. Some of the answer will depend on the king and how well he likes the party, compared to the dead; though when you say right hand, I’d imagine the king really liked the guy. Could be lots of options. King could turn a blind eye to it if he felt like he really owed the PCs. Could let them keep part, but not all of it, as you’d suggested. Could have someone tell the PCs he knows what they did and will allow it, but they will owe him big. Could have the thief arrested on the spot. Could decide to arrest the whole party as co-conspirators.
A lot will depend on how badly this will derail the campaign. The person should have consequences, but you need to find a way to fold them into the larger story.
Yeah, looting a body isn't just "left click +press E". It will take time rifling through pockets and pouches, removing items and stripping the armour. Just look at the times mentioned in the PHB for donning and doffing armour. That's for a someone who actively tries to put on armor. Taking it of a corpse is a lot harder. Items also don't disappear into an inventory so unless the thief had some kind of magic then the king (and everyone else) would see that they took at least the weapon.
What I would do is that the king would confront the party but give them the benefit of the doubt. Let him say something along the lines of "I can't help but notice that you took the weapons and gold as well as the key of our beloved right hand who fell a hero's death in battle. Knowing that you yourself is of noble heart I can only assume that you did it to keep those objects safe until they could be returned to the hero's loving family who would surely starve without the gold. I thank you for that and now ask you to give those items to their rightful owner."*
The players now have a choice. They can act the heroes, in case you can reward them, maybe a part of the gold or a minor favour from the king. Or they can act like villains in case they should be treated like that. I like sardonicmonkey's suggestion of making them into a suicide squad. In either case, the king should make sure that the home of the dead NPC is well guarded and/or that any valuables have been moved to a safe location.
*Or some similar pretentious bullcrap. The point is that it shoudl be clear that they got caught but at least have an option.
I would have warned them before they looted their fallen ally. But, if I didn't do that for whatever reason and found myself in your position, what I'd do is have the king agree not to punish them if they return everything. Otherwise, it's off with the hand and banishment.
I think you have your next plot point - don’t punish the player let it move the story along.
The King now has a piece of leverage on the party to turn them into a suicide squad. Have him confront the player and am show that he knows what they did and that thier life belongs to him now.
I was thinking it could be good for pushing a story in another direction. The problem is that this King isn't big on leveraging and is, most of the time, pretty direct.
But I must say, it would be cool to make some kind of suicide squad quest.
To me its easy. The king invites them back to his keep\castle and then confronts them about said actions. If they are honest, and return the looted items then all is forgiven; they did after all prove their worth in battle. But if they lie or choose to be deceptive in an attempt to keep the items, have the king use divination magic from his sage or similar to learn the truth. I mean, why would the king tolerate that behavior? Had one of the PC's fallen in this battle, would looting their body gone over well? Players need to know that the world around them doesn't bend to their whim.
"Players need to know that the world around them doesn't bend to their whim." - this is the reality that I have to now and then remind my players. We are now playing an ongoing campaign for two and a half years, and they still pull things like this and don't realize that there are consequences.
Thanks for your advice; I was questioning my discussion if I'm in the wrong here, but I think that looting a corpse of an ally for your benefit, especially in this case, is problematic.
Simple enough. The NPC goes up to the player, and says "you will return all the items you stole from fallen friend, immediately, or suffer the consequences". If the player refuses, well, then you have some interesting choices.
There's no world where you can stop a D&D player from looting the corpses of family members and loved ones, let alone a stranger. But I agree that this is beyond the boundaries of good taste.
If the King was there and saw it AND the looter was crucial to the victory, I personally would do a couple things: 1) Quietly have a flunky change the locks on his friend's home and double the guard there; 2) make a big display of giving each of the players a purse of gold coins. If the looter took 12 gold, everyone else gets 15 and he gets 3, get me?; 3) When the looter complains about not getting enough gold, the King and the Royal Guard relieve him of the friend's weapon at swordpoint, thank him for his service, and make it clear that his face is no longer required anywhere in the kingdom; and finally 4) when the character tries to rob the NPC's house anyway and gets captured by the City Watch or the NPC's personal guard, or whoever...THEN a limb comes off.
This way, the player could theoretically just take the L and walk away with the looted weapon AND the looted gold AND an extra 3gp bonus. But they won't. They'll mouth off at the King and then he lowers the boom on them. If you er saw Kenneth Brannagh's Henry V, I'm talking Act 2, Scene 2, getting slapped around while Brian Blessed yells in your face. And even THEN, they could just cut their losses and walk away...
The proper time for the King to act is usually in the moment, though. The King is the one person in the entire kingdom who never has to be shy or say "I didn't want to mention this at the time..." If you loot the King's friend's corpse in front of him, you've metaphorically insulted the whole kingdom. But if the King watches you do it and keeps his mouth shut, he has given silent acquiescence to the deed. So you can't just go right to the limb-chopping.
I might take your idea for the 1 - 4 parts :) I didn't watch Henry V, but I can see that I'm missing out after reading your post.
I agree that King should act now and shouldn't be shy, but that's why I said it was the end of the combat, and he was heavily injured. Maybe I didn't explain the whole situation to the last detail, but King didn't see what the player was looting but only that he was searching through her corpse. He was around 50. ft. away from the player and the corpse.
Did the dead NPC have any family/heirs? I could see the player arguing you can’t steal from the dead, but it could be said he stole from their heirs. Some of the answer will depend on the king and how well he likes the party, compared to the dead; though when you say right hand, I’d imagine the king really liked the guy. Could be lots of options. King could turn a blind eye to it if he felt like he really owed the PCs. Could let them keep part, but not all of it, as you’d suggested. Could have someone tell the PCs he knows what they did and will allow it, but they will owe him big. Could have the thief arrested on the spot. Could decide to arrest the whole party as co-conspirators.
A lot will depend on how badly this will derail the campaign. The person should have consequences, but you need to find a way to fold them into the larger story.
The dead NPC didn't have a family, so her closest was the family of the King. The King likes the party but doesn't know them; in-game, they practically know each other for two weeks now, and he gave them the accommodations in his castle to have somewhere to sleep while they are in the central city. The bigger problem is that 2 out of 5 players were sent to this kingdom by order of their Queen on a diplomatic mission to make peace with the King to join forces for the war coming to their doorstep.
Yeah, looting a body isn't just "left click +press E". It will take time rifling through pockets and pouches, removing items and stripping the armour. Just look at the times mentioned in the PHB for donning and doffing armour. That's for a someone who actively tries to put on armor. Taking it of a corpse is a lot harder. Items also don't disappear into an inventory so unless the thief had some kind of magic then the king (and everyone else) would see that they took at least the weapon.
What I would do is that the king would confront the party but give them the benefit of the doubt. Let him say something along the lines of "I can't help but notice that you took the weapons and gold as well as the key of our beloved right hand who fell a hero's death in battle. Knowing that you yourself is of noble heart I can only assume that you did it to keep those objects safe until they could be returned to the hero's loving family who would surely starve without the gold. I thank you for that and now ask you to give those items to their rightful owner."*
The players now have a choice. They can act the heroes, in case you can reward them, maybe a part of the gold or a minor favour from the king. Or they can act like villains in case they should be treated like that. I like sardonicmonkey's suggestion of making them into a suicide squad. In either case, the king should make sure that the home of the dead NPC is well guarded and/or that any valuables have been moved to a safe location.
*Or some similar pretentious bullcrap. The point is that it shoudl be clear that they got caught but at least have an option.
I like the idea, very clean. It gives a lot of room for the players to decide if they will stick to their decision.
I would have warned them before they looted their fallen ally. But, if I didn't do that for whatever reason and found myself in your position, what I'd do is have the king agree not to punish them if they return everything. Otherwise, it's off with the hand and banishment.
They are playing this campaign for two and a half years and make chaotic decisions like this every third session, so to me, it's more of, they should know by now.
And "searching through the corpse" can hardly be interpreted in any other way than "looting the body". Especially with a hig hpereception roll and especially since you can't just vanish a weapon. But you have option for how you can deal with this. Please let us now how it works out, I'm sure I'm not the only one who is curious.
They are playing this campaign for two and a half years and make chaotic decisions like this every third session, so to me, it's more of, they should know by now
And why don't they? Is it because you are not enforcing the consequences even though you are telling them that, theoretically, there are consequences?
It seems like in 2.5 years, by now they'd have all died if they are pulling this sort of thing all the time and you are actually enforcing that there are consequences in the world. So... ARE you enforcing said consequences? Or do you keep letting them go.
Because if you are not enforcing them, then after 2.5 years you can't really blame them for not believing there will be any. I mean, you are right, that chaos factor will go up and up in a campaign the longer the players are able to do stuff like this and get away with it. I actually stopped watching one of the popular D&D stream-shows because of this -- the players did crazier and crazier stuff and the DM just kept allowing it and not enforcing the clear and obvious consequences of the insane actions, and after a while, to me, the world just became so completely unbelievable that I couldn't watch any more (that was just one of the reasons I stopped watching). But you cannot blame the players here -- the DM allowed it, so they kept doing it. And I have to believe that the DM allowed it and the players did it, in large part, because it was a show and they knew it would entertain the audience.... my guess is that alone in someone's basement they would not pull this stuff and the DM would not allow it. But for me as an audience member, as I say, it became non-believable so I stopped watching it.
And similarly, as a DM, I would not enjoy running a game like this, and a player, would not enjoy playing in it (this should be obvious -- if I can't even watch it you know I would not enjoy playing it). I think actions should have consequences, choices should matter, and if you know X is illegal and you do X right in front of the king and the guards, your PC should suffer the obvious consequences.
BUT... if they have not suffered them before, then they won't expect to suffer them now, and you can't really blame them. It is on the DM to enforce the reality of the world if the players start breaking it. Fail to do that once, twice, three times, and the chaos will go up and up. As I say, I have seen it before. You can't come in now 2.5 years later, after letting the chaos go up and up and not curtailing it, and say, "There are consequences now." Why would the players have expected this when it has not happened before?
Now maybe I am wrong, and it has happened before. If so, then it should happen again. Keep the world consistent.
But also... you should perhaps have a talk with the players, another session 0 (or a first one if you never had one) about the kind of game they want to play. Maybe they prefer a free-wheeling, high-chaos, consequence-free game, and if so, you giving them consequences won't work, because they won't like it. Everyone has to want to play the same kind of game.
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Hi everybody!
So I have a DM question regarding a decision on an event that happened. My players were in a challenging combat encounter, and one of the NPCs died. He was an important NPC for the players and the right hand to the King of the kingdom in which the story is currently taking place. The King, who is also an NPC, fought in the same encounter and, although heavily injured at the end of the fight, saw (he rolled a nat. 19 on perception) that one of the players approached his rights hand corpse and looted it. He took her gold, her weapon, and the key to her home, which happens to hold many magical items (she was a collector of such things).
Now the law of that kingdom is very harsh, and thievery is punishable by cutting off a limb and banishment from the main town. And in a way, the player that looted the corps did a lot and changed the course of the fight to their victory but still looting the corpse of Kings' friend and right hand in his rule sounds to me like something done in poor taste. I'm asking what I should do and how the King should react to the scenery which he saw.
Part of me thinks that he could tolerate taking her gold but threaten him to give back the key. It still seems like a big disrespect to the NPC that fought by their side.
I talked outside of the game to one of the other players that had some DMing experience, and he thinks that the PC shouldn't be punished at all and should keep the loot. But I think he is trying to rule my decision to benefit the party and him since he has an eye for one of the magical items in that home.
Thanks in advance!
I think you have your next plot point - don’t punish the player let it move the story along.
The King now has a piece of leverage on the party to turn them into a suicide squad. Have him confront the player and am show that he knows what they did and that thier life belongs to him now.
To me its easy. The king invites them back to his keep\castle and then confronts them about said actions. If they are honest, and return the looted items then all is forgiven; they did after all prove their worth in battle. But if they lie or choose to be deceptive in an attempt to keep the items, have the king use divination magic from his sage or similar to learn the truth. I mean, why would the king tolerate that behavior? Had one of the PC's fallen in this battle, would looting their body gone over well? Players need to know that the world around them doesn't bend to their whim.
There's no world where you can stop a D&D player from looting the corpses of family members and loved ones, let alone a stranger. But I agree that this is beyond the boundaries of good taste.
If the King was there and saw it AND the looter was crucial to the victory, I personally would do a couple things: 1) Quietly have a flunky change the locks on his friend's home and double the guard there; 2) make a big display of giving each of the players a purse of gold coins. If the looter took 12 gold, everyone else gets 15 and he gets 3, get me?; 3) When the looter complains about not getting enough gold, the King and the Royal Guard relieve him of the friend's weapon at swordpoint, thank him for his service, and make it clear that his face is no longer required anywhere in the kingdom; and finally 4) when the character tries to rob the NPC's house anyway and gets captured by the City Watch or the NPC's personal guard, or whoever...THEN a limb comes off.
This way, the player could theoretically just take the L and walk away with the looted weapon AND the looted gold AND an extra 3gp bonus. But they won't. They'll mouth off at the King and then he lowers the boom on them. If you ever saw Kenneth Brannagh's Henry V, I'm talking Act 2, Scene 2, getting slapped around while Brian Blessed yells in your face. And even THEN, they could just cut their losses and walk away...
The proper time for the King to act is usually in the moment, though. The King is the one person in the entire kingdom who never has to be shy or say "I didn't want to mention this at the time..." If you loot the King's friend's corpse in front of him, you've metaphorically insulted the whole kingdom. But if the King watches you do it and keeps his mouth shut, he has given silent acquiescence to the deed. So you can't just go right to the limb-chopping.
Did the dead NPC have any family/heirs? I could see the player arguing you can’t steal from the dead, but it could be said he stole from their heirs.
Some of the answer will depend on the king and how well he likes the party, compared to the dead; though when you say right hand, I’d imagine the king really liked the guy.
Could be lots of options. King could turn a blind eye to it if he felt like he really owed the PCs. Could let them keep part, but not all of it, as you’d suggested. Could have someone tell the PCs he knows what they did and will allow it, but they will owe him big. Could have the thief arrested on the spot. Could decide to arrest the whole party as co-conspirators.
A lot will depend on how badly this will derail the campaign. The person should have consequences, but you need to find a way to fold them into the larger story.
Yeah, looting a body isn't just "left click +press E". It will take time rifling through pockets and pouches, removing items and stripping the armour. Just look at the times mentioned in the PHB for donning and doffing armour. That's for a someone who actively tries to put on armor. Taking it of a corpse is a lot harder. Items also don't disappear into an inventory so unless the thief had some kind of magic then the king (and everyone else) would see that they took at least the weapon.
What I would do is that the king would confront the party but give them the benefit of the doubt. Let him say something along the lines of "I can't help but notice that you took the weapons and gold as well as the key of our beloved right hand who fell a hero's death in battle. Knowing that you yourself is of noble heart I can only assume that you did it to keep those objects safe until they could be returned to the hero's loving family who would surely starve without the gold. I thank you for that and now ask you to give those items to their rightful owner."*
The players now have a choice. They can act the heroes, in case you can reward them, maybe a part of the gold or a minor favour from the king. Or they can act like villains in case they should be treated like that. I like sardonicmonkey's suggestion of making them into a suicide squad. In either case, the king should make sure that the home of the dead NPC is well guarded and/or that any valuables have been moved to a safe location.
*Or some similar pretentious bullcrap. The point is that it shoudl be clear that they got caught but at least have an option.
I would have warned them before they looted their fallen ally. But, if I didn't do that for whatever reason and found myself in your position, what I'd do is have the king agree not to punish them if they return everything. Otherwise, it's off with the hand and banishment.
I was thinking it could be good for pushing a story in another direction.
The problem is that this King isn't big on leveraging and is, most of the time, pretty direct.
But I must say, it would be cool to make some kind of suicide squad quest.
Thanks for the idea! :)
"Players need to know that the world around them doesn't bend to their whim." - this is the reality that I have to now and then remind my players. We are now playing an ongoing campaign for two and a half years, and they still pull things like this and don't realize that there are consequences.
Thanks for your advice; I was questioning my discussion if I'm in the wrong here, but I think that looting a corpse of an ally for your benefit, especially in this case, is problematic.
Simple enough. The NPC goes up to the player, and says "you will return all the items you stole from fallen friend, immediately, or suffer the consequences". If the player refuses, well, then you have some interesting choices.
I might take your idea for the 1 - 4 parts :)
I didn't watch Henry V, but I can see that I'm missing out after reading your post.
I agree that King should act now and shouldn't be shy, but that's why I said it was the end of the combat, and he was heavily injured. Maybe I didn't explain the whole situation to the last detail, but King didn't see what the player was looting but only that he was searching through her corpse. He was around 50. ft. away from the player and the corpse.
The dead NPC didn't have a family, so her closest was the family of the King. The King likes the party but doesn't know them; in-game, they practically know each other for two weeks now, and he gave them the accommodations in his castle to have somewhere to sleep while they are in the central city. The bigger problem is that 2 out of 5 players were sent to this kingdom by order of their Queen on a diplomatic mission to make peace with the King to join forces for the war coming to their doorstep.
I like the idea, very clean. It gives a lot of room for the players to decide if they will stick to their decision.
They are playing this campaign for two and a half years and make chaotic decisions like this every third session, so to me, it's more of, they should know by now.
Yeah, everyone should watch Henry V. :)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YK4K7CV_PGY
And "searching through the corpse" can hardly be interpreted in any other way than "looting the body". Especially with a hig hpereception roll and especially since you can't just vanish a weapon. But you have option for how you can deal with this. Please let us now how it works out, I'm sure I'm not the only one who is curious.
And why don't they? Is it because you are not enforcing the consequences even though you are telling them that, theoretically, there are consequences?
It seems like in 2.5 years, by now they'd have all died if they are pulling this sort of thing all the time and you are actually enforcing that there are consequences in the world. So... ARE you enforcing said consequences? Or do you keep letting them go.
Because if you are not enforcing them, then after 2.5 years you can't really blame them for not believing there will be any. I mean, you are right, that chaos factor will go up and up in a campaign the longer the players are able to do stuff like this and get away with it. I actually stopped watching one of the popular D&D stream-shows because of this -- the players did crazier and crazier stuff and the DM just kept allowing it and not enforcing the clear and obvious consequences of the insane actions, and after a while, to me, the world just became so completely unbelievable that I couldn't watch any more (that was just one of the reasons I stopped watching). But you cannot blame the players here -- the DM allowed it, so they kept doing it. And I have to believe that the DM allowed it and the players did it, in large part, because it was a show and they knew it would entertain the audience.... my guess is that alone in someone's basement they would not pull this stuff and the DM would not allow it. But for me as an audience member, as I say, it became non-believable so I stopped watching it.
And similarly, as a DM, I would not enjoy running a game like this, and a player, would not enjoy playing in it (this should be obvious -- if I can't even watch it you know I would not enjoy playing it). I think actions should have consequences, choices should matter, and if you know X is illegal and you do X right in front of the king and the guards, your PC should suffer the obvious consequences.
BUT... if they have not suffered them before, then they won't expect to suffer them now, and you can't really blame them. It is on the DM to enforce the reality of the world if the players start breaking it. Fail to do that once, twice, three times, and the chaos will go up and up. As I say, I have seen it before. You can't come in now 2.5 years later, after letting the chaos go up and up and not curtailing it, and say, "There are consequences now." Why would the players have expected this when it has not happened before?
Now maybe I am wrong, and it has happened before. If so, then it should happen again. Keep the world consistent.
But also... you should perhaps have a talk with the players, another session 0 (or a first one if you never had one) about the kind of game they want to play. Maybe they prefer a free-wheeling, high-chaos, consequence-free game, and if so, you giving them consequences won't work, because they won't like it. Everyone has to want to play the same kind of game.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.