Just started DMing again after a 5-year period where other priorities took over, so I am fairly new to 5e. I figured that I would invite a few friends and some random folk online to play the Lost Mine of Phandelver on a Virtual Tabletop for the fun experience of it all!
This tabletop lets players move about Cragmaw Hideout as long as they are within the wall boundaries that I have setup. When the group defeated Klarg in Section 8, one of the players wandered over to the Goblin Den in Section 6 on his own. To note, he was moving at the time that I was reading loot out to everyone else and did not notice. So upon spotting the goblins in the next section and having noticed it, I had him stop there and the game paused as it was the end of the session. Now, if this were a player who was new, I would be a little more forgiving, but this fellow claims to have 5 years worth of experience under his belt.
So I need some advice on what to do. I was thinking of either:
- Have the goblins attack him and capture him as well.
- Let Yeemik parlay with the character, telling him to go kill Klarg and bring proof. This would hopefully send the character back and bring the entire group.
Then after all that is done and they have hopefully saved Sildar Hallwinter, I will have Sildar pull the character aside and tell him that what he did was brave and foolish. That and to go off on his own again may be a quick way to meeting his end. I feel as if I am going to have to house rule some stuff such-as do not wander too far away out of combat but on a map (Such as 40 feet) without telling others.
Would these things sound reasonable? I certainly do not want to reward someone for splitting the group in such a fashion. I am however hesitant on having the goblins outright kill a level 1 character.
There isn't an easy answer to this one, but I'd suggest sparing the character this time, then talking to the player after the session to ask them not to split the party. Contrary to popular belief, it's the players' job to help tell the story, not just the DM's, so they need to cooperate and make sure everyone (you included) is having fun. It's a cooperative game, and the characters are not entities unto themselves; even if wandering off is "what my character would do," the player can make him stay with the group so everyone enjoys themselves more. If the player has as much experience as he says, he hopefully gets this. If he doesn't, well, it's an out-of-game issue—killing the character won't make sure it won't happen again. At that point, you'd have to think about whether the player is a good fit for your game.
Has he been spotted? If that has not been determined, then there are plenty of options... If so, goblins should react, but have them subdue instead of kill the character, unless the character gets real lucky and kills more than two of them... In which case, there will probably be an adventurer who "just got in to town" when they get to P.... ;)
Yeemik isn't going to ask a lone foolish non-goblinoid to try taking out the leader... He would need to see real strength that he would want to exploit.
I understand where this player is coming from. After they "beat" the encounter they sort of assumed the adventure was finished and they just wanted to see if there was anything they missed elsewhere in the dungeon. I think you have thought up a fairly elegant solution to the problem... I'd maybe start the next session by letting your player roll a quick stealth check to see if they can just avoid being seen and make their way back to the rest of the party, but failing that I think your ideas make sense. Pedroig does make a good point that it seems a bit odd that Yeemik would trust that a lone adventurer could solve his problem, but maybe if the player mentions that they already killed Klarg he might send him to bring back proof. Still, if the player gets overwhelmed, the idea that the goblins would choose to knock him unconscious and capture him rather than kill him makes perfect sense, especially since they've already done that with Sildar.
This isn't a case of a character splitting the party in a role playing sense .. and honestly there is nothing wrong if they do. This would appear to be a player taking advantage of the DM being distracted to wander around the map to see what they can see during a moment of downtime while no one is paying attention (unless they said to everyone else - I am going off to explore while you take a short rest).
It seems to me that you need to set a ground rule and expectation for players moving their character tokens during the game. There is always a temptation to move it around if you have nothing else to do.
Also, depending on which table top you are using there is an option that prevents the character tokens from being moved through walls/doors. This can be very effective at preventing unwanted exploration.
Just wanted to say thank you to those who replied. I don't want to reply to each with the same message, but I will certainly take the advice from all of you and see where that takes the player, the group and myself next session!
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Hey everyone,
Just started DMing again after a 5-year period where other priorities took over, so I am fairly new to 5e. I figured that I would invite a few friends and some random folk online to play the Lost Mine of Phandelver on a Virtual Tabletop for the fun experience of it all!
This tabletop lets players move about Cragmaw Hideout as long as they are within the wall boundaries that I have setup. When the group defeated Klarg in Section 8, one of the players wandered over to the Goblin Den in Section 6 on his own. To note, he was moving at the time that I was reading loot out to everyone else and did not notice. So upon spotting the goblins in the next section and having noticed it, I had him stop there and the game paused as it was the end of the session. Now, if this were a player who was new, I would be a little more forgiving, but this fellow claims to have 5 years worth of experience under his belt.
So I need some advice on what to do. I was thinking of either:
- Have the goblins attack him and capture him as well.
- Let Yeemik parlay with the character, telling him to go kill Klarg and bring proof. This would hopefully send the character back and bring the entire group.
Then after all that is done and they have hopefully saved Sildar Hallwinter, I will have Sildar pull the character aside and tell him that what he did was brave and foolish. That and to go off on his own again may be a quick way to meeting his end. I feel as if I am going to have to house rule some stuff such-as do not wander too far away out of combat but on a map (Such as 40 feet) without telling others.
Would these things sound reasonable? I certainly do not want to reward someone for splitting the group in such a fashion. I am however hesitant on having the goblins outright kill a level 1 character.
There isn't an easy answer to this one, but I'd suggest sparing the character this time, then talking to the player after the session to ask them not to split the party. Contrary to popular belief, it's the players' job to help tell the story, not just the DM's, so they need to cooperate and make sure everyone (you included) is having fun. It's a cooperative game, and the characters are not entities unto themselves; even if wandering off is "what my character would do," the player can make him stay with the group so everyone enjoys themselves more. If the player has as much experience as he says, he hopefully gets this. If he doesn't, well, it's an out-of-game issue—killing the character won't make sure it won't happen again. At that point, you'd have to think about whether the player is a good fit for your game.
Good luck!
Wizard (Gandalf) of the Tolkien Club
Has he been spotted? If that has not been determined, then there are plenty of options... If so, goblins should react, but have them subdue instead of kill the character, unless the character gets real lucky and kills more than two of them... In which case, there will probably be an adventurer who "just got in to town" when they get to P.... ;)
Yeemik isn't going to ask a lone foolish non-goblinoid to try taking out the leader... He would need to see real strength that he would want to exploit.
I understand where this player is coming from. After they "beat" the encounter they sort of assumed the adventure was finished and they just wanted to see if there was anything they missed elsewhere in the dungeon. I think you have thought up a fairly elegant solution to the problem... I'd maybe start the next session by letting your player roll a quick stealth check to see if they can just avoid being seen and make their way back to the rest of the party, but failing that I think your ideas make sense. Pedroig does make a good point that it seems a bit odd that Yeemik would trust that a lone adventurer could solve his problem, but maybe if the player mentions that they already killed Klarg he might send him to bring back proof. Still, if the player gets overwhelmed, the idea that the goblins would choose to knock him unconscious and capture him rather than kill him makes perfect sense, especially since they've already done that with Sildar.
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This isn't a case of a character splitting the party in a role playing sense .. and honestly there is nothing wrong if they do. This would appear to be a player taking advantage of the DM being distracted to wander around the map to see what they can see during a moment of downtime while no one is paying attention (unless they said to everyone else - I am going off to explore while you take a short rest).
It seems to me that you need to set a ground rule and expectation for players moving their character tokens during the game. There is always a temptation to move it around if you have nothing else to do.
Also, depending on which table top you are using there is an option that prevents the character tokens from being moved through walls/doors. This can be very effective at preventing unwanted exploration.
Just wanted to say thank you to those who replied. I don't want to reply to each with the same message, but I will certainly take the advice from all of you and see where that takes the player, the group and myself next session!