Recently, two of the players in my campaign had a bad, out-of-the-blue fight, and we've decided to remove the instigating player from our party. All of the other players agree that this was the right decision. However, in our campaign, all of the PCs were happily flying their space ship around the galaxy. As a DM, is there anything I should do to broach the subject, or narratively explain the disappearance? I just want everyone to have fun and not feel like they're weaker without the kicked player.
If the character will be a sore spot, it might be best to just say they get off at the next stop and wander off without explanation and leave it at that. Or you could still have them wander off, but then have the party later find they were working with the BBEG and turn them into a villain. (Or they vanish from the ship maybe taking something with them, which had been their mission, so they teleported away) From a narrative point, that can be fun and dramatic and really invest them in the enemy. But if it seems like that would just be petty, maybe stick with the first option of wander off never to be seen again. As far as the party being weaker, well, they are. There’s no way around it. Of course you will just rebalance the encounters for the smaller party, so they shouldn’t really notice.
Recently, two of the players in my campaign had a bad, out-of-the-blue fight, and we've decided to remove the instigating player from our party. All of the other players agree that this was the right decision. However, in our campaign, all of the PCs were happily flying their space ship around the galaxy. As a DM, is there anything I should do to broach the subject, or narratively explain the disappearance? I just want everyone to have fun and not feel like they're weaker without the kicked player.
1. You can make the PC an NPC who has a similar additude, but doesn't actually fight with the PCs, and doesn't gain levels.
2. You can have the party vote him out the airlock without a space suit.
3. He/she can run away/leave the next time the party reaches a planet.
4. He/she can die in the beginning of the next combat encounter.
5. He/she can go insane due to space sickness or some other disease.
Depending on how serious your game is in tone, you could use the same reason my groups have used to explain a player absence: they just don't exist. It's a little silly and immersion-breaking, but you can just out-of-character acknowledge that the player isn't there anymore, and so the character just vanishes. It's not strange -- in fact, it happens all the time. One of my friend's groups even goes so far as to say that they have been replaced by a cardboard cutout that just follows the party along. Nobody draws attention to it. However, if your game is a little heavier in terms of immersion and roleplay, or if you have a good idea for tying their disappearance into the story, I'd recommend going with one of the other commenters.
I got pretty lucky in a campaign where one of our players eventually left the party... he already had a habit of missing games, which were explained in-game as his character wandering off to take on her own adventures (his character was a chaotic pirate, so it made sense that she would just do something on her own for fun)... although in situations where she had no reason to be somewhere else, she might get drunk or have food poisoning and be unable to move on. When the player eventually left the game it was explained that his character had simply wandered off and never came back. But the other characters still acknowledged that his character exists and would occasionally mention her. It felt natural... it wasn't something that everyone talked about regularly, but it felt unnatural to just pretend they never existed.
If you need an in-story reason, you could make it a mini-side quest too. the PC's character has contracted some sort of rare space sickness that requires specialized treatment. They go on a search for the cure. A successful quest means they find a doctor who can treat him, but he must stay behind as it's a long road to recovery. A failed quest means the PC unfortunately succumbs to the sickness.
If you need an in-story reason, you could make it a mini-side quest too. the PC's character has contracted some sort of rare space sickness that requires specialized treatment. They go on a search for the cure. A successful quest means they find a doctor who can treat him, but he must stay behind as it's a long road to recovery. A failed quest means the PC unfortunately succumbs to the sickness.
This is better for an NPC than a former PC, but I did mention space sickness in my post.
True, it's better for an NPC, but that's what the character has essentially become now that the PC part of the character title is no longer around.
You did mention space sickness, but I wanted to flesh out how it could work to effectively remove the character for in-game reasons beyond simply "he went crazy".
You can make the PC an NPC if the character has some redeeming qualities. Narratively to remove the character you can do anything. Off the top of my head I'm thinking space madness, alien parasite, jettisoning them into space during an attack. The options are endless...
Do whatever is the most satisfying for you and the group.
In one of my campaigns, a player decided to opt out of playing at a certain point and so what happened is that their character became an NPC and in order to keep them as part of the story and relevant, I made the NPC owner of an establishments, this way, players could come and go as they pleased to come and see the character at their leisure.
Now since your game is set in space, that might prove difficult to have a set place for the NPC to be, but they could change role in the ship and thus no longer able to participate in the away missions for your players. As such, though, they could still be on the ship and do their own thing. Otherwise if your space travel is pretty fast and convenient to go around, the charatcer could have inherited from a dead relative and now has to go and take care of the family business. You could have them as a futur contact for them and bouncve many a narrative beat with that NPC
To answer the question higher level, I would always recommand using every opportunity you have to further your story, bring as much immersion as possible, this way the players will feel more involved in the story and more willing to bring their own part to it. (it would mean for them that should something happen to their character, then they will still matter to the story)
Alarms go off, reporting decompression in progress followed by an all-clear as automated doors seal the area. Players find an open airlock that can be sealed remotely. It might appear that someone was doing maintenance in the hatch...
It could have been an accident, ("In space, no one can hear you be stupid") or not so much. A stowaway who's been (or about to be) found out is a possibility. The possibilities are nearly endless, IMO. Mostly whatever you do will depend on the character (not the player) in question.
I wouldn't kill the PC off. But I probably wouldn't use it as an NPC for long either. I would find a quick way to have the NPC leave the party. Maybe they land on a planet, he gets lost, and they end up never finding him again, something like that.
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Narrative or ignore, the answer is ALWAYS narrative! The gods of fate have provided you with a new villain, complete with backstory, narrative ties to the party, drama, etc. SOME of that fight had to bleed into the game yah? Some in-game moment that triggered it? At a minimum you'd think there was tension in you're previous sessions? Gotta get that fleshed out and run with it. If your'e still on good terms with the removed player, maybe occasionally go "hey... hypothetically.. your character went crazy in space and is now plotting to destroy the party by any means necessary... how would you do that?
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Recently, two of the players in my campaign had a bad, out-of-the-blue fight, and we've decided to remove the instigating player from our party. All of the other players agree that this was the right decision. However, in our campaign, all of the PCs were happily flying their space ship around the galaxy. As a DM, is there anything I should do to broach the subject, or narratively explain the disappearance? I just want everyone to have fun and not feel like they're weaker without the kicked player.
If the character will be a sore spot, it might be best to just say they get off at the next stop and wander off without explanation and leave it at that.
Or you could still have them wander off, but then have the party later find they were working with the BBEG and turn them into a villain. (Or they vanish from the ship maybe taking something with them, which had been their mission, so they teleported away) From a narrative point, that can be fun and dramatic and really invest them in the enemy. But if it seems like that would just be petty, maybe stick with the first option of wander off never to be seen again.
As far as the party being weaker, well, they are. There’s no way around it. Of course you will just rebalance the encounters for the smaller party, so they shouldn’t really notice.
1. You can make the PC an NPC who has a similar additude, but doesn't actually fight with the PCs, and doesn't gain levels.
2. You can have the party vote him out the airlock without a space suit.
3. He/she can run away/leave the next time the party reaches a planet.
4. He/she can die in the beginning of the next combat encounter.
5. He/she can go insane due to space sickness or some other disease.
There is no dawn after eternal night.
Homebrew: Magic items, Subclasses
Depending on how serious your game is in tone, you could use the same reason my groups have used to explain a player absence: they just don't exist. It's a little silly and immersion-breaking, but you can just out-of-character acknowledge that the player isn't there anymore, and so the character just vanishes. It's not strange -- in fact, it happens all the time. One of my friend's groups even goes so far as to say that they have been replaced by a cardboard cutout that just follows the party along. Nobody draws attention to it. However, if your game is a little heavier in terms of immersion and roleplay, or if you have a good idea for tying their disappearance into the story, I'd recommend going with one of the other commenters.
I got pretty lucky in a campaign where one of our players eventually left the party... he already had a habit of missing games, which were explained in-game as his character wandering off to take on her own adventures (his character was a chaotic pirate, so it made sense that she would just do something on her own for fun)... although in situations where she had no reason to be somewhere else, she might get drunk or have food poisoning and be unable to move on. When the player eventually left the game it was explained that his character had simply wandered off and never came back. But the other characters still acknowledged that his character exists and would occasionally mention her. It felt natural... it wasn't something that everyone talked about regularly, but it felt unnatural to just pretend they never existed.
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If you need an in-story reason, you could make it a mini-side quest too. the PC's character has contracted some sort of rare space sickness that requires specialized treatment. They go on a search for the cure. A successful quest means they find a doctor who can treat him, but he must stay behind as it's a long road to recovery. A failed quest means the PC unfortunately succumbs to the sickness.
This is better for an NPC than a former PC, but I did mention space sickness in my post.
There is no dawn after eternal night.
Homebrew: Magic items, Subclasses
True, it's better for an NPC, but that's what the character has essentially become now that the PC part of the character title is no longer around.
You did mention space sickness, but I wanted to flesh out how it could work to effectively remove the character for in-game reasons beyond simply "he went crazy".
You can make the PC an NPC if the character has some redeeming qualities. Narratively to remove the character you can do anything. Off the top of my head I'm thinking space madness, alien parasite, jettisoning them into space during an attack. The options are endless...
Do whatever is the most satisfying for you and the group.
In one of my campaigns, a player decided to opt out of playing at a certain point and so what happened is that their character became an NPC and in order to keep them as part of the story and relevant, I made the NPC owner of an establishments, this way, players could come and go as they pleased to come and see the character at their leisure.
Now since your game is set in space, that might prove difficult to have a set place for the NPC to be, but they could change role in the ship and thus no longer able to participate in the away missions for your players. As such, though, they could still be on the ship and do their own thing. Otherwise if your space travel is pretty fast and convenient to go around, the charatcer could have inherited from a dead relative and now has to go and take care of the family business. You could have them as a futur contact for them and bouncve many a narrative beat with that NPC
To answer the question higher level, I would always recommand using every opportunity you have to further your story, bring as much immersion as possible, this way the players will feel more involved in the story and more willing to bring their own part to it. (it would mean for them that should something happen to their character, then they will still matter to the story)
Two words. Explosive decompression.
Alarms go off, reporting decompression in progress followed by an all-clear as automated doors seal the area. Players find an open airlock that can be sealed remotely. It might appear that someone was doing maintenance in the hatch...
It could have been an accident, ("In space, no one can hear you be stupid") or not so much. A stowaway who's been (or about to be) found out is a possibility. The possibilities are nearly endless, IMO. Mostly whatever you do will depend on the character (not the player) in question.
Eric the Grey
I wouldn't kill the PC off. But I probably wouldn't use it as an NPC for long either. I would find a quick way to have the NPC leave the party. Maybe they land on a planet, he gets lost, and they end up never finding him again, something like that.
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.
Heart disease. Too much bacon in the rations. Just keels over during breakfast.
Narrative or ignore, the answer is ALWAYS narrative! The gods of fate have provided you with a new villain, complete with backstory, narrative ties to the party, drama, etc. SOME of that fight had to bleed into the game yah? Some in-game moment that triggered it? At a minimum you'd think there was tension in you're previous sessions? Gotta get that fleshed out and run with it. If your'e still on good terms with the removed player, maybe occasionally go "hey... hypothetically.. your character went crazy in space and is now plotting to destroy the party by any means necessary... how would you do that?