Topic: Looking for general "old school gaming" advice
My players and I haven't played any kind of D&D in about two decades, although we played lots of other roleplaying games since then. We started a semi-regular LotFP campaign a while ago, and while the players enjoy the campaign itself (that is, the story that unfolds as we play), they're getting frustrated by a few aspects of the game. I'd like to address their complaints, but I'm so rusty with this kind of RPG that I thought I'd ask for some advice here. Let's see where things are going badly.
1) "The fights are too tough!"
-To be fair, I made one adventure way too hard and only found out through actual play, but this is skewing their whole perception of the game. Part of the problem is that, while they know about the retainer rules, they never think about hiring retainers. At the end of the last game, I had a band of mercenaries show up and offer their help. I'm hoping that by the end of the next session, the players will see the difference it can make, but I want them to understand that this is a standard part of the game, not a special favor or a one-of-a-kind event. How would you encourage players to hire retainers when they need it?
2) "There's no treasure!" or "There are no hints anywhere!"
-Or rather, they don't always search carefully enough and they end up missing a lot of hidden stuff. Obviously, this can happen all the time in every game, so it's nobody's fault. To be fair, in hindsight, I might have been a bit too subtle about some hidden stuff. However, they seem to expect me to tell them to roll a die, or "make a spot check", whenever they come near secret doors or concealed treasure, instead of asking more questions or taking the time to explore. How would you encourage players to explore more carefully, apart from "penalizing" them for not doing it?
3) "Level progression is too slow!"
-This is tied to the "fights are too tough" complaint. Since we started playing, two players have reached level 2, three are pretty close, and the last is playing an Elf, so she's a little less than halfway there. However, they've had it up to here with the whole level 1 thing, they don't think their characters are tough enough, and they're getting very frustrated about this. I'd like to "dedramatize" the situation, but I'm wary of simply showering them with XP. I offered the Elf player to choose a different class, because she didn't realize just how high the level threshold is for Elves. For the rest, I'm worried that if I give out too much at level 1, they'll expect unrealisitic amounts at higher levels. How would you handle complaints about level progression?
Thanks in advance for your insights!
Last edited by barondutremblay (2015-04-17 05:27:58)