• Registered: 2016-07-25
  • Posts: 106

Topic: Losing Friends to Lotfp

So I've been running Lotfp and I've been violating the social contract. I mean with Better Than Any Man, I had a PC get captured by Millzonaire and tortured to death, and with Fuck For Satan I had my PCs get trapped in the infinite staircase and not figure out how to escape. Both times have been really traumatic to our friendships.

The first time, the PC's capture/death had the player sitting out a whole session as they waited for a rescue that never came. For the Fuck For Satan adventure, the players got super mad at me as they could come up with no solution to escaping the infinite staircase. In both cases I've been non-apologetic, being that the entire spirit of LOTFP is, in my view, about these sorts of consequences.

Previously I played Legends of The Scarecrow, and we had three glorious sessions of players being trapped and slowly going insane, along with their PCs. I enjoyed this mostly because I got to see my friends get super mad, and because the desperation of the PC's situation was mirrored by the player's.

The hidden gold here is that I have one, maybe two players, who are really able to roll with it. That is, the one guy in our group who everyone normally takes a shit on is the one who is best able to deal with the disempowerment. Mostly he thinks it's funny, but he also appreciates the reality of what's going on: sometimes life doesn't go your way.

Bad news is that one of my friends has decided he no longer wants anything to do with me. Go figure.

  • Registered: 2013-08-08
  • Posts: 285

Re: Losing Friends to Lotfp

Wow, thankfully I haven't experienced this while running LotFP.  My group has come to enjoy the abuse and fuckery, and I think each sees it as a personal challenge to try and get a "one up" on the game world to come out ahead for once.

That said, I have loosened up some of my "That's the way it is!" attitude in the interest of people having a good time.  In your above examples, I would have let the PC who was captured roll up a new character, at the very least controlling a 0-level henchman who has taken an interest in the scheme or some such matter, and then they could help plan their own rescue. (In the Referee book, Raggi says to get the player back in the game asap, and even though he's referring to death, I would assume this for anytime a player is unable to participate in the game.

I'm assuming that for the infinite staircase, all the PCs looked at the eye and there was nobody left to complete the ritual?  At this point, I'd just say, "Your characters walk until they die of thirst.  Roll up new ones."  If there are still PCs left who can do the ritual, just keep repeating the important parts in the room.  Sometimes they need to be hit over the head with things.

One last thing, I do let my players read the modules after a TPK, if there is no chance they'll interact with it again.  For example, they explored a lot in Better Than Any Man, and when they all died, we decided to restart in England.  Reading BTAM gave my players a much clearer idea of what LotFP was all about and got them more invested in the setting/system/world.

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  • JimLotFP
  • Lord of All Fevers and Plagues
  • Offline
  • From: Helsinki, Finland
  • Registered: 2009-10-07
  • Posts: 613

Re: Losing Friends to Lotfp

I endorse Crunk's post.

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