Also nobility strongarming merchants into "loans and gifts," and ignoring debts come due at the threat of trumped up charges, was quite the norm from the history I've read about from Europe, Korea, Japan, China, India, etc. Taxation is just one many overt policy measure to raise funds (fees, tolls, duties, confiscations, penalties, marriages, privileges, indulgences, etc.). And this speaks nothing to covert means to attract less opprobrium.

It took millennia for merchants to turn this tide of order. We're just so entrenched in our modern view it seems almost natural that everyone else would go along with our thinking. Nationalism, rule of law also applying to rulers, sanctity of individual in their privacy and property, and so on are recent developments in human history, not existential truths from time immemorial.

Oftentimes the regional big bad just took your stuff and you had to sit there and take it with a smile. In a way it is like today, things haven't changed much except who gets to wear that mask now...

Quote from: Ravenswing;881116Heh, we've been commenting on each other's stuff for over a decade now on multiple forums; you're not wrong.

But it's two different cases.  An entrenched merchant class is used to the trappings and ways of power; it's part of their survival to be sensitive to it.  Merchants of high enough profile to be noticed by the rulers know how to play the game; merchants of low enough profile often know how to cheat and get away with it.

PCs don't.  They're often of lower class, they often are upstarts and foreigners, and they spend their times doing things other than maintaining contacts, memorizing laws and buffing up their political cred.  Mostly, they don't have the patience to play that game, and campaigns are seldom about it.

Yes, but imagine a PC who decides to play that game, or in other words, me coming to play:).
I'd name him Corleone, and people would start calling him "don" by themselves, out of respect;).

Quote from: Opaopajr;881179Also nobility strongarming merchants into "loans and gifts," and ignoring debts come due at the threat of trumped up charges, was quite the norm from the history I've read about from Europe, Korea, Japan, China, India, etc.

Loans and gifts were part of business. They still are, of course, how many politicians pay for their dinners with business officials:D?
But reneging on payments wasn't done as often as you seem to think. Not because this one merchant can do anything, but because if they did so often, other merchants suddenly started lacking funds to borrow you, having used them to sponsor fleets that keep not coming...
Taking funds by force was also to be avoided in most cases. If they did that, merchants just started finding alternative routes, taking their business elsewhere, and their taxes and gifts with them.
And yeah, it took some time for these trends to come into full swing, but Ravenswing agrees that the setting he's running is already at that stage, so there's no time one must wait;).

Quote from: AsenRG;881189Loans and gifts were part of business. They still are, of course, how many politicians pay for their dinners with business officials:D?

Depends on the business. The costs of violating FCPA for US companies can be quite high. Siemens and others have found that the anti-bribery laws in Europe aren't a total joke either. $1.6 billion is hardly a laughing matter to the Siemens shareholders.

Quote from: AsenRG;881189Loans and gifts were part of business. They still are, of course, how many politicians pay for their dinners with business officials:D?
But reneging on payments wasn't done as often as you seem to think. Not because this one merchant can do anything, but because if they did so often, other merchants suddenly started lacking funds to borrow you, having used them to sponsor fleets that keep not coming...
Taking funds by force was also to be avoided in most cases. If they did that, merchants just started finding alternative routes, taking their business elsewhere, and their taxes and gifts with them.
And yeah, it took some time for these trends to come into full swing, but Ravenswing agrees that the setting he's running is already at that stage, so there's no time one must wait;).

Doesn't correspond to what I've read. Korean nobility had a penchant for shaking down merchants with little to no repurcussions. Same with Polish and Russian nobility, and often using minority traders as scapegoats, like pogroms and the like, to get away with it. Similarly such protection extortion seemed par for the course in most Central Asia, Middle East, and India as the noble family line, clan, or caste liked it.

You can only take your business so far around on several trade routes... Geography and culture's a bitch.

Say what you like  but it sounds like you're working off of a post-Neoclassical mindset. Which would be off by several centuries from the assumed social/material tech level of most of D&D's (and most fantasy's) pseudo-medieval setting. But hey, if you want your feudalism to assume the Reformation, Mercantilism, and Declaration of the Rights of Man, be my guest.

Quote from: Spike;880967Now to answer the actual post, at least in part:

As a GM I've really had more minor issues, like people pulling guns and other obvious, but comparatively minor, mayhem in very visible public places.  I always feel like I simply haven't set the damn scene clearly enough that the players always seem to assume they are alone in a small dark room with whichever NPCs are deserving of their mayhem.
.

I played in a Trail of Cthulhu / WoD campaign set in 1930s Shanghai a few years ago.  And BTW we were in Shanghai and my bodies and I all studied modern Chinese history (we started as humans and then...).  So, in all the Trail games my friend GMs there are historical figures.  In this Shanghai campaign (and in parallel only Trail campaigns we were in) there was Victor Sassoon, Sun Yatset/Zhong Shan, Chiang Kaishek/Jiang Jieshi, various real-life mobsters, Russian agents, etc.  These people never got killed by random murderhobos in real life.

My buddy keeps getting a hold of a gun.  And he does bad things with guns.  Like go to a mob clubhouse, demand entry, and shoots the doorman.  The REAL CLUBHOUSE was about 4km from where we were, is a historical building on a main street which we  visited before starting our game.  So... I did what the GM might have done but didn't do.  "haha no you don't really do that, right?".  No.  He did it.  And then guys with tommyguns came out and mow him down.  

Later, we are vampires (which sucks... I hate everything about Vampires). Same player get's a hold of some sort of heavy machine gun used to shoot down airplanes.  We are trying to meet a rival, ultra powerful older vampire out at a busy, multi-story club-space by a race track where Chiank Kai Shek and army people and what not are partying.  He insisted on opening up in the crowded area with the big gun.  "No... you understand the scene, right?  You are in (what is now) People's Square and..."  He fires.  The GM (through Vampire security) takes him down.  

I think the GM handled it the right way.  If people don't get it, the character dies.  Game logic is consistent.  Just have more characters pre-mades ready to roll.

Those are funny anecdotes because it's a little too common for comfort.

At this point I'll assume there's a Lesbian Stripper Ninja story out there that tried in an historical Japan game to rush Admiral Perry's boats by running on the ocean water with a dagger between her teeth, arms straight out along her sides, a la Naruto.

... and then she drowned.

Of course. That sort of stuff only works in Destroyer pulps.

The common problem I see is that if NPCs commit crimes, then it's up to the PCs to fix it - they can't rely on the nobles/police/whoever to deal with the bad guys. However, if the PCs commit crimes, then suddenly the law becomes effective and deals with them.

That doesn't make sense, and is annoying to the players.

In general, I try to set my game in places where legal enforcement is weak - so it is a wild-west-like place, or the PCs work in circles beyond normal law enforcement (sorcerers in the modern world, superheroes, etc.).

Typically, the PCs are pretty powerful, so in these settings, it's more common for leaders to try to co-opt them than try to fight them. i.e. "Here's your deputy badge."  Sometimes they are written in from the start as figures of authority - like being an established viking clan in the area, or members of the royal family (as in Amber).

Quote from: jhkim;881345The common problem I see is that if NPCs commit crimes, then it's up to the PCs to fix it - they can't rely on the nobles/police/whoever to deal with the bad guys. However, if the PCs commit crimes, then suddenly the law becomes effective and deals with them.

That doesn't make sense, and is annoying to the players.

If it doesn't make sense, why would you allow it to work like that:)?

Quote from: Bren;880926Stop the action before allowing the PC to "slaughter the patrons of the local tavern" to clarify whether (a) the PC is actually attempting this, (b) the PC is threatening to do this, or (c) the player is making an out of game comment.

My technique is to insist on first person roleplaying. I had a couple of bad experiences with the third person style comments on what their PCs will do back in the day. Partly because of my hearing loss make it a challenge for me and partly because of our immaturity at the time.

I resolved by making my players state what they do as their character in first person. So if they say "I am going to have Able the Barbarian slaughter the patrons of the tavern." It doesn't count until they look at me (or another player in pvp situations) and say something like I stand up and annouce "I am going to slaughter you all." Then tell me who they are attacking and making a initiative or attack roll.

The extra steps and difference in body language between 1st and 3rd person helps me a lot with clarifying what the players is actually doing. It not much difference but over the long haul it add up and makes the players think more of how to act as if they are there in the setting rather than treating their characters as throw away game pieces.

However if something is that absurd or extreme for the situation I will just ask point blank "Is that what you intend to do?" If they answer yes then the action goes from there.

Quote from: AsenRG;881350If it doesn't make sense, why would you allow it to work like that:)?

Yeah, that's pretty puzzling.

Quote from: jhkim;881345The common problem I see is that if NPCs commit crimes, then it's up to the PCs to fix it - they can't rely on the nobles/police/whoever to deal with the bad guys. However, if the PCs commit crimes, then suddenly the law becomes effective and deals with them.

Hence why I used random tables (preferably with a bell curve) occasionally to keep myself honest in regards to my personal bias.

Something like
2d6
3-5 incompetent law enforcement organization
6-9 average law enforcement organization
10-12 superior law enforcement organization
+1 for a major city.

Average meaning that the guards have no special equipment or tactics. So PCs with good equipment or supernatural abilities are going to have an edge in any confrontation. But guards are not fuck ups either.

Superior means that the guards as an organization are at least the equal of even the best equipped adventuring parties.

Quote from: AsenRG;881350If it doesn't make sense, why would you allow it to work like that:)?

Because a lot of people are not self aware enough to recognized they are biased.

Look at this way, if a setting is a real place then logic demands that average law enforcement setup will be competent. Because if they weren't then the inhabitant would eventually tire of the situation and force a change by whatever means works in their culture.

But the law of averages means at any GIVEN time there will be some guards that incompetent, some that are superior but most are just average. Good enough to deal with the life of the area but probably unlikely able to deal with anything out of the norm.

Of course if the area deals with out of control adventuring parties on a regular basis than the "average" would be better able to deal with that compared to the "average" out of the way rural locale.


My opinion is that winds up as bell curve so if you concerned about bias then turn it into a multiple dice roll and roleplay accordingly.

Now where my personal bias comes into play here is the fact I believe the average law enforcement will be component to deal with ordinary problems. If that not your belief than it OK to interpret the 2d6 roll differently than how I would. But even then you have to admit that somewhere in your setting there are guard who are very good for their circumstances. If you feel that there is only a 5% chance of that then go with it. But doing the dice roll will make it appear far more fair to the players.

Quote from: jhkimThe common problem I see is that if NPCs commit crimes, then it's up to the PCs to fix it - they can't rely on the nobles/police/whoever to deal with the bad guys. However, if the PCs commit crimes, then suddenly the law becomes effective and deals with them.

That doesn't make sense, and is annoying to the players.

Quote from: AsenRG;881350If it doesn't make sense, why would you allow it to work like that:)?

What are you expecting that I should do to not allow it? Stand up and tell my GM, "That sucks - change it or else"?

In practice, every game has problems - and some of them are a lot worse than this bias. GM's are always biased because humans are always biased, and arguing with them doesn't necessarily make things better.

When I notice bias in my own GMing, I try to correct it - but that doesn't mean I'm unbiased. When I'm playing and I see bias in my GMs, I'll sometimes give mild feedback, but for the most part, I'll stand by and support their calls because it's better for the game as a whole to support them rather than complain.


The split that I cite is there for good reasons. (a) GMs often don't want the PCs to just be able to sit back and let NPCs solve the problem. (b) GMs often don't want PCs to run roughshod over the setting. (c) GMs usually want the setting to be consistent and their resolution unbiased.

There is no single solution for these.

1) Having a random roll eliminates the inconsistency (c), but it means that in some cases, the PCs get to sit back and have the law handle the problem (a) - and in some cases, the PCs get away with murder (b).

2) My solution is to have fairly wild-west-like situations, where the PCs have some built-in authority. This allows more of (b) while dealing with (a) and (c).

Quote from: jhkim;881345The common problem I see is that if NPCs commit crimes, then it's up to the PCs to fix it - they can't rely on the nobles/police/whoever to deal with the bad guys. However, if the PCs commit crimes, then suddenly the law becomes effective and deals with them.

That doesn't make sense, and is annoying to the players.

Um. I have never seen that in a session. NPCs commit crimes and someone is investigating if the PCs dont. They might call in the PCs. They might go their own route.