Take no prisoners!

[bubba smith]

I think the source of the objection is the players equate being captured to being kidnapped

[pinecone]

re: Bolo of Earth, One I used "back in the day" was to have the Hero willingly enter the Death trap, to obtain the release of hostages/DNPCs that seemed to go down better, because it was more "heroic".

 

So the last one I ran, the villain placed the intrepid female reporter in a deadly predicament inside a death trap. The Hero enters, and does heroic stuff...

[Lucius]

One time when a certain player had to miss a session, I had his character captured and the others had to track down the band of Goblins who had him. Start of the next session, I told him how his character had enacted a daring escape, and played out his meeting with the heroes who were following him. Then they all tracked down the Goblins to get that one character's magic bow back.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary says that was also the campaign where we found that if you make magic weapons rare, and a player character loses one, they'll quest to the ends of the world to get it back.

[Enforcer84]

I have no problem with it, cooperative storytelling and all. I'm trying to find a genre that doesn't allow for it and I can't.
 

I suppose the GM might want to let players know beforehand. I guess it's easier at the beginning of a game - but I don't get the player angst for it. 

[Enforcer84]

Dammit, Lucious this was a year old. 

[CaptnStrawberry]

New to me!  Interesting stuff.  Who can forget the famous ish where Batman willingly enters a sharktank deathtrap to save an innocent from the Joker?

 

 

A lot of super rpgs recommend that players should get a little extra 'oomph' for letting their characters be placed in captivity - information, equipment, unexpected allies, experience points, and/or heroic action points.  An exchange of current discomfort for future whoop-ass!

[Christopher R Taylor]

Part of the advice given in Champions Complete is that players hate to have their PCs captured, which is something GMs should try to avoid doing. As a player, I don't feel that way, and as a GM might go-to "first adventure" trope is, rather than meeting in a bar, I have my PCs meet as co-prisoners and bond while escaping.

 

As a player, do you find having your characters captured kills your fun?

 

Its hard to take because it feels like you failed.  Many people, such as myself, play RPGs because my life generally sucks and its a chance to do something else, be someone better, to kick ass.  Then you get stomped on and taken prisoner, its tough.  But if you can do it carefully then breaking free and beating ass feels even better.  Its just something you need to do sparingly and for a good story reason that ends up making the heroes even better.

[pinecone]

_{I just got back from a film festival. so I am thinking in "film" terms. Being taken prisoner is like nudity in film. If it is gratuatus, it's a little offensive, if it is called for by the story it's alright.}

[Christopher R Taylor]

I agree with the idea that having suffered captivity ought to be worth something - a hero point, for example - because it is such a genre staple and takes good roleplaying to put up with.

[Enforcer84]

New to me!  Interesting stuff.  Who can forget the famous ish where Batman willingly enters a sharktank deathtrap to save an innocent from the Joker?

 

 

A lot of super rpgs recommend that players should get a little extra 'oomph' for letting their characters be placed in captivity - information, equipment, unexpected allies, experience points, and/or heroic action points.  An exchange of current discomfort for future whoop-ass!

I can get behind this as well. Even though I by and large find the whole thing to be player overreaction. 

[Beast]

this the kind of start that needs spelled out before character creation
and has everybody onboard from the start

I'd be up for it ,just need it spelled out before hand

[Badger]

I think a lot of the complaints about 'being captured' tend to stem from the feeling of being railroaded. I have been absolutely guilty of the sin of railroading myself in many forms over the years and it has taken me a long time to understand why it is so dreadful. I even ran a number of sessions in which I wanted to recreate something very similar to the earlier mentioned Island of Dr. Apocalypse Saker from the first half dozen issues of the Elementals and at the time I couldn't understand why my players were being so recalcitrant. I've got this great story idea. Go with it. It will be fun. I honestly did not see what the problem was.

 

Fast forward thirty years and it finally clicks (it takes me a while, but I'll get there).

 

What we do when we have a game session is that we collaboratively tell a story.; all of us. The GM, the dice, and the players are all part of that process. When a GM 'railroads' a storyline what they are doing is eliminating (or at least greatly reducing) their player's participation in that storyline. They take the player's ability to influence the actions of their characters and remove that from them in any meaningful way.

 

I've been captured because the GM has a storyline that requires me to be captured. Even though I trust my GM and know that I will not remain captured the truth of the matter is that with most storylines that start out this way there will be no real chance to escape until the pre-designated 'escape scene' in the story which will most likely involve a specific method that the GM has determined in advance. Some GMs are more flexible and won't have a pre-designated 'escape scene' with an approved escape method, but most GMs who are good enough to do that will also probably not railroad me into being captured in the first place. They will present a more reasonable scene and if I avoid be captured then we go off to do something else.

 

So in what is suppose to be a cooperative medium I am captured without any real input, I am held prisoner without any real influence on the storyline, and I escape because that's what the script has called for. I might as well just hand my sheet over to the GM and let him write up my exciting adventure so I can read how I was able to find the weakness in the prison and successfully escape. I don't really need to be here for any of this, do I?

 

Yes, I am overexagerrating a bit, but it is to illustrate the point. In a cooperative storytelling excercise there are probably few sins greater than removing the ability of your players to participate in the process. Unfortunately in the case of most 'Prisoner' scenarios that is done to an extreme degree, and I am not referring to the fact that as a prisoner a player has limited control over their actions. I am referring to the entire process, from being captured to being held to eventual escape.

Reading this, made me think of what my problems with being captured are. If I do something stupid to get myself captured so be it. If it is some pre-arranged part of the storyline, that is what tends to irk me.

[Hugh Neilson]

Reading this, made me think of what my problems with being captured are. If I do something stupid to get myself captured so be it. If it is some pre-arranged part of the storyline, that is what tends to irk me.

Is it OK for a bank robbery, an assassination of a diplomat or the kidnapping of a world leader to be a pre-arranged part of the storyline, or do you have to do something stupid for these things to occur? Can a lucky die roll, rather than your own stupidity, result in being captured (or KO'd, or killed), or is that also a problem? Can overwhelming opposition exist (enabling you to be captured or otherwise defeated)? How about 30d6 of Mind Control, only to cause target to surrender and be captured (I rolled the dice!)?

 

The question is really one of "social contract at the table". What genre tropes can occur, which cannot, and under what parameters? "Capture" is just one of many such tropes.

[TheDarkness]

I'm in the okay with it camp, though I would lean towards two scenarios where I could see it being most effective:

 

1) The characters get themselves captured through their own actions.

 

or

 

2) A crafty enemy engineers is, and the capture is preceded by a hunt, the hunt may result in their capture. This Elevates the crafty enemy to actually being crafty, makes the players act dynamically, which is more fun for them, and either they evade capture, or they plot to gain their freedom.

 

Starting a scenario saying "you're captured" is not ideal, for reasons already stated, but either the players trust me to run a good game, or they don't, I won't avoid certain scenarios that I have good reason to believe we can turn into a good session or sessions, so if they get captured on their own, or if there is a compelling and workable plot for their enemy to capture them in game, without raising the question "if he can do it now, why didn't he do it before", then I don't see a problem, as long as I run a good game. Their prison is another place to meet NPCs, raise clues, another environment to prove their heroism, sometimes with the characters who the villain fears least having been underestimated, and capable of being pivotal in freeing the others.

[Cancer]

I admit I have got an irrational aversion to having my character get captured. And yes, it is irrational; I haven't figured out why it's there, but it certainly is there.

 

I reach for character suicide always when capture is about to happen. I need to told, out of character, that's needed to the plot, and the character when freed will be unaltered (no mind control worms put in the ear, no tracker/tracer implants, no secret mind-override conditioning, nothing). Because I have a difficult time understanding why a villain wouldn't kill outright rather than capture ... it's a trope that has never made sense to me. About the only reason I perceive for a villain to perform a capture rather than immediate killing is to manipulate the hero, or those who love him, into doing something for the villain that the villain could not accomplish another way (which, to use other words, is coercing someone on the "good" side into doing called "treason").

 

Probably if I played with a GM who made that happen more than once I'd just stop showing up.

[TheDarkness]

I admit I have got an irrational aversion to having my character get captured. And yes, it is irrational; I haven't figured out why it's there, but it certainly is there.

 

I reach for character suicide always when capture is about to happen. I need to told, out of character, that's needed to the plot, and the character when freed will be unaltered (no mind control worms put in the ear, no tracker/tracer implants, no secret mind-override conditioning, nothing). Because I have a difficult time understanding why a villain wouldn't kill outright rather than capture ... it's a trope that has never made sense to me. About the only reason I perceive for a villain to perform a capture rather than immediate killing is to manipulate the hero, or those who love him, into doing something for the villain that the villain could not accomplish another way (which, to use other words, is coercing someone on the "good" side into doing called "treason").

 

Probably if I played with a GM who made that happen more than once I'd just stop showing up.

Like all things, I think capturing heroes must make sense for the goals and, perhaps most importantly, for the character of the villains.

 

I think there are some villains whose character suggests that they would more likely try to kill, not capture the heroes.

 

As for hidden controls, the rules of the game tend to make it so such long term controls cannot be relied upon, so, in game, the clever villain would not rely upon such an easily alterable plan. If the other characters know they were captured and something done to them, it is exceedingly difficult to put something in place that the other characters cannot undue, like the gadgeteer in the group finding and disabling the chip controlling them.

 

Likewise, the clever villain will, after one attempt, learn the difficulty of trying to keep supers captive. So captivity is likely one step in a larger plan, possibly merely to keep the heroes out of the way for a brief time. Or, the villain may use proxies to capture and hold the heroes, like fooling the public into seeing them as an enemy and seek to capture them. This latter opens interesting role play opportunities, as the period in which the heroes are being hunted by the public requires them to deal with people they do not want to harm, but must elude or otherwise protect from themselves.

 

Definitely, there must be an in-story logic to why the villain is seeking to capture the characters, and not kill them. Joker loves Batman, cannot handle a world without him. Trask, in the movies, wants mutant DNA. For some villains, it is in irrational need to get the upper hand that leads them to go the unwise course of trying to hold against their will people with unpredictable powers.

 

Actually, one example of a capture story, though an unusual one, was in a Superman Annual, I believe Alan Moore wrote it. Wonder Woman and Batman go to the Fortress of Solitude to wish Superman a happy birthday, and they find him unconscious with a symbiotic magical plant lifeform attached to him. The issue deals with them trying to detach it while Superman is imagining a life in which Krypton is never destroyed, and he is an ordinary Kryptonian with a family who is restless, unsatisfied with his life. While this might not play out well in a game as is, it is a useful idea. How do you keep captive someone with staggering powers? Don't let him know he's captive. This way, players could be undergoing an action packed, fun game, in which they have no idea they are actually in a cell under the influence of Kaiser Mayhem's Cerebral Obfuscator, but actually think(and play a game in which) they are fighting off the newest group of super villains. In this, the in-game logic could be that the new super villains, in the real world, are actually cutting into Kaiser Mayhem's territory and business, and he wants the super heroes capable of beating them, and thus, he plots to capture and train the heroes. Yes, the heroes are going to hate Kaiser Mayhem even more, and they will hate him twice as much when they more easily beat the new villain group, The Rule of Fives, because they will remember why they know so much about the group.

 

I think the aversion to capture of some players does not have to always play out as quitting a game because you don't want to be captured, as long as the players know they do not have to wait to get back at Kaiser Mayhem, that they can also make long term plans to find and capture him, which then, as a GM, I can allow to develop into more sessions in which they get to see their plans come to fruition.

 

Beating a worthless enemy is nowhere near as fun as beating one who can and has beaten you, no question about it.

 

I also suspect it would help if the players played sessions in which they were doing danger room training of scenarios that included scenarios in which organized retreat was part of the manuever. Genghis Khan won a tremendous number of battles using feigned retreats.

 

Thinking about it, the character who has been captured and fears he has had implants put in opens interesting role play opportunities. Where will the player go when he fears revealing the position of those he knows? Who does he know with the know how to remove the implants? How can the players help him/her?

 

As someone who spars a fair amount, the person who needs to win is much easier to deal with than the person who plays the game and likes it, and this is an easy concept to teach in that sphere, where actual blows land. In a role playing game, it is easier. If I reward playing smart, if I give the players opportunities to retreat, regroup, and mount a counteroffensive, then retreat loses it's negative connotations, and smart play becomes fun, because they know that they have a group of minds to look to, and will often surprise me.

 

And if they've played with me that long, they know I'm not going to make a game just to capture their characters and turn them into giant mutant prawns. Only players who consistently disrupt the game for their own amusement become the Prawn Pawns of the Shellfish Seven.

[wick]

Depends on the villain really.  A psychotic killer, realistically you can expect a grisly death.  Many bad things can happen when captured, death, crippling, torture, rape, etc..   In fantasy or super heroic genres, you can throw in possessions, mind control, and who knows what.   In D&D, loss of possessions is a fairly big deal since they are source of power and are often won through months of gaming, in games like Hero system maybe not so much if your foci are replaceable or even inaccessible and where your powers are usually innate.

 

Probably the biggest problem I have with capture is that it is often poorly implemented and becomes a hackneyed plot device.  If it is cleverly engineered or I end up surrendering due to the odds turning in my favor I am generally ok ( in games with harsh GMs surrendering may be a viable option as they sometimes put you into situations where fight or flight are both lethal options).

 

Another thing to look out for, is how do the players treat prisoners.  If they commonly kill or maim prisoners, they will likely expect the same treatment if they are captured.  This is probably not as common in champions as in some other genres or systems.  

[Comic]

The premise of the question reminds me not so much of being taken prisoner, but of being mind controlled to capture and take prisoner my entire team.

 

The issues:

 

a) this was the first session for the team, and the players did not know each other well.

almost all of the players HATED being taken prisoner as a form of railroading, with a white hot passion.

c) my character was exceptionally well-built for high-mobility, close quarters action, inspired by the Elementals character Vortex so designed to be immune to inertia (No Turn Radius, Instant acceleration Flight and lots of it, exceptionally high OCV in flight).

d) the fight happened in a cramped house.

 

My mind-controlled character had the entire team unconscious (in GM's discretion) with zero BODY damage done (except for breaking one window) in a single multiple move-by. And they never forgave me.

 

I'm okay with the 'start the game as prisoners'. But I'm not okay with 'meet the other players as prisoners', oh and by the way, you made them that way.

[Clonus]

Part of the advice given in Champions Complete is that players hate to have their PCs captured, which is something GMs should try to avoid doing. As a player, I don't feel that way, and as a GM might go-to "first adventure" trope is, rather than meeting in a bar, I have my PCs meet as co-prisoners and bond while escaping.

 

As a player, do you find having your characters captured kills your fun?

 

Starting out captured is totally different from actually losing a fight and getting captured.  That being said I have been captured and found it quite amusing since it was brief and effortlessly undone.  As I recall, my character, Riptide before going ashore on Doctor Destroyer's island swam around and found the underwater coolant exhaust pipe for the island's power source and messed it up.  Then the team went ashore and were defeated by Menton.  We woke up in some kind of prison with a power suppressor and Riptide got to rant like an idiot at Destroyer and Menton.

 

"So you've got a master plan do you!  You guys always have a master plan!  Well I've got a master plan too, and getting captured was all part of it!  What do you think of that?  Ha-ha!  Ha-ha!"   Destroyer snorts in contempt and leaves, and the power conveniently fails right after that, letting the strong man rip open the door so I can zip out and do a move-through on Menton before he even knows I'm coming.  I run back and tell the other members of the team "OK, now for step four of my master plan."

 

So I was having a great time.  I don't think the others minded too much since our immurement was brief.  

[Narf the Mouse]

It seems there's a few key points:

 

1) Players hate having the GM virtually "run their characters".

2) Capture should be because of player actions, either because the players agree that an "escape scenario" would be fun, or the PCs were "legally" overwhelmed and captured.

3) By "legally", I mean, if a horde of ninja come out of the trees and capture the PCs, there should be a reasonable reason for a horde of ninja to be there, a reasonable chance for the players to realize they're Entering Ninja Horde Territory, a reasonable reason for the ninja to want to capture the PCs, the PCs should be captured through game mechanics, not the GM saying they're captured, and the reasonable expectation that the PCs will soon be able to take action, either to facillitate their escape or enact useful plans inside the prison.

4) Players should have some opportunity to turn the tables on their captor(s).

5) Players want to know that their GM will provide this.

6) Players do not want this to be a frequent occurance; at the least, it's cliche, at the worst, it's bad GM'ing.

 

That about sum it up?

[TheDarkness]

It seems there's a few key points:

 

1) Players hate having the GM virtually "run their characters".

2) Capture should be because of player actions, either because the players agree that an "escape scenario" would be fun, or the PCs were "legally" overwhelmed and captured.

3) By "legally", I mean, if a horde of ninja come out of the trees and capture the PCs, there should be a reasonable reason for a horde of ninja to be there, a reasonable chance for the players to realize they're Entering Ninja Horde Territory, a reasonable reason for the ninja to want to capture the PCs, the PCs should be captured through game mechanics, not the GM saying they're captured, and the reasonable expectation that the PCs will soon be able to take action, either to facillitate their escape or enact useful plans inside the prison.

4) Players should have some opportunity to turn the tables on their captor(s).

5) Players want to know that their GM will provide this.

6) Players do not want this to be a frequent occurance; at the least, it's cliche, at the worst, it's bad GM'ing.

 

That about sum it up?

I think so!

[TheDarkness]

Although this has got me thinking about making a hero group who are actually prisoners. Maybe former villains. Every scenario begins with them being given a mission and ends with them returning to jail.

[bubba smith]

ala the suicide squad /task force x ?

[wick]

 I probably hate it because, while I make a fairly good GM this often translates into being a bad player.  I see a poorly constructed plot device like auto capture coming down the road, I get peeved. Just one trigger among many really ( how about the ultra powerful NPC who treats you like a chump and tells you to go on missions, or you meet in a bar/tavern, or etc...) uuugggggg

 

Getting captured is not very heroic and it takes participation and control out of your hands as a player. It should be used sparingly, and should never be drawn out. "Oh, my character is still imprisoned this week, why don't you just e-mail me what is being done to me GM I have better things to do than to sit around doing little to nothing."  There should be a way to escape or a variety of ways that the character can reasonably try. 

[bigdamnhero]

I think Narf's summary hits the main points.

 

One addition unique to the superhero genre: the one thing players seem to hate more than capture is losing their powers, even temporarily. And since it's often difficult if not impossible to keep a team of supers prisoner without some form of power nullification, getting captured combines both of them. And the only thing players hate worse than both of those? Having to be rescued by NPCs...

 

Whenever I start a campaign, I make sure all my players understand that not every potential situation they face will be a Level-Appropriate Encounter carefully calculated to be challenging but not overwhelming (kindof a pet peeve of mine), and that sometimes running away or even surrendering may be the smart play. If all the players aren't okay with that, we need to have that conversation up front. Even then, best used sparingly and fairly, while still giving the players some control over the situation (even if that control is delayed for a short period).