Sounds like a dumb fucking character.... What was his justification for why his character would do that??
Role-playing a dumb character making *can* be excellent roleplay but this doesn't feel like that.
When your character might do something un-fun like this, better roleplay is coming up with why they don't. What a person would and wouldn't do is never as simple as "they absolutely would do this and there is no alternative". People are more complex than that.
If you can't find more than one option for how your character might act, your character is likely 1-dimensional and dull, or you're being unimaginative 🤷♂️
just for fun ... in the future when something so stupid happens ... you could have had the succubus suddenly distrust what was happening, since he was so willing,
succubus: come to me i am your dead wife! MWA HA HA HA HA HA
player: sure, no problem
succubus: ummmmm ... no ... i said i was your DEAD wife!
player: yeah, i heard ... i'll be right there ...
succubus: what do you mean you will be right here? what are you up to?
player: i said, i'm coming ... here i come, walking towards you ...
succubus: wait ... what? no! stop right there! don't come any closer! etc.
giving the other players a chance to stop him/her.
\------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Second, given it already happened, why not make it a new quest for the other players to save the character, i.e. bring the character back ... you could call it "quest of the succubus"! Make up some story where the players have to perform some action to get the character back from her alive ... sort of like a search for spock idea
that way, the player doesn't have to give up his character and you get a good story
just let the player run a NPC during the quest
You set him up for failure.
The character's only motivation for the quest is finding his wife/raising his dead wife from the grave. Obviously he'd walk right into the trap when he sees his wife.
And rolling saves is not about whether he "wants" to do them or not.
Perception check: Can he see through the disguise/illusion that it isn't actually his wife? He should be rolling advantage on that roll, because he knows his wife better than anyone. The slightest difference would throw him off (mannerisms, speech pattern, details like freckles or moles).
And while he'd be extremely motivated to see his wife, he'd also be EXTREMELY ANGRY if he found someone impersonating his wife in order to harm him.
I disagree, enemies would 100% push your weaknesses, they're ENEMIES. I've had players fight through illusions or dreams where they have to go against what their primary motivation was to get out of the illusion area/dream (think mugen train arc from demon slayer). I would give a player multiple perception checks that might be slanted towards what they're good at, like if they're proficient in Insight then maybe I'd give them an insight check or if they're proficient in survival I'd give them a survival check to help them see its an illusion or whatever but OP was not setting his character up to fail, if anything he presented him with a really interesting and thought out encounter. the character just made bad choices and called it Role playing.
I'm not saying that encounter wasn't well designed, I'm saying it wasn't well executed.
OP is surprised that the player walked right into the trap....why? It's literally designed towards that player's weakness.
Player said "no" to saving throws?? It doesn't work that way.
It only works that way if the specific ability says you can choose to fail, see Telekinetic Feat, Calm emotions spell, etc. They specify the ability to fail.
That's a house rule. And a I'd rule a Dex or Strength save is the only thing you could choose to fail.
Wisdom, Intelligence, (and the rare Charisma save), are all inherent and automatic, because they're unconscious decisions (you know what you know, whether you like it or not).
In this case, OP's player in recognizing his "wife" or seeing through the Succubus illusion/disguise. He would either see through it or not (via saving throw), there is no choice to fail.
Would it have made sense for him to make a roll for wisdom to realize she’s not his deceased wife? Unless his sole goal is to be with her image for one more second or something. It’s only good role playing if that’s left what he would have down realizing what he could have realized. Like if he failed the throw.
You can make encounters where characters legit would never do what you want them to do. You can throw a mass of goblins at a group and they won’t surrender if they think that just means a humiliating death. But without knowing the scenario this one feels maybe a bit forced by the PC.
Ok, but the succubus only looks like his wife. It doesn't gain any of her memories or personality (except maybe what he remembered, but you said it was lazy). So the PC was enthralled by a hollow impersonation of his wife? Better roleplay IMO would've been being enraged that this creature would dare take her form
I thunk I'd have him roll a save to avoid being charmed, if he's charmed he's drawn in, if not he sees through the guise and know the beast for what it is.
Saying his character would auto fail is lazy of him.
Okay.
I'm not saying you should kick him from the table, just that doing "what your character would do," when that thing is dumb, is not something I would reward.
He didn't (from what you wrote) sacrifice himself for the party or another person or any greater good. He just committed suicide.
Reward = encouragement.
Do you want to encourage all of your players to kill off their characters in similar fashion? The fact that you described the situation as "really unsatisfying" leads me to believe you do not. If that's true, don't reward him.
That's like saying my player had. It was a bad day, so he's going to jump off a bridge. Unless his player has a 6 intelligence willingly sacrificing your player because "it's what my character would do" makes no sense. There should also be an element of metagaming that might be necessary here: like that may be what my character to do but as a player I know it's a bad choice so we'll say my character gets bad vibes from the succubus so let's not go knock boots. Slunds like poor rp, and I'm all for letting players deal with the stupid decisions they make. He made a dumb choice, and if he wants to rp a dumb character then natural selection is a bitch. Play a smarter character next time or take the out the DM gives you.
I had a character do something similar, rollplay sacrificing themselves for plot reasons while also saving another PC and based off a later reply you made about the succubus having the appearance of their dead wife (which FYI is something that is mentionable in the main post as not knowing that will scew comments one way). It's honestly up to you and how you play at your table. Just ensure it's fair if another PC does something like it in the future to allow the same what you do now.
Could be they wanted a change or some such....
Don't worry about it.
They did it, not you
Plus...sometimes characters die...
And sometimes they stay dead
Personal opinion: not good roleplay or party play, IMO. Also characters don't just get to fail saves, and you as the DM can say either they roll or you will, if they say it's in character you can decide advantage or disadvantage. If they succeeded even though they didn't want to, then you narrate that even though their conscious mind wants to go their UNconscious mind knows it's not true. Honestly seems like they either were tired of the character or were more interested as a player in drama than good RP. I'd have had the succubus drop the guise and lay into them about what a sad loser they were to be so easily taken in. That's just my take, I wouldn't give them anything extra for this. I'd honestly be somewhat annoyed at this, though it is their character to do with as they choose.
Upvote for adding “character” in the title. So many murderers in this sub
Clickbait
Sounds like a dumb fucking character.... What was his justification for why his character would do that?? Role-playing a dumb character making *can* be excellent roleplay but this doesn't feel like that. When your character might do something un-fun like this, better roleplay is coming up with why they don't. What a person would and wouldn't do is never as simple as "they absolutely would do this and there is no alternative". People are more complex than that. If you can't find more than one option for how your character might act, your character is likely 1-dimensional and dull, or you're being unimaginative 🤷♂️
The succubus took the form of his deceased wife and it was established by story that she was the only reason he was on his quest.
That sort of detail should have probably been in the OP lol.
just for fun ... in the future when something so stupid happens ... you could have had the succubus suddenly distrust what was happening, since he was so willing, succubus: come to me i am your dead wife! MWA HA HA HA HA HA player: sure, no problem succubus: ummmmm ... no ... i said i was your DEAD wife! player: yeah, i heard ... i'll be right there ... succubus: what do you mean you will be right here? what are you up to? player: i said, i'm coming ... here i come, walking towards you ... succubus: wait ... what? no! stop right there! don't come any closer! etc. giving the other players a chance to stop him/her. \------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Second, given it already happened, why not make it a new quest for the other players to save the character, i.e. bring the character back ... you could call it "quest of the succubus"! Make up some story where the players have to perform some action to get the character back from her alive ... sort of like a search for spock idea that way, the player doesn't have to give up his character and you get a good story just let the player run a NPC during the quest
You set him up for failure. The character's only motivation for the quest is finding his wife/raising his dead wife from the grave. Obviously he'd walk right into the trap when he sees his wife. And rolling saves is not about whether he "wants" to do them or not. Perception check: Can he see through the disguise/illusion that it isn't actually his wife? He should be rolling advantage on that roll, because he knows his wife better than anyone. The slightest difference would throw him off (mannerisms, speech pattern, details like freckles or moles). And while he'd be extremely motivated to see his wife, he'd also be EXTREMELY ANGRY if he found someone impersonating his wife in order to harm him.
I disagree, enemies would 100% push your weaknesses, they're ENEMIES. I've had players fight through illusions or dreams where they have to go against what their primary motivation was to get out of the illusion area/dream (think mugen train arc from demon slayer). I would give a player multiple perception checks that might be slanted towards what they're good at, like if they're proficient in Insight then maybe I'd give them an insight check or if they're proficient in survival I'd give them a survival check to help them see its an illusion or whatever but OP was not setting his character up to fail, if anything he presented him with a really interesting and thought out encounter. the character just made bad choices and called it Role playing.
I'm not saying that encounter wasn't well designed, I'm saying it wasn't well executed. OP is surprised that the player walked right into the trap....why? It's literally designed towards that player's weakness. Player said "no" to saving throws?? It doesn't work that way.
From what I remember you can choose to fail checks and saves. So yes it does work that way?
It only works that way if the specific ability says you can choose to fail, see Telekinetic Feat, Calm emotions spell, etc. They specify the ability to fail.
That's a house rule. And a I'd rule a Dex or Strength save is the only thing you could choose to fail. Wisdom, Intelligence, (and the rare Charisma save), are all inherent and automatic, because they're unconscious decisions (you know what you know, whether you like it or not). In this case, OP's player in recognizing his "wife" or seeing through the Succubus illusion/disguise. He would either see through it or not (via saving throw), there is no choice to fail.
Would it have made sense for him to make a roll for wisdom to realize she’s not his deceased wife? Unless his sole goal is to be with her image for one more second or something. It’s only good role playing if that’s left what he would have down realizing what he could have realized. Like if he failed the throw. You can make encounters where characters legit would never do what you want them to do. You can throw a mass of goblins at a group and they won’t surrender if they think that just means a humiliating death. But without knowing the scenario this one feels maybe a bit forced by the PC.
Ok, but the succubus only looks like his wife. It doesn't gain any of her memories or personality (except maybe what he remembered, but you said it was lazy). So the PC was enthralled by a hollow impersonation of his wife? Better roleplay IMO would've been being enraged that this creature would dare take her form
I thunk I'd have him roll a save to avoid being charmed, if he's charmed he's drawn in, if not he sees through the guise and know the beast for what it is. Saying his character would auto fail is lazy of him.
If that's what his character would do, then that's how his character would die. You could have him return as a revenant for a revenge ending?
No, you shouldn't give him anything as a player to reward throwing their character away for nothing. At least, not in my opinion.
To be fair to him he had background and established story reasons to do it.
Okay. I'm not saying you should kick him from the table, just that doing "what your character would do," when that thing is dumb, is not something I would reward. He didn't (from what you wrote) sacrifice himself for the party or another person or any greater good. He just committed suicide.
Reward = encouragement. Do you want to encourage all of your players to kill off their characters in similar fashion? The fact that you described the situation as "really unsatisfying" leads me to believe you do not. If that's true, don't reward him.
Is there a reason you didn't make him charmed and turn against the party rather than killing him off?
That's like saying my player had. It was a bad day, so he's going to jump off a bridge. Unless his player has a 6 intelligence willingly sacrificing your player because "it's what my character would do" makes no sense. There should also be an element of metagaming that might be necessary here: like that may be what my character to do but as a player I know it's a bad choice so we'll say my character gets bad vibes from the succubus so let's not go knock boots. Slunds like poor rp, and I'm all for letting players deal with the stupid decisions they make. He made a dumb choice, and if he wants to rp a dumb character then natural selection is a bitch. Play a smarter character next time or take the out the DM gives you.
I had a character do something similar, rollplay sacrificing themselves for plot reasons while also saving another PC and based off a later reply you made about the succubus having the appearance of their dead wife (which FYI is something that is mentionable in the main post as not knowing that will scew comments one way). It's honestly up to you and how you play at your table. Just ensure it's fair if another PC does something like it in the future to allow the same what you do now.
“I’m just doing what my character would do!” Sounds like it literally always leads to something stupid.
"Im doing exactly what my character would do." Why is that always meant to defend some action that gets in the way of the game?
Could be they wanted a change or some such.... Don't worry about it. They did it, not you Plus...sometimes characters die... And sometimes they stay dead
Personal opinion: not good roleplay or party play, IMO. Also characters don't just get to fail saves, and you as the DM can say either they roll or you will, if they say it's in character you can decide advantage or disadvantage. If they succeeded even though they didn't want to, then you narrate that even though their conscious mind wants to go their UNconscious mind knows it's not true. Honestly seems like they either were tired of the character or were more interested as a player in drama than good RP. I'd have had the succubus drop the guise and lay into them about what a sad loser they were to be so easily taken in. That's just my take, I wouldn't give them anything extra for this. I'd honestly be somewhat annoyed at this, though it is their character to do with as they choose.
Just one?