Ultimately D&D is about telling stories. Does the player want to tell a story about having his character lose those powers temporarily? If not, you can just say that the contract is to sow chaos or something else vague and almost impossible for an adventurer to fail at.
(Or maybe have a supernaturally evil entity simply grant the magic for free, no strings attached. Having Satan give you great power with no explanation might seem even more menacing than a conventional agreement to do evil.)
Beyond that, game rules can’t fix bad roleplaying. The right answer to immersion-ruining, unfun in-game behavior is an out-of-game conversation with the player, which might need to end with “…and stay out!”
Plus I think its unfair that some classes are bounded to strict conditions and some not. Why doesnt the artificer or wizard able to lose their powers then if the cleric or paladin does ?
I agree with you. If the player agrees to it, sure go ahead. As a bad surprise or a bad consequence of something else ? Find something that would affect anyone the same. Like jail.
Well the wizard loses his spells of he loses his spellbook or spell components, or at least that’s how it used to be.
Got nothing for the Artificer. It would be cool if they had tools or something like that they used. But I don’t think it’s about fairness as it is about immersion. Depending on the patron, especially the ones all about planning or intelligence, it breaks some people’s suspension of disbelief that they would make such dumb contracts that allowed the person to keep powers or gain new ones after betraying them.
Used to be. In 5th, all you lose is the possibility to switch spells. And with a focus no need for most components except the ones that have a gold cost.
ONLY if the player is cool with it. I prefer to break immersion that lose a player. If I have to choose, fuck immersion, I love my players and I want to keep them at my table.
Althought I do love immersion. You can have your cake and eat it too. Just… fuck it if the cost is a player’s fun.
Oh definitely, I agree 100%. Player’s fun above all else. I had to defend it because I’m the kind of person who wouldn’t mind this, but with a DM and party who uses it for cool story purposes, not to screw me over.
(Rest of this post is just me reminiscing lol)
For an example, one of our old group’s favorite sessions of all time, one we would talk about for years to come, was when we were imprisoned in an anti-magic field prison without weapons or equipment and had to escape. Sure we lost our spells and equipment, but it was only one session, it let some players shine who hadn’t in a long time, and the spell caster(s) still had ways to contribute (the DM dropped interactable pieces of the environment they could manipulate to help us escape during battles and the followers that came in to help spring us had a relationship with them, so they were controlled by them, too).
Or another time, a DM had a paladin’s god threaten them with falling when they kept doing evil stuff. She never actually lost her powers, but the fear of it pushed her to do a solo atonement quest when we split up during downtime where we she could get more fun character story spotlight and she came back with a cool sword or armor or something.
Ultimately D&D is about telling stories. Does the player want to tell a story about having his character lose those powers temporarily? If not, you can just say that the contract is to sow chaos or something else vague and almost impossible for an adventurer to fail at.
(Or maybe have a supernaturally evil entity simply grant the magic for free, no strings attached. Having Satan give you great power with no explanation might seem even more menacing than a conventional agreement to do evil.)
Beyond that, game rules can’t fix bad roleplaying. The right answer to immersion-ruining, unfun in-game behavior is an out-of-game conversation with the player, which might need to end with “…and stay out!”
Plus I think its unfair that some classes are bounded to strict conditions and some not. Why doesnt the artificer or wizard able to lose their powers then if the cleric or paladin does ?
I agree with you. If the player agrees to it, sure go ahead. As a bad surprise or a bad consequence of something else ? Find something that would affect anyone the same. Like jail.
Well the wizard loses his spells of he loses his spellbook or spell components, or at least that’s how it used to be.
Got nothing for the Artificer. It would be cool if they had tools or something like that they used. But I don’t think it’s about fairness as it is about immersion. Depending on the patron, especially the ones all about planning or intelligence, it breaks some people’s suspension of disbelief that they would make such dumb contracts that allowed the person to keep powers or gain new ones after betraying them.
Used to be. In 5th, all you lose is the possibility to switch spells. And with a focus no need for most components except the ones that have a gold cost.
ONLY if the player is cool with it. I prefer to break immersion that lose a player. If I have to choose, fuck immersion, I love my players and I want to keep them at my table.
Althought I do love immersion. You can have your cake and eat it too. Just… fuck it if the cost is a player’s fun.
Oh definitely, I agree 100%. Player’s fun above all else. I had to defend it because I’m the kind of person who wouldn’t mind this, but with a DM and party who uses it for cool story purposes, not to screw me over.
(Rest of this post is just me reminiscing lol) For an example, one of our old group’s favorite sessions of all time, one we would talk about for years to come, was when we were imprisoned in an anti-magic field prison without weapons or equipment and had to escape. Sure we lost our spells and equipment, but it was only one session, it let some players shine who hadn’t in a long time, and the spell caster(s) still had ways to contribute (the DM dropped interactable pieces of the environment they could manipulate to help us escape during battles and the followers that came in to help spring us had a relationship with them, so they were controlled by them, too).
Or another time, a DM had a paladin’s god threaten them with falling when they kept doing evil stuff. She never actually lost her powers, but the fear of it pushed her to do a solo atonement quest when we split up during downtime where we she could get more fun character story spotlight and she came back with a cool sword or armor or something.