Crime & Punishment Dilemmas

[DBX]

In our earlier campaigns, crime & punishment wasn't exactly on top of us player chaarcters agenda.


it was more a case of empting as many lasers/bullets into NPC's(whatever their nature) until they stopped moving, & then a final burst just to make sure, they were well & truly dead.


In recent campaigns, us players are actually trying to rp the "good" part of a heroic alignment or at least your average joe's take on law.


How do your palyers view law & order in Rifts,

& how do they punish NPC's


In a situation, us players keep on fighting this powerful npc over & over again. we have thwarted him a couple fo times, handed him over to NGR


but he keeps on escaping & coming after us.

In a recent scenario us players have him at our mercy, but the ******** dropped his guns & surrendered.

in older campiagns, it would be full burst & end of NPC, but now we want to **** him up (acatually do something that will hurt him) without killing him


any suggestions.

is there any way to permanently scar him or take away his powers/abilities. somethig that above average power lvl characters who are lvl 5-7th player characters could do.


somethig he can't go & get fixed up in a short amount of time.

alignment reversal! anything

have your players faced similar situation. because other than CS/LAszlo/Atlantsi/NGr/ etc there arn't too many places where law rules.


or nations that "GOOD" alignment characters would turn bad guys over too!

[Sentinel]

The dilema is really that there isn't much of 'law and order' in the sense that we have today.
In the CS of course, you have a powerful law-authority, but it is the extension of a corrupt rascist government whos' views good aligned characters will find abbhorrent. Then you have vast areas of banditry, black market, monster havens, vampire kingdoms...
Well, it was so much easier in the 21st century, when we were superheroes, and there was an established order.
In one of our games, a super villain from the year 2010 found himself in the age of Rifts. He suffered an alignment change, as he found that the very things he did to subvert the authority of government made him a hero here. When he killed CS NTSET guys, he saved several D-Bees from presecution that htey didn't deserve. It was strange for him to be cheered, but he adjusted.
Most of our godd vs. evil confrontations end up with either A) the bad guys getting killed in battle, (B) the bad guys running away, (C) the bad guys end up in the hands of whatever local law exists. In the New West, the players can usually find a Sheriff (sometimes, they appoint one from a pool of brave NPCs, before moving on).

[Dr. Doom III]

Bad guys surviving encounters with PCs?

Weird.

[Scooter the Outlaw]

If you want him to permanently lose his powers, so long as he's an S.D.C. creature and the powers are supernatural in nature, just slap a bionic hand on him. It's a small price to pay to put the guy out of business forever.

Anyway, my players have a confused sense of justice and run into things. Last night they finally actually talked to the 'head evil' of their campaign and found themselves totally rethinking their position on pursuing her. But generally, yeah, they just rail the bad guy in the head as long as the Cyber-Knight isn't around.

In any case, the closest thing to 'justice' you can do is kill them on Rifts earth. Unless, of course, you can find a local jail that is reasonably studry... unfortunately, killing them is the only way to keep them from escaping sometimes and causing more problems.

[Temporalmage]

Let the punishment fit the crime.

If the NPC is a murderer then even so called "good" peaple will condone killing the person. The same is true of rape, slavery, etc.

If the person is a theif, then take all of his worldly possesions, including property.

If the person has misused his powers (magic, psionic, etc) for some gain then treat him like you would a cyborg. If a cyborg is using his bionics in an evil way you'd just take some of his bionics away, like weapons, and replace other bionics with lesser versions, like stripping away his armor, lowering his PP and PS and SPD. If you don't want to just kill the person, (really the easiest solution), then give him some cybernetics that would negate his powers. It may seem cruel but it would certainly be considered a fate better than death.

What exactly is the NPC doing/ has done that warrents his being arrested by the NGR??

[Jefffar]

It all depends on the nature of this guy's acts and the nature of his powers.



Incidently, those of you talking about the bionics to suppress magic, you do realize that you are talking about chopping someone's arm off, don't you? That's pretty nasty.

A nother thing about the bionics, it only works so long as the guy can't get them removed. A lot of mages, given the choice between no hand or no magic will say bye bye to the hand.

As a GM to GM note, maybe you need adifferent villain. This guy is popping up too often. There needs to be someone else to hassle the players, give them a break from this guy and make them feel like putting him away in the NGR actually does work.

Afterall, Batman didn't fight the Joker every day. He had to deal with Penguin or Killer Croc or the Mad Hatter or the Riddler . . .you get the idea?A recurring villain isn't really any fun if he's your only villain. Give them a break and force them to face another foe.

Besides, it appears like they can beat this guy pretty easily, it's timefor a bigger challenge.

[Temporalmage]

Incidently, those of you talking about the bionics to suppress magic, you do realize that you are talking about chopping someone's arm off, don't you? That's pretty nasty.

The penelty for theft in some countrys is still having your hand chopped off. Here he would at least have the use of his hand/arm. Heck, you could go further if you wanted. Cut out his tongue and gouge out his eyes. Hey, at least he's alive. After awhile it's pretty moot, and much more honorable to just put a bullet in the guys head and save him the agony. I still want to know what exactly the guy has done to deserve imprisonment in the first place, and what kind of characters we're talking about that wouldn't just kill an enemy anyway.

[Sentinel]

In the post-apocalyptic world of Rifts, it is hard to imagine any punishments that we today wouldn't consider "cruel and unusual".
In the West I imagine vigilante justice runs rampant, and in the vast tracts of land between civilization, law would be virtually unheard of.
I imagine most small human communities don't even have jails per se, because they don't want violent criminals and mercenaries in their midst at all if they can help it. If violent mercs are the local law, then, well, that pretty much settles that.

[Killer Cyborg]

The knights of King Arthur had to deal with this sort of thing. They WERE the law of the land, so turning them over to the "proper authorities" wasn't exactly an option a lot of the time.
From what I remember, they basically just had 2 main options:
1. Kill the guy.
2. Let him go, but make him swear that he'll reform and that he'll go to Camelot to tell King Arthur who defeated them.

In Rifts, the options are pretty much the same.
If there's no higher authority in the area, then you ARE the law. If somebody merits the death penalty then you can execute them. If they merit anything less, you're kind of screwed... You can't exactly put them in jail.
Generally, a soft version of the Death Penalty would be stripping them of their equipment and letting them loose. Or leaving them tied up in the wilderness, although that's getting pretty close to outright killing them.
If they have harassed a town or community, you could always let the people they have wronged decide what to do with the criminal.

Then there's the "Snowcrash" solution...
In the book there were certain communities whose jails were so badly overcrowded that they had to just release minor offenders. So they did.
But they'd tattoo the person's crime onto their forehead.

[Killer Cyborg]

Oh, and if you have access to a high level Diabolist, then there are plenty of options there...

[DBX]

Toss the NPC in question into cryostasis. See if they can escape that. By the time said character wakes up everyone they know is dead and life has moved on...or the gargoyles are just thawing out tasty snacks from the fridge.

this sounds something that may work, as long as where they dump him, is kept a secret.


it isn't this NPC is popping up too much.
it is he is way more powerful than players & leaving him living means he will ****s us up in future scenarios.


we want to deal with him, without killing him, while reducing him in power, something he can't get fixed up with his "resources" & "contacts"


giving him bionics may work, but knowing how GM thinks, his will just give this NPC uber & highly advnced bionics next time we meet him,...........


is there soemthing along the lines of "Dim Mak", that acording to at least N&SS book, was virtually impossible to fix.


essentially just want to do something to NPC's without killing them, that stops the gM from making them more powerful, the next time he throws them at us.

it must be annoying for you GM's to spend days if not weeks going througgh 5ft high pile of books, to lovingly create powerful NPC's , ONLY to see players emptying bullet adfter bullet into NPC's body on the floor at their feet, until it just stops convulsing.

[Kalinda]

Or you could cut his head off

Couldn't agree more. K.I.S.S.

[Sentinel]

... I thought the point was to find an alternative to killing them.

In game, have your PCs help the NPC community actually start a police force, a judicial system, a jail. Have the PCs teach the inhabitants of this community about the concepts of fairness and justice. It wouldn't even remotely resemble our legal system today, but it would be some kind of a good start. Should be valuable role-play opportunities in that.

[Mack]

Faerie Food.

[Larsen]

Well if its in a battlefield we just unload our bullets, lasers, or other offensive weapons at the enemy with no regard for their crime. But if its in a fight in the middle of a town I tend to play characters that use barbaric justice. For instance, the last guy that took a weapon of mine I had to fight him to get it back. I knocked him out and chopped off his arm from the elbow down. Another npc kidnapped my friend, then hunted him for sport. I caught him, weakened him to the state my friend was in(my friend was a rogue scientist not the most in shape guy) then sent him out into a northern forest unarmed with the scent of meat on him in an area where bears lived to be hunted like he did to my friend. I try to make the punishment fit the crime.

[DBX]

the NPC is an evil Undead Slayer, that is what our group thinks he is, he is using tattoos, but it maybe something our GM has made up.


we had him tied up like a turkey ready for the roasting & were going to hand him over to NGR again, but the ***** was in a coma or that is what we thought. until he got up, dusted himself down & flew away, looking like a mummy wrapped in sdc chains from head to toe

should have just killed him!


is it posisble to remove the tattooes, without NPC getting any new ones.

[Larsen]

Sorry about my above post. It has absolutely nothing to do with the topic. I was very tired when I posted it. In your situation I think if you don't want to kill him you could tranq him and encase his body in cement.(he isn't dead) See if they have straight jackets that will hold him. Or the more barbaric way you could make him a quadraplegic, vegetable, burn him or chop off his limbs.

[DBX]

Sorry about my above post. It has absolutely nothing to do with the topic. I was very tired when I posted it. In your situation I think if you don't want to kill him you could tranq him and encase his body in cement.(he isn't dead) See if they have straight jackets that will hold him. Or the more barbaric way you could make him a quadraplegic, vegetable, burn him or chop off his limbs.

in our normal rp scenarios, this wouldn't be much of an issue. In those scenarios the bullets ONLY stopped flying, once the NPC's weren't moving, or the Players couldn't do anyting when they were well & truly dead.


In these scenarios we trying to actually rp good alignment characters. so we trying not to kill every NPC random encounter we come across.

all your suggestions mentioned above were taken into account, but either us players couldn't do it, or as the GM pointed out to us players, if you didn't fire point blank into his head! why would you torture him or remove his limbs.


this is limitation of being good, we couldn't leave him to run amok again, so we tried handing him over to NGR, but before we handed him over, he escaped again.

we did disarm him, BUT it is surprising how when he beat the **** out of us characters, how much **** hardware/magic items he had on him. yet a few scenarios later us players do the same to him, & he has ****** all on him.


so he is in his birthday suit wrapped up in chains (which we thought were enough to hold him!), legging it......


is it possible to skin a undead slayer, would that stop him getting any more tattoos, or will he just get his skin back due to his healing or spells or by other means

[Sentinel]

You can't skin a Tattooed man.

[Kalinda]

It sounds like your GM is kind of screwing you over using your characters alignments. being good and not killing random NPCs is one thing, killing an evil adversary that has displayed great ability in escaping from confinement is another thing entirely.

I guess it all comes down to your (and your GMs) definition of good. if all your characters are of good alignment and adverse to killing, then you're probably putting yourselfs into a situation not unlike the one the comic book character Batman is in, he will not take a life, ever. so he turns the villains he captures over to the police. being super villains, they eventually escape, forcing him to recapture them again, but not before they've wrecked havoc and in some cases killed many people. (I think at one point in the comic they mention that the Joker has killed over a thousand people over the years during his escapes.)

Now, the million credit question. is it the act of a good person to capture/lock up an evil person, knowing that there is a good chance that said evil person will escape and kill again?

If you don't kill, but allow another to kill, knowing that you could have prevented the deaths by dirtying your own hands, are you still good?

and do you have the right to be judge, jury and executioner?

heavy stuff that I'm not sure I have an answer to.

my own inclination(for my characters) is to take the burden on and end the life of the villain, knowing that I'm saving lives. if that forces an alignment shift, so be it. Innocent live come first.

[Killer Cyborg]

It sounds like your GM is kind of screwing you over using your characters alignments. being good and not killing random NPCs is one thing, killing an evil adversary that has displayed great ability in escaping from confinement is another thing entirely.

I guess it all comes down to your (and your GMs) definition of good. if all your characters are of good alignment and adverse to killing, then you're probably putting yourselfs into a situation not unlike the one the comic book character Batman is in, he will not take a life, ever. so he turns the villains he captures over to the police. being super villains, they eventually escape, forcing him to recapture them again, but not before they've wrecked havoc and in some cases killed many people. (I think at one point in the comic they mention that the Joker has killed over a thousand people over the years during his escapes.)

Now, the million credit question. is it the act of a good person to capture/lock up an evil person, knowing that there is a good chance that said evil person will escape and kill again?

Batman's situation isn't necessarily the same thing.
Batman's main problem is that he's a comic book character; that's why the villians keep getting out of prison and wreaking more havok.
When's the last time you heard about any big criminals escaping from prison in the really-real world?

If the GM runs things like a comic book, and the PCs know that he'll just let the villian escape again, then prison isn't an option and your comparison to Batman's Dilemma is a good one.
But not all GMs run things the way DC runs their universe.

[Kalinda]

It sounds like your GM is kind of screwing you over using your characters alignments. being good and not killing random NPCs is one thing, killing an evil adversary that has displayed great ability in escaping from confinement is another thing entirely.

I guess it all comes down to your (and your GMs) definition of good. if all your characters are of good alignment and adverse to killing, then you're probably putting yourselfs into a situation not unlike the one the comic book character Batman is in, he will not take a life, ever. so he turns the villains he captures over to the police. being super villains, they eventually escape, forcing him to recapture them again, but not before they've wrecked havoc and in some cases killed many people. (I think at one point in the comic they mention that the Joker has killed over a thousand people over the years during his escapes.)

Now, the million credit question. is it the act of a good person to capture/lock up an evil person, knowing that there is a good chance that said evil person will escape and kill again?

Batman's situation isn't necessarily the same thing.
Batman's main problem is that he's a comic book character; that's why the villians keep getting out of prison and wreaking more havok.
When's the last time you heard about any big criminals escaping from prison in the really-real world?

If the GM runs things like a comic book, and the PCs know that he'll just let the villian escape again, then prison isn't an option and your comparison to Batman's Dilemma is a good one.
But not all GMs run things the way DC runs their universe.

Very true, but it does seem as if DBXs GM is forcing them into a moral dilemma very similar to the one Batman faces, thats why I brought it up.

[Sentinel]

If you don't kill, but allow another to kill, knowing that you could have prevented the deaths by dirtying your own hands, are you still good?

and do you have the right to be judge, jury and executioner?

Two very good questions.
If I don't have the right to be judge, jury and executioner, then all I can do is give the villain to the proper authority. If they can't contain them, that's their inadequacy. I'm not to blame for refusing to become a law unto myself.

The question is what to do when there is no proper authority? When you have to become judge, jury and executioner becuase there isn't one.

If you choose to hold onto your principles, then I don't see the need for an alignment change. However, there could be call to check for insanities.

[Vrykolas2k]

I think about it like this: in a post-apocalyptic world, or a medieval world, modern morals have little place.
You go with the morals of the time. If you are a Principled allignment, and you see someone about to get raped, you kill the would-be rapist. It's as simple as that. If you are a paladin and you see a peasant armed with a noble weopon, you kill the peasant or at least take the weopon and punish the peasant.

[Killer Cyborg]

I highly reccomend the story "Reeve The Just," by Stephen R. Donaldson.
The title character is perfectly just, which is different from being perfectly good.

[Jefffar]

Skinning (or Flaying) is probably the worst form of torture you could inflict on the guy.

If you're in Europe, my suggestion would be to haul him to the NGR or Camelot. Both groups should be able to contain such an individual for an indefinite ammount of time.

[DBX]

Faerie Food.

another amazingly simple, yet unbelievably simple way to bring any munchkin player to his knees.


it is amazing how our groups mightiest players Say " GM, only Xy with the cosmic forge slapped on his back, thought you said this was going to be a challenging scenario"


yet when we come anywhere near a fairy, its run, run, don't eat anything, for ***** sake don't eat anything!!!!!!!!!! whether or not said player has fairy lore skill or not!

[DBX]

Kalinda"]

It sounds like your GM is kind of screwing you over using your characters alignments. being good and not killing random NPCs is one thing, killing an evil adversary that has displayed great ability in escaping from confinement is another thing entirely.

[i]i think the reason why GM's make killing some NPC's harder than others is
1. they spend a few years or so going through the library of books creating a major nPC. extremely annoying if once NPC is written up, then NPC's using dice rolls just fill it with holes in a few melees


a recurring npc, whether good or bad, just makes you feel part of the scenarios, & the scenarios you doing part of a campaign.


so an NPC escaping just before you killed him or captured him is good way of doing this. players job is to try & deal with the NPC as the character's they ar gaming would deal with it, rather than how the player would do it.


if you just kill the npc, that is what player wants their character to do, rather than what the PC will do.


in open combat, us players fill npc's with holes, the dilemma arises if you capture the NPC or if he "surrenders". for so called heroic PC's, that is when the problem arises. they know sooner or later the NCP will escape ( or at least us players know, it will come back at us even more powerful than before)


not hurting npc in cold blood is what sets them apart from the NPC

the challenge is not to take the easy option for the gamer & try to do what their character will do. Once you've decided not to remove his head, you can't then turn out & say player removes his limbs or skins him, things like that"


but you can't leave him alone, so then you start justifying killing him or amputating him, cutting him to pieces & scattering them across the world.


handing him over to authorities is limited, because generally any players facing an NPC that is starting to get powerful are on the run from so called "nations/powers/authorities" in the Rifts setting. PC's generally end up on the wrong side of any so called power, once they get into a long term campaign. PC's tend to end up wanted by anyone of note.


in a previous scenario, we handed an NPC over to the CS, he just made a deal with them, got better weapons & equipment & came after us, because we were also wanted by them.

annoying, but the scenario was fun!



dealing with eveil NPC's in a heroic way is difficult? BUT to stay on the right side of authorities in any RPG, let alone RIfst Earth for Player characters is just as difficult?

[DBX]

the most easily surviving, recurring npcs are those without defined stats.... that way you don't get to smite them at any chance, once they become stat'd your pcs will eventually surpass them and then crush him like broken toe glass

too true.

giving NPC really good "fluff!" text & then stats in official material, is the equivalent of a red rag to a bull for player characters. we get to show how hard our PC's are. so any NPC that is meant to be *** **** as hell is seen by Player group is sooner or later going to end up in a scrap, them being evil so & so's just adds credence for players to start something with them & slaughter them.


we tend not to use official NPC's, GM tends to create his own NPC's, just in case, this also negates us players using "GM/player information" from books, to take out NPC.

[Nekira Sudacne]

the most easily surviving, recurring npcs are those without defined stats.... that way you don't get to smite them at any chance, once they become stat'd your pcs will eventually surpass them and then crush him like broken toe glass

too true.

giving NPC really good "fluff!" text & then stats in official material, is the equivalent of a red rag to a bull for player characters. we get to show how hard our PC's are. so any NPC that is meant to be *** **** as hell is seen by Player group is sooner or later going to end up in a scrap, them being evil so & so's just adds credence for players to start something with them & slaughter them.


we tend not to use official NPC's, GM tends to create his own NPC's, just in case, this also negates us players using "GM/player information" from books, to take out NPC.

I loath nothing more than the "undefined invincible NPC"

[Sentinel]

I keep my NPCs advancing, so as to keep pace with the players when needs be. I don't use the NPCs provided in the books all that often, so that isn't much of an issue.
I prefer stats and completed sheets for NPCs, and as a player, one of the things I grew to hate was when a GM would make up stuff to suddenly have his/her favorite NPC suddenly be able to whip the crap out of the player party, often in a manner inconsistant with their (former) power level. Nothing more bogus then a villain who had a 30 PS this week and then has a 50 PS next week, just because the GM doesn't like to lose.

[DBX]

I keep my NPCs advancing, so as to keep pace with the players when needs be. I don't use the NPCs provided in the books all that often, so that isn't much of an issue.
I prefer stats and completed sheets for NPCs, and as a player, one of the things I grew to hate was when a GM would make up stuff to suddenly have his/her favorite NPC suddenly be able to whip the crap out of the player party, often in a manner inconsistant with their (former) power level. Nothing more bogus then a villain who had a 30 PS this week and then has a 50 PS next week, just because the GM doesn't like to lose.

i think recurring NPC's developing ( increasing in power lvls) is a good thing, as long as it makes a good storyline for the scenarios you doing. if PC's develop why not NPC's. why would NPC's remain static.

if PC's take stuff from defeated oppenents, why not NPC's? why do players complain when what they do to NPC's is done to them?

[DBX]

have you had PC's done for breaking laws or doing something evil. in your scenarios.



In our scenarios, players if they get caught ( IF!!! is the main word here) usually end up making deal with their captures, about doing something for them & getting released.


have players served any length of prison term & not been able to get out, & your campaign brought to a halt

What methods for so called breaking the law, have you used to Coerce Player group to do something. has this led to interesting scenarios or talked about campaigns.


what is the most successful method of coercing player group to do something for powerplayer NPC's in your scenarios.

[Sentinel]

Typically, PCs in my Rifts game haven't had to worry about breaking the law. More often than not, they end up fighting corrupt authority and leading rebellions, or helping to establish law and order (order first, then law). Often, Justice must be swiftly meted out from the barrel of a Wilks pistol. The whole party had actualy gotten good at enforcing fair gun duels and not interferring, although they also prevent outside interferrance.