The GM (Digital_Rampage) afterwards justified it in that even if we were being super-sneaky and scouting ahead to what we could see along the path, the character in full armor was clanking so loudly that someone could hear him further away than we could see when scouting.
So ... meh. My comeback could be, "Well, if he was that outrageously noisy, then we would have noticed, because WE would have heard him TOO, and we'd adjust our plan accordingly," but then I'm not sure precisely what we would have adjusted it TO. It still bugs me (so scouting simply doesn't work if anyone in the party is wearing chainmail or heavier?) but it's at least a rationale, so I guess we'll have to roll with it. It's a quiet forest. Sounds can travel a long, long distance. I know that much from experience.
I just don't know what to do (in-character) to improve the situation at that point. Of course, I'll keep investing more ranks in Stealth at each level, but that seems to have little bearing on things. Also, for the most part everyone else seems to just take whatever the GM says in stride; I don't want to establish myself as the argumentative problem-maker. (It's probably too late for that, but at least I don't want to make it worse.)
So far, despite my having a very high Sneak ability -- actually slightly better than the actual Rogue in the party at this point for some reason -- my attempts at scouting have been useless. You go, you sneak, you discover the monster ... and it sees you and attacks, and now you're in front. Thus, when the Rogue hasn't been around, the Cleric (closest we have to a "tank") has taken the lead. The closest we get to having someone sneakily scout ahead is on when the Rogue's player actually shows up mid-session.
The thing is, this is not unlike my experience when playing a Rogue ages ago in Urson's randomly-generated dungeon campaign (circa maybe 2002 or so -- before Ironclaw or the Inferno campaign). I thought I'd rolled well, but it would still never be good enough to avoid getting pasted by a trap or ambushed by monsters, to the point where eventually we gave up on having the rogue take the lead, and our tank (huh, AGAIN, a CLERIC! -- Koogrr's half-ogre character, "Large Marge") ended up taking point instead. Maybe I just have some mistaken ideas about how this is supposed to work, based on what game systems I'm used to GMing.
Or maybe it's a case of "You aren't aware of your success," where there were cases where I DID avoid something, but it's something that, because I wasn't noticed, I never got to find out about, so therefore I only notice the failures?
Just to be clear, this isn't a case of, "Oh woe! My PC is SOOOOO USELESSSSS!" I dare say that wand of healing was awfully handy. (If not for it, we most assuredly would have had a TPK, because one moment we're pretty much at full health, and then an encounter with two enemies wipes over half the party out.) There have been a few times when that humble +1 bonus from "Inspire Courage" actually made a difference between a hit and a miss for an ally. And, "Countersong" was useful to counteract a fear-inducing baying effect that was causing our "tank" (the cleric) to run away at the start of the encounter.
(Okay, so maybe in retrospect, running away wasn't such a bad idea. The GM let us know that he'd gone easy on us by leaving out a couple of special abilities the bad guy was supposed to have. To which point I told him to PLEASE stop sharing such "behind the GM screen" details, because the "meta" of it really spoils things.)
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2018-02-06 09:08 pm (UTC)So ... meh. My comeback could be, "Well, if he was that outrageously noisy, then we would have noticed, because WE would have heard him TOO, and we'd adjust our plan accordingly," but then I'm not sure precisely what we would have adjusted it TO. It still bugs me (so scouting simply doesn't work if anyone in the party is wearing chainmail or heavier?) but it's at least a rationale, so I guess we'll have to roll with it. It's a quiet forest. Sounds can travel a long, long distance. I know that much from experience.
I just don't know what to do (in-character) to improve the situation at that point. Of course, I'll keep investing more ranks in Stealth at each level, but that seems to have little bearing on things. Also, for the most part everyone else seems to just take whatever the GM says in stride; I don't want to establish myself as the argumentative problem-maker. (It's probably too late for that, but at least I don't want to make it worse.)
So far, despite my having a very high Sneak ability -- actually slightly better than the actual Rogue in the party at this point for some reason -- my attempts at scouting have been useless. You go, you sneak, you discover the monster ... and it sees you and attacks, and now you're in front. Thus, when the Rogue hasn't been around, the Cleric (closest we have to a "tank") has taken the lead. The closest we get to having someone sneakily scout ahead is on when the Rogue's player actually shows up mid-session.
The thing is, this is not unlike my experience when playing a Rogue ages ago in Urson's randomly-generated dungeon campaign (circa maybe 2002 or so -- before Ironclaw or the Inferno campaign). I thought I'd rolled well, but it would still never be good enough to avoid getting pasted by a trap or ambushed by monsters, to the point where eventually we gave up on having the rogue take the lead, and our tank (huh, AGAIN, a CLERIC! -- Koogrr's half-ogre character, "Large Marge") ended up taking point instead. Maybe I just have some mistaken ideas about how this is supposed to work, based on what game systems I'm used to GMing.
Or maybe it's a case of "You aren't aware of your success," where there were cases where I DID avoid something, but it's something that, because I wasn't noticed, I never got to find out about, so therefore I only notice the failures?
Just to be clear, this isn't a case of, "Oh woe! My PC is SOOOOO USELESSSSS!" I dare say that wand of healing was awfully handy. (If not for it, we most assuredly would have had a TPK, because one moment we're pretty much at full health, and then an encounter with two enemies wipes over half the party out.) There have been a few times when that humble +1 bonus from "Inspire Courage" actually made a difference between a hit and a miss for an ally. And, "Countersong" was useful to counteract a fear-inducing baying effect that was causing our "tank" (the cleric) to run away at the start of the encounter.
(Okay, so maybe in retrospect, running away wasn't such a bad idea. The GM let us know that he'd gone easy on us by leaving out a couple of special abilities the bad guy was supposed to have. To which point I told him to PLEASE stop sharing such "behind the GM screen" details, because the "meta" of it really spoils things.)