You Make The Call
2007 November 6
Gorlag, a 3rd level barbarian, is accustomed to being in the wilderness and chopping up evil things with his battleaxe. Having performed heroic deeds with a party of adventurers, he has been invited by a local Countess to receive an award for bravery at her house in the city.
A half hour before the event, Gorlag got a fierce case of dry mouth, and drained his waterskin. By the time the awards ceremony rolled around, Gorlag’s mighty bladder threatened to explode.
Choose Gorlag’s Destiny
In order not to piss himself in front of his friends and the local nobility, does Gorlag have to make:
- a Fort Save, relying solely on his bodily strength and constitution to save his social reputation (and trousers), OR
- a Will save, proving once and for all the concept of mind over bladder?
YOU MAKE THE CALL!
It really rather depends on what you want to happen. The fortitude save, which, if you’ll pardon the expression, he’ll probably piss over, would stop his bladder from involuntarily emptying itself. However, I would use the will save to determine whether he is able to stand in place for the ceremony for long enough or if his bladder nags him enough to make him hide behind the nearest piece of furniture and relieve himself.
Personally, I would go with the will save, and risk having the character leave a steaming pool on an antique carpet.
A Will save. It’s funnier if he pees.
But seeing as how his urination is a biological inevitibility, give the Player some on-the-spot rules to play with:
The DC to not pee this round is 15. For every point over 15 you roll, you can hold it for another turn.
After your number of “saved rounds” expires, the PC can either pee or roll again.
Bonuses can be given for good roleplaying. The GM is encouraged to have the host make multiple toasts. 😉
Will save!
Fort save… and the endurance feat should help somehow!
@tom: “A Will save. It’s funnier if he pees.” — way to distill exactly what I wanted out of this thread. 🙂
I’ve been doing some thinking — I’m missing a few modifiers here. Suppose Gorlag had been drinking alcohol all night, and there is a line at the outhouse. If he has broken the seal, I propose a -4 penalty to his roll.
Hold it. Hold it! Hold it!!!!!
Fort Save!
You could always do a combination of Dex and Fort Saves to start and stop the stream, along with a Bluff check to try to convince the King he’s some sort of wonderful water sculpture.
successively more difficult DC fort saves
followed inevitably by either a disguise, hide, run, escape artist to flee
OR
a bluff, intimidate or straight CHA check to make his friends believe that all the cool barbarians are pissing themselves.
I’d say will, just because if you don’t, Garglag will go into a rage for the +2 bonus on fort, then again, that could be hilarious.
If you’d rather have some sway of realism over the control of your PCs actions, go with a Will save. Needing to pee badly is torture, and if you fail the Will save, you give in and must find a place to go. That would not necessarily result in peeing yourself however.
On the other hand, if you allow the Player to control his own PC’s actions completely when not under the effects of an extraordinary, supernatural, or spell-like ability, then when the Player says hold it in, his character attempts to hold it in. Succeeding in holding it in, however, would be a Fortitude save.
Personally, I’d have him make the save either Fort or Will depending on which is lower — All the willpower in the world won’t help if you don’t have the endurance, and mind-over-matter is only as good as the matter you’re minding.
Though I also wouldn’t have him explictly piss himself, per se (unless he failed spectacularly). I’d have it so he’d both have to immediately seek a solution (the easiest one and quickest) such as maybe (if at a table) taking his chalice and “letting go” into it under the table. Then let that come back to bite him in some way.
A success would probably last the whole scene in my mind. Especially if he had Endurance and/or Iron Will. Hell, both of those and I probably wouldn’t make him roll.