How to prevent the PC's from succeeding without seeming cheap

[ferratus]

Here is the scenario. I want to retool my campaign setting to be more "points of light" by shattering my human-dominated world in a magical cataclysm. Basically, a powerful lich whose people were dominant in the planet's last ice age wants to trigger a massive epic spell that not only causes a super-caldera to erupt, but shatters the main continent into several pieces. This in turn causes a fimbrulwinter which causes the ocean levels to drop and reveals ancient cities on the ocean floor.

I would like the players to be there for ground zero to fight the fire giant runecasters and get fleeting glimpses of the main villain, but I don't want them to succeed at stopping the ritual. I'm generally fine with the PC's upsetting or defusing my plots, but if they were to succeed I would have to blow up the world later off-screen. My PC's have been in this campaign world for awhile, so I want them to be there for the changes, rather than having to explain everything upfront in the next campaign.

So how do I make the villain's success an organic part of the adventure, rather than a frustrating railroad event that is forced upon the PC's?

[Woas]

Couple things come to mind.

First, physical space. Player Characters are very deadly within a 100 yard radius. What with ease of teleportation and other quick movement spells, if the characters are given the ability to just 'waltz' right up to the fire giant in charge of the ritual then they have the ability to bring their full arsenal to bear.

So make sure there is plenty of physical space to separate the characters and target, with plenty of speed bumps.

Second, break the scenario up into tangible objectives, and make enough of them that it is nigh impossible for the characters to deal with them all. Don't put all your plot-eggs in one basket.
Furthermore, write down some levels of severity of the cataclysm based on what objectives are allowed to be completed. The characters can choose what goals they want to tackle, giving them the chance to alter the eventually outcome and you can figure out just how the cataclysm works afterwards.

[Kingreaper]

What do you want them to succeed at while they're there?

Maybe there's more than one planned point of eruption. The lich, who they can't hope to stop, is in charge of the main one, but a small group of runecasters is trying to cause one in the PCs home area.
If they stop them, then their families, friends etc. will only have to deal with the fallout of the other eruptions, NOT get blown straight into the sky.

If you make it so that they're making the choice to do the possible and honorable thing (save their home) rather than the impossible, and kinda callous, thing (save much of the rest of the world, but leave their homeland to die) then they have control.

If they choose to try the impossibl, knowing it's impossible? Give them a chance. Even if they succeed at stopping the main eruption, the rest of the plan goes off, and while the world doesn't change quite as much, their homeland is gone.

If they try and stop all 7 (it's a nice number) points of eruption? They're gonna have to get crits every roll. And have the enemies fumble every roll.
If that actually happens, then it, it's epic enough to be worth derailing your planned campaign isn't it?

[Khur]

One thing that worked in a campaign I ran is this: Play against normal player/PC expectations and responses.

I had a similar situation where the bad guys were using a ritual bringing back an epic villain from death and a planar prison for his soul. I made the ritualist's death by external forces integral to the ritual. The ritualist's didn't mind dying, because they knew their lord could and would bring them back if he returned.

The PCs burst into the ritual chamber and proceeded to bust heads. The wizard and cleric, who could sense the gathering eldritch energy, began to get the idea that all the killing was a bad idea, but they vocalized their reservations a little too late. When the sorceress running the show finally died, the gate opened and the epic bad guy came through in a weakened state. Rather than destroy the PCs, he mocked them in a fashion by offering each one a boon for helping to release him. Then he retreated to his distant, ruined fortress to gather strength and prepare his forces.

I had all I wanted: the epic villain in the world again, creeped-out players, and a fine bit of foreshadowing. The players didn't feel robbed; they felt like they should have seen it coming and like they could have stopped it had they been more careful. The PCs will eventually face the ritualists they killed again, this time as mighty servants of the evil one.

[Asmor]

Sounds like a job for the Xanatos Gambit.

Don't worry about the players stopping the ritual... Make them unwittingly instrumental in its completion!

For example, the lich in disguise, or one of his henchmen, might clue the PCs in to the ritual and that it's being performed with an artifact called the Seed of Flame. After some research, they discover that the seed can only be destroyed using the equally-powerful Baelrime Hammer hidden in the Tomb of the Frost Angel.

They race for the hammer, get it just in the nick of time, jet off to the ritual, and shatter the seed with the hammer. Then they hear some mad cackling, turn around to see the person who'd told them about it in the first place as he drops the illusion and reveals that he was the lich and the hammer was inaccessible to him in the tomb because of the powerful wards against evil and undead.

[wedgeski]

Player buy-in.

In other words, tell 'em.

"Guys, I'm setting the stage for the next iteration of the campaign world. Please don't expect to be able to prevent this, but I'd rather do it with your PC's right in the thick of things than off-stage during a campaign intro that will mean little more to you than the paper it's written on.

"However, do not dismay! Your actions during the scheduled apocalypse will directly determine one way or another whether <important location> is destroyed or survives to become a bastion of hope during the dark days ahead (and therefore the future or imminent demise of thousands of lives).

"Who knows what impact your efforts will have on the plans of the villain... or how your heroic actions might draw his future wrath upon you?"

You might be surprised, but only you know your players enough to answer this.

[Barastrondo]

Originally Posted by ferratus

So how do I make the villain's success an organic part of the adventure, rather than a frustrating railroad event that is forced upon the PC's?

As others have noted, the best way is to make it hinge somehow on either their choices or a legitimate failure. By "legitimate," mind, I mean that they actually fail where they had a chance to succeed; if they had no chance to succeed, or if their success only delays the failure until a time that they can't do anything about it, then they didn't fail under their own power. Success was denied by a greater power, effectively you. And that's going to feel like a railroad.

I would be wary of the so-called "Xanatos Gambit," myself. If you include something like that, you have to play fair like Khur did and give them a chance to figure out that they're doing the wrong thing. It may be only a tiny clue that doesn't look like a clue here and there, but the players should have a fair shake at figuring out they're being manipulated. Note that I say "fair," not "easy" — it can be tricky, and rigged so that the players have to be cunning and lucky to figure it out.

I don't know if you can properly answer this question if you don't also ask "What do the players like about my campaign as it is right now?" Give them a chance to preserve some of that. Don't end the session when the ritual goes off, let them keep playing as the aftershocks play out and start to change some of the ritual's effects. If they love Country X or Patch of Wilderness Y, let them divert ritual power or throw up counter-rituals to protect those places. Maybe they can save swaths of the land by throwing them temporarily into other planes, creating further adventures to restore them or the like. Let them fight for their favorite things about the campaign as it is — if all their favorite things about it are taken away, after all, it might affect buy-in to the new post-apocalyptic campaign.

[Mathew_Freeman]

Think of it like a skill challenge.

What I mean is, work out a scale of outcomes from "utter disaster" (eg the ritual goes perfectly, nearly everything is destroyed, etc) all the way to "almost victory" (eg the ritual goes ahead but imperfectly, and so areas of the world are saved). Then work out how the PC's can move along the scale.

Possible outcomes include saving their home village/town or possibly even unexpectedly saving the home base of another long term campaign villain (setting up a nice opportunity for said campaign villain to Owe The A Favour).

[roguerouge]

Sorry, man, but you'd never get me on board with a no-win scenario. And if I was told after the fact that I couldn't succeed, that would cause me to seriously consider leaving the table or asking someone else to DM. Lack of meaningful choices is not fun. Players are not sock puppets and you're moving dangerously close to treating them as such, in my opinion.

If you absolutely, positively have to go with this scenario, use alternate worlds. If the players disrupt the ritual here, it has a catastrophic effect on Earth 2. If they don't disrupt it, Earth 2 is fine, but Earth 1 is messed up. Saving the world but feeling guilty about it might be better.

[Lord Pendragon]

I suggest reworking the encounter so that the PCs are:

a) able to positively effect the event
b) able to make choices that have real impact on the event
c) working towards a potential success, not a guaranteed failure.

In this scenario, make it 3 liches, instead of 1. When the PCs arrive on the scene, they find three massive ziggurats arranged in a triangle. Atop each ziggurat is a lich performing an arcane ritual. Guarding each ziggurat are a swarm of various underlings.

From each lich's ritual, a bolt of black lightning stretches off into the distance, in the direction of three different locations (perhaps important cities, PC hometowns, etc.)

Make it clear to the PCs that it will be impossible for them to get to the top of any of the ziggurats if they try and split up (should that enter their minds. If they don't think of it, no need to bring it up.)

So the PCs must choose which ziggurat to ascend first. Make that the bulk of the encounter, with the lich as a defeatable boss.

Shortly after the first lich is down and the PCs are racing to ziggurat #2, blow up the world. But allow whichever portion of the world that was being targetted by the fallen lich to be less-devastated than the other areas.

This gives the PCs an encounter that they can win, real consequences for their choices, while still blowing up the world.

[ferratus]

This was some really good advice, so I think I've got some outlines.

First, I'll turn to my resident Xanatos, the formorian giant Onagar Granitebones who is the patron of my Warlock player. The party doesn't trust him, but they have gotten used to doing his bidding because he rewards them well. They also know that he is intelligent, greedy and sadistic. I had already planned to have Onagar make a secret alliance with the Lich Queen Vlaakith for the purposes of getting a share of loot and slaves in the war, so this stretches my use of him.

I'll get Onagar to tell the PC's that a powerful weapon exists in a stronghold belonging to Vlaakith, an apocolypse stone. Time is of the essence, because this abyssal shard will unleash a storm of elemental chaos which will shatter the world and dissolve it back into elemental chaos. The only way to destroy it will be to toss into the super-caldera, which is a gate to the elemental chaos. There the crystalized power of the elemental chaos will dissolve harmlessly into the infinite energy of the plane from which it came, like a sugarcube in water.

The volcano-gate will be guarded by devil-worshipping fire giants (I already have a module in Dragon for that!) that given the Githyanki's fondness for infernal pacts and infernal servants would seem to be in league with the Githyanki. They aren't, they are just loyal to Mephistopholes, who is opposing the plans of Asmodeus out of spite.

The PC's defeat the giants and drop the apocolypse stone into the volcano gate, causing first a massive earthquake, and then a massive eruption, and then causes new fault lines to radiate out from it, turning one continent-spanning techtonic plate into several.

The Githyanki incursion will take the opportunity to strike with renewed vigour, while the nations struggle to survive the fimbrulwinter and find food. The PC's will be both instrumental in helping to fight off the Githyanki offensive and choosing various parts of the campaign world to save. They will also have a bone to pick with Onagar, who played them for patsies and is currently looting their home city (his reward from the lich queen).

Meanwhile, the Lich Queen waits for the polar ice caps to grow and reveal the lost city beneath the ocean waves. There a living god king was murdered by his most trusted and powerful servant Asmodeus. She will enter his tomb to retrieve the key to unlocking his power.

Now, this assumes that the PC's will throw the apocolypse stone into the volcano, so I'll resort to a bit of a cheat. The apocolypse stone is only one way to trigger the caldera. A fire titan will lair beneath surface of the volcano's magma, and will be angered if the players attempt to remove the apocolypse stone from its resting place. When they defeat him, the death throes of the titan's body will serve as the catalyst for the eruption of the volcano. The apocolypse stone will be revealed to be a very expensive and powerful magical item but was never really dangerous at all. That will be their reward for getting it right.

[Kingreaper]

Originally Posted by roguerouge

Sorry, man, but you'd never get me on board with a no-win scenario. And if I was told after the fact that I couldn't succeed, that would cause me to seriously consider leaving the table or asking someone else to DM. Lack of meaningful choices is not fun. Players are not sock puppets and you're moving dangerously close to treating them as such, in my opinion.

If you absolutely, positively have to go with this scenario, use alternate worlds. If the players disrupt the ritual here, it has a catastrophic effect on Earth 2. If they don't disrupt it, Earth 2 is fine, but Earth 1 is messed up. Saving the world but feeling guilty about it might be better.

It doesn't have to be no win, if it's done right.

If they save their home base, when it would otherwise be destroyed; that's a win.

If they make it so the ritual remakes the world, but the lich's people cannot return to conquer; that's a win.

If they make it so that the Lich must sacrifice himself for the ritual to reach completion; that's a win.

Just because it's not an all-win, doesn't mean it's no-win.

But it's very important to make sure that some things can be won, and that these are things the players care about.


Definitely avoid the Xanatos Gambit. "Good job breaking it hero" is one of the worst endings. And it's very frustrating and railroady, unless done really well.


EDIT: I see you have a Xanatos in place. I also see that you're planning on using quantum railroading.
I like quantum railroading for things like minor encounters, getting new quests etc. but when it's the fate of the world at stake?
"You thought destroying the gem was a good idea; you destroyed the world"
"You decided to steal the gem; you destroyed the world"
What if they don't take the gem? Is it going to be:
"You didn't destroy that gem; the world has been destroyed"?
Because if not, the only way they can avoid being dupes, and counterproductive, is to ruin your story.

[ferratus]

Originally Posted by roguerouge

Sorry, man, but you'd never get me on board with a no-win scenario. And if I was told after the fact that I couldn't succeed, that would cause me to seriously consider leaving the table or asking someone else to DM. Lack of meaningful choices is not fun. Players are not sock puppets and you're moving dangerously close to treating them as such, in my opinion.

Well, I guess the real way to win is to not follow the quest hook and continue the war. The Lich Queen has to send her own forces to retrieve the artifact, and that allows the PC's to destroy the main floating city-citadel floating above the world and permanently halt the invasion. The resulting cataclysm will then be viewed as a revenge strike, salting the earth as it were so the victors cannot enjoy their victory.

But I get what you are saying here. I don't want to railroad the PC's, hence the purpose of this thread. But if I blow up the world after this campaign, I feel I'm just spitting on their accomplishments anyway by making them irrelevant (the world doesn't stay saved). Nor do I want to start from scratch with a new campaign world to make it more to my liking, because I like the history, cultures, and cosmology I've developed for this world thus far. This way they are up against a no-win scenario in the short term, but they can mitigate the damage and have their final revenge against the perpetrator.

If you absolutely, positively have to go with this scenario, use alternate worlds. If the players disrupt the ritual here, it has a catastrophic effect on Earth 2. If they don't disrupt it, Earth 2 is fine, but Earth 1 is messed up. Saving the world but feeling guilty about it might be better.

See this, and the suggestions of multiple sites to do the same ritual, seems to make the players feel more helpless than what I'm doing. The players will pretty much know that they could not save both worlds or prevent all sites, so it just seems like an irrelevant victory. However, choosing the best of 3 bad options I think is a legitimate way to receive some sense of victory while allowing for villain success.

[ferratus]

Originally Posted by Kingreaper

Because if not, the only way they can avoid being dupes, and counterproductive, is to ruin your story.

Well I figure the three options will be:

a) You saw through Onagar's deception and defeated the Lich Queen, but it was a heavy cost to ignore the artifact.

b) You realized the deception at the last minute, so you get a nifty artifact, but you fell for the the Lich Queen's backup plan.

c) You were saps and followed Onagar's instructions to the letter, so you made a real mess of things.

[Kingreaper]

You think that the PCs destroying the world is more of a win than the PCs saving a part of the world?

[Vorput]

Building on what other have said, just decide now that the cataclysm is going to happen. You're allowed to do that- you're the DM and it makes a good story.

But make the PCs feel like they've saved something. Go with the 7 seals thing, or something similar. The players know from the outset they have to shut down these seven seals in a set amount of time- they also know it'll be next to impossible. But they try anyway and manage to close 3, or 4, or even 5- the resulting cataclysm is just then just presented as less than it was going to be.

It's still what you were planning it to be- everything you said in your original post still happens (and will happen either way), but you milk the angle of what could have happened. The PCs comfort themselves by saying 'at least we closed 4 seals'. If they hadn't closed those 4, the entire world would have been completely destroyed- even though things were bad, at least life goes on- albeit differently.

They're heralded as heroes not because they stopped it from happening completely, but because they managed to lessen its effects.

[ferratus]

Originally Posted by Kingreaper

You think that the PCs destroying the world is more of a win than the PCs saving a part of the world?

No, I don't think that's what I said. The world being blown up is pretty much a forgone conclusion, because the Lich Queen has pretty much crafted a no-win scenerio.

However, their best chance for saving a large part of the world is to continue the war, rather than listening to the treacherous Onagar and going chasing after the artifact.

[Bumbles]

Originally Posted by ferratus

So how do I make the villain's success an organic part of the adventure, rather than a frustrating railroad event that is forced upon the PC's?

Pull an Ozymandias.

Do it? Dan, I'm not a Republic serial villain. Do you seriously think I'd explain my master-stroke if there remained the slightest chance of you affecting its outcome? I did it thirty-five minutes ago.

If you really want, give them one last chance to drop a bomb on the bad guy.

[jbear]

To add to the 'playing on player expentancy' comments above, I had a situation with a ritual in my present game.

The PC's were trying to stop a Drider creation ritual. It was a skill challenge during a battle. All the enemies were young Drow children (Reskinned minions). The altar was a fairly elaborate puzzle that prevented the PC's easy access to the top of the altar where they could free the Drow woman who was to be transformed.

Little did the PC's know that the Boss and all the tough hench men had been deliberately distracted and called away by the same mysterious forces who had caused their group's involvement in the first place. The children were actually stopping the ritual until the boss returned. As each child fell beneath their swords the dark cloud swirling above the chained woman became more real and more spiderlike.

Wrongly, they believed time was running out and redoubled their efforts to slay the children in order to stop the ritual. As the last child died they unwittingly unchained the summoning ritual that they had hoped to stop, which they quickly realised as the woman began to scream in excruciating agony.

The puzzle hadn't been completely unravled at that stage and as the woman began to die screaming above them beyond their reach, a very enjoyable and exciting tension was created and it became a real race against the clock despite their victory.

I didn't have any world shattering plot lines hinged on the ritual succeeding and in the end the PC's were able to free the Drow and flee. But them unchaining it could be enough and then the disastrous effects are instantaneous.

I did however give clues to what was going on as they got closer and closer to putting their foot in it. They payed no heed... your PC's might be a bit more switched on than mine (all very new to RPG that seem to blunder into every trap time after time).

Maybe they can't stop the ritual but they can achieve success by taking something from the bad guy that will give tham a distinct advantage in the future or disrupting it in some way, lets say, creating a stitch in time that buys them a few years to foil his plot before the ritual ever takes place.

I guess situations like this are why I prefer to have things lightly sketched out in my head based on the variety of ways that I imagine things might feasibly go. Until I know for sure where things have gone I don't fill things out. That way I haven't invested hours and hours on a story line that never was.

As one of these lightly sketched out options, build in some way the PC's can be successful (without necessarily destroying the villain, and maybe only delaying the inevitable... unless they complete some other heroic adventure in the mean time) into the encounter/story. And I guess, be prepared if the PC's come up with a different way of being successful that you weren't prepared for just in case... the villain can always have an escape route prepared even for the most improbable event of something getting in the way (turning insubstantial or teleporting away to fight another day)...

[Qwillion]

There are a large# of good suggestions here, the best being to make it a Xanatos Gambit, and using the player's ability to overcome all obstacles to be what causes everything to go wrong.

I have done this myself and had it work out quite well.

If you don't think you can dupe you player honestly than give them a bad vs worse option. The idea being that you have two potential outcomes World wide destruction Vs. Utter Annialation. The players can still have a victory and you still get the dramatic change to your game world.