player killing?

[Glutton]

What's the worst player killing in a single session you've done as a DM? My worst in a while was yesterday, when the munchkin iajitsu using (not in OA, nor was the PC from an Asian setting) 9th level rogue/some PrC/PALADIN thought he could charge an advanced chuul and iajitsu it. He died 2 rounds later, then the chuul killed the hill giant NPC named Zeus, and the party night hag ran away, and the chuul took Bane the elven bard prisoner and forced him into servitude for a week. He also took most of the party's equipment (roughly 60,000 gp of stuff) and went off to start his own organization in the big city Now there's a chuul with the equipment of 2 9th level PCs and pretty high ECL NPC running a business with at least 2 powerful undead (the 2 dead party members) serving him. Yikes.

The player of the dead PC rolled a wizard as his new PC. The wizard saw a bodak and died, even though its DC wasn't exactly deadly. (19, a little more than average due to Ability Focus and some extra HD; they still died in 3 hits to the munchkin fighter and BARD) 2 PC dead, same player. In the next encounter the fighter got touched by 2 spectres and almost died (due to ECL templates, has only 5 HD) BTW, in the previous game a PC managed to get killed by a (huge) zombie when the 7 party members were fighting 8 such zombies (EL 9 encounter, party level= 11 due to numbers and higher level NPCs) Maybe the players should all become devoted defenders of one another...

What about you?

 

[Wraithdrit]

Hmm, would have to say Call of Cthulu where the entire party died. But that is routine in games like Cthulu and say Paranoia. Outside of that we ran a Vampire tourney once and one of the teams I ran through it got completely wiped, felt pretty bad for them. Closer to home in 3E D&D a group I played in botched a serious encounter and the whole group got wasted except for two players... DM hit the big reset button and we did that over again because it was just BADLY played but us players.

3E D&D games that I have run... well deaths are usually sprinkled throughout and not condensed into one time frame. Ones I felt bad about were a rogue that fell down an 80 foot pit trap she missed the search on and bit it, and a couple others that don't really come to mind. Most of the PC deaths in my game come during the epic battles and are casualties of winning, and thus its the kinda thing songs are written about, etc.

Back in the 2nd edition days I did have one party go against a white dragon. It was an Epic fight to say the least. Half the party was wiped out, and the other half was near dead, but they did win in the end.

- Wraith

 

[Henry]

I've so far never killed a player. They enter my home and leave it in just as good a state of health.

Seriously, the worst has been two PC's in the same session. One was technically not killed, but he was made helpless when caught separated from the party. The other PC also went off alone, but when he put up an effective resistance, he was killed by the kidnappers. The living one showed up the next day on the party's doorstep, missing a finger as a warning not to interfere. They never did.

Past that, we've had plenty of close calls, unconsciousness, failed saves that put them in jeopardy, etc. - But no outright kills.

 

[Mathew_Freeman]

Glutton...maybe your players need to stop playing around with templates and alternate races if they want to survive...ouch...

 

[Vaxalon]

Justifiable TPK? I think so.

In one game a while back, the PC's decided to invade a hobgoblin kingdom that was ruled by a very old blue dragon. They encountered a border outpost, and smashed through, not even an attempt at stealth. When a troop of dire-wolf cavalry arrived, they kicked their butts. A fast reaction force of hobgoblin knights on half-dragon wyverns arrived from the capitol a few hours later, and while it was a rough fight, they managed to survive, and the next day they continued their invasion. Finally the dragon itself arrived, and between spells and breath weapons, killed or dominated everyone except the people who decided to run as soon as it appeared. Pretty much a TPK, but I think it was totally justifiable, because they KNEW the dragon was there before they started.

I think every DM should throw in a few encounters that are WAY out of the PC's league once in a while, and if they choose to stand and fight, so be it.

 

[Jeph]

Well, there was this one time that I locked them all in a dark room, with dripping water and a damp floor for three days. Then I baught a 12 gauge and--

Oh, character killing. Ah. Gotcha.

Hrm . . . It wasn't my fault. It was the fault of one of the players. See, I was running this Starwars game, and Curran set off a thermal detonator in the middle of the party . . . everyone but him (on account of his armor) went to negative hps, and one of them died.

My next session of that campaign is in a few days. It will be . . . interesting.

 

[Plane Sailing]

My worst that I've seen in recent experience was last Sunday - the party of ~4th level characters rode into an ambush at the start of the evenings entertainment, and within the first three rounds one PC failed his saving throws against phantasmal killer. Dead.

The player then sat around for the remaining 4 hours of the evening doing nothing.

Not much fun, instant kill spells.

 

[officeronin]

It was in a Cyberpunk campaign -- the group had just killed the mayor-elect, and was running from the group of police and corporate ops squads. They rode their motorcylces into a crowded supermarket, started firing to create a panic, with the idea to escape in the confusion that was created. While the police were worried about the panicking bystanders, the corp squads had no such reservations, and went in with grenades and "big guns". One PC hid out in the liquor section (specifying that he was drinking the hard alcohol), was spotted, and they threw an incindiary grenade at the Everclear display. Another played dead, forgetting that, although he threw away his gun, he still had the empty holster. A third was almost out, but took the time to loot the registers. The last took cover in produce, finding out the hard way that heads of lettuce will not stop 7.62 NATO machinegun bursts. It was a ghastly salad.

Two survived -- one of the PCs mugged a clerk, taking her clothes, and ran out with the crowd. Another mugged a shopper for his clothes, shot himself in the leg (twice!), and hobbled out as a wounded shopper.

OfficeRonin

 

[the Jester]

One session, six deaths. Two of the pcs died twice (and no, they weren't raised- two characters each in the same session).

It was all cause they didn't work together- when the dragon came out from behind the waterfall and demanded all their magic items, half of them started throwing their gear in the dragon's pool while a few hid and one attacked...

 

[Yeoman]

In one session? I think it was 9 deaths out an 8 man party. They lost 5 people in a crushing room trap, when they could not pick a lock to literally save their lives. And after they fled back to town, and recruited some new people. 4 more were lost in a fight with Hill Giants on the way back from town into the mountains.

Many unhappy people that night. Including me who died twice.
Oddly the next week ended in a TPK. Our luck got better after that.