Too many TPKs?

[Desdichado]

It's great that most folks are cautious before passing judgement. I have a pretty decisive filter. So to me, hearing there's 5 TPKs with this GM makes me think there's a problem.

As well they should; a lot of folks like a tough game, and a tough game always has the potential for a TPK or effective TPK. Heck, we just had an effective TPK in the game we're playing; not literally every character was killed, but only one or two survived--barely--and we now need to effectively rebuild the group from scratch. We've had that happen a few times in various campaigns, although it's still rare. And we tend to enjoy it.

Curiously, in our case, the GM didn't really mean to do so. He runs Paizo modules, and he complains bitterly about how poorly they're balanced and how they clearly favor the really tough, ultra-tactician mindset, which our group does not subscribe to. And he believes that they purposefully undersell the difficulty of their encounters. He's not the only one in the group that thinks so, although I reserve judgement until I actually try to run a Paizo module myself. He's also clearly, obviously, and admittedly fudged things on occasion to avoid a TPK or effective TPK.

And it's also not the player's desire to go into TPK territory, really, either.

players who like TPKs or games that encourage them are edge cases (there are more sessions of TPK avoiding players than TPK-as-goal game designs being played).

Yeah, but we're not really talking about encouraging them. We're talking about tolerating them. I don't believe that's as much of an edge case as you make it out to be. In our case, over the course of several campaigns and several years, we've probably had at least five TPKs, near TPKs (effective TPKs from the point of view of most of the party) and fudged "shoulda-been" TPKs from this one GM. I certainly don't believe that we are a group of "stupid" players (although I guess, how would you know?) Why do we tolerate it, then?

In part, because we're all a bunch of friends who have fun just getting together no matter what we do. In part, because that particular GM, who's the most common one to run for our group, delivers on a lot of other aspects of the game, including making a lot of really fun roleplaying and character development opportunities. Partly, also, because he tends to run iconic adventure paths, and we think it's kinda fun to run through the "shared experience" of a really popular and widely played path, like Shackled City, Age of Worms, or Rise of the Runelords currently. But mostly, because we accept that a consequence of the way we like to build characters, and the way we like to play the game, there's always a risk of character death, and even TPK. We don't see it as a colossal failure on the part of the players or the GM any moreso than rolling a natural 1 on a skill check or attack roll would be. It happens from time to time. It's the risk you take. It's just part of the game.

Whether it's the GM or the player's fault? I'm inclined to think it's the GM's fault by that point, Something doesn't jive with players being that stupid. I can't imagine a GM putting up with such dumb players to make it to 3 TPKs.

Though I supposed it's equally odd that good players would put up with a crappy DM for 5 TPKs.

You take a really black and white binary approach to this question, in my opinion. I know that in the case of our group, a lot of the players (and the GM) blame the module writing at Paizo for the TPKs and near-TPKs we've had. Personally, I don't subscribe to that point of view, as in my opinion, of course adapting the module to the group is a key and core skill that a good GM should develop and cultivate, and if he can't or won't, that's his failing, not that of the writers of the module. But like I said, it doesn't have to be the show-stopper that you assume it is. We tend to laugh, roll up new characters and start again from some other entry point into the game with new characters. Our game is still fun, even with TPKs, near TPKs, high death count and turnover, and whatnot. Your assumption that it's not fun, or that only edge case groups would tolerate that kind of scenario is, in my opinion, not correct.

In the original story, it appears the fault is 2 stupid players causing the TPKs. I suppose that seems plausible. They could seem like decent folks, but somehow they drag the party down.

Where is this original story? I feel somehow like I'm missing half of this conversation, but I don't remember seeing a link in the original post.

 

[ExploderWizard]

But I have a question. Do you have any ideas to not end the group or campaing IC a TPK happens?

Like the enemies can make characters prisioner, could be a dream, could travel back in time, etc. More ideas?

IME players are more likely to accept capture if it makes sense. As long as the TPK happened against intelligent opponents who might see the value of captives then it becomes plausable and thus more acceptable.

A TPK against a hungry beast that would likely eat its kills,.. well then the party should just go through thier own pockets and look for loose change.

 

[Nagol]

<snip

Where is this original story? I feel somehow like I'm missing half of this conversation, but I don't remember seeing a link in the original post.

Here's a link to the original thread: http://www.enworld.org/forum/general-rpg-discussion/313459-dm-intervention.html

There's at least one additional post later on by the OP which describes the player dynamic in more detail.

 

[DonTadow]

I originated the original thread.

Objectively, taking myself out of this guy being a good friend and I know a good DM.

I love being a DM, so I always fault the DM if things are like this. It's a craft, its something i teach, something I really appreciate as a craft.

1 or 2 TPKs every 6 months to a year is acceptable, but literally 3 in the first 8 sessions and 2 more since is a problem with the DM not scaling the module (which is built for 6 players). Heck, your'e spending about as much time making characters and building the party than playing the game. I remember the 1st session, my wife came home and was upset that they TPK'd to a bunch of goblins. She explained the encounter. I have the shackled city book. I looked it up. It was scaled for a party of 6 with a strong healer. My wife ran that encounter a few years ago, we had 2 party unconscious (1 was me, a shifter healer) in a party of 6.

I want to blame the module, but this is the 2nd campaign in the 12 sessions. The 1st was Shackled City, this is Jade Regent. (they gave up on shackled city as it was deemed too tough).

Of course, this is, if TPKs are a problem, as most of us believe and are suggesting.

I am starting to think that, in this situation, the rest of the party do not care. The DM has 3 players now. My wife and another have dropped. The other 3 players, although 2 complain, seem to enjoy themselves while they are there. I am privy to their email conversations and they are having a blast coming up with another team design (all clerics this time). As one poster said, I think the players that don't enjoy it are going to leave, but those who stay, in this situation, love making characters.

When I think back on the campaigns I have run, both of the two eccentric players I described have died more than any other player in any of my campaigns. When I think about the 3 one shots I have played under the TPK DM, I know that he's pretty rigid and has a very adversarial style of Dming. In every one shot we were given backgrounds that made us enemies or distrustful of the other.

Thus, as it pertains to the original situation. This is what they call a perfect storm. A very difficult module, a DM who doesn't discourage party dissension and two players who havn't figured out how to make cohesive characters with each other in 5 years.

 

[DonTadow]

Well, first I'd make the caveat that a TPK isn't necessarily something bad, and the fact that a campaign has had them doesn't necessarily mean that the player's aren't having fun. Again, as you say, more info needed first.

But assuming that it is bad and the player's don't want to end up in TPK situations, I'd agree with you.

I agree, every couple months I am going to throw an slightly overpowered encounter at a group. But when I do that, I am ready with alternatives to making a new character. It might be capture, it might be opening a new adventure thread, it may be that the PCs absolutely failed, 2 random characters are killed and the PCs have to now deal with the consequences of their failure..

 

[GSHamster]

In the absence of any clarifying information, I would expect that the GM is at fault.

This is because I make the assumption that the players are working together and not actively sabotaging each other. They may not be effective, because of lack of skill or familiarity with the game/rules/each other, but they are "trying".

In that case, it's the DM's responsibility to match the challenge to the players. Multiple TPKs would indicate that the DM is pitching the challenge too hard.

Basically, in my mind, two scenarios would result in excessive TPKs:

Scenario A: Players work together, DM tunes slightly too hard
Scenario B: Players sabotage each other, DM cannot predict effectiveness to tune properly

I believe Scenario A is more probable (maybe 75% to 25%). However, DonTadow's further explanation shows that his situation is Scenario B.

 

[Desdichado]

This is because I make the assumption that the players are working together and not actively sabotaging each other. They may not be effective, because of lack of skill or familiarity with the game/rules/each other, but they are "trying".

Or they simply don't care to work together, because they don't value the tactical miniatures minigame buried within their roleplaying game.

Too many times gamers, especially if they primarily (or only) play D&D or D&D derivatives, seem to be implying that if they don't care about the tactical minigame, that the players are "doing it wrong" or are "bad players" or unskilled players or something.

One interesting thing about our group is that we know we are playing often very suboptimized characters, who use suboptimal tactics (to say the least) but we very steadfastly refuse to do anything else. Because if we're not playing characters that are interesting to us, then there's no point in playing at all. "Winning" at D&D with characters who bore you and you don't care about is no fun for me or my group.

 

[GSHamster]

Or they simply don't care to work together, because they don't value the tactical miniatures minigame buried within their roleplaying game.

Too many times gamers, especially if they primarily (or only) play D&D or D&D derivatives, seem to be implying that if they don't care about the tactical minigame, that the players are "doing it wrong" or are "bad players" or unskilled players or something.

One interesting thing about our group is that we know we are playing often very suboptimized characters, who use suboptimal tactics (to say the least) but we very steadfastly refuse to do anything else. Because if we're not playing characters that are interesting to us, then there's no point in playing at all. "Winning" at D&D with characters who bore you and you don't care about is no fun for me or my group.

Playing suboptimally is not the same as sabotage. But I don't think it's unreasonable for a DM to assume that the fighter will attack the monsters, or the cleric will heal, or the wizard will cast spells.

If your group insists on not even doing that much, then I don't see how it's possible for the DM to avoid TPKs and still offer challenging combat.

Like, if you play a wizard who prefers casting illusions, the DM can take that into account when creating an encounter. But if you play a wizard who randomly choses to not cast any spells in a given encounter, then an encounter the DM thought was well balanced will end up in a TPK.

 

[nedjer]

Players could consider running away more often.

 

[saskganesh]

ha. it seems like the 3 remaining players are having fun. (keep in mind it's not their only game...)


so, who are we to judge?