D&D General Doing Tragedy in D&D

[NN]

Nah. No dooming flaw, just sacrifice.

 

[soviet]

I wouldn't say so. The character succeeded in his goals. Granted he sacrificed himself to do so, but, he did succeed. Had he tried, failed AND became evil, THAT would be a tragedy to me.

Macbeth wasn't a tragedy because he succeeded in becoming the king?

 

[The Soloist]

I wouldn't say so. The character succeeded in his goals. Granted he sacrificed himself to do so, but, he did succeed. Had he tried, failed AND became evil, THAT would be a tragedy to me.

Interesting. I always viewed him, in retrospect, as a hopeful hero who became a tragic anti-hero. He lost his friends (other party members), his status in the elven community and his identity to save them. In the end, he hated what he had become so much and refused to go back to the surface. He felt broken.

Oxford, Tragedy Definition: a play dealing with tragic events and having an unhappy ending, especially one concerning the downfall of the main character.

 

[The Soloist]

It would be a tragedy if he also hated being drowish .

In the end, he hated what he had become so much and refused to go back to the surface. He felt broken.

 

[Hussar]

Macbeth wasn't a tragedy because he succeeded in becoming the king?

Becoming king was never MacBeth's goal. Exposing Polonius and getting revenge was his goal. And that pursuit of that goal results in the death of everyone and everything he loves, including himself.

Becoming the king?

Something is a tragedy when it's sad. But, we're talking about Tragedy the literary genre, so, whipping out an Oxford dictionary isn't going to actually help you here.

 

[TaranTheWanderer]

I have one.

The PCs start the campaign in their home village at an annual festival where assassins poison the well and half the town dies. The PCs vow to avenge the town.

As the campaign advances, we find out the assassins poisoned the well as part of a prophecy to summon a dark god and bring about the end of civilization.

The PCs refocus their mission to prevent the prophesy. The act of finding the murderers and trying to avert the disaster, fulfills all the parts of the prophecy. We end the campaign in failure and the dark god arises.

Our tragic flaw was vengeance and pride. Vengeance being the main portfolio of the Dark god that is summoned.

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Edit: the fate of the PCs was fitting after we played the same game but 100 years in the future:

The wizard, who had joined an evil wizard conclave (as a sacrifice to stop the end of the world) found himself magically imprisoned by the conclave that promised him power.

The Ranger, whose charming social tendencies played a part in several parts of the prophesy, who had been turned from human into an elf, (and who was the one who tried to prevent everyone from doing evil for the ‘greater good’), was an expert hunter and tracker, fled in shame and wandered a desert, living as a hermit for 100years.

The fighter, who was the toughest and strongest of us all and was reputed as being ‘unkillable’ was killed in the final battle. His soul became the property of a powerful demon.

 

[Hussar]

In the end, he hated what he had become so much and refused to go back to the surface. He felt broken.

Oh, I get that it's a sad ending. Totally get that. But, "sad ending" is not tragedy. If your protagonist has success, then it's not a tragedy in the literary genre sense. Tragedy, again, in the literary genre sense, has a very specific meaning. And @I'm A Banana made it very clear that it's the literary genre sense that we're talking about. Even in something like Breaking Bad, Walter totally destroys his family, he dies, everything he tried to accomplish pretty much goes up in flames. You might argue that Jesse escaping is something, but, at what cost?

Wasn't Walter's entire reason to provide for his family? And ultimately, he destroyed that. Making it a very good example of tragedy.

A bad ending for the protagonist is not a tragedy. Not if the protagonist actually succeeds in what he or she was trying to do. Frodo is a broken man at the end of LotR but, LotR is not, by any measure, a tragedy, despite the harrowing of the Shire and whatnot. ((Oh, no. I just Tolkiened the thread. I'm SOOO sorry @I'm A Banana. I knew not what I was doing.))

But, for me, @TaranTheWanderer 's example is a good example of tragedy. It would be REALLY hard to pull off in D&D. I would think that some of the more story oriented games like things in the PbtA family might be a better way to go. A game like Ironsworn, where everyone understands that failed checks or weakly passed checks, is where all the interesting stuff happens.

 

[el-remmen]

In my "Out of the Frying Pan" campaign, resurrection magic was severely restricted and came with consequences, so when a beloved member of the party was killed and the party found a magical item that could raise him, the party decided to do so even though they did not know the cost for each of them. For one character, the cost was a task put forth him by Osiris that would end his life in the process. So while the friend was raised, the party knew that even assuming something else did not kill the PCs who had to make that oath, he would be killed by fulfilling the promise to bring his friend back to life. The raised character now also felt bound to his friends and felt guilt. The worse part was that the raised character was killed about 3 levels later and could not be brought back to life, but the rest of the party still had to fulfill their oaths, including the one who would die in the process. Oh and another PC who made the oath (4 of them had to) also died in the process of helping a 3rd PC with his oath.

The paladin of the god of death who was not with the party when made that choice, always reminded the rest of the group that they should have let their friend stay dead.

Anyway, it was pretty tragic. Though ultimately there were some positive outcomes at the end of the campaign. They were not promised, nor did the players know they would come when they made those choices.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Becoming king was never MacBeth's goal. Exposing Polonius and getting revenge was his goal. And that pursuit of that goal results in the death of everyone and everything he loves, including himself.

Becoming the king?

Something is a tragedy when it's sad. But, we're talking about Tragedy the literary genre, so, whipping out an Oxford dictionary isn't going to actually help you here.

I think you are confusing Macbeth with Hamlet (and Polonius with Claudius).

 

[TiQuinn]

So, let's talk genre in D&D.

One of the harder genres to splice into the heroic fantasy of standard D&D is tragedy. To evoke the pathos of someone doing their best to do good and utterly, completely failing.

How do you evoke this? What in D&D seems to get the most in the way of it? Can you cause the players to feel pathos like that in your games? Do you ever inflict tragedy...on the PC's? Or is it NPC-only? How can the players see a tragedy about to play out and NOT intervene to fix it?

For the sake of this discussion, assume that there was a good session zero and everyone's on board with a bit of a gut-punch, but also that fundamentally PC's are assumed to survive (assume basically a 1-15-or-so game where the party remains consistent).

So, this is where I like Gothic Horror as a genre, particularly Ravenloft. Ravenloft allows a player to get their thrills from the horror, but the stories of many of the NPCs are tragic in nature. If a player wants to lean into that aspect and interact with the NPCs in that way, then it’s perfectly set up by design within the setting. The key for me is that there have to be tragic elements that cannot be changed, and then the game elements that can be changed by the players. For instance, Strahd is irredeemable. The cycle of Strahd and Tatyana is inevitable. It will continue no matter what the PCs do. But everything else is mutable and on the table.