A momentary lapse of good DM judgement killed all my players.

[Dash Dannigan]

I agree with Bret here. I'd go one up though and have this "survivor" have had his legs gnawed off the little beasties:

"We went in there with our fool-proof plan. Aye, it went smoothly enough until WAMO! They hit us like a solid wall of rat flesh all tearing and rending *shivers* Aye I'll tell ye about it but Ne'er will I ever see the inside of a sewer ever again, I swear it."

-edit- As a matter of note, when I run sessions where PCs go up against something much nastier than they can handle I tend to run the creature in "intimidation-mode" that is, instead of hurling it's full force nastiness at the most threatening PC the creature dimension doors in front of the wizard and chokes him as he lifts him off the floor.

Unusual and difficult (cinematic) actions that are "cool" such as a dragon leaps off the wall and slams into the ground in front of the party forcing everyone to make a difficult balance check as it knocks them down with the force of impact. Just imagine cool cinematic stuff that this uber-creature can get away with because the PCs don't threaten it all that much. Your players AND PCs will catch on. Especcially if it whacks the crap out of one of them and continues to spin around, dodging and flipping off of bannisters and what not.

This supports the uberness of the creature, gets the idea across clearly that this is something too "cool" for them to take at the moment, and also gives them the chance to bow-out of the encounter (though if not gracefully) all at the same time.

 

[BSF]

I agree with the sentiment "I'm the host; we're here to have fun."

What I don't get is everyone saying 'good save' regarding the 'it was a hypnotic vision' bit.

Isn't it a bit like Dallas, where -whoops- the whole season was a dream ? Everyone though that was cruddy (it's practically the Iconic Dumb Writer's Trick).

No offence, and I understand that it was probably the best you could rig up in the circumstances (and believe me, I've resorted to much, much worse deus ex machina to pull PC bacon ouut of the fire), but it is a pretty lame save.

I will be more than happy to tell you why *I* think this was a good save.

The DM in question decided that he made a mistake. In the span of a few minutes, he came up with a resolution. This resolution worked within the context of the encounter! It wasn't a simple reset. It wasn't a weird, alternate timeline or anything like that. It was a mental projection driven by the creature! In the context of the character, they met a creature that pulled the images of them in combat with it and fed those images back of complete doom. If something like that happened to me (the player) it would scare the bejeezus out of me. Especially later when I talked with my friends and realized they had the same experience. So, in the context of the character, I would play it as a frightening experience.

Of course, I would probably plot the creatures demise at the hans of myself and my companions for a future date. Nobody messes with me like that!!

A little cheesy? Heck yeah! But, the resolution wasn't too incredulous or unbelievable. And it was resolved in a rapid manner, not over the next week. That's why I give it high marks. YMMV and that is fine.