Desdichado
Hero
The first sign that a TPK may be imminent is when they allowed me to get behind the screen. Mwahahahah!
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How soon do you see warning signs of a TPK?
- Thread starter Bullgrit
- Start date
Lord Zardoz
Explorer
TPK in todays game
Ordinarily, I would not quote myself. But todays game had a TPK.
Party: All level 1
Bounty the Dwarven Fighter
Merric the Halfling Ranger
Lia the elven Rogue
Torment the Tiefling Sorcerer
Heskan the Dragonborn Cleric
The Encounter
Dungeon Delve: Coppernight Hold 1-3, Audience Chamber
Merric and Lia entered the fight in rough shape (Merric ended encounter 1-2 with 2 hp and 1 surge left). Bounty, Merric and Lia had already used their Daily encounters by this point. The Kobold Wyrmpriest from 1-2 had retreated into the next room. The party decided to fall back just outside the dungeon to regroup and take a 5 minute rest. As background, there is not much ranged capability in that part as the Ranger is a melee build. The only ranged attacks were from the Cleric, the Sorcerer, and occasional thrown daggers from the Rogue
The fight was going reasonably well with the players bottled up in the corridor. I tried to draw them out using the Kobolds shifty ability to coax them into the Audience chamber. The players were making decent progress, mostly focusing on the Kobold Slyblades and Wyrm Priest (who were close enough to be hit but in melee). After several rounds the players had taken some hits, but they were holding up quite well. The Wyrmling had taken a few hits too, but its low attack bonus was balancing its high damage output well enough. The biggest damage inflicted was by the Slyblades getting combat advantage on the Fighter and triggering ongoing damage. However momentum was on their side. Things were well in hand, and other then taking some heavy damage the players were going to win itl.
But then the White Dragon Wyrmling had its opening. All the players were finally drawn into the room and within a 3 x 4 area. I moved the Wyrmling into position and rolled damage first, hitting 20 damage on 3d6+4. Then I looked at the attack bonus and saw it was a pathetic +2 vs Reflex. Still, it was the best shot I would get, and I made the attacks.
I do not remember exactly what I rolled, but it was something like 17, 19, 15, 18, and 7, and 11. I hit every player except the dwarf, and I missed the one Kobold Cutter Minion within the blast. Every player except the dwarf was now in negative HP. And I still had the Wyrmling, both Slyblades at about 3/4 hp, the Wyrmpriest at exactly 1 hp remaining, and 5 minions.
Bounty the Dwarf started calling for Parley, but was getting hit enough that he had to flee. The wyrmling flew overhead and cut him off, and then he was taken down within 2 rounds of the others dropping. The last thing the players remembered were the Kobolds having victory dances, and an arguement over which kobold would eat Heskans eyes.
So as I said in my previous post in my threads, some suddenly hot dice can shift a combat fast. There were only 2 things that might have warned of this TPK.
1) Inability to clear Minions: The players focused a bit too hard on the non minions. The minions managed to keep the players from getting good position on the real threats, and they were hitting often enough to chip away at the players. The ranger was rendered mostly ineffective due to being unable to get into melee. The sorcerer was also unable to set up any effective blast attacks.
2) Single Effective Front Line Melee: The dwarf was effective as front line melee due to Armour class and an Invigorating at will. The Ranger had the damage output but not the AC to stay in the front line. The Rogue was also only wearing Leather armour. The Cleric is passable for melee, but the attack bonus is not especially strong and the AC was only 16.
However as I said, despite the above the players were winning the fight right up until the moment I dropped 4 out of 5 of them in a single attack.
END COMMUNICATION
Ordinarily, I would not quote myself. But todays game had a TPK.
Party: All level 1
Bounty the Dwarven Fighter
Merric the Halfling Ranger
Lia the elven Rogue
Torment the Tiefling Sorcerer
Heskan the Dragonborn Cleric
The Encounter
Dungeon Delve: Coppernight Hold 1-3, Audience Chamber
Merric and Lia entered the fight in rough shape (Merric ended encounter 1-2 with 2 hp and 1 surge left). Bounty, Merric and Lia had already used their Daily encounters by this point. The Kobold Wyrmpriest from 1-2 had retreated into the next room. The party decided to fall back just outside the dungeon to regroup and take a 5 minute rest. As background, there is not much ranged capability in that part as the Ranger is a melee build. The only ranged attacks were from the Cleric, the Sorcerer, and occasional thrown daggers from the Rogue
The fight was going reasonably well with the players bottled up in the corridor. I tried to draw them out using the Kobolds shifty ability to coax them into the Audience chamber. The players were making decent progress, mostly focusing on the Kobold Slyblades and Wyrm Priest (who were close enough to be hit but in melee). After several rounds the players had taken some hits, but they were holding up quite well. The Wyrmling had taken a few hits too, but its low attack bonus was balancing its high damage output well enough. The biggest damage inflicted was by the Slyblades getting combat advantage on the Fighter and triggering ongoing damage. However momentum was on their side. Things were well in hand, and other then taking some heavy damage the players were going to win itl.
But then the White Dragon Wyrmling had its opening. All the players were finally drawn into the room and within a 3 x 4 area. I moved the Wyrmling into position and rolled damage first, hitting 20 damage on 3d6+4. Then I looked at the attack bonus and saw it was a pathetic +2 vs Reflex. Still, it was the best shot I would get, and I made the attacks.
I do not remember exactly what I rolled, but it was something like 17, 19, 15, 18, and 7, and 11. I hit every player except the dwarf, and I missed the one Kobold Cutter Minion within the blast. Every player except the dwarf was now in negative HP. And I still had the Wyrmling, both Slyblades at about 3/4 hp, the Wyrmpriest at exactly 1 hp remaining, and 5 minions.
Bounty the Dwarf started calling for Parley, but was getting hit enough that he had to flee. The wyrmling flew overhead and cut him off, and then he was taken down within 2 rounds of the others dropping. The last thing the players remembered were the Kobolds having victory dances, and an arguement over which kobold would eat Heskans eyes.
So as I said in my previous post in my threads, some suddenly hot dice can shift a combat fast. There were only 2 things that might have warned of this TPK.
1) Inability to clear Minions: The players focused a bit too hard on the non minions. The minions managed to keep the players from getting good position on the real threats, and they were hitting often enough to chip away at the players. The ranger was rendered mostly ineffective due to being unable to get into melee. The sorcerer was also unable to set up any effective blast attacks.
2) Single Effective Front Line Melee: The dwarf was effective as front line melee due to Armour class and an Invigorating at will. The Ranger had the damage output but not the AC to stay in the front line. The Rogue was also only wearing Leather armour. The Cleric is passable for melee, but the attack bonus is not especially strong and the AC was only 16.
However as I said, despite the above the players were winning the fight right up until the moment I dropped 4 out of 5 of them in a single attack.
END COMMUNICATION
TheAuldGrump
First Post
A 'Warning Sign' that I used for the first time yesterday -
Hades Day Begins by dennisobrien.rm, on Flickr
They got the point, and decided to try something other than a frontal assault.
Image from the webcomic Geminni (warning, language and situations that may not be suitable for everyone's tastes).
The Auld Grump
Hades Day Begins by dennisobrien.rm, on Flickr
They got the point, and decided to try something other than a frontal assault.
Image from the webcomic Geminni (warning, language and situations that may not be suitable for everyone's tastes).
The Auld Grump
Lanefan
Victoria Rules
Despite being a full-on RBDM, in 26 years I have yet to wipe out an entire party all at once.
Closest I ever got was in the old Judges' Guild module "Sword of Hope"; the party ignored the warnings that quite literally say "don't go here" and they went here, producing an encounter that is intended to kill them all except the very first character to enter the area - that one gets teleported away instead. I managed to kill 8 of 10; one other guy also found a way to teleport out.
Recently, I seem to have become very good at killing half a party at a time; in the last year or so I think I've done this at least three times, to the same party no less, once in each of three separate adventures! The first was due to an admittedly very nasty ambush set by Giants (the party knew the Giants were dangerous and most probably more than they could handle but that didn't stop them from wading into their lair...); they lost 2 of 8 there and another 2 against Ogres while retreating back to town. Next adventure, they took on and killed a wave of Ogres but failed to retreat after that, and the second wave (seen coming from a long way off) killed 4 of 7 - the rest ran away. Adventure after that they waded loudly into a place where stealth would have been much the better option: 3 of 9 killed outright by the archers and fireballs fired from concealment; 2 others forced into retirement after running away with the survivors.
That said, parties like those mentioned in other posts above where everyone is expected to do certain things in certan ways all the time would bore me to tears both as player and DM.
Lan-"well at least the gods of the dead are kept busy"-efan
Closest I ever got was in the old Judges' Guild module "Sword of Hope"; the party ignored the warnings that quite literally say "don't go here" and they went here, producing an encounter that is intended to kill them all except the very first character to enter the area - that one gets teleported away instead. I managed to kill 8 of 10; one other guy also found a way to teleport out.
Recently, I seem to have become very good at killing half a party at a time; in the last year or so I think I've done this at least three times, to the same party no less, once in each of three separate adventures! The first was due to an admittedly very nasty ambush set by Giants (the party knew the Giants were dangerous and most probably more than they could handle but that didn't stop them from wading into their lair...); they lost 2 of 8 there and another 2 against Ogres while retreating back to town. Next adventure, they took on and killed a wave of Ogres but failed to retreat after that, and the second wave (seen coming from a long way off) killed 4 of 7 - the rest ran away. Adventure after that they waded loudly into a place where stealth would have been much the better option: 3 of 9 killed outright by the archers and fireballs fired from concealment; 2 others forced into retirement after running away with the survivors.
That said, parties like those mentioned in other posts above where everyone is expected to do certain things in certan ways all the time would bore me to tears both as player and DM.
Lan-"well at least the gods of the dead are kept busy"-efan
Last edited:
Almacov
First Post
In my experience DMing, a TPK is coming if the PCs have already made a long string of laughably obvious bad decisions - and haven't noticed yet.
Like, say, strolling through a known (and named!) red dragon's lair without any preparations, then saying "Pfft. Coins stacked along a thin ledge over a pit leading down to a pool of water and tiamat-flavoured statuary? Coincidence. That's not an alarm system. Now let's get to that shimmying."
As a player, it's when the DM throws an ice devil and several bearded devils against the woefully lower-level three-person party in incredibly cramped quarters, after a couple of rounds only the mage is left standing (cornered, of course), and her only hope is repeatedly casting a spell that does not bypass spell resistance and allows a save...
I'm sure that would have been a TPK, anyway. I think the DM fudged the thing's save.
Like, say, strolling through a known (and named!) red dragon's lair without any preparations, then saying "Pfft. Coins stacked along a thin ledge over a pit leading down to a pool of water and tiamat-flavoured statuary? Coincidence. That's not an alarm system. Now let's get to that shimmying."
As a player, it's when the DM throws an ice devil and several bearded devils against the woefully lower-level three-person party in incredibly cramped quarters, after a couple of rounds only the mage is left standing (cornered, of course), and her only hope is repeatedly casting a spell that does not bypass spell resistance and allows a save...
I'm sure that would have been a TPK, anyway. I think the DM fudged the thing's save.
In my experience TPKs almost exclusively happen after a string of bad decisions (often in combination with bad luck) have caused the death of two or more pcs.
At that point the players often decide that a tpk would be 'the lesser evil' for everyone involved rather than having the players of the deceased pcs roll up new pcs or trying to resurrect them all.
At that point the players often decide that a tpk would be 'the lesser evil' for everyone involved rather than having the players of the deceased pcs roll up new pcs or trying to resurrect them all.
The Shaman
First Post
I don't think I've ever encountered such a meta approach to character death.
I'm sad to hear it
Because it's not (just) a meta approach, it's a common thing in history, myth, and fiction. It's "If we go down, we'll go down together!"
In fact I consider it to be excellent roleplaying if a party has been adventuring together for a long time, went through all kinds of dangers and saved each other's lives time and again.
Imho, being unwilling to abandon your allies and making a heroic last stand can be full of awesome!
Wednesday Boy
The Nerd WhoFell to Earth
David Bowie was only 6th level?? That's atrocious!!
clip
First Post
David Bowie might have been 6th, but Ziggy was at least 18th...
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