most ridiculous party wipe ever

[calighis]

So we pool our meager rescources and decide that we can't buy the slaves we have been sent to rescue (Effecive party level 1) the best course of action is to straight jack another slave trader's loot they brought with them for the auction. We figured we would just storm a more isolated tent set up in the field of freshly arrived slave traders.
Well we got our asses handed to us by a group of gnolls. They simply captured us and added us to the slave bounty.

Now the DM is sorta stoked about the interesting direction the game is taking. It's clear that he is enjoying having the characters endure these hardships.
He can't stop talking about it what a neat unexpected twist this is.
Our half giant however is not taking any of this in stride. The idea of gaming as a slave just doesn't meet with his expectations of D&D.

So this is how it happens...
After three days forced march we finally get to the last leg of our journey...
All the slaves are manacled and chained together in one long line 50 people deep and the trail is a narrow ledge with a long drop to the shoreline. The ship is just another mile ahead. The DM makes it clear that we are all at one hit point and not getting enough rest to heal over night. Our cleric is held separatley.
The half giant decides he no longer wants to live. The entire line of slaves along with all the other PC's are forced over the ledge following that huge anchor of a half giant. Behold... he domino effect of death.
TPK
Nobody came anywhere near making a sufficient strength check and after the fourth or fifth body went over the side, there was no need to even bother rolling it. like it or not we were all plunging to our deaths.
A moment of silence comes over the group. everyone stares at the half giant in total disbelief of what he had done.
The half giant explains that a life of slavery was not in the cards for him and that he would sooner die then remain a slave.
Other members of the group were pissed.
I couldn't stop laughing.
It was the most anticlimactic and ignoble death I had ever experienced playing this game.
The DM spent the rest of the session explaining the tortures that the alf giant endured at the hands of demons in hell for the rest of eternity.

I still laugh when i think about this... tell me what you think?

 

[Fenes]

As a DM, I'd have let the chain/rope break, and wouldn't have let the half-giant's player kill the other PCs.

As a player, I'd probably have walked away from the game.

 

[fissionessence]

I find that to be a very amusing story

. . . but I have no idea how I might have reacted if I'd actually been playing.

I think I have to disagree with the DM's decision to keep you at 1hp. That's obvious railroading (you have to follow the slave storyline or DIE!), so I can totally understand the half-giant's frustration with this situation.

If someone killed my character in such a way [at level 1], I think I would just crack up as the OP did. Of course, I probably would have put work and planning into my character, so I'd ask the DM if I could just play the same character for the next campaign. If this had happened at a higher level, I'd be pissed that the half-giant killed of the character I'd put so much time into . . . but hopefully at a higher level this death wouldn't just end the campaing altogether; hopefully we'd be able to come back to life or continue the adventure in the afterworld or something.

~

 

[Foxen]

Wow, that probably was THE worst party wipe I had ever heard of. As the GM, I probably would have prevented it or at least give the other PCs several more chances for survival. What happened to the Cleric? I thought he was seperated from the group.

If I was a player, I would be rather pissed...

We recently had a TPK (first time in a LONG time) when some of our players just "charged" in still thinking this was 3e or 3.5e or any other RPG etc. We ended up compounding two encounters and it ended rather, well, I was rather pissed. Fortunately, my character made her death saving throw and didn't get fined the 500g penalty for a generous raise dead spell, but for some reason I don't think the GM is going to enforce it. Kinda pissed about that. Ah well.

Fox

 

[washout]

Yeah thats an obvious railroad and the DM was being way heavy handed. Keeping at 1hp and the cleric seperate is something that a DM would do as a cruch. So I bet the player just didn't like the game and probably didn't want to play anymore anyway.

Should have been a good message to the DM that his players didn't like his game very much and gives him some things to think about.

 

[calighis]

Well we are going to start a new game on Sunday. What really pisses me off is that this was our fifth adventure and still none of us had leveled.
Also I should be clear about that cleric... It's not that she was held separately... it's just that she wasn't there that day. In fat now that i think of it.. I dont think she was captured at all.
More than anything else I am pissed off that we weren't aloud to level, because otherwise we would have owned those gnolls. What kin of DM keeps you at level 1 for 5 F%#$ing adventures. I hope you read this Jay.
In all fairness the DM asked the party if we wanted to start over or if we wanted to approach the game from the slave angle. Everyone voted to RP some slavery including braun. Despite the jeers and snickers, even the black guy in our group thought that RP'ing enslavement might be interesting.

The DM had advocated an open approach to gaming on several occasions and in the spirit of fairness i put to you the question, how do you do anyhting but rail road when you are chained up and being driven by whips?

In a slavery scenario i think that is forgivable.

 

[Foxen]

Railroading in a slavery scenario, sure, but it could have led to some interesting adventures nevertheless.

Gladiator combat comes to mind...

Seeking and building allies in the slave compound, and working towards an overthrow and freeing all the other slaves or a "jail break" etc. Even getting to know your slavers, or learning about deeper plots spoken in front of the insignificant slaves, or one of the gladiators catching the eyes of an evil noble, etc.

Regardless, I probably wouldn't have the PCs enslaved for more than a level (be it 5-10 sessions or something...just kidding).

On another note, I actually like keeping my PCs at a somewhat lower level, to let them kinda get a feel of their characters and to experience a more fuller range of the mobs from the MM. But as a rule of thumb, I'm kinda leveling them once every 3 sessions or so (about 6-7 combat encounters and a few roleplaying encounters mixed in). I don't actually keep track of XP, but I don't think they care either.

Fox