Worst TPK experiences were in the Temple of Elemental Evil module. We walked through the various set encounters (including the dragon at the moathouse, who died hard, despite breathing on the cleric two rounds in a row, and the cleric miraculously surviving both!), but the random encounters between towns killed the entire party three times in a row.
The party was 5th level.
First random encounter was a pair of Wyverns swooping down at night. The guard was killed by the Con poison on the initial round, but we woke up anyway and managed to annoy one of them before they killed us.
Second random encounter was a Dragon (I don't remember the color. It didn't bother to use it's breath weapon, which I think was the GM desperately trying not to kill us again). Boom. Dead. I'd like to say that we attempted to flee, bravely offering it our horses as a light snack, but really, we were running because of the fearful presence thing.
Third random encounter was a trio of Stone Giants who started lobbing rocks at us. Thanks to a Bow that allowed a True Strike once / day, the archer actually *hit* one of them. (Everyone else needed a 20 to hit their high AC and each of the three of them had more hit points than the entire party...) Other than that, being squashed to jelly by rocks bigger than our bodies was the order of the day. Retreat was attempted. Strangely, being hit in the back by a meteor is no less fatal than being hit in the face. Apparently Stone Giants can throw rocks farther than you can run...
We gave up on the adventure, as we hadn't made it to the temple yet and had already had *three* TPKs. It was just so frustrating, and the GM *loved* random chance and 'let the dice fall where they may,' so he refused to budge on the whole 'can we have *sane* random encounters please?' notion.
Still, I found it a valuable lesson. None of my adventures have ever included random encounters (or random treasure! I've seen more games derailed by a 'random' Deck of Many Things encounter.). The players often bizarre actions and choices (and streaky dice rolls) will provide all the random whackiness I need to satisfy my urge to be surprised (or, more often, shocked and appalled).
For GURPS, worst TPKs include the time we went somewhere the GM didn't want us to go and said, 'I rolled your resistance rolls in advance. You all die. Roll up new characters.' and the more entertaining time when a Super who had a bow that shot energy arrows attempted to stop some fleeing crooks by shooting the engine of their departing speed-boat. 20 gallons of gasoline makes a pretty big explosion, apparently. Dead, beat burnt superhero, and teensy-tiny pieces of crook, scattered all over the water. Not pretty.
The party was 5th level.
First random encounter was a pair of Wyverns swooping down at night. The guard was killed by the Con poison on the initial round, but we woke up anyway and managed to annoy one of them before they killed us.
Second random encounter was a Dragon (I don't remember the color. It didn't bother to use it's breath weapon, which I think was the GM desperately trying not to kill us again). Boom. Dead. I'd like to say that we attempted to flee, bravely offering it our horses as a light snack, but really, we were running because of the fearful presence thing.
Third random encounter was a trio of Stone Giants who started lobbing rocks at us. Thanks to a Bow that allowed a True Strike once / day, the archer actually *hit* one of them. (Everyone else needed a 20 to hit their high AC and each of the three of them had more hit points than the entire party...) Other than that, being squashed to jelly by rocks bigger than our bodies was the order of the day. Retreat was attempted. Strangely, being hit in the back by a meteor is no less fatal than being hit in the face. Apparently Stone Giants can throw rocks farther than you can run...
We gave up on the adventure, as we hadn't made it to the temple yet and had already had *three* TPKs. It was just so frustrating, and the GM *loved* random chance and 'let the dice fall where they may,' so he refused to budge on the whole 'can we have *sane* random encounters please?' notion.
Still, I found it a valuable lesson. None of my adventures have ever included random encounters (or random treasure! I've seen more games derailed by a 'random' Deck of Many Things encounter.). The players often bizarre actions and choices (and streaky dice rolls) will provide all the random whackiness I need to satisfy my urge to be surprised (or, more often, shocked and appalled).
For GURPS, worst TPKs include the time we went somewhere the GM didn't want us to go and said, 'I rolled your resistance rolls in advance. You all die. Roll up new characters.' and the more entertaining time when a Super who had a bow that shot energy arrows attempted to stop some fleeing crooks by shooting the engine of their departing speed-boat. 20 gallons of gasoline makes a pretty big explosion, apparently. Dead, beat burnt superhero, and teensy-tiny pieces of crook, scattered all over the water. Not pretty.
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