Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Rocket your D&D 5E and Level Up: Advanced 5E games into space! Alpha Star Magazine Is Launching... Right Now!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lord Zardoz" data-source="post: 3928761" data-attributes="member: 704">I think that depends on the game, but I do agree with the substance of this statement.In general, I figure a TPK is justified under the following circumstances.1)  The players are given every indication they ought to run away, and the opportunity to do so, and do not.2)  The players do something very stupid and ought to know better ("Lets go challenge that vicious Orog Warlord to an Honorable 4 vs 1 duel").3)  The players find themselves in a level appropriate fight against a non trivial NPC that they know is determined to kill them, and simply lose.Number 3 is one that does not come up very often.  In my games, it has yet to do so.  But if the players did run up against certain villains in an evenly matched fight and then just lose due to fluke of the dice, than I will wipe them out.  I may contrive a way to keep the story going, but as long as the players know that the villain is truly out for blood, I will have the villain act as best it can to kill every last one of them.  This includes chasing down fleeing players and finishing them off if it is appropriate to the NPC.I have no problem with the concept of having combats where Failure is not a viable option for the players, even when the combat may not be relevant to the overall plot of the present adventure.Getting back to the thread subject, I honestly believe that one of the more important things about a Rat Bastard DM is that while being utterly fair, the DM must be willing to play his villains just as hard as the players run their characters.  The reason for this is that it is very hard to maintain suspension of disbelief with respect to a truly nasty villain, or the dangerousness of a situation, when the characters are never in any real danger of jeopardy.   Reserving that level of peril for End of Adventure Climactic Battles is just not good enough in my own opinion. END COMMUNICATION</blockquote>

Verification