So you've killed all the adventurers!
- Thread starter thedungeondelver
- Start date
Man in the Funny Hat
Hero
Depends on the situation. Sometimes we're still having fun and everyone loves their PC's and the ongoing game so we just throw in some "Divine Intervention". Sometimes we roll up new PC's and start again in the same world because we didn't much care for the PC's or the ongoing plot. Sometimes we change the whole campaign. Sometimes we do indeed play a completely different game altogether - not just RPG's.thedungeondelver said:
Back in the day ('80s - early '90s for me), we got together EVERY Saturday, almost without fail, but we didn't ALWAYS just play D&D. We played Traveller, Space Opera, Star Wars (d6), Marvel Superheroes, a little bit of Star Fleet Battles, Micro Armor once or twice when someone got the itch, Battletech a few times, Nuclear War, Risk, Nuclear Risk, Supremacy, Axis & Allies, and any number of other board games both new and VERY old, as well as brief forays into other RPG's like Runequest, and various and sundry other games of all kinds. Once in a while we'd just watch a movie on cable or go see one. It really was a GAMING group.
The advent of better computer games - and especially MMORPG's - killed off a LOT of that. But, "the situation" still is never as cut-and-dried as all that. Sometimes you NEED a break even from D&D, and a TPK is often a good indicator of mood - or at least a prompter of reexamination of moods.
thedungeondelver
Adventurer
Man in the Funny Hat said:
While I certainly don't deny that we all need a change of pace periodically, why do you say that a "TPK is often a good indicator of mood..."(etc.)? A TPK is just that. I wasn't suggesting a situation where a Dungeon Master just throws his players to the wolves.
Here's more the example: the last group I began to run through G123 AGAINST THE GIANTS went in to G2 THE GLACIAL RIFT OF THE FROST GIANT JARL pretty much bulling their way ahead. They got into a tussle and didn't fall back when they should've. They were cut off from escape and massacred because they fought to the last, and inflicted many many casualties (and chaotic evil frost giants weren't too keen on taking prisoners as a result). They knew it was a tough module series, they should have known to retreat after taking serious injury and not dropping even a single giant (that came later in the last, desperate stand), but I didn't TPK them "on purpose". The dice landed where they did, and that was that. Of course that's always how I DM AD&D...
Point is, I didn't mean TPKing just to push the reset button. I meant as a matter of course of regular adventuring is all...
Kaodi said:
I've always wanted to do this, but I've only had one TPK, and we just broke up the group (not a big deal in college) and respawned as different groups of players in different game systems.
I've also like the idea, if there's a sole survivor, of recruiting a new team to continue the adventure.
thedungeondelver said:
I asked (and thank you all for many of your answers thus far) because a couple of years ago there was a TPK in G2 THE GLACIAL RIFT OF THE FROST GIANT JARL which ended the campaign.
I'm once again refereeing a Greyhawk campaign and I'd like to have that over-arching story consistency that a certain fellow from Lake Geneva - old guy, some of you might know him...wargamer, ran a small publishing company up there that had it's own store up on the corner of Main and Lake - has in his house campaign, but I really don't think that's possible in this case.
Well, whatever, I'm going to plan for a TPK in terms of how it will impact the campaign world and move forward accordingly. If it happens, then the next group that adventures in my GREYHAWK campaign may well find the bones and magic-items (or not!) of the previous adventurers...
Oh, in my D&D game, it's almost always been the same World of Greyhawk, with the same dead people or retired characters still around. I believe that is "Lake Geneva style", but who knows since Gary is offline right now?
Similar Threads
