Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="iserith" data-source="post: 7791975" data-attributes="member: 97077">You provide a lot of good detail, but honestly it's hard to say what the &quot;right&quot; thing to do here is because there are so many factors to consider. That said, here are my general thoughts as to this issue:First, almost every time I thought the party in any edition of D&amp;D was doomed, they managed to pull off a victory without any intervention on my part. I'm not saying that's what will happen here, but it's happened enough times for me over the years that I generally ignore that little voice that warns me about this. And though it's been a while since I've played D&amp;D 3.Xe, 18th-level PCs have a lot of tricks up their sleeves. I would not count them out just yet, especially if your players are using optimized characters and solid tactics.Further, I consider any situation in which the PCs find themselves to be fair only if I have have given them enough information to take into full account the situation and make informed decisions. So, yeah, they can definitely walk into an &quot;unwinnable&quot; situation if they want. But it's on me to make sure they know it's &quot;unwinnable.&quot; If I didn't do that, then that's my mistake and then I'll have to consider ways to correct it. To that end, only you can say which of the suggestions you made as to the &quot;outs&quot; works best in context. My only point is that I wouldn't provide any additional outs or make any changes if I felt the situation was fair. And, again, &quot;fair&quot; means they made a decision knowing what it could lead to and I wasn't obfuscating the dangers, not that it conforms to some notion of challenge rating or difficulty level.Finally, I am of the opinion that even if a party is destroyed and ultimately and entirely killed, it really doesn't matter as long as everyone had a good time playing and helped contribute to an exciting, memorable story. Failure can still be fun for the players, even if it totally sucks for the characters. If you think that some element of your setup, description, or design will make it so that is not true, then it's time to make some changes. Otherwise, play on and let things fall where it may. Some stories end in tragedy and that's okay.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="iserith, post: 7791975, member: 97077"] You provide a lot of good detail, but honestly it's hard to say what the "right" thing to do here is because there are so many factors to consider. That said, here are my general thoughts as to this issue: First, almost every time I thought the party in any edition of D&D was doomed, they managed to pull off a victory without any intervention on my part. I'm not saying that's what will happen here, but it's happened enough times for me over the years that I generally ignore that little voice that warns me about this. And though it's been a while since I've played D&D 3.Xe, 18th-level PCs have a lot of tricks up their sleeves. I would not count them out just yet, especially if your players are using optimized characters and solid tactics. Further, I consider any situation in which the PCs find themselves to be fair only if I have have given them enough information to take into full account the situation and make informed decisions. So, yeah, they can definitely walk into an "unwinnable" situation if they want. But it's on me to make sure they know it's "unwinnable." If I didn't do that, then that's my mistake and then I'll have to consider ways to correct it. To that end, only you can say which of the suggestions you made as to the "outs" works best in context. My only point is that I wouldn't provide any additional outs or make any changes if I felt the situation was fair. And, again, "fair" means they made a decision knowing what it could lead to and I wasn't obfuscating the dangers, not that it conforms to some notion of challenge rating or difficulty level. Finally, I am of the opinion that even if a party is destroyed and ultimately and entirely killed, it really doesn't matter as long as everyone had a good time playing and helped contribute to an exciting, memorable story. Failure can still be fun for the players, even if it totally sucks for the characters. If you think that some element of your setup, description, or design will make it so that is not true, then it's time to make some changes. Otherwise, play on and let things fall where it may. Some stories end in tragedy and that's okay. [/QUOTE]

Verification