TPKs

[The_Gneech]

Eh, I'm tired of being taught lessons. I wanna kick butt and take stuff.

-TG

 

[Rodrigo Istalindir]

What Thornir said.

Simplistic example -- party enters the dungeon, comes to the end of the corridor. Behind the door on the right is an Ogre, guarding a chest. The chest contains magic sword of BBEG slaying. Behind the door on the left is the BBEG that can only be slain by by the sword. Party goes left.

If, through bad design or planning on my part, they stumble into something over their heads without warning, then I would feel obliged to fudge things somehow.

OTOH, if there was a sign on the door to the left that said 'BBEG Keep Out' and they went left anyway, that's the way the cookie crumbles.

 

[Speaks With Stone]

I'd say that if the characters were not acting foolishly, then I'd modify the encounter. This is a game where the goal is fun. Everybody dying because they can't remember a clue from 2 weeks ago or other nonsense is not fun. My group basically plays every week, but on Mondays. Plenty of us have bad days and are looking to unwind and relax and have fun. We aren't looking for a test of how smart we are. We want a challenge, but one we can handle while being relatively smart and fairly stylistic. We had a character death this past week (and probably should have been a second death - my own), and that's no big deal. You get unlucky.

But if everyone dies when at the beginning of the night the DM just left the encounter in such a way that we all are going to get screwed, then no fun. We didn't learn a lesson. Don't try to teach us a lesson. We know how to play. We know that at any time the DM can set up an impossible encounter and wait for us to walk in. But we trust our DM to be tough AND fair. Tough being defined that we don't have to be perfect. We can make mistakes. We can even make sub-optimal choices because they are fun or different. Not everyone plays the game to prove how smart they are. But that is our group.

I can certainly see a group where they want to be challenged to make optimal choices every step of the way to anticipate, avoid, or overcome every obstacle. Hey, I've played HALO 2 on Legendary level - it's fun to be pushed to the limit at times - but I got tired of having to work that hard. I play games to relax. So that's my take and it seems to work for our group.

Perhaps you should ask your group's opinion on such things after they all die and before you start the next adventure.

 

[Arnwyn]

Should the DM alter (weaken or remove) the challenge in the room? Should the DM just flat out stop the Players/PCs from going further? Should the DM just let them act on their own, and let the TPK occur "naturally"?

For me, it depends on whose "fault" it is. If the DM screwed up, I would likely alter it. If the players made poor decisions, I'd let it go.

Does your answer vary depending on someone being "at fault" for the coming disaster?

As noted above, yes.

Are TPKs "wrong" things that should not happen in D&D, ever?

Not IMO. We're fine with them.

Are TPKs "natural" things that just sometimes happen. (Sometimes you get the bear. Sometimes the bear gets you.)

Yeah, that's pretty much how we view 'em.

But our group is more "gamist" than anything else.

 

[Pinotage]

As others have alluded to, my general principle in dealing with PC death is thus:

If it's stupid, it deserves to die

I always make sure that the party are up against challenging encounters that they can win, no matter the circumstances. If it means toning down an encounter, then that's fine, but in general I'll only kill PCs if they're doing something outright stupid. Sometimes the luck of the dice is against them, but I tend to minimise those types of scenarios, including save and die spells. TPK? If they're stupid, sure, and this includes fighting against enemies they know they can't beat. But otherwise, no, I avoid TPKs and they shouldn't happen unless its an incredibly bad roll of dice or the players were stupid.

Pinotage

 

[The Shaman]

Are TPKs "natural" things that just sometimes happen? (Sometimes you get the bear. Sometimes the bear gets you.)

Yes - it's part-and-parcel of being an adventurer.

Our Modern tabletop game PCs were just TPK'd - bad luck played a big part in the outcome. While some GMs might choose to fudge the dice in this circumstance to "keep the story alive," and to avoid disappointing the players, I chose to let the dice dictate the outcome. To me, that is the story - if I change the dice rolls to alter the outcome, then I'm removing the drama imparted by the element of chance in the game.

Besides, good stories don't always have happy endings.

My players were quite disappointed of course - my wife has been pestering me about it more than I expected that she might (though to be fair it was her first character death). But she's already reached a point where she's talking about resuming the game with a new character as she doesn't want to see the bad guys get away with their evil schemes.

 

[Ranes]

If the train wreck is going to be caused by my ill-judged DMing, then I'll try to avert it before it's too late. If, on the far more likely other hand, it's about to be caused because of the players themselves, I let it happen.

In my AD&D days, one character made it to eleventh level. All the others died. I'm certain the DM responsible for my surviving character fudged quite a few rolls. I'd rather not suspect that but I do.

Now I DM 3e. I would like to see my players get characters all the way to 20th level (they've been forewarned that I don't want to DM to a higher level) but, if individual PC deaths and TPKs prevent that, so be it. So far, my players have endured one TPK and numerous individual character deaths. And still they come back for more. I try to be impartial and they know it.

Neither they nor I want to look back over a 20 level campaign that was contrived to turn out that way. If it takes a different group and another twenty years, it doesn't matter. If we never see the day, it doesn't matter. Playing the game this way is fun for us.

TPKs are a feature of the game, not a flaw.

 

[Darkness]

I'm fine with a TPK in a climactic battle or similar situation. In fact, I'll often welcome a TPK in that case.

Otherwise, I don't like TPKs. Considering my admittedly somewhat sadistic GMing style, death is the easy way out for the PCs - and I seriously don't fancy giving them such a break.
As such, if a TPK is likely in a random battle of dubious significance, I'd rather have them driven off, captured, or severely injured. A few - or even most - PCs might die, but at least one should survive. (If possible. If not, too bad.)

 

[Quasqueton]

I had a fellow DM once tell me of a time he tried to prevent a TPK by redirecting the PCs away from the danger.

The PCs were about to head into a "bad place" that he knew they couldn't handle (lots of undead, and no party cleric). Previously, they had charged and attacked everything they saw, so the DM decided to divert their attention away from the undead place by sending some minor enemies at them from another direction. He was then going to have the enemies try to pull away and draw they PCs with them. He said the PCs had followed this pattern for every encounter of the adventure up to that point, even though he had not tried to "guide" them in any way before this time.

The PCs instead decided to escape the coming enemies by going into the undead area. A TPK ensued. Afterward, the Players were mad at him for "forcing" them into the TPK area with the rear attack.

Just kind of goes to show, that sometimes TPKs are controlled by Fate.

Quasqueton

 

[Gentlegamer]

Let the dice fall where they may.

Gary sums it up well in my sig line
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