Victories and No Defeats in D&D

[JohnSnow]

Perhaps this is a lesson for DMs and players alike. And it speaks to the notion of hit points as combat capability.

Player1: "We lost our first fighter? Oh no! Run away!! Head down that hallway!"
Player2: "Oh crap, they brought reinforcements..."
Player3: (to DM) "What're you trying to do? Kill us?"
Player4: "We can't escape, fight to the last...*urk*"
Player5 (the aforementioned fighter, 3 rounds later): "Well, that encounter led to a TPK. So, who's ready to make new characters?"

DM: "Not so fast. Regdar, the blackness lifts from your eyes as you find yourself coming to consciousness. From the pounding in your head and the soreness in your limbs, you guess you've lying on this floor for hours. Your armor is missing and your sword is nowhere to be seen. Mialee, Tordek, Jozan and Lidda are lying unconscious in the same cell. They all look pretty beaten up. What do you do?"

Why did the goblins take our heroes captive? A good question. The players in this game have LOST, but they don't have to die. Intelligent foes might take you prisoner. The giant spiders might wrap you in cocoons for later. Other monsters might be scared off...or just wander away without eating you. Heck, even the undead might just walk on by once you're no longer a threat.

Of course, if hit points are meat, you're going to die. But if instead they simply represent combat capability, then 0 hp means "unconscious" not dead. You could wake up hours later, bereft of equipment and left for dead. And really, really itching to get even.

Is that DM fudging? Sure, maybe. But who would complain?

 

[Mattachine]

I have turned a couple TPKs into prisoner situations in my years as DM, but only if it matched the story.

On the other hand, fighting creatures with SoDs often meant either a TPK or breaking suspension of disbelief . . . I came to use those kinds of creatures less and less.

 

[Sunseeker]

Is that DM fudging? Sure, maybe. But who would complain?

As people have said, prisoner situations aren't always a better option to death and I can certainly think of some players in my games/games I've played who would complain about not getting KOed.

I may put a lot of effort into my characters, but if it was a fair death I don't really have any issue making a new one. Character creation is enjoyable for me(provided that the rules aren't too restrictive).

 

[Rhenny]

Great example JohnSnow (can't xp you yet). I also like what Savage Wombat said.

It is important to think about foes and build into the encounter what will happen if the PCs lose. Also, what will happen if the PCs kill the leader of the group quickly, or if there is only 1 or 2 foes left, or if the PCs look like they are going to fall. In some encounters, the foes could offer terms of surrender, or just leave the group for dead. They may need to get somewhere else in a hurry so once they defeat the party, they just move on like a horde on the march.

One thing I like about Skill Challenges (I know they are probably gone in 5e - replaced by Complex Skill Checks most likely), is that often, my players would fail them, so I would have to narrate the story differently to add a complication to the story. I really liked that. Sometimes it really helped make the story more interesting and more like the fictional stories we love. For example, when the party could not convince a paranoid mayor of a plague infested town that they could help the town, the mayor sent them away and made them prove themselves. They ended up killing an Orc leader from a raiding party that was badgering the town, and they cut off the Orc leader's head and brought it back to the mayor as evidence of their commitment. None of that was scripted, but because they failed the skill challenge, that's what evolved.

I guess, failed combats could also lead to plot twists other than TPK - Start Again.

 

[MatthewJHanson]

Another solution is for the fight to be about something more than just survival. Maybe its stopping on NPC from escaping with the MacGuffin. Even if they slay everybody else, if the MacGuffin gets away, they still lose.

(And on a side note, I just reread the Hobbit, and man are those dwarves useless).

 

[Morrus]

How many times can an entire party of killers be defeated an captured before it becomes silly?

And they can kill a million opponents, but they can only be killed once.

I think it's just mathematics. You can capture them occasionally (but players tend to find that unfun and the "hah! you were only unconscious! bazinga!" thing is gonna get old pretty quick) and you can kill them once.

 

[Li Shenron]

If the characters defeat all their enemies, but two characters die, it is still a win.

I think this sentence highlights a problem with the players (and DM's) perspective rather than with the game itself.

Why is killing the monsters but losing 1-2 PCs is a win?
On the other hand...
Why is fleeing the battle a loss?

The answer depends on how the DM has decided what the encounter means in the story: if the purpose is exactly to kill the BBEG, you "win" if you kill it no matter how many PC die, and you "lose" if you don't kill it.

But there are alternatives. Not every encounter is a BBEG. Not every encounter is a "blocker" for the story (in fact, if you think about it, MOST encounters don't really block anything if you fail to kill them all).

Fleeing the battle is a "win" if the purpose is staying alive. If you think this is lame, then ask yourself if Indiana Jones movies have all been lame, because in those movies Indy very rarely actually "wins" a fight by killing or incapacitating someone, he almost always flees from confrontation or he's helped by circumstances and luck (how many times the evil guys in Indy's movies fall into their own traps, are caught up into a hazard or just practically kill themselves by doing something silly?).

In our games we had characters death, and we have been captured many times. But I think we have been fleeing too rarely I would actually like to see that happen more often!

 

[Hassassin]

Early in a campaign, winning and fleeing are often the only possible outcomes where the party doesn't die. Later in the adventurers' career if they are rulers of domains it becomes easier to justify capture. Pretty much any intelligent enemy will be interested in a king's ransom.

If in-combat healing was rarer, I think retreat would become a clearer option. As is, healing makes it difficult to gauge how close you actually are to defeat.

 

[Mattachine]

Part of the reason PCs don't flee is that many DMs have all or most monsters fight to the death (even intelligent ones), and chase a fleeing party even if the monsters are badly injured. Many players perceive fleeing as riskier than fighting onward, because they are likely to keep getting attacked.

 

[delericho]

To a large extent, this is just a game style issue. If the players will always fight to the last man, you'll either get "victory" or "game over!"; they need to be willing to flee or surrender for there to be anything else.

Conversely, a great many DMs will likewise either eliminate other options (by making retreat impossible, or having enemies who cannot be negotiated with), or will design their game so that every encounter can be won (even to the extent of fudging to ensure this).

IMO, there should be some recalibration of suggested encounter design. The 3e DMG had this largely about right, suggesting that most fights should be routine or challenging, but that some 5% should be overwhelming. Unfortunately, this fell by the wayside as soon as "Forge of Fury" (the second 3.0e module) was released, and the Roper encounter became infamous.

The game is almost certainly most satisfying if the PCs win the majority of encounters (about 70%) on the first attempt, but they have some reversals. That way, if they can retreat, regroup, and replan, they get even greater satisfaction from beating the Big Boss on the second attempt - finally, they have managed what was previously impossible.

But beyond suggesting that recalibration, there's really not anything more the rules can do. If the players persist in fighting to the death, or DMs persist in cutting off the retreat (or ignore the advice, such that there's always a win possible), then that's their prerogative. And, really, if they're having fun...