What is the best party level to have a TPK?

[Nifft]

"What level are you right now?"

-- N

 

[Gnarlo]

First level, when the party doesn't know better than to go pick on the Crazy Cat Lady and her deadly swarm!

 

[Baragos]

How is TPK a "learning lesson" for the party? May be for the players, but the characters are dead and no group of mine would continue a campaign if every character had been killed (even if resurrected). Make a tough challenge and kill 1 character perhaps, that will give the party cause to think...

 

[TerraDave]

A lot of people are choosing the "book ends" of the campaign, and I don't agree.

At first level it is just sad, all that trouble making charecters and then BAM (and it is one thing to have one or two close relatively incredibly similar to a dead PC suddenly appear, but not for the whole party).

On the other hand it is a way to end the campaign, but that seems more approiate for CoC then D&D.

Hit in the middle or hit em high: they have gotten some use out of the charecter at least...

 

[MonkeyDragon]

I chose first, partially because there's not s much time to get to know and love your character (and you can always use the concept again later if it was realy keen) but mostly because making new characters is such an arduous process, I'd rather it happen as soon as possible so I have less fiddling to do with all the skills, feats, and spending money.

 

[howandwhy99]

How is TPK a "learning lesson" for the party? May be for the players, but the characters are dead and no group of mine would continue a campaign if every character had been killed (even if resurrected). Make a tough challenge and kill 1 character perhaps, that will give the party cause to think...

I would not want a TPK under any circumstance. Perhaps the question is better phrased in the negative? "What is the least worst time to have a TPK?" My own preference is for RP heavy gamist games. As a DM I would never try and kill characters, but I'd rather the players picked up on the challenge of the game earlier rather than later.

I think howandwhy99 is asking his DM (me .. .or at least one of his DMs) for a TPK. Guess I'll have to oblige.

What are you talking about? We just picked up three new 13th level PCs. What's so unlucky about that?

 

[radferth]

There's no bad level, but the higher the better, so 20 it is.

 

[FreeTheSlaves]

I say 11th because the henchmen will be level 9 and one of which could be a cleric.

One of the things I do as a player and encourage as a dm, is to prepare for the worst. There is nothing dishonourable with having the cleric at base & having an insurance bounty to retrieve the pcs' corpses.

 

[Abulia]

Certainly not first.

If you have a TPK at first there's a good chance your campaign just died too. If I made a character, spent some time on a background, showed up, and we all died within a few hours of playing, I'd walk away. A TPK at first level probably isn't the party's fault.

I voted for 20. Avoid reading the Epic rules and take your campaign out with a bang.

 

[DonTadow]

This type of convo always brings up the great divide in philosophies between those whom think that tpks are good indicators of a in control DM and those whom that would avoid TPKS at all costs. I'm with the latter. Again I think is a player style. If it comes down to the point where only one pc is a live i'll knock him out. I always want at least 1 or 2 people to survive the most visious encounter so that the campaign can go on. I understand the counterargument, the more realistic death is for the party the more realistic the campaign. I do try to empahsise the risks during every encounter and my pcs don't believe i'm not capable of a tpk. Then again some may have those party members whom won't learn not to fight the ancient dragon until they are all killed.