Circle of Life indeed! Sounds like everybody had fun! Sometimes it is amazing how quickly everything can turn.

Last edited by Agricola (9/15/2014 11:40 am)

Yora wrote:

Though that probably works best in a game where the group was on some mission and there is still unresolved business, which the players might want to see completed.

People who are playing Monopoly want to get rich.  People who are playing Risk want to rule the world.  Sometimes the dice dictate otherwise.  Why should an RPG be any different than any other game?  If you can't handle losing you shouldn't play.

Succeeding in an RPG is cheap if the referee gives the PCs plot armor.  It only means something if anyone can die at any time.  Then you'll know you've actually triumphed, instead of having it handed to you.

Blackadder23 wrote:

People who are playing Monopoly want to get rich.  People who are playing Risk want to rule the world.  Sometimes the dice dictate otherwise.  Why should an RPG be any different than any other game?  If you can't handle losing you shouldn't play.

Succeeding in an RPG is cheap if the referee gives the PCs plot armor.  It only means something if anyone can die at any time.  Then you'll know you've actually triumphed, instead of having it handed to you.

Pretty much all of this. When I'm playing in an RPG I'd be pissed if I thought a GM was putting his finger on the scales because of some metaplot nonsense. I know that there's this "story game" vibe in newer games (and newer gamers?) but that's not how I want to play, nor is it how the people I play with want it (which is why I roll in the open in front of the GM's screen, just so there's no question).

From my perspective the "story" should be reflecting with your fellow players, as you all look back over the events of a campaign (no matter how short-lived). When the "story" is predetermined by the GM, then players are cheated of their accomplishments; reduced to passive participants in somebody's fan-fic and in that event I'd read rather read a good book.

nDervish wrote:

Awesome TPK! I especially love how they almost made it out... and then the monk went down... and then the monk got back up and killed the only other almost-survivor.

Yeah--I felt like the players deserved a narrative observation of that one since there were no conscious characters to see it. The sad thing is that technically, the next batch of characters still have no idea how Hyperborean zombies work!
 

Yesterday we had a near-TPK experience: 3 characters out of 5 died because of a cursed scroll (explosive runes), which was rolled randomly at the spot (because I hadn't decided what specific scrolls the NPC had). I will write about it in a more detailed fashion in session report - but just wanted to confirm that this kind of random deaths are a part of the game (there was nothing the players could've done about it, really). Fortunately, my players handled it pretty well, so the campaign shall continue

Handy Haversack wrote:

Ynas Midgard wrote:

Yesterday we had a near-TPK experience: 3 characters out of 5 died because of a cursed scroll (explosive runes), which was rolled randomly at the spot (because I hadn't decided what specific scrolls the NPC had). I will write about it in a more detailed fashion in session report - but just wanted to confirm that this kind of random deaths are a part of the game (there was nothing the players could've done about it, really). Fortunately, my players handled it pretty well, so the campaign shall continue

Yeah, sometimes it's just, "Gee, Ricky, sorry your bard blew up," and you just keep moving forward. I've had players make new characters because of a death the previous session only to have to make yet another new one in the middle of the game! Stuff happens. But bones heal, witches dig scars, and Hyperborea has the best doctors a daredevil could ever want!

Yes, I distinctly remember my buddy Don going through three PCs in one night. "Gee, Ricky, sorry your bard blew up." That's rich, Handy! LOL
 

Blackadder23 wrote:

Succeeding in an RPG is cheap if the referee gives the PCs plot armor.  It only means something if anyone can die at any time.  Then you'll know you've actually triumphed, instead of having it handed to you.

So true.  Great words to see. This has been my experience playing as well.  You keep more players excited about the game, ironically, by playing by the rules, and having them die trying.  Makes them want to figure out more ways to stump or overcome the challenges brought by the DM.  We once had a group where a player's character died 3 times in a single night, and had to keep rolling up new characters during the game.  Pretty unlucky at times, and could have been pretty upset, but just dug down, and kept on rolling...he certainly had a blast that night, in one of his more memorable sessions.  The DM also had a pretty challenging time weaving the new ones back into the game.  Kudos to him that night as well.
 

We flirted with another TPK all day yesterday. Well, the party waltzed through the first few encounters and was feeling pretty tough. But then they got stalked, cut off, and ambushed. The cataphract and berserker were down, the ranger ended up charmed first by the bad guy and then by the party's CE magician. The cleric was seriously considering taking a magic boat into the void. In the end, dumping lamp oil on piles of old rages and creating a smoke cloud saved them. The dice started going their way, and they won a long war of missile attrition. It really could have gone either way--which is what I always look for in a session.

A hit-and-run dungeon crawl against LE extraplanar aliens who had found a portal to Hyperborea and are setting themselves up in a ley-line nexus. Or as my players say, "Kill that one!"