How to handle a TPK

[Beowulfthehunter]

This past Friday my 4th Lv; Halfing Died, as did our Dwarf Ranger, Halfling Roge, and Dwarf Paladin. A TPK total party kill. Done in by darn Darkones, Metalic Blink Dogs, and a Slithe mage our party dropped like River Phonex at a rave. After the session our GM is going through the encounter and exclaims..."that was an ENCOUNTER POWER!" So do to gross GM stupidity as put by our players our characters died. Combine that with hot rolls from the GM (he does not use a screene...so no fudging) and that fact we cannot hit to save our lives (in 10 encounters I have hit with Warlords Favor once!) does not help.

 

 

So our GM says we can either replay the encounter or treat it as if it never happened (because he does not want to ruin his story line). I am sorry, but I am a strong beliver in the GM is law and if you die, you die, Roll a new character. I was curious what everyone else had to say about the TPK.

[Stubbdog]

well, I have no idea about the power levels of the enemy you faced to say whether it was a good match up or not. But, as far as the TPK goes, I think that players have to understand going into things that its a possibility. I admit that growing up, I played with my brother's where it was a foregone conclusion that we would win every fight, collect masses amounts of treasure that we couldnt possibly carry but somehow did, and eventually raise up to gawdly status, get bored and start the process over again as someone else....

 

But, then as I got a little older and after I had reached those lofty heights for about the 200th time, I noticed that it was also much more just going thru the motions and quite boring.

 

I started changing things up a little, and worried less about player character longevity. It didnt matter if the person was 3rd level, 8th level, or 18th level. It didnt matter if it was a character that had been in use 1 week, or 1 year, we started playing the monsters and such the way they should be played no matter the outcome. And in the long run we found it much more enjoyable, even if it was depressing every now and then related to a character that had grown on us. It made the players be more realistic and not just run in super hero mode all the time. It made the decision making in game more relevant and not so much the foregone conclusion. It made the details of description given by the GM much more important and interesting and captivating, and not just " another encounter". It also made for interesting times as it opened up the world of having people at different experience levels workign together all the time as whenever we replaced characters, we tended to replace them with relative raw meat.

 

Sure, there were a few fits along the way as people got attached to characters but in the bigger picture of our gaming it was hugely beneficial.

 

 

But, that was us.

[joshuaslater]

What Stubbdog said. I'll add that the idea that every encounter a party runs into being balanced is silly. Talk to any World War II veteran, and they'll tell you the real heroes were the guys that didn't make it home alive.

[Lars Porsenna]

I'll add that the idea that every encounter a party runs into being balanced is silly.

 

Yeah, but I bet the players get upset when the orcs wait until they have a ratio of 3 to 1 or even (ideally) 10 to one. Gotta get that one in the back! He may be calling for fire...

 

Damon.

[anvil]

I've experienced TPK's from both sides. It's never the desired outcome, but this will give everyone a chance to try something new, and the GM to advance his story line after the villains success.

[shakhak]

I agree with everyone above.

 

But! It sounds like you liked your characters and everyone got miffed when the GM killed the party. I don't know how long you guys have been playing, but maybe a one time "redo" isn't a bad idea and it would allow the GM to get an idea of what is deadly and what's challenging.

[joshuaslater]

A mature group will have the GM drop some hints they are in over their heads for an encounter that's well nigh impossible, and if the encounter is easy and the party is killed due to bad decisions and even poorer dice, well, them's the breaks. Either way, the group can run away to fight another day, or the players can all create more characters.

 

We went through this early on when we were learning Savage Worlds, and now have a better grasp of things. Our GM isn't out to kill us, but challenge us, but that doesn't mean bad things don't happen to characters, hence the expression, "live by the sword, die by the sword."

[Rastl]

If the GM is pleased that the encounter resulted in a TPK then I think it's time to have a talk with that GM.

 

Regarding the re-do. That's up to the group. If they all feel that the encounter was unbalanced and there was no way to prevent the TPK then yes, it is final. If the prevailing opinion was that the encounter wasn't suitable to the party/adventure then that opens discussion for going forward.

 

Personally I know that the players get tetchy when the GM is actively trying to kill them instead of challenge them. Most of the time a quick conversation with the GM is enough to change the mindset. But if the GM continues then I have to wonder why I want to play in a game where the ref is using their position to create a confrontational environment that we can't win.

 

And encourage the GM to hide the dice rolls. It's in their best interest to fudge rolls when necessary. Especially at the lower levels.

[Flit]

I've never been involved in a TPK situation, but it seems to me that if the GM didn't want to ruin his story line he shouldn't have let the whole party die.

Maybe your group should insist on staying dead as a "learning experience" for him.

Since you mentioned GM stupidity in your post maybe he needs one of those GMing For Dummies books that were out not long ago.

[Beowulfthehunter]

The funny thing about this GM is he is a by the book kind of guy so if the module says A you do A, if it says B...you get the idea. So we honeslty think he does not know how to procede. The encounter was meant to be difficult (it was CR6 and we are all level 4), but his mistakes made it impossible. I suspect he does not want to kill us off on purpose. I have played with GMs who like to harras characters and it is not fun,

 

As for the whole DMing for dummies we own that book as a gag.

[GreyHorde]

If the GM admitted to an unintentional mistake, not gleefully killing everyone and then backing down due to complaints, and offered to either replay (properly) or skip the encounter, then I would say take him up on it. If you believe his word is law, transcendent of space and time in the game, then take him up on his offer of using that power. If the mistake was bad enough to be the largest deciding factor - even combined with his hot dice rolling and your cold dice - then I say let him fix the mistake with a mulligan. If the correction is made and everyone still dies, then so be it. Everyone learns from the experience, no one hates the GM and he's not embarassed to the point where he's afraid to make a mistake. AA timid GM is no good to anyone.

[joshuaslater]

That's sensible.

[Ishil]

This is why I believe GMs should roll dice behind a screen - so they can fudge dice when it's necessary. Any GM can be too lenient or too strict, whether or not he hides his dice rolls, but at least hiding them lets him create a more appropriate outcome if he has to.

 

Ishil

[Mad Jack]

If the DM screwed up (and mistaking an encounter power for something else is a big whoops), and he's willing to give you the chance to do it over... I say go for it.

 

He's giving you the option to handle the situation as your group sees fit, so take advantage of that chance.

 

A fair TPK is a fair TPK, but the fight didn't go down the way it was supposed to.

 

Go back and play it through again as a fair fight. If you still get your butt kicked, then it's the party's fault rather than the DM's, lol.

[Shakandara]

The people that I've run games for would tell you that I'm probably an expert on the subject of TPKs. Despite that, I don't have a rep as a "killer GM". I push my players to the limits to challenge them whenever possible. Sometimes things go bad for them under these circumstances. Although there has been only one true TPK in my home campaign (running about 5 years now), there have been several other instances where they've come close. Each time, I provided them with an in-game "out" for their characters. If the TPK was my fault (due to an encounter being a little more powerful than I anticipated), I'd make the situation more lenient - perhaps someone in their past came across their bodies and felt inclined to do something about it based off of an old favor owed. If they players made poor decisions that prompted the TPK, then I make it harder to come back, but still offer solutions (in my campaign world, resurrections are very exspensive, so the person performing it might want a service in return). In either circumstance, these often lead to new opportunities for adventures.

 

It would seem somewhat silly to me to simply replay the encounter as if it had never happened, or ingore it entirely. But since your GM seems to have made an error in running the encounter, perhaps he can work in a new storyline that involves the PCs returning to life and taking them back to that encounter again, this time looking for some payback.

 

~v