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woodenbandman
2010-12-21, 05:49 PM
So suppose the PCs go from level 1 to level 20. At around level 6 or so they become privy to a world-spanning plot to destroy Heaven and invade it with demons or something like that. They fight through dungeons, armies, cities, and into the mouth of hell itself, they defeat legions of demons, and they meet the final boss... who kills all of them after a long-fought battle.

Now, assuming that the battle was a fairly difficult challenge and the dice fell in the way that the PCs lost, and they weren't Destined to lose from the start, what do you do? Do you retcon it and give them a do-over? Or do you treat this as the beginning of a new campaign?

Is victory the only acceptable outcome to a long campaign?

EDIT: by the way, this is all completely hypothetical.

shadow_archmagi
2010-12-21, 05:50 PM
Depends on the party!

AslanCross
2010-12-21, 05:56 PM
If the players feel really bad about it, I'd probably let them do that encounter again, though with the disclaimer that I have to make the boss somewhat stronger to make up for them knowing its tricks.

On the other hand, being ready for an epic ending, even if it is sad, can become a memorable story. I'm pretty sure there are great stories where the hero doesn't make it.

Perhaps the success or failure in a campaign shouldn't be based entirely on a single fight, but on what the PCs have done all throughout the campaign. Stopping the BBEG's doomsday device is saving the world; killing the BBEG is just giving him his just desserts.

Reynard
2010-12-21, 05:57 PM
So suppose the PCs go from level 1 to level 20. At around level 6 or so they become privy to a world-spanning plot to destroy Heaven and invade it with demons or something like that. They fight through dungeons, armies, cities, and into the mouth of hell itself, they defeat legions of demons, and they meet the final boss... who kills all of them after a long-fought battle.

Now, assuming that the battle was a fairly difficult challenge and the dice fell in the way that the PCs lost, and they weren't Destined to lose from the start, what do you do? Do you retcon it and give them a do-over? Or do you treat this as the beginning of a new campaign?

Is victory the only acceptable outcome to a long campaign?

It all depends on the way they lose. If they're all hit by no-save-you-die spells during the final combat, then yeah that's not a good way to end. The same if they're killed by mooks because of bad dice rolls.

If the final battle is a long, hard, tension filled fight, filled with drama, heroics, and other such business, and if the PCs would be happy to die trying to put whatever dent they can into the BBEG's plan so that someone else has more chance against him, then there's no problem.

druid91
2010-12-21, 05:57 PM
Have them become ghosts.

There actions seem like they would have set back the baddies for a while. The heroes use this time to find a worthy heir to their strength. Then have them make plucky young kids who are remarkably like younger versions of the heroes. Each gets a ghost version of the original for an advisory/cohort, as well as 3/4 of the originals ability.

CarpeGuitarrem
2010-12-21, 05:59 PM
On the other hand, being ready for an epic ending, even if it is sad, can become a memorable story. I'm pretty sure there are great stories where the hero doesn't make it.

Perhaps the success or failure in a campaign shouldn't be based entirely on a single fight, but on what the PCs have done all throughout the campaign. Stopping the BBEG's doomsday device is saving the world; killing the BBEG is just giving him his just desserts.
Good stuff here.

Another thing to keep in mind.

Make sure that the characters' defeat isn't the players' defeat as well. The players have expectations and goals, and while tragedy comes around when those goals can't be met, make sure that those expectations and goals aren't entirely crushed.

You could even make a promise. Maybe their weapons get sealed and preserved upon their deaths, so that the Big Bad can't touch them. Those weapons have been tailored to destroy the Big Bad, waiting for another band of heroes to recover and wield....

New campaign hook, anyone?

Oracle_Hunter
2010-12-21, 06:02 PM
Defeat is certainly a proper end for a campaign. The trick is to make it a defeat the Players are happy with.

Provided it's not a TPK, ask the survivors what they do in the epilogue. Everyone likes a chance to narrate an ending to a big ol' campaign - even if it's a Bad End.

If the Players are really sore about losing (unlikely, but possible) say "well, that story is over. Would you be interested in trying to Right What Was Wrong in another game?" If the Players really care about the original campaign, they'll probably pep right up.

The only unacceptable ending is one where the Players had no say in the final outcome.

nedz
2010-12-21, 06:03 PM
My first two long running campaigns both ended when the party (different players BTW) chickened out of the final confrontation with the BBEG. Psychlogical victory for the bad guys I suppose.

I had another one end when the party jumped into a Disintigration Chamber and pressed the button. After they all made their saves they tried again: TPK. Apparently they were convinced it was a teleportation chamber, they weren't even under any kind of threat.

Campaigns have a lifespan and they end how they end. Final PC defeat or victory are unimportant, what matters (IMHO) is their integrity in closure.

Funkyodor
2010-12-21, 06:10 PM
We had a similar situation, and the DM had a novel solution. He passed out some low level NPC sheets and we started playing differient characters that had memory flashes of another life, our defeated PC lives. After we helped drive off some low level bandits, we remembered who we were. Loki intervened and offered us another chance. Same original races & stats, levels, not alot of gear, but one key difference. We were in the past, before the big bad got real powerful, but he still had all his henchmen. We decided to confront the big bad and all his henchmen before he got super powerful because we knew where they would be. The place our original characters first experienced him. We went, most of us were victorious, and after reading the DM's notes we realized why Loki would do this. It diminished the experiences of our original characters whose deities received lesser souls when they eventually died. After Loki brought us back, he got our souls. Part of the bargain he didn't tell us. It was a good "retcon" that wasn't.

woodenbandman
2010-12-21, 06:18 PM
An idea: What if they (the PCs) all died, but their goals were accomplished. Say, for instance, the army of heaven came in after them and destroyed the demon guy, and instead of them becoming heroes, they become legends.

I guess death doesn't necessarily equal defeat.

Akal Saris
2010-12-21, 06:20 PM
That's a really cool idea that your DM had, Funky! I like it a lot =)

Personally, I think that PC defeat is an acceptable end to a campaign as long as the PCs enjoyed it.

I'm running a D&D 3.5 game right now that the PCs know is headed towards their oblivion. It's set in the past of our shared campaign world, where the PCs were witness to (and partly responsible for) the near-instantaneous destruction of a city amid a horrible undead invasion. In that game, the PCs were level 14 or so, while in this one they are level 1's who are just discovering the evil overlord's plots as they pursue a typical low-level quest. Meanwhile all of them are having weird psychic trauma moments or seeing visions from the future, and each day in-game moves the counter one day closer towards Doomsday (now 11 days away!).

I'm curious what the PCs will do when it gets close enough - will they stay to try and fight the BBEG and prevent the catastrophe, or try to flee the city?

druid91
2010-12-21, 06:26 PM
Also I would like to say that, unless your adventurer happens to be immortal, an awesome death is usually more memorable than the "Fading away" of old age.

Frozen_Feet
2010-12-21, 06:42 PM
Short answer to the topic tittle: YES!

Long, tangentially related rant:

I come from Gykaxian line of GMs - I rarely hold any investment towards any particular ending. I don't assume or expect PC success - they aren't there to lose, but they aren't there to win either. I don't fudge rolls for the players. If dice tell a character is going to die, the character will die.

This, I've made clear to my players as well. I tend for heavy use of improvization and randomization - as such, I'm often as clueless about what's going to happen as my players.

As a result, I've managed to kill PCs completely by accident. One memorable example happened when using a pre-made module, which I hadn't read through beforehand. One of the players fell into a river, and failed his save to clutch hold of the bank. I told him "oh well, your character will likely float to the ocean. We'll continue his story on your next turn." After going through a round with the other players, I resumed that character's fate and looked where the river was taking him. A quick check to the map told the river went through several rooms, but overview of said rooms said nothing about a chance to get out of the stream. When I got to the last one, it said "the banks are made of solid metal, too smooth and high to grab a hold off. The river flows to a pit of lava."

Lava? Oops.

Occasionally, these kinds of things end with someone watching others adventure from the sidelines, and likely not having much fun. However, this hasn't proven to be detrimental to my group or games, quite the opposite! Tangible threat of failure has made my players think much more of their actions and feel for their characters more; in addition, they're used to "Bad endings" and can draw enjoyment from both victories and losses.

Of course, part of the reason why this has gone over so well with my group is because my current group is very new to the hobby - they don't have preconcieved notions about how "everyone should have fun" or "how DMs and players should work to build a story together". In could say they haven't been "spoiled" by prior lenience.

Crow
2010-12-21, 06:50 PM
I believe that PC defeat is acceptable, yes, when the PC's bring it upon themselves. Our most recent (level 1-10) campaign ended in such a way. The BBEGirl was using her influence as a member of the royal family to rally nobles to an evil cause. So when the PC's finally discovered proof that the BBEGirl was really an imposter (who murdered the actual noble), they said (and I quote);

"Well that's really nice, but there isn't really anything we can do with this information right now."

So maybe I am a bad DM, and this isn't enough to get a player's gears turning, but I would expect it would trigger *something*. Instead, they seemed to be waiting for me to spoon-feed the next quest to them.

So I decided that their inaction led to the BBEGirl succeeding in her plans, and we switched over to our other (concurrent) epic campaign.

druid91
2010-12-21, 06:50 PM
Short answer to the topic tittle: YES!

Long, tangentially related rant:

I come from Gykaxian line of GMs - I rarely hold any investment towards any particular ending. I don't assume or expect PC success - they aren't there to lose, but they aren't there to win either. I don't fudge rolls for the players. If dice tell a character is going to die, the character will die.

This, I've made clear to my players as well. I tend for heavy use of improvization and randomization - as such, I'm often as clueless about what's going to happen as my players.

As a result, I've managed to kill PCs completely by accident. One memorable example happened when using a pre-made module, which I hadn't read through beforehand. One of the players fell into a river, and failed his save to clutch hold of the bank. I told him "oh well, your character will likely float to the ocean. We'll continue his story on your next turn." After going through a round with the other players, I resumed that character's fate and looked where the river was taking him. A quick check to the map told the river went through several rooms, but overview of said rooms said nothing about a chance to get out of the stream. When I got to the last one, it said "the banks are made of solid metal, too smooth and high to grab a hold off. The river flows to a pit of lava."

Lava? Oops.

Occasionally, these kinds of things end with someone watching others adventure from the sidelines, and likely not having much fun. However, this hasn't proven to be detrimental to my group or games, quite the opposite! Tangible threat of failure has made my players think much more of their actions and feel for their characters more; in addition, they're used to "Bad endings" and can draw enjoyment from both victories and losses.

Of course, part of the reason why this has gone over so well with my group is because my current group is very new to the hobby - they don't have preconcieved notions about how "everyone should have fun" or "how DMs and players should work to build a story together". In could say they haven't been "spoiled" by prior lenience.

You sound like an awesome DM. Sometimes you don't need to make an awesome story. Sometimes all that needs to happen is monsters be slain and PCs be eaten.

And epic deaths are so much more satisfying if you earn them.

Jack_Simth
2010-12-21, 06:54 PM
So suppose the PCs go from level 1 to level 20. At around level 6 or so they become privy to a world-spanning plot to destroy Heaven and invade it with demons or something like that. They fight through dungeons, armies, cities, and into the mouth of hell itself, they defeat legions of demons, and they meet the final boss... who kills all of them after a long-fought battle.

Now, assuming that the battle was a fairly difficult challenge and the dice fell in the way that the PCs lost, and they weren't Destined to lose from the start, what do you do? Do you retcon it and give them a do-over? Or do you treat this as the beginning of a new campaign?
Honest TPK in a tough fight? Reasonable (if unwelcome) way to end a campaign. Fast Forward a large amount of time, and you have a post-apocolyptic campaign setting to work with.

If a PC or two retreated and survived, check:
Did the loss of that exact fight mean the BBEG reached his goal?
Yes: you fast forward a few hundred/thousand years, figure out some consequences to the game world of how it went, and start a new campaign there, where you're plucky young adventurers overthrowing the regime (almost nobody actually wants to destroy everything, seeing as how they live there, so there's usually going to be something after to work with).
No: Then you ask the surviving if they'd be gathering allies for another go at it. If yes, great! The players for the dead PC's roll up new characters (a level or two lower), and answer an ad to save the world. If not, oh well, go with 'yes' above, or a completely independent campaign.
Is victory the only acceptable outcome to a long campaign?Not if you're honest.

Callista
2010-12-21, 07:03 PM
Yes, you should allow the PCs to be defeated. But I would suggest you should always give the PCs a way to take the enemy down with them. This is, after all, the end of the campaign; and you want a good story just as much as you want honesty. If you can give them an item that'll just nuke everything around, the last man standing is bound to use it if the only alternative is a TPK. (A command-word triggered contingent spell that kills the caster and everything within a thousand feet should work. Something with the flavor of Exalted Fury, only more useful.) A pyrrhic victory is just so much better than a TPK--you don't mind that the PCs are dead, because so is the BBEG.

Of course, there's nothing that says you can't bring in a new party to try to succeed where the first group failed. On many occasions, the kind of evil that takes level-20 PCs to bring down is the kind of evil people start to believe can't even be resisted. A group of PCs striking a blow--despite their failure--is enough to inspire others to get off their butts and give it a try.

Trekkin
2010-12-21, 07:03 PM
In my experience, defeat is a matter of degree, and the best endings come from defeats and failures just that little bit less complete than expected.

960 villagers at Masada.
300 Spartans at Thermopylae(and 10000 other guys, but the point remains).
3 astronauts on Apollo 13.

The point is that if you want PC defeat to be good, leave them an out. Drop the net on them, yes, have all the doors and windows seal and the BBEG start crowing at them about how they're all doomed--and make sure he exaggerates. Then trust their desperation to find a way out. Whether it succeeds or fails, they still proved him/her wrong about their fate and won compared to the expectations of the game world. THAT makes it not only acceptable, but enjoyable: that little 'but' to which the players can point and say that even if they didn't win, they were pretty cool to get this far.

The only RPG example I can think of that isn't a long, rambling story is the short story at the front of SR4 Core. The run fails, people die, and in the end no one really wins, but the runners get just the tiniest hint of a win out of it at the end.

Grelna the Blue
2010-12-21, 07:10 PM
I can tell you what I did in a similar instance about 20 years ago. My campaign had been going something over a year but was going to end in only 5-6 months anyway (people were going to be graduating and moving on) so there wasn't really time to start over. The party shouldn't even have fought the BBEG in the first place. He was a Sauron type who they'd decided to attack head on (against GM advice, I might add).

When I realized that no matter what I did they were determined to go the distance (despite a number of strong hints) and I foresaw a campaign-ending TPK in their near future, I had to come up with something. So I thought back to the time the party mage had on his own initiative approached and volunteered his services to a superpowerful and not very nice NPC (a Khelben Blackstaff type but Soul Shifted into an Efreet Lord body) with no love for the BBEG. It had been several levels before and at the time I'd just had the low level mage "adjusted" so that he was no longer capable of seeing/finding the wizard's tower, but I realized I could use that incident to retcon the party's motivation and keep the campaign going.

I decided that the party would never have decided of its own accord to do something this stupid and suicidal if it had not been influenced by an outside force, namely the NPC. Not only that, the NPC had given the party mage a Succor item that would teleport him in once the party had gotten close to the BBEG. However, he'd warded the item from protection and made the mage forget he had it.

The party finally awoke, far too late, to the huge mistake they'd made, but they were already within the enemy's keep on the Demiplane of Shadow. No BBEG worth his salt would have just let them get out alive at that point. And it was then, while they were talking about retreat, that the mage said he suddenly "had a feeling" they should keep going. He'd never had "feelings" before, so they continued on and when they faced the BBEG there were a few very short rounds of combat (which actually went a bit better for them than I had thought they would because I'd forgotten they still had a scroll of Protection from Magic) before it all started going south. At that point, the mage suddenly "remembered" that he had an item that would help.

It was still a TPK, as the titanic battle between the two spellcasters leveled the place. However, at the beginning of the next session the party awoke. They'd been in stasis in an extradimensional space, which was now about to collapse. With them was a message stating that they'd been most useful tools and hence had been rewarded with renewed life and some magic items, but now knew too much and were being placed where they could do no harm. When they escaped the extradimensional pocket, they found themselves on another world, with a sun the apparent size and color of a blood orange directly overhead.

They eventually discovered that this was their own world some 200,000 years in the future, in the 81st Age of Men (their own time had been the 3rd Age, said ages being the epochs between the infrequent occasions of the near-destruction of humanity by the gods). Although the Dark Sun setting had not yet been released, when it was I joked about my game being monitored, as the similarities were truly uncanny.

This allowed the campaign to continue until people graduated, but simultaneously warned the players not to get too cocky overconfident with BBEGs again. They had a lot of fun in the future, despite the fact that most of the time they had to hide their vast fortune of metal gear (weapons, armor, tent stakes) to avoid armies marching just to get it. I don't know how much of that specific example, if any, could be adapted to someone else's campaign, but picture this:

After a party's defeat at the hands of a BBEG they could awake in a grim and distant future to find that a Wish or Miracle scroll or a godly boon had been expended to retrieve/revive the only group of heroes that had ever come close to hurting the BBEG in the hopes that they might succeed, if only given one more chance.

Anxe
2010-12-21, 07:13 PM
It happened in my last campaign. The PCs lost more due to infighting than the final BBEG, but they lost nonetheless. We decided it was still a fitting end to the campaign. The consequences of their failure affected my campaign world and now they have to deal with the son of the BBEG in the next campaign. The loss gave the players a meaningful connection to my campaign world almost as much as a victory would. The next campaign will have an element of payback for them in it.

Ernir
2010-12-21, 07:14 PM
I sure hope it's acceptable. I'm running a campaign right now that has gone from 1-16 so far, and I have no idea how it's going to end. They might die, they might kill the BBEG, and the world might end.
Which means how many possibilities? :smalleek:

Answer: 8 that I can see!
The PCs die, they manage to kill the BBEG, but the world ends anyway.
The PCs die, they manage to kill the BBEG, but they manage to save the world.
The PCs die, they don't manage to kill the BBEG, the world ends. Ouch.
The PCs die, they don't manage to kill the BBEG, but they do manage to save the world.
The PCs don't die, they manage to kill the BBEG, but the world ends anyway.
The PCs don't die, they manage to kill the BBEG, and they manage to save the world. Whoo! \o/
The PCs don't die, they don't manage to kill the BBEG, and the world ends.
The PCs don't die, they don't manage to kill the BBEG, but they manage to save the world.
I think the players are doing their best to end up with #6, but I don't think any of the possibilities is unacceptable unless I somehow make it unfun.

pendell
2010-12-21, 07:20 PM
I'm not as tough as some of those here; but I agree with the consensus; losing IS an acceptable campaign outcome.

I have little experience, but I would prefer to modify my style depending on the players. If we're learning a new gaming system, or playing with young kids, maybe putting them in Tomb of Horrors and playing it dead-straight isn't appropriate.

OTOH, if you're prepping for a tournament or if you're playing with highly skilled players who want a challenge, why hold back?

But even when I'm being nice, I'm still willing to kill the characters and end the game in utter, total defeat. It's not a game if there's no possibility of losing. If the player's achievements are to have any meaning, there must be the possibility of failure.

So losing must be on the table at all times. If the characters are guaranteed to win, what's the point of putting any effort into the game at all? Just sit back and let the plot train carry you to inevitable victory.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

Eldariel
2010-12-21, 07:21 PM
Well, theater was basically founded upon two types of plays: Tragedies about rulers, heroes and overall people of stature; and comedies of simple folk. As such, I find a tragic end to an epic story all the more fitting. So in my books, defeat is definitely fine. Maybe even preferable, as long as it was epic and worthy of a song.

MickJay
2010-12-21, 07:21 PM
One GM I know had the party (in WoD, Werewolf game) bringing about the Apocalypse (which the players thought they were going to prevent). They were given a prophecy at the beginning which explained what has to happen before the Apocalypse can occur, and during an over year of gaming, one way or another, they actually contributed to some of these things happening, as well as made the final move themselves, and only realized that when the hell was (literally) breaking loose. The final step was, of course, killing of the BBEG (they missed the clues indicating that his death would be a bad thing). Definitely a memorable end of a gripping campaign. :smallbiggrin:

kyoryu
2010-12-21, 07:57 PM
Depends on the game, I'd say.

If you're playing a more narrative-based game, where the PCs have effectively had plot armor the whole time, stripping them of that plot armor for the final confrontation may be a bit... abrupt?

For a more sandboxy- or worldy- type game, it's absolutely fine. In those types of games, character success is generally never assured, and character death/failure is generally a much more likely possibility throughout the campaign, anyway. At the extreme of old-school, players may have multiple characters anyway, so the loss of a party isn't even really the "end" of the campaign.

It's really all about what expectations you've set for the players.

prufock
2010-12-21, 08:41 PM
One option that I'm going to attempt in the upcoming end to one of my campaigns is a conditional defeat. That is, give them a choice; neither choice has a wholly good nor wholly bad outcome.

In any boss fight there may be losses, so even success is not necessarily unmarred. Should you have a TPK or otherwise? If it's awesome, yes, if it's lame, no. Follow the philosophy of "do it for the story."

HalfTangible
2010-12-21, 08:47 PM
Start a second compaign that begins shortly after the TPK, in a world where the demons and devils succeeded. The heroes then work to save any surviving celestials and bring the devils/demons down.

0Megabyte
2010-12-21, 08:58 PM
Is PC defeat acceptable?

Yes. If it's awesome. If it's fun, or fitting. This question doesn't seem, to me, to count the situation where the PC's die in the course of completing their plan, or sacrifice themselves to save the world, or die one by one the way many stories tend to go.

But dying in battle against the villain, just totally losing? Yes... if it's done right.

Tengu_temp
2010-12-21, 09:49 PM
"Oops, you died during a fight you were supposed to win, game over" is one of the most disappointing letdowns that can happen during a game. If the death of the PCs doesn't feel like it still accomplished something, or at least dramatic and tragic, if it doesn't create an ending to the story the players are satisfied with - then you, the DM, did poorly. You might have made something everyone will enjoy, and ended up with a table filled with disappointed players instead.

I don't believe in stuff like "an honest DM will let a PC die if that's how the dice roll" or "sometimes you win, sometimes you lose", and especially not "earn your right to have fun". This is roleplaying, not a video game. It's about storytelling first and foremost.

true_shinken
2010-12-21, 09:55 PM
I don't believe in stuff like "an honest DM will let a PC die if that's how the dice roll" or "sometimes you win, sometimes you lose", and especially not "earn your right to have fun". This is roleplaying, not a video game. It's about storytelling first and foremost.
While I agree with this, the death of PCs makes for a very good downer ending and is a nice spark for a new campaign as well.

Grelna the Blue
2010-12-21, 09:57 PM
"Oops, you died during a fight you were supposed to win, game over" is one of the most disappointing letdowns that can happen during a game. If the death of the PCs doesn't feel like it still accomplished something, or at least dramatic and tragic, if it doesn't create an ending to the story the players are satisfied with - then you, the DM, did poorly. You might have made something everyone will enjoy, and ended up with a table filled with disappointed players instead.

I don't believe in stuff like "an honest DM will let a PC die if that's how the dice roll" or "sometimes you win, sometimes you lose", and especially not "earn your right to have fun". This is roleplaying, not a video game. It's about storytelling first and foremost.

It is a legitimate and very defensible viewpoint that the end of a campaign should not be determined solely by the random roll of the dice. However, what if the PCs lose the epic final fight because they drop the ball with poor planning and/or tactics? If the story requires that the heroes literally cannot lose, no matter how much they blunder, the players will sense it and most will feel cheated. Failure has to be an option in at least some circumstances or player choices ultimately mean nothing.

Eldariel
2010-12-21, 10:02 PM
I don't believe in stuff like "an honest DM will let a PC die if that's how the dice roll" or "sometimes you win, sometimes you lose", and especially not "earn your right to have fun". This is roleplaying, not a video game. It's about storytelling first and foremost.

Fun is too subjective to categorize or to really make any categorical statements regarding fun, in my humble opinion. Different people care about completely different things and what one considers a great game can be a yawnfest to another. What I will ask though is "Is the ending as fulfilling if you knew you were gonna win all along?" And as a corollary, how else to make the ending feel earned and fulfilling than with the chance of failure to go with it? And honestly, a defeat can be just as fulfilling and epic as a victory. I find it's the manner of defeat or victory that matters, not the outcome itself.

Tengu_temp
2010-12-21, 10:16 PM
While I agree with this, the death of PCs makes for a very good downer ending and is a nice spark for a new campaign as well.

Those are examples of salvaging the ending in order to make it not disappointing. Something a good DM does to make sure his players will enjoy the game after all.


It is a legitimate and very defensible viewpoint that the end of a campaign should not be determined solely by the random roll of the dice. However, what if the PCs lose the epic final fight because they drop the ball with poor planning and/or tactics? If the story requires that the heroes literally cannot lose, no matter how much they blunder, the players will sense it and most will feel cheated. Failure has to be an option in at least some circumstances or player choices ultimately mean nothing.

I've never actually seen the PCs make a ridiculously bad tactical mistake, something they can't recover from. But, to answer your question: not everyone plays RPGs as tactical games where you have to always use the right strategies, be absolutely prepared and think three turns ahead of the enemy. "They made a blunder, so they deserve to lose!" is this kind of videogame-like thinking that I avoid in my campaigns. None of my players seem to be disappointed so far.


What I will ask though is "Is the ending as fulfilling if you knew you were gonna win all along?"

Honestly? If it's an epic and great ending, then yes. I don't mind railroading if it leads to awesomeness.

Eldariel
2010-12-21, 10:49 PM
Honestly? If it's an epic and great ending, then yes. I don't mind railroading if it leads to awesomeness.

Hm. So you do not derive satisfaction out of success?

Tengu_temp
2010-12-21, 10:59 PM
I don't play RPGs to win.

ShneekeyTheLost
2010-12-21, 11:28 PM
Let me tell you an ending in a PC death that I ran in a game of mine once.

Okay, so the party was around level 18. The plot had come nigh. The almost-a-god BBEG is ascending to godhood, and must be stopped at all costs.

The 'leader' of the party was a Paladin/Warpriest who charged gloriously into battle to right wrongs, for truth, justice... you know the type.

Well, I figured I would wake the party up that the 'kid gloves' had come all the way off, and fired off a Save or Die at the paladin. I figured he could only fail on a natural one, but it would warn the party that they'd better raise defenses before continuing, which was what the BBEG was wanting, because it would give him the time to do Bad Things.

Well, the paladin rolled a 1.

The player was all but dashed. His character knocked out by a lousy roll of the die, and unable to participate in the battle we had literally been building towards for four years of weekend gaming sessions.

So I take him aside, and do some improv roleplay

Okay, the scene goes dark, absolute blackness, a complete void. Then you see a spark of light. As it approaches, you realize that you are the one moving, because it is a gateway. Standing in the gateway is Heironious himself.

"Noble hero, you have done well. You have truly upheld the virtues in your heart, in thought word and deed. Unlike many before you, though you were tempted, you did not give in to worldly vices, and striven in every way to be an example for all.

Now is the time for your reward for you lifetime of sacrifice and virtue. Come, noble one, you may now rest."

He got the idea, and hammed it up properly

"But lord, my friends still need me! On the very hour of darkness, in their very hour of need, I have abandoned them! Please, I ask not for myself, for I do not crave worldly things, but for my friends, and for the entire world, let me face this one final challenge before I come back!"

"Do you know what you ask, young man? You ask me to make an exception in the very laws that bind the cosmos. The laws governing life and death are not so easily put aside."

"I ask not that they be put aside, but just for an hour's time, let me return as your chosen champion as a beacon of light shining to defeat the darkness, before I come back to you."

"Very well, but you must return once you are done, for the cosmic laws are not easily bent, even for one such as myself. No means of resurrection shall you accept, once you accept this. On your honor, swear it."

"I swear it by my honor, just give me this last chance to defeat the true darkness."

So I cobble up an impromptu template giving him immunity to death effects, negative levels, stat damage or drain, and a few other things.
Then we go back to the room, where the other players were shocked to see his you-know-what eating grin.

"A flash of purest light bursts from where the paladin fell, and there he stands once again. Only now, he seems to literally glow with an inner light which seems to be shining from every pore of his body."

As the fight goes on, he charges up, and kills the BBEG with his own sword.

Me: Okay, describe it for us, you backed up a critical, I'm gonna let you run with this one. Yes, you kill him.

Him: I plunge my blade through his chest, then pins him down against the altar he had erected, the altar cracking from the force as the blade goes hilt-deep. Then he stands, observes his surroundings with a beautific smile, salutes, and falls over.

Cleric: Crap, must have been some kind of Delay Death effect... quick, Raise Dead!

Him: No effect. The spirit is not willing to come back.

And so the tale of the noble hero bravely gave is life to save the world from blackest peril. Bards sang of his heroic deeds, and his name shall be synonymous with valor throughout history.

The next campaign I wrote actually had his character in it as an important historical figure, the place where he slew the godling-wannabe was a hallowed shrine which every paladin-candidate must make a pilgrimage to before earning his paladinhood.

Now THAT, my friends, is how you make a PC death truly epic.

Besides, remember the sequel to The Gamers started with a TPK? New heroes hear about the fall of brave people, and seek to investigate. And the cycle continues, with perhaps a bit more intellect this time.

Eldariel
2010-12-22, 12:08 AM
I don't play RPGs to win.

Does that make success any less rewarding though?

kyoryu
2010-12-22, 12:55 AM
I don't believe in stuff like "an honest DM will let a PC die if that's how the dice roll" or "sometimes you win, sometimes you lose", and especially not "earn your right to have fun". This is roleplaying, not a video game. It's about storytelling first and foremost.

Well, that's one way to play. If it's about heroes in a world, rather than characters in a story, it's a different situation.

Keep in mind that I was one of the first to say that the sudden removal of plot armor may not go over well....

aart lover
2010-12-22, 01:09 AM
it really depends. if it's Total Party Annihilation then i would do this whole drawn out plot arc about how they fare in their respective afterlives(still keeping in contact...somehow 0.o), then maybe have them resurrected by a family member or something. if only a few or most party members died, i would do this whole plot sequence thing about what the remaining are doing now, and how they remember the other members and stuff, maybe even doing some stuff in their honor or something. only to be anticlimactically rezzed XD

Gullintanni
2010-12-22, 07:44 AM
One of my campaigns ended on a TPK. A great war was about to take place in my world as the nations occupying the far reaches of the world would meet and do battle.

All five nations knew of an artifact that would permit them to gain absolute dominion over the other nations assuming they could possess it. The party had managed to sneak it away and were on a quest to place it an amplifier, that would allow its energies to reveal the future to all the soldiers fighting in the war. They would see that their war would break the world, and the suffering they would visit upon each other, which would cause them to lay down their arms en masse and desert the battlefield.

Unfortunately, my party was defeated in the dungeon that contained this amplifier. The dungeon itself was screened against divination, which meant that, having taken the artifact into it, it was now lost.

The epilogue revealed that the artifact would remain inaccessible. The leaders of the five nations were committed and they made their war, with the result that each of the five nations was so broken and beaten that they could afford to do no more than return home to nurse their wounds and try to hold onto their existing territories.

Millions had died, civilians and soldiers alike, but none of the nations could claim empire, so despite their deaths, the PC's had successfully buried the artifact and prevented tyranny.

My players were satisfied knowing that their actions had, at the very least, a substantial impact on the world's future. On the other side of the coin, it also meant that their death had meaning. And they got to roll up new characters in a sparsely populated, now broken world :P

Frozen_Feet
2010-12-22, 09:30 AM
"Oops, you died during a fight you were supposed to win, game over" is one of the most disappointing letdowns that can happen during a game.

The obvious solution is to not have fights the characters are supposed to win.

Even a TPK due to a random encounter is not a letdown if every fight is considered and accepted as potentially story altering.


If the death of the PCs doesn't feel like it still accomplished something, or at least dramatic and tragic, if it doesn't create an ending to the story the players are satisfied with - then you, the DM, did poorly. You might have made something everyone will enjoy, and ended up with a table filled with disappointed players instead.

I don't believe in stuff like "an honest DM will let a PC die if that's how the dice roll" or "sometimes you win, sometimes you lose", and especially not "earn your right to have fun". This is roleplaying, not a video game. It's about storytelling first and foremost.

But that depends on what kind of a story you're trying to tell!

There are different ways to approach RPGs as storytelling. One is "story as script", in which the players are filling in pre-determined roles and try to act them out in best way they can. Other is "story as result", where the story is the sum of player whim and random dice rolls, and really only exists after the game.

I prefer the second one much more than the first. It allows me to improvize more, saving time from excessive planning, and it gives much greater leeway for player choice and "going off the rails" when the rails don't have any set destination in the first place.

Finally, not every story is about epic heroes overcoming epic obstacles, and in my mind the PCs aren't always the main protagonists of the story, just their own lives. Sometimes, the PCs end up being the disposable evil mooks who are there to die by the blades of the real heroes - and I'm okay with that, since sometimes the story of the sidecharacters can be interesting as well.

bokodasu
2010-12-22, 09:58 AM
A bad ending is fine, as long as it's a valid ending. I'd rather have a TPK to the BBEG that results in 100 years of war than "You die, but it's ok! Keep attacking until you kill him!"

That epic paladin story above doesn't fall under this rule. That was superawesome, and had clear, dramatic consequences for the character. I mean "hey, free spawns until you win," which is just as boring as "you walk in, SuperFingerOfDeath, you all die."

It's not like heroic fantasy isn't full of temporary defeats. Look at Sauron! Did he let getting his finger chopped off stop him? No! He bided his time until he could rise again, and he made people pay for it. Or I guess you could look at Gandalf. If you wanted. Anyway. Defeat of heroic heroes inspiring a popular uprising, or a resistance movement that ultimately breeds the next generation of heroes is all over the place, and shouldn't be considered an off-limits ending to a campaign.

ShneekeyTheLost
2010-12-22, 10:26 AM
It's not like heroic fantasy isn't full of temporary defeats. Look at Sauron! Did he let getting his finger chopped off stop him? No! He bided his time until he could rise again, and he made people pay for it. Or I guess you could look at Gandalf. If you wanted. Anyway. Defeat of heroic heroes inspiring a popular uprising, or a resistance movement that ultimately breeds the next generation of heroes is all over the place, and shouldn't be considered an off-limits ending to a campaign.

Not only that, but it gives you an immediate follow-up campaign with new characters. Heck, it can even be super awesome cool, if you play it right.

"Okay, your characters that wiped last game? Yea, people were inspired by your fight, and have started a rebellion. Your old characters are now martyrs for a greater cause, and have caused rebels all over the nation to rise up and organize.

Your new characters will be young up and coming rebels, wanting to make a difference, and make sure that the memories of your old characters are never forgotten."

Now, how freeking cool is having one of your characters, one that you ended up getting killed no less, being a major plot point as a martyr for a rebel cause? The character now lives on in legacy in every session you play.

That's how a GM should handle TPK. The GM's job is not to hand the PC's everything, nor is it to ruthlessly wipe them out. The GM's job is to entertain the party. So if they TPK, your job as the GM is to make a situation they can enjoy out of it.

SamsDisciple
2010-12-22, 10:35 AM
I have never had a tpk to end the campaign but my most memorable PC's are the ones that died in epic fashion even if it wasn't by the bbeg. My first character to die was triple critted by a frost giant and while it really sucked to lose him like that the DM made it epic and now Hromngal the barbarian will remain as one of my favorite characters. My most recent character made an out of battle sacrifice that saved millions of lives, the DM warned me that even though we were going epic at the end of the session there would be no ressurection nor would my character even make it to heaven so it would be an absolute new character. I was ok with that because it was an epic end.

Saph
2010-12-22, 10:40 AM
The obvious solution is to not have fights the characters are supposed to win.

This.

One of the most common mistakes I see GMs making is trying to script too much. It very rarely works, because the whole point of a tabletop game is that the players have some freedom of action. If not, you might as well play a computer RPG instead - the graphics are better and you don't have to do any math.

I've never had a campaign end with the PCs being wiped out by the BBEG, but that's because I generally design the BBEG so that the PCs are capable of killing them. However, I also design the BBEG to be capable of killing the PCs. The usual result is that the BBEG goes down at the end of a long and lethal battle, killing several PCs in the process.

The_Admiral
2010-12-22, 10:50 AM
One GM I know had the party (in WoD, Werewolf game) bringing about the Apocalypse (which the players thought they were going to prevent). They were given a prophecy at the beginning which explained what has to happen before the Apocalypse can occur, and during an over year of gaming, one way or another, they actually contributed to some of these things happening, as well as made the final move themselves, and only realized that when the hell was (literally) breaking loose. The final step was, of course, killing of the BBEG (they missed the clues indicating that his death would be a bad thing). Definitely a memorable end of a gripping campaign. :smallbiggrin:

Did you just copy supernatural?

Grogmir
2010-12-22, 10:52 AM
I'm with those that agree its okay to end in 'defeat'. But not the literal meaning of it.

Its Okay to Kill PCs in the final battle - never should you try harder than the 'final battle'. But you should have cool 'post hum' stories lined up so the player doesn't feel like its a defeat.

Its Okay to TPK - but you must have a back up - I.e in a way the Story doesn't end. They get the chance to try again. (Lots of ways to do this already mentioned)

PC death is an acceptable way - defeat of immidient characters is okay - but expect / ensure you players carry on afterwards - otherwise it will leave a bad taste.

Roderick_BR
2010-12-22, 11:04 AM
It really depends. Your example scenario suggests a hardcore campaign, that the players should be aware they could fail, instead of a rail-roaded "rock falls, everyone dies" TPK, so I think it's valid, as long as the players accept it.
On the other hand, some players really hate to "lose" (even though they aren't supposed to be "fighting" the DM), so you should discuss with them the possibility of they dying before completing the mission, and if they are okay with it, or prefer a more tradicional game with better chances of beating the last boss.

Tengu_temp
2010-12-22, 11:07 AM
Does that make success any less rewarding though?

Success on its own is not rewarding. Having an awesome session is rewarding, and that often requires winning in order to feel satisfying. But not just winning - it must be backed up by an interesting story and characters, or else it feels hollow. Like a hard random encounter in Final Fantasy. You don't feel satisfied you won, you're just glad it's over.


There are different ways to approach RPGs as storytelling. One is "story as script", in which the players are filling in pre-determined roles and try to act them out in best way they can. Other is "story as result", where the story is the sum of player whim and random dice rolls, and really only exists after the game.

And I prefer the scripted approach, since it allows me to tell much more interesting, meaningful stories. If the players stir away from what you planned for them, just subtly nudge them back into the right direction or modify the story. It works really well.
The fact that I mostly play PbP might have something to do here - play a freeform PbP game and it bogs down as players discuss too much, act too little and are generally unsure what to do. But I doubt that it's the only factor.


One of the most common mistakes I see GMs making is trying to script too much. It very rarely works, because the whole point of a tabletop game is that the players have some freedom of action.

You say mistake, I say playstyle choice. Only the most railroad-crazy DMs take the freedom completely away from the players, most of them just restrict it. And I'd rather have limited freedom and an interesting story than a game where I can do anything, but it feels pointless.

Kiero
2010-12-22, 11:27 AM
If the PCs chose to stay and die, because it had some greater significance (such as every moment they held the line, people could get away or reinforcements had more time), then defeat can be awesome.

If they just got some unlucky rolls, sucky.

Gwillednt
2010-12-22, 11:32 AM
Just a question: Why would you ever want to play in a game where you know you can't die?

My group contains both extremes: One who sees the entirety of the game as a story and the people as heroes, another who wants to have complete freedom and is 100% tactics oriented... that being said, I've never even seen the former want to win all the time, especially if he makes mistakes.

As for: You shouldn't need to outthink the opponent to beat him, if you're really concerned about the story that should depend entirely on the opponent. You don't need to outhink the giant. It helps, but he usually doesn't have back up schemes.

If you let the PCs kill the archwizard using terrible tactics, you've made your story not believable (unless it was a one time fluke). But if they are constantly killing lawful evil wizards with back up plans with poor tactics, they weren't lawful evil wizards with back up plans. Players should be rewarded for using smart strategies, and not reinforced (I didn't say killed, necessarily) for not. maybe they need to flee because they realized "Whoops, this was really, really stupid."

In any event, my last campaign that last four years had two parties. The main party and the secondary group. The secondary groups last job was to off the three elite servants of the wizard. They failed, one got away, and the rest died. The main party who attacked the wizard, after a long gruesome battle, did win. I was able to formulate an excellent story from both: The wizard who died saw the destruction he wrought, and eventually came back as a Hellbred. He was my PC in the next campaign, and the DM who took over actual had the head of those three servants as the BBEG (Vampire monk) picking up the remnants of the wizard's empire.

It made for a great story, and it took both successes and failures to make happen. Constant sucess by the PCs just doesn't make for a believable story, to me, and it makes when they DO succeed all the bettter.

Saph
2010-12-22, 11:34 AM
You say mistake, I say playstyle choice. Only the most railroad-crazy DMs take the freedom completely away from the players, most of them just restrict it. And I'd rather have limited freedom and an interesting story than a game where I can do anything, but it feels pointless.

In my experience it's usually a mistake. By far the most common error I see GMs make (especially new ones) is to script too much, which works only as long as the players and the GM want exactly the same thing.

Tengu_temp
2010-12-22, 11:41 AM
Just a question: Why would you ever want to play in a game where you know you can't die?

Because for many people, it doesn't make the game any more fun. A campaign where you never lose no matter what has a high chance to become boring, but you can lose without dying. In fact, there are RPGs and campaigns with no combat and no possible ways to die unless you go out of your way to do so.


In my experience it's usually a mistake. By far the most common error I see GMs make (especially new ones) is to script too much, which works only as long as the players and the GM want exactly the same thing.

I actually noticed the opposite mistake way too often - a newbie DM throws the party into the world and tells them "do whatever you want" without any preset ideas for interesting plot hooks, the players are unsure what to do and the game dies. Heck, most of my old games were that way.

Kife
2010-12-22, 12:02 PM
It really depends on the campaign and players. I was running a campaign that ended much as you set up. We started at level 10 and leveled to 20 in the process of killing the evil warrior who was about to activate the McGuffin of Doom. The PC's were very over confident because they thought that it was the end of the game so they were going to spank him. The wizard prepared to do his standard Time-stop-3 delayed blast fireballs / bubble of force combo... but he had a 9 initiative... the highest in the party. Two teleporting assassins teleported adjacent to him and did about double his hit points on 10. And things went down hill from there.

I tried to hedge the bet in the favor of the PC's. Vladimyr, the BBEG, didn't even engage the PC's for five rounds till the assassins were dealt with. But eventually the players started griping and I just had to throw him in. Through bad luck and bone headed moves (the Mindblade, the luke skywalker of the group, seemed to think that because he was getting revenge for a slain lover he would just be given an automatic win.) The cleric also got moved away from the group and that dropped the barbarian. Finally it was a TPK and I had the leader of the adventurers incapacitated and watching as Vladimyr activated the Mc Guffin which sealed away the planes and rearranged to surface of the planet. Game over.

Or was it? One player wanted a do over, most blamed themselves. So I asked if they wanted to keep their characters or make new ones. Most wanted to keep their characters. Mr. Mindblade wanted something new. So... the leader wakes up in a mad scientist's laboratory. It's twenty years later and he's had his mind and soul imprinted on flesh golem of sorts. The scientist who made him says that Vladimyr has set himself up as leader of the world. The planes are sealed off and the scientist basically snatched his soul into the new body. The fighter was resurrected, stuck in an oubliette, and permanently maimed so his body had atrophied horribly. The wizard rerolled as his character's own daughter, a sorcerer. Everyone was level one and they resumed their fight to overthrow Vladimyr. (oh, and it was fourth edition too, but that was completely incidental).

I also tweaked the story. Originally Vladimyr was an evil guy through and through... but the PC's discovered that while Vladimyr killed millions, his actions staved off a divine confrontation between the upper and lower planes and that the world they were on had been created intentionally as a battlefield for their war. Worse, cultists and clerics for both sides were trying to tear him down and kick-start the war.... and the PC's found themselves in the uncomfortable position of working the tyrant they were attempting to overthrow.

ericgrau
2010-12-22, 12:36 PM
Depends on the party!

Pretty dang accurate for a simple answer. Well, this and the campaign. In most light hearted campaigns it's a bit anti-climatic and dull. "Game over, you lose, let's go play something else." In heavier campaigns it could be dramatic or possibly lead to the PCs rescue or replacement with new heroes to clean up the apocalypse the last group left for them.

kyoryu
2010-12-22, 01:33 PM
There are different ways to approach RPGs as storytelling. One is "story as script", in which the players are filling in pre-determined roles and try to act them out in best way they can. Other is "story as result", where the story is the sum of player whim and random dice rolls, and really only exists after the game.


I really, really like this way of differentiating between campaign types. I, too, prefer the second.

true_shinken
2010-12-22, 01:57 PM
I really, really like this way of differentiating between campaign types. I, too, prefer the second.

I find this a bit of an exaggeration. The best choice always seems to be 'use both' for me.
Total sandbox game lack focus and always seem boring to me.
Railroad plots lack freedom and also seem boring to me.

So I usually get an idea of what the bad guys are doing, have them make some plans, throw the players into the mix and see how it cooks up. Sometimes they make mistakes, sometimes they don't think their actions through, sometimes they achieve early victories. That's fine.

Both railroad and sandbox games have problems, so sticking completely to any one of them seems really foolish in my eyes.

Frozen_Feet
2010-12-22, 03:22 PM
Of course the best answer is "some middle ground" - that doesn't mean the division doesn't exist, or that one approach can't be more prominent than the other.

Also, in my opinion the division between "story as a result" and "story as a script" is not exactly the same as the line between linear (railroaded) and non-linear (sandbox) games.

A sandbox game with "story as script" would structurally be akin to videogames like Legend of Zelda or Grand Theft Auto - the characters are allowed to wander and do as they wish, but nothing "big" really happens without them; the main plot stals when the characters are not focusing on it, since the characters still have a set role in the story that no-one else will fullfil.

A railroad game with "story as result" would essentially be a tunnel, a string of encounters - with the difference being that there's no greater purpose to any of them, and all dramatic tension is supposed to emerge on whim and fixation of the players. Videogame equivalent would be something like Angband, where the only way forward is down and each level possesses no more specified challenge than "find next stairs down." The tension and "plot" is left on the hands of the player to create in his mad struggle against varied and dangerous but ultimately meaningless locations.

Non-game examples would of course be Improvized plays Vs. Scripted plays - obviously the former contains enough script to determine starting position for the actors, and latter contains improvization in forms of actors throwing stuff in to felsh out their roles, but there's still a clear difference in how the plot is structured and how it affects the course of the play.

valadil
2010-12-22, 03:31 PM
what do you do? Do you retcon it and give them a do-over? Or do you treat this as the beginning of a new campaign?


I would never retcon it. I've been in a number of retconned games and it always feels cheap. I remember the loss, not the victory.

Is there a reasonable way to save them? Maybe one of their patrons knew where they went and retrieved their bodies. Maybe the bad buy raised them so he could torture information out of them? Maybe you could play out whatever happened to them in the afterlife? Given that they're already at the mouth of hell, they don't have to go very far when they die. Or just send them back to heaven where the bad guy's armies have already gone.

Anyway, save them by pre-established means if you must. Don't make it a freebie though.

cattoy
2010-12-22, 03:41 PM
Sure. A glorious death is better than a hollow victory.

Every story needs an end, and if you can help to craft an epic end, then that's great, even if all the PCs are defeated/slain.

Take a look at the Road Warrior. Of all of the good guy combatants, only Max and the Gyro Captain survive, and their respective vehicles are broken. The bad guys have many working vehicles and more weapons, but what matters is that they didn't get what they were after. They won the battle but lost the war.

Gwillednt
2010-12-22, 03:46 PM
[QUOTE=Tengu_temp;10019922]Because for many people, it doesn't make the game any more fun. A campaign where you never lose no matter what has a high chance to become boring, but you can lose without dying. In fact, there are RPGs and campaigns with no combat and no possible ways to die unless you go out of your way to do so.


[QUOTE]

While that is true, I don't think we were talking about a campaign where combat isn't prevalent, making that point irrelevant to the OP.

ajkkjjk52
2010-12-22, 06:32 PM
Depends on the party!

And on the GM.

I once played in a campaign that had to end in a hurry because the GM was moving to another state. He threw an epic battle at us that was supposed to be a TPK, but through sheer luck of the dice, our Paladin doing some things that resulted in his fall, and a lot of epicness, we survived.

So then it turned out that the emperor of the realm had been colluding with the BBEG, and when we went to report the recently opened portal, we were arrested and sold into slavery.

To a lot of groups, this might have seemed a gimmicky, railroady ending, but the GM pulled it off in such a way that it seemed to flow naturally out of the game and even tie up a lot of plot threads. Even though lived out the last few months of our lives in slavery before the world was destroyed, it felt like a natural conclusion to what had been a gritty campaign, and was a heck of a lot better than the way most campaigns end, which is just trailing off when people don't have time to meet anymore.

DwarfFighter
2010-12-22, 07:04 PM
Is victory the only acceptable outcome to a long campaign?


Late arrival: Success is hollow without the risk of failure.

If the players will automatically succeed in defeating the villain, save the world and get the girl there is no point is making any dice rolls. It's a roll on the table:

1d100:
1-100: Player characters win

Quite frankly, I don't quite see the appeal of that.

On the other hand, the PCs didn't just step out of the In and straight into the end-fight with the main villain. They've endured hardship and dangers that have tested their skill and resolve many times during the course of the campaign, and the victories and sacrifices they have made along the way should count for something.

I know many GMs tend to include milestones of sorts in the campaign: By defeating the vassal baron of the villain they gain allies among the liberated peasantry. By stopping the rampaging orcs, the druids are able to heal the land and deny the forces of darkness their source of power. These milestone victories can of course improve the PCs chances of winning, but they can realistically add up sufficient "story points" that the final confrontation is something of a formality. Certainly both can be rewarding to the PCs.

But on the other hand, failing at such milestones should have its consequences: At the worst the PCs should struggle to even attain a "neutral" ending.

-DF

PS.: That being said, the end of the campaign shouldn't come down to a coin-toss... Well, it could: DM of the Ring (http://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=1293)

ffone
2010-12-22, 10:58 PM
So suppose the PCs go from level 1 to level 20. At around level 6 or so they become privy to a world-spanning plot to destroy Heaven and invade it with demons or something like that. They fight through dungeons, armies, cities, and into the mouth of hell itself, they defeat legions of demons, and they meet the final boss... who kills all of them after a long-fought battle.

Now, assuming that the battle was a fairly difficult challenge and the dice fell in the way that the PCs lost, and they weren't Destined to lose from the start, what do you do? Do you retcon it and give them a do-over? Or do you treat this as the beginning of a new campaign?

Is victory the only acceptable outcome to a long campaign?

EDIT: by the way, this is all completely hypothetical.

No.

Think about how many stories involve some Ancient Tale of a past hero or band of heroes who nearly defeated the Big Evil but narrowly failed. I'm sure tvropes.com has some name/entry for this; it's usually a plot device to motivate the current heroes / explain the villain's origin or motives or abilities / Worf Effect / make-it-personal for heroes (often one of the previous heroes was a father of the current hero; in fact Darth succumbing and Luke not succumbing is an example of this).

Sometimes you are that story. Sometimes you're Anakin in episode III and not Luke in VI.

Ormur
2010-12-22, 11:26 PM
I'd say so, I don't like running or playing games with scripted results. I expect the results to be something particular but there is no certainty, just as in life or in good novels. It doesn't always end well.

Of course the DM might have to intervene to make things more interesting, more dramatic, but always rigging things so that eventual victory is a given just ruins the feeling of accomplishment. My DM posted in this thread saying he had no idea how the campaign would end. We're up against overwhelming odds, the world might end, we might die but we've fought the BBEG in many epic battles. Almost every time we thought for sure it would be the end but we survived. If we loose next time it'll be because we entered willingly into a battle we couldn't win and refused to back down. That's maybe not the best result but it's still a damn good story. Knowing this success would be even sweeter.

If defeat or death is the result I'd prefer there to be some small consolation though, like seeing how things unravel or preserving the chance for a new beginning, a new campaign even.

Dark Kerman
2010-12-28, 05:39 PM
I quote the sourcebook Heroes Of Horrow with


UNHAPPY ENDINGS
In most campaigns, players tend to assume—usually with
good reason—that the end of the campaign is likely to be a
happy one. Certainly bad luck and the occasional Total Party
Kill (TPK) can interfere, but for the most part the end of the
story is more or less a triumphant one.
Throw this idea out the window for horror campaigns. The
story might end happily, the heroes having fi nally defeated
the great evil and freed their lands from whatever terrors
stalked them. On the other hand, the evil of the campaign
might be undefeatable. The campaign might end with the
PCs driven mad or overcome by taint. Perhaps they cannot
destroy the foul demonic entity but can only sacrifi ce their
lives to end the ritual calling it to the Material Plane.
An unhappy ending doesn’t mean the PCs must lose or die.
They can still have their victories and accomplishments—and
should have, in fact, if the players aren’t to feel frustrated or
ill used—but those victories need not be complete. Consider
a quest to retrieve a loved one from the clutches of a vampire
lord. The heroes fi nd her already undead, drained of life and
raised as a slave to their enemy. They can destroy her, freeing
her soul to travel on to the afterlife, but they cannot save her
completely. She is lost to them.
Depending on your players, you might choose to warn
them at the start of a horror campaign that the end might not be pleasant. Doing this runs the risk of ruining the impact
of the conclusion, and you need not do so if you feel your
players will enjoy a bittersweet or dark ending. If you aren’t
certain, however, it’s better to hint at what might come and be
sure they can handle it than risk anger and disappointment
later. Such a hint might reduce the power of the fi rst horror
campaign, but you can always run a second one without
advance warning once you know they’re amenable.

That's the official line of the source books. :P (Though bare in mind, this refers to horror campaigns especially).

SilverClawShift
2010-12-28, 06:49 PM
Personally, I would hate to live in a world where the spikes turn out to be foam rubber, and the danger is all smoke and mirrors. I would also hate to find out that our actions didn't matter, because there was a reset switch for when we mess up.

As a player, if our party dies/fails, then we should have to suck it up and take it. Though sometimes our DM does like to lay it on a little heavy. "You're dead. Your friends and family, dead. The cleric who found you bleeding out in the woods and healed you up? Died screaming. The woods are ash, the sky is black, the rain is sticky with blood. Your failu-" :smallfrown: stop we get it.

As a DM, if the players screw the pooch, I'd have the same stance. If they're early on in the story, I'll let them 'switch camera' to the REAL protagonists and get back in the game. If they're in the middle of the story, I would probably try to find some way to duct-tape the story back together without being too cheap.
If they were LATE in the game, I'd take a cue from my sadist DM and immediately plunge them into "WHATEVER EPIC STORY PART 2: Survival horror edition" and make them deal with the aftermath of the BBEGs plans. Born and raised in this crap sack world where all joy and hope is naught but a quiet whisper, and tragedy is the way of life.
Maybe they're ancestors of the main characters from way back when things went wrong, with one final chance to set things right. Or MAYBE they're just sad little puppets dancing on razor-wire strings and being forced to witness the fruit that the seeds of their failure has sown first hand...

Either way. If things can be reset, it's not actually a story. And if you can't lose, then it's not actually a game.