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View Full Version : When is Deus Ex Machina too much?



dethkruzer
2011-06-06, 05:15 AM
Okay, so I just DMed a good-aligned 3.5 game yesterday. The game is RP-heavy, but with some combat encounters. The party consists of the player, who is a CG Human Fighter/Swashbuckler /Tactical Soldier, an NPC Warforged sorcerer/reforged, and an NPC Synad Rogue/Psion.

In the game, I had to pull a deus Ex machina twice in order o avoid TPK.

The first one was in the first combat encounter of the game, the player and the Synad versus a lifeleech otyugh. The otyugh grappled both within the First round of combat, the synad was KOd by the end of the second round, and by the end of the third round, things were looking grim for the player. So what I did was bring in the warforged and gave it a scroll of Lightning bolt, saving the day.

The second case of DEM was when the party fell into a hole, where they were ambushed by a mindflayer, who was controlling a seven-headed cryohydra and a seven-headed pyrohydra. The encounter started with just the cryohydra, with the synad and player quickly flanking it. Two full attacks, a ray of enfeeblement, and a lucky critical the hydra was very dead. Next the mindflayer and other hydra appeared, the illithid opening up with as mindblast. The entire party failed the save, but I ended up dropping the DC of the mindblast by one, allowing the PC to save. The player made chunky salsa out of the hydra with another lucky critical. The mindflayer escaped.

So I'm asking, did I do the right thing in saving the party in this fashion?

PersonMan
2011-06-06, 05:58 AM
If everyone is having fun, yes.

There are some worries that, if the PC knows you're willing to fudge to leave him alive, that he may feel cheated out of real victories and get crazy because he thinks that there is no risk for him. However, if something like this isn't going to happen, it should be fine.

It really all boils down to 1 question: "Is it more fun* to save the PC than to let him die?"


*For him, too, of course.

Shadowknight12
2011-06-06, 06:05 AM
As said above totally depends on what your party thinks. If they would have preferred to die, you did wrong. If they're glad you used a DEM to save them, you did right.

Personally, I once had a shadow who was hilariously close to TPKing a party of six people twice its CR to suffer a Crushing Despair-like effect after seeing how easily defeated they were and made it go back to its crypt and sulk. That's the only time I had to use a blatant DEM to save the party's collective butts.

The party laughed, even if they had to spend the rest of the day heavily encumbered by their own clothes.

Cespenar
2011-06-06, 06:17 AM
All in all, you might want to bring less creatures with Save-or-suck (or die) abilities, and more creatures with high defense/overall beefiness, if you'd want to avoid having similar situations in the future.

And to answer the real question, fudging, as a Deus Ex Machina, is not inherently a good or bad thing. The most important thing is fun (fun is Serious Business). Whether you and your players get more fun from furthering the story or having no divine intervention in your battles is something you'd know.

Summary: A Deus Ex Machina is too much when you start having no fun.

dethkruzer
2011-06-06, 07:07 AM
I openly told the player that the Otyugh thing was a DEM because of two things: 1) I failed to read through the entire monster statblock before throwing it at 'em. 2) the darn thing kept rolling double digits with it's grapple checks, and I believe the player would enjoy making otyugh filets more than dying to a random monster roaming the sewers.

The hydra case was fudged, because while i kinda expoected the PC to fail the save, but the two NPCs also rolled badly. The pyrohydra was unscathed and un-debuffed, and would have mowed through the party in three rounds.

Also, based on our after-game chat, the player seemed to enjoy, and he seemed rather excited at the thought of starting the next session with some good old-fashion looting.

DontEatRawHagis
2011-06-07, 09:48 PM
Most of the time when I feel an encounter isn't going right its because I read something wrong. Sad thing is is that my players do as well and brings in an entirely new level arse-kicker-y for the players. I had a player who miss read a feat, giving him a higher AC than possible at level 1. Other times I had players who in 4e rolled saving throws and added + 13 to their saves.

I have never gotten the advantage in all the blunders I did. Some of my players are of the opinion that PCs should never die either. I know its not pretty, but I feel that death should always be on the table, even if it is unlikely.

Othniel Edden
2011-06-08, 08:03 PM
I have to say I'm quite pleased that the DEM was the warforged.

SilverClawShift
2011-06-08, 09:01 PM
You're the DM! There's no such things as a deus ex machina. It was all PART OF THE PLAN ALL ALONG HIT ANYONE WHO SAYS OTHERWISE WITH YOUR DMING BOOKS.

Arbitrarity
2011-06-08, 09:30 PM
On the other hand, when the situation is deliberately set up so that a pre-planned Deus Ex is NECESSARY, that's not good. I'm going to bring up my prototypical example.

Ended up in a "military" style campaign. I decided to play a fighter for entertainment, we had a semi-useful sorceress, and an Aristocrat.
With Leadership.

So most fights consisted of me wading into the front and brutally murdering low level orcs with spiked chain AOO's, while fireballs and arrow volleys got tossed around.
Then we spontaneously ended up fighting in a city for no apparent reason, I end up on DM fiat in the middle of a street, surrounded, with orcs TAKING 5 FT STEPS TO AVOID AOO'S.
Cue spontaneous cavalry rescue.

J.Gellert
2011-06-09, 05:05 AM
A Deus Ex Machina is also acceptable when it hurts a bit. Makes the players survive but feel the defeat, instead of buying them a cheap victory.

Ravens_cry
2011-06-09, 09:17 AM
When it feels like, no matter what the players did, it would have ended the same way, taking away their sense of agency, that is too much.

Choco
2011-06-09, 09:58 AM
dethkruzer, as long as your player had fun you did nothing wrong.

Besides, when you DM for only 1-2 players, DEM's are usually par for the course. I am DM'ing a 4e game for only 2 people (with no DMPC's, though they do have some followers that are much weaker than them) at the moment, and I have noticed that the smaller the group, the worse the effects of any screwups are.

In a large group if 1-2 people mess up the rest of the party often steps up to the plate and gives it their all to compensate. Even if those 1-2 characters die there is still plenty of party left and the game can go on. You only have 1 player, playing only 1 character, that means if that one player gets himself in a bad situation then your entire campaign could very well instantly end unless you fudge or DEM. By nature of your group size you are not following the same "rules" as normal size groups.

That being said, unless you roll in the open you can avoid DEM's by fudging the occasional roll. Even in the worst situations you can often get away with only once per fight. For example one time one of the 2 PC's was in a 1.5v1 fight against the boss (the other PC was secretly supporting from the sidelines, damn cheaters :smallbiggrin:), who was a brute (for those who don't know 4e, brutes are monster types that have a lot of HP and do a lot of damage on a hit, but have a low attack bonus). PC was down to about 1/4 health, then the boss gets a max-damage critical (the extra dice he gets on criticals were all maxed, in addition to normal damage being maxed...) that does almost as much damage as the PC's max HP. Needless to say I said it was a glancing blow for 4 damage....

I will admit though the players do know when it gets real. When it is a storyline-critical boss fight, I put away the DM screen and do all my attack rolls in the open. Then I let the players roll the damage they took themselves :smallamused:. Just that they know for a fact that fudging is off the table makes them WAAAAY more tense :smallbiggrin:.

My campaign setting has no resurrection, but the players do get 1 "extra life" basically. They don't know about this, but if they die I will give them the choice to roll new characters, or continue their current ones as intelligent undead. That would take the plot in some interesting directions for sure :smallwink:

Typewriter
2011-06-09, 10:31 AM
As long as your group doesn't have a problem with it and it's not creating an air of "You guy suck, so I guess I'm going to have to swoop in to save the day. Again."

Swooping is bad, but luckily that's not what it sounds like you're doing. You said you made a mistake in one case, and it sounds like you underestimated the other.

Constantly having to do things like this to save the party mean one of two things though:

1. You don't really want to kill the party, so your encounters are pointless.
2. You keep making the same mistakes over again.

I'm personally of the opinion that there's nothing wrong with things occasionally going the parties way to increase the level of fun, as long as it doesn't become a crutch that's used every session.

That's just my two cents.

dethkruzer
2011-06-09, 01:51 PM
Thanks for the input peeps. The Otyugh case was DEMd because of my own mistake, and the hydra thing was just some really bad dice luck, and both are things i'd rather not kill character(much less most of the party) over.

I don't plan on saving the player if they make some bad choices and screw up.

PersonMan
2011-06-10, 12:41 AM
Thanks for the input peeps. The Otyugh case was DEMd because of my own mistake, and the hydra thing was just some really bad dice luck, and both are things i'd rather not kill character(much less most of the party) over.

I don't plan on saving the player if they make some bad choices and screw up.

Just be sure to mention this. Something like "I'll only save you if it's a fail on my part or that of the dice", just a sort of heads-up thing to let him know when he can expect to be saved, as opposed to it seeming random if he dies later.

Archwizard
2011-06-10, 09:59 AM
Shrug, I say let the dice fall where they may. That's kinda the point. I only save players if I made a mistake.

dsmiles
2011-06-10, 10:13 AM
Shrug, I say let the dice fall where they may. That's kinda the point. I only save players if I made a mistake.
That depends on your point of view towards the game in general. If you see it as a dice game or a wargame, sure that's the point. However, if you see it as a collaborative storytelling game, it's not always the case that the dice should be the be-all-end-all of the game. Like I said, it all depends on the individual's PoV.

Necroticplague
2011-06-10, 10:22 AM
I believe that a deus ex machina is always too much. The players die for one of three reasons, so far that I usually see. 1. they messed 2. they got a little bit of bad luck. 3. they pissed of the GM. The third one is under your control, and the first two are OK reasons. If it's the first one, it's fine if they die, their loss. If it's the second one, it's okay, that's the point of dice,RNGs, and similar. Sometimes they are your saving grace, and sometimes the things that damn you. Though, this is probably colored from my first experiences dungeon crawling.

Archwizard
2011-06-10, 10:40 AM
That depends on your point of view towards the game in general. If you see it as a dice game or a wargame, sure that's the point. However, if you see it as a collaborative storytelling game, it's not always the case that the dice should be the be-all-end-all of the game. Like I said, it all depends on the individual's PoV.

Actually, I very much view it as collaborative storytelling. The dice are a part of that story, as is how they fall.

dsmiles
2011-06-10, 10:49 AM
Actually, I very much view it as collaborative storytelling. The dice are a part of that story, as is how they fall.
There's still a fundamental difference between us, then: style. I prefer a game style where the protagonists (characters/party) don't get killed by Random Mook #2.5 just because they rolled poorly, or the mook rolled high. Granted, there's less realism that way, but, IMO, more fun than just running through a series of die-rolls to see who rolls better. If I wanted that, I'd play Yahtzee. To me, the story the characters create is far more important than a die roll.

SuperFerret
2011-06-10, 10:54 AM
I'd personally fudge the dice in those situations and not tell the PCs that I'm saving them.

As for "When is Deus Ex Machina too much?" When it becomes expected.

Archwizard
2011-06-11, 08:33 PM
There's still a fundamental difference between us, then: style. I prefer a game style where the protagonists (characters/party) don't get killed by Random Mook #2.5 just because they rolled poorly, or the mook rolled high. Granted, there's less realism that way, but, IMO, more fun than just running through a series of die-rolls to see who rolls better. If I wanted that, I'd play Yahtzee. To me, the story the characters create is far more important than a die roll.

Perhaps, but unless the players do something mind bogglingly stupid, Random Mook #2.5 isn't going to achieve a TPK (and if they do, seems to me they earned it).

How the party plays their reactions to the unexpected setback/death and then go about dealing with recovering from it is a potential wealth of storytelling interest. It is part of the story the characters create.

I had a game where a level 10 fighter had some serious bad luck and failed a save vs. a Bodak's death gaze (3.5e, Fortitude DC 15 or die). His save was at least +10 (Fighter +7, Con +3), and I think he had another bonus as well. So yeah, sucked to be him, but the characters' reactions to the death and how they handled the fight and bringing him back was pretty cool.

hoff
2011-06-11, 08:42 PM
When I DM I usually have some high level NPC accompany my players during low level adventures to help them out if they get into REAL trouble. I make it clear that if this NPC needs to help them out they will lose something (either loot or prestige).
I usually make this guy a stealthy character (either invisible or rogue character) that stays out of the way letting the players figure things out by themselves, the players do know that he is watching though. If he does need to help he will make fun of the players and will make them feel like losers so they think better their actions.

dsmiles
2011-06-11, 09:10 PM
It is part of the story the characters create.Problem being, IMO, dead characters tell no tales.
In other words: A character can't continue an interesting storyline if they're dead. If the player is heavily invested in a storyline, I'm not about to stop him/her from seeing it through, except from sheer player stupidity or non-random, plot-related deaths.

I'm not saying that characters in my games don't die. I'm saying they won't die in a random encounter that has nothing to do with the plot.

Hell, just last week, I killed the Ranger. She decided to attempt a climb down a chasm after a bridge collapsed out from under her. Easy climb, but while the bridge was still intact, she was taking arrows from elevated positions on both sides of the chasm. Who the hell makes themselves a target like that? A dope on a rope Ranger, that's who. After she got shot to death, and fell 100' to the bottom of the chasm, the other players were like, "Who's going after her body? She had the party fund."

I just smiled at them.

Archwizard
2011-06-11, 09:29 PM
Problem being, IMO, dead characters tell no tales.
In other words: A character can't continue an interesting storyline if they're dead. If the player is heavily invested in a storyline, I'm not about to stop him/her from seeing it through, except from sheer player stupidity or non-random, plot-related deaths.

I'm not saying that characters in my games don't die. I'm saying they won't die in a random encounter that has nothing to do with the plot.

Hell, just last week, I killed the Ranger. She decided to attempt a climb down a chasm after a bridge collapsed out from under her. Easy climb, but while the bridge was still intact, she was taking arrows from elevated positions on both sides of the chasm. Who the hell makes themselves a target like that? A dope on a rope Ranger, that's who. After she got shot to death, and fell 100' to the bottom of the chasm, the other players were like, "Who's going after her body? She had the party fund."

I just smiled at them.

Baha, "Dope on a rope ranger". I guess an important factor here is the ability to come back from the dead. I haven't DM'd a low-level campaign in a while, and I agree that dead characters aren't much in the storytelling department.

dsmiles
2011-06-11, 09:39 PM
Baha, "Dope on a rope ranger". I guess an important factor here is the ability to come back from the dead. I haven't DM'd a low-level campaign in a while, and I agree that dead characters aren't much in the storytelling department.My campaigns are almost exclusively low-level. I'm military, so every time I find a fun group, people start getting re-assigned, and we have to start over with a new group. Plus, lower-level campaigns allow for a few less game-breaking combos. :smallamused:

Seb Wiers
2011-06-11, 10:56 PM
Not to thread crap, but for me, the answer would be "when you have 50% of the party composed of DM controlled NPCs." With such a setup, its hard for even some normal situations not to come off as "DEM," unless the NPCs are clearly inferior (lower level, less equipped) than the PCs. Even then, I'd have a hard time buying that anything useful the NPCs did in combat wasn't GM fiat- and if they aren't useful in combat, why involve them in it?

Jarawara
2011-06-12, 12:03 AM
@Seb Wiers: Interesting. I normally have multiple DM-controlled NPC's in the party at all times. We find it necessary for normal play, as combats are normally dangerous to just a four-man group. I actually consider it a player mistake to go adventuring without a healthy number of NCPs to accompany you. But the NPC's are lower level, less effective in combat, and the only deux-ex they could do is to mass-charge an enemy while the party fled behind a cover of expendables...

...and they just won't do that.

So it's still ultimately up to the party to win the fights, with the NPC's just providing useful support and assistance.

*~*~*

As for the original topic... I find that 'fudging' is better than 'duex ex machina'. Meaning, it's not the NPC's who save you, it's the fudged dice that don't kill you.

I saw posted up above, there are three reasons PC's die:

1) They messed up. 2) They had bad dice. 3) They pissed off the DM.

#3 is right out, so no worries there. #1 is... well, the reason we play the game, and not just annoint the players as victorious heroes. But #2 is the gamebreaker. It ruins the story and the epic feel of the game, when a goblin rolls a good dice and the PC rolls poorly.

So as long as the player is not making an aggregious mistake (dope on a rope ranger, for example), I won't let a PC die just because of a bad set of dice. I will capture, maim, steal from, or otherwise inconvenience, but I will not kill just because of a set of bad dice.

However... about those NPC's I spoke of earlier... they don't have such protections. You get into a fight and it goes poorly, you might lose some NPCs in the melee. You have to work to protect them, lest they get mangulated by the monsters. And when the dice go bad on you, the day can go really bad on your NPC companions.

And it is, after all, a mistake to go adventuring without a healthy number of NPC's to accompany you. Lose too many of your NPC's, and you delve into the realm of 'being a mistake' to get into a fight without them....

Nero24200
2011-06-14, 05:38 AM
I'm normally not a fan of DEM (I fall into the "I feel cheated if it's used" catagory of players) though I think you used them well in both circumstances.

In the first you admitted to the players that it was a DEM and that you were using it because you read the stat blocks wrong. Despite not liking a DEM I would greatly prefer it to dying due to a mistake on the DM's part. In essence you pretty much said to the players "Sorry guys, I goofed, I won't let the mistake screw you guys over" which is something I wish more DM's were willing to do.

For the second though...it's a bit more of a grey area as far as I'm concerned. The party will still losing fair and square so I wouldn't have had an issue pushing forward. Also, as a minor note it might not have ended in death. The later part of your first post seems to indicate that the party took on the remaining hydra pretty easily so it's possible that they wouldn't have died anyway. On the other hand the only DEM I could take from your post was a slightly lowered DC which is far from gamebreaking. It's possible the effect might not have even been noticable. I would class this more as "fudging" than DEM - theres a difference. DEM is setting up a situation so that some outside force saves the day needlessly, while fudging is occasionally altering some dice rolls to aid the PC's.

Though personally I prefer to let the dice lie. Remove luck from the game and it becomes less "Adventure game" and more "make believe for grown-ups". Besides, D'n'D isn't entirely luck (even if it does play a strong part). Good tactics/preperation/higher modifiers can make or break a fight. While it's possible for a 1st level commoner to take on a lower ranking god you certainly wouldn't expect the commoner to do so and the odds would be miniscule.

TriForce
2011-06-14, 07:10 AM
personally, i find it reasonable you helped them out on the first case, having characters die on the first encounter on the first day is simply a bit depressing for everyone, especially if its you as a DM who judged the situation wrong. on the 2nd example, i probably would have let the dice fall where they fall, but instead of kiling the entire party, id let the mindflayer do something a bit more subtle and sinister :) making a npc a voidmind or something like that

dethkruzer
2011-06-14, 07:54 AM
personally, i find it reasonable you helped them out on the first case, having characters die on the first encounter on the first day is simply a bit depressing for everyone, especially if its you as a DM who judged the situation wrong. on the 2nd example, i probably would have let the dice fall where they fall, but instead of kiling the entire party, id let the mindflayer do something a bit more subtle and sinister :) making a npc a voidmind or something like that

I could probably have done that if the mindflayer didn't work for the BBEC. He also issued a warning that he(it?) would have them dead if they didn't turn back.

Gullintanni
2011-06-14, 11:41 AM
My campaigns are almost exclusively low-level. I'm military, so every time I find a fun group, people start getting re-assigned, and we have to start over with a new group. Plus, lower-level campaigns allow for a few less game-breaking combos. :smallamused:

Sounds like E6 might be for you. Character's don't level past 6, and it's much more roleplay focused than mechanically focused.