Non-Standard Game Overs?

[Raine_Sage]

So in the game I'm currently in I'm playing a warlock who made an Infernal pact with an aspect of levistus, who is currently still trapped in a floating iceberg on his plain of hell. The terms of her pact are that every enemy she curses has their soul sent down to be spiritual kindling for the bonfire his minions have got going down there to try and break him out.

Now she's not aware of what the souls are being used for, she just knows they're being cursed to hell. I ran this by the GM as a bit of fluff not really expecting it to come to much but he liked the idea that after a certain number of enemies killed/cursed by her the ice would thin enough for Levistus to break free and drag my character (who at this point in her life is looking for a way to break the contract) down to hell or who knows she might go willingly. Or if the party is a high enough level they could fight him off/reseal him.

While we're still trying to work out the kinks of how this would work if it does become a thing, It got me wondering if anyone else has had a "lose" condition in their game other than the usual failed a saving throw? I was curious and it's the sort of thing that seems like there's an interesting story behind it.

[Slipperychicken]

1. How many souls does he need to break out? He might start asking you to genocide towns and cities for his escape.

2. When he does break out, he might offer you a title of nobility for your service. Like bring one of his knights, or personal bodyguard. I don't know his this guy rolls, so it might not be his style.

3. Someone should warn you, either by mentioning his plot, or someone trying to convince you to stop (possibly through violence). This person should have a letter containing this knowedge on his body, in case you kill him before he shouts it at you.

4. If he gets out, that could be a "secret hard-mode bossfight", where he's much stronger than the party could be expected to defeat, but beating him is the only way to save the world. If you lose, then he wins and you get to watch the apocalypse through a scrying sensor from hell.

5. If your warlock dies before the end of the campaign, it would be a fitting game-over for him to wind up in the inferno, being torturously burned to melt the glacier.

[Blaknic]

I have had what I considered the "usual"- caught infiltrating the enemy camp, executed when the party didn't successfully free me. Killed by disease when the party of martial classes didn't contact the head druid because of circumstances.

Your example sounds both cool and personal, and I may include something like it as an NPC in the next game I run- a Malack-esque death camp for the purpose of fueling the fire, or something.

[hamishspence]

While it's "fail a DC 18 will save" - the Infinite Staircase has one- "You discover your heart's desire".

[CoffeeIncluded]

I am going to have a non-standard game over in my campaign later on, or rather one absolute win/lose condition to the final plot piece, and several other optional conditions that provide better endings if they're fulfilled.

[Blaknic]

"You discover your heart's desire".


Sounds a bit like a non-standard victory, in a way.

[Kalirren]

Getting promoted to High Priestess?

I guess it's a bit like being crowned king, which -is- fairly standard.

[Slipperychicken]

While it's "fail a DC 18 will save" - the Infinite Staircase has one- "You discover your heart's desire".

Along these lines:

If you fail the DC 20 will save against Far Realm's Maddening, you presumably wind up like Daruth Winterwood: a madman with a brain full of spiders. Either that or you turn into an insane pseudonatural creature and just wander aimlessly around the Far Realm being warped and twisted almost beyond recognition.

If your soul gets trapped (like if you're killed by a particular kind of sword), that's essentially a game over. If you're ever freed, it might be too late and you went insane from isolation.

If someone destroys your soul, that's permanent game over, I think. I don't think you can be rezzed without a soul.

[Raine_Sage]

1. How many souls does he need to break out? He might start asking you to genocide towns and cities for his escape.

2. When he does break out, he might offer you a title of nobility for your service. Like bring one of his knights, or personal bodyguard. I don't know his this guy rolls, so it might not be his style.

3. Someone should warn you, either by mentioning his plot, or someone trying to convince you to stop (possibly through violence). This person should have a letter containing this knowedge on his body, in case you kill him before he shouts it at you.

4. If he gets out, that could be a "secret hard-mode bossfight", where he's much stronger than the party could be expected to defeat, but beating him is the only way to save the world. If you lose, then he wins and you get to watch the apocalypse through a scrying sensor from hell.

5. If your warlock dies before the end of the campaign, it would be a fitting game-over for him to wind up in the inferno, being torturously burned to melt the glacier.

1. We don't have a set number of souls yet. Currently she's averaging between one and two per encounter (our group is very large so sometimes I only get to kill one enemy before the encounter is over. Our DM has been trying to work out a balance so that everyone gets to go more than once, but not so overwhelming that the squishier players get insta killed). Currently the deal is if she goes seven in game days without sending down one or more souls she suffers level scaled necrotic damage until the next time she curses someone at which point it's reversed. If the DM feels like being mean it could well result in killing an innocent person (or persons) in an act of desperation. But like I said it's all still up in the air. He's got 10 other players to manage so my stuff understandably is not top priority.

2. Levistus is patron of revenge and betrayal, I chose him as her pact primarily because revenge was what she was after when she made the pact, but also because his history with betrayal paints him as the kind of sleezy guy who preys on young women and tries to get them to assist willingly in his plots through promises of power/wealth/what have you. So yeah that's a feasible thing.

3. Oh she will definitely be warned/told/otherwise informed in game probably when she hits either the halfway or the 75% mark.

4. That would indeed be epic, but I would hate for my character's personal problems to drag down the rest of the party which is why for now the NSGO is limited to just my character for now but might expand if everyone else is cool with the idea. Luckily for humanity Levistus is at least more likely to go directly after Asmodeus than try and conquer the world.

5. Oh yes yea verily, that's actually why she's so eager to get out of her pact. The general dislike of being associated with an archdevil not withstanding.

[Slipperychicken]

5. Oh yes yea verily, that's actually why she's so eager to get out of her pact. The general dislike of being associated with an archdevil not withstanding.

I mean, after damning that many people's souls to be wrongly burned in service to a dark being of betrayal and vengeance, this woman's afterlife prospects are pretty grim at this point.

Actually, even if she winds up in regular hell instead of the glacier, I could see the experience customized so she thinks she's there, being burned by her old master. You know, a "punishment-fits-the-crime" sort of deal.

[Raine_Sage]

Yeah, her afterlife prospects are pretty grim no matter how you slice it. She's a good person but has racked up enough bad karma that she's well aware there's really not much shot at true redemption anymore. Mostly she's trying to avoid making it worse for herself and others. I imagine if she does manage to break her oath she'd be the kind of person who retires from adventuring and joins a convent, which would itself be another kind of nonstandard game over.

Basically she's a person who made a lot of bad decisions hoping that eventually all the wrongs would sort of cancel each other out and when they didn't she started taking a more proactive role in trying to mop up some of the mess she made of her life which is how she found her way to adventuring as a lifestyle. Go from town to town, ask if there's any ruffians that need roughing up, fill her quota while still technically helping people. She's a lot of fun to play because she's this sort of grumpy sarcastic person who wishes other people in the party would stop making hasty and poorly thought out decisions (and chewed out the invoker for shooting a baby yeti).

[CRtwenty]

Some PCs in my game got a TPK running through the Bastion of Souls Module and wound up having their souls absorbed into an imprisoned Deity who then broke free (the PCs having broken into his Prison) and used them as his new Heralds (which they encountered in a later campaign).

[Totally Guy]

I like this concept. The non-standard game overs sound much better than standard game overs.

I wonder if there are any games in which there are only non-standard ones by default.

[supermonkeyjoe]

My PCs had the option for a Non-standard game over which they didn't take, it was kind of an easy-mode win that lead to the 'B' ending and involved using an ancient macguffin to blow up a moon that the BBEGs were getting power from instead of confronting the BBEGs, they opted instead to use the Macguffin to weaken the BBEGs and beat them but if they had blown up a moon, the fallout would have been... interesting.

[prufock]

What you're calling "non-standard" here is really just "plot" to us. We have lose conditions all the time that can end in things other than death. Examples:

- I ran a superhero game where mutants were being offed by some shadowy organization. The PCs tracked down the leader, but the leader was prepared. And he had done the research. Mutants really WERE a huge danger, with accidental powers taking effect, high rates of violent mental illness, higher than normal crime rates, and tons of collateral damage. He gave the PCs the following options: walk away and let them continue their work and they and their friends would be spared, work with the organization to make a safer community for non-mutants, or attack - and by doing so have all this data leaked to the public immediately. None of these conditions was really a "win."

- Currently running a 3.5 game where there are rifts to all the planes opening up on the material, which is causing havoc. The PCs are tracking down and closing these rifts, to eventually face the end boss causing it all. His motivation is to tear apart the planes in order to find out where his wife ended up when she died, and bring her back (since all the standard magical attempts have failed). The end game will likely involve a dramatic change in the cosmology and pantheon of this world, or the destruction of the world. There are several groups working with different goals. They may defeat the villain, but the changes will be felt throughout the setting.

[Fiery Diamond]

What you're calling "non-standard" here is really just "plot" to us. We have lose conditions all the time that can end in things other than death. Examples:

- I ran a superhero game where mutants were being offed by some shadowy organization. The PCs tracked down the leader, but the leader was prepared. And he had done the research. Mutants really WERE a huge danger, with accidental powers taking effect, high rates of violent mental illness, higher than normal crime rates, and tons of collateral damage. He gave the PCs the following options: walk away and let them continue their work and they and their friends would be spared, work with the organization to make a safer community for non-mutants, or attack - and by doing so have all this data leaked to the public immediately. None of these conditions was really a "win."

- Currently running a 3.5 game where there are rifts to all the planes opening up on the material, which is causing havoc. The PCs are tracking down and closing these rifts, to eventually face the end boss causing it all. His motivation is to tear apart the planes in order to find out where his wife ended up when she died, and bring her back (since all the standard magical attempts have failed). The end game will likely involve a dramatic change in the cosmology and pantheon of this world, or the destruction of the world. There are several groups working with different goals. They may defeat the villain, but the changes will be felt throughout the setting.

The term "non-standard game over" comes, I think, from TvTropes (it might have originated elsewhere, but that's where I first saw it). It originated from video games, which have "standard" game over [you die (or for games with more than one player character, TPK), game over]. Some games also have other conditions that cause game over, however, which are therefore "non-standard." This is just applying that concept to tabletop-type rpgs; it's not meant to imply that things other than a TPK ending the game are uncommon, just that TPK is default (or "standard") and the others are therefore "non-standard," as an analogy to those terms when used to refer to video games.

[prufock]

The term "non-standard game over" comes, I think, from TvTropes (it might have originated elsewhere, but that's where I first saw it). It originated from video games, which have "standard" game over [you die (or for games with more than one player character, TPK), game over]. Some games also have other conditions that cause game over, however, which are therefore "non-standard." This is just applying that concept to tabletop-type rpgs; it's not meant to imply that things other than a TPK ending the game are uncommon, just that TPK is default (or "standard") and the others are therefore "non-standard," as an analogy to those terms when used to refer to video games.

Thanks. I'm only a casual video gamer, so I hadn't really heard this term applied that way before.

[Scow2]

She's a good person but has racked up enough bad karma that she's well aware there's really not much shot at true redemption anymore.

She damns people's souls to hell to be destroyed for the crime of merely crossing her, instead of dispatching them to whatever afterlife they've earned through life. She is not a "good person".

[Oracle_Hunter]

I wonder if there are any games in which there are only non-standard ones by default.
Bliss Stage (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/TabletopGame/BlissStage?from=Main.BlissStage) :smallbiggrin:

For one thing, the game's not over until all but one of the PCs ("Pilots") are out of the game. The twist is that the overall plot (depicted by a series of milestones called "Hopes") does not advance until the first Pilot is out of the game -- and he gets to decide how one of those Hopes is resolved.

But most on point is the definition of "out of the game." While your Pilot could die, be put into a coma, or just plain vanish those are not even half of the suggested methods of resolution:
The pilot merges with or allies with the aliens.
The pilot goes off to start another resistance group.
Disgusted, the pilot leaves the group, never to return.
The pilot’s ANIMa enters the real world, rampaging around before finally being stopped.

The kicker is this one: The pilot replaces the authority figure as the head of
the resistance. Due to the structure of the game, this means that when a PC dies, his Player can choose to take over GMing the game.

How's that for "non-standard?" :smallamused:

[Scow2]

The kicker is this one: The pilot replaces the authority figure as the head ofthe resistance. Due to the structure of the game, this means that when a PC dies, his Player can choose to take over GMing the game.

How's that for "non-standard?" :smallamused:"You can't win, Darth. If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you could ever imagine!"

[Xefas]

I wonder if there are any games in which there are only non-standard ones by default.

If I'm interpreting correctly that, in this case, "standard" means "dying", then:

Free Market, of course. You can't be meaningfully physically harmed, or die, nor can you be meaningfully deprived of luxury or comfort. The only failure state is being kicked off the station.

Eternity. The Vast can't be killed, or defeated in any lasting way. They can only be forced to change themselves.

Maybe 'Don't Rest Your Head'. IIRC, the failure states are "You become a nightmare", "You become a denizen of the Mad City", or "You fall asleep and lose your powers". I could be misremembering, though. I'm not sure. I recall that enemies push you towards getting sleepy/going insane, instead of dying.