Post-TPK Worlds and Stories

[RickAllison]

This came up on the saving throws thread, but what do you do for post-TPK worlds? At low levels, the party might be low enough but high-level parties deal with threats that others aren't capable of dealing with. When they fail, how does the world cope? How does the DM cope? That is what this thread is about.

So I will start. Although it wasn't a full-on TPK, a series of unfortunate events removed essentially all of the party who were needed to deal with a dragon that could glass entire kingdoms. Because they failed, the next set of PCs will be dealing with the aftermath, gathering the scraps of civilization left to deal with the abomination.

[Democratus]

Post-apocalypse is a fun place to start if you have a TPK facing a high-level threat.

There's also the possibility of continuing the game in the same world, but long after the events of the previous adventure.

In one game, after a TPK at 15th level, I had them pick up 300 years later. Their characters from the previous game were actually seen as a pantheon of gods in the current age - heroes who sacrificed while fighting ultimate evil. While the villain won and conquered all, over the course of two centuries the growing religion that revered the dead PCs created an insurgency and now finally have enough momentum to push back the tide of darkness.

Nothing like seeing statues of your old PC carved into temples and cliffs to give you a renewed will to take the fight to the ancient enemy once and for all.

[MrFahrenheit]

It really depends on when the TPK occurs plot-wise to me. If my current party (levels 13-14, entering late stage of my campaign) were TPK'ed next session, that would lead to a horde of undead being unleashed on the world, due to a macguffin found but not yet retrieved. (Post apocalyptic survivors = new party)

If, however, it were the session afterwards, team bad guy might turn the tide of an ongoing war back in their favor, but it would take time due to what was already set in motion by the PCs. (Elite members of existing good guy army = new party)

If it were the very last session, up against the final boss, there wouldn't be a new party. Story would end on a tragic note, while making mention of the fact that though it took evil big boss another century and a half to recover and retrain his forces, no one would again rise in the land to challenge him as fiercely.

[R.Shackleford]

Start a game set half way across the world where they hear about some zero heroes failing to take out a threat.

The group is tasked with recovering their bodies so that the *benefactor* can use their bodies to learn what the players knew about said threat.

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Edit: I just came up with this. I kinda read the initial post wrong lol

[Naanomi]

I've also done a time-warp situation. Party tried to stop the ressurection of an eldritch horror after a 10 year career fighting its cult. Died in the process.

Rewind 8 years in another part of the world, another group of heroes exploring ancient ruins for a wealthy benefactor learn of a world threatening horror across the globe, journey there and find it recently awakened after local heroes failed to stop its awakening... Can these foreign heroes reseal it before it gets to full strength?

[BrianDavion]

I tend to assume that if the players don't resolve an issue someone else resolves it. well that or the setting is destroyed no worth worrying about!

[R.Shackleford]

I tend to assume that if the players don't resolve an issue someone else resolves it. well that or the setting is destroyed no worth worrying about!

That's no fun, show players just how much they messed up.

Time jump 5 years, everything is destitute, you just saw the people of your village carted off to a work camp, die of starvation, commit mass suicide.

Have their old characters be known, because of bards, that they are the reason things suck. Even the PCs would have a hatred for them in some way.

These PCs decide enough is enough and go off to save the world

[Hrugner]

It depends. My usual solution is to take whatever story arc I had ready to go afterward and play the two against each other. So if the party wipes trying to reveal the doppelganger who replaced the king, then the doppelganger will turn on the secret cult that hired him to take over as king. So the next party would be approached by the cultists to take out the king and when they face the doppelganger, he will reveal that they were both hired by the same people.

That sort of thing.

[Dark Ass4ssin 1]

I love the idea of a world where the heros failed,or for whatever reason were unable to stop the BBEG.

Whether this happened because of a TPK or a post apocalyptic idea for a world rattling around in a DMs head. I personally (and with nostalgic bias) would suggest a world long after the BBEG beat the hero's and has created the world after his image. You may already notice I am talking about Samurai Jack where the ultimate goal was to go back in time and fix the problem, but you could go in any direction you wanted.

[JackPhoenix]

If they get TPK (or just fail, and there are various possible points of failure) in the current scenario, possible consequences are (depending how much they get done before the failure): thousands of dead as the population of 20k+ city turns on each othe under the influence of fiendish overlord of hatred, rage and war. The riots could be suppressed by the intervention of kingdom's army, but given the region it's in, other nations can take the army's presence as a excuse to start another huge war (that's why PC's were sent in instead of the army in the first place).

As people die, they rise as undead thanks to use of a (failed) prototype superweapon. The undead are uncontrolled and the disease produced by the weapon could spread to the rest of the world (both considered failure, as the original design should've been smaller scale and have the undead under the control of a wielder of said weapon), currently it is contained in that one city. The weapon was actually stolen and so far, nobody knows who the original creators were... if the secrets got out, it could lead to war, as in the first scenario, because nobody would believe it wasn't an intentional attack. The PC's are helping the original creators of the superweapon to build and deploy countermeasure, another weapon that would send huge pulse of positive energy that would destroy both the virus and the undead.

And of course, the fiendish overlord could be freed by his servants. Right now, he's "safely" (not really) imprisoned, if he could get out and gather his full strength, there's about nothing that could stand against him.

If they finish this scenario and die later, nothing much will happen... everyone involved in the plot of the main campaign will just have to wait until another bunch of misfits with appropriate traits shows up so they could steer them to manipulate the Prophecy for their own end. The characters know there's some prophecy and they are a part of it, but they don't know what it is about... yet. And they already met some NPCs that had few "unique" traits suspiciously similar to one of them, suggesting that they could be replaced.