The Fates of Our Characters

[Amaril]

Adventuring is a dangerous business, and getting out is rarely simple. What kinds of memorable endings have your characters recieved? Heroic sacrifices? Royal coronations? Divine ascension? Or just hilariously unique death? Share the stories!

Last night, my group wrapped up our first big campaign. The story had concerned us journeying to the north as part of a nomad warband, each for our own reasons: the leader of the band believed the north was the land of the dead and wanted to contact his mother's ghost there, my character wanted to banish an evil presence he'd heard haunted the region, and the third guy just wanted to see what happened to us in case it was interesting. When we got to where we were going, we found an ancient tower where we encountered a man sitting on a throne in front of a door that somehow stretched as far as the eye could see in every direction. It turned out this was the door to the afterlife, and it was starting to fall open because the man on the throne, its guardian, was dying--this was the source of the evil my character wanted to banish, as things from the other side had started to slip through. To close the door, someone new had to be bound in the guardian's place. I bit that bullet, and the game ended with my character becoming the new gatewarden of the underworld.

(The leader of the warband did end up finding his mom's ghost, but then he got killed. The third guy got to leave and go back to his life.)

[TheCountAlucard]

Regrettably, most of the games in which I actually get to play end in GM Burnout before I really get to a satisfying conclusion.

Then again, I guess it leaves me free to decide what happens to Arch Whitman, L3NN¥, Tykoga Rae, and the rest. >.>

[Comet]

The only wish my character had was becoming a legionnaire and serving his country with honor.

He did that by raiding dungeons to prove his worth. The final dungeon he raided had a magical trap that reversed the sexes of his entire party. While everyone else fell into despair and assumed new identities to match their new assumed gender roles, my character simply walked up to his commanding officer and explained to him what had happened.

And so my character was registered into the legion as an honorable female warrior and sent to the front lines. This suited her just fine, she was always a warrior first and a clansman a distant second.

[Red Fel]

Adventuring is a dangerous business, and getting out is rarely simple. What kinds of memorable endings have your characters recieved? Heroic sacrifices? Royal coronations? Divine ascension? Or just hilariously unique death? Share the stories!

I've got one: Harem. And I wasn't even aiming for it!

I've told this story, before, but the gist is this. We were in a Dragonlance campaign, with a mixed-alignment party, tasked with recovering and returning nothing less than one of the Lances. (For those unfamiliar, the Dragonlances are sacred artifacts of incredible holy power.)

This was my second character. My first, an LE Minotaur swordsman, owed a blood debt to a member of the party, and died an honorable death to allow them to escape from peril. My second - this character - was a Noble Draconian who had received a vision about the party's quest with the Lance. (Basically, in Dragonlance, an evil ritual made humanoid Dragons, the Draconians, out of the good Metallic Dragons, so their opposite number - good, or Noble, Draconians - were made out of evil Chromatic Dragons. It's weird.) Given that most Draconians were dead or in hiding after the War of the Lance, he was presumed to be one of the last of his kind.

We did our whole adventure, with my LG character increasingly disturbed by the rest of the party. Obviously Evil people were obviously Evil, but even the ostensibly Good ones were morally ambiguous, to the point that my PC was one of only two characters in the party who could actually touch the Lance without experiencing pain.

As we approached the finale, the DM approached me with a proposal for an epilogue. I thought it was hysterical. After we fought the monster, saved the world, and returned the Lance to its proper place, the party returned to town and slept it off, to prepare to return to their regular lives the next day. Each player would then be allowed to epilogue. But when they awoke the next day, my PC was gone, leaving only a note in his place.

Basically, it said that while he liked the party (some of them, anyways), he didn't feel morally comfortable remaining around them. Thanked them for their help and said goodbye. He also mentioned that he had received a message while journeying back to civilization, revealing the existence of a small enclave of Noble Draconians, almost universally female, who had received a vision (as he had) of him on his quest. They admired his nobility and wanted him to join them. He had no desire to reveal their location, as their people were in hiding, so he simply told the party that he was leaving to be among his own kind.

Or, in short: "Thanks, but you guys are horrible, so I'm going to go off and have a harem. Bye!"

Jaws hit the floor. It was glorious.

[DrStubbsberg]

We had a great campaign where the "civilised" races had finally had enough of the "savage" races and banded together on a crusade to wipe them out - not counting those who still lived when the campaign went on permanent hiatus, my Goblin Alchemist was the only one to make it out alive.

After a particularly bad foray behind enemy lines, we were taking a break to lick our wounds in a forest near the front-lines - we needed to marshal our strength before breaking through the Hobgoblin trenchworks so we could report in. During the break, the Hobgoblin Anti-Paladin and the Cleric of Lolth - both of whom already disliked each other - decided to finally get into a real screaming match, and were maybe a few words away from actually drawing weapons on each other when they were interrupted by a Treant-propelled boulder. In the shock of the century, they had alerted the forest's defenders.

So now it's basically an every-man(/woman/thing) for themselves dash towards the lines, pursued by some Treants, etc, to try and break through an ongoing combat between the Hobgoblins and forest defenders. The Cleric goes invisible and slips through, the Druid Wild-Shapes and slips through, and my Alchemist and the Anti-Paladin manage to get to the earthen rampart before being brought down. I was dragged off to be interrogated by the Dragon that ruled the forest - he was aiding the crusade, but not really part of it, so rather than just killing me he was curious why a non-evil (CN) character was involved. On finding out that I just wanted to be left to pursue the art of alchemy for the pleasure of it - it was only the genocidal nature of the crusade that forced me to have to get involved - he agreed to kill me relatively painlessly, Reincarnate me (rinse/repeat if I end up as a non-civilised race again), and allow me on my way as long as I give my binding word to never raise my hand against the forests or sell my services as an adventurer again. So my now Half-Elf Alchemist left the forest the way he'd come and went off to settle down as a shop-keeper somewhere, always kind of guilty he'd abandoned his friends/people in their time of need, but glad to have survived.

And for those wondering, yes the invisible Cleric hung around long enough to watch the Anti-Paladin get eaten and then stole what gear survived.

---

Shorter story, but another surviving adventurer was a Half-Elf Wizard who completed his personal goal of becoming powerful enough to be a credible threat to his true love's father - a Cloud Dragon - and force him to stop being an obstacle to their love. Then him and his girl settled down on the Air Plane to raise beautiful Half-Dragon/Quarter-Elves together.

[Cluedrew]

I've only had one character with a proper ending in an RPG, but I liked that one.

My character made it to retirement, after years of working as a mercenary and the fiasco that was the campaign (in-character, out-of-character it was awesome) he decided enough was enough, pulled out the cash he had squired away and retired to a little cottage.

And decorated with all the thank-you letters he had acquired over the years. From the ones with official seals to the ones done in crayon.

[SMWallace]

And decorated with all the thank-you letters he had acquired over the years. From the ones with official seals to the ones done in crayon.
You know, maybe this is more of a superhero game thing, but it always seems to be the second kind of thank you letter that carries more meaning.

Anyway, my favorite ending is definitely the paladin mage-hunter Maylene, but it wouldn't have been possible without the exceptional circumstance our GM offered us and the truly amazing scope of our game, so honestly, I really do need to call out a thank you to him. He made us rage, he made us cry, sometimes simultaneously, but he gave us what I can honestly say is the best campaign I've ever been a part of, and I'm eternally grateful.

So in a scenario frankly fit for epic-level characters but wrapped up by level 12, our team assembled. The "blood dog" Robert, a dwarf wizard and former general of the destroyed land of Sanctuary who had been given a blood curse by the BBEG that was intended to rebirth one of his servants through Robert's blood and arcane power, but Robert turned it around by taking control of the growing blood creature and ejecting it early, gaining a powerful ally and becoming the setting's first and only blood mage. The affectionately-named "cleavosaurus" Tallas, a human Barbarian/Fighter with the dormant god of love and hatred sealed inside himself after his wife sacrificed her life to keep it and him from being taken by the Ghost Hand, an evil faction looking to facilitate something known as the "Cataclysm." Sevyrd, the last druid, who adventured with the party after one of the BBEG's servants slaid his father and clan, and eventually stole the power from the secondary Big Bad of the setting, a being known as the Queen who controlled a vast horde of insect-plant hybrids known as the Infection, turning into a plantlike humanoid with awesome abilities like "seeding" spells into people for later and, of course, controlling the Infection. And last but not least, my character Maylene, gang member and military infiltrator in the Templar (basically mage-hunter) order of the slave-taking empire that had destroyed Robert's homeland, who had the double-whammy of having her hometown destroyed by a creation of a Ghost Hand higher-up (while it was being driven mad by the BBEG's influence no less) and having her wife killed and vampirized before her eyes by a servant of the BBEG. Since alignment wasn't a thing in this game, this otherwise Pragmatic Neutral character was built as a Paladin with some house rules making her more focused on fighting the supernatural than fighting evil (and boy howdy, her Charisma score got extreme).

Over the course of the campaign, we discovered and struggled to survive during not one, not two, but THREE major apocalyptic events: the coming of the Infection, the aforementioned horde that threatened to swallow the world; far more prominently, the Cataclysm, where all the gods of the setting (who had been sealed thousands of years ago) temporarily broke out of their seals as they were wont to do every thousand years or so; and the attempt of the BBEG, Nikamendous, to use the Cataclysm as a chance to open a gate to the plane of chaos (eldritch abomination edition) so that he may return home and regain his old power despite the fact that such a feat would release so much energy as to leave the prime material in cinders. Through this we discovered the ancient lore of the world, the origins of Nikamendous and the Cataclysm, why the gods were sealed, and on the side, Maylene found out the original intentions of the Templar order (namely, to prepare for world-threatening supernatural forces like the Cataclysm) before they were corrupted and reduced into a mere mage-hunting organization by the greedy empire employing them. It all culminated in the world smashed to bits but with Nikamendous dead, the unleashed gods mostly subdued... And the three genies who had been on earth to balance out the gods in the first place before they had been sealed away, who altogether could do things even the gods couldn't. They offered us a four-pronged wish to change the world how we saw fit, each party member getting a "segment" of the wish. We collaborated, and came up with our way to change the world.

Maybe if we had been a different party we'd have taken more full advantage of the possibilities before us. We could've easily wished to revive everyone who had died, destroyed all the gods, and underwent apotheosis in their place to be the new, non-dormant gods of the world. But we decided on a different route. So we unsealed the gods to retake their old positions of ruling reality, but with a catch to prevent the abuse of power that had led to them being sealed in the first place; we, and a handful of our character's loved ones who we revived with another part of the wish (which, importantly, we decided to do *instead* of reviving everyone who had died or undoing all the physical damage, because we wanted the world to remain aware that horrible events like this can happen rather than the system returning to its entirely screwed normal self as if this had been a bad dream) became immortal members of a special metaphysical council that would basically have the power of veto over any action any of the gods wanted to take that affected mortals.

So our immortal characters, who would come to be known throughout the lands as, somewhat unimaginatively, the Heroes, became the center of worship for a massive cult of "Heroists" which splintered off somewhat from the "Traditionalists" who simply worshipped the gods and thought anything more than normal respect for us Heroes was sacreligious (and sometimes even normal respect was considered such, since we dared to stand among the gods). And our characters went on to live their own lives... Tallas became the great king of his home continent/country, helping it recover from the Cataclysm's damage and preventing as much of the country's old corruption from taking root again as he was able, leading it eventually to prosperity and unity. Sevyrd wandered the world, observing things and serving as a reservoir of knowledge for the next generation of druids. And finally, Maylene and Robert... Though Robert had lost the blood companion he originally took control of, he was still a blood mage and the strongest (mortal) wizard to ever exist, and he wanted to both rebuild Sanctuary and start a school of magic while researching ways to protect the world in case of future Cataclysm-scale events. So Maylene came to him with a proposition - she needed magic, he needed Maylene's ungodly Diplomacy abilities and capacity for getting money and connections. They teamed up to reform the Templar order as it was originally meant to be, not an anti-magic order, but an order that used magic and anti-magic capabilities to prepare itself against potential threats to the world. This time, they made it as close to an effectively politically-neutral entity they could, taking advantage of the early chaotic reformation of world powers and their influence as Heroes to get the Templars extremely close ties with all the new world leaders, while turning it into an elite order that took in the most talented of recruits and made exceptional warriors, wizards, and clerics out of them, constantly in a state of research, training, and scouting out potential threats to the world and containing them to either be destroyed or controlled towards a productive purpose.

Meanwhile, of course, the gods wanted to do all sorts of things after being born again, but our party and their loved ones reigned them in, blocking actions that they felt were detrimental to the mortal world, and though the gods were initially enraged at the arrangement they developed a grudging respect for the Heroes since they let them out of their dormancy. Altogether, the Heroes and gods ushered in a new and hopefully better world for the future...

Now all that's well and cool on its own, but the best part? Right now, we're playing in that campaign setting again, a hundred years in the future, with new characters! And it's really great seeing the effects of the post game decisions we all made on the future world. As I suppose is only natural for this sort of thing, the Templars have ended up a semi-regular antagonistic force to our party... But honestly, that's still extremely cool, just that they're such a present force in the world and doing their job that we can come to blows with them during our business is great. (And it's not like they're fighting us because their purpose was twisted or the order was corrupted again or something; most, though not all, of the times that we came to blows with them, Maylene and Robert would've totally sided with what the Templars were doing, our current party is just a very different batch of people with very different goals.)

All in all, I'd say Maylene had the best ending of any character I've ever played, and on top of that is the most fun I've ever had playing a character. I had such a great time with her that it's actually difficult and exciting to imagine a future point in my life where I have anybody other than her as my favorite character ever.

[Cluedrew]

You know, maybe this is more of a superhero game thing, but it always seems to be the second kind of thank you letter that carries more meaning.There is no doubt in my mind of which ones got the place of honour.

The funniest thing about that ending though is the reason for his retirement. I mean he was old and was planning for his retirement over the entire campaign, but the reason it happened at the end (in-character) was not the (T-1)PK or the fact there were assassins out for him, he took the opportunity to fake his death, or the very awkward conversation he was going to have about how the nukes got eaten. No the reason he retired is that his jeep got destroyed, the jeep I bought at the beginning of the campaign with the left over points I had. It sort of grew on me.


Now all that's well and cool on its own, but the best part?I agree with you on both points. Many of the best campaign ideas I have heard of boil down to "now let's see the effect you had on the world last time", or at least have an element of that. I've never played a campaign at that scale though, but I do enjoy the small personal endings as well.

[Lord Raziere]

My characters....? uh. all or most of their stories are unfinished, so they are all in the Town of Unfinished Tales where there is no fourth wall, and its just a strange amalgam of places and things cobbled together, all of them hoping to one day finish their stories in some way.

Some that did finish however:

Sharinelle, my catfolk sorcerer:
she became the new leader of the Tideweavers, an organization I made, and reformed them into something better, as they were beginning to stagnate and fall apart. The Tideweavers rejected the normal adventurers motivations of seeking power and greed, seeing them as inherently corrupting to protectors of the world due to Nysellarine their first leader overthrowing sorcerers who only used their gifts for selfish uses. Sharinelle changed things so that they used better equipment than non-magical robes and a coral staff, teaching them that not all materialism is bad.

Mantakax Boomabillion:
A Wow Bilgewater goblin, former billionaire/fire mage/inventor/shotgun user who led a elite squad of Horde champions into Northrend to take down the Lich King. He succeeded and with a clever use of sympathetic magic, destroyed the entire Scourge by burning the Lich Kings helm after he was taken down. After he won he wrote books about his Northrend Campaign....of course in three versions: The First is a romanticized fun account of his adventures that exaggerate his role in the adventure to the point of solving everything himself, a second dryer but completely true version he released when people complained about the inaccuracies and lies, and a third version he released when people complained about the second being too boring, making it both entertaining and accurate, so that he could make three times as much money off the same story.

other than that, *shrug*. Town of Unfinished Tales, since even I don't know what ending I would've had in mind for them, I was exploring them to see what ending I would get at all, since my intention of many of my characters is to leave the ending open until its clear what their story is and what the natural conclusion of that story is.

[Amaril]

My characters....? uh. all or most of their stories are unfinished, so they are all in the Town of Unfinished Tales where there is no fourth wall, and its just a strange amalgam of places and things cobbled together, all of them hoping to one day finish their stories in some way.

Can I just say this is an awesome idea, and I totally want to make a story or game based on it now?

[Lord Raziere]

Can I just say this is an awesome idea, and I totally want to make a story or game based on it now?

Only if I get to GM it, and have my characters be there. Seriously, I want them to get the endings they deserve.

[Cluedrew]

My characters....? uh. all or most of their stories are unfinished, so they are all in the Town of Unfinished Tales where there is no fourth wall, and its just a strange amalgam of places and things cobbled together, all of them hoping to one day finish their stories in some way.I feel like the roads out of town all lead to the unfinished lands, settings left uncompleted or were apart of the unfinished stories told in them.

I would be responsible for quite a few characters living in the town myself.

[Lord Raziere]

I feel like the roads out of town all lead to the unfinished lands, settings left uncompleted or were apart of the unfinished stories told in them.

I would be responsible for quite a few characters living in the town myself.

Of course other towns include The City of Endings (the place where finished characters live) and New Potentia (a place of characters that have yet to be played, so they have yet to exist except in a half potential state, like reverse ghosts) existing on probably separate planes or dimensions.

and of course, there is a bunch of monsters and challenges phasing in and out sort of existing at times and others not, that were supposed to be the challenges to be faced.....and a lot of problems would be like figuring out how to finish the stories and what to do about the unfinished places, given that no one knows how this place works given the strange cobbled mash up nature of it.