Stealth Marmot
2016-12-28, 11:53 AM
Hello there, I am making a thread about tales of when a DM kills a campaign in a single session through their own insane, stupid, or thoughtless decisions.
Keep in mind a few guidelines for how these tales should go:
If the campaign comes to a planned stop, then it wasn't killed off, it just ended. If the players roll up new characters in the same world, that isn't the end. If the players made poor decisions, got incredibly unlucky, or something the DM had less control over, then it's a different story. If people just wandered apart an couldn't play it anymore but wanted to, then it wasn't this problem. If the campaign was only a couple of session, then there isn't much to burn down.
This is when a campaign is going at least pretty well, and people want to do more, then the DM makes a decision or a string of decisions that just destroys the campaign for the group, or a powder keg finally goes off.
Here is my story:
The first long term campaign I was involved with was a first edition game with some modified rules. I first joined around the year 2001-ish, but kep with that group for what must have been close to a decade. It was run by a guy who I could only describe as "slowly turning into Ted Nugent" over the years.
So some backstory: We had an adventure in a tower outside the City the DM favored having all of our adventures in. We decided to not only clear out the haunted tower, but rebuild it.
So our collective group pooled our resources and actually ended up sort of becoming lords of the manor. We started a small town-like area with a defensible tower, surrounding houses, and even a tavern. One of our players spent HOURS on it, planning, creating fortifications, drawing everything keeping inventory and making plans. We all spent time on it, making our own corners and contributions. Some of the players made their bar, I made a small library and research area for my cleric/magic user. We ended up having adventures related to maintaining the area, clearing out threats and even defending from an encroaching army.
Then things started to go south. First we had a problem when the DM decided to nearly kill us with suddenly bad weather because we hadn't brought winter clothes or provisions. Problem was it was basically non-descript April weather when we left, but he decided to change to realistic weather by date while we were in the middle of the forest. First indication that the DM was sort of going.
However we ended up making it out, healing our frostbite, etc. Not sure if anyone died but the party as a whole made it out fine, minus some flu-like trouble recovering from hypothermia. In our adventure, we came across a few magic items. My character's speciality was research and identification, so she took the item, which was a large crystal bowl the size of a punch bowl, and left it in her research room after failing to identify it. (Keep in mind that I should have probably gotten SOME sort of indication as to what it was, but either way, the following ENDED the campaign)
Turns out it was some sort of weird artifact I believe he found online I think. Judging by his reaction, he didn't appear to read through its effects before unleashing it on us and the town. Basically, the bowl created random effects that would make the Wand of Wonder blush. Amongst its effects, which were about to KILL us, the basement (where the item was and my library was) ended up full of acid. On top of that, random occurences happened, which included a safe appearing over everyone in the vicinity's head and dropping to hit them for 1d20 damage. The DM rolled a natural 20. Every person in the town, including guards, workers, women and children, everyone except the PCs, they all die. Even our captain of the guard failed his system shock roll and died, even though h had over 20 hit points. Finally, through use of an acide resistence potion, a potion of water breathing, and an amulet of underwater action, our group crusader (paladin-ish class) managed to go underground, find the bowl, and smash it. It exploded.
The tower was ruined, everyone in the town was dead, and all that remained was a black orb in the middle of the exploded area. We looked into it, and when someone touched it, they disappeared, from what looks like teleportation. We, foolish as we were, decided this was something summoning us to an adventure, or at least an explanation. Nope. Our levels 6-7 characters were all, ALL sent to the 7th level of hell. The DM basically said we were either dead or selling our souls to demons to get out.
He let us roll what's called Divine Intervention, and my cleric/magic-users deity intervened on behalf of her, bringing her back in the temple in the city, sans all of her possessions (Including her SPELLBOOK). Yet funnily enough, I was the luckiest person there by a good margin. My character survived. Everyone else lost at least one character and in some cases two or more. The tower we worked so hard on was gone, and the land was definitely going to be considered cursed so no one would want to live there again. The bar was gone, the people were gone, the characters were all gone (The DM also ran an evil campaign, so not all of his player characters were gone, just all the Good/neutral aligned ones). I was lucky enough to only have 1 of my 2 characters there and she was only robbed of all her possessions, not irretrievably killed. My other character, luckily, was a witch who was a wanderer and didn't keep any possessions in the tower.
The Dm shrugged it off, saying he didn't read all of the effects and it was just "bad luck with the rolls".
It was at that point I decided to use the excuse of being "uncomfortable" with them smoking marijuana at the game and I wouldn't join them any more. It was less confrontational then telling the DM "You are incredibly inconsiderate, you ruined something we worked hard on, and you refused to just fudge it or retcon it when YOU made the mistake of not looking into the items you introduced to your game." Truth is I had no problem with people smoking pot, at game or otherwise. They respected my choice to abstain without pressure or mockery, and I respected their choice to smoke it.
Failing to research an item that shatters players' hard work and then deciding to roll with its effects rather than retcon or make it up to them somehow? That's not respectful. Even though I didn't suffer that much, the character who lost their gear wasn't my favorite anyway, I realized I had no reason to put effort into that game, and as such had no reason to play in it.
What I learned though, as a player on that side, helped me as a future DM:
1. Read up before you add anything to your game. Modern games usually don't have the kind of kooky stuff that first edition games sometimes had that could destroy a campaign, but you still need to read up on something and consider its effects before adding it. Randomness can add fun, but the people who make "random" kooky items like a wand of wonder or a Deck of Many Things don't tend to consider consequences very well.
2. Don't be afraid to retcon if things go WAY off the rails. A retcon is the nuclear option, but there could be consequences that require backtracking, if not a few minutes even a whole session. If the end result is 6th level or lower characters in the lower planes, things probably went too far.
3. Respect the players' hard work. Don't dismiss or destroy a players hard work on a whim.
4. Cursed items are a real jerk move.
5. If you wipe out everyone in a TPK that was no real fault of the players and the project the group was working on for hours on end and put several sessions of work into, at least take the effort to CARE.
Keep in mind a few guidelines for how these tales should go:
If the campaign comes to a planned stop, then it wasn't killed off, it just ended. If the players roll up new characters in the same world, that isn't the end. If the players made poor decisions, got incredibly unlucky, or something the DM had less control over, then it's a different story. If people just wandered apart an couldn't play it anymore but wanted to, then it wasn't this problem. If the campaign was only a couple of session, then there isn't much to burn down.
This is when a campaign is going at least pretty well, and people want to do more, then the DM makes a decision or a string of decisions that just destroys the campaign for the group, or a powder keg finally goes off.
Here is my story:
The first long term campaign I was involved with was a first edition game with some modified rules. I first joined around the year 2001-ish, but kep with that group for what must have been close to a decade. It was run by a guy who I could only describe as "slowly turning into Ted Nugent" over the years.
So some backstory: We had an adventure in a tower outside the City the DM favored having all of our adventures in. We decided to not only clear out the haunted tower, but rebuild it.
So our collective group pooled our resources and actually ended up sort of becoming lords of the manor. We started a small town-like area with a defensible tower, surrounding houses, and even a tavern. One of our players spent HOURS on it, planning, creating fortifications, drawing everything keeping inventory and making plans. We all spent time on it, making our own corners and contributions. Some of the players made their bar, I made a small library and research area for my cleric/magic user. We ended up having adventures related to maintaining the area, clearing out threats and even defending from an encroaching army.
Then things started to go south. First we had a problem when the DM decided to nearly kill us with suddenly bad weather because we hadn't brought winter clothes or provisions. Problem was it was basically non-descript April weather when we left, but he decided to change to realistic weather by date while we were in the middle of the forest. First indication that the DM was sort of going.
However we ended up making it out, healing our frostbite, etc. Not sure if anyone died but the party as a whole made it out fine, minus some flu-like trouble recovering from hypothermia. In our adventure, we came across a few magic items. My character's speciality was research and identification, so she took the item, which was a large crystal bowl the size of a punch bowl, and left it in her research room after failing to identify it. (Keep in mind that I should have probably gotten SOME sort of indication as to what it was, but either way, the following ENDED the campaign)
Turns out it was some sort of weird artifact I believe he found online I think. Judging by his reaction, he didn't appear to read through its effects before unleashing it on us and the town. Basically, the bowl created random effects that would make the Wand of Wonder blush. Amongst its effects, which were about to KILL us, the basement (where the item was and my library was) ended up full of acid. On top of that, random occurences happened, which included a safe appearing over everyone in the vicinity's head and dropping to hit them for 1d20 damage. The DM rolled a natural 20. Every person in the town, including guards, workers, women and children, everyone except the PCs, they all die. Even our captain of the guard failed his system shock roll and died, even though h had over 20 hit points. Finally, through use of an acide resistence potion, a potion of water breathing, and an amulet of underwater action, our group crusader (paladin-ish class) managed to go underground, find the bowl, and smash it. It exploded.
The tower was ruined, everyone in the town was dead, and all that remained was a black orb in the middle of the exploded area. We looked into it, and when someone touched it, they disappeared, from what looks like teleportation. We, foolish as we were, decided this was something summoning us to an adventure, or at least an explanation. Nope. Our levels 6-7 characters were all, ALL sent to the 7th level of hell. The DM basically said we were either dead or selling our souls to demons to get out.
He let us roll what's called Divine Intervention, and my cleric/magic-users deity intervened on behalf of her, bringing her back in the temple in the city, sans all of her possessions (Including her SPELLBOOK). Yet funnily enough, I was the luckiest person there by a good margin. My character survived. Everyone else lost at least one character and in some cases two or more. The tower we worked so hard on was gone, and the land was definitely going to be considered cursed so no one would want to live there again. The bar was gone, the people were gone, the characters were all gone (The DM also ran an evil campaign, so not all of his player characters were gone, just all the Good/neutral aligned ones). I was lucky enough to only have 1 of my 2 characters there and she was only robbed of all her possessions, not irretrievably killed. My other character, luckily, was a witch who was a wanderer and didn't keep any possessions in the tower.
The Dm shrugged it off, saying he didn't read all of the effects and it was just "bad luck with the rolls".
It was at that point I decided to use the excuse of being "uncomfortable" with them smoking marijuana at the game and I wouldn't join them any more. It was less confrontational then telling the DM "You are incredibly inconsiderate, you ruined something we worked hard on, and you refused to just fudge it or retcon it when YOU made the mistake of not looking into the items you introduced to your game." Truth is I had no problem with people smoking pot, at game or otherwise. They respected my choice to abstain without pressure or mockery, and I respected their choice to smoke it.
Failing to research an item that shatters players' hard work and then deciding to roll with its effects rather than retcon or make it up to them somehow? That's not respectful. Even though I didn't suffer that much, the character who lost their gear wasn't my favorite anyway, I realized I had no reason to put effort into that game, and as such had no reason to play in it.
What I learned though, as a player on that side, helped me as a future DM:
1. Read up before you add anything to your game. Modern games usually don't have the kind of kooky stuff that first edition games sometimes had that could destroy a campaign, but you still need to read up on something and consider its effects before adding it. Randomness can add fun, but the people who make "random" kooky items like a wand of wonder or a Deck of Many Things don't tend to consider consequences very well.
2. Don't be afraid to retcon if things go WAY off the rails. A retcon is the nuclear option, but there could be consequences that require backtracking, if not a few minutes even a whole session. If the end result is 6th level or lower characters in the lower planes, things probably went too far.
3. Respect the players' hard work. Don't dismiss or destroy a players hard work on a whim.
4. Cursed items are a real jerk move.
5. If you wipe out everyone in a TPK that was no real fault of the players and the project the group was working on for hours on end and put several sessions of work into, at least take the effort to CARE.