Help. My players broke time

[SilverSage]

So i’ve hit a big snag for a d&d campaign i’m running and I could use some other DM input.

The long and short of it is that my players have created a temporal paradox, and I was wondering exactly how it should thematically play out (AKA how should I torture them, for messing with time)?

More specifically, I’m running a campaign heavily involved around time and the apparent destruction of it throughout the universe. In our most recent session, my PCs traveled to the Elemental Plane of Fire, 30 years in the past. The former home of my fire genasi PC.

When she was very little (about 30 years ago), the PC witnessed her own mother sacrifice herself, to save the life of a mysterious stranger (which the PC now found out, was in fact, herself from the future). Despite me rendering the PC unconscious and completely devoid of agency (something I hate to do, but felt was necessary for the story), the rest of the party still managed to interfere with the natural cause of events. Honestly, I should have expected it. I feel like an idiot. But nevertheless, I’m left with an interesting opportunity and something of a temporal disaster.

I want my PCs to feel the weight of their actions, and I definitely want them to realize it’s not wise to simply go around mucking up timelines (they’re the ones who are supposed to save time after all). And, this causes several inconveniences for them. On the other hand, I did put them in the position, so I can’t blame them for being the murder hobos they are.


Here's a quick rundown of how the PCs have affected time:

-They snuck into the Charcoal Palace and assassinated the previous Sultan of the Effreet.
-Planted Evidence at the crime scene to make it seem like the Fey court assassinated the Sultan.
-Someone who is not supposed to be alive is now alive (PC’s mother).
-A PC now has an incurable disease which was supposed to be healed by special blood magic via the mother’s death.


Here’s some rough ideas i’ve been kicking around:

1.)The PCs remember two distinct timelines. One where the mother dies, and one where she is alive and well. See Berenstain bears/ mandela effect. There is otherwise no discerning changes to their timeline.

2.) Time always corrects itself. Shortly after saving her mother , The PC’s mom dies in a tragic yet unrelated way.

3.) The PC has altered the timeline to the point where she no longer is the same person. She has completely different memories and experiences. She has been considering rebuilding her character. This may be a good opportunity. Ally PCs make a charisma saving throw to try and remember the original version of her.

4.) There is a sonic “time boom” and everything gets shifted a little bit. Kind of like the DC story flash point. The Fey preoccupation with battling the efreet has led to the new “blood war.” One PC’s unborn child gets erased from history. By and large the universe is a much worse place now that a PC’s mother is alive.

I welcome all suggestions and any ideas/input you guys have. Thanks for your help!

[PopeLinus1]

Do what I do. Don’t send them back to the present, send them farther in the past. Then, have time-travelers from the future try and kill them for mucking around in the fabrics of time. While fighting a PC, they accidentally erase the party from the history of the universe. But as magic can never be distroyed, the wizard reincarnates in a timeless demiplane, and have the wizard go back and stop the whole fiasco.

[tieren]

I would generally go with number 2, but if the PC really was thinking of rebuilding her character and is onboard number 3 would be an excellent way to do it.

[Unoriginal]

I would go with 3), except no one but those who changed time remember the original timeline. Including the PC herself, since she wasn't involved.

[DeTess]

This is going to be a concept that might be slightly difficult to get across, so bear with me.

Is there a way for what the events that the PC's have played through to have been what has happened in a world where the mother was saved? If so, how about you start dropping hints that there was a different past to the party that now no longer is. Some odd memories here and there, maybe one PC suddenly has a wedding ring(but no spouse (in this timeline, at least)). Maybe one of them has a diary that mentions a party member that they never had, and no one remembers.

By doing this, you hit both the PC's and the players with the remains of a time-line that they can't remember, and leaves them questioning what has been. I suggest leaving lots of hints that this alternate time-line was better (maybe they succeeded at their greatest failure, maybe the various party members just had various reasons to be happier, whatever). It should also properly introduce the players to the mind-screw that is meddling in time-travel.

[SirGraystone]

Their action could very well have started a war between the Fey and the Efreet, which could still be going on strong 30 years later. The mother could have dies in the early part of the war, or could have survive and become mean and cruel after killed scores of fey.

The war could even spill over in other planes, and have kills tens of thousands peoples all because the group changed history.

[Finlam]

Here’s some rough ideas i’ve been kicking around:

1.)The PCs remember two distinct timelines. One where the mother dies, and one where she is alive and well. See Berenstain bears/ mandela effect. There is otherwise no discerning changes to their timeline.

2.) Time always corrects itself. Shortly after saving her mother , The PC’s mom dies in a tragic yet unrelated way.

3.) The PC has altered the timeline to the point where she no longer is the same person. She has completely different memories and experiences. She has been considering rebuilding her character. This may be a good opportunity. Ally PCs make a charisma saving throw to try and remember the original version of her.

4.) There is a sonic “time boom” and everything gets shifted a little bit. Kind of like the DC story flash point. The Fey preoccupation with battling the efreet has led to the new “blood war.” One PC’s unborn child gets erased from history. By and large the universe is a much worse place now that a PC’s mother is alive.

I welcome all suggestions and any ideas/input you guys have. Thanks for your help!

Option 1 would be kind of like "that was neat, let's move on" it doesn't really have weight or impact unless the PCs are really good roleplayers and can act out the dissonance.

2 is not really an option. It invalidates the player's choice and while it might be an acceptable story telling device in a novel, rendering PC choices meaningless is literally the worst thing you can ever do as a GM.


Option 3 is your best bet to allow the PC to rebuild their character. Be aware, since it provides positive reinforcement i.e. the player getting to rebuild their character, it is not a very good option if your end-goal is to make them "feel the weight of their actions".

Option 4, however, provides plenty of negative reinforcement and could still allow the player to rebuild her PC. Affecting the PC's child is emotionally meaningful, impactful, and a roleplaying opportunity. It's definitely your strongest of the four options because you make the changes to the timestream personal and relatable instead of just abstract i.e. there's a new blood war.

If you can find a way to make it impact the other PCs too (it doesn't all have to be bad) or their relationships, then it will turn it into a very memorable event and make them think twice before messing around with time again.

[Ventruenox]

Although it would be the most work, I would say a combination of 3 and 4. You have the opportunity now to retcon your entire campaign to make it challenging and fresh. It would mean that you go back through your notes and consider how things would have happened when your NPCs had differing motivations. You get to dump all sorts of entanglements and obligations that their "alt" selves signed up for should the party make it back to the present. How would the efreeti-fey blood war affect the availability of medicines to treat the symptoms of your PC's incurable disease? Your PC also gets to rebuild their character as part of the time quake.

[Tubben]

-A PC now has an incurable disease which was supposed to be healed by special blood magic via the mother’s death.


Muahahahaha.

Make it like this:

The PC will loose like 1 maximum hp/day. The only way to get healed and not die, is to make sure the time gets repaired by healing himself and 'killing' his own mother (Because of getting the blood magic heal).

So, he has to choose. Will my mother live, or will I?

That way, the time will repair itself, or he will just die.
Either he, or the rest of his group will hopefully try to save his life.

If he choose to save his mother and reroll a new char, so be it. You just have to make sure they will KNOW how to heal him, and give them a few hints :)

[bc56]

My suggestion
Their interference causes an apocalypse when they return to the present, so they have to go back and stop themselves. It'd be pretty interesting, too.

[TheYell]

Their action could very well have started a war between the Fey and the Efreet, which could still be going on strong 30 years later. The mother could have dies in the early part of the war, or could have survive and become mean and cruel after killed scores of fey.

The war could even spill over in other planes, and have kills tens of thousands peoples all because the group changed history.

Something like this. I mean they didn't just kill a butterfly, they killed a sovereign and framed an innocent foreign power.

I'd go with 4, and have the party confronted by Time Paladins from future. The Time Paladins are trying to create a True Justice Timeline and find the party to be Time Criminals. They banish the party to a Time Colony in the prehistoric past from which the Time Paladins are going to conquer the present timelines.

The party will adventure in prehistory until the Time Paladins summon them to return to the near past. The Fey-Efreet war has ended with a joint mission to assassinate the party as small children. The Time Paladins want the party to defend their own lives by confronting the assassins. They give them items that will enable them to move through time. The party can use this to carry out the mission of the Time Paladins, or escape to a present-day timeline where they were assassinated as kids.

[SilverSage]

This is going to be a concept that might be slightly difficult to get across, so bear with me.

Is there a way for what the events that the PC's have played through to have been what has happened in a world where the mother was saved? If so, how about you start dropping hints that there was a different past to the party that now no longer is. Some odd memories here and there, maybe one PC suddenly has a wedding ring(but no spouse (in this timeline, at least)). Maybe one of them has a diary that mentions a party member that they never had, and no one remembers.

By doing this, you hit both the PC's and the players with the remains of a time-line that they can't remember, and leaves them questioning what has been. I suggest leaving lots of hints that this alternate time-line was better (maybe they succeeded at their greatest failure, maybe the various party members just had various reasons to be happier, whatever). It should also properly introduce the players to the mind-screw that is meddling in time-travel.


I think I see what your saying, and this is really cool. A better timeline that they inadvertently erased. But now have no memory of. Very compelling.

[Tvtyrant]

So i’ve hit a big snag for a d&d campaign i’m running and I could use some other DM input.

The long and short of it is that my players have created a temporal paradox, and I was wondering exactly how it should thematically play out (AKA how should I torture them, for messing with time)?

More specifically, I’m running a campaign heavily involved around time and the apparent destruction of it throughout the universe. In our most recent session, my PCs traveled to the Elemental Plane of Fire, 30 years in the past. The former home of my fire genasi PC.

When she was very little (about 30 years ago), the PC witnessed her own mother sacrifice herself, to save the life of a mysterious stranger (which the PC now found out, was in fact, herself from the future). Despite me rendering the PC unconscious and completely devoid of agency (something I hate to do, but felt was necessary for the story), the rest of the party still managed to interfere with the natural cause of events. Honestly, I should have expected it. I feel like an idiot. But nevertheless, I’m left with an interesting opportunity and something of a temporal disaster.

I want my PCs to feel the weight of their actions, and I definitely want them to realize it’s not wise to simply go around mucking up timelines (they’re the ones who are supposed to save time after all). And, this causes several inconveniences for them. On the other hand, I did put them in the position, so I can’t blame them for being the murder hobos they are.


Here's a quick rundown of how the PCs have affected time:

-They snuck into the Charcoal Palace and assassinated the previous Sultan of the Effreet.
-Planted Evidence at the crime scene to make it seem like the Fey court assassinated the Sultan.
-Someone who is not supposed to be alive is now alive (PC’s mother).
-A PC now has an incurable disease which was supposed to be healed by special blood magic via the mother’s death.


Here’s some rough ideas i’ve been kicking around:

1.)The PCs remember two distinct timelines. One where the mother dies, and one where she is alive and well. See Berenstain bears/ mandela effect. There is otherwise no discerning changes to their timeline.

2.) Time always corrects itself. Shortly after saving her mother , The PC’s mom dies in a tragic yet unrelated way.

3.) The PC has altered the timeline to the point where she no longer is the same person. She has completely different memories and experiences. She has been considering rebuilding her character. This may be a good opportunity. Ally PCs make a charisma saving throw to try and remember the original version of her.

4.) There is a sonic “time boom” and everything gets shifted a little bit. Kind of like the DC story flash point. The Fey preoccupation with battling the efreet has led to the new “blood war.” One PC’s unborn child gets erased from history. By and large the universe is a much worse place now that a PC’s mother is alive.

I welcome all suggestions and any ideas/input you guys have. Thanks for your help!

I would do something like: They get back to a largely unchanged future, but one where Inevitables keep attacking them. The attacks get worse through the campaign, and the Inevitables start working with the parties bad guys to get them. It is too late to fix the minor changes in timeline, they want an example made so others won't be tempted to do the same.

[Pex]

You didn't say how the party stopped the mother from sacrificing herself to save the stranger.

There is an alternative that avoids the paradox, a method used in Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban. There was no time interference. It was always this way, but now the PCs have a clearer perspective of what happened. The mother still sacrificed herself. Either she's dead as always or it's discovered she never was really dead but Elsewhere and thought to be dead. The Efreet/Fey war was always there, but the PCs weren't aware of it. It explains something that happened during the campaign now that hindsight is 20/20. Now that the PCs know it's happening they can see the signs.

[sithlordnergal]

I would go with the Back to the Future method. I.E., those who went back in time remember going back in time, but still end up changed in some way.

Case in point, Marty went back in time, changed how his parents met, and caused a different time line to occur. He and Doc Brown remembered the original time line, but Marty and his siblings began to fade away due to effectivly being erased.

This would allow the PCs to go back to the present but have major changes, and allow the one player to change their character up without having to deal with too much back story. Personally, I'd have the Efreet and Fey Court at war, the one PC's mother be a soldier in said war as a healer or fighter, and the PC with the disease slowly starts to gain penalties as the new time line exerts itself over them.

[Vogie]

Another option is going the Many Worlds route - they have broken time, but only relative to themselves - the new timeline is a completely different universe. They don't realize it until they run into alternate versions of themselves in the "present".

Then you can use some alternate universe shenanigans:

Sliders - The party now has to hunt down artifacts to help them return to their dimension... which will, in actuality, let you dance them around a series of alternate universes.
The One - The party encounters Multiverse MurderHobo versions of themselves, an Evil version of the party (plus or minus some characters) who are hunting down alternate selves to gain more power - originally the alt selves of that dimension, who let it slip that the party is on that dimension as well.
Fringe - The Party has to assist alternate version of themselves to solve a problem or problems, including (but not limited to) closing the rift and returning to their own dimension.

[Joe dirt]

U can always go with the this was all a bad dream theme.... kill them off with 20th level versions of themselves then have them awaken the moment they would have done time travel giving them a nightmare

[kardar233]

Pex’s suggestion of a one-pass timeline is definitely interesting. I think that that’s a good way to go if you want to use this opportunity to add some mysterious depth to the game. If the PC’s mother was still alive, why did she think her mother was dead? Who or what orchestrated that? Are there people invested in making sure the timeline at least makes sense on the surface (like Discworld’s History Monks, or Exalted’s Sidereals)? Or is some mysterious force leading unrelated people to cover up this snarl in the tapestry of time? Lots of options here.

I would agree that one of the the worst things you can do is have the mother be killed off again. I would also be very strongly against the idea of punishing the PCs for doing that thing in particular. They traveled through time and overcame incredible obstacles (including a disapproving DM) to save their family; doesn’t that sound like something epic heroes should do?

Now, that doesn’t mean there’s not room to be a little nasty. They did start an interplanar war between Efreet and Fey; feel free to describe their favourite towns reduced to lava and ash, or once-friendly NPCs used as spell batteries by nymphs or as meatshields in a Wild Hunt.

Just let them have this one good thing. The rest can be ash and death.

[zinycor]

Go full Flashpoint, this is a chance to have a whole new world. Have allies become enemies, enemies become allies. Have characters that were previously dead, now alive. And the opposite. Explore the idea of the war between the Fey and the fire efreetis and take it to an extreme, maybe the material plane is now mostly burned and the only oceans or lakes are now dominated by fey monsters who rule the cities in a tiranical way.

You shouldn't kill the mother, but make the mother a very important actor in this new world. Maybe she has become a dictator, a rebel or a nun. Maybe she realizes that this reality came to happen because of her and feels proud of it, or guilty or indiferent.

And if you want to go even more flashpoint...

Have a world ending event about to happen because of this disturbance of time. Maybe the end of time is coming and the players are the only ones that can avoid it, by doing some ridiculous quest.

[The_Jette]

I have a tendency to be a bit strong handed where messing with time is concerned. The character who grew up with a dead mother would disappear. The player can create a new character and either be introduced, or have "he was always there" in full effect. The world would be a hellscape, suffering from the war between the two magical factions, with most cities destroyed and in ruins. I'd either have them come across the future version of the mother, who explains how her child died in the war; or, have them come across a completely different version of the character who grew up with their mother alive but had to watch as she died during the war. So, if the character was originally a Warlock, they're now a Paladin. Or, if they were a Cleric, they're a Wizard. Something like that. And, every time they try to go back again to change things they make things worse, until they finally realize that they have to go back and create the ultimate time paradox by killing their younger selves before they ever went and changed the world to begin with. They'll have to sacrifice themselves in order to make right their own mistakes. Then: BAM! Start the campaign over again.

[zinycor]

I have a tendency to be a bit strong handed where messing with time is concerned. The character who grew up with a dead mother would disappear. The player can create a new character and either be introduced, or have "he was always there" in full effect. The world would be a hellscape, suffering from the war between the two magical factions, with most cities destroyed and in ruins. I'd either have them come across the future version of the mother, who explains how her child died in the war; or, have them come across a completely different version of the character who grew up with their mother alive but had to watch as she died during the war. So, if the character was originally a Warlock, they're now a Paladin. Or, if they were a Cleric, they're a Wizard. Something like that. And, every time they try to go back again to change things they make things worse, until they finally realize that they have to go back and create the ultimate time paradox by killing their younger selves before they ever went and changed the world to begin with. They'll have to sacrifice themselves in order to make right their own mistakes. Then: BAM! Start the campaign over again.

Or could have the player not fix the situation, and now this is the sucky world they have to live with.

[DrowPiratRobrts]

I think Option 4 is the most compelling. I agree with where it was stated above that this still provides an opportunity to rebuild the PC if they're unhappy playing with their current PC (I'm inclined to allow this if it's affecting how much someone enjoys playing, even when it doesn't make narrative sense).

In addition, the Flashpoint paradox is such a classic, ironclad example of multiple timelines. If I were you, I would likely say that the party remembers everything from the normal timeline and nothing from the new timeline when they get back to the present. Things change subtly for the whole party, but especially for the PC who now has a mother. The idea of someone who knows the party (a relative or friend perhaps) bringing up a party member from the new timeline who nobody remembers is SOLID GOLD. The party member could be dead, or you could introduce an NPC that they party has to deal with now (for good or ill). Either way, quirky effects like that are soooo good. Mix in good ones and bad ones, but don't make anything too drastic (i.e. This evil emperor came out of nowhere because your mother didn't sacrifice herself when you were a kid). Those sorts of massive changes I typically find less gripping in stories, whereas the subtle changes might affect PCs in different ways. Some of them might feel the need to correct the timeline and risk messing things up more whereas some might prefer this new timeline. This idea is sooooo cool. I hope you all have a great time with it, and good luck! Keep us updated!!!

[DrowPiratRobrts]

This is going to be a concept that might be slightly difficult to get across, so bear with me.

Is there a way for what the events that the PC's have played through to have been what has happened in a world where the mother was saved? If so, how about you start dropping hints that there was a different past to the party that now no longer is. Some odd memories here and there, maybe one PC suddenly has a wedding ring(but no spouse (in this timeline, at least)). Maybe one of them has a diary that mentions a party member that they never had, and no one remembers.

By doing this, you hit both the PC's and the players with the remains of a time-line that they can't remember, and leaves them questioning what has been. I suggest leaving lots of hints that this alternate time-line was better (maybe they succeeded at their greatest failure, maybe the various party members just had various reasons to be happier, whatever). It should also properly introduce the players to the mind-screw that is meddling in time-travel.

The extra party member thing is SO GOOD.

[GorogIrongut]

My suggestion begins with a question...

Do any of the players share a strong faith/worship of a deity that might be inclined to intervene?

If the answer is yes, have them sucked back into the future. A 'dystopian' future in which their actions spawned a millenia long conflict between the Fey and the Elemental plane. Make much of it scary and bad. Seed it with a few moments of light and joy... but only a few. This is a moment far in the future from when they left.

When this mini adventure comes to a bloody end (i.e. all members of the party gasping for breath as they bleed out)... they find themselves in a heavenly location suitable to the deity in question. S/He intervened to give them a taste of the consequences of their actions. The deity grants a blessing to the faithful pc and tells them that S/He can no longer interfere. Insert a bit of a monologue about how actions have consequences and that what they do from hereon out is immutable.
The scene fades to black.

They find themselves back at the point in the past where they just stepped into the Elemental Plane 30 yrs before the 'normal' timeline... exactly. They are essentially given a chance of a do over. They can reset the story line, performing things exactly as they'd done prior to divine intervention, with the knowledge that a thousand years in the future their would be SIGNIFICANT repercussions. They can go for the middle road and hope that they don't do anything that would significantly alter the future. Or they can adhere identically to what happened as the Genasi PC remembers it. By doing so, they will be free to assume that the Future is now safe and that it hasn't descended into out right chaos and destruction.

You essentially give them a reset button and leave it up to them to decide if they would still make the same choices.

If they opt to make changes, I would use the following as the governing principles.
1. When dealing with changes in the timeline, small choices in the flow of time are largely self correcting. If someone was expected to get sick but you prevent this from occurring, then it happens at the earliest logical convenient moment. The same goes for insignificant deaths, etc.
2. Significant changes to the timeline are catastrophic. The changes occur almost immediately and it's nigh impossible to wrench the flow of time back to it's recognizable pattern. The only people aware of the changes are the PC's or beings of demigod status or higher. Expect the PC's to be targetted by deities who are unhappy with the changes in the time line. Deities happy with the changes will befriend them. This can make for an interesting situation where the world has worsened and good deities are hunting the party while evil deities are befriending them.

When the PC's return the 30 years back into the future, they will find a drastically changed world to the one that they left. Whatever plans and property and loot they had arranged prior to their departure is gone. Being alien to the current, altered timeline, no one knows their names. They have essentially a clean slate from which to re establish their influence on this altered world.

[MaxWilson]

This is going to be a concept that might be slightly difficult to get across, so bear with me.

Is there a way for what the events that the PC's have played through to have been what has happened in a world where the mother was saved? If so, how about you start dropping hints that there was a different past to the party that now no longer is. Some odd memories here and there, maybe one PC suddenly has a wedding ring(but no spouse (in this timeline, at least)). Maybe one of them has a diary that mentions a party member that they never had, and no one remembers.

By doing this, you hit both the PC's and the players with the remains of a time-line that they can't remember, and leaves them questioning what has been. I suggest leaving lots of hints that this alternate time-line was better (maybe they succeeded at their greatest failure, maybe the various party members just had various reasons to be happier, whatever). It should also properly introduce the players to the mind-screw that is meddling in time-travel.

Heh. Sounds like someone may have read The Proteus Operation.

Long story short: you successfully change time, and then find out that your original timeline was actually created by time travelers intervening to prevent another disaster.

In this particular case though I'd let the players have their victory: mom is alive, yay! (No character rebuild, no changes to existing characters--you come from a timeline which no longer exists. Deal with the ethical problems of having perhaps eliminated untold infinities of living creatures from existence.) However, it turns out that mom is not in fact a neutral in the Time Wars...

[DeTess]

Heh. Sounds like someone may have read The Proteus Operation.

I haven't actually, but I'll put it on the list.

No, this idea was in part inspired by a campaign(session?)-diary of a horror session in which the players got attacked by a creature that actively erased it's own existence, and that of it's victims, from memory. The players got attacked by that one, returned to camp, and found signs of the existence of a fifth party member (there where only four players at the table) that they didn't know anything about. I remembered that when I was thinking of a way to process this event in a way that didn't just hit the characters with the consequences and mindscrewy-ness of a time paradox, but also the players, and the idea I presented sprouted from that.

[Daithi]

Muahahahaha.

Make it like this:

The PC will loose like 1 maximum hp/day. The only way to get healed and not die, is to make sure the time gets repaired by healing himself and 'killing' his own mother (Because of getting the blood magic heal).

So, he has to choose. Will my mother live, or will I?

That way, the time will repair itself, or he will just die.
Either he, or the rest of his group will hopefully try to save his life.

If he choose to save his mother and reroll a new char, so be it. You just have to make sure they will KNOW how to heal him, and give them a few hints :)

I liked this response.

Kill your mother or you die. Hard not to feel the consequences with this one.

[MaxWilson]

Oh wait, now I remember.

The original timeline was utopia of sorts with no WWII; that was considered a disaster by racists in the original timeline; they went back in time to create WWII, which resulted in huge German victories and by 1963 an America alone. John F. Kennedy launched a crash project to go back in time before America lost completely and stop WWII from happening. In the process the protagonists from 1963 learn about the original original timeline from 2030 and wind up creating our timeline as a side effect of stopping the tech transfers from the original original timeline (so no Nazi atom bomb for example).

[MaxWilson]

I haven't actually, but I'll put it on the list.

No, this idea was in part inspired by a campaign(session?)-diary of a horror session in which the players got attacked by a creature that actively erased it's own existence, and that of it's victims, from memory. The players got attacked by that one, returned to camp, and found signs of the existence of a fifth party member (there where only four players at the table) that they didn't know anything about. I remembered that when I was thinking of a way to process this event in a way that didn't just hit the characters with the consequences and mindscrewy-ness of a time paradox, but also the players, and the idea I presented sprouted from that.

That is brilliant!

[SpamCreateWater]

I haven't actually, but I'll put it on the list.

No, this idea was in part inspired by a campaign(session?)-diary of a horror session in which the players got attacked by a creature that actively erased it's own existence, and that of it's victims, from memory. The players got attacked by that one, returned to camp, and found signs of the existence of a fifth party member (there where only four players at the table) that they didn't know anything about. I remembered that when I was thinking of a way to process this event in a way that didn't just hit the characters with the consequences and mindscrewy-ness of a time paradox, but also the players, and the idea I presented sprouted from that.

Link (https://www.reddit.com/r/dndnext/comments/7ixii3/my_proudest_dm_moment_the_death_of_a_secret_party/). Such a good idea.

[furby076]

for at least a short period of time (they get used to it eventually), pcs have conflicting memories. this could cause them to have a flashback during innocuous times or during battle (lose that round to this faulty memory). They also suffer disadvantage to knowledge checks that revolve around history, nobility, locations, etc. Again, this is only for a short time, and eases up eventually (maybe a level of severe pain, and after the next level it goes away....so 2 levels of suffering, but it eases up).
This would teach the players to not much with time, and pcs too. It would also be plausible (watch Legends and see what happens when time is changed)

[Tetrasodium]

So i’ve hit a big snag for a d&d campaign i’m running and I could use some other DM input.

The long and short of it is that my players have created a temporal paradox, and I was wondering exactly how it should thematically play out (AKA how should I torture them, for messing with time)?

More specifically, I’m running a campaign heavily involved around time and the apparent destruction of it throughout the universe. In our most recent session, my PCs traveled to the Elemental Plane of Fire, 30 years in the past. The former home of my fire genasi PC.

When she was very little (about 30 years ago), the PC witnessed her own mother sacrifice herself, to save the life of a mysterious stranger (which the PC now found out, was in fact, herself from the future). Despite me rendering the PC unconscious and completely devoid of agency (something I hate to do, but felt was necessary for the story), the rest of the party still managed to interfere with the natural cause of events. Honestly, I should have expected it. I feel like an idiot. But nevertheless, I’m left with an interesting opportunity and something of a temporal disaster.

I want my PCs to feel the weight of their actions, and I definitely want them to realize it’s not wise to simply go around mucking up timelines (they’re the ones who are supposed to save time after all). And, this causes several inconveniences for them. On the other hand, I did put them in the position, so I can’t blame them for being the murder hobos they are.


Here's a quick rundown of how the PCs have affected time:

-They snuck into the Charcoal Palace and assassinated the previous Sultan of the Effreet.
-Planted Evidence at the crime scene to make it seem like the Fey court assassinated the Sultan.
-Someone who is not supposed to be alive is now alive (PC’s mother).
-A PC now has an incurable disease which was supposed to be healed by special blood magic via the mother’s death.


Here’s some rough ideas i’ve been kicking around:

1.)The PCs remember two distinct timelines. One where the mother dies, and one where she is alive and well. See Berenstain bears/ mandela effect. There is otherwise no discerning changes to their timeline.

2.) Time always corrects itself. Shortly after saving her mother , The PC’s mom dies in a tragic yet unrelated way.

3.) The PC has altered the timeline to the point where she no longer is the same person. She has completely different memories and experiences. She has been considering rebuilding her character. This may be a good opportunity. Ally PCs make a charisma saving throw to try and remember the original version of her.

4.) There is a sonic “time boom” and everything gets shifted a little bit. Kind of like the DC story flash point. The Fey preoccupation with battling the efreet has led to the new “blood war.” One PC’s unborn child gets erased from history. By and large the universe is a much worse place now that a PC’s mother is alive.

I welcome all suggestions and any ideas/input you guys have. Thanks for your help!
The PC's cannot grandfsther paradox themselves because they themselves are unlinked from the timeline changes... or if you want to be insidious, time is self correcting & requires multiple changes to force a change so the first time they try to exploit time travel it does not seem to work because their grandfather was still that bloke granny had an affair with when they try to grandfather paradox themselves.

my suggestion though is to blue screen the universe & send them (MUCH) further back in time to fix the original problemthat set things in motion. You should never allow a player to much with their own timeline or be in a situation where they could accidentally/intentionally cause headaches with paradoxes.

[Pex]

There is a difference between players dealing with consequences of their actions and the DM looking for an excuse to screw over the PCs and self-righteously blame the players for their own misfortune. The former is the game. The latter is the DM abusing his position.

Choose wisely.

[Ventruenox]

As long as you are borrowing from DC Comics storylines: The erased party member has a way to come back into existence (trapped in a demiplane, Wish spell, Divine Intervention, take your pick of resurrection tropes), then give it the Jason Todd treatment. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batman:_Under_the_Red_Hood) I would imagine that there would be sufficient motivations for that NPC to work against the party.

[Personification]

This really depends on whether you want a new antagonist, but you could go with a #2 that still makes the entire event meaningful. First, have the characters, especially the genasi but also a little bit in the others, get sudden headaches, and flashes of memories that they haven't had involving the genasi's mom in some way, some are bad, but not terrible, and the net is good (though maybe they take some psych damage when it happens). Suddenly, at a point when they are all in one place with the genasi's mother, they feel a ripping noise in their minds, simultaneously get a migraine, and all take psych damage, and can't move. In fact, from what they can see, nothing is moving (e.g. flickerless fires and frozen wavy hair). Then, a portal opens and out step several powerful modrons (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ClockRoaches). They are an elite squad of time fixers who don't care if the changes created by time meddling were good or bad, only that they are undone. They have magic, and most of their spells alter time, resurrect, teleport, alter memory, and paralyze and knock out witnesses. Their leader kills the mother, and then alters the young genasi's memory to better fit the original timeline. A message appears in all of the characters' heads politely informing them that they have altered the proper flow of time, their mistake has been corrected (you're welcome), and if they disagree with this they can file a complaint with the higher powers of Mechanus. The characters suddenly awaken in the place and time that they had been in before going to the 30 years before, and any attempt to return to that specific time has failed. These modrons can be recurring characters, who, while not evil, are extremely antagonistic towards the PCs, believing them to be rogue time-altering agents of chaos.