Setharious
2020-11-01, 08:43 AM
So, I have been running my first campaign for about a year now for 2-4 players. They have all been having a great time slowly getting stronger to fight Tarrur (I'm not great at names) who is an ancient black dragon. Since this was my first time DMing, I sadly did not immediately give him the backstory and such that he needs. 'Evil dragon is evil' was basically all I had. Lately, I have been having some, strange ideas, and I didn't know if anyone else has ever tried this.
The concept here, is that Tarrur is actually a character from a different adventuring party, and a different campaign all together. They used to be a wizard, but used true polymorph repeatedly to become a black dragon, and aged the hard way to become ancient. During their long lifespan they noticed odd things, such as hearing of barbarians to the north, going south, and running into those same barbarians. Or being defeated by much weaker people than himself for no obviously reason. Eventually, they began to worry that their life was not under their own control. That someone or something else was pulling the strings, but for many thousands of years they looked for proof and couldn't find it. Whether they weren't strong enough, or not talented enough is unknown to him. All he knows is something is out there and he needs help.
Seeing no other option, Tarrur began jumping from plane to plane, becoming the BBEG of many different worlds, looking to find adventurers who could outdo him in every way. Adventurers who were smart, stronger, and were also worried about their lives being beyond their control. Tarrur would use illusions to convey their feelings to the players, like putting the party into a town where they would die every day but wake up perfectly fine, reliving the same exact day. A groundhog day situation. Really try to show the players their life is out of their control, and the party never knows who is pulling the strings.
When Tarrur gets defeated, he will use the last remaining amount of his life force to inscribe symbols on each of the party members, which will carry between every character my players make with me, regardless of campaign, that will give them some skills from their previous lives and attempt to draw the party to one another no matter how many years of lifetimes they may see.
Tarrur, and this whole campaign, is turning into an introduction of the ultimate BBEG. Me. The DM. This is where I need help. How can the players beat the DM? I don't want it to simply be 'DM throws puzzles at players, the players solve them, and the DM quits' though that could certainly be a part of it. I want there to be high level meta gaming, possibly some things needing to be learned or obtained through multiple campaigns to even consider challenging the DM.
A thought I have had, is to make the DM quit by not playing his game. If you sit down in one spot not to move the DM could get bored or try to force something to happen, only for the character to ignore that too even at the cost of their own life. Do You have any other ideas on how to 'fight' the DM? Does this sound like a good idea at all? Any thoughts or advice are welcome and encouraged! Thank you.
Edit: Maybe a way to view this is not the players vs the DM, but instead fighting a DM like entity who pulls strings in the background, not nullifying player decisions but taking away control occasionally. Sometimes this DM like entity does it to be helpful, sometimes they are in a bad mood and try to 'rocks fall' someone, so the players decide they don't want this God above Gods to mess with their lives anymore and take them on. More similar to say... superman vs mxyzptlk. A level of meta gaming required, but not exclusively.
The concept here, is that Tarrur is actually a character from a different adventuring party, and a different campaign all together. They used to be a wizard, but used true polymorph repeatedly to become a black dragon, and aged the hard way to become ancient. During their long lifespan they noticed odd things, such as hearing of barbarians to the north, going south, and running into those same barbarians. Or being defeated by much weaker people than himself for no obviously reason. Eventually, they began to worry that their life was not under their own control. That someone or something else was pulling the strings, but for many thousands of years they looked for proof and couldn't find it. Whether they weren't strong enough, or not talented enough is unknown to him. All he knows is something is out there and he needs help.
Seeing no other option, Tarrur began jumping from plane to plane, becoming the BBEG of many different worlds, looking to find adventurers who could outdo him in every way. Adventurers who were smart, stronger, and were also worried about their lives being beyond their control. Tarrur would use illusions to convey their feelings to the players, like putting the party into a town where they would die every day but wake up perfectly fine, reliving the same exact day. A groundhog day situation. Really try to show the players their life is out of their control, and the party never knows who is pulling the strings.
When Tarrur gets defeated, he will use the last remaining amount of his life force to inscribe symbols on each of the party members, which will carry between every character my players make with me, regardless of campaign, that will give them some skills from their previous lives and attempt to draw the party to one another no matter how many years of lifetimes they may see.
Tarrur, and this whole campaign, is turning into an introduction of the ultimate BBEG. Me. The DM. This is where I need help. How can the players beat the DM? I don't want it to simply be 'DM throws puzzles at players, the players solve them, and the DM quits' though that could certainly be a part of it. I want there to be high level meta gaming, possibly some things needing to be learned or obtained through multiple campaigns to even consider challenging the DM.
A thought I have had, is to make the DM quit by not playing his game. If you sit down in one spot not to move the DM could get bored or try to force something to happen, only for the character to ignore that too even at the cost of their own life. Do You have any other ideas on how to 'fight' the DM? Does this sound like a good idea at all? Any thoughts or advice are welcome and encouraged! Thank you.
Edit: Maybe a way to view this is not the players vs the DM, but instead fighting a DM like entity who pulls strings in the background, not nullifying player decisions but taking away control occasionally. Sometimes this DM like entity does it to be helpful, sometimes they are in a bad mood and try to 'rocks fall' someone, so the players decide they don't want this God above Gods to mess with their lives anymore and take them on. More similar to say... superman vs mxyzptlk. A level of meta gaming required, but not exclusively.