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View Full Version : Cop out, unfair, or a cool idea?



mikeejimbo
2008-07-22, 11:34 PM
Imagine this - the players are camped out in the wilderness. There's an air of disease about the place, but they can't quite put their finger on it. They sleep restlessly, and whoever is on watch fidgets with anxiety.

Suddenly, late at night, the watchman hears a noise! Just an animal in the brush, or perhaps some sort of threat. He tenses up and looks around, only to see two shining eyes in the woods beyond. He screams to wake everyone else up and they gather their arms, when out of the woods rushes a dire wolf. He is quickly followed by a half-dozen more, from all directions, and the PCs are surrounded. They fight them, but they are no match - the wolves are powerful and there are too many of them. One by one they fall, until the last PC is dead.

And then, in the morning, they all wake up. Slowly they realize that they had just had a nightmare...

...but what made them all have the same one?

--

So, do you think that this sort of plot device could be well-used, or is it unfair to put the players in any encounter that they can't win, even if it doesn't mean anything? Note that, were I the DM in this instance, I would still give them some experience points for it.

Zeful
2008-07-22, 11:41 PM
It's generally a cop out unless the BBEG is reputed to have great powers over dreams, although you could treat it as roleplaing a Nightmare (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/nightmare.htm). But a TPK seems kind of steep.

What I'd recommend is after they take the 1d10 damage (or more if your using a custom spell) they vanish from within the shared dream, causing not but a small amount of paranoia.

mikeejimbo
2008-07-22, 11:45 PM
Hmm, not a bad idea. Either of those, really. I was thinking it would be an aspect of the location in which they camped.

Also I just noticed I said "What make them have all the same dream?" Ick, how could I made [sic] a mistake like that? :smallwink:

SoD
2008-07-22, 11:51 PM
One possibilty: Say you have 4 players, and there is n XP points awarded for this: first person to 'die' gets 0.25n. Second person gets 0.5n. Third gets 0.75n, final person gets n.

Of course, I'm not sure how that'll work out with my homerule: all unconcious party members at the end of the battle are awarded .5n.

Actually, maybe I'll just refur to n from now on instead of XP...

mabriss lethe
2008-07-22, 11:52 PM
depends on how you handle it from there.

It could be really lame, or it could be the icing on the proverbial cake.

If it's a recurring thing, It'll get boring quickly. Every time it happens, it should be a different situation, not always combat oriented. They meet a wounded stranger in the middle of the night, he makes a series of eerie pronouncements, then dies in their camp, explodes into wisps of shadow.... etc.

mistformsquirrl
2008-07-23, 12:04 AM
Agreeing with Mabriss on this.

I've had DMs do similar things; and where well executed, were fantastic in advancing the 'feel' of the campaign.

I've had others do similar things that felt like a damn slog through foot deep mud.

So the question is: Are you confident enough in your ability as a storyteller to actually make something like this interesting and atmospheric?

Also - I *highly* recommend making certain that the wolves in the dream can kill the players reasonably fast. The last thing you want is for the battle to drag out for a long long time - that'll get first tedious, then frustrating, and finally just plain aggravating when the players realize they can't win. If it happens relatively quick though, you can get to the explanation and keep the "woah" feel.

So I guess my recommendation would be to keep it to 10 rounds or less, perhaps setting up a progression of ever tougher Dire Wolves in each wave; so that eventually, even if they're doing well at first, they're liable to be completely whelmed by the 10th round.

ArmorArmadillo
2008-07-23, 12:17 AM
Imagine this - the players are camped out in the wilderness. There's an air of disease about the place, but they can't quite put their finger on it. They sleep restlessly, and whoever is on watch fidgets with anxiety.

Suddenly, late at night, the watchman hears a noise! Just an animal in the brush, or perhaps some sort of threat. He tenses up and looks around, only to see two shining eyes in the woods beyond. He screams to wake everyone else up and they gather their arms, when out of the woods rushes a dire wolf. He is quickly followed by a half-dozen more, from all directions, and the PCs are surrounded. They fight them, but they are no match - the wolves are powerful and there are too many of them. One by one they fall, until the last PC is dead.

And then, in the morning, they all wake up. Slowly they realize that they had just had a nightmare...

...but what made them all have the same one?

--

So, do you think that this sort of plot device could be well-used, or is it unfair to put the players in any encounter that they can't win, even if it doesn't mean anything? Note that, were I the DM in this instance, I would still give them some experience points for it.

This is a perfectly reasonable plot device, and an excellent device for a horror campaign, but it can also be increibly annoying. "You can't win" makes the players feel powerless, and "It was just a dream" makes them feel like what they do is irrelevant.

It can still be done, but you may want to consider a few things.
1) Don't get hung up on stats: if the battle is set up already doing a lot of bookkeeping with your monsters bogs things down, which ties into point two:
2) Be quick. Be overwhelming. Have the battle finish fast so the players didn't feel like they screwed up by losing.

Kyace
2008-07-23, 12:18 AM
Something I'd like to try in this plot would be to have black out then have wolf attacks near by, only for it to turn out that an enchanter/druid with sleep poison and wolf companion/whatever is faking the werewolvism that the group will jsuspect

Chronos
2008-07-23, 12:35 AM
Risk of doing this: It may look, to your players, as though you intended the encounter to be real, and then used "It was only a dream" as a cop-out after you TPKed them. Sure, you planned it that way all along, but they don't know that.

evisiron
2008-07-23, 01:19 AM
Risk of doing this: It may look, to your players, as though you intended the encounter to be real, and then used "It was only a dream" as a cop-out after you TPKed them. Sure, you planned it that way all along, but they don't know that.

I agree. You could negate this with the previously mentioned 'damage before they wake up'. My way would be to have the characters "explode into a thousand shadows" or some other special affect when they reach half hitpoints. That way its obvious that something is up but won't be blatantly obvious that its all fake.

Venerable
2008-07-23, 01:19 AM
ninja'd!

As a player, I feel cheated in situations where there's no way for me to know what's really happening. If I could have figured it out but didn't, that's my fault, rather than the DM's. That's fair.

With this in mind, could you give some subtle clues that it might not be real (e.g. the dire wolves don't touch the ground, player weapons pass through them harmlessly or don't connect when they should, etc.)? That way the players have a chance to realize something weird's up, rather than the encounter being a fait accompli.

Pronounceable
2008-07-23, 01:30 AM
'It was all a dream' is almost always forced and/or dumb. And a straightforward battle with wolves isn't very sparkling. Something more extraordinary can make up for using such cheese as this, but this is a bad idea as is.

Though I have no qualms about tpking anywhere, anytime. And you won't even be killing them for real, so that's all right.

Gralamin
2008-07-23, 01:36 AM
ninja'd!

As a player, I feel cheated in situations where there's no way for me to know what's really happening. If I could have figured it out but didn't, that's my fault, rather than the DM's. That's fair.

With this in mind, could you give some subtle clues that it might not be real (e.g. the dire wolves don't touch the ground, player weapons pass through them harmlessly or don't connect when they should, etc.)? That way the players have a chance to realize something weird's up, rather than the encounter being a fait accompli.

This is probably the best way of doing it. If the players have a chance of figuring it out, then when its revealed its a dream its more of a "Why didn't I think of that?" then a "What do you mean it was a dream :smallannoyed:".

Khanderas
2008-07-23, 02:23 AM
Above all though I admit the Players need to see that something is up while in the dream. They may not have to know what at the time, BUT the important thing is to make sure that afterwards they don't think it is a retcon of a TPK. As long as they don't think 'Oh it was "just a dream". I guess it was just an encounter that got too hard for us and the DM didn't wanna deal with a TPK yet' and it will be fine. Look at the other tips for ways to up the fine to good :smallsmile:



I do like a dream TPK, but it should not for best effect be because they fight things that are slightly too hard, or slightly too many. They need to face a hopeless battle where they will lose at no fault of their own. Either because their opponents wont be damaged or their attacks and defenses are too feeble. Some ideas of my own to add some Strangeness

Have a spell or two inexplicably fail. Will freak them out alittle and add to the feeling of Strange.

Youknow how you in dreams can get the feeling of "running fast but I can't get anywhere". The feeling of strangeness and helplessness you got as a kid when you were chased by something scary and couln't get away because, for some reason, your running was about half as fast as normal walking.

Perhaps let one person NOT have this dream. That would spook him/her or everyone out alittle and lessens the certainty of a prophetic dream.

Since it is a fight by night, as the encounter progresses have their lightsources wink out one by one. Anyone not in light.... disappears. They can feel something malevolent just out of sight... And then Rorth's torch goes dark and he is heard no more (until they wake up anyway).

TiaC
2008-07-23, 02:42 AM
Perhaps let one person NOT have this dream. That would spook him/her or everyone out alittle and lessens the certainty of a prophetic dream.
You could leave out whoever is on watch at the time of the dream.
this whole thing reminds me of the Dreamscape haunting from dragon #336; you should look it up. it is one of the best articles of the magazine.

strangely, the lyrics that came up as I opened this thread were:
"I thought to myself what could that mean
Am I going crazy or is this just a dream
Now, wait a minute
I know I'm lying in a field of grass somewhere
so it's all in my head..."
see if you can name the song.

Frost
2008-07-23, 03:33 AM
Not sure if it's been mentioned. But the biggest problem with this is that you have to dictate PCs actions for it to turn out that way at all.

Maybe they don't want to run, or maybe the Wizard casts Invisibility or Fly. Sometimes, every once in a while, the Players do something other then boring monster smash, and then the DM gets all mad because he has to active railroad instead of passive railroad.

Hallavast
2008-07-23, 04:07 AM
Does the dream encounter have to be unwinnable? You could just make an exceptionally hard one and make the fight fair. The PCs could still wake up when the fight ends (when either all PCs are dead or the wolves are all killed/driven off).

Otherwise, it sounds like a cool idea. Just find a way to let the PCs know that you planned the encounter to be a dream if they investigate such.

Cheesegear
2008-07-23, 04:09 AM
I did this exact same thing to players once. Where the TPK was 'just a dream'. Where the GMPC with them was an erractic Enchanter, and his nightmare (all his 'new friends' getting killed) was played out to all the people sleeping near him - The Party.

Before I had a chance to explain when the last player died, the party was angry because I had given them an encounter that they couldn't win. And to them, it just felt like I didn't want to play anymore, and it was an elaborate way of saying "Rocks fall. Everyone dies." They were not very pleased with me.

Then I said "Hang on, HANG ON! ...You all wake up." Needless to say, I was given the Death Stare by four people. Which is pretty disconcerting, until I explained what had just happened.

My advice; Give your players some way of Attempting to Disbelieve, or a way to figure out that they're in a dream before you even kill the first one.
(The first player that 'died' in my game was already rolling up a new sheet by the end of the round...)

TheCountAlucard
2008-07-23, 04:44 AM
As has been said, this could easily go very, very wrong. If you can pull this off, power to you. However, it must be handled delicately, lest it explode like an atom bomb.

Treguard
2008-07-23, 06:49 AM
If you're in a mood to scare your party than how about this: when they eventually come to confront the BBEG, he attacks them using the very same monsters from the shared nightmare. Describe them the same way as you did during the dream, ie, the way they surround the party and advance upon them, only this time the monsters are real!

It helps to ramp the tension if the monsters slaughtered them all during the dream- obviously you make the encounter vaguely winnable by using the typical monsters and not the impossible dream ones, but they'll still be left guessing if what they're witnessing is another illusion or not.

For added fun as the wolves/monsters advance, have the BBEG mock their plight if they can't discern reality from dream ("no escape from your endless nightmare" etc) :smallamused:

valadil
2008-07-23, 08:35 AM
This could be a cool idea if you go somewhere with it. If it's a random session that takes place in a dream and ends up being inconsequential then it's pretty pointless. It could be part of a story though. Maybe the villain controls dreams. Maybe at the next town the players reach, some beloved villager is in a restless coma that they recognize to be the group nightmare and they have to find a way to wake the person. You could introduce some sort of spirit or NPC that only exists in dreams. Maybe the BBEG's nemesis was banished to a dream world and you have to free him - being joined together for a dream was his first attempt at communication.

Bottom line, go somewhere with this plot. Don't turn it into the session that was just a dream and nothing ever came of it.

Jade_Tarem
2008-07-23, 09:02 AM
On the one hand, this sounds like it could be kinda cool.

On the other hand, all of my experiences with in-game dreams have been horrrible. All of them. One of them was a ret con, not to avoid a TPK, but because the DM didn't want us to get that much XP when we found a creative solution for killing, I believe, a very large dragon. Others were similarly poorly handled.

So I'm going to echo other posters and say do it well. Give them XP for the fight even though they lose, and make sure they know something isn't right during the Dream.

I just had an interesting thought. The one time I had a player (one player) have an in-game dream, I simply typed it up, printed it, and gave it to him to read in between sessions. I'm a pretty good "scene" writer, and it didn't bother him (the player) at all - although in the dream, he didn't fight or die. You may want to consider trying this. If the battle is going to be scripted anyway, you might as well let them read their way through it, or read it aloud to them - it's faster and proves all along that you meant it to be a dream. Be sure to write it in an interesting manner, though, and don't just make a written record of the combat. In fact, don't reference game mechanics at all during the dream, or turns, but write it like you would a mini horror story.

Just an idea.

Leewei
2008-07-23, 09:28 AM
PCs collectively will get frustrated and feed off of each others' frustration.

Pull each aside, separately, and run them through the scenario you described. Being alone will make the dream scarier, and will also keep players from griping to each other and getting their temperatures up between rounds.

Talon14
2008-07-23, 10:23 AM
PCs collectively will get frustrated and feed off of each others' frustration.

Pull each aside, separately, and run them through the scenario you described. Being alone will make the dream scarier, and will also keep players from griping to each other and getting their temperatures up between rounds.

On a related note, I plan on having a dream for one PC that will feature the other party members as well. I'm going to pull each of the other party members aside and tell them the 'script' and then play it during a session as if it were a real encounter. The other party members will be played close to the way they would normally, with a few deviations to make things seem off. I haven't yet worked out all the details, but I think the dreamer will enjoy it, in the end. He's one to really get into his character and the events around him.

Chronos
2008-07-23, 12:04 PM
A possibility, to alert your players to the fact that something funny is up: Make minor details malleable.

"You see a pack of huge black wolves bounding out of the underbrush at you. Roll for initiative."
"OK, I yell to wake up the other party members, and draw my greatsword."

(later)

"As the wolves charge, the moonlight shines eerily upon their pure white pelts."
"Wait, I thought you said the wolves were black?"
"No, no, these wolves are clearly white. What makes you think they're black?"

(still later)

"As the wolf tears at Adara's jugular, her blood stains the grey fur around its head and neck."
"So they have a grey band around their neck?"
"No, they're grey all over."

Likewise, you could point out a huge oak tree on the battle map, and then have a wolf take cover behind "that big maple", pointing to the same tree. Or change the phase of the Moon, or whether it's up at all. Or change anything else for which there aren't specific game mechanics. At each change, insist that that's the way that things were all along.

Maroon
2008-07-23, 01:43 PM
Instead of starting it like a regular let's-screw-with-the-wizard's-sleep-schedule encounter, have the player on watch feeling very sleepy, then suddenly jolting wide awake. Almost everyone had the dream where they wake up, then wake up again, and afterwards they'll know you planned it instead of it being a retcon for an accidental TPK.

As an alternative to the 'wolves attack, everyone dies' scenario, have the player on watch wake up in the middle of the night to see a shadowy figure standing over him brandishing a very distinct knife, who flees, and the rest of the party with their throats slit. If the player pursues the shadow, it disappears at a dead end, at which point the player wakes up standing in exactly the same place, but at dawn. When the player goes back the way he came in the dream, he finds his party alive and awake.

A follow-up scenario would have the party wake up another night and find one player missing. They'll probably assume the player has the same dream. A quick search of the area would reveal his footprints, and following those, they find the lost PC in some perilous place, like on the edge of a ravine, or at the end of a horrible death trap, seemingly sleepwalking. Before they can do anything, the sleepwalker dies in some manner, at which point they all wake up standing in exactly the same perilous place, but at dawn, and with the missing player safely back at camp (if they make it back alive).

Then you hit them with the TPK. The shadowy assassin of the first dream is a sentient nightmare, luring sleepwalkers to their deaths. Having failed to kill the party (disguised as the lost player) in the second dream, he directly attacks the party in a shared nightmare, seemingly killing them again and again in a terrible Groundhog Day fashion, and the only way to beat him is to wake up (and leave his cursed haunt/stay awake for several nights to starve him of dreams/exorcise him).

Or something. Just a suggestion.

valadil
2008-07-23, 02:06 PM
PCs collectively will get frustrated and feed off of each others' frustration.

Pull each aside, separately, and run them through the scenario you described. Being alone will make the dream scarier, and will also keep players from griping to each other and getting their temperatures up between rounds.

I like this idea combined with the paper handouts idea. Print up a paragraph each describing the dream, pass out to players.

What I really like is doing this a couple times before launching this plot. Give them normal, individual dreams. Maybe give someone a dream that comes true. Then after they're used to that give them a group dream and see how they react. You'll need to detail it in such a way that they're sure it's not coincidental - ie make the order that the players die in the dream the same for everybody's dream.

Lorn
2008-07-23, 02:13 PM
If it's a sort of BBEG effect thing, why not hit them a few times? Randomly generate a night every week/month of gametime, use Chronos' advice each time, but never actually SAY it was a dream. Heavily imply it, have them "jolt to their senses, subconsciously placing hands to wounds that aren't there" etc, though this'd work better if there's a DMPC as well. (S)he can writhe on the ground convinced (s)he's almost dead, then come to their senses or something.

Eventually, the players will realise it's not a dream, but still something happening in the privacy of their own heads - or a shared consciousness if you will - and maybe they can shape things to their whim to some extent. Maybe in the third encounter of this kind something weird happens, describe something that couldn't possibly happen (like, say, someone's sword passing through a team member harmlessly, or maybe a wolf about to bite someone in the jugular, the person screams "nooo" or something, and nothing happens. Again, may need a DMPC for some of this.)

Maybe the fourth time, allow them some leverage as far as being uber goes - say, if they get a crit, then the wolf dies automatically in a spectacular fashion.

Eventually, have it so that they're impossibly powerful within the dreamscape, almost like they're different players or something. Let them each decide on something "special" they can do each time they die after lasting x rounds or killing x wolves or something. Have, say, a list of things they can do (look to anime for inspiration!)

Finally, have them actually win. The wolves vanish into smoke, which almost seems to form a phantasmal face, screaming as it vanishes into nothing. From here on, the dream thing never happens - the players killed whatever it was causing them, like in David Gemmel's book Legend, with the shaman dying. Maybe have something to tell them this, give them a LOT of XP, treat it like completing a miniquest, whatever. Maybe it was one of the BBEG's minions causing the dreams?


E: You COULD maybe make them start when they've done something suitably bad to the BBEG plans. Or maybe they find a bunch of bodies with bite marks, cremate them, and bad things happen.

Perhaps doing the dream thing, then having an actual massive pack of (slightly watered down) dire wolves led by a messed-up dire wolf (conjoined twin or something, so long as it's suitably messed up and clearly caused the dream) attack the players, but in a way they can win but not run from.

Jade_Tarem
2008-07-23, 03:43 PM
Instead of starting it like a regular let's-screw-with-the-wizard's-sleep-schedule encounter, have the player on watch feeling very sleepy, then suddenly jolting wide awake. Almost everyone had the dream where they wake up, then wake up again, and afterwards they'll know you planned it instead of it being a retcon for an accidental TPK.

As an alternative to the 'wolves attack, everyone dies' scenario, have the player on watch wake up in the middle of the night to see a shadowy figure standing over him brandishing a very distinct knife, who flees, and the rest of the party with their throats slit. If the player pursues the shadow, it disappears at a dead end, at which point the player wakes up standing in exactly the same place, but at dawn. When the player goes back the way he came in the dream, he finds his party alive and awake.

A follow-up scenario would have the party wake up another night and find one player missing. They'll probably assume the player has the same dream. A quick search of the area would reveal his footprints, and following those, they find the lost PC in some perilous place, like on the edge of a ravine, or at the end of a horrible death trap, seemingly sleepwalking. Before they can do anything, the sleepwalker dies in some manner, at which point they all wake up standing in exactly the same perilous place, but at dawn, and with the missing player safely back at camp (if they make it back alive).

Then you hit them with the TPK. The shadowy assassin of the first dream is a sentient nightmare, luring sleepwalkers to their deaths. Having failed to kill the party (disguised as the lost player) in the second dream, he directly attacks the party in a shared nightmare, seemingly killing them again and again in a terrible Groundhog Day fashion, and the only way to beat him is to wake up (and leave his cursed haunt/stay awake for several nights to starve him of dreams/exorcise him).

Or something. Just a suggestion.

This is... actually a really good idea. Definitely workable. It also reminds me that Heroes of Horror has a bunch of fun things you can do to players in the night/as they wake up to creep them out.

Helgraf
2008-07-23, 09:47 PM
This is... actually a really good idea. Definitely workable. It also reminds me that Heroes of Horror has a bunch of fun things you can do to players in the night/as they wake up to creep them out.

I once had a character sew his own delimbed body back together with adamantine thread.

Yes, it was a complicated situation.

Tsotha-lanti
2008-07-23, 10:52 PM
The only problem I see that that's not very creepy or terrifying. You need to knock it up a notch. HoH was mentioned, and has some good ideas (even if all the really good ones are repetitive; cannibalism gets old). Well, that, and putting the PCs in an encounter that "doesn't mean anything" is entirely pointless.

I had a Call of Cthulhu "dream episode" idea where one PC has to kill everyone else - starting with integral NPCs - because they're tainted, insane, or monsters... now that's something to work with, especially when half the characters are insane already. Just got to make sure the other PCs realize the killer seems to be acting on information they're not privy to. (Note-passing is the CoC Ref's greatest tool.)

Epinephrine
2008-07-23, 11:03 PM
I think the original idea sounds good, along with possible clues that it might be a dream. An odd feeling, bizarre mists that swirl about, disorientation and changing the battle map, morphing terrain...

I also agree that it should be relatively fast - I have no issue with the TPK aspect (or not; even a partial wipe would be shocking for most groups), but you don't want to spend too much time on it, or leave players "dead" for long. I think done right it could be a great night, but certainly it could backfire - it depends on your players and ability as a storyteller. My group would probably love it.

mikeejimbo
2008-07-23, 11:07 PM
Thanks everyone for the responses. I appreciate them all.