ending the campaign

[Stake A Vamp]

(firstly, I am like 80% sure this is the right place in the forum,and if im wrong I would like to preemptively apologize to the mods)

okay, so me and a friend (R, for short) are running the school LARP club (the fact that this is a larp is mostly irrelevant to the question, but may streamline things a bit) a third friend (who has previously run the club with someone else who has since graduated) is joining us for sessions 2&3. this friend (M, for short) already has an idea of how he wants it to end. the gist of it is:

"I would like the ending to have the players be fighting against a big-bad Demonlord, have the players beat on the NPCs guarding him and come up to him to fight. Demonlord guy will not be able to take damage until he finishes a speech on how this world will burn with the Demontide. Boss battle ensues, buffed up NPCs take to the stage and help out the Demonlord. Players start getting beaten down because **** you, Demonlord's royal guards are not wimps.

As the PC's get beaten down, have an old friend arrive, specifically, the Old Man. (Previous NPC) Ghost form or not, doesn't matter, have him be invulnerable, and able to bring people back up to full health, but have him keep the players back for the time being. At this point, the end of the session will hopefully be in sight, and it will bring Demonlord back with another speech. As he keeps talking, whoever I choose to play the part, a new character comes up (it's probably going to be me), behind the Demonlord, and uses [UNDEFINED] to cut open the Demonlords throat. They then kill the closest royal guardsmen, and 'opens a portal', saying "Your worlds are not the only ones on fire.", or somesuch similar. then it ends."

now initially I agreed to this idea, thinking he meant for the end of session 2. but later I found out he meant for session 3. and I feel like the ultimate end of the campaign (only 3 sessions per year) should have the PC's winning, not the NPC's winning for them.

so, I have a request, could you guys help me A.) find a compromise between the two ideas (because it is a cool idea, just not as an overall ending), or B.) help me phrase why it is unsatisfying without it coming out overly critical or confrontational

thanks in advance for any and all sugestions

[Thrawn4]

As the PC's get beaten down, have an old friend arrive, specifically, the Old Man. (Previous NPC) Ghost form or not, doesn't matter, have him be invulnerable, and able to bring people back up to full health, but have him keep the players back for the time being.

As he keeps talking, whoever I choose to play the part, a new character comes up (it's probably going to be me), behind the Demonlord, and uses [UNDEFINED] to cut open the Demonlords throat. They then kill the closest royal guardsmen, and 'opens a portal', saying "Your worlds are not the only ones on fire.", or somesuch similar. then it ends."

Sounds to me like a DMPC deux ex machina. The players are basically participants and have to watch while plot happens. The worst part about it is that the way you described it there is no clue why this is happening. Imagine Return of the Jedi when everything seems lost, and then suddenly a random stormtrooper comes along and shoots Vader and the Empereor in the back for the lolz.

[mephnick]

A final showdown should include the main characters and the main bad guys, full stop. It's the final battle because they have no back-up. The fate of _____ is in their hands alone. That's the whole point.

Do not have the PCs saved by NPCs. They have to be the heroes.

[KillianHawkeye]

This is a big problem that arises when somebody tries to write the end of a campaign or an adventure like it's a video game cut-scene. Pro Tip: Don't do that. Set up the bad guys and let the PCs defeat them in whatever manner they can. Don't pre-write them failing and needing to be rescued by some NPC. That may work in a video game, but it really ruins the experience in a real roleplaying game.

My suggestion would be to actually define what [UNDEFINED] is going to be, and give it to the PCs with a hint that it can be used to defeat the demon lord. Then let a PC get the kill, and forget any nonsense about ending the campaign on a cliffhanger about other worlds being in danger. If you've ever seen any movie, you should know that ending on a cliffhanger is usually a bad way to do an ending, especially if you aren't sure if your adventure is going to get that sequel. People like endings that give closure to events. People want to see what their hardships and trials throughout the story have led to, or at least to know that everything is going to be alright. You may think it's cliche, but "happily ever after" is actually a pretty nice ending to a story.

[Tengu_temp]

A final showdown should include the main characters and the main bad guys, full stop. It's the final battle because they have no back-up. The fate of _____ is in their hands alone. That's the whole point.

Wrong. Have you never seen a story where suddenly old friends and allies came to help the heroes in the final battle? It can be awesome! But, those have to be people the players care about, not a random overpowered new character. And ther job is to help, not steal the spotlight - they can have a cool scene where their arrival turns the tides and makes a seemingly hopeless battle hopeful again, but the main spotlight still lies on the heroes, and it's their job to beat the villain.

How to fix OP's scenario? First, nix the whole "new guy comes in to kill the demon lord by himself" thing. This just makes the PCs feel like they might as well not be there. Replace him with an old character who already appeared in the game (if he's an NPC; if he's another PC, I guess the rest of the party won't mind that as much), and who now tells the heroes how to destroy the demon lord's invulnerable shield. It's still up to them to actually do it, and then kill the demon lord.
Second, like KillianHawkeye said, nix the cliffhanger. Cliffhangers don't work if you're not 100% sure you're going to follow up on them.
Third, have the PCs fight the demon lord for most of the battle, not just his goons, and scale down the goons. Getting your ass kicked by mooks is annoying and makes you feel powerless; it's better if the minions are weaker while the big bad guy does the ass-kicking.
Fourth, keep the old man's spirit from being a blatant auto-rezzer. As soon as the PCs realize he will always heal them, any sense of danger from the fight will vanish. Use him moderately - heal the party to full health once, when he shows up, and then use him to save dying characters only when the PCs fail to save them themselves.

[Seto]

I agree with what's been said above about PCs being the one that should make a difference. Plan for the fight, but not for the outcome. If you really want to do it video-game style, you could prepare several cinematic endings depending on the outcome, Soulcalibur style.

But... what I really wanted to say is... OH MY GOD YOU HAVE THE BEST EFFING AVATAR EVER !

[ReaderAt2046]

Wrong. Have you never seen a story where suddenly old friends and allies came to help the heroes in the final battle? It can be awesome! But, those have to be people the players care about, not a random overpowered new character. And ther job is to help, not steal the spotlight - they can have a cool scene where their arrival turns the tides and makes a seemingly hopeless battle hopeful again, but the main spotlight still lies on the heroes, and it's their job to beat the villain.

How to fix OP's scenario? First, nix the whole "new guy comes in to kill the demon lord by himself" thing. This just makes the PCs feel like they might as well not be there. Replace him with an old character who already appeared in the game (if he's an NPC; if he's another PC, I guess the rest of the party won't mind that as much), and who now tells the heroes how to destroy the demon lord's invulnerable shield. It's still up to them to actually do it, and then kill the demon lord.
Second, like KillianHawkeye said, nix the cliffhanger. Cliffhangers don't work if you're not 100% sure you're going to follow up on them.
Third, have the PCs fight the demon lord for most of the battle, not just his goons, and scale down the goons. Getting your ass kicked by mooks is annoying and makes you feel powerless; it's better if the minions are weaker while the big bad guy does the ass-kicking.
Fourth, keep the old man's spirit from being a blatant auto-rezzer. As soon as the PCs realize he will always heal them, any sense of danger from the fight will vanish. Use him moderately - heal the party to full health once, when he shows up, and then use him to save dying characters only when the PCs fail to save them themselves.

I actually saw this done really well in one campaign I played in. We were trapped in the villain's underground base, surrounded by legions of enemies that we could not possibly defeat, and then a party-member's old character, accompanied by a god and a bunch of the god's servants, blew upon the roof and saved our asses. BUT, and this is very important, that only happened after we'd already won. By the time we got to the "surrounded by way too many enemies to defeat" bit, we'd already wrecked the villain's McGuffin and thwarted their evil plan. The Deus Ex Machina (literally, since the god came through the roof in a helicopter) only happened after we'd already saved the world.