What LVL does YOUR crew TPK? / or Just die out

[Damionte]

Hey gang,

Long time lurker first time thread starter.

I'm curious.

How high a level does your crews avg party ever really make it too? In our group we rarely make it beyond about 12th level. Before my best friend and I joined this group of players, they say they never even make it that far. Usually biting the dust sometime around lvl 7-9.

There's a couple of reasons for this. 1st we will almost always end up in a TPK around 12th, or the characters individual stories start tugging them in different directions and the adventuring party falls apart on it's own. Either thing forcing us to start over.

We have a couple of players who tend to get killed off early no matter what we're doing or what type of character they're playing. So thier interest lvl will sometimes be a bit lower as they may not always be as "into" the new character as thier old one. Or the nre character doesn't have as much of a vested interest in the current storyline. "They're generally not all that organised about integrating thier background stories into the current story."

So when the time comes around to start thinking abou trather we need to retire the characters and start over they jump on the chance.

On the TPK side, I think the crew doesn't adjust well to life beyond lvl 10. They still think it's all about the fighters wading in while the mages stand back. Not realising the early teen lvl's are about as dangerous as the 1st 3 lvl's to melee types. The big monsters can easily put down the biggest fighters in 1-2 rounds of combat. don't mention the thinking opponents who know to ignore the fighters and kill the soft targets first.

Anyway... I'm curious to see what the avg lvl your parties make it too.

[TheOOB]

I'd say 4 out of 5 TPKs I have been a part of have been before level 5, and at least 9 out of 10 before level 10. At higher levels the PCs can gain so many escape tricks that a TPK becomes almost impossible unless the DM is purposefully trying to kill the party. At low levels a few bad rolls in a tough fight can be deadly.

[Damionte]

Hmm I forgot another reason the party will break up. One that always comes up, is when we have a partial TPK. Like if we lose say 50-75% of the party. Those who got killed usually lose heart and don't want to go again.

Even the GM. Who has trouble repairing the story if he actually defeats the PC's. At which point he'll just give up. And we end up starting over. Real frustrating for the survivors.

[Orzel]

Usually levels 2-5 or 15-20. At levels 3-5, when a strategy fails, you lack the time and resources to try another one. At 15-20, it's AoE "everyone rolls ones and twos" effect for 3 rounds straight.

[Swooper]

I don't think I've ever had a TPK above level one. And right now, off the top of my head, I can only remember two of those (one of which involved kobolds with crossbows back in 1st edition, the other a failed Coup-de-Grace on a sleeping troll we were meant to sneak past. This lead to the capture of one of the PCs and his imprisonment in a cage hanging above a pit full of snakes. The other PCs tried to rescue him by jumping at the cage, and via lots of low jump checks, we were all snakefodder at the end of the night. Was a fun session though). Our DM is generally benovelent enough to avoid putting us in a fight against too dangerous opponents, and if we are near extinction we always somehow get rescued. On the other hand, he has always completely banned all forms of ressurrecting dead characters, so I guess it's pretty fair to avoid letting us get killed.

[Were-Sandwich]

WE've never TPKed to end a game. Our games tend to just...die.

[BardicDuelist]

I have never actually had a character die, even playing with several different DMs and playing styles. One of these "invincable" characters I was guilty of powergaming a little bit, but the rest I didn't. The powergamed one (which had a great story that I followed when I made the powergame build) my DM and I sat down and tried to create a dungeon that was built around his weaknesses (he was a bard, so this included a lot of fort saves and undead) and had him try to solo it. He still didn't die.

When I DM, a party TPK usually happens before level 3, or as high as 5 if the group has no cleric or I use allips or somthing like that. At higher levels, some bad rolls can kill a party, but if they don't have an escape plan, it is their fault.

[Viscount Einstrauss]

I've seen some very close calls, but never actually been in a TPK that wasn't deus ex machina for ending the game. Most of the people I play with like playing super long games, so they try to balance their CR to prevent them.

[Damionte]

WE've never TPKed to end a game. Our games tend to just...die.

That happens a lot too and is also part of the question.

How many of your games just peter out?

[Telonius]

Very seldom does our party ever have a true TPK. There are usually at least two coward characters (Rogue and Wizard normally) who bravely run away if the meatshields go down.

[Just Alex]

The last TPK I can recall involved 5 level 19/20 characters falling to a Fiendish Great Wyrm Red Dragon and a level 22 Cleric with Epic Spellcasting and the Magic domain followed by a 35 HD Balor wielding an artifact level weapon instead of his flaming whip. Because on it's own, that combo would've been too easy, the DM placed that fight in an area where all conjuration spells don't work and banned my sorcerer from casting any polymorph school spells after the fiasco of "Shapechange, share it with my familiar." To top it off, the combat was opened with a Disjunction, thus making the fighter almost completely unable to pierce the dragon's DR.

I'm ok with the polymorph thing, since I did abuse the heck out of it, but the rest of that was just the DM being a ****.

[LotharBot]

I've never had a TPK or a game end because the party lost interest.

I had plenty of games end because my ADD DM couldn't keep DMing the same game for more than 5 sessions. I'd build a new character, be really excited about playing, and a couple sessions later "hey, let's make a new campaign. This one will be level 4 in Ravenloft." "Hey, how about we play a level 12 campaign with a lot of planar travel." "Hey, roll up level 10 characters for City of the Spider Queen." Ugh...

[Orak]

Level 11 or 12. That is when players get their uber powers. We tend to try and take on the world at that point. Or our characters become dangers to themselves.

One ended with a gnomish sorcercer going on a fireball rampage because someone stole his cloak. City guards tried to intervene and died. Religion caused party members to take sides and we ended up on opposite sides of a holy war. A sudden maximized, sudden enlarged, energy add mixture fireball killed everyone.

We also get cocky as we get more powerful. Casting "open/close" on the lid of the casket without checking anything out killed one group. On the lid was written "Inside lies the one who should not be released." Oops. That killed off one group. Didn't help that half the party had been cursed with undeath and one of the group members was an undead slayer. A great opportunity to kill some undead, but bad timing as it got everyone killed.

We almost got TKP'd in our current campaign when the barbarian took levels in frenzied berzerker. Power attacking for 50ish damage a hit is no fun when it is hitting your teammates at the end of a combat. Now we have a holier than thou angel in our party that promises to have a short lifespan (I am the only original character left in the party, with 7 character deaths so far in a group of 5. Go bard.)

[MeklorIlavator]

The only TPL we ever had was in the Fallen Angel one shot on wizards (he was planing on making it the launch of a campaign).

Spoiler

Show

The DM made a spur of the moment decision to have every enemy left un-killed in the dungeon charge us, and we had done a surgical strike, clearing about 1/3 of the enimies. So it was about 8 insectile orges vs a wujen almost out of spells, with mainly shortrange spells, or ones taht were made usless by the enimies(me), a rouge, made useless becasue the enimies had tremorsense and were unflankable, an evil cleric, and a orge zombie. Oh, and the half celestiel fighter, who was our tank. At effective character level 5. I had more hitpoints.

So there we were trapped, and losing, so the DM used his special ability, Deus Ex Machinas, and saved us all.

[Diggorian]

Only had one TPK end a camapign. They were level 4 or 5. A single player chose to do something risky and I didnt adjudicate any escape loop holes, so the whole ship blew up.

With other camps I'll just decide what the level of the BBEG will be and the PC's will grow until they can take him/her. Once they're gone, the plot is resolved. Do a denouement and the surviving PC's live happily ever after.

Around level 10-12 this happens. I kinda look at higher CR monsters being so rare that downtime between encountering them stetches into years. Were they more common they'd rule kingdoms, or you'd have lots of high leveled folk which isnt my taste.

[Amphimir Míriel]

I've only had 1 TPK as a player, when the idiot of a DM rolled up for random encounters in a forest and we ended up fighting an adult green dragon at 3rd level... He tried to justify it saying that the dice decided we had to fight the dragon [groan]

As a DM, I haven't had a TPK, but I feel if something like that happens, it would be a failing as a DM, so I try to balance out the encounters reasonably... not too easy, not TPK-hard... and my party is just 2nd level now, so it is actually hard to gauge how many kobolds to add to the mix without killing the PC's!

Now, I have had innumerable occasions where the game is over due to outside-world considerations... players moving to other cities, players marrying, players getting jobs that interfere with the roleplaying sessions, players (or DM) losing interest... the list goes on and on

[Damionte]

Level 11 or 12. That is when players get their uber powers. We tend to try and take on the world at that point. Or our characters become dangers to themselves.

Yeah that happens to us a lot too.

Didn't help that half the party had been cursed with undeath and one of the group members was an undead slayer. A great opportunity to kill some undead, but bad timing as it got everyone killed.

That's classic.


As for our own groups, our last couple TPK's "I felt" were both due to GM error. They felt justified at the time.

The 1st was in "Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil" Good suppliment but not for a novice GM. He had a few wierd preferences. Like any new characters coming in at the starting lvl. In this case lvl 4. Didn't matter that the rest of us were around 8-10. Plus since he didn't have a very good grasp of the rules of the game various aspects like challenge rating never factored in for him. In the inner circle of the temple we were simultaneously jumped by a patrol, a Dragon from another part of the dungeon that somehow got free and bumped into us at that moment, and a pair of Invisible Elf assasins who apparantly had been trailing us for some time.

That was a stupid way to die. The Dragon which was an adult red would have been bad enough all by itslef. The party was a mix of 6 characters between 4th and 8th. They never stood a chance.

[Orak]

The best TKP that I ever DM'd was at the end of a long campaign.

The party fighter, Thog, had found a magical hammer while there were travelling into the depths of hell to fight the spider queen (Lloth). The hammer contained the soul of Lloths lieutenant and was intelligent and powerful. When they werealone, the hammer asked Thog to open his mind to it. Thog agreed and the hammer posessed him.

In the final fight Thog was controlled by the hammer and fought alongside the spider queen. The whole party tried to take down Thog, but with the spider queen healing him, they didn't stand a chance.

Though in a future campaign, the parties next batch of characters rescued their original ones from the torments of hell. (every one of my campaigns for the last 8 years has added to the original plot line)

[Mr. Moogle]

Now i belive i can simply say that the reason your party separates over time is because they arent unite for a common goal. Hell, Ive once played in a group with a paadin and a chaotic evil rouge and they got along fine, as long as my true neutral monk stopped them from killing each other .

[GoldDragon]

Our last TPK was more of a, "Several Characters Die and the Others Join with the Evil Witch, Baba Yaga." It was funny though. The fight started with us (a group of 5 or so level 9 characters) squaring off against two white CR 11 dragons; at the same time. That wasn't too bad, as really only one of the dragons attempted to kill us. The other one just kinda sat there and attacked the fighter.

Two breath weapons later (and some lucky rolls) and my wizard is at 10 hp, so I duck back to get some healing from the cleric. Except, unluckily for me, Baba Yaga decides this is the opportune moment to break invisibility and unleash Chained Lightning (or some other ridiculous spell). My wizard failed his save and was instantly vaporized as the bolt of lightning arced to a few of the other party members.

Seeing that there was no way they could ever defeat Baba Yaga, the remaining party members struck a deal, betrayed the fighter and went on to sack the town of Spielsburg that they had been protecting for so long.

So yeah... I'd say around level 9 is usually when the group dies out. The funny (read: painful) thing was that the spell that killed my wizard did exactly enough damage to drop him to -10 even if he had had full hit points.

[Nervous Twitch]

My last TPK happened because i (as the DM) had become jaded with the game and sloppy with my adventures.

it was NEVER my intention to kill off all the characters, but they found themselves in a situation far greater than their levels allowed for, and they didn't run.

I have never played or run a game where a character has reached seventh level, because in my experience the interest fades, both for the players and the DM.

I would welcome suggestions as to how people keep their campaigns fresh and interesting.

[Matthew]

I have seen a lot of very close calls (resulting in 50-75% permanent casualties) at all different levels (though generally below Level 10) and the odd Total Party Kill. Most campaigns/adventures end with the story arc, some are cut short due to real life.

[SoulCatcher78]

I have never played or run a game where a character has reached seventh level, because in my experience the interest fades, both for the players and the DM.

I would welcome suggestions as to how people keep their campaigns fresh and interesting.

Someone else mentioned it, keeping the group of characters together to accomplish a common goal (whether it's a scripted set of adventures (GDQ or the Slaver (A1-4) campaigns). When the goal is accomplished (Lolth is destroyed/Slavers vanquished) the characters should be allowed to drift off into NPC land rather than running them into the ground because you're either bored or want to try something different (maybe one of the 700+ Prestige Classes that clutter the landscape). If you're doing something homebrewed, the same things apply...when you're done using them, put them up on the shelf until you need them later.

As far as a TPK, my only one happened with the PCs at level 9-10...one adventure too many and they had gotten cocky about taking on the forces of nature (gravity in particular) without the proper precautions.

[Vodun]

I've only had 1 TPK as a player, when the idiot of a DM rolled up for random encounters in a forest and we ended up fighting an adult green dragon at 3rd level... He tried to justify it saying that the dice decided we had to fight the dragon [groan]

Was he just disinterested in the campaign? Or maybe really tired and wanted to wrap it up? Or maybe just that dumb? Every DM I know would fudge that without even thinking....

[TheAlmightyOne]

We TPKed at level 4 when our DM had 5 of us vs 7 level 20 wizards.

[Matthew]

What on earth happened to cause such a heavy handed slap down? (surely one Wizard 20 would have sufficed?!)

[TheGreatJabu]

No joke - either somebody decided "Hey, let's break in to this Archmage's tower" or your DM was being kind of a jerk.

I've never been involved in a TPK, but my games always peter out at exactly level 8. Don't know why. One time was due to an encounter that had about 50% casualties (they were due to stupidity though). The other stopped due to poor timing (conflicts between boyfriend/girlfriend in our gaming group, arrival of summer, etc.).

I've only died one time, and it was to powergamed NPCs. Our group had a contract out on us, and this Ogre mercenary group intended to cash in. We kept randomly encountering ever-growing numbers of Ogres with 4 levels in fighter and powerful magical weapons and armor that "mysteriously disappeared when the ogres were killed". It was 3.0, and Keen stacked with Improved Crit. Huge sized falchions. 12-20 crit range. You know the rest.

[Diggorian]

Campaigns shouldnt end in TPK's, makes for a bad story.

Aragorn is killed, ending the line of kings, Frodo becomes the new Golem, Samwise dies of a broken heart, the end? The final battle should seem like it may end this way, even with a few losses to the party, but a pyrhic victory is victory which honors those that died in the struggle. Happy or atleast successful endings are satisfying, not object failure.

[Matthew]

...though, sometimes total party death can actually be a victory. Sacrifice for the greater good and all that, plus death isn't really the end in D&D. Also, short campaigns or adventures that end in defeat for the party are not necessarily intrinsically undesirable, though preconstructed and determined party defeat will undoubtedly make for a bad game.