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The PCs in my game are currently 11th level, and are quite a tough group. I can still challenge them, but part of the fun for them at this level is wading through mooks and taking on things that would have put them down hard at level 5-6. Plus, just increasing challenge rating at this level starts to become a numbers game - higher ACs, higher Attack bonuses, Higher Hit Points, higher damage. So I am constantly trying to think up ways to increase narrative drama that don't rely on just increasing the CR of a given encounter.
The current adventure that the party is on (big dungeon craw) needs to end with a bang, and I want to try to find a way to create the possibility for a heroic death for one of the characters. Basically - put the party in a situation where, in order to avoid a horrible fate for all, one of them will have to willingly walk into something that will almost certainly prove fatal. Then see who takes the bait.
Now, my players are more clever in aggregate than I am - so I need some help! Also, I need some general advice, such as:
- How can I drop them into a no-win scenario without it being an egregious railroading?
- How horrible should I make the fate they need to avoid? The obvious thing to use is the threat of a TPK. I dunno if I'm willing to go quite that far, but maybe some sort of horrible curse? Massive level drain of some kind? It has to suck, but I don't want it to feel too gratuitous.
- The act of self sacrifice needs to be something any PC could do - not aimed at a particular power set or class or anything.
- There could (maybe should) be a small chance that whoever steps up will survive, but the odds of that should be really, really small.
- No need to require anything beyond death. The party has no cleric, but they do have other avenues to raise the dead. I don't really care about that. If they want to spend resources to resurrect or raise whoever "takes one for the team" then I don't think that in any way diminishes the act of self-sacrifice.
Any ideas?
Why do you feel forcing sacrifice is good narrative drama? That misses the point of sacrifice.
so this will end the campaign anyway?
I would invent a device that destroys the earth unless a being imprisons itself (it doesn't age in the machine). You can open it from the outside, but there are lots of "danger" signs.
The last person in it was an evil wizard emprisoned a few hundred years ago in it, he slowly finds a way get out, and the party has to kill him (taking with him in the end perhaps a few party members), then there is noone to stay in the machine. Either they find someone who deserves that fate, someone punished to death for example, or they find a friend who will sacrifice himself for the sake of the world, or they do it themselves, perhaps taking turns.
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I have found it very difficult to get character self sacrifice without getting a lot of player resentment. I think the only time I've ever done it was kind of by being a dick and not clearly telling the players that the person stepping into the uber magic machine was actually self sacrificing, and I rewarded them (the player) with an above average race replacement for their character. This was 2e so I won't use ECL, but it was a power bump, and they were effectively reincarnated into the new body so it was "the same character."
So with a caution to avoid doing this for fear of blowing you game up, you could go another way. Approach the players individually starting with those who a) seem board with their current character b) are the kind of player who likes to change characters regularly, c) is playing a kind of character who may be predisposed to self sacrifice like a paladin or priest or d) the player who is most inclined to help tell a more interesting story and would be pleased to have their character become a pivotal character in the story.
If your luck and get d, or at least get a volunteer from a-c, I would start with some serious for shadowing, you know epic doom, etc. Or maybe even less then epic doom, just your regular sort of doom, a shadow cabal kidnaps a person of import and plans to start a war by framing the neighboring kingdom. Place your heroes on the path to saving them, and make it clear that without saving them it will be hard to prevent war. Basically the intent here isn't to rail road them into doing the saving action, but setting up the game world belief that the saving is worth doing, and that external people who are expecting the doom, may then rejoice in the not-doom.
Once you've set your stage and have the player on side for their death, pick a death that will be most avoidable for that players character. IE if they have a low fort save a poison, will save a death effect etc. Put the causative agent of death into the hands a of a memorable villain, not one wants to die to a mook. It is hard at level 11 to have the death be environmental, the classic Gandolfian sacrifice, or holding up the crushing ceiling are less meaningful when your wizard has teleport. A good alternative is an evil artifact that you rest from the hands of your foe. Only to realize that the player must wield the artifact to free the mcguffin and save the kingdom from doom. But in wielding the artifact to do what ever action they require it for, they trigger their death. Maybe they use the sword as a key but it consumes their soul, or they have to shatter it but the energy released consumes their soul, etc.
Again if the player buys in, they they can ham it up, even if the character only expects negative consequences as opposed to the ultimate one, the player should be in the know.
After the character dies doing the whole self sacrifice thing, you have to reward the player. Make damn sure that every mook in the saved kingdom knows them by name, blesses their friends for his noble sacrifice, and canonizes him as a saint. If you ever return to the campaign world with different characters, make sure the memory of that characters death is meaningful and the player feels rewarded for their sacrifice.
At the end of the day that is what is important here, while it is all noble and cool for a character in a story to do the heroic thing, in this game it is sometimes years of work your asking a player to give up. There is always risk in D&D that an encounter overwhelms and hurts the party, that risk is part of the fun, the uncertainty that you might lose. This case is different though, their is no risk, their is certainty that they are going to die, so it better be worth it.
I'd be very careful with trying to use a forced character death as a narrative device. It has the potential for fostering resentment if the players are forced into a situation rather than the situation coming about organically.
If it were me, I would at least create a couple different ways to achieve the objective, or at least giving them the option to retreat. Perhaps if there was another way to achieve the objective that was much more difficult or perhaps had the risk of working in the enemy's favor, but character sacrifice was the "easiest" or most expedient way, for example. I think that would serve your curiosity much better because then it becomes a matter of choice and weighing options. It becomes a matter of a character voluntarily making that choice rather than somebody unhappily biting the bullet so that the plot can advance. That, I think, is the essence of a true heroic sacrifice because that character stepped up when others blanched.
At least that's how I would like it if I were in your game. *shrug*
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There is no way to do the forced sacrifice without it being railroady, and obviously so.
As a player I would just force the GM's hand to see if he was really going to railroad me.
You could just ask them if they would do it, if this is just an experiment to "because you want to know", and not something that you think will add to the game.
If you are trying it out so you can do it later, this is the type of thing that might work or seem cool once at best for most groups. It is not the type of thing that can be done constantly, and players will accept.
The only thing I can think of that might facilitate this was something from Dragon Age II. At the end of the dungeon/adventure, you could have the party come up to the final obstacle and it be a whole crapton of enemies.
So long as talking happens first (perhaps the villain is affably evil), your BBEG could make an offer: any one of the heroes face him in single combat. Should the BBEG win, he promises to let the others go out of respect for the skill they displayed in getting this far and for their comrade's sacrifice. If he loses, his forces will disband.
Should the PCs reject the offer, full scale mega-fight ensues!
Keeping the above in mind, why not railroad them, make it obvious that you're railroading them, and make the self sacrifice the way to derail the railroading?
E.G. Something bad is prophasized, perhaps someone in the group (or better yet, a sub group of the group, (all the halflings for instance) are gonna die in the final conflict with the BBEG. As the PCs investigate, they find out why (and that its somehow necessary to stop the BBEG, perhaps its the only way to stop his evil death machine.
However, at the last minute during the fight, another option is revealed. There is a way for one person to fix it, but it's essentially a suicide mission. The upside is only one person has to die.
Also, I highly recommend a reward of some sort for such a self sacrifice.
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Here's a thought:
Let's say that I spring the "deathtrap" on the PCs. The infernal device's clock is ticking, the room is flooding with lava, the forces of hell are about to burst forth, etc.
I present one really obvious way to stop/forestall the disaster, but the cost to the PC that steps us is going to be high. Lots of raw hit-point or ability score damage. Good but nowhere near absolute chance of a fatality.
I give the party a bit of time to hunt for alternatives. I ask for perception checks from everyone and tell them to hang on to those numbers. They waste a few minutes determining that yes, the room is shielded vs. dimensional travel and no, there is no quick and clever trick that will save them.
If nobody steps up to "throw themselves on the grenade", then call for those perception numbers again. At the very last moment before the rocks fall and kill everybody, whoever rolled the highest gets to spot the heretofore unnoticed escape hatch. The party all get hurt badly, but they do get out of the deathtrap, and I will have administered my own little Kobyashi Maru.
Too far?
I wouldn't say the scenario you just gave was a no-win scenario, but even so your players might be a bit upset if they feel they've been railroaded, especially if it happens all at once.
I would highly reccomend you make a point of adding as much meaning as possible to the death if it happens, up to and including a reward to the player. Possibly divine intervention to bring them back?
Here's another idea: base the next section of campaign around rezzing the downed character. Provide a cleric willing to bring them back (cheaply even!) but who discovers he can't for some reason. The players must ascend to an astral plane to help the spirit of the downed PC deal with a threat on the astral plane and bring them all back.
As a note: in this scenario I would put the no-win scenario as a sort of epilogue to finishing the previous module so they don't feel like they've failed per say.
Actually, after writing that post out? I think I might actually write such a module to start out my own campaign. Seems like a good way to start a campaign!
Here's a thought:
Let's say that I spring the "deathtrap" on the PCs. The infernal device's clock is ticking, the room is flooding with lava, the forces of hell are about to burst forth, etc.
I present one really obvious way to stop/forestall the disaster, but the cost to the PC that steps us is going to be high. Lots of raw hit-point or ability score damage. Good but nowhere near absolute chance of a fatality.
I give the party a bit of time to hunt for alternatives. I ask for perception checks from everyone and tell them to hang on to those numbers. They waste a few minutes determining that yes, the room is shielded vs. dimensional travel and no, there is no quick and clever trick that will save them.
If nobody steps up to "throw themselves on the grenade", then call for those perception numbers again. At the very last moment before the rocks fall and kill everybody, whoever rolled the highest gets to spot the heretofore unnoticed escape hatch. The party all get hurt badly, but they do get out of the deathtrap, and I will have administered my own little Kobyashi Maru.
Too far?
That is an obvious railroad also. It will really fail if someone rolls really high on the perception check, and the trigger/trap is not spotted the first time around.
Unless you have dense or very inexperienced players, this is not fooling anyone, and I doubt it would go over well. Many times what the GM wants is not fun for the players.
Dragonfire's idea is much better. I have done something similar with a player when I replaced him with a doppleganger.
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You could always look to movies for inspiration. Usually in movies, the most common way for a group to lose a member is because the big guy has to hold open the collapsing door so everyone else can get out.
Pretty much any trapped room with a pressure plate could be adapted for this. One guy has to stand on the plate so everyone else can get out, but doing so means he can't continue through/gets crushed. This would be a huge wake-up call to the rest of the group, and lets them know that We're Not Kidding Around This Time. In addition, now they have to take on the BBEG one member down.
It also gives you some wiggle room in case you decide at the last minute not to kill the character-- you can just decide that he has to stay behind for the last fight. Not getting to participate in the climactic end battle can be as much of a sacrifice as losing your character with less of the lasting hassle.
This will be unpleasant for the player who makes the sacrifice, no question, but as others have said: talking about it with the group/player beforehand will help.
a bit of parroting other ideas here
but if you don't want to railroad but give the chance then i think you put the party into the epic situation where it is highly likely that they will all go down. They might not, they could fight their way out, but no one is surprised if everyone goes down.
then there is an option to save everyone, but the other is probably done for (though give him a chance as well-like Gimli being stuck outside in LOTR).
That way someone can make the sacrifice or not. They have a chance to come out of it alive, but it is obvious right away that the odds are REALLY slim. Of course if somehow they do escape, they find themselves in a room w an altar to a lost god, which grant them a boon of some kind. +1 to Will saves or something like that.
That is how I would play it.
Instead of a character sacrificing themselves for the party, create a situation where the PC's "will" all survive, but there will be dire consequences for the rest of the world. (pc's can always die, but that should be if something unexpectedly bad happens.)
Epic PC death stories seem to include the Paladin tackling the uber Balor into the pit of certian death, saving the world.
So give the characters the chance to sacrifice their character for a HUGE story reward. They don't have to give up their character if they don't want to, but instead of trying to force the characters to do so, give them the opportunity to make that character a true legend.
then they get to roll a new character that joins the party who traveled with the legendary dead guy. SOme player may like it, and if they don't do that, they have dire in-world consequences that lead to an awesome adventure. so no matter what the players win.
players like winning.
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In the Shackled City adventure path...
However, the module notes that a character who willingly sacrifices himself to the flames is resurrected by the forces of Good infecting the plane and granted the template for his sacrifice.
You should plan it out similarly, such that the party doesn't have to go through with it, but not doing so has consequences.
A word of warning. Most players will not even think of self-sacrifice. They'll go for someone else's sacrifice. I had just such a situation happen in a one-shot.
The party was trapped in a dungeon, slowly dying of Con poison, with the only apparent option an ornate portal with 'Sacrifice Opens The Path' inscribed in Infernal on the frame. After brief discussion and testing, they suggest using the elf NPC.
The paladin says "Sure, kill the elf."
I learned a lot from that game. :/
The paladin says "Sure, kill the elf."
What paladin?
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I was playing in a game about seven years ago. We were 18-21st characters and were fighting a truely epic enemy to save our world. This being had been imprisoned for millenia before some fool adventurers released him (NOT US). We had been dealing with the effects of his release since about 12th level or so, all leading up to a titanic clash of armies.
Well, the cleric and wizard (both 21st level) had been given a scroll containing an epic spell that the two would have to cast together. Problem was, it had a one hour casting time. So other four of us had to hold back the onslaught until the spell was complete. Thankfully, we managed to get to the site before our foe and start the ritual. Forty-two minutes in, the Gates of Hell open and his army pops into the valley below.
For fifteen minutes, we kill mooks to the left of us and mooks to the right of us; but then HE shows up. In one full-attack, he takes down an adult silver dragon fighting on our side.
Well, we only had to hold for three minutes, but we couldn't afford for him to come into melee range of our archers (a ranger and a rogue). My character, Sir Gustav Wallenstein was an 8th level paladin and a 10th level cavalier (3.5 Complete Warrior Cavalier prestige class, not the PF Base class). I mounted up, with two hundred other knights behind me (pure mooks, but it was cinematic), and we charged.
We cut our through the enemy and all the way up to HIM. My charge went home and I staggered him--but didn't drop him, and his regeneration swiftly healed my lance damage even with the smite evil added. And then we fought. He killed my mount. I made my check and dismonted as a free action. We spared for seven rounds, my buddies peppering him with arrows from on high (and I was fighting defensively with Combat Expertise!). And then it happened. I slipped. And he found an opening and he hit me once, he hit me twice, he hit a third time and Sir Gustav died.
As a player, I was sad, it was true, but Sir Gustav went out fighting the good fight, holding back the tide of evil so that our side could prevail. He did fight his way up the hill and made it to the crest--but he did so just as the cleric and wizard finished the spell which once again imprisioned him.
It was epic, and my companions built a statue of Sir Gustav, handing over his battered armor and broken weapons to his family.
Now, I wasn't railroaded into doing that; you can't force someone to make such a sacrifice. It was, however, something that my character would have done--and he did, even though it meant his death. And we won.
In another game (not quite so high level, about 16-18), I was playing a completely different type of character, a lawful evil monk. And we were given a similar scenario; the world is ending and you guys have to stop it! We get to the end of the campaign, and here we are down in the depths of the earth at this horrid festering wound that has broken free of its prison and infected magic itself.
That's when our divine caster gets the final revelation that only a living, thinking being can seal the wound by sacrificing himself for all eternity: an eternity of pain and suffering. Screw that, we thought. Luckily, we had several very powerful drow prisioners, so I threw them in, the clerics and mages did their part, and the wound was cleansed and sealed, even as their screams echoed from the walls.
The DM did inform us that since the sacrifice wasn't willing it would only last for four score years. To which we said, we'll be dead by then and it'll be someone else's responsibility. Any loot?
Different characters have different reactions, man. Don't railroad, and don't force. Let it happen, and even if it doesn't happen the way you want, don't get upset. Players almost always find the way you aren't expecting.
Master Arminas
Sir Gustav and his story are sweet.