PFS Postmortem: TPKs -- What went wrong?


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Shadow Lodge 4/5

Have you ever suffered (or inflicted) a Total Party Kill or near-TPK in PFS? What happened and could you avoid it in the future?

Dark Archive 4/5

Last gencon.... I've had two tables that barely made it to the final encounter... i told them "you should walk away and live. Do you want to open the door?".... both did open it and that was that.

Shadow Lodge 4/5

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I was GMing the notorious Season 4 scenario King of the Storval Stairs, sub-tier 10-11

When I saw the sign ups for the 4-person party, I pretty much knew it was pretty much a forgone conclusion when 2 of the players would be the folks who often played "flavorful" characters who were very often mechanically weak.

The party was a:
-L10 Half Rogue/Half Summoner with an underpowered Eidolon and whose main schtick was turning invisible one round and then making a single underwhelming ranged sneak-attack the next (wash and repeat).
-L11 Spring Attack Druid - Not wildshaped, just a melee spring attacker.
-L?? Sword and Board Barbarian, playing up.
-L9 or 10, mad bomber alchemist, who actually was a super prepared player with a well-geared character who was tactically smart and carried the party until the second-to-last encounter...where the enemies pretty much smashed the other 3 players. He wisely drank a potion of Fly and escaped.

Take-away: Because my lodge at the time had multiple folks leveling up characters to higher tiers, I wrote a guide on things they should keep in mind.

The Exchange 3/5

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Words of the Ancients

4 person party (maybe was 5?)

Someone is able to see through the fog and sees 2 of the enemies (the others were hidden too well). The enemies don't know he can see and continue to wait but since the party thinks they outnumber the enemies they attack. One hastes, they all swift action greater teleport, gazes all hit the party, the remaining ones who didn't haste now all attack 4 times. The party runs for it. Combat Reflexes.

I think a horse escaped.

3/5

Sammy T wrote:

Take-away: Because my lodge at the time had multiple folks leveling up characters to higher tiers, I wrote a guide on things they should keep in mind.

Great guide! Very approachable.

Grand Lodge 3/5

#6-2 The Silver Mount Collection: APL 3.5 or so, 4 players, two 3.0 experience characters, one ninja pregen, one character ninja with an adamantine weapon. Only the level 4 ninja (not the pregen, not me) was an experienced player, bad tactics were used all around. Players were still in the 1-2 steamroll mentality, for example I tried to sunder metal spears with my normal weapon.

The upside was my next character was an over prepared cleric.

3/5 **** Venture-Agent, Massachusetts—Boston Metro

Tem the First of the Name wrote:

#6-2 The Silver Mount Collection: APL 3.5 or so, 4 players, two 3.0 experience characters, one ninja pregen, one character ninja with an adamantine weapon. Only the level 4 ninja (not the pregen, not me) was an experienced player, bad tactics were used all around. Players were still in the 1-2 steamroll mentality, for example I tried to sunder metal spears with my normal weapon.

The upside was my next character was an over prepared cleric.

Silver Mount Collection TPKs are probably less to do with player composition than the GM. That is one of the worst scenarios to have 0 tactics in.

4/5

TPKs are fairly rare. Again, the PCs are a group and usually have a primary strategy. Scenarios have challenge strategies. There can be a mismatch between how well those two interact and a group can change whereas a scenario is static(set). The larger the mismatch the more difficult the players will find the scenario.
There are a few scenarios that are a hard combat challenge, usually due to setup (monster placement and boxed text, surprise, situation) and lack of recovery time. Some are hard skill challenges where the NPCs or boxed text consequences of failure hit the pocketbook.
Alas, a few have drama options that foolish players will just get themselves killed for doing obviously bad ideas... no help for that.

Silver Crusade 4/5

Sammy T wrote:

I was GMing the notorious Season 4 scenario King of the Storval Stairs, sub-tier 10-11

When I saw the sign ups for the 4-person party, I pretty much knew it was pretty much a forgone conclusion when 2 of the players would be the folks who often played "flavorful" characters who were very often mechanically weak.

...

Take-away: Because my lodge at the time had multiple folks leveling up characters to higher tiers, I wrote a guide on things they should keep in mind.

I remember that one. That was back when I used to play at that store all the time, before I moved across town. I was there that night, just at a different table.

I actually like playing with those two players and their flavorful characters, because they do bring a lot of personality to the game. But I make a point of only playing easy, low level stuff with them, because I know their PCs are usually mechanically weak.

I also remember being scared of the reputation of that particular adventure, especially after you TPKed that group. I finally got around to playing it a few months ago, and our group found it challenging, but not overly so. No deaths, which was surprising to me, especially since I was playing my cleric who has witnessed a LOT of PC deaths. I was starting to think my character is cursed. Not only have I died twice playing that character, but I've seen about 7 or 8 other PC deaths at tables where I've played her, including one where I failed a Silver Crusade faction mission to make sure none of my allies died.

Speaking of which, I've had two near TPKs in PFS, and one was while playing that same cleric. I had driven 2 hours to a convention where I didn't know anyone, and the table I was supposed to GM in the afternoon didn't happen due to lack of players. There weren't many PFS games per session, so there was only one that I could jump into as a player, and it was a tier 7-11 from season 4.

My cleric was level 8, and I remember that our average party level for 6 players was exactly 9. This was back when you had the choice of what sub-tier to play if the group was between tiers, and you got the cash for the sub-tier you played, before there was a different gold reward for being out of tier. Knowing season 4's reputation, I lobbied for playing down, but the guy with the lowest level PC (7th level) was the most enthusiastic about playing up. The guys with the level 9 and 10 PCs wanted the better money, so they went along with it, and I was out-voted. If I wasn't so far from home and had to stick around to GM the evening session afterward, I would have walked away and not played. But it was a small con with nothing to do while sitting around for 5 hours until the next session, so I walked into what I knew would end up being an "I told you so" moment even before it started.

I think the level 7 died in the first combat of the adventure. Since it was in a major city, we got him raised and continued on. In the final fight, the level 7 and I were in the back of the group, and the BBEG cast Blade Barrier to cut us off from the rest of the party. Even more annoying, as if the adventure wasn't tough enough, the GM made the terrible ruling that channeled energy can't pass through a Blade Barrier, so I couldn't heal my teammates that way from behind it, and the damage from going through it would have knocked me unconscious before I could do anything to help up there. So the only thing I could do to even try to help was a desperate Dispel Magic attempt, where I needed something like a 17 on the die to knock down the Blade Barrier, since the BBEG was so much higher level than me. So the two of us in the back managed to run away while the others died.

Thus, my PC was the only who didn't die that session.

My only other near TPK was actually earlier than that, with my old home group. We played PFS, but with a very small circle of friends, playing with whoever could show up that week. We played a late season 3 adventure, back when they were warming up for the harder difficulty of season 4, but didn't have 4 player adjustments yet. Our group had 4 players, and because of party makeup, we were mostly ineffective in two of the fights.

In the first of those fights, we managed to run away, go back to town to re-equip for the challenge, then came back and won against that enemy. In the second fight, we weren't expecting another fight, since we'd already beaten the scenario's BBEG, and thought we were just wrapping up. We got ambushed by enemies that were tougher than expected, and it all went bad quickly. I think two of the PCs died, one stabilized at neg HP, and my sorcerer only got away by casting Expeditious Retreat to outrun the enemies. Those particular enemies had no reason to kill the guy at neg HP, so it was technically only two deaths out of four PCs, but still a pretty near TPK. Ironically, my PC was able to return for the bodies, because the enemies had left the area after the fight, and we still managed to get full prestige for the adventure.

So even though I've had PCs die a few times in PFS, I've actually been the only survivor in both of my near-TPK experiences.

What I learned: Don't play up in season 4. Be prepared with any equipment that might even remotely turn out to be helpful. Be sure to know what your equipment does. (Our ineffectiveness in the first tough fight in that second adventure was partially caused by nobody remembering that holy water could be used against an evil outsider. So the party alchemist was useless due to the enemy's fire immunity, even though we had 4 or 5 holy waters between us that we could have handed him to throw at it).

Liberty's Edge 3/5 5/5 **** Venture-Captain, Nebraska—Omaha

Hmm should we have spoiler tags?

Silver Crusade 4/5

Gary Bush wrote:
Hmm should we have spoiler tags?

That's why I avoided scenario names in my post.

3/5

Avoid spoiler info if you add the name, if you have spoiler info don't add a name? I'd like this conversation to be accessible to players that haven't played so of the scenarios.

Grand Lodge 3/5

4-26 The Waking Rune: Didn't know there was anything special about this scenario, not sure if the other players at the table knew there was something special about this scenario. We were not prepared... My character plane shifted away when he was the last one standing.

Dark Archive 1/5

Joe the Devout wrote:
4-26 The Waking Rune: Didn't know there was anything special about this scenario, not sure if the other players at the table knew there was something special about this scenario. We were not prepared... My character plane shifted away when he was the last one standing.

We just had a GM post this scenario for this weekend without knowing anything about it. I look forward to trying not to die, but I plan to bring a character designed to be more mechanically effective rather then flavorful.

3/5

RSX Raver wrote:
Joe the Devout wrote:
4-26 The Waking Rune: Didn't know there was anything special about this scenario, not sure if the other players at the table knew there was something special about this scenario. We were not prepared... My character plane shifted away when he was the last one standing.
We just had a GM post this scenario for this weekend without knowing anything about it. I look forward to trying not to die, but I plan to bring a character designed to be more mechanically effective rather then flavorful.

Read the scenario splat-text carefully, go the extra mile to prepare.

The Exchange 3/5

When I ran Waking Rune I probably did like 20 hours prep. I recommend planning for 7 hours of time to run it.

Silver Crusade 5/5 5/5 **

I've never been part of a literal TPK. But if we count scenarios where most of the party dies and the rest flee the lessons I've learned are

1) Whenever you teleport anywhere, just assume that you're IMMEDIATELY going to be attacked. ESPECIALLY when it makes absolutely NO sense to assume that. ALWAYS go in "hot" with buffs running. Group invisibility is good [Aside]Yes, I'm still bitter about that one scenario[/aside]

2) Be very, very, very careful when you've been hit by the double rounding level adjustment (eg, in a 5-9 level 6.6 rounds to 7 rounds to 8). ESPECIALLY with 5 players. ESPECIALLY ESPECIALLY in Core

3) Hard to know about in advance, but beware of cases where Paizo editing mistakes makes things much harder than they should be. One of the closest to TPK I came was when Paizo had forgotten to include the 4 player adjustment for the final encounter. Fortunately the GM recognized how unfair things were and went really soft on us so we were able to flee. But there are lots of cases where Paizo misprints makes things significantly harder.

4/5 *

I've GM'd a couple, usually with small-party-plus-pregen groups of strangers. I recently GM'd one where one player chose to abandon their comrades to death to save themselves, though.

Our group's very first Tier 5-9 scenario could have been a TPK, but I subtly encouraged folks to run away - none of it saw it coming and it utilized a class from the (then) new Advanced Player's Guide that had some pretty devastating abilities.

Dark Archive 4/5 5/5

No true TPKs, but a few close calls. Citadel of Flame my first time playing Pathfinder or PFS. It was a 4 player table with 2 pregens playing for the first time, another unplayed first level character, and the 4th had a couple of adventures but was still first level. We ended up with 3 martials and a cleric. Basically the party composition was lopsided and we made just about every mistake you can. Only 1 character survived by running away. The other close call was the first level of Bonekeep. Only 1 survivor from that one, but I'm not sure of Bonekeep counts. It takes a very specific skill set in the party to survive those intact. We had many, but not all of the tactical answers. Second one was kind of close but we ran out the clock in the last battle instead of getting completely wiped out. That second time we were mostly just pressing our luck.

1/5

First time I GM'd PFS (and including somebody who'd never played before) was horribly close to a TPK. Hot GM dice rolling in plain view didn't help, but basilisks are *nasty* at low level.

Dark Archive 1/5

DM Livgin wrote:
RSX Raver wrote:
Joe the Devout wrote:
4-26 The Waking Rune: Didn't know there was anything special about this scenario, not sure if the other players at the table knew there was something special about this scenario. We were not prepared... My character plane shifted away when he was the last one standing.
We just had a GM post this scenario for this weekend without knowing anything about it. I look forward to trying not to die, but I plan to bring a character designed to be more mechanically effective rather then flavorful.
Read the scenario splat-text carefully, go the extra mile to prepare.

I am aware of what happens in this scenario, I told the GM I was not going to hold back with my character like normal. I expect character deaths are going to happen, I just hope we can complete it for the boon.

5/5 *****

GM Lamplighter wrote:
I've GM'd a couple, usually with small-party-plus-pregen groups of strangers. I recently GM'd one where one player chose to abandon their comrades to death to save themselves, though.

I have had one like this which is the closest I have ever come to a TPK with only a single PC escaping alive.

I should have realised things might go badly early on. It was a potentially quite dangerous season 5 3-7 with a marginal group who just pushed into high tier. They had one level 7 sorcerer character. In the first encounter his first action was to cast acid splash. He didn't do much more effective after that.

One PC went down to an unlucky great axe crit playing a playtest occultist. Unfortunate but hard to do much about with x3 weapons especially as it was on the iterative after an initial pretty heavy hit. They got him raised and completed the rest of the scenario and were heading out of town when the final bad guy turns up.

He wins initiative, several players get nauseated by stinking cloud, their one effective martial is focused on a stupid hydra that cannot hit for toffee while I play for time throwing stuff I know wont work well. All during this the boss is demanding they hand over the macguffin and he will let them go. If they don't he will fireball them. They are playing up with the 4 player adjust which does nothing to his caster level. The group has at least one level 3, a 4 and mostly 5 with the one level 7 sorcerer who so far has cast fly and maybe a magic missile.

Eventually the boss gets tired of threatening them and finally chucks a fireball, they are still fairly clumped together. All of them are down save for the sorcerer. The boss repeats his demand, "give me the McGuffin and I will let you go".

The sorcerer, who is the player who has pulled the whole group into the high tier, declared "I am CN, I'm going to roll randomly to decide what to do", declares his roll meant he refused and flew off. The boss gave chase for a bit but couldn't catch him. He returned and finished off the party.

I rather strongly suspect that the player just didn't want to lose out on a PP by losing the macguffin and instead left everyone else with raise costs which he didn't contribute to.

Dark Archive 4/5 5/5 ****

My only real TPK (in other words non-We Be Goblins TPK) was a doozy of a season 4... the players were playing with 5, and at the minimum value that they had to play up... which is not a good idea, even with the 4-player adjustment. The two that were low tier were also melee characters.

After the initial encounter, they were already short on resources but did not choose to rest (they were not on a timeline). Then, they had an encounter that bestowed negative levels on them. They did manage to miss one encounter that might have been lethal, but they were done in by the BBEG... although I slowed him down to try and give him a chance, there was nothing that could happen other than the TPK. In this situation, they could not even run effectively.

Liberty's Edge 5/5

Starfinder Superscriber
Paul Jackson wrote:
2) Be very, very, very careful when you've been hit by the double rounding level adjustment (eg, in a 5-9 level 6.6 rounds to 7 rounds to 8). ESPECIALLY with 5 players. ESPECIALLY ESPECIALLY in Core.

Yeah, this. I had a near-TPK a couple of weeks ago, averted by me starting to softball a little bit in one encounter, and a player coming up with an excellent creative strategy. (They still walked out of that encounter pretty beat up, with several characters bearing negative levels, including the dwarf fighter who was 6th level but with 4 negative levels.)

It was a 5-9. We had one level 9 character; everybody else was 7 or below, including several level 6s. But, our APL came out to 6.8 or some such, which rounded to 7, which meant with 6 players in Season 1 we played the high subtier. Because we did have that one level 9, the rule that "if nobody is in the high subtier, you can opt to play the low subtier" didn't apply. It was almost very ugly.

The Exchange 4/5 5/5

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I've been a part of TPKs and TPK -1s on both sides of the GM screen.

The number two cause of TPKs is playing up with the four-player adjustment, especially in 5-9s. The level 5s and 6s just don't have the stats or gear to hang with enemies that can hit CR11 at times.

The number one cause of TPKs is GMs who don't prepare thoroughly. Most of the TPKs I've been on the receiving end of would not have been nearly as bad if the GM had read the scenario better. "Oh, there was an environmental effect that would have made things much more favorable for the party." "Oh, you can do diplomacy. But since they put two full pages of stat blocks I didn't notice the intro paragraph about meeting the warriors." "Oh, I forgot to read the tactics block. She wasn't supposed to do that except as a last resort." (Usually find out much later when I read the scenario.)

Number three is Tier 1-2 enemy barbarians with crit x3 or x4 weapons.

A distant fourth is GMs who set out to kill the party. Fortunately I've never seen this, just hearsay reports.

Lantern Lodge 5/5

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For what it's worth, the players in our area seem to have a good sense of when to cut and run. I can think of a handful of fights where there was one or two character deaths (and no real meaningful way to decisively end the fight in our favor) where "running and regrouping" was the modus operandi.

Sometimes that's "regroup and try again." Sometimes it's "regroup and cry off." But as a result, there aren't many real TPKs.

"I total defense and pick up the wizard's body."

The few "real TPKs" I've seen/been a part of typically have a downward spiral of failed saves. Paralyzed by ghouls, dazed by necrophidii, unlucky color sprays combined with angry halfling support, cytillipedes, that sort of thing.

Shadow Lodge 4/5 5/5 RPG Superstar Season 9 Top 8

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I have GM'd, seen, and played through several TPKs and what I’ve learned is that TPKs are the result of typically a few reoccurring themes.

1. GMs making a mistake with tactics, or shortcutting some effects of combat (like intiative) that puts the players at an initial disadvantage.
2. Players using foolish tactics, or unknowingly making decisions that make combat exponentially more difficult.
3. Actually challenging fights that are winnable, but do not go in the players favor through a series of unfortunate rolls.
4. Shadows. These stupid good creatures for their CR and have killed more players—newbies and veterans alike--than anything else I can think of.

Here are the first 20 TPKs that came to mind when I thought about it. There are more. Each of these is an instance where it was a complete party wipe--no survivors. Spoiler free, with a list of adventure names at the bottom in spoiler form.

1. GM error with enemy tactics; abilities were used more optimally than written and lead to a TPK. Combination of a wall of stone that split the high level party, a trio of giants with power attack, and a gaggle of hasted harpy archers raining death from above.
2. Mid level party hit by black tentacles with no way to escape. An excruciating 9 rounds of slow, debilitating combat folled while the BBEG picked people off one by one with lower level evocation spells.
3. High level party encounters a blocked corridor. A couple of the party members teleport past. Before they can regroup, they are beset upon by a pair of gugs, who end them in the first round of combat. The second half of the party, wondering what become of their companions, clears the rubble over the course of a few hours and encounters the same gugs, who kill them as well.
4. Mid level party encounters four elementals in tight spaces. Divided, they are easily picked off by the elementals. The lone survivor manages to flee into a new room, which has a beam of negative energy projected across its width. In there, he encounters the next encounter--a shadow beast that shoves him through the beam, cooking him for 20d6 and completing the TPK.
5. Multiple TPKs during the infamous "Shank Shack" PAX quest in 2013. Dozens table of level 1 pregens died again and again attempting to overcome a pit trap, a rat swarm, and a faceless stalker. Few survived.
6. Lower level party passes through a room with two branching hallways. They follow the east, and it loops around the meet the west overlooking a cylindrical chamber that stretches down and up for an immeasurable length. While examining the curious room, two shadows appear, one from each hallway. They engage the undead, only to find that a few rounds later, two more shadows appear. And again, a few rounds after that—two more shadows appear. Party eventually murdered by shadows.
7. Same players as story 6, make a new lower level party to pick up where the previous team left off. They avoid the shadows with some difficulty, and make it to an abandoned prison wing. Low on Strength, the rest for the night in the empty cells. The awaken to find the cells locked by the enemy shadowdancer that is also in this section of the dungeon. Her shadow murders them one by one as they struggle to escape death traps of their own making.
8. Lower level party encounters a final room. From a balcony of sorts, they observe a small lake of noxious water below. A single island sits the far side, upon which is a gilded chest. One party member decides to use spider climb to walk along the low ceiling to retrieve the chest. Mid way through his inverted space walk, the half-devil otyugh emerges from the waters and picks the player from the ceiling. Initiative is rolled, and the poor player is killed before acting. The rest of the party moves to engage, but are staggered in their approach and effectively serve themselves up one by one to the beast, who leaves none alive.
9. High level party is ambushed by low level rogues, each armed with a single bead from a necklace of fireballs. As they bombard the party, a single assassin hits the party cleric, who nat 1s the Fortitude save vs. death. They fall in an embarrassing fashion, to a team of characters 6 levels lower than them with solid tactics.
10. Very high level party encounters a room with 8 greater shadows and vampire, engaged in stage acting. They decide to leave the room as is. Party encounters room directly beneath that room with the vampire lord, and begins combat. During combat, they are stonewalled by a former players PC with an AC above 40, whose body was abandoned previously and returned to unlife by the vampire lord. As they fight their former ally, the 8 greater shadows descend through the ceiling and proceed to mop up the rest of the players. The vampire lord does nothing but inspire courage and use a scroll of harm on his PC vampire minion.
11. GM rolls a single initiative for his 13 vampires against a team of very high level players. The roll is a 20+ and all 13 vampires proceed to act before the party. 13 fireballs explode around the players killing them all. GM retcons that they rolled initiative separately, a couple party members fall but overall the combat is successful.
12. Mid level party encounters a trio of babaus at an abyssal forge. Combat is atrotious, with the players being singled out and murdered by the demons. At one point, the bard attempts a glitterdust. Only blinds himself, then dies to babau sneak attack. To add insult to injury, the babau picks up his halfling body and teleports to the forge before dropping his corpse into the molten pot.
13. Mid level party knows they are to encounter a shadow demon, and prepare protection from evil. Shadow demon laughs at them, and uses his unique ability to ignore protection from evil and possess their strongest melee character. Once he goes down, the demon hops to the next, and the next, until the entire party implodes on itself.
14. Low level party encounters a room with 3 shadows and dies. That’s it.
15. Level 1 party encounters a shadow and intelligently flees from combat, unintelligently entering a room with a wight, who literally one shots each of them.
16. Mid level party encounters a gyrating creature, who forces a will save. Entire party save one player fails, and is unable to act for the rest of the combat. Single player fails a second will save, against a suggestion to leave and does so, abandoning the party. Party is killed one by one by the NPC in block text. Suggested PC makes a new character out of shame.
17. High level party encounters an old man, beset upon by a demon in the ruins of Sarkoris. They aid the old man as a cloud of darkness upon him. Darkness clears to find a party member ripped to shreds and the old man replaced by a glabrezu. Said glabrezu proceeds to make short work of the disjointed party, who wasted time engaging with the illusionary demon that was of the glabrezu’s own making.
18. Mid level party encounters a water level with low visibility, and a maze of metal gates. Two party members enter, navigate the maze, but fail to return. The remaining two party members enter, and encounter the sea hags that killed their friends. Proceed to die to the hags.
19. High level party enters the vaulted final chamber, to find the BBEG touting his strength and flexing in the center of it. They engage with the BBEG, only to find he is an illusion. Waves of fatigue hit the party, preventing the barbarian PC from raging. Subsequent flame strikes, combined with wisdom damage, slow and well placed glyphs of warding divide and destroy the party. Those that engage in combat with the actual BBEG find her difficult to injure with blur, stoneskin, and castings of quicked mirror image. The battle is one of attrition, but in the end the entire party falls to the lamia matriarch with class levels.
20. Mid level party begins combat against some plant monsters shortly after another encounter ends. Low on resources, the party engages. Create pit is cast, but the plants avoid. Tree monster uses absurd reach to trip and drag people towards it, over the created pit, where they fall. Other plant monsters drop onto the pitted PCs, who beat them to death. Remaming PC attempts to flee, but is snagged by the tree, and brought into the blender of death.

What adventures they were:

1. King of the Storval Stairs
2. Golemworks Incident
3. Rats of Round Mountain Part 1
4. Bonekeep Level 1
5. Shank Shack PAX Quest
6-10. Council of Thieves AP
11. The Moonscar
12-13. Wrath of the Righteous AP
14. Rise of the Runelords AP
15. Thornkeep Level 1
16. Kingmaker AP
17. The Sarkorian Prophecy
18. Rebel’s Ransom
19. Portal of the Sacred Rune
20. The Green Market

Shadow Lodge 4/5

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Uncle Walter's TPK Hour is the scariest show on the Pathfinder Network

Dark Archive 1/5

Sammy T wrote:
Uncle Walter's TPK Hour is the scariest show on the Pathfinder Network

Agreed!

4/5

lol... there are a few he left out, but I'm keeping quiet.

I think it's fair within PFS to skip an encounter and take the gold loss, possible prestige and experience loss. Sometimes encounters are just too tough for the party at the table and that is in the GMs court to offer that option to the players. It's rare and nobody likes doing that but sometimes practicality trumps possible multiple party losses.
I have had groups that value roleplaying above martial prowess and were ineffectual combatants and uncoordinated strategically. I don't want to discourage them from playing but coach and mentor them to be better players. It takes time. It's hard when you're a GM and some groups are min-maxed and others, well, just do not have that can of whoop a$$.

4/5

Joe the Devout wrote:
4-26 The Waking Rune: Didn't know there was anything special about this scenario, not sure if the other players at the table knew there was something special about this scenario. We were not prepared... My character plane shifted away when he was the last one standing.

Haven't played it yet, but I think that scenario would call for me releasing the kraken APG summoner who blows through scrolls of Evolution Surge/Greater Evolution Surge like candy.

Grand Lodge 3/5

M party almost ran into a TPK during Bid for Albistran;

Spoiler:
I was playing my 2 U.Rogue/Warpriest with the only Wand of Cure Light Wounds- the others were playing fresh lvl 1s- and she was felled by a critical sneak attack that i had to bound a boon to her for her to survive.
We had archers picking us off, and a trio of rogues backstabbing us.
That's when the GM remembered the four player adjustment, and took away one of the archers that had been picking us off.

We barely survived, sore and a dozen charges spent, my Warpriest's Luck Blessing became a boon to the party during the rest of the scenario.

1/5

Ragoz wrote:
When I ran Waking Rune I probably did like 20 hours prep. I recommend planning for 7 hours of time to run it.

It was a fun time. It was a shame it got cut short because of the slot. We all ran away, but lived. And that's what matters. Don't be a hero. Save yourself and live. But I think that scenario requires a lot of prep... if you ever decide to run it, don't give players a win to make them feel good - that's not what the scenario is for. Ruin their dreams.

Dark Archive 4/5 5/55/5 ****

My only TPK was against a group of tier 1-2 with 4 players that might have survived had they not opened a box to let out a swarm while also fighting the BBEG and minions. An unlucky damage roll taking out one of them also hurt.

Second Seekers (Roheas) 4/5 5/55/55/55/5 ***** Regional Venture-Coordinator, Appalachia

I have been a party to several TPKs.

Walter is right - a lot of the time they come because of a GM going really hardass on a rule that the scenario writer likely did not intend and playing certain monsters extremely efficiently when they probably shouldn't have been.

Especially

Scenario name:
Level one of the Emerald Spire

I have personally GM'd 4 TPKs.

1. Party doesn't recognize that a certain encounter is going to be a real encounter, tries to leave room, accidentally triggers two moderately difficult fights at once, remaining party member tries to escape via a water route and drowns.

2. A Construct in tier 3-4. Poor Bastards.

3. Party falls victim to 3 dominate persons due to a series of botched sense motive rolls. The remaining party member is a fighter who tries valiantly to save the party and dies. This party is now the skum servants of a certain Aboleth

4. A witch's crowd control spells inadvertently box the players into perfect fireball formation. Vs a sorceror with multiple fireballs.

Takeaways:
1. Nothing to do here as the GM except to commit to sometimes embellishing on the box text when it is important to do so. The team made bad decisions and had to live with the results.

2. Inform players that running is an option when they encounter something that they clearly cannot handle after a few rounds of them not handling it. it was pretty demoralizing watching this thing they could only barely damage just slowly pick them apart.

3. Bad dice happen. Bad plans make them worse.

4. Laugh. That witch had been pretty arrogant about how overclocked he was so to see the party die because they tried to be a spotlight hog when their mojo wasnt called for was funny. Felt bad for the other players but they really needed to speak up.

Scenario key:

1. 6-06 Hall of the Flesheaters
2. 6-09 By way of Bloodcove
3. AP Hell's Rebels Book 3
4. MODULE From Shore to Sea

4/5 **** Venture-Lieutenant, Maryland—Hagerstown

Never had a full TPK. The closest was for a social scenario where it only has one combat.

Scenario:
Bid for Albastrine

Started of with a party of six socially built characters. The closest to melee was a ranger and not optimized for melee. So no front line fighters. No one passed the sense motive or perception check to get in on the surprise round. The boss was knife master rogue, and surprise round got d8 instead of d6 on a level 2 or 3 bard. Then the mooks showed up, and per tactics, provide flanking for the boss. So needless to say, not a good day. The scenario was over with-in 30 minutes. One managed to run away.

That was the first time I killed off a character. Since then it has gotten easier to deal with PC death.

4/5

in PFS think of it as a 16-22 PA loss... Rerolls, Retail Incentive Programs(bottom of the page), and the thread Items that can save you in 2017 can help.

If you are having trouble with a scenario, back up and tell your GM. There are options and your GM is a smart guy who can help you out. He's read the scenario (hopefully... lol).

2/5 5/5 Venture-Agent, Indiana—Lafayette

I have had a couple of near TPKs, but only one TPK. A low level adventure in core with a couple harpies. One starts singing, everyone in the party save one botches saves(even with rerolls). Harpies kill the poor caster who made his save in one round, then slowly murder the rest. A few of the players are still (jokingly) bitter. Add in that some of them play in my Skulls & Shackles game where they ran into more harpies......

Grand Lodge 4/5

Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Pathfinder Accessories, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

About the only TPK I can think of was a certain very big barbarian on a mountain. But that was very low level characters playing up.

We did TPK on the final fight of Elven Entanglement, but that was due to misreading a spell.

And there was a TPK I watched but was not a part of. That was mainly player error considering the two players that were also playing Dark Souls while the table was going decided they wanted to go back for the wish spell the big evil was promising. And then bad positioning.

1/5

I've not been in a TPK, but I've been close... and I've definitely seen some..

1) Waking Rune - Got wrecked. Ran away. No one died. Because we decided to not die and ran away. Like heroes.

2) Heard of another party which died due to fighting demons inside a darkness spell and deciding not to run away. YOU GOT EM!

3) Could have been TPKd by savage GMing when a group of monsters with Pounce could have surprised the entire party and pounced us into oblivion, but instead decided to attack only after we had occupied a hall, creating a choke point - although a single character died to pouncing, we could have all been dead, so... yeah.

4) Saw a party die to many, many gaze attacks in a confined space. Sad times.

5) Nearly died playing in a 3-person table with a pregen at a special so that the special could fire. Had 2 fluff characters which were not good at combat at my table and a pregen who was vastly superior to the other PCs in every way. One was a melee character who tried to be a switch hitter playing up who had Power attack and also used a bow, with STR14, DEX 14, CON 12, WIS10 INT14, CHR14 and two of his feats used for skill bumps. Rocking that sweet +6 \ 1d8+3 in the 7-8 tier, and a dex-based sneak attack twf CRB rogue without the agile enchantment. Would have dropped the table, but we barely hit the special requirement to play the special.. dropping would have made the special not fire. Survived by basically not losing / dying in RL time, as the special pushed events forwards at certain intervals.

The Exchange 4/5 5/5 *

Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber; Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber

There's a certain level 1-5 Season 6 scenario that involves an island, and a lot of undead. I TPKed playing that one due to poor tactics and TERRIBLE die rolling by half the party. But I've also seen it TPK other parties.

4/5 *

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andreww wrote:
I rather strongly suspect that the player just didn't want to lose out on a PP by losing the macguffin and instead left everyone else with raise costs which he didn't contribute to.

This is the type of thing I record in Chronicle sheets. "Left his companions, including his wife, to bleed out and be eaten by the monster and didn't contribute to raising them."

4/5 *

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I'm glad that Uncle Walter's TPK Theatre list wasn't nearly as many "designed for PFS" scenarios as modules and APs... Some of those sounds horrific. But yes - shadows should be banned from low-tier scenarios. And the bottle of shadows should be banned from PFS.

Shadow Lodge 4/5 5/5 RPG Superstar Season 9 Top 8

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It's about 50-50 PFS scenarios-PFS sanctioned material (8 to 12)

And yes, shadows suck!

Grand Lodge 4/5

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Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Pathfinder Accessories, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

Critting on the Str damage really sucks for PCs.

Silver Crusade 4/5

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From what I've seen, the biggest problem with modules and APs in PFS play is that the adventures are written with the assumption that PCs will level up along the way, but that doesn't happen in PFS.

So for instance, if you're play something for levels 4-6, outside of PFS, you'd start at level 4 or 5 and advance to level 6 by the final fight. In PFS, you'd be level 4 for the whole thing, fighting a CR 8 or 9 BBEG at the end.

This is why I try to avoid playing PCs at the lowest possible level when I play modules or AP pieces in PFS, and usually try to go for the highest allowable level. And I encourage other players to do the same as much as possible.

Grand Lodge 3/5

I've ran 2 near TPKs and played in two.

The first GMing one was a season 5 3-7 where the party was kind of low level but qualified for high tier (APL around 4.6 rounds up to 5) and were very insistant that they wanted to play up. No one had the right special material weapons, and there were some mean DR creatures that they had a rough time hurting. I probably should have looked at the character sheets more closely at the start of the session to ensure that they would be OK playing up. About half of them ended up fleeing in the end, and I didn't have the enemies pursue.

The second one was a season 6 1-5 with lots of undead that I think has been mentioned already. There was one character who was pretty one-trick style that couldn't do much to the undead in the scenario, so wasn't able to help with combat much, but through smart play was able to save one of the other characters and salvage a successful mission.

The first one I played was also a season 5 3-7. We were doing quite well until the end when a big bad that you obviously shouldn't fight was coming. we were fleeing the secret basement area when one player decided to see if he could fight the thing. It tore him apart, and kept after us. When we got to the maze level above, the first characters to make it up ran ahead, unaware that pursuit had stopped. The nasty up there picked off my character and another I think while we all ran about trying to find our way back out. This was my first character death in PFS and was quite a learning experience for me.

Second one I played was a problem of poor party synergy, a one trick character who couldn't affect an enemy, and some poor luck. We had my bard, a melee alchemist as our front liner, a druid that traded out his animal companion for a domain and a weaker animal companion or something like that, and a Heaven's Oracle. We fight some nasty outsiders on a dam. We have figured out some clues that should help us in the fight, but what goes down is that the Heaven's Oracle can't really affect the enemies with his spells, most of us get slowed, the Alchemist and the pet get dropped really fast. We eventually get all dropped to below 0. I figured that we deserved to get TPKed but the GM decided the outsiders have more pressing concerns than making sure we are dead, so lets us roll to stabilise. a couple of us don't actually die because of this and we limp home with our less fortunate friends and almost no rewards.

1/5

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ah, the party of plinkers.
A party of people whose characters are used to low level play where 10 damage a round was worthwhile. They then play a higher level and either don't do enough damage to finish fights, or get shut down by any DR they can't overcome.
Sure in some higher level scenarios the party can make it through the fights okay. But get a slightly tough fight and this party will crumple and be unable to kill anything.
Usually they get carried by someone that wins fights, a strong control wizard or a really high DPR build, but if the party doesn't happen to draft one of those, it's TPK potential.

Grand Lodge 4/5 **** Venture-Captain, California—Sacramento

Sammy T wrote:


Take-away: Because my lodge at the time had multiple folks leveling up characters to higher tiers, I wrote a guide on things they should keep in mind.

Sammy, that is a really cool guide. I would like to distribute it locally, but you might want to add your name so that you get credit.

3/5

I can be a fierce Dm, besides we be goblins. I have TPKed 2(king of storval stairs, and the traitors lodge). I have defeated the party more times than that. As I am prone to let the PCs escape or have the bad guys spare the PCs.

Although shadows are very dangerous, and their dumb CR rating I have turned a few PCs into shadows. Wraiths can be equally dangerous. I Dmed a scenario with them and one of the player was upset that they put them in encounter until I showed their tactics were to equally hit all the players and I was running them stupid per script.

I have never been part of a TPK as a player.

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