In today’s second-from-the-last session of the current homebrew campaign, there were Three (3) player character fatalities. The PCs began the afternoon trotting after the one NPC (who herself 86’d a PC several months ago) who had the necessary dirt on the main villain of the campaign. However before reaching said NPC, the boys had to deal with a little ambush prepared for them by several of the main villain’s helpers. Long story short, the group went into a large catacomb complex looking for the NPC, and at one point, the corridors went from 10’ by 10’ down to 5’ by 5’ in width (all were 10’ in height). The guys didn’t have a PC rogue with them at the time, and thus didn’t note the two Dimensional Lock traps that were placed in the corridor. Once the dimensional locks went off (effectively blanketing an 80 foot stretch of the corridor as ‘magically travel-proof’, the invisible bad guys present proceeded to have 8 Simulacrum wizards (all 9th level and CR 8 each) EACH drop a Wall of Force spell which effectively “CUBED” all 7 PCs (14th level each) present into their own little 5’ by 5’ prison, and as none could magically leave, this meant multiple PCs were helpless in their individual prisons for the time being. Also during the surprise action, I had a villain PC Fighter, Sir Sean step up to the closest Wall of Force, and on the following round (as the first PC in line couldn’t do anything on his action), the Simulacrum that put up the first Wall of Force, Dispelled that Wall of Force, and Sir Sean proceeded to sink a Full Round of attacks into the PC in the first 5’ square immediately opposite him, as there was no longer a Wall of Force between the two. I hit on all regular attacks (Power Attacks with a Human Bane weapon no less) and the Hasted attack, and did about 225+/- of damage, and carved the PC fighter into sushi…
The PCs immediately grasped that I was going to repeat the process each round until I sliced and diced each one of them on each succeeding round, unless they did something. The sole reason I didn’t have a TPK, was naturally our friend Turin the Mad, who was playing 2 clerics today, and fortuitously had on each of his two cleric’s possession, a Robe of Useful Items. Turin dropped said patches from the robes and created two 10’ pits in the floor, which allowed some of the PCs on the far end of the bottleneck to start moving out of their 5’ prison cubes. On the following round, Haru’s Half-dragon sorcerer assumed gaseous form and flew through the villains, eating some attacks of opportunity, but surviving none the less. On the third round, Sir Sean did a full round attack and 86’d the PC Paladin. At that point, the other PC sorcerer had summoned over 12 Large Earth Elementals, and Turin had had his cleric(s) put up Anti-Life shells, (which allow NO saving throw), and effectively hedged my villain Fighter out from pursuing any more characters, which effectively ended the encounter, as Sir Sean couldn’t magically take the Anti-Life shell down.
The lads then went to the 3rd of 4 bell towers, and sadly made fairly short work of the giant, ettin, and ogre mage defenders (all with PC levels). However the Cyclops Cleric moved in on the PC sorcerer and used his 1/day insight attack to select a natural 20 on a power attack with a Scythe, and did 220 points of damage to the sorcerer and cleaved his ass in two!!!!!!!!!!
The guys headed to chat with a final NPC before we finished for the day. The last session of the current homebrew campaign is scheduled for May. At that point, I’ll be taking something of a sebatical from gaming for the upcoming birth of child #2. I hope to return to GM’ing sometime later this year, if circumstances allow. I for one will miss posting my bi-weekly episodes of player cruelty… But it can’t be helped…
Well, only ONE Anti-Life Shell was cast, but that's a minor detail. Sadly, I did not have sufficient action economy to cast Breath of Life upon the Resident Artist's beloved Paladin...
And yes, both 14th level clerics possessed a combination item: a monk's robe of useful items. While costlier, combining low-cost items into a single item of the same item slot frees up a great deal of flexibility for a PC.
Sir Sean escaped once more ... but then, some day, he won't have a pet cleric around.
Too bad about the giants ... the series of destruction spells against which their Fortitude saving throw bonuses proved insufficient seemed to serve the desired purpose - getting the bastiches out of the way of our bell.
Although The Artist-Paladin did recruit the aforementioned cyclops into working for him to guard something important I believe. ^_^
Sir Sean escaped once more ... but then, some day, he won't have a pet cleric around.
What can I say... One 16th level Fighter can only do so much against Seven 14th level player characters. Given the firepower of the characters, and the caliber of several players (specifically you), I needed the cleric. In the future, (assuming he sees action again some day), if/when I scale Sir Sean back down to levels 8-12 where he ideally belongs, I can probably forgo the cleric again...
In some ways, the demises of the Resident Artist & (the player) Sean were appropriate. The resident artist dodged Sir Sean in the 2005 campaign, and (the player) Sean dodged him in the current campaign. I didn't specifically target their respective characters during last session's encounter, but in hindsight, there was some poetic irony dished out on April 24th:)
Sir Sean escaped once more ... but then, some day, he won't have a pet cleric around.
What can I say... One 16th level Fighter can only do so much against Seven 14th level player characters. Given the firepower of the characters, and the caliber of several players (specifically you), I needed the cleric. In the future, (assuming he sees action again some day), if/when I scale Sir Sean back down to levels 8-12 where he ideally belongs, I can probably forgo the cleric again...
In some ways, the demises of the Resident Artist & (the player) Sean were appropriate. The resident artist dodged Sir Sean in the 2005 campaign, and (the player) Sean dodged him in the current campaign. I didn't specifically target their respective characters during last session's encounter, but in hindsight, there was some poetic irony dished out on April 24th:)
In 12 days we get to (attempt) to stomp on your bad guys for the conclusion of the LK campaign. Hopefully the meerping won't be too bad as some of the characters are hewn like so much firewood... :)
In the Final session of the Current Homebrew Campaign, there was One (1) PC fatality. The grand total for PC fatalities during this campaign (which began in February 2009) was Thirty-eight (38). A decent total, but nothing resembling the 06-07 Age of Worms campaign...
I don't yet have the post describing the action prepared, but I'll get it up as soon as possible. Turin the Mad cleaned house today, and wiped out multiple main campaign villains. Several other players factored heavily in the action as well... Props to Turin, the Resident Artist, and Haru for pulling a miracle out of his *** by rolling a Nat 20 on a save versus Feeblemind, that could have spelled failure for the group, had he failed...
In the Final session of the Current Homebrew Campaign, there was One (1) PC fatality. The grand total for PC fatalities during this campaign (which began in February 2009) was Thirty-eight (38). A decent total, but nothing resembling the 06-07 Age of Worms campaign...
I don't yet have the post describing the action prepared, but I'll get it up as soon as possible. Turin the Mad cleaned house today, and wiped out multiple main campaign villains. Several other players factored heavily in the action as well... Props to Turin, the Resident Artist, and Haru for pulling a miracle out of his *** by rolling a Nat 20 on a save versus Feeblemind, that could have spelled failure for the group, had he failed...
I should point my former players to this thread. Maybe they would be grateful I was their DM.
I should point my former players to this thread. Maybe they would be grateful I was their DM.
By all means, do so. Use my own example to enable your PC brutality:)
On Friday July 16, Killer GM Junior was born at 6:15 AM in Fredericksburg, Virginia. He and his mother are doing fine. The Killer GM who has turned into Killer_Butler, Killer_Laundryman, Killer_Housecleaner, etc., is not doing quite so fine...
Congratulations Allen!
Congratulations Sir Al of N, may you yet manage to avoid the Parents' Curse... :)
When you've caught up on sleep and get your 'puter once more replaced ... hrm, I might be pushing 50 by then. :P
On Friday July 16, Killer GM Junior was born at 6:15 AM in Fredericksburg, Virginia. He and his mother are doing fine. The Killer GM who has turned into Killer_Butler, Killer_Laundryman, Killer_Housecleaner, etc., is not doing quite so fine...
Congrats. Another one to terrorize players for years, hopefully.
Thanks Gents. He sleeps really well. I may have lucked out on this one...
Thats good. I got rather lucky in that department too...my son was sleeping through the night regularly by age: 2 months. What a relief.
Thats good. I got rather lucky in that department too...my son was sleeping through the night regularly by age: 2 months. What a relief.
It is a relief indeed. On the subject of the game, it is unclear when I will be returning to the game. If my wife has her way (which she won't), I'd never return. I've already started story-boarding the next campaign, and I've got several small 2-3 month long campaigns for use depending on how much time the wife is able to be smooth-talked into. I'm already going through withdrawal symptoms from not greasing player characters of late. I don't know how long I can keep going without a few new PC fatalities to report...
Too bad we can't use dominate on our wives....
Mine is pretty cool about it, I had to go through several women till I found the right one :-)
I'm glad your spouse is generous in that regard. With any luck, I'll be where you are in 10-15 years from now...
I'm glad your spouse is generous in that regard. With any luck, I'll be where you are in 10-15 years from now...Too bad we can't use dominate on our wives....
Mine is pretty cool about it, I had to go through several women till I found the right one :-)
Probably not until after the little ones are grown and out of the house my friend. So ... 20 years or so. ^_^
Belated Congratulations Killer_GM. I do hope you manage to sneak out and game occationally.
Belated Congratulations Killer_GM. I do hope you manage to sneak out and game occationally.
Thanks. While sneaking out would probably cause me unpleasant consequences, I'm working on negotiating a limited "work release" from jail with the Wife. Furthermore, once my children hit age 5 or 6 (my daughter will be 3 next month), they undoubtedly will start into activities that make attending a Saturday game even more difficult than it is now. Hence, I'm trying to play now, rather than later...
Well...hopefully everything works out so you can keep gaming Allen. I married a gamer-chick, so its not an issue for me, but I imagine that has to be hard. Does your wife just not approve of gaming or something? Or is it a matter of family time?
I've never understood how some families can have 'Poker night' but Gaming Night (or day) just breaks the back for some reason.
Either way, to your success and growing little ones!
Sir Allen:
Had you considered becoming a 'convention' GM? Then you could go away on holiday to exotic locations, and the wife and children could play on the beach (or visit other local attractions) whilst you spend a couple of afternoons greasing PCs for Pathfinder Society...
Edit:
I believe that some PFS scenarios even follow story arcs, with one scenario following another, in a sort of 'mini campaign'.
Shameless plug Sir Charles! However, visiting the UK is definitely high on the list for my wife and I. Should we ever have such disposable income, I know I intend on looking you up. Not sure what Allen's monetary situation is, but such a plan is worth a shot. Most spouses would want a "Family Vacation" though. More's the pity (not that there's anything wrong with Family Vacations...)
Sir Allen:
Had you considered becoming a 'convention' GM? Then you could go away on holiday to exotic locations, and the wife and children could play on the beach (or visit other local attractions) whilst you spend a couple of afternoons greasing PCs for Pathfinder Society...
Edit:
I believe that some PFS scenarios even follow story arcs, with one scenario following another, in a sort of 'mini campaign'.
Actually Sir Charles, I have contemplated GM'ing at a convention on multiple occasions, and I hope to do so at some point in the future. I don't know exactly when that will happen, but I really do want to give it a try. It's an entire afternoon, where you can brutalize players with impunity, that you will never see again... So one doesn't have to assauge feelings or do damage control with your normal group of players.
While I would willingly GM in England, I'd likely be so thrilled to merely be in the country and chatting with the folk (I'm something of an Anglophile), I don't know that I could be counted on to brutalize the players, given my fondness for the country, culture, & accents. In an American Paizo/3.5 con, I'd slaughter characters en masse and laugh in the player's faces when I did it. I regret that I've never had a cam-corder to video my ridiculous GM'ing antics and PC abuse, from the past...
As far as a possible return to GM'ing, I'm still in negotiations with the wife. November/December remains a possibility... though it may be fairly short in duration this time and the next few times, until my child is out of diapers at least...
Killer GM Returns
I have gotten clearance from the boss (wife) to return to the game, albeit on a somewhat reduced schedule. The game will resume in January 2011. It is not clear at present which (if any) of my players are back in the saddle. I'll work on straightening that out over the next few months.
Having run home brewed campaigns for the past 10 years (with the notable exception of the Age of Worms & Styes/Weavers), I'm giving thought to running a string of my favorite adventures/modules from the TSR/WoTC/Paizo arsenal. More on this later. KGM
Glad to hear you will be back to tormenting players soon. I ran a sustained campaign for over seven years by modifying and tying together many of my favorite modules and it was a blast.
I think that's a good way to go. The adventure path-style of campaigns that I've run before are a grind on players as well as me. I've noticed that the player are often forgetting what happened 6 sessions previously, much less 6 months before. Adventure modules (I think) keep things fresh, and provide closure, rather than a campaign that drags out endlessly. Add to that, there are some adventures that I've always had a fondness for, and would like another chance to throw at my current players.
And yes, I'm all for returning to tormenting and exterminating player characters in droves once again... I can't wait to get back on the 'morphine drip.' I'm already wracked with withdrawal symptoms. Where's Hexen Ineptus, his latest shape shifting character, and his untrusty d20 when I need him...
I have come up with a tentative list of adventures I plan to run for the pending new campaign in 2011/12, which I have listed below. All of these classic adventures will be converted to the Pathfinder rule system. These are still tentative, and I may make some changes depending on a number of factors, but most of these are long time favorites of mine, and I'd love to GM them. A number of these I've never ran before, and am excited at the prospect of finally getting to run them for your sadistic reading pleasure. Any comments are welcome. I'll create a new thread in January 2011 for the new campaign.
Beginning 1st to Mid 2nd level: (Combo of adventures) Dungeon Crawl Classic #24 Legend of the Ripper & "Shut In" from Dungeon
Magazine #128 by W Schneider & J Sutter, with a few elements added in from the Ravenloft adventure "Hour of the Knife." As all 3 adventres present their own respective villain, I'm going to use DM's privilidge and insert my own Axe-wielding Halfling 'Jack Mangler' in the role of the murderer. I'll remove the "Aqua Lady" and her story line from the Legend of the Ripper adventure, and replacing her with Lady Dromdal and some of the events from the Shut In adventure by Sutter & Schneider.
Mid 2nd to End of 3rd level: Bruce Cordell & Mike Selinker's 2nd edition adventure "Diablo, the Awakening." Specifically, I'll have the players do the 'Poison Water' & 'Butcher' Quests. Naturally I'll be throwing a few curve balls in of my own.
4th level: the Myriador (company's) 3.5 edition conversion of the Fighting Fantasy Novel #1, "The Warlock of Firetop Mountain" by Steve Jackson & Ian Livingstone.
5th level: the 1st Edition adventure C2: Ghost Tower of Inverness
6th level: the 2nd Edition Ravenloft Boxed Set adventure: Castles Forlorn
7th level: the 3.5 edition revamp of 1st Edition adventure S2: White Plume Mountain
8th level: Dungeon Crawl Classic #25 Dread Crypt of Srihoz
9th level: the 3.5 edition revamp of 1st Edition adventure S1: Tomb of Horrors by Cordell & Gygax
10th level: Dungeon Crawl Classics #12 & 12.5: Blackguard's Revenge & Iron Crypt of the Heretics
11th level: the 3.5 edition revamp of 1st edition adventure S4: Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth. I am not totally ruling out instead
running Greg Vaughan's "Istivin Trilogy at levels 11-12, but at the moment, I'm leaning heavily towards running Tsojcanth.
12th level: continuing the 3.5 edition revamp of 1st edition adventure S4: Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth & the new expansion of that adventure, "Iggwilv's Horn."
13th level: I'm leaning towards running a Pathfinder update of the 1st edition adventure: G1 Steading of the Hill Giant chief. I may
opt for Maure Castle as an alternative.
14th level: I'm leaning towards running a Pathfinder update of the 1st edition adventure: G2 Glacial Rift of the Frost Giant Jarl.
I may opt for Maure Castle as an alternative.
15th level: I'm leaning towards running a Pathfinder update of the 1st edition adventure: G3 Hall of the Fire Giant King. I may
opt for Maure Castle as an alternative.
16th level: I have not identified an adventure to run at 16th level. If I were to run Maure Castle at levels 13-15, then I
could readily insert the Chamber of Antiquities at 16th level.
17th level: The Pathfinder adventure: The Witch War Legacy by Greg Vaughan
18th level: the Companion Set D&D adventure: CM2 Death's Ride
19th level: I'm waffling between a Home brewed adventure and Monte Cook's "A Paladin in Hell". I'm leaning towards the homebrew
because the Paladin in Hell adventure is very lengthy.
20th level: "The Essence of Evil" by Robert J Schwalb from the November/December 2007 electronic Dungeon magazine, (which amounts
to a stop Tharizdun from being freed adventure to save the campaign world).
A Paladin in Hell has been / is in the process of being converted to 3.5/Pathfinder in the Conversions/Homebrew section of these boards. A worthy conversion indeed, although putting that in the 19th level slot is going to require upgunning it considerably. (Not necessarily from the CR standpoint, so much as from the "endurance test" standpoint.)
A Paladin in Hell has been / is in the process of being converted to 3.5/Pathfinder in the Conversions/Homebrew section of these boards. A worthy conversion indeed, although putting that in the 19th level slot is going to require upgunning it considerably. (Not necessarily from the CR standpoint, so much as from the "endurance test" standpoint.)
Turin, what level is a PiH being converted for?
Just 'keepin it fresh...'
Sir KGM,
The final version seems to be available - it is written/converted for 4 16th level Pathfinder PCs...
Sir KGM,
The final version seems to be available - it is written/converted for 4 16th level Pathfinder PCs...
I didn't see this reply Turin. Is the download reliable and bug free?
I'll take that as a maybe...
I'll take that as a maybe...
It was not complete the last time I looked (last year)...
Happy New Year 2013 to all you wonderful sick freaks and killer GM's out there.
Happy New Year 2013 to all you wonderful sick freaks and killer GM's out there.
And a Happy New Year to you too.
I prefer the title sanity shattering GM, K_GM. A very scary new year to you too, may your fields be littered with the corpses of adventurers!
I prefer the title sanity shattering GM, K_GM. A very scary new year to you too, may your fields be littered with the corpses of adventurers!
That may have merit. Turin, do you think I've "Shattered" any player's sanity over the years? If so, whom?
Honestly, I can tell you at least four or five players who won't roll with me anymore due to high PC fatality counts... Don't know if they'd qualify as having lost their sanity, but they certainly didn't like having consequences applied to their dumb decisions or bad luck...Actually, I went with the KGM both because Turin sometimes refers to me on these boards with it, and it helps me remove the Immediate impression of being a sadist. I'm not a sadist, but if a prospective player comes into the game thinking so, then one might assume they are less likely to enter the game; or would expect to be hamstrung every week, which very seldom happens (except to Hexen Ineptus, and Don the Dying One)...
I prefer the title sanity shattering GM, K_GM. A very scary new year to you too, may your fields be littered with the corpses of adventurers!That may have merit. Turin, do you think I've "Shattered" any player's sanity over the years? If so, whom? ...
It is more likely that they perceive your GMing as a combination of bushwhacker, deckstacker and toe tag collector. There are plenty who appreciate an arbiter (Referee style GM) with a dose of adversarial. Agent J comes readily to mind as one such player. There are others that perceive your style as primarily oriented at collecting toe tags.
A steady diet of the perception of being the first three elements tends towards many not wishing for that particular form of "death therapy".
I prefer the title sanity shattering GM, K_GM. A very scary new year to you too, may your fields be littered with the corpses of adventurers!That may have merit. Turin, do you think I've "Shattered" any player's sanity over the years? If so, whom? ...It is more likely that they perceive your GMing as a combination of bushwhacker, deckstacker and toe tag collector. There are plenty who appreciate an arbiter (Referee style GM) with a dose of adversarial. Agent J comes readily to mind as one such player. There are others that perceive your style as primarily oriented at collecting toe tags.
A steady diet of the perception of being the first three elements tends towards many not wishing for that particular form of "death therapy".
Interesting. I don't see much difference between you and myself as far as GM'ing, save my "schtick" about it. And I have mainly done that in the past to humor players. Guess I may be dropping that act in favor of the "kind and friendly GM who still reluctantly greases player characters" (like you do). You hammer player characters just as much as I do. I have always gone to great lengths to make encounters fair and winnable, and within 3 or 4 CRs of the average party level. If that somehow makes me a toe tag collector, I don't see it, but so be it.
If players deem me a bushwhacker (depending on what that means), or a deckstacker, then I think they've judged me unfairly. Equating a character's demise during a game to GM unfairness or underhanded tactics appears to be par for the course for some of our past players. Their perception of a deckstacker however does not mean that I am guilty as charged, and it says a good deal about their lack of objectivity. That's placing all the responsibility for what happened to their characters on me, and assuming I did it unfairly. It places none of the responsibility where it naturally belongs. On them.
As I said, perception. :) If you decide to requisition the Serpent's Skull AP, take a gander at how the encounters are set up when compared to the nominal power level of the PCs that the authors are tasked with challenging. The gripes observed are aimed more at your homebrew encounter design.
Two points of consideration are (a) the character generation method used - along with the impact of house rules and (b) the differences between 3e and PF encounter scaling. 3 over APL / effective party level is the considered upper limit in the CRB, reserved for boss fights (usually). Most of the time such fights have a good chance of collecting several toe tags.
In PF terms *assuming 15-20 point PCs with s strong command of the metagame* a steady diet of APL+3 encounters will wipe them out in short order. Most of the APs feature a mixture of encounters.
Now, if the group is 6 strong with less game savvy players there probably doesn't need to be much change. If the group has 6 game savvy players sporting a rack of 18s in the ability scored, that skews thingd considerably in the other direction. ;-)
Nothing wrong with collecting toe tags.
Nothing wrong with collecting toe tags.
^____^ The main thing is to make sure everyone is having fun getting hacked into critter kibble!
Follow Up: Having Fun for everyone is Rule Zero. Fnord.
Of course. I don't kill much, having only one kill under my belt, but his soul was consumed by Lolth herself!
Of course. I don't kill much, having only one kill under my belt, but his soul was consumed by Lolth herself!
Was she in "smokin' hot female drow" form or "OMGWTFBBQ ginormous spider!!" form?
I think it depends a bit on the expectations of the players. For instance, if you are up front with them that you want to run an old school kind of game like "Tomb of Horrors" where it is expected that it will be very challenging and somewhat adversarial then it should work well since the players know what they are signing on for.
For instance, one of my friends ran Tomb of Horrors for us in 3.5, and we had tons of PC deaths. We had a great time even though we didn't quite finish it. However, we knew from the get go that we were building expendable characters.
However, an full length AP is a bit of a different ball game. One of my players had recently browsed this thread and mentioned at the table the other day that he didn't think he'd be able to stand playing in a game with that frequent of a kill rate because he wouldn't feel like there would be any chance to see his character grow and develop. He's the sort of guy who likes to put a lot of time into creating an interesting character concept and tweaking his character build. He takes character death fairly well (I've killed plenty of his PCs), but he doesn't want his characters to feel like meat for the grinder. These days, I think most players are of this mind set. Gone are the days where you quickly roll up some stats, look at them, pick your race and class and then slap together a new character in 15-20 minutes- especially with players that are into Pathfinder and 4E. On the other hand if you are running an OSR type system like Dungeon Crawl Classics or Swords and Wizardry, you might find that it is a bit easier to achieve that mind set with your group.
I noticed that Frog God games has their Slumbering Tsar AP available in both Pathfinder and Sword and Wizardry formats. You might check that out. It's got a very old school vibe that I think might be up your alley- plus you could run it with sword and wizardry if you wanted to, and then not have to deal with all the shenanigans that come up with an option filled system like Pathfinder.