How do you handle a TPK?

[sputang]

My party made it to the cryohydra encounter in SCAP yesterday. They consist of 3 lvl 7's, 1 lvl 6, and 1 lvl 5, all gestalt. Since I lowered the number of heads on the monster to 6, I thought they would mop up the floor with it. So I started with the standard cold-breath attack.

After rolling good damage for three of the heads and the party making poor save rolls, I realzed if I had continued, I would have a TPK on my hands. So I choked, and had the hydra stop at three heads. I even fudged the die roll for the recharge so it wouldn't breath again right away (I rolled a 1 on the d4).

Anyway, my question is, how do you guys handle TPK's in a campaign like SCAP, or any other for that matter? Do you allow a do over of the encounter? Do you have everyone roll up new characters and take up where the old party died? Or do you scrap the campaign and use the opporunity to start another?

[Delericho]

I don't balk at a potential TPK. If the dice fall that way, that's life. (I do have a couple of house rules that make character death less likely, but if those aren't enough then so be it.)

Generally, a TPK means the players roll up a new set of characters for a new campaign. The exception would come if I were running an Adventure Path, where I wouldn't want to simply throw away the unused portion of the campaign. In this case, I would probably have a new group generated a couple of levels lower than the dead group, run a couple of 'bootstrap' adventures to funnel them into the campaign, and pick it up at the start of the _next_ adventure in the campaign. (Possibly, the start of the next chapter in the current adventure.)

I don't do do-overs.

[llaletin]

I have yet to experience a TPK as a GM (or as a player), although my group have had a few very close calls.

I would take a moment to see how far though an adventure or compaign we were, and if it was at an appropriate point I'd bring in new PCs to take over from the last lot, getting a few side quests before reaching the point where the last lot "Bit It".
On the otherhand, if the previous option doesn't seem do-able I might well do a "do over" of the encounter.
If however it was a short adventure then I'd end it there, unless the players really wanted to carry on in one form or another.

I am currently running a Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil game, and if there were to be a TPK then I would certainly not use the first or last option. At their current point I would have them resurrected by an NPC after he received their remains (due to the NPC working for the Temple, but no longer being evil). If this was not an option then I and the players would not want to have 2-years of running through this game to end suddenly after a TPK, so it would indeed be a do-over if there was no other alternative.

[Dag Hammarskjold]

Most methods to save the party are one-trick ponies; if you use them a second time with the same group they feel cheesy. If used cafefully, though, they can be very satisfying.

My first idea is to let all the players die, but retro it into a premontion-dream-sequence. Make some changes to the adventure as written for the second go-round so that it isn't exactly the same as before. Reset to the last appropriate point (probably the last time they slept, unless the warning came from an especially powerful source). Then you have to write in a powerful force (mage, god, outsider) that has a particular interest in the party or its goals. You don't have to reveal who helped them right away, though.

Another classic is to have the PCs killed, but anyone not reduced to -10 is taken prisoner. The next adventure will be a prison break. Anyone who actually died rolls up a new charater sans gear and is a fellow prisoner. Dragon just recently ran a great prison-break adventure but I forgot what it was called. You can also look at the old adventure A3 (or A4) Escape From the Slavers Den for ideas.

I'm sure there will be many more great ideas coming from other DMs and players.

[Hierophantasm]

My gamers and I almost had our first TPK the other night. My brother was DMing in a no-to-low magic/"Conan"-esque style campaign, and we finally confronted our foe. After many encounters with ogres, ettins, and a hag covey, we faced an ogre barbarian with a magic sword and a dread witch/sorcerer (no magic in our hands pretty much, but low for the rest of the enemies, etc.) Well, I and another dropped, while two of the party ran away frightened. It was a grueling match, that factored up to being near an overwhelming encounter. (We like the challenge.) But, it took us closer to a TPK than any other fight I've been in. (It's, in fact, the first time I've ever been dropped--rather, critted, and knocked out of a second story bridge.)
Personally, while I would have been disappointed at not having been able to take this character to his prestige progression, I fully believe that a dead character is best remembered as such--unless magic can/should bring him back. That's part of the thrill of low and mid level gameplay. Death looms. With a TPK, the unexpected really happens. It's more work for a DM to situate the new party into its setting, if at all, but its also fun to spice things up with a new character.
Plus, the threat of a TPK allows for a true sense of accomplishment after a challenging encounter. If it all came down to a numbers game--which it is, really, but anyway--it would be no better than an interactive storytelling game. Fine for some, but I like to roleplay aggressive combat, too.
I'm a bit tired of feeling pampered in D&D as a player, and look forward to the time when my character just doesn't cut the mustard anymore. It's a warning sign that when the doo-doo really hits the fan in a D&D encounter, you'll remember not to open door number two...without checking for traps first.

[Gurubabaramalamaswami]

In my case, where the TPK included my wife's beloved red dragon character, I learned how comfortable our couch is. It isn't.

[Rezdave]

Dag Hammarskjold wrote:

Most methods to save the party are one-trick ponies; if you use them a second time with the same group they feel cheesy. If used cafefully, though, they can be very satisfying.

I'm a firm believer in Hero Points.

The DM can always fudge things when your surprisingly-good roll coincidentally meets the party's suprisingly-bad one.

However, rather than the DM deciding when and how to "save" the party in a Player-Kill or potential TPK, let them do it themselves. I give a Hero Point at 1st level, one at 10th and one any time someone does something so cool it will be added to my permanent repertoire of top "oh my gosh, there was this one time when ..." stories to share with other gamers.

I had one time where a nearly spelled-out 4th-level party decided to move their camp from a secure location outside the dungeon into a strategically-poor one within. They got attacked in the middle of the night by a mix of troglodytes and kobolds who broke through their barrier and swarmed them. The wizard's obscuring cloud slowed the advance a little, but when the archer-rogue fell and then the tired and wounded fighter was dropped by the trog champion with only a spelled-out wizard and similarly spell-less cleric left we all knew there was a TPK-in-the-making.

So we sat there with the fighter and rogue slowly bleeding to death round-by-round. Rogue had no HeroP left but his hp was "less negative" than the fighter so he could bleed longer.

I kept thinking the fighter would burn the Hero Point but he kept waiting as the wizard threw darts and the cleric held her ground and took damage towards the bitter end. After three rounds of bleeding and at -8hp the fighter finally said "Now" and stood up with 1hp. Of course, the champion was past him and attacking the cleric, but he could stand, 5' step and attack with flanking. Because of when he burned the HeroP in initiative he did it right before her attack so between the two of them she felled the champion. Seeing him "rise from the dead" and their champion go down demoralized the few remaining (and generally wounded) trogs and kobolds, so when the wizard started screaming like a banshee (with an "Intimidating/Bluffing wail-of-death-and-doom cry") and the others (despite all being a single hit from falling) turned from defense to attack they broke ranks and fled.

I was tempted to give the fighter back his Hero Point, but instead just share the story.

Rez

[Dag Hammarskjold]

Arrgh! Some salty dog be changin' me words 'round. Strike me for a lubber if I ever be speakin' words like tha'.

Well now, I'd be madder than a gob what got deck duty firs' night inta port, w'all his mates goin' t'town while he stands watch on an emp'y ship; 'cept he what done it makes me sound all proper and pirate-y like. Probably meant t' make me sound 'phisticated to the ladies, belike.

So sail on, says I. Pound away on dem plastic keys 'n' make me talk like th' g'tlemen I coulda been, t'ings bein' diff'ren', not the cur what I am t'day.

An' thanks. Save a pint fer me, and tell th' ladies I be down when me watch is o'er.

[Dag Hammarskjold]

Cool! I tried to sound like a pirate, and it automatically changed me words to Elmer Fudd. Don't know how that is done but it is neat. Mildly annoying, but neat.

[Tiger Lily]

The few times I've had a TPK happen (and I DO let them happen), the players have immediately used other PCs to put together a rescue party to go find the first group. They've been lucky in that it's never been a situation where they were fighting something that would have simply swallowed everyone whole, or otherwise leave no remains suitable for resurrection. The game's always continued on from there, either with the original group, the rescue group, or a combination.