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Why even have other spells? (lemmy.world)
submitted 5 months ago by to c/rpgmemes@ttrpg.network
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[–] 65 points 5 months ago (18 children)

I once (as the DM) caused a TPK with fireball.

A cultist mage was about to die. He knew fireball. The whole party was around him.

The reasonable thing to do was a con check to see if he had the mental fortitude to follow through, then kill himself for the cause. So he mustered his strength and fireballed himself.

People were mad

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  • [–] 17 points 5 months ago*

    I accidentally killed the DM's unofficial character who was a rogue with a fireball. Said rogue was a party member that had been hired early in the campaign, and stuck around reasoning that a wizard as an employer was more profitable than being a tax collector.

    We had been given a task to go deal with 3 trolls that turned out to be 5 trolls. Fehldar specifically pulled my wizard aside and said not to worry if he's in the mix, he'd seen me cast multiple fireballs and lightning bolts, and said, "I can dodge your fireballs easily, they aren't that big."

    Fast forward to us finding the trolls and all 5 get within range of each other with one fireball, and no party member was gonna get hit, except Fehldar and he was on the edge of fireball. I cast and roll rather high on damage. Like close to 54 points of damage which was the most I could have done. Great!

    DM rolls Fehldar's dodge save and critically fails taking either full or half damage, but enough to outright kill both him and all 5 trolls. We raced back to the closest temple and I personally paid for a Ressurection.

    Once he was raised and recovering, the party went into the tent, and my character looked at him and asked, "I thought you could dodge my fireballs?" To which he just flipped me off.

    I was rather irritated because that hurt my Leadership score.

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  • [–] 35 points 5 months ago* (9 children)

    To be fair, if the party can’t handle the heat they should get out of the kitchen.

    Assuming this is either dnd or pathfinder, if by the time a rando cultist can cast fireball, 6-30 (and half of a save) damage kills your whole party you really shouldn’t be in meele :D

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  • [–] -1 points 5 months ago (7 children)

    If you TPK your party, that's on you. DnD is supposed to be fun. You know what isn't fun? Getting TPK'ed in a random encounter that isn't a boss fight at the end of the campaign.

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  • [–] 5 points 5 months ago (3 children)

    Speak for yourself. I would absolutely LOVE that.

    You know what isn't fun, to me? Playing random fights that have no meaning because there's no danger anyway, since the DM is too afraid to kill us.

    And I would know, I quit my campaign because of that.

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  • [–] 0 points 5 months ago (2 children)

    I've played campaigns where you can die a lot. It got old after a while. I'm not talking about a player dying here or there anyway. I'm talking about TPK'ing the whole party. If you do that, it's your fault as the DM. Your job is not to TPK the party, but rather make it fun. That does include danger, but seriously, if you think being TPK'ed is okay, don't sit at my table.

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  • [–] 3 points 5 months ago (1 child)

    You shouldn't talk in absolutes. It's everyone's job (not just the DM) to have fun, and if fun = risk of getting TPK'd, then that option should be included as well. Just make sure that everyone's on the same page.

    But if you preemptively remove the option because you think that nobody likes it, you lose players like me who like the challenge and find enjoyment in surviving each session.

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  • [–] 4 points 5 months ago* (2 children)

    Well, you do you.

    I talked about that with my players in session 0 and they would rather have consequences and a challenge instead.

    So far we had 2 PC deaths in 3 years of pathfinder 1e but many close calls. If I were to TPK them fair and square (either because of unfortunate crits on my part or them getting cocky or just plain old messing up) I would do so. I have 0 interest in pulling some “37 red dragons appear, roll for initiative” bullshit but when, like last session, they choose(!) not to heal between encounters and then continue exploring heads might roll.

    I don’t intend to TPK them but if it happened we would have a conversation about how to continue, probably either with a new party or an epilogue.

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  • [–] 6 points 5 months ago

    If you don't like getting TPKed because you're out of position and you didn't use knowledge skills to determine what "out of position" is, then you should not be using D&D's combat system. It's a waste of admin effort to have all those systems without being willing to use them.

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  • [–] 4 points 5 months ago (3 children)

    I think if you just cast it immediately then you’re a bad person, but if you show them “charging up” for a turn then the party gets to decide their own next steps.

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  • [–] 18 points 5 months ago (1 child)

    Does the party not realize they're standing ass to elbows with a fire mage? I'd be giving him a wide berth under all circumstances, not just when he's "charging up". That motherfucker can throw fire from his fingertips in a cone just as easily as he can call a fireball from the heavens.

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  • [–] 12 points 5 months ago

    They may not have. DMs are imperfect, too, and it may not have been communicated. There’s also the problem where D&D is a game and people will have certain expectations. I’ve got our DM to now include the occasional meta note when it comes to changes in how the world works mechanically so we don’t fuck everything up based on previously set precedent.

    If the DM had never shown them suicide bombing NPCs and this was just a mage who happened to have fireball(i.e.: not a fire mage) and then went straight to a no-warning TPK then buddy can get fucked. If that setup was in place, then it’s party’s fault. We don’t know this from their comment.

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  • [–] 7 points 5 months ago

    I don't think that kind of fudging makes for good DND. You could maybe remind the players that wizards cast spells earlier in the scene. But if you want something like that play a different system, or add a consistent house rule that's written down. Some games let you interrupt spell casters.

    Huge anti-fan of ad hoc stuff in otherwise rules driven games.

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