TPK, total party kill

[mikemacdee]

Patroclus that's a pretty good setup. I had something vaguely similar in mind where if at least one hero survives the quest, and the quest is successful, the fallen heroes survive...but I tend to change it depending on the circumstances. If your friend is dropped by a horde of monsters, and you flee the dungeon to save yourself, that fallen hero is definitely gone; but if you killed all active monsters before leaving, I might say you got him out in one piece, albeit without some of his stuff.

[Goblin-King]

Edited by HispaZargon: All the messages from thread "How to handle total party wipe?" have been merged in this thread "TPK, total party kill" because both threads talks about the same topic.

Okay, so the rules are pretty clear how to officially handle the death of a single hero...
He drops his gear and an orc stomps it before anyone can reclaim it. The Empire sends a new ungeared hero to replace the dead one.
The vets better take some hits for the new guy until he can gear up.
Pretty straight forward!

But how do you guys handle a total party wipe? All heroes die!
In principle they should just re-enter the failed quest with naked heroes. But that seems too harsh. Especially in the expansions.
But on the other hand letting them revive their heroes and just "try again" or just handing out gear seems a little lame...

Also I totally killed all the heroes last Saturday!

[Thantos]

Off the top of my head, what about making a special scenario "Raid the Armoury!" where the new heroes tackle a small dungeon which is being used by goblins to hoard their loot and equipment?
It just so happens that the old equipment of the dead heroes is among the hoard.

The heroes much reach the armoury chamber before the goblins can move all the gear and treasure to a new stronghold. Heroes will each reclaim (12 - (Amount of turns it took them to reach the armoury) ) pieces of random equipment/ items and (1,000 - (100x Number of turns it took them to reach the armoury) gold in treasure.

Then the heroes have a chance to gear up with some equipment again, but its not "you magically all have some of your old equipment back". Set it so the level has a few orcs and lots of goblins to slow the heroes down.

?

[knightkrawler]

For my groups, it's not an issue really.
Each player can choose a new Hero from 16 before each new quest, dead or not. Like, Mentor trying to come up with a specialist group of 4 among a cadre of secret agents.
Characters are quite different, so the tactics and skill factors change quite a lot.

When all Heroes die and there's nothing campaign-specific (like the Spirit Sword as an example for the game system pack) to be gained or accomplished, I let them decide if they want to play the quest again. In any case, if they pick a different hero or not, they start fresh, with a chance of me quickening and easing up a repeated quest a tad.
This has happened once and the group chose to replay because the replay was a different evening anyway.

[GimmeYerGold]

The rules from the NA book encourage customization on the part of Zargon in redesigning the failed Quest:

I think the feeling of coming back and triumphing over a failed (albeit modified) quest with "naked" heroes would be exciting to the players, and really ensure they work as a team--as far as compensating for that lost equipment, part of modifying the quest could be giving more gold as a reward at the end, so they might buy something new afterwards.

[ruiza97]

I would make them start over from the very beginning an admonish them for failing.

[Sjeng]

there was a quest here where the 4 dead heroes went to the afterworld, and had to fight ghosts to get back to the living world. I liked that idea.

[GimmeYerGold]

there was a quest here where the 4 dead heroes went to the afterworld, and had to fight ghosts to get back to the living world. I liked that idea.

Now I want to instigate a total party wipe out just to have a setup for this situation ^

[knightkrawler]

Make a dream sequence/after death experience quest after bellthor blows the heroes shut with weed or what it was.

[Daedalus]

Similar to the NA text quoted above, the EU rules have this to say on p.14 under Completing a Quest:

The character players complete a Quest successfully if they achieve the objectives
described in the parchment text which the evil wizard player reads aloud at the
beginning of the game. If they fail to do so, or if they are all players (and/or new
ones) can always attempt the same Quest again, but the evil wizard player always
starts a Quest with a full complement of monsters. Characters escape the dungeon
by landing on the stairway tile.

The EU rules seem to make reattempting the same Quest more of an option that the NA rules. I think the NA rules give better advice by suggesting modifying the failed Quest. Good thing, as the NA rules also imply the Quest is to be replayed. Together, the rule sets seem to indicate the failed Quest can and even should be replayed.

As part of the modification, I'd see to it that the new Heroes found enough replacement equipment to successfully finish the Quest in the second try. The Quest would start with weaker monsters that awarded a piece here and there. Then tougher monsters would be encountered that awarded better/more equipment. Finally, I'd have the Heroes finish the Quest goal at full difficulty. Taken as a whole, I'd make the Quest about as tough as the original, but a bit easier. I'd include a slight downgrade in equipment as well--not so much that they would likely fail the following Quests, but lowered by a combat die here and there to make them feel the effect of their previous party wipe.