PCs ever fail in one of your games? Options

[sunnyside]

Just curious how things go with others. I tend to like playing fairly hardball. Players don't lose too often, but it happens. And most missions have degrees of success, rarely do they come out as good as they could.

Personally I think the challenge and actual tension that results adds to the game significantly.

[WearzManySkins]

They sometimes miss objectives.

WMS

[Red_Cap]

Me and a crew once went into the dramatic, final run of a campaign and completely wiped. It was the big confrontation with that one recurring character, the penultimate confrontation. . . .

And we never made it to said two-timing, double-crossing corporate mastermind because we forgot to lock the front door behind us. Damn corpsec team put a frag grenade right in the middle of the group.

[CanRay]

Often times they do a drunkards walk to get there, but so far, my group has always performed the minimum mission requirements to get paid.

With the exception of the first game I ran as a Demo at a Convention, where they screwed the pooch badly!

[DTFarstar]

I've had a complete mission wipe once, and they unleashed a zombie mini-apocalypse in the form of shedim on the barrens once. They were being paid to stop it.... so they can fail in my games. Things happen the way they happen.

Chris

[sunnyside]

Man. So many party kills and blown runs and so few stories. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/frown.gif)

I guess it could be players reporting honestly but they don't want to talk about it.

Mad props to Red_Cap for being the only PC with a post like that.

[MaxMahem]

Yes the fail. Often repeatedly.

One of the traps you can fall into in GMing is being afraid to let your players fail. Don't be. If there action don't have consiquences, whats the point? If there isn't the potential for failure in their tasks they aren't being challenged enough. As they say in the gym. No pain no gain. In my experience it is only the potential (and reality) of failure that makes success so sweet.

------

Possibly the most dramatic screw up in my game happened fairly recently (well in terms of the length of time we have been playing Shadowrun). The PC's failed to stop a bio-weapon from going off in NYC. Total death toll is over 10 million, including half the PCs involved.

Good times. Made continuing the campaign a bit difficult though.

[toturi]

My GM philosophy is that I do not slide difficulty dynamically. My game world simply is. I have NPCs and they react per their stats. If I statted the NPC to be Inferior, then it is likely that the PCs will be able to win pass him in one manner or another. If the NPC is Equal or better, then maybe not. If the run is out of the PCs' league, either the Johnson or their fixer or the team themselves have opportunities to evaluate the situation and call it off. It is that simple. If they want to be foolhardy or it is a setup and the PCs didn't check on the J, then it happens.

[Wesley Street]

They fail sometimes. Occasionally they all die. But they all learn.

[BullZeye]

Sometimes my players manage to make a foolproof plan and execute it flawlessly but typically one or more things go wrong leading to injuries, missions failed, captures or deaths. Some learn from their mistakes while some seem to repeat them over and over again. Dragging other teammates along to doom is common, too. "No officer, I'm here to do this with my friends *points* and they have just as forged licenses to their guns as I have, sir" (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wobble.gif)

[faultline]

Through the various groups I've run for and groups I've run with we've had the mix of success and failures, but one of those groups did not just fail but outright killed the entire game in less than 5 minutes of game play.

It had taken me about a week to talk my friends who were not the biggest Shadowrun fans to let me run a game for them with my, then, new SR2 books. After about 4 hours of CharGen I finally started running, and as my players decided to want to play runners who had never met before I had to run their introductions. I decided to start with the most Shadowrun experienced players, who had decided to play a Human Rigger, and a Giant PhysAd uber combat monkey.

Well the meeting of these two didn't go too well with the players misunderstanding my desciption of the scene, and their characters insulting one another as a result of this misunderstanding. This insult throwing ended up leading to combat with the PhysAd winning on Init and using his Killing Hands Deadly on the Rigger. After the requisite rolls, the Rigger was dead and the PhysAd wiping the remains of the Rigger off his hands.

Well that one round of game combat was quite the game killer as everyone decided that they didn't want to play anymore. That game became quite famous in my circle of friends for Quickest PC death in any of the games we'd ever been involved in.

[Fuchs]

My current campaign is based upon the theme "The NPC team leader plans, the PCs mess the plan up."

[Stahlseele]

technically we never failed!
realistically? i can't count the fuck ups on my fingers, and i can count the runs on my fingers and have some left . .

[sunnyside]

Actually come to think of it I've never actually had a PC die. Edge/Karma having a lot to do with that though as you can burn both to keep your fat out of the fire. That alone wouldn't be enough. But things early on the games had convenced them they could die so at least my last two groups have had a willingness to bug out before it'd get to that point and a paranoid streak.

[marasaidw]

Hmm, well the only time my players have blown it is when the run is set up fishy from the start. I know them so I can usually figure when they'll fall for a trap, but in my defense I do leave a BIG clue each time before I do that. They really need to learn that sometimes you just have to walk away. I mean come on sit down at the table with the wrong Johnson take the job meet up with the other J realize both jobs are at the same place. Too me screams somethings fishy, they think oooooohhhhh double pay for the same insertion.

[Prime Mover]

My players have always lived by a code of conduct they just seemed to have subconsciously agreed on. Never back out on an agreed upon contract. Never walk away from a job unfinished.
So they might miss some objectives but always strive to meet the letter of the agreement.

[Wesley Street]

Well that one round of game combat was quite the game killer as everyone decided that they didn't want to play anymore. That game became quite famous in my circle of friends for Quickest PC death in any of the games we'd ever been involved in.

Ouch. Funny story but what a downer, especially for those who were unsure about Shadowrun in the first place. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/frown.gif)

As a GM I haven't run into that but if I did I would probably congratulate the winning PC on foolishly vanquishing a potential ally, killing the fun of the game, wasting 4+ hours of prep, and pack up for the night.

[OneThirtyEight]

They've never totally failed, but they've been dragged through some rough stuff in the process.

The most memorable was the time i had seven characters being played, and only two of them survived the run.

This game session was, however, the one which had a death so badass and rediculously awesome that it's still talked about today.

[sunnyside]

Ouch. Funny story but what a downer, especially for those who were unsure about Shadowrun in the first place. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/frown.gif)

As a GM I haven't run into that but if I did I would probably congratulate the winning PC on foolishly vanquishing a potential ally, killing the fun of the game, wasting 4+ hours of prep, and pack up for the night.

As a side note the first thing I have new players do when I get them together is have them go onto the Matrix for a little simulated combat. First of all they tend to just enjoy it and it relieves tension, but beyond that it gets them accostomed to the SR world of combat where (especially in older editions) one shot kills are plenty common and tactics matter (again especially in older editions).

[TKDNinjaInBlack]

Oh yeah there have been failures. My first group never really failed at what the mission was, but we all failed miserably at Shadowrun. Nothing like being inconspicuous walking along a downtown street in full body armor with an Ares Alpha, no SIN, no license, and having your driver follow you in your stolen Ares Citymaster. Did LoneStar respond? nope.

We all had no idea of how the world worked and all of us lacked subtlety, so we had a hacker who compulsively hacked every comm he came across, we had a street sam shooting little kids' mothers before offing the kids, we had a pompous Martial Arts adept who refused to use guns and got shot A LOT, a ninja dwarf who instead of B&E and using infiltration, liked the direct approach of combat axe to the face, and a GM who got a big kick out of creating ANTI characters to combat and counter our team. Being that we had a team who was really combat oriented and didn't really use tech, we always lost against any kind of magical threat, and they happened often. I can't count the number of times on my hand I burned edge on my stupid character in that campaign.

[Stahlseele]

This game session was, however, the one which had a death so badass and rediculously awesome that it's still talked about today.

so talk about it

[ReverendMo]

My previous group of players failed fairly often or eked out some success through sheer determination towards being paid. Often times it was due to poor planning, everyone having very different ideas on how to accomplish the goals with radically different means and methods. Not to mention a great deal of poorly chosen reactions.

For example, one run was to act as undercover security for a new store opening in a mall. They actually did enough legwork to find out the store was owned by Aztechnology and expected some trouble with local Humanis, likely stirred up to just cause drek. The ex-security PhysAd befriended the store's oh, 23-year old security "chief," gave the store staff a crash course in riot security just in case, and in return had the store's basic security system and personnel in line. The mage opted to hide outside the store in the ever-growing crowd opening day and watch for any astral trouble incoming. The dwarf hacker/rigger/combat monkey was watching from the second-tier walkway, waiting for action.

Out of boredom the dwarf decided to try and hack into the *mall* security, using his implanted deck. Mind, it was set in Emergence, while accused technomancers were still being strung up before they could argue. So he botches, and the security hacker decides to let him think he's in while sending two guards in his direction. Next he knows, he's flanked by two Deputy Dans, telling him to hand over his deck. "But I don't have one!" Not a good lie to succeed at, now they think he's one of "them." And he refuses to go quietly.

Many grenades, brain-bursting spells, and mini-flamethrower shots later, the dead/wounded toll in the crowd is insane, the Humanis hired to cause trouble are dead, the dwarf and mage survive only by evaporating all their Edge, the Johnson that hired them has been executed, and Brackhaven's sending them get-well-soon flowers for making it look like mages and technomancers are conspiring against everyone.

Moral: If you don't tell your teammates your idea because you think they'll try and stop you, you probably shouldn't do it.

[ornot]

I'm generally quite kind to my players when they screw up totally, but that's not to say there's no a sting in the tail. They usually manage to complete the run well enough to get paid, but at times I have to completely change the run on the fly to accomodate their excesses. The best example I can think of is the time I spent a week detailing an apartment block they were supposed to infiltrate to steal hardcopies a blackmailer was using to extort money fom their Johnson. The PCs at no stage displayed any interest in entering the blackmailer's home, and the whole run ended up with them demolishing a mansion on the other side of town, whose floor plan I pulled out of my arse.

[BishopMcQ]

"We failed a few times, we just made damn sure no one found out about it."

[psychophipps]

As mean and nasty as I'm sure I come off as, my players tend to pull it out of their asses one way or another when it's crunch time. I can't remember the last time my game hasn't been a "win" (maybe with some losses, but still a win) barring the one time a few years back where I did a TPK because the Paladin's player said the worst thing any player can ever say in a RPG session:

"Man, this is sooo easy. I haven't even taken damage this entire adventure!"

And my agonizingly looooong string of 1-5 d20 rolls immediately turned into an unending rain if Natural 20s...and everyone's level 5 character died like bitches from stupid shit like Dire Wolves and Were-rats.