I previously wrote about how to shower praise upon your players and make them feel like heroes at the end of a successful campaign. This time, we're flipping to the other side of the spectrum: utter defeat. As a Dungeon Master, how do you recover from it? As a player, how can you use it to make your character more interesting and three-dimensional, or to propel your character’s personal story forward?
Let’s take a close look at three ways you can keep your campaign going despite the characters suffering defeat:
- Failing Forward, in which the story still advances even though the characters lost—but perhaps not in the way they intended.
- Character-Affecting Failure, in which nothing directly happens to the overall plot as a result of failure, but it affects the mindset and actions of one or more characters.
- Failing Laterally, in which characters may lose opportunities as a result of failure, but equally enticing adventure options open up as a result of their failure.
Before we unpack any of these terms, we need to understand how the party can fail without dying. Since Dungeons & Dragons has ample ways to bring characters back from the dead, death is often merely a speed bump once characters reach a certain level, not a real state of failure. A total party kill (TPK) is the quintessential Game Over scenario—a situation which I’ll be calling a "failure state" from here on out. But a TPK isn’t the only failure state in D&D, it’s just the most obvious because it’s directly supported by the game’s rules. All other failure states require the Dungeon Master to get more creative by integrating them into the story.
Creative Failure States
What other failure states are there beyond death? Well, what makes a good failure state? In my opinion, failure must occur because of the player characters’ actions or inaction. A failure that the characters had no chance of subverting is frustrating. Failure must have consequences for either the characters or something they care about; the characters and their players can’t simply shrug their shoulders at failure. In my experience, the best failure states must be surmountable; that’s the point of this article, after all. Allowing for failure and consequences without ending the campaign.
Some failure states beyond a TPK include:
- Time’s Up! The characters fail to defeat the villain before a time limit runs out. This could mean the villain completes a ritual, thus gaining immense power, causing a cataclysmic event, or summoning their demonic master. The villain then swats the characters away and retreats to wreak even greater havoc elsewhere.
- Escaped with the MacGuffin. The villain got their hands on an artifact, an incriminating letter, or some other object of importance. Sometimes the characters needed the item for their own plans and the villain is denying them its use, or the villain needed it for their plans and the characters couldn’t stop them from getting it. The villain must ultimately elude capture for this failure state to be effective.
- Lost the Person of Interest. The crown prince was assassinated, the opera star with vital information was kidnapped, or the archmage was polymorphed into a toad before the characters could save them! Be careful using this one, as it can be frustrating to the players if they thought the vital NPC behaved in an unrealistic manner just so you could kill them off.
- Transported Away. The characters are whisked away from the scenario by powerful magic. This can overlap with Time’s Up, if the villain is trying to open a portal that teleports the characters away. But it can also be the case that the entire party is blasted by prismatic spray and the purple beam shifts several of them to random planes of existence. Then, simply reuniting can be an adventure in and of itself!
None of these failure states preclude the death of a player character. If the dice fall that way, then a character death can heighten the emotional intensity of these outcomes. If you have alternative failure states you’ve used in your own game, go ahead and share them with other DMs in the comments!
Now, how do you use these alternative methods of defeat to lead the party to new adventures?
Failing Forward
“Failing forward” has been a business and self-help buzzword since the early 2000s, but it’s a great tool for your campaign, too. In this context, I define failing forward as giving the characters a way to advance the campaign’s story despite a defeat. This can happen in a number of ways, but it’s important that the characters survive their failure.
To fail forward from a party defeat, consider how the story could continue forward and also introduce a further complication for the player characters. For instance, if the party isn’t able to stop a cat burglar from fleeing the museum with an ancient idol, you now get to think of what that idol’s powers are, or what magic it could be used to empower. Perhaps the party learns the next day that the city guard found the thief’s trail … but when the party arrives, the thief is dead with a knife in his back and an evil sorcerer has taken the idol and set an ambush for the player characters. This way, the story continues, but the characters are at a disadvantage because someone else has superior tactics and information.
This concept can also be shrunk down to individual actions within the game to keep the session from grinding to a halt. For instance, if a burly half-orc paladin is trying to linebacker-tackle through a crumbling wall, but rolls a 3 on her Strength (Athletics) check. The DM could just force her to roll again, but the DM could instead opt to fail forward and turn it into a success with a consequence. She knocks down the wall, but the wall then falls on top of her and she takes 2d6 bludgeoning damage and is restrained until she can crawl out.
Character-Affecting Failure
In episodic campaigns, the events of one session may not have much bearing on the next. Even in story-driven campaigns, individual sessions don’t always tie into the overarching story. West Marches-style campaigns with a constantly mutating cast are a prime example of this sort of game. It can be hard to “fail forward” in this sort of campaign, since each session is its own self-contained scenario. In this case, the constant variables are the characters.
In episodic TV shows like Star Trek, the glue that holds each disparate episode together are the characters. Modern showrunners have learned that it’s fun to see these characters learn and grow from episode to episode, just like characters in non-episodic narratives. If the party in an episodic D&D campaign fails in a way that doesn’t just TPK the party, the players and the DM can talk about what the consequences of that failure are for the characters. One character might remember the bitter taste of failure forever, and start developing perfectionist tendencies. One character might have lost a limb in the fight, and seeks out a magical prosthetic. A character that was nearly killed by a devil might decide to join a holy order and gain a level of paladin by the next game.
This sort of failing forward requires good communication between a campaign’s players and its DM, so be sure to touch base frequently to make sure everyone’s character is developing in a way that’s fun and interesting for them.
Failing Laterally
Failing laterally is well suited to an episodic game. The failure breaks the plot chain, but presents a chance to pursue a new plot chain. This sort of failure state requires a lot of flexibility on the part of the DM, because it means being okay with letting your carefully planned plots disintegrate if the players get unlucky in an encounter. Not only that, it means having a few other nascent plot threads kicking around in your brain just in case you need to pull them out at a moment’s notice. Because of this, “failing laterally” is a good option for improvisational DMs, since this style of DMing requires one to always be able to conjure a new idea out of thin air.
Consider this example of failing laterally: The party is defeated, perhaps in a major boss encounter, or ingloriously while traveling through the wilderness. Maybe everyone is killed, or maybe some are killed and others are merely knocked out. Either way, when the party awakens, they discover that they have been taken captive by a group of occultists. These people recognized the heroes and went to great lengths to capture them alive, or pay up for the dead ones’ resurrection. They did so because they need great warriors to perform a task for them, like killing an angel, binding a demon, or slaying the leader of a rival cabal.
The players will discover that their failure had real consequences; the villain from the last plot thread has been successful. With the heroes defeated, their evil plan went off without a hitch. If they want to return to that plot thread and strike back against the victorious villain, they can certainly try—but they have another task at hand. A new plotline has temporarily superseded the previous one, and they have to either complete it or find a clever way of abandoning it if they want to return to their previous quest.
Adapting Failure for Your Home Game
The topic of failure in RPGs is a complicated one, and there’s no one-size-fits-all solution for everyone. Some groups really enjoy just starting a new campaign if their characters die. It’s not my style, but it’s completely valid! How do you handle failure in your game? Let me know in the comments!
James Haeck (@jamesjhaeck) is the former lead writer for D&D Beyond, the co-author of Waterdeep: Dragon Heist and the Critical Role Tal'Dorei Campaign Setting, the DM of Worlds Apart, and a freelance writer for Wizards of the Coast, the D&D Adventurers League, and Kobold Press. He lives in Seattle, Washington with his partner Hannah and their feline adventurers Mei and Marzipan.
Did you mean prismatic spray rather than color spray?
Otherwise a good read, gives a lot to think about
Ah, yes. Corrected.
I usually only let my players die forever if it advances the plot or they do something stupid.
How does something like this apply to hardcovers like Dragon Heist, which you wrote though. In homebrew settings, there is flexibility to just make up whatever.. but let's use Dragon Heist and Adventurers League. Somehow the party goes to the villian for one of the seasons for example and they all die. Sure it has written in there "If the group dies, they wake up at 1 HP in an alley". Also... now the villains lair is gone. The villian escaped and the campaign IS over.
The hardcover makes it so... you can lose unless you homebrew it if you screw up. In adventurers league, that's not an option. So what are the alternatives when those three options are not actually options?
I’m curious if anyone has ever allowed a “reset”, if you will, after a TPK. In other words, you allow the party to restart the encounter and see if they learn from mistakes or change tactics.
I had a DM wipe out the party on my first session after joining the campaign (one player tried to grapple a giant spider to keep it as a mount). I uninvited myself from that campaign.
Interesting article, since my group really screwed up last time. I am running the 5e adaptation of Keep on the Borderlands from Goodman Games for my 10 year old son and his friends. They all have great enthusiasm but not a lot of experience in RPG's. That being said, this is not their first rodeo, as they made it through the Lost Mines of Phandelver and Kill Bargle! with a separate set of characters. They assaulted the bandits in the scenario in their camp, and committed every boneheaded move they could think of. The sorcerer and ranger decided to sneak off on their own and try to get near the camp. They were able to see the camp just fine and get an idea of their numbers after handling the sentries. Then the ranger had the bright idea of sneaking into the camp and pilfering an item. After disregarding my warning and blowing a stealth roll, they ended up fighting the entire camp and being taken prisoner. That encouraged the leader to send off her lieutenant and a couple of others in search of the rest of the party. Long story short, after a huge pitched battle, it ended with the whole party falling in battle with most of the bandits dead or dying. I ruled the bandits took them prisoner instead of killing them outright, and now they have to escape before they are sold into slavery to the Orcs in the caves of chaos. Without their equipment. Or any spells prepared. I think I may have an out for them, as they took out a ferocious water spider with a nixie cave nearby and I'm sure it was witnessed by a nixie or three (there's not much to do for entertainment in that part of the Realms). So if they can't figure out a way themselves, the nixies may help them in exchange for a favor.
Sometimes, a failure can be adapted into a plot twist so brilliant that your players will wonder if the DM didn't expect them to fail all along. For example, if the players fail to stop the arch-villain from unleashing the ancient evil, you may abruptly shift into a post-apocalyptic setting.
Or, alternately, you can reveal that the consequence of failure wasn't as serious as once thought (so long as it remains logical.) For example, in the "Return of the Sinister Six" storyline that ran in AMAZING SPIDER-MAN around 89 or 90, the villains' apparent plot was to release a poison into the Earth's atmosphere if the world's leaders didn't unanimously recognize the Six as the undisputed rulers of the world. After the world leaders refused, Spider-Man infiltrated the Six's hideout, but was unable to stop them from launching the poison into space. Of course, not even a comic book villain is stupid enough to kill the entire population of Earth. It turns out that the poison was simply harmful, not fatal, and the villain's true plan was to get rich by selling off the antidote. (So Spider-Man's new goal was liberating the antidote from the villain's clutches.)
I actually had a situation last Friday where my players tried to take on a vampire Lord with an army of undead, who lives in a castle on a steep mountaintop, and is trying to summon Cyric to help him take over the world. The party was travelling with a whole city's worth of soldiers, civilians, and adventurers that would help them storm his lair. During a fight on their way North to his castle, the party's wildmage had a wildsurge. I use the net libram extended wild magic table for my games, and I use it for many circumstances where magic is unstable, including wild surges. I landed on a wild surge which specified the nearest vampire would switch places with the caster at dawn. The party went into a city for rest and when they woke up they were met with an exposed and confused villain. He tried to talk his way out of the situation, but after revealing that he killed one of the character's parents, that character lashed out and attacked him. In almost an instant, two of the seven players were killed, one was in the vampire's castle, and one was captured by the vampire for use in his ritual (the one that lashed out). That's 4 of seven gone, so only 3 players were left with anything to do, and they were all traumatized. One player wasn't able to make it to the session so his character was left with no real reaction. So we have two people now, and they have lost hope. One of the characters is revived but one is unable to make it back. Obviously my players were bummed out but soon they will only have one party member missing (the dead one) and everything will go back to normal, but they can't see it that way and it's hard to reassure them without spoiling the surprises I have for them.
This is really helpful for my situation, so thanks a lot! :D
This is really awesome! I made sure to send this to my DM so he can use it.
Running CoS we were a small band of 5 heroes, forced together to try and escape. During one encounter our party leader, my human war cleric Matt, dropped and was rolling death saves. The party continued to fight and were unable to throw a heal on him during combat, so as I was still rolling saves they left him. Unbeknownst to them I actually died 2 rounds previously and was rolling to keep their spirits up but as the fight ended they rushed over and threw a cure wounds on me.... finding out it had no effect. (the disbelief in that from the party made it worthwhile!)
Now, my cleric was from Luskan and showed it - gruff ex-soldier who barked orders at everyone around him, but before his death he ha gone from LN to LE via the horrors witnesses and the hopelessness. The party, however, still held him in esteem and as his spirit was carted off his passing words gave our Halfling Bard, Gerbo, lead of the group.
Fast forward and with a reluctant new leader in charge we tackle a castle (advanced from the cleric's death at 5 to the point of us being level 9) and... the party gets split up somehow. Each group is fighting for their lives but losing, badly... slowly... one by one... all but Gerbo passed away into nothingness.
So now, after this abhorrent setback poor Gerbo, who doesn't want to be a leader in the first place, is forced back into town to try and recover by recruiting an entire new party of adventurers to fight Strahd!
Setbacks in the story can be amazing opportunities for role play and I'm loving how our story has unraveled to the point the only one left is our new party leader after the old one died.
One thing I'd add for DMs is that not only should you think in advance about what the consequences of failure are (especially failure that's just the result of a crappy evening of dice-rolling), you also have to make really really explicit to your players what the alternative failure conditions are. We all know what it's like to look out at a table of people who are thinking about work or school or are laughing at a joke someone told. Those people don't always pick up on the importance of the McGuffin or on the fact that there's a clock ticking in the background. In my experience, there's usually a "designated driver" player who everyone else counts on to pay attention, for better or worse. Then, when the clock runs out or the briefcase full of mysterious light gets carried away, everyone complains that they would have done something different if they'd understood the stakes. So don't be afraid to really hammer it home in advance.
"Failing forward" is great, but certain DMs and certain players need to be very careful about how they do it. Especially if you have the kind of sandboxy group that sidetracks itself with quests to find a smith who can make armor for someone's pet hawk or whatever. If players chafe at being railroaded and you as DM like to "yes, and" them, you can't just have the villains' timetable advance in the background as normal. It comes across as very passive-aggressive to have the Tarrasque show up and say "Remember that thing a month ago you thought wasn't important? It was important. This is the consequence of that."
I guess what both of these come down to is communication.
Also, the flip side of this is that you also have to plan for unexpected success. You wanted the naval plans to get stolen, so that you could do an awesome chase through the mountains on the lightning train and then culminate in having to infiltrate the enemy capital and sabotage the new dreadnought in the harbor, except it all just went pear-shaped with two sequential crits on the doppelgänger spy in the very first session. What do you do? There are a million ways to get things back on track, but think about it in advance, so it feels natural and not like your players are being railroaded (especially if they totally are being railroaded).
When I was DMing out of the Abyss for AL, this is happen on 3 separate occasions, instead of trying to escape the Drow prison they would try to attack, ransack or try to capture the prison. None the less i had to restart the AL campaign, three times, the couple of players that would return the next week after the first two TPKs. I would just say, were knock unconscious from they're failed prison escape.
I also had a AL group try to attack the dragon in Hoard of the Dragon Queen in "Greenest" another TPK, When i restarted the campaign the next week, i made sure to mention the dead adventures on the tower.
This is a great way to actually progress the story despite a loss! I'll have to keep that in mind, thank you for the incredible information
@Lyku I personally view material like this just like my own home brew adventures, a guideline that is part of the “sand box” world the PC’s live in, so you don’t have to take EVERY word literal, think outside the box and figure out how a failure can alter the material and allow the players to continue the campaign... I.e the villain won.. for now... how can they now beat them? How do they locate where they went to? Is there a consequence to the failure that needs to be overcome first?... Other solutions... Time travel? etc...
So in short, there are always options to continue the campaign, it is fantasy after all.
I appreciate the nod towards Spiderverse in the use of Goober instead of MacGuffin.
A good example of this "Failling Forward" mentality is the Indy game Kenshi.
Where the first few hours of the game, you get your butt kicked in the dirt by Bandits, Cruel overlords and others, but even though you're left unconcious and they stole your food, you get tougher and learn from your mistakes.
Then you become better, and stronger through efforts, and it give a meaning to the hardships you went through and a sense of satisfaction when you overcome it.
Dragonheist actually has lots of options for losing in my opinion.
its a great adventure
First off if you lose, there is a chapter in the book with the villains lair. So, party can then go and try to get it back from the villain's lair.
Also, if you totally lose every thing, like totally totally lose, I think its very easy to then have the party go to the Dungeon of the Mad Mage to get a artifact or new item to try and defeat him.
Conversely, if you WIN. The villain may be doing that very thing to try to thwart you. As in villain does not get the prize, so he/she starts to go to Undermountain to try and get more power to get you back.
In my opinion, seems like you still have plenty of options...
I have always run my campaign world as a living thing. Anything any group does, for good or bad, can affect another party in the future. I have towns that have been wiped off of the map and years later a player will see this x on the map and remember his old PC had a part in that. As I DM for my kids, they have grown up hearing the tales of my other groups and have thanked players from time to time for doing this or that because it came up in their adventure.
That said, I have had few parties fail. They have had to make choices and only later discovered the consequences of that course of actions. In one case it took almost 2 years for a player to figure out he was charged with murder.
I have only had one time that a group failed enough to really affect the main plot of the campaign. I adjusted and moved on with the new plot. Only one player ever figured out that one and it was because he saw it from a new PC's eyes in a different campaign. The Oh crap!! moments make all worth wild for me, when you have players realize you were serious when telling them that what they do will always have an impact in my world.
I had one group of players that just let go nearing the end of the campaign. Just decided to do ridiculous things that were beyond barmy. While I would generally try to keep them safe but force repercussions, it just got to the point where they had to just die. It was beyond frustrating so I let them die. Afterwards three came up and asked what happened in the narrative. Feeling peevish and petty, I responded "What do you care? You died." and left it at that.
Another group could not catch a break. Just not one whit of a chance. I could have asked them to roll d4s and they would have gotten fewer 1's than rolling their d20s. It wasn't the strongest campaign, but I asked them a simple question as they died, what do you think happened next? Asked them all. And then I incorporated their ideas into the campaign for their next generation of characters. It was immediately more fun.
Sometimes a campaign dying isn't the worst and sometimes it can really make things better. It all depends on the investment of not only the DM but the players themselves.