They just don’t die because the DM didn’t say they died.
It wasn’t a spell but a special power the BBE has because the DM said they have it.
That's basically a subset of "Stopping all damage and go into a cinematic story?", which the OP already discussed. My experience is that "we can't kill the villain because the DM said so" annoys players more than "We can't kill the victim because convoluted plan makes it impossible".
I’m not talking about “we can't kill the villain because the DM said so,” I’m talking about the fact that the DM decides how many HP the monsters have, and it just so happens the BBE has 1 more HP than the amount of damage it’s taken.
Are you telling me you’ve never hot-fixed an encounter? Never added HP to a monster mid battle to make it more dramatic than an unexpected waffle stomping the party was dishing out? Never shaved HP from a monster because it was unexpectedly waffle stomping the party? Never? Really?!? Never? Not once?
Well, part of it is that the BBEG has to realize they're losing the fight and actively escape. If they just escape because you want them to . . . that's unsatisfying.
In my experience, if you give the party the chance to stop something, no matter how obtuse you make the way to stop it, they will luck into it if you're playing fair.
If you don't want your party to be able to stop it, then it has to be something that they don't have a chance to interrupt. Someone else has to pull the BBEG's bacon out of the fire.
So, option: BBEG has polymorphed a victim into looking like them and is mind-controlling them from a different room of the ship. They're using their abilities through them because the BBEG can do that. The party defeats them, and the polymorph drops, revealing that they're actually a child from the party's base of operation (or their own dependent, if you, like me, follow the John Wick School of Playing Dirty). BBEG DDs away, party has to deal with the consequences of their actions.
Play digitally, so the GM doesn't also have to endure the ire of the players.
Not in a really long time, no. But, when having a BBEG I want to survive, I play them intelligently. The BBEG does not engage in combat with the PCs unless they have the homefield advantage and are prepared for it. If, somehow, the party gets the drop on them, they actively try to escape. And, when they do engage the party, if the party proves to be more capable (or luckier) than they expected, they actively try to get away.
When the party was fighting the Shadowdame, in my GURPS Infinite Weirdos/Kingdom Hearts game, I had decided, instead of HP, she would be able to take 30 hits. Critical Hits counted as three, and exceptionally high damage rolls counted as two. As the fight progressed, and the party just mauled their way through her heartless, she began to realize this was not going her way (it was her first time encountering the Weirdos, and she wanted the girl they were protecting). As they started heaping massive abuse on her, she realized how quickly they could take her out, and managed to portal away with two hits remaining. She realized she needed to leave when she was at 50%, but they were doing a really good job of hitting her.
The second encounter with her, she kept to the back and the moment it was obvious that she hadn't brought enough heartless, she brought in a few more and "nope'd" out.
The party really doesn't like her. They actually blitzed Shadowlord Cassim to make sure he couldn't escape when they had to fight him.
Not in a really long time, no. But, when having a BBEG I want to survive, I play them intelligently. The BBEG does not engage in combat with the PCs unless they have the homefield advantage and are prepared for it. If, somehow, the party gets the drop on them, they actively try to escape. And, when they do engage the party, if the party proves to be more capable (or luckier) than they expected, they actively try to get away.
When the party was fighting the Shadowdame, in my GURPS Infinite Weirdos/Kingdom Hearts game, I had decided, instead of HP, she would be able to take 30 hits. Critical Hits counted as three, and exceptionally high damage rolls counted as two. As the fight progressed, and the party just mauled their way through her heartless, she began to realize this was not going her way (it was her first time encountering the Weirdos, and she wanted the girl they were protecting). As they started heaping massive abuse on her, she realized how quickly they could take her out, and managed to portal away with two hits remaining. She realized she needed to leave when she was at 50%, but they were doing a really good job of hitting her.
The second encounter with her, she kept to the back and the moment it was obvious that she hadn't brought enough heartless, she brought in a few more and "nope'd" out.
The party really doesn't like her. They actually blitzed Shadowlord Cassim to make sure he couldn't escape when they had to fight him.
Unless it has very low intelligence, it should be able to understand the battle isn't going well for it and flee.
Even very arrogant creatures often swallow their pride when it comes to life and death, and a problem a lot of DM's have is that monsters refuse to accept defeat because it doesn't matter to the DM, they're just playing a game, but if they were in that situation, they would run away.
My instant out is a necklace of Teleportation, He rips it off his neck and POOF, gone. No issues, no big dramatic overpowered intervention, just a guy who had a cool item, decided the chips weren't falling the way he wanted so "BBEG has LEFT the building!" For a fun addition, if the party examines the remnants of the necklace and collects the pieces, you can have a local merchant know what it is and how to re-activate it (fix it) so the players get a handy item for their efforts too.
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Talk to your Players.Talk to your DM. If more people used this advice, there would be 24.74% fewer threads on Tactics, Rules and DM discussions.
You know how there is a saying, "a plan never survives contact with the enemy"? Well, the same applies for GM plans and players.
Don't go in with the mindset "the villain will escape." That ends up being railroady and annoying to players, removing their agency. "So no matter what we do, the villain escapes? Wel, why should we do anything then? Nothing we do matters!"
Sure, have a plan, but be prepared for smart, lucky, or determined players (or all three!) to derail your plain and actually capture or kill the foe.
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I’m not talking about “we can't kill the villain because the DM said so,” I’m talking about the fact that the DM decides how many HP the monsters have, and it just so happens the BBE has 1 more HP than the amount of damage it’s taken.
Are you telling me you’ve never hot-fixed an encounter? Never added HP to a monster mid battle to make it more dramatic than an unexpected waffle stomping the party was dishing out? Never shaved HP from a monster because it was unexpectedly waffle stomping the party? Never? Really?!? Never? Not once?
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Well, part of it is that the BBEG has to realize they're losing the fight and actively escape. If they just escape because you want them to . . . that's unsatisfying.
In my experience, if you give the party the chance to stop something, no matter how obtuse you make the way to stop it, they will luck into it if you're playing fair.
If you don't want your party to be able to stop it, then it has to be something that they don't have a chance to interrupt. Someone else has to pull the BBEG's bacon out of the fire.
So, option:
BBEG has polymorphed a victim into looking like them and is mind-controlling them from a different room of the ship. They're using their abilities through them because the BBEG can do that. The party defeats them, and the polymorph drops, revealing that they're actually a child from the party's base of operation (or their own dependent, if you, like me, follow the John Wick School of Playing Dirty). BBEG DDs away, party has to deal with the consequences of their actions.
Play digitally, so the GM doesn't also have to endure the ire of the players.
Not in a really long time, no. But, when having a BBEG I want to survive, I play them intelligently. The BBEG does not engage in combat with the PCs unless they have the homefield advantage and are prepared for it. If, somehow, the party gets the drop on them, they actively try to escape. And, when they do engage the party, if the party proves to be more capable (or luckier) than they expected, they actively try to get away.
When the party was fighting the Shadowdame, in my GURPS Infinite Weirdos/Kingdom Hearts game, I had decided, instead of HP, she would be able to take 30 hits. Critical Hits counted as three, and exceptionally high damage rolls counted as two. As the fight progressed, and the party just mauled their way through her heartless, she began to realize this was not going her way (it was her first time encountering the Weirdos, and she wanted the girl they were protecting). As they started heaping massive abuse on her, she realized how quickly they could take her out, and managed to portal away with two hits remaining. She realized she needed to leave when she was at 50%, but they were doing a really good job of hitting her.
The second encounter with her, she kept to the back and the moment it was obvious that she hadn't brought enough heartless, she brought in a few more and "nope'd" out.
The party really doesn't like her. They actually blitzed Shadowlord Cassim to make sure he couldn't escape when they had to fight him.
Unless it has very low intelligence, it should be able to understand the battle isn't going well for it and flee.
Even very arrogant creatures often swallow their pride when it comes to life and death, and a problem a lot of DM's have is that monsters refuse to accept defeat because it doesn't matter to the DM, they're just playing a game, but if they were in that situation, they would run away.
This website has a lot of good info on playing monsters intelligently: https://www.themonstersknow.com/.
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HERE.My instant out is a necklace of Teleportation, He rips it off his neck and POOF, gone. No issues, no big dramatic overpowered intervention, just a guy who had a cool item, decided the chips weren't falling the way he wanted so "BBEG has LEFT the building!" For a fun addition, if the party examines the remnants of the necklace and collects the pieces, you can have a local merchant know what it is and how to re-activate it (fix it) so the players get a handy item for their efforts too.
Talk to your Players. Talk to your DM. If more people used this advice, there would be 24.74% fewer threads on Tactics, Rules and DM discussions.
You know how there is a saying, "a plan never survives contact with the enemy"? Well, the same applies for GM plans and players.
Don't go in with the mindset "the villain will escape." That ends up being railroady and annoying to players, removing their agency. "So no matter what we do, the villain escapes? Wel, why should we do anything then? Nothing we do matters!"
Sure, have a plan, but be prepared for smart, lucky, or determined players (or all three!) to derail your plain and actually capture or kill the foe.