Last weekend, I ran a combat that went terribly, terribly wrong. The combination of monsters was going to lead to a party wipe, and I think it might have been due to my poor combat design... my "balanced" combat turned out to be a buzzsaw. What experience and advice do you have for such situations?
First of all, remember, DMs don't make mistakes. DMs create situations. Players make mistakes. Seriously, if the PCs were in danger of being completely wiped out, why the hell were they still fighting?! I assume you didn't lock them in a room with the baddies, right? They had avenues of escape, right? And they weren't fighting for the fate of the world or something so high stakes that their dying would have been worth it, right?
You may think I'm kidding, but that is actually my philosophy. It takes a hell of a lot for me to adjust an encounter I'm running at the table because the players have free will. If they choose to stay, they are choosing to live with (or die by) the consequences of that choice. And I'm not going to pull any punches just because they make the wrong choice. The combat may not be what I planned, but ultimately, it is no different from a fight in which the PCs are just getting wrecked due to the wrong combination of lucky and unlucky die rolls. I won't pull them out of that fight if they're not making the choice to leave, after all.
The thing is, if you put a combat into your game, you are accepting the possibility that you MIGHT kill the entire the party. That's what's at stake when a combat breaks out. If you can't stomach that, you can't run a combat. And if you start adjusting things to keep the PCs alive, whatever the reason, you're removing their agency. They don't control the outcome through their choices. You do. In essence, by ensuring they will win, you're railroading your players.
But, hey, if you're one of those DMs who feels that it is your duty to only present fights that are an even match and that the PCs should never be expected to run away and you misbalance a combat, well, you've taught your players not to run so you'd better fix it at the table. And frankly, how you fix it really doesn't matter. Some DMs believe you should do it in secret so the party doesn't know what you're doing. Fudge hit points, use hidden die rolls, and so on. But that's fraught with uncertainty and some players are very quick to notice it and they tend to get upset. You can just outright admit you unbalanced the encounter badly and offer the PCs the chance to flee (and you will let them escape) or offer whatever other way out seems appropriate (like ruling that the PCs have a nasty fight and ultimately win and handwaving the details away). Some DMs will balk at these approaches, but ultimately, the most important thing is avoiding the party wipe without risking the trust your players have in you. Admitting your error and wrapping up the fight off camera is the quickest, safest, most honest way.
You may think I'm kidding, but that is actually my philosophy. It takes a hell of a lot for me to adjust an encounter I'm running at the table because the players have free will. If they choose to stay, they are choosing to live with (or die by) the consequences of that choice. And I'm not going to pull any punches just because they make the wrong choice. The combat may not be what I planned, but ultimately, it is no different from a fight in which the PCs are just getting wrecked due to the wrong combination of lucky and unlucky die rolls. I won't pull them out of that fight if they're not making the choice to leave, after all.
The thing is, if you put a combat into your game, you are accepting the possibility that you MIGHT kill the entire the party. That's what's at stake when a combat breaks out. If you can't stomach that, you can't run a combat. And if you start adjusting things to keep the PCs alive, whatever the reason, you're removing their agency. They don't control the outcome through their choices. You do. In essence, by ensuring they will win, you're railroading your players.
But, hey, if you're one of those DMs who feels that it is your duty to only present fights that are an even match and that the PCs should never be expected to run away and you misbalance a combat, well, you've taught your players not to run so you'd better fix it at the table. And frankly, how you fix it really doesn't matter. Some DMs believe you should do it in secret so the party doesn't know what you're doing. Fudge hit points, use hidden die rolls, and so on. But that's fraught with uncertainty and some players are very quick to notice it and they tend to get upset. You can just outright admit you unbalanced the encounter badly and offer the PCs the chance to flee (and you will let them escape) or offer whatever other way out seems appropriate (like ruling that the PCs have a nasty fight and ultimately win and handwaving the details away). Some DMs will balk at these approaches, but ultimately, the most important thing is avoiding the party wipe without risking the trust your players have in you. Admitting your error and wrapping up the fight off camera is the quickest, safest, most honest way.