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So, I've been running the Witchfire campaign in D&D 3.5 (though that doesn't really matter other than for classes, I guess), and things have been running decently smoothly, until recently.

It's a little 2 player party of an Arcane Mechanic/Wizard and a Scout/Ranger, plus a Fellcaller (main party NPC, mostly the party tank) and Cleric (mostly connecting the party to the church, and heal-bot and half-decent fighter: he wasn't going to be a character, but eventually became part of the party), all humans from the area except for the Fellcaller who's a trollkin for necessary reasons.




At the end of the second major arc, after leaving the Cyriss temple (read: dungeon), we got a new player, who's playing a Rogue and is a less experienced player.

The end of the second arc starts with their return to the city and finding out that dethroned king Vinter's posse has taken over the watch, has locked down the city, and is looking for the Witchfire, which they have, and which is rather volatile.

The players make some poor choices, which make it more difficult to get into the city than it's supposed to be. I tried to emphasize that people that look like adventurers will stick out like a sore thumb and that this is the stealth part of the campaign, but this didn't deter all the blunders.

They eventually learn from Helstrom (the secretly loyal guard captain) that the Prelate, who's the only person who can deal with the sword, is being interrogated on a prison island with a bunch of other higher profile people who weren't just plain killed when the new guys came to town.






Fast forward, they've lost their Fellcaller (not dead, just got split up), they're sitting in a mausoleum (long story), with patrolling guards outside. They hatch the most direct/nudged to follow plan of sneak out, get a boat, sneak in through the sewers, get him, escape.

I'm not sure exactly how it happens, but our new Rogue decides she's tired of needing to sneak and role play and wait until night. Everyone walks out when there's a break in the patrol, except two of the party are in heavy armor (one of which is a stolen watch uniform) so make noise and are heard.


A patrol spots them. The Rogue chucks a smoke bomb, which I emphasize is a bad idea in the day with patrols around. The Rogue bolts, the Ranger (in stolen uniform) bluffs that he's helping the other players who are bystanders and the Rogue isn't with them, and they start to get away.

The Rogue circles the building, eventually rejoining the party for some reason even though the danger of being spotted hasn't passed, then, when other guards approach, she shoots one in the face with her concealed gun.

The Wizard turns the Rogue invisible. The Ranger surrenders and bluffs that they were graverobbing. The Wizard doesn't put up much of a fight, but does resist enough to get subdued. The Cleric surrenders, too.

Then, the invisible Rogue then takes the Witchfire and runs again, saying (loud enough that the guards hear her) that she'll break them out of jail and runs off, eventually losing the guards.




This is where the session ends.



The aforementioned serious problems:
Their watch contact can't get them out, because it'll blow his cover and they killed a cop in broad daylight, when the cop wasn't even fighting them, and one's wearing a stolen uniform. Even without the evil dudes in charge, this would be pretty hard to get past.

The Rogue is just a poor player, and has few combat skills- I don't think that she can break them out, because that's a serious operation. Frankly, I also don't want to have the party split up because it's always a royal pain to manage.

The higher-ups know the party has some connection to the Witchfire, are ruthless and interrogators, and are highly suspicious of other magic users and members of the clergy (read: 2/3 of those captured). There are definite grounds for the entire captured group to be interrogated and killed in short order.

The Wizard is blind without his familiar, which is disguised as a mechanical object, powers down after being isolated from him for a while (never happened yet) and will inevitably be confiscated.

All of their connections are in jail, gone, or so deep under cover that they can't realistically help.

There's still my Troll helper-NPC who could deus ex machina them out of there, except he doesn't know what's happened, and is neither subtle nor powerful enough that it's at all realistic for him to break them out of an island jail (assuming that's where they go).

The only other character who'd realistically be in the area and not in a bad spot is a low level rogue they met a while ago, who would have motivation to help, but wouldn't necessarily be able to anything, even if there were any reason to know they were captured.


So, I come to the conclusion that I don't want to go in this direction. I bring up to the party that we're "going back to the last save point," because this direction is untenable, basically because of the above.

It turns out that the Rogue decided that she was tired of sneaking around and dealing with getting out of situations (yeah, I know the irony in that...) and wanted a fight, and thought that getting caught would land them in the same jail, that they could break out of (umm, without the Rogue), and that this had all mostly been intentional.

Even after specifically punishing particularly dangerously stupid choices (including one blind character and another with a stat drop), the Rogue seems to be metagaming that the characters have plot armor.

I don't know what to do. I'm considering putting the campaign on indefinite hold, because I don't want to deal with a character who's constantly intentionally getting into trouble that makes my life way harder, and there seems to be the sense that we should continue on this path, but I'd really rather try to get the campaign going in the right direction.

I considered actually killing off those 3 characters, except that wouldn't help, because the only surviving player is a recent addition to the campaign, has no knowledge of the city, no connections to the NPC guides that exist in the city, and said NPCs are inaccessible anyways. Also, the other two player characters have been around for 3 years and we all like them. I'm almost certainly going to kill off their Cleric to make an example of him, not sure what I can actually do to realistically get them out of interrogation/death.

So, from experienced GMs, I'd really like some help before I need to scrap this campaign.

The last thing you should do is starting killing PCs as an "Example" if you otherwise have no reason to do so. Presumably you like these people enough to game with, treat them with a little consideration. If you're having differences with some PCs and the style of game they like to play sit down and talk about it. Anyway assuming you actually want to move forward with the game and are just having issues with them PCs being arrested:


Well, it's important to remember the PCs are the stars of the story. The stars of a story rarely stay in jail for long (unless it's a story about being jail), therefore we can conclude they can get out. That's a forgone conclusion. You're the GM you can make it happen. It's just matter of what tool to use that's most appropriate for the tone of the game you've been running.

Here are some classics:

-They're put in jail next to some big time criminals. The big time criminals buddies come to bust them out, and just happen to free the PCs when they blow a hole in the side of the prison.
(This is Corvis right? I think the Rail Street Gougers operating out Fharin actually have a cell in the city iirc)

-An official (shady or otherwise), seems some potential in this group of no goodniks as they get hauled in and offers them a pardon in exchange for some big favor.

-While interrogating the PCs, the interrogator slips up or gets cocky and gives the PCs a chance to overpower him and get their hands on the keys.

-While the PCs are being brought back to jail, the group is attacked by angry gorax/tribe of gatormen/bandits/angry badgers/whatever. The officials & monsters spend most of their energy fighting each other, leaving an easy target for the PCs to finish off aftewards.

-The PCs are sentenced to execution by 'Jacking, but an incompetent mechanic has left the cortex locks exposed, they tie on the Mechanik first and his hands are conveniently just free enough to reach...


I could go on. We've all seen enough movies, played enough video games and read enough books to know that when the protagonists get captured there is always some series of events (even if improbable) that get them out. You have the power to set any number of things in motion that will give them a nice window to fly the coop.

The cleric is an NPC, definitely wouldn't kill PCs just to make an example.

There's room for them escaping in transit, you're right- that could definitely work, though it's pretty tricky in a locked down city.

Once they're in jail, they're pretty screwed- they're supposed to be rescuing a much higher level character from jail, so it doesn't make much sense that he's not able to get out but they are, and they've gotten far enough in the campaign that I don't want the scary badasses to be incompetent at keeping guys in jail.

The jacking idea is pretty cool, I may need to use that. I think that, combined with the transit ambush opportunity should give them some room to get out. Thanks.

Please, don't just kill characters. Its not cool. It doesn't make a good story. Think of it as if you were writing a movie:
"So the heroes are taken to jail and die"
The End.

think of something.

Maybe, against all odd, the rogue will find a way to save them. Talk with the rogue to figure out what he plan to do, before the game.

Maybe the rogue will walk into a trap and join his friend in jail.

Maybe the heroes will be able to meet the prelate in jail.

Maybe they will loose the mighty witchfire. To the bad guy. Or to another bad guy.

Maybe they will stay in jail for a couple of years before they have the opportunity to escape.

Like Chongara said. You have seen enough movies to know better:
Don't create a boring story.

Yep, I'd rather just end the campaign than kill characters (except the cleric- he's an NPC and doesn't have a ton of personality).

Stated the likely possibilities above, if I decide to move on. It was mostly just discouraging for the campaign, which has been moving along decently, to be derailed by some supremely unwise choices that had been warned against.

It sounds like the issues have been caused by the new player believing the PCs have plot armour, and to be honest it sounds like they do if you'd rather kill the campaign than the characters. If you do stop the campaign maybe you should consider making the next one slightly more deadly to maintain a sense of danger and respect for the realism of the world.

Anyway, I sympathise, its a huge pain when players go crazy like that especially when its one specific player. I hope you can find some way to keep it going. Maybe the higher level character they are supposed to be rescuing escapes on their own, taking the PCs with them?

Yeah, the big part about preferring to kill the campaign than the characters is that it would be one hell of a task to try to get new PCs back into the campaign when everyone who has served as a guide for getting them familiar with the conflict is under cover, in prison, or dead.

And, thanks: re: sympathies. Feeling like the transit or execution points are where there could reasonably be a way out (harder to secure them), so I'm thinking those are the most decent com[promise points between realism and allowing the players a way out...

Hmm, I guess thats one of the downsides of a story based campaign. Let us know how you resolve it, it'll be interesting to see what you do. And good luck!