The difference? Hilp vs Zorastryl

[Lady Frost]

So, the question I have is this: What is the difference between what happened at Hilp and what happened at the Zorastryl Manor? It's being said that Hilp was manufactured and preplanned, that those on the side of trying to stop the dragon had no chance. However, what I'm also seeing is the exact same thing on the Zorastryl plot. Team Matthias was destined to lose and no amount of planning and preparation was changing that. The plot (like most DM plots) was set ahead of time. The only difference I see is that 'Team Resolution' is upset at losing in Hilp, and 'Team Matthias' was upset about losing at Zorastryl Manor. Team Matthias is however made of generally evil characters that are (more) used to losing, and Team Resolution was made of good characters that aren't used to it.

Tell me how much effort Team Matthias is going to have to put in to tear down Zorastryl Manor and revert the changes of the plot? Or how much effort it'll take to destroy Cloudstone or put a new Baron on the throne? I'm going to guess it's going to be between a lot and improbable. That actually sounds like -less- work than what it'll take to clean up Hilp (which makes sense to have cleaned up). Did it make sense to spend a month building an area to have it auto-cleaned up and replaced in a few weeks or months? No. Let people experience the dungeon.

What I see are two different standards being used based on who the winner is. Please explain why you think I'm wrong.

[Asgardian Grey Hawk]

I can speak on the Zorastryl plot from what myself and Dm mcguff talked on it was supposed to turn out differently but in the end we would of lost the keep no matter in the end. Personally being so in depth with the plot. I'm not really that upset how it turned out. And I feel Hawk has done his best to keep the spirit of the plot in line with mcguffs plans. These are both plots that are Heavily player driven. We all had plans and such. I know on our part for team Mathias the end losing the keep was not the true end. There were doors left open for us to still aid Mathias if we wanted to.

[Razgriz]

What I did not like about Hilp's fate, was not so much the Dragon and its allies "winning" over Cormyr and allies. Those opposing the Dragon demands still saved Quirine in the end. What felt like hopeless for team Quirine/Cormyr, was that either of the outcomes was a partial defeat scenario.

a) Surrender Quirine, let all Faerun know that evil shall see its demands fulfilled. Let all know that Azoun's IV sacrifice mattered not.
b) Fight the dragon, but risk it cause even greater destruction and death of innocents.

Quirine was the one running away of Ixamarun. She could have said something akin to: "Forget it. Thanks for the help, but I cannot accept thousands to die or suffer on my behalf". Silver Dragons are supposed to be LG and would rather promote good via peaceful means. They are protectors. forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Silver_dragon

In no moment that I remember Quirine told her team to plan a rescue attempt later. I could be wrong, but I did not see that the option of such was being considered for that plotline? After all, Ixamarun's lair was not in Cormyr to begin with. To me, it seemed implied that surrendering her would be the end of the story.

So looking back to all of that, I can choose to play Holance feeling really bad, responsible and demoralized for how things went in Hilp. However, having him fall for not surrendering Q to I? Not really, and even less so knowing that the city was planned to be introduced as already destroyed. Were it not a red dragon, then something else would have been the cause of its ruin. Perhaps if a thriving Hilp would have been added considerable time before the dragon attack, then things would have been perceived as more spontaneous in that story.

That said, I told the DM that I had fun with the story, despite the heavy outcome.

[StabbingNirvana]

Quirine as far as I'm remembering didn't plan anything. She came, spoke to a couple of us and then was scarce. From my perspective (as a guy that basically had a locate Quirine item), it was never used after acquiring. For me it was never really a matter of "surrender Quirine and the big mean red dragon will go away". It was "Red dragon has invaded and is attacking Cormyr. Must defend". Quirine was just a convenient excuse for red dragon to do red dragon things. There was plotting going about of finding where the red dragon laired and going there and killing it, but that never came to fruition for one reason or the other. Update: Looked at the guild forum notes and the red's lair was at a volcano in Neverwinter protected by elementals.

Now, whether the end-game is predetermined or not doesn't matter much as long as it's not known to the players or whether they're able to add there touch to certain aspects. There has to be situations with conclusions that are "on rails" to drive storylines. Particularly with Hilp where I gather from what I read over recently, that a dungeon was made and Hilp had to be destroyed, I could find that acceptable. Sometimes, you just gotta buckle in and enjoy the ride. Sometimes, the players, or a large portion of them, have to lose.

[Southpaw]

Oct 29, 2019 13:21:14 GMT -5 StabbingNirvana said:

Now, whether the end-game is predetermined or not doesn't matter much as long as it's not known to the players or whether they're able to add there touch to certain aspects. There has to be situations with conclusions that are "on rails" to drive storylines. Particularly with Hilp where I gather from what I read over recently, that a dungeon was made and Hilp had to be destroyed, I could find that acceptable. Sometimes, you just gotta buckle in and enjoy the ride. Sometimes, the players, or a large portion of them, have to lose.

I'd agree that sometimes a DM may want to determine certain parts of an outcome, and that's fine, but there still needs to be meaningful actions players can take in order to accomplish *something* meaningful.  As a no-win scenario that's fun to play in, I would reference "The Red Hand Of Doom," which is a tabletop scenario where you are faced with an invading army that can't be stopped, and the players do things to try to allow NPC's to escape the advancing army by retreating into territory it isn't going to advance into.  So, while you aren't supposed to beat the army, there are still meaningful actions to take, because you can save an awful lot of NPC's from annihilation by enabling their escape.  So, I didn't play in the dragon vs. Hilp episode, but from what I've read about it, it sounds to me like the place it might have been a little short was in the area of meaningful actions that could have been taken to save the people of the town from death by the horrible dragon without killing the dragon.  And it's also possible that those actions were available, but that the FRC players decided to do the common FRC response of playing Leroy Jenkins to superior forces and letting the DM's OOC raise everyone when they get TPK'ed by forces they weren't supposed to stand and fight against to begin with, and then complain about how heavy handed the DM's were when it wasn't meant for the players to just stand and fight a vastly superior force.  So I don't mean to make definitive statements about how that individual plot went as someone who wasn't even there, but only to speak to the idea of having meaningful actions to take in the face of a lost battle, as opposed to having to just stand there and get thrashed by superior forces.  

If a given situation absolutely needs to happen in a certain way, like a dragon annihilating a whole town, buildings and people and all, in order for a dungeon to go in, then I would suggest implementing the dungeon at the start of the plot and using the attack as hook and backstory, and not forcing PC's to stand there and endure a dragon sized thrashing they can't do anything about, as the end of the plot.  Again, I don't intend that as a comment on a plot I wasn't even there for, but the point is the principle of making the unchangeable into hook and backstory, not the ending.

[Andros]

Well in Matthias case, my understanding was that if he won the world would end or be at risk of ending by the release of the elemental evil Dog thing, so...not a lot of room there for outcomes if we want to keep playing in the server.