I've been running a science fiction game for the last 4 or 5 months. Last night was the final mission. The party infiltrated the enemy base. They snuck through the multitudes of refugees around the compound, slipped in through a well, and found a secret tunnel. Once inside, they located the structural center for a bomb that would destroy the entire stucture, and went there, hoping to locate the villian with the nuke.

The party engaged the enemy martial artist, demon wizard, and their hand full of mind controlled mooks. The problem? The people playing my game wern't intrested. I don't know what happened...

For the last 5 months, the game was great. I mean, there are slow games, but, this wasn't one of them. It was pretty balls out. One girl wouldn't put down her FF mag, another is shy and doesn't rp if other people aren't. One dude was in a funk. Another guy was only half intrested because it was his first game, and he was mostly just there to start the DnD character generation that would happen afterwards.

Anyway, most of the players survived. One guy grabbed the bomb and got it up to the roof before it exploded. It did vaporize like... 200,000 civilians, but at least the party was far enough below ground for the weapon to fail in killing them.

In the end, one helpless PC died during the battle, after the bad guy took her hostage, the one guy that could save her decided he doesn't deal with terrorists and went for it. Another pc died holding the weapon, and one other died because he was at the medical tent helping people when the bomb went off.

The kicker? Everything started because of a dark secret the guy at the medical tent had at the begining of the game, one that he kept, for the most part, all the way up to his death.

I probably wouldn't have been so brutal at the end, but, I was really pissed that no one was intrested / involved. I'm so salty, I don't even want to gm next week. I think my group is going to take a week or two away from actual rp while I, "work on my game."

You can tell, at the start of a game, if it will be good or not based on the spirit with which people make their characters. This dnd game is already horrible. I'm crushing it before it starts and giving some time for a new / better spirit to get into my group's head before I try something again.

Too bad for your SF game.  It sounded pretty interesting, especially the brutal ending.  I would have blown most of my PC's out of the water just for being D-bags.  I hate it when there is a strong beginning and then the ending is semi-interesting.  

I also agree with you about the character for the next gaming session you plan to run/play.  I try  to set up interesting characters with diverse backgrounds, only to find others with minimal interest with the games as a whole.  My only problem is that I have a lot of great characters but I have an issues with articulating them. That is way I surf and post here, to learn and further my experience.

Good luck to your future gaming sessions

Quote from: Venosha;263458Too bad for your SF game.  It sounded pretty interesting, especially the brutal ending.  I would have blown most of my PC's out of the water just for being D-bags.  I hate it when there is a strong beginning and then the ending is semi-interesting.  

I also agree with you about the character for the next gaming session you plan to run/play.  I try  to set up interesting characters with diverse backgrounds, only to find others with minimal interest with the games as a whole.  My only problem is that I have a lot of great characters but I have an issues with articulating them. That is way I surf and post here, to learn and further my experience.

Good luck to your future gaming sessions

I'm trying to find a way to get everyone happy about the next game. I was going to run a game based in the dark ages, but I think I'm instead going to run the d20 Legend of the Five Rings.

I know what you mean, about people having minimal intrest. Sometimes what holds a players intrest is really simple. Over half of my group claims to only care about story, but when push comes to shove, they are never happier than when they are killing NPCs. It can be hard to guess what you need to do to keep people on it.

One thing that IS good about a sad ending to and RPG is that the next time you run, your players know you aren't fucking around. When I say there is a chance the bomb will go off in your hands, they know you aren't kidding. It adds a little excitment that GM's that never take off the kids gloves can't get out of people.

The trick... later... is to put the kids gloves back on, but try to make everyone think you haven't.