Pyhrric Victory (2012)


Submitted by Herve on Thu, 03/05/2012 – 14:46

Not a question but an illustration about how to use the Pyhrric Victory rule, pp 82-83. A possessed character was pulling back a monster from the bottom of a cliff : if he made it, the whole Quest would be derailed. He was very powerful and shrugged off all attacks made by other PCs on him.

The last PC decided to throw himself down the cliff and on the monster, to make the whole thing heavier and make the possessed PC let go of the rope. It was a suicidal act which had great chances to succeed, but which would HURT a lot once reaching the cliff’s bottom. It was a perfect example of a pyhrric contest, done by a player who didn’t even know the rule existed !

Another memorable pyhrric victory

Submitted by Herve on Sun, 06/05/2012 – 12:23.

My own character, Silkinister the humakti, went along the Quest to give Hofstaring his hands back, in solar hells. Before the quest, Silkinister had announced he would issuee a heroquest challenge to ikadz, god of pain, once there. Getting to the plateau of suffering was hard, but we made it and Silk attacked ikadz to kill it. Once he realized it’d be tougher than he thought, he began singing Humakt’s Death Song (and I invoked the Pyhrric Victory rule). It brought my character to 3M4 vs ikadz’ 5M3, a very good chance of success. And it worked – ikadz got chopped up and Silkinster got +13 to his Death Rune score. Of course, he was also wounded and at -6 (total victory). And his relife sickness score jumped up as well…

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