This is why my DM is starting the campaign by teleporting us in post-death house at level 3. Not because he doesn’t think that we can’t handle it or anything, but because everyone except me is invested in their characters enough to get upset if they die without accomplishing anything and apparently the encounters in that thing are blatantly unfair for the sake of building the mood.
Which, my first campaign is a converted AD&D module (Against the Cult of the Reptile God) where the first intentional combat encounter comes after an innkeeper learns that they’re here to investigate strange goings-on in the town, and orders their drinks poisoned under the guise of grateful hospitality. 6 thugs and a level 3 Cleric come out of the wall to kidnap the party while they’re dressed-down of their armor and/or knocked out from the poison kicking in once they’re asleep, the Wizard only survived an Inflict Wounds because melee attacks can always be chosen to knock out. D&D land was never designed to be fair, but it was designed to set the mood that what they’re up against is borderline insurmountable in a direct assault, without telling the players “now that the lesson’s sunk in, hurry up and roll a new dude, other people are waiting.”
This is why my DM is starting the campaign by teleporting us in post-death house at level 3. Not because he doesn’t think that we can’t handle it or anything, but because everyone except me is invested in their characters enough to get upset if they die without accomplishing anything and apparently the encounters in that thing are blatantly unfair for the sake of building the mood. Which, my first campaign is a converted AD&D module (Against the Cult of the Reptile God) where the first intentional combat encounter comes after an innkeeper learns that they’re here to investigate strange goings-on in the town, and orders their drinks poisoned under the guise of grateful hospitality. 6 thugs and a level 3 Cleric come out of the wall to kidnap the party while they’re dressed-down of their armor and/or knocked out from the poison kicking in once they’re asleep, the Wizard only survived an Inflict Wounds because melee attacks can always be chosen to knock out. D&D land was never designed to be fair, but it was designed to set the mood that what they’re up against is borderline insurmountable in a direct assault, without telling the players “now that the lesson’s sunk in, hurry up and roll a new dude, other people are waiting.”