RPGs where you encounter other adventuring parties

[DecadeRiptide]

Skyrim, like when you come across the werewolf ppl fighting the troll (but I know this isn't what you are looking for)

[Norfleet]

This Pokémon has the habit of hugging its companions. Many Trainers have left this world after their spines were squashed by its hug.

That's a very whitewashed version of saying they were raped to death by a pedobear, since as far as I can tell, these Pokeymen Trainers are a bunch of kids. Keep in mind that the character we know as "pedobear" is just known as "bear" in Japan, because "pedo" is implicitly assumed as part of Japanese culture.

[Norfleet]

Why is this so rare?

Is it actually rare? I mean, we have a fair number of cases where this is explicitly so: I'll nominate another example: Arcanum has that one place where you explicitly encounter another murderhobo party just like yours, camping outside the dungeon, and you can do various things like fighting with them, encouraging them to charge to their deaths, or helping them out.

Also, is it REALLY rare? What's the difference between that bandit party and your own murderhobo adventuring party? Both of you are going to kill everything that moves and loot everything not nailed down. It's just that THEY are evil bandits and YOU are...well, YOU KNOW WHAT YOU DID.

[J1M]

If it wasn't rare we'd have examples of games where the primary activity is competing with other adventuring guilds and the encounters with other parties would be more like encountering Gary in Pokemon. Something that happens multiple times in a game.

[UltraFan123]

I remember in Icewind Dale, you encounter another adventuring party that was captured by the Yuan-ti who were disguised as priests.

If you find and free them early in the raid, they help you fight the Yuan-ti and they can even die if the difficulty is high enough.

[Norfleet]

If it wasn't rare we'd have examples of games where the primary activity is competing with other adventuring guilds and the encounters with other parties would be more like encountering Gary in Pokemon. Something that happens multiple times in a game.

I think it's sort of hard for it to happen "multiple times" in a game: Players are particularly ruthless and you don't get to oppose the player more than once unless you're protected by plot armor. But protecting what is supposed to be a competition of equals with plot armor tastes really bad.

[J1M]

If it wasn't rare we'd have examples of games where the primary activity is competing with other adventuring guilds and the encounters with other parties would be more like encountering Gary in Pokemon. Something that happens multiple times in a game.

I think it's sort of hard for it to happen "multiple times" in a game: Players are particularly ruthless and you don't get to oppose the player more than once unless you're protected by plot armor. But protecting what is supposed to be a competition of equals with plot armor tastes really bad.

Multiple competing parties. Arena tournaments for prizes/charity. Races rather than directly fighting the opposition. So many ways to do it.

[UltraFan123]

I agree somewhat with Val that adventuring parties that are backed by proper adventuring organizations - be they independent private organizations or backed by the kingdom/state - are far more common in Japanese fantasy than in Western fantasy.

However, Western RPGs still have "competing adventurers" that have similar goals to yours and thus must always clash against them from time to time.

In Pathfinder Kingmaker you are given a specific task by a powerful high-ranking individual, and your party must achieve this task before the opposing party does so. This is the closest I have seen a Western RPG do the "adventuring party is given a job and is competing against another adventuring party to complete it".

Another example somewhat close is the first NWN where you can go to a local mercenary guild to hire someone to help you. However, you can only hire 1 companion, which I always attributed to hardware limitations.

But most of the time, Western RPGs assemble your party through plot and happenstance rather than having the main character go to a specific building and recruit daredevils to help him in his quest. And those groups who oppose you throughout the story likewise formed the same way your party did.

[Tangerine]

7th Saga is narratively framed as you competing against a bunch of other adventurers. It's all scripted, though.

[Norfleet]

Another example somewhat close is the first NWN where you can go to a local mercenary guild to hire someone to help you. However, you can only hire 1 companion, which I always attributed to hardware limitations.

It wasn't. It's perfectly possible to rescript the game into allowing you to hire an arbitrarily large number of companions. It does, however, rather trivialize the game as you become a spectator to an unruly mob.

[Tweed]

7th Saga is narratively framed as you competing against a bunch of other adventurers. It's all scripted, though.

It was pretty clever. One of the apprentices ends up becoming a traitor and tyrannizes a city. There's also a chance to fight with several of the apprentices, but the battles are always curbstomps in their favor because the American release ****** with the leveling. I think there was a romhack to fix it, though.

[Dorateen]

It's the very concept that drives Wizardry VII: Crusaders of the Dark Savant, which introduced dynamic NPCs who roamed about the world competing for the same map pieces the player's party were searching for. This includes running into rival adventuring parties led by named NPCs.

Honorary mention to Might & Magic VII, which opens with a scavenger hunt, and other parties competing against the player.