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Shinizak
2010-12-29, 12:56 PM
as a DM, I hate killing party members. I hate HATE HATE it and will do my absolute best to avoid such a senerio, but sometimes the players are unintentionally squeezed into a situation where it is a very real chance.

How do you guys view and handle player death?

Psyx
2010-12-29, 01:01 PM
I ask them if they have 4d6 to hand. :smallbiggrin:

Killing PCs is something that shouldn't be relished, but neither should it be shied away from. You're a referee: You need to be honest about it. If it happens, it happens.

Just try not to grind their dirt in it, or at least describe it in a positive light. Nothing sucks more than *roll* "You're dead."

Tengu_temp
2010-12-29, 01:04 PM
Knock them out, or make them dying but not dead yet. This way they still survive if the party wins the fight and rescues them.

Psyx
2010-12-29, 01:06 PM
^Which completely destroys the risk/reward thing. PC death needs to be there and present in order for players to fully enjoy the game in most genres.

If you aren't going to ever kill PCs, you might as well get rid of the dice and make up what you want to happen.

Fudging doesn't help, either. Not unless you are a champion poker player.

Tengu_temp
2010-12-29, 01:11 PM
PC death needs to be there and present in order for players to fully enjoy the game in most genres.

This goes completely against my experiences. I only killed a PC once, because the player had to leave the game anyway, and I don't think if any of my players ever minded. On the other hand, dying is often frustrating and very lethal games discourage roleplaying, because it's hard to get attached to a character or participate in an overarching storyline if you can die at any moment.

I don't care about risk/reward. I'm playing roleplaying games, not wargames.

Sipex
2010-12-29, 01:14 PM
It's something that happens, you can make it easier by making it cooler though and then maybe giving the rest of the party a quest to revive the fallen PC when they hit the next town if they're so inclined.

So yeah, when a PC dies, try to make it Epic somehow.

Ernir
2010-12-29, 01:15 PM
I assume you're talking about D&D? 3.5?

Risk of death is what defines "living the dangerous life of an adventurer", IMO. If you're not at risk of dying, you're not adventuring, you're just doing a job.

So yeah, as a player, I tend to get kind of bored when DMs refuse to kill characters, and as a DM, I make sure that if the dice fall wrong and/or the players do something they shouldn't have done, characters die.

Gnaeus
2010-12-29, 01:17 PM
I mostly agree with Psyx. As a DM I will fudge encounters if they are overpowered through my error or otherwise overpowered through no fault of the party. But if the encounter is balanced OK and the dice say someone dies, they die.

I feel even more strongly about this as a player. If I know the DM won't kill me, the game loses all excitement. You may as well have a cutscene where the DM goes: "you enter the cave. You kill 5 ogres, a minotaur and a young blue dragon. You find a +x sword and 10,000 gp and you return to town uneventfully."

Tengu_temp
2010-12-29, 01:19 PM
I assume you're talking about D&D? 3.5?

Risk of death is what defines "living the dangerous life of an adventurer", IMO. If you're not at risk of dying, you're not adventuring, you're just doing a job.

Except that in DND, there's pretty much no risk of permanently dying ever at levels 10+, at worst you get raised and feel frustrated from the loss of cash and experience. Which cheapens death tremendously and does not keep you on the edge of your seat at all.


I feel even more strongly about this as a player. If I know the DM won't kill me, the game loses all excitement. You may as well have a cutscene where the DM goes: "you enter the cave. You kill 5 ogres, a minotaur and a young blue dragon. You find a +x sword and 10,000 gp and you return to town uneventfully."

If the game consists only of crawling through dungeons and killing monsters then I'd rather just have the cutscene too.

Kyuu Himura
2010-12-29, 01:22 PM
I use "Fate Points", every character gets 3 of them, if someone dies, they can spend a fate point to be let at 0 hit points (AKA: left for dead). Fate points have other uses, but they don't come to case. Why fate points?? because I banned all resurrection magic, I just feel it makes death trivial.

Just my 2 cents.

some guy
2010-12-29, 01:23 PM
In my beginning stages of a DM, i went easy on my PC's. Mostly without thinking,I fudged a die or two.
Now that my player's are experienced and their characters have gained experience; I have noticed it's fun* too make them work. Combat gets intense instead something to breeze through. They need to think to survive, use smart moves. Surprise me.
When a character dies, it gives a kick, a jolt of electricity. And I don't mean to me. It gives the other players something to fight for. Things get personal. Those gnolls? They aren't just a collection of CR1 monsters anymore. Now they are the brutal killers of your comrade in arms. And by the nine hells, you're gonna get revenge. You're gonna make them pay.
When the DM takes off the kid gloves, the characters do the same and then things start to get interesting. The involvement in a game increases. The stakes are higher.

*fun for all involved

Typewriter
2010-12-29, 01:23 PM
I'm also on the side of deaths not being a constant necessary threat.

I encourage my players to come up with their goals for their characters, and if they fail to stop a baddie from doing something chances are that's going to hamper their goals.

Death happens, but usually only when a PC does something stupid. Most of the time I try to avoid it, and it's worked well for my group so far(6 years).

golentan
2010-12-29, 01:25 PM
Avoidable death, and combat death should always be an option. If there's any form of fiat involved, if they couldn't see it coming, or if they simply lack the abilities which would let them cope, it shouldn't be handed down.

My 2 cp.

Gnaeus
2010-12-29, 01:25 PM
Except that in DND, there's pretty much no risk of permanently dying ever at levels 10+, at worst you get raised and feel frustrated from the loss of cash and experience. Which cheapens death tremendously and does not keep you on the edge of your seat at all.


Most games I play in never pass level 10. If they do, I am usually the only full caster. That means death gives you a roll on the reincarnate table :-).

Escheton
2010-12-29, 01:27 PM
The first time I killed a Pc as a DM the campaign crumbled. We had just gotten the new(first) fearun books and wanted something new anyways. But it was sorta typical.

As a player I like the chance of death, but like it if the dm fudges a few numbers and leaves me at -6.

Godskook
2010-12-29, 01:47 PM
This goes completely against my experiences. I only killed a PC once, because the player had to leave the game anyway, and I don't think if any of my players ever minded. On the other hand, dying is often frustrating and very lethal games discourage roleplaying, because it's hard to get attached to a character or participate in an overarching storyline if you can die at any moment.

I disagree. I just joined a oWoD larp, and the most awesome RP I had was in a scene where I *KNEW* ooc that if my character did a certain thing, he or a fellow PC were going to die. 'Course, we were going up against a fellow PC who had just pvp'ed a fourth PC, so the PC deathrate wasn't the ST's fault.


I don't care about risk/reward. I'm playing roleplaying games, not wargames.

Huh? You're playing D&D. That means you're playing a game of chance(oh look, *DICE*). You take away the chance, you're no longer playing D&D, and you should tell your PCs this. If they're cool with the change, awesome, and enjoy your variation, but standard D&D requires a true chance of death by nature of the way it was built.

From a man who said it better:

http://angrydm.com/2010/07/winning-dd/

Tengu_temp
2010-12-29, 02:10 PM
I disagree. I just joined a oWoD larp, and the most awesome RP I had was in a scene where I *KNEW* ooc that if my character did a certain thing, he or a fellow PC were going to die. 'Course, we were going up against a fellow PC who had just pvp'ed a fourth PC, so the PC deathrate wasn't the ST's fault.

Well, that's your experiences. My experiences are very different.


Huh? You're playing D&D. That means you're playing a game of chance(oh look, *DICE*). You take away the chance, you're no longer playing D&D, and you should tell your PCs this. If they're cool with the change, awesome, and enjoy your variation, but standard D&D requires a true chance of death by nature of the way it was built.

Why are you assuming I'm a DND player? There are other RPGs too. Anyway, you can have risk and run exciting battles without ever intending to kill the PCs. Getting knocked out in combat or reduced to a dying state is not fun, and most of them will try to avoid it. Failing to perform an important action might make the situation worse. All of these are temporary elements that usually don't affect the final result in the end, but temporary measures are also important.
It's worth noting that I never had to prevent a TPK. All the battles my players have won, they'd win even if they had a more bloodthirsty DM. The only difference is that one of them would lose their character in some of these battles, which would not have been fun for anyone. Although, since I'm mostly playing M&M where non-lethal combat is the default, such a DM would be going out of his way to enforce "fairness".


From a man who said it better:

http://angrydm.com/2010/07/winning-dd/

I'm a bit puzzled how he talks about running deadly games and yet mentions he's mostly playing 4e. It's a game where dying for a PC is incredibly difficult.

Not a bad article, though its tone is rather arrogant and/or defensive in places. And I disagree with him that the DM playing with smoke and mirrors (as he put it) is a bad thing.

DukeofDellot
2010-12-29, 02:19 PM
... In one of my earlier games (we were playing GURPS) I killed a couple of my players' characters and mutilated them on a regular basis.

Three things happened--

The terrible player kept making characters that he thought were harder to kill, but had glaring weaknesses, such as the inability to do anything.

The decent player started thinking twice about his actions and began to look at the long-term effects of short-term stupidity.

The good player started spending his points on Fast-Talk, Stealth, and other abilities that allowed him to get around combat.


All in all, it was a fun game (when I wasn't dealing with the terrible player, who I've since kicked out of the group). They enjoyed it, and after each character died, they would get disappointed when their character was lost forever, but were excited to get to try something different.

Ernir
2010-12-29, 02:27 PM
Except that in DND, there's pretty much no risk of permanently dying ever at levels 10+, at worst you get raised and feel frustrated from the loss of cash and experience. Which cheapens death tremendously and does not keep you on the edge of your seat at all.
Hmm. In the high level game I am running, death remains something to be feared. It is because the enemies have ways to extract, bind, and destroy the PCs' souls if they get to play with them for long enough, and because in this campaign, every GP and XP point they spend on getting their asses out of the afterlife is one more thing they can't use to defeat their enemy.

In any case. The players are at the edge of their seats when their characters are faced with a major (A.K.A XP-costing) death. And I mean it quite literally.

I'm playing roleplaying games, not wargames.Your call. For me, the wargame aspect of D&D is just as important as the RP aspect.

Sipex
2010-12-29, 02:35 PM
I will input my experience.

I DM a D&D 4e game and since battles have become harder (I've become better at guessing player power and making smarter monsters) and the risk of death has actually reared it's head a few times now things are more exciting for both me and the players.

The last big session we had the party Wizard nearly bit it, was on his last death saving throw and only survived because the rogue rushed over and forced his second wind out.

Ranielle
2010-12-29, 02:45 PM
I don't generally kill my players as long as they aren't doing something stupid, but I also don't allow any kind of "get back from death " scheme as well so it evens out. Oh but I will cripple them, sometimes permanently.

Volos
2010-12-29, 03:06 PM
In my experience it is either the least skilled player that gets killed in my games. On occasion it is one of the intermediate or highly skilled players that dies as a direct result of the least skilled player's mistake. This usually happens at high levels when the players are able to come back from death by either paying high level characters or doing the ceremonies themselves. I really don't see why you would want to avoid killing players. The game is designed to be deadly to PCs, there isn't any point in avoiding that part of the game. You might as well complain that there is magic in the game and try to avoid using that part of the game. While it is your option to do so, it isn't surprising that most people will use that mechanic of the game.

Sir_Chivalry
2010-12-29, 03:21 PM
I found a really interesting system in a 3rd party book which I went on to use in my DnD game.

When you hit -10 or lower, you make a Fort save. The DC is 15+ the amount of damage in excess of -10. If you fail, you die, if you succeed, you stabalize at -9, but take 1d6 points of drain to a random ability, representing a horrendous scar or wound that won't heal. The sorcerer gish in my party took brain damage, the barbarian had part of his muscles torn out, his heart weakened and his face mutilated (he had Diehard, so he kept getting up and being dropped again), the cleric and the paladin both took nerve damage, it's quite interesting.

The drain can be cured regularly, but the scars remain, and the characters both are less likely to die, but fear death more, at least in my experience. Plus it keeps villains alive with horrible scars!

Tyndmyr
2010-12-29, 03:21 PM
How do you guys view and handle player death?

With maniacal glee and laughter.

The Glyphstone
2010-12-29, 03:24 PM
as a DM, I hate killing party members. I hate HATE HATE it and will do my absolute best to avoid such a senerio, but sometimes the players are unintentionally squeezed into a situation where it is a very real chance.

How do you guys view and handle player death?

As another chance to hopefully roll 'DM's choice' on the Reincarnation chart.

pilvento
2010-12-29, 03:27 PM
in our actual campaing one of the DMīs npc said "u are the strongest mortals among the plane now, u are the only ones capable of saving us all". (about lvl 16)
the DM also said that we cant revive anyone cause the planes are closed.

we fought like no tomorrow saying thinks like "we can lose now" or "we cant die cause we cant come back"

well. the ancient red wyrm did, killed us all and now we cant revive and since we are not allowed to change characters "WE ARE ROLEPLAYING GHOSTS" :smallfurious:

Sipex
2010-12-29, 03:29 PM
It sounds like your DM didn't have a backup plan for a TPK.

pilvento
2010-12-29, 03:32 PM
It sounds like your DM didn't have a backup plan for a TPK.

the worst...

DM: "just as planed"
we: WTF!?

btw our body and equip is melting down in lava now

Bang!
2010-12-29, 03:47 PM
Are we talking about D&D? If so, I stick to the philosophy that characters are built to be eaten. If the players aren't exploring dungeon a corridor which ends up being giant worm's esophagus, I feel I'm doing something very wrong. Same goes for Paranoia, All Flesh Must Be Eaten or Deadlands.

In a game with greater emphasis on roleplay/characterization, I'm much more lenient with death (but I tend to play pulpy games like Spirit of the Century, so a character who jumps out of an airplane cockpit to wrestle the parachuting Nazi commandant is pretty much expected to survive one way or another.

Volos
2010-12-29, 03:56 PM
I found a really interesting system in a 3rd party book which I went on to use in my DnD game.

When you hit -10 or lower, you make a Fort save. The DC is 15+ the amount of damage in excess of -10. If you fail, you die, if you succeed, you stabalize at -9, but take 1d6 points of drain to a random ability, representing a horrendous scar or wound that won't heal. The sorcerer gish in my party took brain damage, the barbarian had part of his muscles torn out, his heart weakened and his face mutilated (he had Diehard, so he kept getting up and being dropped again), the cleric and the paladin both took nerve damage, it's quite interesting.

The drain can be cured regularly, but the scars remain, and the characters both are less likely to die, but fear death more, at least in my experience. Plus it keeps villains alive with horrible scars!

This sounds like a wonderful mechanic to help save players from death via super crit or powerful spell while still leaving them some terrible scars. The only addition or change I would make to what you present is making the ability drain more serious. Coming so close to death, it would be reasonable to assume that part of one's soul got dislodged from your physical body. In order to restory the ability drain you must enter an area consecrated by your deity or a temple of your deity before the restoration spell is cast. The character should first make a will save at the same DC of the fort save to stabalize in order to keep one's soul intact.


the worst...

DM: "just as planed"
we: WTF!?

btw our body and equip is melting down in lava now

I love your DM now. I am so tempted to do something like that to my players.

Dalek-K
2010-12-29, 03:59 PM
I put in a "save point" at certain locations (sometimes just random to mess with each person's head) so that they can "save" during the game. If they die they get resurrected back at that point in 1d4-1 days (thus can be instant). However they arrive back naked save a normal non magical tattered cloak.

You could only use these so many times a day/week/month though.

Lost Demiurge
2010-12-29, 04:57 PM
Death's a part of the game. If there's no real risk, then why roll the dice?

That said, I try to scale appropriately. In non-climactic encounters, I'll softball the dice if the players have a bad run that isn't their fault.

Basically, it's less about cheating death and more about helping the PC's find good deaths. And hey, if they beat impossible odds and come out alive from that climactic encounter, so be it!

Shadowrun's (4th ed) actually got a good system for this. Every PC has an Edge stat, which lets them reroll failures, among other things. One of the major uses of it is to cheat death. You can choose to lose a point of edge permanently, and have your character live through something that would otherwise kill him. Mind you, he'll probably be messed up somehow from the experience, and down for the count until about a month of hospital time or so, but he WILL live.

Grelna the Blue
2010-12-29, 05:03 PM
YMMV, but if death isn't a very real possibility, I think the players are being cheated. By all means, if you see the dice going crazy against one particular PC over the course of a fight (multiple consecutive enemy crits or multiple failed easy saves), go ahead and fudge a bit if you think you can do so unobserved. However, I would not play in a game in which my character's success was preordained and I don't believe most of my players would either. If the players are fighting dumb (taking on tough monsters they could have avoided, not protecting the weaker party members, failing to use needed in-combat heals because they'd rather do damage), there should be consequences. This is especially true in a boss fight, in which death should always be a possibility.

Equally important to the possibility of death, though, is the drama of death. When a PC dies the death should be memorable. If it is an instant death, don't just announce,
"You take 25 hit points from the hobgoblin chieftain's critical hit. You're dead." Instead, say something like,
"G'Mok's frenzied attack has momentarily battered down your guard and his final brutal blow caves in your skull, splattering blood, bone, and bits of gray matter across the nearby paladin's breastplate. Your body (all but the missing top half of your head) falls to the ground like a puppet with cut strings." That's a death your PC and your party will remember. Some of my most memorable character stories from the gaming table involve interesting ways my characters have found to die.

However, if a character is in the negatives and is dying by inches, don't make the other PCs and players guess how badly the wounded PC is hurt. Give the PCs unambiguous clues like arterial spurting, or rattling gasps of diminishing volume, at the same you tell the players exactly how deep the stricken PC is in the negatives. Hang realism--it's no fun at all and can breed RL ill-feeling to have a character die who could have lived if only the other PCs had realized the urgency of the situation.

AsteriskAmp
2010-12-29, 05:04 PM
I have lost in my current campaign 5 PCs
3 from the same annoyance Player:
-Cleric disappeared because he wanted to play Wizard.
-Wizard was thrown into a pit by a spell.
-New Wizard got unmade and removed from existence, even with the multiple universes interpretation of quantum mechanics, insulted his god.

The other ones were:
-Paladin Player asked me to kill him because he wanted to play another less alignment restricted guy, now a socerer, Paladin joined the morally ambiguous but not necessarily evil temporary antagonist.

-Druid was killed because the player missed the session and the player controlling it happened to forgot to use Wildshape, ability I counted on them using and as such threw them a hefty amount of animals and two undeads, he was killed in a twist of irony by the animals. (Possibly going to be revived or reincarnated).

I subtly penalize them for dying stupidly or killing themselves. But they don't mind it (at least they haven't told me, and I have asked.)

Rihar33
2010-12-29, 05:35 PM
Are we talking about Players killing other players or just not surviving. cause when other players are forceed or choice to kill their teammates that can get interesting.:smallbiggrin:

TaintedLight
2010-12-29, 08:06 PM
Adventurers are people who do ludicrously dangerous jobs on a regular basis. Way back in first edition, from what I have gathered, making it to second level alive was a significant achievement.

I would be extremely bored if I got the sense that a DM could not kill my character somehow. And it's absolutely false to claim that you can't get attached to a dead character. DMs have the power to make up any situation they want and sometimes they do it to benefit players.

My jack of all trades, a changeling master-of-masks who called himself by a different name every day and always hid his face, encountered just such a situation. When he failed a jump check to leap a gap between two high buildings during a chase, he fell and died. There was no arguing the facts since it was a two hundred foot drop. The thing is, that was not the end for poor Adran.

The DM handled this situation beautifully. I found my spirit in a kind of ghostly tavern, sitting across from a stranger in a hood and a mask very much unlike my own. Turns out this is a manifestation of Olidamarra, who had been impressed by Adran's antics in life and, since he was in a jovial mood, wagered that Adran couldn't solve a riddle to save his soul. I figured out the riddle and the trickster god returned me to life, but promised that the debt would be collected soon.

I lived in terror of what he might have meant since he didn't elaborate, but there was absolutely a consequence for my death. Ultimately, the risk of death was present and the price of failure very real, but my fun continued nonetheless. Not every DM chooses to handle the situation that way, but there are great ways to work a character's death into the game further.

Naeo
2010-12-29, 08:17 PM
for the first dungeon, i just let the PCs do a job for the NPC cleric, in exchange for raising the dead member (1 quest = 1 pc raised)

after the first quest though, my gloves are coming off, i know my friends can think up some very odd and interesting antics to get around things that would kill them, if they die, then they either need to reroll, or pool their gold together and go buy a raise.

Though i do intend to fudge some rolls here and there. Mostly at the start of quests. if they're up against the boss, well, have fun carting bodies back to town if people die, i may fudge a roll to keep my PCs alive a little longer, but i'm not about to fudge every die roll, so each one survives.

(Though, no one died against my first boss o.o they used the Orcs as body sheilds to avoid being hit by arrows. did not see that coming)

RandomNPC
2010-12-29, 08:19 PM
Yea, player character death is supposed to happen sometimes.

When my elf barbarian got surrounded and knocked out I was getting the 4d6 ready. Suddenly a half orc with no access to magic breaks into the room, scares everything away, and forces copious amounts of fermented leech guts down my throat and I heal a bit, seemed like a high 2d8 or low 3d8, I don't remember what the number was, just the number of dice I think I heard roll.

Cheapest save ever.

Goonthegoof
2010-12-29, 09:36 PM
In order to restory the ability drain you must enter an area consecrated by your deity or a temple of your deity before the restoration spell is cast. The character should first make a will save at the same DC of the fort save to stabalize in order to keep one's soul intact.


What about characters that don't have a deity?

Mr. Zolrane
2010-12-29, 10:44 PM
I'm a newb, so this is pure speculation on my part, but balancing the threat of death against player frustration is a big concern for me. I don't want death to be cheap (i.e. easy rezzes) but I also don't want the game to be so lethal as to frequently cut down carefully crafter characters in their prime; I feel like that's just frustrating to players.

I did have one potential option in mind, not entirely unlike this fantastic post:



My jack of all trades, a changeling master-of-masks who called himself by a different name every day and always hid his face, encountered just such a situation. When he failed a jump check to leap a gap between two high buildings during a chase, he fell and died. There was no arguing the facts since it was a two hundred foot drop. The thing is, that was not the end for poor Adran.

The DM handled this situation beautifully. I found my spirit in a kind of ghostly tavern, sitting across from a stranger in a hood and a mask very much unlike my own. Turns out this is a manifestation of Olidamarra, who had been impressed by Adran's antics in life and, since he was in a jovial mood, wagered that Adran couldn't solve a riddle to save his soul. I figured out the riddle and the trickster god returned me to life, but promised that the debt would be collected soon.

I lived in terror of what he might have meant since he didn't elaborate, but there was absolutely a consequence for my death. Ultimately, the risk of death was present and the price of failure very real, but my fun continued nonetheless. Not every DM chooses to handle the situation that way, but there are great ways to work a character's death into the game further.

Mine is sort of like that, but instead of a god, it involves a specific type of wish-granting demon called a Giver: Givers are nearly omnipotent, but chained to the iron will of Felnar, my setting's Satan equivalent. Upon death (any time really, but death is prime desperation time for most characters) they will stop time and offer the player a second chance at life in exchange for whatever the Giver has to offer (and given how powerful they are, that's basically anything Felnar or another comparably powerful deity doesn't overrule).

Ryuk01
2010-12-29, 10:49 PM
I think this (http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/columns/checkfortraps/8330-Check-for-Traps-Violence-Viscera) article goes very well with this thread.

daxos232
2010-12-29, 11:11 PM
Life is meaningful because of Death, and vice versa. It means nothing if you are always guaranteed to succeed. When your enemy lies at your feet and those shining coins flow through your fingers, its all the more poignant knowing not all of your party made it this far.

I personally prefer RuneQuest 2 by Mongoose to D&D 3.5, and especially over 4e. 4e dying is so difficult at higher levels. RQ2 is more realistic, where a single sword thrust, arrow, spell, or falling from a high height can kill you. You can die from the elements as easy in real life.

I've GMed games where players starved to death, were poisoned, or died from the first arrow in a battle. When you live through it, its so much more meaningful. My PCs love it.

daxos232
2010-12-29, 11:20 PM
For those who don't like the approach I mentioned earlier, you could have your PC challenge Death for their life. Time stops and Death and the PC engage in some kind of contest, whether it be a foot race, crafting a better item, a riddle, or a real fight (like in Dantes Inferno). Death will not cheat and has skills or level same as the player. However the more often the PC dies the more power Death will bring to bear, making escape impossible eventually.

Traab
2010-12-29, 11:21 PM
I always wanted to learn to play, but noone in my entire freaking state seems to know how. I have managed to pick up a few things here and there though. As a comprimise for those who hate to kill a PC, couldnt you just include some sort of quest to bring them back? Give them a penalty for having to transport their dead party member out of the dungeon, (and through whatever fights that triggers) then some sort of quest line they have to complete to get their friend back alive. Make it annoying enough to make it so they definately dont want to die, but that way you also remove the chance of destroying someones carefully crafted character.

Dexam
2010-12-29, 11:24 PM
as a DM, I hate killing party members. I hate HATE HATE it and will do my absolute best to avoid such a senerio, but sometimes the players are unintentionally squeezed into a situation where it is a very real chance.

How do you guys view and handle player death?

As a (3.5 Ed D&D) DM: I'll occassionally fudge dice rolls behind the screen so that badly wounded characters have "near misses", or the PC gets knocked into negative HP rather than outright killed. That said, I largely let the dice fall where they may, and I (almost always) put the PCs in situations where resting or retreat is an option - if they're badly wounded and choose not to retreat or rest up, then they deserve what they get.

Example: What I came to term the "Open Door Syndrome". A low-level party was asked to retrieve <objective> from a dungeon. A couple of the PCs somehow became convinced that <objective> was always behind the next closed door, and so would open the door, usually resulting in an encounter. The party had just had several major battles with a goblin tribe, and was severely depleted on resources. I was fully expecting them to rest up before pressing on, which most of the party did - except for one player with the worst case of ODS. Despite being heavily wounded, they decided to "scout ahead", ran head first into the next major encounter, and called for the rest of the party to come help. End result: TPK. This behaviour continued with some of the same players under different DMs, to the point that "ODS" became an accepted term and one of the leading causes of PC death.


As a player: If my character is going to die, and should die, then let them die.

Example: I had one DM who in four separate campaigns threw stupidly overpowered encounters at the party, but had the PCs survive through nonsensical reasons - usually, healed and captured by the enemy, then stripped of all gear and allowed to escape. When I protested to this DM about the repeat occurrence of this situation, they said that escape or surrender was always an option. Technically true, but it would have meant abandoning or selling-out fellow party members. That particular DM seemed to encourage players back-stabbing other players, as the "team player" characters tended to get shafted on a regular basis; while the "I look out for myself" characters walked away unscathed with all the loot. I soon learned to stop playing under that DM.

TL;DR version - be both fair and realistic about PC death. If a PC is in danger of dying through no real fault of their own, allow some chance of escape or resurrection. Don't invent totally implausible or unrealistic reasons to prevent PCs from dying - it cheapens the game play (e.g. having the cavalry show up to save the day once is dramatic; if they do it all the time, it's unrealistic and annoying).

VirOath
2010-12-30, 03:43 AM
All I can really say in the matter is that death should be a possibility. But it being a possibility doesn't mean it's going to happen at the drop of a hat. The group I run with does play on the lethal side of things and even in very long games the PC death rate tends to stay low, across them all over years of playing I've loss less than 10. This is including High Lethality games like Shadowrun (3rd and 4th), Battlelords (1st and 2nd) and Rocket Tag levels of Silver Age Sentinels.

The prospect of death and loss doesn't take away attachment to characters, rather it gives that attachment meaning. It gives it a weight that means my choices as a player will have the full range of outcomes and consequences. It means that the Players and NPCs are playing the same game. It means I will have to play it smart, as odds are often against me.

But the reverse is true. I have experienced the fun draining factor of having a series of written characters die off one after the other for no reason I could control, it does give a detachment. I have felt the full burden of Death's Revolving Door in 3e and how it cheapens death. But having death as a possibility doesn't mean every conflict that could be tough will now be a chopping block.

If you fear that your players would lose any and all attachment the moment they could die because it would be just an endless stream of deaths, then someone is being an idiot. My own were because of the idiocy of another, but often it is the players that reap what they sow. Having no risk of death and providing the recreation of Family Guy's Death Is Injured episode is just as much of a disconnect. It's the same disconnect that the Mary Sue DMPC gives.

Edit: Reading back through this thread gives one simple answer to all these DM "Do I?" questions. Avoid Tropes. If something is common enough to be expected before the outcome is clear, be it player death or Deus Ex Machina, then take steps away from it to make it less common.

Earthwalker
2010-12-30, 05:50 AM
In games I run players die rarly and it is usualy all the players fault. Doing something insane or not acting without first trying to get all the information.

Of course I don't run DnD much so most of my games have a different focus.

To be honest as someone else has said I play wargames for tactical combat and so don't really bother much with it in my role playing.

Of course saying the players rarly die is balaanced by the fact that they can often lose. I have to point out that not dieing, does not mean always winning.

Ryu_Bonkosi
2010-12-30, 07:14 AM
I don't mind a character of mine dying so long as the DM isn't being a prick about it. It is part of the game, but there are ways of reversing it if you are too attached to just make a new character. Hell, at times a character dying is a good thing if the DM lets them rejoin as a new character. They could fill a desperately needed roll that was ignored before.

Malbordeus
2010-12-30, 07:59 AM
How do you guys view and handle player death?

usually by pointing and laughing. but then it also happens when I play with other players too.

Dalek-K
2010-12-30, 11:30 AM
For those who don't like the approach I mentioned earlier, you could have your PC challenge Death for their life. Time stops and Death and the PC engage in some kind of contest, whether it be a foot race, crafting a better item, a riddle, or a real fight (like in Dantes Inferno). Death will not cheat and has skills or level same as the player. However the more often the PC dies the more power Death will bring to bear, making escape impossible eventually.

Fricken sweet... However...

I would say allow the player back up at low hit points and have the challenge at a later time so not to mess with the current fight. Basically make the offer...

Death: I will spare you if you best me at a challenge. This challenge will happen after your friends are safe or dead from the their current situation. Deal?

This way the flow of battle isn't interupted ^ ^

Trebloc
2010-12-30, 12:37 PM
Why bother playing if rolling the dice is meaningless because failure isn't an possibility? Death happens, it's part of the game, and there are multiple mechanics for coming back from death.

Earthwalker
2010-12-30, 12:50 PM
Why bother playing if rolling the dice is meaningless because failure isn't an possibility? Death happens, it's part of the game, and there are multiple mechanics for coming back from death.

Death isn't the only way to fail. If there is no death it doesn't follow there is no failiure. Similarly if death is easy to undo and expected whats it matter if you die ?

Volos
2010-12-30, 01:26 PM
What about characters that don't have a deity?

Every D&D campaign setting (official that is) are worlds with active deities, which tends to turn most everyone into a believer of something or someone. Our world (real life) is a world of distant deities, which allows for both faith and lack of faith. If you can see that the guy who prays to Pelor can destroy evil undead with a gesture of his holy symbol or that the rogue who prays to trickster god can run the gauntlet of traps through a long hallway without a single scratch or that the druid who calls on her patron deity can call the storm that surely would have smashed your ship upon the rocks... you tend to have atleast a small amount of faith. I would assume that you would call out to some force (unknowingly calling on something you didn't intend is also possible). Player Characters without belief in a Deity are like Fighters without Feats. It shouldn't happen, though some people tend to think so.

Side note: I never allow characters without faith in a deity into any of my groups unless their class/race calls for it. Even Ur-Priests realize that there are gods, they just choose to use them rather then pray to them.

Keinnicht
2010-12-30, 02:11 PM
I fudge things if it's pretty much my fault - I made the encounter too strong, etc.

Also at lower levels, where death is a lot more permanent.

Traab
2010-12-30, 02:31 PM
I fudge things if it's pretty much my fault - I made the encounter too strong, etc.

Also at lower levels, where death is a lot more permanent.

"The Glowing Dragon of Belanazoth breathes its californium infused breath upon your party. The entire party shall now die of radiation poisoning before reaching their 20th level."

DAMMIT! Why does that always happen in my games?!

gourdcaptain
2010-12-30, 03:16 PM
Every D&D campaign setting (official that is) are worlds with active deities, which tends to turn most everyone into a believer of something or someone. Our world (real life) is a world of distant deities, which allows for both faith and lack of faith. If you can see that the guy who prays to Pelor can destroy evil undead with a gesture of his holy symbol or that the rogue who prays to trickster god can run the gauntlet of traps through a long hallway without a single scratch or that the druid who calls on her patron deity can call the storm that surely would have smashed your ship upon the rocks... you tend to have atleast a small amount of faith. I would assume that you would call out to some force (unknowingly calling on something you didn't intend is also possible). Player Characters without belief in a Deity are like Fighters without Feats. It shouldn't happen, though some people tend to think so.

Side note: I never allow characters without faith in a deity into any of my groups unless their class/race calls for it. Even Ur-Priests realize that there are gods, they just choose to use them rather then pray to them.

Two notes - Dark Sun campaign setting doesn't have gods at all, and Eberron may or may not have gods - there's no proof either way, and anyone with a strong enough belief in ANYTHING can call on divine power. (One of the antagonists in the setting, the Lord of Blades disbelieves in gods because clerics who worship the religion he made up can draw power anyway, for instance.)

And I have run at least once a maltheist character who knew the FR gods existed, but didn't think they were worth praying to or respecting.