PDA

View Full Version : Roleplaying Save or Pay or: How Discount Death and Ressurrection takes the drama out of RP



Spore
2014-04-19, 05:09 AM
Greetings playground,

everyone has experienced it if they played just long enough. A beloved NPC died, a great or annoying PC has been struck from lightning, various energy rays or shat their pants so vigorously that they died. Personally I love a dramatic ending and the thrill of danger and a real one, too.

I played Pathfinder primarily Level 7-16, but we have two campaigns were we played from 1 onwards. And I feel like the higher the levels go the truer the following statement is: Death is just another status for the PCs. Death isn't final, Death is just an inconvenience. And while I wouldn't say that this fits the mood of a good high magic and Drow campaign it certainly ruins the mood otherwise.

I suffered a total of five deaths on various characters in the last two years (and I fought for that I CAN die in battle because battling could otherwise just be defaulted to wins when no one is in danger). But it's just not very dramatic if the druid/cleric can get you back after 15 mins/8 hours and you are up and kicking one week after that. This feels wrong. It's like you can bribe the grim reaper for a second chance.

How do you feel about that? I know not every character agrees to come back but there are characters that would never not accept a ress. Pious characters fighting for a higher cause, egotisical maniacs and the sorts would always come back. Even a druid would agree to come back if nature/whatevs was still in danger. I know adapting to a new character is work and certainly building one is too, but it's fun enough to not be frowned upon in my opinion.

Eldan
2014-04-19, 05:49 AM
I think that's just how D&D works. As you increase in level, more and more things that were once obstacles cease to be. Teleport means you no longer have adventures about crossing the dangerous swamp. Fly means walls no longer stop you. Once you have Create Food and Water, there's little to fear from a desert. Resurrection does the same for death.

I don't think it necessarily kills all drama, there are always other obstacles.

That said, if you don't like it, change it. That's what house rules are for.

Rhynn
2014-04-19, 08:20 AM
How do you feel about that? I know not every character agrees to come back but there are characters that would never not accept a ress. Pious characters fighting for a higher cause, egotisical maniacs and the sorts would always come back. Even a druid would agree to come back if nature/whatevs was still in danger. I know adapting to a new character is work and certainly building one is too, but it's fun enough to not be frowned upon in my opinion.

Unless the entire setting is designed around easy resurrection (even if only 5% of people can afford it), like Vlad Taltos' Dragaera (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragaera), I think it's terribly boring.

At the same time, some sort of returning from the dead is the norm in D&D (but not really in most other RPGs).

There's a bunch of good compromises and alternatives, though!

For D&D 3.5, Heroes of Horror introduces a bunch of good ideas (you need to travel to the underworld, exchange a soul for a soul, they can come back wrong, etc.).

In Adventurer Conqueror King, the 5th-level cleric spell (called restore life and limb) has a time limit of 2 days at 7th level, up to a maximum of 30 days at 14th level, and every use requires a roll on the Tampering With Mortality table (which can produce failures or side-effects, but with great luck can also produce positive side effects). The 7th-level ritual resurrection is much more effective, has a limit measured in decades, but it can't be learned and must be researched, takes a week to cast, and doesn't automatically succeed (and no caster can ever know more than 3 rituals of a given level).

In the Savage Swords of Athanor (http://swordsofathanor.blogspot.fi/) setting, the only way to bring back the dead is to reach the Clone Pits of the Necromancer Mog-Ur and to pay him a hefty fee; and the clone is quite likely to suffer side-effects or mutations.

In (old) RuneQuest, resurrection is a non-renewable spell, which means it requires a permanent sacrifice of Power (which takes a long time to recover; years, potentially), and it can only be cast in the first seven days after death (after the seventh day, the soul has reached the Underworld, and can only be recovered by undertaking the mightiest otherworld quests at enormous personal risk and cost). Basically, heroes getting back up after death is rare but common enough that most cultures display the corpse for seven days after death before funeral rites are performed, but bringing back the really really dead is an event of enormous portent and significance. And, of course, there's plenty of magic to make sure someone can't be brought back (the simplest being to have a shaman capture their dead spirit and bind it to a fetish). Most of this goes for HeroQuest, too (same setting).

There's plenty of other limitations that could easily be imposed. Bringing back the dead might involve a specific decision by a deity, and even some divine politics. It might require actually going to the underworld, which is always costly. In Mesopotamian mythology, for a soul to leave the underworld (even if they were a living being who entered it freely), another must be given to take its place - so to bring someone back from the dead, you need someone to take their place (does it need to be voluntary?), and someone to take your place(s) when you come back from finding your object...

Artesia: Adventures in the Known World is really comprehensive about what happens after death, especially for game where you can't ever come back to life. Souls get seven days to walk the Path of the Dead to the Underworld, but some (driven by their passions and will) become ghosts, while others are lost in Limbo and fade away, losing everything that they were and becoming life-hating shades. People can be cursed (in life or in death) to become ghosts or to be lost in Limbo, and anyone who is hanged is almost certainly doomed to Limbo; the drowned are also very likely to be lost on the way (suggesting a high incidence of ghosts in shipwrecks, etc.). After reaching the Underworld, souls are persented to the Judge of the Dead, and their deeds in life are recounted by those who have come into the Underworld before them (including, incidentally, animals; eating the flesh of an animal who did not ritually consent to being eaten, either explicitly or by virtue of being a wild animal of prey hunted using the proper rites, is equivalent to murder). Worshippers of the Sun God can pray for intercession, which takes the form of an angelic spirit descending into the Court and lifting them up and into the Sun Palace (completely irrespective of their crimes in life; basically, faith beats sins). This can provide a lot of cool ideas for handling death and resurrection...

Finally, anti-resurrection methods go a ways back (even the Vlad Taltos novels have soul-destroying weapons), and it's easy to think them up. Capturing and binding souls, cursing them into Limbo, etc. One of my favorites is the Ritual of the Grisly Portions from Glorantha (of RuneQuest), a powerful and secret magic rite where you dismember your opponent alive and then scatter and conceal the pieces, trapping their soul in their "living" but impotent body and preventing them from doing anything (including using their magic).

DigoDragon
2014-04-19, 08:47 AM
I don't think it necessarily kills all drama, there are always other obstacles.

My players rarely deal with resurrection. If a PC died they just whip out a new character they made. But if they want to rez someone... One obstacle my players always face with resurrecting characters is getting the huge amounts of diamonds needed for the spell. I employ the GP limits for cities from the DMG, and very few of them will have 10,000gp worth of diamonds on hand to sell. PCs would have to spend days scouring every shop in a city to buy up what they need. They don't have that kind of patience.

I usually have them quest somewhere for the diamonds instead. It's much more exciting to travel to a remote volcano filled with unknown dangers to find some ancient legendary diamond. :smallbiggrin: If it's a dead PC, they whip out some temporary character anyway (or in one case, I let them play a ghost who's soul was held in a jar for safekeeping until they were rez'd).

TheCountAlucard
2014-04-19, 08:51 AM
Exalted's got no resurrection; you die, that's it. If you're really determined to stick around, you might be able to return to action as a ghost...

Though it is assumed your Exaltation will pass on to another. So it's not like you have to stop playing; you've just gotta make a new character. :smalltongue:

Rhynn
2014-04-19, 09:11 AM
Though it is assumed your Exaltation will pass on to another. So it's not like you have to stop playing; you've just gotta make a new character. :smalltongue:

I'm pretty sure there's only one RPG where character death can mean you have to stop playing (deadEarth). :smallamused:

Grinner
2014-04-19, 09:20 AM
I think the most fundamental problem here is that D&D 3.5 is played in ways it simply doesn't handle well.

High-level D&D is an entirely different game from low-level D&D, but this isn't advertised well. Characters keep getting more powerful, but they're not treated that differently in certain settings. As pointed out, spells like Teleport and Fly bypass certain challenges entirely. It'd be nice if the the spectrum of character power was demarcated a little more clearly...Sorta like how 4e does it.

MonochromeTiger
2014-04-19, 09:41 AM
I wouldn't say resurrection spells take the drama out of RP so much as they provide a means for what WOULD be a devastating blow to the party be solved with a temporary inconvenience to the returning person instead of conveniently getting a replacement who is suddenly a completely accepted stand in for the deceased party member in the next town or even in the same dungeon.

that said I think it would depend on the tone and gameplay the campaign has, a campaign with lots of deaths, of which I've heard there are quite a few from this forum, probably doesn't even involve enough life expectancy or attachment to a character for the death to have dramatic impact, everyone who might like the person is likely to get eaten by a dragon the next session or just joined after their predecessor met a similar fate the session before.

a campaign like most of mine which are in favor of story and character development over trying to kill off the characters doesn't really see much death to begin with outside of big fights or unlucky dice. and in that death can still have an impact despite being solvable with magic, the characters just saw their friend get killed in front of them, it takes a complete lack of emotion for that not to have impact for a character being roleplayed semi-accurately.

the ones I can see death having an impact (without messing with the tone or being reverted by magic) are campaigns in settings or involving rules that either prevent or hinder resurrection, and those are entirely reliant on the DM setting the campaign there and getting the players to understand that their characters probably won't get the chance to come back.

NichG
2014-04-19, 10:13 AM
Basically what you have is tension between 'conflict must be meaningful' and 'failure must be recoverable'.

Conflict must be meaningful - if it doesn't matter that you win or lose a conflict (or even more generally, if it doesn't matter in detail how you go about conflict) then it tends to feel grindy and boring. That basically means that if you screw up, there should be consequences (which might be 'we die' or 'the Elder Evil gets summoned' or whatever), and if you do well there should be rewards or things that you could not have otherwise (which might be 'you get to live another day' or 'the city remains standing' or 'we get to loot the bodies'). Of course, like everything else in a game, illusion can often work just as well as reality - the illusion that a lot is on the line can be fine, even if everyone knows they could just roll up a new character if their guy dies.

Failure must be recoverable - over the course of a long campaign, you're going to have maybe a hundred conflict events. If the campaign is to continue with any sort of regularity, it means that when failure does happen (because over a hundred trials, even a 5% chance of failure is going to crop up) the game has to be able to go on.

So one way this tension is resolved is 'here's a resource (gold, xp), failure consumes that resource (resurrection costs)'. Then the issue is that fluffing it as dying and coming back can destroy the illusion of meaningfulness. Part of this is that it conflates something that serves a particular dramatic purpose (the finality of death) with something that requires alteration for sake of gameplay. A simple answer is to go to systems in which being defeated in combat rarely gives rise to a 'dead' state - for instance, things where you're just knocked out unless someone explicitly administers a Coup de Gras (like 7th Sea), or things where you set a 'death flag' to declare that you're willing to bet your character on a particular conflict. Of course this can cause a feeling of a loss of realism (but I'd argue the actual loss of realism was when you decided to tell a story about veterans of 100 fair fights against equally matched foes - you've implicitly decided to talk about larger-than-life figures at that point)

Doing this also frees up character death to have a distinctive dramatic role in the story. Rather than a result of randomness, which often can feel out of place story-wise, character death becomes something that is the culmination of some sort of chain of events that make narrative sense. That is to say, if you have a CdG system, you die because you're facing someone who hates you enough to take the extra action in the middle of a fight to finish you off, not just because someone got a lucky crit or because 10hp is a tiny buffer at high level. If you have a 'death flag' system you die because for whatever reason, you decided this particular fight was worth the risk to win.

Of course, this is hard to square with 'gritty' games, so how do you do it there? You create a game where replacing characters all the time is somehow not disruptive, which may mean limiting plotlines to a certain subset or genre. Maybe what you could do is have auto-retirement: your character retires when he attains his goal or dies, and goals are assigned from a fixed list where if you don't die long enough they become somewhat inevitable. That way the standard thing is swapping characters every 5 sessions, death or not, and having a death is not particularly disruptive to 'the game must go on'. Alternately, there's the idea of having a stable of characters who are all somehow connected, so everyone gets 3 characters and the death of one guy is just motivation for the other two to step up and do something about it. That'd work well for a military-style game, for example.

Edit: Another tactic is, keep the resurrections but have resurrections always have a cost to the party's main goals/desires. For example, I've played in campaigns where every time someone comes back from the dead, the world gets a step closer to Armageddon (but it also gradually marches in that direction at its own rate, so the PCs must weigh the risk of death against actions which help stop the root cause)

Palanan
2014-04-19, 11:05 AM
Originally Posted by Rhynn
At the same time, some sort of returning from the dead is the norm in D&D (but not really in most other RPGs).

This may be the norm for most groups, but in ten years of 3.5 campaigns I've never actually seen a PC brought back. For whatever reason, in the groups I've played with and in the games I've run, it's simply not part of the landscape. Characters die, sometimes with angst and drama (in-game or otherwise), and new characters are brought in. From the few comments that were even made about the option, bringing back an old PC just wasn't worth the trouble to the group.

SimonMoon6
2014-04-19, 11:17 AM
I think it's a big problem. But I think another big problem is how easy it is to die in a D&D game, with all the "save or die" abilities out there. Death can happen just because you rolled low on one die roll one time.

I know back in 1st edition days, I made it hard (or nearly impossible) to resurrect characters, so there were some serious deaths. But then, you have to be careful not to kill people all the time. In a first edition game that I played in, resurrections weren't to be expected. And the DM had made it clear that my character was important, being called the "Chosen One". And then he met a beholder and got disintegrated, failing his save by rolling a 1. And so the DM said, "Um, no, you weren't disintegrated." Because "save or die" abilities suck.

But they are too ingrained into D&D to simply take them out.

Lord Lemming
2014-04-19, 11:29 AM
I think a fair trade-off to the 'no resurrection' rule would be a 'no save-or-die-spells' rule. If you mess up badly, or do everything right and are just really unlucky than you can still die, but you're less likely to die just because you rolled a 1 on that fortitude save against the one spell the enemy wizard cast before he got filleted by a sneak attack.

Calen
2014-04-19, 02:22 PM
Both the game I dm in and the game I play in have no resurrection. They are both 4e games so the save or die spells aren't there. If there were save-or-die I would probably be more lenient with the resurrection stuff but no one in either game has come close to actually dying either.

Pex
2014-04-19, 02:54 PM
The drama of a campaign is in the story. Winning & losing is a measure of accomplishing goals and dealing with Plot. Character death, with the exception of the Heroic Sacrifice, is a symbol of a failure to achieve a goal. Resurrection is a symbol of trying again. If PC death is happening too often then either players are being stupid, the DM is being a donkey cavity, both, or less cynically the players and/or DM Honest True aren't realizing errors of play and set-up which can be corrected.

If for you your character's death is a finality then enjoy your drama of story told. Other players may prefer wanting to continue on with the same character. They're so bad-a$$ not even Death can stop them. Neither is wrong.

Character death happens in stories contributing to the drama, but if it makes you feel better, nothing was taken away from "The Princess Bride" when the Hero benefited from a Raise Dead spell. :smallsmile:

Rhynn
2014-04-19, 04:07 PM
I think it's a big problem. But I think another big problem is how easy it is to die in a D&D game, with all the "save or die" abilities out there. Death can happen just because you rolled low on one die roll one time.

This is seriously exacerbated in D&D 3E.

In all older versions of D&D, your chance of being killed by a SoD effect (poison, spell, petrification, whatever) goes down as you level up, because your saves go up.

In 3E, the DCs rise as your saves rise, which means that only weaker effects (from creatures that aren't meant to be as challenging) are so dangerous.

(This problem also plays a part in making wizards so powerful in 3E. In older editions, blasting may actually be statistically better than an all-or-nothing SoD spell for dealing with e.g. dragons.)


I think a fair trade-off to the 'no resurrection' rule would be a 'no save-or-die-spells' rule.

ACKS has, in addition to the Tampering With Mortality table, a Mortal Wounds table, on which you roll after you've been "killed" in combat and receive help. It reduces the odds of dying (especially if you get good help fast), but certainly doesn't make it unlikely.

Anyway, as a rule I think that's completely unnecessary. Most RPGs I know have no raising of the dead, but also don't make death any less likely to compensate. The total effect is to make players think long and hard about getting into lethal combat. (The paradigm that that's the main content of the game is late-period AD&D 2E, D&D 3E, and 4E pretty exclusively - although I don't doubt most teens, especially now that we're all raised on video games, play all RPGs that way.)

Doorhandle
2014-04-19, 09:30 PM
This may be of interest. (http://www.adnd3egame.com/documents/E6Raising.pdf)

E6 in general, actually. I don't think any resurrection spells can be used at level 6.

Lord Raziere
2014-04-19, 09:52 PM
if you really feel that easy resurrection takes the drama out of it, try Eclipse Phase where everyone in society gets resurrected- in a way- if they keep their monthly payments up. there is tons of drama there.

heck, if you want drama about resurrection- just modify things a little so that a single question is asked about resurrection that can never be answered: "is the person who comes back, the same person who left?"

and that is all. :smallamused:

MonochromeTiger
2014-04-19, 09:58 PM
heck, if you want drama about resurrection- just modify things a little so that a single question is asked about resurrection that can never be answered: "is the person who comes back, the same person who left?"

and that is all. :smallamused:

this also works for bringing up a "wait what?" moment from players when discussing portals, teleportation, and other means of instantaneous or near instantaneous magical travel. however it loses this impact when they start deciding that it's at least someone almost exactly like the person that left if not exactly alike/the same person. you could always throw in something to further it and apply risk like for instance a resurrection spell not always getting the right soul back to the body and some strange and potentially dangerous person inhabiting the trained and trusted adventurer's body until you're ready to pull out the betrayal. it's drama, maybe not great or fair drama but drama.

oxybe
2014-04-19, 10:16 PM
D&D tends to assume the PCs wil be running into danger on a regular basis. Spells like resurrection help manage getting back into the action.

In a game where the PCs aren't expected to run into danger or those where the conflict is non-lethal in nature i'm fine with rez spells being unique situations. But in D&D and games like it, it simply lets the characters, and more importantly the players, get back into the game as quickly as possible.

It also doesn't stop tension, but rather helps generate a different kind that isn't just life or death on a personal level.

Failing to stop the Orc Lord can easily mean having the blood of those that died due to your failure on your hands. The warrior who died but got rezzed still has to live with that failure.

Effectively, it's all about expectations. In a game like D&D resurrection spells let me get back to continue playing the big damn hero so I fully embrace it's inclusion. In other games, I can see how it doesn't mesh with the assumptions of the narrative or players.

erikun
2014-04-19, 10:38 PM
Finally, anti-resurrection methods go a ways back (even the Vlad Taltos novels have soul-destroying weapons)
Simply severing the spine prevents resurrection in the Taltos novels, as well.

Ultimately, it's a question between death/resurrection being a significant event in the game and allowing a player to continue playing in the game. Remember, most characters can't act while dead. There is always the "they could play the NPC" response, but playing the party packmule or loaned cleric is not everybody's idea of a good time - and if they just bring in one of their other PCs, then how is the death relevant again?

Also, remember that setting time is not the same as game time. A ritual may require a month of preparation and preparing exotic herbs to resurrect the body, but it takes the same 10 minutes of game time as the priest just casting a prepared spell.

The trend of cheap-quick resurrection was to convenience the players, so that they wouldn't need to run back to town for the required resurrection (leaving players sitting on the sidelines) and then run back through the parts of the dungeon they've already explored. If you want to put a stop to that, simply make the resurrection spells take longer (a full day) or require being at a temple of the faith to work. Just realize that you're asking players to sit there and do nothing for awhile because of circumstances that might've been completely out of their control.

GrayGriffin
2014-04-19, 10:41 PM
I think Pokemon Tabletop United does it pretty well. Generally no one will die if you have enough healing items/classes with you, but some "boss" battles can push you to that point. However, there's only one "resurrection" feature, and it's in a splatbook that not everyone will want to use, since it deals heavily with the Legendaries as divinity. Furthermore, to get said feature, you need to take several other features corresponding to one Legendary beforehand, as well as complete a specific task they ask of you. And the feature can only be used a limited number of times as well, meaning you can't just use it willy-nilly.

Rhynn
2014-04-20, 04:07 AM
Ultimately, it's a question between death/resurrection being a significant event in the game and allowing a player to continue playing in the game. Remember, most characters can't act while dead. There is always the "they could play the NPC" response, but playing the party packmule or loaned cleric is not everybody's idea of a good time - and if they just bring in one of their other PCs, then how is the death relevant again?

That's a false dichotomy (resurrection or no play) and a strawman (there's no good NPCs to play)!

When my players lost 2 PCs in the first room of The Lost City, they played the henchmen - a fighter and a mage. One of the purposes henchmen (classed NPCs who advance slower) exist at all is to be spare PCs for when your character dies.

W3bDragon
2014-04-20, 05:30 AM
My gaming group always had this feeling that resurrection was far too easy by the rules. Over the years, we've tried various house rule fixes since we started playing 2nd Ed, through 3.5 and pathfinder. The house rules included: (commentary under each one)

* Resurrection is never offered in exchange for gold. A quest of epic proportions must be undertaken to earn a resurrection spell.
This was our original house rule. Deities would not grant the caster the spell for no reason. The players would decide if they wanted to go through the time and effort (and campaign derailment) of attempting to find someone who can resurrect, see if they have something worthwhile to further the goals of the deity that needed doing, go do it, come back and get the reward. While this sounded great on paper and for the first couple of times we did it, in the long run, it became too much of a hassle. We only bothered to attempt a resurrection quest for the most memorable and important characters. This of course caused disagreement on who was worth it and who wasn't. This system was eventually dropped, though I have fond memories of how it allowed resurrection to exist in the game, yet be completely out of the question the vast majority of the time.

* Resurrection doesn't exist. PCs are given a set amount of "life points" that they could spend to avoid death. Those points are determined at character creation (usually a d4) and never replenished. If they run out, you're permanently dead.
We played with this house rule for quite a while. Handing out life points at the start of a campaign generally meant that the DM is taking the gloves off. While it did help the resurrection issue, it did remove remove some of the drama when PCs put themselves in mortal danger. Characters would often retire with several life points to spare, essentially having a full adventuring carrier with never even coming close to death (because of spare life points). The issue of excess life points led to the development of the next house rule.

* Resurrection doesn't exist. PCs have 1 "life point" that they could spend to avoid death. 1 point is granted at character creation. If the point is used, it is replenished when the PC levels up. The PC can never have more than 1 point. If you die without a life point available, you're permanently dead.
This system was used for only one campaign. It worked rather well, giving every PC one backup in case the dice (or brain) doesn't cooperate at a critical moment. Every PC in that campaign used a life point at least once. It was effective, but it still felt a little like having training wheels.

* Resurrection is available only in reasonable places in exchange for gold or services. The cost is usually much higher than the book value. Essentially, two or three resurrections in one campaign can cripple the party's WBL, making everyone weaker.
As we started playing Pathfinder and fell in love with the Golarion setting, we felt it would be a bad idea to have a blanket "resurrection doesn't exist" rule in a setting that probably has resurrection established elsewhere. We left it in, and each DM had his own limitations in place regarding availability and price. The current campaign had 4 deaths so far. Two of them got ressed, at great cost, one wasn't ressed because the player left the campaign, and another wasn't ressed because of lack of availability of funds and a suitable caster. We're not completely happy with this situation either.

None of these have been completely satisfying. We're starting to feel that there simply cannot be a blanket house rule for this issue, because the danger of PC death varies significantly from campaign to campaign. What might work perfectly for one, would be woefully inadequate, or far too powerful, for another. Although we've yet to come to a final answer, I'm starting to feel that the answer will be different for each group, and even then will be different for each campaign. I feel that our first house rule, though it had issues, came the closest to solving the problem.

shadow_archmagi
2014-04-20, 09:36 AM
In Adventurer Conqueror King, the 5th-level cleric spell (called restore life and limb) has a time limit of 2 days at 7th level, up to a maximum of 30 days at 14th level, and every use requires a roll on the Tampering With Mortality table (which can produce failures or side-effects, but with great luck can also produce positive side effects). The 7th-level ritual resurrection is much more effective, has a limit measured in decades, but it can't be learned and must be researched, takes a week to cast, and doesn't automatically succeed (and no caster can ever know more than 3 rituals of a given level)

Actually, it's a week per spell level, so unless your chosen caster happens to have a premade resurrection laying around, you're looking at a two-months wait for your resurrection. (Although Resurrection can be prepared ahead of time.)




ACKS has, in addition to the Tampering With Mortality table, a Mortal Wounds table, on which you roll after you've been "killed" in combat and receive help. It reduces the odds of dying (especially if you get good help fast), but certainly doesn't make it unlikely.


Well, it does make it unlikely (Only a very poor roll or very extreme damage results in death) but players can get KO'd more often to compensate.



None of these have been completely satisfying. We're starting to feel that there simply cannot be a blanket house rule for this issue, because the danger of PC death varies significantly from campaign to campaign. What might work perfectly for one, would be woefully inadequate, or far too powerful, for another. Although we've yet to come to a final answer, I'm starting to feel that the answer will be different for each group, and even then will be different for each campaign. I feel that our first house rule, though it had issues, came the closest to solving the problem.

I'm actually a big fan of the ACKS rules and would definitely consider porting them into another RPG. I really like the multi-stage nature of it, because it means death is a lot less binary. Instead of 3.5's "Are you dead? No? You'll be fine tomorrow then" you have a wide range of injuries and ailments.

My party once decided to ambush a caravan of troglodytes that slightly outnumbered them (and more importantly, trogs are significantly tougher than normal men.) They knew it was a risky move, but the decided the trogs might have taken humans captive, so they were obligated to at least try.

Afterward, our thief was dead, our mage had a permanent crook in his back, our paladin had lost his lower jaw (on top of numerous other scars he'd accumulated; being a frontliner was really taking its toll on him), and numerous henchmen and mercenaries were dead or missing limbs. When we revived the thief, he rolled Came Back Wrong, and now his right arm is a bear's, giving him a big penalty to social rolls. (Our Mage had also died earlier in the campaign, and now his body hair grows several inches per day.)

In short, the party kept facing death and emerging scarred, but intact. Danger in combat became "I might get off scot free, I'll probably have an injury to deal with, and if I'm really unlucky I'll die" and death became "I might come back scot free, I'll probably have something weird to deal with, and if I'm really unlucky I'll permadie"

(Also, in ACKS rules, you don't get to just roll another level-appropriate character; your new character is either an existing henchman of the current one, or a new one with XP equal to the GP you've spent on RP stuff like drinking, gambling, and stamp collecting (I also really like this rule, because it encourages partying hard))

erikun
2014-04-20, 05:16 PM
Ultimately, it's a question between death/resurrection being a significant event in the game and allowing a player to continue playing in the game. Remember, most characters can't act while dead. There is always the "they could play the NPC" response, but playing the party packmule or loaned cleric is not everybody's idea of a good time - and if they just bring in one of their other PCs, then how is the death relevant again?
That's a false dichotomy (resurrection or no play) and a strawman (there's no good NPCs to play)!

When my players lost 2 PCs in the first room of The Lost City, they played the henchmen - a fighter and a mage. One of the purposes henchmen (classed NPCs who advance slower) exist at all is to be spare PCs for when your character dies.
It's hardly a dichotomy when I've presented more than two options (resurrect, no play, run NPC, run another character) and very hard to call it a false dichotomy when your attempted counterexample is one of the options I presented!

Yes, there are games where the player may be fine with playing the NPC. However, as I said, running an NPC rather than their character "is not everybody's idea of a good time." There are also games where the DM has some pre-generated characters for the players to run, rather than making their own. Not everyone enjoys running characters made by someone else! And not everyone enjoys running the weaker henchmen characters, or enjoys running characters of a particular class. For some people, running a character with few or no options would be equal to just not playing the game.

Spore
2014-04-20, 05:40 PM
You gave me a lot of neat ideas to think of. My point is actually that most ressurections spells are either negated by the method of death (you died by something called death effect, we can't use that spell) or impose not enough penalty. Two negative levels are just incentive to not "ress-loop" yourself.

I like the approach Rhynn told me about. Ressurection as gamble but I think it's too random because I already dislike SoDs. Solutions like Reincarnations (guaranteed ressurection but random race), mixing up attributes or changing your character (giving you bonus vs. saves on the spell that killed you and penalties to something different). Something that is a meaningful change that let's you or the world talk about your death.

"Oh I once was a fair elven maiden but this reincarnations transformed me into a Hobgoblin. I am on my quest to regain my former self." Ressurections should be used as features to improve the experience not just to be another thing to diminish ressources and nothing else. Heck, if you have to pay umpteen thousand gold pieces of gold then make the spell interesting enough to use over just creating another character.

Airk
2014-04-20, 09:38 PM
I had a lot of fun in a game where Resurrection was basically considered the same as necromancy for relgious/dogmatic reasons. That made things interesting. :)

DigoDragon
2014-04-22, 08:08 AM
I think a fair trade-off to the 'no resurrection' rule would be a 'no save-or-die-spells' rule.

In my group, our house rule was that a failed Save-or-Die roll meant you'd drop to -1 hit points and are dying. From there it's a matter of getting stablized/healed before whatever dropped you goes for a finishing blow. Gives the party a good chance of preventing your death, but if you died anyway, then that was pretty much it.



Character death happens in stories contributing to the drama, but if it makes you feel better, nothing was taken away from "The Princess Bride" when the Hero benefited from a Raise Dead spell. :smallsmile:

He was only 'Mostly Dead' :smallwink:

Slipperychicken
2014-04-25, 12:35 PM
I don't like resurrection either. Removing the finality of death throws off way too many basic assumptions about how the world works. The number and complexity of its impacts could fill textbooks. It's just not feasible to account for in the context of a roleplaying game.

kyoryu
2014-04-25, 08:35 PM
I prefer to have stakes in combat besides "PCs die!" so that failures don't have to equate to PC death.

You may not die, but the bad guys get away, or get the artifact you need, or you fail to stop the ritual and the whole world is consumed by the flames of the underworld and the game just turned to horror.

Stuff like that.

Of course, that's totally incompatible with linear adventures, so there's a tradeoff... no, wait, who am I kidding? That's just bonus!

Slipperychicken
2014-04-25, 08:40 PM
Of course, that's totally incompatible with linear adventures, so there's a tradeoff... no, wait, who am I kidding? That's just bonus!

Ever heard of a non-standard game over? Just restart the mission if you can't have the PCs fail in your lovingly-crafted campaign.

DigoDragon
2014-04-26, 07:54 AM
I prefer to have stakes in combat besides "PCs die!" so that failures don't have to equate to PC death.

There are fates worse than death. :D

Getting trapped in between planes without a way to communicate with anyone was one that happened to a PC. He eventually died from starvation, which from his perspective took about two months due to the way time flowed for him. Yeah, my players have never taken the danger of 'artifacts' seriously.

Agincourt
2014-04-26, 11:28 AM
Making death permanent will encourage players to avoid combat more. Depending on your play style, this can be a bug or a feature. Players will start looking for ways to achieve the objective without getting into combat. This can make preparation more difficult for the GM in that the players will always be looking for inventive ways to circumvent the designed adventure. Players may simply refuse to engage in an encounter that took hours for the GM to design.

Rhynn
2014-04-26, 12:15 PM
This can make preparation more difficult for the GM in that the players will always be looking for inventive ways to circumvent the designed adventure.

If you can't deal with players being inventive, you shouldn't be a GM. That's the best part of RPGs, especially as compared to books, videogames, etc. - the players get to participate, without artificial limitations, in creating the story and events.


Players may simply refuse to engage in an encounter that took hours for the GM to design.

Taking hours to design an "encounter" sounds insane - one encounter can't (or shouldn't) take hours to play, and if you're putting more time into creating a session than it takes to play a session, you're using your time really badly.

What you're describing are fundamental flaws in GMing style no matter what the nature of death is in a game. They're really common flaws, but they're still flaws.

Slipperychicken
2014-04-26, 12:34 PM
Taking hours to design an "encounter" sounds insane - one encounter can't (or shouldn't) take hours to play, and if you're putting more time into creating a session than it takes to play a session, you're using your time really badly.

What you're describing are fundamental flaws in GMing style no matter what the nature of death is in a game. They're really common flaws, but they're still flaws.

I don't know about that one. My brother would spend staggering amounts of time doing GM prepwork, and come to the session with seriously awesome and fun encounters.


Also, in D&D, encounters can definitely take hours to play. Especially if it's a long one, or the group is the sort which can't add its attack bonuses together.

CarpeGuitarrem
2014-04-26, 12:52 PM
I think that's just how D&D works. As you increase in level, more and more things that were once obstacles cease to be. Teleport means you no longer have adventures about crossing the dangerous swamp. Fly means walls no longer stop you. Once you have Create Food and Water, there's little to fear from a desert. Resurrection does the same for death.

I don't think it necessarily kills all drama, there are always other obstacles.

That said, if you don't like it, change it. That's what house rules are for.
Agreed. It certainly means that death is off of the table, insofar as a source of drama goes. You have to figure out what else comes in to replace it.

Agincourt
2014-04-26, 01:31 PM
If you can't deal with players being inventive, you shouldn't be a GM. That's the best part of RPGs, especially as compared to books, videogames, etc. - the players get to participate, without artificial limitations, in creating the story and events.

Not everyone has years of roleplaying experience. If some GMs need to learn on "easy mode" to get started, I'm all for that. In a perfect world GMs would be plentiful, and they would all be clever, quick thinkers. Alas, we do not live in a perfect world.

Slipperychicken
2014-04-26, 03:02 PM
Agreed. It certainly means that death is off of the table, insofar as a source of drama goes. You have to figure out what else comes in to replace it.

Not really. You can simply ban resurrection effects, or otherwise restrict them.

ericgrau
2014-04-26, 03:27 PM
Oh that's right. Pathfinder gets rid of any death penalties. Instead you get a mere negative level that you can fix after a week. That was a big mistake. They probably put it in because people complain about how horrible level loss is when you die. Well, that's the point. And it doesn't ruin you forever. You fully catch up in about 4 levels due to faster xp, and you partly catch up in the meantime.

Ya, just bring back permanent level loss after resurrection. Don't forget the extra xp for being behind.

And while quite bad it's not the end of the world to be behind a level or two. It's a sensible penalty. I would cap it at two levels though because beyond that is the point when it's difficult to contribute. Also keep in mind that differing optimization levels might effectively put someone a level or so ahead. Try to keep everyone more or less even in optimization and in general.

Spore
2014-04-26, 06:26 PM
Making death permanent will encourage players to avoid combat more. Depending on your play style, this can be a bug or a feature. Players will start looking for ways to achieve the objective without getting into combat. This can make preparation more difficult for the GM in that the players will always be looking for inventive ways to circumvent the designed adventure. Players may simply refuse to engage in an encounter that took hours for the GM to design.

I will force my players by telling them that combat will be deadly. Required battles (to advance the story) will be doable but everything else will be at least challenging or epic. If they want to murder the king, so be it. But they shouldn't wonder onto why the Inquisition wants their head (and WILL get at least the weakest member instantly).

This discourages stupid ideas ("Hey guys let's just screw this whole tribal society and then teleport right out") and gives well planned out ideas a greater feeling of success.


If some GMs need to learn on "easy mode" to get started, I'm all for that. In a perfect world GMs would be plentiful, and they would all be clever, quick thinkers. Alas, we do not live in a perfect world.

I don't need to be quick or witty. Just thoughtful and cool tempered. If people want non-stop entertainment they should honestly just play a shooter. If the DM requires to think he or she should be able to. I've had a few instances where the DM rushed and destroyed the immersion more quickly than a pink gnome riding a battle ostrich.

SimonMoon6
2014-04-26, 07:02 PM
Oh that's right. Pathfinder gets rid of any death penalties. Instead you get a mere negative level that you can fix after a week. That was a big mistake. They probably put it in because people complain about how horrible level loss is when you die.

I think it was part of their deliberate choice to eliminate any XP costs or penalties from everything.

Rhynn
2014-04-26, 09:01 PM
Not everyone has years of roleplaying experience. If some GMs need to learn on "easy mode" to get started, I'm all for that. In a perfect world GMs would be plentiful, and they would all be clever, quick thinkers. Alas, we do not live in a perfect world.

I have literally seen 11-year-old kids of no special talent or intellect run games off the cuff and everyone have fun. It's a matter of being stuck in a videogame/book/novel paradigm, which has nothing to do with RPGs and is really wrong for them.


a pink gnome riding a battle ostrich.

Well, that's going in my post-apocalyptic weird-science-fantasy setting.

CarpeGuitarrem
2014-04-26, 09:14 PM
Not really. You can simply ban resurrection effects, or otherwise restrict them.
This is true; I'm wondering to myself whether there isn't a better way, though. I don't usually like hacking into a game like that when there's a more elegant way to do it.

Quellian-dyrae
2014-04-27, 12:02 AM
I like resurrection for higher-powered games, as it's really just an appropriately epic ability. That said, yeah, it's rather too easy in, say, D&D. My personal ideal system for it would be:

First, you have revivification, which is honestly probably sufficient for most games. This would be a solid upper-level power...on par with long range teleportation, say. Basically similar to Revivify in D&D or the Resurrection Extra in M&M. You can heal people who are dead, within a very short window of death. Maybe a round or several rounds, certainly no more than a few minutes. That covers all the necessary game-mechanics functions of resurrection - you can mess up and get killed without it being the end of the character - without really removing death as a setting or story capability. If an NPC dies for plot purposes, unless there's a powerful healer right on hand, it'll stay dead. And it's still possible for a PC to die for real, if the healer can't reach the body in time, or is disabled, or they're separated from the party, or the rest of the group has to flee, etc. The exact window of time allowed determines if it's "you can be saved, but your healer has to act fast to do it" (a round or so) or "as long as the party comes out of the combat okay, you can most likely be brought back" (more on the scale of minutes).

Then, if you're in a really high-power game, you might have actual resurrection. But this is not only a high-end power, it's costly. Takes an elaborate ritual, probably imposes some lasting energy loss or other penalty on both the caster and the target, both the magnitude and duration of which scales if more resurrections are performed before the character has fully recovered, which should take at least a week or so, maybe more like a month. Probably requires some sort of specialization or independent research or whatever, it's not just something every high-level healer can get as a matter of course. Even then, there's still a relatively limited window of time when someone can be resurrected (generally a day or so, maybe up to a week for really powerful characters). So you still have to act fairly quickly, and if multiple people die, you either only bring one back or maybe you can bring back a few in succession, but you'll be heavily drained and not recovering from it for probably months. It still changes the face of death pretty significantly, at least among the powerful people of the setting, but not quite as much as D&D resurrection does.

Knaight
2014-04-27, 12:30 AM
Ultimately, it's a question between death/resurrection being a significant event in the game and allowing a player to continue playing in the game. Remember, most characters can't act while dead. There is always the "they could play the NPC" response, but playing the party packmule or loaned cleric is not everybody's idea of a good time - and if they just bring in one of their other PCs, then how is the death relevant again?
This is extremely dependant on the specifics of the game being played. If it's "four people walk into a dungeon to kill/get/place the thing" then bringing in another PC does make the death less relevant and the NPCs available are probably limited. On the other hand, take a more political game set within a city. Using an example from one of my recent games, say there's a merchant guild, the PCs are operatives of the guild who try to keep things in order. Say that one of the PCs has built up a personal connection with various nobles connected to the smugglers the merchants come into conflict with, and because they are welcome in those circles they are able to keep the smuggling down fairly well. Now say that their double life is exposed, and one of these nobles kills them. Suddenly, that set of contacts is gone. The smugglers guild goes from contained to a newly emerging threat, and the merchant guild quite possibly loses face. That's a pretty big campaign impact, and that's before even getting into everything about the character besides 'party role' stuff. You know, like the role playing aspect.


Not everyone has years of roleplaying experience. If some GMs need to learn on "easy mode" to get started, I'm all for that. In a perfect world GMs would be plentiful, and they would all be clever, quick thinkers. Alas, we do not live in a perfect world.
Railroad plots aren't "easy mode". They're a way to build bad habits, and likely just make pleasing the players harder. There are certainly things that veterans can do to make life easier on new GMs, but being railroaded is hardly a reasonable request. Inputting direction and life into the campaign when it stalls and similar things are much more reasonable. Not deliberately invoking obscure parts of the rules set then refusing to explain them is part of that. So on and so forth.

Plus, speaking as a GM - Characters doing unexpected things has never been an issue for me. I like having creative players, they make things fun. What I'm not so fond of are "baby bird" players. The term is from Fear the Boot, and it basically denotes players who will do nothing proactive in the game, and just expect the game to be shoved at them continually while they passively consume it - to the fitting visual image of an adult bird vomiting into the mouths of their children. Those make GMing far more difficult, and asking players to follow a railroad pretty much encourages this. I might be an odd case here, but I somehow doubt it.

In short - I don't think that it's a concern, and I don't think that this difficulty is a good reason to retain Resurrection mechanics in games that have them.

D20ragon
2014-04-27, 03:00 PM
Honestly, I prefer the Dragon Ball approach to Resurection.
It'll take a quest to come back to life, but the quest won't get tougher as you level up. So at really high levels it's just a matter of time before you come back to life.
I either use this or make the deceased character do a solo adventure as he or she breaks out of the afterlife.

ReaderAt2046
2014-04-29, 09:50 AM
Another option would be to attach story consequences to resurrection. For example, the Death Gate Cycle has resurrection magic, but because of the nature of that setting's metaphysics, every time you return someone from the dead, another member of the same species spontaneously falls down dead. So resurrection is an option, but only if the PCs are willing to have the deaths of random innocents on their heads.

Alternatively, have resurrection be available, have the PCs get used to having it, and then introduce a weapon or enemy that you can't resurrect from if it kills you. They will freak out epicly.

CarpeGuitarrem
2014-04-29, 10:35 AM
Railroad plots aren't "easy mode". They're a way to build bad habits, and likely just make pleasing the players harder. There are certainly things that veterans can do to make life easier on new GMs, but being railroaded is hardly a reasonable request. Inputting direction and life into the campaign when it stalls and similar things are much more reasonable. Not deliberately invoking obscure parts of the rules set then refusing to explain them is part of that. So on and so forth.

Plus, speaking as a GM - Characters doing unexpected things has never been an issue for me. I like having creative players, they make things fun. What I'm not so fond of are "baby bird" players. The term is from Fear the Boot, and it basically denotes players who will do nothing proactive in the game, and just expect the game to be shoved at them continually while they passively consume it - to the fitting visual image of an adult bird vomiting into the mouths of their children. Those make GMing far more difficult, and asking players to follow a railroad pretty much encourages this. I might be an odd case here, but I somehow doubt it.

Oh, yeah. I have to ponder the question of why railroads are considered "easy mode", and the first thing that comes to mind is "if there's a linear plot, then I don't have to worry about my prep being invalidated". But that's a bit of a tautology: "if I prep for a linear plot, then I don't have to worry about my linear prep being invalidated". You run what you prep.

Really, the better solution would be to develop better non-linear prep models, such as the way that Dungeon World works. To focus on prepping situations, not paths. That's why I'm so jazzed about the way that Fate Core sets things up; it teaches tons of useful techniques that players can use for building the story along with the GM.

Frozen_Feet
2014-04-29, 10:45 AM
Honestly, I prefer the Dragon Ball approach to Resurection.
It'll take a quest to come back to life, but the quest won't get tougher as you level up. So at really high levels it's just a matter of time before you come back to life.


Yeah, but what people forget about Dragon Ball is that after the quest becomes trivial, every villain is strong enough to destroy the magic eight-balls, the dragon they summon and the planet they're on.

So if the heroes fail to defeat the villain, they don't do much good.

On another note, if death is the only source of drama in your games, and the only bad fate your players are scared of, you're doing something wrong. There are whole genres of games where the risk of death is pretty much non-existent, don't you ever play those?

Rhynn
2014-04-29, 11:45 AM
"if I prep for a linear plot, then I don't have to worry about my linear prep being invalidated".

But that doesn't even work, unless you force your players back on the rails (the actual act/practice of "railroading") when they try to stray from your linear plot, which is horrible and wrong and bad.

It's so much better to just not make things linear (and it's less work per hour of play, if you do it right).

Slipperychicken
2014-04-29, 03:11 PM
Yeah, but what people forget about Dragon Ball is that after the quest becomes trivial, every villain is strong enough to destroy the magic eight-balls, the dragon they summon and the planet they're on.

There are also nasty dragon-guys who come out if they use the dragon balls too often.

Pex
2014-04-29, 11:24 PM
Making death permanent will encourage players to avoid combat more. Depending on your play style, this can be a bug or a feature. Players will start looking for ways to achieve the objective without getting into combat. This can make preparation more difficult for the GM in that the players will always be looking for inventive ways to circumvent the designed adventure. Players may simply refuse to engage in an encounter that took hours for the GM to design.

Considering many classes are built only for combat, re fighters, barbarians, paladins, etc., in this style the only ones who get any any fun out of their classes are rogues who get to scout and pilfer, spellcasters engaging in diplomacy, discussing shop, and casting utilitarian spells, and monks who get to roleplay zen enlightenment. Rangers do get to track something. It can put extra pressure on the cleric for healing to the point no one wants to play one.

If you want a combat-lite game, D&D is not the system for it. That is not to say Raise Dead must exist or else, but a desire for little combat at all campaign is not a strong reason not to have it.

Rhynn
2014-04-30, 12:03 AM
Considering many classes are built only for combat, re fighters, barbarians, paladins, etc., in this style the only ones who get any any fun out of their classes are rogues who get to scout and pilfer, spellcasters engaging in diplomacy, discussing shop, and casting utilitarian spells, and monks who get to roleplay zen enlightenment. Rangers do get to track something. It can put extra pressure on the cleric for healing to the point no one wants to play one.

That's nonsense. My players fight all the time in games where combat is deadly and death is permanent, and so do most other peoples'. It just means that they fight smart, and they fight over things that matter.

Gamgee
2014-04-30, 04:57 AM
No resurrection in my games. One wrong move and you can be fighting for your life. If you play smart and sensibly the rewards are yours (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9-QaIvjtBw) for the reaping though. It's funny I had a player come into the game who was a little "slow". He was given to being coddled in high school. He is also bad at math and generally had the memory of a goldfish. One of the funniest people I ever met though. Anyways not the point, so I wondered how he could ever get interested in one of my games. Naturally my player introduced him.

Well I did go a little easier on him. At first to ease him into it. Since he started playing with me since one year ago his skill has shot up considerably. He is a better planner, better at math, has more ambition, has grown a serious side but not lost the fun, and actually likes that he isn't coddled and force fed every answer. I'm not attesting he has become the best player, but far better than any would have given him credit. I like his determination. There was a phase where he was dying a lot, but he finally "got it" and has loved my games ever since. He is even starting to go outside of his comfort zone and start trying to play group face character more when no one ever wanted him too. Still has a lot to learn but getting better. I'm impressed because by all accounts his own friend made him seem to be an idiot. He even talked about himself with a great lack of confidence.

This has happened with another player as well and he is more average intelligence. He is learning quite well. He was very introverted and stuffy, and now is playing quite a skilled group leader and tactician. While not quite the best leader in the group yet he is swiftly making progress. On top of this he has learned to cut loose and have some fun from his over bearing parents who allow him almost no fun at all.

The trick is. As harsh as I seem, I'm not going to be going out of my way to kill you just because I can or am power tripping. Hell I might even give you some small breaks and you'll never know. It all keeps the atmosphere of hard challenges and survival. Many would call me very old school and even a bit of an *******, but so far I don't see anyone complaining. Hell they think my games are getting better and better. I always find it inspiring when I have players that actually learn from the games I host. I find it to be a sign I can take my games to a level few can get to. I'm not being preachy in the games either. I just have a way of challenging people and their perceptions of what things really are.

I've had some players walk who didn't like it, but overall I've been consistently complimented on the games I host.

I'm not going to tell any of them this though, as far as they know I'm just a fun loving GM who knows "nothing". I subscribe to the Shojo method of life. :smallbiggrin:

Edit
Anyways I forgot to tie this back to my main point. Challenge is necessary for the way I GM and a personal philosophy about life. Infinite lives removes such a big challenge about the game. Perhaps in only the most exceptional of games or moments could it happen. One of the greatest reasons the way we act the way we do is we don't know what happens when we die. We certainly have no evidence we get resurrected to keep partying. With death a very tangible thing it means players will think of unorthodox methods of solving challenges. They will role play character death. Some of my greatest moments have been high level characters who died. They were buried with full honors for their service. There was a passing of the torch moment, and they swore to get vengeance in character (Warhammer 40k). It led to some amazing role playing. This amazing Space Marine veteran who had been there at the start of the campaign 2.5 IRL years ago and for a hundred in game years dies. He had earned so many awards including the crux terminatus. The newer players and the player himself felt so lost for awhile. It really let them step up and roleplay a lot.

If I was going for a more comedic game (which I have done) then I would allow resurrection. Since it can allow for some whacky things. Not to say it can't be used touchingly as demonstrated in OOTS, but I often feel with players its too easy to make silly too quickly.

MrNobody
2014-04-30, 09:33 AM
I don't think that death takes the drama out... it simply moves it elsewhere.
Just like other said, there is plenty of way to make PCs regret they are dead even if they have an ally that can resurrect them in a sneeze. Heroes of horror can show you why!

I had a player that fell dead during a match inside the mind of a girl, where the "psycological trauma" they where trying to solve where embodied by a rakshasa necromancer (the girl was an half rahkshasa... long story). The necromancer killed him, then "raised" him as a ghoul.
In the end the group won but forgot to kill the ghoul in the only round they had between destroying the trauma and coming back to reality.
Result? The dead charachter wasn't dead but, when he recovered from his coma a week later, his mind was warped and still the one of a ghoul, with a forced alignement switch to CE.

Resurrection is an easy way, but not a secure one! Pure joy for the party paladin looking at the awakening of his beloved fellow (they are the last survivors of the original party, formed 7 years ago) with an evil aura!

CarpeGuitarrem
2014-04-30, 11:24 AM
But that doesn't even work, unless you force your players back on the rails (the actual act/practice of "railroading") when they try to stray from your linear plot, which is horrible and wrong and bad.

It's so much better to just not make things linear (and it's less work per hour of play, if you do it right).
Oh, yes. It's totally a self-perpetuating vicious cycle in that regard.

Pex
2014-04-30, 07:58 PM
That's nonsense. My players fight all the time in games where combat is deadly and death is permanent, and so do most other peoples'. It just means that they fight smart, and they fight over things that matter.

Which does not refute my point since you are not playing a combat-lite game, and I already acknowledged that Raise Dead existing is not a requirement.

Edit:

It is also fallacious thinking that just because Raise Dead does exist in a campaign the players won't fight smart or over things that matter.

Rhynn
2014-04-30, 10:16 PM
Which does not refute my point since you are not playing a combat-lite game, and I already acknowledged that Raise Dead existing is not a requirement.

I have no idea what you're even saying. Are you saying I am playing combat-lite game? Because that's not the case.

What you said was:


the only ones who get any any fun out of their classes are rogues [...] spellcasters [...] monks

That's nonsense and garbage, because combat-oriented characters in games with deadly combat and hard death get to have plenty of fun playing combat. That's simply an observable fact. Indeed, the only games I can think of where combat itself is fun are games like The Riddle of Steel and Twilight 2013, where it's both dangerous and involved enough to be fun.


It is also fallacious thinking that just because Raise Dead does exist in a campaign the players won't fight smart or over things that matter.

Nope, that's statistics.

Death is easy = players are more likely to fight as a first solution.
Death is hard = players are less likely to fight as a first solution.

In D&D 3E/4E, players are, on average, under less pressure to find alternative approaches or to fight smart to win/survive, so they're less likely to do it.

In games like TW2013 or TROS, players are, on average, under far greater pressure to find alternative approaches or to fight smart to win/survive, so they're more likely to do it.

Feel free to now pretend that I said that players always choose combat first and fight dumb in D&D!

Pex
2014-05-01, 08:09 PM
I have no idea what you're even saying. Are you saying I am playing combat-lite game? Because that's not the case.

What you said was:



That's nonsense and garbage, because combat-oriented characters in games with deadly combat and hard death get to have plenty of fun playing combat. That's simply an observable fact. Indeed, the only games I can think of where combat itself is fun are games like The Riddle of Steel and Twilight 2013, where it's both dangerous and involved enough to be fun.



Nope, that's statistics.

Death is easy = players are more likely to fight as a first solution.
Death is hard = players are less likely to fight as a first solution.

In D&D 3E/4E, players are, on average, under less pressure to find alternative approaches or to fight smart to win/survive, so they're less likely to do it.

In games like TW2013 or TROS, players are, on average, under far greater pressure to find alternative approaches or to fight smart to win/survive, so they're more likely to do it.

Feel free to now pretend that I said that players always choose combat first and fight dumb in D&D!

I was responding to a point made that not having Raise Dead might lead to combat-lite games and that it's a bug or feature depending upon point of view. I went further with that theme saying players of combat orientated classes won't have as much fun with their class abilities in combat-lite games because combat is the point of the class. I interjected my own opinion that the desire to have a combat-lite game is a poor reason not to have Raise Dead because of the problem with combat orientated classes. To want to play a combat-lite game I further opined that D&D is not the system to use. You're the one who brought in your campaign into the conversation. That it is not a combat-lite game, which I never said it was and acknowledged it wasn't, still has no bearing on my opinion vis-a-vis combat-lite games, the desire of such as a reason not to have Raise Dead, and the problem with combat orientated classes as a result.

Your italicizing of the words "smart" and "matter" while proudly claiming your campaign doesn't have Raise Dead puts emphasis on them, giving an impression of implication that campaigns with Raise Dead have players who don't play smart or for things that matter.

Rhynn
2014-05-01, 09:44 PM
You're the one who brought in your campaign into the conversation.

No, I didn't. I have no idea where you're getting this from.


Your italicizing of the words "smart" and "matter" while proudly claiming your campaign doesn't have Raise Dead puts emphasis on them, giving an impression of implication that campaigns with Raise Dead have players who don't play smart or for things that matter.

Where did I claim that? I'm running by-the-book ACKS at the moment, and raising the dead (restore life and limb) absolutely is on the table, provided the PCs can get access to and afford it.


giving an impression of implication that campaigns with Raise Dead have players who don't play smart or for things that matter.

This is all on you, dude: inferred, not implied. You can read anything into what I write if you try hard enough. If you try a little less hard, you might actually read what I wrote.


Here's the recap: deadly combat and/or hard death doesn't need to lead to combat-lite games. Indeed, games that have those can be a lot more fun to play combat-heavy (cf. TROS, TW2013).

A game where players choose to fight smart and fight over things that matter - possibly because the system encourages both - doesn't have to be combat-lite.

Pex
2014-05-01, 10:40 PM
No, I didn't. I have no idea where you're getting this from.



Where did I claim that? I'm running by-the-book ACKS at the moment, and raising the dead (restore life and limb) absolutely is on the table, provided the PCs can get access to and afford it.



This is all on you, dude: inferred, not implied. You can read anything into what I write if you try hard enough. If you try a little less hard, you might actually read what I wrote.


Here's the recap: deadly combat and/or hard death doesn't need to lead to combat-lite games. Indeed, games that have those can be a lot more fun to play combat-heavy (cf. TROS, TW2013).

A game where players choose to fight smart and fight over things that matter - possibly because the system encourages both - doesn't have to be combat-lite.

I don't understand why you are so vexed. I wasn't talking about your campaign at all. You quoted me then talked about your campaign. You brought the subject up, not me. I have no idea who you are and have no anecdote or reference as to why I should start any conversation about your campaign. I don't give a Hoover about your campaign.

It was Agincourt, not me, who offered that games without Raise Dead could encourage combat-lite games, a bug or feature depending on point of view. I just continued that thought with further opinion, emphasizing it's a "bug" if one needs to define it. Nothing you said in any way has any bearing on my original point - combat-lite games can cause players of combat orientated classes not to have fun with their class abilities, wanting a combat-lite game is a poor reason not to have Raise Dead because of that problem, and D&D isn't an appropriate system to use to play a combat-lite game.