Recently had a discussion with a couple of friends of mine about player death in Pen and Paper RPGs.

My stance is the GM shouldn't be out to kill the players but player death should be possible, along with losing gear and getting captured ect.

One of my friends think that player death should only happen at the very end and mostly not even then.

The other thinks you basically should never die ever or lose gear or anything.

I would be willing to only kill players in epic moments, but zero chance of death ever seems lame. Even worse is zero chance to ever lose your gear or get fucked over in some way. I feel like the players should be able to die. It shapes the role playing and makes the world seem more immersive. I've had characters die before, yeah it sucks but it can also be cool and further shape whoever was the one who killed them.

Edit: I'd love to hear how people feel and have felt when their own characters have died. Especially in situations where the campaign continued and you made a new character.

Where is the game?

If you're playing Pride & Prejudice, then staying alive is probably not often a relevant concern. Marriage and money and social status are the usual stakes.

If you're playing Dungeons & Dragons, then surviving the dangers posed by traps and monsters is the main challenge the game is about. Of course a buzz-saw blade the size of a millstone might kill you, or a fire-breathing giant turtle, or a wizard throwing lightning bolts.

THAT IS THE POINT! The game is in finding strategies to keep from getting killed while you abscond with the loot.

Quote from: Ellsminus;866695My stance is the GM shouldn't be out to kill the players but player death should be possible, along with losing gear and getting captured ect.

Right!

Quote from: Ellsminus;866695One of my friends think that player death should only happen at the very end and mostly not even then.

Wrong.

Quote from: Ellsminus;866695The other thinks you basically should never die ever or lose gear or anything.

Wronger. Wrongest. Wrong wrong wrong.

Quote from: Ellsminus;866695I would be willing to only kill players in epic moments,

Wrong. Don't give them an inch of respite. The life of an adventurer is fraught with lethal danger. And every time Death casts a shadow over the PCs is an opportunity to defy it.

Quote from: Ellsminus;866695but zero chance of death ever seems lame. Even worse is zero chance to ever lose your gear or get fucked over in some way. I feel like the players should be able to die. It shapes the role playing and makes the world seem more immersive. I've had characters die before, yeah it sucks but it can also be cool and further shape whoever was the one who killed them.

Right on the money.

Of course, different strokes for different folks, but at my table, I enjoy turning up the heat and seeing the players rise up to the challenge. I do run more than one game system and lethality can vary, but generally speaking, I like systems where the more unfortunate PCs can bleed and die in the mud, shanked by a goblin over a few coins, anonymous and forgotten.

PC death lends pathos to RPG sessions. It invests a PC's acts of courage, sacrifice or daring, of meaning. Every time PCs win a fight they have no chance of losing, you've thrown a paper tiger at them.

IMHO, YMMV, etc. But that's how Butch rolls.

Quote from: Phillip;866699Where is the game?

The Game is a fantasy setting we've been building for a few years now. I wont go into too much detail here but basically it involves magic, traditional weaponry as well as some more advanced stuff.

It surprises me that my friends are even taking this stance, we've always been committed to detail and rp and not hand holding.

These posts give me hope though, hope that I can convince them to come back to the light side. I plan to use some of the arguments you guys have made here to sway them. I particularly like the following.

Quote from: The Butcher;866704PC death lends pathos to RPG sessions. It invests a PC's acts of courage, sacrifice or daring, of meaning.

Quote from: Ellsminus;866705The Game is a fantasy setting we've been building for a few years now.

I think you probably misunderstood the question, but that is one possible answer: The game is in building the world, not in surviving live-threatening adventures.

The question I meant was, what aspect of this phenomenon is an interesting challenge? Regarding what do the players expect to choose strategies? What's the equivalent of scoring a goal? What's a loss?

A risk of getting killed might be a big part of that, or it might be about as relevant as it is to Golf (which is to say just an annoyance, if the stiff has balls).

Quote from: Ellsminus;866705I particularly like the following.

:hatsoff:

Glad to be of service. To be honest, I had similar trouble in the not too distant past, so I'm fresh off the learning curve.

I won't play in a game where it's made obvious my PC can't be killed by plausible threats. It just removes the thrill for me... any sense of danger is gone and with it any chance of feeling heroic or daring for facing that danger.
If I'm going into some dark hole in the ground, full of monsters and traps, I want it to be scary! Something a 'normal' person would never consider.
Same thing for wandering in the wilderness or exploring a city full of thieves and pirates and cultists. Some lesser threat (capture and losing gear!) just won't cut it.

Not that I want a 'killer GM' (never seen one in the wild) but I DO want consequences for my character's actions, mistakes and failures.

In superhero comicbooks, the aptly named Omega the Unknown is an exceedingly rare example of a protagonist who met (so far) permanent death in a rather anti-climactic way (shot by police who thought he was criminally assaulting a villainess). Marvel's original Captain Marvel (Mar-Vell of the Kree) died of cancer, but he got it in the course of dramatically saving the universe.

Lots of other heroes have died (some more than once) only to be resurrected and carry on; and one can never count on a good villain to stay dead.

Superheroes are one of the popular subjects for pen and paper RPGs. Physical combat is a central endeavor, but death for the heroes is hardly ever a consequence of losing the fight. Losing is itself a possibility, and the consequences of not foiling the evildoers' plans are usually pretty impressive.

Superman not only is not usually in any great danger of serious injury, but whether he can do X is rarely the interesting question; the interesting question is usually whether he ought to X, Y or Z when he must choose just one.

Maybe your friends want something like that, only in different trappings than the usual tights-and-cape genre. They can be swinging swords, but as demigods like Achilles and Herakles and that ilk. The appearance of a potentially deadly threat is rare, but can thereby be so much more dramatic because it can be a really high risk of immediate demise. If 'deadly' encounters are a dozen a session, then they can't actually be very deadly if you're going to have much long term character development.

But there's that question again: If piling up foes like a harvest of wheat is less a game than an entitlement, then what is the challenge? Or is it not really a 'game' in that sense that's wanted, but rather an entertainment made of wish fulfillment fantasy like a Hollywood movie?

Other people might want to play wily interstellar traders in a science-fiction game like Traveller. Getting shot may have about the roughly 1 in 6 chance of getting killed that it has on the real street, maybe more if you're blasted with heavy military firepower. However, you won't be losing a character every session or two because they won't be routinely putting themselves in the position of getting shot!

Quote from: Phillip;866710I think you probably misunderstood the question, but that is one possible answer: The game is in building the world, not in surviving live-threatening adventures.

The question I meant was, what aspect of this phenomenon is an interesting challenge? Regarding what do the players expect to choose strategies? What's the equivalent of scoring a goal? What's a loss?

A risk of getting killed might be a big part of that, or it might be about as relevant as it is to Golf (which is to say just an annoyance, if the stiff has balls).

I think I understand now. I am not sure they have really though their stance through on this topic, and what it might mean for a campaign and story. The game lends itself well to most themes, but usually we don't play 'chosen ones'. One thing they both love is monsters(which I am slightly less a fan of, preferring interactions with NPCs with their own wants and needs), but I find their stance on player death to be even more mystifying given the fact that they want to go into dangerous old school type dungeons with savage beasts and deadly traps.

Quote from: Simlasa;866713but I DO want consequences for my character's actions, mistakes and failures.

This is what I want as well. It doesn't always have to be 'you messed up you DIE!' but I want to feel like I am playing in the world, not being railroaded towards an ending the GM has decided.

Quote from: Phillip;866717Maybe your friends want something like that, only in different trappings than the usual tights-and-cape genre. They can be swinging swords, but as demigods like Achilles and Herakles and that ilk. The appearance of a potentially deadly threat is rare, but can thereby be so much more dramatic because it can be a really high risk of immediate demise. If 'deadly' encounters are a dozen a session, then they can't actually be very deadly if you're going to have much long term character development.

An interesting idea.

Quote from: Phillip;866717But there's that question again: If piling up foes like a harvest of wheat is less a game than an entitlement, then what is the challenge? Or is it not really a 'game' in that sense that's wanted, but rather an entertainment made of wish fulfillment fantasy like a Hollywood movie?

It's strange, I never thought they'd be saying 'I don't want player death in the game'. We never had any stipulations like this in the past while playing and it surprised me. One point they made was having a player die can disrupt the story. They don't like making a new character to take the place of one who died. Yes, a player dying does disrupt things, but I feel it should. There shouldn't be any guarantees about your life, your status, or whether you succeed. For me that's the fun. Otherwise I feel like I might as well play a video game.

I am currently compiling an email to them, using lots of bits from this discussion.

Quote from: Phillip;866717In superhero comicbooks, the aptly named Omega the Unknown is an exceedingly rare example of a protagonist who met (so far) permanent death in a rather anti-climactic way (shot by police who thought he was criminally assaulting a villainess).

Not only that but the boy hed been protecting on and off for a portion of the series later self immolates by turning the Omega power inwards rather than risk destroying the world as was the tragic cycle of the power. And hasnt been back either.

As for player death and loss. There have been a few threads on this with opinions ranging from "Hell No!" to "No Holds Barred!"

Personally I ascribe to the stance outlined in D&D and BX. The DM is not the enemy. But also not there to hold the players hands or coddle them. Lay down the clues to a solution and let the players make of it what they will. Use what fits the situation. If the players meet 100 orcs then there should be a way the players can deal with that. Ranging from fighting, to negotiating, to simply avoiding and/or fleeing.

It is mostly a matter of TASTE, of course.

Still, you might want to consider this:

- How long does it take to create a new PC?
- Is it important that you tell a satisfying STORY, as in, the hero must die in the final battle?
- Are the PCs SPECIAL? Do you lose something UNIQUE when the die?

For me, this is one of the distinctions between old school and new school games.

I'm currently playing 5e and taking a "middle of the road" approach, but the best options are very personal choices... I love OS games where death is always a risk when fighting powerful monsters, but not all my players like it.

Quote from: Omega;866727Personally I ascribe to the stance outlined in D&D and BX. The DM is not the enemy. But also not there to hold the players hands or coddle them. Lay down the clues to a solution and let the players make of it what they will. Use what fits the situation. If the players meet 100 orcs then there should be a way the players can deal with that. Ranging from fighting, to negotiating, to simply avoiding and/or fleeing.

I feel very similar. I feel like if the PCs are scouting an army and I say they spot 100 orcs and there are 3 or 4 of them, they have the option to fight or just slip away, if they fight I should be able to kill them.

Quote from: Eric Diaz;866728It is mostly a matter of TASTE, of course.

Still, you might want to consider this:

- How long does it take to create a new PC?
- Is it important that you tell a satisfying STORY, as in, the hero must die in the final battle?
- Are the PCs SPECIAL? Do you lose something UNIQUE when the die?

For me, this is one of the distinctions between old school and new school games.

I'm currently playing 5e and taking a "middle of the road" approach, but the best options are very personal choices... I love OS games where death is always a risk when fighting powerful monsters, but not all my players like it.

It is a matter of taste, and I want everyone to have fun (me included). The PCs are not special in general, although there have been exceptions to this in the past. I always want to tell a good story, but for me that means allowing the players to shape and change the world with their actions. As the GM I have killed a few characters, not a ton. We've had many campaigns where no PCs have died. I am not out to get anyone.




I'd love to hear how people feel and have felt when their own characters have died. Especially in situations where the campaign continued and you made a new character.

Well, communications of expectation is the key.

However:

"Once there was a city called Greyhawk.  People lived in it.  Some lived lives of quiet desperation, some just muddled along, a few trod the jeweled thrones of Earth under their sandaled feet, and many many many of them thought they were heroes but were wrong and died horribly."

Or alternatively,

"We don't know who's Luke, who's Wedge, who's Biggs, and who's Porkins.  We're playing the game to find out."

Or alternatively alternatively,

"Taurus of Nemedia and Conan of Cimmeria both thought THEY were the main character in 'Tower of the Elephant.'"

But Taurus of Nemedia was in a tale by Dunsany or Clark Ashton Smith!

The heroic/dramatic death is over-rated.

I was a big fan of the Sarah Connor Chronicles. And, spoiler, towards the end of the 2nd season, one of the main characters, Derek, is killed at a fairly random moment, quickly, without any kind of dramatic spotlight. Just a single, quick gunshot to the head and he goes down, and the action just continues right on. He doesn't even get to put up a good fight. It all happens too fast.

I remember the first time I saw that and the incredible impact it had. The heroic/dramatic death is so over-done, it's telegraphed and it's really a missed opportunity at having a lasting impact. And maybe it's not just the cliched nature. Maybe it's also because the nature of a "dramatically appropriate" death brings with it a certain sense of closure. In Derek's death, the audience is robbed of that closure. It's unsettling. The emotion lingers.

It would be a shame to close that off as a possibility. It would be ironic to do it in the name of being more dramatic.