When players die

As a veteran rpg player/GM of 30 years it's fair to say I've seen my share of pc deaths from both sides of the GM screen. What I haven't been able to do is figure out how to deal with the death of a player who by their own actions put themselves in a bad "no way out" situation and then blames me for the death. I am a firm believer that if you're up against an evil foe that foe will not "back off" or "take it easy" on players just because they screwed up. It may be only a game but if death is never a real fear than I think that takes some of the fun out of it.

The best way to deal with them is to sit down and explain that you weren't gunning for their character and that their own actions lead or contributed to their characters death. Give them some alternatives to what they could have done differently and then work with them to make a new character for the game. This should deal with most problems but not all. If it doesn't fix the problem then it may be best for you and the player to part ways. Although honestly, if a player is blaming the DM for a death with any hint of seriousness behind it, not the kind of playful joking that we all do, then there is a problem with the player. Yeah it sucks when a character you have put so much time and effort into dies, we've all been through it but with every death comes a chance to try something different, something new. Gives us a chance to have all the fun of establishing connections and creating memorable moments with the character. This is a game and while it is awesome for a player to get attached to the character they also need to realize that shit happens and shouldn't get all butt hurt over losing them.

When I saw your title I thought you were going to post about one of your players dying not one of the player characters. The fear of death in the game should real for the character (not the player-to much realism for my taste) otherwise it would cheapen the thrill of victory if they knew they would survive every combat.

Yep, I agree with both of you. I feel a parting of ways is the best for this "current" death due to the fact that there is no amount of talking that could convince him I wasn't "gunning" for him. Figured this could be a good post for all of us to vent about killing pcs & being killed as a pc.

Did he legitimately get killed in a fair fight? Or did you kill him by fiat for doing something "stupid?" There are two sides to every story. I bet he had other grievances about the game and this was the straw that broke the camel's back. I can also imagine that the player didn't have enough context to assess the situation and found it unfair when it was more difficult than he anticipated. Why couldn't "death" just be some other form of failure? Capture's a common one but not particularly fun in my opinion. Wherever possible, talk to the players about what failure conditions they're most comfortable with. As GMs we often assume failure = death, but that's an extremely limited view. And in many games, death means the player is put out of the primary mode of participation for an unspecified amount of time. That's a bitter pill to swallow if you've shown up to play a game and now you can't, so it's important to have a plan in place for when death occurs.

As a DM I find it necessary to explain PC death and party killing in my games up front with my players. I never "sacrifice" a PC unless I talk extensively about it with the player. It will have a driving point to the story and include ways to bring him back, They have plenty of ways of killing themselves. ( Not saying thats what you were talking about). I also make a point to tell them when I feel that they are putting themselves in "no way out" situation that death could result from their actions. Ex: "You realize that by doing 'X' action you would be exposing yourself to death, right" I DON'T discourage or STOP the actions but keep them informed. I find that this kind of communication has always helped in my games though frustration occurs it is never directed at me or held against me. If a player does die and the group has no means to bring him back ( I have written resurrection out of a few of my games or made it an extreme unnatural thing to happen and can be screwed up, players actually liked the mortaility they had.) I do mmy best to make sure that they are ok, and try to bring the fun and creativity back to them with new character creation that has tie in's with the story. Hope this helps =)

I lost a 12th level character in a game. I spent 2 yrs of game play and had a very well developed history and lost him to a simple spear trap and a monster. The context of the death is as follows: The group just got done raiding an evil overlords castle and while we all took damage non of us were hurt that bad. I went back down into the dungeon we cleared and was scavenging some items we found but left behind. I found a trap we missed the hard way by tripping it (I'm a fighter) and got pinned to a way with multiple spears. While struggling to get free (I was down to about 15 points) a carrion crawler crawled out of it's hole and started to feast on me. Sucks that I was a human and I failed my save. I could have blamed the DM for putting the carrion crawler in the dungeon that we were sure we cleared but I made the choice to roll with it.

I'm totally fine with killing players if they've pulled themselves into a situation that they can't get themselves out of; it happens and they have to understand that the "cavalry" isn't always going to come to their aid. I'm not harsh, I do give fair warning and hints beforehand but if they continue there's nothing I can do.

I have a pretty much standard way of handling this. When I was a BattleTech player in the 80s, character deaths were common, and since all the players were on active duty in the military with me, we all understood the idea that in military service you could lose your actual life so when your character was killed you just roll a replacement and move on. It was basically simple. Bottom line with D&D games usually I went with the idea that you re-roll a character at one level below your character. So that since D&D has tangible levels as measures of advancement you lose levels on death. I would not allow a character to play the descendent or relative of their character, that you could play those for characters of other players. I hated it when the High Level D&D character would go on an adventure, gets killed and his quote brother unquote shows up; All the same things and stats plus the player is demanding to inherit the "fortune" that the First Character had thereby enriched, and no sense of loss over the death, really a power move by the player to make death in the campaign have no significance. I feel there should be some power loss, or risk or dramatic consequence for character death. Nowadays I run a hard core hard sf Traveller RPG (2 campaigns on Roll 20, and one offline) and I really explain up front in the game ad or in notes about the game and how it will go- a social contract before the game that says character death while probably uncommon is in fact likely to happen to a few characters. If your game was Monopoly: How would you handle the death of the player with the top hat or the shoe? well you can't die, it's a token and all you lose is money or property. Similarly D&D, all RPGs are a piece of paper. So if you're player is having an issue with their character quote gunning for them quote to me this is bordering on a person who has loose psychological boundaries or is paranoid. Actors in movies play a character; This is on a piece of paper, the script. So we have a situation where a Director says your character dies in this scene. Or they rewrite the script, and your character goes from surviving the story to dead. The actor says right on, I play another character, I do not quit show business. thus roll up a new one or change games, or yeah quit roleplaying forever. Up to them. It's all fictional, so my reaction to hearing that you have a problem with your player is "your problem player is paranoid or has issues". If the player is saying "that you are gunning for them" they want you to feel guilty, that "you should then give them another chance" or something that's like some kind of dominance or power issue. Really that's just like they want to say you hate me, you owe me because you killed my character. I would say "So you know, I wasn't gunning for you, but you keep insisting I'm doing something that I'm not. In any case, this is all fictional and you getting in my face about your PC dying is not fun, and I run the game to be fun, so since you are not making it fun or helping it to be fun, I'm asking you politely to leave, and depart, realizing, you could stay if you drop these accusations. If in fact you do think I am "Gunning for your character" why are we even having this conversation?" So "drop this and press on and roll a new one" or "good luck and you depart." This is not "Another chance", this is You, as a player in my game, taking charge of you being in my game or not. Your choice, realizing if this "Gunning for you" stuff keeps up next time, I won't ask politely, you'll just be gone. Something along those lines. if at any point they keep it up, just say, "yeah it's not gonna work, good luck." More or less. Good luck to you.

I too thought this was a topic about when one of your players dies in real life and how do you cope with it in your game. Anyway, I think the OP is right on: If the players know in the back of their minds that character death is a real possibility, then that makes their victories all the sweeter. Conversely, if things don't go their way, they knew the risks going in. Learn from your mistakes and move on

I could understand if it was something that seemed a little unfair but I don't think any DM has ever gunned me down. For instance I had the really bad luck to be alone in the dark with my dog as a marksman in a campaign when my DM asked me to roll a spot check. I guess I failed about 3 in a row and then I got a listen check and before I knew something jumped at me. It didn't land its first attack but when I decided to have my dog attack it to give me a chance since I am not winning a hand to hand fight with a gun. Well the DM rolled and said my dog was too scared to attack it and after that I find myself pinned down by a large cat getting my face eaten off. I died needless to say but it was in a campaign with a hero point system where spending all the points I was saving for something else saved the character I had worked on for more than a few hours. Though as I initially asked by something that could deal my total health in one attack at that low lvl was there. I do understand that I could have saved points by using a lower buy out to bring me back up to 0 and out of the negative instead of failing my fort save and being to stuborn to use the points. Though I know that there are plenty of things I could have done different. I even joked about it saying I should have started shouting and waving my hands trying to be bigger as that is how they suggest you deal with animals in the real world. The only thing I had issue with and asked my DM about was how useless my combat companion was being too affraid to do his job and leading to my death. He explained it was a percentage dice roll and told me about it and that was the end of that. So after that rather long and pointless story I say yeah a little communication with the player about any issues they may have with it with a calm and rational mind solves most issues I think. If not I have met players and DM that were just too immature to deal with and sometimes thats all there is to that. Sorry for this being out of proper writing. I realize I should have broke this down into paragraphs and such but, I didn't intend at first for it be this long in honesty.

In the most recent post, I think that type of scenario is a very hard core "dice fall as they may" style, Some groups like it, some don't. In the end, That type of situation might be better handled by saying "Noises in the darkness." not just 3 spot checks since ambush at night by a cat is a horror theme, and failed spot check does not generate dread in the imagination of a player like noises in the darkness might. EVEN IF the cat can sneak up noiselessly. Not really gunning for you, as a player but in my mind, kind of flat. Have the dog alert way long before, their hearing and smell are dozens to hundreds of times better. dog runs off, gets mauled. you hear noises and dog howling. Could have been done better, for more dramatic effect, so that the PC is fleeing, running for thier life, chased, call the comrades, yell for help. Much more fitting, I think. Otherwise it's just a gotcha, you're dead kind of style.

Personally I head off discussions over PC deaths by making it pretty clear right off the bat that death can happen. Anyone who wants to play on god mode knows that this is not happening with me before we start playing. That said, I'm definetly not gunning for players and if the players took a smart course of action but are getting horribly unlucky I will likely tweak the monster's rolls a bit in the players' favor. For example, let's say Hrenthgar the Barbarian and his 3 friends are battling 5 Orc Scouts and none of the players manages to roll anything but critical failures. Now, our Barbarian has 5 HP left and gets critically hit for 20, which would bring him below -10 (which is death). In this case, I'm likely to say "you get hit for 10 HP, you are now at -5, unconscious and the Orc turns to the next target that is still standing". This is why I always make my DM rolls hidden. Not so I can screw the players, but so I can unscrew them if I can justify that in any way, shape or form. On the other hand, if Hrenthgar the Barbarian notices a group of 50 Orcs on their way to raid a village, and he decides to attack... Sorry, I can't do anything for you there. That is no longer being incredibly unlucky, that is just stupid. Overall I try to make PC deaths meaningful and rare. But not impossible. At the end of the day, you gotta know which game you're playing. Are you playing the disney version, where only the protagonist's parents are likely to die? Are you playing the game of thrones version where everyone had best bring a stack of PCs? Or are you somewhere in between? Let's say, the original star wars movie version. Obi Wan Kenobi dies a pretty meaningful death and I try to make PC deaths, if they happen, have a similar impact. Ideally they'd only fall in fights against worthy foes, not by rolling a 1 on a save vs an arrow trap. At the end of the day, you just need to be on the same page as the players. There is no right or wrong answer here, imo.

GMSoftin said: The game started with a nighttime raid on our camp, so my unarmored fighter walked out of his tent, looked out into the darkness and yelled "who's out there?". The dm then rolled a 19 on a spear throw instantly killing my pc (human, couldn't see in the dark, no negative hps as that's an option). So, that's half an hour of work for 2 minutes of play And let's not forget Classic Traveller. You could spend a happy hour rolling up a PC, laying down a loving back story, and then have him die before character generation ended.

heh, thats why i run mongoose Traveller here.

I remember a futuristic game of Mage: the Ascension I ran a while back. One of the players joined in the second session, so we had a scene linking him up with the party. He was a Euthanatos mage (death & entropy), and his primary weapon was a laser scythe which was essentially a quarterstaff while switched off. Two of the other players were Akashic Brotherhood (monks). One challenged the newcomer to hit him with the staff as a condition for joining. The Euthanatos guy rolled to-hit, succeeded, and dealt 0 damage; but the condition was hitting successfully, so the AB was ready to let him join. Then the other AB (with a higher rank in Do, making him a higher rank in the Brotherhood) stepped forward and offered the same challenge. The Euthanatos mage rolled his eyes, pulled an uzi out from his jacket, and unloaded point-blank with full auto. The AB said he wanted to use his Connection sphere to make the bullets warp around him. I stared at him and basically gave him the Common Sense merit on the spot, telling him that he'd get huge amounts of Paradox and if he succeeded on the spell he was casting, all the bullets would hit the first AB. Everyone at the table was telling him to use his Entropy sphere to make the gun jam. He didn't listen. He rolled for his Connection spell... got 0 successes, and rolled three 1s. Not only did the spell fail, it forced every single bullet to hit him, turned them into explosive ammo, earned him a buttload of Paradox, and he suffered Paradox backlash. Because it was so early into the campaign, I used gm fiat to keep the character alive, but his companions were not happy with him, at all, and he certainly would have died if I hadn't intervened.

Honestly I think we owe it to the players to be consistent and to be true to the game and world. For example I create a game/dungeon/etc. and I know what will be in there. They are n't going to raid the legendary dreaded necromancers tomb of legendary legends and fight minion level skeletons because they are not using their heads. Stuff is going to be tough. If they are facing down an army, they will face down and army. They need to figure out a way around that. I always provide them with options. Take for example our latest game... The players are trying to stop the Bad Guy from getting the Bad Stuff. We have 5 players,a nd it all scaled accordingly. In their travels they find out that Henchmen 1, major lieutenant . of the Big Bad is near by. They find the tower he is in and have a number of options. They are strategizing how to get in to kill him without bringing the army down on them when 2 players drop. They don't come back. So.... our now group of 3 decides to storm the tower. Yup. Anyway, they get inside. I decide to 'allow' 3-4 of the stationed patrols to be out at the time, leaving only a skeleton crew. Anyway they know this Boss is in the dungeons, and there is no way out. They have been warned in and out of character that this guy is tough. He was actually built for a later encounter, at higher levels with all 5 players. They are not meant to fight/kill him now. Instead of say burning down the tower on top oh him, ambushing him or what not they do the typical party dungeon crawl looking for him. In all honesty they should have died. he had the capability. However, when they did find him they had good team work. i had removed some of his cronies as it wasn't the parties fault they weren't at full strength, and he did not maximize his abilities. Still, we had a couple incapacitations and it was very close though in the end they won. I didn't intentionally kill them, or keep them alive. I think they appreciated that, and it's a fight they will talk about for a while. I think they just don't want to die randomly, with no hope. However, if they just do something really really stupid then yea, go ahead and kill them. :)

The real problem with character death is that in many games it removes the player from the primary mode of participation for an unspecified amount of time. Take D&D for example: My character dies. Now I'm left to sit there and do basically nothing until my character is either raised (is that feasible given the circumstances in-game?) or I can create and introduce a new character. Character creation is at least in my control but stuff like raise dead or getting to a suitable point in the fiction where the DM/other players will "allow" me to bring in a new character is not. And even character creation could be an issue in later editions of the game where complexity means a longer character creation time. All those things can mean a player is just sat there, put out of a cooperative game, until...? So I think it's important to think of character death as death of player participation . On that basis, it's very easy to see why a player might be disgruntled and why it's very important to plan for it as a group. One way to do that is by establishing trapdoors early and often. "Trapdoors" is a technique TV writers use to introduce "feature" characters (as opposed to PCs who would be "leads") early and often such that if an actor leaves the show, they can have a feature character become a lead and step in to fill the absence. In the context of an RPG, these might be hirelings, henchman or other NPCs. The player creates a backup character which stays in the background most of the time but is familiar to the group such that when the PC dies, it can step in right away and keep the player participating in the game. Of course, if the player doesn't mind sitting out, that's cool too. The important bit is to offer that as a choice, rather than an indirect punishment. That's just a matter of planning for it since it does happen. And what's cooler is that if you plan for it, you can stop fudging or manipulating events/mechanics to avoid it. You can start to have fun playing to find out what happens rather than controlling events to avoid potentially problematic issues.

Frequently, in games I've run, the players have 2 characters because they don't have a well-rounded party with just one each. So, if one character dies, the player still has the other one to control and keep participating in the game until they can get back to civilization and try for a rez. But regardless, everyone I've ever played with knows there's a chance for character death. And if that's your only character, then you're out of play until the others can get you raised.

Hmm. At our table, we've agreed that the moment a PC dies, and there's no way to bring him/her back by next session, the player simply rolls up a new one and bears it. We've all experienced a PC death after we've invested time and emotion into him/her, and we've simply decided to let him/her live on in legend among the surviving PCs. It makes for some good role-play opportunities, for PCs to sit around a campfire and tell stories of their fallen comrades to a new member, familiarising the character with the party and making things fun in general. Good stuff.

All good input. In the end, him blaming you is perhaps a personality problem he has. At that point my newest idea on this is to poll the group, via notes / secret ballot. Did the GM go out of his way to kill the PC?. If all vote yes, hand it over to someone else. if All vote no, remove that guy, he's a problem, and it's his problem. 50/ 50 Ha! no solution.

My main problem with treating PC death as something that shouldn't be fudged slightly is that I want PCs death to mean something, not just be the result of random bad luck. Sure, if one PC is doing really stupid things or start acting as if he was invulnerable, I wouldn't hesitate much but always at the back of my mind would be: is this death of any use to the campaign, is it fun for the player (and others)? For example, take a group of 4, level 1 equivalent. You spent a week defining their characters and story, sorting their stats and everyone's pretty hyped. They just started their adventure and find themselves facing a pack of weak wolves you're just using to make sure everyone understands the rules of combat, set up their token, etc. The goal of the encounter is clear: quick rule check early on so that questions can be answered. Now, your players have CRAZY bad rolls and since you didn't much think about it and have an habit of rolling everything in the open, you can't fudge much without it being obvious. They ALL DIE....20 minutes in your first session, they're dead, just because you rolled 3 crits in a row... What was the point? Sure, it's "fair", but what did this serve apart from you making clear that "death can happen". Unless you're all used to play together for some time, some might end up going "screw this", others might want to just take the EXACT SAME PCs again and start over while others need another week to design new characters. All in all: complete...waste..of time. Now, if the GM start fudging rolls to make sure nothing too bad happens, players might also start feeling that nothing matters and do some crazy shit. To me, that's not a solution either. My personal take on this is, though you need players who can understand their PC and role-play properly: 1) Destiny (or Fate) I try to treat PCs as having a potential destiny ahead of them and that's why we all gather to tell their story. How does that manifest? Well, first, by not fudging rolls, but by adapting what they mean. For example, with the wolves, if you see that they are completely overwhelming the PCs, start focusing on what would such wolves do that you could use to slightly push the PCs destiny ahead. If they down one PC (using D&D next here as example, he'll need to stabilize), it might drive the others into a feeding frenzy, causing them to behave irrationally, rush toward the downed PC and start eating one of his leg or hand, etc. This is still logical in context, involves no die rolling and can give some room to breath for others. Wolves in such frenzy might totally ignore things like opportunity attacks and the like, they might get disadvantage on their defenses, etc. If things keep getting from bad to worse, let them fall, and as they do, a group of NPCs, who maybe have been tracking these wolves, arrive on the scene. 2) Role-play over dice rolling This one is simple but basically, always treat a clever, in context action that a PC tries to do, over a simple success/fail dice rolling. For example, if things start to go bad and one of the PC grabs a burning log from their camp fire and start yelling and trying to scare the wolves away, even if his roll is terrible, give it some room! A success might mean, well, it worked but a failure might mean that the wolves retreat a bit and start circling the PCs, which again might give them time to breath. 3) They are things worst than death If you think you players can handle it, I love this one. Basically, death is finale (usually), but there are worst things that can happen while keeping the PCs in play and, at the same time, mark them for every single session after that. The wolves don't have to kill per se, though they could maim the PC quite a bit, maybe even taking a hand, or scarring (and scaring) him for life. The orcs don't have to kill either, but take the PCs as slaves to abuse and maybe sell to some other party later on. The spiders don't have to kill on the spot, the PCs can find themselves waking up some time later, cocooned in the spider's lair. If you mix all these, you can get very dangerous fights with PCs being really scared, and at the same time, not have them be finale. The wolves attacked in the middle of the night and quickly overwhelmed the PCs. As they are falling unconscious, wolves slowly eating a leg here, an arm there, they can hear faint human shouts, sounds of combat, wolves running and finally a face over them, with a worried look saying: "don't worry, it'll be alright...". Then you deal with the semi-long lasting effects of this in both role-play and game term and now you have your players scared because you didn't pull punches and they lost, their PCs with a firm ground in the world and marks to prove it and yet relieved because it didn't end there.

Anytime you are not using the mechanics in a way the rules (or house rules) prescribe, you are cheating or fudging. It doesn't matter if you say "well, I'm 'roleplaying' so I don't have to use the dice." That is a misunderstanding of the role of the game mechanics as well as what "roleplaying" is. Roleplaying is just this one thing: making a decision your character (or NPC) might also make given the in-game context. If you decide that you're going to attack the wolves that are attacking you, and that's something your character would also do in context, then you're roleplaying. That you are rolling the dice to resolve that attack has nothing to do with "roleplaying" and everything to do with using the game mechanics in a way that are prescribed by the rules (or house rules). Failing to do so for any reason is cheating. "Roleplaying" does not inherently trump the use of the game's mechanics. Game mechanics support conflict resolution brought about by roleplaying. If you "allow" a player to avoid a roll just because they gave a flowery speech or offered a creative solution (neither of which are inherently roleplaying), you're fudging. Whether or not your group is okay with this is a separate issue. I make no judgment as to that. On that basis, I can't agree with #1 or #2 above. But #3 is a different story and it's a good solution. As DMs, we frequently fall into the trap of using only one form of failure in our games: death. It's an understandable conclusion but at the same time an extremely limited view that puts players outside of the primary mode of participation with the game. There are many forms of failure, just look to all the protagonists in movies and literature as an example. It's just a matter of scene framing and playing to the goals and motivations of the PCs and NPCs. If you put those first and make sure they are clearly defined for your NPCs, then killing the PCs frequently makes little sense (at least as a primary goal). The wolves only want food and they aren't willing to die for it, so they flee when bloodied. Or they take the PCs offer of rations with a successful Nature check. If they take the PCs down, they eat whatever was cooking on the fire and the PCs' rations, which they definitely needed to get through the Iron Pass in a timely fashion. The PCs have been defeated, not killed, and they can continue forward with a complication: no food and little time to hunt considering the time constraints of their quest. A dramatic scene is about the goals of two or more sides coming into conflict. Look at the motivations of your NPCs and monsters more closely. What do they want? What are they trying to accomplish? I bet more often than not, that thing is not "to kill adventurers at any cost." Once you start thinking this way, you can start to imagine failure as more than just death and still be in keeping with the rules of the game. Your encounters also become more challenging and dynamic because instead of locking up and fighting until one side or the other is ground down, NPCs and PCs are trying to achieve their goals by whatever means necessary of which fighting is only just one of many means. Even if players know that death isn't even on the table, they are still fully engaged because it's a credible conflict that is tactically challenging. The threat of death is just one of many tools that can bring about the dramatic tension DMs are frequently seeking. So keep death in the game for when it really matters, plan for its occurrence, and consider other ways of getting that same tension without putting a player's participation in the game at risk.

Case in point... A guy in a game reserve got attacked by a mature brown bear. In the melee, he grabbed the tongue of the bear with both hands and held on for dear life. (I don't want to even imagine the DC he had to roll to succeed on that in real life). The bear was trumped...any closing of the jaws now resulted in severe self inflicted pain. The bear's self-preservation nature kicked in and it made a run for it, the guy realising this, released the tongue, and survived the ordeal. True story. Google it. The point I want to bring home is that the bear had self-preservation deeply ingrained in its nature. Unless cornered, it will NOT stay and fight to the death... a small piece of fact many DM's often forget, suffering from what I call "to-the-death-syndrome". That said... There are many ways to mitigate player death, but in most (if not all) of the deaths I have witnessed in my groups, one of the following was the real cause: A retiring player. (A long time player in our group relocated and in his last session our DM indirectly gave him a choice, he chose a valiant death saving a village in the process.) Player stupidity. (Charge into that Neogi lair alone will you? OK, lets roll for initiative.... true story). Getting rid of a disruptive player insisting on sexual themes after warnings. (No, you cannot go rape the wife of the guard that arrested you.) The plot twist resulted in a situation sort-of similar to "Sophie's Choice". (One of you have to jump out of this airship in order to give the remaining a chance of survival) or (Players are captured and one player have to choose who of his party will get to live and who will die). The last bullet was in a once-off game with ad-hoc characters where it was upfront stated that the game is heavily scripted and if the players miss a plot NPC or fail to interact based on given clues, the result will be painful. In none of the games I have DM'ed was the situation of such a nature that actions or plausible interference could not be used to mitigate player death with a positive outcome. I have never allowed a bad dice roll result in insta-death, let it have consequence, but that consequence does not have to be death. One of the duties of a GM is to ensure the fun keeps rolling.... finding that balance between risk/reward and making survival plausible or better, believable, is the challenge....and one of the marks of a great GM.

I must be weird because the fact that death can happen at any time is to me rather exciting. Do we all want our characters to die in some awesome way that will be remembered in stories for decades or longer? Sure, everyone wants to be a hero. Yet at the same time as long as your character has been with the group or in the game for a decent period then their death is going to affect others. If you are in a group and die (due to dice hating you or the like) and your party forgets you or doesn't seem phased by it then that says something about the players, not the game itself. If bad luck is what kills your character than that is as decent of a reason to die. Just in the example above about the guy and the bear. It was pure luck that prevented him from meeting his end. If luck had not been on his side and the bear swung one of his big paws at the man, that story would about a guy that grabbed a bears tongue and then got mauled. Luck makes an interesting story when it is on our side and it makes just as interesting a story when it is not. We all have interesting stories in our lives where bad luck struck us or someone we know and made it memorable. Do you think people killed in real life by simply being at the wrong place at the wrong time wish they died fighting off terrorists to save the world? Fuck yeah, who doesn't? It does not however make the story of their death any less gripping or compelling. As for player participation being a negative reason to kill, I mean yeah it kinda sucks when you aren't in the game but at the same time it happens all the time in game just for different reasons and lengths of time. When a rogue attempts to disarm traps or pick locks...the other players may not be doing anything other than waiting for him to finish. When the face of the group is using his silver tongue to worm the parties way out of being eaten by ogres or sentenced to death or what have you...the other players may not be doing anything other than letting the face work their magic. Hell if your character is the only one to get knocked out by the poison you have to sit back and watch for any length of time. If the death happens and you can use the trapdoor technique offered by Headhunter to serve as a temporary fix then go for it, the player can even temporarily play one of the villains which leads to some awesome fun. However if the player is waiting to be brought back to life and you don't wish to allow the player to control a monster or another npc then he just has to wait. It is like when you introduce a character to the game, sometimes you can introduce them quickly other times you can't. The player can still have fun by watching the game unfold in front of him, being a spectator is almost as much fun as being in it. If it isn't then your game is probably boring and that is an entirely different subject.

Phisto Roboto said: As for player participation being a negative reason to kill, I mean yeah it kinda sucks when you aren't in the game but at the same time it happens all the time in game just for different reasons and lengths of time. When a rogue attempts to disarm traps or pick locks...the other players may not be doing anything other than waiting for him to finish. When the face of the group is using his silver tongue to worm the parties way out of being eaten by ogres or sentenced to death or what have you...the other players may not be doing anything other than letting the face work their magic. Hell if your character is the only one to get knocked out by the poison you have to sit back and watch for any length of time. I think there's a significant distinction between being out of the spotlight for a short period of time tied to intended combat pacing (say when you're stunned (save ends)) and being out of the primary mode of participation until DM (or the rest of the party) says so e.g. "We 'can't' bring in a new character right now because it wouldn't make sense" or "I can't cast raise dead right now." Those last bits are total cop-outs solved by imagination. A rogue attempting to disarm a trap or pick a lock takes literally seconds of real time to transact even if it's minutes of in-game time. If it's a greater challenge on par with a skill challenge, then that should have room for everyone to participate or it's a DM fail. The whole concept of the party's face also comes from a DM fail. It's predicated on DMs that ask for too many rolls outside of dramatic situations. It's an outcome to a specific approach that is common but unintended by the game mechanics. People don't talk because they think there will be a roll and they're trying to mitigate failure - take away the roll and *surprise* they start talking! Rolls only happen when it actually matters for a dramatic conflict. If you're doing something other than that, you're going to get outcomes like the party splitting up all the time or people out of the spotlight for long periods. This is not what the game intends. Of course, if you enjoy it, keep doing it. I just wanted to point out that those examples have origins that are not based in the game's intended outcomes but rather on specific DM approaches. If the death happens and you can use the trapdoor technique offered by Headhunter to serve as a temporary fix then go for it, the player can even temporarily play one of the villains which leads to some awesome fun. However if the player is waiting to be brought back to life and you don't wish to allow the player to control a monster or another npc then he just has to wait. It is like when you introduce a character to the game, sometimes you can introduce them quickly other times you can't. The player can still have fun by watching the game unfold in front of him, being a spectator is almost as much fun as being in it. If it isn't then your game is probably boring and that is an entirely different subject. My position is that this should be at the choice of the player who is forced out of participation, not the whim of the group or the DM/other players seeing the in-game context as "impossible" to bring someone in. If the player wants to sit out and observe, that should be his choice. If that's not his choice, he should be brought back into the game immediately in my view. Nobody should be putting their participation in the game on the line unless they've chosen to. I make sure players in my games understand that it's completely their choice either way since I'm very much interested in them participating in the game. That seems to be very well-received.

TL;DR; - Don't be afraid to kill a PC just because you don't want to upset the player. The player may in fact end up much happier and/or learn a valuable lesson. As a player I was once very upset when my character didn't die. The class was experimental and I agreed to try it knowing full well he would never be a major combat character. The character was chronically low on HP after rolling all ones for HP. The encounter was level appropriate with just two big critters. The character in question had 4 or 5 max hp and may have taken a couple points of damage earlier from excessive curiosity (his weakness). The fighters in the group had around 20 or more max HP. Other characters were around 10+ hp. The character in question had been useful in combat at the early levels, but we had hit a level (4 maybe?) where he crossed a line from moderately useful to completely useless in combat. The best I could do was a 10% chance to hit for 1d4. The fighter was doing things like cleaving 4 enemies a round on a regular basis. The character didn't have any useful buffs, debuffs or heals. Pretty much the only useful spell was levitate. Coupled with armor and weapon restrictions the character was not suited to combat at all. In the encounter in question, rather than just hiding behind a rock the character stabbed whatever it was with his dagger. Even a perfect hit would not have changed the outcome of the combat (so that was a poor tactical choice). Then he was counter-attacked and hit with a critical. I remember saying "Whelp I'm dead for sure." I was ready to just write off the character but instead he lived. I strongly felt the DM fudged the roll (especially when he asked how many HP I had before telling me the damage.) My character was useless, weak, stupid and deserved to die. I was roleplaying badly and I had chosen skills and spells badly. The character should have just quit the group after the last adventure where it was clear he was of no use and clearly wasn't fixable even with a full respec. In fact I think I suggested it (I don't deny I might have been whiny about it though). I lost interest in the game at the exact moment my character didn't die. I felt saddled with a useless character and, much worse , embarrased about my poor play and deus ex machina survival. I think I quit after that session or the next one. I would have been a lot happier had the character just been bit in half and died with me knowing full well it was deserved. For the remainder of the adventure my character did nothing but run and hide. Since my character had nothing useful to contribute to the party, I didn't feel the need to attend the games. So I didn't after that.

Right - Don't fudge to save a PC unless that's the dynamic your group prefers. (I personally don't like fudging one bit either as player or DM because it negates my choices.) If you let the dice fall where they may, have a plan for what to do with the player once his primary game construct has been removed from play. If you have no plan or think it's just fine to force Bob to go sit in the corner until whenever you feel like bringing in another character, maybe rethink that strategy a bit...

"People don't talk because they think there will be a roll and they're trying to mitigate failure - take away the roll and *surprise* they start talking!" I honestly have never encountered a game where people were not talking because they were afraid to make a roll or games where people don't talk for other reasons than being new to the genre and still trying to get a feel for the whole concept that is rping. Those that fall into that last category I of course attempt to aid as best as I can. But yeah in my 20+ years of playing I have never met anyone that didn't talk due to not wanting to fail nor not attempt something due to fear of failure. Now granted I am not privy to a persons motives but when you see people attempting stuff with little to no care if they failure you start to notice a trend. Maybe I am just hella lucky in that respect. Once again HJ I have also not encountered a person that sat out while waiting or creating a character and was bothered by it. If the story/game is interesting enough than the person does not seem to mind as the game is still exciting to them. Once again this could be a simple matter of me being hella lucky with those I've had the good fortunes to rp with. I have lots of things I can gripe about when it comes to past games and players, yet these two are not on the list.

I recently 'killed' an important character in one of my games, and was blown away by the response of the Player who had created him. This player had sat down with me on several occasions to put his character through things that the rest of the party didn't need to know about (story stuff about his character that mattered to him, but boring for everyone else to sit through) and while investigating a hidden dungeon deep under a city (they were stuck in and looking for a way out) I had him and another character caught by a massive stonewall 'trap' in the infamous slowly descending ceiling with little chance of escape. thing is, one person avoided the trap (he never entered the room) and immediately started busting down the door to help free his trapped companions, actually succeeded (roll three 20's against the DOOR, would you believe!) broke it open with the stone slap about 2 feet from the floor and managed to roll another 20 to grab the monk and drag her ass to safety (she was also trying to break down the door, so was within arms reach). most epic save EVER. had to be there. The important character was in the center of the room trying to hold up the ceiling (and actually slowing it down long enough to get the monk out, as he rolled two 20's himself which I ruled slowed it by a round or so each time) while the thief in the room was desperately trying to disarm the trap from the inside and failing miserably(he was rolling 1's). the two in the room just ran out of time, and the ceiling slammed down on them, and their characters blacked out, leaving the monk and the (low strength) fighter on the outside (oh, yea, forgot to mention that the the important one holding up the ceiling was the healer of the group, with only an average strength!) thing is, the whole room was an illusionary trap. it didn't actually kill anyone, just forced em to react with it when they all failed their (secret) saves vs illusion, and chained an upgraded version of sleep and a binding spell to the end of the illusion, to knock out and tie up anyone who got caught until the wizard tasked with guarding the dungeon could come and check them out, see what the hell was going on. Well, the guy who thought he'd died (the healer) got so broken up that I didn't even have a chance to send him a whisper to hold on, so I could deal with the two left outside the room who thought they had just lost half their party. He left, unable to speak for choking on his tears (he really deserved to live, holding up that ceiling as long as he did just to 'die' because the rogue couldn't roll worth a damn. Not a word was heard from him for almost a week, and I had to bomb his skype account with messages trying to continue the game from his end, but he was so broken up he never checked any messages. took nearly two weeks for him to calm down enough to realize that he was still alive! I have never felt so guilty for killing off a character - especially since he wasn't dead from the start (getting caught was a bad idea, but instadeath wasn't ever a part of this trap - although in the state they were in, starving was a problem they might have to face, they hadn't eaten in two days as they had run out of food before even encountering this particular trap). EDIT: Don't get me wrong, this guy is a veteran player with many PC deaths under his belt, it was just so unfair on the guy in what he believed was a dick way to die (he actually got a boost of XP for being the one who put himself in the hotseat - he chose the worst place to be to give everyone else a chance to escape)

There are a LOT of 20's and 1's in this story. Not sure of those are natural rolls or modified ones. Either way, a rather tension building session to be sure. Very sad to learn of yet another player who cries about a character death, regardless of why.

Probably one of my three best ever roleplay sessions I have played in decades of gaming was the one after my character died. I got to play his ghost , dealing with the unfinished business. Death has to have meaning for it to be worth a damn, but damn can it be worth it.

Another cool thing about coming back as a ghost is it keeps you, the player, participating in the game you've chosen to play!

It's a tough topic, and one that gets covered on every RPG blog or podcast eventually. Depending on the setting, you could probably address it a number of ways: 1) Is there a source of resurrection? D&D and Pathfinder have spells that can do this, and even some that don't have nasty side-effects. It may be expensive, of course, but i the party has the money or the player does, it can be arranged without too much difficulty. If it needs to sting more, make one of their Gods offended by the resurrection. 2) is there a "last-moment" save? If you've played any MMOs, you might be familiar with this. in SWTOR, you don't die, you just come very very close, but at the last moment, you're saved by being emergency-transported to the nearest med station. Same in Champions Online, dying (or coming very very close) activates an emergency medical teleporter. You "die" for purposes of what you were fighting, but your character isn't gone for even a moment. 3) can you give them a ghost, as was suggested here? Maybe even make it World of Warcraft-style, where the "ghost" can re-enter his body. if that's making death too cheap for the players, make it hard to do, or require a quest or item or payment to be able to do it. I'm sure there are even other ways you can handle it. I would not make death permanent in most situations, but still find a way to make it sting.

How about the character (in-game) appears in the afterlife on his next turn. Ask him to describe it. Death is there and offers a deal: Take it and live. Collaborate with the player on what that deal is so that they give you their buy-in. It should be something that leads to more adventure or complicates the current adventure in a fun way (for everyone at the table). If the character keeps up his end of the bargain, then he continues to live. Ask him to make a backup PC in case he can't live up to his agreement.

Sometimes players are good sports about it. Sometimes they cry and whine and fight about how they "Were totally checking the wall for traps" while running down the hall, or it's my fault a low-INT enemy was hungry and kept snacking on them. It's a game, and sometimes things happen. Which is why one of my favorite dungeons is the Tomb of Horrors, and other Fourthcore modules designed for lethality. I tell players who ask to play them that they should come in with at least two characters built, because when the entire party decides to run further into a trap room instead of trying to get out, 5 minutes into the first session I have to say "Yeah, you're all dead." And then some players leave, because even if it is what they signed up for, apparently it's not what they signed up for. But it really depends. Sometimes the player can be revived, saved, or otherwise brought back into the game. Sometimes they're just a pile of ash and a Wish spell is too far out of reach, and it's just time to move on and roll a new character. It depends on the game, and the group, and the players. At the end of the day, I feel that if I have to significantly move around bits of the game I've built just because one person is too attatched to their character to die, then I'm putting myself in the position of needing to do that for everyone when they die or get hurt. If I retcon you stepping on that trap because you whine that you can't afford to take damage, why should I have traps at all? Why have combat if death is never an option? Why am I putting work into building a world for you to play in, if you can't accept that sometimes things have consequences?

Askren said: Sometimes players are good sports about it. Sometimes they cry and whine and fight about how they "Were totally checking the wall for traps" while running down the hall, or it's my fault a low-INT enemy was hungry and kept snacking on them. It's a game, and sometimes things happen. Which is why one of my favorite dungeons is the Tomb of Horrors, and other Fourthcore modules designed for lethality. I tell players who ask to play them that they should come in with at least two characters built, because when the entire party decides to run further into a trap room instead of trying to get out, 5 minutes into the first session I have to say "Yeah, you're all dead." Yes, if you're playing a game (say, D&D) and that game includes a mechanic that puts the player's primary mode of participation in the game at risk, you're making a mistake if you don't plan for it. Backup characters are one way. And then some players leave, because even if it is what they signed up for, apparently it's not what they signed up for. But it really depends. Sometimes the player can be revived, saved, or otherwise brought back into the game. Sometimes they're just a pile of ash and a Wish spell is too far out of reach, and it's just time to move on and roll a new character. It depends on the game, and the group, and the players. At the end of the day, I feel that if I have to significantly move around bits of the game I've built just because one person is too attatched to their character to die, then I'm putting myself in the position of needing to do that for everyone when they die or get hurt. If I retcon you stepping on that trap because you whine that you can't afford to take damage, why should I have traps at all? Why have combat if death is never an option? Why am I putting work into building a world for you to play in, if you can't accept that sometimes things have consequences? You might consider that failure in combat needn't always equal death. It might equal some other form of failure, one that leads to further adventure rather than a player sitting out of the game. I personally like building situations that involve monsters/villains that are pursuing particular goals and the deaths of the PCs are secondary. If you get in the monster/villain's way, he's going to jack you. If you leave him alone because you're dealing with something else, he's going to choose to continue spending his actions activating his doomsday device (or whatever) which will destroy the moon in 3 rounds... Not only does this actually make combat scenes way more dynamic and challenging, it recognizes that combat is a solution the players should be choosing as an expression of their agency for solving a legitimate in-game challenge rather than the DM choosing that for them. It's easy to fall into the trap as DM of thinking "This is a combat encounter, therefore violence is the solution, and failure to employ that solution properly equals death." That's a pretty big limit on one's creativity if you think about it.

I've never been blamed for a player death, especially when they put themselves in that situation. I remember this one game of DnD where a player, a low level ranger, ran into a room of a building that they knew for a fact was filled to burst with orcs. I went over the info with him and reminded him of key info (like 5 orcs blocking the front door) that would lead him to believe there was more orcs. He busted down the door anyway and was caught in the room with 8 other orcs. He did this as last of round so no one could help him. He died, and I wrote DECEASED on his character sheet. He learned to look before leaping, but never did he blame me.

Headhunter Jones said: . It's easy to fall into the trap as DM of thinking "This is a combat encounter, therefore violence is the solution, and failure to employ that solution properly equals death." That's a pretty big limit on one's creativity if you think about it. If you're fighting something intent on killing you, then there is only one thing failure in combat leads to, and that's death. The game doesn't work like Pokemon, where when your party passes out, you wake up in an Inn somewhere. If that monster wants to kill you, and you hit 0 hit points, then he probably continues to kill your friends or eat you or raise you as a zombie or whatever. But it still happens. Because this is an ongoing narrative, not a "Sorry, you lost. Go pay for some healing and try again" deal. That inherently removes any challenge or risk. I mean, I'm not one to put a damper on it if you want the character to persist and the GM give some way of bringing it back to life. But to make doing so trivial or free removes any reason to roll dice or have HP at all. Who cares if you roll low and fail the encounter when you can't die?

Askren said: If you're fighting something intent on killing you, then there is only one thing failure in combat leads to, and that's death. Just so long as you're aware that you, the DM, are choosing this. It doesn't have to be so. It's certainly not a rule - it's a choice and nobody's forcing you to choose that. If that choice is leading to unhappy outcomes as some have described, then it's worth examining. The game doesn't work like Pokemon, where when your party passes out, you wake up in an Inn somewhere. Nobody's suggesting that, though it's fine with player buy-in, of course. If that monster wants to kill you, and you hit 0 hit points, then he probably continues to kill your friends or eat you or raise you as a zombie or whatever. But it still happens. It happens because you choose it to happen. You have full control over those monsters. Because this is an ongoing narrative, not a "Sorry, you lost. Go pay for some healing and try again" deal. That inherently removes any challenge or risk. There are other forms of risk and challenges that don't involve death at all. That you choose to exclude them from your game doesn't mean they don't exist. I mean, I'm not one to put a damper on it if you want the character to persist and the GM give some way of bringing it back to life. But to make doing so trivial or free removes any reason to roll dice or have HP at all. Who cares if you roll low and fail the encounter when you can't die? I don't think anyone is suggesting death should be trivial in this discussion though some (like me) recognize the potential problem of a player that is forced out of the primary mode of participation with the game he has chosen to play. And plan for it accordingly. As well, hit points are a pacing mechanism for combat encounters and inherently nothing more. It is a game construct that represents fictional physical damage only as much as you want it to be so. You can choose to imagine that reaching 0 hit points means other things. As for failing the encounter, sometimes there are things worse than death. Evil prevails, the world is made more dangerous, and now it's just that much harder to stem the tide. I know that in my regular games, the players care very much about failing other aspects of the game because of its impact on the emerging narrative. Death is just a single, very narrow aspect of what failure can mean in an RPG. Everyone has tried the death-as-failure default setting of the game. Why not try another way in addition to that and see how it improves your game?