2011 PC Bodycount Thread

[jedavis]

Got another PC-kill finishing up the Traveller campaign; a lightly-armored scientist character took a greatsword to the chest, which put him in critical condition. He managed to drop the stimpacked berserker who had done it, but then decided to prop himself up and try suppressive fire against a marine in heavy armor with a laser rifle. Said marine was unphased, returned fire, and rolled 25 damage on 5d6, which would've been enough to kill the PC outright from full health. Boom headshot. The rest of the party was also pretty torn-up by this point and ended up fleeing, only to return to finish the job / avenge the fallen after patching themselves back together.

 

[RandomCitizenX]

Last session had the first death in my ongoing 4e game. The Star Pact Hexblade decided to be heroic for some reason and ended up being torn apart by the big bad and having a warehouse dropped on him by the Swordmage who was running away from said big bad.

 

[Iron Sky]

We lost two players in our Dark Sun game earlier this year.

I wrote it up in my commentary thread here, but the short version is:

"It was like something from a Quintin Tarantino movie: Arin (changling Athesian Minstrel) was hired by some people to go poison someone for no known reason, did so, a huge fight ensued, and everyone ended up dead but him. It being Athas, he shrugged, looted the bodies, then shapechanged into a guard and walked out of the place."

I also killed two players in a L4W adventure I ran, both immediately risen as zombies. The players subdued them both, but one got away to join the zombie hordes. The other was restored not long after.

 

[lostingeneral]

Tonight I had my first character die without hope of resurrection after almost a year without this situation coming up. A sad day for the 4e campaign.

The party was faced with a portal to the Nine Hells that was to open after eight rounds of combat. They took down the enemies very effectively and set about closing the portal, worried that legions of devils would spill out if they didn't (a pretty good guess). The process of closing the portal required three successful Arcana checks.

After the second check, the warforged fighter decides to poke his head into the portal and is sucked in completely. After deciding they don't want to close the portal and let him die, they prepare to keep the portal open just long enough to let him back through.

A legion of devils followed him. I had a table of possible devils prepared just in case something like this occurred (I really didn't think it would) and I intended to roll randomly for every group coming out of the portal. The first to arrive was a war devil, more than twice the party's level. The party closed the portal right after this happened, but the devil was still there.

In a selfless act of sacrifice the half-elf ardent used a teleport power to trade places with the fighter and held him off just long enough for the party to get the hell away.

 

[SnowleopardVK]

I'm at two so far; one was a fellow player and one was someone I was GM for, so neither character is actually mine. Neither of their players is on EN World though, so what the heck.

Ignatius of the fire - Gnome Sorcerer. Died at 2nd level in a wizard's (sorcerer's) duel against Kobold sorcerer Phliliscut. His cleric tried to save him but didn't make it there in time. Phliliscut was promptly recruited to be his replacement.

Willow the Moontracker - Lycan Cleric. Died at 4th level after deciding to attack a paladin/teammate from behind over a petty argument. Her alignment went from CN to CE as a result and she was the target of several Smite Evils the next day. The moral of the story being that if you're gonna turn evil and attack your own team's paladin, don't leave her alive and seeking holy vengeance.

 

[scruffygrognard]

So far I've killed:

PC: Sigurd Magnisson: 10th level cleric in a 3.5 Ptolus campaign. He (and the rest of the party) died fighting a fire giant and a drow cleric/wizard.

NPC: Finn the Black: A 2nd level AD&D cleric/thief in my homebrew campaign.

 

[Evilhalfling]

Dead Book:
Oberyon. 11th level Paladin/Cleric: disintegrate, and death rays from a beholder. He was trying to escape the Prison Plane of Caceri. They made it out, but the beholder followed them.

Bloody Eight Fingers, Leader: yelled "Get them boys" as a free action, killed before his initiative.
Dogman, expert tracker : offered the chance to switch sides, he refused and was blasted by necromancer.
Black Dow, Evil bastard : tried for flank, and got whacked.
Red Beck, Newbie recruit: cursed to kill his friends, but with only 1 hp the curse killed him instead.
Fred Jr the XII, old family name : charged and lasted almost 18 seconds before being cut down.
Rudd Threetrees Big, dumb, dead.
Huruhk Lifedrinker, slightly insane: Had one chance to be healed by his vampric sword, but missed.
Flargen (gnoll), Apprentice Shaman: Died in melee due to ac penalty.
Mormont Farfang (gnoll), diseased archer: started hemorrhaging slime when he was bloodied, and raced into the middle of his enemies, who knew what was coming and quickly dismembered his body.

Playing 2-hit minions means life is short. Just for the record there was 1 human and 2 surviving gnolls.

 

[Reynard]

Dead Book:
Oberyon. 11th level Paladin/Cleric: disintegrate, and death rays from a beholder. He was trying to escape the Prison Plane of Caceri. They made it out, but the beholder followed them.

Bloody Eight Fingers, Leader: yelled "Get them boys" as a free action, killed before his initiative.
Dogman, expert tracker : offered the chance to switch sides, he refused and was blasted by necromancer.
Black Dow, Evil bastard : tried for flank, and got whacked.
Red Beck, Newbie recruit: cursed to kill his friends, but with only 1 hp the curse killed him instead.
Fred Jr the XII, old family name : charged and lasted almost 18 seconds before being cut down.
Rudd Threetrees Big, dumb, dead.
Huruhk Lifedrinker, slightly insane: Had one chance to be healed by his vampric sword, but missed.
Flargen (gnoll), Apprentice Shaman: Died in melee due to ac penalty.
Mormont Farfang (gnoll), diseased archer: started hemorrhaging slime when he was bloodied, and raced into the middle of his enemies, who knew what was coming and quickly dismembered his body.

Playing 2-hit minions means life is short. Just for the record there was 1 human and 2 surviving gnolls.

Are those all PCs?

 

[CuRoi]

Haven't DM'd as much as normal this year...

Milo TeaLeaf - over confident halfling-monk. Inexplicably decided to stage dive from a decent high ground defensive position into a group of angry lizardfolk so that the Chieftain could impale him multiple times with a long spear. He assumed his high AC and defensive fighting would keep him alive. Until the intelligent, slightly tactical lizardfolk decided to flank, "aid another", feint, bluff, and otherwise destroy his AC.

 

[Evilhalfling]

Are those all PCs?

they were all run by the players ...

Except Obryon they were all barbarian/gnoll 2-hit minions.
As soon as one died the player would pick a new one and add him to the field. They managed to delay & bloody Ravid the Black and a small force of minions sneaking into the rear of the fortress. The necromancer was 4 rounds late, and still bloody when he arrived at the climatic battle, against the regular characters.

The battle was inside the Caern of the Winterking (excellent free adventure from the Monster Vault), taking place 5 months after the PCs defeated the winterking.