D&D 4E Hitting "reset": A counterpoint to "gritty" 4e

[Wormwood]

I used a variant of Unisystem Lite's "Drama Points", which have a greater range of game effects than d20 Action Dice.

Drama Points can be used to avoid death, and since you can choose to 'deficit spend', the net result is that a character only dies when the player wants them to.

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

So there has been a lot of discussion back and forth on whether 4e is making the game too "easy". That its not "gritty" enough. Some old school gamers miss save or die, or level draining. They like the Warhammer style of play where even a bar fight could end their life.

However, for my group we are really looking forward to 4e precisely because it lessens grit. We like cinematic heroics. Heroes who can take on dragons and walk away without permnanent disabilities.

Many of us have been gaming for 10+ years. Some of us (including myself) over 20 years. After our last Age of Worms session (likely our last 3.5 game), we had an interesting discussion after almost getting TPKed (which would have been our 2nd TPK in AoW had it happened). We talked about character death and after all the work we have put into our characters, seeing our characters die is almost like seeing all that work wasted. But all of us agreed that the threat of death is important to creating tension and excitement. No one wants to die, but its no fun to play a game where your character is untouchable. What would the point of playing be after all?

One of our players even went so far as to say that if his character dies, he'll be done playing. At least until 4e comes out and even then he isn't sure he would play again. He has lost so many characters and/or had so many campaigns start strong and then fizzle over the span of his many years of gaming that the will to make yet another new PC has been all but beaten out of him. But yet, being resurrected doesn't appeal to him either. Ironically, he felt it would cheapen the death of his character should it actually occur.

Gritty is what our group absolutely does not want. We want the threat of death, and we want death to be real, but we don't want to actually die. How can we reconcile these two seemingly opposite concepts?

After much discussion on ways avoid PC death, but yet not make it seem like we have plot immunity, we hit upon a solution. The next time a PC dies, our DM will let us hit "reset" like we were playing a video game. We will be able to rewind back to before that battle and replay it again (or perhaps even run away this time). This might be much too metagamey for some groups taste, but it seems like it would work out well for our group. I wanted to post this here, because I think it illustrates the drawback of gritty games. Sure they seem "real" but for my group, its certainly not a fun playstyle.

Have any other groups done anything similar? I wonder if the 4e DMG will offer a similar idea.

That's actually kind of a fun idea. Perhaps you could even include "save points" of some sort. Like, you can only reset to the last time you visited a temple, or the last time you encountered a "save sphere" or whatever. If you knew that you'd have to replay a couple days worth of adventuring, the threat of death would probably be just as great as if you were permanently dead. You could archive your character sheets at each save, perhaps on a spreadsheet or by writing up a quick statblock paying particular attention to things like consumable magic items, removable status effects, etc. Then, when you "reset," you just copy over your saved state.

If it works out for you, good thinking.

 

[Irda Ranger]

I think you're conflating players and characters here. I've played characters who are willing to die for certain things, but that doesn't change the fact that for me as a player, character death usually sucks.

Obviously everyone deals with this differently. I usually take comfort in that "He died well."

But part of my ability to deal is that I really like rolling up new characters, writing their back-stories, etc. I do it even when there's no quest to play them in (or my current character is still around and kicking). So part of me is like "Darn. I liked that guy." but another part is "Awesome! Now I get to try out that Archer build!"

Nice idea.

I totally stole it from Burning Wheel.

 

[Epic Meepo]

Create a situation that makes it very likely for the PCs to die, and then have it turn out to be a vision of an upcoming battle. (Whatever the battle is, the PCs should be able to survive it if they know some of its specific - maybe the combat should involve concaled/invisible attackers or unexpected reinforcments that could be countered.

In the past, I've created new divination spells that do something like this. You cast the spell at the beginning of the day and the first combat of the day is a vision of the possible future; you can either keep it if you like the result or replay it one time. It's not an arbitrary, automatic reset, but a function of having a diviner in the party.

 

[DSRilk]

Sometimes the issue is not player desire, but the storyline. Even when a player is okay with his character dying, epic storylines usually require longevity. LotR would not (imo) been better had Frodo and Sam died along the way and had to have Biffer and Boffer come pick up the slack and finish the trek to Mount Doom. However, having Frodo fail to overcome his desire for the ring and setting the Shire ablaze adds drama -- at the end of the story. And that, for me, is a large part of why I handle character death the way I do. Moreso than the player not being able to take it (though player happiness is also important to me).

 

[I'm A Banana]

Action points have been my solution to balancing out these goals.

Action Points are a really good way that D&D has adopted it, and a way that may even make it into 4e. As long as you have 1 Action Point, you can always avoid out-and-out dying right away. The DM can still kill you with concentrated effort on his part, but it becomes more difficult, and that, for more cinematic games, is definately a good thing.

FFZ adopts a few different tactics. The idea of a Safe Crystal that returns your soul to it upon your death, and re-makes your body is the in-character explanation, but it's effectively a save point. Of course, things change after your death, so it's not entirely a reset button. It's more like a second chance, but the enemy has learned from the first session just as much as you have.

There's also a change in what '0 hp' means. Rather than being dead, you are simply 'KO'd', which can lead to permenant death, but doesn't have to. It makes rising from the status quicker and slightly less challenging for verisimilitude. Dead is still dead, but most of the time the heroes are only 'mostly dead.'

There is a challenge of things your character loves more than a threat to your character's life specifically. FFZ's narrative style can easily accomodate apocalyptic scenarios that threaten the entire world the PC's hold dear if they don't stop the villain.

 

[shilsen]

Obviously everyone deals with this differently. I usually take comfort in that "He died well."

But part of my ability to deal is that I really like rolling up new characters, writing their back-stories, etc. I do it even when there's no quest to play them in (or my current character is still around and kicking). So part of me is like "Darn. I liked that guy." but another part is "Awesome! Now I get to try out that Archer build!"

Sure. I wasn't disagreeing with that playstyle but with your phrasing in the section I'd quoted earlier, since you'd made it sound like player preference and character preference were the same thing, and of course that's not necessarily the case. Just a minor quibble. But without minor quibbling, what is an internet discussion for?

I totally stole it from Burning Wheel.

I use that sort of approach (though not just for this subject) a lot with my players, asking them at regular intervals what their character goals and motivations are, and what they value (since these change over the course of a long campaign). Works great for plot material, as you noted.

 

[Wyrmshadows]

So there has been a lot of discussion back and forth on whether 4e is making the game too "easy". That its not "gritty" enough. Some old school gamers miss save or die, or level draining. They like the Warhammer style of play where even a bar fight could end their life.

Well I think that I can live without save or die effects myself, because I, as a storyteller DM, want my players to enjoy the contiunuity of a character over perhaps years of play. However, having said that, the threat of death is a meaningful portion of the drama within a campaign that highlights sword-swinging daring do.

However, for my group we are really looking forward to 4e precisely because it lessens grit. We like cinematic heroics. Heroes who can take on dragons and walk away without permnanent disabilities.

Feh.

I am ambivalent on 4e. I like the fluff changes such as disappearance of the Great Wheel but loathe some of what I am sensing regarding the level of superheroics that might be part of the mechanics.

Many of us have been gaming for 10+ years. Some of us (including myself) over 20 years. After our last Age of Worms session (likely our last 3.5 game), we had an interesting discussion after almost getting TPKed (which would have been our 2nd TPK in AoW had it happened). We talked about character death and after all the work we have put into our characters, seeing our characters die is almost like seeing all that work wasted. But all of us agreed that the threat of death is important to creating tension and excitement. No one wants to die, but its no fun to play a game where your character is untouchable. What would the point of playing be after all?

Sounds cool. The threat of death is necessary in a game filled to the hilt with bloodletting and death. D&D is filled with killing when played as expected.

One of our players even went so far as to say that if his character dies, he'll be done playing. At least until 4e comes out and even then he isn't sure he would play again. He has lost so many characters and/or had so many campaigns start strong and then fizzle over the span of his many years of gaming that the will to make yet another new PC has been all but beaten out of him. But yet, being resurrected doesn't appeal to him either. Ironically, he felt it would cheapen the death of his character should it actually occur.

Well I fee for his situation. No one, especially those who get emotionally attached to a character, want to lose a beloved and long lived character. My players feel the same way about resurrection/raise dead depending on the context of the death in question. Usually IME players are cool with the honorable death of a PC. Sh*t happens sometimes.

You don't want to risk your life for gold and glory, don't enter the dragon's lair.

Gritty is what our group absolutely does not want. We want the threat of death, and we want death to be real, but we don't want to actually die. How can we reconcile these two seemingly opposite concepts?

Action Points or similar mechanics serve this purpose admirably. It allows for a cinematic feel, like a Sword and Sorcery story like Conan where the hero kicks arse but you aren't assured of victory.

After much discussion on ways avoid PC death, but yet not make it seem like we have plot immunity, we hit upon a solution. The next time a PC dies, our DM will let us hit "reset" like we were playing a video game. We will be able to rewind back to before that battle and replay it again (or perhaps even run away this time). This might be much too metagamey for some groups taste, but it seems like it would work out well for our group. I wanted to post this here, because I think it illustrates the drawback of gritty games. Sure they seem "real" but for my group, its certainly not a fun playstyle.

Now this may work for your group but for the game as a whole:

THE WORST IDEA EVER!..to put it mildly.

This kind of thing turns Tabletop RPing games into tabletop video games. I am playing through Elder Scrolls Oblivion for the second time and though I love it, it is not and will not be a real role playing game. No matter what happens in this game, I will win. There is no real threat to me because of the save and load function. This allows me to basically cheat the system through the cunning use of save and reload. I like the game because it it light fun, but because it is such light fun, there is no real connection between yourself, your character and the setting.

The suspension of disbelief becomes so destroyed through resets that neither I nor my players would really give a rats arse about what happens in the campaign because their success is a forgone conclusion. Why would I, as a DM put forth all kinds od effort creating a setting and a campaign with internal consistancy, believability, interesting villians and challenges when, like the example of Elder Scrolls Oblivion the conclusion is predetermined?

"Wow, great way to overcome the BBEG guys! It only took you 3 resets to figure out how to do it! Your songs will be sung for generations."

And why only a reset on life or death encounters? How about a reset on botched social interaction? Attempts to interrogate? Attampts to steal the jewels? To hide in shadows? The reset can be applied to anything thereby making the game risk free while at the same time allowing players to feel like they actually accomplished something even though they didn't.

Have any other groups done anything similar? I wonder if the 4e DMG will offer a similar idea.

Never in a million, billion years would I DM something like this. I wouldn't even play in such a snorefest. Without the risk of failure via either death, all combat would be ultimately pointless. How can someone be proud of their character in the context of combat at least, when the option of hitting reset is available? Also, and not for nothing, the idea of a reset is amount the most metagamey idea I can imagine and this kind of stuff is never good for the game IMO.

The reset idea might be good for a light, videogamey, D&D experience. In other words, a "bear and pretzels" game, the very kind of game I do not run. Why run a tabletop videogame when there are actual videogames that do what they do much, much more effectively than D&D ever can?

In order to add context to my comments, I am a DM for 24yrs and have never grown out of my "gritty phase." If anything my desire for a deeper, more sophisticated, more adult game full of versimilitude has only increased. I realize that the older I have gotten, the harder it is for me to suspend my disbelief and nonsensical things turn me off. My players feel the same way.



Wyrmshadows

 

[Wyrmshadows]

So there has been a lot of discussion back and forth on whether 4e is making the game too "easy". That its not "gritty" enough. Some old school gamers miss save or die, or level draining. They like the Warhammer style of play where even a bar fight could end their life.

Well I think that I can live without save or die effects myself, because I, as a storyteller DM, want my players to enjoy the contiunuity of a character over perhaps years of play. However, having said that, the threat of death is a meaningful portion of the drama within a campaign that highlights sword-swinging daring do.

However, for my group we are really looking forward to 4e precisely because it lessens grit. We like cinematic heroics. Heroes who can take on dragons and walk away without permnanent disabilities.

Feh.

I am ambivalent on 4e. I like the fluff changes such as disappearance of the Great Wheel but loathe some of what I am sensing regarding the level of superheroics that might be part of the mechanics.

Many of us have been gaming for 10+ years. Some of us (including myself) over 20 years. After our last Age of Worms session (likely our last 3.5 game), we had an interesting discussion after almost getting TPKed (which would have been our 2nd TPK in AoW had it happened). We talked about character death and after all the work we have put into our characters, seeing our characters die is almost like seeing all that work wasted. But all of us agreed that the threat of death is important to creating tension and excitement. No one wants to die, but its no fun to play a game where your character is untouchable. What would the point of playing be after all?

Sounds cool. The threat of death is necessary in a game filled to the hilt with bloodletting and death. D&D is filled with killing when played as expected.

One of our players even went so far as to say that if his character dies, he'll be done playing. At least until 4e comes out and even then he isn't sure he would play again. He has lost so many characters and/or had so many campaigns start strong and then fizzle over the span of his many years of gaming that the will to make yet another new PC has been all but beaten out of him. But yet, being resurrected doesn't appeal to him either. Ironically, he felt it would cheapen the death of his character should it actually occur.

Well I feel for his situation.

No one, especially those who get emotionally attached to a character, want to lose a beloved and long lived character. My players feel the same way about resurrection/raise dead depending on the context of the death in question. Usually IME players are cool with the honorable death of a PC. Sh*t happens sometimes in a heroic fantasy (or sci-fi or horror) game. Sometimes heroes die.

You don't want to risk your life for gold and glory, don't enter the dragon's lair.

Gritty is what our group absolutely does not want. We want the threat of death, and we want death to be real, but we don't want to actually die. How can we reconcile these two seemingly opposite concepts?

Action Points or similar mechanics serve this purpose admirably. It allows for a cinematic feel, like a Sword and Sorcery story like Conan where the hero kicks arse but you aren't assured of victory.

After much discussion on ways avoid PC death, but yet not make it seem like we have plot immunity, we hit upon a solution. The next time a PC dies, our DM will let us hit "reset" like we were playing a video game. We will be able to rewind back to before that battle and replay it again (or perhaps even run away this time). This might be much too metagamey for some groups taste, but it seems like it would work out well for our group. I wanted to post this here, because I think it illustrates the drawback of gritty games. Sure they seem "real" but for my group, its certainly not a fun playstyle.

Now this may work for your group but for the game as a whole:

THE WORST IDEA EVER!..to put it mildly.

This kind of thing turns Tabletop RPing games into tabletop video games. I am playing through Elder Scrolls Oblivion for the second time and though I love it, it is not and will not be a real role playing game. No matter what happens in this game, I will win. There is no real threat to me because of the save and load function. This allows me to basically cheat the system through the cunning use of save and reload. I like the game because it it light fun, but because it is such light fun, there is no real connection between yourself, your character and the setting.

The suspension of disbelief becomes so destroyed through resets that neither I nor my players would really give a rats arse about what happens in the campaign because their success is a forgone conclusion. Why would I, as a DM put forth all kinds od effort creating a setting and a campaign with internal consistancy, believability, interesting villians and challenges when, like the example of Elder Scrolls Oblivion the conclusion is predetermined?

"Wow, great way to overcome the BBEG guys! It only took you 3 resets to figure out how to do it! Your songs will be sung for generations."

And why only a reset on life or death encounters? How about a reset on botched social interaction? Attempts to interrogate? Attampts to steal the jewels? To hide in shadows? The reset can be applied to anything thereby making the game risk free while at the same time allowing players to feel like they actually accomplished something even though they didn't.

Have any other groups done anything similar? I wonder if the 4e DMG will offer a similar idea.

Never in a million, billion years would I DM something like this. I wouldn't even play in such a snorefest. Without the risk of failure via either death, all combat would be ultimately pointless. How can someone be proud of their character in the context of combat at least, when the option of hitting reset is available? Also, and not for nothing, the idea of a reset is amount the most metagamey idea I can imagine and this kind of stuff is never good for the game IMO.

The reset idea might be good for a light, videogamey, D&D experience. In other words, a "bear and pretzels" game, the very kind of game I do not run. Why run a tabletop videogame when there are actual videogames that do what they do much, much more effectively than D&D ever can?

In order to add context to my comments, I am a DM for 24yrs and have never grown out of my "gritty phase." If anything my desire for a deeper, more sophisticated, more adult game full of versimilitude has only increased. I realize that the older I have gotten, the harder it is for me to suspend my disbelief and nonsensical things turn me off. My players feel the same way.



Wyrmshadows

 

[IanB]

I don't like a 'gritty' game myself for the most part, but the reset button is going too far for me. If it works for your group, awesome! I tend to use action points (Eberron style) to give the PCs a little expendable edge they can use when I misjudge things or they're not really suited well for a particular challenge.