Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
The
VOIDRUNNER'S CODEX
is LIVE! Explore new worlds, fight oppressive empires, fend off fearsome aliens, and wield deadly psionics with this comprehensive boxed set expansion for 5E and A5E!
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
If not death, then what?
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Jer" data-source="post: 8706573" data-attributes="member: 19857"><p>The first RPG I really ran as a GM after D&D was Marvel Super Heroes. In a super hero game, random PC death isn't really an option unless you're going to really diverge your game from the source material. Wolverine doesn't die because a random ninja shivved him the back with a lucky roll - Wolverine dies because his death is going to have some kind of plot related impact and even then he'll be back.</p><p></p><p>Which meant that failure in that game had to mean something other than "well I guess Wolverine is dead now - make up a new character". It had to mean that the villain advanced their plot and the PCs now had another setback to deal with. It might mean that the PCs were trapped and needed to escape. It might mean that the PCs were temporarily KO'ed and the players needed to now take up the "B team" to go in to stop the bad guy - when the Avengers are down the West Coast Avengers have to step things up a notch. It might just mean that the villain succeeded and now we need to do another adventure with the repercussions from that.</p><p></p><p>Those thoughts have basically fed back into my GMing for other games ever since. If the kind of game I'm running has an action movie style narrative to it - which most of the games I run do - then random character death is going to be off the table and some other consequence has to be the result.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Jer, post: 8706573, member: 19857"] The first RPG I really ran as a GM after D&D was Marvel Super Heroes. In a super hero game, random PC death isn't really an option unless you're going to really diverge your game from the source material. Wolverine doesn't die because a random ninja shivved him the back with a lucky roll - Wolverine dies because his death is going to have some kind of plot related impact and even then he'll be back. Which meant that failure in that game had to mean something other than "well I guess Wolverine is dead now - make up a new character". It had to mean that the villain advanced their plot and the PCs now had another setback to deal with. It might mean that the PCs were trapped and needed to escape. It might mean that the PCs were temporarily KO'ed and the players needed to now take up the "B team" to go in to stop the bad guy - when the Avengers are down the West Coast Avengers have to step things up a notch. It might just mean that the villain succeeded and now we need to do another adventure with the repercussions from that. Those thoughts have basically fed back into my GMing for other games ever since. If the kind of game I'm running has an action movie style narrative to it - which most of the games I run do - then random character death is going to be off the table and some other consequence has to be the result. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
If not death, then what?
Top