Irrevocable death? Or do you allow resurrection?

[ST]

I went for "usually", but with a qualifier. Most of the games I run, lots of very bad things can happen to your character, but whether they permanently leave play or not is up to the player. So if someone gets killed, but the player wants to continue with the character, they can at a minimum return to haunt people, and even snatch/possess a body from someone, if that's how far they want to take it.

If I'm doing more traditional D&D style, it'd be somewhere between 3 and 4 -- I think of resurrection as "restoring from a save point", so to speak, so it has a significant cost.

 

[Desdichado]

Depends on the game.

I voted for the top three choices.

I voted for all four. In reality, it's a moot point with my group. Character death means get to work making your next character. Nobody ever asks, "hey, can you resurrect me?"

 

[Nifft]

I voted for all four. In reality, it's a moot point with my group. Character death means get to work making your next character. Nobody ever asks, "hey, can you resurrect me?"

That's actually how it mostly ends up in my games, too, because of player preferences: even if resurrection is available, most of the character deaths tend to result in a new character.

I think a part of it is that we like trying new things, so every one of us has at least one exciting character concept that we'd love to try out, floating around in the back of our heads. When a PC dies, that concept shouts "crisitunity!"

None the less, whoever is running tends to allow whatever the base system assumes, even if none of us tend to take advantage of it.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Wombat]

With very, very rare exceptions (I can mentally count about 5 occasions during c. 35 years of gaming), dead = dead.

 

[slwoyach]

No resurrection, combat should be scary. It should also carry a risk of serious wounds, not just hit point loss.

 

[TheYeti1775]

Really depends on Group, Setting, Campaign, what game you are playing and actual gameplay.

Personally I would love bringing forward the old Con rules from 1E. Though I think I would have a player revolt.

 

[Ourph]

If the player wants to keep playing the character, I am happy to let them be raised. It's really up to the player. As DM, I will find a way to make it happen in-game even if the PCs don't necessarily have the resources to do it BTB.

I don't think a game needs permanent character death to make it interesting or challenging.

 

[Theo R Cwithin]

Depends on the campaign, so I voted Sometimes, Rarely and Never.

 

[sjmiller]

With my main gaming group I have to be very careful about player character death. My group is so incredibly clingy/obsessed with their characters that they get a bit whiny when they die. Heck, I made sample characters for a playtest of Gaslight which were meant to test all the races and classes. As I handed them out they complained about how they were made, and the choices made. After the final playtest session I said we could continue playing Gaslight and they could make their own characters. Seven of the nine said they want to play the same characters and they like them!

If you add to that the whining and complaining that has occurred with character deaths in other games, you can see why deaths are few and far between in my games.

 

[Desdichado]

Crisitunity! Hah!

Great word.