D&D 5E Let 'em live or die?

[The Green Hermit]

Death is the ultimate form of failure.

But, this isn't about failure (as you say, and I agree, "failure" can take many forms), IMO, it is about having a real risk in the game where you are possibly losing something you care* about.

Without the threat of death, the game gets ridiculous IMO and pointless because you are basically saying the PCs can't lose! They might not win, but the game would result in a stalemate. Or, given enough "chances", they eventually will win by sheer luck alone. For instance, a high enough level PC could kill an ancient dragon with their bare hands with enough repeats.

Now, I'll freely admit I feel a bit badly (but hey, I get over it LOL!) when a PC dies just due to bad luck on a die roll. Otherwise, frankly, I have never met a DM who wasn't willing the kill the PCs... why wouldn't you??? Boggles my mind, honestly.

(*Assuming you care about your PCs... some players don't so death isn't a threat to them. )

I will kill off individual PCs that die during a battle. A TPK, though, results in an auto-reset before the battle in question, unless the players are at the point where they want to start a new campaign anyway.

And yes, we have ended a battle before with only two survivors, one of which was unconscious and had to be dragged out of harm's way. Everybody else had to reroll and come up with a reason to run into the survivors and join up with them.

 

[Helldritch]

Is "realistic" part of your player's goals?

Because, we are in general talking about a game with cat-people, wizards flinging fireballs, dragons the size of a house flying through the air, and rogues who can do significant damage to house-sized dragons with rapiers. Oh, and magic that brings people back from the dead.

So, it really pays to figure out what "realistic" means in this context, and if your players care about it.

Ok, by "realistic" I mean the reaction of a lord in a medieval time. Fantasy yes, but reactions, expectations and point of views will still be the same. See magic here as a kind of technology and everything will make sense. A lord/high priest/wizard or whatever will not waste precious resources for nobodies. Heroes, they will try to save/rescue/bring back, but a nobody? I mean, if it cost them nothing, yeah, sure. But if the cost is prohibitive, they'll do it only if something will come out for them in the long run.

Earn? So, it sounds to me like there's another style choice at work here, applying a sort of work ethic to characters (and by extension, the players) - if you don't "earn" life, then death shall be your reward.

No, if you act stupidly, then death shall be your reward. If you do play and role play in ways that will bring you fame, reknown and respect, even death will not stop you. It is a matter of how you want to see things.

And it is that extension to the players I am interested in. The player is at the table looking for a good time. Once they are at the table, they shouldn't have to earn a good time. "You don't play well and long enough, you can have a crummy night," sounds sub-optimal, to me. So, making sure that the players actually find this fun, rather than just a thing they have to put up with, seems appropriate.

Depends on what kind of immersion you want. Sometimes, a movie does not end as you would expect (no happy end) does this lessen your enjoyment of it? The main hero dies. It is sad, the hero did not save the day but others will rise to save it. For me and my players this is perfectly acceptable. Not all stories end well. But not all stories end badly. Most of them end up quite well. We are in heroic fantasy after all.

As a DM, I have always rewarded a certain kind of gameplay. I really like the high heroic fantasy genre and it shows. But at the same time, I did GMed in World of Darkness, Cthulhu and Beyond the Supernatural where things can only be dark, horrific and even depressing. One thing for sure, any kind of recognition is never given freely. Otherwise, why play? A journey where everything is given to the players is a pretty bland one.

 

[DND_Reborn]

Because if failure can take many forms, as you agree it does, then even if there is no death, the PCs can lose.

Without the threat of death, any "loss" is only temporary. Death (in theory anyway) is permanent. One of the problems with 5E (for me) is that recovering from death is too easy once you reach 5th level.

Think of it this way: without death, you might lose the battle, but you'll always win the war (or at least result in a stalemate).

And nothing is...

more compelling than life or death.

(yours and/or someone else's).

 

[Oofta]

Without the threat of death, any "loss" is only temporary. Death (in theory anyway) is permanent. One of the problems with 5E (for me) is that recovering from death is too easy once you reach 5th level.

Think of it this way: without death, you might lose the battle, but you'll always win the war (or at least result in a stalemate).

And nothing is...

(yours and/or someone else's).

I don't think recovering from death being too easy is limited to 5E, it's been an issue for a while with the exception of the revivify spell. It's one of my few house rules - resurrection is pretty much unheard of and even raise dead isn't as simple as casting a spell.

 

[prabe]

It is, in my experience, relatively easy to set up a scenario where the PCs can die (even relatively permanently) and still succeed. It is, in my experience, exactly as easy to set up a scenario where the PCs can live and lose--that loss can be permanent (or at least beyond the capacity of the PCs to recover) or it can be temporary (or a story-hook for what comes next).

Neither part of that is exactly relevant to whether a given character (or party) should live or die. That's going to come down to what works at a given table. I think the OP has mentioned talking to the players about how they want to handle this, and I think that's probably a better idea than anything unilateral. I agree with what I think @iserith has said (maybe implied) that discussing death with the players before the start of the campaign is better than waiting until PCs die.

 

[DND_Reborn]

I don't think recovering from death being too easy is limited to 5E, it's been an issue for a while with the exception of the revivify spell. It's one of my few house rules - resurrection is pretty much unheard of and even raise dead isn't as simple as casting a spell.

Depending on how you ran the game, earlier editions could also have easy recovery from death, but much of that was DM fiat (do you have a high priest who will raise dead in most towns, etc.?). Your PCs couldn't do it themselves until 9th level or via a powerful magic item (also DM fiat). And IME, 9th level in AD&D took a LOT longer time than in 5E, but YMMV.

But, in 5E, once you have Revivify it is almost out of the DM's hands unless they restrict the material component for it. But, the spell is there... shrug unless you house-rule as you've done.

 

[embee]

I don't think recovering from death being too easy is limited to 5E, it's been an issue for a while with the exception of the revivify spell. It's one of my few house rules - resurrection is pretty much unheard of and even raise dead isn't as simple as casting a spell.

I play fast and loose with component requirements except...

FOR RAISE DEAD SPELLS.

If the spell calls for diamonds worth 300gp, then if you have enough diamonds on you, that's fine. If you have 300gp, the spell fails. It calls for diamonds. If the spell calls for a diamond worth 500gp and you have two diamonds worth 250gp, the spell fails. It calls for a single diamond worth 500gp. If it calls for rare oils and unguents worth 1,000gp, then you need to get those oils and unguents. Within the allotted time.

This is a rule I do make clear during Session 0, when I explain the death save mechanic. The players have plenty of opportunity to try to get out of a deadly encounter. Pretty much any other spell, just deduct 10gp when you get to a town as it is assumed that the magic users swing by an apothecary or general goods store or other shop to buy the various and sundry material components they may need. But raise dead...

You need diamonds.

I will let a party hire a field medic if they don't have one in the party, though this person is literally just a medic. They cannot fight. They stay with the baggage cart. So when someone goes down, if there isn't an actual healer in the party, better get the person either stabilized or bug out of battle completely and back to the medic. Watch your HP because 0 is unconscious and dying and -10 is dead. Excess damage carries over into the negatives. RAW, if you have 12hp and take 16 dmg, you're at 0. My house rule puts you at -4. Then again, healing potions do the max because a 2hp healing potion is a wet blanket that is just no fun. And if you're at -4 and you get healed for 8, you're not at 1. You're at 4.

As a result, I don't get a lot of dead characters and I don't get TPKs.

When a party member goes down, usually, the players move heaven and earth to get to the member to stabilize and will try to withdraw from combat. There usually is someone who goes down in battle every 4 or 5 sessions. But they invariably get stabilized at zero if not restored to 2 or 3 hp. Death scares them. It's usually a permanent thing and no one wants to try to be the exception.

 

[Oofta]

Depending on how you ran the game, earlier editions could also have easy recovery from death, but much of that was DM fiat (do you have a high priest who will raise dead in most towns, etc.?). Your PCs couldn't do it themselves until 9th level or via a powerful magic item (also DM fiat). And IME, 9th level in AD&D took a LOT longer time than in 5E, but YMMV.

But, in 5E, once you have Revivify it is almost out of the DM's hands unless they restrict the material component for it. But, the spell is there... shrug unless you house-rule as you've done.

Wasn't pretty much everything DM fiat in the first few editions?

 

[Umbran]

Without the threat of death in the game, go write a book together instead.

I'm sorry, but this seems so terribly... macho. DEATH! THE ULTIMATE PRICE!!!1! All you other wusses should go do collaborative story writing! We are HARD CORE!!!

To be clear - Nobody is arguing that death should be completely off the table. This "without the threat..." thing is a strawman, and not constructive to the conversation. Please don't engage that way.

But, what you say raises a question. Why is death the thing that makes it so?

 

[Helldritch]

I'm sorry, but this seems so terribly... macho. DEATH! THE ULTIMATE PRICE!!!1! All you other wusses should go do collaborative story writing! We are HARD CORE!!!

To be clear - Nobody is arguing that death should be completely off the table. This "without the threat..." thing is a strawman, and not constructive to the conversation. Please don't engage that way.

But, what you say raises a question. Why is death the thing that makes it so?

Why do you say that the threat of death is a strawman? Maybe for you, but for many of us, it adds a thrill, it spices up things and raise the tension by quite a margin when a combat comes down to a few die rolls. When the balance can tip either way it is fun.