D&D General Do players even like the risk of death?

[Fanaelialae]

I’ve no idea what that is?

It's a meat grinder for 0th level characters in the Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG. Basically, every player gets a bunch of PCs and whichever ones survive get a class.

 

[Fanaelialae]

All you're testing there are player preferences.

What I am saying is that if you take a player pre-3e and post-3e, they'll have the same opinion on whether the funnel was to their liking. Playing a system with encounter guidelines doesn't make players want fair encounters if they didn't previously. It simply makes it more apparent if they already did.

 

[Maxperson]

It's a meat grinder for 0th level characters in the Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG. Basically, every player gets a bunch of PCs and whichever ones survive get a class.

Yeah, he described it sort of like that earlier in the thread which makes it a False Dichotomy. He said earlier that if players aren't okay with that, then they basically want it to be easy street, except that there is lots of middle ground.

 

[transmission89]

All you're testing there are player preferences.

What I am saying is that if you take a player pre-3e and post-3e, they'll have the same opinion on whether the funnel was to their liking. Playing a system with encounter guidelines doesn't make players want fair encounters if they didn't previously. It simply makes it more apparent if they already did.

Not quite. You’d be testing if they’d accept immediate potentially lethal consequence for actions as a response. Doesn’t even have to be in fighting a monster. Again, I imagine quite a few won’t vibe that style. Which means the answer still stands as no to the original question.

 

[transmission89]

Yeah, he described it sort of like that earlier in the thread which makes it a False Dichotomy. He said earlier that if players aren't okay with that, then they basically want it to be easy street, except that there is lots of middle ground.

I didn’t say that at all. I’m aware there’s a middle ground, which is the structured artificial challenge I was referring too. I’m not so dismissive as to say players want easy street, I’m not into bad wrong funning. None of my statements have been judgemental in nature, merely descriptive of different approaches.

 

[FrogReaver]

Not quite. You’d be testing if they’d accept immediate potentially lethal consequence for actions as a response. Doesn’t even have to be in fighting a monster. Again, I imagine quite a few won’t vibe that style. Which means the answer still stands as no to the original question.

So you believe the only reason someone could not want to play in or not like your 0 DCCC meatgrinder is if they want there to be no PC death? Talk about a logical leap!

 

[Fanaelialae]

Not quite. You’d be testing if they’d accept immediate potentially lethal consequence for actions as a response. Doesn’t even have to be in fighting a monster. Again, I imagine quite a few won’t vibe that style. Which means the answer still stands as no to the original question.

Some players won't. Some players will.

It's a matter of preference. Either you find that kind of meat grinder fun, or you don't.

Given that the funnel is essentially a one-shot, it's not really a good test either IMO. A player could be fine losing their faceless 0th level characters to the funnel, but still grow attached to whichever character survives. Although DCC probably isn't the system for them, in that case.

Players won't suddenly prefer a playstyle that produces lots of death just because they play DCC. Much like players don't suddenly prefer not dying because they play 3e. However, upon trying both games they might very well find that one aligns more with their preexisting preferences than the other.

I've seen plenty of deaths and even several TPKs result from fair and balanced encounters over the years. That's hardly a mere illusion of death. It's character death. It might not be as deadly as you might prefer, but I think there's a pretty wide range between that and the illusion of death.

 

[Arilyn]

I'm not a big fan of character death in my games, but I enjoy DCC. I can get into the spirit of the game. That playstle, however, doesn't line up with what I want from other RPGs.

 

[FrogReaver]

I'm not a big fan of character death in my games, but I enjoy DCC. I can get into the spirit of the game. That playstle, however, doesn't line up with what I want from other RPGs.

Id suggest that is likely typical. Most people don’t mind occasionally running somethings with their group that they may individually not prefer. There’s only a few that are going to flat out refuse to run a system or game due to their preference.

But change the question to - would you be willing to only play in this style from here on out and that’s a much different question.

 

[Arilyn]

Id suggest that is likely typical. Most people don’t mind occasionally running somethings with their group that they may individually not prefer. There’s only a few that are going to flat out refuse to run a system or game due to their preference.

But change the question to - would you be willing to only play in this style from here on out and that’s a much different question.

I do enjoy changing up styles, and played DCC a lot during summer of 2020.
But no, I certainly wouldn't pick it as a default.