D&D 5E [+] Questions for zero character death players and DMs…

[Chaosmancer]

:sigh: That changes nothing about my point. You are still scripting the entire thing and an ending MUST happen if the book is to finish, regardless of what you know and when. An RPG doesn't have to have an ending. TPKs can happen. Adventurers(the players) can just say, we're done with this campaign. A PC can die and never achieve his goals. This is very much unlike the media you are falsely comparing RPGs to.

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Right, because a TPK wouldn't be an ending. Just... the end of the game? The end of that story? But somehow that isn't an.... ending?

And there is no work that is ever started and never finished, right? I mean, that'd be... incredibly common in all forms of media.

And then there is the last point, you know, the think we are actually talking about. How, very rarely in media is a character killed off without completing most of their arc. And how, therefore, it wouldn't be wildly crazy to not kill off a PC before they achieve most of their goals. Kind of like... the entire crux of my point.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Except that there’s no harm in killing a PC. It’s not alive. Ants are. We’re playing a game. The rules of that game include the possibility of PC death. Following the rules of the game to that conclusion is not equivalent to smashing ants, i.e. pointlessly killing living creatures. Playing an RPG is playing a game. If you can’t stand the thought of a PC dying, don’t play a game with that possibility or house rule it. Other people play differently than you and don’t have the same assumptions.

If you’ve never laughed at someone getting hurt or dying in a TV show, film, or book, you might not understand. The characters aren’t real. The actors don’t really get hurt, if everything goes right, nor do the stunt people. So if you laugh, you’re not laughing at a real person really being hurt, you’re laughing at a fictional character being fictionally hurt.

PCs likewise aren’t real. They’re fictional constructs designed for gaming with dice. To be used and discarded at will. They’re not unique or special or precious. You can makes hundreds in an hour. I could design a spreadsheet in an hour that could spit out thousands with the click of a button.

Yes, I understand the concept of what a fictional person is. Thank you for explaining it.

I write. I write a lot. I make fictional people all the time. I don't find the goal of making those people is to then kill them. It... isn't the point of making them. Sure, I could make people and then describe how I kill them, over and over and over. But... kind of pointless? And PCs aren't made by me, they were made by someone else. So it is actually closer to going online, finding people's OC's and... murdering them. Over and over and over.

Again, kind of pointless.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Absolutely. But, to me, the question remains: why does character death prevent story-focused players from getting story out of gaming? Can there be no story where character death is a possibility? Of course there can. There are loads of meaningful stories that involve character death. One of the most popular fantasy series of books and most popular fantasy TV series includes an awful lot of it. The thread reads an awful lot like story-focused players have a predefined end-point in mind before they start play that must be reached for the story to be satisfying. That seems antithetical to player agency and playing to find out what happens. Both of which are high on my list of priorities as a player and referee. For me, protecting a player from their bad choices is not how I want to run a game.

But character death in those stories needs to be handled carefully. The author doesn't just roll a die and decide which character is going to die. And poorly handled character deaths are a MASSIVE problem in media. The entire concept of "fridging" comes from a misuse of character death.

Like was discussed, even Game of Thrones doesn't kill people "randomly" it kills them with a purpose in mind, a goal towards the overall narrative. And many,many people on these threads have stated that it isn't "no deaths ever in anyway" it is "death when the player agrees to it". And even if they all agree, no deaths ever.... that is still a fine choice. Because the agency is actually staying with the players. They are the only ones making the choice. They are saying "I want to see where this story leads, but I don't want to roll a new character." There is no need to "protect" them from bad choices, becuase bad choices still have consequences, just not the consequence of rolling a new character.

 

[Charlaquin]

But character death in those stories needs to be handled carefully. The author doesn't just roll a die and decide which character is going to die. And poorly handled character deaths are a MASSIVE problem in media. The entire concept of "fridging" comes from a misuse of character death.

Like was discussed, even Game of Thrones doesn't kill people "randomly" it kills them with a purpose in mind, a goal towards the overall narrative. And many,many people on these threads have stated that it isn't "no deaths ever in anyway" it is "death when the player agrees to it". And even if they all agree, no deaths ever.... that is still a fine choice. Because the agency is actually staying with the players. They are the only ones making the choice. They are saying "I want to see where this story leads, but I don't want to roll a new character." There is no need to "protect" them from bad choices, becuase bad choices still have consequences, just not the consequence of rolling a new character.

To kill a character with a purpose in mind and goal towards the overall narrative, one must have an overall narrative in mind. Many people object to this in D&D. They want a satisfying narrative to emerge organically, they don’t want to plan one first and then act it out. Rather than keeping characters alive because their death wouldn’t suit the narrative they already had planned, they want to accept the character death that occurred as a result of gameplay and come up with a way to incorporate that into the narrative they are actively creating as they go.

 

[Hussar]

No doubt. Still not the way I and some others play.

Fair enough. But I was talking about how it has nothing to do with when you started playing that you choose to play this way.

I did play a more story oriented way from the very beginning and so did those I played with.

And I have to ask. If story is not why you play then why do you care about lore or the story of the setting. After all it was mentioned earlier that characters aren’t real. You can generate thousands in a spreadsheet.

So why would the external story of the npcs or the setting matter?

 

[JiffyPopTart]

I literally had to tell a player that my game was not source material for or subject to their self insert writings & ban them from creating a characte rthat was intended for that because she was incredibly disruptive playing a character who existed in hammerspace most of the table time but expected to conform to things written in isolation away from the table. Despite that hard line in session zero & before the player recently declared "bob wants to serve his patron and do what they want/ask of him, so she can gain more power to be able to protect his family and her current group. But also, he wants to honor her blue dragon progenitor/his village by sharing his knowledge and helping people that need it. Its all about gaining more power and being stronger so he can use that for good." but didn't lift a finger or even speak up when the group was busy murderhoboing themselves away from the prepared adventures till they were finally banished & literally no part of that story has been reflected in any of the player's actions at the table. I can't throw plot hooks at them because they are ignored if they don't perfectly align with a story written sometime when we aren't actually at the table playing d&d. "Authored story" is what you get from a solo activity like writing a story not playing a team game with other players under a GM who is responsible for all of their players rather than the Author at the table.

Although I can't find the quote (suspect it was a podcast) Jim butcher once got asked if he plays dresden files rpg being the author of the dresden files books. His response was to explain how he would be the worst nightmare of a player since anything the GM says is different than he wants it to be when something is happening would be exactly what he says & that he could make it that later if he felt it was important. That's why d&d is not a place for someone authoring a story about their character.

You gave me two examples of people who are unable to collaborate properly to support what argument? That collaborative fiction doesn't work at all?

 

[JiffyPopTart]

To kill a character with a purpose in mind and goal towards the overall narrative, one must have an overall narrative in mind. Many people object to this in D&D. They want a satisfying narrative to emerge organically, they don’t want to plan one first and then act it out. Rather than keeping characters alive because their death wouldn’t suit the narrative they already had planned, they want to accept the character death that occurred as a result of gameplay and come up with a way to incorporate that into the narrative they are actively creating as they go.

Here's the thing with this endless argument. At no point have I claimed that nobody should have character deaths in their game, I have said I mostly avoid them because it messes up my storytelling style.

This isnt a dig at other types of play. Its a sime statement about my preference.

Which is why it's baffling that I keep getting told DnD or RPGs aren't supposed to work the way I like....because it works fine.

 

[Hussar]

I don't want authored story. Thats for books, movies, TV, and RPGs that aren't D&D.

Would it be accurate to say you don’t want authored story during play but outside of play you have no problems with it?

Also how do you play an rpg without an authored story? I just can’t see it. You have the town. You have the bandits raiding the town. You have the pcs entering town.

How is that not an authored story? Sure I suppose the pcs might join the bandits but most groups disallow evil pcs so that’s probably off the table.

At the end of this it’s most likely a lot of dead bandits and the town rejoicing.

How is that not an authored story?

 

[Charlaquin]

Here's the thing with this endless argument. At no point have I claimed that nobody should have character deaths in their game, I have said I mostly avoid them because it messes up my storytelling style.

This isnt a dig at other types of play. Its a sime statement about my preference.

Which is why it's baffling that I keep getting told DnD or RPGs aren't supposed to work the way I like....because it works fine.

I didn’t say RPGs aren’t supposed to work the way you like. I specifically said “many people object to” having a story already planned out, because I know many other people are fine with it and I wanted to avoid sounding like I was saying it was in anyway wrong.

 

[Hussar]

Do people mean scripted when they say authored? Is that where I’m getting confused?

Even if that is true it’s a huge stretch to say that a game is scripted if a single character moment isn’t randomly resolved.