D&D General How Often Should a PC Die in D&D 5e?

[EzekielRaiden]

It is great to have hope, but why do you think your conversations here will lead to any change?

I have changed more than one person's mind. I have even provided new insight to someone in this very thread (the conversation with Micah over verisimilitude, and whether/when it is worthwhile to "spend" it for some other goal).

It isn't a fast change, that much is certain. But it happens. And if people like me all did as you say, nobody would ever do the things we want to see. Even if I personally never see any fruits of this labor, I am content sowing seeds that someone else may reap the benefits from.

The only change I seem to see is you getting more and more frustrated / angry. That doesn't seem to me to be good for anyone.

Not really. As an example, I too had my perspective widened on alternative possibilities to achieve certain ends (in this case, a gentler introduction for fresh players). I did not ultimately change my mind, but that doesn't mean I got nothing out of the conversation. In the best cases, I get quite a lot out. In the worst, it's a pretty high noise to signal ratio, but there's rarely nothing I gain from it.

To be clear, I am not advocating for you to leave these forums, I think you do have some valuable insight and I look forward to your posts. However, I do seriously worry about your mental health. I lost my daughter last year to mental health and drug issues, so I am perhaps a bit triggered on that issue more than most.

I'm sorry to hear that. (I seem to remember you mentioned this before--I believe we had exchanged commiserations, since I lost my father back in 2023.) Given the context, your empathy and concern are touching and I truly appreciate your desire to look out for your fellow man.

That's a lot of words. What I'm saying is that sometimes you like part of one thing, but not another part of it that is linked. At that point you need to decide which is stronger. Your desire to have what you like, or your dislike of the part that you don't like. Most women like the thin fabric more than they dislike the lack of functional pockets that goes hand in hand with those garments.

For those women who dislike the lack of pockets more, there are garments with heavier fabric and functional pockets that they can buy. There just isn't a wide selection, because most women still buy the non-pocketed items and companies go where the money is.

It depends on if it's elective or not. If someone elects to do something that they don't have to do, it's reasonable to think that there's some reason that they like doing it. Whether they like fitting in with everyone else(all the other women are wearing thin fabric garments with no pockets), or they like it themselves, or they like the brand, or... If there's nothing they like about the elective, they would not elect to do it.

Right. They liked playing simple more than they disliked what the subclass did, so overall they liked the subclass. Or they liked playing fighters more than they liked playing different classes with better free subclasses, so they went with the free Champion.

You don't have to like everything about something in order to like it. If their dislike of the Champion subclass had been stronger than their like of the fighter class or the simple class/subclass, then they would not have picked Champion and would have gone with something else.

Given you seem bothered by my wordiness:

I'm just saying, using X does not mean liking every single characteristic of X. This forum has a VERY bad habit of arguing: "Well, people play X. X has trait Y. Therefore, players must really like Y." That's false. The argument isn't valid. I gave two examples, one real-world and generic (pockets on women's clothing), one real-world and specific to D&D 5e based on WotC's own internal data.

If your argument is merely "Well, lots of people play X, therefore they must like everything about X," your argument is invalid and I have no reason to accept any of the conclusions you drew from it.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

the player MUST always be able to play EXACTLY the kind of behavior they want, no matter how disruptive that might be

If you only play with nice people, "disruptive behaviour" doesn't happen.

Tell me. If your well-loved friends of many years exhibit just one single behavior that isn't entirely the way you'd like, would you "let [them] go on [their] way" and instead seek out total strangers to bring in for stuff?

Not all my friends play D&D. If they didn't play nicely, I wouldn't play D&D with them. I can socialise with them in other ways. I wouldn't seek out strangers, because not playing D&D is preferable to spending time with people I don't like. I'd rather read a book.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

And if wishes were horses, beggars would fly. The opinion of any one individual, especially one unlikely to ever purchase anything from WotC, is never ever going to change anything. This forum likely barely registers on WotC radar, do you really think the opinions of one poster could ever change anything?

"An individual person will never change anything, so you should stop trying" is precisely what leads to a lot of desired change in the world never happening. It's precisely what leads to (...relatively) "young" people like me choosing not to vote.

Not that I'm trying to say the things I want are necessarily "desired change". Maybe they are, maybe they aren't. But if every individual person agrees that their individual contribution can't matter, then (by definition) nothing changes.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

The trouble is, the people who end up changing things are the angry people. Content people don't speak out about how content they are. So things get changed in such a way so as to make the previously content people angry. Making things more how you like them is not the same as making them better.

 

[Oofta]

One poster? Probably not.

Many posters? Who knows. One could argue - I think with solid foundation - that WotC-era D&D design has very much been influenced by in-hobby public opinion including surveys, convention panels, unsolicited feedback, and yes - forum posts here and elsewhere.

And it's worth remembering that many always begins with one.

They will only consider significant change if sales fall. Perhaps some people with popular blogs or some other kind of significant following (I refuse to use the "i" word) could be noticed. But one lone individual that has been banging the same drum for years in a forum? Repeating the same things that never catch fire? Not going to make a difference.

You can't please everyone and no game can be for everyone. Whether it's due to rules that simply work for a lot of people, luck, timing, probably a combination of above, 5E has exceeded all expectations. They aren't going to listen to you, me, or any other individual on this forum.

 

[Maxperson]

Given you seem bothered by my wordiness:

I wasn't bothered. Hell, I read the @Snarf Zagyg posts all the way through...........most of the time.

I'm just saying, using X does not mean liking every single characteristic of X. This forum has a VERY bad habit of arguing: "Well, people play X. X has trait Y. Therefore, players must really like Y." That's false. The argument isn't valid. I gave two examples, one real-world and generic (pockets on women's clothing), one real-world and specific to D&D 5e based on WotC's own internal data.

If your argument is merely "Well, lots of people play X, therefore they must like everything about X," your argument is invalid and I have no reason to accept any of the conclusions you drew from it.

I agree with this. Where I see this the most is the idea that since 5e is so popular, that it has to be the best edition ever made and wildly liked by all. Those folks ignore all of the other factors that had nothing to do with 5e itself that went in to making it as popular as it is.

Is 5e the best? It could be. It could also be that one of the prior editions might have been even more wildly successful had it been released when all of those other factors occurred. We can't know for sure.

My point was you can both like and dislike things in what you buy/play/do. Generally if you are buying/playing/doing something that has aspects you dislike, there are other reasons that exceed the dislike, such as liking the rest of it more than what you dislike. i.e. women's clothing without pockets.

 

[Maxperson]

If your options boil down to:

A - all of you die trying to save the child, meaning the child then dies too; or
B - the child dies but you do not, and you later negate the child's death via reviving it while also avenging its killers

...which seems the better choice?

At 4th level you - depending on the campaign - could easily have the resources required to pay an NPC to cast a high-end revival spell that doesn't require the presence of the corpse.

That assumes that the kid will want to come back. In most editions those in the afterlife don't remember their former lives. So what you are doing is asking some kid who doesn't know you and is enjoying(presumably) the afterlife, to give it up and go with a bunch of strangers.

Most NPCs won't want to leave, unless they were bad people and are suffering on a lower plane, in which case you probably aren't bringing them back anyway.

PCs for some reason always say yes, even though logically most of them wouldn't want to leave the afterlife for a bunch of strangers that they don't know.

 

[Lanefan]

I just don't really see why these two things are so separate. This applies to @Micah Sweet as well. I don't understand why agency exclusively within behavior is absolutely sacrosanct, the player MUST always be able to play EXACTLY the kind of behavior they want, no matter how disruptive that might be, but their agency within selection is totally unimportant and not only can but should be thrust aside any and every time it might be disruptive to some other goal.

That's where I see a disconnect. One side makes an aspect of player agency sacrosanct no matter how disruptive it might be, the other condemns an aspect of player agency specifically because it might, possibly, be disruptive. Why are behavioral disruptions sacrosanct, but character-selection disruptions anathema?

Because character selection ties to a) setting and b) game design, which are entirely under the DM's prerogative. Character play generally does not, other than some alignment-restricted classes.

High reward is worthless when you die after your second or third or fourth high risk.

That's the problem. A given character isn't taking one high risk. They're taking high risk after high risk after high risk after...etc. The inevitable end of that is death by high risk. Playing it safe doesn't earn you the big bucks. But it does mean you last a hell of a lot longer.

That should, ideally, be the trade-off choice one has to make: to play it safe and boring with lower reward but a greater likelihood of longevity, or to play it daring and exciting with higher reward but a lower likelihood of longevity.

I tend to go for the latter and prefer when other players do likewise; mostly because boring is, well, boring and I ain't there to be bored.

Tell me. If your well-loved friends of many years exhibit just one single behavior that isn't entirely the way you'd like, would you "let [them] go on [their] way" and instead seek out total strangers to bring in for stuff?

For the next campaign I'd invite in other friends, and have done so before.

Because that's literally what you're telling me to do here. These players aren't randos who responded to an ad. They're my good friends. I invited them into the game specifically because I like and appreciate their thoughts and tastes. That they are skittish and risk-averse is simply part of working with them to produce a good game. It is not, in any way, some kind of failing or problem with them that would induce me to dump them.

You like and appreciate their thoughts and tastes, and that's great, and yet you frequently note they have a collective skittishness issue. Seems like a conflict there somewhere.

Were it me I'd jokingly tack a sign on the outside of my DM screen to the effect of "The Beatings Will Continue Until Courage Improves".

More seriously, one option you've got is to - if one of them ever does do something rash - go through the motions of rolling etc. but let it work just that one time so they can feel the thrill of victory and know what it's like to have the table cheering for them (they do cheer each other's victories, right?). That alone should provide encouragement for others to do likewise now and then, with a reminder from you that as with any game there's wins and losses.

Then that just reinforces the problem. People who backstab one another without a second thought are exactly the kind of people who do the thing that you find so annoying, leaving someone to die when sticking around another handful of rounds would mean no one dies.

Sometimes. Other times they just pragmatically size up the odds, and if staying in means nobody dies then they'll stay in. However, if staying in is probably suicidal then it's book it, pronto. As a player I've made this choice dozens if not hundreds of times; most of the time I stay in but sometimes it's just not worth dying for, and if I (or someone else) survives there's always a chance of reviving the dead later, a chance that doesn't exist if we all die.

 

[Lanefan]

That assumes that the kid will want to come back. In most editions those in the afterlife don't remember their former lives. So what you are doing is asking some kid who doesn't know you and is enjoying(presumably) the afterlife, to give it up and go with a bunch of strangers.

I'm somewhat harsher on the dead: if someone casts a revival spell the deceased's spirit doesn't get a choice. If the resurrection survival roll succeeds, the target comes back to life and that's that. (if the death was due to sheer old age the target will very soon die again, but that's a different issue)

Usually it's considered a courtesy to, if possible, cast Speak With Dead on the deceased and ask their wishes in the matter (or just read the person's will, if one was ever made); but there's nothing carved in stone saying those wishes or requests have to be followed. In the case of a child who probably doesn't understand the concepts anyway, there's likely no point, so just bring it back to life if such is desired and have done with it.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I'm somewhat harsher on the dead: if someone casts a revival spell the deceased's spirit doesn't get a choice. If the resurrection survival roll succeeds, the target comes back to life and that's that. (if the death was due to sheer old age the target will very soon die again, but that's a different issue)

Usually it's considered a courtesy to, if possible, cast Speak With Dead on the deceased and ask their wishes in the matter (or just read the person's will, if one was ever made); but there's nothing carved in stone saying those wishes or requests have to be followed. In the case of a child who probably doesn't understand the concepts anyway, there's likely no point, so just bring it back to life if such is desired and have done with it.

I agree. The permission thing always made sense to me as more of a cultural choice than a requirement to make the magic work, no matter what the book says. Literature has several examples of characters pulled back to mortal life whether they like it or not.