Character Death and GM Force

In Fighters vs. Spell Casters - A Case For Fighters [MENTION=6701124]Cadence[/MENTION] brought up the subject of the effect that GM Force has on the lethal nature of combat in the game. He mentioned that in his experience when he played in games that avoided using GM Force to a significant extent character death was pretty common. In other games he noticed that character death was pretty rare given what the logical outcomes of the rules should be. So begins our discussion of the effect that different GM techniques have on how lethal a game is.

For the purpose of our discussion GM Force refers to a GM's use of rule adjudication, setting construction, and deployment of NPCs to manipulate the course of events in game. For example in the scope of a combat encounter that is proving to be too tough for the PCs to handle a GM might:

• Purposefully interpret rules in a favorable light for players so that they are more likely to suceed.
• Suspend or alter the task or conflict resolution rules momentarily. This includes shifting hit point totals, lowering AC values, and flat out declaring that a PC who might be dead according to the rules of the game is merely knocked out. It also includes fudging dice rolls.
• Change NPC behaviors. Monsters and NPCs suddenly start making a rash of poor decisions. They trip Attacks of Oppurtunity when they could clearly get around them. They cast spells that don't have much of a chance of working against the PCs. A pack of bloodthirsty ghouls might not chew on the fallen as the fiction dictates.
• They decide cavalry comes in at just the right time to even the odds.

Why do GMs feel the need to adjust the difficulty of an encounter mid stream like this?
If you want a lower body count do you need to use GM force?
What effect does this have on player behavior and decision making?

I think it depends on the match between what the characters are expected to do and the system in use.

Running 4E I can honestly say that I haven't had to use GM force to keep PCs alive at all; we have had occasional PC deaths, but no TPKs (so far!). There is a sort of "system force", in the sense that the encounter design guidelines in the DMG tell me what numbers and powers of monsters are likely to be beatable by the party, so there is a kind of "forced assumption" there.

On the other hand, I run and play in HârnMaster games on a regular basis, too - and we get few PC deaths there, also. But, if the HM characters tried to do what a typical D&D character does, recklessly going into monster-infested sites and deliberately engaging in combat to gain loot, they would die in droves absent some serious DM fudging.

So, the thing seems to be "Ask First What the PCs are Supposed to be Doing, Then Build Rules to Suit". If the general game activity is supposed to be player characters doing heroic and daring stuff to reap mythic rewards, then the system is going to need to make the PCs pretty mythic themselves. If the idea is to emulate a big, independent fantasy world where the PCs are not the "heroes of the action movie", on the other hand, verisimilitude in place of character puissance will be useful. Trying to do either type of core play assumption with rules made for the other will need some major GM interventions (also known as "the GM changes the rules as play goes on, in order to suit the actual requirements of the game").

I know that when I switched, as a DM, from rolling behind the screen to rolling 100% in the open, the lethality of my game increased a WHOLE lot. I didn't realize just how much fudging I'd been doing over the years until then. I went from whacking a PC once in a while to about once every three sessions.

It's astonishing just how lethal the game became just because I rolled in the open.

Oops posted to wrong thread, moved myself.

Personally, I have problems with use of DM force which deviates far from the rules in ways that mystify the players without any attendant communication to the players to indicate whats happening. I've seen this happen in ways that totally deprotagonise players and cause major problems in groups. Explanations when necessary, even partial ones, can really help hold on to player trust, so long as they are not revealed as misdirection and lies subsequently.

Some players have been burned on this issue and are less likely to trust DM force actions on faith.

I just listen to my inner voice.

I've most recently been running a PF adventure path (Serpent's Skull) and I know that I don't know that I could kill the characters if I tried. They've already gone after encounters assuming a party 2 levels higher than they (5 9th level chars against a CR 14 encounter) without any real difficulty.

I'll adjust the encounters mid-stream if I think it enhances the narrative. And I'm actually good enough at it that the players don't even realize it. For my players and myself, death is fine if it is a worthy death. One that will ultimately help the story of the campaign along. If it's meaningless (and not in the way a meaningless death is an indicator of the story spiraling downwards towards an inevitable conclusion)... then usually something will happen rather than the PC dying. Capture, major injury, the PCs spirit going to another plane and having encounters there in an effort to get back to his body, expectation that the party will be able to raise the PC easily, etc.

The best stories are characters overcoming obstacles as they strive to achieve something. And that tends to end if the character dies. But if it turns out the player feels the story just isn't working the way they want it, or the player sees a grander narrative coming out of his/her character dying, then so be it.

Or of course if the player just does something incredibly stupid. If he's cacked that way... the player knows and accepts the death as payment for stupidity rendered.

If I'm making an off-ruleset ruling--something I do often enough, as I run 2E--then I'm clear with my players that that's what's happening, and I solicit their input as a way of ensuring their buy-in.

One thing we all agreed on from the start was that player character death should be rare, so we adopted a house rule that used Paizo's crit deck to apply long term conditions as a way to occasionally avoid death.

I fudge combat now and then, but usually that comes down to sloppy prep rather than outcome manipulation. (It's a pretty open world style game, so things do come up for which I have no plan.)

We've being using "Active" play for 8 years or so, so the players roll all the d20 dice. I do roll damage in the open before their roll is made, so they see how Lethal the hit will be if they miss the defense check

So, the players throw their action points at the check on big damage ... They live longer

I gave an example from my 4e campaign in the earlier thread linked in the OP.

In the one an only TPK in my 4e game, after all the PCs had gone down one was definitely dead - the paladin of the Raven Queen had been dropped below negative bloodied by friendly fire from the PC wizard - but the others were simply at zero hp. I asked the players who wanted to keep playing their PCs. All did (including the one whose PC was dead) except for one player, who wanted to bring in a drow sorcerer to replace his half-elf warlock.

So I decided that the PCs (other than the dead one) were only unconscious rather than dead (as per the options for zero hp in the 4e PHB). The PCs (other than the paladin, and the half-elf) woke up in a goblin prison cell (the TPK was at the hands of evil spirits under the control of the goblin shaman). Also in the cell was a drow. And all could smell the smell of roasting half-elf (the goblins had already butchered him).

The paladin came back to life slightly later in the session, in a different context: his body was laid out on a ritual altar by the shaman, and the shaman was using the body as a focus to conjure up a wraith, the spirit of a witch who had (before dying, coming back as a wight and then being killed by this PC) been an oathsworn servitor of the paladin. The shaman was successful, but the Raven Queen (exercising her mastery over death and fate) sent the paladin back into the world also, to stop this spirit that was bound to his from wreaking more harm.

(In mechanical terms this was treated as Raise Dead ie I deduct the notional amount for a Raise Dead scroll from the party's loot total for that level, and impose the resurrection penalty on the PC's actions.)

Another PC has come back twice in similar circumstances, once at the behest of Erathis (to recover a lost Nerathi artefact) and once in circumstances that revealed his true origin and destiny, with the agreement of many gods.

Another example involved the drow, who died in poisonous fumes being hunted down by salamanders, but was brought back to life by the prayers of the paladin (this one was an improvised action involving the permanent sacrifice of a Cincture of Healing).

My general theory of PC death in (default) 4e: In 4e XP, and hence levels, are basically a pacing mechanism, for pacing both the growth in mechanical complexity, and the growth in cosmological significance, of the PC. The 4e rules mandate the same XP awards for all players in the group. PCs therefore level together. If a PC were to die and a new one be brought in, it would be at the same level, and under the control of that same player. Therefore, what reason is there for it not to be the same PC? The only reason can be a story reason. And given we're talking, to a significant extent at least, about the story of the dead PC, we're talking about a story in which the player has the primary interest and hence should exercise the primary control. My job as GM is simply to facilitate that, and to apply mechanical consequences (namely, applying the cost of a Raise Dead ritual to the party's notional treasure allocation for that level, and imposing resurrection recovery penalties).