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Darkness said:
On the other hand, if every cocky PC who unncecessarily messes with mortal danger can be assured to only get a slap on the wrist for his troubles, the players will quickly learn not to take anyone or anything seriously.
Absolutely. We do not disagree here. However, to my mind, there is a world of room between "you PC is killed" and "a slap on the wrist" in which many GMs play and run games every day. I certainly did not think the alternative i suggested was a slap on thw wrist.
If the PCs are instructed by the Gm that "those types of defiant gestures will result in character death" they will obviously refrain from doing so. hopefully, none of the players was silly enough to bring into this campaign any of those classic "disrespect authority" or "not totally in control at all time" character archtypes because they are probably a brief, character-in-passing and not destined to be a star.
If I did want to teach this lesson to my PCs, perhaps as a part of showing this particular NPC "monster" had no sense of proportionate response and had no personality aspects which might lead him to anything but the most direct overt responses, then i would have had a known rebellious NPC do the deed. this is the classic redshirt-dies-to-establish-the-degre-of-danger.
But, i don't usually have characters such as liches play the role of monsters (the rather simple killing force you have only the option of killing or be killed by) and instead usually have them play the role of characters/antagonists (more detailed motivations and reactions) so I tend to have the lich's response be more one of any number of story/drama producing varieties, such as "One among the sheep with spine. excellent! he will make an excellent herald for my demands." or any number of not-necessarily-pleasant but also not just "this ones dead, pull another out of your backpack" end-of-stories/drama.
I treat the PCs as the stars, not the redshirts, and I think most of my players can attest to that not meaning they just get slaps on the wrist.
otherwise, they wouldn't be calling me "Stevil" and having me on their voice tag cell phone as "Evil Bast..."
Darkness said:
Heh. Playing devil's advocate, here; I don't disagree with swrushing. My point is that:
- The optimal course of action for the DM depends on the campaign, the character and the circumstances.
Agreed. 100%
Darkness said:
[*]Further, that, while encouraging heroism is generally a good thing, there are other important considerations as well.
Agreed 100%
Darkness said:
[*]Lastly, that tragedy doesn't have to be a bad thing even if it comes at the expense of a PC's life.
Agreed, but for my tastes and IMX, the situations which benefit from PCs death are fewer and farther between than i think the frequency of PC death seems represented on these boards typically.
IMX the occurance of PC death often serves to REDUCE the drama, to reduce the importance of the PCs, and to reduce player interest and investment in their characters and not to create the INCREASE in sense of danger. A redshirt death can serve as an alert, can serve as a "pay attention, this is serious" especially if you have NPCs woven into the story as "characters" as opposed to resources and their demise strikes a number of chords inside the game world or in-character, but a PC death strikes other chords entirely and actually IMX tends to strike a lot of chords outside of the game world and out-of-character, which makes a huge difference in result.
But, of course, the particulars would vary from game to game, Gm to Gm, and players to players. Some players I know would be much happier as a player to have their PC killed and bring in a new guy ("I got a backpack full of them") instead of ever having to roleplay their character under any mental influence or captured. I once had to deny a player the option of joining one of my games because he was a "never get captured" **player** and the genre, Stargate Sg-1, features capture as a reasonable occurance. It would have been a horrible mismatch of player and game style otherwise.
