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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Umbran" data-source="post: 5663413" data-attributes="member: 177">I think this may depend upon what you mean by "devoted to", but I'm pretty sure I disagree.It is my experience that players feel far more connection to things they've played through than things that are just written in a couple of sentences in an e-mail.  If the past is supposed to motivate the present, if the player is to feel invested in the character's past, then playing through some of it can pay off.There is no real physical danger to the body of the character, at least in bog-standard D&D.  But heroism isn't just about facing death - it is about facing fears and taking risks for a good cause.  As has often been discussed, there's no reason why character death should be the only meaningful risk.Yes, there are some few players who only react to risk of death, but for many that may well be because GMs don't establish early on that there are other things to lose.  And prologues are very good for doing just that.  Now, getting back to "devoted to" - you seem to suggest that if the game is "devoted to" action and heroism, then that's the only thing of value.  I think that's hardly the case.  First off, there's the simple tutorial.  There's value in getting players acquainted with the mechanics of their particular character before setting them into a scenario when not knowing them can get them killed.Next, a prologue isn't necessarily about just what the player has written down about his past.  It can also include setting elements that the GM has in play that the player hasn't yet seen.Then, if the GM himself is good at role-play, a prologue allows the player to establish some of the character's personality a bit more strongly before getting mixed in with everyone else.  Starting group sessions are generally about getting to know others - a prologue can be about getting to know yourself.The best prologues I've ever been involved with did all these things, and I think helped make the associated game far more successful than if the GM had just dumped the characters together with each having only some paragraphs of background in e-mails.</blockquote>

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