Dead in your first combat ever?

[shilsen]

IMC, players can use action pts to turn a killing blow/effect into one that drops them to -9 hit pts and stable. So the PC wouldn't have died in the first place.

 

[Nonlethal Force]

Thanks, see it now
How do I get to the "first post" from EN main page with the poll, that is with out posting?

On the main page, under the options to click, can't you simply select a link that says "read thread" or "view poll results" or something like that? It'll direct link you to the thread in question where you can read it and vote a bit more informed.

 

[Vraille Darkfang]

Not in D&D....

But here is my entire experience with Mech-Warrior.

1. Spend several hours making Characters.

2. Random Determine Mechs (I get the 100 Tone).

3. Begin Combat. Enemy unit fire first. AC-20 to the Head. My Head.

I'm dead within 15 seconds of beginning play.

4. Wait until Combat is over to make a new character.

5. 6 Hours later. Give up, go back to my Dorm Room.

I'll admit, it wasn't just the game's fault (The GM should have done more to get me back in), but I WAS able to see how the game (as he ran it) was just a Tabletop game with the Mechawarrior Stuff thrown in to Max out the Mech Stats.

But, I've never been interested in playing Mechwarrior again.

 

[Hussar]

Ordrinarily, if you die, that's too bad, start rolling, but in this particular case, it makes sense for Vinny the Fighter's cousin, Jimmy the Fighter, to show up at the first available opportunity.

WHich is exactly what will happen. We've basically decided to mulligan the encounter and have the Cleric retconned back into the game. No harm, no foul.

In all honesty, the very first game of D&D I played (red box Basic) was a TPK in our first encounter. My brother ate our six wizards with the stirges in the Caves of Chaos.

I feel that this is pretty much a learning experience. I do not fudge rolls ever. (Yup, me be Merk's DM) We play over OpenRPG and all my die rolls are 100% in the open. So, if I did fudge, it would be VERY blatant.

This happened about an hour before the session ended, so, it's not like the player was totally screwed over. Chalk it up to learning and away you go.

This is a very gamist style campaign, to use the right buzzword. PC death is frequent and frequently meaningless. New PC's are parachuted in through a mechanic established near the beginning of the campaign. So, it's not like we're bending over backwards to bring the guy back in new ways. A simple bit of handwaving and we're good to go.

On a side note, huge advanced celestial Rasts are bloody fun. Surprisingly enough, that's the second PC I've bagged with rasts in as many weeks. Woot!

 

[Crothian]

Thanks, see it now
How do I get to the "first post" from EN main page with the poll, that is with out posting?

goto the message boards area and find it I guess.

 

[Vraille Darkfang]

Now for my Wife's Story.

She was 8.

EIGHT!

She rolled up her ver first character, a Paladin to play in her Uncle's Game.

She put a lot of effort into it, even making up a picture.

She's 8 remember that.

First Encounter, Giant Rat.

My wife runs in to Kill the Bad thing and Protect the Party (as good Paladins should do).

Uncle rolls dice. "Well, that'd be a 20. Oh, look Max Damage. That 10 Points of Damage. How many Hit Points do you have?"

Wife (She's 8 at the time, remember). "There's an 8 here under H P"

Uncle "Well your're Paladin's Dead then."

Little 8 year old girl "Dead? MOMMIEEEEEEEE! My Paladin's Dead!!!!! Crying"

Needless to say my wife didn't even touch a set of dice until I met here and convinced her to give it another go.

Not that her Uncle is a bad guy, just not the most Child-Aware person on the Planet.

When dealing with small children, killing off the character they spent hours puring their little hearts into isn't the best way to enroll the new generation of gamers.

 

[Merkuri]

When dealing with small children, killing off the character they spent hours puring their little hearts into isn't the best way to enroll the new generation of gamers.

For the record, I do not know exactly how old our new player is (we play over the internet, remember), but he's old enough to have a pregnant wife.

Surprisingly enough, that's the second PC I've bagged with rasts in as many weeks. Woot!

And the first one would be me. My longest-lived character by far in any D&D game I've played. Twelve levels and 52 sessions. We play once a week, so that character was exactly a year old (not counting weeks off for vacation). I liked her, but she got what she wanted in the end. I decided only a couple sessions before that that she had decided never to leave the dungeon. She didn't.

 

[LostSoul]

I don't think that people would get turned off from the game if their first character ever died early on. I think people would get turned off from playing D&D if the DM fudged to make sure that this didn't happen.

No fudge: I died, oh well, I will eventually learn how to play and then I'll kick ass.

Fudge: I guess it doesn't matter what I do, that one guy who controls the monsters will just say whatever he wants.

 

[delericho]

Fudge: I guess it doesn't matter what I do, that one guy who controls the monsters will just say whatever he wants.

See, that's why I try very hard not to fudge, and very hard to not put a new player in that situation in his first game ever. Let them get settled in, then bring out the big guns.

But, it is fair to note that most of the new gamers I deal with are on the lower end of the age spectrum. Older players are likely to take such a blow a bit easier.

 

[DragonLancer]

I would allow them the -5 rather than death, but only once. I would have pointed out even before they started rolling up the character that D&D combat can be deadly especially at lower levels. After that one gimmie, they are on their own and need to learn to guage an encounter.