Death and Storytelling

[Tony Vargas]

. There are people, many of them around here, in fact, that feel that coming back from the dead generally ruins fun, by taking the danger out of the game. If you never really die, what's at risk?

All sorts of things - failure, continued control of the character, wealth, face, power, revenge, whatever cause greater than themselves they may be fighting for...

So, while inserting ways to not die is fine for some, it is not actually a way to sweep the issue under the carpet. Sometimes characters are gong to die, and their story will end abruptly and in an unsatisfying way, story-wise.

A retroactive way to not die sounds close enough to coming back.

So, if characters can come back, then death can be reserved for when it's appropriate to the story. The more so, perhaps, the less the return is nominally under the characters' control vs the players' or GM's...

 

[5ekyu]

Those flashbacks are player-initiated, not under the GM's control. If the players don't do that? Doing those flashbacks generally requires a successful roll on a check. If they don't make it? If the character is not just play-dead, but dead-dead?

And, really, the particulars of a given system are beside the point. There are people, many of them around here, in fact, that feel that coming back from the dead generally ruins fun, by taking the danger out of the game. If you never really die, what's at risk?

So, while inserting ways to not die is fine for some, it is not actually a way to sweep the issue under the carpet. Sometimes characters are gong to die, and their story will end abruptly and in an unsatisfying way, story-wise.

First, it is again choice. If you are a person who does not enjoy chinese food, dont go to chinese place. If you are a gamer who does not like coming back from dead or feels it robs the fun whatever then dont play campaigns where that is possible. That likely means also not playing campaigns that tie major story themes to pcs in ways that will end un-fun if the pc dies.

Obviously you can choose to not wsnt bring backs and to tie plots heavy to pc etc so that pc death will cause that major unfun... But why do that to yourself if you believe the pcs will die? Why book unfun?

But, i personally have indeed seen games where the players outlook was of the "without death fun gone" and its not my cup of tea.

I much prefer games where there are lots of other things than survival at stake and even some more important than my character survival.

I find games to be more rewarding and richer when victory and survival are not synonyms.

But hey, sometimes that means my character is the one running towards the danger, not away from it so...

 

[Sunseeker]

I tend to avoid involving characters in "life threatening danger" at low levels. Sure, dangerous situations, but they are unlikely to kill a character. At low levels, most situations are easy to extract yourself from, enemies present more danger to others than to adventurers (such as kobolds raiding crops). Keeping the player alive at low level is of some importance to me as the low levels serve to draw the player into the greater plots at work and therefore, the greater danger.

Starting over is quite possibly the most annoying thing I ever have to do in a game. Especially with players who can't not metagame. I almost universally refuse to "restart" a game. If the party TPKs, you're done, game over. Since I reuse the same world, you'll either "restart" at a wholly different time and place. It could be decades after, putting the pieces together of what went wrong, or you might find yourself on the other side of the adventure!

I have no real desire to kill characters at ANY level to be honest, especially in a random manner. But I typically begin including life-threatening danger around level 5. From there up until about level 15 the "real danger of death" remains persistent. You're usually on-par with the obstacles preventing you from reaching your goal, and there's a very real chance they might kill you before you kill them.

After ~level 15, the "threat of death" is somewhat meaningless. Getting back from death is easy, avoiding death is easy. At this point I will usually target player's investments in the gameworld. Family, friends, kingdoms, resources. Things they might not find out have been attacked until weeks after. Events that might force them to divide their attention between these surprisingly coordinated bandits and the orcish hordes they've been hunting.

How do I DEAL with death? As a DM, I really don't. Dealing with death is up to the players (and the other NPCs of the game world). Did they value this member of the party? Does the party care that they died? Does the death present some kind of teachable moment, some kind of collective learning experience for the party? Is the loss of this person a serious blow to the party's plans? To the safety of a town or village? That's why I try to avoid "random" deaths, and why I don't really even include death until the PCs have a little meat on their bones. There's no point in killing a PC who fundamentally has no value.

 

[Les Moore]

OTOH, lower level players are vulnerable, and easily replaced. Sometimes, given the right circumstances, crushing a LVL 1 PC can be hilarious.

As to resurrections, IMO, (and IME) they have been, and should be, very, very rare. As someone else stated earlier, if you bring everyone back to life, it makes death
meaningless.

 

[Jhaelen]

This is an oft-mentioned point... but.... A first level character is not one for long. You can quickly cease being 1st level without ever having seen an orc, much less one with a greataxe, much less one that happens to get a critical hit. How many campaigns go without this happening? I daresay most campaigns go without a 1st level death by critical hit by an orc with a greataxe. That scenario... is pretty darned specific, and pretty easy to avoid.

Well, it still happened both in my first 3e campaign and in our first Pathfinder campaign!
IIRC, in D&D 3.0, a waraxe was the default weapon for an orc. In 3.5 they changed this into a scimitar. I wonder why? ;-)

Another PC in my first 3e campaign was killed by a choker. In fact, grappling-based monsters remained a deadly throughout all levels of play.
A a third PC died by falling from a ledge and a TPK was achieved by an encounter lead by an evil NPC cleric with hold person in his spellcasting arsenal (I'm not sure if the PCs were still level 1 at that point, though).

Sure, this may all be anecdotal, but I don't buy into 'death is completely avoidable'. Imho, it's only avoidable if the DM is fudging and/or nerfing encounters.

 

[Imaculata]

An orc with a greataxe can easily kill a first level pc with a critical hit. That d12 is a tough mean damage die when tripled.

In 3.5, at first level almost any monster can easily kill the party. But once you are of any higher level, it stops being an issue.

 

[Lanefan]

Having only read the OP my first response is this:

If at all possible, never ever EVER EVER! tie a story to a particular character, if the story is of any importance. Why? Because sure as shootin' that character will perma-die at the first opportunity, or perma-retire as its player drops out of the game or just gets tired of playing that PC, or whatever. I speak from experience, having made exactly this mistake with exactly this result enough times to hammer the point in.

Tie the story to the party as a whole. The membership may change but the identifyable party will go on, and that way it doesn't matter who dies or retires. Failing that, at the very least tie the story to more than one character, or - if you really must as a last resort - to a party NPC that you can then plot-protect.

 

[Skyscraper]

Cool discussion.
[MENTION=6919838]5ekyu[/MENTION]: you seem to have a rare proactive story approach to PC death. This is great. (Really!) However, I believe you are the exception. At least, from what I have read here and other forums, and in games I have played, PC death is either avoided in some fashion; or if it occurs, then the PC is just dead and swiped under the rug, and the game goes on. It is rare (again, only as it appears from personal play experience and reading on forums) that there are strong story elements linked to PC (or NPC) death. It's not never heard of, just rare. D&D in particular does not suggest that as a default assumption. In many adventures, the authors specifically suggest to have back-up characters in case of PC death. A bit like [MENTION=177]Umbran[/MENTION], I'm not arguing that this is good or bad; just that the default, and IMO most common, experience in many RPG's regarding death, is to have the PC stop being part of the story, and a new PC being incorportated instead. PC-story #1 stops, and PC-story #2 starts.

To those that commented that this is a game, not a story: while I understand that gaming aspect of it all, as opposed to writing book, playing a RPG is not equivalent to playing a board game either. Story, achieved notably through role-playing, is central to such a game. At least, in my experience, it is. I've stopped playing to kill-loot-repeat quite a while ago. We're building something around storytelling, within the structure of a game.

To the suggestion to have only party stories, and no PC-specific stories, in a campaign: that's one way to handle it. I like to have PC-stories also, both as a player and as a DM. It's obviously challenging with respect to PC death - thus the inception of this thread

All that said, it's great to see the varying experiences shared herein. Good stuff.

 

[GMMichael]

RPG's usually have a random aspect to the cooperative storytelling, that regards combat and that determines whether, notably, PC's will survive or die in battle (or in other situations such as traps).

However, most popular heroic fantasy storytelling in particular, outside of gaming, does not usually see its main protagonist(s) die: Conan, Drizzt, Bilbo, Aragon, they all survive their ordeals. In a game where each player's PC is the main protagonist, how to reconcile PC death with the storytelling?

But protagonists suffer setbacks all the time. Usually at the end of the second act The GM always has a choice, whether you know it or not: put the rules first, or put the story/fun first. If you put the rules first, you might be lucky enough to see the player's eyes well up with tears, realizing that his character was not, in the end, THE protagonist.

Have you played in games where PC's simply don't die? Where the DM deploys sometimes obvious efforts to make PC's survive? (I have.) If so, does this kill the suspense and otherwise negatively affect the gaming experience for you?

I think those obvious efforts are called Death Saves.

Sure, this may all be anecdotal, but I don't buy into 'death is completely avoidable'. Imho, it's only avoidable if the DM is fudging and/or nerfing encounters.

Soooo avoidable (at first level):

• PCs can choose to run away from fights.
• If a fight is unavoidable, PCs can throw down their weapons and beg for mercy.
• PCs can enlist help to attain overwhelming odds.
• GMs can provide level-appropriate encounters.
• GMs can play opponents intelligently, to include using realistic morale.
• GMs can provide non-combat encounters. (Yes, they exist.)
• PS maximum 1st-level hit points. And death saves.

No fudging or nerfing necessary. Unless your definition of nerfing is "modifying encounters to be something other than suicide-death-pacts."

 

[5ekyu]

Cool discussion.
[MENTION=6919838]5ekyu[/MENTION]: you seem to have a rare proactive story approach to PC death. This is great. (Really!) However, I believe you are the exception. At least, from what I have read here and other forums, and in games I have played, PC death is either avoided in some fashion; or if it occurs, then the PC is just dead and swiped under the rug, and the game goes on. It is rare (again, only as it appears from personal play experience and reading on forums) that there are strong story elements linked to PC (or NPC) death. It's not never heard of, just rare. D&D in particular does not suggest that as a default assumption. In many adventures, the authors specifically suggest to have back-up characters in case of PC death. A bit like [MENTION=177]Umbran[/MENTION], I'm not arguing that this is good or bad; just that the default, and IMO most common, experience in many RPG's regarding death, is to have the PC stop being part of the story, and a new PC being incorportated instead. PC-story #1 stops, and PC-story #2 starts.

To those that commented that this is a game, not a story: while I understand that gaming aspect of it all, as opposed to writing book, playing a RPG is not equivalent to playing a board game either. Story, achieved notably through role-playing, is central to such a game. At least, in my experience, it is. I've stopped playing to kill-loot-repeat quite a while ago. We're building something around storytelling, within the structure of a game.

To the suggestion to have only party stories, and no PC-specific stories, in a campaign: that's one way to handle it. I like to have PC-stories also, both as a player and as a DM. It's obviously challenging with respect to PC death - thus the inception of this thread

All that said, it's great to see the varying experiences shared herein. Good stuff.

Maybe its odd, maybe its not but since most myths and legends of heroic adventures in magical settings (which arguably these were based on) that involve death make life-death-after a major thing in their cosmology and not an after thought... And since most every religion deals with the subject as well... And since those beliefs have shaped many if not most of our real worlds development... It just seemed logical to,let life-death-after get at least as much thought for a campaign setup and play as say wandering monster tables- or maybe a bit more.

There are it seems a lot of GM who wsnt to see death = losing or death = failure or even death = deserving punishment... But to me in a game where a flat out failure on a check to unlock a door, persuade a guard to let you go, slip out of restraints or climb a wall may actually mean a successful attempt (progress made with setback) it seems mighty incongruous to take so much less an opportunistic approach to such a perceived "failure" as death to make it **not** an enemy of your play and fun but a friend to it.

If you run a game where death of a PC can hurt your games enjoyment due to story, why not at least avail yourself of the same level of flexibility you have for failures at climbing, sneaking or even performing synchronized swimming within the game (if we assume "proactive" is just too too much to expect from DMs these days.)???

Obviously i am referencing 5e and its rather ecplicit failure as success anyway elements, but its not the only system with such flexibility in resolving "failure".