DM's: Are you afraid to kill PC's because of how players might react?

[Lanefan]

3. Never heard of that and can't see having a use for it.

You mean *nobody* in your game has ever decided to retire a character and bring in a new one? That seems most odd...

Lanefan

 

[Tewligan]

Heh. I got over any fear of killing PCs back in 2nd edition; I gave the party a semi-cursed artifact that would either Resurrect you or turn you into a greater undead that hated the party with all its black heart. Oh the fun we had with that.

Incidentally, it's remarkable how many times we found ourselves fighting against one of our undeadified party members before it occurred to us to remove a corpse's equipment BEFORE we used that damn rod. Move to California and run a campaign, James!

 

[sniffles]

I suppose I ought to butt out since I'm not a DM, but my DMs don't post here.

I've played with 3 different DMs regularly for the past 10 years. None of them have ever permanently killed a PC. Two of them share a house rule that if someone can get to you with any healing effect within the same round the PC dropped to a negative equal to CON (we use that instead of -10), you've been rescued from death's door. The other DM just fudges the damage if it drops a PC to death.

Oddly, the DM who fudges is the one who runs the most episodic campaign. He doesn't have any overarching plot that requires the participation of these and only these PCs. He just doesn't like dealing with new characters. He's also very resistant to someone swapping out for a new PC.

The other two DMs don't have any specific rules for swapping characters as far as I know. Both of them run overarching plots and would prefer to stick with the same characters from beginning to end. But if someone is truly unhappy with a character and wants a change they will work with that player to accomodate this desire.

I like to think I would respond reasonably well to character death. I'd be disappointed, since I usually have goals I'd like to achieve such as entering a particular prestige class or finding some item or person. But I also have lots of other character ideas and would look on it as an opportunity to try something new.

I'm pretty certain, though, that at least one other player in the group would not react at all well to losing a character. I expect that if this player lost a PC we'd have to do a lot of wheedling to get the player to come back to the game. I imagine some folks would say 'goodbye and good riddance' to that player, but for reasons I can't go into (the player might see) that would not be an ideal resolution. So I guess I'll just get accustomed to never losing a PC.

I should add, however, that contrary to the belief that no threat of death takes some of the fun out of the game, I still find every challenge thrilling. I get very tense and do my best to take actions that will minimize unnecessary risk for my character. There are times when no one will be able to get to my PC to heal her and I know my DMs will let her die. Even the rules-fudger would probably have to let a PC die if the death was due to some massive spell effect that disintegrated the body.

 

[Tarek]

Rules for replacing characters, with XP grants and magic items appropriate to the replacement level, yes.

Players are encouraged to write "wills" for their characters, in case of death and the inability to raise or resurrect, including instructions on what happens in the period between dying and the point where they find out whether the character is dead or can be raised.

Switching characters without PC death doesn't usually happen mid-adventure, unless 'something comes up' that a particular character has to deal with. In that case, the party can usually find a replacement character in the nearest civilized area.

 

[Aaron L]

You mean *nobody* in your game has ever decided to retire a character and bring in a new one? That seems most odd...

Lanefan

What seems odd about it? No one I've ever played with has retired a character to bring in a new one. We like our characters. Of course, with the way some people talk about disposable PCs that they don't form any kind of attachment to, maybe they wouldn't care that much about their characters and swapping them out would be about the same as using the dog instead of the shoe in Monopoly. We've started new campaigns, but I don't remember anyone ever just dropping a character mid campaign to bring in a new one.


I never kill characters. Sometimes NPCs do, sometimes situations do, but I don't. I will make every effort to keep them alive if they don't have access to life restoring magic and their deaths would be a random event that would be un-fun, but only such things as are logical and realistic to the setting and situation. Or I may do something like fudge a stabilization check.

If someone really likes a character, we will find a way to keep them alive. They may die in battle, but if one of my friends has a character he loves die in a game we are all supposed to be playing for fun, then you're damn right I'm going to make a way for him to keep playing that character. There are far more ways to fail then just dieing. I've failed quite a damn lot in my life, and I haven't died even a single time.

That being said, if someone is in battle and does something stupid and the logical consequences of that action would be the character dieing, then they will die. But afterwards I'll do my best to have a logical way for the character to be restored to life, and if I can't find a logical way, if my friend still wants to play that character, I'll have an illogical way made available and work it into the story, probably introducing a new storyline to the campaign. It may take a while, and maybe for a few games they'll have to play someone else, but I'll get them a way to come back if they don't want to permanently lose their character.


I play this game to have fun. Random pointless deaths of cherished characters isn't fun for me. Some people like to believe that killing off characters left and right somehow makes them more manly, or maybe makes their games morally superior to the games of us poor heathens who like to keep our characters alive. I simply smile and ignore them and continue to have fun playing my make believe game my own way, and they can just leave me alone and feel superior all they want.

 

[Lanefan]

What seems odd about it? No one I've ever played with has retired a character to bring in a new one. We like our characters. Of course, with the way some people talk about disposable PCs that they don't form any kind of attachment to, maybe they wouldn't care that much about their characters and swapping them out would be about the same as using the dog instead of the shoe in Monopoly.

Too much attachment to characters leads to crying and wailing and gnashing of teeth when they die...and sooner or later, they're gonna die. As for swapping characters out, it depends, I suppose, on how long your campaigns are. Ours tend to last for many years (average = about 10), so swapping out characters in order to play something different is quite accepted.

I never kill characters. Sometimes NPCs do, sometimes situations do, but I don't. I will make every effort to keep them alive if they don't have access to life restoring magic and their deaths would be a random event that would be un-fun, but only such things as are logical and realistic to the setting and situation. Or I may do something like fudge a stabilization check.

I don't fudge, though I used to, because I found that if I fudge for one I feel I have to fudge for all just to be fair. Better to just let fate decide...

If someone really likes a character, we will find a way to keep them alive. They may die in battle, but if one of my friends has a character he loves die in a game we are all supposed to be playing for fun, then you're damn right I'm going to make a way for him to keep playing that character. There are far more ways to fail then just dieing. I've failed quite a damn lot in my life, and I haven't died even a single time.

That being said, if someone is in battle and does something stupid and the logical consequences of that action would be the character dieing, then they will die. But afterwards I'll do my best to have a logical way for the character to be restored to life, and if I can't find a logical way, if my friend still wants to play that character, I'll have an illogical way made available and work it into the story, probably introducing a new storyline to the campaign. It may take a while, and maybe for a few games they'll have to play someone else, but I'll get them a way to come back if they don't want to permanently lose their character.

I'll also go to some (preferably logical) length to bring back a well-liked PC if the player so desires...but there comes a point where dead id dead and it's time to move on.

I play this game to have fun. Random pointless deaths of cherished characters isn't fun for me.

For you. For me, both as DM and player, random badness is just part of the game; but I like random, and am well aware it can go both ways.

Some people like to believe that killing off characters left and right somehow makes them more manly, or maybe makes their games morally superior to the games of us poor heathens who like to keep our characters alive. I simply smile and ignore them and continue to have fun playing my make believe game my own way, and they can just leave me alone and feel superior all they want.

The fear of death - and of that death being permanent - adds to the excitement of any good battle. I mean, I *like* to keep my characters alive...well, most of 'em, anyway...but I'm also mature enough to deal with times when what I want isn't what ends up happening.

Lanefan

 

[shilsen]

The fear of death - and of that death being permanent - adds to the excitement of any good battle.

Maybe, but a battle, for many people, can be just as exciting without it. What I would say works better as a generalization is that the fear of failure adds more excitement to a battle. Death is just one kind of failure.

I mean, I *like* to keep my characters alive...well, most of 'em, anyway...but I'm also mature enough to deal with times when what I want isn't what ends up happening.

You're implying that people who want to be able to keep playing specific characters they like are immature, and that's just silly. Death, as I mentioned above, is just one way in which what you don't want can happen. Characters can be challenged and defeated in a myriad ways, and death is just one. For many people, it's also a very short-term one, since it ends the challenges and defeats that character faces (unless easy resurrection is available, in which case it's not really death now, is it?).

To claim that you're more mature because your PCs die is like saying you're more mature because one of your imaginary friends died.

 

[Lanefan]

You're implying that people who want to be able to keep playing specific characters they like are immature, and that's just silly.

True, but I couldn't think of any other way to say what I meant without it coming across that way. I kind of assume nobody really wants to lose a long-term character, and that's fair enough. But the thread is about DMs being *afraid* to kill PCs because of potential reactions...which to me implies tears, tantrums, and hollering (all of which, unfortunately, I've seen firsthand)...and that's a straight-up maturity issue, far beyond the simple disappointment in losing an iconic character.

Death, as I mentioned above, is just one way in which what you don't want can happen. Characters can be challenged and defeated in a myriad ways, and death is just one. For many people, it's also a very short-term one, since it ends the challenges and defeats that character faces (unless easy resurrection is available, in which case it's not really death now, is it?).

Very true, but even with relatively-available raise effects, some players* will sometimes react to a character death as though it's the end of the world. Now granted, in my game we still use resurrection survival % rolls when trying to come back, so there is a chance that a death can become permanent...oddly enough, the reaction when this happens is never as bad as for the death itself. (perhaps because the player is more braced for it?)

* - let me here state that most players I've run or played with are (thankfully) not like this; they take the bad or unlucky outcomes in stride, and often with an impressive amount of grace.

Lanefan

 

[Treebore]

I kill PC's, whenever they do something stupid enough that I feel they deserve it. Plus, if dice roll bad for them and good for me I'll let them die. I might fudge the damage, or call a couple of hits misses, but if the rolls continue to go badly, I let them die. Fortunately more often they don't, but still.

Plus I have had players refuse to play in my games because they are deadly. Which is fine with me. Previous experience with such players tells me we wouldn't play well together anyways.

I find with God Calls, Luck Points, and occassional fudging by me, the deaths are rare enough for most players.

 

[rgard]

You mean *nobody* in your game has ever decided to retire a character and bring in a new one? That seems most odd...

Lanefan

Usually death ends the career.

I did have one player play 3 different characters 3 weeks straight and I only killed one of them. I don't really consider a character played for one week then dumped a 'retirement.' This can happen after a new complete book is released and the player wants to try out the new class...decides he doesn't like it and ends the character after one session.

I did have one player re-engineer his character when he hit 15th level or so. Depending on the in-game rationale, that could be a retirement in theory.

So in the 3E campaign I ran for 18 months, we only had nobody who played the same character for more than 2 sessions retire that character. They either lived to the end or died. The quasi exception is the player above who played 2 different ToB class characters and one BoED class character (saint template I think) in the space of 3 weeks.

Yep, may be odd, but that is what happened.

Thanks,
Rich