D&D General Do players even like the risk of death?

[Eric V]

Not sure if anyone has mentioned this, but Jonathan Tweet uses a rule in 13th Age that PCs can only die when in combat against "named villains." In other circumstances, they might be captured, suffer a campaign loss, a lasting personal injury, etc...but not death.

Adds excitement to the classic showdowns.

 

[Maxperson]

Partly. I thought that you were commenting on how 5e characters at first level are mechanically and thematically more interesting than 2e (which makes level drain even worse; if level drain were a thing it would be possible to level drain a 5e paladin into unswearing their oath).

No. Not really. The 5e rules specifically tell the DM that the rules cannot cover everything and that the DM would need to make calls. It's also a rulings over rules edition. A drained paladin would not unswear an oath if he dropped below oath level. That would be silly. He would just lose oath features until he regained the level(s).

 

[Democratus]

And all those are basically custom-tailored consequences which you are claiming are at random things. The grizzled paladin who lost their +1 sword to a fireball is now carrying around a +3 - just as they would be under normal circumstances. The rogue did not "sacrifice" their ring under the AD&D rules - it was a random chance from an AoE spell. And the melted ring is entirely independent of the AD&D rules.

All of this is entirely wrong. They are all characters at my table over the years: Sterling Trueblade, Jax the Tragic, Fimble Twaddlebottom. That paladin never had a more powerful sword. The rogue made a "sacrifice" in his retelling of what happened for years. The ring and sword were lost due to fireball and a failed magic-item save. The rope to dragon's breath. All were random chance - which then became stories. Emergent storytelling is what our D&D games are all about.

Being allergic to loss can certainly keep your character powerful (whatever that means in a sandbox game), but it can also prevent some great opportunities for roleplay and unexpected narrative.

 

[Maxperson]

And all those are basically custom-tailored consequences which you are claiming are at random things. The grizzled paladin who lost their +1 sword to a fireball is now carrying around a +3 - just as they would be under normal circumstances. The rogue did not "sacrifice" their ring under the AD&D rules - it was a random chance from an AoE spell. And the melted ring is entirely independent of the AD&D rules.

What do you mean by that? There were rules for rings being melted in AD&D.

 

[Fanaelialae]

No. Not really. The 5e rules specifically tell the DM that the rules cannot cover everything and that the DM would to make calls. It's also a rulings over rules edition. A drained paladin would not unswear an oath if he dropped below oath level. That would be silly. He would just lose oath features until he regained the level(s).

While I agree that a DM could make a ruling to prevent it, there's never been anything that said a character who was level drained couldn't go down a different path. Choose to dual class instead of (re)advancing in their primary path, or use multiclassing in later editions.

So if you added level drain back into 5e but ruled that a player had to make the same character choices upon regaining their xp, you COULD. But, to me (used to the old school way level draining worked) it would be really weird.

 

[Marc_C]

Death is not the end. D&D Ghostwalk setting:

Sean Reynolds explained where the idea came from, to make it possible to play a dead PC as a ghost: "I think it was just a matter of Monte and me understanding that one of the least fun parts of the game is when a character dies. Not only is there a feeling of loss regarding the character, but also the player doesn't have anything to do until a new character can be brought in. We thought a campaign where a character's death wouldn't be the end of play for that character or player would be a neat twist on standard D&D."[1]

 

[Neonchameleon]

All of this is entirely wrong. They are all characters at my table over the years: Sterling Trueblade, Jax the Tragic, Fimble Twaddlebottom. That paladin never had a more powerful sword. The rogue made a "sacrifice" in his retelling of what happened for years. The ring and sword were lost due to fireball and a failed magic-item save. The rope to dragon's breath. All were random chance - which then became stories. Emergent storytelling is what our D&D games are all about.

Being allergic to loss can certainly keep your character powerful (whatever that means in a sandbox game), but it can also prevent some great opportunities for roleplay and unexpected narrative.

OK. I'll take the Paladin as an interesting one based on pure luck - and a Holy Avenger, which is why I specifically mentioned a more likely scenario with a sword that wasn't one of the most powerful swords in the game. The rogue's making a character beat - the equivalent of the one that got away in fishing. And the ring was part of the backstory but the important part wasn't the melted magic ring but the lost elven love. Had the love not been lost the melted ring would not have been a meaningful keepsake, and had the ring not been melted it still would have; the specific mechanic in question added almost noth9ing.

There's a difference between no losses (no one is suggesting this) and lots of random ones rather than homing in on interesting ones. There are more interesting consequences than death and lots of mechanics that are less aggravating and have higher hit rates. And I've got more mileage out of stealing the boots off a party of PCs than I have out of destroying any magic items.

 

[Neonchameleon]

What do you mean by that? There were rules for rings being melted in AD&D.

As I said in the post above the fact that the ring was melted was not why it was interesting. The emotional weight was the lost elven love - and it was described as backstory. Anything can be melted in backstory.

 

[FrogReaver]

Death is not the end. D&D Ghostwalk setting:

Sean Reynolds explained where the idea came from, to make it possible to play a dead PC as a ghost: "I think it was just a matter of Monte and me understanding that one of the least fun parts of the game is when a character dies. Not only is there a feeling of loss regarding the character, but also the player doesn't have anything to do until a new character can be brought in. We thought a campaign where a character's death wouldn't be the end of play for that character or player would be a neat twist on standard D&D."[1]

We had a campaign once where upon death something campaign or magic related would normally happen. It was a blast and rolling up a new character wasn’t hard.

 

[Maxperson]

We had a campaign once where upon death something campaign or magic related would normally happen. It was a blast and rolling up a new character wasn’t hard.

That sounds really interesting. Would you give more detail on that please?