Do You Kill off your PC's.

[R-man]

After many years of running a campaign that didn't allow for PC deaths in it, all the members of the group made the comment that they preferred to see combat be more dangerous. So when I started up a new campaign two years ago I have started running all the rolls and combat out in the open. With a lot more PC deaths as a result.

However I am a DM that believes a good battle is one that leaves all PC's at single digit HP's and no deaths, I consider a PC death a failure on my part to properly balance an encounter.

Most of the time the only deaths are as a result of someone doing something really foolish and then having the dice go against them.

I never fudge the rolls now and haven't for a couple of years now.

However one of the other guys in the group is running a campaign of his own using the same brutal rules and isn't as good at modifying or running encounters to prevent PC deaths. I have never had as many PC's die from stupid die rolls as I have in his present campaign. But I am still having fun so I guess it is working for us anyway!

 

[froggie]

the dice do it

hehe....great answer. I actually roll all dice on the table in front of everyone, so yeah, the dice do it.

 

[S. Baldrick]

I do thought it isn't necessary the plan. Sometimes it just happens. I have fudged a time or two in favor of the players but I tend to let the dice decide. Looking back, I ran the Shackled City Adventure Path from beginning to end and every PC died at least once. Most of them, multiple times but that is just how the game goes.

 

[Kalshane]

I kill PCs sometimes, but I don't set out to do it. Sometimes they make stupid mistakes and have to pay for it, like the samurai who felt compelled to challenge a baddie that obviously out-classed him to a duel and was dead in the first round. Oops. Othertimes the dice are unlucky, but even in this instance, it's on the player because I use a fate point system which allows players to spend points to turn a lethal blow into one that drops them to -5 and stable. But if they've already spent all their fate points because they just had to crit that monster in the last fight or decided to buy up one of their stats even if it left them with no points in reserver, that's their choice.

In my last campaign, the samurai managed to die three times and it was tough for the party to get him raised each time because not only did they have to find a priest able and willing to do it, but they also had to locate the diamonds necessary for the spell since they don't just have scads of gems lying around the temple in case some random adventurer buys it. A couple other characters died once each.

That said, my players still feared death because barring significant overkill, they didn't know if the mage that just took a knife in the back is down and dying or if he's dead until someone runs over and tries to heal them or makes a Heal skill check to check for life. I never told the players the amount of damage they took when they dropped, just that they did. I'd also ask them how many fate points they had whenever they dropped. If they would have died I'd tell them after the battle "Well, you're down 5 fate points." If not, I'd tell them they were good once their wounds were tended to. The not knowing their fates until the battle ended or someone tried to heal them caused a lot of tension without having to have a high bodycount.

 

[Silver Moon]

Absolutely.
No risk of death = reduced challenge.
less challenge = less fun

Exactly! Prior to the start of our present module I posted the following in our "Setting and Rules Discussion" thread of our Wild West campaign:

Character Death
I could say that I won’t ever kill a playing character. I’m not going to do that. The potential for character death is a key part of RGP’s in general, D&D in particular and just about every Western story that I’ve ever read or watched. Without it the game would lose a lot of its drama and edge.

I don’t consider myself to be a killer DM by any stretch of the imagination. It’s been five years since a playing character has died in my Sunday night group. I haven’t actively tried to kill any of the characters but I also haven’t been pulling my punches <<examples then cited>>. That’s how this game works and how it will continue to work. Character actions or inactions can result in consequences that may, in turn, lead to a character’s death.

So how should you play it? As one player stated earlier, "when the risks characters take diminishes so does the excitement”. I recommend that you continue to play the game as you have, smartly, and if a beloved character dies as a result then they die. Don’t be foolhardy but also don’t be so cautious that the game ceases to be fun.

 

[Endur]

Kill Pcs...sure.

But destroy all their stuff? Now THAT's cold

Kill PCs: Check.
Destroy all their stuff: Check.
Bring PCs back as undead: Check.

 

[The Thayan Menace]

TPKillah!

I was just curious how many of you DM's or GM's or however you want to put it, actually kill off your PC's.

I'm totally down for wholesale PC slaughter, multilation, and/or humiliation. I do my best to set up fair challenges (or obvious obstacles to avoid) ... and then I give 'em both barrels.

And yes ... I enjoy killing them (via legitimate game mechanics).

Darth Asad is RBDMcore

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[Zhaleskra]

With most RPGs these days having some sort of "save yourself" points, I feel it is on the players to save their own characters. I also try to give the player one chance to rethink zir character's action. After that, it's in the hands of the dice gods.

Having said that, I also play intelligent opponents as intelligent. In Diomin, there are two major villain races, and both of them know that 4/6 of the humanoid population hates them. I do use a GM screen and it is mostly for displaying rules I don't want to look up in the middle of a game. Even so, I've only had one PC death, though there have been some close calls.