OD&D First Character Death

[Lanefan]

My first-ever character death (1982) kinda set the tone: a long story of soap opera, drama and murder led to his being executed by his own party.

My second one (1983) was much more heroic: there's a Frost Giant on a roof where there's only room for one of us to get at it, so (as the party's only Fighter) they load me up with their best magic and out I go. I hurt the Giant badly (it's dying) before it sweeps me off the roof; I fall to my death. The Giant then stumbles and falls to its own death.

The party tried to revive this second guy but he failed the roll; and - I kid you not - the ramifications and fallout from this are still ongoing today (2019).

 

[Tony Vargas]

I think the critter you are searching for is piercer. Those, along with green slime, were the bane of early dungeons.

Green Slime did for one of my early PCs who might otherwise have escaped a TPK.

 

[BookBarbarian]

A Rogue Scientist in a game of Rifts.

Some bad guys (I can't remember) were carrying these big glowing boxes. The party Headhunter shot one of these manual laborers and they dropped the box. Which exploded. The Headhunter survived. My Rogue Scientist did not. My armor wasn't as good as the Headhunters.

I think I was 13 or so. I took it hard.

 

[ccs]

My first character death was an Elf back in Basic, summer of 1981. We'd fought our way through several of the Caves of Chaos, facing goblins, orcs, the minotaur, etc. But his luck ran out vs the gnolls.

 

[Shiroiken]

Summoning @lowkey13, who might enjoy this

My first character death was a 1E Paladin. I was the stereotypical AD&D paladin, which annoyed my older brother to no end. He challenged me to a duel to the death, which I accepted, figuring his magic-user was no match for me. The opening round he created a duplicate of me, who seemed to match every move I made. I used my Horn of Summoning to bring berserkers to aid me, but the duplicate did the same, all the while my brother dropped various spells down upon me. Eventually I struck a death blow to my doppleganger, and advanced on my brother, who suddenly dropped a fireball over the entire field. I figured everyone was dead, but my brother then said he calmly walked over and slit my throat.

Turns out, I knew nothing of illusions, and my brother had mastered the use of Phantasmal Force. Nothing in the fight was real, except me swinging at nothing, occasionally hit with magic missiles. In 1E, as least according to my DM, you had to actively choose not to believe in an illusion, which I never did. All of the damage I took was only in my mind, but once I hit 0 HP, I went unconscious. Since my brother knew the fireball wasn't real, he was completely unaffected, allowing him to kill me with ease. It was a rough first character death, but it taught me a huge lesson about the game... both about illusions and my brother

 

[Legatus Legionis]

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[aco175]

My first character death was an Elf back in Basic, summer of 1981. We'd fought our way through several of the Caves of Chaos, facing goblins, orcs, the minotaur, etc. But his luck ran out vs the gnolls.

I think the same gnolls killed my elf the first time we played. A set of bars came down and separated the party and killed the rest of the party. I tried to come back and save them, but died just the same.

 

[TaranTheWanderer]

Cyberpunk:

"I want to make a guy who's an expert in hand-to hand fighting!"
spends next 2 hours building tweaked out character
Later, in the VERY first scene of the game

DM: "You are in a dark alleyway and there's a cyber-psycho losing it on someone"
ME: "I tumble towards him so I can punch him to death!"
DM: He shoots you with his arm-mounted gun.
rolls dice
DM: he hits you for this much damage. In the head.
ME: I'm dead.
tears up character sheet

 

[Draegn]

Traveller; tearing the vacsuit open in vacuum. Laser rifles suck.

 

[Son of the Serpent]

The first character death i ever experienced it was actually also the first game i ever played in. I was playing as someone's familiar. It was a homebrewed serval which is a type of african cat related to cheetas lions and caracals taken as an improved familiar for a level 4 or so pc to get my feet wet for the next campaign. It was a way of learning the game that i came up with and proposed to the dm myself. Worked amazingly well btw i would highly recommend this option to others. Was fun too. Anyway, my character's master, myself, and one other pc several arcs into the campaign got assimilated by a version of "the thing" from john carpenter's "the thing" and thats how we died. Sortof. Its actually unclear if you are able to truly die when you are a part of that tortured existance. Also no it was not the deep spawn. It was every ounce as horrific as the "thing" from the movie. It was so metal.