Help me! I'm afraid to kill my players!

[dreaded_beast]

If you figure out you are one of my players during the reading of this thread, please stop, hehe.

I've started running a group and have gotten a few sessions under my belt. The core group consists of 3 players with a 4th on-and-off player. The next session, there will be a possible 3 more players that may join the group.

I was originally a player in this campaign, but the original DM had real-life "problems" and could no longer DM. So, I volunteered to DM.

The group started off at 2nd level at the start of the campaign and has managed to work their way to 3rd following the end of last session. However, along the way, I have somewhat been "fudging" the dice, to prevent them from being killed outright or having the bad guys do a little less damage than their roll would indicate.

As the DM, I would like there to be some kind of "storyline" for the campaign, with the characters being the stars. This is my personal preference and none of the players, except one, has expressed any interest in having a "story arc". However, if one of the stars is killed, it may disrupt the flow of the story.

I'm still getting a feel for what the group likes and dislikes.

In addition, I guess I don't want to feel bad if a player loses their character. At this point in time in the campaign, raise dead and ressurrection are not available, at least not easily. So, if a character dies, that may be it.

Also, with the new players coming in, I don't want them to die during their first session.

If the encounter is relatively "mundane", I don't want them to die from this mundane encounter.

2 examples:

The first encounter of the session: the party is making their way through a swamp and encounter a group of dire rats, which I believed they should be able to handle with minor difficulty. However, midway through combat, the cleric is brought to negatives. This is bad because, if the cleric dies, they will have no healing for the rest of the adventure. In addition, the party rogue is brought to 0 HP. So I come up with some story as to why the ranger of the party happens to have a healing potion is his backpack.

Near the end of the session, the party has cleared a large hookwing nest ( a tiny flying reptile in the Scarred Lands ) in a tall dead tree. The rogue spider-climbs up the tree to search for treasure and then drops a rope over the edge for anyone that wants to climb up. The dwarf, wearing some pretty heavy gear, amazingly makes it up to the nest. However, I say the nest can't support their combined weight and have them make Reflex saves to avoid falling and taking damage. They succeed, but I also have the characters directly under the nest make a save as well, to avoid being hit by debris and branches. Unfortunately the cleric doesn't make it. I ask the player how much HP he has before saying the damage, but he doesn't reply with a definite number. I figure he has enough hit points, so I give him the total and find out that he is once again brought to negatives. However, the ranger is able to stabilize the cleric. Unfortunately, there is no healing available now that the cleric is out. I come up with a suggestion for the party to return to their homebase if they hustle and make some quick Survival rolls with some penalties since they are hustling, to avoid the hazards of the area.

Anyway, everyone made it home safely and the session ended, but by this time, I think they figured out that I was "pulling-my-punches" somewhat.

The thing that is really bad, is that I believe my players have found out, come to the conclusion, discovered, etc., that I may have been "pulling my punches" in order for them to survive. I guess part of this could be my constant nagging of "How much HP do you have left?" right before I tell them how much damage they receive.

So, how do you deal, cope with, or decide when it is "appropriate" for a player to die?

 

[Crothian]

If a character dies, he dies. I do not plan it out in advance. Sure, there are encounters where I think a death might occur, but that's not a bad thing. It means it is challenging. Also, character death in D&D is far from permanent. Just don't worry about it, and don't worry about what the PCs do without a key member of the party. I've found that players are at their peek when the cleric goes down and healing becomes almost non existant.

 

[pennywiz]

Help me! I'm afraid to kill my players!

First, think of them as characters, not players.

Second, don't think of it as "killing them" but more as "letting them die" when circumstances dictate that eventuality.

Third, sympathize with the players but encourage them to try out something they've always wanted to try with the subsequent character.

Fourth, be dramatic about in-game events but don't over-dramatize meta-events.

Fifth, it's only a game.

Sixth, rinse and repeat.

 

[Herpes Cineplex]

So, how do you deal, cope with, or decide when it is "appropriate" for a player to die?

I don't. But I'm not as fanatical about "let the dice fall where they may" as some people here are, either.

If I suddenly discover mid-combat that I have grossly overestimated what the party can handle and it's going to end in a TPK, I try to find more artful ways to fudge things to avoid that.

Because a total party kill really isn't any fun for anyone in our game. We have one player who hates generating characters, and since we tend to collaborate during character creation (to give everyone a reason to know and associate with each other), this becomes a headache for everyone. Plus, most of our gaming fun is centered in continuing plotlines and interacting with each other, and killing everyone off totally sabotages that.

What I tend to do more often than not is to start fudging what the bad guys are trying to do, rather than fudge the results of what they do. If a combat starts going really bad, my NPCs start making sub-optimal decisions. They gloat when they shouldn't. They react emotionally and go try and thrash the guy who just hit them instead of ganging up on the most dangerous PC and pounding him into a thin red paste. They don't use an ability that would be devastatingly effective, for no readily explainable reason.

That way, if anyone calls me on it ("Dude, how come he didn't use that spell? He would've totally killed the sh-t out of us!"), I can pretend that I'm surprised and embarrassed about being a big stupid idiot of a GM who didn't use the NPC as well as I should've, or I can pretend to be a clever, theatrical GM who was playing the role of an angry ogre mage appropriately, or just plead the fifth amendment and move on.

One time I decided on the cusp of a TPK to have another group of NPCs wade in, slaughter all the other bad guys, then hold, stun, or otherwise incapacitate the PCs in order to capture them. On the one hand, I was being really generous, because they could've all died. On the other hand, I was blatantly unfair because they literally had no chance against these new NPCs, mostly because I didn't have any stats for them and had just invented them on the fly. It seemed really heavy-handed to me, too. ("Roll a Will save." "I got a 29." "Ooh, so close! But no, you're paralyzed.")

My penance for that was that I had to actually stat them out later, figure out what they wanted, figure out how they got involved in this plot, and then keep track of them for the rest of that campaign. Plot Convenience, my ass: those NPC sons-of-bitches upped my workload by at least 30%!

--
but anyway, there's nothin' wrong with not killin' players or their characters
ryan

 

[Sir Whiskers]

First, concerning character death, some groups prefer it, some abhor it, most probably feel it's appropriate if the characters do something stupid, or if it makes for a truly dramatic scene. I suggest that you talk with your players to see where there comfort zone is with this subject.

Concerning killing characters, GM's should never, never, never kill characters. GM's set the stage for the players to have fun through their characters. Parts of that stage include npc's, creatures, traps, and environmental hazards. These things kill characters. I always try to emphasize to my players that I, as GM, will never try to "take out" someone's character, but their in-game opponents certainly will. This helps avoid the "players vs. GM" style of play.

Assuming you decide that character death is allowed in your game, a couple simple changes should take care of the problems you stated. For instance, don't ask how many hit points a character has - you, as GM, don't need to know that. It's meta-gaming. My group always assigns one player the job of tracking party hit points, and that player will let the other players know when their character is in danger. If the GM doesn't know the current hit points, it's much more difficult to fudge things.

If you find that you've miscalculated and created a killer encounter by mistake, you can still back off - just do it in a realistic way. Maybe the characters are captured, then escape. Or their opponents retreat for reasons the party doesn't understand (btw, listen to the players' guesses - they may come up with something you can use to spice up the session ). This kind of thing should still be rare, as players typically don't like being coddled, but if necessary, it's better than an unfair tpk.

Lastly, make healing readily available. Have most npc's carry healing potions, which the characters can acquire if they defeat them. Place more in treasure troves. Have them for sale in local towns. I always start even 1st-level characters with a couple cure light wounds potions just so that the party doesn't die if the cleric is the first to fall.

 

[pogre]

You need to reestablish the possibility of death occurring. I suggest forgetting the screen next session and roll in front of them. When they see you pull out that d12 for the orcs' damage die, they might think twice about pressing the attack. TPKs stink - believe me I know, but a game with no character death becomes boring as well. Good luck!

 

[StalkingBlue]

dreaded beast - As always, great to see how much thought you put into evolving your DMing style. Sounds as if you're doing good.

Re PC deaths and fudging:
See it from their side. If you played in a game where the DM slipped a healing potion into a PC's pack in mid-combat, how would you feel about it? I would feel cheated and wrongly used. How am I going to enjoy victory if I know the DM will do everything in their power to avoid my PC failing (dying)?

It's a matter of style of course, and there are lots of DMs on these boards who'll be able to advise you on techniques for fudging in the PCs' favour without it being all that obvious, if that's what you want.

Your post sounds as if you'd like to go a different way though - less fudging, more honest deaths if the PCs thrust themselves in that direction. I DM that way and I prefer to play with DMs who do the same: I make all die rolls in the open, I don't fudge enemy stats downwards in mid-combat, and I certainly won't add stuff to PCs' equipment lists (can't even imagine how that one could work without all the players noticing that fudging is going on...).


First, some bits of specific dire rat combat advice. Your description sounds as if one PC death was pretty unavoidable when the cleric went down. That's the players' mistake, for not protecting their only healer!

There's a few things you might have done slightly differently, although none of the non-fuding alternatives I can think of would have been likely to save the cleric. Just one example:
Dire rats are animals. The moment the cleric went down, those rats that had been attacking him might have started feeding on his unconscious body (read: coup de grace). That would have killed him, but given other PCs in melee distance attacks of opportunity against the feeding rats - or if they were wise, a chance to run away with a whole round's head start. (The rats, being animals, probably wouldn't have pursued them because (a) they now had fresh meat available and (b) the threat to their territory that presumably had triggered their attack on the PCs had ended.)

Second, I'd suggest to stop worrying about what PC deaths do to story. If a PC death collapses your planned 'story', that's a warning sign. Because if that's the case, then a PC's in-game choice (turning down a quest, making a friend or an enemy where you'd intended the opposite etc.) will do the same - which means that only railroading can keep the story intact, and railroading isn't much fun.
If you and your players work together to make every moment of a PC's life a good and enjoyable story moment, something very cool will develop out of it. If the character then dies an untimely death, his friends will mourn him, remember him, and move on. Not all PC stories are long stories, you see. Any Plot that is inherent in your world OTOH will still be there if a PC involved in it dies. Maybe it carries on all by itself quietly for a little while, until things happen that cause the other PCs to become interested in it again.

 

[dreaded_beast]

Thank you for all the helpful responses!

Next session is this coming Friday and I will be sure to keep everyone suggestions in mind.

 

[MrBrown]

Hi

There's a couple of things you can do to get rid of the need for fudging and introduce PC death into the game.

First thing is to get a hang of the rules of the system you're using, so that you can gauge the difficulty of enemies well. Not much you can do here but DM more and learn what works. However, one thing you could do is start from a higher level, maybe 3-5. D&D tends to be very random at low levels and starting a bit higher can offset that.


The thing with PC death I think should be strived for is having the players realize their PCs can die, without actually killing any of them. Sort of giving the players "a fear of death" in regards to their characters. When your players are aware of this, they will play more carefully, and won't regard PC death as 'unfair' when it happens, because they were partially prepared for it and aware the PC was in danger. Naturally, sometimes a player might decide it's more in-character to do something, although it might kill the PC.

To achieve this (without meta-gaming and/or fudging), make the players aware of the danger they're facing, or even make it seem stronger than it is. Rumors in towns, events your PCs see, objects they find or even short confrontations before the "real one", anything can give the players some kind of an image of what they're facing.

For example, you mentioned that in your last game the party faced a group Dire Rats, and that the party had a Ranger. To give the players a feel of how strong the Dire Rats are, you might have them face a single Dire Rat so that the players can get a feel of how strong they are in combat, before actually being in danger. After the encounter, you might have the Ranger make a Wilderness Lore roll and tip him off that there are lots of Dire Rats in the area. If the player later on in the 'real' encounter against the Dire Rats start taking too much damage, they'll think that they underestimated the enemy rather than that the DM used an enemy too strong.

This is all assuming, of course, that the player have choices and different ways of going about this quest, and individual encounters in it. Try to avoid railroading.

Also, StalkingBlue's advice on playing Dire Rats as animals is great.

 

[Fester]

However, along the way, I have somewhat been "fudging" the dice, to prevent them from being killed outright or having the bad guys do a little less damage than their roll would indicate.

I role my attack dice and damge in the open to avoid this. It helps with game balance - the encounters must be balanced or they'll just get wiped out. And since my people know this, they are a lot less careless.

In addition, I guess I don't want to feel bad if a player loses their character. At this point in time in the campaign, raise dead and ressurrection are not available, at least not easily. So, if a character dies, that may be it.

Also, with the new players coming in, I don't want them to die during their first session.

Hey, I killed the same guy's character three weeks in a row and I felt terrible about it. I saw another DM kill the same guy's character twice in the same session :\ It goes with the territory of being a DM.

If the encounter is relatively "mundane", I don't want them to die from this mundane encounter.

Then there seems little point having them. Encounters should always have an edge to them, even easy ones. A lucky hit, a high die roll here or there. If your group knows that you're not going kill any of their characters, then I don't think it will hold the same level of excitement for them.

So I come up with some story as to why the ranger of the party happens to have a healing potion is his backpack.

Ouch! I think that's setting a bad precedent.

I ask the player how much HP he has before saying the damage, but he doesn't reply with a definite number. I figure he has enough hit points, so I give him the total and find out that he is once again brought to negatives.

Thats another bad precedent. You shouldn't be rolling damage according to what hp they've got, but according to what the die says.

Unfortunately, there is no healing available now that the cleric is out. I come up with a suggestion for the party to return to their homebase if they hustle and make some quick Survival rolls with some penalties since they are hustling, to avoid the hazards of the area.

Firstly, don't get paranoid if there is no party cleric or other means of healing. It really hurts a party and they generally learn this fast. But in your game, they're not going to need to, since they can't die and they know that you will always come to their rescue (and suddenly, a mysterious vial of healing appears in your backpack...)

Secondly, let them make their own decisions and make their own mistakes. That's how they'll learn. Giving them suggestions about what is the best course of action and doing everything in your power (which, as a DM is substantial) to keep them alive is pretty desperate.

The thing that is really bad, is that I believe my players have found out, come to the conclusion, discovered, etc., that I may have been "pulling my punches" in order for them to survive. I guess part of this could be my constant nagging of "How much HP do you have left?" right before I tell them how much damage they receive.

Of course they know. The level of your interference to keep them alive has been high, so it won't exactly take a lot of working out.

So, how do you deal, cope with, or decide when it is "appropriate" for a player to die?

I don't decide when it's time for anyone to die. The dice do.

As I say, get those rolls in the open and let the players fend for themselves. There are going to be times when the dice will collude and things might go badly for them, but on the whole, if your encounters are balanced, there is more excitement to be had and victories taste more sweet.