How much risk do parties enjoy?

[Shadeydm]

My players cite encounters that push them to the limit as some of the most memorable and exciting sessions. In my opinion such encounters need to be spaced out properly because A) I don't want them to become the norm or it will lose some of the excitement and B)
Sometimes it is a razor thin line between pushed to the limit and killed outright.

It is hard to have continuity in ones campaign if characters are dying frequently unless getting brought back is also happening frequently. Then however you run the risk of trivializing death.

I guess then I am saying risk is generally a good thing and in moderation high risk is as cool as the other side of the pillow.

 

[sniffles]

TPK - Almost never. Single character deaths are very rare.

The group I play with tends toward long overarching plotlines that are very centered on the PCs. If a PC died it could seriously derail the plot, or at least would make it very difficult to introduce a new PC. In those types of games we're not usually playing a bunch of random people who accidentally got thrown together and decided to work together.

But even when we are playing the stereotypical "you meet in a tavern" party, we tend to avoid character deaths. It's just not something we find fun. We still get plenty of challenge from the game. A challenge doesn't have to be deadly to be challenging.

 

[Insight]

I'm DM-ing the AoW, and the death toll has been fairly significant. Through 1 2/3 of the Adventure Path, one player has lost two characters, and one player has lost one. The avg party level is 3rd.

This is more of a death toll than what is normal in my games. But I warned the players that the AoW is more deadly, and they are OK with it from what I can tell. I guess if they left in droves, I would be more inclined to tone down the AP.

 

[Psion]

I believe in some bona fide risk every session, but typically only in climactic encounters, and risk of TPK in major climactic battles.

A little risk helps maintain the feel of a little tension in the game. And the big, major, skin-of-your-teeth battles are stories that get retold for years thereafter. That's one of the great, great things about D&D AFAIAC.

 

[rgard]

I'm curious as to how much actual risk people really like in their games. (I think) Most people talk a lot about risk but they have a relatively low casualty rate inside of their party.

Do parties face a broad tapestry of death but none the less walk a pretty secure path?

How often do party members die in your adventures?

Does everything usually stop for a character death so that he\she can be resurrected? Essentially if one of you gets killed does the party get a do-over?

I kill one pc per session on average. Had a dry spell in September where I went 2 sessions with all the pcs surviving.

The sessions the players enjoy most (they tell me) are ones in which nearly all the pcs are near death and just scrape by.

We never stop for a player death. The other PCs either loot the body or try to raise the pc at a later date. Or the npcs loot the body and the BBEG animates the corpse.

 

[shilsen]

I personally like what I have in the campaign I DM (see sig), namely a combination of substantial risk and tough challenges, and a paucity or complete lack of PC death.

And no, they're not exclusive. In my campaign, where the PCs usually have only 1 combat, and more rarely 2, in a session, one PC on average goes below -10 per two sessions. But since I have a house rule in place allowing PCs who go below -10 to survive, we have had no PC deaths in the entire campaign (2 yrs, 49 sessions). Te reason I have the house rule is because the campaign is heavily PC/player-driven, so losing PCs means a lot of the things the PCs are involved in lose meaning (esp. since returning from the death is very unlikely in this game).

That doesn't mean there is no tension during combat, since the players know - and have experienced - that there are significant repercussions for defeat. PCs may be captured and have to be rescued, valuable possessions and equipment may be lost, the PCs may lose time and opportunity to achieve whatever ends they are seeking to, etc. And, of course, there's always the sheer embarrassment of being beaten, which no player likes.

 

[Lanefan]

When I play a character, I assume it's gonna die...the only variable is how long will it take? I also assume that the game has mechanisms available for character revival, if situation and resources allow...meaning it can go out and die again.

I DM pretty much the same way: high risk, high reward.

Lanefan

 

[frankthedm]

I believe in challenging the players as if they are a well oiled machine of competent combatants. Since they routinely let their party get divided and often fail to have the highest AC characters in the front line, they suffer heavy damage to soft targets even when no one gets killed. This leaves them resting when they should be progressing, allowing foes to gain reinforcements, gives the BBEGs the chance to flee or simply succeed with the Big Bad Evil Plan.

 

[Griffith Dragonlake]

I believe in challenging the players as if they are a well oiled machine of competent combatants. Since they routinely let their party get divided and often fail to have the highest AC characters in the front line, they suffer heavy damage to soft targets even when no one gets killed. This leaves them resting when they should be progressing, allowing foes to gain reinforcements, gives the BBEGs the chance to flee or simply succeed with the Big Bad Evil Plan.

Yeah, what he said!

My game world Grymwurld™ got its name from a player who constantly had his buttocks handed to him. “It’s a grim, grim world” he used to say. In 30 years of playing D&D I’ve only met two people who can roll better than myself. Thanks to 3.x with expanded crit ranges, I’ve been killing off characters faster than every before. But in all honesty, they deserved to die. Like Frank’s comments above, I run tactically smart combats and if the party is disorganised, they will pay the price. Oh and there is no raise dead or resurrection in Grymwurld. Healing is vampiric/empathic so it’s quite rare for a cleric to heal the front rankers in the middle of combat.

One of my favorite combats was when the heroes entered the Goblin Woods. Little did they know that the goblins had sentries located in tree stands high off the ground and armed with shortbow and 2 bags of arrows. The first goblin scored a critical hit on the witch and sent her negative. You can imagine how the rest of the encounter went….

Having said all that, I actually dislike TPKs and surprise deaths. If the players do their job right there should never be a TPK or near TPK. If there is, then I screwed up (and I have from time to time).

As a player I once had a wizard who was killed by the lightning breath of an invisible silent blue dragon. Was it because the DM was dating an ex-girlfriend of mine or just coincidence? Either way, it was total horse****. Also, I no longer have rooms or hallways of disintegration that was seen from time to time in OD&D.

 

[Illirion]

I voted the fifth option.

It's hard to let players die when the DM is rooting for them . If I notice that I'm killing a player, I'll usually think of a logical reason for the monster to do something else and give them a chance to save themselves. If I do have to kill someone, I'd rather do it while they're fighting a boss or trying to accomplish something that's worth dying for.

Generally when I roll the final dice that will decide whether a character dies or not, I ask myself the following questions on whether I'm going to fudge or not:

- Was that player particularly attached to his character?
- Did the player get enough opportunities to prevent his death (could he have seen it comming)?
- Is there something to keep that player occupied while the rest of the party get's on with the story (or goes on a reviving quest)?
- Can I find a way to make this death work within the story?

I've never had to fudge anything though, yet. My players generally get the message fast enough to prevent them from getting killed.

Cheers,
Illirion.