D&D General How Often Should a PC Die in D&D 5e?

[prabe]

Not really. To me the story is incidental, determined after the game is played.

I think the best case is the story's an output, not an input. Different people will, of course, prioritize that output differently. For me it's practically the point, for you ... not so much.

 

[Guest 7037866]

Are we telling a story or playing a game?

Not really. To me the story is incidental, determined after the game is played.

The story comes out of the game being played IME.

"Do you remember when..."
"That one time was so amazing as you..."
"I will never forget how we..."

The game is lived, the story is told. I tell stories of prior games and amazing sessions all the time. Great way to bring new players into the game IMO.

 

[Chaltab]

Unless you run your games in a way that is purely mechanical like some Zed-X Spectrum dungeon crawler then the plot & game elements are inexorably linked. D&D isn't just game or story, it's fundamentally both.

Edit: that said it still has no bearing on how lethal the game is, which was the thread's original purpose.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Unless you run your games in a way that is purely mechanical like some Zed-X Spectrum dungeon crawler then the plot & game elements are inexorably linked. D&D isn't just game or story, it's fundamentally both.

What makes it story then? What parts are fundamentally story, and what do you define story as? I see nothing in traditional RPGs that demands plot, and without plot there's no story. All that stuff can (and for me ideally does) get put together after the fact by how the characters and setting interact over the course of the campaign. That's when you have a story.

 

[Oofta]

What makes it story then? What parts are fundamentally story, and what do you define story as? I see nothing in traditional RPGs that demands plot, and without plot there's no story. All that stuff can (and for me ideally does) get put together after the fact by how the characters and setting interact over the course of the campaign. That's when you have a story.

From wikipedia the definition of plot is "...the sequence of events in which each event affects the next one through the principle of cause-and-effect." So no, we don't have a preplanned plot but we certainly have a sequence of events, typically events based on cause-and-effect.

I don't think it really matters, but if nothing else we can refer to it as a story in the sense that we also refer to the story of someone's life.

 

[Guest 7037866]

Unless you run your games in a way that is purely mechanical like some Zed-X Spectrum dungeon crawler then the plot & game elements are inexorably linked. D&D isn't just game or story, it's fundamentally both.

Edit: that said it still has no bearing on how lethal the game is, which was the thread's original purpose.

While I understand your view, I think it isn't quite accurate and actually disagree, but the differences probably becomes more an issue of semantics than actual intent.

EDIT: (bold) Like I am supposed to have any idea what this is...???

 

[Micah Sweet]

From wikipedia the definition of plot is "...the sequence of events in which each event affects the next one through the principle of cause-and-effect." So no, we don't have a preplanned plot but we certainly have a sequence of events, typically events based on cause-and-effect.

I don't think it really matters, but if nothing else we can refer to it as a story in the sense that we also refer to the story of someone's life.

But you don't know the story of someone's life until it's over, and trying to make a story out of your life generally doesn't happen before or during.

 

[Chaltab]

Like I am supposed to have any idea what this is...???

It's an old home computer used for videogames in the UK.

 

[Oofta]

But you don't know the story of someone's life until it's over, and trying to make a story out of your life generally doesn't happen before or during.

You don't know how the story ends until someone dies. Doesn't mean you don't know the story up until that point.

 

[KYRON45]

But you don't know the story of someone's life until it's over, and trying to make a story out of your life generally doesn't happen before or during.

The story of our lives is happening in real time. The rules we follow dictate the outcome of the story. Red lights, paying for stuff, social interaction, these are the rules that affect the course of the story just like the rules of the game we play.

Autobiographies are literally the story of someone’s life written by that person before they die.