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

[Autumnal]

The one constant in any online forum is that nothing ever happens. Thing just go round and round, get redefined, misinterpreted and misunderstood. The goal posts get moved, the premise changes and people get angry....but nothing ever really happens.

Nothing ever begins.

There is no first moment; no single word or place from which this or any other story springs.

The threads can always be traced back to some earlier tale, and to the tales that preceded that; though as the narrator’s voice recedes, the connections will seem to grow more tenuous, for each age will want the tale told as if it were of its own making.

Thus the pagan will be sanctified, the tragic become laughable; great lovers will stoop to sentiment, and demons dwindle to clockwork toys.

Nothing is fixed. In and out the shuttle goes fact and fiction, mind and matter, woven into patterns that may have only this in common: that hidden amongst them is a filigree which will with time become a world.

- Clive Barker, at the start of Weaveworld

 

[Chaosmancer]

Someone clearly put those stories together after the fact to be told. That's what I said. I'm don't see the point you're trying to make, beyond continuing to hassle me for my opinions.

Considering some of them are still ongoing, you are basically saying that Tolkien put together his story after the fact too. Which most people wouldn't consider to be how Tolkien wrote, or that Tolkien wasn't writing a story. The same with literally any author.

 

[Chaosmancer]

I would say the main differences between "Slice of Life" and a story-focused TTRPG are:

The former are "ordinary" and rarely have climactic events; TTRPG chars almost always begin or become extraordinary and face many climactic events over time
The former rarely have "villains" and don't even need antagonists; TTRPGs almost always have villains and always have antagonists
SoL stories (I wish it had a better acronym) don't usually have dramatic arcs so much as "popcorn"-style events; a story-focused TTRPG almost certainly plays out arcs, they're just done "with" the camera frame, rather than before or after it

But there certainly are similarities. One might say that "Slice of Life" follows the action as it happens, so to speak, which is definitely what a "story now" RPG also does. Further, "Slice of Life" embraces a spontaneity of behavior and growth that a more rigorously plotted story wouldn't, which is very much true of "story now" RPGs.

The closest analogy I can think of for the specific kind of story that "story now" RPGs produce is Choose Your Own Adventure, except that CYOA narratives are completely fixed (y'know, being a written down book) while "story now" is inherently open-ended both in terms of length and in terms of the actions you can choose to take in any given moment. Sometimes, only a few actions make sense (that's the fiction limiting your options)

Oh, I completely agree with you that they are not the closest analogues. It is just deeply frustrating to me to basically see Micah describing a genre of story-telling, a popular and beloved genre of story-telling, then declaring it not a form of story-telling.

 

[tetrasodium]

Is who's story it is relevant? Isn't the question.....Is it a story at all?

Yes it is relevant when the distinction is "MY Character's story that happens to have some other folks each telling THEIR character's story at the table" & something like "a story formed from OUR party's actions "

i didn't think micah was even discussing party story focus vs character story focus (unless it was part of a different conversation thread that i was paying less attention to), but rather what qualifies something to be defined as a story in the first place.

but why can't both story focuses be present at once? the story of the party and the stories of all the individual members of that party who have their own subplots going on, individual threads doesn't have to turn things into 'Me, the protagonist, oh and those other guys are here too', the party is part of a mercenary company all hired to stop a doomsday cult, but in the meantime the cleric wants to investigate the dubious history of their church, the rogue is an estranged noble looking to earn their way back into their family's good graces and the artificer is trying to track down a set of magical relics.

They can't both simultaneously be the focus any more than you can simultaneously be myopic & hyperopia(near sighted/far sighted).

 

[Lanefan]

The one constant in any online forum is that nothing ever happens. Thing just go round and round, get redefined, misinterpreted and misunderstood. The goal posts get moved, the premise changes and people get angry....but nothing ever really happens.

Just watch, it'll be a character ability in 6e: on any successful hit you can shift nearby goalposts 5 feet in any direction.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

For me the threshold is when someone has the opportunity to look back and make sense of it. Apply some coherence to the events.

Then your definition of "story" reduces always to "story after." That is not the only kind of story that can exist.

 

[Chaosmancer]

No one has said it is impossible to challenge the players, but that the encounters build by the (5.0) guidelines will not do it. And WotC agreed, thus changing the guidelines. And here you seem to agree as well, implying that under the old guidelines you would have ignored them, and ran this (what would have counted well above deadly) encounter nevertheless.

Actually, people HAVE stated it is impossible to meaningfully challenge PCs in 5e. Multiple people. You may not agree with them, but it is a constant refrain from that side of the discussion.

 

[Chaosmancer]

You're not gonna like this, but more you rely on malleability of the fiction, on "no myth," closer to illusionism you are. Like yeah, you may have set up some vague foreshadowing about dragon earrings to later justify deus exing things, but less well defined those things are closer we are in the situation where the GM just makes up whatever to direct the play into the direction they want.


Because having things predefined binds the GM. The GM has less freedom to affect the direction of the play once things get going. So it is not just the GM deciding what is and what happens, the players interaction with the fixed starting position and the rules determine the outcome. Like relating to character death, I as GM do not know beforehand whether th PCs will survive a fight, the outcome will be a surprise to me as well.

An odd proposition when player's "turning left" and doing something I did not account for often has me abandoning the notes I had prepared before hand

 

[Chaosmancer]

I have a similar playstyle to what you describe:

1. DM makes the world/setting (I do this with my players to some extent)
2. PCs explore that world
3. DM reacts to the PCs exploring the world (based on DM's interpretation of the natural reaction of the settings environment and occupants)

I can't speak for others; however, where I feel the need to pushback ever so slightly is the idea that your are not creating a story when exploring my setting. I may not be thinking about it as story, my character's story, or concerning myself with the narrative roles of the characters, but that doesn't mean we, as a group, are not creating a story. Whether we realize it or not, or think of it that way or not, we are, IMO, creating a story.

Though, from my perspective everything is a story. For example, I am going to go live the story of taking my dog out to the bathroom on a rainy morning in Seattle. Who knows to what adventures that will lead - possibly a donut!

^^ This

"The characters are just going through an area and exploring it, finding the unexpected" is still a story. Whether or not there is an overarching conflict that connects everything doesn't make it not a story.

 

[Chaosmancer]

It absolutely would...once at least a portion of that story is done and presented.

I am literally right now writing a story, one scene at a time, with people voting on what they want to happen next.

By your definition it isn't a story until... I post the next scene? But before that point, there is nothing happening. It is like saying that the book doesn't continue until you start the next chapter. It just logically does not make sense to me as a statement.