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

[Emerikol]

I mean, at my Dungeon World table, there is no such thing as random, permanent, irrevocable death.

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At it's root you are talking about story vs game. And RPG has both to varying degrees and where you set the dial determines your preference.

Other than low levels, I don't see irrevocable death being a thing in D&D in any edition.

 

[Imaro]

I don't think its necessarily a question of story vs. game. death and/or it's possibility aren't a general requirement for a game... I think its moreso a question of what is the goal of your D&D game.

 

[Swarmkeeper]

What i meant Is players looking at any situation and trying to find which skill (craft, tumble, Hide) to solve It with, which has them look at the game "from the outside", instead i like to favour thinking in context. Use social levers on the NPC instead of Rolling. "Just Rolling my skill" should be secondary to trying to resolve any problem in context or at least be Gated by that action (as in "you only roll diplomacy after having provided a compelling argument)

I can't see who you are talking to here for... reasons... but I think I know what you are getting at.

If I'm understanding correctly, you prefer the player to tell you what their PC is trying to accomplish (goal) and how they are going about it (approach).
The players should focus on engaging with the in-game fiction (what you call "trying to resolve any problem in context") rather than just explicitly invoking mechanics on their character sheets (what you are referring to as "from the outside").

That's how it works at our table, too. As long as the player is reasonably specific about what they want their PC to do, the DM can adjudicate and the play cycle continues. Importantly, no special IRL skill or knowledge is necessary, nor is their any specific benefit for "gaming the DM with persuasive language" or other such concerns that have come up in the past here when this topic comes up.

For example, the the DM describes a locked chest in the scene. The player might state: "my rogue will closely examine the lock for traps, without touching it". The DM then decides, in the context of the scene and the stated goal and approach, if a roll is even necessary. All this happens instead of the player stating: "I roll Investigation".

 

[prabe]

At it's root you are talking about story vs game. And RPG has both to varying degrees and where you set the dial determines your preference.

Other than low levels, I don't see irrevocable death being a thing in D&D in any edition.

It was a thing in both editions of AD&D, where you could only come back from the dead a number of times equal to your CON score. Yes, a double-digit number of deaths for a given PC seems like a lot, but there were by design hard limits. In principle, there were limits in 3e (at least, in 3.5, which is the PHB I have ready access to) but in practice I expect those limits were at least as hard to run up against.

 

[Swarmkeeper]

To address the OP, in our campaigns we set the expectation that PC death is a potential consequence for actions taken in game. Here are a few bullet points from the Campaign Guidelines channel in our Discord server:

• DMs will run the game as a living world: some areas and situations will be more dangerous than others and will be telegraphed accordingly
• DMs are fans of the PCs but we will run enemies true – keeping in mind that enemies often have motivations other than “fight to the death” – and, that said, death is a real possible outcome for PCs
• Retreat is usually an option – if the party wishes to retreat from a situation, we’ll shift from combat rules to chase rules and the enemy will react according to their nature and motivations

I don't think we have any "sweet spot" for the number of deaths expected. It really depends on how the characters choose to approach challenges and, of course, how cruel or benevolent the dice decide to be. The potential for PC death is always there, though, and that is important to us.

 

[Emerikol]

It was a thing in both editions of AD&D, where you could only come back from the dead a number of times equal to your CON score. Yes, a double-digit number of deaths for a given PC seems like a lot, but there were by design hard limits. In principle, there were limits in 3e (at least, in 3.5, which is the PHB I have ready access to) but in practice I expect those limits were at least as hard to run up against.

For my players who were skilled, dying 18 times was pretty unthinkable. Like I said, on average it might be 2 or 3 times in an entire campaign but there were people who didn't die at all.

 

[prabe]

For my players who were skilled, dying 18 times was pretty unthinkable. Like I said, on average it might be 2 or 3 times in an entire campaign but there were people who didn't die at all.

Sure, different campaigns would have different things happen. The 1e campaigns I was in had no PCs die, at all. I was merely pointing out that permadeath was in the rules, that there were hard limits (even if approximately no one reached them).

 

[Black Dougal]

I think for any edition death should be as frequent as fits your group's wants and desires. I do miss the grittiness of older editions where death was more frequent but given we are all adults with responsibilities now we want to play not make new characters as it eats into our limited gaming time. I also have a DCC group who loves the chaos and PC death so we vary within my own two groups quite a bit.

 

[Emerikol]

Sure, different campaigns would have different things happen. The 1e campaigns I was in had no PCs die, at all. I was merely pointing out that permadeath was in the rules, that there were hard limits (even if approximately no one reached them).

Okay. I didn't say it wasn't in the rules so much as it wasn't really a practical worry. If you let your character die 18 times then your character deserves permadeath or your DM's career does. At low levels it is but at about 5th level on, most groups can get a raise dead and eventually even a resurrection.

 

[prabe]

Okay. I didn't say it wasn't in the rules so much as it wasn't really a practical worry. If you let your character die 18 times then your character deserves permadeath or your DM's career does. At low levels it is but at about 5th level on, most groups can get a raise dead and eventually even a resurrection.

I understood "wasn't a thing" to be "wasn't a thing in the rules," not "wasn't a thing that happened." Sorry about that. I don't think we really disagree here.