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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Elf Witch" data-source="post: 5901703" data-attributes="member: 9037">Like I said that has not been my experience at all in my 30 years of gaming. I have never seen people fight to keep their characters alive in a high death game. The characters are disposable and that is how they are treated.  We all had back up characters ready to go but none of them had backgrounds most of the table could not remember their character names much less anyone else character name. We did not play as well as a team because since there were constantly new characters that we had not formed attachments to so we would not go out of our way to save them.Now your players may be different and if they are that's great. And if your game works for you and your players then that is all that matters.I think you missed my question. I am not saying having back up characters ready I was asking how you introduce them to the party do they just show up, do they have ties to the party already. Story wise how do you fit them in a way that makes the story make sense?In the games I play in when a person brings in a new character because of death or wanting a change they don't just magically appear and are accepted. The DM and the player work together to find a reason that it makes sense to the story.For example in one game we had several new characters one was a slave who saw my character being strangled and took a big risk to save my life. A risk that sent him to the games. Because of this we rescued him and with his help finished our mission and took him with us to our country where slavery was outlawed. Another example we had been captured and in the cell was a bard he helped in the escape and came with us. When we got to our home city we found another mission awaiting us to the city which happened to be the bards home.  I am not the only one who seems to think that you are saying there are safe games and killer games several other people have pointed out to you that there is a middle ground. Even if death is rare it is always there hanging over your head. So every combat could be the one where you die. You never know when it is going to happen so it keeps you on your toes. And the longer you play your character the more it matters to you that you don't lose them. And when it happens it is profoundly shocking to the players. If you have death every session then it is expected the players go into the game session knowing someone is going to die. When it happens there is no shock because they expect it what they may feel is relief that it was not there turn to die today.You keep saying that safe games the players don't invest in their characters as much because they have not fought so hard to keep them alive. That is simply not true in my game. My players invest in their characters to the point that they actually take time out of their busy lives to write game journals, they search for the perfect miniature. When death has happened you can tell that the player who lost the character is upset and so is the party. Not angry upset but genuinely feeling a loss. That death had meaning to the entire table. Which is why I don't take death off the table but make it rare.My party works together as a team to make sure no one dies and they make smart plans  and use good tactics. They are never blase about combat and you can see them get tense and worried when the combat looks like it is going against them.</blockquote>

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