Make Death Less Frequent; Lasting Wounds

[Camelot]

The only combat I've experienced is 4e, but I believe this could apply to any combat.

Death is something to be avoided, obviously, but not just for the player. A dead character could put a huge dent in a DM's story, forcing the characters to sidetrack or backtrack to either ressurect the character or find a replacement. It leads to DMs going too easy on the players or handwaving damage and rules.

I thought of a simple way to make death a choice for the player, so it only happens if it fits the story, but the rules are not drastically changed. When a character is "dying," they are instead falling towards uncosciousness. The only rule that is changed is that they can talk; they still need to make death saving throws, are still helpless, etc. for whatever system. When a character is "dead," they are instead unconscious, but will not wake up until they have gotten plenty of rest and medical attention. Of course, if the player wishes, their character could "lose the will to live" and still die upon reaching this point.

The benefit of this houserule is that the DM can feel free to be more ruthless with the characters, not having to fudge attacks or make monsters act in a way they wouldn't normally. Plus, if there is a TPK, this could instead lead to the PCs being captured, or they wake up later after the monsters left them for dead. The game only ends if everyone thinks it should, which I think is a great improvement over accidental TPKs that result in a restart of the campaign.

This also introduces the possibility of serious wounds. To make falling unconscious a little more scary, and also still involve the player, on their turn they can roll to see if they accrue a serious wound, kind of like a death saving throw (of course, adjustments can be made for whatever system you're using, I'm assuming 4e). A serious wound acts like a disease: it gives you some penalty, you need Endurance to get better, Heal can help, it gets worse if you don't take care, and can become permanent.

The only downside to this system that I can see is that it might make some options less powerful if they deal with coming back from the death, like many epic destinies including Undying Warrior, since even though "unconscious" is still mechanically functioning as death, you come back eventually, so coming back in 24 hours from the dead is not that amazing. I think this could be circumvented by declaring that a character dies instead of falling unconsciou if it has such an option so that the balance is not skewed.

Any thoughts?

 

[Similkameen]

The threat of dying - and dying

I've been DM over quite a few years, and now have the happy opportunity to be playing in both 3.5 and 4e games.

I find one of the most important things I am doing as DM is setting up adventures where there is the threat of death. If there isn't a real chance that the party can die or fail in some way, a lot of the fun, the anticipation, the need to really find other solutions is lost. The game goes flat without that threat.

It is a challenge for the DM to not kill all the party members all of the time, but just have death an actuality often enough for the players to enjoy the game.

I can see that if you are a DM for young players this might need to be moderated somewhat.

It is built into the game that you can be raised from the dead, so party members are meant to die.

As a player in 4e, I've been turned to stone, and left there, so built a new character. An opportunity to play something else, and try different elements of the game. I've died and been raised since we're high enough level to cast the ritual, as have two other characters.

In the 3.5 game, I've survived. Most other party members have died, and some several times. The threat there is real, and when we get careless and don't think through what we're doing and just float in, someone dies.

It is sad for our characters, sometimes it is hard to keep campaign cohesiveness, as new characters constantly join us. But the DMs in these games are awesome, a couple of them are very very good. They run the encounters to the fullest, the monsters use all their capabilities, including acting intelligently. It is a much more exciting game, when that thrill is there.

In our games too, the model is that you aren't so attached to our character, that we can't acknowledge that some heros and heroines don't make it, we mourn them, bury them, or leave them to rot depending, eh. New characters join in, the dynamics change, feathers get ruffled. It is part of the interesting roleplaying.

So no, I wouldn't be house-ruling a game where death was avoided. I think it would take away the challenge, the thrill, the anticipation.