I have played 4e since its release. I have followed the boards and have read a lot of threads for 4th edition. One thing I have noticed is how some groups have had many deaths (some with multiple TPKs) while others have had hardly any character death. Our group falls into the latter where death is rare and in our experience, for death to happen, several circumstances seem to have to line up to make it happen.
What I would like to hear from the community is how your character has died and in particular the circumstances and the mechanics behind it. I am not interested in the TPK deaths as I have found, that once a battle turns sour, if PCs don't run they can easily die so please only show single character deaths. From this exercise, I anticpate drawing out several things that can lead to discussion. First, I think we will see how groups vary in how they handle certain rules like Auras for example and I am pretty certain that there are more group variations on rules than what people anticipate. Second, I think we will see that some deaths are caused because of playstyle - some DM's are more likely to kill downed PCs rather than leave them to get healed by the cleric. Third, I think a thread like this could be valuable to WotC in that they can collect some metrics on types of death.
To show you what I am looking for, I will present the 3 deaths that we have seen so far.
Death 1 - Halfling Rogue that died in the climactic battle of our homebrew 1st adventure. Ultimately, this death was the result of us still getting familiar with the new rules. At the time we didn't realize that if you were unconscious and had negative HPs that you are still considered dying. The rogue was just barely into the negative HP's and with temp HP he was over 0 and on his turn we allowed him all his actions. He spent one action to stand and since he was adjacent to the BBEG he attacked rather than retreat to safety. The price of his heroism was that the BBEG attacked him, scored a solid blow doing close to max damage and outright killed the rogue due to reaching the negative bloodied value for his HPs.
Death 2 - Dragonborn Warlord died against a Mind Flayer. The Mind Flayer had his tentacles on him and brought him to 0 instantly killing him. I guess it sucked to be the warlord that day. Most of the party was dazed and had to use their one action on other things and the cleric decided not to heal the Warlord. The warlord paid with his life by reaching 0 HP resulting in instant death.
Death 3 - Elven Wizard fighting a Bloodkiss (Beholder from Open Grave), several Mad Wraiths and the Cleric had Bade Barrier in play. Ultimately, the badly injured wizard (about 1/4 HPs) was hit by a Mad Wraiths Touch of Chaos that forced him to attack an ally. This caused him to go through the Blade Barrier where he took some major damage and dropped him. Unfortunately, for the wizard it was his turn right after that and he started within the Blade Barrier, Aura of the Bloodkiss, Aura of the Mad Wraith and he died before he could do anything. It took a massive number of things to line up for the character die from HP and to reach negative bloodied. Starting the turn unconscious, being in a blade barrier, being in an auras and the timing of the turns all made this happen. Even if one of these events were different, the character would have lived.
Our group has several theories but until I get some responses I will refrain from posting them.
I am looking forward to your responses!
What I would like to hear from the community is how your character has died and in particular the circumstances and the mechanics behind it. I am not interested in the TPK deaths as I have found, that once a battle turns sour, if PCs don't run they can easily die so please only show single character deaths. From this exercise, I anticpate drawing out several things that can lead to discussion. First, I think we will see how groups vary in how they handle certain rules like Auras for example and I am pretty certain that there are more group variations on rules than what people anticipate. Second, I think we will see that some deaths are caused because of playstyle - some DM's are more likely to kill downed PCs rather than leave them to get healed by the cleric. Third, I think a thread like this could be valuable to WotC in that they can collect some metrics on types of death.
To show you what I am looking for, I will present the 3 deaths that we have seen so far.
Death 1 - Halfling Rogue that died in the climactic battle of our homebrew 1st adventure. Ultimately, this death was the result of us still getting familiar with the new rules. At the time we didn't realize that if you were unconscious and had negative HPs that you are still considered dying. The rogue was just barely into the negative HP's and with temp HP he was over 0 and on his turn we allowed him all his actions. He spent one action to stand and since he was adjacent to the BBEG he attacked rather than retreat to safety. The price of his heroism was that the BBEG attacked him, scored a solid blow doing close to max damage and outright killed the rogue due to reaching the negative bloodied value for his HPs.
Death 2 - Dragonborn Warlord died against a Mind Flayer. The Mind Flayer had his tentacles on him and brought him to 0 instantly killing him. I guess it sucked to be the warlord that day. Most of the party was dazed and had to use their one action on other things and the cleric decided not to heal the Warlord. The warlord paid with his life by reaching 0 HP resulting in instant death.
Death 3 - Elven Wizard fighting a Bloodkiss (Beholder from Open Grave), several Mad Wraiths and the Cleric had Bade Barrier in play. Ultimately, the badly injured wizard (about 1/4 HPs) was hit by a Mad Wraiths Touch of Chaos that forced him to attack an ally. This caused him to go through the Blade Barrier where he took some major damage and dropped him. Unfortunately, for the wizard it was his turn right after that and he started within the Blade Barrier, Aura of the Bloodkiss, Aura of the Mad Wraith and he died before he could do anything. It took a massive number of things to line up for the character die from HP and to reach negative bloodied. Starting the turn unconscious, being in a blade barrier, being in an auras and the timing of the turns all made this happen. Even if one of these events were different, the character would have lived.
Our group has several theories but until I get some responses I will refrain from posting them.
I am looking forward to your responses!
