D&D General PC Death: How do You Handle It?

[Li Shenron]

So, my question is this, how do you handle PCs dying? Do you prevent PCs from dying?, do you have them come back as ghosts? Or does something else happen when PCs are on the brink of death?

I don't fudge rolls.

I don't deus-ex-machina the situation, before or after death.

I ask the dead PC's player(s) if they want to make a new character or replace death with some dire but temporary penalty which will mostly fade them to the background for a while (unconscious, captured, disabled...). In the meantime I may offer them to roleplay an NPC or even run some monsters.

 

[Fanaelialae]

There's something about this that I find unaccountably charming. My compliments to your friend.

Thanks, I'll pass it along.

 

[Jonathan Tweet]

If you don't mind a question - what is the meaning of the circles attached to Basilisk and Medusa that have a line to "human"? "Mates with" perhaps? (Eww.)

I don't mind questions, and yes you got that right. I put details in my home campaign that I would not have put in a published work. One theme was that the Creator's good world had been corrupted by the Adversary.