Penalties besides PC death

[B4cchus]

In my current RL campaign character's still die.. and get raised.
The gp cost of raising alone is a penalty hefty enough in my opinion (they're level 7 right now).
I don't steal xp or levels from my players. In my opinion xp represents progress in the game and is it's biggets reward (after the game itself offcourse!). The players need those xp to gain levels to overcome the increasingly difficult challenges I lay before them (the progress).
When a character gets raised in my campaign he doesn't loose xp or levels. Instead, I stick a non-removable negative level on them that goes away as soonas they gain a new level.
Also, I introduced a system much like the craft points system for magical item crafting. This caps the amount of crafting players can perform per level and, again, doesn't penalize thier progress. Selecting a feat for crafting is, in my opninion, costly enough.

 

[shilsen]

Capture is also a brutal punishment. Many heroes would rather die than be captured.

True dat. I'm not completely sure why, but PCs (and players) universally hate being captured. I think it's got a lot to do with issues of control and ego than anything else. Being killed in battle can be heroic, and at least you have a certain amount of control over your fate in that you chose to fight to the death. But being captured is both ignominous and leads to complete (or near-complete) loss of control, both of which players/PCs hate. I think PCs would rather lose really valuable equipment (something else which can be a horrible penalty for them) than be captured. Of course, being captured usually means losing all your stuff too.

Which reminds me, I haven't captured my PCs in a long time. Hmm - time to go prep for next session

I try to find solutiuons that lead to more adventures, even if they're gritty and full of the PCs being on the outs for a time.

Yup. Defeat leading to death is boring for me. Defeat leading to a realization of "Oh crap! How do we get out of this?" is way more interesting, since it usually spawns more stuff for the game. Especially in mine, since I prefer to not do overarching plots but let them emerge from the PCs' actions and choices.

 

[Blackrat]

When a character gets raised in my campaign he doesn't loose xp or levels. Instead, I stick a non-removable negative level on them that goes away as soonas they gain a new level.

That sounds actually like a capital idea. I have been trying to find a way to represent the stress of dying and resurrecting without the loss of xp, and this is perhaps the first valid idea I have heard. Thanks .

 

[fba827]

Some good ones have already been mentioned so I'll offer some twists on thoughts already said ...

A curse. The curse can be mechanical (penatly to skills/stats) or more flavorful for RP purposes only - or both, depending on how severe you want. For mechanical curses you can see the curse spell for examples (or any spell that mimics curse effects or requires the same spell to dispel as a curse spell does). For RP type curses, they grow hair at night (maybe some minor charisma penalty during that time) or something like that; even if it's not affecting them mechanically or during actions, any players actually into the RP aspect of it will feel the 'sting'. You can get curses as part of a magical trap for going into the wrong room, or for pissing off the wrong magical user/magical creature. Or they just wake up one morning cursed and have to figure out why and how to undo it.

A transformation of some sort. A transformation sort of ties in with the idea of a curse.. but maybe a transmuter attacks with some special spell and turns him/her/them into half orcs or goblins or kobolds or just really ugly versions of themselves (gaunt faces, dangly limbs -X to Charisma, etc), or they all get templates (fiendish type templates may make good type characters very uneasy ). This has social/RP implications as well as character stat adjustments... (and if very severely changed, their friends may no longer recognize or trust them) and it would be a few adventure sessions to correct it (finding the right person or item or whatever to correct it or breaking the mirror or staff that the transmuter used to alter their appearance, etc)

Limit use of stuff. The way to get around actually taking their stuff away is to limit it some how. Maybe the stuff was was in the area of a magical attack or trap resulting in a dispel-type effect, making magic items weaker (or fewer charges or a chance to backfire).

Incapacitate. He's not dead but he's stoned (har har) or his soul is trapped in a magic jar or he opened a book that now has him trapped inside. The player would need an alt PC or take over an NPC while the others quest to revive him. But in the end, the incapacitated PC will have less experience than the others -- unless everyone is incapacitated and using alt PCs for the resuce -- the penalty at this point is lost time. If the PCs are racing against some deadline in the story, losing 7 days in game when they only have 8 to stop the big bad plot, well, that's 7 days of counter measures they lost.... they won't actually feel that sort of sting unless there is a known deadline and also only if they had plans for what they would do during those days that will be lost. And if the alt PCs don't free the real PCs in time (the alt PCs being unaware of the other plots) then they could *fail* to stop the big plot.. and nothing stings more than failure.

Scorn. Whatever they did to illicit the penalty was noticed by someone that would otherwise have been their friend (or said would-be-friend heard through the rumor mill, etc). Maybe a particular cleric sect has heard of what happened and that one sect will no longer heal/help them. It turns into an inconvinience as you only need to go to the next cleric sect... but if they are into the RP elements of the story than they could feel like "ouch, we did something bad" if you need a mechanical element for this, make it a penalty on NPC reactions for anyone of whatever group you decide now dislikes them.

Death without ... it's D&D, so raise dead and DM actions are norms to keep people alive...I don't know how to offer this option without an example. I ran a campaign where I also didn't want to kill the PCs unless they did something stupid. Sure enough, they did something stupid that resulted in a total party kill in the middle of the forest. Feeling gracious, I had them all "wake up" only to find they were different. I had a druid reincarnate them all (he was fighting the same evil force in the woods and so wanted the allies) and so they came back as a variety of humanoid forms. Some players got into it (the stat adjustments, the appearance and social implications with friends and associates, etc) but one player did get very upset because his new form's stats no longer allowed the min-maxing for his characters strength-fighter type concept - so careful if you think that might be a result.


this is just a random two-minute brainstorm.. i know some of these ideas are rather weak and some work better in some situations than others. but if i think of anything else, i'll add more later.

 

[sniffles]

I just don't pamper players that way. I love the role play, and I am always rooting for the players to overcome the obstacles placed before them, but should they throw caution to the wind and do something really inappropriate, then they will surely face the consequence of such actions.

I have to remark that not killing PCs is not "pampering" the players. It's giving the players what they want, at least in the OP's example.

Not everyone thinks it's fun to have a single bad decision or bad die roll destroy a carefully-crafted character.

I personally like the concept of threatening what the PCs hold dear. That's much more compelling to me as a roleplayer than worrying that my PC may die the next time I roll a 1.
But YMMV.

 

[avr]

NPCs gloating over the success of their evil plans can work wonders for player motivation, if not overused. Likewise seeing others get rewards which were promised to the PCs.

Actually, be careful with these unless you want a scene where the dwarf goes beserk in the middle of the kings court.

 

[Warren Okuma]

In what way do you think this one-line interjection contributes to the thread?

This is what I'm trying to get across with that one liner.

1) Don't feel bad about killing the PC's.
2) Death is a learning experience.
3) The players can analyze how they died and then build characters that have a better survivability.
4) By killing them they know the world is a dangerous place and will take precautions and will take your world more seriously. And it is a better drama.
5) New: After a TPK (if it happens) or the like leave most of their equipment as loot. Tends to soften the blow. Or I say roll 1D6, 1-4 it's there, 5-6 it's not, for each item.

I'm sure you are not just trying to inflate your postcount, but we would like you to make some effort to contribute in a way appropriate to the topic in hand.

How's that for my point clarifying?

Thanks

Your welcome.

 

[MongooseFamiliar]

Two Words: Gender Change


Bring back the cursed items that change you into the alternate gender. Or, turn them into a goblin or a kobold and send them on an unpleasant quest to change back. The old man whose pouch you stole is actually an archmage, and whoops, the familiar (who can pwn you) saw you. You now have the choice of either retrieving his lunchbox from a dragon's hoard or spending the rest of your lives as kobolds with bad breath and foot fungus. Enjoy.

Some of the problems can possibly be changed by altering where they stand in the world power-wise. If they are more powerful than anything they run into, sure, they might get cocky, since they are surrounded by commoners. However, if they are level 6 and the average guardsman for the main town is 10+ with captains at 15-20, that is another story. And those shopkeepers with the magic items? Retired adventurers, with appropriate levels. That bard hanging out at the local inn where they decide to pick a fight...he may be a noob, he may be with a rival adventurer's group hanging out in that same inn.

Come to think of it, if they start being dishonorable, you could drive the point home by making a rival group that is honorable and works to maintain their reputation. Those who pay are more likely to hire the ones who have an honest reputation, non thieving scum.