@hawkeyefan, the other aspect of danger that came through in your and @Manbearcat's recount was the threat to things the PCs care about. It can trivialise this a bit, I think, to call this an "emotional" threat. With the wolf Thorin, and the dog Fang, and the father Sigurd, it's not just that the PCs (and players) might be upset if they are hurt, or lost to the darkness; but also that this will set back the PC's "position" eg Stonetop will lose it's blacksmith, and that's not a trivial thing; or a boy losing his dog (am I recalling that right for Fang?) might be the beginning of a bigger range of social dislocations, unless it is dealt with in some effective fashion.
To resort to some of my stock terminology, this is a difference between harm to NPCs and associates as mere colour; and harm that actually matters to, and ramifies through, the game play.
This occurred once or twice in my 4e D&D play, but most of the time the mundane world was a backdrop and all the danger and threat was either to the PCs directly or of a more cosmological and often, therefore, impersonal nature. But it is a recurrent feature of Prince Valiant. It also comes up a bit in Classic Traveller, though often in a more cynical or expedient fashion (that being a function of both the default Traveller setting and the Traveller mechanics).
I hope the above makes some sense.
To resort to some of my stock terminology, this is a difference between harm to NPCs and associates as mere colour; and harm that actually matters to, and ramifies through, the game play.
This occurred once or twice in my 4e D&D play, but most of the time the mundane world was a backdrop and all the danger and threat was either to the PCs directly or of a more cosmological and often, therefore, impersonal nature. But it is a recurrent feature of Prince Valiant. It also comes up a bit in Classic Traveller, though often in a more cynical or expedient fashion (that being a function of both the default Traveller setting and the Traveller mechanics).
I hope the above makes some sense.