Too Much Effort to Make New Characters?

[Jd Smith1]

At first I was like , but thinking back on the complexity of character creation with all the bells and whistles in some versions of D&D and I kinda get it. Especially if there have been more than one character death already.

So don't use 5e. If building a character is tedious, either you're (general address, not specific) using the wrong system, or perhaps the wrong hobby.

I wouldn't accept a player who thinks PC creation is drudgery (but I also don't use D&D or Pathfinder). We just started a new campaign last week, and the group had been discussing their new PCs for a month on Discord.

 

[Jd Smith1]

OH! It's a TPK not just one player! That makes so much more sense.

Yes a TPK on an AP at 3rd level would have me also saying "um, can we like pretend we didn't have a tpk here? Maybe take us all prisoner and let us try to break out or something instead?"

TPKs are always annoying, but they're especially annoying when you are just getting a feel for a character and a party. When everyone has to start from scratch it's just kind of depressing.

TPKs are amazing. They restore the sense of risk and heroism.

Even back when I ran D&D I never allowed death reversal.

 

[uzirath]

What’s there to lose with trying a “reload?” It’s unusual. Radical, even. But why not see what happens?

At first, my knee jerk reaction was dismay at the players. After reading through the thread, I’ve come to a different way of thinking. What’s the big deal? Experiment. See what’s fun for everyone. Get plenty of feedback. Just because you do it once doesn’t mean it’s an official house rule.

 

[Jer]

TPKs are amazing. They restore the sense of risk and heroism.

Even back when I ran D&D I never allowed death reversal.

Your opinion.

In my opinion they suck. They drain the momentum from the group, kill any ongoing stories, and are a great way for a gaming group to fall apart due to frustration.

 

[overgeeked]

If you were the GM, how would you respond to a group's attitude that if their characters die, you should just re-play the encounter or move on anyway - because it's too much work to make a new character and losing an evening's worth of game progress is "punishment enough?"
Like, I'm flabbergasted here. Maybe these people shouldn't be playing RPGs - or at least mainstream games like D&D or Pathfinder?

If the game has high lethality it should have super-quick character creation. If character creation takes more than 5 minutes, the game should have low lethality.

Games with high lethality and long character creation are badly designed. If you’re playing a medium to high lethality game with long and involved character creation, you should have a stack of backup characters ready to go.

This is also what hirelings and freed prisoners are for. Promote a hireling to PC until the session is over and the player can make a new one between sessions. Same with prisoners. Any of these characters can be put into play at anytime. It’s a game, so “story” be damned. Don’t leave a player hanging. Bring in the new character immediately.

And TPKs don’t have to end a campaign. Wake the characters up in hell and they have to fight their way out. They become conscious again after being the undead servants of a lich or necromancer for a century.

 

[Jd Smith1]

Your opinion.

In my opinion they suck. They drain the momentum from the group, kill any ongoing stories, and are a great way for a gaming group to fall apart due to frustration.

I've never had a gaming group fold because of a TPK, but if it did, it needed to fold.

There's always more stories and momentum; in fact, the TPK creates stories and momentum. How many scenarios, particularly in D&D-style games, run the standard old trope of 'an adventuring group went missing while investigating....'?

If the NPCs can't win, where is the value in actually playing? Just hand over the loot and XP, and go do something entertaining.

 

[RuinousPowers]

So don't use 5e. If building a character is tedious, either you're (general address, not specific) using the wrong system, or perhaps the wrong hobby.

I wouldn't accept a player who thinks PC creation is drudgery (but I also don't use D&D or Pathfinder). We just started a new campaign last week, and the group had been discussing their new PCs for a month on Discord.

It's funny that you went right to 5e when I was thinking 3.5/PF and 4e, which some people claimed to need an online character builder to navigate all the options.

 

[mythago]

If you were the GM, how would you respond to a group's attitude that if their characters die, you should just re-play the encounter or move on anyway - because it's too much work to make a new character and losing an evening's worth of game progress is "punishment enough?"
Like, I'm flabbergasted here. Maybe these people shouldn't be playing RPGs - or at least mainstream games like D&D or Pathfinder?

Have you considered actually asking the group why, instead of urging a bunch of strangers online to speculate about their motives?

 

[Jd Smith1]

It's funny that you went right to 5e when I was thinking 3.5/PF and 4e, which some people claimed to need an online character builder to navigate all the options.

I quit D&D when it was 1e, and came back briefly when 5e came out, so I know very little about 2-4 editions. But I think that my point still holds true: if PC generation is tedious, it may not be the game for you.

 

[Jd Smith1]

Have you considered actually asking the group why, instead of urging a bunch of strangers online to speculate about their motives?

Now you're just undermining the entire basis of Net message boards.