D&D 5E Why penalize returning from death?

[Sacrosanct]

You should never be able to die from things that aren't intentional by the GM or yourself. Any other failure in combat should at worst result in you being defeated but not dead.

So why even have hit points? Or roll for damage? 1 hp is the same as max hp, mechanically. So if no one ever is at the risk of dying, what's the point in having those things? Why have combat at all? Why not just have everyone roll one die, to see just how heroically they emerged from the battle?

 

[Charlaquin]

Think of any story you read or watch. Characters generally don't die unless it's good for the story.

Why do we let D&D create bad stories?

I can think of at least one series where characters regularly die at times that traditional storytelling wisdom of the genre would indicate are not good for the story. You know the one I mean. It still manages to tell a very compelling story. Characters dying at inopportune times can bring those characters’ narrative arcs to an abrupt stop without a satisfying conclusion yes, but whether or not that is a bad thing for the overarching narrative depends on what the writer does with that loss.

The game should have failure states that don't end the story. You should never be able to die from things that aren't intentional by the GM or yourself. Any other failure in combat should at worst result in you being defeated but not dead.

One character dying does not end the story. It ends that character’s Story. And yes, it feels bad, and it’s a stupid, tragic waste of all the potential that character still had. Just like death in real life. The fact that character death can make us experience in microcosm the same emotions as death in real life makes it an incredibly powerful storytelling tool. Of course, you are free to reserve it for moments you deem narratively appropriate if you like, but I (and I think most DMs) prefer to let it happen organically. Part of the appeal of D&D is the semi-immergent nature of the stories we tell with it.

As for consequences of death, I think the aforementioned loss of that character’s potential is consequence enough for character death. If you want to come back in with a new character, you are welcome to do so at the same level and experience as your characters who died - the game has taken enough from you without taking your leveling progress too. On the other hand, if you’re not ready to let that character go, there are options. This is a world of magic, after all. But, Resurrection should be an arduous process so as not to trivialize the loss associated with a character’s death. It’s not as simple as just running to the local temple and handing over the appropriate amount of gold. In a world where diamonds are 1-ups, the diamond trade is going to be very strictly controlled, most likely by the church of the setting’s god of death. If you want to undo the cutting of a character’s narrative thread, it’d better be damn well narratively justified. This is where I toss aside my notes for the main story and get to work on a sidequest.

 

[5ekyu]

Sure!

Axis and Allies. Get knocked out, the rest of the game continues without you.
Diablo hardcore. Die once, die forever.
The Binding of Isaac (or any of many other games). Yep.

...I could continue, but I trust you get the point. There are different types of games.

Heck, look at sports. You lose in the playoffs, and your team is dead (done). The other team advances, and you sit at home. Too bad, shouldn't have lost. You don't get to tell the story of winning, but maybe there's a good story about the season anyway. A good story sometimes ends.

Look, I understand your preference. It's cool! But not everyone shares it. As you state- other games have fewer consequences and let you create better, winning stories.

Play those.

Or, in the alternative, just houserule that you don't die. No worries there, either!

But my most memorable stories (since it is an emergent story that I didn't create, but was mediated by the interactions of other people and dice) involve my characters dying in awesome, tragic, or stupid circumstances. YMMV!

Axis and allies is a single session... its not uncommon at all for someone dieing in a combat to be out for the session - though some "quick back" ressuscitate type effects may go differently if its really quick.

thats differently from "you died last week wo at thie weeks game your japan plays with 1/10th the normal resources. (Start over at first level.)

play-offs, sure, but for the main season you lose a game this week you come right back next week. i would argue the regular season more closely parallels a campaign play setup than the play-offs.

and both of those are competitive games - opposing sides with players on each playing against each other. an RPG is more typically a GM running a game FOR players who are working together. they are certainly not competing with the GM though they may indeed have some inter-character competitions going on.

Like you said, its all about preferences and to me setting should reflect those preferences.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

Resurrection mechanics in D&D suffer from trying to maintain the conceits of earlier generations of the game.

Think of any other game. If you're playing Chess and you lose, you can just set up a new game and play again. There's no punishment in your next game. No one else playing in the same room has to stop their game and wait for you to set your next game up.

If you're playing Metroid and your character dies, you can reload your last saved game. You might lose a few minutes of playtime, but you learn from what beat you and you can try again. Ditto any modern RPG, with the exception of a few 'hardcore' games.

Think of any story you read or watch. Characters generally don't die unless it's good for the story.

Why do we let D&D create bad stories?

The game should have failure states that don't end the story. You should never be able to die from things that aren't intentional by the GM or yourself. Any other failure in combat should at worst result in you being defeated but not dead.

In chess the punishment is that you lost. You start over, your foe razzes you and tells you to step it up next time. Same with a campaign that ends with a TPK, roll up new PC and start a new one!

I don't judge my games by the standards I do novels or movies, fundamentally different activities. Plenty of PC deaths have been memorable for one reason or another. And the story that the game created when they discussed it after the session was still interesting, even when it was a death via random encounter or trap.

And I'd have to say I totally disagree with the last line, you should be able to die by bad choices and bad luck. But in 5e past 5th level or so other than a TPK there is little risk of any permanent death IME. Part of the reason I'm switching systems but different strokes and all that.

I guess its the game first or story first question, a question as old as the hills.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

There are different ways to resurrect a character.

Revivify, for example, is only a 3rd level spell, and the character resurrected enjoys the lack of penalties.

Resurrection, by contrast, is a high level 7th level spell, and causes the resurrected character to suffer penalties.

The real reason for the difference is tradition. The older editions made Resurrection painful, while the newer editions made Revivify painless − adding it while minimizing complaints from grognards by leaving the older versions alone.

Now the defacto situation is, the game punishes players for failing to resurrect the dead character soon enough. Either ‘pop up’ the character while still dying at zero hit points, or revive immediately after combat. If days pass, there will be pain.

I feel the older spells are no longer worth their high spell levels, because the newer spells at low levels are so much more powerful.

But the narrative of wait longer, suffer more, doesnt bother me too much.

Revivify, a spell I despise, has a one minute time limit I believe. I can see the idea, get them before the soul slips the mortal coil and all that. But still a 3rd level raise dead spell...almost as bad as gnome paladins.

 

[5ekyu]

So why even have hit points? Or roll for damage? 1 hp is the same as max hp, mechanically. So if no one ever is at the risk of dying, what's the point in having those things? Why have combat at all? Why not just have everyone roll one die, to see just how heroically they emerged from the battle?

Wow, hyperbole much?

First at 1hp i can be taken down with almost any hit. At 100hp thats not the case. So either you don;t know what you are talking about or you are ignoring the obvious.

knocked unconscious means "not doing stuff." I play to "do stuff". So "not doing stuff" is a condition any player will try to avoid.

the overall use of HP and the various combat options is to give your character the ability to "do stuff" and the mechanics all play around those basic elements.

Why have combat? Well, for the genre of the game you are playing, combat may be a common staple of resolving conflicts or moving things ahead. not all genres and games work that way and so would have other detailed conflict systems for social, economic or other forms of "conflict".

losing a fight can be very critical... even without death.

lets look at it this way... many many people gamble every year, hell, every day many do so and MOST of them do so without feeling the need to have their house on the line every time they sit down to a table to play poker.

A game where its "Dead is PUNISHED" is like having your house in the pot for poker for some.

but in my games, players really hate losing because they are usually fighting for something they care about. Even without death, losing costs them. it might make great story either way... but my folks want to steer the boat of their characters rather than ride in the hold and most losses come with a loss of control over results.

But everyone has their own preferences.

 

[Uller]

I've been using Mike Mearls proposed xp system of 100 xp per level and all PCs have the same XP. It's been working out to about 3 sessions per level up.

So what about this for PC death? Make introducing a new PC cost some of the party's XP toward their next level? Casting Raise Dead avoids that penalty to the party...

That way if a PC dies and the party can't or won't raise him or her then that sets the next level up back a session or two.

What I typically do is start new PCs down a level but let them level up a little faster so after a few sessions they catch up. New PCs have no permanent magic items unless the other PCs give them some.

Sent from my SM-G900V using EN World mobile app

 

[Blue]

D&D shows it's roots in that combat is the single largest mechanical operation by the wall clock. (RP can take an entire session and be loads of fun, but the mechanical aspects of it like ability checks will still be way less than your average encounter.)

The mechanically supported risk of combat is damage and likely death - most commonly of the character's foes. DMs can and should add on additional risks and rewards around combat, but the most basic and most innately supported is not dying / killing your foes.

There is no risk if there is no downside. And no risk means no tension, and little feel of victory if you win. So, there needs to be an actual cost to the worst failure.

Let's flip this around - if dying has less or equal penalty to running away, you'd always fight to the death.

So there's a cost for coming back to life.

For many, who put time and effort into creating the character's personality, backstory, has relationships with PCs and NPCs, possibly contacts, titles and other advantages you can't get in character creation, the cost to come back to life is less than forgoing all of those. And it's worth it.

For games that have people come back at 1st or a lower level. Or with no/random magic items. So it's still worth it.

For some, the death is awesome and appropriate and the player wants to end their character's story - also cool.

It's when characters are interchangeable, with little outside what their character sheet says AND new characters are as powerful as existing - that's where making a new character is better than the cost of raising an old character. For me, that type of casual game is not my bag so I haven't experienced it.

You can tell good stories through failure, up to and including death. Think back to Sturm in Dragonlance - wasn't a dry eye that read that. Death does not make a bad story unless you weren't fighting for anything worthwhile to risk your life for in the first place.

 

[5ekyu]

Revivify, a spell I despise, has a one minute time limit I believe. I can see the idea, get them before the soul slips the mortal coil and all that. But still a 3rd level raise dead spell...almost as bad as gnome paladins.

I have a slightly different view.

i see it as a progression of scales.

At 1 hp you are active.
At 0 hp you are inactive - pretty severe - and without more player involvement may die - likely if combat flying around you causing incidental damage. Come back and you are mostly Ok though at low Hp.
Dead quick - gotto 0 hp and did not recover - you are inactive and no chance to return on your own. the others have 10 rds to save you with this spell at a cost of 300gp. (So the difference in the brief neglect was 300gp cost.)
Dead long - they did not get to you in ten rounds. Now it will be a riase dead in ten days at 500gp AND you will be down for -4ish for days to come.
Way Way dead - they did not get to you even in the 10 days so now we are looking at 1000gp and problems for both revived and reviver.

That massive jump from stabilize "save you in 1-2 rounds" to raise dead etc if you remove revivify seems out of whack with the difficulties involved. revivify seems to me to be a needed link in the chain of consequences vs effort/fail there. that is why i was gl;ad to see it added in.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Wow, hyperbole much?

No, it was a sincere question, because HP represents life. If you never have the risk of dying, then combat just comes down to a variation of narration. Hence, what i said about about just having everyone roll one die. If they roll a 1, then it didn't go well. If they roll a 20, then they heroically defeated the encounter or something. Getting knocked down is pretty inconsequential if you don't ever have the risk of dying. It becomes an inconvenience that is always overcome, because you always survive to the next one.

But speaking of hyperbole, you nailed it with this:

A game where its "Dead is PUNISHED" is like having your house in the pot for poker for some. .

No one loses their home by having their PC die in a game.