Would you quit a game if....

[Crothian]

This might not be a bad approach, but I'm guessing this wouldn't work here. Just the way this guy presents the issue tells he me he would quit if his gear was gone, cuz that is part of his character, just like if he lost his arm. The afterlife idea might work, but it won't fix the problem of what if this guy does something stupid and gets himself alone killed, then the campaign stops while he works his way back from the dead, so then anyone might as well do something stupid, cuz the campaign just stops for them too.... and michael bay is back again.

Well, he hasn't said he would quit over a lose of an arm, or gear, or anything else so I'm not going to assume he would. Just like I'm not going to assume the guy will do something stupid and gets his character killed. I prefer to give this guy the benefit of the doubt.

Another solution is a character point/ drama point/ action point like system that allows the expenditure of multiple points to avoid death. It is a common thing to do with such points and allows the player to use his point to avoid death and the other players to use their points for other cool things.

I am starting to think that too many DMs feel death has to be part of the game and it seems ignore other possibilities. Death is the easy way out for both DMs and PCs.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Death is the easy way out for both DMs and PCs.

I couldn't disagree more.

 

[Crothian]

I couldn't disagree more.

In what way?

For a DM it is easier for me to kill a character then to come up with some kind of failure that has consequences for the character. For the player their character dies and they can forget everything that he was and not have to deal with the repercussions of anything there. He just creates a new character and joins the group easy as pie.

 

[Water Bob]

When they're weened down to 3 FPs, does Conan turn into a meat grinder?

I can be a tough game. Weapons do more damage than their D&D counterparts. For example, a broadsword does 1d10 damge; a short sword does 1d8 damage; a war club does 2d6; and a bardiche does 2-18 (1d10 + 1d8). And, the massive damage threshold is lowered to 20 hp (which means 20 hp of damage from 1 blow = save or die). While character HP are the same as with standard d20.

OTOH, the PCs start the game with 3 Fate Points, which can be helpful in a number of ways, but one use, Left For Dead, is especially useful in keeping your character alive.

Left For Dead: When your character reaches -10 HP (or less) by any means*, he may spend a Fate Point to be Left For Dead. The character will appear dead to casual examination, but he still has a chance of recovering, particularly if he is attended to quickly by an ally with the Heal skill.

If he is healed at least 1 point of damage within an hour of becoming Left For Dead, he is considered stable and at -9 hp.

If an ally fails to Heal him, then the character still has a chance by making a DC 20 Fort check after one hour. If successful, the character stabilizes and is considered at -9 HP. If the check fails, the character is finally, irrevocably dead.

Left For Dead cannot be used against effects that leave no possibility of survival. Thus, if the bad guys go around and shove a spear through the head of each downed enemy, the LfD ain't going to help you.

If an Undead continues to eat on your downed body when you fall, LfD ain't going to help you either.

If flaming oil is poured over the character. LfD won't help.

If a Pict savage cuts off the downed PC's head and puts it on a pike, the LfD aint going to help.

Left For Dead is not a 100% guarrantee that the character will survive, but it makes it likely under most circumstances.

I'm also curious whether resurrection magic is a reliable commodity in Conan, as it is in D&D, or if it's purely a plot device thing? (Like that warrior blonde who raised Conan in the movie, and then died two scenes later.)

It is purely the latter. There are no healing potions or Cure Light Wounds or Staves of Healing in the Conan RPG. If the GM puts them in the game, then they are exceptionally rare (and items considered relics).

But, natural healing is better:

Sleep 8 hours? Get 3 + CON mod + Character Level in HP back.

Complete bed rest for 24 hours? Get twice the above back.

Attended by a character who makes a DC 15 Long-term Care Heal check? This will double the healing rate.


Thus, if after a battle, an injured warrior gets a full 24 hours worth of complete bed rest and has a healer (nurse) looking over him, taking care of him, changing bandages and what not, then the character can receive a number of hit points equal to: 4 x ( 3 + Con mod + Char Lvl).

And, that's nothing to sneeze at.



In addition, a character can make a Heal check for short term care. This takes about 10 minutes to clean, sew, and bind wounds. If the DC 15 Heal check is successful, this will return Char LvL + CON mod HP back to the injured character. And, this can be attepted once after every combat encounter.

It's kinda like having a single Healing Potion to drink after every combat encounter IF the Heal check can be made.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

In what way?

For a DM it is easier for me to kill a character then to come up with some kind of failure that has consequences for the character. For the player their character dies and they can forget everything that he was and not have to deal with the repercussions of anything there. He just creates a new character and joins the group easy as pie.

For a DM, letting a PC die is easy- but so is fudging things so the PC does not.

Dealing with the consequences of the death seldom are; fudging almost never creates problems. If the deceased was "The One" according to campaign events, suddenly you have some hustling to do. Retcon or dus ex machina to somehow bring him back? If he's really dead, how do you work in a replacement PC? At what level? Is the player pissed off? Did he quit?

Speaking of that, it is clear some players are so invested in the deceased PC that they DO quit- that's the foundational premise of this thread. They don't let go easily as you imply or as I claim I can. It is absolutely NOT easy for them to move on.

 

[Crothian]

I'm not saying it is always the easiest thing to do, but death is pretty easy in D&D.

Dealing with the consequences of the death seldom are; fudging almost never creates problems.

It does when players don't like the DM cheating. There has been plenty of threads on that. And pro fudging.

If the deceased was "The One" according to campaign events, suddenly you have some hustling to do.

That's the DM's fault for getting into that situation in the first place. But yes if the DM is a bad DM and gets himself in this kkind of trouble then death might not be easy.

Did he quit?

Quitting is also taking the easy way out instead of staying and dealing with the issues.

It is absolutely NOT easy for them to move on.

Yes, in rare and specific circumstances. But considering the sheer number of people in this thread that like death to be a part of their game it would seem that death is common and I think the easy way to deal with character failure.

 

[Elf Witch]

We could actually answer the OP's title question.

Would you quit if your PC died?
No.

I view that as poor sportsmanship, being a quitter and taking it too seriously.
I might be mad, sad or disappointed that my PC died, but that does not mean that I let the defeat invalidate all of the fun I had up to that point.

By quitting, I am basically saying "Since I lost, it is clear that I have been wasting all of my previous time spent with you guys. I'm going to go do something else now."

That tends to insult the other players, that they were merely wasting your time, as if they were put on this earth to amuse you.

If you were raising a child, would you really accept the child saying "If I lose this game, I will never play it again." It's the same thing.

I think you are reading to much into this. First of all a board game is not a RPG you do not put the same amount of effort into it as you do with an RPG. If I lose Monopoly tonight with the shoe I can still play the shoe tomorrow and win.

The same with sports if I lose tonight I can still stay on my team as me and play tomorrow.

With an RPG you play a character some people put a lot into that and if the character dies then the game changes it is no longer the same game. For some players that can be enough to take the fun out of it. It is not about being a sore loser.

I think the game designers recognize this because they have put a way to bring characters back from the dead.

I play a lot of Shadowrun which has no way to come back dead is dead but I have never lost a character in it because once we start taking bad hits we usually get pulled out by DocWagon because our injury bracelet has alerted them that we are hurt. We also cut and run and sometimes surrender.

In DnD it is harder sometimes to cut and run also since there are no penalties for taking damage until you hit 1 there is no incentive to run. In Shadowrun as you take damage you start taking penalties to everything it becomes more obvious that you are losing. And without magical healing you know you have to sometimes run. I have noticed that DnD players hate running and hate surrendering.

All of that can lead to a dead PC.


There seems to be this attitude that if you don't like playing in a game with death as a consequence then some how you are a sore loser, baby or mentally ill. I think terms like that are overly judgmental.

On one hand we applaud people who put work into their character and role play well but then we deride them when they don't enjoy having that character killed.

I watched my roommate go through this in a game she lost a character she loved because of the stupid actions of the other PCs. She made a new character and eventually started really getting into that character when that character died she still played but she played differently she stopped writing journals, she stopped really role playing and she stopped putting in any effort into the character.

The DM of that game had decided that raise dead was cheesy and death was permanent. By the end of the campaign we all were playing like my roommate and the DM was unhappy going what happened this used to be an exciting game did you guys lose interest.

It was not that we had lost interest in the game but we had lost interest in putting any work into the characters.

 

[Tequila Sunrise]

If he is healed at least 1 point of damage within an hour of becoming Left For Dead, he is considered stable and at -9 hp.

Does the Heal skill allow HP to be regained within that one hour window? If not, how does one actually take advantage of Left for Dead before resorting to the Fort save? (Which sounds rather steep for a low level PC.)

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

But considering the sheer number of people in this thread that like death to be a part of their game it would seem that death is common and I think the easy way to deal with character failure.

I disagree. IME in 35 years in the hobby, I would say that PC deaths have been rare, and that repercussions of PC death have made many DMs quite gunshy. IOW, while most in this thread would seem to support the possibility of PC death, it is not common for PCs to actually die. If they are like me, most DMs will work hard to keep a campaign from suffering deaths too often in order to retain some kind of narrative continutity & flow, as well as keeping their friends happy.

There is no causal linkage between wanting to have the tool available and the actual willingness to use said tool commonly. Rather, the support for the possibility of PC death merely indicates that those DMs- and players such as myself- wish to have a full array of tools available.

Because honestly, sometimes it IS the right tool for the job.

 

[ExploderWizard]

There seems to be this attitude that if you don't like playing in a game with death as a consequence then some how you are a sore loser, baby or mentally ill. I think terms like that are overly judgmental.

Just don't choose a game/ world which features death. You can roleplay gingerbread men in Candyland and never have the subject of death even brought up. Zero death in the gameworld means characters can never die.

If death exists in the gameworld, and characters are familliar with it then logically it could possibly happen to them. Getting upset over a character dying in world where death exists is like jumping off a cliff and blaming gravity for the painful landing.