Your character died. Big deal.
- Thread starter WarlockLord
- Start date
Fifth Element
Legend
Happened about a month ago in the campaign I'm playing in as well.
Raven Crowking
First Post
You're free to stand by it, if you like standing next to something vague
Sorry, but over the course of the thread I gave lots of specifications about how the tool could be used. If the job at hand is "fun play", and the tool can be used for that job in specific ways (and there is no such thing as a tool that can be used in all ways), then failure to have fun with the tool is using the tool incorrectly.
Saying something is "wrongbadfun" means that my way of having fun with that tool is better than your way of having fun with that tool. If you are not having fun, though, then suggesting a change is not wrongbadfun.
Admittedly, the meaning is only specified within the context of reading the post, especially in context of the statement I was replying to. However, reading a post before replying to it is standard protocol, IMHO. I find it highly odd that anyone would fail to understand what was meant, unless they were predisposed to finding offense?
RC
Ydars
Explorer
Just read some of this (lengthy) discussion and would like to say that I understand both positions because I have DMed/played in both types of campaigns, although we were not sophisticated enough to have death flags; just the implicit knowledge that a certain DM would avoid killing us.
I don't know which game type I prefer; I LOVE immersive roleplaying and tend to get very attached to my characters. On the other hand, the risk of combat is very thrilling, and I love the chance of dying.
I am really happy to hear that both of these play styles are still alive and well. Both have much to recommend them. Neither, as far as I can tell, is superior and in fact I think they are best when combined, though this is not easy.
As an example; in my current group, we are playing a great 3.5E Undermountain compaign. I think I tend to make both the most mechanically optimised characters and the ones with the most flesh-out backgrounds, because many of the group I play with are not hard-core yet, though they are starting to get there.
Despite this, I tend to die more than the others, because the DM seems to apply a slightly different standard to me than to the other players, though I think this is unconcious.
However, I now find that everytime I die, the next character I invent is better than the last; not necessarily mechanically better, but that they seem to have more of a personality. I must add here though that despite DMing RPGs for nearly 20 yrs, this is the first real run at playing I have ever had.
So I agree with those of you who feel that RP is incredibly important but I also love the thrill of deadly combat. I would not be without either of these elements now and feel that I need BOTH to enjoy myself. Character death is pretty traumatic for me but I do enjoy the process of creating a new character and plus it is allowing me to learn all the player rules, like feats etc that a DM doesn't really have time to grapple with.
Oh and I think people who DM need to play alot more; it reminds you what makes a good game and of what it feels like to be a player.
I don't know which game type I prefer; I LOVE immersive roleplaying and tend to get very attached to my characters. On the other hand, the risk of combat is very thrilling, and I love the chance of dying.
I am really happy to hear that both of these play styles are still alive and well. Both have much to recommend them. Neither, as far as I can tell, is superior and in fact I think they are best when combined, though this is not easy.
As an example; in my current group, we are playing a great 3.5E Undermountain compaign. I think I tend to make both the most mechanically optimised characters and the ones with the most flesh-out backgrounds, because many of the group I play with are not hard-core yet, though they are starting to get there.
Despite this, I tend to die more than the others, because the DM seems to apply a slightly different standard to me than to the other players, though I think this is unconcious.
However, I now find that everytime I die, the next character I invent is better than the last; not necessarily mechanically better, but that they seem to have more of a personality. I must add here though that despite DMing RPGs for nearly 20 yrs, this is the first real run at playing I have ever had.
So I agree with those of you who feel that RP is incredibly important but I also love the thrill of deadly combat. I would not be without either of these elements now and feel that I need BOTH to enjoy myself. Character death is pretty traumatic for me but I do enjoy the process of creating a new character and plus it is allowing me to learn all the player rules, like feats etc that a DM doesn't really have time to grapple with.
Oh and I think people who DM need to play alot more; it reminds you what makes a good game and of what it feels like to be a player.
Ydars
Explorer
And to chime in with Merric et al; I NEVER allow my dead characters to be raised when I play. Death is death, even if the DM killed me as a result of a bad rules call (has happened once already).
So this is one campaign, at level 5-6 and I have already had 3 characters.I am LOVING it, because it reminds me of how it used to be!
So this is one campaign, at level 5-6 and I have already had 3 characters.I am LOVING it, because it reminds me of how it used to be!
4e takes the game in a direction much closer to death flag/stakes style play (eg aspects of the skill challenge system, the metagame aspects of power use and their interaction with the saving throw and healing rules). It will be interesting to see whether it becomes/remains (choose one's preferred verb!) a popular RPG.
I think that I've already mentioned that this (like GM fudging of dice) has nothing to do with death flag mechanics, because it is deprotagonising - wherease death flag mechanics take the control out of the hands of the GM and give it to the player.
It is one of the weaknesses of 2nd ed AD&D, and also other games that describe themselves as "storytelling" games, that they make an implicit assumption that it is the GM's role to tell a story, and the players' role to go passively along. Railroading (or "illusionism" ie railroading with a cloak drawn over the rails) is in my view one of the worst ways to play an RPG.
Hence the attractiveness, to me, of mechanics that hand control to the players.
I don't know that I agree - until 4e I've never found D&D rulebooks to be very good at explaining, in simple metagame terms, what the play experience is meant to be like. The rules for death flag/conflict resolution/stakes games tend (in my experience) to be easier to read just because they are written in a more self-conscious fashion.
But I've got no doubt that one might write a completely clear ruleset explaining how to use SoD.
In the quoted passage, it is very clear that we don't know what happened in the gameworld, or exactly what was attempted by the PC, untl the saving throw is resolved. The narration of events in the gameworld is then adapted to be consistent with the roll. This is much like "dying" in 4e, in which we don't know exactly what state a PC is in, or what the dying save roll means, until the mechanical situation is fully resolved.
One label for such mechanics is "fortune-in-the-middle" because the dice are rolled in the middle of the narration, and set the parameters for the rest of the narration.
