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<blockquote data-quote="Mustrum_Ridcully" data-source="post: 4507484" data-attributes="member: 710">Think about it - why shouldn't I? What's the reason? Is it morally wrong? Do I hurt somebody doing it? What if I enjoy it more this way? What if I have even tested the alternatives (and I bet most people with such provisions have done so, because few &quot;traditional&quot; games - including D&amp;D - actually support or assume something like a Death Flag mechanic), and I like it more? The first game I ever played was Shadowrun, 3E. The game had &quot;Karma&quot; as a metagame mechanic that allowed rerolls, buying successes or dice. One of the things you could do with Karma was to &quot;burn&quot; it all (and experienced characters could have a lot, and there were a lot of uses that didn't actually permanently cost Karma) to survive something that should have killed your character. And then I played D&amp;D. It didn't have Karma. I didn't really notice how much I missed such mechanics until the introduction of action points. But what D&amp;D had instead of this was Raise Dead. It's like a &quot;delayed&quot; Death Flag. &quot;You know, I don't like my character to be dead. Please raise him.&quot; &quot;Okay!&quot;. Sure, it has different in-game cost then the Death Flag mechanic we originally refer to, but it's not that much. The &quot;cost&quot; of not raising your Death Flag is missing on a mechanical benefit. The cost of raising your character is... losing a mechanical benefit (gold and XP). But the in-game world effect is very different. You don't need magic to invoke the allowances of the Death Flag. You don't need a world where people regularly return from the dead if they have the resources to do it. By the way, the first time I heard the term &quot;Death Flag&quot; was in the discussion the &quot;E6&quot; variant for D&amp;D. Interesting that specifically a game that halts advancement early (before Raise Dead spells become available to the PCs) sees the introduction of this concept...</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Mustrum_Ridcully, post: 4507484, member: 710"] Think about it - why shouldn't I? What's the reason? Is it morally wrong? Do I hurt somebody doing it? What if I enjoy it more this way? What if I have even tested the alternatives (and I bet most people with such provisions have done so, because few "traditional" games - including D&D - actually support or assume something like a Death Flag mechanic), and I like it more? The first game I ever played was Shadowrun, 3E. The game had "Karma" as a metagame mechanic that allowed rerolls, buying successes or dice. One of the things you could do with Karma was to "burn" it all (and experienced characters could have a lot, and there were a lot of uses that didn't actually permanently cost Karma) to survive something that should have killed your character. And then I played D&D. It didn't have Karma. I didn't really notice how much I missed such mechanics until the introduction of action points. But what D&D had instead of this was Raise Dead. It's like a "delayed" Death Flag. "You know, I don't like my character to be dead. Please raise him." "Okay!". Sure, it has different in-game cost then the Death Flag mechanic we originally refer to, but it's not that much. The "cost" of not raising your Death Flag is missing on a mechanical benefit. The cost of raising your character is... losing a mechanical benefit (gold and XP). But the in-game world effect is very different. You don't need magic to invoke the allowances of the Death Flag. You don't need a world where people regularly return from the dead if they have the resources to do it. By the way, the first time I heard the term "Death Flag" was in the discussion the "E6" variant for D&D. Interesting that specifically a game that halts advancement early (before Raise Dead spells become available to the PCs) sees the introduction of this concept... [/QUOTE]

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