Player character mortality - Yay or Nay ?

[silva]

To continue your video game analogy, the worst, most hated levels in video games are the ones where they take away all your skills/inventory and let you start over again.

These are reviled with almost universal hatred as far as game design goes.

So what's my opinion? That's a fate worse than death for the character.

If the robbing of a character from his goods/weapons/resources is only temporary (which is always the case), I dont see how it equals (or is worst than) character death, since death takes away everything the character has - even the very character - permanently.

[silva]

So, I admit. I was never a fan of character death. If needed, I prefer to ruin a character life by taking away his valued possessions (be it goods, people, values, etc) than taking his life. In fact, I view character death as uncompatible to tabletop rpg gaming.

What are your opinions on the matter ?

Even if Mister Cavern wants to keep PCs from dying, there's nothing keeping players from ditching their own characters. And if you take away enough of the stuff they liked about the character, there is a very real chance the player could simply kill them off to move onto something more interesting.

For instance, in Crypts of Chaos (a play by post here on the Den) there was a lot of character-transforming bullshit. There were a lot of instances where I resolved that it was better to cycle in a new character even if that meant dropping 4 or more levels behind the rest of the party.

You should probably talk things over with your group if you don't want to get a surprise when PCs hit sufficiently bad personal circumstances.

Totally agree with this.

[Lago PARANOIA]

If the robbing of a character from his goods/weapons/resources is only temporary (which is always the case), I dont see how it equals (or is worst than) character death, since death takes away everything the character has - even the very character - permanently.

Even if your DM won't let you bring back the character who died, 3E and 4E D&D have rules to let you instantly bring another character into the game at similar levels of gear.

In 3E D&D you would at the very least be heavily inconvenienced from anywhere from several encounters to an entire level of play until WBL reimbursed you. In 4E D&D, losing treasure gimps you for at least four levels until the exponentially scaling treasure parcels restore a majority of the wealth you're supposed to have.

I imagine in 2E D&D though that perma-death was worse than losing treasure. Since apparently it was a thing to make PCs start over at level 1 and have to get all of their old treasure again. You may as well just start at level 11 and pick up some vendor trash in that case, you'll be less of a burden.

Now, if you're really attached to the character you're playing then suiciding to avoid a period of inconvenience might be a bad trade, since you'll have to stop pre-humously developing the character and have to start with some new jerk whose story was up to this point off-screen. But if your idea of a D&D character is MC Killzalot, suicide + recreation is less of an impediment to play than toughing it out while regaining your phat lewt.

[Voss]

To continue your video game analogy, the worst, most hated levels in video games are the ones where they take away all your skills/inventory and let you start over again.

These are reviled with almost universal hatred as far as game design goes.

So what's my opinion? That's a fate worse than death for the character.

If the robbing of a character from his goods/weapons/resources is only temporary (which is always the case), I dont see how it equals (or is worst than) character death, since death takes away everything the character has - even the very character - permanently.

Why would that even usually be the case, let alone always? If someone steals your money and your computer, they aren't going to come walking back.

[TheFlatline]

To continue your video game analogy, the worst, most hated levels in video games are the ones where they take away all your skills/inventory and let you start over again.

These are reviled with almost universal hatred as far as game design goes.

So what's my opinion? That's a fate worse than death for the character.

If the robbing of a character from his goods/weapons/resources is only temporary (which is always the case), I dont see how it equals (or is worst than) character death, since death takes away everything the character has - even the very character - permanently.

Because you've made a player's character not fun to play, and the whole fucking point of the game is to have fun. I can have fun with another character, but if my hero is arbitrarily stripped of his shit just because he hit zero hitpoints and the dude standing next to me in my party is flinging fireballs as a free action because of his kit, I'm not having fun any more.

Even if I was attached to a character, I'd seriously prefer my 15th level whatever to go out in a worthy way than have my MC strip him down to his underwear for lulz for anything longer than a scene or two (which isn't what we're talking about here). At least when he dies his story comes to an end. When you take his shit away, you're punishing the player, because the player had to put real world time into gaining loot, and in a game like D&D your loot is probably half your character anyway, and taking it away is basically burning time the player put in.

And again, it's universally bitched about when you lose all your kit in any video game, which was your entire original analogy/point. It nukes gameplay all the way back to the beginning for lulz and to pad the game out and make you feel "vulnerable". But your point is to remove that vulnerable feeling.

Can you imagine in Lord of the Rings, the orcs are attacking, Frodo and Sam are slipping away, and Aragorn Gimli & Legolas rush to help Boromir who is fighting off a horde of orcs by himself to give the hobbits time to get away and when they get there... they find Boromir in his underwear tied up.

Yeah real heroic fantasy there.

Edit: I like the idea of alternatives to character death, but there always has to be the threat of character death present when you're doing life & death shit. Otherwise it doesn't matter much.

[Fuchs]

I play to have fun. Character death not fun for me.

[ishy]

and the outcome will depend solely on their rolled stats.

That is actually not true. In AWorld the DM is supposed to make shit up and hand out modifiers sometimes because the rules don't say you can't.

[tussock]

While PC death has it's problems, especially in that many games are ludicrously dangerous and overly-quick to kill people compared to the real world. It can mess with new player's expectations for being awesome and stuff.

But what's worse, to me, is when you end up somewhere that should obviously kill you in some irrevocable way, and then the DM pulls something out of their ass and instead of that you're not dead. That's terrible. That's stealing my exquisitely crafted regret and loss and replacing it with pure void. Not relief, just finding that all the effort to not die in the past was bullshit, because death was secretly never allowed.

And that's the great thing about a character dying now and then, especially if it's banal. It makes all the times that people don't die so much more vital and hearty. Getting critted to -7 and then saved by some massive teamwork nova, when death is always on the table at -10 is a much different feeling to when it's not.

Still, it's important that not everyone dies too. Not dying is much less fun if it's obviously a temporary thing in the long run. So it's nice if an original or two is always in the party, and some people at least get to choose their deaths so that surviving to that point was important.

[Omegonthesane]

How much effect do Fate/Infamy/Destiny/Puppies points that can be burnt to cheat death have on whether or not character mortality should be a thing?

After all, if I've had to burn a puppy to pretend I didn't die, I haven't suddenly discovered that death is meaningless - I've had, and used, the ability to replace "death" with "lose 1 maximum puppy".

[radthemad4]

Is resurrection possible and easy? If yes, I have no qualms about this. As long as I get to play someone or something else in the meantime, even if it's weaker than my old character as long as I can still participate significantly.

While PC death has it's problems, especially in that many games are ludicrously dangerous and overly-quick to kill people compared to the real world. It can mess with new player's expectations for being awesome and stuff.

But what's worse, to me, is when you end up somewhere that should obviously kill you in some irrevocable way, and then the DM pulls something out of their ass and instead of that you're not dead. That's terrible. That's stealing my exquisitely crafted regret and loss and replacing it with pure void. Not relief, just finding that all the effort to not die in the past was bullshit, because death was secretly never allowed.

And that's the great thing about a character dying now and then, especially if it's banal. It makes all the times that people don't die so much more vital and hearty. Getting critted to -7 and then saved by some massive teamwork nova, when death is always on the table at -10 is a much different feeling to when it's not.

Still, it's important that not everyone dies too. Not dying is much less fun if it's obviously a temporary thing in the long run. So it's nice if an original or two is always in the party, and some people at least get to choose their deaths so that surviving to that point was important.

I agree completely. I think the possibility of character death makes combat more interesting. I remember the time someone in my party was bleeding out and how intense every single round was, trying to fend off the enemy, make heal checks to stabilize, etc. In the end we beat the monsters and he died right afterwards but the experience was really something.

[silva]

That is actually not true. In AWorld the DM is supposed to make shit up and hand out modifiers sometimes because the rules don't say you can't.

Actually, its explicitly say you cant. Pg 268 Apocalypse World:

"Here’s a custom threat move. People new to the game occasionally
ask me for this one. It’s general, it modifies nearly every
other move:

Things are tough. Whenever a players’ character makes a
move, the MC judges it normal, difficult, or crazy difficult. If it’s
difficult, the player takes -1 to the roll. If it’s crazy difficult, the
player takes -2 to the roll.

Several groups in playtest wanted this move or one like it. All of
them abandoned it after only one session. It didn’t add anything
fun to the game, but did add a little hassle to every single move.
So it’s a legal custom move, of course, and you can try it if you
like, but I wouldn’t expect you to stick with it."

So, the idea of situational modifiers based on task difficulty is anathema to the spirit of the game. One reason for that is that in AW you want the players making descriptions and following through with the moves that goes with them. If the GM begin attaching modifiers the players will hesitate and back off from their moves/descriptions, breaking the logic. Another reason is the importance of the GM letting the players dictate where the fiction goes, and GM situational modifiers would "load" this process. AW/DW isnt about difficulty, its about consequences.

[silva]

Because you've made a player's character not fun to play, and the whole fucking point of the game is to have fun. I can have fun with another character, but if my hero is arbitrarily stripped of his shit just because he hit zero hitpoints and the dude standing next to me in my party is flinging fireballs as a free action because of his kit, I'm not having fun any more.

Well, this is a good point. I agree. Though I wouldnt think stripping anyone permanently of goods is a nice idea, except all the players are on the bandwagon for it.

[Chamomile]

Chamo, most characters have at least 1-armor and most weapons do 1 or 2 damage

Both of these are technically true, but do not contradict anything I said. About a quarter of the characters have no armor at all, and about half of them have one armor. The most common weapons you'll run into are 1 or 2 harm, but the easy availability of 3-harm weapons to even moderately combat-focused classes makes it clear that anyone who's serious about killing people can dish out 3 harm. The rules imply (though granted do not explicitly state) that any gun big enough that you can't lug it around with you while firing is probably going to deal 4 harm. 5 harm weapons totally do exist; the player characters don't have ready access to them because they're things like getting hit by a freight train or falling thirty feet on your head, but the harm and healing chapter does mention them.

If you get in one fight with even a small pack of assault rifle-toting goons, anyone who's not investing in combat-relevant stats is reasonably likely to go down.

But the real advantage the players have is the fact that, most of times, the MC can only hurt them if 1) he announce future badness

You'd be amazed how many players completely ignore clear narrative warnings that the situation they are facing is dangerous and they are risking their character's lives if they don't turn back.

2) the player rolls a miss or weak sucess.

That accounts for 2/3s of all rolls made at a +2. Factor in that characters typically do find themselves forced to roll an unfortunate stat every now and again and being faced with death is a semi-regular occurence.

And even a weak sucess (7-9) have them under control of damage taken (because of the Take by Force move).

Why are you referencing take by force in the middle of a discussion of going aggro? This is incoherent.

Add to this the possibility of exchanging a lethal damage for cripples and permanent stat impairing, and you have effectively 5 "ressurrection chances" (because you can do it once for each stat).

Dude, this is a death spiral. Each permanent stat reduction makes you more likely to roll 9 or less on future rolls and therefore more likely to be in danger in the future.

[Neurosis]

Most people play D&D 3E at levels 1-3.

Is there any concrete evidence/real data proving this?

To continue your video game analogy, the worst, most hated levels in video games are the ones where they take away all your skills/inventory and let you start over again.

These are reviled with almost universal hatred as far as game design goes.

I always really liked those levels, actually.

[ubernoob]

Most people play D&D 3E at levels 1-3.

Is there any concrete evidence/real data proving this?

How many groups begin playing at a level other than level 1? How many groups stay together long enough to agree "We all start at level X minimum for campaigns"? How many campaigns fall apart by level five (if you follow the standard xp chart and give ~4 encounters a session, it is ~12 sessions to go from level 1 to level 5)?

End result: Only veteran, stable groups really play outside the early levels. Statistically, you're pretty lucky to be in one of those. Nerds have just as much drama as other social groups, but tend to have weaker social skills to resolve said drama.

Source: I am a nerd.

[Aryxbez]

For D&D games I'd run, I've simply considered the rule that get "TKO'd" or simply unconscious, when ye would otherwise be Dead (be that via Death effect or dropping to -10++negatives). Course, ye can still be Coup De Graced or killed, but most enemies aren't going to waste actions to do that when other PC's are up, and if all PC's drop...then all basically defeated anyway. This way, ye may be taken out of the fight, with only some "revival" like effect to bring ya back into battle, but least can continue playing after the encounter ends.

If the robbing of a character from his goods/weapons/resources is only temporary (which is always the case), I dont see how it equals (or is worst than) character death, since death takes away everything the character has - even the very character - permanently.

If the character is swag based, then when stripped of it, you've basically just taken their character away (if not the majority of). So for the time that it's gone, be it forever or for X scene(s), they'll be having that less of an experience, likely getting to do little to nothing at all to contributing. Which case, said player would be bored, and likely to go play Smash Bros, or otherwise lose interest till he can be relevant again. It can be a fate worse than death, as power-leveling to get all that swag again isn't worth it, and be better off just making a new character (as I've heard with 3rd/5th's Shadowrun PC's with Cyberdecks, may as well kill themselves for all they're worth without it). Then comes all the problems in your first post about Character Death, as this event can cause essentially that.

Those iconic "Jail break" lose your stuff for a scene can be bearable, but don't expect the swag-pendant characters to like it at all.

[ishy]

That is actually not true. In AWorld the DM is supposed to make shit up and hand out modifiers sometimes because the rules don't say you can't.

Actually, its explicitly say you cant. Pg 268 Apocalypse World:

So, the idea of situational modifiers based on task difficulty is anathema to the spirit of the game. One reason for that is that in AW you want the players making descriptions and following through with the moves that goes with them. If the GM begin attaching modifiers the players will hesitate and back off from their moves/descriptions, breaking the logic. Another reason is the importance of the GM letting the players dictate where the fiction goes, and GM situational modifiers would "load" this process. AW/DW isnt about difficulty, its about consequences.

From the thread you linked, where the creator of the game is giving some combat examples:

There's nothing in the rules stopping me from giving Berg a +1 for Clarion's help, and often in play I do, but the player can't look at the rules and expect one, if you see what I mean. It's up to me, case by case.

Or in other words, I can make up whatever the fuck I want and apply that whenever I feel you sucked my dick enough.

[silva]

Ishy, that +1 if from the "help or interfere" rule, which is a different matter altogether and has nothing to do with tasks difficulty.

So, no.

[Dean]

I happen to believe death should exist in a fantasy style RPG but it is noteworthy that the pro death crowd has argued EXTREMELY disingenuously from point one. The anti-death crowd's arguments are more honest and less incongruous the the pro death arguments. I personally want death but each of these threads has the same lines so lets cover why they are bullshit arguments.

Fighting is a part of the genre so how can you have fighting without dying!?
Fighting is part of the genre but protagonist death isn't. So this is actually a point for the anti death crowd. The only death's that ever occur seem entirely "player willing". Heroic deaths when facing unlimited hordes and so on. Protagonist death is AGAINST genre emulation not following it.

Without death there's no risk! The whole game becomes meaningless!
That's wrong. It has been repeatedly pointed out that usual D&D style adventures are not an enemy force solely targeting the PC's with no other goal. They are usually missions that can be failed or succeeded. If players can be beaten and not killed the princess can still die, the ring can still fall into Sauron's hands and all the lands be swallowed in darkness. There is definitely still a pot to play for even if the players themselves know that they won't ever die in a pit. The players can still lose even if they can't die if they can be beaten/ko'd and the game doesn't fall apart or become without risk.

People die if they make bad decisions. We should punish bad decisions with death and reward people who make good decisions like me!
This is the centrally wrong point. Those are lies, damned lies and it's provable with statistics. See people who say they want death in their games want death for other people. They don't want it for themselves because they themselves are too smart brave and handsome to make stupid mistakes (like roll badly). The myth is that you want death but all you actually desire is to feel like you are winning a skill based game which you definitely aren't. This is demonstrable by the fact that every single time a pro-deather lists the percentage chance they want death to result per fight or campaign it ends up being 10 to 100 times larger than their actual personal death record. The pro death crowd has repeatedly stated mathematical desires that are massively at odds with either their own games or their desired outcomes for campaigns or games when confronted with iterative statistics. To sum up the pro death crowd is full of bullshit and the things they keep saying they do and they want are provable lies. They are in cognitive dissonance where death needs to exist because that's how you prove who's making below average decisions but they personally will NEVER make below average decisions no matter how extended a test.

Why are you bitching about death!? Death is fine just get a raise dead idiot!
Yeah a game where death is a cureable blackout is the OPPOSING ARGUMENT. Stop saying this. It is a re-skinning of the anti-death crowd's desires but less self aware.

My personal position is similar to Lago's. I think the most genre appropriate, least disingenuous position is for death to technically be on the table but for their to be so many break points and warnings of it that any player dying knew it was coming and knew the scenario he was in. Let me propose a death system I would prefer.

In a D&D style system imagine a character has 100 hp. If he was taking damage he would be...

• 0-100 Damage: "Healthy" No negatives.
  101-200 Damage: "Beaten" Considerable negatives. The equivalent to losing 4 D&D levels or so. The player can keep playing but he's basically out of the fight as a real threat.
  201-300 Damage: "Dying" The character is battered and prone and can basically just crawl slowly or speak.
  301 Damage: Dead.

Characters should also be able to do a "Final Stand" where they ignore any negatives from beaten or dying for a while but die afterwards. If your hp/death system looked like that it would mean death technically existed so death could theoretically happen if things went amazingly terribly. It means players could just get beaten and have to flee a fight because their combat viability was shot. It would mean players could die if they wanted to do a Borimir style last stand where they fight a hundred dudes until their body is weighed down by arrows. And it means death wouldn't happen because two people critted you this round because you would become beaten or at worst dying even if fighting powerful and lucky opposition.

[JonSetanta]

I hate "the negatives" in D&D.

Just have the character unconscious with some kind of check to wake up.

But then again, being knocked unconscious should be plot-related such as being captured by drow slavers to be sold in the market.

Fighting monsters such as ogres that cook and eat people should have its risk of death.
Players should be informed ahead of time and know full well the ogres want to kill you.

[Dean]

Yes HP totals should also count up. In my games I call it damage threshold and its count up because I too hate negative numbers in games. Also Edition is easier for people then subtraction

[PhoneLobster]

My personal position is similar to Lago's. I think the most genre appropriate, least disingenuous position is for death to technically be on the table but for their to be so many break points and warnings of it that any player dying knew it was coming and knew the scenario he was in.

Yeah you were doing pretty well up until then.

But I'm afraid Lago is on the record having personally started an entire thread demanding that other people should have TPKs to make his personal game table feel better. I'm also fairly sure he is on the record for demanding that basically EVERY combat encounter needs to have a random chance of PC death and even a random chance of TPK. Though he notably ISN'T on record for putting even a ball park number on either of those chances.

If there IS some fairly remarkable retraction from Lago where he has switched preference to something closer to your described "more opt out/in break points than you could possibly need" scenario then I'd love to hear about it.

As for your proposed mechanic... meh, it's better than say 3.x but only marginally. There isn't any real benefit using your arbitrary numbers as thresholds and it risks potentially accidentally breaking those thresholds when you don't want to, with no particular reason for being that way. The opt in glorious death thing is cool and ok being opt in, but problematic being a mechanical incentive to a chain of suicide squads or a team with a player who plays serial suicide characters for added powa.

But all in all this would appear to be a Silva thread already devolving into being largely about *-World games.

All that REALLY needs to be said is that you can point out to Silva that if it seems really weird that there are people making some very strange and exceptionally extreme arguments against "soft defeats" like temporary item loss or imprisonment and describing them as "worse than death" it's because a number of incredibly bat shit crazy positions have been firmly committed to as part of pretending that TPKs are awesome and desirable by a group of posters who...

...Think "Other" Gaming Tables Must Suffer For The Good Of The Hobby!

...or who believe...
...They are personally objectively hard core elite super gamers making real achievements by playing a real MANS game with MANLY MACHO DEATH that they personally avoid due to being AWESOME and never ever being soft balled by their GM

And Silva can go off and read enough of the amazing shame of the stupidity of prominent posters on the gaming den to understand just why people are saying some crazy things here, and maybe it might be enough to distract him from being drawn right into yet another god damn *-world specific spiral of ass.

[Kaelik]

How many groups begin playing at a level other than level 1?

Could be lots. That is kinda the point.

How many groups stay together long enough to agree "We all start at level X minimum for campaigns"?

Why would they need to stay together, if I had never met you and we started a group, I would suggest not playing at level one, so would you. Because people who have played lots know that level 1 is about 70% bullshit.

How many campaigns fall apart by level five (if you follow the standard xp chart and give ~4 encounters a session, it is ~12 sessions to go from level 1 to level 5)?

How many of them fall apart at level 10 because they started at 5. This relies on your other questionable assumptions.

End result: Only veteran, stable groups really play outside the early levels.

And veteran players who are not stable. Which at this point in 3es life is like 99% of players.

[ishy]

Ishy, that +1 if from the "help or interfere" rule,

No it is not. It is gaining a random +2 if the DM feels it is appropriate, giving as a standard combat example showing the rules are incomplete and you should make shit up on the fly.

[silva]

Ishy, if youre using that thread as example, at least read the whole thing so you understand the context. Here is the part where he explains it:

"Oh, let me explain that. When I give people bonuses or penalties for stuff like this, I always give +1 or -2, following the lead of helping and interfering. Because his 7 to act under fire is a hit, Berg gets to do what he wants - read the situation fresh - but by flinching he's effectively interfered with himself."

So, again, nothing to do with task difficulty, but with consequences. And even then, he just pulled this out of his ass because its nowhere in the book text. (the next guy in the thread even notes this for him)