I've played a lot of Dungeon Crawl Classics, a little bit of Maze Rats, and ran my first session of the Whitehack tonight. In all of them, character death happens pretty often and unpredictably. In the game tonight one of my players got pretty upset after their 1st level warrior-type character was one-shot by the first monster they fought in the dungeon. He was down to 4 HP out of 6, and the monsters were rolling d6s. Of course I rolled a 6 on my first attack. One failed save later and whoop he was dead. We had to end the game there. He threw a bit of a fit. Clearly these games are not a good match for him, or I'm doing something completely wrong.

So yeah, in these high-lethality games, how do you as players or GMs deal with characters dying off so much? Does it disrupt the continuity of your game? Is it something that takes getting used to? Is there anything you can do as a GM to make it more fun or acceptable to the players? Or is total-buy-in the only way for these games to work? Is this even fun?

It's simply a different set of assumptions of level one characters.

In the 77 Holes basic set is openly states that you may start with up to two characters if the DM  allows.

The lethality was just part of the game at early levels. And people rolled with it.

It seems that from 3.x on, the mindset has changed, and even level one characters are only expected to die against "level appropriate" enemies in rare cases.

That being said, someone throwing a "bit of a fit" over a 1st level character death in an OSR game is a bit of a red flag.

I prefer playing with people who are more able to mentally separate that what happens to their make believe PC is not personal, YMMMV.

To cure them of their "my precious" player character mindset, you obviously need to run OSR games more often.

Oh, and the answer is yes.

Yes it is.

I find that having a definitive stance that PC death is on the table to be a great way to sift the wheat from the chaff when it comes to finding people who are cool to game with.

IME it's only fun if the players can do 'combat as war' and work around it. Charging the machinegun is not fun, but working out how to take out the machinegun without a frontal charge can be fun. Stuff like use of hirelings, avoiding fights, and running away. Stuff like getting Monster X to fight Monster Y.

I freaking love the lethality. Both as a GM and player.

DCC did a great job with its funnel. By having 4 PCs per player, there's both crazy lethality left and right, but the chance of having 1-2 survive the adventure is decent. Also, if one player loses all 4, its pretty common for another player to hand off 1 of their survivors.

Personally, I like playing two characters. It was often the norm for us back in the day, especially in games like D&D, Gamma World and Traveller which are all lethal.

Quote from: Trinculoisdead;1112001I've played a lot of Dungeon Crawl Classics, a little bit of Maze Rats, and ran my first session of the Whitehack tonight. In all of them, character death happens pretty often and unpredictably. In the game tonight one of my players got pretty upset after their 1st level warrior-type character was one-shot by the first monster they fought in the dungeon. He was down to 4 HP out of 6, and the monsters were rolling d6s. Of course I rolled a 6 on my first attack. One failed save later and whoop he was dead. We had to end the game there. He threw a bit of a fit. Clearly these games are not a good match for him, or I'm doing something completely wrong.

So yeah, in these high-lethality games, how do you as players or GMs deal with characters dying off so much? Does it disrupt the continuity of your game? Is it something that takes getting used to? Is there anything you can do as a GM to make it more fun or acceptable to the players? Or is total-buy-in the only way for these games to work? Is this even fun?

Did you make it clear what kind of game you were running? Because new players typically come in a set of expectations that they learned from heroic novels, movies, and TV series. They expect to be the heroes of the story, not the red shirts. They also expect to be the hero, from the very first episode/chapter/session, and to continue to play that character until they're tired of it. They expect the world to follow the rule of cool, to reward abysmally stupid actions taken in the name of heroism, and to give them dramatic immunity.

But that's not the game you wanted to run. It's your responsibility as GM to make that distinction clear, but it's not just a matter of saying it's more like Game of Thrones than Lord of the Rings. Not only will they not know exactly what you mean by that, it also won't sink in. Because these are deeply held and largely unconscious expectations, that have been hammered into them throughout their life. So you need to break that mold by making it more visceral.

Maybe have each player roll up a dozen characters. Then tell them that most of those characters are going to die. Since it's a waste of time to get too invested in any of them before the game starts, they're only allowed to write a single line describing each character ("Fighter #3." is acceptable). Maybe set a time limit, in order to make them roll up their characters fast. Then don't let them pick a character for the first session, have them randomly roll.

You can't just tell them, they need to feel it. That's why I changed the character creation process, and gave strict rules. That way the players aren't just listening to a lecture, they're participating in an experience that reinforces the idea that starting characters are disposable, encourages them to stop identifying too closely with a character, and forces them to treat characters as interchangeable. That's just one approach, there are many. You just have to find one that works for you and your group.

This player has been present in all my DCC and MCC games. They eventually came to dislike the lethality so we stopped playing those. I made a mistake by bringing the Whitehack, which is more lethal than DCC from what I can tell, to the table and expecting it to go well. But in this thread I didn't want to go over my mistakes, only to hear other's experiences. To see what's working at other GM's tables.

Quote from: Trinculoisdead;1112001I've played a lot of Dungeon Crawl Classics, a little bit of Maze Rats, and ran my first session of the Whitehack tonight. In all of them, character death happens pretty often and unpredictably. In the game tonight one of my players got pretty upset after their 1st level warrior-type character was one-shot by the first monster they fought in the dungeon. He was down to 4 HP out of 6, and the monsters were rolling d6s. Of course I rolled a 6 on my first attack. One failed save later and whoop he was dead. We had to end the game there. He threw a bit of a fit. Clearly these games are not a good match for him, or I'm doing something completely wrong.

So yeah, in these high-lethality games, how do you as players or GMs deal with characters dying off so much? Does it disrupt the continuity of your game? Is it something that takes getting used to? Is there anything you can do as a GM to make it more fun or acceptable to the players? Or is total-buy-in the only way for these games to work? Is this even fun?

In the '70s, that tabletop game style was the only one around. Most players didn't know better. A handful of them came up with new game styles of their own. So many game styles to pick from now. Adventure game players still prefer the OSR-ish books though.

I ask players about game systems and settings before starting any kind of game session with them. I also have a house rules list that I show them, so that all the players are on the same page.

Yes. I love the lethality in older or OSR games because it teaches strategy and tactics to the Players. While screaming "Charge!" and committing to a full frontal assault is a tactic, it is a poor one with a high chance of character death in those games. With the real chance of character death being present, when a character levels up in an old school fantasy game it actually means something. The leveling process doesn't feel like earning a series of participation trophies, but a real accomplishment.

When I was introducing players to 5e D&D I made sure they were aware that the system was alot more lethal than prior even with the boosts in HP PCs get at the start. Very akin to BX D&D with a better safety net. And they played carefully and did alot of sneaking and tons of trickery. Resorting to combat only as needed.

The main thing I tell players in a lethal system is that as long as they are playing well and not doing blatantly stupid things. There is usually some option if a character goes down. Even if it is as, maybee,  simple as "haul body back to a temple to have them raised." If they know of such a place and can afford or haggle the raise fee. Otherwise they are going to have to hunt one ASAP or lose the member. And if they really want to save a character then even at that point there may be options if they can think of them or find them. Quest for an item that can raise the dead. Find an alternative like reincarnate. Travel to the afterlife and petition some god to allow the lost member to return.

And failing all that. Roll new character. Sometimes dead is dead for a character and you move on.

No problem with high-risk of death as a referee or player, but yeah, everyone needs to be on the same page before the game starts.

OSRs are lethal, but not every OSR game is equally lethal.  I like how The Black Hack 2e handles things - when a PC drops to 0 hit points, a d6 is rolled, but there is only a 1 in 6 chance of actual death.  But the other options include things such as being maimed, disfigured, etc.  So its not as lethal as, say, D&D B/X, but players still need to be very cautious as there are definitely consequences to dropping to 0 HP.  I think this range of consequences is more fun than just constant death.

Quote from: Omega;1112016When I was introducing players to 5e D&D I made sure they were aware that the system was alot more lethal than prior even with the boosts in HP PCs get at the start.

While I've seen TPKs in 5e, it's really not that deadly once you level past the possibility of instant death (exceed the character's max HP past zero) from a critical hit, and players reach competence with the system. I've seen TPKs and a few high level deaths (disintegrate) but outside of those, once you have raise dead characters are less likely to remain dead - and no long term consequences or limit on raise dead (such as maximum based on CON, or even decreasing CON, or system shock giving even high CON characters a chance of failing).

When I was first lurking here, there was a thread in which gleichman described the Hamster Effect - deadliness for low level characters, the "hamsters" - which in some cases was apparently the only real deadliness in "lethal" campaigns:

Quote from: gleichman;738969I'm wondering why they are saying one thing ("death is near!") when the truth of the matter is that death has never even cast his shadow over the game (except for hamsters).

Deadliness just means the players have to learn how to deal with it.

Back when I ran a 1e campaign, about 10 years ago, we had one brand new player, he lost a character in each of the first two sessions. One or the other involved walking into an abandoned tower, having a spider drop down onto him, one failed poison save later, dead. But the group learned to look up and check the ceilings after that.

I think it was the magic user player who suffered the most character deaths -- four or five, I think. The last one actually made me sad. He arrived late to the session, and the group was trying to work out how to activate a magic carpet. The others told him what they'd tried so far, and he immediately jumped on the carpet and tried a particular command word. I look at the player sadly, gathered my resolve, and let him know that the carpet promptly rolled him up and began smothering him.

Nobody had bothered to mention to him that they had acquired the carpet from a devil ...

In any event, that group became expert at tactical coordination, maximising their effectiveness, checking for dangers and dealing with threats in the most expedient fashion -- because they had to get good at that stuff to survive. It was a lot of fun seeing that happen.

Celebrate.

I keep a Roles of the Dead

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Yeah 5e is nothing as deadly as these other games I've mentioned. No comparison.

I'm glad other groups can make something fun out of it, like having a list on the wall. My list would drape across the floor, but we've played a lot of DCC funnels.

I like these games a lot, but I hate having to kill off characters now. Makes me sick at heart just thinking about it. It's been so long since I had a player who got into the spirit of it, and for a long time now I just feel as though everyone thinks I'm just punishing them or enjoying their "failure". I hate it. I'm just trying to run the game fairly and follow the rules. And it's impossible for me to try to make it fun or memorable or interesting if I'm cringing on the inside whenever I roll a critical hit. I guess I can't play any of these any more.