Character mortality

[Boris Drakov]

Hmmm.... The first monster thread got me thinking.

How many PC's have you guys killed off as DM's?

Man, in the early days the monsters were actually winning in my campaign and that was including giant bats and other insignificant creatures.

I think the score was like 35-33 in the monsters' favour at one point.

I have mellowed out since and haven't really killed off a character for years.

But my total would probably be around 50 PC's over 17 years of play.

[Paladyn]

Lots.
I think every GM/DM desereves to be called "Genocider":).
As well as you, I became mellower with years. Last Pc's I killed, died about seven years ago (almost all party was entirely wiped out). From that taime, i have not killed one PC. Perhaps, I found better ways to amuse myself during sessions

[steveflam]

I think it is more true in RL than in any other campaign setting! What do you guys think?

[JinnTolser]

I've only killed off PCs when somebody is leaving the game, or is changing characters. A couple of times it's happened by pure chance, especially in Star Wars thanks to the vitality/wound system (we still play RCR rules, as I'm the only one in the group who liked Saga edition). But in Star Wars I've allowed people to keep their characters in exchange for lots of prosthetics. One guy had most of his internal organs replaced with prosthetics, while another was nearly vaporized and had to have a General Grievous-like setup.

In D&D, I had two characters die and continue the game as undead (one a Dread Revenant and the other a Nosferatu). Otherwise, like I said, only when people leave the campaign.

[LouisVendredi]

Only two. And one of them was killed by another PC (quote - accidentally - unquote). I didn't even roll dice on that one.

[HuManBing]

One PC was role playing a Chaotic Neutral bard and we went through Thoughts of Darkness, involving Lyssa von Zarovich.

The player took his alignment very seriously. He asked "What does she look like, this Lyssa von Zarovich"? And so I showed him the picture and the player's left eyebrow shot up and he stroked his chin, saying "HmmmmmMMMMmmmMMmmmm...!"

Later when they confronted her, the bard dropped to one knee and began serenading her beauty. I had her pause in her attacks and embrace him and then fly away from the encounter with him.

The party did not want to play Ravenloft after that as they suspected (with good reason) that I would send their former party mate against them as a vampire foe.

[impworks]

Killed PCs in Ravenloft - I was going to say none but then I remembered someones PC got eaten whole by Aggie in Forlorn.

Driven mad, physically scared, transformed into other creatures, transformed to stone and been sold as a statue, brought back from negative hit points with a taint, cursed, poisoned, level drained back to 1st level or otherwise been nasty too since 1990: now those I can't count anymore

[Boris Drakov]

Last ones I killed off was 8 years ago really.

Wow. Haven't really though about that. Hmmmm....

Something wicked their way comes.

But I have kind of instituted a private rule that, unless they majorly muck things up, I won't kill them outright in anything but encounters with major villains.

Like petty thugs, highwaymen, zombies, etc won't be allowed to kill them unless they're begging for it.

As I have only played RL ever in AD&D I feel that unless there's a good story to take from it a PC death is unneccessary.

Dying fighting your nemesis, the major villain etc makes for a better death both for them and me than getting stabbed to death in a random bar fight.

Thing is, they always fear death. That's the important trick. My PC'ocidal tendencies back in the day is still remembered with dread, especially now that they have characters from 8 years back.

[Jester of the FoS]

I've only killed off a couple. I've been soft much of the time they should have died.

[Georg Kristianokov]

I only kill my friend's when they do something extremely stupid.

Example:

DM: You see a pit around the crown of souls. To much mist conceals the bottom.

Player 1: (and this is exactly what he said) Well, no one dies iin the first adventure...I'll jump straight into that pit, find it two feet deep, and come up heroically.

DM: You just landed on spikes...

Player 1: (not batting an eye) So? It's only 2 feet deep! You can roll my d4 for damage!

DM: after jumping into a gaping hole 30 feet deep...

Player 1: What the $@(%! This is the first adventure you mot....

This guy is way to used to Ebberon...

[A G Thing]

Let's see here... I am in my opinion fair and just in the deaths of PC's in games and I am forgiving to a point but I find that the groups I run with have a tendancy to how shall I say it... Do something INCREDIBLY STUPID!!! I can save them or give them desperation rolls and such but I can only within reason do so much to save them and not reveal the cheating of death...

Heres the list of Death's by stupidity or bad decisions that have occured to my players, most of which have happened in Ravenloft...

1: Party enters dungeon and begins to be slaughtered by wererats so the rest retreat while the bard player stays and fights them single handedly... Returning group loots the clothing scraps and buries the bone fragments.
2: Ptyradactyl form Druid of Chaos PC carrying the Ranger/Fighter PC try to take on a bombard artilery emplacement get cocky and get shot down, crash and die in a stupendous and fire filled self caused death after many hyjinks and out of character moments that to be honest I did not wish to save them from anyfurther...
3: Durring the Bogeymen/Hans Gleem thread of the adventure the PC's find the TOME OF TERROR and I treat it as all magic Items of high power in my game. Destroying it is very destructive and needs to be controled or planned... They listen to the bad idea of the Gnoll Sorcerer who is in disguise with them and toss it onto a fire and the energy released from the book kills said Gnoll Sorcerer and hurts several others...
4: Whole party of PC's at dawn raid a mountain side mansion filled with vampires in the Barovian Balonoks and retreat to a nearby cave to save themselves durring the night. Unfortunately the spell like abilities of the vampires plus the spells they cast to flood the caves with vermin and called creatures make them nervous. They accept a challange to come out for fair combat and after a few rounds they are betrayed and surrounded and killed with the paladins Dread Companion Dragging his corpse back and being True Resurrected. This was just a bad decison but the circumstances were against them and they were surrounded and did not retreat from the field or stay in the reinforced cave so they made the wrong decison. I tried to advise them but it was ultimately the parties decison.
5: Party Member ignores (Meaning No Search Check) all signs of the noticible Magical traps that are placed around a chest in the basement of a monster who impersonated a noble in a house and triggers the devestating Effect that causes the character to stumble out melting and and desolving causing horror checks to the entire party in the process who watch stunned as she desolves beyond saving...
6: Non Ravenloft: Neutral party member tries to stuff a Diamond from a treasure hoard of a dragon killed by NPC's into their pocket infront of town guards and fails with a natural 1 causing the gem to plummet to the ground loudly and then gets arrested... This is most likely a small offense and could be cleared up with some gold and an appology but instead the PC kills both of the innocent guards going to neutral evil in the process and makes it back to the party wounded in disguise as the party is getting help from an excentric cleric/paladin who is selling them potions of smiting that allow the wielder to smite evil. Is attacked by the cleric/paladin who detects evil and wishes to prove his potions work and critically smites him killing him instantly caving in his head... He was buried in an unmarked grave and the party continued on... Now while I was in control of the NPC the players had asked for a demonstration of the potions being real so the Cleric/Paladin who was a mad Zelot made an intelligence check of 3 and a wisdom check of 5 and decieded to charge and strike at the first evil character nearby which happened to be the now newly evil PC.
7: Character kills the Donkey of a PC in a vain attempt to distract a monsterous beast chasing them and later when the character lies dying the wronged PC rub's dirt in his wounds and murders him for the death of the animal...
8: Non Ravenloft: Character at one HP attempts to climb 30ft wall while drunk and manages to fall reduce himself to -5 unconcious and die by failure to stablize while no one is around to save him and was otherwise safe from harm...
9: Character hears a whump loud noise from the otherside of a door one night while he is sleeping in an inn in Mordentshire and then hears someone fiddling with the door. Then silence for the next 3 rounds. Mention an odd smell and does not seem to want to examine, does not look out the key hole, does not look under the door to notice the shadow, does not check for traps, and does not seem suspect anything and after getting dressed opens the door to detonate the black powder barrel that is on the otherside...

At the moment these are just some of the more memorable ones that I can recall that come to mind. Of course I had one of the most memorable conclusions in a Ravenloft game where I had a Battle between a PC who failed 5 powers checks and the Paladin of the group at the unfortunate climax of one of my games... The PC had found a cursed Demons Blood Greatsword named Typhon and refused to drop the item and began to be corrupted by it. His first three failed powers checks stemmed from holding the thing and he truly began becoming more and more like the sword as the sword became somewhat more powerful and began instructing him in his dreams and tormenting him with nightmares of his dead children. It convinced him to preform a power ritual as the PC's headed through a town and he captured an innocent child and brought them to a site one mile up on the river that went through town. He preformed the rite and painfully sacrificed the child soul and body, commiting an act of ultimate darkness and also tainted the towns water supply causing a further act of ultimate darkness as the town suffered plague and death from the sudden outbreak after he left, bringing him to his 5th powers check. When the PC's finally return to their base town of Mordentshire to report to the Foxgrove Twins for their next assignment they begin to seriously try and find a way to save their friends soul but instead they take his adopted daughter away for safety. Other events weaken the party and with them divided and a cult attacking them they are picked off as they are divided, and durring this time the character discovers the betrayal and this begins him on a rampage of death and destruction and the Paladin manages to succede against the character but as the Paladin is the lone survivor of the game it is very climaxtic...

[Jakob]

I almost never kill PC because their bad luck. I tend to be a "storyteller GM", so I try to keep them alive.

Sometimes, though, PCs tend to be stupid.

In my current campaign, I had two casualities. One was the half-vistani monk: she couldn't know there was a fighter/rogue with a readied action behind that corner. She was returned to life thanks to a favor the High Cleric of the Eternal Order in Neblus owed to the PCs.
The second one was the aristocrat/wizard, thanks to two particularly vicious carrion crawler. She was reanimated thanks to a powerful halan witch they befriended.

In my first RL campaign... Oh, THAT was a massacre, thanks to incredibly stupid decisions made by those who were my players at the time. Shall I talk about the half-vistani bard running into the big web ("I'm strong, I'll break it")? Maybe... The druid trying to make a wild empathy check (it was Animal Empathy, at the time...) on a shadow mastiff? Or... The Falkovnian warrior who wanted to kill a Dementlieuse baron in the square of Port-au-Lucine? Maybe you want to hear the Dementlieuse bard who just HAD TO SEE what was underwater in that sunken ship in Markovia while the others were still asleep (soul kraken, anyone?)?

I don't consider myself a "Killer DM". But sometimes... It just happens.

EDIT: I forgot! The sorcerer, in the body of a wild elf (thanks to a reincarnation cast by the already mentioned druid), casting sleep spells in St. Mere des Larmes?

[Boris Drakov]

On a side note I haven't allowed resurrections or similar type magic to be available so as to not make death seem trivial.

"Oh, darn, there I went and lost another point of constitution. Oh well"

( I play by 2nd ed rules. Old, old man.... )

[Algaris]

The only characters I killed off were in Basic D&D.

1. A 1st level characters charged a hoard of wights and got hit by one.
2. A character failed his save vs poison against a Spirit Naga.

In 3.5 I nearly had a total party kill (4 PCs) when playing Child of The House. When the players entered the attic with the wooden dummies and started getting slammed around one of them smashed a few of them and everyone got some very nasty splinters.

[Rotipher of the FoS]

The only characters I killed off were in Basic D&D.

1. A 1st level characters charged a hoard of wights and got hit by one.
2. A character failed his save vs poison against a Spirit Naga.

No comment on the power-level of the monsters you were using ... but you had a spirit naga in Basic D&D? I thought those were exclusive to AD&D/3E.